“NBC CALLS IT: John Fetterman wins Pennsylvania Senate race, defeating TV doctor Mehmet Oz and flipping key state for Democrats”
KGsays
I have a nasty feeling there’s a lot of “whistling past the graveyard” going on with regard to the midterms at places like DailyKos and Wonkette. I’ll be delighted to be proved wrong! – me@303
Well, I am (to a considerable extent) delighted to be proved (to a considerable extent) wrong! The Guardian still has the Republicans as likely to gain a small majority in the House*, but most of its coverage is: “Where’s the expected Red Wave?”. Without any acknowledgement, so far, that it got it wrong with its recent “Poised for sweeping gains” headlines. The polling post-mortems could be interesting: was the problem, as DK and Wonkette writers seemed to think, a deliberate Republican push to control the narrative with partisan polls, or a more ordinary failure on the part of pollsters to adjust their expectations of who was likely to vote?
*Which will of course stymie any legislative progress if it happens, but in my judgement would probably not seriously limit aid to Ukraine, on which the Republicans are split.
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian (support them if you can!) Ukraine liveblog. From there:
Russian-installed official in Kherson region dies in car crash – agencies
Kirill Stremousov, the deputy head of the Russian-installed administration in the Kherson region, has died in a car crash, state news agencies have reported, citing local Russian-backed officials.
According to local media, the accident happened near Henichesk, in the Kherson region.
Stremousov, previously an anti-vaccine blogger and political marginal, had emerged as one of the most prominent public faces of the Russian occupation of Ukraine, frequently using social media to record aggressive anti-Ukrainian videos.
Stremousov’s death comes as Ukraine appears to have launched a new offensive to recapture the key city of Kherson
In a video address late Tuesday, Stremousov said that Ukrainian forces gained a foothold on the northern edge of Snihurivka, a southern Ukrainian town that lies on a highway 31 kilometres north of Kherson.
Eastern European countries preparing for new refugee wave in winter
With Russian forces continuing to target Ukraine’s critical infrastructure, power grid and heating plants, eastern European countries are preparing for a new wave of Ukrainian refugees to come in with the winter months, Reuters is reporting.
The UK Ministry of Defence released its latest intelligence update, saying: “Russian efforts to repair the Crimean bridge continue but it is unlikely to be fully operational until at least September 2023.” According to intelligence, the road bridge was closed yesterday to allow the movement and installation of a replacement 64-metre space. Three more spans will be required to replace the damaged sections. “Although Crimean officials have claimed these additional spans will be in place by 20 December, a briefing provided to President Putin added that works to the other carriageway would cause disruption to road traffic until March 2023.”
Ukraine has collated thousands of reports of its children being deported to Russia and wants their plight addressed at a summit of the Group of 20 major economies, Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s chief of staff was quoted as saying on Tuesday. “The Russian Federation continues to commit its crimes in connection with Ukrainian children,” Zelenskiy’s office quoted Andriy Yermak as saying at a meeting he chaired of a group of officials responsible for child protection. “The removal of children continues.”
The US basketball player Brittney Griner is being transferred to a Russian penal colony but neither her family nor legal team have any details on where she is or where she is going.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in his Tuesday night address that about 4 million people were without power in 14 regions plus the capital Kyiv, but on a stabilisation rather than an emergency basis. Scheduled hourly power outages would affect the whole of the country on Wednesday, said Ukraine’s electrical grid operator, Ukrenergo.
The general staff of the Ukrainian armed forces believe about 780 Russian soldiers were killed in the country in the last day.
Landmines continue to cause serious harm to civilians working to restore a sense of normality in Kharkiv, which Ukrainian forces retook from Russian troops in May. Two road service workers, aged 21 and 51, were killed yesterday when their special equipment struck a mine during work in the Chuguyiv district, Oleh Syniehubov, the governor of Kharkiv oblast, said on Telegram. A 55-year-old man and 34-year-old man were also injured in the incident….
Russia’s Security Council secretary Nikolai Patrushev met Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi in Tehran on Wednesday, the Interfax news agency reported….
Thousands of Kyiv residents have signed a petition urging city authorities not to erect a giant tree during this year’s festive period, and instead to give money to the army and to people displaced by the war with Russia….
Villages and towns in Ukraine have experienced more heavy fighting and shelling as Ukrainian and Russian forces strained to advance on different fronts after more than eight and a half months of war….
snarkratessays
A runoff between Walker and Warnock is bad news. There’s a Glibertarian with 2.1% of the vote, which would likely go the way of the brain-damaged former footballer.
There are just two actions needed to prevent catastrophic climate breakdown: leave fossil fuels in the ground and stop farming animals. But, thanks to the power of the two industries, both aims are officially unmentionable. Neither of them has featured in any of the declarations from the 26 climate summits concluded so far.
Astonishingly, the sectors themselves are seldom mentioned. I’ve worked through every final agreement produced by the summits since they began. Fossil fuels are named in only six of them. Just one hints at using less overall: the others propose only to improve efficiency (which, as we have known since the 19th century, can often paradoxically increase fossil fuel use), attempt technical fixes or, in the case of last year’s agreement in Glasgow, phase down “unabated” coal burning, while saying nothing about reducing oil or gas. Not one of them suggests extracting less. If fossil fuels are removed from the ground, they will be used, regardless of governments’ vague declarations about consumption.
The other omission is even starker. Livestock is mentioned in only three agreements, and the only action each of them proposes is “management”. Nowhere is there a word about reduction. It’s as though nuclear non-proliferation negotiators had decided not to talk about bombs. You cannot address an issue if you will not discuss it.
The call to stop farming animals should be as familiar as the call to leave fossil fuels in the ground. But it is seldom heard. Livestock farming, a recent paper in the journal Sustainability estimates, accounts for between 16.5% and 28% of all greenhouse gas pollution. The wide range of these figures is an indication of how badly this issue has been neglected. As the same paper shows, the official figure (14.5%), published by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, is clearly wrong. Everyone in the field knows it, yet few attempts have been made to update it.
Even if the minimum number (16.5%) applies, this is greater than all the world’s transport emissions. And it is growing fast. In the 20 years to 2018, global meat consumption rose by 58%. A paper in Climate Policy estimates that, by 2030, greenhouse gases from livestock farming could use half the world’s entire carbon budget, if we want to avoid more than 1.5C of global heating.
An analysis by Our World in Data shows that even if greenhouse gas pollution from every other sector were eliminated today, by 2100 food production will, on its current trajectory, bust the global carbon budget two or three times over. This is largely because of animal farming, which accounts for 57% of greenhouse gases from the food system, though it provides just 18% of the calories.
This issue has become even more urgent now we know the heating impact of methane is rising. Livestock farming is the world’s greatest source of methane released by human activities. Yet there is no mention of it in the global methane pledge launched at last year’s climate summit.
Governments have not ignored these issues by accident; they have resolutely looked away. A new analysis for Chatham House finds that only 12 nations name emissions from farm animals in their official climate commitments, and none seeks to reduce livestock production. Only two nations (Costa Rica and Ethiopia) mention dietary change: arguably the most important of all environmental actions, as animal farming is also the world’s greatest cause of habitat destruction and wildlife loss.
What accounts for this determined silence? I think there are several reasons. The livestock sector’s cultural power greatly outweighs its economic power. Our connection to food is more personal than our connection to energy sources…. And, by comparison with the denial sponsored by the fossil fuel industry, the misleading claims of the livestock industry have scarcely been challenged in the media.
A scandal broke last week [see #279 in the previous chapter of the thread] about an academic centre at the University of California, Davis, which turns out to have been founded and funded by livestock lobby groups. It has downplayed the impact of livestock farming, in ways that other scientists have described as highly misleading.
But this is just one aspect of the problem. Like the fossil fuel industry, livestock corporations have been ploughing money into public persuasion, using tactics first developed by tobacco companies. Some of this greenwashing has been highly effective, especially the industry’s claims about “regenerative ranching” and the false assertion that pasture-fed meat farming sequesters more greenhouse gases than it releases.
In reality, grass-fed meat is by far the most damaging component of our diets, as a result of its massive land requirement, greenhouse gas emissions, and carbon and ecological opportunity costs. Despite a plethora of claims, there is no empirical evidence that carbon storage in grazing land can compensate for the greenhouse gases livestock produce, let alone for the carbon stocks destroyed when wild ecosystems are converted to pasture.
A paper in Nature Sustainability found that if permanent livestock pasture in just the rich nations were returned to wild ecosystems, their recovery would draw down 380bn tonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, equivalent to 12 years of global carbon emissions. The UK government’s Climate Change Committee reports that, in England, “transitioning from grassland to forestland would increase the soil carbon stock by 25 tonnes of carbon per hectare … This is additional to the large amounts of carbon that would be stored in the biomass of the trees themselves.”
…An extraordinary feature of this debate is that when you present data, your opponents respond with pictures, generally bucolic images of cows or sheep.
Popular food writing is dominated by a disastrous combination of aesthetics and elite tastes. Famous authors propose that everyone eats the food that they like, promoting diets that couldn’t be scaled unless we had several planets and no space on any of them for wild ecosystems. They urge us to use a Neolithic production system (grazing) to feed a 21st-century population, with catastrophic results.
We urgently need to put these foolish things aside, to follow and understand the science, and press our governments to focus on the major causes of the climate crisis….
“Elon Musk sells Tesla shares worth $4bn”: “Musk said he was done selling Tesla stock back in August, before Twitter’s legal action sealed the deal for the $44bn takeover…”
All three states that had abortion on the ballot won by large margins.
In Michigan, a state with a rabid forced birther lobby, the constitutional amendment won by an 11% margin.
This says a lot about how representative our current US Supreme Court is.
Michigan Proposal 3 supporting abortion rights wins big
Proposal 3, which would keep abortion legal in Michigan, has been a top issue among state voters, and the most expensive race in the state this year.
Yue Stella Yu (Email) & Robin Erb (Email)
Proposal 3, which enshrines the right to abortion in the Michigan Constitution, won handily Tuesday
It’s passage upends months of legal drama following the demise of Roe v. Wade this summer Voters in California and Vermont also approve measures to protect abortion rights
LANSING —Michigan voters on Tuesday resoundingly approved Proposal 3, the constitutional amendment to enshrine reproductive rights into the state constitution.
With nearly 85 percent of votes counted by 8:20 a.m. Wednesday, Proposal 3 had received 55.5 percent of the votes in support of the measure, compared to 44.5 percent of voters who opposed it.
Gretchen Whitmer leads over Tudor Dixon in race for Michigan governor
“Today, the people of Michigan voted to restore the reproductive rights they’ve had for 50 years,” Reproductive Freedom campaign spokesperson Darci McConnell said after the group declared victory.
“Proposal 3’s passage marks an historic victory for abortion access in our state and in our country – and Michigan has paved the way for future efforts to restore the rights and protections of Roe v. Wade nationwide.”
Proposal 3’s passage means legal access to abortion and other reproductive services will be preserved in Michigan. The vote comes after the U.S. Supreme Court voted to overturn Roe v. Wade in June, ending federal protections for abortion for nearly 50 years.
Voters in California and Vermont also approved similar measures to protect abortion on Tuesday.
After the Roe reversal, months of legal tumult in Michigan followed. Abortion rights supporters and opponents asked courts to enforce — or abandon — a now-blocked 1931 abortion ban, which would have made most abortions a felony punishable by up to four years in prison or $5,000 in fines.
Proposal 3 was the most expensive race in Michigan this year, according to the latest campaign finance reports, drawing a total $57 million in fundraising between rivaling campaigns.
Reproductive Freedom for All, the coalition spearheading Proposal 3, had raised at least $40.2 million and spent at least $22.5 million on ads.
Countering that effort, the anti-abortion coalition Citizens to Support MI Women and Children has raised at least $16.9 million and spent almost all of it on advertisement, criticizing the proposal as “confusing” and “extreme.” continues
“Democrat Gabe Vasquez is the apparent winner in #NM’s redrawn 2nd Congressional District, a seat currently held by Republican Yvette Herrell. The outcome of the race could have big national implications:…
Currently, 1,015 votes separate the two candidates — or just outside the 0.25% margin to trigger an automatic recount under state law.”
Archaeologists in Israel say they have found the first-known written sentence in Canaanite, an alphabet used by the long-ago inhabitants of the region and until now lost to time.
The sentence—comprising 17 Canaanite characters, totaling seven words—was incised on an ivory comb carved from an elephant tusk. It says: “May this tusk root out the lice of the hair and the beard.”
The comb was found on the site of Tel Lachish, a Bronze Age settlement about 25 miles from Jerusalem. It’s about 1.38 inches by 0.98 inches, though its teeth have long since broken off. Details of the script’s characters and meaning were published today in the Jerusalem Journal of Archaeology.
“This is the first sentence ever found in the Canaanite language in Israel,” said Yosef Garfinkel, an archaeologist at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and a co-author of the study, in a university release. “There are Canaanites in Ugarit in Syria, but they write in a different script, not the alphabet that is used till today.”
…
Bridge blown up as Ukraine continues Kherson advance
The main bridge on a road out of Kherson city was blown up, bringing more turmoil to a Russian-held area where Ukraine’s forces are advancing.
Images on the internet showed the span of the Darivka bridge on the main highway east out of the city of Kherson in southern Ukraine completely collapsed into the water of the Inhulets River, a tributary of the Dnipro River that bisects the country.
Reuters was able to verify the location of the images, though not how the bridge had been destroyed or by whom.
Ukrainians who posted the photos speculated it had been blown up by Russian troops in preparation for a retreat, but Oleh Zhdanov, a Ukrainian military analyst, told Reuters it could have been destroyed by Ukrainian saboteurs to isolate Russian forces on either side and “cut the fighting unit in half”.
Russia orders pullout from west bank of Dnipro at Kherson
Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu has ordered his troops to withdraw from the west bank of the Dnipro River in the face of Ukrainian attacks near the southern city of Kherson, the Reuters news agency reported.
This is a big deal: 28% of children under 5 in the state live in poverty [outrageous]. The initiative could signal to other states and the federal government that child care is not just needed but popular.”
Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu has ordered the country’s troops to retreat to the Dnipro river’s right bank, a move that will likely lead to Moscow surrendering the key southern city of Kherson.
Ukrainian victory in Kherson, one of the main objectives of Kyiv’s southern offensive, will be widely seen as a significant blow to the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, only weeks after a high-profile ceremony in Moscow in which he announced the annexation of the Kherson region along with three other regions.
In televised comments, General Sergei Surovikin, in overall command of the war, recommended the withdrawal of Russian troops from the west bank of the Dnieper River, citing logistical difficulties.
“Kherson cannot be fully supplied and function. Russia did everything possible to ensure the evacuation of the inhabitants of Kherson.” Surovikin told Shoigu.
“The decision to defend on the left bank of the Dnieper is not easy, at the same time we will save the lives of our military,” Surovikin added.
But if you lick a Sonoran desert toad (Incilius alvarius, formerly Bufo alvarius) you might have a transformative, quasi-religious psychedelic experience—or you might get sick and die. And either way, the National Park Service is asking that you don’t do it on the agency’s land.
“As we say with most things you come across in a national park, whether it be a banana slug, unfamiliar mushroom, or a large toad with glowing eyes in the dead of night, please refrain from licking. Thank you,” The park service wrote in a Facebook post published last Monday, along with an alarming trail cam capture of the aforementioned amphibian.
Russian High Command has issued a general retreat to all surviving Russian forces at the Western bank of the Dnipro River. Around 40,000 Russian troops are now officially running.“
@snarkrates #11: The mere fact that the race was even close has got to be the most god-damned appalling thing I’ve seen in the news since … well … hmmm …
The names of towns Russia has reportedly abandoned are now pouring in faster than I can record them. Expect a map update in a couple of hours when I can see if Ukraine has move in to liberate these locations. Holy ****.
This appears to be official. It is now appearing on Russian state media. Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu has ordered a withdrawal of all Russian forces from the west bank of the Dnipro River in Kherson region.
Still, there is active fighting going on. Wait for word of actual cities and towns being liberated.
But get ready. Keep your fingers crossed. Be prepared for good news.
Ask for specific locations, and ye shall receive: Ukraine has reportedly liberated Kalynivske, a small town along the Inhulets River just a few kilometers north of Snihurivka. This leaves just the village of Bobrovyi Kut between Ukrainian forces pressing in from the north, and those pushing west into Snihurivka. Be prepared to hear the name of that village again soon.
As the update was being written this morning, news started to roll in that there is, in fact, fighting near Kyselivka (see map below) with Ukrainian forces reportedly pressing along the highway and Russian fighters concerned that they could be rapidly cut off and isolated.
Also, Kirill Stremousov, a strident anti-vax quisling who was appointed by Russia as the deputy governor of their occupation government in Kherson, has died. The official statement indicates that he died in a car crash. Take from this what you will.
Finally, a report from Russian Telegram sources that some Russian forces in Kherson Oblast have received an order to withdraw from the right bank, some have already crossed, and some have been told to hold the front until the rest can complete the escape. Some forces are also reported to be out of communication, which may reflect earlier reports that no one is in communication with Russian forces in Snihurivka. As with all claims that sound this good, keep a salt shaker handy — especially as we’re still not seeing named locations as liberated.
On Saturday, Russian sources report that they have lost all contact with their forces inside the town of Snihurivka, a location that has been, for months, a fortress town guarding access to the city of Kherson. There has been speculation that those forces have gone into deep shelters, or that they are maneuvering to new locations. What’s clear at this hour is that Ukrainian forces have completely surrounded Snihurivka and entered parts of the city, which presents another option for that Russian silence: There may be no more Russian presence in Snihurivka.
In addition to liberating some portion of Snihurivka (reportedly the northern end of the town), there are multiple reports of a large number of Russian forces and Russian vehicles being destroyed in the area over the last two days. However, it should be noted that the video reportedly showing a Russian convoy being destroyed while trying to escape the city—which was widely distributed on Friday, including by me—has actually proven to be from months earlier.
Right now, only one Russian Telegram channel is reporting that Ukraine has completely liberated Snihurivka. Other channels and sources on both sides have confirmed that Ukraine has entered the city and established a presence there, but have not claimed that Russian forces have been eliminated. It’s going to be some hours yet before the real status of Snihurivka, and of other points along the front lines in Kherson, are better understood. But what news we have is all good news. Russia’s position in Kherson really does seem to be rapidly eroding. [map at the link]
Meanwhile, Ukraine is reportedly advancing south of that location following a night-long exceptionally heavy bombardment with artillery. That includes an attack located east of Pravdyne. Based on the location of fighting, there are several locations that may have already been liberated in this area, but there has been no official announcement. There has, so far, been no report of renewed fighting at Kyselivka.
On the northern line, there are reports indicating that Russian forces are fleeing from locations, running back toward Beryslav in hopes of passage across the Dnipro River. In the process, Russians have reportedly destroyed their own bases at various points as well as blowing up bridges across the Inhulets River and a whole series of small rivers and bays along the western side of the Dnipro to slow the advance of Ukrainian forces. [map of destroyed bridges is available at the link]
[…] everything except the fact that Ukraine has entered Snihurivka—which has been confirmed by multiple sources and represents all on its own a huge change in the battle for Kherson—should be read with extreme caution. Those reports of Russians leaving positions on the north currently lack any kind of specificity, and they’ve not been followed by any images, or even reports, or Ukrainian forces entering Mylove, Bruskynske, and Sukhanove. (Though the bridge just north of Mylove is one of those reportedly destroyed on Friday night.)
Meanwhile, there are additional reports that Russian locations in and around the city of Kherson itself have been abandoned. Some of those reports have been accompanied with videos of abandoned checkpoints. At the very least, it’s clear that Russian forces have been redeployed to other locations. Those could be along the line to hold back pressure from Ukraine. Or they could be across the river. We don’t know, but you can bet that the Ukrainian military does.
There are even Russian sites claiming that Kherson “will be surrendered” on Sunday. However, these reports, like the reports of the line falling apart in the north, are likely reactions to the news that Ukraine has entered Snihurivka. Every sign of Ukrainian advance in the last month has immediately generated over-the-top claims that Kherson was going to be liberated in days, if not hours.
One of these days, hopefully one of these days very soon, those reports are going to be true. However, there is no confirmation that this is that day. Still, things are changing. To coin a phrase … stay tuned.
For now, I am leaving all the positions in the north unchanged. In the south, Ukraine has advanced into Snihurivka, which I am marking as still in dispute. Below that, Ukraine has advanced east of Pravdyne, but I’m leaving that town and neighboring Soldatske as in dispute pending further information. If I see confirmation of any towns/cities being liberated, expect both updates and updated maps. […]
Not in Kherson, but also not to be missed. Warning: The video for this definitely shows humans being injured and killed. [video at the link in comment 29]
Russian military say they’ve suffered huge losses during the battle for Pavlivka village and the video clips prove it. If you want to see repeated Russian armoured attacks getting mangled & Russian infantry have a really bad day […]
I’m looking at the Colorado Secretary of State’s election results page for District 3. Currently, Adam Frisch has 147,263 and the vile Lauren Boebert has 142,328. Only one county in her district, Mesa, has not completed its election night tally. Mesa voters cast 63,918 votes, 35,158 for BoBo and 25,728 for Frisch. That means only 3,032 votes remain to be counted in Mesa. Even if BoBo won all of them, she would still fall short.
I don’t know if there are any early or absentee ballots yet to tally, but I think Boebert might be gone.
The forced birthers lost in deep Red Kentucky as well.
This constitutional amendment would have prohibited revising the Kentucky constitution to permit abortion.
Lexington Herald-Leader
Kentuckians vote no on Constitutional Amendment 2; abortion rights groups claim victory
Alex Acquisto
Tue, November 8, 2022 at 10:30 PM·6 min read
In a major victory for abortion rights groups, Kentucky voters rejected a proposal to revise the state constitution to make clear there is no protected right to abortion.
Unofficial election results from the Associated Press Wednesday morning showed voters narrowly defeated Amendment 2, a largely Republican-backed measure that sought to add these words to the Kentucky constitution: “to protect human life, nothing in this constitution shall be construed to secure or protect a right to abortion or require the funding of abortion.”
As of 8:20 a.m. with an estimated 86% of votes counted, 52.5% of voters cast a “No” vote, compared to the 47.5% who supported changing the constitution.
Reginald Selkirksays
@30: Oh, you meant the state house and senate. Anyway; good news.
Reginald Selkirksays
@ 27: “Moment Surovikin and Shoygu admit defeat in the Kherson direction and announce the withdrawal of troops….”
Probably to be followed soon by “Moments Surovkin and Shoygu fell out of windows”
There is a certain inevitability to eliminationist rhetoric: It may not happen right away, but at some point it will inexorably move from mere words into action—the violent kind, often the lethal kind. That’s how stochastic terrorism works—randomly, without any direct connection. Case in point: It was just a matter of time before the election-related hysterical demonization of Democrats by leading right-wing pundits like Tucker Carlson was picked up by one of the legions of “Patriots” eager for a “civil war”—and then acted on.
That scenario already seems to have played out last weekend in rural Okeana, in southwestern Ohio, where a 43-year-old man out mowing his lawn in the back yard of his home was gunned down by his next-door neighbor—a 26-year-old man who had verbally attacked the older man on at least four previous occasions for being a “Democrat.”
The victim, Anthony Lee King, died of multiple gunshot wounds after he was confronted while tending his yard by Austin Gene Combs, who lived next door. Combs casually walked away, and was arrested without incident soon after while nearby in a Jeep with his father.
Combs was booked on murder charges in the Butler County Jail, and bond was set at $950,000. (The community is located about 30 miles northwest of Cincinnati.) Police said Combs admitted he shot King “several times with a revolver.”
The Butler County Journal News obtained a recording of the family’s call to 911 after the shooting. It opens with King’s son informing the dispatcher: “My neighbor just shot my dad.”
The shooter, he told the dispatcher, “just walked back onto his property.” He said the man was their neighbor who “has come over multiple times making statements. He’s insane.” He said the confrontations were over his father’s perceived political affiliation as a Democrat.
King’s wife then got on the line and recounted what had happened: She and her husband were tending to their back yard, and she went inside the home to let the dog out—at which point she heard gunshots.
“I look in the backyard and that man is walking away from my husband, and my husband is on the ground,” the woman said. “He has come over like four times confronting my husband because he thought he was a Democrat. Why, why … Please, I don’t understand.”
None of us really understand acts like these, because they’re incomprehensible. But as someone who carefully monitors developing trends in domestic terrorism, I have become increasingly concerned about the ongoing demonization of mainstream liberals by high-powered Republicans, as well as the normalization of violence against them we saw in the aftermath of the assault on Paul Pelosi in San Francisco, particularly by Carlson and his Fox News colleagues.
This has been happening at a time when I and other people who monitor the online chat rooms in which far-right extremists radicalize and recruit have been seeing a significant increase in rhetoric about unleashing lethal violence on their neighbors, in the name of a “civil war”—all because they have been told that ordinary Democrats are an existential threat. […]
“Ukrainian officials are reacting with suspicion to Russia’s Kherson withdrawal announcement. Mykolaiv oblast governor Vitaly Kim just now: ‘if Russians say one thing, it means they’re doing the opposite’.”
@ SC: Aha, a Dead song, the title of which I did not know. Thanks for the reference, I’m of the age to know it, but had never heard of it.
@Lynna OM, #33: Yes, looked at from that perspective, I can see (as a Socialist Pinko foreigner) that this is relatively good news.
Beau of the Fifth Column has a good take on it over on his channel. (YT link).
ravensays
Update on Boebert election in Colorado.
Frisch had 50.88% of the vote compared to Boebert’s 49.12%, with 89% of the votes counted:
This is truly amazing.
Boebert is in a red district and still managing to lose.
The other fruitbat crazy is doing well though.
Georgia · District 14
99% reporting
Marjorie Taylor Greene
Republican Party
65.9%
169,988 votes
Marcus Flowers
Democratic Party
34.1%
88,025 vote
Cthulhu can only imagine what MTG’s district in Georgia is like.
ravensays
AOC is doing even better than MTG in New York, with 71% of the vote.
New York · District 14
60% reporting
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
Democratic Party
70.6%
78,788 votes
Tina Forte
Republican Party
27.5%
30,661 votes
Desi Cuellar
Conservative Party of New York State
1.9%
2,128 votes
Kris Kobach, the anti-immigration hard-liner who is a longtime herald of voter fraud allegations, is set to be the new attorney general of Kansas — eking out a narrow victory over opponent Democrat Chris Mann, according to the Associated Press — reviving his stalled career.
The former Kansas secretary of state ran a less bombastic campaign than he did against Democrat Laura Kelly for governor in 2018, when he was frequently photographed at parades riding in a Jeep with a fake machine gun. Kobach lost to Kelly, who is projected to win reelection.
An under-the-radar win for abortion rights in the dark red state of Montana.
In the nonpartisan race for one Montana Supreme Court seat, incumbent and veteran jurist Ingrid Gustafson fended off a challenge from James Brown, an attorney endorsed by a small army of Republicans in the state, including Gov. Greg Gianforte. The race was closely watched in Montana as a measure of support for abortion rights and the power of hard-right Republicans.
In Montana the state Supreme Court has ruled that abortion is guaranteed by individual privacy rights made explicit by the framers of Montana’s 50-year-old constitution. Although one seat wouldn’t have changed the balance of power on the court, this is a clear sign of the heavily Republican population’s view on abortion.
ravensays
Walkouts of state legislators is a tactic to block voting on bills that would pass otherwise. By denying a quorum.
It is an anti-democracy measure for a minority to block a majority.
Oregon just made it a lot harder.
Walkouts longer than 10 days mean that you can’t run for reelection.
The vote wasn’t even close at 68%.
Oregon voters pass Meas. 113, which punishes lawmakers for too many walkouts
by KATU StaffTuesday, November 8th 2022
UserWay icon for accessibility widget
Voters have approved a measure that bars lawmakers from re-election if they have more than 10 unexcused absences on days they are scheduled to vote.
Ballot measure 113 limits lawmakers’ ability to continue staging walkouts without consequences. As of 10 p.m. Tuesday, 68% of voters were in support of the measure.
ELECTION RESULTS
Both Democrats and Republicans in Oregon and other states have used walkouts as a way to stymie the majority party’s bills.
Those for the measure say it’s a way to hold them accountable, while those against it say the only people they should be accountable to are their constituents.
There were those of us insisting the dominant media narrative of a “red wave” was wrong. Kerry Eleveld, Simon Rosenberg, Tom Bonier, and I kept looking at the data and wondering where this fervent belief on the massive Republican wave came from. History, for sure. But it was clear as day that this wasn’t a typical midterm. As I wrote in late August, midterms suck for the party in the White House because 1) midterms are referendums on the incumbent president, and he can never live up to the hype of his campaign. Our broken political system means any president’s agenda will get hacked to death; and 2) supporters of the party out of power feel disenfranchised, which is a crappy feeling. They are extra motivated to do something about it. But this year was clearly different.
1) How can we have a referendum on President Joe Biden, if the last guy won’t get off the stage (as FBI agents swarm around him)? Rather than a referendum, we have a reprise of the 2020 election. And no one motivates the Democratic base more than Donald Trump.
2) Are Democrats truly in the majority if an illegitimate and out-of-control reactionary Supreme Court is overturning decades of established rights, while gutting gun laws and shredding the ability of government to carry out its duties? Conservatives feel disenfranchised, but so do we. And our side doesn’t need manufactured outrages like critical race theory and Honduran caravans to motivate ourselves. Our outrage is real.
Those of us who argued this wasn’t a wave year weren’t riding hopium to our decisions. We weren’t even looking much at polling. Rather, there was hard data to point to: Democratic overperformance in six House special elections after the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision and gangbuster voter registration numbers. There was no sign of a drop-off in Democratic performance. The nonpartisan pollsters all showed Democrats highly competitive in both the national House picture and in key Senate and governor races.
As I write this control of the House hasn’t been decided, but when the prognosticators had assumed 20-40 seat Republican pickups, it’s a victory that we still don’t know who will control the House in January … and there’s a good chance it might still be Democrats!
Still, it was one thing for Republicans to push their wave narrative and another for the media to stupidly play along with it. But too many Democrats fell for the doom and gloom and fed into it. And they didn’t just assume Republican talking points, they all knew that things would be different had Democrats just done that thing that they cared about. We saw this from both the party’s left and centrist wings, stupidly assuming they knew better than what the data showed, because “the narrative.” […]
Michigan Democratic Rep. Daniel Kildee has won reelection for the state’s 8th District.
He defeated Republican Paul Junge — a former Trump administration official who worked for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services — in a district that President Biden won by only 2 points in 2020. Republicans had seen the race as an opportunity to pick up a House seat.
The district covers Flint, the Michigan city at the center of a water crisis.
In one of his campaign ads, Kildee appeared alongside Mona Hanna-Attisha, the doctor who played a central role in exposing the water crisis. In the ad, Hanna-Attisha said Kildee did “more for safe drinking water than maybe anyone else in the country.”
For democracy advocates, the good news is that a lot of election-denying secretary of state candidates lost. The bad news is, there were other contests.
Exactly one month before Election Day, Republican Jim Marchant stood alongside Donald Trump at a rally in Nevada, boasting about a “coalition of secretary of state candidates,” who apparently intend to “fix the whole country.”
This was not encouraging. […] Marchant has been unreserved when pushing ridiculous ideas — and not just about Trump’s 2020 race. The Nevada Republican, who’s been accused of having QAnon ties, has also told Nevadans, “Your vote hasn’t counted for decades. You haven’t elected anybody. The people that are in office have been selected.”
Marchant has also insisted that prominent Democratic lawmakers — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, et al. — shouldn’t be seen as having won legitimate elections, either, despite their landslide victories.
So, how’d his “coalition” do? As NPR reported, Marchant’s extremist ally in Michigan fared poorly.
Democrat Jocelyn Benson, who faced death threats after overseeing the 2020 election, has been reelected secretary of state of Michigan, according to a race call by The Associated Press. Benson defeated Republican Kristina Karamo, a far-right candidate who has spread a number of baseless conspiracies about elections and other things.
With just about all of the votes tallied, Karamo lost by about 14 points. In Minnesota, Republican Kim Crockett, who also echoed Trump’s lies, also lost her bid for secretary of state by nearly 10 points. The same goes for New Mexico’s Audrey Mendonca-Trujillo, who also lost by double digits.
Pennsylvania’s Doug Mastriano ran for governor, not secretary of state, but in the Keystone State, governors appoint secretaries of state, and in this case, the right-wing nominee vowed to name a likeminded ally to the office. Mastriano, of course, lost his statewide bid badly.
For democracy advocates, that’s the good news. The bad news is, there were other contests.
In Indiana, for example, Diego Morales, a former Mike Pence aide, publicly doubted the legitimacy of the 2020 presidential election but was elected secretary of state anyway.
In Arizona, Republican Mark Finchem positioned himself as one of the cycle’s most unhinged radicals, and as of this moment, his secretary of state race hasn’t been called. He is, however, currently trailing his Democratic opponent by roughly five points, though there are still a lot of ballots to be counted.
As for Marchant’s candidacy in the Silver State, he currently has a narrow lead over his Democratic rival, though we may not get the results of the race until the weekend.
[…] I remain mindful of the fact that for many voters, secretary of state — at the state level, not the cabinet secretary who leads the U.S. State Department — is probably a fairly obscure office. These officials tend to work behind the scenes on unglamorous tasks such as election administration, and few reach the household-name level.
But in the wake of Jan. 6, the Republican Party’s brazen lies and conspiracy theories, and Trump’s fixation on installing election-denying allies in key positions, secretaries of state — and this year’s campaigns to elect secretaries of state — have taken on extraordinary importance.
In practical terms, we’re talking about officials who could take radical and undemocratic steps before Election Day — Marchant has said he intends to eliminate early voting, voting by mail, and all electronic voting machines — and then make matters worse after Election Day by refusing to certify election results they don’t like, including vote tallies in the 2024 presidential election.
There’s no shortage of results worth watching in the coming days, but these belong near the top of the list.
The stunning upset gives the party complete control over state government next year.
Minnesota Democrats took back control of the state Legislature in Tuesday’s election, a stunning upset that will give the party complete control of state government for the first time since 2014.
Democrats maintained control in the House and reclaimed the majority in the state Senate for the first time in six years through victories in the Twin Cities suburbs and critical battlegrounds in greater Minnesota. In the Senate, Democrats appear to hold the majority by a single vote, after a northeastern Minnesota seat flipped their way early Wednesday morning.
“We know what Minnesotans want. Minnesotans want fully funded public schools. They want healthcare that everybody can afford, and they want an economy that works for everyone,” DFL House Speaker Melissa Hortman said from the stage at the DFL election night party in St. Paul. “Oh and by the way, they want a government that respects their personal freedom and bodily autonomy.” […]
South Dakota may be one of the nation’s reddest red states, but its voters embraced Medicaid expansion through the ACA anyway.
More than a decade after the Affordable Care Act was signed into law, there are still 12 states that refuse to accept Medicaid expansion. Health care advocates in South Dakota set out to lower than number to 11, though they realized that wouldn’t be easy.
After all, South Dakota is clearly a ruby-red state — Donald Trump carried the state by roughly 26 points in 2020 — and Republican candidates scored big victories up and down the ballot yesterday. A Democratic stronghold it is not.
And yet, when South Dakotans were given the option to embrace Medicaid expansion through “Obamacare,” they said yes. […]
[…] 3:08 AM: This is about as rough a night as one could imagine for Donald Trump. The candidates he forced on the GOP did quite poorly. Meanwhile Ron DeSantis, his biggest rival in the GOP, had an absolutely stomping night. He won a huge victory, did great in South Florida, with Hispanic voters, etc. Lots of people are predicting you’re now going to have governors like DeSantis, Youngkin, Abbott making the argument that it’s time to move past Donald Trump. Notably, it’s move past Donald Trump, not Trumpism. I suspect this is much, much easier said than done. I doubt Donald Trump is receptive to this new plan. […]
Putting this up [new map at the link] with the warning that we’ve had this kind of report before. However, there are dozens of reports coming in, many of them reportedly originating with Ukrainian forces and with locals remaining in towns and villages, that Russia is deserting northern Kherson area wholesale.
On this map, the locations with a black-and-white marker represent locations that have been reported abandoned by Russian forces. Still waiting for verifications that Ukrainian troops have moved into these locations. If this is accurate, expect those verifications to come very quickly.
President Volodomyr Zelenskyy has created a new military department to temporarily administer the Kherson region until civilian authority can be restored. This genuinely seems to be happening.
Tropical Storm Nicole is expected to roar to hurricane strength Wednesday as it eyes Florida’s already battered east coast.
As of 1 p.m., Nicole was 10 miles west of Marsh Harbor, Great Abaco Island, and was 175 miles east of West Palm Beach. The storm had near-hurricane level winds at 70 mph and was moving west at 12 mph.
According to WESH 2 meteorologists, Nicole’s path had shifted slightly southward overnight into Wednesday. However, experts emphasize that tropical storm force winds extend hundreds of miles from the center of circulation. No matter where it eventually makes landfall, the storm will bring hurricane conditions to many Central Florida beaches, and hurricane gusts to areas inland.
Brevard and Volusia counties were placed under a hurricane warning. Flagler remains under a hurricane watch. A tropical storm warning has been posted for Lake, Orange, Osceola and Seminole.
Throughout the day Wednesday, as feeder bands close in on the peninsula, Central Florida is going to be looking at an elevated threat for strong to severe storms, including isolated tornadoes, gusty winds.
The worst of the weather will arrive late Wednesday into Thursday morning.
“On the forecast track, the center of Nicole will move near or over the Abacos and Grand Bahama in the northwestern Bahamas today and move onshore the east coast of Florida within the hurricane warning area tonight. Nicole’s center is then expected to move across central and northern Florida into southern Georgia Thursday and Thursday night, and then across the Carolinas Friday and Friday night,” NHC said. “Nicole is expected to weaken while moving across Florida and the southeastern United States Thursday through Friday, and it is likely to become a post-tropical cyclone by Friday night over the Mid-Atlantic states.”…
Listen, we are still surveying the Republican wreckage from last night, but we wanted to make sure there was another blog post today about how much of a loser Donald Trump is and how many goats his unpopular wretched ugly loser ass boned for the GOP last night.
If there was any pattern to last night that showed itself early and often, it was that Trump-endorsed lunatic hicks just kept going down in flames, in races that were either winnable or might have been if Republicans hadn’t tethered themselves to the world’s stupidest crime boss.
Consider two races that were resolved really early: In Maryland and Massachusetts, there are right this second Republican governors. Because sometimes in the Northeast it be that way. They like to elect somebody they view as a sensible Republican as their governor, while sending lots of blue people to Congress and other places up and down the ballot.
The current governor of Massachusetts is a Republican named Charlie Baker. In the GOP primary, Donald Trump endorsed an election-denying lunatic named Geoff Diehl over a more moderate guy with an entirely different name. Diehl won the primary, and TA-DA! PRESTO CHANGO! as of last night Massachusetts will have its first lesbian governor, Maura Healey, who is decidedly a Democrat. (Also the first openly lesbian governor nationwide.)
In Maryland, likewise, Trump endorsed a lunatic named Dan Cox to replace outgoing Republican Governor Larry Hogan. Cox won that primary. Larry Hogan called Cox a “QAnon whack job.” Welcome to your handsome sexy new and also history-making Democratic governor Wes Moore, Maryland!
Sure, fine, you say. Aside from the Northeast’s penchant for electing Republican governors, those two states are bluer than the “Da Ba Dee” song where everything is blue. Yes, they are flips out of the Republicans’ column, but maybe you want to talk about some places where Republicans were actually holding on to hope, or even confident maybe they could win something.
Don Bolduc? Donald Trump’s handpicked batshit guy to beat Maggie Hassan and represent New Hampshire in the Senate? Hassan grabbed him by the scruff of his neck and smushed his face into a litterbox and at press time is still rubbing his head around in it. That’s right, she took a Fresh Step right up his ass. We are sure there is a Tidy Cats pun in here somewhere. (Bolduc fell for the litterbox hoax, he is abjectly stupid.)-
More?
Doug Mastriano! Mehmet Oz! Nobody gotta stay up all night in Pennsylvania when Trump’s losers lose at a reasonable hour.
Tudor Dixon in Michigan! Congratulations, Gov. Whitmer!
Tim Michels in Wisconsin! Congratulations, Gov. Evers!
Blake Masters in Arizona! (Loss pending!)
Kari Lake in Arizona! (Loss hopefully fucking pending!)
Herschel Walker in Georgia! (Loss in now officially projected runoff pending, and on that day there won’t be any snotnosed gay libertarians to keep Warnock from crossing the 50 percent line. Yes, we are assuming this would be sorted already if he hadn’t been in the race. Anyway, we’ll deal with it in December.)
Look at what little Donald Trump had to celebrate last night. A Republican loss in a race the Republicans were never going to win in the first place, where the Republican failed to enthusiastically suck Trump’s balls. Sad. Low-energy. […]
As we noted in our last post, Trump also tried to pretend Don Bolduc lost because he didn’t Big Lie hard enough. You betcha.
And yeah, yeah, yeah, you might be thinking, “Sure, Wonkette, but isn’t it true that JD Vance is going to rub all his individual butthairs all over the Senate now, which at least partially happened because Trump kept coming to Ohio to call him an ass-kisser?” And that’s true, but guess what? Tim Ryan held Vance to a mere 6.5 point victory, in a state that is a red state just like Florida is a red state. If Vance’s total percentage holds, it’s about the same as Trump managed in Ohio, as opposed to some kind of big orange wave.
Know what else Tim Ryan did there and by extension Donald Trump did not pull off? “He lost, but OH-13 and OH-01 are because of him.”
Or as another elections expert put it, “Democrats will enter 2023 with 5 seats in Ohio, after looking like they could drop to 2.”
So all that happened.
By the way, here’s a headline on the Fox News website right now:
Ron DeSantis is the new Republican Party leader
Yeeeeeeeeah.
And we can’t wait to fight that soulless, boring, poopy-pants, whiny-ass authoritarian wannabe DeSantis and watch him crash and burn on a national stage when the time comes. (Remember Scott Walker? Remember how he was definitely for sure going to be the president of all of us one day and now he just quietly tweets about ham? Mark our words.)
Meta is laying off 11,000 employees, about 13 percent of its workforce, CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote in a message to staff today. Zuckerberg said his previous decision to increase spending didn’t pay off as he thought it would and that Meta’s “revenue outlook is lower than we expected at the beginning of this year.”…
Zuck looks like an actual adult compared to Elon Musk. He admits his estimates were off instead of blaming ‘the libs’.
Yesterday was not a great day for Republicans trying to become governors by running on a MAGA platform. To be sure, some certified (and certifiable) rightwing, Trumpy incumbents resisted challenges by Democrats in red states. Greg Abbott will keep spreading his foul stench over Texas for another four years, as will Ron DeSantis in Florida, Kim Reynolds in Iowa, and Kristi Noem in whichever Dakota she’s in. The South one, we checked. In a loss that really hurt because damn it, we really liked her, Democrat Joy Hofmeister ended up nowhere close to defeating Trumpy Kevin Stitt of Oklahoma, who will presumably find a new disease for his state’s unvaccinated National Guard members to spread.
In another disappointment, future President of United Earth Stacey Abrams conceded the Georgia governor’s race to incumbent Brian Kemp last night; we’re going to list that separately because while Kemp is heinously rightwing and vote-suppressy, he’s not part of the MAGA cult, which these days almost counts as a saving grace, but not quite. He’s no Mike DeWine, is what we’re saying. DeWine was reelected in Ohio, which was entirely expected.
But here’s the thing: The MAGACHUDS trying to move into various governor’s mansions for the most part failed spectacularly. So many big, big MAGAfails!
Probably the most significant of the bunch is in Pennsylvania, where Secretary of State Josh Shapiro stomped election denier and white nationalist-embracer Doug Mastriano, 55.7 percent to 42.5 percent. Mastriano, ever the Trumpsucker, has so far not conceded, which won’t matter anyway because he lost. This one’s a hell of a big deal, not simply because Mastriano would have signed any abortion ban to reach his desk, and not simply because the man’s a QAnon-believing creep who hired open antisemites. It also means that, in Pennsylvania at least, there’s now less chance of MAGAturds ratfucking the 2024 presidential election on Trump’s behalf. Pennsylvania’s secretary of state, who’s in charge of elections, is appointed by the governor, and Mastriano would almost certainly have chosen a partner in election fuckery. Nutty liberal Shapiro is likely to pick someone who’s competent and has experience, even!
Democratic incumbents also fended off MAGA challengers in the Midwest. In Michigan, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer won a second term against Trump-endorsed conspiracy promoter Tudor Dixon, who wanted to make child rape victims carry pregnancies to term, and fantasized about sending police to raid schools and seize all the porn. […]
And in Wisconsin, Gov. Tony Evers narrowly held his seat against election denier Tim Michels, who was sure Trump won in 2020. That means that if the ultra-gerrymandered state Lege wants to pass wingnut legislation, it’ll have to override Evers’s veto, a prospect that’s far less likely because even with the gerrymander, the Republicans appear unable to win the five seats in the Assembly needed for a supermajority, although they should get a supermajority in the Senate.
Also too, a big asterisk for Arizona, where the race between Democrat Katie Hobbs and sentient pile of javelina scat Kari Lake remains too close to call. Lake currently has a thin lead with about 60 percent of the votes counted, but it’s Arizona and it could take days to count everything. Nonetheless, as you’d expect, Lake is already lying about how she’s being robbed, just in case.
In other wins, Democrats flipped two governor’s seats, winning in Massachusetts, where Maura Healy will be the state’s first openly gay governor, and in Maryland, where Wes Moore will become the state’s first Black governor. He’s also delightfully progressive, yay!
Also too, In Colorado, sad news for “kids are turning into CATS” lady Heidi Ganahl, who lost big time to incumbent Dem Jared Polis, although that was hardly a surprise.
So how did it go, big picture? Before yesterday, there were 28 Republicans in the country’s governor’s mansions and 22 Democrats.
As of now, there are 21 Democrats, 24 Republicans, and five too close to call — with the Democrats leading in three of them. Not bad for a night’s work!
[…] Will Fox News own its own failures? Unlikely. They’ve continued to push the falsehoods of an out-of-control crime wave, the threat of inflation, and a president with low approval ratings. But they did push those things, and it didn’t work. Now Fox News’ Marc Thiessen says the Republican Party needs a “really deep introspection look in the mirror right now because this is an absolute disaster.” Really? You think?
Americans aren’t really on board for a bunch of racists, conspiracy theorist knuckleheads storming the U.S. Capitol? Right you are.
[Angelo Carusone posted] Sure, blame Trump for Oz. But Fox News shares that blame. Fox News hosted Oz at least 54 times this year. He was practically a co-host.
There was no more potent booster of Oz’s candidacy than Fox News. No only did they boost Oz, but they went all in attacking Fetterman.
[…] Whatever Fox News and the right-wing propaganda machine tells us happened on Nov. 8, we do know this: The Republicans do not have the numbers they believe they have. This was not a blowout, and it was not a red wave. It was an incremental shift at best, and it wasn’t even uniform. We can reclaim some of these losses and gain new ground in 2024 as long as we don’t fall into the trap of believing the GOP’s lies about its own potential.
In addition to charging a monthly fee for users to keep their coveted blue verified checkmarks, Twitter will introduce a second, harder to see gray checkmark intended to distinguish government accounts, companies, major media outlets, and some public figures. The official gray badge, unlike its blue counterpart, will come free of charge, but not everyone who currently possesses a blue checkmark will qualify…
However, in news that probably won’t surprise you, the Official label rollout is already chaotic. Some accounts—including Ars Technica’s—had the Official tag briefly today then it disappeared. It’s not clear whether the tags are gone for good.
“I just killed it,” Musk wrote today when YouTuber Marques Brownlee asked why his Official tag disappeared.
While it seems that Musk might have ended the whole Official tag system just hours after it launched, Twitter executive Esther Crawford said shortly after Musk’s tweet that it isn’t being killed entirely. “The official label is still going out as part of the @TwitterBlue launch—we are just focusing on government and commercial entities to begin with,” she wrote. “What you saw him mention was the fact that we’re not focusing on giving individuals the ‘Official’ label right now.”
But it’s not clear when the Official tag will be deployed in the manner suggested by Crawford. She said it is rolling out to government and commercial entities and that Musk was only referring to labels for individuals—but the Official label was also taken off the accounts of big commercial entities, like Apple’s Twitter profile. Prominent government accounts like President Biden’s Twitter page have a different “United States government official label.” NASA briefly had the new Official label before it was removed…
It sounds like they have a very stable genius running their company.
Ummm… Considering the medium in which they exist, is that even threatening? Don’t get me wrong, the behavior itself is fascinating. but I’ve done my fair share of swimming and I’ve tried to throw things underwater. The thown object doesn’t go very far, very fast.
Voters in Massachusetts approved an unusual ballot initiative known as the “Millionaires Tax,” a measure unique in Tuesday’s midterm elections. It will impose a 4 percent surtax on income over $1 million, with the proceeds funding schools and transportation.
I’m not sure why they say it was “unique.” California had Proposition 30 on the ballot, which would have imposed a 1.75% tax on the personal income of California residents earning at least $2 million and used that revenue for zero-emission vehicle subsidies and electric-vehicle (EV) charging stations, and for programs to prevent and suppress wildfires.
Prop 30 was supported by the Democratic party, public-health advocates and environmental, labor, and firefighters’ groups. Yet it was soundly defeated, after being opposed by Gavin Newsom, going against his party, and others, mainly from the tech industry, who portrayed it as a money grab by Lyft, the biggest backer of the measure.
But a spokesman for the Prop. 30 campaign said Lyft would have received none of the money from the tax revenue, a point underscored by Lyft Chief Executive Logan Green, who said in a blog post: “We are committed to achieving 100% vehicle electrification regardless of Proposition 30’s outcome.”
The Prop. 30 campaign conceded late Tuesday, releasing a statement that read in part: “Polls showed that a majority of voters supported Prop. 30 until thirty of the richest people in the world spent tens of millions of dollars on lies and disinformation…..”
ravensays
The Russians aren’t even collecting the bodies of their dead soldiers.
Another indication that their army isn’t very competent.
I’m sure this is doing wonders for their army’s morale.
Tweet
Jay in Kyiv @JayinKyiv
Decomposing Russians are becoming a huge problem in Ukraine.
Largely, Russians are no longer collecting the bodies.
None of us really understand acts like these, because they’re incomprehensible.
It’s “incomprehensible” not when you when you understand the right wing’s mindset: It’s not just that liberals and Democrats are “wrong” it’s that also that they are irremediably, literally-diabolically “evil.” The liberals want to murder babies in the womb and even kill them right after their born. then sell their tiny body parts. They want to let sexual perverts (i.e. the LGBTQ community) rape your children, groom to be sex slaves and future predators, and, as Alex Jones so eloquently put it, “cut off little boys penises.” They want to tax you into poverty while showering the undeserving “welfare queens” and “strapping young bucks” with welfare. Meanwhile, business are run into the ground to protect snail darters and spotted owls. They want black and brown “thugs” from BLM and Antifa to burn down the suburbs just like they did the big cities. They want to take away their guns, which ownership is guaranteed by the scared write that is the Bill or Rights, leaving them not only vulnerable to the aforementioned “thugs” but from the government who desires to control every aspect of their lives. They also want to take away your Bible and make Christianity illegal like they did in China and Cuba and make your violate your values. They want to tell you what words to use and what to think about .
They are communists! They are Marxists! They hate achievement and success! They hate white, male, heterosexual, Christians! They hate America! They hate you!
And that’s just the mild version of the narrative. Throw in some Q Anon theories and it’s a wonder why these murders don’t happen more often
HOUSTON — The Texas Supreme Court has stayed a lower court’s order, ruling that votes cast after 7 p.m. in Harris County should be set aside temporarily while a petition from the state’s Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton proceeds.
The lower court judge’s order had extended voting by an hour in Harris County — a Democrat stronghold that encompasses Houston and is the state’s most populous with about 4.8 million — after some polls opened late as a result of problems with voting machines, staff and supplies.
Harris County Attorney Christian Menefee said the county was complying with the court order and had set aside ballots cast after 7 p.m. But he also noted that “extending election hours has happened in Texas before. We saw it happen in at least one other Texas county last night.”
Voting was also extended in Central Texas’s Bell County after problems with voting machines delayed poll openings. But the state attorney general did not petition to have those votes thrown out, according to a county spokesman.
Bell County was 65 percent White as of last year according to the Census and leans conservative: Trump won it by 54 percent in 2020. Harris County, by contrast, is majority-minority, governed by a Democratic county executive, who just won reelection in a tight race.
Paxton’s office did not respond to requests for comment.
Italian archaeologists have unearthed 24 beautifully preserved bronze statues in Tuscany believed to date back to ancient Roman times.
The statues were discovered under the muddy ruins of an ancient bathhouse in San Casciano dei Bagni, a hilltop town in the Siena province, about 160km (100 miles) north of the capital Rome.
Depicting Hygieia, Apollo and other Greco-Roman gods, the figures are said to be around 2,300 years old.
…
Most of the statues – which were found submerged beneath the baths alongside around 6,000 bronze, silver and gold coins – date to between the 2nd Century BC and the 1st Century AD. The era marked a period of “great transformation in ancient Tuscany” as the area transitioned from Etruscan to Roman rule, the Italian culture ministry said…
“BREAKING: Republican Zach Nunn wins election to U.S. House in Iowa’s 3rd Congressional District, beating incumbent Rep. Cindy Axne. #APracecall at 2:20 p.m. CST.”
And there was another R pickup recently announced. On the other hand, Boebert still appears to be in trouble with 91% of the vote in.
A disgruntled resident has been tormented by a stranger screaming the words ‘porridge’ through his letterbox. It happens in the middle of the night and includes ‘porridge time pappa bear’ variations.
The mystery neighbour has been shouting strange things about porridge through his letterbox at odd hours in the Yorkshire town of Halifax for the past three weeks. The man is at his “wit’s end” and is pleading with the ‘porridge whisperer’ to stop immediately…
A gold coin discovered on Newfoundland’s south coast could rewrite the history books on the European presence in the region.
The coin, a quarter noble, dates back to the 1420s and the reign of Henry VI, making it likely the oldest English coin ever discovered in Canada…
The coin was discovered last summer on a beach, where it had waited under sand and salt water for five centuries…
The particular coin discovered this summer was minted in London some time between 1422 and 1427, and such coins were discontinued around 1470, which means the find presents a historical puzzle for archaeologists…
A puzzle, but not an impossible one. The coin could have been dropped or placed there any time after it was minted, and up until the time it was found.
Dang it, here in Los Angeles there are two very important local races that are still too close to call. (This being Los Angeles, in both cases both candidates are nominally Democrats, but that doesn’t make them good for the offices they’re running for… although, sure, none of them is a Trumpist Republican election-denier, so it could be worse.)
The incumbent sheriff of Los Angeles, Alex Villanueva, is almost comically corrupt and horrible. And despite that, he’s still getting a disturbing share of the votes. As of the latest count, his opponent has about a 13% lead, so it does look like he’s likely to lose (fortunately!), but the percentage of votes counted is low enough that it’s not a sure thing. (His opponent, Robert Luna, is nobody to write home about either, but at least he’s not a cartoon villain.)
Meanwhile, one of the candidates for the mayoral race, Rick Caruso, is a Bloombergeque billionaire who used to be a Republican and very recently changed his party affiliation to Democrat (after going ten years as “No Party Preference”) probably only because he thought he’d have a better chance of winning the election that way. And unlike Villanueva, he is currently leading in the reported results, though only by a few percent. (His opponent, Karen Bass, is a centrist establishment Democrat who’s not great either, and I didn’t vote for her or Caruso in the primaries, but at least she wouldn’t be nearly as bad as Caruso.)
YouTuber Nikita Dragun was arrested on Monday night after throwing a water bottle at a cop. And now, she is reportedly being held in a men’s prison.
Dragun, who’s real name is Nikita Nguyen, had allegedly been walking around the pool in a luxury Miami hotel naked and throwing water on hotel staff when the cops were called on her. By the time they arrived, Dragun was back in her room, playing loud music.
Police say they knocked on her door several times before she answered. When they said she needed to follow hotel rules, she allegedly slammed the door on them. When she opened the door again and asked “do you want more?” and threw a water bottle at the cops, they arrested her immediately.
According to a police report obtained by TMZ, Dragun was booked for felony battery on a police officer, misdemeanor disorderly conduct, and misdemeanor battery. Battery on a police officer is punishable by up to five years in prison in Florida.
The fact that Dragun might have to spend five years being abused and tortured in a men’s prison for throwing a water bottle at a cop is ludicrous. However, no matter what crimes she’s committed, no woman deserves to be placed in a men’s prison, and that’s what is happening to Dragun, a video of her talking to a judge revealed.
Nicole has now strengthened into a Category 1 hurricane and has sustained winds of 75 mph, according to the latest update from the National Hurricane Center.
“Recent observations from a NOAA Hurricane Hunter aircraft indicate that Nicole has strengthened into a hurricane,” the center said.
The storm is currently 25 miles east-northeast of Freeport, Bahamas, and 105 miles to the east of West Palm Beach, Florida. Hurricane Nicole continues to track westward at 12 mph toward Florida’s east coast with an expected landfall after midnight.
This storm is getting so little attention I almost feel sorry for it.
“Russian expert: ‘Republicans performed much worse than everyone had predicted… This is because of the Trump factor, this is clearly his fault. He butted into this electoral campaign and with his odious nature, pushed away those who were on the fence’.”
On Tuesday, it was reported that Ukraine had broken through Russian defenses at the fortress town of Snihurivka and occupied the north end of that location. It’s unclear if that was because Russia had already begun pulling forces away from the outer defensive line around the city of Kherson, or if that event triggered a Russian panic. Either way, what followed were a series of reports that Russia has left positions it had long defended on the west side of the Dnipro River and relocated forces either across the river, or to a new defensive line.
Then on Wednesday, Russian state media announced that Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu had ordered a complete withdrawal of Russian forces west of the Dnipro River. This was rapidly followed by reports from local citizens and nearby Ukrainian forces that Russia had withdrawn from a number of locations in northern Kherson, particularly towns along the line from Bruskynske to Mylove which has represented the front line between Russian and Ukrainian forces following a rapid Ukrainian advance last month. At the same time, Ukraine reportedly began advancing south of Snihurivka, both in the area of Pravdyne and along the highway at Kyselivka. [map at the link]
Over the hours that have followed, Ukraine has reportedly liberated all of Snihurivka, Pravdyne, and the village of Kalynivske. That last one may be a small location, but it stands very near a point that would represent the joining of Ukraine’s northern and southern forces in Kherson. In the north, Ukraine has reportedly liberated Borozenske and Pyatykhatky.
Still, there are absolutely reasons to be cautious in reading all these exciting, and upbeat reports. For one, the end of October estimate by the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense put the number of Russian forces west of the Dnipro at somewhere between 30,000 and 50,000 men. That’s an enormous force, and it’s unlikely that a significant number has retreated across the Dnipro in the last week, especially with Ukraine working to keep transportation across the river unreliable.
Vladimir Putin has not yet officially said anything about the withdrawal from Kherson — an area he recently dubbed “Russia forever” after taking the results of a mock election. Russia had a huge political investment in Kherson. They’ve been encouraging Russians to go there not just as soldiers, but as part of the government, as school teachers to indoctrinate Ukrainian children, and as settlers. This is the largest city and only regional capital that Russia has taken in this invasion. They don’t want to give it up.
Of all these reports of liberated towns, only Pravdyne and Kalynivske have been accompanied by clear evidence of Ukrainian soldiers walking around in the formerly occupied location. Snihurivka has famously been seen with a Ukrainian flag flying overhead, but there are no Ukrainian soldiers in the image, or video to show that Ukraine has full control of the town. So there’s still some possibility that things are not quite as good as they seem.
But this time … they probably are. Because if there’s evidence that Russia is lying about their withdrawal, or laying some kind of trap, that evidence sure hasn’t emerged at this point.
At the time of writing, it’s after 11PM in Kyiv. One reason we’re not seeing a lot of Ukrainian flags flying over newly liberated towns and villages at the moment is because not even the people on the ground can see them. It’s dark. However, if the reports of today are accurate, we’re likely to see the results in about 8 hours. If there is a rapidly growing list of liberated towns at that time, then this is real. […]
One other cautionary note: While there are reports of many towns and villages abandoned by Russian forces, it’s far from all locations. And while some of the reports indicate that Russian forces are withdrawing across the river, many Russian Telegram reports of movement along the northern line speak to forces being repositioned at a new defensive line closer to Beryslav.
Don’t assume that things are going to be a cakewalk. Don’t equate every report that a location has been abandoned by Russia with it being liberated and under Ukrainian control. And definitely don’t assume that the city of Kherson is going to fall without a fight. That way, you won’t be disappointed.
If Russia really is retreating, the sheer size of their forces in the area means just getting them out of their is likely to take weeks. In the meantime, their forces will have to try and maintain some semblance of a defensive line, or be completely overrun. The smart thing for Ukraine is likely to continually harry the Russian force, looking for weakness, carving off any isolated force, and capturing any left behind equipment, while not engaging in a nose to nose fight with desperate men whose back is literally to the river.
Mar-a-Lago is under a mandatory evacuation order as Tropical Storm Nicole approaches. It’s currently teetering on hurricane strength and is expected to be at least a Category 1 storm when it makes landfall. The evacuation zone is projected to have a “life threatening” storm surge of five feet or more, with accompanying huge waves pushing more water ashore. Situated on a spaghetti-thin barrier island at minimal elevation, Mar-a-Lago is at considerable risk. Quelle dommage!
Should Trump choose to evacuate, he and his associates really ought be closely watched to see if they take any boxes of documents along. Being caught red-handed would be a delicious cherry on top of his miserable showing as a kingmaker in yesterday’s elections, no?
Reginald Selkirksays
@100 – I saw the headline and hoped it was something from Andy Borowitz.
No instances of digital interference are known to have affected the counting of the midterm vote after a tense Election Day in which officials were closely monitoring domestic and foreign threats.
Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort is in a zone that officials have urged people to evacuate, as Tropical Storm Nicole is expected to soon make landfall on Florida’s east coast as a Category 1 hurricane.
The former president was seen voting in Florida on Tuesday and later held an election night watch party—where he saw a number of his picks lose their races—at his Palm Beach residence.
Mar-a-Lago is located within the National Hurricane Center’s forecast “cone of uncertainty.” According to the NHC, the center of the storm will remain within the cone about 60 to 70 percent of the time.
But the center has warned that Nicole is expected to “be a large storm, with hazards extending well to the north of the center, outside of the forecast cone.”
With forecasters predicting Nicole will hit Florida at hurricane strength on Wednesday night, residents of at least three counties were ordered to evacuate from barrier islands, low-lying areas and mobile homes.
Palm Beach County officials said mandatory evacuations for zones A and B would begin at 7 a.m. on Wednesday. Mar-a-Lago is located in evacuation zone B.
Palm Beach town manager Kirk Blouin said police would not be knocking on doors to convince people to leave their homes.
[…] It was not immediately clear what Trump’s plans for the storm were. Newsweek reached out to Trump for comment.
[…] Officials at Orlando International Airport have said commercial operations would stop at 4 p.m. on Wednesday afternoon until it was safe to resume flights.
The announcements come after Florida Governor Ron DeSantis on Monday declared a state of emergency for 34 counties in the potential path of the storm.
Many of those areas are still reeling from the devastation caused by Hurricane Ian, which hit Florida’s southwestern coast as a Category 4 storm on September 28.
Colorado voters approved a ballot measure to provide free meals for all public school students, according to a call from The Associated Press.
By a comfortable 55 percent to 45 percent margin, they voted to create a program to provide those meals and help schools pay for them, according to election results.
The measure will help schools pay for the meals by raising $100 million a year by increasing taxes on the state’s richest residents. Those making more than $300,000 a year will see their state tax deductions limited, increasing their taxable income.
The vote comes after the expiration of a federal program for universal free lunch started during the pandemic. That left states scrambling to restore funding.
Backers say nearly 70,000 Colorado kids can’t afford school meals but do not qualify for free or reduced-price school meals either.
The measure will also fund pay increases for frontline school cafeteria workers, helping deal with staff shortages and would incentivize schools to buy Colorado products.
… critics said the program was unnecessary and too expensive.
cicelysays
SC @97: “This storm is getting so little attention I almost feel sorry for it.”
