“For God’s sake,” he said, “this man cannot remain in power.”
"... A White House official clarified that “[t]he president’s point was that Putin cannot be allowed to exercise power over his neighbors or the region…. He was not discussing Putin’s power in Russia, or regime change.”
I marvel at the rush of the handlers to walk that back. Pu…
“For God’s sake,” he said, “this man cannot remain in power.”
"... A White House official clarified that “[t]he president’s point was that Putin cannot be allowed to exercise power over his neighbors or the region…. He was not discussing Putin’s power in Russia, or regime change.”
I marvel at the rush of the handlers to walk that back. Putin is a person threatening to use a nation's nuclear arsenal against ANY nation that opposes his invasion of a sovereign nation, who interferes in elections in a number of democracies, who imprisons legitimate opposition and who sends assassins into other sovereign nations to poison those who have opposed or offended him in his quest for absolute power.
Biden's statement is literally correct, and it is spot on.
However, it ultimately begs the world to restore international law so that those who do these things and commit war crimes are removed from power, hauled in front of an international criminal court and their reigns of terror against people and planet brought to an end.
The problem I see is that those handlers are trying to placate the oligarch and party operatives of their own nation and its particularly bad-acting allies who have been behind such actions themselves and made regime change into an art form. They would find themselves facing that court.
Illegal wars and Putin are symptoms of the breakdown of international law at a time when globalization made that more necessary than ever. The United Nations is now proven ineffective in preventing wholesale destruction, and it is headed down the extinction path of the League of Nations. What followed that extinction is something we do not want to repeat.
I read the article you reference and several others yesterday evening. I understand what you're saying and I agree that he was begging for a restoration of international law. IMHO, though, the line was delivered in a place and time where it could be radically interpreted by those aligned with Putin and acted upon in a most gruesome and violent manner. I wouldn't rule out the possibility of retaliation against the US. It frightens the hell out of me.
I completely agree with your last paragraph. We are in a very precarious place.
I am inclined to go with the structured application of the truth, softened by the public softening after-statement. What a person hears first sticks. Qualifications of that statement take more repetitions to modify what was heard first.
“Be careful of the words you speak. You never know which ones you’ll eat.”
“For God’s sake,” he said, “this man cannot remain in power.”
"... A White House official clarified that “[t]he president’s point was that Putin cannot be allowed to exercise power over his neighbors or the region…. He was not discussing Putin’s power in Russia, or regime change.”
I marvel at the rush of the handlers to walk that back. Putin is a person threatening to use a nation's nuclear arsenal against ANY nation that opposes his invasion of a sovereign nation, who interferes in elections in a number of democracies, who imprisons legitimate opposition and who sends assassins into other sovereign nations to poison those who have opposed or offended him in his quest for absolute power.
Biden's statement is literally correct, and it is spot on.
However, it ultimately begs the world to restore international law so that those who do these things and commit war crimes are removed from power, hauled in front of an international criminal court and their reigns of terror against people and planet brought to an end.
The problem I see is that those handlers are trying to placate the oligarch and party operatives of their own nation and its particularly bad-acting allies who have been behind such actions themselves and made regime change into an art form. They would find themselves facing that court.
Illegal wars and Putin are symptoms of the breakdown of international law at a time when globalization made that more necessary than ever. The United Nations is now proven ineffective in preventing wholesale destruction, and it is headed down the extinction path of the League of Nations. What followed that extinction is something we do not want to repeat.
I read the article you reference and several others yesterday evening. I understand what you're saying and I agree that he was begging for a restoration of international law. IMHO, though, the line was delivered in a place and time where it could be radically interpreted by those aligned with Putin and acted upon in a most gruesome and violent manner. I wouldn't rule out the possibility of retaliation against the US. It frightens the hell out of me.
I completely agree with your last paragraph. We are in a very precarious place.
I am inclined to go with the structured application of the truth, softened by the public softening after-statement. What a person hears first sticks. Qualifications of that statement take more repetitions to modify what was heard first.
“Be careful of the words you speak. You never know which ones you’ll eat.”