Saturday, February 26, 2022

Who GAF?

 








Russia Invaded Ukraine. So What??

Or words to that effect. That's what the less-informed (or outright stupid) commentariat on a hundred sites are asking at the moment.

Pay attention.

1) Russia is a nuclear power.

More to the point, the #2 nuclear power on the planet. Despite getting their teeth handed to them after the own-goal of 80 years of Communism's irredeemable flaws, they still think they missed out on the big colonialization era. Most of their conquests were neighbors, rather than far-flung client states, and what's left was nothing to write home about from 1920-1990.

So when a substantial portion of their army crosses international borders to kill people and break things, you ought to pay attention.

Not least of which because Mother Russia is currently in range of every other nuclear power in existence. (For those who were busy doodling or fapping off in the back of their civics classes, that club would be: the U.S., (formerly great) Britain, France, China, India, Pakistan, Israel, and the Norks. And any minute now (thanks Obozo and fat Bill) the Iranians. Every one of them could manage to land a blow to Russia with nukes, and every one of them is in range of Russia's ICBMs. As are a lot of other non-nuclear countries, including arguably, every country that matters, which would be the Top 50 out of 180-190 or so.

2) But the Cold War is over, right?

Back at ya: So what? Nobody told Putin. As a former KGB assassin who misses the glorious Soviet Union that was, he's been forcibly repatriating all the old satellites back into the Sov...er, Russian Federation at gunpoint all along. Ukraine is merely the latest. Anyone: See if you can guess why the Baltic States - Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia - are getting a bit nervous about now. Vlad's running out of territories to conquer back into the fold. Oh, for the civics fapping crowd: they're all full NATO members now. An attack on any one of them constitutes the opening of WWIII, by law and custom. Or else NATO dissolves, and it's 1938 all over again, with a military dictatorship on the prowl east of Poland. Again.

Look in the dictionary under appeasement, and note that the guy most responsible for WWII (after Adolf himself) got dealing with his enemy all horribly wrong, plunged the entire world into a world war, and after finally being replaced, went home afterwards and quite decently died in a matter of months, leaving the rest of the world to suffer the consequences of his jackassery.

Pay no attention to that senile, doddering old fool currently and illegally installed in the White House.

3) Who gives a flying fig about NATO?

That would be three nuclear powers, and about 80% of what we jokingly refer to as the civilized world. I.e. the parts not worshipping trees, headhunting, growing dope as the national crop, humping goats and little boys, or running through jungles with bones through their noses. When that important part of the world gets a cold, the U.S. sneezes. Oil (and thus energy) prices skyrocket. Financial markets crater.  You might have noticed we've already watched gasoline go from under $3/gallon to pushing $5 hereabouts in just the last year. And tell me how robust either the dollar, or the overall economy are already. Then look up The Great Depression and see if it rings any bells. The last one led directly to a world war that ended with the deliberate release of Canned Sunshine. The next world war is likely to open with that. Let me know when the penny drops for you.

4) But nobody on either side is us, and they're all bad guys.

I repeat the title: Who GAF? Putin running a crippled, hamstrung second-rate second world nation with nuclear weapons is tolerable. Putin riding war elephants and rampaging across the European continent (and people, and economies) without a care in the world is not. Thus anything that dick-punches him is in our interest (short of an unforeseen release of the aforementioned Canned Sunshine). Why's that? Well, let's let Tom Clancy's fictional Admiral Painter explain it to you simply and succinctly.

Anything that hamstrings Putin, weakens him, bleeds him, is good for us, and bad for him. Because it makes him vulnerable. Introspective rather than adventurous. More worried about food tasters than external threats. (And under "paranoia" in the dictionary, there's a picture of Russia.) And their paranoia isn't all imaginary. Regarding Ukraine, they have some reasons for an itchy trigger finger. That doesn't make them not delusional. But it explains where their psychotic fear comes from. But if they pull off a second Afghanistan, and come home with cleats all up in their junk, they stop being a bear in a china shop, and start worrying about a far older problem, which haunts them in their bones.

