[Non-US] News That Makes You laugh/cry/neither...
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USA is throwing dollars into revolution with slow success (waaaay too slow for their liking). Germany disapproves, which can be seen by the lack of sanctions from EU and NATO. Russia is throwing smaller ammount of USA dollars into Ukraine, slowing down USA's success. USA is unwilling to put too much effort, which can be seen by the lack of sanctions toward Ukrainian millionaires.Chamomile wrote:The Ukraine is going berserk. Discuss.
http://pavel-shipilin.livejournal.com/202899.html - here the guy calculates the price of each day of Maidan protest (Russian language, so use google translate. He gets 330000$ per day).
While Ukrainian governement is completely corrupt and and belongs to local millionaires, I'm rooting for them because:
-Joining the EU would ruin Ukraine. First, they'll loose gas discount from Russia. Second, they'll go by latvian scenario, being pumped by euro credits and euro goods, untill there is no money and industry left. Ukrainian industry and agriculture isn't needed in Europe.
-It would create military passageway into Russia.
-I have a flight from Donetsk in a month.
TL;DR: there are no good moves for Ukraine. It's fucked no matter what it does.
Last edited by Longes on Fri Jan 24, 2014 7:00 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Username17
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It's actually way more complicated than that. First off, The Ukraine is an independent state because the United States spent nearly sixty years supporting Ukrainian dissidents. Secondly, Ukrainian history as taught in Ukrainian schools is fucking batshit insane ultra-nationalist bullshit that is wholly unrecognizable as actual history. Look up their startling and heterodox theories about the "thousand year struggle for Ukrainian independence" and be prepared to laugh or cry. Little kids in the Ukraine grow up being fed that revisionist garbage in school.
Now Ukrainian historical revisionism may be startlingly bullshit, but they aren't especially unusual for the region. Belarussian children grow up being told that Belarus is the true inheritor of the Lithuanian Empire, and that the Lithuanians stole the name "Lithuania." Polish children grow up being told all kinds of exciting and heterodox things about which ethnicities in which countries are really Poles. Note that while Poland was also broken off from the Soviet Empire as a result of American propaganda and dissident support, Belarus still has statues of Stalin around. So this historical revisionism thing is pretty much a regional trait rather than something we can lay at the feet of one "side" or another.
So the foundation of the current crisis is that the Ukrainian state exists because of anti-soviet propaganda crafted by the US during the cold war. And the people of the Ukraine believe lots of this propaganda because since the early nineties it has been fucking taught in schools there. Despite the fact that it was always bullshit and in any case was directed at bringing down an empire that no longer exists. It's kind of like how the Book of Revelations is actually just a rant about how Christians should fight the Romans, but people still read and believe the book as a prophesy of things yet to come even though Emperor Nero is almost two thousand years dead. The people who are fighting to take down the Ukrainian government now believe in a historical narrative that is not true and which was crafted as a weapon to fight in a war that is over and no longer relevant.
Which gets back to the coalition who are funding and perpetrating the uprisings in the Ukraine. They are a coalition. A group of different interest groups who get funding and political backing from different places.
Svoboda
It means "Freedom" and they are a hard-right nationalist party. They literally sponsored a torch-lit mob to celebrate the birthday of a world war 2 era Ukrainian nationalist who is best known for cooperating with the Nazis and organizing the wholesale slaughter of ethnically Polish civilians. That is a thing that happened. Now Svoboda claims to receive no funding from foreigners, oligarchs, or Jews (yes, really), but to instead receive their funding from small and mid sized businesses. As they are an overtly fascist movement, this is mostly true. However, some of the small and mid sized businesses they get money and support from are fascist movements abroad, which are of course made out of foreigners.
UDAR
It means "Punch" and they are a center-right EU-affiliated party. They want to turn the country over to corporate overlords in Europe and are unsurprisingly funded by European business leaders. Their figure head is an apparently charismatic Ukrainian boxer who puts on a good show of being genuinely concerned with the safety and human rights of Ukrainians. He is however a relatively recent addition to the faction, which was previously in charge of the country during the Ukrainian Gas Crisis where they declared that they hated Russia so much that they were just going to go bandit and start stealing natural gas from Russia's pipelines. Seriously, that is a thing that happened.
