Rather depends on what one means by “the counteroffensive has begun.” Ukraine appears to have been “shaping the battlefield” for some time now by attacking (and destroying) transport infrastructure, supplies, command & control points, and troop concentrations well behind the lines. Do those things count as part of the counteroffensive?
Since that’s been going on for a while and since I assume the Russian MoD knows the difference between that and the “real” start of the counteroffensive, I assume they mean the latter. The question then is whether or not they’re lying. I would ordinarily not repeat anything from any Russian officials, but I figured people would take it with a grain of salt; as others have noted, they would probably like to claim attacks that they’ve repelled to make people think the counteroffensive is weak or failing. And they could believe it but be mistaken. But I thought it noteworthy.
New York Times reporter Ian Urbina discusses his excellent but grim series about crime and impunity on the high seas. (This episode was originally published in 2020.)
Longtime animal advocates may be familiar with the term total liberation, but what exactly does this mean? Yvette Baker joins us today for an exploration of total liberation activism and its profound influence on her own animal advocacy. In our conversation, she sheds light on oppressive language commonly used when representing animals and urges everyone to unlearn and challenge it for the sake of progress. Yvette also tells how growing up in an Indigenous household impacted her perspective on animal activism, lending a unique lens to her advocacy work. We also explore the interconnectedness of various forms of oppression, illustrating how animal activism is an integral part of a broader continuum.
Link to transcript at the link. (When she talks about advocating for rats at a local pet shop when she was a kid I thought of Caine and her photos which made me see rats in a different way.)
Paris Marx is joined by Amanda Mull to discuss the history of consumerism and where ecommerce goes in the next few years as interest rates rise and its market share stalls.
Amanda Mull is a staff writer at The Atlantic, where she writes the Material World column. She’s also a shop steward at The Atlantic Union….
Dr. Naoíse Mac Sweeney presents a radical new account of how the idea of the West has shaped our history, told through the stories of fourteen fascinating lives in her book The West: A New History of an Old Idea (Dutton, 2023).
We tend to imagine Western Civilisation as a golden thread, leading through the centuries from classical antiquity to the countries of the modern West – a cultural genealogy that connects Plato to NATO. It is an idea often invoked in the speeches of politicians and the rhetoric of journalists, and which remains deeply embedded in popular culture. But what if it is wrong?
In an epic sweep through the ages, prize-winning archaeologist and historian Naoíse Mac Sweeney charts the history of this idea – an idea of enormous political significance, but which is nonetheless factually incorrect and obscures the wondrous, rich diversity of our past. She reveals how this particular version of Western history was invented, how it has been used to justify imperialism and racism, and why it is no longer ideologically fit for purpose today.
Told through the lives of fourteen fascinating historical figures – including a formidable Roman matriarch, an unconventional Islamic scholar, an enslaved African American poetess and a British prime minister with Homeric aspirations – The West is a groundbreaking retelling of Western history and a powerful corrective to one of the greatest myths of all: Western Civilisation.
I look forward to reading this. The part about Troy is wild.
whheydtsays
This relates, I think, to the earlier post about the Russian MoD claiming that Ukraine’s counter-offensive has started. It’s the BBC reporting on what the Russians are say, so take it with several pounds of salt…
Link: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-65806152
Russia’s defence ministry says it has thwarted a major Ukrainian offensive and killed 250 Ukrainian troops.
There has been no comment from Kyiv and the Russian claim has not been independently verified.
The ministry said Ukraine had launched the offensive in the Donetsk region on Sunday using six mechanised and two tank battalions.
A Ukrainian counter-offensive has been promised, but on Sunday, Kyiv called for silence ahead of the operation.
It is as yet unclear whether the alleged attacks indicate that the offensive to recapture Ukrainian land from Russian forces has started.
“On the morning of 4 June, the enemy launched a large-scale offensive in five sectors of the front in the South Donetsk direction,” the Russian defence ministry said on Telegram.
The ministry said the Ukrainians tried to break through Russian defences in what Kyiv saw as the most vulnerable part of the frontline.
“The enemy did not achieve its tasks, it had no success.”
Video posted showed military vehicles being attacked from the air. Moscow claimed Ukraine had lost 250 troops as well as 16 tanks.
Ukraine has been planning a counter-offensive for months. But it has wanted as much time as possible to train troops and to receive military equipment from Western allies.
Officials in Kyiv have warned against public speculation over the offensive, saying it could help the enemy.
“Plans love silence. There will be no announcement of the start,” the defence ministry said in a video posted to Telegram on Sunday.
The footage featured masked and well-armed troops holding their fingers against their lips.
…US officials believe that Ukraine has developed sabotage cells inside Russia made up of a mix of pro-Ukrainian sympathizers and operatives well-trained in this kind of warfare. Ukraine is believed to have provided them with Ukrainian-made drones, and two US officials told CNN there is no evidence that any of the drone strikes have been conducted using US-provided drones.
Officials could not say conclusively how Ukraine has managed to get the drones behind enemy lines, but two of the sources told CNN that it has established well-practiced smuggling routes that could be used to send drones or drone components into Russia where they could then be assembled.
A European intelligence official noted that the Russian-Ukrainian border is vast and very difficult to control, making it ripe for smuggling – something the official said the Ukrainians have been doing for the better part of the decade that they’ve been at war with pro-Russian forces.
“You also have to consider that this is a peripheral area of Russia,” the official said. “Survival is everyone’s problem, so cash works wonders.”
Who exactly is controlling these assets is also murky, the sources told CNN, though US officials believe that elements within Ukraine’s intelligence community are involved. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has set general parameters for what his intelligence and security services are allowed to do, two of the sources said, but not every operation requires his sign-off.
Asked for comment, a spokesperson for the head of the Ukrainian Security Service suggested to CNN that the mysterious explosions and drone strikes inside Russia would continue.
“We will comment on instances of ‘cotton’ only after our victory,” he said. Quoting the head of the Security Service, Vasyl Malyuk, the spokesperson added that regardless, “‘cotton’ has been burning, is burning, and will continue burning.”
“Cotton” is a slang-word that Ukrainians use to mean explosions, usually in Russia or Russian-occupied territories in Ukraine. Its origins date back to the early weeks of the war and stem from the fact that the Russian word for a “pop” is very similar to the Ukrainian word for cotton.
There has been a steady drumbeat of mysterious fires and explosions inside Russia over the last year, targeting oil and fuel depots, railways, military enlistment offices, warehouses and pipelines. But officials have noticed an uptick in these attacks on Russian soil in recent weeks, beginning with the attack on the Kremlin building. It appears to be “a culmination of months of effort” by the Ukrainians to set up the infrastructure for such sabotage, said one of the sources familiar with the intelligence.
…
Publicly, senior US officials have condemned the strikes inside Russia, warning of the potential for an escalation of the war. But speaking privately to CNN, US and western officials said that they believe the cross-border attacks are a smart military strategy that could divert Russian resources to protecting its own territory, as Ukraine gears up for a major counteroffensive.
On Tuesday, the UK’s Foreign Secretary told reporters that Ukraine has “the right to project force beyond its borders to undermine Russia’s ability to project force into Ukraine itself. Legitimate military targets beyond its own borders are internationally recognized as being part of a nation’s self-defense…We should recognize that.”
French Vice Admiral Nicolas Vaujour, chief of operations of the Joint Staff, told CNN on Friday that the attacks inside Russia are merely “part of war” and offer an opportunity to send a message to Russia’s population.
“There is a war there and it could concern you [the Russian public] in the future,” Vaujour said of the attacks. “And so it’s a good way for Ukrainians to address a message not only to Vladimir Putin, but to the Russian population,” he added.
Regarding the attacks, he said that it wasn’t “forbidden” for Ukraine to think about that.
Ukrainian officials, moreover, have said privately that they plan to continue the attacks inside Russia because it is a good distraction tactic that is forcing Russia to be concerned with its own security at home, according to a US source who has spoken to Ukrainian officials in recent days.
In an intelligence update, the UK Ministry of Defense said that attacks by pro-Ukrainian partisan groups and drone strikes in the border region of Belgorod have forced Russia to deploy “the full range of military firepower on its own territory.”
“Russian commanders now face an acute dilemma,” the update said, “of whether to strength defences in Russia’s border regions or reinforce their lines in occupied Ukraine.”
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From their latest summary:
A significant escalation in fighting along the frontlines in the Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia regions has been reported overnight, but there was no confirmation from Ukrainian officials that it marked the started of their long-planned counteroffensive.
Russia claimed to have repelled a “major offensive” in the Donetsk region and to have killed hundreds of Ukrainian troops, but the claims could not be independently verified. The defence ministry in Moscow said Ukraine had attacked with six mechanised and two tank battalions from two brigades.
The ministry claimed 250 Ukrainian troops had been killed, and 16 tanks, three infantry fighting vehicles and 21 armoured personnel carriers destroyed. It also claimed that Valery Gerasimov, the Russian chief of general staff, had been near the frontlines when the attack was repelled. The Russian defence ministry has consistently made exaggerated claims about the casualties its forces have inflicted.
A Moscow-backed militia leader and Russian military bloggers admitted that Ukrainian forces had achieved a breakthrough in at least one point in south-western Donetsk. Ukrainian officials made no comment, and emphasised the need for secrecy about operations in recent days as anticipation grows for a major counteroffensive.
Russian mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin said on Monday that Ukrainian forces had retaken part of the settlement of Berkhivka, north of Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine, calling it a “disgrace”….
Alleged leader of ‘transnational criminal organisation’ and a supposed subordinate have been charged over the 2022 murders of journalist and Indigenous expert
They are:
– Ruben Dario da Silva Villar, the alleged leader of a transnational illegal fishing network that operated in the tri-border region between Brazil, Colombia and Peru
– And Jânio Freitas de Souza, a fisher who was allegedly one of Silva Villar’s henchmen along the Itaquaí river where Phillips and Pereira were murdered.
Hundreds of thousands of people have marched through central Warsaw to protest against Poland’s rightwing populist government before a delicately poised election due in the autumn.
The Law and Justice (PiS) party came to power in 2015, since when it has eroded democratic norms, attacked the independent judiciary and launched campaigns against the LGBTQ+ community and reproductive rights.
“We’re half a million here, it’s a record,” said Donald Tusk, the former prime minister who leads the Civic Platform opposition grouping. He said the march on Sunday had been the biggest political gathering since Poland regained independence after the communist period.
There was no official confirmation of the size of the rally, though Warsaw’s city hall also gave a 500,000 estimate, and central streets thronged with crowds of protesters. The city’s metro was overwhelmed as people converged on the centre. Many people waved Polish or EU flags and the mood was defiant but often festive.
“The whole of Poland, the whole of Europe and the whole world sees how strong we are and how we are ready to fight for democracy and freedom again, like we did 30, 40 years ago,” Tusk told the crowds at the start of the rally….
The Ukrainian MP Andrii Kozhemiakin is a wiry, conservative ex-spy who likes to emphasise his Christian faith and large family. He is also an unlikely new recruit in the fight for LGBT rights in Ukraine.
A draft civil union law that would give same-sex partnerships legal status for the first time was introduced this year to Ukraine’s parliament, which is still functioning despite the war.
Kozhemiakin’s committee was the first to debate it and the team behind the legislation were bracing for defeat; they had even prepared a statement. He started with a script they recognised, talking about his Soviet-era KGB training, his religious beliefs and his “personal opinion about LGBT people”.
And then he announced his wholehearted support for the legislation, referencing Vladimir Putin’s homophobic claim that there are no gay Russians.
“Anything that our enemy hates … I will support,” Kozhemiakin said. “If it will never exist in Russia, it should exist and be supported here, to show them and signal to them that we are different. This law is like a smile towards Europe and a middle finger to Russia. So I support it.”
Inna Sovsun, the MP who drafted the law and is now trying to shepherd it through parliament, said Kozhemiakin’s speech was “the most unexpected thing in my political career”.
She would prefer allies who embrace the moral argument for equal marriage, but faces an uphill struggle to get the law passed, and that day showed “there are people who can support the bill for different reasons”….
Ben Roberts-Smith and four key witnesses he called were not honest or reliable when it came to their evidence, a federal court justice has found in the full judgment of the war veteran’s defamation case.
Justice Anthony Besanko’s complete judgment – 736 pages long – was published on Monday afternoon after he delivered an initial summary decision in court on Thursday….
Link to their Australia liveblog at the link. Much more at all of the links.
Ukraine’s military said on Monday it had no information about a major offensive which Russia said Kyiv had launched in the Ukrainian region of Donetsk, Reuters reports.
“We do not have such information and we do not comment on any kind of fake,” a spokesperson for the Ukrainian armed forces’ general staff said in response to a question from Reuters.
A two-day event has started in the European parliament that has brought together more than 200 Russian opposition and civil society activists to discuss how the EU can support Russian democratic forces.
Convened by four MEPs, the conference is entitled “The Day After”, and is meant to discuss strategy for a hypothetical post-Putin Russia.
“I would call this the first gathering of people who believe in the future of a democratic Russia,” said Andrius Kubilius, the Lithuanian MEP behind the forum.
Speaking in the opening session, the exiled opposition leader Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who was the richest person in Russia until he was jailed for a decade in 2003, said the only hope for a future Russia that does not cause problems for the rest of the world was fundamental political change:
“This regime should be destroyed, there is no other road to a peaceful normal future for Russia and for Europe and the whole world. The simple change of Putin to another person with a different name but no move to a federalised parliamentary system with free elections will not change anything,” he said
How to get to that stage is a more difficult question, of course. “The conditions in Russia are certainly not ideal for the rise of democracy,” said Katarina Barley, vice-president of the European parliament, in what is perhaps the understatement of the day.
As engaged citizens it is important for us all to understand the role the Supreme Court plays in our lives and its decisions impact us all. Erwin Chemerinsky, one of the nation’s foremost Constitutional scholars, covers these issues in a series of three Hammer Forums.
This final installment concentrates on constitutional interpretation and the role originalism plays or doesn’t play in the Court’s decisions.
Two anti-vaccine conspiracy theorists have been found guilty of offences in connection with a plot to destroy 5G mobile phone masts.
Darren Reynolds, of Newbould Crescent, Sheffield, was found guilty of six terror offences at Leeds Crown Court.
Christine Grayson, of Boothwood Road, York, was found guilty of conspiracy to commit criminal damage.
Reynolds and Grayson discussed armed uprisings and advocated violence towards MPs, the jury heard.
Grayson, 59, discussed “getting rid” of the masts with expanding foam and angle grinders during discussions online, the court heard.
Both defendants regarded 5G masts as pieces of “enemy infrastructure” and Grayson said she needed a “sabotage team” to “get rid of these 5G bloody near me” in a message on social media on 7 August 2021.
When police searched Grayson’s home they found a crossbow and a number of crossbow bolts, while at Reynolds’ property they discovered two replica assault rifles.
Reynolds, 60, was found guilty of encouraging terrorism with online comments including calling for MPs to be killed.
The court heard that Reynolds described murdered MP Sir David Amess as a “traitor” and reacted with approval to another user’s view that Thomas Mair had “rightly executed the murdered MP Jo Cox because of her alleged treason”.
He was also convicted of disseminating a terrorist publication by sharing a link to a neo-Nazi document.
He was found guilty of six offences of possessing material likely to be useful to a person committing an act of terrorism, including a manual on how to build a rifle, and a document called How To Become An Assassin….
Khodakovsky claims Ukraine is stepping up efforts in the Vuhledar area, says first Leopards were sighted:
“The situation on Novodonets’ke and to the left towards Velika Novosilka is difficult – the enemy, having felt our weak points, is stepping up his efforts. For the first time we saw leopards in our tactical area. As I expected yesterday – having a sense of success, the enemy will throw additional forces into the battle. Only in the area of Novodonets’ke recorded up to thirty units of armored vehicles.”
A map of the southern part of the Donetsk region where fighting between Russian and Ukrainian troops has been reported since yesterday. Novodarivka, Neskuchne, Storozheve and Novodonets’ke are places which are reported to be contested. The actual situation is still unclear.
Russian news reports have long since become a separate virtual meta-universe. #Moscow is already actively involved in repelling… a global offensive that “does not yet exist.” The million-strong Russian army is actively repelling attacks, destroying thousands of tanks, hundreds of #HIMARS, and F-16 squadrons. The battle is on, in a word. #Ukraine is closely watching this epic battle, albeit with some surprise. We would not like to interrupt the classic “Russian performance”, but still: follow only official news from Ukraine if you want to know the truth.
A supposed radio address by Russian president Vladimir Putin heard on Monday on Russian stations in regions bordering Ukraine was fake and the result of a hack, the Kremlin said.
RIA, the state-owned news agency, said a number of radio stations had carried the hoax address.
Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin’s spokesperson, said: “All of these messages are an utter fake,” the RIA reports.
Independent Russian media reported that the announcement had told residents of the Rostov, Belgorod and Voronezh regions, all of which adjoin Ukraine, that Kyiv’s forces had crossed the border with Russia.
They cited the address as saying, wrongly, that martial law had been declared in border regions and a nationwide military mobilisation had begun for Russia’s war with Ukraine, and that residents should evacuate deeper into Russia.
On Sunday, TV broadcasts in Crimea were reportedly hacked with a clip from a short film released by the Ukrainian government showing members of the military putting their fingers to their lips and saying “shh” followed by the words “Plans love silence. There will be no announcement about the start.”
My colleague Dan Sabbagh, our defence and security editor, offers this analysis of developments in the ground on Ukraine:
Ukraine may not have formally declared its counteroffensive has begun, but the attacks being reported on Russian lines overnight and into Monday morning look like the first steps of what is likely to be a tough military campaign.
Individual reports should be viewed sceptically but taken together they can build up a picture. What is clear is that there is not an all-out assault, but also that the level of forces being committed are non-trivial. These are not exploratory raids, but most likely probing attacks, searching for local Russian weaknesses.
If the Russian Ministry of Defence is correct, and Ukraine has attacked with two brigades, that amounts to a force of several thousand troops.
There is also evidence of Ukraine undertaking attacks elsewhere on the 1,000km front. The leader of the Wagner mercenary forces, Yevgeny Prigozhin, complained that Russian troops had fled from part of Berkhivka, a village north of the recently taken Bakhmut, on the eastern front, suggesting that exploratory attacks may not only be taking place in the south.
It is possible, too, that Ukraine does not even know where it wants to place its key counter-attack forces, until a point of weakness is found. The aim of the initial attacks would be to secure a breakthrough that a subsequent force, held in reserve, can exploit to then surround the defenders.
letting neighbors, not the police, respond to low-level street crime.
Several times a year, workers from Brownsville In Violence Out stand sentry on two blocks for five days. The police channel all 911 calls from that area to the civilians. Unless there is a major incident or a victim demands an arrest, officers, always in plainclothes, shadow the workers.
[…]
no arrest powers. But they have persuaded people to turn in illegal guns, prevented shoplifting, kept a man from robbing a bodega
[…]
The idea […] to rebuild the precinct’s relationship with a wary community. […] sometimes all that is needed to keep the peace is a person with credibility—not necessarily a badge—telling someone: “Get out of here. You’re bugging.” […] the “community responder model,” […] Similar programs are underway in Eugene, Ore.; Denver; and Rochester, N.Y., among other places
Ukraine’s deputy defence minister has claimed Russian reports that Ukraine has started a counteroffensive are intended to distract from losses Russia has sustained in the Bakhmut region.
In a post on the Telegram messaging app, Hanna Maliar wrote:
What is happening now? We are continuing the defence that began on 24 February, 2022.
The defensive operation includes everything, including counteroffensive actions. Therefore, in some areas we are moving to offensive actions.
In particular, the Bakhmut direction remains the epicenter of hostilities. There we are moving along a fairly wide front. We are successful. We occupy the dominant heights. The enemy is on the defensive and wants to hold his position.
In the south – the enemy is on the defensive. Fighting of local importance continues.
Why are the Russians actively releasing information about a counteroffensive?
Because they need to divert attention from the defeat in the Bakhmut direction.
.* Quote : “The 2022 winners of the Environmental Photographer of the Year have been announced.” Gallery of award winning & caward contending for photos with accompanying info there.
StevoRsays
The hell did that “c’ get there? Aaargh. Typos FFS.
Also why is sea spelled s-e-a when we say c? Also lightspeed abbriev and ocean are the same proun-sea-ashon wise..
Because yeah.. here, there, toomany placxes and too familiar..
StevoRsays
Here. My home city :
Under the guise of cracking down on climate change protests that triggered a minor traffic delay, Labor joined hands with the Liberal Party opposition to pass laws that can effectively criminalise any protest, march, rally or demonstration. In fact, they ban any activity at all that allegedly disrupts “free passage of a public place.”
That could include handing leaflets on a footpath or in a public mall, demonstrating outside parliament house, participating in a workers’ march against low pay and intolerable conditions, or joining a picket during a strike.
The legislation was rammed through both houses of state parliament in a matter of hours, despite several hastily-called protests, and shock and condemnation voiced by a wide range of civil liberties, legal and other non-government organisations.
With Labor now in office throughout Australia, except for Tasmania, these laws mark an escalation of repressive police-state type of powers introduced over the past several years by federal and state governments.
The changes to South Australia’s Summary Offences Act dramatically increase maximum fines from $750 to $50,000. They add the prospect of imprisonment, for up to three months, as well as possible huge imposts to pay for the alleged costs incurred by police or other authorities in responding to the “obstruction.” ..
.. here was a revealing display of unity between Premier Peter Malinauskas and the state Liberal leader David Speirs, who spearheaded the passage of the laws by agitating for them on talkback radio. Later, Speirs boasted that the legislation went through parliament in “near record time.” He caused outrage by declaring that people should be happy because they could be “beheaded” in other countries for joining protests.
This week, the two parties conducted a 14-hour overnight session to push the changes through the upper house by early Wednesday morning, rejecting Greens amendments to include a reasonable excuse test and an expiry date.
Also on my state’s draconian new anti-Climate Activism laws :
It took only 22 minutes for anti-protest legislation to pass one of the two houses needed for it to become law – and now a number of SA’s leading civil society groups are calling for the SA Government to spend another 22 minutes or even less this week to send the bill to committee for proper review.
The coalition includes the South Australian Council of Social Service, SA Unions, the Working Women’s Centre, Conservation SA, Rights Resource Network SA, Amnesty International Australia, Australian Democracy Network, Human Rights Law Network, SA Abortion Action Coalition and many more. A total of 80 civil society groups signed an open letter to Parliament protesting the bill that appeared in Friday’s The Advertiser.
..(snip)… Quotes attributable to SACOSS CEO Ross Womersley:
“This will be a bad law, badly made, and the result will be bad for all South Australians.
“This legislation was drafted hastily by the Opposition, and then just as hastily seized by the Government and tabled in the Lower House where it was passed in just 22 minutes, with no debate or interrogation. Not even a single question about what it might mean.
..snip.. Quotes attributable to Human Rights Law Centre Senior Lawyer, David Mejia-Canales:
“South Australia was the first place in the world to give women the right to be elected and the first in the country to give women the right to vote. These rights didn’t just appear. They were won because the suffragists protested and organised.
“The proposed anti-protest laws before the Parliament are so broad and vague that even the suffragists could have been jailed under them- all because they wanted to have a say over their destiny.
“A good government would not support these laws.”
.. snip.. Quotes attributable to Working Women’s Centre Director Abbey Kendall:
“South Australians should be able to protest without penalty and fear of jail time. Progress is, more often than not, won through protest, demonstrations and robust public debate.
“Sometimes protest is obstructive, sometimes we have to take up more space than permitted. It is entirely undemocratic to change the law and slap on jail time in 22 minutes.”
Quotes attributable to Amnesty International Australia SA/NT President Adelaide Xerri:
“The right to protest is a foundational part of democracy. It’s how we hold those that represent us to account. Disruptive peaceful protests have been crucial to making the world a better place,..
“Premier” Malisantos, er, Malinauskas (yeah, bad form to pick on names but can’t resist..) has a brother whoworks for Santos, prettty high up I think. Dodgy as.
StevoRsays
^ Santos the Fossil Fool Company that is – not the US compulsive liar Congresscritter…
I have seen today so much where I could say something, but it is so hilariously good what Russians believe is happening. I will not spoil the fun, yet.
Reynolds, of Newbould Crescent, Sheffield, had been cleared of conspiracy to commit criminal damage in relation to 5G masts, but found guilty of terrorism offences.
He was jailed for 12 years, with an additional year on licence, after being found guilty of offences linked to his “extreme right wing, antisemitic and racist views”. …
… She [Grayson] was found guilty of conspiracy to commit criminal damage, while Reynolds was cleared of that charge. …
… Grayson was told she would be released on licence, but failure to comply and she would be returned to prison to serve the remainder of her sentence. [Length of sentence not included in report]
Hey, somebody’s got to make Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. look good!
Former NBCUniversal advertising chief Linda Yaccarino assumed her role as Twitter CEO today…
The same day, The New York Times reported that Twitter brought in $88 million in advertising revenue from April 1 to the first week of May, a decrease of 59% year-over-year. Ad sales make up to 90% of the company’s revenue, making these latest results a gut punch for the company.
With Yaccarino at the helm focusing on business operations, Musk has stated he would become the company’s executive chairman and chief technology officer, overseeing product, software, and system operations…
Lawyers for Donald Trump met Monday morning with Department of Justice officials, a day after the former president noted speculation that special counsel Jack Smith is moving closer to seeking an indictment of him.
NBC News confirmed Trump lawyers on Monday met with officials at the DOJ headquarters in Washington, D.C., after CBS News tweeted a photo of three attorneys walking in to the building. The lawyers, John Rowley, James Trusty and Lindsey Halligan, left the DOJ shortly before noon ET, but declined to comment, NBC reported.
Soon after the meeting ended, Trump posted an all-caps message to his Truth Social account, saying: “How can DOJ possibly charge me, who did nothing wrong, when no other presidents were charged.” [It was a whole rant.]
…
Smith is investigating Trump in two separate cases.
One relates to Trump’s retention of government documents, many of them classified, at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida when he left the White House, and possible obstruction of justice in thwarting the recovery of that material by the National Archives and Records Administration.
NBC reported on Saturday that the federal grand jury that has been hearing evidence in that case is expected to resume proceedings this week in Washington.
…
The other probe by Smith is focused on efforts by Trump and allies, including his campaign lawyers, to overturn his loss in the 2020 election of President Joe Biden, and effectively block confirmation of Biden’s victory in the Electoral College by a joint session of Congress on Jan. 6, 2021….
Ukraine claims 42,000 women currently serve in its armed forces [photo at the link]
JUST when I write that Ukraine appears to have stopped pushing on Bakhmut’s flanks…
Sladkov says Ukraine is pressing on Russia’s flanks in Bakhmut, including shelling Klishchiivka and Kurdyumivka south of Bakhmut (using UAVs for ISR and loitering munitions). He says Ukraine has infiltrated the SW corner of Bakhmut and is bringing armor. [Tweet at the link]
Sladkov is a Russian “journalist,” aka war propagandist.
If this is true, and Leopards have shown up, then this is it.
Khodakovsky claims Ukraine is stepping up efforts in the Vuhledar area, says first Leopards were sighted: “The situation on Novodonets’ke and to the left towards Velika Novosilka is difficult – the enemy, having felt our weak points, is stepping up his efforts. For the first time we saw leopards in our tactical area. As I expected yesterday – having a sense of success, the enemy will throw additional forces into the battle. Only in the area of Novodonets’ke recorded up to thirty units of armored vehicles.”
And it this is it, then indeed, it’s still a spring counteroffensive.
Everyone is waiting for Ukraine’s spring/summer counteroffensive to begin, but none more so than the Russians, who are so jumpy that they claimed a small probing action in Zaporizhzhia oblast was the beginning (and end) of the expected Ukrainian action. Let’s take a look at where things stand.
First of all, Ukraine is telling people to … shush. [A reference to the video already noted upthread. See SC’s comment 4, video also available at the link for this article.]
We’ll contrast that quiet confidence with the shit-show that is Russia in a moment, but first a word about what silence means in operational security (OpSec).
It doesn’t mean that people don’t repost video clips, or geolocate them.
If Russia posts a video, they know that 1) whatever is depicted took place, and 2) where it took place.
If Ukraine posts a video, it is okay with that video being released. The soldiers and airmen with access to those videos know what the OpSec rules are. And as you’ll often see, if they don’t want the video geolocated, they will blur any background identifying features. They’re quite aware of the game.
You will see people complain on Twitter, Telegram, or right here at Daily Kos when such videos are posted, misunderstanding the situation. Ukraine doesn’t want the locals posting videos of their troop movements, or pretty much any battlefield information that could endanger the troops. But if it’s on Twitter, where most of us see this stuff, it’s already been seen by millions on Telegram, where the Russians actually hang out.
Getting back to Ukraine’s quiet confidence, let’s contrast that with the chaos of the Russian side. There was so much chaos this weekend.
Wagner Group mercenaries actually got in a firefight with a Russian army unit, captured its commander, a lieutenant colonel, broke his nose in signs of torture, then filmed him admitting to targeting Wagner out of “personal animosity.” [Tweet at the link, with video]
Wagner CEO Yevgeny Prigozhin must be feeling pretty untouchable to not just kidnap and beat a Russian army officer, but to post it online. […] As several people joked today (so not my joke), we may be getting to a place where Russia isn’t even the second best Army in Ukraine!
Similarly, Wagner’s feud with pro-Moscow Chechen Kadyrovites is escalating, with a not-so-veiled threat posted on Wagner Telegram accounts. The meme features a picture of bombed out Grozny, the capital of Chechnya, with the caption: “Grozny, Chechnya 2000. We can repeat.” [image at the link]
Meanwhile, pro-Ukrainian Russian forces and some Polish foreign legionaries have actually occupied a couple of border settlement on the Russian side of the border in Belgorod. No, they’re not marching on Moscow, and they might’ve retreated back to Ukraine by the time you read this, but they’re certainly making Russian dictator Vladimir Putin look impotent. Russia must either peels troops away from the Ukrainian front lines to stop these border excursions, or the Russian government keeps looking the fool as these marauders romp through the Russian countryside, playing whack-a-mole up and down that long border. This time, they even grabbed a couple of Russian POWs. [Tweet and video at the link]
Kadyrovite leader Ramzan Kadyrov, fresh off promising to send troops to Bakhmut that never arrived, is now offering to secure Russia’s northern border. [Tweet at the link]
To be clear, Kadyrov doesn’t have 70,000 troops [that’s his claim in the tweet]. Most estimates are around 10-12,000, of which only around 10% ever deployed to Ukraine. (When deployed, they mostly posted TikTok videos of themselves shooting at traffic lights and random empty buildings.) They certainly aren’t Spetsnaz—Russian special forces. Russia only has 17,000 of those, minus whatever they’ve lost in Ukraine.
If Kadyrov had 70,000 Spetsnaz, he’d be able to declare independence and there’d be nothing Moscow could do about it. Mostly likely, he saw Prigozhin’s offer to secure the Belgorod border, and he decided he couldn’t be upstaged by his fierce nemesis. [Tweet and image at the link. “”We will not wait for an invitation.” Prigozhin declared his readiness to “protect” the Belgorod region. PMC “Wagner” fighters can come to the region, if the Russian Defense Ministry does not stop the “lawlessness” taking place there in the near future, said Yevgeny Prigozhin, adding that in such a case, the PMC will ask the authorities for munitions. The head of the “Wagner” mercenaries also claims that his conflict with Kadyrov is over.]
I wish they’d just settle it all on the battlefield—it would be the ultimate expression of Russian toxic masculinity.
Russia claimed the Ukrainian counteroffensive began today in southern Ukraine, Zaporizhzhia oblast, and they crushed it! It’s over! [LOL]
On the morning of June 4, the enemy launched a large-scale offensive in five sectors of the front in the South Donetsk direction by introducing into battle 23 and 31 mechanized brigades from the strategic reserves of the Armed Forces of Ukraine with the support of other military units and subunits.
In total, six mechanized and two tank battalions of the enemy were involved […]
As a result of the skillful and competent actions of the Eastern Group of Forces, the losses of the Armed Forces of Ukraine amounted to more than 250 personnel, 16 tanks, three infantry fighting vehicles, 21 armored fighting vehicles. [As whheydt noted in comment 7]
Actually, something is happening. Russia even released blurry video of what seems to be 9-10 stalled armored vehicles, including several on fire. It certainly doesn’t show 37 vehicles on fire. The video was geolocated in the direction of Mariupol, 1.2 kms inside the last assumed front lines. just west of Velika Novosilka. Ukraine released its own video claiming to show Ukrainian tanks destroying a Russian one. But honestly, I can’t tell what’s going on in that video.
Still, Russian Telegram sources admit that Ukraine did manage to liberate settlements in that area, both at Novodarivka, and perhaps even at Neskuchne: [map at the link]
For context, here is where we are on the map, pulled back: [map at the link]
A Russian commander of the pro-Russian Donetsk militia, Alexander Khodakovsky, claims Ukraine took territory, took losses (as the video linked above would suggest), and—importantly—that this isn’t actually the big counteroffensive.
On the Velikonovoselkovsky direction, the enemy is making an attempt to break through. Having grouped his shock fist, in the first half of the day he was able to achieve tactical success – he took one position from us, but suffered tangible losses. Now the enemy is building up his presence in the breakthrough sector – obviously, he is striving to increase his achievements.
Neither action in the north in the direction of Novaya Tavolzhanka, nor action in the south is in itself the promised counter-offensive, but in the event of a breakthrough, more significant forces could be transferred to the site.
This could be like the localized counteroffensive in Bakhmut’s flanks—territory regained on the initiative of local commanders. Or this could be probing actions, testing out Russia’s defenses and searching for weak spots along the lines. Or it could be a diversion, the way Ukraine signaled a Kherson offensive last September, when the real target was Kharkiv’s liberation.
Which is it? No one knows outside a small group of people in Ukraine. All we can do is wait. Personally, I won’t believe the counteroffensive has started until we see Leopard main battle tanks on the prowl.
Leopard main battle tanks may have shown up near Vuhledar.
Musk has stated he would become the company’s executive chairman and chief technology officer, overseeing product, software, and system operations…
That still sounds very bad. Musk is in position to wreak havoc on more of Twitter.
SC @37, it’s almost not worth anyone’s time to read Trump’s rants anymore. He is still repeating the same lies and/or bluntly stupid misperceptions. As you indicated, what’s important is that lawyers for Trump met this morning with Department of Justice officials, so that indicates an indictment may be coming soon.
Reginald 238, Nikki Haley is trying to walk a very narrow tightrope. She’s going to fall off soon. She can’t avoid offending MAGA trumpian cultists while she also runs a campaign for the presidency.
Job growth under President Joe Biden has been so strong that Republican leaders have to go out of their way to pretend not to notice the good news.
It was tough to blame President Joe Biden for celebrating the latest numbers on job growth. The Democrat said in a statement on Friday:
“Today is a good day for the American economy and American workers. We learned this morning that the economy created 339,000 jobs last month. We have now created over 13 million jobs since I took office. That is more jobs in 28 months than any president has created in an entire 4-year term.”
Consider some of the details we learned on Friday morning:
– Over 1.5 million jobs have been created in the United States so far this year — and that’s after just five months.
– The unemployment rate has now been under 4% for 16 consecutive months, a stretch unseen since the 1960s.
– The number of jobs created since January 2021 is more than double the combined total from Donald Trump’s first three years in the White House.
And what, pray tell, do Republican leaders have to say about all of this? Not much.
In keeping with the recent trend, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell responded to the job numbers by saying literally nothing about the good news. No press releases, no tweets, and no public comments. They literally found themselves speechless.
This was hardly new: The GOP leadership in both chambers has spent nearly all of the Biden era pretending not to notice extraordinarily good job growth.
[…] There’s no great mystery here. McCarthy, McConnell, and their teams almost certainly believe that if they were to comment on the good news, more Americans might hear about it — and that’s the last thing Republicans want. There’s political utility in simply looking the other way.
But the GOP’s silence doesn’t change the fact that by most measures, Americans simply have not seen a job market like this one in the last half-century.
From owls to hedgehogs to fungi, genetic material from plants and animals is being inadvertently hoovered up by air-quality monitoring stations around the world, creating an untapped “vault of biodiversity data”, according to a new scientific paper.
Globally, thousands of air filters are continually testing for heavy metals and other pollutants in the atmosphere. Scientists are now realising that this monitoring network is also picking up invisible traces of genetic material known as airborne environmental DNA (eDNA) from bits of hair, feathers, saliva and pollen…
[…] Former ambassador and governor Nikki Haley, at a Sunday CNN town hall, was the latest GOP candidate to squirm out of saying what degree of restriction she supports.
Anchor Jake Tapper asked Haley whether she would sign a six-week gestational ban, if it came to her desk in the White House.
“I will answer that when you ask Kamala and Biden if they would agree to 37 weeks, 38 weeks, 39 weeks,” she responded. “Then I’ll answer your question.”
Demonizing “late-term abortions” is a common Republican tactic, seizing on an anti-abortion myth that women are frequently carrying their pregnancies almost completely to term before having an elective abortion divorced from a medical emergency. And elsewhere in her answers, Haley insisted that she supports a “consensus” decision on abortion, whatever can get 60 votes in the Senate.
But her refusal to say what kind of ban she’d support […] reveals the political danger of the issue to Republicans.
Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America President Marjorie Dannenfelser, responding to similar comments Haley made in May on CBS, called her position “not acceptable.”
“Ambassador Haley is uniquely gifted at communicating from a pro-life woman’s perspective,” Dannenfelser said in a statement. “I look forward to confirmation of her concrete goals.”
Haley’s competitors aren’t faring much better. […]
Where’s It Coming From?
I’ve had quite a few questions in recents weeks from lay persons and readers about the stream of revelations coming out about the Mar-a-Lago documents investigation.
The short answer is that the sources of the flurry of stories we’ve seen are witnesses in the case or, more precisely, their lawyers. Trump World figures, in responding and reacting to some of the disclosures, have divulged some new information, too, but that’s been less revealing of the underlying facts than of potential defenses they might use and the public narrative they want to create.
None of the big reveals about the MAL evidence from the last few weeks bear much sign of having come from Smith, the FBI, or DOJ more broadly.
Kurt Eichenwald, the veteran investigative reporter, had a good thread on the dynamics: [Tweet at the link]
As Eichenwald notes, the timing of these revelations is probably another sign that we’re nearing the end of the pre-indictment phase of the case. […]
More than a dozen migrants from South America who were recently flown on a chartered jet from New Mexico and dropped off in Sacramento were carrying documents indicating that their transportation was arranged by the state of Florida, California’s attorney general said Sunday.
The documents appear to show that the flight was arranged through the Florida Division of Emergency Management and that it was part of the state’s program to relocate migrants, mostly from Texas, to other states, Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta said.
The contractor for the program is Vertol Systems Co., which coordinated similar flights that took dozens of Venezuelan asylum seekers from San Antonio to Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts last year, he said. […]
The Supreme Court said Monday it will hear a case in which a man tried to trademark a phrase mocking former President Donald Trump as “too small.”
The Justice Department is supporting President Joe Biden’s once and possibly future rival in urging the court to deny a trademark for the suggestive phrase “Trump too small” that a California man wants to put on T-shirts.
The case will be argued in the fall, one of two disputes on the court’s upcoming agenda that involve Trump or one of his businesses. Government officials said the phrase “Trump too small” could still be used, just not trademarked because Trump had not consented to its use. But a federal appeals court said refusing trademark registration violated free speech rights…
Wonkette: “Actual Nazis Use Montana Drag Ban To Get Trans Authors Banned From Reading At Libraries, So That’s Bad”
Friday, actual good news came out of a Trump judge’s courtroom, when US District Court Judge Thomas L. Parker ruled in the dead of night that Tennessee’s drag ban is not just unconstitutional, but LMAO Go Fuck Yourself Unconstitutional. (Legal term.) This made Memphis’s pride parade and festival the next day just that much sweeter, according to pretty much everyone we know, and we would know because we live there.
Meanwhile in Montana, things took a turn for the more horrifying last week, in an entirely predictable way to anyone who’s been paying attention. The state’s own absurdly ridiculous anti-drag law was used to ban a transgender person from reading from their own book at the Butte-Silver Bow public library. Republican Governor Greg Gianforte signed HB 359 just last week. Hopefully it will be treated like a wet turd in court just like Tennessee’s ban was. But until then!
The library said it didn’t make the decision, but rather the county did. “The powers that be, they thought they would be in violation of the law if we held that event,” said Shari Curtis, the adult services librarian there. Author Adria Jawort, a member of the Northern Cheyenne tribe, was to give a lecture on “Montana History of Two-Spirit and LGBTQ+ peoples,” but some brain-addled bigot complained. In an email, Jawort was told that “Ou[r] local Chief Executive and County Attorney have decided that it is too much of a legal risk to have a transgendered person in the library.”
The library’s full statement is in the tweets below: [available at the link]
And here is the complaint, which NBC Montana reporter Josh Margolis said came from someone named Cory Allen, which may be an alias. Margolis reported in a later tweet that a group called “White Lives Matter” took credit on social media for the cancellation. And Jawort has more receipts on her Twitter showing that it was literal actual Nazis who made it happen. Congratulations, Montana! You’re taking orders from Nazis! [Tweet at the link]
“Hello, there is a transsexual reading to children at the public library on Friday the 2nd,” the complaint says. “[T]he ‘performer’ has posted on Twitter that it will be discussing sexual acts and there may be children there.” They were referring to tweets from Jawort where she said she was going to be dressed “flamboyantly,” and that she would “def have a book & sexuality will be discussed & minors may be present, & the State of Montana doesn’t legally recognize people being trans, so… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯” (It should be obvious to any moron that Jawort was remarking on the utter insanity of the anti-drag law Gianforte had just signed.)
Obviously, a transgender person reading from their own book is not the same thing as a drag performer doing story hour, but Republicans’ anti-drag crusade was never really just about banning drag shows, although that’s part of it. They may be too stupid to understand that drag performers aren’t the same thing as trans people (although some drag performers are trans), but they definitely are trying to eliminate transgender people’s right to exist, under the auspices of pretending to care about protecting children. (If Republicans wanted to protect kids, they might for instance start by banning children from being alone with conservative Christian religious leaders, since statistically that’s who’s doing the molesting.)
The Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh, who is probably currently the most prominent anti-trans hate activist in the country, has spent the last few days teamed up with Elon Musk to spread his anti-trans propaganda film What Is A Woman? to as many bigoted eyes as possible. Walsh, a father of six, is a fan of saying it would be a “fate worse than death” to have transgender kids, and that he’d “rather be dead” than for that to happen. He’s doing this because it’s Pride month.
Meanwhile, Michael Knowles, also of the Daily Wire, insists that when he says he wants to eradicate “transgenderism” he isn’t issuing some kind of Hitler-esque call to eradicate transgender people. As if we cannot hear him loud and clear, as if the rhetorical games these people play aren’t the same exact rhetorical tropes conservative Christians deploy with every group they want to eliminate. As if literal actual Nazis don’t hear them loud and clear.
So that’s what’s happening here. Nazis are using an anti-drag law in Montana to ban a transgender author from existing in a public space, just like state Rep. Zooey Zephyr and many others have said people would do using these bills: [Tweet and video at the link]
For the latest on this story, keep up with that NBC Montana reporter Josh Margolis on Twitter, as he says he’ll be interviewing more Montana officials today.
On one hand, it definitely does look like idiot Republicans have passed an idiot law and now they have to try to uphold and defend it, like idiots. Best wishes on all that. But on the other hand, the literal worst people in the entire country are emboldened right now, and it’s probably going to get a lot worse before it gets better.
Cornel West, a progressive political activist and philosopher, announced on Monday that he is launching a third-party 2024 bid for the U.S. presidency.
West said on Twitter that he was running for the White House with the small, leftist People’s Party, “fighting to end poverty, mass incarceration, ending wars and ecological collapse, guaranteeing housing, health care, education and living wages for all!” …
Wonkette: “Rachel Campos-Duffy Thinks God Wants A Sacrifice, And It Is This Planet!”
Republican presidential joke candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, who is hilariously polling above Chris Christie and Tim Scott, recently pledged that he would let his faith guide him if elected president […] This is pathetic pandering that he spun into the typical rightwing smear against supposed godless liberals who don’t reference religion as much as Republicans, a party that twice nominated Donald Trump and will probably do so a third time. They stick with him more consistently than Trump does with his wives.
The hosts on “Fox & Friends Sunday” added their own evangelical nonsense to Ramaswamy’s gross comments. Taking the lead in religious bigotry, Rachel Campos-Duffy claimed liberals are obsessed with boring old Earth in the here and now while conservatives are focused on the wonderful imaginary world that lies beyond. [Tweet and video at the link]
“For them, where we live right now, this place, Earth is it,” she said. “So everything’s on the line here for them. They think, as you said, they can perfect this Earth. Those of us who have faith don’t believe that, and we believe how we act here determines where we go after. And so we got to behave.”
Her primitive “don’t anger sky god” morality isn’t even internally consistent. If she believes the faithful must “behave” in order to snag a “skip the line” pass in Heaven, wouldn’t that also include how we treat each others on Earth? Right-wingers demonstrate nothing but contempt for the vast majority of God’s supposed creations. They’re obsessed with drag queen brunches while global warming is accelerating. […]
The oh-so-godly Campos-Duffy once whined — on Mother’s Day, no less — that “gender-confused” men are apparently too sissified to protect women. […]
Most liberals don’t want to “perfect” the Earth — that’s another right-wing straw man. We’d just like to leave the place in remotely habitable condition for our descendants. Republicans want their kids to dodge the estate tax, and we want our kids to avoid breathing smoke during “wildfire season.” The Christian God is a documented asshole but I don’t think another major extinction event — one that includes us shaved apes — is a mandatory part of God’s immediate plan.
Campos-Duffy continued, “The ends justify the means is sort of the rules for radicals. That’s not how Christians act.”
The Spanish Inquisition, the Crusades, Manifest Destiny, the French Wars of Religion, witch hunts … I mean, there’s almost no point in correcting her because she’s so obviously full of crap.
“We’re made for religion,” she said, which is an absurd statement. Humans have brain stems and the capacity for reason. We are geared toward curiosity and asking questions that require more convincing answers than “a wizard did it.”
“So if you don’t have a faith, whether it’s Hindu, Islam, Christianity, you’re going to create one. And it could be climate, or it could be yourself.”
[…] Campos-Duffy also dismisses giving a damn about the climate as some sort of wacko fake religion, when a spiritual connection to nature is a key theme in many ancient religions. Arguably, living in service to the observable world around you is more practical and noble than worshipping some unhinged mob boss posing as a deity. [Tweet and video at the link]
They also brought on some jerk from Notre Dame who suggested that progressive philosophy in general is rooted in narcissism and psychopathy. He seems reasonably educated, so he’s probably at least heard of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene. These guys just can’t stop projecting.
Rep. Jamie Raskin said Sunday that he will decide whether to run for Senate before the Fourth of July, gearing up to potentially become the latest House Democrat to announce a Senate campaign.
The Maryland Democrat — who gained national attention for serving on the committee investigating the events of Jan. 6, 2021, and for his role in former President Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial — told CNN’s “State of the Union” that he’s still mulling whether to enter the race to replace retiring Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin…
Canada is experiencing one of the worst starts to its wildfire season ever recorded.
Millions of people across the Midwest are under dangerous air quality conditions Monday, as smoke from wildfires in eastern Canada wafts over the region.
Hazy skies have blanketed a wide swath of the country from the Ohio Valley to as far south as the Carolinas. Air quality advisories are in effect Monday in southeastern Minnesota and parts of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, as well as in more than 60 counties in Wisconsin.
The spike in air pollution comes from wildfires that have been raging in the Canadian provinces of Quebec and Nova Scotia.
[…] Canada is experiencing one of the worst starts to its wildfire season ever recorded. More than 6.7 million acres in the country have already burned in 2023, federal officials said last week.
In Quebec, around 14,000 people were forced to evacuate, and more than 150 fires are still ablaze in the province, according to CBC News. Further east, in Nova Scotia, officials said Sunday that one wildfire had been contained but a second, covering nearly 100 square miles, was still burning out of control, The Associated Press reported. […]
SC @37, it’s almost not worth anyone’s time to read Trump’s rants anymore. He is still repeating the same lies and/or bluntly stupid misperceptions. As you indicated, what’s important is that lawyers for Trump met this morning with Department of Justice officials, so that indicates an indictment may be coming soon.
It’s funny that in the past we/people used to think his rants might be clues to what was going to happen with investigations or other non-public events. But even in this case it looks like he was unhinged by something he saw on the news or social media rather than anything conveyed to him by his lawyers. In fact, he would probably discount what his lawyers told him if it contradicted some random claim on television. That’s not to say an indictment isn’t imminent – one probably is – but that his rant isn’t even any indication of anything happening behind the scenes in the real world. So just totally unworthy of attention.
You’ve probably heard about The Atlantic article which has painted a devastating picture of network CEO Chris Licht and the state of the network on his watch. (CNN has had some time slots where Newsmax has managed to beat it of late.) There are several moving parts to this story. After what turned out to be a woefully mismanaged acquisition by AT&T, CNN and its parent Time Warner were picked up cheap by Discovery, a cable news heavyweight known for producing cheap shows with solid viewership. That was a bad sign for CNN and HBO — both in their in own spheres premium properties. The results for CNN, judged in viewership, have been abysmal. But for all the grief Licht is getting, this is fundamentally a failure not of execution but of strategy.
Put simply, the theory behind the current revamp of CNN is the network got “too liberal” and gave on-air hosts too much leeway for personal commentary and advocacy. But did CNN get “too liberal”? […] We’re back to the old problem of whether to prioritize “balance” or “accuracy.” Which of those two is more important shapes everything about how you approach journalism.
The revamp of CNN seemed to be based first on the “bothsidesist” theory of journalism that is still so common in elite media circles, albeit to a lesser degree. […] “fix” CNN […] largely by watching the evening line up on Fox. To a great degree that does seem like where the strategy came from […]
the editorial realities of our present politics shouldn’t present a journalist challenge for CNN. But they definitely present a business challenge. CNN isn’t MSNBC or Fox. I don’t say that to equate the two. […] they each embrace being identified with one of the country’s two main political factions. CNN’s business model is based on access to the whole national population. That breaks down if one political party only allows friend and enemy journalists.
My point in noting this is that the Trump and post-Trump era really are a challenging for a network like CNN’s business model. The problem, as Chris Licht and his boss David Zaslav had it, was that CNN had gotten “too liberal”. The solution was to make it less liberal. Then Trump would stop calling it “Fake News” and everything would be better again. Stated as such, it so sounds too simplistic to be real. But listen to how Licht and his supporters describe it. That’s their description.
[…] Licht is a hotshot TV guy. He was showrunner on Morning Joe and Colbert […] The real driver of all this appears to be his boss, Zaslav. He seems broadly reviled by a lot of people in media. But at least from his political giving I looked up he seems to be at least nominally a Democrat. Who executives give money to doesn’t necessarily tell you a lot. But it gives you some sense of the importance of their politics in shaping their business practices. But he’s not the only one in the mix. The real money player behind all of this is longtime media titan John Malone. And he’s definitely that Republican billionaire. His comments through this very much match what you’d expect if an octogenarian Fox viewer took ownership of CNN and tried to “fix” it in line with the Fox worldview.
Wherever this plan came from, the salient point is that it’s not failing because Licht did a poor job implementing it. It’s simply based on a misunderstanding the contemporary media and political landscape and almost everything about cable news. What’s too bad is that CNN, which for all its shortcomings is or at least was a thing of great value, is in the process of being thoroughly trashed.
WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—As Mike Pence prepares to announce his bid for the Presidency, political insiders are questioning whether he has more to offer the nation than unbridled sexual magnetism.
For years, the former Vice-President has wisely refused to dine alone with any woman other than his wife, fearing the havoc that his overpowering pheromones could wreak.
But now, as he hopes to convince voters to elect him leader of the free world, he risks being perceived as little more than a smoldering slice of beefcake.
“Whenever Mike Pence gives a speech, his crackling sexual energy is so palpable that all the women in the audience and a goodly number of men swoon,” Davis Logsdon, who teaches political science at the University of Minnesota, said. “But is that what people want in a President?”
“Sex sells,” he added, “but Mike Pence might just be too smokin’ for the White House.”
Another horse in Australia had died from the dreaded Hendra virus that winter in 2011. For years, the brain-inflaming infectious disease had bedeviled the country, leaping from bats to horses and sometimes from horses to humans. Hendra was as fatal as it was mysterious, striking in a seemingly random fashion. Experts fear that if the virus mutates, it could jump from person to person and wreak havoc.
