Someone explain sanctions to me?

Maybe you'd like something more martial in nature. Also a bit at the bottom about how countries are having to balance US demands for sanctions against their own self interest. How much are the Europeans willing to hurt themselves in the face of US bullying?
 
FluffyMcDeath said:
I have a question for you Wayne. Why do you think something needs to be done about Putin?
Click to expand...
I don't actually. He is doing the moves that WE should be doing to secure the future of his country. What pisses me off is Obama doing weak assed shit like "sanctions" which are completely seen as weak and embarrassing to the rest of the world.

I'd rather America have done nothing at all than to purposely appear weak as they did. All Obama has done by way of these "sanctions" (seen as nothing more than loud whining really) is to encourage Putin to continue or even expand his actions, confirming to him that we're never going to do anything about it...

Wayne
 
Glaucus said:
Apparently we can't ask that.
Click to expand...
The problem wasn't answering the question. My problem was that my real question was answered with a question, which is a non-answer and abrasively argumentative...

I wanted to know if anyone could tell me about why we're bothering doing sanctions in the first place. Instead, what I got was Robert laser-locking on the fact that I absolutely blame Obama and consider this whole situation yet another fuckup caused by his seriously shitty leadership...

It is my opinion that Putin would have never done the things he's done recently if there were real leadership in the White House. The fact that anything at all has to be done rests solely on a weak President, and rolling out the baby crying "sanctions" is little more than an effeminate man running up to a Hell's Angel type, lightly tapping his fists on the biker's chest while crying "you brute! you brute! You brute!".

Wayne
 
Wayne said:
The problem wasn't answering the question. My problem was that my real question was answered with a question, which is a non-answer and abrasively argumentative...
Click to expand...

This was the question you got in response:
As for sanctions, well, is "Puty" actually doing something that you would like to see "Barry" respond to and, if so, what form would you like that response to take?
Click to expand...

.That was my way of pointing out that your question needed clarified before it could be answered properly, regardless of who you blame for whatever.

I'm struggling to see how this was abrasively argumentative, especially since you've now answered it (more or less).
 
Wayne said:
It is my opinion that Putin would have never done the things he's done recently if there were real leadership in the White House. The fact that anything at all has to be done rests solely on a weak President, and rolling out the baby crying "sanctions" is little more than an effeminate man running up to a Hell's Angel type, lightly tapping his fists on the biker's chest while crying "you brute! you brute! You brute!".
Click to expand...
Puitin invaded Georgia while Bush, Cheney and neocons were in power. How do you explain that?
 
Glaucus said:
Puitin invaded Georgia while Bush, Cheney and neocons were in power. How do you explain that?
Click to expand...
I wouldn't call an activity over five years ago "recent", but I get the point you're trying to make. Putin didn't however decide to completely ignore the existing treaties back then. Only now, under weak, bumbling Barry...
 
Glaucus said:
Puitin invaded Georgia while Bush, Cheney and neocons were in power. How do you explain that?
Click to expand...

But not in the same way that America invaded Iraq. Russia sent troops in when Sack of Willies (without proper authorization from the US) attacked Ossetia. They pushed the Georgians back into Georgia, then they followed them part way in and busted up their new military based they'd got from US, and immediately thereafter left - and not resulting in the destruction of civil society, civilian infrastructure, a dispossessed population and the toppling of the regime. It is significantly different from conquest.
 
Wayne said:
It is my opinion that Putin would have never done the things he's done recently if there were real leadership in the White House.
Click to expand...
I am curious to know what you believe to be the "things" that Putin has done recently that the White House should be reacting to.
 
Glaucus said:
Wow fluffy, that's the most garbage you've written in one day for a while. Pretty good.
Click to expand...
Here. I've got a link for you on some of that financial stuff at least. Kind of pointless because it basically just says what I just said but at least this writer has been blessed by The Telegraph.
 
Actually, Russia was hit in the financial sector and it's gonna hurt. They can sign all the contracts they want, unless they get paid in full in advance, they'll have a hard time coming through on any of them. And that big gas deal they signed with China a while back? Russia is practically giving the gas away for free. It's these kinds of deals they'll be making to desperately keep afloat.

Here's a pretty good article explaining how things are shaking down for Russia. Vladimir Putin's pointless conflict with Europe leaves it a vassal of China

The Kremlin is counting on acquiescence from the BRICS quintet as it confronts the West, and counting on capital from China to offset the loss of Western money. This is a pipedream. China's Xi Jinping drove a brutal bargain in May on a future Gazprom pipeline, securing a price near $350 per 1,000 cubic metres that is barely above Russia's production costs.

