REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

Russia Invades Ukraine. Again

POSTED BY: CAPTAINCRUNCH
UPDATED: Friday, April 19, 2024 12:11
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PAGE 21 of 126

Monday, July 4, 2022 1:23 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
SECOND, at this point people who vote Dem are either poor resentful blacks, poor Hispanics, resentful women, LGBTQX activists, or virtue-signalling white males. Hardly the kind of attitude groups on which to build a better nation.

If you love America and care about Americans .... and clearly, you DON'T ... you would reward hard work, a positive attitude, realism, and a concern for all Americans equally. That would build a strong, independent, and properous nation.

Instead, you obviously hate America and most Americans. You hate people who expect to be rewarded for working, and you care far more about Ukraine/ Russia/ Vietnam/ blacks/ LGBTQ/ illegal immigrants/ (fill in the blank) splinter groups. And in reality you promote virtue-signalling rentier money-grubbers.
Seriously? Are you crazy, Signym? Or are you a Russian propagandist? Meanwhile:

A data set of nearly eight million articles about Ukraine collected from more than 8,000 Russian websites since 2014 shows that references to Nazism were relatively flat for eight years and then spiked to unprecedented levels on Feb. 24, the day Russia invaded Ukraine. They have remained high ever since.

The data, provided by Semantic Visions, a defense analytics company, includes major Russian state media outlets in addition to thousands of smaller Russian websites and blogs. It gives a view of Russia’s attempts to justify its attack on Ukraine and maintain domestic support for the ongoing war by falsely portraying Ukraine as being overrun by far-right extremists.

News stories have falsely claimed that Ukrainian Nazis are using noncombatants as human shields, killing Ukrainian civilians and planning a genocide of Russians.

The strategy was most likely intended to justify what the Kremlin hoped would be a quick ouster of the Ukrainian government, said Larissa Doroshenko, a researcher at Northeastern University who studies disinformation. “It would help to explain why they’re establishing this new country in a sense,” Dr. Doroshenko said. “Because the previous government were Nazis, therefore they had to be replaced.”

https://attentiontotheunseen.com/2022/07/03/how-the-russian-media-spre
ad-false-claims-about-nazis-in-ukraine/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Monday, July 4, 2022 2:13 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
SIGNYM:
SECOND, at this point people who vote Dem are either poor resentful blacks, poor Hispanics, resentful women, LGBTQX activists, or virtue-signalling white males. Hardly the kind of attitude groups on which to build a better nation.

If you love America and care about Americans .... and clearly, you DON'T ... you would reward hard work, a positive attitude, realism, and a concern for all Americans equally. That would build a strong, independent, and properous nation.

Instead, you obviously hate America and most Americans. You hate people who expect to be rewarded for working, and you care far more about Ukraine/ Russia/ Vietnam/ blacks/ LGBTQ/ illegal immigrants/ (fill in the blank) splinter groups. And in reality you promote virtue-signalling rentier money-grubbers.

SECOND: Seriously? Are you crazy, Signym? Or are you a Russian propagandist?
For chrissake, SECOND, can't you STOP DIVERTING for even ONE SENTENCE? You are clearly waging some sort of proaganda "war". Yanno, like CAPON, only nuttier.

Quote:
Meanwhile:

A data set of nearly eight million articles about Ukraine collected from more than 8,000 Russian websites since 2014 shows that references to Nazism were relatively flat for eight years an...
All of this is clearly explainable by news cycles.

But what does this have to do with caring about AMERICA? Every time loving America comes up, you start banging on about Trump, or Russia, or the Confederacy, or Russia, or the poor illegal aliens, or Trump, or Russia, or the poor illegal aliens, or slavery, or Russia...

One could imagine that caring about America is toxic to you, or something.

Well, I have more interesting things to do than this.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake


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Monday, July 4, 2022 2:24 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


This is the topic that SECOND is avoiding.

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
SECOND, at this point people who vote Dem are either poor resentful blacks, poor Hispanics, resentful women, LGBTQX activists, or virtue-signalling white males. Hardly the kind of attitude groups on which to build a better nation.

If you love America and care about Americans .... and clearly, you DON'T ... you would reward hard work, a positive attitude, realism, and a concern for all Americans equally. That would build a strong, independent, and properous nation.

Instead, you obviously hate America and most Americans. You hate people who expect to be rewarded for working, and you care far more about Ukraine/ Russia/ Vietnam/ blacks/ LGBTQ/ illegal immigrants/ (fill in the blank) splinter groups. And in reality you promote virtue-signalling rentier money-grubbers.



-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake


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Monday, July 4, 2022 3:39 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

Quote:
Meanwhile:

A data set of nearly eight million articles about Ukraine collected from more than 8,000 Russian websites since 2014 shows that references to Nazism were relatively flat for eight years an...
All of this is clearly explainable by news cycles.

But what does this have to do with caring about AMERICA? Every time loving America comes up, you start banging on about Trump, or Russia, or the Confederacy, or Russia, or the poor illegal aliens, or Trump, or Russia, or the poor illegal aliens, or slavery, or Russia...

One could imagine that caring about America is toxic to you, or something.

Well, I have more interesting things to do than this.
Ukrainians see this war as pretty simple: Russians invaded their country and Ukrainians are gonna kill 'em to persuade 'em to leave Ukraine. But Russians see Ukraine as Russian, which makes it incomprehensible to Russians why the locals want to kill Russians. It must be the locals who are loco, at least from the viewpoint of Russians. See the scholarly article about Putin’s claims that Ukraine and Russia are ‘one people’ https://www.rochester.edu/newscenter/ukraine-history-fact-checking-put
in-513812/

I could draw parallels between Ukrainians/Russians and Democrats/Trumptards, but why bother? I don't think Trumptards can understand any better than Russians can understand that Ukraine is not theirs. Trumptards are claiming to own America, nevertheless, it is not theirs. There is obviously, and very visibly, a wrongness with Trumptards which they can't recognize about themselves, but sure as hell is revealed in economic terms: Biden-voting counties equal 70% of America’s economy. What does this mean for the nation’s political-economic divide?
https://www.brookings.edu/blog/the-avenue/2020/11/09/biden-voting-coun
ties-equal-70-of-americas-economy-what-does-this-mean-for-the-nations-political-economic-divide/

Look at 6ix. He is the quintessential Trumptard, bragging that he is not angry poor white trash and bragging he lives on $18/day, pays no income tax, and will never work again. The Trumptards I know who do work are almost as worthless at work as 6ix, but exactly like 6ix, they don't know that about themselves. All the problems Trumptards have will grow because they lack understanding that they are solely the cause of their own problems. See 6ix's craziness, addictness, toothlessness, unemployableness, and unmarriageableness. Government cannot fix what is wrong with Trumptards. Luckily, Ukrainians can fix what is wrong with Russians. Too bad for Russians about the details of the fixing.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Monday, July 4, 2022 3:46 PM

THG


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

SECOND, at this point people who vote Dem are either poor resentful blacks, poor Hispanics, resentful women, LGBTQX activists, or virtue-signalling white males. Hardly the kind of attitude groups on which to build a better nation.

If you love America and care about Americans .... and clearly, you DON'T ... you would reward hard work, a positive attitude, realism, and a concern for all Americans equally. That would build a strong, independent, and properous nation.

Instead, you obviously hate America and most Americans. You hate people who expect to be rewarded for working, and you care far more about Ukraine/ Russia/ Vietnam/ blacks/ LGBTQ/ illegal immigrants/ (fill in the blank) splinter groups. And in reality you promote virtue-signalling rentier money-grubbers.



Nope, I'm in the right thread. It's you comrade who are not.

T


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Monday, July 4, 2022 3:47 PM

JEWELSTAITEFAN


Almost didn't notice this thread got to 1,000 posts.
Seems like it got derailed long ago.


I go days without hearing M$M mentioning Ukraine or Putin. They gotta gin up baby Covid before another round of Election Theft.

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Monday, July 4, 2022 5:38 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


:

Quote:
SECOND: Meanwhile:

A data set of nearly eight million articles about Ukraine collected from more than 8,000 Russian websites since 2014 shows that references to Nazism were relatively flat for eight years an...

SIGNY: All of this is clearly explainable by news cycles.

But what does this have to do with caring about AMERICA? Every time loving America comes up, you start banging on about Trump, or Russia, or the Confederacy, or Russia, or the poor illegal aliens, or Trump, or Russia, or the poor illegal aliens, or slavery, or Russia...

One could imagine that caring about America is toxic to you, or something.

Well, I have more interesting things to do than this.

SECOND Ukrainians...
You cant lump all Ukrainians together. A significant minority are happy with the "invasion" and are, in fact, fighting alongside Russians.
Once again, you misrepresent the actual situation.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake


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Monday, July 4, 2022 10:17 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Quote:
Originally posted by THG:
I must be in the wrong thread?


Most of the time, yes.

*****
Ya gotta admit, THUGR, you walked into that one!


I can see where Ted got confused. Second can't stop talking about me.

I think it's love.



--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Tuesday, July 5, 2022 4:38 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:

You cant lump all Ukrainians together. A significant minority are happy with the "invasion" and are, in fact, fighting alongside Russians.
Once again, you misrepresent the actual situation.
Did Putin misrepresent the actual situation?

Putin undermined his own rationale for invading Ukraine, saying that the war is to expand Russian territory

Putin said on Thursday that the Ukraine invasion is about expanding Russian territory.

Before, Putin insisted that Russia was freeing Ukraine from so-called Nazis and preventing genocide.

Putin said it was his destiny to "return and reinforce" Russia like Peter the Great did.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said publicly for the first time on Thursday that his invasion of Ukraine is about expanding Russian territory, which Western leaders have long maintained.

To date, Putin has justified the invasion by saying, baselessly, that he's preventing Ukraine and what he described as a neo-Nazi government from committing genocide against ethnic Russians. He has also said that NATO's eastward expansion threatens Russia's national security.

Putin, speaking with students on Thursday after visiting an exhibition about Peter the Great, Russia's first emperor credited with making the country a major power in the early 18th century, compared himself to the ruler and said they were both destined to expand Russia.

"Clearly, it fell to our lot to return and reinforce as well," he said. "And if we operate on the premise that these basic values constitute the basis of our existence, we will certainly succeed in achieving our goals."

