“What do you think? A man had two sons; and he went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work in the vineyard today.’ And he answered, ‘I will not’; but afterward he repented and went. And he went to the second and said the same; and he answered, ‘I go, sir,’ but did not go. Which of the two did the will of his father?” They said, “The first.” (Mt 21:28–31)
Man who neither knows nor cares what was going on in 1996 and who can only narcissistically deflect to talking about himself in order laugh off the victims of his sadistic cruelty…
…offers his utterly dishonest take on WWII,
in which he deliberately confuses the complete and overwhelming defeat of three tyrannies with the Munich Agreement that gave Hitler the green light to begin the bloodiest war in history. Because he is a liar and an enemy of Jesus Christ for this guy and his Russian Boss:
Any con man can spout gooey Catholic pieties and Vance periodically does for the delectation of the Performatively Pious. But the gospel says, “Watch what they do, not what they say.” This man is an apologist for mass murder.
“Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorns, or figs from thistles? So, every sound tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears evil fruit. A sound tree cannot bear evil fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will know them by their fruits.
“Not every one who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you evildoers.’ (Mt 7:15–23)
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6 Responses
Vance is an intelligent man (Yale Law). Curious that he would make a statement so incorrect.
Negotiations typically do not work with tyrants, because they often act in bad faith. I imagine he knows this but in trying to protect his boss, made an incorrect statement.
He *may* know better, but he’s really counting on those listening to him to not know better. They only care about snowing people to maintain their power.
” in trying to protect his boss, made an incorrect statement.”
He lied.
Fixed it.
Vance’s startlingly quick pivot to the role of fawning lickspittle in one of the most naked grabs for power we’ve ever seen means I am not obligated to give any real bandwidth to anything he says. He is background noise, he is static, he is cocktail party chatter who serves to obfuscate and distract while people suffer. Am I held by the teaching and example of Jesus to afford him grace as a human person created in the image and likeness of a loving God? Indeed, I am. God, whose capacities are surely infinitely greater than my own, does just so. But such grace is not at all the same thing as forgiving his mendacity in a position of power and influence. I find myself under no obligation to forgive his consciously chosen actions.
Trump is very famous for completely misreading people. In his first term, he’s been fawning over Kim Jong-Un, expecting to win him over.
That strategy works wonders with some local warlords, but completely failed with Kim Jong-Un, who took it as a sign of weakness and as a way to gain concessions from the West (because Trump expected every western power to fall in line) without having to give up anything in return except some very nebulous promises.
And it counts as Trump’s personal failure regardless of whether it was his lack of awareness, overconfidence in his negotiation ability, hubris or a complete cultural misunderstanding. If it was a cultural thing, then it speaks volumes about Trump’s inability to pick the right advisors and/or to listen to them since he would rather be surrounded by sycophants who tell him how great he is than to listen to those who would have some harsh words to him…
…which pretty much sums up the failure: It’s Trump who would be impressed by somebody fawning over him and would win him over like he was some local warlord. And Putin knows that very well.
There’s more cleverness here than is being acknowledged, and those who only look at the graphics paraphrasing a small portion of Vance’s comments are not going to sway his supporters, because they are going to respond with:
– “Why are you ignoring the rest of his comment about the homeless in DC? You’re just another person promoting false compassion to perpetuate the problem, while Vance talked about how they need help, often including mental health treatment.”
Whoever created that graphic, by picking the 15 second soundbite that could be cast in the worst light in isolation, they made their own strawman. The other side doesn’t even need to create a strawman themselves.
It is more work, but it’s important to address the real problem with his response, because he never answered the question of whether they are receiving help, such as mental health treatment, or critical related questions like whether there is adequate help even available to be provided, and if he supports increasing funding for the sources of such help if it is inadequate.
Similarly:
– “Of course negotiations happened in WWII, and once they did, the war ended quickly, and saved millions of lives compared to estimates for planned landings on Honshu. This time we’re trying to end the war in Ukraine much sooner, before it engulfs all of Europe and Asia and kills millions of people.”
On this one, you did hint at Vance’s primary error here: a negotiated settlement that can be easily broken might end up being as useless as the Munich agreement, and result in having to address far worse problems than drawing clear lines at the start and sticking to them. In this case, the keyword is not the Sudetenland, but the Donbass. The problem is the massive foundational mistake of thinking a little bit of land is an adequate appeasement, and failing to understand the broader goals.
For Putin, land is merely nice to have. What he wants is to be the person remembered for Making Russia Great Again (I think the Cyrillic equivalent of “MAGA” is “СРсв” – pronounced “seyr’esve”), and his benchmark for measuring that is the USSR. That means politically dominating the former Soviet states again. Countries like Belarus and Kazakhstan never drifted that far away, and have been pulled back closer. Putin successfully crushed Chechnya’s desire for self-determination by killing roughly 4-7% of the population (more than most central European nations suffered at Hitler’s hands in WWII). He also fomented a pretext for invading Georgia, easily routing their small military and leaving the country feeling isolated and vulnerable, making it compliant enough for the moment.
Putin tried a similar strategy in Ukraine as worked in Georgia, but Ukraine has 10x the population and a strong conviction that they have a right to be independent of Russia.
So now Putin demands as terms for peace to be rewarded for his violence with international recognition of what he has stolen, to be given additional large portions of Ukraine that he has been unable to capture for the last three years, and most importantly would amount to being handed the keys to bypass the majority of the defenses that Ukraine has spent the last decade building, to shrink the Ukraininan military to a size significantly smaller than the force that barely stopped Russia in 2022, to forbid Ukraine from receiving foreign assistance if they are invaded again, and to have the international community agree that Russia gets to openly interfere in future Ukrainian elections, under the guise of the ambiguous and arbitrary term “denazification.”
Since Trump and Vance have repeatedly failed to understand that out of all those conditions, the land is the least important one to both Russia and Ukraine, they have repeatedly failed to recognize that what Russia is offering is not, “Give up 20% of your country, so you can keep 80% of it and not lose any more lives.”
Instead, what is being offered is, “Give up 20% of your country now, and make it easier for Russia to take the other 80% after they recover for a bit.”
Fortunately, Putin let it become too obvious that he is playing Trump, and he is gradually starting to realize that the Europeans have multiple valid and very serious concerns.