individual,

The Russian space programme is part of their military. So yes, a third world country with first world weapons.

I know its a normal human trait to assume the society they know best is worse than a society they know little about, but its rarely true. Imagine you live overseas. What would you likely see about Australia - beaches or outer suburbs? Same with Russia. You see the cities, the parades, the landscape - you don't see 1950s villages, the rampant alcoholism (highest in the world among men).

I'll preface this by noting that's its been 10 years since I spent any time outside a major Russian city. The difference in wealth and wellbeing between the cities and the rest is significant in Russia.
Russians who live outside the cities live much as they have for the last century. (I used to spend a lot of time in a town called Nakhodka. It was primarily built in the 1950s but was alreayd run-down. In the 1980's the government sought to improve the living standards of the population by building a whole new suburb called Vostochny - new apartments, new jobs, new shops, new facilities. The people moved and Nakhodka was all but abandoned. But 10 years later as the new buildings started to deteriorate, more and more moved back to Nakhodka to live as their grandparents had.)

The per capita GDP (PPP) of Russia is less than half that of Australia while being less equal (higher GINI) than us.

No one who has actually visited Russia and got out of the cities would think for a moment that their lot is better than ours. That's why the Russia suicide rate is twice that here.

I've only ever been to Ukraine once - Odessa- but my impression was that it was even worse than Russia. Little wonder that they want in to the EU.

Might I recommend a book by Theodore Dalrymple called "The Wilder Shores of Marx". Its more about the state of Marxist nations in the 1980s but little has changed since then.

Dear mhaze,

I am extremely glad to be an old man living in Australia. I am probably better off living here than in most other countries including the US where I was born. In fact living in this country may be the main reason I am still alive at 96.

The Russian space programme is part of their military.
mhaze,
I'd imagine so is everyone else's technology when it comes to the crunch. Not many would know what really led to this invasion but my gut instinct tells me that Ukraine going Western would critically if not fatally weaken Russia as a controlling power on the World stage, particularly when peace is concerned.
Weaken Russia & World Peace is jeopardised.
I could be wrong but that's how I see it.

Thanks mhaze for the information on
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodore_Dalrymple

He appears from the Wikipedia article to have some valid and illuminating points.

However-

I'm cautious/ suspicious/ sceptical of secular Hebrew's like "Theodore Dalrymple aka Anthony Malcolm Daniels" and other potential crypto-ethnicities claiming understanding of cultures other than their own.

There are some notable foreigners that have rejected their own culture in the service of what they perceive as a superior Anglo-British one- I'm not sure if it's superior- it's perhaps an arbitrary judgement- but it's my culture.

Some of Freud's claims on the dangerous crowd for example appear to be pure projection of secular Hebrew's fears on wider culture- which probably was a valid concern for Hebrew's though not something of concern to all. Jung seems to offer subtle comment on this- paraphrasing "you can't understand health by studying sickness".

Edward Bernays (Freud's nephew and one of the most powerful unknown figures in the world- and founders of consumer culture) on the other hand saw "the dangerous crowd" as perhaps something to exploit. Perhaps seeing himself as a conquering hero from a dominant exotic culture.

I go back to The Declaration and ask if this is really "a government of the people by and for the people"- when the people have been subverted. What is "a people"- in the traditional sense a people is a kinship group- Herodotus talked about defining culture.

Even Ayn Rand despite her "Objectivist call to life and productivity" may have made this call in the interest of Hebrew's- to create a secular society that would give Hebrew's a place- rather than for the interest of the then still dominant (in 1925) Anglo-Americans.

Anglo-British people should be looking primarily to their own people for their own cultural direction- but sadly the protectors of this cultural realm in the universities have often betrayed us

In a sense the loss of our own cultural direction because of multiculturalism and secularism (something that Theodore Dalrymple ironically seems to recognise) is perhaps the very cause of the youth and underclass misdirection in contemporary Britain.

Interesting that he writes for Taki's Magazine- Greek Paleo-Conservative.

I suspect that some people and groups are "playing both sides against the middle" because they don't have a vested interest in the culture or ethnicity because they don't have blood ties or they have divided ones.

If you can get your enemy to give up their principles while you keep your own then you can potentially dominate them- or they can dominate you

Perhaps the Psycho-Medical community is creating problems for itself to solve- thereby annexing funds in the form of taxation and otherwise- this given the public NHS might be especially true in the UK- in a complex form of ethno-social dominance. But I question the value to the community over more traditional forms- think placebo.

Perhaps this has wider implications for geo-politics- and it's ethno-social games.

Sorry for the diversion.