Batkivshchyna
It means "Fatherland" and they are a break-away faction from the Punch movement (before it was called that) led by imprisoned former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko. They are anti-Moscow and pro-EU, but not to the point of actually being unwilling to deal with Putin. They are the favorites of the European political class, and get direct support from NATO leaders. The rest of the opposition regards them as sell-outs, because they want to stop short of going to war with Russia (exactly the sort of pragmatism that makes them appealing to European politicians). Remember: while the Ukrainian government hasn't lifted a finger to get Yulia out of jail, she is in jail because of trumped up charges brought against her by people loyal to a former president from the UDAR faction (note: it hadn't actually been named UDAR yet, at the time it was named "Our Ukraine" but it's mostly the same people).
Angela Merkel meets with UDAR front-man.
The Outside Agitators
Not all of the people protesting in Ukrainian streets and laying siege to Ukrainian government buildings and shit are actually Ukrainians. A considerable number of them are from other countries. How many outside agitators there are is a matter of some debate. After all, Ruthenians don't actually look any different from Kashubians. And it's not like anyone on any side has much incentive to give an accurate number. The outside agitators are by and large made up of Eastern European neocons. And they are funded by the same international neocon movement that throws money into TEA Party Super PACs in the United States. It's important to understand here that the Eastern European neocon movement pretty much thinks the cold war is still on and wants to first strike Russia. They get funded by Republican donors in the US and go off on big rants about what great people Reagan and Thatcher were. These are the people McCain went to meet, and these are the people that the US government is indirectly backing through the National Endowment for Democracy.
This is John McCain meeting with the head of UDAR, and the head of Svoboda, and some outside agitators at the same time.
Now on top of that, the media in the West and East are still shockingly cold war in their thinking. If you look at the BBC or CNN, you are going to see extremely pro-uprising reports.
These people are giving the Ukrainian Neo-Nazi salute. The caption on the BBC reads '"Svoboda" means "freedom"'
Thank you for clearing that up, BBC.
Needless to say, the free good publicity that the Ukrainian protesters are getting from western media sources is worth a lot of money. But it's not really coming from anywhere in particular. I don't think the Obama administration is actually asking CNN to provide positive portrayals of Ukrainian opposition forces. They are just doing it because of habits from the cold war and the perceived interests of their corporate sponsors.
-Username17
Now Ukrainian historical revisionism may be startlingly bullshit, but they aren't especially unusual for the region. Belarussian children grow up being told that Belarus is the true inheritor of the Lithuanian Empire, and that the Lithuanians stole the name "Lithuania." Polish children grow up being told all kinds of exciting and heterodox things about which ethnicities in which countries are really Poles. Note that while Poland was also broken off from the Soviet Empire as a result of American propaganda and dissident support, Belarus still has statues of Stalin around. So this historical revisionism thing is pretty much a regional trait rather than something we can lay at the feet of one "side" or another.
So the foundation of the current crisis is that the Ukrainian state exists because of anti-soviet propaganda crafted by the US during the cold war. And the people of the Ukraine believe lots of this propaganda because since the early nineties it has been fucking taught in schools there. Despite the fact that it was always bullshit and in any case was directed at bringing down an empire that no longer exists. It's kind of like how the Book of Revelations is actually just a rant about how Christians should fight the Romans, but people still read and believe the book as a prophesy of things yet to come even though Emperor Nero is almost two thousand years dead. The people who are fighting to take down the Ukrainian government now believe in a historical narrative that is not true and which was crafted as a weapon to fight in a war that is over and no longer relevant.
Which gets back to the coalition who are funding and perpetrating the uprisings in the Ukraine. They are a coalition. A group of different interest groups who get funding and political backing from different places.
Svoboda
It means "Freedom" and they are a hard-right nationalist party. They literally sponsored a torch-lit mob to celebrate the birthday of a world war 2 era Ukrainian nationalist who is best known for cooperating with the Nazis and organizing the wholesale slaughter of ethnically Polish civilians. That is a thing that happened. Now Svoboda claims to receive no funding from foreigners, oligarchs, or Jews (yes, really), but to instead receive their funding from small and mid sized businesses. As they are an overtly fascist movement, this is mostly true. However, some of the small and mid sized businesses they get money and support from are fascist movements abroad, which are of course made out of foreigners.
