March 19, 2022

Putin's War Crimes, Ctd.

The Washington Post's live updates of developments Saturday in Russia's war against Ukraine are here: "Ukrainian forces continued to put up a defiant defense of their country's cities, limiting Russian ground advances as the Kremlin's invasion entered its 24th day. Major population centers such as Kyiv and Kharkiv remain in Ukrainian hands, and Russia's troops are still 'stalled across the country,' the Pentagon said, even as it cautioned that Moscow retains 90 percent of its assembled combat power.... On Saturday, the Ukrainian military said it has been cut off from the Sea of Azov, immediately south of [Mariupol].... The United Nations said Friday that roughly 9.8 million people have either fled Ukraine or are internally displaced as a result of the fighting, while 12 million are stranded or otherwise face dangerous living conditions. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said early Saturday that Russian forces have committed war crimes by blocking critical aid deliveries to Ukraine's embattled cities.... Vladimir Putin, at a rally in Moscow, celebrated the invasion and again baselessly claimed that he was stopping a genocide. Chinese leader Xi Jinping pledged more humanitarian assistance to Ukraine during his Friday call with President Biden...." ~~~

     ~~~ The Guardian's live updates for Saturday are here.

Ellen Nakashima, et al., of the Washington Post: "President Biden, in a nearly two-hour video call Friday, warned China's leader, Xi Jinping, that his country would face significant repercussions if it provided aid to Russia.... The call was part of an urgent U.S. effort to head off any Chinese moves to provide economic or military help to Russia as America and its allies try to shut down Moscow's financial lifelines.... There was little indication Friday that Xi was receptive to Biden's entreaties that his country not come to Russia's aid, however.... Administration officials would not say whether Biden explicitly outlined the types of consequences Beijing might face if it should aid Russia in its war on Ukraine.... Most of the discussion between the two leaders was devoted to the Ukraine crisis, the official said.... Biden and Xi on Friday also discussed Taiwan." CNBC's report is here. The White House's readout is here.

John Simpson of BBC News: "On Thursday afternoon..., Vladimir Putin rang the Turkish President, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and told him what Russia's precise demands were for a peace deal with Ukraine.... The Russian demands fall into two categories[, according to Ibrahim Kalin, Mr. Erdogan's leading advisor].... Chief among [those in the first category] is an acceptance by Ukraine that it should be neutral and should not apply to join Nato. Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky has already conceded this.... Ukraine would have to undergo a disarmament process to ensure it wasn't a threat to Russia. There would have to be protection for the Russian language in Ukraine. And there is something called de-Nazification.... Mr Putin said that it would need face-to-face negotiations between him and President Zelensky before agreement could be reached on [demands in the second category].... Mr Kalin was much less specific about these issues, saying simply that they involved the status of Donbas, in eastern Ukraine, parts of which have already broken away from Ukraine and stressed their Russianness, and the status of Crimea. Although Mr Kalin didn't go into detail, the assumption is that Russia will demand that the Ukrainian government should give up territory in eastern Ukraine." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Nothing is fair in love and war, but I don't think Putin should get a prize for invading Ukraine, killing, maiming & starving Ukrainians & bombing their homes & hospitals. Rather, in any negotiation, Russia should have to give up its occupation of Donbas & Crimea & pay reparations to Ukraine. And it would be nice if Putin were forced to spend the rest of his unnatural life in modest accommodations on a tiny Pacific atoll, one that was not too radioactive. Without a yacht.

Robyn Dixon of the Washington Post: "Thousands of flag-waving Russians crammed into Moscow's Luzhniki Stadium ... during a triumphal celebration Friday of the eighth anniversary of Russia's annexation of Crimea.... Vladimir Putin, breaking from his recent image as a remote figure at the end of a very long table, strode about the stage, extolling the war against Ukraine as testament to Russia's 'Christian values.'... He said Russia took military action to stop 'neo-Nazis and extreme nationalists' in Ukraine committing 'genocide.' But the video feed of his speech abruptly cut off mid-sentence, an interruption that was later described by Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov as a technical problem. 'Well, or sabotage,' tweeted the exiled Anti-Corruption Foundation of jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny. Russian state television replayed the speech in full.... As usual for such events, some of the attendees were state employees ordered to attend."

Just a Coincidence! AP: "Three Russian cosmonauts have arrived at the International Space Station wearing yellow flight suits with blue accents, colours that match the Ukrainian flag. The men were the first new arrivals on the space station since the start of the Russian war in Ukraine last month.... When the cosmonauts were able to talk to family back on Earth, [Oleg] Artemyev was asked about the suits. He said every crew chose their own. 'It became our turn to pick a colour. But, in fact, we had accumulated a lot of yellow material so we needed to use it,' he said. 'So that's why we had to wear yellow.'"

The New York Times' live updates of developments Friday in Russia's war against Ukraine are here: "At least 130 survivors have escaped the ruins of a theater that was nearly leveled in a Russian attack in the embattled southern city of Mariupol, a Ukrainian official said on Friday, but hundreds remained unaccounted for in the wreckage.... A missile strike on the outskirts of Lviv, a western city that has been a haven for people fleeing areas under siege, rattled the relative peace there on Friday. The strike may have been an attempt to target the abilities of Ukraine's air force because the local news media has reported that a plant at the airport was 'the only enterprise in Ukraine that refurbishes MiG-29s for the Ukrainian Air Force.'" (Also linked yesterday.)

