Russia, US, Ukraine, and the Future

[Coughdrop addict]

Not all G7 economies have fully recovered to their pre-pandemic size; by contrast, the U.S. real GDP is now 5.4 percent above the level at the end of 2019. Relative to pre-pandemic trends the United States has outperformed other G7 economies. Inflation in the United States over the past year has halved and is now lower than in many major advanced economies. The U.S. labor market recovery has been exceptionally strong. Unemployment in the US will be 3.4%, the lowest since 1959. The demand for American weapons in the world tripled last year. The United States is the number one arms supplier to Europe, India and the Arab world. Total US exports have exceeded two trillion dollars and the US is the second largest exporter on the planet. For the first time in history, the US has become Europe's number one oil supplier. For the first time in history, the US has become India's number one trading partner, officially pushing China to second place. American factories and enterprises last year broke their own historical record for industrial automation and robotics. Stario has no idea what he's talking about.

[conon394]

Certainly a political victory for genocide Joe, whose objective basically is to keep Ukraine from collapsing before the November elections and spare himself further embarrassment. But also a victory for the US military industrial complex executives that have yet again and in a very capitalist manner siphoned away billions of tax dollars from poor Americans. As for the Ukrainians, well unless some of those billions are spent into acquiring some state of the art cloning vats to generate more soldiers it won't really amount to all that much.

Genocide Joe - really. I would have expected better out of you.

But also a victory for the US military industrial complex executives that have yet again and in a very capitalist manner siphoned away billions of tax dollars from poor Americans.

How do you figure that one please elaborate.

[Kyriakos]

The way things are going, it will get to the point where world war not happening will be even more miserable.
Because it'll only mean an extended prewar period of massive rearmament.

What can you do, though, people are braindead enough to think that actually the new massive war will solve matters of justice. Tbf it's not a matter of general intelligence, but a common filling point for a lot of anxieties, from nation level to citizen level.

As for Biden... He was already alive back when the nazi germans still had a land connection to Stalingrad. He shouldn't even be working as sales manager - it's farcical to think he is fit to be potus in so dangerous times.

(ps: rereading my post, I should note that I always (unless bothered) write epithets connoting ethnic nature without capitalizing; I do it obviously for greeks too - the characteristic capitalizing of those epithets doesn't exist in greek, so by habit I don't use it in english either...)

[Alastor]

Genocide Joe - really. I would have expected better out of you.

Yes really. it's a moniker he earnt via his pathetic conduct during this whole Gaza mess. His leadership is at the very least shockingly lacking and more likely outright criminal. Even if he is not the one perpetrating a genocide, he is actively facilitating it because he fears an AIPAC reaction might cost him the elections and his beloved chair, the only thing this senile creep cares about. Facilitating a genocide means you are guilty of genocide. So yes, genocide Joe.

How do you figure that one please elaborate.

Considering the majority of this money will go straight to US arms manufacturers it's a rather straightforward connection.

[conon394]

Yes really. it's a moniker he earnt via his pathetic conduct during this whole Gaza mess. His leadership is at the very least shockingly lacking and more likely outright criminal. Even if he is not the one perpetrating a genocide, he is actively facilitating it because he fears an AIPAC reaction might cost him the elections and his beloved chair, the only thing this senile creep cares about. Facilitating a genocide means you are guilty of genocide. So yes, genocide Joe.

Well I guess if that float you boat but last I checked it was Israel running its policy not Biden. But I thought you were all about the EU managing it economic future with China. So see you cool with genocide as long as kind low key and out of sight the Uyghurs or the worst bit happened back in the day under Mao (Tibet) so whatever am I right.

Considering the majority of this money will go straight to US arms manufacturers it's a rather straightforward connection.

I don't. You implied money was not going to poor. Thus you clearly fail to understand the nature of US government. You realize for example Biden backed maintain COVID era Child tax credits and food support ext and had agree to less because of Republicans. You realize that since the ACA started huge amounts money for medicaid have been on the table for the poor but red states had refused the money. the Amount of aid in the bill for Ukraine or Taiwan or Israel is trivial and it amounts to no dislocation of funds that would otherwise have been spent on the poor. For F-sake Alastor Biden and Dems finally got a desperately needed infrastructure bill of epic size passed and its vilified as inflationary. Biden's initial attempt at student debt relief was killed by the SCOTUS just making stuff up. The US system is stacked against helping the poor. We taking about a place where Louisiana just decided teen workers don't need lunch breaks and where FLA decided workers don't need heat brakes for extrema heat I guess heat stroke is job creation huh. Where a UAW success at organizing an auto plant in the south has southern Republican governors having seizures of panic. The spent in the current bill was never going to be you name it some magic program for the poor.

