Posted on 11/19/2014 1:40:41 AM PST by Berlin_Freeper
Edited on 11/23/2014 8:57:37 AM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]
I grew up hating America. I lived in the Soviet Union and was a child of the Cold War. That hate went away in 1989, though, when the Berlin Wall fell and the Cold War ended. By the time I left Russia in 1991, the year the Soviet Union collapsed, America was a country that Russians looked up to and wanted to emulate.
Twenty-three years later, a new version of cold war is back, though we Americans haven't realized it yet. But I am getting ahead of myself.
After Russia invaded Crimea and staged its referendum, I thought Vladimir Putin's foreign excursions were over. Taking back Crimea violated plenty of international laws, but let's be honest. Though major powers like the US and Russia write the international laws, they are not really expected to abide by those laws if they find them not to be in their best interests. Those laws are for everyone else. I am not condoning such behavior, but I can clearly see how Russians could justify taking Crimea back — after all, it used to belong to Russia.
I was perplexed by how the Russian people could possibly support and not be outraged by Russia's invasion of Ukraine. But I live in Denver, and I read mostly US and European newspapers. I wanted to see what was going on in Russia and Ukraine from the Russian perspective, so I went on a seven-day news diet: I watched only Russian TV — Channel One Russia, the state-owned broadcaster, which I hadn't seen in more than 20 years — and read Pravda, the Russian newspaper whose name means "Truth." Here is what I learned:
I have to confess, it is hard not to develop a lot of self-doubt about your previously held views when you watch Russian TV for a week. But then you have to remind yourself that Putin's Russia doesn't have a free press. The free press that briefly existed after the Soviet Union collapsed is gone — Putin killed it. The government controls most TV channels, radio, and newspapers. What Russians see on TV, read in print, and listen to on the radio is direct propaganda from the Kremlin.
snip
I had never heard of her, so I spent the last few minutes reading up on her. What a POS elitist. She probably had no idea, that in a real communist take over, the commies would have thrown her into the canal as a traitor anyway.
Reads like Pravda from 25 years ago.
Thanks !
Dude could “learn” the same shyt just reading some of FR posts for several hours.
PRAVDA is pretty much the Russian equivalent of America’s Main Stream Media ...... no need for truth .... just political spin to control the masses.
I was stationed in Germany 1981-83. The Left in FRG was Baader-Meinhof & anarchists & every town had its Karl-Marx-Strasse. Better Red than dead was their slogan.
Bridges & autobahn overpasses had built-in niche holes in which to place charges to blow them in case of invasion. Lefties started filling these in with concrete to prevent that. But after locals began watching the bridges & beating the hell out of them, that stopped.
Germany has a much bigger muzzie problem than a commie one. Putin doesn’t need the Red Army to threaten Germany, he has Gazprom.
That says it all.
Most welcome Auntie Mame. :)
The source is Business Insider. Can’t agree, disagree or otherwise form an opinion.
The Eurasian land route envisioned by the Russians and Chinese has a terminus in Germany. This would shorten the transportation time for goods and materials between Asia and Europe considerably while eliminating the need for Western 'security' along the way. Its not hard to see how this type of arrangement might become attractive to Germany, or how it might negatively effect Anglo-American global influence.
Yes, lots of Turks and Pakistanis and Iranians there.
bfl
It was funded the same way last time. It was Reagan's decontrol of the US oil market plus Saudi production that brought down the Soviet Union.
Instead, the Frankfurt School was brought to America and installed in a place of honor at our universities.
It's also not hard to see Poland as a potential problem for that plan.
That and the Soviet inability to do anything properly. They could barely feed themselves.
Am I better off now, with him, than I was before he came into power? For most the answer is yes. What most Russians don't see is that oil prices over the past 14 years went from $14 to more than $100 a barrel... Unless Putin was the one who jump-started China's insatiable demand for oil and other commodities that drove prices higher, he has had very little to do with Russia's recent "prosperity." ...if you take oil and gas riches away from Russia (lower prices can do that with ease), it is in a worse place today than it was 14 years ago... After the Soviet Union collapsed, Russia had a chance to broaden its economy; it had one of the most educated workforces in the world. Sadly, it squandered that opportunity. Name one non-commodity product that is exported from Russia. There aren't many; I can think only of vodka and military equipment.Don't forget terrorism, internet trolls, ID theft, and a treasonous POTUS.
It becomes a question of whether Poland wishes to prosper along with Germany or not. I'd argue the Baltic states would benefit greatly from proximity to such an overland Eurasian link as well.
The Chinese have alternate routes on the drawing board with Russia as a full partner, so it really only hurts Europe if Poland decided not to participate.
Putin already speaks German fluently. And, if I recall correctly, so do his daughters, as they all spoke it at home while he was stationed in former East Germany.
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