Quote Originally Posted by eisenherz View Post
For that argument to be valid, the 'election' would have to be free and fair in the first place. And that would imply: "no fraud and no intimidation." - both were not given. Do you honestly think any person in this referendum could have openly been against the 'separation' and vote 'pro-Kiev' without fear for his safety? Secondly I have seen documented instances where the same person voted at different times (voted more than once); and it is common knowledge that persons were allowed to vote on behalf of others. So this hardly qualifies for 'free and fair'. Having said this, i nevertheless believe that the majority in a genuinely fee and fair referendum would have been for independence; but not 85-90% of the vote.
I wouldn't honestly think that in the last Obama election people coulda been openly against Obama in a lot of cities in the US. But there were no mass executions here after the election and I haven't seen any news feeds about any mass executions of the 12% of the voters that voted against the referendum either.
Tbh, there have been lots of cases of voter fraud and voter intimidation in the US but the outcomes were still accepted. Another phrase that Americans like is "Innocent until proven guilty.". So if I don't see any proof of mass voter fraud or intimidation or both then I still stand by what I said. I accept the outcome of the referendums... until I'm proven wrong. And a few isolated cases of cheating isn't enough to prove that.

But those issues aren't as important as what the vote enabled - the rebuilding of those regions as separate, organized States with their own Military bases. And that's probably what the referendums were all about - to create a strong and accepted (by the people at least) Military front against the deadly assaults of the Ukrainian Military forces.