Coffeesforclosers

My play around portfolio was up 48% YTD before all this happened.

Why bother asking why it has to be one or the other, right?

Of course!

Yup! I also think it's true, so there's our impasse.

It's a judgement call. I trust a patriotic, pro-war Russian nationalist who led what was at the time, the most effective unit in the Russian military to Russia'a greatest victory yet in this war over pretty much any other source. His statement pretty much refutes all of those other arguments. The fact he was then murdered for speaking the truth, trying to upend part of the system, and being better at his job than Putins other cronies just seals the deal.

Ahhhh right. Fill the Zone with *****! Make truth irrelevant. Propaganda 101. Since launching the war, Putin has painted it as a defensive operation to protect Russia. He's claimed it was needed to stop imminent large-scale attacks from Ukraine on largely Russian-speaking eastern regions in Donbas that Russia has occupied since 2014. Prigozhin, whose fighters have played a leading role in the war, said that was not true and there had been no imminent risk of attack from Ukraine.  Recent Stories from ABC News     "The ministry of defense now is trying to deceive society, the president, and tell a story there was insane aggression from Ukraine and that they intended to attack us with the whole NATO bloc," Prigozhin said.  "The Special Military Operation that began on Feb. 24 was started for completely different reasons," he said. Prigozhin has been in a public feud with Russia's defense ministry and its head Sergey Shoigu for months, blaming them for Russia's disastrous prosecution of the war. As Russia has faced deepening setbacks in Ukraine, he has become an unexpected, prominent critic of Russia's leadership, using social media to post almost daily video updates excoriating it as incompetent, but stopping short of directly criticizing Putin. Prigozhin also said in Friday's video that the two goals Putin announced at the start of the war— the "demilitarization" and "de-Nazification" of Ukraine—were "pretty stories."Instead, he blamed Shoigu, the defense ministry and a "clan of oligarchs" for starting the war. He accused Shoigu of seeking glory and wanting "to rob" Ukraine and divide up its assets

Gotcha. Wasn't aware. Bob Woodward did the Lord's work back in the day. I'm sure him and Cy Hersh have the best intentions. I got by what Yevgeniy Prighozin said during the Wagner Mutiny.

What's Operation Mockingbird?

The news is what it is, that's true. I've gone back to doing this old fashioned thing called...reading books. That takes time, effort and concentration though, and we're addicted to instant gratification thanks to our Internet overlords...

Twitter/X is the MSM now. So I trust it about as far as I can throw Elon Musk. Glad you appreciate the classics!

As you lap up talking points from a media source wholly owned and operated by a US Government Employee? Oooooooohhhhhh, better watch out for all these Free Thinkers!

I've got a high stress job and there's so many people here who are so.damn.dumb. Makes things easy! Much obliged! I'm a big believer in James 5:16. Woooooaaahhhh hold on! You're not being sarcastic are you?

Nope. I'm not the one arguing that the Ukraine War needs to end because MoRaLiTy. I'll just keep chilling out while all these pompous hypocrites lord their enlightened opinions over us mere mortals. Let me know if you want to jump in on the virtue signalling!

Another sermon from our forum's most enlightened poster.

Xi Jinping and the CCP used their leverage over Russia to stop Putin from using nukes. Oh, *****. I forgot this was a clever rhetorical question.

Video after video?! Oh no! Has anyone told Chicken Little what's happening. That's fine, just keep isolating them and backing them into a corner. The world is a great place when Europe is militarized.

Then you're waaaaayyy to easy to scare?

Yup. It's a game that we started by choice because...reasons? All Trump had to do was twist arms behind the scenes to get Europe to do what he wanted. He's got the exact same leverage in private as he does in public to threaten withdrawals, tarrifs, whatever his little hear desires. Instead, he chose to make grandiose statements, snide lectures, and public threats. Now the EU is scrambling to centralize power in itself and remilitarize, not on the basis of an alliance with US interests, but because they think they're on their own and it's time to tool up. Of course Trump has to support the AFD and other Eurosceptics...because if they don't keep pulling Europe apart at the seems, this whole strategy blows up his face, and we end up with a centralized European megastate with it's own military capability and an agenda that is divorced from ours. Genius ***** diplomacy! Nothing ever goes wrong when Europe centralizes power and rearms itself! Europe is famously peaceful! We Americans have NEVER experienced blowback from hasty moves and picking fights we don't have to!

Hahahahahahah Tell me you believe what you're told without telling me. Here's the actual article. It has...nuance.

When was the last time we brokered a peace that ended in something besides: 1. A decades long commitment. 2. A collapsed former ally and our humiliation.

Hurray for Reaganomics!

Who's all? There's only two parties negotiating?

I get all my facts from a massive media conglomerate completely aligned with the current President of the United States. It's called X.

That's the spirit! But honestly, this just the pompous, long winded version of a much shorter article from 2023. The tensions between Moscow and the West can only be resolved by talking with the Ukrainian president’s foreign masters, Russia’s FM has said The West and Russia will eventually sit down to discuss their differences, but this dialogue should be held not with Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky but with those using him as a stooge, Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Friday. So what if Russia Today is the government funded propaganda organ of the Russian state. We NeEd NuAnCe!

Outstanding. An actual Russian concession.