People who clutch at Mr Putin are like a drowning man – clutching at a poisonous snake.
– Paul Marks
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Samizdata quote of the dayMarch 11th, 2022 |
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More like a misplaced “The enemy, of my enemy, is my friend.”
Putin is not the answer to any question worth asking. He was a mid-range KGB apparatchik who’s had more Botox than London Fashion Week. He’s also (to quote Withnail) a terrible cunt. He’s also a bust flush. All great states need to be either loved or feared (or both). He lost the first one years ago. The utter debacle in Ukraine shows he’s losing the latter as well. He’s turned Russia from a great power into a joke of such paucity Cannon & Ball wouldn’t have performed it on ITV in the ’80s. He’s mad, he’s bad but he’s also so fucking incompetent he couldn’t get hand-relief in a monkey whore-house if he turned-up with a truck full of bananas. Though it is unlikely he’d even get the fruit given the Russian Army’s utterly lamentable logistics.
Many on “the nationalist right”, whatever that means these days, like Putin because he is not woke, in marked contrast to the ‘Karens’ and ‘effete ponces’ running western nations right now.
But with a few exceptions, it was never really a deep ideological attachment, so these folk will drop him like a hot coal when he starts to look like a loser. And at this point, even if he does manage to eventually crush Ukraine (by no means a forgone conclusion), his inability to do so with a fast shock-and-awe strike is already making him look more than a touch Mussolini-esque. Not so much Genghis Khan as Genghis Can’t.
And speaking of the Putin friendly mob, anyone heard much from nice Mr. Corbyn and the “Anti-War” Far Left these days? Or is it that Russia is not Israel, so who cares if the occasional maternity hospital gets shelled? 😀
I can feel the pain – and unlike President Clinton I mean that.
People are in agony over the dying West – and I am one of the people who is in agony. Therefore people are desperate – and clutch at anything, even the poisonous snake Vladimir Putin.
It only (if only) he was the person they think he is – but he is not.
Someone in the United States waiting for Black Rock (or some other Federal Reserve supported “Woke” corporation) to steal their home and business (using the Infrastructure Bill or a failure to pay impossible taxes) and turn them into a serf, looks around for someone to save them and their family.
That was the desperation that led people to turn to Donald John Trump (who correctly pointed that even such “small” regulations as the declaration that any land with water on it was subject to Federal regulations allowed the government to, de facto, steal EVERY FARM OR RANCH) – and they were correct to do so.
President Trump may not have understood economic theory (very few people do) – but he was indeed on the side of Americans and Westerners in general – he did not HATE them as the people behind Mr Biden and K. Harris do.
Perry sometimes gives the impression things the “Woke” are a bit of a joke – but they are not funny, they are deadly, and each day they get closer to their goal of enslaving the population (no I am not exaggerating).
But Mr Putin is NOT on our side, not-at-all.
Mr Putin is a tyrant and murderer.
The bureaucracy, including the despicable “Woke” Corporations with their hatred of “ists” and “phobes” (i.e. ordinary people whom the international “educated” establishment wish to rob and enslave), steal with court orders and silence dissent with “Cancel Culture”.
Mr Putin steals and silences dissent by having people (including some of his oldest “friends”) MURDERED.
The result is the same.
Do you really think there is a significant mob in the West who admire Putin? Bit like admiring Jeffrey Dahmer because his victims were of diverse races.
I think the dividing line – the one that I’ve seen, at least – comes from “do you or do you not admire Ukraine’s government and path?”
We in the US are in the fun position now of having to repeatedly say “no, that’s not Putin’s fault.” Please don’t read that as Putin-lust. That’s simply a desire to hold Biden responsible for Biden-things.
Hey! I resemble that remark!
Aside from the very last part, that is. Nobody is coming to save us and it’s looking increasingly unlikely that we’ll have the strength of numbers to save ourselves. Which just leaves the matter of assembling an honour guard…
It’s funny – I was always so sure that I would never become black-pilled.
No, not that significant.
No. Not really. A small minority shared similar viewpoints to Mr. Putin on specific issues such as LGBT+ and Western military weakness, maybe a few others admired his testosterone rich PR persona (despite his cosmetic surgery), but that’s about it I suspect.
