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Articles written by Rube Render


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  • Opinion: Document reveal already covered

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Mar 16, 2024

    On the first of March, The Wall Street Journal published an article by Max Colchester, Thomas Grove and Janes Marso. The headline read, “Document From 2022 Reveals Putin’s Punishing Terms for Peace.” A secondary headline read, “Draft peace deal drawn up shortly after Russia’s invasion shows Ukraine was confronted with becoming a neutered state.” The article discussed the peace negotiations held in Istanbul between Ukraine and Russia during March and April of 2022....

  • Opinion: Are we sleepwalking to WWIII?

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Mar 9, 2024

    In February 2023, at the first anniversary of the Ukraine war, Gen. Mark Milley told a news conference, “Russia is now a global pariah and the world remains inspired by Ukrainian bravery and resilience. In short, Russia has lost — they’ve lost strategically, operationally, and tactically.” That sentiment has been repeated ad infinitum by Joe Biden, Jake Sullivan, Antony Blinken and Lloyd Austin. At the second anniversary, during a House Armed Services Committee...

  • Opinion: Biden, Trump likely to sweep primaries

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Mar 2, 2024

    As of today, six states and the Virgin Islands have held their primary elections or caucuses. Early voting for the much-touted Super Tuesday primaries has begun. Fifteen states and American Samoa will vote or caucus on March 5 to determine who will be candidates for the general elections in November. I can’t remember a time when Super Tuesday was this irrelevant. Both the Republican and Democrat candidates have been nominally selected, if not actually chiseled into stone....

  • Opinion: Europeans need to 'cowboy up'

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Feb 24, 2024

    When the Persian king Cyrus the Great established his empire, he divided his holdings into territories or provinces called satrapies. A satrapy was ruled by a satrap who served as a viceroy to the king, but had significant powers of his own. In medieval Europe, satrapies eventually became referred to as vassal states. A vassal state had a mutual obligation to a superior state or empire. Vassal states are generally called client states today. If King Cyrus returned to the...

  • Opinion: Biden not competent for presidency

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Feb 17, 2024

    The 345-page Hur Report landed on the Biden presidential campaign like a 345-pound bomb. The report didn’t start out that way, but eventually it got toxic. Hur decided not to charge Biden with anything that had to do with classified documents. In point of fact, due to the Justice Department’s policy that a sitting president can’t be indicted, Hur had no choice. He couldn’t indict Biden. Hur’s statement that, “our investigation uncovered evidence that President...

  • Opinion: Funding Ukraine won't stop chaos

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Feb 10, 2024

    The world is in chaos. Ukraine is running out of men, material and munitions to fight the war, while the two Zs, Zelensky and Zaluzhnyi, are sparring to see who is in charge. Even with the assistance of U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, President Zelensky can’t seem to fire Gen. Zaluzhnyi, who refuses to leave his post. Also in gridlock is the parliament of Ukraine, who can’t pass a mobilization law that will satisfy everyone and still provide the military...

  • Opinion: Best option: Leave Syria, Iraq now

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Feb 3, 2024

    For the last few weeks, U.S. troops stationed in Syria and Iraq have been taking in-coming rocket, missile and drone attacks. News reports claimed that more than 140 attacks on American troops in Iraq and Syria had been carried out with 70 members wounded and no fatalities. The pentagon faced a quandary that although a response of some kind was required, care had to be taken to ensure that the response taken would not escalate the conflict into a full-blown war. Officials...

  • Opinion: Biden should put U.S. security first

    Rube Render, Correspondent|Updated Jan 27, 2024

    You can’t be on the internet for 10 minutes without stumbling onto some sort of clickbait icon. The original clickbait is the newspaper headline, honed to a fine point by the supermarket tabloids. Who can resist “Blind Man Gets 20/20 Vision After Eating 500 Bushels of Carrots?” You just gotta buy that rag. Because I’m a reader of newspapers, I’m a collector of headlines. One that caught my eye recently was, “Economy Better, but People Feel Worse.” The writer...

