"How do you like them apples?"
Posted on 08/28/2014 9:32:03 AM PDT by Tau Food
Not too long ago, top officials within the Russian government said Western sanctions were not going to hurt. A couple of months later, reality has settled in.
Russia’s Economic Development Minister, Alexei Ulyukayev, said the economy had many obstacles and entered a negative growth cycle. In an op-ed published in the Vedomosti newspaper Monday, Ulyukayev wrote, “ It could be said that we have entered a negative stage of the economic cycle. Lack of demand is a significant obstacle on the way to restoring steady growth.”
Sanctions are not helping matters.
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
The Putin magic.
Putin has failed even with relatively high oil prices.
Criminy, he’s a communist. Failure is in their bones.
But, I think with Putin, it is more than just communism. He's basically a gangster who is surrounded by his gangster friends. He needs them. If his gangster friends feel that they can find a gangster who is more competent than Putin, they'll take him for a "ride" in the countryside.
That's why Putin needs to do better, but he doesn't know how.
Oh come on. Putin is a genius on all matters; he’s the Gilgamesh of good government and a geo-political Gawd for the Putinist fan club.
He's a loser and he's been destroying the Russian economy. A Russian depression is not good for anyone, but that's where Putin seems to be taking his country.
History rhymes. Last time their economy started crashing, they engaged in adventurism abroad with the goal of controlling energy markets.
Fast forward, and they have an economy that can function correctly only if oil is near or above $100/BBL, fracking is the rage, and the US is becoming an energy exporter.
Invading Ukraine should not have been a surprise. It was the economic analysis of the USSR that led the NSA’s office to predict the USSR was ready to tip, and that a weapon’s program like Star Wars could provide the final push.
Turns out we got useful stuff from it. Iron Dome is nice.
Gilgamesh or Gargamel chasing smurfs?
“ It could be said that we have entered a negative stage of the economic cycle. Lack of demand is a significant obstacle on the way to restoring steady growth.”
Well, no shiit Sherlock. We are ALL in the same boat
and these “leaders” all seem to think more regulation
and government meddling is the cure.
Yep, the future looks bright, collapse, ebola, civil
breakdown, why, I can hardly wait...
Putin needs to do a more competent job with the people and the economy that he's still got. He needs to create more incentives in the economy and he needs to create a legal system that protects real people and not just his gangster friends. Of course, his gangster friends will resist such reforms, but Putin needs to summon up the courage to make the effort. Otherwise, he'll wind up driving his economy into a full-blown depression and he'll even lose the support of his gangster buddies.
Russia is sliding downhill fast and blowing up commercial airliners isn't going to solve the real problems for Putin.
Yeah, it’s ridiculous. You’d think Putin could figure that out.
Bill O’Reilly was right - nobody did a damn thing about that flight.
Nothing happened.
Yes, you’re right. What kind of leader becomes involved in shooting down commercial airliners? Putin just seems to be getting increasingly desperate. What might he try next?
Were I him, I’d nuke both of our coasts. I’d leave the US Midwest intact. I would seek to take us out somehow. We won’t respond to the attack. That much is clear.
Surely the Russians can deal with hunger and homelessness and other miseries, as long as Putin regains the pride that Russians once had when they used to be part of the old USSR.
Sacrifice: It’s for the greater good of pride in their country.
"How do you like them apples?"
Crimea is a real mess
tourist traffic down 35% at least
foreign cruise ships no longer make port calls
I guess they’re going to have to get used to eating bread made out of sawdust again, just like during the Seige of Leningrad.
That's what the Japs thought. Putin knows that the US is the only country that has demonstrated a willingness to actually use nukes. We have and we will.
I have no use for him, but I don't think that Putin's that dumb.
I tend to agree with you that the Russian people will go through a lot of pain. Stalin had his people eating the bark off of trees, but I’m not sure that any leader can do that these days. It’s a different world.
The current POTUS is the national command authority. He won’t use them.
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