So while government veterinarians screened other horses, Eby, a wildlife ecologist with a Ph.D., got to work, grubbing around the scene like a detective. Nobody knew flying foxes, the bats that spread Hendra, better. For nearly a quarter century, she’d studied the furry, fox-faced mammals with wingspans up to 3 feet. Eby deduced that the horse paddock wasn’t where the bats had transmitted Hendra. But the horse’s owners had picked mandarin oranges off the trees across the street. The peels ended up in the compost bin, where their horse liked to rummage. “Bingo,” Eby thought. Flying foxes liked mandarins. The bats’ saliva must have contaminated the peels, turning them into a deadly snack…
On Monday, the Ukrainian deputy minister of defense gave a statement translated by Tim Mak: “A defensive operation includes everything, including counteroffensive actions. Therefore, in some areas we are moving to offensive actions.”
Right now, what we know is that there are Ukrainian advances going on both north and south of Bakhmut, and possibly in the city itself. There are also a number of Ukrainian actions underway along the southern front west of Vuhledar. Finally, the Russian Volunteer Corps and Freedom for Russia Legion appear to be holding both Russian territory and Russian prisoners.
All this clearly represents a counteroffensive. But is it the counteroffensive? Is this the big push we’ve been anticipating since Ukrainian advances cooled down with the weather last fall, and talked about all through the stunted Russian winter offensive and months of mud? That’s unclear.
Right now, more reports are coming in from Russian sources than from Ukrainian, and those reports are all over the map. There’s one report that Russia “crushed” a Ukrainian force and destroyed over thirty vehicles. Another has Ukraine busting through Russian defensive lines and liberating a town in southern Ukraine. The only thing certain at this moment is that this pattern, where Ukrainian sources are mostly silent and Russian forces are chattering a mile a minute, is one that has been seen before. It happened with Kharkiv last fall. And with Kherson.
One thing that should be noted immediately: Because a lot of this information, even when reported through familiar names, is ultimately going back to reports on Russian Telegram channels, the level of trust in much of what’s coming out today should be low. Very low. The fact that Ukrainian sources are being quiet reflects well on Ukraine’s operational security, but secondhand info from Russian sources definitely deepens the fog of war.
However, based on everything that is coming down the mile-a-minute pipeline, there are at least five offensive operations underway by Ukraine.
BAKHMUT
That same deputy minister of defense that gave the “moving to offensive” quote also said that Bakhmut “remains at the center” of operations.
In the Bakhmut area, Ukrainian forces have reportedly liberated a portion of the town of Berkhivka, northwest of the city. Russia initially captured this area back in February as part of the semi-encirclement that allowed them to place pressure on Ukrainian forces in Bakhmut from three sides. One very important factor about Berkivka is that it sits just south of the M03 highway that runs northwest to Slovyansk. When Russia captured that location, it cut off one of the biggest routes of supply into Bakhmut, making the situation there much more difficult for Ukraine. [map at the link]
But if Ukraine is able to move through Berkhivka and reach the M03, it would put Russia in an even worse spot. Because several Russian units moved west along the highway, extending a salient 8 kilometers west to a point north of Orikhovo-Vasylivka. Russia has no other exit route for those forces, which are already pinned by Ukrainian forces on three sides. There’s a possibility that a large group of Russian forces could be completely cut off.
Of course, the primary source for all this is … not the best. Much of this information is coming from the mercenary Wagner Group CEO Yevgeny Prigozhin, whose relationship with the truth is barely nodding on his best day. Prigozhin could be overselling Ukraine’s advance in the area just to press his claims that only his Wagner forces are capable of holding positions around Bakhmut. However, Ukrainian forces had already made verified moves in this direction last week, and it seems reasonable that they should extend their gains.
Then there’s Bakhmut itself. As in the city. Even as Prigozhin was claiming that Wagner had finally taken the city, Ukraine was still claiming that it was holding onto that extreme southwest corner of Bakhmut—the area just west of the highway at the city’s southern entrance (if you enlarge the image above, you can see there’s a large appliance factory and several industrial buildings in this area). Now the Ukrainian general staff is reporting progress “in the city.” Does this mean they are recapturing blocks and taking back portions of Bakhmut? It’s entirely possible, especially since Prigozhin reported last week that Wagner forces had withdrawn from 99% of the city. However, at the moment there are no details.
South of Bakhmut, the town of Klishchiivka has been on the receiving end of shelling with a reported Ukrainian advance in the area. Again, much of this information is coming from Russian sources, and it’s hard to tell how much is real, how much is panic, and how much is false reports given out so they can claim to have “stopped the Ukrainians,” but there is a reported advance in this direction. The settlement is important because of heights overlooking its western border. If Ukraine occupies those, it both forces Russians out of Klishchiivka itself and territory farther east, and provides yet another high vantage point to fire on Russian forces inside Bakhmut itself.
VELYKA NOVOSILKA
The fighting in the south appears to be underway at several locations, but Velyka Novosilka is near the center of the action, so for now I’m hanging that name on this section of the front. Fighting in this area appears to have begun on Sunday, with Ukrainian attacks reported near Novodarivka, Neskuchne, and Novodonetske. [map at the link]
A tank battle took place east of Novodarivka on Sunday in which it appears that at least three tanks faced off. A Russian T-80 came out the loser, with the whole ammo supply cooking off seconds after the tank was hit. It’s unclear if Ukraine has continued to press the attack in this area. [Tweet and video at the link]
Also on Sunday, Ukraine advanced several infantry fighting vehicles and MRAPS into the area south of Velyka Novosilka. This advance appears to have been stopped by Russian artillery, with Ukrainian forces apparently leaving damaged vehicles behind. At least one vehicle appears to have been hit over a kilometer to the north, reportedly by a Russian drone. [Tweet and video at the link]
The Russian ministry of defense touted this incident on Monday morning, claiming that they had stopped a “major offensive” taking out “over thirty vehicles” and hundreds of troops. Russia seemed to be claiming the counteroffensive was over before it began—not to mention the Russian bloggers who claimed “all the Abrams tanks” had been destroyed in this thwarted attack.
It now looks as if Ukraine has resumed the attack in this direction and that Sunday’s effort was more of a “reconnaissance in force.” There are reports that Ukraine has liberated the area west of Storozheve and broken through Russian trenches at that location, but this (like everything else this afternoon) is unconfirmed.
The third prong of Ukraine’s attack in this area is southeast of Velyka Novosilka near Novodonetske. This town was formerly occupied by Russia, although the area around it had been in dispute and Russian trench lines are actually south of the town. On Sunday, Russia claimed to have stopped a Ukrainian advance in this area. On Monday, Russian sources are claiming that Ukraine has liberated Novodonetske, forcing them to retreat.
One notable item in addition to this advance: Several Russian sources in the area claimed that they had spotted the first Leopard tanks being used on the front lines. However, images suggest that the new gear in the area is actually the small, wheeled French AMX-10rc. That would fit with other reports that the attack involved Ukraine’s 37th Marine Brigade, as that brigade trained on NATO equipment, including the AMX.
There is a widely-circulating image that’s being reported as showing a Leopard 2 that has been destroyed. That image is a fake. Russian Telegram channels are also circulating another image claiming it’s an abandoned Leopard. It’s not a Leopard, but it may be an AMX-10rc lost as part of the recon south of Velyka Novosilka. However, the camo in the image suggests that the vehicle in question is painted in the tan, desert camo that the AMX-10rc typically wears for French operations in Africa and AMX in Ukrainian service were repainted months ago. So it may also be a fake. Or not. It’s very foggy. A second image reportedly shows two more AMX-10rc left behind, but those also look to be in the former desert tan color. Also foggy.
Despite multiple claims, it’s not clear that any actual Leopard I or Leopard 2 is yet on the front lines. It’s also not clear that Ukraine has put together the kind of large, combined arms assault that many expected. The scale of actions so far suggests they may still be “feeling out” operations, but they’ve apparently been pretty successful. [Tweet at the link]
Even if Ukraine did begin attacks in this area as a minor part of the overall plan, or even if this was intended as a diversionary tactic for an attack to be launched elsewhere, Ukraine seems to be meeting with some success. If they have actually punched through Russian defenses in two locations moving more forces into this location might be a good idea—it’s only 85 kilometers to Mariupol.
BELGOROD
Meanwhile, Ukraine-aligned Russian forces operating under the ”RDK” banner (the Russian initials for “Russian Volunteer Corps”), report that they continue to hold at least part of the Russian village of Novaya Tavolzhanka south of Belgorod. Over the weekend, they also took at least two Russian prisoners, who RDK leaders indicated would be used in prisoner exchanges with Russia.
Multiple maps suggest that the anti-Putin forces are actually holding onto a much larger portion of Belgorod oblast. At the moment, there’s no visual confirmation of anything outside the Novaya Tavolzhanka area. Even so, that RDK has been able to apparently remain in control of Russian territory for a period of days goes a long way to indicating that not only is Russia’s border extremely porous, its home defense forces are dysfunctional.
The book banning mania has apparently made its way into our military, at least as far as one offended “believing Christian” mid-level military commander is concerned. This “believing Christian” military commander, full of offendedness by seeing one of his subordinates reading “The Catcher in the Rye,” actually ordered the subordinate to stop reading the book.
The offended “believing Christian” commander, according to the subordinate in their communications with the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF), saw nothing wrong with carrying around and publicly reading aloud from his Bible, one of the most sex-and-violence-ridden books ever written, but his subordinate quietly reading “The Catcher in the Rye” in the dining facility was a cause of great offense.
Once the Salinger-reading subordinate contacted MRFF about their “believing Christian” commander’s preposterous order, MRFF’s Mikey Weinstein did what he always does, contacting a senior level commander above the offended “believing Christian,” and as the subordinate reported in the following thank you email to MRFF, they can now not only continue reading “The Catcher in the Rye,” but their “believing Christian” superior is no longer permitted to publicly read aloud from his Bible or display it at mandatory unit meetings.
From: (Active Duty MRFF Client’s and Military Member’s E-mail Address Withheld)
Subject: The Catcher in the Rye
Date: June 2, 2023 at 2:09:41 PM MDT
To: Information Weinstein
Mr. Weinstein, I am stationed overseas in an active duty combat billet and wanted to finally thank you all the MRFF for intervening on my behalf to help me when my (mid-level military command title withheld) ordered me to stop reading the classic book “The Catcher in the Rye”. I only read it on my personal meal time at the DFAC (“dining facility”) at (military installation name withheld).
He had told me that “as a believing Christian” it offended him to see me read it. He never ever said how it offended him. He outranked me by a lot so what could I do?
I also want to stress that this (mid-level military command title withheld) is always reading aloud from his bible and carries it everywhere in front of all of us under his command and is almost always present with him at our (unit title withheld) meetings.
After you contacted our (senior level commander’s title withheld) 2 things happened within a few days.
First, I was informed that I could go back to reading my book “The Catcher in the Rye” by author J.D. Salinger at the DFAC or any other time I was not on mission duty.
Second, Our (mid-level military command title withheld) was told to stop publicly reading from and displaying his bible at our mandatory unit meetings.
This all happened back in mid-April and I’m sorry it took so long to thank you.
I cannot stress enough how much I owe to the MRFF for making this mess go in the right direction.
V/R
(Active duty military member’s name, rank, unit and installation all withheld)
Trump’s Republican rivals showed some rare unanimity with surprisingly harsh criticism of Donald Trump’s foreign policy blunders.
From the Guardian:
Republican 2024 candidates criticize Trump for praising Kim Jong-un
Rivals condemn ex-president for posting a message of support on Truth Social after North Korea added to WHO board
By Adam Gabbatt
A number of Republican presidential candidates, including Ron DeSantis, have criticized Donald Trump after the former president again praised the dictatorial leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-un.
The intervention from Trump’s rivals, who have largely avoided attacking the influential frontrunner, comes as a rare moment of dissension during the campaign.
Trump posted a message of support for Kim to his Truth Social site on Saturday, after North Korea was appointed to the board of the World Health Organization.
“Congratulations to Kim Jung [sic] Un!” Trump wrote. He posted a link to an article about the appointment to the WHO, which is an agency of the UN.
Joining the Republicans’ criticism of Trump is John Bolton, Trump’s National Security Advisor who really ripped into Trump’s authoritarian friendly foreign policy. [Tweet at the link: “John Bolton SLAMS Trump’s love affair with the NK dictator:
“No American president past, present or future, should ever utter the words, “Congratulations to Kim Jong Un!” It’s embarrassing for the United States and proves without question that Trump is unfit to lead.”]
During the CNN ‘Town Hall’ interview Trump said he would still try to “break up” NATO. Fulfilling Putin’s fondest wish. [Tweet and video at the link]
[Another tweet shows Trump babbling incoherently when asked by Fox News what he’s do differently from Biden in Ukraine.]
More at the link, including Bolton documenting that it takes 25 minutes for a stylist to do Trump’s makeup and another hour and a halt to sculpt his hair “into a mop that obscures the reality that Trump is almost entirely bald.
Dogged by accusations of proximity to the Kremlin, Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally party had hoped to clear its name by setting up a parliamentary inquiry to investigate foreign interference in French politics. But a draft report on the committee’s findings, which was leaked to the press this week, shows the move backfired spectacularly, finding instead that Le Pen’s policy stances sometimes echo the “official language of Putin’s regime.”
Fort Bragg shed its Confederate namesake Friday to become Fort Liberty in a ceremony some veterans said was a small but important step in making the U.S. Army more welcoming to current and prospective Black service members.
Let us be clear here. In no world does the fact that a tiny handful of trans kids play high school sports — no literally, it’s like somewhere between five and 15 nationwide [Nicolle Wallace reported a source saying perhaps a maximum of 100 individuals nationwide] — and want to compete accordingly with their gender identities have anything to do with teenage girls considering suicide. Nothing. Nikki Haley knows that. Or if she doesn’t, she’s a dumber, more fucking useless bigot than we gave her credit for. But we’re going to assume she knows that.
But for today’s Republican Nazis, trans people are one of the primary targets, so Nikki Haley said at her CNN town hall (of course) last night that there was a connection. [video at the link]
The question was how do you define “woke.” Instead of even trying to give an answer that would sound reasonable to Americans who are not lunatics, she just started argle-bargling about pronouns and said the thing about “our teenage girls” contemplating suicide.
Haley was initially asked to define the word “woke,” but subsequently went into a diatribe about gender identity and pronouns, claiming it is “too much.” “How are we supposed to get our girls used to the fact that biological boys are in their locker rooms?” she asked. “And then we wonder why a third of our teenage girls seriously contemplated suicide last year.”
On top of how that’s literally eliminationist rhetoric of the kind Nazis used to incite hatred and violence against Jewish people and others, it tells you how little Nikki Haley cares about “our teenage girls,” that she would use suicide statistics to bolster her attack on transgender kids.
She complained about “gender pronoun classes in the military,” which we hear is a very tough part of boot camp these days. She said this is the “women’s issue of our time,” which would probably be surprising to a lot of voters who think the fact that they’re no longer allowed to decide in many states if they’d like to remain pregnant is the women’s issue of our time.
She complained about “kids undergoing critical race theory,” which in the diseased conservative brain Haley says entails telling kindergartners, “If she’s white, you’re telling her she’s bad, if she’s brown or Black, you’re telling her she’s never going to be good enough and she’s always going to be a victim.” That sure does sound like kindergarten to us, if you’re a halfwit MAGA voter.
To Jake Tapper’s credit, he noted some real statistics from the Trevor Project on actual suicide rates for LGBTQ+ kids, but he didn’t say anything like “Hey, you’re a full of shit liar and you know it,” so we’re not awarding many points. (Not awarding him a lot of points lately, TBH.) [Tweet from Aaron Rupar, and video, at the link] […]
Wonkette: “Robert Kennedy Jr Keeps Dreaming Up New Ways To Disgrace Family Name”
“The real opposition is the media,” Steve Bannon famously boasted in 2018. “And the way to deal with them is to flood the zone with shit.”
Bannon’s strategy is to spew such an endless firehose of invective and misinformation that journalists give up reporting on truth and simply document the spectacle. And if you do it successfully enough, eventually people believe in nothing. Or they believe in everything you tell them, no matter how facially preposterous. Or they give up believing that truth is knowable at all.
As part of his plan for 2024, Bannon is backing the vanity presidential run of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an antivaxx loon […]
Welcome to the sewer, RFK! And before you get it twisted, you’re not the rat swimming against the fecal tide. You are the shit.
Kennedy toiled in relative obscurity for years as an environmental lawyer, but only got the spotlight when he threw his famous name behind the OG vaccine panic of the early aughts that routine immunizations cause autism. (They don’t!) Since then, he fed his voracious appetite for attention by flogging various conspiracy theories, delivered in his signature rasp, which he blames on the flu vaccine, of course. In 2020, he hit the motherlode with COVID-19, becoming one of the worst purveyors of coronavirus misinformation.
But three left turns is a right, as they say, so naturally Kennedy wound up bedding down with stochastic terrorists like Tucker Carlson who wanted to make political hay out of pretending that public health measures were part of a Democratic plot to weaken the economy and defeat Trump — and who didn’t care how many people died because they believed the anti-mask, anti-vax, let’s-lick-each-other’s-faces-during-a-pandemic rhetoric. Because when your family name conjures up associations of unabashed liberalism and the civil rights movement, why not allow it to be coopted the nation’s premier white nationalist?
But with Tuckkker temporarily out of commission, Kennedy has been making some new friends. And not the kind who might suggest that a little yoga and some therapy would be preferable to acting as a human shield as the very worst people in America try to soften Joe Biden up in the primaries so they can sneak Donald Trump back into the White House.
Here he is whining that Instagram won’t let him flog vaccine misinformation on its platform. But never fear, Uncle Elon will ride to the rescue. [Tweet at the link]
Are you listening to their Twitter space? Was it every bit the technical coup and celebration of Elon Musk’s leadership showcased two weeks ago in that coffee klatch with Ron DeSantis? […]
The best Bannon and his pals can hope for is to take a bite out of Biden in the primary, then cast Kennedy as this season’s Jill Stein in the general. Literally no one earth thinks this guy is going to beat Biden out for the Democratic nomination.
Well, okay, that’s not quite true. [Tweet at the link]
Christ, these people. Let the record reflect that Jack Dorsey predicted that Elon Musk would be an amazing steward of Twitter and would use his power to actually promote free speech. So take his predictions with a giant grain of salt.
But, hey, congrats to RFK, who transformed himself from a respected figure into a loon, and now a walking shitpost. Surely your family must be proud. (Or not.)
The approval of the school, which would offer online, Roman Catholic instruction funded by taxpayers, is almost certain to tee off a legal battle.
The nation’s first religious charter school was approved in Oklahoma on Monday, handing a victory to Christian conservatives, but opening the door to a constitutional battle over whether taxpayer dollars can directly fund religious schools.
The online school, St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School, would be run by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Oklahoma City and the Diocese of Tulsa, with religious teachings embedded in the curriculum, including in math and reading. Yet as a charter school — a type of public school that is independently managed — it would be funded by taxpayer dollars.
After a nearly three-hour meeting, and despite concerns raised by its legal counsel, the Oklahoma Statewide Virtual Charter School Board approved the school in a 3-to-2 vote, including a “yes” vote from a new member who was appointed on Friday.
The relatively obscure board is made up of appointees by Gov. Kevin Stitt, a Republican who supports religious charter schools, and leaders of the Republican-controlled State Legislature.
The approval — which is almost certain to be challenged in court — comes amid a broader conservative push to allow taxpayer dollars to go toward religious schools, including in the form of universal school vouchers, which have been approved in five states in the last year. The movement has been bolstered by recent rulings by the U.S. Supreme Court, which has increasingly signaled its support for directing taxpayer money to religious schools. […]
In Supreme Court rulings in 2020 and 2022, the court ruled that religious schools could not be excluded from state programs that allowed parents to send their children to private schools using government-financed scholarship or tuition programs. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. wrote that while states were not required to support religious education, if a state chooses to subsidize any private schools, it may not discriminate against religious ones.
Supporters in Oklahoma applied similar arguments to St. Isidore, contending that excluding religious schools from charter funding is a violation of the First Amendment’s protection of religious freedom.
“Not only may a charter school in Oklahoma be religious but indeed it would be unlawful to prohibit the operation of such a school,” the school’s organizers wrote in its application.
The move for a religious charter school was opposed by a range of groups, including pastors and religious leaders in Oklahoma, who feared a blurring of the separation of church and state. Leaders in the charter school movement were also opposed.
“Charter schools were conceived as, and have always been, innovative public schools,” Nina Rees, president and chief executive of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, said in April. She added that, as public schools, charters cannot teach religious instruction.
A key legal question is whether charter schools are “state actors,” representing the government, or “private actors,” more like a government contractor. That question is central to another case, out of North Carolina, which the Supreme Court is weighing whether to take up. […]
David Charles Grusch isn’t just some guy waving signs on a street corner in D.C.; he’s a decorated war veteran who worked with both the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency and the National Reconnaissance Office, where he worked as on the Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force with top clearance levels.
Grusch said the recoveries of partial fragments through and up to intact vehicles have been made for decades through the present day by the government, its allies, and defense contractors. Analysis has determined that the objects retrieved are “of exotic origin (non-human intelligence, whether extraterrestrial or unknown origin) based on the vehicle morphologies and material science testing and the possession of unique atomic arrangements and radiological signatures,” he said…
According to reporting from Debrief, Grusch has the support of the intelligence community firmly on his side, as well as other whistleblowers who remain unidentified…
Jonathan Grey is a generational officer of the United States Intelligence Community with a Top-Secret Clearance who currently works for the National Air and Space Intelligence Center (NASIC), where the analysis of UAP has been his focus…
Wicky wacky. If there is such a long-running, serious effort to suppress the information, why haven’t these two been knocked off yet?
Texas and an anonymous anti-abortion activist made a joint court filing over the weekend, urging a federal judge to decide a $1.8 billion fraud lawsuit they brought against Planned Parenthood in their favor, saying a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling strengthened the case.
The lawsuit, before U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk in Amarillo, Texas, had been on hold awaiting the Supreme Court’s decision Friday, which gave a boost to whistleblower lawsuits accusing health care providers and others of defrauding the government.
Texas and the anonymous plaintiff are seeking to force Planned Parenthood to return money it collected from Texas’ and Louisiana’s state Medicaid programs after the states tried to cut off its funding, plus heavy additional penalties…
whheydtsays
Re: Reginald Selkirk @ #67…
The red flag there is the judge. They’ve been judge shopping again.
Liberty Coalition Canada, a conservative Christian advocacy group, is trying to raise $1.3 million to recruit hundreds of Christian politicians and campaign staff to run at all levels of government.
In a document marked “please keep classified” that was obtained by CBC News, the group says its ultimate goal is “the most powerful political disruption in Canadian history.”
Working alongside Liberty Coalition Canada are dozens of churches across the country, a number of small media outlets and at least one well-funded think-tank.
While theological and political differences exist among them, many supporters of this movement share a vocal opposition to LGBTQ rights and other social justice causes.
Several Canadian pastors in the movement also have ties to a controversial branch of evangelical Christianity in the U.S. known as reconstructionism…
StevoRsays
Huh? Just tried to post about a cassius the largest crocodile in capttivity but didn’t go through here…?
It looks like the Kakhovka dam is gone indeed. Major flooding likely on the left bank, also affecting many civilians living there. Neither side claimed the explosion.
The reservoir behind the Kakhova dam supplies cooling water the Zaporishzia (sp) nuclear plant. It also supplies the water that is sent by canal to Crimea. However, the Russians have been filling up all the local reservoirs in Crimea.
So who benefits from blowing the dam?
KGsays
Reginald Selkirk@66,
As someone says in the comments to your linked article, if there was anything in this, no way Trump would not have blabbed it! (Unless of course Trump is actually a transdimensional lizard…)
Russian terrorists. The destruction of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant dam only confirms for the whole world that they must be expelled from every corner of Ukrainian land. Not a single meter should be left to them, because they use every meter for terror. It’s only Ukraine’s victory that will return security. And this victory will come. The terrorists will not be able to stop Ukraine with water, missiles or anything else.
All services are working. I have convened the National Security and Defense Council. Please spread official and verified information only.
Ukrhydroenergo, Ukraine’s state-owned hydropower company, says “Russian occupation forces blew up the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant. As a result of the detonation of the engine room from the inside, the Kakhovka HPP was completely destroyed. The station cannot be restored.”
KGsays
So who benefits from blowing the dam? – whheydt@74
Hard to tell. Apparently the flooding will affect both banks, but predominantly the Russian-occupied left. The Russians may have filled the Crimean reservoirs, but how long will that water last them? I’ve seen claims both that the flooding will prevent any Ukrainian amphibious attack across the Dnipro, and that it would facilitate it by removing the Russian left-bank positions. I’m no sort of expert, but amphibious military operations are notoriously hard to bring off successfully. If we see such an operation in the next week or two, that would be pretty strong evidence Ukraine caused the collapse, as you can’t improvise that kind of major operation in a hurry: they would have to have planned for the flooding. But I think it’s very unlikely we will see this.
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From their latest summary:
The Ukrainian government has accused Russia of blowing up the Nova Kakhovka dam on the Dnipro River, and called for people living downstream to evacuate in the face of catastrophic flooding. Ukrahydroenergo said the hydoelectric power plant at the dam had been blown up from the inside and was irreparable.
The governor of the Kherson region, Oleksandr Prokudin, said about 16,000 people were in the “critical zone” on the Ukrainian-controlled right bank of the river. He said people were being evacuated for districts upstream of Kherson city and would be taken by bus to the city and then by train to Mykolaiv, and to other Ukrainian cities including Khmelnytskyi, Odesa, Kropyvnytskyi and Kyiv.
Occupying Russian authorities in the town of Nova Kakhovka initially denied anything had happened to the dam, then blamed the collapse on Ukrainian shelling….
The areas most under threat of flooding are the islands along the course of the Dnipro downstream of Nova Kakhovka and much of the Russian-held left bank in southern Kherson. Earlier modelling of such a disaster suggested Kherson city would not take the brunt of the flood, but the harbour, the docklands and an island in the south of the city are likely to be inundated. It is unclear how many people could lose their homes….
…
There seems to be no immediate safety threat to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant from the collapse of the Nova Kakhovka dam 200km downstream, according to Ukrainian and UN experts. Water from the reservoir affected by the destruction of the dam is used to supply the plant’s cooling systems.
Ukraine’s foreign affairs minister, Dmytro Kuleba, called the destruction of the dam “probably Europe’s largest technological disaster in decades” and a “heinous war crime”.
The British foreign secretary, James Cleverly, who is in Ukraine, blamed the destruction on Russia’s invasion. “I’ve heard reports of the explosion on the dam and the risk of flooding. It’s too early to make any kind of meaningful assessment of the details. But it’s worth remembering that the only reason this is an issue at all is because of Russia’s unprovoked full-scale invasion of Ukraine,” he said.
The dam traverses Ukraine’s enormous Dnipro River, holding back a huge reservoir of water. The dam is 30 metres tall and hundreds of metres wide. It was built in 1956 as part of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant. Water from the reservoir supplies the Crimean peninsula to the south, which was illegally annexed by Russia in 2014.
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has suggested that the destruction of the Nova Kakhovka dam was the fault of “Russian terrorists”. Zelenskiy said in a post on Twitter, “The destruction of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant dam only confirms for the whole world that they must be expelled from every corner of Ukrainian land. Not a single metre should be left to them, because they use every metre for terror.”
KGsays
An analysis of the possible military repercussions of the dam’s destruction from the Guardian’s Dan Sabbagh. It’s not obvious who will benefit. The delta will widen making crossing it even harder, but the river further up will narrow, possibly giving Ukraine opportunities, but of course they would first need to deal with the immediate impact on civilians and infrastructure. The Russian defensive positions are apparently already on higher ground, but whether they are well-placed is impossible to say until the new course of the river is established.
Before destroying the Kakhovka dam today, Russia reportedly raised the water level to a record 17.5 meters, leaving the gates closed. They created a flooding as large as possible in order to most likely prevent the Ukrainian army from conducting a counteroffensive in the area.
The Ukrainian government has accused Russia of blowing up the Nova Kakhovka dam on the Dnipro River, as it called for people living downstream to evacuate in the face of catastrophic flooding.
As aerial footage circulated on social media, showing most of the dam wall washed away and a massive surge of water heading downstream, the army’s Southern Operational Command put up a Facebook post accusing “Russian occupation troops” of blowing up the hydroelectric dam.
The governor of the Kherson region, Oleksandr Prokudin, said about 16,000 people were in the “critical zone” on the Ukrainian-controlled right bank of the river. He said people were being evacuated for districts upstream of Kherson city and would be taken by bus to the city and then by train to Mykolaiv and other Ukrainian cities, including Khmelnytskyi, Odesa, Kropyvnytskyi and Kyiv.
The disaster will have damaging effects that could last for generations, from the immediate potential for loss of life to the thousands of people forced to abandon their homes and farms. It is expected to have a catastrophic impact on the ecology of the region and will sweep mines from the banks of the Dnipro into villages and farmland downstream.
It also robs Ukraine of long -term capacity for generating hydroelectric power. The loss of the upstream reservoir threatens water supplies to Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions and Crimea, and has long-term implications for the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant 120 miles (200km) upstream.
The dam collapse happened on the second day of Ukrainian offensive operations likely to mark the early stages of a mass counteroffensive. It could affect any Ukrainian plans for an amphibious assault across the river.
“The purpose is obvious: to create insurmountable obstacles on the way of the advancing [Ukrainian army] … to slow down the fair final of the war,” the Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said on Twitter. “On a vast territory, all life will be destroyed; many settlements will be ruined; colossal damage will be done to the environment.”
…
Interfax quoted an unnamed representative from regional emergency services as saying the collapse was the result of a catastrophic structural failure. “The dam could not stand it: one support collapsed, and flooding began,” the representative said, adding that there were no attacks on the hydroelectric power station overnight.
Last month, it was reported that water levels in the reservoir had reached a 30-year high as the Russian occupiers had kept relatively few sluice gates open, according to experts.
David Helms, a former US air force and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration meteorologist who has monitored the dam, said on Twitter: “The Russians allowed the reservoir to fill to record levels; if the dam failed ‘naturally’, it certainly failed due to 6 weeks of over-topping and stress on the structure.”
The areas most under threat from flooding are the islands along the course of the Dnipro downstream of Nova Kakhovka and much of the Russian-held left bank in southern Kherson. Earlier modelling of such a disaster suggested Kherson city would not bear the brunt, but the harbour, the docklands and an island in the south of the city are likely to be inundated. It is unclear how many people could lose their homes.
There could be two further serious side-effects: the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant upstream could lose access to water for cooling as the reservoir drains away, and the water supply to Crimea could also be severely affected.
Four of the six reactors at the nuclear plant are completely shut down, and two are on “hot shutdown”, producing a small amount of energy for the plant itself and the neighbouring town. The International Atomic Energy Agency said in a tweet its experts at the plant were monitoring the situation. It said there was “no immediate nuclear safety risk at plant”.
…
The dam, a Soviet power project, was completed in 1956 and was 30 metres’ high, holding back a vast reservoir of 18m cubic metres of water. It sits about 20 miles (32km) upstream from Ukrainian-held Kherson.
Zelenskiy warned last November that Russia was plotting to blow up the two-mile structure and that doing so would cause “a large-scale disaster” affecting people living downstream.
Blowing up a dam can be considered a war crime, the Geneva conventions say, if it “may cause the release of dangerous forces and consequent severe losses among the civilian population”.
Ukrainian military intelligence said late last year that Russia had conducted the main mining works as long ago as April 2022, but warned that the floodgates and supports of the dam were further primed in November as Ukraine’s forces closed in on Kherson. “Now everyone in the world must act powerfully and quickly to prevent a new Russian terrorist attack,” Zelenskiy said at the time.
The country’s military intelligence also said in November that “dozens of Ukrainian settlements, including Kherson” could be affected by a breach and that “the scale of the ecological disaster will go far beyond the borders of Ukraine and affect the entire Black Sea region”.
The bridge over the dam was one of only two crossing points over the Dnipro south of Zaporizhzhia city before the war. The other, the Antonovsky road bridge at Kherson, was destroyed in November by the retreating Russians, and Russian snipers target anybody lingering on the waterside near the remaining bridge span.
…Mariana Budjeryn, a Ukrainian nuclear scientist, said: “The fact that there’s an artificial pond next to the ZNPP [Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant] where water can be maintained above the reservoir level, and the fact that the reactors are in cold shutdown, offers some reassurance and increased time to respond if ZNPP starts getting affected.”
But Budjeryn, who is a senior research associate on the project on managing the atom at Harvard University, added: “The bigger problem – who is going to do it? ZNPP is already down-staffed to bare bones.”
Oleksiy said that over time water would evaporate from the cooling lake and if it could not be filled from the vast reservoir created upstream of the Nova Kakhovka dam, the turbines and the power plant could not be operated.
In his statement, Grossi said that the cooling pond should last “for some months” but it was imperative it was not damaged in fighting. The water is used to cool not just the reactor cores, but also the spent fuel and the diesel generators used for safety systems.
“Absence of cooling water in the essential cooling water systems for an extended period of time would cause fuel melt and inoperability of the emergency diesel generators,” he warned.
Budjeryn pointed to another implication of the dam collapse regarding the future of the Russian occupied nuclear plant, which Russian occupying forces have allegedly mined. “If the Russians would do this with Kakhovka, there’s no guarantee they won’t blow up the reactor units at ZNPP that are also reportedly mined – three of the six,” she said. “It wouldn’t cause a Chornobyl, but massive disruption, local contamination and long-term damage to Ukraine.”
Foreign Affairs Minister Dmytro Kuleba called out international media on June 6 for entertaining Russian narratives about the Kakhovka dam explosion, saying it “puts facts and propaganda on equal footing.”
“Infuriating to see some media report ‘Kyiv and Moscow accusing each other’ of ruining the Kakhovka dam. It puts facts and propaganda on equal footing. Ukraine is facing a huge humanitarian and environmental crisis. Ignoring this fact means playing Russia’s ‘not all obvious’ game,” Kuleba wrote.
Russian forces blew up the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant’s dam on the morning of June 6, sparking a large-scale humanitarian and environmental disaster across southern Ukraine.
The Moscow-installed mayor in the occupied city of Nova Kakhovka initially downplayed the damage caused to the dam, claiming that it had been caused by Ukrainian shelling….
At least 150 tons of motor oil have been released into the Dnipro River after Russian forces blew up the Kakhovka dam on June 6, the President’s Office reported.
According to the President’s Office, there is a risk of 300 additional tons of machine oil leaking into the river.
President Volodymyr Zelensky convened an emergency meeting of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine after Russian forces destroyed the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant’s dam on the morning of June 6, sparking a large-scale humanitarian and environmental disaster across southern Ukraine.
The attack occurred around 2:50 a.m. local time, the President’s office wrote.
No civilian or military casualties were reported as a result of the explosion, but 80 settlements are in the immediate flood zone.
The Interior Ministry reported that as of 11:00 a.m. local time, 885 civilians have been evacuated from Kherson Oblast. However, some of the settlements which face the biggest risk of flooding are under Russian occupation….
Ihor Klymenko, Ukraine’s interior minister, claims that Russia is shelling areas in southern Kherson where people are being evacuated, leaving two police officers wounded.
“The Russian military continue to shell territory where evacuation measures are being carried out. An hour ago, two police officers were wounded in the area. Shelling continues at the moment,” Klymenko told Ukrainian television.
Russia has been controlling the dam and the entire Kakhovka HPP for more than a year. It is physically impossible to blow it up somehow from the outside, by shelling. It was mined by the Russian occupiers. And they blew it up.
Russia has detonated a bomb of mass environmental destruction. This is the largest man-made environmental disaster in Europe in decades. It is the most dangerous terrorist in the world. And that is why Russia’s defeat – a defeat that we’ll ensure anyway – will be the most significant contribution to the security of our region, our Europe and the entire world.
However, don’t we know what constantly fuels Russian revanchism? This is the belief of Russia’s rulers that Europe will allegedly show weakness. Weakness is the main hope and bet of terrorists.
No more weakness in Europe against the evil of aggression! No more uncertainty about security prospects in Europe! Every step, decision and summit of ours must strengthen us all in our defense against Russian terror. No doubt, the Vilnius #NATOSummit must ensure this.
I said this addressing the Bucharest Nine Summit….
This video shows footage of the devastating flooding in Kherson Oblast. The damage is the result of Russian forces destroying the dam of the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant on the morning of June 6.
StevoRsays
Whelp, with 424 ppm atmospheric carbon dioxide inour planet’s air we’ve now got 50% more than pre-Industrial times – see :
Northern Bakhmut, based on multiple sources both open and closed, Ukrainian forces managed to take over large parts of Berkhivka, as well as fully drive out Russians from the outskirts of Orikhovo-Vasylivka and advance along the M03 while also attacking Zaliznyans’ke.
Map at the link. There’s also activity/explosions in Mariupol, the occupied left bank in Kherson, and Bilhorod.
Ukraine’s deputy defence minister has accused Russia of blowing up the Nova Kakhovka dam as a distraction from ongoing border skirmishes in Russia’s Belgorod region, and suggested it will have a negative impact on Russia’s own ability to hold on to territory it occupies in Kherson region.
On Telegram, Hanna Maliar posted:
The Russian terrorist army has committed another crime that is capable of causing a serious ecological and humanitarian catastrophe.
The purposeful undermining of the dam was carried out by the Russian occupiers in order to stop the process of de-occupation by the defence forces of Ukraine and shift the vector of public attention from the events taking place in the Belgorod region.
Instead, the Russian occupiers had the opposite effect.
Currently, civilians in the temporarily occupied settlements of Kherson region and Crimea are in a critical situation, as the destruction of the dam deprived them of fresh water. In addition, positions of Russian military units were flooded, which could lead to large-scale washing of Russian minefields and their detonation in a chaotic manner.
Earlier the governor of Belgorod region, Vyacheslav Gladkov, issued a denial in a video message that anti-Kremlin forces were in the settlement of Novaya Tavolzhanka, saying “there are many insinuations” but “today there is no enemy in the Belgorod region. People ask a lot about Novaya Tavolzhanka. There is no enemy on the territory of Novaya Tavolzhanka.”
The Russian rebels in Belgorod/Bilhorod oblast are rolling with MBTs through Novaya Tavolzhanka.
The Russian Air Force has apparently gone full AWOL.
Has anyone seen Russian governor Gladkov?
I have geolocated that area. It is 100% on Russian soil. Not going further into details.
Video at the link.
StevoRsays
The Needs-Renaming new Space Telescope shows a lack of winds leading to extremer temperatures than expected and the existence of steam on Hot SuperJovian exoplanet WASP-18b :
This is roughly the prevailing current mood among Russian “bloggers” and “war correspondents”:
“I’m sitting in f**king shock, the situation in the country is fucked up, they’re only destabilizing it further, the situation in Belgorod region is getting worse, the Ministry of Defense almost entered into an open confrontation with Wagner, Wagner had a confrontation with Akhmat [Kadyrov’s forces], they don’t let us work at full strength on the waiting lists, drones fly over Moscow, they fly into Krasnodar, systematically visit Crimea, everyone fights with each other, even Telegram channels. How are we going to win like that?
Nothing distinguishes Russia from other countries as much as competition and hostility of various structures to each other.
The problem is deeper and deeper; people argue with each other in grocery shops, military argue in their locations, there is arguing between the types of military forces, arguing between structures, everyone f**king argues”
UPDATE: Tuesday, Jun 6, 2023 · 10:05:42 AM MDT · Mark Sumner
Meanwhile … there are reports this morning that Ukraine has liberated the town of Berkhivka, just northwest of Bakhmut. This follows earlier reports that Ukrainian forces had reached the edge of the that town.
Ukrainian troops have also reportedly pushed back from Orikhovo-Vasylivka and pushed Russia back several kilometers along the M03 highway. Russian artillery near the village of Dubovo-Vasylivka is in danger of being encircled.
UPDATE: Tuesday, Jun 6, 2023 · 9:20:43 AM MDT · Mark Sumner
One issue with flooding in Ukraine that’s very different from flooding in many areas. Those attempting rescues, and those attempting to escape from flooded areas, are also in danger from mines, many of which have been laid on and near the riverbank. [tweet and image at the link, (scary image of mines in the water)]
In the early hours of Tuesday morning, residents who live near the town of Nova Kakhovka in the Kherson region of Ukraine started sharing text messages about the unusual noises they were hearing. One reported “such explosions” and speculated it was a missile. Another replied, “How horrible. So loud.” The noise and shaking ground led some to run to the bathroom—a central room with no windows—the same way that people in the Midwest might react to a tornado warning.
Soon after, one of the residents reported that the ground was still shaking and that there was a strange noise, an “incomprehensible sound.”
“Why is the water so loud?” asked another.
Some wondered if it was safe to go back to bed. Others worried about losing electricity again. But most were baffled by the sound of thundering water. “I never heard anything like it.” Above them, the Kakhovka Dam was in the middle of collapsing, spilling 18 billion cubic meters of water toward their homes and everywhere along the banks of the Dnipro River.
Russia has been in control of the Kakhovka Dam for almost a year. In that time they have badly—and apparently intentionally—mismanaged water levels in the reservoir above the lake. Throughout most of the year they had two spillways open, which was too much over dry months last summer, leading to very low levels of water above the dam. But following the fall and winter rains, Russia failed to open the sluice gates, allowing water to accumulate, leading to flooding around the edges of the reservoir.
As The New York Times reported on May 17,
Water levels at a reservoir that supplies southern Ukraine with drinking water have reached a 30-year high, increasing the possibility of flooding in the area and signaling a lack of regulation. The sudden increase in levels at the Kakhovka reservoir appears in altimetry data — which uses satellites to measure height — published on Friday by Theia, a French earth data provider.
Images from earlier this week show that by June 1, water that had overtopped the dam was beginning to damage a road that ran over the spillway. That damage is even more visible in images from the following day. Images from June 3 show that the road was swept away. However, the edge of the spillway itself did not seem to have been damaged by June 4. Images from later that day show that the road was also out on the western end, meaning that even if Ukrainian forces had approached the area from the west (right) bank of the Dnipro, they would not have been able to access the area around the hydroelectric power station control center. Only Russia could address the problems at the dam.
The rate of water flow across that five-day period was clearly increasing, as was the damage to the dam structure. However, Russia did not act to open the sluice gates and release more water. [Tweet and video at the link]
By daylight on June 6, it was clear that a large portion of Kakhovka Dam, including much of the control infrastructure, was gone and that a disaster was underway. [tweet and video at the link]
The cleanness of the breaks in the dam, the still-crumbling structure, and the signs that a collapse might have already been underway led many to conjecture that there had been no explosion, and that the dam had ruptured due to the record high water levels and erosion caused by the water overtopping the spillway.
However, other footage seems to indicate that an explosion did occur—a conclusion supported by those text messages from locals and other reports of a loud explosion at just the time of the dam failure. Ukrainian officials are criticizing media for downplaying the damage and failing to definitively pin the explosion on Russia. There are reports of the explosion at the dam being heard 80 km away, which would not be the case in even the most catastrophic collapse. [!!!]
Kakhovka Dam was deliberately destroyed by an explosion that targeted the power plant and control structures, as well as breaking the structural integrity of the dam. That explosion is what locals in the area reported at 1:20 in the morning. The incomprehensible noise that came after has only gotten worse as the breach in the dam has continued to widen and water has poured down into the lower Dnipro basin.
The deliberate destruction of a dam in order to flood civilian areas is a war crime—another to add to the thick stack of such crimes Russia has accumulated over the course of its illegal, unprovoked invasion of Ukraine. It’s hard to say if it’s worse than the destruction of Mariupol, or the mass graves at Bucha and Izyum, or the torture chambers found in basements across formerly Russian-occupied regions, or the deliberate bombing of hospitals and shelters. Such forms of evil are all so dark that it’s hard to distinguish a shade. [Tweet and video at the link]
However, it seems that things can always be worse: On Tuesday there are reports that Russia is shelling Ukrainian rescue operations as Ukrainian police and military attempt to evacuate people, livestock, and wildlife from rapidly flooding areas below the shattered dam. [Tweet and video: “Civilians are helping to evacuate other civilians under shelling in Kherson.”]
This is a massive humanitarian, ecological, and economic disaster, the impact of which will last for years. How it will affect structures upstream and downstream—including the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant where water from the reservoir was vital for cooling—is still to be seen. This is the early hours of a disaster still unfolding.
It also seems likely that the result of the dam failure will alter the flow along the canal that provides water to Crimea, though what that change will be isn’t yet clear. It seems likely that the canal infrastructure could also be damaged by the high levels of water now coming down the Dnipro. Bridges, roads, farms, buildings, homes … the damage is going to be absolutely enormous.
It seems obvious from the available evidence that Russia has committed a deliberate, massive, and blatant war crime. There were warnings that Russia was planning such an act as early as last October, and further warnings shortly after Russia was forced to flee from the city of Kherson. Now it seems that the destruction was timed to signs that Ukraine was in the opening stages of its counteroffensive. Whether this action will affect Ukraine’s plans for the coming weeks is still to be seen. [tweet and video at the link: “the russians are turning occupied territories of Ukraine into deserts, ruins, and flood zones. […]”]
An employee at Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence drained the resort’s swimming pool last October and ended up flooding a room where computer servers containing surveillance video logs were kept, sources familiar with the matter told CNN.
While it’s unclear if the room was intentionally flooded or if it happened by mistake, the incident occurred amid a series of events that federal prosecutors found suspicious.
At least one witness has been asked by prosecutors about the flooded server room as part of the federal investigation into Trump’s handling of classified documents, according to one of the sources.
The incident, which has not been previously reported, came roughly two months after the FBI retrieved hundreds of classified documents from the Florida residence and as prosecutors obtained surveillance footage to track how White House records were moved around the resort. Prosecutors have been examining any effort to obstruct the Justice Department’s investigation after Trump received a subpoena in May 2022 for classified documents.
Prosecutors have heard testimony that the IT equipment in the room was not damaged in the flood, according to one source.
Yet the flooded room as well as conversations and actions by Trump’s employees while the criminal investigation bore down on the club has caught the attention of prosecutors. The circumstances may factor into a possible obstruction conspiracy case, multiple sources tell CNN, as investigators try to determine whether the events of last year around Mar-a-Lago indicate that Trump or a small group of people working for him, took steps to try to interfere with the Justice Department’s evidence-gathering….
A Texas sheriff’s office has recommended criminal charges over flights that the Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, arranged to deport 49 South American migrants from San Antonio to Martha’s Vineyard, in Massachusetts, last year.
In a statement on Monday, the Bexar county sheriff’s office said it had filed a criminal case with the local district attorney over the flight. The Bexar county sheriff, Javier Salazar, has previously said the migrants were “lured under false pretenses” into traveling to Martha’s Vineyard, a wealthy liberal town.
The recommendation comes after the governor of California, Gavin Newsom, threatened DeSantis with kidnapping charges on Monday, after Florida flew a group of people seeking asylum to Sacramento. It was the second time in four days Florida had used taxpayer money to fly asylum seekers to California.
“The charge filed is unlawful restraint and several accounts were filed, both misdemeanor and felony,” the Bexar county sheriff’s office said in a statement provided to KSAT News.
“At this time, the case is being reviewed by the DA’s office. Once an update is available, it will be provided to the public.”…
A plane carrying migrants landed in Sacramento on Monday, just days after a chartered flight with 16 migrants on board landed in the city Friday, officials said.
About 20 people were on Monday’s flight, a spokesperson for the state’s attorney general said. Documentation indicated both flights were linked to the state of Florida.
“The contractor operating the flight that arrived today appears to be the same contractor who transported the migrants last week,” a spokesperson for California Attorney General Rob Bonta said. “As was the case with the migrants who arrived on Friday, the migrants who arrived today carried documents indicating that their transportation to California involved the state of Florida.”
…
After the first flight landed in Sacramento, Bonta said his office was looking into possible criminal or civil action against those who transported the migrants or arranged for the transportation.
“While we continue to collect evidence, I want to say this very clearly: State-sanctioned kidnapping is not a public policy choice, it is immoral and disgusting,” Bonta said. “We are a nation built by immigrants and we must condemn the cruelty and hateful rhetoric of those, whether they are state leaders or private parties, who refuse to recognize humanity and who turn their backs on extending dignity and care to fellow human beings.”…
“If I can’t have it, nobody can!” Putin is beginning to issue his own version of Hitler’s Nero Decree. He’s lost, he knows it, and now the only priority is to hurt the people who have “failed” him as much as he can.
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Hitler’s Nero Decree was deliberately disobeyed by Albert Speer, who saw it, correctly, as a desperate last gasp of a defeated madman.
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Russia is racking up massive amounts of debt to Ukraine and Eastern Europe in general. Let’s hope Russia will eventually be made to pay the bill.
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even a plant in a cold shutdown mode requires a constant supply of both fresh water and electricity to cool the reactors and spent fuel rod pools. While it appears that the onsite cooling pond is currently full and undamaged, the reservoir provides the ultimate parent source of cooling water for the plant. Its destruction further increases the already terrifyingly high risk profile associated with the ZNPP sitting in the middle of this war zone.
————————
It should be noted, that beyond the immediate effects of the dam breach and flood, this dam destruction removes the livelihood of an entire province, for the foreseeable future. (Until that time in the future when peace is restored and the dam can be rebuilt, which will be many many years off).
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Mark Sumner (a correction): now that I sort them ALL of the videos claiming to show an explosion at the dam, at least those I’ve seen so far, show older events — though some claim to show events overnight, they are clearly copies of the older videos. […]
An explosion still fits with the evidence and the testimony of those in the area, but for now I have no definitive evidence that it was an explosion and not an abrupt failure resulting from Russia’s mismanagement of the water levels.
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#Ukraine 🇺🇦: Russians are now openly bragging and posting videos of their artillery targeting Ukrainian forces in the flooded area downstream in #Kherson. https://twitter.com/ThomasVLinge/status/1666002318343512065
Such artillery attacks are making it impossible for the UA military to evacuate people stuck on the islands.
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“Ukraine and Russia trade blame over dam” -Washington Post
“Ukraine and Russia blamed each other for the attack on the Russian-held facility…” -New York Times
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Stupid to think Ukraine would blow up the dam and to equivocate like that is journalistic malpractice. Dam Breached with Massive Flooding, Evidence Points to Russian War Crime is the real headline…
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Drunk local Russian command, likely.
Last week, the House Freedom Caucus made it sound as if Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s job is in jeopardy. This week, the hapless faction is slinking away.
[…] The Hill reported overnight:
A spark of initial interest in forcing a vote to remove Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) from his position as Speaker over the debt limit deal he negotiated with President Biden has not caught on in the House Freedom Caucus. … Multiple members leaving a Freedom Caucus meeting Monday — the first gathering of the group in Washington, D.C., since the debt limit bill passed — said there was no discussion of whether any member should make a motion to vacate the chair, which would force a vote to remove McCarthy.
It was a week ago today when Rep. Dan Bishop became the first House Republican to publicly declare his intention to try to oust McCarthy from his post. Asked specifically if he was prepared to use procedural tactics to force a vote on the speaker’s future, the North Carolina Republican told Politico, “Absolutely. It is inescapable to me. It has to be done.”
As we discussed soon after, he appeared to have some company. Rep. Ken Buck of Colorado broached the subject of McCarthy’s gavel during a House Freedom Caucus conference call, and he told NBC News that he raised the possibility “as a result of a broken promise.”
Rep. Scott Perry, the contingent’s current chair, didn’t explicitly endorse moving against McCarthy, but the Pennsylvanian didn’t rule out the possibility, either.
Rep. Chip Roy didn’t call out McCarthy by name, but the Texan declared at a Capitol Hill press conference, “We will continue to fight it today, tomorrow, and no matter what happens, there’s going to be a reckoning about what just occurred.”
A week later, all of this talk has effectively evaporated. The House speaker is enjoying the best media coverage of his adult life — too much, by my estimation — and his far-right detractors who were gearing up for what would effectively be a no-confidence vote are quietly slinking away.
The problem is not procedural. As we talked about last week, as the current Congress got underway, McCarthy was forced to beg his own members for their support during his protracted fight for the speaker’s gavel. As part of that process, he agreed to tweak the motion-to-vacate-the-chair rules, which at least in theory, would make it easier for angry House Republicans to try to oust McCarthy from his leadership position if he disappointed them.
But what the Freedom Caucus’ members are finding is that while the tool is available, they lack the wherewithal to wield it effectively.
All of this must come as something of a shock to the far-right contingent. Revisiting our earlier coverage, House Freedom Caucus members genuinely seemed to believe they were running the show. They thought their far-right ransom note was their party’s inviolable plan. They thought they had a secret Rules Committee deal that would give them veto power. They thought they’d persuade the rest of the GOP conference to oppose the bill. They thought McCarthy would be afraid of the proverbial motion-to-vacate-the-chair sword hanging overhead.
