Sad news today

[hntnhole]

This is a day we should send our thoughts Eastward, to our brothers (ok, sisters too) in the Ukraine.  Whatever your beliefs on a wide range of issues, there are men in terrible danger, men who are indeed our "brothers", men we cannot spare.  We need all of us to be safe, secure, and alive.  No doubt there are Russian soldiers too, pressed into their armed forces who will be lost.  They too are important.  Today, and in the coming weeks, ALL lives matter.  

[tallslenderguy]

my heart is breaking over the Ukraine. i do not think most people want violence in their lives. i do not understand why humanity continues to follow the orders of violent people, why we allow them control. We have amazing resources on this planet, intelligence, treasure and sources of pleasure beyond imagination. Yet humanity continues to squander those precious resources on making weapons and on destroying what we have based on the whims of insane 'leaders.'  

[backdoorjimmy]

I can't imagine sitting on the edge of your seat, wondering if war is about to breakout in your homeland and if your family will make it out alive. The concept of war is just beyond me - how can political power be so intoxicating to world leaders that they would send men and women into battle with the stroke of a pen, knowing that the price is human lives and utter devastation? Not just during the war, but the thick emotional and mental scarring that carries on for generations after it ends? The families that deal with the heartache of death, and the families that cope with the trauma of PTSD when a soldier who saw unthinkable things comes home and is expected to just carry on like nothing's wrong?

[BearPleaser]

Ukraine has seen so many horrors over the 20th cen and now it seems the 21st. God help us all.

[skinster]

While I personally know multiple people who are from that region and still has family there, I don't need to talk about that horror specifically. I have already seen civilian casualties through unofficial media, I can say that collateral civilian damages in the first day are tremendous. There are already military casualties on both sides, including Russians, and I'll just say I am glad Ukrainians are fighting back even being overwhelmed militarily. The Javelins are working.

Collective "you" for the people in other European countries need to register that costs of an adventure like that will be global, and it will be unavoidable for any major economy in the West. AND regular citizenry will be paying them out of pocket. When you see higher prices for petrol and diesel, when your heating supply may be jacked, if you lose value in your retirement savings because the market crashed - the ways Putler will impact civilized societies will be unprecedented. That is before direct military impacts and casualties on the ground.

There are already reports about military fighting around Chernobyl, where the radiation levels from 1986 disaster are still at play. That alone can become the biggest eco threat to Western Europe when that dust starts flowing with winds after being lifted in the air as a result of explosions.

We really don't know how bad this is going to be.

Edited February 24, 2022 by skinster

[bareback-flipflop]

I really appreciate it that you share your thoughts. Although I don’t have close friends either in Ukraine or Russia I have students from both countries (in same courses) and this war is happening in our neighbourhood. 
War is not a proper answer for debates. And aggression generates newer aggression. 
There are no words how much I am sad. 😞

[ErosWired]

War in Europe. How much of global human calamity has been encapsulated by those three words? There’s no point looking for a rational explanation for how things have come to this - Putin is mentally unbalanced, just as Trump is mentally unbalanced, and the leaders of China, Hungary, Poland, Venezuela, Brazil, Myanmar, Afghanistan… the list continues. As long as populations place power in the hands of lunatics, chaos will ensue. The only question is what price sanity will have to pay to restore order. A lot, I should suspect.

In another thread, we bemoan the tendency of young people these days to ignore conventions of social conduct that make society function smoothly, but young people today are growing and developing in a period of uncertainty and chaos that I, at least, have not experienced in my 55 years. It’s hardly to be wondered that they exhibit signs of insecurity and anxiety. The world has gone mad and they think that’s the way it normally is.

The question now is, how contagious is Putin’s madness? It’s not as if his attack harms Ukraine alone. Every shell he lobs is an attack on the world, because the harm is felt everywhere. The weapons he fired today made holes in buildings in Eastern Ukraine - and made a big fucking hole in my retirement account when the markets plummeted. Not that I put my piffling monetary concern on a level with the suffering faced by the people of Ukraine, but when you multiply my loss of wealth by that of everyone else in the world so affected, the global cost of Putin’s aggression becomes staggering even before it starts being counted in lives lost.

Will his madness encourage others? The notion that slapping a zealot in the wallet is going to deter him strikes me as wishful thinking. I am not hopeful that he can be pushed to any kind of outcome that will not seem like successful aggression, and encourage more of the same…

[BannedWord]

Sadly, Putin is doing this because he knows he can get away with it. But that's less important than the toll this will exact on the citizens of the Ukraine. Keeping them in our thoughts and prayers if you're so inclined.

