BRETT: I’m old enough to remember when Russia and Vladimir Putin were the biggest villains in the universe. Oh, wait. That was merely a number of months ago, when President Trump was the president of the United States, and it’s all we heard 24/7, 365 on the cable channels, reading on the blogs, reading the editorial pages of major newspapers and the fictionalized accounts of leaks coming from fictionalized intelligence agencies.
On the front pages of the newspapers, we knew that Vladimir Putin was absolutely the devil. He was the worst human being in the history of humankind. That’s what you got from CNN and MSNBC and all those newspapers I alluded to. But if I told you after President Trump left office and in came President Joseph Robinette Biden, Joseph R. Biden…
What if I told you that it’s starting to look a lot like Joseph R. Biden is the softest president on Russia and Vladimir Putin maybe ever? It all goes back to Nord Stream 2, that Russian pipeline into Europe ultimately heading into Germany, that President Trump vehemently opposed in talking with Angela Merkel.
He said it was idiotic, strategically dangerous to rely on Vladimir Putin and the Russians for your energy coming into Eastern Europe. Well, well, hold on. President Trump was derided, excoriated, mocked, hated for that commentary — and he was. We remember that conversation. We heard all about the president.
“Look what he does! He bullies the Europeans. He’s a Putin stooge.” He was trying to save the Europeans from Putin. In fact, in fact, Joe Biden has been the most pliable, bestie best friend that Vladimir Putin could have. Just this week alone… Remember at the beginning of the week when you had the Colonial Pipeline shutdown and he let Russia off the hook?
He said, “Well, these are hackers that may be based in Russia, but I don’t think the Russians had anything to do with these hackers.” Of course, ’cause Vladimir Putin has areas of Russia with hackers living in them that have no answerability to Vladimir Putin. Okay, sure thing!
Now we find out that President Biden is reversing course on the pipeline that President Trump opposed. Daily Caller: “Trump Spent Years Sabotaging Putin’s Nord Stream 2 Dreams. Now Biden Is Helping Them Come True — Finishing Nord Stream 2 would be a major geopolitical win for Russian President Vladimir Putin, as Russian gas must flow through Ukraine to get to Germany as things stand now. Nord Stream 2 would allow Russia to bypass Ukraine to get gas to Europe, further isolating its neighboring foe in Kyiv.
“In the context of Russia’s aggression toward Ukraine and European reliance on Russian gas, the pipeline is widely deemed to be a security risk and a means for Russia to increase its leverage on European countries.” If the Europeans are dependent upon Putin’s energy, then they’re gonna be a lot more like those when it comes to Putin trying to cleave them off in the United States and an alliance.
“Former President Donald Trump approved sanctions to deter its completion, citing these concerns. Notably, Trump — not President Joe Biden — is often characterized as being on Russia’s side.” In fact, Rush spoke about this: Trump calling out Merkel’s pipeline act with Russia.
RUSH: The Nord Stream pipeline. This is the special pipeline direct to Germany from Russia, a deal made between Putin and Angela Merkel. Trump called ’em out on it today. This pipeline strikes at the heart of NATO unity. We didn’t have anything to do with it. This is Angela Merkel sabotaging other NATO nations by making a straight deal with Putin while every other pipeline goes through all the European nations.
This pipeline gets, for now, ’cause Putin controls the price, it gets cheap Russian gas to Germany and bypasses all of the smaller eastern European nations, and this gives Russia incredible leverage over Merkel! It allows Russia to pressure them while Germany is held harmless. It’s bad policy for NATO countries, and Trump has the guts to call ’em out on this! Here is another bite from Trump on essentially the point I just made. Here it is…
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Germany is totally controlled by Russia because they were getting from 60 to 70% of their energy from Russia and their new pipeline, and you tell me if that’s appropriate, because I think it’s not. And I think it’s a very bad thing for NATO, and I don’t think it should have happened, and I think we have to talk to Germany about it.
RUSH: Well, all hell broke loose at that point. You just don’t call out other nations like this. You wink and nod. You look the other way. You talk to ’em about it behind closed doors, and then you go out and tell everybody, “We’ve had substantive discussions with Chancellor Merkel over the pipeline, and we’re working behind the scenes to alleviate,” when none of that ever happens! It’s just a bunch of diplo-speak everybody engages in.