Even China’s President Xi Pooh Bear has distanced himself in recent days. The Chinese have no problems with enabling despots, but Putin’s level of incompetence is just embarrassing. At least Kim Jung Un keeps his incompetence off the front pages of the newspaper and the TV screens.
Paul M,
Ists and phobes, I think I’ll use ist and phobe if I’m forced to declare my pronouns.
There is no doubt that Putin is mad. Unfortunately, he retains enough logic to understand that a failure to conquer Ukraine will mean he will be invited to a Plutonium tea party rather than being allowed to retire gracefully to his dacha. The danger is that, if he knows his clogs are going to get popped, then he feels he may as well take the rest of the world with him. We can only hope there are enough senior Russian military officers sane enough to stop him pushing that button.
Yes, that is exactly how I see it. Some folk are attracted to a toxic thug because has is not a toxic wokester. As I have often said about choosing socialism for fear of fascism, it is like suicide for fear of death.
Penseivat,
Yes, this is how I see it playing out. Putin has bet his ass on this one. He has nothing to lose because he has everything to lose. If he orders nuclear weapons used then I could see that triggering the military to act against him at the highest level. Just because Putin might prefer the Samson Option doesn’t mean the Russian military does.
And, cuz they despise Biden.
Sure, yes, I think this is part of it, but how much of it is due to believing the opposite of whatever the MSM claims to be true. Since 2016, the media has presented a warped, inverse, upside down, mirror of reality. The smear campaign of the Trucker Convoy in Ottawa is just the most recent example. This is how they come to discount the bombing of the Maternity Hospital. It is not they are indifferent to or are in favor of bombing hospitals. For some reason, I can’t imagine why, they believe the MSM makes things up. From that POV, the media didn’t just suddenly become trustworthy on this one issue.
How fortunate are we that only Russia has poisonous snakes in the political waters, and how fortunate are we in the West to have political cuddly puppies and kittens to clutch.
Sounds to me like a straw man quote. The number of people in western countries who actually like or support Putin rounds to zero. There are more flat earthers than there are actual Putin supporters.
But I don’t think that’s who he is actually talking about. Anyone not entirely on board with the current Ukraine hysteria is largely getting labeled a Putin apologist or supporter. Largely if you believe or say any of the following will get you labeled:
1. Russia has a larger and more capable military than Ukraine. They are making progress encircling both the Ukraine forces in the east and the capital. They are taking losses due to Ukrainian resistance but these losses are not beyond Russia’s tolerance nor are they likely to prevent Russia from succeeding in the war aims.
2. The war in eastern Ukraine didn’t start two weeks ago. It’s been burning at various levels of intensity for 8 years.
3. Three weeks ago it would not have been particularly notable to describe Ukraine as something other than a western liberal democracy. It is a deeply corrupt place with among the world’s worst levels of corruption and transparency. The internal politics of how Ukraine has treated its Russian minority since independence should be deeply concerning to any wester liberal. Arming and unleashing the Azov brigade on the Donbass being just the most notable example, but by no means the only one.
4. Recognition that Ukraine is far more important to Russia’s strategic interest than to anyone in the west. Apart from a relatively small percentage of the population mostly around Lviv, Ukraine has deep family, cultural, linguistic, economic and military ties to Russia, not the west.
None of this has anything to do with supporting Putin, but remembering what you used to know and understand about Ukraine seems to require an ability to resist the massive saturation propaganda currently sweeping the west.
When two post-Soviet republics like Armenia and Azerbaijan decide to fight no one gets swept up in hysteria anything like this. Ukraine and Russia have had a festering dispute over borders, treatment of Russians withing Ukraine and many other economic and military matters ever since Ukraine’s independence. There is no reason for the west to be so emotionally involved in this conflict, which is mostly about how mostly ethnic Russians are being governed in eastern and southern Ukraine.
“Do you really think there is a significant mob in the West who admire Putin?”
No. But there is a considerable mob that is obsessed with Putin, and so blinded that it can’t see anything else. (See this blog).
They can’t see the good points that Kevin Jaeger above made.
The can’t see the mad and idiotic policy of the US egging on Ukraine to fight to it’s total annihilation with false and hollow and lying NATO membership promises.
Sheer madness.
