Putin, Trump, Obama and Our Shared Interests with Russia

The current insanity over the Russian hacking of DNC emails, not yet proved in my opinion, is another tempest in a teapot.  It has merely provided Obama another opportunity to demonstrate his petulance and contempt for Trump.  It's ironic that the hacks, as revealed on Wikileaks, demonstrate just how corrupt the media and Democratic party are.  Their collusion is only surprising as to the vastness of its extent.

Worth considering is the extent to which our nation's interests align with Putin's.  This is not the same as admiring Putin, who is a dictator and likely murderer.  But he is also the leader of a singularly important nation, whose interests have changed since the cold war.  Full disclosure, I am a former officer in the U.S. Submarine force, but that doesn't influence my thinking here.

First and foremost, both Russia and the U.S. have an interest in isolating and defeating Islamic extremism.  Russia is ringed by Muslims 'stans on its southern border.  Their experience with the Chechens demonstrated the need to contain the spread of extremism.  The U.S. interest in this matter is actually less clear, but certainly, our security from terrorism has to top the list.  With this common interest, cooperation with Putin on defeating ISIS in Syria, keeping the Sunnis and Shiites divided to contain extremism makes sense.  For the record, I don't think that the Arab Muslim world can ever be democratic due to the high rates of consanguineous marriage; Steve Sailer laid this out over a dozen years ago.

The other conundrum with Russia is the confluence of continued warfare in the Middle East and the Russian violation of the Ukrainian border and seizure of Crimea.  One of the key sources of conflict in the Middle East are the asinine borders that do not respect natural geographic feature or traditional tribal regions.  The rise of ISIS stems from the fact that Sunni tribes in both eastern Syria and western Iraq feel greater kinship to each other than to Shiite governments in Damascus and Baghdad respectively.  A redrawing of the borders is necessary to end the incessant warfare and migration crises.  But the U.S. is wedded to a policy of strictly maintaining the sanctity of borders worldwide.  We believe that a failure to do so would allow mischief to break out along Chinese, Indian, or other regions.  This is where Russia comes in.  Their seizure of the Crimea was just, in my opinion, given that it was stolen from the Russian federation in the 1950s by Khruschev.  Were we to grant the legitimacy of some border changes with Russia, they might be amenable to a deal where we redraw Middle East borders, as a one-time exception to the sanctity of borders policy.

I believe that the future of Europe has been put in danger by Muslim migration.  Dealing with the root causes, other than Merkel's fecklessness, is in our long term best interest. Only Europe and the Anglosphere share our values, so helping to save them from themselves is in the U.S. national interest.

The final way in which our interests align also involves Europe.  For various political reasons, Putin has postured as the only defender of traditional Christian values.  I doubt that he is sincere, but his example in promoting these values stands as a contrast to the current European model of attempting to destroy Christianity within the borders of Western European nations.

So I applaud Trump for his tweet.    

Russians are playing @CNN and @NBCNews for such fools - funny to watch, they don't have a clue! @FoxNews totally gets it!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 30, 2016

He knows he has time to deal with Putin.  Putin smartly decided not to retaliate against Obama's petulance, which was the alpha male move.  A relationship based on mutual respect and recognizing shared interests will serve the U.S. well when it comes to Russia.  Since Russia abandoned international Communism, our interests can often be aligned.

Look Who is Opposed to Fracking

So you oppose fracking (hydraulic fracturing) to produce natural gas. Would it surprise you to know that you agree with Vladimir Putin? Just follow the money:

A shadowy Bermudan company that has funneled tens of millions of dollars to anti-fracking environmentalist groups in the United States is run by executives with deep ties to Russian oil interests and offshore money laundering schemes involving members of President Vladimir Putin’s inner circle. . .
. . .
The foundation [funded by the Bermuda company] passed those millions along to some of the nation’s most prominent and politically active environmentalist groups. The Sierra Club, the Natural Resource Defense Council, Food and Water Watch, the League of Conservation Voters, and the Center for American Progress were among the recipients of Sea Change’s $100 million in grants in 2010 and 2011.,
. . .
The Sierra Club, which received nearly $8.5 million from Sea Change in 2010 and 2011, launched its “Beyond Natural Gas” campaign the following year. The effort has become one of the largest and best-funded environmentalist campaigns combating fracking and the extraction of natural gas in general.

