I went into my segment with Tucker intent on challenging him if the opportunity presented itself, but the brief appearance focused on my Oxford speech and ended before I’d had the chance to raise my objections to his coverage of the war in Ukraine.
His producer WhatsApped me immediately after to congratulate me on the appearance with the invitation to “Please come back soon!”. ”Here is my moment”, I naively thought to myself and replied with the offer to come back and discuss my disagreements with Tucker on the war in Ukraine.
The response was telling:
”I’m just not sure it would be great TV to have him debate you on the war”.
[…]
The message was clear: we don’t want to have a discussion about this and if you keep pressing the issue you won’t be coming back on the biggest show in America.
There’s nothing wrong with any of this. No one is entitled to appear on anyone’s show to talk about a subject they nominate. Tucker and his producers are perfectly entitled to invite the guests they want to discuss the subjects they want. But the incident made it obvious to me that Tucker was not a truth-seeking journalist and that when it came to Russia and the war in Ukraine, at least, he had no intention of being objective. That much is obvious, especially after the events of the last week. But the real question is why?
Like Kisin, I once saw Tucker Carlson as one of the good guys, on the same side. I am wiser now, even if we share a few of the same enemies. But sometimes, the enemy of my enemy is also my enemy.
Why? Because Tucker Carlson isn’t in the journalism business. He’s in the selling ad time on his show business. It’s why you don’t see serious debates on US tv shows outside of PBS. All the producers of those shows want to do is have short snippets of gotcha moments and yelling over each other where the host has some snarky comment they throw in once in a while that they can have between frequent commercial breaks.
That’s the nature of the beast when it comes to the US broadcast media and pundits. Once you understand that, the whole thing makes perfect sense.
See also Tucker’s more recent interview of “historian” Darryl Cooper.
@StevenR, your data is incorrect. Carlson’s web channel is subscription only, on which he does interviews that typically last one to two hours and he has no advertising on there at all.
I think describing Carlson as “the woke right” is ridiculous. There are few less woke people in America than he. Not that I am a fan boy, he has some very odd ideas that I don’t subscribe to at all, though I do, as it happens, agree with his views on the Ukraine war. However, he has some very interesting, in depth interviews with fascinating people. Nonetheless, I think it is a shame that he wouldn’t debate Kisin, since I think it would be the discussion of two well thought out and very opposite positions on the matter — something that is always good.
Since his departure from Fox he has changed his direction and goals, based on my observation, and what I have heard him say. I don’t really think he is trying to be a hard hitting journalist. He is obviously capable of being so if you see some of his ball busters at Fox news. But I think his purpose is more to platform under represented views and give them an opportunity to speak. That is what I see him doing, and he does that very well, even if some of his guests are pretty out there.
FWIW, I imagine that is the thinking of the show producers, rather than that he wants to go hide in the corner with his mommy.
I had no idea Carlson was no longer on tv. I don’t watch tv at all these days and assumed he was still doing his show on Fox News. Mea culpa.
There is little more infuriating than the expression of rapt idiocy Carlson adopts while one of his nuttier guests is spouting some deranged bullshit.
Maxim #29. 🙂
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Quotes/SchlockMercenary
Many years ago I read a book titled ‘Amusing Ourselves To Death’.
In summary: the whole purpose of commercial television is to keep you watching until the next advert break.
We’re the product. The content is the bait.
The example of the space aliens proved that Tucker Carlson is an entertainer, and (admittedly) a good one, NOT a truth seeker.
Mr Carlson produced a show about space aliens which he claimed that the government were covering up. Well some people really do believe this – and, therefore, it dominates their lives – “therefore” because if the story was true, if we really were being visited by alien beings from another civilisation – beings with wildly superior technology (otherwise they could not get here), it would make all other stories very unimportant indeed.
But then we were back to stories about the trade deficit, or about the election – or whatever. Space aliens forgotten.
In short Mr Carlson did not really believe what he had been saying about space aliens – it was just an entertaining show to get a lot of views and then off to the next show to be broadcast on X.
More recently there was the interview with Darral Cooper “the most honest historian in America” according to Mr Carlson.
