So Putin is opposed to same-sex marriage. So what? Why should that make Putin’s Russia more of a natural ally of traditional conservatives in the United States and Europe than those Islamic fundamentalists, who are also staunch opponents of gay marriage, abortion, feminism, and secular elements?

Indeed, the Catholic magazine Crisis recently published an article proposing just that, that Muslims should be regarded as the “natural allies” of Catholics and other traditional conservatives. The irony is that Putin is now allied with the secular regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria that is battling Islamic fundamentalists backed by Saudi Arabia, which has remained a great ally of the United States in the Middle East, under both liberal and conservative presidents.

From that perspective, the idea that Putin should become the Patron Saint of American conservatives makes as much sense as having Turkish Islamist President Tayyip Erdogan, a proponent of teaching creationism, play that role. If anything, unlike Putin, Erdogan has remained happily married to his first wife, and presides over a country that with all its problems is much less corrupt, and certainly more committed to free market principles than Russia, with its statist and static economy controlled by Putin’s political cronies and crime syndicates.

The bottom line is that Putin is first and foremost an autocratic right-wing nationalist who not unlike the fascist-communist clique ruling Beijing could care less if other countries embrace his political model or not, as long as Russian interests—and his—are being served.