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PUTIN...What's wrong with him? What's right with him?

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  • #46
    Originally posted by snapper View Post
    Yea them damn Yanky tanks on Maidan were a killer for Yanukovych. Not so his own 'Dictatorship Laws' of Jan 16th last year or his massive thefts of public funds. But then you'd know this right? You were here?
    The same thing can be said by the Russians in Ukraine that the government that followed tried to force Ukrainian as the only official language of the country when even a good percentage of Ukrainians speak Russian as their mother tongue. There are some Ukrainians that live around here, one is a manager at a storage department I use. They all speak Russian and some who come from Ukraine and a significant amount of the ones who come from there or Russia and we call Russians or Ukrainians here speak Yiddish being actually Jewish but its easier for them to just present themselves as Russians instead of having to explain a long story. What is funny, because even being already a sixth generation immigrant, my wife is also a Jewess from her mother side that came from Russia.

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    • #47
      Originally posted by cirrrocco View Post
      In Northern California, they are all baptists.. Tons of them are brought into the sacramento area thru some type of Church Visa , not sure how that works. they stay for a few years and then nranch out to the bay area etc
      But that is because they converted... A lot of people of Italian or Irish ancestry in America eventually converted to some line of Protestantism as their relationship with Italy faded away. If before was almost a rule someone from Italian ancestry for example to say "I am an Italian-American", it doesn't seem to be that distinction anymore. Even the ones who will reply that they are from Italian ancestry usually are mostly Italian, but are also from other ancestry. I for example identify more with my Italian ancestry, but have also Portuguese one. Part of the assimilation is to adapt with the mainstream culture and in America Catholicism is often seen as very backwards. More than once when I said to someone that I am from a Catholic heritage people do faces or say stuff about "people keeping and venerating skin", like "skin of saints" or other stuff that I find quite absurd even being from a Catholic background and having studied in a Catholic school.

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      • #48
        Who the fuck cares? You are an idiot!
        Chimo

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        • #49
          Originally posted by Officer of Engineers View Post
          Who the fuck cares? You are an idiot!
          I really, really wish you worked in my office, lol
          "The great questions of the day will not be settled by means of speeches and majority decisions but by iron and blood"-Otto Von Bismarck

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          • #50
            Originally posted by Officer of Engineers View Post
            Who the fuck cares? You are an idiot!
            You act so much like an internet troll... And guess what? The best strategy against internet trolls is to ignore them.

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            • #51
              Originally posted by Vargas View Post
              The same thing can be said by the Russians in Ukraine that the government that followed tried to force Ukrainian as the only official language of the country when even a good percentage of Ukrainians speak Russian as their mother tongue. There are some Ukrainians that live around here, one is a manager at a storage department I use. They all speak Russian and some who come from Ukraine and a significant amount of the ones who come from there or Russia and we call Russians or Ukrainians here speak Yiddish being actually Jewish but its easier for them to just present themselves as Russians instead of having to explain a long story. What is funny, because even being already a sixth generation immigrant, my wife is also a Jewess from her mother side that came from Russia.
              Well actually language rights were never threatened. Most of the Ukrainian soldiers at the front speak Russian as first language - I myself arguably speak better Russian than Ukrainian or Lemkowie. But you are changing the point; Yanukovych was elected on his promise to sign the EU Association Agreement. I am no great fan of the EU myself but I can understand the Ukrainian perspective that moving closer to the EU means reform and investment - moving out of the post Soviet doldrums as our western neighbours have done. Maidan was about reform - not wanting a war with Russia.

