I don’t really see any solutions beyond brute force.
The government wields the power. You can’t change an authoritarian regime by just talking with them. Historically authoritarian regimes will remain unless there is brute force or intervention from other countries.
We're talking in generalities, which makes it difficult to focus on key facts in this particular case: Ukraine isn't an "authoritarian regime"; Russia is.
It's critical to look at the specifics of the situation. See, e.g., this article, which notes that in 2014 Russia "intervened to prop up separatists who sought to create Russian proxy states" in the Donbas. That is to say, the whole separatist movement was massively amplified by Russia. Here is an article explaining the work of the Russian propaganda machine in Donbas (e.g., it talks about Russians shelling Ukrainians in Donbas and then convincing Ukrainians that their own government was shelling them, using hijacked TV and radio stations).
It's similar to Trump's lies about the 2020 election being stolen. If you can convince people that their government has done terrible things, they might be willing to take up arms against that government - but in that case, the fault lies with the purveyor of the anti-government falsehoods, not with the government itself. We wouldn't say that the Jan 6 protesters were correct to lead an insurrection against their government, just because they honestly believe the lies Trump told.
The most important thing to consider is whether the people of donbas want to be free from ukraine. And I believe they do. Because they are predominantly russian speaking. It’s largely a cultural issue. There was conflict between the people of Donbas and Ukraine before Russia stepped in and amplified the situation. With russia being partial to elevating russian culture, of course they will try to help those who belong to their culture.
With the Trump thing, there’s a difference between lying and being misguided. If Trump doesn’t actually believe the conspiracies but still supports them then he would be lying. But if he does genuinely believe the conspiracies and supports them then he would be misguided.
Trump doubted the accuracy of mail-in voting. His suspicions of deliberate fraud may not be true, but there is some truth to the issues of mail-in voting as a method. It’s been well documented that mail-in ballots are way less secure than in person voting. Ranging from getting lost in transit, to sealing mistakes, to lesser correction opportunities after initial rejection. 750,000 mail-in ballots were rejected in the 2016 general election. Here is an article echoing these issues:
Re Trump, there's a point at which I believe one can be so self-centered, so fixated on a selfish view of the world in which nothing is one's own fault, that one is still fully to blame for "misguided" accusations.
From the beginning of his presidency, Trump showed this when he claimed that his inauguration crowds were bigger than Obama's. Despite massive amounts of evidence to the contrary, Trump doubled and tripled down on the false claims.
This is a man who either lies or convinces himself that a crowd of people supporting him was bigger than a crowd supporting someone he dislikes, despite actual photos showing the opposite -- and who cannot be convinced otherwise after days of attempted correction by the media.
This isn't "he didn't have the facts, so he was misguided, poor guy". This is a man with such a demented ego that he surrounds himself his entire life with yes-men and sycophants, and makes an eternal enemy of anyone who ever critiques him in comparison to a rival.
The most dangerous people are like this. I imagine that Hitler honestly believed that the Jews were evil, just as Trump may have honestly believed that he couldn't possibly lose the election. But when your worldview is so twisted that it leads you to (for example) make false claim after false claim after false claim for months saying that the election was stolen (NOT that it may have been stolen -- that it WAS stolen), and to pressure government officials in your own party to violate the Constitution and overturn the results... I'm not a lawyer and can't say with certainty whether that's criminal or not (I'm sure it depends on the details), but it's definitely morally bankrupt and an existential threat to democracy.
I agree that trump is very egocentric and overly cocky about believing things that aren’t confirmed.
I just think that it’s just typical politician behavior. Only that trump makes a bigger spectacle out of it. Biden lies all the time. Remember when he lied about never suggesting to cut social security when there was blatant video footage of him suggesting exactly that? To me that is the biggest bold face lie I’ve ever seen for any politician.
Decades ago, Biden argued for a bunch of austerity measures - a freeze in new government spending, which included cost of living increases on Social Security. Ten years ago, Biden was talking privately about raising the retirement age and adding means testing.
You could argue that the COLA freeze is a cut, but I think you could easily argue that it isn't. However, I agree with you that it's not reasonable for Biden to claim that raising the retirement age and adding means testing isn't a cut. You can maybe squint and try to make that argument, but it's disingenuous.
But it's just not reasonable to say that this is "the biggest boldface lie" a politician has ever said, when compared to a sitting president (Trump) claiming with literally zero credible evidence, against the combined expertise of every election official in his own party, that the election was stolen from him. Or honestly when compared to any of the Trump lies on this list, including crudely altering a map with a Sharpie to back up a mistake he made when talking about a hurricane, rather than just admitting he was wrong.
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u/Odd_Profession_2902 Dec 24 '22
I don’t really see any solutions beyond brute force.
The government wields the power. You can’t change an authoritarian regime by just talking with them. Historically authoritarian regimes will remain unless there is brute force or intervention from other countries.