If you find yourself in a circle, one where Tucker Carlson agrees with the “one of the leftiest lefties” who is a known Russian apologist, you may have a problem.
On a recent Wednesday evening, off to the side and up the stairs of the 92nd Street Y, beneath an old colorful ceiling and four chandeliers, one of the leftiest lefties asked a question of the couple hundred people in attendance.
“How did it happen,” Stephen F. Cohen wanted to know, “that liberals and progressives are embracing the FBI and the CIA in their war against Trump?”
There was a time, he noted, when the left was deeply suspicious of the American intelligence agencies. Flanked by his wife, the Nation’s Katrina vanden Heuvel, and Dan Rather, Cohen was there to sell and sign War With Russia?, which Tucker Carlson deems “a fantastic new book.” To the assembled, Cohen offered his longtime Putin apologia, waving aside the ills of Vladimir Putin and generally avoiding the topic of 2016’s hacking operation.
But this is the walk-through-the-walls world we live in now, where Tucker Carlson and Stephen F. Cohen commune together, and Patricia Arquette shouts, “Oh, thank you, Robert Mueller!” onstage at the Screen Actors Guild Awards.
BuzzFeed
Meet Vladimir Putin’s American Apologist; March 2, 2014; The New Republic
Cohen’s discussion with Fareed Zakaria was brief but telling. After first denying that Putin was a “rank dictator” and saying that he is not “a thug” or “anti-American” (would Putin even deny this last bit anymore?), Cohen got to the main point of his argument:
“Remember that was the second time in the 20th century that the Russian state had collapsed, the first time in 1917. So to recreate stability, prosperity, greatness, whatever that means in Russia at home and, in the process, restore Russia’s traditional zones of national security on its borders, that means Ukraine as well. He did not create this Ukrainian crisis. It was imposed on him and he had no choice to react. That’s where we stand today.”
Notice that Cohen initially argues that some sort of control over Ukraine is a requirement of Russian greatness. And then, after explaining this, he says the whole crisis was “imposed” on Putin! This is apologetics done well: first you explain why bad behavior is actually sensisble, and then you say that the bad behavior wasn’t really under the control of the bad actor.
The New Republic
That is coming from a publication started in 1914 under the Progressive era banner (though I must say I have always found that label being used today quite incongruent with who and what much of that early 20th century “Progressive era” was about – I don’t think it means what they think it means) known as being left of left-of-center in bias in the Media Bias/Media Fact Check banks.
In case you may have wondered, what is the legendary Jackie Chan up to now days….
He’s partnered up with National Geographic, National Geographic Society’s Emerging Explorers, and now with the Nat Geo’s show, Jackie Chan’s Green Heroes, a three-part documentary series “which captures stories of sustainability innovators to inspire and educate the public.”
After watching a National Geographic show featuring Arthur Huang, “a structural engineer from National Geographic Society’s Emerging Explorers and founder of Miniwiz — a global leader in post-consumer recycling technology that has designed everything from a recycled plastic, multi-tasking USB charging device for EKOCYCLE to Nike’s Air Max packaging and a concept store in Shanghai constructed from waste materials,” Chan “was deeply impressed.”
Inventor.
Jackie Chan is joining forces with technological innovator and National Geographic Emerging Explorer, Arthur Huang. Together, they have invented the world’s first fully mobile plastics recycling machine – The Trashpresso. Now, they’re on a mission to test it in one of the harshest environments in the world – the Tibetan Plateau. It will push the Trashpresso and its inventors to breaking point.
If you understand Mandarin or if you don’t mind English subtitles, here is the first in of the three series. Parts two and three are in production and pre-production.
Art and museum gallery owner.
Now you don’t have to wonder what Jackie Chan is up to now days, now you know!
Stay tuned.