Kalbear

I WILL NOT BE TAMED

Not for at least 150 years. If you want to count those who fled Russia the last nobel winner hasn't been from Russia in 50 years. Absolutely a sign of philistine ignorance and uncultured nonsense. Americans have been better than this for at least 10 years. Same goes for hockey. Nowadays the Chinese are better too. Germany has been dominant in this for 20 years now. Russia hasn't even medaled since 1988. Again, what uncultured boors think that Russia is good at bobsledding? Next you're going to tell me that Russia has great rugby players for some bizarre reason. Vodka has been entirely taken over in every way by other countries, notably the UK. Ukraine makes better vodka. Architecture is a ridiculous notion; what good architects have come out any time recently from Russia? Okay, now THIS is something Disney needs to work on taking from Russia. The lack of successful bear tamers in the West is deplorable. We have a bear taming gap.

Clearly Russia didn't perfect ballet either, given that the best ballet isn't happening in Russia. They just took it and aped it and did a bit better for a while until someone else came along and did it better. What other things can Russia do that's better than anywhere else that we can take? Asking for a friend

I mean, at this point that's not just true of China - apparently the leader of Wagner can do that too. That's how low Russia has fallen - they have to sit there and take it from a ex-cook who doesn't even have a country.

I don't (and neither do they) - I just want to make fun of them for supporting such a below-rate ballet school and point out how much of an uncultured boor they are.

Maybe Russia should spend less money on their shitty military and more money on the Ballet then? And yes, I personally famously banned the ...uh...professional ballet competitions that are so influential. You know the ones, at the ballet olympics. That said, no one who knows ballet thinks that st petersburg's school is the best. It hasnt been that way for 40 years. Only deluded uncultural homers think that. Yes, and it is the west's goal to wipe them out personally. We all hate ballet. They must be destroyed. I mean seriously - who are you arguing with? No one cares about ballet one way or another? Is your thesis seriously that unless Russia can conquer other countries nearby ballet will cease to exist - and that somehow people dancing in tights and padded jocks justifies millions of people dying? I mean, I know that's what you're saying but I want to make sure that we are on the same page and have you say it publicly. Because the casus belli of destroying Mexico to save Cracker Barrel and square dancing seems much stronger an argument to me.

Yeah, this hardon for ballet remains the best thing ever. Lost is apparently any irony that said ballet watching isn't in Russia and appears to still exist. Seems to me that ballet will be fine and has already migrated away to somewhere better. The best ballet dancers aren't from Russia. The best composers aren't either. What does Russia have that's worth taking any more? What culture do they have left that Disney can plunder? I guess they can export their wussification of forgiving traitors for armed rebellion. That's something different.

Please stop talking about my penis

So you're not in favor of war then? Or are you in favor of war?

I guess my feeling is that you shouldn't engage on the 'are Ukrainians actually Russian' viewpoint because it does not matter in the least. Even if they were 100% Russian in every single possible way, including language, eating habits and favorite sex positions it would STILL be not acceptable to invade their nation. Because the nation is Ukraine. Russia can choose to believe that it doesn't exist and shouldn't exist, but that belief and viewpoint doesn't make it so. That all said, again it's educational to understand that the actual Russian position is that Ukraine as a separate nation doesn't exist (despite the 1991 agreement) because it implies a certain type of future scenario that is important.

You tell me! It's your completely specious claim after all. As a counterexample all of the Western military aid that was sent to Ukraine prior to 2022 was Western-built weaponry, and none of that ended up in Azov hands. Azov was using entirely Russian-built weapons throughout their use. You 'imagine'? But you don't know? Well, that's cool. I'm sure that's a very good way to base an entire ideology on. But wait, isn't Russia Ukraine, and Ukraine Russia? So Azov is Ukraine! So...Ukraine isn't Russian then? Also, here's an interesting idea for you - things actually do change over time. Russia wanting Ukraine to be part of Russia because they were in the past is just as legitimate as Mongolia taking over most of Eastern Russia. Ukraine having their own distinct language and culture makes them distinct from Russia regardless of genetic purity, just as much as Norway/Sweden/Denmark are distinct countries despite being almost precisely the same ethnic background genetically. The notion that genetics determines nationality is a very, very peculiar one. Ultimately, Ukraine decided in 1991 to be an independent country. Regardless of any other history that means that Russia's invasion is an actual invasion; Russia does not get to just choose when someone is independent when it suits them.

You keep saying this like it matters or should matter in the slightest. (you also contradict yourself by saying that Russians are not one single ethnic group but a whole bunch of them, but your lack of internal consistency isn't the main point on this one). Why does it matter if they are the same ethnic composition? I mean, the same is true for the US and Canada; does the US have a right to invade Canada? Does Canada have a right to invade the US?

