Tucker Carlson to interview Putin

[Leo Gura]

What threatens Putin the most is organic pro-democracy movements at home. And the next worse thing is such a movement in Ukraine because if Ukraine goes successfully into democracy then Russians will rise up and ask for democracy in Russia. Which means Putin's death.

For corruption to survive it must corrupt everything around itself.

Robust Western democracy is poison to any authoritarian. That's the real issue here and with China. They want to become advanced superpower nations but they refuse to open up access to power and clean up their corrupt ways, which leads to a groteque, backwards system.

They want to treat democracy as though it were optional. But it's too deep of an issue to be optional. Superpower status is entangled with democracy.

Edited February 12 by Leo Gura

[Bobby_2021]

5 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

It was wrong for the US to attempt a coup in Cuba. So that answers that.

How convenient of you? What if the people of US can't sleep knowing their enemy is right beside them with ready to strike missiles. The problem is that USSR would place missiles in Cuba that could wipe off US cities. It is a matter of security and not sovereignty. You need to have security first before even thinking of sovereignty. People of US have the right to sleep well at night without having the threat of smoked in sleep.

How would you feel if a psychopathic criminal becomes comes to live next door in possession of lethal weapons and drugs? You will be shit scared and do something about it instead of wasting time worrying about his sovereignty. 

Geopolitics has nothing to do with ideals like Freedom, Democracy, sovereignty. What moves the pieces are security, money, business, and cold hard power. Can you imagine looking like a complete loser after your neighbor robbed your house and stabbed you when you have all the reasons to suspect that it would happen, did nothing about it because muh sovereignty. 

Survival and life is on the line. All idealism flies out of the window. Security & safety is the peak value. 

[Bobby_2021]

5 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

What threatens Putin the most is organic pro-democracy movements at home. And the next worse thing is such a movement in Ukraine because if Ukraine goes successfully into democracy then Russians will rise up and ask for democracy in Russia. Which means Putin's death.

For corruption to survive it must corrupt everything around itself.

Robust Western democracy is poison to any authoritarian. That's the real issue here and with China. They want to become advanced superpower nations, but they refuse to open up access to power and clean up their corrupt ways, which leads to a groteque, backwards system.

They want to treat democracy as though it were optional. But it's too deep of an issue to be optional. Superpower status is entangled with democracy.

As much as I hate to acknowledge it, organic movements wouldn't make any real change. People in power make all the decisions. People in power can choose to side with the organic movements or choose not to. The side they pick will be the side that you see happen in reality. Organic movements on its own is good as nothing. 

There is a great organic movement in the US to not send any more aid and weapons to Ukraine. So what? Not all of those movements are in the best interests of the people. Will the US acknowledge these movements at home and stop the sending aid? Nah. 

People of Ukraine wanting democracy is not enough to have democracy. They surely want democracy, but they need the help of US to make it happen. CIA are masters of Coups. And CIA pulls of coups not to being democracy, but to make more money and expand their geopolitical power. That is where the problem is. Putin is right in accusing the US of meddling in their internal matters and the matters of Ukraine.

US did not want USSR near their home. Just apply that same logic to NATO expansion as well. It really isn't complicated.  Infact they even signed a treaty that they wouldn't expand eastward. They couldn't even adhere to that.

[Consept]

@Bobby_2021

Leo is right the biggest threat to any dictator will always be the dissenters within their own country, this is why they kill or imprison them as soon as they can,  especially if the dissenter holds any type of significant power or wealth. 

If you look at any desposed dictator it's usually either through a civil war or through a revolution - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_deposed_politicians?wprov=sfla1

A dictator by their very nature is going to create enemies within their own country as the people haven't had a say in decisions, for example a lot of Russians maybe against the war in Ukraine but they will never be able to say that publicly. So to keep control of his country, Putin has to invoke a level of fear that no one dare speak out, this is necessary to keep the power he has. He cannot risk letting people have a vote because that may spell the end of his reign. 

Putin is saying whatever he needs to, to justify actions but ultimately its all really a distraction. If the west do want to have missiles next to him in Ukraine its because they are wary of anyone who holds that much power in the way that he does and I don't blame them to be honest. Dictators through the years have been extremely dangerous and Putin provably very corrupt. So to use your example if a known criminal who has a lot of weapons lives next door to you, you might want to keep some weapons yourself just in case.

 

[Bobby_2021]

1 hour ago, Consept said:

Leo is right the biggest threat to any dictator will always be the dissenters within their own country, this is why they kill or imprison them as soon as they can,  especially if the dissenter holds any type of significant power or wealth. 

Even bigger threat is a dissenter backed by foreign powers, that you cannot imprison or kill. 

