Would a DeSantis administration have a better approach or even more of the attitude that rightly concerns you? Surely not a Mike Pompeo one. Do we need to populate the US Department of State picked from those who are Quincy Experts see here: https://quincyinst.org/experts/? All of what you write makes sense in many ways and I just don't see a practical way to implement the changes given the domestic political situation and the realities of the world. Then I suppose one needs to hope you are something like out of the Book of Isaiah; “The voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare ye the way of the Lord, Make his paths straight.” Indeed you are calling forth the coming of new age. Tough job and somebody has to do it. Somehow I don't get the best case scenario is going to occur though. That said Bob, you go guy!
Great article! Loved the "Warning: A bunch of this is totally wrong. k?" line at the top. I would say that vision is a best case scenario. I have been accused at times of being a pessimist. I don't think so of course as I think I am more of a hard bitten realist type who appreciates the words of Donald Rumsfeld (about all I liked about Donald Rumsfeld): Rumsfeld stated:
"Reports that say that something hasn't happened are always interesting to me because as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns—the ones we don't know we don't know. And if one looks throughout the history of our country and other free countries, it is the latter category that tends to be the difficult ones."
I must say I tend to think there is going to have to be a rather big kill off of some kind of human beings that sends our current world back into something akin to a "Mad Max" event and out of the ashes arises a sort of "secular Buddhist" type mindset and culture that actually learns from the Mad Max experience and creates something like your article. The worst case scenario is things come back in the same old, same old and humanity has to do it over again. All this assumes we don't destroy the planet back to only roaches and we have to evolve back over a few million years. As for the UAP situation I figure something is indeed going on with visitation of some sort be it only robots from another more advanced galaxy. After all robots on Mars is how we are starting out visiting other planets so maybe others started that way we have as well only now are at the galaxy level of the game. Since I recently reached "elderly" status I probably won't see what happens in the next 20 or 30 years that should tell the tale longer term I figure.
Dominic Cummings talked about The Godfather advice in his latest substack which is: Never hate your enemies. It affects your judgement. Michael Corleone says it. Unfortunately it’s in part 3 but isn’t this the perfect way to brand cognitive empathy?
Regarding Russia avoiding General mobilization, I saw a Twitter thread pointing out that post September vote, the Donas and Luhansk will be considered part of Russia. So Russia will be able to move conscripts there legally without a general mobilization call.
That doesn't mean they would be fighting in offensive operations though.
I don't often comment here, but I think Bob has gotten so many things wrong here that some correction is in order. Perhaps Bob didn't notice the reports yesterday that German Chancellor Scholz offered Putin to keep Ukraine out of NATO for 30 years and did not even get a response.
This war happened for one reason and only one reason, and that's because Putin wants to take back Ukraine. He had no interest in negotiating anything. If he had wanted to negotiate he could have started negotiations at any time. But there is nothing Putin wants from negotiations. He just wants Ukraine. Also the assassination of Dugina is of no long term significance, except that it indicates the Ukrainians or whoever did it may have the ability to strike at Putin's inner circle. If so, the good news is that they or whomever carried out the killing may be able to take out other key people in that circle as they have been taking out Russia's top generals in Ukraine.
There isn't going to be a nuclear war over Dugina or any other assassination of Putin's inner circle. In that circle assassinations are regarded as commonplace and people are always falling off buildings or having heart attacks after they are poisoned by the FSB. This war will only end when Putin is removed from power or when he conquers Ukraine or is defeated. If Russian advances are stopped then Putin will leave his troops there and preserve a frozen conflict perhaps for many years. This is his standard procedure and was predictable from the outset. After all he has had a frozen conflict in the Donbas since 2014.
There will be no negotiations until Putin wants to have them because he thinks he can get something.
Right now there is nothing the Ukrainians can offer him that he wants. This will be a long conflict and everyone should get used to the idea.
"German Chancellor Scholz offered Putin to keep Ukraine out of NATO for 30 years and did not even get a response."
I think you're referring to a very brief news update in the German newspaper Die Welt that was picked up by a Ukrainian news site and Yahoo News. Alas, the update gives no detail about the context of the offer and whether it was in fact an offer or just a passing comment by Scholz. So it's not very good evidence for your assertion "[Putin] had no interest in negotiating anything."
The gist of your arguments is also somewhat ahistorical--the roots of this conflict go back to at least the early 1990s when several economic and political blunders on the part of the West helped plunge Russia into an economic crisis and bring Putin to power.
The deliberate ahistoricity on the part of many in the Blob goes someway towards explaining the genesis and development of this extremely worrisome calamity Europe and the wider world find themselves in now. A course correction is urgently in order, as Bob has noted in several of his pieces--we have less and less leeway to repeat the mistakes of the past and "get used to the idea" of long (and unpredictable) conflicts.
"Macho posturing and virtue signaling"
I feel like every politician is auditioning for some poorly produced Tom Clancy film; American foreign policy really lacks imagination.
