FPT. Well done to TSE slipping in 'tergiversation' into his header. It had me beaten. Ad agencies used to play a game where the account director would be given a random word which he or she would have to slip into their client presentation. That would have been a winner
Talking of words anyone know what an "RW voter' is as used by Mr Ed in the previous thread?
We used to play the same game in annual business reviews. The word that never got through was "suddenly" as in "suddenly, market share fell" - while this was not an infrequent occurrence it always had to be dressed up in marketing speak "in line with aggressive competitive pricing and marketing activity share declined in line with historical precedent",when of course, what had actually happened was "suddenly, market share fell".
For many years I was a talking head on business programmes that were broadcast live while the markets were open (Bloomberg, CNN etc). Traders would give me a word that I would have to get into the interview, and a pint or two might change hands, depending on the difficulty of the word. I think my greatest triumph was "Crepuscular", which was apparently greeted with a cheer back on the floor, and a very jolly evening later on.
A girlfriend of mine at the time and an account exec said her biggest achievement was 'Semen' in presentation for a well known dog food.
A friend of mine managed 'the power of greyskull' in a lecture on Thatcher.
FPT. Well done to TSE slipping in 'tergiversation' into his header. It had me beaten. Ad agencies used to play a game where the account director would be given a random word which he or she would have to slip into their client presentation. That would have been a winner
Talking of words anyone know what an "RW voter' is as used by Mr Ed in the previous thread?
We used to play the same game in annual business reviews. The word that never got through was "suddenly" as in "suddenly, market share fell" - while this was not an infrequent occurrence it always had to be dressed up in marketing speak "in line with aggressive competitive pricing and marketing activity share declined in line with historical precedent",when of course, what had actually happened was "suddenly, market share fell".
For many years I was a talking head on business programmes that were broadcast live while the markets were open (Bloomberg, CNN etc). Traders would give me a word that I would have to get into the interview, and a pint or two might change hands, depending on the difficulty of the word. I think my greatest triumph was "Crepuscular", which was apparently greeted with a cheer back on the floor, and a very jolly evening later on.
A girlfriend of mine at the time and an account exec said her biggest achievement was 'Semen' in presentation for a well known dog food.
A friend of mine managed 'the power of greyskull' in a lecture on Thatcher.
I try and avoid touching politics on FB with a shitty stick, but it spurts out at every opportunity. Biggsy would be a good fit for here.
'Michael Biggs Brilliant images. I agree with Barrie Johnson though. War is a terrible thing. Not all Germans were Nazi's, but they had to be defeated. England sufffered huge loses in the Battle of Britain, cities like London, Coventry and Sheffield were heavily bombed, I am from Sheffield so I know what my home city suffered. Britains war debt was only paid off a few years ago, Germany had no war debt, and was rebuilt, it makes one wonder who actually came out the best from the war. I think the term 'British terror bombing' is very harsh. Europeans views on the British is one of the reasons that Brexit happened, I didn't vote for it myself, but there has always been a heavy bias against the British from the Europeans. My mother owned an apartment in Albir, Spain. We holidayed there every year for the last 21 years, and we could feel the anymosity every year. The Spanish and other Europeans didn't want us there, bars and restuarants just want the money the Brits bring, there's no warmth, no smiles on the faces of bar owners, I will miss my holidays in Spain, I won't miss the European people though. But credit were it's due, brilliant images.'
Whohe? (just to make sure I have the right one in mind)
Oh, he's just a random on an obscure FB group, but quite representative of a certain view.
FPT. Well done to TSE slipping in 'tergiversation' into his header. It had me beaten. Ad agencies used to play a game where the account director would be given a random word which he or she would have to slip into their client presentation. That would have been a winner
Talking of words anyone know what an "RW voter' is as used by Mr Ed in the previous thread?
We used to play the same game in annual business reviews. The word that never got through was "suddenly" as in "suddenly, market share fell" - while this was not an infrequent occurrence it always had to be dressed up in marketing speak "in line with aggressive competitive pricing and marketing activity share declined in line with historical precedent",when of course, what had actually happened was "suddenly, market share fell".
For many years I was a talking head on business programmes that were broadcast live while the markets were open (Bloomberg, CNN etc). Traders would give me a word that I would have to get into the interview, and a pint or two might change hands, depending on the difficulty of the word. I think my greatest triumph was "Crepuscular", which was apparently greeted with a cheer back on the floor, and a very jolly evening later on.
A girlfriend of mine at the time and an account exec said her biggest achievement was 'Semen' in presentation for a well known dog food.
A friend of mine managed 'the power of greyskull' in a lecture on Thatcher.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
IF we could bring the dead back to life, my own choice to play Leon as Great Aunt would be the late, great Dame Diana Rigg.
IF not, then Dame Judi Dench.
ADDENDUM - another possible from ranks of deceased would be Jonathan Winters. Except I fear he is (was) much too wholesome for the part?
Absolute shower of shite, they really hate the North.
Grant Shapps had been due in Manchester tom as part of a planned rail/HS2 visit, but the Transport Sec apparently pulled out on Friday. His office say GS's due at Covid-O meeting but insiders point out he's in fact helping the PM get MPs onside before Sue Gray reports
It’s also the fact that his HS2 plans for Manchester are beyond crap and he doesn’t want to be criticised.
Hint in HS2 can have tunnels through the countryside in the chilterns you can do the same in cities.
Actually, tunnels in cities are a lot harder, especially for termini.
Two significant issues come to mind:
1) Termini require many platforms to allow turnaround of trains (getting them ready to go back out again). One of the interesting things about HS2 AIUI is that they've gone rather aggressive with the turnaround times at the termini to reduce the number of platforms required to 10. That's a very large area to have fully underground.
2) Cities are hard to build underground in. There are lots of services (e.g. gas, water), piles of buildings etc to negotiate. It's best to go deep, but that's hard for other reasons.
FPT. Well done to TSE slipping in 'tergiversation' into his header. It had me beaten. Ad agencies used to play a game where the account director would be given a random word which he or she would have to slip into their client presentation. That would have been a winner
Talking of words anyone know what an "RW voter' is as used by Mr Ed in the previous thread?
We used to play the same game in annual business reviews. The word that never got through was "suddenly" as in "suddenly, market share fell" - while this was not an infrequent occurrence it always had to be dressed up in marketing speak "in line with aggressive competitive pricing and marketing activity share declined in line with historical precedent",when of course, what had actually happened was "suddenly, market share fell".
For many years I was a talking head on business programmes that were broadcast live while the markets were open (Bloomberg, CNN etc). Traders would give me a word that I would have to get into the interview, and a pint or two might change hands, depending on the difficulty of the word. I think my greatest triumph was "Crepuscular", which was apparently greeted with a cheer back on the floor, and a very jolly evening later on.
A girlfriend of mine at the time and an account exec said her biggest achievement was 'Semen' in presentation for a well known dog food.
A friend of mine managed 'the power of greyskull' in a lecture on Thatcher.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
Christopher Biggins
He was a really decent actor before he branched into light entertainment and presenting
FPT. Well done to TSE slipping in 'tergiversation' into his header. It had me beaten. Ad agencies used to play a game where the account director would be given a random word which he or she would have to slip into their client presentation. That would have been a winner
Talking of words anyone know what an "RW voter' is as used by Mr Ed in the previous thread?
We used to play the same game in annual business reviews. The word that never got through was "suddenly" as in "suddenly, market share fell" - while this was not an infrequent occurrence it always had to be dressed up in marketing speak "in line with aggressive competitive pricing and marketing activity share declined in line with historical precedent",when of course, what had actually happened was "suddenly, market share fell".
For many years I was a talking head on business programmes that were broadcast live while the markets were open (Bloomberg, CNN etc). Traders would give me a word that I would have to get into the interview, and a pint or two might change hands, depending on the difficulty of the word. I think my greatest triumph was "Crepuscular", which was apparently greeted with a cheer back on the floor, and a very jolly evening later on.
A girlfriend of mine at the time and an account exec said her biggest achievement was 'Semen' in presentation for a well known dog food.
A friend of mine managed 'the power of greyskull' in a lecture on Thatcher.
FPT. Well done to TSE slipping in 'tergiversation' into his header. It had me beaten. Ad agencies used to play a game where the account director would be given a random word which he or she would have to slip into their client presentation. That would have been a winner
Talking of words anyone know what an "RW voter' is as used by Mr Ed in the previous thread?
Does 'Red Wall voter' fit?
I don't think so. Mr Ed said he would know because he's a RW voter. Would someone adit to being a red wall voter voluntarily?
Why not? I don't think people are ashamed to come from Leigh or Stoke or Clay Cross?
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
IF we could bring the dead back to life, my own choice to play Leon as Great Aunt would be the late, great Dame Diana Rigg.
IF not, then Dame Judi Dench.
ADDENDUM - another possible from ranks of deceased would be Jonathan Winters. Except I fear he is (was) much too wholesome for the part?
Alastair Sim (in Miss Fitton guise) or failing that Margaret Rutherford or Joyce Grenfell.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
IF we could bring the dead back to life, my own choice to play Leon as Great Aunt would be the late, great Dame Diana Rigg.
IF not, then Dame Judi Dench.
ADDENDUM - another possible from ranks of deceased would be Jonathan Winters. Except I fear he is (was) much too wholesome for the part?
Alastair Sim (in Miss Fitton guise) or failing that Margaret Rutherford or Joyce Grenfell.
FPT. Well done to TSE slipping in 'tergiversation' into his header. It had me beaten. Ad agencies used to play a game where the account director would be given a random word which he or she would have to slip into their client presentation. That would have been a winner
Talking of words anyone know what an "RW voter' is as used by Mr Ed in the previous thread?
We used to play the same game in annual business reviews. The word that never got through was "suddenly" as in "suddenly, market share fell" - while this was not an infrequent occurrence it always had to be dressed up in marketing speak "in line with aggressive competitive pricing and marketing activity share declined in line with historical precedent",when of course, what had actually happened was "suddenly, market share fell".
For many years I was a talking head on business programmes that were broadcast live while the markets were open (Bloomberg, CNN etc). Traders would give me a word that I would have to get into the interview, and a pint or two might change hands, depending on the difficulty of the word. I think my greatest triumph was "Crepuscular", which was apparently greeted with a cheer back on the floor, and a very jolly evening later on.
A girlfriend of mine at the time and an account exec said her biggest achievement was 'Semen' in presentation for a well known dog food.
A friend of mine managed 'the power of greyskull' in a lecture on Thatcher.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
Christopher Biggins
He was a really decent actor before he branched into light entertainment and presenting
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
IF we could bring the dead back to life, my own choice to play Leon as Great Aunt would be the late, great Dame Diana Rigg.
IF not, then Dame Judi Dench.
ADDENDUM - another possible from ranks of deceased would be Jonathan Winters. Except I fear he is (was) much too wholesome for the part?
Alastair Sim (in Miss Fitton guise) or failing that Margaret Rutherford or Joyce Grenfell.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
IF we could bring the dead back to life, my own choice to play Leon as Great Aunt would be the late, great Dame Diana Rigg.
IF not, then Dame Judi Dench.
ADDENDUM - another possible from ranks of deceased would be Jonathan Winters. Except I fear he is (was) much too wholesome for the part?
Alastair Sim (in Miss Fitton guise) or failing that Margaret Rutherford or Joyce Grenfell.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
Christopher Biggins
He was a really decent actor before he branched into light entertainment and presenting
Brilliant in I Claudius.
Yes, he was superb as Nero. He was also very good in the original Poldark. His character was killed while riding his horse. IIRC the horse was scared by a love rival, intentionally.
He was also a timewarper in the Rocky Horror Picture Show alongside the now, sadly, departed Meatloaf.
I remember him in some god awful children’s GameShow with Gillian Taylforth called ‘On Safari’. Jungle themed and pretty poor.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
IF we could bring the dead back to life, my own choice to play Leon as Great Aunt would be the late, great Dame Diana Rigg.
IF not, then Dame Judi Dench.
ADDENDUM - another possible from ranks of deceased would be Jonathan Winters. Except I fear he is (was) much too wholesome for the part?
Alastair Sim (in Miss Fitton guise) or failing that Margaret Rutherford or Joyce Grenfell.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
IF we could bring the dead back to life, my own choice to play Leon as Great Aunt would be the late, great Dame Diana Rigg.
IF not, then Dame Judi Dench.
ADDENDUM - another possible from ranks of deceased would be Jonathan Winters. Except I fear he is (was) much too wholesome for the part?
Alastair Sim (in Miss Fitton guise) or failing that Margaret Rutherford or Joyce Grenfell.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
IF we could bring the dead back to life, my own choice to play Leon as Great Aunt would be the late, great Dame Diana Rigg.
IF not, then Dame Judi Dench.
ADDENDUM - another possible from ranks of deceased would be Jonathan Winters. Except I fear he is (was) much too wholesome for the part?
Alastair Sim (in Miss Fitton guise) or failing that Margaret Rutherford or Joyce Grenfell.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
IF we could bring the dead back to life, my own choice to play Leon as Great Aunt would be the late, great Dame Diana Rigg.
IF not, then Dame Judi Dench.
ADDENDUM - another possible from ranks of deceased would be Jonathan Winters. Except I fear he is (was) much too wholesome for the part?
Alastair Sim (in Miss Fitton guise) or failing that Margaret Rutherford or Joyce Grenfell.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
Christopher Biggins
He was a really decent actor before he branched into light entertainment and presenting
Brilliant in I Claudius.
Yes, he was superb as Nero. He was also very good in the original Poldark. His character was killed while riding his horse. IIRC the horse was scared by a love rival, intentionally.
He was also a timewarper in the Rocky Horror Picture Show alongside the now, sadly, departed Meatloaf.
I remember him in some god awful children’s GameShow with Gillian Taylforth called ‘On Safari’. Jungle themed and pretty poor.
Woke people, why not extend an olive branch to older conservatives by allowing them to include their preferred units of measurement alongside their preferred pronouns? Now everybody's happy.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
Christopher Biggins
He was a really decent actor before he branched into light entertainment and presenting
Brilliant in I Claudius.
Yes, he was superb as Nero. He was also very good in the original Poldark. His character was killed while riding his horse. IIRC the horse was scared by a love rival, intentionally.
He was also a timewarper in the Rocky Horror Picture Show alongside the now, sadly, departed Meatloaf.
I remember him in some god awful children’s GameShow with Gillian Taylforth called ‘On Safari’. Jungle themed and pretty poor.
I remember Gillian Taylforth as my favourite passenger
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
Oh you already answered in old thread. I’ll stop trolling then.
The French Elections the most important one.
Unless there’s a Tory leader election. 🙂
The French will probably again mak wrong call.
Whoever wins, they will be French 💁♀️
Who was the last French president who was (a) not a crook and (b) any actual good? Am I being harsh in suggesting pretty much the only one who ticks both columns is Adolphe Thiers?
He was a Bronski Beat fan. He put down The Communards.
I was taking that as Red. But he still gets high Marx for it.
So the Whip who took his job too literally was Dominatrix Gavin Williamson. For all those who thought he was over promoted it's all starting to make sense.
Big Dom is Anton Chigurh. Time for Boris to be worried
FPT. Well done to TSE slipping in 'tergiversation' into his header. It had me beaten. Ad agencies used to play a game where the account director would be given a random word which he or she would have to slip into their client presentation. That would have been a winner
Talking of words anyone know what an "RW voter' is as used by Mr Ed in the previous thread?
Does 'Red Wall voter' fit?
I don't think so. Mr Ed said he would know because he's a RW voter. Would someone adit to being a red wall voter voluntarily?
Why not? I don't think people are ashamed to come from Leigh or Stoke or Clay Cross?
There shouldn’t but it’s emblematic of the snobbery shown by some on him (though I do think Rog is a caricature - he’s probably a flog em / hang them high used car salesman from Romford).
@Gardenwalker, like your RW 2nd example. If I start calling you a RC voter, you might have a good idea what I’m talking about…
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
Interesting that he thinks the ruskies will stop at Dnieper river. Dom Lawson is in S Times warning that Ukraine could be Putin's Afghanistan as per soviet disaster - bogged down in a war of attrition by citizens fighting an insurgency.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
Christopher Biggins
He was a really decent actor before he branched into light entertainment and presenting
Brilliant in I Claudius.
Yes, he was superb as Nero. He was also very good in the original Poldark. His character was killed while riding his horse. IIRC the horse was scared by a love rival, intentionally.
He was also a timewarper in the Rocky Horror Picture Show alongside the now, sadly, departed Meatloaf.
I remember him in some god awful children’s GameShow with Gillian Taylforth called ‘On Safari’. Jungle themed and pretty poor.
I remember Gillian Taylforth as my favourite passenger
Was she a good tipper? (Have a semi-professional interest as former cab driver!)
What makes Nato braindead? There's hardly anything new about military alliances throughout history. Rest assured if we don't wish to form such alliances some of our 'rivals' will. Does the alliance need to be re-thought? Probably. It's in its eighth decade after all. The main issue is that the US is doing the heavy lifting of European security. There is no sensible reason why this should be. The other problem is the 'attack on one is an attack on all' of article 5. Obviously Greece and Turkey aren't the best of friends and are we saying we would immediately jump to support Mr Erdogan in any military adventure he might wish to embark upon? So it could be reinvented in a looser format but I'm wary of those who simply wish to dismantle it.
Europe could take complete responsibility for its security with its own common defence partnership instead. I would hope that common interests in liberty, democracy, the rule of law and self determination would see a natural alliance form with North America that would look something like... Nato.
But maybe that is not what Macron wants? Perhaps he sees a world of competing power blocks like the US, China, India, Russia and Europe is simply another actor in such a world. Alliances are for nothing more than leveraging one's interests or playing other superpowers off against each other. Getting the English speakers out of European security, marginalising the views of East Europeans and restoring the 'brain' as it were of European security around a Franco-German axis. Perhaps such an alliance would be less concerned about Russian incursions in Ukraine or Belarus, they might even be prepared to appease Russia in the Baltics rather than defend 'interests' that are more costly than they are worth. It's an alternative view of European security. But not the only plausible one and give the current divisions in attitude to Ukraine it isn't clear that the new 'central powers' in Paris and Berlin would prevail.
I reckon that’s exactly what Macron is aiming for. A reduced Core Federal Europe with a totally coherent political identity and centralised foreign and defence policy. Theoretically the centre would be Brussels but in reality it would be Paris in charge of guns and diplomats but with Berlin doing the economic stuff, of necessity. And it would be French speaking.
