Known for fearless journalism in the Yeltsin years, Leonid Krutakov resurfaces with an epic history of the oil business, at a time when war over energy has never been more relevant.
"The bulk of America’s oil-producing regions were located in the South, which presented a considerable problem for the Union, which was heavily invested in the nascent new business empire led by Rockefeller."
Huh? At the time of the Civil War Western Pennsylvania was the only significant oil-producing region in the US. And even that only started in 1859. Sloppy language at best!
That apparently was Krutakov, the hero of Matt Taibbi's Substack piece here.
Seems like Hero of Russia™ Krutakov has had his brain infected by the Soviets back in the day and now by, well, who knows. This is a conclusion looking for evidence. Really an embarrassing error. A good editor would have spiked that - and perhaps with that other folly in this tale as well.
Speaking of editors, whatever happened to Emily Kopp? Not that she has editorial talent, but just asking ...
13,500 miles a year is what the average American drives, give or take. So it's even more than he estimated, but maybe he's using data from other countries.
So, our current war with Iran has to do with oil. Saudi Arabia has oil, nobody is trying to take theirs. israel pounding the shit out of Iran is because they want their oil? The exporting of terrorism by tribal fundamentalists has nothing to do with it? The only thing that oil has to do with this conflict is that it is being used to fund a bunch of fucking fucks terrorists. All credit to Lewis Black for the term, “Fucking fucks”, his term for the 9/11 terrorists.
When Krutatov referred to the Russian invasion of Ukraine as a “Special Military Operation”, I began to wonder. And when he justified the invasion, comparing it to the Cuban Missile Crisis …
Does Krutatov live in Putin’s Russia?
N.B.: Trying to mollify Putin (probably a mistake), the Ukrainians voted not to seek NATO membership. Putin responded by seizing Crimea and invading Eastern Ukraine. Of course it’s ridiculous to claim that the distant prospect of NATO membership is the equivalent of fully deployed nuclear weapons (which, by the way, Ukraine voluntarily gave up 30 years ago).
Um, you have it backwards. Ask Dr. Google: "ukrainian constitution nato" (w/o quotes) and her AI will tell you this:
"In February 2019, Ukraine amended its constitution to formally commit to securing full membership in NATO and the European Union. This legislation mandates that the President, Parliament, and government ensure this strategic course, designating the president as the guarantor of Euro-Atlantic integration."
Putin annexed Crimea (and began invading Eastern Ukraine) in 2014, not 2019.
So what you’re saying is, Ukraine finally, reluctantly changed its constitution to apply for NATO membership after Russia had been occupying Crimea for _five years_.
Since you want to go back a bit further, Putin told Ambassador William Burns (See the famous NYET MEANS NYET memo he wrote Condi Rice in 2008) that Ukraine would not be permitted to join NATO shortly before the Bush 41 regime strong-armed NATO into offering admission. In the memo Burns made it clear this was a consensus position in Moscow.
Then in 2014 the US instigated the overthrow of a democratically elected government because it was about to sign a treaty with Russia that offered more favorable financial terms than the US would. The US then installed its government of choice (see the transcript of Victoria Nuland's leaked "Fuck the EU" phone call - https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26079957).
NATO's claims about being defensive sound great but then try to find a military alliance that claims otherwise.
As to why Russia might be unwilling to let the US into Ukraine, consider the American reaction to defensive nuclear missiles being placed in Cuba, remembering the US was planning on another invasion after the Bay of Pigs fiasco. In blockading the island the Kennedy regime was willing by JFK's estimate to risk a 1/3 chance of all-out nuclear war.
It always cracks me up when Russian apologists rant on about that diabolical manipulator, Reverend Mother Gaius Victoria Nuland. And the clueless CIA which takes credit after the fact for things that it didn’t even know were going on. Gotta keep those Congressional appropriations coming!
For a more moderate view, here’s that BBC article that you yourself linked above:
“The US is clearly much more involved in trying to broker a deal in Ukraine than it publicly lets on. … Though given some of the comments from Vladimir Putin's adviser on Ukraine Sergei Glazyev … you don't need your own listening station to be clear about Russia's intentions. Russia he said ‘must interfere in Ukraine’ and the authorities there should use force against the demonstrators.”
Wikipedia gives us a nice chronology of “Ukraine-NATO relations”:
“At the 2008 Bucharest summit, NATO declined to offer Ukraine a Membership Action Plan … In 2010 … the Ukrainian parliament voted to abandon the goal of NATO membership … In the February 2014 Ukrainian Revolution, Ukraine's parliament voted to remove Yanukovych, but the new government did not seek to change its neutral status. … Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, and in August 2014 Russia's military invaded eastern Ukraine …Because of this, in December 2014 Ukraine's parliament voted to seek NATO membership …”
The Ukrainians thought they could keep Putin happy by refusing NATO membership. But for him the real issue was never NATO membership, but that Ukrainian independence must be destroyed. A democratic Ukraine might give the Russian people ideas!
That Yanukovych was a traitor and Russian puppet is made obvious from the very different results of the 2014 and 2022 invasions. In 2014 Ukraine was helpless to resist, after Yanukovych gutted its military. But then two democratically elected patriot presidents — Poroshenko and Zelensky — spent the next eight years rebuilding that military, and in the end revealed to the world Putin’s delusions about Ukraine.
BTW, trying to compare the Russian invasion to the Cuban Missile Crisis becomes even more laughable when we remember that Ukraine originally had nuclear weapons, but voluntarily handed them over to Russia 30 years ago.
Yes -- you are wrong. No NATO nation was attacked by remnant Yugoslavia.
NATO involved themselves in internal conflict of a non-member nation in order to pry Kosovo from Yugoslavia. They even updated their mission statement, which had stated they were a defensive alliance, to do so.
There were attacks flowing both ways. We had the KLA on the list of terror organizations, but conveniently took them off when we decided to intervene, taking their side in hostilities.
But the bottom line is the only international recourse for intervening in the internal affairs of another nation is via the UNSC.
This moved NATO into a new role, that was highly subjective. We had no more right to adjudicate it than would China and Russia.
Imagine, for example, if China and Russia decided to create a security structure that includes Iran and attack Israel to force a two state solution and "save" the people of Gaza.
It is a very similar situation. Kosovo conducted terrorist attacks, and the Serbian authorities went with an overwhelming response to neutralize the independence movement.
The Russians used exactly our NATO precedent to set the UN aside and defend the Russian minority in the breakaway provinces of Ukraine.
Also, I doubt NATO cared that much about the Kosovars themselves -- but we are both doing mind reading here as to their dominant motivations. At the time, they were seeking a justifiable reason to still exist as there were calls by many to disband it. Much of this was to preserve and grow the organization, which had outlived its original purpose as a counterweight on a then friendly Russia.
One can see evidence in the fact that we added one of our largest millitary bases in the world on their territory. NATO benefited significantly themselves.
No it didn't. But Hillary and Obama thought it would. Apparently T and his advisors like Rubio think this latest adventure somehow advances US interests. The US seems to have remarkably shortsighted politicians.
Keep digging and find what's in it for each of the opportunists! Capitalism thrives on Perma War E-CON. US industry's sole bright spot has been flooding the world with US-made & contracted off-shore weapons & ammo! It's the Major Barbara Shavian Solution to calls for controlling and prosecuting Institutional Corruption!
Building democracy and human rights in Ukraine complicated Putin’s plans for reconstituting/reconquering the USSR. Obedient satellite Ukraine would have been a platform for the next invasion (probably the Baltics) — just as obedient satellite Belarus served as a platform for the Russian blitzkrieg on Ukraine.
What “NATO presence in Sevastopol”? Not sure what you mean to refer to.
