That’s is poor alright. And obscene when you consider the wealth of the oligarchs. It’s obvious something has gone horribly wrong in this society, well before the fall of communism too. The Soviet communist “model” was very much in the mold of Orwell’s The Farm. That only continued but the top cronies became oligarchs and could enjoy the trappings of the west.
But there is nowhere to put them ,it's that simple , just like in Syria in boardsies were on threads saying they would take refugees into their own homes , guess what nobody ever did ,the realities of doing things like come to the fore very quick ,my wife asked would we take a Ukrainian family I said no ,not because I don't want to ,but we have 2 a 2 bed and 2 kids,we physically can't house more people let alone take the increase in food and electric costs .
This has gone too far
Enough flexing around, yes Putin is in a corner,
All i see is the west wiping the floor with him.
Give the guy an exit, get him out of Ukraine, drop peacekeepers all over the eastern border.
give him Crimea and let's get this over with.
I have no doubt Russia will win the war in Ukraine one way or another but he has made Russia a pariah state on the world stage.
This is an economic disaster for Russia.
I wouldn't know tbh Road high. From what I've gathered from talking with Russians down the years it's pretty much all in the major cities. Moscow is almost another country is the impression I've gotten. In Moscow the average wage is something like 15-16,000 euros, in somewhere like Murmansk it would be well under half that. IIRC their minimum wage is 2 euros an hour. Not a lot of Gucci bags and gold plated iphones on that kinda money.
It's probably not as big as it was last Wednesday week.
This article from 2019 claims 14 percent.
There are obviously young people in the cities, your classic university student types and general teenagers who are not necessarily going along with the Putin line. It would be interesting to see in the coming weeks how many of their number take to the streets.
"Whatever uneasy, mostly for the optics, 'peace' was in place between the invaders and unarmed civilians is gone now, or walking out the door."
I agree, this is where the violent resistance grows.
I fear that's going to happen more and more, especially as Russia gets more dug in and loses more and more men to Ukrainian forces. Whatever uneasy, mostly for the optics, 'peace' was in place between the invaders and unarmed civilians is gone now, or walking out the door.
How big is the Russian middle class? Ie that consume and live like us in the west?
This is not true though. They watched gunfire on a museum and a small fire.
The Russians were not 'shelling' the actual plant or it's reactors.
Anyone following flight radar? Some of the “new” flight paths are insane. See one plane going from Minsk to Konniggsburg taking two hours via the Baltic Sea rather than probably less than an hour direct over Lithuanian airspace.
Can someone explain- are the skies over the Baltic and into Russia international? Not controlled by say Finland or Estonia either side?
The 'both sides' thing is increasingly being used to sow doubt and cynicism. It's one thing to play that game in peace time, but another in war. Let's ask ourselves the question, "Would it be preferable for the enemy to be second-guessing every decision they make?" and they answer would surely be yes because it prevents your enemy from moving swiftly with purpose and direction.
Also, it seems to me that the both sides crew still tend to prefer the classically more morally-bankrupt of two choices. Read into that as you will. We've seen it a lot in the States during their last election cycle. "Trump and Biden are both corrupt. Anyway, where's my MAGA hat?"
Russell Brand's head could take a couple of families as well. Plenty of space in there.
The average Russian has rarely if ever left the country, the average Russian hasn't been inside Ikea or has the latest iphone. The immediate sanctions hit will be mostly to urban middle class Russians and the wealthy. Those in rural areas and the smaller cities not so much. I suspect it'll take quite a bit of time for it to filter down to them. As for food basics Russia is a lot more food secure than a nation like Britain or France and outside cities have a long tradition of growing their own. Russia is not like us or the West in general. Much more like us in the 1940's in many ways.
RE: The live stream from the Nuclear Power Plant.
The guy that was streaming it live has been doing videos of the plant for years. It seems like he is like a social media manager. He didn't just turn up one day and happened to film an attack on the property of a nuclear power plant.
https://youtube.com/c/atomzaes
The IAEA Director General has already confirmed and accepted it was shelling.
Are they part of the MSM media nARRatiVe as well?
You're a rube. Your mind is not your own.
Frustration among the Russians is growing. Unarmed protesters getting shot now.
The sudden shutting down of Facebook and Twitter is significant too. It doesn't exactly sound like the actions of a government who is in control or who thinks the war is going well.
The both sides crew now using something that has curiously grown huge in Western culture, that "standards" have to be applied "equally" without context and that retaliation is as bad if not worse than starting something.
If I walk up to someone and punch them on the nose I think most people would agree that they should be within their rights to respond and defend themselves. And given that they're the ones under attack I think it'd be pretty unreasonable to apply the same "standard" to them. They've been attacked, they're not the aggressor.
At the same time I don't want the Ukrainians pushing it too far because it opens the floor to the "both sides" numpties.
Having read that article after doing Google Translate, it doesn't say exactly what the caused the deaths of the other 6 rape victims - whether it was murder (shooting, strangulation, stabbing) or indeed the rape itself, i.e. bleeding.
Cmon then Woodward and Bernstein? What were we looking at if we weren't witnessing a Russian attack on a nuclear facility?
If you're so incredulous, what exactly was it?
If I told you two weeks ago you'd be here trying to dance on the head of a pin offering up outs for an army attacking a nuclear power facility, you'd have probably told me I was off my head. Yet here you are, doing an elaborate yoga pose about an utterly dangerous attack.
The Russians don't remember the history of the Baltic states from 1940 to 1990!
I thought only Yanks called the gummy bears, while we had jelly babies, but I digress... You're for Ukraine and against Russia, as am I, but I'm also aware that my mind is quite 'hijacked' to that cause. When any poster strays a millimetre from that cause, or questions currently acceptable truths you start shouting. You're arguably just as hijacked, it just happens to be a cause I agree with. It seems self awareness is also a casualty of war.
They might well end up that way and christ I hope they don't, but no they are not all shelled like Grozny. More hysterics.
Jesus your Eeeyore like musings on this, you'd swear you want to see WW3.
Sanctions must be really pissing him off- else he wouldn’t be droning on about them. He really is one miserable dried up **** to look at and listen to.
What did you think you were witnessing? The Russian army throwing bouquets of flowers at a nuclear facility?
Catch yourself on.
Relatively balanced article on what happened there https://www.bbc.com/news/world-60609633 . Still a Western media outlet but it looks like the approach was to cease the offices.
This is possibly the stupidest thing I've read in the entire thread and that includes the people saying that the war is going exactly according to Putin's plan.
The country's biggest nuclear power station and you think it's suspect they have working security cameras.
I agree. I didn't think we'd see NATO intervention but if they start looking useless they may have to show face.
If a nuclear power station was actually shelled then there would be satellite photos on every Western news channel. They would roll out experts to stand in front of big screens and point to the damage. This is not "an extremely high bar".
Plenty of holiday homes dotted all along the coasts of Ireland. Offer owners of these a waiver on property tax if they let them out. The state could cover house insurance for these properties. I'd support these measures because they wouldn't adversely effect rental accommodation availability and hotel room stock. The vast majority of these Ukrainian folks will go back once the war is over too.
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