Tangential Convergence

It's been a year since Putin started his illegal invasion of Ukraine.

We here at TC are staunchly pro democracy and pro Ukraine.

I wonder how people feel about this in Russia?

We could ask Russian.  So we did.

Daniil also told us the story of his leaving Russia in March of 22.

Give to the Red Cross.

Give to the UNHRC.

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It's Canadian National Day of Podcasting!

It's also me and Ken.

Hey, remember the occupation of Ottawa?  Remember the Emergencies Act?  Well  the EA requires a commission be struck to look into the use of the EA, and well, that was our jumping off point.

We talked Ottawa, the October Crisis, the Conscription Crises, Jan 6 and democracies voting themselves out of existence.

We also talked DS9 and Babylon 5.

Enjoy episode 59

We're back.

Well, Ken was for a bit, then there was a LIBRARY EMERGENCY!!

Gee, what'll we talk about?  How about Putin's war of choice in Ukraine?

Putin knows little of the operational. art.

Deception is key.

This got us thinking about a lot of things, Babylon 5, DS9, Operation Mincemeat, Romans, Barbarians, the Gulf War, General Patton etc.

Oh right, it was a Russia episode, so Daniil joined us again, thanks man!

Please give to the Red Cross or the UNHCR to help the people of Ukraine.

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The Queen died.

The Russians are rushin' away (sorry...)

But a couple of weeks ago Mikhail Gorbachev died.

Hey wait, now that's TC material. You know what else?  I KNOW AN ACTUAL RUSSIAN!!  His name is Daniil, and he escaped Putin's totalitarian nightmare with his family six months ago.  He now lives in Vancouver.  So why not get an actual Russian on here to talk about Goby?  

OK, so we did.

Give to the UNHCR.  Give to the Red Cross.

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Lots of weapons are coming in.

Lots of war crimes are happening.

We talked a bit about the history of war crimes.

How can you get someone to do something evil?

I talked a little Asch Line Experiment.

Ken has lots of books.

These show notes are getting lame.

We stand for democracy, we stand with Ukraine.

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Of course we've been both thinking about the topic ever since Russia invaded Ukraine.

Does Putin actually believe his own propaganda?

Are we swayed by propaganda (of course we are).

I've. got a lot of problems with Noam Chomsky.

Oh yeah, this one was recorded live and in person.

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Gee, what's been in the news?  Maybe the Soviet Russian invasion of Ukraine?

Is this a reboot of 1918 or 1938?  (With credit to @docpinko).  We think it's more like 1918.

What is Russia's end game?  We don't know, what the hell do we know about anything?

Will this lead to the end for Putin?  We can only hope.

Putin has put his nukes on alert, it might be the only thing he has.

The Russians are the Cardassians, not the Romulans.

The book of Boba Fett makes an appearance, as does the Flu Trux Klan.

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Some polls are closed, some are open, some people are still in line.  I conducted a completely (scientifically) useless twitter poll.  Many of our US friends voted in advance.  Many of them didn't have lines.  That said, my twitter following probably skews kinda white.  Still, it was nice of people to respond.

The lineups are a sign of a fragile democracy.  That said, a lot of people voted by mail. or in advance some other way.

This got us talking about democratic norms, transfers of power and all that.  Everything from the Algiers Putsch to President Clark in Babylon 5.  

Don't screw this up America.

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