A very simple question.

A substantial number of diarists and commenters here believe, if I am not mistaken, that Trump's outreach to President Putin is a good thing, as improved Russia-US relations can only improve the prospects for peace. I hope I'm not distorting anyone's views when I say this.

Equally, some of these diarists have opined that NATO and the West is being overly confrontational by sending troops and machinery too close to the Russian-East European border. It is also widely believed here (AFAIK) that Russia was fully justified in retrieving Crimea from the Ukraine, which transfer in 1954 from Russia to the (then) UkrSSR was an illegal move by N.Khrushchov.

I have a few questions.

Crimea was originally the homeland of the Crimean Tatars, who during WWII were forcibly expelled and deported from their ancestral homeland by J.V. Stalin and replaced by ethnic Russians. Expulsion of autochthounous peoples and their replacement by "others" is a recognized war crime. Stalin did this repeatedly in the Baltic, in the Caucasus, and even in the Russian hinterland (e.g., the Mari, the Tannu-Tuva, and the Yukagirs). None of these Soviet-era war crimes have ever been prosecuted.

Therefore, to call Crimea "ancestrally" Russian is evil piffle. The Russians in Crimea were mere immigrants and hold no right to the land. To think otherwise and to excuse the annexation on that basis is facially invalid.

It is without doubt that Russian troo[ps and its surrogates have been conducting cross-border campaigns all across the Eastern European borders: Ukraine, Poland, and especially the Baltics. With Russians moving heavy artillery to these borders, do not the sovereign nations have the right to protect themselves? Since their own armed forces are clearly no match for Russia's, and given the NATO alliance, surely they are within their rights to request the presence of NATO troops to assist them in defending their borders and their homelands.

Remember, Russia invaded and occupied Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia within 48 hours in 1940, and forced their Parliaments at gunpoint to "request" admission to the USSR. Days later, Soviet cattle cars carried tens of thousands of the countries' intelligentsia (parliamentarians, lawyers, scientists, professors, etc.) off to Siberia.

It is no wonder that these nations have no love for Russia. They do not share the language, culture, or an authoritarian political tradition. Democracy was well-rooted there during Independence (1918-1940) and was quickly re-established after 1990.

As for the Russian-speaking minority: again, they are there because of criminal ethnic cleansing during 1945-1952 and the replacement of the deportees by Russian-speakers who, for the most part, have never bothered to learn the native languages or to apply for national citizenship. Many of them are "agitators" sent in by the Russian government just to stir up trouble.

So, with all this background, why has this place (caucus99pc) over the last year become so rabidly (and I'm not exaggerating) pro-Putin and pro-Russian?

Is it a reflection of the universal desire for peace and not war, which I understand. But Putin, despite Trump's apparent moves, is just as aggressive as always. Sometimes, you must stop conceding and realize that your opponent has no wish to compromise. [See: Obama and the Republicans].

The final question: Do you really think [cf Chamberlain] that "giving" Putin the Ukraine and the Baltic States would end his ravenous desire to conquer?

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Pricknick's picture

that I am rabidly pro-Putin or pro-Russian.
It's that I am disgusted with the fear factor that so many are promoting about Putin and Russia. So many think we should be happy with the start of a new cold war and that our representatives are only looking out for us. I'm sick of american exceptionalism.
A dialog beats a war any day but right now most seem to be pounding the drums.

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Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.

@Pricknick

    Many different versions of this: http://www.nhbr.com/November-29-2013/JFKs-greatest-legacy-He-avoided-nuc...

    I agree: "A dialog beats a war any day but right now most seem to be pounding the drums."
    Think we dodged a serious possible war by not putting the Clintons back in the White House.

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Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Caerus We might have dodged it. I hope we have.

This would be an easier era to live in if I absolutely believed in a higher Power to pray to.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

dance you monster's picture

I'll leave out the parallel between the Tatars' and our First Nations' circumstances, because I trust you would not be hypocritical at all.