Would a DeSantis administration have a better approach or even more of the attitude that rightly concerns you? Surely not a Mike Pompeo one. Do we need to populate the US Department of State picked from those who are Quincy Experts see here: https://quincyinst.org/experts/? All of what you write makes sense in many ways and I just don't see a practical way to implement the changes given the domestic political situation and the realities of the world. Then I suppose one needs to hope you are something like out of the Book of Isaiah; “The voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare ye the way of the Lord, Make his paths straight.” Indeed you are calling forth the coming of new age. Tough job and somebody has to do it. Somehow I don't get the best case scenario is going to occur though. That said Bob, you go guy!
Great article! Loved the "Warning: A bunch of this is totally wrong. k?" line at the top. I would say that vision is a best case scenario. I have been accused at times of being a pessimist. I don't think so of course as I think I am more of a hard bitten realist type who appreciates the words of Donald Rumsfeld (about all I liked about Donald Rumsfeld): Rumsfeld stated:
"Reports that say that something hasn't happened are always interesting to me because as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns—the ones we don't know we don't know. And if one looks throughout the history of our country and other free countries, it is the latter category that tends to be the difficult ones."
I must say I tend to think there is going to have to be a rather big kill off of some kind of human beings that sends our current world back into something akin to a "Mad Max" event and out of the ashes arises a sort of "secular Buddhist" type mindset and culture that actually learns from the Mad Max experience and creates something like your article. The worst case scenario is things come back in the same old, same old and humanity has to do it over again. All this assumes we don't destroy the planet back to only roaches and we have to evolve back over a few million years. As for the UAP situation I figure something is indeed going on with visitation of some sort be it only robots from another more advanced galaxy. After all robots on Mars is how we are starting out visiting other planets so maybe others started that way we have as well only now are at the galaxy level of the game. Since I recently reached "elderly" status I probably won't see what happens in the next 20 or 30 years that should tell the tale longer term I figure.
Dominic Cummings talked about The Godfather advice in his latest substack which is: Never hate your enemies. It affects your judgement. Michael Corleone says it. Unfortunately it’s in part 3 but isn’t this the perfect way to brand cognitive empathy?
Regarding Russia avoiding General mobilization, I saw a Twitter thread pointing out that post September vote, the Donas and Luhansk will be considered part of Russia. So Russia will be able to move conscripts there legally without a general mobilization call.
That doesn't mean they would be fighting in offensive operations though.
I don't often comment here, but I think Bob has gotten so many things wrong here that some correction is in order. Perhaps Bob didn't notice the reports yesterday that German Chancellor Scholz offered Putin to keep Ukraine out of NATO for 30 years and did not even get a response.
This war happened for one reason and only one reason, and that's because Putin wants to take back Ukraine. He had no interest in negotiating anything. If he had wanted to negotiate he could have started negotiations at any time. But there is nothing Putin wants from negotiations. He just wants Ukraine. Also the assassination of Dugina is of no long term significance, except that it indicates the Ukrainians or whoever did it may have the ability to strike at Putin's inner circle. If so, the good news is that they or whomever carried out the killing may be able to take out other key people in that circle as they have been taking out Russia's top generals in Ukraine.
There isn't going to be a nuclear war over Dugina or any other assassination of Putin's inner circle. In that circle assassinations are regarded as commonplace and people are always falling off buildings or having heart attacks after they are poisoned by the FSB. This war will only end when Putin is removed from power or when he conquers Ukraine or is defeated. If Russian advances are stopped then Putin will leave his troops there and preserve a frozen conflict perhaps for many years. This is his standard procedure and was predictable from the outset. After all he has had a frozen conflict in the Donbas since 2014.
There will be no negotiations until Putin wants to have them because he thinks he can get something.
Right now there is nothing the Ukrainians can offer him that he wants. This will be a long conflict and everyone should get used to the idea.
"German Chancellor Scholz offered Putin to keep Ukraine out of NATO for 30 years and did not even get a response."
I think you're referring to a very brief news update in the German newspaper Die Welt that was picked up by a Ukrainian news site and Yahoo News. Alas, the update gives no detail about the context of the offer and whether it was in fact an offer or just a passing comment by Scholz. So it's not very good evidence for your assertion "[Putin] had no interest in negotiating anything."
The gist of your arguments is also somewhat ahistorical--the roots of this conflict go back to at least the early 1990s when several economic and political blunders on the part of the West helped plunge Russia into an economic crisis and bring Putin to power.
The deliberate ahistoricity on the part of many in the Blob goes someway towards explaining the genesis and development of this extremely worrisome calamity Europe and the wider world find themselves in now. A course correction is urgently in order, as Bob has noted in several of his pieces--we have less and less leeway to repeat the mistakes of the past and "get used to the idea" of long (and unpredictable) conflicts.
Seems as likely that the killing of Daria Dugina was in fact Russian mob related.