  • Opinion: Austin should step down after protocol breach

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Jan 20, 2024

    When I left active duty in 1980 and went to work in the civilian economy, I knew who my boss was and who my boss’ boss was. After that, the line of who was in charge, up to the chief executive of the company, was kind of fuzzy. This was not true in the military, where I could name my bosses’ bosses, from my individual commander, up through the military rank structure to commandant and then secretary of defense and the commander in chief. We were required to learn this...

  • Opinion: Trump's words most likely satirical

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Jan 13, 2024

    Alfred, Lord Tennyson, in his poem “Locksley Hall,” penned the line, “In spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love.” But then Tennyson was a poet, and he never heard of baseball or presidential politics. I’ll leave the baseball intimation to the sports page and use some of my time to talk about politics. Although the vast majority of voters will not begin to pay attention to presidential politics until after Labor Day, the 15% of the public who...

  • Opinion: Europeans need that cheap Russian energy

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Jan 6, 2024

    Two of the greatest miscalculations made by NATO and the Collective West regarding the Ukraine Project are that the Russian economy would collapse as a result of the economic sanctions imposed on it and that the Russian army would collapse when the Spring Counter-Offensive launched its drive to Melitopol and the Sea of Azov, to cut off Crimea. After more than 10 increasingly restrictive sets of sanctions, international institutions including the World Bank as well as...

  • Opinion: Enemy has a vote in freezing war

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Dec 30, 2023

    The collective West has held multiple meetings with itself to decide what should be done to end the fighting in Ukraine. These meetings have included as many as 30 to 40 countries. Noticeably absent from all of these has been Russia. Most of these meetings have decided that Ukraine should “freeze” the war, with the lines where they are today. This would allow Ukraine time to re-build its military, re-arm and allow it NATO membership. Vladimir Putin recently held his...

  • Opinion: No Christmas Truce likely this year

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Dec 23, 2023

    Today is Christmas Eve. Now that I am middle-aged, I have a tendency to reflect on Christmas days that have happened instead of Christmas days that will happen. I am blessed to be able to live with minimal assistance and to have my family around me when I need help. What follows are some Christmas memories. The chapel at St. Anthony’s, where my sister, little brother and I spent our early years, was decorated the same way every year. There were two large trees, one on each s...

  • Opinion: Ukraine out of money, men, time

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Dec 16, 2023

    Ukraine is in a state of disarray with the president of the country, Volodymyr Zelensky, in a major dispute, during an active war, with his senior military commander, Gen. Valerii Zaluzhnyi. And Zaluzhnyi is claiming the president by-passes the chain of command by maintaining parallel communication lines with chiefs of some military branches, including Ground Forces Commander Oleksandr Syrskyi and Air Force Commander Mykola Oleshchuk. Adding to this morass is the fact that...

  • Opinion: NATO won't back US in Ukraine

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Dec 9, 2023

    The Washington Post has published a massive two-part epic on the war in Ukraine and what happened there. It took that much paper and ink to inform the public that Ukraine blames the United States for not providing it with the necessary arms to defeat the Russians and the United States blames Ukraine for not fighting the war the way Ukraine should have. One finding that I absolutely agree with: “Ukrainian officials said the Americans didn’t seem to comprehend how attack...

  • Opinion: What a tangled web we weave

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Dec 2, 2023

    In early April 2022, Ukraine rejected an attempt to make peace with Russia. These mediation attempts were led by the then Israeli prime Minister Naftali Bennett and supported by Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder. The full story is related in a recently detailed article by Michael von der Schulenburg, a former United Nations assistant secretary-general, Hajo Funke, professor emeritus for political sciences of the...

  • Opinion: Ukraine solutions have shortcoming

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Nov 25, 2023

    Lately, there has been a plethora of articles appearing in the world press that decries the plight of Ukraine. The majority of these items contain some articulation of the fact that Ukraine is losing the war and running out of men, munitions and time. Additionally, President Zelenskyy is feuding with his military commander, Gen. Valerii Zaluzhny, and being hounded by his former strategic communications adviser, Oleksii Arestovych. Meanwhile, Zelenskyy has canceled the...