Mr Cooper informed the listeners that he had read a lot of books – well that is nice, but an historian reads original documents and compares these documents to physical reality (for example a historian would read the German Declaration of War upon France in 1914, the actual document, and compare the claims the document makes with the physical reality of the time – and would find that NO France was not bombing Germany and-so-on, the German Declaration of War was a pack-of-lies), an historian then, perhaps, writes books – but an historian (a professional) does not get their view of the past from secondary sources (from books written by other people), but rather from primary sources (the documents, the testimony of witnesses, and physical evidence).
The above may sound pedantic (and perhaps it is pedantic), but it is important in this case.
Mr Cooper argues that the Nazis were not really the bad guys in World War II – that it is a “myth” that they were, and that, for example, there was no plan to exterminate the Jews.
What does Mr Cooper base his view upon? He bases his opinion on books that he has read – books written by people who say that the Nazis were not really….
Do you see the problem? Even leaving aside the fact that the Nazis WERE the bad guys in World War II – the basic approach of Mr Cooper is mistaken.
Now does Tucker Carlson really believe that the Nazis were not the bad guys in World War II – that Winston Churchill was?
No he does not really believe this at all – but he will have Mr Cooper on because it “gets clicks” – an historian saying that Hitler was the bad guy is boring (we have all heard that a thousand times) – but an “historian” saying that Hitler was not the bad guy is interesting, will get clicks, especially if Mr Carlson (like the good salesman and entertainer he is) declares that this is the “most honest historian in America” and acts as a promoter for him.
Next week it will be forgotten – the Nazi apologetics will be old hat, and we will back to Space Aliens, or Demons visiting this plane of existence from Hell, or whatever else that will “get clicks”.
As for modern politics – according to Mr Cooper, Israel “started” the present war in Gaza and had no plan for the civilian population which, according to Mr Cooper, makes Israel as bad as the Nazis (who are now suddenly the bad guys again – now it is useful for them to be so) in their invasion of the east (Poland and then, a couple of years later, the Soviet Union).
Hamas started the present war in Gaza – by attacking on October 7th 2023.
So the “most honest historian in America” is a liar.
As for Ukraine.
It is perfectly possible (possible) to make an argument that Mr Putin is going to win the war in Ukraine and that the West should not risk world thermonuclear war by a direct-intervention to stop him winning the war in Ukraine.
But that is NOT the argument that Mr Carlson makes – the argument he makes (at least sometimes makes – because things vary) is about American bioweapon labs in Ukraine (the germ warfare propaganda that the Soviet Union first used in relation to the Korean War – yes these agitprop lies are over 70 years old) – there were certainly labs in Ukraine, but NOT for producing bioweapons.
And we have the line that President Zelensky was not really democratically elected – that Ukraine was not a real democracy in 2022 when Mr Putin invaded.
Mr Carlson will then use evidence drawn from NOW – that President Zelensky has over stayed his term of office, that the elections were cancelled, that there is a lack of opposition media, that opposition political parties have been banned, that even some churches have been banned, and so on.
Notice the problem? None of that (none of it) was true in February 2022 before Mr Putin invaded.
Mr Putin did not invade because “Ukraine is not a real democracy” – why would Mr Putin care about that, Russia is not a real democracy either. It was the invasion, Mr Putin’s invasion, that led to the things that Mr Carlson complains about.
It is like pointing to the United Kingdom during World War II and saying “the elections have been cancelled”, “dissent has been crushed” and-so-on – and then using that as a justification for saying that the United Kingdom is the bad guy in World War II – as if Britain had not been a democracy (with lots of free dissent) in the 1930s.
Just as Ukraine was a democracy, with lots of dissent, up to the invasion of Mr Putin in February 2022.
One point, not so much in favor of Tucker as in favor of paying attention to him:
He gives voice to a lot of people that I think don’t show any call to be shown to millions of people. Aliens. Other stuff.
He also gives voice to a lot of people who a lot of other people don’t believe show any call to be shown to millions of other people but who I find I want to hear.
He’s sort of an equal opportunity kook. You can’t just watch him trustingly. But he does come up with some good stuff.
bobby b
Absolutely – Tucker is a very good entertainer, and will sometimes (indeed often) present people who have interesting (and TRUE) things to say.
