Tucker Carlson to interview Putin

[Buck Edwards]

On 12/02/2024 at 3:23 PM, Leo Gura said:

Because the entire power center of Russia survives off insane levels of corruption.

Can't Russia ever grow without corruption? 

[Leo Gura]

1 hour ago, Buck Edwards said:

Can't Russia ever grow without corruption? 

It can and it will, but that takes a long time and Putin is pumping the breaks.

Edited February 14 by Leo Gura

[Karmadhi]

41 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

It can and it will, but that takes a long time and Putin is pumping the breaks.

I thought you always said Putin cares about Russia and all.

Apparently he cares about Blue Russia more than overall Russia?

[Bobby_2021]

18 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Yes, of course that's a factor. But democracy is also a factor because it is necessary for solid business. It's hard to do business in a corrupt dictatorship.

Democracy is necessary for doing business with tertiary level industries like tourism and IT. Not Primary and secondary level industries.

There are three different types of Industries: 1) Natural resources oil, coal, agriculture etc.(primary) 2) Manufacturing goods(secondary) 3) Services. (tertiary)

Do you think a stable democratically elected government will allow their underage kids to work in mines to make batteries for iPhones and Tesla superchargers for people in the west? No. That's why if your intention is to exploit cheap labor and natural resources, then it is in your best interest to have dictators that would silence these organic movements that people raise. 

The whole economic model of the US lies in exploiting cheap labor in undemocratic countries. There would not be any iphones or Teslas or green energy without it. 

Does the US care about human rights and democracy for people who work in sweat shops? The US benefits from not being democracy in these places. That is why US funds and overthrows democratically elected governments especially, after they nationalized their oil industry. 

1) Jacobo Árbenz in Guatemala in 1954

2) Mohammad Mossadegh, democratically elected in 1951, overthrew by operation ajax in 1953. 

3) Salvador Allende democratically elected in 1971 aimed to nationalize certain industries (not even oil) that would hurt US business interest. Project FUBELT funded and orchestrated by US destabilized the government. 

So do not make it look like democracy is necessary for all sorts of business. Cold hard dictators are good business dealers for exploiting cheap natural resources.

18 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Obviously they are weighing all sorts of corporate interests. But you can't reduce the Russia relationship to that.

Both of them are looking forward to advancing their corporate interests. That's the crux.

Putin is the corporate Lord of Russia. He is the deep state of Russia.

Power, Money, Business, reign supreme. All of those are orange values. The only difference is that US has to justify what they are doing to their people and Russia do not. So, the US spreads propaganda about human rights violations and lack of democracy in these nations as a reason why they orchestrated the coup to mask their business interests.

[Bobby_2021]

19 hours ago, zurew said:

No.

Thats like essentially saying you will obey whatever nonsense excuse or reason any country will come up with, cause they said if you don't do it they will go to war. Like giving a free ticket and control to the global political landscape. - Of course there are lines that needs to be drawn somewhere, where you evaluate the reasons put on the table.

You can say that, but on the other hand lets not forget that such corruption destroys millions of lives and more given how long a corruption will stay alive. 

In this case. there is not much difference between doing vs allowing harm.

The "nonsense" excuse that you are talking about is the west not keeping its own word on not expanding the NATO borders which was vital to not cause needless wars. 

You are admitting that Putin was right in starting this war. There is no need for Putin to give a free ticket to the US to control the political landscape. There are lines that need to be drawn. Exactly my point. Those lines where the NATO borders agreed upon by the USSR. NATO clearly crossed it. 

The reason was clearly put on the table. To have national security for east and the west. And the west has crossed their lines by expanding beyond their border and there is no reason for Putin to sit and watch. 

----

You should also consider the possibility of this kind of war strengthening Putin's stronghold on power. Dictators thrive on war and unstable political climate that can justify them holding onto power for as long as possible. Which is what Putin is doing.

This war also helped Putin eliminate that Wagner group leader who were one of the strong challengers to Putin out there. So he is getting stronger and not weaker.   