"Building democracy and human rights in Ukraine" = rehabilitating Petlyura and Bandera? Those are warm and fuzzy words that the dysfunctional Ukrainian government was never able to deliver, whether ruled by Orange or Blue. It was always a game of musical chairs in which each party's oligarch patrons took possession of state owned enterprises until the next change. It was an uneasy equilibrium between the Ukrainian speaking west and the Russian speaking east, the leadership of both parties taking their turn at the trough. Corruption was the glue holding the country together.
(The outrage against Tymoshenko was that she was the only one prosecuted. Even Yushchenko supported the prosecution. She struck a heroic figure during the Orange Revolution with her glorious braids, but proved to be the same corrupt tribe. )
I remember the freak out when US Marines practiced beach landings in Crimea during Kuchma's presidency. When the Maidan forced Yanukovych to flee the US was widely viewed as the puppet master, fairly or not. The prominent presence of black and red OUN flags felt threatening to many.
The very notion of the new government of Ukraine, with overt EU membership ambitions, giving NATO forces access to Sevastopol was not entirely out of the question. It was definitely prominent in Russian paranoia and seemed a very real possibility at the time.
Have you ever been to Sevastopol? Lovely town, very clean and pleasant for a Soviet city. Although the Ukrainian and Russian fleets shared the harbor facilities, it is a thoroughly Russian city. Riding the bus from Simferopol to Sevastopol I recall seeing two wedding parties on the same day at shrines to WW II battles. The Panorama on top of the hill in the city is a temple to Russian nationalism, celebrating victory (survival) in the Crimean War and the two bloody sieges by the Nazis. In Soviet/Russian mythology, Sevastopol is the "Hero City."
When the new government was installed in Kyiv the "little green men" occupied Crimea with ridiculous ease because the ethnic Russian majority welcomed them. (The Tatars not so much ... )
It seems to me that Volodya deceived himself with that easy victory and started fucking up with his move into Donbas.
My point is that the adversary's perspective must be understood. Slogans are no substitute for analysis.
Just before the 2022 Russian invasion, international corruption watchdogs rated Ukraine much less corrupt than Russia (in spite of Russia’s efforts to corrupt it).
Arguably, the failure of the Russian blitzkrieg corroborates that: Russian troops were poorly trained and poorly equipped because so much of the training and equipment money had been embezzled.
Meanwhile, the Ukrainians were standing ready with the Javelin anti-tank missiles that Trump, breaking with Obama’s “blankets and MREs” policy, had let them have.
While Crimea, like the rest of Ukraine, had voted for independence from Russia when the USSR broke up, the vote was much closer there, so it’s conceivable that given a do-over they would have voted differently in 2014. However, Putin has never allowed a fair referendum. Certainly the original inhabitants, the Crimean Tatars, prefer Ukrainian to Russian rule.
Given that most of Bandera's alleged misdeed were NKVD psy-ops, and with Putin's Russia successfully rehabilitating far more odious personages (like Uncle Joe), "rehabilitating" Bandera is hardly something to be bent out of shape about...
Tucker Carlson’s interview of Putin was mostly softball questions; but there was one exception: If it’s so obvious Ukraine is really a runaway province of Russia, Tucker asked, why did it take Putin 20 years to get around to making that argument?
See the Wikipedia article on “Ukraine-NATO relations” (which I discuss in more detail above).
To keep Putin happy, the Ukrainians had agreed not to seek NATO membership but, in 2014, Putin invaded Crimea and Eastern Ukraine anyway.
In other words, Putin didn’t attack because Ukraine applied to (someday) join NATO. Ukraine applied to join NATO because Putin attacked.
Of course, what makes the comparison to the Cuban Missile Crisis even more absurd is that Ukraine originally had nuclear weapons but voluntarily handed them over 30 years ago — to Russia!
It was a preventive action. The Ukrainian Revolution flipped Ukraine into a Western aligned nation. Furthermore, NATO refused to take NATO membership off the table for Ukraine, and Crimea was pivotal to Russian security.
Important to keep in mind that NATO helps modernize Ukraine’s military, and they'd already worked together on joint missions, and Russia had long been watching the slow creeping threat of NATO enlargement.
Even the words of their Acting Foreign Minister, hinted that the Ukrainian parliament may seek to join NATO in the future -- they didn't rule it out:
"We are considering all options regarding the strengthening of our security and collective security. But we must stick to the existing legislation of Ukraine,...But the issue whether to change this legislation depends on the Ukrainian parliament. The program of the new Ukrainian government does not contain the intention of becoming a member of NATO"
04/02/26: No, actually, the statement is factually correct. Once both sides realized what was happening, in 1863, President Abrahambone Lincoln Nebraska issued his famous “Oil Emancipation Proctologist Enunciation” edict.
This put the American Civil War on hold for a decade so that both sides could pump the oil needed to fight with weapons yet to be invented (and also, to bail out Matt’s statement that “The bulk of America’s oil-producing regions were located in the South…”).
They resumed fighting in 1873. The North was now armed with “Sherman tanks,” presciently named after a Northern general not yet famous (actually, unknown to anyone other than the West Point plebes Eisenhower and Patton).
Little Known Fact: Winner of 163 Purple Hearts was the original “Hellfire Hegseth,” who made his business to fight for both the North and the South and the East and the West. His post-Gettysburg campaign in Greenland created a diplomatic crisis in Denmark, a country that had yet to acquire the country now coveted by the Iranians.
"Sloppy language"? This clown Kutakov has no business saying anything about the causes of the American Civil War, about which he clearly knows nothing.
Probably so. I was trying to give maximum benefit of the doubt. Perhaps he meant "suspected potential oil-producing regions." But even that is highly suspect.
Absolutely and England was building Iron Clad warships for the Confederacy to break the Union port blockades so the cotton from the South could continue to flow to England and France and English coal was what the Confederacy desperately needed
My dear, you have your carbon chains mixed up. Kerosene and paraffin and lighter oil were vital to the British industrialization machine. The Americas have light oil. We add heavy oil to produce products above Kerosene.
Moreover, factories in the industial portions of Great Britain could stay open 24 hours per day now, because of vast artifical light, e.g., exploiting the southern states, their mines (fuel can be made from coal), and their slaves.
We had Kerosene, coal and cotton. Vital commodities industrialization.
Civil war started in 1861. Standard oil’s precursor started in 1863. Kerosene was introduce in the 1860s. When you get small obvious facts wrong it call into question entire narratives
Prior to the 1850s development of kerosene, people used whale blubber as oil for lamps.
Much of this is recorded in the children's books by Laura Ingalls Wilder. When they ran out of kerosene during the long winter, their parents used animal fat and paraffin to create a button lamp until the train came through the snow in spring. I am going off memory now, but I am sure you can google it.
Haven’t read the book but the first oil well in the south was in Texas in 1866. It was only discovered in Pennsylvania in late 1850’s so if the claim is made that the civil war was related to oil, this is foolish
04/02/26: No, actually, the statement is factually correct. Once both sides realized what was happening, in 1863, President Abrahambone Lincoln Nebraska issued his famous “Oil Emancipation Proctologist Enunciation” edict.
This put the American Civil War on hold for a decade so that both sides could pump the oil needed to fight with weapons yet to be invented (and also, to bail out Matt’s statement that “The bulk of America’s oil-producing regions were located in the South…”).
They resumed fighting in 1873. The North was now armed with “Sherman tanks,” presciently named after a Northern general not yet famous (actually, unknown to anyone other than the West Point plebes Eisenhower and Patton).
Little Known Fact: Winner of 163 Purple Hearts was the original “Hellfire Hegseth,” who made his business to fight for both the North and the South and the East and the West. His post-Gettysburg campaign in Greenland created a diplomatic crisis in Denmark, a country that had yet to acquire the country now coveted by the Iranians.
I am arguing that the object of the British supplying the Confederacy was not just to have control over those southern states if the Confederacy won, but Britain would control the Union too and the USA would be right back to 1775, a vassel of the British and the City of London.
The Civil War was a proxy war with the British using Americans as fodder (sound familiar?), but no one talks about that, and to some extent the French against the British too, in the War of 1812, only on American soil.
