Barothmuk

Err, no. Nostalgia for the Soviet Union amongst the former Soviet states (and satellites) is pretty common knowledge so I picked from the first article I found. It'd be nice if it did also show the opinions those 4 countries had on the dissolution of the Soviet Union however that was by no means necessary to disprove your point. You said 90% of people hated it. This is evidently wrong. Now for those countries not mentioned East-Germany, and to a much lesser extent Poland, have a concept known as Ostalgie which refers to the cultural phenomenon of missing the late Soviet system and Yugoslavia is quite well known for its continued reverence for Tito. Now because I get the feeling some are being a little thick, this is not support for the late Soviet style system nor its leaders, I'm merely pointing out your historical and cultural ignorance.

That's a shame. I thought she had the best design so far.

Despite the "economic stagnation" of the Brezhnev years and the imperialist relationship between Russia and many of the Republics most people today actually miss the union or at the very least perceive the break-up to have been negative. E.g. With that said this is irrelevant to the original argument. You incorrectly stated the Soviet republics did not want to be part of the union and were occupied. I assert the much more sensible claim that relationships between Russia and the other Soviet states varied but in general their was popular support and collaboration between the regimes. Amusing how what is deemed correct is not based on facts but on whether or not what is stated fits with pre-existing notions. If a Westerner acknowledges there existed popular support this shows their ignorance; if someone from the East acknowledges support this shows their "indoctrination".

That's 2, and no not initially. Poland was liberated by a joint Polish-Soviet effort, which was followed by a series of agricultural reforms wherein land was redistributed to the peasants which proved to be extremely popular. Furthermore Poland also received “15,000 tons of petroleum products, 2 million tons of iron ore, 569,000 tons of aluminium, 250,000 tons of manganese ore, and 155,000 tons of cotton which naturally encouraged Soviet support and helped redevelop the nation. Of course as we all know relations eventually soured. Haha, no. You post a Wikipedia link of a single event and assert this is proof that every state was in a permanent state of occupation and wanted no part of it. I assert relations between the Soviet states were dynamic and gradually changed.

You do realise how fallacious it is suggesting this invasion means ALL STATES WERE OCCUPIED AND DID NOT EVER WANT TO BE PART OF THE UNION. I'm by no means condoning the Soviet's aggression here, I'm just pointing out the silliness of your assertion. (for some extra historical wankery) The shift right-ward in Czech politics was largely thanks to Khrushchev's expulsion of the "dogmatic" Stalinist hardliners in favour of promoting more lenient market friendly leaders such as Dubček. It's only natural leaders such as this would shift their alliances west-ward.

Incorrect. Red Army forces operated alongside national communist parties (whom were quite popular as they were often the dominant resistance against the fascists) who were democratically elected either fully into power or as part of coalition governments. The Red Army itself, contrary to what many believed, evacuated the areas quite quickly and were basically entirely gone by the early 50's.

It's a tad premature to be declaring the end of "liberal democracy" just yet, however the prosperity that the post-war boom gave the west has been dwindling for decades and is naturally going to continue to do so thus pushing 'people' to search for 'alternatives'. Lol, oh wow no. You had a right-wing government in 2002 and a slightly less right-wing government in 2008.

Why not? Music seems like a different bag of fish to visual mediums. The content of Slayer's music doesn't depict or exclude any ethnic groups as far as I'm aware. "Appeal more to women" is a vague and meaningless platitude. What fantasy writers should do is write female characters that aren't simply props, prizes or whatever and instead individuals with their own thoughts, motivations and so on like male characters. GRRM's depiction of women is certainly mixed but at the very least better than most male fantasy writers. Why not?

Nah, the West is interfering. This whole kerfuffle escalated when the West backed anti-Russian sections within Ukraine so they could drag Ukrainian markets within the Western sphere. In turn the Russians respond by grabbing hold of whatever sections of the Ukraine they can maintain domination over. It's stupid to play cheerleader for either side.

Aww (rhymes with door) Mao (as in Zedong) Ahh (as in Doctor: "Say ahhh") Yup.

My Walking Dead Season 2 play-through:

This is the explanation I found on RPGCodex so make of it what you will. Going purely off that I can't even pretend to care about this so-called controversy.

"A man may build himself a throne of bayonets, but he cannot sit on it". That sounds like it's dripping with homoerotic subtext.

I'd love to see games with AAA budgets targeted at women made by the same out-of-touch stuffy old white guys. **** like Cooking Mama would be the new COD.

