Vladimir Putin is very easy to understand and almost as easy to predict. He's a Russian patriot. He consistently does whatever he thinks is best for Russia's national interests, and he doesn't exactly keep what those are a secret.
The "West" (by which I mean the US and UK) has always regarded foreign leaders in the way they regard their own: as a Fuhrer.
With Putin regarded as such, he is scrutinized in the way you describe. It is a sorry tale, to tell the truth: scrabbling to find a diagnosis that fits the reality that Putin is 70 years old, and hearty for his age.
One day, something will bring Putin down, and the media will grasp the one article from 2006 that described the minor ailment that led to his demise.
Then the West will get what they deserve: a Russian leader who is as intelligent and as patriotic as Putin, but far less patient.
PS I don't buy you coffees because of your opinions (which I appreciate) it was because you allowed me to post comments without having to buy you coffees or subscribe or whatever. I appreciated that openness.
I get a lot from the comments. I learn a lot. I think you are right about the Western need for Fuhrers of one kind or another. One person wrote me and said "leaders" are a fiction, inconsequential in the final analysis, just expressions of a society, That got me thinking.... A bad habit -- thinking.
The idea of a fictional leader is one way to look at what one might term the "Trump phenomenon" - that is to say, you vote for Trump and his promises and you get the same regime as existed under Bush and Biden...
A democracy like Germany does not need "fuhrers" in the way the US and UK do. For years, the mainstream media was baffled that the Germans voted for Merkel, despite the fact that her image was trashed in the media.
What the media did not understand - and this is crucial to understand the difference between a political party and one that is only political on the outside (so to speak) - is that the political party has policies. Not promises that can be washed away, policies that are determined by the members of the party - and costed!
My point being that the German voters were not voting for a Fuhrer called Merkel, they were voting for the policies of the CDU.
It is the same with Merz. But you have to look very carefully to see what he is doing for Germany, because he is always spoken of in the media as being anti-German in the way many Fuhrers are.
You: As I said, in the “West” Putin is not “normal”. Not like Bush or Biden or Trump.
You made me lol.
I consider Vladimir Putin the best of the best. I have said "...the ONLY man." Among leaders. And I am not referring to gender, but to 'man' as universal human. I guess I mean, by saying that, the only one with that combination of integrity and bravery.
He's the cowboy, if you ask, "Where have all the cowboys gone"
He's there, right there.
(But there may be another, Ibrahim Traore, whom they've also wanted to kill, in a smaller nation.)
Back to Putin. Yes, obviously gifted. But that he uses his awareness and ability to think in service to his nation is what makes him so ...saintly? godly?
I am a bit confused, having read that Asperger's is a "disorder of empathy", meaning they have none. Maybe that has been updated too, or I should avoid pop psychology?
I have seen Vladimir Putin's empathy in his eyes, affect, acts. He feels and he cares.
Unlike Western leaders who act out false displays of feeling and caring that never touched them.
Yeah..Long life to him. If he gets that, we too may have hope for a future of something other than pain and suffering, the stuff "our" leaders deliver.
But I wish it for his sake. I respect and admire his goodness.
Interesting that you mention Traore, whose name I always misspell. Also interesting is the West's demonization of him. I would avoid pop psychology, which means DSM IV and V. Asperger's no longer exists as a separate "disorder" under DSM V, it is thrown in with all the other manifestations of autism. The Russians BTW do not use DSM. Nor do they view autism the same way although earlier research in the 1920s was Russian! Many people with Asperger's or ADHD are highly empathetic -- so much so -- that sometimes find relationships painful. They tend to be good with animals because they sense feeling directly. They are also good with children and the elderly. They make excellent counsellors. I have a variant of ADHD and I have done a lot of counselling. I love parties -- for about 45 minutes -- after which it is painful. On the other hand, I was raised before Asperger's or ADHD was a "thing". I was just another odd kid. I didn't have to "fit in". The mistake parents make today is trying to 'normalize" neurodivergent kids.
