August1991 Posted November 30, 2025 Author Report Posted November 30, 2025 44 minutes ago, SpankyMcFarland said: Zelensky isn’t Napoleon and he certainly isn’t Hitler. I entirely agree. But from the Russian perspective, Zelensky is a potential NATO member. === Heck, Zelensky is a Russian Jew. Crimea? Almost everyone in Crimea speaks Russian. And most people in Eastern Ukraine have a Russian parent. The difference between Ukrainians and Russians is almost like the difference between Acadians and Quebecers. New Brunswick Acadians are stubborn federalists. Quote
August1991 Posted November 30, 2025 Author Report Posted November 30, 2025 1 hour ago, SpankyMcFarland said: Are you equating those American adoptions with what has happened in Ukraine? From Putin's perspective, in the 1990s, foreigners arrived and took Russian children. Quote
SpankyMcFarland Posted November 30, 2025 Report Posted November 30, 2025 12 hours ago, August1991 said: I entirely agree. But from the Russian perspective, Zelensky is a potential NATO member. === Heck, Zelensky is a Russian Jew. Crimea? Almost everyone in Crimea speaks Russian. And most people in Eastern Ukraine have a Russian parent. The difference between Ukrainians and Russians is almost like the difference between Acadians and Quebecers. New Brunswick Acadians are stubborn federalists. I’ve seen a claim that Ukrainian and Russian share only 60% of their vocabulary, less than the overlap between Ukrainian and Belarusian or Polish and similar to the distance between English and Dutch. I can’t follow spoken Dutch and I would hope that Acadian and Quebec French share more than that. This distance reflects the history. For centuries, Ukraine has struggled to assert its independence from Poland, the Ottomans and, in particular, Russia as it relentlessly expanded. The nations are clearly distinct, not least in their tolerance of authoritarian rule. Quote ‘How small we make our worlds. Gather them in, tighten them up into little castles of fear.’
SpankyMcFarland Posted November 30, 2025 Report Posted November 30, 2025 (edited) NATO was set up to deter the Soviet Union. All the other European empires had long since seen sense and stopped threatening their neighbours. If Russia became a normal European country, NATO could either disappear or change its focus to defending Europe, including Russia, from China and other threats. Russia fearing NATO is like a mugger complaining about a victim arming themselves. It’s just backwards. Edited November 30, 2025 by SpankyMcFarland Quote ‘How small we make our worlds. Gather them in, tighten them up into little castles of fear.’
August1991 Posted December 2, 2025 Author Report Posted December 2, 2025 On 11/30/2025 at 2:40 PM, SpankyMcFarland said: I’ve seen a claim that Ukrainian and Russian share only 60% of their vocabulary, less than the overlap between Ukrainian and Belarusian or Polish and similar to the distance between English and Dutch. I can’t follow spoken Dutch and I would hope that Acadian and Quebec French share more than that. This distance reflects the history. For centuries, Ukraine has struggled to assert its independence from Poland, the Ottomans and, in particular, Russia as it relentlessly expanded. The nations are clearly distinct, not least in their tolerance of authoritarian rule. Sometimes I wish that Pierre Trudeau were alive today and could say what he thinks about world affairs. He was a federalist. Lévesque was a democrat. Quote
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