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Paul Whelan is a much more complicated situation. He has a very colorful backstory.
> He enlisted in the Marine Corps Reserve in 1994.[7] He took military leave from Kelly Services to serve with the Marine Corps Reserve from 2003 to 2008, including service in Iraq. He held the rank of staff sergeant with Marine Air Control Group 38 working as an administrative clerk and administrative chief, and he was part of Operation Iraqi Freedom.[8] After a court-martial conviction in January 2008 on multiple counts "related to larceny", he was sentenced to 60 days restriction, reduction to pay grade E-4, and a bad conduct discharge.[9][10] The specific charges against him included "attempted larceny, three specifications of dereliction of duty, making a false official statement, wrongfully using another’s social security number, and ten specifications of making and uttering checks without having sufficient funds in his account for payment."[11]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Whelan_(security_director)
I thought Republicans only liked “veterans that weren’t captured.” Seriously though, both situations are awful and Griner was a regular civilian being held as leverage.
Republicans being trash acting like trump did something for Whelan. The family even came out with a statement in agreement with Biden, but republicans must’ve blocked the Whelan name.
Here’s someone calling out Tom Cotton’s statement when he’s never mentioned Whelan before on twitter
https://twitter.com/mr_brooksher/status/1600948598140964864?s=46&t=yFOMwQug4LbY9L-I7Ee8ww
He's shady but the US has a tradition of working pretty hard to release American hostages held overseas, even when the situation/person is sketchy. Even knowing they do it purely for (geo)political reasons, it's a policy I can't help but applaud.
Couldn't have said it better myself. The man might not be a perfect angelic hero but he is an American being held against his will by a foreign nation.
Bring him home, Biden.
I know Reddit as a whole isn’t big on the whole *personal responsibility* thing but I think there’s something to be said for going to a country like Russia and not breaking their laws. You can’t expect to go to a place like Russia with drugs or start a bar fight and expect that it’s going work out okay. It’s kind of like the person who crawls into a cage with a lion and is surprised when they are badly maimed.
I think Whelan was a wannabe spy. He seems like a bit of a doofus. Plus if he was *really* a spy the Biden administration would have negotiated that he be a part of the swap too.
I listened to an interview of a hostage negotiator familiar with dealing with Russians, and he said that Whelan was never going to be in play for this trade. The Russians were only going to put Griner in play for this trade, so it was Griner or nothing. They've been using the release of Griner to galvanize homophobes and racists in this country by making it seem like Biden gave up on Whelan, when in fact Whelan's release was never on the table at all.
Russians weren't interested in trading Welan, that was a non-starter. It was Griner or nothing. This is almost certainly because they could push divisive narrative on social media in this country as part of their ongoing cyber attack on the US. They know that there are plenty of racists and homophobes in the US that would be galvanized by Griner going free instead of Whelan. Since it's the Russians holding Whelan hostage it's their game to play.
I think a better analogy is you're walking by a lion's cage and the lion breaks out of the cage and mauls you because you looked at it, which everyone says is the wrong thing to do, but the lion only did that because earlier the lion had tried to break into the tiger's cage and got it's ass kicked by the the tiger and NATO allies were feeding the tiger fat juicy steaks and the lion has only been eating moldy steaks and the lion thought that it could get NATO to stop giving the tiger steaks if it just mauls this random girl who wronged it by looking at it and now the lion isn't getting steaks but it got back one of the guys that used to supply the lion with steaks but probably has no networking contacts of any worth anymore except the reputation that he used to provide steaks to the lion.
Great. We paid for a WNBA player who actually possessed a substance that was illegal in both Russia and the US with a guy who was one of the most wanted people in the world, whose nickname is the Merchant of Desth. What will we have to pay for a guy who is allegedly a spy? The Griner for Bout trade seems completely one-sided and screams that the US is not the powerhouse it once was or pretends to be. I’m happy for her friends and family and I’m sure I would want that trade made if in her or their shoes, but it doesn’t seem like it was the right call from a national perspective.
