The 2024 U.S. election is about a lot of enormously important issues.
Will the nation remain committed to addressing the global climate emergency? Will it further undermine or even end basic human rights like reproductive freedom and marriage equality? Will it continue to construct and rely on public policies rooted in science and facts or cede control to those who champion superstition and conspiracy theories? Will it live up to its heritage as the world’s melting pot or retreat into the mire of nativism and xenophobia?
But as has become increasingly apparent in recent weeks, there is another, even more fundamental matter at stake — something that would have been unthinkable throughout most of American history, but that now rears its ugly head in the halls of Congress, in news headlines, and the nation’s modern electronic public square every day.
The question – shockingly and frighteningly – is whether the United States will continue as a democratic nation, a nation of laws, and the leader of what’s long been known as the “free world.”
And while there are many enormously important subjects connected to this question and indicative of the broader debate that grips the country, right now, one clearly tops the list: America’s response to Russian dictator Vladimir Putin’s brutal and illegal invasion of Ukraine.
For a shaky but bipartisan majority of Americans, the fight to save Ukraine and its democratically elected government and Western-oriented society from Putin’s clutches (while also dramatically bolstering European security) is an absolute imperative. Helping an ally to resist an unprovoked attack and the tyranny that the Putin dictatorship represents speaks to the essence of who we are as a people. Holders of this view rightfully see Putin for what he is and the threat he represents and recognize that turning our back on Ukraine in a moment of such profound peril would constitute the ultimate treachery and betrayal.
Amazingly and disturbingly, however, a not insignificant minority — led by former President Donald Trump — sees things differently. In a series of actions that would have sickened previous Republican presidents like Eisenhower and Reagan, this group has not only opted to block American aid to Ukraine, but to attack and undermine the Ukrainian regime and disloyally undermine national foreign policy by making overtures to Putin.
North Carolinians can see this divide playing out among their own elected leaders in the stances of their two Republican U.S. Senators.
For senior Sen. Thom Tillis, opposition to Putin and what he stands for is obvious and essential. As he stated recently and accurately in the aftermath of the death of Russian dissident and Putin opponent, Alexei Navalny: “Navalny laid down his life fighting for the freedom of the country he loved. Putin is a murderous, paranoid dictator. History will not be kind to those in America who make apologies for Putin and praise Russian autocracy.”
Sadly, however, Tillis’s colleague, North Carolina’s junior senator Ted Budd, has thrown in with the Putin protectors. This fact was brought home earlier this month when Budd voted along with 28 fellow Republicans of the far right in opposing a bipartisan aid package for Ukraine, Taiwan, and Israel. In so doing, of course, he’s mimicking the manufactured and disingenuous stance of U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, who continues to link approval of Ukrainian aid to the unrelated subject of domestic immigration reform — a topic on which Trump has forbidden agreement.
And while all of this would be one thing if it were truly born of some kind of genuine or principled, Nixonian realpolitik beliefs about international relations and the best interests of the western democracies, it’s increasingly clear that it’s actually being driven by the Trumpian right’s overt and appalling embrace of authoritarianism.
Trump and his minions like Budd (and tools like Tucker Carlson) aren’t doing the bidding of Putin and other murderous thugs around the world like North Korea’s Kim because they think it’s the best way to protect the U.S. and its allies and principles. They’re doing it because they recognize these dictators as kindred spirits — corrupt, power-hungry bosses who cloak their pursuit of unaccountable power and personal wealth in cynical appeals to nationalism, religion, and cults of personality.
Ultimately, the Trumpian right’s abandonment of Ukraine (and even the rest of Europe) and its embrace of Putin and company aren’t just frightening because of what it portends for the good people of Ukraine and Eastern Europe (and, indeed, Russia), it’s terrifying because of what will be in store for Americans if and when such a movement gains complete control of the U.S. government.
In the end, Sen. Tillis might be right that history will be unkind to Putin’s friends and apologists. One certainly hopes so. But this presupposes that the U.S. and other democratic nations continue to employ and empower honest chroniclers of that history. And at a moment in time in which lovers of autocracy and their accomplices wield so much power and stand ever so close to assuming control of the U.S. government, such a prediction appears worrisomely questionable.
NC Newsline Editor Rob Schofield oversees day-to-day newsroom operations, authors regular commentaries, and hosts a weekly radio show/podcast. Republished from ncnewsline.com.
