What NO ONE is saying about Tucker Carlson’s Putin Interview

Guest Post by Kit Knightly

Everyone is talking about Tucker Carlson’s interview with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The two-hour long conversation was live-streamed on twitter. Every major news outlet has had some form of coverage.

You can watch the whole thing here:

After eight years of covering the Ukraine coup/civil War, and more specifically Western propaganda on Russia, I could pretty much tell you everything Putin was going to say before he said it.

Anybody who has covered Russia or Ukraine could tell you that.

He was always going to detail, in cogent and historically literate terms, Russia’s position on Ukraine.

He was always going  to  cite  the (very real) broken promises Western diplomats made about NATO’s Eastward expansion.

He was almost certainly going remake his very worthy point about US foreign policy never seeming to change no matter who is President.

He’s an intelligent and persuasive speaker, and he was always going to  do well.

And, if this was 2014, that would be great.

But it’s not 2014 is it?

It’s 2024 & the world is being hurried fast toward the Brave New (“multipolar”) Normal. Russia is on board with Agenda 2030 &  very powerful  western establishment voices are now promoting Putin & his once-sidelined views.

In the face of these realities we should be asking questions about the relevance and purpose of this kind of geopolitical theatrics.

Let’s remind ourselves again that everyone is talking about the Putin interview.

EVERYONE.

From Hillary to Elon to Russell Brand.

Every major news outlet covered it, too. Maybe they “fact-checked” it, maybe they ranted about it or insisted it be banned, but they were all talking about it.

Let’s compare and contrast that coverage to the coverage of Oliver Stone’s 4-part interview with Putin in 2017.

Seriously. Look at the difference. It tells you a great deal about how the establishment agenda is changing. There were no big headlines then.

But I don’t want to talk about Putin.  Because everyone is talking about Putin.

I want to talk about Carlson.

The  Tucker Carlson who has been suddenly positioned as a supposed anti-establishment JFK-doubting, 9/11 truthing threat to the system.

The same Tucker Carlson whose father was director of the Voice of America. The same Tucker Carlson who censored and insulted 9/11 skeptics on his show.

The same Tucker Carlson who applied to (but was allegedly turned down by) the CIA.

How did this re-invention happen?

When did it happen?

Why did it happen?

And no, I’m not claiming everything he says is de facto wrong, a lot of it is in fact very right. His monologues on the state of the economy, the 2020 election, JFK and 9/11 have all been at least partially accurate.

…but that should make us ask more questions, shouldn’t it?

Did he have some great awakening?

Even if you believe he did, do you believe that his bosses at Fox did as well? Or that Elon Musk did? Or that either of these entities would be powerless to stop him dropping supposed truth bombs on their dime if they didn’t want him to?

Tucker Carlson was the most watched current events program on US television before he was apparently  fired by Fox News last year.

Since then, and with all the hero-kudos of being exiled by the establishment,  he has been live-streaming his shows on X/Twitter instead, and every single one of them gets more views than CNN or MSNBC or his old show on Fox…Combined.

Interesting, no.

The fact is, legacy media is dying. Which is a good thing. But do you think the establishment doesn’t see this? Do you think it hadn’t occurred to them to get out in front of it by seizing control of the new media platforms and planting “leaders” in supposedly independent media movements?

As we keep having to remind our readers  lately the people and institutions that run the world are not wed to any single platform, method, nation or flag.

Or media.

They bought up all the newspapers because they were useful, they “syndicated” all the television networks because that’s what people were watching…

so now as legacy media dies –  what do you think they’re gonna do?

Like a hermit crab swapping out shells – they will simply slide themselves from their old home to a nice shiny new  “indy” one.

Goodbye old fashioned corporate CNN, hello honestly completely organic guerilla news reporting livestreaming on X and getting totally accidentally promoted by the algorithm.

Goodbye long form editorials in newspapers, hello ten-second tiktoks from fake influencers in a government-run opinion factory.

Goodbye Tucker Carlson, paid disinfo promoter, hello Tucker Carlson voice of the new media who somehow still gets promoted by the very forces he’s supposed to be opposing .

We’ve seen other examples of this kind of thing already, for example AOC’s obviously fake “look at me live streaming my random off the cuff thoughts” videos. As if she hasn’t had a focus group decide exactly how little make up she should wear or how “unkempt” her hair should be be, or signed a sponsorship deal for the fried chicken she’s eating.

The selling point of new-media was that everyone had access to it instantly, with that came realness marked by rawness.  The establishment quickly seized on these markers of authenticity & tried to make them  their own. Now that rawness is being manufactured and realness is being faked on a production line.

And by seeding the rising new-media with establishment voices allegedly “gone rogue” , the establishment take control of it.

On top of that, the transition from old to new media can also be used to co-opt independent outlets and construct agenda-controlling fake binary narratives. With the old media selling one “side”, and new media the other.

That’s how you end up with crazy scenarios where billionaires like Elon Musk are cast as some kind of outsider, no matter how many Great Reset talking points he promotes, or podcasters like Joe Rogan apparently get $250 million from the system to attack the system, or the “intellectual dark web” shilling vaccines and Israel in equal measure.

The old establishment voices (Guardian, CNN, New York Times or whoever) noisily attack these new “anti-establishment” voices (who are always selling the same agenda in a slightly altered form), knowing that the “enemy of my enemy is my friend” mindset will give them cred  in genuine alternate media circles.

I mean it’s pretty cool to get a big old “ex”-mainstreamer on your side and agreeing to be on your podcast, right? Instant kudos, excitement. “See, even Big Name X admits we’re right about this”. It’s too easy to be seduced by the lure of  “celebrity rebel” narratives. We all want to believe them don’t we.

And thus, by putting “former” establishment insiders in leadership positions of “the alternative”, the ‘elite’ control the direction of their supposed opposition.

Tucker Carlson is the first really big voice to make the swap in a major way, but he won’t be the last. And his interview with Putin is yet another sign of the “approved alternative” messaging.

According to Twitter, the interview has been viewed 140 million times in 24 hours. Tucker and Putin have been trending ever since, promoted by the all powerful algorithm on a site owned by the richest man in the world, whilst simultaneously appearing on the front pages of every paper.

Wow, cool, right. The new media is just so right about this the establishment has no choice but to promote it!

Too easy to  fail to notice there’s nothing really  “new” about this media at all. It’s just a very old hermit crab in a very new shell.