[Alastor]

Well I guess if that float you boat but last I checked it was Israel running its policy not Biden. But I thought you were all about the EU managing it economic future with China. So see you cool with genocide as long as kind low key and out of sight the Uyghurs or the worst bit happened back in the day under Mao (Tibet) so whatever am I right.

And last I checked Israel was doing it with American funding and support, including lots of military aid. Sorry, no avoiding this. As for the false comparison with the Uyghurs, yes certainly show me the cities the Chinese bombed to the ground and the 10s of thousands they buried under the rubble. Show me the ICJ ruling that asked China to stop because what they are doing looks and smells like a genocide. Finally, show me the EU weapons and military aid the Chinese are using in that "genocide" of theirs too. The fact you are attempting to equate a certainly deplorable Chinese persecution of a minority that has nothing to do with the EU to an outright massacre perpetrated by Israel and clearly facilitated by the US, as if that somehow evens the score is at the very least disappointing

I don't. You implied money was not going to poor. Thus you clearly fail to understand the nature of US government. You realize for example Biden backed maintain COVID era Child tax credits and food support ext and had agree to less because of Republicans. You realize that since the ACA started huge amounts money for medicaid have been on the table for the poor but red states had refused the money. the Amount of aid in the bill for Ukraine or Taiwan or Israel is trivial and it amounts to no dislocation of funds that would otherwise have been spent on the poor. For F-sake Alastor Biden and Dems finally got a desperately needed infrastructure bill of epic size passed and its vilified as inflationary. Biden's initial attempt at student debt relief was killed by the SCOTUS just making stuff up. The US system is stacked against helping the poor. We taking about a place where Louisiana just decided teen workers don't need lunch breaks and where FLA decided workers don't need heat brakes for extrema heat I guess heat stroke is job creation huh. Where a UAW success at organizing an auto plant in the south has southern Republican governors having seizures of panic. The spent in the current bill was never going to be you name it some magic program for the poor.

And that somehow means it's ok to give it to the rich military industrial complex execs right? The poor were never gonna get it anyway so we might as well make our donors a bit richer. At this point, I wonder if you even know what it is you are trying to justify.

[Jozam]

I understand this is some kind of an attempt at humour. Some attempt to sarcastically demonstrate the behaviour you want to mock. Or at least I hope it is. Unfortunately though, I can't say I found it too funny.

There's probably a comedic layer to his posts but he's just being honest. At the end of the day Westerners only oppose dictatorships like Russia and China because they're against Western hegemony, but if they weren't they'd support them too. Just look at the West's support for... practically every dictatorship in the Middle East.

U.S. Knew Saudis Were Killing African Migrants But Kept Silent — New York Times

The Saudi security forces’ violence along the border came to the fore in a report by Human Rights Watch on Monday that accused them of shooting and firing explosive projectiles at Ethiopian migrants, killing hundreds, and perhaps thousands, of them during the 15-month period that ended in June.

The report was based on interviews with migrants and their associates, photos and videos and satellite photos of the border area. It cited migrants who said Saudi guards had asked them which limb they preferred before shooting them in the arm or leg and a 17-year-old boy who said guards had forced him and another migrant to rape two girls as the guards looked on.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/us-kne...t-quiet-report

The killings came up while US President Joe Biden’s administration was trying to squash past troubles in bilateral relations with the Saudis and advance a potential normalization deal between Saudi Arabia and Israel — a factor that potentially muted the White House response, The New York Times reported. Washington occasionally overlooks human rights violations by Riyadh and other authoritarian partners in order to maintain friendly relations.

If you take away all the theatrics about "democracy" and "human rights", there isn't much left to Western foreign policy besides what AqD is posting here.