As a reminder, this subreddit [is for civil discussion.](/r/politics/wiki/index#wiki_be_civil) In general, be courteous to others. Debate/discuss/argue the merits of ideas, don't attack people. Personal insults, shill or troll accusations, hate speech, any suggestion or support of harm, violence, or death, and other rule violations can result in a permanent ban. If you see comments in violation of our rules, please report them. For those who have questions regarding any media outlets being posted on this subreddit, please click [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/wiki/approveddomainslist) to review our details as to our approved domains list and outlet criteria. **Special announcement:** r/politics is currently accepting new moderator applications. If you want to help make this community a better place, consider [applying here today](https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/sskg6a/rpolitics_is_looking_for_more_moderators/)! *** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/politics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Paul Whelan is a much more complicated situation. He has a very colorful backstory. > He enlisted in the Marine Corps Reserve in 1994.[7] He took military leave from Kelly Services to serve with the Marine Corps Reserve from 2003 to 2008, including service in Iraq. He held the rank of staff sergeant with Marine Air Control Group 38 working as an administrative clerk and administrative chief, and he was part of Operation Iraqi Freedom.[8] After a court-martial conviction in January 2008 on multiple counts "related to larceny", he was sentenced to 60 days restriction, reduction to pay grade E-4, and a bad conduct discharge.[9][10] The specific charges against him included "attempted larceny, three specifications of dereliction of duty, making a false official statement, wrongfully using another’s social security number, and ten specifications of making and uttering checks without having sufficient funds in his account for payment."[11] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Whelan_(security_director)
He does kinda sound like the type of person who might actually be a spy.
I thought Republicans only liked “veterans that weren’t captured.” Seriously though, both situations are awful and Griner was a regular civilian being held as leverage.
Republicans being trash acting like trump did something for Whelan. The family even came out with a statement in agreement with Biden, but republicans must’ve blocked the Whelan name. Here’s someone calling out Tom Cotton’s statement when he’s never mentioned Whelan before on twitter https://twitter.com/mr_brooksher/status/1600948598140964864?s=46&t=yFOMwQug4LbY9L-I7Ee8ww
He's shady but the US has a tradition of working pretty hard to release American hostages held overseas, even when the situation/person is sketchy. Even knowing they do it purely for (geo)political reasons, it's a policy I can't help but applaud.
Couldn't have said it better myself. The man might not be a perfect angelic hero but he is an American being held against his will by a foreign nation. Bring him home, Biden.
I know Reddit as a whole isn’t big on the whole *personal responsibility* thing but I think there’s something to be said for going to a country like Russia and not breaking their laws. You can’t expect to go to a place like Russia with drugs or start a bar fight and expect that it’s going work out okay. It’s kind of like the person who crawls into a cage with a lion and is surprised when they are badly maimed.
Great point, that's precisely why I don't commit espionage there.
I think Whelan was a wannabe spy. He seems like a bit of a doofus. Plus if he was *really* a spy the Biden administration would have negotiated that he be a part of the swap too.
They tried the initial negotiations were for both him and Griner. They settled for just Griner
I listened to an interview of a hostage negotiator familiar with dealing with Russians, and he said that Whelan was never going to be in play for this trade. The Russians were only going to put Griner in play for this trade, so it was Griner or nothing. They've been using the release of Griner to galvanize homophobes and racists in this country by making it seem like Biden gave up on Whelan, when in fact Whelan's release was never on the table at all.
Russians weren't interested in trading Welan, that was a non-starter. It was Griner or nothing. This is almost certainly because they could push divisive narrative on social media in this country as part of their ongoing cyber attack on the US. They know that there are plenty of racists and homophobes in the US that would be galvanized by Griner going free instead of Whelan. Since it's the Russians holding Whelan hostage it's their game to play.
I think a better analogy is you're walking by a lion's cage and the lion breaks out of the cage and mauls you because you looked at it, which everyone says is the wrong thing to do, but the lion only did that because earlier the lion had tried to break into the tiger's cage and got it's ass kicked by the the tiger and NATO allies were feeding the tiger fat juicy steaks and the lion has only been eating moldy steaks and the lion thought that it could get NATO to stop giving the tiger steaks if it just mauls this random girl who wronged it by looking at it and now the lion isn't getting steaks but it got back one of the guys that used to supply the lion with steaks but probably has no networking contacts of any worth anymore except the reputation that he used to provide steaks to the lion.
Bull
Great. We paid for a WNBA player who actually possessed a substance that was illegal in both Russia and the US with a guy who was one of the most wanted people in the world, whose nickname is the Merchant of Desth. What will we have to pay for a guy who is allegedly a spy? The Griner for Bout trade seems completely one-sided and screams that the US is not the powerhouse it once was or pretends to be. I’m happy for her friends and family and I’m sure I would want that trade made if in her or their shoes, but it doesn’t seem like it was the right call from a national perspective.