But as a Washington Post analysis summarized last week, “The right-wing caucus emerges from [the clash over the debt ceiling] looking bruised, hapless and apparently without the leverage it thought it had over McCarthy.”
To be sure, given the House Republicans’ tiny majority, the faction still has the votes to derail future measures as they reach the floor. But that would only put GOP leaders in a position of having to reach out to Democrats for votes — as previous House speakers such as John Boehner and Paul Ryan occasionally had to do — strengthening the hand of Republican opponents.
In other words, the Freedom Caucus lost the year’s biggest fight, can’t find the leverage it thought it had, and has no credible plan to reassert its influence.
[…] My acquaintances in Crimea (Russian-annexed since 2014) are telling me that in Yevpatoria the local media are running a public service announcement to fill bathtubs, etc. with water — it may be cut off in the afternoon. Kerch is without water already.
Most of Crimea’s fresh water came from the Nova Kakhovka Dam reservoir. This reservoir now has been destroyed, most likely by Russian troops from the 205th Armored Infantry Brigade. Whoever ordered the charges (which had been planted well in advance) to be blown must fully expect Russia to lose Crimea.
What makes things worse is that the east coast of Dnieper river was heavily mined by the Russians in anticipation of Ukraine’s counteratack. These mines are now randomly carried by the floodwaters and occasionally exploding.
Sorry — cannot identify my sources in Russian-occupied areas — too risky for them.
NBC News reports that the US government has intelligence that indicates Russia is behind the blowing up of the Nova Kakhovka dam, according to two US officials and one western official.
US president Joe Biden’s administration was working to declassify some of the intelligence and share it as early as Tuesday afternoon.
The western official said the collapse appears likely to make it more difficult for Ukrainian forces to conduct a river crossing.
The Orlando Sentinel published a report yesterday that raised eyebrows for a reason.
A Republican state attorney last May declined to prosecute six voter fraud cases that involved circumstances strikingly similar to the cases later brought against 20 ex-felons by Gov. Ron DeSantis’ election police unit and statewide prosecutors. The office of State Attorney Bill Gladson, whose district includes The Villages and five Republican counties, confirmed six convicted sex offenders in Lake County had voted in the 2020 general election, according to a determination letter obtained by the Orlando Sentinel.
And why is it, pray tell, that the local Republican prosecutor’s office passed on these fraud cases? According to the Sentinel’s report, Gladson and his staff concluded that the fraud wasn’t deliberate — and therefore couldn’t be prosecuted.
At first blush, this wouldn’t be especially notable. Six former felons were caught casting ballots they weren’t supposed to cast, but these Floridians were under the mistaken impression that they could legally vote. Indeed, they were even given voter-ID cards by state agencies.
They didn’t willfully break the law, so their Republican state attorney didn’t feel the need to file charges.
But given the larger context, that’s not the end of the story.
Revisiting our earlier coverage, it was roughly 10 months ago when Gov. Ron DeSantis held a news conference, making what he characterized as an important announcement: The Florida Office of Election Crimes and Security — an office he created to pursue a problem that didn’t appear to exist in any meaningful way — had found 20 people who voted illegally in 2020.
The Republican governor, surrounded by uniformed officers, assured the public that the suspects were in custody and would be prosecuted.
As we’ve discussed, DeSantis seemed quite pleased with himself. He had created an election crimes office and it uncovered election crimes, just like he said it would. His press conference was a victory lap for the ambitious governor’s “election integrity” campaign.
It wasn’t long, however, before the cases went to court and started falling apart. Most of the initial 20 arrests — each targeting former convicts who weren’t eligible to vote — have either seen the charges dismissed or plea deals that resulted in no jail time. Among the most obvious problems with these dubious charges is that the Floridians who’d been arrested had been notified by government entities they were eligible to cast ballots.
Indeed, The Tampa Bay Times highlighted the suspects who seemed utterly baffled as to why they were being taken away in handcuffs, insisting they had cast perfectly legal votes — not only because voters approved a state constitutional amendment in 2018, restoring voting rights to many felons, but also because they’d been told explicitly that they could participate in elections.
Those targeted by DeSantis’ election police haven’t ended up behind bars, but many of them have nevertheless seen their lives uprooted as a result of their unnecessary arrests.
We’re left with an unavoidable question: Why did DeSantis’ operation take 20 Floridians away in handcuffs for unknowingly casting improper ballots, while a Republican state attorney in a Republican area passed on prosecuting effectively identical cases?
A local lawyer representing one of the suspects arrested by DeSantis’ election police told the Sentinel, “Laws of the state of Florida, as well as the United States, are designed to protect everybody equally. How can some people be prosecuted and others not?”
Take another look at where the Republicans who actually committed voter fraud were NOT prosecuted: “The office of State Attorney Bill Gladson, whose district includes The Villages and five Republican counties […]” There’s your answer.
A federal judge Tuesday granted media organizations’ requests to unseal the names of the people who cosigned Rep. George Santos’s (R-N.Y.) $500,000 bond in his criminal fraud case.
The order is a blow to Santos, whose attorney Monday asked a judge to keep the names of the bond cosigners sealed. The congressman’s lawyer, Joseph Murray, expressed concern for the sponsors should their identities be revealed, citing a “media frenzy” around the Santos case.
[…] Murray previously indicated Santos would rather go to jail ahead of trial rather than allow the suretors to face the public attention
.
“My client would rather surrender to pretrial detainment than subject these suretors to what will inevitably come,” Murray said.
Federal prosecutors took no position on the unsealing request.
[…] Last month, the panel [House Ethics panel] asked for information on the individuals who sponsored Santos’s bond.
The request — outlined in a letter dated May 13 that was first made public on Monday — asks Santos to identify the individuals who co-signed his bond, inform the committee of any payments made on his behalf to the co-signers as compensation, lay out any exceptions to House rules that the congressman believes applies to the bond guarantors and provide all documents related to the bond, including communications with the co-signers.
[…] “I firmly believe that Congressman Santos has conducted himself honorably, lawfully, and ethically in keeping with the good order and finest traditions of an honorable members of the United States House of Representatives, in the manner in which the suretors who cosigned the unsecured $500,000.00 appearance bond, under oath in court were engaged,” Murray said. [LOL, LOL, LOL]
On April 4, former U.S. President Bill Clinton admitted to having been wrong to compel Ukraine to surrender its nuclear weapons to Russia.
Then, on May 31, French President Emmanuel Macron told an audience in Bratislava that France, and by extension the West, should have listened to Eastern Europeans about Russia.
“I feel personally involved because I forced them [Ukraine] to agree to refuse nuclear weapons,” Clinton said. The Ukrainians “were afraid to let them [the nuclear weapons] go because they thought it was the only thing that protected them from an expansionist Russia. Putin, when he saw an opportunity, broke the agreement and seized Crimea first. And I feel terrible because of this, because Ukraine is a very important country.”
Macron, meanwhile, first criticized former French President Jacques Chirac for telling the Eastern Europeans in 2003 that they missed a “good opportunity to shut up” during the run-up to the attack on Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. He then admitted that “we also lost an opportunity to listen to you” when it came to assessing the Russian threat.
Preceding both leaders was German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who said back in April 2022 that “We failed on many points. It is true that we should have taken the warnings of our Eastern European partners more seriously, particularly regarding the time after 2014.” […]
A federal judge in Florida issued a scathing assessment on Tuesday of the state’s ban on gender transition care for minors, asserting in a ruling that the families with transgender children who sued the state are “likely to prevail on their claim that the prohibition is unconstitutional.”
Judge Robert L. Hinkle of Federal District Court in Tallahassee ruled specifically that three transgender children can be prescribed puberty blockers despite the new state law, which also adds new hurdles for adults who seek similar care.
But as legal challenges have been mounted to new restrictions on transition care that have been enacted across the country, Judge Hinkle’s ruling exemplifies the kind of chilly reception that the bans may receive from judges.
“Gender identity is real,” Judge Hinkle wrote, adding that “proper treatment” can include mental health therapy followed by puberty blockers and hormone treatments. “Florida has adopted a statute and rules that prohibit these treatments even when medically appropriate.”
[…]
The plaintiffs had urged Judge Robert L. Hinkle of Federal District Court in Tallahassee specifically to block one part of the law that bars doctors and nurses from prescribing or administering transition-related medication to children, and another part that exposes medical providers to criminal liability and professional discipline for doing so.
The injunction granted by Judge Hinkle does not apply to other aspects of the far-reaching legislation, which also bars gender-transition surgery for minors, alters child custody statutes to treat transition care as equivalent to child abuse, and forbids the use of state funds to pay for transition care.
Even so, the judge wrote dismissively of the arguments offered by the state, calling them “a laundry list of purported justifications for the statute and rules” that were “largely pretextual and, in any event, do not call for a different result.”
Concerning the state’s claim that professional associations that endorsed gender transition care had done so for political reasons, the judge wrote: “If ever a pot called a kettle black, it is here. The statute and the rules were an exercise in politics, not good medicine.”
[…]
Before he signed the legislation, Mr. DeSantis, who has since announced a presidential bid, criticized puberty blockers and other forms of gender transition care for children. “That is wrong, and we’re glad that we put a stop to that in the state of Florida,” he said.
The legislation was part of an avalanche of measures focused on L.G.B.T.Q. people that Florida’s Republican-controlled State Legislature passed during its annual session.
After weeks of clamoring and buildup, House Oversight Committee chair Rep. James Comer (R-KY) on Thursday will oversee a vote to hold FBI Director Christopher Wray in contempt of Congress.
But the staging for this move didn’t begin in April, when House Republicans started spreading outrageous fabrications about a foreign bribery scheme involving Joe Biden. Nor did the choreography begin when the GOP took the majority in the House last year.
Rather, it started at the end of Trump’s first impeachment with Attorney General Bill Barr.
At the time, Barr set up what he described as an “intake process” for material that was brought back from Ukraine by Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s attorney and a consummate flirter with shady Eastern European cash flows.
Giuliani had helped get his client, President Trump, impeached in 2019 by demanding that the Ukrainian government produce damaging information about the Bidens. By early 2020, after months of impeachment proceedings and another trip to Kyiv, Giuliani had a binder of records full of fabrications that he wanted loudly and publicly investigated.
Some of that information made its way to the FBI which, per the Washington Post, found it unworthy of further investigation.
[…] Comer is reviewing the FBI’s work following the 2019 impeachment. He claims that the FBI’s failure to say that the allegations are true — and refusal to give Comer a copy of a document from the investigation which he could then publicize — should warrant contempt of Congress.
On Monday, the FBI brought the document — a second-hand report of an allegation about a $5 million bribe to Joe Biden — to Capitol Hill, and Comer and Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) reviewed it.
At a press conference afterwards, Raskin said that the FBI found the information not credible.
But Comer, undeterred, used it as a springboard to schedule a vote to hold FBI Director Chris Wray in contempt for not letting Comer keep a copy.
Old made new again
When Barr first set up Giuliani’s special intake office, the President had faced months of investigations in the Democratic-controlled House and a subsequent speedy acquittal in the GOP-controlled Senate over his withholding of military aid to Ukraine as part of an effort to extort Kyiv into manufacturing dirt on Trump’s then-potential 2020 presidential opponent, Biden.
Giuliani had played a central role in the effort, […] receiving information from anyone who was willing to make an allegation. That included at least one person who has since been identified as a Russian agent: Ukrainian politician Andrii Derkach.
The impeachment proceedings wrapped up in early February 2020. But according to records released by nonprofit watchdog American Oversight, the effort to create American investigations into the Bidens continued, with a top Barr deputy asking the then-U.S. Attorney in Pittsburgh if he could take on a “possible discreet assignment.”
At around the same time, Barr opened up the “intake process” — cases emanating from Ukraine were to go to Scott Brady, the Trump-appointed U.S. Attorney in Pittsburgh.
That resulted in a multi-month probe […] The claim was that the prosecutor was fired for not going after a gas company advised by Hunter Biden. It’s an allegation that’s been thoroughly refuted […]
But like so many Trump-era efforts to rewrite history, Giuliani’s allegations continued to simmer. One of the investigations that Giuliani sparked through this “intake process” included the claim that Comer is now waving around — that a foreign government bribed Biden with a $5 million payment. Per Raskin and the Washington Post, the FBI immediately debunked the allegation.
Investigate the investigation
Comer has set Wray up for a contempt vote in part by taking up the strategy that Trump acolytes have used over the past several years of scandal: investigate the investigators.
In Comer’s case, that’s meant examining how the FBI reacted to an allegation that, by all accounts, was complete nonsense and had no basis.
It’s thanks to Barr’s “intake process” that the allegation existed in the archives for Comer to find […] they’ve used the nonsense bribery claim as a springboard to move forward the same allegations that the FBI has treated Trump very unfairly forward, this time by suggesting that it’s given Biden a light touch.
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD), as ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, also got a peek at a copy of the record on Capitol Hill on Monday. At a press conference, he suggested that Comer had inflated the document’s importance, saying that it only showed what an FBI informant had heard someone else allege — “secondhand information.”
“If there’s a complaint, the complaint is with Attorney General William Barr, the Trump Justice Department and the team that the Trump administration appointed to look into it,” Raskin said.
Posted by readers of the article:
Just more performative bullshit from the GQP. It’s all they’ve got.
——————–
So basically his complaint is that reality was unfair to tfg?
——————–
I for one am thankful that Jamie Raskin is the ranking member on this committee.
———————-
Comer is strikingly unsuited to his task. The aspect of the House GOP I most appreciate is their incompetence and Comer has it in spades
The Washington Post’s Aaron Blake has a new piece analyzing future Republican presidential primary also-ran Vivek Ramaswamy’s proposal to cut off U.S. military aid to Ukraine and what it might mean for the Republican primaries at large. Ramaswamy’s “peace” plan for Ukraine boils down to cutting off U.S. aid so that the country no longer has hope of regaining its lost territory, after which Ukraine will be forced to accept the Russian annexation of that territory [yikes!]
[…] Ramaswamy is an unserious contender, a gadfly who will likely exist on the debate stage mainly as an excuse for the top contenders to take a few sips of water after trading newly invented insults, but advancing such proposals likely will encourage both seditionist Donald Trump and ambition-bot Ron DeSantis to express their anti-Ukraine views more fully. […] both top contenders have dismissed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as something beneath U.S. interest. […] whine about how upstanding Republican taxpayers shouldn’t be spending money to protect the world against Trump’s best authoritarian friend.
Donald Trump was already impeached for withholding Ukraine aid once, […] and for nothing more than a Nixonish ratf-cking operation. […] It was Trump’s camp that pushed the Republican Party to rewrite its party platform to water down support for Ukraine during the 2016 presidential race, a move that almost certainly resulted from outright crookedness and Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort’s lobbying work against Ukraine’s government. We don’t need to speculate on Trump’s position; he has taken concrete steps to weaken Ukraine’s government and boost Russian efforts against the country for more than six years now. In fact, during a Fox News’ town hall’ just days ago, Trump floated the idea of breaking up NATO, which must have been music to Putin’s ears.
As for DeSantis, his policies are more prosaic: He just doesn’t care. It is not in his electoral interests to care, and if later on it would move a few votes one way or the other, then he will decide what his position is according to what the polls say it should be. Until then, he remains laser-focused on attacking schoolchildren, teachers, and the Walt Disney Company.
Ramaswamy might be a vanity candidate, but his ideas for “peace” are noncontroversial among the Republican base and the hardest-right and most sedition-agnostic House Republicans: stop supporting Ukraine, give Putin what Putin can take, and be done with it. […] the Republicans, still willing to back Trump even after an attempt to overthrow the United States government, do want to make cozy with dictatorial thugs, or at least want to not spend money getting in their way.
[…] NATO heads and other European leaders are already fretting that the Republican presidential campaigns will “shatter” already-brittle bipartisan support for Ukrainian aid […]
[…] That could mean that Putin orders his government to pull out all the stops in conducting espionage and online social engineering efforts to boost Republican candidates and damage Democratic ones. The future of Crimea may well depend on Russian efforts to again bend a presidential election toward a Russian-friendly Republican; how many more resources might Putin bring to bear on such an effort now, with Russia’s military forces being ground into a paste on a daily and hourly basis […]
Not since Chernobyl has Russian incompetence and stupidity had such devastating consequences on humanity and the planet in general.
It seems that the Russians may have thought they were surgically blowing up just enough of the Kakhovka power plant to flood Ukraine’s military on islands in the Dnipro River further south near Kherson.
Oops. […]
At two o’clock in the morning, the Russians blow up the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station, but they don’t see how much. […]
1. The Russians still think that they have neatly blown up a small part of the HPP and are flooding our military on the islands. At 6:06 a.m., the head of Nova Kakhovka, Leontyev, said that the explosion of the GES was nonsense. Like, we don’t know why the water rose there. Here is the link to Ria Novosti’s http://archive.is/aTyK8
2. Russian OSINT intelligence community Rybar picks up the thesis and says a small area was blown up at 6:51 a.m. Link http://archive.ph/flapa
3. At 6:51 in Nova Kakhovka, they see that the dam is a complete [mess], and […] start to realize that they are in trouble. The mayor of Nova Kakhovka abruptly changes his rhetoric and says there was no explosion, it was a shelling by the Ukrainian army. Link http://archive.ph/LFFKF
4. But the propagandists, who do not know what the fuck has happened, continue to work according to the methodology and continue to throw into the information space that the dam was previously shelled, and then it got a little tired and broke a little. Here is a post by Podolyaki’s propagandist http://archive.ph/DgQIV. And the propaganda channel War on Fakes http://archive.ph/GRN55
[Tweet and image at the link]
Everything Russia touches turns to shit. [Tweet and video at the link]
Add this to the already huge pile of Russian atrocities. [tweet and video at the link: "There used to be a zoo in temporarily occupied Nova Kakhovka. About 300 animals lived there.
This morning, it was flooded completely. Reportedly, all the animals except for swans and ducks died. Locals said that "authorities" did nothing to rescue the animals."]
It’s gets me worked up and I’m not Ukrainian. I can’t imagine how awful it must be to see this being done to your country. [Tweet at the link] […]
At an underwater mountain in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, scientists have drilled nearly a mile beneath the ocean floor and pulled up an unprecedented scientific bounty — pieces of Earth’s rocky mantle.
The record-breaking achievement has electrified geoscientists, who for decades have dreamed of punching through miles of Earth’s crust to sample the mysterious realm that makes up most of the planet. The heat-driven churn of the mantle is what fuels plate tectonics in the crust, giving rise to mountains, volcanoes and earthquakes.
The new expedition, by an ocean drilling vessel called the JOIDES Resolution, did not technically drill into the mantle, and the hole isn’t the deepest ever drilled beneath the ocean floor. Instead, researchers cruised to a special “tectonic window” in the North Atlantic where drills don’t have to tunnel as far to strike pay dirt. Here, the rocks of the mantle have been pushed close to the surface as the ocean floor slowly pulls apart at the nearby Mid-Atlantic Ridge.
On May 1, they began drilling the hole, known as U1601C. Andrew McCaig, the expedition’s co-chief scientist, expected to make a shallow “pinprick” because the record for drilling in mantle rock, set in the 1990s, was a mere tenth of a mile. The researchers hoped to recover enough samples to help elucidate how chemical reactions between mantle rocks and water could have given rise to life on our planet. But ocean drilling can be an uncertain enterprise — drills get stuck, or the long cores of rock being recovered may be only partial samples.
This time, though, the drill yielded tube after tube of dark rock, many of them surprisingly complete.
“It just kept going deeper, deeper and deeper. Then everyone in the science party said, ‘Hey, this is what we wanted all along. Since 1960, we wanted to get a hole this deep in mantle rock,’” McCaig said, speaking from the JOIDES Resolution minutes before another long section of dark rock was pulled on board. When the team stopped drilling on June 2, the team had taken rock samples from as deep as 4,157 feet below the seafloor. […]
The drilling ship set out from Ponta Delgada in Portugal’s Azores Islands to reach the Atlantis massif, a large underwater mountain that offers a rare window into Earth’s mantle. [map at the link]
In 1909, a Croatian seismologist named Andrija Mohorovičić discovered a boundary within Earth.
Mohorovičić monitored how seismic waves generated by an earthquake traveled through the ground, similar to using X-rays to probe inside the human body. Closer to the surface, seismic waves traveled at one speed, but past a certain zone all around the globe, they traveled faster, suggesting the waves were moving through two distinct layers of rock.
This discontinuity, called the Moho, is now recognized as the line between Earth’s crust and its mantle. Its depth varies, but the mantle generally begins about five miles beneath the ocean floor and roughly 20 miles beneath the continents.
[…] The mantle isn’t a complete unknown. Occasionally, volcanic eruptions spew out bits of it — chunks of greenish peridotite, the type of rock that dominates the upper mantle, embedded in basalt rock. But these samples, called mantle xenoliths, have their limits, because they are often chewed up and weathered from their trip to the surface. There are also ophiolites, sheets of oceanic crust tinged with some of the upper mantle that were uplifted and plastered onto the land. But they too have been altered by the trip.
What scientists have long craved was a drilled sample of mantle rock. Project Mohole, a famous ocean expedition, set out to drill through the thinner crust on the ocean floor to reach the mantle in 1961 but failed.
[…] Most of the mantle is buried beneath the crust, not exposed to the ocean the way it is at this site. That raises the fundamental question: How closely do the latest samples mimic the rest of the mantle? Do the rocks truly represent mantle, or are they lower crust?
[…] The scientists have been so busy processing the enormous volume of rock they’ve recovered that they’ve had little opportunity to study the samples in detail, or even reflect on the magnitude of the achievement. The drill bits need to be switched out every 50 hours. The team aboard works in 12-hour shifts, not wasting a minute of time.
[…] “The deeper we get in there, the closer we’re getting to what we those rocks look like, closer to what the mantle looks like,” Warren said.
[…] In making a second run for the presidency, Mr. Christie, 60, has positioned himself as the person most willing to attack both Mr. Trump, his former friend turned adversary, and Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, who has been in second place in nearly every public Republican primary poll for months. Mr. Christie’s presence in the race could be unwelcome for Mr. DeSantis, for whom every additional candidate harms his ability to consolidate support.
Mr. Christie, who is set to announce his run at a town-hall-style event in New Hampshire Tuesday evening, has already begun laying out an aggressive case against Mr. Trump based on the former president’s policies — namely, that he made a number of promises that he never delivered. That case is one that other hopefuls have generally sidestepped, instead largely avoiding saying Mr. Trump’s name. By contrast, Mr. Christie has gone directly at him.
He has mocked Mr. Trump’s dwindling crowd sizes, called him a loser and said that he crossed a line with his actions that led a pro-Trump mob to attack the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. […]
New York City spent two years probing more than $3 million in unpaid rent the city was expecting from Trump’s Grand Hyatt hotel
[…]
“In September, 1988, the Hotel informed us that it could not locate seven of the twelve monthly general ledgers, because they ‘were discarded after they were severely damaged by water when the room in which they were stored was flooded,'” the report said. […] “resistance to our review and the Hotel’s lapses in record keeping had substantial impact upon our inquiry’s scope and methodology,”
[…]
auditors were investigating why the hotel paid $3.7 million for rent in 1985 and, although its gross revenues increased in 1986, it paid only $667,155.
After lawsuits and the bankruptcy of an accounting firm used by Trump, the case was mistakenly labeled as disposed and later reopened. Trump had sold the hotel and the new owners reached an undisclosed settlement
The Food and Drug Administration has withdrawn authorization for Johnson & Johnson’s COVID-19 vaccine, ending its short-lived but troubled existence amid the pandemic.
In a letter last week, the FDA’s top vaccine regulator, Peter Marks, wrote to Janssen Biotech—the Johnson & Johnson-owned, Belgium-based company responsible for the vaccine—saying that the agency was revoking authorization. Marks opened the letter by noting that the withdrawal was at the request of the company…
WASHINGTON — A band of 11 House conservative rabble-rousers on Tuesday took the rare step of joining all Democrats to block a pair of GOP bills to protect gas stoves to express their anger over the debt deal cut by Speaker Kevin McCarthy and President Joe Biden.
The procedural vote was rejected, 206 to 220, stunning longtime lawmakers and reporters who have not seen a rule vote — a procedural measure typically widely supported by the majority party — go down in more than two decades.
Members of the House Freedom Caucus, along with a conservative ally, Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., gathered on the steps of the Capitol after voting to rail at how McCarthy and his leadership team handled negotiations to lift the debt ceiling.
The group warned that all Republican legislation could come to a standstill unless they resolve their internal issues.
[…]
Walking off the floor, Democrats, including former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, appeared downright giddy at the GOP dysfunction.
whheydtsays
Today being the anniversary of D-Day (1944), the end of the Battle of Midway (`942), and my late wife’s birthday (also 1942),
here is an article from the BBC about a Royal Marine who was involved in D-Day… https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lincolnshire-65815672
One of Britain’s last remaining D-Day veterans has said he puts his survival down to “the luck of the draw”.
Les Budding, 97, was 18 years old when he served on board Landing Craft Flak 34, charged with providing covering fire for the first wave of troops who stormed Sword Beach on 6 June 1944.
Mr Budding said: “On this anniversary, I’m thinking about the veterans we’ve lost over the past few years.
“I’m also thinking about all those men we lost that day.”
The son of a steam locomotive driver, Mr Budding joined the Royal Marines at 17.
Following intense training in Scotland, he found himself with 85 others boarding a 186ft landing craft in Portsmouth headed for the Normandy coast, 79 years ago.
They were tasked with defending the main invasion force from attack from the Luftwaffe as well as surface vessels.
He told the BBC: “I wasn’t nervous. We were kept busy. We knew we had an important job to do. Looking back, I think we had that attitude because of our youth. If we were 25 or 30 and had experience of death – of life, come to think of it – we would probably have seen things different.
“Survival was luck of the draw. A lot of people were lost.”
Mr Budding, who lives near Sleaford in his native Lincolnshire, recalled “the false start” when the invasion was put back a day due to bad weather.
“There was a narrow weather window and off we went,” he said. “We all just wanted to get going, to get the job done.”
Mr Budding saw his first enemy aircraft later that morning, but added the Luftwaffe posed little threat thanks to the efforts of the RAF who controlled the skies.
“The RAF did a marvellous job that day, keeping the Luftwaffe away from us,” he recalled.
He said: “Our role was protecting the landing forces. The Germans were firing at us from the upper windows of houses dotted along the shore. They had all these sandbags around the windows and you could see the muzzle flashes.”
Mr Budding, although proud of his actions that day, insisted the more important task was the holding of the Trout Line – a defensive line ensuring supplies reached the first waves.
After the war, Mr Budding returned to his childhood sweetheart Doris and they married soon after. They were married 71 years. Mrs Budding died five years ago.
“I still miss her,” he said. “She was not a happy bunny when I joined the forces,” he said. “But I had to go and do my bit.”
Mr Budding, a father to daughter Linda, grandfather to three and great-grandfather to six, believes it is “most important” the nation continues to remember the sacrifices of those who helped free the world from Nazi tyranny.
He remains modest, insisting he was “just one of many”.
Today, however, he is one of the few.
With a wink, he added: “We’re getting a little thin on the ground now, aren’t we?”
The White House on Tuesday is launching a website to map and track tens of thousands of infrastructure projects and private manufacturing investments, an effort by the administration to show the positive impact of its policies on the U.S. economy to a skeptical public.
The site, Invest.gov, documents roughly 32,000 infrastructure projects and more than $470 billion worth of investments in the production of electric vehicles, batteries, computer chips, biotech, clean energy and other sectors. […]
UPDATE: Tuesday, Jun 6, 2023 · 7:10:59 PM MDT · Mark Sumner
Unconfirmed reports that Ukrainian forces have moved south from Avdiivka and are fighting in the town of Optyne, just a kilometer from the Donetsk airport.
Most of the attention today is focused on events related to Russia’s breach of the Kakhovka Dam. Considering that thousands of square kilometers are being flooded, thousands of people will be displaced, and both the ecology and economy of the area will be affected for decades, that level of attention is well-deserved.
But across the country, fighting continues. Russia may have intended to slow the start of Ukraine’s counteroffensive through an uncontestable war crime, but in places like Bakhmut, the guns have definitely not gone silent.
Fighting continues both on the eastern front around Bakhmut, and on the southern front around Velyka Novosilka. There are reports of Ukrainian advances in several areas, and also of Russia recapturing an area that was liberated one day earlier. And across the Russian border in Belgorod, there’s another change in the situation as the Russian Volunteer Corps bring something new into their conflict: tanks.
BAKHMUT
On Monday, there were reports that Ukraine had moved across the “road of death” to recapture the area just below Berkhivka, northwest of the city. On Tuesday Ukraine reportedly advanced again, taking most or all of the town while pushing Russian forces back from positions they held around the reservoir on the southwest edge of Berkhivka. [Map at the link]
At the same time, other Ukrainian forces have pressed from the west, hitting the end of the Russian salient along highway M30 (top arrow on the map) and pushing it back around 3 kilometers.
There is still reportedly Russian artillery around the village of Dubovo-Vasylivka—right in the middle of these two Ukrainian advances. These forces are now in danger of being cut off or encircled. Forcing this group into retreat takes the heat off the “road of life” through Khromove, which has carried a lot of the supply burden in the area over the past six months, and brings Ukraine closer to regaining use of the M03, which was lost at the first of the year.
In Bakhmut itself, there are more reports of gains, but no details. I’ve put a tiny blue polygon around the area of the appliance factory at Bakhmut’s southern entrance, but that’s not so much area regained from Russia as territory never really lost. Russia was in no hurry to occupy positions exposed to Ukrainian artillery, mortar, and direct fire. It would be nice to show portions of the city returning to Ukrainian control, but the details are not currently available and Ukraine might be in the same position: occupying that land would expose it to Russian fire, for little actual benefit.
South of the city, there are more reports of Ukrainian forces moving toward Klishchiivka and its big prize—the high terrain west of the settlement. Videos are appearing of Ukrainian forces crossing the canal south of the city on Monday and moving up from the southwest. Other forces are pressing from the west toward the fortifications on the hill above the town. If Ukraine can gain those fortifications, they’d have a position shooting down on Russians to the east (and another excellent artillery position for firing at areas around Bakhmut from a new direction). Things seem to be moving in this area, so expect more updates.
One thing very much worth noting in this map is the scale. After months of tracking change of control that happened block by block on maps zoomed in to have a scale of a couple of hundred meters, that scale bar over at the bottom right of this map is 10 kilometers. Ukraine has reportedly taken positions in the south that were captured by Russia in January. This is not a major counteroffensive, but it is having some fairly sizable results.
VELYKA NOVOSILKA
This area received attention on Monday when Ukraine suddenly moved against the Russian line at three locations, but on Tuesday action in the area appears to be reduced. [map at the link]
In the west. Russian sources report that Ukraine has liberated the town of Novodarivka. However, an attempt to reach Rivnopil, 5 kilometers to the east, resulted in the loss of as many as 10 Ukrainian vehicles and an unknown number of men.
There are reports that fighting continues around Neskuchne at the center of this effort, However, there doesn’t seem to be any confirmed change in areas of control.
To the east, Ukraine had reportedly liberated Novodonetske on Monday, but Russia reportedly pushed back into part of the town overnight. Ukrainian forces reportedly took an area to the west of that town, leaving an extended area in dispute.
As with Monday, what’s interesting about these attacks is how big they are not. Despite Russian claims to have wiped out 1,500 men and 150 vehicles, it doesn’t seem that much gear has been invested in all these attacks combined. Also, despite Russian claims, there doesn’t seem to be evidence of a lot of new NATO gear being used in this area. Clearly, this is part of the counteroffensive, because everything Ukraine is doing at this point is part of their strategy for what comes next. But this is not at all the kind of large, combined arms action that many expect when thinking about all those new Western-trained and equipped Ukrainian brigades.
BELGOROD
The baffling thing with the move of Russian Volunteer Corps (known as RDK) and other anti-Putin Russian forces into the Belgorod area is just how slow Russia has been to respond. A week earlier, when the Russian opposition force moved through another border crossing 90 kilometers to the west, Russia made a huge show of sending in a high-ranking commander and elite airborne VDV forces to chase them out. But this time, the Ukrainian-aligned forces parked in Novaya Tavolzhanka seem to be considerably lower on Russia’s to-do list.
RDK forces have repeatedly taken Russian soldiers prisoner, killed a Russian colonel at the head of a small force sent to meet them, and basically taunted Russian forces for six straight days. Circulating maps showing an expanding “Belgorod People’s Republic” are a joke … probably. But the fact that these guys have been able to sustain a small occupation force within Russia for nearly a week is hard to fathom.
And now …[tweet and video at the link: "Tanks of Russia Free Legion entering Novaya Tavolzhanka settlement in Belgorod Oblast of Russia. Russian army seems to be unable to respond opposition's forces advance in the area."]
As of Tuesday evening, RDK forces were claiming to control all of the border settlement of Novaya Tavolzhanka (pop. 5,300). That claim was backed up by statements on Russian Telegram channels.
It’s enough to make it seem that the entire 400,000 Rosgvardia (“National Guard”) exists only to serve as Vladimir Putin’s personal army rather than for the defense of the nation.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sure has come a long way from 2014, when he angered fossil fuel lobbyists by saying that climate change deniers should be jailed. Or maybe not such a long way; by 2005 he was already spreading the anti-vax gospel and falsely claiming that childhood vaccines cause autism. And now he’s running for president and everyone is reminding you what a complete freakass whackaloon he is.
We’ll do our part. Hey, remember that long-ago time in 2022 when he said, of COVID vaccine mandates, that at least in Nazi Germany “you could cross the Alps into Switzerland, you could hide in an attic like Anne Frank did.”
Kennedy did his part to help out that educational endeavor Monday night by sitting down with chief Twitter troll Elon Musk, who seems to love conspiratorial bullshit nearly as much as Kennedy does. He started out by thanking Musk for ending all the terrible “censorship” on the platform — by making it a free-for all for COVID and vaccine disinformation, not to mention for Nazis, far-Right conspiracy theories, and rampant hatred of transgender people, but also by actually censoring people on behalf of authoritarian governments. Kennedy also explained that in 2021, “the government pressured Mark Zuckerberg” to ban him from Instagram, although now his account has been restored because he’s running for president. Talk about ineffective censorship!
Rolling Stone reports that for the first 40 minutes of the Twitter Spaces chat, Kennedy barely talked about his candidacy, because he and Musk were too busy telling each other how much they admired each other for being courageous and shit, which is honestly what free speech is for. [Yuck. Two narcissistic peas in a pod.]
At one point, Kennedy asked where Musk got the courage to be like one of America’s Founders by being “willing to take this huge, massive, unspeakable economic hit on behalf of a principle for a country in which you weren’t even born?” Musk, who does kind of have US citizenship after all, replied, “I should say I do very much consider myself an American.” Musk also acknowledged that advertisers had deserted the platform because he was so very committed to democracy, at least for people who think he’s cool, so it’s been “frankly a struggle to break even” (he is not breaking even) and then everyone with an $8 blue checkmark felt very warm that they had done their part to save America and/or Twitter.
After they both agreed that free speech is the very best, and that they both really love free speech the most, Kennedy bemoaned the sad fact that “we’re no longer living in a democratic system,” because Big Pharma controls the government and silences brave advocates of medical disinformation, which would explain why we only hear from anti-vaxxers everywhere on social media but not yet in (most) doctors’ offices.
Among other great trolls, Musk and Kennedy were joined by Tulsi Gabbard and Michael Shellenberger, author of books about how environmentalism is bad for everyone and global warming is happening but is honestly no big deal, yeesh, calm down. […]
Kennedy and Musk agreed that America shouldn’t be supporting the Ukrainian government, since as Kennedy put it, the Ukrainian people are “almost equally” victimized by America as by Russians. Musk added that the war was kind of our fault anyway, since “We are sending the flower of Ukrainian youth and Russian youth to die in the trenches, and it’s morally reprehensible,” and when you think about it, we probably shouldn’t be ordering Russia’s youth flowers around like that, how would we like it huh?
The conversation got even more sane when Gabbard added that
the U.S. had turned Ukraine into a “slaughterhouse” and blamed the conflict on an “elitist cabal of war-mongers” who had seized control of the Democratic Party.
Those war-mongers, Kennedy warned, hadn’t just taken control of the Democratic party: They were in control of the Deep State as well.
He recalled being told by Donald Trump’s former CIA Director Mike Pompeo that the “top layer of that agency is made up almost entirely of people who do not believe in the American institutions of democracy,” which is pretty rich coming from a top guy in the Trump administration.
Kennedy also said he opposed an assault weapons ban, because the Second Amendment is pretty awesome, and anyway, the problem isn’t guns, it’s antidepressant meds, which turn people into mass shooters, explaining that
“prior to the introduction of Prozac, we had almost none of these events in our country. […] The one thing that we have, it’s different than anybody in the world, is the amount of psychiatric drugs our children are taking.” He then alleged that the National Institutes of Health won’t research the supposed link between these drugs and shootings “because they’re working with the pharmaceutical industry.”
It’s pretty convincing until you remember that antidepressants are prescribed worldwide, but in countries where there aren’t more guns than people, there aren’t a bunch of school shootings. Also, maybe someone could have pointed out that only about a quarter of mass shooters use antidepressants, while 100 percent of them use firearms, albeit not usually with a doctor’s prescription.
Along the way, Kennedy also insisted that COVID was a “bioweapon,” lied that after the passage of the Affordable Care Act the “Democrats were getting more money from pharma than Republicans” (it’s the other way around, according to STAT News, but then STAT News believes vaccines work), and promised to go to the US-Mexico border to “try to formulate policies that will seal the border permanently,” so he really sounds like the mainstream Democrat that everyone on the far Right has been looking for […]
potentially [an] alternative to surgical spaying.
[…]
viral gene therapy vector with a slightly altered version of the feline [anti-Müllerian hormone] gene. […] A single injection […] causes […] muscles to produce AMH, which is normally only produced in the ovaries, and raises […] AMH about 100 times higher […] Suppressing ovarian follicle development and ovulation […] no adverse effects
[…]
“A non-surgical sterilant […] will transform animal welfare,” […] infrastructure needed to produce enough doses to sterilize millions […] does not yet exist.
An emerging technology to fish for lobsters virtually ropeless to prevent whale entanglements is exciting conservationists, but getting a frigid reception from harvesters worried it will drive them out of business and upend their way of life.
Injuries to endangered North Atlantic Right Whales ensnared in fishing gear have fueled a prominent campaign by environmental groups to pressure the industry to adopt on-demand equipment that only suspends ropes in the water briefly before traps are pulled from the water…
Reanna Bendzak thought giving her teething seven-month-old daughter a celery stalk would be a simple and safe way to offer her some relief as they enjoyed the sun earlier this spring.
She never expected it would result in burns and blisters around her baby’s mouth, the result of compounds found in certain foods coming into contact with sunlight…
She later discovered that her child had suffered from phytophotodermatitis, commonly referred to as “margarita burns.” This condition occurs when the skin comes into contact with the sap or juice of plants including carrots, celery and limes and is then exposed to sunlight…
Oggie: Mathomsays
Back from Maine. Wife and I, my daughter, my son and his wife and the twins, all went up to Maine on Sunday, went to the Memorial Service/Celebration of Life at the UU church, and drove home yesterday.
The service was beautiful. No mention of God/gods. Or Jesus. Instead, a celebration of Mom’s almost 84 years — as an artist, mother, wife, grandmother, great grandmother, teacher, (the list of what she did during her life is extensive). Dad spoke about their childhood, and how they met, and how two children of severely dysfunctional families were able to fill in each other’s missing bits so both of them could become whole.
All were asked to wear bright colours, and they did. Many spoke during the service. We laughed and cried. And it really helped the grieving process.
Damnit, why can’t this be what churches are all about, rather than the othering and demands of conformity?
StevoRsays
The world’s largest sand island off the coast of Queensland, formerly known as Fraser Island, has officially been renamed K’gari.The landmark decision by the state government to rename the island is being likened to the historic name change at Uluru.
Pronounced “Gurrie”, K’gari means “paradise” in native Butchulla language.
K’gari will now appear on official maps and road signs.
Traditional owners say the name change symbolises something greater than labels.
“It’s been an eight-year battle to actually get [here] … the fight was a journey of strength and courage,” Butchulla elder Chris Royan said.
“As traditional owners, we have always called it K’gari – so for us to officially get the rest of Queensland and Australia to call it K’gari, is really important.”
While driving home yesterday, I hit smoke in Massachusetts. By the time we got to Pennsylvania, we had 1 or 2 kilometer visibility and the filtered sunlight had that beautiful orange glow. All from the fires in Quebec. Feels really weird to me. This is what days were often like when I worked wildland fires. Even smells like overtime out there. And in here.
Here is a good map which shows both smoke and active large incidents.
Russians have released a video in which they claim a Russian Ka-52 helicopter strikes on “Leopard 2 tanks.” Only for some reason this “Leopard” looks more like a tractor. For example, John Deere 4830.
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From there:
Ukraine has not yet launched a planned counteroffensive to win back territory occupied by Russia, and its start will be obvious to everyone when it happens, a senior security official said on Wednesday.
Oleksiy Danilov, secretary of Ukraine’s national security and defence council, dismissed statements by Russian officials who have said the counteroffensive has already begun.
“All of this is not true. When all this will begin, it will be decided by our military,” Danilov told Reuters in an interview. “When we start the counteroffensive, everyone will know about it, they will see it.”
Danilov said Russian officials had mistaken local Ukrainian advances in some frontline areas for the start of the larger operation.
The occupied town of Oleshky appears to be the worst affected area on the left bank of the Dnipro river, with severe flooding and residents stranded on the roofs of their cottages.
According to locals, the Russian authorities have set up checkpoints. They refuse to let volunteers enter the town to help with evacuation. Local Telegram channels are full of desperate messages from relatives, asking for their loved ones to be rescued.
One message read:
SOS!!! Can anyone with a boat help? Cottagers Anna .. and her husband have been sitting on their roof since morning, praying for rescue. They’ve raised a white flag. It’s the first house on the right. Help!!!
Another said:
Help! How can people in Oleshky be saved? Everyone in the Red Army district is sitting on the roof, waiting for assistance. Animals are sinking, drowning.
Sergei, a local volunteer in the occupied city of Nova Kakhovka, described the situation in Oleshky as “bad”. “There is almost no contact with the people there. No one is allowed into the town and those who make it out on boats are placed into buses and driven away,” he said.
“We tried reaching Oleshky but checkpoints have been set up all around the town. A lot of people are waiting to be evacuated. We have heard stories of people drowning, but we can’t confirm because there is no access. Those with Ukrainian passports who are being evacuated further to Russia are forced to go through filtration centres.”
Helping to Leave, a new organisation that provides aid and services to Ukrainians fleeing the war, described the situation in Oleshky as “chaotic”. “They are not allowing volunteers on boats to enter. Some evacuation is being carried out by [Russian] emergency services but it’s very selective and it is not enough.”
Ukraine’s military has released footage showing drones delivering water to Oleshky residents trapped in their homes.
According to authorities, more than 42,000 people have been affected by catastrophic flooding caused by the destruction of the Kakhovka dam.
Re the video @ #90 above:
If Vladimir Saldo was trying to project a sense of calm among the deluged frontline towns and villages of Russian-occupied Kherson region, he was failing miserably.
The Kremlin-installed “governor”, dressed in camouflage and helmet and sitting in front of the flooded remains of the town centre of Nova Kakhovka, claimed that the city was “alive”.
“People are calmly walking around the streets,” said Saldo, as the flood waters rose up the walls of the city hall behind him. “I’ve just driven around the streets, people are working, the gas stations are open, some stores are open.”
The reality of the catastrophe was playing out around him: people stranded on the roofs of their houses and flats, begging for those with boats to come and save them.
Dozens missing and whole towns downriver washed away. And reports that Russian troops were blocking access to the frontline towns on the left bank of the Dnipro river by installing new checkpoints even as the flood waters continued to rise.
“Everyone is left to fend for themselves, there is no organised evacuation,” said Gleb, a resident of Nova Kakhova who was looking for ways to leave the city.
A few thoughts on the dam’s destruction and its implications for Ukraine’s offensive. In brief, I doubt it will have a significant impact on UA mil operations. The Khakovka dam is at least 100 miles from where much of the activity might take place at its closest point.
A Ukrainian cross-river operation in southern Kherson, below the dam, was always a risky and therefore low-probability prospect. There is no evidence that such an operation was under way, or would have necessarily been a part of the UA offensive plans.
Destroying the dam does not substantially shorten Russian lines, or make defense much easier, although it does make a UA cross-river operation exceedingly difficult in that area. But, the flood will likely also destroy the initial line of Russian entrenchments along the river.
If the Ukrainian plan is to break through RF lines in Zaporizhia and advance to the ground lines of communication from Crimea, or sever the ‘land bridge’ (and I won’t speculate as to what it might be), the resultant flooding is unlikely to impede such an operation.
This is an ecological and humanitarian catastrophe, with long term economic implications for the region, for which Russia is responsible, but I’m skeptical that Ukraine’s military prospects in the short term will be negatively affected in a meaningful way.
Authorities on Wednesday rushed supplies of drinking water to flooded areas from a collapsed dam in southern Ukraine as officials weighed where they might have to resettle thousands of residents who relied on the breached reservoir that forms part of the front line in the 15-month war.
About 3,000 people have been evacuated from flooded areas on both the Russian and Ukrainian-controlled sides of the river, officials said, but it was not clear whether the true scale of the disaster had yet emerged in an affected area that was home to more than 60,000 people. Russian-appointed authorities in the occupied parts of the Kherson region reported 15,000 homes were flooded.
Some residents of Russian-occupied areas hit by high water complained that help was slow in arriving.
The Kakhovka hydroelectric dam and reservoir, essential for drinking water and irrigation for a huge area of southern Ukraine, lies in a part of the Kherson region occupied by Moscow’s forces for the past year. It is also critical for water supplies to the Crimean Peninsula, which was illegally annexed by Russia in 2014.
Ukraine holds the western bank of the Dnieper, while Russia controls the eastern side, which is lower and more vulnerable to flooding.
Scenes of flooded communities and rescues by boat and from rooftops called to mind a natural disaster, rather than those usually seen in war.
The flooding could wash away this season’s crops, while the depleted Kakhovka reservoir would deny adequate irrigation in the years ahead.
[…] Many residents had long ago fled the region due to the fighting, but others stayed despite shelling and drone attacks, making it hard to determine how many people remain at risk in an area where hundreds of thousands lived before Russia’s February 2022 invasion.
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he met with officials on the “urgent provision of drinking water and long-term solutions for settlements that were dependent on the reservoir,” as well as assessing damage to property and the environment in the region.
Zelenskyy accused Moscow-installed officials in occupied areas of failing to respond adequately to the emergency.
Russian-installed authorities said they evacuated fewer than 1,300 people in an area where at least 22,000 people were said to have been affected. That compared with about 1,700 evacuated on the Ukrainian side where the population was reportedly around 42,000.
In the Moscow-controlled city of Oleshky, Lera told The Associated Press that the first floor of her home is flooded, confining her and her family to the second floor.
“Everything around us is floating, people are standing on rooftops and asking for help, but no one is evacuating them,” said the 19-year-old, who declined to give her last name out of fear of reprisals.
Most Russian troops fled from Oleshky shortly after the dam incident, Lera said, although a military checkpoint remains, and boats with people trying to leave have come under fire from soldiers. Her claim could not be independently verified.
She said other residents are running out of food, with her own home without power or water.
Civilians in Kherson clutched personal belongings as they waded through knee-deep water in the streets and rode rubber rafts. Video on social media showed rescuers carrying people to safety, and what looked like the triangular roof of a building floating downstream.
Aerial footage showed flooded streets in the Russian-controlled city of Nova Kakhovska on the eastern side of the Dnieper, where Mayor Vladimir Leontyev said seven people were missing, although believed to be alive.
Animals also were caught in the flood, with some pets trapped. Officials at the Kazkova Dibrova Zoo in Novaya Kakhovka said it was under water and that “only swans and ducks could escape.”
Zelenskyy said Ukraine will appeal to international organizations for help.
In his first public comments on the disaster, Russian President Vladimir Putin repeated Moscow’s line that Ukraine is to blame for destroying the Kakhovka dam.
In a call with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Putin alleged that Kyiv authorities had escalated “war crimes, openly using terrorist methods and staging acts of sabotage on the Russian territory,” the Kremlin said in its account of the call.
It was unclear how the dam disaster would affect the war just as Ukraine appeared to be preparing for a counteroffensive against Russian troops. Amid the disaster response, artillery boomed as people scrambled to leave the danger zone.
Addressing who might be to blame, the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington think tank, said Russia has “a greater and clearer interest in flooding the lower Dnieper despite the damage to their own prepared defensive positions.”
Amid speculation that Ukraine might have begun its long-anticipated counteroffensive, the ISW said Russian forces may think breaching the dam could cover a possible retreat and delay Ukraine’s campaign.
Experts noted that the 1950s-era dam, about 70 kilometers (44 miles) to the east of the city of Kherson, was believed to be in disrepair and vulnerable to collapse as water was already brimming over when the wall gave way. It hadn’t been producing power since November, according to officials.
Britain’s Ministry of Defense said the Kakhovka reservoir was at record high levels before the breach. While the dam wasn’t entirely washed away, the ministry warned that its structure “is likely to deteriorate further over the next few days, causing additional flooding.”
[…] Authorities, meanwhiule, are holding water in upstream reservoirs to compensate in part for the loss of the dam, he said.
Wheat and corn prices spiked Tuesday as the dam collapse raised fears about the fragility of Ukraine’s ability to ship its crucial grain supplies to developing nations where people are struggling with hunger and high food prices. Prices stabilized Wednesday after markets had reacted to signals of an escalation in the war that could upend a shaky agreement allowing Ukraine to export wheat, corn, sunflower oil and other food to the world through the Black Sea
Both sides warned of environmental disaster from polluted waters, partly caused by oil leaking from the dam’s machinery.
Ukrainian and Russian officials, as well as the U.N., have said it will take days to assess the damage, warning of a long recovery period.
birgerjohanssonsays
Fire By Night: A failed Christian attempt to copy SNL aka a mediocre humor show copied by the humorless.
This episode is about scaaaary music.
God Awful Movies.
GAM407 Fire by nite episode 7 https://youtu.be/vdcsWRZGO0s
Federal law enforcement has had plenty of critics over the years, but Donald Trump’s vigorous and enthusiastic public smear campaign has no modern parallels.
In recent months, the former president has equated the FBI with “the Gestapo.” He’s told the public that the bureau is led by “Marxist Thugs.” He’s condemned the FBI as “corrupt” and “crooked.” He’s described FBI officials as “mobsters” and a “real threat to democracy.” He’s slammed the FBI as the “Fake Bureau of Investigation,” before accusing the bureau of secretly paying people to “steal” the 2020 election from him, as part of the FBI’s plot to “rig” the election and “illegally change” the results. [JFC]
As recently as two months ago, Trump even endorsed congressional Republicans defunding federal law enforcement.
Yesterday, however, the Republican broke new rhetorical ground: By way of his social media platform, Trump condemned “fascists” in federal law enforcement:
“The Marxists and Fascists in the DOJ & FBI are going after me at a level and speed never seen before in our Country, and I did nothing wrong. Joe Biden kept (keeps) thousand of documents, in many locations, some illegally taken from skiffs while he was a Senator, a big portion of which were classified. He didn’t want to give them back, and still doesn’t.” [trumpian bullshit]
About 10 minutes later, the former president repeated the line, insisting that Democrats “are using the DOJ & FBI against me to Rigg the 2024 Election. … Nothing about these Fascists is fair or honest.”
Right off the bat, I’d be remiss if I neglected to highlight some of his more amusing typos. Trump not only misspelled “rig” — a relatively easy word to spell — he also accused Biden of taking documents “from skiffs.” [LOL]
A skiff, of course, is a small, flat-bottomed rowboat. A “SCIF,” on the other hand, is a sensitive compartmented information facility, where officials routinely receive classified information and review sensitive documents. [LOL]
I should also take a moment to note that Trump’s specific allegations against Biden appear to have been made up out of whole cloth. [Yep]
But of particular interest was seeing the former president twice argue that there are “fascists” in the FBI and the Justice Department.
I’m reminded of a story from 2009.
In the first year of Barack Obama’s presidency, his opponents on the right found that incessant references to “socialism” weren’t making much of an impact. As regular readers might recall, GOP operatives started using “fascism” instead.
There was nothing about the Democratic White House’s agenda that resembled fascism in any way, but Republicans thought it sounded harsh and negative, so they gave it a try.
Saul Anuzis, a former chairman of the Michigan Republican Party who tried to become national party chairman, told The New York Times in April 2009, “We’ve so overused the word ‘socialism’ that it no longer has the negative connotation it had 20 years ago, or even 10 years ago. Fascism — everybody still thinks that’s a bad thing.”