Like an otherwise excellent movie that has the bad luck to hit the theaters at the same time as the latest MCU, Star Wars, and Bond flicks.
_
whheydtsays
Re: cicely @ #105…
Took me a bit to unpack MCU. My first thought was that theaters aren’t likely very interested in microcontroller units.
quotetheunquotesays
#100 – #101 grins
I was sure, absolutely sure, that it was an Andy Borowitz title as well! Something about the cadence, it’s just like one. (Plus the fact that it’s really, really hard to tell fact from fiction these days).
The MAGA world is shaken. The traditional media is shaken. The right wing-o-sphere is shaken. After believing a “red tsunami” was coming to wash away the Democratic Party and usher in a red wave of fascists on Nov. 8, centrists and conservatives everywhere are shaken. We were less shaken.
It is usually bad form to gloat over another person’s loss. But the fact is the MAGA world is so free of reality and so cruel in its projected platitudes, like “facts don’t care about your feelings.” So today, fuck your feelings, you wannabe tyrants.
Bring me those tears!
Let’s begin with a good old conservative Christian invocation.
Right-wing pastor George Pearsons kicked off The Victory Channel’s election night coverage by claiming that “this election will not be stolen” and victory was assured because God told him yesterday afternoon,”I got this.” [video at the link]
Uh-oh. Sounds like the Lord is super angry at these “Christians,” maybe?
I promised a MAGA freakout, Benny Johnson delivers. [video of segment of The Charlie Kirk Show is available at the link]
[…] But it’s not just on-air talent losing their proverbial marbles.
Fetterman faked a stroke knowing it would help him politically! Conservative cope is both hilarious and beautiful [example at the link]
Some people are blaming Donald Trump. I’m not saying who, I’m just saying some people. I’ve had big men—big, strong men—come up to me, tears in their eyes, telling me they wish Donald Trump would stay quiet. Also, former Trump press secretaries have said the same thing. [video of former Trump press secretary turned Fox host Kayleigh McEnany]
[…] Maybe it really is these “crazy” women wanting their autonomy? [Fox News video at the link]
What does the haircut guy have to say?
Watters: There’s just not the hatred for Joe Biden the way there is for Obama and the Clintons. There’s not a hate Biden vote that’s out there. [video at the link]
[…] We need hate. Got it. […] And for that beltway media.
A moment of silence out of respect for all the prewritten “Progressives Went Too Far” columns that won’t see the light of day
And finally.
[screen shot of Trump on Truth Social writing “Now that the Election in Florida is over, and everything went quite well, shouldn’t it be said that in 2020, I got 1.1 Million more votes in Florida than Ron D got this year, 5.7 Million to 4.6 Million? Just asking?”]
It’s far too early to know if there is any connection, but this is one hell of a coincidence…
The victims in a weekend shooting at a central El Paso home have been identified, both were lawyers who worked for the Texas Attorney General’s Office.
Georgette Kaufman was shot and killed, while her husband 47-year-old Daniel Kaufman remained hospitalized Tuesday in stable condition but was expected to recover.
(snip)
A police spokesman said an arrest had not yet been made and authorities were continuing to look for “somebody that is outstanding.”
That is horrific and tragic news, but it becomes perplexing in light of yesterday’s news out of Texas.
The Texas Tribune:
The FBI is investigating Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, the Associated Press reported Tuesday evening, vetting allegations made by eight of Paxton’s former top aides that he illegally used the power of his office to benefit a political donor.
Two unnamed sources told the AP that the bureau was examining claims made by the whistleblowers that Paxton broke the law by intervening several times in legal matters involving Nate Paul, a real estate investor and friend who donated $25,000 to Paxton’s campaign in 2018.
On Sept. 30 and Oct. 1, eight aides in total told authorities that they believed Paxton had committed crimes as part of his relationship with Paul, citing bribery and abuse of office. Since then, four aides have been fired, three have resigned, and one has been placed on leave — sparking a whistleblower lawsuit.
(snip)
Paxton has been under indictment for more than five years on securities fraud charges but has yet to stand trial. He has dismissed the charges as politically motivated and entered a not guilty plea.
I can only speculate on possible motives for this incident… It could be random. It could be a home invasion. Maybe someone didn’t like their yard sign… But it also COULD be connected to the FBI investigation of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. It could have been supporters of the AG or it could have been his detractors. There is absolutely no way of knowing at this time, so let’s not bandy about wild speculation. At this point it’s just NEWS… Very sad, but thought provoking, news.
“It could have been supporters of the AG or it could have been his detractors. There is absolutely no way of knowing at this time, so let’s not bandy about wild speculation.”
Transparent, that is.
Fucking propaganda, I know it when I see it, when it’s so overt.
Bah.
Tethyssays
JM
propaganda, I know it when I see it, when it’s so overt.
The author states multiple times that they are wildly speculating about possible motives for what appears to be a targeted murder of two lawyers. In the world of corrupt politicians, Paxton is a long time player who (as also reported) is facing some serious legal consequences from very serious government agencies.
None of the speculations (even the lawn signs) seems outside the realm of possibility. It’s Texas after all. Home of guns and quite a few maga seditionists.
John Moralessays
Tethys:
The author states multiple times that they
FFS. “so let’s not bandy about wild speculation”, the author writes, even as “The author states multiple times that they are wildly speculating” — in your very own words.
(Surely you don’t imagine you’re somehow disputing me thereby!)
John Moralessays
Basically, the credibility of that site is thereby established.
Anyway, let’s see…
Bias Rating: LEFT
Factual Reporting: MIXED
Country: USA (45/180 Press Freedom)
Media Type: Website
Traffic/Popularity: High Traffic
MBFC Credibility Rating: MEDIUM CREDIBILITY
Generous assessment, from what I’ve seen. I have higher standards.
Tethyssays
The author overtly stated that it is biased wild speculation John. Good of you to pick up on that!
John Moralessays
:)
So long as we know what it is, I’m good with it.
We concur.
StevoRsays
An old / baby / recently discovered / froma decade ago paradoxical stunning supernova find here :
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From their latest summary:
…America’s top general and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, estimates that Russia’s military had seen more than 100,000 of its soldiers killed and wounded in Ukraine, adding Kyiv’s armed forces has “probably” suffered a similar level of casualties in the war. Mark Milley’s remarks offer the highest US estimate of casualties to date in the nearly nine-month-old conflict.
…
The global dash for gas amid the Ukraine war will accelerate climate breakdown and could send temperatures soaring far beyond the 1.5C limit of safety, analysis has shown. If all of the new gas projects announced in response to the global gas supply crunch are fulfilled, the resulting greenhouse gas emissions would add up to about 10% of the total amount of carbon dioxide that can safely be emitted by 2050….
Also from there:
Sweden will continue its dialogue with Turkey to overcome objections raised by Ankara over its application to join the Nato alliance, its foreign minister, Tobias Billstrom, said on Thursday.
“I think the discussions are continuing in a very positive way,” Billstrom told reporters in Berlin after meeting his German counterpart, Reuters reports.
Billstrom said discussions would continue on all levels and that he would go to Ankara shortly.
At the same time, Germany’s foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, spoke about Hungary’s delay in ratifying the accession of Sweden and Finland to the alliance.
“With regard to the question about Hungary: I would like to underline this clearly … there is no grey area,” Baerbock told a joint news conference. [?]
Hungary’s parliament will discuss the ratification during its autumn session.
Ukrainian official: Russia mining Kherson to turn it into ‘city of death’
A senior Ukrainian official has warned that Russian forces are booby-trapping the city of Kherson, accusing them of trying to turn it into a “city of death”.
Mykhailo Podolyak, adviser to the head office of Ukraine’s president, tweeted that Russia “wants to turn Kherson into a ‘city of death’”,
He claimed that the Russian military “mines everything they can: apartments, sewers”, and that “artillery on the left bank” of the Dnieper River “plans to turn the city into ruins”.
He said that the Russian forces deployed to Kherson city “came, robbed, celebrated, killed ‘witnesses’, left ruins and left”.
The Ukrainian 131 Separate Reconnaissance battalion has posted a video to Telegram that they say was filmed in Snihurivka, Mykolaiv region. It would mark the first official confirmation that Ukrainian troops have captured the town.
The message accompanying the video reads: “Today, 10 November 2022, the settlement of Snihurivka was liberated [by] the forces of 131 separate reconnaissance battalion. Glory to Ukraine!”
A version with English subtitles has also been posted to Twitter.
Snihurivka is about 35 miles from the city of Kherson.
Ukrainian troops have advanced 7km in two directions and recaptured 12 settlements, according to its armed forces.
The Ukrainian army commander-in-chief, Valeriy Zaluzhny, was quoted by the force’s official Telegram account, which shows a map indicating Ukrainian advances towards Kherson city.
He said: “We can’t yet confirm or deny the information of the so-called withdrawal of Russian occupation troops from Kherson. We continue to conduct the offensive operation in line with our plan.”
…Let us overlook the breathless commentary that Sunak’s anointment was a Big Moment for race politics in the UK. Well, Braverman’s war on migrants is also a Big Moment, but it doesn’t get half the column inches. From Priti Patel to Kemi Badenoch, diversity on the blue team is always hymned by the newspapers – even as they ignore how black and brown ministers are regularly used to front up attacks on black and brown people.
Never mind, either, how much has remained constant. Many of the faces, from Liz Truss to Michael Gove, have stayed the same over the last decade, as has much policy. Kwasi Kwarteng’s supposedly radical plan for growth took up George Osborne’s ideas of corporation tax cuts and ditching the top rate of income tax. He merely deployed them at breakneck speed, as if setting all the coalition budgets to the Benny Hill theme tune.
Indeed, the greatest element missing from this supposed tale of two Tory halves is economics – in particular, the kind of austerity economics that will be imposed on the country in next Thursday’s budget. That is when Hunt will try to suck £50bn to £60bn out of the economy, the bulk of that money coming from our public services. It will be not the second but the third wave of austerity since 2010 (many forget the cuts made by Sunak at No 11 as the pandemic eased). Each has been about disciplining poor people and protecting the rich, and each has come with a fresh wave of authoritarianism. Just look at what they introduced this year in the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act, banning protests and locking up those who take part in them for a year.
First they stole our money, then they robbed our right to protest. And now they are taking away our right to strike too. The very same prime minister who just days ago stood on the steps of Downing Street and promised “integrity and accountability” is pressing ahead with two separate legal attacks on the rights of workers to take industrial action – even allowing drafted-in agency staff to break strikes.
Do not be fooled that there is a pre-Brexit nice, liberal Toryism trying to get out from underneath the pulverising post-2016 draconian monster…. They are not different breeds of Conservative, let alone rival ideologues. They both protect the interests of the wealthy, the company bosses and mega asset-owners against the rest of us. Picture brutal metal studs embedded in the sole of a shiny black Oxford brogue: that is the form of government we face now.
Let us call it authoritarian austerity, for it is an ideology with a long and terrible history. In a new book titled The Capital Order: How Economists Invented Austerity and Paved the Way to Fascism, the economic historian Clara E Mattei reminds us that the greatest austerity the UK ever faced was not under Osborne or Margaret Thatcher but in the early 1920s, when Whitehall slashed spending in short order by 20%….
The working classes in Britain emerged from the massacre of the Great War demanding universal healthcare and public housing. Forced impoverishment saw off those demands and tamed the radicals. It was not just that the government clamped down on the right to protest; as Mattei writes, austerity “foreclosed alternatives to capitalism”. It shut down the public’s political imagination.
Mattei points to the fact that Mussolini posed as an austerity politician when he took power. “Thrift, work, discipline … the budget has to be balanced as soon as possible,” he declared in his first speech in parliament. His ministers were inspired by the spending-cut politics practised in the UK – talk that was lapped up by the Times and the Economist. At the Bank of England, an extraordinary memo went round, which has been unearthed by Mattei. Titled Fascist Italy – Fascist Methods, it argued: “The Italian people are the descendants of Roman slaves … Mussolini and his Fascists seized power and restored order … and the people are reduced to the servitude which had been their lot for a score of centuries.”
Austerity is a one-sided class war, conducted in numbers and defended by economists’ jargon. And when that fails to do the trick, dissenters can be silenced. Already, you can see the forces of law and order mustering….
A clampdown on public finances, a crackdown on public disorder: the two went together in the 80s, in the 2010s – and they are what lie ahead now.
…Days ago on Instagram, the actor [Taraneh Alidoosti] vowed to remain in her homeland at “any price”, saying she planned to stop working and instead support the families of those killed or arrested in the protest crackdown.
“I am the one who stays here and I have no intention of leaving,” said the 38-year-old, denying having any foreign passport or residence.
“I will stay, I will halt working. I will stand by the families of prisoners and those killed. I will be their advocate,” she said.
“I will fight for my home. I will pay any price to stand up for my rights, and most importantly, I believe in what we are building together today,” she added….
…The new rule, introduced this week, further squeezes women out of an ever-shrinking public space. They are already banned from travelling without a male escort and forced to wear a hijab or burqa whenever out of the home. Secondary schools for girls have also been shut for over a year across most of the country….
…Jonathan Matthews, head of Yad Vashem’s photo archive, said the photos dispel a Nazi myth that the attacks were “a spontaneous outburst of violence” rather than a pogrom orchestrated by the state. Firefighters, SS special police officers and members of the general public are all seen in the photos participating in Kristallnacht. The photographers themselves were an integral part of the events….
Tropical Storm Nicole, now centered over central Florida, continues to deliver heavy rain over a large area, as well as dangerous storm surge.
Nicole now has sustained winds of 60 mph — down from 75 mph during landfall — and was centered about 30 miles southwest of Orlando around 7 a.m. ET, the National Hurricane Center says.
Its wind field is huge — winds of tropical storm force extend outward up to 450 miles, hurricane the center says.
As for storm surge: Onshore inundation measured about 5.8 feet at Florida’s Port Canaveral around 4 a.m. ET, just after landfall, according to NOAA. Peak winds, and therefore the surge, coincided with the low tide in the region, which happened around 2:30 a.m. — and that limited the surge.
Even though the winds have lessened and the storm surge is now down to around 3 feet, coastal water levels in the area are expected to remain high for a while because high tide (happening between 8 and 10 a.m.) is coming in. The hurricane center had been forecasting widespread areas of 3 to 5 feet of storm surge, with up to 6 feet possible, for the east coast of Florida from the storm’s location northward….
Nicole hit Florida’s east coast as the first US hurricane in November in nearly 40 years
Nicole weakened to a tropical storm after making landfall as a Category 1 hurricane along the east coast of Florida early Thursday morning, knocking out power to thousands, pushing some coastal buildings near collapse and flooding the coast as the first hurricane to hit the US in November in nearly 40 years.
A tornado threat, plus powerful wind and rain, are expected to continue Thursday in parts of Florida, Georgia and South Carolina
Up to 8 inches of rain could drench eastern, central and northern portions of Florida. And between 2 to 6 inches are expected from parts of the US Southeast to the southern and central Appalachians and western mid-Atlantic through Friday, the National Hurricane Center said.
Ahead of Nicole’s landfall, officials in Florida asked people to evacuate some buildings deemed unsafe to withstand the storm. In New Smyrna Beach, some condos were determined to be unsound due to the erosion of a sea wall. And in Daytona Beach Shores, still reeling from September’s Hurricane Ian, at least 11 buildings were at risk of collapse, a public safety director said.
April Ryan: “Four years ago in the East Room of the White House I was told to sit down during a press conference on midterm election results. I tried to ask about voter suppression. I was continuously told to ‘sit down’. Four years later,yesterday I was able to ask three questions.”
There are reports that Ukraine has completely retaken the village of Kyselivka, 15km to the north west of Kherson city and not far from the region’s airport.
It had previously been the sight of battles between Ukraine and Russian forces.
Top Russian propagandist says that Russia waited to announce the Kherson withdrawal until after Nov. 8, to make sure it does not help Joe Biden and the Democrats in the midterms. More in my recent article:…
Subtitled video and DB link at the (Twitter) link. Blatant imperialism on display, but I was a bit distracted by the size of one guy’s suit. The knot in his tie is like half the size of his head.
Following the earlier videos and reports that Ukrainian forces had captured the village of Kyselivka, the Guardian’s Peter Beaumont is reporting that they are now closing in on Chornobaivka on the outskirts of Kherson city, near its airport….
Jonathan Landay is in a village near the frontline in Kherson for Reuters, the precise location of which cannot be disclosed due to Ukrainian military rules. There he spoke to 85-year-old Nadiia Nizarenko, who said last night was “the first night it’s been quiet, it’s like there was no war” since Russia’s latest invasion of Ukraine began on 24 February.
Her 63-year-old daughter, Svitlana Lischeniuk, who retired last year as the local school director, was suspicious of what would come next, telling the reporter “They (the Russians) can prepare a trap for our army. We will get Kherson back, but what is very important is that our soldiers don’t suffer.”
The family has lived on humanitarian aid, pickled vegetables grown over the summer, water from a nearby well and occasional grocery runs to the town of Bashtanka. They also have a portable generator and a wood-burning stove.
“We have wood, so we have heat,” Lischeniuk said. “We will be able to survive and I’m sure we can get through the winter.”
The school where she worked has been reduced to rubble. Lischeniuk said she had left this summer but returned to help guard her neighbour’s properties and extinguish fires that she said the Russians deliberately set to destroy the wheat in surrounding fields.
“I am here on a mission,” she declared. “My place is here.”
Confirming that Ukraine has actually been moving forward for at least two days, but keeping things quiet.
Here’s a short clip of liberated Ukrainians seeing us for the first time. We had this all day yesterday and the day before! 🥹
Like the hundreds of people we met, we also were almost overcome with emotion and tiredness. We pushed hard and fast. This is the result, happy faces [video at the link]
[…] Officials in Mykolaiv are reporting that the entire Mykolaiv oblast has been liberated. That would be everything above that faint blue line that cuts back and forth on the map below, all the way down to Oleksandrivka in the middle. But I’m going to wait for individual towns to report in. It’s more fun that way.
Just going to put this up there. No point in trying to keep up the idea of a northern and southern front as everything is melting together as the Russian occupied region of Kherson west of the river dissolves. [map at the link]
Expect another update later. The locations are rolling in faster than I can update. It’s exactly the best of all possible outcomes we hoped for yesterday. Still no news of Ukrainian forces bumping up against a new Russian line, but that could happen soon — if there is a new Russian line.
Mylove is reported to be liberated. For completely selfish reasons I can’t tell you have nice it will be to have the front line past this point. because it’s impossible to search for the name of this town in either Twitter or Telegram without getting … other things.
Man. They are getting so far ahead of me. Go, Ukraine, go! [Tweet and video at the link]
Expect more and more of this today.
#Ukraine: A Ukrainian T-72B3 towing a captured Russian T-90A, #Kherson Oblast.
To our surprise, this isn’t the 1st time this tank has been captured – it was lost once before by the Russian army in Feb and was either never recovered or was quickly lost again by Ukrainian forces.[video at the link.]
Stanislav, down at the very south tip of the area, confirmed as liberated. […]
Local residents of Pavlivka, Mykolaiv region welcome the Ukrainian defenders. [video at the link]
Time to make a big rework of the map, because the northern advance and southern advance in Kherson just merged.
Those two red dots south of Snihurivka on the map? They’re not red any more. Yurivka and Afanasiivka liberated. I am so going to do a new map later today. [As reported earlier by SC in comment 132]
I love it when I can’t even finish writing before needing a good news update. [video from liberated Kyselivka at the link]With the sunrise in Ukraine, the images and videos started to appear, and all the best news of Wednesday was confirmed. The fortress town of Snihurivka, which has long guarded any access to the city of Kherson from the northwest and had resisted months of assaults, has been totally liberated. [video at the link]
And that’s just one part of the larger retreat that appears to be going on across the region. After several false starts and false claims, this Russian withdrawal is the real deal. On the northern border, Ukraine has reportedly liberated Piatykhatky, Sadok, Bezvodne, Ishchenka, and Bruskynske. That last one has long been a Russian strongpoint, fortified after Ukraine first established a bridgehead across the Inhulets River south of Davydiv Brid over three months ago. Now it looks like this. [video at the link]
In that Bruskynske video, one of the Ukrainian troops handily holds up his iPhone, showing that the town was actually liberated early on Wednesday afternoon. By now it’s unclear just how far Ukrainian forces may have advanced, or where they’ve run into resistance. However, there are reports that Russian forces have not left some areas, which may give an idea of where Russia is attempting to hold a fallback position as it withdraws toward the crossing at Kherson and Nova Kakhovka. [map at the link]
That loop reaching up in the middle of this area represents a zone in which locals have reported that Russian forces are still present. Best guess as to why it may be is that Russia is trying to guard the highway intersection west of Stepne to prevent a rapid advance by Ukraine to Beryslav. Something similar is going on along the Dnipro, where Russia also appears to be guarding that highway.
However, other videos on Thursday morning show Ukrainian forces advancing rapidly down highways littered with abandoned Russian vehicles. So this tactic may not be holding. Stay tuned through the day to see if these areas also begin to appear on the list of liberated locations. [video at the link]
But as big as what’s happening north of Beryslav may be, there’s another liberation to report west of Kherson city that may be as big, or bigger, than anything else so far. [map at the link]
Though I’ve yet to see videos of Ukrainian forces walking through Kyselivka, enough reliable sources have reported this now that I’m considering it confirmed. Not only was this another fortified position that’s been fought over for months (Ukraine actually managed to free it at one point only to have Russia surge back), Kyselivka is only 20 kilometers from Kherson, right down a major highway.
Previously, Russian forces had taken steps to harden areas around Chornobaivka to safeguard the approach to Kherson. That may still be the case. With the liberation of Pravdyne, which was confirmed on Wednesday, today will also be a day to watch for additional reports and what they reveal about Ukraine’s approach to the city itself.
Meanwhile in Kherson city, Russian forces have stopped any attempt to evacuate civilians. Why? Because of a reported “lack of interest.” In other words, with liberation on their doorstep and the quislings already gone, no one in Kherson wants to leave.
They want to be there to welcome the Ukrainian troops, as they welcome Kherson home.
Get your popcorn, because the Republican finger-pointing is in full swing after they dramatically underperformed expectations on Tuesday. Most of those expectations were set by Republicans, too! They hoped that an aura of invincibility would help them, but instead, it left them with more to answer for.
Donald Trump is taking plenty of incoming from the right-wing media, and behind the scenes, there’s a Republican “reckoning about former President Trump,” Robert Costa reported on CBS News, but he can comfort himself, as he weighs exactly how much ketchup to throw after reading the headlines, that he’s far from alone in that. But the great thing is that, after they’re done tearing their hair, Republicans will come out having learned exactly no lessons. And a lot of what they’re angry about stems from Trump’s sway over the Republican base: He chose bad candidates, they say—but the real problem for them is that the Republican base followed Trump’s choice of bad candidates.
Here’s the Rupert Murdoch-owned New York Post (along with a good point from Gary Legum):
People keep posting this and going “OOOOOO, they’re turning on him!” Does no one remember Jan. 6? They turned on him then too, for about a week. Let’s all check back after the holidays. [Tweet and image at the link: “Don (who couldn’t build a wall) had a great fall — can all the GOP’s men put the party back together again? Trumpty Dumpty.”
Here’s the Murdoch-owned Wall Street Journal with an editorial on “The GOP’s Midterm Failure.” (Subhed: “The party wasted a great opportunity, but at least we may get gridlock in Washington.” Woo! Yeah! Gridlock—that’s what I’m talkin’ about!) Republicans in general come in for a lashing in the editorial, which says, “Republicans are dismayed, and they should be—at themselves,” going on to name their handling of abortion among “the party’s mistakes.”
But, according to the WSJ editorial board, “The larger failure was that the GOP nominated too many lousy candidates who courted Donald Trump more than they did voters.”
The thing is, that’s framed as a mistake by Republican Party leaders. But Republican voters nominated those candidates. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell did not go out and clear the field for Mehmet Oz or Blake Masters just because Trump backed them. They won their primaries, because enough voters continue to listen to Trump. (Votes are still being counted in Arizona, where Masters was challenging Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly. Kelly currently leads, 51.4% to 46.4%.) Trump-backed Republican candidates J.D. Vance and Ted Budd won in Ohio and North Carolina, but their wins were much narrower than expected for those states. Donald Trump’s endorsement is powerful with the Republican base, and he chooses crappy candidates. As long as they thought they were going to win no matter what, they were fine with that.
The American Enterprise Institute (AEI) also blamed Trump and his influence on the Republican Party, in a statement saying, “The Republican Party substantially underperformed in yesterday’s elections. Candidates backed by former president Trump had the worst results.” The AEI went on to call on Republicans to “reject an economic policy agenda based on Trumpian populism and grievance.” Once again, they seem to be missing that Republican voters respond strongly to Trumpian populism and grievance—it’s just that it alienates basically everyone else.
Trump is probably happier with Fox News’s Tucker Carlson, who was furious and bitter about the results, but focused his blame on other Republicans.
”So what happened?” he asked on Wednesday evening. “Well, before we give you our theories as to what happened, one obvious point: The people whose job it was to win but did not win should go do something else now. We’re speaking specifically of the Republican leadership of the House and the Senate and of the RNC. There’s nothing personal, some of them are no doubt nice people, but they took hundreds of millions of dollars to paint the map red, and they didn’t. That doesn’t mean they’re evil, it doesn’t mean they should be jailed, but it does mean they shouldn’t be promoted.” [video at the link]
But there’s no question that the right-wing media is nervously shifting its eyes back and forth between Trump, with his disastrous candidate selection and habit of centering himself when he’s supposed to be boosting the people on the ballot, and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who provided one of the top Republican bright spots of Tuesday night. Trump already felt threatened by DeSantis. It’s only going to get worse now, so bring on the increased Republican infighting. [more video at the link]
whheydtsays
Re: Lynna, OM @ #135…
Wishful thinking department…Maybe–just maybe–this time the Republican party will fragment.
According to the preliminary reports, Mykolaiv Oblast is now Russian-free.
Goodbye and “farebad”!
Hee.
Several European defence ministers said Ukraine should feel under no pressure to enter any peace negotiations with Russia as the war heads towards the nine month mark at a meeting of the 10 country Joint Expeditionary Forum in Edinburgh on Thursday….
The Estonian government has said it may remove Soviet-era monuments from public spaces, saying they incite hatred amid Russia’s war in Ukraine.
The parliament of neighbouring Baltic country Latvia, has already voted to remove all remaining Soviet statues and plaques by mid-November, prompting Russia to summon its ambassador.
Both Estonia and Latvia have large Russian-speaking minorities that are sometimes at odds with the national governments.
There have been concerns that Moscow could seek to exploit these differences to destabilise the countries, both EU and NATO members.
“The government’s position is that Soviet monuments that incite hatred must be removed from public space,” Estonian culture minister Piret Hartman said in a statement.
But “we need to distinguish the monuments that incite or romanticise war from the symbols or buildings that, according to experts, have significant historical or cultural value,” she added.
Estonia had already taken down many monuments when it became independent of the Soviet Union in 1991. It is now moving to remove the remaining ones after Russia’s invasion [of Ukraine].
The Russian withdrawal from Kherson to the other side of the Dnieper continues. More curious is the escape of the driver of Deputy Governor of Kherson Stremousov. Run away, run away. [Screenshot of announcement of Kirill Stremousov’s death]
[…]
[…]The loss of Kherson follows a string of other military defeats and retreats by Russia in eastern Ukraine. The city is the capital of the Kherson region, one of four Ukrainian territories that Moscow officially claimed to have annexed and incorporated into the Russian Federation on Sept. 30.
[…] [Graphic showing 12 Russian army generals who were dismissed.]
[…] Russian federal subjects are struggling to pay mobilized personnel, and the Russian military is struggling to provision them.
Relatives of mobilized personnel continue to protest lack of payment and poor conditions.
Occupation authorities in rear areas are likely increasing law enforcement crackdowns and filtration measures amid fears of Ukrainian counteroffensives after the November 9 withdrawal announcement
[…] The Ukrainian counteroffensive in the Kherson direction since August—a coordinated interdiction campaign to force Russian forces to withdraw across the Dnipro without necessitating major Ukrainian ground offensives—has likely succeeded. http://www.understandingwar.org/...
[…] Ukrainians – who prefer to attack indirectly, attrit enemy logistic and C2, and corrode the Russians from within – will look for other opportunities in other areas to clear the Russians from the south. Of course, Ukrainian deep strikes will continue. Their recapture of Kherson will expand the area in the south that systems like #HIMARS can reach for shaping and strike activities in support of future offensives. […] this halts any future Russian designs on Odesa, but puts the Ukrainians a step closer to recapturing the south.
Capturing Kherson is also an important enabling operation for a future campaign to recapture Crimea. […] while this announcement was made by the military, ceding territory is political. There is no way this would have occurred without Putin’s sign off. […] This is evidence that Putin can recognise reality, and can make rational decisions […] But it is also evidence he is setting up the military as the fall guys for the Russian debacle in Ukraine.
[…] conducting a tactical withdrawal in good order is a very difficult undertaking, even in the best of circumstances.[…]
The Russians may accompany this withdrawal with stepped up strategic strikes elsewhere in Ukraine. While their own inventory of long range strike weapons is much smaller, they are seeking more from Iran. From a Russian perspective, these strikes would continue their ongoing ‘energy warfare’ against Ukraine, and would also provide strategic comms material to distract a Russian audience from the Kherson withdrawal & loss of territory. […] This is important for Putin. Having told the Russian people, in the annexation declaration, that Kherson is part of Russia, Putin will need a story to justify the withdrawal and distract the domestic audience from it.
[…] with less territory to defend and coupled with an influx of mobilised troops, Surovikin can rebuild battered combat and support units. He may also build operational reserves in the south or east. The locations to which withdrawn troops are deployed will also provide insights into their combat status as well as General Surovikin’s likely priorities for the winter and into early 2023. This consolidation might also prolong the war.
[…] this is a validation of Ukraine’s military strategy and the approach taken by its senior leadership. They are succeeding and the Russians know it. This will also provide a morale boost for Ukraine going into winter. […] now is NOT the time to force Ukraine into negotiations. The Russians might be weakened but they are not giving up on their territorial aspirations. They will have to be beaten on the battlefield and pushed out of Ukraine. […]
Midterm elections … a few summary versions of news:
* It looks like none of the U.S. Senate candidates in Alaska will reach the 50% mark, which means the race is headed to a ranked choice runoff. The seat will remain in Republican hands, though it remains unclear whether incumbent Sen. Lisa Murkowski or GOP challenger Kelly Tshibaka will ultimately prevail. [Tshibaka is a trumpist loon. Murkowski is a “moderate” Republican who occasionally does the right thing.]
* In addition to impressive Democratic gains in Michigan’s and Minnesota’s state legislatures, the Associated Press reported, “Democrats in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives are likely to make significant gains in the chamber, and some even see hope they could retake the majority once smoke clears from the Tuesday election they began with a 23-seat gap behind the Republicans.” [That’s good news.]
[…] * The GOP had great success taking over the state Supreme Courts in Ohio and North Carolina, but a related effort in Illinois appears to have failed.
* Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s margin of victory was smaller than other Republicans’, but the incumbent was nevertheless re-elected this week, despite the criminal indictment and FBI investigation hanging over his head.
* In New Hampshire’s U.S. Senate race, Don Bolduc fell far short, losing to incumbent Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan by nearly 10 points, though Donald Trump said the Republican would’ve won “easily” if only he’d been an even more enthusiastic election denier.
* According to a Washington Post tally, Mehmet Oz ended up loaning his Republican U.S. Senate campaign more than $21 million. The first-time candidate ended up losing in Pennsylvania this week by roughly four percentage points. [Wow. Oz lost a lot of his own money in that fiasco. I’m not sure what “loan” means in this context.]
* And in Maryland, outgoing Republican Gov. Larry Hogan said this week’s election results make him more likely to launch a 2024 presidential campaign.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican Ryan Zinke wins election to U.S. House in Montana’s 1st Congressional District.
To refresh memories, Zinke was Trump’s Interior Secretary for two years until he left amid mounting misconduct allegations. A federal investigation found Zinke misused his position to advance a development project in his Montana hometown and failed to disclose details of his involvement when questioned. Investigators also found that he misused his authority to direct subordinates to help with the project.
And here he is again, rising from the ashes to a seat in Congress.
To hear Mike Pence tell it, the Lincoln Project put unfortunate thoughts in Donald Trump’s head. In reality, that’s not what happened.
As former Vice President Mike Pence prepares to release a new book, ahead of [his] likely national campaign, the Hoosier has a new op-ed in The Wall Street Journal on his “last days with Donald Trump.” It included a claim I don’t recall him making before:
By mid-December, the internet was filled with speculation about my role [in the elections process]. An irresponsible TV ad by a group calling itself the Lincoln Project suggested that when I presided over the Jan. 6 joint session of Congress to count the electoral votes, it would prove that I knew “it’s over,” and that by doing my constitutional duty, I would be “putting the final nail in the coffin” of the president’s re-election. To my knowledge, it was the first time anyone implied I might be able to change the outcome. It was designed to annoy the president. It worked.
According to Pence’s version of events, the outgoing president told him at a Cabinet meeting that the Lincoln Project’s ad “looked bad” for Pence.
At this point, if you’re anything like me, you’re asking, “What Lincoln Project ad?”
Evidently, the former vice president was referring to this post-election video, created by the group of Trump critics. It was a derisive message to the outgoing president, explaining that Pence knew the process was over, and the certification of the results on Jan. 6 would prove it. [video at the link]
In the op-ed, Pence said this was “the first time” that someone had “implied” he might be able to change the outcome of the election. But there’s a problem with that.
For one thing, the video includes no such implication. It simply stated as fact that the then-vice president would certify the results.
For another, blaming the Lincoln Project for putting ideas in Trump’s head is bizarre given everything else we know about the post-election period. Indeed, the Lincoln Project’s clip didn’t exactly break new ground: Members of Team Trump had prepared a series of outlandish legal memos sketching out schemes to use Pence to help the defeated president claim illegitimate power.
[…] pointing the finger at the Lincoln Project doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.
As for the larger context, my MSNBC colleague Hayes Brown raised an important point this morning:
It’s not that I object to Pence’s recounting his side of the story. It’s that I’m annoyed that he’s yet another Trump administration official who chose to sell a book months or years later rather than speak out when it matters. …. [I]t’s not like there aren’t several investigations into the attack that would love to hear from Pence about what he saw and heard. If Mike Pence really wants to show America that he understands the gravity of what happened in his last days in office, he should be telling what he knows to the Justice Department or the Jan. 6 committee. If he really wants, he can plug his book while testifying under oath.
It’s entirely unclear at this point whether Pence and his team have tried to work out any kind of arrangement with the Jan. 6 committee, but his op-ed — and presumably, the former vice president’s book — provides chronological details and behind-the-scenes accounts that will likely be of interest to investigators.
Maybe this represents the Republican’s weird and indirect way of trying to cooperate with the official congressional probe?
Pence strikes me as cowardly but craftily deceitful. He strikes me as almost, but not quite spineless. It would not be pleasant to be him.
Ron Johnson made clear that he wasn’t prepared to lose gracefully. Evidently, he doesn’t believe in winning gracefully, either.
[…] The conservative Washington Times reported yesterday, “Sen. Ron Johnson blasted his Democratic opponent Mandela Barnes for a long wait to concede the race clear when it was clearly breaking for the incumbent.” It’s not that Barnes refused to accept the results; it’s that Johnson was bothered by the fact that Barnes didn’t concede fast enough to satisfy the senator.
The Republican also slammed the “corporate media” for not calling the race as quickly as he would’ve liked.
Last night, Johnson appeared on Fox News, thanked Sean Hannity for the host’s “crucial” campaign support, and proceeded to whine some more.
“[T]he media is completely allied against us, as is our education system. … But I think maybe more than anything, Democrats have no problem lying. The president lies. President Obama lies. My opponent lied. And, of course, the media amplifies those same lies. And let’s face it, lies taint you. So it’s very effective. You know, we won this campaign, we won this race, because I told the truth. But, again, those lies — when you have a political party that has no problem lying, where they figure the end justifies the means, unfortunately, that has impact in politics.”
Remember, this is the guy who didn’t come up short on Election Day. […]
From ReligionClause
Results for ballot issues of interest to those following law and religion developments.
Arkansas Issue 3: Constitutional amendment that would provide “government shall not burden a person’s freedom of religion even if the burden results from a rule of general applicability.” Losing 49.56%- 50.44% with 97% of precincts reporting.
California Proposition 1: Right to Reproductive Freedom Amendment. Passed 65%- 35%.
Colorado Amendment F: Constitutional amendment to allow operators of charitable gaming activities to be paid and authorize the legislature to determine how long an organization must exist to obtain a charitable gaming license. Defeated 39%- 61%.
Kentucky Constitutional Amendment 2: Amendment to the Kentucky Constitution to provide that nothing in the state constitution creates a right to abortion or requires government funding for abortion. Defeated 48%- 52%.
Michigan Proposal 3: Constitutional amendment to provide a right to reproductive freedom. Passed 57%- 43%
Montana LR-131: Referendum on statute that states infants born alive at any stage of development are legal persons, and requires medical care for infants born alive after an induced labor, cesarean section, or attempted abortion. Losing 48%- 52% with 85% of precincts reporting.
Nevada Question 1: Constitutional amendment to prohibit the denial or abridgment of rights on account of an individual’s race, color, creed, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, disability, ancestry or national origin. Winning 57%- 43% with 77% of precincts reporting.
Tennessee Constitutional Amendment 4: Amendment to repeal section of the Tennessee Constitution that disqualifies religious ministers from being elected to the state General Assembly. Passed 63%- 37%.
Vermont Proposal 5: Constitution amendment that would protect the right to personal reproductive autonomy and prohibit government infringement unless justified by a compelling state interest. Passed 77%- 23%.
West Virginia Amendment 3: Amendment to remove the state constitution’s prohibition on incorporating religious denominations and churches and to authorize the state legislature to pass laws providing for such incorporations. Defeated 45%- 55%.
I’d love to give y’all some examples of what I heard at doors in rural Missouri to help you understand what folks out here say when confronted with a progressive message. I will say that we knocked over 5k doors and made as many calls. Also, we had near zero data to go on…
I knocked a door in a town of 200 people. The woman asked if I was a D or R. She immediately handed back my lit and said she was a Christian and couldn’t vote for Democrats. She then said she’d heard I was a teacher (her kid’s schools just went 4-day)…
She said there’s something you can do about our schools and I was hopeful that she would talk about getting her schools funding so they could stay open 5 days. She wasn’t. She said legislators should be working to mandate prayer in classrooms.
I talked to a man who said that if a woman dies of an ectopic pregnancy, it’s God’s will. Another man told me that a child who has been raped and impregnated should have to deliver the pregnancy because “a baby shouldn’t suffer for another person’s crime.”
I had an elderly woman send my postcards back to me with “Biden’s Demonrat” scrawled across my face. A man who I knew (I had his kids in class) sent me an email hoping “my soul would forever rest in hell for murdering babies.”
I talked to a woman at her door who said she had heard that Democrats are releasing murderers onto our streets. I asked for an example and she cited a Fox News story. She also thought Biden was in control of gas prices and setting high grocery prices to starve the elderly.
There is a massive amount of misinformation out here and folks not only hear it on Fox, but also in church. They share it on Facebook and it came up at so many doors. Our papers lean conservative and elected Republicans are given space every week to preach their message in papers
Every ounce of me and my energy went into a campaign that swayed 4% of non-Democratic voters. Hundreds of thousands of dollars went into 4%. Grassroots is HARD work and it takes more than just me knocking doors. It’s very long game. Folks can walk away and say it wasn’t worth it.
I can’t walk away…I live here. So, I am now organizing those that put in the work with me. My campaign brought out a silent minority who has decided to be silent no longer–we found each other and we will continue the work. Every. Day.
I don’t know what the future holds, but I will keep working in my community while our roads continue to crumble and our teachers flee and healthcare gets more scarce. The Dirt Road Democrat didn’t start with me and it won’t end in my failed run. I am rural. These are my people.
As to other doors… I was walking down the road and a woman ran out of her front door and told me she was voting for me to save bodily autonomy for her daughters. The woman right across the street from her had my sign and said she was worried about abortion rights too.
I talked to a man raking his leaves and he said he can’t believe what happened to our country after 2016. He promised that he and his wife were voting for me because they were scared our state was off the rails with only Rs in charge.
A woman with a baby said that rape victims shouldn’t be forced to deliver. A teacher told me that Rex Sinquefield will eventually get his hands on her retirement. A man came to a meeting to say that he’d been quiet too long and was standing up to the Republicans in Jeff City
The point: while we are overwhelmed with misinformation, many have quit listening. They drive the roads, they see the sschools are defunded, they knew COVID was real. Those folks are out here too along with reasonable Republicans and Independents. We are all here.
Our reporter Isobel Koshiw has spoken to Ukraine’s deputy military intelligence chief Vadym Skibitsky about the apparent withdrawal by Russian troops in Kherson to the east side of the Dnipro river.
Over half of the Russian forces that were stationed on the right bank are still there, said Vadym Skibitsky, Ukraine’s deputy military intelligence chief. Previous estimates put the total of Russian forces in the area at about 20,000.
First, the Russians moved the civilians, then the military who weren’t involved in active fighting, logistics and supplies. Now only individual fighting units are leaving, according to Skibitsky.
“The most recent information we have is the 4th tactical military base has supposedly been transferred to the left bank.
“The rest are still there, fighting, conducting military activities with the aim of providing cover for others to leave.”
According to Skibitsky, the Russians are retreating from the second line of defence that they were pushed back to by Ukrainian forces in early October. But they have built a defence line around Kherson city – and he said “time will tell” whether they will choose to defend the city.
He believes the Russians will retreat to the east side of the river and take up defensive positions to protect Crimea. Ahead of their retreat the Russians mined the area.
It’s thought that the retreat from the right bank of Kherson will free up forces that will then be shifted to the Donbas front, which is now the priority. He ruled out that the Russians currently have the capability to launch a new offensive front, for example from Belarus.
“They need to reach the administrate boundaries of the Donetsk region. They need to at least fulfil one of their tasks – creating the so-called Donetsk Republic is their priority task,” said Skibitsky….
“I have to thank @chrislhayes for broadcasting the most satisfying 2-minutes of television I’ve watched today. A perfect encapsulation of what Fox News has looked like over the past several months….”
Video at the (Twitter) link.
ravensays
Tweet
Михайло Подоляк @Podolyak_M
RF wants to turn Kherson into a “city of death”. Ru-military mines everything they can: apartments, sewers. Artillery on the left bank plans to turn the city into ruins. This is what “Russian world” looks like: came, robbed, celebrated, killed “witnesses”, left ruins and left.
I’m sure Russia will do something terrible with and to Kherson, just not sure what.
They did level a larger city, Mariupol with up to 100,000 dead, 87,000 dead documented.
Podolyak is a high Ukrainian government advisor.
“There’s a little Black woman walking, spraying stuff on the sidewalks and trees,” he complained. “I don’t know what the hell she’s doing, it scares me though.”
Fox News continues to deliver the incisive election analysis that they alone are putting out into the world. Case in point: Host Jesse Watters on Wednesday night broke down a segment that showed 68% of unmarried women voted for Democrats this cycle, compared with just 42% of married women. He has a theory for why this may be. “Democrat policies are designed to keep women single,” Watters said. He continued, “Single women and voters under 40 have been captured by Democrats. So, we need these ladies to get married. And it’s time to fall in love and just settle down. Guys, go put a ring on it.”…
Most of the Republicans linked to Jan. 6 lost their campaigns this week, but not all of them.
On Jan. 6, 2021, a man named Derrick Van Orden went to Capitol Hill. According to the Wisconsin Republican’s version of events, he left when the pro-Trump mob became violent, and he insisted that he did not enter the grounds of the Capitol itself. A Daily Beast report later called Van Orden’s claims into question, though he rejected the accuracy of the article.
Almost two years to the day later, the Wisconsin Republican will return to Capitol Hill — this time as an elected member of Congress. MSNBC reported yesterday:
Derrick Van Orden, a Trump loyalist who rallied outside the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, won his U.S. House race in Wisconsin’s 3rd Congressional District. … Van Orden flipped the seat, defeating Democratic state Sen. Brad Pfaff, after Democrat Rep. Ron Kind decided not to run for re-election.
For democracy advocates, the outcome was likely discouraging, but Van Orden wasn’t the only Republican candidate linked to Jan. 6 on the ballot yesterday, and others weren’t as fortunate as the Wisconsinite. HuffPost reported:
Many Republican candidates who were directly linked to the deadly Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol lost their bids for office in Tuesday’s midterm elections, in a big repudiation of extremism and GOP efforts to torpedo democracy.
Perhaps the most high-profile example was Doug Mastriano, who went to the Capitol on Jan. 6, and whose claims about what transpired have been called into question. The Pennsylvania Republican badly lost his gubernatorial race this week.
There’s also Dan Cox, who attended Donald Trump’s pre-riot rally on Jan. 6. The Maryland Republican badly lost his gubernatorial campaign, too.
In Ohio, Republican congressional candidate J.R. Majewski was seen around the Capitol on Jan. 6, and he lost this week to incumbent Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur. North Carolina’s Sandy Smith said she “marched … to the Capitol” on Jan. 6, and she lost her congressional campaign, too.
As for Arizona, Mark Finchem, the Republican nominee for secretary of state, has faced difficult questions about his involvement with the events at the Capitol, and in the state’s 3rd congressional district, Jeff Zink ran, despite facing criminal charges related to Jan. 6.
Zink, who’s pleaded not guilty, lost in a landslide to incumbent Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego, while Finchem’s race has not yet been called.
In the wake of midterm defeats, some Republicans are talking about moving on from Donald Trump and his failures. He’s not handling this especially well.
Just hours before Americans started learning the results of the midterm elections, Donald Trump explained his perspective on the best way to interpret the vote tallies. “Well, I think if [Republicans] win, I should get all the credit,” the former president said. “If they lose, I should not be blamed at all.”
He added that, as far as he’s concerned, he’d elevated “very good candidates,” but if they fell short, “they will blame everything on me.”
Trump didn’t specify who “they” were, but if he was describing his intraparty critics, the predication was accurate.
One GOP insider told Fox News on Wednesday, “If it wasn’t clear before, it should be now: We have a Trump problem.” As The New York Times reported, this was not an uncommon sentiment.
Donald J. Trump faced unusual public attacks from across the Republican Party on Wednesday after a string of midterm losses by candidates he had handpicked and supported, a display of weakness as he prepared to announce a third presidential campaign as soon as next week. As the sheer number of missed Republican opportunities sank in, the rush to openly blame Mr. Trump was as immediate as it was surprising.
Some of the blame came by way of Republicans in the media — the editorial board of The Wall Street Journal, for example, on Thursday labeled the former president the GOP’s “biggest loser” — while other prominent voices in the party, including former House Speaker Paul Ryan, implored Republicans to take this opportunity to move forward in a new, non-Trump direction.
To the extent that reality has any role in the discussion, the former president’s critics have a point. Republicans really were burdened by weak and failed candidates whom Trump had championed, even over more credible alternatives. What’s more, he kept his unpopular persona at the forefront of the cycle, which also didn’t do GOP candidates any favors.
This isn’t a situation in which disappointed partisans are blaming Trump because he’s a convenient foil; this is a situation in which the former president has earned his ostensible allies’ ire.
In private, [Trump] doesn’t appear to be handling this well. According to the Times’ report, […] Trump has spread the blame around, targeting Fox News’ Sean Hannity and casino mogul Steve Wynn. The account added that the former president has even complained about his own wife, who he believes gave him poor advice about which candidates to support. [OMFG]
But in public, Trump’s reactions have hardly been any better. By way of his social media platform, [Trump] argued that the midterm cycle was “a very big victory” for him — because he endorsed a great many candidates, and only 16 of them lost this week.
I don’t know if that figure is correct — many races haven’t yet been called, and he might very well be undercounting his misses — but even taken at face value, 16 losses for Trump-backed candidates, including many defeats in critically important contests, isn’t something to brag about. [Also, before election day Trump prepared to look good by endorsing candidates that were sure to win in red districts .]
The former president went on to argue that the aforementioned New York Times article doesn’t count, in part because it quotes “enemies and losers,” and in part because the piece was written by journalists Trump considers to be “THE ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE!!!”
Hours later, he complained that Mehmet Oz wasn’t enough of an election denier and Fox News is insufficiently loyal to him.
It culminated in a message in which Trump insisted he “did a great job” in the midterms, concluding, “Remember, I am a ‘Stable Genius.’” [LOL, LOL, LOL. That’s perfect.]
[…] the existence of this conversation — less than a week before he’s expected to formally launch another presidential campaign — has rattled the former president in ways he’s struggling to hide.
I’ll also point out that Trump posted multiple times that he is not “Angry,” with the word angry capitalized in the middle of a sentence, and sometime in all caps. Here is just one example:
[…] First of all Oz is a wonderful guy who really worked hard, and was a very good candidate, but he WAS LONG IN THE RACE before I ever Endorsed him, they [Melania and Sean Hannity] had NOTHING to do with it, he was not a ‘denier’ (his mistake!), and I was not at all ANGRY. Fake News!”
Russian forces also reportedly blew up a regional energy facility, a local publication Most reported on Nov. 10. According to the report, there are problems with mobile service in the city.”
whheydtsays
Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and his company were ordered Thursday to pay an extra $473 million to victims’ families and an FBI agent for calling the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting a hoax, adding to a nearly $1 billion jury verdict issued last month.
Connecticut Judge Barabara Bellis imposed the punitive damages on the Infowars host and Free Speech Systems. Jones repeatedly told his millions of followers the massacre that killed 20 first graders and six educators was staged by “crisis actors” to enact more gun control.
Eight victims’ relatives and the FBI agent testified during a month-long trial about being threatened and harassed for years by people who deny the shooting happened. Strangers showed up at some of their homes and confronted some of them in public. People hurled abusive comments at them on social media and in emails. And some received death and rape threats.
Six jurors ordered Jones to pay $965 million to compensate the 15 plaintiffs for defamation, infliction of emotional distress and violations of Connecticut’s Unfair Trade Practices Act, which bans deceptive business practices and unfair competition.
Jones has bashed the trial as unfair and an assault on free speech rights. He says he will appeal the verdicts. He also says he doesn’t have the money to pay such huge verdicts, because he has less than $2 million to his name — which contradicted testimony at a similar trial in Texas. Free Speech Systems, meanwhile, is seeking bankruptcy protection.
Bellis found Jones and Infowars’ parent company liable for damages without a trial last year, as a consequence for what she called his repeated failures to turn over many financial documents and other records to the plaintiffs. After the unusual “default” ruling, the jury was tasked only with deciding on the amount of compensatory damages and whether punitive damages were warranted.
Jones says he turned over thousands of documents and the default ruling deprived him of his right to present a defense against the lawsuit.
In Connecticut, punitive damages for defamation and infliction of emotional distress are generally limited to plaintiffs’ legal fees. The Sandy Hook plaintiffs’ lawyers are to get one-third of the $965 million in compensatory damages under a retainer agreement — putting their legal fees at $322 million.
But there is no cap on punitive damages for violations of the Unfair Trade Practices Act. The plaintiffs had not asked for a specific amount of punitive damages, but under one hypothetical calculation, they said such damages could be around $2.75 trillion under the unfair trade law.
In a similar trial in Texas in August, Jones was ordered to pay nearly $50 million to the parents of another child killed in the Sandy Hook shooting for calling the massacre a hoax. A forensic economist testified during that trial that Jones and Free Speech Systems have a combined net worth as high as $270 million.
A third and final trial over Jones’ hoax claims is expected to begin around the end of the year in Texas. As in Connecticut, Jones was found liable for damages without trials in both Texas cases because he failed to turn over many records to the plaintiffs.
Wonkette: “Fox News Bros Wilding Out Over Midterms […]”
Fox News’s “The Five” had a weird one yesterday, as the hosts grappled with how they are all big losers and none of the normal and good people in the country share their values or thoughts or prayers or feelings or bedwetting fears or conspiracy theories or sexism or racism or general garbage-ness. The beta boys who sit at Jeanine Pirro’s lunch table were in fine form.
Watch Greg Gutfeld, who gets to be the “king of late night” because septuagenarian white racists pass out in their box wine during Laura Ingraham and leave the TV on, as he slouches like a frumpy teenager in his chair — he is pushing 60 — and moans that normal Americans aren’t anti-abortion white extremists.
Remember how literally everybody in America voted to love abortion yesterday, […] Yeah, Greg mad. [video at the link]
JESSICA TARLOV (CO-HOST): Abortion is so much a part of health care, of family planning. There’s so many people who are forced to have an abortion from wanted pregnancies. And those are the conversations that are going on all over this country.
GREG GUTFELD (CO-HOST): Are you campaigning for Planned Parenthood, or what?
As if that’s not a completely mainstream position, despite how it makes Greg Gutfeld’s lower lip pouty […]
Anyway, that’s when he made that face above.
GUTFELD: People who are pro-life actually do take the issues more seriously than you think, right? You want to talk about the quiet majority? Talk about the unborn. They don’t have a word in this at all.
[…] Eat shit.
He just babbled and shrieked and swore that situations like Tarlov brought up, like the 10-year-old rape victim from Ohio who had to go to Indiana just to get healthcare, are “very rare, very rare, very rare!” He shouted over her — again and again! — because Greg Gutfeld does not need any woman explaining him about “abortion,” like that sometimes you have to have one even when you don’t want one, because the baby’s messed up or it’s gonna make you dead, NO, Greg Gutfeld DOES NOT NEED TO KNOW about THAT. In Greg Gutfeld’s screams, the anti-choice people are the “nuanced” ones because they will let you have an abortion if you are actively dying (and not a minute before), and everybody else on the panel — hell, Jesse Watters wisely managed to keep his mouth shut — just hoped he’d be quiet and not stroke out.
So that was Greg Gutfeld’s day. Reminder: Greg Gutfeld recently said he wouldn’t want to go to college these days (again he’s almost 60) because the women there aren’t hot enough for him.
As for other dudes who do Fox News’s somehow worse version of “The View,” Jesse Watters unshut his mouth long enough to trend on Twitter, under “fashion & beauty” because Elon’s Twitter is a well-oiled machine.
And the reason Watters is trending is because he was also an ass, the entire afternoon.
On “The Five,” he just seemed extremely confused that the Kids These Days don’t even hate Joe Biden very much. People hate the Clintons. People hate Barack Obama. Some people even hate Donald Trump, if you can believe such a thing! People are brainwashed, and they are single women — BIG PROBLEM, AS YOU WILL SEE — and single women are brainwashed to think Republicans are vile, and to not even hate Joe Biden.
WATTERS: People just don’t feel the same passion against the guy that they also feel for other people. And we have a problem, demographically. Single women are voting for Democrats by 30 points.
DANA PERINO: 37.
WATTERS: 37 points. And in urban America they’re cleaning our clocks in the cities. Cleaning our clocks. I’m not saying anything nefarious is going on, but they are cleaning our clocks in the cities. And we’re giving it away. And the fact that these youth voters are coming in so strong on an off-year is very concerning. It looks like they’ve been brainwashed. This new generation is totally brainwashed.
“The fact that these youth voters are coming in so strong on an off-year is very concerning.” These midterms are supposed to be for old racist white misogynist trash, unfair! Cry more about the youth, please.
A couple hours later on his own show was when Watters really got mad at the single ladies. [video at the link]
JESSE WATTERS (HOST): Also, single women are breaking for Democrats by 30 points. And this makes sense when you think about how Democrat policies are designed to keep women single.
But once women get married, they vote Republican. Married women, married men go for Republicans by double digits. But single women and voters under 40 have been captured by Democrats. So, we need these ladies to get married. And it’s time to fall in love and just settle down. Guys, go put a ring on it.
[Already noted by Reginald in comment 150]
“We need these ladies to get married.”
“Guys, go put a ring on it.”
Reminder: Jesse Watters admitted to being a predator when he confessed that he once let the air out of a woman’s tires to trick her into letting him drive her home. But it’s OK, though! He divorced his then-wife and now the person with the deflated tires — who is 14 years his junior — is his today-wife!
Love hearing that guy tell us what “we need these ladies” to do.
In summary and in conclusion, it’s not Fox, but here’s another table full of really cool white guys that includes Charlie Kirk and Jack Posobiec. “The Left literally wants to turn everyone into an unmarried woman. Literally. Literally,” says Posobiec, who meant it literally. [video at the link]
Thoughts and prayers for all these guys, really truly, they are hearts in need of blessing.
[…] There are definitely some places where school boards have indeed been taken over by anti-LGBTQ wingnuts. But as the crazies have gotten louder, there are also plenty of examples of their views being soundly rejected by voters who are sick of their kids being targets in the Culture Wars and just want schools with fully stocked libraries and no interference from religious bigots whose open aim is ending public education. Some snapshots [below]!
Texas: GOP-Backed Candidates Bite The Big Lone Star
In Round Rock, Texas, a suburb north of Austin, the Texas Republican Party sponsored its own slate of five school board candidates to bring decency and patriotism to the godless libs living in the area, and every last one of the GOP-sponsored candidates lost […] Charmingly, one of the candidates ran on the slogan “Teach ABCs + 123s, Not CRTs & LGBTs,” which sounds to us like a bigot’s version of a Dr. Bronner’s soap bottle. Happily, the voters replied, “Dilute! Dilute!” and washed the wingnuts right out of their schools.
Unfortunately, because people who want to protect children know the Prince of Peace is on their side, the election got very charming; NBC affiliate KXAN reports that one of the incumbent board members, Tiffanie Harrison, said that during the summer she’d been sent
crude packages and the contents of one allegedly contained used feminine products. She said since being elected, she has faced similar harassment that is intensifying in the final months of the election.
She won reelection anyway, against a guy whose campaign focused on dirty school books and CRT of course.
Statewide, NBC News says, only two of the 11 school board candidates with state GOP support actually won seats, while the others
lost by wide margins. School board candidates running on platforms focused on critical race theory and sexually explicit library books also performed poorly in the nearby Leander Independent School District, and in a pair of right-leaning suburbs outside of Houston.
[…]
And Then There’s Fuckin’ FLORIDA
Ron DeSantis and the Florida Republican Party have been in the business of pushing for school Gileadization longer than Texas has — including at least one direct replacement of Democrats on a school board, under the pretext of “mismanaging” school safety funds — so it shouldn’t be too surprising that all six school board candidates endorsed by DeSantis won in runoff elections held Tuesday. Of 30 school board candidates endorsed by DeSantis this year, 24 won seats. As in Texas, school board races are nominally nonpartisan, but the GOP and big PACs are getting increasingly involved, as are Democrats who are playing catch-up, so political pundits can now cry “both sides” are polarizing education.
From Politico:
In one glaring example, the 1776 PAC, which opposes critical race theory in schools, endorsed 49 candidates in Florida throughout 21 counties — more than even DeSantis.
Parental rights groups also played a role, such as the conservative Moms for Liberty, which endorsed 12 school board candidates in Florida and donated to campaigns. Florida Democrats endorsed 20 candidates ahead of the general election.
Come on, guys, at least put “parental rights” in quotes. They want public funds to move from public schools to private religious schools and homeschooling parents, and to tightly restrict whatever’s still taught in any remaining public schools until they can be liquidated.
Indiana: Some Wins For Sanity, Some Losses
Independent reporter Erin Reed has been following the anti-LGBTQ+ political movement closely, and notes that in the Tippecanoe School Corporation (yeesh, no “districts” for Indiana?) in Lafayette, Indiana, two candidates pushing for LGBTQ book bans and other crap lost their races, hooray! While we were checking Lafayette’s Gannet paper for more info, we found that in another district, the Lafayette School Corporation, the incumbent board vice president lost his reelection bid to Chuck Hockema, a dude sponsored by the “Tippe Citizens’ Devolution of Education,” the same rightwing “parental rights” group that sponsored the two losing candidates in Tippecanoe. […]Hockema’s statement on the group’s website is A LOT:
Trustworthiness, honesty, integrity and being a conservative Christian are my life’s values.
I strongly oppose any ideology that teaches OR:
1. Undermines traditional values and beliefs.
2. Promotes gender confusion
3. Encourages peer to peer sex education
4. Violates or undermines parental rights
5. Supports CRT (Critical Race Theory) or SEL (Social Emotional Learning) when used as a cover for divisive instruction (“Privilege”, et al).
6. Promotes WOKE ideology (Change of descriptive pronouns, etc.)
(See ISAIAH 5: 20-21)
Wonkette public service: The Bible stuff is about what you’d expect.
Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!
Woe unto them that are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight!
[…]
North Carolina: Dems Keep BibleBangers From Taking School Board
Reed also highlighted a big win in the Wake County, North Carolina, school board elections — also officially nonpartisan — where candidates supported by the Wake County Democratic Party took seven of the nine seats. Four were incumbents, and the Dems added three new board members. A slate of GOP-backed candidates had sought to take over the board, but only two of the would-be book censors and purity monitors managed to win seats. They’ll no doubt work harmoniously with their colleagues, at least when not calling them pedos and groomers.
One of the losing Republican candidates, Michele Morrow, attended the January 6 election denial rally, and during the campaign “apologized” for tweets in which she had called for Islam to be banned in God’s USA and also for a ban on Muslims holding office. Needless to say, she homeschools her own kids. The school board will surely regret not having her expertise to rely upon. She was defeated by a truly polar opposite, Tyler Swanson, a former teacher in the district who campaigned on his record of being arrested during the Moral Monday protests against racial gerrymandering and vote suppression by the state’s GOP legislators.
Michigan Township Would Rather Hate Gays Than Have Public Library
Voters in Jamestown Township, Michigan, voted for a second time against a tax measure to fund the Patmos Library, which means that unless more funding comes through, the library will close for good in the fall of 2024. The library funding was opposed by the usual rightwing “concerned citizens” who were convinced children would catch the Ghey from library books with LGBT characters. A previous vote on funding the library with property taxes failed in August, and although the headlines that vote generated led to a successful crowdfunding effort, you really can’t run a public library forever on donations. We’re sure there will be more crowdfunding and another vote on taxes somewhere down the line, and who knows, maybe the MAGA fever will go down at some point.
Ohio: State Board Of Ed Gets Three Non-Crazy Board Members
Three candidates who oppose rightwing culture war assaults on public education were elected to the 19-member Ohio State Board of Education, which has 11 elected members and eight who are appointed by the governor. The three new members were elected with substantial support from teachers’ unions, Crom bless them, and defeated candidates sponsored by “Ohio Value Voters.” Wingnuts on the state board last year overturned an antiracism resolution that had been passed after the murder of George Floyd; two of the losers Tuesday were incumbents who’d voted for racism. A third chose not to run for reelection.
The new members will have to get right to work on defeating a proposed resolution that
would urge local school districts to defy Title IX protections for LGBTQ students that are being proposed by President Joe Biden’s administration, potentially putting federal money for free and reduced lunch and special education in jeopardy.
That resolution remains under consideration and does Cleveland.com tell us how many righties remain on the board or its chances of passing? Why would a newspaper mention that?
We’re sure we’ll have more wingnut school and library board results for you; the most optimistic thing we can point out is that most people don’t want education policy set by the small but loud minority of activists who respond to moral panics. But first, they have to know that it’s a threat, and sometimes by the time kids are asking why the library had to close and there’s no more summer reading program, it’s too late.
Next year, Democrats will control both houses of the Michigan Legislature for the first time since 1983.
And do you want to know why? DO YOU?!
Fair maps.
No, really! I’m serious! All it took was fair maps.
I don’t want to say gerrymandering is one of my favorite things to talk about, since I wish it didn’t exist in the first place, but I did explain it to some strangers at the bus stop the other day, so here we are.
Gerrymandering is such an important issue — and one that’s easily overlooked, because of how easy it is to get wonky and into the weeds when you’re talking about things like statistics, population size, and cartography. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Whether or not they even know what the word gerrymandering means, Americans overwhelmingly want fair elections and fair maps. And when they get them, good things happen.
And on Tuesday, three midwestern states gave us stark examples of the power of gerrymandering — and the power of democracy.
Let’s start with the good news!
Michigan, fuck yeah.
For the first time in my lifetime, Michigan will have a Democratic Legislature. And the reason for that is independent redistricting, baby.
In 2018, Michigan voters approved Prop 2, to unfuck their legislature and create an independent redistricting commission. Instead of being drawn by self-interested politicians, Michigan’s political maps are now drawn by a commission of Michigan citizens consisting of four Democrats, four Republicans, and five unaffiliated voters.