Some have argued Iran and Palestine are still vassels of the City of London (financially/MI6), and that what the USA and Israel are currently involved in is a proxy war to disrupt City of London financially and supply chain control.
I am not saying I believe that, but it has been classically the London MO since the 1600s.
Wrong carbon chain. You what you want to focus on Kerosene. Coal can make Kerosene (1849). Which states have coal, cotton, and Kerosene? What fueled the British industrialization? Coal, cotton, Kerosene, and slavery. Who supplied the Confederacy to fight the Union?
I believe his claim involved Rockefeller. He was only involved in oil. Pennsylvania and West Virginia were union states and PA was the main source of coal at the time. Specifically anthracite from Eastern PA
Right, see my reply to RN retired, and it was NOT the English. It was the City of London financial machine and the British Empire. As far as I am concerned, the English and Celtic people are separate from the financial-ists. The English and Celts were fodder for the wars and factories.
Perhaps even an extension of the Roman Empire form of control?
Just ideas floating around in my head from reading English fiction, and frankly not nearly enough for my satisfaction. 😉
Have to love when someone from another country attempts to rewrite the history of the U.S. when it was clear from Lincoln’s own writings why the civil war happened. Matt going to what he loves most and it’s Russia. The worst is he actually believes what that guy was saying. Getting to the point of just dropping Racket News. Matt, you made a choice and you chose wrong. I’d pivot back is you could but you allowed your new editor to publicly slander Walter as you stood by her. You really screwed the pooch on that one. Attempting to promote some Russian hack as a some US history authoritarian is a joke.
I read your comment and I started to ask what the heck you were talking about. Thinking I should first RTFM (anyone else old enough to remember that?), I went to Grok. Holy cow! There is a lot more to this story than I realized.
I don’t know what Grok told you as I’ve never used it but I follow Walter on Substack and he posted what she was claiming about his movie. Walter is an American treasure an should be revered more then to have some half twit try and damage his career. I also subscribe to his county highway newspaper which is a joy
Grok told me that (which I'd not heard before) and a good summary of the timeline of everything. I was oblivious to pretty much all of it other than what was disclosed here at the time of the ATW breakup.
It’s fascinating how often people like Krutakov with a good handle on social reality and a sophisticated understanding of political economy are ignored in favor of simple-mindedness and wish casting from our “leaders”: Vietnam is like the Alamo (LBJ); we’ll bring democracy to Libya (BHO & HRC); we’ll liberate Iraq (GWB); we’ll take Ukraine to victory over Putin (JRB ).And it’s even more fascinating how many highly credentialed pundits and journalists traffic in the same simple-minded “analyses.” Thanks Matt, for introducing a little depth to the national conversation.
"There are parts of the book that will cause an American reader to raise an eyebrow, like the assertion that the American Civil War “wasn’t fought over human rights or a struggle over slavery . . . ."
That war (which wasn't a "civil war" but was simply named such by the victors) was about preserving the union --not about eliminating slavery. Lincoln said so himself, repeatedly. He didn't give a damn about the slaves (and said that repeatedly as well). The author of this piece would do well to learn his history.
False. The immediate cause of the Civil War was the South Carolinians' attack on Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor. Lincoln used that attack to launch the war as an act of national self-defense, much the way a border skirmish on the Texas-Mexico border had been used as an excuse to start the Mexican War in 1846. But the underlying cause (without which, there would have been no showdown at Ft Sumter) was over slavery, and in particular, its extension into the western territories, to which Lincoln was utterly opposed. It was Lincoln's uncompromising opposition to any further addition of slave states into the Union that had prompted the South (starting with South Carolina) to secede. In short, the Civil War began as a war over slavery disguised as a war to save the Union. After the Emancipation Proclamation in Sept 1862, it officially became a war both to save the Union and to end slavery. Any questions?
Show me the quotes where Lincoln said he "didn't give a damn about the slaves" and I will explain how you have mis-contextualized/misconstrued his words.
"The bulk of America’s oil-producing regions were located in the South, which presented a considerable problem for the Union, which was heavily invested in the nascent new business empire led by Rockefeller. " I don't understand this comment. Spindletop was only in 1901. Until then virtually all oil production was in Pennsylvania with a small amount in adjacent states and literally zero in the Confederate states.
Well, interesting article. Not sure the guy is completely accurate. I HAVE come to see Trump's geopolitical agenda in a much bigger way than I first did. It IS about energy and about stopping China and Russia from strategically controlling it. Trump is consistent that this is all America First (which I and he think will ultimately benefit the world--we don't want China or Russia's to run the world--at least we have more democratic ideas). Iran needed to be dealt with and it seems even other Arab countries see that more than Europe does. I heard someone say last night something I hadn't thought of: Europe has migrated in so many Muslims they are afraid of what they will do within their own countries if they get involved. Probably truth there.
As for the civil war, yes it was partly economic but it was not ALL economic. Every day he stood on the senate floor my cousin ancestor, John Adams railed about the evils of slavery--he owned none and paid everyone who worked for him, including black people all his life -- and the constitution was written with abolishing it in mind, clearly. To say it was not part of the equation does America a disservice.
Hmm why would Europe need to shelter so many Muslims 🤔 maybe because the US and Israel have corrupted, overthrown, and destroyed many of their original counties. Iran needed to be dealt with? How delusional are you?
The US and Israel have not corrupted, overthrown their original countries, though I am sure it has been framed and can be perceived that way. What caused all this is England messing around in it on top of a centuries long Hatfield and McCoys feud between Muslims and Jews in that part of the world, where they both tell a good story. Read BOTH of the stories, not just this propaganda against Israel that you are all lapping up. I don't understand taking a side in this. Israel has a tiny spot over there but that's not ok with them, that particular spot matters to them both, and the Muslims want them OUT. And Israel defending herself is now "genocide" when Hamas behavior isn't? "Zionists" do not go all over the world, especially here, into Mosques and kill Muslims or Americans. They have a nightmare in Europe now.
You can be ignorant of history all you like. Doesn't change the fact that Israel is the aggressor and committed multiple acts of "terrorism" that mainstream media won't call out. Propaganda is Israels main tool and they have controlled the narrative for decades. The US and Israel are actively committing war crimes. Full stop.
You are ignorant of history, not me. Israel is NOT the aggressor. You can argue they over-reacted (though the US would do exactly that until the terrorists were wiped out if they were hanging in Mexico). If Israel commits "genocide," so did Hamas. And no thinking person should have a dog in that fight. You just lap up with leftist propaganda bullshit.
ps one of the first things even leftist professors do is make it clear Wikipedia is not a reliable source, and only a jumping off point for real research. Anyone can change Wikipedia and whoever runs it has left political bias as well. It is not reliable and it never was.
Please, apply that to Oct. 7th TOO. Ridiculous you don't. And stop reading leftist propaganda. This is all about an oppressor/oppressed narrative leftists are using for power. It doesn't resemble reality. There has been plenty of past wrongs and the Jews have had their share of it. I am an ex adjunct professor and I know what is being taught in our universities. It's about power and the leftists will come to regret it.
Make sure you tell everyone in your life you support killing innocent women and children. So they know where your morals lie. Just Google Israels history if you need to learn something. The largest terrorist groups in the world are the US and Israel. Have a nice day Zionist pig!
Leftists always insult people when they can't win an argument. Be sure you tell everyone in your life you support raping women and killing people and children like Hamas did. Incredible how you ignore that and the overall history. Try some critical thinking for a change and forget the insults. Zionist pig. How ridiculous you are. I am on nobody's side over there, but I see why Israel responded to Oct. 7th. Incredible you don't.
My greatgrandfather rode with Sherman in the 2nd volunteer Indiana cavalry. (He was 16, my father and his mother were both the youngest of very large families.) His issue, along with so many German refugees from the repression of 1849, was Free Soil. The Jeffersonian ideal of a yeomanry of small landholders is inconsistent with protoindustrial plantation economy dependent on slave labor. That was the Republican goal, not abolition per se.