That's not the only claim you made. You said billions were poured in by the west to create these militias that you say exist. Where's the proof here? You say that the West spent billions supporting an education to make the Russians made out to be mongols. Where's the proof here? So this is the Azov stuff again. So your proof of billions of investment from the West is an entirely homegrown subset of folks in the Ukraine which has already been disavowed by the official government several times and does not have actual political power. Again, always appreciate you providing links that completely negate your point!

Citations needed on all of this. You say it like it is actually true when it really isn't.

I mean, the stated goal is pretty simple here: the West is interested in Ukraine because Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe and wars in Europe are pretty influential to the rest of Europe. In addition, many countries in the West - the Baltics, Poland, Hungary, Czechia and Slovakia - are maybe a smidgen suspicious of ongoing Russian aggression in the area given prior history of Russia conquering. The notion that a country with 40 million people that neighbors Poland, feeds 25% of the world and is actively interested in a more democratic governance would not be interesting to European countries is bizarre. That the ONLY reason that you would want to avoid a refugee crisis of 5 million people fleeing a country is to 'hurt Russia' is obviously stupid.

538 did. Though I was mostly looking it up as a response to the Sanders folks saying how they could come back and beat Clinton despite it not working that way.

I am also curious - is the hypothesis put forward that Russia's unique culture will disappear if it stops being such a douchecanoe? If that's the case, is it also the case that Russia's unique culture will disappear unless people continue to try and invade it every 30-50 years? Or Russia has to lose approximately 5% of their population on a regular basis to war, famine, genocide or other calamity in order to preserve (checks notes) ballet?

To be clear here - math and physics are proven and tested; engineering is not. One example of this: we have no idea how well vehicles - remote piloted or otherwise - will need to deal with things like a lack of a magnetosphere on the way there. We have ideas and we have hopes, but those are things we need to design for and figure out, and those are not established values. We don't know the kind of stresses that a very large vehicle will have compared to smaller ones when going to Mars or the engineering tolerances that it will have to have. We don't know things like how to make sure that supplies remain viable on Mars other than theories. We've not done it 200 times and we don't have a robust system for manufacturing to those specifications. And that's the actual non-human factors. The human factors of sending people that far for that long without some of the protections we know we have are...difficult. These are things we can build around and work on - they are known knowns for the most part - but they are not something we've done before. And any engineer can tell you that doing something for the first time is hard, even if you know what you may need to do. It's expensive, it's challenging, and it can be more unsafe than usual. Another issue not brought up is that the primary people who would want to make this a reality - NASA and SpaceX - are both not in great positions compared to where they were 5 years ago to get this done. Musk's credibility has taken a massive hit and it is not clear how much he wants to do this compared to his other random pet projects. How much of his personal fortune is he willing to invest in this? Heck, how much of his fortune will exist in 5 years time given his current trajectory? NASA is the other alternative but they're almost certainly nonviable as an option for anything soon, especially with the way that the US is going with lack of investment in things like research or, well, NASA. One Republican in the white house and that dream goes away unless you can also use it to kill immigrants.

Just to be clear here this is all great news for Trump. Unlike the Dem primaries most Republican primaries are winner-take-all, regardless of how much you win by. If Trump gets 30%? He gets all the electoral votes. This is exactly how he managed to get such a commanding lead in 2016 as well despite the majority of Republican voters not actually voting for him. The last thing Trump wants is to have one actually strong opponent.

Heck, I find it implausible simply because Musk says it'll happen, and betting against musk's timelines is one of the safest bets out there.

Also want to point out a previous statement i made about it being important to understand Putin and the general viewpoint they have. You should not remotely agree with the paranoid murder orc view, but the beliefs are sincerely held and matter a great deal to them. And again it means that diplomatic options are not likely to succeed. Doesn't mean you shouldn't try them but chances are good that they will only result in a delay and fracture of western alliances; they won't result in actual stoppage of the fighting. When the Russian point of view is that in some convoluted, stupid way that this is a fight for Russian identity and existence - that somehow Ukraine holds the key to their 500 year existence and way of life despite that being an obviously illogical and idiotic view - you can't dismiss it as a bargaining ploy. You have to extrapolate that into what it actually means for their goals and means for giving them something they want. And they want to eradicate Ukraine as an independent country.

They were not supposed to take children away. And I agree - the forced abduction and genocide of Ukraine by Russia has been going on from the start. I appreciate you're on the same page. A really easy way to avoid having kids in a war zone is to not invade the war zone. A really easy way to avoid abducting kids is to not do that and instead send them back to their country of origin.

31 returned ...out of an estimated 20,000, who have been given re-education and indoctrination. Thanks for the link!

I'm guessing the abduction of thousands of Ukrainian children into Russia is just an extended field trip

The powder blue san Diego kit is amazing