So, this Saturday you take the opportunity to drop another of these essays trying to paint c99ers as Putinists, eh? Mmmm, the paintbrush is wielded sloppily this morning.

First, there is no one viewpoint at this site, but many. The general distaste for the ramping up of the Cold War again is just that -- an objection to being stampeded into ill-considered, poorly-reasoned hatreds of the kind that you, tapu dali, have brought here.

Do c99ers love them some Putin? Pretty much no, from my observations. But we also can see when certain people with another agenda try to bamboozle or stampede us.

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Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@dance you monster Well I don't "love me some Putin," but I do admit to a general preference for a world leader that doesn't want to start a nuclear war.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

there were 106 comments in your last essay that touched on this same topic, none of those 106 comments were yours. If you like to poke sticks at c99p members at least have the courage and decency to respond to folks that take the time to read your piece and add commentary.

If there's one thing that gets under my skin it's when someone uses a public restroom and doesn't flush.

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@JtC thanks for moderating, and everything. Glad to know someone else noticed the lack of discourse last time, excepting our reactions. Fort Ross is all the Russian history I need in California, they "helped" settle it just like the missionaries "helped".
Yet again, the world is not my enemy, please stop trying to make it so.

PEACE

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Not Henry Kissinger's picture

@JtC It's a shame. We just don't get the quality of trolling we used to.

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The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?

importer's picture

"But Putin, despite Trump's apparent moves, is just as aggressive as always."

Was that the part where Russia held Crimea against our CIA planned civil war in Ukraine? Russia was already there, troops, ships the whole enchilada, we are the agressers who created the whole mess stirring up the old Nazi inclinations in the West against the pro-russian groups in the East. Putin was not going to give up his warm water port at Sevastopol. We are the ones who are moving tanks and missiles to Russia's borders while putting the fear into the old USSR states. It is tantamount to Russia placing tanks and missiles on our Canadian and Mexican borders. We are also stoking that fear with lots of money, so they will play along with our own Russian hysteria. While we howl about Russian agression, we are the agressors - worldwide.

Should Crimea be given back to the native Tatars? We can send the 3-4 generations of Russian-speaking immigrants to Siberia? Why is Ukraine so teary-eyed about Crimea. It's not like they can hold the land they have at the moment.

Russia is the largest land mass in the world - twice the size of Canada with one of the smallest and declining populations in the world. They are actually offering homesteads to people willing to come into Russia! Russia's natural resources are valued in the tens of trillions, mostly unexploited.

We are demonizing Russia - once again - because people have become jaded about the wars in the middle east - you know - the countries we have invaded and destroyed since 2002. Russia is backing Syria for the same reason he holds Crimea - Russia has a port there.

One could reverse your final statement with: is giving the US the whole middle east to destroy going to quench OUR thirst for conquest? Do you think that when we are done creating chaos in the middle east, we aren't going to move on to Russia?

John McCain, Lindsey Graham and the rest of the neocon/lib war party in the US can't wait to start a shooting war with Russia and China. That is just insane, and the rest of the world knows it. We are the ones who have been brainwashed into thinking we are the good guys.

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gulfgal98's picture

The drumbeat for escalating a new cold and possibly even a hot war with Russia has absolutely zero to do with Russia's so called annexation of Crimea. The reported results of the election showed that Crimea voted to join Russia.

Crimea was originally the homeland of the Crimean Tatars, who during WWII were forcibly expelled and deported from their ancestral homeland by J.V. Stalin and replaced by ethnic Russians. Expulsion of autochthounous peoples and their replacement by "others" is a recognized war crime. Stalin did this repeatedly in the Baltic, in the Caucasus, and even in the Russian hinterland (e.g., the Mari, the Tannu-Tuva, and the Yukagirs). None of these Soviet-era war crimes have ever been prosecuted.

