Alright, so, I was wrong to suggest Putin presents no threat. I'm consuming the testimony and it's fascinating.

In the meantime, how significant to you is the ties with Trump to Russia? Does this have the capacity to truly topple American supremacy?

I'm fine with speculation that knows it's speculation.

oh yeah, totally. I'm agnostic about whether Ted Cruz's dad was in on the JFK assassination. I see both sides, man. *rolleyes*

AMERICAN DECLARATION OF IGNORABIMUS

We hold these truths to be self-evident--that all factoids and all hands were created equal

doing my dissertation in the category of factoids. Get the inside scoop on Conway's Theorem!

American supremacy? Of what?

Throughout the past few posts you've written with the assumption that anything short of "toppling American supremacy" wouldn't be "impactful" or damaging.

But Russia has already done significant damage to the republic. Nobody knows whether once he's gone -- whether in one month, a year, four or eight -- whether we recover from the crisis of authority and lack of faith in our institutions and the electoral process. It had already been bad before the 2016 election.

That's asymmetrical war in the 21st century. The NYT's rhetoric after Nov 8th, which compared Russian interference with warfare, was justified. On certain axes, such as GDP, military spending, natural resources, infrastructure, economics, etc, some countries, such as the US, have massive advantages. But nuclear arms, cyber warfare and others, enable some countries to punch far above their weight class, and basically stand among countries in the first tier as equals.

Lol, I thought the chinese beat us to that proof. Sad!



Political, economic, military control of significant portions of the world. Or maybe it's a poorly posed question. Will this lead to Russia taking control of larger sections of the world?

I'm actually fine with Trump toppling the United States government. It would destroy the white liberal patriarchy, which also happens to be the one thing holding me back from turning my local local co-op grocery store into a full-fledged government that respects the struggle of Native Americans.

let me know if you want to buy handmade soap made from hemp oil

> "Russia taking control of larger sections of the world?"
> 2017

Sorry, if that's what you've understood, that's not what I meant.



So I agree, there's significant damage done by Trump already. The mere fact that U.S. Intelligence is now redirecting their resources inward and Russia has gotten away with a bold move, may embolden other enemies to commit acts. It's bad for American all around.

My only question with what you just said is, why does "faith in our institutions and electoral process" matter? Would it be a good thing to you if everyone simply believed American democracy was great, despite it not being great? I mean, we haven't gotten to the point of having sham "90% of people voted for the dictator" elections, right, so complete cynicism with American democracy is unwarranted. Unless we're not talking about average Americans, or there's something else I'm not getting.



It is an act of war. And I get what you're saying. Russia is one of the strongest countries is cyber-warfare, I definitely recognize that.

What are you even talking about?



Uh, Russia controlled that section of the world, and was afraid of losing control, so they invaded. They're trying to maintain status quo, not expand.

It's not a matter of being great. It's a matter of adequacy. And American institutions are perfectly morally adequate for the purposes of garbage collecting the resources claimed by the segfault of a life living in the White House.

The pot smoking musician on my Facebook feed who got all in a huff when I criticized "Black Bloc" anarchists, who thought they were smashing the patriarchy by setting fire to property in reaction to a right wing troll.

I actually don't know too much about the precise details of the situation in Eastern Europe, but I do find it a little shocking that you'd side with the Kremlin. They are a cancer on the world.

? I'm exasperated. I'm not "defending the Kremlin" by saying "prior to 2014, Russia had significant control over Ukraine's politics". There were tensions and Ukraine was moving to buddy up to NATO and leave Russia's sphere of influence.

That doesn't make it right what they did, it's just what they did.

Yes, and Ukraine used to be just one part of what harmonious "union", in more glorious times?

Your main mistake is equating influence with control.

Since the Soviet Union fell, Eastern Europe has been slowly transitioning from the remnants of Soviet control to the control of liberal Western Europe. For all it's problems I see this as a good thing. Putin's trying to stop the advancement of what he probably sees as "anti-Russian" forces Eastern. Putin's scrambling to maintain the control Russia has over former Soviet countries, he's not doing some proactive, out-of-the-blue invasions like the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.