I started noticing Putin really when I started listening to his press conferences - quite different from western leaders - and then his speeches and so on. Although I agree with your analysis Julian, the main thing which stands out about Putin is compassion. Just look at how he approaches his people, his understanding of them and Russian history both near and far. One of the things he said about the break up of the Soviet Union is the fragmentation of peoples. Russian people who considered themselves Russian and who ended up outside the Russian Federation suddenly found they had lost their nationality. Explains a lot. There are Russian troops in Transnistria because there are many Russians living there - the troops were sent in as peace keepers and still remain to this day. I bet the Transnistrians really hope Russia will take Odessa and make its borders with Transnistria so they can join the Russian Federation! Like you articles! Lots of snow in Nova Scotia, probably Tokyo finds it difficult. Greetings to Ichi and Chappy from my crew.
You make a good point. Compassion! I should have pointed out that "Type 3" "thinking" includes the capacity for compassion, which of course requires empathy. I did write that fundamental to the genetic changes that define "behavioral modernity" is empathy and ego transcendence,which allows altruism. That allowed Paleo bands to look after each other. From my point of view, "Type 3" is emotional logic . I wrote a couple of posts a while back about Putin's capacity for compassion and how that distinguishes him from other leaders. my "special articles" also talk about that. But I don't think I have expressed these ideas very well. Then again no one in the academic community talks about these things. Thank you for this comment -- it helps a lot!
“Type 3 thinking” frankly sounds like psychobabble some American academic idiot “invented” to enable the usual book/seminar/world tour/ Oprah scam , which lasts long enough to make a buck , then sinks into the slime of current western intellectual culture, never to be seen again.
The above is a practical example of TYPE 10 thinking, BTW.
Book , seminar and world tour coming soon. Send money.
' Looking at facts and realities he perceives patterns and relationships and connections that others do not. He appears as a gradualist because he is aware that wisdom comes from knowing that you don’t know - that things can change; prediction, probabilistic; and the future, uncertain. It’s non-linear and can be slooooooooooowww! '
A perfect way to describe ' Sensing of the Wordless Reality. '
In the gravest extreme everybody's top priority is to save themself, even if it's just so they can exist to save those they care about. Putin's top priority is to save Russia, which is as it should be. The rest of the world, Gaza included, is having a collateral benefit to Russia saving itself. Russia is not going to risk saving itself to save anybody else if they foolishly endanger Russia while getting assisted. Regarding Gaza, are we talking recovering Palestine from its invaders of just living peacefully in the dog house? Only Palestinians can make and act on that decision. The world may wail and lament the Palestinian situation, and make condescending decisions for them, but nobody is sacrificing their own self interest for the Palestinians, least of all the Israelis or Americans. I personally think Palestinians are ambivalent about how they resist the theft of their country, and this type of game is not for the ambivalent. If they misstep they will go the way of the American Indian. In fact eventually we all will if we misstep. Iran wants Israel gone because Israel is a threat to their neighborhood, they prefer to do it by proxy attrition but will do it suddenly if they have no choice. As a country, Iran is not ambivalent. Russia is their friend because they are useful to Russia's interests, and China's, and those countries don't stand tight with the ambivalent.
As usual your writing is thought provoking and informative.
We will continue to disagree on Trump, whose recent moves in the Western Hemisphere seem clearly to acknowledge a coming calamity that requires a riddance of all Russian and Chinese influence, both marshal and economic, in South America and a secure control over Greenland natural resources and access to the Arctic circle. Remember the Greenlanders have a legal right conceded to them by Denmark in the ‘70s to disassociate themselves from Denmark by an internal election supporting politicians who support the notion. Trump has an agreement, not by a military invasion, that gains access to the natural resources and to strengthen US military presence. I would suggest that as the EU tumbles toward war with Russia and the European financial crisis deepens over the next few years Greenlanders may yet decide to line up with the US.
I REALLY like "the Gunslinger Gait". Loved the Good, the Bad and the Ugly. Here in Japan I guess it's the "Samurai Gait", depending on how you sling you sword. Also those damn sandals keep on slipping off.
Vladimir Putin is very easy to understand and almost as easy to predict. He's a Russian patriot. He consistently does whatever he thinks is best for Russia's national interests, and he doesn't exactly keep what those are a secret.
The "West" (by which I mean the US and UK) has always regarded foreign leaders in the way they regard their own: as a Fuhrer.
With Putin regarded as such, he is scrutinized in the way you describe. It is a sorry tale, to tell the truth: scrabbling to find a diagnosis that fits the reality that Putin is 70 years old, and hearty for his age.
One day, something will bring Putin down, and the media will grasp the one article from 2006 that described the minor ailment that led to his demise.
