The Very Latest on the US-Russian Summit

-a contingent of about 5,000 U.S. troops that landed in Arkhangelsk, Russia as part of the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War and fought the Red Army ..

maybe it takes a long time for the Russians to forget we invaded their country....

"danita, you know what? i've read your comments on here (which are prodigious) and they tend to be unhelpful"

I agree, I am completely unhelpful to those who come here day in and day out to call the President names, insult him personally (and his family) and generally just try to smear him.

Remember during the election? All the people on here calling him a terrorist, a Muslim, a white hater, a communist, totalitarian, a drug addict, born on the planet Zoron and not american, a thug, a dictator and on and on.

And it continues.

And I am NOT helpful to those people AT ALL.

Ryan C . . .

Yeah, and I don't recall President Obama saying anything about staring into Chavez's soul.

Remember Bush, how he said he'd looked into Putin's eyes and seen his soul - and declared it good.

I do remember them staring into each other's eyes - who can forget?

"danita, you know what? i've read your comments on here (which are prodigious) and they tend to be unhelpful. today's is especially silly, that bush and putin are gazing into the others eyes. my first thought was: hugo chavez and barack obama. and the despotic leader of honduras. and the castros. and...."

Danita,

Your posting is apparently infuriating right wingers who want their dribble to be more prominent.

Good work ;-)

Bush did the right thing by ignoring Russia for 8 years. Posted by: Miguel Diaz | Jul 6, 2009 4:16:49 PM

Except I don't think he did.

Bush did the right thing by ignoring Russia for 8 years. Obama will get tricked into this friendship and then we all get screwed

danita, you know what? i've read your comments on here (which are prodigious) and they tend to be unhelpful. today's is especially silly, that bush and putin are gazing into the others eyes. my first thought was: hugo chavez and barack obama. and the despotic leader of honduras. and the castros. and....

you see, in this era of hope and change, some of us would like to focus on the issues.

Who can forget Bush and Putin staring lovingly into each other's eyes?

The former President's hubris that he could 'trust' Putin Posted by: J House | Jul 6, 2009 3:33:09 PM
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re: hubris, I prefer naivete.

That's how I remember it. Posted by: MayBee | Jul 6, 2009 3:21:44 PM

Thanks. As others have said, I can see why they are concerned but I was getting the sense that Bush had refused to talk with Russia for 8 years the way the story is unfolding here and that Obama is mending fences put up for the past 8 years. Seems to me that this is just the normal back and forth of two super powers. A normal "treaty has ended, let's renew and do better" kind of thing. Once again, Obama is acting like he's come to save the world.

The former President's hubris that he could 'trust' Putin is as pitiful as the current President's narcissic belief that he can sway them with his way with words.

Let us remember that at the same time the President was getting high in college, Putin was playing out the Great Game in the KGB.

As I recall history, the Soviet Union was beginning to place nuclear IRBM's in Cuba, which would have taken about 15 minutes to render Washington to ashes.
Bay of Pigs was hardly provocation...Kennedy bailed on the air component and stiffed CIA.

Let us not forget that the Soviet Union violated multiple arms treaties with the U.S., and we never knew about it. After the empire fell, we found it they had stockpiled hundreds of tons of BC weapons.

The Preasident is a naif and the Russians will eat him alive, as they did Kennedy.

TCTimmy:Wasn't Bush kind of jilted by Putin after it seemed he made some headway with him? Seems like I recall Bush saying he was disappointed in the things Putin was doing towards the end of Bush's term. They seemed pretty close in the beginning.
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That's how I remember it. I recall the stories that Putin was the first on the phone after the 9/11 attacks.

I loved the photos of Putin and Bush tooling around in the old Volga. Remember how great those photos were?
But yeah, Putin's consolidation of power put a strain on relations.

"What Russia objects to is the placement of a radar system and a few ground-based interceptors in Poland and Czech.

They know it doesn't threaten them...they just want to oppose it because it is a natural Russian response to the U.S./Western Europe sphere of influence."

Much like we react to Cuba was to stage "defensive armaments".

The U.S. missile defense system is currently entirely oriented towards Asia-Pacific.

What Russia objects to is the placement of a radar system and a few ground-based interceptors in Poland and Czech.

They know it doesn't threaten them...they just want to oppose it because it is a natural Russian response to the U.S./Western Europe sphere of influence.

Countries have different interests. Posted by: MayBee | Jul 6, 2009 2:59:41 PM

Wasn't Bush kind of jilted by Putin after it seemed he made some headway with him? Seems like I recall Bush saying he was disappointed in the things Putin was doing towards the end of Bush's term. They seemed pretty close in the beginning.

Russian President Medvedev has also agreed to mandate that all Russians inflate their tires after President Obama told him that if they inflate their tires, they can "save just as much."

When asked what that meant, Medvedev said he had "no clue" but that President Obama was so suave and sophisticated, it must be "a good thing, whatever it means."

While the meeting seemed to go well, Medvedev did admit that he got "a little nervous" when President Obama said that he didn't want to "run Russia" just like he didn't want to run a car company or healthcare.

Someone asked why Russia would be miffed at us.

No I didn't ask why they'd be miffed at us. I asked how we mistreated them.

You can treat a country completely correctly and they might still be miffed at us. Countries have different interests.

For example, I'm sure they were miffed at us when we didn't support the little Georgia incursion. We certainly did not mistreat them then, however.

"And the treaty was signed in 1972. I'm not sure what your point is."

The point was the ABM was left intact even after the dissolution of the Soviet Union until Bush decided it was time to "protect" America 2 months after 9/11.

Someone asked why Russia would be miffed at us.

The withdraw from the treaty and the ramping up of our missile defense system to be on their border was my answer.

Oh sure, reducing nuclear arms is a bad idea. Hardly worth even trying - or even attempting to set an example. Hell, why even suggest the idea?