I watched all 2 plus hours of the interview Tucker Carlson had with Vladimir Putin. Before the interview even aired (if that’s the right term), the establishment media was blasting Tucker and the whole thing. The people who lie for a living were accusing Carlson of not being a real journalist.
This is actually what a real journalist is supposed to do. This is what a journalist who isn’t controlled by the government and power elite does.
Overall, I thought Tucker did a good job. You can always say there are questions you wished had been asked. I wish he had been more direct on getting Putin to list his demands in order to bring the war in Ukraine to a close. Still, just giving Putin a platform was good, as it gives the American people an opportunity to hear from the person who is deemed the enemy.
Putin – Marketer, Propagandist, Politician?
Putin is a politician. He is not like a typical American politician, but he is still a politician. He is going to use propaganda to his advantage, just as we all do in certain situations. Using propaganda is similar to marketing. It can be honest, but you use the words in a way to convince others of your viewpoint. This can be to sell a product or to sell ideas.
Some people thought Putin did a brilliant job of using propaganda. I think in many ways this is correct, but I thought his very long lesson on Russian history may not have been that brilliant.
It showed Putin’s intelligence and vast knowledge. In that sense, it was well played. Putin is far more intelligent and knowledgeable about history than any U.S. president I can ever remember. Of course, it doesn’t mean you are a good person. You can be evil and intelligent. Hillary Clinton is not as intelligent as Putin, but she is far more intelligent than Joe Biden or Nikki Haley. She is still as evil as them though.
Putin’s long history lesson did not answer the question for me on whether there was some justification for launching a war in Ukraine. I really don’t think any wars can be justified from a libertarian perspective unless it is somehow fought to not endanger any innocent people.
With that said, some wars are far worse than others. I think there are more justifications for Putin invading Ukraine than there were for Bush invading Iraq. And despite what the media likes to say, the war in Ukraine was far from being “unprovoked”.
Going back in history over 1,000 years ago does little for me, and I suspect it is the same for most others. I don’t think anything that was done 1,000 years ago could justify any sort of war today. I feel the same way when the discussion turns to the state of Israel.
The problem is that Putin spent so much time on this history that it diluted the much more important parts of the interview.
The majority of his time would have been better spent talking about the coup in Ukraine a decade ago that overthrew the democratically-elected president who was somewhat friendly towards Russia. He could have pointed out the seeming involvement of the U.S. government in the coup.
Putin could have spent more time talking about the slaughter and abuse of ethnic Russians in eastern Ukraine. He certainly did reference this, but with a disproportionately small amount of time.
Putin also talked about the NATO push eastward to the Russian border, but he probably could have gone into even more detail on this.
Why the Interview Matters
I don’t care about people liking Putin, but I do want the American people to see the human side of Russians, and I want them to see that Putin is not an irrational human being.
Most of all, I want Americans to realize that their own government officials have been lying to them. This wasn’t an unprovoked war, and it was the U.S. that was the biggest outside provoker.
If Americans understood it to this degree, they would at least take the position that the U.S. government should stop interfering in Ukraine and other parts of the world.
If the U.S. government stopped funding Ukraine and simply promised not to admit Ukraine into NATO, this might be enough to bring the war to a quick close. This would save a lot of lives on both sides, but particularly innocent Ukrainians. Without U.S. support, the Ukrainian government would feel forced to reach some kind of negotiation. Perhaps it would involve allowing free independent states for the ethnic Russians.
Even if you think Putin is a really evil person who just wants to perpetuate war, it is good to hear his reasoning for it. It is not much different from someone listening to the complaints of Osama bin Laden. You don’t have to be a bin Laden fan to realize that U.S. involvement overseas contributes to people not liking America and wanting some kind of revenge.
Instead of taking the lying media’s word for things, it is usually a good idea to go directly to the source. In this case, Tucker gave us the source. He allowed a long interview for Putin to give his positions, which are not something that the corporate media will give you.
If Tucker were still at Fox News, I don’t think this interview would have happened. Maybe Fox did us a favor by firing their most popular host.