[tomder55]

Putin's political rival Alexei Navalny was alternately poisoned and jailed in Siberia since August 2020 . In that time he was Putin's most prominent critic. He was tried and convicted in a show trial in 2022

Russia: Navalny facing possible 15-year jail term in 'sham' trial set to take place in prison | Amnesty International UK

He was last heard from at the beginning of the month urging Russians to protest on Russia's March election day

Kremlin foe Navalny urges election day protests in Russia next month by voting at a specific hour | AP News

Yesterday it was announced that he died after taking a walk.

What are we to make of this ?
The first is that Putin sucks . He is a vicious totalitarian dictator . This assassination is more proof that Russia under Putin will not move towards liberty .

Second besides condemnations ;there is nothing we really can do about it.

Clueless Joe used the opportunity to attack Trump

President Biden Delivers Remarks on the Reported Death of Aleksey Navalny - YouTube

That is because he cannot follow up on his bombastic comments about the consequences if Navalny got wacked .

• Both Putin and Biden spoke about Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny during their individual news conferences. According to Biden, he told Putin that if Navalny dies, the consequences "would be devastating for Russia.""What do you think happens when he's saying it's not about hurting Navalny, and all the stuff he says to rationalize the treatment of Navalny, and then he dies in prison?”

Here's what happened at the Biden-Putin Geneva summit (cnn.com)

Political opponents get killed in Russia. Political opponents in the US get killed by a thousand lawfare cuts.

Judge Engoron fines Trump more than $350M, bars him from running businesses in N.Y. for 3 years (nbcnews.com)

(of note ;it is true Trump lied through his a$$ when applying for loans . But NONE of his lenders complained and they all profited from the relationship

But, testifying for the defense, managing director David Williams said the bankers viewed clients’ reports of their net worth as “subjective or subject to estimates” and took its own view of such financial statements.
“I think we expect clients-provided information to be accurate. At the same time, it’s not an industry standard that these statements be audited. They’re largely reliant on the use of estimates,” Williams said, so bankers routinely “make some adjustments.”

Deutsche Bank MD testifies on Donald Trump inflating his net worth | Fortune

)

We've already sanctioned Russia and all that did was give China an opportunity to deepen it's ties with Russia. Further a large part of the leverage we have is being left in the ground as Clueless continues to cater to a small enviro-wacko constituency. If only Russia wasn’t so rich from the US dropping out of the oil business.............hmm

The cold honest truth is that despite our preconceptions ;not everyone wants independence and freedom. Some people like the strong arm security of the state . In this decade we saw during covid how vulnerable we are to those impulses .

My suggestion would be to examine what sucks in our country ;to see where we sacrifice liberty to the leviathan state . That we can do something about .

[jlisenbe]

According to Biden, he told Putin that if Navalny dies, the consequences "would be devastating for Russia.""What do you think happens when he's saying it's not about hurting Navalny, and all the stuff he says to rationalize the treatment of Navalny, and then he dies in prison?”

Perhaps Putin left that meeting terrified of the potential consequences, or perhaps he left confident that Biden would not be able to remember what he said the next day.

When the media became dishonest proponents of particular political and social positions, then the task at hand became a great deal more difficult. They plan on Trump being their latest victory. I'm not too sure of that, and if he wins, then they will be in a tough spot.