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1) They say that "democratic process" must be followed in Crimea. But who voted for the current government in Kiev? No one. It was a violent coup. The democratically elected leader of Ukraine is Yanukovich. He offered new elections this year, and they threw him out. This is the democratic process that America is defending.
2) They say no one must violate Ukraine's "territorial integrity", but violating Iraq's is okay, or Grenada, Yemen, Haiti, Afghanistan or all the others documented here, whenever it suited their interests: http://academic.evergreen.edu/g/grossmaz/interventions.html.
3) They say no sovereign nation should be interfered with. Well, see #2. The Ukraine nation state is about as old as Justin Bieber, and about as rational. Russians make up 75% of Donetsk region, 70% of Lugansk region, 60% of the Crimea. Life is Russian in these states. They belong in Russia. We can debate the borderline states, but only the most blatant form of hegemonistic interference, by America, can stand in the way of the natural and finally inevitable self-rationalization of this nonsensical pseudo-country.
As long as such self-serving hypocrisy motivates America's response, Ukraine will only sink further into needless bloodshed, and that blood will be on America's head.

But now, an American solution!
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/henry-kissinger-to-settle-the-ukraine-crisis-start-at-the-end/2014/03/05/46dad868-a496-11e3-8466-d34c451760b9_story.html
Henry Kissinger says Ukraine should not be a battleground but a bridge between East and West--independent (of Russia at least) and neutral, like Finland.
Finland!
Yes Henry, anyone with the faintest acquaintance with the Slavic peoples know their many similarities with the Finnish. Merely consider the most obvious parallels between Ukraine and Finland: almost no corruption, high levels of economic and governmental transparency, an enlightened western-style democracy (never mind Maidan or the egg-throwing brawls in the Rada), one of the highest levels of standard of living in the world, linguistic and cultural homogeneity; like Ukraine, "Finland is a top performer in numerous metrics of national performance, including education, economic competitiveness, civil liberties, quality of life, and human development. In 2010, Newsweek magazine ranked Finland as the overall "best country in the world" after summing various factors."
Okay, but Ukraine a close second!

Spoken like a true (good) American!
But now the facts.
1) Crimea has always been a part--an integral part--of Russia, including when Khrushchov 'gave' it to the Soviet State of Ukraine (= Russia).
2) Only a fool (which I'm sure you're not; nor is Kissinger--except about Finland, hahaha) could think that Russia will ever, ever risk its Black Sea interests. It would be like giving away Hawaii...go ahead!
3) Of course there was vote rigging in Crimea--this is how Slavic elections work--the same way you put on more make-up for the opera than for the garden (I assume).
4) But there is no doubt in anybody's mind, including the Crimean Ukrainians and Tartars, that a solid majority was in place (maybe 67%, not 97%).
5) The reason--the right reason--in case your interested, for the soldiers and folk music, was simply to remind the people of #1 and #2, and thus, the fact that a solid majority was the key to their peaceful future existence. This is merely good transparent campaigning, as in America. Ask Bush and the NSA.

So, the Crimea is Russian once again.
And congratulations to America for waving their hands impressively (good transparent campaigning) and doing absolutely nothing of consequence to make matters worse here. But instead, allowing the democratic process to take place. Three cheers for democracy! Three cheers for America!
And so far, no blood--well, not much, they made Maidan worse--on their head.
Americans are fools in a deeper way.

And what now?
Now Putin 'lays low', as you say, allowing the Crimean reality to sink in, and the Russian east of Ukraine to mount the media war which, like traditional artillery, is critical to softening up the enemy before the formal attack is launched. This will go on for some time, until he and the overwhelmingly Russian east Ukraine feel things are ready.
Then, the Donetsk referendum.
And so on.

And America will wave its hands, and feet, and do absolutely nothing of consequence, because of the even more forceful reasons above in the case of Donetsk.
Unless Ukrainians die. Many. On tv.
If many die, and I mean many, and on tv--if it's not on tv it didn't happen for Americans--they may risk something of consequence to themselves...say, one of their cool robot bombers.
But let us wait for the blood (though they are cool); this is all fantasy at this point.

Well at least we (I mean Americans) have this much right (in spite of the media's efforts to convince us otherwise)...

Poll: Americans say Putin not like Hitler
Posted by
CNN Political Editor Paul Steinhauser and CNN's Dan Merica
(CNN) - The vast majority of Americans say Vladimir Putin's not honest or trustworthy, but according to a new national poll they don't compare the Russian president's actions in Ukraine with the land grabs in the years leading up to World War II by Germany's Adolf Hitler.

A Quinnipiac University survey released Wednesday indicates that only 24% of the public equates Putin's annexing last month of neighboring Ukraine's Crimea peninsula with Hitler's actions, with 51% saying that's too strong a comparison. Just over one in five admitted they don't know enough about pre-Second World War history to answer the question.

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2014/04/02/poll-americans-say-putin-not-like-hitler/?hpt=hp_t3

And now the Donetsk (etc.) referendum, which America "will not recognize"...ouch!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/ukraine/10754873/Kiev-warns-of-force-as-separatists-build-barricades-in-east-Ukraine.html
Crow about the sovereignty of a nonsensical twenty-year-old paper country, and you're nothing more than a parrot.