Whether it made sense or not was irrelevant. What mattered was that talk of “socialism” had become tiresome, leading lazy voices on the right to look for the next rung on the rhetorical ladder.
Fourteen years later, does Trump genuinely believe that federal law enforcement has been infiltrated by fascists? Probably not. Does the former president even know what fascism is? Again, probably not.
But he’s apparently run out of insults, and he’s loath to repeat himself, fearing that the same old lines grow stale with repetition. And so, here we are, watching Trump raise the specter of “fascists” in the FBI — because “everybody still thinks that’s a bad thing.”
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, a top Trump ally, is calling on the Justice Department to provide lawmakers with internal documents laying out the scope of special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into the former president’s handling of classified documents found last year at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.
Commentary:
[…] In a letter first reported by NBC News, Jordan told Garland that his committee wants “an unredacted copy of the memorandum outlining the scope of Mr. Smith’s probes regarding President Trump and any supporting documentation related to his appointment as special counsel.”
The due date, evidently, is June 20.
This comes roughly a week after Jordan wrote a different letter to Garland, complaining of an “institutional rot that pervades the FBI,” and seeking detailed information on the specific FBI personnel involved in the investigation into Trump’s classified documents scandal.
So, a few things.
First, I’m all for robust congressional oversight of the executive branch, but Jordan’s hysteria is plainly indefensible. There’s simply no way federal prosecutors — before a possible indictment is filed — will open its files in an ongoing investigation to a criminal suspect’s sycophantic ally. The very idea is absurd to the point of comedy.
Second, if recent history is any guide, the Judiciary Committee chairman will respond to inevitable Justice Department resistance as evidence of law enforcement having “something to hide.” That will be ridiculous, but he’s made similar comments before.
And finally, no one should be surprised if Jordan, desperate to use his gavel to assist Trump, takes these antics in some radical directions. Will he issue subpoenas? Should we expect contempt proceedings? Will impeachment talk soon follow?
The possibilities might seem outlandish, but so too are the antics Jordan is already engaged in.
The White House put out a memo Tuesday evening warning that Republicans are once again coming after Social Security and Medicare, despite members loud pledges not to during President Biden’s State Of The Union speech this year.
In a memo to the media, White House deputy press secretary and senior communications adviser Andrew Bates responded to House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s (R-CA) announcement last week that after the debt ceiling bill cleared the House, he’d set up a “commission” to further examine the deficit and other potential cuts his party might push. He specifically cited Medicare and Social Security as programs to be examined.
[…] In the memo, Bates goes on to sound the alarm, pointing to recent reporting from the Wall Street Journal that confirmed that McCarthy does, in fact, intend to “organize a bipartisan commission to look at the entirety of government spending, including mandatory spending programs like Medicaid and Social Security.”
More from Bates:
These new statements from the Speaker demonstrate that the House GOP are reversing the promise they made to President Biden and the country in the State of the Union, and that to shield billionaires and multinational corporations from paying a cent more in taxes, they very much intend to slash Americans’ Medicare and Social Security benefits.
The American people – including majorities of conservatives – reject that approach, and support President Biden’s work to stand up for the benefits they pay their entire lives to earn.
While Bates seized on the State Of The Union episode — when President Biden was able to back Republicans into a corner and commit to opposing cuts to Social Security and Medicare, all on live television — McCarthy’s about-face last week is reflective of Republicans’ years-long split personality on the issue, supporting the popular programs publicly only to later advocate for gutting them under the guise of “reform.”
[…] far-right members have at least thus far backed off of threatening to put forward a motion-to-vacate, they’re finding other ways to punish McCarthy for not holding the national economy hostage for long enough.
On Tuesday evening, 11 right-wing members mucked up McCarthy’s lib-owning gambit when they joined Democrats and successfully blocked two Republican leadership-lauded bills that would protect gas stoves from the Biden deep state.
Videos published online showed large numbers of dead fish in the Kakhovka reservoir after the destruction of a dam in southern Ukraine.
…
Videos showed dead fish lining the banks of the reservoir, one of the largest in Europe.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Wednesday he was “shocked” at what he said was the failure of the United Nations and the Red Cross to provide help after the destruction of the massive Kakhovka dam.
Although the catastrophe happened many hours ago, “they aren’t here”, Zelenskiy told German newspapers Bild and Die Welt and also Politico. “We have had no response. I am shocked”.
He also said Russian soldiers were shooting from a distance while rescue attempts were in progress. “As soon as our helpers try to save them, they are shot at,” he was quoted as saying.
Over 200 “out of control” fires are currently burning across Canada as experts warn that air quality will continue to deteriorate….
My colleague Adam Gabbatt has the full report on how smoke from Canada’s wildfires is having an impact on air quality in the US.
He writes:
Tens of millions of people in the US were under air quality alerts on Wednesday, as smoke from Canadian wildfires drifted south, turning the sky in some of the country’s biggest cities a murky brown and saturating the air with harmful pollution.
States across the east, including New York, Massachusetts and Connecticut, issued air quality alerts, with officials recommending that people limit outdoor activity.
In New York City, where conditions were expected to deteriorate further through the day, residents were urged to limit their time outdoors, as public schools canceled outdoor activities.
Smoke from wildfires in Canada has been moving south into the US since May. Hundreds of fires are burning in Canada, from the western provinces to Nova Scotia and Quebec in the east, where there are more than 150 active fires in a particularly fierce start to the summer season.
It’s quite strange – hazy and pinkish and the winds feel unusual. Everything’s slightly…off.
With New York City being ranked briefly this morning as the city with the world’s worst air pollution, mayor Eric Adams warned that climate change has accelerated the conditions surrounding the smokey haze that has shrouded the city.
“While this may be the first time we’ve experienced something like this on this magnitude…it is not the last. Climate change accelerated these conditions.”
Adams went on to urge for more action towards addressing climate change issues…
…
Vermont senator Bernie Sanders and echoed similar sentiments towards climate change on Wednesday, tweeting:
“Right now, 98 MILLION people on the East Coast are under air quality alerts from Canadian fires and, last night, NYC had the worst air quality in the world. Climate change makes wildfires more frequent and widespread. If we do nothing, this is our new reality. It’s time to act.”
Meanwhile, during a press briefing this afternoon, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said that “climate change [is] a top priority” as tens of millions of Americans remain under air quality alerts.
I was just reading this article in Roll Call and it contained this passage. It’s not at all surprising but still worth stepping back and absorbing for its sheer magnitude.
In letters, statements and media comments over the past days and weeks, Republicans in both chambers previewed their criticism of a possible indictment that some legal experts say could come as soon as this week from grand jury probes supervised by Special Counsel John L. “Jack” Smith.
Congressional Republicans have cast Attorney General Merrick B. Garland as biased, threatened to strip funding from the FBI, questioned the role of the FBI in that special counsel probe and moved to impeach FBI Director Christopher Wray.
As I said, not surprising. This is after all the world of Trump we’ve been living in for years. But as I said, it’s worth stepping back, shaking off that impact of repetition, and seeing how totalizing it is. Just a few short years after Trump came on the political scene basically the entire GOP is ready to uproot the whole federal law enforcement system, even impeaching Trump’s own FBI director, to discredit any and all of what they expect will be the variety of charges he’ll face. [fealty to Hair Furor, the leader of the cult.]
Needless to say this is just the federal charges — not the more mundane but still consequential indictments in New York City or the extremely serious ones that are expected in Atlanta. It’s stunning and worth remembering that it’s stunning, despite the fact that in some ways it now almost feels normal.
Special counsel Jack Smith was appointed on Nov. 18, 2022. Within the next two weeks, Smith had assembled a team of nearly two dozen federal prosecutors. Before the end of the month, Smith had empaneled two federal grand juries—one to hear testimony concerning Donald Trump’s actions in connection to the 2020 election, the second for the investigation into Trump’s handling of classified documents. Before November was out, dozens of subpoenas for testimony before those grand juries had already been delivered.
More than two years after Trump left office, it’s easy to be upset about the speed with which federal authorities have moved to hold him responsible for his numerous and apparently obvious crimes. It’s much harder to be upset with Smith, who in seven months has conducted what appears to be a wide-ranging investigation into everything from Trump’s schemes to replace the attorney general with someone more coup-friendly, to claims that security video at Mar-a-Lago was lost because someone drained the swimming pool.
One of Smith’s two grand juries, the one hearing the classified documents case, went into a reported hiatus earlier this month after hearing testimony from dozens, if not hundreds, of witnesses, ranging from former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows to 20 members of Trump’s Secret Service security detail. [20 members of the Secret Service!] Many observers regarded this as a sign that Smith was preparing to either issue indictments or make a statement that the investigation had not led to findings that could be charged. And considering the wealth of public evidence about how Trump hid documents, stonewalled investigators, and bragged about showing off classified information, the odds of indictment seemed very high.
But now something has happened that no one was predicting: Smith has created grand jury number three.
On Saturday, NBC News first reported that a new grand jury had been empaneled in Florida. While that report made the action seem like a continuation of the testimony before the Washington, D.C., jury hearing evidence on the classified document case, it raised the central concern about this new development.
It’s unclear how the testimony expected in Florida will affect the grand jury that has been investigating in Washington or whether prosecutors are prepared to seek an indictment in either jurisdiction.
It now appears this grand jury has been hearing testimony for at least a month. However, it has heard from many fewer witnesses, and apparently none of the high-profile names that attended the court in Washington.
Looking at the possibilities raised by Smith’s creation of this third jury, The New York Times projects three possible meanings:
– The Florida jury is hearing additional evidence from local witnesses rather than requiring those witnesses to fly to Washington, D.C. The Times appears to consider this a low-probability option, but it might make sense if there were something Smith needed from workers at Mar-a-Lago or at some other location in the state.
– Trump, along with possibly some high-ranking members of his staff, might be indicted in Washington, D.C., while others—such as staff members involved in moving classified documents from a storage room where they had been kept in an arrangement with the FBI—might be indicted in Florida.
– Smith has decided to move his entire case to Florida after determining that there was some undetermined issue with the Washington, D.C. venue, a move that might argue against an indictment of Trump since it appears to dump months of testimony from Meadows, those Secret Service agents, and hundreds of others who are unlikely to be called again before the Florida jury.
[…] While every article is quick to remind readers that Smith and his prosecutors have far more information than what has leaked to the public, it’s genuinely difficult to see how Trump could not be charged at this point. The two instructions given to Smith by Attorney General Merrick Garland were that he look at whether Trump wrongfully retained classified documents after he left the White House, and whether he obstructed lawful efforts to retrieve those documents.
The answer to both these questions is a resounding “yes.” Even from the relatively small amount of information available to the public, it’s clear that Trump took documents he knew to be highly classified, that he lied to both the National Archives and FBI about holding these documents, that he bragged about showing classified documents to others, that he violated agreements to hand over documents, and that he made repeated false claims about having declassified documents. It seems impossible that Smith’s team would have any additional knowledge that somehow makes all this less than indictable.
Some clue about what’s going on may be gleaned from looking at who is appearing before the Florida jury. CNN reports that one of those called to testify is former Trump spokesperson Taylor Budowich.
In addition to having previously held a position as Trump’s communications director, Budowich is the founder and operator of a political action committee called “MAGA Inc.” That PAC, formed just weeks before the 2020 election, stepped in at the last minute to reportedly “supersede Trump’s existing super PAC.” In those fading weeks of the campaign, MAGA Inc. was the recipient of some rather odd transfers of funds. That includes getting $32 million from other Trump PACs just before the election. It reported spending $12 million in the run up to the election, with most of that aimed at promoting Senate candidates supported by Trump.
Currently, it seems that the Florida jury may have heard from no more than two other witnesses, and the appearance of Budowich brings in another possibility that doesn’t seem to be among the options so far mentioned. The Florida grand jury might not be about the classified documents at all, but about something that surfaced during Trump’s other two investigations. [Yep. Maybe so. The rot is deep. The layers of corruption are thick.]
The Florida jury might be hearing testimony on how Trump scammed his supporters, both by false claims about the election, and by false claims about the investigations. That would mean that Smith convened a third grand jury to hear testimony in what is essentially a third case, one that has connections to his other two investigations, but one that also has a different set of potential witnesses, charges, and defendants.
Back in April, The Washington Post reported Smith had issued a series of subpoenas “focused on money raised during the period between Nov. 3, 2020, and the end of Trump’s time in office on Jan. 20, 2021.” They called this the “fundraising prong” of Smith’s investigation and speculated on charges of felony fraud. However, if this investigation bore fruit, it makes absolute sense that Smith would want to separate that investigation from those into the classified documents and attempt to overturn the 2020 election.
The best explanation for Smith’s third jury may be that it’s a third case. It’s not a substitute for either of the Washington juries. Just the fact that Budowich was called shows this is something altogether different from the charges Smith was looking into in those two investigations.
Note that this idea doesn’t mesh with that of some very smart and legally savvy people like Marcy Wheeler, who connects the Florida jury and the classified documents case through Budowich being Trump’s spokesperson at the time he issued some pretty obvious lies about his actions in that case. Betting against Marcy is never a great idea on any kind of legal issue.
But unless Smith has decided that there is some sort of venue issue that requires the document case to be heard in Florida, it’s hard to see how this works. And if that’s the case, and what we’re going to get now is a redo of the testimony heard over the last seven months, it’s hard to see starting with Budowich.
If Smith would only get on with indicting Trump, maybe we can learn something. He can start with case number one, or case number two, or case number three. But he needs to get out the cuffs. Soon.
This article goes through all the arguments that might persuade one that the Russians detonated the Nova Kakhovka Dam. Photos and maps available at the link.
The wildfire season has started, perhaps the worst time of the year for those of us who enjoy fresh air and breathing. More than 400 fires have raged across Canada in the past month — half of them burning out of control, forcing the evacuation of more than 29,000 people from communities across Alberta. Officials described this as an “unprecedented situation” for the region.
The impact has been significant and extends well beyond our northern neighbor. Poor air quality has been reported in states as far away as Missouri, Minnesota, and New York. As the saying goes, where there’s smoke, there’s fire, and the bigger the fire, the more smoke it produces. This spring’s Canadian wildfires were especially big and hot, causing the smoke to travel farther up into the atmosphere. The higher the smoke rises, the farther it spreads. In this case, the winds in the atmosphere’s upper levels are spreading the smoke thousands of miles away.
There were also extensive forest fires last week in Quebec and Ontario. As a result, the air quality in Toronto has become so polluted that officials warn residents against strenuous outdoor activities, unless they enjoy hacking up a lung. Smoke density is expected to only worsen by Thursday morning.
Outbreaks as widespread as this in May and June are “virtually unheard of,”until now. This was sunrise over New York City Tuesday: [tweets and videos at the link]
Wonkette: “Climate Change-Fueled Wildfires Draping Nation In Cloud Of Death”
Well, now we know what it looks like when Tucker Carlson doesn’t have a budget or a name for his show or writers or talent or a bath or a purpose. It was “Tucker on Twitter,” which suddenly happened last night seemingly because Tucker hadn’t given Vladimir Putin a rimjob in a minute and we guess he was missing it.
Welcome to SNOOOOOOOOOOZE TUCKER WITHOUT MAKEUP, a 10-minute Twitter show that came out of nowhere at 6 p.m. last night without warning or fanfare, because we guess he just needed to say some Russian propaganda about how Ukraine probably blew up the Nova Kakhova dam. [JFC]
[video at the link]
“Hey, it’s Tucker Carlson!” he shouted at the beginning, like a person doing an impression of “glad to be alive.”
RUSSIAN PROPAGANDA RUSSIAN PROPAGANDA RUSSIA PROPAGANDA! Vladimir Putin would never blow up dam! Vladimir Putin love dam! Dam make water for Crimea! Vladimir Putin love Crimea!
That’s the first minute.
He continued to babble about how wonderful Putin was, and how evil it was of the American media to accuse Putin of attacking himself. He was so mad nobody would blame Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Why does everybody love Zelenskyy!
“Sweaty and rat-like, a comedian–turned-oligarch, a persecutor of Christians, a friend of Blackrock.” Yes, that is how Tucker talked about the Jewish Zelenskyy. (Another one of his old hits from back in earlier times of prosperity and employment.) “Our shifty, dead-eyed Ukrainian friend in the tracksuit.” So Tucker still has an exposed nerve about the guy […] “He’s literally a living saint, a man in whom there is no sin! That’s why Lindsey Graham is so attracted to him!”
OK, Tucker. LOL.
Remember how the Russians were mad because of that edited clip where Lindsey Graham said “the Russians are dying”? Tucker is mad about that too.
Tucker is mad at Nikki Haley for supporting Ukraine. Tucker says Nikki Haley’s types of arguments are “tautologies” and “hilariously stupid” and “only dumb people talk like that.”
Tucker is mad because “your average yak herder in Tajikistan knows who blew up the Nord Stream pipeline,” but Americans don’t. (Yeah he was probably right about the pipeline actually, we guess it had to happen at least once.) “Does he think some skinny dude in a dress is actually a girl?” (Still talking about the yak herder.) “That idea would never OCCUR to him.” To recap: Americans are dumber than yak herders because they don’t know who blew up pipeline and also believe that trans people exist. Matt Walsh should ask that yak herder: What is a woman?
Tucker wants to know where our Ukraine aid money has gone. (Ukraine.) Who organized the Black Lives Matter protests, which he called “riots,” because obviously? “What exactly happened on 9/11? Well it’s still classified!” Jeffrey Epstein! JFK! Aliens!
So basically at this point he’s Alex Jones but without the showmanship or the bedside manner.
Not sure how this is going to survive in a world where any old incel Nazi can make an iPhone TikTok […] from their mom’s basement on their phone and upload it for free.
Guess Tucker will just have to find out. By himself. In his shed.
The EPA recommends using a “particulate respirator” tested and approved by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health when trying to protect yourself from wildfire smoke or ash. It should have the words “NIOSH” and either “N95” or “P100” printed on it. It should also have two straps to go above and below your ears — otherwise it will not seal well enough to protect your lungs.
A good fit is important, the agency says, which may not be possible with facial hair. Respirator masks are also not available in children’s sizes, according to the EPA.
The agency adds that respirator masks may make it harder to breathe, and those with heart or lung problems should speak to their doctor.
Replace your mask if it becomes more difficult to breathe through or is visibly dirty.
Keep in mind, though, that N95s and similar respirators “only protect against particles,” according to the CDC. “They do not protect against chemicals, gases, or vapors, and are intended only for low hazard levels,” it notes. That’s why on poorer air-quality days, some experts say the best thing to do is stay inside. […]
The people living along Ukraine’s lower Dnipro River must contend with the immediate consequences of the collapse of the Nova Kakhovka dam and flee for safety with whatever they can salvage, but the wider impact could make itself felt for generations.
Downstream, the flood waters will subside somewhat as the surge reaches the Black Sea, but many of the villages and towns along the course of the Dnipro may not be habitable again unless and until a new dam is built. Thousands of homes and livelihoods have been swept away, along with countless domesticated and wild animals.
The ecological trauma of such an inundation of water and silt has changed the landscape in an instant, wiping away islands and wetlands. It could take years if not decades for the fauna and flora to bounce back. Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, called it the “largest man-made environmental disaster in Europe in decades”. It is the country’s misfortune to have also been the site of the Chornobyl disaster in 1986, arguably the last calamity on such a scale.
With a reservoir of 18bn cubic metres, Nova Kakhovka was one the dams with the largest capacity in the world, according to Mohammad Heidarzadeh, a senior lecturer in the architecture and civil engineering department at the UK’s University of Bath. It was 90 times bigger than the largest dam reservoir in Britain, the Kielder dam in Northumberland.
Heidarzadeh said:
It is obvious that the failure of this dam will definitely have extensive long-term ecological and environmental negative consequences not only for Ukraine but for neighbouring countries and regions.
Along with all the debris carried along by the rushing waters are tens of thousands of mines. The flood waters are rolling through a frontline in the war. The banks of the Dnipro have been frontlines since at least November, when Ukrainian forces drove the Russians across the river to the southern bank. Both sides laid mines along the waterfront and they have now been washed away and will be distributed randomly in towns, villages and farmland downstream. A flood means civilians can be blown up many kilometres from a conflict zone, many years after the war.
In other news, here is Andy Borowitz’s satirical response to Mike Pence:
WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—Just days after announcing his candidacy for President, Mike Pence has picked up the coveted endorsement of the National Association of Ass-Kissers.
The N.A.A., a trade organization representing more than a hundred thousand of the nation’s leading toadies, minions, and lickspittles, heaped praise on the former Vice-President, calling him an “awe-inspiring tower of unctuousness.”
“During his four years as Vice-President, Mike Pence brought flattery and obsequiousness to new heights,” the N.A.A. statement read. “We bow down to his utter magnificence.”
Accepting the endorsement, a jubilant Pence praised the organization of abject flunkies, calling the N.A.A. “without question the finest collection of humans this planet has ever known.”
But the endorsement drew a sour response from Chris Christie, who had hoped to receive the ass-kissers’ nod. “I thought I sucked up to Donald Trump as much as anybody did,” Christie said. “Maybe I should have sucked harder.”
NEW: Prosecutors are ready to ask for grand jurors to vote on a Trump indictment as early as tomorrow, on charges of obstruction of justice and Espionage Act violations.
MORE: It is understood that Mr Trump’s last White House chief of staff, @MarkMeadows, has agreed to plead guilty to several lesser federal crimes in exchange for his testimony under a limited grant of immunity.
Former US vice-president Mike Pence opened his bid for the Republican nomination for president with a firm denunciation of former president Donald Trump, accusing his two-time running mate of abandoning conservative principles and being guilty of dereliction of duty on January 6, 2021.Mr Pence became the first vice-president in modern history to challenge the president under whom he served.
He said Mr Trump had disqualified himself when he insisted that Mr Pence had the power to keep him in office — even though he did not. Mr Trump, he said, “endangered my family and everyone at the Capitol” on January 6. “But the American people deserve to know that on that day, president Trump also demanded I choose between him and our constitution. Now voters will be faced with the same choice,” he said.
…(Snip)…A CNN poll conducted last month found 45 per cent of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents said they would not support Mr Pence under any circumstance. Only 16 per cent said the same about Mr Trump.
StevoR @163, when asked if he would vote for whomever the Republican nominee is in 2024, Mike Pence said “Yes.” So, no matter what he says now or during his campaign, Pence will still vote for Trump is Trump if the Republican nominee.
UPDATE: Wednesday, Jun 7, 2023 · 2:22:52 PM MDT · kos
Great thread on the developing counteroffensive heading in the Mariupol direction: [Tweet and map at the link] As everything, consider the info speculative and unconfirmed until we received official word or geolocated video.
UPDATE: Wednesday, Jun 7, 2023 · 2:19:32 PM MDT · kos
Russians are so bad at propaganda. [Tweet and video at the link, showing Vladimir Saldo, as already mentioned in comments 90 and 134] He says in the video that all is fine, “people are calm moving on the streets, I just drove on the streets” of Nova Kakhovka, and does it all Baghdad Bob-style, with clear evidence to the contrary behind him.
————————
It’s the worst whodunit ever, with people feigning ignorance as to who was responsible for the Kakhovka Dam disaster that has flooded much of Kherson oblast, destroyed thousands of homes, and killed who knows how many people, including desperate residents standing on the roofs of their flooded homes on the Russian-occupied side of the Dnipro, calling friends and family and saying their last goodbyes.
No one expects the Russians to give a damn enough to try and rescue them.
Yet the destruction of the dam, while somewhat advantageous to Russia in the short term, also creates the conditions for Russia’s eventual defeat.
Here are the whodunit scenarios:
RUSSIA BLOWS UP THE DAM ON PURPOSE
It’s quite the coincidence that the dam would break the exact same day Ukraine launched its counteroffensive, huh? Militarily, there was a very outside chance that Ukraine could launch an attack across the Dnipro. Not would launch, but could launch. And given Russia’s thinned-out defenses across a thousands-kilometer-long front, widening that river would essentially eliminate the potential threat, securing Russia’s western flank at Melitopol.
RUSSIA’S INCOMPETENCE CAUSES THE DAM TO BREAK
The Kakhovka reservoir was at extremely high levels before the collapse. [tweet and record of water levels at the link] Satellite images didn’t just show water overlapping the dam’s walls, but actual damage that predated the collapse. [Tweet and images at the link]
Responsible managers would have cracked open the gates to release water, and thus relieve pressure on the dam itself. We know Russia knew how to do this, because you can see in the chart above: They dropped reservoir levels to dangerous lows in February in order to fill Crimea’s network of reservoirs. In the process, that endangered the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, as it needs the water to cool its spent fuel rods.
UKRAINE BLOWS THE DAM UP ON PURPOSE
Yeah, this is not a scenario, as there is almost zero benefit to Ukraine. Sure, some Russian defenses on the left bank of the Dnipro were washed out, but … so what? Ukraine wasn’t going to be hitting those defenses anyway. And the economic and ecological costs are beyond severe.
So which scenario is it? Pretty much everyone assumes Russia did it. Russian warbloggers on Telegram were celebrating the destruction. Russian propagandists were smirking about it on TV.
The big question is: Did Russia do it on purpose? I don’t believe they did. There is one major reason why: Crimea is now in trouble.
Prior to the war (the original start date, 2014), the North Crimean Canal provided 85% of Crimea’s water. After Russia’s invasion of the peninsula, Ukraine dammed the canal, forcing Russia to truck water in over the Kerch bridge, attempt expensive desalination, and unsuccessfully try to drill for groundwater. Russia even sued Ukraine at the European Court of Human Rights, where the effort went nowhere (there wasn’t any international conflict since the vast majority of countries still recognized Crimea as Ukraine).
During the early days of the February 2022 invasion, Russia prioritized restoring that water supply. Doing so is among Russia’s very short list of successes.
The problem is, the North Crimean Canal uses gravity to move the water from the canal’s mouth at Tavriisk to Dzhankoi around 200 kilometers away, where pumps there help keep things moving. [Tweet and map at the link]
The need for gravity means that the canal’s water intake isn’t being pumped from the bottom of the reservoir, but skimmed off the top. The disappearance of the Kakhovka reservoir is the end of the canal.
Russian state media agency TASS reported on a local government and its “What me, worry?” statement.
There is no threat of the North Crimean Canal which delivers water to Crimea from the Kherson Region draining after the collapse of the dam at the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant (HPP), the local municipal administration [of Genichesk] said on its Telegram channel on Tuesday.
“There is no threat of the North Crimean Canal losing water (Crimea residents got worried),” its statement said, adding that the flooded residential areas have no power or water while local residents left on their own. It is specified that water will recede in a couple of days.
This isn’t exactly wrong. The canal traditionally worked seasonally, with water flowing from March to December. This allowed all of Crimea’s reservoirs to fill, with the canal itself holding extra water. Given that everything was topped off in February, Crimea is certainly okay for the time being.
Yet the Kremlin knows the deal. “A gaping hole punched in Ukraine’s Nova Kakhovka dam that unleashed a wall of floodwater means that the canal which has traditionally met most of Crimea’s water needs is receiving drastically less water, the Kremlin warned on Tuesday,” reported Reuters. The Russian government noted that the peninsula’s reservoirs were at 80%, plus the water in the canal itself added considerable supply, limiting the short-term pain. But that water won’t last forever.
And therein lies Russia’s existential problem. Check out this scenario:
– North Crimean Canal out of commission: check.
– Ukraine cuts Russia’s land bridge from mainland Russia to Crimea: In progress.
– Ukraine destroys the Kerch bridge: On the to-do list.
By the end of the year, Ukraine could very well have the Crimean peninsula completely isolated. Check out the map: [map at the link]
If Mariupol is liberated, Ukraine would have complete fire control over Russian shipping in the Azov Sea, shutting down the key Russian logistical hub at Rostov-on-Don, Russia’s 15th largest port in its vast country. Remember those Harpoon anti-ship missiles Ukraine got early in the war in order to thwart an amphibious landing on Odesa? Those would suddenly come in handy once again.
Russia has three other ports further south on the Black Sea which could presumably supply Crimea, but they would need to unload at Sevastopol, putting them in range of Ukrainian F-16s and F-18s (likely coming from Australia) with Harpoon and other anti-ship missiles prowling the skies just off their coast. And those anti-ship drones Ukraine has been launching at Russian warships would feast on defenseless civilian cargo ships.
The cost to supply Crimea with the most basic of basics—water and food—would prove prohibitively high, nevermind any other necessary supplies. And if Russia can’t provide, their hold on the peninsula comes to an end and they likely have to sue for peace.
Quite simply, Ukraine may not even need to invade Crimea to liberate it. It could pull another Kherson, making it logistically impossible for Russia to hold.
Given all that, does anyone really think Russia blew the dam on purpose? We know they are f’n stupid, but they can’t possibly be that stupid, can they?
Fox News on Wednesday notified Tucker Carlson’s legal team that the former prime-time host violated his contract with the network when he launched his own Twitter show on Tuesday, Axios reported, citing a copy of a letter obtained by the news website…
The letter quoted by Axios refers to Carlson’s contract, and said its former prime time star was “prohibited from rendering services of any type whatsoever, whether ‘over the internet via streaming or similar distribution, or other digital distribution whether now known or hereafter devised.'”
A no-compete clause! Popcorn sales are going through the roof this year.
whheydtsays
Re: Reginald Selkirk @ #166…
That’s an interesting situation. One could easily argue that, if one has been fired, then one is no longer under contract and the non-compete clause is no longer in effect. In order for the non-compete clause to work, they’d have to keep paying him…
Today, Ukraine claimed the following Russian losses:
– 880 men
-13 tanks
– 17 APVs
– 37 (!) artillery pieces
– 4 MLRS
Those are insanely high numbers, and support the growing consensus that yup, the counteroffensive is on the way. Ukraine is being appropriately tight-lipped, but American administration officials are already expressing delight at Ukrainian advances.
“Administration officials were encouraged by better-than-expected progress Monday, as Ukrainian units pushed through heavily mined areas to advance between five and 10 kilometers in some areas of the long front,” wrote David Ignatius in The Washington Post. “That raised hopes that Ukrainian forces can keep thrusting toward Mariupol, Melitopol and other Russian-held places along the coast — severing the land bridge.”
Five to 10 kilometers in a couple of days is stunning progress against Russian defenses, particularly since we haven’t yet seen the emergence of Ukrainian’s new “storm brigades” kitted out with Western gear. If (and I stress, if) Ukraine is notching these kinds of gains from their probing attacks, then Russia is in even more trouble than expected.
——————–
🇷🇺 Strelkov: “As of 20.00 – fighting in the village of Opytne. The enemy broke into the village. An attempt to cut off our units in Vodyanoye” Others Mil Blogger contradict him. Location 1km north of #Donetsk city airport
Strelkov is war criminal Igor Girkin’s war alias. If he’s right that Ukraine is advancing on Optyne, well then, holy shit. [map at the link]
Opytne and neighboring Vodyane are Russian-occupied suburbs of the regional capital city of Donetsk, just south of Avdiivka, which has been under siege by Russia since 2014. The invaders made a big show of pushing hard on Avdiivka when it launched its winter offensive, but somehow its Ukrainian defenders held fast. It’s certainly one of the under-told stories of this war.
I’ve written about Donetsk being an attractive counteroffensive direction, and breaking defensive lines to the city’s west could certainly be part of any such effort. Girking specifically mentions Opytne, so why am I also pointing to Vodyane? Ukraine’s July 7 morning update lists it as a location of Russian shelling. And Russia generally doesn’t shell itself.
————————–
This is beautiful: [Tweet and video at the link: “Today is D-Day and at the American cemetery in Normandy, French caretakers will have collected sand from Omaha Beach and rubbed it into the gravestones to highlight the names of the departed.
They do this for all 9,388 soldiers who lay there. [That works remarkably well.]
The French take our country’s sacrifice for their liberation seriously.
———————
This is one kilometer away from the nearest overflowing river: [Tweet and images at the link]
I can’t vouch for this account, and I didn’t see it reported elsewhere. (Could’ve been discussed in Ukrainian-language Telegram.) Regardless, it’s getting a great deal of attention.
⚡️BREAKING: Ukrainian soldiers witnessed Russian soldiers being swept away in flood waters. Many drowned in the process according to sources.
They attempted to flee the east bank of the Dnipro River after the collapse of the Nova Khakovka dam.
Some accounts argue Russia callously threw these lives away because tipping them off would’ve tipped off Ukraine. But that doesn’t make sense. What could Ukraine have done with advance notice? Absolutely nothing.
To me, this supports the theory that the dam broke due to Russian incompetence, rather than intentional malice.
[…] Before launching, Christie advertised himself and fundraised for his bid as a brawler who would take on Trump like no other Republican in the GOP field. Frankly, that was a very low bar, given the lightweight barbs of Trump’s other rivals thus far. But Christie didn’t just clear that bar during his town hall-style event at the New Hampshire Institute of Politics: He smashed it to smithereens.
If New Hampshire marked a bitter end to Christie’s disappointing run in 2016, he delivered a raucous rebirth Tuesday, with nothing and no one off limits.
“The grift from this family is breathtaking,” Christie said, going straight at the Trump family’s shameless swindling. “Jared Kushner and Ivanka Kushner walk out of the White House and months later get $2 billion from the Saudis?”
What for? It’s a payoff, Christie suggested.
“You think it’s because he’s some kind of investing genius?” Christie posited. “Or do you think it’s because he was sitting next to the president of the United States for 4 years doing favors for the Saudis?”
Voters should be pissed off, he added.
“That’s your money,” Christie said. “That’s your money he stole, and gave it to his family.” […]
“He left with the biggest deficit of any president in American history,” Christie said, before pummeling one of Trump’s patently ridiculous 2016 campaign pledges. “He said he was going to eliminate the national debt in 8 years. He added $3 trillion to the national debt in 4 years.” […]
Some accounts argue Russia callously threw these lives away because tipping them off would’ve tipped off Ukraine. But that doesn’t make sense. What could Ukraine have done with advance notice? Absolutely nothing.
To me, this supports the theory that the dam broke due to Russian incompetence, rather than intentional malice. – Lynna, OM@168 quoting Daily Kos
I agree that particular argument doesn’t make sense. But the Kremlin narrative is that Ukraine destroyed the dam, and warning that Russia was going to do it would have made that impossible to claim rather than just highly implausible. So I think the incompetence/malice question remains open.
Steve Bannon, a onetime adviser to former President Donald Trump, has been subpoenaed by a federal grand jury in Washington in connection with special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, attacks on the U.S. Capitol, NBC News reported on Wednesday, citing sources.
The subpoena, for documents and testimony, was sent out in late May, NBC News reported, citing two sources familiar with the matter…
Tesla may face a class-action lawsuit after 240 Black factory workers in California described rampant racism and discrimination at the electric automaker’s San Francisco Bay Area plant, including frequent use of racial slurs and references to the manufacturing site as a plantation or slave ship…
An Oregon man who rigged his lost home with an “Indiana Jones”-inspired booby trap of a “round hot tub that was on its side set to roll down the hill” was found guilty of charges stemming from the 2018 incident, in which a federal agent was injured, officials said Tuesday.
A federal jury in Medford found Gregory Lee Rodvelt, 71, guilty of assaulting a federal officer and using and discharging a firearm during and in relation to a crime of violence, the U.S. attorney’s office for Oregon said in a statement.
Rodvelt had lost his home in a lawsuit, and after he “learned that a receiver had been appointed to sell that property, he proceeded to booby trap it,” federal prosecutors said…
In a Thursday ruling that virtually no one saw coming, the Supreme Court has decided not to take another sledgehammer to voting rights.
Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh joined the three Democratic-appointed Justices in a 5-4 ruling to say that Congressional maps in Alabama were racially gerrymandered and diluted the votes of Black residents. (That means Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, and Amy Coney Barrett all dissented—the four horsemen of the apocalypse.) …
“One of NASA’s key priorities is the search for life elsewhere in the universe, but so far, NASA has not found any credible evidence of extraterrestrial life and there is no evidence that UAPs are extraterrestrial,” a NASA spokesperson told the newspaper. “However, NASA is exploring the solar system and beyond to help us answer fundamental questions, including whether we are alone in the universe.” …
Tom Mesereau and Sharon Appelbaum, Danny Masterson’s previous lawyers before they were ousted from the actor’s defense team, have been sanctioned for leaking confidential discovery material to the Church of Scientology.
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Charlaine Olmedo on Wednesday found that Meseareau and Applebaum shared criminal discovery related to claims from Masterson’s accusers that they are being stalked and harassed. That discovery was shared with Vicki Podberesky, an attorney defending the church in a civil suit from the women who used the information to lodge a complaint against the lead prosecutors in the trial that they were soliciting false testimony to convict Masterson…
* Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, a longshot Republican presidential candidate, argued last night that his party “should clarify that there is no pledge to support a nominee if they are found guilty of espionage or a serious felony.” I find it extraordinary that a major American political party would have to consider such a clarification — and almost certainly won’t. […]
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said on Tuesday night at a town-hall-style event in New Hampshire. “It’s breathtaking. Jared Kushner and Ivanka Kushner walk out of the White House and months later get $2 billion from the Saudis? That’s your money he stole. … That makes us a banana republic.”
[…] To know anything about Pat Robertson is to recall his decades’ worth of hateful rhetoric toward, well, pretty much anyone who didn’t look, act and think as he did. My friend Rob Boston at Americans United for Separation of Church and State summarized the televangelist’s record in striking fashion this morning:
He repeatedly attacked non-Christian faiths, once calling Hinduism a “cult” that is “in touch with Satan and demon spirits.” In 1991, he penned The New World Order, a book anchored in antisemitic conspiracy theories. He once signed a fundraising letter asserting that feminism teaches women to “leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism, and become lesbians.” In 1991, he asserted that you don’t have to be nice to Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Methodists and others because they reflect “the spirit of the Antichrist.” In 1990, he asserted that being gay is “a pathology. It is a sickness, and it needs to be treated” and went on to assert, “Many of those people involved with Adolf Hitler were satanists, many of them were homosexuals. The two things seem to go together.”
Reading this brutal summary, it’s tempting to think someone who said and believed such things would be kept at arm’s length by major American political parties, elected officials, and candidates who sought the public’s trust.
But as Robertson exits the stage, that’s what stands out most for me about his adult life: The TV preacher’s radicalism didn’t prevent him from becoming, at least for a time, one of the most powerful and influential figures in conservative politics.
In recent years, several presidential candidates, after coming up short, have talked about taking their political infrastructure — mailing lists, donors, operatives, etc. — and creating powerhouse organizations. Only one failed candidate actually managed to pull it off in a meaningful way.
Robertson ran a competitive race for the GOP nomination in 1988, and soon after, he managed to parlay the partisan effort into a veritable empire. He created the Christian Coalition, which in the 1990s was a group that Republicans were eager to pander to — and afraid to cross. He created the American Center for Law and Justice, which has advanced the religious right’s agenda in the courts. [Evil.]
Robertson also created the Christian Broadcasting Network. He founded Regent University. He headlined “Road to Victory” conferences. He hosted “The 700 Club” television program.
Robertson, in other words, took full advantage of the available opportunities, led an ugly movement, and became a political giant who helped fundamentally alter the direction of the Republican Party for a generation while sparking culture wars that much of the country is still fighting.
The televangelist changed American politics, but not for the better.
@180: “should clarify that there is no pledge to support a nominee if they are found guilty of espionage or a serious felony.”
It will probably be more complicated than that, since at the pace things are going, it seems doubtful verdicts in any of the prominent cases will be available before the GOP convention, which is scheduled for July 15-18 2024.
birgerjohanssonsays
I just learned El Nino has started.
2024 is expected to be the warmest year ever recorded.
I didn’t realize until I started writing this Wonkette Remembrance that Pat Robertson and I share the same unused first name that John Wayne also didn’t use, although I knew about John Wayne of course. Born Marion Gordon Robertson in 1930, the one-time GOP presidential candidate, televangelist, and culture wars hatemonger died today at the age of 93. Maybe he went straight to Heaven, which is a depressing thought, or to hell for all the people he focused rightwing hate on. Or maybe his brain shut down and that was that, which strikes us as most likely, if narratively unsatisfying. So it goes.
As Moms Mabley said of her ex-husband, “I was always taught never to say anything about the dead unless it’s good. He’s dead. Good.” (Nope, not Bette Davis speaking of Joan Crawford. Everything you think you know is a lie.)
You can go elsewhere for the sober discussions of Robertson’s business and media acumen, because we think his real genius was for saying inflammatory stuff that blamed all of the world’s ills on women, gay people, abortion, and liberals in general, linking religious fervor with politics and generally enshittening America. He had a knack for making political disagreements not mere matters of policy, but of framing them as a literal spiritual battle, with Democrats inevitably on the side of Satan. He wasn’t the first to do that, but it really was his bread and butter.
[…] Robertson also had a habit of blaming disasters on whatever sinners he was thinking of at any given moment; in 2001, he explained that the 9/11 attacks were God’s retribution for
the federal courts, pornography, abortion rights and church-state separation. Talking again about 9-11 on his TV show a year later, Robertson described Islam as a violent religion that wants to “dominate” and “destroy,” prompting President George W. Bush to distance himself and say Islam is a peaceful and respectful religion.
Robertson really had it in for gay people and abortion, neither of which Jesus ever said anything about, and suggested that Hurricane Katrina in 2005 was God’s punishment for legal abortion in the USA, which is a good thing to know because I’d always thought he’d blamed gay people for that one, too. (Turns out that was John Hagee, a different nutter.)
But Robertson did warn in 1998 that Orlando, Florida, was likely to be hit by hurricanes if the city flew rainbow flags in celebration of Disney’s Gay Days promotion. And lo, hurricanes have indeed visited Orlando, but other parts of Florida too! Just to be on the safe side, Robertson also expanded that prophesy to cover the entire US and a wide range of catastrophes:
I would warn Orlando that you’re right in the way of some serious hurricanes, and I don’t think I’d be waving those flags in God’s face if I were you. … [A] condition like this will bring about the destruction of your nation. It’ll bring about terrorist bombs, it’ll bring earthquakes, tornadoes, and possibly a meteor.
Robertson also blamed the 2010 earthquake in Haiti on that nation’s “pact with the devil,” which is also what allowed Haiti’s 1791 revolt against French enslavers to succeed, because without the assistance of demons, the Black rebels couldn’t possibly have beaten white European colonialists. And indeed, Haiti has since then been beset by all sorts of tragedies and poverty, all of them the result of demonic forces, not geopolitical revenge by France and other “civilized” countries.
Oh hey, speaking of prophetic, back in 2014 Yr Wonkette predicted that someday, “Pat Robertson will shuffle off this mortal coil, and then we will have approximately 30% less things to blog about,” although at the time we didn’t foresee that Donald Trump’s “presidency” and the resulting aftershocks would more than make up for it. (At the time, Robertson was mad that gay people couldn’t be stoned to death, but instead were able to get wedding cakes.)
So much of Robertson’s deranged fantasies involved gay people, only they weren’t the fun kind of fantasies. Like that time he said that gay men in San Francisco and elsewhere deliberately spread AIDS to straight people:
“[If] they got the stuff they’ll have a ring, you shake hands, and the ring’s got a little thing where you cut your finger. […] Really. It’s that kind of vicious stuff, which would be the equivalent of murder.”
Some of his hatemongering was of the more down-to-earth, practical sort, the kind that could really destroy some families, like his advice for how to shun your gay kids at Thanksgiving so they’d stop being gay. If that isn’t an example of Christ’s love, we … oh, it isn’t, not in any conceivable sense.
Once in a rare while, Robertson would surprise us by saying non-insane things, like when he said in 2013 that transgender people are OK because sometimes “there are men who are in a woman’s body” or women in men’s bodies, and “I don’t think there’s any sin associated with that.” Or in 2015 when he acknowledged that police not only can make mistakes, but can be genuine murderers, as in the case of Derek Chauvin’s murder of George Floyd.
But then he’d go and say some casually evil shit, like telling a woman to comfort a grieving coworker whose three-year-old died by telling her that maybe the kid would have grown up to be Hitler, so God took the baby to heaven to prevent that, and the potential Hitler baby is in heaven anyway now, so cheer up. He didn’t explain why God neglected to kill the actual Baby Hitler, but hey, mysterious ways.
There was also his bizarre advice about how parents shouldn’t adopt orphans, because who even knows what kind of sticky psychological goo they might have on them.
You just never know what’s been done to a child before you get that child; what kind of sexual abuse there has been, what kind of cruelty, what kind of food deprivation, etc., etc, etc. So, you’re not a dog because you don’t want to take on that responsibility. You don’t have to take on somebody else’s problems. I mean, you really don’t.
Robertson even backslid on his seeming acceptance of trans people by 2016, proclaiming that he hadn’t changed his mind about people who were really transgender, but insisting that was really rare, and so most people claiming to be trans are just faking it so they can go into restrooms to watch people poop, a thing that literally does not happen.
In conclusion, Pat Robertson is dead, good, and we will probably get by just fine without his help in averting hurricanes, since his record there is kind of spotty.
[Today] The Supreme Court upheld a key mechanism for beneficiaries of federal spending programs to sue if states violate their rights, the conclusion of a case that spawned protests, hearings and bottomless worry from activists and experts terrified that the Court would use it to hobble programs like Medicaid.
The case grew from a garden-variety Medicaid case, where a nursing home inhabitant’s family alleged that he was ill-treated. But the municipal-run nursing home, Health and Hospital Corporation of Marion County, Indiana (HHC), sensing an opportunity, challenged the mechanism to sue writ large.
[…] This pathway to sue, known as private rights of action under Section 1983, is incredibly important for holding states accountable to make sure they provide the full services they’re required to within these spending programs. Without it, those who depend on federally-funded, state-administered programs — think Medicaid, SNAP (formerly known as food stamps) or WIC, which helps low-income pregnant women and mothers with young children buy food — are left without recourse should states stop providing the benefits they’re required to give.
The federal government doesn’t have many tools in its arsenal to force compliance, and lacks the resources to police all the various state programs for evidence of wrongdoing. These lawsuits, then, also serve as red flags to point Health and Human Services (HHS) towards the biggest offenders. […]
[…] 1) Why was Cyber Ninjas, a Florida-based company with no election recount experience, hired to conduct the audit? and 2) What was the connection between Cyber Ninjas and officials in the Trump administration?
This week The Arizona Republic published several articles based on more than 39,000 emails that Cyber Ninjas’ CEO Doug Logan tried to keep from the public for more than two years. So much of the audit itself was secret, with reputable reporters banned from the scene while One America News Network was given carte blanche. Media outlets argued that the audit was funded in part by taxpayers’ dollars, and therefore the public has a right to know how this bumbling catastrophe came about, who was involved, what the audit actually found, and who funded this mess. (As we now know, it found that Biden won Maricopa County by even more votes. What it did not find was any fraud.)
Initially thousands of communications were turned over to the media, all but the 39,000 that Logan held onto for years—until, that is, the courts said he can’t. He eventually released most of them, but not in a way most people could decipher: “Logan has released the texts in haphazard, nonsequential batches and in different formats, so threads were broken and not easily searchable.” It took data pros a long time to untangle what they called “intentional obfuscation.”
It’s not hard to see why Logan did not want the emails released. The first story yesterday made it clear that Cyber Ninjas didn’t know WTF they were doing, and any “findings” they announced were fiction, which is what most reputable audit firms said at the time.
Logan’s texts offer the first direct evidence that the Senate’s hand-picked auditor could not aggregate the results of his own “audit.” And they appear to bolster critics who long have maintained Logan “made up” numbers and lacked the ability or methodology to make any credible findings.
Another story today sheds light on Doug Logan’s role in the Stop the Steal movement before he was hired to run the Arizona audit (which explains why he was hired).
Cyber Ninjas CEO Doug Logan already was part of a coordinated effort to overturn 2020 election results in several swing states when he was tapped to lead the Arizona Senate’s partisan “audit,” records show.
Well before Logan began the Arizona audit, he was in contact with major deniers like MyPillowGuy, Lin Wood, Michael Flynn, and QAnon nutter Ron Watkins—working not only in Arizona but in Georgia and Michigan as well. Logan remains part of a criminal investigation in Michigan for breaking into voting machines. I would not be surprised to learn that he’s part of DA Fani Willis’s investigation in Georgia. [Interesting.]
The new emails also reveal that Senate President Karen Fann hired the inexperienced Cyber Ninjas because she “felt comfortable” with Logan (read: she liked his previous Stop the Steal work), even though firms with recount experience applied for the job, and even though “she cannot recall any of Logan’s references or why she selected his firm.” Sen. Fann’s star has faded fast (“everything Trump touches dies”) and she will not seek reelection. The same is true of Cyber Ninjas, which went bankrupt and folded.
Most importantly, while Sen. Fann and others maintained all along that the audit was not partisan and was not intended to help Trump, the emails show Doug Logan was in contact with Stop the Steal leaders, right-wing funders, and members of Trump’s orbit from the start. Like the fake electors scheme, the countless lawsuits, the Giuliani-Powell traveling circus, and the Jan. 6 insurrection itself, the Maricopa County audit was simply another tool in Trump’s 2020 election overthrow scheme.
I can see AG Kris Mayes’s office from my window. I’m guessing she might be interested in this outright fraud.
President Joe Biden pledged additional help for Canada as wildfires fume, especially in Quebec, causing unhealthy air quality levels throughout much of the Eastern U.S.
In a readout of a call between President Biden and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, the president “directed his team to deploy all available Federal firefighting assets that can rapidly assist in suppressing fires impacting Canadian and American communities.”
The White House said 600 firefighters and support personnel have been sent to Canada. […]
[…] I have been watching Morning Joe this morning, and they have covered the wildfires. Mika seemed to be most concerned that Laguarida had shut down. Mike Barnicle laughs at reports that people are wearing masks. Joe won’t talk about it. Lemire and Willis dance around the issue of climate change. Not one mentioned heat or drought. And here we are. The media is useless for the challenges of today.
On Twitter, the climate trolls Musk unleashed on the platform are furiously attempting to blame everything but the climate emergency.
Defenestration must be climbing the charts of the top causes of death in Russia. […]
In other news, Russia is actively campaigning to convince the International Olympic Committee to accept Defenestration as an Olympic sport. Which Russia (well, Russians competing under the IOC flag) would dominate. I’m still not sure if this would be a judged event, or a sport in which time from the ground floor to the twelfth floor, and down again, would be used to determine the winning team. The IOC is quite resistant to the inclusion of Team or Individual Defenestration competitions as it appears that only one nation in the world actually HAS defenestration teams. Additionally, it appears that, although Russia has defenestration teams, there is no evidence of competitions ever being held either at the team or individual level, nor is there any evidence of a rule book or even enforcement mechanisms if a rule, written or unwritten, is transgressed.
I have yet to see in the media the full, true story of Gov. Ron DeSantis’ war on Florida’s public honors college, New College of Florida. The narrative has been that this is a small college that DeSantis is trying to take over for his culture war and leave it at that. It is true that DeSantis is effectively destroying Florida’s universities with the help of his supporters’ openly hostile resentment of higher education. And yes, he’s making Florida toxic to not just out-of-state students, but Florida’s own students and professors who are deciding it’s best to leave the state and go somewhere less oppressive. Not to mention the medical students who are canceling their residencies in Florida due to abortion laws. But there’s so much more than that.
To begin with, no outlet has even described the unique way New College operates. It’s modeled after the New College of Oxford University in England. There are no grades: all courses are pass/fail. The student is responsible for his or her entire course planning, and there are no required courses. There’s few organized sports, and no fraternities or sororities. This school is only for the most highly motivated students who have the maturity and intellect to chart their own path and create their own approved course structure. New College has always scored at the top of national rankings, such as The Princeton Review and Forbes; and has ranked fifth in U.S. News & World Report’s annual review of public schools for higher learning. It is a very small school, with under 1,000 students, but has produced more Fulbright scholars than either Harvard or Yale.
Yet DeSantis is determined to spend millions transforming this successful Florida institution into a sham school […] He appointed unqualified extremists to the board who immediately ousted the current president. Already, they are embroiled in scandal as the new president, Richard Corcoran, former state House speaker and friend of DeSantis, is getting paid a salary of almost $700,000. His predecessor made $276,000. Corcoran is now the highest paid college president in Florida with the exception of the University of Central Florida, which is 70 times its size. Yet the real scandal is why DeSantis specifically targeted this institution. There’s a reason, and if you don’t know what happened on this campus 10 years ago, you’d never guess.
The media narrative for DeSantis’ destruction of New College is that it’s a small college with little clout famous for its left-leaning population and high percentage of LGBTQ+ students. That’s true […] Yet there are plenty of small, underfunded schools in Florida. To understand DeSantis’ promise to completely erase the “woke” of New College, you need to understand how it all ties into the rise of the resurgent white nationalist movement in Florida.
