Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Putin Becoming a Saint for Certain Twisted Conservatives?
I just saw this Twitter quote posted by Scott McConnell, co-founder of The American Conservative magazine, from Jan. 15: “At least Putin doesn’t hate his own people and own country.”
I’m not sure what this quote is referring to exactly, if anything in particular.
Things like this can be said in a joking way, of course, and perhaps it is even true in some ways. I recently heard a Democrat historian who doesn’t fit the mold of a typical 21st century Democrat say that the biggest reason that American leftists don’t care about the opioid crisis is that it is killing off rural white men who 21st century leftists really do not care about anyway. Well, I’m sure that some leftists might care if the electrical grid, food supply, and transportation system crashes, but I’m sure they can think about that later.
Russia President Vladimir Putin’s Russians could still get slaughtered in Ukraine. It looks like 5,768 Russians have been killed in the Russo-Ukrainian or Donbass wars since 2014. That’s 2.38 times the number of American military personnel killed in Afghanistan in just eight years, as compared to 20 years for the Afghanistan War.
I have seen posts on Twitter from some likely conservative types who state that Ukraine is really part of Russia anyway.
Ridiculous, but if you really want to try to make that comparison, Belarus would probably be the better example. Only about 12% of Belarusians actively speak Belarusian; however, Ukrainian is the native language of about 68% of Ukrainians, with Russian being the native language for about 30% of Ukrainians, and 2% of the population using other languages. The percentage of 68% is quite a lot. The last American president to win more than 61.05% of the popular vote was James Monroe in 1820. Besides, native languages are not the only thing when it comes to determining the borders of a country. Some guy already tried Putin’s Sudetenland trick about 84 years ago. If language was the only important thing for determining a country’s boundaries, most of Latin America outside of Brazil and Haiti would simply be one giant Spanish-speaking continental nation. The Ukrainian language is apparently more similar to the NATO languages of Polish and Slovak than Russian anyway, with words borrowed from German, while Russian apparently borrowed more words from Turkish, Latin, and even French due to Peter the Great.
I’ve been told by some Twitter conservative types that the Ukrainian government is one of the most corrupt in the world. Yeah, I think they have been rated even slightly more corrupt than Russia itself, but most countries are rather corrupt to a certain extent except for a few ideal Nordic countries, which I am sure have their own problems. Some Twitter conservative types state that the people in Russia have much better lives than the people in Ukraine. Well, having a hostile Putin as a neighbor isn’t helping that situation. Besides, a person in Qatar on average is richer than the average American, but I have no desire to live there. Russia has had the same dictator since 1999. Ukraine has had six presidents and about 16 prime ministers since 1999. At least there is some democratic turnover there.
Putin may be the richest person in the world by some estimates. I wonder how he acquired all that wealth. I remember reading some article about how our NATO ally Turkey throws all of its disagreeable journalists in jail. Yeah, there’s is a lot of outrage about that, and I don’t think Putin does that. I think Putin just has his enemies killed or deported or both.
I think a lot of the Twitter conservative thought that is default defending Putin is because those people do not want the United States to send its citizens to get into a fight with nuclear-armed Putin, trying to save a corrupt government in Ukraine. That’s understandable, but American presidents should be more like former President Ronald Reagan and at least push back against evil whenever possible. This should be an ongoing concern of any American president. Reagan barely got involved in any military actions during his eight years as president other than Granada and a few strikes against Muammar Gaddafi, but he was also trying to find a way to support freedom and the forces of good.
Former President Donald Trump’s weird somewhat friendliness toward Putin was even a very minor reason why I essentially tossed my presidential vote away in 2016.
Any ideas about how to convince conservative default Putin fans that they have gone down some terrible path?
Published in General
This post was promoted to the Main Feed by a Ricochet Editor at the recommendation of Ricochet members.
Like this post? Want to comment? Join Ricochet’s community
of conservatives and be part of the conversation. Join Ricochet for Free.
Kyievan Rus was Orthodox with Vladimir the Great accepting Orthodoxy as the official religion in 988, marrying a daughter of the Byzantine Emperor. The Poles conquered part of Ukraine and forced conversion of those Ukrainians in it’s territory. Many are Uniate Catholic to this day, which is actually a hybrid of Catholicism and Orthodoxy ( example they recognize the Pope, but their priests can marry). My wifes family is Uniate.
