I listened live to Putin’s speech yesterday with great interest. Here is my own analysis, for what it is worth.
Putin was strongest in his accusations of western hypocrisy. His ironic welcoming of the West having suddenly discovered the concept of international law was very well done. His analysis of the might is right approach the West had previously adopted, and their contempt of the UN over Iraq and Afghanistan, was spot on. Putin also was absolutely right in describing the Kosovo situation as “highly analogous” to the situation in Crimea. That is indeed true, and attempts by the West – including the Guardian – to argue the cases are different are pathetic exercises in special pleading.
The problem is that Putin blithely ignored the enormous logical inconsistency in his argument. He stated that the Crimean and Kosovo cases were highly analogous, but then used that to justify Russia’s action in Crimea, despite the fact that Russia has always maintained the NATO Kosovo intervention was illegal(and still refuses to recognize Kosovo). In fact of course Russia was right over Kosovo, and thus is wrong over Crimea.
I was very interested that Putin made distinct reference to the appalling crimes against the Tartars in the 1930’s, but also to the terrible suffering of Ukrainians in that period. His references were not detailed but their meaning was clear. I was surprised because under Putin’s rule there has been a great deal of rehabilitation of Stalin. Archives that were opened under glasnost have frozen over again, and history in Russian schools now portrays Stalin’s foreign policy achievement much more than his crimes (and it is now again possible to complete your Russian school education with no knowledge the Stalin-Hitler pact ever happened). So this was both surprising and positive. Designed to be positive was his assurance that Crimea will be trilingual. We will see what happens; Putin’s Russia is in fact not tolerant of its ethnic populations in majority Russian areas, and in fact contains a great many more far right thugs than Ukraine – probably about the same percentage of the population.
The 97% referendum figure is simply unbelievable to any reasonable person and is straight out of the Soviet playbook – it was strange to see Putin going in and out of modern media friendly mode and his audience, with their Soviet en brosse haircuts and synchronized clapping – obviously liked the Soviet bits best.
The attempt to downplay Russia’s diplomatic isolation was also a bit strange. He thanked China, though China had very pointedly failed to support Russian in the Security Council. When you are forced to thank people for abstaining, you are not in a strong position diplomatically. He also thanked India, which is peculiar, because the Indian PM yesterday put out a press release saying Putin had called him, but the had urged Putin to engage diplomatically with the interim government in Kiev, which certainly would not be welcome to Putin. I concluded that Putin was merely trying to tell his domestic audience Russia has support, even when it does not.
But what I find really strange is that the parts of the speech I found most interesting have not drawn any media comment I can see. Putin plainly said that in his discussions with Kuchma on the boundaries of Ukraine after the collapse of the Soviet Union, they hadn’t wanted to open any dispute with what they expected to be a friendly neighbor, and that therefore the boundaries of Ukraine had never been finally demarcated. He said twice the boundaries had not been demarcated. That seemed to indicate a very general threat to Eastern Ukraine. He also spoke of the common heritage of Russia, Belarus and Ukraine in a way that indicated that he did not accept that Ukraine might choose a political future away from Russia.
Secondly, he said that on the day the Soviet Union broke up, Russians in many places had “woken up to find themselves in a foreign country.” Again from the context in which he said it, this referred not just to Crimea, and not just even to the rest of Ukraine, but to Russian nationals all over the Former Soviet Union. I would be worrying a lot about this part of the speech if I was Kazakh, to give just one example. Putin seemed to be outlining a clear agenda to bring Russian speaking areas of CIS countries back in to Mother Russia – indeed, I see no other possible interpretation of his actions in Georgia and Ukraine.
I think that we should start listening much more carefully to what he says. I also think that the weakness of the EU’s response to events gives Putin a very dangerous encouragement to pursue further aggrandizement. I posted a few days ago:
The EU I expect to do nothing. Sanctions will target a few individuals who are not too close to Putin and don’t keep too many of their interests in the West. I don’t think Alisher Usmanov and Roman Abramovic need lose too much sleep, that Harrods need worry or that we will see any flats seized at One Hyde Park. (It is among my dearest wishes one day to see One Hyde Park given out for council housing.) Neither do I expect to see the United States do anything effective; its levers are limited.
