There needs to be a universal understanding of what is transpiring in Ukraine. Stay with me, as I will say this slowly and clearly: Vladimir Putin has attacked a sovereign country on Russia’s western border and is seeking to bring Ukrainians under Russian control; therefore, Vladimir Putin is the aggressor in this conflict.

OK. Are we clear on that?

What, then, in this world of ours is preventing some Americans — and some others around the world — from recognizing what is plainly obvious?

Some right-wing media nut jobs in the U.S.A. are suggesting out loud and in plain English that Ukraine has invited this naked aggression. By doing what, precisely? By, um, cozying up to its European neighbors? By suggesting it might want to join another treaty organization, such as, NATO?

Vladimir Putin’s flagrant assault on Ukraine is without a shred of merit.

The Russian dictator has lamented the end of the Soviet Union, calling it a dark day in history. He wants the USSR restored. I fear greatly he has re-started the Cold War with the United States and the rest of the “free world.”

He blusters about possessing those nukes and his top aides have threatened to use them if anyone interferes in this fight with Ukraine.

I now will remind Putin of the term with which I am certain he is familiar. That term is MAD, an acronym for “mutually assured destruction.” The United States has nukes, too, and the superpowers’ possession of those massive weapons kept them from destroying themselves and the rest of the world.

Putin’s aggression has brought us all — perhaps — to the brink of MADness once again.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com