Posts by hollowdriver13

restlessmason54 said:Why do you feel the need to dive into such exhausting detail just to soothe your ego because you can't find any actual arguments to counter mine?
In a capitalist system, money is the only thing that actually matters; once the cash starts flowing, every single barrier just evaporates.
All of this posturing regarding economic sanctions is really just a massive performance staged for public consumption.

👍

So, you've got nothing, which explains why you're dodging the specifics.
Honestly, I'm not even surprised.

restlessmason54 said:If you want a quick lesson, just rewind the clock to 2014 and 2015 and look at how hypocritical the West was being regarding the annexation of Crimea—those sanctions were about as effective as they were sincere.

Do you honestly believe a major powerhouse like Germany is going to tank its own economy just because Putin and some insignificant conflict in Ukraine are rattling guns over there? 🤣
Forget the European Union for a second; the Germans are the ones calling the shots here, and their hands are on the wheel. Just don't forget about Nord Stream 2.

That is some top-tier "logic" proving how much Russia basically treats the EU like a joke. 🙏

I mean, seriously, this deep dive into geopolitics definitely deserves a PhD.

restlessmason54 said:God, I just love this typical Anglo-fanatic style of personal attacks. It’s such a classic move. 😍

The world isn't nearly as one-dimensional as you think, and honestly, seeing Russia collapse is something you’ll only ever experience in your wildest, most delusional dreams. 🙂

Look, we shouldn't just sit back and let Putin enthusiasts spout nonsense without calling them out on it.
What do you mean by saying Russia holds Europe by the balls? Care to elaborate on that? Or is it just an opinion? Because, honestly, an opinion isn't an actual argument.

restlessmason54 said:My favorite part of all this has been reading the comments from people claiming Russia is headed for some unprecedented economic apocalypse because the ruble is sliding.

People genuinely seem to believe that the Swabians are just going to toss billions of euros invested in Nord Stream 2 straight into the wind and suddenly become independent of Russian gas. Honestly, you aren't going to see that movie anytime soon—not when you consider how much those capitalists have at stake.
All these heavy-duty sanctions being thrown at Russia? It's mostly just media theater designed for the naive.

Time will tell how Russia ends up holding the entire EU by the balls, especially once they start quietly easing up on those sanctions under the radar in the near future.

🤣🤣🤣🙏🙏🙏:

The Russians are feeding you some seriously bad vibes here—stop listening to them. Honestly, you're better off sticking to astrology.

https://www.scmp.com/news/world/russ...les-bankruptcy

FYI Nord Stream 2 is dead & gone. That holding company set up by ExxonMobil was already insolvent back on February 3rd and filed for bankruptcy.

So, let me get this straight: the Fed basically banned regular folks and businesses from trading foreign currency, and now every company pulling in more than 80% of their revenue from exports is being forced to swap those dollars back into rubles? Is that really considered a "healthy" way to stabilize an exchange rate?
If you want to use a medical analogy, it’s like putting the ruble into a medically induced coma just to keep it from flatlining.
Oh, and let’s not forget that brilliant long-term strategy where brokers are strictly forbidden from selling bonds or securities held by foreign owners. Truly genius stuff. 👍

wiredseal7 said:It's just the American playbook—they've clearly been mapping this out since 2014, if not earlier. Back in 2016, I actually thought Hillary Clinton winning would be a disaster because it would trigger a war with Russia. Now, that same crowd is back in power—just looking a bit more senile—and they've proven 😁
theory right pretty quickly.
The rest of Europe didn't have these plans. Take the French, for example—they might act tough in public, but believe me, they aren't thrilled when some idiot starts dragging General Motors through the mud in a speech before their parliament (especially when it's a state-backed attempt to save a massive investment in Russia). If Europe shouldn't have stepped in there in the first place, then you'll just see players from Korea, Japan, and China moving in.

If Europeans had been smarter earlier and just pushed the Ukrainians to honor the Minsk agreement—which was weirdly backwards since Russia was being sanctioned while the Ukrainians kept sabotaging it—we wouldn't be seeing a war on the continent today.
But that's hard to pull off when certain countries in the EU, especially Poland, seem more loyal to the USA than to the Union itself. That's the biggest hurdle to any real European independence in foreign policy.

Even the original Minsk deal felt like Angela Merkel and Hollande Ukrainian were just playing games with the Ukrainians. Minsk 2 was such a humiliating "agreement" that no country would ever agree to it willingly. The real issue was this whole policy of appeasing Putin and all those extra little clauses Russia demanded. If it had just been about decentralizing Ukraine, it probably would have gone through without any drama.

wiredseal7 said:We're talking past each other here.
Sure, Putin ignored the Announcements—he figured he could weather whatever was promised before the war started (plus, he knew the Americans would eventually dump every sanction in the book on him anyway)—but the actual fallout ended up being way more brutal than he anticipated.

