About the Western support for Ukraine:how long will the politicians be able to continue to give Ukraine billions of money that belong to their electors?
The Belgian PM promised Ukraine 800 million Euro,without any consultation of Parliament ,this is 70 Euro per inhabitant .This will cost him a lot of votes,especially given the fact that countless people have lost everything because of the anti-Covid measures,imposed by the same PM .
The presidential and legislative elections in France are a dire sign for Macron .
The German PM (Scholz ) decided to increase the military budget by 100/150 billion Euro in 3 years ( as usual the numbers are contradictory ),which means an increase of taxes of 1200/1800 Euro for every German . While there is for the moment a lot of support for the decision, it will not last long :the moment when people will receive their tax bill,the support will very fast collaps: there are a lot of pensioners in Germany and a lot of them have a monthly pension of less than 1800 Euro .While they will blame Putin, they will punish Scholz .
Meanwhile the German minister of agriculture said that the price increase for food products will continue : you ain't seen nothing yet .And we know what taxpayers ,who are also electors,will do when bad times are coming back again .
In Belgium a bread costs now 3 Euro and a lot of pensioners have only an income of 1500 Euro per month .The price of petrol is now more than 2 Euro per liter. The government is claiming that everything is the fault of Putin, but how long will people accept this claim ?
Stagflation with increasing taxes is not something that the taxpayer will accept for longtime .

Originally Posted by lljadw

About the Western support for Ukraine:how long will the politicians be able to continue to give Ukraine billions of money that belong to their electors?
The Belgian PM promised Ukraine 800 million Euro,without any consultation of Parliament ,this is 70 Euro per inhabitant .This will cost him a lot of votes,especially given the fact that countless people have lost everything because of the anti-Covid measures,imposed by the same PM .
The presidential and legislative elections in France are a dire sign for Macron .
The German PM (Scholz ) decided to increase the military budget by 100/150 billion Euro in 3 years ( as usual the numbers are contradictory ),which means an increase of taxes of 1200/1800 Euro for every German . While there is for the moment a lot of support for the decision, it will not last long :the moment when people will receive their tax bill,the support will very fast collaps: there are a lot of pensioners in Germany and a lot of them have a monthly pension of less than 1800 Euro .While they will blame Putin, they will punish Scholz .
Meanwhile the German minister of agriculture said that the price increase for food products will continue : you ain't seen nothing yet .And we know what taxpayers ,who are also electors,will do when bad times are coming back again .
In Belgium a bread costs now 3 Euro and a lot of pensioners have only an income of 1500 Euro per month .The price of petrol is now more than 2 Euro per liter. The government is claiming that everything is the fault of Putin, but how long will people accept this claim ?
Stagflation with increasing taxes is not something that the taxpayer will accept for longtime .

While true I am not sure it is as bad as you indicate, most people understand that the "peace dividend" has come to an end, while food prices are a concern but if the rest of the world is like this place smart, seasonal buying offsets the price increases to a large degree and we will see a return to things like home gardens to reduce costs, I can't really talk about petrol prices as we replaced our ICE vehicles with electric last year and I expect this will drive the move to alternative fuels sooner and faster than expected.

The thing is that as solar, wind, electric, hydrogen, nuclear or what ever generation systems are rushed in to replace Russian gas and oil it reduces future need for Russian gas and oil as such their economy is pretty much shot long term.

This leaves the question, how much longer can Russia afford this war?
From a New Zealand point of view it is the perfect war, New Zealanders aren't risking anything, Russia grows weaker by the day and all for the cost of a few million dollars.

Putin on the other hand has a country being fed ludicrous propaganda about this being the beginning of a new Russian empire (not sure how they think this rabble of an army are going to perform against NATO as I doubt they would make it more than a few miles into Poland before they are destroyed), how are they going to take a war that has decimated their economy, killed a large number of their youth and left them with giant pile of rubble in eastern Ukraine as the reward?

Originally Posted by MontyB

While true I am not sure it is as bad as you indicate, most people understand that the "peace dividend" has come to an end, while food prices are a concern but if the rest of the world is like this place smart, seasonal buying offsets the price increases to a large degree and we will see a return to things like home gardens to reduce costs, I can't really talk about petrol prices as we replaced our ICE vehicles with electric last year and I expect this will drive the move to alternative fuels sooner and faster than expected.