It is also well-nigh impossible to achieve, even Berlin and Paris disagree on too much. But that is Macron’s aim. A mainland core EU run by the French and acting as a sort-of equal to the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese, with the Russians floating about weirdly and the Indians on the rise
You can’t fault his ambition. And even if he fails, he will probably win more power for Paris and France
I think that's a fair approximation of Macron's overall goal but the Ukraine crisis has shown Germany are in the foreign policy driving seat as well as the economic one. Germany has decreed no help for Ukraine from the EU and that's what's happened. What we're seeing is Macron's worst nightmare playing out, France standing by impotently as the US decides Europe's fate in a closed room with Russia and the UK making friends and allies all across the continent because it isn't bound by Germany's appeasement policies.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
Christopher Biggins
He was a really decent actor before he branched into light entertainment and presenting
Brilliant in I Claudius.
Yes, he was superb as Nero. He was also very good in the original Poldark. His character was killed while riding his horse. IIRC the horse was scared by a love rival, intentionally.
He was also a timewarper in the Rocky Horror Picture Show alongside the now, sadly, departed Meatloaf.
I remember him in some god awful children’s GameShow with Gillian Taylforth called ‘On Safari’. Jungle themed and pretty poor.
I read that as a love rival of the horse...
😲😲😲😲 Sorry, it was the husband of the woman his character was having a relationship with. Seventies TV could be pretty out there but not that far out there.
So the Whip who took his job too literally was Dominatrix Gavin Williamson. For all those who thought he was over promoted it's all starting to make sense.
Big Dom is Anton Chigurh. Time for Boris to be worried
The current chief whip is heading the way of Martin Redmayne.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
Christopher Biggins
He was a really decent actor before he branched into light entertainment and presenting
Brilliant in I Claudius.
Yes, he was superb as Nero. He was also very good in the original Poldark. His character was killed while riding his horse. IIRC the horse was scared by a love rival, intentionally.
He was also a timewarper in the Rocky Horror Picture Show alongside the now, sadly, departed Meatloaf.
I remember him in some god awful children’s GameShow with Gillian Taylforth called ‘On Safari’. Jungle themed and pretty poor.
I read that as a love rival of the horse...
😲😲😲😲 Sorry, it was the husband of the woman his character was having a relationship with. Seventies TV could be pretty out there but not that far out there.
I thought you were going to get The Boot for that - or is that a little sandal?
FPT. Well done to TSE slipping in 'tergiversation' into his header. It had me beaten. Ad agencies used to play a game where the account director would be given a random word which he or she would have to slip into their client presentation. That would have been a winner
Talking of words anyone know what an "RW voter' is as used by Mr Ed in the previous thread?
We used to play the same game in annual business reviews. The word that never got through was "suddenly" as in "suddenly, market share fell" - while this was not an infrequent occurrence it always had to be dressed up in marketing speak "in line with aggressive competitive pricing and marketing activity share declined in line with historical precedent",when of course, what had actually happened was "suddenly, market share fell".
For many years I was a talking head on business programmes that were broadcast live while the markets were open (Bloomberg, CNN etc). Traders would give me a word that I would have to get into the interview, and a pint or two might change hands, depending on the difficulty of the word. I think my greatest triumph was "Crepuscular", which was apparently greeted with a cheer back on the floor, and a very jolly evening later on.
A girlfriend of mine at the time and an account exec said her biggest achievement was 'Semen' in presentation for a well known dog food.
A friend of mine managed 'the power of greyskull' in a lecture on Thatcher.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
Christopher Biggins
He was a really decent actor before he branched into light entertainment and presenting
Brilliant in I Claudius.
Yes, he was superb as Nero. He was also very good in the original Poldark. His character was killed while riding his horse. IIRC the horse was scared by a love rival, intentionally.
He was also a timewarper in the Rocky Horror Picture Show alongside the now, sadly, departed Meatloaf.
I remember him in some god awful children’s GameShow with Gillian Taylforth called ‘On Safari’. Jungle themed and pretty poor.
I read that as a love rival of the horse...
😲😲😲😲 Sorry, it was the husband of the woman his character was having a relationship with. Seventies TV could be pretty out there but not that far out there.
I thought you were going to get The Boot for that - or is that a little sandal?
So near, oh yet so far away.
But then, when you see an opportunity for a pun, you have to seize 'er.
What makes Nato braindead? There's hardly anything new about military alliances throughout history. Rest assured if we don't wish to form such alliances some of our 'rivals' will. Does the alliance need to be re-thought? Probably. It's in its eighth decade after all. The main issue is that the US is doing the heavy lifting of European security. There is no sensible reason why this should be. The other problem is the 'attack on one is an attack on all' of article 5. Obviously Greece and Turkey aren't the best of friends and are we saying we would immediately jump to support Mr Erdogan in any military adventure he might wish to embark upon? So it could be reinvented in a looser format but I'm wary of those who simply wish to dismantle it.
Europe could take complete responsibility for its security with its own common defence partnership instead. I would hope that common interests in liberty, democracy, the rule of law and self determination would see a natural alliance form with North America that would look something like... Nato.
But maybe that is not what Macron wants? Perhaps he sees a world of competing power blocks like the US, China, India, Russia and Europe is simply another actor in such a world. Alliances are for nothing more than leveraging one's interests or playing other superpowers off against each other. Getting the English speakers out of European security, marginalising the views of East Europeans and restoring the 'brain' as it were of European security around a Franco-German axis. Perhaps such an alliance would be less concerned about Russian incursions in Ukraine or Belarus, they might even be prepared to appease Russia in the Baltics rather than defend 'interests' that are more costly than they are worth. It's an alternative view of European security. But not the only plausible one and give the current divisions in attitude to Ukraine it isn't clear that the new 'central powers' in Paris and Berlin would prevail.
I reckon that’s exactly what Macron is aiming for. A reduced Core Federal Europe with a totally coherent political identity and centralised foreign and defence policy. Theoretically the centre would be Brussels but in reality it would be Paris in charge of guns and diplomats but with Berlin doing the economic stuff, of necessity. And it would be French speaking.
It is also well-nigh impossible to achieve, even Berlin and Paris disagree on too much. But that is Macron’s aim. A mainland core EU run by the French and acting as a sort-of equal to the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese, with the Russians floating about weirdly and the Indians on the rise
You can’t fault his ambition. And even if he fails, he will probably win more power for Paris and France
I think that's a fair approximation of Macron's overall goal but the Ukraine crisis has shown Germany are in the foreign policy driving seat as well as the economic one. Germany has decreed no help for Ukraine from the EU and that's what's happened. What we're seeing is Macron's worst nightmare playing out, France standing by impotently as the US decides Europe's fate in a closed room with Russia and the UK making friends and allies all across the continent because it isn't bound by Germany's appeasement policies.
Macron's understanding and handling of foreign policy is an abject lesson in what not to do. He's managed to reduce French influence in their old colonies in Africa and managed to p1ss off multiple sides without ever managing to get his own vision of how the EU should operate even seriously considered. Very few friends, no influence - great job Macron.
FPT. Well done to TSE slipping in 'tergiversation' into his header. It had me beaten. Ad agencies used to play a game where the account director would be given a random word which he or she would have to slip into their client presentation. That would have been a winner
Talking of words anyone know what an "RW voter' is as used by Mr Ed in the previous thread?
Does 'Red Wall voter' fit?
I don't think so. Mr Ed said he would know because he's a RW voter. Would someone adit to being a red wall voter voluntarily?
Why not? I don't think people are ashamed to come from Leigh or Stoke or Clay Cross?
There shouldn’t but it’s emblematic of the snobbery shown by some on him (though I do think Rog is a caricature - he’s probably a flog em / hang them high used car salesman from Romford).
@Gardenwalker, like your RW 2nd example. If I start calling you a RC voter, you might have a good idea what I’m talking about…
Well what was it or were you being deliberately obscure?
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
Christopher Biggins
He was a really decent actor before he branched into light entertainment and presenting
Brilliant in I Claudius.
Yes, he was superb as Nero. He was also very good in the original Poldark. His character was killed while riding his horse. IIRC the horse was scared by a love rival, intentionally.
He was also a timewarper in the Rocky Horror Picture Show alongside the now, sadly, departed Meatloaf.
I remember him in some god awful children’s GameShow with Gillian Taylforth called ‘On Safari’. Jungle themed and pretty poor.
I read that as a love rival of the horse...
😲😲😲😲 Sorry, it was the husband of the woman his character was having a relationship with. Seventies TV could be pretty out there but not that far out there.
I thought you were going to get The Boot for that - or is that a little sandal?
So near, oh yet so far away.
But then, when you see an opportunity for a pun, you have to seize 'er.
But Caesar has squeezed her in Rome on his quilt for a day. Hey hey hey.
FPT. Well done to TSE slipping in 'tergiversation' into his header. It had me beaten. Ad agencies used to play a game where the account director would be given a random word which he or she would have to slip into their client presentation. That would have been a winner
Talking of words anyone know what an "RW voter' is as used by Mr Ed in the previous thread?
We used to play the same game in annual business reviews. The word that never got through was "suddenly" as in "suddenly, market share fell" - while this was not an infrequent occurrence it always had to be dressed up in marketing speak "in line with aggressive competitive pricing and marketing activity share declined in line with historical precedent",when of course, what had actually happened was "suddenly, market share fell".
For many years I was a talking head on business programmes that were broadcast live while the markets were open (Bloomberg, CNN etc). Traders would give me a word that I would have to get into the interview, and a pint or two might change hands, depending on the difficulty of the word. I think my greatest triumph was "Crepuscular", which was apparently greeted with a cheer back on the floor, and a very jolly evening later on.
A girlfriend of mine at the time and an account exec said her biggest achievement was 'Semen' in presentation for a well known dog food.
A friend of mine managed 'the power of greyskull' in a lecture on Thatcher.
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
And I have little doubt that he is correct that the Russians could grab Eastern Ukraine. The question that remains unresolved in this scenario, though, is:
(a) is the goal to use the leverage of having grabbed Eastern Ukraine to force a pro-Russian government for all of the Ukraine?
or
(b) to have a separate puppet state in Eastern Ukraine
or
(c) to absorb Eastern Ukraine into Russia
In scenarios (b) and (c), it is by no means clear that Western Ukraine would fall into line as a pro-Russian state. After all, pro-Russian parties garner the vast majority of their votes in Eastern Ukraine.
Those that are left in the West will be terrified of Russia, for sure, but also incredibly angry at them. And democracy wouldn't be suspended in Western Ukraine.
Ultimately, I get that Putin wants geopolitical influence and all. But it seems to be tactics largely devoid of strategy. Russia exports oil, coal and natural gas. Demand for oil is being impacted by the increasing electrification of ...well... everything. Demand for coal has been hammered. And it used to be that Russia (and Norway) were the only possible exporters of gas to Europe. But the rise of LNG fundamentally changes that: back in 2000 Russia exports of gas were about 10x the global LNG market. Now, the LNG market is bigger. A decade from now, the LNG market will be 2-3x larger than Russian exports.
That's like three new Russias of natural gas coming on line - only they can sell their gas to anyone in the world, and not just to the people at the end of the pipe. Perhaps Putin sees now as the last time when he can exert pressure through the gas price?
But it also seems rather short sighted. Russia - fundamentally - has dreadful demographics and is extremely reliant on the export of commodities. If the price of natural gas and oil were to halve, it would find itself in terrible trouble. Russia needs the rest of the World, because it produces practically nothing - beyond energy and food - that it consumes.
When PB's elite armchair warriors tire of waging their proxy wars on Russia, Germany, China and France, we can always be confident that they still have in their armoury one never-ending war that they will never tire of until victory is complete:
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
Christopher Biggins
He was a really decent actor before he branched into light entertainment and presenting
Brilliant in I Claudius.
Yes, he was superb as Nero. He was also very good in the original Poldark. His character was killed while riding his horse. IIRC the horse was scared by a love rival, intentionally.
He was also a timewarper in the Rocky Horror Picture Show alongside the now, sadly, departed Meatloaf.
I remember him in some god awful children’s GameShow with Gillian Taylforth called ‘On Safari’. Jungle themed and pretty poor.
I read that as a love rival of the horse...
😲😲😲😲 Sorry, it was the husband of the woman his character was having a relationship with. Seventies TV could be pretty out there but not that far out there.
I thought you were going to get The Boot for that - or is that a little sandal?
So near, oh yet so far away.
But then, when you see an opportunity for a pun, you have to seize 'er.
But Caesar has squeezed her in Rome on his quilt for a day. Hey hey hey.
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
Interesting that he thinks the ruskies will stop at Dnieper river. Dom Lawson is in S Times warning that Ukraine could be Putin's Afghanistan as per soviet disaster - bogged down in a war of attrition by citizens fighting an insurgency.
As he notes, it is hard to imagine Putin backing down now given all the steps that have been taken, it's the sort of step that could easily see him overthrown. Having said that, he is also right that the West haven't taken into account just how sensitive the geographic / historical angle is to Moscow.
When PB's elite armchair warriors tire of waging their proxy wars on Russia, Germany, China and France, we can always be confident that they still have in their armoury one never-ending war that they will never tire of until victory is complete:
The War on Woke.
Oh don't worry about that, the tide has turned on that one. To quote Churchill, it's not the end, or even the beginning of the end but it is the end of the beginning.
Macron is also surprisingly firm in the Culture Wars. When the statues started falling, he gave a speech to the French people saying, Very Sternly, “not a single statue in the French Republic will fall, they are our patrimony”
And, as far as I know - I am happy to be corrected - his promise has been fulfilled
Yes, both @Casino_Royale and I have made that point and if it wasn't for his general obnoxiousness I'd be pretty happy with him as PM here tbh. I'd rate him far ahead of Boris on economic and cultural issues. He's got the ability and confidence to say "shut the fuck up" to whining wokists.
I also think he's got an innate understanding of how wokism is making the west weak. China terms it as white liberalism, but essentially it is weakness.
Boris has the right instincts on Woke but is too emotionally needy and weirdly feeble to follow through. I have finally - belatedly - realised this. He’s terrifically bright and often sees the bigger picture but he hasn’t got the backbone to Really Do Anything. Apart from Brexit, which he won and then concluded with his bravado. But bravado is not enough for a long career at the top
Boris is like some hero on a battlefield who takes on the Tiger tanks armed only with his derring-do and a sense of destiny, and maybe some small grenades. But heroes are meant to die, quite soon after their acts, if not during. As Greek myth tells us.
Mythologically and politically he is doomed
In the medium term someone like Macron is preferable. Macron also has an astute vision of the future, as you say. His prescient prediction that “NATO is brain dead” is perhaps about to be tested. I fear it will be proved correct
I think Boris has underestimated the damage wokism is doing to western nations. Companies, governments and charities are paralysed in fear of criticising anything or anyone that might not be white, straight and male (with an actual cock and balls). It allows China to get away with genocide, it allows Middle Eastern countries to restart slave auctions and sex offending men into women's prisons because they say they're women.
There's a lack of confidence across the west, yet Macron is someone who has successfully stood up to the nonsense. Boris could have done but he's useless, and as you say heroes die in the best stories, the ultimate or final sacrifice in order to save everyone else. Boris is past his time, his usefulness has passed now that Brexit is delivered, he needs to make the sacrifice in order to ensure it isn't unwound by a Labour/SNP government in 2024.
You and Leon just need to turn off GB News. You would both be so much more relaxed and realise woke is just a manufactured crock...
They sound like two great aunts at a wedding whispering in a corner "What does she think she's come as?"
Now you've got me wonder, just what great actor should play the role of Leon as Great Aunt?
Rutger Hauer.
Christopher Biggins
He was a really decent actor before he branched into light entertainment and presenting
Brilliant in I Claudius.
Yes, he was superb as Nero. He was also very good in the original Poldark. His character was killed while riding his horse. IIRC the horse was scared by a love rival, intentionally.
He was also a timewarper in the Rocky Horror Picture Show alongside the now, sadly, departed Meatloaf.
I remember him in some god awful children’s GameShow with Gillian Taylforth called ‘On Safari’. Jungle themed and pretty poor.
I remember Gillian Taylforth as my favourite passenger
Was she a good tipper? (Have a semi-professional interest as former cab driver!)
Totally off topic - don't know how many PBers watched (or are even aware of) yesterday's NFL playoff game Cincinnati Bengals vs Tennessee Titans, which Bengals won in dramatic fashion via a last-second field goal.
Note that quarterback for Bengals, Joe Burrows, was before that QB for for NCAA Div 1 national-championship-winners, the Fighting Tigers of Louisiana State University. Further note that famed LSU mascot ("Mike") is a Bengal tiger. (Further further note the tiger was adopted as name for school's teams in honor of the Louisiana Tigers, a renowned Confederate Civil War regiment.
Also know that Joe Burrows is from Athens, Ohio where he (naturally) was QB for his local high school team.
Fearless prediction - Joe Burrows will some day be elected Governor of Ohio.
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
And I have little doubt that he is correct that the Russians could grab Eastern Ukraine. The question that remains unresolved in this scenario, though, is:
(a) is the goal to use the leverage of having grabbed Eastern Ukraine to force a pro-Russian government for all of the Ukraine?
or
(b) to have a separate puppet state in Eastern Ukraine
or
(c) to absorb Eastern Ukraine into Russia
In scenarios (b) and (c), it is by no means clear that Western Ukraine would fall into line as a pro-Russian state. After all, pro-Russian parties garner the vast majority of their votes in Eastern Ukraine.
Those that are left in the West will be terrified of Russia, for sure, but also incredibly angry at them. And democracy wouldn't be suspended in Western Ukraine.
Ultimately, I get that Putin wants geopolitical influence and all. But it seems to be tactics largely devoid of strategy. Russia exports oil, coal and natural gas. Demand for oil is being impacted by the increasing electrification of ...well... everything. Demand for coal has been hammered. And it used to be that Russia (and Norway) were the only possible exporters of gas to Europe. But the rise of LNG fundamentally changes that: back in 2000 Russia exports of gas were about 10x the global LNG market. Now, the LNG market is bigger. A decade from now, the LNG market will be 2-3x larger than Russian exports.
That's like three new Russias of natural gas coming on line - only they can sell their gas to anyone in the world, and not just to the people at the end of the pipe. Perhaps Putin sees now as the last time when he can exert pressure through the gas price?
But it also seems rather short sighted. Russia - fundamentally - has dreadful demographics and is extremely reliant on the export of commodities. If the price of natural gas and oil were to halve, it would find itself in terrible trouble. Russia needs the rest of the World, because it produces practically nothing - beyond energy and food - that it consumes.
Putin's decision making does have echoes of the thinking in Germany in 1914 that it was better to go to war with Russia sooner rather than later because of the perceived growing Russian effectiveness in its military (ironic really given WW1*). Not that Ukraine could beat Russia but that its growing military preparations and hardware purchases would make it more confident to stand up to Russia and / or increase the military cost to Russia significantly of any future invasion. Chances are war now happens but, as you said, what happens then?
