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  • #46
    Originally posted by Nodens View Post
    It seems that it doesn't. Ukrainians haven't yet implemented a single condition required for receiving further IMF financial aid. Christine Lagarde already registered disproval in her letter to Ukrainian PM.
    Can't be a*sed with idiot trolls anymore, apologies. If you want a real explanation try using the introduction here http://www.worldaffairsboard.com/showthread.php?t=61571

    Last edited by snapper; 19 Nov 15,, 07:07.

    Comment


    • #47
      hello nodens,

      welcome to WAB-- please introduce yourself!

      http://www.worldaffairsboard.com/sho...61571&page=123
      There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov

      Comment


      • #48
        Welcome BocaVoc. Please see astralis' post above yours. You are kindly asked to introduce yourself. I agree that the corruption issue in Ukraine is not being sufficiently targeted at present but hopefully we will have a new Prosecutor General soon and clear out the judiciary. Until then

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        • #49
          [QUOTE=snapper;1001007]Welcome BocaVoc. Please see astralis' post above yours. You are kindly asked to introduce yourself. I agree that the corruption issue in Ukraine is not being sufficiently targeted at present but hopefully we will have a new Prosecutor General soon and clear out the judiciary. Until then


          Snapper

          He has no intention of introducing himself. He's just a drive-by poster with an agenda not in keeping with the WAB ideal, which is to discuss various topics. Unless you think his post is worthwhile, I'm inclined to delete it in hopes this will discourage drive-by postings.
          To be Truly ignorant, Man requires an Education - Plato

          Comment


          • #50
            By all means delete it.

            Sadly a less than appropriate new Prosecutor General, Yuriy Lutsenko, an old political players, former head of Poroshenko's Party in the Rada and a man without any legal qualification, was appointed by Poroshenko in May/June this year. Not encouraging when there are serious questions regarding land deals in which he and the President engaged in 2013, that he should be asked himself. Nor frankly is he is any good at cross examination as proved by his pathetic questioning of Yanukovych via a live link recently.

            Comment


            • #51
              not sure if this is the right thread to put this in, but here goes.

              https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/08/w...tykh-dead.html

              Assassins Are Killing Ukraine’s Rebel Chiefs, but on Whose Orders?

              MOSCOW — All died far from the front lines in circumstances unrelated to military action. They died in elaborate ambushes, car bomb attacks and, in one case, a booby-trapped elevator. The latest died on Wednesday in an explosion in his office.

              The staccato of about half a dozen assassinations of commanders in the Russian-backed separatist army in eastern Ukraine has become one of the riddles of the war there since 2015, when the first unexplained killings of Cossack militia leaders occurred.

              Ukrainian officials have denied any involvement in the killings, while welcoming them for thinning the ranks of the breakaway military. The authorities in Kiev say the deaths point to either infighting in the separatist leadership or efforts by Russia to consolidate control by eliminating erratic, if popular, local commanders on their own side.

              The assassinations could ease peace talks; Ukraine had refused direct negotiations with the rebel leadership as long as men it deemed war criminals held senior posts.

              Rebel officials blamed Ukraine for the latest death, of Mikhail Tolstykh, best known by his nom de guerre, Givi. The Kremlin spokesman, Dmitri S. Peskov, denied any Russian role.

              Mr. Tolstykh died early Wednesday when a rocket was fired from a portable launcher into the window of his office, a separatist news agency reported. The blast blew out windows and started a fire.

              A Ukrainian military spokesman, Aleksandr Motuzyanik, suggested to journalists in Kiev that Mr. Tolstykh’s own soldiers might be to blame in a so-called fragging episode, or the killing of an officer.

              His unit, Mr. Motuzyanik said, suffered heavy losses in a recent flare-up of fighting near the town of Avdiivka, creating “many enemies and ill-wishers.”

