Ukraine's European Revolution?

[Sheilbh]

Wasn't his boyfriend, you know, actually smuggling documents, as the British authorities claimed?  I don't know how anyone tolerates this asshole.

Yep:
http://www.judiciary.gov.uk/Resources/JCO/Documents/Judgments/miranda-v-sofshd.pdf
58 000 secret or top secret documents. The Judges address Greenwald's points in paragraphs 55-8.

I'm sure it's fine though because we can trust these journalists to examine all of those documents, make sure they redact all the names and don't accidentally release information, or insufficiently secure the data. That could lead to hurting valid security interests or loss of life.

[Queequeg]

The fucker's pathological.  I don't understand why more people don't understand that.  It's fucking obvious. 

[Valmy]

I'm sure it's fine though because we can trust these journalists to examine all of those documents, make sure they redact all the names and don't accidentally release information, or insufficiently secure the data. That could lead to hurting valid security interests or loss of life.

Yes all the dozens of people who have been murdered truly fill my heart with sadness and the press cannot do its job to inform the public on the actions of its elected officials or everybody will die and our national security will collapse.  Whatever I get it.  We already have a thread for our impending doom and the massacre of thousands because of evil journalists, can we focus on the Ukraine thing please?  Or at least on your Bete Noir's opinions on the Ukraine business?

[Valmy]

The fucker's pathological.  I don't understand why more people don't understand that.  It's fucking obvious. 

Sometimes you have to use the journalists you have and not the ones you wish you had.

[grumbler]

You can be surprised then, I don't like Walt. I just don't think there's much to criticise him on about this - unlike Greenwald.

I think the point he's making is valid. The US and EU backed the revolution but didn't think how they'd respond to a Russian intervention. At least I hope they hadn't thought that far ahead because that means they've just been surprised and taken a while to cobble together a policy. The grim alternative is they did think about the possibility of a Russian intervention and this is the masterplan unfolding.

I think the point he is making is tinfoil-hat stuff.  The very idea that the EU could engage in collusion is absurd. 

As far as the issue of whether the US and EU considered the consequences of their collusion (even if they could somehow engage in collusion), it seems to me that Putin has done pretty much exactly what such conspirators would want; he has danced the Flamenco on his crank, and gotten...what... for it?  the Crimea?  Yeah, that's worth getting kicked out of the G-8 and crashing your stock market over! 

The grim  alternative is that Stephen Walt doesn't give a fuck about truth and just spews whatever line he thinks will get him some hits.  Even that's not so grim when you consider that he is a British news media type, and so everyone expects him to lie.

[grumbler]

Sometimes you have to use the journalists you have and not the ones you wish you had.

These are British journalists, not journalists.

[Sheilbh]

The fucker's pathological.  I don't understand why more people don't understand that.  It's fucking obvious. 

Sometimes you have to use the journalists you have and not the ones you wish you had.

The trouble is Greenwald's flounced out of deals with Washington Post, the NYT and the Guardian because they won't be aggressive enough in releasing things. Now he's got his own online newspaper which will specialise in 'adversarial' journalism. It launched, as was par for the course, with a new NSA document that was inaccurately and sensationally described.

His statement after the Miranda detention was extraordinary. 'I am going to write my stories a lot more aggressively now, I am going to publish many more documents now. I am going to publish a lot about England, too, I have a lot of documents about the espionage system in England. Now my focus is going to be that as well.' If there's legitimate public interest surely they should already have been written and if there's not this is just a threat. Either way it doesn't reflect well on him.

Edit: I thought this piece was pretty harsh but fair:
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/03/russia-vladimir-putin-the-west-104134.html#.UxPZoON_uSq

[Phillip V]

Will world oil prices rise due to this Ukraine crisis?

Almost certainly not.

Brent crude advanced as much as 2 percent this evening on the ICE Futures Europe exchange in London.

Some analysts estimate that the Ukraine crisis might add a risk premium of as much as $5 a barrel to crude prices.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-03-02/yen-gains-with-oil-on-ukraine-as-s-p-500-futures-retreat.html

[frunk]

Just watched Dr. Strangelove.  I knew I should have listened to that mine shaft salesman.

[LaCroix]

ukrainian military at mykolaiv, which is somewhat close to crimea

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkMoER2DIOE

also, something going on in kerch with the ukrainian sea guard.

and this: http://imageshack.com/a/img812/850/394a.jpg

[alfred russel]

It is a nice start.

So it is a start, but the only tangible action is that Russia doesn't get to be in the G8. There is also implied that the Ukraine will get access to money. Effectively it is just a sternly worded letter.

[Ed Anger]

ukrainian military at mykolaiv, which is somewhat close to crimea

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XkMoER2DIOE

also, something going on in kerch with the ukrainian sea guard.

and this: http://imageshack.com/a/img812/850/394a.jpg

I like the dude's uniform.

[derspiess]

It's very poorly made.

[Ed Anger]

It's very poorly made.

It is hard to make a uniform out of beets, turnips and potato skins.

[CountDeMoney]

It is a nice start.

So it is a start, but the only tangible action is that Russia doesn't get to be in the G8. There is also implied that the Ukraine will get access to money. Effectively it is just a sternly worded letter.

Honestly, did anybody expect anything else this quickly?  And on a weekend?  C'mon, "strong letter to follow" was the only real play this early after the international phone calls and Sunday talking heads shows on Oscars Weekend.