What was done to the Tatars decades ago is very much akin to what the white people did to the native Americans here in the United States. So is it up to the United States to prosecute Russia for war crimes from WWII? What about our own war crimes and ethnic cleansing? It is pretty hard for the United States to self righteously throw stones at Russia when we are still practicing ethnic cleansing here in the United States. Look no further than the horrific treatment of the water protectors by our own government in favor of a private corporation DAPL.

The bottom line for me is no more wars, cold or otherwise!!! So why is the United States aggressively going after Russia and trying to start another war? I am no lover of Putin, but this is none of our freaking business unless we are still expanding empire, which is exactly what this appears to be.

The defense budget of the United States is greater than the next seven nations combined. Over 1/3 of the money spent on defense worldwide is spent by the United States. No matter how bad Russia may be, no other nation has been aggressively attacking other countries than the United States. The United States is currently illegally bombing in seven countries right now, none of which we have declared war upon.

We're already bombing seven countries. We identified seven countries lately bombed by the U.S.: Pakistan, Somalia, Yemen, Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq and Libya.

Like many Americans, I am war weary and angry that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will end up costing us somewhere near $5 trillion thus far, not to mention the most conservative estimate of at least one half million civilians killed in Iraq alone.

We need to clean our own very dirty and toxic laundry before we accuse anyone else of theirs. Reaching out is always preferable to military action. You cannot bomb your way to peace.

Edited to add link.

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Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy

Azazello's picture

@gulfgal98
Stalin didn't deport the Tartars in order to seize Crimea. Sebastopol was founded as a Russian port by Catherine the Great before Stalin was even born.

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We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Azazello Thanks for this information, which I didn't know.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

gulfgal98's picture

@Azazello It is always good to learn something new. Thank you for the history lesson. Good

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Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy

Azazello's picture

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qygr2YCvq8 width:500 height:300]

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We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.

Oldest Son Of A Sailor's picture

Is a good idea...
Certainly better than massive uncontrolled thermo nuclear reactions on 2 or more continents...

The problem is that Crimea is not a simple issue...
And one that was certainly better off before Hillary Clinton, George Soros, and Victoria Nuland, decided to make it an experiment in Regime Change, with all it's intended and unintended consequences...

One must remember that Crimea was a part of Russia or the USSR from 1783 until the breakup of the USSR. 84% of the Crimea citizens name Russian as their native language, and about 68% identify themselves ethnically as Russian...

In addition to the claims of the need to provide protection to formerly Russian Citizens who supported heavily Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych in the democratic elections prior to the 2014 Ukrainian Revolution, one must also remember that the Russian Black Sea Fleet naval base in Sevastopol has significant strategic value to Russia that won't be ignored...

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"Do you realize the responsibility I carry?
I'm the only person standing between Richard Nixon and the White House."

~John F. Kennedy~
Economic: -9.13, Social: -7.28,

So I have to ask: are you honestly interested in hearing a differing opinion? Or do you just want to lecture us like we are hard of hearing?

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Oldest Son Of A Sailor's picture

@gjohnsit Comes by here to throw feces every once in a while, contributing nothing...

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"Do you realize the responsibility I carry?
I'm the only person standing between Richard Nixon and the White House."

~John F. Kennedy~
Economic: -9.13, Social: -7.28,
Not Henry Kissinger's picture

@gjohnsit Being called 'nutjobs' by someone trying to gin up WWIII.

These people know nothing but projection.

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The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?

@Not Henry Kissinger
why we don't agree with their agenda.

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Not Henry Kissinger's picture

@gjohnsit we're all just one big mutiny of deviated preverts.

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The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?

Deja's picture

@gjohnsit Nice Smile

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Not Henry Kissinger's picture

It is without doubt that Russian troo[ps and its surrogates have been conducting cross-border campaigns all across the Eastern European borders: Ukraine, Poland, and especially the Baltics.