[Bobby_2021]

19 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

In the end it's Ukraine's choice whether they wanna keep fighting or not.

If they don't wanna fight, they can surrender any day. So it's not like the US is making them fight Putin.

Ukraine has its own national identity that wants to defend itself.

The people of Ukraine do not want to fight and die leaving women and children at home. They are being conscripted beyond their will. Some of them are breaking their legs to not get conscripted. You are making it look like they are eager to feed themselves into the meat grinder. 

Let democracy prevail. If the people do not want to fight, they should not have to fight. 

[Leo Gura]

4 hours ago, Karmadhi said:

I thought you always said Putin cares about Russia and all.

Every dictator's worldview is such that he thinks his dictatorship is what's best for the country.

[Leo Gura]

17 minutes ago, Bobby_2021 said:

The people of Ukraine do not want to fight

Then they can take that up with their president.

Military service is not a pure democracy.

[Hello from Russia]

7 hours ago, Buck Edwards said:

Can't Russia ever grow without corruption? 

Subjectively if feels like it's been way less corruption in the past years and there are actually ton of improvements in Russian infrustructure

Actually becoming very nice place to live

My main complain about Russia is for sure its social politics rather than quality of life. 

Though western products are expensive af and it hurts. But there are a ton of Russian and Сhinese replacements nowadays that are quite good. We even have a plant milk brand that is in my opinion superior to western plant milk brands

Edited February 14 by Hello from Russia

[Bobby_2021]

2 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Then they can take that up with their president.

Military service is not a pure democracy.

Democracy is when you elect a dictator to serve 5 years until another comes up. The dude you elect does what the corporate overlords tell him to do.  Basically, corporate dictatorship with extra steps.

1 hour ago, Hello from Russia said:

Subjectively if feels like it's been way less corruption in the past years and there are actually ton of improvements in Russian infrustructure

Actually becoming very nice place to live

My main complain about Russia is for sure its social politics rather than quality of life. 

Though western products are expensive af and it hurts. But there are a ton of Russian and Сhinese replacements nowadays that are quite good. We even have a plant milk brand that is in my opinion superior to western plant milk brands

I have noticed it in India. The amount of vile corruption that were rampant a few years ago have gone and infrastructure have substantially improved. The existing corruption cases are more strictly investigated, although I wonder they will actually be convicted. But I should say it is a massive improvement compared to the shit show that happened 20 years ago. 

At some places the roads and parks are seemingly at western level that I wonder if I am lost in Canada or something. Electricity outages are rare and water is abundant. Not to say all is fine, but it is hard to ignore all the developments that are happening. I personally do not care about corruption as long as it does not affect the standard of the living too much. Which I why I do not think it is wise to orchestrate coups or radical acts to undo the corruption. Corruption should take itself out soon enough.

But I do hope US can do something about North Korea though. 

Even in China, with record levels of corruption, the standard of living in some places are too damn high that they do not receive enough credit for it. But they might have to work 996. That is a serious downside. But not having democracy is self crippling in the long run no matter how good the standard of living gets. 

[zurew]

3 hours ago, Bobby_2021 said:

The "nonsense" excuse that you are talking about is the west not keeping its own word on not expanding the NATO borders which was vital to not cause needless wars. 

When I said nonsense I didn't specifically refer to this war (even though I disagree with the idea ,that if I feel threatened that justifies invading a country), I spoke about in general and try to point out whats the entailment of such reasoning, that says you need to do everything to avoid war.

Do you think feeling threatened justifies invading a country in general?  

4 hours ago, Bobby_2021 said:

The reason was clearly put on the table. To have national security for east and the west.

"I feel threatened , therefore I am justified to invade a country" -  even though there were already Nato members close to Moscow (Latvia, Estonia). So how is that reasoning comes anywhere near justifying invading Ukraine? (even under the moral system that says it is okay to invade a country if you feel threatened)

4 hours ago, Bobby_2021 said:

Those lines where the NATO borders agreed upon by the USSR. NATO clearly crossed it. 

