(NewsGlobal.com)- Former Vice President Mike Pence gave a speech to donors in New Orleans last Friday in which he urged Republicans to move on from the 2020 election and proclaimed that there was no room in the GOP for “apologists for Putin.”
Pence is falling into the same trap many Republican politicians find themselves in by conflating opposition to US involvement in a war against Russia with being “pro-Putin.”
The claim that Republicans are “pro-Putin” is a straw man constructed by the Democrats and the Democrat-supporting corporate news media.
You would think Mike Pence would be smart enough not to take it at face value.
In his speech, Pence declared that there is only room in the GOP for “champions of freedom,” as if not wanting to start World War Three over Ukraine is somehow opposing freedom.
Pence also criticized the Biden administration for not doing enough to deter Putin’s actions in Ukraine. He accused Biden of squandering the deterrence measures put in place by the Trump administration that kept Vladimir Putin from “trying to redraw international boundaries by force.”
Saying “weakness arouses evil,” Pence pointed out that it isn’t a coincidence that Putin waited until now to invade Russia. He said the “magnitude of evil” in Ukraine “speaks volumes” about Joe Biden’s weakness.
Interestingly, much of what Pence said echoes what has been said by former President Donald Trump. Trump too said that Putin waited until Biden was in the White House to invade Ukraine because he knew Biden was weak.
Like Pence, Trump has criticized the sanctions imposed by the Biden administration and NATO, saying they weren’t sufficient to deter Putin.
Pence also returned to his familiar theme that winning elections requires the Republican Party to stop looking back at 2020 and instead unite “around an optimistic vision for the future.” He said winning future elections won’t happen “by fighting yesterday’s battles” or “relitigating the past.”