1 hour ago, Consept said:

If the west do want to have missiles next to him in Ukraine its because they are wary of anyone who holds that much power in the way that he does and I don't blame them to be honest. Dictators through the years have been extremely dangerous and Putin provably very corrupt. So to use your example if a known criminal who has a lot of weapons lives next door to you, you might want to keep some weapons yourself just in case.

The self-bias of the western world view is so shockingly obvious here.  And that is what caused a war that caused needless destruction to millions of lives.
The correct course of action is to not go near people with lots of weapons, or you move away from them, or make them move away from you. Either of these possibilities can avoid war. But if you and your Neighbour stack up lethal weapons over mounting tensions, then it is only a matter of time before a boldly war breaks out. In this case, a full-on nuclear war.

There are no western missiles based in Ukraine at the moment. But that is the direction they were going in. So Putin had to do something without sitting and watch the slow demise of the empire.

US is a threat to Russia as much as Russia is a threat to the US. I think you can see that.

I do not see anything wrong with anything happening so far. Russia- Ukraine war, Israel-Gaza war, etc. Idealism does not fly here.

[Leo Gura]

Ask yourself why the US is not overthrowing the government of Japan or Sweden.

Putin acts as if the West is so domineering, but look at Japan. Japan sided with the West and it has kept its unique culture fully entact. It's not like Americans are oppressing Japan into being American. Nor is there any risk of Americans invading or bombing Japan. And Japan has a better economy and standard of living than Russia.

Russia could go the way of Japan. The only real problem with that for Putin is that he could not hold life-long power. He would have to share power with others. So that's really the issue. And also, Russia would have to open itself up to stage Green. But this will happen after Putin leaves office anyway.

It's not like the West is going to destroy Russian culture. But what the West would destroy is Russian corruption. And that's the rub.

Edited February 12 by Leo Gura

[erik8lrl]

A truly healthy Western democracy requires an extremely high standard of collective consciousness and development. People will need to be extremely good at sense-making and develop deep political understanding to not be manipulated, brainwashed, or controlled by corruption. Thus it's really hard to see healthy Western democracy develop in third-world nations or in countries with large or complex populations. The process of adapting and implementing democracy is very complex and nuanced depending on the country's culture, development, and population. The notion of democracy itself is also different in different cultures. In China, for example, they view the concept of democracy not so much as a system but as an ideal result of good governance. The ideal end goal of democracy is to produce more equality and help the majority of people survive better to meet their survival needs and develop society healthily and sustainably. The Chinese think that this ideal is independent of the Western Political voting system. Centuries of autocratic governance have made most modern-day Chinese people adopt a direct separation between the general public and the government. Most people in China are not interested in politics. The people and the government form a symbiotic relationship where the government is in control of the political direction of the country as long as the people are meeting their survival needs and society continues to improve stably. This political structure has been in place since ancient China, with Confucianism as the central philosophy. Throughout history, when the people in power are virtuous, the nation prospered, when they are corrupt, the nation divided and wars are fought. In modern China, however, the people have learned to seek balance, their current political system aims not to eliminate corruption since it's not possible unless most people become developed consciously and the survival needs of most are taken care of.  So instead they maximize the balance between the government and the people, where as long as people's survival needs are met, and society continues to develop sustainability, they are willing to give up individual power, to them, as long as the government is acting in the interest of the people, they are democratic. 
It's true that a healthy society must have a democratic system where the government acts in the interests of the people, but most if not all countries are not able to implement such a system without corruption. At the current stage of human collective development, most countries will likely go through a gradual process of either meeting the requirements of implementing such systems or improving their system to be less corrupt over time. But all nations will have to go through this process in their own way in the context of their culture, history, and developmental stages.       

[Consept]

14 minutes ago, Bobby_2021 said:

Even bigger threat is a dissenter backed by foreign powers, that you cannot imprison or kill. 

Well yes but the foreign power could not just invade by themselves, there would be no point and it usually just doesnt work, like when US invaded Vietnam, Afghanistan or Iraq. What makes a successful deposition is when there is significant power within the country that goes against the current power. Foreign powers are really only a tool within that. 

17 minutes ago, Bobby_2021 said:

US is a threat to Russia as much as Russia is a threat to the US. I think you can see that.

This is the same as saying democracy is a threat to dictatorship as much dictatorship is a threat to democracy. Of course they cant really co-exist peacefully, they are antithetical to each other. This is not to say US is a perfect democracy btw. But having a dictator who is liable to invade another country because he doesnt 'feel' safe, seems like a dangerous thing, because where does this end? If he invades Ukraine successfully, he could then reasonably argue that Poland should give up any weapons or Kazakstan or wherever because they are now closer. Keep in mind Hitler used the false justification that Poland was planning to encircle Germany with its allies to then invade Poland. Point being its a dangerous situation to have one person with so much power as they can use whatever justifications to just do what they want, which has been played out countless times through history. As they say 'those who dont know history are doomed to repeat it'.