And Ukrainian president Zelensky is a total putz. Buuuuuuuut...

He's not wrong when he cries "Rape!" about being invaded. Even if he's a crook, in bed with Gropey Dopey and his doper son. This is 2022, not 1622 (nor even 1942), and countries don't get to just walk into other countries without good cause, and conquer them back into their own fold. (Pentacle Would-Be Democracy Builders: Call your office.)

Moscow's puppet ruler was driven out of Ukraine in a hail of molotov cocktails a few years back. One third of the country may miss him; another third may love the new crook. But the last third just wants to be left the f**k alone, in peace, to make their own way, and those guys are going to explain that to Russia the same way we explained it to King George III circa 1775ff.

Those are the guys I'm rooting for, and for exactly the same reasons. Gravity took the communists out in 1990. Molotovs did it again last decade. They're not inclined to give Putin a free pass just because he executes a Plan 37, flips the chessboard over, and pulls a gun. They're going to start kicking him in the dick every chance they get, over and over again. FTR, Putin's army is about 500K guys. He's supposedly sent in 150K-200K for this little excursion. That one-third of Ukraine disinclined to acquiesce to his intention is somewhere between 10,000,000 and 15,000,000 folks. Putin can conquer the entire Ukraine military, and still lose at this, day after day, forever, for decades. Unless Putin is willing to nuke the entire country, and kill every swinging Richard there that opposes him, which would move him to the Bronze Trophy in the worldwide Genocide Olympics, and push Hitler's Germany completely off the platform. So yeah, under those circumstances, I'ma root for any little guy willing to step up and say, "F**K no, you aren't doing that to my country yet again.

We would also point out that unlike the -stans, Ukraine is Eastern Orthodox, which is to say Eastern Christian, as opposed to Muslim crazy, and provides a strategic landbridge in both directions. Ask Frankistan, Deutschistan, Norwayistan, Swedenistan, and Britistan, among others, how well that whole Muslim invasion of Europe over the last few years is going for them at the moment, even with an entire ocean between them and their history-long blood-enemies. I'll wait while you look that up.

5) Cui bono?

Who's pushing this war? Who's been trying every way they know how, for weeks, to set it off? Who benefits?

For J. Kb @ GFZ






Gina Carrano posted an answer. And she's correct. To a point.

COVID failure news? Gone.

But it's far more than just that.

Inflation news? Gone. Or better yet, scapegoated onto Putin. (Pay attention: At this point, the dog's tail becomes self-wagging.)

Economy bad news? Gone.

Canadian trucker fallout news? Gone.

American trucker convoy news? Gone.

Durham tagging Shrillary and the DNC for spying on Trump news? Gone.

2020 Election shenanigans news? Gone.

Sketchy Affirmative Action SCOTUS nominee news? Gone.

Other Countries taking advantage of the chaos and our flailing policy: Free Pass! (And then they kick back another 10% to the Big Guy. ;) So what happened is, Ukrainian thieves got outbid by Beijing pirates, and thrown under the bus.)











Everything else outside the DC Narrative (other than local traffic, the weather - caused by global warming/climate change/racism/transphobia, of course - that building on fire or a police chase on the freeway, and/or who's fucking who or who raped who in Hollyweird): Gone. Gone. Gone.

Wagging the dog: 24/7/365, until mid-terms, and all the way to 2024. It's the only rabbit left to pull out of their hat, unless they release anthrax, Ebola, and a scorching case of airborne herpes.

The DemoCommunists here have two fears:

a) Biden lives until 2024.

b) He doesn't.

One is a disaster. The other is a catastrophe. (It's anyone's guess which is which.) Gallup had to install a basement to capture Gropey Dopey's approval ratings, which have now gone lower than the deepest coal mines in Appalachia, and threaten to hit the earth's volcanic magma any day, unleashing the District of Columbia Caldera, triggering a massive volcanic eruption in Lafayette Park, and wiping out the DNC in 50 states and 7 territories, no matter how many imaginary votes they submit in 2022 and 2024.

And they just can't be having that. Because their power and maintaining it endlessly is all that matters, your wishes matter not at all, and how many people worldwide they have to kill to stay in clover is merely a statistic.