Naturally, Republicans have done everything they can to stop the voice of the people from being heard. Even after more than 61 percent of Michiganders voted in favor of independent redistricting, Republicans asked a federal court to, as the lovely Liz Dyeso aptly described, “declare the entire law unconstitutional and return mapmaking power to the Republican-controlled legislature as White Jesus intended.” Luckily, fairness won out, Republicans’ ratfucking attempts failed, and Michigan’s Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission drew the state its first fair political maps in two decades.
[…] For the first time since 1983, both houses of the Michigan Legislature will be blue. And with Gretchen Whitmer also cruising to reelection along with a Dem lieutenant governor, secretary of state, AG, most college trustees, and on and on, Michigan Democrats have been given about as strong of a mandate as you can get.
I am so happy that Michigan will have sanity restored to its statehouse — but that is truly not what this is about. This is about democratic ideals, fundamental fairness, and ensuring our elections give people a real voice. Michigan’s results reflect the actual will of the people. The number of Democratic and Republican lawmakers is based on votes instead of creative mapmaking. That is exactly what a legislative election should be. It also just so happens that Michigan voters (who came out to vote in record numbers!) are fans of politicians who fight for things like abortion rights, equity, and affordable healthcare. 😊
Meanwhile, in Wisconsin . . .
On the other end of the ratfucking spectrum, we have two of Michigan’s neighbors, Wisconsin and Ohio.
Let me be frank: Wisconsin, where I live, is not a democracy.
Wisconsin is about as close to a 50-50 state as you can get, and has been that way for decades. Candidates from both parties are competitive in statewide races. And, for a long time, control of the state Legislature bounced back and forth. In 2011, Scott Walker and Republicans in the legislature changed all that and passed themselves the most gerrymandered maps in the country.
A quick glance at the results of the 2018 election really tells you all you need to know about the (lack of) fairness in Wisconsin’s maps and the power of gerrymandering. In 2018, Democrats won 54 percent of the statewide votes for the Assembly . . . and won 36 percent of the seats. [Chart at the link]
With the majority they guaranteed themselves in their 2011 gerrymander, this time around, Republicans managed to draw maps that were even worse for democracy. After some legalback and forth, the GOP’s mega-gerrymander was eventually chosen by the conservative-controlled Wisconsin Supreme Court.
So that’s how, in a state that’s about as purple as you can get, Republicans almost managed to gerrymander themselves a supermajority in both houses of the Legislature.
Thanks to this ratfucking, Wisconsin managed to re-elect Democratic Governor Tony Evers by almost 3.5 points while also getting itself a state Senate with a two-thirds Republican supermajority. Thankfully, Democrats managed to stave off a Republican supermajority in the Assembly. And while narrowly avoiding a double GOP legislative supermajority may not sound terribly impressive, it couldn’t be more important for the state.
Since 2018, Governor Evers has been one of the only things keeping Wisconsin remotely sane. With 150 vetoes during Wisconsin’s last two-year legislative session, he broke a record set almost 100 years ago. These vetoes stopped things like anti-vaxxer nonsense, destroying our public school system, bans on teaching about systemic racism, putting guns in schools, and a whole bunch of voter suppression.
If Republicans had managed to win just a few more votes in the Assembly, all of these things — and worse — would likely have become law.
(And no, I do not want to talk about that asshole Ron Johnson.)
Oh, Ohio . . .
Wisconsin wasn’t the only Michigan neighbor to give us a live demonstration of the power of gerrymandering this year. Not wanting to be outdone, Ohio stepped in to show just how much ratfucking Republicans can get away with when they really put their minds to it.
What’s really fucked up about Ohio is that, per the Ohio Constitution, it absolutely should not be this way. In 2015 and 2018, in direct response to Republican ratfucking, Ohio voters added provisions to the state’s constitution banning partisan gerrymandering.
However, rather than follow their state constitution and listen to the will of the people, Ohio Republicans decided to give themselves maps that were even more gerrymandered than the previous maps.
This was a bridge too far for even the conservative-controlled Ohio Supreme Court, which threw out the Republican maps as an illegal gerrymander. But despite this ruling by the state’s high court, a federal court intervened and forced the state to use its unconstitutional maps for at least the next two years. Because who really needs democracy, anyway?[head/desk]
And thus, Ohio Republicans held on to their supermajorities in both houses, allowing them to continue overriding gubernatorial vetoes from their own Republican governor, Mike DeWine, when they’re too crazy. Hopefully the state will have fair and constitutional maps come 2024, but, as we know all too well, a lot can happen in two years.
A Tale of Three States
With Michigan on one side and Wisconsin and Ohio on the other, Tuesday’s results show us what we can make happen when the system is free and fair. In Michigan, democracy prevailed. In Wisconsin and Ohio, democracy wasn’t an option. But we live to fight another day.
Fair maps should not be a partisan issue — and for the people, they aren’t. Regardless of their political party, American voters don’t want rigged maps. States with independent redistricting range from California and Colorado to Iowa and Alaska. With gerrymandering, it’s the politicians who are the problem, not the people. When nonpartisan redistricting is on the ballot, it wins.
Even here in Wisconsin, there’s hope. Last year, the state supreme court ruled 4-3 that it would not invalidate political maps on the basis of partisan fairness. But next April, Wisconsin voters have the opportunity to flip our state’s high court and vote for a justice who believes in democracy.
And in Michigan, democracy won this week in more ways than one.
[…] let us note that Jesse Watters does not name any of these policies “designed to keep women single,” because that is not a thing and it would be very weird if it were. Clearly what he’s referring to are civil rights laws and economic reforms that make it possible for women to be economically independent and not have to rely on a man to survive. He just doesn’t want to come right out and say we shouldn’t be allowed to have our own credit cards.
[…] Watters is far from the first person to come up with this theory. I’ve seen similar ideas and variations bandied about in rightwing forums and incel message boards for years. The idea is that by getting rid of the social safety net, outlawing abortion, getting rid of no-fault divorce, and enacting other reforms that make it more difficult for a woman to be economically independent, wild single liberal women will be forced to settle down and therefore will become more conservative and more likely to vote Republican.
Third — there is one very big thing standing in their way, and that is the fact they are so incredibly unfuckable.
This is not just me saying this, though it is also me saying this. One of the more delightful news stories that pops up every now and again is the woeful tale of The Unfuckable Republicans. “Young DC Conservatives: No One Wants to Date Us,” reads one headline from The Washingtonian. “Donald Trump supporters are struggling to find online dates” says the Daily Mail. “The question keeping Trump-loving men up at night,” according to one article on NBC’s Think, is “Why won’t liberal women date us?” A Pew Research poll found that “Most Democrats seeking a relationship wouldn’t date a Trump supporter.” “Conservatives Are Whining Because No One Wants to Date Them” reads a headline from Vice. “National Review’s Lament: No One Will F*ck Trump Voters” says one from Wonkette.
Republicans have been throwing a fit for the last several years over the fact that Democrats won’t even swipe right on them on Tinder, and Jesse Watters thinks that the solution to their electoral woes is for them to marry us, which will then lead to a glorious electoral victory for the Republican Party several years down the road. That should work out great for them.
Links to additional resources are embedded in the article at the main link … in case you want to have handy some statistics that show just how unfuckable some rightwing doofuses are.
[…] Yes, things are going to hell in a handbasket very quickly, and Elon Musk may have found a way to lose even more than $44 billion on his new hobby. That’s because Musk’s new policies have opened the door to fraud, impersonation, and identity theft. Now top Twitter executives are (again) resigning rather than face the legal liabilities Musk is forcing onto himself and his company.
At issue is Twitter’s existing legal settlement with the Federal Trade Commission, a settlement agreed to after Twitter was found to be using private user information to target advertisements.
In a resignation letter sent to all Twitter staff Thursday morning, company chief privacy officer Damien Kieran, chief information security officer Lea Kissner, and chief compliance officer Marianne Fogarty warned their fellow employees that while Musk himself may be “willing to take on a huge amount of risk in relation to this company and its users,” the company’s new plans to “shift the burden” of FTC compliance “to engineers” will “put a huge amount of personal, professional and legal risk” onto company engineers.
“All of this is extremely dangerous for our users. Also, given that the FTC can (and will!) fine Twitter BILLIONS of dollars pursuant to the FTC Consent Order, extremely detrimental to Twitter’s longevity as a platform.”
The Twitter executives who up until this morning were responsible for making sure Twitter wouldn’t face multi-billion-dollar fines for violating the trust and security of their users have now quit, rather than being put on the hook for those violations—and they’re warning the rest of Twitter’s staff that they, too, had better watch their legal backs. The message ends by directing employees to both Twitter and FTC whistleblower hotlines.
[…] What’s the big risk, for Twitter? At present, it’s that the company appears to have chosen a path that allows them to monetize fraud. With the launch of Musk’s new $8-for-verification scheme, the company is allowing credible impersonations of Twitter users famous and not. It’s already turned into chaos; there are many people willing to throw $8 into a burner Twitter account that impersonates international companies, sports figures, or anyone else they don’t happen to like. Meet the new “verified” Twitter, everyone: [Tweet showing O.J. Simpson impersonators, another impersonators, (with official verification check marks), available at the link.]
The more imminent danger to Twitter, however, is that Elon Musk has been taking multiple steps that make the impersonation problem worse. Musk killed the company’s plan to differentiate between “verified” and pay-for “verified” accounts, eliminating the primary means by which Twitter users could differentiate between verified and fraudulent accounts. After a Chrome browser extension was released that would mark pay-for accounts and “verified” accounts as separate entities, mirroring Twitter’s already-canceled feature, Musk took steps that would thwart that, too: he tweeted on Thursday that “Far too many corrupt legacy Blue “verification” checkmarks exist, so no choice but to remove legacy Blue in coming months.”
Want to know whether the charity organization, celebrity, political figure, reporter, or corporation you’re following on Twitter is the real one or an imitation identity meant to deceive you? There won’t be one. It appears there won’t be a way for Twitter itself to differentiate between the real and fraudulent accounts, either.
There’s little chance that’s a salvageable situation, when it comes to the FTC consent agreement Twitter is required to follow. What turns this into a potential multi-billion dollar catastrophe is the strong suggestion, from Musk, that his own actions are intended to allow Twitter to financially profit from fraudulent user behavior.
And Elon’s not being shy about providing plenty of evidence for that. Lawyers, grab your tweets: [Tweets at the link]
Twitter is also measurably profiting from a proliferation of hate accounts: [Tweets at the link, including examples of racism, Nazis]
Current Twitter advertisers and companies that rely on Twitter are not taking it well. It’s evident to all of them that brand safety has been wiped out overnight, on Twitter. Companies are now setting new guidelines distancing themselves from Twitter. [Tweets at the link]
And advertisers? Even the ones unbothered by potential impersonations aren’t going to want to pay money for their ads to be seen amidst a sea of trolls and hucksters. [Tweets at the link]
There’s no longer a question that Musk is perhaps-intentionally putting Twitter into a financial spiral that it will be unable to recover from. That’s bad news for those around the world who currently rely on it, but a copycat system—or, rather, many—will arise in Twitter’s absence.
Musk isn’t going to get his $44B back. At this point, he’s going to have to start worrying about whether the FTC will bury him in additional billions for intentionally creating a platform aimed at enabling identity theft and fraud. It doesn’t matter if he blusters about it or not; he’s going to have to start reaching very deep to find employees willing to share in the sort of legal liabilities he’s laughing off.
And if he can’t, then Twitter’s going to collapse under its own weight simply because there won’t be anyone left to run its systems.
I’m not sure Musk’s acts of sabotage are intentional. I think he is just that stupid … and too narcissistic to realize that he doesn’t know what the hell he is doing when it comes to running Twitter.
Arizona election officials announced that they may be still counting votes into next week. Patience is needed. We’ll get the results eventually.
It looks to me like Mark Kelly is going to win the Senate seat, but this is not yet a sure thing.
It looks to me like Kari Lake is going to lose the race for governor, and then her perfectly coiffed head will explode. But that is not yet a sure thing.
German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock slammed Hungary on Thursday for blocking €18 billion of EU financial aid to Ukraine, saying that Budapest should not “play poker” in an attempt to put pressure on Brussels in a separate rule-of-law dispute.
Baerbock’s protest echoed appeals from several EU diplomats who accused Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s government of blackmail.
The European Commission on Wednesday proposed an €18 billion support package to help Ukraine keep its economy and public services afloat throughout the coming year and to restore critical infrastructure destroyed by Russian missile and kamikaze drone strikes.
At an EU ambassadors’ meeting, also on Wednesday, Hungary said it could not support the aid package, according to three officials. This creates a potentially fatal hurdle as the money for Ukraine cannot flow without the backing of all 27 EU countries because of budget rules demanding unanimity.
Hungary’s wrecking ball has created frustration in Brussels, Berlin and other EU capitals. Four EU officials and diplomats told POLITICO that they see Budapest’s blockage of the Ukraine aid as a blackmail tactic to create pressure to release over €13 billion of EU funds for Hungary, which could be suspended next month if the country does not sufficiently address longstanding concerns over democratic backsliding.
Baerbock joined the fray on Thursday.
“Our financial, our humanitarian support [to Ukraine] within the framework of winter aid is not a normal European matter where people play poker and negotiate back and forth about financial resources,” the German foreign minister told reporters in response to a question from POLITICO about whether Hungary was trying to strongarm the EU into making concessions in the rule-of-law dispute.
“We are in a situation where we are saving lives precisely with the financial support from Europe,” said Baerbock, who was speaking at a press conference with her Swedish counterpart Tobias Billström in Berlin.
“We are seeing that at least 30 percent, if not 40 percent, of the civilian infrastructure [in Ukraine] has been destroyed,” she added, arguing the EU aid package must be approved quickly because “winter is just around the corner.”
…
Hungary is under increasing financial pressure as the EU is threatening to suspend about €7.5 billion in EU funds for the country under a mechanism that links budget payouts to rule-of-law standards, while an additional €5.8 billion in coronavirus recovery funds are also on the line. Brussels is demanding anti-corruption and judicial reforms to unlock the money.
On Thursday evening, the German parliament is expected to adopt a resolution that urges the government to “thoroughly” scrutinize Hungary’s reforms and only release the money if Budapest can prove it’s serious about its intentions to reform.
The matter is likely to come to a head at a meeting of European finance ministers on December 6.
Afghanistan, in short, was a catastrophe for the Soviet Union. Its traumatic impact upon a generation of conscripted soldiers would emerge only later. By the early-1990s it was estimated that one in five veterans of the Afghan wars were confirmed alcoholics; in post-Soviet Russia many of the others, unable to find regular work, drifted into far-right nationalist organizations. But long before then even the Soviet leaders themselves could see the scale of their mis-step. In addition to the cost in men and matériel, the decade-long war of attrition in the Afghan mountains constituted an extended international humiliation. It excluded for the foreseeable future any further deployment of the Red Army beyond its frontiers: as Politburo member Yegor Ligachev would later acknowledge to the American journalist David Remnick, after Afghanistan there could no longer be any question of applying force in Eastern Europe.
As Gen Z headed to the polls this week, conservative commentators had a message for young voters: please stop.
Tuesday’s midterm election saw Gen Z come out strong for Democrats, including for their generation’s first U.S. representative: Maxwell Frost, a 25-year-old Democrat from Florida. The young blue bloc left Fox News personalities dismayed, with other conservative voices suggesting that the minimum voting age be raised from 18 (currently enshrined in the Constitution) to 21 or 28.
“The fact that these youth voters are coming in so strong in an off-year is very concerning,” Fox News commentator Jesse Watters lamented on Wednesday night. “It looks like they’ve been brainwashed. This new generation is totally brainwashed ‘cause a lot of these single women [who] vote 37 spreads for Democrats, are teaching all of our younger generation in these schools and they’re polluting their minds and then they grow up and they’re in their twenties and then they vote for leftists.”
Exit polling shows strong youth support for Democrats, typically on issues like climate change, reproductive rights, and guns. Voters aged 18-24 (all of whom fall into Gen Z) voted 61 percent for Democrats, while the 25-29 age group, some of whom are Gen Z, voted 65 percent blue, exit polls show.
[…]
Frost, the newly elected representative from Florida, said his generation is fired up over the overturning of Roe v. Wade, and economic issues like student debt.
“We see that young people see the economy through a very specific lens, looking at things like crushing debt, not because we live beyond our means, but because we’ve been denied the means to live,” Frost told The Daily Beast. He pointed to President Joe Biden’s student debt relief program as a win with young voters.
Other Fox stars acknowledged the right’s weakness with young people. “We have to win over voters outside of our traditional base,” Fox News host Laura Ingraham said on her program Wednesday night. “That means young people too.”
Other conservative voices were less rosy on winning the youth vote. In a now-viral series of tweets, anti-Muslim activist Brigitte Gabriel suggested barring America’s youngest voters from the polls.
“Raise the voting age to 21,” Gabriel tweeted, immediately after noting that “We were promised a red wave and we got a red puddle.”
[…]
Not to be outdone, conservative radio personality Peter Schiff suggested cutting out current Gen Z voters altogether. “Let’s raise the voting age to 28. If I was still 18 I’d support this,” the 59-year-old tweeted.
The current 18-year age minimum for voting is guaranteed by the Constitution’s 26th amendment, which passed, in part, because the Vietnam War draft was conscripting people too young to vote. [Personal note: I was one of them–th]
Frost said he wasn’t shocked to hear talk of disenfranchising young voters. He likened the talk to existing measures that make voting more difficult for people of color.
“When voters don’t vote in their favor, what do they look to do?” he asked. “Change the votes, change the electorate, change the people who can vote. That’s why we see these horrible voter suppression laws championed by the GOP to suppress the votes of Black and brown people, to put it bluntly.”
“I think the GOP’s doing the calculation,” Frost added, “‘half these people can’t vote yet. What does this mean for us in the future?’”
In the early months of 1989 the [Hungarian] Communist legislature passed a series of measures recognizing the right of free assembly; officially sanctioning ‘transition’ to a multi-party system; and, in April, formally jettisoning ‘democratic centralism’ in the Party itself. Of even greater moment, Hungary’s Communist rulers – tacitly acknowledging that their Party could not hope to maintain its control of the country unless it came clean about its past – announced their intention to exhume and rebury the troublesome remains of Imre Nagy. At the same time Imre Pozsgay and other reformers in the Hungarian Politburo convinced their colleagues to open a commission of inquiry into the events of 1956 and officially redefine them: no longer a ‘counter-revolution’, they were now officially a ‘popular uprising against an oligarchic rule that had debased the nation’.
On June 16th 1989 – the thirty-first anniversary of his death – the remains of Imre Nagy and four of his colleagues were ceremoniously reburied as national heroes. An estimated 300,000 Hungarians lined the streets, with millions more watching the proceedings live on television. Among the speakers at the graveside was Viktor Orbán, the young leader of the Young Democrats, who could not help noting that some of the Communists present at Nagy’s reburial were the same who, just a few years before, had so strenuously falsified the very revolution whose praises they were now singing.
ravensays
The Russians have one skill at least.
They have mastered the art of making people die under mysterious circumstances.
Aleskey Remenyuk was a member of their parliament who went over to the Russians. He just died allegedly in a car crash, the second high level traitor to die within days.
I’m not even sure either one of these are really dead.
Was drunk. Ex-deputy of the Verkhovna Rada crashed in Crimea during a chase
November 10, 11:06 am
New Voice of Ukraine
The ex-people’s deputy drove into the oncoming lane and crashed into a truck (Photo: Alexey Remenyuk / Facebook)
In Simferopol, as a result of an accident, the former deputy of the Verkhovna Rada Alexei Remenyuk, who went over to the side of the invaders after the capture of the peninsula, crashed to death.
This is reported by pro-Kremlin Telegram channels.
Read also: The car was torn to pieces. Russian propagandists showed “footage from the place of death” of Stremousov
“66-year-old Aleksey Remenyuk was driving his Range Rover on the evening of his friend’s birthday. He was stopped. During the verification of documents, they asked to purge – he turned out to be drunk, ”the message says.
When they wanted to detain Remenyuk, he escaped, jumped into the car and tried to hide, dragging one of the security forces, who had grabbed the car door, along the asphalt.
After that, a chase began, during which Remenyuk’s SUV flew into the oncoming lane and crashed into a truck.
As a result of his injuries, the ex-people’s deputy and his passenger died at the scene.
Elon Musk is doing an all hands with Twitter employees. They got a one hour notice and he showed up 15 minutes late.
Elon Musk just told Twitter staff: “If you can physically make it to an office and you don’t show up, resignation accepted.”
Wow. Elon Musk just told Twitter employees he’s not sure how much run rate the company has and “bankruptcy isn’t out of the question.”
whheydtsays
Re: tomh @ #164…
When I was 18, voting age was 21. Indeed, by the time the 26th Amendment was ratified, I was 22. The R’s can go stuff themselves. Their “base” is dying, whether from age or COVID. They’ve made their bed, let them lie in it.
whheydtsays
Re: SC (Salty Current) @ #165…
When I was a student at UC Berkeley, I took a fencing (saber) course. The instructor was a former European military fencing champion from Hungary. He escaped during the 1956 uprising.
“The hits keep coming: Twitter moderation chief Yoel Roth, one of the few steady public faces post-takeover, is gone too, sources said.”
ravensays
This is not confirmed yet.
There is at least one claim that Ukrainian soldiers are now in Kherson and fighting with the Russians.
I doubt very much if the Russians at this point are fighting for anything but their own survival.
It’s like the end in Vietnam. Who wants to be the last person killed in a lost cause for no reason?
It’s time for the Russians to go home and find another hobby. A hobby that doesn’t involve spending hundreds of billions of dollars killing hundreds of thousands of people for no good reason.
Tweet
Neil Hauer @NeilPHauer
Reports that Ukrainian troops have taken Chernobaivka and entered Kherson city, engaged in firefights with Russian forces there
12:10 PM · Nov 10, 2022
After laying the blame on his wife for recommending that he endorse Dr. Mehmet Oz for the United States Senate, Donald J. Trump explained his wife’s actions by revealing that she is attracted to men who are totally unfit to govern.
“It’s a weird thing with her,” he said in a phone call to “Fox & Friends.” “If she sees some loser who is in no way qualified to hold office, she goes weak.”
Further explaining his wife’s visceral attraction to obviously unfit candidates, Trump added, “It could be some clown on TV who’s never held office in his life, and she’s, like, ‘I’d go for him in a big way. In a big way.’ ”
“If he’s been sued for fraud, that’s just icing on the cake,” he said.
Responding to her husband’s revelations, Mrs. Trump issued the following statement: “I take full responsibility for my husband’s decision to back Dr. Oz. To atone for this terrible mistake, I must pay the ultimate price, and immediately get a divorce.”
German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock slammed Hungary on Thursday for blocking €18 billion of EU financial aid to Ukraine, saying that Budapest should not “play poker” …
I’m not sure I would call what Hungary is doing “poker”.
At best it is extortion, holding Ukraine ranson to extort money from the EU that Hungary isn’t qualified for.
At worst it is supporting Russia in their attemp to wreck Ukraine forever.
.1. I keep asking myself, why is Hungary even in the Eu and why are they even in NATO. All they are doing is getting in the way and being a liability.
They don’t add anything worthwhile.
.2. Hungary suffered under the Russian occupation as much as any of the Eastern European nations, including being invaded once by the Soviets for not being enough of a door mat.
The rest of the captive nations learned the lesson well. Never again.
They all hate the Russians for good reasons and aren’t going back.
Hurricane Nicole made landfall on Florida’s Atlantic coast early Thursday, leading to at least two deaths, widespread power outages, the collapse of several homes and the unearthing of what may be a Native American burial ground.
Russian President Vladimir Putin will not attend the Group of 20 summit in Indonesia next week, an Indonesian government official said Thursday, avoiding a possible confrontation with the United States and its allies over his war in Ukraine.
A research paper details a so-called natural experiment that occurred when all but two school districts in the greater Boston area lifted mask requirements in the spring. Researchers took that opportunity to make a direct comparison of the spread of Covid in masking and non-masking schools. The bottom line: Masking mandates were linked with significantly reduced numbers of Covid cases in schools.
“Russian telegram channels saying Ukrainians are smashing the crossing points where thousands of Russians are retreating across the Dnipro. This looks huge.”
The other end of the bombardment being directed at Russian forces. Turn down your speakers before playing. [video at the link]
For the last two days, pro-Russian sites have been insisting that there was a “deal” in place, one that said Ukraine wouldn’t press Russian forces and would allow them to escape across the river to Dnipro in exchange for their agreeing to leave. The idea of this deal never made any sense, but it was very reassuring for Russian sources, both because it meant they would get their troops and equipment across the river, and because it suggested that they were only surrendering Kherson as part of an agreement, rather than being “actually defeated.”
The problem with spreading around a theory like that, is that the wrong people might believe it. Like the guys who needed to be driving full speed for the river in hopes of making some escape.
“There is panic there now. The equipment is abandoned. According to optimistic estimates, the Ukrainian military will capture about 5,000 of our military. According to the pessimistic, the whole group of 20,000 may be captured. This is the end.” [Tweet at the link]
[…] There is reportedly a whole lot of this going on tonight. It’s 3AM in Kherson. Sunrise is 4 hours away. [Tweet and video at the link]
The posts on Russian Telegram channels tonight are almost as incredible as the military situation. One is calling on Ukrainian forces to march on Moscow, destroy the Kremlin, and get it over with. Others are saying that when the images of Russian losses in Kherson become public, it may be enough to end Vladimir Putin.
There seems to be a broad understanding that this isn’t just a repositioning, or even a defeat. It’s a humiliation.
Russian air defenses have reportedly been withdrawn from the Kherson area. Both Ukrainian planes and drone are reportedly free to work the area, with drones using IR to spot for artillery. Both air strikes and precision guided weapons hitting at both massed forces and vehicles attempting to break away.
This is a very, very bad night for Russia.
This time, you can actually see what’s facing the Russian forces that failed to make their way out of Kherson before Thursday night. [video at the link]
Official tally:
.@ZelenskyyUa Today we have good news from the south. The number of Ukrainian flags returning to their rightful place in the framework of the ongoing defense operation is already dozens. 41 settlements were liberated.
This is a small fraction of what’s going to pile up over the coming days. The amount of equipment left behind in Kherson is likely to make the equipment captured in the Kharkiv counteroffensive seem like a blip. [List at the link]
[posted by WarMonitor] Russian paratrooper on his last order in Kherson region: “The last oder was change into civilian clothing and run in any direction you wanted”
Throughout the day, videos and images have shown that Ukrainian forces have been sweeping through Kherson oblast with very little in the way of opposition. However, it’s become clear that many of the videos being released are at least 24 hours old. Ukraine has been moving toward Kherson for the last two days.
And now it’s there. Sources on both sides have confirmed that Ukrainian forces have full control of Bilozerka west of Kherson, as well as Chornobaivka on the immediate northern edge of the town. Both of these places have been, in the recent past, areas with high concentrations of Russian forces and equipment.
It’s now clear that Russia no longer really controls any area west of the Dnipro River. Whatever plans they had for a fallback defensive line appear to have fallen apart. It’s well after dark in Kherson right now, and Ukrainian forces appear to be still advancing under a nearly full moon. [map at the link, wow]
[…] There are reports that Ukraine is chiefly acting to keep anyone from escaping across the river. They want to bag these guys where they are, so they never have to fight them again, and so that Russia is delivered a crushing blow to morale.
Ukrainian forces have been collecting Russian equipment and Russian stragglers along the roads as they moved rapidly toward Kherson and Beryslav. They’ve also engaged with small Russian forces, eliminating them in passing.
However, reports from Russian sources put the remaining Russian force on the west bank of the river at an astounding 20,000. If other reports are accurate, those forces are now mostly concentrated in the area of Beryslav, and near the harbor in the city of Kherson. Fighting is going on in both places. And that fighting is not trivial. [video at the link]
So far, Thursday has been like a celebration in Kherson. Ukrainian forces have advanced capturing an untold bounty of abandoned equipment and being greeted in village, town, and city. Now it is just after midnight there on Friday morning. When the next sunrise comes up, Ukraine could hold all of Kherson, and perhaps all of the oblast west of the river.
If the number of Russians still on the west side is accurate, Ukraine may also be about to take a terrific victory, or be on the receiving end of one of the largest surrenders in history. Some Russian forces are reportedly attempting to flee the city under cover of darkness in small boats, or on anything that will float, hoping to be carried to safety downriver. However, Russian troops deliberately smashed many small boats along the waterfront days ago, probably to prevent anyone from getting this idea too early.
What’s happening in Kherson is going to be a story for the ages, no matter what comes next.
Multiple reports of Russian forces moving through Nova Kakhovka to somewhere east. Possibly the Melitopol area. […]
Reports that a lot of that Ukrainian artillery firing in Kherson is doing so to make it clear that attempting to cross the river is a very bad idea. [Tweet at the link] […]
Democratic gubernatorial candidate Tina Kotek has won the race to become Oregon’s next governor. The Associated Press called the race for Kotek Thursday night, keeping her party in control of the longtime blue seat after a tight race. […]
Nevada’s Clark County on Thursday hit back at former President Trump’s claims that the local voting system was “corrupt” amid the tense wait for results on the state’s Senate seat.
Trump’s favored Republican nominee Adam Laxalt is slightly ahead of Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto in Nevada as of Thursday, but Clark County election officials say the ballot counting process in the state’s largest county could drag into next week.
“Clark County, Nevada, has a corrupt voting system (be careful Adam!), as do many places in our soon to be Third World Country. Arizona even said ‘by the end of the week!’ – They want more time to cheat!” Trump had said on Truth Social.
In a rare move for a jurisdiction, Clark County on Twitter called Trump’s claims “outrageous” and said the former president “is obviously still misinformed about the law and our election processes.”
“First, we could not speed up the process even if we wanted to,” the county argued, noting that state law allows ballots to come in as late as Saturday, Nov. 12, as long as they were postmarked on or before Election Day.
Clark County Registrar of Voters Joe Gloria said in a news conference Wednesday that Election Day votes have been counted, but that tens of thousands of mail-in votes had yet to be tallied, with more still expected to roll in.
Other factors could draw out the counting process in the close race, Clark County explained in its Twitter post.
If there is a discrepancy on a mail ballot signature, election officials are required to give the affected voter until Monday to come in and cure their signature — and to ensure voters don’t cast ballots twice, officials have to carefully process provisional ballots, which could take until Wednesday.
“All of our election systems are certified by the state and federal governments for use in the State of Nevada, and there are several state required audits done before, during and after each election, which further ensure the reliability and integrity of the election,” Clark County said.
As Russia’s military troubles mount in Ukraine, it’s also becoming more isolated internationally as organizations affiliated with the United Nations purge Moscow’s representatives from leadership positions.
This rollback of Russian power and prestige at the United Nations has accelerated in recent months. It’s another example of the way the Ukraine war is realigning the international system into a small bloc supporting the Kremlin and a larger group backing the United States and its broad coalition of allies.
The General Assembly, the closest thing to a global parliament, has condemned Russia’s assault on Ukraine twice by overwhelming margins. In March, it demanded Russia’s unconditional withdrawal, 141-5. Last month, it rejected Russia’s attempted annexation plan, 143-5. The only countries that backed Russia were Belarus, Eritrea, Nicaragua, North Korea and Syria.
Russia’s isolation will be dramatized next week by President Vladimir Putin’s absence from the Group of 20 summit, historically a favorite forum for Russia. Putin’s troubles with international organizations come as Russia’s army has been forced to retreat in Ukraine, most recently in this week’s withdrawal from the territory it occupied in Kherson.
The most significant diplomatic reversals have involved the internet. A year ago, the Kremlin was bidding to control cyberspace: A Russian candidate was campaigning to lead the United Nations’ International Telecommunications Union, and Russia was drafting a U.N. cybersecurity plan that favored authoritarian control rather than openness.
Moscow’s effort to seize the high ground of technology has failed miserably. Doreen Bogdan-Martin, an American, was elected secretary-general of the ITU in September, winning 139-25. A challenge from Rashid Ismailov, a Russian former deputy minister of communications, collapsed after the invasion of Ukraine.
The ITU drubbing extended to components of the regulatory body. At the ITU’s September-October meeting in Bucharest, Russia failed to win a seat on the group’s 48-member council, its 12-member Radio Regulations Board or any of its three oversight bureaus. It was a shutout for a country that last year boasted it would “develop and implement legal norms and standards in the field of internet governance.”
Russia’s other internet initiatives have also stalled. Moscow’s plan to write a new U.N. pact to replace the 2001 Budapest Convention on Cybercrime is on hold. The Moscow daily Kommersant noted this week that its proposal to continue overseeing internet issues through a Russian-backed “Open Ended Working Group” was supported by only 12 nations, while a U.S.-backed alternative had 50 sponsors.
The spreading stain of the Ukraine invasion has affected Russia’s involvement in other U.N. activities. In April, the General Assembly voted to suspend it from the United Nations’ Human Rights Council. That same month, Russian candidates were rejected for seats on four organizations of the United Nations’ Economic and Social Council, and Russia was suspended from the United Nations’ World Tourism Organization.
Even the skies are unfriendly. Last month, Russia lost an election to retain its seat on the governing council of the International Civil Aviation Organization, which oversees global air travel. A Ukrainian ambassador argued that Russia should be punished for bombing Ukraine’s civilian airports and using its airspace as a free-fire zone.
These U.N. bodies might seem trivial. But much of the world’s regulation and standard-setting takes place in these obscure organizations, and they have often been forums for Russian propaganda and manipulation. The Ukraine war is turning these venues into no-go zones for Russian diplomats. Russia still has its veto in the Security Council — and its nuclear arsenal. But much of its other power, hard and soft, is decaying.
Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said during a visit to Kyiv this week: “Is it realistic to hold Russia accountable? Yes, it is. … Russia has heard loudly and clearly from the world that what they’re doing is unacceptable, and while they have the veto power, that veto power is not shielding them from condemnation.”
The Russian military has made some stunning mistakes on the battlefield — in Kyiv, Kharkiv and now Kherson. But Russia’s diplomats may have fared even worse. Russia is in retreat in every major international forum. Putin imagined this war would bring him greater global influence. It has instead been an epic disaster.
Research by Tufts University’s Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE), suggests 27 percent of people ages 18-29 voted in the election. It’s the second-highest youth turnout in midterm history, Al Jazeera reported.
It may be the second-highest youth turnout in midterm history, but 27% is still fucking pathetic. And I’m not interested in hearing: “Oh, the two parties are just the same, that’s why”, because (a) they’re not, by any rational assessment and (b) if none of the choices on offer are good enough to vote for, set about providing one that is. At least the fuckwit numpty glibertarians do that much!
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From there:
Ukraine’s armed forces were reported to have reached the centre of Kherson city as Russia’s retreat from the key strategic city appeared to have descended into chaotic scenes.
Amid reports of wounded Russian soldiers being abandoned or taken prisoner, Ukrainian shelling of troop crossings across the Dnipro River, one Russian soldiers told of some units being told to escape any way they can.
Pictures posted on social media from Kherson on Friday morning were said to show Ukrainian infantry being greeted by residents in the Korabelnyi district of the city with the city’s Garrison pub visible in the background.
A member of the Kherson regional council told Reuters that almost all of the city was under control of Ukrainian armed forces.
Residents were being advised to stay at home while searches continued for Russian troops still in the city, and that some drowned in the Dnipro river while trying to escape.
More photos here of people waiting to welcome Ukrainian troops into central Kherson earlier on Friday.
The Ukrainian flag was raised in the city centre earlier on Friday by partisans as soldiers advanced to retake the city, amid a Russian retreat.
The Ukrainian flag continues to be raised over official buildings in Kherson.
This video shows soldiers putting it back up outside the headquarters of the Ukrainian national police in the city.
For almost 250 years the men and women of the United States armed forces have prevailed against tyranny. Your example inspires Ukrainians today to fight back against Russian aggression.
On behalf of all Ukrainians, Happy Veterans Day and thank you for your service.
Video at the (Twitter) link. Not the moment for a historical fact check, I suppose. Slava Ukraini!
So the Russians delayed their retreat until after the US midterms, which had no impact but set the stage for Ukrainian forces to march into Kherson amid wildly cheering crowds on what is a national holiday in France, the US, the UK, and Canada. Brilliant.
The Ukrainian military intelligence body, the GUR, has appealed to Russian troops who have been left behind in Kherson after the withdrawal to give themselves up.
There are reports that some soldiers may have been left behind during the order to pull out. Some have changed into civilian clothing but there are fears that they may still be armed.
In a statement posted on its social media channels, the defence intelligence of Ukraine said: “In case of voluntary captivity, Ukraine guarantees you survival and safety. We comply with the Geneva Conventions, guarantee prisoners of war food, medical care and the possibility of your exchange for soldiers of the Ukrainian Armed Forces held captive in the Russian Federation.
“It is safe to surrender to captivity after prior discussing the conditions of surrender with authorised representatives of the Ukrainian command by calling the hotline of the state project of Ukraine ‘I want to live.’”
It has provided telephone numbers, or told soldiers to approach Ukrainian military with their guns hung over their shoulder, with a white flag or cloth and shout “I surrender”.
More than 30,000 Russian service personnal have been withdrawn to the eastern bank of the Dnipro River, Russia’s defence ministry has said in a statement released through the Interfax news agency.
A Ukrainian defence ministry spokesperson has told the BBC that Ukraine’s forces are almost in full control of the southern city of Kherson.
Forty-five Ukrainian soldiers have been freed in a prisoner exchange with Russia and the bodies of two killed Ukrainian soldiers have also been repatriated, the head of the Ukrainian presidential office has said….
And yes, we knew this was coming. There is no way that this glorious day won’t be tainted by the evidence that will rapidly come out of what’s happened in Kherson and all over the oblast. Now that Beryslav has been liberated, there are expected to be true horrors emerging from the “filtration camp” that Russian forces established there.
In so many of the videos coming out, you can see that moment when people go from undeniable joy at the approach of Ukrainian forces, to breaking down as they release everything they’ve been holding in over the last nine months. All of this, the joy and the sadness, and the horror, and the relief … it’s all part of this day. And the evidence of what Russia has done in Kherson will only show how vitally important it is that they quickly be removed from all other areas of Ukraine.
[Tweet and image at the link, with details blurred so that the image does not insult the dead.]
The sheer joy that people in Kherson are feeling today shines through in so many of these videos. [video at the link]
Beryslav is liberated. That’s it. That’s the last place I know of where Russian forces were still fighting on the west bank. It’s done.
This is how I can see my aunt from Kherson region for the first time in 9 months – in a video hugging a Ukrainian soldier. She even doesn’t know to have become an internet star 💙💛 [video at the link]
And of course, it’s not just Kherson. Expect more joyous videos from other locations today. I’m still waiting on better information for what’s happening around Beryslav, where fighting was reported overnight. [video of Tyahynka being liberated]
Not sure I can embed a Facebook video, but this one from the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense is worth a clickthrough. Then, for your own mental health’s sake, close the tab before Facebook starts the cavalcade of unrelated nonsense.
The 11th of November already has a storied place in the history of warfare. But this morning the people of Kherson, and the entering troops of Ukraine, didn’t bother waiting for the 11th minute of the 11th hour. They just got right down to celebrating. [video at the link]
These soldiers are actually members of the Kherson police who joined the military to help free their city. [video at the link]
At this hour, locals have already raised the Ukrainian flag at the city center and are waiting for those troops who are marching into the city. [video at the link]
There are still small numbers of Russian troops wandering, apparently to no purpose, along the waterfront and clustered near the shattered bridge. There is also confirmation that some Russian troops shed their uniforms and put on civilian clothing. None of that seems to matter right now.
The liberation of Kherson is going to continue throughout this day, and likely into tomorrow. The cleanup of remaining Russian forces west of the Dnipro, and the catalog of captured Russian equipment, will be carrying on for many days, if not weeks, after that. Overnight, Russian media came out with a staged video claiming that all Russian forces had been safely removed from Kherson. [liars, bullshit artists, con men] [video at the link]
On the other hand, there were maps purporting to be locations of Russian cell phones that painted a somewhat different picture. [map at the link !!!]
Russia might want to toss a net across the mouth of the Dnipro if they want to pick up some of those guys as they flow down the river. BTW, water temperatures near Kherson are about 10°C (50°F).
But really, this morning isn’t about what happened to those Russian forces. It’s all about the victory of Ukrainian forces, and that victory is special in so many ways. As the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense made sure to point out this morning, their forces are not walking into a ruin. They’re not reaching a city center pulverized into rubble the way that Russia did when they captured Mariupol or so many other locations.
Kherson is largely intact. Tens of thousands of citizens remain there, cheering on the approaching Ukrainian force. That’s because Ukraine fought the battle of Kherson in a smart way, choking off Russian supply routes, keeping up pressure to force Russian troops to expend their ammo and strain their equipment, bringing things to the point where Russia had no choice but to leave the city.
There are, of course, concerns this morning. Russia could be waiting until both troops and civilians are massed in celebration before firing artillery from across the river. The possibility that Russia might choose this moment to toss a missile, or drop a bomb, in the city that Vladimir Putin claimed was “forever Russia” remains real. There’s no doubt that Ukrainian troops will not be packing into that central plaza all at once, the way so many of them would love to do.
But this is a helluva great day, one that Ukraine has worked carefully, over a period of many months, to achieve. It’s a great victory. And a huge, huge defeat for Russia.
The liberation of Kherson is not yet official. But expect that announcement to come at any hour, and expect that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is anxious to pay a visit.
As I’ve been writing, Ukrainian troops have reached the central square. And that thing I said about people being afraid to mass together? Forget it. [video at the link]
The Russian collapse/retreat is a special military operation, indeed.
Tick tock, Vlad
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A special military collapse.
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Those cell phone dots sure tell a story, don’t they? [map at the link in comment 197]
—————————-
Cook Political Report and Wasserman have already called Arizona for Dem Senator Mark Kelly. More blue in on the way!
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The trouble with doubling down is that you need something to double down with. Putin has exhausted his best resources and is pretty deep into his reserves. The army is more than decimated, conscription led to many more people leaving the country than joining up, sanctions have crippled their ability to build their own advanced arms, and they’re pretty low on friends. So while he can use more of his dwindling supply of long-range missiles to damage more Ukrainian cities, he doesn’t have much left to actually fight a war with.
It’s deja-vu all over again, with Georgia is in the spotlight and the Senate majority potentially hanging on the outcome of the December 6 run-off. Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock has been able to pivot immediately to getting out vote for Democrats in a shortened process while Republicans are occupied, as usual, with Trump.
Republican state legislators in Georgia hard shortened the run-off process earlier. It used to be nine weeks. Now it is four weeks.
The glaring deficiencies of Trump’s guy in the race, Herschel Walker, was enough to give Senate Republicans heartburn. The specter of Trump big-footing his way into the run-off and using it as a platform for his 2024 presidential launch is enough to give them heart attacks. Anonymously, of course.
“Hopefully Trump will stay out of the race as much as he possibly can, and if that means holding off announcing his campaign for the White House, that would be a smart move not just for Republicans’ chances in Georgia but Trump’s hopes to win the nomination for president,” one GOP aide told The Hill.
“If you talk to Georgia election strategists, they believe Trump was a huge drag on Walker in suburban Atlanta, and there’s just no reason to risk repeating that,” the source said. “If Trump injects himself into the race somehow and Walker comes up short, that’s really bad for Trump too.”
They’ve got good reason to worry—it’s just what Trump did in the 2020 run-off during his “Stop the Steal” campaign. He had an hour-and-a-half-long rally, ostensibly for the Republicans in the double run-off, in which he railed about the rigged election and how he could not have possibly lost the state to Joe Biden. It wasn’t exactly inspiring for Republicans to go out and vote again for Republican Sens. Sens. David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler. And they didn’t. Jon Ossoff and Warnock took the seats, and Democrats the Senate majority.
“I think it’s still possible that we win Nevada and then it all comes down to Georgia,” another anonymous source, a Senate Republican aide, said. “I think that we can win Georgia if Trump doesn’t tell people not to vote.
“But if he’s going to come out in five days and announce his presidential run, that’s not going to be great for us,” the aide continued. “He doesn’t know how to do anything other than make things about him.”
[…] Even former Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (MS) had to be dusted off to encourage Trump to stay away, telling SiriusXM host Steve Scully that Trump possibly lost Georgia for Republicans in 2020. “When President Trump went in there, I got the impression it depressed the vote on the Republican side, and we lost both senators,” he said. “That cost us the majority in the Senate.
“We’re going to have to be careful about what we do, and I would hope that former President Trump would be careful about what he does there,” he added.
Trump probably doesn’t know Trent Lott exists, so that’s probably not going to help much in convincing him to stay away from cameras, the rally stage. So have fun with that, GOP.
Meanwhile, we’ll all be here helping the good Rev. Sen. Warnock make it back to the Senate.
Ukraine is building a wall at its border with Belarus, a key ally of Russia where Vladimir Putin launched part of his invasion from in February.
The concrete wall will be reinforced with barbed wire, a ditch and an embankment to fortify its border with Belarus, the Kyiv Independent is reporting.
Deputy head of the president’s office Kyrylo Tymoshenko said the wall already spans three kilometers and construction is also taking place in Ukraine’s Rivne and Zhytomyr oblasts.
Conservative justices could take steps to reassure the public that the Supreme Court is a neutral arbiter worthy of trust. They’re doing the opposite.
Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito, perhaps best known for authoring the ruling that overturned Roe v. Wade, has heard the criticisms that have questioned the integrity of the institution he serves. The far-right jurist has also made some appearances in recent weeks, trying to defend the high court’s credibility.
He’s an awful messenger for the message. In fact, as regular readers may recall, Alito, in the wake of a series of overtly political speeches, even tried to defend the Supreme Court’s integrity at a pro-Trump organization, exactly two weeks before the midterm elections, while early voting was underway. [JFC]
It was against this backdrop that Alito made another public appearance last night. NBC News reported:
Justice Samuel Alito, who authored the Supreme Court ruling that upended abortion rights, was given a boisterous standing ovation Thursday at an event hosted by the Federalist Society, an influential conservative legal group. Alito, in brief remarks at the organization’s 40th-anniversary gala near the Supreme Court, praised the influence the society has had on the legal landscape, with its members now spread throughout the federal judiciary.
[head/desk]
“And boy, is your work needed today,” Alito said.
In case this isn’t obvious, Politico’s report noted that the Federalist Society is a “right-leaning lawyers’ group that has become instrumental in grooming and vetting candidates to be nominated to the federal judiciary by Republican presidents.”
And when the group got together to celebrate itself, Alito agreed to join the festivities. He wasn’t alone: Justices Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett, each of whom were nominated by Donald Trump, were also in attendance.
Their presence at the gathering gave the impression that they’re part of a broader political movement, which doesn’t do the court any favors. The latest Gallup poll found trust in the Supreme Court deteriorating to historical lows, and the data came on the heels of a national Grinnell College/Selzer survey that found that nearly two-thirds of Americans agree that politics drives the justices’ rulings.
[…] What matters most, of course, is their rulings, and the conservative justices have been unreserved in their reactionary ambitions. […] their extracurricular activities don’t help.
Alito’s provocative speeches tend to have an unmistakable political bent, and Justice Clarence Thomas also recently attended a political event hosted by a conservative group, where he was celebrated by the Republicans’ Senate leader [Mitch McConnell].
In February, Justice Neil Gorsuch spoke to the Florida chapter of the Federalist Society, where journalists were told they were not allowed to hear what he had to say.
A few months earlier, Justice Amy Coney Barrett tried to defend the Supreme Court’s political impartiality — while speaking alongside Mitch McConnell, who rushed her onto the bench during the 2020 presidential election as part of a brazenly political display.
“My goal today is to convince you that this court is not comprised of a bunch of partisan hacks,” Barrett said at the time.
Is it any wonder why some find her assurances hard to believe?
Dear MAGA, Ultra-MAGA, Hyper-MAGA, and Hypoallergenic-but-still-itchy MAGA: Now is not the time to surrender to so-called reason and facts. You’ve come this far down the orange-colored highway. You don’t want to be remembered as cowardly lions. As LINOs.
Yes, this may be the moment when it seems that the Republican Party has turned against you. When suddenly everyone from Ron DeSantis to Mitch McConnell to Glenn Youngkin feels free to question the leadership of Donald Trump. When Fox News has lost its way. When so many Republican “leaders” are eager to seize what they think is a moment of weakness. But you know better. You are not Peter ready to deny Trump on the evening of the electoral crucifixion. You know that in three days time, he’ll be back at a rally somewhere, doing some big-time smiting. After everyone sends him $5. Which is exactly how the Bible story goes.
Above all, never forget the biggest golden rule from the one who rules the gold: “When someone hits you on the left cheek, hit them back on the right cheek ten times as hard. Then kick their ass.” Now get out there and stomp Ron DeSantis in the balls. For Trump.
There may be those who are now singing a song about Republicans finding new leadership. Who are these people, and what do they have on their pizza?
DeSantis. The Satan. Could it be more obvious? Do not be deceived by the followers of the Anti-Trump. Who even knew where Florida was before Trump made it famous?
There are also those who, in this critical hour, have concluded that maybe Americans actually value democracy. That they aren’t ready to hand over the nation to people who want to destroy voting rights, human rights, and every other right that’s been piled up since someone knocked out the stele of Hammurabi. (Don’t worry about what that is. Not important.) You tell them that Americans have never cared about these things. Or that they’d ever go to war to protect them. Have you seen the price of sausage rolls at Walmart?
All of these Brutuses. Bruti. Bruten. Whatever. All these so-called Republicans are pulling out the knives and demanding that everyone find unity over the body of the one man who showed them how with enough money and an angry base, laws don’t matter. Have they forgotten so soon? Et tu, Sean Hannity?
Don’t listen to them. You like clinging, so cling. Hold tight to Trump and show your loyalty by striking out at all these others. In fact, this would be an absolutely excellent time to show them what you think by starting a whole new party and running in opposition to the party of weak-kneed Trump deniers. Call it the Golden Throne Party.
The point is, now is not the time for Republican unity, not it if it means abandoning one single belief of your multi-layered Q-centric, Trump as messiah fantasies. Not when that worked so well in 2017, and 2018, and 2019, and 2020, and 2022. Stick with the plan. Stick with the man. And give those traitor Republicans a big smack in the ballot box.
Maybe don’t even go. After all, the only election that counts is the one that happens in your hearts.
Wonkette: “Trump Confesses To Crimes He Might Not Have Even Done This Time, Stealing Florida Edition!”
Last night, Donald Trump confessed to using the Justice Department to steal an election. No, not the 2020 election, although he sure did try. Nope, Trump sent an email to his eleventy million followers and the entire media announcing that he stole the 2018 election for Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.
I was all in for Ron, and he beat Gillum, but after the Race, when votes were being stolen by the corrupt Election process in Broward County, and Ron was going down ten thousand votes a day, along with now-Senator Rick Scott, I sent in the FBI and the U.S. Attorneys, and the ballot theft immediately ended, just prior to them running out of the votes necessary to win. I stopped his Election from being stolen.
And in case there were still some people left in US America who hadn’t heard him copping to CRIMES, he belched it out on his janky social media platform, too.
Okay, look … Trump talks a lot of shit. Plus he ran the leakiest administration in the world. So, let’s assume that if there were any truth to this story, we’d have heard about it four years ago. Mediaite transcribed a factcheck from CNN this morning suggesting that what really happened is that in November 2018 Rick Scott screamed and shouted that two big Democratic counties were frauding. Trump contacted his pal Pam Bondi, who was then the Florida attorney general, and she tapped the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, which investigated the matter and found no widespread fraud. But if the DOJ wants to either clarify or launch an investigation, giddyup!
The apparent confession was part of a long, rant, which was unhinged even by the debased Trump standard. Raging at the Murdoch-owned New York Post after it anointed the Florida governor “DeFuture” of the GOP, Trump snarked about “Ron DeSanctimonious, an average REPUBLICAN Governor with great Public Relations, who didn’t have to close up his State, but did, unlike other Republican Governors.”
No, no, don’t waste brain cells trying to parse it. Just let the filth flow by you, it’ll be over soon.
Bragging that he pushed DeSantis over the line in the 2018 gubernatorial primary with his endorsement (true!), Trump claims that he then got Ron “by the ‘Star’ of the Democrat Party, Andrew Gillum (who was later revealed to be a ‘Crack Head’), by having two massive Rallies with tens of thousands of people at each one.”
And after all that, DeSantis has the gall to consider a presidential run?
And now, Ron DeSanctimonious is playing games! The Fake News asks him if he’s going to run if President Trump runs, and he says, “I’m only focused on the Governor’s race, I’m not looking into the future.” Well, in terms of loyalty and class, that’s really not the right answer.
The nerve!
Rolling Stone reports that the former president is actively seeking dirt on DeSantis’s personal life — although it’s not clear why that old [P-word] grabber thinks anyone in the GOP would give a flea’s fart about sexual assault, much less adultery, if they thought they could get the White House back.
With his rumored 2024 announcement coming as soon as next week, Trump is particularly pissed off about the throat clearing within the GOP that he needs to make way for someone less toxic and undisciplined. Sure he provoked an insurrection, lost the White House and the Senate (probably twice), and saddled the party with such shite candidates that they put up a miserable midterm showing. But the base loves him, so whaddaya gonna do about it, Mitch?
Trump went to bed mad, and he woke up mad. At 7:23 a.m., he was already kneecapping another competitor online:
Young Kin (now that’s an interesting take. Sounds Chinese, doesn’t it?) in Virginia couldn’t have won without me. I Endorsed him, did a very big Trump Rally for him telephonically, got MAGA to Vote for him – or he couldn’t have come close to winning. But he knows that, and admits it. Besides, having a hard time with the Dems in Virginia – But he’ll get it done!
Wow, haven’t seen that much early-morning racism since, like, January 7, 2021. It’s super gross, but probably to be expected since the GOP didn’t say one word to criticize him after that gross comment about Elaine Chao. […]
Guys! Guys! Donald Trump Jr. here! Guys! I’m pretty hyped up right now! I just shot a rare Malayan tapir with a cannon a buddy of mine scavenged off a blown-up Russian tank in Kharkiv, and it was pretty awesome! Boom! Boom! Doesn’t leave much of a trophy, though! (cackles like a hyena on an Adderall binge)
Guys! I have to say, this election result isn’t the bloodbath I was referring to in the tweet I put out just as the polls were closing on Election Day and then didn’t tweet again for going on three days now for some reason! I was talking about the beatdown that American patriots were about to lay down on the radical communists that have taken over the Democrat Party! I was sure of it! So I tweeted that out and then I nestled into the hollow between my beloved Kimberly’s magnificent breasts and she carried me around the rest of the night like a mama wombat carrying her baby! It’s just a little thing we do! Keeps everything spicy!
Damn, a wombat! I shot one once in Australia, with the 30-millimeter rotary cannon from an A-10 Warthog! Take it from me, guys! If you go wombat hunting, use something smaller if you want to take home a tail or a pelt or literally any scrap of tissue at all! That thing was obliterated! (giggles like an evil Pippi Longstocking)
What’s that, honey? Sure, we can play Candyland as soon as Daddy finishes making this video for all his fans! Why don’t you go set up the board? I’ll be the red gingerbread guy! No, I’m always the red gingerbread guy! We talked about this!
Kids, right?? I have, like, five of them! I think! (counting on fingers) One, two, three, fo—(freezes for a full thirty seconds while still moving lips) Fuck it! You get the idea!
Guys! This election! What the hell? Blake Masters might lose? Kari Lake might lose? John Fetterman won? That guy is literally brain-dead! Like, literally! How does that happen?
So now we’re maybe not going to have the House or the Senate! Which means the radical Marxists that have taken over the Democrat Party can keep persecuting my father! Over a riot that he never would have started if everyone hadn’t been so unfair by not voting for him! It’s ridiculous!
Oh, and also they’re mad at him for having some papers in his house! Presidential papers! Papers that, ergo by the transitive property (squints) of his declassifying them summa cum laude (furrows brow so hard his eyebrows fuse together) are his! He has every right to have them!
Obama did worse! Did you know that? Obama took all sorts of presidential documents to a secure warehouse in Chicago, but Donald Trump keeps some highly classified material in his underwear drawer, and suddenly it’s literally a federal case! Literally!
Oh! Oh! A football, you say! Later! This is Daddy’s special video time!
Guys, can you even believe what these damn kids are always bugging me about? Throw a football around! Play Candyland! Tell Kimberly she’s not our real mom!
It never ends! This constant buzzing noise in my ears! Like nails on one of those thingies we had in school that teachers used to write on! The sound just burrowing into my brain like there’s a woodpecker on my frontal lobe boring out a hole for a nest!
Woodpeckers! Now there’s some good hunting! I once shot a woodpecker with a BGM-71 TOW missile! Took out him, the hole he was drilling, the whole damn tree! Several trees! Take that, Woody! (makes a noise that sounds like a cat with its tail caught in a garbage disposal)
Guys! Guys! My father was the best president this country ever had! He built the wall! He made the economy awesome! He killed everyone in ISIS! Ukraine? Did anyone invade Ukraine while my father was president? I think we all know the answer to that one!
And what does he get for all he did for America? He gets sued! He gets investigated! He gets his lawyers calling every ten minutes telling him to not publicly confess to felonies before they’ve finished resolving the felonies he’s already publicly confessed to!
Meanwhile Hunter Biden is literally the Alphabet Killer! Literally! And no one cares!
Oh, and now everyone says Ron DeSanctimonious is going to be the Republican nominee in 2024! Ron DeSanctimonious! That guy! Have you seen him talk? He’s like an inanimate rod, but without the charisma! He’s going to Make America Great Again? I don’t think so! My father will destroy him with some brutal nicknames! Check it out! (clears throat with a sound like an elephant drowning) Ron DePantsless! Huh? Huh? Don’t even need to workshop it!
Honey! Daddy is still making his video! We’ll race go-karts later!
Guys! These kids! Maybe I should tell them to go play in the Everglades with an M119 howitzer and not come back until they’ve shot a damn alligator!
“The scenes of jubilation in Kherson are remarkable, and should be of no surprise considering how fiercely the city resisted the Russian occupation. The bravery on display in Kherson back in March was incredible, as the clips below show. They never stopped fighting.”
A man arrested in a Scottish hospital last year is US fugitive Nicholas Rossi, a court has ruled.
The man had claimed to have been the victim of mistaken identity, and insisted his name was Arthur Knight.
But Edinburgh Sheriff Court heard that his tattoos and fingerprints matched those of Rossi…
Reginald Selkirksays
ibid:
Rossi’s accent also changed several times while he was giving evidence.
ravensays
SC @203, what amazes me is how quickly Musk is destroying Twitter. I thought it would take longer.
Musk could be in serious trouble here.
Part of Twitter was bought with OPM, Other People’s Money.
IIRC, it was $13 billion.
These are not the type of people to watch their money disappear in a few months.
If Musk doesn’t get his act together, he might be replaced and sooner rather than later.
Sure, he owns a majority stake but his power is great but not unlimited.
PS Musk isn’t impressing anyone here.
He undeniably had some successes with Tesla and SpaceX.
It isn’t continuing with Twitter.
Celebrations are continuing into the night in Kherson, with videos showing parties in the streets and people chanting “ZSU”, the initials of the Ukrainian armed forces.
Zelenskiy: ‘Kherson never gave up on Ukraine’
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy has released a statement on his official Telegram account after his troops retook Kherson on Friday.
Zelenskiy said it was a “historic day” and that the people in the southern city “never lost hope”.
He said: “They never gave up on Ukraine. Hope for Ukraine is always justified – and Ukraine always returns its own.”
The president previously shared a video of people celebrating around a fire in Kherson as darkness descended.
The full statement reads:
Today is a historic day. We are returning Kherson. As of now, our defenders are on the approaches to the city. But special units are already in the city.
The people of Kherson were waiting. They never gave up on Ukraine. Hope for Ukraine is always justified – and Ukraine always returns its own.
And even when the city is not yet completely cleansed of the enemy’s presence, the people of Kherson themselves are already removing Russian symbols from the streets and buildings and any traces of the occupiers’ stay in Kherson.
It was the same in all other cities liberated by our defenders. It will be the same in those cities that are still waiting for our return.
Ukraine will come to all its people.
And I thank every soldier and every unit of the defence forces who are making this offensive operation in the south possible now.
Absolutely everyone – from privates to generals.
The armed forces, intelligence, SBU, National Guard – all who brought today’s day closer for Kherson oblast.
It’s not just in Kherson that people are celebrating today’s events, there are also people gathering in Kyiv to mark the return of the southern Ukrainian city into Ukrainian hands.
There is significant new damage caused to the Nova Kakhovka dam in southern Ukraine, after Russia’s withdrawal from Kherson, according to aerial images.
Satellite imagery company Maxar said: “Satellite images this morning … reveal significant new damage to several bridges and the Nova Kakhovka dam in the aftermath of the Russian retreat from Kherson across the Dnipro River.”
It follows news earlier on Friday that the Antonivskiy Bridge had been blown up, cutting a link between the two sides of the river. The Russian forces have fled to the west side, allowing Ukrainian forces to retake Kherson city.
Confirmed liberation of Vesele and Kozatske, which are right at the western end of the Kakhovka bridge. Russia has completely taken out a span of that bridge, just as they did with the bridge at Kherson.
Note the people taking pictures of these things. They’ll be great curiosities to show the kids when they talk about how they beat “the second greatest army in the world.”
Russia: Consider this the final vote in your “referendum.” [video at the link]
President Zelenskyy has officially announced the liberation of Kherson. The largest city and the only regional capital captured by Russian forces, is free.
More Kherson video. Because it is not possible to have too much. [video at the link]
The Ukrainian military was finally stopped … by thousands of celebrating people who wouldn’t let them get past without a hug. [video at the link]
Night has fallen over a liberated Kherson. [video at the link]
Consider this the last map of the Ukrainian counteroffensive in Kherson. Yes, there are still cities and towns whose liberation has not been verified (seen here in yellow). But they will be verified, likely within the next few hours. It’s liberated. It’s all liberated. [map at the link]
All those names that have come to mean so much over the last nine months — the prolonged fight to crack the Russian stronghold at Vysokopillya, the bridgehead south of Davydiv Brid, the back and forth at the southern end of the area, the constant battle to break through on the highways west of Kherson city, and the day to day bravery of those living under the occupation … all of that is in the history books now. And if you feel a need to express joy, anger, and sadness, just like the Ukrainians appearing in the liberation videos, that’s understandable.
The next time we pick up the mapping of Ukraine’s advance, it will be on the other bank of the river.
“This cannot be attributed to incompetent lawyering,” a judge concluded. “It was a deliberate use of the judicial system to pursue a political agenda.”
Donald Trump and his lawyers have suffered quite a few defeats of late, and as CNBC reported yesterday, their latest setback will hit their wallets.
A federal judge Thursday sanctioned attorneys for former President Donald Trump to pay $50,000 as penalty for advancing a “frivolous” lawsuit against a raft of Trump’s political enemies, including Hillary Clinton and the Democratic National Committee. Judge Donald Middlebrooks’ scathing order in Florida federal court suggested Trump’s lawyers had undermined the rule of law by pushing a political narrative in court “without factual basis or any cognizable legal theory.”
[…] keeping track of Team Trump’s legal troubles is admittedly challenging […]
It was in March when Trump had the bright idea of suing Clinton and several other Democrats, alleging they tried to rig the 2016 presidential election by bringing attention to his Russia scandal. The case, believe it or not, alleged “racketeering” and a “conspiracy to commit injurious falsehood,” among other things.
By any fair measure, the lawsuit was utterly bonkers, though some on Fox News encouraged its viewers to take the matter quite seriously. The suit certainly had a serious goal: Trump claimed the Russia scandal cost him more than $24 million — and he wanted his legal targets to pay far more than that.
The judge in the case didn’t just reject the underlying claims, Middlebrooks could barely contain his disgust with the inanity of the legal complaint.
American courtrooms are not supposed to be abused by politicians filing frivolous cases for no reasons. Those who do open themselves up to possible sanctions […]
Clinton’s lawyers asked Middlebrooks to force Team Trump to pay up. Yesterday, the judge agreed, concluding that the Republican’s attorneys filed litigation in bad faith.
“These were political grievances masquerading as legal claims,” Middlebrooks concluded. “This cannot be attributed to incompetent lawyering. It was a deliberate use of the judicial system to pursue a political agenda.” He went on to cite the attorneys’ “cavalier attitude towards facts.”
The penalties were imposed on several Trump lawyers, including Alina Habba. What’s more, the sanctions may not end there: “Additional sanctions may be appropriate,” the judge added in yesterday’s ruling.