              The other victims of the assassinations include Arsen Pavlov, who went by the nickname Motorola and was killed in the elevator bombing; Aleksei Mozgovoy, a former restaurant cook turned commander of a unit called the Ghost Brigade; and Aleksandr Bednov, who went by the nickname Batman.

              The European Union placed Mr. Pavlov, a Russian citizen, on sanctions lists after he boasted in an interview of shooting 15 Ukrainian soldiers who were taken prisoner during the fight for the Donetsk city airport in 2015.

              Mr. Tolstykh also played a prominent role in that battle and appeared in a video forcing kneeling, captured Ukrainian soldiers to eat the cloth Ukrainian flag insignia from their uniforms.

              The assassinations have caused enough worry among rebel commanders that a year ago Aleksandr Khodakovsky, leader of the Vostok battalion, insinuated a Russian role in a post on the social network LiveJournal.

              “I ask you again,” he wrote in a sarcastic letter addressed to Russian authorities that noted the car bombings and machine gun bursts in earlier attacks, “if it comes to taking measures against me, try to do it in a way that others don’t suffer.”
              There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov

              Comment


              • #52
                Political parties better aggregate and represent citizen interests. and Elections are fair, transparent and competitive.

                Comment


                • #53
                  I guess I'll post here... Honestly, would have loved to be able to just start my own thread, but there is no button for it, for some reason...

                  As I said in the other thread, my position on Crimea is... complicated. Very much so.

                  I was born in Sevastopol myself. My father, at the time, in 1989, was a proud officer of the Soviet Navy, serving aboard what is now the missile cruiser RFS "Moscow"

                  At the time, it was called, the "Slava" ("Glory"). It entered the ranks of the Soviet Black Sea fleet in 1983. Today, it is the flagship of the Russian BSF. Carries "carrier killer" missiles. I don't need to explain what those are for, name kinda speaks for itself :)

                  Dad, he is ethnic Ukrainian. From Poltava, originally. But he was a proud Soviet. Proud Soviet MILITARY too, I should add. He was Navy. His brother, Uncle Alik was in the Red Army, in strategic missile forces, actually, he worked with nukes! Their father, grandpa Nikolai, was a red Army GENERAL, Lieutenant-General, to be exact.

                  When he talks about serving on the Slava/Moskva... It's like, the proudest time of his life.

                  He hates modern Ukraine and modern Russia. Putin and Poroshenko and etc. He basically, feels that his country, soviet Union, was stolen from him in 1991. When I ask him who, he feels, stole it from him, he is not sure. Gorbachev. Yeltsin. Kravchuk. All of them together...

                  Personally, I believe he just misses his youth and all the good times he had back then, all his friends from the Navy, some of whom are dead now... Not to mention the... well... privileges he enjoyed, growing up as a son of a powerful Soviet general. Grandma Olga, God rest her soul, once told me, when I was little, how they had, back then, a big, shiny black limo with a chauffeur soldier; and also three women who cooked, cleaned, and did their laundry for them... Not to mention a big apartment in an elite building in central Moscow (same building where the Brezhnev family was living back then, btw, in fact, dad and Brezhnev's daughter often shared an elevator in the morning, no joke!)

                  Now, mom, well, she hates the Soviet Union, the Communists, with a passion. She is Russian, btw. Well, HALF Russian. Russian mother, grandma Katya; Jewish father, grandpa Teodor. Katya's ancestors were Russian nobility, before the Revolution. After 1917 they faced unimaginable horrors. Dekulakization, executions, GULags. Well... see "Dr. Zhivago" or something, it shows much about that period... Most of them died. The survivors struggled on in poverty and misery, in hellish communal apartments and barracks... Katya was born in one of those places. She had three brothers. two were killed in battle in WWII; third came home without legs, and killed himself when Stalin began shipping the war cripples out to the Far North, so as not to soil the people's victorious mood with their sight. He chose to put a bullet in his own head, rather than slowly perish out there... Teodor, he was a brilliant engineer, even, one would say inventor. In America, he would have made a name for himself, become like Thomas Edison, or fucking Steve Jobs, seriously, he was, I believe, that gifted. As it was, in Soviet Union, he helped design many power plants and big factories and such. But, because he was Jewish, many top universities were closed to him, and he was not trusted to travel out of the country, after 1948, when Israel was formed, and they were afraid he'd bolt there and take all his knowledge, including classified projects he'd worked on, with him. Many, many years later, from archive research, we would learn that Grandpa Todik was extremely lucky that Stalin died when he did. There was an accident at a power plant he'd helped design. An explosion. A worker was killed. They were gonna blame him, Grandpa Todik, declare him an enemy agent, a spy, saboteur, God knows what else. He'd probably have been shot. That was when Stalin, in his paranoid delirium, was convinced the Jews were out to get him, that's when the fake "Doctor's Plot" emerged: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctors%27_plot

