RTE Roundtable Talk #4: What is Russia?
Featuring Tessa Lena and Riley Waggaman
"It was the most existentially meandering podcast…very very Russian. Very appropriate." -Tessa Lena
I'm a little late getting yesterday's Roundtable Talk out. I've been recovering from a back injury, and thankfully the pain has subsided faster than I would have expected. But I'm still staying away from long sits at the desk, spending more time stretching and being basically mobile.
Tessa (a Russian living in the U.S.) and Riley (an American recently living in Russia) are two brilliant people with enjoyable substacks and interviews. I'll go ahead and recommend Tessa's chats with Johnny Vedmore (here and here) which I greatly enjoyed. Tessa's is the first substack I started reading, and I now check Riley's once a week or so both as an update on what's going on in Russia and for the laughs.
Since a sort of second Cold War has emerged in the recent chaos, I thought a simple question like, "What is Russia?" might serve Western audiences well. It's not a question to answer in a 90 minute discussion, and if our talk provokes more questions than feelings of answers, then good.
You can watch our discussion on Rumble, here:
Also, here we are on YouTube where our first few podcasts somehow passed the censors (so far):
You can watch us live on Tuesdays at 1 PM Eastern. The RTE podcast is on numerous platforms including Rumble, YouTube, Bitchute, Odyssey, Stitcher, Spotify, Apple, and some other places that Liam knows better about than I do. Written transcripts will be available for paid subscribers. We thank all of our supporters and hope that you get something excellent out of each discussion.
Mathew, it was a great honor to have the conversation, and we sure went deep down the philosophical rabbithole1 Thank you.
My impression lately has been that Russia is like an evil twin of America; like what we would be like if not for our Constitution. I'm not saying that I approve of American imperialism or the Nazi-ridden Zelenskyy regime in Ukraine, but one has to note that Putin is posturing as an "anti-fascist" and is using "denazification" as a pretext for invading Ukraine. Could also be used as a pretext for genocide. Now doesn't the US also fancy itself as anti-fascist, particularly in its role as the world police? As Russia does imperialism in the vicinity of its borders too, the main difference between the two is how the government handles its own citizens. People can be banned from spreading Nazi propaganda in Russia, and jailed or otherwise punished by the government for dissent. As much as most Americans loathe such views they are not allowed to arrest you for being a Nazi in America or for spreading Nazi propaganda unless it openly calls for violence (probably the only country more hospitable to Nazis is Ukraine by the way; Nazi propaganda is a lot more open there). Corporations are allowed to punish and discriminate based on your perceived views though (except in California where political discrimination is illegal) and there are loads of useful idiots on the "left" that seem willing to do their bidding (Antifa was much worse under Trump though). Maybe when the corporations completely take over the US this country will turn into something like a clone of Russia.