Do you actually understand the Russian-Georgian conflict?

[Elok]

BE HONEST. I mean really understand the background causes and not just pretending to because your friends are passionate about it.

Personally, I can't figure out what the hell happened. It's like the Balkans suddenly teleported several hundred miles east, and there are a bunch of armpit-sized "republics" with unpronounceable names declaring war/independence/they're gay/who-knows-what. So South Ossetia wants to be part of Russia, which granted them citizenship, only Georgia says secession is not okay, but that's illegitimate because Georgia's president blew up South Ossetia's capital and also stepped on several puppies. Also Azkhlabzech province next door has decided it wants something too, either to be part of Russia or to be independent, or possibly just a more violent part of Georgia, and I can't keep track of which because I'm trying to remember if Laura is pregnant with Stan's identical twin's baby or just pretending to be to disrupt Michael's wedding or what.

BONUS QUESTION: Do you care? Why/Why not? Are you really "too busy watching the Olympics instead," or doing something even more ignoble such as trolling the StarCraft II forums?

[BeBMan]

Are you suggesting we aren't all EXPERTS in this and THAT WE DON'T have lots of good info on teh issue???

[rah]

As far as I can tell.
I asked Ben to call Asher a *** and tell him he was going to rot in hell for liking guys.
Asher responded with a 10 page tirade against the right and called Ben all sorts of names.
I banned Asher for breaking the rules.

I'll get around to banning Ben later just for fun.

If that's not similar, then chalk me up to the second answer.

[DirtyMartini]

I really wanted to vote to protect or 48" pizzas, but I decided to be honest. I don't understand. I haven't taken the time to read the news carefully in the past week, so I don't know if I could become informed if I made the effort. Since Elok says he doesn't understand, and he seems generally well informed and intelligent, I'm going to assume that my own efforts to educate myself would be wasted and I will forgo any such efforts.

[Lorizael]

What I can't understand is why anyone would want to be a part of Russia.

[rah]

If you don't want to be part of Georgia, then your options are limited. Who else is going to help you?

[Elok]

Originally posted by DirtyMartini
I really wanted to vote to protect or 48" pizzas, but I decided to be honest. I don't understand. I haven't taken the time to read the news carefully in the past week, so I don't know if I could become informed if I made the effort. Since Elok says he doesn't understand, and he seems generally well informed and intelligent, I'm going to assume that my own efforts to educate myself would be wasted and I will forgo any such efforts.

Intelligent? Sure. But well-informed? What on earth gave you that idea?

AFAICT all information to be had on the matter comes from Georgian or Russian officials, and therefore is probably not much more reliable than the supermarket tabloids. Or you can get information from people like Serb, who get their information from those same sources and have the added negative of being rabid jingos themselves. So I say to hell with it.

[Theben]

I didn't even know they had a tiff back in '92. Related to the overall breakup, I suppose. Ossetia's AFAIK is full of Russians so they want to rejoin the Motherland. Georgia prefers to keep the land. That's about it.

[C0ckney]

ossetia is full of ossestians to whom the russians have given russian passports.

[BeBMan]

Let's hope they don't give Russian passports to the Americans and claim it's all theirs

[DirtyMartini]

Originally posted by Elok


Intelligent? Sure. But well-informed? What on earth gave you that idea?

Dunno. You usually seem to know what you're talking about, even when I disagree with you.

[Tuberski]

I was wondering if Atlanta was going to burn again.

ACK!

[GePap]

Yes, I think I am pretty well versed in the issue now. Finding information is not as hard as it may seem.

I think the caring bit is the harder one.

[Whoha]

Originally posted by rah
As far as I can tell.
I asked Ben to call Asher a *** and tell him he was going to rot in hell for liking guys.
Asher responded with a 10 page tirade against the right and called Ben all sorts of names.
I banned Asher for breaking the rules.

I'll get around to banning Ben later just for fun.

If that's not similar, then chalk me up to the second answer.

[Elok]

I guess I'm better at pretending than I thought. Compared to many other polytubbies I'm quite ignorant, in my experience. Or maybe they're even better at pretending than I am...hmmm....GePap, what source do you recommend?

BTW, has anyone compared Putin or Medvedev to Hitler annexing the Sudetenland yet? On Poly, I mean; I'm sure Godwinization has happened somewhere online by now.