Dear Dr. Snyder. Vance's endorsement and appearance at the Orban rally further substantiates the rot of the current Republican administration. With the Hungarian election upcoming, thoughts return to the version of the quote attributed to Stalin
" I consider it completely unimportant who in the party will vote, or how; but what is extraordinarily important is this—who will count the votes, and how."
Vote-counting matters a lot, but by the time a Hungarian voter stands in the booth, Fidesz has already controlled roughly 80% of what that voter believed was real.
The fraud is also upstream: in the information environment, in judicial capture, in who gets to define the terms of the contest before a single ballot is cast.
The Vance visit is a signal to the apparatus. Mid-level civil servants, electoral commissioners, local administrators read high-visibility endorsement visits as permission structures. Compliance cascades downward from elite alignment, not from explicit instruction. Orbán doesn’t need to issue orders. The visit itself is the order.
So here is the Stalin formulation updated: who counts the votes matters, and who controls what voters know matters just as much.
The 21st-century autocrat doesn’t choose between those levers—-they pull both simultaneously. Vance just handed Orbán international legitimacy at the exact moment the information architecture needed shoring up.
Timothy Snyder errs in the most typical way, speaking of "the export model in action."
You see, Johan, he never once mentions Miklos Radnoti, Gyula Krudy, Attila Jozsef, or Miklos Banffy -- just a few of Hungary's great poets and novelists.
The ironic thing is that no one on Hungary's far right mentions any of them ever, either. Ostensibly all these nationalists posture as for their native culture, but none has any grounding in or reference to any of it.
This owes to your own "export model in action," and how Timothy Snyder, for all his brilliance, fails to see the American role in exporting its own corrosive, destructive, dehumanizing model for decades now.
First, directly due to the 1971 Powell memo, and its subsequent far-right foundations, U.S. schools gutted their own, our own humanities. Then they replaced all that was human and natural (and complicated) with all that was corporate in standardized testing and corporate packaged textbooks.
Regarding the Powell memo, I could not agree more. The memo is arguably the fight wing backlash of the progressive culture of the mid 60’s and 70’s. Reading the memo is chilling as it is prophetic, outing the plan to halt “all this progressive nonsense that is destroying our country.” The tobacco defender lawyer and later Supreme Court Justice deserves his status as one of the great villains of US history.
If they had any interest in truth, they would call themselves the Authoritarian Party. Republicans? If they are Republicans, I'm the King of Luxembourg.
You mean there have always been people who crave being worshipped, adored, and feared? You mean the people who aspire to to be gods? You mean people who have not a whit of understanding what being human is? Those people? <smile>
In some, but not all, respects. Fidesz's strong welfare policies are definitely not anything like the Republican party in America. It accounts for much of Orban's strong support in rural areas.
You’ll find that most European right-wing parties favor what could be called “welfare” policies. The sense of community and the role of the state is stronger in Europe. (I’m American but have lived in Europe since 2012) That said, far-right parties like Fidesz understand that sense and cultivate support by leveraging programs in ways that effectively buy loyalty to the party. The political machines in the US used to act similarly, like Huey Long to Boss Tweed.
Aeons before the notion of 'right wing' existed (I believe that idea first arose in the French Revolution), we humans have had to endure warlords, emperors, conquerers, raiders, dynasts and men who were merely bloodthirsty.
The right wing is a result of a basic human character, the instinct for personal survival. And personal corruption is the inevitable consequence. It's "me" versus thee and "I" must win.
'Basic human character' as you call it must - biologically - be based on a great deal of careful nurturing, in fact, or Sapiens would never have living offspring.
I largely disagree with you on basic human character. Humans have evolved to survive the basic variability of planet Earth's climate cycles with variable elements of the need for individuals to survive to preserve the species and/or cooperate to safely grow an abundant and productive population. We even see this in other species of vertebrates.
The nurturing part is only critical to the part where the young human is too weak to survive alone. After that young humans receive constantly decreasing support during the maturing process until they reach adulthood. Then it is cooperation between adults (the so called "left" side of our character) versus the "right" who are secure enough in their growing assets to go it alone in competition for individual supremacy. That competition produces a few of the strongest of the human species in order to reproduce our kind after a deadly period of natural climate change. A similar cyclic behavior is seen in some other vertebrate species.
But now the endurance of that intellect based evolutionary character is being upset by new forms of behavior that are the fruit of evolution and are actually changing the climate.
Technology. Is this the curse of the "master species"?
