xzar_monty

With all due respect, that looks like pretty silly whataboutism to me. I spoke about Russia's ridiculous comments on Lithuania, and you bringing up "the west bleating" is changing the subject altogether. I didn't say anything about the west. I am not ignorant of the faults of the west. It's true that most subjects are complex and most things have repercussions and implications, but when someone says "X looks stupid doing Y", a derogatory response concerning parties other than X and actions other than Y does not look like adult discussion / reasonable argumentation in my book. Anyone can do that at any time no matter what the subject, and it's almost never a good idea.

The Moscow Times is far from being pro-western, for reasons you describe. But as you say, it isn't pro Putin enough: for example, that article talks about a "military campaign" (even if it's misspelled), and that's enough to land you in trouble in Russia.

Here's what Kreml spokesman Dmitry Peskov has to say about the Lithuania / Kaliningrad situation, according to Reuters: "The situation is more than serious," Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters. "This decision is really unprecedented. It's a violation of everything." Let us pause for moment to reflect [sic] upon the fact that it is impossible to build a mirror large enough for Russia to see itself. "It's a violation of everything." Hear the indignation of the spokesperson whose country is in the process of raping babies, murdering civilians, destroying buildings, demolishing infrastructure, etc.

No, and no. This, of course, does not mean that they might not contain truthful information. But I think it would be quite foolish to regard them as reliable sources. I wonder whether they themselves regard what they do as journalism, or whether they purposefully write adolescent stuff like that(*). It's hard to know. But as I said earlier, the language itself is a total giveaway right from the start: any journalist who knows anything about the craft will not use language like that. (I started my journalistic career in the 1980s.) Now, you would get away with stuff like that in The Sun or the now-defunct News of the World, but that's rubbish, that's not proper journalism. (*) We do know there are troll factories in Russia, but I don't know if this is an example of that kind of work.

No. The first paragraph was enough to convince me that this was adolescent stuff. You just don't write language like that if you want to be taken seriously as a political commentator.

An article written by a bloke called "Tyler Durden", with the first paragraph containing expressions like "media establishment" and "singular event". It would take some effort to get further away from credible reporting. It's doable, of course, but takes effort.

@Gorth: download the Duolingo app and refresh your French. This is not in French, but some of the stress placements are decidedly not English. "Mystic mistakes are neVER made" and so on. Superb prog-metal from (French) Canada!

I read four sentences of the first article you linked, the one on that national-conservative site. It was enough to convince me that it was either extraordinarily bad journalism or intentionally nasty stuff. One of the worst aspects of internet is that all kinds of rubbish can quite easily be made to look at least somewhat legit.

They're the best (says one). Here's some marvelous footage. Btw, if anyone wishes to count what time signature that main riff is in, there's a fairly big clue right there in front of you.

Russia is what it is is the new boys will be boys.

According to various sources, none of which I'd trust, there's (been?) a huge fire in Russia's largest gas deposit today / yesterday. There are several videos on youtube for anyone who's interested. I haven't seen anything on this on any medium that I would trust. Annoying, this. And it's been like this since about day one.

I understand. However, Sauli Niinistö is almost the opposite of a scaremonger: very careful with his language and very understated in his tone. I know you probably weren't aware of this and almost certainly haven't been able to listen to him in his native language, so no blame on you. Btw, not relevant, but here's another example of the charm of Scandinavia (for me, anyway). The president of Finland came to a book fair to listen to his wife, but all the seats were taken so he just sat on the stairs. There's something refreshingly humane about that, i.e. the leader of country being in a position to do something simple like that without any hassle.

The translation is wrong. He didn't use the term WMD, he described thermobarics as weapons capable of causing great destruction. There is a difference there, right? All WMDs are capable of causing great destruction, but not all weapons capable of causing great destruction are WMDs. The guy is a lawyer and strict with his language, so I'd wager he's chosen his words with care. As for which media, that's a fair point and one I'm not able to ascertain. Russia has plenty of equivalents for The Sun, but I'm not sure if it has equivalents for quality media anymore. It used to, but a lot has changed in the past 3+ months.

