1. We're used to this but Trump's open admiration for Putin is remarkable. Nor is it a quirk of his personality. There's a wider swath of right wing opinion that is quite fairly described as Putin friendly.
https://twitter.com/dabbs346/status/1496647138738159624
2. There's a Resistance Liberal narrative focusing on Trump as explanation for this Putin fandom ("Putin's puppet"). This has always struck me as both too conspiratorial and ignoring the much longer tradition of ideological affinity between USA right & Russian authoritarianism
3. Russia as a bulwark against liberalism goes back to Metternich, if not earlier. This was briefly eclipsed under communism but even then there were a few figures, notably the fascist agitator Francis Parker Yockey, who looked to Russia with love.
4. The roots of right-wing Russophilia are complex, mixing elements of anti-liberalism and white supremacy (sometimes in tension). Steve Bannon perhaps got to the nub by saying, admiringly, "Putin ain't woke."
https://twitter.com/carolecadwalla/status/1496678275975897089
5. A deep dive into the history of pro-Putin sentiment on the hard right. jeetheer.substack.com/p/putin-aint-w…
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