Having just gone through and read that piece again, I honestly can't see a single grammatical mistake. There's one typo where he wrote 'wooly' instead of 'woolly' and there's the brain fart that you already highlighted. He's placed a couple of commas in places where I wouldn't have chosen to do it, but these are not errors as such, it's just a stylistic preference.

Seriously RJ, I think you need to chill about about Ricky's writing style. It's quite obvious that he types things out quickly and sometimes his fingers run ahead of his brain a little bit. So what ? I do the same quite regularly, it's just that I'm vain enough to always check after I hit the post button and make edits accordingly. Ricky is less bothered about that, and yes it can be irritating at times because it's distracting and makes reading his posts a little more difficult, but it's really not a big deal and I'm at a loss as to why you insist on making it one. Surely there's quite enough to criticise in his arguments without picking up on trivia like that ?

I can grade it if you would like. There are several errors.

I'm comfortable with my understanding of written English thanks.

I did miss one actually:

This is a religious war. (Propping up a despot wrapped in his Alawite religion)

The rest are just matters of stylistic preference. But honestly who gives a shit ?

I don't care about grammatical errors or spelling but the style can be difficult to get through (just be a little more careful that any insults are grammatical and spelled correctly...). A little needling is fair but I think that sometimes it becomes a technique to minimize his arguments. His content is usually clear enough and he makes his share of good points.

His whole post is painful to read. He is asking me to be specific about something, yet he seems to have no need to be specific about anything. Yes, it is irritating and hard to follow his arguments. Yes, his style is difficult to get through. Why should I have to spend my time diagnosing all of his slopping thinking and usage?

His incoherent writing style is indicative of his incoherent arguments. (Yes, some of his arguments are good.) If he cleaned up his writing, he would clean up his arguments. He regularly misquotes others. He says the same things over and over again. He quotes people, and then he launches into arguments that are not related to the quote at hand. He has no respect for the reader.

Sheesh.

Over the border to the north, do we think it was ISIS who bombed that leftist & pro-Kurdish peace march in Ankara? Or someone else?

Ricky:

rayjay

There are a lot of possibilities here

.
Any that are likely to please Putin? Please be specific.

It will please him to tell all sorts of regimes in the Middle East, Asia, and Africa that the US will not always back up its words with actions. It will please him to tell these regimes that Russian support can be counted on. It will please him to retain a naval base in the Med. It will please him to strengthen his influence in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Iran. It will please him to have a wedge issue against Europe as it pertains to immigration and to use this as a lever in negotiating vis-à-vis Ukraine.

As I said, these aren't all definite, but they are all possibilities. What additional specificity is required here?

danivon wrote:Sheesh.

Over the border to the north, do we think it was ISIS who bombed that leftist & pro-Kurdish peace march in Ankara? Or someone else?

No way to know. But ISIS usually claims credit when they do these sorts of things.

I tend not to buy into conspiracy theories. If it was genuinely a suicide bomber then I tend to think it would have been difficult for the Turkish government to rustle up a volunteer.

Oh, and...:

all of his slopping thinking

Tut tut

Sassenach wrote:I tend not to buy into conspiracy theories. If it was genuinely a suicide bomber then I tend to think it would have been difficult for the Turkish government to rustle up a volunteer.

Oh, and...:

all of his slopping thinking

Tut tut

Yes, very funny; I made a mistake. You've made some too. I'm not looking for perfect writing, but I am looking for more courtesy to the reader, and more honesty in postings.

ray

It will please him to tell all sorts of regimes in the Middle East, Asia, and Africa that the US will not always back up its words with actions.

He didn't need to put troops and planes in Syria to do this.Nor is it a big deal. nations understand the limitations that other nations are forced to operate under.

Ray

It will please him to tell these regimes that Russian support can be counted on

.
To do what? Bomb Sunnis? What does that tell them? The US and many other nations are bombing Sunnis too. Can they all be counted on ? How does the Russian involvement differ significantly from the other nations? Everyone is bombing in Syria now.

Ray

It will please him to retain a naval base in the Med.

They've had that since 71. Forgiving Syria's arms debt to Russia helped them achieve that. They didn't need to bomb to get access.
What strategic use has it been to Russia since then anyway? They have a small fleet there with limited capability.

Ray
It will please him to strengthen his influence in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Iran.

It would. But does he actually increase his influence in Lebanon or Iran? The Hezbollah/Iran relationship is because of the Shia religion.
The relationship between Russia and Iran is location based. They trade but are also trade rivals in oil and gas and some agriculture. Russia's main source of outside income. is oil and gas.
I genuinely doubt that bombing Sunnis will generate any long term benefit in the relationship. They are seen as outsiders and interlopers who will eventually leave. Just like the Americans.
And it will enrage Russians who are Sunni and may decide to become domestic terrorists in Russia.

Ray

It will please him to have a wedge issue against Europe as it pertains to immigration and to use this as a lever in negotiating vis-à-vis Ukraine

.
And how is his bombing in Syria helping his position in Ukraine?
He's creating more refugees, which is going to irritate most of the nations he needs to influence.
He's ignoring the fact that in Eastern Ukraine his involvement has achieved little of permanence but has resulted in crippling sanctions against Russia. (Made easier to apply by the Europeans by the Iran nuclear deal, offering them a source of gas and oil other than Russia) His Syrian involvement will not ease those sanctions or improve the performance of the rebels in East Ukraine.
The two are not linked.

