Putin Goes Into Battle on a Second Front: Culture

[Uncle Joe]

(snip)

In a speech on Friday from the nondescript, beige-walled office in which he has been conducting much of his public business this month, Mr. Putin made no mention of Ukraine. Instead, he expanded upon a personal obsession: “cancel culture.”

(snip)

That the Russian president delivered a disquisition on Western public discourse on Friday may seem odd at a time when Russia is fighting what some analysts believe to be its bloodiest war since the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in the 1980s. But it underscores how Mr. Putin tries to channel cultural grievances and common stereotypes for political gain — while using language that also allows him to speak directly to possible allies in the West.

“This is his cultural front,” said Andrei Kolesnikov, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Moscow Center. “He’s also at war there.”

(snip)

For the moment, Mr. Kolesnikov said, Mr. Putin’s main audience when railing against Western “cancel culture” is domestic, with the Kremlin intent on feeding the grievances against the West upon which Mr. Putin draws much of his support. But casting Russia as a protector of traditional values from the thrall of wanton liberalism is also a message that finds sympathy around the world — including among American right-wing commentators like Fox News’s Tucker Carlson, whose monologues are often shown on Russian state television.

(snip)

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/25/world/europe/putin-cancel-culture-rowling.html

[PortTack]

1. Got anything else pootie?

[PSPS]

2. There is little distinction, if any besides language, between this and the GOP playbook.

Putin's "rally" the other day, complete with paid or coerced "fans" in attendance, had the identical stagecraft of a trump "rally."

[C_U_L8R]

3. He's senile or an idiot. Or both.

Putin is showing the world what he’s made of. And it’s awful and pathetic.

[dalton99a]

4. "Everybody is treating Russia very badly. It is very unfair"

"Many people are saying Russia won. It was a beautiful victory."

[The Unmitigated Gall]

5. Fuck you, Pootler

What the fuck have you added to “Russian Culture”?

Sorry about the “canceling”; when you target and bomb women and children, bury them under rubble, burn them to death, spread their body parts across the landscape, I just tend to do that.

I’m weird that way. So is the rest of the civilized world you thought you could gaslight.

Oh, and FUCK YOU AGAIN, MURDERING SCUM.