So Baghdad Bob was brought out of retirement to be Russia’s new Information Minister?
I was thinking that too, but allow some time for the original inhabitants to move back in coupled with, “I’m out from under Putin’s thumb if I vote to stay Ukraine? Sign me up!” from the recent Russian immigrants* it just might work.
*Another cunning plan blowing up in Putin’s face.
Moderating:
Just a reminder that this is a breaking news thread in MPSIMS. We have lots of threads on the war in Ukraine, and several of them are appropriate places for political commentary. This one isn’t.
Reporting what Biden said, and that the White House is walking it back are news. Opining on how good or bad it was for Biden to say that is… hard to separate, i know, but that becomes politics.
Garry Kasparov is one Russian who is definitely thinking along those lines. From his Twitter account:
When a regime is repressive, murderous, dictatorial, and led by someone who has committed war crimes in multiple countries, including his own, what else should be hoped for and worked toward than regime change?” he wrote in the first of a series of tweets.
“When the President is right, the White House should stick with him instead of fumbling to apologize to a murderous dictator for speaking the truth. It’s pathetic,” he continued.
“Biden isn’t Trump, requiring an English to English translator! No dictator is legitimate. Don’t backpedal when you are right and in the right. Don’t play diplomatic games with a mass murderer. ”
I don’t know how much influence he has among Russians (he lives in NYC now) but one thing that could really change everything is more resistance from within. I can’t imagine what it’s like right now to be a Russian who hates what’s happening.
Can anybody imagine Churchill catching heat for saying that Hitler is a war criminal and needs to “go”?
another thought on the “Putin has to go” sentence …
I think we might get a good feeling how “safe” Putin is, by watching what and how this is being transmitted in russian media:
-
if Putin feels reasonably safe, the media should blow that phrase out of proportion … → see, the americans want to kill our president
-
if he feels not too save, the media will be downplaying/ignoring it … → we don’t want to put stupid ideas in people’s heads
Retired Lieutenant General Mark Hertling strikes an optimistic note:
Does Russia’s constitution (1993) include impeachment? Yes, under normal circumstances no one would dare try. But, I could see the FSB collectively removing Putin and calling it an impeachment.
Then, some of the recent repressive laws could be repealed. That would be the safest and most stable solution. Preserve the constitution and undo some of Putin’s authoritarian changes.
If the FSB and the Oligarchs want Putin gone, he is gone.
The United Kingdom was formally, legally at war with Germany.
I don’t think the second one follows from the first.
Perhaps they can just sentence Putin to 10 years Without the Right of Correspondence.
Not before September, 1939.
Above all I fear they would say: You are weak, and we are strong. After all, my friends, only a few hours away by air there dwells a nation of nearly 70 millions of the most educated, industrious scientific people in the world, who are being taught from childhood to think of war as a glorious exercise and death in battle as the noblest deed for man. There is a nation which has abandoned all its liberties in order to augment its collective strength. There is a nation which with all its strength and virtue is in the grip of a group of ruthless men preaching a gospel of intolerance and racial pride unrestrained by law by Parliament or by public opinion. In that country all pacifist speeches, all morbid books, are forbidden or suppressed and the authors rigorously imprisoned. From their new table of commandments they have omitted: Thou shalt not kill. It is but 20 years since these neighbours of ours fought almost the whole world and almost defeated them. Now they are re-arming with the utmost speed.
Winston Churchill in a BBC radio broadcast, November, 1934
And Winston was not in government at that point.
60 miles (100 km) north of Mariupol:
Excellent article by Illia Ponomarenko in the Kyiv Independent:
Ukraine reaches breaking point in Russia’s war
NB: The headline writer meant turning point, not breaking point! 
This is a clear, informative, detailed, and balanced article about the war over past month, the current situation and future prospects. Long, but worth reading.
Now the recent deportations makes sense. Russia is removing people that could vote. It’s also a terror tactic.
Any electon will be heavily manipulated. It’s easier with Ukrainians forcibly removed or killed.
Guardian Live blog
Elections in occupied territory are meaningless.
Just like Russia has been removing elected mayors from towns it has occupied and replacing them with preferred candidates.
https://twitter.com/AndrejNkv/status/1507365192405073920
Here’s the whole thing:
I am the very model of a Russian Major General
My standing in the battlefield is growing quite untenable
My forces, though equipped and given orders unequivocal
Did not expect the fight to be remotely this reciprocalI used to have a tank brigade but now I have lost several
My fresh assaults are faltering with battleplans extemporal
I can’t recover vehicles but farmers in a tractor can
It’s all becoming rather reminiscent of AfghanistanMy ordnance is the best but only half my missiles make it there
I would have thought by now that we would be controllers of the air
But at the rate the snipers work my time here is ephemeral
I am the very model of a Russian Major General
The Ukrainians are admirable and resilient people. The US needs accept to more refugees. We had a large Eastern European immigration around 1900. They’ve contributed a lot to our country.
These people are still doing garbage collection. The men wear flak jackets emptying garbage cans. They’re determined to keep their city running as normal as possible.
Does require a registered login. It’s free.