If you know anything about what is going on in this state, you know that white supremacists and literal Nazis are enjoying a resurgence here in Florida […] They feel emboldened enough to hold Nazi protests and hate rallies in front of tourist attractions, major shopping hubs, and in the center of downtown areas. […]
Jacksonville: [Tweet and images at the link, images show swastika and swastika-with-cross]
Orlando: [Tweet and images at the link: white nationalist banners]
Tampa (outside the Turning Point conference): [Tweet and images at the link: antisemitic flyers, Nazi flags, etc.]
DeSantis is part of the new crop of GOP leaders, like Doug Mastriano and Tommy Tuberville, who openly stand by white nationalism. DeSantis even told them they were saviors of the Republican Party.
[DeSantis] has reached out to QAnon supporters and insurrectionists and suggested January 6 was a setup by the FBI. He has denounced Liz Cheney for participating in the January 6 hearings but refused to denounce a gang of Nazis who showed up in Orlando and menaced local Jews. This is a clear signal of whom DeSantis sees as inside the coalition (white supremacists) and who is out (pro-democracy Republicans like Cheney).
At these rallies, the Nazis wave the swastika flags alongside DeSantis posters and “DeSantis Country” flags. […] DeSantis has steadfastly refused to denounce the neo-Nazi rallies held in his honor, even when he is repeatedly asked to do so by reporters and Jewish leaders. [Tweets and video at the link]
[…] So what does this have to do with New College? Well, as someone who has covered Florida politics for decades, I’ve seen first-hand the slow and systematic infiltration of white supremacist extremists into the state GOP. You can guess what the Republican Party here is going to do if you keep your ear to the ground on what is first happening with these hate groups. […]
White supremacist groups in Florida aren’t just growing, but becoming more visible. Their websites, which I won’t link to, moved from posts about MS-13 and immigrants to suddenly discussing conspiracies about transgender people and grooming. This was before Florida became known for book bans and attacks on teachers as grooming pedophiles.
[…] DeSantis was also, I’m certain, very well aware of the neo-Nazis’ hatred for New College. In my opinion, our local press has done a disservice for not reporting on this for whatever reason. So I’ll tell the tale.
For a school that has produced some notable alumni, one of the ones they tend not to feature is a young man by the name of Derek Black. He is the godson of David Duke and the son of Don Black, the grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. Don Black founded the first neo-Nazi online forum and world’s most prominent white nationalist website, Stormfront. In fact, Dylan Roof, the 21-year-old who murdered nine Black victims while they were praying in a South Carolina church, was radicalized by the website.
Derek grew up completely immersed in the white supremacist movement and was the heir apparent to the empire his dad built. […] He hosted a hateful radio show on his father’s network, and even created a companion website called “Kid’s Stormfront.” At 19, he ran to be a GOP committee chair and won, although to be fair, he wasn’t allowed to be seated. (Open fascism used to be more frowned upon.)
[…] His main belief was that Blacks, Hispanics, Muslims, and the LGBTQ+ community would not only outnumber Christian whites, but would then destroy “white culture” and thus the nation. You may not know Derek, but I’m willing to bet you’ve heard the term “white genocide.” Derek has been credited with popularizing that term, and it’s a concept that even Trump retweeted during his first campaign.
Derek was apparently a very good student and wanted to go to college to study medieval history. (This historical period is popular among white nationalists because they believe it proves European superiority.) He convinced his parents to let him go to New College in Florida.
[…] his dad wanted his son to be college-educated so he could give the neo-Nazi movement some academic credentials. He also stated on his radio program that Derek was persuasive enough to win over converts at his new school.
Fearing he would be kicked out of New College if they knew about his hateful beliefs, Derek tried to hide his family lineage from the other students. Unfortunately for Derek, it wasn’t long before the student body found out who he was because someone Googled his name. […] Many demanded he be expelled, which New College did not oblige. Administrative leaders made the decision to resist student calls to expel him.
However, there was a progressive Jewish organization on campus that took an interest in Derek. In a remarkable act of kindness, they invited Derek each week to their homes for dinner to share in Shabbat services. […] Derek eventually took them up on the offer.
[…] One student named Allison Gornick, who originally called for his expulsion and refused to be in the same room with him, decided to try to talk with him instead.
They had similar interests, which they bonded over, and eventually she confronted him about his ideology. […] to refute his many beliefs that minorities were inferior due to everything from IQ scores to crime.
Through the fights, they forged a strong friendship, and eventually, a romance. Gornick is Jewish.
In 2013, Derek sent a letter to the Southern Poverty Law Center that rocked the white supremacist movement to the core, and outraged the hate communities in Florida. The key phrase was this: “I do not believe advocacy against ‘oppression of whites’ exists in any form but an entrenched desire to preserve white power at the expense of others. I am sorry for the damage done by my actions and my past endorsement of white nationalism.”
[…] his complete denunciation of white supremacy was the top discussion on hate radio and hate chat sites. Instantly, his father banished him from his home. […] Derek, for his part, did not disagree that New College changed him:
Transformation can occur in many ways, but for Black, New College was a living lesson in the persuasive power of critical thinking, and the perfect petri dish for change. Small, socially aware and committed to rational thought, the school encourages students to confront and engage with each other.
“If I’d gone to the University of Florida, I don’t think it would have played out the same,” says Black. “The [UF] community would not have condemned me like that. There would have been maybe a sporadic protest, but I would have found spaces where I didn’t feel as challenged. I guess that’s the point. Engaging is the answer. There’s a thousand ways to do it, and New College did something.”
Although DeSantis claims he targeted the school specifically for their “progressive culture,” the fact is that this particular college dealt a major blow to Florida’s white supremacist movement, which makes up a core part of DeSantis’ base. [Tweet and image at the link]
Most people who live in this state haven’t even heard about New College until this year, but if you keep track of the state’s white nationalist movement, you know exactly what it is. The hatred they have for this school is unfathomable. […]
DeSantis appointed six right-wing extremists with no background in education to New College’s board on Jan. 6 […] DeSantis’ fealty to white supremacist groups has gone well beyond New College.
The governor has made numerous laws that are blatantly fascist and racist, which has led to Florida becoming a hellhole of hate. His laws against the teaching of race, sexual orientation, and gender have led to strict book bans in various school districts. Florida’s board of education has banned authors such as Kimberlé Crenshaw, Roderick Ferguson, Angela Davis, and Ta-Nehisi Coates. Book bans […] extended to books about Rosa Parks and Anne Frank.
[…] The governor’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill has terrorized students and teachers in schools across Florida […] His “Stop WOKE Act” essentially bans anything being taught that would make a white kid feel guilt, and allows a student or parent to sue.
It was purposefully written to be extremely vague so DeSantis could deny it would prevent teachers from talking about slavery, but also frighten them enough that they would self-censure.
[…] DeSantis upped the ante by literally banning AP African American studies based on the false claim that they “lack educational value.” […]
He announced his intent to defund all programs at public universities that involve any diversity, equity, and inclusion, also known as DEI, which is an open attack on marginalized communities throughout the state. […]
It turns out that terminating DEI in Florida colleges would mean losing accreditation for several programs, such as those for mental health professions that require curriculum on diversity, equity, and inclusion. Yet Republican lawmakers made things worse by replacing the term DEI with a more vague phrase on “theories that undermine institutions in the United States.” Potentially, depending on how that’s interpreted, it could jeopardize even more programs.
The attack on New College is not just another piece of fodder on DeSantis’ culture war, or another attempt to “own the libs.” It was a deliberate assault on an institution that wounded the white supremacist movement.
[…] Beyond his purging of Black history, DeSantis has waged a war on immigrants, targeted gay and transgender youth, purged voters, illegally arrested Black voters, and used state power to punish businesses that criticize him. My home state is now a controlled experiment of how many fascist politics he can get away with. Nazis here know the score, and DeSantis is counting on them to put him in power.
[…] If he isn’t stopped now, his dreams of turning our land into a Christian nationalist hellhole might come to pass.
Lynna… @ # 191, quoting “SemDem” at dailykos.com: I have yet to see in the media the full, true story of Gov. Ron DeSantis’ war on Florida’s public honors college, New College of Florida.
“SemDem” uncovered an important aspect of the NC story, but may have missed an important part of its history. Florida lore has it (I admit I haven’t found any links to substantiate this) that New College – which first began classes in 1964 – was used by the state university system as a “safety valve” to remove the most radical and rebellious students from other campuses around the state.
If so, this was not entirely successful (the University of Florida central campus in Gainesville definitely earned the nickname “Berkeley of the South” in the late ’60s/early 70s), but it may well have served that purpose to some degree. Of course, DeSantis has escalated that program by pushing hard to move both students and faculty with troublesome notions about academic freedom and social engagement out of Florida entirely, though he has not yet chartered aircraft to take them to Martha’s Vineyard or Sacramento.
On Wednesday night, Ukraine reportedly did what many had expected this week: take advantage of a waning moon and Western night-vision gear to attack Russian positions along the southern front. The results of these attacks aren’t fully known as Ukraine maintains operational silence, but it’s now clear that the counteroffensive is really, truly underway. And that includes Leopard tanks being involved in combat.
Meanwhile, Russia has continued its own attack in the west. After flooding the Kherson area by blowing up the Kakhovka Dam, Russian forces have reportedly destroyed several dams on smaller reservoirs in the area, along with preparing still more dams for destruction. The point of all this seems to be to put as much water and mud between Russian forces and a potential Ukrainian counterattack across the river as possible, while still allowing Russian artillery to fire into Kherson. That it’s leaving people stranded on rooftops across the area occupied by Russia doesn’t appear to be a concern.
Four days after Russian sources first began reporting Ukrainian attacks along a section of the southern front, those attacks seem to be getting ever larger and more significant. Rather than just small unit actions, it now seems as if at least three full brigades are engaged in the area around Velyka Novosilka pressing Russian forces back.
But that does leave one big question that is surely of high interest to Russia: Where are Ukraine’s nine other strike brigades? [map at the link]
It now seems that Ukraine has launched attacks not just in the three areas where actions had been underway up until yesterday, but also well to the west, north of Melitopol and Tokmak.Those attacks appear to have had success in moving Russian forces back in at least two locations. As with almost everything currently underway, the information available comes largely from Russian sources. Often those sources are reporting how they have valiantly repelled Ukrainian troops and defended their positions. Only the positions that Russia is defending keep showing a tendency to drift to the south. [map at the link]
On Wednesday, political history professor John Helin provided what’s probably the best overview of actions in the area south of Velyka Novosilka, where attacks have been reported since Monday.
While those actions may have started with what appeared to be probing attacks at several locations along the front, they’ve grown into a larger and more sustained push, one in which Ukrainian troops aren’t sending out small groups and then setting back, but following up gains with more forces, securing positions, and bringing artillery and other weapons forward under cover of tanks and infantry. In short, it’s looking like combined arms warfare being conducted by a force that includes both Western gear and a large number of men.
Russians claim these units are the 23rd, 31st, and 37th brigades. Only 37th can be confirmed with moderate confidence through OSINT due to the presence of AMX-10 RC’s and Mastiff MRAP’s on Russian videos.
Previous reporting on the area (including here) had focused heavily on the town of Novodonetske, where Ukrainian forces seemed to have their first successes in pushing Russian troops out of a long-occupied settlement. However, it now seems that the major thrust of the operations in the area have been along the road directly south of Velyka Novosilka. Ukraine has powered through Russian positions at a whole string of towns that lead toward the highway junction at Staromlynivka.
At its deepest penetration, Ukraine has approached the village of Urozhaine, about 10 kilometers south of Velyka Novosilka, after either securing or bypassing a cluster of other villages and towns.The area just west of the highway is split by the narrow and twisting Mokri Yaly River, but it appears that Ukrainian forces are staging attacks on both sides of this river, with the eastern advance currently running ahead of the penetration on the west where more substantial villages were located.
But while it may not look like the troops on the western bank are advancing quickly, they’ve performed an even more important task. They reportedly secured positions on high ground around Storozheve, allowing Ukraine to have fire control over the highway and Russian positions to the south.
Helin’s thread doesn’t include the activities of the past 24 hours. In that time, Ukraine seems to have united the area around Novodonetske with the push toward Staromlynivka. It may not look like much, but that’s about 60 square kilometers—an area larger than the whole city of Bakhmut—which took Russia nine months to capture. This is particularly notable because this is heavily defended and heavily mined territory, in an area Russia expected would be targeted.
At the same time, Ukraine has renewed attacks around Rivnopil and Levadne. If it looks like there are a lot of arrows on the map above, that’s because there seems to be a good number of units involved here pressing the line across about 40 kilometers of front. If those actions on Monday were Ukraine feeling out Russian positions, Ukraine apparently liked what they found. It’s likely that several of these settlements are now fully liberated by Ukraine, but so far nothing has been announced.
That’s not all. Early reports that there was activity to the west turned into what seem to be more coordinated attacks on Wednesday night, with Ukrainian forces taking ground around Robotyne, directly south of Orikhiv, and around Lobkove, to the northeast of Vasylivka. [map at the link]
The scale or the units involved in these attacks aren’t clear. However, they did come with something new: the first real footage of Leopard tanks on the front lines. [Tweet, images and video at the link]
The string of images, which is all Russian drone footage, includes a group of vehicles burning at a location south and east of the earlier pictures near Novopokrovka. One of the vehicles involved does appear to be a damaged or destroyed Leopard 2A4 tank. This time, the loss looks to be real and not just a misidentified tractor. Reports from Russian military bloggers are that the Leopard ran into mines, while the Russian MOD insists it was hit by artillery fire.The outcome of the battle in which the Leopards were involved is unknown.
Things are just that foggy at the moment. Most information is coming either from Russians who are panicking, Russians who are trying to curry favor with leadership, or Russians who are trying to curry favor while panicking. None of the above are great sources for accurate information.
However, that lost Leopard certainly seems to be part of a large collection of hardware in the area, one that certainly suggests where a good portion of those remaining Western-trained brigades may be. [Tweet and image at the link]
This area is right above Melitopol and the crucial railway and highway junction town of Tokmak. It’s the area where most reports have suggested Ukraine might concentrate its efforts for months. It’s also the area where Russia had dedicated itself to ring after ring of defensive structures designed to slow any assault.
It’s essentially the hardest of hard points anywhere on the front, but also one of the most valuable targets. Ukraine is hitting it. On Thursday, there is reportedly another push underway in the area of Nesterianka.
Along the southern front, Ukraine’s counteroffensive is now active across 150 kilometers of positions. That won’t be all. It may not even be the only front. So far Ukraine had made gains in some areas, but the loss of the Leopard tank shows that Western hardware is far from invulnerable on the battlefield, especially in areas with prepared positions, minefields, surveillance drones, and overlapping zones of artillery fire.
With Kharkiv, Ukraine was able to dash. In Zaporizhzhia, it may be a grind. And Ukraine hasn’t even hit the first series of defensive lines. But in any case, it’s not just Ukrainian equipment that’s burning.
KHERSON
While Ukrainian troops on the west bank have been working steadily to rescue people and animals from the floodwaters resulting from Russia’s destruction of the Kakhovka Dam, the east bank is offering up nothing but horror stories. Civilians are finding themselves trapped on rooftops, without assistance, as Russia attempts to pretend all is normal.
For many of those in heavily flooded low-lying towns east of the Dnipro River, the situation is dire. But at least a few have been getting a little help from Ukrainian drone pilots. [Tweet and video at the link]
Even in the liberated areas on the west bank, rescue efforts are having to deal with an element that should never be a part of such situations. In the midst of the flooding, Russia is shelling locations where rescue operations are underway. [Tweet and video at the link]
To make things even worse, Human Rights in Ukraine reports that Russians are destroying dams at smaller reservoirs, and erecting barriers not to protect homes but, “to ensure that the water overflows and floods roads and fields.” The goal is apparently to create a huge area of watery bog, protecting Russia’s western flank from a potential cross-river counterattack. Russia feels that it can do this, while still maintaining positions from which it can shell Kherson city and other locations to the west. [Tweet and video at the link: “Russian artillery nearly killed the Chief Rabbi of Ukraine, Moshe Azman, as he was trying to evacuate people from the flooded Kherson region today. Israel has previously stated that it is ready to send radar systems to Ukraine. It would be good if they sent heavy weapons too”]
The immediate result, in addition to causing misery and threatening the lives of people trapped by the rising waters, is destruction of a large area of Ukraine’s industrial base as well as millions of hectares of highly productive farmland (the whole region depended on the Kakhovka reservoir for irrigation water). Thousands of Ukrainians have been directly endangered, and tens of thousands more made homeless by Russia’s actions. This is something that won’t easily be resolved, even if a new dam is constructed.
BAKHMUT
Ukrainian forces continue to make gains both north and south of Bakhmut, but the city itself isn’t being left out of the action. [Tweet and video at the link]
[…] Pat Robertson was the man who recognized television evangelism as a path to wealth and to political power both, and for half a century, Robertson was known to the world not as a vehicle of bottomless faith, but as a political voice, making political declarations while signing God’s name to the bottom of them. He used his tele-religious empire to become a very rich man with a private jet, and died with enough money in the bank to count as a mortal sin (greed) no matter how you might look at it.
[…] He showed the way for an entire generation of ambitious and sketchy godbotherers who also bought mansions and private jets and tied salvation and cash together as a package deal.
[…] In his eyes, God was always prowling somewhere on the planet, an impossibly fickle and mostly-lazy deity looking for a person or town or country to smite the holy bejeezus out of, every now and then, because He caught a glance of a newspaper and learned that lesbians had too many rights these days. Robertson popularized the now-omnipresent televangelist notion of God being a minor mob boss, with Jesus his enforcer and the preacher his collection man, and that for a small amount of money fished out of your purse you might get the don to recognize your face at least well enough to spare you when the next hurricane loomed offshore.
[…] God’s enemies were conservatism’s enemies were Republicanism’s enemies, and that was all there was to it. So when a disaster struck, there was never talk that it was because God was angry at the greed of those who had cut poverty programs to give private jet owners slightly better tax treatment. God never smote those who pressed for less aid to poor children, or towns that treated immigrants with contempt. And when hurricanes hit places where hurricanes usually hit, it was never because God had gotten good and tired of a state’s racist gerrymanderings or gun policies. […]
Time passes quickly. My twin granddaughters are graduating from high school child car seats with seat belts to booster seats with seat belts. They are both over 40 pounds and over 40 inches tall (I discovered that different car seats have different minimum height requirements (who knew?)). When Wife and I were children, our parents used portable cribs/playpens in their cars (not sure with Wife’s family, but ours was a blue ’63 VW Microbus (and I, at the age of one, fell out of the back onto the driveway)).. Our kids went straight from rear facing buckets to booster seats. The world has changed. In some ways, for the better.
Oggie: Mathomsays
Addendum to my #190, re Defenestration Teams:
I read that paragraph to Wife. Wife, without missing a beat, said, “And they’ll still be doping the athletes.”
The Supreme Court knocked down Alabama’s racially gerrymandered congressional map in a 5-4 decision Thursday, preserving a key section of the Voting Rights Act.
On top of this Court’s habitual hostility towards voting rights, the decision was all the more surprising given that a majority of justices had let the map stand and be used for the 2022 midterms, despite a lower court finding that the map likely diluted the Black vote in violation of the VRA.
The ruling fueled speculation about what the decision might mean for pending cases that will decide maps for 2024: One major prognosticator, the Cook Political Report, immediately shifted five seats in Democrats’ direction. It also prompted bitter reflection on what the Court’s opinion could have meant for the 2022 midterms, had the questions in the case been resolved sooner. [Yep]
In 2022, the Court had put the lower court’s order that Alabama redraw the map for the election on pause, and did so through the shadow docket, without explaining its reasoning. While the shadow docket was once reserved for matters that require unusually quick Court action, the conservative-dominated bench has grown increasingly comfortable using it to quietly overturn precedent and hand down momentous decisions.
Both Chief Justice John Roberts and Elena Kagan wrote in dissent at the time.
“The District Court’s analysis should therefore control the upcoming election,” Roberts wrote. “The practical effect of this approach would be that the 2022 election would take place in accord with the judgment of the District Court, but subsequent elections would be governed by this Court’s decision on review.”
Justice Brett Kavanaugh, part of the majority, snapped back that the stay was not a ruling on the merits, and merely to preserve order before the election (order that he himself found in Thursday’s ruling to have massively disenfranchised Black voters).
By issuing that unnecessary stay rather than letting the lower court’s order that Alabama redraw its maps proceed, the Supreme Court effectively axed a seat in the House of Representatives that almost certainly would have gone to the Democrats.
And the effect of their silent ruling likely touched other states — and other seats — as well.
“Similar litigation in Georgia and Louisiana — where lower court judges said they thought the VRA was probably violated but stayed their own opinions following the signal of the Supreme Court in Milligan — would likely have produced at least one more minority-opportunity district that would have elected a Democrat,” Doug Spencer, an associate professor of law and election law expert at the University of Colorado, told TPM.
Elections for those seats alone likely wouldn’t have been enough to swing the House, barring further ripple effects. But, as Spencer pointed out, they would have had “implications for the already challenging election of Kevin McCarthy, and his fragile coalition which would be even weaker.”
The McCarthy-led Republican majority controls the House by just a handful of seats — 222 to Democrats’ 212 — complicating the speaker’s efforts to get a majority of Republicans to follow his lead on votes and even on questions of strategy.
Thursday’s decision will also almost certainly have a significant effect on the 2024 elections, when Democrats will battle to overcome Republicans’ slim majority and take back the chamber. Some of that stems from ongoing litigation.
“I imagine that Democrats might pick up five to six seats max from litigation in Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas,” Spencer calculated.
The Cook Political Report’s Dave Wasserman tweeted that among the five seats the organization is now shifting bluer, two formerly solid Republican seats will likely end up being solid Democratic ones.
Democracy Docket, a Democratic-aligned website that tracks redistricting cases, found that Thursday’s decision will affect redistricting cases in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Kansas, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, North Dakota, Texas and Washington — though the states Spencer tallied plus Alabama will likely have the most direct effect on congressional seats.
In a chamber currently governed by a handful of votes, flipping control of five or six seats could mean a significant Democratic advantage (or, more accurately, unraveling a manufactured Republican advantage). [Good news for democracy.]
And the ramifications go even beyond congressional majorities.
As Spencer points out, the decision will also affect state legislative districts, which have become all the more critical with a potentially significant, looming Supreme Court case — Moore v. Harper — yet to be decided.
“This might become especially important if the Supreme Court agrees with the Independent State Legislative Theory that pushes more authority to state legislatures in this space,” he said.
The Independent State Legislature Theory is a right-wing concoction that would give state legislatures absolute power to administer federal elections — to the exclusion of state courts, state constitutions and governors’ vetoes. While state-level elections traditionally engender low turnout and little attention, the political makeup of the chambers would be more important than ever under the theory.
The Court’s decision on Moore v. Harper and the Independent State Legislature Theory continues to hover in limbo after the newly-Republican North Carolina Supreme Court overturned its one-year-old decision on the state’s maps, potentially mooting the underlying case. The Supreme Court has twice asked for additional briefing on how it should proceed with the case, but has yet to act on that guidance.
REP. MARC MOLINARO [during an interview on Fox News]: “AOC can save her lecturing for the floor of the House. Right now there are countless firefighters, there are families being impacted, senior citizens, folks with respiratory issues. There’s little question that Canada needs to obviously focus on forest management, but this isn’t the moment to start lecturing people about the science of climate change. Right now it’s about putting out a fire and keeping people safe.”
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted:
Between NYC in wildfire smoke and this in PR, it bears repeating how unprepared we are for the climate crisis. We must adapt our food systems, energy grids, infrastructure, healthcare, etc ASAP to prepare for what’s to come and catch up to what is already here.
Commentary:
[…] For the nontweeters, Ocasio-Cortez shared a tweet from meteorologist Jeff Berardelli about a terrifying scorcher in Puerto Rico, with some commentary of her own. […]
A quick Google search of “AOC” and “wildfires” currently brings up several articles, almost all of which come from right-wing outlets. One such headline, from The New York Post, reads, “AOC uses NYC wildfire smoke shroud to promote progressives’ Green New Deal.”
Oh, noes! Hie thee to thy fainting couch! What’s this wild-eyed, out-of-control radical doing now? Is she looking for ways to prevent wildfires during a a wildfire outbreak? The temerity! It’s like asking people to wear a mask during a killer pandemic. […]
Of course, conservatives have perfected this sort of response, particularly when it comes to their inaction on gun violence. After mass shootings, Republicans love to tsk-tsk Democrats’ penchant for “politicizing” these incidents. Because God forbid we try to do anything about them. […]
If anything, AOC and her fellow progressives aren’t being nearly strident enough in their calls for climate action, because wildfires like the ones now ravaging areas of Canada are likely to only get worse and more frequent as the world warms.
Here’s just one assessment of our current fraught situation from North Carolina State University’s Andrew Moore:
[S]ince 2000, an annual average of 70,072 wildfires have burned an annual average of 7 million acres across the country. That’s more than double the annual average of 3.3 million acres burned in the 1990s, when a greater number of fires occurred annually.
Robert Scheller, a professor of forestry and environmental resources at NC State’s College of Natural Resources, said greenhouse gas emissions continue to drive changes in the climate, contributing to warmer-than-average surface temperatures and shifting precipitation patterns — trends that are expected to increase the frequency, intensity and duration of wildfires across the U.S.
“Climate change is creating the perfect conditions for larger, more intense wildfires,” said Scheller, who uses geospatial analytics to examine the effects of climate change and human activities on long-term landscape health. “We’re already seeing fires that we didn’t expect to see until 2080.”
But never mind any of that, because the smoke you’re breathing in right now isn’t all that bad, really. Come on, quit whining! Take one for the Chevron Corp. public relations team.
In fact, as professional fossil fuel shill Steve Milloy told Fox News’ Laura Ingraham on Wednesday, what we’re experiencing may seem awful, but it’s just a typical Thursday in China. Gotta love the chyrons and mask-mocking, too. [Tweet and video at the link: “Fox guest: There’s just no health risk…We have this kind of air in India and China all the time, no public health emergency… this doesn’t kill anybody, this doesn’t make anybody cough [I have friends living in NYC … they are coughing], this is not a health event… particulate matter is just very fine soot, they’re innocuous.” [!!!!]]
(Partial) transcript!
MILLOY: “Look, the air is ugly, it’s unpleasant to breathe, and for a lot of people they get anxiety over it. But the reality is there’s no health risk. Okay, there’s EPA research, they’ve done lots of clinical research on asthmatics, on elderly asthmatics, on children, on elderly with heart disease—not a cough or a wheeze from any of them. We have this kind of air in India and China all the time. No public health emergency.” [WTF?!]
That’s weird, because this Reuters story about the health risks of wildfire smoke from Wednesday says different:
Studies in people have linked wildfire smoke with higher rates of heart attacks, strokes, and cardiac arrests, increases in emergency room visits for respiratory conditions, and weakened immune defenses. Wildfires have also been linked with eye irritation and skin problems.
The effects of exposure can persist for years. After Australia’s 2014 Hazelwood Coal Mine fire, rates of heart disease remained elevated for two and a half years and respiratory illnesses for five years, researchers reported in April.
Wildfire exposure in pregnancy has been associated with pregnancy loss, low birth weight, and preterm delivery. A study from California that has yet to be peer reviewed found a link between wildfire exposure and cellular damage in first- and second-trimester placentas.
But hey, at least our air isn’t as bad as China’s! Don’t you feel better now? By the way, Milloy is a longtime climate change denier, so you may need to take his assurances with a grain of bath salts if you want any hope of understanding them. You can read more about his rascally exploits at Media Matters For America.
[Milloy] has still been a staple of Fox News’ climate denial for over a decade. […]
In addition to Fox News, Milloy has a large presence on Twitter, where he often says outlandish things like obsessively referring to climate change believers as “bedwetters” and “climate communists.” He’s called climate activists Nazis and referred to activist Greta Thunberg as “Greta the Climate Puppet.”
Since the beginning of 2021, Milloy has begun appearing regularly on far-right outlets One America News Network and Newsmax to continue his brand of grotesque climate denial.
Speaking of Newsmax: [Tweet and video at the link: “Newsmax’s Greg Kelly praises the smoke from Canadian wildfires, saying “It’s a beautiful, interesting aura” and “it’s not an unpleasant odor, to be honest”]
Transcript!
GREG KELLY: ”The orange smog here in New York City, have you heard about it? Many cities, on the east coast, primarily, have this big blanket of orange smog right over the top of it. Our woke friends to the north in Canada, their forest fires got out of hand and well, this is what we’re dealing with. It’s complicating some people’s lives, but it’s manageable. I tell ya, it actually smells like wood smoke. It’s not an unpleasant odor, to be honest. It’s kinda weird when it seeps into the building, but outdoors I can deal with it. Folks with respiratory issues though, that’s a real thing, a real complication.
“The White House is trying to exploit this, saying it’s all because of global warming and the normal talking points that go with that. I don’t think that’s the case, I think it’s a forest fire. This actually has happened a couple of times before in history, and for the time being, we can live with it. But it is pretty—it actually is pretty (laughs). It’s a beautiful, interesting aura the city has right now.”
If there’s one thing Republicans are good at, it’s failing to solve the problems they want to pretend don’t exist, or in Greg Kelly’s case, problems they think are “manageable” and “pretty.” Their rather predictable deflections, on the other hand, are getting less and less convincing all the time.
I am an elderly (73) person with asthma and I can tell him right now, smoke from a forest fire will mess up your asthma badly, and possibly kill you.
Where did he get this information from: “Okay, there’s EPA research, they’ve done lots of clinical research on asthmatics, on elderly asthmatics, on children, on elderly with heart disease—not a cough or a wheeze from any of them.”?
————————-
My pulmonologist says this is damaging to the lungs
————————
I knew it. I called it this morning. They’re going to blame it on “woke.” [See the phrase, “our woke friends to the north in Canada” in the article.]
————————
Lots of studies of the dangers of fine particulates, they are deadly, asthma, heart risks, shorter life spans.
NY Health Department has a page on them. Lots of studies have been done, they are health hazards.
———————
There are particles in that smoke. Very, very small particles. So……Fox followers — go ahead and go outside and breath without a KN95 mask. Please….go ahead. Problem: just like the pandemic — you motherfuckers will cause our healthcare workers to have to care for you and your stupidity. This bullshit propaganda from the right continues to kill our planet and therefore us — sooner!
—————————
heartily encourage conservatives to give us bleeding-heart liberal, global warming alarmists our comeuppance by going outside, maskless of course, and going to a long, fast-paced jog.
Oggie: Mathomsays
Back when I worked wildland fires (mostly in CA, OR, ID, MT, NM), it sometimes took me 6 months to fully recover from smoke and particulate inhalation. Twice I was stationed in Forks of Salmon, CA, up in the canyons feeding the Klamath River. At one fire, visibility was 50 meters and small particulate matter was at 1200ppm –about 4 times the dangerous level. We were only there for two weeks, and most days were not that bad, but we still had daily transports to the local hospital for breathing difficulties, along with the usual injuries associated with wildland fires. We were also mostly young (I was doing this in my 30s. 40s and early 50s), in pretty good shape (most positions require physical performance tests (the most stringent was 1 mile, with a 40 pound pack, in less than 10 minutes, with a pulse check before and after, and if you pulse was elevated more than 50% (may be wrong on that), even if you made the time limit, you still failed), had first aid tents with oxygen, etc., but I still think that in fire camps with that much smoke, even overhead should have gotten hazard pay.
To see these smoke levels in eastern cities is jarring. The locals in fire-prone areas knew what to do in heavy smoke. But after conservative talking heads, and news networks, and politicians telling us that public health is out of control and/or out to get us, how many older people are actually going to listen to the warnings?
A coworker told me yesterday he had his first asthma attack in 10 years.
whheydtsays
Re: Reginald Selkirk @ #207…
Hmmmm… I wonder how many of the legislators would be able to sign up for a social media account…without help from their teen-aged kids?
Trump says he’s been indicted in classified documents probe
Former President Donald Trump said Thursday that his legal team has been told he’s been indicted in an investigation into his handling of classified documents.
Trump posted on Truth Social that he has been summoned to appear in federal court in Miami on Tuesday afternoon.
DEVELOPING
Australia’s government plans legislation to ban swastikas and other Nazi symbols nationwide due to an increase in far-right activity, Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus said Thursday.
While most Australian states already ban such Nazi symbols, the federal law would go further by also banning the trade in such material, Dreyfus said…
FBI agents on Thursday arrested a businessman at the center of the scandal that led to the historic impeachment of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a day after his defense presented evidence that was intended to counter bribery allegations but raised new questions about the two men’s dealings.
Nate Paul was booked into an Austin jail in the afternoon after being taken into custody by federal agents, according Travis County Sheriff’s Office records. It was not immediately clear what charges led to his arrest, and the records said only that he was being held on a federal detainer for a felony…
UPDATE: Thursday, Jun 8, 2023 · 7:04:08 PM MDT · Mark Sumner
Because The New York Times doesn’t want you to go to bed happy:
“Bringing a case in Florida also would also raise the possibility that it could be randomly assigned—or transferred—to Judge Aileen Cannon.”
[That seems unlikely. Two of her recent ruling were overruled by higher courts.]
UPDATE: Thursday, Jun 8, 2023 · 6:34:52 PM MDT · Mark Sumner
ABC News indicating more about the nature of the charges:
“We’re learning from our sources that there appear to be at least seven counts here. This ranges from everything from the willful retention of national defense information to conspiracy to a scheme to conceal, to false statements and representations.”
The last case featuring willful retention of national defense information appears to be the 2017 case of federal contractor Harold Thomas Martin III, who was sentenced to nine years in federal prison for taking home copies of defense information and keeping them in his house and car.
UPDATE: Thursday, Jun 8, 2023 · 6:22:42 PM MDT · Mark Sumner
From the Associated Press:
“Within 20 minutes of his announcement, Trump, who said he was due in court Tuesday afternoon in Miami, had begun fundraising off it for his 2024 presidential campaign.”
The federal grand jury empaneled by special counsel Jack Smith has handed down indictments to Donald Trump over his mishandling of classified documents which the FBI recovered from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort. Trump is reporting the indictments on his failing Truth Social media platform, and the claim has been confirmed by multiple news sources. Reports indicate that Trump is facing seven charges, including illegal retention of classified documents, conspiracy, and obstruction of justice.
Trump repeatedly lied to both the National Archives and the FBI about the documents he was holding. He instructed his attorneys to say that all documents had been returned, when he knew this was untrue. He claimed that he had declassified the documents, when he knew this was untrue. He repeatedly obstructed the progress of the case including the long delaying tactic of insisting on a “special master” to evaluate the documents.
These indictments come from the newly seated grand jury in Miami, Florida, one of three grand juries that Smith has created to cover both the investigations into Trump’s document theft and his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election. That investigation has also expanded into looking at how Trump has used both false claims around the election and claims about the investigations to scam his supporters out of millions.
[…] With the historic news that Donald Trump has been federally indicted, reportedly on seven criminal counts, congressional Republicans got right down to the business of rolling over, back flipping, and prostrating themselves to the Don yet again. It’s like breathing to them now. […]
Many examples at the link. “sham indictment” seems to be one phrase on which Republicans have decided to base their propaganda. There’s also “what about Biden,” “hoax,” etc.
Kevin McCarthy, Steve Scalise, House Judiciary GOP, Elise Stefanik, Josh Hawley, Jim Jordan, Andy Biggs, Matt Gaetz, Marjorie Taylor Greene, etc., etc. … all are airing their stupidity.
“THE ENEMY IS REMOTELY MINING OUR REAR, ROUTES OF SUPPLY OF AMMUNITION AND RESERVES,” wrote Alexander Sladkov, a prominent pro-Russian milblogger, in a Thursday Telegram post.
Sladkov wrote that Ukraine is firing the Remote Anti-Armor Mine System (RAAMS), a US-made artillery round that lays anti-tank mines in flight. The US has sent Ukraine over 10,000 of these rounds along with the 155mm howitzers that fire them out to a range of nearly 11 miles…
Trump confirmed that he has been summoned to appear at the Federal Courthouse in Miami on Tuesday at 3 PM. Unsurprisingly, the orange doofus claims he is innocent.
Elon Musk weighed in. He tweeted something about “what appears to be differential enforcement.” I can’t be bothered to repeat it all.
Donald Junior says we have to stop the corrupt Biden DOJ by putting his Daddy back in the White House. [scoff] I do think Trump should be in the Big House. Of course, Trump is innocent until proven guilty over and over and over and over again.
A Boise man has filed a $1 million lawsuit against the city of Boise and two police officers over an arrest last summer in a downtown parking lot.
Ty Justin William Werenka, 30 of Boise, filed the lawsuit Monday in the U.S. District of Idaho, the region’s federal court. The two named officers are Cpl. Norman “Denny” Carter and Officer Avery Westendorf, both then with the Boise Police Department.
In June 2022, Werenka was leaving a parking garage on Main Street when he saw police officers responding to a vehicle accident near the garage’s exit, according to a complaint.
He had a conversation with a garage employee, who asked him to continue on out of the garage, after which Werenka left, parked on a nearby street and returned.
“Mr. Werenka is an activist who routinely films police interactions as he wants to ensure an independent record is kept and for the safety of all involved,” according to the complaint…
Conservatives are having a kitten over Cracker Barrel’s embrace of both Pride Month and diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.
Now, the country store and restaurant chain has become the latest in a string of companies and products being cancelled by the right for being too “woke,” joining the likes of Chick-fil-A, Bud Light, Target, Kohl’s, The North Face, Lego and more…
Lawyers seeking redrawn congressional lines in New York argued before a state appeals court Thursday in a Democrat-backed lawsuit that could have implications in the 2024 fight for control of the House.
The lawsuit was brought on behalf of 10 New York voters who want a state redistricting commission to submit new proposed state congressional lines for 2024. A victory for the plaintiffs would scrap lines drafted for 2022 by an outside expert after a legal challenge. Republicans were able to flip four congressional seats in New York under those lines…
St. Louis County Prosecutor Wesley Bell announced his Democratic primary campaign for the United States Senate, using the Wednesday morning launch to contrast himself with sitting Republican Sen. Josh Hawley on issues of police brutality and public safety…
Before he can face Hawley, Bell must defeat fellow Democrat Lucas Kunce in the primary…
“Bringing a case in Florida also would also raise the possibility that it could be randomly assigned—or transferred—to Judge Aileen Cannon.”
[That seems unlikely. Two of her recent ruling were overruled by higher courts.]
I was wrong. The case has been assigned to pro-Trump, unethical doofus Aileen Cannon.
In March, Donald Trump became the first former American president to be indicted, when a New York district attorney brought charges against the Republican as part of his hush-money-to-a-porn-star scandal. Last night, we learned that he’s also the first former American president to face a federal criminal indictment.
But it would be a mistake to assume there won’t be additional charges as a result of other investigations. As a New York Times report noted:
Former President Donald J. Trump faces a host of investigations around the country, at both the state and federal levels, into matters related to his business and political careers.
Yes, and some — or perhaps even all — might yet lead to additional charges.
Revisiting our earlier coverage, let’s recap.
– In New York, Trump has been indicted by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, as part of its investigation into the former president’s hush money scandal.
– In Florida, special counsel Jack Smith’s office has apparently indicted the former president as a result of his classified documents scandal.
– The special counsel’s office is also investigating Trump’s role in the Jan. 6 attack and the efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
– In Georgia, Trump is under investigation by the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office, which is scrutinizing his alleged efforts to interfere in the 2020 presidential election.
– Federal officials, including the Securities and Exchange Commission, have also launched a criminal investigation surrounding his special purpose acquisition company (SPAC).
This does not include a variety of civil cases pending against the former president, including the sweeping case brought by the New York Attorney General’s Office, several lawsuits filed by police officers injured during the Jan. 6 attack, and the defamation cases filed by E. Jean Carroll.
There’s also some question as to whether the district attorney’s office in Westchester County, N.Y., is still examining Trump’s alleged financial crimes.
[…] as things stand, if the former president is assuming that his first two indictments will be his last, he might yet be disappointed.
After months of brainstorming and scheming, Meta is getting closer to releasing a Twitter clone to the world, according to a new report from The Verge. The company’s pitch is simple. Execs claim they will offer “a platform that is sanely run.”
On Thursday night, The Verge reported that Meta chief product officer Chris Cox showed employees a preview of “Project 92,” a code name for a project Cox called “our response to Twitter” in a company-wide meeting. As explained by The Verge, Project 92 is Meta’s new standalone text app that looks a lot like Instagram’s comment section. Meta executives are purportedly considering naming the app “Threads,” the same name given to its dead Instagram messaging app, although the decision is not final.
According to The Verge, Threads (or whatever it ends up being called) will integrate with the decentralized social media protocol ActivityPub, which aims to untether social content from specific apps and make it more widely accessible. It will use Instagram’s account system to quickly generate users’ profiles…
[…] Trump announced his indictment via his social media platform, and according to the online timestamp, he published the news at 7:21 p.m. ET. His followers then received a fundraising appeal — the subject line read, “BREAKING: INDICTED” — and according to my email inbox, it arrived at 7:38 p.m. ET.
[…] Under normal political conditions, no one would even try to effectively say, “Prosecutors and grand jurors saw evidence that I committed a variety of felonies, so you should definitely reward me with cash.” […]
As Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida begins to aggressively attack former President Donald J. Trump, his campaign has spread three images of the former president embracing Dr. Anthony S. Fauci that forensic experts say are almost certainly realistic-looking “deepfakes” generated by artificial intelligence.
Washington Post:
In response to criticism of the new web video Thursday, the DeSantis campaign played the whataboutism card and rather flippantly dismissed concerns about its deception. It pointed to a fake image Trump shared on social media of DeSantis riding a rhinoceros (the implication being that DeSantis is a RINO, or “Republican in Name Only.”) The image looks a lot more like a crude photoshop than an AI image, though. It also seems much less likely to lead people to think it’s genuine. And even to the extent people believe it’s real, it would hardly be as damning as Trump hugging a much-hated figure on the right.
Commentary:
[…] DeSantis is presenting himself as a Trump imitator, equally indifferent to reality and propriety, which is every bit as pitiful as it sounds.
[…] Trump issued a 180-word written statement, followed by a four-minute video message. What he failed to do, however, was present much of a defense. Trump lied about Robert Mueller’s special counsel investigation. He lied about his policy accomplishments. He mischaracterized the Presidential Records Act. He continued to pretend others had done the same thing he did, despite reality. He peddled nonsense about President Joe Biden.
My point is not to draw attention to the fact that Trump said a bunch of things that were plainly and demonstrably untrue. That’s as common as the sunrise. Rather, what matters in this context is that the former president, while breaking the news about his federal indictment, had an opportunity to put his best foot forward, presenting a positive spin on his legal predicament, and sharing the best possible arguments.
It should give Republicans pause that the guy apparently couldn’t think of anything compelling.
StevoRsays
@ ^ Lynna, OM : “DeSantis is presenting himself as a Trump imitator, equally indifferent to reality and propriety, which is every bit as pitiful as it sounds.”
Yet that somehow worked for Trump. Willit work for hisfellow fascist ? Who knows? Wish it could be ruled out but.. Fuck.
The White House yesterday released Fact Sheet: Biden-Harris Administration Announces New Actions to Protect LGBTQI+ Communities (full text). It reads in part:
Today, in celebration of Pride Month, the Biden-Harris Administration is announcing new actions to protect LGBTQI+ communities from attacks on their rights and safety. Over a dozen states have enacted anti-LGBTQI+ laws that violate our most basic values and freedoms as Americans, and are cruel and callous to our kids, our neighbors, and those in our community. The Biden-Harris administration stands with the LGBTQI+ community and has their backs in the face of these attacks….
The Fact Sheet announced new federal action, including a new LGBTQI+ Community Safety Partnership and new initiatives to deal with LGBTQI+ youth homelessness, foster care and mental health. It also announced the release of federal funds “to support programs that help parents affirm their LGBTQI+ kids.” Additionally, it announced initiatives to counter book bans, which “disproportionately strip books about LGBTQI+ communities, communities of color, and other communities off of library and classroom shelves.” The Department of Education will appoint a coordinator to “work to provide new trainings for schools nationwide on how book bans that target specific communities and create a hostile school environment may violate federal civil rights laws.”
Trump announced on Truth Social just now that he’s parting ways with Jim Trusty and John Rowley, two attorneys who have represented him over the past year in the Mar-a-Lago investigation.
They will be replaced by Todd Blanche, who also began representing Trump in the New York hush money case as Trump was indicted by DA Alvin Bragg.
Blanche previously represented Paul Manafort. In that case, Blanche successfully managed to have a New York state indictment dropped against Trump’s 2016 campaign chair. […]
In the statement, Trump said that he was parting ways with Trusty and Rowland after they had gone up against a “very dishonest, corrupt, evil, and ‘sick’ group of people.”
One day after being indicted on charges carrying a potential sentence of 100 years in a federal penitentiary, it might seem unlikely that Donald Trump would be celebrating. However, this morning at Mar-a-Lago had to be filled with champagne corks and party streamers because the announcement just came out about which judge has been appointed to handle Trump’s case.
ABC News reports that the judge will be Aileen Cannon.
That would be the same Trump-appointed, Trump-serving Cannon who completely overlooked existing law to appoint a “special master” to help Trump keep documents from being reviewed by the Department of Justice. The same Cannon who supported the most ridiculous claims from Trump’s third-rate legal team. The same Cannon who, when the special master made reasonable demands on Trump’s team, overruled the judge she had appointed to give Trump gift after gift in rulings so ridiculous even right-wing pundits seemed shocked. It would be the same Cannon whose actions in this case were absolutely shredded in a ruling from the 11th Circuit that tossed out everything she had done, except the two months of stalling she achieved for Trump.
Now Cannon gets a chance to show her gratitude to Trump again with an appointment that seems like a cruel joke on the nation.
When special counsel Jack Smith convened a new federal grand jury in Florida and then used that grand jury to issue indictments against Trump, legal experts rushed in to point out how smart this was.
Though the case had been heard for months by a jury empaneled in Washington, D.C., a trial in that location might mean the jury pool was insufficiently loaded with committed Trump supporters. Moving the case to south Florida meant that any pool was going to be chock full o’ MAGA, giving Trump no grounds for making any claims about “venue” when this air-tight case landed a conviction.
Sure, The New York Times did mention the possibility that the case could end up falling to Cannon, but that seemed like a joke. After all … what are the odds? There are 18 judges in the South Florida Federal District Court. Eighteen. Stick a hand in a fishbowl and the odds of pulling out Cannon’s name should be less than 6%.
Cannon was already involved in an earlier portion of this case, and courts do sometimes move to place judges who have familiarity with the issues. But considering that Cannon’s interference in favor of Trump was so blatant that her every action was eventually reversed in an eviscerating ruling from a higher court, it might seem reasonable that Cannon’s name would be entirely removed from that fishbowl.
What did the 11th Circuit say about her decision to create a whole new rule that gave Trump power to block the government from looking at the evidence it had collected?
“We cannot write a rule that allows any subject of a search warrant to block government investigations after the execution of the warrant. Nor can we write a rule that allows only former presidents to do so.”
There were serious calls for Cannon to be impeached. A long list of legal experts stepped forward to complain that “in the tank for Trump” didn’t go far enough in explaining just how wrong Cannon’s rulings were and how much she contorted the law in her efforts to help Trump.
It’s entirely possible that Cannon will not remain the judge in charge of this proceeding. She might recuse herself (which seems unlikely). She might also be removed. Judge Bruce Reinhart is also mentioned in the court summons. Reinhart was also involved in the early stages of the case, authorizing the FBI search at Mar-a-Lago and and it’s possible he could take over the case following the initial proceedings. Reinhart is a magistrate judge selected by members of the district court rather than having been directly appointed by a president, so he might be regarded as the most neutral option.
However, unless something changes it will be Cannon who determines what evidence can be admitted in court. Cannon who instructs the jury on what they must consider before reaching a decision. Cannon who determines any sentence should Trump be convicted.
If you’re willing to bet that the answers to those questions are not “Nothing,” “You can’t,” and “Do you want me to drive you home?” You haven’t been following Cannon’s rulings.
Cartoon: Mike Luckovich on the spineless Mike Pence
StevoRsays
Apologies if someone else ha slaready posted here but :
Since the high-profile police killings of Philando Castile, Daunte Wright and Tyre Nichols, all of which began as traffic stops, calls for de-escalation by officers have been growing. A study analyzing footage in 577 stops of Black drivers found the first 45 words spoken by the officer could determine how that encounter ended. Amna Nawaz spoke with Tracey Meares to learn more.
Yet that somehow worked for Trump. Willit work for hisfellow fascist ? Who knows? Wish it could be ruled out but.. Fuck.
There is a big difference. Trump has charisma. DeSantis has charisn’t. Also, setting himself up as Trumpier than Trump will turn off Trump loyalists. And to Trumpists, loyalty to Trump trumps Trumpism.
In a normal political party, presidential primary candidates might take multiple federal indictments against one of their rivals as an opportunity to attack or at least mildly criticize that rival. Not in today’s Republican Party, and not when the person under indictment is Donald Trump. […]
“The weaponization of federal law enforcement represents a mortal threat to a free society. We have for years witnessed an uneven application of the law depending upon political affiliation. Why so zealous in pursuing Trump yet so passive about Hillary or Hunter?” DeSantis tweeted. “The DeSantis administration will bring accountability to the DOJ, excise political bias and end weaponization once and for all.”
[…]
“I think it would send a terrible message to the wider world,” Pence said. “But again, let me be very clear: No one’s above the law. And if the Department of Justice chooses to move forward with an indictment, I would hope that it would meet the very high threshold for the unprecedented action of a federal indictment against the former president.”
If no one is above the law, then what is the “terrible message” being sent “to the wider world” in indicting Trump? But when news of the indictments did come, Pence went to ground. A scheduled appearance on Fox News to be interviewed by Sean Hannity didn’t happen. As of Friday morning, he hadn’t issued a statement. So courageous.
It’s an interesting question, in fact, who has less courage here: DeSantis with his pivot to sucking up to the Trump base, or Pence with his silence.
[…] It would be much easier for me to win this election if Trump weren’t in the race, but I stand for principles over politics,” Vivek Ramaswamy said. “I commit to pardon Trump promptly on January 20, 2025, and to restore the rule of law in our country.” With a statement like that, it’s no wonder Ramaswamy is drawing attention and polling ahead of a senator and a governor and less than two points behind a former vice president. You really have to admire the commitment to Trumpian rhetoric in his claim that pardoning Trump and restoring the rule of law are things he can simultaneously do in the name of principle, not politics.
South Carolina’s Tim Scott, the senator trailing Ramaswamy, went on Fox News Thursday and tried to do a balancing act wherein he pretended to care about the rule of law while spewing the official “weaponization” line.
“We look at every case based on evidence in America,” Scott said. “Every person is presumed innocent, not guilty, and what we’ve seen over the last several years is the weaponization of the Department of Justice against the former president.” Every person is presumed innocent, but it’s the job of prosecutors to break through that presumption and prove guilt. There’s a clause that comes after “presumed innocent”—“until proven guilty”—and it’s kind of the foundation of the criminal justice system. Scott pledged to “purge all of the injustices and impurities in our system,” or, in translation, ensure that prominent Republicans are not charged with crimes. […]
Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson was the only Republican running for president that called for Donald Trump to withdraw from the 2024 race. The indictment of Trump on seven counts is a good reason for Trump to withdraw.
Meanwhile, other Republicans are suggesting that the indictment will assure that Trump is the nominee.
Former President Donald Trump acknowledged on tape in a 2021 meeting that he had retained “secret” military information that he had not declassified, according to a transcript of the audio recording obtained by CNN. “As president, I could have declassified, but now I can’t,” Trump says, according to the transcript.
Commentary:
[…] What’s new are the direct quotes from the recording. […]
“Secret. This is secret information. Look, look at this,” Trump reportedly said at one point, according to the transcript. “This was done by the military and given to me.”
“Well, with Milley — uh, let me see that, I’ll show you an example. He said that I wanted to attack Iran. Isn’t that amazing? I have a big pile of papers, this thing just came up. Look. This was him,” Trump added. “They presented me this — this is off the record, but — they presented me this. This was him. This was the Defense Department and him. We looked at some. This was him. This wasn’t done by me, this was him.”
The former president reportedly went on to say, “All sorts of stuff — pages long, look. Wait a minute, let’s see here. I just found, isn’t that amazing? This totally wins my case, you know. Except it is like, highly confidential. Secret. This is secret information. Look, look at this.”
[…] it’s these 10 words that I keep staring at: “As president, I could have declassified, but now I can’t.”