UDAR
It means "Punch" and they are a center-right EU-affiliated party. They want to turn the country over to corporate overlords in Europe and are unsurprisingly funded by European business leaders. Their figure head is an apparently charismatic Ukrainian boxer who puts on a good show of being genuinely concerned with the safety and human rights of Ukrainians. He is however a relatively recent addition to the faction, which was previously in charge of the country during the Ukrainian Gas Crisis where they declared that they hated Russia so much that they were just going to go bandit and start stealing natural gas from Russia's pipelines. Seriously, that is a thing that happened.
Batkivshchyna
It means "Fatherland" and they are a break-away faction from the Punch movement (before it was called that) led by imprisoned former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko. They are anti-Moscow and pro-EU, but not to the point of actually being unwilling to deal with Putin. They are the favorites of the European political class, and get direct support from NATO leaders. The rest of the opposition regards them as sell-outs, because they want to stop short of going to war with Russia (exactly the sort of pragmatism that makes them appealing to European politicians). Remember: while the Ukrainian government hasn't lifted a finger to get Yulia out of jail, she is in jail because of trumped up charges brought against her by people loyal to a former president from the UDAR faction (note: it hadn't actually been named UDAR yet, at the time it was named "Our Ukraine" but it's mostly the same people).
Angela Merkel meets with UDAR front-man.
The Outside Agitators
Not all of the people protesting in Ukrainian streets and laying siege to Ukrainian government buildings and shit are actually Ukrainians. A considerable number of them are from other countries. How many outside agitators there are is a matter of some debate. After all, Ruthenians don't actually look any different from Kashubians. And it's not like anyone on any side has much incentive to give an accurate number. The outside agitators are by and large made up of Eastern European neocons. And they are funded by the same international neocon movement that throws money into TEA Party Super PACs in the United States. It's important to understand here that the Eastern European neocon movement pretty much thinks the cold war is still on and wants to first strike Russia. They get funded by Republican donors in the US and go off on big rants about what great people Reagan and Thatcher were. These are the people McCain went to meet, and these are the people that the US government is indirectly backing through the National Endowment for Democracy.
This is John McCain meeting with the head of UDAR, and the head of Svoboda, and some outside agitators at the same time.
Now on top of that, the media in the West and East are still shockingly cold war in their thinking. If you look at the BBC or CNN, you are going to see extremely pro-uprising reports.
These people are giving the Ukrainian Neo-Nazi salute. The caption on the BBC reads '"Svoboda" means "freedom"'
Thank you for clearing that up, BBC.
Needless to say, the free good publicity that the Ukrainian protesters are getting from western media sources is worth a lot of money. But it's not really coming from anywhere in particular. I don't think the Obama administration is actually asking CNN to provide positive portrayals of Ukrainian opposition forces. They are just doing it because of habits from the cold war and the perceived interests of their corporate sponsors.
-Username17
Some clarification.
Ukrainian history is ironic as fuck, in that Ukrainians periodically fight for independence from their current overlord while enslaving themself to new overlord.
Also, opposition leaders no longer control the crowd. On the last meeting with Yanukovich they agreed to exchange 100 protesters (who are currently in jail) for moving barricades. Klichko and company failed to move the barricades.
Also, Crimea wants to leave the Ukraine. Wooo!
Ukrainians are still incredibly bitter about Holodomor, which is a part of USSR's famine of 1932-1933. They blame Stalin and Russians, because blaming Stalin and Russians is easier than not being twats. The main reason for famine was the process of collectivisation, which involved unionizing the farmers into "kolhoz", which is a kind of big communal farm. The farmers were against it to the point of "burn shit to the ground and salt the earth". Also in kolhozes, where everything belongs to everyone, it's easy to go "everything is mine", steal whatever isn't nailed to the ground and run. In the long run, kolhozes has proven to be neat and functional, and some still exist in Russia. In the short run, you have the famine.So the foundation of the current crisis is that the Ukrainian state exists because of anti-soviet propaganda crafted by the US during the cold war. And the people of the Ukraine believe lots of this propaganda because since the early nineties it has been fucking taught in schools there.