I see that Ukraine has struck back, clearing out the separatists in Kharkiv, with no action from Russia. A wrinkle in the master plan, Dima?

Just back from a busy week in Slovyansk and country, visiting friends and sightseeing—благодаря Ольга!
(Are you okay there?)
Exactly right about Russian view. McDermott is a worried man, I have seen other things of his. And he is right to be worried, because no one is listening to him! America only listens to him worry, and thinks nonsense about cold wars and such.
Russia was a proud and stupid country. Now it is a humiliated and stupid country. It has remained vigorously stupid over this quarter-century, and now looks much—and acts much—like Germany in the 1930s, another proud and stupid country, equally capable of great things.
First Crimea, now Sudetenland. Henlein in Carlsbad, Ponomaryov in Slovyansk.

This almost says it all.
http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20140501-718623.html
"I'm just kidding."
Right out of Gogol.

And so the Donetsk referendum, with Tsar Vladimir playing his part in the last days of the pre-referendum media war to perfection: celebrating the result of the Crimean referendum while poo-pooing exactly the same thing in even more heavily Russian Donetsk.
According to my Russian friends in Ukraine, who are going to the 'so-called' polls tomorrow, a pregnant women was burned to so-called death in the Odessa trade unions building, two so-called children of three, along with their grandmother, were shot dead by a fascist sniper, and a young couple, with their child, who drove through a barricade in Slovyansk, were gunned down in their so-called car.
And more from our local sage, John Kerry, Stenographer of State for President Neville Obama:
"This is really the Crimea playbook all over again, and no civilised nation is going to recognise the results of such a bogus effort.
We flatly reject this illegal effort to further divide Ukraine."
Unfortunately, John, the uncivilised nations, the nations who stand outside the White House in their underwear, hailing a cab for some pizza, will recognize the results, while the civilised nations continue to waste our time with nonsense like yours.
The uncivilised nations think, hey, if you want a pizza, get one, don't sit around talking about it forever.
Speaking of which, I hear much about NATO's military chest thumping to 'reassure' the allies it swallowed up in its inexorable march to the borders of Russia, but I hear nothing about about a United Nations peacekeeping force being deployed in Ukraine.
Why is that?

American hypocrisy is fairly clear here, at least with respect to their constant declarations that 'international law' is being violated. Granted, the Obama administration may have a better record than previous administrations with respect to international law, but all presidents must take some responsibility for the actions of their predecessors. More importantly, it seems intellectually dishonest to suggest that international law has ever been capable of dealing with these kinds of high-level, existential geopolitical problems. If it weren't for it couching so many of its proclamations in legalistic terminology, America's statements would be a lot easier to take.

In contrast, Russia's statements are often so obviously and ridiculously hypocritical and self-serving--and even blatantly untrue--that there is a strange kind of honesty to them. It is as if Russia and its supporters are essentially saying that this game of words is irrelevant bullshit--a Western, effete game that they are mocking by playing, but with no concern for the truth. They feel free to say whatever they want because they don't take words seriously--theirs or the West's.

What I do find interesting is speculating what each of the Ukrainian sides really want--or will one day desire. The ethnic and/or linguistic Russians are being driven by other considerations at the moment, but I suspect that one day (for good or ill) they will succumb to the 'Disneyland' phenomenon, and wish they had sided with Europe. And Ukrainian Ukrainians may one day look back and wonder why they ever fought to keep the Crimea and the Donetsk region. Once they get past the national pride-driven desire for pure, aggregate national power, they may just start to focus on becoming as individually rich as they can (as many smaller countries eventually do). Decades from now, the 'rump' Ukraine may look back and see the predominantly Russian-speaking regions as economic millstones they have become quite happy to have gotten rid of.

Damn, just when you had him on his knees...http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/05/21/china-russia-gas-deal/9365155/

"It's a demonstration of the fact that Russia always has and always will have other options to develop relations elsewhere. The threat of isolation coming from the West will not be complete," Sergei Utkin, political expert at the Russian Academy of Sciences, said.

I see an idea being implied that reminds me of the old adage that the opposite of love is not hate, but rather apathy. Here, the notion that seems to be being suggested is that the true opposite of magnanimous behavior is not pusillanimous behavior, but rather the soulless prioritization of materialism over all other, more human considerations. Such a point of view is not without merit, but it also leads to some startling implications.
For a start, it tends to turn the accepted roster of heroes and villains on its head. If the the Russian team is to be cheered for because, at the end of the day, despite the general thuggishness and small-mindedness with which they are being pursued, notions of tribe, language, and culture are still preferable to subjugating all human feeling and history to whatever is most efficient with regards to making money, then what about cultural conservatives in America, or even Muslim 'extremists' (or --dare I say it--terrorists) fighting to preserve their way of life, which for all the evil in some of it, still seems far more human than the West's prescription of liberal humanist capitalism for all.
And of course all of this begs the question: when is a more human course of action so evil that it becomes worse than the less human, materialist alternative? This is probably to abstract to be answered now, but something to be kept in mind. At the moment, there is a relative balance of thuggery on all sides. But I imagine that it won't be too long before this balance is broken, and the European-looking Ukrainians adopt a seemingly less primitive and apparently more benign Western approach to things that contrasts more markedly with Russian behavior.