Youtube comments of This Channel (@thischannel1071).
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This video's information is out of date and is pushing discredited conspiracy theories.
Navalny's 'Putin's palace' claim has already fallen apart as the owner of the property has come forward (since over a week ago) and said they're developing it into a hotel that will open in 12 - 18 months. Other Russian journalists have visited and toured the property and filmed all the rooms on the inside, and they're all bare concrete, without any of the lavish decorations Navalny claimed there to be.
Following Navalny's poisoning and his 'Putin's palace' video, Navalny's trust-rating in Russia is at 5%, while Putin's latest approval rating is standing at 64% - according to US-funded Levada Centre (which is branded a foreign agent in Russia because it is US-funded).
https://twitter.com/Malinka1102/status/1357415295800004611
Navalny is a proud, far-right, anti-immigrant nationalist who is extremely xenophobic and has made racist comments, including celebrating the Holocaust by calling for a toast to it at an event in Moscow. He has also compared immigrants to tooth-rot and claimed they need to be deported to save Russia. He has also compared Muslims to cockroaches that need exterminating by shooting them.
https://youtu.be/DRP37r0Faao "Become a nationalist, deport immigrants!"
Navalny also says that to live in Russia a person must become a "true Russian", whatever that means. And he says that Crimea is rightfully a part of Russia and he wouldn't give it back if he were Russia's president - which is appropriate, but this view again shows that he is merely used as a convenient tool of the West, while he doesn't share the West's goals other than the goal of deposing Putin.
In short, the video is capitalizing on discredited conspiracy theories. Navalny's image as a champion of the people is entirely a Western propaganda construct. Navalny isn't feared by Russia's government. His sentencing is a result of a French cosmetics company accusing Navalny and his brother of embezzling $400,000 from the company. The French company, Yves Rocher, has said they stand by the charges and Russia's sentencing process.
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The video is filled with false information, though.
Navalny is a proud, far-right, anti-immigrant nationalist who is extremely xenophobic and has made racist comments, including celebrating the Holocaust by calling for a toast to it at an event in Moscow. He has also compared immigrants to tooth-rot and claimed they need to be deported to save Russia. He has also compared Muslims to cockroaches that need exterminating by shooting them.
https://youtu.be/DRP37r0Faao "Become a nationalist, deport immigrants!"
Navalny's 'Putin's palace' claim has already fallen apart as the owner of the property has come forward (since over a week ago) and said they're developing it into a hotel that will open in 12 - 18 months. Other Russian journalists have visited and toured the property and filmed all the rooms on the inside, and they're all bare concrete, without any of the lavish decorations Navalny claimed there to be.
Following Navalny's poisoning and his 'Putin's palace' video, Navalny's trust-rating in Russia is at 5%, while Putin's latest approval rating is standing at 64% - according to US-funded Levada Centre (which is branded a foreign agent in Russia because it is US-funded).
https://twitter.com/Malinka1102/status/1357415295800004611
Navalny also says that to live in Russia a person must become a "true Russian", whatever that means. And he says that Crimea is rightfully a part of Russia and he wouldn't give it back if he were Russia's president - which is appropriate, but this view again shows that he is merely used as a convenient tool of the West, while he doesn't share the West's goals other than the goal of deposing Putin.
In short, the video is capitalizing on discredited conspiracy theories. Navalny's image as a champion of the people is entirely a Western propaganda construct. Navalny isn't feared by Russia's government. His sentencing is a result of a French cosmetics company accusing Navalny and his brother of embezzling $400,000 from the company. The French company, Yves Rocher, has said they stand by the charges and Russia's sentencing process.
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The video is filled with disinfo, though.
Navalny is a proud, far-right, anti-immigrant nationalist who is extremely xenophobic and has made racist comments, including celebrating the Holocaust by calling for a toast to it at an event in Moscow, comparing immigrants to tooth-rot and claiming they need to be deported to save Russia, and comparing Muslims to cockroaches that need exterminating by shooting them.
https://youtu.be/DRP37r0Faao "Become a nationalist, deport immigrants!"
Navalny's 'Putin's palace' claim has already fallen apart as the owner of the property has come forward (since over a week ago) and said they're developing it into a hotel that will open in 12 - 18 months. Other Russian journalists have visited and toured the property and filmed all the rooms on the inside, and they're all bare concrete, without any of the lavish decorations Navalny claimed there to be.
Following Navalny's poisoning and his 'Putin's palace' video, Navalny's trust-rating in Russia is at 5%, while Putin's latest approval rating is standing at 64% - according to US-funded Levada Centre (which is branded a foreign agent in Russia because it is US-funded).
https://twitter.com/Malinka1102/status/1357415295800004611
Navalny also says that to live in Russia a person must become a "true Russian", whatever that means. And he says that Crimea is rightfully a part of Russia and he wouldn't give it back if he were Russia's president - which is appropriate, but this view again shows that he is merely used as a convenient tool of the West, while he doesn't share the West's goals other than the depose Putin.
In short, the video is capitalizing on discredited conspiracy theories. Navalny's image as a champion of the people is entirely a Western propaganda construct. Navalny isn't feared by Russia's government. His sentencing is a result of a French cosmetics company accusing Navalny and his brother of embezzling $400,000 from the company. The French company, Yves Rocher, has said they stand by the charges and Russia's sentencing process.
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@marasm5258 Because he's not mindless. He gave the girl encouragement and understanding rather than a personal opinion. Just saying 'Yes' or 'No' would be silly.
Just a heads-up for people: The accounts "White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo", and probably others, are all operated by the same person who pretends to be different people with them. They are extremely aggressive, impulsive, can be stalking, and difficult to explain things to. And they have no restraint or compunction against making lies of any size, big or small, even when you'd think it's impossible for them to not know that you know that they're lying. They don't accept correction and are unyielding in their initial insistence. I believe this is because they are on the spectrum.
This person has been extremely sensitive to any talk about Ukraine's large troll farm program and can spend an entire day, more than 10 hours straight, non-stop, saying the same inane or whitewashing comment about it. In general, they mentally block-out all information that doesn't tell them what they want to hear, no matter how inarguably and demonstrably factual it is. They will also pretend they didn't get answers they received to their questions just so that they can continue to badger someone with the already-answered question and pretend with themselves that they're "owning" someone for not getting an answer. It is as detached from reality and normal sanity as it sounds.
With each of their accounts, they show the same very poor English grammar and phrasing, and are sometimes completely unintelligible - especially when they become upset. Yet, even when they're at their very most incoherent, as in, posting fully unintelligible gibberish, they maintain an insistence that they're speaking perfect English. When they spend more time working out a post they can make it appear a bit more normal, though there's typically always some oddities in their writing style. Again, I believe they are on the spectrum and that their behaviour is a result of that.
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Just because someone makes a video doesn't mean the video is factual. And this video is filled with disinfo.
Navalny is a proud, far-right, anti-immigrant nationalist who is extremely xenophobic and has made racist comments, including celebrating the Holocaust by calling for a toast to it at an event in Moscow, comparing immigrants to tooth-rot and claiming they need to be deported to save Russia, and comparing Muslims to cockroaches that need exterminating by shooting them.
https://youtu.be/DRP37r0Faao "Become a nationalist, deport immigrants!"
Navalny's 'Putin's palace' claim has already fallen apart as the owner of the property has come forward (since over a week ago) and said they're developing it into a hotel that will open in 12 - 18 months. Other Russian journalists have visited and toured the property and filmed all the rooms on the inside, and they're all bare concrete, without any of the lavish decorations Navalny claimed there to be.
Following Navalny's poisoning and his 'Putin's palace' video, Navalny's trust-rating in Russia is at 5%, while Putin's latest approval rating is standing at 64% - according to US-funded Levada Centre (which is branded a foreign agent in Russia because it is US-funded).
https://twitter.com/Malinka1102/status/1357415295800004611
Navalny also says that to live in Russia a person must become a "true Russian", whatever that means. And he says that Crimea is rightfully a part of Russia and he wouldn't give it back if he were Russia's president - which is appropriate, but this view again shows that he is merely used as a convenient tool of the West, while he doesn't share the West's goals other than the depose Putin.
In short, the video is capitalizing on discredited conspiracy theories. Navalny's image as a champion of the people is entirely a Western propaganda construct. Navalny isn't feared by Russia's government. His sentencing is a result of a French cosmetics company accusing Navalny and his brother of embezzling $400,000 from the company. The French company, Yves Rocher, has said they stand by the charges and Russia's sentencing process.
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The reason Navalny was arrested upon his return to Russia is because he was serving that suspended prison sentence for embezzlement charges made by French cosmetics company, Yves Rocher. And the European Court of Human Rights, which ruled that Navalny and his brother's trial wasn't fair also dismissed Navalny's appeal that the charges were politically motivated.
While Navalny was in Germany receiving treatment, Russia's Penitentiary Service didn't require Navalny to adhere to their probation term which required him to check-in twice a month. But after he was discharged from the German hospital, and after the hospital published a report saying Navalny was fully recovered, Russia's Penitentiary Service told Navalny that he had to return to Russia and check-in again, otherwise he would be arrested upon his return to Russia and might have his suspended sentence turned into a prison sentence. Navalny chose to ignore the warning and stayed out of Russia a week or so beyond the date he was required to return. So, as he had been told would happen, he was arrested. And in his sentencing hearing, the German hospital's report of Navalny's full recovery was cited as evidence against Navalny's claim he couldn't have returned sooner.
Do you know what happens in the US when you skip bail and violate the terms of a suspended sentence? You're arrested and your suspended sentence is changed into a prison sentence. And as Navalny is a high-profile person, any exception made for him (and I don't know why he'd get an exception in this case) would affect Russia's prison authority's ability to apply their rules to others.
The depiction of Navalny as a champion of Russians is a Western propaganda construct. following his poisoning, Levada Centre reports his approval rating soared to 20%, while his disapproval rating also soared to 50%.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-politics-navalny-idUSKBN26N1Z9
Here's an article on a Spanish-Jewish site featuring various anti-Semitic and anti-immigrant quotes made by Navalny:
https://itongadol.com/noticias/73171-moscow-mayor-hopeful-raises-jewish-fears-with-anti-semitic-remarks
And here's an undercover video recently released showing Navalny's top aide requesting $20 million in funding from a UK intel officer.
https://www.rt.com/russia/514291-navalny-aide-funding-alleged-british-spy/
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The video is filled with false information, though.
Navalny is a proud, far-right, anti-immigrant nationalist who is extremely xenophobic and has made racist comments, including celebrating the Holocaust by calling for a toast to it at an event in Moscow, comparing immigrants to tooth-rot and claiming they need to be deported to save Russia, and comparing Muslims to cockroaches that need exterminating by shooting them.
https://youtu.be/DRP37r0Faao "Become a nationalist, deport immigrants!"
Navalny's 'Putin's palace' claim has already fallen apart as the owner of the property has come forward (since over a week ago, I think) and said they're developing it into a hotel that will open in 12 - 18 months. Other Russian journalists have visited and toured the property and filmed all the rooms on the inside, and they're all bare concrete, without any of the lavish decorations Navalny claimed there to be.
Following Navalny's poisoning and 'Putin's palace' video, Navalny's trust-rating in Russia is at 5%, while Putin's latest approval rating is standing at 64% - according to US-funded Levada Centre.
https://twitter.com/Malinka1102/status/1357415295800004611
Navalny also says that to live in Russia a person must become a "true Russian", whatever that means. And he says that Crimea is rightfully a part of Russia and he wouldn't give it back if he were Russia's president - which is appropriate, but this view again shows that he is merely used as a convenient tool of the West, while he doesn't share the West's goals other than the depose Putin.
In short, the video is capitalizing on discredited conspiracy theories. Navalny's image as a champion of the people is entirely a Western propaganda construct. Navalny isn't feared by Russia's government. His sentencing is a result of a French cosmetics company accusing Navalny and his brother of embezzling $400,000 from the company. The French company, Yves Rocher, has said they stand by the charges and Russia's sentencing process.
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I would say that 80%+ of Johnny’s video is extremely-false information, and that it seems as though he started ‘researching’ just 2 weeks ago, and mostly just read some NYT articles (as an example of an outlet which never utters an honest word regarding anything related to Russia) and picked-up on some sneering anti-Putin conspiracy theories online, and then assumed he had it all worked out filled in the gaps with his imagination and put the concoction he’d come-up with into video form.
This isn't a matter of opinion and point-of-view, his video is primarily based in false ideas and narratives, of the sort that's inventive hearsay spread among sneering detractors. It’s largely opposite to the facts and is instead very sensationalist through sacrificing important facts.
Johnny claims that Navalny was arrested upon his return to Russia from recovering in Germany on "some old fake set of charges brought against him years ago that were thrown out later, they were totally fake". None of that is at-all true. The charges of embezzlement, brought by French cosmetics company Yves Rocher, were not fake and they weren't thrown-out - hence he had a suspended sentence. Navalny brought a complaint about the charges to the European Court of Human Rights, and the ECHR decided that the ruling against Navalny and his brother had been "arbitrary and manifestly unreasonable", but the ECHR didn't throw out the charges nor did they have the authority to. Additionally, the ECHR heard Navalny's appeal to have the charges construed as politically-motivated, but the ECHR dismissed Navalny's appeal of that. So, when he later calls Navalny's sentencing "politically-motivated", he's asserting something that wasn't deemed to be the case by the ECHR.
He also says that the pretext for Navalny's arrest was that he violated his parole terms, and he adds, "Turns-out he couldn't report to parole, officers, because he was in a coma from being poisoned by the Russian government". That's a lie which I believe is absolutely impossible for him to not have known was a lie when he made his video, because Navalny only had to return and check-in with the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service by the end of his probation period, on December 29th. But Navalny was discharged from the German hospital on September 23rd. That's over 3 months of difference, where Navalny wasn't in a coma and wasn't hospitalized. Further, the German hospital made a report mid-December stating that Navalny had recovered - and that report was cited during his sentencing hearing to show that he was able to return and check-in despite him not doing so.
Not that Navalny needed to be reminded of his parole terms for it to be legally binding, he's an adult who is responsible for himself and not a child, but Russia's Penitentiary Service did give him a last-minute warning that he had to return to make the final check-in otherwise he would be arrested upon his return to Russia. For the 4 months he'd been away in Germany, including all the time he was in a coma and for a very long time after that, Navalny's not-checking-in twice a month as his parole conditions required wasn't held against him and was never even mentioned as leverage against him in any way.
Russia's Federal Penitentiary Service could have required Navalny to return to Russia sooner, but the only check-in Navalny was absolutely required to do was the final one, by December 29th. Navalny knew that, but he chose to stay in Germany for 2.5 weeks beyond that date.
Do you know what happens in the US when you skip probation and violate the terms of a suspended sentence? You're arrested and your suspended sentence is changed into a prison sentence. And as Navalny is a high-profile person, any exception made for him (and I don't know why he'd get an exception in this case beyond the unofficial exemption from having to check-in while he was recovering in Germany) would affect Russia's prison authority's ability to apply their rules to others.
Just some select other issues I have with his video are these, though there are also others that I'm not listing here:
His video doesn't mention the corruption scandals Navalny has been embroiled in, his racism and fierce xenophobia, the fact that 5,000 or a few times that number of protesters, and around 1,000 protesters arrested in the Moscow metropolitan area, the population of which is over 20 million, is statistically insignificant, or that Navalny's top aide was recorded seeking $20 million in funding from UK spies offering billions of 'you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours' payback when Navalny becomes Russia's president - which has been a serious goal of Navalny's even though Johnny downplayed it in his video.
What he said about Novichok, who has developed it, the idea that it's a signature, is also 100% false and more of a cartoonish kind of an imaginative narrative. Many countries, including the US, UK, Czech, Iran, and others, have made Novichok, and the US took over the USSR's supplies of Novichok in 1991 when the US was responsible for the dismantling of the USSR's Uzbekistan chemical facilities where Novichok was made and stored. The US showed interest in patenting weaponized Novichok in 2015, and held discussions with Russia on the matter. The method to create Novichok was put into a book by its creator that is publicly available and can be purchased through Amazon. Novichok is not prohibitively difficult to make and the former head of the OPCW and many chemical experts have refuted the claim otherwise. I could expand a huge amount on this topic alone in a standalone post.
Bluntly, his video is either horrendously under-researched, or it's lying and deliberate propaganda. I'm shocked by the number of false claims and deferrals to conspiracy theories and cartoon visions that are contained in it. This isn't something anyone who considers themselves to be a journalist should be doing. And it certainly isn’t anything worth praising. The fact that it is convincing people of complete falsehoods makes it all the worse.
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@epiclouislive4991 Ukraine has been waging war against ethnic-Russians, including Russian-citizen-holding ethnic-Russians, in eastern Ukraine for the past 8 years. And in response to Russia finally recognising those regions' independence, after Kiev had refused for 8 years to implement the Minsk agreements, Ukraine threatened to review its commitment to being a non-nuclear state (meaning Ukraine was contemplating acquiring nukes). That comment, of course, was aimed at Russia. And in the years before that, neo-Nazism was flourishing in Ukraine, and Ukraine's neo-Nazis don't regard Russians as humans.
This topic is a lot more complex and there's a lot more unscrupulous actions from the West behind it than what has been hinted at in our news media's reporting. Did you know that the US, UK, and Canada have been knowingly training neo-Nazis in Ukraine, so they would fight (and kill) ethnic-Russians in eastern Ukraine?
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@omggom2488 As you request. I hope you'll read my response detailing significant false information in Johnny's video. And there's far more that I haven't addressed here.
I would say that 80%+ of Johnny’s video is extremely-false information, and that it seems as though he started ‘researching’ just 2 weeks ago, and mostly just read some NYT articles (as an example of an outlet which never utters an honest word regarding anything related to Russia) and picked-up on some sneering anti-Putin conspiracy theories online, and then assumed he had it all worked out filled in the gaps with his imagination and put the concoction he’d come-up with into video form.
This isn't a matter of opinion and point-of-view, his video is primarily based in false ideas and narratives, of the sort that's inventive hearsay spread among sneering detractors. It’s largely opposite to the facts and is instead very sensationalist through sacrificing important facts.
Here are just a few examples of his ignorance or lies, whichever they may be.
