Rushing to Russia?

Social media is not real life. Twitter is not real life. Twitter is overwhelmingly dominated by white progressives and an army of activists and promoters. While millions of Americans have Twitter accounts, few use them. Most Twitter discourse is conducted by about 10 percent of the platform’s users. But, on the right, a subset of online new right thinkers and activists are trying to move the Overton window of the center-right coalition, and too many are moving them toward authoritarianism.

Though not on Twitter themselves, former White House strategist Steve Bannon and former national security adviser Michael Flynn have been some of the most vocal pro-Putin apologists of late in the United States. The young men (it is rarely women) who idolize them have circulated their views on social media while often cheering on Tucker Carlson’s tough talk about Ukraine on Fox News. As the war turned and Russia did not have an easy sweep, this group has turned instead to debunking any story helpful to Ukraine. They claim now not to be pro-Russia, just pro-truth, while dedicating their energies to amplifying attacks on Ukraine and playing down Russian aggression.

It’s not just Russia, however. China also gets some praise. Sohrab Ahmari, to be clear, is not one of the irresponsible, but the conservative writer tweeted a tweet that started a trend. He tweeted that he was at peace with China leading the 21st century. In the since-deleted tweet, Ahmari said, “Late-liberal America is too dumb and decadent to last as a superpower.” He followed his deleted tweet by noting, “My wife is Chinese-born, so I don’t need lectures on the horrors of the CCP. But my conservative friends lull themselves into thinking that China’s civilizational wisdom is completely dead and not a source of strength.”

I’ll take Ahmari at his word that he is no fan of China, but his tweet helped me notice a trend of others on the right who are throwing off the label “conservative” and praising China.

Carlson, no fan of China’s Communist Party, said, “The Chinese care about themselves and their future.”

But Ahmari and Carlson, voices the Overton window–shifting Twitterati listen to, seemingly emboldened the would-be right-wing authoritarians. None of them like China, but they appreciate Chinese unity, culture, and its supposed cultural conservatism.

What’s actually happening here, with so many young men of the right disaffected with conservatism and grasping for a new ideology, is much the same thing that happens with American socialists. They have the luxury of having never lived in China or Russia. They, like many of their ideological counterparts, view their opponents as enemies out to destroy their way of life. They perceive Russia and China as maintaining their ways of life. They prefer to gamble on the hypothetical ideal of authoritarianism than live in the system they have.

Additionally, many of those on the right sympathetic to Russia and China flirt with racial identity politics. They see Russia and China as homogenous peoples. They ignore the corruption and strong man tactics of these regimes and praise homogenous conservative monoculture. The Russian and Chinese acolytes take it further. But there is still a difference between Russia and China, on the one hand, and Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s head of state, who is similarly praised for leading his country in a self-consciously conservative direction.

Some of these voices on the right, who call themselves “national populists,” advocate a federal government that provides for the “common good” of Americans. That common good is tied to the Judeo-Christian worldview and a conservative culture woven through society. They argue that the federal government ought to push conservative morals and values to guide funding, doctrine, and who should be targeted for silence. As a Christian and a conservative, I’m not criticizing their desire for Christianity or conservatism’s influence (I’m very much in favor of both!), but the use of force to exclude from American identity those who are neither violates the very idea of the United States’ constitutional order.

At a time when progressives are ever more brazen about shoving their godless values into the forefront of American life and silencing dissent, the national populists offer something appealing to some conservatives: fighting back with the same tactics, such as using the courts and mobs to impose a set of values. They see the laissez-faire, free marketplace of ideas that so many conservatives advocate as weakness. They see Russia and China stamping out dissent to ensure a cultural homogeneity that the United States does not have, and they are envious.

The ultimate problem, however, is that the United States is committed to elections. There is no such thing as a permanent political majority in the United States. The only way to get it is to claim power and refuse to give it up. This is undoubtedly why many of the loudest pro-Russia voices, like Steve Bannon and Mike Flynn, are also so vocal about stolen elections. They must discredit trust in the election process to upend those elections and refuse to give up power.

It is all a very dangerous game that is both destabilizing to the republic and overwhelmingly likely to backfire. In a fallen world full of sinners who hate the things of God, a Christian conservative republic held together by autocratic forces will not stay Christian for long.