The Zaporizian Kozaks were independent and Orthodox free men. They fled the Poles, the Russians and the Otoman empire and set up their state on the “borderlands” between those empires. Hence, Ukraine ( translates as borderland). They also were one of the first democracies in Europe, electing their leader the Hetman, and their Colonels. Unfortunately being caught between 3 hostile powers, they made a bad treaty with Russia and much of it ended up getting absorbed by Russia when it betrayed their trust. The rest was absorbed by Poland. The Poles suffered a similar fate in the 18th century between Russia, Prussia and Austria.
Epic! Thank you for the condensation — I’ll take that all as FACT from a guy named Kozak with an av of Taras Bulba.
And the 1954 “gift” of the Crimea was a poison pill — it was full of Russians by then. Oh, those Russians.
@Kozak has everything correct, just incomplete. The princes of the first Russian cities were the sons and later progeny of the rulers of Kievan Rus. The oldest legitimate son would become the ruler of Kiev. This went on with lots of disagreements and fighting until the Mongols showed up in the 14th century and sacked, raped and pillaged with Kiev taking the brunt.
Moscow was able to rise out of these ashes because it could pay the most tribute to the Mongols since it controlled the trade route to the Baltic and thus western Europe. Moscow also attracted the church hierarchy away from Kiev. Moscow then defeated the Mongols on the battlefield, the most important test of all.
Poland-Lithuania would then rise as a power as well and would sack Moscow and take over the throne briefly. Time of Troubles as it is known. Basis for Russian opera and movies.
Since that time, Russians have been convinced they need a strong and autocratic rulet to keep from being invaded. There are no natural boundaries.
Wasn’t meant to be condescending. Yeah, I come with the viewpoint of someone raised as a Ukrainian American. Who went to Ukrainian school on saturdays, is married to a Ukrainian, and has been to Ukraine several times.
Right. It seemed merely argumentative for me to point out (and so I did not) that all of Russia-dom is an outgrowth of Ukraine-dom. My single-state solution for Israel is for them to just take the whole damned thing over, Suez to Jordan, based on the fact that the Jordanians already have the Arab portion of the Palestine mandate. This would be an even less productive suggestion to Kiev right now.
Well, if you really want me to.
OK.
I think the thrust of your objections can be summed up here.
I don’t believe sending troops overseas is done for fun and profit – I took a bath on Halliburton in the mid 00’s – not much profit there and their dividend sucks. Do you have a portfolio recommendation to take advantage of this “profit”? I am all ears.
Since our troops can’t be used for our “civil war” (Posse Comitatus and all) I am just seeing that you really don’t believe in the stabilizing effect of troops being forward based.
I disagree. The value of deterrence is quite simple, really. It has stopped major power conflict since 1945. Reducing said conflicts to proxy wars in varying degrees. While those conflicts were fought on someone else’s territory and in large degree by someone else’s forces we have borne the majority of the monetary cost and some of the costs in terms of lives. Nowhere to the degree that we would bear the costs had such conflicts gone to major power conflict (NATO vs WP) or heaven forbid nuclear.
I see our problem somewhat differently.
Losing credibility overseas will make the world a less safe place and while it may be perfectly ok to acquiesce to Russian demands that they be the sole controllers of Russian speaking populations; when that was tried last century via a different ethnicity, it didn’t work out so well for the rest of the humans on planet earth.
The second is what I have already pointed out. Non-proliferation has also helped keep the planet safe, and the Obama destruction of non-proliferation is going to yield some terrible outcomes.
Instugator’s Razor:
Just to clarify, there have been 3000+ nuclear explosions on planet Earth. 1000+ of them have been above ground. By treaty, the Russians and the US are allowed 1550 strategic weapons each. (Or about the same number that have already been detonated on planet Earth). Russia has a significant number of Non-strategic nuclear weapons, the US not so much. Our allies aren’t bound by those limitations, but they also seem unwilling to increase their arsenals to deter Russia or the Chinese.
So – yeah. My opinion is that we either pay now or later, and later will cost a premium.