Then the West will get what they deserve: a Russian leader who is as intelligent and as patriotic as Putin, but far less patient.
PS I don't buy you coffees because of your opinions (which I appreciate) it was because you allowed me to post comments without having to buy you coffees or subscribe or whatever. I appreciated that openness.
I get a lot from the comments. I learn a lot. I think you are right about the Western need for Fuhrers of one kind or another. One person wrote me and said "leaders" are a fiction, inconsequential in the final analysis, just expressions of a society, That got me thinking.... A bad habit -- thinking.
The idea of a fictional leader is one way to look at what one might term the "Trump phenomenon" - that is to say, you vote for Trump and his promises and you get the same regime as existed under Bush and Biden...
A democracy like Germany does not need "fuhrers" in the way the US and UK do. For years, the mainstream media was baffled that the Germans voted for Merkel, despite the fact that her image was trashed in the media.
What the media did not understand - and this is crucial to understand the difference between a political party and one that is only political on the outside (so to speak) - is that the political party has policies. Not promises that can be washed away, policies that are determined by the members of the party - and costed!
My point being that the German voters were not voting for a Fuhrer called Merkel, they were voting for the policies of the CDU.
It is the same with Merz. But you have to look very carefully to see what he is doing for Germany, because he is always spoken of in the media as being anti-German in the way many Fuhrers are.
As to thinking, leave that to your cats!
By the way, do they get to go outdoors?
You: As I said, in the “West” Putin is not “normal”. Not like Bush or Biden or Trump.
You made me lol.
I consider Vladimir Putin the best of the best. I have said "...the ONLY man." Among leaders. And I am not referring to gender, but to 'man' as universal human. I guess I mean, by saying that, the only one with that combination of integrity and bravery.
He's the cowboy, if you ask, "Where have all the cowboys gone"
He's there, right there.
(But there may be another, Ibrahim Traore, whom they've also wanted to kill, in a smaller nation.)
Back to Putin. Yes, obviously gifted. But that he uses his awareness and ability to think in service to his nation is what makes him so ...saintly? godly?
I am a bit confused, having read that Asperger's is a "disorder of empathy", meaning they have none. Maybe that has been updated too, or I should avoid pop psychology?
I have seen Vladimir Putin's empathy in his eyes, affect, acts. He feels and he cares.
Unlike Western leaders who act out false displays of feeling and caring that never touched them.
Yeah..Long life to him. If he gets that, we too may have hope for a future of something other than pain and suffering, the stuff "our" leaders deliver.
But I wish it for his sake. I respect and admire his goodness.
Interesting that you mention Traore, whose name I always misspell. Also interesting is the West's demonization of him. I would avoid pop psychology, which means DSM IV and V. Asperger's no longer exists as a separate "disorder" under DSM V, it is thrown in with all the other manifestations of autism. The Russians BTW do not use DSM. Nor do they view autism the same way although earlier research in the 1920s was Russian! Many people with Asperger's or ADHD are highly empathetic -- so much so -- that sometimes find relationships painful. They tend to be good with animals because they sense feeling directly. They are also good with children and the elderly. They make excellent counsellors. I have a variant of ADHD and I have done a lot of counselling. I love parties -- for about 45 minutes -- after which it is painful. On the other hand, I was raised before Asperger's or ADHD was a "thing". I was just another odd kid. I didn't have to "fit in". The mistake parents make today is trying to 'normalize" neurodivergent kids.
I started noticing Putin really when I started listening to his press conferences - quite different from western leaders - and then his speeches and so on. Although I agree with your analysis Julian, the main thing which stands out about Putin is compassion. Just look at how he approaches his people, his understanding of them and Russian history both near and far. One of the things he said about the break up of the Soviet Union is the fragmentation of peoples. Russian people who considered themselves Russian and who ended up outside the Russian Federation suddenly found they had lost their nationality. Explains a lot. There are Russian troops in Transnistria because there are many Russians living there - the troops were sent in as peace keepers and still remain to this day. I bet the Transnistrians really hope Russia will take Odessa and make its borders with Transnistria so they can join the Russian Federation! Like you articles! Lots of snow in Nova Scotia, probably Tokyo finds it difficult. Greetings to Ichi and Chappy from my crew.
