S&P: Russia's rating now CCC-

[cesfx]

One thing though. I don't agree with seizing the personal assets of people as a way to stop the war. It's Putin who started the war through governmental means; if you want to seize or freeze assets, you should seize or freeze the assets of the Russian government or government officials but people's personal assets should be off-limit. If you feel that these personal assets were ill-gotten gains, then you should open an investigation or put those people on trial to find out if really broke the law in gaining these assets but you cannot be just arbitrarily seizing people's houses and yachts just because...Nobody should be above or below the law. If a serial killer is even entitled to a trial then so should anybody before their assets are taken away otherwise you are operating no different from mobs and terrorists and not in a democracy governed by rules of law. Stopping a war should not be used as a reason.

You are also setting very dangerous precedents that grossly violate people's fundamental rights and freedom and nobody's personal assets will be safe. Imagine you and your family are sleeping in your home and all of sudden in the middle of the night, you are thrown onto the street because the government didn't like what you said in one of your tweets and they seized your house... If you don't want this to happen to you or your descendants one day, you should stop Biden and the West from seizing people's yachts right now. If Biden has the guts to stop the war, he should order troops to Ukraine and face Russia head-on and leave civilians' stuff alone. Does Biden have the guts? No and Putin knows that and that's why he's calling US' bluff.

Are you actually saying that confiscating rich motherfuckers spare asset, is worse than sending troops to die in a foreign land and risking a global nuclear conflict?
Ridiculous and pathetic.
You are comparing the seizure of a mega yacht parked abroad, to some average man and family being kicked out of their only own home by their government...

 

[Pekelo]

I am not the Commander-In-Chief of the most powerful military force in the world and a printing press with unlimited money printing.

I don't see what the money printing has to do with it. But since you so smart, why don't you give us at least ideas, what should be done? You know, without the chance of starting a nuclear world war...

Mind you, the opposing side is not reasonable. So how do you deal with an unreasonable, old despot?

 

[HlibKozakXX]

Russian warship go fuck yourself.
Their economy will collapse soon.

 

[terr]

One thing though. I don't agree with seizing the personal assets of people as a way to stop the war. It's Putin who started the war through governmental means; if you want to seize or freeze assets, you should seize or freeze the assets of the Russian government or government officials but people's personal assets should be off-limit.

There is very little distinction between government and oligarchs in Russia. It is a gang of criminals at the top, some give themselves government titles, some don't bother.

I am usually very much against politics interfering in stuff like sports and arts. But this is not "politics". "Politics" is rhetoric, negotiations, trade, treaties, pressure, etc. What Russia is doing is not "politics" anymore. Unprovoked military aggression is not "politics". This is far beyond politics. So the sanctions are not political. They are practical. They are there to isolate, block and make a pariah a country that claimed that it can shit all over the international law and no one can do anything about it. Well the West is doing something about it, both the governments, private companies and non-governmental organizations.

 

[M.W.]

But the sanctions are also highly emotional and that's where the danger lies. Millions of innocent Russians are punished for the wrongs of a despot. I am not talking about oligarchs who have stolen and extracted billions of Russian publicly owned assets. I am talking about performers at the NY Met and many others who are all equated with Stalin and Putin due to their passport. This indicates an emotionally unstable people and culture that always launches missiles at perceived opponents, regardless of whether it's Hitler or a mosquito. Degrees of association matter but here entire lives are destroyed because of nationality. Canceling mobile apps in Russia? How much more pathetic and out of any proportion can this American emotional shock response get? And free public transit tickets for ukrainians all over Europe? Even those who are already living abroad for a long time.

I am all for targeted sanctions and pressure. But against a generalized and broad assault on an entire culture and its people who are not part of this war.

There is very little distinction between government and oligarchs in Russia. It is a gang of criminals at the top, some give themselves government titles, some don't bother.

I am usually very much against politics interfering in stuff like sports and arts. But this is not "politics". "Politics" is rhetoric, negotiations, trade, treaties, pressure, etc. What Russia is doing is not "politics" anymore. Unprovoked military aggression is not "politics". This is far beyond politics. So the sanctions are not political. They are practical. They are there to isolate, block and make a pariah a country that claimed that it can shit all over the international law and no one can do anything about it. Well the West is doing something about it, both the governments, private companies and non-governmental organizations.

 

[terr]

But against a generalized and broad assault on an entire culture and its people who are not part of this war.

You don't seem to understand. This is not politics as usual. This is unhinged unprovoked military invasion of a European country, with nuclear threats galore. This makes Russia a rogue pariah state. With the emphasis on pariah. There is no business as usual. This is NOT usual.

You think that what the Western private companies and non-governmental organizations are doing is done to punish Russians, but you're wrong.

Every company, when it lists its assets, lists "good will" as an asset. Basically, you can think of it as the company's image in public opinion. For some companies it is a significant percentage of the company's valuation.

I repeat, Russia is now a rogue pariah state. Selling to Russia, dealing with it in any way, today, reduces that "good will" quite a bit, due to unhinged Russian military aggression. A lot of companies and organizations are not willing to reduce their "good will" asset in that way.

 

[M.W.]