Who is this “we” you speak of? This government is unfit to deploy troops, and is actively destroying its legitimacy and our livelihoods.
I’ve been forward deployed and I’ve served in Afghanistan, and I’m Fn done with it. Afghanistan is now just Benghazi writ large.
The whole Fn point of NATO is to oppose Russian expansion. So having Russia in NATO is as stupid as having Obama as President, and for the same reason — enemies in control.
I would agree with you if not for watching everything we do turn to manure, and our sacrifices converted to mere waste, carnage at that. Screw these guys.
Every communist country is a mob kleptocracy. They all have a strongman and a group of elites extracting wealth from the populace.
Do you contend that every mob kleptocracy is communism? If not, reconsider your whole line of objection in this thread.
That’s probably true. But the effort to bring him into the west was necessary. In my opinion, Russia wants to be a counter to the west and that is it. Oh they’ll take our money when we build a pipeline for them. As far as I’m concerned, it’s time to counter back economically. Both Russia and China want to surpass us as the dominant country in the world. And we’re giving them all the money they need to do it. It has to stop.
Security and peace and a working economic relationship with economically advanced nations.
Italy, Germany, even France I don’t think actually touches the Atlantic. Most of them don’t.
It is true. We can’t fight wars any more. We can fight battles but wars take perseverance and will from more than the military.
Italy does not. France and Germany do.
Speaking of geography lessons ;)
My understanding is that “North Atlantic” part of NATO came from our Dept. of Defense naval term for the general area.
Of the founding members, only Italy and Luxembourg lacked any Atlantic coastline. It got significantly looser from there.
I don’t understand this at all
Putin is and will always be a KBG thug
(Said in Italian accent):
North Atlantic, Mediterranean? Watcha gonna do, eh?
I do.
But first, what is it with certain conservatives taking on the tactics and illogic of the left?
That saying something vaguely positive, like the quote cited above, constitutes some form of canonization?
The post fails to make sense, considering the title chosen.
I don’t know how you live your life, but I have to interact with people who are not nice and might just be my enemies almost everyday. I interact with them in a friendly way, because we have to work together. This includes government functionaries, co-workers, certain family members and friends who disagree with me vehemently on politics. My wife talks to people who have committed egregious and highly immoral acts every day as a therapist.
Further, I don’t know if it’s very useful to go into negotiations with a guy like Putin by calling him a murderer, a thug or a dictator. In fact, I know that in most cases it’s ineffective and even counterproductive.
I also don’t think an American President lends “legitimacy” to a dictator or country by visiting, hosting, holding discussions etc.
Neo-cons have been playing the morality card when they want to get their way. This is their lifeline to conservatives who see the world as a struggle between good and evil, and the USA exists to stamp out evil in the world (it’s not succeeding).
They seem to enjoy when our President virtue-signals and wags his finger at Putin or Kim Jong Un (but not Xi) and diplomatic talks fizzle out or don’t even occur. Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia, seems to be their motto. They get to feel good about themselves and things stay the same.
All this tough talk coming after our very recent debacle in Afghanistan is a bit much.
The USA is not currently in any position to get into this fight, not with Joe Biden in command – or possibly worse – whichever forces control him.
I would question Neo-cons on how they have such confidence in our current military leadership. And where exactly are the limits to American involvement? Considering those limits, what kind of poker hand we hold. I don’t think we can bluff Putin at this point, so he knows we will ultimately have to fold.
This is the distortion of American support for individual liberty and equality of opportunity by all those once conservatives co-opted to the now failed establishment GOP. America has always welcomed those who break free of the chains in this countries operating under evil political systems. We have never directly attacked Russia, China, or North Korea but NATO and SEATO have avenues to use force in efforts that lie beyond our charter and our ability. I don’t see America as the tool to stamp out evil but as a refuge for those individuals who value freedom and the right to choose. That is now under siege by our own federal government.
No he wasn’t. That is a ridiculous assertion. He wasn’t more anti- Russian than Kennedy who almost went to war with the Soviet Union or Reagan who called them the evil empire. When did Trump say anything even half as harsh as that? During the 2016 campaign he was still looking to keep open the possibility of building a Trump hotel in Moscow.