[BBBxCumDumpster]

4 hours ago, hntnhole said:

This is a day we should send our thoughts Eastward, to our brothers (ok, sisters too) in the Ukraine.  Whatever your beliefs on a wide range of issues, there are men in terrible danger, men who are indeed our "brothers", men we cannot spare.  We need all of us to be safe, secure, and alive.  No doubt there are Russian soldiers too, pressed into their armed forces who will be lost.  They too are important.  Today, and in the coming weeks, ALL lives matter.  

Amen. All lives do matter. We all should live in harmony,  with dignity, without fear of invasion, coercion or slaughter.  All who do live this way should be aware of and grateful for it.  Thank you for reminding me hntnhole!

[ohmalewhore]

It should just show how the vote of 81-million can affect the lives of 43-million someplace else. Weak leaders allow tyrants to flourish. This is the beginning of World War II all over again - just different players.  🙏🙏🙏 for #Ukraine

[BootmanLA]

2 hours ago, ohmalewhore said:

It should just show how the vote of 81-million can affect the lives of 43-million someplace else. Weak leaders allow tyrants to flourish. This is the beginning of World War II all over again - just different players.  🙏🙏🙏 for #Ukraine

Since you mention 81 million votes - are you suggesting that the current president (recipient of those votes) was "weak" and allowed this tyrant to flourish?

[ErosWired]

3 hours ago, ohmalewhore said:

It should just show how the vote of 81-million can affect the lives of 43-million someplace else. Weak leaders allow tyrants to flourish. This is the beginning of World War II all over again - just different players.  🙏🙏🙏 for #Ukraine

It is indeed shocking to think that if the votes of 74 million had prevailed, this nation would now have at its head the unrepentant traitor who just today praised Putin’s naked aggression against a neighboring sovereign democracy as “genius”. And worse, that many of those same 74 million would have it so tomorrow given any chance. Weak-minded citizens allow tyrants to rule. Mercifully, we’re still strong enough a people to send them packing here at home.

[hntnhole]

6 hours ago, ErosWired said:

unrepentant traitor

My friend, you must be the most generous-of-heart man Earth.  "Unrepentant traitor" is far too kind.

The misshapen mistake-of-nature you refer to, hardly possessing any intelligence, yet crafty as any common circus barker, con man, thief, grifter ever to walk this earth, may well wind up in the White House again.  If the citizens of these Dis-United States don't vote en masse in a few months for decency, honesty, integrity - all of which the depraved would-be despot possesses none, our Democracy may well sink into the quicksand of history.  Every single citizen possessing some measure of humanity must register and vote against such a calamity. Even if only for personal, selfish reasons, since once these hatemongers dole out their horrors to those who appear differently from themselves, they will come for us too.  

If I believed in such things, I would imagine that there are the infamous 3 sixes burned into that filthy, foul scalp - hidden under that ridiculous, cheato*-colored pompadour.  

*intentional

[ErosWired]

11 hours ago, ohmalewhore said:

🙏🙏🙏 for #Ukraine

And, I might add, since you’re criticizing what you claim to be weakness, that a sack full of prayers is worth the sack. Prayers are going to do bupkis to shield Kyiv from incoming missiles. Pulling the financial rug out from under Russia’s fat-cat oligarchs, however, might make them squirm enough to tell Putin to call it off.

[tallslenderguy]

1 hour ago, hntnhole said:

My friend, you must be the most generous-of-heart man Earth.  "Unrepentant traitor" is far too kind.

The misshapen mistake-of-nature you refer to, hardly possessing any intelligence, yet crafty as any common circus barker, con man, thief, grifter ever to walk this earth, may well wind up in the White House again.  If the citizens of these Dis-United States don't vote en masse in a few months for decency, honesty, integrity - all of which the depraved would-be despot possesses none, our Democracy may well sink into the quicksand of history.  Every single citizen possessing some measure of humanity must register and vote against such a calamity. Even if only for personal, selfish reasons, since once these hatemongers dole out their horrors to those who appear differently from themselves, they will come for us too.  

If I believed in such things, I would imagine that there are the infamous 3 sixes burned into that filthy, foul scalp - hidden under that ridiculous, cheato*-colored pompadour.  

*intentional

Agreed. 

i think we are talking about two schoolyard bullies, cut from the same cloth,  self absorbed, narcissists without a care for anyone or anything but their own distorted sense of self grandizement.  The lack of maturity and simple humanity is some world 'leaders' is stunning. Of course, school yard bullies don't have armies or nuclear weapons to employ, and invading a country and killing people is what we get from aged bullies.  The deception that still holds humanity captive is that a small minority can control the majority of humanity in its own destruction.