Anne Applebaum

It distorts ordinary life and ordinary decision-making.

You know, in Russia, universities became very corrupt.

The state services became very corrupt.

I mean, if you wanted a driver's license or any kind of license, you could pay for it.

And people knew that.

And then that has a corresponding effect on safety and so on.

So you can get into this very ugly downward drift if you don't stop it soon.

And as I said, I mean, the main problem in the United States is just the lack of awareness.

I mean,

We're so used to our system running on autopilot, you know, assuming that people more or less, most people obey the law and more or less, you know, things work.

And once that once the kind of critical mass is reached and that's no longer true, then it's going to be very hard to fix.

I mean, that's an interesting point.

I mean, it depends what

what it looks like.

You know, if it looks exactly like it does now, you know, maybe there wouldn't be an impact.

But if there has been a series of failed Trump peace efforts that were transparently grifting, that they weren't really about peace,

or if there has been some kind of Trump-Russia, Trump-Putin agreement to start doing business over the heads of the Ukrainians and the Europeans, I don't think Americans will find that attractive.

Maybe I'm wrong.

Maybe people won't care.

You know, foreign policy is far away.