Jeez Loueeze. Biden makes a comment almost every sentient caring person agrees with in their heart, and oh my god. What he said! Give me a break. No, give honest Joe a break. Sure, these are treacherous times and we need the most delicate diplomacy from our leaders. Still, chill.
Well, I still believe foreign affairs is President Biden’s wheelhouse. If he spoke inappropriately, it’s regrettable; and I believe he will walk it back. Or, the MSM will move on to the next sparkly sound bite. However, I wonder if speaking his mind wasn’t what he had in mind or, perhaps, inadvertently a good thing. Known for his gaffes, it expresses to those suffering that he has a heart. He’s not an automaton. And, he’s not TFG thank god. Just saying. ❤️🤍💙
Yes, you're right. But even inadvertently "poking the bear" is not a good idea. We expect guys with Joe's experience to know when to bite their tongue.
Agree that the bell can't be unrung. Though I do think this gaff speaks for many of us even though we expect that there are many equally malevolent replacements behind Putin, much like tfg is not the only neo-republican wannabee. The Sheriff twirled his six-shooters for those god-fearing folks who think taking out the badguy Could solve everything. Tits up for the billegerent ones with wrinkles and gray hair.
True and important comment, but why are so many convinced that Putins war is not going as planned? We assume he is always lying, and we are right most of the time. We don't believe a leader can be so callous about loosing his people and a lot of arms, while destroying cities and taking so many innocent lives, as distractions to reaching the primary goal of securing land and water for Crimea and the Black Sea fleet. Putin does not have to respond to Biden, but just wait for the primaries to make him lame after the election this year, and have him replaced by Trump in the White House in 2024. The wedges are set for splitting the US, and Putin might have lost his black belt in judo, but he sure knows how to use the energy of the enemy to destroy himself. The two legged US demockracy will be limping on, while Trump is stabbing Europe in the back, and Putin takes back what "belongs to him". - Sorry, it is not to give up. I believe we can gather strength from considering more perspectives.
Yeah, after all we have been through with a fucking traitor sucking Russia's dick for four plus years, Joe gets a Mullgan for this. Fuck the msm and their drooling over a sound bite. It will be forgotten, except for Murrica's Pravda, FOX the next time Putin slaughters another children's hospital
I heard it as an anguished cry to the heavens! It has been my cry every day for a month. With no end in sight of the bloodshed, the destruction, the reports that several thousands from Mariopoul have been taken away by Russian soldiers to Russia (I pray to God this report is NOT true, but I fear it is since terror is now the name of Putin's game), as surprised as I was, I was also not surprised. I imagine he has cried out in the privacy of his own home, standing before the mirror in the morning and wondering, what the hell is going on here. Of course words matter. Of course these words have over shadowed to some degree the content of the speech which was good - I think he went off message a couple of other times just because reading from a teleprompter is not easy. You have probably seen the video of residents of Kharkiv, Mariopoul. areas of Kyiv, and Lviv among other towns and cities cursing Putin. At least he didn't curse him outright. Putin intends to redraw the boundary of Ukraine if he can get away with it. I wonder given Putin whether anything that President Biden said would make any damn difference to his calculations. I read today that there are Russians who oppose the war who are staying in Russia to protest and resist from inside the borders. In a way they're sunk - Finland is sending no more trains to Russia and getting a flight anywhere has become virtually impossible. Whatever is going on now, the people suffering the most are Ukrainians. After them, Russians opposing the war. Soon it will be the rest of the world needing wheat and corn from Ukraine and Russia. No matter how you look at it, Putin made the decision. He threw the dice thinking they were loaded like his sycophants had told him. He took his country to war thinking the west would roll over and pant for more oil and gas, like we did with our lackluster response to Georgia (2008) and the farce of Crimea and the Donbas region in 2014. Putin has wanted a Belarus in Ukraine. He has not gotten that. The truth is he has wrecked his nation in so many ways it takes more than 10 fingers to count. But he's now wrecking Ukraine who asked for none of it but has been resisting and fighting against Russian aggression in its many forms really for the last 10+ years. So, the President said what millions are thinking and are hesitant to say aloud - unless you are a woman in Ukraine mourning the loss of her family, her way of life, and her hope for a peaceful spring that leads to summer and full gardens. I think everyone should chill and work hard to get people elected in 2022 who are NOT from the gop. And we should keep supporting every effort we can to bring assistance to Ukrainians and the places which shall be hungering for bread in coming months.
