There is not a single successful country or society where the common good was achieved without a moral and responsible elite. The sooner Ukrainians realize this, the sooner we will begin to build an effective state.

One of the characteristic features of conservatism and, ultimately, of Christian democracy is the emphasis on the decisive role of the elite in society. But elitism here should not be perceived as the domination of the greedy rich over the working people, as it is often presented in leftist distortions of this rational and sober thought. Take a simple meeting of a class, a student group, a condominium, or a work team, and everywhere and always any activity aimed at the common good will be impossible without an initiative minority, without leadership. On the scale of a community or a state, this will be the political elite, with whom Ukrainians have not always been lucky, but we are not the only ones. But without the leadership role of the elite, which rules under the people’s mandate, neither the state nor the nation can develop.

For Ukrainians, this is a huge problem, because the problem of the quality of the Ukrainian elite is one of the most acute, although its roots lie in the real prevailing values of the Ukrainian people, who have been living by specific life guidelines since the 1990s. If personal enrichment at any cost or violation of the law is a cause for praise and is not condemned by the environment or even society, then it is not surprising that each new wave of elite will be the same as the previous one.

But in our country, there are already centers with fundamentally different values, on the basis of which a new Ukrainian elite can be elected to power. But for this to happen, it is necessary that the voters who will give the government a mandate choose candidates who promise fair rules for everyone, instead of those who gave a ball of buckwheat and brought a KAMAZ truckload of gravel to a village street.

One of the deepest problems of Ukrainian state-building is that a significant part of Ukrainians perceive the elite as a priori something alien and anti-national, believing that the “deep people” will solve all problems themselves. Although this opinion can only be held by those who have never done anything of social importance, this idea has already led to severe social disasters.

In December 1918, the socialist-oriented leaders of the Ukrainian People’s Republic approved the so-called “labor principle,” according to which local power was to be vested in councils of workers, peasants, and labor intellectuals. The bourgeoisie was deprived of voting rights, effectively excluding the elites from the process of state-building. Given the catastrophic level of literacy among peasants, workers, and soldiers of the time, the threat of populism was even greater than the Moscow-Bolshevik invasion.

As a result, the very next month, the Directory lost the capital of Ukraine and was unable to organize the army, defense, overcome atamanism and introduce discipline, etc. And then the Bolsheviks came and introduced repression, famines, and further Russification. 100 years ago, Ukrainians disliked their elites so much that they were forced to grovel before others who were much worse.

For conservatives, the elite is the engine that sets the vector of development due to its education, experience in managing people, and moral qualities based on responsibility to society. Ukrainian historian Roman Lekhniuk notes that the way out of Ukraine’s current situation is not to reject elites as such, but to create conditions under which a qualitatively new elite with social elevators that function not according to paternalistic ties but according to the criterion of efficiency for society can be formed.

Ukrainians should remember that their own state is difficult to gain, but very easy to lose. Especially considering our neighbors. But your own state, even if imperfect, is always better than someone else’s. At least because Ukrainians can always force their government to take into account the opinion of the people.

Author: Valeriy Maydanyuk

One of the popular myths about conservatism spread by opponents of this rational ideology is that conservatives are against change and would like to bring everything back hundreds of years, or even better, to the mammoth era.

The fallacy of this opinion is that conservatism has never denied change, but only insisted on its rational and reasonable nature. For conservatism, changing something unnecessarily, for the sake of change, or even worse, imitating change and inventing “innovations” that make no sense, is worse than not changing at all.

In our history, Ukrainian conservative forces have been perhaps the greatest advocates of change. And Ukraine’s being under the rule of other states turned the struggle to preserve Ukrainian national traditions and identity into a real revolutionary and sometimes radical struggle, in which conservatives were far ahead of liberals or socialists.

The conservatives in Galicia fought for electoral reform in Austria-Hungary and the introduction of universal suffrage, rather than defending the outdated noble-elite system. The Hetmanate of Pavlo Skoropadskyi became a real driver of reforms during its 7.5 months, while the socialist Central Rada managed to issue only 4 station wagons in a year.

During the era of independence, the conservative People’s Movement was a force that fought for change, while it was the communists who wanted to preserve the colonial position of the Ukrainian language, culture, and national status in relation to Erephia. Initiatives to raise the status of the Ukrainian language in the 1990s, conservative in their content, were called “radical,” “extremist,” and whatever else you want to call them. The fact is that if conservatives were in favor of no changes, they would have to demand that the Russian language and the Communist Party remain dominant in Ukraine, as they were before. However, it was the Ukrainian national-democratic conservatives who promoted revolutionary state-building processes at the dawn of independence.

Conservatism advocates change when it is important and indispensable, not just to change things for the sake of change. In Ukraine, as a result of the prevailing bureaucratic and populist procedures, a system was formed whereby every new leader or minister, upon taking office, tried to “change” something to make it visible that they were doing something. Usually, this was limited to changing the names, signs, and “caps” of documents, although it also consumed a lot of Ukrainian taxpayers’ money and man-hours of government agencies that could have been used to better serve the needs of the population.