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
Interesting that he thinks the ruskies will stop at Dnieper river. Dom Lawson is in S Times warning that Ukraine could be Putin's Afghanistan as per soviet disaster - bogged down in a war of attrition by citizens fighting an insurgency.
"Stop at the Dnieper" = annex the entire Eastern half of the country and probably Kyiv which sits astride the river with the centre on the right bank.
Would restore Peter the Great's border with Poland-Lithuania after Poltava.
FPT. Well done to TSE slipping in 'tergiversation' into his header. It had me beaten. Ad agencies used to play a game where the account director would be given a random word which he or she would have to slip into their client presentation. That would have been a winner
Talking of words anyone know what an "RW voter' is as used by Mr Ed in the previous thread?
Does 'Red Wall voter' fit?
I don't think so. Mr Ed said he would know because he's a RW voter. Would someone adit to being a red wall voter voluntarily?
Why not? I don't think people are ashamed to come from Leigh or Stoke or Clay Cross?
There shouldn’t but it’s emblematic of the snobbery shown by some on him (though I do think Rog is a caricature - he’s probably a flog em / hang them high used car salesman from Romford).
@Gardenwalker, like your RW 2nd example. If I start calling you a RC voter, you might have a good idea what I’m talking about…
Well what was it or were you being deliberately obscure?
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
And I have little doubt that he is correct that the Russians could grab Eastern Ukraine. The question that remains unresolved in this scenario, though, is:
(a) is the goal to use the leverage of having grabbed Eastern Ukraine to force a pro-Russian government for all of the Ukraine?
or
(b) to have a separate puppet state in Eastern Ukraine
or
(c) to absorb Eastern Ukraine into Russia
In scenarios (b) and (c), it is by no means clear that Western Ukraine would fall into line as a pro-Russian state. After all, pro-Russian parties garner the vast majority of their votes in Eastern Ukraine.
Those that are left in the West will be terrified of Russia, for sure, but also incredibly angry at them. And democracy wouldn't be suspended in Western Ukraine.
Ultimately, I get that Putin wants geopolitical influence and all. But it seems to be tactics largely devoid of strategy. Russia exports oil, coal and natural gas. Demand for oil is being impacted by the increasing electrification of ...well... everything. Demand for coal has been hammered. And it used to be that Russia (and Norway) were the only possible exporters of gas to Europe. But the rise of LNG fundamentally changes that: back in 2000 Russia exports of gas were about 10x the global LNG market. Now, the LNG market is bigger. A decade from now, the LNG market will be 2-3x larger than Russian exports.
That's like three new Russias of natural gas coming on line - only they can sell their gas to anyone in the world, and not just to the people at the end of the pipe. Perhaps Putin sees now as the last time when he can exert pressure through the gas price?
But it also seems rather short sighted. Russia - fundamentally - has dreadful demographics and is extremely reliant on the export of commodities. If the price of natural gas and oil were to halve, it would find itself in terrible trouble. Russia needs the rest of the World, because it produces practically nothing - beyond energy and food - that it consumes.
All this is true, but you’ve been saying this for the last decade and in that time Russia has annexed Crimea, intervened successfully in Syria and seen the West give up on Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, Putin - having installed himself as dictator for life - has likely intervened in both UK and US domestic politics, making both countries notably weaker.
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
Interesting that he thinks the ruskies will stop at Dnieper river. Dom Lawson is in S Times warning that Ukraine could be Putin's Afghanistan as per soviet disaster - bogged down in a war of attrition by citizens fighting an insurgency.
"Stop at the Dnieper" = annex the entire Eastern half of the country and probably Kyiv which sits astride the river with the centre on the right bank.
Would restore Peter the Great's border with Poland-Lithuania after Poltava.
I can’t see him annexing Kiev. That’s the spiritual heart of Ukraine and such a move guarantees perpetual insurgency and a new Vietnam
I reckon more limited seizures and a puppet regime in Kiev: is the aim. Likely do-able
FPT. Well done to TSE slipping in 'tergiversation' into his header. It had me beaten. Ad agencies used to play a game where the account director would be given a random word which he or she would have to slip into their client presentation. That would have been a winner
Talking of words anyone know what an "RW voter' is as used by Mr Ed in the previous thread?
We used to play the same game in annual business reviews. The word that never got through was "suddenly" as in "suddenly, market share fell" - while this was not an infrequent occurrence it always had to be dressed up in marketing speak "in line with aggressive competitive pricing and marketing activity share declined in line with historical precedent",when of course, what had actually happened was "suddenly, market share fell".
For many years I was a talking head on business programmes that were broadcast live while the markets were open (Bloomberg, CNN etc). Traders would give me a word that I would have to get into the interview, and a pint or two might change hands, depending on the difficulty of the word. I think my greatest triumph was "Crepuscular", which was apparently greeted with a cheer back on the floor, and a very jolly evening later on.
A girlfriend of mine at the time and an account exec said her biggest achievement was 'Semen' in presentation for a well known dog food.
A friend of mine managed 'the power of greyskull' in a lecture on Thatcher.
For reasons I won't go into my team bought me this and then challenged me to use it and the phrase in ever more difficult situations. The last was with some army officers, who couldn't believe what they were seeing - or so they claimed - which I found surprising and implausible.
Sadly the handle broke recently so it is now just a pen holder.
Totally off topic - don't know how many PBers watched (or are even aware of) yesterday's NFL playoff game Cincinnati Bengals vs Tennessee Titans, which Bengals won in dramatic fashion via a last-second field goal.
Note that quarterback for Bengals, Joe Burrows, was before that QB for for NCAA Div 1 national-championship-winners, the Fighting Tigers of Louisiana State University. Further note that famed LSU mascot ("Mike") is a Bengal tiger. (Further further note the tiger was adopted as name for school's teams in honor of the Louisiana Tigers, a renowned Confederate Civil War regiment.
Also know that Joe Burrows is from Athens, Ohio where he (naturally) was QB for his local high school team.
Fearless prediction - Joe Burrows will some day be elected Governor of Ohio.
So, what's the rule, SSI? Actors* go into Presidential politics, while sportspeople go into the Senate or governors' races?
*(including Trump in that category as someone who tries to pretend he is a businessman)
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
FPT. Well done to TSE slipping in 'tergiversation' into his header. It had me beaten. Ad agencies used to play a game where the account director would be given a random word which he or she would have to slip into their client presentation. That would have been a winner
Talking of words anyone know what an "RW voter' is as used by Mr Ed in the previous thread?
We used to play the same game in annual business reviews. The word that never got through was "suddenly" as in "suddenly, market share fell" - while this was not an infrequent occurrence it always had to be dressed up in marketing speak "in line with aggressive competitive pricing and marketing activity share declined in line with historical precedent",when of course, what had actually happened was "suddenly, market share fell".
For many years I was a talking head on business programmes that were broadcast live while the markets were open (Bloomberg, CNN etc). Traders would give me a word that I would have to get into the interview, and a pint or two might change hands, depending on the difficulty of the word. I think my greatest triumph was "Crepuscular", which was apparently greeted with a cheer back on the floor, and a very jolly evening later on.
A girlfriend of mine at the time and an account exec said her biggest achievement was 'Semen' in presentation for a well known dog food.
A friend of mine managed 'the power of greyskull' in a lecture on Thatcher.
For reasons I won't go into my team bought me this and then challenged me to use it and the phrase in ever more difficult situations. The last was with some army officers, who couldn't believe what they were seeing - or so they claimed - which I found surprising and implausible.
Sadly the handle broke recently so it is now just a pen holder.
If you need a new one, I believe @Taz and @MrEd have plenty they are trying to shift.
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
Interesting that he thinks the ruskies will stop at Dnieper river. Dom Lawson is in S Times warning that Ukraine could be Putin's Afghanistan as per soviet disaster - bogged down in a war of attrition by citizens fighting an insurgency.
"Stop at the Dnieper" = annex the entire Eastern half of the country and probably Kyiv which sits astride the river with the centre on the right bank.
Would restore Peter the Great's border with Poland-Lithuania after Poltava.
I can’t see him annexing Kiev. That’s the spiritual heart of Ukraine and such a move guarantees perpetual insurgency and a new Vietnam
I reckon more limited seizures and a puppet regime in Kiev: is the aim. Likely do-able
So, you're reckoning that Western Ukraine agrees to a puppet regime in return for a United Ukraine?
I mean it's certainly possible. But it's far from the only option. And unless you suspend democracy in the East, then it's not very stable.
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
Interesting that he thinks the ruskies will stop at Dnieper river. Dom Lawson is in S Times warning that Ukraine could be Putin's Afghanistan as per soviet disaster - bogged down in a war of attrition by citizens fighting an insurgency.
"Stop at the Dnieper" = annex the entire Eastern half of the country and probably Kyiv which sits astride the river with the centre on the right bank.
Would restore Peter the Great's border with Poland-Lithuania after Poltava.
I can’t see him annexing Kiev. That’s the spiritual heart of Ukraine and such a move guarantees perpetual insurgency and a new Vietnam
I reckon more limited seizures and a puppet regime in Kiev: is the aim. Likely do-able
So, you're reckoning that Western Ukraine agrees to a puppet regime in return for a United Ukraine?
I mean it's certainly possible. But it's far from the only option. And unless you suspend democracy in the East, then it's not very stable.
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
If they won't come out for this sort of thing, then they never will
What makes Nato braindead? There's hardly anything new about military alliances throughout history. Rest assured if we don't wish to form such alliances some of our 'rivals' will. Does the alliance need to be re-thought? Probably. It's in its eighth decade after all. The main issue is that the US is doing the heavy lifting of European security. There is no sensible reason why this should be. The other problem is the 'attack on one is an attack on all' of article 5. Obviously Greece and Turkey aren't the best of friends and are we saying we would immediately jump to support Mr Erdogan in any military adventure he might wish to embark upon? So it could be reinvented in a looser format but I'm wary of those who simply wish to dismantle it.
Europe could take complete responsibility for its security with its own common defence partnership instead. I would hope that common interests in liberty, democracy, the rule of law and self determination would see a natural alliance form with North America that would look something like... Nato.
But maybe that is not what Macron wants? Perhaps he sees a world of competing power blocks like the US, China, India, Russia and Europe is simply another actor in such a world. Alliances are for nothing more than leveraging one's interests or playing other superpowers off against each other. Getting the English speakers out of European security, marginalising the views of East Europeans and restoring the 'brain' as it were of European security around a Franco-German axis. Perhaps such an alliance would be less concerned about Russian incursions in Ukraine or Belarus, they might even be prepared to appease Russia in the Baltics rather than defend 'interests' that are more costly than they are worth. It's an alternative view of European security. But not the only plausible one and give the current divisions in attitude to Ukraine it isn't clear that the new 'central powers' in Paris and Berlin would prevail.
I reckon that’s exactly what Macron is aiming for. A reduced Core Federal Europe with a totally coherent political identity and centralised foreign and defence policy. Theoretically the centre would be Brussels but in reality it would be Paris in charge of guns and diplomats but with Berlin doing the economic stuff, of necessity. And it would be French speaking.
It is also well-nigh impossible to achieve, even Berlin and Paris disagree on too much. But that is Macron’s aim. A mainland core EU run by the French and acting as a sort-of equal to the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese, with the Russians floating about weirdly and the Indians on the rise
You can’t fault his ambition. And even if he fails, he will probably win more power for Paris and France
I think that's a fair approximation of Macron's overall goal but the Ukraine crisis has shown Germany are in the foreign policy driving seat as well as the economic one. Germany has decreed no help for Ukraine from the EU and that's what's happened. What we're seeing is Macron's worst nightmare playing out, France standing by impotently as the US decides Europe's fate in a closed room with Russia and the UK making friends and allies all across the continent because it isn't bound by Germany's appeasement policies.
Macron's understanding and handling of foreign policy is an abject lesson in what not to do. He's managed to reduce French influence in their old colonies in Africa and managed to p1ss off multiple sides without ever managing to get his own vision of how the EU should operate even seriously considered. Very few friends, no influence - great job Macron.
Africa, alongside AUKUS, is his biggest failure, yes
But I’m not sure he had much choice in the matter. He’s occasionally been a bit clumsy and arrogant but in the end both are symptoms of secular French decline - in soft power as much as hard. France has punched above its weight in Africa for decades, relying on linguistic ties and metropolitan patronage - African leaders like to go shopping with their wives in Paris
But in the end China is now way more important, and the Anglo-Saxons more salient through the English language and residual USA power. Ditto the South Pacific
Hence the simultaneous French pivot to an even more Federal Europe (now, in good and bad ways for France, devoid of the UK). If France can somehow make the EU simply an extension of French sovereignty but with vastly greater economic prestige (by sheer size) then French grandeur and influence is restored
Trouble is it is 6D chess and surely impossible. The EU will not bend to the whims of Paris, it is no longer 1962
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
And I have little doubt that he is correct that the Russians could grab Eastern Ukraine. The question that remains unresolved in this scenario, though, is:
(a) is the goal to use the leverage of having grabbed Eastern Ukraine to force a pro-Russian government for all of the Ukraine?
or
(b) to have a separate puppet state in Eastern Ukraine
or
(c) to absorb Eastern Ukraine into Russia
In scenarios (b) and (c), it is by no means clear that Western Ukraine would fall into line as a pro-Russian state. After all, pro-Russian parties garner the vast majority of their votes in Eastern Ukraine.
Those that are left in the West will be terrified of Russia, for sure, but also incredibly angry at them. And democracy wouldn't be suspended in Western Ukraine.
Ultimately, I get that Putin wants geopolitical influence and all. But it seems to be tactics largely devoid of strategy. Russia exports oil, coal and natural gas. Demand for oil is being impacted by the increasing electrification of ...well... everything. Demand for coal has been hammered. And it used to be that Russia (and Norway) were the only possible exporters of gas to Europe. But the rise of LNG fundamentally changes that: back in 2000 Russia exports of gas were about 10x the global LNG market. Now, the LNG market is bigger. A decade from now, the LNG market will be 2-3x larger than Russian exports.
That's like three new Russias of natural gas coming on line - only they can sell their gas to anyone in the world, and not just to the people at the end of the pipe. Perhaps Putin sees now as the last time when he can exert pressure through the gas price?
But it also seems rather short sighted. Russia - fundamentally - has dreadful demographics and is extremely reliant on the export of commodities. If the price of natural gas and oil were to halve, it would find itself in terrible trouble. Russia needs the rest of the World, because it produces practically nothing - beyond energy and food - that it consumes.
Putin's decision making does have echoes of the thinking in Germany in 1914 that it was better to go to war with Russia sooner rather than later because of the perceived growing Russian effectiveness in its military (ironic really given WW1*). Not that Ukraine could beat Russia but that its growing military preparations and hardware purchases would make it more confident to stand up to Russia and / or increase the military cost to Russia significantly of any future invasion. Chances are war now happens but, as you said, what happens then?
* For Rog et al, WW = World War
(c) would achieve one of the ambitions of the Greater Russian types.
For the 1914 German decision there is some interesting modern scholarship. Why did Kaiser Fuckwit abandon the Treaty with Russia? This left an opportunity for the French and they were on it like a tramp on chips.
For years people said it was because he was less good at his job than the UK DfE.....
More recently, it has been pointed out that the Prussian aristocracy/German military wanted to expand into what is now Poland. They wanted a Greater Prussia. Since this was occupied by Russia, problem.
WWI, in this thesis, was about knocking out the French, so the Germans could take the opportunity from Serbia etc to go to war with Russia, and grab what they really wanted.
It is interesting to note that "Poland must be destroyed" was enthusiastically received by the German high command in WWII - one Claus Von Stauffenberg disagreed with Hitler on lots, but said he had that one right....
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
If they won't come out for this sort of thing, then they never will
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
And I have little doubt that he is correct that the Russians could grab Eastern Ukraine. The question that remains unresolved in this scenario, though, is:
(a) is the goal to use the leverage of having grabbed Eastern Ukraine to force a pro-Russian government for all of the Ukraine?
or
(b) to have a separate puppet state in Eastern Ukraine
or
(c) to absorb Eastern Ukraine into Russia
In scenarios (b) and (c), it is by no means clear that Western Ukraine would fall into line as a pro-Russian state. After all, pro-Russian parties garner the vast majority of their votes in Eastern Ukraine.
Those that are left in the West will be terrified of Russia, for sure, but also incredibly angry at them. And democracy wouldn't be suspended in Western Ukraine.
Ultimately, I get that Putin wants geopolitical influence and all. But it seems to be tactics largely devoid of strategy. Russia exports oil, coal and natural gas. Demand for oil is being impacted by the increasing electrification of ...well... everything. Demand for coal has been hammered. And it used to be that Russia (and Norway) were the only possible exporters of gas to Europe. But the rise of LNG fundamentally changes that: back in 2000 Russia exports of gas were about 10x the global LNG market. Now, the LNG market is bigger. A decade from now, the LNG market will be 2-3x larger than Russian exports.
That's like three new Russias of natural gas coming on line - only they can sell their gas to anyone in the world, and not just to the people at the end of the pipe. Perhaps Putin sees now as the last time when he can exert pressure through the gas price?
But it also seems rather short sighted. Russia - fundamentally - has dreadful demographics and is extremely reliant on the export of commodities. If the price of natural gas and oil were to halve, it would find itself in terrible trouble. Russia needs the rest of the World, because it produces practically nothing - beyond energy and food - that it consumes.
Putin's decision making does have echoes of the thinking in Germany in 1914 that it was better to go to war with Russia sooner rather than later because of the perceived growing Russian effectiveness in its military (ironic really given WW1*). Not that Ukraine could beat Russia but that its growing military preparations and hardware purchases would make it more confident to stand up to Russia and / or increase the military cost to Russia significantly of any future invasion. Chances are war now happens but, as you said, what happens then?
* For Rog et al, WW = World War
(c) would achieve one of the ambitions of the Greater Russian types.
For the 1914 German decision there is some interesting modern scholarship. Why did Kaiser Fuckwit abandon the Treaty with Russia? This left an opportunity for the French and they were on it like a tramp on chips.
For years people said it was because he was less good at his job than the UK DfE.....
More recently, it has been pointed out that the Prussian aristocracy/German military wanted to expand into what is now Poland. They wanted a Greater Prussia. Since this was occupied by Russia, problem.
WWI, in this thesis, was about knocking out the French, so the Germans could take the opportunity from Serbia etc to go to war with Russia, and grab what they really wanted.