As counting continues, Democrats are increasingly optimistic about their chances of winning Senate races in Arizona and Nevada, victories that would keep the party in control of the chamber regardless of what happens in a Dec. 6 runoff in Georgia.
In Arizona, the latest numbers showed the lead of Sen. Mark Kelly (D) widening over Republican challenger Blake Masters. In Nevada, Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D) has gained on her GOP opponent, Adam Laxalt, and the remaining uncounted vote appears to favor her. But both races are still too close to call.
Republicans remain confident they will narrowly win the House, but several key uncalled races, particularly in Western states, are breaking in favor of Democrats, giving the party an outside shot at retaining control.
If the Dems win NV and AZ the Georgia runoff would be to decide if Manchin still rules Dem policy. Of course, there’s still Sinema but still…it would be a welcome change to see Manchin fade to irrelevancy.
[…] Haaland v. Brackeen involves a white Texas couple, Jennifer and Chad Brackeen, who in 2016 were appointed as foster parents of a 10-month old boy whose birth parents were Navajo and Cherokee. The Brackeens were very well off, since Jennifer Brackeen is an anesthesiologist, and as Jennifer explained on a long-gone blog, “God started to speak to our hearts about opening our home for more.”
When they sought to adopt the boy, however, they learned that it would be difficult to do under the federal Indian Child Welfare Act, (ICWA), passed in 1978, as Vox explains.
Among other things, this law provides that, if a state court determines that a child who is either “a member of an Indian tribe” or “is eligible for membership in an Indian tribe and is the biological child of a member of an Indian tribe” must be removed from their home, then the child should be placed with an American Indian family — and, if possible, a member of the child’s extended family or, at least, their own tribe.
The law aims to keep Native children within Native communities, after over a century of US attempts at genociding Native Americans and, for most of the 20th century, actively attempting to alienate people from their tribal identities — first by taking Native kids from their families to Indian schools that aimed to assimilate them into the dominant Anglo culture, and later by encouraging adoptions of Native kids by white parents.
A quick note on language here: Federal law and court cases use the term “Indian,” which has very specific meanings in law, so at times we will too, even if in the wider culture it’s no longer the preferred nomenclature, Dude.
The history of trying to “kill the Indian and save the man” through forced assimilation has an ugly legacy, as the Texas Tribune explains. Even as the residential schools were beginning to close down in the ’50s and ’60s, the federal government remained disgustingly enthusiastic about a joint effort to encourage adoptions of Native kids by white families:
“One little, two little, three little Indians — and 206 more — are brightening the homes and lives of 172 American families, mostly non-Indians, who have taken the Indian waifs as their own,” a 1966 Bureau of Indian Affairs press release boasted.
By the 1970s, the removal of Native children to white families was so widespread that, when the BIA commissioned a federal task force to research the phenomenon, it found that 25% to 35% of Native children around the country were removed from their homes, and 85% of those children were adopted by white families. ICWA was created in response to the report, and Congress passed the law in 1978.
Not surprisingly, tribes are not at all happy about that, especially when white parents start claiming — as the Brackeens did — that they can offer a Native child a better upbringing because they’re wealthier than a Native family might be, or because God told them to do acts of charity to the unfortunate Indian kids. […]
The Brackeens’ lawsuit, joined by the states of Texas, Louisiana, and Indiana and combining three other cases involving adoptions by non-Indigenous families, seeks to overturn or at least sharply limit the Indian Child Welfare Act, claiming — like so many attempts to roll back civil rights — that it’s racially discriminatory in giving preference to Native families, the entirety of the USA’s genocidal practices notwithstanding.
The federal Justice Department, which is defending the ICWA, agrees with the argument put forward by tribes, as the Texas Tribune sums up:
The tribes argue that their relationship with the United States is a political, and not a racial, one. Mandating a placement preference for Black adoptive children with Black families, for instance, might be ruled unconstitutional, but tribes and their supporters argue the standard is different for Native children. […]
Because Native tribes have sovereignty over their citizens and an established interest in the well-being of their children, the question of how to weigh a Native child’s cultural lineage in child welfare proceedings is different than for children of other races that don’t have that legal history, U.S. Justice Department attorneys argued to the court.
And in fact, if the ICWA is found to be unconstitutional on the basis of race, it could demolish more than a century of federal law on relations between tribes and the federal government, which falls under Title 25 of the US Code. Chuck Hoskin Jr., chief of the Cherokee Nation, said that Brackeen is
“part of a broader attack” on laws governing the federal relationship with Native tribes and that a decision that ICWA constitutes a racial preference could make other federally mandated programs, like the provision of health care for Native people, vulnerable. “That’s the great worry that many of us have is that if we lose ICWA, it’s detrimental — but it’s also something that could erode the strength of these legal principles that underpin so much of what we need in Indian country to make progress.”
In the oral arguments Wednesday, Justice Neil Gorsuch, who’s surprisingly friendly to Tribal interests in federal law, observed that if Texas were to get what it’s asking for in the case, “there’ll be a lot that would be bitten out of Title 25. We’d be busy for the next many years striking things down.”
As Vox notes, it’s entirely possible that a five-justice majority could uphold the ICWA in whole or in part.
If not, things could get weird, since another of the plaintiffs’ claims is, as Vox puts it, “completely unhinged.” We’ll just touch on it since it’s pretty convoluted, but it involves the fact that federal law regarding Indian tribes is based in a reading of the interstate commerce clause, the same provision of the Constitution that enables the government to set a minimum wage and prohibit racial discrimination by private businesses. Texas’s arguments in Brackeen appear to call for the restoration of a long-discarded 1918 SCOTUS ruling that very narrowly interpreted the commerce clause to strike down a federal ban on child labor.
It’s impossible to exaggerate the sheer chaos that would result if the Supreme Court reinstated the Hammer decision. Such a decision wouldn’t simply endanger the ICWA and federal child labor laws, it would abolish huge swaths of federal laws governing the workplace, prohibiting discrimination, and regulating entire industries such as health insurers. It would be as if the Supreme Court picked up the entire United States Code, and just started randomly crossing out huge swaths of it with a black marker.
That said, it is unlikely that the Court would go that far. Of the Court’s current members, only Justice Clarence Thomas has openly suggested that Hammer was correctly decided. Most of the justices appear to have made peace — albeit often an uneasy peace — with the fact that Congress may enact economic regulation on a broad range of subjects.
But again, in 2022, who’s to say what the Court will do? The very fact that the state of Texas is raising the issue before the Court should have everyone looking nervously at the Overton Window and worrying who might be defenestrated through it next.
Here’s a highlight for the captured equipment reel.
“Some capture tanks – but we focus more on helicopters!”
Hey, @MoD_Russia! You forgot something! [video at the link]
Quick note: I’m off next week. I’ll be doing a Ukraine update tomorrow, and then won’t see you for a bit. Thanks for reading, and I’m ecstatic that this happened “on my shift.
the Ukrainian supermarket chain АТБ is already bringing food to freshly-liberated Kherson. [video at the link]
He undeniably had some successes with Tesla and SpaceX.
In both cases, the successes were in spite of him, rather than because of him. Tesla has to obey heavy regulation because people would directly be killed otherwise. SpaceX has to be well-engineered because people would directly be killed otherwise. Both of them are also extremely heavily subsidized by the US government and therefore have certain limitations as to how they can operate. Nevertheless, in both cases Musk has a history of trying to meddle in disastrously stupid ways which are usually overruled by the engineers/regulators. (One of the lesser ways he has interfered is by getting rid of safety devices at Tesla factories because he thinks they’re ugly.) He has always been a fraud who has claimed other people’s success as his own — the whole fact that he literally bought the title of “founder” of Tesla tells you everything you need to know about his level of competence and honesty.
Hello! It is I, your Canadian Girlfriend, whom your friends do not know.
The Editrix has kindly given me the opportunity to let you know exactly to what degree we up here are currently fucked — or maybe don’t have your go-bags ready to flee across your northern border?
Let me Wonksplain!
Ontario, my home and native land, is so thoroughly, thoroughly fucked.
Doug Ford, noted brother of the late and not great Toronto mayor Rob, has all of Rob’s flaws with none of his sibling’s charm. A college drop-out, he ALLEGEDLY spent much of the ’80s selling drugs.
He roared into office in 2018 with a hefty majority, and proceeded to strip the province for parts. Like, there’s no way to list everything he fucked up, but some have tried.
The waiting list for autism therapy went from 23,000 to 53,000 in his first four years in office, with an average wait time now of eight years.
He passed legislation holding public employees such as health care workers to a 1 percent annual increase, which contributed to the unprecedented increase of 56 percent in nursing vacancies in just the first half of 2021. You know, during the pandemic. No biggie.
Oh, and with absolutely horrific conditions in privately owned nursing homes, leading to high death rates from COVID-19, Doug Ford’s response was to give them 30-year contracts instead of focusing on non-profit homes instead. In one home, more than a dozen residents died of dehydration, as the army discovered when they moved in to help.
He pushed through plans to build a $10 billion by-pass through valuable agricultural land and natural wetlands to save 30 to 60 seconds per trip. But oh, hey, there are lots of Doug’s developer buddies who have lands they’d like to turn into more suburban sprawl all along the route! How crazy is that? (It’s on hold right now because the federal government is insisting on an environmental review, as well as Indigenous consultations. Phew!)
Oh, and yeah, while Ottawa, very much a part of Ontario, was occupied by the honkening this past winter, where was Doug? Snowmobiling.
So, you’d think with all this and so very, very, much more that there was NO WAY Doug could win a second term this past June, right? Wrong!
Forty-three percent of eligible voters actually got off their asses and voted. Of them, 40 percent voted for Ford and his merry band of thugs. They won 83 seats of 124. Eighteen percent of eligible voters have saddled us with four more years of fuckery. (It didn’t help that the Liberal and New Democratic Party were both fucking useless during the campaign.)
So, what’s happened since? Well, when school support workers tried to get a decent wage hike so they wouldn’t be scraping by on ridiculously low pay, they got stonewalled by Ford and his preening Minister of Education, Stephen Lecce, offering them less than 16 percent of what they were asking for, just to keep up with inflation.
The workers voted to strike, legally. Ford turned around and introduced legislation forcing them to stay on the job, and imposing a contract with increases of only 2.5 or 1.5 percent. Well below inflation!
But wait, you may say if you knew the previous history of such Ontario legislation. Did not a judge strike down a similar attempt by the Ontario Liberal government in the past?
Why yes, yes he did! But there’s this one weird trick that we all hate, called the Notwithstanding Clause. You see, when Pierre Trudeau, daddy of Justin, was prime minister back in the early ’80s and negotiating with the provincial premiers to get the Charter of Rights and Freedoms into the Constitution, the only way he could get them to sign on was if there was a handy escape hatch that could be used to override those said rights and freedoms.
In other words, all a premier had to do was use that clause to shut down any judicial appeal of any law. And that’s what Doug Ford has done here.
So, last Friday CUPE workers went out on strike. Ford ran straight to the Labour Relations Board over the weekend and begged them to declare the strike illegal. Monday, he and weasel-who-walks-like-a-man Lecce blinked. Probably because they knew the LRB was going to rule in favour of the union. Anyway, Ford promised to withdraw the legislation if CUPE quit striking. They’re negotiating again (phew).
Oh, and Ford just sent out a few hundred dollars to every parent in the province for tutoring or a new tablet or whatever. Despite the fact that it won’t pay for more than a couple of hours of tutoring, if mom or dad does decide to spend it on that and not on basically whatever the fuck they want.
You know what’s funny? Seven construction unions endorsed Doug in the election. All seven have now condemned him for trampling on union rights. Why, it’s almost as if you can’t trust the man to actually care about workers, but that can’t be right?
And now there’s something new and rotten going on! You see, we’ve had this thing called the Greenbelt since 2005. It’s a wide swath of environmentally sensitive lands surrounding Toronto, Hamilton, etc. In 2018 Ford promised he’d never touch it.
Oh, guess what? (You guessed, didn’t you?) Yes, last week, he announced that they were going to carve out 15 parcels of land to build 50,000 new homes. But it’s okay, really, guys, because they’ll just add other land in other places to compensate. It’s not okay; they’re proposing to destroy wetlands and some of the best farmland in Canada to do it.
And you’ll never guess whose land is being released! (You guessed, didn’t you?) Funny story. Over the last year or so those same developer buddies have been buying up huge tracts of land in the Greenbelt. Huh. Crazy coincidence!
Fun! Meanwhile, Doug is refusing to appear before the inquiry into the Emergency Act that ended the Clownvoy occupation of Ottawa in February. Because what possibly could he have to say about a major event that happened in his province while he was premier and should have been doing something to end it?
About that Convoy Inquiry…
You do know about the absolute fuckery that happened in Ottawa because it sure made big news!
Right now, a judge is holding an inquiry into the reasons for invoking the Emergency Act that got the ruffians swept off the streets. There is A LOT that I could tell you about it, but let’s just deal with a couple of the most interesting (read: fucking terrifying) tidbits so far.
Flyers were circulated threatening that Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland would “get a bullet to the head.” Those guys seem nice!
And the convoyers (I refuse to call them truckers because most of them weren’t truckers, and my husband the trucker was fucking furious over what they were doing!) were getting a constant stream of information from not only the Ottawa Police, but also, too, the Ontario Provincial Police, the RCMP, and, god help us, CSIS, which is our spy agency. The calls were indeed coming from within the building!
One of Thursday’s witnesses said, and I quote, “I was told by God to put this convoy together.” So that bodes well for our future, doesn’t it?
One of the latest tidbits: Tow truck operators in Coutts, Alberta, were being paid NOT to work with the RCMP to tow away trucks that were blocking the border crossing. By whom? It’s a mystery!
Oh, and what was Pierre Poilievre, now the new leader of the federal Conservatives and possibly our next prime minister, doing during the occupation of Ottawa? Hanging out with the honkers, of course. And now he’s hired this charming woman, who loved hearing the truck horns for eight hours straight, as the Conservative communications director.
Meanwhile in Russia, they’re grasping at straws as to anything to feel good about: portraying the U.S. as a hellhole no one wants to visit and presenting their retreat from Kherson as an orderly withdrawal & not a hasty escape. Neither one of these talking points cheered them up.
Subtitled video at the (Twitter) link.
“Think for a second about what we’re rejoicing over. We’re rejoicing that we didn’t run, but orderly retreated. This is a dubious achievement.”
“We are not rejoicing. I’m not glad at all about liberatio… I mean, the retreat.”
“It is a terrible wound, an enormous pain. We’ll be getting ready to take it back…”
New: Elon Musk’s lawyer has sought to reassure Twitter employees they won’t go to jail if the company is found in violation of a Federal Trade Commission decree that outlines steps Twitter must take to protect users’ personal data.
Also: We’re told Musk laid off an entire information security team at Twitter that oversaw sharing of user data with advertisers & research partners, a move that triggered internal concerns about vulnerability to security threats & potential violations of FTC rules.
The move to scrap the six-person information security team was combined with layoffs of at least a dozen other employees working on security, privacy & compliance issues at the company, according to people familiar with the matter.
The laid off information security team was focused on third-party risk management & was responsible for providing security assurances to advertisers that work with Twitter & share data with the company.
The team also monitored Twitter’s sharing of user data with dozens of commercial partners & research orgs, some of whom have access to an interface that can be used to view non-public info about Twitter users, such as location data, IP addresses & unique device identifiers.
“The people at Twitter doing the checks on that access are simply not there anymore,” one of the people said, adding that the privacy & security of user data has been put at risk as a result.
These latest developments come after a chaotic week at Twitter that has seen the resignations of several senior executives, including the Chief Information Security Officer, Chief Privacy Officer & Chief Compliance Officer.
If your employer’s lawyer ever tells you that you won’t get in trouble for doing what the company is asking you to do, make sure to ask them, preferably in writing, if they represent YOU and if they are giving you legal advice. They love that.
Re: SC 96
I see bigot murmurations. The moral panics.
ravensays
Tweet
NOËL 🇪🇺 🇺🇦 @NOELreports
Alexander Dugin directly blamed Putin for the retreat from Kherson. He stated that the power in Russia is almost autocratic, but if the tsar cannot save the people, then he will face the “king of the rains fate” (a man whose stomach was ritually torn open by his fellow tribesmen)
Alexander Dugin is the lunatic fringe loon that keeps advocating for the Greater Russian empire once again, with the Great Russian Fascists in charge of everything.
He hates the West, wants to abolish the internet, and thinks chemistry and physics are demonic.
.1. He is the guy whose daughter died in a car explosion probably meant for him, a few months ago.
.2. Calling for Putin’s death usually results in someone falling out a window 10 stories up.
Dugin isn’t that interesting in living much longer.
A federal judge in Texas on Thursday blocked President Joe Biden’s student-loan forgiveness plan, which was already on hold after the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals issued a temporary stay last month.
A conservative group called the Job Creators Network Foundation filed a lawsuit in federal court in Fort Worth in October, arguing the Biden administration violated federal procedures by failing to seek public input on the program. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of two borrowers — one who was purportedly ineligible for the relief, and another who allegedly did not qualify for the maximum $20,000 debt forgiveness. The suit alleges the Biden administration violated federal procedures by denying borrowers an opportunity to provide public comment before debuting the program.
U.S. District Judge Mark Pittman, who was appointed by former President Donald Trump, declared the program “unlawful,” citing the 2002 Higher Education Relief Opportunities For Students Act (HEROES), which gives the Education Department the ability to grant waivers to financial aid recipients.
“This case involves the question of whether Congress — through the HEROES Act — gave the secretary [of Education] authority to implement a program that provides debt forgiveness to millions of student-loan borrowers, totaling over $400 billion,” Pittman wrote in his ruling. “And having interpreted the HEROES Act, the Court holds that it does not provide ‘clear congressional authorization’ for the program proposed by the secretary.”
The Justice Department said it will appeal the decision.
“We strongly disagree” with the ruling, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in statement late Thursday night.
In response, student debt relief applications have been pulled from Dept. of Education website.
“Courts have issued orders blocking our student debt relief program,” the application website reads. “As a result, at this time, we are not accepting applications. We are seeking to overturn those orders.”
Two brothers have been charged in Sweden with spying for Russia over a period of 10 years, prosecutors have announced.
Both are reported to have worked for Sweden’s security services, and one was a senior manager at a government agency when arrested last year.
…
Peyman Kia, 42, and Payam Kia, 35, are believed to have worked together to pass on information to Russia’s military intelligence service, the GRU…
Je salue le retour de Kherson à l’Ukraine, un pas important vers le plein rétablissement de ses droits souverains. La France restera aux côtés des Ukrainiennes et Ukrainiens.
Merci @EmmanuelMacron. Et ces pas vont continuer, jusqu’à ce que les drapeaux 🇺🇦 flottent au-dessus de toutes les villes et villages ukrainiens. Heureux d’avoir des alliés comme toi et le peuple🇫🇷 coude-à-coude avec nous sur ce chemin.
The Canadian crew of a passenger plane that has been unable to leave the Dominican Republic for the past seven months is finally being allowed to come home.
The ordeal began in early April of this year, when the five-person crew of a Pivot Airlines flight from Calgary to Punta Cana, Dominican Republic, found a strange bag aboard the aircraft and reported it to authorities.
More bags were subsequently discovered, and local police say they eventually found more than 200 kilograms of cocaine aboard the jet.
Crew members including two pilots, two flight attendants and a mechanic have been forbidden from leaving the country ever since…
“Iranians are finding various ways to show their support of anti-regime protests. Team after team is refusing to sing the national anthem of the Islamic Republic. This time, #Iran’s basketball team did so before the match with #China. #MahsaAmini
So did the national sitting volleyball team. They also refused to sing the national anthem today.#Iran #MahsaAmini”
Energy giant DTEK: Russia completely destroyed energy system in Kherson.
Executive director of Ukraine’s largest private power producer DTEK Dmytro Sakharuk said on TV on Nov. 11 that there is no electricity at all in the city of Kherson.
Sakharuk added that it took 30 days to restore power to the parts of Kyiv Oblast occupied by Russia and expects it will take about the same amount of time to restore electricity to Kherson.
NBC now calling CA-6 for Ami Bera (D) and CA-26 for Julia Brownley (D). Brings tally to 211-203 GOP. Now 21 uncalled D vs. R races. Magic number for House control:
Dems: 15
GOP: 7
Top Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov is so mad about Russia’s retreat from Kherson that he forgot the name of his own show and admitted to missing life the way it used to be. Watch his furious tirade, full of sighs, insults and outlandish lies:…
“The Russian attitude towards Ukraine is… imperial” says @TimothyDSnyder. “Fighting this war against Ukraine is a way for certain Russians to try to answer the question of who they are. Because unless they’re fighting against Ukraine, they don’t have an answer to that question.”
The undeniably broad domestic support for Russia’s brutal attack against Ukraine has baffled and horrified people around the world. How could so many ordinary Russian people fall for Kremlin’s crude and outlandish anti-Ukrainian propaganda?
Trying to make sense of this has become an obsession for me. My conclusions are undoubtedly informed by my own positionality as a Central Asian. In short, the propaganda works because it taps into something that has been a crucial part of Russian identity long before Putin.
Russian society famously underwent extreme upheavals in the 20th century. Revolutions, World Wars, emergence and collapse of the USSR – the dizzying magnitude of change and disruption is hard to exaggerate. Yet, amidst all the turmoil, one part of the Russian worldview persisted.
The remarkably stable and enduring phenomenon transcending different historical periods and regime types is the self-conception of Russia as a great power that brings good to those around it and Russian people as bearers of superior culture and morality.
Deeply internalized, the idea of its own benevolence has long permeated and shaped Russian society. In this narrative, unlike the old European powers guilty of ruthless colonial conquest, Russia is a selfless bringer of culture, prosperity, and order.
The view of Russia as a big brother bestowing its blessings on the lesser people around it is ubiquitous among Russians of all political persuasions. In this narrative, Russia’s neighbors are perpetually indebted to it. The relationship is always unequal.
The word “gift“ features prominently. The gifts include Russian language, literature, music, and art. But also science and, even, modernity itself. Naturally, in this worldview, Russians are superior and those on the receiving end of Russia’s largesse are expected to be grateful.
Russia’s view of Central Asians is unabashedly and unapologetically racist, of the “we taught you how to piss standing up” variety. Russia’s long-standing view of Ukrainians is more complex but equally pernicious and condescending.
Ominously, according to Russian politicians from Putin on down, in case of #Ukraine and #Kazakhstan, the list of Russian “gifts” includes chunks of territory or even statehood itself. Sovereign nations since 1991, both [Ukraine] and [Kazakhstan] have been described by Putin as artificial states.
A central part of this worldview is a refusal to accept that nations formerly under Moscow’s control could have agency of their own. Attempts by Kyiv, Astana, or Tbilisi to set a course diverging from that of Russia are seen as a result of manipulation by great powers elsewhere.
In this worldview, Ukraine that seeks to decide its own affairs, free of Moscow’s control, is an aberration, a result of gullible/corrupted Ukrainian leaders being manipulated by Washington, London, etc. Because why else would they want to escape Russia’s “sphere of influence”?
The power of this idea in Russia’s public imagination is impossible to overstate. To wit, consider the much touted expectation that invading Russian soldiers would be met with flowers by “liberated” Ukrainians.
To understand Russian public support for the horrible attack against a sovereign nation, Russia’s long history as an unapologetic colonial power and its long-held view of itself and its neighbors must be taken into account.
Putin’s propaganda is so effective because it taps into the imperial idea deeply held by Russians. In fact, the imperial idea has been the trump card in [Russian] politics and society for a long time. It’s not Putin’s war, it’s Russia’s war. It’s not Putin’s Russia, it’s Russia’s Putin.
As long as Russia views itself as a benevolent empire and sees the sovereignty of its former colonial subjects as a “geopolitical catastrophe” that needs fixing, no one is safe. The sooner the world recognizes this, the better.
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian (support them if you can!) Ukraine liveblog. From there:
Henichesk declared new ‘temporary administrative capital’ of occupied Kherson
The state-owned Russian news agency Tass is reporting that Alexander Fomin, one of the members of the Russian-imposed administration in occupied Kherson oblast, has said Henichesk has been declared the temporary administrative capital of Kherson. The region is one of the areas that the Russian Federation has claimed to have annexed.
He said: “All the main authorities are concentrated there.”
Henichesk, a port city on the sea of Azov, has been occupied since 27 February. It is very close to the border with the Crimea region, but a significant distance from Kherson city and the Dnipro River.
…“The events of the past week have precipitated a Lehman Brothers moment for the entire crypto economy,” said Carol Alexander, a professor of finance at the University of Sussex….
According to Russian Telegram channels, Russian forces are leaving this area. Whether this might serve as a beachhead for Ukraine’s troops on the east side of the river, or is too restricted… looks like we’ll find out.
The Kinburn peninsula, or as it is also called, the Kinburn Spit, remains the only not yet liberated territory in the Mykolaiv region, is the goal of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, “combat work is underway” on this occasion, – Natalia Humeniuk
In addition, she promised good news🤞[map at the link]
Historic scenes of jubilation in Kherson following the city’s liberation from Russian occupation. Amazing to think that just weeks ago, the Kremlin tried to convince the world that that these people wanted to join Russia [video at the link]
Waking up this morning with all of Kherson west of the Dnipro liberated by Ukraine. There are still more videos of celebrations, still more videos of towns being liberated, still more videos of Russian equipment wrecked alongside the road, still more videos of captured equipment, still more videos of Russian prisoners, and still more videos of elderly Ukrainian women greeting soldiers with belts of heavy machine gun ammo. Okay, that last one may be unique.
Sure, some people bring them flowers, but does that really top this? [Tweet and video at the link]
As expected, not everything is completely peaceful on Saturday morning. Just hours after the liberations of Kherson, artillery has begun firing across the river to the north. However, it may not be firing quite in the direction that many expected.
Artillery duels between both sides of the Dnipro river have started. Russian troops in Nova Kakhovka quite in a hurry.
As of Friday, Russia has moved the “capital” of Russian-occupied Kherson from the city of Kherson to Henichesk. This is a town of less than 20,000 people before the war began. That makes it considerably smaller than such familiar small cities as Izyum or Kupyansk. Far smaller than any actual regional capital in Ukraine. There are certainly other larger cities within Kherson oblast. For example, both Kakhovka and Nova Kakovka are much larger.
What’s so special about Henichesk? What’s special is that it is tucked all the way over in the southeastern corner of the oblast — putting it outside of both artillery and HIMARS range. [map at the link]
Henichesk is as far away as Russia can run, and still pretend to be in control of Kherson oblast; from a town 14x smaller than the one they occupied at the beginning of the week. And, of course, there are good reasons to move Russian operations as far from any Ukrainian force as possible. Because it’s not just artillery targeting Russian positions across the river. [video at the link]
For Nova Kakhovka, this is nothing new. Ukrainian forces have been striking ammunition depots, supply depots, and aggregations of military vehicles in the area since HIMARS became a factor in the war, well before Ukraine began the western counteroffensive that reached its climax in Kherson this week. The idea that Russia could safely mass artillery on the east bank and pound the west once removed from Kherson was always questionable, because this is the likely fate of any sort of fixed artillery position anywhere in that region. And if Russia thought they had some kind of “deal” that meant they could sit across the river and not be bothered by Ukrainian forces … nope.
Where did the Ukrainian grandmother get her handy stock of 12.7mm NSV ammo? It’s likely that Russia was using her home or a nearby building for a small stockpile like this one. [tweet and image at the link]
An inability to supply forces across the river after Ukraine targeted bridge surfaces was a primary reason behind Russia’s withdrawal from the area west of the Dnipro. However, that doesn’t mean there was no ammo left. A number of caches like this one have been found. Still they’re nothing like the cavernous warehouses of artillery shells left behind when Russia fled from Kharkiv.
And hey, hopefully those troops helped that grandmother get her appliances back in place.
Even with all those videos linked above, a few more won’t hurt. [videos at the link]
You can’t say that Russia didn’t get away with something.
🤦A Russian propagandist boasted that “her comrade” had stolen a raccoon from the Kherson Zoo when he fled the city
The AFU are ready to exchange 10 captured mobiks for a raccoon, which was stolen from the Kherson Zoo by the heroically retreating second army of the world.
With all of western Kherson liberated (except for that raccoon), expect more coverage of what’s happening on the fronts in Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia oblasts. The situation around cities like Bakhmut and towns such as Avdiivka, continues to be absolutely grim. Ukraine has not surrendered these locations, but the back and forth over ground that has been plowed to a bloody froth continues and the costs are extraordinary. Even as Kherson was being liberated, Russia was turning up the heat in this area in hopes of generating some kind of counter-story for the media.
They’ve even claimed to have completely captured Paviivka. That’s not true. However, Russia has gained a foothold in that town, and Ukrainian troops are being forced to defend what remains block by block.
Nothing happening in the east is anywhere close to the scale of the victory in Kherson. But that doesn’t make the lives of the Ukrainian soldiers fighting there any less significant.
Besides all the joy in the south, the AFU in #Bakhmut faces hell. Russia has increased it’s attacks which the Ukrainian forces try to withstand.
Here are some pictures shot in the Hospital. Every half hour soldiers are brought in. Wounded and also dead.
This is the truth of war [terrifying and memorable images at the link]
However, what’s happening around Bakhmut isn’t the only place where things are heating up following Russia’s retreat from Kherson. Far up to the north, there’s something else going on.
In #Svatove, locals that still live there are nervous. Explosions are heard very close to the city.
“The night passed terribly, no one slept, everything thundered very close, in the morning the same thing, there is no idea what is happening, people’s nerves are at the limit”
Fighting is reportedly going on both immediately west of the city, as well as to the NW near the town of Kuzemivka. As of Wednesday, Ukrainian forces were reportedly engaged with Russian troops at a whole series of locations west of the highway. [map at the link]
The “faded” explosions on this map represent the older known points of confrontation. The symbol near Kuzemivka represents the place of a battle that was taking place on Saturday morning. However, the reports from Svatove make it seem as if Ukrainian forces are closer to the city than this map may indicate. It’s possible that the “third ring” of defenses may have been broken at one of the points west of the city.
More information from this area could be coming soon.
The Russians predictably left a disaster behind in Kherson.
There is no water, electricity, or food.
They destroyed the electrical system and there are photos of them blowing up cell phone towers.
This report says 70-80 thousand out of 300,000 residents still remain. Other reports say it is 150,000 left. The lower number seems more likely.
Kherson still lacks water, medicine and food, with disguised Russians hiding in the city
Elena Rasenko en.socportal.info
Kherson now has about 70-80 thousand inhabitants, while at the beginning of the full-scale invasion 320 thousand people lived in the regional centre.
People in Kherson, which has been liberated from the Russian invaders, are short of water, medicine and food, but humanitarian cargoes are already beginning to arrive in the city, the mayor’s advisor Roman Golovnya said on a national telethon.
He noted that the occupiers and collaborators have done everything possible to ensure that those people who remain in the city find themselves in the most difficult situation:
There is now a critical lack of water in the city above all, because there is virtually no water supply in the city
Golovnya also pointed out that the people have no medicine and no bread, nor is it possible to bake bread, because there is no electricity in the city
At the same time, according to Golovnya, humanitarian cargoes are already being formed, particularly from Mykolaiv, and some vehicles with aid have already arrived in the city.
For their part, AFU fighters continue clearing the city of occupants and collaborators. Many of them have changed into civilian clothes and are trying to escape
The Ukrainian population is helping the defenders in every way possible
Anglin, one of the nation’s most notorious neofascists as the longtime publisher of the explicitly pro-Nazi Daily Stormer, has a number of multimillion-dollar legal judgments against him that he has made a second career out of skipping out on and avoiding, claiming that he lives overseas now. But now a federal judge has issued an arrest warrant for Anglin in the case involving the largest of these judgments—which means that Anglin is now officially a federal fugitive, and his options are going to become very limited.
On Wednesday in Missoula, Montana, U.S. District Judge Dana Christensen issued a bench warrant for Anglin’s arrest, after three years of Anglin ignoring a $14 million judgment against him. In August 2019, he was ordered to pay that amount to a Montana woman for orchestrating an antisemitic harassment campaign against her family.
Whitefish resident Tanya Gersh, a real-estate agent, was bombarded by Anglin’s army of online neo-Nazis in 2016 with a flood of threats and hateful messages after Anglin targeted her for having helped organize a local campaign against white nationalist Richard Spencer, who lived in Whitefish part-time then. Anglin claimed that she and other Jewish residents had engaged in an “extortion racket.” He wound up publishing 30 stories at the Stormer attacking her by name. The harassment included posting photos of her and her children (including a photoshop of them entering Auschwitz).
“So Then—Let’s Hit Em Up. Are y’all ready for an old-fashioned Troll Storm?” Anglin wrote. He demurred that he was not advocating “violence or threats of violence or anything even close to that.” A week later, he published another post claiming he was preparing to bus in skinheads from the Bay Area of California: “I have already worked out most of the details with the leaders of the local groups,” he wrote. “We are continuing our barrage against the criminal Jews of Whitefish,” he wrote. “We are planning an armed protest in Whitefish … we can easily march through the center of the town carrying high-powered rifles.”
Gersh, with the assistance of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), sued Anglin. In response to the suit, Anglin allegedly fled the country to avoid being served the court papers—reportedly to places such as Cambodia and Albania. After multiple delaying tactics on Anglin’s part—mainly by not appearing in court—the case was resolved when Judge Christensen finally issued a default judgment against him in August 2019 and ordered him to pay over $4 million in compensatory damages and $10 million in punitive damages to Gersh.
Anglin fell silent for a while and burrowed deeper into hiding afterward. Gersh’s attorneys say Anglin has paid nothing at all toward the judgment, and has blown off requests for information—regarding his assets, his revenues from the Stormer, and most of all, his whereabouts.
[…] He’s proven previously adept at just skipping out on any legal consequences […] A federal judge in Ohio awarded Muslim American radio host Dean Obeidallah $4.1 million in damages from Anglin in June 2019, after the Stormer published a piece claiming he had taken responsibility for a May 2017 terrorist attack by Islamist radicals at an Ariana Grande concert. He’s been able to skip out on any payments in that case so far.
Similarly, Anglin was among the multiple defendants named in the Sines v. Kessler trial targeting organizers of the lethal “Unite the Right” march in August 2017 in Charlottesville, Virginia, but was among the no-shows when the federal lawsuit was heard in court last year—and has not poked his head up in any known locale since the jury ruled in November 2021 that the defendants owe over $26 million to the plaintiffs they victimized.
Anglin, a native of Ohio, also was found liable for $600,000 in damages awarded to an American University student leader he targeted at the Stormer. He has consistently claimed in court to be living outside the U.S., though it is not clear this really is the case. Right-wing rumor mills sometimes have him hunkering down in a U.S. locale, though this may also just be misdirection. […]
But international travel can be fraught for people with outstanding federal warrants, particularly if they attempt to enter or leave the United States, mainly because the likelihood is much higher that customs and border agents might turn up your warrant while processing you as part of a database search. So wherever Anglin currently might be hiding, the warrant likely will severely restrict his ability to move about anywhere else.
Anglin’s attorneys have claimed that he hasn’t been to the U.S. since 2013 and has no intention of returning. On the Stormer, Anglin says he keeps his location secret because he receives “credible” death threats. At various times he has claimed to have taken up residency in various locations around the globe, including living in the Philippines sometime before 2010, and in Greece sometime in 2013. He claimed he moved to Cambodia four days before Gersh and the SPLC filed their lawsuit in 2017.
Anglin most recently popped up in the American political scene by endorsing Blake Masters, the GOP nominee for Arizona’s Senate seat (who is currently on the brink of losing that race). [LOL. He endorsed a loser!] Anglin announced his eager support for Masters after a video went viral showing Masters throttling and shoving a 73-year-old man to the ground at a Republican fundraising event after the latter showed up wearing a Black Lives Matter shirt.
[…] “This is exactly the kind of man this country needs.”
[…] By endorsing a figure like Masters, as the Anti-Defamation League’s Marilyn Mayo explains, Anglin is attaching himself to a candidate who has aligned with the extremist right by embracing nativist politics and MAGA conspiracism and denialism, all of which intersect with his interests. […] he’s demonstrating his own proximity to the right-wing mainstream.
“Anglin exploits that to make it seem like extremism is being normalized,” Mayo said. “Unfortunately, that happens to be true these days.”
So glad to see that Senator Mark Kelly was re-elected in Arizona. That puts Democrats just one more win away from holding the Senate majority.
In other great news from Arizona, election denier and dunderhead Mark Finchem lost the race for Secretary of State. Democrat Adrian Fontes won.
[…] Finchem was among a host of GOP candidates for statewide office who have repeatedly cast doubt over Joe Biden’s presidential victory or falsely claimed that the 2020 election was stolen from former President Donald Trump in Arizona.
Last year, Trump backed Finchem’s candidacy and highlighted his record of defending the stolen election claims. “Mark was willing to say what few others had the courage to say” about the 2020 election, Trump said in offering his public support.
As a state legislator, Finchem has introduced several resolutions seeking to decertify the results of the 2020 election in three major Arizona counties, as well as a bill that would give the Legislature the power to reject election results. He also supported a partisan review of Maricopa County’s election results, even though the review reaffirmed Biden’s victory. […]
While we are waiting for the run-off race in Georgia, (to be decided on December 6), we are going to hear Herschel Walker trying to insult Raphael Warnock by claiming that Warnock uses “big words.” Heaven forbid.
The cartoon shows Elon Musk, Putin, and Trump sitting at a bar. Trump has a coke, the other two men are drinking whiskey and vodka (looks like). All look despondent. Thought balloons identify what they are thinking:
Musk: “I was wrong to buy Twitter.”
Putin: “I was wrong to invade Ukraine.”
Trump: “Melania was wrong about Dr. Oz.”
ravensays
The gifts include Russian language, literature, music, and art. But also science and, even, modernity itself.
Oh really?
from SC #239 quoting a central Asian Azamat Junisbai:
Deeply internalized, the idea of its own benevolence has long permeated and shaped Russian society. In this narrative, unlike the old European powers guilty of ruthless colonial conquest, Russia is a selfless bringer of culture, prosperity, and order.
The view of Russia as a big brother bestowing its blessings on the lesser people around it is ubiquitous among Russians of all political persuasions. In this narrative, Russia’s neighbors are perpetually indebted to it. The relationship is always unequal.
The word “gift“ features prominently. The gifts include Russian language, literature, music, and art. But also science and, even, modernity itself.
What Russian culture?
AFAICT, there isn’t much of anything that can be called Russian culture.
It is almost all borrowed or stolen.
A huge amount of the old culture seems to be Ukrainian, from Kyivian Rus, the first real major Slavic state in the 10th century.
The music, art, modernity (what little there is), and science all come from the West, mostly Western Europe.
The actual modern Russian culture seems to be highly dysfunctional.
Human life is cheap and meaningless. Social problems are very high. Alcoholism is high as is Fetal Alcohol syndrome in children. Most Russians seem to be fatalistic and apathetic about the future. They’ve never had a democracy. They live in a warped dictatorship of Oligarchies and ex-KGB agents.
I don’t get the same impression about Ukrainian culture though.
They have a deep and ancient culture that is still alive. Superimposed on this are layers of younger eras and finally, a lot of the modern world and its values have been adopted by Ukraine.
They could easily fit into the EU.
Russia could not.
tomhsays
Re the Senate:
As of Saturday morning in the Nevada Senate race, Democrat Cortez Masto trailed Republican Laxalt by about 800 votes. In Clark County, Nevada’s largest, which includes Las Vegas, there are roughly 24,000 more mail-in ballots to be counted, along with about 15,000 provisional ballots and ballots that need to be cured.
In Washoe County, Nevada’s second-most populous, there are roughly 12,000 remaining. State law allows for mail-in ballots to be received in Nevada through Saturday, though the ballots need to have been postmarked by Election Day to be valid.
Cortez Masto is slightly favored to win but Laxalt still has a chance.
Meanwhile, Lindsey Graham is busy being Lindsey Graham.
From Politico:
On a Republican conference call Thursday, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), went so far as to suggest fraud in Nevada if Laxalt isn’t declared the winner. The midday call was hosted by Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee.
“There is no mathematical way Laxalt loses,” Graham said on the call. “If he does, then it’s a lie.”
No evidence of election fraud has emerged and independent analysts have been expecting Cortez Masto to take the lead for days based on the number of outstanding mail votes in the most Democratic part of the state.
I think that mail ballots will put Catherine Cortez Masto ahead in Nevada. It looks likely to me that the Democrat will win that Senate race. I also think Raphael Warnock will win the run-off race in Georgia. If he does, that will put Democrats in the Senate in a very good position to support the Democratic Party agenda when it comes to appointing judges, preventing Republicans like Lindsey Graham from passing a federal ban on abortion, etc.
Talk about the “red wave” spluttering to an ignominious close!
Masto is currently within 1,000 votes of overtaking that doofus Adam Laxalt.
[…] All eyes will be on Clark County, home to Las Vegas, which is a Democratic stronghold. Ms. Cortez Masto has led mail ballots tabulated after Election Day there by nearly two to one, a margin that would be more than enough to overtake Mr. Laxalt if the trend continues among the approximately 25,000 mail ballots that remain to be counted.
The bulk of the remaining mail ballots in Clark County are expected to be reported on Saturday (though the deadline to have all ballots counted is not until Tuesday). That could be enough to allow news organizations to project a winner, depending on the number of ballots counted and the size of Ms. Cortez Masto’s lead. […]
I’m no fancy head doctor like Ben Carson, but I think I need to install an emergency stent in my brain to safely vent the schadenfreude after reading this story about Donald Trump’s foul mood in the wake of his latest colossal face-plant. [I resemble that remark.]
As we all know, Trump ruins everything. That apparently includes his daughter’s wedding and Republicans’ chances of persuading a majority of Americans ever to back them again. Meanwhile, he’s licking his wounds as if they were dribbling heavenly nectar instead of rancid nougat and inky black orc blood.
Gott im Himmel, it is glorious.
So Trump’s daughter Tiffany is getting married on Saturday, and Donald’s mind is naturally fixated on Himself.
CNN has all the sordid details:
[E]ven though Tropical Storm Nicole is moving on, the Trumps may still be in for some tumult over the weekend. They’re gathering as their patriarch makes moves toward a 2024 presidential run, a prospect not everyone in the family is excited about. Some of them are signaling they don’t want to be involved much, if at all, sources close to the family tell CNN.
Three people familiar with the former president’s activities say he is not in the best of spirits. Many of the high-profile candidates he endorsed in the midterms failed to secure a win, and now some Republicans are whispering about his dwindling influence over the party. Trump is “cranky,” says one of the people.
Uh huh. Let us know when Trump isn’t “cranky.” The dude’s got the longest case of diaper rash in the celebrated history of unsightly skin blotches. But hey, Tiffany’s in luck! Trump is far more interested at the moment in ruining all of our lives instead of hers!
At present, say those who are familiar, Trump is more focused on his “special announcement” on Tuesday, when he may – or may not – announce his planned third run for the presidency. His mind is consumed with the 2024 political landscape and where and how he will fit into it.
Oy, that’s not good. Normally when Donald Trump attends a wedding, the hosts’ biggest worry is that he’ll show up in a flowing white dress to take attention away from the bride. In this case, there’s nearly a metaphysical certitude he’ll use his toast to whine at length about the 2020 election.
CNN also says two sources claim Trump has been “on the outs” with his wife, Melania, whom Trump reportedly blamed for making him endorse Dr. Mehmet Oz, who mysteriously lost his Senate bid despite being a world-class snake oil salesman. [LOL]
The report also notes that Donald’s No. 1 daughter, Ivanka, has no interest in politics or pretending to be interested in politics anymore. Nor does the smarmy pillar of fancy wallpaper paste she’s married to.
[…] What? That just leaves Don Jr. and Eric. And Mike Lindell. And Fiddle-Drawers Giuliani. At this rate, Trump will be filling out his cabinet with whoever sends in the most Count Chocula boxtops. That’s assuming he wins, of course. Which he can’t. Because while God’s quite the practical joker, there’s no way in hell He’d be that cruel. Is there?
So enjoy the weekend, big guy. And look on the bright side. The daughter who’s getting married isn’t the one you want to date. So this will have no emotional impact on you whatsoever, and you can direct all your rage at whatever fool thought Dr. Oz would be a good senatorial candidate.
That’s you, by the way—in case you somehow haven’t figured that out yet.
[…] As reported by Dana Milbank in his column for the Washington Post, as the “wave” failed to materialize, the event’s planners soon turned off Fox News’ election coverage (which is, of course, the only coverage that the guests would watch) and substituted music. Whatever that music was, however, was soon drowned out by those who, one by one, took their turn at the stage microphone.
As Milbank reports, the tone was set from the beginning:
They eschewed basic decency. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is “losing the gavel but finding the hammer,” Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) told the crowd, joking about the attack on Pelosi’s husband that left him with a fractured skull — just as GOP gubernatorial nominee Kari Lake did a week earlier. The crowd laughed. [***]
They hurled insults every which way. “Merrick Garland needs some new pantyhose.” “Beto [O’Rourke] is a furry.” Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) is a “little man” whose “ears don’t match.” President Biden is a “lost child” with a “very dirty diaper.” Democrats are “lunatics.” [***]
At a time that typically calls for magnanimity and reconciliation, they instead cried out for vengeance. When Anthony Fauci’s name was invoked, they chanted “Lock him up!” They vowed to be a “nightmare to Joe Biden” and to impeach his aides. “Sorry libs,” sneered the emcee. “Sucks to suck.”
[All top drawer material.]
As Milbank reports, state party Chair Kelli Ward declared, without a trace of irony, that her fellow Republicans had “remade the party in our image.” Even as beleaguered election workers in Maricopa county performed the tedious task of counting all the votes, they were slammed with insults accusing them of fraud and criminality.
Then Kari Lake, the former anchorwoman and newly rising Republican star, chimed in with her own nasty invective:
A few minutes after 10 p.m. local time, Kari Lake took the stage with a fresh stream of invective: “Corruption.” “Cheaters and crooks.” “BS and garbage.” “Incompetent people running the show in Arizona.” “Propagandists.” “Fake media.” “Incompetency.”
As Milbank observes, “It was an appropriately ugly end to this grotesque campaign, just one last attempt to generate disgust — not just toward Democrats but toward the democratic process.”
This kind of rhetoric from Republicans has been the salient feature of the entire 2022 election. Inspired by Trump’s lies about nonexistent election fraud, and by Fox News’ continuous demonization of all things Democratic, it’s understandable why Republicans would think it might be effective, no matter how ugly or dangerous it became. But as it turned out, the voters did not direct their disgust at Democrats. Rather, they directed their disgust towards the GOP, in the clearest way imaginable. And although Milbank doesn’t mention this, the most pathetic aspect of this display was the fact that every single one of those speakers would doubtlessly call him/herself a “Christian.” […]
A holiday cruise ship carrying about 800 passengers with Covid-19 has docked in Sydney, Australia.
The Majestic Princess cruise ship arrived at Circular Quay, having sailed from New Zealand.
About 4,600 passengers and crew were aboard the ship when it docked – meaning around one in five had Covid…
England’s winning streak came to an end in the most important game of all as New Zealand won the World Cup for a sixth time on a historic night for women’s rugby at Eden Park…
Ukraine is carrying out “stabilisation measures” near Kherson on Saturday after its forces retook the city, write Lorenzo Tondo and Luke Harding.
Hundreds of citizens flooded on to the city streets on Saturday morning after a night of jubilation that the eight-month occupation had ended, embracing Ukrainian soldiers and foreign journalists following what has been described as a “historic day” for Kyiv – and perhaps the most important strategic breakthrough since the beginning of the Russian invasion.
However, the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, cautioned that while special military units had reached Kherson city, a full deployment to reinforce the advance troops was still under way – a reminder that about 70% of the Kherson region remains under Russian control.
“We are winning battles on the ground, but the war continues,” said the Ukrainian foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, from Cambodia, where he was attending a meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.
Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy says Kyiv’s forces have established control in over 60 settlements in the Kherson region and that stabilisation measures are being carried out in Kherson.
He added that Russian forces have destroyed all of Kherson’s critical infrastructure before they fled including communications, water supplies, heat and electricity supplies.
Here are further comments from president Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s video address.
“Before fleeing from Kherson, the occupiers destroyed all the critical infrastructure: communications, water, heat, electricity,” he said.
“(Russians) everywhere have the same goal: to humiliate people as much as possible. But we will restore everything, believe me,” Zelenskiy added.
Zelenskiy added that Ukraine was able to conduct successful operations in Kherson and elsewhere in part because of resistance in the Donetsk region in the face of repeated Russian attacks.
“There it is just hell – there are extremely fierce battles there every day,” he said.
“But our units are defending bravely – they are withstanding the terrible pressure of the invaders, preserving our defense lines.”
The British graffiti-artist Banksy unveiled his latest work, on a Ukrainian building damaged by Russian bombing. The anonymous artist from Bristol, whose work sells for millions of pounds, posted a picture on Instagram of the artwork, a gymnast doing a handstand amid debris in Borodianka, a town north of the capital, Kyiv, which was pummelled by Russian bombs and then occupied.
When it was first published in 1897, Bram Stoker’s Dracula immediately triggered a spate of strong emotional responses. These responses partly stemmed from its action-movie depiction of Christianity, but also partly from the xenophobic fears of European Jews that lurk beneath its titular monster. Dracula also introduced the idea of a holy conspiracy, whose members must conduct their sacred fight against evil in secret. In this episode, we talk about how a century of adaptations has preserved the notion of dueling conspiracies, and thereby provided the narrative that fuels QAnon, the Oath Keepers, and other modern Crusaders consumed with their own secret plot to take America back from the “globalist” monsters they fear and loathe.
The insurrection at the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, was not a blip or an aberration. It was the logical outcome of years of a White evangelical subculture’s preparation for war. Religion scholar and former insider Bradley Onishi maps the origins of White Christian nationalism and traces its offshoots in Preparing for War: The Extremist History of White Christian Nationalism–And What Comes Next (Broadleaf Books, 2023).
Combining his own experiences in the youth groups and prayer meetings of the 1990s with an immersive look at the steady blending of White grievance politics with evangelicalism, Onishi crafts an engrossing account of the years-long campaign of White Christian nationalism that led to January 6. How did the rise of what Onishi calls the New Religious Right, between 1960 and 2015, give birth to violent White Christian nationalism during the Trump presidency and beyond? What propelled some of the most conservative religious communities in the country–communities of which Onishi was once a part–to ignite a cold civil war?
Through chapters on White supremacy and segregationist theologies, conspiracy theories, the Christian-school movement, purity culture, and the right-wing media ecosystem, Onishi pulls back the curtain on a subculture that birthed a movement and has taken a dangerous turn. In taut and unsparing prose, Onishi traces the migration of many White Christians to Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming in what is known as the American Redoubt. Learning the troubling history of the New Religious Right and the longings and logic of White Christian nationalism is deeply alarming. It is also critical for preserving the shape of our democracy for years to come.
Would you eat raw testicles to become an alpha male? This week, Julian Feeld and Annie Kelly of the QAnon Anonymous podcast join us to discuss their new series “Man Clan,” which delves into the dark, dietarily dubious world of masculinity influencers. Meanwhile, as voters go to the polls, election vigilantes are flocking to Telegram channels where they award each other “points” for conspiracy theories about people they baselessly believe to be election “mules.” If Republicans take the House of Representatives, the right might mount an effort to impeach President Joe Biden, albeit on unclear charges. Fever Dreams co-hosts Will Sommer and Kelly Weill break down how Republicans might try to oust Biden, plus why failed candidate Laura Loomer is now blaming her primary loss on fellow rightwing mudslinger Milo Yiannopoulos.
In Episode 148 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg notes that the ANSWER Coalition—a formation so “tankie” that it actually displays portraits of the genocidal Syrian dictator Bashar Assad at its Orwellian “anti-war” rallies—is holding a panel at The People’s Forum in New York on “The Real Path to Peace in Ukraine.” The headlining speaker is to be Jeremy Corbyn, who was bashed by Ukraine’s government as a “useful idiot” of Vladimir Putin for joining a panel demanding a cut-off of military to aid to the besieged nation. Other panelists are even more subservient to Moscow’s military aims, including Vijay Prashad, Medea Benjamin, Jill Stein and Brian Becker. Notably absent from the panel (of course) are any progressive Ukrainian voices—such as Anatoliy Dubovik and Sergiy Shevchenko of Ukraine’s Revolutionary Confederation of Anarcho-Syndicalists; Yuliya Yurchenko or Vladislav Starodubtsev of the Ukrainian left-opposition group Sotsialniy Rukh (Social Movement); Taras Bilous, editor of the Ukrainian socialist journal Commons; or Artem Chapeye, Noam Chomsky’s Ukrainian translator who called Chomsky out in an open letter for abetting Russian propaganda after the war began. All these Ukrainian voices, whatever strong criticism they may have of the neoliberal government of Volodymyr Zelensky, are unequivocal on the need to defend Ukraine against Russian imperialist assault. Whereas this hypocritical “anti-war” panel is an exercise in pseudo-pacifist war propaganda.
“Nine weeks into anti-regime protests in Iran led by women and Gen Z, human rights group Hrana estimates 336 protesters, including 52 children, have been killed and 15,094 have been arrested by the regime so far.
#مهسا_امینی
#MahsaAmini”
ravensays
More nuclear threats.
This rally in Moscow wasn’t very big and was obviously preplanned.
The Sarmat II rocket is the Russian’s new ICBM capable of carrying multiple war heads.
I don’t think nuking Washington DC is a very good idea. It makes it certain that Moscow and St. Petersberg also disappear.
Tweet
Anton Gerashchenko @Gerashchenko_en
Moscow residents did come to the rally, chanting ” to Washington” and demanding urgently “to strike at the decision-making centers with Sarmat rockets”.
[In] Arizona, Democrat Adrian Fontes beat Oath Keeper and January 6 attendant Mark Finchem and in Nevada, Democrat Cisco Aguilar beat QAnon weirdo Jim Marchant. Both Republicans believed the 2022 election was stolen from Donald Trump and wanted to be Secretary of State for the explicit purpose of being able to overturn elections that don’t favor Republicans. Given that both states tend to be swing states, this really would have been bad.
Arizona in particular has been the site of much drama over the 2020 election, so electing a Democrat instead of a complete loony toon is a very big deal for the state. […]
TAMPA, Fla. — A Frontier Airlines flight that was headed for Tampa made an emergency landing Friday night after a passenger was found with a box cutter, according to officials with the airline.
Flight 1761, which was scheduled to fly from Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport to Tampa International Airport, was diverted to Atlanta and landed safely.
The passenger was taken into custody by Atlanta law enforcement.
A second box cutter was found in his carry-on bag, according to the Transportation Security Administration (TSA).
There were no injuries to anyone on the plane.
Passengers were given overnight hotel stays, with a new flight scheduled for Saturday morning to Tampa.
“Trump endorsed Joe Kent over Jaime Herrera Beutler who voted for his impeachment. Kent ousted her in the primary — but this was supposed to be a very safe GOP seat. It’s a big upset. [Marie Gluesenkamp Perez] hyper focused on local issues while Kent was going on the Steve Bannon podcast routinely.”
Catherine Cortez Masto left Adam Laxalt in the dust when those last mail ballot votes were counted from Clark County. The Democrats control the Senate.
And when Raphael Warnock wins in Georgia, which I think he will in the run-off, Democrats will have an extra vote in the Senate. And remember, the Senate also has Vice President Kamala Harris’s vote if it is needed.
Democrats defied historical trends and defeated several candidates backed by former President Donald Trump to keep control of the Senate, providing enormous relief for President Joe Biden.
The battle for the House, meanwhile, remains too close to call.
The picture in the Senate became clear on Saturday after Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada narrowly defeated Republican Adam Laxalt to win re-election, putting her party over the threshold, NBC News projected Saturday.
Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona won his re-election contest in Arizona, NBC News projected Friday evening, directing all eyes to Nevada and its two most populous counties, Clark and Washoe, as mail-in ballot counting continued over the weekend.
Both Laxalt and Masters were endorsed by Trump and promoted his false claims about the presidential race he lost. Laxalt has said the 2020 election was “rigged.”
Biden can now count on partners in the Senate to confirm his judicial and administration appointments, even if his legislative agenda ends up effectively blocked because of a Republican takeover of the House. […]
At the link there’s a lovely photo of Masto with some of her supporters.
Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto was seen as one of the most endangered Democratic Senate incumbents this year, but after days of counting, she has pulled it out, with NBC and CNN projecting her as the winner after a ballot drop from Clark County put her ahead by almost 5,000 votes. The first Latina in the U.S. Senate has won a second term.
Cortez Masto defeated Adam Laxalt after being endorsed by 14 members of his extended family. [LOL] Laxalt embraced Donald Trump’s Big Lie about the 2020 presidential election, as well as running an ad featuring a “great replacement” conspiracy theorist. [Yuck!] Despite coming from one of the top solar power-producing states, he has called for increased use of fossil fuels.
HIMARS will soon be firing from Kherson. The approaches to Crimea are within range. This will degrade Russian defenses/LOC’s while “left wing” of the counter-offensive takes Mariupol & Melitopol by January. Then begins the decisive phase of the campaign…liberation of Crimea.
Nerd of Redhead, Dances OM Trollssays
Hooray! Another two years of good judges being confirmed.
Now that Cortez Masto has won in Nevada, securing Democratic control of the Senate, how many Republicans in Georgia are going to bother turning out for Herschel Walker on December 6 for the run-off election? Some Republicans were holding their nose to vote for him before. Now they won’t bother voting on December 6.
With any luck, Trump will also waddle over to Georgia to put his Loser brand on Herschel Walker.
[…] Ivanka and Jared are moving on and are not interested in being part of a Trump restoration, according to Kate Bennett at CNN. Even die-hard Laura Ingraham seemed to sour on her former hero. “If the voters conclude that you’re putting your own ego or your own grudges ahead of what’s good for the country,” she told her viewers Wednesday night, “they’re going to look elsewhere, period.”
[…] One of the bright spots of the election is that a lot of people seemed to turn their back on crazy. Let’s hope that Republicans will get the message and move on from the King of Crazy before he gets another shot at destroying democracy.
SC @264, I really like that win for Democrats. That’s a swing district and it looks like it has swung away from crazy trumpian candidates and focused on an intelligent and practical representative.
The U.S. Senate will stay in Democratic control in the 118th session of Congress, beginning Jan. 3, 2023. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto’s win in Nevada gives Democrats the 50 votes they need to stay in power. That gives this experiment in democracy at least a few more years. The work has to start anew when they return next week to finish out the current session.
It also means that Sen. Raphael Warnock’s path back to the Senate in his run-off race on December 6 might be just a tiny bit smoother. When control of the Senate isn’t at issue, are Republicans in Georgia really going to be all that enthused to give their vote to a very bad candidate?
The time to act is very brief. Georgia Republicans shortened the runoff period after Democrats’ huge upsets last year because they thought a briefer second round would benefit them. Let’s prove them wrong. Let’s give the Democrats just one more seat.
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From there:
Russia says military training will return to its schools from next year
Russia’s education minister, Sergey Kravstov, has stated that military training will return to Russian schools next September, according to the latest update by the UK’s Ministry of Defence.
The programme is supported by Russia’s Ministry of Defence, which states that no less than 140 hours per academic year should be devoted to this training.
This reprises a Soviet-era programme where students had mandatory military training, a programme which ended in 1993. This training included contingencies for a chemical or nuclear attack, first aid and experience handling and firing Kalashnikov rifles,” the UK MoD said.
Russian officials attempted to revive this training in 2014 following Russia’s invasion of Crimea. It was hoped that the initiative would improve the quality of conscripts. Eight years later, little has changed, and the quality of Russian conscripts remains poor, with low morale and limited training.
It adds that this training likely intends to prepare students with military skills as they approach conscription age and to increase the take-up for mobilisation drives. The initiative is also likely to be part of “a wider project to instil an ideology of patriotism and trust in public institutions in the Russian population,” the UK’s MoD added.
Ukraine’s ministry of defence believes that 650 Russian soldiers were killed in the country in the last day.
Utility companies in Kherson are working to restore critical infrastructure mined by fleeing Russian forces, with most homes in the southern Ukrainian city still without electricity and water, regional officials said on Sunday.
The governor of the region, Yaroslav Yanushevych, said the authorities had decided to maintain a curfew from 5pm to 8am and ban people from leaving or entering the city, as a security measure, Reuters reported.
“The enemy mined all critical infrastructure objects. We are trying to meet within a few days and (then) open the city,” Yanushevych told Ukrainian TV, adding that he hoped mobile phone operators could start working on Sunday.
Yuriy Sobolevskiy, first deputy chairman of Kherson regional council, added to Ukrainian TV: “Most houses have no electricity, no water and problems with gas supplies.”
The head of Ukrainian state railways said train service to Kherson was expected to resume this week.
The US has declared the Russian retreat in Kherson “an extraordinary victory” for Ukraine.
US national security advisor, Jake Sullivan, on board Air Force One en route to the ASEAN summit in Phnom Penh, told reporters:
It does look as though the Ukrainians have just won an extraordinary victory where the one regional capital that Russia had seized in this war is now back under a Ukrainian flag. And that is quite a remarkable thing.
And it has broader strategic implications as well, because being able to push the Russians across the river means that the longer-term threat to places like Odessa and the Black Sea coastline are reduced from where they were before.
And so this is a big moment. And it’s certainly not the end of the line, but it’s a big moment. And it’s due to the incredible tenacity and skill of the Ukrainians, backed by the relentless and united support of the United States and our allies.
Oliver Milman reports for us from Cop27 in Sharm el-Sheikh:
Ukraine has used the Cop27 climate talks to make the case that Russia’s invasion is causing an environmental as well as humanitarian catastrophe, with fossil fuels a key catalyst of the country’s destruction.
Ukraine has dispatched two dozen officials to the summit in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, to spell out the links between the war launched by Russia in February, the soaring cost of energy due to Russia’s status as a key gas supplier and the planet-heating emissions expelled by the offensive.
Heavy shelling and the movement of troops and tanks has polluted the air, water and land, said Svitlana Grynchuk, Ukraine’s assistant environment minister, as well as killed thousands of people and decimated the country’s economy. A fifth of Ukraine’s protected areas have been ruined by the war, she added, with the contamination of previously fertile soils alone costing €11.4bn (£10bn) in damages.
“This is not simply a war, this is state terrorism and it is ecocide,” Grynchuk said. “The invasion has killed wildlife, generated pollution and caused social instability. The terrorist state continues to send missiles to our power plants. Our environment is under threat because of this terrorist attack.”
Amnesty International’s secretary general has made an urgent plea to Fifa before the World Cup, calling on it to commit to a compensation package for migrant workers who suffered abuses in Qatar.
Agnès Callamard urged the world football governing body to issue a “cast-iron commitment” that “abused workers will be compensated and that programmes to prevent further abuses are funded”, adding that such a package would go “a long way towards helping victims and their families rebuild their lives”.
She also fiercely criticised Fifa president Gianni Infantino’s request to World Cup teams that they should “focus on the football” rather than discussing human rights issues in Qatar. “Infantino’s letter is a crass attempt at shirking Fifa’s culpability,” Callamard said.
In the letter, sent last month, Infantino had suggested critics were “handing out moral lessons to the rest of the world” and said nations should “not allow football to be dragged into every ideological or political battle that exists”.
Rather than calming criticism of Qatar, the letter angered human rights groups and football leaders, with countries including England and Wales saying they would continue campaigning on off-pitch issues. “Human rights are universal and they apply everywhere,” they said in a joint statement with eight other European football associations.
The hosting of the World Cup by Qatar has attracted protest worldwide over LGBTQ+ rights and labour issues. Ten captains of European teams have said they will wear “One love” armbands to promote diversity and inclusion during the tournament. While, last month, Australia released a video in which players criticised Qatar’s human rights record.
Last week, the Danish football association said Fifa had rejected a request to allow its players to train at the World Cup in shirts with the words “human rights for all” on them “due to technical reasons”.
Also last week, England’s largest LGBTQ+ supporters’ group criticised David Beckham for his role as a paid ambassador for the Qatar World Cup, saying it was “incredibly disappointing” that he had taken the role given that Qatari law criminalises homosexual behaviour.
…
The comments from Callamard come six months after Amnesty and 24 other rights groups wrote to Infantino urging Fifa to establish a remediation programme for the abuses suffered by workers in Qatar.