In addition to seizing territory in a 21-year war with Sweden in the late 17th century, Peter captured the territory of Azov from Crimean Tatars, who were aligned with Turkey, in 1696, and he seized territory on the Caspian Sea from Persia in 1723.

"On the face of it, he was at war with Sweden taking something away from it," Putin said of Peter. "He was returning and reinforcing, that is what he was doing."

In a tweet on Friday, Mykhailo Podolyak, an advisor to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said Putin's comments prove his "contrived pretexts of people's genocide" in Ukraine were false and demanded "immediate de-imperialization" of Russia.

Putin's attempts to expand Russian territory started long before his invasion of Ukraine on February 24. Putin invaded Georgia in 2008 and still backs pro-Kremlin factions there. In 2014, Russia annexed the Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine and invaded the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine via proxies that same year.

Just two days before invading Ukraine, Putin said claims he wanted to restore the Russian empire were false. But Western leaders have long maintained that this was not the case.

"He has much larger ambitions than Ukraine. He wants to, in fact, reestablish the former Soviet Union. That's what this is about," President Joe Biden said on February 24, the first day of the invasion.

https://www.businessinsider.com/putin-says-ukraine-war-seize-land-russ
ia-undermines-rationale-2022-6

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Tuesday, July 5, 2022 5:12 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Quote:
Originally posted by THG:
I must be in the wrong thread?


Most of the time, yes.

*****
Ya gotta admit, THUGR, you walked into that one!


I can see where Ted got confused. Second can't stop talking about me.

I think it's love.
The people I know who voted for Trump twice, or more, were struggling through life long before Trump became a politician. I don't know what 6ix is because I have never been near 6ix, but I sure know what kind of people Trumptards are: the women are obnoxious and ignorant and the men are incompetent and crooked and both are proud of it. I have not meet all the Trumptards in America, but because of my large sample size of Trumptards, I am confident that their character is the cause of their troubled lives. But Trumptards don't want to believe that about themselves as a matter of pride. Therefore, they blame Democrats. Russia is loaded up with people who have the same flawed character as the Trumptards, except it is Putin, not Trump, they give authority to. And who do the Russians blame, instead of themselves, for their troubled lives? NATO, EU, UK, USA, Ukraine.

A certain rich man lumped the two things together for the 4th of July. Ray Dalio has hit out at political extremes in the U.S. that don’t respect a rules-based system, and warned that Russia is likely to be the “lesser loser” from the Ukraine war as the economic cost to the West causes NATO support to fracture.

The founder of Bridgewater Associates, the world’s largest hedge fund with about $150 billion under management, took to Linkedin on the U.S. Independence Day holiday to deliver an update on the forces he believes are shaping the world.

And he’s not happy with how things are going in the U.S.

“The remarkable leaders who designed the governance system [after the 1776 declaration of independence] and laid it out in the Constitution created both a principled and practical approach that thus far has lasted for nearly 250 years,” Dalio wrote.

But now, some of the essential elements required for representative democracies to work well are being called into question, he noted, such as abiding by election votes and rulings of the Supreme Court.

“With increasing conflict between populists of the right and populists of the left, growing numbers of people are inclined to fight for what they want and what they believe is right rather that work themselves through the rules-based system of consensus and compromise that our Founding Fathers designed.”

Meanwhile, the world order is not changing for the better, implied Dalio, if the conflict in Ukraine is a guide.

If Russian President Vladimir Putin ends up controlling the eastern part of Ukraine and manages to remain on the world stage then Russia would be a “lesser loser,” Dalio reckoned.

“Because the devastation in Ukraine has been so much greater than it has been in Russia, and because this will be economically costly to Ukraine and/or those countries that will pay to have it rebuilt, the war looks like it will be even more costly to NATO countries, so that also will be relative win for Russia,” he added.

In summary he said: “It appears that few countries are lining up strongly against Russia and behind NATO countries, and it appears that support within NATO countries for war is weakening due to its relatively high costs.”

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/ray-dalio-attacks-u-s-populists-and-
warns-russia-may-be-lesser-loser-in-ukraine-war-11656948778

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Tuesday, July 5, 2022 5:30 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


'They behave like barbarians:' Ukraine's chief war crimes investigator sees few prospects for reconciliation with Russians

KYIV, Ukraine – As Russia has escalated its use of imprecise Soviet-era missiles against civilian infrastructure, Ukraine's top legal official said she doesn't see how ordinary Ukrainians and Russians can achieve reconciliation until Moscow "asks for forgiveness, pays reparations to the state" and ensures "all its war criminals are in prison."

Prosecutor General Iryna Venediktova was speaking exclusively to USA TODAY from her office in Ukraine's capital, where she is coordinating the work of hundreds of Ukrainian and international war crimes investigators and specialists. Her aim is to hold Russia's military and senior officials accountable for alleged indiscriminate missile strikes and shelling, civilian assassinations, torture, sexual violence, repeated assaults on hospitals, and for denying civilians access to food, water and humanitarian aid.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/they-behave-like-barbarians-ukrai
ne-s-chief-war-crimes-investigator-sees-few-prospects-for-reconciliation-with-russians/ar-AAZcSXc

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Tuesday, July 5, 2022 11:29 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Quote:
Originally posted by THG:
I must be in the wrong thread?


Most of the time, yes.

*****
Ya gotta admit, THUGR, you walked into that one!


I can see where Ted got confused. Second can't stop talking about me.

I think it's love.
The people I know who voted for Trump twice, or more, were struggling through life long before Trump became a politician. I don't know what 6ix is because I have never been near 6ix,


Oh good. You're learning. Because I have a few hundred posts from you here where you seemed pretty convinced you had me pegged, while then writing a wall of text that doesn't apply at all to me.

Oh... wait. You probably did that here too. I don't read your dumb shit anymore.


Meanwhile, in reality...

The median rent costs $2000 a month; Median mortgage $1,200 (We'll split the difference and call that $1,600 I'm not paying), Median car payment $700, $140 car insurance (we'll call it $127 a month I'm not paying since I do pay $125 every six months for liability), $110 average monthly credit card payment, Average student debt payment $393, Average cell phone bill $114, Average cable bill $217 (We'll call it $197 since I only pay for internet and I got them down to $20 per month). I'm sure I'm missing other things that I'm not paying for. I certainly haven't even added gasoline to this list, of which I hardly pay for at all either. That's okay... I already have enough to illustrate my point at $3,241 per month worth of bills I don't have.

Well... not MISSING them.

There's 251 working days in the US in a year (if you include holidays, which I will even though the only jobs I've had in the last 13 years didn't).

251 / 12 is roughly 20.92. We'll just call it 21 working days in a month.

$3,241 / 21 = $270.01

Yup. I'm going to make $270.01 today, tax free, simply by not being a wage slave.

Do the math yourself to figure out how much income that would be in a year and you'll get a number higher than I've ever made in a single year in my life, before taxes... And I can imagine most Americans can say the same thing, which is why we need two adults working in most households and they still rack up credit card debt to "pay" for everything.

I'm going to go wrap up the electric in my garage and clean it all up. I've got to have a spot to put the brand new shiny shed door that I bought with cash to sit until my friend's dad comes over to pay off some of the favors he owes me and we get it installed.

Have fun today at work to pay off all that shit you bought that you don't need for anything other than to impress your rich Democrat "friends", honey.



--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Tuesday, July 5, 2022 12:40 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
'They behave like barbarians:' Ukraine's chief war crimes investigator...

Yep, more secondhand bullshit from SECOND.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake


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Tuesday, July 5, 2022 1:02 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


No transcripts of Putin's speeches?

Putin commonly speaks AT LENGTH, but western "journalists" hyperfocus on, literally, a snippet, ignoring the main thrust and spinning a preferred narrative. Selective reporting is a propagandists' favorite tool.

That snippet

Quote:
... will be viewed as both a thinly-veiled threat to the Baltic States of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania which fear he will launch war on them once he is done with Ukraine, and to Sweden and Finland as the two countries bid to join NATO.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10902225/Swedish-King-Finnish
-president-rushed-Baltic-island-hours-Putin-issued-veiled-threat.html

A threat, not an intention.

It is a reminder to Sweden, Finland, Lithuania, Poland etc that they have been at war with Russia over the centuries, the border has moved back and forth between the rise and fall of various dynasties (Did you know there was a Polish-Lithuanin empire that invaded Russia? Well, now you do.) and if these nations continue to threaten Russia's security, the borders may move once again.

I would not interpret this as anything more than a restatement that Russia intends to ensure its security by whatever means the west makes necessary.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake


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Tuesday, July 5, 2022 4:22 PM

CAPTAINCRUNCH

... stay crunchy...


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

I would not interpret this as anything more than a restatement that Russia intends to ensure its security by whatever means the west makes necessary.



"Even if it means being incredibly stupid and making things worse." - Putin

Yeah, look what killing innocent Ukrainian civilians just to grab a piece of land has gotten Russia: NATO & the US investing billions to arm Ukraine. Killing their own economy and devastating their place in the world all while clamping down on the few freedoms their citizens enjoy (like putting a lid on a simmering pot). Name me one other autocratic regime that has survived that? North Korea? China? Any others? You sure can pick 'em Ziggy.

You act like there was only one (very stupid) way to achieve Russian Security, by stealing it. You think just like a Russian.

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Tuesday, July 5, 2022 6:48 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Putin’s War Was Never About NATO

Russia makes its own choices — however bad they are.

By Natalia Antonova, July 5, 2022, 1:49 PM
https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/07/05/putin-russia-ukraine-war-nato/

As NATO met in Madrid last week, conspiracy theories about its role in Ukraine spread fast in Russian media. More respected theorists such as John Mearsheimer, meanwhile, still reiterate their claim that in making war, Russia was merely reacting to the West. Similar arguments have been put forth by other prominent thinkers, including Noam Chomsky.

There’s just one problem with this theory. At an event in June, leaning back casually in his chair, Russian President Vladimir Putin confirmed that in Ukraine, he is fighting a war of imperialist conquest—not defending himself against NATO, as his apologists have repeatedly claimed.

“It is also our lot to return and strengthen,” Putin stated, referring to past Russian conquests, as he compared his legacy to that of Peter the Great.

The Russian president had already said before the invasion that he did not believe Ukraine was a real country, claiming that Ukrainians were part of Russia’s “own history, culture, and spiritual space.”