He is just not the sort of person one should buy a used car from.
By the way – someone can be highly “theatrical” and still be passionate about the truth, but T.C. is not passionate about the truth.
Indeed, as I learned the hard way when, as a young trainee broadcast engineer, I once scheduled an amplifier failover test for the start of an advert break.
I was soon invited to an interview without biscuits… or coffee!!!
WindyPants – and it is much the same with Tucker Carlson’s X broadcasts.
The more people watch them, and the more people talk about them – the more money Tucker ends up earing for himself and his family.
So we are helping him right now – which is fair enough because, although he is not always truthful, he is very good at what he does.
There seems to be a connection between Tucker’s revisionism about ww2, and his contrarianism wrt Russia-Ukraine.
From this article:
It would be insane to compare Putin to Hitler (at least for now), but questioning the necessity of fighting against Hitler seems to me the necessary end of a trajectory starting from questioning the necessity of fighting against Putin.
Tucker Carlson has been going into a dark place for some time and now he is playing host to apologists for Hitler.
Candace Owens is also another of the rightwing folk who, either because she is terminally thick or just a grifter, has chosen to go into these places. Understandably, Ben Shapiro was well rid of her on the Daily Wire. I would be interested to know what Douglas Murray, who has been outstandingly clear on issues such as Israel’s fight for survival, makes of all this.
Far too many are willing to say that if this or that person upsets the Left, then they get a pass. They don’t. It’s an abdication of thinking, of evasion. I see too much of this today, and of course it makes me lonely at times when I call BS on the conspiracy theories that people have about the “stolen” 2020 election, for example, or for that matter, the equally annoying crap that the Democrats and their media stenographers spun about how Trump is a Russian plant, or that the assassination attempt on him in Pennsylvania a few weeks ago was staged.
Being able to cut through the claims and counter-claims that get thrown around today can lose you friends, but it depends on what you value more: integrity, or popularity.
Yaron Brook, in his news round-ups, touches on this issue of Carlson’s moral turpitude here.
I agree with Paul Marks that I would not buy a used car, or even a new one, from Carlson, or many of that ilk.
Thanks for the link, Johnathan. Brook is quite right.
Having said that I think study of Cooper is worthwhile. This is how to lie. You start off with a grain of truth. That stuff about feeding people? Probably true. Churchill not perfect? Also true. Then make sure you fail to put the truth into its proper context. He talks about Hitler’s peace proposals but fails to mention that Hitler had already broken his word. His promises were worth nothing.
There are probably a few other little tricks going on.
I wonder how much of the intellectual nuttiness of some on the right is due to the MSM. When you see a lie here and lie there and then another one there why not conclude that they are lying all the time?
I have no desire to be an apologist for Carlson, but I think some of what is being said here is not true. To be clear some of what is said here most definitely is true — his take on aliens is definitely kooky, and he has a lot of religious views that give me the collywobbles. I also think he goes too far in his extremist theories on the CIA, though, TBH I sometimes wonder if that is just me being naive.
But he is not on TV so he isn’t just entertaining till the next commercial break, because there are no commercial breaks. I actually don’t think he is a great entertainer: most people looking for a quick hit are not looking to watch two hour interviews without breaks. He does interview interesting people. He reminds me a lot of Joe Rogan. He also platforms a lot of interesting people with different, sometimes odd views. The big difference there is that Rogan is advertising supported and Carlson is not. However, I agree with whoever said “you can’t trust him”, for sure you need your critical faculties engaged and often you can tell after fifteen minutes that it is time to change the channel.
As to Ukraine, sorry Paul you are mischaracterizing his position. His position is very much a classical liberal American position of “stay out of foreign wars”. “It is none of our business”. “Let the Europeans fight it out themselves”.
Of course you are perfectly within your rights to say that you don’t agree with that position, that it really does affect the USA, that NATO obliges us to participate, that times have changed and two oceans don’t matter much, that it risks dragging us into a much larger war and so forth. Nonetheless, historically there is nothing at all odd about Carlson’s position on Russia. It used to be the standard libertarian take on just about every war. And of course, back to the OP, it sure would be interesting to see a debate on this from two capable advocates of the opposite opinions.
