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Am I the only one somewhat concerned over the absolutely blatant declarations that Russia is now our enemy again? You've got a one presidential candidate claim

by blhack 10y ago

Am I the only one somewhat concerned over the absolutely blatant declarations that Russia is now our enemy again? You've got a one presidential candidate claiming that the other is Bad Guy because he might have ties to The Russians. It sounds like something from McCarthyism, or from the height of the cold war. And now the mainstream attempts to discredit what is effectively a whistleblowing service seem to center around The Russians. It's creepy.

teslabox 10y ago
> Am I the only one somewhat concerned over the absolutely blatant declarations that Russia is now our enemy again? Something's definitely fishy about the resurgence of the anti-Russia propaganda in the United States. I recently found a copy of The Soviet Achievement (1967) [1] in a library's discarded booksale. From the jacket: "... This is a study of the deliberate creation of a new industrial society from a relatively backward, underdeveloped and basically rural country. Mr. Nettl illustrates the shifting balance between theory and practice, the attempt to apply Marxist ideology to practical problems, and the evolution of those distinctively Soviet solutions which have made the USSR one of the two dominating world powers. ..." [1] https://books.google.com/books?id=z81BAAAAIAAJ https://books.google.com/books?id=z81BAAAAIAAJ My impression is that the Soviets were never the villains that they were portrayed to be in the West. They knew they were behind, couldn't keep up with the US, and were quite afraid of western efforts to subjugate them. I like Scott Adams' take on 'blaming the Russians': When Clinton’s surrogates respond to questions about Wikileaks by saying the Russians are behind it, that’s an acknowledgment of guilt. Guilty people almost always question the source of the information first. Innocent people start with a clear denial, or sometimes confusion as to why the question is being asked. - http://blog.dilbert.com/post/151933602961/lie-detection-and-scandals http://blog.dilbert.com/post/151933602961/lie-detection-and-...
- danudey 10y ago
  The Adams quote, as with a lot of other things that Scott Adams has said lately, is pretty biased. 'Because they said things this way they're obviously guilty' even though that's a huge leap in logic. It's the kind of thing you would say when you want to paint someone you dislike in a negative light in a way that's difficult to outright refute (because it makes no logical sense). > "My impression is that the Soviets were never the villains that they were portrayed to be in the West. They knew they were behind, couldn't keep up with the US, and were quite afraid of western efforts to subjugate them." Well, the Stalin government killed millions of people, had massive propaganda campaigns, and was rife with corruption. They certainly felt there was an existential threat, as did the US and other western nations, but that's not surprising in that sort of political environment. Were they villains? Well, not necessarily. Undoubtedly there were a lot of officials who truly believed in the cause they were supporting, but there was also a lot of self-serving abuse of power that started at the top and worked its way down, at the expense of the citizens (to a larger and more extreme extent than what happens in the West). TL;DR very few people are truly evil but it's hard to imagine the soviets as good guys either; the same is true of the current Russian government, which is very apparently corrupt and frequently abuses its power and, lately, starts wars it knows it can get away with, so there's a very tangible sense that Russia's current motives are bad for the majority of people, including Russian citizens.
the_watcher 10y ago
Russia has been behaving as, if not an enemy, an actor whose interests align with our enemies (see: their partnership with Iran, their support of Assad, and their annexation of Crimea). And while it's ironic to watch the media that could not have been more supportive of Wikileaks when the reveals focused on Bush-era scandals (at least some of which deserved the attention as abuses) now discovering that Assange is as self-interested as they come now that his dumps concern Clinton, who they're clearly much more supportive of than Trump (justifiably), but he's been known to despise Hillary for a long time now, and the recent dumps have been far less carefully redacted this time around. Wikileaks should be a whistleblowing service. Unfortunately, Assange won't let it be that simple.
- drakonandor 10y ago
  When did Assad become our enemy?
  - M_Grey 10y ago
    When he started chlorine and barrel bombing civilians?
    - throwanem 10y ago
      Our civilians? Perhaps this sounds harsh, but consider the possibility that US intervention in conflicts among and within other sovereign nations may do more harm than good. "Team America: World Police" is a fun movie. It may not be the best of foreign policy goals.
      - the_watcher 10y ago
        Was the parent edited? I don't see the word "our" in it. Just civilians.
        M_Grey 10y ago
        My post is unedited.
dmix 10y ago
Russia is treated as the evil foreign boogieman which happens primarily because it's useful to so many powerful groups of people. They're a convenient scapegoat because in real life there are rarely actual evil bad guys that fit neatly into this category, more often reality is much more boring and harmless, so exaggeration fills the void. The jews suffered heavily from this in the early 20th century/late 19th century, they were constantly used by others for justifications of power grabs or used as distractions. Before that "Vikings" were heavily used as a constant abstract threat by the English government in the 13-15th century. The church used it to recruit and crown used it to justify authority. In public announcements and oratory they would often warn the population about the threat of savage invasion, spreading fake stories of previous invasions, even though there were zero significant viking events in those times. Much like how anti-semites spread a fake story of Jewish consipracy to take over the world https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Protocols_of_the_Elders_of_Zion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Protocols_of_the_Elders_of... Russia is flawed, corrupt, has some backwards policies and cultural norms (see: homosexuality), and does pose some danger in a foreign policy sense, but largely they're a heavily weakened state with a far bigger bark than bite. Any serious conflict with them would turn nuclear fast so any large war is extremely unlikely. But for the people in question bark is all that's need to exploit the situation. For example if you're an influential person with deep PR connections and embarassing papers come out, you can make the narrative about the Russia rather than the leaks. 75-90% of the recent coverage of Wikileaks has been about Russia instead of the leaks. The US military dreams of having a modern military/navy like Russia as an adversary. The military industrial complex is hugely incentivized to promote this narrative and push it heavily in the press. NATO recently released a statement warning of a repeat of the Ukraine incursion in places like Estonia/Latvia... even though the Ukranian thing was entirely a result of exploiting the crisis and near lawlessness that was already happening there. Russia didn't just randomly decide to invade a sovereign state. So it's so incredibly highly unlikely they'd invade stable NATO counties because they happen to have minor Russian populations. NATO and other security organizations which are seemingly out of date in a world of modern terrorism warfare are also continuing to pump up the threat to justify their existence (NATO only THIS year opened a counter-terrorism department). There's lots of other examples of people exaggerating the Russia threat for their own ends but this comment is long enough as it is.
dragonwriter 10y ago
The new cold war with Russia started in the 1990s, little more than a handful of years after the Soviet Union fell (it was quite obvious in the Balkans crises of the 1990s.) Clinton's famous "reset button" was an effort to try to create an opening to reverse that (or, more cynically, merely to be seen as making such an effort.)
gotofritz 10y ago
Russia has always been the enemy. They just took a break in the 90s because they were going bankrupt.