He would probably like to expand West, but that's not what's been happening. Until now, where the invasion of Ukraine and now the American election shows he can push back.

You're right, I equivocated.

I fail to see how that would justify it.

And I am certainly not interested to see just how far he decides to "push pack".

Well I mean, the Soviet Union had total control of Ukrainian politics. It then became an independent state, but economic momentum meant it's primary trading partners had to be ex-Soviet states.

Jon's comment is accurate, the word I used should have been "influence", whereas Putin seeks "control".

I'm not trying to "justify it", I'm trying to explain it. Like how you can understand mental illness without being mentally ill.

Yeah, there are quite a few things you're not grasping.

But one of the more obvious ones is that "faith in institutions" has nothing to do with believing that "American democracy [is] great", or in American exceptionalism, or anything like that. It has more to do elections being free and fair, and citizens believing them to be so, or citizens believing that newspapers are reliable, trustworthy sources of information, when they are in fact reliable, trustworthy sources of information. And so on and so on. It has to do with trust among citizens that their institutions do what they claim to do.

Look, I don't know much about Ukrainian history, but I would hazard to guess that they don't particularly care to be controlled by a foreign government. Seeing that their language and culture is closer to that of Russia than, say, Lithuania, makes occupation less egregious, but I would be highly skeptical that they would want it.

Unless you think the Marshall Plan was merely part of our "empire" and was no better than the USSR's motivation for COMECON....

Nobody has said that! In fact, the history leading up to the invasion is basically their rejection of Russian control.

Okay, so you are simply arguing that the evidence points to the theory that Putin will stop at Ukraine, in large part because of historic ties between the greater region.

Have I heard this logic before?

So what I'm getting is, Trump supporters, who seem to believe the exact opposite on both points, are the biggest problem in America right now?

I think he'll stop with Georgia!

Oh, wait.

I didn't said this and I don't believe this.

Which brings us back to your original question:



I've been pretty sardonic about this, so you must know that my answer is: we can bet Putin will try, should Trump hand him the opportunity!

Well I was talking about something that happened a little bit longer ago before that....

No. It's true across the political spectrum. The Democratic candidate put forward in the general election was compromised too. And your boy Glenn Greenwald loves ripping on WashPo and other "lamestream" media sources just as much as Sarah Palin does. There's also justified skepticism about American financial institutions after the 2008 mortgage crisis. Bush 43 led us into an elective war based on bald-faced lies, and after nearly fourteen years we still haven't been able to extricate ourselves from it. James Clapper lied about the extent to which the NSA runs surveillance on American citizens, and shortly afterwards Edward Snowden exposed him. Beyoncé didn't win the grammy for best album... the awards are a hoax!

I can't believe I have to spell this out for you? The prevailing ethos is that nothing is what it purports to be, and there are powerful special interests that self-servingly and insidiously pull the strings and reap benefit for at the expense of the common man. It's entered into every facet of society. The damn award shows.

Yes, along with their propaganda masters on talk radio, and that little ***** Paul Ryan.

UNLESS, we just all get lucky and nothing terrible enough happens before the next election that we can't fix it later. But holy cow, it's been what, like almost a month?

If anyone thinks that Putin will stop at the Ukraine, ask the Georgians.

Okay, I agree with you. My problem was I read this



and read it as you were implying the primary problem is people's trust in the institutions and not the institutions themselves. I agree trust is necessary for institutions which work properly, but I also don't see our institutions as working properly precisely for the reasons you have mentioned. Can we agree that both need be improved if we're to keep Russia out of our government?

The US got where it is by being the world's largest manufacturer of finished goods. That's, um, pretty much it. Everything that followed was in service to that.

Is the US still the world's largest manufacturer of finished goods?

You don't really need Russia's help to lose influence, is what I'm saying. That's already been happening for a long time.

Sure.

Of course, I was talking about the Sudetenland.

I am sure you are right, but it sure didn't hurt that we had our doors open to some pretty snazzy refugees.