I am getting more and more respect for ex-CIA analyst, Larry Johnson.

Kremlin Attacked- What do we know, What does it mean? Larry Johnson fmr CIA

In the meantime, I have someone. who lives locally who insists on pushing, in a series of emails, the extreme views of Igor Strelkov.

So I sent him the following video with commentary from Dmitry Babich, who I have not heard in some time.

I was surprised to hear,not an automatic justification of the Kremlin line but a moderately critical attitude and a mild acknowledgement that Evegeny Progozhin might be justified in part. He laid out a range of possibilities, which is what most skilled commentators..

But my “friend” described Babich in almost unprintable terms as “verbiage” because he did not blindly follow his extreme interpretation of Progozhin’s inflammatory comments which I think (along with Babich), probably had a political goal.

I differ from my “friend” in that I think there was a lot to be gleaned from someone who lives this every day and is on the ground and not sitting in front of a screen from outside a small town in New Zealand.

I am fairly well-versed in Russian history (I speak the language), and yet I am able to acknowledge that the further we go the less I know, no matter how many videos I listen to.

But this person thinks he knows so much more than everyone else as illustrated by his latest email.

“I was fully onboard with Lira and Ritter et al until the attack on the airbase in Crimea. Then I started really digging and what I found has held true thru to today”

I have my own perceptions and they change over time according to the information.

For instance, I don’t listen to the Duran so much and don’t hang on their every word.

But, I am not so arrogant (or stupid) to say they do not know what they are talking about.

Clearly they do.  

I will have nothing to do with people with closed minds who insist on foisting their opinions on me, especially when they were never asked for.