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              • #52
                Originally posted by snapper View Post
                Well actually language rights were never threatened. Most of the Ukrainian soldiers at the front speak Russian as first language - I myself arguably speak better Russian than Ukrainian or Lemkowie. But you are changing the point; Yanukovych was elected on his promise to sign the EU Association Agreement. I am no great fan of the EU myself but I can understand the Ukrainian perspective that moving closer to the EU means reform and investment - moving out of the post Soviet doldrums as our western neighbours have done. Maidan was about reform - not wanting a war with Russia.
                Well, there is no way to enforce nowadays a complete ban on a language. Specially one which is so similar to the desired only official language. What was changed - or they tried to change -, was to take the official status of Russian as an official language together with Ukrainian. What that meant was that they would stop to have documents written in Russian and to teach Russian at school, instead teaching Ukraine to everybody. That is nothing new. Before the French revolution less than 5% of the French population spoke French. There was parts of France that spoke Italian, Basque, Spanish, German and Breton. The French revolution imposed French as the only official language and compulsory public schools in French and Napoleon expanded the schools and compulsory military service and instruction in French and in the space of a few generations virtually everyone in French spoke French.

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                • #53
                  Steve,

                  Ukr thread is not lost, it's locked. Guess we can rant here?
                  No such thing as a good tax - Churchill

                  To make mistakes is human. To blame someone else for your mistake, is strategic.

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                  • #54
                    Not sure this is the correct place to post this but I go by 'outage thread' advice to post where possible and thought this might be of interest to our Military members from the Moscow Conference on International Security 2015 Part 2: Gerasimov (Chief of Staff) on military threats facing Russia earlier this month;

                    https://russiamil.wordpress.com/2015...facing-russia/

                    See also Part 1 'Plenary Speeches'; https://russiamil.wordpress.com/2015...nary-speeches/

                    Nikolay Patrushev, former FSB Director is (replacing Putin) is now chair of the Security Council of the Russian Federation - an arch 'siloviki' naturally from the old KGB branch in Lenningrad originally (where he was responsible for stopping smuggling and corruption in the 1990s- I kid you not) is still one of the really big fish in the increasingly small clique that influences policy in Moscow. Sergey Shoigu is the current Minister of Defence. He is not one of the 'inner circle' but seen by some as a possible replacement for Putin if/when that is deemed necessary.

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                    • #55
                      testing post

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                      • #56
                        I just read about the condition of Vladimir Kara-Murza. It saddens me to think that Putin would be so brazen and outright in his genuinely evil and fucked up actions as to poison a man that has dual UK/Russian citizenship and lives and works in Washington DC, for writing articles that show that sinister bastard for what he really is. I have enjoyed Kara-Murza's articles for years, and his I wish him a speedy recovery.

                        My heart goes out to the Kara-Murza family.
                        "We are all special cases." - Camus

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                        • #57
                          +1 that. See also the new findings on the 2012 Alexander Perepilichny case. He was mixed up in the Hermitage Capital business that also lead to the death of Sergei Magnitsky. Not polonium this time but gelsemium, a natural poison.

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                          • #58
                            Kara-Murza was taken 'ill' three months to the day after Nemtsov was shot.

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                            • #59
                              I will look into that. Any idea wtf is going on with Kara-Murza's father? Stuck in Russia and afraid? I find it no small coincidence that he became "ill" while visiting where he was. It's just insane to me that Putin will probably get away with this. I can't imagine someone getting shot in a drive by right in front of the white house, not to mention no charges being made. Putin is such a bastard.
                              "We are all special cases." - Camus

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                              • #60
                                Originally posted by Squirrel View Post
                                I will look into that. Any idea wtf is going on with Kara-Murza's father? Stuck in Russia and afraid? I find it no small coincidence that he became "ill" while visiting where he was. It's just insane to me that Putin will probably get away with this. I can't imagine someone getting shot in a drive by right in front of the white house, not to mention no charges being made. Putin is such a bastard.
                                Alot of questions to cover there but it all relates to the internal workings of the Putin regime and the rift between the FSB/Siloviki 'gang' and the Kadyrov mob. First charges have been brought against suspects in the Nemtsov case; 5 or 6 Chechens were rounded up. One suspect, Beslan Shavanov, apparently 'blew himself up' as police tried to arrest him in Chechnya. The 'prime suspect' and alleged 'organiser' of the murder who is under arrest is Zaur Dadayev, another is Anzor Gubashev and his brother who is a lorry driver. Dadayev allegedly confessed having been arrested and later retracted his 'confession' saying he had been tortured. Dadayev is a Chechen 'policeman' and personal aquaintance of Ramzan Kadyrov who a Deputy Commander in the Northern (Sever) Battalion of the Chechen Ministry of Interior forces which is commanded by Alibek Delimkhanov... In his alleged 'confession' Dadayev implicated Ruslan Geremeev, another Sever Battalion Deputy Commander and a relative of Suleiman Geremeev, a member of the Russian Feberation Council.

