Ukraine

I think that there is little danger of us getting into a shooting war. I'm thinking that should sanction aggressive countries. I might feel differently if Ukraine was part of our national interest, but I don't think that it is.

I think that Putin's gamble was that we would give him the concessions he wants. This might turn out badly for him if he actually invades Ukraine.

China is so terrible on human rights that I feel strongly that we should slowly phase out trade with them. We could impose a 5 to 10% tariff that increases indefinitely 5 to 10% per year until China is willing to respect human rights more. We could demand that they be more open about the origins of COVID.

We are currently very dependent on trade with China, but that doesn't mean that we couldn't adapt. We could bring manufacturing home, and trade with other countries with cheap labor, like Mexico.

Best wishes,

John Coffey

On Tue, Jan 25, 2022 at 12:11 PM Albert > wrote:

More people have invaded the United States as compared to Ukraine in the past year. Even if the Russians invade, Ukraine will have fewer "illegal aliens" than we have.


On a serious note, we need to be careful how we handle the Russian/ Ukraine situation. No one is going to support the use of troops. No one is going to support the casualties we'll suffer if we send in troops. Keep in mind we weren't able to beat the Taliban with the best military with top-of-the-line equipment. Imagine how "well" we would do against a modern equally equipped military force. Maybe, not so good.