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This flipped within our lifetimes. Before 2016, it was considered paranoid right-wing extremism (albeit true; see Venona) to claim that Russian spies had infiltrated the US government. After 2016, it became mainstream conventional wisdom (albeit false; see Russiagate) to claim that Russian spies had infiltrated the US government. The reason is that for much of the 20th century Russia was on the communist left. But by 2016, Russia was now on the nationalist right. So, the idea of a Russian conspiracy was not useful to the left before 2016. Then it became useful to the left after 2016. Venona proved there really was a communist conspiracy to infiltrate the US government. Though even that is an understatement, as there were bidirectional sympathies between the progressives in America and the communists in Russia. https://t.co/h2YJmVunJQ https://t.co/zQ6WXWisxP