Clarification/Follow-up by tomder55 on 08/14/08 12:30 pm:
The Left continues to side with Russia on this one, even continuing to show willful credulousness. I see it in some pundits’ and journalists’ interpretations of events. In the web we continue to see people, who we know are not Russian disinformation agents, but nonetheless say that Georgia deserves this and Russia is right to defend its interests in the region.

Putin sees how much of this is happening in the West. And he makes the correct assessment that his view of us as “weak” has been borne out by events and our reactions to them.

Clarification/Follow-up by Mary_Susan on 08/14/08 7:03 pm:
Your usual blithering lunatic fringe idiocy, Tom...BUSH HAS BEEN PRES FOR 8 YEARS!! He has a close associate, Condolezza, an academic expert on Russia, and THIS HAPPENS??.

What did he expect? Bush conducted a war on Iraq for OIL...Putin is conducting a war on Georgia about OIL.

BWAH HA HA

Or, maybe Bush and Putin agreed on it all???

BWAH HA HA

Clarification/Follow-up by tomder55 on 08/15/08 10:45 am:
You missed the point!!

not at all . I take anything you say with a subtext that you blame Bush for everything.

However you missed my point .

Every President since the fall of the Soviet Union (including your beloved Clintoon) has made a concerted effort to bring the Ruskies into the world of civilized nations. Condi Rice ,as much as I like and admire her has been a Russofile for years and has helped direct this noble but misguided policy .

The Ruskie tanks rolling has forced President Bush to reassess his efforts to find common ground with the thugs in Moscow.

For now President Bush is trying to salvage what remains of the US Russian potamkin relationship .That is why Condi Rice was sent on her diplomatic junket.

But the truth is that as the Ruskies have spit on the world wide effort to appease them ,Bush's rhetoric is falling more in line with reality .Too bad Sec. Def. Gates is still using appeaser language.

America will have a real choice this fall ;McCain with his finger on the pulse of reality ;or BO with his pie-in-the-sky flowery kumbaya speeches. The only hope for BO is that he has Zbigniew Brzezinski on his advisery staff.

Clarification/Follow-up by Mary_Susan on 08/15/08 4:27 pm:
BUSH was the kumbaya guy with Russia since he "looked into Putin's eyes and saw a guy he could trust"...BWAH HA HA!!!!!!!!

Bush and the neo-cons(fascists) have again proven how stupid they were when it comes to foreign relations. While their heads were having fantasies about whatever, Russia was PLOTTING AS USUAL.

Bush is responsible for going easy on Russia. What, one oil man to another????

Blah..Bush is an idiot and has caused much damage. Everyone can see it.