A spokesperson for the Russian government clarified that it has rejected requests to interview Vladimir Putin from reputable media outlets
The Kremlin’s first public response to Tucker Carlson’s announcement that he’s landed an interview with Russian President Vladimir Putin was to fact-check the former Fox News host.
On Wednesday, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov confirmed that Carlson had indeed interviewed Putin, but took issue with Carlson’s claim that “not a single Western journalist has bothered” to interview Russia’s president throughout the nation’s war with Ukraine, which has raged for more than two years.
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Putin’s refusal to sit down with most Western media outlets likely has less to do with accusations of bias so much as an unwillingness to be subjected to legitimate scrutiny of his government. Russia has been accused of committing atrocities and war crimes in its offensive against Ukraine, including the unlawful executions of civilians. Putin’s government is also infamous for its frequent detainment of political rivals and critics, as well as the cloud of mysterious deaths and poisonings of those in his orbit.
Whether Carlson will question Putin on any of these matters remains to be seen. The former Fox News host’s history of granting softball interviews to controversial influencers, political figures, and authoritarian leaders, indicates this is unlikely. Given everything we know about Putin’s propaganda machine, it’s clear that in Carlson, the Russian government sees a safe opportunity to broadcast its carefully crafted messaging to American viewers.
I don’t think he’s a useful idiot, he knows exactly what he’s doing. 1980’s Trump was a useful idiot, advocating for the end of the Western international order because it made him look and feel smart and powerful.
Tucker is participating in a quid pro quo. He gets a major interview which makes him the center of the conversation for a while and gives him negotiating leverage in his next project, Putin gets his preferred message out to the American Right.
Yeah, but he’s definitely an idiot.
No, he’s intelligent, and that’s why he’s dangerous. He knows how to launder Russian propaganda and white supremacist talking points to a broader audience.
Your bar is so low. He simply panders to a very low iq audience. You know nothing of intelligence.
Manipulating idiots requires planning and calculated intent. Do not ascribe lack of intelligence to people who work very hard to hurt democratic ideals, whether they look like fools or no.
You are promoting a success fallacy. “Icons and leaders must be intelligent to have made it into positions of power and popularity” the fact is that a combination of chaos, charisma, privilege, and ignorance are actually more likely to permit a rise to power than intelligence. Don’t make assumptions about intelligence where there is no objective evidence. The words he speaks and the decisions he makes demonstrate emperic stupidity. Ascrbing a sense of evil calculating genius is unwarranted and empowers the stooges that follow him to presume that there is some sort of master plan with hidden potential for greatness.
I think he’s vying to up his VP cred. Would make him usedul, but maybe less of an idiot. Immoral? Yes. Idiot… Not entirely.
That’s why we gotta watch out for him. He gets VP and Trump dies? I think it could be worse than many imagine.
I’m already on suicide watch if Trump is prez again. At that point you’d be foolish to hold on to hope. I don’t care if he picks Satan for his VP or even Satan’s boss MTG.