Ukrainians Take Up Arms in Self Defense
They’re not the only ones who should be allowed to protect themselves.
![sipaphotosthirteen071489 | Abaca Press/Lafargue Raphael/Abaca/Sipa USA/Newscom](https://d2eehagpk5cl65.cloudfront.net/img/c800x450-w800-q80/uploads/2022/03/sipaphotosthirteen071489-scaled-e1646169188877-800x450.jpg)
Security and liberty, we're again reminded, rest on a foundation of force. We can offload responsibility to protective laws and institutions, but they may fail. Ukrainians found to their horror that it fell to them as individuals to defend their country and themselves when a nation entrusted to guarantee their independence instead proved to be a predatory threat. In similar but (thankfully) less bloody fashion, Americans learned that police empowered to defend them can also be abusive. That doesn't mean we give up on protective institutions, but we need to have the ability and willingness to defend ourselves.
"We will give weapons to anyone who wants to defend the country," Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy tweeted on February 24 as Ukraine's armed forces struggled against Russian invaders. While he referred to military weapons, Ukrainians also stripped gun stores in anticipation of the invasion. "Gun shops have sold out of some weapons, such as AR-10 and AR-15 assault rifles," noted The Guardian. Additionally, Ukrainians volunteered for military service and assembled Molotov cocktails. It's genuinely moving to watch people take on such responsibility. But it's also evidence of failed guarantees embodied in the 1994 Budapest Memorandum.
"Washington brokered with Kyiv and Moscow the terms under which Ukraine agreed to eliminate the strategic missiles, missile silos and bombers on its territory and transfer the 1,900 nuclear warheads to Russia for disassembly," the Brookings Institution's Steven Pifer wrote in 2014. "A key element of the arrangement—many Ukrainians would say the key element—was the readiness of the United States and Russia, joined by Britain, to provide security assurances."
Russia, a party to that arrangement, now besieges Ukrainian cities. Britain, the United States, and countries outside the Budapest Memorandum are providing weapons and other support to Ukraine but are highly unlikely to directly intervene because Russia's President Vladimir Putin controls thousands of nuclear weapons that he threatens to use.
Fortunately, Ukraine's military is performing better than expected. The country also has a motivated population and "2.2 to 6.3 million" guns in private hands even before it liberalized gun laws last week, according to the University of Sydney's GunPolicy.org. Armed civilians, many with military training, are unlikely to stop the invading force. But they can bleed it, and they can extract a continuing toll from the Russians, though many of them will undoubtedly pay their own price.
If Ukrainians now must take responsibility for liberty and safety back in their own hands, so Americans have also confronted the dangers posed by relying on police. Through events less apocalyptic than those in Europe, people saw that law enforcers could abuse their powers, but that they also suffered when those same police were unavailable to keep the peace.
In summer 2020, after the death of George Floyd, the U.S. and countries around the world had huge protests backing the Black Lives Matter movement. It wasn't Floyd alone; pent-up anger over acts of police abuse, many against racial minorities, brought people into the streets. But fueled by simmering tensions and the stresses of pandemic restrictions in the U.S., some protests exploded into riots and overwhelmed law enforcers.
"Police in Minneapolis catalyzed Wednesday night's violent protests by killing George Floyd on Monday," Reason's Christian Britschgi noted at the time. "They've since done a terrible job of protecting innocent property owners from being victimized by the rioting that's erupted in response to Floyd's death."
It was a double-whammy of disillusionment in the institutions established to protect Americans that drove many people to take responsibility for their own protection.
"Americans bought guns in record numbers in 2020 during a year of unrest – and the surge is continuing," CNN reported last March. "Industry data and firearms background checks show nearly 23 million guns were purchased in 2020, according to Small Arms Analytics, a consulting firm based in Greenville, South Carolina. That's a 65% increase compared with 2019, when 13.9 million guns were sold."
The experiences of Americans alienated by police and frightened by unrest don't entirely compare to those of Ukrainians battling invaders. But people in both situations were thrown on their own resources when protective arrangements failed. That doesn't mean they are resigned to unilaterally fending for themselves. To the contrary, Ukraine seeks NATO and European Union membership as well as military assistance, while proposals in the U.S. for reform of law enforcement are far more popular than calls to fully defund police. But there's no doubt that multiple institutional arrangements to guarantee safety have taken hits to their credibility. Ultimate responsibility for security and liberty lies with those willing and able to, if necessary, use force.
But this isn't entirely a victory for individual empowerment, at least on the international scene. As with all things involving war, there's a stinger for freedom. Political leaders impressed by Ukraine's performance against superior forces won't miss the fact that the country had a large pool of veterans on which to draw because of continuing conflict and the use of a military draft to supply personnel.
"Prior to the war in Eastern Ukraine in 2014, the country was planning to move away from conscription," reports Forces.net, part of the British Forces Broadcasting Service. "In October 2013, then-President Yanukovich abolished mandatory military service. However, after rising tensions with Russia conscription was reinstated again."
Last October, The Economist observed that conscription is making a comeback. "This renewed interest has many causes. One is the return of a gloomier world in which hard power, rather than diplomacy, can shape national destinies." Finland, which fought the old Soviet Union, has a draft. Among the Baltic states bordering Russia, Lithuania reinstated conscription before the world grew even gloomier this year and Estonia expanded its draft; the country also trains and arms insurgents against occupation.
"Under the program, members must hide the weapons and ammunition, perhaps in a safe built into a wall or buried in the backyard," according to The New York Times.
Conscription, like civilian arms ownership, disperses responsibility for defense in a world that may not be able to rely on diplomatic arrangements and small, professional forces as much as once hoped. But while civilian weapons empower people, coerced military service enhances state authority. Individuals will be asking more of themselves in the years to come but, unfortunately, governments are likely to do the same.
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First. Fully support the 2a. But it is hilarious that one of the first articles here on Ukraine was this:
https://reason.com/2022/02/25/stop-trying-to-make-ukraine-about-your-culture-war/
Yet reason has done nothing since then than squeeze Ukraine into their pre existing beliefs.
“Culture War” is when the Social Right pushes its issues, not when the Social Left does.
Stop resisting!
#stopresisting
No one thinks that. Sanders, AOC, and their wingnuts are just as committed to the culture war, they just haven’t managed to control their party like the culture warriors on the right.
Just look the “defund the police” bullshit on the left and contrast it with the “socialism” bullshit on the right. The Dems have pushed their nuts to the fringes, but the GOP gives theirs leadership positions.
Until the GOP starts admiring people like Cheney and Kinsinger, who are both deeply conservative but refuse to sign on to the idiocy of a stolen election and the “January 6th wasn’t a riot” crowd, and stop admiring MTG, Louis Gomert, Jim Jordan, Ron Johnson, etc., we are screwed as a country.
“January 6th wasn’t a riot” crowd,
The people screaming “Jan 6th wasn’t a riot” the loudest are the Democrats.
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According to progressives, the right commits Culture War by resisting the activist agenda from the left. Similar to how they accused Trump of fascism when he impeded their totalitarian agenda.
Agenda.
Reason claiming ” rights” ( to bear arms or whatever) then hinging rights on
‘ government permission’ wuch invalidates the initial premise.
Commie Psychobabble
Reason Editors are just following the script.
And was followed by not one, not two, but so far THREE articles about how we should let in unlimited war refugees from Ukranine AND Russia. (Not that we shouldn’t)
we shouldn’t let them stay in local countries. no need to ship people all over the world just to ship them back. Of course Reason doesn’t really want to ship them home even if they want to go home
Sometimes democrats build a Frankenstein. A bullshit narrative crisis that becomes so politically ingrained that the it squashes a real crisis.
https://nypost.com/2022/02/28/nikole-hannah-jones-blasts-racialized-coverage-of-ukraine-war/
White peoples are not refugees
Yet reason has done nothing since then than squeeze Ukraine into their pre existing beliefs.
At the same time, I feel compelled to say that virtually every time Reason has made an pro-open boarders argument, I’ve pointed out that it only makes sense if we reinforce our values both here and abroad. Specifically the 2A. Otherwise, it’s a perpetual game of run and hide until there are no more hiding places.
And, AFAICT, this is the first time Reason has, albeit indirectly, said not just ‘gun bans don’t work’ but more legitimately ‘everyone, even in other countries, have an RTKBA’. Kinda stupid that it took a war in Ukraine rather than a plain text reading of The Constitution and a modicum of thinking about oppression and human rights for them to reach that conclusion but, at least for now, good job Reason on finally developing more than half a brain on world affairs.
I noticed after Nicole mentioned the constant coverage of this, my stock market news app moved on to climate, communities of color and cash for kids.
https://nypost.com/2022/02/28/nikole-hannah-jones-blasts-racialized-coverage-of-ukraine-war/
no war
no more.
Thx a lot for this!
Your welcome. I wrote it myself.
I sure hope everyone is being careful not to harm the environment while fighting.
Yep. Can’t have a Carbon footprint when sending Putineers to their graves.
Why else do think that old Ukrainian woman was giving the Putineers sumflower seeds to put in their pockets to grow when the Putineers get planted? 🙂
Solar-powered bullets?
Even better: Impossible Bullets made from plants. 🙂
Arrows?
Wind.
Wind is the renewable energy that will defeat the enemy.
And no, totally not arrows!
Wind is the renewable energy that will defeat the enemy.
And no, totally not arrows!
But all the dead birds around the windmills make fletching easy.
Good point.
I’ve just gotten into archery btw.
Fun hobby.
LOL!
“Armed civilians, many with military training, are unlikely to stop the invading force. But they can bleed it, and they can extract a continuing toll from the Russians, though many of them will undoubtedly pay their own price.”
One of the reasons the Russians are bombarding the two largest Ukrainian cities from afar is because they fear what those irregular armed civilians will do to regular Russian army when the Russians move into those cities. Meanwhile the difference between regular army and irregulars starts to close as irregular armed civilians continue to gain experience in battle. Things haven’t really changed in that regard since the Second Amendment was written and its core principles were defended in The Federalist Papers No. 29.
“To oblige the great body of the yeomanry, and of the other classes of the citizens, to be under arms for the purpose of going through military exercises and evolutions, as often as might be necessary to acquire the degree of perfection which would entitle them to the character of a well-regulated militia, would be a real grievance to the people, and a serious public inconvenience and loss.
—-Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 29
https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed29.asp
A well-regulated militia, rather than irregulars, was the goal then as it is now, and Alexander Hamilton knew exactly what he was talking about–having trained and led an army of shopkeepers and farmers against British and Hessian regular army. Muskets were harder to operate effectively than modern “assault weapons”, but the principle is the same. A collection of irregulars who already know how to shoot and care for their weapons is a lot less irregular than they would be otherwise.
If armed civilians are unlikely to stop an invading force, the Russian regular army doesn’t seem to think so. They’re changing tactics and remain outside the cities after repeatedly being driven back by a force largely composed of armed civilian irregulars. Holding territory still entails sending large numbers of troops into cities, and if the Russians can’t do that for fear of what those Ukrainian irregulars will do to them, then as far as I’m concerned, those armed citizens are stopping an invading force.
If there was a stalled enemy column through 40 miles of American farmland, every local hunter would be snipping enemy soliders all day long.
But we’ve been told that the 40 mile long Russian column has been stalled for days in Ukraine, so why isn’t that happening?
I wonder that too. It is low hanging fruit for mortars and artillery. They only thing I can think of is there isn’t much of the Ukraine military left and they pulled all assets into the city for gorrilla warfare.
gorrilla warfare
So like us.
But you talked about hunters here doing it, not the military.
Every civilian in Ukraine now has a rifle. Why aren’t they doing what you said we’d do?
I’m not criticizing the Ukrainians here, but pointing out that it’s possible, just possible, that we are being misled on what the situation really is.
Why resist statist propaganda when it bolsters your position on personal ownership of firearms?
