If you want to understand someone’s values or worldview, take a look at who (and what) provokes outrage and who (and what) evokes sympathy. The cognitive dissonance inherent in much of the American right can make such an examination problematic.
That’s because some of the most prominent voices on the right today view Vladimir Putin as a misunderstood victim. Meanwhile, they cast Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as an authoritarian strongman.
Consider the message of right-wing commentator Candace Owens, who recently tweeted: “STOP talking about Russia. Send American troops to Canada to deal with the tyrannical reign of Justin Trudeau Castro. He has fundamentally declared himself dictator and is waging war on innocent Canadian protesters and those who have supported them financially.” Dictator? (Hardly.) Innocent protesters? (This only makes sense if you also believe the Jan. 6 rioters were harmless tourists.)
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Or consider Fox News host Tucker Carlson, my friend (though we disagree profoundly on politics) and former boss. Carlson isn’t outraged over what is happening to Ukraine, but found time last week to bash “strongman” Trudeau as “the dictator of Canada,” while saying that “Canada canceled democracy…”
There’s also Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who says Trudeau has gone “full dictator.” And J.D. Vance (celebrated author and Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate in Ohio) who recently declared that he “doesn’t really care what happens to Ukraine.”
If the 1985 version of Marty McFly transported to 2022, it would be impossible to explain to him why so many conservative Republicans are willing to look the other way on Russia invading a sovereign nation, while they simultaneously blast Canada for imposing consequences on protesters blocking traffic. Heck, you probably wouldn't even need to go as far back as 1985. How about 2005?
To be clear, Putin is a former KGB agent and an actual authoritarian. He literally kills and imprisons his critics. Russian citizens probably couldn’t get rid of him if they wanted to. But they don’t want to, since their world knowledge is fed to them via Russian media propaganda.
And don’t forget the little matter of 100,000 of his troops massed on the Ukrainian border.
Meanwhile, Justin Trudeau is the elected leader of a free nation. He took action to restore law and order after three weeks of truckers blocking traffic and generally disturbing the peace.
“We cannot and will not allow illegal and dangerous activities to continue,” Trudeau said in a speech, citing “serious challenges to law enforcement’s ability to effectively enforce the law.” In a different world, this would be called “leadership,” and Trudeau would be hailed by conservatives for demonstrating “toughness” and for not letting lawlessness prevail. At least, that would be the case if the protesters were hippies or Black Lives Matter protesters.
Now, as a conservative, I’ve never been a big fan of Trudeau, and his critics do have one point about what he did that I find persuasive. As The New York Times writes, Trudeau “invoked an emergency measure that gave the police the ability to seize the protesters’ vehicles and allowed banks to freeze their accounts.” Freezing people’s bank accounts and doxing donors (which was done via a leak, not by the government) raises legitimate concerns about asset seizures and the implementation of a sort of “social credit system,” whereby unpopular political opinions are suppressed. “What the Canadian government is doing is a preview of what the US government in the future will likely [do to] dissenters,” writes the conservative writer Rod Dreher.
This argument is obviously a slippery-slope prediction, but those who care about preserving liberty must be vigilant in calling out attempts to limit free expression and stifle diverse political viewpoints—which, of course, is vastly different from punishing lawless acts like shutting down traffic.
Regardless, in the pantheon of civil liberties violations, Trudeau is a piker when compared with Putin. My friend Jeff Mayhugh sums it up perfectly: “In Canada, Trudeau is enforcing the rule of law and if the people of his country do not like the laws they can organize and lawfully remove him from power. In Russia, Putin is breaking the rule of law and the people have no recourse to stop his actions.”
I’m reminded of the “blame America first” phenomenon that was once a feature of the “useful idiots” and “dupes” on the left—but has become democratized, so to speak. To be sure, Canada isn’t the U.S., but they’re pretty darn close. The penchant to beat up the West, while giving the legitimate authoritarians a pass, is problematic and unhelpful. On the other hand, I do understand why Americans might worry more about creeping authoritarian tendencies closer to home than those occurring abroad. This concern makes sense, and not just for those who espouse an “American First” worldview, with all that entails.
However, we’re still comparing apples to oranges. The two dominant news stories right now (Russia menacing Ukraine and the Canadian truckers protest) provide us with a unique opportunity to compare and contrast people’s comments. If you find someone willing to defend Vladimir Putin for threatening to invade and kill his neighbors, while simultaneously calling Justin Trudeau a “dictator” for shutting down a lawless protest after three weeks, you have found someone who either is intellectually dishonest or has a warped sense of reality.
If you thought the gaslighting would end with Trump, you were wrong. The American right is getting in the habit of calling evil good and good evil. It’s a truly twisted and perverse perception of a dangerous world, and the scary thing is, it’s catching on.
