'Scuse me, Mr. Putin...a moment of your time?

The BBQ Pit
1

As an American born during the sunset years of the cold war, I am quite pleased to see our countries working together. Your country’s experience with Afghanistan, however unfortunate, will be of immeasurable value once we get around to doing something; and overall, it’s nice that we can still be buddies, even after so much bad shit happened between our nations in the past.

That said, there’s this one nagging little problem I’d like to see you address in your fine country. Crime. Particularly the Russian Mafia.

Now, as an American, I hesitate to point fingers at ANY other country where crime is concerned. Hell, it’s one of the hallmarks of our society. Drugs, guns, sick assholes burning up kitty-cats for the fuck of it…you name it, and some low-class assmonkey in this country will do it.

And it’s entirely possible that if there was ready access to nuclear & chemical WMD components in this country, some bastards would gladly make a buck selling said goodies to smallish third-world tinpot dictators. We DO encourage capitalism, after all, so I’m not saying we’re above it by nature.

But the point is, there’s not such easy access here. We tend to treat such items gingerly.

I realize that your country’s financial problems predate your election; but given that we might end up on the receiving end of some of your nastier toys, might it be possible for you to put the Spetsnaz smackdown on some of your less ethical ne’er-do-wells? I’ve got nerve, and I’ve had gas, but Sarin ain’t the best of both worlds.

Spasiba, tovarisch.

[sub](Pretty good, eh? Tom Clancy, Red Storm Rising.)[/sub]

[sub](On second thought, forget that last part. Think ‘Iron Eagle II’.)[/sub]

2

I wonder how long we’ve been aware of this? If the WTC had not been attacked, would we still have declared war?

3

Yes, probably. There’s theories abounding (and it even was a news.bbc.co.uk article, so it’s probably got -some- credence) that the US was preparing to attack Afghanistan in October of this year anyway.

Whether that’s true or not is mostly irrelevant to my frustration; I just get a bit irked when some people see that and then make the “logical” conclusion that the CIA staged the terrorist attacks to make an attack on Afghanistan palatable.

4

Fact: anytime anything happens in or to America that’s bad enough to make the national media, one or more assholes will pop up and claim it’s the CIA’s fault – usually accompanied by elaborate, convoluted theories tying it back to the JFK asassination.

Which, of course, was done to cover up the faked moon landings.

[tim_curry] Castro was just a red herring. [/tim_curry]

:rolleyes:

5

We should have brought back the Marshall Plan for the end of the Cold War. Instead we laughed and said “we are the only superpower” about 10 billion times. Hubris for dinner anyone?