We'll have to wait till Sunday elections, to see if THE PEOPLE will have their way. Hoping for their success, and orban's, trump's, vance's FAIL. Democracy is hard, because it takes participation from the citizens to make it happen. We can do it, but must stay committed & vigilant.
There is a singular reason T. Idolizes Orban and P. They figured out the playbook: how to stay in power. Oppression: keep your enemies poor and your champions rich.
Vance's continual demonstration that he lacks any backbone whatsoever hopefully will be his undoing. How can he charge American students with antisemitism when they disagree with Netanyahu while fully backing an avowed antisemite? How can he honestly blame Ukrainian secret service for interfering with Hungary's election this Sunday? How can he openly back policies that favor Russia? He obviously feels no shame.
Shame is not something the GOP seems to comprehend or feel. I wonder if there is some genetic aberration in persons that gravitate to right wing policies that has no genetic component for truth, honesty, honor, empathy, compassion, or discerning reality. Not just the GOP in America, but right wing everywhere seems hell bent on creating a false reality based on the fantasies of a few in power.
"Inside Hungary he managed, largely by way of constitutional changes, to create an apparently invincible strategic position for one-party rule and his own personal power: the “illiberal state” which he then presented to others as a model for emulation."
Most of us probably never imagined political leaders in the USA reading a script written in the dark halls of the Kremlin and refined in Budapest.
Thank you bringing this all out into the open. Putin’s puppeteer act in the US must end soon. The last thing America needs is more unnecessary wars. Is anyone named Trump volunteering to serve? Hopefully, the people of Hungary will stand up to Orban and Putin.
Are we lost in the Doom Loop of DJT's brain? If I understand, he has sent JD, our VP, a strong advocate and crusader for Theocratic White Nationalism, Wittcoff, a Real Estate buddy and Jared, his son in law to negotiate with Iran. JD is as much a fascist as DJT, Wittcoff and Kushner are both ardent supporters of the Netanyahu government in Israel. So, I ask. What can go wrong with this strategy? Today he released completely crazed, anti immigrant tweets that have the authorship of Stephen Miller "written" all over them. What's next? Just when Trump is trying to transition from the episode "A HAPPY ENDING" to his great victory against Iran, Melania absolves herself from the Epstein business. Is anyone sane working or living at the White House?
As I watched Vance pledging his eternal love and fealty to Orban while Orban’s government was offering financial assistance and US intelligence information to Iran, the proverb, “there is no honor among thieves” came to mind. We are now alone in the world, having alienated our enemies and aligned with adversaries who are playing us (though our current administration is too stupid to know this). I am hoping that what happens in Hungary will be the beginning of the end - for now. (Everything in history seems cyclical.) I want Orban to go down hard. I’m hoping this will offer courage and resolve to the pro-democracy resisters in our country, enabling us to decisively sweep the elections in November and giving us the opportunity to prosecute and purge the bad actors. I’m not a historian, but it seems that civilizations continue to resist brutality and repression as they strive to restore freedom and individual liberties. I’m hoping we are wide awake, clear-eyed and ready.
Thank you for this post Dr Snyder. Let us hope for ordinary Hungarians as we hope for ordinary Americans that we will all soon be rid of this pestilence.🙏🏻💔🇺🇸💔 🇭🇺
To someone who doesn’t get into the weeds about things Orban, and I include myself in that group, although I’ve known he is a European, and influential right wing authoritarian,
and a major thorn in the side of the EU, I was still stunned when I found out Vance went to Hungary to campaign for him! WTF?
An American VP in Budapest supporting a dictator aligned with Putin? Why hasn’t this gotten a bigger reaction in the US? More press?
Michael, the Guardian has been covering it. PBS News Hour, too, if I remember correctly. Of course, the Iran situation, and now Melania’s strange news conference force other kinds of news out of view.
Thanks for pointing this out. We can all get a bit emotional about these occurrences lately. Still where were the democrats in congress? Did you hear anything from them? Or is it the “too much all the time flood em one outrage after another” strategy?
Good riddance. Unfortunately the demise of Trump and Orban may not be the beginning of the end for this fascist nightmare. This movement is metastasizing in the face of the debacle in Iran, but at its core is anti semitism and its spiritual leader is Nick Fuentes who thinks none of these people, including Hitler, went far enough, and he has a huge following. Please read: How the Internet Fringe Infiltrated Republican Politics by Antonia Hitchens, The New Yorker April 6, 2026.