I felt surprised at Max Boot's take in the WAPO. I do get what you wrote. I wonder if you've read Jonathan Littell's recent article in Le Monde. It was picked up by Meduza and reprinted there. Thoughtful and tragic.
I'm laughing. I thought Timothy Snyder's newsletter was especially good yesterday - he focused on the importance of where the President gave his address. I hope you had a chance to read it. And Max Boot had some interesting things to say about them. Who knows. There is so much disinformation flooding the zone - some articles about Russians being poisoned at the negotiations in early March held in Kyiv. That one was on Meduza.
It depends, I think, to whom he was speaking. We all know who he was speaking for - us. He said what we all believe to be a heartfelt truth. That last sentence wasn't for the US or Euro MSM, but it was guaranteed to make those chooks loose enough feathers that the Russian public will hear about it.
I'd love to think you're right, but I don't. that's not going to get through. If there was something we wanted to "get through," it was the entire rest of the speech, which was aimed at the Russian people.
Unfortunately, a moment of stupidity outweighs 40 hours of intelligence.
Nobody is talking this morning about the speech he gave, which is what I wish they were - that speech would do much to show people how serious he is on this. But it's gone now, and replaced by this stupidity. It makes me want to go out and pound my head against a brick wall.
Perhaps I have more faith in your President. I don't feel, with all his diplomatic experience and nouse that this was a casual throw away line added on a last minute whim. While those around him have tried to unspeak and spin talk for him, Biden has not explained, denied, backpedalled, or in any way watered down his statement yet has he?
I think he knew and considered the noise it would cause in the western media but felt the need to get that message to (specific?) people in Russia to encourage pressure for change from within.
To that end, it doesn't matter what people elsewhere are talking about. Stupidity may actually have been the smart beginning of showing the cornered rat's people their leader is really a squeaking trembling mouse (who is running out of real rat friends, tanks, soldiers, and soon food for all).
Granting all of this, I would argue that this comment ultimately is likely to mean nothing to the average Russian. They already are totally committed to Putin, or totally opposed to Putin. Also, let's take into account that American intelligence has been very good--it may be worth asking if Biden says this if he really thinks Putin is going to cave in any way.
I think what makes Dr. Nichols worry - I know it's what makes me worry - about the president's blurt is the statement this morning from the Russian Defense Ministry that they will deploy nuclear weapons if the existence of the state is threatened. The question is, does Vladolf agree with Louis XIV that "l'etat c'est moi"? I think he might. He's already said that he can't imagine living in a world in which Russia does not have "its proper place," and given that he thinks its proper place is leading the Empire of Eurasia, that stretches from "Dublin to Vladivostok" in the words of his favorite political idiot, Dugin, well... I think you can see what worries me.
TC, I think that I'd like to have a chat with you. In case you missed it, this was on the forum today:
daria (MID)29 min ago·edited 8 min ago
Lest you forget, there are people on the left, on this very page who have threatened to do harm or wished bodily harm to another because of the difference of beliefs, they've called them ugly names, questioned another's right to make dissenting comments, even questioned their patriotism, declared them un-American. That behavior, too, begets violence and hatred. It ratchets up the temperature. The door swings both ways. Never forget that.
I'm not sure why Daria continues to subscribe to TAFM if that's her attitude. I'm not going to engage with her, and I hope you and everyone else won't either.
It is exactly how Putin takes Biden's attack at a time in which he is suffering a crucial blow to a sense of his invincibility. Bidden 'gaffe' was provocative in the worse way. Putin won't forget it.
True, although that presumes that, as a narcissist and megalomaniac, he feels more vincible. Don't forget his buddy at Mar-A-Lago. They aren't THAT different.
I expect their alliance gets even stronger. Think about what Putin will execute for the mid-terms and presidential election. ' Four rockets hit the western Ukrainian city of Lviv on Saturday, local officials said, in the most significant attack on the city since the start of the war with Russia.'(Reuters) Russian military is getting closer and closer to Poland
Michael, I should not have used the word 'gaffe' for Biden's line closing his speech in Warsaw. It wasn't in the speech, but it came very convincingly from his heart. It was a colossal strategic mistake.. We were in serious danger before the speech. ___I'll write no more for now. Salud, Michael.
Almost everyone in the west has thought that. It's not likely to change the ponies and rainbows between Biden and Putin. The Pres has been extraordinary in managing NATO's response. Maybe he's dumb like a fox.
