Photo by Ilja Nedilko on Unsplash
Many people have written about the parallels between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump. Both men require their followers to blindly accept the truth as they see it. Neither Putin nor Trump will tolerate dissent in any form. To them, violence is the only mark of strength — and they are willing to sacrifice anybody who gets in their way.
But Putin has something Trump lacks: Putin is an intelligent, educated man. He’s a psychopath, but he’s not stupid. Whereas Trump, as former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson so eloquently put it, is “ a f****** moron.”
Trump also lacks impulse control. The combination of ignorance and lack of internal locus of control makes Trump a comical figure. If Trump had not received the backing of Republican Party leadership, he would have been laughed off the podium before his first campaign speech had ended. Instead, Trump became president.
It wasn’t until Trump was in office that the American people could see how unfit he was. Granted, the citizens of New York figured it out years ago — they witnessed his many failed business deals, knew of his family’s history of discrimination against Blacks, and were regularly subjected to Trump’s pathetic attempts to prop himself up as a playboy worth billions more than he ever possessed.
Trump is a loser. But what if he hadn’t been?
What concerns me today is not so much the similarities between Putin and Trump as the similarities between their followers. The people who put Trump on a pedestal and attempted to use his influence to destroy our democracy are not so different from the people surrounding Putin today.
Madmen succeed when sane men support them
The Republican base took their cue from the members of Congress who propped Trump up. If Republican leadership had done the right thing and disqualified Trump based on his obvious lack of qualifications, we would not be where we are today. The cynical, manipulative, self-serving nature of the current Republican leadership put Trump in power with the goal of using him to disenfranchise Democrats — that was their single focus — and it resulted in a dangerous case of tunnel vision.
Republican leadership didn’t have the foresight to realize that a moron with a toddler’s intellectual and emotional maturity might be difficult to manage.
I keep returning to the scene of then-president Trump sitting around a large table with his cabinet shortly after he became president. They were engaged in a sort of round-robin whereby everybody had a chance to speak. As one cabinet member after the other spewed embarrassing compliments about how honored they were to be part of such an esteemed president’s cabinet, I was astounded. It was more than awkward; it was horrifying. This was when I realized for the first time that the real danger to our country wasn’t Trump; it was the people using him to maintain their power.
The good news for America is that Trump’s history of criminal behavior has finally caught up with him. He is no longer president and can no longer use the power of that office to destroy our democracy.
Putin, however, is another story.
Russian sycophants prop up Putin and feed his delusions
In a recent piece by David Von Drehle in the Washington Post, Von Drehle describes the environment Putin has created for himself and how it led to Ukraine’s invasion and the Russian army’s inevitable failure.
All of Russia is not as stupid as this decision would suggest — but the Russians who correctly perceived the patriotism of the Ukrainian people had no way to warn Putin. The Russians who knew about the weakness of their army had no avenue to inform Putin. The Russians who understood the latent strength of the West weren’t welcome around Putin. The Russians familiar with the unpreparedness of the civilian reserves weren’t consulted by Putin. All the leader heard was the groveling echo of his own misconceptions.
The problem with lying to people is that they forget the truth if you do it enough. Surrounded by sycophants intent on pleasing Putin at all costs, the Russian leader has cut off all access to accurate information — curtailing his ability to assess the situation on the ground realistically.
While the rest of us can see how determined the Ukrainian resistance is and how disheartened and poorly equipped the Russian army is, Putin sees none of this. In an autocracy such as the Putin regime, the only truth is Putin’s truth.
State media are feeding the people of Russia lies to make Putin’s truth a reality, but this effort is failing. Putin needs a way to get out now — hence his referendum charade, designed to convince the world that Ukraine now wants to be a part of Russia.
Never mind that armed Russian soldiers have been forcing Ukrainians to sign ballots voting for annexation by Russia at the point of a gun. Never mind that the referendum came only after dozens of images of Russian conscripts resisting Putin’s call to join the military had been broadcast globally. Never mind that Putin’s cronies keep falling out of windows.
Putin’s power is collapsing in on him. Instead of protecting him from political rivals, the Putin loyalists who once defended him are now his greatest liability. They have handicapped him. Incapable of accurately assessing his situation, Putin is forced to resort to the kind of tactics he’s used in the past — regardless of their ineffectiveness in the present.
Deprived of any solid connection to reality, Putin is now flailing blindly. Our only hope is that someone can explain to Putin what will happen if he chooses the nuclear option.
If someone can make Putin understand that radiation from a nuclear bomb cannot be contained and will likely contaminate his own country as well as Ukraine, it may be possible to avoid a nuclear disaster.
The question now is whether Putin is capable of hearing the truth after decades of hearing nothing but lies. And if he isn’t, who among the sycophants surrounding him will have the strength of character to resist an order to bring about the end of the world as we know it?
The Putin regime will end regardless, the only unknown at this point is who he’ll take with him. If we survive, let’s hope we take a lesson from this horror show. Let’s hope the human race will finally learn the end does not justify the means and the only good answer in any situation is to do the right thing — regardless of whether it benefits us personally or not.
In other words, let’s hope we finally learn what every other war in the history of mankind should have already taught us.