  • Opinion: Missing time in the U.S. Marines

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Nov 18, 2023

    Thanksgiving will fall on Nov. 23 this year. That’s a Thursday. Thanksgiving falls on a Thursday every year. As a matter of fact, Thanksgiving falls on the fourth Thursday of November every year. The day after Thanksgiving is the Friday after Thanksgiving. Everybody knows this, and many employers take this into consideration and arrange their schedules to give everyone a four-day weekend. The U.S. Marines are aware of this custom also, and when I worked for them, we usually...

  • Opinion: Take time to thank vets and wives

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Nov 11, 2023

    Nov. 11 was Armistice Day, a day designated to honor those lost in the Great War, or the “war to end all wars.” Would that it was so. Armistice Day became Veterans Day in 1954 and honors those who serve or served in all branches of the U.S. military. My heartfelt thanks to all who served and continue to serve in the military forces of our country. Nov. 10 was the 248th birthday of the U.S. Marines, and I would be remiss if I did not say to Marines everywhere, “To all...

  • Opinion: Numerous unknowns before us

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Nov 7, 2023

    Some years ago, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld wrote that there were known/knowns, known/unknowns and unknown/unknowns. Think about it. That’s things we know, things we know that we don’t know and things we don’t know we don’t know. It’s that last one that will put you in really deep kimchi. Jake Sullivan’s “Foreign Affairs” article prepared prior to Oct. 7, noting that the Middle East was quieter than it had been in two decades, is a classic example of u...

  • Numerous unknowns before us

    Rube Render, Correspondent|Updated Nov 4, 2023

    Some years ago, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld wrote that there were known/knowns, known/unknowns and unknown/unknowns. Think about it. That’s things we know, things we know that we don’t know and things we don’t know we don’t know. It’s that last one that will put you in really deep kimchi. Jake Sullivan’s “Foreign Affairs” article prepared prior to Oct. 7, noting that the Middle East was quieter than it had been in two decades, is a classic example of... Full story

  • Opinion: Ukraine isn't in top five threats to US

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Oct 28, 2023

    I recently stumbled across a column in Axios, written by Jim VandeHei and Mike Allen. The article is based on “regular conversations with White House and congressional leaders, CEOs, and top technologists,” and is titled, “Behind the Curtain: Rattled U.S. Government Fears Wars Could Spread.” My sources consist of aging retired military personnel, many of whom spent time in Sunny South-East Asia. We reached that same conclusion a while ago. The writers list a...

  • Opinion: Iran, Russia accusations hypocritical

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Oct 21, 2023

    When I was a 19-year-old lance corporal, it was common to have open debates in the squad bay about the various wars or insurgencies that were going on, or had gone on in the past and what would be the best way to solve these conflicts. Inevitably the outcome of these debates was, “Kill ’em all and let God sort ’em out.” While this made perfect sense to young enlisted men, I never thought I’d hear it espoused from supposed mature, elected senators who like to...

  • Opinion: US likely to shift away from Ukraine

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Oct 14, 2023

    I am constantly reminded that most Americans have little interest in what goes on outside their own borders. As a matter of fact, during the football season, most Americans have little interest in what goes on off the gridiron, college or professional. In spite of all that is going on in Ukraine, the citizenry has pretty much given it the ho-hum treatment. After last weekend, all that is about to change. The Hamas attack on Israel put an end to U.S. indifference, probably...

  • Opinion: Russia sending message in Ukraine conflict

    Rube Render, Local columnist|Updated Oct 7, 2023

    The only people who believe Russia is winning the war are a smattering of retired U.S. military officers, retired CIA analysts, assorted writers of opinion columns and the Russian government. The chairman of Russia’s Duma, Vyacheslav Volodin, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Defense Chief Sergei Shoigu, speaking at different times, recently noted that Russia is not interested in a negotiated settlement with Ukraine. Volodin’s statement, “Ukraine must surrender...

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