@WackbiscuitThorazine

How much do they pay you to write that stuff? I could use a second part time job in off hours, sitting on the toilet, etc. Do you get better pay when you have an account pushing 20 years old here? Is there a premium for that?

Do they 1099 you? Or is it like PayPal, Venmo, DogeCoin or something? How does one get around the Fed shit for "Failure to register as a foreign agent?" Or is that just a paper-tiger bullshit thing, unless you're Gov. Whitmer's CCP Dept. Chief of staff?

I figure I can spin out eloquent & wordy variants of... "globohomo... hurrrr" pretty well.

At least until if/when Trump wins in November, he keeps supporting Ukraine, maybe even ramps it up substantially, in the "Let's get this the fuck over with.."-sense, and the genuine "honest" idiots mostly go radio silent, slinking away in confusion, shame, or just "forgetting." And only bots & paid sock-puppets are left.

But, I've got some home improvements I want to fund, and toss some spare change in the pickle jar for. Although, if rt.com or whatever fronts the whole thing is game, I might take a lower cents per word-rate, if they give me some hi-def noodz of Anna Chapmann.

So, if there's a recruiter, or a sign up page on LinkedIn or whatever, help a guy out. I'd really appreciate it.

Unfortunately, it's far worse than that.

They mostly know and know it full well. They automatically expect that everything they're told is lies.

And it's not exactly that they, "don't care" either. It's more of a very cynical and fatalistic: "This is how the world works" default viewpoint that has been ground into them over centuries  

It began with somewhat accidental issues of geography and world history. And it's at least partially WHY Communism took root there and the USSR even existed as well .

Spanning Eurasia, the dominant Muscovite "Rus" people had other groups perpetually invading or marching across them from all four compass directions.

Scandinavians/Vikings from the North, using the Volga to reach what's now Turkey & the Mediterranean and Silk Road.

The Mongols and Ghengis Khan from the far East.

Turkic, Persian, & various Middle Eastern powers from the South.

Various European powers from the West. The latest of which in "modern history" were Napoleon & Hitler.

This is the first half of a one-two punch that created the default Russian paranoid cynicism.

And that history of land warfare created the overall cultural sense that whoever is fit to rule Russia, that person ought to project some semblance of brutal strength, and stack up an "empire" of speed bump vassal buffer states around Mother Russia itself.

And, in that context, broadly speaking, it's what the Tsars, Stalin & the USSR & their high-water mark of the Warsaw Pact, were ALL doing, and in his second-rate wish.com sort of way, what Putin is attempting to do too. And that Ukraine isn't interested, is a grave insult.

The second half of this one-two punch creating the whole: "WTF is wrong with the Russians?" and their perpetual cultural pathologies, is that while they're nominally white European Judeo-Christian people, they have perpetually been: "Not part of the club," in many, if not most alk of the large formative events that characterize "Western Civilization."

And they know it.

Arguably first & foremost, the Roman Empire never extended that far.

Eastern Orthodox Christianity, despite the Eastern Empire lasting several hundred years longer than the Western Empire, "fell" to Islam (playlist: They Might Be Giants - Istanbul or Constantinople?) and in the process, they somewhat lost that H.Q. or center the religion could provide.

While the Western Roman Empire was shattered, Rome & the Vatican more or less maintained constant operations, up until Protestants split off. And it continued on even then. The Hagia Sophia had minarets added, and was made into a mosque...

The key ideas in the Reformation, some that the RC Church had to adopt to one degree or another in response, (depending on one's view, anyway,) and things like the Renaissance and Enlightenment... due just to sheer distance, geopolitics, and other factors, they all reached Russia "later," or arrived as fully formed more mature ideas or institutions they didn't have a lot of input in creating.

As such, "core Western Civ Stuff" that we may take for granted to the point we don't always "see it," ... (unless you've been to the ME, Africa, or Asia...) all seemed much more "foreign," externally imposed, or merely as ideas, tools, & technology used to oppress them. And, the "new stuff," when adopted by Russian nobility & the Tsars, was initially very foreign, effete, or otherwise  a cause for side-eye from the Russian people at large.

Not that what they thought actually mattered anyway.

In essence, all this created a HUGE "poor ghetto kid"-syndrome for the Russians. (Not to mention all the non-Russians who are "Russian," only by the geographic borders, and ignored & mistreated by the Muscovite/Rus...) And all of the baggage slong for the ride you might imagine a "ghetto kid" will have.

A raging inferiority complex/Napoleon syndrome.

A belief that "rules & civil society" (aka, the wider international order) are ALWAYS a lie/scam, and "might makes right."

A belief, borne of hard experience, that everyone cheats & steals. And that the, "rich folks in the burbs" do too. And none of them truly "worked for what they have." They simply have access to better scams & free shit based on where they were lucky enough to be born.

They look up to whoever projects "strength," even if they're simultaneously a cause of suffering, strife, & harm for their neighborhood.

So, when some do-gooder, even if 100% legitimate, tries to "help," the "ghetto kid" naturally thinks they're full of shit. Either because they're stupid & coddled, and can't see how the "world really works." Or, it's some sophisticated "rich people" con that they're actually running.

And if/when the ghetto kid actually listens, and tries. "Stay in school." "Don't rob the liquor store." "Don't knock up five different girls." "Work this part-time fast food job with the stupid hat..." etc. At the first sign of difficulty, they throw in the towel. Because there's zero faith, backed by their own lived experience, that any of this "actually works" or has any sort of fairness or real rules under all of it people follow.

And in part at least, IS WHY "kids from rural areas," with Wagner chomos & murderers on their flanks, with Chinese bubble gum tires on the BMP, and half the shit on that BMP is missing because it was stolen & sold on vk.com or ebay.ru... March to their deaths anyway.

Because: "That's just how the world works."

Ukraine, as FUBAR as they are, arguably, as any former SSR Stalin collected as a "speed bump" is TRYING to not be in the ghetto.

COL MacGregor?

LOL!