If it's 'without a doubt' then I'm sure you won't mind providing a piffle of support?

There haven't been Russian troops in Poland or the Baltics for twenty five years. By surrogates I assume you mean the Russian speaking people in the Ukraine who actually live there?

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The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Not Henry Kissinger Oh god. Surrogates. Kinda like every Arab man over 12 in certain geographical areas is a terrorist? Or like the "fake news" sites listed by PropOrNot might not intend to be working for Putin, but are Putin plants anyway because of the views they support?

Well, you know, if you're not with us...

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

It is without doubt that Russian troo[ps and its surrogates have been conducting cross-border campaigns all across the Eastern European borders: Ukraine, Poland, and especially the Baltics.

It's true in Ukraine, but that is without a shadow of a doubt a lie in Poland and the Baltics.

the replacement of the deportees by Russian-speakers who, for the most part, have never bothered to learn the native languages or to apply for national citizenship. Many of them are "agitators" sent in by the Russian government just to stir up trouble.

More bullsh*t.

why has this place (caucus99pc) over the last year become so rabidly (and I'm not exaggerating) pro-Putin and pro-Russian?

And finally, slander.

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Azazello's picture

@gjohnsit
because you're tired of being smeared, they'll follow you here and smear you some more.
It's just more of this shit:
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8wtNl0R6TiQ width:500 height:300]

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We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

OK, so because Stalin was bad to people who lived in Crimea in the 30s and 40s, the neo-Nazis in western Ukraine should be able to dictate to the people who live in Crimea NOW, and those people shouldn't be able to vote to join Russia.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal This is kind of like how, because Social Security benefits were not extended to Black people in the 30s (shame on you, FDR) opposing Social Security cuts today is racist.\

(Yes, someone actually made that argument to me once in the grand old Obama days.)

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

TheOtherMaven's picture

He was ever so right when he said that "jaw-jaw is better than war-war".

If BOTH sides have sane leaders who are willing to listen to each other - and every indication so far is that Putin is willing to listen, and even make some small concessions - then it doesn't have to come to "war-war".

Unfortunately I am not certain at all that the leaders of the US are sane.

(You sound much the same as an Irishman who is still terrified of/furious with Great Britain because of the dreadful things the Brits did to the Irish as recently as the 20th century. Yes there still are some, even though "Evil Great Britain" is essentially a boogeyman these days.)

Added to avoid stupid comments: I don't like Putin, and certainly wouldn't vote for him if there were any possibility at all of his running for President of the US (which there isn't) - but you don't have to like someone to respect their geopolitical savvy. So far it seems as though he's got more of that in his littlest toenail than can be found in the entire US government. Blum 3

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There is no justice. There can be no peace.

How about the West agreeing to the outcome of a UN sponsored plebiscite? If the people of Crimea and Sevastopol vote to be part of Russia, then so be it.

This will never happen because the West knows exactly the outcome. After the election in which some 96% of Crimea voted to ask Russia to accept them as a region of the Russian Federation, many Western poling organizations took a try at it and found the same results.

To say that Crimea and Sevastopol should be part of the Ukraine is to say the the neo-nazis in Kiev have more right to the land on the peninsula than the people that live there. If Kiev ever gains control of the region you can expect blood and destruction. They already proved that in attacking 8 bus loads of Crimeans with iron pipes returning through the Ukraine. In the Ukrainian East, the Banderites stated goal is to drive the people of Donetsk and Lhugansk out of Ukraine or to kill them. These are nasty people

When the Soviet Union collapsed it left in its wake a mess of ethnic and state boundaries. Lenin's concept of the USSR was deeply flawed and resulted in artificial borders and associations. These stresses exploded when the USSR collapsed. Instead of trying to resolve these issues, the USSR just catastrophically collapsed, a product of the personalities and leadership of Yeltsin and Gorbachev. Many of these stresses have been resolved, but not until states were split, borders realigned and new states were formed. Crimea and Sevastopol are two examples of this. If you are against these changes they you are defending the outcomes of a totalitarian, communist state, the USSR over the democratic rights of the current citizens of those regions.