Again, I’m not at all defending Carlson unequivocally. He definitely can be platforming people who I disagree with, sometimes vehemently. But I am opposed strongly to the idea of no-platforming, I think it is very healthy to listen to views that I disagree with, and I think his format of very long, non advertising break interviews is what you’d want if you actually want to learn something.
FWIW, one other thing I find a bit disturbing in the discussion above (some commentators excluded) is this black and white view of the world. He is either my friend or my enemy. If I disagree with him on one point he is a kook to be dismissed and ignored. I think the world, people and relationships are really rather more nuanced than that.
I’m reminded of Rush Limbaugh for some reason. I agreed with a lot of what he said, certainly not everything, but with the sheer number of “revenue breaks” he had I found his show to be unlistenable. He would have a few minutes of content, be in the middle of a story for ten minutes, and then go to selling something or a good five minutes of ads, then back to the story for three minutes, then back to the ads. I get the whole point of the format was to keep people listening to the ads, but I would rather just flip on iTunes and not listen to people constantly hawking goods. I don’t know how the broadcasting works in the UK, but in the US we are constantly bombarded with ads, even to the point that it is starting to invade satellite radio (which we pay for) just like it did with cable TV (which we also pay for) and are starting to invade things like Youtube videos and podcasts. It’s bad enough I need to subscribe to podcasts, but paying and still having a pitchman sell me whatever is infuriating.
His position is Putin was provoked, which is quite different to “stay out of foreign wars”. In reality Putin was provoked only in the same sense as Hitler was “provoked” to occupy the Sudetenland with very similar justifications given.
What if Tucker is, to use the phrase commonly used by my teenaged daughter, chaotic good? Allow me to explain.
One day I stumbled across an interview with David Irving. (For those who may not know, Irving was a relatively well regarded historian who, for reasons best known to himself, became a Hitler apologist, anti-Semite and holocaust denier.) Whatever the causes of his personal journey, here was a man who had studied the subject far more intensively than I could ever hope to do. Surely there must be something to his claims, right?
Well, I listened to his arguments. There was one point he made that seemed plausible and worthy of further investigation. In short, he said, cremating the bodies of the holocaust victims required lots of coal. Where are these piles of coal in the images of the death camps? You have to admit, it’s a good question.
Except it isn’t, because he’d massively overstated the amount of coal needed per victim. When this error was corrected, the discrepancy goes away, and with it, any academic rigour that Irving claimed to have.
I don’t know who hosted that interview, but I thank them for sending me on that little spiral. By interviewing Irving and by letting me investigate that seemingly minor detail, I went from 99% to 100% confidence in the official holocaust narrative.
Good speech will always defeat bad speech and sunlight is always the best disinfectant.
One of my small claims to fleeting fame was I had a minor ‘kinetic exchange’ with David Irving many years ago 😀 Je ne regrette rien
@Perry de Havilland (Wiltshire)
His position is Putin was provoked, which is quite different to “stay out of foreign wars”.
I think you have the cart before the horse. Of course I could be wrong but from what I have heard, and I have heard him speak a fair bit on this, his position is “Stay out of foreign wars, and, btw especially so since Putin was provoked”, rather than “Putin was provoked and therefore this war is not justified.” Which is to say even if he didn’t think Putin was provoked he’d still think we should still stay out of the war. His foundation is “we should stay out of foreign wars” which is a matter of opinion, rather than “Putin was provoked” which is a matter of facts.
I feel the need to reiterate that I think that he has some out there views that I don’t agree with at all, some of them are stupid and kooky. He is, for example, a bit of a luddite, and I work in tech, so he’d probably wish people like me got put out of a job. But I think some of the discussion here is not accurately reflecting the reality of who he is. And I think platforming the unpopular is a very good thing indeed.
After all, if you can swallow “holocaust denier” has the right to his opinion, it makes it a lot easier to demand that “covid denier” has the right to his opinion.
One of my small claims to fleeting fame was I had a minor ‘kinetic exchange’ with David Irving many years ago
So you didn’t say — this guy is a holocaust denier, so I’m not even going to talk to the evil bastard? I applaud you. This is how free speech is supposed to work. I bet it would have been a hell of an discussion to watch. Video?