I have seen this talking point repeated, but to my knowledge there was never a written agreement that would specifically underline the claim you made there. So, in the agreement that you brought up, where does it says that Ukraine can't become a Nato member?

 

 

[Bobby_2021]

37 minutes ago, zurew said:

Do you think feeling threatened justifies invading a country in general? 

Absolutely. As a leader, you should be able to make sure that the citizens of your country can sleep peacefully. I respect united states for threatening to invade Cuba when USSR tried to bring missiles in Cuba. It is giving them a strong reminder that "I do not take any shit from you, Back off".

Being a leader is about having balls to say that. National security is everything. 

That is what Putin did. As a leader I respect his decision. Although war is despicable. The war happened because of geopolitical reasons which should be more than enough to convince America. Not because he is a war mongerer. He took a calculated decision to protect the integrity of Russia. 

You can criticize him for the merit of his decision. But not for the very decision itself. At least not as an American.

46 minutes ago, zurew said:

"I feel threatened , therefore I am justified to invade a country" -  even though there were already Nato members close to Moscow (Latvia, Estonia). So how is that reasoning comes anywhere near justifying invading Ukraine? (even under the moral system that says it is okay to invade a country if you feel threatened)

Latvia & Estonia are surrounded by Russia on all sides and the Baltic Sea. And they are much weaker countries and there are many more geographic advantages to that favor Russia in the event of an invasion. He can invade it right now and NATO couldn't do shit. It is under their control. in other words, it is not a threat to Russia. 

Which further goes on to show how Russia took a calculated approach in invading Ukraine, since it was indeed a threat to Russia, even though it was not a part of NATO. But if Ukraine joins NATO, they will not remain under the Russian control like Estonia and Latvia. 

53 minutes ago, zurew said:

I have seen this talking point repeated, but to my knowledge there was never a written agreement that would specifically underline the claim you made there. So, in the agreement that you brought up, where does it says that Ukraine can't become a Nato member?

Written agreements are good enough to be followed as long as it suits their interest. You can always claim the agreement was not done in your favor and violate it.  The fact that it is written or not doesn't hold much value. it is their intention that matters. Also, who is supposed to enforce such an agreement? If there is a written agreement between two people, then you can ask the government to enforce it? who is the enforcer here? Nobody.  

Governments are notorious for ditching agreements when it does not suit them, on a whim, because there is no one to stop them anyway.  

[Consept]

1 hour ago, zurew said:

"I feel threatened , therefore I am justified to invade a country"

The problem is this justification doesnt work when put onto other countries, it justifies pretty much every invasion. So Germany in 1939 could claim, and im sure they did, that they felt threatened by Europe and Jewish people so that justified invading Poland. Even now, USA and Europe can claim they feel threatened by Russia, North Korea, China and justify invading those countries, arguably there would be much more justification with at least Russia and North Korea than Russia had to invade Ukraine. 

One could say the reason for invasion was Putin felt threatened but to say its justified ill be curious to hear that argument. 

[zurew]

23 minutes ago, Bobby_2021 said:

Absolutely. As a leader, you should be able to make sure that the citizens of your country can sleep peacefully. I respect united states for threatening to invade Cuba when USSR tried to bring missiles in Cuba. It is giving them a strong reminder that "I do not take any shit from you, Back off".

Being a leader is about having balls to say that. National security is everything. 

So as long as a country claims it feels threatened by x thats a good enough justification to invade x.

I think thats a pretty weak and vague justification ,given that literally any country could use that right now against any other country.

15 minutes ago, Consept said:

The problem is this justification doesnt work when put onto other countries, it justifies pretty much every invasion. 

So Germany in 1939 could claim, and im sure they did, that they felt threatened by Europe and Jewish people so that justified invading Poland. Even now, USA and Europe can claim they feel threatened by Russia, North Korea, China and justify invading those countries, arguably there would be much more justification with at least Russia and North Korea than Russia had to invade Ukraine. 