A narrow majority of the Ukrainian nationalists I know in Ukraine are Russian rather than Ukrainian speaking. The notion Russians were a systematically persecuted minority in Ukraine is horseshit.
I sneeze in threes – I took “ists and phobes” from “Nerdortic” on Youtube – but he is a generous fellow (unless you steal his food – he has been in prison, and like a lot of ex prisoners really does not like it if you steal his food) and will not mind my using his words.
Jacob – my dear Sir, this is not the campaign against Donald Trump – the “Russian collusion” LIE (it is not “Russia, Russia, Russia”, “Putin, Putin, Putin” for the sake of smearing people), Mr Putin really has plunged Europe into war and there really are millions of refugees.
No one distrusts the media more than I do (after all I have been on the front page of Stalin’s dear friend the Guardian newspaper – and I can assure you that it was not a friendly story), but they are actually telling the truth about Mr Putin – they really are.
By the way – my old opponent Dr Sean Gabb was never fooled by Mr Putin and was quite open in telling the people he associated with (who were often Putin fans) that they were wrong.
I am telling you Jacob, that you are wrong. Although I do not deny your wisdom in other matters.
“But President Z….” – yes I know.
“But the Western establishment have….” yes I know that as well.
It does not alter the situation – not at all.
We have the same problem here in the UK, and it is worse in the EU, but I have the impression it is worst with you. Biden and the greens both have a lot to distract from. The usual suspects are thinking “a crisis is a terrible thing to waste” – especially when you have a lot to distract people from. My US petrol station bumper sticker would show Biden saying “I did that” with a small Putin behind saying either, “I helped – but not much” or “It encouraged me” or “It encouraged me so much that now I’m helping”.
For the record, I do not think this particular crisis is at all convenient for them. From “And guess what – he got fired”, through who sent weapons and who didn’t, to whose watch it was when Putin invaded and when he didn’t, this fills the news slots but it’s not a convenient crisis for Biden.
Yes, Niall. To my everlasting shame, I bought into and believed the fwckwits: Bush, Cheney, and Colin Powell. Note that Colin Powell, to his credit, recanted. This is the skepticism and cynicism that the Biden administration has to overcome. We all know that the “Deep State” lies and have no reason to trust the MSM, who have lied to our faces for at least the last 6 years.
And, NO. I am not pro-Putin.
If, by “credit”, you mean his financial and social standing, yep.
It doesn’t take a weatherman . . .
“And, NO. I am not pro-Putin.”
It’s been a great marketing success by the Biden folk – hell, by the Ukraine folk – that any statement questioning their actions so far has to be accompanied by this.
I do not remember many people opposing the Afghan War – now, with political DEFEAT, everyone acts as if they opposed it. The population of Afghanistan, according to the Pew Research Centre and other outfits, support the doctrines that are now being enforced. There was no MILITARY defeat in Afghanistan – just the stubborn fact of the beliefs of most people there, and the brutal fact that the West NO LONGER HAS A PHILOSOPHICAL BELIEF SYSTEM (core principles). Islam will win – when it is up against NOTHING (up against a void) – what are the beliefs of the modern West? It has none – at least worth mentioning. So all the fancy weapons do not really matter.
As for Iraq (an operation I did not think much of) – Saddam and his Sunni government were defeated, and a Shia government (representing a majority of the population) are in their place. By any objective measure Iraq was a victory – the aim was achieved (whatever one thinks of the aim) was achieved. The fact that most people think Iraq was a defeat shows how the media shape perceptions.
“But Iraq is a nasty place” – yes it is, because that is what the locals create (oh dear I fear another punishment from Central Office coming on). If the objective of the war was to make Iraq a nice place it was indeed mad – the United States government has been throwing money at American cities for 60 years (SIXTY YEARS)_ – and they are vastly WORSE than before the government started throwing money at them. What did not work in Detroit or Baltimore was unlikely to work in Afghanistan and Iraq.
By the way – what has complaining about the Afghan and Iraq wars got to do with opposing Mr Putin.
Changing the subject does not alter the fact that Mr Putin must be opposed.
As for the dying West, without good core beliefs (whose education system, and so on, teaches “Woke” madness and evil). Yes that is very unfortunate.