Johnny claims that Navalny was arrested upon his return to Russia from recovering in Germany on "some old fake set of charges brought against him years ago that were thrown out later, they were totally fake". None of that is at-all true. The charges of embezzlement, brought by French cosmetics company Yves Rocher, were not fake and they weren't thrown-out - hence he had a suspended sentence. Navalny brought a complaint about the charges to the European Court of Human Rights, and the ECHR decided that the ruling against Navalny and his brother had been "arbitrary and manifestly unreasonable", but the ECHR didn't throw out the charges nor did they have the authority to. Additionally, the ECHR heard Navalny's appeal to have the charges construed as politically-motivated, but the ECHR dismissed Navalny's appeal of that. So, when he later calls Navalny's sentencing "politically-motivated", he's asserting something that wasn't deemed to be the case by the ECHR.
He also says that the pretext for Navalny's arrest was that he violated his parole terms, and he adds, "Turns-out he couldn't report to parole, officers, because he was in a coma from being poisoned by the Russian government". That's a lie which I believe is absolutely impossible for him to not have known was a lie when he made his video, because Navalny only had to return and check-in with the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service by the end of his probation period, on December 29th. But Navalny was discharged from the German hospital on September 23rd. That's over 3 months of difference, where Navalny wasn't in a coma and wasn't hospitalized. Further, the German hospital made a report mid-December stating that Navalny had recovered - and that report was cited during his sentencing hearing to show that he was able to return and check-in despite him not doing so.
Not that Navalny needed to be reminded of his parole terms for it to be legally binding, he's an adult who is responsible for himself and not a child, but Russia's Penitentiary Service did give him a last-minute warning that he had to return to make the final check-in otherwise he would be arrested upon his return to Russia. For the 4 months he'd been away in Germany, including all the time he was in a coma and for a very long time after that, Navalny's not-checking-in twice a month as his parole conditions required wasn't held against him and was never even mentioned as leverage against him in any way.
Russia's Federal Penitentiary Service could have required Navalny to return to Russia sooner, but the only check-in Navalny was absolutely required to do was the final one, by December 29th. Navalny knew that, but he chose to stay in Germany for 2.5 weeks beyond that date.
Do you know what happens in the US when you skip probation and violate the terms of a suspended sentence? You're arrested and your suspended sentence is changed into a prison sentence. And as Navalny is a high-profile person, any exception made for him (and I don't know why he'd get an exception in this case beyond the unofficial exemption from having to check-in while he was recovering in Germany) would affect Russia's prison authority's ability to apply their rules to others.
Just some select other issues I have with his video are these, though there are lots of others that I'm not listing here:
His video doesn't mention the corruption scandals Navalny has been embroiled in, his racism and fierce xenophobia, the fact that 5,000 or a few times that number of protesters, and around 1,000 protesters arrested in the Moscow metropolitan area, the population of which is over 20 million, is statistically insignificant, or that Navalny's top aide was recorded seeking $20 million in funding from UK spies offering billions of 'you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours' payback when Navalny becomes Russia's president - which has been a serious goal of Navalny's even though Johnny downplayed it in his video.
What he said about Novichok, who has developed it, the idea that it's a signature, is also 100% false and more of a cartoonish kind of an imaginative narrative. Many countries, including the US, UK, Czech, Iran, and others, have made Novichok, and the US took over the USSR's supplies of Novichok in 1991 when the US was responsible for the dismantling of the USSR's Uzbekistan chemical facilities where Novichok was made and stored. The US showed interest in patenting weaponized Novichok in 2015, and held discussions with Russia on the matter. The method to create Novichok was put into a book by its creator that is publicly available and can be purchased through Amazon. Novichok is not prohibitively difficult to make and the former head of the OPCW and many chemical experts have refuted the claim otherwise. I could expand a huge amount on this topic alone in a standalone post.
Bluntly, his video is either horrendously under-researched, or it's lying and deliberate propaganda. I'm shocked by the number of false claims and deferrals to conspiracy theories and cartoon visions that are contained in it. This isn't something anyone who considers themselves to be a journalist should be doing. And it certainly isn’t anything worth praising. The fact that it is convincing people of complete falsehoods makes it all the worse.
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But you apparently didn't see through this video's lies. The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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There is much disinfo in your video. Navalny is a far-right proud anti-immigrant nationalist who is extremely xenophobic and has made racist comments, including celebrating the Holocaust by calling for a toast to it at an event in Moscow, comparing immigrants to tooth-rot and claiming they need to be deported to save Russia, and comparing Muslims to cockroaches that need exterminating by shooting them.
https://youtu.be/DRP37r0Faao "Become a nationalist, deport immigrants!"
Navalny's 'Putin's palace' claim has already fallen apart as the owner of the property has come forward (since over a week ago, I think) and said they're developing it into a hotel that will open in 12 - 18 months. Other Russian journalists have visited and toured the property and filmed all the rooms on the inside, and they're all bare concrete, without any of the lavish decorations Navalny claimed there to be.
Following Navalny's poisoning and 'Putin's palace' video, Navalny's trust-rating in Russia is at 5%, while Putin's latest approval rating is standing at 64% - according to US-funded Levada Centre.
https://twitter.com/Malinka1102/status/1357415295800004611
Navalny also says that to live in Russia a person must become a "true Russian", whatever that means. And he says that Crimea is rightfully a part of Russia and he wouldn't give it back if he were Russia's president - which is appropriate, but this view again shows that he is merely used as a convenient tool of the West, while he doesn't share the West's goals other than the depose Putin.
In short, your video is capitalizing on discredited conspiracy theories. Navalny's image as a champion of the people is entirely a Western propaganda construct. Navalny isn't feared by Russia's government. His sentencing is a result of a French cosmetics company accusing Navalny and his brother of embezzling $400,000 from the company. The French company, Yves Rocher, has said they stand by the charges and Russia's sentencing process.
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@expirednachos Hi Lili. For a decent answer to your question, please see the post I just made right above this one. I could post a lot more, too. But YT will only let me include so much text and links before comments disappear. In addition to that comment, read this Jewish
https://itongadol.com/noticias/73171-moscow-mayor-hopeful-raises-jewish-fears-with-anti-semitic-remarks
Alexei Navalny, the so-called "defender of Russian democracy" known in the West for his opposition to President Vladimir Putin and who is running for Mayor of Moscow in the September 8 election, is raising fear and concern among Jews and other minorities in the capital with his anti-Semitic and xenophobic remarks.
In a party celebrating the anniversary of the newspaper The New Times, the 37-year-old Russian blogger suggested that they "make the first toast for the Holocaust"; he referred to religious Jews in his blog as: "dandies in fox hats and rags" and stated that "whoever wants to live in Russia has to become Russian – in the full sense of the word."
Calling for total foreigner cleansing, Navalny’s supporters threatened Jews and other minorities, who are afraid to openly come out against the candidate.
Jews are not the only ethnic minority on the "liberal candidate\’s" mind. In a video distributed in Moscow, he identifies dark skinned Caucasians as cockroaches and states that: though one can kill cockroaches with a shoe, when it comes to human beings, I recommend using a gun."
Alexei Navalny who regularly insists on taking part in the nationalistic demonstration "Russian Marsh" (Ruskiy Marsh), has incited the skinheads in the marsh, by elaborating his ideas on immigrants and foreigners in the country. He declared: "This is our country, and it is our duty to eliminate all the crooks who suck our blood … All immigrants are like dental caries, destroying the Russian public. There is no need to hit anybody – whoever is in our way will be deported by a strong hand. There is a need for full cleansing/disinfection."
When accused of being a dangerous nationalist, Navalny stated: "nationalism is dangerous only when it is in underground – when it is part of the government it becomes more moderate," adding that "the mayor of Rome is also a neo – fascist and so far, there were no pogroms in the city.’’
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Hi. I would say that the large majority of Johnny's video is false information. And I've made some responses to him that I hope he reads concerning inaccurate statements in the video. I'll included part of what I've mentioned to him below, after I mention a couple of other points.
Following Navalny's poisoning and 'Putin's palace' video, the owner of the property has come forward to say that they are developing it into a hotel which will open in 12 - 18 months. And after the Navalny video released, US-funded pollster Levada Centre surveyed Russians of their views concerning the video and reported that just 17% of Russians believe the claims in the video, while Navalny is considered trustworthy by just 5% of Russia's population. Levada also reports Putin's current domestic support level to be 64%.
Here is part of one of my responses to Johnny, detailing just a few issues I've found with the claims in his video:
"You claim that Navalny was arrested upon his return to Russia from recovering in Germany on "some old fake set of charges brought against him years ago that were thrown out later, they were totally fake". None of that is at-all true. The charges of embezzlement, brought by French cosmetics company Yves Rocher, were not fake and they weren't thrown-out - hence he had a suspended sentence. Navalny brought a complaint about the charges to the European Court of Human Rights, and the ECHR decided that the ruling against Navalny and his brother had been "arbitrary and manifestly unreasonable", but the ECHR didn't throw out the charges nor did they have the authority to. Additionally, the ECHR heard Navalny's appeal to have the charges construed as politically-motivated, but the ECHR dismissed Navalny's appeal of that. So, when you later call Navalny's sentencing "politically-motivated", you're asserting something that wasn't deemed to be the case.
You also say that the pretext for Navalny's arrest was that he violated his parole terms, and you add, "Turns-out he couldn't report to parole, officers, because he was in a coma from being poisoned by the Russian government". That's a lie which I believe is absolutely impossible for you to not have known was a lie when you made your video, because Navalny only had to return and check-in with the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service by the end of his probation period, on December 29th. But Navalny was discharged from the German hospital on September 23rd. That's over 3 months of difference, where Navalny wasn't in a coma and wasn't hospitalized. Further, the German hospital made a report mid-December stating that Navalny had recovered - and that report was cited during his sentencing hearing to show that he was able to return and check-in despite him not doing so.
Not that Navalny needed to be reminded of his parole terms for it to be legally binding, he's an adult who is responsible for himself and not a child, but Russia's Penitentiary Service did give him a last-minute warning that he had to return to make the final check-in otherwise he would be arrested upon his return to Russia. For the 4 months he'd been away in Germany, including all the time he was in a coma and for a very long time after that, Navalny's not-checking-in twice a month as his parole conditions required wasn't held against him and was never even mentioned as leverage against him in any way.
Russia's Federal Penitentiary Service could have required Navalny to return to Russia sooner, but the only check-in Navalny was absolutely required to do was the final one, by December 29th. Navalny knew that, but he chose to stay in Germany for 2.5 weeks beyond that date.
Do you know what happens in the US when you skip probation and violate the terms of a suspended sentence? You're arrested and your suspended sentence is changed into a prison sentence. And as Navalny is a high-profile person, any exception made for him (and I don't know why he'd get an exception in this case beyond the unofficial exemption from having to check-in while he was recovering in Germany) would affect Russia's prison authority's ability to apply their rules to others.
Just some select other issues I have with your video are these, though there are also some others that I'm not listing here:
Your video also doesn't mention the corruption scandals Navalny has been embroiled in, his racism and fierce xenophobia, the fact that 5,000 or a few times that number of protesters, and around 1,000 protesters arrested in the Moscow metropolitan area, the population of which is over 20 million, is statistically insignificant, or that Navalny's top aide was recorded seeking $20 million in funding from UK spies offering billions of 'you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours' payback when Navalny becomes Russia's president - which has been a serious goal of Navalny's even though you downplayed it in your video.
What you said about Novichok, who's developed it, the idea that it's a signature, is also 100% false and more of that child's kind of a cartoonish narrative. Many countries, including the US, UK, Czech, Iran, and others, have made Novichok, and the US took over the USSR's supplies of Novichok in 1991 when the US was responsible for the dismantling of the USSR's Uzbekistan chemical facilities where Novichok was made and stored. The US showed interest in patenting weaponized Novichok in 2015, and held discussions with Russia on the matter. The method to create Novichok was put into a book by its creator that is publicly available and can be purchased through Amazon. Novichok is not prohibitively difficult to make and the former head of the OPCW and many chemical experts have refuted the claim otherwise. I could expand a huge amount on this topic alone in a standalone post (whether I'm going to I'm yet undecided)."
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Just a heads-up for people: The accounts "White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo", and probably others, are all operated by the same person who pretends to be different people with them. They are extremely aggressive, impulsive, can be stalking, and difficult to explain things to. And they have no restraint or compunction against making lies of any size, big or small, even when you'd think it's impossible for them to not know that you know that they're lying. They don't accept correction and are unyielding in their initial insistence. I believe this is because they are on the spectrum.
This person has been extremely sensitive to any talk about Ukraine's large troll farm program and can spend an entire day, more than 10 hours straight, non-stop, saying the same inane or whitewashing comment about it. In general, they mentally block-out all information that doesn't tell them what they want to hear, no matter how inarguably and demonstrably factual it is. They will also pretend they didn't get answers they received to their questions just so that they can continue to badger someone with the already-answered question and pretend with themselves that they're "owning" someone for not getting an answer. It is as detached from reality and normal sanity as it sounds.
With each of their accounts, they show the same very poor English grammar and phrasing, and are sometimes completely unintelligible - especially when they become upset. Yet, even when they're at their very most incoherent, as in, posting fully unintelligible gibberish, they maintain an insistence that they're speaking perfect English. When they spend more time working out a post they can make it appear a bit more normal, though there's typically always some oddities in their writing style. Again, I believe they are on the spectrum and that their behaviour is a result of that.
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@gazonchek8116 "In Russia, we have a company owned by Russian oligarchs that paid money to people like this to create the right opinion on the internet."
Sadly, that's normal everywhere. Israel's government has employed troll farms since 2008. In the US, since 2011, the US government spends $200 million per year on troll farms to do the same thing. The DNC also has their own troll farms. Canada has had troll farms since 2011. The UK government has a variety of aggressive troll farms and their online-discussion-disruption field guide leaked back in 2014, and what it instructs UK trolls to do is nasty. Ukraine has a large troll farm. Poland, China, and many other countries also have troll farms.
So, that "rabbit hole" you mentioned isn't unique to Russia, it's a widespread issue - and it was pioneered by Israel, the US, and Canada, and not Russia. Russia only started doing what the West and Israel were doing first.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/mar/17/us-spy-operation-social-networks
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@fsho5260 What I've said isn't irrelevant. It shows:
- That Navalny's 'Putin's palace' story is already being credibly discredited
- That the Russian people don't trust Navalny (so, why should you?), with only 5% considering him trustworthy
- That the Russian people don't buy into Navalny's 'Putin's palace' story (so, why should you?)
- That Navalny's claim of being persecuted on political grounds isn't supported because there are legitimate grounds for what is happening, and the EUCR dismissed Navalny's appeal that the Yves Rocher charges against him are politically motivated
- That Navalny isn't the hero he's depicted as in Western propaganda media, so reporting which presents him as what he isn't should be suspect in all of its claims, because it is unreliable
One of the links I posted above deals with the issue of whether Russians think Putin is as corrupts as Navalny alleges. And, guess what? They don't give any special credence to his his claims - and why should they, given the track-record of Navalny's claims, and the fact his 'Putin's palace' story is already seemingly falling apart?
"Almost a third of those polled (29%) believe that Vladimir Putin has never abused his power. Another 24% are sure that even if such accusations are true, the country began to live better under him. 17% believe that Vladimir Putin is definitely guilty of abuses, 25% - that he is guilty as much as other high-ranking officials. "
By the way, it's likely that the US poisoned Navalny as a last-ditch effort to push EU countries to abandon Nord Stream 2.
https://sainomia.medium.com/the-obvious-false-flag-that-is-navalnys-poisoning-deef1d023bdb
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Just a heads-up for people: The accounts "White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo", and probably others, are all operated by the same person who pretends to be different people with them. They are extremely aggressive, impulsive, can be stalking, and difficult to explain things to. And they have no restraint or compunction against making lies of any size, big or small, even when you'd think it's impossible for them to not know that you know that they're lying. They don't accept correction and are unyielding in their initial insistence. I believe this is because they are on the spectrum.
This person has been extremely sensitive to any talk about Ukraine's large troll farm program and can spend an entire day, more than 10 hours straight, non-stop, saying the same inane or whitewashing comment about it. In general, they mentally block-out all information that doesn't tell them what they want to hear, no matter how inarguably and demonstrably factual it is. They will also pretend they didn't get answers they received to their questions just so that they can continue to badger someone with the already-answered question and pretend with themselves that they're "owning" someone for not getting an answer. It is as detached from reality and normal sanity as it sounds.
With each of their accounts, they show the same very poor English grammar and phrasing, and are sometimes completely unintelligible - especially when they become upset. Yet, even when they're at their very most incoherent, as in, posting fully unintelligible gibberish, they maintain an insistence that they're speaking perfect English. When they spend more time working out a post they can make it appear a bit more normal, though there's typically always some oddities in their writing style. Again, I believe they are on the spectrum and that their behaviour is a result of that.
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Do you know that 80%+ of your video is extremely-false information? I think I have to write a longer response to you about this at a later time. But what I've seen in this video makes it look like you just started 'researching' 2 weeks ago and simply read some NYT articles and some internet allegations and conspiracy theories from partial sources, and then assumed you had the facts and put them together in your video with a hefty dose of imagination thrown in. This isn't a matter of opinion and point-of-view, your video is primarily based in false ideas and narratives, of the sort that's inventive hearsay spread among sneering detractors. Your video is largely not factual and opposite to the facts. It is very sensationalist through sacrificing important facts.
For now, here's just a couple of examples of its false claims looked at in detail:
You claim that Navalny was arrested upon his return to Russia from recovering in Germany on "some old fake set of charges brought against him years ago that were thrown out later, they were totally fake". None of that is at-all true. The charges of embezzlement, brought by French cosmetics company Yves Rocher, were not fake and they weren't thrown-out - hence he had a suspended sentence. Navalny brought a complaint about the charges to the European Court of Human Rights, and the ECHR decided that the ruling against Navalny and his brother had been "arbitrary and manifestly unreasonable", but the ECHR didn't throw out the charges nor did they have the authority to. Additionally, the ECHR heard Navalny's appeal to have the charges construed as politically-motivated, but the ECHR dismissed Navalny's appeal of that. So, when you later call Navalny's sentencing "politically-motivated", you're asserting something that wasn't deemed to be the case.