John Ismay of the New York Times describes the NLAW -- Next Generation Light Anti-Tank Weapon -- an anti-tank missile made by Saab that is half the weight of a Javelin, that costs much less, & that a soldier can easily carry on his back. "In perhaps 15 seconds, and sometimes even faster than that, the soldiers can unsling the weapon, unfold its aiming sight, release a safety catch and wait for their prey to appear." NLAWs are something of an equalizer between a foot soldier & an armored tank. The U.K. reportedly has given 4,200 of them to Ukraine. An NLAW hit kills everybody in the tank.

Rachel Lerman & Cat Zakrzewski of the Washington Post: "Elon Musk recently challenged Russian President Vladimir Putin to a one-handed fistfight for the future of Ukraine. But the entrepreneur's real defense of the besieged country is his effort to keep Ukrainians online with shipments of Starlink satellite Internet service. Starlink is a unit of Musk's space company, SpaceX. The service uses terminals that resemble TV dishes equipped with antennas and are usually mounted on roofs to access the Internet via satellite in rural or disconnected areas. When war broke out in Ukraine, the country faced threats of Russian cyberattacks and shelling that had the potential to take down the Internet.... So the country's minister of digital transformation, Mykhailo Fedorov, tweeted a direct plea to Musk urging him to send help. Musk replied just hours later: 'Starlink service is now active in Ukraine. More terminals en route.' Ukraine has already received thousands of antennas from Musk's companies and European allies, which has proved 'very effective,' Fedorov said in an interview with The Washington Post Friday."

John Reinan of the Minneapolis Star Tribune: "Jimmy Hill's last act was gathering food for hospital patients in Ukraine. The Mahtomedi native, 67, was killed Thursday in the northern Ukraine city of Chernihiv when Russian forces attacked people standing in a bread line. He is among several U.S. citizens to die so far in the war that began when Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24."

Michael Luciano of Mediaite recounts an exchange between Sens. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) & Chris Murphy (D-Ct.) in which Sasse in particular seemed to forget he was speaking in the chamber of "the world's greatest deliberative body." Eventually, the presiding officer had to ask the senators to address their remarks to the president of the Senate & not to each other. Luciano notes that Sasse's remarks might include "the first time in history a senator has directly addressed another senator as 'dude' on the floor." Marie: But I find it rather more notable that Sasse used the venue to accuse another senator of verbal masturbation when he asked Murphy, "Do you think a single person that your Twitter self-pleasuring was for ... voted against it because they were against Ukrainian aid?" (Also linked yesterday.)

Melanie Zanona & Manu Raju of CNN: Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-Russia) "infuriated members of his own party this week for calling Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky a 'thug' and the Ukrainian government 'incredibly evil' -- comments that surfaced just days before Zelensky made a passionate plea to Congress on Wednesday for more help in defending Ukraine against Russia's bloody assault on the country.... Cawthorn's latest comments have put GOP leaders in an awkward spot -- just as they're trying to show a unified front against Russia and paint President Joe Biden as weak against ... Vladimir Putin. The remarks from a freshman firebrand with the ear of ... Donald Trump risks undermining their anti-Russia position.... 'Madison is wrong, if there's any thug in this world it's Putin,' House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said at his weekly news conference on Friday, though he said he's still supporting Cawthorn's reelection bid."

Finally, Some Appreciation for Fox "News"' Fair & Balanced Coverage. Joanna Walters of the Guardian: "Russia's foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, has praised Fox News for its coverage, appearing on the Russian state-controlled RT network to hail the right-leaning US cable channel, whose primetime host Tucker Carlson has played down the invasion. 'We know the manners and the tricks that are being used by the western countries to manipulate media, we understood long ago that there is no such thing as an independent western media,' said Lavrov, speaking in English in a studio interview on Friday. 'If you take the United States, only Fox News is trying to present some alternative point of view.'..."

Ellen Francis & Amy Cheng of the Washington Post: "Four American service members were killed on Friday night after a U.S. military aircraft crashed in Norway while taking part in a NATO exercise, the Norwegian prime minister said.... The U.S. 2nd Marines Expeditionary Force, in a statement, had not specified how many people were in the MV-22B Osprey, which is capable of vertical takeoffs and landings and is primarily used to transport troops and equipment in support of amphibious assaults. Norwegian civilian authorities led search and rescue efforts, the Marines said. The aircraft was assigned to participate in Exercise Cold Response 2022, a 'long-planned and regular' routine that Norway hosts biannually, according to the NATO military alliance. Around 30,000 troops from more than 27 NATO countries have gathered to train in Norway's cold-weather conditions. Norway announced Friday that it would step up defense spending in support of forces near its border with Russia.... NATO stressed that the exercise was not in response [to Russia's war on Ukraine]."

Maria Sachetti of the Washington Post: "Homeland Security's inspector general on Friday called for the immediate evacuation of dozens of immigrants detained at a privately run detention facility in New Mexico, saying it is 'critically understaffed' and has unsanitary conditions such as clogged toilets, moldy sinks and water leaks throughout the facility.... The report drew a highly unusual rebuke from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and CoreCivic, the private company that runs the facility, with both accusing the government watchdog of staging photos and fabricating claims. Filthy sinks and clogged toilets, for instance, were in unoccupied areas undergoing renovations, company officials said. ICE officials signaled the agency would not withdraw the 60 detainees from the facility...."