I agree the Russian collusion nonsense was way out of line but his rhetoric made that a lay up for Democrats. When asked about Putin’s killing of journalists Trump responded, “We kill people too.” What was anti-Russian about that? Worse, he was smearing his own country to defend the thug, Putin.
Tell it to Alexander Litvinenko.
LOL, I read that as hate Whitney and I was like…hate Witney Houston…not THEM’S some fightin’ words.
I don’t really care too much about the Ukraine except that I support any people wishing to be free. The fact is, the Ukraine should have known for a long time now that the Soviets in charge of Russia again will attack them. They have had ample time to prepare a vigorous and punishing defense that should include strikes against Russia.
If not, then they get the predictable result. The Ukraine has done nothing for me or this country. They just don’t matter. I would like them to be friends, but I’m not willing to send Americans to die protecting them. That’s on them. Let’s hope they can at least not all starve to death again.
He’s a dictator who routinely murders his political opponents, steals from his country, threatens his neighbors, and threatens our country- but because he calls out woke-tyranny that makes his actual tyranny preferable to Obama?
Obama (and others) sucked, but he didn’t murder his opposition, stay in power for 20+ years, or steal billions for personal wealth. I think you’ve lost the plot.
I think I agree with you in general. It used to be that America was a sort of refuge for those under tyranny, and our armed forces and economic strength served to keep those others in check (somewhat, anyway). But now we citizens are losing our freedom by the week. Our vaunted “democracy” isn’t functioning very well, to say the least.
I’m not saying every conservative sees this as a morality play, I was saying that the Neo-cons play on the human emotions, and demonize dictators to get their way, while ignoring other dictators. Khadaffi, Assad, the House of Saud (when convenient), Mullahs in Iran ( when convienient) Kim Jong Un, Saddam, the Taliban, et all. Never once have we found a good replacement for these demons. WWII vanquishing of the Third Reich and the Nipponese imperialists required total devastation of those countries followed by prolonged occupation. That was the last time we were able to do that. And look – we still had Stalin and the Soviets to deal with. The wall came down, and we have Putin.
The risk/reward function is very negative, and these people never talk about that aspect of their plans.
Putin is basically irrelevant to us now because Biden and who ever runs him can’t deal with him and won’t deal with the Chinese because they have hands around Biden’s throat. It would be a mistake to push Biden to do something real about Russia. What we have to do is get rid ob Biden because the Chinese own him in what matters. To dismiss Trump because he tried to foster a division between Putin and China is silly. Both Russian and Chinese were so cautious they helped Biden steal the election.
I think BDB meant more post Cold War, meaning Clinton, Bush I, Bush II and Obama. Search Reagan Gorbachov and click images. You will see them smiling, laughing and shaking hands. So Trump being “nice” to Putin is no argument. Policywise, Trump was a hard-liner. Trump tried to bolster NATO. But the kind of knee-jerk analysis we get from Neocons is “Trump is bad for criticizing NATO” . Are these the same people who say the drill sergeant is wrong for yelling at his troops?
If there ever was an evil man and an evil empire, it was Stalin and his Soviet Union. We fought alongside them, and, even though we were fighting another evil tyrant, one could question the morality of that, especially considering what happened in the world later. The Soviets gained tremendous power, killed tens of millions and are still “evil”.
Let me ask you, has the USA ever done anything you would consider “evil”? Has our CIA never assassinated anyone? Trump was right. We kill people too.
It’s not about what they say but what they do. Yes Reagan called the USSR the Evil Empire. That was a broad general judgement. Reagan did not publicly call Gorbachev names, though. That would have been unproductive. Instead Reagan opened communications, trusted but verified, and all that. Trump did that too, along with aggressive policy. The difference now is that Russia is not the USSR. It’s not evil in the same ways or degrees that USSR was evil. If you had honest polls of the citizens living under the USSR then and citizens living under Putin’s Russia now, what would they say? I don’t know but I could guess.
I don’t like the moral equivalence of the “we kill people too”, but it would be ridiculous to act as if that weren’t true or as if our motives in doing so were always pure. I also don’t like the implied moral equivalence between USSR and modern Russia; I’m no expert on either one but my impression is that whatever authoritarianism displayed by modern Russia is way different than the totalitarianism of the USSR.