You also say that the pretext for Navalny's arrest was that he violated his parole terms, and you add, "Turns-out he couldn't report to parole, officers, because he was in a coma from being poisoned by the Russian government". That's a lie which I believe is absolutely impossible for you to not have known was a lie when you made your video, because Navalny only had to return and check-in with the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service by the end of his probation period, on December 29th. But Navalny was discharged from the German hospital on September 23rd. That's over 3 months of difference, where Navalny wasn't in a coma and wasn't hospitalized. Further, the German hospital made a report mid-December stating that Navalny had recovered - and that report was cited during his sentencing hearing to show that he was able to return and check-in despite him not doing so.
Not that Navalny needed to be reminded of his parole terms for it to be legally binding, he's an adult who is responsible for himself and not a child, but Russia's Penitentiary Service did give him a last-minute warning that he had to return to make the final check-in otherwise he would be arrested upon his return to Russia. For the 4 months he'd been away in Germany, including all the time he was in a coma and for a very long time after that, Navalny's not-checking-in twice a month as his parole conditions required wasn't held against him and was never even mentioned as leverage against him in any way.
Russia's Federal Penitentiary Service could have required Navalny to return to Russia sooner, but the only check-in Navalny was absolutely required to do was the final one, by December 29th. Navalny knew that, but he chose to stay in Germany for 2.5 weeks beyond that date.
Do you know what happens in the US when you skip probation and violate the terms of a suspended sentence? You're arrested and your suspended sentence is changed into a prison sentence. And as Navalny is a high-profile person, any exception made for him (and I don't know why he'd get an exception in this case beyond the unofficial exemption from having to check-in while he was recovering in Germany) would affect Russia's prison authority's ability to apply their rules to others.
Just some select other issues I have with your video are these, though there are also some others that I'm not listing here:
Your video also doesn't mention the corruption scandals Navalny has been embroiled in, his racism and fierce xenophobia, the fact that 5,000 or a few times that number of protesters, and around 1,000 protesters arrested in the Moscow metropolitan area, the population of which is over 20 million, is statistically insignificant, or that Navalny's top aide was recorded seeking $20 million in funding from UK spies offering billions of 'you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours' payback when Navalny becomes Russia's president - which has been a serious goal of Navalny's even though you downplayed it in your video.
What you said about Novichok, who's developed it, the idea that it's a signature, is also 100% false and more of that child's kind of a cartoonish narrative. Many countries, including the US, UK, Czech, Iran, and others, have made Novichok, and the US took over the USSR's supplies of Novichok in 1991 when the US was responsible for the dismantling of the USSR's Uzbekistan chemical facilities where Novichok was made and stored. The US showed interest in patenting weaponized Novichok in 2015, and held discussions with Russian on the matter. The method to create Novichok was put into a book by its creator that is publicly available and can be purchased through Amazon. Novichok is not prohibitively difficult to make and the former head of the OPCW and many chemical experts have refuted the claim otherwise. I could expand a huge amount on this topic alone in a standalone post (whether I'm going to I'm yet undecided).
Bluntly, your video is either horrendously under-researched, or it's lying and deliberate propaganda. I'm shocked by the number of false claims and deferrals to conspiracy theories and cartoon visions that are contained in it. This isn't something anyone who considers themselves to be a journalist should be doing.
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Just a heads-up for people: The accounts "White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo", and probably others, are all operated by the same person who pretends to be different people with them. They are extremely aggressive, impulsive, can be stalking, and difficult to explain things to. And they have no restraint or compunction against making lies of any size, big or small, even when you'd think it's impossible for them to not know that you know that they're lying. They don't accept correction and are unyielding in their initial insistence. I believe this is because they are on the spectrum.
This person has been extremely sensitive to any talk about Ukraine's large troll farm program and can spend an entire day, more than 10 hours straight, non-stop, saying the same inane or whitewashing comment about it. In general, they mentally block-out all information that doesn't tell them what they want to hear, no matter how inarguably and demonstrably factual it is. They will also pretend they didn't get answers they received to their questions just so that they can continue to badger someone with the already-answered question and pretend with themselves that they're "owning" someone for not getting an answer. It is as detached from reality and normal sanity as it sounds.
With each of their accounts, they show the same very poor English grammar and phrasing, and are sometimes completely unintelligible - especially when they become upset. Yet, even when they're at their very most incoherent, as in, posting fully unintelligible gibberish, they maintain an insistence that they're speaking perfect English. When they spend more time working out a post they can make it appear a bit more normal, though there's typically always some oddities in their writing style. Again, I believe they are on the spectrum and that their behaviour is a result of that.
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There is scarcely a more-surveyed topic than the Crimean people's desire to leave Ukraine and join Russia. Before the Crimean referendum, Western pollsters were surveying Crimea and hearing that people were eager to vote to join Russia. After the referendum, Western pollsters surveyed Crimea and they confirmed the result of the Crimean referendum.
https://www.quora.com/Did-the-great-majority-of-people-in-Crimea-wish-their-land-to-return-to-the-Russian-Federation/answers/158756133
The referendum was fully lawful. There was no Ukrainian constitution in effect at the time of Crimea's referendum - Ukraine's constitution had been overruled and nullified 3 weeks prior to Crimea's referendum. Crimea had been left stateless by the US-orchestrated coup in Kiev and was not subject to any Ukrainian law at the time of its referendum. Further, even if Crimea had been a part of Ukraine at the time of its referendum, Crimea was still entitled to organize and carry-out their own referendums under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights treaty.
There has only been a single UNGA resolution against Russia over Crimea which received majority support, at that was in 2014 during the chaos of things when nobody knew what was going on. That resolution received just barely over 50% support. But, since then, not a single resolution calling Crimea occupied has received anywhere close to majority support.
A UNGA resolution is non-binding and it passing doesn't count for anything. What matters is which and how many countries support a resolution. In the case of the most recent UNGA vote calling Crimea occupied, only 63 countries (out of 195), representing 17% of the world's population, voted in support of it. Those who voted in support of the resolution are basically just NATO and some of its dependants. So, it can't really be said that the UNGA is condemning Russia - it's primarily just NATO. And NATO is isolated from the larger world on the matter.
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@senyaiv " I just want the world to live in peace."
I want that too. That's why I post the truth because it is the truth. Disinformation doesn't create peace, but creates confusion, chaos, suspicion, anger, and other negative things - as can be seen in accusation of me being some 'Russian troll' just because I posted truth that is contrary to propaganda people have been told.
And that is why I've made comments in response to this video pointing-out issues with it, and why I've pointed-out the issue with the fictional narrative that troll farms are particularly a Russian thing - Russia was a late-comer to using troll farms. It's just that West, particularly the US and UK, have been effective in making propaganda to associate Russia with troll farms, despite that the US was using them years before Russia and spends far, far more money on them than Russia could possibly do.
Regarding checking the validity of things I've claimed, here's a comment I made pointing-out a bunch of wild inaccuracies with Johnny's video. The things I say here aren't difficult to verify yourself, and I'll even provide the link to the ECHR ruling so you can easily check what I write concerning it:
https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/eng#{%22tabview%22:[%22document%22],%22itemid%22:[%22001-177665%22]}
"[Johnny claimed] that Navalny was arrested upon his return to Russia from recovering in Germany on "some old fake set of charges brought against him years ago that were thrown out later, they were totally fake". None of that is at-all true. The charges of embezzlement, brought by French cosmetics company Yves Rocher, were not fake and they weren't thrown-out - hence he had a suspended sentence. Navalny brought a complaint about the charges to the European Court of Human Rights, and the ECHR decided that the ruling against Navalny and his brother had been "arbitrary and manifestly unreasonable", but the ECHR didn't throw out the charges nor did they have the authority to. Additionally, the ECHR heard Navalny's appeal to have the charges construed as politically-motivated, but the ECHR dismissed Navalny's appeal of that. So, when you later call Navalny's sentencing "politically-motivated", you're asserting something that wasn't deemed to be the case.
You also say that the pretext for Navalny's arrest was that he violated his parole terms, and you add, "Turns-out he couldn't report to parole, officers, because he was in a coma from being poisoned by the Russian government". That's a lie which I believe is absolutely impossible for you to not have known was a lie when you made your video, because Navalny only had to return and check-in with the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service by the end of his probation period, on December 29th. But Navalny was discharged from the German hospital on September 23rd. That's over 3 months of difference, where Navalny wasn't in a coma and wasn't hospitalized. Further, the German hospital made a report mid-December stating that Navalny had recovered - and that report was cited during his sentencing hearing to show that he was able to return and check-in despite him not doing so.
Not that Navalny needed to be reminded of his parole terms for it to be legally binding, he's an adult who is responsible for himself and not a child, but Russia's Penitentiary Service did give him a last-minute warning that he had to return to make the final check-in otherwise he would be arrested upon his return to Russia. For the 4 months he'd been away in Germany, including all the time he was in a coma and for a very long time after that, Navalny's not-checking-in twice a month as his parole conditions required wasn't held against him and was never even mentioned as leverage against him in any way.
Russia's Federal Penitentiary Service could have required Navalny to return to Russia sooner, but the only check-in Navalny was absolutely required to do was the final one, by December 29th. Navalny knew that, but he chose to stay in Germany for 2.5 weeks beyond that date.
Do you know what happens in the US when you skip probation and violate the terms of a suspended sentence? You're arrested and your suspended sentence is changed into a prison sentence. And as Navalny is a high-profile person, any exception made for him (and I don't know why he'd get an exception in this case beyond the unofficial exemption from having to check-in while he was recovering in Germany) would affect Russia's prison authority's ability to apply their rules to others.
Just some select other issues I have with your video are these, though there are also some others that I'm not listing here:
Your video also doesn't mention the corruption scandals Navalny has been embroiled in, his racism and fierce xenophobia, the fact that 5,000 or a few times that number of protesters, and around 1,000 protesters arrested in the Moscow metropolitan area, the population of which is over 20 million, is statistically insignificant, or that Navalny's top aide was recorded seeking $20 million in funding from UK spies offering billions of 'you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours' payback when Navalny becomes Russia's president - which has been a serious goal of Navalny's even though you downplayed it in your video.
What you said about Novichok, who's developed it, the idea that it's a signature, is also 100% false and more of that child's kind of a cartoonish narrative. Many countries, including the US, UK, Czech, Iran, and others, have made Novichok, and the US took over the USSR's supplies of Novichok in 1991 when the US was responsible for the dismantling of the USSR's Uzbekistan chemical facilities where Novichok was made and stored. The US showed interest in patenting weaponized Novichok in 2015, and held discussions with Russia on the matter. The method to create Novichok was put into a book by its creator that is publicly available and can be purchased through Amazon. Novichok is not prohibitively difficult to make and the former head of the OPCW and many chemical experts have refuted the claim otherwise. I could expand a huge amount on this topic alone in a standalone post (whether I'm going to I'm yet undecided)."
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Just a heads-up for people: The accounts "White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo", and probably others, are all operated by the same person who pretends to be different people with them. They are extremely aggressive, impulsive, can be stalking, and difficult to explain things to. And they have no restraint or compunction against making lies of any size, big or small, even when you'd think it's impossible for them to not know that you know that they're lying. They don't accept correction and are unyielding in their initial insistence. I believe this is because they are on the spectrum.
This person has been extremely sensitive to any talk about Ukraine's large troll farm program and can spend an entire day, more than 10 hours straight, non-stop, saying the same inane or whitewashing comment about it. In general, they mentally block-out all information that doesn't tell them what they want to hear, no matter how inarguably and demonstrably factual it is. They will also pretend they didn't get answers they received to their questions just so that they can continue to badger someone with the already-answered question and pretend with themselves that they're "owning" someone for not getting an answer. It is as detached from reality and normal sanity as it sounds.
With each of their accounts, they show the same very poor English grammar and phrasing, and are sometimes completely unintelligible - especially when they become upset. Yet, even when they're at their very most incoherent, as in, posting fully unintelligible gibberish, they maintain an insistence that they're speaking perfect English. When they spend more time working out a post they can make it appear a bit more normal, though there's typically always some oddities in their writing style. Again, I believe they are on the spectrum and that their behaviour is a result of that.
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@JoeyGirardin My saying that most of Johnny's video is false information isn't me claiming to know what happened to Navalny. However, it is plausible that the US could have poisoned him as a last-ditch effort to push EU countries to abandon the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which the US has been desperately trying to shut-down and which is nearing completion. Once completed, it will ensure Russia-EU relations get stronger, Russia will have a lot of profits from it, while US influence in Europe will lessen and the US won't be able to sell its own more-expensive LNG to Europe.
The US has been sanctioning the development of NS2 for a long time and was cocky that the project would be halted. Shortly before Navalny's poisoning, Mike "We lied, we cheated, we stole" Pompeo was boasting that the US gov't would be successful in stopping NS2, with no hint as to how. As soon as Navalny was poisoned, the US gov't was demanding that EU countries break-off their support for NS2 to show Russia that this won't be tolerated. I haven't noticed take any other new measures against NS2. So, if that wasn't what Mike "We lied, we cheated, we stole" Pompeo was planning, then I haven't yet seen what else he was referring to.
https://sainomia.medium.com/the-obvious-false-flag-that-is-navalnys-poisoning-deef1d023bdb
Regarding Johnny's claim that the use of Novichok is like a "signature", and regarding the US and other countries' production of Novichok:
tass.com/politics/1000583
newscientist.com/article/2164202-exclusive-other-countries-could-have-made-russian-nerve-agent/
medium.com/insurge-intelligence/former-opcw-official-no-conclusive-proof-of-russian-complicity-in-salisbury-attack-1ae3749ba38e
Professor of organic chemistry at Cornell university:
https://twitter.com/DavidBCollum/status/998613563680882694
https://twitter.com/DavidBCollum/status/978435092103254016
Also see the NYT article linked-to in a response to that second Twitter post. It's concerning the US taking-over and cleaning-up the USSR's Uzbekistan facility where the USSR's Novichok was developed and stored.
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@Noah-lj2sg >> "Russia is in a messed up state due to putin, it isn't democracy"
Yet Russians say they've never had as good living conditions as they do now. If you look at where Russia was after the fall of the USSR, and compare it to now, it is beyond night and day. Regarding democracy, Russia is one and is much more of one than the US is. Though, when people say "democracy", especially when they're from the US, they often don't actually mean democracy at all, but mean some ambiguous sentiments which they associate with their own country. Russia isn't the US, that's true. And the US isn't a democracy.
Democracy means 'rule by the will of the people'. In Russia, the head-of-state is elected by the popular vote, and that makes it a democracy. In the US, the head-of-state is elected by a group of representatives in the electoral college - which means that the popular vote doesn't elect the US' head-of-state, and therefore the US isn't a democracy.
In Russia, there were 8 presidential candidates in the previous presidential election. In the US, there were 2. There is no democracy where there is no choice. Once again, here, Russia is much more of a democracy than the US is.
In Russia, there are 5 federal political parties in their legislature. In the US, there is just 2 - and the 2 parties are basically two heads of the corporate party, so nothing much changes depending on which party is incumbent. Here, yet again, Russia shows much stronger signs of being a democracy than the US is.
No Western democracy has overall term limits for the head of government / state, and term limits are an anti-democratic feature which prevent the people's will for who will be the head of state from being enacted. Germany's Chancellor Merkle has been in her position for about as long as Putin has been Russia's president. Yet, people don't bring that up as an issue. If the Russian people keep wanting Putin to be their president, then it is democracy, the 'rule by the will of the people' for him to continue to be Russia's president.
In Russia, pollsters keep confirming that Putin continues to hold the significant popular support - and at a much higher approval rating than most any Western politician. That is again an example of 'rule by the will of the people'. In the US, the president doesn't normally have that much domestic support.
Russia's presidential elections are monitored and validated by the OSCE, which has not found Russia's elections to be fraudulent, but instead "well-administered". The OSCE has criticized Russia's elections for featuring a lack of "serious" competition - but that lack of serious competition isn't due to a lack of candidates to choose from, but due to Putin's strong popularity dwarfing the prospects of other candidates, and Russian media focusing on Putin because he is popular (similar to how CNN became the Trump-channel throughout Trump's term because it caused their ratings to soar - and their ratings have plummeted since Trump left office).
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@senyaiv I checked my profile, and I don't see what you mean by "everyone can see that by clicking the profile pic circle". Could you explain?
By the way, just a heads-up, since you mentioned my profile and I noticed some comments on it from a particular person: The accounts "White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo", and probably others, are all operated by the same person who pretends to be different people with them. They are extremely aggressive, impulsive, can be stalking, and difficult to explain things to. And they have no restraint or compunction against making lies of any size, big or small, even when you'd think it's impossible for them to not know that you know that they're lying. They don't accept correction and are unyielding in their initial insistence. I believe this is because they are on the spectrum. Alternatively, they might work for a troll farm.
This person has been extremely sensitive to any talk about Ukraine's large troll farm program and can spend an entire day, more than 10 hours straight, non-stop, saying the same inane or whitewashing comment about it. In general, they mentally block-out all information that doesn't tell them what they want to hear, no matter how inarguably and demonstrably factual it is. They will also pretend they didn't get answers they received to their questions just so that they can continue to badger someone with the already-answered question and pretend with themselves that they're "owning" someone for not getting an answer. It is as detached from reality and normal sanity as it sounds.
With each of their accounts, they show the same very poor English grammar and phrasing, and are sometimes completely unintelligible - especially when they become upset. Yet, even when they're at their very most incoherent, as in, posting fully unintelligible gibberish, they maintain an insistence that they're speaking perfect English. When they spend more time working out a post they can make it appear a bit more normal, though there's typically always some oddities in their writing style. Again, I believe they are on the spectrum and that their behaviour is a result of that.
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@ElenaKomleva The fact that you've made one erroneous judgment call after another means that you aren't an informed person who knows how to tell the difference between credible and non-credible sources. And if you buy into the majority of claims of Johnny's video, which is a video blog, with most of the information in it being inaccurate, then you aren't going to be a well-informed person on the topic he discusses.