Likewise. And I assert that collectivization was a success as it fulfilled its stated goal. It rapidly collectivized agriculture turning millions of ineffective small scale farms into a couple of hundred thousand large, efficient collectively owned farms serviced with tractors and machinery; in turn this was able to provide a push for mass industrialization in urban centres which doubled the urban populace. Naturally such a large scale endeavour was not executed flawlessly; disruption of agricultural norms certainly antagonized sections of the populace, local officials often used coercive means to encourage collectivization. Furthermore this was obviously the final rift between the Soviet state and the enemy capitalist Kulak class, as the Kulaks resisted Soviet collectivization and tried to sabotage it by slaughtering cattle and so on (although the extent of this was greatly exaggerated by the Soviets). Of course this all coincided with a terrible draught which combined with heavy handed Soviet policies, Kulak sabotage and an all around ****ty harvest resulted in a terrible famine. Despite all this, agriculture stabilized by 1935 and became much more efficient than ever before thereby bringing an end to major famines in the region.

Annnnnnd you've missed the point. The Soviet leadership is indeed responsible for a significant loss of life in this period however it is incorrect to say they are wholly responsible and that all of these deaths were a direct consequence of these policies. The U.S.S.R at the time was a huge collection of republics that were at most semi-industrialised. Death on a large scale was going to happen regardless of who was in charge. Where the Soviet leadership succeeded was in pulling out of this crisis and managing to rapidly industrialise and eclipse the productivity of the West: Reducing it to merely "Stalin implemented policies than everyone died" is an inaccurate and dishonest portrayal that fails to capture the success and severity of the period. An excess of 4-24 million is quite the overshoot. And like I said, with a population that size, in a collection of republics with limited levels of industry, in a time of severe drought, a large scale of death is going to happen no matter what man or party is "in charge". Have you studied the era perchance? I say this because all of the historians I first mentioned, although they by no means support Stalin, they highlight his success and effectiveness as a leader. To quote a famous historian who certainly felt no love for the man: "[stalin] had found Russia working with wooden ploughs and left it equipped with atomic piles". - Isaac Deutscher

This wasn't done arbitrarily. The state capitalism of the NEP had restored Russia and the republics to pre-war levels and begun to plateau. Not wanting to continue presiding over capitalism longer then necessary (kind of looks bad for a CP) and desperately needing to industrialise to "build socialism" and catch up with, and defend themselves from, the rest of the world they believed they had to simultaneously, collectivize agriculture, rapidly industrialize and abolish the remnants of "capitalist relations" (e.g. the kulak class). Given the large landspace, primitive technology, competing interests of individuals (both in and out of the party), poor-planning and ****-ups of the party combined with a massive draught (a common occurrence in the Slavic states) this naturally resulted in an catastrophic loss of life. Despite all this their policies were a success, industrial productivity surpassed the Western powers and they were able to defend themselves from the growing fascist threat. So a success with lots of tragedy. Worth keeping in mind is that the rest of industrialized powers took hundreds of years of colonialism, imperialism, raw worker exploitaton and slavery to achieve the same thing. Lol those statistics are ridiculous. The Black Book of Communism, a widely discredit piece where even the authors themselves admitted to inflating deathtolls says the maximum deaths in the era was 6 million. You said "Leader quality = number of deaths", I was merely following your logic.

1) Pillars of Eternity 2) Pillars of Eternity 3) Pillars of Eternity It's literally the only upcoming game I'm excited for atm. That said the missus is picking up DA:I (excuse being "You know we're going to want to bitch about it") so if I hear it's particularly awful I'll no doubt end up giving it a whirl.

Nah, that's far too simplistic. More Americans died under Lincoln than Bush but that doesn't mean the latter is a "better leader" than the former.

I think it's the fact that they look short that through me off.

In western academia, once the archives were opened, the most prominent historians in the Soviet field (J. Arch Getty, Robert Thurston, Sarah Davies, Sheila Fitzpatrick etc) more or less debunked the "evil totalitarian" paradigm. Yes, they don't support Stalin in the sense that they're Stalinists or whatever but they do acknowledge although ruthless he was indeed a competent and thus "great" leader of the time (much like Sorophx's Russian pals). Of course the West can't be peddling an educational curriculum that's sympathetic to the reds so instead they stick with the flawed historical narrative of Cold War works like Robert Conquest and Service. But you know, crazy Russian propaganda vs glorious Western freedom. EDIT: RE: The comments provided by sorophx's Russian friends) Although I have no love for the Russian, nor U.S state I can't help but find it amusing that the "brainwashed" Russians have a more level headed (albeit wrong) approach to this whole situation compared to many of the "Free-minded" people of the West. Of course this is only two people so we can't be making sweeping conclusions but it's amusing none the less.

What are portraits #1 and #16 meant to be?

I'm going to be boring and say I genuinely like all the portraits so far. Definitely need some more dorf love though. EDIT: Although now that I examine closer the elf-backer portrait having a "proper" background unlike the rest kind of sticks out.

Sorry to be quoting you here two for two but... Thanks Obama.

Because up until now the police had been maintaining a velvet glove policy.