I hate and despise the late Roman Empire, after the totalitarian “reforms” of the Emperor Diocletian. But the Huns (and so on) still had to be opposed. Burning the cities and killing or driving away the people.
Mr Putin has invaded Ukraine, he must be opposed.
Finis.
I don’t think many people opposed some kind of military intervention in Afghanistan in 2001. That’s different to to supporting a 20 year long commitment that didn’t achieve a lot of benefit.That it did go on for 20 years and still ended with Taliban success has made me idly wonder if it’d have been better to have done more to just bribe the Taliban to deal with Bin Laden at the time. I acknowledge that might not have worked and may not have been feasible due to understandable demands for vengeance at the time.
The most major UK commitment in Afghanistan, in Helmand, began over five years after 9/11. I opposed that because while the Taliban are bad hombres and possibly a threat to Britain in some respects, it didn’t seem worth sending a relatively small and underarmed force to get involved in the civil conflict going on in that province. That the UK government at the time had said they hoped our troops would accomplish their mission without firing a shot made me think they weren’t serious.Sadly over 400 of our soldiers died and the mission there was a failure. Can’t say I’ve had reason to change my mind on this.
“Mr Putin has invaded Ukraine, he must be opposed.”
Actually, no. We live in what used to be free countries and once were allowed differing opinions. While blaming the west for this conflict goes too far and denies agency to the two parties of this conflict, I believe we are still allowed to say that the actions of the EU and NATO have not resulted in results that we would consider beneficial to either us or Ukraine. I think it’s quite possible to conclude that those warning against such extensive western involvement in Ukraine have in fact been vindicated and it’s not too late to reconsider our position now.
Ukraine and Russia should work this out on their own and we should stay out of it. We could perhaps play a constructive role once a cease fire is reached.
Martin – bribing the Taliban would not have worked. When Bin Laden fled to Pakistan the operation (the Afghan War) could either be declared a failure – or it could be transformed into an operation about trying to build a Western democracy in Afghanistan.
20 years were spent trying to do that in Afghanistan and it did not work – I could tell you WHY it did not work (explain the belief system of the people there), but then I would be punished again.
Kevin Jaeger – I can only warn people, if you want to commit political suicide you are free to do so.
Anyone who does not oppose Mr Putin and support the Ukrainian people might as well hang themselves politically – but if you want to hang yourself, O.K.
But at least stop saying “Russia” – this is about Mr Putin, he is admirer of Joseph Stalin (who is praised the education system that Mr Putin controls).
Stalin was not Russian (he was Georgian) – Stalin also murdered millions of Russians. Stalin could not give a toss about Russia or Russians – and neither does Mr Putin.
There seems to be cult blaming everything on “Russia” and “Russian Culture” – as if Stalin came out of that (he did not – and despised it), and Mr Putin comes out of the KGB.
Mr Putin has lost his Marxist faith – but he is not the Russian Orthodox Christian Nationalist he pretends to be (certainly not). He is just a violent criminal now.
Far from it, indeed quite the opposite.
No, I will not reduce very long running geopolitical disputes to one personality. The tensions within Ukraine that have been tearing it apart for more than twenty years will certainly continue to exist if Putin dies tomorrow. And Russia, being Russia, will produce a successor that you will not like any better.
Oh I agree the problem is not just a “Putin problem”, it is a Russian imperialism problem, and that is bigger than Putin. But the latest attack on Ukraine was enabled not by excessive western engagement but rather perceptions of western disinterest and weakness. A more robust response in 2014 (not necessarily NATO membership) might have have not lead us where we are now.
That said, in 2014 the Ukrainian army as an institution was shambolic (I have heard many accounts from the inside & they described African levels of corruption). That started to change along with the Ukrainian political landscape, so I am not entirely down on ‘the west’ for thinking Ukraine was still a basket case, albeit the progressive collapse of the pro-Russian vote in subsequent elections did indicate something quite dramatic was afoot and worth supporting.
You do still have to deal with the personal moral imperatives, not just the practical ones.
If – IF – we determine that one side of one of these overseas (to us) conflicts is indeed the innocent and undeserving victim of a larger and more dangerous bully, then I think that we – individually, personally, at least – are morally bound to intervene. If I see a large biker beating up an old woman in the street, I think I have a moral duty to try to stop him. (Not, important to add, to punish him, but to remove the old woman from harm.)