One could say the reason for invasion was Putin felt threatened but to say its justified ill be curious to hear that argument.

Yeah I agree, thats why I disagree with such vague justifications - it can basically be applied by anyone ,especially against Russia right now.

21 minutes ago, Bobby_2021 said:

Governments are notorious for ditching agreements when it does not suit them, on a whim, because there is no one to stop them anyway. 

One more reason why you should have written agreements. Its pretty weak on Russia's part that their main argument for invading is not even grounded in a written agreement.

 Again based on this low standard for invading - literally any country could come up with any weak reason to ground their belief of feeling threatened. 

55 minutes ago, Bobby_2021 said:

The fact that it is written or not doesn't hold much value. it is their intention that matters

Oh it does hold a lot of value, because they could point to something very tangible other than literally making up any baseless claim without evidence.

30 minutes ago, Bobby_2021 said:

Latvia & Estonia are surrounded by Russia on all sides and the Baltic Sea. And they are much weaker countries and there are many more geographic advantages to that favor Russia in the event of an invasion. He can invade it right now and NATO couldn't do shit. It is under their control. in other words, it is not a threat to Russia. 

This seems like an attempt to pivot from the original reason. The original reason of "we can't let Nato get close to Moscow" is now being abandoned and we are changing it to saying , Russia only has problem with Nato members that are close to Moscow and have good enough geographic advantages.

What kind of geographic advantages a country needs to have, so that Russia can be justified in invading them? 

58 minutes ago, Bobby_2021 said:

Which further goes on to show how Russia took a calculated approach in invading Ukraine, since it was indeed a threat to Russia, even though it was not a part of NATO. But if Ukraine joins NATO, they will not remain under the Russian control like Estonia and Latvia. 

I  reject the idea that Estonia and Latvia are not a threat to Russia if we define threat as Putin did. Whats the argument that establishes how Latvia and Estonia are in Russian control?

Like what exactly is stopping NATO from arming up both of those countries with missiles and other weapons?

 

[Bobby_2021]

@zurew All these are massive oversimplifications of a complex geopolitical situation. It's not a country can simply "feel" threatened and use it as a justification to attack. There are serious people investing all their time and life assessing the geopolitical climate to arrive at the correct move. No country will go to war unless they are forced to. The cost of fighting a war is too damn high to do it on feelings.

Your feelings are not backed by research or data, or merely supported by biased western reporting of the situation. There are plenty of people on YT giving insights into the complicated nature of the situation. I am forming my analysis only after watching all that. 

[zurew]

19 minutes ago, Bobby_2021 said:

@zurew All these are massive oversimplifications of a complex geopolitical situation. It's not a country can simply "feel" threatened and use it as a justification to attack. There are serious people investing all their time and life assessing the geopolitical climate to arrive at the correct move. No country will go to war unless they are forced to. The cost of fighting a war is too damn high to do it on feelings.

Your feelings are not backed by research or data, or merely supported by biased western reporting of the situation. There are plenty of people on YT giving insights into the complicated nature of the situation. I am forming my analysis only after watching all that. 

What feelings? What oversimplifications? I havent provided any position on the situation, Im only trying to systematically follow and question  the justifications  you provided  and so far the reasons you provided seem to be completely falling apart after getting 2 layers deep in the line of questioning.

No one forced you, but you took a position where you think a country is justified in invading another country if it feels threatened by it and now that I showed some of the bad entailments of such a view, you are trying to wash it away by saying that Im oversimplifying things - no, im showing what your position entails. If you want to adjust that position, go ahead do so.

If you want to provide different  justifications that you think can hold their grounds you are free to do so, but then be clear that you want to abandon all the justifications that you provided so far. Or if you don't want to abandon any of the justifications, then I would appreciate if you would answer the questions that I gave you in my earlier reply.

 

[Karmadhi]

12 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Every dictator's worldview is such that he thinks his dictatorship is what's best for the country.