John Adams words which he was know to repeat constantly, but slavery mattered to nobody, just money? If he equivocated at ALL it was to get the south on board the constitution. They knew the south would not join if the constitution prohibited slavery. Ridiculous to think it was only one issue. Why can't it be more than one?
"I have, through my whole life, held the practice of slavery in such abhorrence, that I have never owned a negro or any other slave, though I have lived for many years in times, when the practice was not disgraceful, when the best men in my vicinity thought it not inconsistent with their character, and when it has cost me thousands of dollars for the labor and subsistence of free men, which I might have saved by the purchase of negroes at times when they were very cheap."
Oh bologna. I did not say that wasn't part or even the main goal, I said it was economic certainly; what I SAID if you read it is that our forefathers did care about slavery, and not just John Adams. It MATTERED, too. Adams was the most outspoken, but they easily could have reinforced slavery and discrimination in the constitution and they did not. It was worded in a way to get the south to go along with the intention of getting rid of it. If you read Adams' history, you'd know that. So don't tell me there was only one goal. That's just not true. And it wasn't just an excuse. It mattered. I get sick of people saying there were NO moral or ethical goals in the civil war. There were a lot of issues.
It is often difficult to untangle moral goals from self interest.
Your larger point that the compromise that Adams made with his southern peers was unstable is indisputable. (No doubt he was uncomfortable with it the contradiction and could foresee bad mojo in the future.)
When the soil of the original southern states was exhausted by intensive commodity plantation agriculture and Alabama, Mississippi and points west became available to expand into (in those days before petroleum based fertilizers) the operators came to resemble slash and burn farming, dependent on the availability of virgin lands for future expansion.
There was certainly a powerful abolitionist movement, but, the settlers on the frontier provided crucial manpower to the Union cause. They were abolitionist in sentiment, but Unionist in their motivation to fight to secure their own ability to own land among other free smallholders without a plantation aristocracy to rule over them.
(One could even argue that some roots lie in the English Civil War - the South was ruled by Royalist Cavaliers and the North by Parliamentary Roundheads. The story has many strands ... )
Ok, sure! There was a lot that drove that war. And Matt's interviewee seems to think it was only economic. (These DEI people have devoted great energy to ignoring the good things our forefathers did and denigrating their long-term intentions. They couldn't have gotten the south on board without some short-term compromises --and it annoys me the left does this). You can clearly see what they intended down the road by the wording of the constitution. (The south just didn't think black people were "men created equal" -- and that's how Adams and Jefferson tricked them, ha). It certainly was economic, but not exclusively by any means. Your last sentence was my problem. :) Otherwise good points.
I also think Lincoln wanted to preserve the union as much as he wanted to free slaves. It certainly was economic just in that way alone. But not exclusively.
I read the piece and come away with scratching my head about a lot of loose ends
Obviously, the Civil War assertion is ridiculous. This sounds to me like someone formed a thesis and then went out looking for facts to support them rather than the other way around
The other part that had me wondering was the reference to Dmitry Simes and the shutdown of Russian TV. Depending on what source you look at, Simes is either a KGB agent who deeply infiltrated the Reagan administration and the republican party in general or visionary. I am still not sure just what "As for cutting off access to Russian television, I can only say that this is how it always happens when you lose in direct information confrontation" refers to.
So, to me it was kind of a circuitous chat with no real conclusion. Anyone else get that impression ?
One of the laws of the universe is that energy is everything and everything is energy. So, it will always be connected to $$ and hey, who doesn’t buy energy stocks?
Since human nature is self-serving, instinctually, it will always influence government to serve the man, not the “higher good,” so it would make sense to get rid of government since it will become corrupt. The bigger the government the more corrupt it will become.
But, since human nature is self-serving, how do we live in a civilized society without some form of government?
If the solution is to truly limit government, wasn’t that the idea of our original constitution, the Articles of the Confederation?
Maybe we got it right the first time around (first instincts), and after the revolutionary war exposed its problems, it just needed to be amended to address those problems that are basically moot today.
If the decision is to get rid of government there will be a need to allocate work and the products of work. At great sacrifice I offer myself for the role. I promise to be fair in all decisions. I will, however, require a guarded compound to insulate my decisionmaking from any who might take exception. I'll also need a nice plane.
"The bulk of America’s oil-producing regions were located in the South, which presented a considerable problem for the Union, which was heavily invested in the nascent new business empire led by Rockefeller."
Huh? At the time of the Civil War Western Pennsylvania was the only significant oil-producing region in the US. And even that only started in 1859. Sloppy language at best!
That apparently was Krutakov, the hero of Matt Taibbi's Substack piece here.
Seems like Hero of Russia™ Krutakov has had his brain infected by the Soviets back in the day and now by, well, who knows. This is a conclusion looking for evidence. Really an embarrassing error. A good editor would have spiked that - and perhaps with that other folly in this tale as well.
Speaking of editors, whatever happened to Emily Kopp? Not that she has editorial talent, but just asking ...
Lost me when he stated that average driving for a month is 1000 km and average consumption is 10 liters per kilometer .
I noticed that too, but suspect it was a language translation error. He probably meant 10 km per liter is a bit over 23.5 mpg, which makes sense.
13,500 miles a year is what the average American drives, give or take. So it's even more than he estimated, but maybe he's using data from other countries.
I thought he was referring to Russia.
Source?
So, our current war with Iran has to do with oil. Saudi Arabia has oil, nobody is trying to take theirs. israel pounding the shit out of Iran is because they want their oil? The exporting of terrorism by tribal fundamentalists has nothing to do with it? The only thing that oil has to do with this conflict is that it is being used to fund a bunch of fucking fucks terrorists. All credit to Lewis Black for the term, “Fucking fucks”, his term for the 9/11 terrorists.
When Krutatov referred to the Russian invasion of Ukraine as a “Special Military Operation”, I began to wonder. And when he justified the invasion, comparing it to the Cuban Missile Crisis …
Does Krutatov live in Putin’s Russia?
N.B.: Trying to mollify Putin (probably a mistake), the Ukrainians voted not to seek NATO membership. Putin responded by seizing Crimea and invading Eastern Ukraine. Of course it’s ridiculous to claim that the distant prospect of NATO membership is the equivalent of fully deployed nuclear weapons (which, by the way, Ukraine voluntarily gave up 30 years ago).
Um, you have it backwards. Ask Dr. Google: "ukrainian constitution nato" (w/o quotes) and her AI will tell you this:
"In February 2019, Ukraine amended its constitution to formally commit to securing full membership in NATO and the European Union. This legislation mandates that the President, Parliament, and government ensure this strategic course, designating the president as the guarantor of Euro-Atlantic integration."
Putin annexed Crimea (and began invading Eastern Ukraine) in 2014, not 2019.
So what you’re saying is, Ukraine finally, reluctantly changed its constitution to apply for NATO membership after Russia had been occupying Crimea for _five years_.
Since you want to go back a bit further, Putin told Ambassador William Burns (See the famous NYET MEANS NYET memo he wrote Condi Rice in 2008) that Ukraine would not be permitted to join NATO shortly before the Bush 41 regime strong-armed NATO into offering admission. In the memo Burns made it clear this was a consensus position in Moscow.
Then in 2014 the US instigated the overthrow of a democratically elected government because it was about to sign a treaty with Russia that offered more favorable financial terms than the US would. The US then installed its government of choice (see the transcript of Victoria Nuland's leaked "Fuck the EU" phone call - https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26079957).
NATO's claims about being defensive sound great but then try to find a military alliance that claims otherwise.
As to why Russia might be unwilling to let the US into Ukraine, consider the American reaction to defensive nuclear missiles being placed in Cuba, remembering the US was planning on another invasion after the Bay of Pigs fiasco. In blockading the island the Kennedy regime was willing by JFK's estimate to risk a 1/3 chance of all-out nuclear war.
