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What does Putin want? The same thing Trump sought.

If you bothered to do ANY research on Viktor Shokin you would make such a false claim. The Russian oligarchs were stealing money from Ukraine and Shokin was protecting them. Shokin's office was so corrupt Ukrainians were outside of his office demanding his removal after a major scandal where his prosecutors were caught with cash and diamonds from bribes. That's why Biden and all the nations trying to help Ukraine wanted Shokin fired.

But do facts even matter to Trump supporters? No. You just keep spewing discredited talking points.

I'm aware they claimed there was corruption and Shokin was doing nothing to prosecute it. However, that doesn't change the fact that BIden said we're not giving you the billion dollars unless he's fired. That is literally what Biden said he did. He claims it's because of corruption, but nobody proved that, and it's no more his business to make that internal Ukraine decision than for Trump to demand an investigation of what he thinks is corruption in Ukraine, right?

 
That OP is without question one of the stinkiest piles of BS I've read lately.
What's the matter, communist? We all know how much Trump and his Cult loves Putin.
 
And he's done the exact opposite. NATO hasn't been united like this since 9/11.
We don't have a president attacking NATO and allying with Putin.
 
We don't have a president attacking NATO and allying with Putin.
We didn't before, either. That was just propaganda. Holding NATO members accountable to their obligations is called being serious and not allowing member states to take advantage.
 
We didn't before, either. That was just propaganda. Holding NATO members accountable to their obligations is called being serious and not allowing member states to take advantage.
Yes, we did. There was a lot more than wanting them to increase spending.
 
We didn't before, either. That was just propaganda. Holding NATO members accountable to their obligations is called being serious and not allowing member states to take advantage.
Conservatives want to withdraw membership from NATO, let Putin loose in eastern Europe, let tens of thousands die and let him threaten western Europe and why? NATO won't pay their all of their obligations! So ****'em, let them die, that'll show those dead beats! Just like Trump throwing the baby out with the bathwater by halting funding of WHO over the handling of covid, causing unknown suffering by reducing the other health services they provide. So ****'em, let them die, that'll show those dead beats!

I actually don't think it's the money that motivates these callous acts, they just flat out don't care, the money is just icing on the cake...
 
What? This is so full of BS.
Democrats ignore the Obama/Biden experience with Russia/Putin. The reset, the 2014 invasion of part of Ukraine. Blind, deaf, dumb are the democrats. The world is in the mess it's in because of weak democrats.
The left claims Trump was Putins puppet? Well then why did Putin wait until now to execute this latest phase of his expansion? He didn't do it during Trump because he couldn't, he was afraid of what might happen. He's not afraid of Biden. Biden told him he would not send US troops to fight in Ukraine. Biden's boy got money from Russians oligarchs. Watch what China does in the next year. China is watching Joe's reaction to Putin.
How blind the left is, or complicit.
Communist goals for USA.

What does Putin want? The same thing Trump sought.​


I decided to quote box the post above because it is such drivel and has nothing to do with anything. It is simply irrelevant drivel.

That said I am not sure what Trump sought is as relevant as trying to figuring out what drives the "party" that he apparently leads from the golf course at Mar-a-lago seeks.

Is it not bad enough to have Tucker Vladimir Carlson siding with Putin over the President of the United States over a matter of National Security and Foreign Policy?

Now we have to have Donald back to his fawning over Putin and Mike Disgusting Pompeo fawning over him as well.

Those with the audacity to call Biden weak have checked their scruples and their minds at the door. Its just this sort of nonsense from public figures like Trump and Pompeo and Carlson and the bevy of Russia-crats in the Republican Party that make us weaker in the world. Obama made us weaker because he was weak. Bush 43 make us weak because he was weak. They were not trying to make us weak for their own purposes. Enter scum like Mike Pompeo and Mafia DONald Trump. and Tucker Vladimir Carlson and the rest of the Russia-crats of the GOP.y of

Time to face the facts that are staring us right the face. The bulk of the current Republican Party prefers the White Autocracy of Russia to the diversity of the United States and will even support a world pariah like Putin to that end. Watch....its so obvious at this point the usual Russia-crats won't even come into this thread and challenge this post. They are proud of their position. They are proud of their Russia-crat fawning over Putin.
 