And BTW, you’d have been perfectly justified to do the “I’m not going to talk to this evil bastard” too. Freedom of speech goes hand in hand with freedom of association.
That is exactly the point I am making, he holds up the contention “Putin was provoked” as factor why Russia is not really the bad guy & US should not be helping Ukraine. But Putin was not “provoked” any more than any expansionist power is “provoked” by who they seek to occupy & annex into their empire.
No, I talked to him but he got in my face as he disliked the style & substance of my critique of his grasp on historical facts. I reacted poorly to him getting in my face, as I tend to.
As much as I am loath to agree with anything Irving says, he is right on the point that there is no documentary evidence that Hitler knew of or ordered the Holocaust. That said, of course he knew at the very least. The systemic extermination of European Jews, not to mention homosexuals, pacifists, Gypsies, Communists, political rivals, the mentally ill, the developmentally challenged, and all the rest that perished in the camps was decided at the highest levels. What was Himmler going to do when asked where the Jews were, say “oh yeah boss, I had them all killed on my own authority” or just shrug his shoulders and say “oh man, I just lost them the other day. Oh well”? I suspect it was more a case of Hitler saying “will no one rid me of this turbulent rabbi” in a meeting with Himmler than any written order from his office to direct the SS.
It’s like saying “there’s no documentary evidence Richard III had the Princes in the Tower killed.” No, there isn’t, but it fit in with his needs and plans and worked out for Dickie, didn’t it, at least until he died at Bosworth Field of course.
Sometimes historians have to actually say “no, we don’t have paperwork to support X, but given how it worked in favor of this guy, and basic human nature, we’re pretty sure the guy knew about or ordered X.”
That said, I hope Perry’s “kinetic exchange” was less of the yelling type and more of the fist to Irving’s snot locker type.
“Stay out of foreign wars” is not a classical liberal American position.
It’s a classical American isolationist opinion.
@Steven R
That said, I hope Perry’s “kinetic exchange” was less of the yelling type and more of the fist to Irving’s snot locker type.
Seriously? You think the way to deal with someone you disagree with, even vehemently, is to punch him in the face?
Context is everything, Fraser
I suppose that Perry’s encounter with Irving went something like this.
Here is some more context.
@Perry de Havilland (Wiltshire)
Context is everything, Fraser
Don’t you mean “Your honour, my client would like to point out that ‘context is everything'”.
Given the strange brew occurring over the last few days here in the US, and how it all seems to . . . intertwine . . . I’m starting to have the same feelings about Kisin. He’s really pouring it on about the “woke Right”, starting on the same day some other unhelpful efforts arise.
No, Fraser, that’s not what I mean at all. I didn’t get kinetic because of his views as such, I got kinetic because that’s where the interaction naturally went. I got ejected from the premises as a result by a large sympathetic security chap who grinned from ear to ear & that was the end of it 🤣
I learned all I needed to know about David Irving during the ‘Hitler Diaries’ farrago in the 1980s.
@PdH – funny you should say that, I never met the man, but I heard at the time that he had a remarkably-quick temper that could turn on a dime. I don’t believe he’s an anti-Semite, specifically – from what I’ve read, he seems to despise all foreigners pretty-much equally.
llater,
llamas
Remember the “mainstream media” are just as dishonest as Tucker Carlson is – for example….
For example, the Economist this week waxed lyrical about the censorship in China. And, the same edition of the magazine, backed K. Harris. Not a word about how K. Harris supports censorship (and how Supreme Court Justices appointed by Harris would use the Bill of Rights for toilet paper) – and wants to guide all thought in a Progressive direction via control of education and so on.
The contradiction, the dishonestly, was total.
And, of course, there was the standard lie (repeated every week for years – indeed decades) of pretending to be a Classical Liberal, roll back the state, publication – whilst, at the same time, supporting a bigger government. Now even supporting Democrat candidates (like K. Harris) who support using “the environment” as an excuse to make private property in land a legal fiction – as the government would be able to intervene, on “environmental” grounds, do control water, trees, and everything else.
The United States would no longer have real private property in land – any more than the People’s Republic of China does.
