December 16, 2019

MY CORNER by Boyd Cathey

The New Stalin-Hitler Alliance: Neoconservatives and the Far Left

Friends,

Back in late 2014, in a lengthy essay I published—long before Donald Trump was a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination and four years before any formal “investigation” of his supposed “Russian ties”—I suggested that Russia, and in particular its president Vladimir Putin, had become a pivotal issue in American politics. That is, Russia was being resurrected as “the Number One enemy” of the United States in the world. Had we not just heard the hapless Mitt Romney utter this same claim in 2012? And the Neoconservative foreign policy elites, from John McCain’s former “foreign policy advisor” and Never Trumper Max Boot to Bill Kristol to the scribbling pygmies at National Review, all were atwitter: the Russia of Vladimir Putin was “the reincarnation of Stalin” or worse.

But then, with the advent of candidate Trump and his desire to normalize relations with Moscow, one of those remarkable “miracles d’histoire” occurred: the American Left, in particular its most zealous elements, jumped aboard and began employing the same narrative and basis for its attacks against President Trump as the Establishment conservatives. There were a few—a very few—exceptions, such as Princeton University professor  and Russian Studies Program Director, Stephen F. Cohen (see, for example, his very recent volume, War With Russia? From Putin & Ukraine to Trump & Russiagate, Skyhorse Publishing, 2019). But their voices went unheeded as the Left competed furiously with the Neocon Establishment conservatives over who could be the most ferociously anti-Russian and opposed to “that thug in the Kremlin.”

For the Neocon elites dominating the “conservative movement” it was largely the fact the President Putin refused to accept all the various “fruits” of American-style “democracy” (including same sex marriage, homosexual propaganda in Russian schools, full-fledged secularism—“benefits” which he rejected), and that he believed that newly-emerged non-Communist Russia should be an equal partner with the United States and not a subservient “poodle,” as his predecessor Boris Yeltsin’s Russia had pliantly been. Alas, Putin, the former KGB agent who had been instrumental in actually saving Russia’s nascent newly-free government by facing down the attempted KGB-coup in August 1991, was lambasted by an ideologically tendentious foreign policy establishment and media. Gasp! He actually announced that he was returning to the Russian Orthodox faith of his ancestors, denounced Lenin and Stalin and the barbarism of Communism! How dare he turn tail on the ineluctable and advancing “progressivist revolution”?

And for the frenzied Left, Russia—whose Communist regime they had courted and defended for more than seventy years—Russia suddenly became, just like the claim of Mitt the Twit, “the Number One enemy” and threat to America, and, without doubt—didn’t our intel agencies tell us?—the reason that hated “man with orange hair” won the presidency?

That “coalition of the wicked”—that combine of establishment conservatives (think here of such voices as Representative Adam Kinzinger, Jonah Goldberg, Ben Shapiro, etc.) and the loony Left Democrats (think here of Representatives Jerry Nadler, Adam Schiff, Eric Swalwell, etc.)—reminds me of the alliance between Stalin and Hitler before their joint invasion of Poland in 1939.

But the appearance of a temporary alliance of convenience between fanatical Left and faux Right betrays a deeper unity of belief and purpose…and fear. For both the Neocon conservative establishment and the far Left zealots share an unapologetic opposition to Russia’s revival of traditionalism and nationalism, Russia’s return in many respects to its religious roots, and, perhaps most significantly, its emergence as a “sign of contradiction” against the worldwide campaign to normalize same sex marriage, transgenderism, and feminism. Russia today thus uncomfortably reminds secularist-dominated Europe and United States what it has rejected. And that the possible resurrection of traditional moral and historic beliefs, upon which our civilization is based, is the real threat perceived by both the Neocon “conservatives” and the Left.

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I pass on several items referencing this. First, two excerpts from addresses by President Putin, one earlier this year (September 20) to a meeting of the International Valdai Club, and second, an address to the Russian Federal Assembly from a few years ago. Then, from earlier this month Putin’s rejection of attacks on motherhood and the use of the word “mother” by European bureaucrats. Finally, the results of a Pew Survey (December 5, 2019) on Russian attitudes to aberrant sexual behavior. The results may—should—startle some Americans: indeed, they are one of the major reasons why our Establishment, both “conservative” and Left wing, dislike Russia with such passion.

Read on:

President Vladimir Putin, Address to the International Valdai Club, http://valdaiclub.com/politics.62880.html September 20, 2019 at:

We can see how many of the Euro-Atlantic countries are actually rejecting their roots, including the Christian values that constitute the basis of Western civilisation. They are denying moral principles and all traditional identities: national, cultural, religious and even sexual. They are implementing policies that equate large families with same-sex partnerships, belief in God with the belief in Satan.

The excesses of political correctness have reached the point where people are seriously talking about registering political parties whose aim is to promote paedophilia. People in many European countries are embarrassed or afraid to talk about their religious affiliations. Holidays are abolished or even called something different; their essence is hidden away, as is their moral foundation. And people are aggressively trying to export this model all over the world. I am convinced that this opens a direct path to degradation and primitivism, resulting in a profound demographic and moral crisis.

What else but the loss of the ability to self-reproduce could act as the greatest testimony of the moral crisis facing a human society? Today almost all developed nations are no longer able to reproduce themselves, even with the help of migration. Without the values ​​embedded in Christianity and other world religions, without the standards of morality that have taken shape over millennia, people will inevitably lose their human dignity. We consider it natural and right to defend these values​.