Your claim that Hasib and I are the same person again confirms, at least to me, that you aren't a person with good skills of judgment. And using your own logic, US, UK, Ukrainian, Canadian, etc troll farms exist, and they denigrate Russia, and the people who post comments that aren't anti-Russia, and, therefore, you must be a troll, yourself. And it's known that the US and UK specifically try to harm Russia via their propaganda:
"British Government Runs Secret Anti-Russian Smear Campaigns"
https://www.moonofalabama.org/2018/11/british-government-behind-secret-anti-russian-disinformation-campaign.html
Your latest comment is just random drivel, not focused on any topic and not responding to the matters which people have raised. In it, you present a conspiracy-theory about different posters being the same person (spoiler: we're not), and another about how previously you weren't receiving comments and now you are (maybe that has to do with the fact that you started making wild accusations, where you hadn't yet done that previously), and then falsely claim that everyone is suddenly talking about Navalny not being poisoned... but not a single person in this thread has claimed that Navalny wasn't poisoned [edit: I think one person has claimed that] (so, you are either a liar and disinformationist, or otherwise are delusional and so non-credible), and then throw in some random comment about Putin being an autocrat (how did the topic change to that?).
So, obviously, you are or have become unhinged. You are not exercising objective, clear-headed, and critical thinking skills. You're acting petty, insulting, and extremely prejudiced and unintelligent. I think that you need to reflect on your behaviour and the kind of person that you are. Dogmatic assumption of guilt, based on extreme biases and false information, isn't what an intelligent person does. Your assessments here have been nothing remotely resembling a state of being informed.
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@bartconnolly6104 I think there are some claims in your comments that are missing context. One is the argument regarding Russia's GDP. You're referring to a nominal USD figure, which doesn't convey the scale of Russian production and wealth. In PPP, which is what applies to compare the sizes of different economies, Russia's GDP is equal to $6 trillion USD - around $4.3 trillion before accounting for Russia's large black economy, and slightly above $6 trillion after. Before factoring in the black economy, Russia's economy is about the same size as Germany's. After factoring it in, it's larger than Germany's.
Another thing worth noting is that, even before factoring in the West's military contributions since Russia's intervention in Ukraine, Ukraine still had the largest military in Europe, after Russia, which has the largest. Since Russia entered the Ukraine war, the West has given Ukraine over $90 billion in support, amount to much more than Russia's annual military budget of $60 or so billion, and vastly more than what Russia spends annually on procurement.
Regarding Ukraine's nuclear disarmament, Ukraine never possessed any nukes that it could actually use. The nukes remained under the control of Russia's nuclear forces, and the launch codes were in the possession of the administration in Russia. Ukraine never had means to use the nukes stationed in its territory, and nukes have a shelf-life of around 10 years, and those nukes would've needed dismantling or rebuilding (something Ukraine doesn't an ability to do) before the year 2000. They were useless and only a liability to Ukraine. Also, NATO gave Ukraine no choice but to hand over its nukes, warning that it would invade Ukraine to take them if they didn't hand them over. The Budapest memorandum is commonly mentioned as when Ukraine gave up its nukes, but that's a myth. Ukraine committed to disarmament in the 1992 Lisbon protocol, and had already handed over its nukes to Russia before signing the Budapest memo.
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The Real Joe Biden Yes, of course. That's how international law works, how the UN charter works, how the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights treaty works, how self-determination works. It's also how Ukraine's law worked, as Ukraine was / is signatory to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights treaty.
So, yes, absolutely. That's how the world works, and that's how it's good for things to work.
Additionally, only 63 countries (NATO and its dependants) representing just 17% of the world's population still claim that Crimea is annexed and occupied. Each December since 2016, there has been a UNGA vote on the status of Crimea. And not a single one of the votes ever came close to majority support.
The fact is that Crimea is lawfully and democratically a part of Russia.
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FYI everybody, this video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@conaldeugenepeterson2147 That is incorrect. Games are in-fact our property - top courts around the world have ruled on this matter. I have not seen the phrase ”you are leasing this IP from the publisher and can be denied access at any time”, but I think you might be referring to the phrase "this software is licensed, not sold". First, a license is not the same thing as a lease. And in that phrase, the "software" which is being licensed is the software IP, and not the software copy which you are purchasing and outright own just as you also own your cars, your clothing, your TV... all those things are licensed instances of copyrighted IPs. Also, that phrase, "this software is licensed, not sold", appears in EULAs and EULAs are not legal documents or contracts. Further, a Terms of Service isn't the same thing as an EULA, and a ToS doesn't apply to your purchased games - it applies to the online servers and the services supplied through them that you might engage and use. You own your games and they are your property. But you don't own the 3rd-party servers that you might use to play a play online with. A company has a right to set the terms for their own servers, but they don't have any rights to dictate how you may use your game properties
You can read all about software ownership, licenses, and EULAs here: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/953835-you-own-the-software-that-you-purchase-and-any-claims-otherwise-are-urban-myth-or-corporate-propaganda/
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@rugiletunaityte4037 Speaking of talking about things you don't understand, you shouldn't have said any of what you did in that post because you didn't get any of what you wrote correct. Russia's government hasn't admitted to poisoning Navlany - they've adamantly rejected the accusation. You've heard a video released by Navalny - one the Russian government says is BS and fake. Last I knew, denying something isn't the same as admitting to it. In fact, they're the complete opposite.
Navalny was arrested when he returned to Russia in line with the warning he was given while he was still in Germany that, if he didn't return to Russia by a certain date to check-in with the Russian prison authority, in accordance with the terms of his suspended prison sentence, he would be arrested and his suspended sentence could be changed to a prison sentence. Russia's prison authority only warned Navalny that he had to return to Russia to comply with the terms of his suspended prison sentence after he had been discharged from the German hospital, and after the doctors had published a report declaring him fully recovered. Navalny was warned but he decided to stay in Germany anyway until after the date he had to return by was passed.
Navalny had a suspended prison sentence due to a conviction for embezzlement in charged made against him and his brother by French cosmetics company Yves Rocher, which accused the brothers of taking $400,000 from the company. French company Yves Rocher has said they stand by the charges and the sentencing process in Russia. The European Court of Human Rights which ruled the trial of Navalny and his brother to be lacking fairness also dismissed Navalny's appeal that the charges were politically motivated. Do you know what happens in the US when you skip bail and violate the terms of a suspended sentence? You're arrested and your suspended sentence is changed into a prison sentence. And as Navalny is a high-profile person, any exception made for him (and I don't know why he'd get an exception in this case) would affect Russia's prison authority's ability to apply their rules to others. Hopefully you now have a reality-based idea of why Navalny was arrested when he returned to Russia.
So, in your post, you are smugly talking about things you don't understand, while telling others to not do that. That might be something to reflect on.
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FYI, this video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@TheHappyCatsTail Don't just mention the IRA, but all the state troll-farms out there: The US', Israel's, the UK's Canada's, Ukraine's, China's, Poland's, etc. Did you know that Russia was actually a late-comer to the scene? Troll farms were pioneered by Israel (2008), the US (2011), and Canada (2011). Out of all of them, the US, which has budgeted $200 million per year since 2011 on social media disinformation efforts, has by far the largest.
Here's a document that leaked from the UK's troll farm program in 2014. It instructs its trolls on how to manipulate and deceive people in conversations online using the 10 so-called "principles" of Deception, Herd-mentality, Distraction, Dishonesty, Time, Consistency, Flattery, Need and Greed, Social Compliance, Reciprocity:
https://theintercept.com/document/2014/02/24/art-deception-training-new-generation-online-covert-operations/
So, if you can, tell me how you assess one topic to be a "landmine" for Russia concerning such activities when that topic is going to be even more of one for Russia detractors? The US has more internet trolls than any other country and could dwarf Russia's trolls on any topic by itself. But put the US, UK, Ukraine, and Canada's trolls together, and then what do you get? Keep that in mind when evaluating what you read in topics like this one.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/mar/17/us-spy-operation-social-networks
https://www.moonofalabama.org/2018/11/british-government-behind-secret-anti-russian-disinformation-campaign.html
https://www.newsweek.com/35000-volunteers-sign-ukraines-information-army-first-day-310121
https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/israeli-students-get-2000-spread-state-propaganda-facebook
To keep things in perspective, Russia probably couldn't afford to match just half of the US' own troll farm efforts if it wanted to.
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@TheHappyCatsTail While other states' social media propaganda and disinformation programs do certainly work as single groups, the fact that they additionally work in coordination with each-other makes them all the more powerful, encompassing, and effective - and so all the more important to be on guard against, I would think. That they are more sophisticated than what someone's expectation of a troll farm might be doesn't change what they're doing, which is presenting themselves falsely and using misleading information to trick people into believing narratives that suit their own governments and the geopolitical objectives which their governments have in common with their military partners.
Atlantic Council, which is effectively the propaganda and disinformation branch of NATO (an anti-Russia military alliance), works with the UK's Institute for Statecraft and "Integrity Initiative" to spread anti-Russia messaging online and to sway elections in foreign countries. That doesn't mean that the UK doesn't also have the 77th Brigade and Joint Threat Research Intelligence Group, and other groups which focus more on the UK's specific interests. It also doesn't mean that the Institute for Statecraft and "Integrity Initiative" don't also manipulate social media on behalf of specifically the UK government's interests in addition to their other manipulation campaigns.
https://theintercept.com/2014/02/24/jtrig-manipulation/
All that really means is that there are ominous layers to the disinformation scheme of states which are partnered together.
Same with the US: While the US will also be engaged through Atlantic Council and other social media propaganda partnerships with NATO countries, the US also furthers its own specific goals with its own troll farms. They're just extremely-sophisticated and well-equipped troll farms, but still troll farms nonetheless. From The Guardian's 2011 reporting on a leaked US contract for the US' social media propaganda program:
"the software could allow US service personnel, working around the clock in one location, to respond to emerging online conversations with any number of co-ordinated messages, blogposts, chatroom posts and other interventions. Details of the contract suggest this location would be MacDill air force base near Tampa, Florida, home of US Special Operations Command"
"Centcom's contract requires for each controller the provision of one "virtual private server" located in the United States and others appearing to be outside the US to give the impression the fake personas are real people located in different parts of the world."
"It also calls for "traffic mixing", blending the persona controllers' internet usage with the usage of people outside Centcom in a manner that must offer "excellent cover and powerful deniability". "
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There wasn't an invasion of Crimea or Ukraine, either.
The US-coup in Kiev resulted in the overruling and nullification of Ukraine's constitution, which left Crimea stateless (and Donbass too, for that matter). The current Ukrainian state has no constitutional continuity with the pre-coup Ukrainian state, and Crimea and Donbass have never been in a legal union with the post-coup Ukrainian state. Donbass is fully entitled to accept Russia's help in defending them against Kiev if that's their choice.
And since the dissolution of the USSR in 1991, Russia has had a large naval base in Crimea, and was allowed up to 25,000 troops in Crimea under a treaty with Kiev. At the time of the US-coup in Kiev, there were many thousands of Russian troops already present in Crimea. There was no invasion. Additionally, Russia's forces in Crimea were not detrimental or threatening to Crimea, but protected Crimea and ensured it was spared from the violence that the US-coup was caused in other parts of Ukraine.
Crimea's referendum was fully lawful, and its result has been verified by Western pollsters repeatedly - just as Crimea's desire to leave Ukraine and rejoin Russia was surveyed by Western pollster, Kiev, and the UN, continually from 1991 until the day of their 2014 referendum. And all surveys showed that they always wanted to leave Ukraine and rejoin Russia.
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The Real Joe Biden How is it fair for a people to decide what they want their political, social, and economic identity to be? I don't understand the basis for that question because that is fairness. That's called self-determination and it's coded into international law, the UN charter, and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights treaty. I read that as akin to asking 'How is democracy fair?', as opposed to dictatorship. A people get to choose for themselves.
How would it be fair for Kiev or Ukraine to get to decide the future of the people of the autonomous region of Crimea? Kiev never invested in Crimea, they let the place fall-apart. Now Crimea has new roads, buildings, a direct land-route to the Russian mainland which lowers the costs of goods and makes them more reliable, free healthcare, a new airport terminal, domestic power generation...
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Stop being propaganda. Crimea was NOT annexed. It acceded, lawfully, to Russia.
There is scarcely a more-surveyed topic than the Crimean people's desire to leave Ukraine and join Russia. Before the Crimean referendum, Western pollsters were surveying Crimea and hearing that people were eager to vote to join Russia. After the referendum, Western pollsters surveyed Crimea and they confirmed the result of the Crimean referendum.
https://www.quora.com/Did-the-great-majority-of-people-in-Crimea-wish-their-land-to-return-to-the-Russian-Federation/answers/158756133
The referendum was fully lawful. There was no Ukrainian constitution in effect at the time of Crimea's referendum - Ukraine's constitution had been overruled and nullified 3 weeks prior to Crimea's referendum. Crimea had been left stateless by the US-orchestrated coup in Kiev and was not subject to any Ukrainian law at the time of its referendum. Further, even if Crimea had been a part of Ukraine at the time of its referendum, Crimea was still entitled to organize and carry-out their own referendums under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights treaty.
There has only been a single UNGA resolution against Russia over Crimea which received majority support, at that was in 2014 during the chaos of things when nobody knew what was going on. That resolution received just barely over 50% support. But, since then, not a single resolution calling Crimea occupied has received anywhere close to majority support.
A UNGA resolution is non-binding and it passing doesn't count for anything. What matters is which and how many countries support a resolution. In the case of the most recent UNGA vote calling Crimea occupied, only 63 countries (out of 195), representing 17% of the world's population, voted in support of it. Those who voted in support of the resolution are basically just NATO and some of its dependants. So, it can't really be said that the UNGA is condemning Russia - it's primarily just NATO. And NATO is isolated from the larger world on the matter.
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@i-am-art Navalny simply played both sides of the Crimea debate - he believes Crimea, and even all of Ukraine are a rightful part of Russia. But since the decision isn't in his hands to change one way or the other, Navalny appeased his Western backers by criticizing the referendum and saying another should be held and then whatever the Crimean people decided should be accepted - and he said that knowing full-well that the overwhelming majority of the Crimean population had always wanted to leave Ukraine and rejoin Russia and would always vote to rejoin Russia.
I'll add, contrary to what Johnny Harris said in his video here, Crimea wasn't annexed but acceded to Russia. And there was no invasion of Crimea. Also, Crimea's referendum and accession to Russia were fully lawful by all international and domestic law, the UN's charter, and even Ukraine's law (via the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights treaty, which Ukraine is signatory to), although Ukraine was a non-factor at that time as its constitution had already been overruled and nullified as a result of the US-backed coup, which meant that Ukraine didn't exist as a legal entity and Crimea was stateless and free to do as it pleased.
Since 2016, the large majority of the world has refused to call Crimea occupied - there's been a UNGA vote on the matter each December since then, and not a single one reach anywhere close to majority support in favour of calling Crimea occupied. Only 63 governments, out of 195, and representing just 17% of the world's population, still claim that Crimea is occupied. That 17% claiming Crimea is occupied is basically NATO and the countries which are dependent upon it.
Here are a couple of resources on the topic, though there's more to be said about the legal aspects of Crimea's referendum and accession to Russia that isn't contained in these links:
https://www.quora.com/Did-the-great-majority-of-people-in-Crimea-wish-their-land-to-return-to-the-Russian-Federation/answers/158756133
https://www.quora.com/Did-Russia-invade-Ukraine/answers/161900115
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@i-am-art If you research the information I have provided and the links I have given, you will discover that things are as I've said I can help you out a bit here:
1. Navalny has used language is associated with the view that Ukraine is a part of Russia. However, as it isn't a confirmed thing, I have said "and even" rather than a definitive statement: "he believes Crimea, and even all of Ukraine are a rightful part of Russia"
2. I said: "Since 2016, the large majority of the world has refused to call Crimea occupied - there's been a UNGA vote on the matter each December since then, and not a single one reach anywhere close to majority support in favour of calling Crimea occupied". All of that is perfectly true. The UNGA votes calling Crimea "occupied" are calls for support from UNGA members to put their voice behind that position. Support is an affirmative action, and where it isn't given, there isn't support. It is the truth that the large majority of the world doesn't support the view that Crimea is occupied.
3. No. The overwhelming majority of Crimeans wanted to leave Ukraine and join Russia. This fact had been verified by pollsters around the world and the UN continuously from 1991 until 2014, and support for the decision for Crimea to rejoin Russia has been polled by pollsters from around the world from 2014 until today.
See this link for a summary of the polling done in Crimea over the decades. Everything is fully sourced with links to the original poll reporting, and screenshots of the relevant data:
https://www.quora.com/Did-the-great-majority-of-people-in-Crimea-wish-their-land-to-return-to-the-Russian-Federation/answers/158756133
4. Everything you have referenced under this point is as stated in the Quora link, which is meticulously sourced to the first-hand, authoritative sources. If you choose to ignore the information and the sources for it, then you are blocking out truth, facts, and reality out of prejudice and bias. And so, you would have fooled yourself.
There is nothing flawed in what I've said and the sources I've given. Therefore, your claim of "there's so much disinformation in your comment", which was prejudiced knee-jerk reactivity, was unwarranted.
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Do you know that 80%+ of your video is extremely-false information? I think I have to write a longer response to you about this at a later time. But what I've seen in this video makes it look like you just started 'researching' 2 weeks ago and simply read some NYT articles and some internet allegations and conspiracy theories from partial sources, and then assumed you had the facts and put them together in your video with a hefty dose of imagination thrown in. This isn't a matter of opinion and point-of-view, your video is primarily based in false ideas and narratives, of the sort that's inventive hearsay spread among sneering detractors. Your video is largely not factual and opposite to the facts. It is very sensationalist through sacrificing important facts.
For now, here's just a couple of examples of its false claims looked at in detail:
You claim that Navalny was arrested upon his return to Russia from recovering in Germany on "some old fake set of charges brought against him years ago that were thrown out later, they were totally fake". None of that is at-all true. The charges of embezzlement, brought by French cosmetics company Yves Rocher, were not fake and they weren't thrown-out - hence he had a suspended sentence. Navalny brought a complaint about the charges to the European Court of Human Rights, and the ECHR decided that Navalny's trial had been unfair and arbitrary, but the ECHR didn't throw out the charges nor did they have the authority to. Additionally, the ECHR heard Navalny's appeal to have the charges construed as politically-motivated, but the ECHR dismissed Navalny's appeal of that. So, when you later call Navalny's sentencing "politically-motivated", you're asserting something that wasn't deemed to be the case.
