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[Owlbread]

 The funny thing is most people in Russia will see that article and think "Good, I hope those idiots never set foot here again." Western media outrage has no effect. This is why Putin can do whatever the hell he wants.

[Sergarr]

The funny thing is most people in Russia will see that article and think "Good, I hope those idiots never set foot here again." Western media outrage has no effect. This is why Putin can do whatever the hell he wants.

Why would people in Russia even care about hostile foreign politicians and their problems? Are Western Europeans any different?

[MonkeyHead]

I do not think there is "outrage". Confused bemusement as to what banning Nick Clegg or the ex heads of MI5 and MI6 is actually supposed to achieve, yes. Outrage, no. Nick Clegg could not do hostile even if he tried. It just seems like "tit for tat" retaliation.

[Loud Whispers]

I'm not sure why any of our heads would even go to Russia. With things as they are, seems risky.

[SirQuiamus]

I'm not sure why any of our heads would even go to Russia. With things as they are, seems risky.

Today's Lesson: Don't let your head go to Russia – you might not get it back.

[mainiac]

The funny thing is most people in Russia will see that article and think "Good, I hope those idiots never set foot here again." Western media outrage has no effect. This is why Putin can do whatever the hell he wants.

Why would people in Russia even care about hostile foreign politicians and their problems? Are Western Europeans any different?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question

So let's pointlessly antagonize people and then disregard them because our antagonism has made them hostile.  GG, no re.

[Antsan]

To be fair, our politicians and media were hostile long before this whole mess started.

[mainiac]

To be fair, our politicians and media were hostile long before this whole mess started.

....G8 expansion, Sochi olympics, lowering of trade barriers, Bush "stared into his soul", Obama "hit the reset", western funding for infrastructure in Russia...

There's a lot of countries that would love to have this kind of "hostility".

[LordSlowpoke]

treating a country like not literally hitler after 6+ decades isn't a big step up m80

not like this conversation will persuade everyone except the people who want to believe something that doesn't exist

[Loud Whispers]

I'm not sure why any of our heads would even go to Russia. With things as they are, seems risky.

Today's Lesson: Don't let your head go to Russia – you might not get it back.

Or worse, might become Russian. Admittedly, if Nick Clegg defected to Russia that would probably be a catastrophic failure on Russia's part.

[mainiac]

Pretty sure Russia already has refined weapons grade politicium in unlimited quantities.

[Bohandas]

To be fair, our politicians and media were hostile long before this whole mess started.

....G8 expansion, Sochi olympics, lowering of trade barriers, Bush "stared into his soul"...

And that's why Bush was so messed up. It's kind of like if he had stared at Cthulhu or Hastur

[Helgoland]

treating a country like not literally hitler after 6+ decades isn't a big step up m80

It was a wee bit more than just that. There's been a lot of goodwill from the West in the last 25 years, it's just that a country with an economy the size of Italy, whose only claims to fame are land mass, natural resources, an oversized army, and a shitton of nukes - cannot be treated like a superpower. If that's seen as a non-negotiable point on the other side, there's only so much goodwill can accomplish.

[Loud Whispers]

treating a country like not literally hitler after 6+ decades isn't a big step up m80

It was a wee bit more than just that. There's been a lot of goodwill from the West in the last 25 years, it's just that a country with an economy the size of Italy, whose only claims to fame are land mass, natural resources, an oversized army, and a shitton of nukes - cannot be treated like a superpower. If that's seen as a non-negotiable point on the other side, there's only so much goodwill can accomplish.

A regional power, who if you're in their region, you should be wary of. Russia's oversized military is oversized because their power projection only comes in two ways; energy and military, because they cannot use their economy to project power the same way a country like the USA effortlessly can.
I agree, it is very easy to make Russia insignificant, and a great big country should not be confused with a great country - Russia is only the former. Yet it has aspirations for the latter, and we'd be fools to see that it doesn't particularly mind stepping on European toes to get there.

[LordSlowpoke]

helgo sweetie, i'm not the sorta person to claim at any point of time that putin and friends are right in their wrecking of ukraine (outside imageboards maybe, saying "ukraine is a not even a country what are you people getting mad about" is 12/10 bait for over a year now), i'm pretty salty about a fair bit of their domestic politics also but honestly?

the most remembered western goodwill that i personally am aware of, as someone who halfheartedly can think of themselves as a person with connections to the place, are danish powdered milk cans

seriously who didn't see a danish powdered milk can like every single person i mentioned this to had at least one unless they were born in the late 90s or something and even then sometimes?

the average person doesn't see the infrastructure investment, nor the part where the west helped to get rid of its chemical weapons, disarm its nukes, etc. etc. (which is why we have big damn signs on everything the eu throws funds at, and subsequently why poland's got like 70% approval for the eu, probably) so when the closest thing you get to western goodwill in your everyday life is food aid when your country was in common percieval being fucked over by people calling themselves democrats and liberals literally carting away whatever was worth more than 10 rubles over the western border in wheelbarrows - and i'm sure this point is one being regurgiated a thousand times by now, if you pardon a little lampshading - if there's something they can point at and say, yeah man, we're totally getting back at the west for this shit! then they'll probably roll with it. but then i'm the sorta guy trying to speak for over 50 nations on an internet forum when i don't even live in the country, bloody amazing innit

hell, when i was in vienna couple weeks back, i was chatting with a belarussian who spent a grand total of four years in belarus

he remembers the danish powdered milk

it's a symbol by now, i think