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Conservatives want to withdraw membership from NATO, let Putin loose in eastern Europe, let tens of thousands die and let him threaten western Europe and why? NATO won't pay their all of their obligations! So ****'em, let them die, that'll show those dead beats! Just like Trump throwing the baby out with the bathwater by halting funding of WHO over the handling of covid, causing unknown suffering by reducing the other health services they provide. So ****'em, let them die, that'll show those dead beats!

I actually don't think it's the money that motivates these callous acts, they just flat out don't care, the money is just icing on the cake...
I haven't heard conservatives say they want the US to withdraw from NATO, if that's what you're saying. I'm no conservative, of course, so it doesn't apply to me. I don't want the US out of NATO, nor do I want Putin loose in Eastern Europe.

NATO members should meet the spending levels required under the treaty - that's because it's a mutual defense treaty, not a "US defends everybody" treaty. Asking Germany - a very rich country -- and the rest of western Europe - which is routinely lorded over the US as being smarter than the US because they don't waste money on military and instead they have (supposedly) "free college" and "free healthcare." It is the responsibility of all NATO members to do their part.

The WHO is controlled by China, and we have no interest in funding it. It doesn't need our funding.

You haven't identified a callous act - you've made up what you think your evil political opponents want - they're so evil, they just want everyone to die and hand over everything to Putin. IF that's what you believe, fine, but you have no evidence for it.

We have Democrats now blathering on about "stopping Putin," - well, a Democrat is in the white house - they have control of Congress. Have at it. The adults are in the room, and now we have a competent president who can handle diplomacy the right way, right? So, stop Putin. If y'all think "issuing sanctions on oligarchs" or writing some other strongly worded letters is going stop Putin, then let's see - because that's all they're doing. Biden is leaving Ukraine hanging out to dry - he said he'd not commit troops over Ukraine. So, he's already committed that. He'll sanction Putin - great. But those sanctions apparently don't mean dick to Putin. So, with all these strong words about how you're committed to NATO and dedicated to stopping the scourge of Putin - nothing much is happening on that front, is it?
 
Atlantic is bracketed by All Sides with
Yahoo, WaPo , NYT , Guardian etc .

It would make life easier just to ring up Langley and get their scripts before they are handed out to bought and compliant editors. The piece is low grade drivel .
We may have to end up saving the ass of the country that you live in for the 3rd time.
 
I haven't heard conservatives say they want the US to withdraw from NATO, if that's what you're saying. I'm no conservative, of course, so it doesn't apply to me. I don't want the US out of NATO, nor do I want Putin loose in Eastern Europe.

NATO members should meet the spending levels required under the treaty - that's because it's a mutual defense treaty, not a "US defends everybody" treaty. Asking Germany - a very rich country -- and the rest of western Europe - which is routinely lorded over the US as being smarter than the US because they don't waste money on military and instead they have (supposedly) "free college" and "free healthcare." It is the responsibility of all NATO members to do their part.

The WHO is controlled by China, and we have no interest in funding it. It doesn't need our funding.

You haven't identified a callous act - you've made up what you think your evil political opponents want - they're so evil, they just want everyone to die and hand over everything to Putin. IF that's what you believe, fine, but you have no evidence for it.

We have Democrats now blathering on about "stopping Putin," - well, a Democrat is in the white house - they have control of Congress. Have at it. The adults are in the room, and now we have a competent president who can handle diplomacy the right way, right? So, stop Putin. If y'all think "issuing sanctions on oligarchs" or writing some other strongly worded letters is going stop Putin, then let's see - because that's all they're doing. Biden is leaving Ukraine hanging out to dry - he said he'd not commit troops over Ukraine. So, he's already committed that. He'll sanction Putin - great. But those sanctions apparently don't mean dick to Putin. So, with all these strong words about how you're committed to NATO and dedicated to stopping the scourge of Putin - nothing much is happening on that front, is it?
This never was a big deal. It was a red herring. NATO countries have been solid contributors to their mutual NATO defense responsibilities. Mafia DONald yammered endlessly about their individual contributions to their own military budgets. Just a minor point for Fat Donnie but a complete misrepresentation of the actual situation.

