Let's not forget that Donbas is the home viblastь of the pro-Russia minigarchs who begged Putin to intervene in 2013-14 so that they would not lose their assets when Ukraine eventually joined the EU. That economic logic started this war, and its flaws are even more evident after 12 years of hell.

My Eurasianology is also getting fired back up with the Единороссы on their geoeconomic heels: eurasianology.substack.com

Midgie, It's logical that Mike Waltz has to go, not due to Signalgate, but as a military mind with a healthy skepticism of Putin's true ambitions. Replacing Waltz with Putin cheerleader Steve Witkoff will make ignoring the empty minerals deal ever more swift, and bowing to the Kremlin ever deeper.

Tough to see that both Dmitriev and Simonyan did their ACTR or FSA/FLEX time in the US in New Hampshire high schools. Maybe if they had been placed in VT or ME, they would have found more productive professions in their adult lives than shilling for a government that holds back Russia's future.

Hope his district doesn't come down on him for repping Vermont's own Cabot Creamery. But his voters should all be down with the old Russ Feingold-Jim Jeffords Northeast-Midwest Dairy Compact. It benefitted them as well. Habanero Cheddar!

Fertilizer exports via Black Sea also aren't a legitimate pillar of the ceasefire - they either go via the Baltic Sea or by rail to China. Every RUS request is just a front for some sanctions- or military-related reason.

Vance repeatedly proving himself a policy lightweight - he doesn't understand Ukraine, and then ferked up a key US-UKR meeting. He doesn't understand that EU trade flow price/volumes affect US trade flow price/volumes, then cites his own poor logic. He's a culture war VP who needs to know his role.

Don't go up to SIPA, Midgie, you may be ICE'd out of there (and the US) within minutes

As Trump moves slowly to appease Putin, he's going to find himself fully usurped out of the process by the EU, which is moving relatively much faster with its arms & personnel plans. Germany is finally using its organizational capacity to target its future low-cost product base, Ukraïna.