The truth is of course that the global political elite are in the pockets of the global financial elite, and while ordinary Russians are still desperately poor, the money the oligarchs rip out of Russia’s backward commodity exporting economy is parceled around the world financial system in ways that make it impossible for the western political classes to do anything. Whose funds would the hedge fund managers look after? Whose yacht could Mandelson and Osborne holiday on?
Personally I should like to see a complete financial freeze on the entire Russian oligarchy. The knock on effects would only hurt a few bankers, and city types and those who depend on them (cocaine dealers, lap dancers, Porsche dealers, illegal domestic servants). Sadly we shan’t see anything happen. They won’t let Eton go bust.
Uzbek in the UK
19 Mar, 2014 – 5:17 pm
doug scorgie
“Do your own reading. Nobody provided me references when I wanted to learn something.”
Uzbek, you make statements as if they are fact without any references to back-up what you say.
How do you think other posters here can check that what you say is true if you don’t provide links or references?
Are we to accept that if Uzbek says something it must be true?
Uzbek in the UK
20 Mar, 2014 – 12:44 am
“Ben”
“Why did you call me stupid? Just because I disagree with you and do not sing God Bless Mr Putin?”
Sometimes Uzbek you sound just like Habbabkuk.
Uzbek in the UK
20 Mar, 2014 – 11:26 am
“Mr Murray
“It was actually Lenin who first said that who are not with us is against us.”
Now Uzbek you have the chance to back-up what you claim by telling us where you sourced the above claim.
References please.
John Goss
I read your article now. As I expected you used appalling Human Right record and crimes of Karimov in Uzbekistan to support your anti-Zionist and anti-western propaganda arguments.
While it is true that after 9/11 Karimov became close ally of GWB and TB and 2 latter turned their blind eye on many of karimov’s crimes (for which I many times stated my hatred towards these 2 and also Jack Straw after what he did to Mr Murray). BUT you FAILED to even mention that in May 2005 couple days after the Andijan Massacre karimov went to Moscow and it was putin who SUPPORTED karimov this time.
In fact I failed to mention it earlier but in addition to Lavrov’s hypocrisy (which Mr Murray mentioned in his earlier thread) I have at least ONE more. It was Lavrov who announced to the world that karimov dealt with attempt of overthrowing Uzbek government by terrorists. He was LYING that time. He knew for sure that there were MANY women and children amongst the people who were still being buried at the time of Lavro’s hypocratic speech. Russia still have excellent intelligence agenture in former soviet union. I hope that documents will come to light (may be after fall of putin’s cleptocratic regime) showing that Russian intelligence reported that karimov shot mostly unarmed people many of whom were women and children.
Now WHY is your article SO BIASED?
doug scorgie
Use google mate. You have computer and internet, do not you? Alternative could be buying ticket to Moscow and ordering access to the Kremlin archive. Googel is still cheaper and more convenient I guess.
“Uzbek in the UK, 20 Mar, 2014 – 11:26 am
Mr Murray
It was actually Lenin who first said that who are not with us is against us.”
Does that sound like someone who was aware of the biblical quote?
The one who believes in torture knows who he is. The sock-puppet(s) know who they are. I did not say you believed in torture, rather that if you continued insulting me with slurs like MAD leftie I would treat you like them by ignoring your comments. If you do not agree with my views, argue against them, using facts. If you convince me I will change my views. But do not make unsubstantiated statements based on your personal experiences of one former USSR and later satellite Russian state. You have a view of Putin and the current Russian government based on those experiences. You refer to your reading but never give a source. I’m sorry. This simply makes you look like a self-opinionated bigot.
Uzbek in the UK
20 Mar, 2014 – 12:11 pm
“Notice how anti-Israeli comments slowly making their way to this thread.”
Direct question Uzbek: are you a Zionist?
doug scorgie
This is not university research committee. I am not publishing my dissertation or essay on this blog. I am sharing my views on the topics raised by Mr Murray. I am also annoyed and angry that many here (including you) are so limited by their cliché that they fail to see tragedies behind cheap but persistent putin propaganda.
For the sake of proving me wrong please read about Russian/Ukrainian/Central Asian history first before making biased comments. Your MAD leftie cliché and absence of knowledge about long and troublesome history of Russia and its colonies make you sound stupid.
Uzbek in the UK, 20 Mar, 2014 – 1:09 pm
You’ve done it again. First let me say I did not know that Karimov visited (was called perhaps?) to Russia two days after the Andijan massacre, or what was said between the two. Please supply the source and perhaps I can use it in the future.
doug scorgie
“Direct question Uzbek: are you a Zionist?”