Since that was ignored by his apologists, Putin has now explicitly stated that he identifies with Peter—even if his Great Northern War against the Swedes did last 21 years, a not-so-subtle signal that Putin believes he can dig in with regard to Ukraine—and is inspired to “take back” what he believes to be rightfully Russia’s.

In this conception of regional history, Ukraine doesn’t even exist. It’s simply a province occupied by uppity serfs who need to be subdued for their own good.

Experts who should know better often frame Putin as a noble savage, not a savvy political actor. He is portrayed as strong and terrifying but also not responsible for his own actions. Instead, per the “realists,” as they call themselves, these actions are the inevitable outcomes of Russia’s so-called security concerns.

At the root of this is a deeply patronizing attitude toward Russia and Russians themselves. Only Americans, in this framing, make choices; everyone else merely responds or acts in accordance with the machinery of immutable state rules.

In order to hold someone responsible for their actions, you must first grant them agency. Mearsheimer, Chomsky, and German politicians who have dragged their feet on supplying heavy arms to Ukraine are refusing to do a very simple thing: recognize that Russia, all on its own, chose to invade a sovereign country and butcher its citizens. There was nothing compelling Russia to pick this war—or the 2014 war. Prior to 2014, the majority of Ukrainians did not want to be in NATO, and between 2008 and 2010, 88 to 93 percent of Ukrainians held positive views of Russia.

If Russia wanted Ukraine in its orbit, it could have chosen the path of economic incentives, political cooperation, and genuine aid. Instead, the Russian leadership chose imperial fantasies, demonizing Ukrainians on state TV, and, finally, an all-out, tragic war.

Of course, for Germans the memory of their own racist imperialism still haunts their decisions. They’re hesitant to be seen as too aggressive toward Russia, as evidenced by a long-standing “special relationship” with Moscow—but by conflating “Soviet” with “Russian,” the Germans are playing right into Putin’s hands. It was Ukraine that was the first victim of Adolf Hitler’s war on the Soviet Union, just as it was the first victim of Soviet terror itself.

Therefore, it is important for Western nations to listen to Ukrainians—who do not see themselves as serfs and who are willing to die to ensure that their children are not stolen or taken into Russian bondage. Ukrainians need heavy arms right now, not later, not whenever.

As Sarah Rainsford, a longtime Eastern Europe correspondent, has pointed out, Putin’s remarks in June about sharing a legacy with Peter the Great did not appear to come from a place of fear. Putin didn’t look cornered but relaxed and smiling. Putin’s army of online apologists has largely taken his demeanor as a sign that Russia is winning and further Western involvement will only result in more unnecessary bloodshed.

Of course, this defeatist position is deeply wrong. It is borne of a myth that Putin is a 3D chess player and policy ninja—a myth promoted by Russian propaganda for decades now. The costs to the West are regularly mentioned, but it is the much higher price Russia is paying—in economic growth, in manpower losses, and in the destruction of its diplomatic reputation—that Russian propaganda currently seeks to divert attention from.

The truth is, Putin is overconfident. He has surrounded himself with yes men, and that’s one problem when it comes to convincing him the cost for Russia is too high. The other problem is that he views his soldiers as just another massive horde of serfs that can be sacrificed. Major losses don’t deter him, not yet, anyway. In order to be deterred, he needs to have some empathy for his own people. He has none.

An overconfident bully is vulnerable. Even Joseph Stalin, a man far more terrifying than Putin, had his reckoning. Russian historians, including the former head of the Russian State Archive, Sergei Mironenko, have pointed out that after Stalin ignored his own spies telling him that Hitler was about to attack, the immediate aftermath of the invasion had the Russian leader wondering if he was going to be arrested.

Western pundits panicking over Russia’s advances in Ukraine’s east need to pull themselves together and consider the long game. The Kremlin has none; its future plans are an ethnonationalist fever dream not dissimilar to Hitler’s own deranged fantasies. It took six years of war and massive sacrifices to beat Hitler. Today, all we really have to do is keep hammering Russia’s economy and arming millions of determined Ukrainians.

A sadly telling video recently made the rounds on social media. In it, a disgruntled Russian war widow shows off the humiliating “gifts” she received in honor of June 12, a national holiday in Russia. The woman bitterly laughs at the small package of sugar, a bottle of vegetable oil, some buckwheat, oatmeal, and a few other such delicacies she had been so generously given by her country’s corrupt officials.

In a different situation, I may have felt sympathy. As such, I look at the video and see weakness. I see a country that has painted itself into a corner with its own lies, its cruelty, its pretensions of grandeur. I see an enemy that can and must be defeated.

https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/07/05/putin-russia-ukraine-war-nato/



The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Tuesday, July 5, 2022 10:30 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


You're bowing out again I see, Second.

Good.



--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 5:56 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
You're bowing out again I see, Second.

Good.
6ix made an argument that I will quote:
Quote:
Meanwhile, in reality...

The median rent costs $2000 a month; Median mortgage $1,200 (We'll split the difference and call that $1,600 I'm not paying), Median car payment $700, $140 car insurance (we'll call it $127 a month I'm not paying since I do pay $125 every six months for liability), $110 average monthly credit card payment, Average student debt payment $393, Average cell phone bill $114, Average cable bill $217 (We'll call it $197 since I only pay for internet and I got them down to $20 per month). I'm sure I'm missing other things that I'm not paying for. I certainly haven't even added gasoline to this list, of which I hardly pay for at all either. That's okay... I already have enough to illustrate my point at $3,241 per month worth of bills I don't have.

There's 251 working days in the US in a year (if you include holidays, which I will even though the only jobs I've had in the last 13 years didn't).

251 / 12 is roughly 20.92. We'll just call it 21 working days in a month.

$3,241 / 21 = $270.01

Yup. I'm going to make $270.01 today, tax free, simply by not being a wage slave.

Do the math yourself to figure out how much income that would be in a year and you'll get a number higher than I've ever made in a single year in my life, before taxes...
6ix, here is the math for the number higher than you made in a year: $67,772.71 = $270.01 * 251

6ix, if you think your argument makes sense, then how about my argument? I didn't have to buy a Boeing 777-300er (list price $375.5 million). Instead, I bought tickets for the whole family. I saved so much money by not owning a plane that I can retire. 6ix, just kidding. This argument does not make good sense, but it is close to the absurd argument 6ix is making.

Anyway, I don't "argue" with Trumptards because they are foolish people and don't know it. I used to argue with my East Texas cousins, all Trumptards, at least the ones that lived long enough to vote in 2016. The last of my cousins, Laurie, who twice voted for Trump (or 4 times if you count both the primary and general elections) died recently. She was 3 years younger than me. All the Trumptard cousins died younger than I am now, and their children are dying young, too, because Trumptards are silly and yet dangerous to the health of people around them. (Russians are dangerous to the health of people around them. Ukrainians know this for a fact.)

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 6:21 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

. . . if these nations continue to threaten Russia's security, the borders may move once again.

I would not interpret this as anything more than a restatement that Russia intends to ensure its security by whatever means the west makes necessary.
People who support Putin make similar bombastic statements as Signym makes. For one example from Julia Davis @JuliaDavisNews

Chechen parliament speaker Magomed Daudov says that first and foremost, Chechen battalions in Ukraine are fighting a jihad to defend Islam.

Daudov says that unless Putin stops them, they will keep going until they reach Berlin.

11:44 AM · Jul 5, 2022·Twitter Web App
https://twitter.com/JuliaDavisNews/status/1544361566082109445

This kind of emotional sentiment will kill many people and destroy much real estate. (Why stop at Berlin? The Chechen should go onward to London! Boris Johnson sent weapons to Ukraine. He must be punished by destroying the House of Parliament in London! )

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 6:51 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


An order by the international court of justice told Russia to withdraw from Ukraine. Is Russia withdrawing? No! Instead, what is Russia doing?

HANOI, July 6 (Reuters) - Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Wednesday called on all parties in the world to make efforts to protect international laws as "the world is evolving in a complicated manner."

Lavrov was speaking though a translator at a meeting with his Vietnamese counterpart Bui Thanh Son in Hanoi.

His comments come as Russia has been accused by Western countries of breaching international law through its invasion of Ukraine. European Union leaders have urged Moscow to abide by an order by the international court of justice telling Russia to withdraw from Ukraine.

"Vietnam is a key partner (of Russia) in ASEAN...and the two countries' relations are based on history and their common fight for justice," Lavrov said at the meeting, referring to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

Vietnam and Russia have close ties dating back to the Soviet era and Hanoi has not so far condemned Russia's war in Ukraine, which Moscow calls a "special operation".

Lavrov's visit to Hanoi comes as the two nations mark the 10th anniversary of their "comprehensive strategic partnership".

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/russias-lavrov-calls-effort
s-protect-international-laws-2022-07-06/

What International Law is Russia disobeying?

16 March 2022 -- By a vote of 13 to two, with Vice-President Kirill Gevorgian of Russia and Judge Xue Hanqin of China dissenting, the ICJ ruled that Russia “shall immediately suspend the military operations that it commenced on 24 February.”

The court’s ruling – the first such verdict handed down by the ‘world court’ since the Russian invasion began – is in response to a suit filed by Ukraine on 27 February, accusing Russia of manipulating the concept of genocide to justify its military aggression.

https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/03/1114052

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 8:17 AM

CAPTAINCRUNCH

... stay crunchy...


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
It is a reminder to Sweden, Finland, Lithuania, Poland etc that they have been at war with Russia over the centuries, the border has moved back and forth between the rise and fall of various dynasties (Did you know there was a Polish-Lithuanin empire that invaded Russia? Well, now you do.) and if these nations continue to threaten Russia's security, the borders may move once again.


So killing innocent Ukrainians really is just so Putin can redraw a line - thanks for clearing that up. I mean, we knew that all along. His rolodex of previous reasons was pretty flimsy, typical thin Russian double speak, "I dunno, nazi something."
What a shitty place Russia must be, that they value lines over people. It does make sense, though. They way Putin uses up his soldiers and has them kill children and old women - zero respect for human life anywhere. And such a waste too. You'd think someone with that much power could do so much good for his own people. O-well, no imagination I guess.