Thus, the Presidential Administration of Ukraine became the Presidential Secretariat, and today it is called the Presidential Office, but the essence of its powers has not changed at all, despite the name change. The question is: why change it and spend people’s money on these changes? After all, as the “icon” of conservatism Margaret Thatcher said: “The state has no money of its own, only taxpayers’ money.”

Conservatism advocates changes that are truly important for society and rejects the pseudo-change-making that is used by those who seek to change only their financial situation, often at someone else’s expense.

Author: Valeriy Maydanyuk

Conservatism is perhaps the only ideology that does not idealize a person, does not try to make him or her an ideal citizen, and does not force society to be perfect.

Conservatives are guided by the principle of the imperfection of human nature, realize that every person has some flaws, passions and sins, and treat this with understanding, not looking for perfection. For conservatives, the phrase “even the sun has spots” is not just about the celestial body. The Communists tried to force people to be selfless, to work selflessly in Komsomol units for rations and to dream of the success of socialism. And when they failed, the USSR was plagued by corruption, fraudsters, speculators, crime, and sycophancy. And then communist idealists tried to re-educate people through repression, famines, and gulags.

Contemporary left-liberals and leftist movements fight against what they themselves consider latent or overt manifestations of intolerance, censor hate speech, fight for the correct use of feminine terms, and hate those who cannot understand the importance of their ideas. And yet studies show that in no country in the world has 100% of the population become tolerant, equal, and inclusive. Even in Denmark and Sweden, countries that are considered to be the flagships of feminism, gender experts say that women’s rights are only 80-90% protected. For some reason, in this reality, there is not a single society that has reached the level of tolerance ideals sought by left-liberal activists.

Neither fascists, nor environmentalists, nor communists, nor liberals have yet succeeded in forcing people to stop being selfish creatures, to get rid of their stereotypes and desires, and to start serving the ideals of the perfect society they have constructed. Strange, isn’t it?

Such lofty ideas, imbued with the public good, but for some reason they are still unattainable.

The United States is still fighting racism, Sweden is still fighting patriarchy, and the Netherlands is still fighting homophobia, and the struggle is still ongoing, with no end in sight. It seems that the activists of the above ideologies themselves do not believe that their ideas can be implemented 100%, but no one will say so out loud. And if a person remains imperfect, then no ideal social order can be created.

Conservatives are the only ones who do not rape human nature and do not demand that citizens be inclusive, diverse, tolerant, selfless, or conform to the purity of a race. According to conservatives, humanity will never become the way adherents of social utopias see it. And forcing people to follow the utopia means killing millions of “different” people who do not meet the standards of utopianism. Lenin and Stalin exterminated kulaks, the bourgeoisie, and “enemies of the people,” while in modern Iran they are trying to force women to hide under veils, and in Cuba communism has been completed to the point of total blackout and no one is allowed to leave the “island of freedom.”

Conservatives are convinced that it is best not to pursue any perfect utopia, but to build a relatively orderly, just and as free a society as possible, in which poverty, inequality and injustice will not disappear, but their manifestations will be minimized by fair state and social regulation.

Of course, there will always be dissatisfied minorities: for example, quadroberts may be unhappy with the parliamentary representation quota, and others may complain about the lack of respect for their identity. But the basic provisions of the Declaration of Human Rights and Freedoms are a sufficient framework for human and social development.

By implementing sensible reforms, society can preserve and improve an imperfect but tolerable order. Instead, those who promised the perfection of man and society turned their countries into ruins and hell. Conservatism does not force people to be perfect and does not kill anyone for it.

Author: Valeriy Maydanyuk

Donald Trump is forming his cabinet and selecting members of the team that will lead the US domestic and foreign policy tomorrow. Therefore, it is particularly important for us to know who in the team of the new owner of the White House will deal with issues related to Ukraine.

The electoral advantage of the Republicans in Congress, the Senate and the White House allows Trump to gain full power and freedom to make decisions and appoint his preferred candidates. Trump chose Florida Republican Senator Mark Rubio as his candidate for Secretary of State, who has previously supported assistance to Ukraine and even criticized his fellow party members for doubting the continuation of assistance to our country. The new Secretary of State still has to be confirmed by Congress in January 2025, but given the Republican advantage in the U.S. Senate, his nomination should be voted on without any complications.

But in recent years, Rubio has expressed skeptical rhetoric about the nature of the Russian-Ukrainian war, and in April he did not support a bill to allocate $61 billion to support Ukraine. At the same time, Rubio has been ambiguous about how to end the war, calling Ukraine’s struggle for independence against the Russian occupiers a “stalemate war.”

“I think that Ukrainians have been incredibly brave and strong when they have stood up to Russia. But, at the end of the day, what we are funding here is a stalemate war, and it has to be brought to an end. I think there should be common sense here. You don’t have to be a fan of Vladimir Putin to want the war to end,” Rubio said.