The thing is that as solar, wind, electric, hydrogen, nuclear or what ever generation systems are rushed in to replace Russian gas and oil it reduces future need for Russian gas and oil as such their economy is pretty much shot long term.

This leaves the question, how much longer can Russia afford this war?
From a New Zealand point of view it is the perfect war, New Zealanders aren't risking anything, Russia grows weaker by the day and all for the cost of a few million dollars.

Putin on the other hand has a country being fed ludicrous propaganda about this being the beginning of a new Russian empire (not sure how they think this rabble of an army are going to perform against NATO as I doubt they would make it more than a few miles into Poland before they are destroyed), how are they going to take a war that has decimated their economy, killed a large number of their youth and left them with giant pile of rubble in eastern Ukraine as the reward?

About the economic future :Jamie Dimon (CEO from JP Morgan ) predicts an economic catastrophe :he said that an economic ''hurricane ''is coming,caused by the war in Ukraine,with rising inflation pressures and interest rate hikes from the Federal Reserve .
JP Morgan and the Bank of America have lost this year 18 % of their value .
About electric cars : here most people can't afford such a car : he cost more than 3,7 euro on electricity per hundred km and the cheapest one costs 20000 euro .
A battery of such a car lasts maximum 8 years and to replace him cost a fortune : a new battery of an Audi costs 38000 euro ,which is 63292 NZ dollars .
To upload an electric car to drive 100 km lasts 30 minutes .

Originally Posted by lljadw

About the economic future :Jamie Dimon (CEO from JP Morgan ) predicts an economic catastrophe :he said that an economic ''hurricane ''is coming,caused by the war in Ukraine,with rising inflation pressures and interest rate hikes from the Federal Reserve .
JP Morgan and the Bank of America have lost this year 18 % of their value .
About electric cars : here most people can't afford such a car : he cost more than 3,7 euro on electricity per hundred km and the cheapest one costs 20000 euro .
A battery of such a car lasts maximum 8 years and to replace him cost a fortune : a new battery of an Audi costs 38000 euro ,which is 63292 NZ dollars .
To upload an electric car to drive 100 km lasts 30 minutes .

With regards to electric vehicles, I have the Audi e-tron 55 quattro Advanced and by no stretch of the imagination is it a small vehicle but it comes with a 10 year full replacement warranty on the battery (Not a major consideration given that I replace my car every 3-4 years), I get roughly 550km from a single charge which costs me roughly $3 NZD at home, in the 12 months I have owned it battery deterioration has been undetectable, charging at a fast charger takes you from 0-80% in less than 30 mins, the only drawback is the cost of the vehicle which was $165k but the positive is $3-6 in fuel costs per week.

The wife on the other hand has a Hyundai Ionic 5 and that costs about the same to charge, has the same 10 year battery warranty, charges faster and goes just as far for $70k NZD.

In my opinion other than the initial purchase price there is no longer a down side to owning electric vehicles over petrol ones and given the cost of fuel locally people are paying $200-300 in petrol a week just to go to work you could pay off an electric car in fuel savings now.

Originally Posted by lljadw

1 Kazakhstan is already a Russian ally.

Just figured I would respond to this theory strangely enough using a blog and Russian article because they don't seem particularly close to me.

https://www.jamesmdorsey.net/post/is...s-next-ukraine

https://novayagazeta.ru/articles/202...4/terpi-kazakh

Originally Posted by MontyB

Just figured I would respond to this theory strangely enough using a blog and Russian article because they don't seem particularly close to me.

https://www.jamesmdorsey.net/post/is...s-next-ukraine

https://novayagazeta.ru/articles/202...4/terpi-kazakh

Dorsey said that Putin and Nazarbayev ( dictator of Kazakhstan ) had a close relationship :when Nazarbayev got Covid, Putin sent him doctors to treat him .
OTOH ,I have no faith in Dorsey,who is a biased and interventioning journalist who labeled Russian nationalists as far-right ,while remaining silent about nationalists from Ukraine, Kazahkstan, Syria, Africa, etc .
Every one who has a little understanding of these things,knows that far-right, right, far-left,left,etc are European notions from the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries,who have no place outside the continent .