Given what Russians have had to live under for the last 80 years, I think that they need at least three generations to even begin the process of healing and recuperation.
From there, they will, and ought to, map out their own future, for what's good for them--not what is good for US or the rest of the world. They sure don't need advice from anyone else.
We won't ever trust them, as we have been inculcated to mistrust them. They were the bogeymen in MY entire youth, with Hollywood and the media driving home EVERY negative stereotype about Russians that ever existed.
I am optimistic about the Russians. But, then, I admire their culture, or much of it, and have faith that their culture, which did survive Stalin and communism, to see them through the next several generations of recuperation and thriving. I trust them to do what's best for them, when they DO recover.
But, then, each country IS expected to do what's best for IT, not for us or anything on OUR agenda. That is just common sense.
But came in first where it counted. Calling for a new election after the first scam "election".
I guess Iraq and Afghanastan having free elections doesn't count. Or the brave men and women of American giving their lives for people they don't even know just to give them a chance at creating their own destiny through democracy.
Could of fooled me...
Gary Kasparov is a naive idiot.
I agree that Putin is behaving like a damned fool and making it difficult or impossible for us to work with Russia. But there is no way that the U.S. can impose its will on Russia unless we are prepared to go to war with them and their 20,000 nuclear weapons. Russia is no longer the power it was, but it is still a major power.
Also, Bush is the leader of the only remaining superpower, the leader of the free world, such as it is. What he says has to be taken seriously. Chirac can say whatever his latest whim suggests to him, and no one will take him seriously. "Oh, that's just that idiot Chirac mouthing off," people will say. "Typical Frog."
But when Bush speaks, every word is important. Every word is recorded and analyzed. He can't afford to mouth off.
The fact is, Ukraine had to take care of itself. If the Ukrainians couldn't do it, nothing Bush said would make a pin's worth of difference. I'm delighted that they did. But this whining is just plain stupid.
And Putin is not Caligula. I wish he had more sense, but he's not a madman, just an ambitious fool.
Could you imagine having to fill in that name on countless forms? Remember filling in the dots for the SAT and similar tests? You would probably never be able to fit the whole name into the space and circles alloted.
She must hava adopted some sort of short-form signature. You simply could not sign that last name again and again and again.