Gee, I wonder how much more weight Putin's yammering about having to attack to defend himself against NATO would be if those countries did in fact significantly increase their own military budgets.
 
I'm aware they claimed there was corruption and Shokin was doing nothing to prosecute it. However, that doesn't change the fact that BIden said we're not giving you the billion dollars unless he's fired. That is literally what Biden said he did. He claims it's because of corruption, but nobody proved that, and it's no more his business to make that internal Ukraine decision than for Trump to demand an investigation of what he thinks is corruption in Ukraine, right?



Trump’s core argument against Joe Biden is that then-Vice President Biden improperly used the power of his office to get a Ukrainian general prosecutor fired in order to stop him from investigating a Ukrainian gas company that Biden’s son Hunter served on the board of.

The reality is that the Obama administration — as well as many other Western European officials — wanted the prosecutor, a man named Viktor Shokin, removed because he was believed to be trying to stymie anti-corruption efforts in Ukraine. In other words, if anything, Biden’s efforts could have put his son in more legal jeopardy, not less.

Yet the conspiracy theory persists and has been repeated by Trump’s Republican allies on Fox News and in Congress. But it turns out Republicans have failed to mention one important thing: At least three GOP senators at the time also wanted that Ukrainian prosecutor fired.



...We similarly urge you to press ahead with urgent reforms to the Prosecutor General's office and judiciary...
 
Putin and Trump would simply be Pinky and the Brain.

Trump: "Gee, Vlad, what do you want to do tonight?"
Vlad: "The same thing we do every night, Donny- try to take over the world!"

And now that Vlad has Ukraine he's one piece closer to rebuilding the USSR. So who's next?
 
I haven't heard conservatives say they want the US to withdraw from NATO, if that's what you're saying. I'm no conservative, of course, so it doesn't apply to me. I don't want the US out of NATO, nor do I want Putin loose in Eastern Europe...
You may be no conservative but it sure looks like your policies align.

The American Conservative giving Trump advice; Trump Should Get Out Of NATO Now, But Nice.
Trump privately said a number of times in 2018 that he wanted the U.S. to leave NATO,
..."

And as you know, so goes Trump, so goes the Trumpists. Conservatives are naturally against foreign alliances of all kinds, they're natural nationalists. This was recently on display by Trump's praising Putin's, "peacekeeping" invasion and saying that we should "...employ military force akin to that used by Russia..." on the Mexican border.

Many conservatives have been opposed to UN membership for decades;
Republicans move to break with the United Nations
(CNSNews.com) - An opinion poll released on Thursday by The Conservative Caucus (TCC) finds that conservatives, overall, oppose a larger American role for the United Nations and would prefer to see the United States withdraw from that world body entirely.
Other examples include;
US formally withdraws from Paris agreement
Trump Administration
Withdraws U.S. From U.N. Human Rights Council

...NATO members should meet the spending levels required under the treaty - that's because it's a mutual defense treaty, not a "US defends everybody" treaty. Asking Germany - a very rich country -- and the rest of western Europe - which is routinely lorded over the US as being smarter than the US because they don't waste money on military and instead they have (supposedly) "free college" and "free healthcare." It is the responsibility of all NATO members to do their part...
You're right about the funding, they should meet their goals and we should do more to get them to pay up. But does this mean you agree with Trump and want out of NATO? The money we spend to makeup for those deadbeats is well spent, unless you have no problem with a return of the USSR/ Warsaw Pact map of Europe and a possibility of another cold war. Also most people forget that those deadbeats will be the first ones dead when Putin moves west.
 
...The WHO is controlled by China, and we have no interest in funding it. It doesn't need our funding.

You haven't identified a callous act - you've made up what you think your evil political opponents want - they're so evil, they just want everyone to die and hand over everything to Putin. IF that's what you believe, fine, but you have no evidence for it...
Read what I actually wrote, not what your fertile imagination made you think what I wrote. I said callous acts, I didn't accuse evil political opponents to want everyone to die and hand over everything to Putin. And I stand behind my comment that they flat out don't care. Conservatives don't even care about poor Americans, they aren't going to give a crap about people on the other side of the world. Nationalism rears its ugly head again.