                  Basically, if Stalin had lived longer... Who knows, there may have been a second, Soviet, Holocaust, to speak plainly.

                  So, point is, mom can't stand the Soviets. Period.

                  Yet, for some reason, she feels better about Putin. Most of her relatives in Crimea also support him. They all voted in the Referendum in 2014, all for Russia. All of them expressed the same wish before, in 1991. There was a referendum back then also, where Crimeans voted to become their own, separate Soviet Republic. But that was all forgotten when USSR broke up and Russia and Ukraine went their own ways...

                  Now... My opinion... Ukraine, independent, post-1991 Ukraine, made many mistakes in Crimea.

                  Their biggest one was pushing away ethnic Russian citizens, rather than embracing them and DRAWING them into Ukraine.

                  I was little back then, but I remember a bit of 1991 and 1992. Black Sea Fleet was being divided back then. It was a crazy time. Father was still serving then too, he would be demobilized in 1995, when I was six. I recall, one evening, he came home, his uniform jacket all torn up, a black eye on his face, one lip also bleeding. Mom was horrified, asked him, what the hell happened. I was eating supper in the kitchen then, and heard them talking, he was telling how sailors who wanted to serve for Russia and those for Ukraine were having physical altercations aboard the warships. And how he and a group of fellow officers had to beat up, that day, some sailors who tried to raise the Ukrainian flag on the Slava; and then had to hold back others, who wanted to fucking lynch those "traitors". That's why he was all roughed up.

                  Take this in, btw, this is a Ukrainian man himself, who beat the crap out of other Ukrainians for trying to take down the Soviet flag on his ship :D

                  In the end, these Ukrainians, a small minority on the Slava, left the ship, and joined the new Ukrainian fleet; just as Russian and pro-Russian personnel who were in minority on certain mainly Ukrainian ships, went to the new Russian fleet. That's how it was all divided. Quickly, half-assedly, and often violently...

                  Well, afterwards, many families of Russian officers in Crimea, including my parents, received threatening letters from Ukrainian nationalist groups. The Ukrainian government did nothing about this. They treated Russian people in Crimea not as fellow citizens, but as some kind of occupiers or something. Rather than do things the civilized way, and allow Crimea full autonomy, including in language, like Canada has done for Quebec; Ukraine tried to suppress Russian identity in Crimea, making schools teach in Ukrainian; making pharmacies hand out Ukrainian prescriptions to old people who could not understand them, endangering their health and fucking lives in the process (the pharmacies, in the end, wrote out handwritten Russian translations for the poor sods anyhow).

                  On top of that, the Crimean Tatars, who were cruelly expelled from Crimea by Stalin, started returning to the Peninsula in the 80s, during Perestroika. In the 90s, independent Ukraine basically began using them as a demographic counterweight against the Russian population. They allowed Russophobic propaganda and anti-Russian sentiment to spread among them, taught them to blame Russians for Stalin's crimes, even though he was a fucking Georgian, and plenty of Ukrainian Red Army and NKVD officers, by the way, were just as complicit in the deportation of the Tatars from Crimea. While many Russians, such as my mom's family, were also VICTIMS of that regime.