President Vladimir Putin Address to the Federal Assembly, December 13, 2013

Today many countries revisit their moral standards, erasing national traditions and boundaries between different ethnicities and cultures. Society is asked to respect every person’s right to freedom of thought, political views and private life. But now people also have to treat evil and good equally, which is strange, because these are opposite things. Not only does such destruction of traditional values have negative effects on societies, but it is also anti-democratic to the core, because these are abstract ideas applied to real life despite of what the majority of people think. Most people don’t accept such changes and suggested revisions.

And we know that more and more people in the world support our approach of protecting traditional values, which have been a spiritual and moral foundation of our civilization and every nation. We value the traditional Christian family and genuine human life, including a person’s religious life; not just material, but also spiritual values.

Of course, this is a conservative position. But as Nikolai Berdyaev said, the meaning of conservatism is not to prevent moving forward and upward, but to prevent moving backwards and downward, into chaotic darkness, back to the primitive state.

We have seen in recent years how attempts to impose a presumably more progressive model of development on other countries in reality led to regress, barbarity and massive bloodshed….

Russian President Vladimir Putin Took Aim at Political Correctness over the Word ‘Mother’ in Paris; here’s What He Said

summit.news/2019/12/05/putin-in-some-countries-the-word-mother-is-being-replaced/

(Tea Party 247 – December 5, 2019) – Political correctness is a scourge on societies all across the globe, not just here in the United States. The concept of trying to tip toe through the tulips to try and avoid offending someone or hurting their feelings is causing a massive stagnation in the forward progress of human culture.

And it’s not just Americans who are taking notice of this phenomenon either.

Russian President Vladimir Putin recently remarked during a meeting at the Kremlin that now the word “mother” has become offensive, referring to how some countries are moving to use “parent 1” and “parent 2.”

Here’s more from Summit News:

President Vladimir Putin remarked at a recent Kremlin meeting that some countries are replacing the word “mother” out of concerns for political correctness, something he hoped ‘would never happen in Russia’. Putin was referring to a law passed in France earlier this year which mandates that schools refrain from using ‘father’ and ‘mother’ and instead use ‘parent 1’ and ‘parent 2’. According to government MP Valérie Petit, the change was necessary because using ‘father’ and ‘mother’ is “old fashioned” and doesn’t meet the needs of “social equality.” Don’t expect to see Russia following suit.

During a meeting of the Council for Interethnic Relations, a Kremlin advisory group, Putin told delegates, “You said the word mother ‘can’t be replaced.’ It turns out, perhaps, it can, in some countries, they now have ‘parent number one’ and ‘parent number two.’ I hope we never have that (in Russia).”

Officials attending the conference laughed, but for many in the west, who are told to accept such absurdities in silence lest they be punished for a myriad of potential thought crimes, it’s not that funny.

“That good-natured response masked the looming uneasiness that yet another crazy train has departed the Western station and is on a collision course with Russia, as well as the rest of the world,” writes Robert Bridge.

“Will Russia be able to holdout forever against the globalists’ ultra-liberal agenda now threatening the planet?” he asks.

As we previously highlighted, a discussion on one of Russia’s most popular TV shows about a boy in Scotland who was suspended for saying there are only two genders underscored how people in Eastern Europe are completely bewildered by the west’s obsession with identity politics.

Back in June, Vladimir Putin commented on a similar topic, asserting that liberalism was in its death throws thanks to forced multiculturalism. “The ruling elites have broken away from the people,” Putin told the Financial Times, adding that the “so-called liberal idea has outlived its purpose.”

Believe it or not, Putin is actually spot on here. Political correctness is destroying human culture all around the globe. If people can’t freely express ideas, how can we ever find truth? The whole notion of relativism — the idea that there is no objective truth — is completely ridiculous and self-defeating, therefore, in order to be fulfilled and make progress, our ideas need to compete against each other freely.

Without this, folks cannot discover paths forward in culture making. Without culture making, we become bored and depressed, life loses its purpose. Political correctness is a destroyer, which is why it must be opposed.

Russia & Ukraine: Highest Resistance to Homosexuality in Europe

According to recent polls, 86% of Russians and Ukrainians reject the homosexual lifestyle, and say it should not be accepted by society. 

 Ortho Christian(Orthodox Christianity) Dec 5, 2019

According to a new Pew Research survey, of all Europeans, Ukrainians and Russians are the least tolerant towards homosexuality. In the survey, “European Public Opinion Three Decades After the Fall of Communism,” Pew reports that only 14% of people from both Ukraine and Russia have a favorable attitude towards homosexuality. Unsurprisingly, homosexuality is more accepted overall by Western European countries. Of the nations surveyed, the highest level of support comes from Sweden, with 94%, followed closely by the Netherlands, with 92%. Germany, France, Spain, and the UK all polled in the 80s, with Italy at 75%. 

The numbers are markedly lower in Central and Eastern Europe. Of the other solidly-Orthodox nations included in the survey, 32% of Bulgarians and 48% of Greeks are accepting of homosexuality. In Lithuania—28%; Czech Republic—59%; Slovakia—44%; Hungary—49%; and Poland—47%.

For comparison, Pew notes that 72% of Americans today say homosexuality should be accepted by society—lower than the median of 86% in Western Europe, though much higher than the numbers in Central and Eastern Europe.