US President Donald Trump's decision to stop funding the World Health Organization (WHO) is likely to hurt many Africans.
Director of the World Health Organization said, "It will cost lives."

China was the 2nd largest contributor, after Xi Jinping's $2 billion investment they will ability to shape health agendas around the world
"...With that loss, the United States will relinquish its ability to shape health agendas around the world, says Lee. Ironically, that is exactly what the Trump administration is complaining about. “If the US pulls out and leaves a vacuum, it will be filled by other countries, like China,” she says. “You’ll see a self-fulfilling prophecy.”

The organization needed reform, but that was no reason to pull out, just another example of nationalism runamok. Not that you are one, but most conservatives have no problem with Xi Jinping and Putin dividing up the world between them. It was no coincidence that Putin waited until the Olympics were over before he invaded Ukraine, you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours. If Putin is successful without much pushback, it'll give Xi Jinping more confidence about taking Taiwan.

...We have Democrats now blathering on about "stopping Putin," - well, a Democrat is in the white house - they have control of Congress. Have at it. The adults are in the room, and now we have a competent president who can handle diplomacy the right way, right? So, stop Putin. If y'all think "issuing sanctions on oligarchs" or writing some other strongly worded letters is going stop Putin, then let's see - because that's all they're doing. Biden is leaving Ukraine hanging out to dry - he said he'd not commit troops over Ukraine. So, he's already committed that. He'll sanction Putin - great. But those sanctions apparently don't mean dick to Putin. So, with all these strong words about how you're committed to NATO and dedicated to stopping the scourge of Putin - nothing much is happening on that front, is it?
I'm not sure what you're saying here. Are claiming it's our responsibility to protect Ukraine, but because we're only sending strongly worded letters and imposing sanctions we're, "leaving Ukraine hanging out to dry"?
Should we have not said anything
Should we not say anything anytime Putin invades a country?
Should we have promised to send troops?
What the hell do you expect Biden to do, act like nothing happened, send in the F-35's or something in between? Or as I said, maybe you have no problem with a return of the USSR/ Warsaw Pact map of Europe and a possibility of another cold war. So far Biden is doing fine by me...
 
As Putin's thug military approaches Kyiv it should be obvious that he will be hunting for Zelinsky and the rest of the Ukraine government so that he can arrest them or assassinate them and install his own lapdog puppets instead. It is also obvious that all of Putin's horse shit rationalizations for invasion were just that horse shit. The Donbas region....NOPE...the cover is off that bullshit LIE. What are you doing in Odessa Vlad? What are you doing twenty miles outside of Kyiv Vlad. NATO....NOPE. NATO is a defensive treaty organization Vlad and Ukraine was nowhere close to membership.

So, IMO, its time to unleash the hounds. Vlad is threatening the use of nukes. Fugg you Vlad. Call his bluff. Unleash the full volley of sanctions on Vlad, the Oligarchs, every bank and bank transactions, imports and exports and find some way to put an air cap over Kyiv via coalition. Drive Vlad's cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs, deranged ass back off and force him back onto his heels before he lops the heads off the Ukraine government.

EU and NATO cooperation has been fine to a point. But they have to be driven to the next steps and we have to take the lead AGAIN.

Here is what has not changed in this world since the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The new world has had to come to the rescue of the old world in order to save the old world and save itself.

Putin's rant the other night tells everything about what absolute power has done to his thinking. He has abandoned and swatted away every other concept of government that Russia and the Soviet Union have gone through save one......MONARCHY....the CZARS. Monarchy, the worst, most, destructive form of government ever conceived by one man to rule other men. We either stop him here or at the border of some NATO country as he is about to start WW3. Put an air cap over Kyiv and dare Vlad to shoot it down or try to breach it or make good his bluff to end the world via nukes so he can have Ukraine. Its the Ukraine government Vlad is after today. Its not Donbas and its not NATO at least not today. You want to stop Vlad dead in his tracks....turn his whole little party into a waste? Don't let him topple the Ukraine government.
 