But my point is about what happened after those massive sanctions hit in early March, specifically targeting the Russian currency. The EU and US officials thought hitting the money supply would make Putin fold, beg for mercy, or maybe even get ousted so they could dictate terms for an economic surrender.

The gamble with sanctions was whether Putin would actually break or be removed. We can see now that didn't happen—he stayed put, and both sides are going to be bleeding economically for a long time. It’ll be even worse if energy sales grind to a halt on April 1st.

See, my take on the sanctions has always been a bit different. I see them as a way to choke off Russia's ability to fund this war in the long run, essentially pushing them toward poverty so they can't afford to keep fighting—sort of like what happened with South Korea or Iran. Combine that with sending military aid to Ukraine to bleed the Russian military dry until they're practically incapable of any combat operations, and you've got a plan to force Russia to walk away from these insane demands of theirs.

Peter Sanders4 said:Let's be clear: they aren't getting gas for free. It's up to them to figure out how they want to handle that.

Essentially, the EU has imposed sanctions on itself that every citizen will end up footing the bill for. And if we're being honest, the US was the primary driver here, essentially ordering its loyal EU subordinate to follow suit.

It's Russia that's trying to unilaterally change contracts they already signed and agreed to. At no point did the EU stop paying for the gas they actually received.

wiredseal7 said:Olaf Scholz is doing great—Merkel never would've let things get this messy. To start with, the Americans wouldn't have even bought into the idea that just tightening the screws with sanctions would make the Russians back off from the invasion. Now he can just bang his head against the wall realizing how much damage he's actually done.
Besides, those green energy types don't care anyway—they think we can just run everything on wind and sunshine.

So what, are Russians just bluffing when they talk about turning off the taps? Or are you trying to tell me Putin is some kind of humanitarian who doesn't want the EU to freeze?

feralpilot0 said:They haven't even hit Russia yet; it's obvious they're playing a strategic game, doing just enough to satisfy the media cycle.

Nestlé is still operating, oil is still flowing, and diamonds are still heading to Belgium.
The whole thing is a farce...

Actually, Nestlé and General Motors already blinked under the pressure—they both went public with this stuff just a few days ago.

Nestlé announced IT was caving to pressure and suspending The sales of most products in Russia , covering everything fra KitKat and Nesquik

“As the war rages in Ukraine , Our activities in Russia will focus on providing essential food , such as infant food and Medical / Hospital Nutrition — Nestle Said

https://www.standard.co.uk/business/...r-b990206.html

French carmaker Renault Has also reversed its earlier decision to remain in The country and is shutting down Operations AT its Moscow Plant. It is also “ assessing The available options ” for its Staka in Russian Car maker AVTOVAZ.

https://mobile.twitter.com/SarahTabe...76806090584065

So, I put together this decent little long-form thread that breaks down the whole mythology surrounding that 25% grain figure. It clears up why it’s not actually some massive, catastrophic flood situation like a few people here keep trying to insist on.

steelfox98 said:Is it really that hard to find and grasp two sentences in a twenty-second clip? Or do I need to provide a timestamped pointer for you?
"With regard to food shortages, yes we did talk about food shortages and it's gonna be real. The price of these sanctions is not just imposed on Russia, it is imposed on an awful lot of countries, including European countries and our country as well."

Man, looks like English grammar is giving you a run for your money.

“Regarding food shortages, yeah, we talked about them and they’re going to be real. The cost of these sanctions isn't just being dumped on Russia; it's hitting a huge number of nations, including the EU and the US.”

You're spinning things and twisting the facts again. You originally wrote that Biden said the US and the EU would face food shortages, but he never actually said it the way you're trying to frame it now.

steelfox98 said:Biden’s out there warning us about food shortages hitting the US and the European Union because of these sanctions:
https://twitter.com/disclosetv/statu...74994748399616

Izvrces, just say whatever fits your narrative, man.