[Karmadhi]

9 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

What threatens Putin the most is organic pro-democracy movements at home. And the next worse thing is such a movement in Ukraine because if Ukraine goes successfully into democracy then Russians will rise up and ask for democracy in Russia. Which means Putin's death.

For corruption to survive it must corrupt everything around itself.

Robust Western democracy is poison to any authoritarian. That's the real issue here and with China. They want to become advanced superpower nations but they refuse to open up access to power and clean up their corrupt ways, which leads to a groteque, backwards system.

They want to treat democracy as though it were optional. But it's too deep of an issue to be optional. Superpower status is entangled with democracy.

Why doesnt Putin simply open democracy in Russia then? 

I always assumed Putin keeps Russia a dictatorship because it is simply the best way to govern Russia given its level of development.

If Russia would thrive as a democracy then why doesnt Putin do so?

He is loved by most Russian and has totally transformed Russia since its disastrously 2000 economy so he would have a decent shot of keeping power.

I always assumed he cared about Russia most to the point of killing others for it.

Edited February 12 by Karmadhi

[Karmadhi]

5 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Ask yourself why the US is not overthrowing the government of Japan or Sweden.

USA has overthrown relatively liberal governments in countries like Chile and putin hardcore dictators in their place. In Latin American especially.

They got no qualms keeping Saudi Arabia dictator for example in charge.

I assume its because USA wants other countries to be their bitch and bow down to them. If they do then they are safe regardless of how democratic they are.

Sweden and especially Japan are USA's minions when it comes to foreign policy. That is why they are safe.

6 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

t's not like the West is going to destroy Russian culture. But what the West would destroy is Russia corruption. And that's the rub

I think they fear their society getting into LGBT, immigration and other liberal stuff which Putin would consider "corruption".

I find it silly personally to think like that as a Green but for Stage Blue it means basically death.

[Leo Gura]

18 minutes ago, Karmadhi said:

If Russia would thrive as a democracy then why doesnt Putin do so?

Because the entire power center of Russia survives off insane levels of corruption. Opening up to democracy means that Putin and all the richest Russians would have to surrender their power, status, and wealth, and reform their corrupt ways or end up in prison. They simply cannot allow that. They are too old to change their ways. Their lives are literally at stake here. It's like a giant mafia family. There's no getting out alive.

Just so you understand, corruption is the exploitation of the masses by a small group of elites. This system cannot be sustained but through force, manipulation, and lies. They are parasites. Democracy is poison to parasite elites.

Edited February 12 by Leo Gura

[Consept]

Interesting article on why Russia isnt a democracy - https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/10/30/russia-democracy-putin-soviet-union-cold-war/

[Emissary]

It's been interesting to observe the completely opposite reactions to the interview in the news media vs. social media. In the former it's negative as usual, even some outright false statements predicated on the fact almost nobody will watch the whole 2 hours themselves. But if you look at comments on Twitter, YouTube, or just talk to people in person you see a different response, a largely positive one. Putin does a really good job managing his image in the eyes of foreigners. Over time I've talked to some extremely wealthy and well-educated people from all over the world, it's surprising how many actively argue in his favor even if you tell them as a Russian what actually goes on inside the country they've never been in.

[rnd]

On 7/2/2024 at 11:52 PM, VictorB02 said:

I don't understand why anyone would be against a 2hr interview with Putin that isn't controlled or censored if it weren't for a fear of losing the narrative that he is an evil madman.

Because people, when it comes to strong believes, want not the truth but any kind of information that reinforces them.

How do I know? Because I'm also this way.

[rnd]

1 hour ago, Consept said:

This is the same as saying democracy is a threat to dictatorship as much dictatorship is a threat to democracy.

Naive, black and white thinking.

First of all, who is it who gives the labels "this is a democrasy", "this is dictatorship"? When it's a pro-Western agency, guess what countries will be democrasies and what dictatorships? Thefore, one should pick other agency.

Secondly, the two notions aren't binary.

Thirdly, even if those classifications are correct, there're other types of freedoms in so-called non-democrasies, the ones that don't exist in democrasies. Remember, for instance, about apreheit in the most of "Western-European democrasies" (except Sweden), in Canada, US, UK, Australia that took place during the "little flu virus". One may not enter a cafe, bus or gym because he was in good heath. Absolutely tyranical, almost nazi-like countries.

[Consept]

20 minutes ago, rnd said:

First of all, who is it who gives the labels "this is a democrasy", "this is dictatorship"? When it's a pro-Western agency, guess what countries will be democrasies and what dictatorships? Thefore, one should pick other agency.

From your comment Im not sure you understand what a democracy is vs a dictatorship, its not a pejorative against a country its just how state is organised. Russia is a dictatorship because Putin eliminates or silences all political rivals, critics and dissenters (sometimes through assassination), he has extended years in power(20 years+), he has absolute authority, this is a dictatorship, i dont think any person could credibly argue it was a democracy. 

