An armed response by the interim government of Ukraine could be used as a pretext for the Russians to intervene. I feel the need for some very skillful diplomacy at this point or things are going to spiral out of control quickly. Unfortunately, finding someone who would be trusted by both sides may be difficult to find at this juncture.
Yeah, the developments over night are pretty much the worst so far. Russian nationalists attempting to slice the Crimea away to Russia is a recipe for a civil war with potential for spiraling out of control.
I hope everyone’s better angels prevail, but I wouldn’t bet money on it right now.
In this case, though, it looks as if at least a significant portion of the Crimeans themselves actually do want Russian protection - or even for Crimea to become a Russian territory. This is an “internal cause.”
If - I repeat: if - union with Russia is what an overwhelming majority of the people of Crimea want, I absolutely think this should be allowed, NATO’s sabre-rattling notwithstanding.
It can be both, though. The ethnic minority might genuinely want protection, or even union, while the motherland might just want to expand.
In Crimea, this might very well be the case. A lot of the Crimeans might genuinely want to join Russia, while Mother Russia herself, power-hungry as she is, might just want a fresh new slice of land.
Very true. The U.S. generally finds other reasons to attack.
The only thing? Of course not.
When it comes to Chechnya, the Russians are hypocrites.
The demographic collapse has mostly bottomed out. Russia had a higher birth rate (barely) than America last year. And their population is projected to start growing again sometime around 2020.
Russia is still a world power, a developed industrial economy, currently (I think) the eighth largest economy in the world, and probably will continue to be one for the foreseeable future. Very far from South Africa, either in 1980 or today.
Malthus The problem with the anti-gay laws isn’t Putin. Most Russians simply have a lot of anti-gay sentiment. Those laws were overwhelmingly popular, and there’s a limit to what the government can do about it.
Putin ‘had journalists murdered’ was stated as a fact by Carnalk not an assumption. Based on the evidence as you define evidence then Carnalk should have said, many suspect Putin is tied to organized criminals/ corrupt Russian officials who might be linked to the unsolved deaths of maybe 17 journalists over a period from 2000 to 2009.
" … there’s a limit to what the government can do about it"? You make it sound like he’s trying to be liberal on the issue of gay rights, but the people won’t allow him. Is there any evidence this is true?
Sure, the population of Russia is extremely homophobic, but they did not force the government to enact anti-gay laws - while I understand those laws are very popular in Russia. The head of that government cannot be sheltered from justified oppribrium for drafting and passing unjust laws simply because the laws are popular.
I simply do not understand why so many posters here seem intent on seeing Putin as a sadly misunderstood fellow.
Putin signs laws outlawing “gay propaganda”? Not his fault - there is only so much he can do, when the Russian people hate gays.
Putin almost certainly has journalists murdered? Well, it was only 17 of them, and over a whole decade - and where’s that absolute proof, hey?
Putin starts making noises about invading Ukraine and siezing Crimea? Well, the West provoked him. And they are hypocrites. Because the US invaded Afganistan.
I am not apologizing for Putin. I’m asking if you believe or even care if the number of journalists killed in Russia is seen ‘In comparative perspective’? I am asking if it possible that " the use of CPJ’s raw data can sometimes be misleading." ?
This is the last paragraph from the following commentary:
" Simply using the number of killings leaves Russia, with 52 killings since 1992, appearing as one of the world’s worst violators of journalists’ rights and free speech with the fourth highest volume of murdered journalists. When one introduces the country population factor into the CPJ’s list of the “20 Deadliest Countries” for journalists, a rather different picture of Russia appears. Russia moves from the position of fourth highest volume of murdered journalists to fourteenth in the top twenty on the CPJ list as of December 2009. "
Calling for a comparative perspective is not ‘apologizing’ for anyone.
And look at this:
Georgia of McCain’s ‘we are all Georgians now’… from 1992 to 2009 had one journalist murdered per 500,000 of population … Russia over the same time period had one journalist killed per 2,700,000 of population.
Perhaps you can understand why I should not be accused of apologizing for Putin if you understood my contrary outlook on America’s right wing political policies that are driven in large part by Evangelical Christians non-church political activism with proselytizing mixed up in the background, not just here but apparently all around the entire world.
Some excerpts from http://www.thenation.com/article/177823/how-us-evangelicals-fueled-rise-russias-pro-family-right
Americans hopefully have progressed enough on these social issues to POLTICALLY constrain the ‘evangelicals’ … from leading us backward… But I would not count them out.
But no… I am not apologizing for Putin at all. Just want to straighten that out.
Malthus I’m not particularly fond of Putin, though I love the masculine theatrics. He’s much too right-wing for me on economics- if I lived in Russia I’d probably vote for his main opposition, which is the remnant of the Communist Party- although it’s worth noting that in spite of his right-wing economics, Russia still has less economic inequality than America.
I do think one has to concede his pretty important achievements though. Unemployment is down (also lower than America), economic growth is up, the abortion rate is down, and the birth rate is up, under his tenure.
I think the thing I like most about Putin is that he’s served as a counterweight to US foreign policy in Latin America and in the former Soviet bloc. I’m generally sympathetic to left-wing governments in places like Venezuela, Nicaragua, etc., and Putin has been a reliable ally of theirs (and they’ve generally returned the favour).
I also think the fussing about authoritarianism just makes me roll my eyes. Russia is not a country of liberal democrats, and they aren’t going to be a liberal democracy now or in the foreseeable future. (Which doesn’t terribly bother me; I’m fairly skeptical of democracy in general). The realistic alternative to Putin isn’t the liberal democrats, it’s the communists.
As for the Crimea, they’re overwhelmingly Russian, and it seems pretty clear they want to be part of Russia.
As for Chechnya, they are overwhelmingly (95%) Chechen and don’t want to be part of Russia. So Russia can get Crimea, but only the day after Chechnya’s independence.
I doubt Putin wants to split Crimea off from Ukraine or partition any part.
Good commentary in that… The odds on choice will be ‘fence-sitting’…
Putin suffered a set-back for sure but hostile or punitive actions against the new government in Ukraine won’t help. He’ll wait it out. The EU might cut a deal with Putin to share the cost of bringing Ukraine out of its economic and political chaos.
After all it was not Putin that instigated and carried out the overthrow of a democratically elected President.
He’ll sit back and see if Ukraine falls into worse condition that in was six months ago. before Putin and Viktor Yanukovych made a deal.
There’s no way Putin will hand Chechnya potentially into the hands of the Islamist terrorists that would take over this:
http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article18299.html
OF Putin took your deal Terr, do you guarantee that whoever takes over from the Russian backed government there now would put all that natural gas and oil into construction and nation building for the all the peaceful people who live there?
You take comfort from the fact that Russia is no worse that Georgia or Tajikistan on a murdered-journalist-per-capita basis? This is supposed to “add perspective”?
It isn’t some sort of contest. Russia can be terrible and Georgia and Tajikistan can be terrible as well.
Fair enough. I believe Chechnya should be free, too. (I’m not optimistic about what sort of government they’ll choose for themselves, but that’s their business, not mine and not Russia’s).