He doesn't even mention the US or the EU specifically; he just says "many countries worldwide will feel the impact due to the sanctions imposed." Basically, food prices are gonna spike in the US and Europe, and places like Africa and Asia are going to get absolutely hammered since those struggling nations rely so heavily on exports from the big players, not to mention the mess with Ukraine and Russia.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...d-Ukraine.html

The first group of Ukrainians just wrapped up their training, and now they're getting Starstreak sent straight to the front lines.

wiredseal7 said:Maybe do some actual reading. They’re moving forward with everything already on the books.
They just paused talks on a new project that was still being hashed out.
I'm guessing they don't want to stick their necks out too far until things settle down in Ukraine.☕

And honestly, why should they care what the angry West thinks about them? At the end of the day, China and Russia are probably going to tear the West apart anyway, right? Plus, China might just ditch Western markets entirely if it means saving Russia's skin.
They really ought to be subsidizing investments to bail out their allies, especially since Russian oil is practically dirt cheap right now.
Or... hey, maybe those cold, calculating capitalists wrapped in communist colors over in Beijing actually find the wealthy West a little too important to ignore after all? ☕

https://twitter.com/jeancharlesgand/...02610713280512

The Moscow stock market just took a massive dive, basically wiping out all those gains from the start of the week. Honestly, even if they hadn't crashed, most of that profit was kind of a mirage anyway because the central bank stepped in and banned foreign investors from selling their holdings. 😬

https://www.reuters.com/business/ene...es-2022-03-25/

Sinopec, the state-owned giant over in China, is pulling the plug on all their Russian projects and freezing any more investments.

🤔 I mean, weren't all those Putin fans claiming China would just swoop in and grab every last drop of Russian fossil fuel production? They made it sound like they’d easily just replace the European Union market. But nope—turns out Europe is basically just sabotaging itself by cutting off Russia, and apparently, Beijing isn't actually going to bail them out. Who would've thought?

Nathan Evans78 said:That’s the "plan," sure, but it makes me wonder—how many lithium mines actually exist in the European Union right now? 😁

Look, I’m not exactly jumping for joy over this whole "cold turkey" approach to breaking our fossil fuel addiction. It feels a bit late to the party, especially since for years it seemed like they were more interested in putting on big flashy shows for the cameras rather than making any actual progress. But hey, what can you do? Putin basically forced a "us vs. them" reality on everyone, and since fossil fuels are his biggest leverage against the West, we're stuck in this spot. It is what it is—we just have to adapt.

Nathan Evans78 said:And honestly, why on earth would Qatar be dumping massive amounts of capital into carbon capture infrastructure if that were the case? This whole setup is way too complex for them to just guess the outcome. I mean, I simply don't see how the Gulf states are going to play nice and let Europe continue its pivot toward decarbonization. Plus, the democracies are eventually going to hit a wall—they'll have to sell their voters on some massive, embarrassing delay regarding those CO2 reduction targets. Because let's face it, if they start building up new industrial plants in the USA, all they're doing is pumping even more of those molecules into the atmosphere.

My take? The European Union is going to squeeze every last cent out of us to cover these costs, leaving our grandkids to deal with a totally stagnant, "Japanified" economy. They can deal with the mess later. ☕

Companies like ExxonMobil aren't going anywhere even after this so-called decarbonization phase, so fossil fuel trading will always be a thing.
The actual goal here is to kill off fossil fuel consumption in consumer transport and power generation.

silverotter72 said:Putin simply can't afford to turn off the tap. While Germany and a few other European Union nations might suffer some setbacks due to their reliance on Russian gas, Russia would face total ruin. At this point, he could probably just drop a nuke on Moscow or St. Petersburg and still claim victory in the war.

Honestly, it’s all just empty bluster meant for domestic audiences and those Putin-loving types in the West who are always looking for a "strongman." It's like that post from a few days ago saying "we're only taking rubles from now on," only to get hit with a massive "lol nope," followed by that classic reaction: "Oh, okay, my bad, we weren't being serious."

Nathan Evans78 said:But then again, that's just what you hear from the MSM. Just a few days ago, the UAE placed an order for Chinese airplanes instead of American ones, so I’m honestly struggling to wrap my head around the strategy these Gulf monarchies are playing. In my view, it actually makes more sense for them to scale back production and enjoy higher prices rather than pouring money into infrastructure while watching Europeans pivot en masse toward EVs and heat pumps. You have to assume the folks in the Middle East have read the EU's "Fit for 55" plan more closely than the Europeans themselves have!🤣

The UAE has basically been at odds with the US since back in 2017, specifically when Washington refused to sell them those loitering munitions they needed for the fight against the Houthis. Even when things came up regarding the F-35, it was just total madness—there were so many strings attached to how they’d actually be allowed to use them if they ever even got their hands on them. Honestly, it makes sense why the UAE and Saudi Arabia are being so cautious and keeping their distance from this whole Ukraine situation. They're pretty much nursing a grudge because the US hasn't stepped up to support their military operations in Yemen.