QED

Dear Vladimir,

If you can't spot the sucker at the poker table, it's you.






































[Editorial: If this was written above your level, or you couldn't read it all the way to the end, flaunt your ignorance in Comments. You pay nothing to read it, and I earn nothing by typing it, so think about what it is that compels you like a lemming to the sea* to jump on your junk with cleats on before you post. I look forward each day to see the 10,000 people who read what I post, just to find the seven commenters who'll unfailingly miss the point of the whole thing, then pull their diapers down and decorate the walls with their best efforts. Because it's never "Um, Aesop, you might have totally missed this fact which contradicts what you wrote." No, because that would evidence logic and critical thinking, and iron sharpens iron. It's nearly always "Blah! Blah! Blah! I didn't read anything there because I already disagree with it, so I didn't read it all, because no reasons, so there!" This is why all cats, including lions and tigers, have scratching posts. Everyone in life serves a purpose.]

Public school education FTW.

































*{For the three retards that will make that comment, I'm well aware that the original example is from a debunked and faked Disney nature film. The greater point of the metaphor nonetheless stands on the merits. Don't make me use my hind claws too. Because after that comes marking my territory. Veterinarians and zoologists will catch my drift.}

35 comments:

  1. Putin has done an amazing job by any metric, turning Russia into a net food exporter, building cathedrals, and producing a military with the best technology in the world...He furthermore has the ultimate ace in the hole, more energy and more undeveloped energy resources than any country in the world...He also isn't letting in millions of 3d world parasites, unlike every President we've had for decades...

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  2. Sir,

    With regard to your point referencing nukes: Ukraine is the poster child for the reason no sensible country would give up their nukes (remember that up to around 1994 Ukraine had the 3rd largest arsenal that was USSR leftovers). We (and other countries) were supposed to guarantee Ukraine's safety once they gave up the nukes. They f***ed up and trusted us. And people wonder why North Korea and Iran are pushing to keep theirs ?....

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  3. @pyrrhus,

    Right-o. And Mussolini made the trains run on time.

    @JL,

    1) I never respond with "smug crap". Scorn and derision, for a certainty.

    2) So, I gather then than reading comprehension is not your forté.

    3) I'm curious what it is you think I was attempting to sell you.

    4) If your enlightened self-interest dictates that you pay no attention to a major problem 4000 miles away, I wish you sincere best wishes for dealing with it on your own doorstep.
    No one, least of all me, suggested you ignore one thing and focus solely on the other, but that gets back to my second point, above.

    5) No one told you to ignore anything that's happening in Ottawa either, so obviously, either you didn't or weren't capable, of reading and getting as far as point #5 in the OP. if you have better luck the second time around, take another swing at this, and provide something related to what I actually wrote, rather than to what you imagined I wrote, based either on non-comprehension or non-attempt at same.

    Your ball, chief.
    Own the scorn and derision, or sit warmly in the puddle of your own smug crap?

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  4. Aesop when you get a moment, I'd like your thoughts about OUR OWN Stasi that the Captial Police have become, so well described in 90 miles of Tyranny site today.

    Feckless Biden And His Feckless Administration Is An Existential Threat To The Western World...

    Then you can go back to your regularly scheduled anti-Russian ranting.

    But then again you DID put in almost One whole sentence mentioning someone's webpages comment WHY the Russian are so "irrational" (you said Paranoid but) about Ukraine and the traditional invasion routes into Russia.

    Maybe Cuban Missile Crisis sparks a memory in you Sir? NATO-aka USA has been doing that to Russia for several years now. The behind-the-scenes Removal of American Nuclear Missiles in Turkey was the TRADE for Russian Missiles in Cuba being removed.

    We ALMOST had that Canned Sunshine then. DO we have somebody in the White House smart enough to keep that canned sunshine sealed THIS TIME?

    I'd like your opinion if we have leadership for that serious of a situation.

    OUR House is ON Fire, maybe when you find a moment maybe we need some help with the bucket brigade here before we "Dick Punch" Vlad again and again.