How to square that with the idea that the collective “State” may have no such moral duty is hard. But the fact that it’s hard doesn’t relieve us of attempting it.
1938 flashback: “Germany and Czechoslovakia should work this out on their own and we should stay out of it.”
That worked out well.
For some people it’s always 1939 and everyone they don’t like is Hitler.
For a more relevant analogy how about 1853? For reasons I’m sure historians of the British and French empires understand those two empires cooperated to invade Russian territory in Crimea. Russia is still doing Russian empire things in exactly the same territory they’ve been active in ever since. But exactly why is the west trying to bring places like Odessa, Donetsk, Kharkiv and Sevastopol under the EU and NATO banners? What historical ties do we have there? Britain claims it is no longer in the empire business but seems heavily emotionally invested in rerunning some version of the Crimean war.
I suppose you think Crimea needs to be reincorporated into Ukraine and Sevestaplol converted into a NATO naval base?
Count me out.
Actually for me it more like 1938 not 1939.
And not he is not Hitler, he is Putin, who like Hitler has helpfully explained why he does what he does if anyone cares to listen. Sadly, an amazing number of western folk who have opinions on Russia and Ukraine don’t listen to what he says to his domestic audience, preferring to get the Russia Today version, as taking Putin’s talk of Ukraine being a ‘historical mistake’ and the Ukrainian identity not being separate from Russian identity gets in the way of their analysis by not placing the actions of the west at the centre of his motivation 😀
Ideally yes, but making it a Tartar freestate works too. Rather unlikely to happen though. More likely, Ukraine ends up having to accept Crimea’s loss as part of a deal along with Donbas & Luhansk, after Russia grasps crushing Ukraine is actually beyond its power. Such a deal that does not end with Ukraine’s Finlandisation or demilitarisation is probably a good deal. But that will only happen if Russia is beggared and attrited to the point it cannot keep pushing for the extinction of an independent Ukraine.
“Ideally yes”.
The urge to empire is strong and enduring in some cultures.
As to the broad outlines of a likely peace agreement, we are in pretty close agreement.
Not sure what bobby meant by saying “no, that’s not Putin’s fault.” What exactly is not Putin’s fault? (NB: I am not trying to be sarcastic here, and it’s not a rhetorical question.)
Anyway, not all news are bad.
Ukraine now definitely has a national identity distinct from Russia.
Russian people are discovering what kind of person Putin is (which would not have happened had he invaded pretty much any other country).
Globalization is dead. (While, ironically, the “anti”-globalists tell us that we should not decouple from Russia.)
And leaders of assorted NATO countries must pretend to take Joe & Kamala seriously, while the rest of us can laugh at them all.
If you look at the change in voting patterns over time (i.e. the inexorable decline in the ‘pro-Russian’ vote), that process was already well under way. This will just massively strengthen it.
William Prochneau’s ‘Trinity’s Child’ is one of my favourite novels.
I always really hoped I’d never live it, though!
The actual number of outright Putin advocates in the west is relatively small, and outside a few notable examples like Gerhard Schroder and Silvio Berlusconi, were/are relatively powerless.
There are more people who at one time or another approved of certain things Putin has done or advocated. This is a pretty wide ranging group, but would include every US president that has been in power since Putin took over from Yeltsin.
Perhaps an even larger group, and the one that has arguably done in effect the most to empower Putin, are those that proclaim loudly they always hated Putin (for apparently rigging 2106 US election or causing Brexit etc) but supported policies that made most of Europe dependent on Russian oil and gas, thus providing much of the money for Russian rearmament and still is (as we’re still buying Russian oil and gas). This is much of the Euro-American centrist/centre-left and even a lot of the centre right. Ultimately, Putin doesn’t need to care that these people hate him, as they still help him indirectly by ensuring the oil and gas revenues keep flowing in. you can add to the list those who perennially underfunded national defence, or at the very least supported misdirecting much western military power to wasteful uses like Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Mali, etc.
While I will stress that Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is completely unjustified and wrong, I think much of the outrage in the west about group 1 above is a rather convenient way for those in group 3 to distract attention from the fact that they aren’t quite the saints they purport to be.
