Vladimir Putin

Anyone who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities.”

Voltaire

No matter how many Russians and Ukrainians die in Putin's attempt to destroy Ukraine and its Democracy, after one week he has already failed in his dual goals:

1.  To demonstrate his power and might
2.  Prove that Democracy doesn't work.

Vladimir Putin instead has proven that he is a gutless, feckless, cowardly international bully. He is incompetent at fulfilling his duties as the Russian commander in chief.

Despite massive disinformation campaigns in Russia and outside of Russia, he has been unable to bring his country to consensus about the invasion let alone holding together his loose cabal of authoritarian wanna bees. Viktor Orban in Hungary and Recep Erdogan in Turkey have seized the moment to dive back under the NATO tent, perhaps fearing that their hero might come after them next.

Speaking on MSNBC’s “The Beat” yesterday, Chai Komanduri outlined the reasons for the political right in the United States flocking to the model of Russia under Vladimir Putin:

• An economy based on fossil fuels (aka climate change denial)
• Far right religious leaders driving social policy (nearly 80% of Russians are Christians)
• Strongman ruler
• White Ethno Nationalism

Komanduri equated Russia to “a gas station masquerading as a country.” I had to stop and think about that for awhile before it made sense. Russia’s reason for being is to find, refine and sell petroleum products to fund the Oligarchs that keep Putin propped up and out of risk of losing his political job. Without fossil fuels, petro chemicals, “black gold” this current iteration of Russia would cease to exist. You don’t have to look too far away from Putin’s Russia to see where climate change denial came from in the first place.

Recognition of diversity in ethnicity, sexuality and multiculturalism simply is not tolerated in Russia. Russia’s majority Christian population is guided by conservative political beliefs which I urge you to read more about in the linked article.

Authoritarians seem to be the “in thing” for the party without a policy henceforth to be referred to as the RePutlican Party. Find a figure-head puppet strongman put them under the thumb of the ruling economic elite class and you have a group of rich and powerful Billionaires protecting their wealth and power for generations to come. Sort of sounds like Donald Trump doesn’t it? Find someone who is split hair away from being a convicted felon and put them into the world’s most powerful position.

Make no mistake that Russia under Putin is a white nationalist state. The same kind of a place that Tucker Carlson and Lauren Boebert would like to turn the United States into is in full and open view to the world as I write this piece. Putin’s Russia, Hitler’s Germany, Trump’s United States. One in the same, synonymous and equally pathetic and despicable. A world rooted in white nationalism, hatred, intolerance and greed.

The strength, resolve and unity of democratic forces around the world have shown the clear and irrefutable response to Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is proof positive that democracy works. Ukrainians are fighting and dying for Democracy. My guess is that people like Mr. Carlson and Ms. Boebert have never had to fight for the freedom which gives them the right to speak their poison no matter how frighteningly ignorant and misguided that it is in the land of the free and the home of the brave.

Mr. Putin has already is a fraud. Americans, when given the facts, can spot a fraud a mile away. Denounce Putin, denounce Putin followers and stand up for democracy.

As long as I live and breath (and beyond) I fill do my part to carry out the mission that the “Greatest Generation” set out for us. “Preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States of America.”