You also say that the pretext for Navalny's arrest was that he violated his parole terms, and you add, "Turns-out he couldn't report to parole, officers, because he was in a coma from being poisoned by the Russian government". That's a lie which I believe is absolutely impossible for you to not have known was a lie when you made your video, because Navalny only had to return and check-in with the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service by the end of his probation period, on December 29th. But Navalny was discharged from the German hospital on September 23rd. That's over 3 months of difference, where Navalny wasn't in a coma and wasn't hospitalized. Further, the German hospital made a report mid-December stating that Navalny had recovered - and that report was cited during his sentencing hearing to show that he was able to return and check-in despite him not doing so.
Not that Navalny needed to be reminded of his parole terms for it to be legally binding, he's an adult who is responsible for himself and not a child, but Russia's Penitentiary Service did give him a last-minute warning that he had to return to make the final check-in otherwise he would be arrested upon his return to Russia. For the 4 months he'd been away in Germany, including all the time he was in a coma and for a very long time after that, Navalny's not-checking-in twice a month as his parole conditions required wasn't held against him and was never even mentioned as leverage against him in any way.
Russia's Federal Penitentiary Service could have required Navalny to return to Russia sooner, but the only check-in Navalny was absolutely required to do was the final one, by December 29th. Navalny knew that, but he chose to stay in Germany for 2.5 weeks beyond that date.
Do you know what happens in the US when you skip probation and violate the terms of a suspended sentence? You're arrested and your suspended sentence is changed into a prison sentence. And as Navalny is a high-profile person, any exception made for him (and I don't know why he'd get an exception in this case beyond the unofficial exemption from having to check-in while he was recovering in Germany) would affect Russia's prison authority's ability to apply their rules to others.
Just some select other issues I have with your video are these, though there are also some others that I'm not listing here:
Your video also doesn't mention the corruption scandals Navalny has been embroiled in, his racism and fierce xenophobia, the fact that 5,000 or a few times that number of protesters, and around 1,000 protesters arrested in the Moscow metropolitan area, the population of which is over 20 million, is statistically insignificant, or that Navalny's top aide was recorded seeking $20 million in funding from UK spies offering billions of 'you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours' payback when Navalny becomes Russia's president - which has been a serious goal of Navalny's even though you downplayed it in your video.
What you said about Novichok, who's developed it, the idea that it's a signature, is also 100% false and more of that child's kind of a cartoonish narrative. Many countries, including the US, UK, Czech, Iran, and others, have made Novichok, and the US took over the USSR's supplies of Novichok in 1991 when the US was responsible for the dismantling of the USSR's Uzbekistan chemical facilities where Novichok was made and stored. The US showed interest in patenting weaponized Novichok in 2015, and held discussions with Russian on the matter. The method to create Novichok was put into a book by its creator that is publicly available and can be purchased through Amazon. Novichok is not prohibitively difficult to make and the former head of the OPCW and many chemical experts have refuted the claim otherwise. I could expand a huge amount on this topic alone in a standalone post (whether I'm going to I'm yet undecided).
Bluntly, your video is either horrendously under-researched, or it's lying and deliberate propaganda. I'm shocked by the number of false claims and deferrals to conspiracy theories and cartoon visions that are contained in it. This isn't something anyone who considers themselves to be a journalist should be doing.
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Most countries have condemned Russia's invasion of Ukraine (but did they the US invasions of Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya?), but countries representing 57% of the world's population have not. And most countries have not imposed sanctions on Russia. Only the West, representing less than 16% of the world's population, has imposed sanctions on Russia over Ukraine. Some countries, notably China, have blamed the US for the war in Ukraine. Many countries, including India, Pakistan, and others, have increased their cooperation with Russia following Western sanctions, to scoop-up the business Western countries have abandoned. As one Israel article said, the West is entertaining delusion within its own information bubble about Ukraine. The world is not with the West on Ukraine. And it is the West, not Russia, which has been isolated from the rest of the international community on Ukraine.
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@jb1918 I'm not wrong. What I've said is correct. The prequels are awful. It's ironic that you're criticizing the sequels while not doing the same for the prequels, which are just about as bad. Guess what? In 15 years, there will be people who grew-up with the sequels telling you to "shut the hell up" when you try to criticize them, because they like them due to nostalgia. Nostalgia is fine. But objective thinking can be employed at the same time, and if you look at the prequels objectively, you should be able to recognize that they're nowhere near as good as the OT and they're filled with bad writing, characters, dialog, acting, visuals, etc.
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Novichok was created by the USSR. But since 1991, many countries have made it, and the US patented weaponized Novichok in 2015. Czech, Iran, UK, US, and many other countries are known to have made Novichok. And when the USSR's research facilities in Uzebekistan, where their Novichok was made, were dismantled when the USSR dissolved in 1991, the US was responsible for the dismantling of the facilities and the destruction of its chemical stockpiles, and the US took charge of the USSR's Novichok at that time.
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Your given backstory of the events in Ukraine which led to the current situation is filled with incorrect information. Based on your offered backstory, it sounds like you're somebody who just reads NYT and the like, and takes what they say as gospel. It's disappointing as I hoped you would be more thorough and objective. Now I have to assume there's as much one-sidedness and incorrect claims in other videos that you make.
By the way, most countries have condemned Russia's invasion of Ukraine (but did they the US invasions of Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya?), but countries representing 57% of the world's population have not. And most countries have not imposed sanctions on Russia. Only the West, representing less than 16% of the world's population, has imposed sanctions on Russia over Ukraine. Some countries, notably China, have blamed the US for the war in Ukraine. Many countries, including India, Pakistan, and others, have increased their cooperation with Russia following Western sanctions, to scoop-up the business Western countries have abandoned. As one Israel article said, the West is entertaining delusion within its own information bubble about Ukraine. The world is not with the West on Ukraine. And it is the West, not Russia, which has been isolated from the rest of the international community on Ukraine.
Also BTW, most of the world doesn't regard Crimea as occupied by Russia. Only 62 govt, representing less than 17% of world population, still support the view that it is.
nd Ukraine has just submit to Russia's key demands, which are that Ukraine not join NATO (an anti-Russia military alliance with a track-record of illegal invasions and destructions of countries based on lies), and that Ukraine never pursue WMDs. Reportedly, it was Ukraine's President's threat to pursue nuclear weapons that made Putin finally decide to invade Ukraine.
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There was no invasion of Crimea by Russia. Since the dissolution of the USSR, Russia has kept a large military base in Crimea, and was allowed, by treaty with Kiev, up to 25,000 troops in Crimea. At the time of the US-backed coup in Kiev in 2014, there were 15,000 Russian troops already stationed in Crimea. When the coup in Kiev was happening, Ukraine's then-President, Yanukovych, formally requested and authorised Russia to use its troops to secure Crimea. Russia did that. It was not an invasion. The post-coup Ukrainian govt's Chief Prosecutor confirmed that Yanukovych authorised Russia to take control over Crimea. And the people and government of Crimea took that opportunity to hold the sovereignty referendum which they'd tried repeatedly for the previous 2.5 decades to hold, but which Kiev had repeatedly, illegitimately, obstructed from being held.
Additionally, and this holds more weight that your 'Russia isn't the inheritor of the USSR's UNSC seat' theory, since Ukraine's constitution was nullified in February by the illegitimate process to remove Yanukovych and form a new government that wasn't backed by Ukraine's constitution, it can be argued (as Crimea's government did) that it was no longer a part of a Ukraine that no longer existed at the time of its referendum. Ukraine's constitution is clear on what process needs to be followed to remove a sitting president. And basically none of the steps of the process were followed, the the impeachment vote failed to receive the constitutionally-mandated 3/4ths support from the legislature. BTW, if Russia isn't the inheritor of the USSR's seat, then Ukraine has even less of a claim to keep its UNGA seat following the 2014 US-backed coup in Kiev.
You're as partisan (as opposed to fact-based) on these matters as as any self-identifying stringent Republican or Democrat in the US. Facts, reason, and logic are being surrogated with personal emotion-gratifying preference in your telling of things.
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@theartguy6776 Hi. I study and track Russia's economy for work. I assure you, the Russians are still laughing. The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@whitewall1948 I have chosen to disengage with you over your apparent au.tism challenges. It seems telling yourself things that aren't reality is a part of the self-assurance you crave and need to feel OK. That is unfortunate, but it would be wrong for me to agitate what you have no control over.
Just a heads-up for people: The accounts "White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo", and probably others, are all operated by the same person who pretends to be different people with them. They are extremely aggressive, impulsive, can be stalking, and difficult to explain things to. And they have no restraint or compunction against making lies of any size, big or small, even when you'd think it's impossible for them to not know that you know that they're lying. They don't accept correction and are unyielding in their initial insistence. I believe this is because they are on the spectrum (autism).
This person has been extremely sensitive to any talk about Ukraine's large troll farm program and can spend an entire day, more than 10 hours straight, non-stop, saying the same inane or whitewashing comment about it. In general, they mentally block-out all information that doesn't tell them what they want to hear, no matter how inarguably and demonstrably factual it is. They will also pretend they didn't get answers they received to their questions just so that they can continue to badger someone with the already-answered question and pretend with themselves that they're "owning" someone for not getting an answer. It is as detached from reality and normal sanity as it sounds.
With each of their accounts, they show the same very poor English grammar and phrasing, and are sometimes completely unintelligible - especially when they become upset. Yet, even when they're at their very most incoherent, as in, posting fully unintelligible gibberish, they maintain an insistence that they're speaking perfect English. When they spend more time working out a post they can make it appear a bit more normal, though there's typically always some oddities in their writing style. Again, I believe they are on the spectrum and that their behaviour is a result of that.
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@alhakimov5480 BTW, I just did read a bit more of your post and now I'm going to call you out even further: You're not a Canadian, so stop lying. We're not brainwashed by US propaganda like you are and we haven't swallowed the debunked nonsense that you're peddling. Bluntly, based on your effort here, you couldn't pass as a Canadian if your life dependent on it. And in attempting such non-passable BS, you've proven that you're a troll. You picked the wrong fake identity to go with. I would say that if you were a Canadian, then you must work at one of Canada's troll farms (and Canada has had them as long as the US has, sadly, which is years longer than Russia has had them). But, you're not a Canadian - and if you were, you'd be a complete traitor and embarrassment to my country.
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@stivvits1067 FYI, there are such things as US, Ukrainian, Israeli, UK, Canadian, Polish, etc trolls. They're literally paid by their governments to post propaganda in social media that's in favour of their governments, while attacking the opponents of their governments and their governments' policies. Troll farms were pioneered by Israel, the US, and Canada - not Russia.
Since 2011, the US government has budgeted $200 million per year for troll farms. And an official US gov't troll-farm contract that was published online showed that the US uses "sophisticated" technology to monitor and respond to online discussions in real time, and tag-team comments sections with multiple paid trolls at once, with each paid troll using multiple fake accounts and each of their fake accounts having their IPs disguised to appear as though they're posting from different places.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/mar/17/us-spy-operation-social-networks
And over 35,000 Ukrainians signed-up for Ukraine's troll-farm program on the first day that it launched.
https://www.newsweek.com/35000-volunteers-sign-ukraines-information-army-first-day-310121
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Jay Morales No, I'm right. George had lost his sense of what the movies were when he made the prequels. When he was making the original trilogy, he stated that he was making the films that he, as an adult, wanted to see. But after the prequels were receiving huge flak, he rationalized them by saying that they (the prequels) were kids films. And during the making of the prequels, after TPM, George said he thought they went too far with with the silliness of the movie. And they definitely went much too far with it.
Also, George made up a bunch of legalese for Jedi behaviour in the prequel trilogy, and then half-way through them, realized how rigid it made things seem and that it was incongruous with how the force is presented in the original trilogy, so he then back-tracked on it and started counter-rationalizing those explanations between characters in AotC: Ben Kenobi - "Only a Sith deals in absolutes" - Which is an absolute, which means that Ben Kenobi is a Sith. So, the prequels aren't consistent within themselves. And they are much less consistent with the original trilogy.
Again, the prequels are messes from a compositional standpoint, and they don't convey any of the same touches as the original trilogy. George writing and directing them doesn't change that. When he made them, he wasn't in-touch with the same things he was when he crafted the original trilogy - and the original trilogy was far from just a George production. The OT was made with input and decisions by many people who made those films better than George's intention for them was, and George had no choice but to allow others to take control of aspects of the OT. But with the prequels, he exercised full control over them and didn't take any outside input. He just did what he wanted and everyone nodded like yesmen because no-one could say no to George or tell him that an idea stank.
OT and prequels are very different in design and quality. And I would say that the prequels have more that's bad about them than that's good.
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Here's a partial review of Johnny's video that I posted in another comment: I would say that 80%+ of Johnny’s video is extremely-false information, and that it seems as though he started ‘researching’ just 2 weeks ago, and mostly just read some NYT articles (as an example of an outlet which never utters an honest word regarding anything related to Russia) and picked-up on some sneering anti-Putin conspiracy theories online, and then assumed he had it all worked out filled in the gaps with his imagination and put the concoction he’d come-up with into video form.
This isn't a matter of opinion and point-of-view, his video is primarily based in false ideas and narratives, of the sort that's inventive hearsay spread among sneering detractors. It’s largely opposite to the facts and is instead very sensationalist through sacrificing important facts.
Here are just a few examples of his ignorance or lies, whichever they may be.
Johnny claims that Navalny was arrested upon his return to Russia from recovering in Germany on "some old fake set of charges brought against him years ago that were thrown out later, they were totally fake". None of that is at-all true. The charges of embezzlement, brought by French cosmetics company Yves Rocher, were not fake and they weren't thrown-out - hence he had a suspended sentence. Navalny brought a complaint about the charges to the European Court of Human Rights, and the ECHR decided that the ruling against Navalny and his brother had been "arbitrary and manifestly unreasonable", but the ECHR didn't throw out the charges nor did they have the authority to. Additionally, the ECHR heard Navalny's appeal to have the charges construed as politically-motivated, but the ECHR dismissed Navalny's appeal of that. So, when he later calls Navalny's sentencing "politically-motivated", he's asserting something that wasn't deemed to be a confirmed fact by the ECHR.
He also says that the pretext for Navalny's arrest was that he violated his parole terms, and he adds, "Turns-out he couldn't report to parole, officers, because he was in a coma from being poisoned by the Russian government". That's a lie which I believe is absolutely impossible for him to not have known was a lie when he made his video, because Navalny only had to return and check-in with the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service by the end of his probation period, on December 29th. But Navalny was discharged from the German hospital on September 23rd. That's over 3 months of difference, where Navalny wasn't in a coma and wasn't hospitalized. Further, the German hospital made a report mid-December stating that Navalny had recovered - and that report was cited during his sentencing hearing to show that he was able to return and check-in despite him not doing so.
Not that Navalny needed to be reminded of his parole terms for it to be legally binding, he's an adult who is responsible for himself and not a child, but Russia's Penitentiary Service did give him a last-minute warning that he had to return to make the final check-in otherwise he would be arrested upon his return to Russia. For the 4 months he'd been away in Germany, including all the time he was in a coma and for a very long time after that, Navalny's not-checking-in twice a month as his parole conditions required wasn't held against him and was never even mentioned as leverage against him in any way.
Russia's Federal Penitentiary Service could have required Navalny to return to Russia sooner, but the only check-in Navalny was absolutely required to do was the final one, by December 29th. Navalny knew that, but he chose to stay in Germany for 2.5 weeks beyond that date.
Do you know what happens in the US when you skip probation and violate the terms of a suspended sentence? You're arrested and your suspended sentence is changed into a prison sentence. And as Navalny is a high-profile person, any exception made for him (and I don't know why he'd get an exception in this case beyond the unofficial exemption from having to check-in while he was recovering in Germany) would affect Russia's prison authority's ability to apply their rules to others.
Just some select other issues I have with his video are these, though there are also others that I'm not listing here:
His video doesn't mention the corruption scandals Navalny has been embroiled in, his racism and fierce xenophobia, the fact that 5,000 or a few times that number of protesters, and around 1,000 protesters arrested in the Moscow metropolitan area, the population of which is over 20 million, is statistically insignificant, or that Navalny's top aide was recorded seeking $20 million in funding from UK spies offering billions of 'you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours' payback when Navalny becomes Russia's president - which has been a serious goal of Navalny's even though Johnny downplayed it in his video.
What he said about Novichok, who has developed it, the idea that it's a signature, is also 100% false and more of a cartoonish kind of an imaginative narrative. Many countries, including the US, UK, Czech, Iran, and others, have made Novichok, and the US took over the USSR's supplies of Novichok in 1991 when the US was responsible for the dismantling of the USSR's Uzbekistan chemical facilities where Novichok was made and stored. The US showed interest in patenting weaponized Novichok in 2015, and held discussions with Russia on the matter. The method to create Novichok was put into a book by its creator that is publicly available and can be purchased through Amazon. Novichok is not prohibitively difficult to make and the former head of the OPCW and many chemical experts have refuted the claim otherwise. I could expand a huge amount on this topic alone in a standalone post.
Bluntly, his video is either horrendously under-researched, or it's lying and deliberate propaganda. I'm shocked by the number of false claims and deferrals to conspiracy theories and cartoon visions that are contained in it. This isn't something anyone who considers themselves to be a journalist should be doing. And it certainly isn’t anything worth praising. The fact that it is convincing people of complete falsehoods makes it all the worse.
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No, Russia didn't invade Crimea, or any other part of Ukraine.
Since the dissolution of the USSR, Russia has had a large naval base in Crimea and was allowed up to 25,000 troops in Crimea by treaty with Kiev. At the time of the US-coup in Kiev, Russia had many thousands of troops in Crimea. And those troops helped secure Crimea and protect it from the violence that was happening elsewhere in Ukraine due to the US-coup in Kiev.
The US-coup in Kiev culminated in the overruling and nullification of Ukraine's constitution, ending that legal state of Ukraine and leaving Crimea (and Donbass) stateless.
The Crimean people are ethnically Russian, and they had always wanted to leave Ukraine and rejoin Russia, and they had tried to do that for the last 2.5 decades, ever since the dissolution of the USSR, when they voted 94.3% in favour of leaving Ukraine. But as the USSR dissolved later than year, and Russia was then unable to support Crimea due to being broke, Crimea reluctantly accepted autonomous status in Ukraine. But they always tried to leave Ukraine and rejoin Russia from that time.
There was no invasion of Crimea and there has been no invasion of Ukraine by Russia. And everything said in this Vox video is false.
