re: Russian economy collapsing?

quote:

---

Oh look. Dickhead Sanctions with a ridiculous opinion with no merit.

---

You upset about something bro?

Oh yeah, 23-17

Don't enable the dickhead obama dick sucker. Obama may have stumbled into some good fortune on the foreign policy front, but it's his first good stumble this term.

Putin is nothing like Ronald Reagan

quote:

---

Putin is nothing like Ronald Reagan

---

he inspires Russians to have a sense of pride in their nation like nothing since communism. that was the comparison. not their desire for freedom or democracy.

quote:

---

Learn something about the world and about the differences in the world's peoples before making stupid fricking statements such as the ones you've made in this thread.

Is Middle Eastern Pride and Russian Pride the same, or French Pride and Mexican Pride? Australian Pride and Polish Pride perhaps?

Sometimes, and you just illustrated why this is usually true ... but sometimes it is better to be silent and thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.

---

old enough to tell an old fart to go stick his dick in a blender.

i'm just as conservative as you are on all issues and was alive for the Reagan years and the fall of the wall. While we're on the same side and hate the President's handling of anything in his administration, to just criticize him for the heck of it is stupid.

Russia was in the dumps after the cold war. Putin has put them back on the scene, hosted an Olympics and in their eyes "fought for Russian speakers" in the Crimea.

Don't act like it's an outlandish statement, you old crotchety fool.

quote:

---

old enough to tell an old fart to go stick his dick in a blender.

i'm just as conservative as you are on all issues and was alive for the Reagan years and the fall of the wall.

Russia was in the dumps after the cold war. Putin has put them back on the scene, hosted an Olympics and in their eyes "fought for Russian speakers" in the Crimea.

Don't act like it's an outlandish statement, you old crotchety fool.

---

Okay then ... well then read and learn.

I'm old enough that I passed through Checkpoint Charlie, on several occasions, back in the bad old days long before that wall came down.

Ronald Reagan putting economic pressure on the Soviet Union is what brought that wall down.

What brought the Russian economy back from the brink is multi-layered.

First, they opened up their markets to foreign investment which led to technological advancements being implemented in their energy sector not the least of which was with regard to their ability to extract oil and natural gas from their frozen ground ... something they were unable to do prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Secondly, they discovered the richest diamond mine in the world and, have since, held the diamond cartel hostage under the threat of flooding the market with diamonds - thus forcing the diamond cartel to pay them a regular ransom.

Third, their extensive black market network boomed under Glasnost. It was a well-organized, extensive network of capitalistic minded thugs who pounced on the new open policy and it was they who were the first millionaires and billionaires after the collapse of the USSR. This led to a great deal of corruption and a massive gap between the rich and poor which led to the old school, hard core communists who were used to being taken care of ... they started screaming for a return to the old party system. (We're going to have that same problem here one day when our social welfare system finally collapses.)

The uprising caused by the corruption within their system led to Putin. Putin was in a good spot in St Pete in the early 90s and, within his connections and background in the KGB and his understanding of how the Russian mindset works and how susceptible it is to propaganda, he acquired a great deal of personal wealth through shady government deals and combined that wealth with his connections to make his eventual move into power ... most of it on the back of Sobchak, who he had followed from St Pete.

Once Putin got to Moscow he wasted little time moving-in and allying himself with Yeltsin and the rest is history and has been for the past fifteen years ... it was a complete and totally calculated power grab.

No election can be believed. The polls coming-out of Russia are total bullshite. His country is in dire straights and he is keeping the population in line using the jack-booted thuggery tactics of the old hard line Soviet old guard dating back to Stalin ... Putin's smarter though, more worldly, more diplomatic than Stalin, but just as brutal and just as dictatorial.

Putin's place in Russia has nothing to do with national pride, nothing at all. If it ever did it was only for a very very short period until things started falling apart.

So please, don't compare this murdering piece of shite to Ronald Reagan on any level. Stop and think before you type something like that again during the course of what could have been an intelligent discussion on Russia's current economic situation.

no his point is that Putin is a communist thug, and criminal posing as a politician. One that has without a doubt ordered and probably participated in many murders to secure and maintain his position.



Not to be compared to Ronald Reagan or any other American President in any way.

quote:

---

We definitely have had our share of shitbag Presidents and they have surely ordered murders and shady things but most of those things have occurred outside of our country... Iran, Nicaragua, Guatemala etc etc.

---

Name one.

quote:

---

Putin is the typical Russian Leader. They've got to be strong and cruel to succeed over there.

---

Strong yes ... all national leaders must be strong or else they will fail. But cruel? Why must he be cruel to his people?

Gorbachev? Did we have a discussion of Mother Russia and not mentioned Gorby?