Category Archives: Russia

UPDATED (2/3/023) Ukraine Chronology & Commentary: Ignorant Mike Pence Pitches War Forevermore For Ukraine, Under The Defunct, Cold War Reagan Doctrine

America, Argument, Communism, Democracy, Donald Trump, Elections, Foreign Policy, Iran, Republicans, Russia

Another good reason to disqualify one more jingoist from office: Mike Pence is still working from the defunct, cold-war based Reagan doctrine

Mike Ponce tells Bret Baier, lightweight Fox News neoconservative host, that it is imperative the “United States and the new Republican majority continue to provide the Ukrainian people with the support they need to defend themselves.”

In other words, enable war forevermore for Ukraine, so its slimy leader, Zelensky, can continue to play his biggest role yet and is exempt from his duty to do diplomacy. (READ “It’s biblical, Zelensky: a leader who fails to haggle for the lives of his people is a failed leader.”)

Ponce spoke about the latest allegation against Russia, namely that of dropping ordnance on Poland, a NATO member. He spouted forth about an Article 5 obligation to go to war for Poland, and then further waffled in his best faux ponderous, presidential manner, that Russia ought to be “transparent” during the investigation into the origin of the bomb that fell on “Ukraine” (sic: it fell on Poland, Ponce). This, when the US is stoking the conflict as vociferously as Zelensky is.

“I’ve gone toe-to-toe with Putin,” bragged Ponce. He followed up with the cretin’s commonplace cliche: “Putin understands only strength.” Other than that Trump deployed the worst people during his term—Ponce stands as a reminder to Deplorables that he and Trump provided lethal arms to Ukraine.

Likely a liar, Pence blames Biden for restricting billions in military aid to Ukraine to “blankets and boxed meals.” Only he could truly support Ukraine in the style to which this little tinpot destination has become accustomed, argued Ponce, striking his best “I’m-presidential” pose possible.

We are informed that Pence and wife Karen visited Ukraine … blah blah blah, and he is thus in the position to advise that it is imperative that the USA continue to pump this great Democracy with funds to defend its great democracy.

Of course, the defending-democracy premise is one Tucker Carlson uses in his case against helping Ukraine. Carlson claims Ukraine is not a democracy, hence deserves no defense. Both Pence and Tucker use democracy to justify opposing policies: Democracy as a premise for or against war is wrong.

These discrepancies only expose the impoverished neoconservative nature of a foreign policy based on the US’s obligations to act in furtherance of democracy across the world.

“If you are willing to fight communists in your country; we’ll provide you the means”: Mike Pence says this is the Reagan doctrine to which he subscribes.

Right there is another good reason to disqualify one more American jingoist from office. Putin’s Russia is not communist; it is a traditionalist, reactionary, Russian Orthodox favoring authoritarian state. Pence is still working from the defunct, cold-war based Reagan doctrine.

This man, Pence, holds a neoconservative foreign policy and believes his duty is to Ukraine, not the people of the US, deplorables in particular, whose freedoms are curtailed stateside.

UPDATE (11/21/022): The impoverished neoconservative foreign policy habit-of-mind ingrained in Mike Pence is on display in other characters with whom Trump surrounded himself. Some of these made an appearance at the recent Republican Jewish Coalition conference.

Beware of Mike Pompeo and Nikki Haley.

What has been said here about Mr. Ponce easily applies to “Mike Pompeo, Trump’s hand-picked secretary of State and CIA director” and Nikki Haley, Trump’s U.N. ambassador, who is threatening to win the next presidency. She also bragged that “she’s ‘never lost an election and [is] not going to start now.’”

Both Pompeo and Haley are known for their robotic sloganeering against Bashar al-Assad’s more enlightened Alawite regime—Syria’s Christians simply love him—Putin’s Russian Orthodox traditionalist rule, and the impoverished Iran.

If I hear Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis — “Trump’s most formidable potential rival right now” — agitating against the long-suffering people of Iran; I’m done voting GOP.

This axis of evil, Israel and America, are aligned against the Christian-Shia-Alawite alliance. This axis has formed a protective perimeter around Sunni rebel holdouts, who are not the good guys. As I wrote in “Lies About Putin, Syria & The Alawite (Iranian) Alliance,”

Under Putin’s protection, the more civilized Alawite minority (read higher IQ), which has governed Syria since 1966, is in charge again. Duly, reports the anti-Assad Economist, “Government departments are functioning. … electricity and water supplies are more reliable than in much of the Middle East. Officials predict that next year’s natural-gas production will surpass pre-war levels. The railway from Damascus to Aleppo might resume operations this summer. The National Museum in Damascus, which locked up its prized antiquities for protection, is preparing to reopen to the public.” …
… Infested as it is by globalist ideologues, the permanent establishment of American foreign policy refuses to consider regional, religious, local, even tribal, dynamics in the Middle East. In particular, that the “good” guys in Syria—a relative term—are not the Islamist “rebels,” with whom the [neoconservatives are] forever frolicking; but the secular Alawites, who are allied with Shia Iran against the onslaught of the Sunni fundamentalist majority.