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I would say that 80%+ of Johnny’s video is extremely-false information, and that it seems as though he started ‘researching’ just 2 weeks ago, and mostly just read some NYT articles (as an example of an outlet which never utters an honest word regarding anything related to Russia) and picked-up on some sneering anti-Putin conspiracy theories online, and then assumed he had it all worked out filled in the gaps with his imagination and put the concoction he’d come-up with into video form.
This isn't a matter of opinion and point-of-view, his video is primarily based in false ideas and narratives, of the sort that's inventive hearsay spread among sneering detractors. It’s largely opposite to the facts and is instead very sensationalist through sacrificing important facts.
Here are just a few examples of his ignorance or lies, whichever they may be.
Johnny claims that Navalny was arrested upon his return to Russia from recovering in Germany on "some old fake set of charges brought against him years ago that were thrown out later, they were totally fake". None of that is at-all true. The charges of embezzlement, brought by French cosmetics company Yves Rocher, were not fake and they weren't thrown-out - hence he had a suspended sentence. Navalny brought a complaint about the charges to the European Court of Human Rights, and the ECHR decided that the ruling against Navalny and his brother had been "arbitrary and manifestly unreasonable", but the ECHR didn't throw out the charges nor did they have the authority to. Additionally, the ECHR heard Navalny's appeal to have the charges construed as politically-motivated, but the ECHR dismissed Navalny's appeal of that. So, when he later calls Navalny's sentencing "politically-motivated", he's asserting something that wasn't deemed to be the case by the ECHR.
He also says that the pretext for Navalny's arrest was that he violated his parole terms, and he adds, "Turns-out he couldn't report to parole, officers, because he was in a coma from being poisoned by the Russian government". That's a lie which I believe is absolutely impossible for him to not have known was a lie when he made his video, because Navalny only had to return and check-in with the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service by the end of his probation period, on December 29th. But Navalny was discharged from the German hospital on September 23rd. That's over 3 months of difference, where Navalny wasn't in a coma and wasn't hospitalized. Further, the German hospital made a report mid-December stating that Navalny had recovered - and that report was cited during his sentencing hearing to show that he was able to return and check-in despite him not doing so.
Not that Navalny needed to be reminded of his parole terms for it to be legally binding, he's an adult who is responsible for himself and not a child, but Russia's Penitentiary Service did give him a last-minute warning that he had to return to make the final check-in otherwise he would be arrested upon his return to Russia. For the 4 months he'd been away in Germany, including all the time he was in a coma and for a very long time after that, Navalny's not-checking-in twice a month as his parole conditions required wasn't held against him and was never even mentioned as leverage against him in any way.
Russia's Federal Penitentiary Service could have required Navalny to return to Russia sooner, but the only check-in Navalny was absolutely required to do was the final one, by December 29th. Navalny knew that, but he chose to stay in Germany for 2.5 weeks beyond that date.
Do you know what happens in the US when you skip probation and violate the terms of a suspended sentence? You're arrested and your suspended sentence is changed into a prison sentence. And as Navalny is a high-profile person, any exception made for him (and I don't know why he'd get an exception in this case beyond the unofficial exemption from having to check-in while he was recovering in Germany) would affect Russia's prison authority's ability to apply their rules to others.
Just some select other issues I have with his video are these, though there are also others that I'm not listing here:
His video doesn't mention the corruption scandals Navalny has been embroiled in, his racism and fierce xenophobia, the fact that 5,000 or a few times that number of protesters, and around 1,000 protesters arrested in the Moscow metropolitan area, the population of which is over 20 million, is statistically insignificant, or that Navalny's top aide was recorded seeking $20 million in funding from UK spies offering billions of 'you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours' payback when Navalny becomes Russia's president - which has been a serious goal of Navalny's even though Johnny downplayed it in his video.
What he said about Novichok, who has developed it, the idea that it's a signature, is also 100% false and more of a cartoonish kind of an imaginative narrative. Many countries, including the US, UK, Czech, Iran, and others, have made Novichok, and the US took over the USSR's supplies of Novichok in 1991 when the US was responsible for the dismantling of the USSR's Uzbekistan chemical facilities where Novichok was made and stored. The US showed interest in patenting weaponized Novichok in 2015, and held discussions with Russia on the matter. The method to create Novichok was put into a book by its creator that is publicly available and can be purchased through Amazon. Novichok is not prohibitively difficult to make and the former head of the OPCW and many chemical experts have refuted the claim otherwise. I could expand a huge amount on this topic alone in a standalone post.
Bluntly, his video is either horrendously under-researched, or it's lying and deliberate propaganda. I'm shocked by the number of false claims and deferrals to conspiracy theories and cartoon visions that are contained in it. This isn't something anyone who considers themselves to be a journalist should be doing. And it certainly isn’t anything worth praising. The fact that it is convincing people of complete falsehoods makes it all the worse.
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No-one has yet done a proper review of the EVGA. MSI, Asus, Gigabyte, the FE, all have reviews which evaluate the construction, temperature, noise level, power consumption, performance, and compare those stats to other 3080s (even if it's just the FE). But there's no similar review for the EVGA (Jayz doesn't look at stuff like noise, temps, power consumption). I look forward to your in-depth reviews.
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@ElenaKomleva I thought that I might have received an apology for your assumptions about me and your accusations after I proved that I am as I said. But, instead, you're switching gears / deflecting from your errors of judgment and trying to protect your sense of entitlement to be indignant. Cut the BS. I said specific things, which are all true. You responded with conspiracy theories, accusations, and insults. Now your theories, accusations, and insults are proven to be false. Where is your remorse? Or, are you an unapologetic liar? And now you have the arrogance to say that my correctly calling you out on your erroneous judgment isn't decent behaviour, after you just falsely judged and accused me and others in this thread? You not only are uninformed and with poor judgment, but you're also a hypocrite.
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@ElenaKomleva Ironically, I haven't said anything about Putin. I have, however, pointed-out specific falsehoods concerning specific topics. And what I have said is true. Judging your intelligence and skills of perception isn't simply a matter of who Navalny is and what he's doing, or what Russia is. It's a matter of how you behave and present yourself when there are things you clearly don't know (including who I am, why I'm posting, and what I know), how receptive you are to truthful information you're unaware of, how gracefully you correct yourself (if you even do correct yourself, which you haven't done). What I see in your responses is that you are intellectually and emotionally immature, and too arrogant to accept when you were wrong.
And as a side-note: In Canada and the US, sometimes retired people have to rummage in garbage bins because they don't have or receive enough money. In Canada and the US, a protest permit is also required for protesting in cities, on private property, in large groups, or when making loud noises.
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@ElenaKomleva What I have said is true, and what experts have assessed generally doesn't conflict with what I've said - but it does conflict with what Johnny's video says. For example, Johnny claimed in his video that the charges against Navalny in the Yves Rocher case were tossed-out and fake. But that's not true at all. The charges were real and the French cosmetics company which issued them, Yves Rocher, stands by them. Navalny petitioned the ECHR about the charges and his Russian trial, and the ECHR ruled that the verdict in the Russian trial was arbitrary and unreasonable, but they didn't toss the charges out and they declined Navalny's argument that the charges were politically motivated. The ECHR also ordered Russia to pay monetary compensation to Russia. But the charges weren't fake, and they weren't thrown-out. Navalny's probation violation wasn't over non-existent charges but over real charges.
That's not me disagreeing with the 'experts', that's me testifying what the expert in this case, the ECHR, actually said and did, which is very different than what Johnny claimed they did.
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@hakanpetersson2662 Russia's unemployment level is at a historic low. Russian wages are where they were before Russia's intervention, or higher.
A recent The Economist (a very anti-Russia magazine) report: "As Europe falls into recession, Russia climbs out" - shows Russia's economic growth is on the up, while those of Germany, UK, France, and Italy are on a downward trajectory.
Wall Street Journal: Russia's manufacturing and services sectors are now doing as well or better than they were before Russia's intervention in the Ukraine war.
Lots of new economic projects happening between Russia, China, Turkey, India, and other countries.
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@maxvolkov6127 There is no distinction between factually and conceptually wrong. Being wrong is wrong. And you failed to identify where I was wrong.
What Lend-Lease contributed to the USSR's war effort in terms of importance doesn't challenge whether what Lend-Lease contributed amounted to 6% of the USSR's wartime production. Whether that 6% was essential or not doesn't change 6% from being 6% and doesn't make a comment that Lend-Lease amounted to 6% of USSR's wartime production wrong. Per the accurate usage of the English language, you haven't identified something wrong about my comment. Adding context to a comment isn't proving the comment wrong, but is based on the comment being true.
And it seems that logic isn't the only thing you struggle with - it's clear that you're also ignorant of history. It isn't questionable whether the USSR had deals with Germany prior to Hitler's rise as Chancellor: They did. And when Hitler came to power, he began tearing-down relations with the USSR, while the USSR tried to preserve the positive relations it had with the previous Germany government. I don't know why you're talking about a possibility of the USSR breaking a deal with Germany, as if it has anything to do with anything, but it was Germany which spurned the deals previously made by the previous German government with the USSR.
And, as I said, the Nazis claimed that without US technology from the US, Hitler's style of warfare would've been "impossible". To quote one historian:
‘The contribution made by American capitalism to German war preparations can only be described as phenomenal. It was certainly crucial to German military capabilities... Not only was an influential sector of American business aware of the nature of Nazism, but for its own purposes aided Nazism wherever possible (and profitable) - with full knowledge that the probable outcome would be war involving Europe and the United States.’
But the US' sponsorship of Hitler and the Nazis was by no means limited to money and produced goods. Hitler and the Nazis' ambitions were heavily based on US imperialism and racism. Hitler called Henry Ford, an infamous anti-Semite who wrote a weekly anti-Jew article in his newspaper, his "inspiration", vowing to put his theories into practice in Germany. Hitler also kept a life-sized portrait of Henry Ford next to his desk. And he cited US treatment of native-Americans as a model to be followed.
You've said a lot of miscellaneous words about topics you clearly don't have a deep knowledge of, to create a word salad that ultimately have context to the topics raised.
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@maxvolkov6127 Russian propaganda is portraying the West's economies as collapsed? Russian media is, correctly, portraying the difficulties in Western economies, most of all in Europe. And as their economies are declining, I would call that collapsing.
It seems that you don't actually know what the situation is in Europe, where monthly gas bills have gone from well under a hundred euros to well over a thousand, the EU's trade surplus has drastically nose-dived, the value of EU wages has plummeted, or in the UK, where energy costs have increased by 80%, compared to just 10% in Russia.
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@Vokabre Most of the most-popular news in the West is state-sponsored. That in itself doesn't mean anything. The most popular news station in the world, BBC, is state-owned, state-funded, and state-run. State-sponsored Western news includes: BBC, CBC, CNN, Washington Post, Euro News, Deutsche Welle, France 24, Radio France, NPR, PBS, Voice of America, Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Radio Free Asia, RAI, RTVE, ARD... and many others including around 1,400 additional US outlets which are funded by the US government through Corporation For Public Broadcasting.
In general RT is a great news source, with many big names from BBC, NYT, NBC, CNN, The Guardian, and other places having left to work at RT and said that RT allows for much more freedom to report the news truthfully, while outlets like NBC, BBC, NYT would tell their hosts and reporters what to say and what they can't say. RT's reporting of Navalny is certainly more fact-based than this video.
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@olgai6337 Putin hasn't invaded any country while president. Instead, he's helped Syria, Venezuela, Crimea, South Ossetia and save or protected them from invasions and attempted coups by foreign states. Since 2001, the US and UK have murdered between 5 and 7+ million people in the Middle East, destroyed entire countries, overthrown many governments including Ukraine's, threatened many more countries, destabilized economies killing dozens of thousands to try force revolts against governments, persecuted truth-tellers... But Russia under Putin hasn't invaded any country, hasn't killed any millions of people, and rather than use Russia's military to create wars has used it to respond to acts of aggression and protect the victims. So, how is Putin a villain in that picture of world affairs?
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@ Yes, I do. I study and track Russia's economy for work purposes. This video's entire message is based in mischaracterization and misunderstanding.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@kathcasey2090 And there's no axe being ground in the statement "This kind of narrative is a way the West, and more specifically, the US are trying to save face, to make it sound like they weren't overcome, defeated, or humiliated by Russia, and that they've successfully stuck it to Russia". That's actually what these narratives are about: protecting of the national ego, making oneself sound victories and their enemy defeated, even when it isn't true. They're a constant part of the US narratives on all topics, not just concerning Russia. You should be able to know that just from how the Democrat and Republican parties and leader frame their own actions versus those of their opponents. The same applies on the global scale, only to an even greater degree.
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@halva9357 In these comments, I've addressed Johnny's video about Navalny and his 'Putin's palace' video. Navalny's video contains a lot of ideas and allegations. But ideas and allegations are ideas and allegations, and not proof of something. Regarding Johnny's video about Navalny, here's some of what I've said about it:
I would say that 80%+ of Johnny’s video is extremely-false information, and that it seems as though he started ‘researching’ just 2 weeks ago, and mostly just read some NYT articles (as an example of an outlet which never utters an honest word regarding anything related to Russia) and picked-up on some sneering anti-Putin conspiracy theories online, and then assumed he had it all worked out filled in the gaps with his imagination and put the concoction he’d come-up with into video form.
This isn't a matter of opinion and point-of-view, his video is primarily based in false ideas and narratives, of the sort that's inventive hearsay spread among sneering detractors. It’s largely opposite to the facts and is instead very sensationalist through sacrificing important facts.
You might be wondering why I said that Johnny's video "is almost entirely inarguably-false in its claims". Or, you might have taken that comment as more confirmation bias that I fit whatever cartoonish depiction of a paid troll you might have. But it's true: Johnny's video is horrendously under-researched, or otherwise he's deliberately lying about 80%+ of what he says in the video.
Here are just a few examples of his ignorance or lies, whichever they may be.
Johnny claims that Navalny was arrested upon his return to Russia from recovering in Germany on "some old fake set of charges brought against him years ago that were thrown out later, they were totally fake". None of that is at-all true. The charges of embezzlement, brought by French cosmetics company Yves Rocher, were not fake and they weren't thrown-out - hence he had a suspended sentence. Navalny brought a complaint about the charges to the European Court of Human Rights, and the ECHR decided that the ruling against Navalny and his brother had been "arbitrary and manifestly unreasonable", but the ECHR didn't throw out the charges nor did they have the authority to. Additionally, the ECHR heard Navalny's appeal to have the charges construed as politically-motivated, but the ECHR dismissed Navalny's appeal of that. So, when he later calls Navalny's sentencing "politically-motivated", he's asserting something that wasn't deemed to be the case by the ECHR.
He also says that the pretext for Navalny's arrest was that he violated his parole terms, and he adds, "Turns-out he couldn't report to parole, officers, because he was in a coma from being poisoned by the Russian government". That's a lie which I believe is absolutely impossible for him to not have known was a lie when he made his video, because Navalny only had to return and check-in with the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service by the end of his probation period, on December 29th. But Navalny was discharged from the German hospital on September 23rd. That's over 3 months of difference, where Navalny wasn't in a coma and wasn't hospitalized. Further, the German hospital made a report mid-December stating that Navalny had recovered - and that report was cited during his sentencing hearing to show that he was able to return and check-in despite him not doing so.
Not that Navalny needed to be reminded of his parole terms for it to be legally binding, he's an adult who is responsible for himself and not a child, but Russia's Penitentiary Service did give him a last-minute warning that he had to return to make the final check-in otherwise he would be arrested upon his return to Russia. For the 4 months he'd been away in Germany, including all the time he was in a coma and for a very long time after that, Navalny's not-checking-in twice a month as his parole conditions required wasn't held against him and was never even mentioned as leverage against him in any way.
Russia's Federal Penitentiary Service could have required Navalny to return to Russia sooner, but the only check-in Navalny was absolutely required to do was the final one, by December 29th. Navalny knew that, but he chose to stay in Germany for 2.5 weeks beyond that date.
Do you know what happens in the US when you skip probation and violate the terms of a suspended sentence? You're arrested and your suspended sentence is changed into a prison sentence. And as Navalny is a high-profile person, any exception made for him (and I don't know why he'd get an exception in this case beyond the unofficial exemption from having to check-in while he was recovering in Germany) would affect Russia's prison authority's ability to apply their rules to others.
Just some select other issues I have with his video are these, though there are also others that I'm not listing here:
His video doesn't mention the corruption scandals Navalny has been embroiled in, his racism and fierce xenophobia, the fact that 5,000 or a few times that number of protesters, and around 1,000 protesters arrested in the Moscow metropolitan area, the population of which is over 20 million, is statistically insignificant, or that Navalny's top aide was recorded seeking $20 million in funding from UK spies offering billions of 'you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours' payback when Navalny becomes Russia's president - which has been a serious goal of Navalny's even though Johnny downplayed it in his video.
What he said about Novichok, who has developed it, the idea that it's a signature, is also 100% false and more of a cartoonish kind of an imaginative narrative. Many countries, including the US, UK, Czech, Iran, and others, have made Novichok, and the US took over the USSR's supplies of Novichok in 1991 when the US was responsible for the dismantling of the USSR's Uzbekistan chemical facilities where Novichok was made and stored. The US showed interest in patenting weaponized Novichok in 2015, and held discussions with Russia on the matter. The method to create Novichok was put into a book by its creator that is publicly available and can be purchased through Amazon. Novichok is not prohibitively difficult to make and the former head of the OPCW and many chemical experts have refuted the claim otherwise. I could expand a huge amount on this topic alone in a standalone post.
Bluntly, his video is either horrendously under-researched, or it's lying and deliberate propaganda. I'm shocked by the number of false claims and deferrals to conspiracy theories and cartoon visions that are contained in it. This isn't something anyone who considers themselves to be a journalist should be doing. And it certainly isn’t anything worth praising. The fact that it is convincing people of complete falsehoods makes it all the worse.
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@halva9357 This video, Johnny's, the one who we're both commenting in the comments section for and the one I have commented on, isn't Navalny's video, but is Johnny's video about many things including Navalny's video. I have addressed the actual video. And in my large previous comment to you, I didn't give my own opinion on Navalny, I gave a critique of the misinformation in Johnny's video, which is the video I have commented on and which is the video you are making your comment in the comments section of. In my previous comment, I have not relied on someone who isn't from Russia as a source for matters concerning Russia. I have relied on the first-hand sources relevant to the specific matters I have commented on. I haven't dealt in opinions, but in facts.
