1/X So, some (unsystematic) remarks on #Putin's #Valdai speech: 1) Yes, he turned most of it into a rebel yell ag. the declining West, its arrogance, and attempts to maintain power. Much of that was instrumental yet based, actually, on fact. Don't like it? Complain to the...
2/X ... West for giving #Putin so much reality to work with. 2) Yes, he clearly tried to appeal to "another West" (and also another Europe) where he believes #Russia's position of multipolarity and cultural conservatism can find sympathy. So what? We, the West, see nothing...
3/X ...illegitimate in constantly appealing to what we see as "another Russia." Yes, same thing, like it or not. Two can play at that game. 3) Note: while calling for resistance to the West, he also insisted that the West as well would have a place in the new "multipolar...
4/X .... order," just on equal - and no longer hegemonic - terms. He also stressed that Russia is not "anti" any given nation; instead he rejected all forms of "xenophobia." 4) He made intriguing use of quotations (and thanked his aides for finding them), from Dostoyevsky...
5/X ... via Solzhenitsyn to, indeed (if implicitly) Marx/Engels etc. The Marx/Engels (or perhaps Lenin?) bit was most interesting because he used it to describe the international situation as "revolutionary," in that those "below" don't want to keep obeying and those "above"...
6/X ... don't want to give in. 7) He called for finding "common sense" solutions that would not be "ideal" but "would work." 8) His prediction for what will happen if we don't find such solutions was dire (but not, NOT a nuclear threat - of which has uttered far less than some...
7/X ... in the West claim (and no more than we do btw). 9) It is NOT true that he omitted the war in #Ukraine. Rather he spoke about it in detail in the Q+A w the moderator (def. no accident). I might do a second thread abt that part.
PS Make of the above what you will. Beware:..
PS Make of the above what you will. Beware:..
8/X ... My Russian is v good. I've worked from the original, of course. I've looked for what seemed esp. important to me. NO politics. So: If you want to do some infowar/NAFO-policing here, get lost right away. Don't even try.
(Apologies for typos.)
(Apologies for typos.)
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