Heather Cox Richardson picked up on that too (in slightly more polite language lol):
“It’s not enough to speak with rhetorical flourish, of ennobling words of democracy, of freedom, equality, and liberty,” he said. “All of us…must do the hard work of democracy each and every day. My country as well.” His message “for all freedom-loving nations,” he said, is that “we must commit now to be in this fight for the long haul.” In the end, though, “the darkness that drives autocracy is ultimately no match for the flame of liberty that lights the souls of free people everywhere.” “We will have a different future—a brighter future rooted in democracy and principle, hope and light, of decency and dignity, of freedom and possibilities.”
“For God’s sake,” he said, “this man cannot remain in power.”
That last line seemed a logical conclusion to the argument Biden has been making about the struggle between democracy and autocracy, rallying democratic countries to stay unified against Putin as his troops smash Ukraine. But it prompted a flurry of media stories saying Biden had made a gaffe, changing his long-standing insistence that the U.S. is not engaging in regime change but rather is trying to defend Ukraine’s right to exist independently of Russia. A White House official clarified that “[t]he president’s point was that Putin cannot be allowed to exercise power over his neighbors or the region…. He was not discussing Putin’s power in Russia, or regime change.” Michael D. Shear and David E. Sanger of the New York Times noted that, however Biden meant the line, it underscored the difficulty of holding allies together against Putin while also avoiding an escalation of the war. not enough to speak with rhetorical flourish, of ennobling words of democracy, of freedom, equality, and liberty,” he said. “All of us…must do the hard work of democracy each and every day. My country as well.” His message “for all freedom-loving nations,” he said, is that “we must commit now to be in this fight for the long haul.” In the end, though, “the darkness that drives autocracy is ultimately no match for the flame of liberty that lights the souls of free people everywhere.” “We will have a different future—a brighter future rooted in democracy and principle, hope and light, of decency and dignity, of freedom and possibilities.”
Jeez Loueeze. Biden makes a comment almost every sentient caring person agrees with in their heart, and oh my god. What he said! Give me a break. No, give honest Joe a break. Sure, these are treacherous times and we need the most delicate diplomacy from our leaders. Still, chill.
I agree with him in my heart too. But at that level of "the game" you learn to keep it there. That's why you're there.
Well, I still believe foreign affairs is President Biden’s wheelhouse. If he spoke inappropriately, it’s regrettable; and I believe he will walk it back. Or, the MSM will move on to the next sparkly sound bite. However, I wonder if speaking his mind wasn’t what he had in mind or, perhaps, inadvertently a good thing. Known for his gaffes, it expresses to those suffering that he has a heart. He’s not an automaton. And, he’s not TFG thank god. Just saying. ❤️🤍💙
Yes, you're right. But even inadvertently "poking the bear" is not a good idea. We expect guys with Joe's experience to know when to bite their tongue.
I really appreciate the comparison to a Greek course.
Now if we could just get the chorus to stop their lament....
…and we cannot.
Agree that the bell can't be unrung. Though I do think this gaff speaks for many of us even though we expect that there are many equally malevolent replacements behind Putin, much like tfg is not the only neo-republican wannabee. The Sheriff twirled his six-shooters for those god-fearing folks who think taking out the badguy Could solve everything. Tits up for the billegerent ones with wrinkles and gray hair.
Yes, whatever is there to replace Putin is no choir boy.
“Biden, by comparison, is living with a Greek chorus of millions offering their commentary and advice—some of it breathtakingly reckless.”
Such an accurate and descriptive observation., TC. This will stay with me.
True and important comment, but why are so many convinced that Putins war is not going as planned? We assume he is always lying, and we are right most of the time. We don't believe a leader can be so callous about loosing his people and a lot of arms, while destroying cities and taking so many innocent lives, as distractions to reaching the primary goal of securing land and water for Crimea and the Black Sea fleet. Putin does not have to respond to Biden, but just wait for the primaries to make him lame after the election this year, and have him replaced by Trump in the White House in 2024. The wedges are set for splitting the US, and Putin might have lost his black belt in judo, but he sure knows how to use the energy of the enemy to destroy himself. The two legged US demockracy will be limping on, while Trump is stabbing Europe in the back, and Putin takes back what "belongs to him". - Sorry, it is not to give up. I believe we can gather strength from considering more perspectives.
Good points.
Yeah, after all we have been through with a fucking traitor sucking Russia's dick for four plus years, Joe gets a Mullgan for this. Fuck the msm and their drooling over a sound bite. It will be forgotten, except for Murrica's Pravda, FOX the next time Putin slaughters another children's hospital
He does get a Mulligan. But at this level of "the game" you learn to keep a "poker face", or not to smile when the other guy puts his king in mate.