Read what I actually wrote, not what your fertile imagination made you think what I wrote. I said callous acts, I didn't accuse evil political opponents to want everyone to die and hand over everything to Putin.
You literally wrote this "Conservatives want to withdraw membership from NATO, let Putin loose in eastern Europe, let tens of thousands die and let him threaten western Europe "

You didn't say your political opponents have a different view of the right course of action - you said they "want" to let Putin loose in Europ and "let tens of thousands die." If that's what you believe, fine, but it's just your own imaginings. I'm not even a conservative, and I know it can't be said that they want that.
 
George Conway: "For a moment, just contemplate the difference in moral character between the two men on the so-called "perfect" phone call."
 
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Why would you lie about something that takes second to fact check?

He has no shame and is not embarrassed at all by posting lies that just make him look like an idiot.
 
What? This is so full of BS.
Democrats ignore the Obama/Biden experience with Russia/Putin. The reset, the 2014 invasion of part of Ukraine. Blind, deaf, dumb are the democrats. The world is in the mess it's in because of weak democrats.
The left claims Trump was Putins puppet? Well then why did Putin wait until now to execute this latest phase of his expansion? He didn't do it during Trump because he couldn't, he was afraid of what might happen. He's not afraid of Biden. Biden told him he would not send US troops to fight in Ukraine. Biden's boy got money from Russians oligarchs. Watch what China does in the next year. China is watching Joe's reaction to Putin.
How blind the left is, or complicit.
Communist goals for USA.
The timing has more to do with Ukrainian politics than with Biden. The US is not the deciding factor in this.
 
You literally wrote this "Conservatives want to withdraw membership from NATO, let Putin loose in eastern Europe, let tens of thousands die and let him threaten western Europe "

You didn't say your political opponents have a different view of the right course of action - you said they "want" to let Putin loose in Europ and "let tens of thousands die." If that's what you believe, fine, but it's just your own imaginings. I'm not even a conservative, and I know it can't be said that they want that.
I wasn't clear distinguishing between wanting a policy (wanting out of NATO) and its result. For example, do you think Conservatives "want" people's lives cut short in conservative states that implement their health policies, or did their policies let it happen? I don't believe conservatives who implement their environmental policies, "want" to kill thousands of people, it's their policies that let it happen. Do you think Trump "wanted" his pandemic response to kill 40% of our Covid-19 deaths or was it his policy that let it happen?

So you went off on Biden and I responded with a few questions, might I get your response given a second chance?
...We have Democrats now blathering on about "stopping Putin," - well, a Democrat is in the white house - they have control of Congress. Have at it. The adults are in the room, and now we have a competent president who can handle diplomacy the right way, right? So, stop Putin. If y'all think "issuing sanctions on oligarchs" or writing some other strongly worded letters is going stop Putin, then let's see - because that's all they're doing. Biden is leaving Ukraine hanging out to dry - he said he'd not commit troops over Ukraine. So, he's already committed that. He'll sanction Putin - great. But those sanctions apparently don't mean dick to Putin. So, with all these strong words about how you're committed to NATO and dedicated to stopping the scourge of Putin - nothing much is happening on that front, is it?
I'm not sure what you're saying here. Are claiming it's our responsibility to protect Ukraine, but because we're only sending strongly worded letters and imposing sanctions we're, "leaving Ukraine hanging out to dry"?
Should we have not said anything
Should we not say anything anytime Putin invades a country?
Should we have promised to send troops?
What the hell do you expect Biden to do, act like nothing happened, send in the F-35's or something in between? Or as I said, maybe you have no problem with a return of the USSR/ Warsaw Pact map of Europe and a possibility of another cold war. So far Biden is doing fine by me...
 
I wasn't clear distinguishing between wanting a policy (wanting out of NATO) and its result. For example, do you think Conservatives "want" people's lives cut short in conservative states that implement their health policies, or did their policies let it happen? I don't believe conservatives who implement their environmental policies, "want" to kill thousands of people, it's their policies that let it happen. Do you think Trump "wanted" his pandemic response to kill 40% of our Covid-19 deaths or was it his policy that let it happen?