That I won’t fight too hard against, other than to point out that the people against gun ownership here now cheering it on when Russians are the targets, are still against gun ownership here.
I’ll also note that our own governments are tyrannical and growing more totalitarian by the day. I don’t think the poor Ukrainians and evil Russians should be our focus when we have pressing, existential threats at home.
They are called pickets.
Look it up.
Not so sure on that one.
5.56 is a good round and in my special version I can throw a 75 gr slug accurately out to about 700 yards.
7.62×39 is a good round. Similar to a 30-30. I can hit with my 30-30 with 150 gr slug out to about 500 yards.
My M1 hits reliably out to 800 with 168 gr BTHPs.
My 308 with its 1:10 twist can throw a 175 gr slug reliably out to 1000 and maybe a tad more with the right optics.
Getting 1000 yards from a 40 mile long Russian convoy will not be easy. Retaliation will be swift so you need to ensure your slug arrives before the sound does and that you only take one shot.
Mortars are no match for Howitzers and rockets so if you want to hit the convoy with mortars, you fire 5 shots, hope they hit, and boogie.
Neither option is going to be very effective and both come with VERY high risk.
Excellent post, Ken! Your research is meticulous and thorough and your position on armed civilian resistance is unassailable! Excellent! 🙂
We’ll argle-bargle later about free-markets in the Animal Kingdom. There is a world on the precipice right now.
4.000 invaders poorly outfitted in a terrorist, not national military affront.
75,000 armed pissed off Citizens.
Thats Biden level math.
They can kill them just with riccochets!
just expand the interpretation of the second amendment to include all small arms of military effectiveness (as the Founders intended), including anything an infantryman can carry, such as the shoulder-fired Javelin anti-tank missiles. that would make the militia far more effective.
This I enthusiastically agree with.
Unfortunately, javelins are like 100k a pop just for the ammo.
Your confiscated earnings at work (for Ukraine), Americans!
Ugh, stop using the factually inaccurate language of the totalitarian left.
It never ceases to amaze me, the amateur hour crap posted here.
Ironically, the uprising of Ukrainian citizens to defend their country from foreign invasion speaks to the uncontroversially accepted core of the Second Amendment, which has to do with that whole “well-regulated militia” clause that gun nuts have spent half a century pretending isn’t there. What’s going on in Ukraine is precisely the reason we have the Second Amendment. All the stuff about “self-defense” that we now have due to Scalia and Heller is just inferred from that core.
Citing the George Floyd “riots” in this context undermines the point. Police weren’t so much “overwhelmed” as they tended to decide it was better for themselves not to get involved. They’re very good at using overwhelming force to break up non-violent obstructions of traffic and kettling peaceful protests; they’re less adept at stopping violence while it is occurring, for some reason.
Absent police involvement, sure – it makes sense for property owners to have the means of defending themselves, since the cops are too lazy and chickenshit to do so. But even there it’s dangerous to suggest that guns were what the George Floyd protests needed more of. That creep Rittenhouse shows us why. We don’t need these protests to be monitored by self-appointed and deranged “defenders” whose presence amps up tensions and brings about the very violence they’re putatively trying to stop.
This question hangs at the edge of every insipid libertarian argument about the Second Amendment protecting us from tyranny. The question is always, who decides? Certainly, you won’t get any objection from me if we’re talking about an armed resistance against a government like Putin’s. But we have people in this country who want to overthrow the government because the CDC has been issuing non-mandatory guidance on masks and a president developing vaccine mandates that have been thrown out on legal grounds pursuant to ordinary judicial review. Do you want them to decide, enough is enough?
“CDC has been issuing non-mandatory guidance on masks”
Lol, don’t get out much do you?
Most mask mandates were imposed at the state or local level. Still nothing to overthrow the government over.
It’s not that it doesn’t get out, it is a biased and ignorant yutz making the same weak or false assertions each and every time in support of gun control. And the same lies about the riots and LEA response, that they were all just misunderstood, that the foul police are always bullies, but in this case were faced with numbers, and backed down. Pathetic masturbatory progressive fan fiction, but, what one expects from it.
I say let Nardz decide. He’s got a kill-list a mile long.
Hi, stasi bitch.
That creep Rittenhouse shows us why. We don’t need these protests to be monitored by self-appointed and deranged “defenders” whose presence amps up tensions and brings about the very violence they’re putatively trying to stop.
Today in fantastical interpretations of events that were captured on video…
the CDC has been issuing non-mandatory guidance on masks
That magically become mandatory in vast swaths of the country.
Do you want them to decide, enough is enough?
Well, somebody has to. These guys might seem crazy one day and be proven sane the next. Certainly happened with COVID, repeatedly.
Today in fantastical interpretations of events that were captured on video…
I’ll acknowledge that Rittenhouse acted in self-defense if you acknowledge that he likely wouldn’t have been attacked in the first place if he weren’t openly carrying a rifle at the protest.
That magically become mandatory in vast swaths of the country.
The CDC had no power to compel any state or local government to accept those mandates. And those that did, generally speaking, had more political support for such mask mandates than states that ignored the guidance. This whole ridiculous discourse over mask mandates is this bizarre thing, where Texans are crying out over losing a freedom they still had, while New Yorkers generally complied with the mandates without fuss. That’s why so many of these blue state mandates are falling away just now – blue staters have been convinced that it’s time.
Well, somebody has to. These guys might seem crazy one day and be proven sane the next. Certainly happened with COVID, repeatedly.
What, have vaccinated people started dropping like flies, for unknown reasons?
“Somebody has to” – this is an incredible thing to say, with all the militant idiocy we’re seeing in today’s politics. We had a crowd of people engage in an embarrassing attempt to stop the peaceful transfer of power because they found it easier to believe that Biden had somehow successfully and secretly engineered a multi-state effort to corrupt the election than that Trump simply lost the election. The same people who oppose vaccine and mask mandates as government overreach and “tyranny” turn around and don’t get vaccinated, despite all the evidence that the vaccines are safe and effective. These people are essentially a convenient and clear counterargument to anyone claiming that we need to be permitted to arm ourselves so as to overthrow a tyrannical government.
Never mind that all of the putative overrreaches and excesses are being addressed and rolled back through ordinary political and legal process – the system, in other words, is working.
“She shouldn’t have been wearing a skirt that short!”
I’ll acknowledge that Rittenhouse acted in self-defense if you acknowledge that he likely wouldn’t have been attacked in the first place if he weren’t openly carrying a rifle at the protest.
I guarantee he would have been attacked for putting out the fire that Rosenfuck started. The Marxist shits rely on the willingness of their opponents to follow the law and use it to their advantage. If his dumbfuck unprosecuted co-agitator hadn’t fired the first shot in the air, he would probably still be alive.
I’ll acknowledge that Rittenhouse acted in self-defense if you acknowledge that he likely wouldn’t have been attacked in the first place if he weren’t openly carrying a rifle at the protest.
I will acknowledge no such thing, because the events leading up to the initial exchange show it to be obviously untrue. He was jumped by a nutter that was wound up by a provocateur. If he were carrying a taser or pepper spray the same thing would have happened, except he’d be dead and the nutter would be off either raping children or attempting to avoid gang rape himself.
The CDC had no power to compel any state or local government to accept those mandates. And those that did, generally speaking, had more political support for such mask mandates than states that ignored the guidance.
The states have been made to behave as the junior partner in our little arrangement for a long, long time. Governors are used to dancing to the Feds’ tune; what’s notable about COVID is how many stopped doing so as time went on.
“Somebody has to” – this is an incredible thing to say, with all the militant idiocy we’re seeing in today’s politics.
It’s a fact of life. The first people who will notice our (hypothetical) decent into tyranny will be the ones most affected by it – which for the near future will be nonconforming hicks. The recent events in Canada just saw this play out – Trudeau thankfully got his head on straight once his administration was put on notice by the Senate, but that could have gone sideways for everyone.
What, have vaccinated people started dropping like flies, for unknown reasons?
Sure, pick out the craziest example and just ignore vaccine side effects; rapid loss of efficacy against infection; efficacy of vaccine vs recovery against new infection; origin of the virus itself; skewing of hospitalization stats; mask efficacy; imposition of vaccine passports, etc.
These people are essentially a convenient and clear counterargument to anyone claiming that we need to be permitted to arm ourselves so as to overthrow a tyrannical government.
No, these people are a counterargument to the case that the government is currently tyrannical.
Never mind that all of the putative overrreaches and excesses are being addressed and rolled back through ordinary political and legal process – the system, in other words, is working.
And how do you think it stays that way? Our government is on a much shorter leash than many others, and they act like it.
The purpose of the 2nd amendment is to allow property owners to defend their property.
Your life is your own property. You defend it. No one else will.
Rittenhouse was correct. He had a right and a duty to be where he was and to defend himself and private property. Things escalated because our government no longer upholds it’s singular duty to defend our RIGHTS.
Whenever government becomes hostile to property owners defending their property, we have a right, a duty to abolish or alter it and create one that will.
We have a duty to perform.
Yep, it’s idiots like this we don’t want deciding to push the “civil war” button.
The only person who can push a civil war “button” is a president.
If he were to do so, I should expect to try to kill him along with his BLM and Antifa thugs.
It would be my duty.
“The purpose of the 2nd amendment is to allow property owners to defend their property.”
Please see my post above quoting the Federalist No. 29.
“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
—Second Amendment
A well-regulated militia–as shown by Federalist No. 29–is a body of citizens who are well trained in the use of their arms so that they can defeat the standing army of an oppressive government. A well-regulated militia is what we refer to as “regular” army as opposed to “irregulars”, which is average citizens who have taken up arms but haven’t been trained to use them effectively. The Second Amendment was written by people who had taken up arms against the standing army of their oppressive government.
SimonP is correct. The logic of the Second Amendment does a better job of protecting AR-15s than it does of protecting 9mm pistols. Of course you have a right to defend yourself against criminals and you have a right to bear arms, but the logic of the Second Amendment was really about how people should be free to own and carry their weapons–because having people who know how to use their weapons is a necessary defense against an oppressive army.
CMP for 40+ years Ken.
Oppressive army may very simply be Antifa. And yes, I support shooting Antifa dead if they are trying to torch private property.
Not entirely sure I would defend a police station or any government property with my rifle.
Only private property (such as human life) is worth killing for, IMO.
Actually, the people responsible for interpreting the constitution in the United States tell you to go pound sand.
Which is why they should have that same sand pounded…
Our rights don’t come from government and are not in the US Constitution. Our rights come from our humanity and are enumerated in the founding document of our nation which was purposely put above the law and above any government ability for “Interpretation”.
SCOTUS is not the final answer as to what is the law. We the people are because we literally own the concept of SCOTUS and the building they work out of. SCOTUS is not sovereign. We are.
Word
” weren’t so much “overwhelmed” as they tended to decide it was better for themselves not to get involved. ”
Parallel. poLice know theyll get slaughtered in a situation like that. Ukraine style.
They for the most part arent stupid. Most organisms default to Survival Instinct to duck as Shit hits the Fan.
This is why the Second Amendment is so important. Not to fight against your own, democratically elected government, but to defend your country against foreign invaders.
I hope the Belarusian army gets the same taste of what an unsubjugated country is like and uses the example to throw their Russian puppet givernment out on their asses.
Wait what?
How could the Belarusian army throw out their own democratically elected government if the private arms are to defend your country against foreign invaders instead of for use against their own democratically elected government?
If Belarusians or Russians or Americans or Canadians are to be free, they need to turn the guns against their president and create a new government that will defend their rights.
I never said they an armed insurrection. The Soviet puppet governments of Eastern Europe weren’t overthrown by armed insurrection. Protests, civil disobedience, and demonstrating that the consent of the governed is opposed to a dictatorial regime is a tested and effective way to remove leaders that don’t represent the people.
Individuals with guns usually fail to achieve regime change, whether wielded by neocon douchebags from outside the country or delusional conservatives within.