Felicia Sonmez & Mariana Alfaro of the Washington Post: "The House on Friday passed the Crown Act, legislation that would ban discrimination against individuals based on how they choose to wear their hair. The measure, H.R. 2116 ... passed on a vote of 235 to 189, with 14 Republicans joining all Democrats in supporting the measure. The legislation was introduced by Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-N.J.) and prohibits discrimination 'based on the individual's hair texture or hairstyle, if that hair texture or that hairstyle is commonly associated with a particular race or national origin.'... The measure's future in the Senate remains uncertain.... The White House has said it strongly supports the House bill.... More than a dozen states have already enacted similar legislation, often with bipartisan support."

Maybe It's Her Hair. Ruth Marcus of the Washington Post: "How desperate can you get? This desperate: Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) is pushing the argument that Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson is dangerously soft on sex offenders, child pornographers in particular. 'I've noticed an alarming pattern when it comes to Judge Jackson's treatment of sex offenders, especially those preying on children,' Hawley tweeted. 'I'm concerned that this [is] a record that endangers our children.'" Hawley then takes snippets of Jackson's writings and her rulings way out of context or otherwise misrepresents them to try to make his case. "Douglas Berman, an expert on sentencing policy at Ohio State University, reviewed Jackson's sentences in child pornography cases and pronounced them 'not at all out of the ordinary.'&" ~~~

~~~ Tierney Sneed of CNN digs a little more deeply into Jackson's record & Hawley's "concerns": "Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson's writings, remarks and decisions as she wrestled with the highly sensitive issue of child pornography crimes are the focus of a new GOP line of attack on President Joe Biden's pick for the Supreme Court.... But a CNN review of the material in question shows that Jackson has mostly followed the common judicial sentencing practices in these kinds of cases, and that Hawley took some of her comments out of context by suggesting they were opinions, rather than follow-up questions to subject-matter experts." ~~~

Take It Away, Wingers! She's clearly got a very scary history when it comes to pedophilia, or at least handling people who are pedophiles. It's one more drop in the bucket when it comes to dealing with the left and their problem with pedophilia. -- Red State Editor Brandon Morse, on Ketanji Brown Jackson, OAN interview ~~~

~~~ Zachary Pleat of Media Matters: "Following Sen. Josh Hawley's (R-MO) Twitter rant yesterday against Supreme Court nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, a segment on [far-right cable channel] OAN took his unfounded and misleading attacks against her record in a more deranged direction. The host and her guest falsely accused Jackson of being 'kind' to pedophiles, echoing the long-running QAnon conspiracy theory accusing liberal elites of engaging in pedophilia."

Annie Karni of the New York Times: "They were once seatmates in the spare limousine of the White House motorcade, traveling the globe together as part of the president's inner circle. Bonded by the miles they logged on the road and their unique access to power, Pete Souza, the former official White House photographer who took nearly two million photographs of former President Barack Obama, and Representative Ronny Jackson of Texas, the former White House physician who was elected to Congress as a Republican in 2020, were once close friends. Now, they are the most public of enemies on social media, where Mr. Jackson routinely hurls insults and unsubstantiated claims of cognitive decline at President Biden and Mr. Souza responds with bitingly personal, sometimes salacious takedowns of the congressman's character. He often begins them tauntingly with, 'Hey Ronny." MB: All I can say is, "Go Pete!" (Also linked yesterday.)

Maria Cramer of the New York Times: "Donald J. Trump's presidential campaign has been ordered to pay more than $300,000 in legal fees and expenses to a former employee who the campaign's lawyers said had violated the terms of a nondisclosure agreement when she accused Mr. Trump of forcibly kissing her in 2016. The award, the culmination of an arbitration claim that was dismissed in November, represents the latest instance of Mr. Trump"s failure to use a nondisclosure agreement successfully against an ex-worker."

Tara Bernard of the New York Times: "Equifax, Experian and TransUnion -- the giant credit-reporting companies that each keep files on roughly 200 million Americans -- said on Friday that they will soon [-- beginning July 1 --] wipe away credit stains created by certain medical debts. The changes -- including removing black marks for people who settled a debt after it went to collections -- were cheered by consumer advocates and reflected a growing acceptance that such debts aren't the best predictor of a consumer's financial behavior. The companies said the changes would eliminate up to 70 percent of the medical debt accounts on consumers' credit reports, which contain reams of data used to calculate the all-important three-digit credit score that is the key to mortgages, car loans, rental agreements and more.... And beginning in the first half of 2023, the credit-reporting companies said, they will exclude unpaid medical collection debts under $500.... But the changes will do little to lift the scores of people with the largest unpaid debts, who are often dealing with catastrophic or costly illnesses that result in high bills even with insurance coverage."

Sooner or Later, It All Comes Down to Racism. Brad Dress of the Hill: "A member of the 'People's Convoy' said that he was going to tar and feather Black Lives Matter Plaza while speaking to a crowd gathered in Washington, D.C.... In a video captured by The Daily Beast, a speaker standing on a stage bearing a sign for 'Freedom Convoy 2022' tells a crowd to 'take back' a street adorned with the slogan 'Black Lives Matter,' which stretches for two blocks on 16th Street NW in D.C." MB: Just as I forgot all about the "People's Convoy," this guy seems to have forgot that the idea of the protest was to fight Covid-19 healthcare protocols.