In other words, if this reporting is accurate, Trump (a) realized he’d kept sensitive documents related to national security; (b) recognized the security concerns; (c) shared “highly confidential” information anyway; and (d) undermined his own absurd “declassification” defense with explicit rhetoric about the limits on what he could do as a former president.
The former president was already facing a serious legal dilemma. It now appears even worse.
Now that I see excerpts from the transcript of that recording, it looks much more like Trump had the actual classified document in his hands … and he was showing it to someone else.
More dunderheaded rightwing responses to the indictment of Donald Trump:
[…] Charlie Kirk, founder of the far-right youth activist group Turning Point USA, suggested candidates who do not show “solidarty” [sic] and “suspend their campaign” to join Trump at the courthouse when he is set to turn himself in next week would suffer the wrath of the conservative base.
“Every ‘Republican’ running for President should suspend their campaign and go to Miami as a show of support,” Kirk wrote on Twitter. “If you don’t, you are part of the problem. Either we have an opposition party or we don’t. GO to Miami Tuesday, and show solidarty [sic] or we will mark you as part of the oppsition [sic].”
Fox News host Pete Hegseth similarly called the other Republicans running in the presidential primary against Trump to protest by his side in an appearance on the network.
“This is a terrible night for our Republic and our Constitution and our justice system, but as it pertains to the Republican primary, Republicans will rally around Donald Trump. I think every single Republican nominee should be down in Miami on Tuesday night standing for justice in the country,” Hegseth declared, adding, “This is injustice. This should not stand. … It’s not about Trump. It’s about our system and he’s been willing to expose it.”
Hegseth’s comments were subsequently promoted by the pro-Trump super PAC “MAGA Inc.” They also earned praise from Kirk and far-right broadcaster Jack Posobiec, who suggested he hoped to see a protest at the courthouse next Tuesday.
“Pete is right. Peacefully and patriotically!” Posobiec tweeted.
Lower profile right-wing influencers and QAnon accounts also quickly latched onto the idea of a pro-Trump indictment day demonstration in Florida.
The two attorneys who, as of yesterday, were representing Trump in the Mar-a-Lago documents investigation say that they resigned this morning. Trump just posted on Truth Social that they were no longer representing him.
“This morning, we tendered our resignations as counsel to President Trump, and we will no longer represent him on either the indicted case or the January 6 investigation,” wrote Jim Trusty and John Rowland in a statement.
Trusty appeared on CNN last night defending Trump, saying that he and the legal team had received a summons to appear at Miami federal court on Tuesday to respond to federal charges in the Mar-a-Lago probe.
[…] Trusty and Rowley were key members of Trump’s defense team, and both were inside Justice Department headquarters just this Monday to complain to special counsel Jack Smith about alleged abuses by his investigators. Their departure comes on the heels of the resignation of Trump attorney Tim Parlatore and in the wake of reports that Trump’s large legal team is in absolute chaos due to paranoia and infighting.
Trump’s assertion that he will now be represented by Todd Blanche and “a firm to be named later” and that he “will be announcing additional lawyers in the coming days” suggests that Trusty and Rowley’s departure came as a complete surprise to the Trump team; it will be astonishing to see the onetime president walk into a Miami courthouse on Tuesday with a brand-new defense team assigned to the case mere days beforehand. We can expect future leaks to clarify just what happened here, but the Trump team getting blindsided by federal charges dropping in Miami, rather than Washington, D.C., isn’t the best excuse for losing two of their top lawyers within 24 hours of the indictment.
As for the reason Trump may be looking for “a firm to be named later” to assist in his Florida-based defense, The Daily Beast reported last month that close Trump legal adviser Boris Epshteyn had already “pissed off all the Florida lawyers. People are dropping like flies.” We can only imagine which new Florida law firm might be both fame-seeking and thickheaded enough to put themselves in the middle of that.
Scientists have discovered which animal was the first to branch off from our collective common ancestor. …
Trace back the history of any creature from humans to slugs, and you’ll eventually be able to follow all of the branches on the animal tree of life back to its trunk.
But that trunk had to branch off at some point, or we wouldn’t have all of today’s animals. And that first split has been a bit elusive to scientists, due to it taking place around 600 million years ago.
… in essence, whichever animal showed the least re-shuffling of genes on chromosomes must have evolved into existence first.
… The sister to all other animals, the first to branch off, and the most genetically isolated animal is … drumroll please … the comb jelly!
While I find this scientifically fascinating, I post it here primarily to comment on the writer’s approach. I find the strained cutesiness irritating, but I’ve experienced the combined pressure of deadlines and simplifying technical issues and can sympathize with flailing while going over those hurdles.
But throughout the article, every organism gets framed in the singular: the sponge, “the first split resulted in the birth of two creatures—the ancestor of almost all animals, and the ‘sister’ to that ancestor”, etc: barely a hint that this question concerns whole populations over multiple generations, and no mention of our vegetative and fungal cousins. The writer, a Popular Mechanics staffer, deserves credit for not even mentioning creationist nonsense, but still bears a share of responsibility for public evolution confusion.
Pierce R. Butlersays
Oops – apologies for formatting foo @ # 246!
tomhsays
Trump indictment unsealed. You can read the full text here.
On Friday Walt Nauta, an assistant who regularly travels with Donald Trump, became the second person indicted in an investigation of Trump’s mishandling of classified documents. This follows Trump’s earlier indictment on seven counts.
As with Trump, the number and nature of Nauta’s charges remain sealed. However, based on information from CNN, it’s a pretty good bet those charges include lying to the FBI. That’s because Nauta told FBI investigators that he hadn’t handled boxes in the storeroom at Mar-a-Lago, but “Investigators obtained surveillance footage showing Nauta and the worker moving boxes of the classified documents around the resort.”
Assuming that Nauta moved those boxes on direct orders from Trump, it also seems likely he could be at least one of those connected with Trump in what was reported to be a charge of conspiracy to obstruct justice. The Department of Justice has scheduled an on-camera event for 3 PM ET, which will likely include an announcement concerning the charges against Trump and Nauta.
[…] After investigators viewed the surveillance video, Nauta reportedly altered his earlier testimony. Since October, he has refused to speak to investigators.
Conspiracy to obstruct justice carries a maximum penalty of 20 years. False statements to the FBI bring a potential penalty of five years. However, if the DOJ believes that Nauta was aware he was moving classified material, he could also be subject to charges of gathering, transmitting, or losing defense information under the Espionage Act, as well as charges of conspiracy under that act.
Trump’s immediate response to Nauta’s indictment was to post a message on his media platform defending his assistant. However, it is easy to read this as an attempt to prevent Nauta from agreeing to provide testimony in exchange for avoiding the charges under the Espionage Act. [Yep. No kidding. That’s an attempt at witness intimidation. See the link for the text.]
[…]
Also of note: The Indictment has been unsealed.
Trump and his co-conspiracists “stored his boxes containing classified documents in a ballroom, a bathroom and shower, an office space, his bedroom, and a storage room.”
The indictment alleges that Trump committed a broad range of criminal wrongdoing in his alleged effort to hold onto national defense information and then fool investigators who were attempting to retrieve it.
The feds charged Trump with 31 separate counts of holding onto national defense information, one each, the indictment says, for sensitive documents retained. Prosecutors offered a brief description of each document’s contents; one concerned, for example, the “nuclear weaponry of the United States,” another dealt with “military attacks by a foreign country.”
All of the records included in the willful retention of national defense information counts — criminalized under the Espionage Act — were returned to the government either during the August 2022 Mar-a-Lago raid, the indictment says, or during a June 2022 meeting with DOJ and FBI officials at the Florida club.
Trump also faces one count of conspiracy to obstruct justice, one count of withholding a record, one count of corruptly concealing a record, one count of concealing a document in a federal investigation, one count of scheme to conceal, and one count of false statements.
More telling details from the unsealed indictment:
[…] An indictment unsealed by the Justice Department Friday underscores the high-level material the former president kept after leaving office, the times he improperly shared it with those without clearances and the extent he sought to block any efforts to retrieve them.
The filing indicates Trump weighed a number of methods to avoid returning them, asking his attorney to “hide or destroy” the documents in his possession following a June subpoena last year.
[…] The filing details two specific instances where Trump is alleged to have shared highly sensitive materials with individuals at his Bedminster, N.J., club who did not have security clearances.
[…] The filing also alleges that Trump tried to obstruct the FBI and grand jury investigations and conceal his continued possession of classified documents by suggesting his attorney falsely represent to the FBI that he did not have the documents in question.
[…] Prosecutors also alleged Trump directed Walt Nauta, a longtime aide also charged in the case, to move boxes of documents to conceal them […]
Here is a riddle for you: What do you call a meathead who has been married four times, fired from a succession of jobs in various police departments for such infractions as using unnecessary force and refusing to tone down the racist and demeaning comments about suspects on publicity videos but nonetheless still brags about his career in law enforcement, believes in lunatic conspiracy theories, publicly shouts out militias, and recently manhandled a protestor and labeled him a mental case because the guy dared to keep asking him questions?
Give up? The answer is “Congressman.”
Congressman Clay Higgins, to be more precise, […] currently representing Louisiana’s Third District in the House. Higgins on Thursday night reacted to the news of Donald Trump’s indictment on federal charges with this … this … whatever the Cajun swamp fuck this is: [Tweet at the link]
We consider ourselves fairly fluent in Wingnut, and all we got from this was a twitching eyeball and a raging headache. Luckily journalist Jeff Sharlet has an explanation:
Take this seriously. “Perimeter probe”: Higgins thinks indictment precedes bigger attack. “rPOTUS”: “real POTUS,” Trump. “Hold”: “stand back & stand by.” “Buckle up”: prepare for war. “1/50 k”: military scale maps. “Know your bridges”: militia speak for prepare to seize bridges. […] If you’re laughing at Rep Clay Higgins using militia speak, referencing military grade maps, & telling Trumpers to “know your bridges,” recall that Canadian far rightists held border bridges recently in a tense stand off. This is on the table.
[…] the danger is that Higgins is going to activate lone nuts who have been marinating in the Right’s hysterical reactions to the Trump indictment and decide to take it on themselves to start a revolution.
That is how Timothy McVeigh wound up blowing an enormous hole in the Murrah building in Oklahoma City — and the day care inside it. And he hadn’t spent a couple of decades marinating in Fox News and garbage like the Gateway Pundit first.
Tweets from congressmen calling for violence will get the attention, but Trump’s fans don’t really need the encouragement. They are perfectly capable of being threatening treasonous criminal-minded chuckleheads all on their own, as Vice is reporting:
“We need to start killing these traitorous fuckstains,” wrote one Trump supporter on The Donald, a rabidly pro-Trump message board that played a key role in planning the January 6 attack on the Capitol. Another user added: “It’s not gonna stop until bodies start stacking up. We are not civilly represented anymore and they’ll come for us next. Some of us, they already have.”
We do want to be cautious about giving too much agency to Internet randos, 99 percent of whom are probably blowing off admittedly superheated steam. But even one of them deciding to get off his butt and do something at the urging of and dark conspiratorial mutterings from elected representatives who should absolutely know better would be one too many.
America, where we don’t always lock up our armed and unhinged lunatics. Sometimes we elect them to Congress instead.
whheydtsays
Re: Reginald Selkirk @ #220…
Of that list of “woke” companies, the least surprising is Lego. After all, they were founded and headquartered in Denmark.
tomhsays
At the end of the indictment is the “penalty sheet,” giving the maximum term of imprisonment for each count. Adding them up: for Trump, 100 years, for Nauta, 90 years.
Reginald Selkirksays
@239: Weird indeed. They all want Trump to withdraw, but they can’t say it out loud because they want to inherit his base.
[…] What would Fox News do? The right-wing propaganda outfit has a long history of ignoring some of the biggest bad news for conservatives. But with news this cataclysmic coming down the pike, even they couldn’t ignore the story. Would they simply parrot Trump’s personal all-caps, fact-free ranting that Joe Biden has classified documents in his garage, and something about Chinatown?
Pretty much. And Fox News made sure to add Hillary Clinton’s emails to the news cycle as well. It was bizarre!
It must be noted that every strange Trump-inspired claim that Fox News promoted on its channel last night has been debunked as false. [Tweet and video at the link]
Did you get that? Clinton has “things in a sock drow-wer [sic],” and there is stuff in “Chinatown.” Clinton “bleached classified documents.” Biden has been “caught” “taking $10 million from Burisma.” I know you hadn’t heard that Biden was caught taking bribes because … he wasn’t, and the Republican witch hunters saying this have yet to provide even the tiniest particle of evidence to support that lie.
This next one includes a call for evangelicals to vote … and something about Hillary Clinton. [Tweet and video at the link]
And these two include Hannity’s Clinton-obsession and right-wing commentator Mark Levin saying Trump would die in prison if he served 100 years. That’s how crime and time work sometimes. [tweets and videos at the link.]
So what’s the important news today? [Followed by numerous examples of Fox News covering petty stories]
Bring it home, Fox. [Tweet and images claiming Joe Biden and “deep-pocketed climate nonprofits] are pushing a gas stove ban. Includes claims of a “direct line to Biden admin and to China.]
Oggie: Mathomsays
re Lynna @252:
But remember, it is, according to much of the news media and one entire political party, the only ones who are violent are the radical leftists.
Followup to comment 256.
Posted by readers of the article:
Ari FLiesher just claimed Biden pardoned Hillary. On fox. Just now.
——————-
That’s exactly what I expected. Utter bullshit.
———————–
if there’s no evidence to be found of Biden doing any of this, that’s definitely because he’s so good at covering up (also senile and incompetent)
—————————
“Trump goes undercover to investigate the corrupt DOJ, FBI, CIA, BATF and the BSA” — Hannity
—————————–
Ari Fleisher just said, every GQP candidate should promise to pardon Trump because Joe Biden pardoned Hillary and her 30,000 classified letters. I kid you not.
—————————-
Fox News anchors John Roberts and Sandra Smith have been reasonable but appear stunned. The chirons they are running are fair and accurate and devastating. Even some of Trump’s biggest legal defenders such as Jonathan Turley, Andy McCarthy, and Shannon Bream are saying that the information released today is devastating. […] And just when you thought Fox was growing a conscience, they bring on Mark Levin who goes nuts.
YouTube link to Jack Smith speaking about the Trump federal indictment. Calm. Intelligent. Clear.
Boris Johnson is a regular deliverer of political asteroids. Tonight, another one crashes in.
Not only is Boris Johnson giving up as an MP – triggering a by election in a marginal seat.
He is doing so in an explosive manner – taking a direct pot shot at Prime Minister Rishi Sunak as he does so.
Hours after stepping off a plane from Washington in which Sunak transparently wasn’t talking about a free trade agreement with the US (he was never going to be), Johnson says he should have been.
He claims the Commons Privileges Committee is a “kangaroo court”.
And he is rallying the Brexit troops in suggesting his demise is driven by a motivation to overturn the result of the EU referendum.
Oh, and anyone thinking Boris Johnson is about to retreat into obscurity, note how his statement ends.
The indictment that Jack Smith filed includes photos. For example, there is a photo of “Classified documents sitting in a ballroom used for weddings and other events.”
There’s also this: “Nauta and female family member discuss taking classified material away in advance of DOJ visit.”
Commentary:
[…] To call this indictment “damning” is underselling it. It’s easy to see why Trump’s attorneys chose today to take a hike, especially if they were previously unaware of some of the efforts Trump had put into betraying his own legal team and trying to leave them on the hook for his crimes.
Also, this isn’t just 100 years of potential penalties: It’s more like 380 years. It’s hard to see anyone, no matter their previous address, walking away from this without spending some time with some pretty strict limits on their range of travel.
Evidence-wise, Trump and Nauta are on the well-done side of cooked gooses. Whether any attorney—or any judge—can get them out of this seems doubtful. Some of those who have rushed to endorse Trump following his indictment need to whip out their reading glasses and take a close look, because this stuff is very hard to dismiss.
The ‘kernel of truth’ is that Clinton’s IT staff, with court approval, erased a hard drive. You can’t just delete the files, that only clears out the directory listings. You have to erase the entire contents of the disk. For this purpose they used open source software named BleachBit. This is standard practice, and good security.
In Trump’s addled mind in 2016, this transformed into a story about Clinton’s people using actual chemical bleach. It then transformed somehow into acid wash because that is an indication of how well Trump’s mind works.
Reginald Selkirksays
@262: If they were actually worried about Clinton mishandling classified emails they should have applauded the use of BleachBit.
An activist has sued Rep. Lauren Boebert for defamation, alleging she lied about him and his nonprofit on Fox News and in other media outlets after he made a series of allegations about her personal life as she mounted a bid for reelection.
David Wheeler, president of the American Muckrakers Political Action Committee, sued the Colorado Republican in federal court in Colorado on June 8, alleging Boebert appeared on “The Sean Hannity Show” last year among other media outlets to deny Wheeler’s allegations that she’d used meth, had two abortions, and worked as a paid escort — and threatened to sue him and his PAC…
A committee of the Maine Legislature signed off Friday on a proposal from Democratic Gov. Janet Mills that would give the state one of the least restrictive abortion laws in the country.
Maine’s current laws allow abortions until a fetus becomes viable, which is generally considered to be about 24 weeks. The governor’s proposal would change state law to allow abortion after fetal viability if it’s deemed necessary by a physician…
Oggie: Mathomsays
Lynna @261:
<
blockquote>Oggie @257, well I know that I’m dangerous.
Yeah, the right wing does consider truth and reality to be dangerous. And, to a right wing mind, dangerous is the moral equivalent of violence.
Oggie: Mathomsays
All hail Borkquotia, acolyte of Typos, may hre raeign be logn and friutful!
Before special counsel Jack Smith released the indictment charging Donald Trump for mishandling hundreds of classified documents, speculation was rampant that the twice-impeached former president was going to be charged under the very law he signed in 2018 to toughen up misuse of classified documents. That would really have been delicious. Turns out, he’s not being charged under that law. What he is being charged under is even better—potentially 100 years in prison better.
That’s not to say that Trump’s pushing for and signing that law doesn’t make an appearance in the indictment. The indictment includes five examples of Trump doing his “Lock her up” schtick attacking Hillary Clinton over her supposed emails scandal, statements that reinforce that even when he was a candidate, Trump knew how classified documents should be handled. He campaigned on it. [Text from indictment is available at the link]
This is one of the examples that’s included: [video at the link: "In my administration, I'm going to enforce all laws concerning the protection of classified information. No one will be above the law."]
Prosecutors also couldn’t resist including this statement from July 26, 2018, because it’s a doozy.
As the head of the executive branch and Commander in Chief, I have a unique, Constitutional responsibility to protect the Nation’s classified information, including by controlling access to it…. More broadly, the issue of [a former executive branch official’s] security clearance raises larger questions about the practice of former officials maintaining access to our Nation’s most sensitive secrets long after their time in Government has ended. Such access is particularly inappropriate when former officials have transitioned into highly partisan positions and seek to use real or perceived access to sensitive information to validate their political attacks. Any access granted to our Nation’s secrets should in furtherance of national, not personal, interests.
[…] Yes, Trump knows what he was doing with those documents is very illegal, and he’s known it all along. He knew it when he was signing a new law increasing penalties for mishandling documents.
[…] Here’s the law no one is above, including him, as it applies to this indictment:
– 31 counts under 18 U.S. Code § 793: Gathering, transmitting or losing defense information, maximum 10 years in prison, $250,000 fine
-3 counts under 18 U.S. Code § 1512: Tampering with a witness, victim, or an informant, conspiracy to obstruct justice, withholding a document or record, corruptly concealing a document or record, with maximum 20 years and $250,000 fine per count
– 1 count under 18 U.S. Code § 1519: Destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in Federal investigations and bankruptcy, 20 years maximum, $250,000 fine
– 2 counts under 18 U.S. Code § 1001: Scheme to conceal, false statements and representations, maximum 5 years, $250,000 fine
Not bad. He might not have been hoisted on his own particular petard, but this one is even better.
I laughed when earlier today Chris Hayes said there was “something Gollum-like” in Trump’s obsession with the classified documents he took. “My documents!” and “My boxes!”
Jonathan Turley, a constitutional law expert who drew national attention when he became the lone Republican witness to testify during the first Trump impeachment hearings, appeared on Fox News this afternoon and described the newly unsealed federal indictment as “extremely damning.” … “This is not an indictment that you can dismiss,” said Turley, who is a regular legal analyst on Fox News and tends to provide analysis that is more favorable to the former president.
Iran is sending materials to Russia to help Moscow build a drone manufacturing plant that could be operational next year, part of a “deepening” military partnership between the two countries, the Biden administration said Friday. Officials also said that Tehran provided hundreds of armed drones to Russia last month for Moscow’s war in Ukraine.
[…] Trump comes across in prosecutor’s portrayal as a combination of master manipulator and clumsy oaf, alternately dispatching his valet Walt Nauta to move boxes of records out of the eyes of his legal team while loudly hinting to his own attorneys that Hillary Clinton’s lawyer simply deleted records sought by the government, and thereby took the fall.
[…] Nauta, prosecutors say, walked into the storage room in December 2021, only to find that a stack of boxes had collapsed, and a secret-marked record revealing “five eyes” access was strewn on the floor.
“I opened the door and found this…” Nauta allegedly texted another employee, along with a photo.
[…] Corcoran and Trump agreed that Corcoran would come back to Mar-a-Lago on June 2 to conduct a search for records to provide under the subpoena, the indictment says.
Trump allegedly used his valet, Nauta, to then play what prosecutors depict as a shell game with the records. Nauta allegedly moved 64 documents from storage into Trump’s residence, at one point texting with a member of Trump’s family who he addressed as “ma’am” that Trump “wanted to pick from” the documents.
And in the hours before Corcoran appeared at Mar-a-Lago on June 2, Trump allegedly had Nauta move 30 boxes of records out of the storage room that the attorney would search later that day.
When Corcoran arrived, Trump allegedly kept up the show, trying to befuddle his lawyer into helping him dodge the subpoena. At a Mar-a-Lago dining room, Corcoran recalled in a record cited by prosecutors that Trump suggested he take a folder with classified records to his hotel safe, and then made a “funny motion” with his hands. Corcoran understood that to mean, “pluck it out.” […]
Trump has chandeliers in his Mar-a-Lago bathroom. The bathroom, despite the chandelier, still manages to be particularly ugly Dictator chic style.
tomhsays
For anyone who doesn’t want to wade through the 49 page indictment, NBC News has provided 11 “key takeaways” from it. There are many more details at the link but these are some highlights.
Trump hid classified documents in a bathroom.
The indictment even features a color photo of the scene: more than two dozen boxes on the bathroom’s marble floor, stacked high in front of a shower with a crystal chandelier overhead.
Trump revealed classified documents to an author
…includes a transcript of a conversation Trump had with the two about a classified military document described as a “plan of attack” against another country… “Secret. This is secret information,” Trump said. “Look, look at this.”
Trump admitted that he didn’t declassify the documents, and that they were still ‘secret’
At another point in his conversation with the author and publisher, Trump conceded he could no longer declassify the documents and did not do so when he was president.
“See as president, I could have declassified it,” Trump said. “Now I can’t, you know, but this is still a secret.”
“Yeah,” a staffer responded, laughing. “Now we have a problem.”
Trump could easily have received a waiver to possess classified documents
The indictment explained that protocols do exist for former presidents to obtain a specific waiver of a rule — known as a “need-to-know” requirement” — that would have allowed Trump, under certain circumstances, to possess classified documents.
But Trump “did not obtain any such waiver after his presidency,” the charging document states.
Trump told someone not to stand too close a classified map
At his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, in August or September 2021, Trump reportedly showed “a classified map related to a military operation” to an aide who worked for his political action committee, according to the indictment. That person did not possess a security clearance.
Trump, the indictment states, “told the representative that he should not be showing it to the representative and that the representative should not get too close.”
Trump’s documents contained national security secrets
According to the indictment, documents Trump took “included information regarding defense and weapons capabilities of both the United States and foreign countries; United States nuclear programs; potential vulnerabilities of the United States and its allies to military attack; and plans for a possible retaliation in response to a foreign attack.”
Staffers freaked out as classified documents needed to be moved repeatedly
The indictment details multiple instances where documents were transported — or cleaned up — by staffers who lacked proper security clearances to be in contact with such information.
Classified documents came from a number of federal agencies
Classified documents Trump kept after his presidency ended originated from a plethora of the top national security and law enforcement agencies of the U.S. government. Among them: the CIA, the Department of Defense, the National Security Agency, the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency, the National Reconnaissance Office, the Department of Energy, the Department of State and its Bureau of Intelligence Research, according to the indictment.
Trump suggested his lawyers should not ‘play ball’ with the grand jury subpoena
In May 2022, following a subpoena from the grand jury for all classified documents, Trump met with his lawyers, who told him that they needed to search for the requested items.
But Trump waved off his attorneys’ attempts to comply, according to the indictment, which recounted a series of conversations Trump had with his attorneys.
“I don’t want anybody looking through my boxes,” Trump said.
At another point, Trump said, “What happens if we just don’t respond at all or don’t play ball with them?”
“Isn’t it better if there are no documents?” he said, according to his attorneys’ records.
Trump made a ‘funny’ ‘plucking’ motion
The indictment recounts an interaction between Trump and one of his lawyers when they were discussing what to do with a folder containing documents with classified markings. The lawyer recounted that Trump made a “plucking” motion that seemed to indicate the lawyer should just remove the incriminating papers.
“He made a funny motion as though — well okay why don’t you take them with you to your hotel room and if there’s anything really bad in there, like, you know, pluck it out,” the lawyer said.
Trump wanted his lawyers to takes notes from Hillary Clinton’s attorney
The indictment describes a conversation Trump had with two attorneys while discussing the document probe in May 2022. As one of the attorneys relayed, Trump was fixated on how an attorney for his 2016 Democratic presidential rival Hillary Clinton handled an investigation into her use of a private email server while she served as secretary of state.
“[H]e was great, he did a great job,” Trump said of the Clinton attorney whose name was redacted in the indictment. “You know what? He said, he said that it — that it was him. That he was the one who deleted all of her emails, the 30,000 emails, because they basically dealt with her scheduling and her going to the gym and her having beauty appointments. And he was great. And he, so she didn’t get into any trouble because he said that he was the one who deleted them.”
Trump, according to one of the attorneys, relayed that story multiple times that day.
If you look closely at the photo of the boxes in the bathroom, you can see in the upper righthand corner that more boxes are stacked in the shower. They are only partially hidden by the shower curtain.
Bizarre to see people draw sweeping conclusion from a few images. They suggest poor tactics. But could also indicate bad luck. One US armour officer said to me: if his battalion had to breach complex obstacles, mines, he’d expect 25%-plus casualties—“if everything went right”.
[In response to:]
Some people are drawing some very big conclusions from a few videos and photos of less than one company group of damaged / destroyed AFVs… as predicted. Ukraine should just throw in the towel now.
For me, those images are proof that this shit is hard, not that Ukraine has somehow failed. War is dangerous business.
It wasn’t long ago that too many people chortled at how “easy” Russia’s lines would be to breach. The dragon’s teeth were cheaply made! Russian troops are demoralized and will run at first contact! It was the worst kind of triumphalism, ignoring the inherent difficulties of war, and overstating both Ukrainian capabilities and underestimating Russia’s.
Now that Ukraine’s long-awaited spring offensive has begun, we’re seeing the reality of war—brutal, deadly, bloody, and anything but easy.
After a year and a half of endless videos of burning Russian vehicles, the tables are turned. And for the first time, we’re seeing the difficult consequences of going on the offensive against prepared defensive positions. For the first time, we’re seeing videos and pictures of burning Ukrainian vehicles, trapped in minefields, showered with artillery.
And all of this is happening before Ukraine has even reached the main defensive lines. [Tweet and images at the link: ‘Better look at the other grouping, which includes 4 damaged and abandoned Bradley IFVs, 1 Leopard 2A6, and a BMR-2 mine clearing vehicle.”]
War is difficult. And Ukraine decided to plunge head-first into the most densely defended corner of the Ukrainian front. [map at the link]
Of course, there’s a reason this is the most densely defended corner of the map. While Ukraine would benefit from liberating territory in other areas, getting to either Melitopol or Berdyansk is the most direct route toward actually ending the war. Russia knows this and has prepared accordingly, with multiple layers of defenses. […]
Each of the color bands in that image is a defensive line. Ukraine would have to bust through all of them to get to Tokmak. [Image at the link]
There are several distinct layers or defensive zones. Zone 1: first 3-4km from the RuFLOT [Forward Line of Own Troops] is the forward security zone consisting of individual squad or platoon outposts and individual company strongpoints.
Zone 2: first defensive line, 2-3km deep. Company trenches and strongpoints arranged along key terrain features in continuous line. This zone has seen recent additions and is constantly being improved. Villages of Kopani and Robotyne form the linchpins of this position.
Zone 3: 4-5km deep zone with reserve- and possible decoy positions. This zone is also where majority of the local Russian artillery and mechanized reserves will be maneuvering behind the first defense line. Multiple shelter areas for vehicles and equipment observed.
Zone 4: Prepared main defensive line. Massive multilayered trench lines with anti-tank ditches and dragons’ teeth obstacles. Extensive minefields are likely. These fortifications form nearly uniformly continuous defensive belt across the front. Built 3-4km deep.
Zone 5: Reserve and fallback positions behind the main defensive line (zone 3). Zone 6: Town of Tokmak and the surrounding AT-ditch and strongpoints form the last fallback and reserve position on this sector, prepared for all-around defense.
Note that Ukraine has to punch through three lines before they even get to the main defensive line! Each one is kilometers deep, all heavily mined, with artillery dialed into the relevant coordinates. Russian positions are all on higher terrain, meaning Ukraine has to attack uphill to secure those defensive emplacements (trenches, bunkers, and hidden ambush points).
The fog of war is thick, but there are suggestions that Ukraine is somewhere near Robotyne, which is the first substantive defensive line after the observational posts that Russia acknowledges have been overrun. Yet Ukraine still has to punch through those Zone 2 and 3 defenses before it even gets to Russia’s main prepared defensive lines, where the first dragon’s teeth show up.
So everyone confidently predicting Ukraine would slice through Russia’s cheaply made dragon’s teeth and untrained mobilized mobiks, well, they’re is still a ways from even getting there … and they’re already taking heavy casualties. Mines and artillery don’t suffer from poor morale.
Now go back to that picture at the top of the disabled Leopard and M2 Bradleys …
They’re not destroyed. They’re disabled. They hit mines. That means they’re temporarily out of commission, but not out of the war.
Either that Leopard, or another one we haven’t seen yet, has already been pulled back by Ukraine and is under repair: [Tweet and video at the link]
That’s the thing about Western gear: It’s designed to protect their crews from mine hits. By all indications, the crews of all these vehicles survived—critically important given the time and investment in getting these troops up to speed. They’re not easily replaced. And the vehicles can be towed to the rear for repair, to be thrown back into the battle later. This Leopard? It suffered a blown track and some side panels blown off its hinges. This one will be back in action soon. (Ukrainian sources claim it already is, which is plausible.)
Incidentally, this is another reason why I got excited when Western arms packages included tank recovery vehicles—they are critical in rescuing damaged equipment. You don’t want Ukrainian tractors venturing out into those minefields And it’s why logistics and maintenance are doubly critical—it gives this valuable equipment multiple lives.
Unfortunately, not all vehicles have been this lucky. Another Leopard was filmed burning, hit by either artillery or anti-tank guided missiles. [Tweet and video at the link]
But generally, most of the losses seen are from mines—many of them recoverable, and even those that aren’t, like the MRAP infantry vehicle seen in the tweet below, the crews were likely saved. They are literally called “mine-resistant ambush protection” vehicles, designed to survive the IEDs that were prevalent during our wars against ISIS and the Taliban. [Tweet and video at the link]
More Ukrainian losses: [Tweet and images at the link]
The current visually confirmed tally is two Leopard 2A6es damaged and one destroyed, around 10 M2 Bradleys—all damaged—and a small handful of MRAPs and armored personnel carriers. Ukraine has literally thousands of Western MRAPs in its arsenal right now. But even those Leopard and M2 Bradley losses, assuming they can’t be salvaged, would still represent only 2% of their supplies. And while we don’t know the full extent of their losses (Ukraine is tight-lipped and certainly won’t release this footage, and Russian sources both have terrible quality drone footage, or outright lie), it’s clear that this was never going to be bloodless or easy. [Tweet and video at the link]
If you’re wondering why these incapacitated and/or destroyed Ukrainian vehicles are all bunched up, it’s because that’s what happens during a minefield breach.
These vehicles must travel on mine-cleared lanes, which then makes it easy for artillery to zero in on their location. Also, as I’ve written ad infinitum, combined arms warfare is hard, and the best, most highly trained armies in the world struggle to pull it off. Ukraine has been drilling on it for just a handful of months. And all the “Ukraine can do it!” rah-rah talk can’t overcome the laws of warfare. Heck, the best wartime officers will tell the story about how their mistakes cost people’s lives, but that’s how they learn. Ukraine is doing something it has never done before, and they were struggling to do combined arms in the smallest unit operations. Doing it at the brigade level, with dozens of vehicles, is another level of difficulty.
All that said, Ukraine is advancing. Russian war propagandist War Gonzo was near-hysterics after last night’s battles:
Urgent Situation in Zaporozhye at 6:30 Moscow time 4
As we wrote earlier, the enemy again stepped up offensive operations by nightfall.
Fighting continued throughout the night, as a result of which the enemy, with massive support from artillery and armored vehicles, managed to occupy several positions of our troops in the Orekhov-Tokmak direction.
The situation is really serious. Neo-Nazis by their actions are trying to create a threat of encirclement of some of our advanced groups in one of the directions. The activity of the battles is extremely high.
Recall that during yesterday’s run-up, the enemy was also able to cling to our advanced positions, but could not gain a foothold on them.
I’m at a loss to explain War Gonzo’s talk of “a threat of encirclement,” as that would require a pincer maneuver that we haven’t seen happen. Perhaps he means that by pushing past defensive positions—a standard Soviet doctrine that Ukraine used to great effect during the Kharkiv offensive—that Ukraine would essentially cut off the roads supplying the bypassed positions. In the morning, War Gonzo triumphantly declared that the Ukrainian advance had been pushed back, but … sure. We can all roll our eyes.
Ukrainian media outlet Volyamedia has some exciting claims:
The Armed Forces of Ukraine liberated more than 15 settlements and advanced 5-17 km deep into the front in the Zaporozhye direction […]
The most dangerous for the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation remains the south-eastern direction (near Ugledar), where the Armed Forces of Ukraine have achieved the greatest success so far. Heavy fighting is going on along the entire line, the Russian command has already activated up to 70% of the reserves in the south.
This tracks with common claims, even among American officials, of Ukrainian gains of 5-15 kms along the front. And here is where things get curious. Those vehicle kills above? All of them are from a single engagement across a front line in which Ukraine is moving in multiple directions—and not in the Vuhledar direction in the block quote above.
Russian sources are posting those images and video over and over again—it’s been a long time since they’ve had anything to celebrate, and disabled Western kit is exciting for them—but it paints a small picture of the overall counteroffensive. If Ukraine suffered similar losses elsewhere, Russia would post that, not keep recycling the same battle kills, from different angles, attempting to paint a picture of overwhelming Ukrainian losses. [Good point!]
For their part, Ukraine is claiming massive Russian kills: [Tweet and list of combat losses is available at the link]
Thirty-four armored vehicles is massive, but 38 artillery and MLRS systems destroyed is next-level. Counter-battery is working aggressively to identify and eliminate Russia’s biggest defensive advantage. The more Ukraine can attrit Russian artillery and stop its supply of shells, the more effective this counteroffensive will be. If these numbers are anywhere close to being true, Ukraine is making serious headway.
Mark Sumner’s update yesterday is still an accurate source for where Ukraine is attacking. With Ukraine’s information blackout, we don’t know how far they’ve advanced. We’ll have to keep waiting on further information. The only place Ukraine has claimed progress is the area around Bakhmut, where Ukraine claims another kilometer in gains. That might refer to Berhivka, north of Yahidne/Bakhmut, which multiple Ukrainian and Russian sources claim has been liberated. [map at the link]
Yevgeny Prigozhin, the CEO of the mercenary Wagner group, must be beside himself, given the hundreds of his troops that likely died taking Berhivka several months ago, just to see it gifted back to the Ukrainians as soon as Russian troops were put in charge of its defense. He himself announced that Ukraine had taken part of the town several days ago.
The Ukrainian goal is clear: a pincer maneuver from the north and south that would force Russia’s Bakhmut garrison to retreat or risk getting cut off. Even without full encirclement, this is a reverse of what Ukraine faced a couple of months ago—with Russians encircling their defenders in town, being shelled from three sides. Now, Ukraine gets to return the favor. [Tweet and video at the link]
I do wonder why Ukraine is pushing in this direction. Bakhmut has nothing left worth retaking, and the push in Zaporizhzhia is incredibly difficult and will likely need an all-hands-on-deck effort (assuming it isn’t a diversion from a bigger attack somewhere else on the map). Perhaps there’s a big enough chunk of the Russian army garrisoned there that’s worth destroying. Maybe it’s a blocking action, keeping Russian forces from being redeployed to the main active front. Maybe it’s preparation for something else in Ukraine’s plans.
Either way, Ukraine doesn’t seem to have much committed there—I’ve seen mostly a single brigade, the Azov one, in action. So perhaps Ukraine sees it as a minimal investment to keep Russia on the defensive.
StevoRsays
@244. Lynna, OM :
President Biden had nothing to do with Trump’s indictment.
And yet, Josh Hawley posted this: “If the people in power can jail their political opponents at will, we don’t have a republic.”
Same guy who was cheering on those trying to lynch Trump’s own Vice-President for not doing illegal stuff that he constituitionally could not do right? (Ok then running away in terror from same Trumpist mob when they actually did pretty much what he was calling on them to do..)
Wonder what his past comments about locking Hilary Clinton up and maybe some Quanon fantasies about literally executing y’know most of the high ranking office bearers of the Democratic party were? Wonder wha he wanted to do to Obama for being POTUS whilst black?
Wonder if anyone has called out Hawley’s staggering hypocrisy there and, if so, how he’s responded?
StevoRsays
A friend shared an essay from Umair Haque the other day which, well, bleak and powerful writer :
If there’s one thing that strikes me regularly these days, it’s this observation. Never before has humanity been confronted by such a choice of catastrophes. An age of apocalypse doesn’t just loom — it’s already here. Enjoying another Covid winter? I didn’t think so. And yet…the apathy. Can you feel it?
The reigning sentiment of our age, this age of apocalypse, isn’t anger, disappointment, a fierce determination to fix all the wrongs confronting us, or even a simmering sense of discontent. It’s not even an entirely appropriate sense of despair. Above all, it’s apathy.
That’s bad. Weird. Odd. Because it’s wrong. Standing here on the cusp of civilisational collapse, watching the future implode by the day, the last thing we should feel, as societies, as nations, is apathy. The response does not match the predicament. The mismatch is head-spinning. It doesn’t make sense. Or does it?
By now, America’s approaching what can only really be described as a state of free-fall. Massacres are now regular events. One side of politics is openly authoritarian, and incites them. Social bonds have collapsed. Neighbor kills neighbor. The existence of social groups isn’t to be tolerated, and books are to be banned. The other side opposes this — but all too weakly. And in between them sits a majority, bewildered, in shock, traumatized, confused. What’s happening to our country?
Let me not mince words. America, you’re having a fascist collapse. This is what it is.
But what does this new rising war on woke, death to woke, this moral panic and frenzy and histrionic mania about wokeness really mean — now?
At this point it means that if the elderly gay couple who live around the corner from me, supporting each other through cancer, old age, time, with love and dignity and grace, wear rainbows— that’s not OK. It means that if I talk to the wonderful trans lady up the street, whose doggie plays with little Snowy, and she tells me all her about life — star-studded, glamorous, amazing — and I call her “her,” that’s not OK.
Shall I keep going?
It means that if little kids walk by me clutching books, I’d better check to see if those books are banned, because now, being against woke means being for banning books. It means that I should rally, screaming in rage, around Ron DeSantis, and his new book, though. It means, too, that if a kid’s different, in some way, I shouldn’t sit down and talk to them about it, and empathize about how damned hard it is to be that kind of kid — nope, I should tell them not to talk about it, not to even mention it, not to share their challenges, because, now, being “anti-woke” means even bullying and hectoring little kids.
Can’t find the original piece by Umair Haque that I really wanted to share here – Age of Idiots and Extinction but in a way relieved by that as its horrendously depressing reading. Too doomist.
KGsays
Pierce R. Butler@246,
Further to the irritation you express, the first branch in the evolutionary history of animals is of course far from the first branch in the “tree of life”! That, as far as we know, was that between bacteria and archaea, probably some three billion years earlier, and almost the same length of time before animals evolved. Also worth noting that the claim that comb jellies vs the rest was the first branching among animals is far from a consensus; many relevant experts still favour the sponges vs the rest hypothesis.
Three landmark Supreme Court decisions in 2022 have each been widely criticized by health experts as threats to public health, but a study released Thursday in JAMA Network Open modeled their collective toll. The study found that, by conservative estimates, the decisions will lead to thousands of deaths in the coming years, with tens of thousands more being harmed.
The three decisions included: one from January 13, 2022, that invalidated some COVID-19 workplace protections (National Federation of Independent Business v Department of Labor, Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA)); one on June 23, 2022, that voided some state laws restricting handgun carry (New York State Rifle and Pistol Association Inc v Superintendent of New York State Police (Bruen)); and one on June 24, 2022, that revoked the constitutional right to abortion (Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization).
A group of health researchers, led by Adam Gaffney at Harvard University, modeled how these decisions would impact Americans’ morbidity and mortality in the near future…
A Texas appeals court on Friday dismissed a billionaire’s defamation lawsuit against Democrat Beto O’Rouke that was brought after O’Rourke criticized a $1 million campaign contribution to Republican Gov. Greg Abbott.
The ruling by the Third Court of Appeals in Austin comes more than a year after O’Rourke repeatedly made critical remarks about the donation during a failed run for governor, at one point saying that it “looks like a bribe to me.”
The contribution came from Kelcy Warren, chairman of pipeline company Energy Transfer, which reported about $2.4 billion in earnings related to the catastrophic February 2021 winter storm that sent natural gas prices soaring in Texas…
Donald Trump can proceed with a lawsuit against his niece Mary Trump for providing information to the New York Times for its 2018 report on his taxes, a judge ruled.
New York state court Justice Robert Reed on Friday rejected Mary Trump’s argument that the former president’s lawsuit violated a state law against frivolous litigation “aimed at chilling freedom of speech and the press.”
The ruling is a modest procedural victory for Trump on an otherwise rough day in which he became the first-ever ex-president indicted for federal crimes…
Donald Trump claims that, by acting as a source for the newspaper, Mary Trump violated confidentiality provisions of a 2001 settlement that resolved an estate dispute over the family property business.
In Friday’s ruling, Reed said Trump can advance with a breach-of-contract claim against his niece, while dismissing allegations of unjust enrichment and bad-faith conduct…
A Texas businessman at the center of the scandal that led to the historic impeachment of state Attorney General Ken Paxton was charged Friday with making false statements to mortgage lenders to obtain $172 million in loans.
The federal indictment of real estate developer Nate Paul is the result of a yearslong FBI investigation — a probe Paxton involved his office in, setting off a chain of events that led to a separate federal probe of the attorney general and his impeachment and suspension from office last month.
Paul was charged with eight counts of making false statements while seeking loans from mortgage lenders in the U.S. and Ireland. There was no mention of Paxton or the attorney general’s office during the hearing…
StevoR @281: “Same guy who was cheering on those trying to lynch Trump’s own Vice-President for not doing illegal stuff that he constituitionally could not do right?”
Yep. Josh Hawley is that guy. Hypocrisy too rich to swallow.
Hawley is not the only one. Lots of Republicans are saying that Trump should not be indicted because political opponents of the sitting president should not be harassed by law enforcement. All of them seem to have conveniently forgotten Trump’s “lock them up” campaign speeches. During one campaign debate, Trump said to Hillary Clinton’s face that he was going to put her in jail.
So sorry, Republicans, that Trump can no longer get away with committing crimes right and left. Nope, not sorry.
I sort of held my tongue through most of the revelations and hijinks yesterday. I will share some thoughts later on the particulars of the indictment. (You can do no better than reading Josh Kovensky’s global wrap-up here.) But for now I wanted to share one thought.
That is the sheer ordinariness of the whole story. That may seem like a odd thing to say: ex-President facing multiple federal felony indictments for the first time ever, the bizarre details of this antic clown’s Florida Villa-cum-Hotel stuffed with banker’s boxes of classified documents, the bathroom chandelier, the power glitz jammed together with gaudy dime store aesthetic. But we grant Trump too much by lavishing, wearying too much in the purported weightiness of the moment. It’s very normal. Yes, powerful people get away with a lot. But if you commit crimes repeatedly and brazenly you’re very likely to get charged with one or more crimes, particularly if you’re in the public spotlight.
It’s true that he got away with an endless amount as President. But President’s are unique in American society and law. They’re not above the law but at the federal level they’re mostly in charge of it if they really want to be. And that amounts mostly to the same thing. But he’s not President now.
I’ll go into some particulars later. But the main takeaway from the indictment is that there’s basically no defense against these charges. He wasn’t allowed to have them. He did have them. He denied having them. He hid them, played a comical game of cat and mouse with federal agents while leaving plenty of evidence of the shenanigans. Presidents and high ranking officials are probably entitled to some leeway in their handling of classified materials since their jobs require them to spend so much time with them – a stray document gets folded in with handwritten notes or the text of a speech and whatnot. But clearly this is orders of magnitude and universes away from that. The sheer scale makes that clear. But the clincher is the willful and repeated efforts to hide them and deceive those trying lawfully to retrieve them.
Really the simple possession of them makes it open and shut. The law is clear. But the cat and mouse shenanigans shreds any argument of misunderstanding or accident. The purported defenses make this clear enough, entirely ignoring the particulars and reaching for clumsy whataboutism or lurid claims about banana republics.
If Trump is charged with crimes tied to January 6th or his election subversion efforts in Georgia that will be different. Those are crimes tied to an attempted overthrow of the state, whether or not they’re technically categorized as sedition. That’s not normal. Certainly not for Presidents and ex-Presidents. This is pretty straightforward.
We hear endlessly how everyone not thoroughly in Trump’s thrall wants to ‘move on’ from the man. The first and most important part of that is shaking free of the reality distortion field that surrounds the man, as much for his foes as his followers. He’s hit with charges with evidence of his guilt that is clear and overwhelming and he jumps to the front to declare no one ever thought this could happen or be possible. He didn’t do it … but of course he was perfectly entitled to do it, even though he chose not to. Remember, he could have but chose not to. Got it? He attacks, defames. People get caught up in the frenzy of his seeming invulnerability and transgressive nature, the entertainment and the confusion. They’re wondering what he’ll do next. They’re baffled and suddenly the obvious ceases to be obvious.
Don’t be baffled. You may be thinking somehow there’s no way he’ll actually get convicted of anything. You’re wrong. He probably will. […]
The editorial board for The National Review said one cannot read the allegations outlined in the federal indictment against former President Trump and “not be appalled.”
The editorial board said in a post on Saturday that it has in the past pointed out times that it believes Trump’s opponents have manipulated the law to pursue politically motivated legal claims against him. It added that the members of the board do not like the precedent of a federal prosecutor who serves under the president indicting the president’s lead rival for reelection.
“That said, it is impossible to read the indictment against Trump in the Mar-a-Lago documents case and not be appalled at the way he handled classified documents as an ex-president, and responded to the attempt by federal authorities to reclaim them,” the editorial states.
The board for the conservative news outlet noted that many of the boxes that Trump had moved from the White House to Mar-a-Lago at the end of his presidency only contained newspaper clippings, photos, cards and letters, but they also included hundreds of documents with classified markings.
The information on the documents covered information relating to U.S. nuclear programs, defense capabilities, vulnerabilities and plans for potential retaliatory action in the event of an attack from another country, according to the indictment.
The board said Trump no longer had a right to possess these documents after his term ended, and he stored them “recklessly” in locations like his bedroom, a bathroom and a ballroom at Mar-a-Lago. It also mentioned federal prosecutors’ allegations that Trump ignored requests for the documents to be returned for months and attempted to keep investigators from obtaining the documents he had.
The editorial board argued the “most damning” part of the indictment is the transcript of the conversation Trump had in which he showed one document to a reporter who was not authorized to see it.
“Equally damning, particularly for someone who was and would like again to be the nation’s chief executive, responsible for the enforcement of the laws, is the evidence that Trump not only deceived the investigators and the grand jury, but his own lawyers — knowing and intending that they would consequently obstruct the investigation,” the editorial states.
[…] The board previously declared in November that it would reject Trump as a choice for the Republican nomination for president in 2024.
At least one conservative news organization is appalled by Trump’s actions.
“SEE YOU IN MIAMI ON TUESDAY!!!” former President DONALD TRUMP told his followers last night in a Truth Social post, amid a stream of political attacks, conspiracy theories and typical Trumpian bombast.
It’s a message that portends some volatile days ahead for American democracy.
[…] Already there are materials circulating online calling for a gathering outside the federal courthouse in downtown Miami where Trump will be arraigned Tuesday, though those plans do not have Trump’s imprimatur. “Specific plans for that day are still being developed, according to a Trump campaign aide,” WaPo’s Isaac Arnsdorf and Hannah Knowles report this morning.
The backdrop is an unmistakable rhetorical escalation from Trump’s supporters — and even some of his rivals inside the GOP — some of whom have not only attacked the Justice Department and special counsel JACK SMITH but have cast Trump’s indictment as a politically apocalyptic moment.
Consider how Rep. CLAY HIGGINS (R-La.) appeared to fan the flames in a Thursday night tweet: “This is a perimeter probe from the oppressors. Hold. rPOTUS has this. Buckle up. 1/50K know your bridges. Rock steady calm. That is all.”
For those of you who don’t speak conspiracy theory, those are apparent references to the “real president of the United States,” military-scale maps and guerilla warfare tactics. “This isn’t a metaphor. This isn’t slow civil war,” said author and radicalization expert JEFF SHARLET. “This is a congressman calling for the real thing.”
To be sure: Trump warned of “potential death & destruction” ahead of his April hush-money indictment in New York, and while some supporters (and counter-protesters) rallied outside the Manhattan courthouse, there was no significant violence. And you can be certain federal authorities will be taking every precaution to prevent a riot, or anything close to it. […] officials are already ramping up security for Tuesday.
But three days is a lot of time for Trump and his allies to continue raising the temperature. In the past 24 hours alone, Trump has sent more than 80 messages on Truth Social, including attacks on Smith as “a Coward and a Thug,” renewals of his false stolen-election claims and, early this morning, a parody video of himself driving a golf ball and knocking Biden down. “AMERICA WENT TO SLEEP LAST NIGHT WITH TEARS IN ITS EYES,” he wrote this morning. “SOMEDAY SOON, HOWEVER, IT WILL BE ABLE TO WIPE AWAY THOSE TEARS AND SMILE, BIGGER THAN EVER BEFORE.”
Later today, Trump will make his first live remarks since the indictment […] We’ll be watching closely how he calls upon his supporters to react to his growing legal peril. Will he simply urge Republicans to keep filling his campaign coffers? Or will things take a darker turn? […]
When conditions fluctuate, they can rapidly recode key proteins in their nerve cells, ensuring critical neurological activities remain functional when temperatures drop dramatically.
[…]
an intermediate molecule called messenger RNA […] travels from the nucleus into the surrounding goo to […] protein-building machines. […] In most organisms, this is pretty straightforward […] squids, cuttlefish, and octopuses can tweak the RNA after it has left the nucleus
Zelenskyy says ‘counteroffensive, defensive actions’ taking place in Ukraine.
Ukraine’s General Staff said Saturday that “heavy battles” were ongoing, with 34 clashes over the previous day in the country’s industrial east.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Saturday that counteroffensive and defensive actions were underway against Russian forces, asserting that his top commanders were in a “positive” mindset as their troops engaged in intense fighting along the front line.
The Ukrainian leader, at a Kyiv news conference alongside Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, responded to a question about Russian President Vladimir Putin’s comment a day earlier that Ukraine’s counteroffensive had started — and Ukrainian forces were taking “significant losses.”
Zelenskyy said that “the counteroffensive, defensive actions are taking place in Ukraine. I will not speak about which stage or phase they are in.”
“I am in touch with our commanders of different directions every day,” he added, citing the names of five of Ukraine’s top military leaders. “Everyone is positive. Pass this on to Putin.”
Trudeau, the first foreign leader to visit Ukraine since devastating floods caused by a breach in a Dnieper River dam, offered up monetary, military and moral support for Ukraine. He pledged $500 million in new military aid, on top of $8 billion that Canada has already provided since the war began in February 2022, and announced $10 million for humanitarian assistance for the flood response.
