Potential 2020 Dem Candidate Sherrod Brown: Russophile

U.S. Senator from Ohio and potential 2020 Democratic candidate for president Sherrod Brown is a Russophile, according to a profile in The Atlantic. 

The profile said that Brown’s third-favorite quote is from Leo Tolstoy, famed 19th century Russian author of “War and Peace.” The quote is about the “equality and brotherhood of men,” which is the sort of collectivist propaganda that led to Stalin’s slaughter of 60 million innocent people in the 20th century.

According to the piece, though, Brown does not outwardly want to be seen as a collectivist like some of his younger lawmaking colleagues.

“You don’t hear politicians talk about ‘the equality and brotherhood of men’ any more,” the piece said. “It sounded to me like Eugene Debs, the great socialist leader of the early-20th century. ‘Jeez, don’t put that down,’ Brown said, before acknowledging that with Debs pretty much forgotten, the comparison would have no effect one way or the other.”

Brown also studied Russian in college, and not just the language. Russian Studies was his major.

“Brown grew up comfortably in Mansfield, Ohio—his father was a doctor and his mother a social activist—and he attended Yale, where he majored in Russian studies. (Schultz forbids him from speaking Russian in public.)” the piece said.

Brown finds himself in an odd position for a Democrat in 2019. His party has decided that Russia is an enemy to be destroyed – a nation that subverted America’s democracy in order to bolster the candidacy of President Donald J. Trump.

“In other words, Brown discovered Tolstoy before he discovered the working class,” the piece said. “In the shallow version of American politics, he would have had to choose between bookish idealism and the cause of ordinary people. Instead, his love of the first nourished his commitment to the second.”


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