What do the Hungarian, American, and Russian "personalities" have in common? The "politics of eternity" is the singular, common urge. Do they have any interest in the betterment of humanity or a more peaceful human society, or any kind of equanimity for individuals? No! They are in it for self-glorification and of course, self-enrichment. By self-glorification and self-enrichment, they have a deep sense that that they will be eternally "alive." They have externalized what is a very internal urge within humans - to be impervious to death, or to live forever. Some people call it an immortality project. Ernest Becker wrote his seminal work called, Denial of Death, that describes this deep psychological urge in great detail. It's not that some sociopaths and psychopaths have this urge, but all of us do, to one degree or another. These people on the political front are simply exposing this need outside their skin.
It's not that they want to be powerful, they want to be Gods. They want power over our minds, and ultimately they want devotion. And that is the logical outcome of the complete denial of death. They are refusing to suffer the deepest suffering that there is in life - to have to die - like everyone else. And we're seeing this psychological refusal playing out in history.
Dear Dr. Snyder. Vance's endorsement and appearance at the Orban rally further substantiates the rot of the current Republican administration. With the Hungarian election upcoming, thoughts return to the version of the quote attributed to Stalin
" I consider it completely unimportant who in the party will vote, or how; but what is extraordinarily important is this—who will count the votes, and how."
Struggle.
Great quote and excellent point…
Vote-counting matters a lot, but by the time a Hungarian voter stands in the booth, Fidesz has already controlled roughly 80% of what that voter believed was real.
The fraud is also upstream: in the information environment, in judicial capture, in who gets to define the terms of the contest before a single ballot is cast.
The Vance visit is a signal to the apparatus. Mid-level civil servants, electoral commissioners, local administrators read high-visibility endorsement visits as permission structures. Compliance cascades downward from elite alignment, not from explicit instruction. Orbán doesn’t need to issue orders. The visit itself is the order.
So here is the Stalin formulation updated: who counts the votes matters, and who controls what voters know matters just as much.
The 21st-century autocrat doesn’t choose between those levers—-they pull both simultaneously. Vance just handed Orbán international legitimacy at the exact moment the information architecture needed shoring up.
That’s not a coincidence.
That’s the export model in action.
Johan🐌
And yet in spite of this the election is too close a call for Trump or Putin hence the great efforts they have made to swing it for Viktor.
Timothy Snyder errs in the most typical way, speaking of "the export model in action."
You see, Johan, he never once mentions Miklos Radnoti, Gyula Krudy, Attila Jozsef, or Miklos Banffy -- just a few of Hungary's great poets and novelists.
The ironic thing is that no one on Hungary's far right mentions any of them ever, either. Ostensibly all these nationalists posture as for their native culture, but none has any grounding in or reference to any of it.
This owes to your own "export model in action," and how Timothy Snyder, for all his brilliance, fails to see the American role in exporting its own corrosive, destructive, dehumanizing model for decades now.
First, directly due to the 1971 Powell memo, and its subsequent far-right foundations, U.S. schools gutted their own, our own humanities. Then they replaced all that was human and natural (and complicated) with all that was corporate in standardized testing and corporate packaged textbooks.
Regarding the Powell memo, I could not agree more. The memo is arguably the fight wing backlash of the progressive culture of the mid 60’s and 70’s. Reading the memo is chilling as it is prophetic, outing the plan to halt “all this progressive nonsense that is destroying our country.” The tobacco defender lawyer and later Supreme Court Justice deserves his status as one of the great villains of US history.
I checked the Substack of Rod Dreher, an American conservative, who lives in Hungary. He does not speak Hungarian (or anything other than English).
He claims, for example, that claims of Russian interference are delusional. He also doesn’t believe Russia interfered in the US.
So he’s kind of gullible. But he did note one thing: Trump and Vance have lost all popularity in Europe, even amongst conservative.
The tariffs and constant insults have completely turned people off. Maybe Vance’s appearance will hurt Orban.
If they had any interest in truth, they would call themselves the Authoritarian Party. Republicans? If they are Republicans, I'm the King of Luxembourg.
Putin uses this quote, too. I read that he made a point of stressing the quote when meeting with Trump.
Orban is another proof that the right wing is the same everywhere.
You mean there have always been people who crave being worshipped, adored, and feared? You mean the people who aspire to to be gods? You mean people who have not a whit of understanding what being human is? Those people? <smile>
"Those People" suffering from The Hubris Syndrome and the ignorance of those who follow.
Followers feel comfort by following. It feels like a good way to fit in. The only thing it costs them is their freedom.