… the endangered Alawite minority formed an alliance with the Iranian Shia, also a minority among the Ummah. Now, civilized and secular Syrians want their country back. In fact, many Syrian “Sunnis prefer Mr. Assad’s secular rule to that of Islamist rebels.”

Mercer on Ukraine:

1. Neocons, Neolibs And NATO Inch Us Closer To Nuclear War With Russia, 01/29/2022: https://www.ilanamercer.com/2022/01/neocons-neolibs-nato-inch-us-closer-nuclear-war-russia/
2. Uncle Sam Still King Of All Invaders: Ukraine, Realpolitik And The West’s Failure: March 3, 2022 https://www.ilanamercer.com/2022/03/uncle-sam-still-king-invaders-ukraine-realpolitik-wests-failure/
3. True Story: Russia Finds WMD In Ukraine! March 10, 2022 https://www.ilanamercer.com/2022/03/true-story-russia-finds-wmd-ukraine/
4. It’s Biblical, Zelensky: A Leader Who Fails To Haggle For The Lives Of His People Has Failed https://www.ilanamercer.com/2022/03/biblical-zelensky-leader-fails-haggle-lives-people-failed/
5. U.S. Cancels Countries, Kills Ancient, Civilizing Concept Of Neutrality April 7, 2022 https://www.ilanamercer.com/2022/04/u-s-cancels-countries-kills-ancient-civilizing-concept-neutrality/
6. Ukraine’s Azov Battalion: Nazis Or Just Nationalists? May 12, 2022 https://www.ilanamercer.com/2022/05/ukraines-azov-battalion-nazis-or-just-nationalists/
7. “The D-Bomb, Realpolitik, Zelensky’s Self-Serving ‘Heroics’ & What ‘Mixed-Race’ Really Means” December 22, 2022 https://www.ilanamercer.com/2022/12/the-d-bomb-realpolitik-zelenskys-self-serving-heroics-what-mixed-race-really-means/
8. “Oh, What Wonderful Wars: The West’s Lying Warlords,” March 10, 2023

Mercer “Hard Truth” Video Podcasts on Ukraine. Please Subscribe:

https://rumble.com/c/HardTruthPodcast
https://rumble.com/vx058f-true-story-russia-finds-wmd-in-ukrainehtml
https://rumble.com/vw897h-russia-to-us-on-ukraine-pot.-kettle.-black..html
https://rumble.com/vtea18-neocons-neolibs-and-nato-inch-us-closer-to-nuclear-war-with-russia.html
“Ukraine’s Azov Brigade: Nazis Or Just Nationalists?”
“The US Plan To Bleed Russia Dry”
“Steamrolled By The Abrams: Republican Cretins Swallow Classified-Doc Bait”
“Oh What Wonderful Wars: The West’s Lying Warlords”

Quick Note On Principle-Bereft Conservative Utilitarianism

Argument, Conservatism, Energy, Political Philosophy, Russia, War

2 Replies

In a segment today, Monday October 3, Fox News personality Tucker Carlson and guest Glenn Greenwald discussed the Evil Empire’s sabotage of Russia’s energy pipelines to Europe . (The best on the subject is FRED REED’s “A Diagnostic Letter To Our Euro-Peon Vassals, Who Are Dumber Than The Better Class Of Nematode.”)

Glenn Greenwald belabored the point as to whether a war with Russia is even advantageous to the United States and its people. This was also as far as Tucker Carlson would venture, the premise of such crass utilitarianism being that the American State has the right to do anything it wishes, provided this benefits the American people. Poppycock.

Contra Tucker Carlson and Glenn Greenwald, even if war with Russia were “advantageous to the American people”—to paraphrase the exclusively utilitarian point the two made—it is an unjust war. Like most conservatives, the two personalities mentioned ignore ethical or moral argument, never mentioning Just War theory. Or, even the constitutionally correct way to take our country to war.

See “JUST WAR FOR DUMMIES” (March 12, 2003)

*Image credit, screen picture of this image.

UPDATED (9/7/022): Being Neocon, Wrong And Immoral Earns America’s Pundits More Plaudits

Conservatism, Foreign Policy, Ilana Mercer, Neoconservatism, Russia, The West, War

Leave a reply

Sorry, Tucker Carlson: We like Victor Davis Hanson (VDH) as a person–but his record, put charitably, is that of playing catch-up. Only recently and slowly has he loosened the grip the neoconservative worldview has had on his thinking. And unconvincingly so.

VDH has been avidly cheering for the Ukrainian project—and seems unable to quiet his rhetoric about American foreign-policy Manifest Destiny. His first instinct was to support the Ukrainian endeavor and he holds the most mundane neoconservative views on Russia.

