Letters Archives

Letters

Filed under: Letters

RE: At Last, NATO Pushes Back Against Russian Aggression

Dear Publius Pundit:

You might highlight this line:

"...Naturally, we rehearse our counteractions."

He implies the Western response is an attack, notes that his crews are playing war and are on a hair trigger, then delivers the above line ensuring that no one can misunderstand that he is threatening our fighters.

You are right to hammer these provocative monsters. Keep at it.

Best,

Brian

RE: Myanmar's Russia Connection

Dear Publius Pundit,

Here's something else to keep in mind when exploring Russia's relationships with energy-rich states: Russia has huge reserve of oil and natural gas, and any jump in the price of these commodities will first and foremost raise energy revenue that the Russian government receives. Since the resource-driven economic boom is the primary reason why Putin's support is so high (another being those oh-so-convenient Chechens), maintaining high energy prices are key to Putin's ambitions for the Russian state.

This preoccupation with energy, though, leads the Russians to do some pretty treacherous things. For example, in the late 1990s they allegedly trained Ayman al-Zawahiri (bin Laden's sidekick -- or perhaps the true leader of al-Qaeda). Just a few months later, al-Zawahiri's terrorist group was incredibly interested and well-informed of plans by Americans to build a natural gas pipeline through Afghanistan and ease the Russian's quasi-monopoly in the region. Later, al-Qaeda attacks American embassies in East Africa, which was believed by many to be a provocation of the US, trying to get them to enter Afghanistan. Though there was no invasion, the oil pipeline was shelved shortly after the attacks. Interestingly enough, all of this is right about the time when the price of oil starts skyrocketing -- in early 1999 the price of oil had fallen to about $12 per barrel, but has increased fairly regularly ever since, to the point where it is now 1000% of the price that it was less than a decade ago. Much of this increase in prices was no doubt due to the ramifications of US policy in the Middle East in response to periodic attacks by al-Qaeda.

And Burma is not the only place where we see Russia abetting regimes that have been drawing the ire of the United States: Iran, too, has been helped by Russia in developing something (at minimum nuclear power, and at most nuclear weapons) that doesn't seem to benefit Russia much at all. Iran (like Burma) is a relatively poor country that wouldn't seem to be in the position to pay lots of money for expensive nuclear reactors, especially given its own enormous energy reserves. Security interests don't seem too great, since both Russia and the US have enough weapons to inflict more damage than they'd ever want, and an attack on Russia by any country is pretty unthinkable. And Russia, by supporting the regimes, is putting itself at risk of being criticized. So what's in it for Russia? An American invasion of Iran -- with the world's second-largest reserves of natural gas, and third-largest reserves of oil -- would surely send the price of oil skyrocketing past $200 a barrel, and that couldn't be bad for Putin. Just something to think about.

Sincerely,

Stephen Smith

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Kim Zigfeld · May 13, 2008 5:50 PM · TrackBacks (0)

Letters

Filed under: Letters

RE: Inflation Continues to Ravage Putin's Russia (April 9th)

Dear Publius Pundit,

As someone with a postgraduate university degree in political and economic subjects, who works in risk analysis advising major companies on investments in Russia, I absolutely had to go against my better judgment and comment on this article. it is woefully ignorant and shows a lack of intellectual rigour to attempt to attribute inflation to Putin -- you might as well blame the leader of almost every East European (and the occasional Western) country where inflation is rampant. The reality is that inflation is hitting everyone hard due to global economic issues I won't bother to detail here (you must be aware of them yourself), not to mention oil money etc. Secondly, to suggest that Putin is incapable of any social or economic reforms because he isn't an economist is a blatant misunderstanding of the political system. How many heads of state are trained economists? I guarantee that you can count them on one hand. in any case, you seem to have conveniently forgotten the significant reforms Putin introduced during his first term, and the flat tax (only a distant dream in America) which continues to be praised in the Western media. in fact, contrary to your insinuations, the obvious explanation for inflation is that it is taking place because the economy is doing well, not poorly: as Reuters reported, in 2006 "GDP reached $1 trillion in nominal terms, propelling Russia into the world's top 10 economies". Finally, to compare Putin and Mugabe is simply untenable, and typical of US commentators' inclination to portray Russia in an unjustifiably negative light -- whereas most of the country's problems stem from the various impractical recommendations made by Western institutions and the rapacious gangster capitalism that inevitably took hold after the total destruction of the previous system. Putin is not an ideal leader, but he has not done exclusively bad things as somany so-called 'pundits' would like to believe. I hope that in future you will think twice about misinforming the public with your clearly biased and strident opinions.

