Imperium

[Serb]

This is the mall in my city (Omsk, which is 2000 miles away from Moscow).

[Serb]

The store next door:
(A typical Omsk store, two minutes walk from your appartments)

[Serb]

I certainly agree Israel is defending itself from the evil Islamic terrorists who murdered 1700 of its citizens back in October of last year. I further agree that Putin's Russia is engaged in a evil, brutal, war of conquest (for which it is failing) which is terrible and for which there is no defense. I, personally, hope all of those Russian war criminals are both tried and hanged

Cough! The last time I have checked, 15 000 of Russians slaughtered by Ukranians is a little bit bigger than 1 700 Israelis.

Your media will never show you what your fancy Ukranian Nazi friends did at Donbass and Kursk. How they raped, murdered and tortured to death civilians for just being Russian.

You are living with an eyes wide shut.

[Serb]

the overwhelming majority of the colonies were divested by legal process. The Donbass did not pursue the legal process

Oh, really?
So, the will of the people expressed via referendum is not legal enough for you?

How many referendums you, Americans had when you were seceding from the United Kingdom?
In what court you have gained your freedom?

the overwhelming majority of the colonies were divested by legal process.

Bullsh!t!
The overwhelming majority of liberation from the colonial oppression was won in a fight for freedom, not in the court.

and like Russia, Ukraine had discretion to refuse as Russia did for Chechnya.

Unlike Ukraine, Russia has never had an intention to exterminate Chechen language, their culture and faith and forcibly assimilate Chechens to make them Russians. We have never threatened to "knife the Chechens" or "hang the Chechens", like your Ukrainian friends did in 2014, before any the Crimea, the Russian invasion of 2022 or any other bull****. At winter 2014, when they were jumping at Maidan, overthrowing a legal government and threatening to exterminate all the Russians and first of all the domestic ones. Half of Ukraine, which historically was a part of Russia for MANY CENTURIES, but was presented by Communists to Ukrainian Soviet Socialistic Republic as a gift, like Donbass in 1920 by Lenin or Crimea in 1954 by Khrushev has revolted against the illegal coup you call Maidan, which was held under the Nazi slogans. The first law new Kiev authorities had issued after the coup, was the law to ban Russian language. Now not only they have banned the Russian language, Russian culture, and Russian Orthodox Christian faith, now they burn Russian classical literature books like Nazis (whom they are), teach their kids to kill Russians in their kindergartens and destroy monuments to Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Chekhov, destroy monuments and graves of Ukrainians who fought versus Nazism, but erect monuments to the bloody Nazi collaborators responsible for slaughter of hundreds of thousand innocent civilians in a most brutal and inhuman way. Such Nazi butchers are their National heroes now.

Do you honestly think that considering such circumstances Donbass and Crimea had no right to revolt just to save themselves?

You don't have a leg to stand on here Serb.

I have both legs to stand here.

You can't say that Crimea and the Donbass had some right for instant unilateral secession while maintaining that Chechnya did not or that the break up of the USSR was illegal.

But, the breakup of USSR WAS ILLEGAL!!!

Ukraine had no right to secede from the USSR in 1991 the way it did.

Firstly because there was a referendum, which results have clearly proved that the absolute majority of Soviet people want to keep the Soviet Union intact.
Secondly, because USSR had a constitution and THE SPECIAL LAW, which has a detailed procedure for quitting the Union by any of its republics. In that law was described a strict LEGAL procedure, the sequence of events and LEGAL actions a Soviet republic should do, if she decided to quit the Soviet Union.

So, you can shove your "legal" argument where the sun doesn't shine.

As for your analogy with Chechnya, you seem to forget that Russia has given a de facto independence to Chechnya with Hasavyurt peace agreements of 1996.

For three years Chechnya was de facto an independent state.

And became a snake nest for international terrorists of all kinds, who committed innumerous terrorist attacks against Russia from their base in Checnhya.

And it was only in 1999, when THEY HAVE INVADED the neighboring Russian region of Dagestan (which had no relation to Chechen independence whatsoever, but was a first step in their expansion to establish a World's Islamic Khalifate), when we were forced to retaliate and restore the constitutional order in Chechnya.

Once again, - it was THEM in 1999, who committed a full-scale military invasion into our land, NOT US INVADING THEM!

And after three years of Islamist bacchanalia there, the people of Chechnya have supported our forces to restore order. They have voted for their new constitution, elected their new leaders in a democratic way and 25 years after made Chechnya one of the most beautiful and prosperous regions of Russia.
And now Chechens fight back-to-back with Russians in the Ukrainian conflict.
Chechens are no less Russians than I am. We are all Russians.
All of the people of our huge common Motherland.

So Chechnya and Donbass are not even a close.

Period.

[Dinner]

It is nice to see Russia's current death spiral. It is well earned

[Lorizael]

Oh hey Oerdin while you're here I've got a question for you: https://apolyton.net/forum/miscellan...-next-17-years

[giblets]

How ****ed does your country have to be for you to think a grocery store is something impressive that needs to be shown to the world?

[Aeson]

How ****ed does your country have to be for you to think a grocery store is something impressive that needs to be shown to the world?

Well our President thinks just knowing the word "grocery" is something special ...

[Aeson]

This is the mall in my city (Omsk, which is 2000 miles away from Moscow).

It's a trap ... don't let the capitalists in!

[Serb]

Russia is a socialist country with a free market economy and a real democracy.

Unlike Western idiots we don't elect corrupt clowns like Zelensky or populist like the rest of the Euro leaders, whom they start to hate one year after election (Macron, Merz, or whatever chain of British PM they have). We vote for a professional, who makes our lives better year after year, not for the populist clowns.

[Serb]

It is nice to see Russia's current death spiral. It is well earned

Lol!

Says who?

Your society is sick with a civil war, not ours!
Your society is sick with homeless, not ours!
Your society is sick with drug addicts, not ours!
Your society is sick with street crime, not ours!
Your society has betrayed Christ, not ours!

[Serb]

How ****ed does your country have to be for you to think a grocery store is something impressive that needs to be shown to the world?

Less f*cked then your country.

[Broken_Erika]

This was one of the grocery stores in my hometown in the 90's

On August 21, 1991, Knob Hill Farms opened a terminal in Cambridge, Ontario, the first outside the Greater Toronto Area. The terminal measured 340,000 square feet (31,500 square metres), making it the largest food retail store in the world. It was estimated that the terminal saw over 20,000 customers on opening day, with hour long lines and traffic jams surrounding the store. The store featured 5,250 ft (1,600 m) of refrigeration units, a 500 ft (150 m) meat counter and 1,500 parking spaces.^[8]

The opening day crowd was estimated at 20,000. The store was located on a 25-acre site and had docks for 11 tractor trailers and 10 rail cars; one mile of refrigeration and coolers; a 500 foot meat counter; an acre of produce; 49 checkouts; battery powered shopping carts for handicapped shoppers; and a hitching rail for horses.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knob_Hill_Farms

https://www.cambridgetimes.ca/opinion/columnists/1991-worlds-largest-food-market-opens/article_7e5e792b-f74b-571c-86b4-fc98183021df.html?

[Serb]

Care to show it nowadays?

[Broken_Erika]

A Canadian Tire, A Home Depot and various smaller shops and restaurants, There's an even larger supercenter across the street.

It was too big to be really practical and it couldn't compete will the low-cost grocery stores. Closed in 2000.