Imagine if Elizabeth tried going back to the days when everybody who spoke English was expected to subject themselves to Her sovereign authority
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The first Elizabeth spoke eleven languages: English, French, Spanish, Italian, Flemish, Greek, Latin, Welsh, Cornish, Scottish, and Irish.
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So you’re saying … Putin is likely to add more languages to his list?
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Here’s a more detailed report on the Russian language bill
It has a link to the text of the bill in Russian. There’s even a diff.
Google translate claims that this bill would “eliminate the shortcomings of an unreasonably broad interpretation of the key concept of “compatriot”.”
Поправками, предложенными в Федеральный закон «О государственной политике Российской Федерации в отношении соотечественников за рубежом», законопроект устраняет недостатки неоправданно широкого толкования ключевого понятия «соотечественник».
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Point of order: an Irish phrasebook was prepared for her, but she could not, in fact, speak Irish.
Her conversation with Grainne Ní Mháille was held in Latin.
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According to this article, which cites unnamed western intelligence officials, China is supporting Russia only with non-lethal aid (food and communications equipment are mentioned specifically) in spite of repeated Russian requests for armaments.
It also says that, at their current pace, Russia will likely run out of necessary missiles, ammunition and fuel to prosecute the war around early May, as Russia has not been able to shift manufacturing to meet military demand.
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It does say right in the onebox that Scaramelli may have exagerated…
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That’s great news for John McCain.
/s
We’ve been hearing this since around the second week of the war, though. “In 2 weeks, the Russians will run out of stuff.”
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Animosity toward Russia has sharpened among people in the east for two main reasons. First, eastern Ukraine has borne the brunt of the indiscriminate destruction that Putin has unleashed. Kharkiv and Mariupol have suffered brutal and cruel bombardments. The second factor is proximity to Russia — and not just in geographical and cultural terms. For many, this feels like a deep family betrayal, as if it is their siblings and cousins firing the shots. In some cases, it is.
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It’s weird that it keeps coming up at all. Before the war, I would have thought that Russia was sitting on mountains of that stuff and not much else.
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The thinking is that reserve stocks have been neglected or stolen (soldiers selling off food and fuel is a big problem), so that reserves that exist on paper are gone or unusable.
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So did everyone. I suspect the oligarchs counted on that, in pocketing piles of gold that was supposed to buy it, reporting that it was bought and paid for, and expecting no one would ever test them and find out there was nothing in those warehouses but rusting hulks. With reports that they are down to Somalia-style armed pick-up trucks, they seem to be well and truly fucked.
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When an army is scrounging up used Toyota Hiluxes and bunging .50-calibre MGs on them it’s a quick next step down to throwing rocks at the enemy. It’s hard to believe the vaunted Russian army has reached the stage of fielding “technicals”, but it’s a lot of work to put together a video like this for propaganda purposes.
This might be the first modern war where a major power’s army is defeated due to its own internal corruption.
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What is the social media situation in Russia these days with all the blockages?
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It’s almost exclusively on Vkontakte, I’m sure. That way Vova’s secret police can check which children are being naughty or nice.
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