© Rick Wilking / ReutersAnthony Scaramucci
Trump adviser Anthony Scaramucci says US sanctions against Russia have, in fact, united the nation around President Putin and his government, having the opposite effect to that desired by Washington, largely due to the toughness of "Russian culture."
"I think the sanctions had, in some ways, an opposite effect because of Russian culture," Anthony Scaramucci, the extravagant Wall Street hedge fund showman, told TASS news agency on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
"I think the Russians would eat snow if they had to survive. And so, for me, the sanctions probably galvanized the nation with the nation's president," explained Scaramucci, who was a fundraiser in Donald Trump's election campaign and has just joined the president-elect's White House staff as senior advisor for communications with business, while also noting that he does not see sanctions as a generally effective measure under the current circumstances.
"Long-term sanctions could be painful had they been effective in other areas... They wouldn't be using them if they weren't effective, but what I think we have to do now is think outside the box. We have to make the world safer, we have to eliminate from the world the radical Islamic terrorism, and we have to figure out the ways to grow the wages for working-class families," Scaramucci said, adding that Russia and the United States share a lot of common objectives.
According to the advisor, despite the fact that some actions taken by the Russian government have been "met with some level of disapproval by the global community," and the US in particular, he hopes "there will be an opportunity to sit down again" and negotiate to solve the existing disagreements, given President-elect Donald Trump's declared respect for Russia.
Comment: In other words, they're delivering as many weapons and equipment to ISIS as they possibly can before Trump becomes president.