[Alastor]

There's probably a comedic layer to his posts but he's just being honest. At the end of the day Westerners only oppose dictatorships like Russia and China because they're against Western hegemony, but if they weren't they'd support them too. Just look at the West's support for... practically every dictatorship in the Middle East.

If you take away all the theatrics about "democracy" and "human rights", there isn't much left to Western foreign policy besides what AqD is posting here.

Oh I'm well aware of the amorality of international politics. I don't have any such illusions. The issue I have with AqD's posts isn't necessarily that what he claims doesn't reflect an aspect of reality, it's simply that the points he is making while touching on that aspect are delusional. The west is amoral sure, but it's not all powerful like AqD seems to suggest. As such, I interpret this hyperbole as a tell that he is not being serious.

[AqD]

What can you do, though, people are braindead enough to think that actually the new massive war will solve matters of justice. Tbf it's not a matter of general intelligence, but a common filling point for a lot of anxieties, from nation level to citizen level.

Anxieties are good. Without pressure, people have forgotten that enemies are still breathing.

The west is amoral sure, but it's not all powerful like AqD seems to suggest.

Eh? Morality is never my point. My position has always been to defend our future, which is the utmost function of our governments.

If we're not powerful enough, we must invest more on military, more on strengthening our allies, more on weakening enemies and their friends whenever we can. We're not doing nearly enough but troubling ourselves with all those moral and ethic nonsense.

[mishkin]

This is jingoism/ultranationalism:

Anxieties are good. Without pressure, people have forgotten that enemies are still breathing.



Eh? Morality is never my point. My position has always been to defend our future, which is the utmost function of our governments.

If we're not powerful enough, we must invest more on military, more on strengthening our allies, more on weakening enemies and their friends whenever we can. We're not doing nearly enough but troubling ourselves with all those moral and ethic nonsense.

jingoism is nationalism in the form of aggressive and proactive foreign policy, such as a country's advocacy for the use of threats or actual force, as opposed to peaceful relations, in efforts to safeguard what it perceives as its national interests.[1] Colloquially, jingoism is excessive bias in judging one's own country as superior to others – an extreme type of nationalism (cf. chauvinism and ultranationalism).

It may be fun to defend jingoism on an internet forum, but in reality it has horrific repercussions. And its justification, its ideological bases, are absurd (it is enough to point out again its direct relationship with extreme nationalism/chauvinism).

Btw, If we leave aside morals and ethics we become Nazi Germany (or Maoist China, choose what you want).

[Kyriakos]

I agree with Mishkin, it's just jingoism to support x because "it's our side!". It's another problematic consequence of viewing large entities (countries, or even blocks like "the west") as in near-tautology with an individual. It makes perfect sense for an individual to support his/her self regardless. But a country going to war doesn't do it so that the effect of a potentially victorious war will trickle down on you. So cheering for it is not rational by definition; it could be if you were one of the people in power who specifically stood to gain stuff if a war was won by side x.

Besides (or not besides - it is simultaneously complimentary), even if a war brought about the death of all enemies, you'd discover that enemies would appear in the block you previously misidentified as homogeneous homoiogenes (terrible english spelling replaced with one closer to the original).

[AqD]

Btw, If we leave aside morals and ethics we become Nazi Germany (or Maoist China, choose what you want).

Our morals and ethics apply to our own and our friends and anyone who want to be our friends.


The way I see it, we're vault dwellers and they're surface raiders. And you're just daydreaming we're the same kind of societies. End of discussion for me.

[mishkin]

Delete/sorry

[Kyriakos]

I tried to look for other posts by AqD in the thread, which would imply that this is sarcasm, but he doesn't have that many here apparently and I can't go back 500 pages
Regardless if it is, there are people (on other forums) who in so many words have the position that "we" should maintain the supremacy of the "west" etc, so on its own that isn't by now enough to put it down to sarcasm.
Then again, sarcasm has many faces; it doesn't need to be a feigned support of position A which is against the honestly held position -A. It can also be a hyperbolic version of A.

I mean the above as just a self-contained note on sarcasm - prompted by a deleted post which might have been self-deleted for entirely different reasons... I certainly don't mean it as an accusation (I obviously used sarcasm too, very recently, in the thread).
If anything, lack to detect sarcasm is evidence of not being familiar enough with the other poster But vault references can override that.