It always cracks me up when Russian apologists rant on about that diabolical manipulator, Reverend Mother Gaius Victoria Nuland. And the clueless CIA which takes credit after the fact for things that it didn’t even know were going on. Gotta keep those Congressional appropriations coming!
For a more moderate view, here’s that BBC article that you yourself linked above:
“The US is clearly much more involved in trying to broker a deal in Ukraine than it publicly lets on. … Though given some of the comments from Vladimir Putin's adviser on Ukraine Sergei Glazyev … you don't need your own listening station to be clear about Russia's intentions. Russia he said ‘must interfere in Ukraine’ and the authorities there should use force against the demonstrators.”
Wikipedia gives us a nice chronology of “Ukraine-NATO relations”:
“At the 2008 Bucharest summit, NATO declined to offer Ukraine a Membership Action Plan … In 2010 … the Ukrainian parliament voted to abandon the goal of NATO membership … In the February 2014 Ukrainian Revolution, Ukraine's parliament voted to remove Yanukovych, but the new government did not seek to change its neutral status. … Russia then occupied and annexed Crimea, and in August 2014 Russia's military invaded eastern Ukraine …Because of this, in December 2014 Ukraine's parliament voted to seek NATO membership …”
The Ukrainians thought they could keep Putin happy by refusing NATO membership. But for him the real issue was never NATO membership, but that Ukrainian independence must be destroyed. A democratic Ukraine might give the Russian people ideas!
That Yanukovych was a traitor and Russian puppet is made obvious from the very different results of the 2014 and 2022 invasions. In 2014 Ukraine was helpless to resist, after Yanukovych gutted its military. But then two democratically elected patriot presidents — Poroshenko and Zelensky — spent the next eight years rebuilding that military, and in the end revealed to the world Putin’s delusions about Ukraine.
BTW, trying to compare the Russian invasion to the Cuban Missile Crisis becomes even more laughable when we remember that Ukraine originally had nuclear weapons, but voluntarily handed them over to Russia 30 years ago.
And why exactly should some tybla have any say about another country joining whatever they want?
Besides, repeating Poopin's talking points that even in Russia are only believed by drunks passed out in their on piss is not a good look.
Again, It is my understanding NATO is exclusively defense. I am wrong?
Exactly. Putin doesn’t want neighboring countries to join because invading a NATO member is riskier and more complicated.
Yes -- you are wrong. No NATO nation was attacked by remnant Yugoslavia.
NATO involved themselves in internal conflict of a non-member nation in order to pry Kosovo from Yugoslavia. They even updated their mission statement, which had stated they were a defensive alliance, to do so.
NATO got involved only because Russia and China vetoed any UN action to stop the atrocities being carried out against the people of Kosovo.
If you think about it, NATO didn’t much care who ran Kosovo, so:long as the mass murders stopped.
Interesting comments. It shows that issues are complicated.
There were attacks flowing both ways. We had the KLA on the list of terror organizations, but conveniently took them off when we decided to intervene, taking their side in hostilities.
But the bottom line is the only international recourse for intervening in the internal affairs of another nation is via the UNSC.
This moved NATO into a new role, that was highly subjective. We had no more right to adjudicate it than would China and Russia.
Imagine, for example, if China and Russia decided to create a security structure that includes Iran and attack Israel to force a two state solution and "save" the people of Gaza.
It is a very similar situation. Kosovo conducted terrorist attacks, and the Serbian authorities went with an overwhelming response to neutralize the independence movement.
The Russians used exactly our NATO precedent to set the UN aside and defend the Russian minority in the breakaway provinces of Ukraine.
Also, I doubt NATO cared that much about the Kosovars themselves -- but we are both doing mind reading here as to their dominant motivations. At the time, they were seeking a justifiable reason to still exist as there were calls by many to disband it. Much of this was to preserve and grow the organization, which had outlived its original purpose as a counterweight on a then friendly Russia.
One can see evidence in the fact that we added one of our largest millitary bases in the world on their territory. NATO benefited significantly themselves.
Specifically, NATO presense in Sevastopol.
Encouraging Maidan did not advance US interests.
No it didn't. But Hillary and Obama thought it would. Apparently T and his advisors like Rubio think this latest adventure somehow advances US interests. The US seems to have remarkably shortsighted politicians.
Don’t they know, to get from Iran to the U.S., it takes months by sailing ship!
Keep digging and find what's in it for each of the opportunists! Capitalism thrives on Perma War E-CON. US industry's sole bright spot has been flooding the world with US-made & contracted off-shore weapons & ammo! It's the Major Barbara Shavian Solution to calls for controlling and prosecuting Institutional Corruption!
https://www.jns.org/israel-news/us-tops-global-arms-exports-israel-ranks-eighth
https://worldostats.com/country-stats/arms-exports-by-country/
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-56397601 (2021)
https://www.timesofisrael.com/amid-arms-embargo-calls-data-shows-99-of-israeli-weapon-imports-are-from-us-germany/
https://www.dw.com/en/us-increases-dominance-as-worlds-biggest-arms-exporter/a-71860617
Tio Mitchito
TM
Building democracy and human rights in Ukraine complicated Putin’s plans for reconstituting/reconquering the USSR. Obedient satellite Ukraine would have been a platform for the next invasion (probably the Baltics) — just as obedient satellite Belarus served as a platform for the Russian blitzkrieg on Ukraine.
What “NATO presence in Sevastopol”? Not sure what you mean to refer to.
"Building democracy and human rights in Ukraine" = rehabilitating Petlyura and Bandera? Those are warm and fuzzy words that the dysfunctional Ukrainian government was never able to deliver, whether ruled by Orange or Blue. It was always a game of musical chairs in which each party's oligarch patrons took possession of state owned enterprises until the next change. It was an uneasy equilibrium between the Ukrainian speaking west and the Russian speaking east, the leadership of both parties taking their turn at the trough. Corruption was the glue holding the country together.
(The outrage against Tymoshenko was that she was the only one prosecuted. Even Yushchenko supported the prosecution. She struck a heroic figure during the Orange Revolution with her glorious braids, but proved to be the same corrupt tribe. )
I remember the freak out when US Marines practiced beach landings in Crimea during Kuchma's presidency. When the Maidan forced Yanukovych to flee the US was widely viewed as the puppet master, fairly or not. The prominent presence of black and red OUN flags felt threatening to many.
The very notion of the new government of Ukraine, with overt EU membership ambitions, giving NATO forces access to Sevastopol was not entirely out of the question. It was definitely prominent in Russian paranoia and seemed a very real possibility at the time.
Have you ever been to Sevastopol? Lovely town, very clean and pleasant for a Soviet city. Although the Ukrainian and Russian fleets shared the harbor facilities, it is a thoroughly Russian city. Riding the bus from Simferopol to Sevastopol I recall seeing two wedding parties on the same day at shrines to WW II battles. The Panorama on top of the hill in the city is a temple to Russian nationalism, celebrating victory (survival) in the Crimean War and the two bloody sieges by the Nazis. In Soviet/Russian mythology, Sevastopol is the "Hero City."
When the new government was installed in Kyiv the "little green men" occupied Crimea with ridiculous ease because the ethnic Russian majority welcomed them. (The Tatars not so much ... )
It seems to me that Volodya deceived himself with that easy victory and started fucking up with his move into Donbas.
My point is that the adversary's perspective must be understood. Slogans are no substitute for analysis.
Just before the 2022 Russian invasion, international corruption watchdogs rated Ukraine much less corrupt than Russia (in spite of Russia’s efforts to corrupt it).
Arguably, the failure of the Russian blitzkrieg corroborates that: Russian troops were poorly trained and poorly equipped because so much of the training and equipment money had been embezzled.
Meanwhile, the Ukrainians were standing ready with the Javelin anti-tank missiles that Trump, breaking with Obama’s “blankets and MREs” policy, had let them have.