The idea that the gun-owning masses of America are going to rise up and overthrow a government that was freely and fairly elected is a far right fantasy.
but Leftist gun toting radicals do…and arent at fault.
Yours is a great recitation of Communist anarchy.
Actually, it’s a far left fantasy…
For one, Biden was not freely nor fairly elected. Much as I dislike him, Trump won and by a landslide.
For two, it’s not about overthrowing Washington. It’s about making Washington irrelevant. And yes, private guns can very easily make Washington irrelevant. Just look at what BLM did to Obama and Trump.
Yeah, because an abusive, totalitarian homeland government is good for us but an abusive, totalitarian foreign government is evil.
That does seem to be the consensus among Reason commenters.
“Ukrainians are heros, but we need to remain peaceful at all costs. Trust the system!”
The Ukrainians are being cheered on in defending their own democratically elected gang-bosses against another democratically elected gang-boss.
It is still better than watching the NBA, I guess.
Is that because most the players are black?
Let me guess you’re a jazz fan…
I became disinterested after watching years of naked bias by the refs against Clyde Drexler. That and the fact that it the fanfare of the NBA digressed from Wilt claiming to have slept with 20,000 women to Kobe being accused by a hotel maid. Drag shows engage in less drama.
Originally, I was a Sonics fan. So….
So when the black players became more comfortable expressing themselves is when you lost interest?
You are the one making it about race. I lost interest when it became more about the glory and spectacle of the colosseum than the athleticism and skills of the gladiators. The NBA doesn’t give a fuck about the sport, just the marketing.
Well you’re the one who belongs to a racist church…
You also bitch about CRT while at the same time having a cunt public school teacher pal indoctrinating kids in a podunk Yamhill county town.(also why did your dead pig friend live there but work in Beaverton? To be fair that’s a pig problem not just a Mormon pig problem. Why do so many pigs not live in the community they “police.”)
I’ve never been big into basketball, but I think it’s great that players have power and can express themselves.
You racists cry “shut up and dribble” unless it’s something you agree with.
I support all athletes expressing themselves. Even if it’s slack jawed Adam Laroche claiming his kid can learn more in the clubhouse than at school.
Back to doxxing dead police officers. Your inevitable experience at the blunt end of a truncheon will only come as a surprise to you.
How is it my fault you morons fuck people over and do a shit job hiding?
I’m sure little Alexa and Grace will be surprised to hear their dad and grandfather are burning in hell.
Yep, definitely gang rape anger being displayed.
There’s healthier ways to deal with your trauma than acting like a bitch on the internet.
You racists are such snowflakes.
“Boo hop! You can’t teach about slavery or the civil rights movement in schools! You’ll upset our little white kid’s feelings!”
*Boo hoo. Stinking autocorrect
You are such a perfect contradiction. Accusing me of racism while railing against my religion as an immutable characteristic.
Well out of the hundreds of Mormons I’ve met maybe less than 10 ever admitted they were wrong about anything. Y’all are pretty fucking set in your ways. You’d have to be to believe such patently false crap.
Since our government isn’t even close to “an abusive, totalitarian homeland government” (regardless of the nonstop efforts of the religious right), I’m not sure what your point is. Other than to demonstrate extremism or a false equivelency.
You are correct, at least about the right, in terms of the success they have had recently in codifying their conservative utopian visions.
Now try to overcome your bias, and tell us about the goals the progressive left has to remake the world through a (friendly, caring) totalitarian utopia.
+∞
I don’t know this Nelson yahoo’s posting history well enough to know if the responses here are inferring from outside context… but it appears to me that he, inarticulately, was trying to say “the important reason for 2A isn’t just that it can be useful for keeping your own government in check, but also that it may be necessary for defense of one’s country from foreign invaders.”
Ok, I should have refreshed the page first…
Not to fight against your own, democratically elected government, but to defend your country against foreign invaders.
That is an utterly retarded argument and you’re utterly retarded for making it. If the Second Amendment was a military provision against foreign adversaries, there wouldn’t need to be a Constitutional Amendment enforcing it as a right. Governments are always and everywhere happy to have people take up arms against their foreign adversaries. It would be as absurd as a Constitutional Amendment guaranteeing the right of the people to shut the hell up an do what they’re told to by government officials.
Yeah, it was maybe the stupidest ‘interpretation’ of 2A I’ve heard so far.
It would be as absurd as an Amendment guaranteeing the right of the people to rely on paid mercenaries to defend them from the sovereign government that is Constitutionally authorized to pay and give orders to the mercenaries.
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand comments are hosed on the Mourning Lynx.
Seems Putin stumbled into another ‘Winter War ‘. It’s strange seeing all the gun grabbers on tv cheering for the Ukrainian civilians taking up arms to defend their country , including Biden. Who, last night, made it clear he wants to take away many of the best weapons for self defense. Funny strange, not funny ha,ha.
Telling, not strange.
BINGO.
You won the giant stuffed giraffe and money pot!!
The radical Commie front in the media are up against a wall of it being exposed whos behind their soft Commie propaganda.
Hard murderous Communists.
‘We were sent as cannon fodder. We’re killing peaceful people’: Weeping Russian POWs say they had no idea they were being sent to war and were made ‘to attack people defending their territory’
Russian troops captured by Ukrainian forces in opening days of war described themselves as ‘cannon fodder’
Crying soldiers said they were not told they were going to attack ‘peaceful people defending their territory’
Comes after Putin’s troops suffered a number of embarrassing defeats in the opening stages of the conflict
But Russia is now rearming and adjusting before a bloody ‘second phase’ to overcome Ukrainian defenders
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10568725/We-sent-cannon-fodder-killing-peaceful-people-Weeping-Russian-POWs.html
Even Putin’s soldiers get it.
Isn’t that a violation of the Geneva Convention? Using POWs as propaganda, I mean. The convention doesn’t mention quoting the Daily Mail.
Crying in front of reporters to avoid charges for war-crimes. Fascists everywhere are furiously taking notes.
At least you’re admiting you’re a fascist.
Your church cries and lies about the holocaust and claims to be Christ like martyrs all the time. Crying to distract from your crimes is a staple of Mormon bitchery.
Cite? I mean, of me engaging in such behavior. Put up or fuck off, provocateur.
You financially support a church that engages in such behavior.
“The state of Missouri tried to exterminate us over 150 years ago. Us Mormons are constantly being targeted and discriminated against.”
Are you aware that quotation marks are used to signify something someone actually said? Placing them around words that are not directly attributable to me is dishonest. Likewise, imputing the actions or words of other members of a church to me based only on my participation is disingenuous.
For more than a year, you have singled me out for mockery, based not on my actual comments, but only on my religious affiliation. You are literally engaged in the exact behavior you are trying to imply with this most recent comment is imaginary; constant targeted discrimination. It goes well beyond gaslighting. It is full blown psychosis.
Sorry I should of been more clear.
The part in quotes is paraphrasing crap I’ve heard from Mormons over the years when they claim they’re victims.
“For more than a year, you have singled me out for mockery, based not on my actual comments, but only on my religious affiliation.”
If you don’t want your beliefs ridiculed then don’t have such stupid beliefs. Mormons discriminate against others based solely on religion or sexual orientation. I don’t see what’s wrong in picking on y’all. Especially since your beliefs have been disproven and you’re such arrogant assholes.
Russian trust in Putin has SURGED since the invasion of Ukraine (according to state-run poll): Study claims support is up from 60% to 71% – as public are told ‘shameless lies’ about the war
Russia’s support for Putin has seemingly soared amid the invasion of Ukraine
Putin’s approval rating went from 60 to 71 per cent in less than a fortnight
The poll was conducted by FOM, a Russian state-owned research company
A separate poll however showed a near 50/50 split in support in major cities
It comes as the widow of Putin’s political mentor blasted the propaganda being pushed on Russian state television surrounding the ongoing war in Ukraine
Lyudmila Narusova, 69, said Russian media was broadcasting ‘shameless lies’
Narusova was married to Putin’s mentor and former mayor of St. Petersburg
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10568223/Russian-trust-Putin-SURGED-invasion-Ukraine.html
Know who else’s support soared after telling ‘shameless lies’?
“Know who else’s support soared after telling ‘shameless lies’?”
Biden…
Now that we are on to him, his approval is sinking here as fast as approval in Antifa and the rest of the hammer and sickle waving, Putin loving Democrats.
LOL
The right is so fucking gullible.
Have you not been paying attention for the past decade plus?
Democrats hate Putin, he’s been the neoconlibs’ #1 boogeyman for a long time.
Or do you think Russiagate was an organic, random act of political malfeasance and espionage?
Finally, right and left have come together and united… for Ukraine’s “sovereignty and freedom”.
Honest question. No sarc or snark. Why are you so close to this?
Because I’ve been following it since 2014 and the US media coverage has been absolutely insane, pure propaganda. Now we have people who were more or less completely unaware of Maidan, Donbass, Crimea, Luhansk, Yanukovych, Poroshenk, Azov, etc two weeks ago cheerleading us toward war.
A week ago, 74% of the American public was against the US taking a major role.
Now, after just a week of covidian style coverage, about 50% favor DECLARING WAR ON RUSSIA and sending US troops into combat.
Wow. Guess I’m glad I don’t have cable.
Do you also not read articles about world events you find interesting?
Propaganda doesn’t only happen on cable.
Progressives of all parties LOVE Putin.
Democrat progressives LOVE the FBI agitprop called Antifa who carries around shields with the hammer and sickle. Republican progressives love pigs and prohibition. Both love Putin or at least they love his policies.
BLM used to (not any more since people rejected it) list on their web page their intent to impose the original 25 NAZI demands. These demands include free public school, no private home rentals… same rules Russia and ole’ Putin love. Romney marched with them to chant their slogans and try to overturn private property rights.
Democrats or Republicans who demand NAZI or Commie laws such as prohibition or property taxes are lefties and no better than XI.
They love the power Putin has, but they hate Putin the person/figure. Almost certainly because he’s resisted globalist expansion and has always taken a firm nationalist opinion. Possibly also because, contrary to popular belief, he is not a fan of communism. Autocracy, yes, but communism like much of the ideology of the USSR not so much. His statements about the Soviet Union are rationally read as valuing the power and ability to influence events in its interests it had, vs the hell a hobbled Russia went through in the decade after the USSR fell and the constant threat it’s faced since.
There has been a clear and concerted effort to cast Putin as the world’s boogeyman for over a decade. He is no good guy, but he has the right enemies.
I can understand his point of view to an extent. Russia has been a pariah on the world stage for as long as there’s been a stage. Anyone who plays with them gets kicked out of the playground. And it’s not like the West is innocent of evil, it’s just that the West writes the news and the history books. So yeah. I can see how Putin feels wronged and is looked up to as an underdog by some.
He’s still a dick.
He’s one of the most powerful men alive, of course he’s a dick.
Not buying it.
Biden shut down our energy supply and doubled the US importation of Russian gas…
Nothing says I love you like a billion dollar bonus.
Actions speak louder than words. Progressives talk a good game but it’s all talk. They support Putin and have been since Hillary gave him access to US State Dept emails. Whether or not they actually like the guy is irrelevant.
They support his policies and that’s all I need to know.
Our corrupt officials certainly have a weird dynamic with Putin. Impossible to tell if he’s a real opponent or just playing his role.
I suspect he is playing his role.
Putin isn’t stupid and he doesn’t lose. Even if he fails to secure Ukraine I would assume he has a fallback so that even if he loses, he wins.
IMO this is a ploy to get the US to commit so China can take Taiwan and massacre opposition in Hong Kong.
IMO the proper thing to do right now today, is to fortify Taiwan with nukes. Lots and lots and lots of nukes, all aimed at Beijing.
THAT will stop Putin, Biden and Xi. I don’t see anything else that will.
Plausible theory.
Makes more sense than some other rather lengthy posts make.
