“Careful, some on this board consider Putin to be the 2nd coming of Thomas Jefferson.”
Maybe not Jefferson, but he certainly LOVES HIS COUNTRY far more than the Democrats in power here, and does far more to protect his children there, while we’re surgically mutilating our children.
You have to think of Putin as a modern equivalent of the Czar. Almost none of them were ‘nice guys’ by modern standards. Like them he’s a Russian nationalist like them his goal is to advance the power, prestige & economics of Russia by hook or crook and if necessary, at all other nations expense (including us!). I can respect that! In fact, it’s refreshing it’s back to the ancient game of nations instead of exporting a secular religious ideology. We should go back to that ancient game and stop trying to make places like Afghanistan or Iraq like us. It took a long bloody painful history for the West and the USA to be like it is. That history & experience can’t be grafted onto alien societies. We need to learn that. We need to pull back our missionary zeal in exporting ‘democracy’, stop trying to do it. Putin’s Russia has no ideology to export any more, its goal is simple play the ancient game to be on top - increase national power. That should be our game too !
When he's not blowing up apartment buildings filled with Russians, or having Russians shot in the head, thrown from windows, or poisoned with Polonium 210 for the crime of exposing the crimes of the regime.