Trudeau said the dam’s collapse was “a direct consequence of Russia’s war,” but he didn’t blame Moscow directly.
Ukraine’s General Staff said Saturday that “heavy battles” were ongoing, with 34 clashes over the previous day in the country’s industrial east. It gave no details but said Russian forces were “defending themselves” and launching air and artillery strikes in Ukraine’s southern Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions. […]
Ottawa MPP attacked while attending rally attempting to keep trans and queer individuals safe
Ottawa Centre MPP Joel Harden was assaulted by an anti-trans protestor while attending a rally in support of queer and trans rights in Ottawa Friday morning.
Harden, who recently spoke at the Ontario Legislation on Thursday about the importance of protection for queer and trans youth as the country celebrates Pride Month, was punched several times by the anti-trans protestor…
No identification of the puncher, no mention of an arrest.
JAKARTA, Indonesia — Indonesia’s Anak Krakatau volcano has erupted, spewing ash as high as 3 kilometers (2 miles) into the air, officials said Saturday.
The volcano island located in Indonesia’s Sunda Strait between the main Java and Sumatra islands has erupted at least seven times since late Friday, Indonesia’s Volcanology and Geological Hazard Mitigation Center said.
It was the longest eruption since the explosive collapse of the mountain caused a deadly tsunami in 2018 along the coasts of Java and Sumatra, the center said. There were no casualties reported in the latest eruption and no evacuation order was issued. The nearest settlement is 16 1/2 kilometers (10 1/2 miles) away.
The center’s closed-circuit camera showed lava flares and the volcano continuously erupting until Saturday morning.
The second-highest alert on a scale of four has remained in place since 2018. Authorities in May warned residents and tourists to stay 5 kilometers (3 miles) from the crater. Up till then, people used to trek to the top to observe the nature’s spectacle.
Scientists at the center said that since the 2018 eruption and collapse, Anak Krakatau island is now only about a quarter of its original size.
A 2019 study by the center shed light on the power of the tsunami that crashed into more than 300 kilometers (186 miles) of coastline in Sumatra and Java. More than 430 people died in the waves that were 2 meters (6.6 feet) or higher and 40,000 were displaced.
The center said that the peak of the crater was 159 meters (520 feet) high, compared to 338 meters (1,108 feet) before the December 2018 eruption.
Anak Krakatau, which means “child of Kratakau,” is the offspring of the famous Krakatau, whose monumental eruption in 1883 triggered a period of global cooling.
Side note for anyone who has seen–or even heard of–the movie “Krakatoa East of Java”…Krakatoa (preferred modern spelling is Krakatau) is west of Java.
I wouldn’t be so sure about that. These things have a timeline. There is initial outrage, but over time, the less insane Republicans will see that the charges against Trump are well-founded. You will see the argument (I have already seen it in a few places) that Trump should drop out so that he can concentrate on his legal problems. And there is the possibility that other of his legal problems could get worse. An indictment from Georgia for election tampering would be severe, and completely separate from the classified documents case.
lotharloosays
but over time, the less insane Republicans will see that the charges against Trump are well-founded.
I really admire your faith in any portion of the Republican voters. I am not at all optimistic. In fact, I am so ready to remove the entire human race from the category of “intelligent species”.
Oggie: Mathomsays
I fully expect Trump, even if he is sitting in a prison cell, to get the GOP nomination. His supporters are too radicalized to accept anyone else. There is precedent. Debs, in 1920, was the nominee of the Social Democratic Party, and received about a million votes while sitting in a jail cell. Just picture other candidates (state, local and federal level), the Law and Order GOP, the we-are-the-only-ones-who-care-about-national-security GOP, the Support the Cops GOP, trying to distance themselves from Criminal Trump while at the same time trying to convince his supporters to vote for them. Would be interesting. As in, a severe-shortage-of-popcorn interesting.
There is no other way to explain the rabid adherence of his disciples, willing to overlook his and his family’s corruption, his putrid morality, and his rank incompetence.
There is a racist, toxic, marginalized deplorable community, and Trump gave it voice. And in return, they’ve pledged their undying allegiance. Which means that they will never have a problem with anything he does, even if it’s stealing our nation’s top secrets.
They don’t care if Trump carts off and shares our top military vulnerabilities with Kid Rock or anyone else. They don’t care if Trump leaks our military contingency plans against our enemies, potentially costing the lives of our troops. They don’t care if our nuclear secrets are spilled on some tacky Trump carpeting. And they certainly don’t care that he conspires with his staff and lawyers to lie to the national archives and the FBI so he doesn’t have to turn anything over.
Some are feigning outrage like “oh noes, we’re politicizing the Justice Department,” as if they weren’t the same people leading “lock her up!” chants in 2016. Other are arguing that “let the voters decide” is how the rich and powerful should face justice, because why should they face the same laws and system as the plebes?
But this is the modern conservative movement, prone to violence and destruction, and their rhetoric is heating up.
It is true—right-wing violence is, by far, the leading cause of deadly attacks since 9-11. [chart at the link]
In its report, “Terrorism in America after 9-11: What is the Threat to the United States Today?,” the think tank New America found that far-right violence outpaced Jihadist attacks in the number of people killed. I would argue that “far right wing” and the incels are all of the same piece, emerging from the same dark web sewer pits, and listening to the same destructive voices.
That mixture of violence worship with rapturous Trump support culminated in the Jan. 6 coup attempt—an event that we, as a country, still haven’t properly addressed. How could we? Its instigator is the leading Republican candidate! HIs cult remains alive and well.
In a sane world, Trump’s supporters would process this week’s indictments and accept that their hero is not just flawed, but fundamentally broken. The top lines of the indictment are bad, the details are even worse. Here was their hero stealing America’s secrets, then carelessly dumping them all over the White House front drive, an open stage, a bathroom, he didn’t give a shit.
And when the National Archives came to collect, and after them the FBI, Trump colluded with his lawyers and staff—on tape!—to hide the materials, to the point of carting off boxes of it on his private plane to his Bedminster, N.J. golf course. He also admitted—on tape!—that he knew the documents were not declassified. He just didn’t give a damn.
It’s truly shocking that anyone would defend this. The same crowd that had conniptions over Hillary Clinton’s emails—despite there never being any evidence of any crime—are now acting like it’s no big deal for a private citizen to steal our nation’s top secrets, store them behind a cheap but very secure Walmart shower curtain, and then lie to everyone about holding on to them. Those documents weren’t his. He knew it, and he actively fought to keep them by lying and hiding the materials.
Conservative terrorists don’t care.
Kari Lake: “If you want to get to Trump, you’re going to have to go through me, and 75 million Americans just like me. And most of us are card carrying members of the NRA. That’s not a threat, that’s a public service announcement.” [video at the link]
Kari Lake is no fringe conservative figure. She was the Republican Party’s candidate for governor last year in Arizona. She got 1.27 million votes, and only lost the election by 17,000 to Democrat Katie Hobbs. And yet there she is threatening armed insurrection. [Snipped Clay Higgins threat, which is covered in comment 252]
[Update to nonsense spouted by Clay Higgins] Now he claims that by covering his threatening Friday tweet, he had “Manipulated the MSM to establish deep commo.” Okay champ. Go with that. “Copy this” means he expects his followers (whether real or in his head) to acknowledge his order to (for now) stand down. And in case they don’t want to listen, he claims that by acting, they’d be falling into some trap that “they” laid.
Over at Patriot.win, the successors to the infamous subreddit r/TheDonald, people are having a rough go. Vice collated some of the standout hits.
“We need to start killing these traitorous fuckstains,” wrote one Trump supporter on The Donald, a rabidly pro-Trump message board that played a key role in planning the January 6 attack on the Capitol. Another user added: “It’s not gonna stop until bodies start stacking up. We are not civilly represented anymore and they’ll come for us next. Some of us, they already have.” […]
“Perhaps it’s time for that Civil War that the damn DemoKKKrats have been trying to start for years now,” a member of The Donald wrote. Another, referencing former President Barack Obama and former secretary of State Hillary Clinton, said: “FACT: OUR FOREFATHERS WOULD HAVE HUNG THESE TWO FOR TREASON…”
I went over this morning to check out the vibe, and they were responding to Trump’s Truth Social posting that said, in its all-caps glory, “AMERIA WENT TO SLEEP LAST NIGHT WITH TEARS IN ITS EYES. SOMEDAY SOON, HOWEVER, IT WILL BE ABLE TO WIPE AWAY THOSE TEARS AND SMILE, BIGGER THAN EVER BEFORE, FOR WE WILL HAVE DEFEATED THE RADICAL LEFT MARXISTS, FASCISTS, COMMUNISTS, LUNATICS, & DERANGED MANIACS, & CLEARED THE PATH TO PUT AMERICA FIRST & THEN, QUICKLY, MAKE AMERIA GREAT AGAIN!!!”
You want to see a cult in action? [Screen grab at the link: “I love this man,” “Send him money.” etc. etc.]
And we’re so scared guys. [Screen grab at the link: “Shit is hitting a breaking point,” “Even Dems I know are scared that Biden and crew have all gone too far.” etc. etc.]
Ultimately, we just don’t deserve someone as selfless as Trump. [Screen grab at the link: “Trump is an American hero […] In my life time I haven’t seen a person persecuted the way Trump has been persecuted. Only a righteous hero could take so much unjust punishment.” etc.]
Searching around their site, it looks like many of the offending comments Vice plucked out for their story have been deleted, with commenters hushing each other because “the FBI is listening.”
Somewhere along the Zaporizhzhia front. [Tweet and video of “A bunch of orcs abandoning their positions leaving behind equipment and the wounded.”]
This strike is near Crimea. Vladimir Saldo was supposedly wounded. He is the collaborationist head of Russian-occupied Kherson Oblast. [Tweet, videos and map at the link]
Gauletier is a term from WWII for Germans installed to head occupied territories. [Tweet and video at the link]
The Dnipro River flooding has apparently caused the Kinburn Spit to be cut off from the mainland. Russians are moving around via helicopter. Sounds like a great time to send in some special forces with Stingers. [Tweets and videos at the link]
The reservoir is now a river again. [Tweet and before/after video at the link]
Sucks to run over your own mines. [Tweet and video at the link]
Speaking of mines, whoever came up with this demining. idea is a freakin’ genius. There is nothing sensitive about the video [Tweet and video at the link]
Any day a thermobaric launcher is destroyed is a good day. [Tweet and video at the link]
Meanwhile, over in the People’s Republic of Belgorod … [Tweet and video of artillery fire from anti-russian “Freedom Fighters.”]
Leopards are on the prowl. [video at the link]
Chechnyan militia head Ramzan Kadyrov explains in this interview how his relationship with Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin soured. [Tweet and text at the link]
The biggest thing I take from this is the high stakes for the Ministry of Defense. Their heads are on the chopping block. They’ll be the scapegoats, the ones thrown under the bus when Ukraine’s offensive succeeds. [Tweet discussing Putin’s recent remarks, “things are going as planned.” “[…] the Russian army leadership has clearly briefed and convinced Putin that the Russian forces can hold on against an Ukrainian attack, which is why Putin has decided to speak publicly about the offensive. This means that the army leadership takes full responsibility for what happens next. They will be scapegoated if Ukraine reaches even a moderate success. Remember, in Russia it’s always about blame, you don’t want to take responsibility, it’s extremely risky. Putin claims that the main stage of the offensive hasn’t happened yet, he states that all the first attacks were repulsed. This goes with the general Russian information strategy during this offensive, in which they claim victory before the main battle has occurred. […]]
Good riddance. [Tweet and images regarding National Bolshevik Andrei Keller being “denazified” in Mariinka]
Canada is stepping up to the plate: [tweets, image and video at the link]
The rescue of animals continues. This dog drifted on debris all the way to Odesa. [Several tweets, images and videos at the link]
Tethyssays
Despite the media and various elected officials constantly trying to spin everything into a story about election front-runners, a Grand Jury in Florida has obviously voted to indict the orange one. I wish various news sources would start reporting on Espionage, and running stories about other people that have been indicted for espionage. The election is next year but the media act as if the voters didn’t overwhelmingly reject orangini in 2020. If his base was 30% before he attempted an insurrection, it’s bleedingly obvious that he is not going to be a viable contender in between his trial dates.
I will assume that jury included Republicans and people who voted for the crook. We have only seen a few photos of the evidence, and I’m sure there will be further bombshells that shall emerge as the case progresses.
I’m sure that the loud mouthed fools in Congress that are parroting the ‘unfair attack’ talking points have a significant overlap with those who sought pardons in the wake of Jan 6th.
That case is still in the Grand Jury phase, and of course Georgia also has its case in the works.
Blah, blah, blah. Pretty much as expected … still fucking terrible. Trump spoke. The New York Times covered the speech:
Former President Donald J. Trump on Saturday cast both his indictments by prosecutors and his bid for the White House as part of a “final battle” with “corrupt” forces that he maintained are destroying the country.
The apocalyptic language came in Mr. Trump’s first public appearance since the 38-count federal indictment against him and a personal aide were unsealed — and in a state where he may soon face additional charges for his efforts to pressure Georgia election officials to overturn his 2020 election loss there. It was Mr. Trump’s second indictment in less than three months.
“This is the final battle,” Mr. Trump said in the speech to several thousand activists, delegates and members of the news media who gathered in Columbus, Ga., at a brick building that was once an iron works that manufactured mortars, guns and cannons for the Confederate Army in the Civil War.
“With you at my side,” he continued, “we will demolish the Deep State, we will expel the warmongers from our government.” He added: “We will drive out the globalists, we will cast out the Communists, we will throw off the sick political class that hates our country, we will rout the fake news media,” and said “We will expose the RINOs, we will defeat Joe Biden and we will liberate America from these villains once and for all.”
“Either the Communists win and destroy America, or we destroy the Communists,” the former president said. He made similar remarks about the “Deep State,” using the pejorative term he uses both for U.S. intelligence agencies and more broadly for any federal government bureaucrat he perceives as a political opponent.
Mr. Trump went on to describe the Justice Department as “a sick nest of people that needs to be cleaned out immediately.” He called the special counsel, Jack Smith, “deranged” and “openly a Trump hater.” He attacked Mr. Smith’s wife as “even more of a Trump hater. I wish her a lot of luck.”
And he attacked by name Fani Willis, the district attorney of Fulton County, Ga., who is weighing criminal charges against Mr. Trump, calling her “a lunatic Marxist” and accusing her of ignoring violent crime and instead spending all of her time “working on getting Trump.”
Mr. Trump leavened an at-times menacing speech with humor, declaring at one point, “Every time I fly over a blue state I get a subpoena.”
The crowd cheered and laughed throughout, and when he mentioned Democrats, the hall was filled with boos and jeers. At one mention of Hillary Clinton, a woman started chanting, “Lock her up.”
[…] Women wore bejeweled Trump caps. Men wore caps reading, “God, Guns and Trump.” References to the 2020 election were everywhere: T-shirts read “Trump won,” and plastered on delegates’ chests and backs were stickers bashing voting machines.
[…] Like several other state parties around the country, the Republican Party in Georgia has been taken over by the hard-right, ardently pro-Trump base.
The Republican governor of Georgia, Brian Kemp, is loathed by the former president for refusing to assist his efforts to overturn the 2020 election. Mr. Kemp has been forced to build his own political operation independent from a state party that despises him. The governor did not show up to his party’s convention. Nor did Georgia’s secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, whom Mr. Trump pressured on a taped call to “find” him enough votes to overturn the state’s 2020 election results.
Had they shown up to speak, those two Georgia G.O.P. leaders, who were re-elected last year, would have struggled to be heard over the boos.
Instead of receiving their own state’s Republican governor, the Georgia G.O.P. on Friday welcomed as a keynote speaker Kari Lake, the failed Arizona candidate for governor, who railed against Mr. Trump’s latest indictment.
“We see it’s just a bunch of bogus lies,” Ms. Lake said of Mr. Trump’s indictment in an interview. “He’s the front-runner, and they have to constantly throw things in front of his path to stop him.” […]
I read that paragraph to Wife. Wife, without missing a beat, said, “And they’ll still be doping the athletes.”
The world record for “doping related death in the most niche sport” must be a Russian man who died in a sauna bathing contest in Finland. His Finnish opponent only very narrowly survived, and required extensive medical treatment.
Competitive sauna bathing (ie. who can withstand the heat the longest) is a classic Finnish expression of toxic masculinity. It’s supposedly not that dangerous, if the sauna is very hot, so that you get out when your skin starts to burn, before you get hyperthermia/dehydration.
Back in the 2000s, one small town in Finland tried to turn this thing into a local spectator event, called International Sauna Championship. It went on for some years. People from several countries attended, though the top “athletes” always seemed to be from Finland, Russia, or Estonia. I think that part, and this story generally, isn’t about national doping culture, but about national sauna culture, international sports culture and doping.
Anyway, it didn’t take long for doping to become an issue. Since it was basically just a game of pain tolerance, the contestants were simply taking painkillers, which was a recipe for burn injuries. After the lethal/near lethal incident happened, in the final one-to-one match one year around 2010, the event was discontinued.
Oggie: Mathomsays
Lynna @307:
IANAL, but doesn’t that sound an awful lot like incitement to riot?
Federal prosecutors are investigating possible campaign finance violations in connection with an undercover operation based in Wyoming that aimed to infiltrate progressive groups, political campaigns and the offices of elected representatives before the 2020 election, according to two people familiar with the matter and documents related to the case.
As part of the operation, revealed in 2021 by The New York Times, participants used large campaign donations and cover stories to gain access to their targets and gather dirt to sabotage the reputations of people and organizations considered threats to the agenda of President Donald Trump.
In recent days, prosecutors have issued subpoenas for at least two of the people the Times identified as being part of the operation, including Richard Seddon, a former British spy, and Susan Gore, a Wyoming heir to the Gore-Tex fortune, the people said. The subpoenas were reported earlier by CNN…
What if the Zaporizhzhia attacks are actually a feint? [Tweet at the link: “Pro-Russian telegram accounts are reporting Ukrainian “movement” on the Kharkiv front. Waiting for further reports to corroborate.”] Starobilsk, here we come!
@Tendar Since both sides are already reporting it, I will release the information I collected, too. There is anyway a delay of this information and therefore does not compromise OPSEC.
Almost the entire forward defense line of the Russian army near Velyka Novosilka – around 20 km long – has been wiped out. Ukrainian forces liberated Neskuchne and Novodonets’ke.
Based on Russian drone footage we know that Ukrainian forces are already operating further south, hammering Russian forces in Storozheve and the little village of Blahodatne, nearby. [map at the link]
The fog of war is thick. Ukraine has maintained strict operational security (OpSec), while Russia keeps replaying that one failed Ukrainian assault, the one in which they lost a Leopard 2 battle tank and up to 10 M2 Bradleys infantry fighting vehicles.
New video from the Ukrainian side shows that the Western gear did their job—the crews were saved. [Tweet and video at the link]
With subpar Soviet gear, infantry ride on the roof of the vehicle, exposed to shrapnel from artillery and mine blasts. Not so with the good stuff we’ve been sending. An American C-17 cargo aircraft can carry three Bradleys at once, and the U.S. has 223 of them. With thousands more in storage and in the process of being phased out from active service, the United States has plenty more to replenish any Ukrainian losses.
You know what the U.S. can’t send over on C-17s? Trained and experienced Ukrainian soldiers. The gear is doing what it’s supposed to do—protect lives—so they can live to fight another day, ever wiser.
Losses are certainly to be expected. Heavy losses. This gear wasn’t sent to sit in warehouses and look menacing. It was sent to be used, against a near-peer opponent with the tools to destroy those vehicles. But given other thinner lines across the front, why did Ukraine decide to hit Russia at its most fortified point?
Ukraine’s current line of advance is into literally the densest network of defensive entrenchments anywhere on the map. [map at the link]
The reason for this overwhelming defensive display is Melitopol—the transportation-logistical hub of the region, and Ukraine’s gateway to Putin’s precious Crimea. Crimea is critically important strategically to Russia, because with its port at Sevastopol, Russia can (theoretically) dominate the Black Sea. [map at the link]
Putin has accomplished one solitary war goal—establishing a “land bridge” from mainland Russia (just east of Mariupol) to Crimea, through Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia oblasts. That lessens the importance of the Kerch Bridge to keep the peninsula supplied, as it is vulnerable to Ukrainian attack and disruption.
Melitpol would further require the retreat of all Russian forces from all of occupied Zaporizhzhia oblast—including Enerhodar, home of the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant. There just no way to easily and properly supply Russian positions without Melitopol. Its importance is critical, on so many levels, that it makes sense why Russia would lard up the defenses, and why Ukraine is hitting them head on anyway.
But before Ukraine can threaten Melitopol, it has to get to Tokmak, itself a key regional logistical hub. Look at how all of the region’s highways radiate out from the city, including the only rail line running through the land bridge. [map at the link]
Ukrainian forces are moving in the direction of Robotyne. Looking at this map of Russian defensive lines, I count seven layers between the two towns. Ukraine has only gotten through the first line, as far as we know, and that was a reconnaissance screening line. Once Ukraine reaches Tokmak, it’s another 75 kilometers to Melitopol, with Russian defensive lines holding positions on a ridge that runs parallel the entire highway. [map at the link]
Interestingly, those other side roads aren’t fortified, so once Ukraine reaches Tokmak and bypasses its southern defensive lines (notice how Russia has ringed the entire city), the liberators might have some options to bypass that ridge-line defense.
Once at Melitopol:
– Russia’s forces in Ukraine are split in half
– Russia can no longer supply Crimea by land, putting pressure on the Kerch Bridge
– Russia surrenders its single war success—its precious land bridge
– Unable to supply its forces, Russia will have to withdraw from all of occupied Zaporizhzhia oblast
– Ukraine will have a free stroll down to the Azov Sea
– From coastal positions, the Kerch Bridge will be around 150 kms away, in range of Storm Shadow cruise missiles (250 kms). Just as importantly, Ukrainian aviation may be able to risk sorties over the Azov Sea to launch heavier guided ordinance against the bridge
Related, Russia just cut water off to Crimea. And to confirm what I wrote a couple of days ago, the mouth of the canal is indeed dry: [Tweet and video at the link]
With reservoirs topped off in the peninsula, Russia will have water for about a year. The results won’t be immediately felt. But it creates mid-term pressures for Russia to manage.
With the land bridge and the Kerch Bridge cut off, Russia will face the same challenge in the peninsula that it faced when it occupied the northern part of Kherson oblast—how to supply without reliable sources of transportation.
Shipping will be vulnerable to Ukrainian anti-ship missiles and drones. Cargo flights will present lumbering targets for F-16s carrying long-range missiles. The situation in the peninsula will become, over time, untenable. It may be enough to force Russia to the peace table. And if not?
Western production of artillery shells is ramping up, both in procuring new sources (Pakistan, South Korea), and in reestablishing manufacturing lines in both Europe and the United States. Russia will be forced to defend as sanctions decimate its manufacturing capacity as its allies, other than Iran, refuse or are unable to step up.
The U.S. has thousands of M1 Abrams battle tanks and M2 Bradleys in storage, ready to be retrofitted for the long haul, if necessary. What does Russia have?
Russia has Donald Trump, and the hope that his return to the White House knocks the United States out of the war effort and out of NATO entirely. In the end, that hope may be the only thing keeping Russia in the war.
—————————
Ukraine has claimed dozens of artillery kills per day for the last week or two. And some of those videos are coming out. [Tweet and video at the link]
The rocket detonates above the GRAD, shredding it with tungsten balls (you can see the spread of the shrapnel in the dirt around the target). Ukraine has been using GMLRS (launched by HIMARS launchers) to take out buildings and supply depots, as it lacked the cruise missiles that NATO forces would use for those purposes. Now, Ukraine is using HIMARS the same way NATO would—to take out artillery and, if Russian sources are to be believed, even trenches.
————————-
What a sad, sad, pathetic society, Russia is.
To cheer up the inhabitants of Mariupol and take their minds off having to live in a destroyed city with few functioning public services, Russia has sent them a circus with a troupe of performing beavers. [video of clumsy beavers clearing low hurdles is available at the link]
I would take to Vodka too, if this was my reality.
The Age of the Idiot Versus the Age of Extinction
Hello, This Is the End of the World Calling, Would You Like To Survive? Press One for “Yes”
By Umair Haque
Eudaimonia and Co
Huh. Now saying this is a “Members only story” (Fuck I hate how online places do that.) yet I was able to read it before…
Oh well, THIS is the one I mentioned but couldn’t then find in my #282 above here. Again, you have been warned – extremely grim read. If you can read it. If you want to..
StevoRsays
Meanwhile in fascinating stellar evolution and possible soon tobe supernovae news – a Woldf rayet star called BELL 1 :
..a Wolf-Rayet star is a massive star that is at an advanced stage of its evolution and is in the process of shedding tremendous amounts of mass at an incredibly high rate. This class of star is named after French astronomers Charles-Joseph-Étienne Wolf and Georges-Antoine-Pons Rayet who first classified them in 1867.
The typical size of a Wolf-Rayet star is over 20 times the mass of the sun, and they have temperatures that range around 45,000 degrees Fahrenheit to 90,000 degrees Fahrenheit (or 25,000 to 50,000 degrees Celsius). This is much hotter than our sun, which has an average temperature of around 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit (5,500 degrees Celsius). The luminosity of Wolf-Rayet stars is greater than that of the sun by as much as a million times.
In other news :
Dr. Joseph Dituri set a new record for the longest time living underwater without depressurization during his stay at Jules’ Undersea Lodge, submerged beneath 22 feet of water in a Key Largo lagoon.
The diving explorer and medical researcher shattered the previous mark of 73 days, two hours and 34 minutes set by two Tennessee professors at the same lodge in 2014.
“It was never about the record,” Dituri said. “It was about extending human tolerance for the underwater world and for an isolated, confined, extreme environment.”
Brittney Griner and her Phoenix Mercury teammates were confronted by a “provocateur” at a Dallas airport on Saturday.
The WNBA said in a statement it was looking into the team’s run-in with a ”social media figure” whose ”actions were inappropriate and unfortunate.”…
A Twitter user posted a video that appears to show a part of the confrontation where the individual asks questions of Griner about ”why she hates America?” …
In February, the Southern Baptist Convention’s Executive Committee voted to oust Fern Creek for having a woman pastor — the same issue it cited for expelling four other churches, including the massive California-based Saddleback Church. All Baptist churches are independent, so the convention can’t tell them what to do, but it can decide which churches are “not in friendly cooperation,” the official verbiage for an expulsion.
Fern Creek and Saddleback are appealing the decision to the SBC’s annual meeting being held Tuesday and Wednesday in New Orleans…
Five centuries ago, Martin Luther, a German monk, initiated a split in Christianity that came to be known as the Protestant Reformation. After the Reformation, deep divisions between Protestants and Catholics contributed to wars, hostility and violence in Europe and America. For centuries, each side denounced the other and sought to convert its followers.
Then, in the early 1900s, ambitious Protestants in the U.S. attempted the unthinkable. Building on ideas circulating in Europe, they took charge of an effort to negotiate the reunion of Christianity. They failed, of course. Strange as it might now seem, their effort is nevertheless informative. Here’s why.
How it started
By 1900, atheists and agnostics were becoming more prominent in the U.S. Anxious Protestant religious leaders started to argue in favor of a united Christianity to stop the spread of these ideas…
A few excerpts from Trump’s North Carolina speech, (he gave two speeches yesterday, one in Georgia and one in North Carolina.)
Trump: When I left, Venezuela was ready to collapse. We would have taken it over, we would have gotten all that oil.
Trump claims that while president he was on a call with Russia and Saudi where he pleaded for higher oil prices [video at the link]
Trump claims that when he became president there were “sadists” working at the VA who “would beat up old wonderful soldiers. Beat the hell out of them. They got their jollies out of it. They’re sick. And we weren’t allowed to fire them.”
Trump goes out of his way bring up Jack Smith’s wife and describe her as a “Trump-hater” [Trump did that twice.]
Trump notes his crowd is more enthused about bigotry than they are for tax cuts: “It’s amazing how strongly people feel about that. I talk about cutting taxes, people go like that, I talk about transgender everybody goes crazy. Five years ago you didn’t know what the hell it was”
Trump takes credit for “killing Roe v Wade” while lying about Democrats being in support of baby murder
Commentary:
[…] He literally brags about raising oil prices to “save the oil companies”!
Let’s pause a moment to appreciate that the Republican Party, crying about high gas prices during the midterm, worship their cult hero who brags about demanding higher gas prices.
Then he complains Biden lowered gas prices by releasing strategic oil reserves before the election.
Uh, thanks for the campaign ad material, Donnie boy!
Now he wants to kill American tourist industry. [Trump proposed that foreigners be charged a 15 percent tax when they enter the United States. Video at the link.]
Anyone have a clue about what this 15% would apply to? We already make a fortune from tourists. Pre-COVID, foreign visitors spent $233.5 billion in the U.S., or $640 million every single day. I suspect we’re close or back to those pre-pandemic levels.
So anyway, yes, Trump is back. But I certainly like it a lot better now that he’s under double-indictment. Regardless, beating him won’t be easy, so we need the reminder that he is an existentialist threat to this country we love so much. And while it’s fun to watch Republicans beat up on each other, and there’ll be plenty of that in the coming months, we’ll need to be ready to gear up soon to challenge this grave threat.
Former attorney general Bill Barr says the Trump indictment is “damning.”
Former attorney general Bill Barr said Sunday morning that he believed that Donald Trump is in real trouble with the latest indictment against him for mishandling classified documents. “I was shocked by the degree of sensitivity of these documents and how many there were, frankly,” Barr told Fox News’ Shannon Bream. “If even half of it is true, he’s toast. It is a very detailed indictment and it’s very, very damning.” Barr noted that despite Trump’s insistence that the prosecution is a politically motivated witch hunt, “I think the counts under the Espionage Act … are solid counts.” [video at the link]
When it comes to Trump, Barr has been all over the map since leaving his post running the Department of Justice. But his assessment of the new indictment may be telling given that just last month, Barr was on Fox News decrying Trump’s first—first!—indictment in New York on charges related to his alleged payment of hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels. He told host Larry Kudlow that the New York indictment was an “abomination” and a weak case, “the epitome of the abuse of prosecutorial power.” He dubbed the legal theory behind the indictment “pathetically weak…held together with chicken wire, paper clips and rubber bands. It’s a lousy case.”
The fact that Barr is conceding that the Justice Department may have a solid case against Trump in the classified documents case suggests that the charges may be far more serious for Trump that the former president likes to acknowledge. Trump’s most die-hard supporters, however, still remain unconvinced.
Also making the rounds of the Sunday talk shows this week was Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), chairman of the House judiciary committee, who was deeply involved with Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election. Jordan told CNN’s Dana Bash that the new indictment was “most political thing” he’d ever seen. “Dana, he said time and time again he declassified all this material,” Jordan claimed. “If he wants to store material in a box in a bathroom, if he wants to store it in a box on a stage, he can do that.” [video at the link]
Jordan’s assertions are directly contradicted by Trump himself, who was captured on tape bragging to people at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, that the military secrets he was sharing with them had not, in fact, been declassified. “Secret. This is secret information. Look, look at this,” Trump says during the meeting, according to the transcript obtained by CNN. “This was done by the military and given to me…. Except it is like, highly confidential. Secret. This is secret information.”
Excerpts from the New York Times article “Trump Supporters’ Violent Rhetoric in His Defense Disturbs Experts”:
[…] On Instagram on Saturday morning, Mr. Trump posted a mash-up video of himself swinging a golf club on the course and an animation of a golf ball hitting President Biden in the head, superimposed with footage of Mr. Biden falling at a public event in recent days after he tripped over something onstage.
[…] On Pete Santilli’s talk show, the conservative provocateur declared that if he were the commandant of the Marine Corps, he would order “every single Marine” to grab President Biden, “throw him in freakin’ zip ties in the back of a freakin’ pickup truck,” and “get him out of the White House.”
One of his guests, Lance Migliaccio, said that if it were legal and he had access, he would “probably walk in and shoot” Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and someone Mr. Trump has identified as one of his enemies. […]
[…] on Fox, host Jesse Watters announced the news by saying that “the president, former, calls it the boxes hoax” and suggesting that the indictment was an attempt to distract attention from the House GOP’s investigations of President Joe Biden.
The situation rapidly devolved from there. Over the following hours, Fox’s hosts and the menagerie of Trump cronies and sycophants the network put on the air unleashed unhinged demagoguery.
Trump lawyer Alina Habba called it evidence that we live in a “sick world” with “a two-tier system of justice,” citing the lack of legal punishment for Biden, his son Hunter, Barack Obama, and Hillary Clinton.
Former Trump aide Stephen Miller claimed that “history will record today as the day that we ceased to be a democratic republic and we became a people ruled by an unelected government bureaucracy.”
Former Trump acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker called it “a really sad day for our country” and “the stuff of banana republics.”
For right-wing activist Ned Ryun, it was “late-stage republic behavior. When you use the legal system as a weapon against political opponents, you’ve abandoned the rule of law.”
“What’s going on here is a disgusting disgrace. It is war on Trump, it is war on the Republican Party, and it is a war on the republic,” Fox host Mark Levin screamed. “You have crossed the Rubicon twice, which has never been done, and we will never forgive you — never, ever, and that’s the bottom line,” he added.
“It is a dark day in America,” concluded longtime Trump adviser and Fox host Sean Hannity. “There is no equal justice. There is no equal application of our laws.” He added, “Our system of justice has now been weaponized beyond belief and this country is in serious trouble.”
Fox’s furious denunciations may have taken the issue off the table for Trump’s would-be presidential rivals. When Fox’s Harris Faulkner brought on Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), who is theoretically running for president against Trump, to discuss the indictment, she asked him, “The bottom line is, you’re a Republican, this was a Republican president, and look at what has happened. Your reaction?” Scott took the hint and issued a rambling response that avoided directly criticizing Trump.
Fox’s over-the-top response is familiar. While some have suggested that the network and its Murdoch owners have turned on the former president, Fox always rises to Trump’s defense at his moments of legal peril.
[…] The throughline is that any legal attack on Trump is inherently corrupt and a signal that America has been lost — and that, if Trump is brought down, Fox’s viewers may be next.
Trump needs the powerful propaganda apparatus of Fox to keep his supporters in line and his primary opponents at bay, and the network’s hosts and executives are happy to oblige. But we’ve seen the disastrous consequences that can come from Fox’s overheated rhetoric in the former president’s service.
KGsays
Reginald Selkirk@324,
We’ll see if they can find anything to charge Sturgeon with. They haven’t, so far, charged either Peter Murrell (Sturgeon’s husband, and former Chief Executive of the SNP) or Colin Beattie (treasurer of the party at the time of his arrest) with anything. OK, investigations into possible financial crimes can be complex and hence take a long time, but if Sturgeon is also released without charge but “under investigation”, questions about Police Scotland’s approach will multiply.
The production company of Matt Damon and Ben Affleck has asked the Trump campaign to stop using their work in the fundraising videos.
Former President Donald Trump posted a video on Saturday on his Truth Social platform that included a monologue from the Amazon movie Air in which Mr Damon plays the Nike marketing and sales representative Sonny Vaccaro, a film directed by Mr Affleck…
“I have a message tonight for Merrick Garland, and Jack Smith, and Joe Biden. And the guys back there in the fake news media, you should listen up as well, this one’s for you,” she said at a speaking event in Georgia. “If you wanna get to President Trump, you’re gonna have to go through me, and you’re gonna have to go through 75 million Americans just like me. And most of us are card carrying members of the NRA. That’s not a threat, that’s a public service announcement.”
The NRA reached 5 million members in 2013, prompting its leader, Wayne LaPierre, to proclaim that the group would double its ranks to 10 million, according to USA Today. While its base swelled to 6 million members by 2018, it has lost ground since then, with LaPierre saying in a 2021 deposition that its membership was “under 4.9 million.”
In a statement to CBS MoneyWatch, the NRA said that it has “approximately 5 million members.” …
UPDATE: Sunday, Jun 11, 2023 · 1:09:30 PM MDT · quaoar
UPDATE: Makarivka has been liberated. This has also been confirmed by the deputy defense minister. [Tweet and map at the link]
The counteroffensive is beginning to show substantial progress along the southern front south of Velyka Novosilka.
In just the last few hours reports indicated that first Neckuchne just 2 km southwest of Velyka Novosilka, then Storozheve further south, then Mararivka south of that and even Urozhaine were either liberated or are being contested. All these villages are along a winding river that runs south and reports indicate Ukrainian forces are advancing along both sides of the river.
There are also reports that Ukraine has taken Levadne, which is west along the front line.
Things are moving fast and are likely to change quickly. This doesn’t necessarily mean that Ukraine will be rolling into Tokamak or Melitopol anytime soon — there are substantial Russian defensive lines still to work through — but it is encouraging. Hopefully there will soon be videos from these locations to confirm all of this. [tweets and maps at the link]
The town of Levadne is west of Urozhaine. If Russia still has troops in Rivnopil and Novodarivka, which are along the frontline between Leaden and Urozhaine, they are in danger of being surrounded (see map below). [Tweet and map at the link]
Partisan activity has also stepped up. [tweet and image at the link]
More partisan activity in Crimea: [tweets and video at the link]
This is from yesterday and shows the aftermath of Russian shelling in their own town. [Tweet and video at the link]
Hopefully the rockets cooking off hit another Russian vehicle. [Tweet video at the link]
Ufa is the capital of the Russian republic of Bashkortostan, which is east of Moscow. [Tweet and video of about 10 fuel tanks on fire]
It’s that “Oh, shit” moment. [tweet and video at the link]
Big Bavovna. [Tweet and video at the link, shelling of a russian column in the rear, in the Zaporizhia direction]
This is a video of a young raccoon. And Twitter has it marked sensitive because they let Russian trolls run amok. [Tweet and video at the link]
That’s one happy dog. [Tweet and video at the link: A Ukrainian border guard met his faithful friend after long months of captivity.]
That’s a big ole kitty. [A Maine Coon cat gets rescued in Kherson]
New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman said Sunday that the Walt Nauta is a “case study” of what could happen to former President Trump’s loyalists.
“I think that you have to look at Walt Nauta a different way than we have seen other people who have ended up on the wrong side of prosecutors alongside Donald Trump,” Haberman said on ABC’s “This Week.”
Nauta, a close aide to Trump, was indicted alongside his boss in connection to the Mar-a-Lago probe of Trump’s handling of classified documents. According to the 49-page indictment, Trump directed Nauta to move about 64 boxes from the storage room where one of Trump’s attorneys planned to look to Trump’s residence.
Haberman pointed to other Trump allies, like Allen Weisselberg and Michael Cohen, who have been charged with crimes while Trump had not. Weisselberg was sentenced last year to five months in prison after pleading guilty to 15 tax crimes and to also be a witness against the Trump Organization, while Cohen pleaded guilty in 2018 to campaign finance violations in connection with a hush-money payment to an adult-film star to cover up an alleged affair with Trump.
She said that Nauta has been described to her and her colleagues as not political, adding that he likely was just doing what he was told to do and not playing a “side game.” She said Nauta’s military background means he likely sees “the commander in chief differently.
“I think there’s an open question as to whether prosecutors are now going to try to pressure him to accept a plea deal and cooperate,” she said. “But I do think that Walt Nauta is a case study and what happens to people who are loyal to Trump, and we have seen that over and over.” […]
Guess what, Walt … You may be loyal to Trump, but Trump is not loyal to you.
Clinicians at Queen Mary University of London and Barts Hospital have identified a gene variant that causes a common type of hypertension (high blood pressure) and a way to cure it, new research published in the journal Nature Genetics shows.
The cause is a tiny benign nodule, present in one-in-twenty people with hypertension. The nodule produces a hormone, aldosterone, that controls how much salt is in the body. The new discovery is a gene variant in some of these nodules which leads to a vast, but intermittent, over-production of the hormone…
Reginald Selkirksays
@333: Sturgeon “released without charge”
This seems very odd to me. I could see someone being accidentally arrested during an urgent situation – a bank robbery or whatever; but this isn’t that, and they’ve had time to investigate already. They shouldn’t be arresting her unless they have definite charges.
“The defence industry of the Russian Federation is affected by international sanctions. According to available information, large batches of 122- and 152-mm artillery ammunition produced in 2023 are prohibited for use due to their self-detonation. In addition, there is a deterioration in the level of providing occupying units with weapons and military equipment.” …
whheydtsays
Re: Reginald Selkirk @ #339…
Even Russian ammo doesn’t want to fight in Ukraine…
On Saturday afternoon, a bunch of neo-Nazis decided to stand in front of the entrance to Walt Disney World waving Nazi flags and Ron DeSantis flags, shouting “Go back to Mexico!” and (I think) “Get bigger AIDS in your [C-Word that is meant to demean women] hole” at passerby. Like you do when you are a Florida neo-Nazi.
Video of the event was posted on Twitter by multiple people, including Rep. Anna V. Eskamani. [video at the link]
[…] For the past year or so, DeSantis has been striking out at Disney after the company, which employs nearly 500,000 Floridians, came out against his insidious “Don’t Say Gay Bill.” Given the fact that Orlando tourism — which, let’s be real, is Disney tourism — generates approximately $75 billion for the state’s economy and $5 billion in tax revenue, this was probably not the smartest move. But DeSantis isn’t that swift and neither are Nazis.
In the replies to Eskaman’s post, there are approximately a bajillion people claiming that the Nazis are actually FBI Agents doing an anti-DeSantis “false flag,” despite the fact that several have already been identified. [Tweets and images at the link]
But really, what is it that they think neo-Nazis would find unappealing about Ron DeSantis? Maybe the fact that he’s not an Aryan, but they like Mussolini, Pinochet and Franco well enough, so I’d have to imagine that DeSantis would also get a pass. Certainly they wouldn’t have any policy disagreements with him. He hates immigrants, they hate immigrants. He wants to oppress LGBTQ+ people, they want to oppress LGBTQ+ people.
It’s also pretty hard to put anything past the Right, given the fact that no small number of right wing Twitter users and, uh, Twitter owners, had some mighty high praise yesterday for … the Unabomber. [Tweets and images at the link]
[…] Ted Kaczynski was definitely wrong. Because of the whole “bombing people” thing.
Surely, if the Republican party is populated by people who can say, with a straight face, that “You gotta give it to the Unabomber,” twirling around Nazi flags in front of Disney World is hardly a stretch.
The U.S. has told the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) that it is interested in re-joining the agency, nearly six years after withdrawing its membership…
More platform instability could be in Twitter’s near future. In 2018, Twitter signed a $1 billion contract with Google to host some of its services on the company’s Google Cloud servers. Platformer reports Twitter recently refused to pay the search giant ahead of the contract’s June 30th renewal date. Twitter is reportedly rushing to move as many services off of Google’s infrastructure before the contract expires, but the effort is “running behind schedule,” putting some tools, including Smyte, a platform the company acquired in 2018 to bolster its moderation capabilities, in danger of going offline.
If Twitter can’t migrate the system to its own servers before the end of the month, Platformer suggests a shutdown would greatly impact the company’s ability to combat spam and child sexual abuse material (CSAM)…
The mysterious user seems to have been able to put blockchain and Bitcoin technologies to work against the Russian terrorist state.
The hacker gained access to hundreds of crypto wallets that likely belong to Russian security agencies, cryptocurrency industry news site CoinDesk clarified, citing Chainalysis, a cryptocurrency monitoring company that works closely with the U.S. government.
Chainalysis analysts believe that the hacker used the transaction documentation feature of the Bitcoin blockchain to identify 986 wallets controlled by Russia’s foreign military intelligence agency (GRU), the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), and the Federal Security Service (FSB)…
sticking a furnace/HVAC filter on a standard box fan […] It did okay, cutting the initial particulate load by 87 percent over 35 minutes on medium. That’s nothing like the 99 percent reductions [proper purifiers] achieved […] and it didn’t reduce particulates as quickly, but […] better than one might expect.
[…]
seal the filter around its entire perimeter with clear pro-strength packing tape—any gap would have let unfiltered air pass through […] no box fan is engineered to withstand the extra workload of driving air through a dense filter, so we can’t claim this won’t damage the fan’s motor, and we wouldn’t consider it a long-term solution
Jeansays
@345
A Corsi-Rosenthal box would be a better solution. It will be more expensive (4 times the number of filters) but it will be more efficient and has less chance of burning out the fan.
CompulsoryAccount7746, Sky Captainsays
@Jean: Neat!
CompulsoryAccount7746, Sky Captainsays
3D Handyman – Build & TEST 3 DIY Corsi-Rosenthal box fan air filters (5:26)
* Cheap box fan + 20x20x1″ MERV14 6-pack + dowel legs = ~$100.
* Airflow Tests (# of Filters vs Cu-ft/min): 0=1200, 1=170, 4=490, 5=610
* 5-filter noise: 76 dB on high, 66dB on low.
* More filters is way better airflow, less motor strain.
If you live in California, how much you pay for electricity will soon be tied to much you earn. A state law passed last summer requires the California Public Utilities Commission, or CPUC, to approve a pricing structure that incorporates a flat fee with a sliding scale based on income…
I don’t know about this. You’re going to have to reveal your income to the power company?
UPDATE: Sunday, Jun 11, 2023 · 10:00:09 PM MDT · Mark Sumner
Unconfirmed reports that Ukraine has liberated Novomaioske if you look at the third map, it’s the town whose name is cut in half along the eastern edge… I’m going to need a bigger map.
With every passing evening the intensity of Ukraine’s counteroffensive along the southern front has increased. At this point it’s clear that Ukraine is not concentrating on breaking through Russian defenses in a single point, but is conducting numerous separate, but coordinated assaults.
Over the course of Sunday, Ukraine has apparently liberated numerous towns and villages that have been on the front line in Zaporizhzhia oblast for months. They’ve also pushed Russian forces out of some of the advanced “screening” lines that had been closer to the front and in general demonstrated success at numerous points.
The degree of success has varied from a location just south of Orikhiv, near the village of Robotyne, where dislodging Russian forces has proved difficult, to closer to Velyka Novosilka where a whole string of villages has been liberated and reports show Ukrainian forces still advancing.
Over the course of Sunday, Ukraine has apparently liberated numerous towns and villages that have been on the front line in Zaporizhzhia oblast for months. They’ve also pushed Russian forces out of some of the advanced “screening” lines that had been closer to the front and in general demonstrated success at numerous points.
The degree of success has varied from a location just south of Orikhiv, near the village of Robotyne, where dislodging Russian forces has proved difficult, to closer to Velyka Novosilka where a whole string of villages has been liberated and reports show Ukrainian forces still advancing.
Over the course of Sunday, Ukraine has apparently liberated numerous towns and villages that have been on the front line in Zaporizhzhia oblast for months. They’ve also pushed Russian forces out of some of the advanced “screening” lines that had been closer to the front and in general demonstrated success at numerous points.
The degree of success has varied from a location just south of Orikhiv, near the village of Robotyne, where dislodging Russian forces has proved difficult, to closer to Velyka Novosilka where a whole string of villages has been liberated and reports show Ukrainian forces still advancing.
Over the course of Sunday, Ukraine has apparently liberated numerous towns and villages that have been on the front line in Zaporizhzhia oblast for months. They’ve also pushed Russian forces out of some of the advanced “screening” lines that had been closer to the front and in general demonstrated success at numerous points.
The degree of success has varied from a location just south of Orikhiv, near the village of Robotyne, where dislodging Russian forces has proved difficult, to closer to Velyka Novosilka where a whole string of villages has been liberated and reports show Ukrainian forces still advancing.
This is definitely the point of the counteroffensive where every day more towns and villages need to be added to the map as Ukrainian forces reach them, the location becomes disputed, and then the settlement is liberated and the fight moves on. It’s an excitement that hasn’t been felt since things quieted down on the northern section of the line last fall. There are going to be a lot of photos like this one in the near future, and their return is extremely uplifting. [Tweet and video at the link]
This is definitely the point of the counteroffensive where every day more towns and villages need to be added to the map as Ukrainian forces reach them, the location becomes disputed, and then the settlement is liberated and the fight moves on. It’s an excitement that hasn’t been felt since things quieted down on the northern section of the line last fall. There are going to be a lot of photos like this one in the near future, and their return is extremely uplifting. […]
The word “weaponized” has been used by Trump, his supporters and even his GOP rivals to describe the Department of Justice. Do you see the Trump prosecution as different in any notable way from other Espionage Act prosecutions that you’ve worked on or observed?
Durkin: Obviously, it’s different because of who the defendant is. But I see it in kind of an opposite way: If Trump were anyone other than a former president, he would not have been given the luxury of a summons to appear in court. There would be a team of armed FBI agents outside his door at 6:30 in the morning, he would have been arrested and the government would be immediately moving to detain. So the idea that he’s being treated differently is true – but not from the way his supporters seem to be arguing.
…
Ferguson: I might pull media statements that he has made in the last couple years and explain to him how they have complicated the ability to defend him. I’d put on the table to him that I need to see every statement that he is going to make in the political realm about this before he makes it. I’d tell him he’s otherwise basically hanging himself.
I’d tell him: If you want to die in jail, keep talking. But if you want to try to figure out a way that brings about an acceptable resolution – a plea deal that opens the door to a lighter jail sentence than what the guidelines threaten and, possibly, even no jail time – you need to turn it down or at least have it screened by your lawyers….
Kubrakov said that the bridge will provide Ukrainian exporters with the most direct route from central Ukraine to Central and Southeastern Europe, bypassing the Russian-occupied region of Transnistria…
NASA recently selected the Monitoring Activity from Nearby sTars with uv Imaging and Spectroscopy (MANTIS) to assist Webb by observing the skies in the full range of ultraviolet light. The cubesat, which cost $8.5 million, is currently being built at the University of Colorado Boulder’s Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP) and is scheduled to launch in 2026…
I go away for a few days and things boil over like an unwatched pot!
Since I left last week: Ukraine has done some liberating, Trump was federally indicted, Boris Johnson and other Tories resigned, Nicola Sturgeon was arrested and then released, Pat Robertson died, Ted Kaczynski died by suicide, James Watt died, Silvio Berlusconi died, and the Supreme Court issued a surprisingly pro-democracy ruling. And I’m still catching up.
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From their closing summary:
US secretary of state Antony Blinken on Monday said it was too soon to say exactly where Ukraine’s counteroffensive was going, but said Washington was confident that Kyiv will continue to have success in trying to take back its land seized by Russia. Speaking at a press conference in Washington, Blinken said the United States was determined to maximise its support for Ukraine so it can succeed on the battlefield.
…
The UN secretary general, António Guterres, said on Monday he was concerned that Russia would on 17 July quit a deal allowing the safe wartime export of grain and fertilisers from three Ukrainian Black Sea ports. Moscow has been threatening to walk away from the deal, known as the Black Sea grain initiative, brokered by the UN and Turkey in July last year, if obstacles to its own grain and fertiliser shipments are not removed.
The Group of Seven (G7) rich nations are working on a scheme to combat the suspected theft of Ukraine’s grain by using chemical identification of grain origin, Britain’s food and farming minister, Mark Spencer, said on Monday. Spencer told an International Grains Council (IGC) conference in London that Britain was leading on the scheme and that G7 countries were also working closely with Ukraine, the world’s fourth largest grains exporter.
Ukraine has accused Russian forces of destroying another dam with the aim of slowing a counteroffensive launched by Kyiv. As rescue and relief efforts entered their seventh day for victims of the destruction of the Kakhovka hydroelectric station in Kherson region, the Russian military was accused of blowing up a much smaller dam along the Mokri Yaly River, which has become the most successful axis so far for Ukraine’s advances in western Donetsk.
The largest Nato military jet exercise since the foundation of the alliance is taking place today in the skies over Germany, the Netherlands and the Czech Republic. About 10,000 soldiers from 25 countries are involved, making use of 250 military jets – 70 from Germany – to prepare for an attack on one of Nato’s members. Although the exercise was planned long before Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, it is nevertheless being viewed as a signal towards Kremlin leader, Vladimir Putin.
President Vladimir Putin marked Russia’s national day on Monday by appealing to Russians’ patriotic pride at what he said was a “difficult time” for the country. However, speaking at a lavish award-giving ceremony in the Kremlin, Putin made no direct comment on the latest developments in Ukraine, where Kyiv’s forces have launched a long-awaited counteroffensive and have retaken several villages in the eastern Donetsk region over the past few days.
Ukraine’s armed forces claim to have liberated several frontline villages in western Donetsk, almost a week after the launch of counteroffensive operations. Soldiers were shown in video footage raising the Ukrainian flag over the village of Blahodatne, south of the town of Velyka Novosilka, one of the main axes of the counteroffensive so far. Troops from another brigade filmed themselves with their unit’s banner in Neskuchne. Later on Sunday, Kyiv said a third village, Makarivka, had been taken. Ukraine’s deputy defence minister, Hanna Maliar, announced the liberation of Storozheve by Ukrainian marines on Monday morning.
