Nudging the Bear

"Meanwhile, the beat goes on. Our weak President has covid and dimension. Our military is understaffed, and those who serve, are being trained to use proper pronouns rather than how to break things and kill people."

Shortly after the illegal and immoral invasion of Ukraine started, Vladimir Putin was very forthcoming in his threats to the West. Especially us. "Supply weapons to Ukraine, and you will become part of this". Then as time went on, there were more and more veiled or not so veiled threats. Putin even offered to vaporize both of our coasts, which would put an end to America. A bit different (and more truculent) than Khrushchev banging his shoe on the podium at the UN.

First, an aside. Three days ago, NPR finally raised the question about Ukraine being corrupt. DUH! We have known for a long time, that the government of Ukraine is corrupt. How do we know Ukraine was (or still is corrupt)? Hunter Biden. He could sniff out a deal in Ukraine. Hunter's business acumen is sniffing through the garbage.

This unqualified crack head, ended up on the Board of Directors of Burisma, an Ukraine based energy company. And what did Hunter know about energy? Nada - but - Hunter's daddy was the Veep at that time. It was a pay to play deal.

Now we have Russia, a very corrupt country, who is nothing but a gas station with nukes, invading Ukraine, an almost as corrupt country. And - NATO and the United States, who continue to send scads of cash and weaponry over to the war zone. Soon, we might be sending some of our best fighter jets over there. Will this cross Putin's red line? Maybe. Will he take some kind of nuclear option to retaliate? I sure hope not. 

Here is my way of thinking on this matter. We are nudging the Bear. More and more, harder and harder. We are banking on the premise that cooler heads will prevail in Russia. That they will just put up with weapons which will further decimate their troops and equipment. But what if we nudge the Bear too far? Do we need to practice the "duck and cover" drills again? Or will Russia decide to teach us all a lesson by turning NATO headquarters in Belgium into a flaming cinder?

We may think our participation in this war right now is solely lend lease. Or it is proxy? My question is this - is this going to be a quagmire for us, like Viet Nam was? Where we started out advisors helping the French, and ended up owning the defeat of South Vietnam? How do we extricate ourselves from Ukraine? Or are we there for the long haul?

Messing with Russia, is like getting into a shoving contest with someone who has a loaded Glock in his waistband. You are hoping that the pushing and shoving stays at pushing and shoving. However, there is always the chance the other guy could take his Glock out of his waistband, and shoot. We are banking on the chance that Putin will never spin up this nukes and use them on us or NATO.

Meanwhile, the beat goes on. Our weak President has covid and dimension. Our military is understaffed, and those who serve, are being trained to use proper pronouns rather than how to break things and kill people. Our economy is a mess, we have three million illegals who have invaded our southern border this year, and half the people in the country are confused if they are still proud to be Americans anymore. 

Will Putin destroy America? I don't think he needs to. We are doing a good job of destroying it ourselves. November cannot come fast enough.