                                So Kadyrov then praised Dadayev as a “genuine Russian patriot” (and rememeber that any who are critical of Putin are de facto 'anti Russian fifth columnists') and was awarded a Medal of Honour by Putin. But the FSB wanted to question Delimkhanov and Ruslan Geremeev. They were allowed to question Delimkhanov, who then got a promotion but not Geremeev. Kadyrov then told the FSB "not on my patch" in no uncertain terms; "I would like to officially state: Open fire if someone from Moscow or Stavropol — it doesn't matter where from — appears on your turf without your knowledge," while Geremeev was spirited out of the country. His precise whereabouts are unknown, there is some speculation that he's in Donbass but Vostok (Eastern) Battalion has largely left, others say he's in UAE or maybe Syria. The chief investigator was then changed from Igor Krasnov, who many regard as an a conscientious Russian police officer to Alexander Drymanov, who has a reputation of the opposite kind having handled the Khodorkovsky case among others. And that realistically is where the Nemtsov case will end. Like all the other murders blame will attatched, guilt found and sentences handed down but who ordered it or why or when will remain hidden.

                                I haven't had time to follow the Vladimir Kara-Murza case in detail. I believe he was taken ill at some state owned news agency. If he was poisoned at all, which is unclear at present, then for to him have been poisoned there it would have to be a fast acting toxin but the whole point is to implicitly warn and threaten any and all potential opposition to Putin's "L'etat c'est moi" rule, hence Nemtsov's murder within sight of the Kremlin etc, so if he was poisoned it cannot be ruled out. As I understand it he is in an induced coma due to organ failure - pancreas and lungs. Not being a specialist in toxicology I wouldn't know what poisons can cause that in such a short space of time. Apparently he was fine that morning though according to Illya Yashin but then Yashin was himself en route the US at the time to publicise the 'Nemtsov Report' which he and others finished (link below). Kara-Murza had been working with Khodorkovsky's Open Russia lot (who also fund the http://www.interpretermag.com/) and last week they put out a video about the Kadyrov mob called 'The Family' (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krXLTNNeNZs). Not to be outdone Kadyrov announced that he is to star in a feauture film and released a clip (https://instagram.com/p/3G06hziRmd/). The film, which is a myth, is to be called "Whoever Doesn’t Understand Will Get It," subtlety not being Kadyrov's forte. As far as I know an Israeli doctor has been summoned to do a toxicology report on Kara-Murza and if he says the patient can be moved abroad for treatment he will be moved to either London or Tel Aviv. As for V. Kara-Murza Snr being 'stuck' in Russia I imagine he wants to remain near his son. Is he afraid? I can't say but he will be sure not to saying anything too 'contraversial' I would assume.

                                For those who want a better understanding of the internal dynamics of the Putin regime I recommend the Power Vertical blog and podcast (http://www.rferl.org/archive/The_Pow...2/884/884.html) which Brian Whitmore describes a primer for Russia 'wonks'. Lot's of good previous episodes with other Russian specialists particularly Mark Galiotti who also writes 'In Moscow's Shadows (https://inmoscowsshadows.wordpress.com/). If you want to understand the internal dynamics of the Putin regime and the relations with Kadyrov's Chechen mob these are good places to start.

                                A new Atlantic Council/Bellingcat report out last week, 'Hiding in Plain Sight'; https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/co...Xo5380unvnW1wt
                                The Nemtsov Report; 'Putin. War' finished by Yashin and others in English here; http://www.4freerussia.org/putin.war/
                                Atlantic Council Presentation of both reports video here; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eU0kuHI6lNg
                                See also the Interpreter analysis of what new evidence the Nemtsov report provides here; http://www.interpretermag.com/assess...is-colleagues/

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