                  Rather than reconciliation; nationalism, hostility, and anger, mutual, as similar forces arose among the Russians, were bred in Crimea.

                  This, I believe, is what, along with a timely intervention by Putin, led to the events of March 2014, and to where Crimea is today...

                  Let me be clear. I do not approve of what Putin did. In 21st century, taking territory from another country by military force is not appropriate.

                  But if Ukraine simply handled Crimea better, none of this shit would have happened. Period.

                  Comment


                  • #54
                    Absolutely fantastic narrative and post. You are a natural writer...in English no less !
                    ('Gifted, like friggin' Tolstoy, no seriously...') Touché ;-D

                    Sergey, the story of your upbringing and lineage assists the reader in understanding as to where your point of view/ perspective comes from.
                    Did Putin really steal Crimea ? No, he just took it back into the Russian fold.
                    His action was bold like a tiger...not like the actions taken by a pussycat (EU et al).
                    Putin played his hand at poker and won! Think natural energy reserves within Crimean land and water borders and an uncomprimised /(uncontested) access to the centre of the Black Sea.

                    As to family Sergey - L'Chaim !
                    Real eyes realize real lies.

                    Comment


                    • #55
                      Originally posted by The_One View Post
                      I guess I'll post here... Honestly, would have loved to be able to just start my own thread, but there is no button for it, for some reason...

                      As I said in the other thread, my position on Crimea is... complicated. Very much so....

                      After 20-25 posts, you'll be able to open threads.

                      Your personal remembrances add to the human element of the Crimea story. Adds credence to the saying "all politics are local".
                      To be Truly ignorant, Man requires an Education - Plato

                      Comment


                      • #56
                        Originally posted by The_One View Post
                        I guess I'll post here... Honestly, would have loved to be able to just start my own thread, but there is no button for it, for some reason...

                        As I said in the other thread, my position on Crimea is... complicated. Very much so.

                        I was born in Sevastopol myself. My father, at the time, in 1989, was a proud officer of the Soviet Navy, serving aboard what is now the missile cruiser RFS "Moscow"

                        At the time, it was called, the "Slava" ("Glory"). It entered the ranks of the Soviet Black Sea fleet in 1983. Today, it is the flagship of the Russian BSF. Carries "carrier killer" missiles. I don't need to explain what those are for, name kinda speaks for itself :)

                        Dad, he is ethnic Ukrainian. From Poltava, originally. But he was a proud Soviet. Proud Soviet MILITARY too, I should add. He was Navy. His brother, Uncle Alik was in the Red Army, in strategic missile forces, actually, he worked with nukes! Their father, grandpa Nikolai, was a red Army GENERAL, Lieutenant-General, to be exact.

                        When he talks about serving on the Slava/Moskva... It's like, the proudest time of his life.

                        He hates modern Ukraine and modern Russia. Putin and Poroshenko and etc. He basically, feels that his country, soviet Union, was stolen from him in 1991. When I ask him who, he feels, stole it from him, he is not sure. Gorbachev. Yeltsin. Kravchuk. All of them together...

                        Personally, I believe he just misses his youth and all the good times he had back then, all his friends from the Navy, some of whom are dead now... Not to mention the... well... privileges he enjoyed, growing up as a son of a powerful Soviet general. Grandma Olga, God rest her soul, once told me, when I was little, how they had, back then, a big, shiny black limo with a chauffeur soldier; and also three women who cooked, cleaned, and did their laundry for them... Not to mention a big apartment in an elite building in central Moscow (same building where the Brezhnev family was living back then, btw, in fact, dad and Brezhnev's daughter often shared an elevator in the morning, no joke!)