It is interesting to note that "Poland must be destroyed" was enthusiastically received by the German high command in WWII - one Claus Von Stauffenberg disagreed with Hitler on lots, but said he had that one right....
Well, that theory was always total bollocks, on the grounds it is actually impossible.
What makes Nato braindead? There's hardly anything new about military alliances throughout history. Rest assured if we don't wish to form such alliances some of our 'rivals' will. Does the alliance need to be re-thought? Probably. It's in its eighth decade after all. The main issue is that the US is doing the heavy lifting of European security. There is no sensible reason why this should be. The other problem is the 'attack on one is an attack on all' of article 5. Obviously Greece and Turkey aren't the best of friends and are we saying we would immediately jump to support Mr Erdogan in any military adventure he might wish to embark upon? So it could be reinvented in a looser format but I'm wary of those who simply wish to dismantle it.
Europe could take complete responsibility for its security with its own common defence partnership instead. I would hope that common interests in liberty, democracy, the rule of law and self determination would see a natural alliance form with North America that would look something like... Nato.
But maybe that is not what Macron wants? Perhaps he sees a world of competing power blocks like the US, China, India, Russia and Europe is simply another actor in such a world. Alliances are for nothing more than leveraging one's interests or playing other superpowers off against each other. Getting the English speakers out of European security, marginalising the views of East Europeans and restoring the 'brain' as it were of European security around a Franco-German axis. Perhaps such an alliance would be less concerned about Russian incursions in Ukraine or Belarus, they might even be prepared to appease Russia in the Baltics rather than defend 'interests' that are more costly than they are worth. It's an alternative view of European security. But not the only plausible one and give the current divisions in attitude to Ukraine it isn't clear that the new 'central powers' in Paris and Berlin would prevail.
I reckon that’s exactly what Macron is aiming for. A reduced Core Federal Europe with a totally coherent political identity and centralised foreign and defence policy. Theoretically the centre would be Brussels but in reality it would be Paris in charge of guns and diplomats but with Berlin doing the economic stuff, of necessity. And it would be French speaking.
It is also well-nigh impossible to achieve, even Berlin and Paris disagree on too much. But that is Macron’s aim. A mainland core EU run by the French and acting as a sort-of equal to the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese, with the Russians floating about weirdly and the Indians on the rise
You can’t fault his ambition. And even if he fails, he will probably win more power for Paris and France
I think that's a fair approximation of Macron's overall goal but the Ukraine crisis has shown Germany are in the foreign policy driving seat as well as the economic one. Germany has decreed no help for Ukraine from the EU and that's what's happened. What we're seeing is Macron's worst nightmare playing out, France standing by impotently as the US decides Europe's fate in a closed room with Russia and the UK making friends and allies all across the continent because it isn't bound by Germany's appeasement policies.
Macron's understanding and handling of foreign policy is an abject lesson in what not to do. He's managed to reduce French influence in their old colonies in Africa and managed to p1ss off multiple sides without ever managing to get his own vision of how the EU should operate even seriously considered. Very few friends, no influence - great job Macron.
Africa, alongside AUKUS, is his biggest failure, yes
But I’m not sure he had much choice in the matter. He’s occasionally been a bit clumsy and arrogant but in the end both are symptoms of secular French decline - in soft power as much as hard. France has punched above its weight in Africa for decades, relying on linguistic ties and metropolitan patronage - African leaders like to go shopping with their wives in Paris
But in the end China is now way more important, and the Anglo-Saxons more salient through the English language and residual USA power. Ditto the South Pacific
Hence the simultaneous French pivot to an even more Federal Europe (now, in good and bad ways for France, devoid of the UK). If France can somehow make the EU simply an extension of French sovereignty but with vastly greater economic prestige (by sheer size) then French grandeur and influence is restored
Trouble is it is 6D chess and surely impossible. The EU will not bend to the whims of Paris, it is no longer 1962
The problem with the French Run The EU thing is that Germany is no longer West Germany. It is larger than France in every way and wants what it wants.
The idea that you can demarcate foreign policy from economics seems untenable.
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
If they won't come out for this sort of thing, then they never will
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
If they won't come out for this sort of thing, then they never will
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
If they won't come out for this sort of thing, then they never will
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
And I have little doubt that he is correct that the Russians could grab Eastern Ukraine. The question that remains unresolved in this scenario, though, is:
(a) is the goal to use the leverage of having grabbed Eastern Ukraine to force a pro-Russian government for all of the Ukraine?
or
(b) to have a separate puppet state in Eastern Ukraine
or
(c) to absorb Eastern Ukraine into Russia
In scenarios (b) and (c), it is by no means clear that Western Ukraine would fall into line as a pro-Russian state. After all, pro-Russian parties garner the vast majority of their votes in Eastern Ukraine.
Those that are left in the West will be terrified of Russia, for sure, but also incredibly angry at them. And democracy wouldn't be suspended in Western Ukraine.
Ultimately, I get that Putin wants geopolitical influence and all. But it seems to be tactics largely devoid of strategy. Russia exports oil, coal and natural gas. Demand for oil is being impacted by the increasing electrification of ...well... everything. Demand for coal has been hammered. And it used to be that Russia (and Norway) were the only possible exporters of gas to Europe. But the rise of LNG fundamentally changes that: back in 2000 Russia exports of gas were about 10x the global LNG market. Now, the LNG market is bigger. A decade from now, the LNG market will be 2-3x larger than Russian exports.
That's like three new Russias of natural gas coming on line - only they can sell their gas to anyone in the world, and not just to the people at the end of the pipe. Perhaps Putin sees now as the last time when he can exert pressure through the gas price?
But it also seems rather short sighted. Russia - fundamentally - has dreadful demographics and is extremely reliant on the export of commodities. If the price of natural gas and oil were to halve, it would find itself in terrible trouble. Russia needs the rest of the World, because it produces practically nothing - beyond energy and food - that it consumes.
Putin's decision making does have echoes of the thinking in Germany in 1914 that it was better to go to war with Russia sooner rather than later because of the perceived growing Russian effectiveness in its military (ironic really given WW1*). Not that Ukraine could beat Russia but that its growing military preparations and hardware purchases would make it more confident to stand up to Russia and / or increase the military cost to Russia significantly of any future invasion. Chances are war now happens but, as you said, what happens then?
* For Rog et al, WW = World War
(c) would achieve one of the ambitions of the Greater Russian types.
For the 1914 German decision there is some interesting modern scholarship. Why did Kaiser Fuckwit abandon the Treaty with Russia? This left an opportunity for the French and they were on it like a tramp on chips.
For years people said it was because he was less good at his job than the UK DfE.....
More recently, it has been pointed out that the Prussian aristocracy/German military wanted to expand into what is now Poland. They wanted a Greater Prussia. Since this was occupied by Russia, problem.
WWI, in this thesis, was about knocking out the French, so the Germans could take the opportunity from Serbia etc to go to war with Russia, and grab what they really wanted.
It is interesting to note that "Poland must be destroyed" was enthusiastically received by the German high command in WWII - one Claus Von Stauffenberg disagreed with Hitler on lots, but said he had that one right....
It probably wasn't only Poland that was of interest. The Baltic areas had many Germanic-descended noblemen and, as future actions showed, the Germans were particularly interested in that area.
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
Interesting that he thinks the ruskies will stop at Dnieper river. Dom Lawson is in S Times warning that Ukraine could be Putin's Afghanistan as per soviet disaster - bogged down in a war of attrition by citizens fighting an insurgency.
"Stop at the Dnieper" = annex the entire Eastern half of the country and probably Kyiv which sits astride the river with the centre on the right bank.
Would restore Peter the Great's border with Poland-Lithuania after Poltava.
I can’t see him annexing Kiev. That’s the spiritual heart of Ukraine and such a move guarantees perpetual insurgency and a new Vietnam
I reckon more limited seizures and a puppet regime in Kiev: is the aim. Likely do-able
So, you're reckoning that Western Ukraine agrees to a puppet regime in return for a United Ukraine?
I mean it's certainly possible. But it's far from the only option. And unless you suspend democracy in the East, then it's not very stable.
I’m wildly guessing from multiple options, like all of us. But something like that, yes. It’ll be more like Armenia than Belarus. But the regime will always be pro-Russian
Turkey is an interesting actor here. One reason Armenia has now cosied up to Russia and Putin is because the Turks whipped them, via Azerbaijan, in their recent war. So Armenia wants Russian protection. Two Christian states. Turkey is an enemy of Putin’s, in essence.
We really are back to 19th century Great Power politics
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
And I have little doubt that he is correct that the Russians could grab Eastern Ukraine. The question that remains unresolved in this scenario, though, is:
(a) is the goal to use the leverage of having grabbed Eastern Ukraine to force a pro-Russian government for all of the Ukraine?
or
(b) to have a separate puppet state in Eastern Ukraine
or
(c) to absorb Eastern Ukraine into Russia
In scenarios (b) and (c), it is by no means clear that Western Ukraine would fall into line as a pro-Russian state. After all, pro-Russian parties garner the vast majority of their votes in Eastern Ukraine.
Those that are left in the West will be terrified of Russia, for sure, but also incredibly angry at them. And democracy wouldn't be suspended in Western Ukraine.
Ultimately, I get that Putin wants geopolitical influence and all. But it seems to be tactics largely devoid of strategy. Russia exports oil, coal and natural gas. Demand for oil is being impacted by the increasing electrification of ...well... everything. Demand for coal has been hammered. And it used to be that Russia (and Norway) were the only possible exporters of gas to Europe. But the rise of LNG fundamentally changes that: back in 2000 Russia exports of gas were about 10x the global LNG market. Now, the LNG market is bigger. A decade from now, the LNG market will be 2-3x larger than Russian exports.
That's like three new Russias of natural gas coming on line - only they can sell their gas to anyone in the world, and not just to the people at the end of the pipe. Perhaps Putin sees now as the last time when he can exert pressure through the gas price?
But it also seems rather short sighted. Russia - fundamentally - has dreadful demographics and is extremely reliant on the export of commodities. If the price of natural gas and oil were to halve, it would find itself in terrible trouble. Russia needs the rest of the World, because it produces practically nothing - beyond energy and food - that it consumes.
Putin's decision making does have echoes of the thinking in Germany in 1914 that it was better to go to war with Russia sooner rather than later because of the perceived growing Russian effectiveness in its military (ironic really given WW1*). Not that Ukraine could beat Russia but that its growing military preparations and hardware purchases would make it more confident to stand up to Russia and / or increase the military cost to Russia significantly of any future invasion. Chances are war now happens but, as you said, what happens then?
* For Rog et al, WW = World War
(c) would achieve one of the ambitions of the Greater Russian types.
For the 1914 German decision there is some interesting modern scholarship. Why did Kaiser Fuckwit abandon the Treaty with Russia? This left an opportunity for the French and they were on it like a tramp on chips.
For years people said it was because he was less good at his job than the UK DfE.....
More recently, it has been pointed out that the Prussian aristocracy/German military wanted to expand into what is now Poland. They wanted a Greater Prussia. Since this was occupied by Russia, problem.
WWI, in this thesis, was about knocking out the French, so the Germans could take the opportunity from Serbia etc to go to war with Russia, and grab what they really wanted.
It is interesting to note that "Poland must be destroyed" was enthusiastically received by the German high command in WWII - one Claus Von Stauffenberg disagreed with Hitler on lots, but said he had that one right....
Well, that theory was always total bollocks, on the grounds it is actually impossible.
The UK DfE has
- Left most of the schools standing - Most of the children are alive - Most of the teachers are alive
After the Kaiser finished with the German Empire.......
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
Interesting that he thinks the ruskies will stop at Dnieper river. Dom Lawson is in S Times warning that Ukraine could be Putin's Afghanistan as per soviet disaster - bogged down in a war of attrition by citizens fighting an insurgency.
"Stop at the Dnieper" = annex the entire Eastern half of the country and probably Kyiv which sits astride the river with the centre on the right bank.
Would restore Peter the Great's border with Poland-Lithuania after Poltava.
I can’t see him annexing Kiev. That’s the spiritual heart of Ukraine and such a move guarantees perpetual insurgency and a new Vietnam
I reckon more limited seizures and a puppet regime in Kiev: is the aim. Likely do-able
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
Interesting that he thinks the ruskies will stop at Dnieper river. Dom Lawson is in S Times warning that Ukraine could be Putin's Afghanistan as per soviet disaster - bogged down in a war of attrition by citizens fighting an insurgency.
"Stop at the Dnieper" = annex the entire Eastern half of the country and probably Kyiv which sits astride the river with the centre on the right bank.
Would restore Peter the Great's border with Poland-Lithuania after Poltava.
I can’t see him annexing Kiev. That’s the spiritual heart of Ukraine and such a move guarantees perpetual insurgency and a new Vietnam
I reckon more limited seizures and a puppet regime in Kiev: is the aim. Likely do-able
Kyiv is also the spiritual heart of the Russian nation, the capital of Kievan Rus before it broke up into principalities (Kyiv ended up in Lithuania). The Rus then evolved into White, Little and Great Russians, and their languages diverged, but I would think some Russians would like it "back". Alperovitch seems to be assuming Putun will aim to take the whole Left Bank and if he does so, he may as well take the other half of Kyiv.
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
If they won't come out for this sort of thing, then they never will
What makes Nato braindead? There's hardly anything new about military alliances throughout history. Rest assured if we don't wish to form such alliances some of our 'rivals' will. Does the alliance need to be re-thought? Probably. It's in its eighth decade after all. The main issue is that the US is doing the heavy lifting of European security. There is no sensible reason why this should be. The other problem is the 'attack on one is an attack on all' of article 5. Obviously Greece and Turkey aren't the best of friends and are we saying we would immediately jump to support Mr Erdogan in any military adventure he might wish to embark upon? So it could be reinvented in a looser format but I'm wary of those who simply wish to dismantle it.
Europe could take complete responsibility for its security with its own common defence partnership instead. I would hope that common interests in liberty, democracy, the rule of law and self determination would see a natural alliance form with North America that would look something like... Nato.
But maybe that is not what Macron wants? Perhaps he sees a world of competing power blocks like the US, China, India, Russia and Europe is simply another actor in such a world. Alliances are for nothing more than leveraging one's interests or playing other superpowers off against each other. Getting the English speakers out of European security, marginalising the views of East Europeans and restoring the 'brain' as it were of European security around a Franco-German axis. Perhaps such an alliance would be less concerned about Russian incursions in Ukraine or Belarus, they might even be prepared to appease Russia in the Baltics rather than defend 'interests' that are more costly than they are worth. It's an alternative view of European security. But not the only plausible one and give the current divisions in attitude to Ukraine it isn't clear that the new 'central powers' in Paris and Berlin would prevail.
I reckon that’s exactly what Macron is aiming for. A reduced Core Federal Europe with a totally coherent political identity and centralised foreign and defence policy. Theoretically the centre would be Brussels but in reality it would be Paris in charge of guns and diplomats but with Berlin doing the economic stuff, of necessity. And it would be French speaking.
It is also well-nigh impossible to achieve, even Berlin and Paris disagree on too much. But that is Macron’s aim. A mainland core EU run by the French and acting as a sort-of equal to the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese, with the Russians floating about weirdly and the Indians on the rise
You can’t fault his ambition. And even if he fails, he will probably win more power for Paris and France
I think that's a fair approximation of Macron's overall goal but the Ukraine crisis has shown Germany are in the foreign policy driving seat as well as the economic one. Germany has decreed no help for Ukraine from the EU and that's what's happened. What we're seeing is Macron's worst nightmare playing out, France standing by impotently as the US decides Europe's fate in a closed room with Russia and the UK making friends and allies all across the continent because it isn't bound by Germany's appeasement policies.
Macron's understanding and handling of foreign policy is an abject lesson in what not to do. He's managed to reduce French influence in their old colonies in Africa and managed to p1ss off multiple sides without ever managing to get his own vision of how the EU should operate even seriously considered. Very few friends, no influence - great job Macron.
Africa, alongside AUKUS, is his biggest failure, yes
But I’m not sure he had much choice in the matter. He’s occasionally been a bit clumsy and arrogant but in the end both are symptoms of secular French decline - in soft power as much as hard. France has punched above its weight in Africa for decades, relying on linguistic ties and metropolitan patronage - African leaders like to go shopping with their wives in Paris
But in the end China is now way more important, and the Anglo-Saxons more salient through the English language and residual USA power. Ditto the South Pacific
Hence the simultaneous French pivot to an even more Federal Europe (now, in good and bad ways for France, devoid of the UK). If France can somehow make the EU simply an extension of French sovereignty but with vastly greater economic prestige (by sheer size) then French grandeur and influence is restored
Trouble is it is 6D chess and surely impossible. The EU will not bend to the whims of Paris, it is no longer 1962
The problem with the French Run The EU thing is that Germany is no longer West Germany. It is larger than France in every way and wants what it wants.
The idea that you can demarcate foreign policy from economics seems untenable.
France has been working with Italy and others to create a French-led faction that can indeed outweigh Germany in particular.
The unruly Eastern flank are way too independent-minded, though.
If France wants to achieve its strategic goal (of foreign policy hegemony in the EU) it needs the Eastern flank ex-EU’d. And it’s not as if Poland and Hungary haven’t provided enough reasons to be expelled.
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
Interesting that he thinks the ruskies will stop at Dnieper river. Dom Lawson is in S Times warning that Ukraine could be Putin's Afghanistan as per soviet disaster - bogged down in a war of attrition by citizens fighting an insurgency.
"Stop at the Dnieper" = annex the entire Eastern half of the country and probably Kyiv which sits astride the river with the centre on the right bank.
Would restore Peter the Great's border with Poland-Lithuania after Poltava.
I can’t see him annexing Kiev. That’s the spiritual heart of Ukraine and such a move guarantees perpetual insurgency and a new Vietnam
I reckon more limited seizures and a puppet regime in Kiev: is the aim. Likely do-able
How does he get a puppet into Kiev?
The same way China has annexed Hong Kong, without a shot in that case
Sheer menacing power and a stranglehold, and the mere threat of overwhelming violence
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
And I have little doubt that he is correct that the Russians could grab Eastern Ukraine. The question that remains unresolved in this scenario, though, is:
(a) is the goal to use the leverage of having grabbed Eastern Ukraine to force a pro-Russian government for all of the Ukraine?
or
(b) to have a separate puppet state in Eastern Ukraine
or
(c) to absorb Eastern Ukraine into Russia
In scenarios (b) and (c), it is by no means clear that Western Ukraine would fall into line as a pro-Russian state. After all, pro-Russian parties garner the vast majority of their votes in Eastern Ukraine.
Those that are left in the West will be terrified of Russia, for sure, but also incredibly angry at them. And democracy wouldn't be suspended in Western Ukraine.