I heard it as an anguished cry to the heavens! It has been my cry every day for a month. With no end in sight of the bloodshed, the destruction, the reports that several thousands from Mariopoul have been taken away by Russian soldiers to Russia (I pray to God this report is NOT true, but I fear it is since terror is now the name of Putin's game), as surprised as I was, I was also not surprised. I imagine he has cried out in the privacy of his own home, standing before the mirror in the morning and wondering, what the hell is going on here. Of course words matter. Of course these words have over shadowed to some degree the content of the speech which was good - I think he went off message a couple of other times just because reading from a teleprompter is not easy. You have probably seen the video of residents of Kharkiv, Mariopoul. areas of Kyiv, and Lviv among other towns and cities cursing Putin. At least he didn't curse him outright. Putin intends to redraw the boundary of Ukraine if he can get away with it. I wonder given Putin whether anything that President Biden said would make any damn difference to his calculations. I read today that there are Russians who oppose the war who are staying in Russia to protest and resist from inside the borders. In a way they're sunk - Finland is sending no more trains to Russia and getting a flight anywhere has become virtually impossible. Whatever is going on now, the people suffering the most are Ukrainians. After them, Russians opposing the war. Soon it will be the rest of the world needing wheat and corn from Ukraine and Russia. No matter how you look at it, Putin made the decision. He threw the dice thinking they were loaded like his sycophants had told him. He took his country to war thinking the west would roll over and pant for more oil and gas, like we did with our lackluster response to Georgia (2008) and the farce of Crimea and the Donbas region in 2014. Putin has wanted a Belarus in Ukraine. He has not gotten that. The truth is he has wrecked his nation in so many ways it takes more than 10 fingers to count. But he's now wrecking Ukraine who asked for none of it but has been resisting and fighting against Russian aggression in its many forms really for the last 10+ years. So, the President said what millions are thinking and are hesitant to say aloud - unless you are a woman in Ukraine mourning the loss of her family, her way of life, and her hope for a peaceful spring that leads to summer and full gardens. I think everyone should chill and work hard to get people elected in 2022 who are NOT from the gop. And we should keep supporting every effort we can to bring assistance to Ukrainians and the places which shall be hungering for bread in coming months.
Yes, that's what it was. But it wasn't needed - we all know it already.
I felt surprised at Max Boot's take in the WAPO. I do get what you wrote. I wonder if you've read Jonathan Littell's recent article in Le Monde. It was picked up by Meduza and reprinted there. Thoughtful and tragic.
Watch Biden's press conference today. If he gets one question that doesn't have to do with The Nine Ignorant Words, I will be completely surprised.
I'm laughing. I thought Timothy Snyder's newsletter was especially good yesterday - he focused on the importance of where the President gave his address. I hope you had a chance to read it. And Max Boot had some interesting things to say about them. Who knows. There is so much disinformation flooding the zone - some articles about Russians being poisoned at the negotiations in early March held in Kyiv. That one was on Meduza.
It depends, I think, to whom he was speaking. We all know who he was speaking for - us. He said what we all believe to be a heartfelt truth. That last sentence wasn't for the US or Euro MSM, but it was guaranteed to make those chooks loose enough feathers that the Russian public will hear about it.
I'd love to think you're right, but I don't. that's not going to get through. If there was something we wanted to "get through," it was the entire rest of the speech, which was aimed at the Russian people.
Unfortunately, a moment of stupidity outweighs 40 hours of intelligence.
Nobody is talking this morning about the speech he gave, which is what I wish they were - that speech would do much to show people how serious he is on this. But it's gone now, and replaced by this stupidity. It makes me want to go out and pound my head against a brick wall.
Perhaps I have more faith in your President. I don't feel, with all his diplomatic experience and nouse that this was a casual throw away line added on a last minute whim. While those around him have tried to unspeak and spin talk for him, Biden has not explained, denied, backpedalled, or in any way watered down his statement yet has he?
I think he knew and considered the noise it would cause in the western media but felt the need to get that message to (specific?) people in Russia to encourage pressure for change from within.
To that end, it doesn't matter what people elsewhere are talking about. Stupidity may actually have been the smart beginning of showing the cornered rat's people their leader is really a squeaking trembling mouse (who is running out of real rat friends, tanks, soldiers, and soon food for all).
The White House has officially walked back the blurt. That's the president, speaking.
I sit corrected then.