Ukrainian history is ironic as fuck, in that Ukrainians periodically fight for independence from their current overlord while enslaving themself to new overlord.
Also, opposition leaders no longer control the crowd. On the last meeting with Yanukovich they agreed to exchange 100 protesters (who are currently in jail) for moving barricades. Klichko and company failed to move the barricades.
Also, Crimea wants to leave the Ukraine. Wooo!
Last edited by Longes on Fri Jan 24, 2014 10:43 am, edited 3 times in total.
nope.jpgLonges wrote:@Frank.
"UDAR" is more correctly translated as "Strike", rather than "Punch", altough both translations have place
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boxing_punches#Punches
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitali_Klitschko
So?Starmaker wrote:nope.jpgLonges wrote:@Frank.
"UDAR" is more correctly translated as "Strike", rather than "Punch", altough both translations have place
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boxing_punches#Punches
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitali_Klitschko
Historical revisionism is not specific to Eastern Europe. It's everywhere in Europe.
Nation-states are recent. Before them, there were only kingdoms (and empires). You were French/English/Danish/etc. not because you belonged to some culture or some people, but because the lord of the lord of [...] of your lord was the King of France/England/Danemark.
For a very long time, there was absolutely no feeling of belonging to a nation/people. There were culture, religions and (for the nobles) lineages.
For most places in (post-medieval) Europe, the concept of Nation-States appeared when religion lost its grasp and people started thinking that maybe there wasn't such a thing as a God-given right to govern. From that point, there was a need to find something else than a "King" to unify a state.
That's when the concept of "Nation" started to appear. But most nations were created by trying to find something that tied together the current state. In some places it was a common ancestry, in other the language, but it wasn't "we've got this in common, hence we're a nation" it was "we need to stick together, let's say that's because we're all [...]"
When these new "Nations" became Republic, they had an even bigger need for this concept. That was one of the reason why public schools started to appear: to teach all the children that they belonged to the Nation.
In France, we get history lessons about "our ancestors: the Gauls" even if we have very little in common with them, and more with the Romans and Francs who arrived after them. And it's pretty much the same nearly everywhere in Europe.
Nation-states are recent. Before them, there were only kingdoms (and empires). You were French/English/Danish/etc. not because you belonged to some culture or some people, but because the lord of the lord of [...] of your lord was the King of France/England/Danemark.
For a very long time, there was absolutely no feeling of belonging to a nation/people. There were culture, religions and (for the nobles) lineages.
For most places in (post-medieval) Europe, the concept of Nation-States appeared when religion lost its grasp and people started thinking that maybe there wasn't such a thing as a God-given right to govern. From that point, there was a need to find something else than a "King" to unify a state.
That's when the concept of "Nation" started to appear. But most nations were created by trying to find something that tied together the current state. In some places it was a common ancestry, in other the language, but it wasn't "we've got this in common, hence we're a nation" it was "we need to stick together, let's say that's because we're all [...]"
When these new "Nations" became Republic, they had an even bigger need for this concept. That was one of the reason why public schools started to appear: to teach all the children that they belonged to the Nation.
In France, we get history lessons about "our ancestors: the Gauls" even if we have very little in common with them, and more with the Romans and Francs who arrived after them. And it's pretty much the same nearly everywhere in Europe.
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Lago PARANOIA
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I wish that the academic term of 'historical revisionism' was named something else or that 'negationism' and 'historical revisionism' weren't synonymous in common parlance.
Historical revisionism is a thing that really needs to be done and gets more necessary the further back in history you go. Unfortunately, a whole mess of infant-fuckers gave the concept a bad name.
Historical revisionism is a thing that really needs to be done and gets more necessary the further back in history you go. Unfortunately, a whole mess of infant-fuckers gave the concept a bad name.
Josh Kablack wrote:Your freedom to make rulings up on the fly is in direct conflict with my freedom to interact with an internally consistent narrative. Your freedom to run/play a game without needing to understand a complex rule system is in direct conflict with my freedom to play a character whose abilities and flaws function as I intended within that ruleset. Your freedom to add and change rules in the middle of the game is in direct conflict with my ability to understand that rules system before I decided whether or not to join your game.