Tucker Carlson may pretend to believe in space aliens – but he does not support Democrats for high office (well apart from Mayor Adams – who he supported in the New York City election) – and that is much more important than space alien stories.
As for Mr Putin.
He no more supports the 1st Amendment or the 2nd Amendment, or opposes abortion, or is a Constitutional Conservative in any other way, than K. Harris.
“Stay out of foreign wars”. Well yes it is (not is not) a Classical Liberal concept – it was “peace, retrenchment and reform” Joseph Hume (peace was the very first word) and Richard Cobden and John Bright, and the others, were all about peace. But war is sometimes necessary – with one proviso.
I would add a few words to the line – “stay out of foreign wars” the words to be added being “unless you are going to win”.
One of the problems I have with most recent wars going back to Vietnam (yes I am that old) is that there is rarely any plan to WIN – there is rarely a plan for VICTORY (indeed victory is a forbidden concept – the objective is always a “political settlement” which means DEFEAT).
If the idea is, and it normally has been all my life, “let us spend lots of lives and money on a war – without any plan to win that war, indeed victory is a forbidden concept”, then I am not interested.
“Victory in Ukraine” has a nice sound to it – but what is the plan of Joseph Biden or K. Harris to win that war?
“‘Victory in Ukraine’ has a nice sound to it – but what is the plan of Joseph Biden or K. Harris to win that war?”
Hmm… yes. They – like all the other Western leaders – don’t really have one. That would involve mobilizing our (i.e., the West’s) industrial base to outfit the Ukrainian war effort with everything it needs to take the fight to Russia and grind down that country’s will to continue its “special military operation”.
But that’s actual real world scary stuff with consequences as opposed to, say, posturing over “climate change” or fretting over “gender-based” this and that.
@Paul Marks
“‘Victory in Ukraine’ has a nice sound to it – but what is the plan of Joseph Biden or K. Harris to win that war?”
The plan is to continue this grinding war of attrition, with occasional victories to bolster things in the popular press, much as I believe I predicted a few weeks after the war started. That way arms manufacturers will continue making a fortune, politicians will continue being very self important, the bribery and corruption will continue unabated and we will remain in an “emergency” mode to allow all the governments involved to suppress us and steal our civil rights.
What will end the war? Most likely when Ukraine runs out of people to throw in the meat grinder. Over many years I have hired young Ukranian men to do programming work for me — for some reason Ukraine is a source of really good programmers. In the past couple of years two of these lovely, hard working, smart young men have been called up to military service. I don’t know their disposition, but there is a good chance they are dead or wounded. I find it utterly heartbreaking.
Politicians don’t plan wars for victory, they plan them for profit, either financial or political. The longer they go, the better it is, as long as they don’t pay the cost. Which is why Americans much prefer small wars far away. And Ukraine is perfect. It has all the financial and political benefits of war to politicians and there are no young Americans coming back in body bags to embarrass them in the press and make their dishonesty and avarice particularly apparent.
And even if you think the Ukraine war is justified and necessary you can surely agree that there are no worse people to run wars than politicians, especially the worst kind of politicians like Biden, Kamala, BoJo and so forth.
JJM and Frasor Orr – grim, very grim.
What you are saying, if true, would indicate that Ukrainians are dying in a war that can only have one outcome – and that outcome is not victory to Ukraine.
It would, if true, mean that people such as the then British Defence Secretary who rushed supplies to Ukraine in early 2022 (building on supplies and training that go back to about 2014) just got a lot of people, on both sides, killed – delaying the end of the war, but not changing its outcome.
Grim – grim indeed.
Massive protests in Brazil yesterday – protests against the rigged elections (election rigging that was approved by Washington) and the censorship and persecution imposed by the socialist regime.
And the international “mainstream media” ignore the protests – this is why people like Tucker Carlson (in spite of his very real faults) are necessary.
The international establishment remain committed to election rigging and to censorship and persecution – the establishment of a totalitarian system (Agenda 2030 – or whatever you want to call it), and the media are very much on board with the agenda.
Paul Marks: “Ukrainians are dying in a war that can only have one outcome – and that outcome is not victory to Ukraine.”