Robert McFadden of the New York Times: "Don Young, the Alaska congressman who secured pork-barrel billions for his state over nearly a half-century and became the longest-serving Republican in the House of Representatives and the oldest current member of both the House and Senate, died on Friday. He was 88. Mr. Young died while traveling home to Alaska, his office said. His wife, Anne, was with him. In a state whose small population allows for two senators but only one representative, Mr. Young, who cultivated the image of a rugged frontiersman with outsize clout in Washington, was sometimes called Alaska's 'third senator.'... Most Alaskans have had no congressman in their lifetimes but Mr. Young, who was first elected in 1973, during the Nixon administration.... Gruff and irascible, Mr. Young, who survived occasional allegations of shady ethics, was a staunch opponent of environmental causes and a tough defender of Alaska's oil, mineral and logging industries." MB: IOW, a nasty piece of work, may the Fates rest his soul, if he has one.

The Pandemic, Ctd.

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Friday are here. (Also linked yesterday.)

Beyond the Beltway

Alabama. Jonathan Edwards of the Washington Post: So this Alabama gunshop owner named Nathan Kirk thought it would be funny to get a vanity plate that read, "LGBFJB," which signified to Kirk, "Let's Go Brandon. Fuck Joe Biden." After a while, Kirk got a letter from Alabama's motor vehicle officials telling him his plate was an affront to the "peace and dignity of the State of Alabama" and Kirk would have to turn it in. Well, sez Kirk, "I wasn't going to just lay down." He means "lie down," but he's an Alabama Republican, so. Poor Kirk's plight became a right-wing cause célèbre. So the state Motor Vehicle Division reversed itself & told Kirk they were right sorry for any inconvenience that might have caused him. (Also linked yesterday.)

Ohio Senate Race. Craig Howie of Politico: "An onstage standoff erupted between Ohio Republican Senate candidates Josh Mandel and Mike Gibbons at a primary debate Friday evening. In video from the Gahanna debate, former state treasurer Mandel stood up to challenge investment banker Gibbons during a heated discussion over a stock trade as the crowd jeered the confrontation and a debate official sought to separate the two men.... The men repeatedly told each other to back off before standing eye-to-eye for several seconds, while fellow GOP debate participants Matt Dolan, Jane Timken and JD Vance looked on awkwardly. Mandel eventually took his seat. Mandel and Gibbons continued their feud offstage, with Gibbons' team calling Mandel 'unhinged' and Mandel further criticizing Gibbons' investment record. The two candidates have been locked in a tight race for first place in the Republican Senate primary, according to recent polling."

South Carolina. Meg Kinnard of the AP: "South Carolina has given the greenlight to firing-squad executions, a method codified into state law last year after a decade-long pause in carrying out death sentences because of the state's inability to procure lethal injection drugs. The state Corrections Department said Friday that renovations have been completed on the death chamber in Columbia and that the agency had notified Attorney General Alan Wilson that it was able to carry out a firing-squad execution. Lawmakers set about tweaking state law to get around the lethal injection drug situation. Legislation that went into effect in May made the electric chair the state's primary means of execution while giving inmates the option of choosing death by firing squad or lethal injection, if those methods are available."

Way Beyond

A Heat Wave in Antartica. Jason Samenow & Kasha Patel of the Washington Post: "The coldest location on the planet has experienced an episode of warm weather this week unlike any ever observed, with temperatures over the eastern Antarctic ice sheet soaring 50 to 90 degrees above normal. The warmth has smashed records and shocked scientists.... Parts of eastern Antarctica have seen temperatures hover 70 degrees (40 Celsius) above normal for three days and counting, [climate researcher Jonathan] Wille said. He likened the event to the June heat wave in the Pacific Northwest, which scientists concluded would have been 'virtually impossible' without human-caused climate change.

News Lede

New York Times: "At least one person was killed, 50 homes were destroyed and nearly 500 others evacuated in central Texas after a wildfire burned more than 45,000 acres, officials said on Friday. The wildfire, a set of blazes west of the Dallas-Fort Worth area called the Eastland Complex fire, began on Thursday evening. A deputy with the Eastland County Sheriff's Office, Barbara Fenley, died while helping people escape, the authorities said. The blaze was 15 percent contained as of Friday evening, the Texas A&M Forest Service said on Twitter."

March 18, 2022

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

Michael Luciano of Mediaite recounts an exchange between Sens. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) & Chris Murphy (D-Ct.) in which Sasse in particular seemed to forget he was speaking in the chamber of "the world's greatest deliberative body." Eventually, the presiding officer had to ask the senators to address their remarks to the president of the Senate & not to each other. Luciano notes that Sasse's remarks might include "the first time in history a senator has directly addressed another senator as 'dude' on the floor." Marie: But I find it rather more notable that Sasse used the venue to accuse another senator of verbal masturbation when he asked Murphy, "Do you think a single person that your Twitter self-pleasuring was for ... voted against it because they were against Ukrainian aid?"