[chilon]

The problem w US foreign policy has always been that USA doesn't try to be the best by improving the world, but instead it aims to be the best by default; by making everyone else worse off. The rot on world economy i feel can also be atributed to America when I speak to most non-westerners (the majority of word population).

Attributing rot on world economy to one nation is too simplistic and misleading but any rot really begins with Russia and the OPEC nations more than anywhere else.

[Kyriakos]

By now the majority of oil production is in the China/Russia alliance (the one originally termed Brics), including Saudi and Persia. Russia alone is almost as big a producer as Saudi.
Graph: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...Production.png

[mishkin]

I tried to look for other posts by AqD in the thread, which would imply that this is sarcasm, but he doesn't have that many here apparently and I can't go back 500 pages
Regardless if it is, there are people (on other forums) who in so many words have the position that "we" should maintain the supremacy of the "west" etc, so on its own that isn't by now enough to put it down to sarcasm.
Then again, sarcasm has many faces; it doesn't need to be a feigned support of position A which is against the honestly held position -A. It can also be a hyperbolic version of A.

I mean the above as just a self-contained note on sarcasm - prompted by a deleted post which might have been self-deleted for entirely different reasons... I certainly don't mean it as an accusation (I obviously used sarcasm too, very recently, in the thread).
If anything, lack to detect sarcasm is evidence of not being familiar enough with the other poster But vault references can override that.

It is nothing new that some users refer to the Russian population as savages, ogres or raiders. Sarcasm is great, makes you feel terribly smart, but it has the disadvantage that it is totally unproductive in a conversation and can be easily ignored or dismissed as mere imbecility. (ten percent of my posts contain some sarcasm, it's really just me venting/making fun of something, so absolute garbage).

[Ludicus]

The population is willing to fight.

Yes- and no. Whatever the country, few are willing to be forcibly recruited.

Ukraine Stops Issuing Passports Abroad To Military-aged men.

Poland ready to help Ukraine get its military-aged men back

Poland will help Ukraine bring its military-aged men back following new changes to passport and consular service laws for Ukrainian men living abroad, Polish Defence Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz said on April 24."I think many Poles are outraged when they see young Ukrainian men in hotels and cafes, and they hear how much effort we have to make to help Ukraine," Kosiniak-Kamysz told Polsat News

Anger among Ukrainians in Poland as Kyiv halts passport

Hundreds of Ukrainians crammed up against a closed passport office in Warsaw on Wednesday, furious over Kyiv's suspension of consular services for fighting-aged men in a bid to force them to return home and bolster troop numbers… The consular service suspensions, which come as Kyiv scrambles to recruit troops, is widely seen as an attempt to force fighting-age men back to Ukraine.

'Like North Korea': Ukrainian Men in Poland Express Anger

Up to a hundred Ukrainian citizens, mostly men, were gathered on Wednesday in front of a passport centre in Warsaw, unable to pick up their documents, after Kyiv suspended consular services as part of a drive to increase conscription.
Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine’s foreign minister, wrote on Twitter/X on Tuesday: “Staying abroad does not relieve a citizen of his or her duties to the Homeland.
When asked how he feels about Ukraine’s efforts to get men living abroad to fight in the war, Sergey replied: “This feels like North Korea.”
“I have supported Ukraine as much as I could since the war started, I’ve raised money and sent it to folks back there. But I’ve been living in Poland for ten years, my life is here, it makes no sense for me to go and fight in the war of a country I am no longer living in,” he said.
While Kuleba’s post claimed that Ukrainians living abroad are not interested in helping with the war effort but still “want to receive services from this state”, the men waiting in line in Warsaw mostly shared the feeling that they don’t owe Ukraine anything.

The Ukrainian men fleeing the draft:-BBC World Service Documentaries



---
Monsieur Le President/Mr. President,

[Kyriakos]

Any chance of a russian offensive in Summer that can force some kind of end (=talks about signing peace, clearly with more lost territories for Ukraine)?
Russia is slowly eating up more land in the eastern front, and I suppose they will ultimately try to encircle Kharkov (Ukraine's second largest city).

[Roma_Victrix]

Please no one tell Stario that the American billions are being spent in America and Ukraine is getting stuff produced decades ago in America that would otherwise just sit in a depot somewhere.