In short, your entire post is dismissive of not merely my intelligence, but my agency. And I don't mean agency as a player within one of your games, I mean my agency as a person. You do not want me to be informed when I make the fundamental decisions of deciding whether to join your game or buying your rules system.
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Username17
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Yeah, France's claim that they are totally Gauls and not Franks is very strange.
Our Ukraine was renamed "UDAR" simultaneously with adopting a boxer as their figurehead. So the name is very obviously a boxing reference. That is why the translation "punch" is obviously the one to use. And not other meanings such as "push" or "strike" or "clap."
Crimea has always wanted to split off from Ukraine. They declared independence in the early nineties and Ukrainian soldiers put them down with extreme brutality in 1995. The first and only president of the Republic of Crimea lives in exile in Russia. Crimea is and always has been full of non-Ruthenian Russians. It was part of Russia until 1954 when Khrushchev transferred it into Ukrainian control as part of a gerrymandering project (putting more Soviet sympathizers into "Ukraine" in order to dilute nationalist movements). The Soviet Union really should have kept Crimea and South Ossetia for Russia when the empire broke up. It really makes no sense that they didn't put a provision into the terms of the secession votes that they get to redraw the borders to include provinces that voted unionist.
-Username17
Our Ukraine was renamed "UDAR" simultaneously with adopting a boxer as their figurehead. So the name is very obviously a boxing reference. That is why the translation "punch" is obviously the one to use. And not other meanings such as "push" or "strike" or "clap."
Crimea has always wanted to split off from Ukraine. They declared independence in the early nineties and Ukrainian soldiers put them down with extreme brutality in 1995. The first and only president of the Republic of Crimea lives in exile in Russia. Crimea is and always has been full of non-Ruthenian Russians. It was part of Russia until 1954 when Khrushchev transferred it into Ukrainian control as part of a gerrymandering project (putting more Soviet sympathizers into "Ukraine" in order to dilute nationalist movements). The Soviet Union really should have kept Crimea and South Ossetia for Russia when the empire broke up. It really makes no sense that they didn't put a provision into the terms of the secession votes that they get to redraw the borders to include provinces that voted unionist.
-Username17
Franks were:FrankTrollman wrote:Yeah, France's claim that they are totally Gauls and not Franks is very strange.
1. Too tied to the nobility/royalty for the post-revolution France
2. Too Germanic. It would have been difficult to explain why France needed to stand against Prussia/Germany in 1870/1914 if France had Germanic roots.
On the other hands, Gauls could be shown as a people united against foreign aggressors (Romans and Germans), with heroes (Vercingetorix) who had no ties to the nobility/royalty
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Lago PARANOIA
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http://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/ukrai ... opposition
What the fucking fuck? Is... is that a coup? Did a coup just happen?
What the fucking fuck? Is... is that a coup? Did a coup just happen?
Josh Kablack wrote:Your freedom to make rulings up on the fly is in direct conflict with my freedom to interact with an internally consistent narrative. Your freedom to run/play a game without needing to understand a complex rule system is in direct conflict with my freedom to play a character whose abilities and flaws function as I intended within that ruleset. Your freedom to add and change rules in the middle of the game is in direct conflict with my ability to understand that rules system before I decided whether or not to join your game.
In short, your entire post is dismissive of not merely my intelligence, but my agency. And I don't mean agency as a player within one of your games, I mean my agency as a person. You do not want me to be informed when I make the fundamental decisions of deciding whether to join your game or buying your rules system.
Lol no. Yanukovich sacrifices a fairly unimportant figure in exchange for calming down the opposition.Lago PARANOIA wrote:http://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/ukrai ... opposition
What the fucking fuck? Is... is that a coup? Did a coup just happen?
The trick about Ukraine is that the president isn't actually rulling the country. The oligarchs do. And PM has basically no power at all.
Last edited by Longes on Sat Jan 25, 2014 8:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.
IMHO, the most interesting player on the field right now isn't the Ukraine - it's Germany.
