How About neither for Putin, nor Obama's foreign policy, nor Right Sector, Nor Svoboda, nor Commies?

5/16/2014 | Laissez-Faire Capitalist

[Laissez-faire capitalist]

That might very well be the best position to take:

Don't support Putin, but realize that Obama has the fecal touch on foreign policy issues. Libya (Benghazi). Syria (he thought about arming Syrian "rebels"). Egypt (the Muslim Brotherhood came to power and before that the WH said they were "largely secular"). Ergo - no interventionism of any kind in Ukraine, be it NGO's, mercs, etc.

Don't support the Commies in Ukraine, but don't support Right Sector, or Svoboda, either.

Angela Merkel and Hollande have both said that unlawful acts were carried out against those who were burned up in Odessa, not to mention their anger at what happened in Mariupol. So maybe it would be best for Obama/WH to keep Kiev at arms length?

Jesus Christ taught us there are times when it is EITHER/OR: John the Baptist's authority came from either God or man. He asked the Pharisees which one, AFTER they and the Sadducees asked him two false EITHER/OR questions.

Jesus replied to those two:

We don't render to EITHER Caesar OR God. We render to BOTH God AND man: BOTH/AND.

Jesus was asked by the Sadducees: if a woman is married seven times, according to the Levirate Law, who will be her husband in the resurrection?

They wonder if it would be EITHER 1, OR 2-7.

Jesus said it would be NEITHER 1, NOR 2-7, but that she would not be married to any of them, but she would be as the angels in heaven.

Ukraine: take a NEITHER/NOR position on this. This is not a time for "We must EITHER intervene OR not." (Interventionism)

[Laissez-faire capitalist]

Time to say NEITHER Kiev, NOR Putin, and just stay out of this, which a WSJ/NBC News poll (April 24th, 2014) found:

80% plus said no more to interventionism of any kind.

[cripplecreek]

I don’t want anything to do with it.

[Laissez-faire capitalist]

Sounds good to me, and conservatives in general.

RINOs, otoh...

[Ohioan]

We need to return to to the Washington/Jefferson foreign policy, where we punish those who threaten our immediate interests, but never try to interfere in the domestic affairs of other nations. After Bush II's grossly over-reaching Second Inaugural Address, I staged a textual debate between "W" & Washington, in which the totality of Bush's Address, section by section, was answered by the most appropriate segment of Washington's Farewell Address:

Bush/Washington Debate.

The contrast is impressive in the clarity of Washington's thinking, based upon a deep understanding of human psychology, compared to the demonstrably confused sloganizing by Bush's speech writer.

Check it out!

William Flax

[Corporate Democrat]

It depends upon what the meaning of the word ‘interventionalism’ is. If ‘interventionalism’ means any intervention over Ukraine of any kind, that is one thing. If it means there should be no military intervention or aid in Ukraine, I agree with you.

[MUDDOG]

I wasn’t a big fan of Ron Swoboda either.

[Laissez-faire capitalist]

So, you apparently don’t asupprt arming them (the McCainiac position) which I don’t asupport.

But, do you support NGO’s, mercs, and what some have said took place - US AID working in Ukraine.

Do you support the last three?

[McGruff]

I don't really care if the Ukrainians kill all the Russians or the Russian kill all the Ukrainians. What I do care about is our government lying to us which is happening more and more these days. Take this newest case.

Report: US threatened Nigeria with sanctions in 2013 for fighting Boko Haram.

Open your eyes people. Don't let anyone pull the wool over them. The truth is out there

[Corporate Democrat]

Well funding mercenaries is pretty much the same as arming them, if not worse. And I don’t support funding the Kiev government with anything more than symbolic aid. Because the EU has already stepped up, and the oligarchs are doing they can without our help. I don’t think the US can really control NGO’s either.

What I meant was things like real sanctions, oil deals, weaning Europe off of Russia, restricting Russia’s access to SWIFT and restricting Russian oligarch assets from leaving the United States and the EU, if we can manage it. Proportionate retaliation.

[Ohioan]

On the subject of unofficial involvement, of any type, in the Ukrainian tragedy, there needs to be a further understanding that is really beside the point of what is a proper United States' involvement in foreign affairs, in general.

Both Putin & the Ukrainians are stuck with the consequences of Stalin's deliberate effort to undermine Ukrainian ethnic cohesion, after World War II. The most vicious of all the Socialist dictators of his era, deliberately resettled millions of ethnic Russians in the Ukraine, which had shown a great affinity for any alternative to Bolshevik Communism during the War. Sorting this out, today, is a real problem, however it may be ignored by a ideologically indoctrinated mass media in the West.

Under these circumstances, the best course for those in Western Nations, who would like to see the Ukraine realize its very considerable natural potential, is to adopt helpful but not intrusive postures. World War III, would have no possible beneficial effect on either the Ukrainians or the Russians--nor on any people on the face of the earth.

William Flax

[tcrlaf]

“We”, meaning the Obama administration, has no business undermining an already existing Democracy.

Not only that, but “we” backed the most radical, hateful, and violent of the Maidan groups, to top it off.

That it has backfired in the administrations face, and Putin moved to take advantage of it, shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that has been paying attention.

[DJ MacWoW]

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[Ohioan]

Of course the idea of the Government of a supposedly still free people's lying to them, is totally unacceptable. But it is part of the reality of American political life, at least since LBJ, that we have had an increasing involvement of committed ideologues in the Administration of our affairs, to whom the end justifies the means. This is a generally accepted mantra among those who seek to build Socialistic societies and new collectivist world orders.

I am not trying to sell you on cynicism; only hoping to apprise you as to how truly serious is the threat to all we hold sacred. The Government gets by with this, because the mass media, to an overwhelming extent, is part of the ideological problem.

William Flax

[mac_truck]

The United States missed an important opportunity to rise above the fray of this European/Eurasian tug of war over the Ukraine back in February when it didn't immediately condemn the violent overthrow of the democratically elected government by radical militants, and join with Russia to insist that the international agreement the Yanukovitch government had just negotiated with the opposition leaders on Feb 28th be held in force.

American insistence on abiding agreements and lawful democratic process would have dramatically changed the outcome in Ukraine without the blood shed and loss of territory we have recently witnessed. It may have also provided the "reset" with Russia that the Obama administration has been seeking for the past five years.

-btw I'm quite sure some neoconservative shill will be along shortly to loudly proclaim the Yanukovitch election in 2010 was tainted and his overthrow in 2014 was legitimate. Both assertions are demonstrably false.

[FBD]

Seems like a reasonable position to me. The best we can do, is learn from this un-civil war, and work to make sure that it never happens HERE.