by blhack 10y ago

teslabox 10y ago

> Am I the only one somewhat concerned over the absolutely blatant declarations that Russia is now our enemy again? Something's definitely fishy about the resurgence of the anti-Russia propaganda in the United States. I recently found a copy of The Soviet Achievement (1967) [1] in a library's discarded booksale. From the jacket: "... This is a study of the deliberate creation of a new industrial society from a relatively backward, underdeveloped and basically rural country. Mr. Nettl illustrates the shifting balance between theory and practice, the attempt to apply Marxist ideology to practical problems, and the evolution of those distinctively Soviet solutions which have made the USSR one of the two dominating world powers. ..." [1] https://books.google.com/books?id=z81BAAAAIAAJ https://books.google.com/books?id=z81BAAAAIAAJ My impression is that the Soviets were never the villains that they were portrayed to be in the West. They knew they were behind, couldn't keep up with the US, and were quite afraid of western efforts to subjugate them. I like Scott Adams' take on 'blaming the Russians': When Clinton’s surrogates respond to questions about Wikileaks by saying the Russians are behind it, that’s an acknowledgment of guilt. Guilty people almost always question the source of the information first. Innocent people start with a clear denial, or sometimes confusion as to why the question is being asked. - http://blog.dilbert.com/post/151933602961/lie-detection-and-scandals http://blog.dilbert.com/post/151933602961/lie-detection-and-...