                        Now, mom, well, she hates the Soviet Union, the Communists, with a passion. She is Russian, btw. Well, HALF Russian. Russian mother, grandma Katya; Jewish father, grandpa Teodor. Katya's ancestors were Russian nobility, before the Revolution. After 1917 they faced unimaginable horrors. Dekulakization, executions, GULags. Well... see "Dr. Zhivago" or something, it shows much about that period... Most of them died. The survivors struggled on in poverty and misery, in hellish communal apartments and barracks... Katya was born in one of those places. She had three brothers. two were killed in battle in WWII; third came home without legs, and killed himself when Stalin began shipping the war cripples out to the Far North, so as not to soil the people's victorious mood with their sight. He chose to put a bullet in his own head, rather than slowly perish out there... Teodor, he was a brilliant engineer, even, one would say inventor. In America, he would have made a name for himself, become like Thomas Edison, or fucking Steve Jobs, seriously, he was, I believe, that gifted. As it was, in Soviet Union, he helped design many power plants and big factories and such. But, because he was Jewish, many top universities were closed to him, and he was not trusted to travel out of the country, after 1948, when Israel was formed, and they were afraid he'd bolt there and take all his knowledge, including classified projects he'd worked on, with him. Many, many years later, from archive research, we would learn that Grandpa Todik was extremely lucky that Stalin died when he did. There was an accident at a power plant he'd helped design. An explosion. A worker was killed. They were gonna blame him, Grandpa Todik, declare him an enemy agent, a spy, saboteur, God knows what else. He'd probably have been shot. That was when Stalin, in his paranoid delirium, was convinced the Jews were out to get him, that's when the fake "Doctor's Plot" emerged: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctors%27_plot

                        Basically, if Stalin had lived longer... Who knows, there may have been a second, Soviet, Holocaust, to speak plainly.

                        So, point is, mom can't stand the Soviets. Period.

                        Yet, for some reason, she feels better about Putin. Most of her relatives in Crimea also support him. They all voted in the Referendum in 2014, all for Russia. All of them expressed the same wish before, in 1991. There was a referendum back then also, where Crimeans voted to become their own, separate Soviet Republic. But that was all forgotten when USSR broke up and Russia and Ukraine went their own ways...

                        Now... My opinion... Ukraine, independent, post-1991 Ukraine, made many mistakes in Crimea.

                        Their biggest one was pushing away ethnic Russian citizens, rather than embracing them and DRAWING them into Ukraine.

                        I was little back then, but I remember a bit of 1991 and 1992. Black Sea Fleet was being divided back then. It was a crazy time. Father was still serving then too, he would be demobilized in 1995, when I was six. I recall, one evening, he came home, his uniform jacket all torn up, a black eye on his face, one lip also bleeding. Mom was horrified, asked him, what the hell happened. I was eating supper in the kitchen then, and heard them talking, he was telling how sailors who wanted to serve for Russia and those for Ukraine were having physical altercations aboard the warships. And how he and a group of fellow officers had to beat up, that day, some sailors who tried to raise the Ukrainian flag on the Slava; and then had to hold back others, who wanted to fucking lynch those "traitors". That's why he was all roughed up.

                        Take this in, btw, this is a Ukrainian man himself, who beat the crap out of other Ukrainians for trying to take down the Soviet flag on his ship :D

                        In the end, these Ukrainians, a small minority on the Slava, left the ship, and joined the new Ukrainian fleet; just as Russian and pro-Russian personnel who were in minority on certain mainly Ukrainian ships, went to the new Russian fleet. That's how it was all divided. Quickly, half-assedly, and often violently...

                        Well, afterwards, many families of Russian officers in Crimea, including my parents, received threatening letters from Ukrainian nationalist groups. The Ukrainian government did nothing about this. They treated Russian people in Crimea not as fellow citizens, but as some kind of occupiers or something. Rather than do things the civilized way, and allow Crimea full autonomy, including in language, like Canada has done for Quebec; Ukraine tried to suppress Russian identity in Crimea, making schools teach in Ukrainian; making pharmacies hand out Ukrainian prescriptions to old people who could not understand them, endangering their health and fucking lives in the process (the pharmacies, in the end, wrote out handwritten Russian translations for the poor sods anyhow).