Very truly yours,

Anna Marron (vervana@googlemail.com)

Publius Pundit responds after the jump.

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Kim Zigfeld · May 7, 2008 1:07 AM · TrackBacks (0)

Letters

Filed under: Letters

RE: Vladimir Putin, A National Catastrophe

Dear Publius Pundit,

There is no rule of law or free enterprise in the West, there is the rule of money and state-sponsored big corporations, with high government employment. Western countries are paper democracies, when they are in fact run by powerful bureaucrats like in Russia. Russians don't need the West, but the West needs Russia, the Middle East, Venezuela, Nigeria...etc.Time to wake up my friend, Russian politics and business are not so different from the West, it just has a Russian flavor.

Signed, Mr. GAF

RE: Getting to Know the Real Barack Obama

Dear Publius Pundit,

Good, no great, post on the Obama Drama. Is the graphic yours??? I would like to put it on a t-shirt.... or buy one with it.... keep it up!!!!!

Signed, CW Ivy

Publius Pundit responds: No, the graphic was made by one of Michell Malkin's readers.

Dear Publius Pundit:

I honestly believe you're doing your absolute best to either twist the words that Barack said, or you're choosing to hear the Fox News rhetoric over any context of the sentence. Barack was not against Religion, and his stance on gun ownership(while I disagree with it), is in line with people from all over.

But, as he used bad wording for this(as he said himself, the word 'cling' has too many negative connotations), he stood by what his intended message was: That those are not the important issues in America right now. Right now, it is more important for us to worry about Washington Lobbyists, the Iraq War, and curbing executive power, than issues that have honestly been twisted to become the important parts of the modern republican party(this coming from a republican).

As he has said outside of what you posted, he wants us to come together for the more important issues, and that in the end, while those issues are things that are important to people, that it is better for the country to come together and deal with our biggest problems now, before we move on to working out the things we disagree on- also together.

Signed, Jake

RE: Comments on Publius Pundit

Dear Publius Pundit:

In reading the comments of the various apologists for Russia that have appeared in comments on your blog in the past, an idea struck me from one of the comments that had been posted by "Misha." I've run this idea by others, and they agree. Totalitarianism, it was rationalized, is a "necessary" step towards - democracy. And here is the key - "otherwise, we might have more Chechnya's."

Russia is not a country - it is a federation. And there are many areas that are simply not Russian. They are more Asian, and other than Russian. So indeed, if these other areas start getting ideas in their heads about trying to break away, like Chechnya, then Russia shrinks down to -- nothing. It follows in line with Stalin's comment that if Russia "loses Ukraine, then everything is lost." And with Putin's recent outburst at the NATO summit in a private meeting with President Bush, that "Ukraine is not a state." It falls in line with Russia's history of totalitarian governments.

The justification, among others is - the "greatness of Russia." It's all built on FORCING people to be part of Russia and Moscow. Because without the subjugation of non-Russian people into a greater sort of artificial Russian federation, Russia, in reality, is a tiny little -- nothing.

Signed, Elmer

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Kim Zigfeld · April 17, 2008 8:00 AM · TrackBacks (0)

Letters

Filed under: Letters

RE: The Russian Rx: Take two aspirin and call me . . . from Germany!

Dear Publius Pundit,

I am pretty sure that Russia lost a significant part of its medical personnel with the mass emigration of Russian Jews (and their families) to Israel. Russia's loss, our gain!

Signed, Ruth

RE: Daily Kos: Still Bogus After all these Years!

Dear Publius Pundit,

Thank you very much for your recent post outing Daily Kos. The site is one sided and ignores the facts. I have tried to read it with an open mind but all I saw is candidates getting attacked for no reason other than hate. The site wants the country to unite and come together - the biggest hypocrisy of the site - because for coming together you do not need to attack and tear the other side apart. You need to be open and then state your opinion and stop looking for flaws, you can point them out but do not attack them like crazy. Thank you very much for your article once again. I now will be an avid reader of your site. Thank you very much.

Signed, Donald

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Kim Zigfeld · April 11, 2008 12:34 AM · TrackBacks (0)