Not at all. But after YOU white Europeans did to Jews I believe that they have right to establish their own statehood. Not at the expense of Arabs. Like Mr Murray I believe that both Arabs and Jews must be given the same right in the state of Israel.
Deconstructing Centralised Authority
Representative Democracy in the East or West,
represents democracy in the same way a transvestite represents a woman!
what sort of people are attracted to representative democracies?
Using his law enforcement experience and data drawn from the FBI’s behavioral analysis unit, Jim Kouri has collected a series of personality traits common to a couple of professions.
Kouri, who’s a vice president of the National Assn. of Chiefs of Police, has assembled traits such as superficial charm, an exaggerated sense of self-worth, glibness, lying, lack of remorse and manipulation of others.
These traits, Kouri points out in his analysis, are common to psychopathic serial killers.
But these traits are also common to politicians.
Our elected officials often show many of the exact same character traits as criminal nut-jobs, who run from police but not for office.
Kouri notes that these criminals are psychologically capable of committing their dirty deeds free of any concern for social, moral or legal consequences and with absolutely no remorse.
“This allows them to do what they want, whenever they want,” he wrote. “Ironically, these same traits exist in men and women who are drawn to high-profile and powerful positions in society including political officeholders.”
http://current.com/community/93332432_study-politicians-share-personality-traits-with-serial-killers.htm
http://cuthulan.wordpress.com/2010/01/09/a-list-of-child-sex-offenders-inside-the-british-government/
http://cuthulan.wordpress.com/2010/01/07/uk-government-blackmailed-into-war-blair-covers-mps-paedophile-ring-and-the-dunblane-massacre/
http://cuthulan.wordpress.com/2013/02/20/here-is-a-list-of-100-paedophile-councillors-or-uk-political-party-affiliated-members-they-are-among-the-people-who-help-run-our-country/
http://cuthulan.wordpress.com/2012/11/10/british-establishment-paedophile-rings-and-their-global-partners/
http://cuthulan.wordpress.com/2014/03/05/david-cameron-is-covering-for-paedophiles-again/
This monsters are attracted to centralised power in the East or the West!
What are the results of centralised authorities and respresentative democracies
DEMOCIDE!
Democide is a term revived and redefined by the political scientist R. J. Rummel as “the murder of any person or people by a government, including genocide, politicide, and mass murder.” Rummel estimates that there have been 262 million victims of democide in the last century. According to his figures, six times as many people have died from the inflictions of people working for governments than have died in battle
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democide
Albert Einstein: “A Foolish Faith In Authority Is The Worst Enemy Of The Truth”
Centralised governments lie and kill and steal!
Anybody who SERIOUSLY studies this situation comes to the same and OBVIOUS conclusion
Police Intelligence Analyst Fired For Saying 9/11 And 7/7 Look Like Inside Jobs
UK Police Intel Expert: Government, Not Islam, Real Terror Threat
Tony found that he could only conclude that the official 7/7 narrative was ‘a monstrous lie.’
Instead of the official ‘suicide bombers’ narrative, which he and all of his colleagues had believed without question, he realised that the weight of evidence strongly points far more towards 7/7 being an event stage-managed by British intelligence than anything else.
On July 8th he handed over a very short version of the ‘Strategic Assessment Matrix,’ which averred that the real terrorist ‘threat’ to society was almost entirely of the state-sponsored kind, and it alluded to both 9/11 and 7/7 in this context. Other threats from other ‘domains of criminality’ were, his brief report claimed, ‘insignificant’ by comparison
By Nick Kollerstrom
July 12, 2011
http://theintelhub.com/2011/07/12/uk-police-intel-expert-government-not-islam-real-terror-threat/
they also cannot run an economy!
FYI 181ST IS LAST PLACE!!!
NOTICE THE 4 BIGGEST DEBTOR NATIONS WHERE THE NATIONS THAT GOT LIED INTO ILLEGAL WARS!
THEY ALL HAVE MAJOR ELITE PAEDOPHILE RINGS AS WELL
…WHERE DID THOSE IRAQI WMD’S DISAPPEAR TOO?
