Crisis in the Ukraine

Crimea River

 

Quite a speech today by Putin.

Doesn't sound like sanctions are working.

 

A few weeks ago, Ukrainians "decided their future" (with, ahem, some "help" from America) by violently throwing out their elected leader.

Our reaction: Hooray!

This week, Crimea "decided its future" by overwhelmingly electing to secede from Ukraine and join Russia.

Our reaction: Nooooooooooooo!

We are, bar none, the world's worst hypocrites.

No decision is "acceptable" --- no matter how peaceful, voluntary and democratic the process is --- unless we like the result.

Add Zoë Schlanger --- in addition to Stephen Cohen --- to the handful of people who seem to "get it."

http://www.newsweek.com/american-who-dared-make-putins-case-231388

 

Ding... Ding ... Ding ...

And nobody was crying foul when we overthrew the government of Iran in the 1950s and host of other Middle Eastern countries and Banana Republics.

USA! USA! USA!

Yeah, I have a really hard time generating any outrage towards Russia.
The country has enough problems to worry about before getting involved with the Crimean Crisis.

 

Good read so far, and this was solid:

 

You're seriously just realizing this now?

 

You are doing some great work on this thread.

 

But his delivery to some on this board is top notch.

 

"We are deeply concerned with what's happening in Ukraine and our concern is understandable. We're not just neighbors, we are one nation. Kyiv is the mother of Russian cities.. .Russia is our common root, our common fundament. We won't be able to live without each other."

 

What I'm waiting for is some journalist to point out these gross inconsistencies to Obama or Kerry or Clinton or McCain and just say, "Please explain, sir, why it's fine for a few hundred protesters to violently overthrow a government, while it's unacceptable for 95 percent of a region to elect to secede from this country and its new government."

 

Putin couldn't agree with you more.

“Our western partners created the Kosovo precedent with their own hands. In a situation absolutely the same as the one in Crimea they recognized Kosovo’s secession from Serbia legitimate while arguing that no permission from a country’s central authority for a unilateral declaration of independence is necessary.

“That’s what they wrote, that what they trumpeted all over the world, coerced everyone into it – and now they are complaining. Why is that?”

“It’s beyond double standards. It’s a kind of baffling, primitive and blatant cynicism. One can’t just twist things to fit his interests, to call something white on one day and black on the next one.”

“Well’ it’s good that they at least recalled that there is international law. Thank you very much. Better late than never."

"In the practical application of policies, our western partners – the United States first and foremost – prefer to be guided not by international law, but by the right of strength. They believe in their exceptionalism, that they are allowed to decide on the fate of the world, that they are always right."

 

That is seriously a great interview with Cohen. Brutal truths.