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Thanks for taking the time to respond. It does seem that "better than Yeltsin" is a running theme in this discussion, so in turn I wonder what "better than Puti

Thanks for taking the time to respond. It does seem that "better than Yeltsin" is a running theme in this discussion, so in turn I wonder what "better than Putin" would mean to you? With regards to tensions around the border with Russia and Europe, Putin is firmly seen as the aggressor from here, especially after the annexation of Crimea. To us it seems that Russia is testing the water, with the full knowledge that essentially everyone in Europe wants to avoid an outright war. You say that you can blog freely without consequence in Russia, but I wonder what the effects of publicly disclosing e.g. homosexuality would be? The impression I have is that it would be analogous to admitting to racism in the US or Europe. I do appreciate being able to have a reasonable conversation with someone who literally sees the world from a different angle to myself!

anticodon 5y ago
You say that you can blog freely without consequence in Russia, but I wonder what the effects of publicly disclosing e.g. homosexuality would be? The impression I have is that it would be analogous to admitting to racism in the US or Europe. I guess nothing will happen. It's not like homosexuality is persecuted in Russia. I've seen several times people openly admitting their homosexuality in public with no consequences. It's explicitly prohibited to "promote" homosexuality, whatever that means. Though I've never seen or heard anyone being prosecuted by this law.
anticodon 5y ago
With regards to tensions around the border with Russia and Europe, Putin is firmly seen as the aggressor from here, especially after the annexation of Crimea. To us it seems that Russia is testing the water, with the full knowledge that essentially everyone in Europe wants to avoid an outright war. I assure nobody wants a war here. From here it's seen as USA aggressively trying to push Ukraine to start something stupid like trying to take Crimea back by force. Ukraine is not a sovereign country, it's under external control and they have a very little choice. Their economy is unviable, and I guess US gives them a hard choice: either you go to war with Russia or the flow of credit from the West that allows you to feed your people will stop. We don't need Ukraine at all. It's useless for us, it's useless for Europe. If we'd captured the Ukraine (and I'm sure that would be easy), we'd have to feed the big population that can't feed themselves and about 50% of that population also hates us to guts. Everybody understands it, including Putin. Why waste resources feeding big ungrateful population if you can offload this problem to Europe? USSR tried to feed too many hungry mouths: Georgia, Asian republics, Baltic Republics. USSR built infrastructure: schools, hospitals, industry in those countries. They were prosperous during Soviet times because Georgia for example, consumed roughly 10 times or more money its economy generated. The difference was covered by RSFSR (Russia). Only to hear after USSR collapse that we were oppressors. Nobody is going to make this mistake again. Nobody wants to take back Georgia or Tajikistan or Estonia or Lithuania. Let them care about themselves, we better spend our resources to make our life better rather than trying to buy loyalty. So, I highly doubt Putin have any desire to start a war. It's not beneficial to him or to our country at all. It would be highly beneficial for the US, though.
- phpnode 5y ago
  I'm surprised to hear this description of Ukraine. I'll agree that their economy is not particularly strong (although it is recovering), but it has historically been an agricultural powerhouse and is still one of the world's largest grain exporters. Famine in Ukraine in the last century was a direct result of the collectivisation policy of the USSR, not an intrinsic inability to feed their own population. The message I'll take from our exchange here is that what you and I know to be true is a result of the culture and media that we've been exposed to throughout our lives, and that objective truth is hard to determine, even for well educated people. Less well educated and informed people stand little chance of discovering the true-truth in this environment.
  - anticodon 5y ago
    Ukraine economy is not strong and not recovering. One of indirect measures of economy health is energy production and consumption. Both metrics are declining in Ukraine for many years, especially after 2014 coup. All the industry was destroyed, especially after the coup of 2014. Agriculture remains, but EU sets a tiny quote for Ukrainian exports. So maybe Ukraine could produce and sell more agricultural products, but they can't sell them because EU quotes are exhausted usually within the first month of the year. Also, agriculture isn't so simple. It requires huge amounts of hydrocarbons for fueling agricultural equipment (tractors, harvesters, etc consume huge amounts of diesel for example). You also need fertilizers and other chemicals. Ukraine has to import all that. Also, Ukraine is hostile to Russia so we don't want to import anything from them and law explicitly forbids many ukrainian imports. But EU also has its own industry and its own agriculture and they do not need one more competitor on its market. For example, after 2014 sanctions, when Russia stopped importing many articles of food from EU, many agricultural companies of EU started to experience difficulties. E.g. meat producers in Czech Republic. EU needs to give work to its own citizens, why would they open the market for cheap competing products from Ukraine? So that more EU producers go bankrupt? Not going to happen.