The rights groups say hundreds of thousands of migrant workers, predominantly from south and south-east Asia and Africa, have been subjected to “rampant labour abuses” including “extortionate recruitment fees, conditions amounting to forced labour, lost and unpaid wages, and long hours without days off”.
It also highlighted the cases of workers harmed in Qatar, including a Nepali citizen, Tul Bahadur Gharti, who is reported to have died in his sleep in November 2020 after working more than 10 hours in extreme heat on a construction site….
As of 1 December, the Russian Ministry of (In)Justice will publish the full name, home address, passport number and tax number of every “foreign agent” in the country — including most independent Russian journalists and human rights activists.
This list includes 89 NGOs and informal associations, 54 media outlets, and 193 individuals. Including the activists and employees of those organizations and outlets, we’re talking about thousands of people.
The object — quite transparently — is to increase the vulnerability of these people to fraud, harassment and physical violence. The foreign agent law failed to deter oppositional activity. The Kremlin’s hope is that enlisting astroturfed vigilantism will up the ante.
The result will be violent. Western governments need to make it clear that the Kremlin will be held responsible for every activist and journalist — and every partner or relative — attacked, regardless of who perpetrated the attack.
Putin’s thugs will not hesitate to threaten or attack activists’ and journalists’ children and parents. He’s counting on that having a chilling effect. So governments need to open channels to allow those who resist Putin to get their families to safety.
Putin can and must be defeated both in Ukraine and at home. In Russia itself, of course, there’s precious little we can do to empower Putin’s opponents. But we can and should have their backs.
ravensays
The good people won one in Washington state.
Marie Perez defeated Joe Kent in Southwest Washington.
Kent is a right wingnut loon who called for all military weapons to be available to the public (who needs a kamikazi high explosive tank killer drone and why?). Antivaxxer, Pro Russia and against any aid to Ukraine.
Ironically, Southwest Washington has a fair number of…Ukrainians. Seattletimes: Mar 22, 2022 — Washington has the largest Ukrainian population in the U.S. after California and New York. …” Reportedly throwing Ukraine to the jackals didn’t go over very well.
Democrat Marie Gluesenkamp Perez defeats Republican Joe Kent in WA House race
Nov. 12, 2022 at 4:32 pm Updated Nov. 12, 2022 at 7:13 pm
Seattle Times staff reporters
Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, an auto shop owner who was a virtual unknown before August’s primary election, pulled off perhaps the most stunning political upset in the country this year, winning a congressional seat in Southwest Washington that few saw as competitive.
Gluesenkamp Perez, a Democrat, defeated Donald Trump-endorsed Republican Joe Kent on Saturday in Washington’s 3rd Congressional District, with roughly 50.5% of the vote.
Gluesenkamp Perez’s victory sends a Democrat to Congress in a district that has voted Republican for more than a decade, and means eight of Washington’s 10 House members will now be Democrats, along with the state’s two U.S. senators.
Gluesenkamp Perez said the final result shows most voters in the 3rd District reject that ideology and Kent’s agenda, which focused on unyielding partisan warfare.
She credited her win to a coalition that included Republicans and independents who favored her focus on local issues and rebuilding the rural economy, instead of national partisan fights.
Before the election, the political news site FiveThirtyEight gave Kent a 98% chance of winning, but there had been little polling in the race.
Kent had become a star in conservative media, appearing frequently on Tucker Carlson’s Fox News show, and almost daily at times on the podcast of former Trump adviser Steve Bannon.
The path to Gluesenkamp Perez’s improbable win started when six-term Republican U.S. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler last year voted to impeach Trump over his role in stoking the violent Jan. 6 , 2021 attack on the Capitol by a mob of his supporters seeking to halt certification of Joe Biden’s win.
Gluesenkamp Perez, 34, will be among the youngest members of Congress next year. She grew up in Texas, the daughter of a Mexican immigrant father who met her mother on a visit to Washington. She graduated from Reed College in Portland with a degree in economics. She and her husband live in rural Skamania County in a house they built, and co-own a Portland auto-repair shop with eight employees.
During her congressional campaign, Gluesenkamp Perez pitched herself as a supporter of both abortion rights and Second Amendment rights and emphasized support for small businesses, job training and local concerns, like the timber industry.
She ran ads that showcased her rural, Skamania County home, in which she fells a tree with a chainsaw.
Kent, 42, won former Trump’s endorsement early in the primary cycle and has embraced the former president’s lies about the 2020 election and downplayed the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.
Kent repeatedly called those arrested for the Jan. 6 attack “political prisoners” and said he wanted to investigate the FBI, searching for evidence the agency secretly instigated the attack.
He ran on a pro-Trump “America First” agenda, vowing to seek immediate impeachment of Biden, opposing U.S. miltary aid to Ukraine, and calling for a near total shutdown on immigration.
Kent’s alignment with Trump and the most conservative House Republicans, including Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz, opened the door for Gluesenkamp Perez. He called for all weapons available to the military, including machine guns, to be available to the public. He supported a national abortion ban, with no exceptions, and called for Dr. Anthony Fauci to be charged with murder.
A handful of notable Republicans in Southwest Washington who’d backed Herrera Beutler in the primary crossed party lines to publicly endorse Gluesenkamp Perez.
The general election results indicate a significant number of voters quietly followed suit.
How the war in Ukraine is fueling separatism in Russia’s far region of Bashkortostan.
Bashkortostan is in Eastern Europe between the Volga and the Urals. This war is doing wonders for geographical knowledge.
The Bashkirs are Turkic Muslims and there are also Turkic Muslim Tatars, making up over half the population.
Russia has a lot of captive nations and minorities that they generally treat badly. They are poor and taxed and the taxes flow to Moscow and St. Petesburg.
It is hard to say just how many Bashkirs have taken up arms against Russia. I’m guessing not many. “In World War II, there was a simple solution to these kinds of saboteurs – summary execution,” Putin’s spokeswoman Medvedev…I’m sure it hasn’t changed much.
Russia is going downhill fast towards the era of Stalin.
Radiy Khabirov
NOS News How the war in Ukraine is fueling separatism in Russia’s far region of Bashkortostan
Paul Alexander
“The days of demonstrations and protest marches are over. From now on, Putin’s accomplices can count on Molotov cocktails and bullets.” That was the first message on the Telegram channel of the Committee of the Bashkir Resistance a month and a half ago, immediately after Putin announced the mobilization.
At the same time, the resistance group posted a manual for the partisan struggle and instructions on how to make Molotov cocktails. A series of attacks followed in the remote republic of Bashkortostan south of the Urals.
The first target was a local recruitment agency. Resistance fighters also set fire to a party office of the ruling United Russia party, transformer houses at railway junctions and this week a large storage tank at a station.
The Kremlin is now beginning to worry. “In World War II, there was a simple solution to these kinds of saboteurs – summary execution,” Putin’s spokeswoman Medvedev wrote on his Telegram channel.
Head of RT Margarita Simonyan—the mouthpiece of the regime that refuses to call its invasion of Ukraine a war—revisits her favorite topics: “hypocrisy” of the West, which she compares to Russia’s “sincerity.” Simonyan says that the British are hypocritical & Americans are stupid.
Subtitled video at the (Twitter) link.
“I’m amazed that we ourselves don’t even realize how much more open-minded we’ve been historically, although it may seem strange to the rest of the world. We’ve been more accepting, more tolerant, and devoid of prejudice, unlike all of them.”
Akira MacKenziesays
Yesterday we brought home our newest addition to our family, a four-month old male Brittany puppy we’ve named Theodore/Teddy/Ted. I’ve posted some pics of him in the Pharyngula Discord.
Governor: Ukrainian telecom operator Kyivstar resumes service in Kherson.
Kherson Oblast Governor Yaroslav Yanushevych said on Nov. 13 that Ukrainian mobile operator Kyivstar’s operations have been restored in the city.
They link to an article of theirs from September:
…Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Russia has continuously used the disruption of telecom services as a weapon. Cutting off Ukrainian internet providers, television and mobile connection creates an information blockade for…millions of Ukrainians living under Russian occupation.
Under this blockade, it is much harder for Ukrainians to access independent media and communicate with relatives in other parts of Ukraine. The Kremlin is then able to fill this information void with its own propaganda, such as describing Russia’s full-scale invasion as “a liberation” and lying about what is actually happening on the battlefield.
…
“The first thing the Russians do when they occupy Ukrainian territory is cut off the networks,” Stas Prybytko, head of mobile broadband development in Ukraine’s Ministry of Digital Transformation, told the Kyiv Independent.
…
One way to quickly switch Ukrainian users to a Russian-controlled internet is to seize the equipment of Ukrainian operators and reroute internet traffic through Russian networks, according to Oleksandr Arutiunian, board member of the Ukrainian Internet Association.
When internet connection is routed via Russia’s telecom infrastructure instead of Ukraine’s, it is usually subject to Russian internet regulations, surveillance, and censorship, according to internet monitoring firm NetBlocks.
Russian internet regulator Roskomnadzor also uses the internet to find and track opponents of Russian dictator Vladimir Putin and suppress independent information, according to an investigation by the New York Times.
…
Whenever Ukraine liberates territories, like it did in the recent Kharkiv Oblast offensive, the country’s telecom operators immediately start working on restoring internet and cellular services.
Telecom operators, escorted by soldiers and emergency service workers, repair damaged communication lines in heavily shelled cities near the front line. For their efforts and courage, Ukraine’s telecom technicians are often called “invisible heroes.”…
Around 3,000+ contractor employees of Twitter were canned last night (totally normal thing to do, btw). How does Twitter have so many contractors? This is where the CONTENT MODERATOR numbers are hidden. They are called ‘agents’ at Twitter….”
Twitter thread follows.
ravensays
Thread
Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦@bayraktar_1love
The video of Russians stealing a raccoon from the Kherson Zoo appeared.
Link to a full video of animal theft filmed by the Russians themselves – https://youtu.be/ajd8QolVtcA
P.S: You can politely ask to return the Kherson raccoon back home
One of the Russian accomplishments lately.
They stole a raccoon from the Kherson zoo.
The video shows them picking up an overfed raccoon by the tail.
This isn’t how you handle animals.
And who wants a raccoon anyway?
They are fierce fighters when cornered, carry a parasite lethal to humans (a nematode that goes for the brain in humans, Baylisascaris infection), and don’t make good pets.
From the video, these were Russians from a zoo in Crimea.
Odd Fact. Raccoons aren’t native but were introduced to Europe. Being very smart, they promptly went invasive species.
I remember writing about how simply awful Mo Brooks was when he was supporting Trump. Now Mo Brooks has turned on Trump. Good for him. But he should have done so sooner.
The walls are closing in on Donald Trump […] Republicans stuck with him through the Access Hollywood tape, Charlottesville, family separation, the Big Lie, the insurrection, two impeachments, interminable outrages, and tens of thousands of corrosive lies. But if there’s one thing Republicans won’t abide, it’s losing a chance at retaking the Senate and giving more tax breaks to billionaires.
And now one ex-congressman—who found out too late that Trump is loyal only to himself, his appetites, and his gargoylish gonads—is saying what anyone with a functional brain stem has known for decades: Donald Trump is simply awful.
Former GOP Rep. Mo Brooks, who, acting on Trump’s behalf, was the first member of Congress to object to the 2020 presidential election results, has now gone full Michael Cohen on the ocher abomination. And it’s a beautiful sight.
Of course, Trump and Brooks’ relationship has been ice cold for some time. At an August 2021 rally, Brooks said voters should put the 2020 election behind them, despite Trump’s continued obsession with somehow overturning it—which, of course, Trump asked Brooks to help him do, even after Biden had taken office. Eventually, Trump had had enough with Brooks’ insolence and un-endorsed him for Senate.
Well, now Brooks is warning his fellow Republicans about Trump in advance of Trump’s expected presidential announcement on Tuesday. Like they really need a warning […]
AL.com
“It would be a bad mistake for the Republicans to have Donald Trump as their nominee in 2024,” Brooks said in an interview with AL.com. “Donald Trump has proven himself to be dishonest, disloyal, incompetent, crude and a lot of other things that alienate so many independents and Republicans. Even a candidate who campaigns from his basement can beat him.” (A reference, of course, to virtual campaign events Biden held from his home in Delaware during the pandemic.)
“It’s just the way it is,” Brooks said.
It’s almost like this whole Trump-as-president experiment was a disaster for everyone—his friends as well as his enemies.
So if you’re thinking of getting in bed with Trump, you should think twice. And I mean that figuratively, of course. […]
So that’s one more right-wing Republican off the Trump bandwagon. If you keep losing people from an already losing coalition, things probably don’t look great for your future. Unless you can recruit a lot more liberal Democrats to QAnon.
Sen. Markey: A @washingtonpost reporter was able to create a verified account impersonating me—I’m asking for answers from @elonmusk who is putting profits over people and his debt over stopping disinformation. Twitter must explain how this happened and how to prevent it from happening again.
Elon Musk (two days later, for some reason): Perhaps it is because your real account sounds like a parody?
Sen. Markey: One of your companies is under an FTC consent decree. Auto safety watchdog NHTSA is investigating another for killing people. And you’re spending your time picking fights online. Fix your companies. Or Congress will.
[…] the government in Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital, has been adamant that a stalemate would simply cement Russian gains, suggesting that, even if conditions force Ukraine to slow its offensives, it does not plan to stop them. There has been a chorus of conflicting predictions by military analysts and others, inside and outside Ukraine, about what to expect next, and Ukrainian soldiers often delight in the military command’s ability to obscure its intentions and keep everyone guessing.
The drawing of a new front line at the southern reaches of the Dnipro, with the two sides controlling opposite banks, will essentially bring a halt on the Kherson front, military analysts said. The river’s immense width and further damage to the main Antonivksy Bridge by departing Russian troops make it extremely difficult and risky for Ukrainian troops to try to pursue the retreating Russian forces across the water.
There was evidence that Ukraine was continuing to strike deep behind Russian lines, with reports of rocket strikes on Russian forces regrouping in several locations along the eastern bank, and of strikes in recent days on the southern cities of Melitopol and Henichesk, near the Black Sea coast, more than 40 miles from the front.
Ukrainian special forces and partisan forces will maintain a steady momentum of small-scale attacks behind Russian lines, said Justin Bronk, a senior research fellow in military sciences at the Royal United Services Institute, a defense analysis organization in London.
Kherson liberation chronicles, from Ukrainian social media: When soldiers enter to clear a village that was occupied by Russia and a local girl comes out with a violin to play the Ukrainian anthem.
Correction? to the last part of comment 294. On the Twitter thread there is an argument about what the girl is playing. I don’t really care what she is playing. It is a great moment.
That’s Chervona Kalina, not the official national anthem. That said, Chervona Kalina is a FANTASTIC, inspiring song for Ukrainians & the world. Here’s a great version by the lead singer in the group Boombox, who returned from tour to defend his country.
Around 20% of people who survive cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) after cardiac arrest may describe lucid experiences of death that occurred while they were seemingly unconscious and on the brink of death. This is according to new research led by investigators at NYU Grossman School of Medicine and elsewhere…
Survivors reported having unique lucid experiences, including a perception of separation from the body and observing events without pain or distress. They also reported a meaningful evaluation of life, including of their actions, intentions, and thoughts toward others. The researchers found these experiences of death to be different from hallucinations, dreams, delusions, illusions, or CPR-induced consciousness…
Sam Parnia, MD, PhD…
“These lucid experiences cannot be considered a trick of a disordered or dying brain, but rather a unique human experience that emerges on the brink of death,” says Parnia. As the brain is shutting down, many of its natural braking systems are released. Known as disinhibition, this provides access to the depths of a person’s consciousness, including stored memories, thoughts from early childhood to death, and other aspects of reality. While no one knows the evolutionary purpose of this phenomenon, it clearly reveals “intriguing questions about human consciousness, even at death,” says Parnia.
Should be retitled Deuced Lying. Parnia is a “true believer” who will interpret results to fit his views. “perception of separation from the body” does not mean the patients actually left their body. And so on.
Russian military chiefs said “not one single piece of equipment was left behind” in #Kherson. [LOL] Well, here is some of it over at the airfield. The haul included a Mil MI-24 helicopter.
[…] Exit polls show 72 percent of women ages 18-29 voted for Democrats in House races nationwide. In a pivotal Pennsylvania Senate race, 77 percent of young women voted for embattled Democrat John Fetterman, helping to secure his victory. […]
Remove young women from the equation, and neither women nor young people delivered much to the Democrats on Tuesday, according to exit polls conducted by Edison Research. Fifty-three percent of women overall voted blue in House contests. Women over 45 delivered the party no advantage at all. And Democrats won a comparatively low 54 percent of votes from young men.
SC @293, that was a good response from Senator Markey.
In other news: “Chappelle returns to SNL with no apologies — and many jokes about Kanye” Washington Post link
Dave Chappelle returned for his third stint as host of “Saturday Night Live,” which gave the controversial comedian a starring role in an episode dominated by the midterm elections and the fallout from Kanye West’s antisemitic remarks.
As Chappelle walked onto the stage for his opening monologue, he pulled out a piece of paper from his pocket and said he was going to “read a brief statement” that he had prepared.
“I denounce antisemitism in all its forms, and I stand with my friends in the Jewish community,” he began.
“And that, Kanye, is how you buy yourself some time,” he said, to laughs from the live audience.
The choice of Chappelle, who hosted SNL after the presidential elections in 2016 and 2020, to anchor the post-midterms episode raised eyebrows because of his past jokes about trans people. The release last year of his Netflix special “The Closer” sparked a walkout by some employees of the streaming service who viewed his jokes as transphobic. Last week, Page Six reported that some SNL writers were planning a boycott in protest of Chappelle. In a statement to CNN, a representative for Chappelle said, “we’ve seen nothing to support media reports of a writer’s boycott.” […]
[…] In Saturday’s episode, Chappelle did not directly address the controversy over his jokes about trans people but touched on several other hot topics. He dedicated almost half of his opening monologue to the backlash over antisemitic statements and material shared by Ye, the rapper formerly known as Kanye West, and by Brooklyn Nets guard Kyrie Irving.
Chappelle joked that he had learned in his decades as a comedian that “there are two words in the English language that you should never say together in sequence — and those words are ‘the’ and ‘Jews.’ I’ve never heard someone do good after they said that.”
[…] The other half of Chappelle’s monologue — and much of the rest of the episode — was dedicated to politics and the midterm elections, whose outcome came into sharper focus after the episode began as a Democratic win in Nevada allowed the party to retain its Senate majority. Control over the House of Representatives is still being decided.
The cold open lampooned the “Fox & Friends” morning news show, in which hosts, not including Chappelle, framed former president Donald Trump as a loser. “Mister President, I don’t know how to tell you this, but we’ve moved on. We can’t have you on the show anymore,” SNL cast member Heidi Gardner, playing co-host Ainsley Earhardt, told an irate Trump, played by comedian James Austin Johnson.
In his monologue, Chappelle also took aim at Herschel Walker, the Republican candidate for Senate in Georgia, whom he called “observably stupid,” and said Trump is an “honest liar.”
Many of the sketches walked the line between comedy and discomfort that Chappelle has honed since “Chappelle’s Show,” poking fun at White people and their perceived cluelessness about Black culture and history. In one skit, Chappelle, playing a blues musician, explains to stunned White talk-show anchors and reporters that “potato hole” is not, as they seemed to infer, a word with sexual undertones, but rather describes the holes in the ground in which enslaved people in the United States buried food.
[…] The only certainty is that the monologue was divisive, but, as musician Felix Kay opined: “Dave Chappelle is a comedian. You either like his jokes or you. don’t. He doesn’t care.” […]
Dolly Parton is the latest recipient of the Bezos Courage and Civility Award. ..
“We can’t wait to see all the good that you’re going to do with this $100 million award, @DollyParton.”
Bezos, the founder and former head of Amazon.com, said at a news conference at the time the grant had no strings attached.
“They can give it all to their own charity,” Bezos said last year. “Or they can share the wealth. It is up to them.”
$100 million isn’t really that much to Jeff Bezos. I’m sure he’s getting a nice tax break out of this. So one rich person gives a pile of money to another rich person to give away to charity. Hmmm.
Reuters is reporting that a former Russian mercenary has been executed after he switched sides to back Ukraine.
In an unverified video distributed on Telegram channels which Russian media said were linked to the Wagner mercenary group, the man identified himself as Yevgenny Nuzhin, 55, and said he had changed sides to “fight against the Russians”.
In the footage, Nuzhin, shown with his head taped to a brick wall, gave his name, date of birth and said that he had changed sides on September 4.
He said he was abducted in Kyiv on October 11 and came around in a cellar, before the footage shows him being struck with a sledgehammer.
It was unclear how Nuzhin, who told Ukrainian media in September that he wanted to fight for Ukraine, ended up in the hands of what appear to be Russian forces.
Russia’s Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close ally of president Vladimir Putin, said today that the former mercenary was a traitor.
It’s simply not possible that Elon Musk purchased Twitter with the sole intent of destroying it. And by “not possible,” we mean “unlikely.” And by “unlikely,” we’re not sure what we mean because there’s a great deal of evidence suggesting that Musk’s nonstop campaign of mismanagement is well on its way to doing irreparable damage to the social media site, and there’s no evidence at all that any of his management decisions will not put the company into worse straits than before he showed up.
Yes, it’s time for another update on the state of one of the top social media companies in the world, and it’s all bad. All of it. Every bit.
When we last gave an update, Twitter was in the midst of an upper management collapse. Chief privacy officer Damien Kieran, chief information security officer Lea Kissner, and chief compliance officer Marianne Fogarty turned in their resignations last Thursday morning, on their way out delivering a blistering in-house warning to Twitter’s remaining staff informing them that Musk’s actions were putting “a huge amount of personal, professional and legal risk” on remaining company engineers.
The resignations were in the wake of a Musk-ordered and hasty rollout of a pay-to-play “Twitter Blue” plan that would, among other perks, allow new accounts the same “checkmark” status as previously verified, high-profile accounts. This immediately led to widespread cases of impersonation and attempted fraud, as all rational observers warned it would—but Musk immediately followed up by removing “verified” status completely, making it difficult if not impossible to tell the impersonation accounts from the real ones.
The problem, and the almost certain reason those particular top Twitter officers hastily resigned their posts, is that Twitter is currently constrained by a Federal Trade Commission consent agreement after Twitter was discovered to be badly violating user privacy.
A Tech-dirt post from last Thursday spells out the stakes. There’s little to no chance Musk’s ordered changes comply with the consent decree that requires Twitter to comply with strict FTC oversight rules when rolling out new or changed product features; we can gather from the resignations of the three executives most responsible for making sure Twitter does comply that they themselves think Twitter is in Deep Deep Trouble here.
And the FTC, unlike more flaccid federal oversight agencies, has teeth. If the FTC were to find that Twitter employees intentionally skirted the consent agreement, multi-billion dollar fines could be levied against the company—and there could be prison time involved for executives who made it happen. In short order, then, Elon Musk has found a way to lose even more than his original $44 billion investment.
Now? New Twitter Blue memberships have, as of now, been temporarily suspended. There’s no word on when they’ll be back. That could be a bit of damage control, after the FTC let it be known that they were monitoring the situation. Musk, however, has been continuing to publicly mock those who point out the consumer dangers inherent in Musk’s apparent plan to monetize identity theft.
The targets for his mockery include not just the media and random celebrities who have caught his ire, but sitting U.S. senators. [Tweets at the link, see SC’s comment 293]
Aside from the questionable wisdom of publicly mocking anyone concerned that your product’s new direction consists in large part of, again, monetizing opportunities for market manipulations, phishing, and identity theft, Musk’s trolling continues to signal apathy, at best, in complying with consumer protections. The FTC will certainly be able to take dozens of Musk tweets to show that the corporate culture of Twitter is, now, contemptuous of the privacy concerns that stem from the company’s new direction.
Musk appears to be making a terrific case for new FTC fines that make his new $1 billion per year in corporate interest payments look piddling in comparison. Not great!
Also not great: The infrastructure that Musk so cavalierly gutted, long before he had time to learn what any of it did. [more tweets at the link]
Ah, an infrastructure problem at Twitter. Well, at least Musk’s team is, uh, on top of things.
[Dare Obasanjo tweeted] […] The original tweet was clearly nonsense even before I saw it debunked by the former timeline tech lead. Fired too many, too fast. [Ben Leib’s tweet available at the link]
As the former tech lead for timelines infrastructure at Twitter, I can confidently say this man [Elon Musk] has no idea wtf he’s talking about.
Could Elon Musk kill off Twitter—that is, make it functionally unusable—in only a few months?
As astonishing as the thought is, he’s sure doing all the right things to make it happen.
[…] you’ve known from the first days of the war that this was always going to be decided on logistics. Most people think wars are about tanks battling it out, infantry pushing each other out of trenches and other defensive positions, and artillery duels. And yes, those are things that happen. But ultimately, wars are decided by boring trucks and spreadsheets and beancounters. No war machine functions without the food, water, fuel, lubricants, ammunition, and other supplies it needs. As I calculated early during the war, about 15% of an army fights, the other 85% supports the 15%.
That’s why I knew from the first day that Russia’s invading army of 200,000 was woefully inadequate, and even more so divided among five different axes. It’s why I knew Kyiv would never be taken once Ukraine demonstrated its will to fight […]
And it’s why I knew that Kherson was untenable, marveling at Russia’s illogical reinforcement of that front, despite being dependent on just two bridges for its entire supply. And to be clear, none of this was rocket science, I didn’t have special insight or unique military talent. As the famous saying goes, amateurs talk tactics, professionals study logistics.
Apparently, Russia is severely lacking in professionals.
Kherson was the only regional capital conquered by Russia this entire war, and then only because of treachery and treason. Had Ukraine managed to quickly blow the Antonovsky bridge connecting the city to the south, Russia would likely have never taken it. Furthermore, had Ukraine managed to blow the bridge at the Nova Kakhovka dam, Russia’s war effort would’ve looked much different, sparing this entire front the ravages of war.
Yet it was on this front that Ukraine notched its first military victory—the halt of Russia’s push toward Odesa at Voznesensk. Russia would give up its effort toward Kyiv just a week or so later. But the flat open space, with little cover for any advancing military force, turned the region into a sort of see-saw battle, with both sides pushing forward, then receding as a wall of artillery stymied any advance. Here’s an example from just this past week: [tweet and video at the link]
Here’s Russian armor getting hit. Everything is out in the open out here. [tweet and video at the link]
Still, Russia had occupied most of Kherson oblast, and rather than push forward, it seemed content digging in for the long haul, building an extensive network of trenches through the region See this entire thread: [tweet and image at the link]
A head-on charge toward Kherson, like what Russia is currently attempting in the Donbas (e.g. Bakhmut), would cost thousands of lives and pieces of equipment and months of time which Ukraine couldn’t spare. But there was a smarter way to do it, and yes, it was … logistics. [map at the link]
As already noted, Northern Kherson is connected to other Russian-occupied territory by two bridges—the Antonovsky bridge near Kherson city, and the dam at Nova Kakhova. Russia was fine so long as those bridges and their railheads and supply depots lay beyond Ukrainian artillery range. But the receipt of HIMRS/MLRS rocket artillery changed the entire game. Now in range, Ukraine lobbed tens of millions of dollars worth of GMLRS rockets at both bridges severely degrading them, while systematically taking out every single Russia command and control center and ammunition/supply depot within 80 kilometers. Russia was suddenly dependent on truck logistics and and a network of barges to supply the Kherson front.
Ukraine was never shy about broadcasting its designs on the region. So much so, that after several months of promising an August counteroffensive in Kherson, Russia flooded the zone with tens of thousands of new troops and thousands of pieces of equipment, many of them pulled from the Izyum front. It dug the trenches we saw above. It formally annexed the region, proclaiming that Kherson was Russia. It even issued veiled threats, claiming they would defend their new territory with nuclear weapons.
This all backfired spectacularly on Russia. First, they hollowed out the Izyum front. Ukraine was able to launch its surprise September Kharkiv counteroffensive, capturing thousands of square kilometers of land in a matter of weeks, and liberating all but a sliver of Kharkiv oblast. While the progress isn’t as dramatic as it was back in September, Ukraine continues to advance on that front, threatening Svatove and Russia’s hold on thousands more square kilometers of occupied lands in Ukraine’s northeast.
But Russia’s Kherson reinforcement backfired a second way—it had no way to supply 20-40,000 troops via barge. Military observers estimated that Russia was able to only move about 30-40% of the supplies necessary for a force that large. Artillery, in particular, is particularly hungry, with Russia firing tens of thousands of shells every single day. On a front in which artillery was particularly determinative, this posed an extremely serious problem.
Meanwhile, Ukraine was happily using supplies of precision-guided Excalibur artillery shells to systematically degrade those prepared Russian positions. These precious rounds were even used against supply trucks—an interesting choice for a $100,000 artillery round. But again, when you’re degrading an opponent’s logistical supplies, taking out a truck and whatever supplies it was carrying becomes far more valuable than comparing the cost of the round to cheap Russian crap.
All the while, HIMARS kept pounding supply cachets and barges, while disrupting Russian attempts to build a pontoon bridge next to the incapacitated Antonovsky bridge. Ukraine’s stunning attack on the Kerch Bridge connecting Crimea to Russia further degraded Russia’s logistics to its southern front. That rail line is still out of commission.
And then, Ukraine pushed, attacking toward Mylove (which translates to a far less romantic “soap”), and around Snihurivka. Don’t worry if you don’t know where they are, it doesn’t matter anymore. Russian forces held strongly in this incredibly unforgiving terrain for an attacker, and Ukraine undoubtedly took losses. But they were never designed to actually take territory. They were designed to force Russia to expend valuable resources—its limited ammo and fuel. Ukrainian troops reported in various channels how Russian shelling had slowed to almost nothing, clearly forced to ration supplies for defensive purpose.
Winter was likely the final straw. Supply struggles would only worsen with winter weather, thus Russia had little choice but abandon its hard-fought, well-entrenched positions. On its way out, it finished blowing the Antonovsky and Nova Kakhovka bridges. Ukraine is likely fine with that. This front, for the time being, is over. So now what? [map at the link]
Mykolaiv finally gets a break from tube artillery. Russia can still strike the city with its dwindling stock of cruise missiles and Iranian drones, but for the most part, the city will be able to start rebuilding in earnest. Kherson is clearly in range of Russian artillery, but Ukraine can keep its counter-battery operation at full alert. My guess is that Russia will mostly move on, like we’ve seen in Sumy and Chernihiv. The fact that Kherson hasn’t been shelled during its liberation celebrations seems significant.
Telegram sources have reported massive numbers of retreating Russian forces moving through Melitipol, likely headed toward other fronts.
Ukraine has designs on Melitopol of course. Russian Telegram has been claiming a buildup of Ukrainian forces in that direction for the last two months. There’s the Svatove direction, up north. If Ukraine takes the town, then pushes to Starobilsk (a straight shot), that entire northeastern swatch of red territory would be liberated in one fell swoop. We’d be back near the original February 24 borders in that direction.
And then there’s the battle for Bakhmut and the strong Russian push toward Pavlivka. Ukrainian defenders likely desperately need to be rotated out. But even more importantly, there will be a lot of newly freed up artillery to help in these directions, including HIMARS/MLRS assets and the latest 500 Excalibur shells announced by the Pentagon this week.
Russia’s winter isn’t going to be an easy one. Ukraine, on the other hand, just sewed up its Southern flank and can now plot its next move, on its own terms. [tweet and image at the link]
Lori Chavez-DeRemer, a Republican, won a U.S. House seat in central Oregon on Sunday, according to The Associated Press, defeating her Democratic opponent, Jamie McLeod-Skinner, and handing her party a crucial victory in its push to win a majority in the House.
McLeod-Skinner triumphed over Representative Kurt Schrader, a centrist who has served seven terms, in a Democratic primary amid a progressive backlash over his more conservative stances. Ms. Chavez-DeRemer and her Republican allies sought to cast Ms. McLeod-Skinner as too liberal for the district.
In her primary contest against Mr. Schrader, Ms. McLeod-Skinner ran as a more liberal candidate, leveraging frustrations over his opposition to the scope of the Build Back Better agenda championed by President Biden and other Democrats, as well as over Mr. Schrader’s successful push to water down a proposal that would lower the cost of prescription drugs.
But Ms. Chavez-DeRemer, who opposes codifying abortion rights at the federal level and evaded questions about the legitimacy of the 2020 election, criticized Ms. McLeod-Skinner for her liberal stances. Ms. Chavez-DeRemer was also buoyed by statewide frustration over crime and homelessness in Portland, two issues that energized Republicans and independents to vote for Republican candidates for governor and the House.
After his Wagner guys made an ISIS-style execution video, Evgeny Prigozhin has threatened his fellow Russian elites, hinting they are next.
This is very calculated. Prigozhin correctly senses that many Putin insiders are vulnerable now, as Russia’s war continues to falter.
Screenshot at the (Twitter) link. From the post:
But don’t forget, there are not only traitors who drop their guns and go to the enemy, betraying their people and their homeland. Some traitors sit in their offices, not thinking about their own people. Some of them fly on their own business jets to those countries that so far seem neutral to us. They fly away so as not to participate in today’s problems. They are also traitors.
This doesn’t say too much new.
Kherson doesn’t have much of anything working yet.
No cell phones, no landline phones, no electricity, no water, and food and medical supplies are scarce.
No surprise.
The Russians looted everything they could carry including a raccoon from the Kherson zoo.
There are photos of them blowing up cell phone towers in acts of pointless vandalism.
Kherson celebrates Russian exit yet faces huge rebuilding
By HANNA ARHIROVA
yesterday apnews
KHERSON, Ukraine (AP) — Residents of Kherson celebrated the end of Russia’s eight-month occupation for the third straight day Sunday, even as they took stock of the extensive damage left behind in the southern Ukrainian city by the Kremlin’s retreating forces.
A jubilant crowd gathered in Kherson’s main square, despite the distant thumps of artillery fire that could be heard as Ukrainian forces pressed on with their effort to push out Moscow’s invasion force.
“It’s a new year for us now,” said Karina Zaikina, 24, who wore on her coat a yellow-and-blue ribbon in Ukraine’s national colors. “For the first time in many months, I wasn’t scared to come into the city.”
“Finally, freedom!” said 61-year-old resident Tetiana Hitina. “The city was dead.”
But even as locals rejoiced, the evidence of Russia’s ruthless occupation was all around, and Russian forces still control some 70% of the wider Kherson region.
With cellphone networks knocked out, Zaikina and others lined up to use a satellite phone connection set up for everyone’s use in the square, enabling them to swap news with family and friends for the first time in weeks.
Downtown stores were shuttered. With many people having fled the city during the Russian occupation, the city streets were thinly populated. Many of the few people venturing out Sunday carried yellow and blue flags. On the square, people lined up to ask soldiers to autograph their flags and rewarded them with hugs. Some wept.
What US election results mean for the future of Ukraine aid
More bleakly, Kherson is also without electricity or running water, and food and medical supplies are short. Residents said Russian troops plundered the city, carting away loot as they withdrew last week. They also wrecked key public infrastructure before retreating across the wide Dnieper River to its east bank. One Ukrainian official described the situation in Kherson as “a humanitarian catastrophe.”
“I don’t understand what kind of people this is. I don’t know why they did it,” said resident Yevhen Teliezhenko, draped in a Ukrainian flag.
Still, he said, “it became easier to breathe” once the Russians had gone.
“There is no better holiday than what’s happening now,” he declared.
Ukrainian authorities said the demining of critical infrastructure is under way in the city. Reconnecting the electricity supply is the priority, with gas supplies already assured, Kherson regional governor Yaroslav Yanushevych said.
The Russian pullout marked a triumphant milestone in Ukraine’s pushback against Moscow’s invasion almost nine months ago. In the past two months, Ukraine’s military claimed to have retaken dozens of towns and villages north of the city of Kherson.
ravensays
More on the destruction in Kherson.
The Russians looted the art museums and took away 15,000 paintings.
Given the high levels of corruption in Russia, most of these will probably end up being sold into the art markets.
Racists looted the cultural fund of the Kherson region: 15,000 paintings were taken away – Center of National Resistance
News Censor.NET War in Ukraine
This is reported by Censor.NET with reference to the Center of National Resistance .
In particular, according to our underground, the Russians took property from the Kherson Art Museum named after Oleksiy Shovkunenko. The museum also has a branch in Nova Kakhovka. Among the collections on the museum fund in the museum’s permanent exposition are icon paintings of the 17th – early 20th centuries, Ukrainian art of the second half of the 19th – early 20th centuries. The works of modern artists are also presented. In total, almost 15,000 exhibits were removed from the museum fund, as well as other cultural institutions of the Kherson region.
But not only cultural values were taken away by the occupiers. The Russians, according to tradition, stole sanitary ware, including toilets, and household appliances.
“Together with our territories, we will return everything looted by the barbarians. And everything that was destroyed by the Russians will be restored for reparations,” the Center of National Resistance added.
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian (support them if you can!) Ukraine liveblog. From there:
[Lorenzo Tondo:] We have just arrived in a small, coastal village, named Kobleve, in the region of Mykolaiv, facing the vast Black Sea. Crimea is “only’” 140km away from here.
Just yesterday, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy suggested that Crimea, illegally annexed by Moscow in 2014, is an active Ukrainian military target and that, after the liberation of Kherson, the Ukrainians could try to take it back.
“We will definitely reach our state border – all sections of the internationally recognised border of Ukraine,” Zelenskiy said.
The beach and sea are infested with hundreds of mines placed by both sides in Russia’s war on Ukraine, posing a serious threat to people. The Ukrainian government has banned coastal bathing. Experts agree it will take years to de-mine the Black Sea.
According to Russian media sources, the Ukrainian army has entered the city of Herois’ke, in the Kinburn Peninsula, following an amphibious operation, as heavy fighting continues across the region.
On Sunday, there were “unconfirmed reports’’ that Ukrainian forces were about to launch a “small-scale amphibious operation” on the peninsula, in Biloberezhia Sviatoslava national park, which connects to Russian-occupied territory on the eastern side of the Dnipro River. [See #308 above.]
Ukrainian troops are likely to continue consolidating control of the western bank in the coming days.
‘We are moving forward’, says Zelenskiy as he visits newly liberated Kherson
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy spent 30 minutes on Monday morning visiting Kherson, days after Russian troops withdrew.
Addressing Ukrainian soldiers in front of the administration building in the main square, Zelenskiy said:
We are moving forward. We are ready for peace, peace for all our country.
The president sang the Ukrainian national anthem as the country’s blue and yellow flag was hoisted in the southern city.
Canada will provide Ukraine with another $500m (£425m) in additional military assistance in addition to sanctions on another nearly two dozen Russians, prime minister Justin Trudeau said in a statement on Monday amid the G20 summit.
Reuters reports the additional funding adds to the $3.4 billion Canadian assistance to Kyiv so far for its defence against Russia’s invasion and will help fund military, surveillance and communications equipment, fuel and medical supplies, the statement said.
Monday’s sanctions target 23 Russian individuals “involved in gross and systematic human rights violations against Russian opposition leaders,” including police officers, prosecutors, judges and prison officials, Trudeau’s office said.
Zambia has asked Russia to explain how one of its citizens who had been serving a prison sentence in Moscow ended up on the battlefield in Ukraine where he was killed, Zambia’s foreign affairs minister said on Monday, Reuters reports.
Stanley Kakubo said in a statement that Russia had notified Zambia about the death in September of the 23-year-old, but did not provide details.
The Zambian student was serving a jail sentence at a medium security prison on the outskirts of Moscow after being convicted of contravening Russian law, Kakubo said, without specifying the offence that occurred in April 2020.
“The Zambian government has requested the Russian authorities to urgently provide information on the circumstances under which a Zambian citizen, serving a prison sentence in Moscow, could have been recruited to fight in Ukraine,” Kakubo said.
It was not clear how the prisoner was recruited and by whom. Reuters could not independently verify the details surrounding his death. Russia’s defence ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
There are two incidents of violence on US college campuses today. Four people have been killed on the University of Virginia campus. The suspect, who has been identified, is still at large and the campus is on lockdown. Four University of Idaho students were found dead in a home and are reported to be homicide victims.
…The inner workings of Kim’s regime, like those of his father and grandfather, have always been shrouded in mystery. The totalitarian system imposes tight controls on borders, communications and culture. Foreigners working in or visiting the country have their movements tightly controlled. But in some ways, the North has gradually became more porous, thanks to citizens who traded with China or worked there illicitly, and to North Koreans glimpsing the US and South Korea via smuggled foreign movies and TV shows.
Then came Covid. The North was among the first countries to close its borders, and warned that anyone attempting to cross the buffer zones it created would be “unconditionally shot”…. The terror of the virus is real: its health system is in tatters. But the virus has also been an opportunity for authoritarian leaders to impose measures that further increase their control. Nowhere has that been clearer than the North: “Covid has given a lot to Kim Jong-un,” says the elite defector Tae Yong-ho.
Pyongyang has turned down offers of aid, blocked almost all official and unofficial trade and severely restricted domestic travel – with devastating impact: it has long been unable to meet basic needs, leaving citizens to scrape a living through trade and the informal economy. One expert on the North’s economy warns that food availability has probably fallen below basic human needs and, on one metric, is at its worst since the deadly famine of the 1990s. In December 2020, it also introduced a law attacking foreign influence that made distributing or watching foreign media punishable by long prison terms, and encouraging others to view punishable by the death penalty – intensifying previous campaigns.
Even before the pandemic, the regime had halted and then reversed very limited economic changes that incentivised individuals, fearing they were reducing its control. The failure of the unprecedented bilateral talks with the US, and of the South’s attempts to thaw relations, left Pyongyang more suspicious of the west than ever, and more closely tied to Russia and especially China, which is propping it up with deliveries of food, fuel and fertiliser.
Covid has exacerbated these shifts. Due to the harsh restrictions, NGOs shut down and all western diplomats left the country: only eight embassies are functioning at all, around a third of the previous total, and with much-reduced staff. Experts say state media is less revealing than ever, and fewer publications can be read from overseas now. A once steady stream of defectors is said to have plummeted from 1,000 in 2019 to 195 in the first nine months of 2020, with perhaps 19 arriving in the South in the first half of this year. The shutting down of smuggling networks has reduced the flow of information out, as well as in. The result: “Our knowledge of North Korea is the worst for 35 years,” says Andrei Lankov, a leading expert on the country.
While some call for the South to attempt to penetrate the North’s barriers to information – for instance, resuming propaganda broadcasts along the border – such measures would risk destabilising relations for probably minimal return. At best, it might enlighten some North Korean troops; it would not improve outsiders’ knowledge of the country. Continuing to offer it vaccines and other supplies, despite its snubs, and to petition for the return of diplomats and other foreign workers, would be a wiser choice – albeit one requiring considerable patience.
Last year, we were told that North Korea had banned the population from wearing leather trench coats like Kim’s. This January, reports that the country claims burritos as its own invention circulated widely. Meanwhile, the increased hunger and isolation of North Koreans has been largely overlooked. It is long past time to treat the country not as a WTF-inducing curiosity and a heavily armed security nightmare but as a place in which 25 million people live, in dire economic straits, subject to what the UN has described as “unparalleled” human rights abuses by their own leadership, and now under tightened control. Standing at the DMZ, looking into North Korea, it is clear that it has shut the world out even more decisively. But how hard did we try to see it in the first place?
…Stremousov’s rise and fall is a story of how one man’s ruthless opportunism and ideological fantasies can play out in a war-torn country.
It also serves to demonstrate how thuggish and unsavoury characters thrive in Russia today as the country’s leadership embraces anti-western hysteria.
Born in eastern Ukraine in 1976, Stremousov worked odd jobs growing up, claiming to sell bloodhounds to the UK and the Netherlands, while later working for the state fisheries inspectorate.
His life transformed, he said, after what he described as an “epic journey in search of himself” on a motorbike across Latin America, following the footsteps of his hero, Ernesto Che Guevara.
“I always wanted to be someone, like Che. I am getting there,” he said.
On his return, he started blogging profusely, propagandising some of the many conspiracy theories that had sprung up in the post-Soviet sphere as millions sought ways to cope with the collapse of the bloc and extreme economic instability.
He was particularly fond of the neo-Stalinist and neo-pagan movement Conception of Social Security, a conspiracy theory with strong antisemitic undertones, just one of the many contradictions of a man who claimed to be fighting “Ukrainian Nazis”.
Much of the interview with the Guardian in August consisted of him rambling about the Nazis he said were running Ukraine while also bashing “western perverted liberalism”.
At times, however, Stremousov would suddenly change his tone, speaking with envy and admiration of the European capitals he visited during his travels.
“I would like to see those special coffee shops in Amsterdam again,” he laughed.
As Covid came, Stremousov unsurprisingly became a loud anti-vaxxer.
In the meantime, he also went viral after a video of him swinging his young daughter around his head like a rag doll, causing her “bones to pop”, was picked up by tabloids around the world.
Running for mayor in Kherson in 2020, Stremousov received just over 1% of the vote. He would probably have spent his life as a petty troublemaker if not for Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine, which gave the misfit blogger a chance to fulfil his darkest daydreams….
Afghanistan’s supreme leader has ordered judges to fully implement aspects of Islamic law that include public executions, stonings, floggings and the amputation of limbs for thieves, the Taliban’s chief spokesman said.
Zabihullah Mujahid tweeted on Sunday that the “obligatory” command by Haibatullah Akhundzada came after the secretive leader met with a group of judges.
Akhundzada, who has not been filmed or photographed in public since the Taliban returned to power in August last year, rules by decree from Kandahar, the movement’s birthplace and spiritual heartland.
The Taliban promised a softer version of the harsh rule that characterised their first stint in power, from 1996-2001, but have gradually clamped down on rights and freedoms….
Iran has issued its first death sentence over the protests that have shaken the country’s clerical leadership, as a rights group warned other convicts could be “hastily” executed.
Almost two months of demonstrations triggered by the death of Mahsa Amini have prompted authorities to unleash a crackdown that has led to the detention of thousands of people.
Some have been charged with offences that could incur the death penalty in a country that Amnesty International says is second only to China worldwide in the number of people it executes every year.
The unnamed accused was sentenced to death in a Tehran court for the crimes of “setting fire to a government building, disturbing public order, assembly and conspiracy to commit a crime against national security”, as well as for being “an enemy of God and corruption on earth”, the judiciary website Mizan Online reported on Sunday….
Meanwhile in Russia: in coordination with the recent rally demanding to nuke Washington, propagandist Vladimir Solovyov revives his nuclear shtick. The stench of desperation overrides the threats—Solovyov even wants the Collective Security Treaty Organization to take part in war.
I think it would be more accurate to say that Zelenskyi confronts the normal fears of anyone living in a war zone, and then he continues to do the right thing.
About those people, including many Republican politicians in the USA, thinking that Ukraine should negotiate with Russia now:
Russia has broken several international treaties with Ukraine in the last 30 years. What makes some in the West think that it will honor any future ones? Russia’s surrender terms must include realistic security guarantees for Ukraine.
Re #313, the three people who were killed (apologies – I had thought it was four) at UVA were members of the football team. I believe the shooter was as well.
Let’s look more closely at the balance of power in the US Senate:
[…] So, maybe the Georgia runoff isn’t that important anymore? Those making that assumption are making an important mistake.
Take the Senate’s power-sharing agreement, for example. As a practical matter, Democrats have a functioning majority in the Senate because Vice President Kamala Harris can break ties, but their majority is the result of a compromise deal that was negotiated — slowly — by party leaders early last year.
This agreement gives the parties equal membership in committees, and creates procedural dynamics that make it more difficult to advance bills and nominations to the floor. Why is a majority “always better at 51,” as Biden put it? Because with 51 seats, the power-sharing agreement goes away, and Democrats can govern in the Senate as a proper majority party.
There’s also Sens. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema to consider: In some instances over the last two years, the centrist Democrats have balked — at times individually — ahead of key votes. With a 51-seat majority, if either Manchin or Sinema balked, party leaders could move forward anyway.
Similarly, there have been times in the current Congress in which a member has been absent for entirely legitimate reasons. In those instances, however, Democratic leaders have occasionally had to curtail their plans on the Senate floor, because 49 votes proved insufficient. One more member offers some procedural insurance.
There’s also the 2024 cycle to consider: The next round of elections looks rough for Democrats, and the larger their majority in the next Congress, the better positioned they’ll be for the Congress that follows.
Finally, there’s the question of whether folks in the great state of Georgia want to be represented by Herschel Walker — who has been credibly accused of being the single worst Senate candidate in recent memory.
A former White House chief of staff just accused — on the record — a former American president of an impeachable offense.
After leading the Department of Homeland Security in 2017, retired Marine Gen. John Kelly served as Donald Trump’s White House chief of staff for 17 months. Once he’d parted ways with the then-president, Kelly had little to say about his former boss and place of employment.
At least, that is, Kelly bit his tongue for a long while.
[…] The more unhinged Trump became, the more willing his former chief of staff became to condemn the former president, accusing Trump of, among other things, “poisoning“ people’s minds. Kelly ultimately added that Trump has “serious character issues“ and is not “a real man.”
But as it turns out, the retired general, after having served at Trump’s side for a year and a half, doesn’t just think the former president is an awful person, he also has serious concerns about the kind of abuses the Republican engaged in while in office. The New York Times reported:
While in office, President Donald J. Trump repeatedly told John F. Kelly, his second White House chief of staff, that he wanted a number of his perceived political enemies to be investigated by the Internal Revenue Service, Mr. Kelly said. Mr. Kelly … said in response to questions from The New York Times that Mr. Trump’s demands were part of a broader pattern of him trying to use the Justice Department and his authority as president against people who had been critical of him.
Kelly said Trump specifically wanted to “get the IRS” on former FBI Director James Comey and his deputy, Andrew McCabe.
The Times reported over the summer that Comey and McCabe faced unusual IRS audits, receiving the kind of scrutiny few Americans ever experience.
The Times’ new report went on to note, “Mr. Kelly said he made clear to Mr. Trump that there were serious legal and ethical issues with what he wanted.” The then-president “regularly” made the demands anyway, seeking investigations against his perceived foes, leading Kelly to remind his boss what he wanted “was not just potentially illegal and immoral but also could blow back on him.”
The former chief of staff added that, in addition to Comey and McCabe, Trump discussed the IRS and the Justice Department to target former CIA Director John O. Brennan, Hillary Clinton, Jeff Bezos, and FBI officials including Peter Strzok and Lisa Page.
I can appreciate why it’s easy to become jaded in response to reports like these. Americans have seen an avalanche of Trump scandals over the course of the last several years, and many of those controversies haven’t amounted to much, despite their merits.
But it’s nevertheless worth pausing to appreciate the significance of a story like this one:
Impeachable offense: A former White House chief of staff has now said, on the record, that a former president committed an impeachable — and possibly even criminal — offense while in office. Indeed, when Richard Nixon tried related abuses, they were included in the articles of impeachment that ultimately forced his resignation.
Irony: Republicans were convinced that the Obama White House used the Internal Revenue Service to target political foes. That never happened, though it now appears Trump committed the offense that the GOP falsely accused Obama of committing.
Similarly, when the FBI executed a court-approved search warrant at Mar-a-Lago, Republicans furiously insisted that the Biden White House had turned federal law enforcement into a partisan weapon. That’s long been ridiculous, but if Kelly’s account is correct, we now have fresh evidence of Trump trying to weaponize federal law enforcement for his own partisan purposes.
Timing: Kelly has been a private citizen for nearly four years, after having departed the White House in January 2019. Maybe he could have said something about this sooner?
Ongoing disdain: The former White House chief, reflecting on his former boss, also told the Times, “If he told you to slit someone’s throat, he thought you would go out and do it.”
If Trump is looking for a 2024 endorsement from Kelly, the Republican should probably keep his expectations low.
By way of a defense, a spokesperson for the former president told the Times that the retired general is “irrelevant” and a “psycho.”
The questions about the Comey and McCabe audits are currently under an inspector general review. A spokesperson for Trump, meanwhile, denied that the former president had ever discussed misusing the IRS.
Correction: the UVA shooter was no longer on the football team. They said he had come to the attention of police before, once in connection to a reported hazing incident, the investigation into which was apparently closed by UVA.
ravensays
Russia has broken several international treaties with Ukraine in the last 30 years. What makes some in the West think that it will honor any future ones? Russia’s surrender terms must include realistic security guarantees for Ukraine.
True.
Ukraine gave up several thousand nuclear weapons for security guarantees from Russia, the USA, and the UK, the Budapest memorandum.
Wikipedia: “On December 5, 1994 the leaders of Ukraine, Russia, Britain, and the United States signed a memorandum to provide Ukraine with security assurances in connection with its accession to the NPT as a non-nuclear weapon state.”
And how did that work out?
The USA and UK are honoring their part of the agreement while Russia is just ignoring it.
AFAICT, it is inevitable that Ukraine will join the EU and NATO.
A large NATO base near the Russian border should be a good “security guarantee.
Family members of a former Russian prison inmate, who defected to Ukraine after being recruited by the Kremlin-linked private military group Wagner, have expressed “horror” over his apparent execution after a gruesome video emerged on Friday that showed him being repeatedly struck with a sledgehammer.
Footage of the summary killing of Yevgeny Nuzhin was posted over the weekend by the Wagner-linked Telegram channel Grey Zone. In the video, Nuzhin was shown lying down with his head taped to a brick wall as an unidentified man in combat clothing hits him with a sledgehammer.
Nuzhin, 55, had been serving a 24-year prison sentence for a murder he committed in 1999 when he was freed in July and conscripted into Wagner, a notorious military group run by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a powerful Russian businessman and a close ally of Vladimir Putin.
Following his capture by Ukrainian forces in September, Nuzhin gave a series of interviews in the country, in which he said he had joined the Wagner group to get out of prison and that he quickly hatched a plan to surrender to Ukraine.
In the interviews, he also criticised the Russian leadership and expressed his desire to join the Ukrainian forces and fight against Moscow.
Ilya Nuzhin, Yevgeny’s son, confirmed to the Guardian on Monday that the man in the video was his father but declined to give further comments, citing “security concerns”.
The MSNBC graphics for this election have been atrocious, by the way. The Senate graphic has been completely normal – the up-to-the-moment count of races won by each party until the Nevada race was called, then followed by a checkmark indicating the Dems have retained control with 50 Senate seats. Alongside this running tally of actual results, they’ve had a projection of the House outcome. This has changed over time as results have come in, and has been within the margin of error for several days. They rarely if ever have said or shown the actual seats called or contested, and the side-by-side placement with the real Senate tally (especially with the small “projection” indicator often being cut off from the side of the screen) would lead reasonable people to think its the count to date in the House. It’s inexplicable, misleading, and ridiculous.
UN votes to hold Russia accountable for reparations in Ukraine
The UN’s general assembly has approved a resolution calling for Russia to be held accountable for its invasion of Ukraine, including by making reparations to Kyiv.
The resolution, supported by 94 of the assembly’s 193 members [14 opposed – WTF, Bahamas?; 73 abstaining], recognises that Russia must be held accountable for violations of international law in or against Ukraine.
Russia “must bear the legal consequences of all of its internationally wrongful acts, including making reparation for the injury, including any damage, caused by such acts”, the resolution reads.
These are the votes in opposition to the reparations resolution: Belarus, CAR, China, Cuba, North Korea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Iran, Mali, Nicaragua, Russia, Syria, Zimbabwe.
Michael Hobbes (of Maintenance Phase, formerly of You’re Wrong About) has a new podcast, If Books Could Kill, co-hosted with Peter Shamshiri of the 5-4 podcast. Only two episodes have been released – about Freakonomics and Outliers – but they’re great.
tomhsays
Ah, that savvy businessman Elon Musk. Two weeks ago he tweeted: “Power to the people! Blue for $8/month.”
WaPo: A fake tweet sparked panic at Eli Lilly and may have cost Twitter millions The pharmaceutical giant halted ad spending after fake blue-check accounts went viral. For $8, Twitter is ‘losing out on millions of dollars in ad revenue,’ a former Eli Lilly official said.
By Drew Harwell / November 14, 2022
The nine-word tweet was sent Thursday afternoon from an account using the name and logo of the pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly and Co., and it immediately attracted a giant response: “We are excited to announce insulin is free now.”
The tweet carried a blue “verified” check mark, a badge that Twitter had used for years to signal an account’s authenticity — and that Twitter’s new billionaire owner, Elon Musk, had, while declaring “power to the people!” suddenly opened to anyone, regardless of their identity, as long as they paid $8.
But the tweet was a fake — one of what became a fast-multiplying horde of impersonated businesses, political leaders, government agencies and celebrities. By the time Twitter had removed the tweet, more than six hours later, the account had inspired other fake Eli Lilly copycats and been viewed millions of times.
Inside the real Eli Lilly, the fake sparked a panic…. Company officials scrambled to contact Twitter representatives and demanded they kill the viral spoof, worried it could undermine their brand’s reputation or push false claims about people’s medicine. Twitter, its staffing cut in half, didn’t react for hours.
By Friday morning, Eli Lilly executives had ordered a halt to all Twitter ad campaigns — a potentially serious blow, given that the $330 billion company controls the kind of massive advertising budget that Musk says the company needs to avoid bankruptcy. They also paused their Twitter publishing plan for all corporate accounts around the world.
It maintains a robust Twitter presence. In addition to its main corporate account, @LillyPad, it runs stand-alone accounts devoted to diabetes care, European health policy, clinical trials, rheumatology and the distribution of health information in Spanish, Italian and French. It spends more than $100 million a year on TV commercials and digital-ad campaigns in the United States, according to MediaRadar, a marketing data firm.
“For $8, they’re potentially losing out on millions of dollars in ad revenue,” said Amy O’Connor, a former senior communications official at Eli Lilly who now works at a trade association.
[…]
To health care companies such as Eli Lilly, the change offered not just a reputational threat but the risk that other fakes could threaten people’s well-being. Eli Lilly’s Twitter accounts routinely field medical questions and work to correct misinformation about side effects, health issues and long-term care.“This isn’t just about Twitter, this is about patients’ health,” O’Connor said. What if a public health group was “spoofed and shared information that made people’s diabetes worse? Where does it stop? It feels like this is literally just the beginning, and it’s only going to get worse.”
The Supreme Court on Monday refused to block a Jan. 6 Committee subpoena for the phone records of Kelli Ward, an ally of former President Donald Trump. The vote was 7-to-2, with Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito noting their dissent, without explanation.
The court’s action means that specific parts of Ward’s phone records will be turned over to the House committee investigating the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, in an attempt to prevent the certification of Joe Biden as president.
Ward is the chairwoman of the Arizona Republican Party. She claimed that the limited request for her phone records, served on her service provider T-Mobile, was a violation of the First Amendment.
The subpoena is of particular interest because during this same period, Ginni Thomas, the wife of Justice Thomas, emailed 29 lawmakers in Arizona, urging them to choose “a clean slate of electors” instead of the state electors pledged to vote for Biden if he won the state, which he did. It is not known whether Ginni Thomas was in communication with Ward. Justice Thomas did not recuse himself from the case, nor has he recused himself from any matter involving the Jan. 6 committee, though his wife was questioned under oath by the panel.
[…]
Ward is under scrutiny from the committee largely for her role in the “fake elector” scheme following the 2020 election, in which she and others falsely declared themselves the Arizona electors for the purpose of disrupting election certification. The committee is also scrutinizing Ward’s alleged claims that the election in Arizona was “stolen” and “fraudulent.”
Ward, who filed the emergency application, argued primarily that the disclosure of her phone records would violate “associational rights” protected by the First Amendment. She says that since she uses her phone to engage in political communications, the required disclosure would potentially – and, she argues, impermissibly – reveal the identities of individuals who were “most in communication with the state chair of the [Republican] party at a time when the legitimacy of the last presidential election was in dispute.” This, she says, would chill political activity.
The Arizona district court and the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals found this argument unpersuasive. The three-member appellate panel, consisting of two Trump appointees and one Clinton appointee, voted 2-1 to require T-Mobile to provide Ward’s phone records to the Jan. 6 committee. The majority noted that if the possibility of revealing party affiliation were sufficient to quash subpoenas of call records, “Narcotics traffickers . . . would be well advised to make at least a few calls to their preferred political party.”
[…]
The Supreme Court’s order was considered by the full court, after it was referred to them by Justice Elena Kagan, who is responsible for emergency applications from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
In yesterday’s update, a commenter asked how winter would affect the war. Great topic! Let’s do it.
Let’s start with logistics. It’s been well-established that Russia is incapable of functioning efficiently 25 kilometers past its nearest railhead. Theirs is an army built and designed for domestic defense, with an extensive rail network to move troops and supplies across vast distances. Other than smaller-scale incursions with their “elite” VDV airborne troops, they weren’t designed to engage in large-scale offensive operations in foreign territory, and Ukraine has rendered that glaring deficiency for all to see.
Russia can supply its forces from three locations—Belgorod in the north, east of the Donbas, and south, through Crimea. Ukraine’s push in the northeast is threatening to cut the Belgorod line, and its daring attack on the Kerch Bridge means it is out of commission at least until March, dramatically affecting Russia’s southern lines.
Ukraine is adding to the pressure by hitting Russian railheads and supply depots 70 to 80 kilometers from the front lines. Ukraine’s successful Kherson campaign has now further scrambled Russia’s supply situation. Here is a map with Ukraine’s updated HIMARS/MLRS range: [map at the link]
Russia is down to a single road connecting Mariupol on the Sea of Azov coast, to Berdyansk, to the southern edge of Melitopol. Everything else is within Ukrainian artillery, including all rail lines. This area has also been swarming with partisan activity, and those supply columns on that single road will be extremely vulnerable to ambushes. Without a functioning rail, trucks will need to navigate icy, snowy, blustery conditions. The cold will affect engine performance (especially salient given Russia’s famously bad maintenance procedures), and the ice and snow will slow the speed these trucks can travel, slowing down the delivery of supplies.
Furthermore, there is little evidence that Russia can properly equip its soldiers to withstand freezing winter temperatures inside cold trenches. Millions of cold weather jackets famously disappeared in Russia a couple of months ago and were never found. We’ve seen plenty of videos of conscripts wearing rubber boots, and those are the lucky ones. Plenty more aren’t wearing anything more than sandals or sneakers. On the other hand, NATO is in a full-fledged effort to properly equip the Ukrainian army with proper winter war-fighting gear.
Meanwhile, by occupying Ukraine’s periphery, it’s extremely difficult for Russia to move units from one front to the other, severely limiting its operational flexibility. [map at the link]
Russia has to cover that entire front, and it is massive, thousands of kilometers wide. The distances between those fronts are longer when you have to travel on the outside edge, and Russia doesn’t have rail anywhere except in the purple area (and even there, railheads are getting regular visits from St. HIMARS). Meanwhile, Ukraine doesn’t just have shorter distances to move, but it can do so by rail, as Russia would rather launch rockets at civilian infrastructure than legitimate military targets.
Of course, this issue will bedevil Russia for as long as this war lasts, but again, winter conditions will make road transportation slow and treacherous. Ukraine can attack anywhere it wants, at will, while Russia’s ability to respond will be slow, ineffective, and perhaps even nonexistent.
Ukraine’s modern NATO gear and better-maintained Soviet gear will inevitably hold up better to the cold. But poor weather conditions and heavy cloud cover will make it easier for Russia to conceal its equipment, weapons caches, and other juicy targets. Without clear skies, drones and satellites will have a hard time getting the necessary intelligence to inform artillery and rocket strikes, as well as tactical advances. Russia’s newly effective suicide drones will also be rendered unusable in these dark, cloudy months, but Ukraine needs drones more than Russia does. If drones can’t beam the necessary intelligence back to Ukrainian commanders, that, more than anything, might slow Ukraine’s advances.
Finally, there is morale.
Who will better survive a freezing, dark, damp, trench for months on end, under a relentless artillery barrage: Someone dragged off the street and thrown to the front with rusty rifles and minimal training, or Ukrainians fighting to reach their babushkas behind enemy lines? [Tweet and video at the link]
It’s clear which side will fight, and which side will find any excuse to go home. I mean, look at this lopsided fight, where two (brave) Ukrainians, backed by an armored personnel carrier, storm a trench, forcing around 15 Russians to retreat in panic. [tweet and video at the link]
Winter will be tough on everyone, but one side is fighting for their homes, and the other has no idea why they’re there. Nazis? Satanists? Putin’s glory? None of that is real or worth dying for.
