"Vested interests and wayward thinking" is exactly what the US has been doing in Ukraine for over a decade. And all over the world. The propaganda media in this country is busy making sure the population doesn't encounter that information easily.

To say you would "like to see the Russian army driven out of Ukraine" turns a blind eye to the ongoing conflicts of that country, especially regarding the Russian speaking population — an oversimplification, and one that most obviously will never happen.

"Driven out" — by whom? Ukrainian boys as proxy cannon fodder for the US/NATO?

It is exactly what our neoliberals and the military-industrial-complex would like.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Feg2xwUrQHM

Let's add that Ukraine remains dazzlingly corrupt — just last week 24/7 actor-comedian Zelenskyy had to fire all his military recruiting people (and replace them with wounded soldiers from the front.)

You also drop other US fear propaganda narratives — Russia occupying Bulgaria and Finland — seemingly ignoring that US manipulating its onster toy, NATO, to expand.

That to me is a far more dangerous and a far more real danger — and the last half century of US invasions. regime changes, etc are there as witness.

There are no easy answers. Discussing alternative methods of democracy is a nice parlor game — certainly better than all the comfortable computer keyboard warriors on Medium who want to go all in and escalate the war — but to me the dangers are too immediate — so I'm going to focus on speaking out against my country's militaristic empire building.

And all wars . . . they are "silly" only to those comfortably far away.

I will speak out at every turn against this dangerous world devouring madness — it can't wait for the world to learn a new democracy.

PS Cornel West 2024.