Ray

Spend some time correcting your many grammatical mistakes, among others ("Syria would become a 'client state' of Syria"?), and I'll spend some time being specific

Your complaint is usually offered when you've run into a brick wall. Where you haven't marshaled your facts, and have done no research to back up your baseless claims. (And you don't know much about grammar really.)
You haven't been specific here. You've offered vague claims without regard to supporting the claim with evidence or rationale.

Ricky, I appreciate that you put some thought into your post.

Ray

Spend some time correcting your many grammatical mistakes, among others ("Syria would become a 'client state' of Syria"?), and I'll spend some time being specific

Your complaint is usually offered when you've run into a brick wall. Where you haven't marshaled your facts, and have done no research to back up your baseless claims. (And you don't know much about grammar really.)
You haven't been specific here. You've offered vague claims without regard to supporting the claim with evidence or rationale.

What baseless claim are you referring to? The claim I made before you launched into your tirades is this:

I think it is a real possibility that Assad will severely weaken all rebel groups (thanks to Russia air support and Iranian ground troops. I think it is possible that he would then defeat ISIS(with the help of others). I think it's reasonable to believe that the Sunnis will suffer mightily and many more will become refugees as a result. There are a lot of possibilities here

How do I go about proving that those are possibilities? The first sentence is already happening as is the 2nd to last. Long term, none of us really know. What are you claiming? Are you saying that none of this is possible? I think what you've written is possible, but not certain.

rickyp wrote:Fate

Yes, it is. Iran has plenty of oil. So does Iraq. Both will be Russian clients.

God your an idiot.
Iran is a competitor with Russia for the European market for oil. One of the consequences of the treaty with Iran is that European nations will have a source other than Russia for gas and oil. Its going to hurt Russia to have Iran competing for that market and the Asian market.
Iran will not be a "client" to anyone. (Iraq Will be Iran's but that's been the case since shortly after the US invasion.)

Yeah, I don't know what I'm talking about . . .

Or . . . you don't have a clue and should abandon your keyboard until you do.

Iran is not a Russian client?

U.S. officials are concerned that Russia is moving ahead with plans to sell Iran a sophisticated missile defense system that could undercut Washington's ability to challenge Tehran's airspace.

The advanced S-300 air defense system would mean that U.S. or Israeli warplanes likely couldn't sneak into Iranian airspace if they wanted to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities. Bombing the S-300 radar and missiles first would give the Iranians a warning that an attack would be on the way. http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/19/politics/ ... ense-sale/

Zarif said on August 17 that Iran attaches "huge significance" to relations with Russia and that the "the Vienna agreement is of great help to the development of relations between the two sides.

"We are confident that the Vienna agreement will have an enormous impact on developing ties between our two countries," Zarif said.

Russia is seen as eager to get a head start in what is expected to be an international race for lucrative contracts with Iran once sanctions are lifted. Of particular interest to Moscow is Iran's nuclear power sector.

Lavrov said on August 17 that a contract between Moscow and Tehran for the construction of eight nuclear units will strengthen Iran's power industry. Iranian and Russian officials announced in November that they had negotiated terms for the construction by Russia's state nuclear-power company Rosatom of four new reactors at Iran's existing, Russian-built Bushehr facility, and four more at another site in the country. http://www.rferl.org/content/russia-ira ... 92710.html

rickyp wrote:Iran's involvement in Syria is all about the support for the Alawite minority. They are a Shia sect and that comes down to the religious war... Sunni versus Shia.
They accept Russia's contribution against their enemies but they aren't aligning with them in a fundamental way.

You miss one tiny little point: Russia is attacking the Syrians our CIA has been training and equipping. In other words, our "allies" are under attack and Obama does . . . nothing. There's not even "harsh language."

Oh, well, he did warn Putin that he's making a mistake . . . which is pretty funny coming from Obama. How's Libya doing these days, Barack? Yemen? Iraq?

President Obama says we have a 60-plus nation "coalition" against ISIS. The Russian/Iranian/Assad alliance has done more, militarily, in a few weeks than our "coalition" has done in over a year.

You can say whatever you want. It would be nice if it occasionally reflected reality.

I would urge anyone who did not see the 60 Minutes interview with President Obama to watch it. If you still think he has a clue, feel free to post what in that interview bolstered your confidence.

This is a snippet of the interview, followed by a bit of analysis on MSNBC:

STEVE KROFT: You have been talking a lot about the moderate opposition in Syria. It seems very hard to identify. And you talked about the frustrations of trying to find some and train them. You had a half-a-billion dollars from congress to train and equip 5,000, and at the end, according to the commander of CENTCOM, you got 50 people, most of whom are, are dead or deserted. He said you've got four or five left.

BARACK OBAMA: Steve, this is why I've been skeptical from the get-go about the notion that we were going to effectively create this proxy army inside of Syria.

. . .

WILLIE GEIST: It cost about $500 million for five trained fighters. And he said you know what, I didn't really like that policy from the beginning. And Steve Kroft asked him, well then why did you go forth with it? Are you surprised at the way the president has talked so openly about his own disdain for that policy?

DAVID IGNATIUS: It was weird to me, Willie, in that he spoke almost like a man vindicated when a policy of his own administration had collapsed in failure. And he was, he took the line almost of, see, I told you so.

- See more at: http://newsbusters.org/blogs/nb/mark-fi ... hxVkT.dpuf