Democracy is essentially the rule of the majority through elected officials and shared power amongst the people to vote in an elected representative. In most cases with a maximum of three terms. 

So this is nothing to do the west deciding its a democracy or dictatorship. 

28 minutes ago, rnd said:

Secondly, the two notions aren't binary.

The two notions are basically the opposite of each other, one is rule by one person and the other is rule by majority of the people, its pretty much as binary as you can get. 

29 minutes ago, rnd said:

Thirdly, even if those classifications are correct, there're other types of freedoms in so-called non-democrasies, the ones that don't exist in democrasies. Remember, for instance, about apreheit in the most of "Western-European democrasies" (except Sweden), in Canada, US, UK, Australia that took place during the "little flu virus". One may not enter a cafe, bus or gym because he was in good heath. Absolutely tyranical, almost nazi-like countries.

So is your argument here that you get more freedom in a dictatorship? Or at least different freedoms. They dont really have freedom in the situation you proposed, they just have the will of the leader, so for example if the leader did want everyone to take vaccines he would have the power to force them to do so. If he doesnt and you happen to agree with him, thats not really freedom thats just luck that you agree with him, most likely if you live in a dictatorship you would just agree with everything they say anyway as thats how youve been raised. 

The reason why certain countries had the restrictions they did is because they are trying to look out for the majority which does show that its a democracy. Lets hypothetically say vaccines and stopping unvaccinated people going into public establishments was the right cause of action, Putin and other dictators chose not to do that for whatever reason and that couldve killed millions of people, he was the only one to decide that regardless of experts, its not like he took a vote. 

Brazils president who chose to do this for his people made Brazil the second worst country in the world affected by covid, in fact the leaders of individual states had to rebel against him and bring in safety measures themselves for their states. 

So no youre not gonna be more free in a dictatorship. 

[Leo Gura]

1 hour ago, rnd said:

First of all, who is it who gives the labels "this is a democrasy", "this is dictatorship"? When it's a pro-Western agency, guess what countries will be democrasies and what dictatorships? Thefore, one should pick other agency.

There is a whole field of science of various systems of government and how they function.

We are not using definitions from the US government or CIA, we are using definitions from political science. Putin has not invented some unique form of government. It's a very typical extractive kleptocracy.

There are objective, neutral measures of every country's level of development:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_Human_Development_Index

https://www.heritage.org/index/ranking

Putin acts as if political science doesn't exist. Political science is not merely a Western invention. As if political science does not apply to Russians. This Duginesque Russian exceptionalism is a joke.

Edited February 12 by Leo Gura

[Nilsi]

Putin has made it no secret that his politics is deeply steeped in mythopoiesis. This is not so much about Putin as an agent in a game-theoretic exchange with the west, as it is about him as a historical entity.

This is very similar to the Jordan Peterson situation. You can not really characterize him as a power-hungry Machiavellian, as that's not what he's psychologically motivated by. This is some twisted Jungian shit.

For Putin to open itself up to the ideals of the modern West would completely undermine his Traditionalist ambitions. It's clear that the Western version of "Diversity" is quite twisted and not really interested in any true kind of multiplicity (as argued quite convincingly by Alexander Dugin).

 

The deeper problem is that Putins iron rule in the face of Western colonialism has led to a lot of reactionary pro-western sympathies amongst young Russians. This is understandable, but unfortunate, as defining yourself in opposition to some other prevents any kind of true liberation and self-determination.

This issue does not call for a diplomatic solution but of a philosophical and aesthetic one. There needs to be a new collective identity of the Russian people, beyond Putins radical traditionalism and (reactionary) Western liberalism. 

It's ironic how many self-proclaimed Marxists and Post-Modernists will argue over the same old texts to the nth degree in the name of progress and emancipation, while contemporary Russian philosophy and art is virtually absent in any such discourse.

[_Archangel_]

@rnd Don't fall into the trap of thinking every country has the same level of developement.
Authoritarian is a step back of Democracy. Here in Italy we had what Russia is having a hundred yers ago.

And no, Democracy doesn't mean heaven. it can be pretty corrupt. But is better then whatever Russia is today.

And no, Covid wasn't just a little flu virus.

 

Edited February 12 by _Archangel_

[Consept]

42 minutes ago, _Archangel_ said:

@rnd Don't fall into the trap of thinking every country has the same level of developement.
Authoritarian is a step back of Democracy. Here in Italy we had what Russia is having a hundred yers ago.

And no, Democracy doesn't mean heaven. it can be pretty corrupt. But is better of whatever Russia is today.

And no, Covid wasn't just a little flu virus.

 

Well said, i think the great trick authoritarians pull off or attempt to pull off, is that an authoritarian government with them in charge is a step forward. The reality is its a step back which is known by democracy because they've all been through it in their past.