cochyn

I've always thought the only body with any influence over Putin is his paymasters. He's fucked them over royally with this vainglorious war. Irreparably, perhaps in terms of doing business with western Europe - at least at pre-war levels. One thing that has been a constant since February 24th has been the flow of gas east-west. Putin weponised this early doors by breaking the contract and insisting on payment in Roubles to bolster their zombie currency. IIRC, Gazprom own and manage the infrastructure. Now it's destroyed (by whomever) only they can legitimately get it working again. I might be being tinfoil hat here, but self-sabotage puts the ball in their court wrt recommissioning. Business never changes and is as brutal as war: it's long-term interests lie in Putin putting his chap away and backing the fuck down and allowing the gas to flow for more years than he could possibly retain power. Money talks. And even Putin has to realise his entire raison d'etre is built on Russia's massive hydrocarbon economy. Has been since Brezhnev's time and will be for as long as they can keep pulling it out of the ground. Popping the pipes has given Gazprom some leverage - not much - but combined with the myriad other pressures on Putin's peccadillo, might just be enough to pull Russia into some sort of line. The bovine masses of Russia will never rally around an anti-Putin cause. But business has the balls and the teeth to do exactly that and maintain the status quo. One which fellow 'big-player' Germany is entirely supportive of, no doubt.

An interesting line of thought. Gazprom bankroll Putin so guess they’re not too happy being told what to do by him (numerous bogus ‘technical issues’ to limit supply to the west to score political leverage = banjaxing their income). Haven’t a few of their higher-ups been defenestrated recently too?

The shithouses attacked the pipes in international waters. Now who would do such a calculated thing? Avoiding actual aggression within the realm of a NATO member, yet still having the desired effect? Knowing the pipeline is under Gazprom's ownership and maintenance? Nope, I can't think... Surely the bold bit is an act of war, regardless of the jurisdiction of the actual attack?

Life under occupation. Day 212. Lyptsi. - by Alona / cryptodrftng (substack.com) Harrowing.

According to twitter, the russian finance ministry has budgeted enough 'death in service payments' for another 134,000 of their troops to be killed in Ukraine. That doesn't include the thousands of DNR/LPR conscripts, PMC and the convicts they're press-ganging into the war. Putin's russia just doesn't give a fuck about their people - or any people for that matter.

The current Russian regime have proved time and again to be duplicitous, murderous war criminals. Regime change, then easing of sanctions once robust security guarantees are in place...

Salt & Pepper ribs Prawn toast to share Special in black bean and green pepper sauce w/ chips. All liberally sprinkled with the obligatory crispy seaweed. Fuck yeah!

More words of wisdom from the GF quisling… Fuck’s sake..

Reports on the ground (admittedly, from July) paint a slightly different picture: https://www.sibreal.org/a/v-rossii-nachalis-zaderzhki-zarplaty/31941523.html The evidence here may be anecdotal but it's no less credible than the 'hazy' stats currently being bandied about by Rosstat on the kremlin's watch. Also tallies with the article you posted which stated employees are being put on 'unpaid furlough' (i.e: laid off) en-masse. A more recent analysis projects 'real' decline in Russian GDP of 10-15% by December (backed up by Russia's own central bank): Not wildly exciting to anyone hoping for a radical collapse. But enough to demonstrate that Russia's economy is only going one way once coal and oil embargoes take effect in the coming months. One illuminating stat is the cost of buying a new Lada in Russia; $12500 pre-invasion, $50000 now due to collapse in industrial output. Extrapolate that across Russia's manufacturing economy and things look dire indeed in the medium term. Going back to the sibreal link, collapsing consumer confidence will play havoc with any economy (as we are about to find out to a lesser degree soon). Only one person to blame I guess...

Two buckets, Meguiars shampoo, elbow grease, chamois and Simoniz Original wax to finish (lasts forever). Everything else is bunkum. Never rotary polish the car - all it does is abrade the lacquer until it's gone. Use something like Megs Scratch-X to fill any swirls. Auto Glym leather conditioner is a must (for leather seats obvs, proper fucks up velour).

Long night of big booms in Crimea and over the border in Belgorod. Bad news for the russians, who it seems are evacuating Crimea in droves. Wonder if all this talk of an offensive in Kherson was a feint, and that Crimea was the objective all along? Also, I believe AWACS has clear line of sight over much of southern Ukraine, making target identification a breeze.

Crimean air base goes boom! Probably just a munitions handling accident. Again.

That post my friend, is every lind of beautiful. Love the colour in that baby. Love my PRS acoustic. If I could justify another leccy guitar, the PRS SE-24 would be near the top of my list.

Decent article on how we've all been kidding ourselves that Russia is a 'great power'. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/07/rethinking-russia-ukraine-international-political-power-military-strength/661452/ When if fact it is exactly as we have now seen - a nation led by swine. Or to paraphrase John McCain, a mafia-run gas station, masquerading as a country.

Russia bombs a strategic shopping centre, full of shoppers. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-europe-61941287 NATO announcing increasing it's battle-ready contingent of forces along the eastern front from 40,000 to 300,000 troops. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-61954516 Not looking good, and no sign at all of Russia backing down.. quite the opposite.

That's Sir Gavin Williamson as well. We ain't arsing around on this one.

Yeah, this surely. For many crypto was their first dabble in 'investing'. This bloodbath has got Wall Street 1929 written all over it. (except the bit where the world ends). A lot of poor saps will have to pick themselves up off the floor and either forget investing or actually invest in something tangible. Harsh lesson, I feel for them. But they won't be going back in to crypto if they have any sense.

You're forgetting there's an absolute shit-ton of NATO hardware and personnel in the entire eastern border with Ukraine following the slew of recent exercises in the region (Poland and Lithuania maybe)? Most of that gear is the shiny new stuff we've kept for ourselves. Not the bin-ends we've been giving Ukraine.

All the while the cunt is hawking a shipload of stolen Ukrainian wheat to his mate Al Assad in Syria after being blocked from every other port on the Med. despicable shite.

We have an inflationary 'hump' caused by pent-up demand far outstripping supply hobbled in a post-pandemic period. As for gas prices? Wholesale gas is back to June 2021 prices. OT I guess, but the banking system is strong, liquidity is generally good it's just consumer confidence is taking a knock probably past Q3 this year.

Really?

There was talk of a retreat from Kherson area back to Crimea as well yesterday. Not sure how that's going...

I suspect the Allied MO is to make Russia bleed out slowly until it decides to cut its losses. A wounded Russia is still an adversary whereas a defeated Russia (a la Germany in 1945) becomes the world's problem and diminishes the need for NATO...

I'm sure their leader's 'SS' tattoos are just his wee tribute to Mike Read's Saturday Superstore, which he enjoyed watching on TV a child.

Yes, it's proper fog of war stuff the numbers of 300/ 200s recorded by the RFA. I say recorded, there's ample evidence to show they simply refuse to recover their dead or wounded and therefore just register them as MIA: It dukes the stats and saves them the compo owed to the fallens' families. We may never know for sure. But I suspect some enterprising journo like Bellingcat could get to the bottom of it by bribing russian mobile phone carriers to divulge the numbers of sim cards that became inactive/ lapsed since February 24th (much like China's 'true' death toll was estimated during Covid). There's always a way.