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 8:39 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


The Soviet Union never really solved Russian nationalism

https://aeon.co/essays/the-soviet-union-never-really-solved-russian-na
tionalism

On 19 November 1990, Boris Yeltsin gave a speech in Kiev to announce that, after more than 300 years of rule by the Russian tsars and the Soviet ‘totalitarian regime’ in Moscow, Ukraine was free at last. Russia, he said, did not want any special role in dictating Ukraine’s future, nor did it aim to be at the centre of any future empire. Five months earlier, in June 1990, inspired by independence movements in the Baltics and the Caucasus, Yeltsin had passed a declaration of Russian sovereignty that served as a model for those of several other Soviet republics, including Ukraine. While they stopped short of demanding full separation, such statements asserted that the USSR would have only as much power as its republics were willing to give.

Russian imperial ambitions can appear to be age-old and constant. Even relatively sophisticated media often present a Kremlin drive to dominate its neighbours that seems to have passed from the tsars to Stalin, and from Stalin to Putin. So it is worth remembering that, not long ago, Russia turned away from empire. In fact, in 1990-91, it was Russian secessionism – together with separatist movements in the republics – that brought down the USSR. To defeat the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev’s attempt at preserving the union, Yeltsin fused the concerns of Russia’s liberal democrats and conservative nationalists into an awkward alliance. Like Donald Trump’s Make America Great Again or Boris Johnson’s Brexit, Yeltsin insisted that Russians, the Soviet Union’s dominant group, were oppressed. He called for separation from burdensome others to bring Russian renewal.

The roots of nationalist discontent lay in Russia’s peculiar status within the Soviet Union. After the Bolsheviks took control over much of the tsarist empire’s former territory, Lenin declared ‘war to the death on Great Russian chauvinism’ and proposed to uplift the ‘oppressed nations’ on its peripheries. To combat imperial inequality, Lenin called for unity, creating a federation of republics divided by nationality. The republics forfeited political sovereignty in exchange for territorial integrity, educational and cultural institutions in their own languages, and the elevation of the local ‘titular’ nationality into positions of power. Soviet policy, following Lenin, conceived of the republics as homelands for their respective nationalities (with autonomous regions and districts for smaller nationalities nested within them). The exception was the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, or RSFSR, which remained an administrative territory not associated with any ethnic or historic ‘Russia’.

Russia was the only Soviet republic that did not have its own Communist Party, capital, or Academy of Sciences. These omissions contributed to the uneasy overlap of ‘Russian’ and ‘Soviet’.

It was Joseph Stalin, a Georgian, who promoted Russians to ‘first among equals’ in the Soviet Union, confirmed by his postwar toast that credited ‘most of all, the Russian people’ with the Soviet defeat of Nazi Germany. Nikita Khrushchev continued the Soviet commitment to the formation of a multiethnic community that would eventually converge in a shared economic, cultural and linguistic system. In this Soviet melting pot, Russia was a kind of older brother, especially to the purportedly less-advanced peoples of Central Asia. Russian remained the Soviet language of upward mobility, Russian history and culture were the most celebrated, and Russians generally thought of the Soviet Union as ‘theirs’. Like white Americans who marked other groups as ‘ethnic’, Russians saw themselves as the norm in relation to ‘national minorities’.

By the late 1960s, the Soviet Union was a majority urbanised, educated society whose legitimacy had come to rest on its status as a stable welfare state. Freed from the terror, war and mass mobilisation of the previous decades, Soviet citizens spent their leisure time watching TV and listening to records (some officially banned, but easily available thanks to state-produced consumer technologies). After the horrors of the Second World War, in which 20 to 28 million Soviet citizens died, the hard-won stability of the postwar decades led some to wonder what a meaningful life looked like when the era of epic struggle was over. The question was particularly acute for the generation that reached adulthood after Stalin’s death in 1953. They inherited the Soviet state’s crowning achievements – victory over Hitler, the conquest of space – but lacked a unifying world-historical cause. Like their peers in other highly developed societies of the 1970s, they sought answers through self-improvement quests, spiritual awakening, aimless hedonism and environmental activism. Some Soviet citizens idealised the inaccessible West. Still others looked for ‘roots’ in different national pasts. The Soviet empire subsidised distinct ethnocultural identities that were subordinate to a universalising Communist (Russian) one. As the latter grew hollow, the former was ready to fill the void.

The ‘village prose’ writers expressed various nationalities’ sense that they were losing their patrimony. These authors, who were born in rural areas and studied in Moscow, framed village-dwellers as authentic bearers of tradition, in an elegiac key equivalent to foreign contemporaries such as Wendell Berry in the United States or the Irish writer John McGahern. The most catastrophist feared that Russia’s land and people were imperilled by forces beyond their control. Valentin Rasputin’s apocalyptic novel Farewell to Matyora (1976) was inspired by the flooding of his native village to create the Bratsk Hydroelectric Power Station. In the novel, the old widow Darya condemns the project as an ecological and spiritual catastrophe. She mourns the destruction of her ancestral home but, rather than relocating to the city, she and several others stay behind and drown.

Solzhenitsyn saw Communism as a foreign ideology that separated Russia from its Orthodox heritage

The ‘village prose’ movement was not alone in perceiving Russian identity as under existential threat in the Soviet Union. Their concern was shared by Russian apparatchiks such as the Politburo member Dmitry Polyansky and members of the intelligentsia such as the October magazine editor Vsevolod Kochetov. In their view, the Soviet Union was the reincarnation of the Russian empire, destined to take up its historic mantle as an anti-Western autocracy rooted in a revitalised peasantry. It was supposedly held back by Jews (and, increasingly, people from the Caucasus and Central Asia), who leeched off Russians’ labour and resources, and impeded their advancement. Beginning in the 1960s, the Soviet party-state turned to co-opting Russian nationalist sentiments in order to fortify its weakening legitimacy. Official institutions such as the Young Guard publishing house and the All-Russian Society for the Protection of Culture and Monuments served as key recruitment centres for the Russian nationalist cause.

Much of the culture that Russian nationalists produced was compatible with the Soviet Union’s self-image. The painter Ilya Glazunov glorified figures such as Ivan the Terrible and St Sergius of Radonezh alongside portraits of Leonid Brezhnev, the Communist Party’s General Secretary. The Slavophile critic Vadim Kozhinov declared that Russia had saved the world three times: from Genghis Khan, Napoleon, and Hitler. Importantly, praise for Russians’ achievements was sometimes paired with indignation about their mistreatment, and more radical materials circulated in samizdat (self-published form). Alexander Solzhenitsyn, who viewed Communism as a foreign ideology that separated Russia from its Orthodox heritage, was stripped of his Soviet citizenship after a vicious press campaign that accused him of ‘choking with pathological hatred’ for the country and its people.

While Russian nationalists such as Solzhenitsyn were punished for directly challenging the Soviet claim to rule, Soviet rulers were punished for directly challenging Russian nationalism. In 1972, Alexander Yakovlev, the acting head of the Central Committee’s Propaganda Department and later a top advisor to Gorbachev, published a letter in a Soviet newspaper that attacked both dissident and officially aligned forms of Russian nationalism. The article led to Yakovlev’s demotion to an ambassadorship in Ottawa.

The most popular and broadly relatable image of Russian victimisation was created by the writer, director and actor Vasily Shukshin. Shukshin was born in the Altai region of Siberia to a peasant father executed during Stalin’s forced collectivisation of agriculture (a fact that was excluded from his official biography as unbefitting for a Communist Party member). After moving to Moscow, he became known for playful short stories about eccentric rural men who resist conforming to modern life by playing the balalaika or steaming in the bathhouse. By the early 1970s, however, his characters were increasingly lost and marginalised. Shukshin’s last effort as a film director and his biggest hit, Kalina Krasnaya (1974) – released in English as The Red Snowball Tree – was centred on Egor, an ex-convict who struggles to find his place after fleeing hunger in the countryside as a young man. ‘I don’t know what to do with this life,’ Egor tells the saintly pen-pal who takes him in after his release from prison. Egor ultimately reconnects with his rural roots and takes up a new life as a tractor driver, but his redemption is cut short when his former gang shows up and shoots him dead in an open field. ‘Don’t pity him,’ Egor’s murderer says coolly as he smokes a cigarette. ‘He was never a person – he was a muzhik [peasant man]. And there are plenty of them in Russia.’

Shukshin’s allegory of emasculation and deracination reflected his darkening outlook: in private remarks, he lamented the poor and depopulated state of Russia’s countryside, noting that most of his male relatives were alcoholics or in jail. ‘There’s trouble in Rus’, great trouble,’ he wrote in his notebook. ‘I feel it in my heart.’ But his work was wryly sentimental rather than angry or accusatory, and his rise from the peasantry to the intelligentsia modelled official myths of upward mobility. Shukshin won top prizes and benefited from extensive state support.

However, when Shukshin died of a heart attack shortly after Kalina Krasnaya’s release, some nationalists whispered that he, like his most famous hero, was the victim of predation. The village prose writer Vasily Belov, a close friend, wrote in his diary that ‘if [Jews] didn’t poison [Shukshin] directly, then they certainly poisoned him indirectly. His entire life was poisoned by Jews.’ Shukshin’s cinematographer Anatoly Zabolotsky claimed in the draft of his memoirs (written in the early 1980s) that Shukshin had read the Protocols of the Elders of Zion before his death and was shocked to learn that a ‘genocide’ was being committed against the Russian people. Zabolotsky suggested that the actor who played Egor’s killer and his (Jewish) wife had murdered Shukshin to protect the secret.

Until the late 1980s, Russian nationalists’ paranoid xenophobia (which included broadsides against disco music and aerobics) was semi-covert and irrelevant to most. During Gorbachev’s perestroika (reform) and glasnost (openness), however, when everything from Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago (1973) to astrology was openly permitted, nationalist intellectuals’ concerns found freer and wider expression in political life, where they latched on to broader dissatisfaction. As activists in the Caucasus and the Baltics began demanding greater cultural and political autonomy, in April 1989 Soviet troops crushed a large demonstration in Tbilisi.

Denunciations of this repression kicked off the opening sessions at the televised First Congress of People’s Deputies of the USSR in May 1989. Valentin Rasputin, author of Farewell to Matyora, was among the delegates. After listening to Baltic and Georgian deputies’ complaints about Russian imperialism, Rasputin took the floor to bitterly suggest that

perhaps it is Russia that should secede from the Union, since you accuse her of all your misfortunes and since her back­wardness and awkwardness obstruct your progressive aspirations? … We could then pronounce the word ‘Russian’ without fear of being rebuked for nationalism, we could talk openly about our national identity … Believe me, we’re fed up with being scapegoats, with being mocked and spat upon.