So Russia is reeling, and Ukraine doesn’t seem interested in giving it any time to catch its breath. According to Russian sources, Ukraine is making a breakthrough near Svatove, in northeastern Ukraine. [tweet and map at the link]
Related, and very interesting: [Tweet and map at the link] To be clear, when Russia is evacuating “citizens,” it is evacuating Russian collaborators and Russian citizens imported to administer those cities and indoctrinate kids in schools. Loyal residents have been unwilling to help, requiring Russia to bring in reinforcements from Russia. Those are the people being evacuated, and good riddance.
Evacuating Kreminna makes sense, as Ukrainian forces are literally at the town’s outskirts. But Rubizhne and Severodonetsk? This doesn’t speak well of Russia’s confidence in its defensive lines.
Rumors persist of Ukrainian advances south of Kherson, which seem utterly ridiculous on their face. Remember Russia’s difficulties supplying its forces north of the Dnipro River into Kherson? Ukraine would face similar problems if they pushed south of the river. Yet there are persistent rumors of a Ukrainian military operation to liberate the Kinburn Spit peninsula, south of Kherson. This thread explains why it might make military sense: [Tweet and video at the link]
I still doubt it makes sense. That strip of land, used by Russia to launch killer drones, could be cleared with artillery. If necessary, a special forces operation could clear it as they did with Snake Island. No need to have a persistent presence here.
Even more ridiculous is this rumor: [tweet and image at the link] That can’t possibly be real, could it? My current theory is that Russian forces fled to defensive positions closer to Crimea, and locals are putting up the Ukrainian flag. But who knows! Perhaps Russia did clear this entire region, thus explaining the lack of continued artillery shelling of Ukrainian positions in Kherson, or the disruption of the city’s festivities.
Rybar is certainly furious at the lack of Russian response. The largest Russian Telegram channel covering the war in Ukraine is apoplectic at Russia’s disappearance from this front: [Tweet and image at the link]
In context, this might suggest that Russia did, in fact, pull back significantly from the Dnipro to positions further south and east.
[…] Russia has no friends. [Tweet and image at the link: “the positioning, in this picture, of President Biden to the left of Sec. Gral. Xi is a win for US advance team.”] Wondering why this matters? So did I. […] Xi always stands on the left, and did so even with President Barack Obama. It looks better and more dominant to be open to the camera, as opposed to reaching across one’s body for the handshake. Silly, right?
Of course, none of this means that China is ready to assist the West with Russian sanctions, nor does it defuse tensions over Taiwan. But if you’re wondering why Russia has backed off the nuclear threats of late, this might have something to do with it:
Biden, Xi agreed ‘nuclear war should never be fought,’ condemned Russian atomic threats on Ukraine.
China apparently told Russia to knock it off. And here, it’s underscoring its sentiments alongside their mutual geopolitical nemesis, the United States. This is particularly humiliating for Russia (and exponentially so since Vladimir Putin was too cowardly to attend the G20 summit and stayed home).
Reginald Selkirksays
#337: Ward is the chairwoman of the Arizona Republican Party. She claimed that the limited request for her phone records, served on her service provider T-Mobile, was a violation of the First Amendment.
She sounds imcompetent. It is Fourth amendment which deals with “unreasonable searches and seizures”.
The president was referencing the fruit that has become an internet meme in the last few days – a fruit that is a symbol of the southern Ukrainian region.
Most watermelons in Ukraine come from Kherson, a farming city on the Black Sea. Its humid climate allows the fruit to flourish…
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has said he plans to give away most of his $124bn (£107bn) fortune during his lifetime.
The businessman told news network CNN he would donate his wealth to fighting climate change and reducing inequality…
If we had a fair tax system, we wouldn’t have to rely on the generosity of billionaire sociopaths.
The X-37B launched into orbit from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on May 17, 2020…
In a statement, Boeing, which built the X-37B, said the craft has now flown more than 1.3 billion miles, spending 3,774 days in space while conducting experiments for the government and its partners.
[…] although El Caudillo del Mar-a-Lago and his parade of brain-wormed sycophants continue to dominate headlines, Biden has doggedly persevered in his governance as he did in his campaign. The result is a tally of accomplishments as ambitious as they are historic.
Since taking the oath of office in January 2021, Biden has pulled American troops out of Afghanistan and signed both the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and the Inflation Reduction Act, which together addressed the country’s screaming need for infrastructure improvement and made the most serious bid to confront the climate crisis ever attempted at the federal level. He got a gun law passed, and a law to relieve the suffering of veterans exposed to toxic burn pits in Iraq and elsewhere. He put his money where his mouth was in Ukraine. He put Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson on the Supreme Court; has had more federal judges confirmed, as of August, than any president to that point in his tenure since JFK; and has managed both the Covid pandemic and the aftermath of the Trump administration—twin plagues that fed off each other.
He’s done all this FDR-LBJ legerdemain with a razor-thin majority in the House and a de facto stalemate in the Senate. He’s done it in the teeth of a radicalized Republican party still in thrall to a nihilistic narcissist and its frenzied media ecosystem—and with an approval rating that, month to month, struggles to stay in the low 40s. This is, politically, nothing short of miraculous. A very big part of why is that Biden understands that he’s reached the Davy Crockett, “make sure you’re right and go ahead” portion of his political career.”
[…] …However frustrated he may be by the pace of the proceedings, Biden has done an admirable job of giving Garland a free hand, staying out of the investigations into his predecessor’s assorted misdeeds. It is essential to his strategy of unwinding the chaotic politicization of the DOJ under Bill Barr. Without some sort of credible legal resolution to these matters, Biden will stand arraigned for having left unfulfilled his most significant campaign promise: to win what he called—rightly—the “battle for the soul of America.” This is not a battle that can end in a tie, nor one that can end in a half-a-loaf negotiated settlement. It’s a battle that must be won decisively, and in the full light of day. It’s a battle that gives life to everything else he’s trying to do.
Victory in this battle means more than all the shiny new bridges in the world.
Before we get to the lovely results of the tail end of the midterm elections that descended upon a grateful nation over the weekend, let’s take a look at a good idea. Not merely a good idea, but a really good idea. Like a penicillin-level really good idea. Like a ‘trade Pete Best for Ringo Starr’ really good idea. Like a Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto, Mark Kelly, John Fetterman really, really good idea.
To the surprise of essentially nobody, the idea comes from Speaker Nancy Pelosi. From Reuters:
Democrats in the U.S. Congress aim to pass bills protecting same-sex marriage, clarifying lawmakers’ role in certifying presidential elections and raising the nation’s debt ceiling when they return from the campaign trail on Monday[…]House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen both signaled that addressing the nations’ looming debt ceiling would be a priority during the session.
Some Republicans have threatened to use the next hike in the $31.4 trillion debt ceiling, expected in the first quarter of 2023, as leverage to force concessions from Biden. Yellen in a Saturday interview with Reuters warned that a failure to act would pose a “huge threat” to America’s credit rating and the functioning of financial markets. Pelosi, who would lose her position as speaker if Republicans win a majority in the House, told ABC News on Sunday that the best way to address the debt ceiling was “to do it now.”
You have dozens of clichés pushing you on: You have the whip hand, the wind at your back, and God is holding you in the palm of his hand, and you will have a Senate majority a half-hour before the devil knows you’re in the majority again. There is much sunshine in which to make very much hay. (I might be running out, now that I think about it.)
But the debt ceiling thing comes first. Do everything you can to defuse this particular piece of ordnance. Use that act to demonstrate that the era of negotiating with political hostage-takers is over. Use it to drape bright red neon over last Tuesday’s results. Use it to demonstrate to Kevin McCarthy (or whoever) that any tiny majority in the House he may or may not eke out is next to useless, except for what is shaping up to be a very entertaining cannibal feast at the top of the Republican caucus.
Thanks to President Biden’s infrastructure bill, remote locations on the Navajo Nation reservation are receiving electricity — for the first time, ever.
[…] Nothing terribly controversial or monumental there, but without federal money, there would be a lot more families on the Navajo Nation who’d still be driving long distances every week or two to buy gas or diesel to run generators. It’s the largest tribal reservation in the US by territory, covering parts of Arizona, New Mexico, and southeast Utah, but nearly 14,000 families still lack connections to the electric grid. (Another 18,000 lack connections to clean water infrastructure.) The money just hasn’t been available, although somehow the rest of the country is on the grid. […]
Republicans might call it “pork,” but the pandemic relief bills, from the March 2020 CARES Act to the 2021 American Rescue Plan, have included funding to finally connect remote reservation communities to the grid. (And given that the Navajo Nation was especially hard hit by COVID, having reliable electric power — for clinics and homes where people need oxygen and other medical devices — isn’t just a luxury, either.) That funding was supplemented by roughly a billion dollars from the Bipartisan Infrastructure bill passed last fall, and by a portion of another $272.5 million from the climate bill to help tribal governments make infrastructure more resilient to climate change.
As a 2021 Brookings Institution report noted, the grid in Navajo country is built primarily to carry coal-generated power, and will need significant upgrades to handle renewables effectively. The Navajo Nation is also pursuing wind and solar in a big way, although here we’re focusing on getting folks on the grid at all.
In any case, the money is finally coming to the Navajo Nation and other tribes. The pandemic aid and infrastructure money will boost ongoing efforts by nonprofits, the American Public Power Association and utility companies across the Southwest, and the Navajo Tribal Utility Authority (NTUA) to get power to communities that haven’t had it. In August, the Navajo Nation Council passed an agreement for allocation of $1 billion in federal funding, to get aid for power and water projects to communities that need it.
“This is for all of the families that have to haul water and use generators, especially those who live in very remote areas. We are going to change lives forever beginning today. Lives will be forever changed because of this resolution.” Navajo Nation Council Delegate Mark Freeland said.
Navajo Nation President Jonathan Nez also said he hoped the funding would bring electricians, engineers, and other tradespeople back to Navajo communities to stay, and that adequate infrastructure on the reservation will mean fewer young people migrating away just to have modern utilities, to which we will again add, “for fuckssakes, it’s about time.”
Unfortunately, as the Salt Lake Tribune reported in April, red tape from federal, state, and tribal governments may slow the process of turning the funding into utility connections. In Clark Village, Utah, one family, Harry Clark and Marilyn Haycock, had solar panels installed on their home by a nonprofit during the pandemic, which was nice. But Clark and Haycock aren’t sure what group it was and can’t contact it for maintenance, if it still exists. Worse, the solar panels may mean they get pushed to the back of the line for connection to the grid, even though the solar installation isn’t really adequate to their needs. On the whole, they’d rather be on the grid.
One of their in-laws, Yeula Atene, uses Clark’s and Haycock’s refrigerator for her meat and vegetables because her generator doesn’t put out enough juice to run a fridge. She may have to wait quite a while to get on the grid for a different reason, because Native people always have more paperwork (we believe government is good, but only when bureaucracy isn’t a nightmare).
For Atene, there’s another barrier to getting power. Her home needs to be deemed an official homesite through the Navajo Land Department to get connected to the grid or get solar panels, she says. Getting a homesite designation can take years, with a lengthy process of approvals from families with grazing permits, signoffs from archaeologists, fish and wildlife services, environmental reviews, surveys and grazing officer clearances. […]
The families have been told the Oljato Chapter, the local government that oversees the area that’s home to Clark Village, has prioritized homes for NTUA to connect. The chapter, one of 110 municipalities inside the Navajo Nation, doesn’t have a physical building and is hard to contact. The families in Clark Village aren’t sure if they’re in line for power.
“It seems like there are people just ignoring us,” Clark said.
All told, as the Tribune found out, it could take another year or two before Clark Village gets connected to the grid. President Nez, the paper said in April, has advocated for President Joe Biden to issue an executive order to speed up the electrification of rural homes on reservations. We haven’t seen whether that’s actually happened, although the administration did issue a detailed guidance for distributing a total of $13 billion of Infrastructure Law funds for tribal governments. We went down a rabbit hole looking for any mention of an executive order on streamlining the approval process, and it may very well be out there. Or not!
That said, the pandemic and infrastructure funding is indeed making its way to remote communities, and it’s making lives better already. In Westwater, Utah, a community where the land is owned by the Navajo Nation although it’s not inside reservation borders, electricity was finally connected to all 29 homes in September, after decades of promises, plans, and funding falling through. Folks bought air conditioners and washing machines, or looked forward to running groundwater pumps without hauling in diesel, or just to “using their microwaves and leaving their devices plugged in.”
Westwater resident Bessie Begay told the Colorado Sun that having reliable power would mean her grandson wouldn’t have to do his homework by the light of a lantern anymore: “Sometimes the light goes dim and he can’t see, so I bring out my flashlight. I think it’s ruining his eyes.” Here’s what happened when power came on the first day, September 1:
“I was happy. I was really happy. They turned it on in the afternoon, and I was saying, ‘I’m going to have light!’” Begay said. She and her family laughed that night when, out of habit, they started using their lanterns and forgot all about the electricity.
“You can turn on a light. We can go to the bathroom without sitting in the dark. I just love it. My grandkid, he turned it off and on for a while,” Begay said. “His eyes were big and he goes, ‘Grandma, you really do have light!’”
And now the community can start working on getting a municipal water system, here in the 21st century. Damned well about time.
The U.S. Justice Department recently informed the Israeli Justice Ministry that the FBI has opened an investigation into the death of Palestinian American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, who was killed in May while covering an Israeli military raid in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin, Israeli officials said Monday.
…Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz called the FBI decision “a grave mistake” and said Israel will refuse to cooperate.
…
Five sources briefed on the issue, including four Israeli officials, confirmed to Axios that DOJ notified the Israeli Justice Ministry about the decision. The sources requested anonymity as they were not authorized to publicly speak on the issue.
…Gantz said later Monday that “the U.S. Justice Department decision to investigate the tragic death of Shireen Abu Akleh is a grave mistake.”
“The IDF conducted an independent and professional investigation. I have made it clear to the U.S. government that we won’t cooperate with any external investigation and won’t allow any interference in Israel’s internal affairs,” he added.
White House National Security Council spokesperson referred Axios to the DOJ.
“Our thoughts remain with the Abu Akleh family as they grieve this tremendous loss. Not only was Shireen an American citizen, she was a fearless reporter whose journalism and pursuit of truth earned her the respect of audiences around the world,” the NSC spokesperson added.
…
…The administration has faced pressure by dozens of congressional Democrats and Abu Akleh’s family to do more to ensure accountability. More than 20 Democratic senators signed a letter calling for an independent FBI investigation.
U.S. Sen Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) said in a statement that “this is an overdue but necessary and important step in the pursuit of justice and accountability in the shooting death of American citizen and journalist, Shireen Abu Akleh.”
…
The Biden administration said in early July that Abu Akleh was likely killed by unintentional Israeli fire, but a ballistics test of the bullet fragment removed from her body was “inconclusive.”
Citing witnesses, as well as visual and audio evidence, independent investigations by several news organizations, including the Washington Post, AP and the New York Times, found that it was likely that an Israeli soldier fired the fatal shot.
A probe conducted by the UN human rights body came to a similar conclusion.
As they conduct a postmortem on the midterm elections, top Republicans have disclosed that they were “totally blindsided” that people who vote tend to believe in democracy.
According to Party officials, Republican strategists have been flabbergasted by exit polls indicating that voters who had just cast their ballots wanted those votes to be counted.
“In the run-up to Election Day, we believed that our message about ignoring the will of the people would strongly appeal to people,” Harland Dorrinson, a prominent G.O.P. strategist, said. “What we found instead was that people who participated in democracy were inclined to favor democracy. It’s a humbling reminder of just how unpredictable politics can be.”
Fearing that voters’ preference for voting could be more than a passing fad, Republicans have already started rethinking their 2024 strategy, Dorrinson said.
“We’re going to have to make it clear that we Republicans believe in elections, whether we do or not,” he said.
A student accused of gunning down three University of Virginia football players had been on the school’s radar for possible links to weapons and hazing, officials said Monday.
NBC News:
Authorities on Monday identified the four students from the University of Idaho found dead at an off-campus residence. Police in the city of Moscow declined to release additional details surrounding the deaths, which are being classified as part of a homicide case but said the bodies were found Sunday after officers responded to a call for an unconscious individual.
A local Fox affiliate in Denver, Colorado, broadcast a fairly alarming package on Monday detailing the ongoing results of the midterm elections. The station displayed a “Democrats steal control of Senate” chyron along with seemingly random footage of a recent Donald Trump rally in Florida, which was wholly unrelated to the runoff election the station’s anchor was reporting on as the segment concluded.
The station, KWGN, is owned by Nexstar, a parent company that historically donates more to Republicans than Democrats. Nexstar has also faced scrutiny for how it may influence some of the properties it owns. This may be why “Democrats steal control of Senate” was an acceptable on-screen graphic to KWGN employees. The segment could be altered for future broadcasts but it’s pretty damning that this still made it to the airwaves. [video at the link]
It should go without saying that the Democrats did not “steal” anything and that strong turnouts leading to the reelection of Democrat incumbents and the turning of key seats were a hard-fought victory owing to an uptick in youth voting, GOTV initiatives, and many other absolutely legal factors that have nothing to do with so-called rigged elections.
As for Colorado, the state remains in the hands of Democrats. Gov. Jared Polis won reelection, as did Sen. Michael Bennet. Four of Colorado’s eight U.S. House seats were also won by Democrats.
“Remarkable video: A young, unveiled female protester in Ardabil (NW Iran) is physically accosted by more than a dozen male and female security forces. She escapes their clutches and continues to protest.”
A federal appeals court on Monday temporarily blocked the Biden administration’s student loan forgiveness program, which had already been halted nationwide by a separate court ruling.
The latest ruling, by a unanimous three-judge panel on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit, added to the legal jeopardy surrounding President Biden’s massive debt relief plan.
The panel, which comprised two Trump-appointed judges and one appointee of former President George W. Bush, said its order would remain in effect until further notice by the 8th Circuit or the Supreme Court.
The ruling was a win for six conservative-led states — Nebraska, Missouri, Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas and South Carolina — which argued they were harmed by a freeze on the collection of student loan payments and interest.
The court’s six-page ruling singled out the impact on a large, Missouri-based holder of student loans called the Higher Education Loan Authority of the State of Missouri.
“The equities strongly favor an injunction considering the irreversible impact the Secretary’s debt forgiveness action would have as compared to the lack of harm an injunction would presently impose,” the panel wrote. “Among the considerations is the fact that collection of student loan payments as well as accrual of interest on student loans have both been suspended.”
Zelensky: Russia has deported 11,000 Ukrainian children.
During his nightly address, President Volodymyr Zelensky said that according to official data, Russian forces have deported almost 11,000 Ukrainian children to Russia.
Zelensky also said the list of children includes those the Ukrainian government knows about, but that the figure is actually higher.
“In order to return all the deportees, we will need the power of the whole world,” he said.
Dave Wasserman: “I’ve seen enough: Juan Ciscomani (R) defeats Kirsten Engel (D) in #AZ06. Dems’ path to the House majority virtually non-existent now.”
A tapped call btw a Russian soldier and his wife:
„- Just imagine, they (Ukrainians) have toilets for cats, with special fillings, some round things.
– They are sick. Sick nation. It is all the western technologies.
– And they by them special cat food! Give away money! Sick!“
This is culture shock Russian style.
Those round things are kitty litter.
Special cat food? My cat is a picky eater so she gets dry food and a rotating list of canned food every day.
When you get out of the major cities, Russia is very much Third World. No lights, dirt roads, no running water, poor. 20% of Russian houses don’t have indoor plumbing.
Instead of developing their rural areas, they set up their economy so all the money flows to Moscow and St. Petersburg.
Democrats enjoyed yet another welcome burst of news when NBC called the Arizona governor’s race for Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, who will be the first Democrat in 14 years to lead what’s become a crucial swing state. Hobbs leads her far-right opponent, former local TV anchor Kari Lake, 50.4-49.6 with 98% of the likely total vote reporting for the contest to succeed termed-out Gov. Doug Ducey. Republicans hoped that later-counted ballot would allow Lake to overcome the edge that Hobbs has enjoyed since election night, but those batches of votes weren’t quite red enough to deny Hobbs the win.
Lake, who began spreading conspiracy theories and cultivating ties with the extremist right well before she went off the air last year as a news anchor for Phoenix’s Fox 10, was part of Trump’s nationwide primary slate of Big Lie spreaders, and she rode that support to beat out a Ducey-backed foe for the nomination in August. Lake quickly became a national MAGA star, and some over-eager observers speculated that she could be Trump’s running mate―or even a future presidential nominee―even though she hadn’t even won her own race yet. Lake herself even recorded videos imploring voters in Michigan and Pennsylvania to elect like-minded Trumpists, Tudor Dixon and Doug Mastriano, to lead their respective states.
What Lake didn’t do in the general election, though, was abandon her conspiracy mongering. The Republican nominee spent the week before the election making light of the assassination attempt on Speaker Nancy Pelosi, saying, “Nancy Pelosi, well, she’s got protection when she’s in D.C.—apparently her house doesn’t have a lot of protection.” Lake also continued to push the Big Lie, saying of Trump’s 2020 loss in Arizona, “We had 740,000 ballots with no chain of custody. Those ballots shouldn’t have been counted.”
Hobbs, for her part, launched her campaign last year highlighting how she performed her job as the Grand Canyon State’s chief election administrator in the face of death threats. Hobbs ran a considerably more low-key campaign than Lake, who aired several ads hitting the Democrat for refusing to debate her. Hobbs and her allies, though, stuck with their strategy of highlighting Lake’s extremism, which included an ad hitting her for appearing to flirt with secession in response to the FBI’s search of Mar-a-Lago.
Hobbs’ victory will make her Arizona’s first Democratic governor since early 2009, when Janet Napolitano resigned to become Barack Obama’s first secretary of homeland security. Team Blue knew that Napolitano’s departure would hand the governor’s office to Republican Secretary of State Jan Brewer, who was next in line for the top job in a state that lacks a lieutenant governor’s post, but they hoped the GOP would hand back control the next year.
That was a huge miscalculation. Brewer was in place to sign the infamous anti-immigrant bill SB 1070 into law months before she rode the 2010 red wave to a full term, and Ducey won the following two elections. Hobbs, though, finally returns this office to Democratic control over a decade after they forfeited it.
P.S. It looks like Arizona will, starting in 2026, elect a lieutenant governor for the first time, since voters are on the verge of passing a ballot measure to establish the post. Hobbs would be able to name her own running mate, who would assume the governorship should Hobbs win a second term but be unable to complete it, ensuring that the debacle of 2009 can never be repeated. Until then, though, the person next in line to succeed her will be Secretary of State-elect Adrian Fontes, a fellow Democrat who won the race to succeed Hobbs by defeating election denier Mark Finchem.
People were speculating that Kari Lake could be Trump’s running mate in the 2024 presidential race. Is that a problem now that she has lost the race for governor in Arizona. I don’t think so. Why can’t we put two losers at the top of the Republican ticket?
whheydtsays
Re: raven @ #362…
We had a cat who thought he was people. What he insisted on eating was cooked hamburger. We had him with us at an SF con and ran out of hamburger we’d brought with us, so I went to the hotel coffee shop and ordered a plain hamburger for “a picky 5-year-old”. They didn’t ask 5-year-old what?
StevoRsays
@ ^ whheydt : Awww! Nicely done.
Just back from tea out at the local pub sitting outdoors with my new dog – and feeding her a few chips and bits of hamburger too – here!
.***
Incidentaly, there’s been a major storm in Adelaide which has seen a great many people lose power for a few days great many including myself :
Though I’ve now got electricity back unlike many others and didn’t see my house or car or much damage done unlike many others. There’s also currnetly major flooding in parts of Australia’s eastern states notably Forbes on the Lachlan river (or Galarai as it is known to the Wiradjuri people*) too. See :
Human beings used fire to cook food hundreds of thousands of years earlier than previously thought, an Israeli-led group of researchers have suggested.
They found evidence in the 780,000-year-old remains of a huge carp-like fish discovered in northern Israel…
The previous earliest evidence of cooking dated from about 170,000 BC…
Researchers studied crystals from the enamel of the fish’s teeth, which were found in large quantities at the site. The way the crystals had expanded was a sign that they had not been exposed to direct fire, but cooked at a lower temperature…
Marsh says that criminal psychologists tend to classify people as having psychopathy only when they display violent and extreme behaviour. For her, however, the condition displays itself as a spectrum with other, less dramatic behaviour that can vary from person to person…
While a number of studies suggest that psychopathy is more prevalent in men than women, Marsh argues this may be due to how the testing was devised in the first instance.
“Initial psychopathy scales were primarily developed and tested on a prison population of men in British Columbia by Bob Hare,” she says…
A reminder that C.S. Lewis used his juvenile fiction to introduce readers to sophisticated theological concepts, such as talking animals.
ravensays
I’m not posting this article from the Washington Post.
Trigger Warning!!!It is as gruesome and horrifying as you can imagine.
The Russians tortured, raped, killed, and disappeared thousands of Kherson civilians.
Nothing like trying to win over the hearts and minds of the people they were saving from freedom, democracy, and their own culture. /s
The link goes to an archived copy that isn’t behind a pay wall.
EUROPE
Witnesses recount detentions, torture, disappearances in occupied Kherson
By Michael E. Miller and Anastacia Galouchka
November 14, 2022 at 10:38 a.m. EST
Washington post
On Monday night, Arizona election officials released the tabulation results from Maricopa, Pinal, and Pima counties, and it was enough to declare Katie Hobbs the next winner in the race for governor in Arizona, defeating Fox News favorite Kari Lake.
Sean Hannity was live on the air as the call came in and had to bring the news to his audience. You can taste the bitterness from here. [As PZ noted in Kari Lake, loser]
Despite Fox News propping up all the Trump-backed election deniers with stacked prime time appearances, they weren’t able to drag this conspiracy-loving bunch across the line. Heck, Hannity held three different “town hall” specials with Herschel Walker, Mehmet Oz, and Lake to close the campaign and bring it home. Fox News hosted Lake for seven different interviews in prime time the final week of the campaign!
The morning crew didn’t take the news any better. Despite their own network declaring Hobbs the winner, Fox News correspondent Kevin Corke cautioned the audience that it isn’t over just yet! The margin of victory might trigger a recount.
Bless his heart, right?
While Fox News talking heads struggle to come to terms, Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger wasted absolutely no time serving up their own revenge on Twitter. [Tweets and text available at the link. Liz Cheney, also here: https://twitter.com/Liz_Cheney/status/1592340964982808576 ]
Trump just sent out a fundraising email for Herschel Walker that says “Contribute ANY AMOUNT IMMEDIATELY to the Official Georgia Runoff Fundraising Goal and increase your impact by 1200%” and then auto-defaults to splitting your donation 90% to Trump and 10% to Herschel Walker. [Text and video at the link]
Republican politicians and associated committees are sending out desperate fundraising emails begging the GOP faithful to help save America by getting behind Herschel Walker in his Dec. 6 runoff race against Georgia Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock.
But what’s not immediately clear to recipients is how little of that money is going to Walker’s campaign: just a dime for every dollar given by small donors.
Walker’s campaign, which has trailed Warnock’s in fundraising throughout the election, is now asking fellow Republicans to stop their fundraising practices — or at least start sharing more with the candidate.
“We need everyone focused on winning the Georgia Senate race, and deceptive fundraising tactics by teams that just won their races are siphoning money away from Georgia,” Walker campaign manager Scott Paradise told NBC News on Monday.
“This is the last fight of 2022 and every dollar will help,” Paradise said. “The companies and consultants raising money off this need to cut it out.”
The campaign said it first noticed the problem on Saturday when former President Donald Trump’s Save America sent out an email that asked prospective donors to “contribute ANY AMOUNT IMMEDIATELY to the Official Georgia Runoff Fundraising Goal and increase your impact by 1200%”
But if donors didn’t see a link that says “click here for details or to edit allocation,” they would not have noticed that 90 percent of their contribution automatically went to Trump, with the remaining 10 percent going to Walker.
After the 90:10 split was highlighted on Twitter, Trump’s committee changed the allocation to a 50:50 split.
Paradise credited Trump’s team for making the quick change and said that it “is extremely helpful and it’s what we request others do.”
The problem for the Walker campaign, however, is that the emails from different political committees — one for the North Carolina Republican Party and the campaign committees of newly elected GOP senators J.D. Vance in Ohio and Ted Budd in North Carolina — initially defaulted to a 90:10 division as well. […]
Half of Frances nuclear reactors are off line right as winter starts and Europe has an energy shortage.
I would say good planning but I’m sure everyone knows that.
It isn’t a secret that winter is coming.
It seems to be a lot of deferred maintenance, lack of investment in the plants, and design flaws.
It wouldn’t surprise me if their schedule slips but good luck anyway.
As Europe Quits Russian Gas, Half of France’s Nuclear Plants Are Off-Line
France’s state-backed nuclear operator is scrambling to overcome a monthslong crisis to get as many reactors as possible restarted before winter sets in.
NYTimes 11/15/2022
Nov. 15, 2022
Updated 10:07 a.m. ET
An army of engineers has fanned out through nuclear power plants across France in recent months, inspecting reactors for signs of wear and tear. Hundreds of expert welders have been recruited to repair problems found in cooling circuits. Stress tests are being conducted to check for safety problems.
As Europe braces for a winter without Russian gas, France is moving fast to repair a series of problems plaguing its atomic fleet. A record 26 of its 56 reactors are off-line for maintenance or repairs after the worrisome discovery of cracks and corrosion in some pipes used to cool reactor cores.
The crisis is upending the role that France has long played as Europe’s biggest producer of nuclear energy, raising questions about how much its nuclear power arsenal will be able to help bridge the continent’s looming crunch.
The state-backed nuclear power operator, Électricité de France, or EDF, which runs France’s nuclear power industry, said last week that it was working on an accelerated schedule to get all but 10 reactors running again by January, adding that there were no safety risks and that regulators were monitoring every step. President Emmanuel Macron’s government has been pressing the company to improve performance before freezing weather sets in.
“We were faced with an unprecedented situation and have gotten past the worst,” Regis Clement, EDF’s deputy general manager of nuclear production, said at a briefing. “We are doing our best to play a role in the energy crisis,” he added.
The troubles facing EDF — a fresh outbreak of safety-related incidents, combined with unforeseen delays to the company’s repair schedule — could not be hitting at a worse time. Russian President Vladimir V. Putin’s tactic of withholding energy to punish countries supporting Ukraine is pushing Europe to transform how it generates and saves power. Countries are banding together to stock additional power supplies, while pushing out major conservation programs.
Europe’s Shift Away From Fossil Fuels
The European Union has begun a transition to greener forms of energy. But financial and geopolitical considerations could complicate the efforts.
Wood Energy: European lawmakers voted to phase out some wood-energy subsidies, a recognition that the incentives have contributed to deforestation without curbing greenhouse gas emissions.
Turning to Africa: As European leaders face a gas crisis brought on by the war in Ukraine, they have been converging on Africa’s capital cities, eager to find alternatives.
Nuclear Plants: Germany will keep two of its last nuclear power plants operational to cushion the blow of a deepening energy crisis tied to the war in Ukraine. The decision will delay the country’s plans to become the first industrial power to go nuclear-free for its energy.
Up in Arms: A decision by the Dutch government to set goals of cutting nitrogen emissions in half by 2030, has caused an uproar among dairy farmers, who believe the plan unfairly targets them.
Europe’s energy security remains on a thin edge, creating a sense of urgency in France to get its nuclear power program back on track. President Macron’s government this month introduced a measure in parliament to speed up an ambitious plan to build six new mammoth reactors starting in 2028, moving to fulfill a pledge for what he called a French “nuclear renaissance.”
France pivoted to nuclear power in the 1980s and, after the United States, boasts the world’s biggest atomic fleet, generating 70 percent of its electricity and exporting power to other countries. That has made France historically less dependent on Russian gas than neighboring Germany.
But France’s nuclear power crunch has become so acute that Mr. Macron is preparing to have the government take over the remaining 16 percent of EDF that it doesn’t already own, at a cost of nearly 10 billion euros ($10.3 billion).
The company, which is nearly 45 billion euros in debt, has tumbled further into financial difficulty and announced that its 2022 profit would drop by 29 billion euros because of the problems with its reactors, as well as a government effort to force EDF to provide artificially cheap electricity for households and businesses.
Even as EDF is rushing to comply with the demand for accelerated repairs, the company last week cut its 2022 nuclear power production forecast. The announcement caused the cost of French and European electricity to spike.
Herculean efforts to repair corrosion in pipes that cool the cores of four reactors were taking longer than expected, the company said. Those reactors now will not restart until January or February.
A strike late last month by French nuclear plant workers demanding higher wages to keep up with inflation was another blow. EDF said it was already behind in performing required maintenance on several aging reactors because of coronavirus lockdowns when the labor action put it further behind.
The company’s recent troubles began late last year, as it started moving through that backlog. The inspections unearthed alarming safety issues — especially corrosion and micro-cracks in systems that cool a reactor’s radioactive core — at an older-generation nuclear reactor in southwest France called Civaux 1. As EDF scoured its nuclear facilities, it found that 16 reactors, most of them newer-generation models, faced similar risks and closed them down.
Officials suspect that the corrosion resulted from changes that EDF made to reactors designed by Westinghouse Electric Company that EDF had used in its older-generation plants. Bernard Doroszczuk, the head of France’s Nuclear Safety Authority, testified to French lawmakers this summer that the modifications, used for later-generation reactors, appeared to have caused abnormal corrosion and stress on critical cooling pipes.
The crisis has sent French nuclear power production to a 30-year low, generating less than half of the 61 gigawatts that the reactors can produce. (EDF also generates electricity with gas, coal and renewable technologies.) Even when more reactors are restarted in the coming months, French nuclear output will be around 45 gigawatts — lower than usual this winter, compounding the impact of Russia’s gas cutoff.
Such a scenario “increases the risk of supply shortages for the coming winter, with availability standing at record low levels for this time of the year,” Fabian Ronningen, a senior analyst at Rystad Energy, an independent consultancy, said in a note to clients.
The energy shortfall has turned France, once the continent’s biggest exporter of energy, into a net importer this year. A quarter of Europe’s electricity comes from nuclear power plants in about a dozen countries, with France producing more than half the total.
The country finds itself in the awkward position this winter of leaning more heavily on its coal-fired power stations, importing electricity from Germany and relying on natural gas reserves stocked in a warren of underground caves to get through the winter.
To save power, Mr. Macron’s government is pressing ahead with France’s biggest energy conservation measures in decades, part of a broader effort in Europe. The plan calls on citizens and businesses to make major lifestyle changes, including lowering thermostats, car-pooling and cutting lighting after hours.
Analysts say that a likely recession in Europe next year, though unwelcome, could help lower energy demand by leading energy-intensive businesses to cut production. The power squeeze has already forced steel, chemical and glass makers to slash output and furlough workers in France and elsewhere in Europe.
But France will still need to repair its reactors, most of which were built in the 1980s, and that have been marred for decades by a lack of investment. Experts say France has lost valuable engineering expertise over the years, with repercussions for EDF’s ability to maintain the existing power stations.
As part of its broader repair and maintenance effort, EDF said it has brought on hundreds of skilled engineers to make up for a dearth of hands in France’s nuclear work force. The experts include welders and pipe-fitters from Westinghouse, as well as from French and Canadian contractors.
But even critical repairs must be monitored. EDF said that a radioactive leak occurred this month during a hydraulic test on the main cooling circuit of the Civaux 1 nuclear power plant. EDF had spent months laboring to repair the corroded cooling pipes, using new technologies including ultrasound and welding robots that don’t have radiation exposure limits.
EDF said there was no safety risk from that leak, and that no radioactivity was detected outside of it. But the episode is likely to delay the plant’s reopening beyond a planned Jan. 8 start date, adding to the nuclear park’s woes.
Yahoo News reporting on what Herschel Walker recently said:
Campaigning in Georgia on Sunday, Republican Senate candidate Herschel Walker said the United States is not ready to implement policies like the Green New Deal that are designed to address climate change. Instead, Walker suggested the country needs to “keep having those gas-guzzling cars” that produce “good emissions.”
Walker’s exact words:
If we was ready for the green agenda, I’d raise my hand right now. But we’re not ready right now. So don’t let them fool you like this is a new agenda. This is not a new agenda. We’re not prepared. We’re not ready right now. What we need to do is keep having those gas-guzzling cars, ‘cause we got the good emissions under those cars. We’re doing the best thing that we can.
Ukrainian officials across the country reported a wave of Russian airstrikes pounding residential areas and cities following a series of significant losses for the Russian military in recent weeks.
Air raid sirens blared Tuesday in Lviv, Kryvyi Rih and Kharkiv, among other cities. The mayor of Lviv, Andriy Sadovyi, tweeted part of the city was without power.
[…] In the city of Zhytomyr in northwestern Ukraine, Russia knocked out power after two missile strikes pounded the city’s energy grid, according to Ukrainian media.
Ukraine’s Centre for Strategic Communication and Information Security reported blackouts in Rivne and Khmelnytskyi in the west.
“Russia is not targeting the military,” the agency tweeted. “It is targeting civilians.” […]
[…] Cruz is raging at Mitch McConnell, whose fault it is that the Republicans [failed during the midterms] and ran away. (It is popular for Republican idiots to try to deflect blame to McConnell right now. […])
Cruz was on his podcast this weekend, and he just moaned and drank White Claw about it. (See above.) We’re not going to spend too much time on things that should be between Ted and his therapist, but here are a few quotes:
“Let me start off by saying I am so pissed off, I cannot even see straight.”
Told you he’s pissed.
“We had an extraordinary opportunity. We had a generational opportunity. This should have been a fundamental landslide election.
This is what happens when people set unreasonable expectations that fail to take into account that all normal patriotic Americans despise the Republican Party and can’t wait to watch it self-destruct.
“We should have won the House and the Senate. We should have a 30, 40, 50 vote majority in the House. We should have 53, 54, 55 Republicans in the Senate.
“And instead, holy crap, the Democrats keep the Senate. Worse than that, the Democrats potentially grow their majority in the Senate.
Ha ha, yep, we are going to grow our majority. Right after Raphael Warnock beats the living shit out of the braindead guy sitting next to some extremely awkward nodding guy right here. [video of Ted Cruz nodding along to a Herschel Walker rant on Fox News, while the host smiles beatifically.]
So weird.
Anyway:
“Worse than that, yes, we take the House, but at best we’re gonna take the House with a couple of seats. Maybe there is an outside chance we lose the House. I don’t think we will. I think the numbers are enough that we will hold onto the House.
“The rage Americans are feeling across this country. The rage that I’m feeling, there are almost no words to describe it, because this opportunity was screwed up. It was screwed up badly, and the people that are gonna pay the price are the American people.
The raaaaaaaaaage. Ted Cruz is full of raaaaaaaaaage. You wouldn’t like him when he is raaaaaaaaage.
“The country is screwed for the next four years. Because of this, we’re gonna see horrible Left wing judges confirmed for the next two years, because of this. [Yay!] “We’re gonna see judges taking away our free speech rights, our religious liberty rights, our Second Amendment rights. It is an enormous missed opportunity.
Fuck yeah, if Ted says so.
And I gotta say — it is hard to describe my feelings as anything other than rage.
Raaaaaage.
“If you look at this last cycle, Mitch McConnell pulled the money out of Arizona. We could have won — won Arizona. We nearly won Arizona and abandoning Blake Masters was indefensible.
“Because Masters said he would vote against Mitch McConnell, and so Mitch would rather be leader than have a Republican majority.
“If there’s a Republican who can win, who’s not gonna support Mitch, the truth of the matter is he’d rather the Democrat win. So he pulled all the money out of Arizona.”
Blake Masters was an absolute clownfuck of a candidate, possibly the worst Republican running for the Senate, and he lost Arizona by five full points. Blake Masters was never going to win Arizona. Everybody hates that guy, almost as much as everybody hates Ted Cruz. [Yep. True.]
OK, that’s enough of Ted’s whining, because there is a punchline, are you ready for the punchline?
The headline at the Daily Beast is that Ted Cruz just might be the biggest loser of all, because it looks like the House candidates supported by Cruz-associated PACs are the most losing-est losers of the midterms, even more than all Donald Trump’s losers.
Cruz focused his support on House races, most specifically 24 of the 25 candidates participating in his “Cruz 25 for 22 Victory Fund” joint fundraising committee. Of the 24 candidates, only nine won their races. The group features just one of Cruz’s fellow senators, Mike Lee, who won his re-election bid after putting down a surprisingly tough challenge from independent candidate Evan McMullin.
The Cruz-tied “Truth and Courage” super PAC did even worse. The group, which openly aligns with Cruz—to a possibly unlawful degree—only won one of the three races that it funded. That would be the victory Rep.-elect Cory Mills scored over Karen Green in an open seat in Florida.
The Daily Beast further explains that Cruz has ties to another joint fundraising committee for the Senate that had five candidates in it. Only three won, and of those, Katie Britt and JD Vance come from the red states of Alabama and Ohio, respectively. The other winner was Ted Budd. The losers? Adam Laxalt in Nevada and loser Dr. Fucking Oz in Pennsylvania.
In other words, in the tougher races, all Ted’s picks came up losers.
But sure, Ted, rage a whole bunch at Mitch McConnell and spend the next three weeks in Georgia “helping” Herschel Walker.
Chuck Schumer appreciates it, we are sure.
I know that the Republican legislature in Georgia shortened the run-off period of time in order to help awkward Republican candidates limp to the finish line, but apparently it is not possible to shorten the time enough to save Walker from himself.
Akira MacKenziesays
@ 375
So much for the “biased liberal media.” Also…
If we was ready for the green agenda, I’d raise my hand right now. But we’re not ready right now. So don’t let them fool you like this is a new agenda. This is not a new agenda. We’re not prepared. We’re not ready right now. What we need to do is keep having those gas-guzzling cars, ‘cause we got the good emissions under those cars. We’re doing the best thing that we can.
If the partisan shoe was on the other foot, the Republicans would be blasting Walker with every racist stereotype in the book over that bowl of word salad.
Co-host of “The Five” on Fox News, Judge Jeanine Pirro, said:
Abortion! It was all about abortion! Joe Biden didn’t do abortion! Abortion just kinda fell outta of the Supreme Court for whatever reason!
More of Pirro’s pronouncements:
“Sure, the young people came out and voted!” Some slight slurring detected.
“They got paid! They got the student loans paid back! It was a buyout! That’s what happened with them!”
From Wonkette’s commentary:
Apparently the student loan debt relief only affects voters who are currently very young. Fox News hosts always are very good at understanding the issues.
ravensays
Tweet
Andrij Melnyk @MelnykAndrij
Russian mother fuckers🤬🤬🤬 A 🇷🇺rocket just flew over our heads and hit a residential building in the very center of Kyiv 🤬🤬🤬
You should burn in hell for all eternity 🔥🔥🔥
It is a sunny day here and I’ve got a cup of coffee in front of my screen.
Meanwhile Ukraine is getting pounded by Russian missiles and drones.
It’s time to give Ukraine long range drones and rockets and let them fire back on Russia.
Fair is fair.
Having one set of rules for Russia and another for Ukraine during a war is senseless and immoral.
This is pure terrorism.
While it terrorizes the civilian population, it has limited military effects.
The Ukrainians aren’t going anywhere because they are already home and they have no where to go.
KGsays
The Ukrainians aren’t going anywhere because they are already home and they have no where to go.
Interpreted literally this is simply false. Some millions have already fled Ukraine for other European countries – and mostly been treated decently, in sharp contrast to refugees with darker skin – and although some have returned, many have not. I expect a fresh wave of refugees as the days become colder and darker, and the Russians continue their attacks on energy infrastructure.
However, what the attacks won’t do is persuade or force the Ukranians to surrender, and I agree that sooner or later, Ukraine is going to need the weapons to hit back at Russian infrastructure, otherwise there seems no way to halt the Russian missile and drone attacks even if every Russian soldier or mercenary is driven out – although the Ukranians should still refrain from deliberately hitting residential buildings.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Conservative groups that sought to get hundreds of “parents’ rights” activists elected to local school boards largely fell short in last week’s midterm elections, notching notable wins in some Republican strongholds but failing to gain a groundswell of support among moderate voters.
Traditionally nonpartisan, local school boards have become fiercely political amid entrenched battles over the teaching of race, history and sexuality. Candidates opposing what they see as “woke” ideology in public schools have sought to gain control of school boards across the U.S. and overturn policies deemed too liberal.
The push has been boosted by Republican groups including the 1776 Project PAC, which steered millions of dollars into local school races this year amid predictions of a red wave. But on Tuesday, just a third of its roughly 50 candidates won.
Moms for Liberty, another conservative political group, endorsed more than 250 candidates, with about half winning so far. And despite resounding victories for Republicans including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, several gubernatorial candidates who leaned heavily on parents’ rights fell short, including in Michigan, Wisconsin, Kansas and Maine.
[…]
The parents’ rights movement demands transparency around teaching but also includes a wide range of cultural stances, calling for schools to remove certain books dealing with race or sexuality, for example, and an end to history lessons that aren’t “patriotic.”
Before Tuesday, the 1776 PAC had won roughly 75% of its races in the two previous years, putting dozens of school boards across the nation in control of conservative candidates.
Those victories have been attributed largely to parents’ anger over schools’ handling of the pandemic, including long closures and mask mandates. This year, the message pivoted to the cultural divides that have sparked battles around transgender rights, racism and sexuality.
[…]
Despite the losses, some conservatives saw hopeful signs in DeSantis and Abbott’s high-profile victories. And even picking up scattered school board seats across the country should be viewed as progress for a Republican Party that has long neglected education as a priority, said Rory Cooper, a GOP strategist and former congressional staffer.
“We’re not seeing Democratic opponents go unopposed like they used to,” he said. “I’m counting this year as a victory.”
Democrats see the losses as proof that rhetoric around critical race theory and gender issues may play well in Republican primaries, but it has limited appeal for moderate Americans.
“In general elections, voters don’t want to hear about it,” said Stephanie Cutter, a Democratic strategist and former senior adviser to President Barack Obama. “The overwhelming majority of parents support their kids’ teachers, believe in their public schools and want accurate history being taught in their classrooms.”
As conservative groups increasingly inject themselves into local school board races, Democrats have responded in kind. State teachers unions have increased spending on their candidates, and grassroots groups including Red Wine and Blue have rallied liberal suburban parents.
But in many areas, school board members facing conservative challengers have aimed to distance themselves from any political affiliation.
In Coloma, Michigan, a town near New Buffalo, four incumbents opted not to accept outside money as they ran against three challengers supported by the 1776 PAC. All four incumbents won.
“We did not speak about them. We spoke about us,” said Heidi Ishmael, president of the school board. “I am a firm believer the school board is nonpartisan. We are there to listen to and represent our entire community.”
Democratic strategists have held up that approach — de-escalating the role of politics in education — as a winning tactic. Candidates who draw attention to any perceived bias run the risk of looking like they’re the ones looking for political fights, said Guy Molyneux of Hart Research, a Democratic polling firm.
“I don’t think people want either the left or the right to triumph here,” Molyneux said. “They really want politics out of their schools.”
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From their latest summary:
Russia has launched waves of missile strikes across Ukraine even as G20 leaders – including its foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov – met in Bali. Ukraine’s authorities said it was another planned attack aimed at the country’s energy infrastructure facilities.
Ukraine’s public broadcaster reported that the strikes have targeted Kyiv, Kyiv region, Kharkiv city as well as Poltava, Mykolaiv, Dnipro, Zhytomyr, Khmelnytskiy, Lviv, Cherkassy, Odesa, and Chernihiv regions. The strikes follow Russia’s retreat from Kherson and the west bank of the Dnipro River last week.
Russia fired “around 100 missiles” at cities across Ukraine, according to Yurii Ihnat, a spokesperson for the Ukrainian air force command.
At least one person has died after three residential buildings in the capital, Kyiv, were hit, according to the city’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko. He said the buildings were in Kyiv’s Pechersk district, a residential area just north of the presidential administration. Klitschko said medics and rescue workers were on their way to the scenes. Widespread power outages are reported across the country as a result of the attack.
The head of Ukraine’s presidential administration, Andriy Yermak, said the attack was a response to president Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s address to the G20 on Tuesday. Zelenskiy called on the leaders to support Ukraine to end it on its terms – the primary being that Russian troops leave all of Ukraine, including the areas it occupied in 2014. Zelenskiy is calling for an international conference to “cement key element of the postwar security architecture” and prevent a recurrence of “Russian aggression”….
The US “strongly condemns” the latest wave of Russian missile attacks against Ukraine, the White House has said.
In a statement, it said today’s attacks “will serve to only deepen the concerns among the G-20 about the destabilising impact of Putin’s war”….
Zelenskiy warns of Russian strikes but ‘we will survive’
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has warned Ukrainians they could face more Russian missile strikes today, but said the country would survive.
In a video shared on Telegram, Zelenskiy said 85 missiles were launched against Ukraine on Tuesday and a further 20 were expected to hit the country.
He warned residents to stay in shelters, adding:
I know that the (missile) strikes turned off energy in many places … We are working, we will restore everything, we will survive.
Ukraine is currently experiencing “major internet disruption” with live metrics showing that national connectivity is at 67% of previous levels, according to the internet monitoring group Netblocks.
Most regions of the country have been impacted by a countrywide power outage amid intense Russian missile attacks targeting critical infrastructure, the group said.
The UK foreign secretary James Cleverly has said Russia’s latest missile attacks on Ukraine demonstrate President Vladimir Putin’s “weakness”….
Guardian reporters in the region of Mykolaiv heard a series of explosions and reported a series of visible rockets being launched from Odesa region.
A few minutes later, the head of the military administration Maksym Marchenko confirmed that Ukraine’s air defence forces in Odesa shot down eight Russian kamikaze drones and one Russian rocket.
Akira MacKenziesays
@ 382
I don’t think people want either the left or the right to triumph here,” Molyneux said. “They really want politics out of their schools.”
A culturally and politically illiterate and indifferent people serves the interests of the right just as well as one overtly indoctrinated with the white, Christian, nationalist “education” that the right wants to foist. Either way, the right wins.
Fuck this shithole country and it’s moronic citizens.
A psychiatrist studying the development of psychosis faked data from studies of brain imaging in a grant application to the National Institutes of Health, a U.S, government watchdog has found.
The federal Office of Research Integrity (ORI) announced sanctions against Romina Mizrahi, associate chair of research in McGill University’s department of psychiatry in Montreal, Canada, for “intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly falsifying data” in a grant application to the National Institute of Mental Health.
Mizrahi submitted the grant application in question, R01 MH118495-01, “Imaging nociceptin receptors in clinical high risk and first episode psychosis,” in February 2018; it does not appear to have been funded.
According to ORI, Mizrahi:
knowingly, intentionally, or recklessly falsified the Positron Emission Tomography (PET) data of the binding of radiopharmaceutical [11C]NOP-1A (NOP) in brain regions between the patient group and healthy volunteer (HV) group….
Mizrahi, formerly of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health and University of Toronto, agreed to have her research supervised for one year. The ORI did not indicate whether she admitted to their findings of misconduct, and she did not immediately respond to our request for comment.
Mizrahi has received more than $4 million in NIH grants since 2014, and is a principal investigator on 13 grants or renewals.
Some of that funding was behind a study that found “long-term cannabis use could be elevating stress and anxiety levels in young adults,” according to a 2019 story by the CBC. [They link to both the study and the CBC article; the CBC article is pretty bad, and the scientific article looks even worse.]
The Canadian Institutes of Health Research has granted Mizrahi nearly $3 million CAD, including to fund the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health from 2012-14. None of her papers appear to have been retracted to date.
Analysis of the paper, which was irresponsibly featured in the Guardian, at the link.
It is also worth noting that study was paid for by Imanova Ltd (now Invicro), whose profit is dependent on demonstrating the success of imaging techniques, such as PET, for “drug and diagnostic development.” In an acknowledgment, the researchers express appreciation for the work of the company’s employees “for their excellent technical support.” It is unclear how much input the company had in developing the study, conducting the analysis, and writing the paper.
These imaging companies should probably be getting more attention, not only in the general sense that they often (and plainly in this case) have a direct financial interest in the research but also because some of these researchers seem to become attached to an element of a complex system whose action or role is dimly understood but which can be (accurately?) imaged using this equipment, on the basis of which – even setting aside the cases of fudging the images – they extrapolate wildly.
My condolences to our Polish brothers in arms. Criminal Russian regime fired missiles which target not only Ukrainian civilians but also landed on NATO territory in Poland. Latvia fully stands with Polish friends and condemns this crime.
Two people killed after Russian missiles crossed into Poland, says US intelligence official
Poland’s prime minister has convened an urgent meeting of a committee for national security and defence affairs, the government spokesman Piot Müller said on Twitter on Tuesday, as a senior US intelligence official said Russian missiles crossed into Nato member Poland, killing two people.
Müller did not mention what the committee was due to discuss but local media reported that the meeting may be related to a reported explosion on the Polish border with Ukraine. Russia shelled cities and energy facilities across Ukraine on Tuesday, including Lviv, a city in the west of the country close to Poland.
Donald Trump, who is a traitor, is allegedly holding a big event to announce something at his Mar-a-Lago crime den this evening. The press wisdom appears to be that the seditionist who knowingly aimed an armed mob at the U.S. Congress in an attempt to nullify an American election will tonight be announcing a 2024 presidential campaign. This is certainly what Trump and his allies want the press to be reporting, as he sells tonight’s sedition soiree as potentially “one of the most important days in the history of our country.” [LOL, much scoffing]
But Donald Trump lies about everything, all the time, and the press could very well find themselves hustled to Mar-a-Lago instead for an announcement that Donald Trump has launched a new line of Trump-branded catheters. Or frozen meat. […]
If you believe the carefully curated rumors of the past few months, however, Trump has been wanting to announce a new presidential run for some time now. He’s been chafing at all the attention that people who are not him have been getting on the campaign trail, and actually wanted to announce before last week’s elections so that he could claim it was his announcement that led to the widely Republican-predicted “red wave” of victories. His advisers did not want him to do that, perhaps correctly intuiting that catapulting the seditionist criminal dirtbag back into the middle of everyone else’s campaigns would not go well.
They got their way, it seems—Trump did what they said, but now the election’s over and it’s time for captain seditionist criminal dirtbag to shove his way back to the center podium and announce that he is once again In Charge Of All Republicans.
He’s been preparing for this moment in the manner of his people: by shitposting. Or rather, shitposting-by-proxy [Tweet and images at the link]
You’re gonna see that gold-sprayed Trump troll thing in your nightmares tonight, and I’m sorry for that, but the sheer fascist energy involved in fluffing this incompetent, criminal Dear Leader into supposed alpha manhood will never not be funny.
This is the new way our betters will speak to us, by the way. The richest people in America, plus maybe Donald Trump, will each buy or create their own social media platforms so that they can compete with each other to repost QAnon conspiracy memes and smear whoever’s risen to the top of their daily-adjusted enemies lists.
The real news from Mar-a-Lago tonight, however, might be the guest list. A gaggle of mid-tier white nationalists, conspiracy promoters, and national traitors are claiming they have been invited, including seditionist crapsack Roger Stone. It’s a mob that appears to tilt heavily toward the most frothing of Trump’s sedition-backing allies, but among the prominent voices who will reportedly not be attending one of the Most Important Days In American History are Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump.
Are they avoiding the meeting because they think the Department of Justice might crash the party? Did Jared have a previous engagement with Saudi royalty? Are they worried that gathering up the people in America who provided the most support for a violent coup might be, as they say in the shoot-em-up movies, a “security situation” they don’t want to be within a mile of?
Who knows. Maybe they saw that gold-sprayed Trump muscle statue their dad tweeted and plan on spending a private night alone fighting off the dry heaves.
As for whether a Trump “presidential campaign” announcement will have much effect on the investigations into Donald Trump’s many, many, many recent criminal acts: it’s unlikely. Federal authorities will either have the spine to prosecute Trump for things that would land anyone else in America in a prison cell or they won’t, but the idea of Trump announcing a new presidential run specifically to discourage such prosecutions is one they’ve all had time to chew on. There may or may not be agents specifically eager to review tonight’s Mar-a-Lago security tapes to try to glean whether any of tonight’s guests walk away with a gift bag containing some of the classified documents federal investigators still suspect Donald Trump may have.
Will Trump really announce a new campaign tonight, or is this all a bluff? Will he instead insist that he’s been the “real” president all this time, and demand Biden step down so that he can move back into the White House? Will he announce a new line of premium toilets designed for the discerning seditionist mob? Who knows. It’s hard to care, really.
The leader of a violent coup against the United States government has something to say. Fair enough. And the rest of us get to say something about that as well.
Hungarian government spokesperson (via Guardian liveblog):
In response to the stop in oil transfer through the Druzhba pipeline and the missile hitting territory of Poland, @PM_ViktorOrban has convened HU’s Defense Council for 8 p.m.
Latest news from Poland is most concerning. We are consulting closely with Poland and other Allies. Estonia is ready to defend every inch of NATO territory. We’re in full solidarity with our close ally Poland
“Polish reporter on blasts tonight: My sources in the services say that what hit Przewowo is most likely the remains of a [Russian] rocket shot down by the Armed Forces of Ukraine.”
We’ve seen these reports out of Poland and are working with the Polish government to gather more information. We cannot confirm the reports or any of the details at this time. We will determine what happened and what the appropriate next steps would be.
“An official from Polish intelligence [said] investigators were probing whether it could have been a Russian missile. If confirmed, it would be the first time a Nato country had been hit by a missile since Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine”
Here is a full translation of Zelenskiy’s remarks on Russian missiles reportedly crossing into Poland
Today, what we we warned about long ago has happened.
We talked about it.
Terror is not limited to our national borders. It has already spread to
the territory of Moldova. And today, Russian missiles hit Poland, the
territory of our friendly country. People died. Please accept
condolences from all Ukrainian brothers!
How many times has Ukraine said that the terrorist state will not be
limited to our country?
Poland, the Baltic states… It’s only a matter of time before
Russian terror goes further. It is necessary to put the terrorist in
place! The longer Russia feels impunity, the more threats there will
be to everyone who can be reached by Russian missiles.
Hitting missiles on NATO territory… This is a Russian missile
attack on collective security! This is a very significant escalation.
We must act.
And I want to say now to all our Polish brothers and sisters…
Ukraine will always support you! Terror will not break free people!
Victory is possible when there is no fear! You and I don’t have it.
I want to thank all partners who helped protect the sky. In
particular, our NASAMS systems worked well today: ten hits out of ten
launches. As of this hour, more than 70 missiles and ten attack
drones have been shot down.
I thank all our American and European friends who helped us to ensure this result.
Thank you to all our soldiers of the “Southern”, “Center”, “East” and
“West” air commands, as well as air defense units of the Ground
Forces.
Thanks to all our rescuers, our energy workers, who will work
around the clock to restore normal life for Ukrainians. Restoration
work has begun across the country.
We will get through this too. We will restore everything.
Russia opposes itself to the world. Russia loses on the battlefield.
Russia is terrorizing us and everyone it can reach.
Let’s do everything to stop it!
ravensays
Thread
WarMonitor🇺🇦 @WarMonitor3
“Two stray rockets fell in the town of Przewodów in Poland on the border with Ukraine. They hit the grain dryers. Two people died.”
😳😳😳😳😳😳😳
10:12 AM · Nov 15, 2022
This is the latest.
We are up to two rockets right now.
I’ve seen some photos of the blast site.
It doesn’t look at all like debris from shooting down a rocket.
There is a large, deep crater.
Poland raising readiness of military following explosion
The Polish government spokesperson Piotr Muller has just given a press conference in the capital Warsaw, where he said the government was raising the military’s level of readiness in response to the explosion near its border with Ukraine.
Speaking to cameras, Muller confirmed that two people had been killed earlier on Tuesday.
He told reporters that the government was considering whether to trigger article 4, which would mean a meeting would take place of Nato members after their “territorial integrity, political independence or security” has been threatened.
ravensays
A second person told The Associated Press that apparent Russian missiles struck a site in Poland about 15 miles from the Ukrainian border.
No way is debris from a countermissile strike going to travel 15 miles.
15 miles is a lot for a mistake.
This isn’t even close to the border with Ukraine.
“Russia fired 100 missiles at Ukraine today, hitting a residential building in Kyiv and leaving whole cities without electricity. These young men and women were inputting the missile flight paths, again….”
Names, photos, and organizational chart at the (Twitter) link.
On tracking the missile’s origin- no it’s not some panoptic capability that NATO possesses. There are limitations based on what sensors are active on the ground and in the air. Range and terrain from sensor to target is key too, especially for…
Low flying, terrain masking, small radar cross section, cruise missiles and drones. Just because a radar is active X miles away doesn’t mean it detected it or even had line of sight to it.
That being said, the they should still be able to piece together what this was and who it belonged to. Russian missile or errant SAM etc, which happens especially with older Soviet era stuff
Heard reports on the restoration of 🇺🇦 electricity supply. About 10 million Ukrainians were disconnected after the terrorist attack. Supply to 8 million consumers has already been restored. Power engineers and repairmen will work all night. Thanks to everyone!
Preliminary versions say it’s a Russian Kh-101 rocket, same ones were launched on 🇺🇦 today, – @interfax_news
It might be first ever rocket strike on NATO territory [image of missile part at the link]
Better. Get the facts. The alliance has already gamed out how it would respond in this eventuality. Let the facts come out, and then we see what’s next. Hopefully, it means better and more weapons for Ukraine.
[…] At this time, we don’t know where this missile came from. But, let’s assume for a moment that it’s confirmed Russian, then what? What is Senator Menendez threatening here exactly? If you want to make Russia pay, start delivering ATACMS long-range rockets to Ukraine, so they can strike even deeper behind enemy lines (including the Kerch Bridge, still under repair).
Honestly, Russia has done plenty enough to merit “significant consequences.” At this point, we should be doing everything possible to arm Ukraine in the short term with ATACMS and Bradley infantry fighting vehicles, and in the long-term with F-16 fighter jets. But none of that is within Mendendez’ control. He’s a senator, not the Commander in Chief.
[…] The fear is that the new Republican House might be more hostile to Ukrainian aid. Note that Joe Biden has a backup plan in that case—for one, pass this aid now, in the lame-duck session. But beyond that, the Lend-Lease Act allows Biden to keep delivering weapons to Ukraine without additional congressional action. This is just a clearer, easier, more transparent approach. Either way, Ukraine has nothing to fear so long as Biden remains president.
[…] Russia launched around 100 missiles and drones against Ukrainian civilian infrastructure today—the largest since the war began—with the clear aim to spread terror, and to also knock out Ukraine’s energy grid. (Ukraine claims that 73 of the missiles were shot down, which may or may not be true.) If anyone wonders why Ukraine is winning the war, it’s because Ukraine knocks out Russia’s logistical hubs and depots, while Russia would rather kill civilians and inconvenience them this winter in the cold. Meanwhile, Ukrainian trains run virtually unimpeded, supplying Ukraine’s war effort on the fronts.
This war has laid bare Russia’s incompetence from top to bottom, and that extends to the effectiveness of their weaponry. The fact that two Russian cruise missiles missed their Ukrainian target and landed in Polish territory isn’t surprising; what is surprising is that it hadn’t happened until now. That two people were killed in the attack raises the stakes.
The two missiles hit 100 kilometers from their presumed intended target of Lviv, so some people are skeptical it was a mistake, but I’d be shocked if Russia was interested in escalating with NATO. They’re already losing the war. The last thing they need is either Poland or NATO engaging. If the target was military, perhaps a supply depot or rail head feeding Western weapons and ammunition to Ukraine, there would be logic to such an attack. They hit a farm. This doesn’t make any sense beyond “oh shit, we missed … by a lot.”
So the big question is: Will Poland invoke Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization? And the answer to that is: not likely. Article 4 allows for consultations between the allies, and that is almost assuredly going to happen. They’ll demand an explanation and apology from Russia. The alliance will talk about strengthening its Polish front. Maybe they’ll rush additional air defense units to the border area. But it seems inconceivable that either side is eager to use this mistake to escalate further. At most, NATO might send an “if it happens one more time …” message that will force Russia to avoid further hitting western Ukraine, lest it screw it again. Russia already backed down to Turkish threats on the Black Sea grain deal, so they’re not currently operating from a position of strength.
There is no chance the alliance hasn’t gamed out this possibility already. Now we wait and see what Poland’s and the alliance’s reposes will be.