You make a good point. Compassion! I should have pointed out that "Type 3" "thinking" includes the capacity for compassion, which of course requires empathy. I did write that fundamental to the genetic changes that define "behavioral modernity" is empathy and ego transcendence,which allows altruism. That allowed Paleo bands to look after each other. From my point of view, "Type 3" is emotional logic . I wrote a couple of posts a while back about Putin's capacity for compassion and how that distinguishes him from other leaders. my "special articles" also talk about that. But I don't think I have expressed these ideas very well. Then again no one in the academic community talks about these things. Thank you for this comment -- it helps a lot!
“Type 3 thinking” frankly sounds like psychobabble some American academic idiot “invented” to enable the usual book/seminar/world tour/ Oprah scam , which lasts long enough to make a buck , then sinks into the slime of current western intellectual culture, never to be seen again.
The above is a practical example of TYPE 10 thinking, BTW.
Book , seminar and world tour coming soon. Send money.
Thank You Julian, a perfect article again.
' Looking at facts and realities he perceives patterns and relationships and connections that others do not. He appears as a gradualist because he is aware that wisdom comes from knowing that you don’t know - that things can change; prediction, probabilistic; and the future, uncertain. It’s non-linear and can be slooooooooooowww! '
A perfect way to describe ' Sensing of the Wordless Reality. '
Cassandra
A comment on 'style' from the superb series 17 Moments of Spring.
https://youtu.be/R07TIgQh2CM
In the gravest extreme everybody's top priority is to save themself, even if it's just so they can exist to save those they care about. Putin's top priority is to save Russia, which is as it should be. The rest of the world, Gaza included, is having a collateral benefit to Russia saving itself. Russia is not going to risk saving itself to save anybody else if they foolishly endanger Russia while getting assisted. Regarding Gaza, are we talking recovering Palestine from its invaders of just living peacefully in the dog house? Only Palestinians can make and act on that decision. The world may wail and lament the Palestinian situation, and make condescending decisions for them, but nobody is sacrificing their own self interest for the Palestinians, least of all the Israelis or Americans. I personally think Palestinians are ambivalent about how they resist the theft of their country, and this type of game is not for the ambivalent. If they misstep they will go the way of the American Indian. In fact eventually we all will if we misstep. Iran wants Israel gone because Israel is a threat to their neighborhood, they prefer to do it by proxy attrition but will do it suddenly if they have no choice. As a country, Iran is not ambivalent. Russia is their friend because they are useful to Russia's interests, and China's, and those countries don't stand tight with the ambivalent.
Yes, for Putin, the Battlefield is the Mind for Humanitys struggle to defeat colonialism. The Vietcong Peoples War.
The BRICs brand of 'Socialism with Chinese characteristics' is a Global People First campaign. Xi Jinpings' Global Goverance Initiative.
https://www.chinausfocus.com/foreign-policy/the-global-governance-initiative-and-new-multilateralism
Thanks for the article. Really good.
As usual your writing is thought provoking and informative.
We will continue to disagree on Trump, whose recent moves in the Western Hemisphere seem clearly to acknowledge a coming calamity that requires a riddance of all Russian and Chinese influence, both marshal and economic, in South America and a secure control over Greenland natural resources and access to the Arctic circle. Remember the Greenlanders have a legal right conceded to them by Denmark in the ‘70s to disassociate themselves from Denmark by an internal election supporting politicians who support the notion. Trump has an agreement, not by a military invasion, that gains access to the natural resources and to strengthen US military presence. I would suggest that as the EU tumbles toward war with Russia and the European financial crisis deepens over the next few years Greenlanders may yet decide to line up with the US.
Thank you for your "disagreement" LOL. These are all points I need to consider.
Next, the West will say that Putin the Great ( yes, that’s what I call him) has been imitating
‘George Jefferson’s ( comedian Sherman Hemsley) walk. 😂
https://youtube.com/shorts/HStltFy2S48?si=QrSU-7SLDJHZZxdZ
I REALLY like "the Gunslinger Gait". Loved the Good, the Bad and the Ugly. Here in Japan I guess it's the "Samurai Gait", depending on how you sling you sword. Also those damn sandals keep on slipping off.
Yes, the ‘Gunslinger Gait’ is my favorite too. Cheers!
Why doesn’t Putin invite me for dinner?
Do you like Kefir and quail eggs?