Is Donald Trump, Vivek Ramaswamy, Jill Stein, Elon Musk, Jordan Peterson, Glenn Beck, Peter Thiel, Noam Chomsky, The Heritage Foundation, Matt Taibbi, Daily Wire, The Nation, Turning Point USA, Ben Shapiro, the African People’s Socialist Party, Fox News and Code Pink have something in common?
They are all Russian apologists! Stooges of Vladimir Putin! All part of a right-wing, left-wing, and/or center-wing conspiracy to paralyze Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the brave Ukrainian freedom fighters! And this is not just a blacklist, according to the award-winning Ukrainian non-governmental organization that put together this unlikely rogues gallery, but simply a “statement of facts.”
Let’s back it up a bit, though. On June 6, Texty.org – the aforementioned Ukrainian NGO, winner of several media awards – published a strange interactive map connecting the “nodes” of “forces in the US that block aid to Ukraine and how to do it.”
“Study,” for example, this title is “Roller Coaster” – and I must admit, that’s how the brain felt trying to absorb the connections and rationality behind people. Every supposedly anti-Ukrainian – and, by extension, pro-Russian – “node” is graphically connected in such a haphazard and febrile way that a person with very little common sense would have to read it like an index card. -and-strings scene from “A Beautiful Mind.”
Most of these people and organizations are listed for the crime of endlessly questionable, unaudited, military and financial aid to the Ukrainian government.
“We have identified a wide spectrum of enemies of the aid, ranging from Trump supporters to communists, and examined their connections,” Texty said in the article. “While our research does not cover every public figure who opposes aid to Ukraine, it highlights important individuals and public arguments that often reflect Kremlin propaganda.”
To be fair, he included a caveat thrown into the piece: “Most of the people in our study have no direct and proven ties to the Russian government or propagandists.”
Oh.
Also to be fair, there is a very A small number of people and organizations in the constellation of John Nash are crazy who deserve to be called out as Putin’s marionettes. RT, which is the Russian state media, clearly made the list. So is The Grayzone, the weird disinformation outlet that goes to great lengths to defend every anti-democratic, anti-American, pro-irredentism regime on planet Earth.
But Jordan Peterson?
“In mid-2022, after the destruction of Mariupol in eastern Ukraine by Russian forces, Jordan Peterson, a widely followed Canadian psychologist and Dostoevsky fan who was treated in Moscow for six months in 2020, rationalized Putin’s attack on Ukraine as a defense of Christian values traditional to the corrosive impact of Western culture. This narrative is in line with the explanation given by Russian officials to domestic audiences,” the piece said.
He likes Dostoevsky, one of the greatest artists in human history? Holy Moses – Me too! I’m a Muscovite stooge and I don’t even know it.
Other than this assassination of Jordan Peterson’s character, you may not be surprised to learn, leaving out a lot of context that essentially qualifies as a lie.
By his own account, Peterson sought treatment in Russia not because he was impressed by the country’s leadership or the cultural climate, but because Russian doctors were the only ones willing to try a novel treatment to ease withdrawal from a class of anti-anxiety drugs called benzodiazepines that he had been prescribed after a cancer diagnosis. his wife; withdrawal from benzodiazepines, if handled incorrectly or in patients with severe sensitivity to the drug, can be fatal. It is important information to just elides over if you want to casually mention that Peterson has been medically treated in perfidious Russia as proof of his disloyalty.
And, as for how Peterson “rationalizes Putin’s attack on Ukraine as a defense of traditional Christian values ​​against the corrosive influence of Western culture,” this is such an oversimplification that it is conceivable that the person in Texty who typed those words could keep it straight. face
Peterson, instead, joined the discussion and wrote a piece for the Daily Wire — another tentacle of pro-Putin agitprop, according to Texty — noting that the Ukraine-Russia conflict is more complex socially, culturally, and geopolitically than the prevailing narrative of “Vlad wants to invade the country, Vlad attack the country, Vlad is bad and should be attacked by American missiles.”
This is just one example of how rude, misleading and propaganda-tastic this garbage is. I can not go through every fallacious and hurtful statement made to try to prove that these “glands” were Putinian stooges, because for something that long I’d need an advance from the publisher.
All I can say is that I’m a little disappointed that The Western Journal didn’t make the list. What, we are not important enough? I know that I have been insulted! I know that I have been insulted!
But wait: It gets worse. As it turns out, the people behind Texty.org have ties to the American government. What a surprise! Who would have imagined?
As The American Conservative – a publication that can make the “Roller Coaster” list, it should be noted – reported, the founder of the NGO, Anatoly Bondarenko, is a trainer for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
“Bondarenko is an instructor for the State Department’s ‘TechCamp’ program, which provides training for foreign journalists, NGOs, and activists,” the outlet said.
“The association of Bondarenko and Texty.org.ua to TechCamp and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is very public, with the TechCamp website listing Bondarenko as a trainer for the Ukraine TechForum program. In this program, more than ’60 local journalists, civil society, community leaders, and partners private sector’ are taught various media skills through the State Department’s TechCamp.
The connection was enough that two GOP lawmakers – Ohio Senator JD Vance and Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz, both on the list, as well – called Secretary of State Antony Blinken to investigate.
“If this was just some random news in a foreign country, the hit piece would be easy to ignore. But the founder of the group himself, Anatoly Bondarenko, is listed on the US government website supported by the United States Department of State, Bureau of Education and Culture,” said a member parliament in a letter on Tuesday.
“Needless to say, whatever we think about America’s foreign aid or support for Ukraine, all Americans can agree that our tax dollars should not support direct attacks on the US people based on reasonable political disagreement, and especially not direct attacks on US legislators based only on his voice.”
And Glenn Beck, one of the many conservatives who entered the list only to question the unlimited funding and material support for an unwinnable war in a country not known for corruption, as well as America’s love for “color revolution” astroturfing. in uncertain countries want he, expressed his anger at being included in the list in a post on his blog.
“We have carried out a color revolution in the Middle East, Latin America, and Eastern Europe,” he wrote. “Ukraine is one of them. This is how they do it. The United States stays away from ‘dirty jobs’ by bypassing NGOs and trade unions. They train and mobilize street movements – like the Black Lives Matter 2020 riots or today’s pro-Palestinian protests. These movements are funded by the same person and appears every four years.
“Well, why am I on this list? I’m sure I’m on this list because I’m telling you what’s going on,” he said. “We have a color revolution that’s happening in our own country. Our government, NGOs, George Soros, and all the same actors used to start a color revolution abroad are now starting a color revolution in the US”
Unfortunately, it is very unlikely in 2024 America, especially when the State Department has suspicious ties with NGOs that publish a list of de facto enemies and show all those mentioned explicitly or implicitly on the side of Russia. I would cheer up if I were Glenn Beck, though: There are certain blacklists that pay off, and this latest Russian hoax is definitely one of them.
This article first appeared in The Western Journal.