Rank Country CAB USD, bn
1 People’s Republic of China 371.833
2 Germany 252.501
3 Japan 210.967
4 Saudi Arabia 95.762
5 Russia 76.163
6 Switzerland 70.797
7 Norway 59.983
8 Netherlands 52.522
176 Greece -44.218
177 Italy -52.725
178 Australia -56.342
179 United Kingdom -105.224
180 Spain -145.141
181 United States -731.214
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_current_account_balance
This is a list of countries and territories by current account balance (CAB), based on the International Monetary Fund data for 2007, obtained from the latest World Economic Outlook database (October 2008).
NOTE THAT THESE FIGURE ARE FROM 2007. THIS WAS BEFORE THE CREDIT CRUNCH!
THIS WAS THE END OF A BOOM PERIOD IN A “BOOM AND BUST” ECONOMY!!
WHO WAS GOING TO PAY THE DEBT WHEN THE ECONOMY WENT BUST?
NOTE THE POSITION OF SMALL INDEPENDANT NATIONS LIKE SWITZERLAND AND NORWAY!!
FREE MARKET CAPITALISM FOR DUMMIES!
its not that difficult , so you see we do not need the brightest and the best.
1.Availability of credit allows money to flow between savers and borrowers.
2.Resources and funds are allocated to various projects or investments during a boom phase.
3.Eventually borrowing becomes excessive and leads to malinvestment,
4.At this stage, adherence to free market theory would allow for an efficient cleansing period and a healthy recovery period. How? Irresponsible and unprofitable businesses fail. Bad debts get liquidated. Excess resources go on sale, flow into more stable ventures and pool together with more profitable resources controlled by healthy corporations or entities
http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article6497.html
NEWSFLASH , UK ,USA AND EUROPEAN BANKS FOUND TO BE UNPROFITABLE AND IRRESPONSIBLE .
THEREFORE YOU GET ASSET STRIPPED AND REPLACED BY RESPONSIBLE AND PROFITABLE BUSINESS MODELS!!
http://cuthulan.wordpress.com/2013/12/20/do-we-even-need-a-banking-sector-not-any-more/
http://cuthulan.wordpress.com/2011/04/20/bonuses-for-dummies-or-the-bonus-myth/
FYI
Belgium without a government for 2 years economically outpreformed the rest of Europe…including Switzerland!!
WHO NEEDS POLITIONS OR POLITICAL PARTIES?
The 2nd LAW of Thermodynamics clearly states the more you impose law ,the more you accelerate chaos.
A centralised authority imposing social laws can only create social chaos!
There is a law against murder ,how is that going?
OR today is the centralised authority training our youth to murder without thought or consequence? (its called joining the armed forces)
Who was responsible for starting WWII?
“Should Germany merchandise (do business) again in the next 50 years we have led this war (WW1) in vain.” – Winston Churchill in The Times (1919)
“We will force this war upon Hitler, if he wants it or not.” – Winston Churchill (1936 broadcast)
“Germany becomes too powerful. We have to crush it.” – Winston Churchill (November 1936 speaking to US – General Robert E. Wood)
“This war is an English war and its goal is the destruction of Germany.” – Winston Churchill (- Autumn 1939 broadcast)
Enjoy your freedom peasants!!
Remember to pay your taxes and fight thier wars!!
http://cuthulan.wordpress.com/2011/08/18/democracy-2-0-progressive-iceland-and-dictatorship-2-0-oppressive-britain-the-difference-between-true-democracy-and-elected-dictatorship/
John Goss
You see what your LIMITED knowledge does to you. Should not you have research problem more carefully before publishing your article? Andijan Massacre may mean LITTLE to MAD lefties but it means A LOT for Uzbeks.
Lavrov’s speech. Here is the source in Russian http://www.globalrus.ru/news/141391/ Published on 2nd June 2005. Use google translate.
Karimov’s visit to Kremlin after Andijan massacre also in Russian http://www.fergananews.com/articles/3846
Here is another Russian source http://4vlada.net/vneshnyaya-politika/andizhanskoe-poboishche-vosstanie-v-uzbekistane-podavleno-s-bespretsedentnoi-zhe
Uzbek in the UK; I think what you’re seeing is a reaction. I grew up under Cold War propaganda. I didn’t take much notice of the news; as a child, I called it “the nasty old news”. But somehow it worked its magic. I knew that the Sun never shone in “Russia” (ie. the USSR). I knew that people were perpetually miserable there, everyone wore the same uniform, endlessly watched missile parades, and no one ever smiled, because there was nothing to be happy about.
