Tucker Carlson opened his show with another segment mocking Russia hysteria in the media, even saying at one point that Vladimir Putin “does not hate America” as much as many people in the press do.

He opened by reviewing Chuck Todd’s contentious interview with Senator John Kennedy Sunday on Russia and Ukraine, in which Todd said at one point, “You realize, the only other person selling this argument outside the United States is this man, Vladimir Putin.”

Carlson laughed at Todd’s questions, said he went “full Joe McCarthy,” and asked why people are even still talking about Russia.

After playing Todd’s comment about Putin, Carlson said, “Not only are these people unwise and hysterical, totally political, utterly dishonest, they’re also kind of dumb. And because shifting mental gears is hard for dumb people, it turns out the entire on-air staff over at MSNBC is still pretending that Russia collusion is the most important story there is.”

He showed a few more clips from MSNBC before asking, “If you excluded debunked conspiracy theories, could any of these people actually tell you why Vladimir Putin is so bad? Why is he so bad? ‘He’s bad!’ Chuck Todd says. Okay, speak slowly so I can understand.”

He asked what makes Putin worse than American allies like Saudi Arabia, before continuing:

“For Chuck Todd and the rest of the dummies, Vladimir Putin is isn’t a real person with actual ideas and priorities and a country and beliefs. No, he stopped being that long ago. He’s a metaphor, a living metaphor, he’s the boogeyman! Step out of line and you’re a traitor in league with Vladimir Putin!… The irony, of course, is that Putin, for all his faults, does not hate America is much as many of these people do. They really dislike our country. And they call other people traitors? Because they’re ‘mouthing the talking points of Putin!’ These are people who don’t know anything about Russia, who don’t speak Russian!”

He concluded by saying the U.S.’ main enemy right now is China and that we “ought to be in a relationship with Russia aligned against China, to the extent that we can.”

You can watch above, via Fox News.

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