It might be cold comfort but Russia probably isn’t going to “win” either. Two and a half years on, its utterly shambolic invasion – sorry, “special military operation” – continues to stumble along.
I expected Fraser Orr to sound like Darryl Cooper, had no expectations about JJM, but am greatly surprised that Paul Marks takes the same position.
I am no military expert, but it seems to me that all what Trump has got to do to get Putin out of Ukraine is:
* frack, build pipelines, and export LNG like there is no tomorrow;
* privately tell Putin that he’ll allow the Ukrainians to use Western weapons all the way to Vladivostok if Putin does not get out of Ukraine, and that he (Trump) will do everything he can to help Putin to save face, and won’t make a fuss if Russians opposed to retreat from Ukraine end up dying in mysterious circumstances.
Tosh. That is one outcome, but by no means the only possible or even probably outcome.
@Snorri Godhi
You raise a good point. Were Trump to be elected that would be an end to the Ukraine war. Perhaps not in 24 hours, but quickly — and probably not in a way that many of the NeoCons here would like. However, I didn’t mention this in my comments because I think Trump has very little chance of being elected as things stand today, so the likelihood of that happening is small enough that it is barely worth mentioning.
Rather than editing what I typed and then replying to the thing they have you have created by editing – read what I actually typed.
Carlson’s positions vis a vis Ukraine have aligned with Kremlin talking points almost 1:1. Adopting the same Kremlin endorsed position as Mearsheimer with regards to spheres of influence and NATO “provocation”, extensive links with “The Grayzone”, promoting the “Ukrainian Biolabs” conspiracy, misrepresenting (quite deliberately) that the U.S. is sending “billions of dollars” to Ukraine, the utter farce that was his praise of supermarkets in Moscow and amazement at shopping carts you have to put money in to release, and on, and on, and on.
This is without his “just entertainment” positions where he was providing better propaganda for the DNC than they could have come up with themselves by waffling on about rigged voting machines “owned by Venezuela” and midnight raids on server farms in Frankfurt rather than, you know, those machines being tabulators and the company majority owned by Switzerland’s Post Office. Which is why Fox News got it’s ass handed to them in court and Tucker marched out of the nearest exit. But of course he was “just being silenced”.
In case it wasn’t clear, I really do not like that disingenuous, dissembling, self-aggrandizing poltroon.
That Fraser Orr does not mind being compared to Darryl Cooper, tells me all what i need to know about him.
@Snorri Godhi
That Fraser Orr does not mind being compared to Darryl Cooper, tells me all what i need to know about him.
I don’t really know anything about the man, never heard him speak, so I can’t comment. All I know is what people here have said. Assuming they are right that he is a Hitler apologist, what you said is plainly ridiculous. I am a pretty standard, peacenik, strongly pro free speech, anti fascist, “treat people by the content of their character not the color of their skin”, “government is way too big” libertarian, and is evident from every comment I have made here for many years. Those views are obviously the exact opposite of Hitler’s views.
So you took a cheap shot, which is fine, we all do it sometimes. I’m a big boy. I can take it. It is why I ignored your unwarranted insult and tried to stick to the substance of your comment.
I’m not really sure the source of your opprobrium, perhaps I said something equally unkind to you. If so you have my apologies. I find your comments often interesting and insightful, though I sometimes disagree. I hope we can get back to an honest respectful dialog.
Fraser:
I could say that that is exactly what i meant by comparing you to Darryl Cooper … but i would have to add a smiley.
The fact is, i have read arguments on the web that Lincoln is the real villain of the Civil War, that Hitler invaded Czechia and Poland because he was threatened by Stalin, that FDR provoked the attack on Pearl Harbor, that NATO provoked Putin into invading Georgia and Ukraine, and that the Jews provoked Hamas into the Oct.7 attack.
Guess which 3 of the above arguments i have seen made by peacenik libertarians?
Which is not to say that no libertarian made the other 2, it’s just that i don’t know about it.
But i appreciate the tone of your reply.
PS: I have also seen arguments that 9/11 was an inside job, or that it was provoked by American foreign policy over the decades. The first was made also by libertarians, although pretty fringe libertarians. I am sure that some libertarians made the second, somewhere.