In today’s 350th Vatnik Soup, I’ll introduce an American comedian and podcaster, Dave Smith (@ComicDaveSmith). He’s best-known for his numerous appearances on the Joe Rogan Experience and for his unhinged takes on the Russo-Ukrainian War.

1/22

Smith has a massive megaphone – he’s a good friend of Joe Rogan, and he’s appeared on Joe’s podcast a whopping 16 times. Naturally, he’s also visited Lex Fridman’s podcast and frequently appears on Fox News’ Kennedy and The Greg Gutfeld Show.

2/22

Dave is part of the Kremlintarian section of the Libertarian Party called Mises Caucus. They took control of the party in May 2022, and with the help of their new leader, Angela McArdle, turned it into an extension of the MAGA Republicans:

3/22

Angela McArdle

Dave has said that he “became a libertarian through the Ron Paul movement.” Incidentally, Ronny has been one of the biggest cheerleaders for Putin at least since 2004. He’s supported Russia’s annexation of Crimea, and objected to sanctions against Russia & aid to Ukraine.

4/22

He’s also promoted Scott Horton’s historically inaccurate pro-Kremlin propaganda book, “Provoked: How Washington Started the New Cold War with Russia and the Catastrophe in Ukraine.” In the book, Horton shifts all the blame for Russia’s genocidal invasion on Obama & Biden.

5/22

One of Dave’s biggest pitfalls is that he simply does not understand Russian or Ukrainian culture, at all. The discussions are shrouded in whataboutism where Russian imperialism is just brushed off and the discussion is moved to the “evil deeds of the neocon warmongers”.

6/22

While debating Vaush (they really couldn’t find anyone else?) about the war in Ukraine, Dave’s opened the discussion with un classique du vatnique, saying that “The US should give Russia what it wants and leave NATO,” completely brushing off the fact that…

7/22

…Russia has invaded its neighboring countries multiple times in the last few decades and forcibly annexed territory from Moldova, Georgia and Ukraine while proclaiming that Ukraine does not exist and is actually just a part of Russia.

8/22

According to Dave, Tucker is an “American hero” because “he gave Putin a tougher interview than any corporate “journalist” has given Zelenskyy.” He also claimed that Putin “undeniably” made a “lot of truthful and reasonable points” during the interview.

9/22

Another problem with the moral contrarians is that in their world, the bad guys like Russia are never agents, and only react to other’s actions. All evil, including bombing of civilians, is just blowback, and the responsibility always lies on the good guys.

10/22

Like Scott Horton’s, Dave’s “anti-war” stance seems to be that countries like Russia can invade other sovereign nations, whereas their victims’ allies should not be able to help in any way because that would “provoke” or “escalate”.

11/22

But Dave doesn’t stop there – according to him, Western hegemony is also the reason for “reactionary movements” like Andrew Tate’s misogynist ideology, and even the Nazis. As is tradition, he’s also an Assad apologist who denies the chemical attacks against civilians.

12/22

Smith has also defended his nazi apologist friend, Darryl Cooper, on Rogan’s show. One of Darryl’s main claims was that “Churchill was the real villain of the war,” which he also said on Tucker Carlson’s podcast. Dave, who do you think was the real villain of World War II?

13/22

According to Dave, “countries want to join NATO because they get their defense subsidized and security guarantees from the most powerful country in the world.” Again, if he had read just a little bit of history of Eastern Europe, Dave could MAYBE see why countries…

14/22

…like Poland, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia and Czechia were so eager to join NATO as soon as they had the chance. The reason is extremely simple: all these countries were invaded by Russia, know what Russian occupation is like, and simply don’t want it to happen again.

15/22

To this day, Russia has not invaded a NATO country, and neither has any NATO country invaded Russia. And by the way, Russian media has already moved on to 100% Russkiy Mir imperialism, and don’t even mention NATO anymore.

16/22

And as most of the Mises Caucus, Dave also went through a radical transformation and started supporting Trump, despite having called him a “war criminal”. Was pardoning Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht really the only reason, or was it more about helping Putin?

17/22

Nevermind Trump’s promises to evict all Palestinians from Gaza and turn it into a tourist resort/Trump worship site that was promoted with the most ridiculous AI slop ever produced by man. Actually, Dave had previously even accused Trump of genocide.

18/22

In November 2024, Smith claimed that Trump could end the war in Ukraine if he’d listen to Ramaswamy, Tucker and RFK Jr., suggesting that Putin’s been trying to end the conflict “the entire time.”

Dave’s just another “contrarian” politically cuckolded by the orange man.

19/22

As a comedian/geopolitical expert, Dave rarely speaks about any real events in Ukraine. For example, he hasn’t mentioned Bucha, Kherson, Sumy, or any other atrocity or war crime done by the Russians. He’d rather just call Zelenskyy a “pawn” of US imperialism.

20/22

But I gotta give it to Dave – he isn’t afraid to debate these matters. His debate with Douglas Murray on JRE was entertaining, and I would like to see him debate a real Ukraine expert on the topic. I mean, he’s wrong about most things but it would still be entertaining.

21/22

To conclude, Dave is a comedian turned geopolitical analyst who doesn’t know history. Yet, if you search social media for educational content about Ukraine or even World War II, the top results you’ll get are hot takes from him, Darryl Cooper and Tucker Carlson. Yikes.

22/22

More soup for the hungry!

Scott Horton: x.com/P_Kallioniemi/…

Darryl Cooper: x.com/P_Kallioniemi/…

Joe Rogan: x.com/P_Kallioniemi/…

Tucker Carlson: x.com/P_Kallioniemi/…

The 2nd edition of “Vatnik Soup – The Ultimate Guide to Russian Disinformation” is officially out!

You can order your copy here:

The Book | Vatnik Soup