For the last 50 years Germany was a puppet state of USA. Germany has no nukes, it has 257 USA millitary bases (its closest neighbours are Italy and Japan - 120 and 87). Germany also has no gold reserve - it's split between France, GB and USA. And when a few years ago Germany tried to take a look at its reserve, it got slapped down. Germany made only token response against NSA spying, despite being the biggest victim. However, with the Ukraine situation Germany is now playing against the USA - there are no sanctions from the EU against Ukraine. Germany clearly doesn't want a civil war at its doorstep, and is making steps against its american overlord policy.
So, I suspect interesting changes in Europe in the next few decades.
For the last 50 years Germany was a puppet state of USA. Germany has no nukes, it has 257 USA millitary bases (its closest neighbours are Italy and Japan - 120 and 87). Germany also has no gold reserve - it's split between France, GB and USA. And when a few years ago Germany tried to take a look at its reserve, it got slapped down. Germany made only token response against NSA spying, despite being the biggest victim. However, with the Ukraine situation Germany is now playing against the USA - there are no sanctions from the EU against Ukraine. Germany clearly doesn't want a civil war at its doorstep, and is making steps against its american overlord policy.
So, I suspect interesting changes in Europe in the next few decades.
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Username17
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That's the president trying to make common cause with Yulia's faction, on the grounds that it is well known that they are actually reasonable and can be negotiated with. Also because while they hate him, they also hate Svoboda and UDAR.Lago PARANOIA wrote:http://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/ukrai ... opposition
What the fucking fuck? Is... is that a coup? Did a coup just happen?
Fatherland is the second biggest bloc in parliament, and the most respectable faction in the opposition. If they can be enticed to join the government in exchange for anything at all, the rebels are over.
Everything you just said is insane.Longes wrote:For the last 50 years Germany was a puppet state of USA. Germany has no nukes, it has 257 USA millitary bases (its closest neighbours are Italy and Japan - 120 and 87). Germany also has no gold reserve - it's split between France, GB and USA. And when a few years ago Germany tried to take a look at its reserve, it got slapped down. Germany made only token response against NSA spying, despite being the biggest victim. However, with the Ukraine situation Germany is now playing against the USA - there are no sanctions from the EU against Ukraine. Germany clearly doesn't want a civil war at its doorstep, and is making steps against its american overlord policy.
First of all, gold reserves? Are you fucking kidding me? Does it look like 1924 to you? Do you know when the last time any country's fucking gold reserves factored into anything? I'll give you a hint: it wasn't in this century.
Secondly: the NSA spying situation doesn't have any "victims." Spying on world leaders, diplomats, and foreign powers is something that every country does. The thing that was revealed by the Snowden leaks was not that the United States was breaking international rules of normal conduct, but that it was apparently much much better at spying on Europeans than Europeans were at spying on America. Yes, Germany and Brasil came out and protested to look good for their domestic audiences, but these protests were necessarily hollow because they were doing exactly the same things, just not as well.
"What was I supposed to do- call him out for cheating better than me in front of the others?"
Thirdly, failing to put sanctions up against the Ukraine is obviously not against United States policy, because the additional sanctions that were proposed in Europe that Germany has - for the moment - said are off the table, were not proposed by the United States. The American "sanctions" that were imposed this week are actually just the revocation of some visas, something the EU already did. The Americans calling for more meaningful action against the Ukrainian government are Republicans, who are not actually in control of the US government. John McCain is out there meeting with opposition leaders, but if you'll recall he actually lost the election and does not speak for America.
One of these guys is not the president of the United States.
And finally: you know who is supporting the fucking crazy radical elements in the Ukraine right now? Angela Merkel! Remember how it was her meeting with the UDAR head in the photo lists I posted up a bit ago? That's because fucking Der Spiegel refers to Klitschko as the CDU's de facto representative in Ukraine. She has her hand so far up the Maidan asshole that UDAR speaks when she wiggles her fingers and shuts up when she closes her fist.
-Username17
That must be tricky, given her hands are glued together.FrankTrollman wrote:She has her hand so far up the Maidan asshole that UDAR speaks when she wiggles her fingers and shuts up when she closes her fist
Count Arioch the 28th wrote:There is NOTHING better than lesbians. Lesbians make everything better.
