Even though I have been glued to the computer while following the events in Ukraine, not everyone is engaged in the conflict....
When I was in college, I dated a young teacher. Her grasp on current events was very poor and one day we were in casual conversation about the news of the day. She admitted it's not important to know everything that's going on the world, she didn't even know the 50 states.
I stopped her cold "what did you say?"
"I don't know all 50 states. In teaching, you have to know how to teach. You don't have to memorize every tiny little detail in the world, the textbook has all the answers. You have to know where to find the answers. What you learn in college is the process of teaching."
I was incredulous. "Listen, there's a certain baseline of knowledge of what a teacher should know-"
She kind of snipped at me, "there's really not-"
And every day there's people out there trying to get up to speed on the Ukraine Invasion, and then there's a certain segment of the population that does not care.
But as soon as I saw this headline at the Drudge Report, I knew that Putin had lost the PR War. One of the things that Putin USED to pride himself on, was optics. You've seen the pictures of shirtless Putin riding a horse, or carrying firearms, or lingering around the Olympics (2014) or World Cup (2018). Putin tried to convey that he oozed Male Machismo.
Since Covid hit, Putin has walled himself into his own little world, reading old history books. One picture of Ukrainian Leader Zelensky is undoing decades of Putin's image manipulation.
The casual world citizen used to think of Putin as his own man. Now they are starting to see him as creaky ol' man Brezhnev, hidden away from the masses. Images of Zelensky running around in his army fatigues and bullet proof vest have even made their way down to local news broadcasts and the most casual social media user.
Young people now see Zelensky as the virile world leader.
Now don't start talking to me about NATO or Crimea or post-Soviet alliances. I am not talking about the intricacies of foreign relations.
Don't get me wrong, next week, next month, or next year, I am afraid that Putin is still going to have Zelensky killed. That's his method of operations. But what Putin doesn't understand is that when he finally pops his head out of that gopher hole, that the average world citizen, who usually doesn't even pay attention to what's going on down their own block, has already turned against him.