I’d say the guy you voted for but biden continues to fall.
https://twitter.com/disclosetv/status/1498961339951329280?t=ANgCDEWSFuKM-JzDqFG8hg&s=19
JUST IN – World War III would be “nuclear and destructive,” says Russia’s Foreign Minister Lavrov
https://twitter.com/emeriticus/status/1498752223177846786?t=vKMxjDo21a-IAkadnFMcSw&s=19
Zelensky is the Dr. Fauci of world leaders and I’m not going to pretend he isn’t
https://twitter.com/DarnelSugarfoo/status/1498180407430242315?t=VLFTqP56sWrszN2CoG24QA&s=19
The Pro-Ukraine team, ladies and gents.
[Link]
Weird how the pro-Ukraine team is also the globalist team.
But we totes shouldn’t consider if suddenly having the exact same opinion as they do might be cause for reflection, or if they might be using biased presentation to manipulate us into supporting actions which are against our interests.
It’s totes different than covid!
Meanwhile, regarding Iran…
https://twitter.com/GLNoronha/status/1499018795926626305?t=ItnnGnRCdGh_OGZc5HdtWQ&s=19
1. NEW: My former career @StateDept, NSC, and EU colleagues are so concerned with the concessions being made by @RobMalley in Vienna that they’ve allowed me to publish some details of the coming deal in the hopes that Congress will act to stop the capitulation.
[Long thread]
https://twitter.com/Timcast/status/1499032259285897219?t=kVUO65QmKZRgDMBvQntMMg&s=19
You are being played
They are manipulating your emotions to get you to support war
[Link]
https://twitter.com/JordanSchachtel/status/1499049850410876929?t=SFC3d3FCQOmEp2K-P0rxtQ&s=19
I’ve never seen so many bots in my life when it comes to pushing to heavily supply the Ukraine war effort. Zero chance this is authentic behavior. All new accounts, channeling the same energy, seeking to prolong conflict.
Did anyone see Savannah Guthrie get slam dunked by the Ukraine M.P. this AM?
Great Blooper Reel content.
That was classical ” ass handed on platter… ”
Toying with Communist idealogy is playing with a de fanged rattlesnake. Eventually ‘familiarity breeding acceptance’ gets one bit by a real one.
“Military expert Dr Jack Watling said there is evidence of low morale among the Russian troops – citing lost and confused units, and their surprise at coming under fire from Ukrainians.”
BBC.
BET ME TIME:
This is NOT a Russian National Military force.
Its a private militia ginned up by PuXi.
$10.
Fuck Joe Biden for implicitly supporting Russia by buying their oil.
And also Leftists still holding onto your ” Bush big oil” b.s.
Its in YOUR face now.
Gliating Moment.
I WAS RIGHT. No COMMS.
https://www.the-sun.com/tech/4803987/anonymous-russia-space-agency-roscosmos/
The significance of ” no sats” is that sats are required for Stealth operation. and much other battlefield comms.
Its undetectable and unhackable for the most part. It goes straight up and to intercept, one must be in the path.
Without that, it falls back to two way radio and anyone in Europe with a few KW can jam the hell out of that especially as the column draws near.
If you know much about how Russia fights, they don’t throw their coin into just satellite nav or comms, which, no are not required for stealth operations. They also don’t throw all their money into frequency hopping FM. What they do have that the US and NATO have forgotten, stronger FM transmitters to punch through jamming, and old school paper SOI for encyption, what you are calling stealth, I think. Over-reliance on modern technology is as ignorant as calling the taliban drug dealers and goat herders -they were often former Northern Alliance and anti-Soviet mujaheddin. The same tactics and weapons they used, were used effectively against us in Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia.
What the heck is going on in that picture?
I heard something (not sure if true) about how they were handing out rifles in Kiev to willing citizens and many were taken by criminal gangs who used them to fight each other.
That should have been obvious to everyone. Kiev is full of gangsters, and some of the private citizens may well be pro-Russian.
And these aren’t semi-automatic versions! Another one of those “and just like that” moments in the annals of American liberal cognitive dissonance.
A gangster? In Kiev? Must have escaped from prison.
Nobody escaped from prison, Zelensky released them all to fight the Russkis.
Bold move, let’s see how it plays out.
Bold move, let’s see how it plays out.
They can just blame all the rapes on the Russians. The ‘Rape of Berlin’ when the Red Army occupied it was not figurative.
What’s the figure- 100,000 women raped in Berlin?
Under-discussed element of history: rape babies.
No way it could be done now w/o either being full woke garbage or being shouted out of existence, but the historical impact – genetics, culture, socialization, etc – of rape and the offspring produced thereof is probably significant. Pre industrial revolution, in those periods when wars of conquest were relatively frequent, I wonder what % of the following generation were born to women raped and/or enslaved by pillaging soldiers.
Genghis Khan is said to have something like 40 million living descendants.
The chief supporter of Russia is China.
The chief supporter of China is DC.
Thumbs up to you.
Finger up to Comrade Biden.
Fuck Joe Biden
I have to say, it is fascinating to see how people take sides in the whole Russia Ukraine thing. One of those odd issues where the normal political alignments don’t seem to apply.
The media lies about everything. And now that is compounded by massive amounts of war propaganda coming from both Russia and Ukraine and its supporters. No one should feel so confident in their positions about a conflict they have no direct connection to. Putin’s a bad guy. But so are Ukrainian politicians. No one is anywhere close to clean in that part of the world.
I also think that while I hate to see this kind of violence, perhaps some adjustment of post-communist borders should be expected. The current borders of Ukraine were determined by the USSR for all kinds of political and practical reasons. Similar situations exist in the middle east, former Yugoslavia and much of Africa. There is nothing sacred about borders imposed by imperial powers. It would be great if these things could be peacefully negotiated. But that’s just not how things work, sadly.
You seem to have a blind spot to Russia attacking and murdering innocent citizens.
Also a problem with overgeneralization and attacking the victim/ messengetlr.
I speak for me saying ” fuck off ” and get counselling. Youre mentally broken.
“You seem to have a blind spot to Russia attacking and murdering innocent citizens.”
Now do Ukrainian government and paramilitary actions in Donbass and Luhansk 2014-2022.
See what I mean?
Who am I attacking? The media? Do you think they don’t lie about everything? They’ve been lying and propagandizing for 2 years about covid. Why do you think they are being honest about this now?
There have been a couple of stories recently at Reason where, and I’m making up an example here, someone shoots up a restaurant because they believe in some political narrative and reason ‘to be sures’ a narrative they themselves supported into the indictment of the individual.
Even just small stupid tidbits like “Linguistics researchers uncover rise in transphobic language in the last decade.” keep popping up.
Radio Free Europe wanted to open a branch in Hungary. Orban told them it was offensive. Reason has a documented history of disliking Orban. You’d have to be willfully stupid to think Orban just went crazy for thinking the CIA or American media (or parts of it) was out to get him.
more ranting off topic, running away when caught and further attacking the messenger just proves my point.
.Thats classic Troll.
Go play in traffic. Preferrably in Kiev.
Are you responding to my comments? I can’t quite figure out what you think I am saying.
It’s best to just leave sqrlsy2 to his rantings
It’s like he randomly strings together insults that he’s seen other people use.
I stopped trying to make sense of it a while ago
On the contrary, the one good thing here is how much clarity there is.
Russia is governed by one of the most corrupt regimes in human history. It also invaded Ukraine unprovoked and is trying to destroy its existence as an independent country.
What a weird time to find gray areas.
There are always gray areas. Anyone who sees the world without gray areas is ignorant or possessed by ideology.
Ukraine is also one of the most corrupt regimes in the world. I do not support or approve of the invasion. That doesn’t mean everything the invaders do is bad or that everything the invadees do is good. And there is such a thing as predictable consequences. Sure Russia is evil (let’s say). That doesn’t mean that this isn’t the predictable outcome of past actions by Ukraine and western powers. Predictable doesn’t mean justifiable. But it does mean that you are an idiot if you act all surprised when this happens.
Who said I was surprised?
It was a conscious choice by a dictator who is currently bombing hospitals. I got plenty of gray areas in my life.
Fair enough. But no need to insult people who bother to actually try to understand things.
https://twitter.com/JordanSchachtel/status/1499098551158202370?t=9ZwM5qtPelJBrIDTt25sxA&s=19
Russia will most likely take the deal if Ukraine:
– Recognizes Crimea as Russia (it already is)
– Agrees not to join NATO
– Wink and nod at no more weapons shipments
– Recognize autonomy of Russian speaking separatist regions
War is over. Countless lives saved. Get it done.
I wouldn’t doubt that the attempted assassination of Zelensky kiboshes that whole framework for the Ukrainians. That goes beyond the mere continuation of politics by other means that such a deal would represent. If the Putin’s going to make it personal then he’ll have to earn it.
The what now???
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/03/02/zelensky-russia-ukraine-assassination-attempt-foiled/
I should’ve prefaced it by saying that there’s at least a 50/50 chance that this is pure propaganda, but if true, etc.
99% probability it’s pure propaganda
Neville Chamberlain had similar opinions.
In hindsight, Ukraine should never have disarmed. If they used nukes in Donbass we would all be hating on Ukraine, but we aren’t.
The only way to deal with a carjacker is to kill it.
IMO the proper way to end this is to blockade China and put nuclear armed planes in Chinese airspace now. Shut China down hard and Russia will withdraw immediately.
https://twitter.com/RnaudBertrand/status/1498491107902062592?t=KBEc_H3SqCdjDwec7n7LEQ&s=19
Most fascinating thing about the Ukraine war is the sheer number of top strategic thinkers who warned for years that it was coming if we continued down the same path.
No-one listened to them and here we are.
Small compilation of these warnings, from Kissinger to Mearsheimer.
[Links]
You can lead a horse to water…
People still carry cell phones, use unencrypted email, use their real names online, and talk to the police.
You can’t fix stupid. You can warn it, you can avoid it, you can kill it, but stupid is as stupid does and it is endemic.
https://twitter.com/JordanSchachtel/status/1499111427348606980?t=pHayP5qxHycyk0WqcXflyg&s=19
Ukraine has openly stated its intent to violate the Geneva Convention and slaughter captured Russian soldiers.
It’s worth taking a pause to think about this for a moment.
Is this the freedom versus autocracy fight that’s been advertised on TV?
Details. It’s real, from their verified pages:
[Link]
https://twitter.com/JoeShikhman/status/1499088068128780289?t=i0BAn8eZlvP6wgCcZj6TBQ&s=19
Ukraine’s special operations command just issued a warning to Russian soldiers that they will not be taken prisoner and will be “slaughtered like pigs” without the option of surrendering.
That is public admission of a war crime.
[Link]
Guessing you never served in the military.
I’m a US Army Airborne Infantry vet. You only take prisoners when you have the supply lines to support them.
If you do not have the supply lines to support prisoners, they are a tremendous liability and for unit safety you cannot take prisoners.
To be clear. It would be against the convention to murder disarmed or surrendering enemies. It is not, however, against convention to kill them while they are on the battlefield.
If you are surrounded by enemies you do not take prisoners from the battlefield. You sterilize the battlefield.
contrary to your self absorbed bullshit how the whole world works like you think…PuXis an off the rails dictator who doesnt care what assholes like you think.
Do we SEE him doing what retards like you say cant be done?
Do what?
What am I saying can’t be done?
Did you reply to the wrong post?
“The 1st Amendment is first for a reason. The 2nd Amendment is second in case the first doesn’t work.” Dave Chapelle
Gavin Newsom: “AR-15s are vile weapons of war. There is absolutely no reason anyone needs one of these types of rifles.”
Dear Leader Newsom prefers subjects, not citizens.
https://thepostmillennial.com/trudeaus-deputy-pm-holds-pro-nazi-banner-during-ukraine-demonstration?utm_campaign=64483
Biden called Rittenhouse a “white supremacist”.
Biden… the guy famously holding hands with David Duke…
It’s called projection and anyone who listens to SPLC is likely suffering from an extra hole in their heads.
