If At First You Don’t Succeed …
… try, try again.
aka “Barbarossa II” or “Following the footsteps of Napoleon once again” or “We’ll get it right this time”
Barbarossa I started June 22; ended Dec 5
“Germany’s General Burkhalter Merz Greenlights Ukraine To Strike Russia With German Weapons“
Those funny Germans – even Sgt Schultz would know better.
Screw NATO.
This time, let’s just sit back and watch.
The gif, dude munching popcorn, is a symbol of our times. Appropriate for almost every reply online, you think? Hey… where the hell is Maggie’s Farm? It comes up snake eyes for several days now. http://maggiesfarm.anotherdotcom.com/
Speaking of popcorn, I hadn’t eaten that stuff in years but last Sun I had a hankering during the Indy 500. Broke out a pack and threw it in the micro and it tasted like pure dung. Looked at the box and the “best by” date was in 2021. Like I said, it’s been awhile.
I guess micro popcorn doesn’t hold up for the long haul. So I cooked up the other 2 bags in the box and all of it went in the yard for the creatures. Next morn there wasn’t a trace of it. Them possums and coons slept like logs, but their anuses were trashed.
You could have tried composting it if you had a pile. But all those nasty chemicals they put in the fake “butter” flavoring and fake “oil” would probably poison the compost, and make it smell for a while until the bacteria evolved to eat that nasty stuff. And then it still might not be fully remediated and the residues end up being incorporated into your garden foods.
I’m a Mr. Natural when it comes to popcorn. Either olive oil, or a hot air popper. My wife doesn’t like the fresh-out too-dry air-popped kernels, so she will melt some real butter and sprinkle it on the popcorn with salt.
Yeah, no more microwave popcorn for me, no matter how fresh or before its expiry date. That metallic chemical aftertaste is no bueno. Trust your tastebuds, they know what real food is.
Worked in places where some would complain about various “smells” – perfumes mostly – and HR would pass rules. The smell of microwave popcorn makes me physically ill … my stomch start churning away … but can’t complain about that smell. Not fond of the smell of hazelnut coffee either. Phew!
Oh. Am I supposed to believe that that’s going to happen? That America will just sit back and watch as Russia eats away at Europe? Maybe Tucker will invite David Sacks and JD Vance onto his podcast and they can all cluck, cluck at how what is happening in Europe is none of our business and we can “just sit back and watch”.
Sorry guys, but I don’t think that it’ll turn out that way. Poland is getting ready now….today….for a Russian invasion. Hedgehogs, barbed wire, and minefields….all going in today. That article tells us that they’re spending 5% of their GDP on defense (considerably more than the US spends, BTW). That’s a ton of money taken from what might be a productive use for their economy. The Baltic countries–Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia–are preparing for war too. From this second article, the Danes tell us that…
…which, by the way, is exactly what having America “just sit back and watch” will lead to.
And it get’s scarier. The Poles have publicly discussed, as a short-term matter, placing themselves under a French nuclear umbrella. Their long-term plan is to acquire nuclear weapons themselves. By saying “Screw NATO”, we are encouraging a nuclear arms race in Europe. But that’s not the scary part: The Germans–yes, the Germans–are having the same discussions.
No. We can’t just “sit back and watch”. This isn’t entertainment for us to consume alongside our popcorn as we watch the Russians upset stability in Europe. The old saying is that “In any conflict, the enemy gets a vote too”. In this case, the enemy–the Russians–are voting with their military. They’re going to keep pushing to recast Europe as they wish it to be right up until they’re stopped. I say that they should be stopped as early as possible.
We can’t just “sit back and watch”.
================
The criminal, tyrannical entity that can’t balance it’s own checkbook nor understand which bathroom to use should obviously further indebt it’s citizenry by sticking it’s incapable and unaccountable snoot into the entire planets business because scary media moguls make up retarded stories.
Me?
I’m going to the store today and getting some popcorn and I hope the criminal politicians stay tangled up in red tape.
No. I don’t believe we can or will sit back and watch. But I wish we could. What’s coming is going to be ugly and the world – including North America – as it is today will no longer exist by its end.
I believe it was George Washington that said words about avoiding foreign entanglements but that’s not the world we live in. But I don’t believe Russia of today is the Soviet Union anymore than the America of today is the America of the time of the Soviet Union. Europe is eating itself; it needs a war with “someone” in order to keep their own power base intact and divert attention from its internal failures. Russia seems to be responding to broken promises about NATO expansion the same way we would if Canada and Mexico had joined the Warsaw Pact – we saw a sample of that in ’62.
I don’t think Russia has the same desire for world empire the Soviet Union (may have) once had. I have no doubt TPTB have dreams of a US-inspired global government – if “government” would be the right word to use in such case. Russia would get in the way of that; China has its own plans and has already infiltrated the major players.
I favor a partnership with Russia – far more than I favor our current partnerships with … not-friends.
I do believe our propaganda is misleading at best and that very few of us truly know what’s going on. I have no doubt the Ukraine mess is a result of US interference – thinking Biden/Burisma and the associated participants.
I’d prefer to let Europe go their own way with their own consequences – The European Union is no longer the Europe of the Cold War era either. I believe NATO has long outlived its usefulness and it’s time the US pulled away.
