OPINION: What can San Franciscans do? Lifelong Giants fans know how to root for an underdog. San Franciscans are showing blue and gold flag Zoom backdrops, sending aid and demonstrating publicly. We are rooting for Ukrainians, rooting for Zelensky.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine during a news conference in Kyiv, March 3, 2022. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky came to America a few months back to cajole and plead for support — both military and political. He saw the storm coming. It is now a Putin-driven hailstorm of rockets and bullets raining down on cities and civilians. Urban residents have gone from sheltering-in-place against COVID to picking up arms to fight in the streets.
Zelensky then jumped in a car and headed to Mountain View to visit the Adjutant General David S. Baldwin, to review the California National Guard at Moffett Field. I was there for much of Zelensky’s time with my wife, Lt.
The juxtaposition of war abroad and peace at home creates for a schizophrenic present, for cognitive dissonance. America just pulled out of its longest war in Afghanistan — a war that was mostly out of sight and, for both citizens and political leaders, is now out of mind. The Taliban was outgunned and outmanned, too, but the U.S. was not going to enter into World War III to oppose the Taliban. Also, nuclear conflagration from Afghanistan was never a threat. Putin, on the other hand, is ready to pull the nuclear trigger.