While Crimea, like the rest of Ukraine, had voted for independence from Russia when the USSR broke up, the vote was much closer there, so it’s conceivable that given a do-over they would have voted differently in 2014. However, Putin has never allowed a fair referendum. Certainly the original inhabitants, the Crimean Tatars, prefer Ukrainian to Russian rule.
Given that most of Bandera's alleged misdeed were NKVD psy-ops, and with Putin's Russia successfully rehabilitating far more odious personages (like Uncle Joe), "rehabilitating" Bandera is hardly something to be bent out of shape about...
Putin believes Ukraine IS Russia.
Or rather, that’s what Putin says now.
Tucker Carlson’s interview of Putin was mostly softball questions; but there was one exception: If it’s so obvious Ukraine is really a runaway province of Russia, Tucker asked, why did it take Putin 20 years to get around to making that argument?
It is very similar to the Cuban Missile Crisis.
We'd never allow Mexico to enter a Chinese millitary alliance. We'd take that as a major threat.
See the Wikipedia article on “Ukraine-NATO relations” (which I discuss in more detail above).
To keep Putin happy, the Ukrainians had agreed not to seek NATO membership but, in 2014, Putin invaded Crimea and Eastern Ukraine anyway.
In other words, Putin didn’t attack because Ukraine applied to (someday) join NATO. Ukraine applied to join NATO because Putin attacked.
Of course, what makes the comparison to the Cuban Missile Crisis even more absurd is that Ukraine originally had nuclear weapons but voluntarily handed them over 30 years ago — to Russia!
It was a preventive action. The Ukrainian Revolution flipped Ukraine into a Western aligned nation. Furthermore, NATO refused to take NATO membership off the table for Ukraine, and Crimea was pivotal to Russian security.
Important to keep in mind that NATO helps modernize Ukraine’s military, and they'd already worked together on joint missions, and Russia had long been watching the slow creeping threat of NATO enlargement.
Even the words of their Acting Foreign Minister, hinted that the Ukrainian parliament may seek to join NATO in the future -- they didn't rule it out:
"We are considering all options regarding the strengthening of our security and collective security. But we must stick to the existing legislation of Ukraine,...But the issue whether to change this legislation depends on the Ukrainian parliament. The program of the new Ukrainian government does not contain the intention of becoming a member of NATO"
04/02/26: Apparently, she's on a long lunch hour with Judge Crater.
04/02/26: This is what happens when you believe what you read on Wikipedia, or just mentally sleep-walk / regurgitate AI slop ("Black Nazis" Google):
"The bulk of America’s oil-producing regions were located in the South,"
Patently absurd. Sublimely stupid. A riot of radical rubbish.
Suddenly hit me: This whole interview is an April Fools joke — Matt, you really got us!
04/02/26: If so, how humiliating,. I'm going home to Mother.
04/02/26: No, actually, the statement is factually correct. Once both sides realized what was happening, in 1863, President Abrahambone Lincoln Nebraska issued his famous “Oil Emancipation Proctologist Enunciation” edict.
This put the American Civil War on hold for a decade so that both sides could pump the oil needed to fight with weapons yet to be invented (and also, to bail out Matt’s statement that “The bulk of America’s oil-producing regions were located in the South…”).
They resumed fighting in 1873. The North was now armed with “Sherman tanks,” presciently named after a Northern general not yet famous (actually, unknown to anyone other than the West Point plebes Eisenhower and Patton).
Little Known Fact: Winner of 163 Purple Hearts was the original “Hellfire Hegseth,” who made his business to fight for both the North and the South and the East and the West. His post-Gettysburg campaign in Greenland created a diplomatic crisis in Denmark, a country that had yet to acquire the country now coveted by the Iranians.
Yes, what he said…
I'm from Pennsylvania, so I also took issue with that. I was once in Oil City.
04/02/26: So was Olive Oyl.
LOL
I was there twice ...
I was there back in 1994 to interview for a reporting job with the Derrick, which I just found out is going to be shut down soon.
Good thing they didn't hire me.
Coal, big time.
His baseline acceptance of the notion of "fossil fuel" is what has me looking askance 😁
Are you under the impression that we're making more oil
No. You can answer all your own questions by using search engines in a persistent manner to find highly suppressed scientific work.
I don't have any questions except about how your diseased mind works.
Ok, boomer👌🏻
"Sloppy language"? This clown Kutakov has no business saying anything about the causes of the American Civil War, about which he clearly knows nothing.
Probably so. I was trying to give maximum benefit of the doubt. Perhaps he meant "suspected potential oil-producing regions." But even that is highly suspect.
Did we give up when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor??
Yea, the oil industry was brand new at the time. He probably projected backwards, assuming that the oil dominant regions remained the same.
Rockefeller didn't even enter the oil business until 1863 when he and a partner established a small refinery.
Yes, that is incorrect. At the time of the Civil War, it was in eastern Ohio and western Pennsylvania; he got his US geography mixed.
Otherwise, an accurate appraisal, particularly about how culture and life-style is intimately connected to oil (and gas).
The Spindletop discovery in Texas wasn't until 1901! Hardly a driver of the Civil War 🙄
Absolutely and England was building Iron Clad warships for the Confederacy to break the Union port blockades so the cotton from the South could continue to flow to England and France and English coal was what the Confederacy desperately needed
Where does one purchase this book? And is there an English-language edition?
My dear, you have your carbon chains mixed up. Kerosene and paraffin and lighter oil were vital to the British industrialization machine. The Americas have light oil. We add heavy oil to produce products above Kerosene.
Moreover, factories in the industial portions of Great Britain could stay open 24 hours per day now, because of vast artifical light, e.g., exploiting the southern states, their mines (fuel can be made from coal), and their slaves.
We had Kerosene, coal and cotton. Vital commodities industrialization.
I think you meant to respond to a different comment, mine was not about these things
Kerosene can be made from coal. What did the South have? I think this process was developed in 1946?
Civil war started in 1861. Standard oil’s precursor started in 1863. Kerosene was introduce in the 1860s. When you get small obvious facts wrong it call into question entire narratives
Krutakov broke rule #1 of historical revisionism: “Never go full-1619 Project.”
I saw that, too
Prior to the 1850s development of kerosene, people used whale blubber as oil for lamps.
Much of this is recorded in the children's books by Laura Ingalls Wilder. When they ran out of kerosene during the long winter, their parents used animal fat and paraffin to create a button lamp until the train came through the snow in spring. I am going off memory now, but I am sure you can google it.
Actually Kerosene was developed in the 1850s.
Haven’t read the book but the first oil well in the south was in Texas in 1866. It was only discovered in Pennsylvania in late 1850’s so if the claim is made that the civil war was related to oil, this is foolish
I'm from Pennsylvania, and I was in Oil City once, so I had a problem with that too.
04/02/26: No, actually, the statement is factually correct. Once both sides realized what was happening, in 1863, President Abrahambone Lincoln Nebraska issued his famous “Oil Emancipation Proctologist Enunciation” edict.
This put the American Civil War on hold for a decade so that both sides could pump the oil needed to fight with weapons yet to be invented (and also, to bail out Matt’s statement that “The bulk of America’s oil-producing regions were located in the South…”).
They resumed fighting in 1873. The North was now armed with “Sherman tanks,” presciently named after a Northern general not yet famous (actually, unknown to anyone other than the West Point plebes Eisenhower and Patton).
Little Known Fact: Winner of 163 Purple Hearts was the original “Hellfire Hegseth,” who made his business to fight for both the North and the South and the East and the West. His post-Gettysburg campaign in Greenland created a diplomatic crisis in Denmark, a country that had yet to acquire the country now coveted by the Iranians.
😂
Finally, a true history lesson. Bravo!
04/02/26: Thank you. Look up Will Cuppy (real name), American humorist. When I finished the above, I realized that W.C. is still with us (!).
