manxu

Overall, I would absolutely agree with you. But with the recent fall of oil prices, I don’t think the economics are there for Putin to be able to sustain the war. He needs it to end, and soon.

Zelenskyy, on the other hand, seems to have been rattled by the swiftness with which Russia pushed back Ukraine out of Kursk oblast once America stopped intelligence sharing.

I could see it play out like you describe: both sides continue to just want to outlast the other. Even then, the Trump administration plays linchpin: they can stop intelligence sharing again, and they can push the price of oil up and down to an extent.

I continue being surprised that the war is not more unpopular in Russia. Something that makes a million people flee out of their country can’t really be value neutral or even popular. But then again, Russia has a very long history of stubborn rulers that pushed things too far and then were overthrown when they wouldn’t relent, which is again the scenario you describe.

Good article, IMHO

The Ukrainians can’t take back lost territory, but they’re not going to get rolled over either. This has come down to a war of economic attrition. It’s what’s happening in the Russian rear that decides this.

Strange as it seems to say this, the Trump administration played this well. They negotiated with both sides, saw that the Ukrainians were willing to make concessions while Putin was stubborn, so they went with the side where they could make money.

The thing I don’t understand is that the administration pulled out of the peace negotiations, but the gas deal with Ukraine requires peace to be realized. Nobody is going to build shale gas extraction facilities in an active war zone, after all.

So, either the Trump administration knows something we don’t about Russia’s ability to continue the war, or they will have to force Ukraine to make concessions to get a peace deal. In both cases, they’d be better off continuing the peace talks, no?

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All very fair points, I agree.

What a shit world this has turned into if we let a whole people starve to death.

I wholeheartedly support David Hogg’s movement to primary away status quo Democrats. I have seen Chuck Schumer’s “negotiating skills” with the continuing resolution, I have seen Newsom’s equivocation on trans rights, I have seen Biden’s handling of Gaza. Believe me, I understand how useless it is to have one party be radically authoritarian and the other wants to play nice and get along.

What I am saying is that I think it makes more sense to get rid of the status quo party now than in 2024.

You sound like one of those people who stopped caring about the child cages soon as biden was the one doing it.

That’s interesting, because unlike so, so many of the people that took on the mantle of the righteous cause of the Palestinians, I’ve been talking about it since last century. The Palestinians have been mistreated since at least the 80s, and in an ongoing fashion for now 40 years.

Did I hear anyone on the American left complain about it until 2023? Not really. It was really lonely in that camp. It somehow feels that if it hadn’t been for TikTok taking up the cause, this would have been another one of those times when Palestine is forgotten.

I am delighted that Palestine has gotten more attention, and I am very hopeful that somehow the situation can be stabilized and improved for a people that has suffered way too much. But not preventing Trump from taking power was honestly a very bad thing to happen for Palestine.

I guess you have never heard of Mahmud Khalil then, or any of the other students arrested simply for speaking out about Palestine.

Nothing prevents an astroturfed movement from attracting real life supporters. I saw the genuine anger and upset at the protests. The problem is that it was all very convenient for Trump and his people. They were absolutely delighted at the self-inflicted vote suppression.

Economically and culturally, Europe is already a superpower. Militarily it isn’t, and maybe that’s not a terrible thing. Politically, it just seems to have a bias for moving slowly and by consensus, although it responded quickly to COVID and the assault on Ukraine, so it can do what’s needed?

Absolutely! I had the same impression with the Gaza protests. The Biden/Harris administration handled the situation absolutely horribly, but anyone who had watched #45 knew that things were going to get a whole universe worse for Gaza if Trump got reelected. And yet, there was that strange bombardment with “I can’t vote for Harris because of Gaza” that seemed astroturfed.

I think of this as an opportunity. The administration seems to be incredibly incompetent in addition to corrupt. The resulting economic calamity will probably taint everything they advanced with the stink of failure - from anti-trans policies to willy-nilly suspension of constitutional rights and declarations of phony emergencies.

It’s never good to have enemies, but it’s almost tolerable when they are incompetent.

The Overton window is anchored by a series of landmarks. The most effective way to lose one of them, like the Constitution, is to start discussing whether it has merit.

Right now, the country is in the sad state that the absolute minimum, adherence to a Constitution to which government official swear an oath of allegiance, is in question. You gain absolutely nothing, right now, by questioning the Constitution. You wait until the constitutional order is re-established and actors that routinely violate it are punished, and when the Overton window moves back … it’s not really to the left, it’s more towards democracy itself, then you discuss the flaws of the Constitution.

This is the stupidest culture war, fought with the stupidest people on one side and a marginalized group that really just would like to live a life without fear on the other. Not even “without fear,” because apparently that’s asking too much. Just no state-sanctioned fear.

Thank you for the info!

It sound like he was trying to get Russian citizenship through military service. Then they sent him to Bakhmut to die with 100,000 other recruits. Number made up, but probably not that far off.

After using Metro and Vanilla for ages, I switched to Gramophone. Looks pretty and I find it intuitive. Also has great support for media change detection and does m3u playlists (that I rely on heavily) very well.