If China were to start something over Taiwan, do you think there will be a reckoning about the politicians, economists and journalists who advocated for ‘free trade’ with China, the multinationals that helped industrialise China and collaborated with the CCP, the businesses in the west that give us tons of choice of products providing it’s all made in China or some other authoritarian state, or the scientists who helped China get away with their dubious coronavirus research? One would like to think so, but I’m doubtful.
I can write a reply, Snorri, but may I first check whether you read my earlier one (Niall Kilmartin, March 12, 2022 at 6:55 pm). I, like you, am not trying to be sarcastic but, while I could suggest several things, I am puzzled if you can provide no item to get a list started, so it would help me answer if you were to (re)read my response and say where it leaves you.
bobby b, of course, can answer for himself.
Yes, Niall, i read your comment and now i have re-read it. That comment too is not very clear to me 🙂 but the implication seems to be that bobby meant: no, high gas prices are not Putin’s fault.
But since there was no mention of gas prices in bobby’s comment, that seemed unlikely to me. Although he might have taken it for granted that we know what people in Minnesota blame Putin for.
Incidentally, i agree that this is not going to help Biden. Not unless the Republicans make a hash of it.
Martin:
Yes, i have been insisting on this in several comments over the last couple of weeks.
Please note, however, that people who go around saying things like: “i do not approve of the invasion, but the blame lies on both sides” are objectively blaming the Ukrainians for problems generated by Obama and “Biden”, Schroeder and Merkel, et al. And of course Putin, but Putin has been a constant: what has been variable is POTUS and the German Chancellor, etc.
I am doubtful the ‘Putin is to blame for high oil/gas prices’ narrative will pay off for Biden, especially if the high prices continue for some time. Even if you believe the Ukraine invasion is the overriding reason for the high prices, Biden and his apparatchiks can’t simply wave their finger and tell people to go buy a Tesla or not use central heating. The narrative it’s a worthwhile sacrifice for the sake of Ukraine will lose force over time, especially if Biden’s administration hasn’t by November achieved much to counter the high prices. I don’t think Biden et al will commit to ramping up American energy production (even if they wanted to do that with ‘green’ methods that will have little short term impact), so from what I can see they’ll be left begging Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, even Venezuela and Iran, to increase production.
Right now the traditional pro-US petromonarchies seem to have interests more aligned with Russia than the US in terms of high oil/gas prices (although I’m no expert on this, from what I’ve read, while these states could handle Trump as he was fundamentally pragmatic with regards to relations, it seems they can’t stand Biden). As for Venezuela and Iran, this does illustrate that quite often ‘standing up’ to one malevolent foreign power often involves appeasing others. And kissing up to Maduro will be further electoral poison for democrats in places like Florida.
Depends on how you define who ‘both sides’ are. If you mean merely Russia and Ukraine, I’d agree it is unfair to blame Ukraine for the faults of Germany, UK, France, USA etc. If by ‘both sides’ ones mean Russia and NATO and the EU, I think it is fair to attribute errors made by NATO/EU countries to NATO/EU countries.
“I think it is fair to attribute errors made by NATO/EU countries to NATO/EU countries”
I agree. It really should be obvious how expanding NATO into places like Odessa and the Ukrainian ports in the Sea of Asov are EXTREMELY provocative to Russia. Just a glance at a map shows how threatening that would be to their Black Sea naval operations. They’ve been insisting for more than 20 years that they would consider that totally unacceptable yet the western powers continued without a thought to the ridiculous risks they were taking.
Even before making it official, it’s absurd to what extent they were already treating Ukraine as a defacto NATO country, with regular training, shipments of weapons, sharing of intelligence and logistics, etc.
Sorry, yes, I did leave out context that would have made that more clear. I meant gas prices and inflation, the two large American problems which the Biden people are frantically trying to re-explain as having been caused by Putin’s invasion. Amusingly, it’s getting hard to find a gas pump or a grocery store that does not have at least one of the now-ubiquitous “I did that!” stickers with Biden’s image.
Thank you bobby for the clarification!
I understand that some gas stations in the US sell those “I did that!” stickers.
A question for US readers: have you tried buying them from a gas station and then asked: do you mind if i stick them on your pumps? 🙂
“As to the broad outlines of a likely peace agreement, we are in pretty close agreement.”