Russia's interests are served by higher energy prices worldwide, so opposition to U.S. fracking by them is understandable.  All those years of using the KGB to foment propaganda against the West are still being put to use.

Getting beyond ad-hominem attack, I have always believed that environmentalists reflexive opposition to the new technology is based on a hatred of industrialization not a love for the environment. This is clearly the case with fracking and the increased production of natural gas.  Environmentalists should be ecstatic about the use of natural gas, instead we see the Sierra Club launching a campaign against it.  Last year, greenhouse gas emissions from the United States fell to their lowest levels since 1995.  It is well understood that increased use of natural gas to displace coal, has been a key factor in this reduction.   From the MIT Technology Review:

. . . the trend is largely the result of a rapid drop in coal-fired electricity, and a corresponding rise in electricity generated by cleaner fuels, especially natural gas.

You would think this would be cause for cheer amongst green groups. But then, you have to expect it will actual consistency from the environmentalists.

American Heroes, Engaged in Fracking Operations

Photo: Courtesy of Joshua Doubek

My Enemy's Enemy

. . . Can still be my enemy.  The left has set out to stifle my free speech on social issues.  I am compelled to recognize homosexual unions as marriages.  I am compelled to subsidize insurance plans that cover abortion. If I am a Catholic organization, I am compelled to pay for insurance for contraception.  All of these are attacks intended to delegitimize my social beliefs through government coercion.  So shouldn't I be thankful that there is a world leader ready to fight for the value of social conservatives?  Owen Matthews reports:

In his annual state of the nation speech to Russia’s parliament in December, Vladimir Putin assured conservatives around the world that Russia was ready and willing to stand up for ‘family values’ against a tide of liberal, western, pro-gay propaganda ‘that asks us to accept without question the equality of good and evil’. Russia, he promised, will ‘defend traditional values that have made up the spiritual and moral foundation of civilisation in every nation for thousands of years’. Crucially, Putin made it clear that his message was directed not only at Russians — who have already been protected from ‘promotion of non-traditional relationships’ by recent legislation — but for ‘more and more people across the world who support our position’.

Well, maybe not so much.  Here's the problem; Putin is a corrupt tyrant who has blood on his hands.  Other than that, he makes a great champion of family values.  Holman Jenkins recounts the tale of Alexander Litvinenko, who had evidence that Putin benefited from a series of bombings that the Russian state security apparatus manufactured themselves but blamed on the Chechens.  We see Putin's heavy hand in the Ukraine, where he has used bribery and economic pressure to undermine the desires of the Ukrainians for greater prosperity through economic ties to Europe.  (Whether that will lead to prosperity is anyone's guess, but it is their right to make the choice.)  Putin's machinations are well chronicled.

Taking up with the likes of Putin is never morally acceptable, nor it will it prove to be a winning strategy.  As much as I see the leftist tile of this administration as tyrannical (who else would be unashamedly suing the Little Sisters of the Poor?), throwing in with tyrants only weakens our cause.  The Russian Orthodox church has seen fit to again make an alliance with a tyrannical Russian government.  Historically in Europe, the alliance between church and state ultimately weakened the church, as it lost focus on its founder and became enmeshed in politics.  Some on the Christian Right, such as the World Congress of Families and Bryan Fischer are praising Putin.  I can not let this pass.  Our point of view will prevail, because it is grounded in fundamental and eternal truths, not because we find tyrants to help enforce our ideas.  We don't need to make a deal with the devil.

What You Should Be Reading

• The nomination of Vice Admiral Mike Rodgers to head both the NSA and U.S. Cyber Command has opened the door to more revelations about the extent of Iranian penetration of U.S. Navy networks.  I warned that our tacit admission regarding Stuxnet would have consequences. 
• Dean adds more to the leftism = fascism meme that started this post.  The problem with your California high-speed choo-choo? Apparently, not enough Mussolini. 
• The most under-reported story in America? The tragedies that the divorce industry wreaks on the American family. H/T Temple of Mut.