And as a side note, for what it’s worth – I may not have been in the military but I spent a good part of my career on military bases and projects – mostly AF – building “toys for the boys” and other such I need not go into. Not that it equates and not that I was direct CS but I was GS15 equivalent as far as interaction with military was concerned. Never made SES ranks …
All this far, far above my paygrade.
I’ve got a few minutes for a multi-part response to some of what you’ve said.
I agree with the wish that we could sit back and ignore coming conflicts. I sometimes envision how a different life for me might have evolved. What if I had been a Paraguan pilot and spent a career flying around South America? Maybe I’d have retired to some villa somewhere. Does anyone know anything about Paraguay? I don’t. Do they have a democracy and a President or are they ruled by some Generalisimo? Would it matter which way it went?
And that’s my point: A guy of my station in life in Paraguay can afford to not care about the world because nothing in his world will make a difference anywhere else. I could ignore the hostilities in Israel and Ukraine (being only the most recent of a long list of countries looking for a benefactor) because there is nothing that a Paraguan could do for them. Does Paraguay have nuclear weapons or aircraft carriers? Is global trade settled in the Paraguan Guaraní (a currency I’d never heard of until I just looked it up)? With no offense to Paraguay or Paraguans, nothing matters in Paraguay, and that gives them the great luxury of being able to sit on the sidelines.
We–America, and more broadly, the West–don’t have that luxury. Like it or not (and there is some that I like and some that I don’t), we are the World’s Policeman, and sometimes that means that we’ve got to bruise our knuckles. Yes–I wish I could be sitting on the patio of my Paraguan villa sipping whatever drinks they sip down there. But being that guy makes me someone who doesn’t benefit from being a citizen of a global power. People automatically want to watch our TV and our movies, hold our dollars, and emigrate here (illegally, if necessary). I both benefit from and pay the price for being a citizen of a Global Power.
I do agree that, as time goes by, countries change. But I disagree that Putin’s Russia isn’t trying to reconstitute their heady days of the USSR. I think that Russia is insecure without what they used to term their “Near Abroad” of nearby states over which Russia had control to act as buffers between themselves from the West. They see NATO on their borders as a threat of invasion. I don’t think that there is anything further from the truth.
I’ll cede that Europe is “eating itself” in the sense that they’ve allowed faaar too much immigration from primarily Muslim areas. While the Europeans haven’t been keeping up with their birthrates and need the extra population, they’ve taken in far too many and these immigrants aren’t integrating well into their cultures. Europe will regret what they’ve done in the last 25 years.
Have you ever known a couple who have gotten a divorce? Of course you have. If you haven’t been there yourself, you certainly have watched a couple bicker after their relationship has fallen apart. He says that the house is always a mess, and she says that he’s not making enough money. Whatever their differences, for me, the key is that they each look backwards at these past promises and understandings of how life was supposed to be, and blame the other.
If a promise existed regarding NATO expansion, was that set in concrete? Or was there a reason that the West’s understanding of whatever promise had been made was different than the Russian understanding of that promise?
Further, I look at countries as independent sovereigns. The 3 Baltic states, Poland, Finland, Sweden, Hungary, and all the other recent additions to NATO have the right, as independent countries, to join, or to not join, any alliance that exists. I don’t think that Russia has a veto. I don’t believe that Russia has the right to say that these neighboring countries can’t join NATO. [BTW, in your hypothetical, in my mind, Canada and/or Mexico have the right to align themselves with Russia or the old Warsaw Pact. Should they begin to lean in that direction, it would be incumbent on the US to make them a better deal and keep them connected to us.]
And if it were limited to just Europe or parts of Europe, then I’d agree with you. I just don’t think that it’ll turn out that way. The US and Europe have far too many historical, cultural, economic, and trade alliances (to name just a few) for us to not care what happens there. I think that eventually, the US will have to get involved. Repeating myself, eventually, I think that watching that movie of one European country fighting against another will become distasteful enough that we’ll put down the popcorn bowl and get involved. We’re just not going to stand by.
Here, you and I agree entirely. A citizen has the right to his opinion on the nation’s affairs regardless of whether he’s served in uniform, served as a civilian, or hasn’t served at all. None of those backgrounds give him more or less credibility than any of the others.
Mine too. But we can still talk about it.
“we can still talk about it”
Yes we can but sometimes these discussions get antagonistic. That I Don’t want.
We agree on some things and not on others. Not good to be clones of one another.
reply: “Canada and/or Mexico have the right to align themselves with Russia or the old Warsaw Pact”
I don’t disagree they had the right; my intent was to put forth the possible US reaction to same.
NATO: Comes too close to the military arm of a global government and I don’t favor a global government. Have the same feeling about the UN, WHO, and other similar organizations. They’ve gone from being lower level advisory bodies to cooperating governments to over-reaching/over-powerful busybody bureaucracies.
Paraguay huh? That’s the 2nd time this past week I’ve heard someone speak favorably about that place.
For about 50 years I’ve wanted to explore Argentina, but maybe Paraguay might be better? Looks like I’m going to do some web ‘sploring of Paraguay.