Pieties aside, the two countries are rivals in central Asia, where China is systematically building pipelines that break Russia's stranglehold. China has large territorial claims on Far Eastern Russia, land seized from the Qing Dynasty in the 19th century.

Even if Mr Putin's strategy of a Euro-Asia alliance with China succeeds, it will reduce Russia to a vassal state of China, a supplier of commodities with a development model that dooms it to backwardness. "It is a dangerous illusion. We are witnessing the funeral of Russia,” said Aleksandr Kokh, a former top Kremlin official.
Click to expand...

The Russian state news will continue to do all it can to convince people that the sanctions will amount to nothing, and fluffs will parrot there here for our amusement, but those sanctions will cause some serious damage to Russia. This is the beginning of the end for Putin.
 
Putin isn't in conflict with Europe. The US is in conflict with Putin. Putin is as able to avoid the conflict as Saddam was. It's the same pattern. The goal is regime change and if sanctions don't work or they do but not fast enough the US will go to war.
 
Glaucus said:
Actually, Russia was hit in the financial sector and it's gonna hurt. They can sign all the contracts they want, unless they get paid in full in advance, they'll have a hard time coming through on any of them.
Click to expand...

I think you've missed the point of these deals. Russia won't be able to borrow Euros, Yen or Dollars. These trades they are setting up don't require any of those currencies. They can be transacted outside of the US ability to stop them.
Russia will still get Euros for it's gas (it doesn't really want dollars) and when Russia stops being able to buy from people that really need to sell to it in dollars, those people will have to find other currencies which means less demand for dollars.Falling dollar demand is an existential threat.

The collapse of Russia and China are such important goals for the US (PNAC) that they are willing to gamble the dollar and ultimately they can back the whole thing up with nukes if it comes to that. Yes, there is brinkmanship going on here.

Russia has yet to actually engage in any regime change in the two decades that the US has been going on a regime change bender (both by USAID/NED and IMF and when that doesn't work, war). Russia's propaganda machine didn't make the US invade all those countries. And Russia's propaganda machine doesn't have every channel of our media the way the neocons (by which I mean all those who ascribe to US global supremacy doctrine) do.
 
Glaucus said:
The Russian state news will continue to do all it can to convince people that the sanctions will amount to nothing, and fluffs will parrot there here for our amusement, but those sanctions will cause some serious damage to Russia. This is the beginning of the end for Putin.
Click to expand...

I tend to agree with you that it is the beginning of the end but it's more about what the US wants than what Putin can do. This feels a lot like back in the day arguing with Tigger. In those days you were against the war on Iraq and I see now that a large part of that was because Canadian news was significantly at odds with US news. These days that problem has been fixed and we march in lock step thanks to the fact that they have our Prime Minister to smooth the way for them. He is a very un-Candanian Prime Minister and he has really carried water for the neocons after they lost power - but also he has cut the nuts off our national broadcaster while "internationalists" have gained more of our news outlets.

Putin ultimately won't stand a chance because there is too much power against him. The news is full of innuendo and secret intelligence which can't be shared with us and we, rather than insisting it be shown or we reserve the right to not believe, merely accept that Putin is hiding weapons of mass destruction/gassing his own people/etc.

Meanwhile we look the other way while the rebels in Donbass are bombed by their own government, rebels which, if they were fighting a government we didn't agree with we would lobby the UN for a "no-fly zone" that we could bomb from in order to help them. There is no right and wrong, only power and Putin doesn't have as much of it as the US.

So, once the US owns the entire world, do you think they will decide it's OK to stop spying on everyone and go back to respecting people's rights? I'm not convinced. I feel better in a multipolar rather than a monopolar world, but that is what this is really about. We support monsters far worse than Putin but they are obedient monsters and Putin ... too independent.
 
Here's something about sanctions.
The Dutch.
The Fench.
The Poles.

Food is perishable. These guys need to sell it now or, considering margins in food production, go under. that will leave a lot of banks holding bad debt.
Maybe the US can pitch in and just buy all the stuff. That would be the sporting thing to do since they want the sanctions. Of course, the food producers in the US don't want this stuff to come across the ocean and depress local prices. Maybe those products can be exported to places that regularly import such things from the US, get better prices from the Europeans instead.
Meanwhile the Russians will have to make do with importing fruit from former satellites with whom they want to strengthen trade. On the flip side, Russian producers just might be better off though the people might have to cut back on fruit for this year.

And here's where the European Central Bank decides that an already delicate EU economy requires printing more money. They kind of need to create sufficient inflation to counteract plunging produce prices I guess. This is all preferable to simple telling the US to screw off and fight its own battles.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top