danudey 10y ago
The Adams quote, as with a lot of other things that Scott Adams has said lately, is pretty biased. 'Because they said things this way they're obviously guilty' even though that's a huge leap in logic. It's the kind of thing you would say when you want to paint someone you dislike in a negative light in a way that's difficult to outright refute (because it makes no logical sense). > "My impression is that the Soviets were never the villains that they were portrayed to be in the West. They knew they were behind, couldn't keep up with the US, and were quite afraid of western efforts to subjugate them." Well, the Stalin government killed millions of people, had massive propaganda campaigns, and was rife with corruption. They certainly felt there was an existential threat, as did the US and other western nations, but that's not surprising in that sort of political environment. Were they villains? Well, not necessarily. Undoubtedly there were a lot of officials who truly believed in the cause they were supporting, but there was also a lot of self-serving abuse of power that started at the top and worked its way down, at the expense of the citizens (to a larger and more extreme extent than what happens in the West). TL;DR very few people are truly evil but it's hard to imagine the soviets as good guys either; the same is true of the current Russian government, which is very apparently corrupt and frequently abuses its power and, lately, starts wars it knows it can get away with, so there's a very tangible sense that Russia's current motives are bad for the majority of people, including Russian citizens.

the_watcher 10y ago

Russia has been behaving as, if not an enemy, an actor whose interests align with our enemies (see: their partnership with Iran, their support of Assad, and their annexation of Crimea). And while it's ironic to watch the media that could not have been more supportive of Wikileaks when the reveals focused on Bush-era scandals (at least some of which deserved the attention as abuses) now discovering that Assange is as self-interested as they come now that his dumps concern Clinton, who they're clearly much more supportive of than Trump (justifiably), but he's been known to despise Hillary for a long time now, and the recent dumps have been far less carefully redacted this time around. Wikileaks should be a whistleblowing service. Unfortunately, Assange won't let it be that simple.

drakonandor 10y ago
When did Assad become our enemy?
- M_Grey 10y ago
  When he started chlorine and barrel bombing civilians?
  - throwanem 10y ago
    Our civilians? Perhaps this sounds harsh, but consider the possibility that US intervention in conflicts among and within other sovereign nations may do more harm than good. "Team America: World Police" is a fun movie. It may not be the best of foreign policy goals.
    - the_watcher 10y ago
      Was the parent edited? I don't see the word "our" in it. Just civilians.
      - M_Grey 10y ago
        My post is unedited.

dmix 10y ago

Russia is treated as the evil foreign boogieman which happens primarily because it's useful to so many powerful groups of people. They're a convenient scapegoat because in real life there are rarely actual evil bad guys that fit neatly into this category, more often reality is much more boring and harmless, so exaggeration fills the void. The jews suffered heavily from this in the early 20th century/late 19th century, they were constantly used by others for justifications of power grabs or used as distractions. Before that "Vikings" were heavily used as a constant abstract threat by the English government in the 13-15th century. The church used it to recruit and crown used it to justify authority. In public announcements and oratory they would often warn the population about the threat of savage invasion, spreading fake stories of previous invasions, even though there were zero significant viking events in those times. Much like how anti-semites spread a fake story of Jewish consipracy to take over the world https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Protocols_of_the_Elders_of_Zion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Protocols_of_the_Elders_of... Russia is flawed, corrupt, has some backwards policies and cultural norms (see: homosexuality), and does pose some danger in a foreign policy sense, but largely they're a heavily weakened state with a far bigger bark than bite. Any serious conflict with them would turn nuclear fast so any large war is extremely unlikely. But for the people in question bark is all that's need to exploit the situation. For example if you're an influential person with deep PR connections and embarassing papers come out, you can make the narrative about the Russia rather than the leaks. 75-90% of the recent coverage of Wikileaks has been about Russia instead of the leaks. The US military dreams of having a modern military/navy like Russia as an adversary. The military industrial complex is hugely incentivized to promote this narrative and push it heavily in the press. NATO recently released a statement warning of a repeat of the Ukraine incursion in places like Estonia/Latvia... even though the Ukranian thing was entirely a result of exploiting the crisis and near lawlessness that was already happening there. Russia didn't just randomly decide to invade a sovereign state. So it's so incredibly highly unlikely they'd invade stable NATO counties because they happen to have minor Russian populations. NATO and other security organizations which are seemingly out of date in a world of modern terrorism warfare are also continuing to pump up the threat to justify their existence (NATO only THIS year opened a counter-terrorism department). There's lots of other examples of people exaggerating the Russia threat for their own ends but this comment is long enough as it is.

dragonwriter 10y ago

The new cold war with Russia started in the 1990s, little more than a handful of years after the Soviet Union fell (it was quite obvious in the Balkans crises of the 1990s.) Clinton's famous "reset button" was an effort to try to create an opening to reverse that (or, more cynically, merely to be seen as making such an effort.)

gotofritz 10y ago

Russia has always been the enemy. They just took a break in the 90s because they were going bankrupt.