Under the influence of other republics’ demands, Russian nationalists’ long-running resentment was rapidly turning into separatism.

‘Enough feeding the other republics!’ he exclaimed in a speech to industrial workers

Gorbachev’s political and economic devolution of the USSR produced chaos, including severe food shortages. The suddenly uncensored media exposed violence and degradation ranging from Stalinist repressions to the flailing war in Afghanistan. In response to the rush of bad news, the intelligentsia lamented Russia’s ‘total ruin’. The cultural historian and Gulag survivor Dmitry Likhachev said that the communist regime ‘humiliated and robbed Russia so much, that Russians can hardly breathe’. In Collapse: The Fall of the Soviet Union (2021), Vladislav Zubok recounts how the separatist idea gained momentum in the first half of 1990 thanks to three ‘mutually hostile’ forces: Russian nationalists inside the party and elites; the democratic opposition that dominated Moscow politics; and the masses behind Gorbachev’s rival, Yeltsin, a charismatic apparatchik who transformed into the ‘people’s tsar’.

Yeltsin, who was elected the first head of the Russian Supreme Soviet, riled up crowds by declaring that the Soviet Union was stealing from Russians to subsidise Central Asia. ‘Enough feeding the other republics!’ he exclaimed in a speech to industrial workers, who responded with a chant against Gorbachev. Yeltsin called for Russia’s ‘democratic, national, and spiritual resurrection’ and promised to redistribute resources to the people. Though Yeltsin adopted elements of conservative nationalists’ ideas, he was also pro-Western and pushed for further democratisation and marketisation, which they opposed.

In contrast to Yeltsin, Gorbachev dreamed of creating a ‘common European home’ that would include all peoples of the USSR in a closer relationship with the West. By the end of 1990, all of the Soviet republics had responded to the vacuum of central authority and the example set by former Soviet satellites in eastern Europe by declaring themselves sovereign (and in several cases independent). Yet the future shape of their relationship with the union remained unclear, and possibly still compatible with Gorbachev’s vision of a more equal federation.

In November 1990, Yeltsin travelled to Kiev as part of a strategy to undermine Gorbachev by building a new union from below based on ‘horizontal’ ties between Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan. Like other political elites at the time, Yeltsin’s use of the word ‘sovereignty’ in his speeches and promotional materials was ambiguous. According to his advisor Gennady Burbulis, Yeltsin was under the heavy influence of Solzhenitsyn’s recently published essay ‘Rebuilding Russia’, which claimed that the Russian people were exhausted, and proposed dissolving the USSR while retaining a Slavic core of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus, along with Russian-populated parts of Kazakhstan. Solzhenitsyn’s view that all three of these peoples ‘sprang from precious Kiev’ was shared by many Russians who did not necessarily identify as nationalists but assumed they would stay together.

Yeltsin’s expectations for a rapprochement with Ukraine were soon disappointed. In August 1991, the Communist hardliners’ failed coup put an end to Gorbachev’s hopes for a revitalised union and consolidated the power of Yeltsin, who was now the first elected president of the RSFSR. The Verkovna Rada, Ukraine’s parliament, passed an act proclaiming an independent state of Ukraine with ‘indivisible and inviolable’ territory. Particularly panicked at the thought of losing Crimea, Yeltsin had his press officer announce that the Russian republic reserved the right to reconsider its borders, angering the Ukrainian leader Leonid Kravchuk. Yeltsin’s administration backtracked and recognised all existing borders, and in December 1990 Yeltsin joined the heads of Ukraine and Belarus in the Belavezha forest to officially dissolve the USSR. Conservative Russian nationalists were outraged by the sudden end of Moscow’s control over the region but, as Zubok notes, it was they who had initially raised the question of Russian sovereignty and opposed Gorbachev when he was struggling to save the union.

The Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev learned about Belavezha only after the fact. Yeltsin thought that Kazakhstan should be part of a new commonwealth of independent states but wanted to keep out the ‘Muslim’ republics of Central Asia. Nazarbayev insisted on their inclusion, and prevailed. According to Adeeb Khalid’s book Central Asia (2021), full independence from the Soviet Union was ‘unexpected and, in many ways, unwanted by both the people and the political elites of Central Asia’. As a supplier of raw materials, the region was ill-served by isolation from the union’s economic structures. However great their enthusiasm for strengthening national identity and autonomy, some politicians and members of the intelligentsia still saw weaker union with Russia as preferable to separation. The surprise dissolution at Belavezha was the final irony of Soviet empire: for peoples seen as inferior, even freedom was dictated by Moscow.

Yeltsin’s administration announced a contest for a new ‘national idea’. It never chose a winner

As other countries in the former Eastern Bloc celebrated a ‘return to Europe’, the fusion of the Russian and the Soviet prevented the creation of a national identity based on casting off an oppressive foreign yoke. Yeltsin expected that Russia would be welcomed into the ‘West’ with a massive aid package and NATO membership. Instead, it was left in the ‘East’ and received meagre humanitarian assistance. After decades of being told that they represented the world’s leading civilisation, Russians were reduced to eating expired US military rations. The Yeltsin administration’s economic ‘shock therapy’, carried out in consultation with Western advisors, brought an atmosphere of brutal lawlessness that enriched a few and impoverished many others. The neoliberal Harvard economist Jeffrey Sachs and the Harvard Institute for International Development in Moscow helped design Yeltsin’s market reform and privatisation package, and implement it at dizzying speed. Crime and mortality rates skyrocketed as savings vanished overnight.

Reeling from inflation and shortages, several Russian republics and regions developed sovereignty movements aimed at achieving political and economic advantages over other territories (including Yeltsin’s native Sverdlovsk Oblast, which briefly declared itself the ‘Urals Republic’). These were largely brought to heel by Yeltsin’s December 1993 constitution. The republic of Chechnya, however, pressed for full independence, prompting Yeltsin’s disastrous decision to invade in 1994. The Russian Federation was a web of nationality-based republics, autonomous districts and territorial regions without a unifying concept. In June 1996, Yeltsin’s administration announced a contest to generate a new ‘national idea’. It never chose a winner.

Russian nationalist politicians attempted to turn poverty and disillusionment into votes against Yeltsin. Vladimir Zhirinovsky, a racist and antisemitic provocateur and head of the misleadingly named Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR), argued for the re-establishment of an autocratic Russian state within Soviet-era borders. Gennady Zyuganov’s Communist Party of the Russian Federation offered a Stalinist brand of Russian imperialism influenced by Lev Gumilev’s concept of ‘Eurasianism’. These parties achieved moderate electoral success: LDPR performed well in the 1993 elections, and Zyuganov trailed Yeltsin by only three percentage points in the 1996 presidential race. But most Russians, especially in the younger generation, were more interested in the problems and possibilities of the present (including foreign travel and consumer goods) than chauvinist messianism that looked to the past.

Through the 1990s, visions of national disempowerment and revenge gained more traction in Russian popular culture. The lost men of Shukshin’s stories, for example, morphed into action heroes who offered redemptive masculinity through violence. Danila, the protagonist of the hit movies Brother (1997) and Brother 2 (2000), is a young veteran of Yeltsin’s war in Chechnya from a poor provincial town. In an early scene, his grandmother tells Danila he’s a hopeless case and will die in prison like his father. She sends him to Saint Petersburg to be mentored by his big brother, who turns out to be a contract killer for the mafia. Rather than falling victim, Danila becomes an earnest vigilante who hurts the bad guys (especially men from the Caucasus) and protects the weak (poor Russian women and men).

In the sequel, Danila travels to the US to rescue the victims of an evil empire run by American businessmen in cahoots with Chicago’s Ukrainian mafia and ‘new Russians’ in Moscow. Stereotyped Others embody the threats facing the Russian people; in Chicago, he meets a sex worker named Dasha who is controlled by an abusive Black pimp. In the climactic scene, Danila takes revenge by committing a mass shooting at a nightclub in the city’s Ukrainian district. Moral righteousness is clearly on his side: Danila declares his love for the motherland and repeats Second World War-era slogans such as ‘Russians in war don’t abandon their own.’ At the end, he and Dasha drink vodka on a flight back home as the song ‘Goodbye, America’ (sung by a children’s choir) plays in the background. Brother 2 was released in 2000, the year that Vladimir Putin ascended to the presidency.

Putin kept his distance from nationalists, affirming that Russia was part of ‘European culture’ and cooperating with the US invasion of Afghanistan, while maintaining LDPR and the Communists as a loyal opposition in parliament. Like Yeltsin, he selectively incorporated aspects of their ideas, for example, in his decision to bring back the Soviet national anthem. He rejected other Russian nationalist hobby horses, including open racism and antisemitism. The booming oil and gas prices of Putin’s first two terms (2000-08) significantly improved Russians’ quality of life. Putin increasingly espoused the country’s mission as a bastion of traditional values that was ready to seek payback for the indignities of the preceding years.

An ex-convict considers killing a man he feels has humiliated him, but takes his own life instead

Putin’s 2014 annexation of Crimea pushed his approval ratings to record highs among ethnic Russians as well as Tatars, Chechens and other groups in the Russian Federation. Yet public enthusiasm for further expansionism remained limited. In January 2020, a poll by the Levada Center found that 82 per cent of Russians thought that Ukraine should be an independent state. Annual surveys have consistently shown that Russians prefer a higher standard of living to great power status (except in the post-Crimea afterglow of 2014). Now, as Putin tries to channel national aggrievement into support for a full-scale war against the neighbour who was once promised freedom, the late-Soviet case serves as a reminder that resentment is an unpredictable tool. Russians’ sense of pride and victimisation propped up the Soviet empire when Communist orthodoxy lost the power to convince. But it ultimately fuelled claims that imperial ambition came at too high a cost for the Russian people, turning them into a disposable resource.

Shukshin died in the relative torpor of the Soviet 1970s, when a sense of national disorientation wasn’t necessarily hitched to a political programme. His work didn’t idealise a vanishing past or a bright future. There are no scapegoats or saviours, and attempts at revenge end in self-destruction. In Shukshin’s short story ‘Bastard’ (1970), an ex-convict from the countryside considers killing a man he feels has humiliated him, but takes his own life instead. During his final moments, he feels ‘the peace of a lost person who understands he is lost.’

