Peaks OH
wow all white men

deathtokoalas
....because race & gender are relevant in discussing agriculture. clearly, if we had more race & gender diversity, we would understand the ecology much better. absolutely pertinent observation.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GUYl_RYvfw
http://en.ria.ru/russia/20140303/188056671/Russia-Enlists-Chinese-Support-on-Ukraine-Position.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5Y_wjT-530
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDA52gwWVhk&feature=youtube_gdata
http://on.rt.com/o9tuz2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptqyVyqrNwk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyrxsZC4IIY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JfB8fmhC8XI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nK9FEBxghw

the difference in venezuela is that chavez controlled the military. that can't be said for the other social democrats being discussed.

if chavez didn't control the military, he would have been dead in a matter of weeks.

the spin the russians are taking on this is that patriotic ukrainian military personnel are refusing to take orders from the illegal coup, not that soviet-thinking soldiers are aligning with the motherland.

the truth is probably somewhere in between. it's something to think about, though. if a flow of white trash stormed the white house, it would be hard to deduce that the us military would ignore the president. if it happened in canada, there would be lingering allegiances to nato.

no, tim, but if the russians orchestrated a coup in canada, you can bet that the americans would protect norad and various other bases they have in the country.

the language and protection stuff is the actual propaganda. that's not what's driving them.

also, cia mcgovern misspoke 'cause he's old. but suggesting that russia should be interpreted differently than the soviet union is one of those naive academic traps that i've fallen into in the past and others shouldn't.

the cold war didn't start in 1945 or 1917. it goes back to a string of conflicts originating around the french revolution that was about the british empire containing the growing russian empire and included conflict both in the crimea area and central asia (the great game), over control of india.

it's historically wrong to siphon off russia's communist phase. it's convenient from an american imperial perspective that wants to compartmentalize everything in order to deny a larger strategic conflict, but it's wrong.

rather, there's a deep continuity going back centuries. it's not wrong to look at the situation today and say "gee, it looks just like it did in the mid nineteenth century". in fact, that's the perspective that really gets it.

in that sense, you can almost leap frog the soviet union.

taking it back to kievan rus is a bit too far, granted. you could get really abstract about eastern and western roman empires but it's largely incoherent.

understanding it in a general london v moscow conflict that is older than any of us is, however, far more correct than setting up a year zero in 1991.

this is really legitimately still british shipping interests containing czarist ambitions.

and they're *still* fighting over russian deepwater ports.

it's funny, though. the one thing that the russians and british have always agreed on is that those goddamned franks and germans can't get out of hand. it'll be interesting to see if that reasserts itself.