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| Vladimir Putin - Inflaming Ukraine Challenging Obama (Photo credit: DonkeyHotey) |
From Denny: While Putin plays Liars Poker with the world, losing miserably, it's time for the world to move past this dead leader walking. It's only a matter of time before he is assassinated or removed from office.
Meanwhile, the rest of us need to decide how we will handle rogue actions like this seizing of sovereign territory as Putin has done in Crimea.
He has his eye on the rest of the Ukraine, hoping to take it in big chunks: the first easy plucking was Crimea as he knew most Russians back home would not oppose him. Next he is moving to take Eastern Ukraine where there are ethnic Russians in residence as they are in Crimea. After that he plans to take back the rest of Ukraine just for general principle and a fun military exercise...
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| Ethnic Russians in former Soviet Union states in 1994 (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
Does Putin plan to take back the other former Soviet Union satellite countries? Of course he does; no one doubts his plans. Well, at least Moldova has rejected him coming to their home town and taking over like he did in Crimea. They are spitting mad and ready to do battle.
The smart thing to do for Ukraine and the other former satellite countries would be to take away the excuses for Putin to come in to their countries in the first place. They should start deporting all ethnic Russians immediately, with one way tickets to Russia. It's the only immediate way to prevent Russia from conquering them.
As it is American (and European) businesses are howling angry at how Putin just nationalized their businesses and assets in Crimea. Yeah, global businesses hate the NZ word (nationalize) as it tends to interfere with their profitable bottom line.
Those businesses have been calling non-stop to the State Department, the White House and the EU to bend their ears in complaint. Yeah, this is one serious financial war just heating up. If President Obama listens to Big Business afraid to lose profits then he will be branded as a weak President in American history. Multi-national businesses like GE knew the financial risk of investing in Russia. "Let the market forces reign" and play themselves out as Big Business and their puppet Republicans are so fond of saying. It's the ultimate in non-government regulation, now isn't it?
It's time for President Obama to play serious financial hardball from every conceivable angle and not let up on Russia. While he's at it he needs to organize the FBI and the EU in law enforcement coordination to shine a very bright light. Put a full court press on the Russian mob interests worldwide to shut them down, squeezing the money flow in the arms industry as well as illegal activities like drugs, prostitution and human trafficking. That will certainly get Putin's attention.
Another contender as an attention getter? Go after money laundering for Russian businesses, flowing through big mainstream U. S. and EU banks.
Because, in the end, we must choose between money or tyranny. Putin is betting the U. S. and the EU will choose profits over integrity and he may be accurate in his assessment. If President Obama does anything less than a full court press against Russia he will be viewed as very weak by the world, U. S. historians and, most certainly, Putin.
Go after the money and squeeze it drier than dry. Act quickly. Do not delay. ("Do Ya Think?" that font was large enough to pound hard on those too slow to react government skulls?)
Did President Obama and EU leaders take too long to freeze Russian assets? Did they give Putin's inner circle too much time to move their monies? Just how much money are we talking about that President Obama and EU leaders have already frozen? I want an accounting of each and every person and how many assets they froze here and in Europe. That list is definitely good for Western morale.
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Of course, cheers went up at our house, while on Kudos Watch, when we heard President Obama was actually serious about freezing assets and other sanctions against Putin, his inner circle and regional idiots who helped facilitate this Crimea shakedown. FYI, Mr. President, do not give up on Crimea staying in Russia's hands. In the end, it will be a free region, independent of Russia. For only this short moment in history does Russia hold Crimea in its grip.
Putin managed to sweet talk the older voters in Crimea with promises of free Russian pensions. Nothing in life is ever truly free when it comes to promises like this one. Yeah, "free" with strings attached is more like it. Never mind those old people never paid into the national pension fund. I seriously doubt they will ever see those pensions as promised. If Putin makes a big show of giving it to them, he will just yank those "free" pensions later when the press cameras are turned off. The world, and the rest of the Russia people, will never know the whole truth.
It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see how shabbily he treats the average Russian - just take a look at how nasty he was to the villagers of Sochi where Putin just bulldozed right over them to over spend for his $40 billion Olympics that was beset by way too many problems and ineptness. What used to take 15 minutes to work now takes the villagers two hours of walking. That's how insensitive Putin is to the people of his own country. Do the old people in Crimea really believe this guy will treat them any better? They had better take off their fantasy goggles.
Oh, right, there are plans for a new fantasy amusement park in Crimea; it's called "Putin's World." This is where Putin makes idiot pronouncements like when he decided the U. S. uses a gun policy for its foreign policy. Come on, really?? Last time the world checked it was Putin's tanks outside those Crimea voting stations to force voting to go Putin's way. We didn't see any U. S. tanks parked there to intimidate voters.