Ukraine’s top military command said on Monday that its forces were engaged in heavy battles in frontline hotspots. Twenty-five battles had taken place over the past day near the eastern town of Bakhmut and farther south near Avdiivka and Maryinka, all in the Donetsk region, and also near Bilohorivka in the Luhansk region, Ukraine’s armed forces general staff said.
US thinktank The Institute for the Study of War said Ukrainian forces had made “visually verified advances” in the Donetsk and Zaporizhia regions and that Russian sources “confirmed but sought to downplay” those advances.
The water level at the ponds used to cool the reactors at Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant remain stable and sufficient despite the falling water level of the Kakhovka reservoir nearby, Ukraine’s environment minister said on Monday.
…
Russia’s defence ministry said on Monday it had signed a contract with the Akhmat group of Chechen special forces, a day after mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin refused to do so. The signing followed an order that all “volunteer units” should sign contracts by 1 July bringing them under the control of defence minister Sergei Shoigu, as Moscow tries to assert its control over private armies fighting on its behalf in Ukraine. Prigozhin, who has waged a running feud with the defence ministry and accused it of failing to provide adequate ammunition supplies to his Wagner mercenaries in Ukraine, said on Sunday he would refuse to sign any such contract.
Former Russian president and prime minister Dmitry Medvedev has celebrated Russia day by posting a an edited image to Telegram which shows Kyiv’s central Maidan square with the Russian flag flying on it and the message “Independence Square. Coming soon – Russia Square”.
Work has already started in an investigation by the international criminal court over the breach of the Kakhovka dam in Ukraine and the vast flood it triggered, Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said. Suspilne, Ukraine’s state broadcaster, reported that the flood water level in Kherson had dropped by 64cm.
…
This would not be the first time that the vice president has taken on the president’s itinerary for health reasons. In November 2021, Mr Biden temporarily transferred power to Ms Harris when he invoked the 25th amendment of the US Constitution as he underwent a prostate exam.
That made her the first woman to hold presidential power, though it was only for a little more than an hour.
But the president will not undergo anesthesia and the 25th amendment will not be invoked during the root canal…
Iran’s parliament speaker Qalibaf and more than a dozen other men today discussed a new hijab bill that calls for fines and other punishments against women who defy the compulsory hijab law.
A photo of the meeting to review new hijab restrictions and a recent photo of unveiled women in the religious city of Mashhad….
Tweet o’ the day.
whheydt @ #500 on the previous thread:
Since that’s been going on for a while and since I assume the Russian MoD knows the difference between that and the “real” start of the counteroffensive, I assume they mean the latter. The question then is whether or not they’re lying. I would ordinarily not repeat anything from any Russian officials, but I figured people would take it with a grain of salt; as others have noted, they would probably like to claim attacks that they’ve repelled to make people think the counteroffensive is weak or failing. And they could believe it but be mistaken. But I thought it noteworthy.
Ukrainian Minister of Defenc/se Oleksii Reznikov tweeted this earlier today.
(((Tendar))) on Twitter:
It’s the video Reznikov tweeted (@ #3 above).
Re: SC (Salty Current) @ #3…
Reminds one of the “Loose Lips Sink Ships” posters from WW2.
Some podcast episodes:
Bribe, Swindle[,] or Steal – “The Outlaw Ocean”:
A horrifying web of oppression and destruction.
Our Hen House – “Total Liberation w/ Yvette Baker”:
Link to transcript at the link. (When she talks about advocating for rats at a local pet shop when she was a kid I thought of Caine and her photos which made me see rats in a different way.)
Tech Won’t Save Us – “The Online Shopping Boom Is Over w/ Amanda Mull”:
New Books Network – “Naoíse Mac Sweeney, The West: A New History of an Old Idea“:
I look forward to reading this. The part about Troy is wild.
This relates, I think, to the earlier post about the Russian MoD claiming that Ukraine’s counter-offensive has started. It’s the BBC reporting on what the Russians are say, so take it with several pounds of salt…
Link: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-65806152
For the Europa Clipper mission : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europa_Clipper
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-06-03/nasa-sends-message-in-a-bottle-to-jupiter-europa-clipper/102436722
Folks can sign on here :
https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-invites-public-to-sign-poem-that-will-fly-aboard-europa-clipper
CNN – “Exclusive: Ukraine has cultivated sabotage agents inside Russia and is giving them drones to stage attacks, sources say”:
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From their latest summary:
Also in the Guardian:
“Brazil police charge alleged mastermind behind murders of Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira”:
“Poland: hundreds of thousands march against rightwing populist government”:
“War brings urgency to fight for LGBT rights in Ukraine”:
Schismogenesis: a case study.
“Ben Roberts-Smith and four key witnesses were not honest or reliable, judge says in full verdict”:
Link to their Australia liveblog at the link. Much more at all of the links.
Guardian liveblog:
I’ve been looking into Constitutional interpretation and related areas lately, and thought this talk was excellent (YT link) – “Erwin Chemerinsky on Originalism and the Supreme Court”:
BBC – “Covid: Anti-vaccine conspiracy theorists guilty of 5G mast plot”:
Dmitri on Twitter:
Noel on Twitter:
LOL. (Twitter link)
Mykhailo Podolyak tweeted:
Guardian liveblog:
The radio address also took the form of a deepfake video (Twitter link).
NYTimes – What happened when a Brooklyn neighborhood policed itself
Guardian liveblog:
Noel on Twitter:
Photos at the link.
Someone on nextdoor posted this (warning for all of the ads), not seriously.
https://wiredconservative.com/thepoliticalmovement/scientists-discover-committed-leftists-are-usually-psychopaths-narcissists/?aff_id=1262&utm_placement=thepoliticalmovement&embedded_webview=true
Another poster found the paper it was based on. They don’t look similar.
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0963721418817755?embedded_webview=true
Good article which includes a lot of powerfully illustrative graphs and figures here :
https://johnmenadue.com/the-earth-has-bipolar-disorder-and-so-do-we/
Meanwhile, Potholer 54 debunks the latest Climate Crock here which is apparently popular in Denialists circles now – under 15 mins long.
Oh and Happy (?) World Environment Day y’all.
https://www.worldenvironmentday.global/
Russian Media Monitor (YT link) – “Pundits argue about protecting Russia’s borders.”
I’m sure this will calm public fears in Russia.
The graph here :
https://climatecrocks.com/2023/06/01/will-this-years-el-nino-be-as-intense-as-2015-1998-does-it-matter/
By the University of Maine and its Climate Reanalyser :
https://climatereanalyzer.org/
Literally terrifies me.
This :
https://epoty.org/ *
is where we are now..
.* Quote : “The 2022 winners of the Environmental Photographer of the Year have been announced.” Gallery of award winning & caward contending for photos with accompanying info there.
The hell did that “c’ get there? Aaargh. Typos FFS.
Also why is sea spelled s-e-a when we say c? Also lightspeed abbriev and ocean are the same proun-sea-ashon wise..
Its a lingusitic ‘mare ain’t it?
“Both Mykolaiv Governor Vitalii Kim and Head of the Presidential Office Andryi Yermak with similar messages on their official channels.
🤞🇺🇦”
Signal boost and shout out to Abe Drayton’s Oceanoxia post here :
https://freethoughtblogs.com/oceanoxia/2023/06/04/police-state-atlanta-cops-arrest-organizers-for-legal-activity/
Because yeah.. here, there, toomany placxes and too familiar..
Here. My home city :
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2023/06/03/tvur-j03.html
Also on my state’s draconian new anti-Climate Activism laws :
Source : https://www.sacoss.org.au/joint-media-release-proposed-new-anti-protest-laws-undo-22-minutes-bad-lawmaking
“Premier” Malisantos, er, Malinauskas (yeah, bad form to pick on names but can’t resist..) has a brother whoworks for Santos, prettty high up I think. Dodgy as.
^ Santos the Fossil Fool Company that is – not the US compulsive liar Congresscritter…
Or the much more admirable pioneering aviator : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alberto_Santos-Dumont
(((Tendar))) on Twitter:
BBC update to SC…’s # 14:
Hey, somebody’s got to make Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. look good!
Linda Yaccarino Takes Over Hot Mess Twitter as Ad Revenue Plunges
CNBC – “Trump lawyers meet with DOJ after ex-president slams indictment speculation”:
Nikki Haley Generously Proposes Not Executing Women Who Have Abortions
Ukraine Update: The calm before the storm isn’t so calm
Leopard main battle tanks may have shown up near Vuhledar.
Text quoted by Reginald @36:
That still sounds very bad. Musk is in position to wreak havoc on more of Twitter.
SC @37, it’s almost not worth anyone’s time to read Trump’s rants anymore. He is still repeating the same lies and/or bluntly stupid misperceptions. As you indicated, what’s important is that lawyers for Trump met this morning with Department of Justice officials, so that indicates an indictment may be coming soon.
Reginald 238, Nikki Haley is trying to walk a very narrow tightrope. She’s going to fall off soon. She can’t avoid offending MAGA trumpian cultists while she also runs a campaign for the presidency.
Republican leaders literally speechless about good news on jobs
Job growth under President Joe Biden has been so strong that Republican leaders have to go out of their way to pretend not to notice the good news.
Airborne DNA accidentally collected by air-quality filters reveals state of species
Followup to comment Reginald’s comment 38:
No, Jack Smith Isn’t Leaking All The Damning Mar-A-Lago Evidence
Migrants’ trip to Sacramento aboard private jet appears to have been arranged by state of Florida, officials say
NEWS FLASH: At least one Republican governor is not running for the presidency
Sununu, that is.
A man wants to trademark ‘Trump too small’ for T-shirts. Now the Supreme Court will hear the case.
Wonkette: “Actual Nazis Use Montana Drag Ban To Get Trans Authors Banned From Reading At Libraries, So That’s Bad”
Left-wing philosopher Cornel West launches long-shot 2024 presidential bid
Wonkette: “Rachel Campos-Duffy Thinks God Wants A Sacrifice, And It Is This Planet!”
Rep. Jamie Raskin Says He Hopes To Decide On Senate Run By Fourth Of July
Air quality levels in parts of the U.S. plunge as Canada wildfires rage
Canada is experiencing one of the worst starts to its wildfire season ever recorded.
Lynna @ #40:
It’s funny that in the past we/people used to think his rants might be clues to what was going to happen with investigations or other non-public events. But even in this case it looks like he was unhinged by something he saw on the news or social media rather than anything conveyed to him by his lawyers. In fact, he would probably discount what his lawyers told him if it contradicted some random claim on television. That’s not to say an indictment isn’t imminent – one probably is – but that his rant isn’t even any indication of anything happening behind the scenes in the real world. So just totally unworthy of attention.
Josh Marshall:
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/about-that-big-cnn-article
Satire from Andy Borowitz:
New Yorker link
Funders thought watching bats wasn’t important. Then she helped solve the mystery of a deadly virus.
Tweet o’ the day.
Ukraine Update: ‘We are moving to offensive actions’
Service member ordered to stop reading “The Catcher in the Rye” by offended Christian superior
Trump: “Congratulations to Kim Jong Un!” John Bolton angerly rips him: “Trump is unfit to lead.”
More at the link, including Bolton documenting that it takes 25 minutes for a stylist to do Trump’s makeup and another hour and a halt to sculpt his hair “into a mop that obscures the reality that Trump is almost entirely bald.
From France 24:
Associated Press:
https://www.wonkette.com/nikki-haley-transgender-high-school-athletes
Wonkette: “Robert Kennedy Jr Keeps Dreaming Up New Ways To Disgrace Family Name”
Oklahoma Approves First Religious Charter School in the U.S.
New York Times link
The approval of the school, which would offer online, Roman Catholic instruction funded by taxpayers, is almost certain to tee off a legal battle.
More at the link.
Wackos break cover:
U.S. Recovered ‘Intact And Partially Intact Vehicles’ Of Non-Human Origin: Whistleblower
Wicky wacky. If there is such a long-running, serious effort to suppress the information, why haven’t these two been knocked off yet?
Purity of essence.
Texas seeks to bolster $1.8 billion fraud claim against Planned Parenthood
Re: Reginald Selkirk @ #67…
The red flag there is the judge. They’ve been judge shopping again.
Inside the fundamentalist Christian movement that wants to remake Canadian politics
Huh? Just tried to post about a cassius the largest crocodile in capttivity but didn’t go through here…?
I just got an alert that Ukraine blew up the Nova Kakhova dam. Here’s Aric Toler’s Twitter thread about it.
Yaroslav Trofimov on Twitter:
Videos at the links.
“Ukrainian command is blaming Russians for the dam’s destruction”
The reservoir behind the Kakhova dam supplies cooling water the Zaporishzia (sp) nuclear plant. It also supplies the water that is sent by canal to Crimea. However, the Russians have been filling up all the local reservoirs in Crimea.
So who benefits from blowing the dam?
Reginald Selkirk@66,
As someone says in the comments to your linked article, if there was anything in this, no way Trump would not have blabbed it! (Unless of course Trump is actually a transdimensional lizard…)
Zelenskyy tweeted:
Christopher Miller on Twitter:
Hard to tell. Apparently the flooding will affect both banks, but predominantly the Russian-occupied left. The Russians may have filled the Crimean reservoirs, but how long will that water last them? I’ve seen claims both that the flooding will prevent any Ukrainian amphibious attack across the Dnipro, and that it would facilitate it by removing the Russian left-bank positions. I’m no sort of expert, but amphibious military operations are notoriously hard to bring off successfully. If we see such an operation in the next week or two, that would be pretty strong evidence Ukraine caused the collapse, as you can’t improvise that kind of major operation in a hurry: they would have to have planned for the flooding. But I think it’s very unlikely we will see this.
According to Mark Sumner of Daily Kos:
Here is a link to images allegedly from Maxar of the same part of the dam from 28 May and 5 June. It seems quite a coincidence the collapse would happen just at the point when Ukraine seems to be launching its counteroffensive, but of course, coincidences do happen.
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From their latest summary:
An analysis of the possible military repercussions of the dam’s destruction from the Guardian’s Dan Sabbagh. It’s not obvious who will benefit. The delta will widen making crossing it even harder, but the river further up will narrow, possibly giving Ukraine opportunities, but of course they would first need to deal with the immediate impact on civilians and infrastructure. The Russian defensive positions are apparently already on higher ground, but whether they are well-placed is impossible to say until the new course of the river is established.
Noel on Twitter:
Chart at the link.
Guardian – “Ukraine accuses Russia of blowing up Nova Kakhovka dam near Kherson”:
Guardian – “Ukrainian dam collapse ‘no immediate risk’ to Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant”:
Tweet o’ the day.
Kyiv Independent:
“Kuleba criticizes international media for entertaining Russian propaganda about Kakhovka dam explosion”:
“President’s Office: At least 150 tons of motor oil released into Dnipro River after Kakhovka dam explosion”:
Guardian liveblog:
Zelenskyy tweeted:
Kyiv Independent on Twitter:
Whelp, with 424 ppm atmospheric carbon dioxide inour planet’s air we’ve now got 50% more than pre-Industrial times – see :
https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2023-06-06/science-atmospheric-co2-hits-record-high/102444412
One unwanted and worrying milestone passed. How many more to come and with what consequences?
Wow:
Video at the (Twitter) link.
Noel on Twitter:
Map at the link. There’s also activity/explosions in Mariupol, the occupied left bank in Kherson, and Bilhorod.
Guardian liveblog:
(((Tendar))) on Twitter:
Video at the link.
The Needs-Renaming new Space Telescope shows a lack of winds leading to extremer temperatures than expected and the existence of steam on Hot SuperJovian exoplanet WASP-18b :
https://www.space.com/james-webb-water-atmosphere-hot-jupiter-exoplanet-wasp-18b
Anton Gerashchenko on Twitter:
(((Tendar))) on Twitter:
Video/photos at the link.
Guardian – “Mobsters, murder and moments of resistance: life under the Sicilian mafia – in pictures”:
Ukraine Update: Russia blows up Kakhovka dam, creating massive human and ecological disaster
In US news:
CNN – “Exclusive: Mar-a-Lago pool flood raises suspicions among prosecutors in Trump classified documents case”:
Guardian – “Texas sheriff files criminal case over DeSantis flights to Martha’s Vineyard”:
“Second plane carrying migrants lands in Sacramento; officials say Florida was involved”:
The third link @ #99 is CBS News.
Followup to comment 98.
Posted by readers of the article:
Defeated and deflated, Freedom Caucus backs off anti-McCarthy push
Last week, the House Freedom Caucus made it sound as if Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s job is in jeopardy. This week, the hapless faction is slinking away.
Well, that’s good news.
Hmmm, what fresh dumbfuckery is this?
Link
Map of North Crimean canal at the link.
Guardian liveblog:
“Saudi Arabia: Hey PGA golfers! We have a bunch of money to offer you for our new league.
PGA Tour: You’re ruining the game and sportswashing your reputation of human rights abuses.
SA: OK but what if we offered you a lot of money?
PGA: Today, we’d like to announce a merger w”
Link
Take another look at where the Republicans who actually committed voter fraud were NOT prosecuted: “The office of State Attorney Bill Gladson, whose district includes The Villages and five Republican counties […]” There’s your answer.
Followup to comment 103.
Judge grants request for George Santos’s bond sponsors to be unsealed
Link
More at the link, including historical context.
NYT:
Judge Sides With Families Fighting Florida’s Ban on Gender Care for Minors
A federal judge wrote that the plaintiffs suing to block the new law are “likely to prevail on their claim that the prohibition is unconstitutional.”
By Rick Rojas and Azeen Ghorayshi / June 6, 2023
Comer Tries To Run The First Trump Impeachment In Reverse
Posted by readers of the article:
Republican presidential candidates are eager to appease Putin—and Putin’s surely listening
Link
In a geologic triumph, scientists drill a window into Earth’s mantle.
Washington Post link
Chris Christie Formally Enters ’24 Race, as He Takes Square Aim at Trump
New York Times link
Followup to #99:
RawStory – Mar-a-Lago wasn’t the first time Trump ‘evidence’ was flooded
J&J’s COVID vaccine is dead in the US; FDA revokes authorization
Ted Cruz is citing the Bible and preaching on Twitter in defense of gay people, and it’s quite something
Russians have released a video in which they claim a Russian Ka-52 helicopter strikes on “Leopard 2 tanks.” Only for some reason this “Leopard” looks more like a tractor. For example, John Deere 4830.
re Reginald Selkirk @119: You must have missed post #96 by SC earlier today. Still funny though.
NBC News:
Republicans angry with McCarthy over debt deal join Democrats to block gas stove bills
Today being the anniversary of D-Day (1944), the end of the Battle of Midway (`942), and my late wife’s birthday (also 1942),
here is an article from the BBC about a Royal Marine who was involved in D-Day…
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lincolnshire-65815672
Associated Press:
Ukraine Update: Meanwhile, in Bakhmut …
Wonkette link
JFC.
Gene therapy produces long-term contraception in female domestic cats
North American lobster industry confronts ‘ropeless’ traps after whale entanglements
Mom warns about ‘margarita burns’ after baby eats celery in the sun
Back from Maine. Wife and I, my daughter, my son and his wife and the twins, all went up to Maine on Sunday, went to the Memorial Service/Celebration of Life at the UU church, and drove home yesterday.
The service was beautiful. No mention of God/gods. Or Jesus. Instead, a celebration of Mom’s almost 84 years — as an artist, mother, wife, grandmother, great grandmother, teacher, (the list of what she did during her life is extensive). Dad spoke about their childhood, and how they met, and how two children of severely dysfunctional families were able to fill in each other’s missing bits so both of them could become whole.
All were asked to wear bright colours, and they did. Many spoke during the service. We laughed and cried. And it really helped the grieving process.
Damnit, why can’t this be what churches are all about, rather than the othering and demands of conformity?
Source : https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-06-07/traditional-owners-celebrate-fraser-island-name-change-to-kgari/102410130
Good.
Kilauea has lit off…again.
https://www.youtube.com/usgs/live
While driving home yesterday, I hit smoke in Massachusetts. By the time we got to Pennsylvania, we had 1 or 2 kilometer visibility and the filtered sunlight had that beautiful orange glow. All from the fires in Quebec. Feels really weird to me. This is what days were often like when I worked wildland fires. Even smells like overtime out there. And in here.
Here is a good map which shows both smoke and active large incidents.
Russians have destroyed a Leopard. Well, maybe not.
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From there:
Re the video @ #90 above:
Michael Kofman on Twitter:
Ukraine rushes drinking water to flooded areas as officials wrestle with impact of major dam breach
Fire By Night: A failed Christian attempt to copy SNL aka a mediocre humor show copied by the humorless.
This episode is about scaaaary music.
God Awful Movies.
GAM407 Fire by nite episode 7
https://youtu.be/vdcsWRZGO0s
Oh, FFS.
Tired of equating the FBI with the “Gestapo,” Donald Trump is breaking new ground, lashing out at “fascists” in federal law enforcement.
NBC News:
Commentary:
Link
Re: Lynna, OM @ #138…
A closer (at least in name) analogue to Gestapo (short for Geheime Staatspolizei) would be the Dept. of Homeland Security.
WH Sounds Alarm After McCarthy Tries To Buy Off Far-Right With Soc Security-Slashing Commission
LOL
Guardian liveblog:
The Guardian has a liveblog about the fires in Canada and smoke in the US:
It’s quite strange – hazy and pinkish and the winds feel unusual. Everything’s slightly…off.
Sorry – this is the link for #143.
Guardian liveblog:
SC @143, I heard there was also a ground stop at New York City airports — that’s how bad the smoke is.
Friends of mine in NYC are wearing the masks they stockpiled during the COVID epidemic. At least those masks provide some protection.
Josh Marshall:
Fucking invaders. (Twitter link)
Related to comment 147.
Reading the tea leaves on Jack Smith’s next move
Quick Explainer: Russia Did It
This article goes through all the arguments that might persuade one that the Russians detonated the Nova Kakhovka Dam. Photos and maps available at the link.
Wonkette: “Climate Change-Fueled Wildfires Draping Nation In Cloud Of Death”
Tucker’s Russian Propaganda Public Access Show ‘Live From A Strange Man’s Shed’ Not So Good, Y’all :(
https://www.wonkette.com/tucker-carlson-twitter-show
Washington Post link
Julian Borger at the Guardian liveblog:
SC @154, horrifying.
In other news, here is Andy Borowitz’s satirical response to Mike Pence:
New Yorker link
“‘They couldn’t finish us off so they decided to drown us!’
Listen to this lady from Kherson.
Imagine yourself (if you dare) in her shoes…”
Subtitled video at the Twitter link.
“I-80 in northern NJ. Looks like Mars.”
Video at the Twitter link.
Tweet o’ the day.
Andrew Feinberg on Twitter:
Cheques will be phased out by 2030 as mobile wallet use sky-rockets
Pastor: We’ve heard much about ‘indoctrination.’ What do you call Catholic charter school?
Lionel Messi announces he will sign with MLS’ Inter Miami, spurning rich Saudi offer
Source : https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-06-08/mike-pence-slams-trump-at-campaign-launch-presidential-race/102453682
StevoR @163, when asked if he would vote for whomever the Republican nominee is in 2024, Mike Pence said “Yes.” So, no matter what he says now or during his campaign, Pence will still vote for Trump is Trump if the Republican nominee.
Ukraine Update: Crimea just lost its water, and the consequences are huge
More Ukraine updates coming soon.
Fox News says Tucker Carlson breached his contract
A no-compete clause! Popcorn sales are going through the roof this year.
Re: Reginald Selkirk @ #166…
That’s an interesting situation. One could easily argue that, if one has been fired, then one is no longer under contract and the non-compete clause is no longer in effect. In order for the non-compete clause to work, they’d have to keep paying him…
Followup to comment 165.
More Ukraine updates:
Link. Scroll down to view updates.
Link
I agree that particular argument doesn’t make sense. But the Kremlin narrative is that Ukraine destroyed the dam, and warning that Russia was going to do it would have made that impossible to claim rather than just highly implausible. So I think the incompetence/malice question remains open.
Pat Robertson, broadcaster who helped make religion central to GOP politics, dies at 93
re Reginald Selkirk @171: You should never say bad things about the dead, only good… Pat Robertson is dead. Good. (Thanks to Bette Davis.)
Re: Reginald Selkirk 171
Good riddance. He fanned the flames of many moral panics over the years.
Ex-Trump aide Steve Bannon issued subpoena in US Capitol attack probe
Black workers at California Tesla factory allege rampant racism, seek class-action status
Jury convicts Oregon man who rigged home with ‘Indiana Jones’ booby trap, injuring federal officer
Supreme Court Shocks Everyone With 5-4 Ruling in Favor of Voting Rights
NASA Pushes Back Against Claim Government Has an Alien Spaceship
Danny Masterson’s Former Legal Team Sanctioned for Leaking Discovery Material to the Church of Scientology in Rape Trial
Steve Benen reports this campaign news:
Followup to comments 171, 172 and 173.
Link
It will probably be more complicated than that, since at the pace things are going, it seems doubtful verdicts in any of the prominent cases will be available before the GOP convention, which is scheduled for July 15-18 2024.
I just learned El Nino has started.
2024 is expected to be the warmest year ever recorded.
God Strikes Down Pat Robertson For What He Said About Gays, Hurricanes, 9/11, Haiti, Orphans …
https://www.wonkette.com/god-strikes-down-pat-robertson
Medicaid Wins Big At Supreme Court Despite Fears That Right-Wing Majority Would Hobble Program
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/medicaid-supreme-court-talevski
https://twitter.com/nexta_tv/status/1666733165975674880
Link
Kazan is the capital of the Russian republic of Tatarstan.
I don’t yet see any reporting on why this particular Russian official “fell” out of a window.
Link
Scripps news service:
See also: https://twitter.com/ScottDuncanWX/status/1666554152552484869
Temperature Anomaly map at the link.
Followup to comment 188.
Link
In other news, Russia is actively campaigning to convince the International Olympic Committee to accept Defenestration as an Olympic sport. Which Russia (well, Russians competing under the IOC flag) would dominate. I’m still not sure if this would be a judged event, or a sport in which time from the ground floor to the twelfth floor, and down again, would be used to determine the winning team. The IOC is quite resistant to the inclusion of Team or Individual Defenestration competitions as it appears that only one nation in the world actually HAS defenestration teams. Additionally, it appears that, although Russia has defenestration teams, there is no evidence of competitions ever being held either at the team or individual level, nor is there any evidence of a rule book or even enforcement mechanisms if a rule, written or unwritten, is transgressed.
Oggie @190, LOL!
In other news: The shocking real reason DeSantis targeted New College is foretelling of things to come
@187: Did someone mention Lin Wood?
Attorney Lin Wood held in contempt of court for denigrating ex-associates
MAGA Lawyer Lin Wood is Facing a Lawsuit Avalanche
Clarence Thomas wrote a scathing, nearly 50-page dissent about why the Supreme Court should have gutted voting rights
Thanks for trying to save me from atheism — but I’m fine with it
Lynna… @ # 191, quoting “SemDem” at dailykos.com: I have yet to see in the media the full, true story of Gov. Ron DeSantis’ war on Florida’s public honors college, New College of Florida.
“SemDem” uncovered an important aspect of the NC story, but may have missed an important part of its history. Florida lore has it (I admit I haven’t found any links to substantiate this) that New College – which first began classes in 1964 – was used by the state university system as a “safety valve” to remove the most radical and rebellious students from other campuses around the state.
If so, this was not entirely successful (the University of Florida central campus in Gainesville definitely earned the nickname “Berkeley of the South” in the late ’60s/early 70s), but it may well have served that purpose to some degree. Of course, DeSantis has escalated that program by pushing hard to move both students and faculty with troublesome notions about academic freedom and social engagement out of Florida entirely, though he has not yet chartered aircraft to take them to Martha’s Vineyard or Sacramento.
Ukraine Update: Action in the south is larger, more important than previously reported
Link
A growing number of GOP officials are disregarding church-state separation because they believe the U.S. Supreme Court will let them get away with it.
[PERSONAL NON-POLOITICAL]
Time passes quickly. My twin granddaughters are graduating from
high schoolchild car seats with seat belts to booster seats with seat belts. They are both over 40 pounds and over 40 inches tall (I discovered that different car seats have different minimum height requirements (who knew?)). When Wife and I were children, our parents used portable cribs/playpens in their cars (not sure with Wife’s family, but ours was a blue ’63 VW Microbus (and I, at the age of one, fell out of the back onto the driveway)).. Our kids went straight from rear facing buckets to booster seats. The world has changed. In some ways, for the better.Addendum to my #190, re Defenestration Teams:
I read that paragraph to Wife. Wife, without missing a beat, said, “And they’ll still be doping the athletes.”
Followup to Reginald’s comment 177.
How The Supreme Court’s Alabama Decisions Affected The 2022 Election — And Could Shape 2024
Cartoon: Mike Luckovich on the PGA’s deal with the devil
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted:
Commentary:
Followup to comment 203.
Posted by readers of the article:
Back when I worked wildland fires (mostly in CA, OR, ID, MT, NM), it sometimes took me 6 months to fully recover from smoke and particulate inhalation. Twice I was stationed in Forks of Salmon, CA, up in the canyons feeding the Klamath River. At one fire, visibility was 50 meters and small particulate matter was at 1200ppm –about 4 times the dangerous level. We were only there for two weeks, and most days were not that bad, but we still had daily transports to the local hospital for breathing difficulties, along with the usual injuries associated with wildland fires. We were also mostly young (I was doing this in my 30s. 40s and early 50s), in pretty good shape (most positions require physical performance tests (the most stringent was 1 mile, with a 40 pound pack, in less than 10 minutes, with a pulse check before and after, and if you pulse was elevated more than 50% (may be wrong on that), even if you made the time limit, you still failed), had first aid tents with oxygen, etc., but I still think that in fire camps with that much smoke, even overhead should have gotten hazard pay.
To see these smoke levels in eastern cities is jarring. The locals in fire-prone areas knew what to do in heavy smoke. But after conservative talking heads, and news networks, and politicians telling us that public health is out of control and/or out to get us, how many older people are actually going to listen to the warnings?
These 25 rainbow flag-waiving corporations donated $13.5 million to anti-gay politicians since 2022
Louisiana Passes Bill Banning Kids From the Internet Without Parental Consent
Good luck enforcing that.
@204, air quality:
A coworker told me yesterday he had his first asthma attack in 10 years.
Re: Reginald Selkirk @ #207…
Hmmmm… I wonder how many of the legislators would be able to sign up for a social media account…without help from their teen-aged kids?
Trump says he’s been indicted in classified documents probe
Link
Russian man dies after being mauled by shark off Egyptian Red Sea resort
No windows were available.
Australia to ban swastikas and other Nazi symbols
FBI arrests Texas businessman linked to impeachment of state Attorney General Ken Paxton
Donald Trump indicted for illegal retention of classified documents
Many examples at the link. “sham indictment” seems to be one phrase on which Republicans have decided to base their propaganda. There’s also “what about Biden,” “hoax,” etc.
Link
Kevin McCarthy, Steve Scalise, House Judiciary GOP, Elise Stefanik, Josh Hawley, Jim Jordan, Andy Biggs, Matt Gaetz, Marjorie Taylor Greene, etc., etc. … all are airing their stupidity.
Russian forces battling Ukraine’s assault are discovering a nasty danger behind them, courtesy of the US
Trump confirmed that he has been summoned to appear at the Federal Courthouse in Miami on Tuesday at 3 PM. Unsurprisingly, the orange doofus claims he is innocent.
Elon Musk weighed in. He tweeted something about “what appears to be differential enforcement.” I can’t be bothered to repeat it all.
Donald Junior says we have to stop the corrupt Biden DOJ by putting his Daddy back in the White House. [scoff] I do think Trump should be in the Big House. Of course, Trump is innocent until proven guilty over and over and over and over again.
Boise man filming police was arrested in 2022. Charges dropped, he’s suing for $1M
James Watt, sharp-tongued and pro-development Interior secretary under Reagan, dies at 85
Right-Wingers Mocked For Full-Blown Freakout Over ‘Woke’ Cracker Barrel
Lawsuit seeking new congressional lines for NY could have national political implications
France hails ‘hero with a backpack’ who intervened in knife attack on very young children
If we outlaw backpacks, only outlaws will have backpacks.
It takes a good guy with a backpack to stop a bad guy with a knife.
…
Democrat Wesley Bell launches Senate campaign to challenge Josh Hawley: ‘We can do better’
Correction to comment 214. Previous text:
I was wrong. The case has been assigned to pro-Trump, unethical doofus Aileen Cannon.
Link
Meta, King of Copycats, Makes Power Play for Twitter Users With Instagram Spinoff
Link
New York Times:
Washington Post:
Commentary:
Link
Donald Trump had plenty of time to come up with talking points about his federal criminal indictment. He apparently couldn’t think of much of anything.
@ ^ Lynna, OM : “DeSantis is presenting himself as a Trump imitator, equally indifferent to reality and propriety, which is every bit as pitiful as it sounds.”
Yet that somehow worked for Trump. Willit work for hisfellow fascist ? Who knows? Wish it could be ruled out but.. Fuck.
White House Announces New Initiatives to Protect LGBTQI+ Communities
June 09, 2023
ReligionClause
Link
Followup to comments 214 and 224.
Trump’s favorite judge appointed to oversee his case
Cartoon: Mike Luckovich on the spineless Mike Pence
Apologies if someone else ha slaready posted here but :
Source : https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/study-shows-first-words-from-police-during-traffic-stops-affect-outcome-for-black-drivers
StevoR:
There is a big difference. Trump has charisma. DeSantis has charisn’t. Also, setting himself up as Trumpier than Trump will turn off Trump loyalists. And to Trumpists, loyalty to Trump trumps Trumpism.
Republican presidential candidates cower in fear
ulian Assange Is One Step Closer to American Prison After Losing His Latest Extradition Appeal
Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson was the only Republican running for president that called for Donald Trump to withdraw from the 2024 race. The indictment of Trump on seven counts is a good reason for Trump to withdraw.
Meanwhile, other Republicans are suggesting that the indictment will assure that Trump is the nominee.
Upside down world.
CNN:
Commentary:
Link
Now that I see excerpts from the transcript of that recording, it looks much more like Trump had the actual classified document in his hands … and he was showing it to someone else.
More dunderheaded rightwing responses to the indictment of Donald Trump:
Link
Followup to comments 232 and 242:
Link
President Biden had nothing to do with Trump’s indictment.
And yet, Josh Hawley posted this: “If the people in power can jail their political opponents at will, we don’t have a republic.”
Trump probably blamed his lawyers for failing to nobble the grand jury.
An interesting scientific digression: Scientists Have Found the First Branch on the Tree of Life:
While I find this scientifically fascinating, I post it here primarily to comment on the writer’s approach. I find the strained cutesiness irritating, but I’ve experienced the combined pressure of deadlines and simplifying technical issues and can sympathize with flailing while going over those hurdles.
But throughout the article, every organism gets framed in the singular: the sponge, “the first split resulted in the birth of two creatures—the ancestor of almost all animals, and the ‘sister’ to that ancestor”, etc: barely a hint that this question concerns whole populations over multiple generations, and no mention of our vegetative and fungal cousins. The writer, a Popular Mechanics staffer, deserves credit for not even mentioning creationist nonsense, but still bears a share of responsibility for public evolution confusion.
Oops – apologies for formatting foo @ # 246!
Trump indictment unsealed. You can read the full text here.
Trump aide is second person indicted in classified documents case
Also of note: The Indictment has been unsealed.
Trump and his co-conspiracists “stored his boxes containing classified documents in a ballroom, a bathroom and shower, an office space, his bedroom, and a storage room.”
More from the unsealed indictment soon.
Thanks tomh, at 248.
Here is a summary from TPM:
Link
More telling details from the unsealed indictment:
Link
Nutter Congressman Clay Higgins Calls For Armed Revolution
https://www.wonkette.com/clay-higgins-militia-revolution
Re: Reginald Selkirk @ #220…
Of that list of “woke” companies, the least surprising is Lego. After all, they were founded and headquartered in Denmark.
At the end of the indictment is the “penalty sheet,” giving the maximum term of imprisonment for each count. Adding them up: for Trump, 100 years, for Nauta, 90 years.
@239: Weird indeed. They all want Trump to withdraw, but they can’t say it out loud because they want to inherit his base.
How did Fox News cover Trump’s indictment?
re Lynna @252:
But remember, it is, according to much of the news media and one entire political party, the only ones who are violent are the radical leftists.
Reginald @255, Yep. That’s true.
Followup to comment 256.
Posted by readers of the article:
YouTube link to Jack Smith speaking about the Trump federal indictment. Calm. Intelligent. Clear.
And if the news about Trump wasn’t enough…
https://www.bbc.com/news/live/uk-politics-65860705
The indictment that Jack Smith filed includes photos. For example, there is a photo of “Classified documents sitting in a ballroom used for weddings and other events.”
There’s also this: “Nauta and female family member discuss taking classified material away in advance of DOJ visit.”
Commentary:
Link
Oggie @257, well I know that I’m dangerous.
I remember that one.
The ‘kernel of truth’ is that Clinton’s IT staff, with court approval, erased a hard drive. You can’t just delete the files, that only clears out the directory listings. You have to erase the entire contents of the disk. For this purpose they used open source software named BleachBit. This is standard practice, and good security.
In Trump’s addled mind in 2016, this transformed into a story about Clinton’s people using actual chemical bleach. It then transformed somehow into acid wash because that is an indication of how well Trump’s mind works.
@262: If they were actually worried about Clinton mishandling classified emails they should have applauded the use of BleachBit.
Activist sues Rep. Lauren Boebert for defamation, alleging she slandered him on Fox News when he revealed her alleged drug use, abortions, and escort work
Maine expansion of abortion laws, which would be among the country’s broadest, passes committee
Lynna @261:
<
blockquote>Oggie @257, well I know that I’m dangerous.
Yeah, the right wing does consider truth and reality to be dangerous. And, to a right wing mind, dangerous is the moral equivalent of violence.
All hail Borkquotia, acolyte of Typos, may hre raeign be logn and friutful!
Apple to stop autocorrecting swear word to ‘ducking’ on iPhone
These fish from Thailand glow from the inside out
Trump was all about protecting classified docs … until he wasn’t
I laughed when earlier today Chris Hayes said there was “something Gollum-like” in Trump’s obsession with the classified documents he took. “My documents!” and “My boxes!”
Cartoon: Wearable tech expo
NBC News:
Perfect.
NBC News:
NBC News:
Trump has chandeliers in his Mar-a-Lago bathroom. The bathroom, despite the chandelier, still manages to be particularly ugly Dictator chic style.
For anyone who doesn’t want to wade through the 49 page indictment, NBC News has provided 11 “key takeaways” from it. There are many more details at the link but these are some highlights.
If you look closely at the photo of the boxes in the bathroom, you can see in the upper righthand corner that more boxes are stacked in the shower. They are only partially hidden by the shower curtain.
Ukraine Update: Ukraine takes losses in counterattack, but still advances
@244. Lynna, OM :
Same guy who was cheering on those trying to lynch Trump’s own Vice-President for not doing illegal stuff that he constituitionally could not do right? (Ok then running away in terror from same Trumpist mob when they actually did pretty much what he was calling on them to do..)
Wonder what his past comments about locking Hilary Clinton up and maybe some Quanon fantasies about literally executing y’know most of the high ranking office bearers of the Democratic party were? Wonder wha he wanted to do to Obama for being POTUS whilst black?
Wonder if anyone has called out Hawley’s staggering hypocrisy there and, if so, how he’s responded?
A friend shared an essay from Umair Haque the other day which, well, bleak and powerful writer :
Source : https://eand.co/the-age-of-apocalypse-and-indifference-d8a9f004aa7b
Plus read his :
Source : https://eand.co/america-youre-having-a-fascist-collapse-a91f1b9d159a
In addition to :
Source : https://eand.co/this-is-how-an-age-of-fascism-is-dawning-in-america-2683d9cbbd8d
Can’t find the original piece by Umair Haque that I really wanted to share here – Age of Idiots and Extinction but in a way relieved by that as its horrendously depressing reading. Too doomist.
Pierce R. Butler@246,
Further to the irritation you express, the first branch in the evolutionary history of animals is of course far from the first branch in the “tree of life”! That, as far as we know, was that between bacteria and archaea, probably some three billion years earlier, and almost the same length of time before animals evolved. Also worth noting that the claim that comb jellies vs the rest was the first branching among animals is far from a consensus; many relevant experts still favour the sponges vs the rest hypothesis.
Here’s a rough estimate of how many people recent SCOTUS rulings might kill
Canada’s Trudeau visits Kyiv in gesture of support
Texas court dismisses GOP donor’s defamation lawsuit against Beto O’Rourke
Trump Suit Against Niece Over NY Times Story Advances
@213:
Businessman linked to Texas AG Ken Paxton’s impeachment charged with lying to get $172M in loans
Hillary Clinton responds to Trump indictment with ‘But Her Emails’ merch pitch
Trombonist soldier tries to play on after fainting
StevoR @281: “Same guy who was cheering on those trying to lynch Trump’s own Vice-President for not doing illegal stuff that he constituitionally could not do right?”
Yep. Josh Hawley is that guy. Hypocrisy too rich to swallow.
Hawley is not the only one. Lots of Republicans are saying that Trump should not be indicted because political opponents of the sitting president should not be harassed by law enforcement. All of them seem to have conveniently forgotten Trump’s “lock them up” campaign speeches. During one campaign debate, Trump said to Hillary Clinton’s face that he was going to put her in jail.
So sorry, Republicans, that Trump can no longer get away with committing crimes right and left. Nope, not sorry.
Trump and the Clown-Wowza Reality Distortion Field, by Josh Marshall
National Review editorial board: Impossible to read Trump indictment and ‘not be appalled’
At least one conservative news organization is appalled by Trump’s actions.
Trump dumps gas on the political fire
Octopuses can rewire their ‘brains’ by editing their own RNA on the fly
RUSSIA’S WAR ON UKRAINE
Zelenskyy says ‘counteroffensive, defensive actions’ taking place in Ukraine.
Ukraine’s General Staff said Saturday that “heavy battles” were ongoing, with 34 clashes over the previous day in the country’s industrial east.
Unabomber Ted Kaczynski found dead in prison cell
“I’ll take a punch for queer and trans youth any day:” Ottawa MPP punched in the face at rally supporting queer and trans youth
No identification of the puncher, no mention of an arrest.
https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/indonesias-anak-krakatau-volcano-spews-ash-lava-new-99980837
Side note for anyone who has seen–or even heard of–the movie “Krakatoa East of Java”…Krakatoa (preferred modern spelling is Krakatau) is west of Java.
Pence calls for Garland to publicly justify Trump indictment
Um, because he broke the law? What an idjit.
Put your money on Trump – these charges make him more likely to be Republican nominee
I wouldn’t be so sure about that. These things have a timeline. There is initial outrage, but over time, the less insane Republicans will see that the charges against Trump are well-founded. You will see the argument (I have already seen it in a few places) that Trump should drop out so that he can concentrate on his legal problems. And there is the possibility that other of his legal problems could get worse. An indictment from Georgia for election tampering would be severe, and completely separate from the classified documents case.
I really admire your faith in any portion of the Republican voters. I am not at all optimistic. In fact, I am so ready to remove the entire human race from the category of “intelligent species”.
I fully expect Trump, even if he is sitting in a prison cell, to get the GOP nomination. His supporters are too radicalized to accept anyone else. There is precedent. Debs, in 1920, was the nominee of the Social Democratic Party, and received about a million votes while sitting in a jail cell. Just picture other candidates (state, local and federal level), the Law and Order GOP, the we-are-the-only-ones-who-care-about-national-security GOP, the Support the Cops GOP, trying to distance themselves from Criminal Trump while at the same time trying to convince his supporters to vote for them. Would be interesting. As in, a severe-shortage-of-popcorn interesting.
Conservative terrorists threaten armed resistance to protect their God King cult leader
More Russian stuff blowing up, plus flooding cuts off the Kinburn Spit
Despite the media and various elected officials constantly trying to spin everything into a story about election front-runners, a Grand Jury in Florida has obviously voted to indict the orange one. I wish various news sources would start reporting on Espionage, and running stories about other people that have been indicted for espionage. The election is next year but the media act as if the voters didn’t overwhelmingly reject orangini in 2020. If his base was 30% before he attempted an insurrection, it’s bleedingly obvious that he is not going to be a viable contender in between his trial dates.
I will assume that jury included Republicans and people who voted for the crook. We have only seen a few photos of the evidence, and I’m sure there will be further bombshells that shall emerge as the case progresses.
I’m sure that the loud mouthed fools in Congress that are parroting the ‘unfair attack’ talking points have a significant overlap with those who sought pardons in the wake of Jan 6th.
That case is still in the Grand Jury phase, and of course Georgia also has its case in the works.
I hope all of them are indicted by September.
Blah, blah, blah. Pretty much as expected … still fucking terrible. Trump spoke. The New York Times covered the speech:
New York Times link
Oggie at 190 and 200: An excellent joke!
The world record for “doping related death in the most niche sport” must be a Russian man who died in a sauna bathing contest in Finland. His Finnish opponent only very narrowly survived, and required extensive medical treatment.
Competitive sauna bathing (ie. who can withstand the heat the longest) is a classic Finnish expression of toxic masculinity. It’s supposedly not that dangerous, if the sauna is very hot, so that you get out when your skin starts to burn, before you get hyperthermia/dehydration.
Back in the 2000s, one small town in Finland tried to turn this thing into a local spectator event, called International Sauna Championship. It went on for some years. People from several countries attended, though the top “athletes” always seemed to be from Finland, Russia, or Estonia. I think that part, and this story generally, isn’t about national doping culture, but about national sauna culture, international sports culture and doping.
Anyway, it didn’t take long for doping to become an issue. Since it was basically just a game of pain tolerance, the contestants were simply taking painkillers, which was a recipe for burn injuries. After the lethal/near lethal incident happened, in the final one-to-one match one year around 2010, the event was discontinued.
Lynna @307:
IANAL, but doesn’t that sound an awful lot like incitement to riot?
FBI Investigating Spy Ring’s Political Contributions
North Carolina GOP censures Sen. Tillis for supporting LGBTQ+ rights, immigration policies
He fails the MAGA purity test.
Fact Check: Did Trump Sign Into Law Felony for Which He’s Indicted?
True.
Yes, Trump Said ‘No One Will Be Above the Law’ Regarding Protection of Classified Information
Ukraine Update: Why did Ukraine target the most heavily defended corner of the front?
Meanwhile, children in Donetsk city are begging on the streets for food. Russians are not competently governing the territories they seized.
https://twitter.com/ChrisO_wiki/status/1667634194686656513
Cartoon: But his toilet!
WARNING : Seriously depressing reading.
https://eand.co/the-age-of-the-idiot-versus-the-age-of-extinction-9f47e0b17cff
Huh. Now saying this is a “Members only story” (Fuck I hate how online places do that.) yet I was able to read it before…
Oh well, THIS is the one I mentioned but couldn’t then find in my #282 above here. Again, you have been warned – extremely grim read. If you can read it. If you want to..
Meanwhile in fascinating stellar evolution and possible soon tobe supernovae news – a Woldf rayet star called BELL 1 :
https://www.space.com/chaotic-star-wolf-rayet-supernova
@316. That’s Wolf Rayet star natch. Hit submit by mistake too early rather than preview..
See : https://www.popularmechanics.com/space/deep-space/a43563625/what-is-a-wolf-rayet-star/
In other news :
Source : https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/florida-scientist-resurfaces-after-living-underwater-for-record-100-days
Plus there’s this Seven Days of Science – Even More Spinosaur youtube clip by Ben Thomas here On so much more than just the title suggests including a virgin crocodile birth and the first and earliest stars in our Cosmos. 6 minutes long.
Brittney Griner, Mercury teammates confronted at airport by ‘provocateur,’ WNBA says
Can a chatbot preach a good sermon? Hundreds attend church service generated by ChatGPT to find out
The CW is pivoting to Jesus
In a last-ditch effort, longtime Southern Baptist churches expelled for women pastors fight to stay
Sir Rod Stewart’s wife banned him from being friends with Donald Trump
When Americans tried – and failed – to reunite Christianity
Former Scottish leader Nicola Sturgeon arrested over SNP funding probe
Reginald @319, I think a sermon would be one of the easiest things for ChatGPT to fake.
A few excerpts from Trump’s North Carolina speech, (he gave two speeches yesterday, one in Georgia and one in North Carolina.)
Commentary:
Link
Trump’s AG: “If Even Half of it Is True, He’s Toast”
Former attorney general Bill Barr says the Trump indictment is “damning.”
Excerpts from the New York Times article “Trump Supporters’ Violent Rhetoric in His Defense Disturbs Experts”:
New York Times link
Fox News responds to federal Trump indictment with unhinged demagoguery
Reginald Selkirk@324,
We’ll see if they can find anything to charge Sturgeon with. They haven’t, so far, charged either Peter Murrell (Sturgeon’s husband, and former Chief Executive of the SNP) or Colin Beattie (treasurer of the party at the time of his arrest) with anything. OK, investigations into possible financial crimes can be complex and hence take a long time, but if Sturgeon is also released without charge but “under investigation”, questions about Police Scotland’s approach will multiply.
Matt Damon and Ben Affleck production company asks Trump to stop using their work in video
Kari Lake Threatens Mass Gun Violence in Defense of Donald Trump
NRA, long viewed as invincible, faces shrinking membership and revenue
Sturgeon has now been “released without charge pending further investigation”.
Cartoon: Heaven’s Gate
Russian defenses in Zaporizhia are starting to collapse, plus more Russian stuff blowing up
Haberman says Walt Nauta is ‘case study’ of what happens to Trump loyalists
Guess what, Walt … You may be loyal to Trump, but Trump is not loyal to you.
Cause and Cure Discovered for Common Type of High Blood Pressure
@333: Sturgeon “released without charge”
This seems very odd to me. I could see someone being accidentally arrested during an urgent situation – a bank robbery or whatever; but this isn’t that, and they’ve had time to investigate already. They shouldn’t be arresting her unless they have definite charges.
Russia bans use of large quantities of ammunition due to self-detonation
Re: Reginald Selkirk @ #339…
Even Russian ammo doesn’t want to fight in Ukraine…
https://www.wonkette.com/desantis-disney-nazis
US tells UNESCO it wants to rejoin
Twitter has reportedly refused to pay its Google Cloud contract
Hacker drains Russian special services wallets, transfers funds to Ukraine
NYTimes – How to DIY an Air Purifier
@345
A Corsi-Rosenthal box would be a better solution. It will be more expensive (4 times the number of filters) but it will be more efficient and has less chance of burning out the fan.
@Jean: Neat!
3D Handyman – Build & TEST 3 DIY Corsi-Rosenthal box fan air filters (5:26)
* Cheap box fan + 20x20x1″ MERV14 6-pack + dowel legs = ~$100.
* Airflow Tests (# of Filters vs Cu-ft/min): 0=1200, 1=170, 4=490, 5=610
* 5-filter noise: 76 dB on high, 66dB on low.
* More filters is way better airflow, less motor strain.
Reginald Selkirk@338,
Apparently there was a change in Scottish law in 2016 which means the police must arrest someone they want to interview as a suspect. But Police Scotland must now be feeling a lot of pressure to find something to charge at least one senior SNP figure with.
More good news from the Grim Reaper: Silvio Berlusconi is dead.
Electricity Bills in California Will Soon Be Based on Income.
I don’t know about this. You’re going to have to reveal your income to the power company?
Florida man gets flesh-eating infection from human bite during family fight
Ukraine Update: Counteroffensive continues as Ukraine liberates more locations
More Ukraine updates coming later.
‘If you want to die in jail, keep talking’ – two national security law experts discuss the special treatment for Trump and offer him some advice
Ukraine and Moldova to construct bridge across Dniester, key link between Kyiv and Chisinau
Webb Telescope Will Soon Get a Tiny Sidekick to Explore Alien Worlds
I go away for a few days and things boil over like an unwatched pot!
Since I left last week: Ukraine has done some liberating, Trump was federally indicted, Boris Johnson and other Tories resigned, Nicola Sturgeon was arrested and then released, Pat Robertson died, Ted Kaczynski died by suicide, James Watt died, Silvio Berlusconi died, and the Supreme Court issued a surprisingly pro-democracy ruling. And I’m still catching up.
Here’s a link to today’s Guardian Ukraine liveblog. From their closing summary:
Kamala Harris takes over Biden’s schedule as he undergoes root canal
Golnaz Esfandiari on Twitter:
Photos at the link.
SC (Salty Current) says
<