The New York Times' live updates of developments in Russia's war against Ukraine are here: "At least 130 survivors have escaped the ruins of a theater that was nearly leveled in a Russian attack in the embattled southern city of Mariupol, a Ukrainian official said on Friday, but hundreds remained unaccounted for in the wreckage.... A missile strike on the outskirts of Lviv, a western city that has been a haven for people fleeing areas under siege, rattled the relative peace there on Friday. The strike may have been an attempt to target the abilities of Ukraine's air force because the local news media has reported that a plant at the airport was 'the only enterprise in Ukraine that refurbishes MiG-29s for the Ukrainian Air Force.'"

Annie Karni of the New York Times: "They were once seatmates in the spare limousine of the White House motorcade, traveling the globe together as part of the president's inner circle. Bonded by the miles they logged on the road and their unique access to power, Pete Souza, the former official White House photographer who took nearly two million photographs of former President Barack Obama, and Representative Ronny Jackson of Texas, the former White House physician who was elected to Congress as a Republican in 2020, were once close friends. Now, they are the most public of enemies on social media, where Mr. Jackson routinely hurls insults and unsubstantiated claims of cognitive decline at President Biden and Mr. Souza responds with bitingly personal, sometimes salacious takedowns of the congressman’s character. He often begins them tauntingly with, 'Hey Ronny.'" MB: All I can say is, "Go Pete!"

Jonathan Edwards of the Washington Post: So this Alabama gunshop owner named Nathan Kirk thought it would be funny to get a vanity plate that read, "LGBFJB," which signified to Kirk, "Let's Go Brandon. Fuck Joe Biden." After a while, Kirk got a letter from Alabama's motor vehicle officials telling him his plate was an affront to the "peace and dignity of the State of Alabama" and Kirk would have to turn it in. Well, sez Kirk, "I wasn't going to just lay down." He means "lie down," but he's an Alabama Republican, so. Then poor Kirk's plight became a right-wing cause célèbre. So the state Motor Vehicle Division reversed itself & told Kirk they were right sorry for any inconvenience that might have caused him.

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Friday are here.

~~~~~~~~~~

Putin's War Crimes, Ctd.

The Washington Post's live updates of developments Friday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here: "The Russian invasion of Ukraine, now in its fourth week, is 'basically frozen' on the ground amid fierce resistance and mounting logistical difficulties, according to the Pentagon. But Western officials warned that the Kremlin still has significant combat power in reserve, even though poor logistics and Ukrainian attacks on their supply lines have left Russian forces scrambling for food and fuel. In the absence of major advances, Russia -- which has launched more than 1,000 missiles so far -- is increasingly relying on 'dumb' bombs to wear cities and civilians down. The United Nations has reported 1,900 civilian casualties, including the deaths of 52 children, and the flight of more than 3.1 million refugees. But humanitarian groups have warned that the true scale of human suffering is likely to be far greater.... A video from the besieged city of Chernihiv, verified by The Washington Post, shows blanket-covered bodies of children amid rubble. (A U.S. citizen was killed amid Russian shelling there Thursday.) In Kharkiv, where a Post reporter witnessed evidence of cluster bombs being used in civilian areas, body bags and coffins are in short supply. And on Friday morning, missiles struck near an airport in Lviv, a city close to the Polish border...."

Loveday Morris of the Washington Post: "Before the war, Kharkiv was known as Ukraine's intellectual capital. With more than 30 universities, it brimmed with hundreds of thousands of students. It was a scientific and cultural hub. But today, the 19th-century architectural gems in its center have been ravaged by missile strikes. Burst water pipes leave a cascade of icicles framing blown-out windows. Parts of the city were eerily devoid of people. Around half the population, some 700,000 people, have fled, according to the regional administration. At a checkpoint on a desolate, potholed road into the city -- one of the few safe remaining passages in and out -- a Ukrainian territorial defense soldier warned of what lies ahead. 'Be careful,' he said. 'The sky is on fire there.'" MB: An accompanying photo of plastic body bags piled on the side of the road like trash on pick-up day is devastating. This is Putin's legacy.

Marie: I have no idea if the following is true, because Inside Edition, but I'm passing it along anyway: ~~~

~~~ Inside Edition: "Daily Beast contributing editor Craig Copetas says he's been told that Putin has people tasting his food before he eats it and that last month, he replaced his entire personal staff of 1,000 people. MB: Let's look at the logic of such a staffing decision: You have a thousand fairly anonymous people who've been working for you for various lengths of time and none of them has poisoned you, so you fire them and replace them with a thousand more fairly anonymous people, any one or more of whom might be inclined to poison you or stab you with a fork. So you're moving from the known (= so far, not assassins) to the unknown (= could be assassins).

India, Friend to Russia. Gerry Shih of the Washington Post: "India, the world’s biggest oil importer behind China and the United States, has agreed to purchase 3 million barrels of Russian oil at a heavy discount, an Indian official said Thursday. The purchase, which was first reported by the Wall Street Journal, is relatively small given Russia's production and Indian demand. But the volume could increase in the coming months and reinforce a growing perception that India is determined to preserve its extensive trade and military ties with Moscow, even as the United States and its allies urge governments around the world to isolate Russia. Aside from the oil deal, the Indian government is also exploring ways to maintain trade with Russia by reviving a Cold War-era arrangement called the rupee-ruble trade.... The mechanism ... would let Indian and Russian firms do business while bypassing the need to use U.S. dollars -- the predominant currency of international trade -- and lowering the risk of potential U.S. sanctions."