So you went off on Biden and I responded with a few questions, might I get your response given a second chance?

I'm not sure what you're saying here. Are claiming it's our responsibility to protect Ukraine, but because we're only sending strongly worded letters and imposing sanctions we're, "leaving Ukraine hanging out to dry"?
1. You state that conservative environmental policies killed thousands of people, as if that is a fact or a given. It isn't. You'll need to produce evidence or at least cite it. What we do know is that many policies result in unintended consequences, even fatal ones. Like the environmentalist movement to ban DDT arguably resulted in millions of deaths. https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB113236412756302115 - other policies like environmental preservation regulations arguably increased carbon emissions globally - https://www.sciencedaily.com/releas...rvation efforts, they,in the journal PLOS ONE - there are unintended consequences of increased tele-health and remote healthcare - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5171569/

There are such costs in universal health care systems, too. A study the Fraser Institute titled The Effect of Wait Times on Mortality in Canada estimated that “increases in wait times for medically necessary care in Canada between 1993 and 2009 may have resulted in between 25,456 and 63,090 (with a middle value of 44,273) additional deaths among females.” Adjusting for the difference in populations (the US has about 9 times as many people), that middle value inflates to an estimated 400,000 additional deaths among females over a 16 year period. This translates to an estimated 25,000 additional female deaths each year if the American system were to suffer from increased mortality similar to that experienced in Canada due to increases in wait times https://www.fraserinstitute.org/sites/default/files/effect-of-wait-times-on-mortality-in-canada.pdf - do those who advance such policies "want" these deaths?

The suggestion that it is only "conservative" policies which have negative consequences is naive. The analysis of what governmental policies and actions cost the fewest lives is always a complicated analysis. You're probably already trying to figure out how to tell me that the cost in lives of not doing universal healthcare is way worse than doing it. Certainly a fine argument to make, but you'll need to show your work. And, it just means that you're engaging in a balancing test and the "trolley problem" (do you pull a lever to divert a trolley headed toward a cliff which will kill the people on board, but by diverting the trolley you condemn a couple other people who are stuck on the track to certain doom). A cold policy analysis will try to determine which course of action saves the most people - but there is the rub. There must be an analysis of which course saves the most people, and that has not been established when it comes to most complicated policy decisions.

That's just, also, leaving the policy decision up to the single determining factor of which saves the most lives. There are other factors that a free and democratic society takes into account, including actual costs, other options which can be attempted, the effects of such regulations on freedom and liberty interests and the dignity of the individual. Certainly, for example, a policy could be enacted requiring speed limits no higher than 25mph, four point race car style seatbelts, and roll cages installed in all vehicles, and we know that would save 10s of thousands of lives per year, but we don't enact such a law, and nobody is even suggesting it. Why? By doing none of those things, are we "intending" the lives lost?
 
I'm not sure what you're saying here. Are claiming it's our responsibility to protect Ukraine, but because we're only sending strongly worded letters and imposing sanctions we're, "leaving Ukraine hanging out to dry"?
Should we have not said anything
Should we not say anything anytime Putin invades a country?
Should we have promised to send troops?
What the hell do you expect Biden to do, act like nothing happened, send in the F-35's or something in between? Or as I said, maybe you have no problem with a return of the USSR/ Warsaw Pact map of Europe and a possibility of another cold war. So far Biden is doing fine by me...
Regarding Ukraine, I am not saying it's our responsiblity to protect Ukraine. I'm saying Biden and those on his side - many democrats and republicans both - are saying it's "our" responsiblity to protect Ukraine. However, the policies set out by Biden in the run up to this invasion did notthing but encourage the invasion. Putin was essentially told that there would be no outside help for Ukraine, and that was that. It's an amazing thing that I see Ukraine bolstering its defense and according to the news it is succeeding in holding off the onslaught. I'm suspicious of the news reports, though - we can't know what is and isnt propaganda. Russia is on the doorstep of Kyiv and it's only been a few days - I think the US military actions have set a new expectation for wars - we think invasions only take a few days, like they did in Iraq and result in only a few casualties on our side - but, even if the conquest of Ukraine takes months, it wouldn't be unusual from a historical perspective. I don't know if the news about Ukraine's success, and how Putin is "furious" and how he's now changed from before and behaving "erratically" and that he has a screw loose sounds like propaganda to me. So, I don't know.