                        On top of that, the Crimean Tatars, who were cruelly expelled from Crimea by Stalin, started returning to the Peninsula in the 80s, during Perestroika. In the 90s, independent Ukraine basically began using them as a demographic counterweight against the Russian population. They allowed Russophobic propaganda and anti-Russian sentiment to spread among them, taught them to blame Russians for Stalin's crimes, even though he was a fucking Georgian, and plenty of Ukrainian Red Army and NKVD officers, by the way, were just as complicit in the deportation of the Tatars from Crimea. While many Russians, such as my mom's family, were also VICTIMS of that regime.

                        Rather than reconciliation; nationalism, hostility, and anger, mutual, as similar forces arose among the Russians, were bred in Crimea.

                        This, I believe, is what, along with a timely intervention by Putin, led to the events of March 2014, and to where Crimea is today...

                        Let me be clear. I do not approve of what Putin did. In 21st century, taking territory from another country by military force is not appropriate.

                        But if Ukraine simply handled Crimea better, none of this shit would have happened. Period.
                        Interesting history - not much different from mine though more recent and my family are split along Polish/Muscovite lines from the time of Catherine's Tatars campaign. Some son of what until then was a Polish family took service with the Muscovite Tsarina and the family became 'Muscovised' (i's became y's and w's became v, Catholic turned Orthodox) and stayed loyal to the Tsar's and the Revolution, one of them serving under Denekin in Crimea where the commies poisoned him in hospital and buried him in an unmarked grave. The family survived and we remained in touch over the years to the extent that one of our distant cousins now lives with my family in what is now Western Ukraine. The son is in prison somewhere initially over the Bolotnaya Square protests and the parents will not leave without him.

                        Originally posted by The_One View Post
                        All of them expressed the same wish before, in 1991. There was a referendum back then also, where Crimeans voted to become their own, separate Soviet Republic.
                        There was yet another in 1994.... Crimea remained an autonomous Republik until the little green men moved in. Dual citizenship was permitted. Naturally the Tatars came back - why should they not? It has been their homeland since the Mongols. If they prefer to be Ukrainian rather than Muscovite... considering their treatment under Uncle Joe can you blame them? Already many of their leaders are banished, their TV station closed and their organisations banned for 'extremism' but how is it 'extreme' to be who and what you are? The Jews have their things and that doesn't bother anyone I know in Ukraine -why should the Tatars and their Mosques? We got Rusyns, Rutheinians, Lemkos, Hutsuls, Romanian speakers, Hungarian speakers and Poles - there still some 'Shamans' in the hills and nobody gives a damn really because this is not about the past - and I do not know how the Muscovite speakers in Crimea were treated - but about the future. It isn't about who or what you are but what you want for your children and grand children.

                        I went the opposite way around from you. I now have Ukrainian citizenship (though I am still a Catholic Pole in essence) and gave up British citizenship because when the Checkist neighbour - and today's Putin-ist form of Checkist State is no different from the Commies or the Tsars before them - threatens my family home (which thanks to Stalin and Churchill is now in Ukraine) I do not hesistate to fight against the same old imperialist enemy again - not in the hope of destroying the Muscovite state but in the hope of ending it's Checkist and imperialistic nature - for if Ukraine can be free and prosperous (just as Poland has become since 1991 for example) then why can't Muscovy? This is why Putin sends his troops to Ukraine - nothing to do with Muscovite minority speaking populations but because if Muscovy becomes free he hangs.

                        Comment


                        • #57
                          Originally posted by The_One View Post
                          I guess I'll post here... Honestly, would have loved to be able to just start my own thread, but there is no button for it, for some reason...

                          As I said in the other thread, my position on Crimea is... complicated. Very much so.
                          Excellent narration from the personal perspective of living through it.

                          Comment


                          • #58
                            Originally posted by JAD_333 View Post
                            After 20-25 posts, you'll be able to open threads.