The New York Times' live updates of developments Thursday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here: "Rescuers on Thursday began pulling some survivors from the wreckage of a theater in the besieged port city of Mariupol, an adviser to the city's mayor said, a day after an attack destroyed the building where hundreds of people were believed to be taking shelter. The extent of casualties was unknown as Russian forces continued to shell the area, he said, hampering recovery efforts. In an overnight address, President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine alleged that a Russian aircraft had 'purposefully dropped a huge bomb' on the theater.'... Cease-fire talks between the Russians and Ukrainians were expected to enter their fourth day on Thursday, but increasingly harsh comments by ... Vladimir V. Putin ... were a dim portent for progress, despite conciliatory public statements by negotiators from both sides.... His statements came amid an increasingly brutal war of attrition unfolding on the ground and in the air, with fierce battles raging in the suburbs of Kyiv, Ukrainian forces claiming to have shot down more Russian aircraft, and Russian warships on the Black Sea launching missiles at towns around the southern city of Odessa.... British intelligence reports say that Russian forces have 'made minimal progress on land, sea or air in recent days,' and that they 'continue to suffer heavy losses.' Still, Russian forces have taken control of large sections of Ukraine, particularly in the east and south. The battle for the skies above Kyiv raged overnight on Thursday, with the Ukrainian military claiming to have shot down 10 Russian planes and missiles. The remnants of one rocket tore through a residential high-rise and killed at least one person, officials said." (Also linked yesterday.)

Andrea Rosa of the AP: "Rescuers searched for survivors Thursday in the ruins of a theater blown apart by a Russian airstrike in the besieged city of Mariupol, while a ferocious bombardment left dozens dead in a northern city over the past day, authorities said. Hundreds of civilians had been taking shelter in the grand, columned theater in central Mariupol after their homes were destroyed in three weeks of fighting in the besieged port city. Nearly a day after the airstrike there were no reports of deaths. With much of the city cut off from the flow of information, there were also conflicting reports on whether anyone had emerged from the rubble. 'We hope and we think that some people who stayed in the shelter under the theater could survive,' Petro Andrushchenko, an official with the mayor's office, told The Associated Press. He said the building had a relatively modern basement bomb shelter designed to withstand airstrikes." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ MEANWHILE. Michael Luciano of Mediaite: Sen. Rand Paul appeared on a Newsmax show where he opined that Ukraine should pay for the military aid the U.S. is sending them. But, hey, Paul does "have sympathy for Ukraine." MB: Thanks to Akhilleus for the lead, and do see his commentary in today's thread. How is it that Li'l Randy is so dense he doesn't understand that Ukrainians are fighting our war? Ukrainians of every age are the missile fodder that is protecting the people of all Western countries. I believe President Zelensky explained that to, you know, members of Congress yesterday. I feel guilty that all I'm doing is sending money & supplies when little children are dying in this war on the West. And all Randy wants is a check. Oddly enough, it never occurred to him that the check he wants should come from Russia, not Ukraine. (Also linked yesterday.)

Jacob Knutson of Axios: "President Biden will speak to Chinese President Xi Jinping Friday as 'part of our ongoing efforts to maintain open lines of communication between the United States and the PRC,' press secretary Jen Psaki said in a statement Thursday. Biden and Xi will in part discuss Russia's ongoing invasion of Ukraine after reports indicated that Moscow had asked China's government for military ​equipment and other assistance to support its war." (Also linked yesterday.)

Maegan Vazquez & Nikki Carvajal of CNN: "Speaking at the annual Friends of Ireland Luncheon on St. Patrick's Day at Capitol Hill, [President] Biden said Putin is 'a murderous dictator, a pure thug who is waging an immoral war against the people of Ukraine.'" (Also linked yesterday.)>

** Watch What We Say, Not What We Do. It's Impossible to Be More Hypocritcal Than We Are. Mariana Alfaro & Eugene Scott of the Washington Post: "More than two dozen Senate Republicans are demanding that President Biden do more to aid war-torn Ukraine and arm its forces against Russia's brutal assault, after voting last week against $13.6 billion in military and humanitarian assistance for Ukraine.... '"We should send more lethal aid to Ukraine which I voted against last week" is making my brain melt,' tweeted Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii).... 'They voted to exonerate Trump for this specific reason, which was to withhold aid from Zelensky, and here they are again, opposing aid to Zelensky,' Schatz said. 'So now they're doing it twice.'" (Also linked yesterday.)

Catie Edmondson of the New York Times: "The House voted overwhelmingly on Thursday to strip Russia of its preferential trade status with the United States, moving to further penalize the country's economy in response to the invasion of Ukraine. The lopsided 424-to-8 vote came after President Biden announced last week that the United States and its European allies would take new steps to isolate Russia from the global trading system. All of the lawmakers who opposed the measure were Republicans. The bill ... would allow the United States to impose higher tariffs on Russian goods.... The trade measure still needs Senate approval. Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the majority leader, said he would work to move it through the chamber quickly. ~~~

     ~~~ The Usual Suspects. Bryan Metzger of Business Insider, republished in Yahoo! News: "Here are the eight Republicans who voted against the bill...."

O Canada! (Click on the letter to call up a readable-sized version. Thanks to RAS for the link.)

