In his zeal to vilify Ukraine and malign the United States, Carlson betrays an appalling ignorance of the politics and history of both countries.
Is Tucker Carlson a knowing Putin propagandist or historically obtuse and ignorant?
It’s hard to tell, but that is the inescapable conclusion one must draw after listening to his myriad commentaries trying to portray Ukraine in the worst possible light, while saying little or nothing critical of Putin and Russia.
Most recently (Dec. 7, 2022), Carlson declared that Ukrainian President Zelensky is a Lenin-like dictator who is using American tax dollars to stamp out opposition parties and religious liberty in Ukraine.
Zelensky is a “dangerous authoritarian” who “has no interest in freedom and democracy,” Carlson intoned. And, for this reason, any comparison to World War II, the proverbial “good war” for freedom and democracy, is wrongheaded.
American support for Ukraine today does not mirror American support for Britain at the outset of World War II. No, Sir, said Carlson.
The Biden administration “baited” Russia into invading Ukraine: by “telling Zelensky to join NATO, which they, [the Biden administration], knew was a Russian red line. They, [the Biden administration], wanted this war,” Carlson said.
Russia Threats. Carlson then brought left-wing journalist Glenn Greenwald on air to tell viewers that the U.S. government “actually doesn’t care about spreading democracy.” That is a “fairy tale,” Greenwald said.
Russia, he scoffed, is no threat to the United States. Russia is not our enemy. Presidents Obama and Trump didn’t see Russia as an enemy and neither should we. Only crazy left-wing Democrats who still cling to the Trump-Russia collusion hoax think that, Greenwald said.
As Luke Coffey observes, “Tucker would make a fantastic spokesman for the Kremlin.” And, in fact, as The Guardian points out:
Carlson’s commentaries on the Ukraine war generally reflect Putin’s speeches and claims. Russian television then plays back the monologues as evidence that Putin is right because the same is being said by “the most popular television presenter in America”.
But while Americans of all political stripes do not accept the lies spewed by a Russian dictator, American conservatives are inclined to accept the falsehoods spouted by Fox News’ Tucker Carlson, and therein lies the problem.
Carlson is opposed to U.S. aid to Ukraine, which is a legitimate, albeit wrongheaded position.
What is illegitimate is deliberately lying about the United States and Ukraine, and deliberately defaming and demonizing these two great countries, to try and make your case for cutting off American aid dollars.
Zelensky v. Lenin. First, to compare Zelensky to Lenin is obviously idiotic and slanderous. Lenin seized power in a violent Communist revolution and was guided by dictatorial Communist ideology. Zelensky was elected president peacefully and democratically, and is guided by the broad-based concerns of the Ukrainian people.
As for religious liberty, it is guaranteed in the Ukrainian Constitution, and it is, in the main, respected and protected. However, because Putin has weaponized the Orthodox Church and manipulated the church to try and conquer and subdue Ukraine, matters are considerably more complicated than Carlson acknowledges.
Ukraine is fighting for its very survival and has a legitimate interest in rooting out spies, traitors, and saboteurs.
Perhaps Zelensky and his government have overreached. But if that is the case, they did so as a wartime exigency and not out of any ideological desire to stamp out legitimate democratic opposition and dissent.
Let us remember: the United States, too, has sometimes stifled dissent and infringed upon liberty while at war.
Lincoln. During the Civil War, for instance, President Lincoln suspended the writ of habeas corpus to ensure that Union commanders could arrest and detain people seen as a threat to military operations. Yet, only the historically illiterate would suggest that, because of this, Lincoln was a “dangerous authoritarian” opposed to democracy.
Instead, historians understand that Lincoln was a wartime leader trying to preserve the union and save his country.
This doesn’t meant that Lincoln was right to suspend habeas corpus. That is a legitimate historical argument to have. But any fair-minded historian will place Lincoln’s suspension of the writ into historical context to arrive at a judicious and fair-minded conclusion regardless of whether he thinks what Lincoln did was right or wrong.
So, too, with Zelensky. Political and wartime context is required to understand his actions vis-a-vis the Orthodox Church. Yet, Carlson eschews such context precisely in order to demonize Zelensky and portray him as a cartoonish political villain.
Ukraine. What is beyond dispute and debate is that Ukraine is a burgeoning democracy that aspires to be part of the West. The Ukrainians wish to share in our political and cultural patrimony. They wish to be a free, sovereign, and independent country.
Russia, by contrast, wants to dominate and subjugate Ukraine. They want to isolate Ukraine from the West and make it dependent upon and subservient to Russia. And, more ominously, in so doing, they want to wipe Ukraine off the map and destroy its culture and its nationhood.
American support for Ukraine is thus morally just and righteous and something all Americans ought to be proud of—Carlson and Greenwald to the contrary notwithstanding.
But make no mistake: America supports Ukraine not just because it is the right thing to do, but because it serves the American national interest.
Russia. Again, Russia is an avowed enemy of the United States that has spent the better part of two decades undermining American national security interests in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. So any opportunity to bloody and weaken Russia is a good and welcome opportunity for the United States.
This doesn’t mean that the United States baited or lured Russia into waging war on Ukraine, as Carlson and Greenwald idiotically assert. To the contrary: the United States and its European allies went to great pains for many years to allay Russian concerns.
The problem is that Putin has been hellbent on resurrecting a new Russian empire and could not be assuaged by anything less than utter appeasement and surrender.
Putin launched a war on Ukraine not because of anything the United States or NATO did or did not do. He launched a war on Ukraine because he wants to conquer and subsume Ukraine.
The United States is supporting Ukraine because it recognizes that Russia success there will threaten peace and stability throughout Europe, while inspiring dictators worldwide to redraw national boundaries and rewrite the wold map.
In other words, American support for democracy is no fairy tale; it is reality, hard-headed realism in a dangerous world. And the only lies being told are those by Carlson and Greenwald, who portray an illiberal, authoritarian Ukraine that doesn’t exist.
The bottom line: Ukraine is a good country and its president, Zelensky, is a great wartime leader, despite whatever mistakes he might have made and, undoubtedly, will make in the future.
Ukraine and Zelensky, in fact, can be compared, favorably, to Great Britain and Winston Churchill as they heroically fought back against Nazi Germany at the onset of World War II.
Russia, by contrast, is a bad country and its dictator, Vladimir Putin, is a bad man. Russia and Putin can be compared, unfavorably, to Nazi Germany and Adolph Hitler as they savagely tried to conquer Europe during World War II.
And then, as now, the United States is doing the Lord’s work in supporting the forces of freedom and democracy. May it always be so.
Feature photo credit: Fox News’ host Tucker Carlson and left-wing journalist Glenn Greenwald, courtesy of a Fox News screenshot.