I actually have no idea what it was in originally - it was just a clip shown in the intro to Saturday Night Live. Which goes to show how normalised that sort of thing is.

So will this actually help anything, Or will Bardella just pick up where she left off?

Hmm. Would that be politically viable? If they’re coming to your rescue militarily the relationship has to be deeper than just trade.

I said 15 months or less to hyperinflation somewhere yesterday. In that case, they could theoretically start conscription and grind Ukraine down that way, or start selling big ticket things like territory in exchange for help, but political capacity to enforce that is a serious question.

Or just literally any of the giant pile of dictators that were overthrown.

Lol, it’s on my socials so it’s real.

Two can play that game. Not to mention I’m not even British.

Really? Just since I posted this, I saw Mikey Madison getting shot into a lit stove and catching on fire.

The actual Russian part is the European part, though.

Yes. Back when analysts used to talk about a war with Russia pre-2022, something you heard pretty often was “they’re not as advanced, but they have so much stockpiled armour”.

This is like America running out of guns or Canada running out of syrup.

Nah, adjust for Russian standards in what “poor technical condition” even means. It’s not going to Ukraine if it can’t drive off the base.

the industry is not covering combat losses

Since it’s not clear from the headline, that’s the restoration industry. We’re not even talking about the production of new tanks (which was never that impressive at any point in the full-scale war).

They have >1000. They only need a 1% success rate.

Based on intel from my MI buddies

I really hope you’re lying about that.

Yeah, even he has to know that if Europe does fight back (as you and me know it would) it will go poorly for him.

Eh. Regardless of how careful he is, he’s still just a man. If it’s a coup from within the security he has means nothing, and they will also know where he is at a given time.

It’s still not on the BBC 12 hours on, and I don’t know the website, so this is fake, unfortunately.

Clearly, Putin underestimated Ukraine at the beginning of his invasion. But Russia can maintain the war against Ukraine for a long time to come.

Barring help from the US, I would be shocked if they don’t have hyperinflation within 15 months. Maybe they can keep going through that, or maybe not.

There’s a chance Trump’s successor as fuhrer will be more directly militaristic, but only a chance. Most likely, Putin is still expecting Europe to fold and submit this time he escalates. Probably because he’s misread the complacency of the West over the past two decades as a weakness of personality.

likely when this happens will have new allies besides the US

Who are you thinking of? Canada’s a “shoe in” if you’ll take us, of course, but anyone else?

Not surprised. The level of European alarm about the Russian threat being real has been greater than what could have been sustained without there being secret direct evidence.

Here’s hoping when he does that and immediately starts to lose, he doesn’t decide to end the world.

Ah, to be clear, gratuitous sex and gratuitous violence are both pornographic in their own way. Sorry, my bad.

I agree. The only people that can claim the violence doesn’t serve a purpose with any intellectual honesty are the tiny number of anarcho-pacifists.

However, a superhero punching out a bad guy, or even a realistic depiction of a recent-ish war like in the opening of Saving Private Ryan, is very different from the kind of gratuitous onscreen gore that’s all over the place now.

They’ll claim the woodchipper serial killer stuff establishes who the badguy is or whatever, of course, but I don’t buy it, and I definitely don’t believe the producer is paying out that much on special effects for the sake of artistic integrity.