by OLD1953 » Sun May 06, 2012 12:40 am
Russia routinely does whatever it pleases internally and totally ignores outside complaints, they've done this for about a century now. The governments of Russia since the final fall of the Czars and the rise of the Reds have not given any concern to outside anything, and they've been self sufficient in everything possible so trade sanctions would hurt the sanctioning party more than the Russians. And they've always had a rigid policy of ignoring outside objections or protests about their policies, save when they could shut the complainer up, often by violent means.
Also, they made it as difficult as possible to get accurate reports about what was going on inside the country.
This is the never negotiate with terrorists policy taken to extremes. And it had an effect over time, as people simply quit mentioning Russia. If it's political correctness that prevents Russia from being castigated, it's certainly a PC that affects all parties on both ends of the political spectrum, it's very seldom you hear anything about Russia apart from the annual reviews, etc., that show up from various organizations. (And I should mention that Europe shut up totally about Russia when they started shutting off the gas supply if the government felt offended - which goes back to trade sanctions again. Anyone in Europe that feels like saying something nasty about Russia does it in the spring.)
China is a different category, there is a good deal of PC involving China as many people seem to think they are communist in name only (ha ha) and a good many more seem to believe that if we "accept" China they'll somehow become a different society if we keep on letting them do as they please while buying their products.
China has a lot of people treading softly, Russia just wore them out by ignoring them and killing a few who were too noisy. Anyhow, that's how I see it.
Russia routinely does whatever it pleases internally and totally ignores outside complaints, they've done this for about a century now. The governments of Russia since the final fall of the Czars and the rise of the Reds have not given any concern to outside anything, and they've been self sufficient in everything possible so trade sanctions would hurt the sanctioning party more than the Russians. And they've always had a rigid policy of ignoring outside objections or protests about their policies, save when they could shut the complainer up, often by violent means.
Also, they made it as difficult as possible to get accurate reports about what was going on inside the country.
This is the never negotiate with terrorists policy taken to extremes. And it had an effect over time, as people simply quit mentioning Russia. If it's political correctness that prevents Russia from being castigated, it's certainly a PC that affects all parties on both ends of the political spectrum, it's very seldom you hear anything about Russia apart from the annual reviews, etc., that show up from various organizations. (And I should mention that Europe shut up totally about Russia when they started shutting off the gas supply if the government felt offended - which goes back to trade sanctions again. Anyone in Europe that feels like saying something nasty about Russia does it in the spring.)
China is a different category, there is a good deal of PC involving China as many people seem to think they are communist in name only (ha ha) and a good many more seem to believe that if we "accept" China they'll somehow become a different society if we keep on letting them do as they please while buying their products.
China has a lot of people treading softly, Russia just wore them out by ignoring them and killing a few who were too noisy. Anyhow, that's how I see it.