Do you have any idea how brave you have to be as a Russian citizen to protest, in Moscow?

Do you know how against the war the thousands who are right now in Pushkin Square protesting, have to be, to brave arrest and all that goes along with it in Russia?

Putin does NOT have the support of Russians in Russia.

Putin does NOT have the support of the “Russian Speaking Eastern Ukrainians” in Ukraine.

Putin does NOT have the support of the majority of the world.

I think Putin realized he had no choice but to shit or get off the pot.

Putin was trying to play the long game here, starting with disinformation campaigns in the US and other western countries.

He meddled in a few elections (notably, ours), to try and weaken Democracies.

He bought a weak minded leader, a ‘useful idiot, Trump, specifically with the intent of weakening the United States’ relationships with her Allies and to destabilize NATO.

And for a while there, the plan was working.

But then we elected Biden.

Putin was not expecting that. But I’m sure he believed that his misinformation campaigns, along with the indoctrinated likes of Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingram, would help him to weaken Biden’s Presidency.

And on the surface, that looked like it was working as well. But Putin is a realist. And folks tired of the fact-free fantasies of the conspiracy theorist lunatics stopped playing nice. Reality was seeping in, and while things were getting better for the US, things for Putin were going to worse if he didn’t act soon.

For the last year and change, Biden has been reaffirming and strengthening the relationships Trump tried to break. NATO countries saw Trump for what he was – a temporary mental illness within the Democratic sphere – a malignant cancerous tumor – that once removed, would bring, if not the country as a whole, then at least our leadership apparatus, back to it’s senses.

Putin had to put up or shut up – now.

He couldn’t wait for NATO to grow stronger. He couldn’t wait for the US to fully recover from the Trumpian disease. He couldn’t wait for the world to recover from the pandemic we all suffered from.

That’s why he struck now.

I think he may actually be surprised at how much resistance he is facing – How united so many countries are against him – How united so many of his people are against him.

The history of Russia is full of megalomaniacal leaders who destroy their own citizens for personal gain. Putin is the most recent in that long line of bad actors who misrepresent the will of the good people who live in that country.

I hope this Hitleresque attack of Putin’s ends quickly, and much the same way Hitler’s did.

I pray the people of Russia are finally able to elect someone who will represent them better on the world stage.

I pray that soon they can have peace and freedom and freedom to cry out for peace.