                            Your personal remembrances add to the human element of the Crimea story. Adds credence to the saying "all politics are local".
                            Thanks, and thanks for info, good to know :)

                            Originally posted by snapper View Post
                            Interesting history - not much different from mine though more recent and my family are split along Polish/Muscovite lines from the time of Catherine's Tatars campaign. Some son of what until then was a Polish family took service with the Muscovite Tsarina and the family became 'Muscovised' (i's became y's and w's became v, Catholic turned Orthodox) and stayed loyal to the Tsar's and the Revolution, one of them serving under Denekin in Crimea where the commies poisoned him in hospital and buried him in an unmarked grave. The family survived and we remained in touch over the years to the extent that one of our distant cousins now lives with my family in what is now Western Ukraine. The son is in prison somewhere initially over the Bolotnaya Square protests and the parents will not leave without him.



                            There was yet another in 1994.... Crimea remained an autonomous Republik until the little green men moved in. Dual citizenship was permitted. Naturally the Tatars came back - why should they not? It has been their homeland since the Mongols. If they prefer to be Ukrainian rather than Muscovite... considering their treatment under Uncle Joe can you blame them? Already many of their leaders are banished, their TV station closed and their organisations banned for 'extremism' but how is it 'extreme' to be who and what you are? The Jews have their things and that doesn't bother anyone I know in Ukraine -why should the Tatars and their Mosques? We got Rusyns, Rutheinians, Lemkos, Hutsuls, Romanian speakers, Hungarian speakers and Poles - there still some 'Shamans' in the hills and nobody gives a damn really because this is not about the past - and I do not know how the Muscovite speakers in Crimea were treated - but about the future. It isn't about who or what you are but what you want for your children and grand children.

                            I went the opposite way around from you. I now have Ukrainian citizenship (though I am still a Catholic Pole in essence) and gave up British citizenship because when the Checkist neighbour - and today's Putin-ist form of Checkist State is no different from the Commies or the Tsars before them - threatens my family home (which thanks to Stalin and Churchill is now in Ukraine) I do not hesistate to fight against the same old imperialist enemy again - not in the hope of destroying the Muscovite state but in the hope of ending it's Checkist and imperialistic nature - for if Ukraine can be free and prosperous (just as Poland has become since 1991 for example) then why can't Muscovy? This is why Putin sends his troops to Ukraine - nothing to do with Muscovite minority speaking populations but because if Muscovy becomes free he hangs.
                            Ukraine is far from a free country. Pro-Russian journalists have been killed: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-32337621

                            There is heavy censorship, banning of Russian movies and TV shows:
                            http://www.reuters.com/article/us-uk...0GJ1QM20140819
                            https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-bans.../27688221.html
                            http://www.uawire.org/news/ukraine-b...-shows-in-2016

                            Even Dozhd, the only independent anti-Putin TV channel in Russia is banned in Ukraine lol
                            https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-bans.../28228049.html

                            There is internet censorship too:
                            https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...emlin-role-war

                            What normal country acts this way? Russia does shit like that too, but that's a dictatorship and shit, right, while Ukraine is part of "free Europe" now? lol

                            Spare me, man, Ukraine is no better than Russia on freedom.

                            As to prosperity?

                            Average pension in Russia is $237 per month: http://tass.com/economy/929268

                            Ukraine - fucking $70 per month! http://uaposition.com/latest-news/av...cial-minister/

                            Russia is a shithole. Ukraine is even worse shithole. Sorry, my brother, just some harsh reality for ya. Deal with it.

                            Originally posted by tbm3fan View Post
                            Excellent narration from the personal perspective of living through it.
                            Thanks :)

                            Comment


                            • #59
                              Seems to be numerous nations considered as shit / shitholes.

                              Seriously there are many worse shitholes throughout the world that would make both Russia and Ukraine appear relatively well off.