In other news: Russia has breached Swedish airspace once again. Also, according to Russian media, the president of Finland is psychotic; their analyst stressed that it is a real psychosis he's talking about. This kind of stuff is not overly significant, but it shows what kind of country we're dealing with.

I agree that the rhetorical construct is abused all the time, and I wouldn't use it in the case of Palestine or Israel. However, from this it does not follow that the ability to just stop wouldn't apply to Russia. (This, btw, is in response to @Gorth as well, it's too much of a hassle to quote both on a similar topic.) What you both said does apply here, as does the psychological problem of resources already spent (in the same way a gambler will often continue 'because the big win is just around the corner' even if it would be wiser to just stop and accept the current losses). But I still believe that because of the extent to which Putin controls the narrative in Russia, he could stop. The goals of the operation have already changed, and Putin could declare victory right now by saying that Mariupol has been liberated, and that would be that. Now, he absolutely won't do it. But the original claim that I objected to was that both Russia and Ukraine are effectively out of options, and thus the collective west is the main culprit for the continuation of the war. This claim is just stupid, in my opinion, and I actually wonder whether the person who made it is one of those who think that rape victims generally deserve it -- the logic is similar. Ukraine has no options, because surrender just isn't realistic. Russia has all kinds of options. It won't use them, but it absolutely does have them.

Don't be ridiculous. Russia always has the option to just stop. There is no way this can ever be taken away from them. The reponsible party is Russia who disregarded everything and just went on and started the war. I wonder what your agenda is, making claims that are so utterly against reality. If your argument against this is that Putin would lose face, that doesn't make any sense, either. If he stops the war or loses it, he can simply claim victory. If anyone inside the country disputes that, these people will be jailed or outright killed. Remember, according to Russia, there is no war, and there haven't been any notable demonstrations against this blatant lie. All other lies will also be accepted.

What do you mean by "just to punish Russia"? If the fight goes "to the last Ukrainian" as you write, then it surely must be a defensive fight, in which case there is no way it can be "just to punish Russia" as you also write.

I wonder if the mechanism is roughly the same as with wars: apparently the appreciation of life goes up when it's threatened. One notable consequence of war is a significant drop in suicides.

Harrowing scenario as presented by the historian Timothy Snyder. I find this entirely logical and plausible, but whether it's true (or intended to happen) is a different thing altogether.

Two interesting things to notice: Scandinavia, once again, does really damn well. And the United States does not do well. Whether it's corruption or infant mortality or whatnot, the United States does not do well.

No doubt that is true as well. There is hierarchy among the lower classes, too.

Regardless of how they feel, they are in fact treated as second class by virtue of the fact that they are the ones sent to the front. It's not the ethnic Russians from the big cities that fight the fight, it's the poor rural boys whose ethnicity tends to be other than Russian.

It would be, yes, I agree. But the strange thing is that Russia has clearly done an awful lot of things that are very damaging. I wonder if this kind of symbolism would make them stop. Obviously we're not going to know. This thought experiment just came along when I was thinking of power, symbolism, potential peaceful ways of making a difference, that sort of thing. As for #2, that's an interesting thing. Of course the pope has always been a big figure, but still. When I recently read that "Jordan Peterson is the most important intellectual of the western world right now", or something along those lines, I thought that if that is true, it's not a good thing.

Nah. I was a classmate of a future minister. It's not really useful to regard politicians as something fundamentally other, or a group to make blanket statements about. Obviously there are countries where politicians tend to be more trustworthy than in some other countries.

It absolutely depends, and I don't have much respect for the Catholic church, either. But despite either of our reservations, I would still argue that in a case such as this, the pope would be the biggest figure on the planet. He's religious, and he has a massive church behind him. There is no Albert Einstein figure in the world right now, would you agree?