The alignment of much of the U.S. Right with Putin and his invasion of Ukraine makes it clear that their ends are about power, domination, and white supremacy. For some it takes the form of warped Christian patriarchal supermacism.
This thread by a visiting professor at Georgetown named Thomas Zimmer lays it out:
Reactionaries and far-right movements across the “West” are siding with Putin. They see him as an ally in the struggle to uphold white Christian patriarchal rule – the kind of authoritarian strongman that can turn the tide against the forces of “woke” pluralism.
None of these right-wingers who are currently professing their sympathy for Putin know much about Russia or care about the specific causes and dynamics of what is going on in Ukraine. What matters to them is an imagined Russia: a stronghold of white patriarchal Christianity.
Zimmer also discusses Hungary's Orban in the thread, of course. And then he wraps up:
Right-wingers understand clearly that the United States is an acute test case for whether or not a stable multiracial, pluralistic democracy is possible. It’s a question of world-historic significance: Such a political, social, and cultural order has never been achieved, anywhere.
There have been several stable, fairly liberal democracies – but either they have been culturally and ethnically homogeneous to begin with; or there has always been a pretty clearly defined ruling group: a white man’s democracy, a racial caste democracy, a “herrenvolk” democracy.
A truly multiracial, pluralistic democracy in which an individual’s status was not significantly determined by race, gender, or religion? That’s never been achieved anywhere. It’s a vision that reactionaries abhor – to them, it would be the end of “Western civilization.”
The Right has made its choice: If democracy threatens white Christian patriarchal rule, then democracy has got to go. More and more conservatives are ready to openly embrace authoritarianism – whatever works in the “noble” fight against multiracial pluralism.
The key question: How far into the mainstream will this ideology advance, how much of the Center will fall for this logic of anti-“wokeism” as the overriding concern of our era? How many “moderates” will ally with the Right because they see “the Left” as the more urgent threat?
As the 1619 Project says, it's Black people who have tried to make the United States live up to the promises of our founding documents and the promises made after the Civil War. And white people who have pushed back, with violence and legalism, against that effort.
I didn't believe there was any real threat from the religious focus of the culture war in the U.S., despite living through the rise of the Moral Majority and Phyllis Schlafly, until the last decade or so. I guess I didn't credit the idea that very many people truly want to create a theocracy here. But recent history, and the big money behind their efforts, is disabusing me of that notion.
I take a little comfort from people who say the Right is fighting so hard because they know they're losing against a rising tide of pluralism and sheer demographics.
But not a lot, because they have aligned a lot of structural forces. They've organized for a long time, and they have an incredible amount of money behind them, plus religion. And too many American voters, even when they get a chance to vote and have their votes fairly counted, don't seem to get the idea that one party has given up on democracy. (If they they are getting to vote and having their votes fairly counted.)
Meanwhile, this cartoon from Steve Sack includes one of his best caricatures:
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