Monica Hesse of the Washington Post: In a nine-minute video available to Russians via "various different channels," Arnold Schwarzenegger tries to get across the real strength that's demonstrated by Russians who oppose the war on Ukraine: ~~~

Elisha Fieldstadt of NBC News: "American basketball star Brittney Griner's detention in Russia has been extended until May, the Russian state news agency TASS reported, citing the Khimki Court of the Moscow Region.... Griner has been detained for weeks fter Russian officials said they found vape cartridges containing oil derived from cannabis in her luggage at the Sheremetyevo airport near Moscow." (Also linked yesterday.)

Another Way Donald Trump Is Still Ruining Earth. Lisa Friedman of the New York Times: "The nation's largest federally owned utility plans to invest more than $3.5 billion in new gas-burning electric plants, despite President Biden's commitment to swiftly move away from fossil fuels and eliminate greenhouse gases from the power sector in a little more than a decade. The Tennessee Valley Authority, which provides electricity to nearly 10 million people across the Southeast, is replacing aging power plants that run on coal, the dirtiest fossil fuel. But critics say substituting gas for coal would lock in decades of additional carbon dioxide emissions that are heating the planet and could be avoided by generating more electricity from solar, wind or another renewable source.... It raises the question of whether President Franklin D. Roosevelt's grand 20th-century experiment with electrification can adapt to a 21st-century climate crisis.... Like the Postal Service, the Tennessee Valley Authority is an independent organization governed by a board of directors made up of presidential appointees. And in both cases, the board is dominated by members nominated by ... Donald J. Trump, who frequently mocked climate science and was an ally of the fossil fuel industry."

Can You Hear Me Now? Bob Brigham of the Raw Story: "'Indicted Rep. Jeff Fortenberry (R-NE) may have just staked his political career -- and possibly his freedom -- on a tried-and-true excuse: Bad cell phone reception,' The Daily Beast reported Thursday. 'Attorneys for Fortenberry, who on Thursday became the first sitting member of Congress to stand trial in 21 years, told a federal jury that what the government calls lying to the FBI could boil down to a misunderstanding stemming from "a bad cell phone connection."' In October, the Department of Justice alleged that 'Fortenberry repeatedly lied to and misled authorities during a federal investigation into illegal contributions to Fortenberry's re-election campaign made by a foreign billionaire in early 2016.'"

The Pandemic, Ctd.

Katie Shepherd of the Washington Post: "Biotechnology company Moderna on Thursday asked the Food and Drug Administration to allow adults 18 and older to receive a second booster shot of the company's mRNA vaccine amid concerns that immune protection from the vaccines wanes over time. Moderna's application is substantially broader than what Pfizer and its German partner, BioNTech, sought earlier in the week -- FDA authorization for a second booster shot for adults 65 and older." Free to nonsubscribers.

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Thursday are here. (Also linked yesterday.)

Michael Shear & Sheryl Stoldberg of the New York Times: "Jeffrey D. Zients, an entrepreneur and management consultant who steered President Biden's coronavirus response through successive pandemic waves and the largest vaccination campaign in American history, plans to leave the White House in April to return to private life, President Biden said in a statement. Mr. Zients will be replaced as the White House coronavirus coordinator by Dr. Ashish K. Jha, the dean of the Brown University School of Public Health and a practicing internist who has urged an aggressive approach to the pandemic in frequent television appearances. Dr. Jha will coordinate the government's Covid-19 response from inside the White House, officials said." An NBC News story is here. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ President Biden's statement, via the White House, is here. (Also linked yesterday.)

Beyond the Beltway

New Hampshire. Kathy McCormack of the AP: "New Hampshire Republican Gov. Chris Sununu said Thursday that he will veto a GOP-backed redistricting plan that would tilt the state's 1st Congressional District toward Republicans while solidifying the Democrats- advantage in the 2nd District, shortly after legislators passed the bill.... The Senate's 13-11 vote in favor of the plan on Thursday followed House passage of the bill in January on a vote of 186-164. Republicans lead by a narrow majority in the Legislature. Overturning a veto requires a two-thirds majority in both bodies." (Also linked yesterday.)

North Carolina. Finally. Blatant 2020 Voter Fraud Under Legitimate Investigation. Reid Epstein of the New York Times: "North Carolina officials said on Thursday that they planned to investigate whether Mark Meadows, who as ... Donald J. Trump's chief of staff helped amplify false claims of voter fraud in an attempt to overturn the 2020 election, cast a legal vote in that year's presidential race. The North Carolina Department of Justice has asked the State Bureau of Investigation to examine whether Mr. Meadows broke the law when he registered to vote, and voted from, a remote mobile home where he did not live, said Nazneen Ahmed, a spokeswoman for Josh Stein, the state attorney general, who is a Democrat." Politico's report is here.

News Ledes

New York Times: "A 13-year-old boy was behind the wheel of a pickup truck that struck a van in Texas on Tuesday night in a collision that killed nine people, including a college golf coach and six of his players, along with the boy and a man traveling with him, officials said on Thursday. Bruce Landsberg, vice chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, said at a news conference that the truck's left front tire was a spare that had blown out before the truck veered into the lane the golf team's van was traveling in and struck the van head-on. It was unclear at what speeds the vehicles were traveling, but Mr. Landsberg noted that the speed limit in the area is 75 miles per hour.... Both vehicles went up in flames in the collision near Andrews, Texas, about 50 miles east of the state line with New Mexico."