Not sure what the SPLC has to do with this.
Are you saying Bandera wasn’t a nazi partisan?
I read this:
“On Sunday, Canadian Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland was photographed at a rally for Ukraine with a red and black scarf that appears to represent the colours of the Bandera movement, a far-right Ukrainian Nationalist movement linked to Neo-Nazis.”
I believe this:
“On Sunday, Canadian Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland was photographed at a rally for Ukraine.”
IMO everything else is propaganda. Since the story itself is nothing of any value at all, I must assume that the story was only written for the purpose of propaganda.
Any way you slice it, Chrystia Freeland is NOT a NAZI partisan. If the article got people to associate her with Nazis, that is the story, and that is my point.
The folks over at thepostmillenial are, IMO, probably Progressives (AKA National Socialists) calling this Jewish politician a NAZI.
Projection…
The post millennial is conservative. It’s who Andy Ngo works for.
Making common cause with psychotic leftists isn’t good policy.
I don’t think this is an example of leftist style mischaracterization. I think this evil bitch, which I call her for reasons unrelated to anything going on in Ukraine, went looking for a photo op and stumbled into a group with nazi sympathies because it’s not as rare among Ukrainian nationalists as media would have us believe. She didn’t do her homework, and is appropriately criticized for it because she’s a totalitarian bitch.
So if she wasn’t a “totalitarian bitch” she wouldn’t deserve the appropriate criticism?
If she voted to murder babies it would be a story.
Someone standing behind a banner they may or may not understand being photographed by someone who dislikes them is NOT a story. It’s propaganda.
Fair enough
I do like Andy’s work.
Still, the story is nothing. It wouldn’t be news except for the banner and the story of the banner is being told by the enemies of the people with the banner.
She may be a psychotic leftist but nothing in this story indicates such other than someone’s interpretation of a banner.
To me that is just obnoxious. Like this politician matters enough that anyone would care where she stands. The story attempts to demean this person but has to elevate her relevance to do so.
If she votes to support psychotic leftists that’s a story. Otherwise, she is not important enough for anyone to care where she stands or if she remembers to breathe.
The context is her actions and comments regarding the Canadian trucker protest
One more reply here.
Thanks for the tip. I am adding the post millennial to my reading list. It also led me to Legal Insurrection… Gonna keep that one at arms length but it’s no worse than the Atlantic or Huffpo, both also on my reading list.
I re-read the article. I mistook Ms Chrystia Freeland for Melissa Lantsman. Yeah I know. My mistake. More reading and I’m no fan of Ms Freeland either.
As far as the Bandera movement banners in the crowd, I’m still not going to read into it as far as the authors of that article want me to.
If The Taliban showed up on Ukraine’s doorstep with 25 piloted jets, 50 crewed tanks and a nuke for use against Russia, do you think Ukraine would turn them down?
Yeah. Me neither. Times are hard. Ukraine could use some friends who will actually fight and I don’t know if they particularly care who those friends are right now.
If the nazi-admiration were something that suddenly popped up, that would be one thing. But paramilitaries with those leanings have played a large role in Maidan and the Civil War in the east.
Look around for some info on Azov Battalion. Their insignia is an undisguised nazi emblem. They make no secret of their ideology, but western media tries to ignore or obfuscate it.
Apparently they’re engaged with Chechen regiments at the moment, which is fun…
IMO the US are the original Nazis. Wilson pushed this cancerous thing upon the world during WWI and we were left with the FBI and have been paying for war against this ideology ever since.
Guess what I am saying is that if Biden’s FBI were hammering on my door at 2AM for something I may or may not have said online (FJB) and the Azovs showed up and took care of it for me, I wouldn’t care much about the armbands while the smell of gun powder is still in the air. I’d be handing out beer and reloading mags.
It still wouldn’t make me a Nazi.
And if the story in the news is about the armbands and NOT about the FBI raiding a private citizen’s home due to him calling for Biden’s ouster, well, that’s propaganda.
I have enjoyed our dialog. I learned something and had some fun and that seems kinda rare here, so thank you for the chat. I look forward to reading you elsewhere.
People, like some here who I won’t name (but it’s pretty easy to figure out), actually believe this stuff and form opinions based on it.
https://twitter.com/RichardEngel/status/1499119611190599686?t=qqmuR2C7Fn-R9X3Yvj649Q&s=19
Around 6000 Russians killed in Ukraine so far. “two Western officials tell @NBCNews that about 5,800 Russians have been killed, a number in line with Ukraine’s estimates.” @JoshNBCNews
On that same page is this:
Rob Reiner
At a time when Democracy is being tested in America and throughout the world, I’m so grateful to have an intelligent, compassionate, experienced President at the helm. So grateful for Joe Biden.
No-one with half a brain believes the crap on that page.
The tweet I posted is from NBC NEWS chief foreign correspondent.
If you read through the replies, the vast majority are taking him at face value.
And as I mentioned, you can see plenty of posters here who 100% believe what the media is saying about how things are progressing on the ground.
Understood.
Yes. I completely understand that.
I am appalled and disgusted but I understand.
https://twitter.com/davereaboi/status/1499096113198084098?t=4u2P5md7E_nHZ67GhmIlhg&s=19
This should remind you of Libya.
[Link]
if Putin doesn’t stop soon he’ll do more billions in damage than the peaceful BLM protests
now its trillions in Roubke.
Theyre a new source of durable toilet paper.
We need to take the commie motherfuckers in China down too.
BOTH these ASSHOLE nations OWE US for not speaking German or Japanese.
And you assholes in Vladtown and Bat Eaters City remember that.
It really doesn’t take much to sate you people’s hunger for mindless talking points, huh?
You know why property damage is not really the cosmically terrible thing you people have been instructed to think it is? Insurance exists.
Property rights are your right to own yourself, your life, and the things you build during the time of your life. No insurance company or amount of money can repay you for the time of your life.
Property rights are the only thing in this world worth killing for.
Property rights are a government handout as well, so believe what you want, it’s still welfare.
The government derives its power from the people.
Being a fascist you wouldn’t know that would you?
In a democracy, sure, in theory.
+zing!
Christ, you people will use any opportunity to sell guns.
At some point you should self-reflect. If your political philosophy is dominated by explaining why arms dealers need more money from frightened dupes, you’re a bad person.
I don’t want frightened people to own firearms.
If you are afraid, I won’t teach you.
If you believe property rights are worth shooting rioters in the head over, I have a lane for you at the range to help you perfect your aim.
Property rights are not worth ending people’s lives over. That is insane. Property is not more valuable than people. And on top of that, you’re insured.
Ashli Babbitt says hi.
Insurance is a lie. It’s another way to cheapen human life.
Property rights are the ONLY thing worth killing over.
Your right to marry who you want is due to you owning your own life, and the time of your life being your property.
Without property rights, human life is very cheap.
Voltaire disait” occupez-vous de mes amis je m’en chargerais de mes ennemis” en effet c’est de Zelensky et sa bande au pouvoir qu’il faut s’organiser contre ; le peuple ukrainien soit avait mal choisi ses gouvernants soit ces gouvernants lui est imposé à l’instar des pays arabes. Poutine attaque tout un peuple dans le tunnel des métros qui a un message à faire passer que le peuple renverse Zelensky et sa bande qui sont les premiers responsables ou à l’armée ukrainienne de faire son devoir de coup d’État militaire pour pouvoir dégager des négociations serieuses car exiger des garanties de la Russie sur sa propre sécurité c’est renverser la question sur quoi Poutine a commencé cette guerre et qui ne fait que débuter car il est certain que Poutine pardonnera à l’armée russe d’utiliser des armes sophistiquées à l’instar des missiles thermoboriques avant Satan2 et Zelensky et sa clique sont d’aucune conscience
Des missiles thermobariques
I sincerely hope that Ukrainian civilians fight back, but I haven’t seen any evidence of that yet, at least. I saw on the news some people making Molotov cocktails (but not using them), and the grandma with the sunflower seeds was inspiring, but have any Russians actually been killed by civilians? How many Ukrainians saw that Russian that the grandma approached, but didn’t shoot him?
Happy, neoconlibs?
https://twitter.com/disclosetv/status/1499133783135694853?t=DkNRadkmdK4RQnv37oUoSw&s=19
NEW – Russian billionaire Alisher Usmanov’s superyacht, one of the biggest in the world and valued at nearly $600 million, reportedly seized in Hamburg, Germany.
[Link]
In progressive societies, you can take up arms when the state tells you to (in fact, you probably must); you can’t carry them for self-defense.
So, I don’t see what Ukraine has to do with gun rights.
Neither the AR-10 nor AR-15 are Assault Rifles, which Guardian should be well aware of. Assault Rifles are Selective Fire Capable. Neither the AR-10 nor the AR-15 are, which the publication staff of Guardian should be well aware of. Are they really that ignorant, lacking of information or don’t facts matter? One wonders.
This should be a lesson to all those advocating for gun control. Nothing deters tyrants – be they foreign or domestic – like a well armed populace. I, for one, will never give up my guns without a fight.
What’s the alternative if your country is invaded? Give in? Hope your shackles rest easily on your limbs?
Perhaps some things (we here take for granted) like your home, your family, and your freedom might actually be worth dying for?
I’m saying that encouraging civilians in Ukraine to run face first into certain death is neither humanitarian, nor sensible.
Based on this attitude no nation would ever be a free nation even the U.S would not exist if not for the actions of civilians. I’m beginning to think you are a Russian troll, you have no chance surrender now.
Not so. Pistols, rifles, and shotguns in the hands of determined resistance fights can leverage the seizure of larger weapons from invaders, such as heavy machine guns, grenades, mines, mortars, and small anti-tank missiles.
From there, these more powerful small arms can help leverage even bigger weapons such as howitzers, Armored Personnel Carriers, tanks, heliocopters, boats, and ships, on up to conventional and nuclear missiles.
The uprising of the inmates of the Nazi’s death camp Sobibor started with improvised shop-made knives and hatchets. These, then, helped the inmates to seize guns from the guards, right up to seizing the machine gun turrets guarding the death camp.
Without spoiling the details, in the end, everyone did just what the Hell they wanted for as long as they could get away with it, the way freedom-loving people do.
A year after the Tiananmen Square Massacre, in the pages of The Christian Science Monitor, these words of a Chinese student jumped out at me and remain burned into my head today as much as the image of Tank Man:
“We do not have guns, so we can not fight.”
So much of history would have been different with access to arms and the will to use them in defense of Life, Liberty, and Property. The future does not have to follow the path of rhe past if we so choose.
If each Ukrainian citizen kills just one Russian, Russia will need a 40 million man army. It isn’t about going toe to toe against an army. It is about slow steady bleed.
Arming civilians will hopefully (from Zelensky’s perspective) run up the body count to convince US/NATO to jump in and save Ukraine.
He could’ve simply negotiated for peace, but hey – gotta crack a few eggs to make a globalist omelet
I am all for people taking up arms to defend themselves, but GG is making a very poignant point that some commenters are reflexively resisting instead of carefully considering. When civilians take up arms and fight invaders, then the murder of civilians by the invading forces is not just justified, but required. American forces fighting on foreign soil have always faced this same dilemma.
My understanding is that the Russian forces have been fairly reserved concerning the population while focusing on military resistance. I have seen videos of Russian forces allowing civilians to pass out of occupied territory unharmed. All it takes is one Molotov cocktail to change a caravan of refugees into a retreating military force.
“the virtues of women using sniper rifles to massacre entire divisions”
Well thats nearly happening.
The stupid Rusky SOBs didnt learn from goat herders and drug lords beatung them up in Assghanistan.
Well, the Russians did it first:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyudmila_Pavlichenko
Pavlichenko was a Soviet sniper in the Red Army during World War II, who was credited with 309 confirmed deaths, making her the most successful female sniper in recorded history. Pavlichenko was called “Lady Death” for her ability with a sniper rifle. She served in the Red Army during the siege of Odessa and the siege of Sevastopol, during the early stages of the fighting on the Eastern Front.