I stand with Ukraine, but I recognize that the West, too, had a hand in creating this crisis, and the far Left is correct that US policy of NATO expansion, together with its meddling in Ukraine a decade ago, generated this kind of counter-action by Putin. If Putin did nothing, Ukraine was going to eventually join NATO, and that was completely unacceptable to Putin. The West is playing a dangerous game here, and Putin views this as an existential threat to Russia, which is already weak (economy smaller than Texas), and a military that is far more limited than America's military (except for nukes). So, while Ukraine has a right not to be invaded by Russia, it is certainly not hard to figure out why Putin is doing it, and we do need to recognize that the West is not morally (or legally) pure and righteous here.

It's fine to say something - but to tell him in advance that we're not going to defend Ukraine militarily is not the right thing to say.

We should say what we mean, and mean what we say.

I think that we should have at least moved additional troops (not just from the US, but from the UK, India, Germany, France, Italy, Australia, Canada, and Japan, small contingents from as many as possible) to neighboring countries, and make a global unified statement that the invasion will be resisted, and then prior to the invasion send guns, ammo, anti-tank weapons, and anti-aircraft weapons in, and tell Putin he will get what they're telling him he's getting now - a country where civilians will stand up and fight voluntarily and throw molotov cocktails at any Russian soldier they see.

What do I expect Biden to do? Refrain from equivocation - like when he said "it depends what kind of invasion it is...." allowing for Russia to make incursions, which greenlit Russia to invade. Those public statements are serious matters when world leaders make them. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/...ns-weakness-on-ukraine-has-fueled-putins-fire
 
What the hell do you expect Biden to do, act like nothing happened, send in the F-35's or something in between?
When Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014 and then seized Crimea, the Obama administration offered equivocation and mild sanctions. Biden was a senior party to this failure to enforce deterrence. As tensions began growing around Ukraine last year, Biden's first instinct was weakness. He canceled U.S. Navy deployments to the Black Sea and pressured the Pentagon to reduce its military activity near Russian borders. Biden has also steadfastly opposed Republican-sponsored sanctions against Putin's Nord Stream II natural gas pipeline, lobbying Senate Democrats to join his misguided opposition. While Germany did suspend that pipeline's certification Tuesday, the suspension is unlikely to be permanent. Until mid-January, Biden slow-rolled the delivery of anti-tank weapons to Ukraine. Even now, Biden refuses to provide Ukraine with significant quantities of anti-air missile systems. Instead, the far smaller Baltic member states have been left to fill this desperate Ukrainian need (and even then, Biden slow-rolled approving their doing so with U.S.-made weapons).

The president has undertaken a Herculean effort to remind everyone relentlessly that he has no intention of deploying U.S. military forces to Ukraine. Many, including this publication, support that proposition. But it makes very little sense to so relentlessly remind Putin of this posture. Doing so only suggests to Putin that he retains the strategic initiative. More absurd was Biden's recent pledge that there are no circumstances in which he would order the U.S. military to rescue Americans in Ukraine. When asked if his self-imposed restriction covered even evacuation flights, Biden said it did. Again, what message does this send to Putin? Certainly not one of strength. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/...ns-weakness-on-ukraine-has-fueled-putins-fire

I would expect him not to equivocate. And, if he truly does want to help Ukraine, he should have done so, not with mere wishy-washy rhetoric, but with clarity and strength, backed up by actions. One of the reasons I thought the news about the Russian invasion being imminent was over-hyped was because Biden had not already imposed strong sanctions. If they knew it was coming, as they said they did, why hold back on sanctions? The crushing sanctions should have been imposed, and only withdrawn if Putin relented. By just blathering on about what will happen "if" Putin invades, none of it being the use of force, it's just a greenlight to Putin, who isn't all that concerned about being sancitioned and is comfortable fighiting it out in Ukraine if the world just stands by and watches. He upped the nuke readiness as a message to the West - "**** with me on this, and I'm ready to go to the, literal, nuclear option." Putin has balls. And, this is a dangerous time.
 
