Putin denounces Soviet founder Lenin

He's more of a Stalin type of guy.

"(Putin) said that Lenin and his government whimsically drew borders between
parts of the U.S.S.R., placing Donbass in the Ukraine..."

Revisionist nonsense. The Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic didn't join the U.S.S.R. until December 30 1922. Donbass was incorporated into the Ukrainian Soviet Republic in March of 1918. After an intermediate period of German occupation followed by the Soviet-Polish War, its status as part of Ukrainian territory was confirmed by the Peace of Riga (1921) which was attended by Russian, Ukrainian, and Polish delegates.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donetsk%E2%80%93Krivoy_Rog_Soviet_Republic

Put quite simply, the U.S.S.R did not even exist at the time that the borders of Ukraine (including Donbass) were established. And as part of a federated system of states, Lenin would not have had the authority to determine Ukrainian territorial borders even if it had been part of the U.S.S.R. at the time. Furthermore, on December 13 1922 Lenin suffered two attacks of thrombosis of the brain, resulting in a withdrawal from political life for a time.

Finally, note that 84 percent of both the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts (these constituting the Donbass) voted to secede from the Soviet Union as part of an independent Ukraine:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukrainian_independence_referendum,_1991

But what about Pods-Carpatha Rus?

Transcarpathia was awarded to the Ukraine by the Allies at the Yalta conference in 1945. Today, only 3 percent of its inhabitants are ethnically Russian. Until the end of the First World War it was part of Hungary. In fact, 12 percent of its inhabitants are ethnically Hungarian.

http://springtimeofnations.blogspot.com/2014/07/will-transcarpathia-be-next-donetskor.html?m=1

Aside from Transcarpathia and some other territories of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire, pretty much the whole of Ukraine was part of the Russian Empire from the 18th century until the end of the First World War, as this map shows:

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Oo3DeZdxqtc/U9qFfG6sXfI/AAAAAAAAJ2k/GJd_rMlhhvk/s1600/ukraine+in+1917.png

Until the end of the First World War there was no Poland (part belonged to Germany and part to the Russian Empire); there were no Baltic states (Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia were part of the Russian Empire), and no Czechoslovakia (part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire); and there were other changes in the map of Europe (e.g. Romania got a lot bigger at the expense of both Austro-Hungary and Russia).

All of that together with the nationalism of both Hitler and Stalin goes a long way toward explaining the land grabs of Germany and the Soviet Union before, during, and after the Second World War.

Maps of Europe before and after the First World War as well as today:

https://hamphighhistory.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/mapanalysiswwi.pdf

Oh yeah? We prefer being called "Ruthenians"

he designations Rusyn and Carpatho-Rusyn were banned by Joseph Stalin in June 1945.[7] Ruthenians who identify under the Rusyn ethnonym and consider themselves to be a national and linguistic group separate from Ukrainians and Belarusians,[12] were relegated to the Carpathian diaspora and formally functioned among the large immigrant communities in the United States.[7] A cross-European revival took place only with the collapse of communist rule (1989).[7] This has resulted in political conflict and accusations of intrigue against Rusyn activists, including criminal charges. The Ruthenian minority is well represented in Slovakia. The single category of people who listed their ethnicity as Ruthenian was created already in the 1920s, however, no generally accepted standardised Ruthenian language existed.[14]

After World War II, following the practice in the Soviet Union, Ruthenian ethnicity was disallowed. This Soviet policy maintained that the Ruthenians and their language were part of the Ukrainian ethnic group and language. At the same time, the Greek Catholic church was banned and replaced with the Eastern Orthodox church under the Russian Patriarch, in an atmosphere which repressed all religions. Thus, in Slovakia the former Ruthenians were technically free to register as any ethnicity but Ruthenian. [14]

I don't think morality is a big part of Putin's reasoning process. This sends some kind of signals, but which signals and for what purpose?

To draw draw world attention away from simmering Ruthenian nationalism?