                              Of course I'm not naming any. Just look at the roster of the United Nations and check off the countries that are obviously close to hopelessness or despair from an economic perspective...or just at the butt end of humanity. Just sayin'.
                              Real eyes realize real lies.

                              Comment


                              • #60
                                Originally posted by The_One View Post
                                Thanks, and thanks for info, good to know :)



                                Ukraine is far from a free country. Pro-Russian journalists have been killed: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-32337621

                                There is heavy censorship, banning of Russian movies and TV shows:
                                http://www.reuters.com/article/us-uk...0GJ1QM20140819
                                https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-bans.../27688221.html
                                http://www.uawire.org/news/ukraine-b...-shows-in-2016

                                Even Dozhd, the only independent anti-Putin TV channel in Russia is banned in Ukraine lol
                                https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-bans.../28228049.html

                                There is internet censorship too:
                                https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...emlin-role-war

                                What normal country acts this way? Russia does shit like that too, but that's a dictatorship and shit, right, while Ukraine is part of "free Europe" now? lol

                                Spare me, man, Ukraine is no better than Russia on freedom.

                                As to prosperity?

                                Average pension in Russia is $237 per month: http://tass.com/economy/929268

                                Ukraine - fucking $70 per month! http://uaposition.com/latest-news/av...cial-minister/

                                Russia is a shithole. Ukraine is even worse shithole. Sorry, my brother, just some harsh reality for ya. Deal with it.
                                There is plenty of free press and critical discussion of Government policies and individual appointments - I do not fear to criticise where I feel it right. I do not worry that I might be shot or tried on some rubbish charge; protesters are not arrested en masse. There is a genuine and growing opposition on both sides of the current Government course, one more reformist and the other more pro Muscovite. None of the opposition have been locked up, poisoned or shot. As for the economy Muscovy is going backwards while Ukraine is moving forward.

                                As regards Muscovite media bans I think it is widely accepted - not only in Ukraine - that Muscovite media such as RT and Sputnik are not 'news' sites in the ordinary sense of the word. Unless you hadn't noticed Muscovy has been waging an unprovoked war of aggressive imperialism against Ukraine for over 3yrs and I do not find it 'extreme' to bar the propaganda of an aggressor. As it is being Ukrainian is regarded as 'extreme' in Moscow; the Ukrainian Literature Library in Moscow was closed and the Director (a Muscovite Lady, Natalya Sharina) charged with inciting ethnic hatred and spreading "anti-Russian propaganda"; she was banned from saying anything to the press and given a suspended sentence. Presumably it is "anti-Russian propaganda" just to assert that Ukraine and Ukrainians have a separate identity and a considerable body of their own literature? Just the same as Moscow tries to steal Kyivan Rus history; Volodymyr the Great (the first Orthodox ruler of Kyiv) becomes Vladimir the Great and claimed to be the founder of Muscovite Orthodoxy, statues are built of him in Moscow and Putin claims Crimea was always Muscovite since that is where this Kyivan Prince, who never heard of let alone visited Moscow (which did not exist at the time) was baptised. Anna of Kyiv (who married the King of France) is referred to as "a Russian Princess" but again never heard of nor visited Moscow in her lifetime. To assert that there was once a Crimean Tatar Khanate and there still exists a separate Tatar identity and culture is 'extremist' in the same way that asserting that there is separate Ukrainian language, literature or history is "anti-Russian propaganda"; presumably to assert a separate Circassian identity and history would be 'treason'? Greater Muscovy as it is today is the last Empire where the slightest hint of a historical truth that not all the peoples over which they claim some right to rule derive their identity from Moscow must be heretical; a challenge to the current Checkist orthodox line of history, whether it be founded in Marxist historical revolution theory or todays neo Tsarism. But Ukrainians are the 'fascists' right? They must be! They do not exist!

                                In the rest of the world history stays largely the same and the present changes; in Muscovy the opposite happens; the everyday life remains the same for practically all the people but the history is always changing.
                                Last edited by snapper; 24 Jun 17,, 10:33.

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