Richard_Jon

Mike Waltz on US aid to Ukraine: "We need to recoup those costs. And that is going to be a partnership with the Ukrainians in terms of their rare earth, their natural resources, and their oil and gas and also buying ours."

Once again Putin is using energy as a weapon. He is trying to blackmail Austria & Europe by cutting gas supplies. We are prepared for this and ready for the winter. Gas storage across the EU is full. As I told @karlnehammer yesterday Europe stands united in supporting Austria

Ladies, do not have rap battles with these fellas. 😳

Latinos are 70% more likely to be diagnosed with diabetes. Together, with the @HispanicCaucus, we capped the cost of insulin at $35 a month—saving money for millions of our seniors.

Chinese athletes all refuse to sign the flag, even if its a kid, saw it happen with volleyball players too Great respect🇨🇳

When it comes to Ukraine, Joe Biden made a lot of mistakes.  The most painful thing about that is that so many of those mistakes could have been easily avoided if Biden had people in his team who genuinely understood what Putin’s Russia was and how things worked with the Kremlin mafia.  Heaven knows, and we know it too, that the Biden administration, along with other Western leaders, spent way too much time in vain trying to talk Putin out of invading Ukraine. We all remember those endless, humiliating summits, diplomatic powwows, meetings, calls, and conversations behind closed doors that resulted in nothing in the winter of 2021-22— nothing but Putin and his cronies openly jesting at their frantic attempts and spitting at their faces.  The decision to invade and devour Ukraine had been made a long time ago. Putin’s TV propaganda within Russia was only using those pictures to send a message to the domestic audience: Look, the American president is now seeking Putin’s attention and is reasoning with Russia, but who is he in the face of the inevitable? (Yes, the galaxy brains who keep saying that Biden “never tried diplomacy with Russia” are either fucking utterly dumb, or extraordinarily shameless, or just never actually followed the developments at all). I think it would be honest and true to say that the U.S. administration in the days of February 2022 was ready to accept the option of Ukraine going down, establishing a national government in exile somewhere in Poland, and gradually coming to terms with “new territorial realities in Europe.”  They decided to go the easiest way and take as little action as possible, assume as little responsibility as possible, and make decisions as free from risk as possible. Moreover, the administration appeared to be very, very reluctant to change its course due to new circumstances and opportunities.  That was one of the Biden administration’s key mistakes regarding Ukraine, which, in a certain way, has affected Biden today’s electoral chances.   A very unexpected and catastrophic Russian defeat at Kyiv (which essentially spelled the failure of Putin’s “special military operation”) in 2022 should have destroyed a lot of long-ingrained illusions. And it shouldn’t have taken months of Ukrainian begging to start providing Ukraine with artillery to stand against Russian “walls of fire,” destroying everything on their way in Donbas. It shouldn’t have taken months of Ukrainian begging to provide Ukraine with a handful of HIMARS systems that effectively derailed Russian offensive campaigns in the summer of 2022 and precipitated the liberation of Kherson in November 2022. It shouldn’t have taken months and years of Ukrainian begging to provide Ukraine with PATRIOT missile defense systems, which not only did not lead to “World War III” but instead demonstrated the greatest results in the type’s entire operational history and set a number of milestones in defending the Ukrainian capital from Russian missiles and saving lives.  It shouldn’t have taken months and years of Ukrainian begging to give the green light to provide Ukraine with armored vehicles, particularly M2 Bradleys, which demonstrated extraordinary results in Ukrainian hands. The same goes with tanks, particularly a handful of M1 Abrams, which unblocked the scarce deliveries of Leopard tanks from European nations.  It shouldn’t have taken years of Ukrainian begging to get long-outdated ATACMS missiles that not only did not trigger “a major escalation” but effectively wiped out Russian military airfields and sophisticated air defense systems used against Ukraine. And, of course, it shouldn’t have taken years to finally admit the fact that the policy of not allowing Ukraine to use American weapons to strike Russia's military infrastructure in Russian territory is deeply absurd and ineffective; it only provides the aggressor with a safe haven for escalating its offensive operations and terror bombing campaigns in Ukraine and only encourages to move on unpunished.  This list can be continued for a long time. The problem is that way too much authority was given to people who graduated from the most elite universities and read all of Kissinger — but never had the experience of fighting back to street thugs and discouraging them from harassing someone with a good old punch in the face.  Amid endless “escalation management” and heeding Russia’s “nuclear threats,” way too much time was given to Putin to recover from the initial stress of the failure in Ukraine, to restructure production and economy, to adapt to sanctions, to find allies in Iran and North Korea, and reshape Russia into a totalitarian state obsessed with exterminating a neighboring country. This is what our military has had to deal with for more than a decade since Russia invaded Ukraine for the first time in 2014. Even in the final months before the resignation from the presidential race, the Biden administration was still placing way too much hope on trying to reason with Putin or trying to motivate Putin to get reasonable to strike a fair deal on Ukraine via the tactics of slow bites. So, after two years of war, Putin is still not ready to talk serious business and leave Ukraine alone? Okay, we let Ukraine use ATACMS, but only in Crimea and not against Russian territory.  Many months later, Putin is still defiant as always? Okay, let’s let Ukrainians strike targets in Russian territory, but only within 100 miles of the Ukrainian border and no ATACMS.  And this drags on, and on, and on. And failure to realize that the moment when Putin says “Okay, now I’m ready to leave Ukraine alone” would never come unless Putin is forced to stop and calm down was among Biden biggest mistakes.  Yet — even though so many mistakes were made, every Ukrainian should remember that we owe a lot to the old man.  Even though there have been a lot of incompetent Putin appeasers whispering things in his ear, without his faith and without his decisions — even though many of them were half-hearted, terribly belated, and questionable — there wouldn’t be the Ukraine as we know it now. Half of us would have been rotting in mass graves with Russian bullets in our foreheads and with our heads tied behind our backs. For this, we will always be thankful as we should.  But there were critical, terrible mistakes that prevented Joe Biden from having a large geopolitical victory right now.  I really, really hope that whoever replaces the old man in the Oval Office will be smart enough to draw conclusions.

Trump’s mug shot

A flock of Sheep in Inner Mongolia have been walking in a circle for over 10 days straight and no one knows why.