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Ukraine / Russia

Chip on my shoulder, please forgive me.

One thing that is interesting in the US vs many other countries is how we 100% fetishize service members. That doesn't happen in most of our peer countries.

I wore camo and carried a tan Kifaru backpack on a flight to Alaska last year and was stopped by no less than six women who tearfully thanked me for my service. It was weird and made me uncomfortable

One thing I'm pretty sure of after having been to 27 countries and seen, for only a small example, the (loosely translated) Museum of American Atrocities in Ho Chi Minh, we generally in the US get a very censored version of what our military is up to abroad. Go there and see all the napalm-warped infants and fetuses of people that in our circumstance we would consider doing their Red Dawn duty to protect their homeland.

Ever heard of No Gun Ri? Few people have ...top 2 atrocities, up there with My Lai in terms of worst tragedies that US forces have inflicted on civilians (excluding Native Americans...they were just butchered wholesale, and as a card carrying member I find it more than a little annoying that we don't count). Two Master's degrees and I had never heard of No Gun Ri.

I say all this for a simple reason: my wife is uber liberal, and she was giving me grief the other day about how the American Empire was doing its dirty deeds again in the Ukraine/Russia situation. I strongly countered it because I do think this nation has a lot of good in its DNA, a lot of ability to be the 'good guy' in the world...

But I also think most Americans have an extremely binary view that we are 100% black/white and good/bad. Say Abu Ghraib or Haditha and they bristle or much more likely, don't even recognize it. We've done a lot of good and a lot of bad. Let's not pretend we're blameless, but let's continue to move forward in supporting the things that are clearly good, like Ukraine, and condemning what is bad. Carry on but keep your eyes open.

I hear you,

But the reason why (I hope) that people thank service members in this country, is that that are volunteers that sign up for the sole purpose of serving their country. I'm sorry but that Private or PFC in the marines did not join because they are corrupt and want to take over the world. They want to better themselves somehow and/or serve their country. Some even do it because their forefathers did. Some even do it cause they feel called to serve.

We have no government expectation that you are required to serve in the military in order to live in this country. Therefore it is honorary to serve a country as a volunteer.

DO NOT blame those young officers and enlisted members for the choices made in congress. Congress members (at least as of late) are not the same as those of us who are buried in Arlington. Many of us had to fight in wars that in the end made no sense to the public sector. But we did so to the best of our ability's for each other. So we can come home.

Is there bad apples. Absolutely, just like in all walks of life. Do some of them move up the ranks and do awful things, Yup.

But keep in mind they signed a contract to serve and are required to execute every lawful order, regardless if they agree personally. Is it perfect, sure is not.

Fog of war is a real thing. If you have ever experienced it, you would know.

We can fix corruption at the ballot box. I hope we can eventually.
 
I wore camo and carried a tan Kifaru backpack on a flight to Alaska last year and was stopped by no less than six women who tearfully thanked me for my service. It was weird and made me uncomfortable
You rockstar, could have whipped out a sharpie and asked where they wanted a signature!
 
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So, honest question, when will the Europeans decide to frack their own natural gas?
Probably not in any relevant time frame

Poland does have some active wells and drilling, Conoco was there for a while and had issues
France: to my knowledge there has never been a test well.
UK: a company, Cuadrilla, did some drilling for a while, until fracking was banned.

Bottom-line energy security hasn't been a priority for Europe in recent years, or at least they made poor choices. Establishing a fracking program would be very expense if they had the right kind of rock, which we think exists but there haven't been enough wells to know for sure. Then there is the image of fracking in Europe. Last a lot of the big European companies for instance BP have huge establish US assets, so it makes more sense for them to just ship the gas.
 
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