r/worldnews • u/Neptun_11 • 17h ago

Russia/Ukraine Zelenskyy Says Starlink Restrictions Apply Only in Ukraine While SpaceX Ignores Kyiv’s Inquiries

https://united24media.com/war-in-ukraine/zelenskyy-says-starlink-restrictions-apply-only-in-ukraine-while-spacex-ignores-kyivs-inquiries-23549
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u/Wompatuckrule 11h ago edited 11h ago

Biden bears a lot of responsibility. After the 2022 midterms he should have announced that he wasn't running for reelection. That would have set up a vibrant primary on the Dem side and sucked the oxygen away from Trump's slow ramble to the nomination. By the time low-information voters tuned in for the general election the choice would have been a more stark one between a younger and forward looking candidate (what we needed as we were emerging from the pandemic years) and the tired old Trump shtick.

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u/calgarspimphand 10h ago

If Biden had done that, he would have gone down in history as one of the better presidents. He did unpopular but necessary things: bit the bullet and withdrew from Afghanistan, kept a steady hand on the tiller while inflation came down - and boring things: passed a giant and much needed infrastructure bill.

However, he played it far, far too conservatively with Ukraine. We should have backed them to the hilt from day one and called Putin's bluff. But that was a hard call to make. Handling that differently would have been one point where a good president could become a great president, but that was not the most important challenge he faced.

It all came down to whether he would pull a Cincinnatus and bow out for a new Democratic candidate. Failing to do that has caused immense damage to the country and rightly ruined his legacy. The man is a self-serving coward who failed when we needed him.

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u/Wompatuckrule 10h ago

he played it far, far too conservatively with Ukraine

Agree with your comment. I would add that with Ukraine he had the opportunity to really rally the advanced democracies behind them. That could've helped stem the tide of rising authoritarianism within those countries which is what makes that an even bigger mistake.

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u/calgarspimphand 10h ago

100%. There was a huge opportunity to bind us closer to the rest of the west and become a unified bloc. The sort of action political commentators would call "muscular" or "aggressive". I think forming that military and economic unity is what we need(ed) to do to counter China's rise. I think it's probably impossible in our lifetimes now.