That you asked me to review all of Navalny's own video doesn't mean I have agreed to do that for you here. Here, I have responded to Johnny's video, as this is the comments section for Johnny's video and that is what I have been interested in doing so far.
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@valeremkin5188 "White Wall" is a paid propaganda troll who uses multiple accounts to spam gibberish in broken English. They've been exposed numerous times before. Here's a warning that I wrote about them previously:
Just a heads-up for people: The accounts "White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo", and probably others, are all operated by the same person who pretends to be different people with them. They are extremely aggressive, impulsive, can be stalking, and difficult to explain things to. And they have no restraint or compunction against making lies of any size, big or small, even when you'd think it's impossible for them to not know that you know that they're lying. They don't accept correction and are unyielding in their initial insistence. I believe this is because they are on the spectrum.
This person has been extremely sensitive to any talk about Ukraine's large troll farm program and can spend an entire day, more than 10 hours straight, non-stop, saying the same inane or whitewashing comment about it. In general, they mentally block-out all information that doesn't tell them what they want to hear, no matter how inarguably and demonstrably factual it is. They will also pretend they didn't get answers they received to their questions just so that they can continue to badger someone with the already-answered question and pretend with themselves that they're "owning" someone for not getting an answer. It is as detached from reality and normal sanity as it sounds.
With each of their accounts, they show the same very poor English grammar and phrasing, and are sometimes completely unintelligible - especially when they become upset. Yet, even when they're at their very most incoherent, as in, posting fully unintelligible gibberish, they maintain an insistence that they're speaking perfect English. When they spend more time working out a post they can make it appear a bit more normal, though there's typically always some oddities in their writing style. Again, I believe they are on the spectrum and that their behaviour is a result of that.
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Just a heads-up for people: The accounts "White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo", "George", "Lloon Burg", and probably others, are all operated by the same person who pretends to be different people with them. They are extremely aggressive, impulsive, can be stalking, and difficult to explain things to. And they have no restraint or compunction against making lies of any size, big or small, even when you'd think it's impossible for them to not know that you know that they're lying. They don't accept correction and are unyielding in their initial insistence. I believe this is because they are on the spectrum.
This person has been extremely sensitive to any talk about Ukraine's large troll farm program and can spend an entire day, more than 10 hours straight, non-stop, saying the same inane or whitewashing comment about it. In general, they mentally block-out all information that doesn't tell them what they want to hear, no matter how inarguably and demonstrably factual it is. They will also pretend they didn't get answers they received to their questions just so that they can continue to badger someone with the already-answered question and pretend with themselves that they're "owning" someone for not getting an answer. It is as detached from reality and normal sanity as it sounds.
With each of their accounts, they show the same very poor English grammar and phrasing, and are sometimes completely unintelligible - especially when they become upset. Yet, even when they're at their very most incoherent, as in, posting fully unintelligible gibberish, they maintain an insistence that they're speaking perfect English. When they spend more time working out a post they can make it appear a bit more normal, though there's typically always some oddities in their writing style. Again, I believe they are on the spectrum and that their behaviour is a result of that.
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@megaman37456 No, the prequels are awful and they aren't compatible with the OT at all. In fact, the prequels, like the sequels, are downright unwatchable - I tried, the level of cringe in them is simply too much. Saying that the OT is as poorly-written as the prequels means that you don't pay a lot of attention to movies while watching them, and tend to shut your mind off and just look at the visuals - which might explain why you like the prequels. Nevertheless, people like you are likely the reason why George got away with the SEs and the prequels in the first place, and why he thought selling to Disney was acceptable. People who make blind rationalization for bad content, as you're doing here, are why series keep getting ruined in the hands of other people who don't have perception for those series.
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No. AC4 is the most AC-ish game of the series. AC4 has the most First Civilization lore in it, it directly continues the story from AC3 where Juno was freed and said now she was going to do her part. AC4 is all about the Sage, who is the reincarnation of Juno's husband, and the observatory. And the Abstergo tech in the modern day is also the reincarnation of Aita, Juno's husband.
AC3 is more of a spin-off than AC4, because AC3's protagonist, Connor, doesn't care at all about the assassins and is only joining them for training to be able to get revenge. He pretty much disowns the assassins. Edward in AC4, by contrast, becomes more and more dedicated to the assassins as the game progresses, and he end-up hunting the templars and stopping the Templar grand-master at the observatory. AC3 is a Native American simulator. And Unity is a French Revolution simulator.
I guess that AC2 is also a spin-off, because it's more about Ezio wanting revenge and being interesting in looking after his family than it is the assassins order.
Seems like there's no actual AC game, because they're all spin-offs. But of all the AC games, AC4 Black Flag is the most AC-ish of them all.
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Just a heads-up for people: The accounts "White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo", and probably others, are all operated by the same person who pretends to be different people with them. They are extremely aggressive, impulsive, can be stalking, and difficult to explain things to. And they have no restraint or compunction against making lies of any size, big or small, even when you'd think it's impossible for them to not know that you know that they're lying. The don't accept correction and are unyielding in their initial insistence. I believe this is because they are they are on the spectrum.
This person has been extremely sensitive to any talk about Ukraine's large troll farm program and can spend an entire day, more than 10 hours straight, non-stop, saying the same inane or whitewashing comment about it. In general, they mentally block-out all information that doesn't tell them what they want to hear, no matter how inarguably and demonstrably factual it is. They will also pretend they didn't get answers they received to their questions just so that they can continue to badger someone with the already-answered question and pretend with themselves that they're "owning" someone for not getting an answer. It is as detached from reality and normal sanity as it sounds.
With each of their accounts, they show the same very poor English grammar and phrasing, and are sometimes completely unintelligible - especially when they become upset. Yet, even when they're at their very most incoherent, as in, posting fully unintelligible gibberish, they maintain an insistence that they're speaking perfect English. Though, when they spend more time working out a post they can make it appear a bit more normal, though there's typically always some oddities in their writing style. Again, I believe they are on the spectrum and their behaviour is a result of that.
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@whitewall1948
That you're begging for my attention following the exposure of your 4 fake accounts ("White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo"), which you tried to pretend were 4 different people (but not well at all, since you said the same things with each of them, used the same taunts at the same time, with the same broken English, and all shared the same uncommon gross ignorances... which resulted in some spectacular breakdowns when it was pointed-out), means you are desperate to try to score some point back. Which, you know, is never going to happen. What you did, you did to yourself. And by desperately begging for my attention, you're showing you're in pain, but rather than healing you're just humiliating yourself even more.
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@teamhadd5235 Not exactly. Russia allowed for two consecutive terms. But there was no limit on the overall number of terms a person could serve as president. So, a person could serve two terms, then stay away for a term, and then serve another two terms. That's what Putin did: He served two terms as Russia's President, then became Russia's Prime Minister for a term, and then served another term as President, and is now on his first consecutive term to the last one since he took a break to be Russia's PM. In total, Putin has been Russia's President for 16 years. Canada, Australia, the UK, and Germany have still all had longer-serving heads-of-state than Putin has been Russia's.
That was how Russia's law on presidential terms worked until recently, when they changed the law to impose a maximum of two terms in total. So, going forward, a person can't serve more than two terms in Russia. But Russia's presidential terms are also now 6 years, which means a person can serve a total of 12 years as Russia's president.
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No, there is no occupation in Crimea.
Crimea's referendum and accession to Russia were fully lawful by all domestic and international law. The US coup in Kiev overruled Ukraine's constitution and left Crimea stateless. And regardless of the US-coup in Kiev, even if Crimea had still been part of Ukraine at the time of its referendum (which it wasn't), the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights treaty (which Ukraine was signatory to) granted Crimea the right to unilaterally organize, hold, and carry-out the result of their own referendums. So, no matter how things are looked-at, Crimea's referendum and accession to Russia are fully lawful and Crimea is lawfully a part of Russia, per the democratic will of the Crimean people:
https://www.quora.com/Did-the-great-majority-of-people-in-Crimea-wish-their-land-to-return-to-the-Russian-Federation/answers/158756133
BTW, the international community does not regard Crimea as occupied. UNGA resolutions on the topic have been done every year since 2016, and each one of them failed to get anywhere close to majority support. Only 63 countries, representing just 17% of the world's population, still claim that Crimea is occupied. And those 63 countries can be summed-up at NATO and its dependents.
So, no, Crimea isn't occupied. Crimea is lawfully a part of Russia.
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Though, America doesn't mean the USA. America is a continent, like Eurasia, and not a country. And an American is a person from the continent America. US of A literally means 'the united states of [continent] America' and not 'the united states [that are] America'. In early trade documents, the USA was titled “the united states of North America”, making it clear there never was an intention for the USA to be thought-of as America itself.
Employing the misnomer of calling the US "America" and USians "Americans" to denote their nationality is a misappropriation that also feeds hubris and imperialism. Calling the US "America" is rooted in, and is, imperialism and self-aggrandization.
Calling the US "America" is like if a Hitler figure called all of Europe "Germany", or if they were from Germany and called Germany "Europe". If they believe it, then they'll feel entitled to take all of it for themselves and to impose their will upon it. That same effect is at play when the US calls itself "America", and it's what is being fed when other sources refer to the US as "America". And we see it in action with all the US coups in South America and in US persons arrogantly referring to South America as the US' "backyard".
The US has a population of just 335 million. But there are over 1 billion Americans. There are far more South Americans who call themselves Americans from America than there are people living in the USA - and they were called Americans before the US existed.
Most countries in the world use a separate term to refer to people from the US, and don't call them Americans. Largely, throughout South America, for example, people from the US are called "estadounidenses" (which translates to United-Statesian). In Germany, many people use the term "US-Amerikaner" (which means US-American, as opposed to Canadian-American, Bolivian-American, etc). In Italy, the term "statunitense" (which, again, means United-Statesian) is often used. France, likewise, makes use of the term états-unien (United-Statesian). In Canada, in regular speech, a US citizen is typically referred to as "a US citizen", "from the US" or "from the States".
https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/06/what-does-american-actually-mean/276999/
https://www.thisisrocio.com/blog/is-america-a-continent-or-a-country
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@mensen4488 I definitely provided an argument, which noted that the sectors of Russia's economy its growth is coming from show Russia is experiencing the opposite of Dutch Disease. So, if you haven't seen any argument from me, then you've either forgotten or ignored what I previously said, or just don't have enough topic knowledge to catch what it means.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@mensen4488 I definitely provided an argument, which laid-out that the sectors giving Russia's economy most of its growth show the opposite of Dutch Disease. So, if you haven't seen any argument from me, then you've either forgotten or ignored what I previously said, or just don't have enough topic knowledge to recognize what it means.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@mensen4488 I did provide an argument. So, if you haven't seen one from me, then you've either forgotten or ignored what I said, or just don't have enough topic knowledge to catch what it means.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@mensen4488 If you haven't seen any argument from me, then you've either forgotten or ignored what I previously said, or just don't have enough topic knowledge to catch what it means.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@mensen4488 I definitely provided an argument, which noted that the sectors of Russia's economy its growth is coming from show Russia is experiencing the opposite of Dutch Disease. So, if you haven't seen any argument from me, then you likely just didn't have enough topic knowledge to catch what I said means.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@mensen4488 I definitely provided an argument, which noted that the sectors of Russia's economy its growth is coming from show Russia is experiencing the opposite of Dutch Disease.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@mensen4488 If you haven't seen any argument from me, then you don't have enough topic knowledge to have noticed what I said means.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@mensen4488 Then your understanding of the topic is such that you didn't catch the argument I gave you.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@mensen4488 I gave a clear demonstration of Russia's situation being the total opposite of Dutch Disease. So, you don't have enough understanding to have recognized it.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
1
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@mensen4488 I gave a clear example of Russia's situation being the total opposite of Dutch Disease. You somehow thought the video had acknowledged that (it didn't) and presented it as the reason why Russia is in trouble (it's the opposite of what the video claims.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
1
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@mensen4488 I gave a clear example of Russia's situation being the total opposite of Dutch Disease. You somehow thought the video had acknowledged it (it didn't) and presented it as the reason why Russia is in trouble (the video claims the opposite of what I said is happening, which is wrong).
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
1
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@mensen4488 I gave a clear example of Russia's situation being the total opposite of Dutch Disease. But you didn't understand it.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
1
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@mensen4488 I gave a clear example of Russia's situation being the total opposite of Dutch Disease, which you didn't understand.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
1
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@mensen4488 I gave an explicit example of Russia's situation being the total opposite of Dutch Disease.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
1
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@mensen4488 I gave a clear example of Russia's situation being the total opposite of Dutch Disease.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@mensen4488 I plainly explained why Russia's situation is the total opposite of Dutch Disease.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
1
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@mensen4488 I gave a clear example of Russia's situation being the total opposite of Dutch Disease.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
1
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@mensen4488 The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
1
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@mensen4488 There's a difference between no argument being given, and you not understanding the topic enough to recognize what was said.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@mensen4488 There's a difference between no argument being given, and you not understanding the topic enough to recognize what was said.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@mensen4488 There's a difference between no argument being given, and you not understanding the topic enough to recognize what was said.
The situation in Russia is basically the total opposite of what this video claims. This video is totally bogus, and filled with mischaracterization from someone who clearly doesn't know Russia, its economy, or economics in general.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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@whitewall9594 What's funny here is that in the end, no matter what I say and no matter what you say, Ukraine will still have that propaganda farm / troll farm operating, and I'll know it, and I'll know you're desperate to have it not be called a troll farm. And that won't change things.
If you aren't invested in Ukraine, then it is utterly meaningless for you to obsess over Ukraine's troll farm and what it's called. There is no meaning in you doing so, no motivation, no purpose, no accomplishment, apart from you having a personal vested interest in what it is and what it's called. You haven't explained what that interest is, yet. And that is extremely suspicious. No normal, sane, rational person goes on about a thing for 10 hours without a reason for why they're doing so. You have continued to hide your reason for doing so.
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@whitewall1948 Except that you didn't expose me for any lying. Ukraine has a troll farm. It doesn't matter what term some article used to describe Ukraine's troll farm, Ukraine's troll farm is a troll farm. You have been devastated endlessly, and you clearly can't bear to hear Ukraine's troll farm referred to as the troll farm that it is. But it is a troll farm, your desperate deflections of that fact notwithstanding.
This is semi-incoherent: "You call me Ukrainian because you’re a Russian troll it’s simple, Ukrainian social media I was never on it did you find my name on it know as I just exposed your very own link that you provided, you’re more Ukrainian more Ukrainian then me."
Strange, you think it's unfair to identify you as a Ukrainian, when it's clear that you are completely obsessed with whitewashing Ukraine's troll farm, but you think that someone calling you a Ukrainian makes them a Russian. Hmm... hypocrisy much? The moment I start trying to whitewash Russia's troll farm, as you're doing for Ukraine's, maybe you'll have a reason to suspect me of being Russian.
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@whitewall9594 So, you don't know what a troll is. I already know that. I've explained it to you ad nauseum:
"A state-run social media manipulation program where thousands of employees post anonymously online to further the government's interests without disclosing that they're posting on behalf of the government, is a troll farm. It is a psyops. And it is an information army. The article calls Ukraine's troll farm an "information army". And an army is something that does combat. And an information army is something that does combat with information. The way that's done is by attacking viewpoint and pushing others - all clandestinely. That is being a troll. When you hide your purpose and have an ulterior motive that isn't disclosed to those you aim to manipulate, you're trolling."
And:
Who cares if the article uses the term "troll farm"? It's still a troll farm, and that's what a troll farm is. An article doesn't have to use the word "troll farm" - Troll Farm isn't even an official description, it's a label given to operations, typically by opponents of it. The UK's "Integrity Initiative" troll farm, for which there was leaked official documents details their instructions of how to confuse and destabilize conversations online, was never called a "troll farm" by "Integrity Initiative", the UK government, or UK MSM articles reporting about it. But it was a troll farm.
You keep saying 'article doesn't say troll farm', but it's never mattered whether it does or doesn't. If a car magazine talks about a specific car model without using the word "car" to refer to it, it's still a car. Whether the article uses the term which describes what that type of operation is, is irrelevant. That operation is a troll farm.
Ukraine's troll farm is a troll farm.
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@whitewall1948 Why would I post something from the Newsweek article talking about it being a troll farm? I've already answered your interest on that matter:
You keep saying 'article doesn't say troll farm', but it's never mattered whether it does or doesn't. If a car magazine talks about a specific car model without using the word "car" to refer to it, it's still a car. Whether the article uses the term which describes what that type of operation is, is irrelevant. That operation is a troll farm.
Who cares if the article uses the term "troll farm"? It's still a troll farm, and that's what a troll farm is. An article doesn't have to use the word "troll farm" - Troll Farm isn't even an official description, it's a label given to operations, typically by opponents of it. The UK's "Integrity Initiative" troll farm, for which there was leaked official documents details their instructions of how to confuse and destabilize conversations online, was never called a "troll farm" by "Integrity Initiative", the UK government, or UK MSM articles reporting about it. But it was a troll farm.
A state-run social media manipulation program where thousands of employees post anonymously online to further the government's interests without disclosing that they're posting on behalf of the government, is a troll farm. It is a psyops. And it is an information army. The article calls Ukraine's troll farm an "information army". And an army is something that does combat. And an information army is something that does combat with information. The way that's done is by attacking viewpoint and pushing others - all clandestinely. That is being a troll. When you hide your purpose and have an ulterior motive that isn't disclosed to those you aim to manipulate, you're trolling."
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Navalny is no competitor to Putin. He has a 2% domestic public approval rating and would have come in 4th place if he had been eligible to participate in Russia's previous presidential election. He is regarded as a clown in Russia for his antics. He's far-right, a nationalist, and has promoted some pretty crazy ideas, like deporting immigrants from Russia.
Russia's government would not poison him because he's no threat to them, and his poisoning would only create a negative effect for them. And the Russian government has already said they're doing everything to try to help Navalny, and that they'll launch a probe into what happened to him.
Who his poisoning would benefit, though, would be an enemy of the Russian government. With Belarus experiencing protests, and the potential for Russia to come to Belarus' defence aid, there's motivation for countries to want to make Russia have their hands full with their own scandal. And with Russia's recent covid-19 vaccine announcement, countries might be wanting to undermine the positive PR of their success.