Ultimately, I get that Putin wants geopolitical influence and all. But it seems to be tactics largely devoid of strategy. Russia exports oil, coal and natural gas. Demand for oil is being impacted by the increasing electrification of ...well... everything. Demand for coal has been hammered. And it used to be that Russia (and Norway) were the only possible exporters of gas to Europe. But the rise of LNG fundamentally changes that: back in 2000 Russia exports of gas were about 10x the global LNG market. Now, the LNG market is bigger. A decade from now, the LNG market will be 2-3x larger than Russian exports.
That's like three new Russias of natural gas coming on line - only they can sell their gas to anyone in the world, and not just to the people at the end of the pipe. Perhaps Putin sees now as the last time when he can exert pressure through the gas price?
But it also seems rather short sighted. Russia - fundamentally - has dreadful demographics and is extremely reliant on the export of commodities. If the price of natural gas and oil were to halve, it would find itself in terrible trouble. Russia needs the rest of the World, because it produces practically nothing - beyond energy and food - that it consumes.
Putin's decision making does have echoes of the thinking in Germany in 1914 that it was better to go to war with Russia sooner rather than later because of the perceived growing Russian effectiveness in its military (ironic really given WW1*). Not that Ukraine could beat Russia but that its growing military preparations and hardware purchases would make it more confident to stand up to Russia and / or increase the military cost to Russia significantly of any future invasion. Chances are war now happens but, as you said, what happens then?
* For Rog et al, WW = World War
(c) would achieve one of the ambitions of the Greater Russian types.
For the 1914 German decision there is some interesting modern scholarship. Why did Kaiser Fuckwit abandon the Treaty with Russia? This left an opportunity for the French and they were on it like a tramp on chips.
For years people said it was because he was less good at his job than the UK DfE.....
More recently, it has been pointed out that the Prussian aristocracy/German military wanted to expand into what is now Poland. They wanted a Greater Prussia. Since this was occupied by Russia, problem.
WWI, in this thesis, was about knocking out the French, so the Germans could take the opportunity from Serbia etc to go to war with Russia, and grab what they really wanted.
It is interesting to note that "Poland must be destroyed" was enthusiastically received by the German high command in WWII - one Claus Von Stauffenberg disagreed with Hitler on lots, but said he had that one right....
It probably wasn't only Poland that was of interest. The Baltic areas had many Germanic-descended noblemen and, as future actions showed, the Germans were particularly interested in that area.
The thesis is from those who argue that Hitler was simply going for a maximalist version of all the Greater Germany ideas.
- Without the Empire, Austria was ethnically German (at least as far as the Nazis gave a shit) - Sudetenland etc - The expansion east - etc
Each of those had long roots - Hitler pulled them all together and went for the Demented Meth Head version of all of them. Which is why he enjoyed broad support from *all* the ultra-nationalists. He aimed to make all the hardest of hard core versions of their wildest fantasies come true....
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
He is hardly questioning though, he is stating his view as fact - he is saying that, if his reforms don't get passed, then the elections will be illegitimate. His exact words were:
""The increase in the prospect of being illegitimate is in direct proportion to us not being able to get these reforms passed,"
Since he won't get his reforms passed, he has effectively said the mid-terms are illegitimate.
Nice try on the wording but we are seeing what has been clear for a while - namely the Democrats are as bad as the Republicans when it comes to trying to keep hold of power, it is just the tactics are different.
What makes Nato braindead? There's hardly anything new about military alliances throughout history. Rest assured if we don't wish to form such alliances some of our 'rivals' will. Does the alliance need to be re-thought? Probably. It's in its eighth decade after all. The main issue is that the US is doing the heavy lifting of European security. There is no sensible reason why this should be. The other problem is the 'attack on one is an attack on all' of article 5. Obviously Greece and Turkey aren't the best of friends and are we saying we would immediately jump to support Mr Erdogan in any military adventure he might wish to embark upon? So it could be reinvented in a looser format but I'm wary of those who simply wish to dismantle it.
Europe could take complete responsibility for its security with its own common defence partnership instead. I would hope that common interests in liberty, democracy, the rule of law and self determination would see a natural alliance form with North America that would look something like... Nato.
But maybe that is not what Macron wants? Perhaps he sees a world of competing power blocks like the US, China, India, Russia and Europe is simply another actor in such a world. Alliances are for nothing more than leveraging one's interests or playing other superpowers off against each other. Getting the English speakers out of European security, marginalising the views of East Europeans and restoring the 'brain' as it were of European security around a Franco-German axis. Perhaps such an alliance would be less concerned about Russian incursions in Ukraine or Belarus, they might even be prepared to appease Russia in the Baltics rather than defend 'interests' that are more costly than they are worth. It's an alternative view of European security. But not the only plausible one and give the current divisions in attitude to Ukraine it isn't clear that the new 'central powers' in Paris and Berlin would prevail.
I reckon that’s exactly what Macron is aiming for. A reduced Core Federal Europe with a totally coherent political identity and centralised foreign and defence policy. Theoretically the centre would be Brussels but in reality it would be Paris in charge of guns and diplomats but with Berlin doing the economic stuff, of necessity. And it would be French speaking.
It is also well-nigh impossible to achieve, even Berlin and Paris disagree on too much. But that is Macron’s aim. A mainland core EU run by the French and acting as a sort-of equal to the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese, with the Russians floating about weirdly and the Indians on the rise
You can’t fault his ambition. And even if he fails, he will probably win more power for Paris and France
I think that's a fair approximation of Macron's overall goal but the Ukraine crisis has shown Germany are in the foreign policy driving seat as well as the economic one. Germany has decreed no help for Ukraine from the EU and that's what's happened. What we're seeing is Macron's worst nightmare playing out, France standing by impotently as the US decides Europe's fate in a closed room with Russia and the UK making friends and allies all across the continent because it isn't bound by Germany's appeasement policies.
Macron's understanding and handling of foreign policy is an abject lesson in what not to do. He's managed to reduce French influence in their old colonies in Africa and managed to p1ss off multiple sides without ever managing to get his own vision of how the EU should operate even seriously considered. Very few friends, no influence - great job Macron.
Africa, alongside AUKUS, is his biggest failure, yes
But I’m not sure he had much choice in the matter. He’s occasionally been a bit clumsy and arrogant but in the end both are symptoms of secular French decline - in soft power as much as hard. France has punched above its weight in Africa for decades, relying on linguistic ties and metropolitan patronage - African leaders like to go shopping with their wives in Paris
But in the end China is now way more important, and the Anglo-Saxons more salient through the English language and residual USA power. Ditto the South Pacific
Hence the simultaneous French pivot to an even more Federal Europe (now, in good and bad ways for France, devoid of the UK). If France can somehow make the EU simply an extension of French sovereignty but with vastly greater economic prestige (by sheer size) then French grandeur and influence is restored
Trouble is it is 6D chess and surely impossible. The EU will not bend to the whims of Paris, it is no longer 1962
The problem with the French Run The EU thing is that Germany is no longer West Germany. It is larger than France in every way and wants what it wants.
The idea that you can demarcate foreign policy from economics seems untenable.
What makes Nato braindead? There's hardly anything new about military alliances throughout history. Rest assured if we don't wish to form such alliances some of our 'rivals' will. Does the alliance need to be re-thought? Probably. It's in its eighth decade after all. The main issue is that the US is doing the heavy lifting of European security. There is no sensible reason why this should be. The other problem is the 'attack on one is an attack on all' of article 5. Obviously Greece and Turkey aren't the best of friends and are we saying we would immediately jump to support Mr Erdogan in any military adventure he might wish to embark upon? So it could be reinvented in a looser format but I'm wary of those who simply wish to dismantle it.
Europe could take complete responsibility for its security with its own common defence partnership instead. I would hope that common interests in liberty, democracy, the rule of law and self determination would see a natural alliance form with North America that would look something like... Nato.
But maybe that is not what Macron wants? Perhaps he sees a world of competing power blocks like the US, China, India, Russia and Europe is simply another actor in such a world. Alliances are for nothing more than leveraging one's interests or playing other superpowers off against each other. Getting the English speakers out of European security, marginalising the views of East Europeans and restoring the 'brain' as it were of European security around a Franco-German axis. Perhaps such an alliance would be less concerned about Russian incursions in Ukraine or Belarus, they might even be prepared to appease Russia in the Baltics rather than defend 'interests' that are more costly than they are worth. It's an alternative view of European security. But not the only plausible one and give the current divisions in attitude to Ukraine it isn't clear that the new 'central powers' in Paris and Berlin would prevail.
I reckon that’s exactly what Macron is aiming for. A reduced Core Federal Europe with a totally coherent political identity and centralised foreign and defence policy. Theoretically the centre would be Brussels but in reality it would be Paris in charge of guns and diplomats but with Berlin doing the economic stuff, of necessity. And it would be French speaking.
It is also well-nigh impossible to achieve, even Berlin and Paris disagree on too much. But that is Macron’s aim. A mainland core EU run by the French and acting as a sort-of equal to the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese, with the Russians floating about weirdly and the Indians on the rise
You can’t fault his ambition. And even if he fails, he will probably win more power for Paris and France
I think that's a fair approximation of Macron's overall goal but the Ukraine crisis has shown Germany are in the foreign policy driving seat as well as the economic one. Germany has decreed no help for Ukraine from the EU and that's what's happened. What we're seeing is Macron's worst nightmare playing out, France standing by impotently as the US decides Europe's fate in a closed room with Russia and the UK making friends and allies all across the continent because it isn't bound by Germany's appeasement policies.
Macron's understanding and handling of foreign policy is an abject lesson in what not to do. He's managed to reduce French influence in their old colonies in Africa and managed to p1ss off multiple sides without ever managing to get his own vision of how the EU should operate even seriously considered. Very few friends, no influence - great job Macron.
Africa, alongside AUKUS, is his biggest failure, yes
But I’m not sure he had much choice in the matter. He’s occasionally been a bit clumsy and arrogant but in the end both are symptoms of secular French decline - in soft power as much as hard. France has punched above its weight in Africa for decades, relying on linguistic ties and metropolitan patronage - African leaders like to go shopping with their wives in Paris
But in the end China is now way more important, and the Anglo-Saxons more salient through the English language and residual USA power. Ditto the South Pacific
Hence the simultaneous French pivot to an even more Federal Europe (now, in good and bad ways for France, devoid of the UK). If France can somehow make the EU simply an extension of French sovereignty but with vastly greater economic prestige (by sheer size) then French grandeur and influence is restored
Trouble is it is 6D chess and surely impossible. The EU will not bend to the whims of Paris, it is no longer 1962
The problem with the French Run The EU thing is that Germany is no longer West Germany. It is larger than France in every way and wants what it wants.
The idea that you can demarcate foreign policy from economics seems untenable.
But Germany is still very reluctant to play a wider political role. Meanwhile Macron has built French powerbases like the EU-Med group, stretching from Portugal to Cyprus, and is busy making France a key player in the East Mediterranean, for example.
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
Interesting that he thinks the ruskies will stop at Dnieper river. Dom Lawson is in S Times warning that Ukraine could be Putin's Afghanistan as per soviet disaster - bogged down in a war of attrition by citizens fighting an insurgency.
"Stop at the Dnieper" = annex the entire Eastern half of the country and probably Kyiv which sits astride the river with the centre on the right bank.
Would restore Peter the Great's border with Poland-Lithuania after Poltava.
I can’t see him annexing Kiev. That’s the spiritual heart of Ukraine and such a move guarantees perpetual insurgency and a new Vietnam
I reckon more limited seizures and a puppet regime in Kiev: is the aim. Likely do-able
Kyiv is also the spiritual heart of the Russian nation, the capital of Kievan Rus before it broke up into principalities (Kyiv ended up in Lithuania). The Rus then evolved into White, Little and Great Russians, and their languages diverged, but I would think some Russians would like it "back". Alperovitch seems to be assuming Putun will aim to take the whole Left Bank and if he does so, he may as well take the other half of Kyiv.
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
And I have little doubt that he is correct that the Russians could grab Eastern Ukraine. The question that remains unresolved in this scenario, though, is:
(a) is the goal to use the leverage of having grabbed Eastern Ukraine to force a pro-Russian government for all of the Ukraine?
or
(b) to have a separate puppet state in Eastern Ukraine
or
(c) to absorb Eastern Ukraine into Russia
In scenarios (b) and (c), it is by no means clear that Western Ukraine would fall into line as a pro-Russian state. After all, pro-Russian parties garner the vast majority of their votes in Eastern Ukraine.
Those that are left in the West will be terrified of Russia, for sure, but also incredibly angry at them. And democracy wouldn't be suspended in Western Ukraine.
Ultimately, I get that Putin wants geopolitical influence and all. But it seems to be tactics largely devoid of strategy. Russia exports oil, coal and natural gas. Demand for oil is being impacted by the increasing electrification of ...well... everything. Demand for coal has been hammered. And it used to be that Russia (and Norway) were the only possible exporters of gas to Europe. But the rise of LNG fundamentally changes that: back in 2000 Russia exports of gas were about 10x the global LNG market. Now, the LNG market is bigger. A decade from now, the LNG market will be 2-3x larger than Russian exports.
That's like three new Russias of natural gas coming on line - only they can sell their gas to anyone in the world, and not just to the people at the end of the pipe. Perhaps Putin sees now as the last time when he can exert pressure through the gas price?
But it also seems rather short sighted. Russia - fundamentally - has dreadful demographics and is extremely reliant on the export of commodities. If the price of natural gas and oil were to halve, it would find itself in terrible trouble. Russia needs the rest of the World, because it produces practically nothing - beyond energy and food - that it consumes.
Putin's decision making does have echoes of the thinking in Germany in 1914 that it was better to go to war with Russia sooner rather than later because of the perceived growing Russian effectiveness in its military (ironic really given WW1*). Not that Ukraine could beat Russia but that its growing military preparations and hardware purchases would make it more confident to stand up to Russia and / or increase the military cost to Russia significantly of any future invasion. Chances are war now happens but, as you said, what happens then?
* For Rog et al, WW = World War
(c) would achieve one of the ambitions of the Greater Russian types.
For the 1914 German decision there is some interesting modern scholarship. Why did Kaiser Fuckwit abandon the Treaty with Russia? This left an opportunity for the French and they were on it like a tramp on chips.
For years people said it was because he was less good at his job than the UK DfE.....
More recently, it has been pointed out that the Prussian aristocracy/German military wanted to expand into what is now Poland. They wanted a Greater Prussia. Since this was occupied by Russia, problem.
WWI, in this thesis, was about knocking out the French, so the Germans could take the opportunity from Serbia etc to go to war with Russia, and grab what they really wanted.
It is interesting to note that "Poland must be destroyed" was enthusiastically received by the German high command in WWII - one Claus Von Stauffenberg disagreed with Hitler on lots, but said he had that one right....
It probably wasn't only Poland that was of interest. The Baltic areas had many Germanic-descended noblemen and, as future actions showed, the Germans were particularly interested in that area.
The thesis is from those who argue that Hitler was simply going for a maximalist version of all the Greater Germany ideas.
- Without the Empire, Austria was ethnically German (at least as far as the Nazis gave a shit) - Sudetenland etc - The expansion east - etc
Each of those had long roots - Hitler pulled them all together and went for the Demented Meth Head version of all of them. Which is why he enjoyed broad support from *all* the ultra-nationalists. He aimed to make all the hardest of hard core versions of their wildest fantasies come true....
Yes, that makes sense. HItler didn't mind a bit of plagarising when it came to ideas.
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
Interesting that he thinks the ruskies will stop at Dnieper river. Dom Lawson is in S Times warning that Ukraine could be Putin's Afghanistan as per soviet disaster - bogged down in a war of attrition by citizens fighting an insurgency.
"Stop at the Dnieper" = annex the entire Eastern half of the country and probably Kyiv which sits astride the river with the centre on the right bank.
Would restore Peter the Great's border with Poland-Lithuania after Poltava.
I can’t see him annexing Kiev. That’s the spiritual heart of Ukraine and such a move guarantees perpetual insurgency and a new Vietnam
I reckon more limited seizures and a puppet regime in Kiev: is the aim. Likely do-able
How does he get a puppet into Kiev?
Push the Ukrainian government out by force and crown the puppet of his choosing, there.
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
If they won't come out for this sort of thing, then they never will
Much of the Republican Party have given up on democracy and are willing to countenance authoritarian measures in order to gain and or maintain power.
Sad times.
What do you think of the fact that Biden said the 2022 midterms' elections will probably be illegitimate?
Source?
Posted but here is his quote: ""The increase in the prospect of being illegitimate is in direct proportion to us not being able to get these reforms passed," Since he won't get his reforms passed, he has effectively said the mid-terms are illegitimate.
What makes Nato braindead? There's hardly anything new about military alliances throughout history. Rest assured if we don't wish to form such alliances some of our 'rivals' will. Does the alliance need to be re-thought? Probably. It's in its eighth decade after all. The main issue is that the US is doing the heavy lifting of European security. There is no sensible reason why this should be. The other problem is the 'attack on one is an attack on all' of article 5. Obviously Greece and Turkey aren't the best of friends and are we saying we would immediately jump to support Mr Erdogan in any military adventure he might wish to embark upon? So it could be reinvented in a looser format but I'm wary of those who simply wish to dismantle it.
Europe could take complete responsibility for its security with its own common defence partnership instead. I would hope that common interests in liberty, democracy, the rule of law and self determination would see a natural alliance form with North America that would look something like... Nato.
But maybe that is not what Macron wants? Perhaps he sees a world of competing power blocks like the US, China, India, Russia and Europe is simply another actor in such a world. Alliances are for nothing more than leveraging one's interests or playing other superpowers off against each other. Getting the English speakers out of European security, marginalising the views of East Europeans and restoring the 'brain' as it were of European security around a Franco-German axis. Perhaps such an alliance would be less concerned about Russian incursions in Ukraine or Belarus, they might even be prepared to appease Russia in the Baltics rather than defend 'interests' that are more costly than they are worth. It's an alternative view of European security. But not the only plausible one and give the current divisions in attitude to Ukraine it isn't clear that the new 'central powers' in Paris and Berlin would prevail.
I reckon that’s exactly what Macron is aiming for. A reduced Core Federal Europe with a totally coherent political identity and centralised foreign and defence policy. Theoretically the centre would be Brussels but in reality it would be Paris in charge of guns and diplomats but with Berlin doing the economic stuff, of necessity. And it would be French speaking.
