Is Putin the alt-right's friend?
Former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard David Duke, who has eagerly embraced the alt-right movement, has traveled to Russia several times to promote his book "The Ultimate Supremacism: My Awakening on the Jewish Question," according to the Anti-Defamation League.
Rising self-described white nationalist Matthew Heimbach also has praised Putin's Russia as "the axis for nationalists," according to an interview by Business Insider. "I really believe that Russia is the leader of the free world right now," he told the news website. "Putin is supporting nationalists around the world and building an anti-globalist alliance, while promoting traditional values and self-determination."
Heimbach leads the Traditionalist Workers Party which, like Spencer's American Policy Institute, is listed as a "white identity" hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Leading American alt-right figures like "race realist" Jared Taylor also attended a right-wing conference in St. Petersburg, Russia, two years ago, organized by a fringe nationalist Russia group. Taylor, according to Business Insider, called the United States "the greatest enemy of tradition everywhere."
It may be only coincidental that white nationalists cheer Russia as "our friend" two days before President Trump was reported to have revealed "highly classified" secrets to two high-ranking Russians in the Oval Office. But both episodes raise questions about how much Putin may be actively engaged in sowing divisions in this country.
We know from past behavior that Putin cares much less about what we Americans think of him than what his own people think of him. With his tightening despotic control over speech and Russian media, he promotes a return to the dominant "Mother Russia" of the czars and the Soviet Union.
The computer hackers and fake news purveyors who serve as an underground propaganda army in his behalf aim to undermine the West's faith in democracy and its institutions. When it comes to corruption, human rights and empire-building, Putin wants you to believe that Western democracies are no better than his Russia.
President Trump curiously seemed to defend that line in an interview with then-Fox News anchor Bill O'Reilly. Trump boldly suggested that we were no better than Putin when it comes to being "a killer." That's breathtaking.
If nothing else, we know that Putin is delighted to see us Americans divide ourselves against one another. That's how he gained almost unquestioned control in Russia. Dividing Americans against one another is something that the alt-right also is delighted to do. The rest of us need to show them, in the words of the late Rodney King, that we still know how to get along.
========
(E-mail Clarence Page at cpage@chicagotribune.com.)
(c) 2017 CLARENCE PAGE DISTRIBUTED BY TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC.