Non-political historians are funny, in that they are a small minority with no funding which everyone ignores. Kinda like how there's media-trained people who do journalism for the purpose of informing people of useful facts in a timely manner, and a hundred times as many trained people working to stop them doing that.Lago PARANOIA wrote:I wish that the academic term of 'historical revisionism' was named something else or that 'negationism' and 'historical revisionism' weren't synonymous in common parlance.
Historical revisionism is a thing that really needs to be done and gets more necessary the further back in history you go. Unfortunately, a whole mess of infant-fuckers gave the concept a bad name.
I mean, the west still has poor people not because poverty is difficult, (it isn't, they just need more money, and there is no longer a limit on that) but because politicians like never cleaning their own toilets or carrying their own bags. There's really no point in being rich if you have to clean your own toilet. But you won't read that in a paper anywhere, nor will history speak of the power of protest and benefits of equality.
/random.
PC, SJW, anti-fascist, not being a dick, or working on it, he/him.
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Josh_Kablack
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Wait what, the Ukrainian cops have neither guns nor tear gas? And the local commander doesn't think to have a phalanx in front of the fire hose before the rioters get to it? And weren't the cops trained to keep a hold of their riot shields properly?
Are they completely cut off from resupply? Is the commander incompetent? Or are those merely irregulars sworn in for the crisis and not actual cops?
Are they completely cut off from resupply? Is the commander incompetent? Or are those merely irregulars sworn in for the crisis and not actual cops?
"But transportation issues are social-justice issues. The toll of bad transit policies and worse infrastructure—trains and buses that don’t run well and badly serve low-income neighborhoods, vehicular traffic that pollutes the environment and endangers the lives of cyclists and pedestrians—is borne disproportionately by black and brown communities."
I'm pretty sure things turned ugly when the police attempted to forcibly disperse a protest. That's how this sort of thing usually goes.Longes wrote:http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=959_1390672028
Peaceful protests on the Ukraine. NSFW - violence.
Well, firstly, it's usually a bad idea to use guns against a riot. That's a good way to make things escalate. Sure, it will probably put it down pretty quickly, but it's also a good way to find out exactly how much of the military is on your side. And it doesn't play well internationally. As for tear gas, pretty much everyone is wearing a scarf over their nose and mouth. While that probably doesn't provide complete protection, it would help some.Wait what, the Ukrainian cops have neither guns nor tear gas? And the local commander doesn't think to have a phalanx in front of the fire hose before the rioters get to it? And weren't the cops trained to keep a hold of their riot shields properly?
Are they completely cut off from resupply? Is the commander incompetent? Or are those merely irregulars sworn in for the crisis and not actual cops?
It is fairly likely they're cut off from resupply, too; I saw some video of the street fighting and it was not going well for the police. The protestors have been using molotov cocktails and fireworks to break their lines pretty effectively and seem to have managed to get their hands on plenty of riot shields of their own.
DSMatticus wrote:It's not just that everything you say is stupid, but that they are Gordian knots of stupid that leave me completely bewildered as to where to even begin. After hearing you speak Alexander the Great would stab you and triumphantly declare the puzzle solved.
Honestly, the police are being really restrained there. They were putting up with a lot of shit that, even if your orders as a group are to not fight, would personally provoke a lot of people into cracking a skull or two. I'm really impressed with their self-control in that particular video.
And no offence to Longes, but could someone with less crazy ideas explain why it's all happening? Is it a direct result of Merkel and McCain talking with opposition elements? Were they also pushing AUSTERITY to the breaking point as has happened in Greece? Something else? Just that time of year where it's fashionable for people to riot?
Sadly, Ukraine going up in flames is not important enough for Australian news, because Justin Bieber got arrested for DUI!
And no offence to Longes, but could someone with less crazy ideas explain why it's all happening? Is it a direct result of Merkel and McCain talking with opposition elements? Were they also pushing AUSTERITY to the breaking point as has happened in Greece? Something else? Just that time of year where it's fashionable for people to riot?
Sadly, Ukraine going up in flames is not important enough for Australian news, because Justin Bieber got arrested for DUI!
Count Arioch the 28th wrote:There is NOTHING better than lesbians. Lesbians make everything better.