It is also well-nigh impossible to achieve, even Berlin and Paris disagree on too much. But that is Macron’s aim. A mainland core EU run by the French and acting as a sort-of equal to the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese, with the Russians floating about weirdly and the Indians on the rise
You can’t fault his ambition. And even if he fails, he will probably win more power for Paris and France
I think that's a fair approximation of Macron's overall goal but the Ukraine crisis has shown Germany are in the foreign policy driving seat as well as the economic one. Germany has decreed no help for Ukraine from the EU and that's what's happened. What we're seeing is Macron's worst nightmare playing out, France standing by impotently as the US decides Europe's fate in a closed room with Russia and the UK making friends and allies all across the continent because it isn't bound by Germany's appeasement policies.
Macron's understanding and handling of foreign policy is an abject lesson in what not to do. He's managed to reduce French influence in their old colonies in Africa and managed to p1ss off multiple sides without ever managing to get his own vision of how the EU should operate even seriously considered. Very few friends, no influence - great job Macron.
Africa, alongside AUKUS, is his biggest failure, yes
But I’m not sure he had much choice in the matter. He’s occasionally been a bit clumsy and arrogant but in the end both are symptoms of secular French decline - in soft power as much as hard. France has punched above its weight in Africa for decades, relying on linguistic ties and metropolitan patronage - African leaders like to go shopping with their wives in Paris
But in the end China is now way more important, and the Anglo-Saxons more salient through the English language and residual USA power. Ditto the South Pacific
Hence the simultaneous French pivot to an even more Federal Europe (now, in good and bad ways for France, devoid of the UK). If France can somehow make the EU simply an extension of French sovereignty but with vastly greater economic prestige (by sheer size) then French grandeur and influence is restored
Trouble is it is 6D chess and surely impossible. The EU will not bend to the whims of Paris, it is no longer 1962
The problem with the French Run The EU thing is that Germany is no longer West Germany. It is larger than France in every way and wants what it wants.
The idea that you can demarcate foreign policy from economics seems untenable.
What makes Nato braindead? There's hardly anything new about military alliances throughout history. Rest assured if we don't wish to form such alliances some of our 'rivals' will. Does the alliance need to be re-thought? Probably. It's in its eighth decade after all. The main issue is that the US is doing the heavy lifting of European security. There is no sensible reason why this should be. The other problem is the 'attack on one is an attack on all' of article 5. Obviously Greece and Turkey aren't the best of friends and are we saying we would immediately jump to support Mr Erdogan in any military adventure he might wish to embark upon? So it could be reinvented in a looser format but I'm wary of those who simply wish to dismantle it.
Europe could take complete responsibility for its security with its own common defence partnership instead. I would hope that common interests in liberty, democracy, the rule of law and self determination would see a natural alliance form with North America that would look something like... Nato.
But maybe that is not what Macron wants? Perhaps he sees a world of competing power blocks like the US, China, India, Russia and Europe is simply another actor in such a world. Alliances are for nothing more than leveraging one's interests or playing other superpowers off against each other. Getting the English speakers out of European security, marginalising the views of East Europeans and restoring the 'brain' as it were of European security around a Franco-German axis. Perhaps such an alliance would be less concerned about Russian incursions in Ukraine or Belarus, they might even be prepared to appease Russia in the Baltics rather than defend 'interests' that are more costly than they are worth. It's an alternative view of European security. But not the only plausible one and give the current divisions in attitude to Ukraine it isn't clear that the new 'central powers' in Paris and Berlin would prevail.
I reckon that’s exactly what Macron is aiming for. A reduced Core Federal Europe with a totally coherent political identity and centralised foreign and defence policy. Theoretically the centre would be Brussels but in reality it would be Paris in charge of guns and diplomats but with Berlin doing the economic stuff, of necessity. And it would be French speaking.
It is also well-nigh impossible to achieve, even Berlin and Paris disagree on too much. But that is Macron’s aim. A mainland core EU run by the French and acting as a sort-of equal to the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese, with the Russians floating about weirdly and the Indians on the rise
You can’t fault his ambition. And even if he fails, he will probably win more power for Paris and France
I think that's a fair approximation of Macron's overall goal but the Ukraine crisis has shown Germany are in the foreign policy driving seat as well as the economic one. Germany has decreed no help for Ukraine from the EU and that's what's happened. What we're seeing is Macron's worst nightmare playing out, France standing by impotently as the US decides Europe's fate in a closed room with Russia and the UK making friends and allies all across the continent because it isn't bound by Germany's appeasement policies.
Macron's understanding and handling of foreign policy is an abject lesson in what not to do. He's managed to reduce French influence in their old colonies in Africa and managed to p1ss off multiple sides without ever managing to get his own vision of how the EU should operate even seriously considered. Very few friends, no influence - great job Macron.
Africa, alongside AUKUS, is his biggest failure, yes
But I’m not sure he had much choice in the matter. He’s occasionally been a bit clumsy and arrogant but in the end both are symptoms of secular French decline - in soft power as much as hard. France has punched above its weight in Africa for decades, relying on linguistic ties and metropolitan patronage - African leaders like to go shopping with their wives in Paris
But in the end China is now way more important, and the Anglo-Saxons more salient through the English language and residual USA power. Ditto the South Pacific
Hence the simultaneous French pivot to an even more Federal Europe (now, in good and bad ways for France, devoid of the UK). If France can somehow make the EU simply an extension of French sovereignty but with vastly greater economic prestige (by sheer size) then French grandeur and influence is restored
Trouble is it is 6D chess and surely impossible. The EU will not bend to the whims of Paris, it is no longer 1962
The problem with the French Run The EU thing is that Germany is no longer West Germany. It is larger than France in every way and wants what it wants.
The idea that you can demarcate foreign policy from economics seems untenable.
But Germany is still very reluctant to play a wider role. Meanwhile Macron has built French powerbases like the EU-Med group, stretching from Portugal to Cyprus, and is busy making France a key player in the East Meditteranean , too.
But without Germany, Holland, the Nordics and Eastern Europe on board (and they are not on board) then it is a non-starter. It is the PIIGs plus France minus Ireland. They don’t have any money
This is the paradox of Brexit for Macron. To make a viable EU military he needs British power and influence as well. Together they would have made a credible force, and the Brits might have brought the Dutch, Nordics alongside
Without Britain Macron has more room to manoeuvre and scheme but less basic power and credibility
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
And I have little doubt that he is correct that the Russians could grab Eastern Ukraine. The question that remains unresolved in this scenario, though, is:
(a) is the goal to use the leverage of having grabbed Eastern Ukraine to force a pro-Russian government for all of the Ukraine?
or
(b) to have a separate puppet state in Eastern Ukraine
or
(c) to absorb Eastern Ukraine into Russia
In scenarios (b) and (c), it is by no means clear that Western Ukraine would fall into line as a pro-Russian state. After all, pro-Russian parties garner the vast majority of their votes in Eastern Ukraine.
Those that are left in the West will be terrified of Russia, for sure, but also incredibly angry at them. And democracy wouldn't be suspended in Western Ukraine.
Ultimately, I get that Putin wants geopolitical influence and all. But it seems to be tactics largely devoid of strategy. Russia exports oil, coal and natural gas. Demand for oil is being impacted by the increasing electrification of ...well... everything. Demand for coal has been hammered. And it used to be that Russia (and Norway) were the only possible exporters of gas to Europe. But the rise of LNG fundamentally changes that: back in 2000 Russia exports of gas were about 10x the global LNG market. Now, the LNG market is bigger. A decade from now, the LNG market will be 2-3x larger than Russian exports.
That's like three new Russias of natural gas coming on line - only they can sell their gas to anyone in the world, and not just to the people at the end of the pipe. Perhaps Putin sees now as the last time when he can exert pressure through the gas price?
But it also seems rather short sighted. Russia - fundamentally - has dreadful demographics and is extremely reliant on the export of commodities. If the price of natural gas and oil were to halve, it would find itself in terrible trouble. Russia needs the rest of the World, because it produces practically nothing - beyond energy and food - that it consumes.
All this is true, but you’ve been saying this for the last decade and in that time Russia has annexed Crimea, intervened successfully in Syria and seen the West give up on Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, Putin - having installed himself as dictator for life - has likely intervened in both UK and US domestic politics, making both countries notably weaker.
And the money hasn’t run out yet.
I don’t buy into idea of East Ukraine - West Ukraine as separate states going forwards, for the three main actors in this theatre, Moscow, Kiev, and the West, I can’t think why any of them would be satisfied with that. Yes with a broad brush the East definitely still looks East the West looks a bit more West - but it’s still classed by academics as an Eastern Slave tradition - whole country shares same ethnic and religious heritage of Russia, not the countrys to North and West of them.
To me Ukraine looks like in the Balkans where it’s not easy to draw neat lines for borders inside it around the mindsets and heritage and politics of everyday people.
The only thing in the mind of Moscow is everything within the current Ukraine border to fall under the sphere of Moscow. Other than that I can’t see them feeling they have the security they feel they need, and the legacy Putin feels he needs.
Totally off topic - don't know how many PBers watched (or are even aware of) yesterday's NFL playoff game Cincinnati Bengals vs Tennessee Titans, which Bengals won in dramatic fashion via a last-second field goal.
Note that quarterback for Bengals, Joe Burrows, was before that QB for for NCAA Div 1 national-championship-winners, the Fighting Tigers of Louisiana State University. Further note that famed LSU mascot ("Mike") is a Bengal tiger. (Further further note the tiger was adopted as name for school's teams in honor of the Louisiana Tigers, a renowned Confederate Civil War regiment.
Also know that Joe Burrows is from Athens, Ohio where he (naturally) was QB for his local high school team.
Fearless prediction - Joe Burrows will some day be elected Governor of Ohio.
So, what's the rule, SSI? Actors* go into Presidential politics, while sportspeople go into the Senate or governors' races?
*(including Trump in that category as someone who tries to pretend he is a businessman)
First actors > statewide politicos were, as I recall, were both elected (first anyway) in California (naturally): > US Senator George Murphy (not presidential timber, though like RR was pres of Screen Actors Guild) > Governor Ronald Reagan (subsequently elected POTUS) > Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (ineligible for presidency)
So right there first half of your theory is underwater!
As for sports stars, identification with state & regional teams (collegiate or professional) is a big factor, certainly compared with actors.
One example from WA State was John Cherberg, who was game-winning coach for Washington State University football team. Until he was fired (forget why) and subsequently persuaded to run for Lieutenant Governor, which he won, serving several terms. In fact, the state office building in Olympia for senators and senate staff is named after him.
Another example was Gov. Max Gardner of North Carolina, who path in politics was greatly aided by fact that he's only one to every captain football team for both UNC and NC State. After serving as governor he emerged as a major advisor to FDR, and was nominated by Harry Truman as US Ambassador to UK, but died before he could present his credentials to the Court of St. James.
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
If they won't come out for this sort of thing, then they never will
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
He is hardly questioning though, he is stating his view as fact - he is saying that, if his reforms don't get passed, then the elections will be illegitimate. His exact words were:
""The increase in the prospect of being illegitimate is in direct proportion to us not being able to get these reforms passed,"
Since he won't get his reforms passed, he has effectively said the mid-terms are illegitimate.
Nice try on the wording but we are seeing what has been clear for a while - namely the Democrats are as bad as the Republicans when it comes to trying to keep hold of power, it is just the tactics are different.
Cf the proposed expansion of the SCOTUS for partisan Dem advantage
What makes Nato braindead? There's hardly anything new about military alliances throughout history. Rest assured if we don't wish to form such alliances some of our 'rivals' will. Does the alliance need to be re-thought? Probably. It's in its eighth decade after all. The main issue is that the US is doing the heavy lifting of European security. There is no sensible reason why this should be. The other problem is the 'attack on one is an attack on all' of article 5. Obviously Greece and Turkey aren't the best of friends and are we saying we would immediately jump to support Mr Erdogan in any military adventure he might wish to embark upon? So it could be reinvented in a looser format but I'm wary of those who simply wish to dismantle it.
Europe could take complete responsibility for its security with its own common defence partnership instead. I would hope that common interests in liberty, democracy, the rule of law and self determination would see a natural alliance form with North America that would look something like... Nato.
But maybe that is not what Macron wants? Perhaps he sees a world of competing power blocks like the US, China, India, Russia and Europe is simply another actor in such a world. Alliances are for nothing more than leveraging one's interests or playing other superpowers off against each other. Getting the English speakers out of European security, marginalising the views of East Europeans and restoring the 'brain' as it were of European security around a Franco-German axis. Perhaps such an alliance would be less concerned about Russian incursions in Ukraine or Belarus, they might even be prepared to appease Russia in the Baltics rather than defend 'interests' that are more costly than they are worth. It's an alternative view of European security. But not the only plausible one and give the current divisions in attitude to Ukraine it isn't clear that the new 'central powers' in Paris and Berlin would prevail.
I reckon that’s exactly what Macron is aiming for. A reduced Core Federal Europe with a totally coherent political identity and centralised foreign and defence policy. Theoretically the centre would be Brussels but in reality it would be Paris in charge of guns and diplomats but with Berlin doing the economic stuff, of necessity. And it would be French speaking.
It is also well-nigh impossible to achieve, even Berlin and Paris disagree on too much. But that is Macron’s aim. A mainland core EU run by the French and acting as a sort-of equal to the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese, with the Russians floating about weirdly and the Indians on the rise
You can’t fault his ambition. And even if he fails, he will probably win more power for Paris and France
And which, by the way, isn't that far away from Ms Le Pen's vision for the EU.
The problem with that vision is that the Germans, while trying not to get into Big Power politics, in fact have done so. Quite a bit.
1) Russia invades Ukraine. 2) Germany goes forward with a contract to equip and train the Russian Army. 3) Russia threatens Ukraine again. 4) Germany says that areas sales to Ukraine are impossible.
Now, the Germans will say, it's not like that, governments have changed etc etc. But the fact remains that they have made military choices. And military interventions.
I don’t quite understand something about this German training of the Russian army and maybe one of the PB Brains Trust Military Division can explain:
Why would the Russians choose Germans to train them?
I get that there have been certain periods of history where the German military were quite useful, some of us might have heard about it but, with all due respect to the German military and no respect to my lack of knowledge, what in the name of god do the current German military know about modern warfare?
If it’s their previous genius that’s being tapped then surely cheaper to buy books or watch the history channel. Otherwise what is it they are advising? They have very little experience of war in the last 70 odd years, their afghan adventures were reportedly 9-5 five days a week.
What have the Russians gained from German training that they wouldn’t have got more benefit from if they had paid many other nations who’ve actually been at war recently?
Do the Germans have some incredibly organised war system that works today “war-sprung durch technic” perhaps?
Maybe I’m being ignorant or chauvinistic but I can’t see what the hell the German military could teach the Russians that they already didn’t know first hand from Chechnya for example.
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
He is hardly questioning though, he is stating his view as fact - he is saying that, if his reforms don't get passed, then the elections will be illegitimate. His exact words were:
""The increase in the prospect of being illegitimate is in direct proportion to us not being able to get these reforms passed,"
Since he won't get his reforms passed, he has effectively said the mid-terms are illegitimate.
Nice try on the wording but we are seeing what has been clear for a while - namely the Democrats are as bad as the Republicans when it comes to trying to keep hold of power, it is just the tactics are different.
Cf the proposed expansion of the SCOTUS for partisan Dem advantage
Yes, but because it's the Democrats that are saying it, it's ok. If Trump had proposed the same thing when faced with the opposing situation, all on here would have been proclaiming the end of American democracy. Nothing like a bit of hypocrisy.....
A month ago on this site I predicted that Putin is likely to invade Ukraine this winter. Since then the White House, among others, have come out with a similar assessment.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
And I have little doubt that he is correct that the Russians could grab Eastern Ukraine. The question that remains unresolved in this scenario, though, is:
(a) is the goal to use the leverage of having grabbed Eastern Ukraine to force a pro-Russian government for all of the Ukraine?
or
(b) to have a separate puppet state in Eastern Ukraine
or
(c) to absorb Eastern Ukraine into Russia
In scenarios (b) and (c), it is by no means clear that Western Ukraine would fall into line as a pro-Russian state. After all, pro-Russian parties garner the vast majority of their votes in Eastern Ukraine.
Those that are left in the West will be terrified of Russia, for sure, but also incredibly angry at them. And democracy wouldn't be suspended in Western Ukraine.
Ultimately, I get that Putin wants geopolitical influence and all. But it seems to be tactics largely devoid of strategy. Russia exports oil, coal and natural gas. Demand for oil is being impacted by the increasing electrification of ...well... everything. Demand for coal has been hammered. And it used to be that Russia (and Norway) were the only possible exporters of gas to Europe. But the rise of LNG fundamentally changes that: back in 2000 Russia exports of gas were about 10x the global LNG market. Now, the LNG market is bigger. A decade from now, the LNG market will be 2-3x larger than Russian exports.
That's like three new Russias of natural gas coming on line - only they can sell their gas to anyone in the world, and not just to the people at the end of the pipe. Perhaps Putin sees now as the last time when he can exert pressure through the gas price?
But it also seems rather short sighted. Russia - fundamentally - has dreadful demographics and is extremely reliant on the export of commodities. If the price of natural gas and oil were to halve, it would find itself in terrible trouble. Russia needs the rest of the World, because it produces practically nothing - beyond energy and food - that it consumes.
Putin's decision making does have echoes of the thinking in Germany in 1914 that it was better to go to war with Russia sooner rather than later because of the perceived growing Russian effectiveness in its military (ironic really given WW1*). Not that Ukraine could beat Russia but that its growing military preparations and hardware purchases would make it more confident to stand up to Russia and / or increase the military cost to Russia significantly of any future invasion. Chances are war now happens but, as you said, what happens then?
* For Rog et al, WW = World War
(c) would achieve one of the ambitions of the Greater Russian types.
For the 1914 German decision there is some interesting modern scholarship. Why did Kaiser Fuckwit abandon the Treaty with Russia? This left an opportunity for the French and they were on it like a tramp on chips.
For years people said it was because he was less good at his job than the UK DfE.....
More recently, it has been pointed out that the Prussian aristocracy/German military wanted to expand into what is now Poland. They wanted a Greater Prussia. Since this was occupied by Russia, problem.
WWI, in this thesis, was about knocking out the French, so the Germans could take the opportunity from Serbia etc to go to war with Russia, and grab what they really wanted.
It is interesting to note that "Poland must be destroyed" was enthusiastically received by the German high command in WWII - one Claus Von Stauffenberg disagreed with Hitler on lots, but said he had that one right....
It probably wasn't only Poland that was of interest. The Baltic areas had many Germanic-descended noblemen and, as future actions showed, the Germans were particularly interested in that area.
The thesis is from those who argue that Hitler was simply going for a maximalist version of all the Greater Germany ideas.