I don't really know how aid to Ukraine is related to Bidens possible re-election.

Ah yes, America is evil. And also a genocidal facist dictator must be good because anything not America is good. Everyone knows the world was a better place before American hegomony. There were no wars, no imperialism, no genocides and so on. Everything was rosy and everyone was singing and smelling flowers. Oh wait, maybe it wasn't.... Just blaming everything bad in the world on the US doesn't actually make it so.

Meanwhile, invading Ukraine made Russia a paradise on Earth and the best place to live ��

Basic international finance knowledge would show us what you claim here to be false. While we saw changes in exchange rates during the pandemic EUR/USD only played within a small margin. Today, it is pretty much at the same level as what it was 5 years ago.

Not all G7 economies have fully recovered to their pre-pandemic size; by contrast, the U.S. real GDP is now 5.4 percent above the level at the end of 2019. Relative to pre-pandemic trends the United States has outperformed other G7 economies. Inflation in the United States over the past year has halved and is now lower than in many major advanced economies. The U.S. labor market recovery has been exceptionally strong. Unemployment in the US will be 3.4%, the lowest since 1959. The demand for American weapons in the world tripled last year. The United States is the number one arms supplier to Europe, India and the Arab world. Total US exports have exceeded two trillion dollars and the US is the second largest exporter on the planet. For the first time in history, the US has become Europe's number one oil supplier. For the first time in history, the US has become India's number one trading partner, officially pushing China to second place. American factories and enterprises last year broke their own historical record for industrial automation and robotics. Stario has no idea what he's talking about.

--- THE RETURN OF THE VICTRIX TO MUDPIT EARTH ---

I haven't checked on this thread in several months, or even visited the Mudpit in that amount of time either. I see that most of what I've missed lately is just Stario's posts being destroyed more brutally than the Russian navy's Moskva cruiser.

That and AqD most likely trying out a satire routine?

--- PUTIN IS A BIG FAT SMELLY WIENER ---

[Comment to be redacted if he joins this forum as a member, so that I can't insult him directly and be forced to take down my "ask me, Vladimir Putin, a question" thread too.]

Putin sucks. So does the Russian government and many in Russia who are supportive or apathetic of the regime that unjustly imprisons and kills its own like Navalny while detaining and terrorizing people from abroad (not just American citizens on bogus charges, but also tons of innocent kidnapped Ukrainian children). However, dehumanizing depictions of Russians as ogres or orcs is both silly and kind of creepy. Many Russians are good, honest, intelligent, resourceful people and for that matter even the apathetic ones are largely powerless to change things there at the moment, especially after the brain drain of so many who fled Russia (can't blame them for doing that). We don't have to dehumanize an enormous swath of millions of people in order to voice opposition to Putin and his fellow oligarchs who live in luxury yacht comfort while poorer people outside the core Moscow and St Petersburg areas get drafted into this madness.

--- THE RUSSIAN GIRL I USED TO BOINK ---

Hell, I've even dated a Russian broad before (though she was a Kyrgyzstan national), so I can't fault them for lack of skills in bedroom activities either.

--- DON'T YOU DARE CALL MY BOY TCHAIKOVSKY AN ORC ---

Come on? Who doesn't love Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, his 1812 Overture and The Nutcracker? If someone calls Tchaikovsky an orc, I'm gonna give them a swirlie in a toilet bowl. We don't have to swear off everything Russian and stop drinking vodka just cuz the current government happens to really suck. I just don't trust anything their government spokespeople like Sergey Lavrov have to say on anything, and people in the Baltics have every right to be suspicious of Russian intentions.

--- RUSSIA'S CHASIV YAR OFFENSIVE, AND THE UKRAINIAN DEFENSE ---

Putting Tchaikovsky and toilet bowls aside and to continue the conversation, one of the more significant developments of late have been buildups and maneuvers by Russia to take the strategic chokepoint city of Chasiv Yar, which the Ukrainians are hoping to better defend now that the American military aid package is being speedily delivered. If the Russians seize Chasiv Yar, they not only relieve pressure on Bakhmut but also open up the possibility of taking all of Donetsk. It would leave Kramatorsk and Slovyansk vulnerable to attack.

"Ukraine Faces 'Crucial' Battle for Chasiv Yar" (source: Newsweek)