Wouldn’t it have been nice to reach said agreement before Ukraine got completely wrecked and XX million refugees fled?
Paul: “I am telling you Jacob, that you are wrong.”
Wrong about what? I’m not disputing anything you say about Putin, and you speak of nothing else.
“yet the western powers continued without a thought to the ridiculous risks they were taking.” [in expanding NATO]
There are no Western powers, and no NATO. These are fictions. There is only the US. It is idotic, ignorant and arrogant. And surely partially (small part maybe) responsible for the wreckage in Ukraine, and for making false promises and pledging support it is unable to give.
Brilliant! Since they’re the people who eventually have to try to scrape them off daily, they might as well make some profit from them. Plus, they can choose to sell stickers with a low-strength adhesive backing to make removal easier!
Some see lemons, some see lemonade!
“Anyway, not all news are bad.”
Sure.
Putin has overreached, his army was shown to be incompetent, same as it’s leaders, which means – Putin himself looses his luster, maybe his end is nearer. Russia’s people and economy take a big hit (along with the global economy – albeit a smaller hit).
And Ukraine is wrecked, it’s cities and infrastructure flattened… thousands of dead, tens of millions of refugees…but they are only Ukrainians.
So, yes…. not all news are bad…
Not according to the UN, and they’re not famous for minimizing their counts. Of course, this is the age of fake news, so I’m not sure that even they have a good insight on this.
But this is also the age of ubiquitous video in everyone’s pocket, and I’ve not seen the sorts or numbers of vids that support “thousands.” I would expect to see them if they were there because it would be good marketing.
This is the most obvious political trap in my lifetime.
Those who make excuses for Mr Putin (who go on about “the national interest of Russia” or “context”) will discredit themselves – and the public will not listen to anything else they say, on any other matter. This is obvious – I would have hoped that hardly anyone would have fallen for such an obvious trap.
Yet the trap has worked brilliantly – the right is divided and the left are, privately, laughing.
Now the economic and social (societal) collapse caused by wild government spending and Credit Money expansion, will be blamed on Mr Putin – and on “friends of Mr Putin”.
By which Jacob means Ukraine should surrender.
‘Putin is not the answer to any question worth asking.’
Here’s my question. Which person thousands of miles away from me can kill me in 30 minutes or less?
Mr. Putin has a 20-1 numerical superiority over NATO in tactical nukes (at least in Europe). That means that while NATO can easily crush him in a conventional war, Russia can easily crush us back without a single strategic missile launching from its silo, if he believes that we wouldn’t respond to a few tactical strikes by destroying the world.
Perry:
Thank you for making us aware of this over the last couple of weeks.
I am sure that you’ll agree, however, that people willing to kill and risk their lives for national independence, are making a statement much stronger than failing to vote pro-Russian.
Oh hell yes, that is putting it mildly.
Jacob, and others, have walked into the trap prepared for them.
The astonishing thing is that they still, even now, do not understand that by making endless excuses for Mr Putin and asking for some “settlement” or “deal” they are destroying any chance that the public will listen to them on OTHER MATTERS.
The establishment are already smearing anyone who opposes “Woke” policy (for example the policy of endless government spending and Credit Money expansion) as “friends of Putin”. And some people on this very site are MAKING IT EASY for the establishment to do that.
To Jacob and others – you are in a hole, please (please) stop digging. Because you are not in that hole alone – “guilt by association” means that the rest of “the right” (for want of a better word for enemies of the ever-bigger-government establishment) are in that hole with you.
You are not just burying yourselves – you are burying us as well. Please (please) stop doing this.
If you can not condemn Mr Putin and state in the strongest terms that he must be opposed, then please (please) JUST STOP.
Oh, what jingoistic nonsense. “Surrender??? Never we are the mighty Ukrainian Nation”
I (Jacob) am in a hole? Look at the thousands dead Ukrainians (and Russians too). And the millions of refugees. And flattened cities.
I think they are in a hole more than me… Never surrender. Die fighting, great Ukrainian Heroes.
Perry applauds with all his heart.
Glory, Glory Halelujai!
Stop your preposterous bleating & explain what Ukraine should do if it wants to survive as a nation. Explain what the ‘Jacob Solution’ is, oh wise one.
Or if you can’t, just get lost.