- Without the Empire, Austria was ethnically German (at least as far as the Nazis gave a shit) - Sudetenland etc - The expansion east - etc
Each of those had long roots - Hitler pulled them all together and went for the Demented Meth Head version of all of them. Which is why he enjoyed broad support from *all* the ultra-nationalists. He aimed to make all the hardest of hard core versions of their wildest fantasies come true....
Yes, that makes sense. HItler didn't mind a bit of plagarising when it came to ideas.
Not so much that - but that the Nazi movement and Hitler didn't just turn up and invent themselves. That they were the end product of a long tradition in the political and social structures of Germany.
Hitler himself proclaimed himself the protector of Germany and German-ness. The whole point of the Nazi's was a weird fusion of the past, present and a nightmare future. Hence stuff like this
EDIT: Hitler below is being depicted as a leader of a fantasy version of the Teutonic Order. Guess where those dudes did their partying?
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
He is hardly questioning though, he is stating his view as fact - he is saying that, if his reforms don't get passed, then the elections will be illegitimate. His exact words were:
""The increase in the prospect of being illegitimate is in direct proportion to us not being able to get these reforms passed,"
Since he won't get his reforms passed, he has effectively said the mid-terms are illegitimate.
Nice try on the wording but we are seeing what has been clear for a while - namely the Democrats are as bad as the Republicans when it comes to trying to keep hold of power, it is just the tactics are different.
Cf the proposed expansion of the SCOTUS for partisan Dem advantage
Yes, but because it's the Democrats that are saying it, it's ok. If Trump had proposed the same thing when faced with the opposing situation, all on here would have been proclaiming the end of American democracy. Nothing like a bit of hypocrisy.....
Right now American party politics - Dems v Reps - resembles Iraq v Iran. One hopes they both lose
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
He is hardly questioning though, he is stating his view as fact - he is saying that, if his reforms don't get passed, then the elections will be illegitimate. His exact words were:
""The increase in the prospect of being illegitimate is in direct proportion to us not being able to get these reforms passed,"
Since he won't get his reforms passed, he has effectively said the mid-terms are illegitimate.
Nice try on the wording but we are seeing what has been clear for a while - namely the Democrats are as bad as the Republicans when it comes to trying to keep hold of power, it is just the tactics are different.
Cf the proposed expansion of the SCOTUS for partisan Dem advantage
Yes, but because it's the Democrats that are saying it, it's ok. If Trump had proposed the same thing when faced with the opposing situation, all on here would have been proclaiming the end of American democracy. Nothing like a bit of hypocrisy.....
Right now American party politics - Dems v Reps - resembles Iraq v Iran. One hopes they both lose
What makes Nato braindead? There's hardly anything new about military alliances throughout history. Rest assured if we don't wish to form such alliances some of our 'rivals' will. Does the alliance need to be re-thought? Probably. It's in its eighth decade after all. The main issue is that the US is doing the heavy lifting of European security. There is no sensible reason why this should be. The other problem is the 'attack on one is an attack on all' of article 5. Obviously Greece and Turkey aren't the best of friends and are we saying we would immediately jump to support Mr Erdogan in any military adventure he might wish to embark upon? So it could be reinvented in a looser format but I'm wary of those who simply wish to dismantle it.
Europe could take complete responsibility for its security with its own common defence partnership instead. I would hope that common interests in liberty, democracy, the rule of law and self determination would see a natural alliance form with North America that would look something like... Nato.
But maybe that is not what Macron wants? Perhaps he sees a world of competing power blocks like the US, China, India, Russia and Europe is simply another actor in such a world. Alliances are for nothing more than leveraging one's interests or playing other superpowers off against each other. Getting the English speakers out of European security, marginalising the views of East Europeans and restoring the 'brain' as it were of European security around a Franco-German axis. Perhaps such an alliance would be less concerned about Russian incursions in Ukraine or Belarus, they might even be prepared to appease Russia in the Baltics rather than defend 'interests' that are more costly than they are worth. It's an alternative view of European security. But not the only plausible one and give the current divisions in attitude to Ukraine it isn't clear that the new 'central powers' in Paris and Berlin would prevail.
I reckon that’s exactly what Macron is aiming for. A reduced Core Federal Europe with a totally coherent political identity and centralised foreign and defence policy. Theoretically the centre would be Brussels but in reality it would be Paris in charge of guns and diplomats but with Berlin doing the economic stuff, of necessity. And it would be French speaking.
It is also well-nigh impossible to achieve, even Berlin and Paris disagree on too much. But that is Macron’s aim. A mainland core EU run by the French and acting as a sort-of equal to the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese, with the Russians floating about weirdly and the Indians on the rise
You can’t fault his ambition. And even if he fails, he will probably win more power for Paris and France
I think that's a fair approximation of Macron's overall goal but the Ukraine crisis has shown Germany are in the foreign policy driving seat as well as the economic one. Germany has decreed no help for Ukraine from the EU and that's what's happened. What we're seeing is Macron's worst nightmare playing out, France standing by impotently as the US decides Europe's fate in a closed room with Russia and the UK making friends and allies all across the continent because it isn't bound by Germany's appeasement policies.
Macron's understanding and handling of foreign policy is an abject lesson in what not to do. He's managed to reduce French influence in their old colonies in Africa and managed to p1ss off multiple sides without ever managing to get his own vision of how the EU should operate even seriously considered. Very few friends, no influence - great job Macron.
Africa, alongside AUKUS, is his biggest failure, yes
But I’m not sure he had much choice in the matter. He’s occasionally been a bit clumsy and arrogant but in the end both are symptoms of secular French decline - in soft power as much as hard. France has punched above its weight in Africa for decades, relying on linguistic ties and metropolitan patronage - African leaders like to go shopping with their wives in Paris
But in the end China is now way more important, and the Anglo-Saxons more salient through the English language and residual USA power. Ditto the South Pacific
Hence the simultaneous French pivot to an even more Federal Europe (now, in good and bad ways for France, devoid of the UK). If France can somehow make the EU simply an extension of French sovereignty but with vastly greater economic prestige (by sheer size) then French grandeur and influence is restored
Trouble is it is 6D chess and surely impossible. The EU will not bend to the whims of Paris, it is no longer 1962
The problem with the French Run The EU thing is that Germany is no longer West Germany. It is larger than France in every way and wants what it wants.
The idea that you can demarcate foreign policy from economics seems untenable.
What makes Nato braindead? There's hardly anything new about military alliances throughout history. Rest assured if we don't wish to form such alliances some of our 'rivals' will. Does the alliance need to be re-thought? Probably. It's in its eighth decade after all. The main issue is that the US is doing the heavy lifting of European security. There is no sensible reason why this should be. The other problem is the 'attack on one is an attack on all' of article 5. Obviously Greece and Turkey aren't the best of friends and are we saying we would immediately jump to support Mr Erdogan in any military adventure he might wish to embark upon? So it could be reinvented in a looser format but I'm wary of those who simply wish to dismantle it.
Europe could take complete responsibility for its security with its own common defence partnership instead. I would hope that common interests in liberty, democracy, the rule of law and self determination would see a natural alliance form with North America that would look something like... Nato.
But maybe that is not what Macron wants? Perhaps he sees a world of competing power blocks like the US, China, India, Russia and Europe is simply another actor in such a world. Alliances are for nothing more than leveraging one's interests or playing other superpowers off against each other. Getting the English speakers out of European security, marginalising the views of East Europeans and restoring the 'brain' as it were of European security around a Franco-German axis. Perhaps such an alliance would be less concerned about Russian incursions in Ukraine or Belarus, they might even be prepared to appease Russia in the Baltics rather than defend 'interests' that are more costly than they are worth. It's an alternative view of European security. But not the only plausible one and give the current divisions in attitude to Ukraine it isn't clear that the new 'central powers' in Paris and Berlin would prevail.
I reckon that’s exactly what Macron is aiming for. A reduced Core Federal Europe with a totally coherent political identity and centralised foreign and defence policy. Theoretically the centre would be Brussels but in reality it would be Paris in charge of guns and diplomats but with Berlin doing the economic stuff, of necessity. And it would be French speaking.
It is also well-nigh impossible to achieve, even Berlin and Paris disagree on too much. But that is Macron’s aim. A mainland core EU run by the French and acting as a sort-of equal to the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese, with the Russians floating about weirdly and the Indians on the rise
You can’t fault his ambition. And even if he fails, he will probably win more power for Paris and France
I think that's a fair approximation of Macron's overall goal but the Ukraine crisis has shown Germany are in the foreign policy driving seat as well as the economic one. Germany has decreed no help for Ukraine from the EU and that's what's happened. What we're seeing is Macron's worst nightmare playing out, France standing by impotently as the US decides Europe's fate in a closed room with Russia and the UK making friends and allies all across the continent because it isn't bound by Germany's appeasement policies.
Macron's understanding and handling of foreign policy is an abject lesson in what not to do. He's managed to reduce French influence in their old colonies in Africa and managed to p1ss off multiple sides without ever managing to get his own vision of how the EU should operate even seriously considered. Very few friends, no influence - great job Macron.
Africa, alongside AUKUS, is his biggest failure, yes
But I’m not sure he had much choice in the matter. He’s occasionally been a bit clumsy and arrogant but in the end both are symptoms of secular French decline - in soft power as much as hard. France has punched above its weight in Africa for decades, relying on linguistic ties and metropolitan patronage - African leaders like to go shopping with their wives in Paris
But in the end China is now way more important, and the Anglo-Saxons more salient through the English language and residual USA power. Ditto the South Pacific
Hence the simultaneous French pivot to an even more Federal Europe (now, in good and bad ways for France, devoid of the UK). If France can somehow make the EU simply an extension of French sovereignty but with vastly greater economic prestige (by sheer size) then French grandeur and influence is restored
Trouble is it is 6D chess and surely impossible. The EU will not bend to the whims of Paris, it is no longer 1962
The problem with the French Run The EU thing is that Germany is no longer West Germany. It is larger than France in every way and wants what it wants.
The idea that you can demarcate foreign policy from economics seems untenable.
But Germany is still very reluctant to play a wider role. Meanwhile Macron has built French powerbases like the EU-Med group, stretching from Portugal to Cyprus, and is busy making France a key player in the East Meditteranean , too.
But without Germany, Holland, the Nordics and Eastern Europe on board (and they are not on board) then it is a non-starter. It is the PIIGs plus France minus Ireland. They don’t have any money
This is the paradox of Brexit for Macron. To make a viable EU military he needs British power and influence as well. Together they would have made a credible force, and the Brits might have brought the Dutch, Nordics alongside
Without Britain Macron has more room to manoeuvre and scheme but less basic power and credibility
He doesn't necessarily need to start with too much money to advance strategic interests, however. In the last couple of years he's sold a lot of ships and military equipment to countries in the mediterranean , formed formal and informal defence alliances in the eastern mediterranean, and simultaneously made France far better placed to gain from the hydrocarbons there in the future than other north european nations. He's achieving part of the kind of things that Britain did in Southern Europe and the Near East a century ago, largely unknown to the British political and media classes, in their transatlantic and now pacific bubble.
What makes Nato braindead? There's hardly anything new about military alliances throughout history. Rest assured if we don't wish to form such alliances some of our 'rivals' will. Does the alliance need to be re-thought? Probably. It's in its eighth decade after all. The main issue is that the US is doing the heavy lifting of European security. There is no sensible reason why this should be. The other problem is the 'attack on one is an attack on all' of article 5. Obviously Greece and Turkey aren't the best of friends and are we saying we would immediately jump to support Mr Erdogan in any military adventure he might wish to embark upon? So it could be reinvented in a looser format but I'm wary of those who simply wish to dismantle it.
Europe could take complete responsibility for its security with its own common defence partnership instead. I would hope that common interests in liberty, democracy, the rule of law and self determination would see a natural alliance form with North America that would look something like... Nato.
But maybe that is not what Macron wants? Perhaps he sees a world of competing power blocks like the US, China, India, Russia and Europe is simply another actor in such a world. Alliances are for nothing more than leveraging one's interests or playing other superpowers off against each other. Getting the English speakers out of European security, marginalising the views of East Europeans and restoring the 'brain' as it were of European security around a Franco-German axis. Perhaps such an alliance would be less concerned about Russian incursions in Ukraine or Belarus, they might even be prepared to appease Russia in the Baltics rather than defend 'interests' that are more costly than they are worth. It's an alternative view of European security. But not the only plausible one and give the current divisions in attitude to Ukraine it isn't clear that the new 'central powers' in Paris and Berlin would prevail.
I reckon that’s exactly what Macron is aiming for. A reduced Core Federal Europe with a totally coherent political identity and centralised foreign and defence policy. Theoretically the centre would be Brussels but in reality it would be Paris in charge of guns and diplomats but with Berlin doing the economic stuff, of necessity. And it would be French speaking.
It is also well-nigh impossible to achieve, even Berlin and Paris disagree on too much. But that is Macron’s aim. A mainland core EU run by the French and acting as a sort-of equal to the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese, with the Russians floating about weirdly and the Indians on the rise
You can’t fault his ambition. And even if he fails, he will probably win more power for Paris and France
I think that's a fair approximation of Macron's overall goal but the Ukraine crisis has shown Germany are in the foreign policy driving seat as well as the economic one. Germany has decreed no help for Ukraine from the EU and that's what's happened. What we're seeing is Macron's worst nightmare playing out, France standing by impotently as the US decides Europe's fate in a closed room with Russia and the UK making friends and allies all across the continent because it isn't bound by Germany's appeasement policies.
Macron's understanding and handling of foreign policy is an abject lesson in what not to do. He's managed to reduce French influence in their old colonies in Africa and managed to p1ss off multiple sides without ever managing to get his own vision of how the EU should operate even seriously considered. Very few friends, no influence - great job Macron.
Africa, alongside AUKUS, is his biggest failure, yes
But I’m not sure he had much choice in the matter. He’s occasionally been a bit clumsy and arrogant but in the end both are symptoms of secular French decline - in soft power as much as hard. France has punched above its weight in Africa for decades, relying on linguistic ties and metropolitan patronage - African leaders like to go shopping with their wives in Paris
But in the end China is now way more important, and the Anglo-Saxons more salient through the English language and residual USA power. Ditto the South Pacific
Hence the simultaneous French pivot to an even more Federal Europe (now, in good and bad ways for France, devoid of the UK). If France can somehow make the EU simply an extension of French sovereignty but with vastly greater economic prestige (by sheer size) then French grandeur and influence is restored
Trouble is it is 6D chess and surely impossible. The EU will not bend to the whims of Paris, it is no longer 1962
The problem with the French Run The EU thing is that Germany is no longer West Germany. It is larger than France in every way and wants what it wants.
The idea that you can demarcate foreign policy from economics seems untenable.
What makes Nato braindead? There's hardly anything new about military alliances throughout history. Rest assured if we don't wish to form such alliances some of our 'rivals' will. Does the alliance need to be re-thought? Probably. It's in its eighth decade after all. The main issue is that the US is doing the heavy lifting of European security. There is no sensible reason why this should be. The other problem is the 'attack on one is an attack on all' of article 5. Obviously Greece and Turkey aren't the best of friends and are we saying we would immediately jump to support Mr Erdogan in any military adventure he might wish to embark upon? So it could be reinvented in a looser format but I'm wary of those who simply wish to dismantle it.
Europe could take complete responsibility for its security with its own common defence partnership instead. I would hope that common interests in liberty, democracy, the rule of law and self determination would see a natural alliance form with North America that would look something like... Nato.
But maybe that is not what Macron wants? Perhaps he sees a world of competing power blocks like the US, China, India, Russia and Europe is simply another actor in such a world. Alliances are for nothing more than leveraging one's interests or playing other superpowers off against each other. Getting the English speakers out of European security, marginalising the views of East Europeans and restoring the 'brain' as it were of European security around a Franco-German axis. Perhaps such an alliance would be less concerned about Russian incursions in Ukraine or Belarus, they might even be prepared to appease Russia in the Baltics rather than defend 'interests' that are more costly than they are worth. It's an alternative view of European security. But not the only plausible one and give the current divisions in attitude to Ukraine it isn't clear that the new 'central powers' in Paris and Berlin would prevail.
I reckon that’s exactly what Macron is aiming for. A reduced Core Federal Europe with a totally coherent political identity and centralised foreign and defence policy. Theoretically the centre would be Brussels but in reality it would be Paris in charge of guns and diplomats but with Berlin doing the economic stuff, of necessity. And it would be French speaking.
It is also well-nigh impossible to achieve, even Berlin and Paris disagree on too much. But that is Macron’s aim. A mainland core EU run by the French and acting as a sort-of equal to the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese, with the Russians floating about weirdly and the Indians on the rise
You can’t fault his ambition. And even if he fails, he will probably win more power for Paris and France
I think that's a fair approximation of Macron's overall goal but the Ukraine crisis has shown Germany are in the foreign policy driving seat as well as the economic one. Germany has decreed no help for Ukraine from the EU and that's what's happened. What we're seeing is Macron's worst nightmare playing out, France standing by impotently as the US decides Europe's fate in a closed room with Russia and the UK making friends and allies all across the continent because it isn't bound by Germany's appeasement policies.
Macron's understanding and handling of foreign policy is an abject lesson in what not to do. He's managed to reduce French influence in their old colonies in Africa and managed to p1ss off multiple sides without ever managing to get his own vision of how the EU should operate even seriously considered. Very few friends, no influence - great job Macron.
Africa, alongside AUKUS, is his biggest failure, yes
But I’m not sure he had much choice in the matter. He’s occasionally been a bit clumsy and arrogant but in the end both are symptoms of secular French decline - in soft power as much as hard. France has punched above its weight in Africa for decades, relying on linguistic ties and metropolitan patronage - African leaders like to go shopping with their wives in Paris
But in the end China is now way more important, and the Anglo-Saxons more salient through the English language and residual USA power. Ditto the South Pacific
Hence the simultaneous French pivot to an even more Federal Europe (now, in good and bad ways for France, devoid of the UK). If France can somehow make the EU simply an extension of French sovereignty but with vastly greater economic prestige (by sheer size) then French grandeur and influence is restored
Trouble is it is 6D chess and surely impossible. The EU will not bend to the whims of Paris, it is no longer 1962
The problem with the French Run The EU thing is that Germany is no longer West Germany. It is larger than France in every way and wants what it wants.
The idea that you can demarcate foreign policy from economics seems untenable.
But Germany is still very reluctant to play a wider role. Meanwhile Macron has built French powerbases like the EU-Med group, stretching from Portugal to Cyprus, and is busy making France a key player in the East Meditteranean , too.