I did some research and apparently Putin made Russia grow like crazy from 2000 until 2014. Also, he put all the oligarchs in order and overall did quite good management considering how bad Russia was when he took power.

2014 onwards the growth seems to slow down a lot, maybe signalling that change needs to happen. However considering the amount of growth that happened under Putin, I am not suprised that Russians love him so much.

And I have seen your comments and you seem to make Russia seem like a hellhole but perhaps it was like that when you left in in the 1990s, not in 2024.

I have friends from there that came to the West, also Western friends that went there for Erasmus programmes. They said it was quite chill. All governmental services are online, the infrastructure and public transport is good and they did not feel oppressed or harassed in any way. Biggest issue they had is the salaries were not that great compared to Germany for example. But far from a hell hole. They told me with a good salary it seemed like a first world country. And the people were quite nice and kind.

I am talking about Moscow, Saint Peters and Sochi. These are the cities I had friends go to.

Needs to be noticed that these people have/had lived in the West so they know how life is there too. It is not like you are taking someone from Africa and putting them into Russia.

Just sharing this.

[Consept]

12 minutes ago, Karmadhi said:

Also, he put all the oligarchs in order and overall did quite good management considering how bad Russia was when he took power.

'Putting the oligarchs in order' actually means he imprisoned the ones that didnt side with him and empowered the ones that did side with him. The way you put it is as if he cleaned up the corruption of the rich, which is not true he just made sure they were loyal to him. Roman Abramovich for example was a multi billionaire up until the Ukraine war and was allowed to exist with many perks because he was cool with Putin. 

I dont think people were saying Russia was a hellhole, but its not a free country in that you cant credibly vote for an alternative and you cant speak out against Putin - 

"Russia clamped down harder Friday on news and free speech than at any time in President Vladimir V. Putin's 22 years in power, blocking access to Facebook and major foreign news outlets, and enacting a law to punish anyone spreading “false information” about its Ukraine invasion with up to 15 years in prison." - New York Times

What im confused with is that you seem to be someone that would be for freedom of speech, during the pandemic a lot people complained that they werent allowed to share 'alternative science' however there was never anything close to a 15 year prison sentence threatened, the worst was being banned on facebook for a month or having a fact check under a post. So it doesnt quite square how some of the same people complaining about freedom of speech during the pandemic are actually agreeing with Putins methods. 

[Karmadhi]

33 minutes ago, Consept said:

'Putting the oligarchs in order' actually means he imprisoned the ones that didnt side with him and empowered the ones that did side with him. The way you put it is as if he cleaned up the corruption of the rich, which is not true he just made sure they were loyal to him. Roman Abramovich for example was a multi billionaire up until the Ukraine war and was allowed to exist with many perks because he was cool with Putin. 

I see. I am not that informed on this issue so perhaps "putting the oligarchs in order" was wrong from me. In that case I stand corrected. However I saw the gdp growth of Russia under Putin so that I think is more objective.

33 minutes ago, Consept said:

I dont think people were saying Russia was a hellhole, but its not a free country in that you cant credibly vote for an alternative and you cant speak out against Putin - 

"Russia clamped down harder Friday on news and free speech than at any time in President Vladimir V. Putin's 22 years in power, blocking access to Facebook and major foreign news outlets, and enacting a law to punish anyone spreading “false information” about its Ukraine invasion with up to 15 years in prison." - New York Times

What im confused with is that you seem to be someone that would be for freedom of speech, during the pandemic a lot people complained that they werent allowed to share 'alternative science' however there was never anything close to a 15 year prison sentence threatened, the worst was being banned on facebook for a month or having a fact check under a post. So it doesnt quite square how some of the same people complaining about freedom of speech during the pandemic are actually agreeing with Putins methods. 

Personally I do not think there is free speech anywhere in the world. It is a myth. If I go out in the West and say Israel is a genocidal racist country for example will I face persecutions? Benzema was threatened with citizenship revoking (even though he is born in france) just for sharing some solidarity with Palestine. No hate speech or anything. So there are always  topics where you have no free speech. These topics will vary by country.

