Wallace and Daly

tax cheating by a public rep is a shameful act but until they side with a megalomanic war criminal by pushing his agenda Wallace is by some degree the worst ive ever met from wexford , and i know some right cnuts from wexford

Daly was on a fair oul rant today over in Brussels, you know its bad when Matt Cooper asked Paul Murphy to comment on what she said after the clip was played and even he admitted he wasn't sure what she was talking about.

Her speech was wonderful true humanitarian. Unfortunately, her speech will be sidelined by the reptilians.

😂😂😂. I presume that is good sarcasm

I think you went wrong at "why?"

The answer is nothing to do with elites. Russia invaded a sovereign nation and continues to wage a war against civilians, murdering them in their homes. We are applying sanctions as a non escalating resistance to these war crimes. The Russians may well sell some of their product elsewhere but there will be less demand, therefore they will get a lower price and make less profit. This is seen as a better alternative to engaging them in physical conventional war, far from being warmongers. There is some kind of dissonance going on here, in that you want to protect global trade and corporate profits from sanctions so that eu citizens can have a better lifestyle at the expense of poorer ukrainians who are murdered in their own country. Would you prefer full military conflict with russia? Allow genocide to proceed in Ukraine and leave Russia unchallenged? Or accept the impact of sanctions?

The useful idiots always end up on the side of unrestricted free trade in a round about way.

In the same vein as Madeleine Albright ...the dead kids were worth it . wow.

the correct reasoning saddam and iraq were pretty bollocked after the iran/iraq war....and who supported him then... rumsfeld and co.

@foxsake Why the "Wow"?

You said "Clare Daly is right. Sanctions only effect the poor to a significant degree."

Clare Daly is wrong. You were also wrong, in that those Iraq sanctions did remove Saddam's ability to rebuild his military after the US coalition destroyed it during the 1st Gulf war. They were able to invade a smaller neighbour after Iran-Iraq war so they were not "bolloxed". Similar argument applies to N. Korea and Iran, big armies and modern weapons needed to go about invading others are very expensive, take alot of resources. Even more to put them to use in waging a war rather than have them sit there.

I didn't pass comment on morality/correctness of those particular sanctions but I think the EU/US etc. sanctioning Russia now, or even putting a complete trade embargo on it later (as regards trade with the EU/US) when they are able to do that is justified, given its policies (you know, the whole unfortunate effort at conquering a democratic neighbour that did nothing to them and trying to wipe it from the map, oh and the brutal tactics they are using in their war as well).

Those opposing the actions are in effect supporting Russia/Putin here IMO, esp. if they have some political power and voice like an MEP does (even if that is limited).

You are now bringing up more irrelevant stuff (Rumsfeld and US foreign policy), why I do not know.

Brid Smith is no better. Heard her yesterday on radio saying sanctions against Israel was good because the palastinians asked for them against their oppressors even though they affected ordinary Israelis while Ukraine asking for them against Russia was wrong because it was inflicting hardship in Russians.

I thought this couldn't be just made up but I'm not convinced in her case

The person above arguing sanctions are the wrong move also opened their statement with the classic from the Daly/Murphy/Wallace playbook.

"But...NATO!"

It's time to live in the here and now and stop given oxygen to this utter uninformed, willfully misleading nonsense. I suppose next it'll be Finland's fault if they're invaded for wanting, as a sovereign country, to join NATO as well.

No, couldn't possibly be solely the fault of archaic dictator-led Russia, which is still operating from the Stalin handbook and is pushing terrified, independent countries towards the alliance due to its sickening war-mongering and blatant disregard for morals, ethics, or law.

Anyway, so it's no to arms for Ukraine. No to support for Ukraine. Yet, also no to sanctions on Russia.

So...what's the solution then?

I mean, I know they argue "diplomacy is the way forward" but how could one seriously say that with a straight face with talking about Vladimir Putin, the man who's said Ukraine shouldn't exist and is deliberately targeting civilians and destroying infrastructure, having invaded with zero justification in the first instance.

Effectively what they are saying is, Ukraine should just accept defeat and allow Putin to erase their national identify, and purge their country of anything and anyone he deems a threat, in so far as a threat to a dictator of his ilk could include anyone with formal education like schoolteachers and doctors.

Also, sanctions are absolutely the correct way forward. As the noose tightens on the Russian economy and ability to import vital materials for the war effort plummets, they cannot keep their war machine going indefinitely and will have to find a way out sooner rather than later.

Putin does not care about ordinary people. He only cares about what he wants. If there were no sanctions he would just keep going until Ukraine is a wasteland like Chechyna was. Precisely because there is international support including hefty sanctions, he literally is already incapable of doing this and he cannot win.

Also, please for the love of god I wish people would stop saying "but sanctions didn't stop North Korea" or wherever else. OK? In what sense? It certainly has curtailed them severely and certainly stopped them being nations capable of waging aggressive war outside their own borders.

North Korea, Iraq, wherever. Severe sanctions don't have to actually cause revolution to achieve the desired effect, not sure why some people use this as a yardstick of success.

Likewise, elites remaining wealthy and owning yachts or whatever other irrelevant examples get thrown around means absolutely nothing in terms of how effective sanctions are.

I'm sure Kim Jong Un lives in a palace, has a fleet of super-cars, eats steak every night and sleeps in silk sheets....his country is still a medieval-level backwater with a military that's about 7 decades out of date.....not to mention, training and maintenance of same is awful or non existant.

We see it already with Russia. $60bn a year yet look how shoddy their leadership, training, doctrine and equipment are. North Korea spends $1.5bn a year despite having one of the biggest armies in the world. You can imagine what that looks like, in reality, in terms of actual combat capability.

Anyone who tries to claim sanctions achieve nothing against Russia is either willfully sowing misinformation or just innocently ignorant.

Anyone who argues diplomacy alone is the only way forward with Putin is either living on another planet altogether, or is actually expressing an opinion that Ukraine should roll over and allow itself to be purged and gutted ala the Nazi and Soviet approach to creating greater states.

So you disagree with Daly on sanctions?