Gawd, how comforting to feel so free.
In some, but not all, respects. Fidesz's strong welfare policies are definitely not anything like the Republican party in America. It accounts for much of Orban's strong support in rural areas.
https://www.lse.ac.uk/european-institute/Assets/Documents/LEQS-Discussion-Papers/EIQPaper181.pdf
You’ll find that most European right-wing parties favor what could be called “welfare” policies. The sense of community and the role of the state is stronger in Europe. (I’m American but have lived in Europe since 2012) That said, far-right parties like Fidesz understand that sense and cultivate support by leveraging programs in ways that effectively buy loyalty to the party. The political machines in the US used to act similarly, like Huey Long to Boss Tweed.
This is also true in Canada: much stronger social safety net. Even the Conservative Party doesn’t threaten it.
Right wing?
Aeons before the notion of 'right wing' existed (I believe that idea first arose in the French Revolution), we humans have had to endure warlords, emperors, conquerers, raiders, dynasts and men who were merely bloodthirsty.
The right wing is a result of a basic human character, the instinct for personal survival. And personal corruption is the inevitable consequence. It's "me" versus thee and "I" must win.
Nah.
'Basic human character' as you call it must - biologically - be based on a great deal of careful nurturing, in fact, or Sapiens would never have living offspring.
I largely disagree with you on basic human character. Humans have evolved to survive the basic variability of planet Earth's climate cycles with variable elements of the need for individuals to survive to preserve the species and/or cooperate to safely grow an abundant and productive population. We even see this in other species of vertebrates.
The nurturing part is only critical to the part where the young human is too weak to survive alone. After that young humans receive constantly decreasing support during the maturing process until they reach adulthood. Then it is cooperation between adults (the so called "left" side of our character) versus the "right" who are secure enough in their growing assets to go it alone in competition for individual supremacy. That competition produces a few of the strongest of the human species in order to reproduce our kind after a deadly period of natural climate change. A similar cyclic behavior is seen in some other vertebrate species.
But now the endurance of that intellect based evolutionary character is being upset by new forms of behavior that are the fruit of evolution and are actually changing the climate.
Technology. Is this the curse of the "master species"?
We'll have to wait till Sunday elections, to see if THE PEOPLE will have their way. Hoping for their success, and orban's, trump's, vance's FAIL. Democracy is hard, because it takes participation from the citizens to make it happen. We can do it, but must stay committed & vigilant.
There is a singular reason T. Idolizes Orban and P. They figured out the playbook: how to stay in power. Oppression: keep your enemies poor and your champions rich.
And grift as much money for yourself as is possible.
Vance's continual demonstration that he lacks any backbone whatsoever hopefully will be his undoing. How can he charge American students with antisemitism when they disagree with Netanyahu while fully backing an avowed antisemite? How can he honestly blame Ukrainian secret service for interfering with Hungary's election this Sunday? How can he openly back policies that favor Russia? He obviously feels no shame.
Shame is not something the GOP seems to comprehend or feel. I wonder if there is some genetic aberration in persons that gravitate to right wing policies that has no genetic component for truth, honesty, honor, empathy, compassion, or discerning reality. Not just the GOP in America, but right wing everywhere seems hell bent on creating a false reality based on the fantasies of a few in power.
How, indeed?
Orwell would have loved Orban. Per TS:
"Inside Hungary he managed, largely by way of constitutional changes, to create an apparently invincible strategic position for one-party rule and his own personal power: the “illiberal state” which he then presented to others as a model for emulation."
Most of us probably never imagined political leaders in the USA reading a script written in the dark halls of the Kremlin and refined in Budapest.
Thank you bringing this all out into the open. Putin’s puppeteer act in the US must end soon. The last thing America needs is more unnecessary wars. Is anyone named Trump volunteering to serve? Hopefully, the people of Hungary will stand up to Orban and Putin.
Are we lost in the Doom Loop of DJT's brain? If I understand, he has sent JD, our VP, a strong advocate and crusader for Theocratic White Nationalism, Wittcoff, a Real Estate buddy and Jared, his son in law to negotiate with Iran. JD is as much a fascist as DJT, Wittcoff and Kushner are both ardent supporters of the Netanyahu government in Israel. So, I ask. What can go wrong with this strategy? Today he released completely crazed, anti immigrant tweets that have the authorship of Stephen Miller "written" all over them. What's next? Just when Trump is trying to transition from the episode "A HAPPY ENDING" to his great victory against Iran, Melania absolves herself from the Epstein business. Is anyone sane working or living at the White House?