In Russia you cannot criticize Putin. In Germany you cannot criticize Israel. So this myth of free speech is bullshit in my opinion.

Also, you have plenty of other countries where you cannot criticize the governments that are seen as very attractive to live in. Qatar and UAE being prime examples. They are literally monarchies and still many people go there to live, even Western expats. How come they do not get the hate Russia gets even though their system of governance is not much better?

Biggest issue with Russia is corruption. Freedom of speech like protesting and stuff may be important to some but personally I do not care much about it. As long as the courts are fair and nobody asks me for bribes I am satisfied. I have never been in a protest in my life. But that is a huge bias of mine. Many people do those things so for them it would be way worse not to be able to protest. I am just talking about myself .

I am from a country where we have total freedom of speech but a lot of corruption and low income  and personally I would trade that freedom of speech for lower corruption and higher income any day of the year. Because even in the West, I do not feel like I have true freedom of speech.

I cannot post about Israel devilry or say that Ukraine should make peace with Russia etc.

Personally I am quite liberal in my views, so no racism nor homophobia or xenophobia. 

However I have friends that did have these views and they felt very repressed in the West and felt like they had no freedom of speech about it. Ironically one of them went to Russia and there he says he feels a lot more free to speak his mind about stuff than in the West. He is also a huge Putin fan. So for him, Russia has more freedom of speech than the West. For a hardcore liberal it will be the opposite. These things are to some extent relative.

Edited February 14 by Karmadhi

[Consept]

27 minutes ago, Karmadhi said:

Personally I do not think there is free speech anywhere in the world.

Theres no absolute freedom of speech of course as a society couldnt really function but there are levels to it. If you speak up against the Ukraine war in Russia you will be sentanced to 15 years in prison, I dont think any country comes anywhere near that level of punishment. I live in the UK and have many muslim friends who post daily with extremely violent imagery against Israel and as far as i know none of them have had facebook or instagram accounts even banned let alone being prosecuted for it. There are near weekly marches and protests in support of palestine and nothing has happened. This is similar in other countries which is in fact why a lot of far right ideologies can even get in power in the first place or at least run for power. So i dont think Putins Russia equates with other countries shutting down free speech at all. 

33 minutes ago, Karmadhi said:

Also, you have plenty of other countries where you cannot criticize the governments that are seen as very attractive to live in. Qatar and UAE being prime examples. They are literally monarchies and still many people go there to live, even Western expats. How come they do not get the hate Russia gets even though their system of governance is not much better?

They dont invade other countries and work with other nations. Theyre not perfect by any stretch and there are issues with human rights etc it helps that theyre very rich nations as well. But essentially they dont create problems with other nations, whereas Russia constantly does. 

 

37 minutes ago, Karmadhi said:

I cannot post about Israel devilry or say that Ukraine should make peace with Russia etc.

You can post whatever you want, you might be mistaking social persecution for state persecution. Social just means people will disagree with you on social media maybe some acquaintances will judge you or something, but no ones going to come and arrest you because you say Ukraine should make peace. Whereas if you said Russia was wrong in Russia you would literally get arrested. 

 

40 minutes ago, Karmadhi said:

However I have friends that did have these views and they felt very repressed in the West and felt like they had no freedom of speech about it. Ironically one of them went to Russia and there he says he feels a lot more free to speak his mind about stuff than in the West.

Heres where there seems to be a blind spot, if i hate gay people and move to a country where they hate gay people and then talk about how i hate gay people and everyone in that country agrees with me, it doesnt mean that theres free speech it just means that everyone agrees with me. If i had the opinion gay people were great then i wouldnt feel comfortable to express that opinion. So in this case Russia definitely doesnt have more free speech, your friend just feels like that because he agrees with everything Putin says. The real test is if you say something against the government how would they react, in Russia you get 15 years in prison and in the west you may but probably wont get your facebook account restricted.