    BTW I fully expect that since China is willing to PAY for Russia's Oil and Heating Gas that they will turn OFF Germanys HEAT and Electricity as a Reward for sending Anti-Tank and Anti-Aircraft missiles to Ukraine.

    Since about 22% of America's OIL and Fertilizer comes from Russia due to the Sock Puppets actions in BUT ONE YEAR of mischief the words Traitor comes to mind. 18 months ago, we were essentially energy and fertilizer independent. Between the pipeline shut down the bans on oil exploration and EPA shutting down fertilizer factories here in the USA we are in a bad situation.

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    1. You might note that Russia has nuclear capable Iskander ballistic missiles in Kaliningrad which is sandwiched between two NATO countries, Poland and Lithuania.

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  5. The Capitol Police became Stasi the minute they executed an unarmed woman. You've pretty well covered that.

    The Russians (going only back to the dawn of writing) are not anyone's friends, and never have been. Ever.

    The current regime and their titular figurehead, Emperor Poopypants, constitute a Banana Republic, a topic we've covered times beyond counting.

    The "traditional" invasion route into Russia is through Mongolia, not Ukraine, but that was also covered.

    The removal of missiles in Turkey was sold as a trade, but had in fact been ordered by Kennedy on multiple occasions, and in other times would have occasioned the head-lopping of the generals derelict in complying with the orders of the C-in-C, given months before the Cuba Crisis, and in no small part, creating that problem. In the event, he didn't live long enough to oversee that end, which was why even Ike warned of the MIC.

    We have resources enough to dick punch Vlad and oversee our own salvation. This is not a zero-sum game.

    Germany (et al) should blow up the pipelines to begin with, and take that bargaining chip off the table. If they can pin that on Vlad to boot as his doing, so much the better. A scapegoat is a scapegoat.

    Our situation is nearly entirely of Gropey Dopey's making, which, to belabor the point, is why there's now a hot war in Ukraine. That doesn't make that war non-existent, nor mean that we should let a crisis go to waste either. If we can pin the war on Poopypants' incompetence, and dickpunch Putin, that's what is known in the trade as a win-win. If it simultaneously forces us back to tolerating full Freedom and energy independence, that's a Grand Slam.

    I'm in favor of all of that.
    But you can't play chess well, let alone win, if you're going to ignore half the pieces being moved on the board.
    That won't work.

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  6. Thank you, Aesop, for an excellent reply.

    Now a moment again if I may.

    Who has the most to GAIN if the USA and Russia (and as a side dish Europe) is seriously damaged or eliminated from the economics of the world?

    Who's on the sideline egging both sides? The Scorpion Riding on Russia back eager to own Taiwan as well as some of Russia's resources?

    Oh, I am sure Putin is well aware of the Scorpion effect. KGB doesn't mean idiot. But the USA has been a real threat to the Russians for quite some time and the enemy of my enemy idea is real politics.

    I do believe they OWN a good chunk of our "Leadership" and I suspect the 3 letter agencies right now.

    General Milley politely kept them in the "Loop" in case then President Trump was going to DO SOMETHING. I doubt if the 3 letter sorts were not in China's pocket, they would have prevented that behavior.

    The ultimate Sun Tzu maneuver would be China and Taiwan becoming ONE CHINA in a Business Merger. Not impossible give the intermarriages between mainland China and Taiwan's rich families. Sweet 80+% of the microchip production is now China.

    China needs to remove the American Umbrella of "Protection" and nothing like another serious military failure like Afghanistan to show our weaknesses?

    Is it Poopypants "incompetence"? OR the successful behind the scenes handlers plans doing the damage? He can barely read a teleprompter, let alone discuss anything with a world leader without an ear bud giving him his lines.

    Is any of this one the Chessboard, Aesop?

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  7. China has never been all that astute.

    I think they're following the timeless maxim: "When your enemy is making a blunder, stay out of his way."

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  8. My only surprise about the whole thing was that it took so long for the Nekulturny Chekist to get around to it.