In the early ’90s I started to meet some real Russians who had come to Britain. They were just ordinary people, with stories of family life and work and love. The caricature of Russians as broken people robbed of all humanity by an overpowering system was broken, and I started to learn some surprising things. They’d gone swimming a lot, because there was no charge to use the municipal baths. They’d had to share telephones, but there were no telephone bills. No one expected to be unemployed. So it had turned out that there had been a genuinely communal side to “communism”, which for me had just been a word for intense oppression.
Please note that I am not arguing against the USSR and Russia’s poor human rights, but the picture I’d been presented with by the media was hopelessly biased, leaving my mind with no truer image to fill the large gap left by what had been discredited. Speculation fills such voids, and the pro-capitalist propaganda continues, inciting reaction against it.
Uzbek, I missed something on the threads. Is MAD an acronym? What does it stand for?
John Goss
I said that Lenin said it first (and I still convinced that he was the first) because I DO NOT believe that texts in Bible reflect historical facts. In fact historians nowadays argue about many of the texts in Bible that were given to the Christians as undisputable truth for centuries. Do you want links for this too? Come on do your research.
Can you argue with the fact that someone who experienced oppression and unfair treatment from another will always (or at least for a long time) will have fear of that another? I suppose Iraqis will have for long time fear, distrust or hate towards Anglo Saxons. And would you argue with the fact that many Iraqis would now MUCH BETTER the EVIL of US/UK? Or would you still claim that John Goss whose arse is firmly on chair in (I suppose) comfortable British town knows better than Iraqis what US/UK did to them?
Mr Goss’s Doctrine, neatly set out by the Tovarish himself:
“Now if you keep hounding me because I do not share your vision about western democracies I will ignore you, as I ignore those who believe in torture, and the sock-puppets. Have you signed up to MI5 or something?”
Characterised by
1/. the slur (MI5)
2/. the laughable misrepresentation (“hounding me”..because “I do not share your vision”)
3. the cop-out (I can’t meet your arguments, therefore I will, on the basis of a trumped-up charge, no longer engage with you.
********************
“Life is getting better, life is getting merrier!” (J. Stalin, ca. 1932)
Uzbek
“Notice how anti-Israeli comments slowly making their way to this thread.”
__________________
You’re not surprised, surely? It was only a matter of time, since the two great themes of the Excellences on this blog are
1/. anti-Westernism
2/. anti-Israelism and a barely concealed anti-Jewishness.
Uzbek in the UK, my generation in the UK was not encouraged to know very much about Russia/USSR, beyond it being a dangerous inhuman enemy poised to destroy us with nuclear weapons which would be there forever. Similarly, the media repeatedly made big efforts to convince us of the insane inhumanity of the leader(s) of whichever country our politicians were about have their next war with. That never included Russia/USSR (thank God). There has never been much consciousness of the real situation in Russia.
Uzbek in the UK
20 Mar, 2014 – 1:23 pm
“I believe that both Arabs and Jews must be given the same right in the state of Israel.”
Thank you, but is your support for a two state solution or a single state solution?
Doug Scorgie (to Uzbek)
“How do you think other posters here can check that what you say is true if you don’t provide links or references?”
_______________________-
Which implies that you think that everything is true provided it’s from or backed up by a link.
Newsjunkiepost? Counterpunch?
I give you this, you do have a sense of humour! 🙂
Clark
“Uzbek in the UK, my generation in the UK was not encouraged to know very much about Russia/USSR, beyond it being a dangerous inhuman enemy poised to destroy us with nuclear weapons”
_______________________
Sounds very much like your excuse for being one of the useful idiots. It’s not my fault, boo hoo, they suppressed the information about how wonderful lofe in the Soviet Union really was!
The Eastern Europeans can tell you all about Russia/Soviet Union.
Mr Scorgie to Uzbek
“Thank you, but is your support for a two state solution or a single state solution?”
__________________
Once he’s told you, will you tell which of the two YOU support?
Thank you.
Спасибо, Mister Goss. My favorite, most subversive part of the UDHR is
“every individual and every organ of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms”
because if Americans took in this web page, the US deep state would grind to a halt.
http://www.ohchr.org/EN/ProfessionalInterest/Pages/UniversalHumanRightsInstruments.aspx
It’s more sensitive and secret than anything Snowden took. In the US this stuff is strictly for elites, like in the USSR where only the nomenklatura could read 1984. The young US elites that manage to learn of human rights, usually in an International Baccalaureate, immediately get shipped off to Hotchkiss and Harvard or Yale or Johns Hopkins, where they’re taught it’s a stick to beat enemy nations. Lawyers are carefully indoctrinated not to think of human rights as domestic law: it’s “non-self executing” (just a runaround, it’s binding anyway); “the constitution covers all those rights” (obsolete shit dreamed up by slavers and now revoked – right, that’s all you need.)