Crimea and Sevastopol are Russian, and Russia is Crimea and Sevastopol. There is nothing to be gained by the West to demand that Russia "return" Crimea. It will never happen and global problems will only get worse as long as Russia and the US are not honest partners.

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Capitalism has always been the rule of the people by the oligarchs. You only have two choices, eliminate them or restrict their power.

Ugly business. Sure, let's turn Crimea over to them.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_W0darIeDFs
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8-RyOaFwcEw

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Big Al's picture

do you have any examples of the anti=imperialist rhetoric on this site that also indicates a pro-Putin attitude? That would be helpful. I find the imperialist democrats from Daily Kos always infer that opposition to wars automatically means support for the "dictators" the Democratic party is out to remove, like Hussein, Gaddafi and Assad. I remember being called pro-Assad and pro-Gaddafi many times on Daily Kos simply because of my opposition to war against Libya and Syria.
So let's get this settled and give us some real examples we can analyze.

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mimi's picture

approach your accusations of people, who are not enough anti-Putin in your opinion, with some kind of understanding, imagining your anchestry and may be life-time experiences of your parents or some such.

Now, I am telling you why I am not that anti-Putin. He looks great with his bare chest on a horse! Yeah. And I have seen him cuddling little kids. Cute man with some feelings! And I read he protected the girl he made a baby with from unnecessary bullshit main stream media press exposure. All good. So far he hasn't attacked a EU country with bombs and tanks. Good.

I hope that settles it. It's a very simple answer to your very simple question. I hope you don't mind.

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Putin is not Stalin, Trump is not Chamberlain, and Crimea is no longer populated primarily by Tatars. Russia has no desire, nor even ability, to invade or to subjugate either Poland or the Baltics. To equate the geopolitical realities of 2017 to those of 1940 (or earlier) is absurd. It is also a recipe for opening up old wounds that are still in the process of healing, and it will do no one any good.

Putin does not have "a ravenous desire to conquer". Nor even a desire for confrontation, and certainly no desire for an escalation of hostilities. What Putin desires (as per his many speeches on the subject) is peaceful co-existence with the West -- with adequate security for Russia and her interests. NATO appears unwilling to offer him that.

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native

It is without doubt that Russian troops and its surrogates have been conducting cross-border campaigns all across the Eastern European borders: Ukraine, Poland, and especially the Baltics.

Perhaps you could actually show some evidence of this. Some actual border crossings would be nice. Otherwise one might think you're a neocon nutjob.

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CB's picture

@TJ

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Amanda Matthews's picture

@CB Or

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I'm tired of this back-slapping "Isn't humanity neat?" bullshit. We're a virus with shoes, okay? That's all we are. - Bill Hicks

Politics is the entertainment branch of industry. - Frank Zappa

CB's picture

@Amanda Matthews
https://consortiumnews.com/2015/03/20/a-family-business-of-perpetual-war/

Neoconservative pundit Robert Kagan and his wife, Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, run a remarkable family business: she has sparked a hot war in Ukraine and helped launch Cold War II with Russia and he steps in to demand that Congress jack up military spending so America can meet these new security threats.

This extraordinary husband-and-wife duo makes quite a one-two punch for the Military-Industrial Complex, an inside-outside team that creates the need for more military spending, applies political pressure to ensure higher appropriations, and watches as thankful weapons manufacturers lavish grants on like-minded hawkish Washington think tanks.

Not only does the broader community of neoconservatives stand to benefit but so do other members of the Kagan clan, including Robert’s brother Frederick at the American Enterprise Institute and his wife Kimberly, who runs her own shop called the Institute for the Study of War.
...
To be fair, the Nuland-Kagan mom-and-pop shop is really only a microcosm of how the Military-Industrial Complex has worked for decades: think-tank analysts generate the reasons for military spending, the government bureaucrats implement the necessary war policies, and the military contractors make lots of money before kicking back some to the think tanks — so the bloody but profitable cycle can spin again.