    Back in '92 as I was about to receive my Peace Dividend (a RIF notice) because the Soviet Union had crashed and we ain't gonna study war no more at the End of History, I predicted that Russia would be back to their expansionistic empire building in 20 years.

    So I was off by a bit. Sue me.

    (If you count Georgia, I was optimistic by 4 years. The Crimea, I was pessimistic by 2 years. If you want to just go with the ongoing Live fire Games, 10 years.)

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  9. I like this one a lot. The cats scratching post was just gravy, and very enjoyable. One additional thought on why the Biden Clintons, and associated leftists may this end result. Or more should I say certain financial interests who pull their strings. Ukraine has since about 1995 been very useful for channeling money through. The much overused term "Money Laundering" would be part of this smorgasbord of illegal but highly profitable activities that the financial communities of the west have been able to profit from and obfuscate the sources of through Ukrainian offices, fronts,etc. Having that come to an end by a "Force Majeur" ties up a lot of loose ends that otherwise comeback around and bite them. By tying them all up in a bundle this closes the door on ill gotten gains. Downside for such financial interests? They have to find a new place for such things. They will.

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  10. I think you ended your post with something about the reading comprehension of those that would deem it necessary to find the "flaws" in your logic. LOL. This issue is far more complex than most people are even capable of imagining. It's not Russia bad, Ukraine good. It's not binary. There are nuances within nuances, and history that goes back nearly forever. But people have short memories, or never learned the material to begin with. Thus they make stupid points and risk the back claws.

    It's possible that Putin has made a fatal mistake, and I wonder if China, having suspected this would be the case, may actually use this on multiple fronts to their advantage. Like you said, the path to invade Russia is through Mongolia. Now, on the China topic, which you may have reason to discuss in the next few days, is Taiwan. Just like Ukraine, Taiwan will not take kindly to China invading. They can, and will, take out Shanghai and the Yangtze River Dam if China makes a move. Not only that, but they may have the capability to smoke every one of China's ports. This would be a considerable issue for China for many years.

    Oh, and we're bound by law to defend Taiwan. We'll see how that turns out.

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  11. Gina Carrano is sexy...in a "I can kick your ass, or love you long-time, what's it gonna be?" kind of way.

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  12. @HT,

    People on the internet are not dumber than we imagine, they are dumber than we can imagine. I can extrapolate pretty far, and they still amaze me daily, and exceed my wildest expectations with a tedious monotony.

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  13. Very good read and responses. Left here better educated. Thanks. h/t WRSA

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  14. Y'know, if a foreign power engineered a coup in Mexico, replacing a (democratically-elected, FWIW) leader who preferred to deal with Western powers, with one more friendly to the East, we'd have a bit of a problem with that. The reverse is exactly what we (the US .gov, with NATO countries' help) did in Ukraine, in the coup--sorry, 'Revolution of Dignity'(snort!)--in 2014. I'm not a big fan of Vlad the Bald, but I can see why he doesn't want an unfriendly country on his borders--that, & the fact that Ukraine was for a thousand years or more part of Greater Russia, & a lot of people native to there consider themselves Russian, more or less.
    But no, reading comprehension is my problem.
    --Tennessee Budd

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    1. Winner winner chicken dinner!!!
      Knoxvegas resident here, Budd.

      Delete
  15. @JL,

    Huzzah! Well-said, sir!
    I won't argue degrees. But this is important. People should learn to multi-task.

    I use the Thomas Jefferson Acid test:
    Does it break my leg? So far, no.
    Does it pick my pocket? Yup. Every time I fill my tank at the gas station, and likely for months to come.
    Not bene I am not, and never have, said that Vlad is a bigger threat than Poopypants or his minions to the average American. But this contest is neither frivolous nonsense, nor inconsequential.

    The target to our direct and near front is, indeed, the greater problem, which was the entire reason for pointing them out in Point #5.

    My suggestion is that adult supervision would dictate to start hamstringing Vlad to whatever extent might be prudent short of open war (and bear well in mind, Russia already attacked a Turkish warship in the Black Sea, and Turkey is undeniably a NATO ally). This Shit Show is thus already headed from Shit Circus to Shit Mardi Gras, and we're only on Day Three.

    Simultaneously dropping the whole Exploding Shit Grenade right into Poopypants' lap (and that of his team of freakshow irregular retard minions) might be most helpful in leveraging the whole shitball pile of them back out into the cold, far from the reins of power, and keeping them there indefinitely, before they bumble the entire world into global thermonuclear war.

    That solves Ukraine (and returns it to a local question, rather than an international one), while simultaneously undoing the ongoing destruction of civilization being headed by a doddering senile bumpkin who, even when he was in full control of his negligible faculties, would have been hard-pressed to run so much as the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade, let alone serve as chief executive of the republic.

    You want to focus on one over the other? Okay, I understand that.
    But I reject it.
    We can do both, and we should.
    In questions of chocolate or vanilla, as with blondes or brunettes, the correct answer is "Both, please."

    I'll go further:
    We must multi-task in this.
    To focus on Ukraine to the exclusion of everything is the exact purpose of starting the war from the outset. That would be like hurling oneself on a land mine, for no good reason.
    To ignore it, while focusing on politics as usual, cedes the whole "you're stupid/near-sighted/treasonous for ignoring this conflict" argument to the Leftard dumbasses as well.

    Rather, approach this the way Chuck Norris would:
    Give them so many rights, they beg for a left.

    We cannot afford to ignore either item, and letting either one drop is to cede that argument to the other side by forfeit.

    We don't need to send the 1st Armored and half the Air Farce to Europe.
    But we ought to be doing everything we can short of provocative and open warfare.
    While still Sticking It To The Man here at home.

    It's the only way to beat them at their own game.

    What Ukraine does internally after this is over is, and always was, Ukraine's problem.
    Getting the Biden Family Crime Syndicate out of their internal affairs would be an excellent first step.

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  16. Not so what, more of about time. US policy since 14 has been pushing for a war with a slight pause for Orange Man. It covers for so many and covers-up even more. The enemy of my enemy is still my enemy. Putin trusts Joe chink at his own peril. From what I read Joe chink has big trouble brewing in real estate and his cult of personality. As for canned sunshine MAD is still a strategic policy for all who possess them.

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  17. "
    We have resources enough to dick punch Vlad and oversee our own salvation. This is not a zero-sum game"

    I get why we should care. Get outvof cities. But regular readers know that

    What I do not get is what "We have resources enough to dick punch Vlad and oversee our own salvation. This is not a zero-sum game" has to do with the drooling, evil, brain-dead pool noodles who just oversaw the "covid crisis". Is there any scenario where these dewberries do not make what happens to folks on the ground worse?

    Maybe a concerted "who cares" can at least derail the wag-the-dog utility to the laptop caste. Like the hippies used to say, "what if we manufactured a crisis and nobody came.

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  18. @Tennessee Bud,

    That's happened, multiple times. Mexico. Nicaragua. Cuba. Venezuela.
    We haven't been to Mexico since about 1914. Cuba, not since 1898 (unless you want to count that farcical Bay Of Pigs fiasco). Nicaragua, not since the 1930s. Venezuela - never.
    So, pretty much nothing for 100 years.
    What Putin's doing isn't a Grenada or a Panama.
    If he'd stopped at Donetsk and Luhansk, the world would have yawned, and said "Serves 'em right."
    Instead, he's quite simply violated long-term agreements to respect the sovereignty and security of Ukraine, which agreements both NATO and Russian signed onto, in exchange for Ukraine giving up their nukes after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

    So, in your executive opinion, WhoTF is EVER going to give up nuclear weapons once they've gotten them, now?
    Wo will not, in fact, seek to develop them (and let's get serious: all of Europe could make one in about a month, and so could half the high-tech nations in the Pacific Rim, from Korea to Australia).
    So will the world be more safe when 57 nations have nukes, or less safe?

    What happened for 1000 years won't mean a flying fuck when people start dropping nukes every time they get in a tiff. Replay the Falklands War.The Irish Troubles. Bosnia. Lebanon, Syria. Any five Israeli wars. Somalia. Yemen. Any 20 other conflicts. Before we talk about theft, accidents, etc.

    Forget reading comprehension.
    You got bomb shelter in back yard?

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  19. "But we ought to be doing everything we can short of provocative and open warfare."

    But who is this "we" you're writing about?

    In the very next sentence you write "While [we are] still Sticking It To The Man here at home"

    That 2nd "we" is *everyone* not in charge, except for local pols at the state level.

    The first "we" is the one I wrote about in the previous comment, but there's a good chance you mean someone different.

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  20. "You got bomb shelter in back yard?"

    Spot on.

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  21. OH,

    The dicks in charge are the authors of both sets of problems: those here at home, and the ones in Ukraine.

    Both problems need to be addressed, and adult supervision restored.

    Fake elections have consequences, and in this case, it can include Global Thermonuclear War.
    And you noticed that the Russians "accidentally" attacked a Turkish warship, who they've danced with a time or three already, and who is, for decades, a long-standing member of NATO?

    This shit is going sideways at light speed, and Asshole Joe is going to pull us all into the maw of Canned Sunshine, simply by being too dodderingly obtuse to notice his minions fucking around to try and save his fake election and their continued rice bowls.

    And if you think every brasshole in the Pentacle is too stupid to notice where this is headed, and that any sort of intervention with the traditional NCA is impossible, I have a bridge to sell you, cheap.

    Incompetence at this level literally screams at people to pull a coup, and sooner or later, some damned fool will try. Might even succeed. Then we'll be Ukraine, Live at 5, coast-to-coast.

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  22. Daring people on the internet to argue with you?

    Lolz

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  23. @SWR,

    No, the furfest had already begun in earnest when I added that.

    The dare would be to ask that they do so intelligently, and address the arguments on merit. Not a complete debacle there, even the occaisonal encouraging sign, but so many disappointments over the long haul.

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  24. Some information I've recently been exposed to that may not be known to y'all, about the Russian Orthodox Church.
    1. It's supposedly founded by the Apostle Andrew, at Kiev. That makes Kiev their holy city, second only to Jerusalem.
    2. The Patriarch of Moscow and all the Rus was the top dog for the church, including the Ukraine.
    3. Ukraine split off from them (sort of, claiming to be still Russian Orthodox but self-governing), getting a pass from the Patriarch of Constantinople. This was requested after the 2014 Crimea takover, but sat until SecState Pompeo got behind it and pushed. The split was final in 2019, and instantly recognized by the US.
    4. For some strange reason this really ticked off the Russian Orthodox Church. The Ukranians are somewhat split, some 20% with the ROC and 80% going with the new UOC.

    Please feel free to check this and see if there's something wrong or missing. Note that minor religious differences have made for some major loss of blood in the past.

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  25. Just a point, for what it's worth. Around the tenth to the eleventh centuries...and before, Ukraine had thriving metropolises with magnificent buildings and churches, whilst Moscow was still virgin forest. Ukrainians and their various ancestors of different ethnicities, have been in that area for many centuries.

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  26. Those that benefit from the turmoil are comfortable in their beds tonight, have no qualms about how their meddling kills thousands, and remember when some of their efforts killed millions. Common people, to them, are pesky problems, and need to be culled every now and then, when they reach too high to secure liberty. Liberty means autonomy, and that means their manipulation for control is threatened.

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  27. I admit I thought the Cossacks could be watering their horses in the Seine in six weeks like it was 1814 but the new Czars army seems to be on a par with the old Czars army and is fighting like it's 1914 again or 1922. Looks like Tannenburg is happening again or the collapse of the Red Army in front of Warsaw. Unlike Nicky Romanov or Lenin this Czar has nukes so let's hope like Gorbachev he doesn't use them

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  28. Had to read over it a couple times. I thought this was going to be some Red Dawn nostalgia BS surprisingly it wasn't. I still don't think the US should commit to this conflict. Not even in supplying weapons unless we're actually getting payment for them. No "money printer go brrrrrr" charity BS. Even better if we took a page from Ivan by drastically scaling back our regulation of PMCs and allowing Ukraine to hire them. "What American troops? I only see Black Water in Ukraine." Recruiting wouldn't be an issue if pallets of automatic weapons and hot Ukrainian war brides are up for grabs. That's just my incoherent rambling though.

    It was going to be a knee jerk argument. Let's see if I read this correctly Aesop. We need to prevent this from progressing into WW3, but at the same time we don't need to get dragged into WW3. Last thing we need is the Dems using this to cover their fuckery. Except we don't need the Dems clinging to power through Emergency powers because WW3 started. With all that being the best case scenario if we don't do anything. Worst case scenario if we don't do anything is canned sunshine on a massive scale which sucks for everybody.

    As for the bomb shelter in the back yard. That's the current project. Except it's not a bomb shelter. More like a fallout shelter. I couldn't afford anything that could survive a hit from a nuke on my county. Thankfully though my AO is in BFE and only strategic target is 200+ miles away. It's a real target. Not a sock factory that supplies the 3rd ID. Thankfully not important enough for anything with real weight.

    Everyone doesn't like the idea ofa fallout shelter. They say you'll just get smoked out and somebody will take it from you. Yeah. Going to try and dig somebody out of a shelter. It's not hard, but can you do it with no equipment staged prior and/or knowledge of the design on hand? Can you do that before the radioactive dust starts to settle?

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  29. 2 pm in Kiev here is independence square.

    https://www.webcamtaxi.com/en/ukraine/kiev/maidan-nezalezhnosti.html

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  30. Brings to mind the old saying: "Russia is never as strong as it looks. Russia is never as weak as it looks."

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  31. Aesop, I don't disagree with you in most of this comment, except to point out the agreements broken by US/NATO. Russians may feel that such agreements are apparently more flexible, as a lot of rules are in, well, most of the world. After all, a lot of pols are now condemning Russia for breaking agreements we broke for Kosovo, but, of course, we know that hypocrisy is nothing to a politician, or to most countries.
    In my previous comment, I wasn't talking about realpolitik & the reality of war. I meant to be speaking about right or wrong.
    The take I got--and forgive the mistake if I misunderstood you; such things happen, and I like argument in its true meaning, an exchange of ideas without rancor--was that Vlad is wrong for doing this, for several reasons.
    Military, politically, and financially, as if they can be separated, I agree with you. Seemed to me, though, that you said Russia was wrong also in more metaphysical terms, and that they'd done this with little or no justification; further, that we (the West) were the good guys, trying peacefully to exist, although you put it in slightly more cynical terms.
    That may not have been your meaning; if so, mea culpa. If so, we disagree.
    --Tennessee Budd

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  32. There are no perfect players in this.

    Like most disagreements, the one who resorts to physical violence first is usually the one in the wrong.
    NATO broke an agreement? Okay, fine. Which one did they break at the end of a column of tanks? Ever?
    Do the wishes of the Ukrainians inform those agreements?
    Or Do NATO and Russia get to make decisions for "the little people" despite the wishes of the Ukrainians?

    If NATO had marched in under tanks and was holding Ukraine hostage, Vlad's answer would have some validity.
    They did not, and thus he's entirely wrong, despite any claims to the contrary.
    This is what happens when you parlay with a thug who only understands brute force.
    Putin is everything he's alleged to be, save smart.
    And the realization is going to come at a painful price.
    He has no way to "win" this, and nuclear bluster simply makes him exactly the international terrorist always alleged.
    The West is about an inch from offering a bounty to Russia for his head, and ordering his forces destroyed on sight anywhere outside their territorial borders.

    After that point, fallout meters begin to climb, and Moscow etc. become fond memories.
    He's the wrong guy, doing all the wrong things, and it's going to cost him everything the longer he keeps doing this.

    The timeline when he can withdraw with anything like an intact position are rapidly drawing to a close. Russia had about 15 minutes, under Yeltsin, when the West was inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt, and deal with them as honest brokers. Putin has pissed all that away in about a week. and it's going to last for decades, even if he quits right this minute.

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