Meanwhile, I want to once again stress the inadequacy of the Russian missile barrage. At last count, Russia spent hundreds of millions of dollars on its dwindling supply of missiles to knock out power for 7 million Ukrainian citizens. Russia is losing the war, and yet it continues to prioritize terrorism against civilians as opposed to hitting militarily valuable targets. This is a victory for Ukraine. Ukrainian forces are currently rushing from the Kherson front to reinforce their positions in the Donbas, where Russia continues its human-wave attacks on Bakhmut and Pavlivka. And instead of hitting the rail and logistical lines making this shift possible, Russia hits power generation facilities and apartment complexes instead. Russia’s tactics are cruel, definitely, but they are also unfathomably stupid.
With the fog of war cleared somewhat around Kherson, it’s clear that all the rumors about Ukrainian forces crossing the Dnipro into Russian-held territory were false. There is zero evidence of any Ukrainian incursions past the river, and no one is making those claims anymore. Whether it was irrational exuberance, informational psyops, or something else, it seems increasingly clear that Ukraine is happy with the current Kherson borders and will happily use the spare military capacity to reinforce its other fronts.
Meanwhile, I suspect my theory will hold—that Russia will withdraw all forces out of range of 155mm artillery, so about 15 to 25 miles from the Dnipro River, and locals in some of those “gray zone” villages will put up Ukrainian flags, “liberating” their territory. But there is little reason for Ukraine (or Russia) to militarily occupy those villages for now.
[posted by Julia Davis] Meanwhile in Russia: pundits and experts worry about the potential uprising, comparing Russia’s current state to 1916, in the run-up to the revolution of 1917. They worry that the Russian people are getting more angry & social media is adding more heat to the growing volatility. [video at the link in comment 410, scroll down]
These updates are always interesting, but this is one of the best in a long time. Julia leads with the talk of revolution, which itself is a remarkable acknowledgement. But listening in, these pundits are very explicit about their “social contract”—the politicians are left to rule Russia as they see fit, including their grift, so long as the people are allowed to lead their lives in relative peace. The mobilization violated that contract, the Russian people now have skin in the game, and Russia’s rulers have to be increasingly wary of, as one of the pundits put it, “annoyance.” […] they do have a history of revolution. Now would be as good a time for one as any.
The former television anchorwoman Kari Lake became enraged after the state of Arizona attempted to present her with a participation trophy for her unsuccessful gubernatorial campaign.
According to the Arizona state constitution, every losing candidate for statewide office is entitled to such a trophy, as well as an eight-by-eleven-inch “certificate of participation,” suitable for framing.
After a state official tried to bestow the trophy on Lake at her campaign headquarters, she snarled at the six-inch plastic figurine and drop-kicked it across the room.
Refusing to concede defeat, Lake instead lashed out at the woman who had just vanquished her. “Katie Hobbs is totally unqualified to lead Arizona into the nineteenth century,” she said.
As Donald Trump slithers towards a new presidential campaign, The Washington Post piped up yesterday with one of those stories that really didn’t have to be a story, if we’re going to be honest about these things. “Investigators see ego, not money, as Trump’s motive on classified papers” says the Post headline, referring to the whole nasty business of Donald Trump carting off boxes of classified government national security documents, lying to the government about having them, and then getting pissy when the government came to take the documents back.
Citing nebulous “people familiar with the matter,” which sounds suspiciously like “one or more of Donald Trump’s lawyers told us this,” the Post asserts that prosecutors think Donald Trump only stole classified national security secrets because, uh, he just felt like it.
Or, as the Post puts it, a government review of those documents “has not found any apparent business advantage to the types of classified information in Trump’s possession, these people said. FBI interviews with witnesses so far, they said, also do not point to any nefarious effort by Trump to leverage, sell or use the government secrets. Instead, the former president seemed motivated by a more basic desire not to give up what he believed was his property, these people said.”
That’s a lot of these people said for a story that, at the heart of it, doesn’t actually matter when it comes to a determination of whether Trump broke multiple laws when hoarding classified documents in unsecured locations in his for-profit golf resort. There’s no “but he just felt like doing that” exemption to government records law.
You don’t see “Investigators believe ego, not money, was motive behind church arson.” There are—at least, to my knowledge—no headlines blaring: “Serial mass murderer cites inquisitive nature, not hunger, for eating five victims.”
[…] the Post quickly clarifies that point only after sharing with us several paragraphs that ignore it.
[…] That there is no discernible logic to the stuff Donald Trump stuffed down his pants before leaving the White House is not evidence that Donald Trump did or did not have a particular intent in collecting it. Trump would have no idea what classified information had monetary value and what didn’t. He wouldn’t have a clue as to what national security secret would provide him a “business advantage” in his day job as golf club owner and real estate huckster.
Just because there was no rhyme or reason to the documents Trump wanted to keep doesn’t mean he didn’t have a plan for them. It just means his motives may be ridiculous enough to be indecipherable to anyone not familiar with the peculiarities of his often-incoherent mind.
There are a great many ways Donald Trump could look to leverage stolen national security documents. He could have taken them purely to show off to future sycophantic visitors. He could have taken them to hand out as door prizes when courting foreign investors—not because he thought they had value, but as confidence-man hint that maybe he could get them something of value, if they were to purchase five condos in New West Trumpistan. Everything Donald Trump has done to make money after winning public office has been cheap. A new proposed hotel chain themed around ‘Merica stuff. Family suggestions to Chinese investors that the new Trump regime could grease the gears of the U.S. immigration machine, for a price. Making it widely known that supplicants who hold events at the Trump-owned property near the White House would get more of Trump’s attention than supplicants who did not.
The man’s greed is only matched by his utter inability to come up with any money-making venture that isn’t a petty scam. [Correct!]
When reading any story that relies on anonymous sources, it is imperative to examine just why those anonymous sources are piping up with this news. Who does it benefit? […] In the end, the takeaway “news” of this story is that, according to Somebody, federal investigators still don’t have any evidence that Donald Trump successfully traded away any of the classified documents he collected for personal or professional favors.
The “news” is that it’s still an absolute certainty that Donald Trump stole classified national security documents, some of them in the top ranks of classification, and that he possessed them illegally, lied about it, and violated laws yet again by stacking them in insecure locations in a building known to attract foreign intelligence agents.
But there’s no evidence he committed actual espionage! Everybody make sure you report that, on the day before Donald’s Big Important History-Shaking Announcement! No provable espionage!
Good to know. Not new news, though—although the timing of the alleged leak downplaying the severity of one of the seditionist coup-attempting politician’s most recent federal crimes, on the eve of his desired rebranding, might be news.
Rep. Matt Gaetz, one of the very few GOP lawmakers who had planned to go down to Mar-a-Lago tonight for Trump’s announcement, says the weather is not looking good for his flight down from D.C. to Florida. But he will be there “in spirit.”
First Donald Trump lost Mo Brooks, and now Ivanka and Jared. If Randy Quaid makes a Ron DeSantis bust out of earwax, molted skin, and toenail clippings, we’ll really know the ocher oaf is in trouble.
The ex-presidential cosplayer who stole top secret nuclear documents, literally tried to end America, and gravely irked Mitch McConnell with his Senate endorsements is eyeing another four years of slow, simmering treason, punctuated by intermittent outbursts of high crimes. But first he has to convince a weary nation to get behind him and, according to new reports, he can’t even persuade his third-favorite person (after himself and his cryogenically preserved organ-donor clone) to join the party.
The New York Post is reporting that Trump spent much of the weekend trying to convince his daughter Ivanka and the origami goose she married to show up at his Tuesday campaign launch, where he plans to further horrify an already traumatized world with another Adderall-facilitated Hitler goof rally. But so far he’s had no luck.
Business Insider:
An unnamed source told the paper that the couple was “holding firm” after Trump spent much of the weekend coaxing them at Mar-a-Lago, as the family gathered for Tiffany Trump’s lavish wedding. …
The Post’s source told the paper: “Trump thought he could convince Ivanka this weekend to come back and campaign for him as she was the most requested speaker after the president himself last time around.”
“But so far she’s resisting his entreaties and holding firm, as is Jared,” they continued. “They both feel they got burned in Washington and don’t want to go back and expose themselves and their children to another bitter campaign.”
Of course, it’s both amusing and revealing that this story is showing up in Murdoch’s New York Post, which spent years debasing itself at the same altar Trump used to sacrifice America’s deeply held values and fast-fading credibility. Ever since Trump’s merde-ous touch sunk Republicans’ hopes for a red wave last Tuesday, Murdoch and his media properties have been kicking the crutch out from The Former Guy as if he were an elderly, disabled veteran struggling to get by on Social Security.
Then again, the Post isn’t the only outlet highlighting the Trump-Kushner cold war. CNN recently reported that the Kushner clan is 100% done with politics. (Securing $2 billion in sketchy funding from Prince Bone Saws tends to reorient your priorities, apparently.)
[…] Aw, man. A Trump campaign with no Ivanka or Jared? That’s like a Brady Bunch reunion without Marcia and Cousin Oliver. Who wants to watch that show? And who’s gonna be in charge of Middle East peace in the Trump 2.0 administration? Scott Baio’s expertise is in Sino-Russian relations, so he can’t do it.
The source the Post spoke with also said that Trump’s discussions with family members caused “extra behind-the-scenes tension” at Tiffany Trump’s wedding this past weekend. Because why wouldn’t Trump ruin his own daughter’s special day? After all, he’s done it to all of us more than we can possibly count.
U.S. producer prices increased less than expected in October as services fell for the first time in nearly two years, offering more evidence that inflation was starting to subside, potentially allowing the Federal Reserve to slow its aggressive pace of interest rate hikes.
Elon Musk has fired a group of Twitter engineers, some of whom posted critical comments either on the social network or on its internal Slack messaging system, according to two current Twitter employees and one former employee familiar with the situation.
The Trump family has struck a deal with a Saudi-based real estate company to license its name to a housing and golf complex that will be built in Oman, renewing a swirl of questions about former President Donald J. Trump’s mixing of politics and business just as he appears poised to announce a third presidential candidacy.
US president Joe Biden has offered Poland’s leader Andrzej Duda the US’ “full support for assistance with Poland’s investigation,” Reuters reports.
In a telephone call, the Polish president gave Biden an update on the inquiry into the explosion which killed two people, and in turn Biden said the US had an “ironclad” commitment to Nato.
The US president has also spoken by phone to Nato general secretary Jens Stoltenberg.
Duda has spoken to Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy. Zelenskiy tweeted afterwards: “We exchanged available information and are clarifying all the facts … all of Europe and the world must be fully protected from terrorist Russia.”
The Polish foreign minister has summoned the Russian ambassador to Poland for an explanation of the events connected to the explosion in Przewodów.
In a statement on Poland’s government’s website, a spokesperson said: “The minister of foreign affairs, Zbigniew Rau summoned the ambassador of the Russian federation to the ministry of foreign affairs and demanded immediate detailed explanations.”
The Polish foreign ministry has said that a “Russian-made missile” was responsible for killing two people in the eastern village of Przewodów on Tuesday afternoon.
Foreign affairs spokesperson Lukasz Jasina said: “On 15 November 2022, massive shelling of the entire territory of Ukraine and its critical infrastructure by the armed forces of the Russian Federation was observed for many hours.
“At 15:40 in the village of Przewodów … a Russian-made missile fell, killing two citizens of the republic of Poland.”
The statement also said that the Russian ambassador to Poland has also been summoned to give an explanation (see 11:10pm).
The famed SpaceX and Tesla entrepreneur posted a tweet on Sunday “to apologize for Twitter being super slow in many countries. App is doing >1000 poorly batched RPCs just to render a home timeline!”
Soon after, Twitter software engineer Eric Frohnhoefer decided to embark on a bit of career roulette. “I have spent ~6yrs working on Twitter for Android and can say this is wrong,” he posted…
Asked again about the “right number” of RPCs, Frohnhoefer replied flatly: “Zero. The apps don’t make RPC calls.”
…
Reginald Selkirksays
@Polish missile episode: It is frightening to imagine how this would have gone down if the 2020 election had turned out differently.
America’s Frontline Doctors …
The scandal has split the group—aka AFLDS—into warring factions, with its prominent founder, Simone Gold, accused of a slew of wrongdoing, including using the charity group’s funds to buy a $3.6 million mansion for herself and her boyfriend. She’s also accused of staging a hostile coup of the organization in the weeks since her release from federal prison for her role in the January 6, 2021, insurrection, which the group has defended…
Poland’s president Andrzej Duda has said that the explosion in Przewodów was a “one-off incident” and there are “no indications” that it is going to happen again.
Duda said it was “most-likely” a Russian-made rocket but “we have no definite evidence of who fired it”.
He added it was likely Poland will active Nato’s article 4 at a meeting of Nato on Wednesday.
238 views
ChrisO
Twitter logo
Nov 15 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
1/ Russia’s poorly trained and armed mobilised soldiers are acting as a human wall blocking Ukrainian advances with their bodies, and are being replaced as fast as they are killed, according to accounts from Ukrainian troops on the front line. ⬇️
2/ Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFERL) has published an interesting insight into what effect the mobilised Russians are having on Ukraine’s offensive in the small part of the Kharkiv region that remains under occupation. A tank crewman interviewed by RFERL says:
3/ “There are too many of them here. We hit their positions with artillery and thought we could advance, but [Russian forces] brought more soldiers there. I can’t say they are badly trained, but they don’t seem to realise where they are going.”
4/ “[Russian forces] are not sparing their soldiers. There is no sense in using your troops like that. They are brought into a bare forest and just stay there as long as they can.”
5/ RFERL comments that the Ukrainians say that the mobilised troops lack weapons and military experience, which matches accounts from the mobiks and their relatives back in Russia. /end
Huge news: The Mormon Church (LDS) has just announced its support for the Respect for Marriage Act, which would codify same-sex marriage in federal law.
Statement from Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints says Church doctrine on marriage “will remain unchanged” but bill is “the way forward” to respect religious freedom while “preserving the rights of our LGBTQ brothers and sisters”
StevoRsays
@ ^ SC (Salty Current) : Whoah! Was NOT expecting that! Good.
CNN: NATO reportedly tracked missile that landed in Poland.
A NATO military official told CNN that the alliance’s aircraft flying above Polish airspace on Nov. 15 tracked the missile that landed in the village of Przewodów. “Intel with the radar tracks [of the missile] was provided to NATO and Poland,” the NATO military official added. NATO aircraft have been conducting regular surveillance around Ukraine since Feb. 24. The aircraft flying above Poland was monitoring events in Ukraine.
@430: Some of the commenters on that twitter post are a little more cynical about the Mormon church’s proclamation:
Of course the LDS Church supports the proposal, which, despite the name, is not about respecting same-sex marriage. It allows states to continue to ban same-sex marriage, and it allows religious institutions to discriminate against same-sex couples.
This is some trick to get the Supreme Court to rule against Loving.
Except that this whole pernicious statement is just wrong. RMA doesn’t codify marriage equality; it codifies states’ rights to continue to discriminate against LGBTQA+ people by making their lives and choices harder if that state so chooses! Of course, LDS is all for that.
This Bill is just entrenching discrimination. Imagine if they wrote a bill saying states didn’t have to recognise interracial marriage, or non-christian marriages. It’s outrageous. If a couple is legally married they are married, and that fact should be recognised everywhere
Other commenters, though, are more sanguine, and say that even if the act is flawed, it’s still a step in the right direction. I haven’t read the text of the act myself; I don’t know who’s right here. But I’m not readily inclined to trust that the LDS church has suddenly decided they’re all for gay rights.
Okay, I’ve just read the actual statement, and that’s got me thinking the cynics are on the right track. Here’s the text of the statement:
The doctrine of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints related to marriage between a man and a woman is well known and will remain unchanged.
We are grateful for the continuing efforts of those who work to ensure the Respect for Marriage Act includes appropriate religious freedom protections while respecting the law and preserving the rights of our LGBTQ brothers and sisters.
We believe this approach is the way forward. As we work together to preserve the principles and practices of religious freedom together with the rights of LGBTQ individuals, much can be accomplished to heal relationships and foster greater understanding.
Notably, contra what the quoted twitter post claims, the church’s statement does not actually say that the church supports the Respect for Marriage Act. What it actually says is that the church supports “the efforts of those who work to ensure the Respect for Marriage Act includes appropriate religious freedom protections”. That could be interpreted as meaning that the church supports changing the Respect of Marriage Act to put further restrictions on gay marriage in the name of “religious freedom”. And honestly, given the church’s histories and doctrines, that does not seem like an unlikely interpretation.
I could be wrong. Maybe the LDS church really has decided it’s on the wrong side of history here and is turning over a new leaf in its views on gay rights. But I’m not going to get out the ticker tape just yet.
StevoRsays
YES! NASA has just successfully launched the Artemis 1 flight to our Moon! :
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From there:
Nato allies are meeting in Brussels to discuss their reactions after a missile fell Tuesday on the Polish village of Przewodów, near the Ukrainian border, killing two people. The incident is the first time that the territory of a Nato country has been struck during the near-nine-month Ukraine war.
The US president, Joe Biden, has said the missile was unlikely to have been fired from Russia due to its trajectory….
A senior adviser to Ukraine’s president said on Wednesday that Russia was to blame for any “incidents with missiles” after its invasion of his country. “In my opinion, it is necessary to adhere to only one logic. The war was started and is being waged by Russia. Russia massively attacks Ukraine with cruise missiles,” Mykhailo Podolyak said in a written statement. “Russia has turned the eastern part of the European continent into an unpredictable battlefield. Intent, means of execution, risks, escalation – all this is only Russia. And there can be no other explanation for any incidents with missiles.”
Poland is still analysing the possibility of launching the Nato article 4 measure, the formal mechanism for a consultation under which a country can summon a meeting when it feels its territory is being violated or threatened, according to its prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki[.]
Stoltenberg: Polish missile ‘likely caused by Ukraine but not Ukraine’s fault’
Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg is speaking at a news conference following the missile strike on Poland yesterday.
An investigation is ongoing but preliminary analysis “suggests the incident was likely caused by a Ukrainian air defence missile fired to defend Ukrainian territory against Russian cruise missile attacks”, Stoltenberg said.
He added:
Let me be clear, this is not Ukraine’s fault. Russia bears ultimate responsibility as it continues its illegal war against Ukraine.
There is “no indication” that the missile was the result of a deliberate attack or that Russia is preparing offensive military actions against Nato, he added.
In an unexpected move, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints gave its support Tuesday to a proposed federal law that would codify marriages between same-sex couples.
[news release quoted above]
The church’s remarks come after the act’s sponsors added an amendment to the House-passed bill exempting religious organizations, including faith-based universities, from providing “services, accommodations, advantages, facilities, goods or privileges for the solemnization or celebration of a marriage.” Neither could the act be used to alter the tax-exempt status of any organization.
The amendment also specified that the measure did not extend to polygamous marriages. [LOL]
[more from the statement quoted above]
Troy Williams, executive director of Equality Utah, was “heartened to see The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints publicly take this stance today.”
…
Allison Dayton, founder of the Lift and Love foundation for LGBTQ Latter-day Saints, said the church’s message is “huge.”
“It answers, once and for all, the question, ‘Can members of the church support same-sex marriage?’ The answer is yes, and the church does, too [as long as it’s outside of the faith],” Dayton said. “This news is an enormous relief to families of gay children who can now comfortably shower their gay children with the same love and support they give their straight children who marry.”
‘A dramatic reversal’
Taylor Petrey, a religion professor at Michigan’s Kalamazoo College and author of “Tabernacles of Clay: Sexuality and Gender in Modern Mormonism,” called the church’s statement “a dramatic reversal of previous teachings.”
Dating as far back as the 1970s, he said, the faith has combated efforts to legalize same-sex marriage, which it framed “as a threat to children, churches and the nation as a whole.”
These efforts reached a crescendo 14 years ago when the church put its members and its money squarely behind California’s Proposition 8 to oppose same-sex marriage.
The Supreme Court’s ruling legalizing those unions came seven years later. Since then, Latter-day Saint leaders appear to have largely pivoted away from messaging around opposing the legalization of same-sex marriage and have emphasized instead their concern around protections of religious freedom.
…
If the church were to reverse course, Petrey said, now would be the time.
“This summer, when the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade,” he said, “some conservatives suggested that overturning Obergefell, the 2015 decision granting same-sex marriage rights, was next on the chopping block.”
The Respect for Marriage Act was drafted in direct response to that threat.
“That Latter-day Saints have chosen to support the Democratic-backed law in this environment when some conservatives are gearing up to revive this fight,” Petrey said, “signals a major break with other members of the religious right.”
The professor noted that this apparent shift is in keeping with other examples of “growth and accommodation of church teachings” employed by the Latter-day Saint leaders in response to changing social norms, including issues regarding race, birth control, women in the workforce and more.
…
Utah politicians weigh in
Sen. Mitt Romney threw his support behind the latest version of the Respect for Marriage Act, telling The Hill “if that [religious freedom] amendment is attached to the bill, I’ll vote for it.”
Sen. Mike Lee, in contrast, remains unconvinced the changes go far enough in protecting the rights of institutions that may oppose same-sex marriage. [They just reelected this awful person.]
…
Lee’s vote may not prove necessary, however. According to CNN, key senators heading up the effort believe they have the votes needed for it to pass and are calling on the chamber’s Democratic leadership to put it on the floor for a vote as soon as possible.
Utah’s four House representatives — all Republicans and all Latter-day Saints — voted in favor of the act in the summer before the addition of the recent amendment and its exemptions for religious organizations.
Rep. John Curtis said at the time that he did not believe the Supreme Court had any intention of reversing any decisions regarding the right to marry.
“That said, I also understand how important codifying these protections are to many Utahns,” he said. “I do not believe the federal government should infringe upon an individual’s decision about who they wish to marry.”
State Sen. Derek Kitchen, D-Salt Lake City and the only openly queer Utah legislator, also issued a statement, saying the church’s announcement was “a long time coming” and “I applaud their evolution on this subject.”
A ‘milestone’ act
Clifford Rosky, a professor at the University of Utah’s S.J. Quinney College of Law who teaches sexuality and gender law, called the church’s endorsement “wonderful news,” saying he was “thrilled to see both parties in Congress and people of all faiths coming together to respect the right of every American to marry regardless of race or sex.”
He labeled the act a “milestone” of bipartisan deal-making, made all the more impressive by the fact of its taking place in such a polarized political climate.
…
Affirmation, a support group for LGTBTQ Latter-day Saints and their families and friends, “appreciates the work [the church] is doing with outside LGBTQ group to secure housing and employment rights,” Nathan Kitchen, the group’s president, said Tuesday, “as well as its support to codify marriage equality in the United States.”
Yet, a “great disconnect exists between the public sphere and the faith home of LGBTQ people, where Latter-day Saint families are offered less protections and equality within the church for their LGBTQ children than what is granted them by the laws of the land,” he said. “No amount of religious freedom success can compensate for failure within our spiritual home.”
Statement from the bill’s sponsors
The act’s bipartisan sponsors include Sens. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wisc.; Susan Collins, R-Maine; Rob Portman, R-Ohio; Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz.; and Thom Tillis, R-N.C.
Together they released a statement saying “we’ve crafted commonsense language to confirm that this legislation fully respects and protects Americans’ religious liberties and diverse beliefs, while leaving intact the core mission of the legislation to protect marriage equality.”
World Cup organisers have apologised to a Danish television station whose live broadcast from a street in Doha was interrupted by Qatari officials who threatened to their break camera equipment….
Gay Qataris have been promised safety from physical torture in exchange for helping the authorities to track down other LGBTQ+ people in the country, a prominent Qatari doctor and gay rights campaigner has told the Guardian….
As 32 teams gather in Qatar for this most unsettling of World Cups, the following numbers serve as a stark reminder of the human cost of the tournament, as well as the ongoing suffering among migrant workers, women and the LGBTQ+ community in the country.
On Christmas Day three years ago British businessman Marc Bennett was found dead in his four star hotel room in Qatar. He’d been successfully working on the country’s tourism industry but died in unexplained circumstances after being arrested and allegedly tortured by the country’s police. A British coroner ruled there was no evidence of suicidal intent. So what happened?
NEW YORK — Megadonor and novelist MacKenzie Scott announced almost $2 billion in donations to 343 organizations in a short blog post Monday, emphasizing her interest in supporting people from underserved communities…
Scott also repeated a promise first made in December last year to release a database of the organizations to which she’s donated…
Poland’s president, Andrzej Duda, said it was highly probable the rocket, which was Russian-made, was used by the Ukrainian air defence. There were no grounds to believe the incident was an intentional attack, Duda said, or that the rocket had been launched by the Russian side.
Preparations to dismantle Odesa’s controversial Catherine the Great monument began in early November, with the site cordoned off and the figure of the Russian empress covered in a decidedly undignified shroud of black plastic. While final confirmation of Catherine’s removal is still pending, her fate appears to be sealed. She has fallen victim to radical changes in public opinion as Vladimir Putin’s brutal invasion forces Ukrainians to re-evaluate attitudes toward their country’s imperial Russian past.
The Catherine the Great statue in Ukrainian Black Sea port city Odesa has long been one of the country’s most politically controversial monuments. It was unveiled in 2007 during an escalation in Ukraine’s post-Soviet memory wars following the country’s landmark 2004 Orange Revolution. While patriotic Ukrainians were busy erecting monuments to figures from the country’s formerly outlawed national liberation movement, Odesa’s decision to honor the Russian empress with a statue was widely viewed as a defiant and deliberate demonstration of pride in the imperial past.
In the wake of Russia’s 2014 invasion of Crimea and eastern Ukraine, the Ukrainian authorities passed a series of decommunization laws that led to the dismantling of thousands of Soviet era monuments across the country and the renaming of streets, villages, and entire cities. However, this legislation did not apply to the Czarist era and had no impact on the status of Odesa’s Catherine monument.
Although there were no legal grounds for the removal of Catherine, her continued presence often sparked political conflicts within Odesa society and on the national stage. This tension reflected growing demands to reassess the nature of Ukraine’s relationship with Russia as a new generation of Ukrainians increasingly questioned the imperial dogmas established by centuries of Czarist and Soviet official histories.
Many also objected specifically to Catherine and pointed to her personal role as a key figure in the subjugation of Ukraine. While the Russian empress is known internationally as Catherine the Great, significant numbers of Ukrainians object to this title and regard her instead as a notorious tyrant. They note that Catherine extinguished the broad autonomy of the Ukrainian Cossacks and oversaw the aggressive colonization of Ukraine.
Catherine’s eighteenth-century reign is closely associated with the imperial myths that now serve as historical justification for Vladimir Putin’s campaign to reconquer Ukraine and destroy Ukrainian statehood. Under Catherine, Russian imperial power expanded into southern Ukraine and Crimea, with the Czarist authorities posing as pioneers and founders of towns and cities such as Odesa that in reality had already existed in one form or another for centuries.
It was during this period that Catherine’s favorite, Grigory Potemkin, is said to have erected the infamous “Potemkin Villages” along the banks of Ukraine’s Dnipro River in order to create the false impression of a prosperous and happy colony for the visiting empress. Some historians now believe the legend of the Potemkin Villages may itself be a fabrication, but critics of Catherine nevertheless see it as fitting that her oppressive conquest of Ukraine is associated with one of history’s most notorious political deceptions. To them, she is anything but “great.”
Despite this challenging legacy, Odesa’s Catherine the Great monument was broadly popular among residents of the Black Sea port city until the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine began in early 2022. This popularity was not based on support for her actions against Ukrainian statehood or Cossack autonomy; instead, Catherine served as a symbol of the imperial identity that many in Odesa embraced following the Soviet collapse. She embodied the sense of pride Odesites felt over the prominent place occupied by their hometown in Russian imperial history.
Attitudes have changed dramatically since Feb. 24. The shock and trauma of Russia’s invasion has convinced many Odesites to abandon their previous enthusiasm for the city’s Russian imperial heritage and has sparked a surge in public demands for the removal of Catherine.
…
Crucially, Putin has harked back to Catherine the Great in his attempts to provide historical justification for the invasion of Ukraine and the capture of Odesa. Likewise, Kremlin officials and regime proxies have actively revived the term “Novorossiya” (“New Russia”), which was coined during Catherine’s reign to refer to her imperial possessions in southern Ukraine. In areas of Ukraine occupied by Russian forces, Catherine’s legacy has been used to legitimize the Kremlin’s claims. This is part of a conscious attempt to change the optics of the invasion and portray Russia as liberator rather than an aggressor.
Unfortunately for Putin, Odesites have shown little interest in being liberated by him or his soldiers. On the contrary, they have rallied to the defense of their city and have loudly condemned the Russian invasion. One of the many ways in which Odesites have expressed their opposition to Russia’s imperial aggression is by demanding the removal of the city’s Catherine the Great monument.
The Odesa authorities were initially hesitant to bow to public pressure, with Odesa City Council refusing in September to support a proposal to dismantle the Catherine monument. However, following an online public vote, Odesa Mayor Hennadiy Truhanov announced on Nov. 5 that he would now back calls for the removal of the statue. On day later, the monument was fenced in and a notice from the municipal authorities appeared announcing that it would soon be dismantled.
Skeptics caution that the saga of Odesa’s Catherine the Great monument may still be far from over and warn that recent steps could simply be a stalling tactic to ease tensions and prevent further embarrassing acts of vandalism. However, the symbolism of Odesa’s boarded up Russian empress is already undeniable and reflects the city’s decisive turn away from the imperial myth-making that Putin has tried so hard to exploit.
The Kremlin has sought to win Odesites over with a highly sanitized and largely mythical version of history, but Moscow’s appeals to imperial nostalgia have clearly fallen flat. While Putin’s Russia remains trapped in the past, today’s Ukraine is building its identity around a compelling vision of the country’s future as an increasingly self-confident European democracy. This has proved far more persuasive to Odesites than the authoritarianism, isolation, and endless aggression offered by the Putin regime.
For decades, Odesa was arguably Ukraine’s most Russophile city. However, the current invasion has made Russia so toxic that even formerly sympathetic Odesites no longer want anything to do with Moscow’s imperial agenda. Putin claims to be waging war in order to return “historic Russian lands,” but in reality he has only succeeded in convincing Ukrainians that there is no place for Russia in their country’s future, and no place for Russian Empress Catherine the Great in a free Odesa.
“Profile in courage: An unveiled woman inside Iran holds an LGBT pride flag. The former can earn her a prison sentence, the latter can earn her a death sentence.”
My own view (which I recognise is not going to prevail any time soon!) is that professional sport is inevitably a hive of financial corruption, cheating, child abuse, toxic masculinity and nationalism, and golden opportunities for tyrannical regimes to propagandise for themselves. Sport should be for fun and exercise.
ravensays
twitter
Clash Report @clashreport
The armored car of the Russian-installed deputy governor of Kherson, Kirill Stremousov, who allegedly died in an accident in the Kherson region.
Numerous bullet holes are visible on the car.
Kirill Stremousov died in a car accident that was apparently caused by someone firing high powered rifles at his car.
From the pictures of this vehicle, it might have been something like a .50 caliber bullet or a small grenade. The car is clearly an armored car and it is wrecked.
So who did it?
There is a long list of people who would be happy if this guy was dead.
Probably the FSB but it could have been Ukrainian special forces.
I can’t confirm any of this but the timing (as Kherson was rescued), the place, (Russian occupied Crimea), and the guy (weird guy and a traitor) make it likely.
… a Georgia state trial court enjoined enforcement of two sections of Georgia’s Living Infants Fairness and Equality (LIFE) Act which was enacted in 2019. The court invoked Georgia’s “Void Ab Initio” doctrine. Quoting a Georgia Supreme Court case decided in 1900, the court said:
The time with reference to which the constitutionality of an act of the general assembly is to be determined is the date of its passage, and, if it is unconstitutional, then it is forever void.
Applying this, the court concluded that Section 4 which bans most abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected, and Section 11 which requires physicians to file a justification for any abortions where a fetal heartbeat was detected, both were void when enacted and never became the law of Georgia.
However, Section 10 which requires doctors to determine the presence of a human heartbeat before performing an abortion is valid since even before the Dobbs decision, it could be justified as providing the mother with more information about the state of her pregnancy. The court also refused to dismiss a challenge to a provision of the law that authorizes district attorneys to access medical records relating to abortions.
ACLU of Georgia issued a press release
announcing the decision.
Britain’s foreign secretary James Cleverly has tweeted a clip of his address earlier this afternoon in parliament where he said the only reason that missiles were flying through European skies was because of Russia’s aggression.
Poland ‘cannot rule out missile strike was intentional provocation’, says PM
Poland’s prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, has told the Polish parliament that it is possible the incident in which a missile landed in the country was the result of a provocation from the Russian side.
Morawiecki said:
We cannot rule out that the shelling of Ukrainian infrastructure near the border was an intentional provocation done in the hope that such a situation could arise.
“Protestors have entered some Tehran mosques, calling on people to overthrow the Islamic Republic through loudspeakers normally used for the call for prayer etc.
#مهسا_امینی
#MahsaAmini”
Zelenskiy: ‘No doubt’ missile that struck Poland was not Ukrainian
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said he is convinced that the missile that landed in Poland and killed two people on Tuesday evening was not Ukrainian.
Interfax news agency quotes Zelenskiy as saying:
I have no doubt that it was not our rocket.
He said he had received reports from the command of Ukraine’s armed forces and air force and “cannot but trust them”.
He added that he believed Ukraine should have been allowed access to the site of the explosion in eastern Poland, adding:
Can we not say the final conclusions? Do we have the right to be in the investigation team? Of course.
Zelenskiy’s remarks came after Oleksiy Danilov, secretary of Ukraine’s national security and defence council, said Ukraine wanted a “joint study” of Tuesday’s incident with its partners.
CNN: Ukraine tells US, allies it attempted missile interception near Poland.
Ukraine informed the U.S. and its allies that it tried to intercept a Russian missile near and in the timeframe of the missile strike on Poland on Nov. 15, CNN reported, citing a U.S. official.
It is currently unclear whether the missile that hit Poland was the same missile that Ukraine’s military attempted to intercept. Earlier, U.S. President Joe Biden said it is “unlikely in the lines of the trajectory that it [the missile] was fired from Russia, but we’ll see.”
whheydtsays
Re; SC (Salty Current) @ #457…
Given where whatever it was landed, as well as other news that has come up over time, I notice that no one is claiming that it wasn’t launched from Belarus.
ravensays
A Russian battalion just lost half its soldiers.
A battalion is supposedly 600-800 people but Russian battalions tend to be short on personnel.
One wonders how many casualties the Russian people can take before they get tired of this pointless war of choice.
Reportedly, the morale of the survivors isn’t so good for some reason.
One of the Russian battalions has lost 50% of its military personnel in battles for the town of Maiorsk in Donetsk Oblast and has been disbanded.
Source: General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine on Facebook
Quote from the General Staff: “In light of the significant losses in the course of hostilities, the morale among units of occupation forces on the temporarily occupied territories of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts has significantly deteriorated and the instances of desertion have become more frequent.”
Details: The General Staff reported that the 1st Horlivka Territorial Battalion has lost its combat capability following battles in the vicinity of the town of Maiorsk.
“It has lost more than 50% of its active duty personnel, who have been either killed or injured, and the morale of the remaining soldiers is very poor,” the General Staff noted.
Russian command has therefore made a decision to disband the battalion. Surviving military personnel have been transferred to other units.
whheydtsays
Re: raven @ #459…
One wonders what the transferred troops will do to the morale of their “new” units.
whheydt @ #458, it is strange. Belarus was trending for a bit yesterday, but then stopped. Someone suggested that it would be “stupid” for the Russians to launch it from Belarus towards Poland, which I found unconvincing to put it mildly. Someone else said that even Belarus was too far for this type of missile. I didn’t see anyone dispute that but lack the knowledge to evaluate it myself. FWIW, the weapons experts yesterday seemed to think it was a Ukrainian S-300 used for air defense and didn’t mention Belarus at all. It’s odd that the Ukrainians are so insistent that it wasn’t theirs, though, especially since even the people saying that that’s most likely are stating unequivocally (and rightfully) that if it was it of course wasn’t their fault but the Russians’.
NATO has determined the missile was a Ukrainian fired surface-to-air-missile. Also noted that none of this would’ve happened (including the two dead Poles) if Russia wasn’t engaging in an unprovoked war of aggression.
“NSC spox Adrienne Watson: We have seen nothing that contradicts Polish Pres. Duda’s preliminary assessment that this explosion was most likely the result of a Ukrainian air defense missile that unfortunately landed in Poland. will continue to assess & share any new information”
Statement at the (Twitter) link.
“That said, whatever the final conclusions may be, it is clear that the party ultimately responsible for this tragic incident is Russia, which launched a barrage of missiles on Ukraine specifically intended to target civilian infrastructure. Ukraine had – and has – every right to defend itself.”
Despite rejection after rejection, the twice-impeached former president just doesn’t know when to walk away from the fight. I must confess, I didn’t watch Donald Trump’s speech from Mar-a-Lago Tuesday night. Quite frankly, I’m bitter about how much of my life one awful conman has consumed.
Besides, over on ESPN, two epic battles were raging in back-to-back basketball games: Michigan State vs. Kentucky and Kansas vs. Duke. Both games ended in furious comeback wins that were instant classics. Who doesn’t love a good comeback, right? Oh, wait …
In between hoops action, I did keep an eye on social media; while Michigan State and Kansas pulled off epic comeback wins, it seems Donald Trump’s big comeback failed to get off the ground.
As the former president droned on and on, many attendees began heading toward the exits. In fact, so many attendees started to leave during the speech that, according to reporters on the ground, resort staff began blocking people from leaving so the hall wouldn’t empty out during the speech—something that surely would’ve embarrassed and infuriated the most fragile man in the world. [video at the link]
Some attendees didn’t just look bored, they were downright distressed listening to the same old speech. [Tweet and video at the link]
[…] Ivanka, Kushner, Gaetz, and the Mar-a-Lago attendees weren’t the only ones trying to back away from the flop announcement. Fox News pulled the plug and ended their live coverage around 40 minutes into the speech. Over at once-supportive Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post Wednesday, Trump’s announcement was buried on Page 26, brutally describing the insurrection fomenter as “a Florida retiree.” […]
@465: Despite rejection after rejection, the twice-impeached former president just doesn’t know when to walk away from the fight…
I don’t think it matters to him whether he wins, I think he plans to use the fact that he is running to 1) attempt to block investigations and 2) make money.
Sen. Raphael Warnock’s campaign has joined with the Democratic Party of Georgia and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee in a lawsuit challenging a state prohibition on Saturday voting.
Good.
Atlanta Journal Constitution:
Herschel Walker falsely suggested yesterday that early voting won’t be part of Georgia’s Senate runoff election.
Arizona Central:
It took a few days, but in Arizona’s U.S. Senate race, Republican Blake Masters yesterday conceded defeat and congratulated Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly.
Good.
New York Times:
Republican Kari Lake has reportedly not yet decided whether to accept the results of Arizona’s gubernatorial race. The race was called for Gov.-elect Katie Hobbs on Monday.
We visited Kherson today where artillery fire echoed in the distance. Heavy fighting continues across the region, as Ukrainian troops are attempting to consolidate their gains.
Meanwhile, people are assessing the extent of the damage wreaked by eight long months of Russian occupation, as they are still dealing with no electricity and water.
To believe that Donald Trump was responsible for “the greatest economy in the history of the world” is to believe a ridiculous and demonstrable lie.
[…] A variety of worthwhile fact-check reports were published overnight, and they’re well worth your time to fully appreciate the avalanche of dishonesty Trump dumped on his audience. But a New York Times report highlighted a claim of particular interest.
Trump falsely claimed, as he has previously done almost 300 times, to have passed the “largest tax cut and reform in the history of our country by far” despite the 2017 tax cut ranking below several others. He also boasted once more to having presided over the “greatest economy.” Annual average growth, even before the coronavirus pandemic decimated the economy, was lower under Trump than under recent former Presidents Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan.
Abandoning all subtlety, the Republican at one declared that he and his team “built the greatest economy in the history of the world.”
Before we get into why this is so bonkers, it’s worth pausing to appreciate the significance of the lie. For Trump and many of his allies, this is the linchpin to the Republican’s success: Many voters, they believe, might be bothered by Trump’s corruption, bigotry, ignorance, incompetence, mismanagement, abuses, affection for dictators, divisiveness, and overt rejection of democracy, but there’s a significant chunk of the electorate that will prioritize their wallets above all other considerations.
[…] The point is not that the economy was awful during Trump’s first three years. Rather, by every relevant metric — job growth, economic growth, wages, manufacturing, et al. — the economy was mediocre by contemporary standards. […]
Republican Senators Chuck Grassley, John Barrasso and Pat Toomey have all repeated Trump’s lies.
“JUST IN: The probability of Russia conquering Ukraine militarily is ‘close to zero’, says Gen. Milley, in rare Pentagon press conference. Milley predicts Russia military will continue fighting through the winter but ‘is hurting bad’.”
NOW: Jonathan Crisp calls JESSICA WATKINS to the stand to testify in her own defense. She wasn’t expected to take the stand. Her fiancé, Montana Siniff, testified last week.
…
Here we go. Jessica Watkins is on the stand. Unclear how much Jonathan Crisp actually got to prep her for this. Very much seems she decided to take the stand at the last minute.
…
Watkins says she experienced gender dysphoria as early as four years old. Was still identifying as a man when she joined the Army.
“I tried very much to bury it,” Watkins says. “I had a very strict Christian upbringing. A lot of physical punishment.”
“After I came back from Afghanistan I was struggling a lot,” Watkins says. “I was doing some research [into being trans]. I let a battle buddy in my unit borrow my laptop, and long story short, he confronted me.”
“He came into my room, slammed the door, threw my laptop in front of me and yelled, ‘I know what you are, f****t,'” Watkins says.
After that encounter, Watkins panicked and went AWOL for more than two months. Went to Alaska. Eventually turned herself in to police.
Watkins had an Article 15 hearing and eventually was discharged from the Army. When she came out to her parents, “I was asked never to come home again,” she says. “It was dark.”
(Watkins apparently decided to testify last night.)
Crisp: “We’ve seen evidence of you using f-word slurs. Why?”
Watkins: “I think a lot of that has to do with internalizing emotions wrong. I think it has to do with lashing out at others like I’ve been lashed out at.”
Watkins got a contract with security contractor Triple Canopy after the service, but it didn’t work out. She then became a firefighter, which she loved. That fell apart eventually and, amid mounting debt, she moved home to Ohio to live w/ her parents, who’d come to accept her.
Watkins smiles as she recalls her parents buying her “girly things” for Christmas the first year she returned home as a way to show they now accepted her identity.
Watkins on why she doesn’t consider herself part of the trans community: “It’s a painful thing for me. It’s nothing something to wave a flag about. There’s a lot of painful memories.”
Watkins and fiancé Montana Siniff formed the Ohio State Regular Militia in 2015, but its purpose changed during the summer of 2020. Watkins says she thought there would be more violence from protesters if Trump was re-elected. Began to call it a militia.
…
Watkins says the OSRM went to Louisville four times for a total of six days. She says she thought the killed of Breonna Taylor was awful, she did a lot of research about it. Was there because the Oath Keepers were asked to protect businesses.
Watkins went to the Million MAGA March in November 2020 w/ the Oath Keepers.
“The Million MAGA March did not feel professional,” she says. “We were there to protect Alex Jones and Roger Stone from counter-protesters, and all of that fell apart.”
Crisp directs Jessica Watkins to get into some of the conspiracy theories she believed in. She says she thought the United Nations might invade. Talks about a joint exercise in Canada that would have had 80-90,000 Chinese troops massed on the border.
“I thought the United Nations was going to come here and go door-to-door with vaccines, and I didn’t want that,” Watkins says. “I gave it a 50/50 shot.”
Jessica Watkins describes herself as “gullible.”
“I got a steady diet of Alex Jones and InfoWars,” she says. “That’s how I discovered the Oath Keepers.”…
The former president officially announced his candidacy for the 2024 presidential election on Tuesday evening in front of a rowdy crowd at his Mar-a-Lago estate. That single act of formally declaring his re-election bid triggers Meta policies preventing the company’s third party fact-checkers from intervening on politicians’ posts. And even though Trump himself remains banned on most major platforms, the fact-checking ban still applies to content crafteted by him that’s then shared by others on the plattform, according to a company wide memo obtained by CNN…
ravensays
I don’t think it matters to him whether he wins, I think he plans to use the fact that he is running to 1) attempt to block investigations and 2) make money.
Yeah, that was my thought as well.
Trump is an attention seeker. He lives for attention.
He also uses it to make money.
Attention builds his Trump brand.
And he has formed PAC after PAC to raise money, a lot of money, that somehow usually ends up in his bank accounts.
It’s an easy scam and easy money.
Almost all of the parts of the Iranian drones are from the West.
Three quarters of the parts are American.
The computer components are American, many from Texas Instruments. One of the cameras is Israeli. Another camera is Japanese.
The motor is Austrian.
Intelligence finds Western supply chain behind Iran’s drones used by Russia in Ukraine – WSJ
2022/11/16 – 18:18 • LATEST NEWS UKRAINE
Ukrainian intelligence finds that components of Iranian drones, including Mohajer-6, were produced by U.S, Japanese and Israeli companies, The Wall Street Journal reported.
According to Ukraine’s analysis, three-quarters of the components are American-made. The servomotors in the Mohajer-6, which allow operators to maneuver the unmanned craft through the air, were made by Japan’s Tonegawa-Seiko Co. The high-resolution telescopic infrared lens used in the Mohajer-6 is identical to a model made by an Israeli firm, Ophir Optronics Solutions Ltd.
Russia began using Iranian drones after Ukrainian battlefield successes to attack its critical infrastructure.
[…] Republican office holders conspicuously avoided Mar-a-Lago for Trump’s “special announcement.” Even Trumpophilic Rep. Matt Gaetz (Fla.) begged off, claiming bad weather kept him from flying from Washington to Palm Beach, when in fact air travel Tuesday was normal. Reporters spotted only one current member of Congress: Rep. Madison Cawthorn of North Carolina — and he was defeated in a primary.
[…] Trump aide Jason Miller promised a 35-minute, “very forward-looking” speech. Instead, it was interminable, meandering and, well, low-energy, as Trump kept departing from the teleprompter into gibberish.
[…] He spoke nonsense: “I’ve gone decades — decades — without a war, the first president to do it that long,” he said of his four-year term.
[…] Trump saw a “failing nation” beset by “festering rot and corruption,” run by “radical lunatics” who are “leading us to the brink of nuclear war.”
It was desultory and random, bouncing from supposed long-ago conversations with China’s president, to his belief that “you won’t get” a turkey for Thanksgiving, to the FBI’s seizure of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago, to urban “cesspools of blood,” to imitating former German chancellor Angela Merkel’s accent.
[…] Karl Marx, of all people, anticipated the Donald Trump of 2022, when he noted that great personages of history occur twice, “the first time as tragedy, the second as farce.”
[…] the number of Trump supporters lining the intracoastal waterway, or driving back and forth in trucks and motorcycles waving “Trump 2024” and “Let’s Go, Brandon” banners, numbered not in the thousands nor even the hundreds but the dozens.
[…] The Trump campaign seemed to be compensating for the lack of respect. No fewer than 33 flags jammed the stage in the gilded Mar-a-Lago ballroom, with its 15 massive chandeliers and mirrored walls. Banners and big screens demanded “Make America Great Again!” (The urgent exclamation point has been added.) […]
This is now a NATO problem, but it’s also a Poland problem. If I was Poland, I would immediately strike back at Russian forces in Russia. And you say, “Hannity, you’re going to start a nuclear war.” No, I’m not looking to start a nuclear war. I’m looking to prevent a nuclear war. I’m looking to prevent this from now getting far worse. The only thing that should matter here is that there be a quick and appropriate response.
Correction: It would have been a NATO problem if it was a confirmed hostile strike on Poland by Russia. It was not time yet for Poland to “immediately strike back at Russian forces in Russia,” no matter how much Sean Hannity was enjoying this game of “If I Was Poland.” […]
And you say “Hannity, you’re going to start a nuclear wear.” And the answer is yes, he could have, because if he had done that and it turned out the Russian strike was a mistake, then Hannity/Poland’s strike on Russia would have been the first strike.
Of course, in one way we are happy to hear a Fox News primetime host be so willing to hold Russia accountable for its actions. He should have some friendly dad chats with the guy in the timeslot next to his.
For some reason that Hannity “If I Was Poland” monologue reminds us of how Hannity talks about his MMA workouts.
“We have days we call ‘keeping it real,’ ” he said. “And keeping it real is like this guy who’s so big and so strong, and he’s coming up to me all throughout an hour-and-15-minute session and putting me in chokeholds, seeing how I respond to a gun to my head. You know, how do I deal with blades? And then another day is pain day, and then literally you put out your arms, ‘Boom, boom, boom.’ ” He mimed a hammer-punching motion against his forearm and stomach. “It’s made me stronger than I’ve ever been in my life.”
62-37, Senate advances bill to protect same-sex marriage. It still needs to clear another 60-vote procedural hurdle, pass the Senate by a simple majority and pass the House. But very clear sign that this is poised to become law this year.
GOP senators who voted yes: Sen. Susan Collins, Sen Lisa Murkowski, Sen. Rob Portman, Sen. Mitt Romney, Sen. Thom Tillis, Sen. Roy Blunt, Sen. Cynthia Lummis, Sen. Richard Burr,, Shelley Moore Capito, Dan Sullivan, Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa, Sen. Todd Young, per @alizaslav
I don’t think it matters to him whether he wins – Reginald Selkirk@467
How is it people can so completely fail to understand Trump after all this time? Of course it matters to him whether he wins, and of course he’s persuaded himself he will! People said in 2016 that he didn’t really want to win the presidency, that he would find an excuse to back out, or lose deliberately. Once he’d won, people said he would not take up the post. Once he did, they said he was looking for a way to resign. Then people said he wouldn’t stand again. Not only does he crave power over others without limit, his ego won’t let him end his career as a “loser”.
New Twitter CEO and sole director Elon Musk sent a companywide email to remaining employees of the social media business on Wednesday, demanding they commit to working “long hours at high intensity” or receive “three months of severance,” if they did not consent to these conditions, or support his vision for “Twitter 2.0.”
The companywide ultimatum, sent around midnight in San Francisco time and shared with CNBC, comes after Musk has already fired key Twitter executives, laid off half of Twitter’s full-time employees, and slashed the number of contractors working with the company without notice. This week, he also fired veteran engineers at Twitter after they criticized him in public, or in the company’s internal Slack channels.
[…] Musk now plans a revised Twitter Blue Verified release on Nov. 29th. [LOL]
[…]
Wisconsin state Assembly, Robin Vos, a Republican, said some stupid stuff about abortion laws in his state:
[…] while he claimed he believed in exceptions [for rape and incest] and that the law should be changed to reflect that, he didn’t specify how he wanted the exceptions to be made until this week. Vos doesn’t want to just add exceptions for rape and incest to the abortion policy, he also wants survivors to provide a police report and prove they are victims of sexual assault or incest before they receive permission to obtain an abortion.
[…] Requiring a police report and forcing victims to obtain permission is not only insensitive but “cruel and unusual punishment” for survivors.
“We do know that the overwhelming number of sexual assaults that occur are not reported, and forcing a person who has experienced sexual assault or rape or incest to report that trauma when they’re not ready to be able to face this flies in the face of all evidence-based policy making,” said Senate Minority Leader Melissa Agard.
A federal judge ruled Tuesday that the U.S. government can no longer use a Covid-era policy that allowed authorities to severely limit asylum-seekers from crossing the border into the country. U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan vacated the controversial rule, known as Title 42, which U.S. Customs and Border Protection has used to turn back migrants at the border before they could make asylum claims.
A longtime executive at the Trump Organization [Allen Weisselberg] took the witness stand Tuesday for the first time to testify against his employer in a criminal tax fraud case against the company, telling jurors that Donald Trump had been aware of the unusual pay structure for high-level employees.
“Unusual,” is not the right word. It was an arrangement set up to allow executives to cheat on their taxes. It was tax fraud. It was a criminal scheme.
Stating that “no one’s ever done this before,” Donald J. Trump announced plans to be impeached for a historic third time.
Speaking to supporters in a ballroom at Mar-a-Lago, the former President claimed that he and only he could bring impeachable offenses back to the White House.
Although he was short on specifics about which crimes he might commit, Trump pledged, “We’re gonna perpetrate so much, you’re gonna get tired of perpetrating.”
He contrasted his record for getting impeached with that of his successor, Joe Biden, who, he claimed, “is too low-energy to commit a felony.”
“Joe Biden has been President for almost two years, and how many impeachments does he have to show for it? Zero,” he said. “The rest of the world is looking at us with a President who can’t get a single impeachment, and they’re laughing at us. Laughing at us. This should never be allowed to happen in this country.”
“The head of Belarus’ Border Committee complained this morning about Ukraine’s hostile [LOL] actions: ‘They have mined the border area, blown up almost all the bridges in the Gomel and Mozyr regions. Now they are destroying all the bridges in the Volyn region. All roads are impassable’.”
“MICHIGAN: Fox News can project that Michigan Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer will prevail over Republican former TV host Tudor Dixon.”
Jocelyn Benson has also been re-elected as Secretary of State.
From the responses:
“Michigan pennsylvania and New York all deserve what’s coming”
“We do and we’re ecstatic!”
NBC and CNN have both called Washington Senate for Democrat Patty Murray.
“Democrat Greg Landsman wins Ohio’s 1st congressional district, defeating Republican Rep. Steve Chabot, @NBCNews projects.
That’s a Dem flip.
(Also in Ohio, Rep. Marcy Kaptur wins in the 9th district and Emilia Sykes wins in the 13th district. Dem holds.)”
FT: “The Republican wave has failed to materialise in early election results…”
Wow:
“Decision Desk HQ projects Wiley Nickel (D) wins election to the U.S. House in North Carolina’s 13th Congressional District.
R to D Flip. (This is the second “Likely R” race to flip from our forecast.)
#DecisionMade: 11:50pm EST”
“BREAKING: California votes ‘yes’ on Proposition 1, a ballot measure to codify the right to abortion in the state’s constitution”
Re: SD (Salty Current) @ #3…
That is good news. Polling was getting close towards the end.
whheydt, Vermont, California, and now Michigan: “BREAKING: Michigan approves constitutional amendment to protect abortion, reproductive rights, NBC News projects
The amendment includes protections for abortion, contraception, prenatal care, postpartum care, miscarriage management, sterilization and infertility”
“NBC CALLS IT: John Fetterman wins Pennsylvania Senate race, defeating TV doctor Mehmet Oz and flipping key state for Democrats”
Well, I am (to a considerable extent) delighted to be proved (to a considerable extent) wrong! The Guardian still has the Republicans as likely to gain a small majority in the House*, but most of its coverage is: “Where’s the expected Red Wave?”. Without any acknowledgement, so far, that it got it wrong with its recent “Poised for sweeping gains” headlines. The polling post-mortems could be interesting: was the problem, as DK and Wonkette writers seemed to think, a deliberate Republican push to control the narrative with partisan polls, or a more ordinary failure on the part of pollsters to adjust their expectations of who was likely to vote?
*Which will of course stymie any legislative progress if it happens, but in my judgement would probably not seriously limit aid to Ukraine, on which the Republicans are split.
Warnock vs Walker: Georgia U.S. Senate still too close to call, runoff likely
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian (support them if you can!) Ukraine liveblog. From there:
Also from the Guardian liveblog:
A runoff between Walker and Warnock is bad news. There’s a Glibertarian with 2.1% of the vote, which would likely go the way of the brain-damaged former footballer.
George Monbiot with one of my favorite pieces in the Guardian possibly ever – “There’s one big subject our leaders at Cop27 won’t touch: livestock farming”:
Also in the Guardian:
“Iranian leaders resist growing demands for referendum on constitution”: “Hardline parliamentarians insist only response to recent unrest is for violent protesters to be executed…” (Tea and cake or death!)
“‘Exceptional’ trove of 24 ancient statues found immersed in Tuscan spa”: “Collection of bronzes dating back 2,300 years sheds light on transition between Etruscans and Romans…”
“Elon Musk sells Tesla shares worth $4bn”: “Musk said he was done selling Tesla stock back in August, before Twitter’s legal action sealed the deal for the $44bn takeover…”
Toomas Ilves:
:)
All three states that had abortion on the ballot won by large margins.
In Michigan, a state with a rabid forced birther lobby, the constitutional amendment won by an 11% margin.
This says a lot about how representative our current US Supreme Court is.
Great:
“Democrat Gabe Vasquez is the apparent winner in #NM’s redrawn 2nd Congressional District, a seat currently held by Republican Yvette Herrell. The outcome of the race could have big national implications:…
Currently, 1,015 votes separate the two candidates — or just outside the 0.25% margin to trigger an automatic recount under state law.”
First Sentence Ever Found in Ancient Alphabet, and It’s About Beard Lice
!!! – Guardian liveblog:
Kid Rock calls out Oprah
Do they have enough for real control, or just Manchin control?
“New Mexico votes to make universal pre-K a universal right.
This is a big deal: 28% of children under 5 in the state live in poverty [outrageous]. The initiative could signal to other states and the federal government that child care is not just needed but popular.”
Guardian liveblog:
Please Don’t Lick the DMT Toads, Begs the National Park Service
“BREAKING
Russian High Command has issued a general retreat to all surviving Russian forces at the Western bank of the Dnipro River. Around 40,000 Russian troops are now officially running.“
The Ukrainians have liberated Snihurivka.
“Moment Surovikin and Shoygu admit defeat in the Kherson direction and announce the withdrawal of troops….”
Subtitled video at the (Twitter) link.
@snarkrates #11: The mere fact that the race was even close has got to be the most god-damned appalling thing I’ve seen in the news since … well … hmmm …
… last week.
@SC #14: Huh?
Ukraine update: Russian state media reports that forces have been ordered to withdraw from Kherson
Reginald Selkirk @ #21, “Democrats will have a 56-54 majority in the Michigan House of Representatives.
Control of the Senate will either be a 20-18 majority or a 19-19 tie with a Democratic lieutenant governor serving as the tiebreaker.”
So more like Manchin control, but far preferable to Republican control!
Followup to comment 29.
More from the Ukraine update:
Good news coming soon?
Link
Trump lost 40 house seats in his first midterm.
Obama lost 63
Clinton lost 52
Reagan lost 26
Carter lost 15
Biden’s house is a dead heat.
OUTSTANDING night for dems 💙💙
quotetheunquote @ #28, it’s a wonderfully apt lyric from “Ripple.”
The forced birthers lost in deep Red Kentucky as well.
This constitutional amendment would have prohibited revising the Kentucky constitution to permit abortion.
@30: Oh, you meant the state house and senate. Anyway; good news.
Probably to be followed soon by “Moments Surovkin and Shoygu fell out of windows”
Ron Johnson has won reelection to the Senate in Wisconsin, unfortunately (and shamefully for Wisconsin).
Lynna @ #32, last night I considered staying up to see if Boebert lost. I’m glad I didn’t try!
“MAGA candidates in key races conceding so far is notable and something not to be taken for granted”
Ohio man’s murder by neighbor angry he was a Democrat realizes far right’s lethal fantasy
“Decision Desk HQ projects Sen. Raphael Warnock (D) and Herschel Walker (R) advance to a runoff for U.S. Senate in Georgia.
#DecisionMade: 11:42am EST”
Schadenfreude moment:
https://twitter.com/CHueyBurns/status/1590206409118883840
Note the “TAKE BACK …” slogan … and the empty room. Very nicely pitiful.
“lol he killed the ‘official’ check mark like hours after it was instituted. he has no fucking clue what he’s doing and i’m just going to laugh at this catastrophe while he fucks up until it all crashes”
“Ukrainian officials are reacting with suspicion to Russia’s Kherson withdrawal announcement. Mykolaiv oblast governor Vitaly Kim just now: ‘if Russians say one thing, it means they’re doing the opposite’.”
Additional schadenfreude moments:
From last night:
And there’s this:
https://twitter.com/Timodc/status/1590229822785355777
Sad!
@ SC: Aha, a Dead song, the title of which I did not know. Thanks for the reference, I’m of the age to know it, but had never heard of it.
@Lynna OM, #33: Yes, looked at from that perspective, I can see (as a Socialist Pinko foreigner) that this is relatively good news.
Beau of the Fifth Column has a good take on it over on his channel. (YT link).
Update on Boebert election in Colorado.
This is truly amazing.
Boebert is in a red district and still managing to lose.
The other fruitbat crazy is doing well though.
Georgia · District 14
99% reporting
Marjorie Taylor Greene
Republican Party
65.9%
169,988 votes
Marcus Flowers
Democratic Party
34.1%
88,025 vote
Cthulhu can only imagine what MTG’s district in Georgia is like.
AOC is doing even better than MTG in New York, with 71% of the vote.
New York · District 14
60% reporting
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
Democratic Party
70.6%
78,788 votes
Tina Forte
Republican Party
27.5%
30,661 votes
Desi Cuellar
Conservative Party of New York State
1.9%
2,128 votes
A name I had hoped I’d never have to hear again.
WaPo Live Updates:
Kansas’s Kobach, immigration hardliner, makes a comeback
By Annie Gowen
In France, all large parking lots now have to be covered by solar panels
An under-the-radar win for abortion rights in the dark red state of Montana.
In Montana the state Supreme Court has ruled that abortion is guaranteed by individual privacy rights made explicit by the framers of Montana’s 50-year-old constitution. Although one seat wouldn’t have changed the balance of power on the court, this is a clear sign of the heavily Republican population’s view on abortion.
Walkouts of state legislators is a tactic to block voting on bills that would pass otherwise. By denying a quorum.
It is an anti-democracy measure for a minority to block a majority.
Oregon just made it a lot harder.
Walkouts longer than 10 days mean that you can’t run for reelection.
The vote wasn’t even close at 68%.
Link
WaPo:
In Michigan, Kildee wins reelection
By Mariana Alfaro
How did election-denying secretary of state candidates fare?
For democracy advocates, the good news is that a lot of election-denying secretary of state candidates lost. The bad news is, there were other contests.
Democrats take control of the Minnesota Legislature
The stunning upset gives the party complete control over state government next year.
Red-state voters back Medicaid expansion, extending ACA coverage
South Dakota may be one of the nation’s reddest red states, but its voters embraced Medicaid expansion through the ACA anyway.
Josh Marshall:
Josh Really Just Operating on Fumes Now Blog
Mark Sumner, updating the post @ Lynna’s #29:
Update – WESH2 in Orlando – “Tropical Storm Nicole battering Florida coast as it strengthens”:
Two Good Posts Sh*tting On Electoral Kiss-Of-Death Loser Donald Trump Deserve Another!
https://www.wonkette.com/midterm-results-donald-trump-loser
“NEW: At least fourteen of Donald Trump’s handpicked candidates are projected to have lost their election bids — leaving the former president ‘fuming’, sources say.”
Meta lays off 11,000 workers; Zuckerberg says his investments didn’t pay off
Zuck looks like an actual adult compared to Elon Musk. He admits his estimates were off instead of blaming ‘the libs’.
More from Wonkette:
Link
Link
Obviously, G_d is punishing Floriduh for re-electing Ron DeSantis.
Twitter Is Offering Government Officials and Major Brands a Free but Confusing ‘Official’ Gray Checkmark
Musk-led Twitter rolls out new “Official” tags, removes them hours later
It sounds like they have a very stable genius running their company.
Octopuses Caught on Camera Throwing Shells at Each Other
@ 70:
Ummm… Considering the medium in which they exist, is that even threatening? Don’t get me wrong, the behavior itself is fascinating. but I’ve done my fair share of swimming and I’ve tried to throw things underwater. The thown object doesn’t go very far, very fast.
“Tina Kotek wins Oregon governor’s race, fending off strongest Republican bid in a decade”
WaPo:
By Joanna Slater
I’m not sure why they say it was “unique.” California had Proposition 30 on the ballot, which would have imposed a 1.75% tax on the personal income of California residents earning at least $2 million and used that revenue for zero-emission vehicle subsidies and electric-vehicle (EV) charging stations, and for programs to prevent and suppress wildfires.
Prop 30 was supported by the Democratic party, public-health advocates and environmental, labor, and firefighters’ groups. Yet it was soundly defeated, after being opposed by Gavin Newsom, going against his party, and others, mainly from the tech industry, who portrayed it as a money grab by Lyft, the biggest backer of the measure.
But a spokesman for the Prop. 30 campaign said Lyft would have received none of the money from the tax revenue, a point underscored by Lyft Chief Executive Logan Green, who said in a blog post: “We are committed to achieving 100% vehicle electrification regardless of Proposition 30’s outcome.”