The timing has more to do with Ukrainian politics than with Biden. The US is not the deciding factor in this.
The reason Biden is not content to let Ukraine retain its own politics is because the West, through NATO and the EU, were slowly sucking Ukraine in, and that has always been a red line for Russia. They got ****ed out of Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Poland, East Germany, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Slovenia (in their minds, they had no way to retain them, but they certainly didn't consent to it willingly). But they certainly aren't giving up Belarus, Ukraine, Georgia, etc. They've been saying "not gonna happen" for decades. That's what caused the Crimean invasion first. The US and the West swallowed that pill, because they were flipping Ukraine in the Euromaidan coup. So, Russia could take Crimea, and that was an acceptable price for the West to get the rest of Ukraine.

Here, Biden and the West were clear about one thing in the beginning - if Russia stuck to the Russian separatist areas, they'd get away with it with little to no significant response - just chest thumping and weak sancitons. However, now that Putin went for the whole kit-and-kaboodle, which is what Biden and the Western leaders weren't sure he would ultimately do, we are stuck with having to now send in more munitions and try to eff up Putin's invasion and make it too costly for him to stay.

The danger here is that Putin needs a way to pull back while claiming victory. I think the ultimate settlement has to be that Russia gets the separatist bits of Ukraine, or they become independent states under Russian influence, and the West gives an assurance that for at least 20 years there will be no attempt to allow Ukraine to join NATO or the EU. If Putin doesn't get something like that, then he will have to be deposed or killed and someone else could come in and save the Russian face in this.
 
1. You state that conservative environmental policies killed thousands of people, as if that is a fact or a given. It isn't....

There are such costs in universal health care systems, too...

The suggestion that it is only "conservative" policies which have negative consequences is naive...

That's just, also, leaving the policy decision up to the single determining factor of which saves the most lives...
See post #46 for full text.

I'm not going to spend time citing proof beyond the links I've provided, nor will I ask for yours. You're right, there're unintended downsides to most any policy, conservative or liberal and there should be an analysis of both, but conservative dogma takes precedence over analysis far too often. I won't cite the lives saved by providing healthcare to an additional 8% of Americans, I will only point out that we spend four times the amount every other western democracy spends and their citizens are healthier and live longer. Conservatives see the data yet cling so tightly to our outdated, expensive system. It's the The free market must not be infringed, otherwise it's (clutch your pearls) communism!

The deaths caused by excessively long emergency room waiting times you cite is a theory by a conservative author, known for his fight to scrap Canadian's current system and return to an insurance based system. Lastly, I'm enough of a capitalist to have heard about a theory called, supply and demand. It seems all the democracies in Europe and around the world that have a successful universal system are able to supply enough health care to meet their demand. As far as proof that stopping our funding of WHO will cost lives, if you can't take the opinion of the doctors who are saving those lives, how about the common sense that no money equals no health care, equals an increase in unhealthy people, that might result in more deaths?

I do have to comment on the WSJ opinion piece on DDT you cited though. Until now I wasn't aware of the concerted effort by conservatives to paint Rachel Carson (who largely responsible for banning DDT in the US), as a mass murderer, even going so far as to call her worst than Hitler.
If anyone wants to read an unbiased report try this link;
"...The reality is that the American ban on DDT did not extend to other nations, although some later enacted their own prohibitions. For that matter, the pesticide was not completely banished in the United States or elsewhere; the E.P.A. declared it acceptable if public health was at risk. And despite a decline in its effectiveness because of overuse, it remains a valued anti-malaria tool in many countries, principally for spraying indoors, where its potency is enhanced and its impact on nature is kept low..."

As far as negative consequences, in the end I guess you have to pick your poison. What motivates conservatives to ban abortion is based primarily on religious convictions, not on the analysis of women's health. An unrestrained Putin facing NATO without US backing is a recipe for tens of thousands of deaths and a return of the Warsaw Pact. Withdrawing from NATO is a penny wise, pound foolish policy. Dogma motivating conservative abortion bans and refusal to update our healthcare system, nationalism and greed motivating conservatives to withdraw from NATO...
 
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