anticodon 5y ago

You say that you can blog freely without consequence in Russia, but I wonder what the effects of publicly disclosing e.g. homosexuality would be? The impression I have is that it would be analogous to admitting to racism in the US or Europe. I guess nothing will happen. It's not like homosexuality is persecuted in Russia. I've seen several times people openly admitting their homosexuality in public with no consequences. It's explicitly prohibited to "promote" homosexuality, whatever that means. Though I've never seen or heard anyone being prosecuted by this law.

anticodon 5y ago

With regards to tensions around the border with Russia and Europe, Putin is firmly seen as the aggressor from here, especially after the annexation of Crimea. To us it seems that Russia is testing the water, with the full knowledge that essentially everyone in Europe wants to avoid an outright war. I assure nobody wants a war here. From here it's seen as USA aggressively trying to push Ukraine to start something stupid like trying to take Crimea back by force. Ukraine is not a sovereign country, it's under external control and they have a very little choice. Their economy is unviable, and I guess US gives them a hard choice: either you go to war with Russia or the flow of credit from the West that allows you to feed your people will stop. We don't need Ukraine at all. It's useless for us, it's useless for Europe. If we'd captured the Ukraine (and I'm sure that would be easy), we'd have to feed the big population that can't feed themselves and about 50% of that population also hates us to guts. Everybody understands it, including Putin. Why waste resources feeding big ungrateful population if you can offload this problem to Europe? USSR tried to feed too many hungry mouths: Georgia, Asian republics, Baltic Republics. USSR built infrastructure: schools, hospitals, industry in those countries. They were prosperous during Soviet times because Georgia for example, consumed roughly 10 times or more money its economy generated. The difference was covered by RSFSR (Russia). Only to hear after USSR collapse that we were oppressors. Nobody is going to make this mistake again. Nobody wants to take back Georgia or Tajikistan or Estonia or Lithuania. Let them care about themselves, we better spend our resources to make our life better rather than trying to buy loyalty. So, I highly doubt Putin have any desire to start a war. It's not beneficial to him or to our country at all. It would be highly beneficial for the US, though.

phpnode 5y ago
I'm surprised to hear this description of Ukraine. I'll agree that their economy is not particularly strong (although it is recovering), but it has historically been an agricultural powerhouse and is still one of the world's largest grain exporters. Famine in Ukraine in the last century was a direct result of the collectivisation policy of the USSR, not an intrinsic inability to feed their own population. The message I'll take from our exchange here is that what you and I know to be true is a result of the culture and media that we've been exposed to throughout our lives, and that objective truth is hard to determine, even for well educated people. Less well educated and informed people stand little chance of discovering the true-truth in this environment.
- anticodon 5y ago
  Ukraine economy is not strong and not recovering. One of indirect measures of economy health is energy production and consumption. Both metrics are declining in Ukraine for many years, especially after 2014 coup. All the industry was destroyed, especially after the coup of 2014. Agriculture remains, but EU sets a tiny quote for Ukrainian exports. So maybe Ukraine could produce and sell more agricultural products, but they can't sell them because EU quotes are exhausted usually within the first month of the year. Also, agriculture isn't so simple. It requires huge amounts of hydrocarbons for fueling agricultural equipment (tractors, harvesters, etc consume huge amounts of diesel for example). You also need fertilizers and other chemicals. Ukraine has to import all that. Also, Ukraine is hostile to Russia so we don't want to import anything from them and law explicitly forbids many ukrainian imports. But EU also has its own industry and its own agriculture and they do not need one more competitor on its market. For example, after 2014 sanctions, when Russia stopped importing many articles of food from EU, many agricultural companies of EU started to experience difficulties. E.g. meat producers in Czech Republic. EU needs to give work to its own citizens, why would they open the market for cheap competing products from Ukraine? So that more EU producers go bankrupt? Not going to happen.