If the shackler is ideologically simpatico or sufficiently adversarial towards the Davos set, yes.
So it’s not Russia’s fault that Russia is invading Ukraine, that’s solely the responsibility of the United States, meanwhile Ukraine is bad for fighting against Russia’s invasion. Do I have that right?
One, under the First Amendment, U.S. media outlets and just plain ol’ blogging Citizens have the right to express any opinion on Ukraine that they want. You know, the same right as people expressing views against CRT, SJWs, and Wokeism.
Two, the Ukrainians don’t need either U.S. media or conscription to fight the Putineers. They are doing fine without it, judging from the civilian resistance and the death toll of Putineers.
It’s called an insurgency. And even if the Russian army manages to stop being completely incompetent, they will be facing it for the forseeable future. It’s almost like Ukrainians love their country and don’t want to be ruled by Russia.
At this point there is no scenario in which this goes well for Russia. On the plus side, he has managed to unify most of the world, reverse the world trend of tolerating autocrats and dictators, allowed for a powerful demonstration of non-military consequences of invading neighbors, and demonstrated to Russians that he is a weak and corrupt leader.
Go fuck yourself, invaders!
Geiger is a pro-Russian dupe. If you just assume that he is willfully ignorant of reality it helps make his posts more understandable.
Afgahanistan say Hi.
And if a Ukrainian kill TWO Russians, then get two friends to each kill two Russians……
Ukrainian fifth column resistance MLM recruiting; pitch meeting?
Are you Russian?
Tell me more about how Russia cares about its people and would never kill them.
How does bombarding a city from afar reduce civilian casualties? Seriously, just because the WEF crowd is agitating against Russia doesn’t make Russia the good guys.
Oh gosh, again, it’s not the invading Russians who are doing the damage, it’s those damned Ukrainian citizens getting in the way of Russian tanks and bullets and bombs.
Go on, pull the other one. You think Putin is going to pay for such shoddy propaganda? You really think all your effort is worth those devalued rubles?
Dropping cluster bombs on civilians is an excellent way for Russia to show they are worried about Ukrainian civimian casualties.
Pathetic.
Not to justify or defend Ukrainian conscription, but doesn’t that apply to Putin using conscripts too? And was conscription really necessary by Ukraine, with old ladies giving out Sunflower seeds to invaders so they can fertilize the seeds with their dead bodies? And citizens changing road signs to divert and cuss out the Putineers?
The U.S. had conscription during WWII, but recruiting offices were so full after Pearl Harbor, it also wasn’t necessary. Teenage boys were fudging their age for a chance to go fight and kill Hitler, Mussolini, Tojo and their minions.
And then there’s this thought that’s been bouncing in my mind this whole time:
If the government of Ukraine is so rife with corruption (I won’t argue, since every government in the world has some degree of corruption,) don’t you think that Volodymyr Zelenskyy–whether accidentally or deliberately–just gave the Citizens of Ukraine a vital tool in checking corruption by passing out guns like candy?
And do you seriously think those Ukrainian Citizens will willfully give up their guns after having used them to free their homeland from Putin’s invasion and tyranny? How many World War II vets and Partizan resistance fighters willingly gave up theirs?
“An armed society is a polite society” as “Papa” Robert A. Heinlein observed, and, whether Volodymyr Zelenskyy wants to be or not, Zelenskyy has also been self-conscripted to become Ukraine’s Mr. Manners.
Half the people at my company are from Ukraine, and several of them have voluntarily joined the fight. So there are definitely people doing it willingly. Just as I imagine people here would.
There are also definitely people at the company who are trying very hard to avoid conscription.
60! Shit, even WW1 was conscription to 50
He is actually saying america shouldn’t take any side.
Okay, then explain it to me, because that’s exactly my impression of your rantings: it’s not Russia’s fault because we made them do it, but now Ukraine is in the wrong for fighting back.
If they feel the situation to be so desperate they need to do that, I do. But nice deflection. You can’t deny that armed, untrained masses will stop even a super power as Afgahanistan, where empires go to die, has done for 1000’s of years.
It really is strange how so much spit and anger is against Ukrainians being told what to do, and so little is against Russians being told what to do (fight for Putin, desert Putin, leave Ukraine). So one sided in urging freedom. How mysterious!
The Russians are using cluster bombs on civilian targets. The Russians are shelling civilian targets. Putin is invading the Ukraine because the the Ukrainian people rejected him and his boot. The Russians have adapted to a strategy of trying to break the Ukrainian people’s will by targeting civilians.
My brother has a dog that loves rabbits. She loves rabbits so much, she chases them down, breaks their necks, and eats them–bones, fur, and all. That’s how much Putin cares about the Ukrainian people. He wishes they’d just do what they’re told, but because they won’t . . . he’s like a abusive drunk that beats the shit out of his wife. Look what you made me do!
She’s gonna stick a knife in his throat, and the whole world we be glad when he’s dead.
You can do that without twisting yourself into pretzels. In the exact same quote that he’s complaining about western media telling Ukrainians what to do, he tells Ukrainians not to fight against Russia.
He’s saying a lot more than that. Here are just a few of his beliefs, as posted throughout these comments:
Supporting an ally (Ukraine) is a bad thing.
Suggesting Russia is wrong to invade is a bad thing.
Sanctioning Russia is a bad thing.
Admiring Ukrainians for fighting for their country is a bad thing.
Worldwide condemnation of Eussia is a bad thing.
Ukrainian civilian casualties are not Russia’s fault.
I’m sure he will come up with some tortuous logic to support these positions, but none of it will be reasonable. Whether he’s a fool or a pro-Russia propagandist, it all ends up in the same place.
No, he’s saying Ukrainians shouldn’t take their own side.
Your distinction between conscripting reservists and everybody is moot when everybody is a reservist due to conscription.
Social stability?
They’re fucking invaded. Worrying about social stability is akin to social distancing in a fallout shelter.
I mean for fuck’s sake, we have a “libertarian” arguing against arming civilians. If the Ukrainian government was so evil, wouldn’t they not want an armed populace that can over throw them?
Yes. The American media has taken aside. He criticized them for it.
I am pretty neutral on it as well. Feel free to help Ukraine arm itself. I dont see a need in being a cheerleader foe them though.
And this is from the same guy that has been talking about violent action against our own tyrannical government now claiming that it’s futile to fight against government armies.
“Russians want to minimize civilian casualties and have no interest in killing, for all practical purposes, their own people”
Yup, you said Russia has no interests in killing “their own people.” Despite killing millions of their own people in the Holodomor by starvation. You somehow now believe they care?
You mean the propaganda that Russia is using to invade Ukraine?
There is no genocide in Ukraine. There never has been.
Poorer and poorer. Putin is disappoint. He expects more from his Putin Puppets.
No. I am not Ukrainian. I’m American through and through.
Are you Serbian?
Why are you so sympathetic to Putin?
This, is neokeNN
Yes, gentle Putin hasn’t reduced any of Ukraine to rubble. None. Ukraine doesn’t exist, it’s a figment of western imagination. Putin is reducing Western Russia to rubble.
No you didn’t. The word i”n the context of this conflict” appear in none of your comments execpt this one, when you tried to deflect.
All that Taliban training and Russian arms were a boon during the defeat Alexander the Great and the British Empire in 1919. With your lack of history I am suprised the NY Times hasn’t asked you to write the follow up to the 1619 project.
That’s just the most recent hint of yours. You think everybody is dumber than you and can’t read what you wrote?
Russia has tactical nukes. They are definitely not the good guys, but they could eliminate Kiev and all resistance without a single casualty if that was their goal. The Dnieper is plenty big enough to dilute the radioactive waste downstream. Chernobyl already proved that when Kiev was not abandoned.
There is plenty of evidence that they don’t want to slaughter the civilian population.
So the Ukrainians have no agency? They do what ever the America media tells them to do?
Isn’t it possible that, you know, it’s Ukraine that’s encouraging Ukrainians to fight because Ukrainians are concerned about forty miles worth of tanks entering their country unannounced?
Nah, must be the CIA.
We should also point out the Kremlin propaganda about the Ukrainians being the Russians own people. That’s Putin’s own personal bullshit justification for subjugating the people of not only the Ukraine but also of the Baltics and Poland. You can read it straight from Putin, but the link I’ve been using to the Putin’s bullshit argument on the Kremlin website seems to have been blocked.
http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/66181
Why destroy what you are trying to steal?
But not when you’re pretending one side is pure evil and the other is the beacon of freedom and self ownership
Five million well armed and pissed off Southerners couldn’t take out
Lincoln’s army in 1861-1865.
When all this is over, I’m afraid the West will have overestimated the vigor of the Ukrainian defense and underestimated the Russian offensive capabilities. A retired history professor friend, who specialized in European WWII history, said the news was full of “Poland is stopping the Nazi invasion” in 1939, and “French resistance is fierce” in 1940. Yes, lots of Polish and French courageous stories, but the enemy bastards still collapsed the defenses in shockingly quick time.
I’m not the one telling Ukrainians to do anything, I’m perfectly fine with letting Ukrainians take care of their own country.
“I’m not the one telling Ukrainians to do anything,”
No, the Ukrainian and Russian governments are, egged on by the western pajama class.
So that whole taking up arms against our tyrannical government thing you’ve been repeating for months…that’s off now?
Actually, Russian stooge, that is exactly what Ukrainian citizens have been doing. Often without the rifle. And, unlike your dumbass prognostication, they have not only not died, they have sometimes prevailed.
It turns out that resistance in the face of tyranny is a successful strategy.
Apparently getting your point accross is. You fail to do it in every post, then backtrack with qualifiers.
“It really is strange how so much spit and anger is against Ukrainians being told what to do, and so little is against Russians being told what to do (fight for Putin, desert Putin, leave Ukraine). So one sided in urging freedom. How mysterious”
It’s not really strange when you consider that you, along with ALL media and politicians, are holding up Ukraine as this bastion of freedom and democracy which requires taking resources from Americans, at gunpoint, to invest in and go all the way to world War III.
Reading is not that hard.
“I regret that I have but one life to give for my country.”
It works in Ukrainian as well.
If Russians (and Belarusians, now) don’t want to get dead, all they have to do is stop invading another country.
I’m not sure if you are a paid Russian disinformation agent like JohnZ or just an incredibly credulous rube. But either way:
Fuck off, Russian apologist.
^this is what loosing the argument looks like.
^this is what loosing the argument looks like.
Watching neokeNN and others call people Russian trolls and Putin puppets as they parrot the msm, right down to specific word choice, is peak 2022.
You clearly are considering that’s a legitimate, and most reasonable, analysis of the situation.
The tendency to read what you want, determine the true meaning and intent based on your own bias is best left to academe, media, and progressives. If you decide that there is a ‘hint’ in something, then there are several possibilities. You could be intellectually mature, and ask the person what was meant by the original statement. You could be intellectually mature, and realize that discerning things that are not present is not healthy. You could ignore these choices, and decide that there is a secret meaning or pattern, so the author must be a 1) witch 2) cryptoid 3) secret nazi 4) reptilian 5) all of the above. When making the latter choice, it is important to never back down, always be petulant and resentful, and never ever let the nazi cryptoid reptilian witch see your fear.
Does that mean you are or aren’t Serbian?
Is that supposed to mean you are NOT sympathetic to Putin?
This is what I expect to happen. The Russian military has always been a lumbering behemoth – their underperformance in the first phase of a conflict is just par for the course.
I don’t think that the Ukrainian army will prevail. Russia’s military is too big. But they will never stop fighting, much like the French Resistance or any other insurgency throughout history.
Russia will end up with a country that will constantly sap their blood and treasure. And because Putin is stuck in the Soviet era he will keep being more and more brutal, never recognizing that he is creating the problems himself.
I dont read it as supporting but being against the cheerleading.
The only thing you have wrong there is that Ukraine is not any kind of US or NATO ally.
