If you want to get down to it, should Putin be in power?
He gamed the system over there to the point he’s got it for life it seems. That makes him somewhat illegitimate too.
I am not convinced anyone has pristine hands on this. I don’t buy the idea it was evil for the Ukraine to opt to go with the West. Lets not kid ourselves either. Russia had it’s own players in there fighting.
I guess. I get the impression the people really like him as well. Dunno.
Russia is a backwards racist country who average rural citizen hates Americans from what I have gathered from recent conversations with several Russians. I understand lots of us think differently and the the Russia "people" are "very similar to us" - not so much I'm learning.
I guess the people in large cities are okay but I've now heard several times - and I don't know why you would - folks having unnecessary local messing with the tourists trouble.
Putin learned the english language to a high level of fluency in a couple of years - thats hard to do, my point is this guys quite intelligent. I think he has people killed, that reporter with the polonium and he turned that presidents face in something out a Dick Tracy comic book.- that used to bother me not so much now, we via drones and special ops have people killed evey day - we set appointments almost daily those get keep with a boom. We've been at war now for yikes over 15 years now holy cow!
I guess if there is a point to this, it is recent years have made us re-evaluate Putin as we have been exposed a whee bit to the decline of world wide dominance feeling. Putin is Russia First with a nice mix of domestic paranoia that feeds nicely in to the underlying Slavic racism that is from what I'm lead to understand fairly prevalent.
I understand this is what the media says Trump is but discussing what morons believe much less spout as partyprop is a waste of both of our times as we know of the many things DJT was able to erect a big tent around - groups and issues based on hate and contempt for life and liberty were not allowed in and that is garbage.
I could be way off base on that I don't speak Russian, hang out there so take it with a grain of salt.
I also understand that effective demagogues ply their craft by weaving the lies with a large amount of truth.
What is the Truth about Putin and Russia?
Well they always suck and backstab you but you know that going in
The Russians like Putin and Putin likes Russia being Russian and wants his country to kick ass. He almost knows how but policies to protect russian culture (all the mean hateful stuff) is accompanied by byzantine and endemic corruption that he seems to get himself meshed in as so much of his economy is oil based and oil has collapsed in price.
He kinda loses his super evil genius status as he hasn't been able to lead Russia economically very well, but a nation is much more then its economy or government and Russians trust him.
He crushed Chechnya and sent Ziranoffsky??? to eradicate that region - that was pretty medieval at the time - now it looks quite wise.
Is he evil? I doubt a patriotic Russian would say so and I wonder really what difference does it matter anyhow:)
Putin is a serious player in the game of realpolitick and plays it well. He isn't going away.
Syria is about a couple of things but one of the things was to show the world that if you are on the Russian side of the ledger you will receive help when the feces and fan blades intersect (I doubt that will be the case but it was a good opportunity for him).
Contrast that to the Americas under Chairman Mullah Obama.
Perhaps its just that Bush,Clinton,Bush,Obama have so lowered the bar to what passes for a leader - Putin is starting to look better as time moves along and history plays out. Anyhow DoughyOne thanks for letting blather on be well