Tucker Carlson said Vladimir Putin made him wait for "a couple hours" in the Kremlin before sitting down for their interview.
  • Tucker Carlson said Vladimir Putin was “a couple hours late” for their Kremlin interview this week.
  • Making people wait is a power move often used by the Russian president.
  • Putin launched into a lengthy revisionist history of Russia that Carlson said “annoyed” him.

Russian President Vladimir Putin pulled a power move on Tucker Carlson that set the stage for the former Fox News host getting steamrolled.

In a post-interview reaction clip, Carlson said Putin was “a couple hours late” for his two-hour interview with the Russian leader in the Kremlin this week.

Making people wait is a tactic Putin has regularly used as a power play to show dominance over his guests, including world leaders.

Putin had former President Donald Trump wait for an hour before a summit in Helsinki in 2018.

He was about 50 minutes behind schedule for a meeting with Pope Francis at the Vatican in 2015, Reuters reported.

And he also held German Chancellor Angela Merkel waiting for more than four hours at a private lunch in 2014, Radio Free Europe reported.

  • mozz
    102•5 months ago

    One Obama story I enjoyed was that Obama’s staff insisted that Putin had to get on the phone first, and wait for Obama to get on the phone. Obama couldn’t understand why it was a big deal, and just wanted to get on the phone so they could talk and he could get on with his day, but his diplomatic staff put their foot down, and so when they had a phone call scheduled, he would just assemble a bunch of work and sit down to work on it while no one was on the phone call that was supposed to be what was happening. After some long, long length of time, Putin would give up and connect to the call, and someone would tell Obama, and Obama would put down his work and get on the phone.

    To me it perfectly encapsulates the weirdness of this kind of Trump-yanking-your-hand-around “power move” mentality. If you are stable then you’re either unaffected or repelled by this kind of thing. It is only the very strange who factor it into their future decision-making in anything like the intended way.

    • @ringwraithfish
      22•5 months ago

      Thanks for sharing that, I hadn’t heard this story before. I wonder if there are other examples of people putting pony boy in his place.

      • mozz
        22•5 months ago

        There’s only one other Putin story I like, which sadly doesn’t fit the current narrative if you want an anti-Putin outcome. Putin stole Robert Kraft’s super bowl ring. Kraft met with Putin, and Putin pointed out his ring and asked hey can I see that, and Kraft handed it over so Putin could examine it, and shortly after that there was some kind of interruption, and Putin’s security people told Kraft he had to leave now. They hustled him out without the ring, and at that point it was pretty much gone.

        Kraft was obviously pissed about the loss of the ring, so much so that he tried to get the State Department to make a stink to get it back, and the State Department told him sorry man that’s your own interpersonal problem to deal with.

        IDK why, but the sheer balls of the entire operation kind of made me like Putin for it. Like fuck you, maybe you’re a big shot but I’m a real blatnoy gangster, watch me prove it.

        • @ringwraithfish
          22•5 months ago

          That’s an intriguing story. I don’t think that makes him a gangster. More like something a common thief would do. That sounds like right out of a playbook of common street urchins in Paris or eastern Asia.

          Glad the state department told Kraft to shove it. Could you imagine an international standoff over a fucking billionaire’s ring.

          • mozz
            12•5 months ago

            That’s a lot of gangsters though (in my opinion). There’s this mystique that they’re honorable and all-powerful when in fact the whole thing is based on just the capacity for shocking violence, coupled with this kind of skeevy pettiness. They’re all just a bunch of step-daughter-fuckers with delusions about themselves.

            And yeah, if you hand a precious object to a known thief because in your mind there’s no way he would steal it from you, that’s on you. If you won’t or can’t go head-to-head with him yourself to get it back, then chalk it up as a valuable lesson.

        • @PrincessLeiasCat@sh.itjust.works
          9•5 months ago

          I feel like contacting the NFL for a replacement would be easier than creating a diplomatic incident with the State Department, but maybe I’m missing something.