Everything else is right, but doesn’t mention the worst: that his arguments are entirely that other people should shut up, that only he has the right advice, everybody should follow his advice, no one else should be offering any advice. And his advice is entirely that Ukrainians should acquiesce in the Russian invasion. He has no advice for Russians to go home and leave Ukraine alone.
Ken do you have a cite on the cluster bombs against civilians? The vacuum bomb story was bullshit as it was used against non civilians targets which isn’t an actual war crime. We have the same types of bombs in the US armament.
Russia doesn’t conscript civilians?
You’re not dismissing Ukrainian lives from the comfort of your armchair?
That training thing works for hollywood strongwimmin; picking up a firearm means being able to use it like one has trained with it for decades. It also works for the small arms and small units tactics knowledge of a goodly number of the reasonmag commentariat -if they saw it in a movie, they are bona fide salty killing machines now. Your point on conscription and commenting from comfort is well put.
I saw a video of cluster bombs going off in a civilian parking lot.
Check the following video at 2:35.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e42F1V3AOq4
Looks like a cluster bomb to me.
That looks like a civilian target to me.
Far as I can tell, that’s evidence of them using cluster bombs on civilian targets.
You said it wasn’t the business of the U.S. media. As if the media were impinging on something greater and shouldn’t exercise their right.
Covid on steroids.
Amazing really.
Why don’t you counsel Russians for neutrality?
Why are your appeals to stop speaking only for those counseling Ukrainians to defend themselves and their country? Why does their free speech so offend you?
If you were screaming that the US government should not get involved, that would be different. But you’re not. You’re screaming that individuals should stop exercising their free speech by encouraging Ukrainians to defend themselves and their country.
“What does free speech have to do with it? I am saying people do not have the right to express their opinion.”
Hey, dumbass. That’s what free speech is. Ha ing the right to express their opinions.
I know it isn’t accepted in the totalitarian worldview you prefer, but free speech is the cornerstone of a free society.
If you don’t like free speech, move somewhere that doesn’t have it and let me know how awesome it is.
Why don’t you counsel Russians for neutrality?
Does that even make sense? The issue is Russia/Ukraine and how they relate to the rest of Europe and the West in general. Russia can’t be neutral regarding tension between Russia and the west.
Actually, the issue is Russia invading another country. Russia’s paranoia and Soviet-era worldview doesn’t excuse bombing civilians or trying to assassinate heads of state.
So, you’re not sympathetic to Putin?
Referring to people who eviscerated the Iraq War on this very site every day for year after year after year after year as “neocons”–only beclowns yourself.
And your take is that you’re not promulgating Kremlin propaganda about the Ukrainians being the Russians’ own people or suggesting that the reason Putin is reluctant to invade the cities is because he’s worried about civilian targets (despite all the shelling) is NOT because you’re sympathetic to Putin.
It’s because you genuinely believe these things to be true?!
LOL
I’d have more respect for you if you were a Serbian nationalist and a Putin sympathizer. You’re just claiming to be a useful idiot.
“Your emotions have turned your brain to shit.”
You’re basically accusing me of failing to engage in bothsideism again.
The position that Putin isn’t sending his troops into the city–because he cares about minimizing civilian casualties–simply doesn’t merit equal or serious consideration.
Not when he’s shelling and bombing civilian targets like they’re in Grozny or Syria.
And the fact that you think this propaganda bullshit does merit equal and serious consideration is telling. Maybe you really are a useful idiot!
“A useful idiot is a derogatory term for a person perceived as propagandizing for a cause without fully comprehending the cause’s goals, and who is cynically used by the cause’s leaders. The term was originally used during the Cold War to describe non-communists regarded as susceptible to communist propaganda and manipulation.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Useful_idiot
Maybe you’re a victim here, but being a naive dupe of a victim isn’t an excuse for anything. It’s embarrassing! A nationalist Putin apologist might have something interesting to say. A naive propaganda victim doesn’t have anything to say that we can’t get straight from the propaganda without him.
“Because Ken fucking said so, that’s why!”
He’s targeting civilians.
What’s the body count?
We’re a full week in, so we should expect to see some pretty big numbers if the Russians are committing war crimes right and left, no?
Point out one single comment of mine claiming what you claim I claim.
* Ukraine is a bastion of freedom and democracy
* which requires taking resources from Americans
* at gunpoint
* to invest in
* go all the way to world War III.
I double dog dare you. You can’t. You can’t even lie well.
Of course encouraging people to fight for their country and lauding their courage is a terrible idea. Because you’re just supposed to lie down and take it when a foreign country invades.
Pathetic.
Why should the invadee negotiate with the invader to make your foreign life easier? Is your nightly sleep so precious that Ukrainians should tug their forelock on your behalf?
That’s what the rule of law is for. If you don’t like losing legal battles, get better arguments.
Or just accept that there is a vast difference between a government who you don’t agree with and a government that is oppressive.
It is a distinction the radical right (especially the anti-abortion, anti-gay, anti-liberty, coercive religious crowd) seems incapable of accepting.
That’s how that Bundy idiot got his friend killed.
Uh, what part of this says anything about “foreign and domestic enemies”?
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.[
Where did you NOT say that?
Except in comments like this where you either deny it or dodge the question.
Damn, you can’t even get your insults right. Shit floats.
Free speech BAD! Opinions BAD! Opposing Russia’s invasion BAD!
For fuck’s sake. What a jackass.
If the government of Ukraine is so rife with corruption”
It may be corrupt bu tit is their country much like you can say anything but don’t mess with my family. no one likes outside interference anymore than families or countries
Fortunately Ukraine has achieved a great deal of social stability through their resistance to Russian invasion. It’ll be even stronger when Russia finally manages to overcome their incompetence and install a puppet regime. A righteous insurgency fueled by national pride and an unwillingness to buckle under to tyrants will bleed Russia like a stuck pig.
You first. I hear Putin is looking for more cannon fodder.
I think the Ukrainians should be applauded for standing up and fighting against Russia. And I think they should be aided in their struggle with economic sanctions against Russia and Belarus, weapons and intelligence from the West, and the support of freedom-loving people from around the globe.
Russia, hopefully, will suffer the death and economic collapse they have brought on themselves.
Actions have consequences. Russia has earned every death and misery it suffers until they go back home and stop killing innocent people.
It’s not hard to grasp who is in the wrong here, nor who has caused all of the death and suffering in Ikraine over the past 8 years.
But, hey. You do your Neville Chamberlain act. Putin is more like Stalin than Hitler, but it isn’t much of a difference.
We should be taking up arms against people like Nelson, our real enemy, not supporting of their publicly funded (again, at gunpoint) donation to Ukraine.
I think the Ukrainians should be applauded for standing up and fighting against Russia. And I think they should be aided in their struggle with economic sanctions against Russia and Belarus, weapons and intelligence from the West, and the support of freedom-loving people from around the globe.
Who is going to pay for all this shit? Do you care about small investors getting hammered? Do you care about rising oil prices? Do you care about inflation? These things are real and the eventual total cost could be in the trillions, and I am certain of one thing: You want everyone else to pay.
Instead of parasitizing the rest of society to pay for your preferred foreign policy objectives, why not start a go fund me? While you are at it you can go to Ukraine and pick up a gun.
There is nothing more contemptable than a parasite.
How very transactional of you. Don’t have any principles, only worry about how it might effect you and what you can get out of it.
Wherr do amoral apologists with no principles or concern for anyone other than themselves fit in your list of contemptible things? How about autocratic invaders dropping cluster bombs on civilians? Or people who call moral outrage contemptible?
tell that to the french underground of women and children harassing occupying NAZI’s to great affect which helped allow for the D-Day invasions. didn’t the Afganies harass both occupying forces form America and before Russia, it can be done. You GG I believe would surrender and turn in your friends, a collaborator worse type of person
Fuck off, slaver.
go to their most certain deaths”
it seem sit teh Russians who are going to their death, have you seen what the Ukrainians have done to their convoy
For years now. Pay attention.
I guess the US sells weapons to non-allies now? Because we have been selling them lethal aid for a while now.
They aren’t in a mutual defense pact (NATO) or, as far as I know, in a formal treaty with us. But many of our allies (the good like Finland and the bad like Saudi Arabia) aren’t in formal treaties with us.
It’s weird to compare and contrast a hospital at the edge of a war zone and a hospital being overrun by COVID. All those medical staff on the edge of a war zone and everybody’s standing around on their phones. Where are all the doctors openly weeping for more ventilators? Where are all the medical studies on the microtrauma induced by 5.56 mm projectiles? Why is everyone just standing around?
So you admit it’s a good thing for the media to express themselves however they choose? Because that is the exact opposite of what you have been saying all along.
“Unwise” is your claim (and your opinion). But that doesn’t make it right, just your opinion. And it is a terrible opinion, in my view, but one you are completely entitled to.
I usually call you a Russian apologist or a rube. Because that is what the character of your posts have been. Granted, as your positions are exposed you have retreated further and further so now you are left with “it’s a bad idea” instead of your recent fallback position of “the media is killing Ukrainians with their speech” nonsense.
Speech should always be used to support, rally, and commend those who stand up to tyranny. Whether Russia’s invasion of Ukraine or any of the various neocon “regime change” disasters that the US has embarked on.
Ukrainian civilians should take up arms against the Russians.
And? You seem to be under the mistaken delusion that the only one allowed to have an opinion is someone who is there.
I’m not Ukrainian. I’m not in Ukraine. That doesn’t mean my opinion or voice is invalid.
I believe that America should support those who fight tyranny and oppose those who wish to spread tyranny. I oppose regime change wars and unjustified foreign invasions. Full stop. I oppose it when the US does it (Iraq being the most egregious example) and I oppose it when other countries do it.
I believe your stick-my-head-in-the-sand appeasement has been shown, with Hitler as the prime example, to be a foolish, craven, and ultimately disastrous policy. Pretending the world isn’t interconnected or that tyrants like Putin will stop if we just let him invade this one last time is stupidity.
If you leave a bully alone, they don’t stop being a bully. They just look for their next victim.
Your position is that the only people who get to have an opinion are those who have experienced something themselves? You’re an idiot.
Everyone gets an opinion. A terrible opinion from someone experiencing the issue isn’t more valid than a great opinion formed by facts, logic, and analysis, but put forth by someone who has never personally experienced it.
What you are advocating is a logical fallacy called “the appeal to experience” or “appeal to accomplishment”. Experiencing something doesn’t make an opinion valid, nor does a lack of experience make an opinion invalid.
But let’s summarize what your Russian apologism has been reduced to. If I understand it correctly, your position has been reduced to two points:
1) no one who isn’t in Ukraine should encourage or express support for a citizen insurgency, and
2) Ukraine shouldn’t be involuntarily conscripting citizens.
Plus the unspoken points:
3) no one other than Ukrainians should speak out against, support sanctions against, or otherwise resist Russia’s invasion,
4) appeasement is a morally acceptable route for a world leader to take, and
5) regime change through military invasion is perfectly fine.
I find your worldview to be one of implicit support for tyrants and implicit rejection of nations having self-determination.
Neville Chamberlain would be proud of you.
Because you think that dying for your country is a silly thing? That when a bigger country invades a smaller one the smaller one should just take it?
Do you also believe that rape victims should just accept their rape? That assault victims should just stand there and take it? That victims should never fight back, whether on a pesonal or geopolitical level.
All that does is encourage the tyrants and the bullies and the rapists. And yes, Russia is the tyrant, the bully, the rapist.
Oh, and it isn’t a war between governments. It’s a war between an illegitimate, brutal, dictatorial invader and the citizens he is trying to oppress.
Or, if you prefer, a war between one government with no legitamacy and another whose obligation is to protect its citizens from foreign tyranny.
Because pretending that the invading government and the legitimate national government of the invaded country are equivalent is propaganda-level nonsense.