Right it was coal which England supplied along with Iron Clad ships for the Confederacy to use breaking the Unions blockade of Southern Ports
Alabama, Kentucky and Tennessee had coal too.
I am arguing that the object of the British supplying the Confederacy was not just to have control over those southern states if the Confederacy won, but Britain would control the Union too and the USA would be right back to 1775, a vassel of the British and the City of London.
The Civil War was a proxy war with the British using Americans as fodder (sound familiar?), but no one talks about that, and to some extent the French against the British too, in the War of 1812, only on American soil.
Some have argued Iran and Palestine are still vassels of the City of London (financially/MI6), and that what the USA and Israel are currently involved in is a proxy war to disrupt City of London financially and supply chain control.
I am not saying I believe that, but it has been classically the London MO since the 1600s.
Wrong carbon chain. You what you want to focus on Kerosene. Coal can make Kerosene (1849). Which states have coal, cotton, and Kerosene? What fueled the British industrialization? Coal, cotton, Kerosene, and slavery. Who supplied the Confederacy to fight the Union?
I believe his claim involved Rockefeller. He was only involved in oil. Pennsylvania and West Virginia were union states and PA was the main source of coal at the time. Specifically anthracite from Eastern PA
Right, see my reply to RN retired, and it was NOT the English. It was the City of London financial machine and the British Empire. As far as I am concerned, the English and Celtic people are separate from the financial-ists. The English and Celts were fodder for the wars and factories.
Perhaps even an extension of the Roman Empire form of control?
Just ideas floating around in my head from reading English fiction, and frankly not nearly enough for my satisfaction. 😉
Wrong carbon chain.
Probably a hundred readers will point this out but 10 liters per kilometer is 0.2 miles per gallon.
Another howler of an error. He means 10 liters per 100km. Liters per 100km is the standard measure of fuel consumption outside of the U.S.
Needs better editing. Did Matt’s staff leave?
Is that what those big dually trucks get?
Have to love when someone from another country attempts to rewrite the history of the U.S. when it was clear from Lincoln’s own writings why the civil war happened. Matt going to what he loves most and it’s Russia. The worst is he actually believes what that guy was saying. Getting to the point of just dropping Racket News. Matt, you made a choice and you chose wrong. I’d pivot back is you could but you allowed your new editor to publicly slander Walter as you stood by her. You really screwed the pooch on that one. Attempting to promote some Russian hack as a some US history authoritarian is a joke.
I read your comment and I started to ask what the heck you were talking about. Thinking I should first RTFM (anyone else old enough to remember that?), I went to Grok. Holy cow! There is a lot more to this story than I realized.
I don’t know what Grok told you as I’ve never used it but I follow Walter on Substack and he posted what she was claiming about his movie. Walter is an American treasure an should be revered more then to have some half twit try and damage his career. I also subscribe to his county highway newspaper which is a joy
Grok told me that (which I'd not heard before) and a good summary of the timeline of everything. I was oblivious to pretty much all of it other than what was disclosed here at the time of the ATW breakup.
I’m surprised that it had it. Like I said I don’t use any of them.
Than. Half wit.
"That's not true, a politician said otherwise" is a very American and very stupid argument
This whole thing seems to be unraveling. Very disappointing…….. I truly admire Matt and admired Walter. Hope this mess can be salvaged.
It’s fascinating how often people like Krutakov with a good handle on social reality and a sophisticated understanding of political economy are ignored in favor of simple-mindedness and wish casting from our “leaders”: Vietnam is like the Alamo (LBJ); we’ll bring democracy to Libya (BHO & HRC); we’ll liberate Iraq (GWB); we’ll take Ukraine to victory over Putin (JRB ).And it’s even more fascinating how many highly credentialed pundits and journalists traffic in the same simple-minded “analyses.” Thanks Matt, for introducing a little depth to the national conversation.
"Knutson"
You mean "Krutakov,"?
Thx. Corrected it. Curse autocorrect!
"There are parts of the book that will cause an American reader to raise an eyebrow, like the assertion that the American Civil War “wasn’t fought over human rights or a struggle over slavery . . . ."
That war (which wasn't a "civil war" but was simply named such by the victors) was about preserving the union --not about eliminating slavery. Lincoln said so himself, repeatedly. He didn't give a damn about the slaves (and said that repeatedly as well). The author of this piece would do well to learn his history.
False. The immediate cause of the Civil War was the South Carolinians' attack on Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor. Lincoln used that attack to launch the war as an act of national self-defense, much the way a border skirmish on the Texas-Mexico border had been used as an excuse to start the Mexican War in 1846. But the underlying cause (without which, there would have been no showdown at Ft Sumter) was over slavery, and in particular, its extension into the western territories, to which Lincoln was utterly opposed. It was Lincoln's uncompromising opposition to any further addition of slave states into the Union that had prompted the South (starting with South Carolina) to secede. In short, the Civil War began as a war over slavery disguised as a war to save the Union. After the Emancipation Proclamation in Sept 1862, it officially became a war both to save the Union and to end slavery. Any questions?
Show me the quotes where Lincoln said he "didn't give a damn about the slaves" and I will explain how you have mis-contextualized/misconstrued his words.
Do you not know that the North still had slaves after the civil war or do you know that and just choose not to think about it
I know more about before, during, and after the Civil War than you ever thought about knowing. Clown.
Yeah it sounds like it. You don't sound like an ignorant imbecile at all. Not at all, not even a little bit.
If you want help, start by reading my comment and trying to respond to it. You can start now.
You are correct.
10 liters per kilometer driven? That is roughly 2 1/2 gallons per mile. Really?
That's actually worse than what my boat gets -- w/ twin 8.1 l engines
"The bulk of America’s oil-producing regions were located in the South, which presented a considerable problem for the Union, which was heavily invested in the nascent new business empire led by Rockefeller. " I don't understand this comment. Spindletop was only in 1901. Until then virtually all oil production was in Pennsylvania with a small amount in adjacent states and literally zero in the Confederate states.
He screwed up.
Where can one find a copy of the book in English?
I just asked that myself.
In which language?
I want one in English. The only edition I found online is in Russian.
"with an average consumption of 10 liters per kilometer." I'm not a metric native but that seems very wrong.
Well, interesting article. Not sure the guy is completely accurate. I HAVE come to see Trump's geopolitical agenda in a much bigger way than I first did. It IS about energy and about stopping China and Russia from strategically controlling it. Trump is consistent that this is all America First (which I and he think will ultimately benefit the world--we don't want China or Russia's to run the world--at least we have more democratic ideas). Iran needed to be dealt with and it seems even other Arab countries see that more than Europe does. I heard someone say last night something I hadn't thought of: Europe has migrated in so many Muslims they are afraid of what they will do within their own countries if they get involved. Probably truth there.
As for the civil war, yes it was partly economic but it was not ALL economic. Every day he stood on the senate floor my cousin ancestor, John Adams railed about the evils of slavery--he owned none and paid everyone who worked for him, including black people all his life -- and the constitution was written with abolishing it in mind, clearly. To say it was not part of the equation does America a disservice.
Hmm why would Europe need to shelter so many Muslims 🤔 maybe because the US and Israel have corrupted, overthrown, and destroyed many of their original counties. Iran needed to be dealt with? How delusional are you?
YOU are delusional. Europe is sorry they ruined their sovereignty. It's a mess there.
Oh the sovereignty that you refuse to grant Iran huh? Guess it's only good for the goose no the gander. Go drink some bleach you warmonger.
Why do you launch off into a pissing contest? And I was beginning to enjoy some of your points……. But, you gotta go off on some mission.
Iran with ICBM’s and a medieval religion maybe?
Wow.