Putin came of age in Shukshin’s heyday and knows of his work. Like the Russian nationalists who once whispered about murder, he has tried to appropriate Shukshin’s memory for his own ends. In November 2014, he made an appearance at a theatre adaptation of Shukshin’s stories in central Moscow. The occasion was the Day of National Unity, an imperial holiday brought back by his administration, marking the expulsion of Polish-Lithuanian forces from the Kremlin in 1612 and the founding of the Romanov dynasty. In his onstage remarks, Putin praised Shukshin for showing ‘a simple man, for this is the essence of Russia.’

‘It’s a shame that Shukshin is no longer with us,’ Putin concluded. ‘But at least we have his heroes.

‘Russia depends on them.’

https://aeon.co/essays/the-soviet-union-never-really-solved-russian-na
tionalism



The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 10:10 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
Originally posted by captaincrunch:
Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
It is a reminder to Sweden, Finland, Lithuania, Poland etc that they have been at war with Russia over the centuries, the border has moved back and forth between the rise and fall of various dynasties (Did you know there was a Polish-Lithuanin empire that invaded Russia? Well, now you do.) and if these nations continue to threaten Russia's security, the borders may move once again.


So killing innocent Ukrainians really is just so Putin can redraw a line - thanks for clearing that up. I mean, we knew that all along. His rolodex of previous reasons was pretty flimsy, typical thin Russian double speak, "I dunno, nazi something."
What a shitty place Russia must be, that they value lines over people. It does make sense, though. They way Putin uses up his soldiers and has them kill children and old women - zero respect for human life anywhere. And such a waste too. You'd think someone with that much power could do so much good for his own people. O-well, no imagination I guess.

No, that's what NAZI Germany did.

It's still about security. Russia has USA/NATO missile bases on its border. It has asked to be part of NATO a dozen times. Then the USA withdrew from our nuclear and missile treaties. Russia has asked, and then demanded, new security agreements from the USA. We blew them off.

Then NATO said (after a coup in Ukraine) that Kiev would be part of NATO, and Kiev massed 150,000+ troops on the line of contact, after ignoring the Minsk Agreement for 8 years.

What is Russia to think? WE would freak out if Russia placed missiles in ... say... Cuba, and based 200,000 Russian troops there.
Wouldn't we?

And BTW, Ukrainians are better at killing innocent civilians than Russians. They've been doing that since 2014 and haven't stopped.

I'm with SIX: Fuck Ukraine.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake


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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 10:47 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


I see SECOND is posting walls of gibberish again.

I'll have you know, SECOND, that rarely do I get past your first two sentences and sometimes not even the first word. ("Ukrainians" in a case in point, which demonstrates total misrepresentation of reality.)

This isn't like a term paper. You don't get graded on length, but on clarity of analysis, and (if applicable) accuracy of prediction. Since your posts are incomprehensibly muddled and unfiltered by any sort of logic, they're not worth reading.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake


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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 11:43 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
You're bowing out again I see, Second.

Good.
6ix made an argument that I will quote:
Quote:
Meanwhile, in reality...

The median rent costs $2000 a month; Median mortgage $1,200 (We'll split the difference and call that $1,600 I'm not paying), Median car payment $700, $140 car insurance (we'll call it $127 a month I'm not paying since I do pay $125 every six months for liability), $110 average monthly credit card payment, Average student debt payment $393, Average cell phone bill $114, Average cable bill $217 (We'll call it $197 since I only pay for internet and I got them down to $20 per month). I'm sure I'm missing other things that I'm not paying for. I certainly haven't even added gasoline to this list, of which I hardly pay for at all either. That's okay... I already have enough to illustrate my point at $3,241 per month worth of bills I don't have.

There's 251 working days in the US in a year (if you include holidays, which I will even though the only jobs I've had in the last 13 years didn't).

251 / 12 is roughly 20.92. We'll just call it 21 working days in a month.

$3,241 / 21 = $270.01

Yup. I'm going to make $270.01 today, tax free, simply by not being a wage slave.

Do the math yourself to figure out how much income that would be in a year and you'll get a number higher than I've ever made in a single year in my life, before taxes...
6ix, here is the math for the number higher than you made in a year: $67,772.71 = $270.01 * 251


Yup. That's $67,722.71 AFTER income taxes and SS/Medicare tax.

So... just taking a guess here and not bothering with the math, more like in the ballpark of $85,000 to $95,000.

Quote:
6ix, if you think your argument makes sense, then how about my argument? I didn't have to buy a Boeing 777-300er (list price $375.5 million). Instead, I bought tickets for the whole family. I saved so much money by not owning a plane that I can retire. 6ix, just kidding. This argument does not make good sense, but it is close to the absurd argument 6ix is making.


No. Your argument makes no sense. I didn't add to the average American's monthly costs the price of a Boeing 777-300er. In fact, I didn't even add the average American's yearly expenses for vacation, which mine is also zero and would make my numbers even better.

The things I have on that list are what are considered normal monthly expenditures.

The only thing that arguably doesn't need to be on that list is Student Loan Debt payments, but then again I didn't add gasoline costs or food expenditures either.

My argument is sound.

Quote:
Anyway, I don't "argue" with Trumptards because they are foolish people and don't know it. I used to argue with my East Texas cousins, all Trumptards, at least the ones that lived long enough to vote in 2016. The last of my cousins, Laurie, who twice voted for Trump (or 4 times if you count both the primary and general elections) died recently. She was 3 years younger than me. All the Trumptard cousins died younger than I am now, and their children are dying young, too, because Trumptards are silly and yet dangerous to the health of people around them. (Russians are dangerous to the health of people around them. Ukrainians know this for a fact.)


Nobody believes anything you have to say about your personal life.

--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 12:31 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
I see SECOND is posting walls of gibberish again.

I'll have you know, SECOND, that rarely do I get past your first two sentences and sometimes not even the first word. ("Ukrainians" in a case in point, which demonstrates total misrepresentation of reality.)

This isn't like a term paper. You don't get graded on length, but on clarity of analysis, and (if applicable) accuracy of prediction. Since your posts are incomprehensibly muddled and unfiltered by any sort of logic, they're not worth reading.
Is this short enough for you to read?

Is Russian state TV souring on Trump? 'We’ll have to think whether to reinstall him again'
Tuesday July 05, 2022 · 6:44 PM CDT

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/7/5/2108641/-Russian-state-TV-so
uring-on-Trump-We-ll-have-to-think-whether-to-reinstall-him-again

Now, it’s not clear when Trump threatened to destroy the Russian Federation or Putin’s hegemony. Newsweek looked into this and was unable to uncover any such threats, either. But that’s not the point. If Russia no longer wants to ratfuck the election in Trump’s favor, it could mean they see the writing on the wall. Not to shock your delicate sensibilities too much, but Russian state TV tends to make shit up to serve its own very narrow interests. (For the record, Davis herself hasn’t heard Trump say anything like what Skabeeva attributed to him.)


The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 1:00 PM

CAPTAINCRUNCH

... stay crunchy...


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
No, that's what NAZI Germany did.


No, that's what Russia is currently doing. Deflect and deny all you want, Russian troops are killing Ukrainian citizens to carve out some of Ukraine for itself. I mean, how else can you describe it? Maybe you think it's not happening?

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
It's still about security. Russia has USA/NATO missile bases on its border.


Funny - Russia used to have Ukrainian Nukes on it's border but Ukraine removed them. Big mistake. Russia doesn't seem to be the grateful type.

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
It has asked to be part of NATO a dozen times. Then the USA withdrew from our nuclear and missile treaties. Russia has asked, and then demanded, new security agreements from the USA. We blew them off.


I keep trying to enlighten you on just how untrustworthy Russia is and has always been. I never can seem to get through. Huh, wonder why... Additionally, you seem to have a block when it comes to how much Russia is hated around the world. Especially Putin. Imagine, they are so hated and untrustworthy peace loving Sweden and Finland are both jumping at the chance to join NATO in direct opposition to Russia. Get real, sister, this is a major backfire f-up.

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
WE would freak out if Russia placed missiles in ... say... Cuba, and based 200,000 Russian troops there.
Wouldn't we?
Hell yeah. It's Russia. Thee most untrustworthy country next to NK.

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
And BTW, Ukrainians are better at killing innocent civilians than Russians. They've been doing that since 2014 and haven't stopped.


Explain how you know. Cites!

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
I'm with SIX: Fuck Ukraine.


Big Question: Why are you so mad at Ukrainians that you want to see innocent civilians murdered? What did they do to you?

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 1:21 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev said attempts to use courts or tribunals to investigate Russia’s actions would be futile and catastrophic.

Mr Medvedev, now deputy chair of the Russian security council, said on Telegram: “The idea of punishing a country that has one of the largest nuclear potentials is absurd. And potentially poses a threat to the existence of humanity.”

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/russia-ukraine-war-nuc
lear-weapons-putin-zelensky-b2116683.html

With a little checking, I found what made Medvedev threaten to nuke the world: Russia must not be allowed to use the G20 meeting this week as a platform given its war in Ukraine, German foreign minister Annalena Baerbock said. “It is in the interest of us all to ensure that international law is respected and adhered to. That is the common denominator,” said Ms Baerbock in a statement ahead of her trip to Indonesia – where the G20 meeting will be held. “And it is also the reason why we will not simply stand aside and allow Russia to use the meeting as a platform.”

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 1:57 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
Originally posted by captaincrunch:
Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
No, that's what NAZI Germany did.


No, that's what Russia is currently doing. Deflect and deny all you want, Russian troops are killing Ukrainian citizens to carve out some of Ukraine for itself. I mean, how else can you describe it? Maybe you think it's not happening?

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
It's still about security. Russia has USA/NATO missile bases on its border.


Funny - Russia used to have Ukrainian Nukes on it's border but Ukraine removed them. Big mistake. Russia doesn't seem to be the grateful type.

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
It has asked to be part of NATO a dozen times. Then the USA withdrew from our nuclear and missile treaties. Russia has asked, and then demanded, new security agreements from the USA. We blew them off.


I keep trying to enlighten you on just how untrustworthy Russia is and has always been. I never can seem to get through. Huh, wonder why... Additionally, you seem to have a block when it comes to how much Russia is hated around the world. Especially Putin. Imagine, they are so hated and untrustworthy peace loving Sweden and Finland are both jumping at the chance to join NATO in direct opposition to Russia. Get real, sister, this is a major backfire f-up.