How predictive is VDH’s analysis in this, our latest, foreign-policy debacle? Not at all. In March of 2022, VDH celebrated “the muscular response of a West supposedly in decline,” when the West is manifestly in decline and Russia is winning by attrition. See “Russia Admits Weaponization Of Gas, Halts NS1 Shipments ‘Until Sanctions Lifted,’ As EU Prepares Response To Energy Crisis.” “[I]n response to the west’s weaponization of currencies and capital flows—Russia has halted gas supplies through Nord Stream 1.”

UPDATE 9/7/022: Putin: “We’ve Lost Nothing” – Putin Warns Western Elites’ “Sanctions Fever” Will See European People “Freeze”

…the blowback from EU and US-led sanctions and attempts at decoupling from Russian fossil fuels is wrecking lives in the West. “Now we are seeing how production and jobs in Europe are closing one after another,” Putin said, stressing that this is happening as “Western elites, who would not, or even cannot acknowledge objective facts.”

While against its war of aggression—those of us who see Russia as a natural ally of traditionalism (expressed in “America’s Radical, Foreign-Policy Alinskyites Destroyed South Africa!“) offered a solid distillation of the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Not VDH. He celebrated the puppet Zelensky, who, early in my analysis (March 24, 2022), betrayed his people for war and western aggrandizement.

When VDH, in March 2022, was getting hot for war (the mildest neocon finds war a turn-on), proclaiming a western revival—which is EXACTLY how neocons see war; a rejuvenator of sorts—aggrandizing its horrors ; I wrote this, March 3, 2022:

Good old realpolitik is what Zelensky should have been practicing with his powerful neighbors and historic brethren, the Russians.

Realpolitik is practical politics, the art of getting along, differences and all, in a real world in which reality, including the differences between people and their political systems, is accepted and dealt with.

VDH absolutely loved the war on Iraq (we railed against it from 2002 onward) and admits to NOT supporting Trump in the primaries. We were Orange from day one. (Trump book was published in June, 2016.)

Here we were for Trump from the get-go; against the Iraq war; hold a realistic position on Russia as friend of conservatives (the rest is the business of Russians, not Americans).

Still, readers have become angry with me, and not with the famous, rich, sinecured fools who led them astray and have proven wrong all the time (including in their current pursuits of the Ukraine production).

That kind of schedule of reinforcement and preference in public intellectuals and politicians explains the quality of cognoscenti Americans get. I’ve always said the government and culture don’t stand apart from us; they are us.

The more you reward those who are frequently and reliably wrong in public life—the more flourishing wrongdoers you’ll get and the more likely you are to keep going wrong.

Those who are right and principled get maligned for having foresight and principles. Those who were wrong are redeemed and forgiven, for they reflect the masses.

“PUNDITS, HEAL THYSELVES!”

* Image credit, screen pic

Lousy Lithuania Blockading Kaliningrad Could Be A Catalyst For World War Three

EU, Europe, Foreign Policy, Russia, The West, War

2 Replies

Russia will have to intrude into NATO territory to feed its people in Kaliningrad. NATO, doing Uncle Sam’s bidding, could then invoke its Article 5 obligation to, one and all, galvanize against Russia.

On July 28, 1914, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia pursuant to the killing of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife by a Serbian nationalist in Sarajevo, thus effectively starting the First World War.

Americans, aside some asses who may rot in Russian jails as prisoners of war, have not gotten as worked up about Ukraine as the neoconservative, neoliberal and the ConOink laptop bombardiers have wanted them to.

But Lithuania’s partial blockade of Kaliningrad—“a Russian sovereign territory on the Baltic Sea, sandwiched between Lithuania and Poland,” and thus reliant on these EU neighbors, also NATO members, for overland shipping of essential supplies—might just constitute a provocation like the one that ignited WWI.

This is the case because Russia will have to intrude into NATO territory to feed its people in Kaliningrad. NATO members, doing Uncle Sam’s bidding, could then invoke their Article 5 obligation to, one and all, galvanize against Russia.

Via ZeroHedge:

Ahead of the new Lithuanian transit ban taking effect, the state railways service was reportedly awaiting final word from the European Commission on enforcing it:

The cargo unit of Lithuania’s state railways service set out details of the ban in a letter to clients following “clarification” from the European Commission on the mechanism for applying the sanctions.

Previously, Lithuanian Deputy Foreign Minister Mantas Adomenas said the ministry was waiting for “clarification from the European Commission on applying European sanctions to Kaliningrad cargo transit.”

Brussels then ruled that “sanctioned goods and cargo should still be prohibited even if they travel from one part of Russia to another but through EU territory,” according to Rueters/Rferl.

In Moscow’s eyes, this is tantamount to laying economic siege to part of Russia’s sovereign territory and one million of its citizens. When the EU first proposed the blockage of goods as part of the last major sanctions package in early April, Kremlin officials warned of war given Moscow would have to “break the blockade” for the sake if its citizens.

MORE.