No UN election monitors present either to ensure there were no voter intimidation or illegalities. Oh, that's right; it was an illegal new puppet government - installed by Putin - holding an illegal election to accomplish illegal election results to illegally annex Crimea to Russia. So, the illegal votes really may have gone another way as there is really no way to verify Putin's claims of 97 percent in favor of secession from Ukraine. It's a lot like the CIA's game theory guy, Bruce The Mosquito, claiming the CIA claims he is 96 percent accurate in his predictions of how geo-politics will play out. Come on, really??
Bruce The Mosquito is a charlatan as much as Putin. Mosquito doesn't allow anyone to see his equations of how he arrived at his predictions. Sound vaguely familiar? And how much is the idiot IC and U. S. government paying for this loser? Cut that contract, folks; the American voter is fed up with wasteful spending and bad government contracts.
It's far better to put taxpayer money into beefing up NATO and arming and training Ukraine, Moldova, Romania and other countries surrounding Russia. After all, Congress has refused to allow the Pentagon to cancel a defense contract to make tanks in Ohio. As a result, hundreds of unneeded tanks are parked rusting out in some forlorn desert because Ohio politicians won't allow the Pentagon to cancel the contract.
Hey, here's a thought: give a bunch of those tanks to Ukraine, Poland and Moldova. We sure don't need them. Just make sure our brilliant Pentagon is smart enough to retrofit those same tanks with less advanced technology (while still making the tanks effective in warfare). We don't want the Russians possibly getting their hands on our best technology after a battle.
Coordinate these various countries into a serious combined military and IT force to challenge Russia once Putin starts tiptoeing over Russian borders to steal and annex more land. We all know Putin isn't stopping at Crimea. He's a yard cat, always pushing his boundaries, refusing to respect anyone. He wants respect yet refuses to give respect. Did he really think that spitting on the entire world would result in any other outcome but disrespect for him and Russia?
Well, it's back to the world governments' Minor League for Russia because Putin sure doesn't understand how to operate in the world's Major League. It sure wasn't for lack of trying to teach him how to succeed from people like me, hoping that Russia would finally take a respected place in the world. But Putin is too immature to be teachable, holding back the Russian people from a healthy economy, a peaceful relationship with the world and a quality future.
As it is Russia was suspended from the G8 meeting today, effectively cancelling Putin's own G8 meeting he was going to host and kicking him out of the Big Boys Club. France is now hosting the G7 meeting. Russia is going backwards rapidly. This Russian yard cat just can't keep his litter box clean.
Putin trots out former Russian leader Mikhail Gorbachev, thinking the West will believe and respect his opinion. Sending out Gorbachev to chirp how great it is to have Crimea back in the Russian fold does not convince any Western leader. This is a different generation. Nice try, yard cat.
Putin just claimed he will not move into Ukraine or other surrounding countries in an attempt to mollify the financial markets. Putin and his closest cronies are already losing sleep at night and bleeding money. There are runs on the Russian banks and investors have pulled out completely. Just where is Russia going to borrow money when they need it? From the U. S. and the IMF? I doubt anyone is stupid enough to give it to him. He just cooked himself and the Russian economy for decades to come. There will be no coming back from this.
Now on to the Rogue State label. It's time to place Russia (under Putin's continued leadership) firmly in that category. It could be reassessed once the Russians remove him from power. Until then, it's time to advance and treat Russia as a terrorist state.
We also must address those K Street lobbyists who have been giving aid to Putin, those public relations firms (Ketchum) and other attorneys (Alston & Bird). The FBI should investigate to see just what kind of information they have procured for Putin, on whom and just how much information violates the privacy of key political figures like President Obama and Congress and may also be government sensitive. It doesn't take much to go to online data brokers and pay cheap amounts to procure all that information without anyone's express permission or knowledge. They could be well paid spies for Putin and Russia. Perhaps President Obama and the DOJ have been far too lax on looking into this shadowy relationship of lobbyists and public relations firms to Putin.
And then there's Putin's media crown jewel in the U. S.: Russia Today news channel. Shut it down. Can it be there is any worse propaganda TV than Russia Today? They are worse than the much rightfully maligned Fox News Idiots. Putin actually believes Americans watch his lying news channel. About the only people who do are intelligence, military and State Department, and, oh, yeah, comedian folks. No average American watches that nonsense. The government people who do watch it grab a little Colorado Wacky Weed to heighten the amusing experience. For the munchies? Include a bowl of popcorn, some Chock Full O'Nuts coffee and then start laughing their heads off they find it so comical. A cartoon could not be funnier.
So, since this is the age of mega business mergers, how about this idea? Let the fantasy news of Fox News and Putin's World at Russia Today merge to create World Comedy News. After all, none of it is based in reality and no one with a brain - or without an agenda - watches them. Of course, investment bankers like Romney might buy them to help propel him into the White House on a third try. When they fail to reach the voting demographics, it's tough luck, fantasy news guys, you will be broken up and the parts sold off to anyone stupid enough to purchase you. And your pension funds? They just might get siphoned off and sent to the old folks in Crimea.
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