Again, the First Amendment applies in the U.S. and the natural individual human right to free expression applies everywhere, including Ukraine. To Hell with ‘honor culture,’ which is really not a culture at all.
Another thing I am concerned about from the Ukrainian side is that they have Azerbaijani and Chechen volunteers.
When I heard of this, I thought: “Are they Islamists using the chaos and fog of war to dress reherse for Jihad with live target practice, much like every terrorist group in the world used the Lebanese Civil War in the Seventies and Eighties?)
I hope and trust my worst suspicions here are not true, and if true, I hope armed civilians can deal with that problem too as they do in Israel.
“then the murder of civilians by the invading forces is not just justified, but required.”
An invading army murdering civilians is not only unjustified, it is immoral and evil. The invading army shouldn’t be there in the first place, so nothing they do is justified.
I suspect pro Russian militias have no trouble getting arms and ammo since 2014 or so..
A lot of people bought semi-auto versions of rifles such as the AR15 before the government started handing out fully auto rifles, machine guns, frags and rockets.
Personally here in the USA, I will trust my neighbor who’s family all lives right here, with a nuke before I trust a government employee with a spitwad.
Which part is insane? The inevitability of Russia installing a puppet regime or the inevitability of a protracted insurgency that will sap Russia’s resources?
Because the Ukrainians have shown they won’t just roll over for Russia.
Would be remiss to not state that 1A says nothing about media’s role, only about Congress and laws. Would also be remiss to not state that media would be doing a great service if facts and only facts rather than opinions were provided.
What’s the basis for your claim that putin is stuck in the the Soviet era? His age, background, behavior, or do do have something concrete other than your opinion? I can see this being a possibility, but I can see him playing the Soviet to lull outsiders.
As much as I want to suck the life out of Putin’s regime, and drain his economy, I would rather not see it happen at the cost of Ukrainian lives.
Apply this to US forces in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, Vietnam, Korea and so on. Does your second paragraph still hold, or are US forces now justified, because, US? I fought in three of those, and don’t regret it, but the reason for my being there was bullshit
so nothing they do is justified.
Your criticism is well taken. There is no way I can possibly defend my statements that so flimsily rest on a basic understanding of human psychology and the last 4,000 years of the recorded history of warfare.
You literally said, “What does free speech have to do with it? I am saying people do not have the right to express their opinion.”.
You very directly said free speech and ooinikns were bad in your quote. And you have openly stated that ordinary Ukrainians shouldn’t rake up arms against the Russian invasion.
On that, you are correct, there is an invasion, a small-scale war, and the typical outrage and lack of thinking.
But how would Fox replace its entire primetime lineup all at once? Never mind the start-from-scratch that Newsmax and OANN would require. MSNBC would have to import people with a face for radio from Vox and HuffPo. CNN would be left with about half their primetine hosts.
Calling for such a content-based standard would be disastrous to the cable news industry. Do you know how many pretty/handsome, angry, vapid, and biased people would suddenly be out of a job?
Or we could just ask that news be labeled as such and opinion be likewise.
reverse the world trend of tolerating autocrats and dictators
Well, they say that anyway. But looking at recent actions by Biden and Trudeau and many other “leaders” of supposedly free countries, I’m not so sure that’s accurate.
Shhh, that sort of sensible point is clearly somehow pro-Putin. Certainly don’t point out that the Russian air strike capability is impressive, and unused. Or that conventional, non-nuclear short-range missiles are within easy striking range or major targets and population centers. Putin is a scary asshole, no doubt, but, he seems to want the country and people to survive, the emotional yoyoing here aside.
Except for the whole “launching cluster munitions into civilian areas” thing. Which has been documented, witnessed and filmed.
Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?
I don’t believe I know enough about the situation to have a valid opinion beyond “we need to stay out of it”.
It’s amazing how many people are just taking the news at face value after the past two years of being lied to about pretty much everything. There is definitely tons of propaganda coming from all sides. I’m definitely not in favor of anyone invading other countries for regime change or conquest. But there is a lot more going on than Putin being evil and crazy.
“But there is a lot more going on than Putin being evil and crazy.”
Not really.
Yes, really. That you think that only reveals your ignorance.
“It’s amazing how many people are just taking the news at face value after the past two years of being lied to about pretty much everything.”
You’re lashing out like a child because someone dares step outside the mass prescribed narrative.
The whole argument that Russia is absolutely evil rests on their “unprovoked” violation of Ukraine’s sovereignty. You cheerlead them “fighting for their freedom”.
Do you support sending arms to the Ukrainians?
If you do, you support taking resources from the American people at gunpoint to invest in Ukraine. Weapons aren’t free, they’re paid from public funds, which are accumulated via taxes, which result in state force used against people who don’t pay them.
You may not support WWIII explicitly, you may even say you oppose it, but you’re arguing the rationale for WWIII is justified when demonizing all disagreement.
You know there’s a difference between “autocrats and dictators” and “democratically elected head of state”, right? Just because you don’t like the policies of the guy who won the election doesn’t make him an autocrat or a dictator. Unless the legislature and judiciary suddenly vamished when I wasn’t looking.
It’s this type of hyperbole that “justifies” people makimg false equivalencies between Putin and Biden (or Zelinski or any other leader you disagree with).
If Zelensky cares about people’s lives, as he claims when pleading for foreign intervention, negotiating a peace deal with Russia is the wisest choice.
Zelensky’s responsibility as head of state is the well being of his people and nation.
Russia’s demands are:
-promise of no NATO in Ukraine
-cessation of assault on rebel areas (which has been going on for 8 years)
-autonomy, possibly independence, for rebel areas
-disarmed Ukraine
If you want to make the argument that those demands are unacceptable for the well being of Ukrainians, thus lives should be sacrificed to resist those conditions at all costs, that’s fine. I’d disagree, but it’s a legitimate discussion.
But arguments here don’t discuss the matters at hand, they’re entirely concerned with abstract ideas like sovereignty, freedom, aggression, etc.
I admire the spirit of Ukrainians fighting against the invader, but I don’t think their political leadership, armed by the way with “the arsenal of democracy” and foreign interventions, is serving their people’s best interests by refusing to negotiate and sacrificing Ukrainian lives.
Yes. As I have said before, the only post-WWII military actions I could justify is Korea (somewhat), the Iraq War (since we just sent Saddam packing and went home), and Afghanistan until we killed bin Laden. In very other one, especially Iraq and Vietnam, we were the unjustified invader that should have been opposed by the world.
And then refuse to engage in direct conversation, but passive-aggressively swipe at me in other posts as a Russian propagandist.
It’s disappointing behavior.
Claiming they can’t be stopped is fine, if a little morally bankrupt.
Claiming they are justified is just false. And entirely morally bankrupt.
We live in the most connected, documented times ever… yet we seem to get the same two or three shots only played on a loop.
I know the exact video Ken’s talking about, because they do exactly this with it.
There’s another one of a missile hitting just in front of a government building in Kharkiv. Pretty spectacular shot. No mention that it was the sight of Azov recruitment tents, which were hit directly 2 hours before they had a recruiting event scheduled, and few seemed to notice the white car that drove directly through the explosion and kept going, which was pretty amazing.
“Racist, I mean Russian troll, I mean racist, I mean conspiracy theorist, I mean insurrectionist, I mean antivaxxer, I mean Russian troll!”
I was referring to the fiction of a genocide in the Donbass (one of many laughable and batshit crazy “justifications” Putin used to invade). But calling the Russian invasion a “genocide” is definitely hyperbole.
Apparently you kissed the “free and fair” part.
If you think that the “democratic elections” of Putin and, after the first, Hitler were free and fair, no one can help you. You are too far gone into the Land of Fakse Equivalence.
Oh, you just realized we don’t sell weapons to our enemies? Maybe your brain isn’t total shit.
Ukraine us our ally. That’s a big reason why Putin wants to kill the present government and install a puppet. He doesn’t like that Ukraine chose the West (specifically Europe) over Russia.
Actually, the psycho ex-husband analogy isn’t a bad frame of reference. God help us if Putin follows the “if I can’t have her, no one can” path. A family annihilator is bad enough with a gun. With nuclear weapons?
His age, background, behavior, numerous speeches extolling the virtues of the USSR and lamenting its demise, poisoning opposition figures (specifically with a Soviet-era radioactive poison), imprisonment of opposition leaders, fixed “elections”, elimination of independent journalism, seizing private companies and property, creation of state media as a propaganda tool, … do I need to continue?
Elected officials who take on unconstitutional powers and rule by decree are autocratic and dictatorial too. Being elected doesn’t mean you have legitimate power to do anything you want. Have you missed the past year of both the US and Canada trying to paint political dissent as insurrection and terrorism? Or the past two years of rule by appointed “experts” and emergency orders? That’s how dictatorships often happen. Declare an emergency that never ends.
Claiming they are justified is just false. And entirely morally bankrupt.
You seem to be ignorant of US and international law.
a person is a civilian if that person does not belong to one of the following groups identified in GC III, art. 4(A) and AP I, art. 43:
…
d. GC III, art. 4(A)(6). Inhabitants of a non-occupied territory, who spontaneously take up arms to resist invading forces (“mass levies”3), provided they carry arms openly and respect the laws and customs of war https://www.loc.gov/rr/frd/Military_Law/pdf/LOAC-Deskbook-2015_Ch7.pdf
Anyone who spontaneously takes up arms has self-selected as ‘not a civilian’. What is morally bankrupt is encouraging such resistance without making sure they have been informed of the consequences of their actions.
Meanwhile, under the Article 47 Prohibition of perfidy, pretending to be a civilian once you have taken up arms, is a war crime. You don’t get to take up arms and then change your mind.
But please, keep digging.
Brilliant analysis. If only you actually had a valid position, or logic, or facts, or moral courage. We might have been able to have a substantive debate.
Run away and hide, Neville. Appeasement is your woldview.
Sorry, the Gulf War, not the Iraq War, is justifiable.
The invasion itself is unjustified. Claiming that killing a civilian that is trying to defend their country is “justified” is to remove any moral.content from the word. It is a “might is right” argument.
Russia has zero legitimate reason to be in Ukraine killing Ukrainians (civilian or not).
Hey, while you’re justifying a baselss invasion of a soverign nation, tell me how using cluster bombs in civilian neighborhoods is totally acceptable.
Your goalpost moving response is not the witty riposte you seem to believe it is. Did I claim those things have not happened? No. So why the fuck would you act like it has any relevance to my comment?
The only mark you have tallied is the one in your shorts, shitstain.
Fuck off fascist
while you’re justifying a baselss invasion of a soverign nation
Lying about the arguments being made does not further the conversation in any way. Are you capable of honest discourse?
It’s no longer relevant if Putin is justified. He’s not, but the invasion is a fact and ongoing. The question is now what to do, or not do about it.
Can’t really defuse a bomb after it’s gone off.
The invasion itself is unjustified.
It is bold of you to so openly state you are arguing something completely off-topic from my comments about how the rules of war change regarding civilians who take up arms which was perfectly relevant to the thread header about how sad it is when civilians are encouraged by propaganda to engage in a fruitless cause. Evidence of a classic Motte & Bailey fallacy. That is the fallacy where it is pointed out that you are full of shit and don’t know what you are talking about, so you retreat to a completely different position that is supportable while pretending that we were talking about that position all along.
The proper response to such logic is “fuck off”.
Cite?
If it makes you feel any better, I doubt any Ukrainians are going to charge a tank just because of a pep talk from Brian Stelter or Don Lemon.
Your church forces it’s views and lifestyle on others
Probably less than the number of strap ons. she owns.
Who are these church members forcing their views and lifestyle on you? Do other people see them as well?
Yes others see them because I’m not the only one who’s been fucked over by you scoundrels.
That’s much too rational a consideration for some people
So you admit you’ve been fucked by Mormons and that’s why you hate them so.
It was a gang rape, wasn’t it? Yeah, you definitely come off as a gang rape victim.
Not literally fucked you buttpipe