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
WE would freak out if Russia placed missiles in ... say... Cuba, and based 200,000 Russian troops there.
Wouldn't we?
Hell yeah. It's Russia. Thee most untrustworthy country next to NK.

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
And BTW, Ukrainians are better at killing innocent civilians than Russians. They've been doing that since 2014 and haven't stopped.


Explain how you know. Cites!

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
I'm with SIX: Fuck Ukraine.


Big Question: Why are you so mad at Ukrainians that you want to see innocent civilians murdered? What did they do to you?
Thanks for posting a raft of weasely evasions.

Question:

Have you stopped beating your boyfriend yet?

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake


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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 1:58 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Nobody believes anything you have to say about your personal life.
Remember Rush Limbaugh? He was a Trumptard before Trump called Obama a monkey. My cousins had all Limbaugh's books. The cousins would loan the books to each other, if a cousin couldn't afford to buy. My cousins also had Limbaugh's medical history: drugs, tobacco induced lung cancer, loss of hearing. It is kind of amazing that Limbaugh lived to be 70, despite how stupidly he lived. None of my Limbaugh-loving, Trump-voting cousins lived that long, probably because they didn't have Limbaugh's money to keep themselves alive and because Medicare starts at 65. Most of my cousins were dead before their 65th birthday. Only one cousin lived long enough to see Trump give the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Limbaugh. It was a great day for dittoheads.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rush_Limbaugh#Prescription_drug_addictio
n

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 2:04 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Nobody believes anything you have to say about your personal life.
Remember Rush Limbaugh? He was a Trumptard before Trump called Obama a monkey. My cousins had all Limbaugh's books. The cousins would loan the books to each other, if a cousin couldn't afford to buy. My cousins also had Limbaugh's medical history: drugs, tobacco induced lung cancer, loss of hearing. It is kind of amazing that Limbaugh lived to be 70, despite how stupidly he lived. None of my Limbaugh-loving, Trump-voting cousins lived that long, probably because they didn't have Limbaugh's money to keep themselves alive.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rush_Limbaugh#Prescription_drug_addictio
n

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Annnnnd.... in response to nobody believing anything SECOND posts about his persoanl life, SECOND ... posts about his personal life!

Does anyone besides me see the humor in that?

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake


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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 2:21 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

Does anyone besides me see the humor in that?

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake

The humorous part is that Trumptards drop dead years earlier and make half as much money as Democrats. Compare Russians to Democrats and the differences in lifespan and income are even greater. The Trumptards blame their unfortunate lives on Democrats, rather than themselves, which is kind of expected from somebody whose signature is "If we did not MAKE someone poor." Signym, poor Trumptards make themselves what they are as do Russians make themselves what they are. But Trumptards blame Democrats and Russians blame NATO/EU/UK/USA. For some cultural or ethnic reasons, angry poor white trash, be they Trumptards or Russians, cannot place the blame where it belongs, on themselves. Instead, Trumptards and Russians find enemies everywhere. It's not at all surprising that they have many enemies, considering how Trumptards and Russians act in their daily lives toward people who aren't the same as them.

Also not surprising that Russia has an economy smaller than South Korea, but bigger than North Korea. Russia has much in common with North Korea, especially the threats of nuking the world and attacking its neighbors. https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/gnp-by-country

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 2:57 PM

CAPTAINCRUNCH

... stay crunchy...


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Quote:
Originally posted by captaincrunch:
Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
No, that's what NAZI Germany did.


No, that's what Russia is currently doing. Deflect and deny all you want, Russian troops are killing Ukrainian citizens to carve out some of Ukraine for itself. I mean, how else can you describe it? Maybe you think it's not happening?

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
It's still about security. Russia has USA/NATO missile bases on its border.


Funny - Russia used to have Ukrainian Nukes on it's border but Ukraine removed them. Big mistake. Russia doesn't seem to be the grateful type.

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
It has asked to be part of NATO a dozen times. Then the USA withdrew from our nuclear and missile treaties. Russia has asked, and then demanded, new security agreements from the USA. We blew them off.


I keep trying to enlighten you on just how untrustworthy Russia is and has always been. I never can seem to get through. Huh, wonder why... Additionally, you seem to have a block when it comes to how much Russia is hated around the world. Especially Putin. Imagine, they are so hated and untrustworthy peace loving Sweden and Finland are both jumping at the chance to join NATO in direct opposition to Russia. Get real, sister, this is a major backfire f-up.

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
WE would freak out if Russia placed missiles in ... say... Cuba, and based 200,000 Russian troops there.
Wouldn't we?
Hell yeah. It's Russia. Thee most untrustworthy country next to NK.

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
And BTW, Ukrainians are better at killing innocent civilians than Russians. They've been doing that since 2014 and haven't stopped.


Explain how you know. Cites!

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
I'm with SIX: Fuck Ukraine.


Big Question: Why are you so mad at Ukrainians that you want to see innocent civilians murdered? What did they do to you?
Thanks for posting a raft of weasely evasions.

Question:

Have you stopped beating your boyfriend yet?



Have you stopped beating your daughter yet? 2 can play that stupid game, hon. (Do you even have a daughter? I'm about 50-50 on that).

I love how consistent you are in pointing out what you're doing by accusing others of it first, "weasely evasions." Why do you continue to post here if you run from simple questions?

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 3:48 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Nobody believes anything you have to say about your personal life.
Remember Rush Limbaugh? He was a Trumptard before Trump called Obama a monkey. My cousins had all Limbaugh's books. The cousins would loan the books to each other, if a cousin couldn't afford to buy. My cousins also had Limbaugh's medical history: drugs, tobacco induced lung cancer, loss of hearing. It is kind of amazing that Limbaugh lived to be 70, despite how stupidly he lived. None of my Limbaugh-loving, Trump-voting cousins lived that long, probably because they didn't have Limbaugh's money to keep themselves alive.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rush_Limbaugh#Prescription_drug_addictio
n

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two


Annnnnd.... in response to nobody believing anything SECOND posts about his persoanl life, SECOND ... posts about his personal life!

Does anyone besides me see the humor in that?


Nothing Second says or does is humorous. At least not intentionally.

Second is a sad, sad man devoid of all humor and joy in life.


Meanwhile, I see he's dropped our conversation again.

I'm sure it will be one week before he starts talking about how poor he thinks I am again.

Anyhow... Going to clean up my paid-in-full house before my buddy gets here. We're picking up the $360 rolling shed door that I paid cash for.



--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 4:02 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
Originally posted by captaincrunch:
Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Quote:
Originally posted by captaincrunch:
Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
No, that's what NAZI Germany did.


No, that's what Russia is currently doing. Deflect and deny all you want, Russian troops are killing Ukrainian citizens to carve out some of Ukraine for itself. I mean, how else can you describe it? Maybe you think it's not happening?

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
It's still about security. Russia has USA/NATO missile bases on its border.


Funny - Russia used to have Ukrainian Nukes on it's border but Ukraine removed them. Big mistake. Russia doesn't seem to be the grateful type.

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
It has asked to be part of NATO a dozen times. Then the USA withdrew from our nuclear and missile treaties. Russia has asked, and then demanded, new security agreements from the USA. We blew them off.


I keep trying to enlighten you on just how untrustworthy Russia is and has always been. I never can seem to get through. Huh, wonder why... Additionally, you seem to have a block when it comes to how much Russia is hated around the world. Especially Putin. Imagine, they are so hated and untrustworthy peace loving Sweden and Finland are both jumping at the chance to join NATO in direct opposition to Russia. Get real, sister, this is a major backfire f-up.

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
WE would freak out if Russia placed missiles in ... say... Cuba, and based 200,000 Russian troops there.
Wouldn't we?
Hell yeah. It's Russia. Thee most untrustworthy country next to NK.

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
And BTW, Ukrainians are better at killing innocent civilians than Russians. They've been doing that since 2014 and haven't stopped.


Explain how you know. Cites!

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
I'm with SIX: Fuck Ukraine.


Big Question: Why are you so mad at Ukrainians that you want to see innocent civilians murdered? What did they do to you?
Thanks for posting a raft of weasely evasions.

Question:

Have you stopped beating your boyfriend yet?



Have you stopped beating your daughter yet? 2 can play that stupid game
Yes,and you started it.

Now you're just looking pathetic.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake


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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 5:11 PM

CAPTAINCRUNCH

... stay crunchy...


SIGNYM: I'm with SIX: Fuck Ukraine.

CC: Big Question: Why are you so mad at Ukrainians that you want to see innocent civilians murdered? What did they do to you?

SIGNYM: Thanks for posting a raft of weasely evasions. Question: Have you stopped beating your boyfriend yet?

CC: Have you stopped beating your daughter yet? 2 can play that stupid game.

SIGNYM: Yes, and you started it. Now you're just looking pathetic.

CC: No, you started it - read the thread above.
And you continue to use it as a deflection from answering simple questions about Russians murdering Ukrainians. It's pathetic how you avoid questions.

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 5:25 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


You can't possibly be that stupid, CAPON.

Would anyone genuinely believe that
Quote:
CAPON: Big Question: Why are you so mad at Ukrainians that you want to see innocent civilians murdered?
is an honest question?

See?
You started it.


If you're ever interested in having an honest discussion, let me know.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake


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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 5:33 PM

CAPTAINCRUNCH

... stay crunchy...


Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Meanwhile, in reality...

The median rent costs $2000 a month; Median mortgage $1,200 (We'll split the difference and call that $1,600 I'm not paying), Median car payment $700, $140 car insurance (we'll call it $127 a month I'm not paying since I do pay $125 every six months for liability), $110 average monthly credit card payment, Average student debt payment $393, Average cell phone bill $114, Average cable bill $217 (We'll call it $197 since I only pay for internet and I got them down to $20 per month). I'm sure I'm missing other things that I'm not paying for. I certainly haven't even added gasoline to this list, of which I hardly pay for at all either. That's okay... I already have enough to illustrate my point at $3,241 per month worth of bills I don't have.

Well... not MISSING them.

There's 251 working days in the US in a year (if you include holidays, which I will even though the only jobs I've had in the last 13 years didn't).

251 / 12 is roughly 20.92. We'll just call it 21 working days in a month.

