One of the great qualities of dictatorship is that dictators can hold the line even as democracies

start to fade. That, of course, is the theory of pretty much every dictator across history

when faced with a democratic rival. That is certainly the theory of Vladimir Putin today,

whether it is in Ukraine or whether it's with regard to him just killing the people who oppose

him, people like Alexei Navalny. And it's becoming very clear this week that Vladimir Putin is now settling all family business. This is the week where he feels like he has the ability to do exactly what it is that he wants. And the reason he feels that way is because of a combination of splits on the right in the United States and a combination of splits on the left in the United States, as well as splits in the European coalition with regard to Russia.

When Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine, there was pretty much unanimity that this was not

something that the West could allow to stand. That you couldn't have Vladimir Putin simply

waltzing into Kiev, taking over the country, killing Vladimir Zelensky, and essentially setting up a puppet dictatorship and turning Ukraine into a second

Belarus. You couldn't have that because it would put Russia directly on the borders of a wide

variety of NATO countries, including Hungary and Poland. You couldn't have it because it would

certainly threaten former Soviet satellite states like Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania,

all of which are deeply

fearful of a Putin-led incursion into their territory, Finland as well. You couldn't have it

because Ukraine actually is a relatively major producer of products like wheat and oil.

And mostly you couldn't have it because Vladimir Putin has interests that are antithetical to those of the West. And for all of the talk about over the last 25 years,

about how Vladimir Putin was just on the cusp of moderating, how there was going to be a

moment when Vladimir Putin was welcomed into the family of nations and then he would

just be nice to everybody. That never happened. Every single president of my lifetime

has tried a reset with Vladimir Putin.

George Dobby Bush famously looked into Putin's eyes and thought he had a sense of his soul.

And then you had Barack Obama who literally sent Hillary Clinton, his secretary of state to Moscow to give them a button that didn't actually say reset, but was supposed to be a reset button.

And then you had Vladimir Putin being offered flexibility by Barack Obama in 2012 in the lead

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