Republicans love Trump---and Putin

Jennifer Rubin:

Most Republicans remain cultishly devoted to defeated former president Donald Trump, even as he openly praises Vladimir Putin for dismembering Ukraine, a democratic ally. 

Imagine a leader of an American party praising the Soviets as their troops crushed the Hungarian uprising in 1956.

Trump has never stopped rooting for and genuflecting to Putin — not when he sided with Putin’s lies over U.S. intelligence on election interference; not when he echoed Russian propaganda on its invasion of Crimea; not when he diminished the murder of Russian journalists. 

So perhaps it should not be shocking that he remains infatuated with Putin as the Russian dictator wages a war of aggression unlike anything we have seen since World War II.

Many Republicans have absorbed Trump’s reverence for authoritarians. Others refuse to denounce him, apparently more concerned about not offending Trump than about supporting democratic allies in Europe. Will they keep this up as the casualties pile up? Once Kyiv is reduced to rubble?....

See also The invasion begins with Trump's support.