ecugringo

Its like that movie "By Dawns Early Light" where a rogue Russian nuke goes off and the Russian diplomat is trying to convince the US not to retaliate but does anyway and WW3 begins. Then the Sec of the Interior is running the show. I am still trying to see what the end zone was going to be for Putin. A quick victory in Ukrains still meant massive sanctions against him. Is he trying to bait NATO into a larger fight so he can move West and then cut a deal to secure more former USSR turf? Is this a master plan for a new Russia/China/India trade sphere?

Explosions in Moldova Attacks Begin in New Country as Russia Warns Nuclear Threat Is ‘Real’ (yahoo.com)

LOL this is basically me. But I have to travel to meet clients when needed and go to my main office in Houston occasionally. Not everyone can work from home. They arent mature enough of they need the social interaction. We are trying to get ppl in but its come in when you need to. The commute is pretty bad for a lot. I also moved out of CO and cashed in and moved to the south east. My clients are all over hte US so it didnt matter really where I was. I think having a Mil background helped maintain discipline for me. I am surprised the Dems seem to push ppl back into the cities though. The work from home option seems to be a helper for climate change and help with congestion. Fewer care=less pollution? Or is the whole global warming scare a farce for voters? Seems like an arrow in your quiver if you care that much.

I remember reading about a town in Eastern Germany where the Wermacht retreated and left the civilian population at the mercy of the Reds. Thousands committed suicide vs the oncoming rape/murder that awaited them. I recall families jumping into a river together tied to rocks. Just hard to fathom. The brutality against the Berliners is pretty hard to read. Then again so is the siege of Leningrad. The Serbs share commonality with the Russians. THey used Rape and torture as a weapon. Isnt Zelensky Jewish? Cant really defend the neo nazi claim by Putin if thats the case. I have a contractor finishing work on my property. He's a Pole in his 60's. He was telling me his father was in a Soviet camp in WW2. According to him, the Ukraines that joined the SS were pretty a pretty nasty group and very feared against everyone espicially the Soviets. Many crimes were at their hands. An Elijah wood movie "Everything is Illuminated" hints at this. Anyway....According to the contractor there is a deep hatred vs the Ukrainians from WW2 in Russia.

I was born in 81'. My Dad took me to see it in the theatres LOL. I think my wife would kill me if I took my boys to see it. Crazy that my 5 yr old will be about hte same age when Top Gun 2 comes out as I was when the original came out. And Maverick is still in the Navy!

NATO estimates Russian casualties at 40k with 7k-15k KIA. Crazy! Thats more losses than the US suffered at IWO Jima.

Been watching a lot of Peter Zeihan interviews lately, not sure it's good for my health. If half of his global predictions come true its a pretty scary world.

Heard that Russian KIA estimates are around 6k. The commentator said this was almost 50% of losses Russia had in Afghanistan in 10 years of war. Crazy to think in 2 weeks they are at the half way point and that war was partially claimed as responsible for the end of the USSR.

It is different but.....If Putin goes home he's done. He cant just hang a Uey and pretend nothing happened. And then what? You get a global friendly Russia? Or Putin 2.0? I just feel like hes going to double down and go all in.

Didnt Iraq have sanctions in the 90's that the UN estimated was responsible for over 500k dead mostly children? You think in WW2 the allies wanted unconditional surrender. That made the Germans and Japanese only fight on harder. More people died in the last year of hte war than all the previous combined. I dont know what the solution is but backing Putin in a corner could be dangerous. If he loses in Ukraine more of Russia will break away and he will lose more resources. Mostly the oil around the Caspian Sea which is vast. He will lose out on the revenue from transportation of crude as well. Even China could become aggressive in Russia's east. They can be starved out through sanctions but I think that will only draw more internal support for Putin. Putin can also show his neighbors that if you go against him he will exhaust all resources to burn you down like Ukraine. Maybe that is his path to victory and create a new economic zone with his neighboring allies and China? If he can take Ukraine he will have a stable food source and can influence the global food market. Also, I guess we're buying Crude from Venezuela now...Good job Brandon!

There are 4 months with pretty bad weather. But great food, very diverse. You are right on a # of factors. It's very suburban so lots of sprawl and thats hard to get away from. We lived in CO and were far from family. I either work from home or travel so we moved back east. If the company wants me in Houston they can pay me to move....but Im pretty happy in the South East.

Houston for the most part. Its not that exciting though. Working with pipelines etc..There aren't as many as there use to be. I work for a tech vendor, its been fun. Not without its challenges but better than anything else I've done.

