Tag: brexit
When Putin Strikes Ukraine, He Is Aiming For America

When Putin Strikes Ukraine, He Is Aiming For America

When Tucker Carlson insists there is no reason for Americans to distrust Russian President Vladimir Putin — and that his reputation for criminal brutality is simply fabricated by the "globalist deep state" controlled by George Soros — his rhetoric conceals the true source of friction between the United States and Russia. Having erupted in the bloody destruction wreaked by Putin on Ukraine, that uniquely alarming conflict will persist even if the world escapes the worst consequences now.

To understand this peril means setting aside the myths and lies promulgated by Putin's enormous worldwide propaganda apparatus and its operatives in this country — not just Carlson but former Trump White House strategist Steve Bannon and a virtual army of the minions of former President Donald Trump.

Let's be clear: No matter what Putin or his apologists may claim, he didn't invade because of fears that Ukraine will join NATO, which he knows won't happen anytime soon. He didn't invade because he worries about alleged Ukrainian nuclear, chemical or biological weapons programs, which he knows do not exist. And he certainly didn't invade because he fears that Ukraine is overrun with "Nazis," since he clearly doesn't much object to actual Nazism or any other variety of fascism. (To take just one example from among the many Nazis supported or tolerated by Putin, he has permitted the main neo-Nazi media outlet in the United States to operate from Russian territory for years.)

What troubles Putin and his ultra-nationalist coterie in the Kremlin is something much deeper. He believes that authoritarian rule in Russia is threatened by the example of Western democracies, whose people are accustomed to affluence and freedom that are enjoyed in his country only by the oligarchs who surround him (who mainly reside in American and European cities). Worse than Ukraine joining NATO, according to his worldview, is its urge to join the European Union — a symbol not only of Western power but of liberal democratic values. That was why he covertly financed the "Brexit" campaign that led to Britain's exit from the EU.

Naturally, Putin regards the example of Ukraine, with its improving economy and popularly elected government, as a menace to his own regime. Although Russia's living standards have improved during the past two decades, its gross domestic product still lags far behind much smaller nations such as Italy and France — and remains less than one-tenth the size of the United States. Russians are well aware that their authoritarian system incubates corruption like excrement breeds flies.

But simply denouncing Western democracy and materialism is a hard sell. So, in recent years, Putin has increasingly depicted himself as a defender of traditional Christian values against the supposed "decadence" of America and Europe, meaning that he persecutes lesbians and gays while proclaiming the mystical superiority of the Russian Orthodox church and a powerful new Russia that reclaims the lost Soviet empire. Although divorced from his wife and reputed to be a hedonist with a harem of younger girlfriends, Putin is well aware of how eagerly right-wing "Christians" accept hate as a substitute for actual morality. Anyone who has observed Trump's embrace by American evangelicals, despite his platoon of porn stars and Playboy models, knows that much.

What does Putin believe? Nobody but him may know and that scarcely matters anyway. His objectives are as clear as his bloody criminality — and his loud-mouthed media apparatchiks regularly enunciate his regime's hostility toward us. They exult in any setback for the United States, they imagine themselves rising with our destruction, they attack us covertly every day, and they persistently aim to divide Americans by race, region, religion, and partisan affiliation.

Vladimir Putin is an implacable and exceptionally dangerous enemy of the United States and of the values enshrined in our Constitution. Those who provide aid and comfort to his regime betray this country and those values.

To find out more about Joe Conason and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

Danziger: Pound Foolish

Danziger: Pound Foolish

Jeff Danziger lives in New York City. He is represented by CWS Syndicate and the Washington Post Writers Group. He is the recipient of the Herblock Prize and the Thomas Nast (Landau) Prize. He served in the US Army in Vietnam and was awarded the Bronze Star and the Air Medal. He has published eleven books of cartoons and one novel. Visit him at DanzigerCartoons.com.

Danziger: Be Careful What You Wish For, Boris

Danziger: Be Careful What You Wish For, Boris

Jeff Danziger lives in New York City. He is represented by CWS Syndicate and the Washington Post Writers Group. He is the recipient of the Herblock Prize and the Thomas Nast (Landau) Prize. He served in the US Army in Vietnam and was awarded the Bronze Star and the Air Medal. He has published eleven books of cartoons and one novel. Visit him at DanzigerCartoons.com.

Irish Columnist Offers Scathing Review Of Pence Visit

Irish Columnist Offers Scathing Review Of Pence Visit

Reprinted with permission from Alternet

Vice President Mike Pence has completed a two-day visit to the Republican of Ireland, where he met with Prime Minister Leo Varadkar, President Michael D. Higgins and other officials. During his visit, Pence (who is Irish-American) spoke in glowing terms about his Irish ancestry. But Miriam Lord, a columnist for the Irish Times, was not impressed — and on Tuesday, she delivered a scathing critique of Pence’s visit to her country.

Ireland is two separate countries: Northern Ireland is part of the U.K., while the Republic of Ireland to the south is not. Residents of Ireland have been worried about how a hard Brexit could affect them, as the Republic of Ireland is on the euro and plans to remain in the European Union (EU).

Lord notes that Pence, like President Donald Trump, is a strong supporter of Brexit and was on his way to meet with U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson when he was in Ireland. And in her column, she takes Pence to task for the pro-Johnson comments he made during his meeting with Irish officials.

Lord asserts, “As the air in the steamy ballroom turned decidedly frosty, Pence urged Ireland and the European Union ‘to negotiate in good faith’ with the new British prime minister…. The local crowd raised eyebrows and wondered what he thinks the aforementioned EU has been doing for the last three years, if not negotiating in good faith with the U.K.”

These comments, she said, were so jarring and out of place that it was as if Pence were a house guest who “shat on the new carpet in the spare room.”

The columnist added that Pence’s “Irish hosts, up to their oxters for the last three years in Brexit worry, hoped to impress upon him Ireland’s fears about the consequences of a no-deal Brexit for the country.”

Lord’s sarcasm becomes even more biting, however, when she discusses Pence’s anti-gay history and the fact the Varadkar is gay.

“In the end,” Lord writes, “Pence brought his wife, his mother and his sister to the old country, where it seems a lot of the natives have turned alarmingly heathen in the generations since his ancestors left our shores….. To look at Mike Pence, with all smiles and handshakes, you’d hardly think he isn’t very keen on the gays at all.”

Lord goes on to say that even though Pence embraces a severe form of fundamentalist Christianity, he seems to have no problem with Johnson’s history of infidelity.

“The next prime minister the couple (Pence and his wife, Karen Pence) will meet on their trip will be the serial philander Boris Johnson,” Lord writes.

Lord concludes her column on a snarky note, pointing out how greatly Pence’s Christian fundamentalism contrasts with Trump’s behavior.

Pence’s visit to Ireland, Lord writes, “was a great example of diversity in action. President Trump, who recently visited, is very hands-on with women and likes to grab them in all sorts of places — and his second in command is the opposite. He won’t stay on his own with a woman who isn’t his wife. God bless America.”