Diplomacy, Demons, and Tucker Carlson

Tucker Carlson has once again taken the internet by storm, this time for a fiery exchange with Senator Ted Cruz of Texas over Iran, Israel, and isolationism writ large.

Tucker has been criticizing the Trump administration on these subjects, piquing the president enough that he fired back. “I don’t know what Tucker Carlson is saying,” Trump, who knows Tucker personally, told reporters. “Let him go get a television network and say it so that people listen.” The president followed that up with a post on Truth Social: “Somebody please explain to kooky Tucker Carlson that, ‘IRAN CAN NOT HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON!’”

Tucker Carlson was once a brilliant political essayist, but these days, “kooky” is a sadly accurate way to describe his trajectory. I’m not referring to his non-interventionist views, of which there is a long tradition on the American Right. I’m referring to his expressed view that, for example, the U.S. government may have entered into an agreement with aliens or extraterrestrial spiritual forces. Or his claim that the atomic bomb was likely invented by demons during a discussion with Steve Bannon

The situation is this.

Ukraine War has opened up a Second Front in Iran.

Success in Iran will create a southern front against Russia for more intrigue like Syrian and Libyan Civil Wars through Central Asia.

The US gives Taliban money so Afghanistan neighboring Iran plays in this didn’t the USSR once invade Afghanistan payback time.

Now China also borders Afghanistan.

The pathway is open to do a Libya-Syria with the Uyghurs of Western China.

Uyghurs are Turkic people so yes there is something to Lindsey Graham and Donald Trump their love of Turkey-Erdogan and acceptance of the new Turkish backed government of Syria.

“I’ve taken a train out of that station. If Tucker had done so, he would have seen cinder block houses with tin roofs scant miles from Moscow. He didn’t, of course.”

Whatever else this writer wrote, I’m calling horse hockey on this claim. I doubt there is a single cinder block house in Russia. Okay, maybe somehow somewhere maybe a two or three. I never saw a single one.

They do have rustic wooden houses that often lean at weird angles. (think Anatevka in Fiddler on the Roof).

Those dachas on the outskirts of Moscow are weekend houses where city dwellers spend weekends tending their little vegetable plots and fruit trees. They’re meant for rustic living, sort of like our weekend mountain cabins used to be. It was how they made do during Soviet times. They used to have no running water or electricity, but times have changed and still changing.

Russians love “camping” in their dachas on summer weekends the same way Americans love weekends at their rustic mountain cabins or Cajun “camps” on the water.

You also find wooden houses, yes, also leaning at odd angles, people actually live in in the smaller villages.

Note: Stupid spellchecker thinks it should be Toddler on the Roof. Yikes! Nobody wants that! Now if Tucker said spellchecker is demonic, I’d have to agree with him on that one.

Many of those dachas are huge and are year round dwellings. The middle class and up live in there and the parents commute to Moscow while grandma stays with the kids.

Plenty of cinderblock single family houses but they are relatively new.

Lots of tower apartments that look awful but are well done on the inside. Russias own the inside but not the outside or common areas. No one is sure who does so they are not maintained.

The ramshakle house are mostly pre-Soviet. There can be awesome when repaired but most aren’t.

At one time before we made Russia an enemy, Russians wanted American houses, retail stores, cars, music, and American style freedom. They were in love with the American of the Reagan era.

On that I think we can all agree with that nostalgia.

I stayed in dachas families had built during Soviet times. You could get a little plot in a dacha settlement, but it was up to you to build it from whatever materials you could manage to scrounge.

During Soviet times, anything that wasn’t locked up, nailed down or under guard was considered fair game and free for the taking. I was amazed at one dacha I stayed in, and complimented my friends on how straight and sturdy their dacha was, unlike all the others which were kinda wonky.

The father (who was a mechanical engineer) beamed and explained how he had used railroad timbers for the bones of the structure, how they were just left out in the open for the taking when railway workers started to build a bridge, but for some reason abandoned the project.

The other dachas in the settlement were built by amateurs out of whatever they could scrounge.

Yes, the ramshackle houses people live in in the villages are often pre-Soviet.

I thought they used they used those new foam blocks, not cinder blocks, for the new ones?

I didn’t visit Russia in the 80s, but a wonderful elderly gentleman at my church did. He went with a church peace group and had the time of his life. His photos were great. He Said the people were super friendly and welcoming and curious about American life. They walked from village to village part way between Moscow and St. Petersburg, took the train for most of the journey, got to visit both cities.

I missed the horrors of the early nineties but spent quite some time there during the latter Yeltsin years. Heartbreaking poverty, but despite the horrid way we had treated Russia, the people still loved Americans and wanted to be like us, wanted to our friend, desperately wanted Russia to be allowed to join the West. I could go and on.

I haven’t been there since, but kept up with old friends who sent photos and videos of all the changes there once they got internet. Sadly, first the husband died, then the wife (both of old age), and I’ve lost touch with the daughter who now lives in New Zealand.

Even back in the 90s, I thought we were nuts not to get friendly with the Russians — China was the rising superpower to worry about and Russia will always be a distant third in the superpower contest. Better to have them more on our side, two against one (plus the geography thing). During this century, I grew more and more horrified at the way we were pushing a reluctant Russia into the arms of China. Well, it’s done now, no going back.

Back to the article. You can see lots of ramshackle wooden and dilapidated masonry houses in other former Soviet countries (like Ukraine!) and in the Balkans. Some I saw there had dirt floors and worse than any I saw in Russia. And in the USA, you can see lots of cinder block houses in Florida, lots of trailer parks in any state, ramshackle houses in lots of areas.

The author of this article just seems so arrogant and biased.

I like your screen name, BTW!

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