End of the ColdWar--25 years later

The Soviet Union collapsed 25 years ago today and it disappeared with barely a whisper.  There was no great revolt, no failed Third World War, no civil war.  Gorbachev left a letter of resignation on the desk in the Kremlin and left.

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

 TS Elliot's poem was, as the Brits say, "spot on."

The Soviet system was literally sick and dying.  Andropov and Chernenko were only around for a year and state funerals were becoming annual events.  Mikhail Gorbachev saw there had to be change and we had glastnost and pereskroika

And an attempted coup by the KGB in August 1991 and the collapse began in slow motion.

There was talk about the "end of history"(idiots!) and a peace dividend.

The West blew it.

American foreign policy became hyper agressive and the European Union is just as tyrannical as the Soviet Union.  Then we were straddled with the millstone of Political Correctness.

Like its Soviet predecessor, we see the cracks in the EU and Political Correctness.  They are not invincible monoliths that cannot be stopped.  They have weaknesses because they are built on lies.  Internal contradictions are the worst kind.

Like I wrote earlier, the first age of the Cold War era is over. Brexit and Trump (?!) are the beginning of something else.  Good,bad, in between, remains to be be seen.

Humanity's natural state is to be free.Yes, there must be order, but once it becomes the Evil Empire, conflict arises, trouble begins, and in the end, oppression will fail.  Moscow was smart and left before it became bloody.  Over here, we had an election.

Now, let's do it right.

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, say what you want,but don't tell others what to say.

That lesson was free :-)