A rogue government should never be the motivation to punish and destroy the lives of millions who live peacefully abroad or even under the pressure of said rogue government. Completely disproportionate and emotional response that clearly reflects the inability to go after the true perps. It is perfectly apparent that strategists and military leaders in the west don't comprehend that this is a chess game where victory is a function of many small battles that take time to play out. You hardly ever win a chess match by going straight after the king or queen from the very start. The reason China has ascended to Super power status is because they play the long game. All those knee jerk reactions by the west have done nothing to really tackle the enemy. Not with Russia, not with China, not with North Korea, not with Iran, not with the war on drugs.

The only effect the current strategy has on a pariah is to push him into a corner and pariahs in corners get way more dangerous and unpredictable than anything else.

You don't seem to understand. This is not politics as usual. This is unhinged unprovoked military invasion of a European country, with nuclear threats galore. This makes Russia a rogue pariah state. With the emphasis on pariah. There is no business as usual. This is NOT usual.

You think that what the Western private companies and non-governmental organizations are doing is done to punish Russians, but you're wrong.

Every company, when it lists its assets, lists "good will" as an asset. Basically, you can think of it as the company's image in public opinion. For some companies it is a significant percentage of the company's valuation.

I repeat, Russia is now a rogue pariah state. Selling to Russia, dealing with it in any way, today, reduces that "good will" quite a bit, due to unhinged Russian military aggression. A lot of companies and organizations are not willing to reduce their "good will" asset in that way.

 

[cesfx]

But the sanctions are also highly emotional and that's where the danger lies. Millions of innocent Russians are punished for the wrongs of a despot. I am not talking about oligarchs who have stolen and extracted billions of Russian publicly owned assets. I am talking about performers at the NY Met and many others who are all equated with Stalin and Putin due to their passport. This indicates an emotionally unstable people and culture that always launches missiles at perceived opponents, regardless of whether it's Hitler or a mosquito. Degrees of association matter but here entire lives are destroyed because of nationality. Canceling mobile apps in Russia? How much more pathetic and out of any proportion can this American emotional shock response get? And free public transit tickets for ukrainians all over Europe? Even those who are already living abroad for a long time.

I am all for targeted sanctions and pressure. But against a generalized and broad assault on an entire culture and its people who are not part of this war.

Sanctions highly emotional???
How about a nuclear threat? Or missiles falling on cities right now? Brothers killing brothers?
But the sanction against a passport holder (sport, arts or whatever) are.... Emotional? Good!
It's always the people paying.
This russian invasion will also hurt a lot of ordinary people who are not ukrainians or russians.
I don't see hurting the Russian people as an obscenity, and definitely not as an emotional situation. What Putin is doing, to resolve a security issue (or paranoia), is hurting badly the Ukraninans.
Wars are not meant to be in peace.
I prefer the sanction to any military retaliation.
Canceling Russia without bombing it it's a great strategy, and if hits the ordinary man and woman, it won't hit as bad as Putin missiles.

 

[M.W.]

Selective outrage by people who lived for 20 years on social media. The current civilian hunt that is going on everywhere is a clear reflection that we don't have a proper response to counter Putin. And this is the result of being poorly prepared and having elected weak (or should I say brain dead) presidents and leaders. Biden, Boris Johnson, Scholz, Trudeau and the rest of the bunch have no idea how to run a country and much less making wise decisions on a geopolitical scale. Instead they instruct their industry captains to punish an entire civilization for the wrongs of a single despot. Nobody during the cold War punished the entire civilizations of the eastern block, east Germany, Russia, and China because they were powerless to counter their own despots and thugs. Politicians understood that. But today we rather give free fare rides to Ukrainian citizens in European cities or turn off Google play and Apple App stores to all Russians in our hopes to affect Putin. This is laughable. The only thing Putin cares about is an assurance by Nato that Ukraine will not become member of the alliance or the EU. As simple as that. Pride and arrogance is the only reason this assurance was withheld even long before the Ukraine was invaded. This was a grave geopolitical mistake. The US demanded such assurance from Russia during the Cuba missile crisis. Nobody cried about that when the US put its nuclear arsenal into high alert and ran unconstitutional and UN violating illegal prison and interrogation camps out of the midst of Cuba.

Sanctions highly emotional???
How about a nuclear threat? Or missiles falling on cities right now? Brothers killing brothers?
But the sanction against a passport holder (sport, arts or whatever) are.... Emotional? Good!
It's always the people paying.
This russian invasion will also hurt a lot of ordinary people who are not ukrainians or russians.
I don't see hurting the Russian people as an obscenity, and definitely not as an emotional situation. What Putin is doing, to resolve a security issue (or paranoia), is hurting badly the Ukraninans.
Wars are not meant to be in peace.
I prefer the sanction to any military retaliation.
Canceling Russia without bombing it it's a great strategy, and if hits the ordinary man and woman, it won't hit as bad as Putin missiles.

 

[cesfx]

A rogue government should never be the motivation to punish and destroy the lives of millions who live peacefully abroad or even under the pressure of said rogue government. Completely disproportionate and emotional response that clearly reflects the inability to go after the true perps. It is perfectly apparent that strategists and military leaders in the west don't comprehend that this is a chess game where victory is a function of many small battles that take time to play out. You hardly ever win a chess match by going straight after the king or queen from the very start.

Are you personally touched by those sanctions?

At chess, one single rule violation will make you lose the game. Putin didn't just violate a rule, he threw the board across the room.

A complete disproportionate and emotional paranoic response, is to invade a country killing civilians, because none listened to you when you were making your point about Nato expansion.