The only thing that makes the Nuland-Kagan operation special perhaps is that the whole process is all in the family.

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after delivering a lecture on the dangers of Russian aggression, has declined to respond to any of the rebuttals to his thesis. Perhaps he considers them to be unworthy of his attention? Or maybe he's just very busy trying to elect more and better Democrats, so they can help to defend us from the Rooskis.

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native

@native

I've learned several new things here today. He would have been annoying.

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CB's picture

@Sunspots
opportunity to educate and reveal the truth.

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@native There's no way Clinton gets a do-over.

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Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@TJ My take? Unless she's dead or incapacitated, she will run against some Republican in 2020--probably Mike Pence--and she will "win." Because the Department of Homeland Security will be running our elections.

They've realized that depriving us of most choice wasn't good enough.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@native I can't freaking believe what I'm seeing. The Democrats are staying alive (barely) with a combination of McCarthyism and a zombie feminist movement.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal

But are they really alive, or maintaining some semblance of life by draining the life-blood of society and by eating the brains of those subjected to their corporate propaganda?

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Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

CB's picture

This is not a neo-McCarthyist site like DKos.

WTF is this shiite?

Therefore, to call Crimea "ancestrally" Russian is evil piffle. The Russians in Crimea were mere immigrants and hold no right to the land. To think otherwise and to excuse the annexation on that basis is facially invalid.

Catherine II defeated the Ottoman Empire and annexed Crimea in 1783.

What happened to the "autochthounous peoples" that inhabited North America during that era?

The US colonies signed The Treaty of Paris in 1783 and went on from there to annex more and more of the "autochthounous peoples" land until there were only tiny isolated pockets left.

Annex.jpg

What's your cutoff date for war crimes?

Speaking of "evil piffle", what is one historical similarity between the Khanate Tatars and the Americans during the 16th to the 19th century? I'll give you a hint. It stopped in Crimea in 1783 but continued in America until 1865. Here's another hint: it is named after the Slavic people who lived in Russia.

Maria Zakharova has a perfect response to the crap you have posted:

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@CB CB, thank you! Maria Zakharova is amazing! Thank you, I had never heard of her. Please make this well-known.

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CB's picture

@Linda Wood

45% of senior management positions are held by women in Russia (highest percentage in the world), almost double the 23% in the US.

Maria Zakharova is Director of the Information and Press Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation. You can find her reports on RT or Sputnik. She's fantastic. Great sense of humor.

You may also be interested in Inessa S' YouTube channel for English subtitles for Russian reports. When you compare her subtitled reports to some western media you can see how we are being fooled.

Here Inessa S talks about why she does this.

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@CB She is amazing!

It struck me, watching the subtitles, that the list of Ukraine crimes recited was identical with those committed by/by order of the US PTB and I wondered if the latter raise their own psychopaths or merely draw them like maggot-flies to place them over other people's countries as well as their own, wherever they wish to weaken and more easily control and steal resources...

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0 users have voted.

Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

CB's picture

the happier I am that Hillary did not win. Despite Trump being such a fuck-head, he is still the lessor of two evils.

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@CB

smelly militaristic fervor at the D National Convention, when General John Allen gave his rousing speech endorsing HRC. And then the retired spook Leon Panetta gets up to echo the same disturbing sentiments... to much applause. I remember asking myself, "These people are supposed to be... Democrats??" Alas, they were indeed, and still are, Democrats.

From WaPo:

Retired Gen. John Allen delivered one of the most stirring, impactful speeches of the Democratic National Convention on Thursday night. It was a full-scale indictment of Donald Trump's foreign policy from the man who led the fight against the Islamic State.

