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**August 5, 2021**

Meyerson on TAP

Tucker Trundles to Tin-Pot Land

The Authoritarian International took a brisk step forward this week, as
Tucker Carlson ventured to Budapest

to sing the praises of Victor Orban's repressive regime to Fox News
junkies. All this week, Carlson is broadcasting from Budapest, and will
conclude his stay in Orbanland with a Saturday address to MCC Feszt, a
mix of rock performances and "idea" discussions funded by the
Hungarian government.

Orban isn't the first rightwing thug ruler whom Carlson has visited.
In March, Tucker ventured south to expose Fox viewers to another budding
tin-pot potentate, El Salvador President Nayib Bukele.

Building solidarity within the Tin-pot-ariat has long been the dream of
Trump master strategist Steve Bannon, as the more that authoritarian
regimes enact the same strategies, the more likely they are to hire the
same strategists, which, in this case, means Bannon. Like Bannon,
Carlson clearly hopes to build a global, white, Christian, authoritarian
movement. In distant lands, to be sure, Carlson shows some flexibility
on the white Christian stuff, as his Bukele promotion indicates.
Sometimes, what really matters even to racists, if they have some sense
of realpolitik, is anti-liberal authoritarianism, as the Nazis made
clear when they formally allied themselves with Japan's military
rulers.

So, where to go next? Poland is an obvious choice, but why limit Carlson
just to European thugocracies? How about the Burmese junta? How about
Saudi Arabia's MBS? After all, Orban merely harasses and eventually
bans independent news media, while MBS actually kills journalists he
doesn't like.

Which brings us to what some might regard as an anomaly in Carlson's
Orban embrace. According to Reporters Without Borders, Orban "has
steadily and effectively undermined media pluralism and independence
since being returned to power in 2010."

Apparently, this kind of record doesn't dim Carlson's support for
Orban; he wouldn't be bustling around Budapest if he didn't think
the Orban approach to press freedom -kill it-was both positive and
worthy of emulation. But suppose the Biden administration took that
approach to Fox News, or The New York Post, or, heaven forfend, the
editorial pages of The Wall Street Journal? Would Rupert be okay with
that? Would Paul Gigot (who edits the Journal's editorial pages)?
Where's the Journal editorial saying that Tucker's Orbanlove is
actually dangerous-if not to the world at large, at least to its
Murdoch interests?

Curious minds want to know (if it's still OK to have curious minds).

~ HAROLD MEYERSON

Follow Harold Meyerson on Twitter

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