Last edited Mon Mar 3, 2014, 10:20 AM - Edit history (1)

Not particularly competent, but democratically elected.

Do progressives do that nowadays?

If there's money to be made at the expense of others, leave it to the wealthy to find a way.

Link to it found at the end of the OP's Pando article, marked "Update".

https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2014/03/01/journalistic-independence/

I read both articles but still don't have any conclusions to draw from them, as I don't know enough about this Ukranian/Russian cast of characters yet. But GG's points ring true to me as far as they go.

Ordinary, run of the mill Ukrainians who were sick of corruption and meddling by its larger neighbor.

This was not a military coup. This was a street level revolution. And covertly facilitating a street level revolution involving thousands upon thousands of protesters is essentially an impossible task. So cut the conspiracy crap.

And frankly, if some force in the US wanted to enact regime change in Ukraine, knowing the response from Russia that everyone knew was coming, why would they have waited until after the Sochi games had begun? There would have been nothing more embarrassing to Russia than another major boycott of its Olympic games.

On the morning of 8 August, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who was in Beijing attending the 2008 Summer Olympics, condemned the Georgian government for aggression and breaking the Olympic truce, and that Russia would be compelled to retaliate.[91] By 09:30, President Medvedev convened an emergency session of government officials to consider Russia’s options regarding the conflict.[92]
...

After the opening ceremonies in Beijing for the Olympics, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said to U.S. President George W. Bush that a real war had begun in Ossetia, to which Bush replied that no one wanted war, and Putin added that it is difficult to maintain peace in the Caucasus.[115]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_Russia%E2%80%93Georgia_war

A military coup generally requires that the military be used.

It's a lot easier to buy off member's of a country's military than an entire populist opposition movement. Which makes your claim that western forces were at work buying off protesters extremely dubious.

a.k.a. the usual neocon suspects -- and not, it appears, the Obama administration.

p.s.thanks for posting this MattSh

Remember the revolution we had over NAFTA? The burning buildings, the barricades, the blood in the streets?

Or the near apocalyptic violence shaking our society over the TPP?

Obama does seem to have strong ties to some of these tech billionaires - but I don't see what he gets out of it. Possibly owns stock in certain oil companies? (Ukraine has reserves) That's all I can come up with.