Your final question hits the nail on the head and the answer is NO. They entire regime of Felon47 is nuttier than a fruitcake.
As I watched Vance pledging his eternal love and fealty to Orban while Orban’s government was offering financial assistance and US intelligence information to Iran, the proverb, “there is no honor among thieves” came to mind. We are now alone in the world, having alienated our enemies and aligned with adversaries who are playing us (though our current administration is too stupid to know this). I am hoping that what happens in Hungary will be the beginning of the end - for now. (Everything in history seems cyclical.) I want Orban to go down hard. I’m hoping this will offer courage and resolve to the pro-democracy resisters in our country, enabling us to decisively sweep the elections in November and giving us the opportunity to prosecute and purge the bad actors. I’m not a historian, but it seems that civilizations continue to resist brutality and repression as they strive to restore freedom and individual liberties. I’m hoping we are wide awake, clear-eyed and ready.
Thank you for this post Dr Snyder. Let us hope for ordinary Hungarians as we hope for ordinary Americans that we will all soon be rid of this pestilence.🙏🏻💔🇺🇸💔 🇭🇺
To someone who doesn’t get into the weeds about things Orban, and I include myself in that group, although I’ve known he is a European, and influential right wing authoritarian,
and a major thorn in the side of the EU, I was still stunned when I found out Vance went to Hungary to campaign for him! WTF?
An American VP in Budapest supporting a dictator aligned with Putin? Why hasn’t this gotten a bigger reaction in the US? More press?
And Vance was accusing the EU of meddling in Hungary’s election, at the same time he was there denying his own, very transparent meddling.
Michael, the Guardian has been covering it. PBS News Hour, too, if I remember correctly. Of course, the Iran situation, and now Melania’s strange news conference force other kinds of news out of view.
Thanks for pointing this out. We can all get a bit emotional about these occurrences lately. Still where were the democrats in congress? Did you hear anything from them? Or is it the “too much all the time flood em one outrage after another” strategy?
The Dems tried to introduce a resolution but the R acting speaker would not allow it to be brought up for discussion.
They probably figure most Americans wouldn’t care.
The WSJ did do an unfavourable editorial. Traditional GOP.
Good riddance. Unfortunately the demise of Trump and Orban may not be the beginning of the end for this fascist nightmare. This movement is metastasizing in the face of the debacle in Iran, but at its core is anti semitism and its spiritual leader is Nick Fuentes who thinks none of these people, including Hitler, went far enough, and he has a huge following. Please read: How the Internet Fringe Infiltrated Republican Politics by Antonia Hitchens, The New Yorker April 6, 2026.
Link:
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2026/04/13/how-the-internet-fringe-infiltrated-republican-politics
Orban will lose. He will not accept the result.
He can't. He can't accept it because he is immortal - in his own mind. It sounds silly but it is very dangerous.
Sounds eerily familiar
Trump and Vance will be watching.
Orban/Trump may lose, so the vote-counting will continue until they eventually win.
Every peace loving human around the world is weary of oppression. Let us hope Orban fails and Vance trips on his falling.
What do the Hungarian, American, and Russian "personalities" have in common? The "politics of eternity" is the singular, common urge. Do they have any interest in the betterment of humanity or a more peaceful human society, or any kind of equanimity for individuals? No! They are in it for self-glorification and of course, self-enrichment. By self-glorification and self-enrichment, they have a deep sense that that they will be eternally "alive." They have externalized what is a very internal urge within humans - to be impervious to death, or to live forever. Some people call it an immortality project. Ernest Becker wrote his seminal work called, Denial of Death, that describes this deep psychological urge in great detail. It's not that some sociopaths and psychopaths have this urge, but all of us do, to one degree or another. These people on the political front are simply exposing this need outside their skin.
It's not that they want to be powerful, they want to be Gods. They want power over our minds, and ultimately they want devotion. And that is the logical outcome of the complete denial of death. They are refusing to suffer the deepest suffering that there is in life - to have to die - like everyone else. And we're seeing this psychological refusal playing out in history.
I am American but Hungarian roots. I’m really not a bad guy.
I don't understand why you would say that.
Did you read what you wrote? 😂
Did you think I was talking about you?
Of course not!
The "personalities" discussed in Dr. Snyder's substack were political leaders of the aforementioned countries.
Dr. Snyder, thank you for the attribution for the “cracks are where the light gets in“, Leonard Cohen,