The US and Israel have not corrupted, overthrown their original countries, though I am sure it has been framed and can be perceived that way. What caused all this is England messing around in it on top of a centuries long Hatfield and McCoys feud between Muslims and Jews in that part of the world, where they both tell a good story. Read BOTH of the stories, not just this propaganda against Israel that you are all lapping up. I don't understand taking a side in this. Israel has a tiny spot over there but that's not ok with them, that particular spot matters to them both, and the Muslims want them OUT. And Israel defending herself is now "genocide" when Hamas behavior isn't? "Zionists" do not go all over the world, especially here, into Mosques and kill Muslims or Americans. They have a nightmare in Europe now.
You can be ignorant of history all you like. Doesn't change the fact that Israel is the aggressor and committed multiple acts of "terrorism" that mainstream media won't call out. Propaganda is Israels main tool and they have controlled the narrative for decades. The US and Israel are actively committing war crimes. Full stop.
You are ignorant of history, not me. Israel is NOT the aggressor. You can argue they over-reacted (though the US would do exactly that until the terrorists were wiped out if they were hanging in Mexico). If Israel commits "genocide," so did Hamas. And no thinking person should have a dog in that fight. You just lap up with leftist propaganda bullshit.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_war_crimes
ps one of the first things even leftist professors do is make it clear Wikipedia is not a reliable source, and only a jumping off point for real research. Anyone can change Wikipedia and whoever runs it has left political bias as well. It is not reliable and it never was.
Please, apply that to Oct. 7th TOO. Ridiculous you don't. And stop reading leftist propaganda. This is all about an oppressor/oppressed narrative leftists are using for power. It doesn't resemble reality. There has been plenty of past wrongs and the Jews have had their share of it. I am an ex adjunct professor and I know what is being taught in our universities. It's about power and the leftists will come to regret it.
Make sure you tell everyone in your life you support killing innocent women and children. So they know where your morals lie. Just Google Israels history if you need to learn something. The largest terrorist groups in the world are the US and Israel. Have a nice day Zionist pig!
Leftists always insult people when they can't win an argument. Be sure you tell everyone in your life you support raping women and killing people and children like Hamas did. Incredible how you ignore that and the overall history. Try some critical thinking for a change and forget the insults. Zionist pig. How ridiculous you are. I am on nobody's side over there, but I see why Israel responded to Oct. 7th. Incredible you don't.
My greatgrandfather rode with Sherman in the 2nd volunteer Indiana cavalry. (He was 16, my father and his mother were both the youngest of very large families.) His issue, along with so many German refugees from the repression of 1849, was Free Soil. The Jeffersonian ideal of a yeomanry of small landholders is inconsistent with protoindustrial plantation economy dependent on slave labor. That was the Republican goal, not abolition per se.
John Adams words which he was know to repeat constantly, but slavery mattered to nobody, just money? If he equivocated at ALL it was to get the south on board the constitution. They knew the south would not join if the constitution prohibited slavery. Ridiculous to think it was only one issue. Why can't it be more than one?
"I have, through my whole life, held the practice of slavery in such abhorrence, that I have never owned a negro or any other slave, though I have lived for many years in times, when the practice was not disgraceful, when the best men in my vicinity thought it not inconsistent with their character, and when it has cost me thousands of dollars for the labor and subsistence of free men, which I might have saved by the purchase of negroes at times when they were very cheap."
John Adams
Oh bologna. I did not say that wasn't part or even the main goal, I said it was economic certainly; what I SAID if you read it is that our forefathers did care about slavery, and not just John Adams. It MATTERED, too. Adams was the most outspoken, but they easily could have reinforced slavery and discrimination in the constitution and they did not. It was worded in a way to get the south to go along with the intention of getting rid of it. If you read Adams' history, you'd know that. So don't tell me there was only one goal. That's just not true. And it wasn't just an excuse. It mattered. I get sick of people saying there were NO moral or ethical goals in the civil war. There were a lot of issues.
I'm sorry. I wasn't questioning your point. I was adding another perspective.
I said NOTHING about the "main goal." I was telling the story of the enormous midwestern German contingent that contributed to the Union victory.
Please do try to read a little more closely.
Oh, I'm sorry. It sounded like you were saying there was only ONE goal and it was economic.
But actually you DID claim the Republican's main goal" was economic, that was the R epublican goal, not abolition "per se."
It sounds like that is the main and/or only goal, the way that is worded.
I was unclear.
It is often difficult to untangle moral goals from self interest.
Your larger point that the compromise that Adams made with his southern peers was unstable is indisputable. (No doubt he was uncomfortable with it the contradiction and could foresee bad mojo in the future.)
When the soil of the original southern states was exhausted by intensive commodity plantation agriculture and Alabama, Mississippi and points west became available to expand into (in those days before petroleum based fertilizers) the operators came to resemble slash and burn farming, dependent on the availability of virgin lands for future expansion.
There was certainly a powerful abolitionist movement, but, the settlers on the frontier provided crucial manpower to the Union cause. They were abolitionist in sentiment, but Unionist in their motivation to fight to secure their own ability to own land among other free smallholders without a plantation aristocracy to rule over them.
(One could even argue that some roots lie in the English Civil War - the South was ruled by Royalist Cavaliers and the North by Parliamentary Roundheads. The story has many strands ... )
Ok, sure! There was a lot that drove that war. And Matt's interviewee seems to think it was only economic. (These DEI people have devoted great energy to ignoring the good things our forefathers did and denigrating their long-term intentions. They couldn't have gotten the south on board without some short-term compromises --and it annoys me the left does this). You can clearly see what they intended down the road by the wording of the constitution. (The south just didn't think black people were "men created equal" -- and that's how Adams and Jefferson tricked them, ha). It certainly was economic, but not exclusively by any means. Your last sentence was my problem. :) Otherwise good points.
I also think Lincoln wanted to preserve the union as much as he wanted to free slaves. It certainly was economic just in that way alone. But not exclusively.
Bologna? I always thought it was called Baloney. Learn something new everyday
Pronounced by many baloney. Spelled bologna, originally anyway.
I read the piece and come away with scratching my head about a lot of loose ends
Obviously, the Civil War assertion is ridiculous. This sounds to me like someone formed a thesis and then went out looking for facts to support them rather than the other way around
The other part that had me wondering was the reference to Dmitry Simes and the shutdown of Russian TV. Depending on what source you look at, Simes is either a KGB agent who deeply infiltrated the Reagan administration and the republican party in general or visionary. I am still not sure just what "As for cutting off access to Russian television, I can only say that this is how it always happens when you lose in direct information confrontation" refers to.
So, to me it was kind of a circuitous chat with no real conclusion. Anyone else get that impression ?
How did you not understand any of that? It couldn't be more clear.
Well, explain to me what he meant? Was arresting Dmitry good or bad ? That certainly was not clear
10 liters of gasoline per Kilometer?
Maybe a Soviet tank gets an MPG of a 1/4 mile per gallon, but otherwise the math is way off
One of the laws of the universe is that energy is everything and everything is energy. So, it will always be connected to $$ and hey, who doesn’t buy energy stocks?
Since human nature is self-serving, instinctually, it will always influence government to serve the man, not the “higher good,” so it would make sense to get rid of government since it will become corrupt. The bigger the government the more corrupt it will become.
But, since human nature is self-serving, how do we live in a civilized society without some form of government?
If the solution is to truly limit government, wasn’t that the idea of our original constitution, the Articles of the Confederation?
Maybe we got it right the first time around (first instincts), and after the revolutionary war exposed its problems, it just needed to be amended to address those problems that are basically moot today.
If the decision is to get rid of government there will be a need to allocate work and the products of work. At great sacrifice I offer myself for the role. I promise to be fair in all decisions. I will, however, require a guarded compound to insulate my decisionmaking from any who might take exception. I'll also need a nice plane.
😆😝
I will offer my services as your Viceroy….
Liz, outstanding comment. Question: Why do you subscribe to the same Substacks as me? Are you surveilling me or are we just great minds in sync?
🤣🤣
🙏 - inquiring minds gotta know...what exactly?
Most intriguing remark: "Where is 'Rain Man'? Where is 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest'? Only lines and comics." Would like to hear more about that.