Orang Utan
Psychick Worrier Ov Geyoor
Do oligarchs have oligarch listed as their profession on their passports?
How close are we to war breaking out in Europe?
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Orang Utan
Psychick Worrier Ov Geyoor
It was a question, not a quip
I was trying to lighten the mood a bit...
To answer your question..I dont know. But I doubt an Oligarch is a listed profession?
The term "oligarch" derives from the Ancient Greek oligarkhia meaning "the rule of the few"
AnnaKarpik
Queen of all she surveys
Then they would use the usual terms 'politician' or 'businessman'.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
no one with a british passport has their occupation listed within the document
(photo from mirror)
and no one seems to in a russian one either
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Kevbad the Bad
Amiable Bowel Syndrome
You've changed over the years.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
_Russ_
Never not Knowingly Misunderstood
Yesterday an otherwise Banned Russian owned Il76 was allowed to overfly Poland en route to Bratislava and back to Moscow, looks like its doing it again today, supposedly delivering Nuclear fuel.
A couple of Turkish Airliners seem to be likewise overflying Poland En-Route to Moscow Today.
I doubt of course that the flights are linked.
A couple of Turkish Airliners seem to be likewise overflying Poland En-Route to Moscow Today.
I doubt of course that the flights are linked.
Dom Traynor
Tino Pai
Be unusual if he didn't
Orang Utan
Psychick Worrier Ov Geyoor
Such a weird word, that’s all.
A colleague thinks it’s Russian for millionaire/billionaire
A colleague thinks it’s Russian for millionaire/billionaire
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
From the same route as monarch - monos (alone) olig(o) (a few) arkhein (to rule).
Orang Utan
Psychick Worrier Ov Geyoor
But what is an oligarch? I had thought it just mean an oil billionaire or summat, but I think it must have changed
bimble
floofy
i think its a word that we now only use for Russian billionaires, if the billionaire is not Russian we just say billionaire. So it's russophobic, imo, in current usage.
8ball
Decolonise colons!
I think 'oligarchy' is perfectly applicable to China, the USA and the UK (among others).
bimble
floofy
ye but Oligarch? Who have you seen that applied to not even Musk or Bezos right?
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
It's just someone who is in a small group, or in a small group of individuals, who rule. It doesn't come with any ideology. I don't know why we specifically apply it to rich Russians but the word does imply a bit more than 'lobbying' (that you might get here for example). It doesn't mean rich and has nothing to do with oil. It's just the Russian oligarchs are rich oil people in the main.
They have untold wealth, generally stolen from the people with the collapse of the Soviet Union. This wealth gives them influence. Whether that means actual 'ruling' power in the literal sense I'm not so sure. Putin seems a bit of an autocrat to me. And Russia has 100 billionaires apparently. But for some of them at least their wealth gives influence beyond what normal 'lobbying' might do in say the U.K. If that's oligarchy, then maybe the word applies to some other countries too, like the USA.
8ball
Decolonise colons!
Doesn't get used so much because their power did not come from kleptocratic proximity to centres of power during a massive collapse and theft of state owned assets.
Is def applicable to China imo, and I'd say we don't use it much in the West for the same reason they don't openly use the term so much in Russia.
Like planetgeli says, there about a hundred of them. I'd hardly call something 'Russophobic' when it applies to 100 people out of 258 million, any more than it is anti-British to call James Dyson a cunt.
Orang Utan
Psychick Worrier Ov Geyoor
I had assumed the oli- referred to oil, as in oleaginous
Ĝasper
Well-Known Member
Listened to a colleague's rant about the backhanded compliment of calling Zelenskyy a comedian unlikely to become president. He's acted in all kinds of genres, theatre, comedy, serious stuff. Basically an intellectual. And building something from scratch, with a tight-knit team for years.I know many have a good grasp of how Zelensky became president, but this is a great article about his life.
Zelensky’s unlikely journey from comedian to Ukrainian hero
Zelensky’s unlikely journey from comedian to Ukrainian hero
The comedian actually became president after starring in a TV show about a teacher who seeks office after becoming fed up with corrupt politicians.www.thejournal.ie
andysays
Love and solidarity
That's only its recent usage though, the word doesn't originally have any suggestion of theft following a collapse.
I remember someone I knew studying politics A level 40 years ago saying that we in Britain were governed by an elected oligarchy, which was correct then and it's obviously still correct now.
But yeah, the word oligarch now does tend to refer to those who gained enormous wealth and power very quickly and by dodgy methods after the collapse of the Soviet Union. There are also eg Ukrainian oligarchs as well as Russians though.
_Russ_
Never not Knowingly Misunderstood
Moving back on Topic, recent chatter of letting Poland give a large number of Mig 29s to Ukraine (to be picked up by Ukrainian Pilots and replaced in Poland by US Supplied F16s) might escalate matters if it happens.
I was hoping NATO would throw bundles of Combat drones at Ukraine F.O.C. in the first few days but that didnt happen.
IMO Yes there is War in Europe already and Im not sure if the current NATO position of no direct conflict is sustainable.
Putin has flipped yes, but NATO's expansionist reality certainly helped prod him.
I believe that unless someone can bump off Putin and cooler heads replace him then Russia has to be militarily defeated in Ukraine or War will spread
I was hoping NATO would throw bundles of Combat drones at Ukraine F.O.C. in the first few days but that didnt happen.
IMO Yes there is War in Europe already and Im not sure if the current NATO position of no direct conflict is sustainable.
Putin has flipped yes, but NATO's expansionist reality certainly helped prod him.
I believe that unless someone can bump off Putin and cooler heads replace him then Russia has to be militarily defeated in Ukraine or War will spread
planetgeli
There's no future in England's dreaming
12km apparently.
existentialist
Tired and unemotional
Most people's mental image of nuclear war - understandably enough - tends to be based around the idea of a maximum nuclear exchange. I think that, if (hopefully not when) a nuclear attack occurs, we may well find that the outcome is not quite as apocalyptic as we imagine it is going to be. Which is not in any way to suggest that it won't be anything less than appalling, but I really could see a situation where a tactical nuclear weapon was employed and the whole thing didn't escalate to a full-on MAD scenario.
But a red line would have been crossed, and I am certain that such a use would prompt NATO to seriously escalate its (conventional) response - indeed, I would hope that it did, because failing to do so would only encourage Russia to up the stakes even further). Which, in turn, could eventually become a strategic nuclear exchange, but I don't think that is guaranteed at all.
Cold comfort, perhaps, and no consolation to those in the vicinity of the nuclear explosion, but perhaps not as overwhelmingly bleak as we might imagine.
It's also worth noting that the nuclear threat we're all terrified of tends to be perceived as a situation where an entire nation is flattened by the detonation of nuclear weapons. But the reality is somewhat less apocalyptic, at least generally. A typical 50kT tactical nuke (roughly the size of the weapons in Russia's tactical nuclear arsenal) would break windows (light blast radius - 1psi overpressure) over an area of some 170 sq.km - for comparison, the land area of Ukraine is somewhat over 600,000 sq.km. Locally, the effect would be devastating, but we'd be a long way from turning Europe into a wasteland.
This is meant to be encouraging.
bmd
Island in the stream.
Did you hear a rich Russian dude on BBC4 R4 PM last week? I've looked for it but can't find it. The Russian was claiming that he was the victim of xenophobia and that he was simply a UK citizen paying UK taxes living in a UK house, running a UK business generating UK jobs that pay UK income tax and UK NI.
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