Granting all of this, I would argue that this comment ultimately is likely to mean nothing to the average Russian. They already are totally committed to Putin, or totally opposed to Putin. Also, let's take into account that American intelligence has been very good--it may be worth asking if Biden says this if he really thinks Putin is going to cave in any way.
I think what makes Dr. Nichols worry - I know it's what makes me worry - about the president's blurt is the statement this morning from the Russian Defense Ministry that they will deploy nuclear weapons if the existence of the state is threatened. The question is, does Vladolf agree with Louis XIV that "l'etat c'est moi"? I think he might. He's already said that he can't imagine living in a world in which Russia does not have "its proper place," and given that he thinks its proper place is leading the Empire of Eurasia, that stretches from "Dublin to Vladivostok" in the words of his favorite political idiot, Dugin, well... I think you can see what worries me.
TC, I think that I'd like to have a chat with you. In case you missed it, this was on the forum today:
daria (MID)29 min ago·edited 8 min ago
Lest you forget, there are people on the left, on this very page who have threatened to do harm or wished bodily harm to another because of the difference of beliefs, they've called them ugly names, questioned another's right to make dissenting comments, even questioned their patriotism, declared them un-American. That behavior, too, begets violence and hatred. It ratchets up the temperature. The door swings both ways. Never forget that.
I'm not sure why Daria continues to subscribe to TAFM if that's her attitude. I'm not going to engage with her, and I hope you and everyone else won't either.
Yeah, I totally get what you're saying here Fern. And "quality over quantity" is always a good goal (which I should practice).
Very succinct and supportive. Thank you, TC.
It is exactly how Putin takes Biden's attack at a time in which he is suffering a crucial blow to a sense of his invincibility. Bidden 'gaffe' was provocative in the worse way. Putin won't forget it.
True, although that presumes that, as a narcissist and megalomaniac, he feels more vincible. Don't forget his buddy at Mar-A-Lago. They aren't THAT different.
I expect their alliance gets even stronger. Think about what Putin will execute for the mid-terms and presidential election. ' Four rockets hit the western Ukrainian city of Lviv on Saturday, local officials said, in the most significant attack on the city since the start of the war with Russia.'(Reuters) Russian military is getting closer and closer to Poland
Michael, I should not have used the word 'gaffe' for Biden's line closing his speech in Warsaw. It wasn't in the speech, but it came very convincingly from his heart. It was a colossal strategic mistake.. We were in serious danger before the speech. ___I'll write no more for now. Salud, Michael.
Almost everyone in the west has thought that. It's not likely to change the ponies and rainbows between Biden and Putin. The Pres has been extraordinary in managing NATO's response. Maybe he's dumb like a fox.
Heather Cox Richardson picked up on that too (in slightly more polite language lol):
“It’s not enough to speak with rhetorical flourish, of ennobling words of democracy, of freedom, equality, and liberty,” he said. “All of us…must do the hard work of democracy each and every day. My country as well.” His message “for all freedom-loving nations,” he said, is that “we must commit now to be in this fight for the long haul.” In the end, though, “the darkness that drives autocracy is ultimately no match for the flame of liberty that lights the souls of free people everywhere.” “We will have a different future—a brighter future rooted in democracy and principle, hope and light, of decency and dignity, of freedom and possibilities.”
“For God’s sake,” he said, “this man cannot remain in power.”
That last line seemed a logical conclusion to the argument Biden has been making about the struggle between democracy and autocracy, rallying democratic countries to stay unified against Putin as his troops smash Ukraine. But it prompted a flurry of media stories saying Biden had made a gaffe, changing his long-standing insistence that the U.S. is not engaging in regime change but rather is trying to defend Ukraine’s right to exist independently of Russia. A White House official clarified that “[t]he president’s point was that Putin cannot be allowed to exercise power over his neighbors or the region…. He was not discussing Putin’s power in Russia, or regime change.” Michael D. Shear and David E. Sanger of the New York Times noted that, however Biden meant the line, it underscored the difficulty of holding allies together against Putin while also avoiding an escalation of the war. not enough to speak with rhetorical flourish, of ennobling words of democracy, of freedom, equality, and liberty,” he said. “All of us…must do the hard work of democracy each and every day. My country as well.” His message “for all freedom-loving nations,” he said, is that “we must commit now to be in this fight for the long haul.” In the end, though, “the darkness that drives autocracy is ultimately no match for the flame of liberty that lights the souls of free people everywhere.” “We will have a different future—a brighter future rooted in democracy and principle, hope and light, of decency and dignity, of freedom and possibilities.”
This, too, shall pass? One can only hope so.