Here is Trump confronting her and the rest of NATO about it. So the media’s gonna fact-check this. “Is Trump really right? Is Germany gonna the bet 70% of its gas from Russia?” He’s right-on-the-button right. U.K. Daily Mail: “Donald Trump RIGHT — Germany imports 70% of its gas from Russia in a controversial deal that’s enriched Merkel, Germany will soon receive even MORE, but the U.S. could step….” See, Trump wants to sell natural gas to NATO. We have become one of the largest energy exporters in the world.
Trump thinks it would make much more sense for Germany to get natural gas from an ally than a potential enemy, but Merkel’s gone around everybody’s back and made her own sweet deal that she’s personally profiting from. Other people have looked into this, and “it turns out Trump is right on the button about the level of Russian imports expected by Germany from this Nord Stream 2 pipeline. The BBC has also confirmed that Trump’s estimation is pretty much in line with what the analysts expectations are.
“‘The latest official E.U. figure for imports of Russian gas to Germany is between 50% and 75%…’ So it’s right there. Now, you might think, well what’s the big deal about this?” This isn’t done! NATO nations calling each other out, other NATO nations being told how they’re being screwed by…? And Germany’s not paying much yet toward the requirement for spending certain percentage GDP on defense, in addition to everything else Germany’s done by opening its borders. It’s a mess, and Trump is simply calling ’em out.
Germany is a NATO member, and they have a pledge whenever that deals are made with nonmembers. Russia is not a member. This is a side deal that’s not gonna benefit other NATO countries, which means it’s not gonna promote unity. She’s gonna profit from this personally somehow, it says here, it’s generally considered to be a side deal that she didn’t tell anybody she was making. Putin went ahead and did it, and it makes Germany now much more vulnerable because so much of their gas is gonna be coming from Putin.
What if Putin wakes up one day says, “You know what? I don’t like Germans today. I think Germans ought to freeze to death. So I’m gonna be raise the price.” This is the problem that people have. But look, what really happened here is that these kind of things used to happen frequently and nobody did anything about it because diplomats never really solve anything. If they did, there wouldn’t be any need for diplomats. Trump is looking at all of these things and saying, “This doesn’t make any sense, and we end up getting blamed for whatever goes wrong here? No more.” That’s it.
Here’s Trump’s latest tweet on this. “What good is NATO if Germany is paying Russia billions of dollars for gas and energy? Why are there only 5 out of 29 countries that have met their commitment? The U.S. is paying for Europe’s protection, then loses billions on Trade. Must pay 2% of GDP IMMEDIATELY, not by 2025,” or we’re out. Well, he didn’t say “we’re out,” but he means it.
Where are the environmentalist wackos. So here’s Germany moving away from clean energy and back to fossil fuels. Natural gas is a fossil fuel energy that the environmentalist wackos hate, plus it’s coming from Putin! They hate Putin! Putin stole the election from Hillary, don’t you know? And it’s really bugging them that Trump is now criticizing Germany for working with Putin when they think that Trump ought to be praising Putin and Germany for doing the deal because of the absolute convoluted worldview they now have on the left.
This is NATO not behaving in the best interests of NATO. He’s asking what good is NATO if Germany is paying Russia billions of dollars in a sweetheart deal for gas and energy and is not paying its fair share toward defending NATO nations from Russia? Do I need to put this in perspective?
NATO exists because of Vladimir Putin, NATO exists because of the Soviet Union, and Putin wants to rebuild Russia back into the Soviet Union. He’s made no bones about it. That’s what his objective is. And so here is a member nation from NATO striking an exclusive natural gas pipeline deal. None of the other NATO member nations participating in it, therefore any of the so-called benefits from it.
The Drive-Bys are also upset because while Trump is criticizing Merkel and Trump is openly confronting our friends at NATO, Trump will not criticize Putin. CNN’s beside itself over that today, that Trump’s gonna go meet with Putin — it’s gonna be a couple good old boys having a yuk-yuk good time — and, meanwhile, he dares to confront Merkel! This is so delicious to watch, folks.
BRETT: And suddenly you’re gonna see President Biden meet with Vladimir Putin at some point, sometime, and he’s gonna come out and smile and say, “We’re working on a number of challenges that we’re facing,” and, meanwhile, Putin is running the entire show in our backyard in NATO. Astounding.