Re: Ukraine
 

So your view is based upon? Daily Mail? Telegraph? Independent? Gurniad? Sun? The bloke next door? Tory dogma? A straw poll of 4 year olds?

Or maybe you have some wondrous insight that doesn't require input from other sources..oh wait..you already stated you have no first hand experience..so by definition you pretty much base your opinion on hearsay and input from other sources. (Mainstream Murdoch media Tory bias perhaps?)

How do you know that the websites that Margaret refers to have false and/or lazy reporting as opposed to the ones you get your information from having factual and/or industrious reporting? You give no evidence whatsoever.

I always thought that to win a debate you had to destroy a proposal by giving an argument to disprove it, not by saying 'ya boo sucks, I'm right and you're wrong cos I say so regardless of anything you say'

Margaret offers evidence..you offer a personal view without any basis at all......ain't that hard to spot the Tory!

Re: Ukraine
 

Where is your evidence for this supposition?

Lots of people of all political persuasions will make their own judgements on news stories.

Many people believe what they are told in the newspapers and other media sources because they have no reason not to believe what they are told(they haven't looked below the surface)......They do not have the level of cynicism or perhaps the life experience of some members.

That, however, doesn not necessarily mean that they are 'Tory' in their thinking.
You could level the same criticism against me, but you would be wrong...oh so wrong!

Re: Ukraine
 

I must have missed the post where Lucysgirl said she had first hand experience.

Where do you draw your opinions from Guinness?
Don't you read or listen to media news reports? If you do...then how much of them do you believe and what do you base your beliefs on?
I am not being 'fly' here. I would genuinely like to know your thought processes when making your opinions...and what influences them.

You could go to the Ukraine and still not be in possession of all of the facts...(or those that were relevant to the conflict anyway) and we all know that you can only make choices based on the information you have in front of you.

Re: Ukraine
 

You can choose to regard all news as propaganda.
Unless you witness an event you can never know enough to 'take sides'.

Re: Ukraine
 

Guinness...I think you may have misinterpreted Lucysgirl's post.

I don't think she was accusing the links that MargaretR gave of 'false and/or lazy reporting'
She was just making the point that she had not looked at all of the links(relating to the subject of false/lazy reporting) that MargaretR had supplied.

I'm sure if it is me who has misinterpreted this post, there will be someone out there who slaps my wrist and tells me to behave.:)

Re: Ukraine
 

Yes Margaret.....that is how I view the news. I also look for underlying motives as to why I am being asked to believe this.
As you might know I am quite cynical in some respects.
Belief systems grow with us as we grow, they should develop as we develop....they change as we change.
It only takes the sharp frost of political lies to wipe out what we have grown over a number of years...and there have been a very large number of political lies that have come under the spotlight in recent times.
Politicians only tell us what they think we want to hear. There role is not to make life better for us, but to make life better for themselves.

Re: Ukraine
 

And even when you are there, you can only ever witness one bit of the event...you can only ever see it from your own perspective...in effect, your own life experience will make you see it in your own way...it can be no other way.

Re: Ukraine
 

In an earlier life, when we had a 3 mile limit around the UK, my pals and I were frequent visitors to the east coast sands. The fish were plentiful then and amongst the local trawlers was one which scarcely moved. It was a very different looking Russian "trawler" which stood out due to its shape and antennae.

Re: Ukraine
 

I'm not wanting to "win a debate", especially in troubled times like this. I don't actually read any newspaper these days, especially since the corner newsagent closed down recently.

I haven't been following the events in the Baltic States, excepting to note that a once handsome politician was suddenly rushed to an out of state hospital and later emerged with a pock marked face looking twice his age.

The next instance to hit my consciousness was the blonde female parliamentarian who won power and was then imprisoned for some reason.

Then Crimea hit the headline news and when one views an atlas and realises the Russians need security for their shipping in the Sea of Azos there's no wonder Putin didn't want the Ukraine to take the Crimea with it into Europe.

During the Soviet union there has to have been movement of Russian naval dockyard men and their families across to the Crimea and the same applies to the Ukrainian eastern border where it's evident that Russians have crossed over and settled.

France, the UK and other western European countries have laid down policies that everyone in their countries have to speak the national language if they want any benefits, work, etc. ONE tipping point in the current situation seems to have been that the Ukraine Parliament had also tried to insist that the Ukrainian language be taught in schools as a FIRST language, which annoyed the Russian speaking inhabitants.

Now - go back to the Atlas and see how easy it would be for NATO to contain Russian war ships at the entry to the Black Sea if the Ukraine signed up to join us in the west.

Oh - and you can congratulate me as I've just become a great grandma :dancedog:

Re: Ukraine
 

My word, you must have been having a really bad day!
No need at all for that ranting.
We all base our opinions on what we see, read, hear and experience, if you have a better way of forming an opinion you really must tell us.
We can only use our own judgement to decide if we trust and believe our sources.
Lucysgirl is merely expressing her opinions as we're still allowed to on here. Just because you don't like them doesn't make her wrong or you right.
As for making her a Tory- we all have personal views without any basis at all- start with religion.Does that make us all Tories? Even you?

Re: Ukraine
 

She didn't say she had first hand experience....and I didn't accuse her of that either, re-read my post. I was referring to her comment in post 54 where she said she had NO first hand experience.

I didn't claim that I don't draw conclusions from what I read, nor did I claim my thought processes were different than anyone else..again re-read my post...I stated that she pretty much ignored a researched argument with a wave of the hand, whilst giving a contrary opinion without offering any evidence at all.

Re: Ukraine
 

My apologies for misreading your post.
It was something of a rant though(and more that a little scathing)...and you make no mention of whether you misinterpreted what Lucysgirl was saying about the links which Margaret provided.

I am afraid that I am guilty of sometimes doing that.....I will read some links, but perhaps not others....and you have to be just as cynical about some of the links that are posted on Accyweb(though this is not a slur against MargaretR).
You make your choices about what to believe based on the information you have at hand at the time.. and on your own life experiences...they must colour your beliefs in some way

Also, you did imply that Lucysgirls post was an indication of Tory thought processes without giving a reason why you made this assumption.
I am not the only person who has interpreted the post in this way.....and yes I know the internet is not a good way to get subtle nuances across...so maybe we all got it wrong.

I hope we can still be friends.....I do enjoy your posts.

Re: Ukraine
 

Yup..guilty as charged..it was a rant. But in my defence, I get a tad irritated when someone dismisses an argument as irrelevant without disproving it.

Anyway Lucysgirl gave a fairly coherent response to my harangue :), and fair play to her for doing it without ranting back.

The 'typical tory' was a bit below the belt..but..meh, I'll take any opportunity to attack a tory no matter how tenuous :p

As for us falling out over a forum post...ain't never gonna happen

Re: Ukraine
 

Now why would he wish to do something stupid like this? I might agree that Putin wants a stronger Russia, probably so that he can cut a more dashing figure on the world stage, but not something that has proved unworkable first time around. Folks tend to talk about US, or Russian, or Chinese military might but it exists only in the minds of armchair strategists. America's last successful military adventure was, let me think, .... oh, yes, Grenada. And for Russia's one has to go back to about 1945. In Afghanistan, the Soviet Union employed massive military force, without the niceties of "rules of engagement", and they made an even more dismal showing than did NATO.

But beware! Grand Fenwick is mobilizing.;)

Re: Ukraine
 

I haven't the foggiest. Maybe he's got a crystal ball and wanted to keep intact as much of the old Union as possible which could match the size/strength of the Yellow Peril?