The Prop. 30 campaign conceded late Tuesday, releasing a statement that read in part: “Polls showed that a majority of voters supported Prop. 30 until thirty of the richest people in the world spent tens of millions of dollars on lies and disinformation…..”
The Russians aren’t even collecting the bodies of their dead soldiers.
Another indication that their army isn’t very competent.
I’m sure this is doing wonders for their army’s morale.
@ 41
It’s “incomprehensible” not when you when you understand the right wing’s mindset: It’s not just that liberals and Democrats are “wrong” it’s that also that they are irremediably, literally-diabolically “evil.” The liberals want to murder babies in the womb and even kill them right after their born. then sell their tiny body parts. They want to let sexual perverts (i.e. the LGBTQ community) rape your children, groom to be sex slaves and future predators, and, as Alex Jones so eloquently put it, “cut off little boys penises.” They want to tax you into poverty while showering the undeserving “welfare queens” and “strapping young bucks” with welfare. Meanwhile, business are run into the ground to protect snail darters and spotted owls. They want black and brown “thugs” from BLM and Antifa to burn down the suburbs just like they did the big cities. They want to take away their guns, which ownership is guaranteed by the scared write that is the Bill or Rights, leaving them not only vulnerable to the aforementioned “thugs” but from the government who desires to control every aspect of their lives. They also want to take away your Bible and make Christianity illegal like they did in China and Cuba and make your violate your values. They want to tell you what words to use and what to think about .
They are communists! They are Marxists! They hate achievement and success! They hate white, male, heterosexual, Christians! They hate America! They hate you!
And that’s just the mild version of the narrative. Throw in some Q Anon theories and it’s a wonder why these murders don’t happen more often
“A U.S. military official said Wednesday that ‘as far as we can tell’, it appears the Russian withdrawal from Kherson is underway.”
WaPo:
Last-minute Texas court ruling affects late ballots cast in Harris County
By Molly Hennessy-Fiske
Ancient Rome: Stunningly preserved bronze statues found in Italy
Mark Sumner:
I was already partying way back @ #26 above. :)
Edit @ 75
It’s not “incomprehensible” when you when you understand…
“AP calls PA7 for Dem Susan Wild – completing a Democratic sweep of all the top races in Pennsylvania.
There were 3 PA House seats Rs thought they could win, PA7, PA8, PA17, but Dems held them all”
“Decision Desk HQ projects John James (R) wins election to the U.S. House in Michigan’s 10th Congressional District.
D to R Flip.
#DecisionMade: 3:46pm EST”
All the Anti-Abortion Assholes Who Lost Their Elections
“BREAKING: Republican Zach Nunn wins election to U.S. House in Iowa’s 3rd Congressional District, beating incumbent Rep. Cindy Axne. #APracecall at 2:20 p.m. CST.”
And there was another R pickup recently announced. On the other hand, Boebert still appears to be in trouble with 91% of the vote in.
Resident’s torment by stranger shouting porridge through letterbox
Gold coin discovered in Newfoundland could be oldest English coin in Canada
A puzzle, but not an impossible one. The coin could have been dropped or placed there any time after it was minted, and up until the time it was found.
CNN has a liveblog for storm Nicole.
How the Republican Fringe Became the Mainstream
“NBC: Some U.S. and Western officials think neither side can win and see winter as a shot at diplomacy”
WTF is with these reports?! It’s like every time Russia suffers a massive defeat they manage to get these idiotic articles printed.
LOL. (Twitter link.)
Viruses devastate Salinas Valley lettuce
“Reporter: Russia had claimed they had evacuated from Kherson
Biden: I found it interesting that they waited till after the election to make that judgement”
Video at the (Twitter) link. Says “we’ve” known it was coming for a while.
How Ukrainian berries find their way abroad
Dang it, here in Los Angeles there are two very important local races that are still too close to call. (This being Los Angeles, in both cases both candidates are nominally Democrats, but that doesn’t make them good for the offices they’re running for… although, sure, none of them is a Trumpist Republican election-denier, so it could be worse.)
The incumbent sheriff of Los Angeles, Alex Villanueva, is almost comically corrupt and horrible. And despite that, he’s still getting a disturbing share of the votes. As of the latest count, his opponent has about a 13% lead, so it does look like he’s likely to lose (fortunately!), but the percentage of votes counted is low enough that it’s not a sure thing. (His opponent, Robert Luna, is nobody to write home about either, but at least he’s not a cartoon villain.)
Meanwhile, one of the candidates for the mayoral race, Rick Caruso, is a Bloombergeque billionaire who used to be a Republican and very recently changed his party affiliation to Democrat (after going ten years as “No Party Preference”) probably only because he thought he’d have a better chance of winning the election that way. And unlike Villanueva, he is currently leading in the reported results, though only by a few percent. (His opponent, Karen Bass, is a centrist establishment Democrat who’s not great either, and I didn’t vote for her or Caruso in the primaries, but at least she wouldn’t be nearly as bad as Caruso.)
Trans Influencer Nikita Dragun Reportedly Being Held in a Men’s Prison
Very interesting piece – “How Online Mobs Act Like Flocks Of Birds.”
Bonus starling video at the link, too.
CNN liveblog:
This storm is getting so little attention I almost feel sorry for it.
“Russian expert: ‘Republicans performed much worse than everyone had predicted… This is because of the Trump factor, this is clearly his fault. He butted into this electoral campaign and with his odious nature, pushed away those who were on the fence’.”
His “odious nature.”
Ukraine update: Towns across Kherson region reported liberated as Russia announces withdrawal
Mandatory Evacuation Ordered for Mar-A-Lago
@100 – I saw the headline and hoped it was something from Andy Borowitz.
Associated Press:
Donald Trump Urged to Evacuate Mar-a-Lago Before Hurricane Nicole Hits
NPR:
Universal free lunch ballot measure passes easily in Colorado
November 9, 20224:31 PM ET / JOHN DALEY – COLORADO PUBLIC RADIO
SC @97: “This storm is getting so little attention I almost feel sorry for it.”
Like an otherwise excellent movie that has the bad luck to hit the theaters at the same time as the latest MCU, Star Wars, and Bond flicks.
_
Re: cicely @ #105…
Took me a bit to unpack MCU. My first thought was that theaters aren’t likely very interested in microcontroller units.
#100 – #101
grins
I was sure, absolutely sure, that it was an Andy Borowitz title as well! Something about the cadence, it’s just like one. (Plus the fact that it’s really, really hard to tell fact from fiction these days).
Tweet o’ the day.
MAGA tears flow around the internet, and we are here for it
WTF?
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/11/18/1996595/&v=20221103
“It could have been supporters of the AG or it could have been his detractors. There is absolutely no way of knowing at this time, so let’s not bandy about wild speculation.”
Transparent, that is.
Fucking propaganda, I know it when I see it, when it’s so overt.
Bah.
JM
The author states multiple times that they are wildly speculating about possible motives for what appears to be a targeted murder of two lawyers. In the world of corrupt politicians, Paxton is a long time player who (as also reported) is facing some serious legal consequences from very serious government agencies.
None of the speculations (even the lawn signs) seems outside the realm of possibility. It’s Texas after all. Home of guns and quite a few maga seditionists.
Tethys:
FFS. “so let’s not bandy about wild speculation”, the author writes, even as “The author states multiple times that they are wildly speculating” — in your very own words.
(Surely you don’t imagine you’re somehow disputing me thereby!)
Basically, the credibility of that site is thereby established.
Anyway, let’s see…
https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/daily-kos/
Generous assessment, from what I’ve seen. I have higher standards.
The author overtly stated that it is biased wild speculation John. Good of you to pick up on that!
:)
So long as we know what it is, I’m good with it.
We concur.
An old / baby / recently discovered / froma decade ago paradoxical stunning supernova find here :
https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2022-11-10/hubble-telescope-detects-supernova-from-early-universe/101630264
By the Hubble Space Telescope.
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From their latest summary:
Also from there:
Here’s the tweet with the video.
Aditya Chakrabortty in the Guardian – “Discipline the poor, protect the rich – it’s the same old Tories, same old class war”:
Also in the Guardian:
“Prominent Iranian actor removes mandatory headscarf in defiant protest”:
(Photo at the link. I like her wallpaper.)
“Taliban ban women from parks and funfairs in Afghan capital”:
“Unseen Kristallnacht photos published 84 years after Nazi pogrom”:
CNN has a new Nicole liveblog today. From there:
April Ryan: “Four years ago in the East Room of the White House I was told to sit down during a press conference on midterm election results. I tried to ask about voter suppression. I was continuously told to ‘sit down’. Four years later,yesterday I was able to ask three questions.”
LOL. (Twitter link.)
“WSJ EDITORIAL BOARD: ‘.. a perfect record of electoral defeat. .. he has led Republicans into one political fiasco after another’.”
The title of the editorial is “Trump Is the Republican Party’s Biggest Loser.”
Guardian liveblog:
Re #16 above – Daily Kos elections:
Julia Davis:
Subtitled video and DB link at the (Twitter) link. Blatant imperialism on display, but I was a bit distracted by the size of one guy’s suit. The knot in his tie is like half the size of his head.
Illia Ponomarenko:
Guardian liveblog:
Right outside the city.
Where things stand:
Guardian liveblog:
Mark Sumner: “I am so going to do a new map later today.” :D
KFC apologises after German Kristallnacht promotion
Ukraine update: Snihurivka, Kyselivka, Bruskynske liberated. Ukraine advances across Kherson region
Oh, good. We always had lots of derogatory nicknames for Hair Furor, but now Trump is now attracting derogatory nicknames from the rightwing.
Right-wing media takes aim at ‘Trumpty Dumpty’ after the red wave that wasn’t
Re: Lynna, OM @ #135…
Wishful thinking department…Maybe–just maybe–this time the Republican party will fragment.
Guardian liveblog:
(As Mark Sumner also mentioned in the post @ #134:)
The Kyiv Post tweet:
Hee.
More Ukraine Update:
Link
More details, maps, videos and images at the link.
Midterm elections … a few summary versions of news:
Link
Another name no one wanted to see again.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican Ryan Zinke wins election to U.S. House in Montana’s 1st Congressional District.
To refresh memories, Zinke was Trump’s Interior Secretary for two years until he left amid mounting misconduct allegations. A federal investigation found Zinke misused his position to advance a development project in his Montana hometown and failed to disclose details of his involvement when questioned. Investigators also found that he misused his authority to direct subordinates to help with the project.
And here he is again, rising from the ashes to a seat in Congress.
The problem(s) with Mike Pence taking aim at the Lincoln Project
To hear Mike Pence tell it, the Lincoln Project put unfortunate thoughts in Donald Trump’s head. In reality, that’s not what happened.
Pence strikes me as cowardly but craftily deceitful. He strikes me as almost, but not quite spineless. It would not be pleasant to be him.
tomh @ 140: Sigh. Another yucky, unethical trumpian Republican rises from the ashes. Yuck. Ditto for your comment #50
In the same vein: After earning a third term, Ron Johnson can’t even win gracefully
Ron Johnson made clear that he wasn’t prepared to lose gracefully. Evidently, he doesn’t believe in winning gracefully, either.
JFC
Tweet o’ the day.
From ReligionClause
Results for ballot issues of interest to those following law and religion developments.
Jessica Piper:
Guardian liveblog:
“I have to thank @chrislhayes for broadcasting the most satisfying 2-minutes of television I’ve watched today. A perfect encapsulation of what Fox News has looked like over the past several months….”
Video at the (Twitter) link.
I’m sure Russia will do something terrible with and to Kherson, just not sure what.
They did level a larger city, Mariupol with up to 100,000 dead, 87,000 dead documented.
Podolyak is a high Ukrainian government advisor.
GOP New Jersey Official Called Cops on 9-Year-Old Black Girl Catching Spotted Lanternflies
Divorced Fox News Host Laments That Democrats Are Trying ‘to Keep Women Single’
Candidates linked to Jan. 6 find mixed results on Election Day
Most of the Republicans linked to Jan. 6 lost their campaigns this week, but not all of them.
Facing GOP blame for midterms, Trump pushes ‘stable genius’ line
In the wake of midterm defeats, some Republicans are talking about moving on from Donald Trump and his failures. He’s not handling this especially well.
Followup to comment 152.
I’ll also point out that Trump posted multiple times that he is not “Angry,” with the word angry capitalized in the middle of a sentence, and sometime in all caps. Here is just one example:
Okay. What do we think? Is he angry?
“Media: Russian troops reportedly blow up TV center, destroy infrastructure in Kherson.
Russian forces also reportedly blew up a regional energy facility, a local publication Most reported on Nov. 10. According to the report, there are problems with mobile service in the city.”
https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/national-international/alex-jones-ordered-to-pay-473m-more-to-sandy-hook-families/3074705/
Wonkette: “Fox News Bros Wilding Out Over Midterms […]”
Link
Michigan Unf*cks Its Maps And Democracy Happens
Followup to comments 150 and 156.
There Is A Flaw In Jesse Watters’s ‘Marry Women So They Vote Republican’ Plan
Links to additional resources are embedded in the article at the main link … in case you want to have handy some statistics that show just how unfuckable some rightwing doofuses are.
Link
I’m not sure Musk’s acts of sabotage are intentional. I think he is just that stupid … and too narcissistic to realize that he doesn’t know what the hell he is doing when it comes to running Twitter.
Arizona election officials announced that they may be still counting votes into next week. Patience is needed. We’ll get the results eventually.
It looks to me like Mark Kelly is going to win the Senate seat, but this is not yet a sure thing.
It looks to me like Kari Lake is going to lose the race for governor, and then her perfectly coiffed head will explode. But that is not yet a sure thing.
Politico – “Hungary infuriates EU with block on €18B Ukraine aid”:
From Tony Judt’s 2005 Postwar (p. 593):
Daily Beast:
Some Republicans Want to Raise Voting Age After Gen Z Midterm Turnout
Kelly Weill / Nov. 10, 2022
Postwar, pp. 609-610:
The Russians have one skill at least.
They have mastered the art of making people die under mysterious circumstances.
Aleskey Remenyuk was a member of their parliament who went over to the Russians. He just died allegedly in a car crash, the second high level traitor to die within days.
I’m not even sure either one of these are really dead.
Inspiring:
Re: tomh @ #164…
When I was 18, voting age was 21. Indeed, by the time the 26th Amendment was ratified, I was 22. The R’s can go stuff themselves. Their “base” is dying, whether from age or COVID. They’ve made their bed, let them lie in it.
Re: SC (Salty Current) @ #165…
When I was a student at UC Berkeley, I took a fencing (saber) course. The instructor was a former European military fencing champion from Hungary. He escaped during the 1956 uprising.
“The hits keep coming: Twitter moderation chief Yoel Roth, one of the few steady public faces post-takeover, is gone too, sources said.”
This is not confirmed yet.
There is at least one claim that Ukrainian soldiers are now in Kherson and fighting with the Russians.
I doubt very much if the Russians at this point are fighting for anything but their own survival.
It’s like the end in Vietnam.
Who wants to be the last person killed in a lost cause for no reason?
It’s time for the Russians to go home and find another hobby. A hobby that doesn’t involve spending hundreds of billions of dollars killing hundreds of thousands of people for no good reason.
Satire from Andy Borowitz:
New Yorker link
I’m not sure I would call what Hungary is doing “poker”.
At best it is extortion, holding Ukraine ranson to extort money from the EU that Hungary isn’t qualified for.
At worst it is supporting Russia in their attemp to wreck Ukraine forever.
.1. I keep asking myself, why is Hungary even in the Eu and why are they even in NATO. All they are doing is getting in the way and being a liability.
They don’t add anything worthwhile.
.2. Hungary suffered under the Russian occupation as much as any of the Eastern European nations, including being invaded once by the Soviets for not being enough of a door mat.
The rest of the captive nations learned the lesson well.
Never again.
They all hate the Russians for good reasons and aren’t going back.
NBC News:
NBC News:
New York Times:
“Russian telegram channels saying Ukrainians are smashing the crossing points where thousands of Russians are retreating across the Dnipro. This looks huge.”
Follow up to raven’s comment 171.
Ukraine update: Fighting underway as Ukrainian troops enter Kherson. Russia loses its biggest prize
The Hill:
Nevada’s Clark County responds to Trump election claims
Russia is in retreat in every major international forum
Washington Post link
Aussie ABC US midterm election updates here :
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-11/us-midterm-results-latest-data-key-races-house-senate/101642564
Also here :
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-11/us-midterm-elections-results-analysis-experts/101625436
In addition to here :
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-10/what-the-outcome-of-the-us-midterms-tell-us-about-2024/101628160
From tomh’s Daily Beast link @164:
It may be the second-highest youth turnout in midterm history, but 27% is still fucking pathetic. And I’m not interested in hearing: “Oh, the two parties are just the same, that’s why”, because (a) they’re not, by any rational assessment and (b) if none of the choices on offer are good enough to vote for, set about providing one that is. At least the fuckwit numpty glibertarians do that much!
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From there:
LOL. (Twitter link.)
Zelenskyy:
Video at the (Twitter) link. Not the moment for a historical fact check, I suppose. Slava Ukraini!
“Ukrainian and European Union flags raised over Kherson’s main square — even before advance Ukrainian troops entered the area. Ever since the Maidan revolution in 2013, it was about Ukraine’s European future. 🇪🇺🇺🇦”
“Amazing footage of the first Ukrainian troops reaching Kherson’s main square….”
Video at the (Twitter) link.
“People in Kherson central sq. chant Z-S-U (Armed Forces of Ukraine). Ukraine’s Intelligence Dept confirms Ukrainian troops had entered the city. The call is to remain cautious”
So the Russians delayed their retreat until after the US midterms, which had no impact but set the stage for Ukrainian forces to march into Kherson amid wildly cheering crowds on what is a national holiday in France, the US, the UK, and Canada. Brilliant.
Andriy Yermak:
Guardian liveblog:
“It is reported that the advance of Ukrainian forces to the center of Kherson has slowed down as they have to break through the crowds of local residents trying to hug the soldiers”
“NEW: Supercharged by a supermajority in the House and Senate, Florida legislative leaders broke their silence Wednesday and confirmed they are prepared to further tighten abortion restrictions in Florida in the next year.”
It’s also Independence Day in Poland! Perfect timing, Russians.
Guardian liveblog:
Cross-posted with the “You can see at a glance where people are dying” thread:
From the comments at Daily Kos: “Tears today for all the victims of war. Tears of joy for the people of Ukraine.”
Ukraine update: Kherson is liberated
Followup to comment 197.
Posted by readers of the article:
Republican state legislators in Georgia hard shortened the run-off process earlier. It used to be nine weeks. Now it is four weeks.
Link
Guardian liveblog:
Conservative lawyers celebrate Alito at Federalist Society event
Conservative justices could take steps to reassure the public that the Supreme Court is a neutral arbiter worthy of trust. They’re doing the opposite.
Dear MAGA America: Please cling to your one true leader
“Twitter suspended its $8 subscription program to combat a growing problem of users impersonating major brands”
Ben Collins on MSNBC said it’s suspended now but he doesn’t know what will happen ten minutes from now.
Wonkette: “Trump Confesses To Crimes He Might Not Have Even Done This Time, Stealing Florida Edition!”
Donald Trump Jr. Is Very Mad At You People For Not Electing Republicans
https://www.wonkette.com/donald-trump-jr-election-guns
SC @203, what amazes me is how quickly Musk is destroying Twitter. I thought it would take longer.
“The scenes of jubilation in Kherson are remarkable, and should be of no surprise considering how fiercely the city resisted the Russian occupation. The bravery on display in Kherson back in March was incredible, as the clips below show. They never stopped fighting.”
Video at the (Twitter) link.
Lynna @ #206, it’s making me a little uneasy about SpaceX, TBH.
Re #207, I remember linking to videos of the people protesting in Kherson in March, Russian guns pointed in their faces. What a joyous day.
Nicholas Rossi: Arrested man is missing US fugitive, court rules
ibid:
Musk could be in serious trouble here.
Part of Twitter was bought with OPM, Other People’s Money.
IIRC, it was $13 billion.
These are not the type of people to watch their money disappear in a few months.
If Musk doesn’t get his act together, he might be replaced and sooner rather than later.
Sure, he owns a majority stake but his power is great but not unlimited.
PS Musk isn’t impressing anyone here.
He undeniably had some successes with Tesla and SpaceX.
It isn’t continuing with Twitter.
“Governor-elect @JoshShapiroPA on Mastriano’s lack of concession:
‘Honestly, who cares? People pick the winner, not him’. #PAGOV”
Guardian liveblog:
Ukraine Update
Judge sanctions Trump lawyers over frivolous anti-Clinton case
“This cannot be attributed to incompetent lawyering,” a judge concluded. “It was a deliberate use of the judicial system to pursue a political agenda.”
WaPo:
Democrats increasingly optimistic about holding the Senate
By John Wagner, Eugene Scott, Azi Paybarah and Mariana Alfaro
Updated November 11, 2022 at 1:58 p.m. EST
If the Dems win NV and AZ the Georgia runoff would be to decide if Manchin still rules Dem policy. Of course, there’s still Sinema but still…it would be a welcome change to see Manchin fade to irrelevancy.
Happy Birthday, Kyiv Independent!
Link
Ukraine Update:
@#212, raven
In both cases, the successes were in spite of him, rather than because of him. Tesla has to obey heavy regulation because people would directly be killed otherwise. SpaceX has to be well-engineered because people would directly be killed otherwise. Both of them are also extremely heavily subsidized by the US government and therefore have certain limitations as to how they can operate. Nevertheless, in both cases Musk has a history of trying to meddle in disastrously stupid ways which are usually overruled by the engineers/regulators. (One of the lesser ways he has interfered is by getting rid of safety devices at Tesla factories because he thinks they’re ugly.) He has always been a fraud who has claimed other people’s success as his own — the whole fact that he literally bought the title of “founder” of Tesla tells you everything you need to know about his level of competence and honesty.
Oh, Canada:
https://www.wonkette.com/hey-what-s-up-in-canada-eh-a-roond-up
Julia Davis:
Subtitled video at the (Twitter) link.
“Think for a second about what we’re rejoicing over. We’re rejoicing that we didn’t run, but orderly retreated. This is a dubious achievement.”
“We are not rejoicing. I’m not glad at all about liberatio… I mean, the retreat.”
“It is a terrible wound, an enormous pain. We’ll be getting ready to take it back…”
Ryan Gallagher, Bloomberg:
Popehat:
Re: SC 96
I see bigot murmurations. The moral panics.
Alexander Dugin is the lunatic fringe loon that keeps advocating for the Greater Russian empire once again, with the Great Russian Fascists in charge of everything.
He hates the West, wants to abolish the internet, and thinks chemistry and physics are demonic.
.1. He is the guy whose daughter died in a car explosion probably meant for him, a few months ago.
.2. Calling for Putin’s death usually results in someone falling out a window 10 stories up.
Dugin isn’t that interesting in living much longer.
CBS News
Federal judge in Texas blocks Biden’s student loan forgiveness plan
Caroline Linton, Caitlin Yilek / November 10, 2022
In response, student debt relief applications have been pulled from Dept. of Education website.
“Courts have issued orders blocking our student debt relief program,” the application website reads. “As a result, at this time, we are not accepting applications. We are seeking to overturn those orders.”
Swedish brothers charged as spies for Russia
Macron:
Zelenskyy:
Canadian flight crew detained in Dominican Republic since April now free to leave
“Iranians are finding various ways to show their support of anti-regime protests. Team after team is refusing to sing the national anthem of the Islamic Republic. This time, #Iran’s basketball team did so before the match with #China. #MahsaAmini
So did the national sitting volleyball team. They also refused to sing the national anthem today.#Iran #MahsaAmini”
Videos at the (Twitter) link.
“Holy shit how did I missed this thermonuclear ad? And it’s even got the Succession vibe.”
Video at the (Twitter) link. I burst out laughing @ :28. That’s a devastating minute.
Kyiv Independent:
Jon Ralston:
“So many to choose from but this is my favorite exchange between fake ‘verified’ accounts.”
Outstanding.
Steve Kornacki:
Julia Davis:
Subtitled video at the (Twitter) link.
“Decision Desk HQ projects Sen. Mark Kelly (D) wins re-election to the U.S. Senate in Arizona.
#DecisionMade: 10:08pm EST”
NBC as well.
Christiane Amanpour:
Video at the (Twitter) link.
Another thread about Russian imperialism – Azamat Junisbai:
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian (support them if you can!) Ukraine liveblog. From there:
LOL.
Guardian:
“‘Like Vegas, but worse’: Sharm el-Sheikh fails to charm Cop27 delegates”: “On first week of summit there have been traffic jams, water shortages – and an atmosphere of state repression…”
“Cryptocurrency exchange FTX files for bankruptcy protection in US”:
Related to this, Ryan Mac shares the Tom Brady/Gisele Bündchen FTX ad:
Video at the (Twitter) link.
Ukraine update: Celebrations continue in Kherson, as elsewhere the war goes on
https://twitter.com/Tendar/status/1591426728769236992
Video at the link. Live broadcast!
The Russians predictably left a disaster behind in Kherson.
There is no water, electricity, or food.
They destroyed the electrical system and there are photos of them blowing up cell phone towers.
This report says 70-80 thousand out of 300,000 residents still remain. Other reports say it is 150,000 left. The lower number seems more likely.
Andrew Anglin adept at skipping the bill for his neofascist hate, but federal warrant changes things
Followup to comments 161 and 238.
So glad to see that Senator Mark Kelly was re-elected in Arizona. That puts Democrats just one more win away from holding the Senate majority.
In other great news from Arizona, election denier and dunderhead Mark Finchem lost the race for Secretary of State. Democrat Adrian Fontes won.
Link
Another bad guy was defeated at the ballot box.
While we are waiting for the run-off race in Georgia, (to be decided on December 6), we are going to hear Herschel Walker trying to insult Raphael Warnock by claiming that Warnock uses “big words.” Heaven forbid.
Cartoon: Drowning their sorrows
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/11/11/drowning-their-sorrows/
The cartoon shows Elon Musk, Putin, and Trump sitting at a bar. Trump has a coke, the other two men are drinking whiskey and vodka (looks like). All look despondent. Thought balloons identify what they are thinking:
Musk: “I was wrong to buy Twitter.”
Putin: “I was wrong to invade Ukraine.”
Trump: “Melania was wrong about Dr. Oz.”
The gifts include Russian language, literature, music, and art. But also science and, even, modernity itself.
Oh really?
What Russian culture?
AFAICT, there isn’t much of anything that can be called Russian culture.
It is almost all borrowed or stolen.
A huge amount of the old culture seems to be Ukrainian, from Kyivian Rus, the first real major Slavic state in the 10th century.
The music, art, modernity (what little there is), and science all come from the West, mostly Western Europe.
The actual modern Russian culture seems to be highly dysfunctional.
Human life is cheap and meaningless. Social problems are very high. Alcoholism is high as is Fetal Alcohol syndrome in children. Most Russians seem to be fatalistic and apathetic about the future. They’ve never had a democracy. They live in a warped dictatorship of Oligarchies and ex-KGB agents.
I don’t get the same impression about Ukrainian culture though.
They have a deep and ancient culture that is still alive. Superimposed on this are layers of younger eras and finally, a lot of the modern world and its values have been adopted by Ukraine.
They could easily fit into the EU.
Russia could not.
Re the Senate:
As of Saturday morning in the Nevada Senate race, Democrat Cortez Masto trailed Republican Laxalt by about 800 votes. In Clark County, Nevada’s largest, which includes Las Vegas, there are roughly 24,000 more mail-in ballots to be counted, along with about 15,000 provisional ballots and ballots that need to be cured.
In Washoe County, Nevada’s second-most populous, there are roughly 12,000 remaining. State law allows for mail-in ballots to be received in Nevada through Saturday, though the ballots need to have been postmarked by Election Day to be valid.
Cortez Masto is slightly favored to win but Laxalt still has a chance.
Meanwhile, Lindsey Graham is busy being Lindsey Graham.
From Politico:
I think that mail ballots will put Catherine Cortez Masto ahead in Nevada. It looks likely to me that the Democrat will win that Senate race. I also think Raphael Warnock will win the run-off race in Georgia. If he does, that will put Democrats in the Senate in a very good position to support the Democratic Party agenda when it comes to appointing judges, preventing Republicans like Lindsey Graham from passing a federal ban on abortion, etc.
Talk about the “red wave” spluttering to an ignominious close!
Masto is currently within 1,000 votes of overtaking that doofus Adam Laxalt.
New York Times link
Yikes, that’s some “victory” party:
Link
Looks like Kari Lake is losing the Arizona Governor’s race.
Another GOP loon down.
Cruise ship with 800 Covid cases docks in Sydney
New Zealand 34-31 England: Black Ferns win World Cup with dramatic victory
Tweet o’ the day.
Guardian liveblog:
Some podcast episodes:
SWAJ – “Monster in the Mirror: Ep. 2 – Dracula’s Tale of Two Conspiracies”:
NBN – “Bradley Onishi, Preparing for War: The Extremist History of White Christian Nationalism–And What Comes Next“:
Fever Dreams – “Enter The Manclan feat QAnon Anonymous”:
CounterVortex – “Podcast: against pseudo-pacifist war propaganda II”:
“Nine weeks into anti-regime protests in Iran led by women and Gen Z, human rights group Hrana estimates 336 protesters, including 52 children, have been killed and 15,094 have been arrested by the regime so far.
#مهسا_امینی
#MahsaAmini”
More nuclear threats.
This rally in Moscow wasn’t very big and was obviously preplanned.
The Sarmat II rocket is the Russian’s new ICBM capable of carrying multiple war heads.
I don’t think nuking Washington DC is a very good idea. It makes it certain that Moscow and St. Petersberg also disappear.
https://www.wonkette.com/dem-secretary-of-state-wins
Flight to Tampa diverted after passenger found with box cutter
“Marie Gluesenkamp Perez just defeated Republican extremist Joe Kent, and these were the odds…”
FiveThirtyEight gave her a 2 in 100 chance of winning. 2!
“Trump endorsed Joe Kent over Jaime Herrera Beutler who voted for his impeachment. Kent ousted her in the primary — but this was supposed to be a very safe GOP seat. It’s a big upset. [Marie Gluesenkamp Perez] hyper focused on local issues while Kent was going on the Steve Bannon podcast routinely.”
The Democrat won the Senate seat in Nevada!
NBC calling it for Catherine Cortez-Masto in Nevada, so the Dems have won the Senate!
Catherine Cortez Masto left Adam Laxalt in the dust when those last mail ballot votes were counted from Clark County. The Democrats control the Senate.
And when Raphael Warnock wins in Georgia, which I think he will in the run-off, Democrats will have an extra vote in the Senate. And remember, the Senate also has Vice President Kamala Harris’s vote if it is needed.
SC @267, Hooray! Yes, we are excited.
NBC News:
Nevada Senate race called for Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto in huge win for Democrats
At the link there’s a lovely photo of Masto with some of her supporters.
Ben Hodges:
Hooray! Another two years of good judges being confirmed.
Now that Cortez Masto has won in Nevada, securing Democratic control of the Senate, how many Republicans in Georgia are going to bother turning out for Herschel Walker on December 6 for the run-off election? Some Republicans were holding their nose to vote for him before. Now they won’t bother voting on December 6.
With any luck, Trump will also waddle over to Georgia to put his Loser brand on Herschel Walker.
We’re having fun now.
Nerd @273, oh yes! And we know how important good judges are.
New York Times link
SC @264, I really like that win for Democrats. That’s a swing district and it looks like it has swung away from crazy trumpian candidates and focused on an intelligent and practical representative.
Link
Thank you, Culinary Workers Union!
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From there:
Guardian – “Anger over Fifa president’s ‘stick to football’ letter to World Cup teams”:
Sam Greene:
The good people won one in Washington state.
Marie Perez defeated Joe Kent in Southwest Washington.
Kent is a right wingnut loon who called for all military weapons to be available to the public (who needs a kamikazi high explosive tank killer drone and why?). Antivaxxer, Pro Russia and against any aid to Ukraine.
Ironically, Southwest Washington has a fair number of…Ukrainians. Seattletimes: Mar 22, 2022 — Washington has the largest Ukrainian population in the U.S. after California and New York. …” Reportedly throwing Ukraine to the jackals didn’t go over very well.
Re: Raven @ 283
Thanks for that. The story reminded me of an opinion roundtable the NYT had a few days ago whose hopeful title says it all.
‘We May Have Reached the Limit of Crazy That Will Be Tolerated’
How the war in Ukraine is fueling separatism in Russia’s far region of Bashkortostan.
Bashkortostan is in Eastern Europe between the Volga and the Urals. This war is doing wonders for geographical knowledge.
The Bashkirs are Turkic Muslims and there are also Turkic Muslim Tatars, making up over half the population.
Russia has a lot of captive nations and minorities that they generally treat badly. They are poor and taxed and the taxes flow to Moscow and St. Petesburg.
It is hard to say just how many Bashkirs have taken up arms against Russia. I’m guessing not many.
“In World War II, there was a simple solution to these kinds of saboteurs – summary execution,” Putin’s spokeswoman Medvedev…I’m sure it hasn’t changed much.
Russia is going downhill fast towards the era of Stalin.
Julia Davis:
Subtitled video at the (Twitter) link.
“I’m amazed that we ourselves don’t even realize how much more open-minded we’ve been historically, although it may seem strange to the rest of the world. We’ve been more accepting, more tolerant, and devoid of prejudice, unlike all of them.”
Yesterday we brought home our newest addition to our family, a four-month old male Brittany puppy we’ve named Theodore/Teddy/Ted. I’ve posted some pics of him in the Pharyngula Discord.
Good news – Kyiv Independent:
They link to an article of theirs from September:
Congratulations, Akira! So happy for you and for Ted!
“FYI, reporters:
Around 3,000+ contractor employees of Twitter were canned last night (totally normal thing to do, btw). How does Twitter have so many contractors? This is where the CONTENT MODERATOR numbers are hidden. They are called ‘agents’ at Twitter….”
Twitter thread follows.
One of the Russian accomplishments lately.
They stole a raccoon from the Kherson zoo.
The video shows them picking up an overfed raccoon by the tail.
This isn’t how you handle animals.
And who wants a raccoon anyway?
They are fierce fighters when cornered, carry a parasite lethal to humans (a nematode that goes for the brain in humans, Baylisascaris infection), and don’t make good pets.
From the video, these were Russians from a zoo in Crimea.
Odd Fact. Raccoons aren’t native but were introduced to Europe. Being very smart, they promptly went invasive species.
I remember writing about how simply awful Mo Brooks was when he was supporting Trump. Now Mo Brooks has turned on Trump. Good for him. But he should have done so sooner.
Link
Sen. Markey: A @washingtonpost reporter was able to create a verified account impersonating me—I’m asking for answers from @elonmusk who is putting profits over people and his debt over stopping disinformation. Twitter must explain how this happened and how to prevent it from happening again.
Elon Musk (two days later, for some reason): Perhaps it is because your real account sounds like a parody?
Sen. Markey: One of your companies is under an FTC consent decree. Auto safety watchdog NHTSA is investigating another for killing people. And you’re spending your time picking fights online. Fix your companies. Or Congress will.
Ukraine update from the New York Times:
https://twitter.com/yarotrof/status/1591016545685078016
Video at the link.
Correction? to the last part of comment 294. On the Twitter thread there is an argument about what the girl is playing. I don’t really care what she is playing. It is a great moment.
https://twitter.com/KaetiGirl/status/1591019017912868865
Lucid Dying: Patients Recall Near-Death Experiences During CPR While They Were Seemingly Unconscious
Should be retitled Deuced Lying. Parnia is a “true believer” who will interpret results to fit his views. “perception of separation from the body” does not mean the patients actually left their body. And so on.
https://twitter.com/PeterClifford1/status/1591588990452649985
Link
SC @293, that was a good response from Senator Markey.
In other news: “Chappelle returns to SNL with no apologies — and many jokes about Kanye”
Washington Post link
Video available at the link. Scroll down.
Dolly Parton receives $100 million Courage and Civility Award from Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchez
$100 million isn’t really that much to Jeff Bezos. I’m sure he’s getting a nice tax break out of this. So one rich person gives a pile of money to another rich person to give away to charity. Hmmm.
Guardian liveblog:
Elon Musk continues to mock privacy, legal concerns as the great Twitter garbage fire burns on
Ukraine Update: ‘logistics’ might be boring, but it’s what drove Russia out of Kherson
Six dead in Istanbul blast, Erdogan says it ‘smells like terrorism’
A celebrity rooster who thinks he’s a kitten has gone missing from the Funny Farm Rescue
This one hurts.
NYT Live
Lori Chavez-DeRemer, a Republican, flips an Oregon House seat.
Natalia Antonova:
Screenshot at the (Twitter) link. From the post:
Tweet o’ the day.
This doesn’t say too much new.
Kherson doesn’t have much of anything working yet.
No cell phones, no landline phones, no electricity, no water, and food and medical supplies are scarce.
No surprise.
The Russians looted everything they could carry including a raccoon from the Kherson zoo.
There are photos of them blowing up cell phone towers in acts of pointless vandalism.
More on the destruction in Kherson.
The Russians looted the art museums and took away 15,000 paintings.
Given the high levels of corruption in Russia, most of these will probably end up being sold into the art markets.
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian (support them if you can!) Ukraine liveblog. From there:
Guardian liveblog:
There are two incidents of violence on US college campuses today. Four people have been killed on the University of Virginia campus. The suspect, who has been identified, is still at large and the campus is on lockdown. Four University of Idaho students were found dead in a home and are reported to be homicide victims.
Tania Branigan in the Guardian – “It’s too easy for the west to see North Korea as a WTF curiosity. We need to do better.”:
Guardian – “Kirill Stremousov: rise, fall and death of Russia-installed Kherson official”:
Guardian:
“Afghan supreme leader orders full implementation of sharia law”:
“Iran issues first death sentence over protests”:
Julia Davis:
Subtitled video at the (Twitter) link.
“We are all alone. So what?”
Heh. (Twitter link.)
https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1592091706698366976
Video at the link.
I think it would be more accurate to say that Zelenskyi confronts the normal fears of anyone living in a war zone, and then he continues to do the right thing.
About those people, including many Republican politicians in the USA, thinking that Ukraine should negotiate with Russia now:
https://twitter.com/Euan_MacDonald/status/1592083557417160708
Re #313, the three people who were killed (apologies – I had thought it was four) at UVA were members of the football team. I believe the shooter was as well.
Let’s look more closely at the balance of power in the US Senate:
Link
The UVA suspect is now in custody.
John Kelly: Trump wanted IRS to target perceived political foes
A former White House chief of staff just accused — on the record — a former American president of an impeachable offense.
Correction: the UVA shooter was no longer on the football team. They said he had come to the attention of police before, once in connection to a reported hazing incident, the investigation into which was apparently closed by UVA.
True.
Ukraine gave up several thousand nuclear weapons for security guarantees from Russia, the USA, and the UK, the Budapest memorandum.
Wikipedia: “On December 5, 1994 the leaders of Ukraine, Russia, Britain, and the United States signed a memorandum to provide Ukraine with security assurances in connection with its accession to the NPT as a non-nuclear weapon state.”
And how did that work out?
The USA and UK are honoring their part of the agreement while Russia is just ignoring it.
AFAICT, it is inevitable that Ukraine will join the EU and NATO.
A large NATO base near the Russian border should be a good “security guarantee.
“NBC News projects: Gabriel Vasquez (D) wins NM-2. Democrat gain.”
I should note that the race @ #326 was called by others earlier, but not by NBC.
Guardian liveblog:
The MSNBC graphics for this election have been atrocious, by the way. The Senate graphic has been completely normal – the up-to-the-moment count of races won by each party until the Nevada race was called, then followed by a checkmark indicating the Dems have retained control with 50 Senate seats. Alongside this running tally of actual results, they’ve had a projection of the House outcome. This has changed over time as results have come in, and has been within the margin of error for several days. They rarely if ever have said or shown the actual seats called or contested, and the side-by-side placement with the real Senate tally (especially with the small “projection” indicator often being cut off from the side of the screen) would lead reasonable people to think its the count to date in the House. It’s inexplicable, misleading, and ridiculous.
“CONSERVATIVE ANDY BIGGS TO CHALLENGE MCCARTHY FOR HOUSE SPEAKER – WSJ”
LOL.
Guardian liveblog:
Update: That must have been an error by the Bahamas or the tabulator. It’s now 13 opposed and 74 abstentions.
These are the votes in opposition to the reparations resolution: Belarus, CAR, China, Cuba, North Korea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Iran, Mali, Nicaragua, Russia, Syria, Zimbabwe.
“Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Turkey and China spent more money than previously known at the Trump International Hotel at crucial times in 2017 and 2018 for those countries’ relations with the US”
NYT link at the (Twitter) link. One of the reporters was just being interviewed and said the Saudis spent $10,000 per night on one room.
Michael Hobbes (of Maintenance Phase, formerly of You’re Wrong About) has a new podcast, If Books Could Kill, co-hosted with Peter Shamshiri of the 5-4 podcast. Only two episodes have been released – about Freakonomics and Outliers – but they’re great.
Ah, that savvy businessman Elon Musk. Two weeks ago he tweeted: “Power to the people! Blue for $8/month.”
WaPo:
A fake tweet sparked panic at Eli Lilly and may have cost Twitter millions
The pharmaceutical giant halted ad spending after fake blue-check accounts went viral. For $8, Twitter is ‘losing out on millions of dollars in ad revenue,’ a former Eli Lilly official said.
By Drew Harwell / November 14, 2022
NPR:
Supreme Court allows Jan. 6 committee to subpoena Arizona GOP chair’s phone records
NINA TOTENBERG JESS ZALPH / November 14, 2022
Ukraine update: No winter pause as Ukraine pushes hard on multiple fronts
She sounds imcompetent. It is Fourth amendment which deals with “unreasonable searches and seizures”.
Why did Zelensky want a watermelon in Kherson?
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos pledges to give away most of his wealth
If we had a fair tax system, we wouldn’t have to rely on the generosity of billionaire sociopaths.
Sonic boom rips across Florida as Space Force plane X-37B returns
Charles Pierce, writing for Esquire:
I am so angry about that poor raccoon. The animals those fuckers stole have to be terrified.
Reginald Selkirk @ #s 300 and 341, Dolly Parton should give a big chunk of the money to the Amazon Labor Union.
Good news.
Photos on Twitter: https://twitter.com/LakotaMan1/status/1591475455210979328
Photos on Wonkette
Commentary from Wonkette:
Navajo Communities Get Electricity For First Time
Wonkette
Axios – “FBI opens investigation into killing of Palestinian American Shireen Abu Akleh”:
Satire from Andy Borowitz:
New Yorker link
NBC News:
NBC News:
Wall Street Journal:
Oh FFS.
Colorado Fox affiliate runs ‘Democrats steal control of Senate’ chyron during post-midterm broadcast
“Remarkable video: A young, unveiled female protester in Ardabil (NW Iran) is physically accosted by more than a dozen male and female security forces. She escapes their clutches and continues to protest.”
Twitter link.
The Hill:
Appeals court blocks Biden student debt cancellation plan
John Kruzel – 11/14/22
Gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!
Kyiv Independent:
Tweet o’ the day.
More on the traumatized kidnapped animals. (Twitter link.)
Ha: “feeling more and more vindicated in having avoided crypto and kept my hopes all tied up in Mega Millions, like a normal person”
Dave Wasserman: “I’ve seen enough: Juan Ciscomani (R) defeats Kirsten Engel (D) in #AZ06. Dems’ path to the House majority virtually non-existent now.”
:(
Democrat Katie Hobbs defeats MAGA favorite Kari Lake in high-stakes race for governor in Arizona
The human race at 8 billion
This is culture shock Russian style.
Those round things are kitty litter.
Special cat food? My cat is a picky eater so she gets dry food and a rotating list of canned food every day.
When you get out of the major cities, Russia is very much Third World. No lights, dirt roads, no running water, poor. 20% of Russian houses don’t have indoor plumbing.
Instead of developing their rural areas, they set up their economy so all the money flows to Moscow and St. Petersburg.
Green light shows promise in addressing oximetry racial bias
Followup to Reginald @360.
Katie Hobbs wins in Arizona, giving Democrats governorship for first time since 2009
People were speculating that Kari Lake could be Trump’s running mate in the 2024 presidential race. Is that a problem now that she has lost the race for governor in Arizona. I don’t think so. Why can’t we put two losers at the top of the Republican ticket?
Re: raven @ #362…
We had a cat who thought he was people. What he insisted on eating was cooked hamburger. We had him with us at an SF con and ran out of hamburger we’d brought with us, so I went to the hotel coffee shop and ordered a plain hamburger for “a picky 5-year-old”. They didn’t ask 5-year-old what?
@ ^ whheydt : Awww! Nicely done.
Just back from tea out at the local pub sitting outdoors with my new dog – and feeding her a few chips and bits of hamburger too – here!
.***
Incidentaly, there’s been a major storm in Adelaide which has seen a great many people lose power for a few days great many including myself :
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-13/wild-weather-causes-widespread-damage-power-outages/101647886?utm_campaign=abc_news_web
Though I’ve now got electricity back unlike many others and didn’t see my house or car or much damage done unlike many others. There’s also currnetly major flooding in parts of Australia’s eastern states notably Forbes on the Lachlan river (or Galarai as it is known to the Wiradjuri people*) too. See :
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-15/nsw-floods-forbes-evacuation-wyangala-dam-newell-highway/101653738
among other not really that “natural” anymore climate -related disasters.
.* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lachlan_River#History
I wonder if there’s any connection here with Forbes media / magazine?
Ancient fish teeth reveal earliest sign of cooking
What it’s like living as a female psychopath
Netflix’s Narnia Adaptations May Have Found a Surprising Director
A reminder that C.S. Lewis used his juvenile fiction to introduce readers to sophisticated theological concepts, such as talking animals.
I’m not posting this article from the Washington Post.
Trigger Warning!!!It is as gruesome and horrifying as you can imagine.
The Russians tortured, raped, killed, and disappeared thousands of Kherson civilians.
Nothing like trying to win over the hearts and minds of the people they were saving from freedom, democracy, and their own culture. /s
The link goes to an archived copy that isn’t behind a pay wall.
Fox News is having a hard time dealing and Liz Cheney gets her revenge
Herschel Walker gets scammed by Trump:
Link
Everybody is scamming Herschel Walker! Ha!
Half of Frances nuclear reactors are off line right as winter starts and Europe has an energy shortage.
I would say good planning but I’m sure everyone knows that.
It isn’t a secret that winter is coming.
It seems to be a lot of deferred maintenance, lack of investment in the plants, and design flaws.
It wouldn’t surprise me if their schedule slips but good luck anyway.
Yahoo News reporting on what Herschel Walker recently said:
Walker’s exact words:
Link
Ted Cruz Hates Mitch McConnell For Losing Midterms, Should Probably Hate Himself Instead
https://www.wonkette.com/ted-cruz-mitch-mcconnell-midterms
I know that the Republican legislature in Georgia shortened the run-off period of time in order to help awkward Republican candidates limp to the finish line, but apparently it is not possible to shorten the time enough to save Walker from himself.
@ 375
So much for the “biased liberal media.” Also…
If the partisan shoe was on the other foot, the Republicans would be blasting Walker with every racist stereotype in the book over that bowl of word salad.
Co-host of “The Five” on Fox News, Judge Jeanine Pirro, said:
More of Pirro’s pronouncements:
From Wonkette’s commentary:
It is a sunny day here and I’ve got a cup of coffee in front of my screen.
Meanwhile Ukraine is getting pounded by Russian missiles and drones.
It’s time to give Ukraine long range drones and rockets and let them fire back on Russia.
Fair is fair.
Having one set of rules for Russia and another for Ukraine during a war is senseless and immoral.
This is pure terrorism.
While it terrorizes the civilian population, it has limited military effects.
The Ukrainians aren’t going anywhere because they are already home and they have no where to go.
Interpreted literally this is simply false. Some millions have already fled Ukraine for other European countries – and mostly been treated decently, in sharp contrast to refugees with darker skin – and although some have returned, many have not. I expect a fresh wave of refugees as the days become colder and darker, and the Russians continue their attacks on energy infrastructure.
However, what the attacks won’t do is persuade or force the Ukranians to surrender, and I agree that sooner or later, Ukraine is going to need the weapons to hit back at Russian infrastructure, otherwise there seems no way to halt the Russian missile and drone attacks even if every Russian soldier or mercenary is driven out – although the Ukranians should still refrain from deliberately hitting residential buildings.
AP News
‘Too hyperbolic’? School board parental rights push falters
By Collin Binkley / November 14, 2022
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From their latest summary:
@ 382
A culturally and politically illiterate and indifferent people serves the interests of the right just as well as one overtly indoctrinated with the white, Christian, nationalist “education” that the right wants to foist. Either way, the right wins.
Fuck this shithole country and it’s moronic citizens.
Semi-related articles:
Retraction Watch – “Psychiatrist in Canada faked brain imaging data in grant application, U.S. federal watchdog says”:
Mad in America – “The Serotonin Zombie: Authors of New Study Try to Breathe New Life into the Dead”: “However, the results of the study actually support the conclusion that low serotonin is not a cause of depression…”
Analysis of the paper, which was irresponsibly featured in the Guardian, at the link.
These imaging companies should probably be getting more attention, not only in the general sense that they often (and plainly in this case) have a direct financial interest in the research but also because some of these researchers seem to become attached to an element of a complex system whose action or role is dimly understood but which can be (accurately?) imaged using this equipment, on the basis of which – even setting aside the cases of fudging the images – they extrapolate wildly.
To be clear, the serotonin-zombie paper wasn’t by or connected to Mizrahi, as far as I know, but by a David Erritzoe and several others in London.
Guardian liveblog:
Holy shit: “WARSAW, Poland (AP) — A senior U.S. intelligence official says Russian missiles crossed into NATO member Poland, killing two people.”
Artis Pabriks, Deputy PM of Latvia:
Guardian liveblog:
Trump summons dregs of Republicanism for ‘announcement’ that may or may not launch new campaign
“Warsaw, seemingly, isn’t confirming that it was a missile strike and is asking people not to publish unverified info.
(It is possible that the explosion was the result of a missile being intercepted, and debris crossing the border.)”
Hungarian government spokesperson (via Guardian liveblog):
Estonian MFA:
SC @388, 389 and 390: well, if we were wondering what other extremely stupid moves Putin could make, now we know.
“Polish reporter on blasts tonight: My sources in the services say that what hit Przewowo is most likely the remains of a [Russian] rocket shot down by the Armed Forces of Ukraine.”
“Two people are dead in Poland because Russia started a genocidal war next door.
RT propagandist Margarita Simonyan thinks this is hilarious.
Never ever ask if these people can sink any lower or act any more deranged. They take it as a challenge.”
Video from the site where the missiles hit in Poland (Twitter link). I have zero expertise to say anything about it. Probably less than zero given that I’ve been reading Twitter.
NSC spokesperson:
“An official from Polish intelligence [said] investigators were probing whether it could have been a Russian missile. If confirmed, it would be the first time a Nato country had been hit by a missile since Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine”
Guardian liveblog:
This is the latest.
We are up to two rockets right now.
I’ve seen some photos of the blast site.
It doesn’t look at all like debris from shooting down a rocket.
There is a large, deep crater.
Guardian liveblog:
No way is debris from a countermissile strike going to travel 15 miles.
15 miles is a lot for a mistake.
This isn’t even close to the border with Ukraine.
Biden is speaking with Duda now.
“Russia fired 100 missiles at Ukraine today, hitting a residential building in Kyiv and leaving whole cities without electricity. These young men and women were inputting the missile flight paths, again….”
Names, photos, and organizational chart at the (Twitter) link.
“#BREAKING: NATO ambassadors to hold emergency meeting at Poland’s request”
Tyler Rogoway:
Zelenskyy:
Ukraine update: Russian missiles (inadvertently) strike Poland
Followup to comment 410.
More Updates from Ukraine:
Satire from Andy Borowitz:
New Yorker link
Link
LOL
https://twitter.com/FarnoushAmiri/status/1592575055388872705
Trump reportedly begged Ivanka and Jared to appear at his campaign launch. They’ve refused
Reuters:
NBC News:
New York Times:
Guardian liveblog:
@417: more details
Twitter engineer calls out Elon Musk for technical BS in unusual career move
@Polish missile episode: It is frightening to imagine how this would have gone down if the 2020 election had turned out differently.
Right-wing doctor group led by anti-vaccine insurrectionist implodes in scandal
“The persistence of the public in small & large provincial centers is amazing.
A revolution – as we see wheels turning again.
The regime can’t claim protesters are out-of-touch elites. Because the elite & out of touch are the regime members themselves.
#WomenLifeFreedom”
Video at the (Twitter) link.
Guardian liveblog:
“President Biden is hosting key US allies at an ’emergency’ meeting in Bali on the missile hit in Poland. You will be able to follow here:…”
Twitter link. but I’m sure you can just go to the White House site.
McConnell faces leadership challenge from Rick Scott as conservatives steam
Tweet o’ the day.
(Comes with a backstory.)
I guess they’re not going to show it after all.
“Biden and world leaders meeting here in Bali
I asked if the president would supply an update on what they know about the explosion in Poland
Biden: ‘No’.
No other comments”
Photo at the (Twitter) link.
More on how the Russian mobilized are doing.
Not well.
They are dying en masse and being replaced so more can die.
!!! – Josh Lederman:
@ ^ SC (Salty Current) : Whoah! Was NOT expecting that! Good.
.***
Harrowing Four Corners episode Monday night on Australia’s racist and sadistic youth detention WARNING : Confronting scenes, physical abuse of children, swearing.
See also (same WARNING applies) :
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-15/nt-youth-detention-government-transparency-criticised/101654470
They wouldn’t treat rich white kids that way I’m sure.
Also breaking news, I guess, though very much expected :
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-16/donald-trump-presidential-candidacy-2024/101320474
So its official now. Thankfully post midterms less likely he’ll win their nomination again.
Couple of other ABC news articles here :
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-16/coercive-control-bill-passes-nsw-lower-house-vote/101659416
WARNING : Domestic violence references & better news here :
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-16/nasa-rocket-launch-latest/101660116
& see also Space dot com article here :
https://www.space.com/nasa-artemis-1-sls-moon-rocket-launch-webcasts
As reported on https://kyivindependent.com/
@430: Some of the commenters on that twitter post are a little more cynical about the Mormon church’s proclamation:
Other commenters, though, are more sanguine, and say that even if the act is flawed, it’s still a step in the right direction. I haven’t read the text of the act myself; I don’t know who’s right here. But I’m not readily inclined to trust that the LDS church has suddenly decided they’re all for gay rights.
Okay, I’ve just read the actual statement, and that’s got me thinking the cynics are on the right track. Here’s the text of the statement:
Notably, contra what the quoted twitter post claims, the church’s statement does not actually say that the church supports the Respect for Marriage Act. What it actually says is that the church supports “the efforts of those who work to ensure the Respect for Marriage Act includes appropriate religious freedom protections”. That could be interpreted as meaning that the church supports changing the Respect of Marriage Act to put further restrictions on gay marriage in the name of “religious freedom”. And honestly, given the church’s histories and doctrines, that does not seem like an unlikely interpretation.
I could be wrong. Maybe the LDS church really has decided it’s on the wrong side of history here and is turning over a new leaf in its views on gay rights. But I’m not going to get out the ticker tape just yet.
YES! NASA has just successfully launched the Artemis 1 flight to our Moon! :
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-16/nasa-space-launch-system-rocket-takes-off/101661222
See also :
https://www.nasa.gov/content/live-coverage-of-nasas-artemis-i-mission-to-the-moon
& https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-c2eecd7e-b73f-47c5-8b04-ae970d6ed7b5
It now seems pretty certain that the missile that landed on Poland and killed two people was a misdirected Ukranian airdefence missile. Of course, primary reponsibility for it is still with the Russian forces.
Lynna, OM@414, 415
Life, eh? You’ve hogged the global conversation for the best part of a decade, then suddenly, you’re Yesterday’s Fascist!
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From there:
Guardian liveblog:
Re #s 430 and 434 – Salt Lake Tribune – “In a stunning move, LDS Church comes out for bill that recognizes same-sex marriage”:
From the Guardian:
“Qatar World Cup organisers apologise after threats to a Danish television crew”:
“Gay Qataris physically abused then recruited as agents, campaigner says”:
“Stadiums of shame: the numbers World Cup hosts Qatar don’t want to be seen”:
The new episode of Oh God, What Now? has a worthwhile discussion of the Qatar World Cup.
I’ll also repost the link to this shocking podcast from December – “Death in Qatar: What really happened to British businessman Marc Bennett?”:
MacKenzie Scott acknowledges another $2B in donations with reference to Minnesotan’s poem
Guardian liveblog:
Oleksiy Goncharenko reprinted in the Kyiv Post – “Odesa Rejects Catherine the Great as Putin’s Invasion Makes Russia Toxic”:
“Profile in courage: An unveiled woman inside Iran holds an LGBT pride flag. The former can earn her a prison sentence, the latter can earn her a death sentence.”
Photo at the (Twitter) link.
Here’s Aaron Rupar’s livetweeted thread of Trump’s speech last night, with videos and quotes. Low-energy fascism.
Fentanyl Vaccine Potential ‘Game Changer’ for Opioid Epidemic
SC@441, 442,
My own view (which I recognise is not going to prevail any time soon!) is that professional sport is inevitably a hive of financial corruption, cheating, child abuse, toxic masculinity and nationalism, and golden opportunities for tyrannical regimes to propagandise for themselves. Sport should be for fun and exercise.
Kirill Stremousov died in a car accident that was apparently caused by someone firing high powered rifles at his car.
From the pictures of this vehicle, it might have been something like a .50 caliber bullet or a small grenade. The car is clearly an armored car and it is wrecked.
So who did it?
There is a long list of people who would be happy if this guy was dead.
Probably the FSB but it could have been Ukrainian special forces.
I can’t confirm any of this but the timing (as Kherson was rescued), the place, (Russian occupied Crimea), and the guy (weird guy and a traitor) make it likely.
Georgia’s Heartbeat Abortion Ban Is Held Invalid
Religion Clause
Further to my #449, a relevant Guardian article on “sportswashing” Qatar and its links with western (especially British) elites. I recmmend David Wearing’s book, referred to at the end.
Guardian liveblog:
“Protestors have entered some Tehran mosques, calling on people to overthrow the Islamic Republic through loudspeakers normally used for the call for prayer etc.
#مهسا_امینی
#MahsaAmini”
Video at the (Twitter) link.
Tony Ortega’s Today in Q – “Trump announces for 2024, stunning Q patriots who still think he won in 2020.”
Huh – Guardian liveblog:
Kyiv Independent:
Re; SC (Salty Current) @ #457…
Given where whatever it was landed, as well as other news that has come up over time, I notice that no one is claiming that it wasn’t launched from Belarus.
A Russian battalion just lost half its soldiers.
A battalion is supposedly 600-800 people but Russian battalions tend to be short on personnel.
One wonders how many casualties the Russian people can take before they get tired of this pointless war of choice.
Reportedly, the morale of the survivors isn’t so good for some reason.
Re: raven @ #459…
One wonders what the transferred troops will do to the morale of their “new” units.
KG @437, yep. Even Donald Junior did not attend his dad’s lie, whine and bloviate fest.
whheydt @ #458, it is strange. Belarus was trending for a bit yesterday, but then stopped. Someone suggested that it would be “stupid” for the Russians to launch it from Belarus towards Poland, which I found unconvincing to put it mildly. Someone else said that even Belarus was too far for this type of missile. I didn’t see anyone dispute that but lack the knowledge to evaluate it myself. FWIW, the weapons experts yesterday seemed to think it was a Ukrainian S-300 used for air defense and didn’t mention Belarus at all. It’s odd that the Ukrainians are so insistent that it wasn’t theirs, though, especially since even the people saying that that’s most likely are stating unequivocally (and rightfully) that if it was it of course wasn’t their fault but the Russians’.
Ukraine Update:
Link
I’m still waiting for a full report of all the findings, and for a definitive conclusion to which all parties have agreed.
“NSC spox Adrienne Watson: We have seen nothing that contradicts Polish Pres. Duda’s preliminary assessment that this explosion was most likely the result of a Ukrainian air defense missile that unfortunately landed in Poland. will continue to assess & share any new information”
Statement at the (Twitter) link.
“That said, whatever the final conclusions may be, it is clear that the party ultimately responsible for this tragic incident is Russia, which launched a barrage of missiles on Ukraine specifically intended to target civilian infrastructure. Ukraine had – and has – every right to defend itself.”
Link
How to Move From Twitter to Mastodon
I don’t think it matters to him whether he wins, I think he plans to use the fact that he is running to 1) attempt to block investigations and 2) make money.
USA Today:
Good.
Atlanta Journal Constitution:
Arizona Central:
Good.
New York Times:
Lorenzo Tondo at the Guardian liveblog:
Milley is speaking now. Very supportive of Ukraine and positive about its military success.
Hee. (Twitter link.)
“Florida Man Makes Announcement”: New York Post Buries Donald Trump’s 2024 Announcement As Others In GOP Shun Mar-A-Lago Event
Why Trump’s economic lies stood out in his 2024 kickoff speech
To believe that Donald Trump was responsible for “the greatest economy in the history of the world” is to believe a ridiculous and demonstrable lie.
Republican Senators Chuck Grassley, John Barrasso and Pat Toomey have all repeated Trump’s lies.
“WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Mitch McConnell reelected as Republican leader, quashing challenge from Sen. Rick Scott after GOP midterm failures.”
Vote was 38-10, with one person voting “present.”
Julia Davis:
Subtitled video at the (Twitter) link.
“JUST IN: The probability of Russia conquering Ukraine militarily is ‘close to zero’, says Gen. Milley, in rare Pentagon press conference. Milley predicts Russia military will continue fighting through the winter but ‘is hurting bad’.”
Austin pointing out that winter fighting “favors the Ukrainians.”
Wow – thread following Jessica Watkins’ testimony in the Oathkeepers’ trial:
Her testimony and the thread are still going.
“‘My staff was unsuccessful’ in setting up a call with Russian Gen. Valery Gerasimov [yesterday], Gen. Milley tells reporters just now.”
Facebook to Fact-Checkers: Remember, Trump Is Off Limits Again
Yeah, that was my thought as well.
Trump is an attention seeker. He lives for attention.
He also uses it to make money.
Attention builds his Trump brand.
And he has formed PAC after PAC to raise money, a lot of money, that somehow usually ends up in his bank accounts.
It’s an easy scam and easy money.
Snowdon: Park to use mountain’s Welsh name Yr Wyddfa
Denali salutes you!
Almost all of the parts of the Iranian drones are from the West.
Three quarters of the parts are American.
The computer components are American, many from Texas Instruments. One of the cameras is Israeli. Another camera is Japanese.
The motor is Austrian.
Reginald @480, well that’s bad news. Also sounds like a bad business decision to me.
Followup to 437, 447 and 461.
Washington Post link
I am so glad I didn’t watch Trump’s “special announcement.”
Excerpt from a Wonkette article:
https://www.wonkette.com/sean-hannity-poland-russia
Manu Raju:
Aussie ABC TV’s Planet America has this 50 min lo9ng episode analysing Trump’s third POTUS run here which reckon has some good stuff in it.
How is it people can so completely fail to understand Trump after all this time? Of course it matters to him whether he wins, and of course he’s persuaded himself he will! People said in 2016 that he didn’t really want to win the presidency, that he would find an excuse to back out, or lose deliberately. Once he’d won, people said he would not take up the post. Once he did, they said he was looking for a way to resign. Then people said he wouldn’t stand again. Not only does he crave power over others without limit, his ego won’t let him end his career as a “loser”.
Kaja Kallas:
Definitely not the kind of boss I would want to work with: Elon Musk demands Twitter staff commit to ‘long hours’ or leave
Wisconsin state Assembly, Robin Vos, a Republican, said some stupid stuff about abortion laws in his state:
Link
Democratic Governor Tony Evers said he would veto legislation that included a police report requirement.
NBC News:
Good.
NBC News:
“Unusual,” is not the right word. It was an arrangement set up to allow executives to cheat on their taxes. It was tax fraud. It was a criminal scheme.
Satire from Andy Borowitz:
New Yorker link
“The head of Belarus’ Border Committee complained this morning about Ukraine’s hostile [LOL] actions: ‘They have mined the border area, blown up almost all the bridges in the Gomel and Mozyr regions. Now they are destroying all the bridges in the Volyn region. All roads are impassable’.”
Funny hat at the (Twitter) link.