Trump chose Michael Walz as his National Security Advisor, who has taken a tough stance on China and Russia. Last year, when Walz visited Kyiv, he criticized Biden for the slow pace of deliveries and tweeted that Ukraine should have had weapons before the war, not the second year after it began. Walz is considered to be a hawkish candidate who demands to counteract Russia and China, pointing out their aggressive intentions towards the West and the United States as the leader of the democratic world. With such candidates, US foreign policy has a chance to become more decisive and stronger.

Trump may appoint Brian Hook, a career diplomat who is called a “hawk” and a critic of Iran, as a special representative for negotiations to “end the Russian-Ukrainian war.” Brian Hook, 56, a lawyer by training, worked in the Republican administrations of George W. Bush and Donald Trump. He was responsible for the Iranian direction: he was the head of the interagency sanctions coordination group, supported the withdrawal from the Iranian nuclear deal and the operation to eliminate Iranian General Qassem Soleimani. Currently, the powers of the US special representative are not clearly defined, but the press claims that the main task of such a potential appointment is to fulfill Trump’s promise to end the war quickly.

At the same time, a problematic aspect of Trump’s personnel policy was the initiative to appoint Tulsi Gabbard, a politician and former US Army reserve officer who repeated Russian propaganda, as Director of National Intelligence. In 2022, she left the Democratic Party, calling it an “elite cabal of warmongers,” and joined the Republicans a month before the presidential election.

Tulsi Gabbard is known for her position against providing military assistance to our country. Moreover, in 2022, the Center for Countering Disinformation at the National Security and Defense Council claimed that Tulsi Gabbard was working for a foreign audience for the Kremlin’s money. For example, she claimed that “the United States is guilty of military aggression” against Russia, “provoked” the aggressor for many years, and “the ruling elite of Washington wants to kill as many Russians as possible with the help of Ukrainians.”

On the air of the American Fox News channel, which supports Trump, Tulsi Gabbard spread Russian propaganda theses about weapons of mass destruction in Ukrainian biolabs. In 2018, Gabbard accused Poland and Ukraine of anti-Semitism, glorification of Nazism, and Holocaust denial. However, the Association of Jewish Communities (AJC) rejected these accusations and called Gabbard’s words “anti-Ukrainian defamation” used by the Russians.

Hubbard even met secretly with Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, whom she called a “fact-finding mission” and refused to call Assad a war criminal. The appointment of such an intelligence candidate is a serious problem for a successful confrontation with the Russian aggressor, unless Trump changes his choice or Gabbard changes her position.

The new potential team of Donald Trump’s administration, which still needs to be confirmed in the Capitol, is made up of candidates who do not agree on the vision of US foreign policy. Some of Trump’s nominees take a completely correct, conservative and pro-Western position, some want the war to end as soon as possible, and some have been found to be spreading Russian propaganda, unless this can be attributed to populist rhetoric for the sake of ratings. But no matter who works in the US State Department, the decisive influence on the course of our struggle for independence depends on the Armed Forces, the crisis management abilities of the current Ukrainian government, and the resilience of the Ukrainian nation.

Author: Valeriy Maydanyuk

The recent governmental crisis in Germany could return power to the Christian Democrats, who remain the most popular party in the country.

Germany’s de facto three-party ruling coalition of the Social Democrats, the Greens and the Free Democrats has ceased to exist after Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced that he would dismiss the “Free Democrat” Finance Minister Christian Lindner due to persistent disagreements over spending and economic reforms. The “traffic light” coalition, which was named after the main colors of the parties – red (Social Democrats), green (obviously) and yellow (Free Democrats) – is ceasing to exist.

The disagreement in the coalition arose from the position of the Free Democrats’ Finance Minister Lindner, who insisted that the government stick to austerity and tax cuts, while the Social Democrats wanted to maintain social spending and support German industry with economic incentives. Lindner demanded liberal economic reforms, tax cuts, and curtailment of climate policy to stimulate economic growth, but such provisions contradicted the policies of the Greens and the SPD. Chancellor Scholz was dissatisfied with this approach of the finance minister and criticized his “frugality” in helping Ukraine, but Lindner refused to “break his oath.”

The dismissal of the finance minister removes the Free Democratic Party from the government coalition and forces Chancellor Scholz to call a vote of confidence in parliament, which is scheduled for January 15. If the incumbent chancellor loses this vote – and the rival parties and the Free Democrats are unlikely to support the government’s policies – early elections will be held as early as March 2025.

There is also a possibility that within 21 days the parliamentary parties will form a new majority, the government coalition will attract another party to the partnership, and the MPs will approve a new chancellor.

Given that the Free Democrats currently have a rating of about 4%, which does not allow them to enter the Bundestag, the parliamentary future of the German liberals remains in doubt.

Early elections are likely to bring to power a new government led by the CDU/CSU, which is currently leading in opinion polls by a wide margin. In recent years, the German Christian Democrats have moved to a more center-right position on migration and have also advocated for more military aid to Ukraine.

Author: Valeriy Maydanyuk