$3,241 / 21 = $270.01

Yup. I'm going to make $270.01 today, tax free, simply by not being a wage slave.

Do the math yourself to figure out how much income that would be in a year and you'll get a number higher than I've ever made in a single year in my life, before taxes... And I can imagine most Americans can say the same thing, which is why we need two adults working in most households and they still rack up credit card debt to "pay" for everything.

I'm going to go wrap up the electric in my garage and clean it all up. I've got to have a spot to put the brand new shiny shed door that I bought with cash to sit until my friend's dad comes over to pay off some of the favors he owes me and we get it installed.

Have fun today at work to pay off all that shit you bought that you don't need for anything other than to impress your rich Democrat "friends", honey.



"Yup. I'm going to make $270.01 today, tax free, simply by not being a wage slave."

Hilarious. No, you're not going to make it. Go ahead, take that money that you "made" and buy something with it. Get some gas and tell the attendant the same story. "Look here buddy, I made $270 dollars today by not being a wage slave, so have some for the gas I just put in my car."

Here, let me make you even richer: think of all the money you "made" by not having a wife and kids. Not having to pay for college, no weddings, no clothes or food. No divorce proceedings (just in case), no vacations, no dining out, no bigger house, no second car, on and on. You add it all up and you might be the richest person in your county.

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 5:36 PM

CAPTAINCRUNCH

... stay crunchy...


Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
You can't possibly be that stupid, CAPON.

Would anyone genuinely believe that
Quote:
CAPON: Big Question: Why are you so mad at Ukrainians that you want to see innocent civilians murdered?
is an honest question?

See?
You started it.



I must have misinterpreted you when you said, "SIGNYM: I'm with SIX: Fuck Ukraine." The meaning seems pretty obvious given the actual war and murder of Ukrainians by Russians going on.

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 6:15 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Nothing Second says or does is humorous. At least not intentionally.

Second is a sad, sad man devoid of all humor and joy in life.


Meanwhile, I see he's dropped our conversation again.

I'm sure it will be one week before he starts talking about how poor he thinks I am again.

Anyhow... Going to clean up my paid-in-full house before my buddy gets here. We're picking up the $360 rolling shed door that I paid cash for.



--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus
6ix, first thing, nobody cares about your $360 rolling shed door. Nobody. Why tell us about a big, fat nothing? Second thing, you posted dozens of times that nobody cares about Ukraine and Russia. How about you reading your own words and showing you understand the words by not posting about what you don't care about? Third thing, you were an asshole when you were drunk, but as many famous novelists have proven by writing while drunk, alcohol enhanced articulateness. 6ix, go back to posting while drunk. That was the best version of you.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 8:41 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Nothing Second says or does is humorous. At least not intentionally.

Second is a sad, sad man devoid of all humor and joy in life.


Meanwhile, I see he's dropped our conversation again.

I'm sure it will be one week before he starts talking about how poor he thinks I am again.

Anyhow... Going to clean up my paid-in-full house before my buddy gets here. We're picking up the $360 rolling shed door that I paid cash for.



--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus
6ix, first thing, nobody cares about your $360 rolling shed door. Nobody. Why tell us about a big, fat nothing? Second thing, you posted dozens of times that nobody cares about Ukraine and Russia. How about you reading your own words and showing you understand the words by not posting about what you don't care about? Third thing, you were an asshole when you were drunk, but as many famous novelists have proven by writing while drunk, alcohol enhanced articulateness. 6ix, go back to posting while drunk. That was the best version of you.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two



We picked up my $360 paid for rolling door for my paid for shed at my paid for house. My friend, who owes me quite a few favors used his truck to pick it up for me, so it didn't even cost me any gas. It will be installed by my friend's dad who owes me even more favors, so that won't cost me any money either.

I'm fucking awesome. I'm thriving in your Leader's bullshit economy.

Fuck Russia. Fuck Ukraine. Fuck Democrats. Fuck Gas prices. Fuck Joe Biden*. Fuck you.

Your party is dead. It is all your fault too.



Meanwhile, keep on talking about how I'm a poor dummy and I'll keep telling you about how awesome I am, no matter what thread it's under. If you want me to stop doing this, you know what you have to control yourself from doing.

--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 8:59 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
Originally posted by captaincrunch:
Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
You can't possibly be that stupid, CAPON.

Would anyone genuinely believe that
Quote:
CAPON: Big Question: Why are you so mad at Ukrainians that you want to see innocent civilians murdered?
is an honest question?

See?
You started it.



I must have misinterpreted you when you said, "SIGNYM: I'm with SIX: Fuck Ukraine." The meaning seems pretty obvious given the actual war and murder of Ukrainians by Russians going on.
Yeah, right.

I'm sure the dozens (if not hundreds) of times you've tried to paint me as something I'm not were just accidents.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake


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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 9:48 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


But what about Hitler? Compared to Hitler, Putin is not so bad, according to Putin ally.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said he thought 'forgetful Europe' should face a 'moral cleansing'

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, a major ally of Vladimir Putin, has said that Europe should undergo a "moral cleansing," according to state news agency Belta.

During a government meeting at the weekend, Lukashenko talked about fighting Nazis in the Second World War and said: "The time has come for the forgetful Europe to give itself a moral cleansing."

"They — all who chose to forget — will have to look again at the grueling evidence of the bloody crimes of their own fathers and grandfathers," he said, according to Belta.

"I must admit that we were delicately silent. In our Slavic way, we believed that children were not responsible for their parents. We still think so."

He did not elaborate on what such a cleansing would entail.

As one of Russian President Putin's staunchest allies, Lukashenko has supported his military operation in Ukraine since it began on February 24.

Lukashenko's cryptic comments about Nazis echo Putin's previous claim that Russian forces invaded Ukraine to "denazify" the country and save its Russian-speaking population from "genocide."

There is no evidence of a genocide being carried out in Ukraine and experts say Putin only says this as part of a broader disinformation campaign.

Lukashenko's comments come several days after he accused Ukraine of firing missiles at military facilities on his country's territory. He did not provide any evidence for this claim.

"We are being provoked," Lukashenko said, Al Jazeera reported.
Ukrainian officials have yet to comment on reports of the blasts in Belarus and the Ukrainian military did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

https://www.businessinsider.com/belarus-lukashenko-europe-moral-cleans
ing-putin-ukraine-russia-invasion-2022-7

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 10:05 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Fuck Russia. Fuck Ukraine. Fuck Democrats. Fuck Gas prices. Fuck Joe Biden*. Fuck you.
Dull and repetitive. In a time long passed, you were creative when you were hammered. Change your name back to 6ixStringJoker. Bring back your good old days. Have a beer. Or 6ix pack.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 11:50 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


"Dull and repetitive" applies to SECOND.

Also dishonest and warped.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake


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Thursday, July 7, 2022 12:21 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Fuck Russia. Fuck Ukraine. Fuck Democrats. Fuck Gas prices. Fuck Joe Biden*. Fuck you.
Dull and repetitive. In a time long passed, you were creative when you were hammered. Change your name back to 6ixStringJoker.


I don't waste my creativity on you, dumbshit.

Here's what I've been doing. What purpose could you have possibly served yourself or anybody else while I was busy creating things?

http://fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?bid=18&tid=58882&mid=11585
42#1158542

Quote:
Bring back your good old days. Have a beer. Or 6ix pack.


No thanks. I don't have any desire to ever drink again.



--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Thursday, July 7, 2022 1:59 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


SECOND is a nasty twisted fuck who tries to harm those he disagrees with.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake


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Thursday, July 7, 2022 9:49 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
SECOND is a nasty twisted fuck who tries to harm those he disagrees with.


If his opinions meant anything to anybody other than himself, and if he were half as good with words as he believed himself to be, he might be good at it too.

Remember when his sockpuppet was telling people step by step how to put the gun in their mouths and fire?

Archive.today and Haken's TESTING thread remembers.



--------------------------------------------------

Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus

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Thursday, July 7, 2022 12:47 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


On Wednesday, Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin traveled to Kyiv, where he met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Martin said Ireland stands ready to support Ukraine’s postwar reconstruction — and to help hold Russia accountable.

Prime Minister Micheál Martin: “The use of terror against and the deliberate targeting of civilian populations are war crimes. Those responsible, those carrying out these actions and those directing them, will be held fully accountable, and there will be no hiding places.”

In response, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev warned the U.S. and its allies could face nuclear retaliation if they pursue an international tribunal to investigate Russian war crimes committed in Ukraine. Medvedev wrote on social media, “The idea of punishing a country that has one of the largest nuclear potentials is absurd. And potentially poses a threat to the existence of humanity.”

https://www.democracynow.org/2022/7/7/headlines/irish_prime_minister_m
icheal_martin_condemns_russian_war_crimes

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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Thursday, July 7, 2022 1:03 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Vladimir Putin’s tactic of targeting civilian populations has finally backfired. Instead of demoralizing war-weary Ukrainians it has galvanized its European neighbors and re-invigorated NATO.

Russia has form here, with Putin targeting civilian populations as a well-worn tactic to demoralize communities and achieve his strategic goals. The targeting, terrorizing, and killing of civilians was used to horrific effect in Syria from 2015. In partnership with Syrian government forces, Russian forces besieged and attacked civilian areas, including hospitals and schools. This included the use of ‘barrel’ bombs and chemical weapons, costing the lives of thousands of innocent people and causing untold misery.

But Putin’s tactics have finally backfired.

NATO, Russia’s biggest adversary, has been horrified by the attacks on civilians this close to its borders. The alliance announced plans to increase the number of forces at high readiness to over 300,000, a dramatic increase from the existing 40,000. Jens Stoltenberg, the secretary general of NATO, said that the increase is a direct response to Russian actions in Ukraine. Stoltenberg also announced that the alliance would alter its official stance on Russia, from a ‘strategic partner’ to posing ‘a direct threat to our security, to our values, to the rules-based international order.’

The re-invigoration of NATO, through enlargement and increased military capabilities, is the opposite of what Putin intended when his forces invaded Ukraine.

Countries in its perceived sphere of influence have used Russian aggression as the final straw to seek closer ties with the West, finally leaving Russia’s orbit.

This has revealed Russia for what it really is: a diminished power with nothing to offer except aggressive nationalism and terror.

https://www.eurasiareview.com/07072022-russian-war-crimes-in-ukraine-a
re-backfiring-oped/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

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