But some Democratic delegates didn't want to hear it. They chanted "no more war" at the general as he made his case for Hillary Clinton and against Trump.
To be sure, this was a relatively small contingent, and it was easily eclipsed by supportive chants of "USA! USA!" for Allen...

It was right about then that I became fully aware that I was definitely not a Democrat any longer. Unfortunately, I couldn't think of anything else to be.

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native

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@native Easily eclipsed, after some work put in by those running the convention. Like making sure the Bernie delegates were hidden behind signs, etc.

Doesn't "eclipsed" mean "something got in the way of the light?"

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal

Weren't the Bernie delegates also drowned out by white noise machines? Imagine people having the nerve to call for 'no more war' and impede the corporate/military Empire's rightful path to the subjection (and destruction) of the globe?

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Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

edg's picture

why did Crimeans vote in 1991 to become an autonomous republic and then in 1992 why did they declare independence from Ukraine? It seems like they really don't want to be part of Ukraine and haven't wanted to be part of Ukraine for quite a while.

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@edg

just like it doesn't matter what people in Donetsk and Luhansk want. The only things that matter are what the Government in Kiev wants, and what Amerika wants. Which two things just happen to be nearly identical. And of course it goes without saying that whatever Russia wants, never matters.

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native

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@native Hell, it doesn't matter what Americans want either!

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@edg Give it back to Erdogan! That'll show those nasty Bears.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

When the Russian nuke hits you, you likely won't feel it.
If it hits somewhere else, you likely will.
Discuss.
"nutjobs" works both ways.

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"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

You are up against the rift between labor and democracy vs forced labor and tyranny. This rift existed within the United States government during WWII. Roosevelt disappointed his Wall Street backers by bringing the United States into the war on the side of the Allies, on the side of Britain, the democracies, and the Soviet Union, rather than on the side of Germany and Fascism, which was favored and supported by our industrial elite.

Your question may be over how anyone could side with Russia, as the United States did in WWII, when there was tyranny and forced labor in Russia. The answer is that Fascism was worse. In Ukraine now, the Nazi Fascist military and political force inflicted on the people of Ukraine by Victoria Nuland of my government is worse than the Russian Federation. Clearly worse.

I am an American who believes the Russian people deserved a democratic socialist government in 1917 when they voted for the Bolsheviks, but I believe the Bolsheviks were forced by the circumstances of czarist war, famine, revolution, and civil war, into making a pact with the devil, U.S. industrial plunderers, in order to survive invasion by the United States in 1918. As a result, the dictatorship of the proletariat, which was meant to lead to a labor democracy, became a capitalist death machine, which replaced Trotsky with Stalin.

I believe it was the struggle by the proletariat, the workforce of the Soviet Union, even during the Stalinist period, and the struggle and gains made by organized labor in Europe, that moved capitalist forces to inflict Hitler and Fascism upon the world.

I will always be for labor and democracy against forced labor and tyranny. I will always see Russia as a focal point in this struggle. And when my government forces me into a choice between Hitler worshippers and Russia, I will side with Russia. This has been a dichotomy established in my childhood as a person born during WWII. I grew up in a blessed paradise of peace, freedom and free college education, and the war was far, far away. But if I had grown up in Ukraine or in Crimea, I would have much more powerful, permanent, and personal reasons for preferring Russia.

You can point to atrocities by the Soviet Union. You can point to atrocities by Syria. But you cannot get me to agree to replace them with Fascism in Ukraine and Salafism in Syria. I refuse to agree to replace them with something worse.

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enhydra lutris's picture

than you have, waaaay before Stalin. Waay before the Tatars too.

Most importantly, modern Crimea voted to break with Ukraine and join with Russia, so why shouldn't they be allowed to do so? The US and NATO only recognize self-determination when it meets their goals. If it is OK for Ukraine to withdraw from Russia, it is equally OK for Crimea to stay with Russia.

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --