| Re: Empire [message #98725 is a reply to message #98724] |
Tue, 24 June 2025 11:41   |
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Wayne Parham
Messages: 18934
Registered: January 2001
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Illuminati (33rd Degree) |
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No.
I've watched the middle-east conflicts through my lifetime and thought of it as a sad war between fanatic moslems and Israel. I don't think it's the common people that are to blame - I think it's the politicians and fanatics driving that perpetual conflict. Jews, Christans and Moslems should consider themselves like-minded, but the mentally sick ones don't and they cause strife. Other than that, I don't have an opinion on events in the middle east.
But I do have my finger on the pulse of the conflict in Ukraine and it is caused solely by Putin. It isn't the west. You may say America and Europe had fingers in stuff in other parts of the world, but not there. We should have, in my opinion, but we didn't. At least not 'til now, and we're a little late.
That's just how it is, my friend.
Let me give you just one of a million examples. Back in the late 1990s, I considered buying a Volga and having it shipped here. I wanted to put a blown big block in it and wrinkle-wall back tires. Paint it black and put the words, "Механическая Перегрузка" on the back. That means "mechanical overload" and I just thought it would be really cool.
Well, days passed and I didn't get around to doing that. I spent my hot-rod dollars on my Cutlass and eventually bought an Impala. But I never stopped thinkin' about the Volga...
Then later I learned that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton tried to smooth-over relations with the Russians with a "Russian Reset" campaign. I don't suppose it's ever a bad thing to improve relations with anyone, but my point is that American political attention to Russia and Ukraine is so abysmally slight that we didn't even take the time to pay a translator a hundred bucks to make sure we got the word right.
We gave the Russian Foreign Minister a cute little Staples-like-that-was-easy button with what we thought was the word for reset - "перезагрузка" - but instead, we labeled the button "перегрузка" - overload.
Caught my eye 'cause of my fun Volga phrase. Still think that would have been cool on a funny car based on a Volga.
Point is, we ain't into it here. We don't have a clue what's going on there. Not at the everyman level and not even at the highest political levels. It's not a sinister plot. It's a comedy of errors.
Odessa, at the top of the Potemkin stairs, right by the statue of Duke de Richelieu (in a jacket, just for fun):
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| Re: Empire [message #98728 is a reply to message #98727] |
Wed, 25 June 2025 09:16 |
Rusty
Messages: 1381
Registered: May 2018
Location: Kansas City Missouri
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Illuminati (3rd Degree) |
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I'm sorry for all the Ukraine's too. They wanted independence from Mother Russia. They got it. But they've also had a long involved history being part of it. Unfortunately they've also been a pawn in this unnecessary dispute. That you can discount and disregard the same as they are bravely holding off the hoards of the Russian enemy. Grinding down their military capability slowly and surely.
But that's a delusion the same as what Europe is doing as far as "re-arming" of NATO by decree by the United States to spend 5% of their GDP on this military boondoggle. Europe's economy, especially Germany is recessional now. That cheap Russian natural gas was eliminated by old Joe, who got this whole shebang going in earnest. So, like here in the US, a military industrial complex is useful to prop up an economy that can't be competitive in the world market with manufacturing due to the cost of living.
Austerity will ensue in Europe as it has in the US. Social services will be cut as in the US.
I just think you deny the responsibility of the big picture to make things fit with your experiences over there. Useful absolutely for getting to know the culture. But inadequate to assess the geopolitical implications that go on between governments.
I'm not letting anyone off the hook. I've just been putting the pieces of the puzzle together with the help and knowledge of learned people that have a grasp of that big picture.
And brother, the blame sure tilts our way. Just as it has in the Middle East, and Latin America and South America with our overt meddling. Sorry, but that is the reality.
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