Putin was a rising star when the Helsinki Final Act dissolved his totalitarian state, and now it’s payback time.
Habbabkuk, I do not believe that there is much anti-Jewishness in this comment sections, though I agree that there is some. There is much suspicion that Jewish connections and influence are often pro-Israeli, and thus pro Israel expansionism, pro Israeli apartheid and supportive of Israeli racist murder and human rights abuses. Undoubtedly such influence exists, but it is not explicitly displayed, thus encouraging speculation as to its extent. I have such worries myself, the extent of Murdoch’s influence being just one example.
But subtract the problem of Israel, and I’m convinced that the vast majority of what you perceive as “anti-Jewishness” would simply evaporate.
Habbabkuk, 2:03 pm: do you think that the people you argue against here are evil and/or inhuman?
Uzbek in the UK
20 Mar, 2014 – 1:23 pm
“I believe that both Arabs and Jews must be given the same right in the state of Israel.”
But as the Israeli State does not practice this, you presumably must agree with the highlighting of & criticism of exactly this when it is posted here ?
BTW how goes the Jewish myth of Jews being the superior “Chosen People” rate your assessment of the Israeli State history of military aggression against its neighbours ? It this not a sort of chauvinism that you say that is inherent with Russians ?
Ignoring the bigger and more serious picture, looking at this purely from a gay sub-culture point of view, some of these uniformed shaven Ukranian lads, whether they be far right or whatever political labels they claim or are given, are quite cute. It’s a wonder ‘the West’ hasn’t found a gay angle to this with which to bash Russia or Putin.
Mad-leftie anti-zionists of the world unite. This thread has deteriorated somewhat since the routine, ever recurring and totally spurious claims of “anti-Israeli comments” being made were made. I for one have noticed a steady onslaught of anti-anti-Zionist comments pervading these comments for a considerable time (years actually). No-one has mentioned the zionist terrorist state of Israel except for those tireless tiresome anti-anti-zionists who daily scale new heights of hypocrisy and selective memory in defending this gruesome cult. Feeling left out in the cold as they’re not centre stage the zionist troll cadre must and are introducing the subject themselves, whilst attempting to police others comments, as ever. Legitimate and deserved, even scathing and bitter criticism of Israel’s state sanctioned crimes of genocide and exposing its band of willing idiot Israel-firster drones for their breathtaking gall. Such exceptionalism, such presumption of impunity from the ghastliest bloodiest crimes as found in the Israeli case is shared by the UK and US governing oligarchical elites and unsurprisingly all three are the subject of these same noisome trolls’ mendacious ostentatious sickly devotion.
They hang together, they’ll hang together.
tarpit 20 Mar, 2014 – 2:10 pm
Thank you too. Yes, I believe it that those exclusive universities teach that these rights (UDHR) are to make sure foreign countries toe the line. Same in the UK I’m afraid. Here it starts a lot earlier, maybe even at prep-school but certainly by Eton, Rugby or Harrow. Such privileged children are taught they are different from us, and born to rule. Unfortunately it turns out to be true.
Uzbek, cannot find in your links where Karimov visited Russia and spoke to Putin on May 15 2005. Can you point me please to the exact text.
Clark
“Habbabkuk, 2:03 pm: do you think that the people you argue against here are evil and/or inhuman?”
___________________
To do so would be to overstate their importance, I think. I’d only start asking myself those questions about people who actually DO, or are in a position to DO rather than just foam at the mouth. As far as the mouth foamers are concerned, it’s a kinder – and more constructive – use of my time and energy to offer them a metaphorical Kleenex tissue rather than to speculate about whether they’re evil and/or inhuman.
I do of course have my opinions about them and also about what probably makes them tick. But I’m sure you know what those opinions are from my posts.
Tony M
“It’s a wonder ‘the West’ hasn’t found a gay angle to this with which to bash Russia or Putin.”
_________________
Heaven forbid, Tony! There’s enough gay-bashing going on already in rasPutin’s Russia!