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@sandroh7573 I'm aware of Navalny's support. In Russia, it isn't much. His audience is more in the West. Moscow is a city of 12 million people, or over 25 million for the greater area. Thousands isn't all that remarkable.
Many countries have had the same government for more than 20 years, including: Canada, the UK, Australia, Germany.
Democracy means 'rule by the will of the people', and if the people want to continue having the same government, then that's democracy. We don't have term limits in Canada, and neither does any Western democracy have term limits (the US is not a democracy). Western pollsters keep confirming that Putin holds the popular support in Russia, and so his continuation as head of state is, whether we like it or not, democracy.
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Piers seems to be unable to wrap his head around the fact that there is no requirement that the US / West wins the Ukraine war. Like he thinks the West has impunity to do anything it wants in the war and that Russia magically won't respond because it will submit to Piers' daft notion that the West is just supposed to get to do whatever it takes to win and Russia will respect that. But if he can't understand that it's possible that the West can lose the Ukraine war, like it can lose other wars, then why does he think it's possible that Russia can lose the Ukraine war? If countries simply can't lose wars, then that must apply to Russia, too. Piers is stuck in babyish comic-book fantasizing.
And the ideological difference between Kuwait and Ukraine is that there was no risk to the US to attack Iraq, as the US had total dominance and Iraq had no means to do anything to the US in response. But Russia has the means to end all life in the US and turn the US into a glass crater in minutes. That's the ideological difference between the wars for the US.
Also, Russia isn't the bad guy. The US, UK, and EU are the bad guys who started, perpetuated, and deliberately drew Russia into the war, so they could try to take-down a geopolitical rival, while Ukraine is just their human sacrifice victim and mercenary army. And the bad guys are going to lose, and the much more justified party is going to win.
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Hi. I study and track Russia's economy for work. FYI, this video is complete fiction, and an inversion of reality.
One example: He claims that inflation in Russia is making Russians unable to buy as much today as they used to be able to. The situation is actually the total opposite: Russians' purchasing power has increased for the last 2 years, and it is continuing to increase now. That's because their wages growth is outpacing the inflation rate. The metric that compares purchasing power changes via wages growth relative to inflation is called Real-Wages. And Russia's real wages are surging.
And it's actually in part that Russians' purchasing power is surging that Russia's inflation is as high as it is. Because Russians are wealthier than normal, they're able to buy more than normal, and so they're consuming more than normal, which is increasing inflation. BTW, the situation in the West is generally the opposite: real wages are decreasing, and so people are becoming poorer due to losing purchasing power, due to inflation in their countries outpacing their wages growth.
BTW, the lower the rouble goes, the more profit Russia makes and the richer it becomes. That's because Russia has the 2nd or 3rd-largest trade surplus in the world. What do you think happens if you export $100 billion of goods, and import only $1 billion of goods, and suddenly your currency devalues so you're now paying 100% more cost on your $1 billion of imports, but are also making 100% more profit on your $100 billion of exports? Russia's government deliberately keeps the rouble low for this reason. It also recently cashed-out its FX reserves at a particular low point, and will restock when the rouble's up - basic buy low, sell high reasoning.
Putin has always been equally open and frank in his public statements, including about Russia's challenges. Nothing he said during his annual Q&A was out of character in the least, and his comments about Russia's economy were nothing new - they were all repeats of things the Russian government had openly said over the past 2 years. They don't portend disaster for Russia, but express challenges that Russia has openly been addressing, successfully, for a long time, and which it will most surely continue to.
Russia's economic growth is out-pacing the economic growth of all Western economies. And Russia is predicted to have an economic boom (even more than the one it's had for the past two years) when the Ukraine war ends, as sanctions will be removed and foreign investors will be eager to invest in Russia again.
Additionally, independent polling of Russia's population in July of 2024 found that the level of satisfaction and confidence in Russia's future was at the highest ever recorded since the USSR's dissolution. Putin's approval rating is currently at 87% positive. The Russian people are not going to be turning on Putin, and you can be sure that the performance of Russia's economy has a lot to do with his high approval rating.
Russia has serious economic challenges to contend with. And it's been handling them very well. The West has economic challenges, and it's not handling them nearly as well. Despite its economic challenges, Russia is in a much better position than probably all Western countries. The only Western country I would caveat that with is possibly the US, though it really depends on how the US is going to handle its enormous debt. Russia's economy is currently, and for the past two years has been, growing faster than the US'.
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The charges by which Navalny and his brother were sentenced - Navalny with a suspended sentence and his brother with a prison sentence, were made by French cosmetic company Yves Rocher. The charges were not fake and, contrary to what Johnny Harris says in his video, they weren't thrown-out. Navalny went to the European Court of Human Rights to protest the charges, and the ECHR ruled that the trial was unfair and arbitrary, but the ECHR didn't toss-out the charges, nor did it have the authority to. Navalny also appealed that the court consider the charges politically motivated, but the ECHR denied Navalny's appeal.
Honestly, a lot of what is said in Johnny Harris' video is not true at all. One other example is that he says Navalny couldn't check-in with the Russian Penitentiary Service because he was in a coma. But there was over 3 months between the time that Navalny was out of his coma and discharged from the hospital, and when he had to check-in by. Navalny was not required to check-in with the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service while he was still recovering in Germany. It was only required after the German hospital reported Navalny was recovered, which was 3 months after he was discharged from the hospital.
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@Justlookingg What you have said is false, Svetlana. I already gave the truthful details of the Yves Rocher case in my comment above. And anybody can verify it for themselves. I'll including the ECHR ruling in a link. The ECHR did not rule the Yves Rocher case illegal. It ruled that Russia had denied Navalny and his brother their right to a fair trial and that Russia must pay Navalny and his brother 76,000 EUR and 460,000 Rubles in damages. But it didn't dismiss the charges and didn't have the authority to. Additionally, the ECHR dismissed Navalny's appeal to have the charges deemed politically motivated.
Yves Rocher has stood by the charges against Navalny, saying, "its Russian subsidiary "acted in accordance with the practices and procedures of all international and independent companies and the more general principle of business ethics.""
The ECHR ruling is here: https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/eng#{%22tabview%22:[%22document%22],%22itemid%22:[%22001-177665%22]}
There's the actual court itself saying what I said, Svetlana, and it contradicts the falsehood that you have written and smeared me with. So, you have spoken disinformation. I don't know if you're lying or just ignorant or disinformed to the point that you aren't qualified to be talking on the subject. But either way, you owe me an apology. Please do a better job to inform yourself in the future.
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There is scarcely a more-surveyed topic than the Crimean people's desire to leave Ukraine and join Russia. Before the Crimean referendum, Western pollsters were surveying Crimea and hearing that people were eager to vote to join Russia. After the referendum, Western pollsters surveyed Crimea and they confirmed the result of the Crimean referendum.
https://www.quora.com/Did-the-great-majority-of-people-in-Crimea-wish-their-land-to-return-to-the-Russian-Federation/answers/158756133
The referendum was fully lawful. There was no Ukrainian constitution in effect at the time of Crimea's referendum - Ukraine's constitution had been overruled and nullified 3 weeks prior to Crimea's referendum. Crimea had been left stateless by the US-orchestrated coup in Kiev and was not subject to any Ukrainian law at the time of its referendum. Further, even if Crimea had been a part of Ukraine at the time of its referendum, Crimea was still entitled to organize and carry-out their own referendums under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights treaty.
There has only been a single UNGA resolution against Russia over Crimea which received majority support, at that was in 2014 during the chaos of things when nobody knew what was going on. That resolution received just barely over 50% support. But, since then, not a single resolution calling Crimea occupied has received anywhere close to majority support.
A UNGA resolution is non-binding and it passing doesn't count for anything. What matters is which and how many countries support a resolution. In the case of the most recent UNGA vote calling Crimea occupied, only 63 countries (out of 195), representing 17% of the world's population, voted in support of it. Those who voted in support of the resolution are basically just NATO and some of its dependants. So, it can't really be said that the UNGA is condemning Russia - it's primarily just NATO. And NATO is isolated from the larger world on the matter.
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Just a heads-up for people: The accounts "White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo", "Lloon Burg", "Beth Perkins", and probably others, are all operated by the same person who pretends to be different people with them. They are extremely aggressive, impulsive, can be stalking, and difficult to explain things to. And they have no restraint or compunction against making lies of any size, big or small, even when you'd think it's impossible for them to not know that you know that they're lying. They don't accept correction and are unyielding in their initial insistence. I believe this is because they are on the spectrum.
This person has been extremely sensitive to any talk about Ukraine's large troll farm program and can spend an entire day, more than 10 hours straight, non-stop, saying the same inane or whitewashing comment about it. In general, they mentally block-out all information that doesn't tell them what they want to hear, no matter how inarguably and demonstrably factual it is. They will also pretend they didn't get answers they received to their questions just so that they can continue to badger someone with the already-answered question and pretend with themselves that they're "owning" someone for not getting an answer. It is as detached from reality and normal sanity as it sounds.
With each of their accounts, they show the same very poor English grammar and phrasing, and are sometimes completely unintelligible - especially when they become upset. Yet, even when they're at their very most incoherent, as in, posting fully unintelligible gibberish, they maintain an insistence that they're speaking perfect English. When they spend more time working out a post they can make it appear a bit more normal, though there's typically always some oddities in their writing style. Again, I believe they are on the spectrum and that their behaviour is a result of that.
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@bethperkin2762 Oh my. I just checked the automatically-withheld comments for my YT page, and wow... this "Beth Perkins", "White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo", "Lloon Burg", etc unstable poster hasn't figured-out that they can't make comments on my YT page regardless of how many alt accounts they make. They're going nonstop with creating new accounts to get around a ban on my YT page and post comments there, without realizing that which account they're posting from has nothing to do with the block on their comments, and that all their comments are automatically blocked regardless of which account they use. What a total dummy! HAHAHA!!
They haven't been smart enough to realize they've been burning literal days of their time making new alt accounts all day long and posting things which nobody, including myself, ever sees (unless I check if there's been any automatically-withheld comments). The unintelligence of this "Beth Perkins", etc, person is record-setting. They're a failure of everything they tried to be, haha.
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Just a heads-up for people: The accounts "White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo", "Lloon Burg", "Beth Perkins", and probably others, are all operated by the same person who pretends to be different people with them. They are extremely aggressive, impulsive, can be stalking, and difficult to explain things to. And they have no restraint or compunction against making lies of any size, big or small, even when you'd think it's impossible for them to not know that you know that they're lying. They don't accept correction and are unyielding in their initial insistence. I believe this is because they are on the spectrum.
This person has been extremely sensitive to any talk about Ukraine's large troll farm program and can spend an entire day, more than 10 hours straight, non-stop, saying the same inane or whitewashing comment about it. In general, they mentally block-out all information that doesn't tell them what they want to hear, no matter how inarguably and demonstrably factual it is. They will also pretend they didn't get answers they received to their questions just so that they can continue to badger someone with the already-answered question and pretend with themselves that they're "owning" someone for not getting an answer. It is as detached from reality and normal sanity as it sounds.
With each of their accounts, they show the same very poor English grammar and phrasing, and are sometimes completely unintelligible - especially when they become upset. Yet, even when they're at their very most incoherent, as in, posting fully unintelligible gibberish, they maintain an insistence that they're speaking perfect English. When they spend more time working out a post they can make it appear a bit more normal, though there's typically always some oddities in their writing style. Again, I believe they are on the spectrum and that their behaviour is a result of that.
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@bethperkin3200 It's said that imitation is the clearest form of flattery, so thanks for quoting what I told you again. It underscores that you know you don't have the intelligence or grasp of the English language to think of anything to say, yourself, and that you think your own behaviour, which I identify in my comments you keep copy-pasting, is a humiliation of yourself.
"I can't even imagine how destroyed you must feel to have spent more than half a year thinking about me, to come back begging me for my attention and spamming endless comments hoping to salvage something you can't salvage because you didn't have it to begin with. Your life must be nothing but pain and humiliation.
You're far too enraged to see clearly or think competently, as made evident by the fact you've been spending all your time making alt accounts and trying to post on my YT page, without ever realizing that all your comments are automatically withheld from the page. Hahaha!! You literally spent hours, and hours, and hours, making accounts and posts that nobody could ever see, and the whole while you never clued into it. I don't know which words would even describe that level of stupidity and obliviousness. How very sad for you."
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Just a heads-up for people: The accounts "White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo", "Lloon Burg", "Beth Perkins", and probably others, are all operated by the same person who pretends to be different people with them. They are extremely aggressive, impulsive, can be stalking, and difficult to explain things to. And they have no restraint or compunction against making lies of any size, big or small, even when you'd think it's impossible for them to not know that you know that they're lying. They don't accept correction and are unyielding in their initial insistence. I believe this is because they are on the spectrum.
This person has been extremely sensitive to any talk about Ukraine's large troll farm program and can spend an entire day, more than 10 hours straight, non-stop, saying the same inane or whitewashing comment about it. In general, they mentally block-out all information that doesn't tell them what they want to hear, no matter how inarguably and demonstrably factual it is. They will also pretend they didn't get answers they received to their questions just so that they can continue to badger someone with the already-answered question and pretend with themselves that they're "owning" someone for not getting an answer. It is as detached from reality and normal sanity as it sounds.
With each of their accounts, they show the same very poor English grammar and phrasing, and are sometimes completely unintelligible - especially when they become upset. Yet, even when they're at their very most incoherent, as in, posting fully unintelligible gibberish, they maintain an insistence that they're speaking perfect English. When they spend more time working out a post they can make it appear a bit more normal, though there's typically always some oddities in their writing style. Again, I believe they are on the spectrum and that their behaviour is a result of that.
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Just a heads-up for people: The accounts "White Wall", "William Sam", "Fi Bryar", "Fatty Hendo", "Lloon Burg", "Beth Perkins", and probably others, are all operated by the same person who pretends to be different people with them. They are extremely aggressive, impulsive, can be stalking, and difficult to explain things to. And they have no restraint or compunction against making lies of any size, big or small, even when you'd think it's impossible for them to not know that you know that they're lying. They don't accept correction and are unyielding in their initial insistence. I believe this is because they are on the spectrum.
This person has been extremely sensitive to any talk about Ukraine's large troll farm program and can spend an entire day, more than 10 hours straight, non-stop, saying the same inane or whitewashing comment about it. In general, they mentally block-out all information that doesn't tell them what they want to hear, no matter how inarguably and demonstrably factual it is. They will also pretend they didn't get answers they received to their questions just so that they can continue to badger someone with the already-answered question and pretend with themselves that they're "owning" someone for not getting an answer. It is as detached from reality and normal sanity as it sounds.
With each of their accounts, they show the same very poor English grammar and phrasing (except when copy-pasting my comments), and are sometimes completely unintelligible - especially when they become upset. Yet, even when they're at their very most incoherent, as in, posting fully unintelligible gibberish, they maintain an insistence that they're speaking perfect English. When they spend more time working out a post they can make it appear a bit more normal, though there's typically always some oddities in their writing style. Again, I believe they are on the spectrum and that their behaviour is a result of that.
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@Hynotama AC4 is the best AC game, and the most AC-ish of the series. It has the most precursor race lore out of any AC game, it has the actual Assassins and Templars organizations and they're at the core of the story, it has a story that's actually about the Assassins and Templars conflict, it has a modern-day story that contains big new reveals, it has the peak refinement of the AC gameplay and controls, it has loads of climbing and parkour, and stealth, it has an actual First Civilization building and technology in it. AC4 is the most AC-ish game of the series, and it's also the best game of the series. Sadly, it's also the last true AC game of the series (unless Rogue is counted - but Rogue focuses on the Templars).
Additionally, boating in AC4 can be kept to a minimal. But I don't know why it would be an issue. It's a lot more fun than AC2's base building and store-unlocking. And it doesn't take more time than that. I guess AC2 isn't a real AC game, it's an entrepreneur simulator. AC3 is a Native American simulator (Connor didn't care about the Assassins at all), Unity is a French Revolution simulator.
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@Hynotama The First Civilization has been building-up and central to everything the Assassins and Templars are doing since AC2. Both groups are after their technology and seeking understanding of them, and AC2's ending is all about the FS. AC3 is centred around the FS with Juno wanting to be freed, showing they aren't just something from the distant past. She is freed at the end, and says Desmond's done her part and now she's going to do her part - meaning the FS were planned to have a bigger presence in the game. AC4 continues what AC2 - AC3 was establishing. AC4 added that Juno's husband, Aita, has been reincarnating throughout the ages.
AC4 didn't take away from the mystery, it added to it with the stories in the bottles found on beaches that contain glimpses of what happened to Aita during the time of the FS, with the FS' observatory, with the realization that Aita is reincarnating and is keeping tabs on the Templars, that Juno is now up to something that isn't yet revealed...
If you didn't see mystery in AC4 at every turn, you were asleep or just not willing to pay attention because you saw boats and decided that meant there's no AC there. There's more AC in AC4 than there is in any other game in the series.
BTW, the boats in AC4 are great fun and they suit the period and story. AC3 also has boats. AC4's boats are much refined, though. AC2 has a flying machine made by Leonardo. I've always thought that the inclusion of Leonardo as a friend of Ezio is one of the weakest design points of the classic series, up to AC4. And the flying machine's gameplay is awful - so is the unlocking of towers ad nauseum, and same with AC2's unlocking of storefronts (which you do have to do, by the way, unless you don't plan to upgrade your gear) and scavenging to pull-down wanted posters after every encounter or so. AC2 is far more repetitive than AC4, and more repetitive than AC3, which itself is a lot more repetitive than AC4. You can get by in AC4 spending less time boating than you can in AC2 with unlocking towers and storefronts. But the boating in AC4 is far more engaging and fun then AC2's grind.
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@Melted Synapse Hynotama
hasn't even played Black Flag 4. Literally nothing they've said about it is true. That troll absurdly claimed that 75% of the game is boating (more like 10% of it), and that a "minimal" playthrough of Black Flag can avoid exploring islands (no, it can't), and then admitted that they hadn't even played much of the game. Hynotama
is a clown and has embarrassed themselves greatly here.
Yes, Black Flag is excellently designed, and is easily one of the best games made on any platform to date. It's by far the best AC game. It's music, art direction, character design, voice acting, level design, are all top-notch, and superior to anything that Ubisoft or most any other studio has done since.
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