NotNecessarilyOstrich
SuitsVille
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Please note: This was written and posted before the 'attack' began
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There's a whole lot of pundit whisper breathing going on wondering 'why now?' when it comes to Mr. Putin's latest actions in the Donbas as opposed to, say, during the time of the previous American president.
Marcy Wheeler wastes no breath on this and instead puts pixels to paper in a really fantastic explanatory post over at Emptywheel.
The following is just one of Ms. Wheeler's many kickers:
...Sure, Putin didn’t get Trump to carve up Ukraine as President. But he got so much more from Trump’s presidency.
Putin did get Trump to do real damage to NATO. He got Trump to largely abandon Syria. Trump made a humiliating deal with the Taliban that would result in the US withdrawing its military from Russia’s back door. After years of Russia having to work hard to highlight American hypocrisy on human rights, Trump did things like pardon war criminals, forever tainting America’s claim to be exceptional...
And then, of course, there is the matter of what Mr. Putin now receives from his media enablers that reach millions of malleable American medullas.
And we're not just talking about those that work for RT.
As an example, the following is from the 'official transcript' of Mr. T. Carlson's latest television program (I will not link to it):
The only good news, as Ms. Wheeler sees it, is that Mr. Biden has made all the right moves.
Since the day that Donald Trump became president, Democrats in Washington have told you it's your patriotic duty to hate Vladimir Putin. It's not a suggestion. It's a mandate. Anything less than hatred for Putin is treason.
Many Americans have obeyed this directive. They now dutifully hate Vladimir Putin. Maybe you're one of them. Hating Putin has become the central purpose of America's foreign policy. It's the main thing that we talk about. Entire cable channels are now devoted to it. Very soon, that hatred of Vladimir Putin could bring the United States into a conflict in Eastern Europe...
The only good news, as Ms. Wheeler sees it, is that Mr. Biden has made all the right moves.
At least so far.
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6 comments:
Well Trumps is supporting Putin, though no surprise there. But, will the Evangelical GOP follow?
(CNN)Former President Donald Trump has signaled to Republicans that Russian President Vladimir Putin is a "genius" for invading Ukraine.
This is dangerous stuff because if the GOP support the Russian Invasion of Ukraine, the former Russian Baltic states will be next and China will be eying Taiwan.
The madness of Trump is partly do to Trumps like of strongmen and dictators.
for the full story.
https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/23/politics/vladimir-putin-russia-trump-ukraine-gop-what-matters/index.html
We are living in dangerous times and it seems the useful idiots in Canada and the USA have been woken up by their operatives.
Remember this, when Germany invaded Poland in 1939, they had little defense along the western German boarder. If France and the UK invaded Germany and retook the Ruhr, Hitler would have been disposed and the the 2nd world war would only have been a slight boarder skirmish in history.
It seems, by international accounts, Putin is becoming unpopular in Russia and there is nothing like a good old war to rally the troops.
I am dusting off my old "duck and cover manuals"
Buzzcocks answer…. Sloth, Fairport Convention
Plenty of blame and shame to go around. Check out Victoria Nuland and some of the behind-the-scenes stuff in the iterations of the Orange Revolution. Putin is trouble and has taken the bait. How soon he forgets Afghanistan or, in the words of Country Joe Macdonald re: Cakewalk To Baghdad: "Easy to cakewalk in, not so easy to cakewalk out." Now where did we leave that Peace Dividend? https://youtu.be/vLByWRqRhME
What you have laid out Ross is why the election of an American president is to important to be left to the American people.
EmptyWheel's earlier site 'The Next Hurrah' .... and in light of Russia's attack on Ukraine this week one of the first things was to ensure that Chernobyl hadn't been hit by the invaders because ... according to BMAZ .. 'On 26 April, 1986, the worst commercial nuclear accident in history occurred during a test at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, which lies near the Belarus-Ukraine border, 100 km north of Kiev, Ukraine.'
https://thenexthurrah.typepad.com/the_next_hurrah/contributorplutonium_page/
What does Vlad get? Comments from Emptywheel:
https://www.emptywheel.net/2022/03/03/three-things-part-3-putins-particular-peculiarities/#comments
Peterr says:
March 3, 2022 at 9:11 pm
They may not get the pictures we see, but the news *is* reaching them.
Increasing numbers of “regular people” are becoming protesters, including one of the last survivors of the Siege of Leningrad in WWII. They are out in the streets and getting arrested in ever larger numbers every day. They are getting the news about Ukraine.
The ApplePay app no longer work in the Moscow Metro, and the millions of commuters know exactly why. Businesses are laying off workers and closing up shop, some of them permanently. They are getting the news about Ukraine.
Flights are no longer leaving for Europe and the West, and none are landing from Europe and the West. The Russian Stock Market has not been open since last Friday, leading one trader to raise a glass and say “Rest in peace, dear comrade” as the market is collapsing. They are getting the news about Ukraine.
And most tellingly, word of the deaths of Russian soldiers is getting back to their families, their friends, and their loved ones, even if the bodies have yet to come back for burial. They are getting the news about Ukraine.
With all this news, one can’t help but notice that the Russia people are not protesting against the US and the West for the economic disruptions. That lack of protest against the West ought to be more worrying to Putin than the cries of those who are protesting against him.
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