But without Germany, Holland, the Nordics and Eastern Europe on board (and they are not on board) then it is a non-starter. It is the PIIGs plus France minus Ireland. They don’t have any money
This is the paradox of Brexit for Macron. To make a viable EU military he needs British power and influence as well. Together they would have made a credible force, and the Brits might have brought the Dutch, Nordics alongside
Without Britain Macron has more room to manoeuvre and scheme but less basic power and credibility
Strangely your last paragraph also reflects the UK after Brexit - without the EU Britain has more room to manoeuvre and scheme but less power and credibility.
I think ultimately, especially after French elections, both Britain and France will benefit from each other being in that position and find themselves natural allies working together with similar global views and strategic interests contra German views and interests.
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
If they won't come out for this sort of thing, then they never will
Much of the Republican Party have given up on democracy and are willing to countenance authoritarian measures in order to gain and or maintain power.
Sad times.
What do you think of the fact that Biden said the 2022 midterms' elections will probably be illegitimate?
Source?
Posted but here is his quote: ""The increase in the prospect of being illegitimate is in direct proportion to us not being able to get these reforms passed," Since he won't get his reforms passed, he has effectively said the mid-terms are illegitimate.
And those around him quickly said "Er...did he say that?" and "Er...."
Questioning is NOT same thing as declaring. Not hardly.
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
He is hardly questioning though, he is stating his view as fact - he is saying that, if his reforms don't get passed, then the elections will be illegitimate. His exact words were:
""The increase in the prospect of being illegitimate is in direct proportion to us not being able to get these reforms passed,"
Since he won't get his reforms passed, he has effectively said the mid-terms are illegitimate.
Nice try on the wording but we are seeing what has been clear for a while - namely the Democrats are as bad as the Republicans when it comes to trying to keep hold of power, it is just the tactics are different.
So formenting attempted Putch is same thing as Biden's speech? Interesting argument!
Anyway, you say nothing about my point, which is that actual fact, let alone advocacy, of overt voter suppression by Republican lawmakers, is likely to be counter-productive to their side?
Which is why Dems from Uncle Joe on down are focusing on this issue, even when they do NOT have the votes now to actually pass federal voting-rights legislation, even to safeguard election from post-facto congressional nullification?
Note that in 1948, Harry Truman won a famous victory, in large measure for flaying the "do-nothing Congress" to mobilize Democratic base and persuade swing voters.
What makes Nato braindead? There's hardly anything new about military alliances throughout history. Rest assured if we don't wish to form such alliances some of our 'rivals' will. Does the alliance need to be re-thought? Probably. It's in its eighth decade after all. The main issue is that the US is doing the heavy lifting of European security. There is no sensible reason why this should be. The other problem is the 'attack on one is an attack on all' of article 5. Obviously Greece and Turkey aren't the best of friends and are we saying we would immediately jump to support Mr Erdogan in any military adventure he might wish to embark upon? So it could be reinvented in a looser format but I'm wary of those who simply wish to dismantle it.
Europe could take complete responsibility for its security with its own common defence partnership instead. I would hope that common interests in liberty, democracy, the rule of law and self determination would see a natural alliance form with North America that would look something like... Nato.
But maybe that is not what Macron wants? Perhaps he sees a world of competing power blocks like the US, China, India, Russia and Europe is simply another actor in such a world. Alliances are for nothing more than leveraging one's interests or playing other superpowers off against each other. Getting the English speakers out of European security, marginalising the views of East Europeans and restoring the 'brain' as it were of European security around a Franco-German axis. Perhaps such an alliance would be less concerned about Russian incursions in Ukraine or Belarus, they might even be prepared to appease Russia in the Baltics rather than defend 'interests' that are more costly than they are worth. It's an alternative view of European security. But not the only plausible one and give the current divisions in attitude to Ukraine it isn't clear that the new 'central powers' in Paris and Berlin would prevail.
I reckon that’s exactly what Macron is aiming for. A reduced Core Federal Europe with a totally coherent political identity and centralised foreign and defence policy. Theoretically the centre would be Brussels but in reality it would be Paris in charge of guns and diplomats but with Berlin doing the economic stuff, of necessity. And it would be French speaking.
It is also well-nigh impossible to achieve, even Berlin and Paris disagree on too much. But that is Macron’s aim. A mainland core EU run by the French and acting as a sort-of equal to the Anglo-Saxons and the Chinese, with the Russians floating about weirdly and the Indians on the rise
You can’t fault his ambition. And even if he fails, he will probably win more power for Paris and France
And which, by the way, isn't that far away from Ms Le Pen's vision for the EU.
The problem with that vision is that the Germans, while trying not to get into Big Power politics, in fact have done so. Quite a bit.
1) Russia invades Ukraine. 2) Germany goes forward with a contract to equip and train the Russian Army. 3) Russia threatens Ukraine again. 4) Germany says that areas sales to Ukraine are impossible.
Now, the Germans will say, it's not like that, governments have changed etc etc. But the fact remains that they have made military choices. And military interventions.
I don’t quite understand something about this German training of the Russian army and maybe one of the PB Brains Trust Military Division can explain:
Why would the Russians choose Germans to train them?
I get that there have been certain periods of history where the German military were quite useful, some of us might have heard about it but, with all due respect to the German military and no respect to my lack of knowledge, what in the name of god do the current German military know about modern warfare?
If it’s their previous genius that’s being tapped then surely cheaper to buy books or watch the history channel. Otherwise what is it they are advising? They have very little experience of war in the last 70 odd years, their afghan adventures were reportedly 9-5 five days a week.
What have the Russians gained from German training that they wouldn’t have got more benefit from if they had paid many other nations who’ve actually been at war recently?
Do the Germans have some incredibly organised war system that works today “war-sprung durch technic” perhaps?
Maybe I’m being ignorant or chauvinistic but I can’t see what the hell the German military could teach the Russians that they already didn’t know first hand from Chechnya for example.
Thanks in advance for enlightenment.
Modern technology integrated warfare.
The traditional Soviet deep battle plan had lots of technology in it - but was still about lots of conscripts and vast amounts of relatively crude weaponry. With a layer of hi-tech on top.
With the Gulf War in 1991, the Russian General Staff saw the way that the Americans achieved something that had eluded everyone else - completely mobile *armoured* (not just mechanised) columns striking across the map without regard to roads. Total integration of artillery and air power into the battle plan - to the point of the soldiers on the ground pointing a laser at something and saying "make that go away"... All this had existed before, but in nothing like the depth and breadth.
The Frunze Academy went into high gear about the need for a super integrated, super mobile, non-conscript force. They did analysis that suggested that if the Cold War had gone hot, that the Americans (and friends) would have hammered the Soviet Army....
Chechnya showed that the existing conscript army was good for generating casualties - the winning was done by the best trained troops with the best kit.
Putin finally found the money to get them some of this - which is why they love him.
Comments
When I got a rather shocked reaction, 'you can't say that!' I said 'why, don't you like cats?'
Two significant issues come to mind:
1) Termini require many platforms to allow turnaround of trains (getting them ready to go back out again). One of the interesting things about HS2 AIUI is that they've gone rather aggressive with the turnaround times at the termini to reduce the number of platforms required to 10. That's a very large area to have fully underground.
2) Cities are hard to build underground in. There are lots of services (e.g. gas, water), piles of buildings etc to negotiate. It's best to go deep, but that's hard for other reasons.
Have you seen the movie?
He was also a timewarper in the Rocky Horror Picture Show alongside the now, sadly, departed Meatloaf.
I remember him in some god awful children’s GameShow with Gillian Taylforth called ‘On Safari’. Jungle themed and pretty poor.
Let’s talk now about how such invasion may unfold and what its primary goals might be 🧵
https://twitter.com/dalperovitch/status/1485241734925897728?s=21
Big Dom is Anton Chigurh. Time for Boris to be worried
@Gardenwalker, like your RW 2nd example. If I start calling you a RC voter, you might have a good idea what I’m talking about…
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-60063594
But then, when you see an opportunity for a pun, you have to seize 'er.
And I have little doubt that he is correct that the Russians could grab Eastern Ukraine. The question that remains unresolved in this scenario, though, is:
(a) is the goal to use the leverage of having grabbed Eastern Ukraine to force a pro-Russian government for all of the Ukraine?
or
(b) to have a separate puppet state in Eastern Ukraine
or
(c) to absorb Eastern Ukraine into Russia
In scenarios (b) and (c), it is by no means clear that Western Ukraine would fall into line as a pro-Russian state. After all, pro-Russian parties garner the vast majority of their votes in Eastern Ukraine.
Those that are left in the West will be terrified of Russia, for sure, but also incredibly angry at them. And democracy wouldn't be suspended in Western Ukraine.
Ultimately, I get that Putin wants geopolitical influence and all. But it seems to be tactics largely devoid of strategy. Russia exports oil, coal and natural gas. Demand for oil is being impacted by the increasing electrification of ...well... everything. Demand for coal has been hammered. And it used to be that Russia (and Norway) were the only possible exporters of gas to Europe. But the rise of LNG fundamentally changes that: back in 2000 Russia exports of gas were about 10x the global LNG market. Now, the LNG market is bigger. A decade from now, the LNG market will be 2-3x larger than Russian exports.
That's like three new Russias of natural gas coming on line - only they can sell their gas to anyone in the world, and not just to the people at the end of the pipe. Perhaps Putin sees now as the last time when he can exert pressure through the gas price?
But it also seems rather short sighted. Russia - fundamentally - has dreadful demographics and is extremely reliant on the export of commodities. If the price of natural gas and oil were to halve, it would find itself in terrible trouble. Russia needs the rest of the World, because it produces practically nothing - beyond energy and food - that it consumes.
The War on Woke.
https://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/opinion/latest/1350142.blown/
Note that quarterback for Bengals, Joe Burrows, was before that QB for for NCAA Div 1 national-championship-winners, the Fighting Tigers of Louisiana State University. Further note that famed LSU mascot ("Mike") is a Bengal tiger. (Further further note the tiger was adopted as name for school's teams in honor of the Louisiana Tigers, a renowned Confederate Civil War regiment.
Also know that Joe Burrows is from Athens, Ohio where he (naturally) was QB for his local high school team.
Fearless prediction - Joe Burrows will some day be elected Governor of Ohio.
* For Rog et al, WW = World War
Would restore Peter the Great's border with Poland-Lithuania after Poltava.
Meanwhile, Putin - having installed himself as dictator for life - has likely intervened in both UK and US domestic politics, making both countries notably weaker.
And the money hasn’t run out yet.
I reckon more limited seizures and a puppet regime in Kiev: is the aim. Likely do-able
For reasons I won't go into my team bought me this and then challenged me to use it and the phrase in ever more difficult situations. The last was with some army officers, who couldn't believe what they were seeing - or so they claimed - which I found surprising and implausible.
Sadly the handle broke recently so it is now just a pen holder.
*(including Trump in that category as someone who tries to pretend he is a businessman)
Republican zeal in pushing voter suppression, in order to propitiate & egg-on their base, is giving Democrats the means for energizing & mobilizing OUR base. And also, albeit lesser extent,k persuading swing voters to swing our direction next fall.
Personally think the backlash will be more potent that the lash, so to speak. Which is NOT the same as saying Democrats are gonna win overall, just that it will help us re: turnout.
I mean it's certainly possible. But it's far from the only option. And unless you suspend democracy in the East, then it's not very stable.
https://twitter.com/RonFilipkowski/status/1485313965177589770
But I’m not sure he had much choice in the matter. He’s occasionally been a bit clumsy and arrogant but in the end both are symptoms of secular French decline - in soft power as much as hard. France has punched above its weight in Africa for decades, relying on linguistic ties and metropolitan patronage - African leaders like to go shopping with their wives in Paris
But in the end China is now way more important, and the Anglo-Saxons more salient through the English language and residual USA power. Ditto the South Pacific
Hence the simultaneous French pivot to an even more Federal Europe (now, in good and bad ways for France, devoid of the UK). If France can somehow make the EU simply an extension of French sovereignty but with vastly greater economic prestige (by sheer size) then French grandeur and influence is restored
Trouble is it is 6D chess and surely impossible. The EU will not bend to the whims of Paris, it is no longer 1962
For the 1914 German decision there is some interesting modern scholarship. Why did Kaiser Fuckwit abandon the Treaty with Russia? This left an opportunity for the French and they were on it like a tramp on chips.
For years people said it was because he was less good at his job than the UK DfE.....
More recently, it has been pointed out that the Prussian aristocracy/German military wanted to expand into what is now Poland. They wanted a Greater Prussia. Since this was occupied by Russia, problem.
WWI, in this thesis, was about knocking out the French, so the Germans could take the opportunity from Serbia etc to go to war with Russia, and grab what they really wanted.
It is interesting to note that "Poland must be destroyed" was enthusiastically received by the German high command in WWII - one Claus Von Stauffenberg disagreed with Hitler on lots, but said he had that one right....
Sad times.
The idea that you can demarcate foreign policy from economics seems untenable.
It probably wasn't only Poland that was of interest. The Baltic areas had many Germanic-descended noblemen and, as future actions showed, the Germans were particularly interested in that area.
Turkey is an interesting actor here. One reason Armenia has now cosied up to Russia and Putin is because the Turks whipped them, via Azerbaijan, in their recent war. So Armenia wants Russian protection. Two Christian states. Turkey is an enemy of Putin’s, in essence.
We really are back to 19th century Great Power politics
- Left most of the schools standing
- Most of the children are alive
- Most of the teachers are alive
After the Kaiser finished with the German Empire.......
They really do need some kind of civil war, to sort it all out. I suggest they do it in the Metaverse, to save money and lives
The unruly Eastern flank are way too independent-minded, though.
If France wants to achieve its strategic goal (of foreign policy hegemony in the EU) it needs the Eastern flank ex-EU’d. And it’s not as if Poland and Hungary haven’t provided enough reasons to be expelled.
Sheer menacing power and a stranglehold, and the mere threat of overwhelming violence
That should do it
- Without the Empire, Austria was ethnically German (at least as far as the Nazis gave a shit)
- Sudetenland etc
- The expansion east
- etc
Each of those had long roots - Hitler pulled them all together and went for the Demented Meth Head version of all of them. Which is why he enjoyed broad support from *all* the ultra-nationalists. He aimed to make all the hardest of hard core versions of their wildest fantasies come true....
""The increase in the prospect of being illegitimate is in direct proportion to us not being able to get these reforms passed,"
Since he won't get his reforms passed, he has effectively said the mid-terms are illegitimate.
Nice try on the wording but we are seeing what has been clear for a while - namely the Democrats are as bad as the Republicans when it comes to trying to keep hold of power, it is just the tactics are different.
This is the paradox of Brexit for Macron. To make a viable EU military he needs British power and influence as well. Together they would have made a credible force, and the Brits might have brought the Dutch, Nordics alongside
Without Britain Macron has more room to manoeuvre and scheme but less basic power and credibility
To me Ukraine looks like in the Balkans where it’s not easy to draw neat lines for borders inside it around the mindsets and heritage and politics of everyday people.
The only thing in the mind of Moscow is everything within the current Ukraine border to fall under the sphere of Moscow. Other than that I can’t see them feeling they have the security they feel they need, and the legacy Putin feels he needs.
> US Senator George Murphy (not presidential timber, though like RR was pres of Screen Actors Guild)
> Governor Ronald Reagan (subsequently elected POTUS)
> Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (ineligible for presidency)
So right there first half of your theory is underwater!
As for sports stars, identification with state & regional teams (collegiate or professional) is a big factor, certainly compared with actors.
One example from WA State was John Cherberg, who was game-winning coach for Washington State University football team. Until he was fired (forget why) and subsequently persuaded to run for Lieutenant Governor, which he won, serving several terms. In fact, the state office building in Olympia for senators and senate staff is named after him.
Another example was Gov. Max Gardner of North Carolina, who path in politics was greatly aided by fact that he's only one to every captain football team for both UNC and NC State. After serving as governor he emerged as a major advisor to FDR, and was nominated by Harry Truman as US Ambassador to UK, but died before he could present his credentials to the Court of St. James.
Cf the proposed expansion of the SCOTUS for partisan Dem advantage
Why would the Russians choose Germans to train them?
I get that there have been certain periods of history where the German military were quite useful, some of us might have heard about it but, with all due respect to the German military and no respect to my lack of knowledge, what in the name of god do the current German military know about modern warfare?
If it’s their previous genius that’s being tapped then surely cheaper to buy books or watch the history channel. Otherwise what is it they are advising? They have very little experience of war in the last 70 odd years, their afghan adventures were reportedly 9-5 five days a week.
What have the Russians gained from German training that they wouldn’t have got more benefit from if they had paid many other nations who’ve actually been at war recently?
Do the Germans have some incredibly organised war system that works today “war-sprung durch technic” perhaps?
Maybe I’m being ignorant or chauvinistic but I can’t see what the hell the German military could teach the Russians that they already didn’t know first hand from Chechnya for example.
Thanks in advance for enlightenment.
Hitler himself proclaimed himself the protector of Germany and German-ness. The whole point of the Nazi's was a weird fusion of the past, present and a nightmare future. Hence stuff like this
EDIT: Hitler below is being depicted as a leader of a fantasy version of the Teutonic Order. Guess where those dudes did their partying?
I think ultimately, especially after French elections, both Britain and France will benefit from each other being in that position and find themselves natural allies working together with similar global views and strategic interests contra German views and interests.
Anyway, you say nothing about my point, which is that actual fact, let alone advocacy, of overt voter suppression by Republican lawmakers, is likely to be counter-productive to their side?
Which is why Dems from Uncle Joe on down are focusing on this issue, even when they do NOT have the votes now to actually pass federal voting-rights legislation, even to safeguard election from post-facto congressional nullification?
Note that in 1948, Harry Truman won a famous victory, in large measure for flaying the "do-nothing Congress" to mobilize Democratic base and persuade swing voters.
The traditional Soviet deep battle plan had lots of technology in it - but was still about lots of conscripts and vast amounts of relatively crude weaponry. With a layer of hi-tech on top.
With the Gulf War in 1991, the Russian General Staff saw the way that the Americans achieved something that had eluded everyone else - completely mobile *armoured* (not just mechanised) columns striking across the map without regard to roads. Total integration of artillery and air power into the battle plan - to the point of the soldiers on the ground pointing a laser at something and saying "make that go away"... All this had existed before, but in nothing like the depth and breadth.
The Frunze Academy went into high gear about the need for a super integrated, super mobile, non-conscript force. They did analysis that suggested that if the Cold War had gone hot, that the Americans (and friends) would have hammered the Soviet Army....
Chechnya showed that the existing conscript army was good for generating casualties - the winning was done by the best trained troops with the best kit.
Putin finally found the money to get them some of this - which is why they love him.