As mentioned there are a lot of factors in the price of oil. It is a globally traded commodity and the US doesnt dictate how much Oil Exxon can extract from the Permian or Bakken. What they can do is force heavy taxes on these companies for their green policies. Just recently P66 and Holly Frontier shut down 2 refineries and they will be converted to bio diesel. There is a lot of debate over how green bio diesel is and how good it is for engine components. Nevertheless, Holly saved over $60mm/yr in taxes by doing this. There are also fees and taxes for green house gas emissions. There are incentives for auto makers to make more efficient vehicles or EV. I think Ford will be 60% EV by 2035. Reservations for the E F-150 sold out in 15 minutes. Its an $80k truck. The state level has its own set of penalties. In CO they want to limit how far you can put a well from a structure. SOme of hte proposals would basically outlaw any new wells based off this distance. O&G is still a major industry in teh state and is a huge revenue source for education. Too bad a lot of people there are far left and want to shut it down. I had a mid school teacher tell me at a neighborhood holiday party that I can just work in another industry. NY and CA want to ban gas ranges and gas heating. More states will join. But we have oceans of natural gas under the US. We dont have the infrastructure to make it usable at the moment. Politicians will add red tape as their constituents wish making capital investment more and more difficult. Good luck trying to start a nuclear plant. Interesting note. CA shut down their nuke plants but buys energy from Palo Verde in AZ. I think you could easily replace coal with Natural gas which is 40-60% cleaner but the incentives being pushed for solar/wind will make it too challenging. Sad thing is there are great jobs in Oil and Gas. I have done better than I ever thought I could. All i needed was military experience since nobody wants to go into this industry. I work with a lot of engineers from very prestigious schools. A lot are Aero Engineers. THey tell me Exxon pays over 2x what Lockheed, Boeing etc....pay.

You are only speculating on his demands. I dont underestimate Putin at all and I think he's the strongest player in this chess match. Everyone needs to figure out what his end game is. As you stated he prepped for sanctions. He knew taking Ukraine would isolate him on the global playing field. Do you really think Ukraine is the end zone? my guess is no. He wants to make Western Europe his bitch and control fuel/gas prices they must buy. I think he also wants a bigger say in how oil prices fluctuate globally. His population is dying. In his mind if he doesnt expand Russia will be nothing more than Ft. McMurry is in Canada in 50 years.

Didn’t know Russia applied. agree. I don’t think anyone knows what his end game is. He’s not dumb. He’s out maneuvered our presidents. I can’t envision Putin not seeing the sanctions and thinking we’ll I’ll take Ukraine and a month later they’ll be more focused on the kardashisns by then. he’s been on their border since November. This is just a piece of the grander scheme.

The question will be for the west: do u let a free nation become destroyed and annihilated in your back yard? There is interest. Natural gas flows through Ukraine. Kazakhstan has a massive oil play. It needs to go through Ukraine or the Black Sea to reach market. We can’t ship enough lng for demand in Europe. If we had balls we’d stop Russian crude from market and increase production ourselves but Biden is too focused on trying to look green. Putin is all in. Theres no going back now. Conquer Ukraine just to be economically isolated isnt a win.

Nobody put a gun to their head and made them join. They made that decision as a free nation. I understand Putin being WTF? But throwing a tantrum isn’t the right way. Maybe realize you’re the dick in the room and figure out how to benefit the most from the game.

Interesting review of Russian tactics. Better than the TEAM meeting i was on while watching it. Russo-Ukraine War: What the West Doesn't Understand EP 3 - YouTube

I agree. He's been pretty brilliant as far as achieving his goals in his role. He seemed to be 2 steps ahead of everyone else the whole way. What I cant figure out is what his own intel on his own forces was. Did he know he could barely move his army 400 miles? Did he know his logistics were that poor? Or is this all part of his ruse to draw in more nations? Russia is taking heavy losses we needed to step up...oh btw you were funneling arms in through Poland so thats mine now? The other big question is what is victory for him at this point? He is interested in marking his legacy. If he concedes and only takes a chunk of Ukraine and goes home, but the costs was isolating Russia from the global economy worth it? No statues of himself for that. If he is defeated in Ukraine and goes home then hes a total failure. At this point the only glimpse of a victory would be inflicting as much damage as he can on his way out. I dont see how he or Russia recovers.

Highway of death 2.0.

17-mile-long Russian convoy reaches outskirts of Kyiv (yahoo.com) 17 Mile long convoy on the outskirts of Kiev.

There was an article I saw on MSN or somewhere how the Russians were being forced into this and they had mobile incinerators to cremate their dead on site to hide the true # of KIA. Crazy to think about.

Wasnt Hillary's deputy SOS on video marching in Kiev with anti Putin demonstrators?

So how does this differ from the Gulf War? You have 2 sovereign nations invaded by an aggressor. Bush rallied the international community to free Kuwait. What is Biden going to do? Sanctions? China is already buying Russia exports to alleviate that pressure. Russia/Belarus controls a massive amount of components for fertilizer going into the growing season. Factor that Ukraine will not be able to export wheat as well and it could set up a global crisis.

Isnt Russia one of the fastest dying populations in the world? I remember reading something like the birth rate is extremely low and in something like 40 years their population will be less than 1/2 what it is today? I do think Putin wants to expand his sphere of influence into Europe and push the US out. If the EU gravitates towards Russia for resources in enhances Russia's survivability long term.