New York Times: Domenico DeMarco, who defined the New York slice "has died at age 85, his daughter Margie DeMarco Mieles announced Thursday in a Facebook post. Originally from the Italian province of Caserta, he began making pies at Di Fara Pizza in Midwood, Brooklyn, in 1965."

March 17, 2022

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

Maegan Vazquez & Nikki Carvajal of CNN: "Speaking at the annual Friends of Ireland Luncheon on St. Patrick's Day at Capitol Hill, [President] Biden said Putin is 'a murderous dictator, a pure thug who is waging an immoral war against the people of Ukraine.'"

** Forget Our Votes; Follow Our Tweets. Mariana Alfaro & Eugene Scott of the Washington Post: "More than two dozen Senate Republicans are demanding that President Biden do more to aid war-torn Ukraine and arm its forces against Russia's brutal assault, after voting last week against $13.6 billion in military and humanitarian assistance for Ukraine.... '"We should send more lethal aid to Ukraine which I voted against last week" is making my brain melt,' tweeted Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii).... 'They voted to exonerate Trump for this specific reason, which was to withhold aid from Zelensky, and here they are again, opposing aid to Zelensky,' Schatz said. 'So now they're doing it twice.'"

Kathy McCormack of the AP: "New Hampshire Republican Gov. Chris Sununu said Thursday that he will veto a GOP-backed redistricting plan that would tilt the state's 1st Congressional District toward Republicans while solidifying the Democrats' advantage in the 2nd District, shortly after legislators passed the bill.... The Senate's 13-11 vote in favor of the plan on Thursday followed House passage of the bill in January on a vote of 186-164. Republicans lead by a narrow majority in the Legislature. Overturning a veto requires a two-thirds majority in both bodies."

The New York Times' live updates of developments Thursday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here: "Rescuers on Thursday began pulling some survivors from the wreckage of a theater in the besieged port city of Mariupol, an adviser to the city's mayor said, a day after an attack destroyed the building where hundreds of people were believed to be taking shelter. The extent of casualties was unknown as Russian forces continued to shell the area, he said, hampering recovery efforts. In an overnight address, President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine alleged that a Russian aircraft had 'purposefully dropped a huge bomb' on the theater.'... Cease-fire talks between the Russians and Ukrainians were expected to enter their fourth day on Thursday, but increasingly harsh comments by ... Vladimir V. Putin ... were a dim portent for progress, despite conciliatory public statements by negotiators from both sides.... His statements came amid an increasingly brutal war of attrition unfolding on the ground and in the air, with fierce battles raging in the suburbs of Kyiv, Ukrainian forces claiming to have shot down more Russian aircraft, and Russian warships on the Black Sea launching missiles at towns around the southern city of Odessa.... British intelligence reports say that Russian forces have 'made minimal progress on land, sea or air in recent days,' and that they 'continue to suffer heavy losses.' Still, Russian forces have taken control of large sections of Ukraine, particularly in the east and south. The battle for the skies above Kyiv raged overnight on Thursday, with the Ukrainian military claiming to have shot down 10 Russian planes and missiles. The remnants of one rocket tore through a residential high-rise and killed at least one person, officials said."

Andrea Rosa of the AP: "Rescuers searched for survivors Thursday in the ruins of a theater blown apart by a Russian airstrike in the besieged city of Mariupol, while a ferocious bombardment left dozens dead in a northern city over the past day, authorities said. Hundreds of civilians had been taking shelter in the grand, columned theater in central Mariupol after their homes were destroyed in three weeks of fighting in the besieged port city. Nearly a day after the airstrike, there were no reports of deaths. With much of the city cut off from the flow of information, there were also conflicting reports on whether anyone had emerged from the rubble. 'We hope and we think that some people who stayed in the shelter under the theater could survive,' Petro Andrushchenko, an official with the mayor's office, told The Associated Press. He said the building had a relatively modern basement bomb shelter designed to withstand airstrikes." ~~~

~~~ MEANWHILE. Michael Luciano of Mediaite: Sen. Rand Paul appeared on a Newsmax show where he opined that Ukraine should pay for the military aid the U.S. is sending them. But, hey, Paul does "have sympathy for Ukraine." MB: Thanks to Akhilleus for the lead, and do see his commentary in today's thread. How is it that Li'l Randy is so dense he doesn't understand that Ukrainians are fighting our war? Ukrainians of every age are the missile fodder that is protecting the people of all Western countries. I believe President Zelensky explained that to, you know, members of Congress yesterday. I feel guilty that all I'm doing is sending money & supplies when little children are dying in this war on the West. And all Randy wants is a check. Oddly enough, it never occurred to him that the check he wants should come from Russia, not Ukraine.

Jacob Knutson of Axios: "President Biden will speak to Chinese President Xi Jinping Friday as 'part of our ongoing efforts to maintain open lines of communication between the United States and the PRC,' press secretary Jen Psaki said in a statement Thursday. Biden and Xi will in part discuss Russia's ongoing invasion of Ukraine after reports indicated that Moscow had asked China's government for military ​equipment and other assistance to support its war."

Elisha Fieldstadt of NBC News: "American basketball star Brittney Griner's detention in Russia has been extended until May, the Russian state news agency TASS reported, citing the Khimki Court of the Moscow Region.... Griner has been detained for weeks after Russian officials said they found vape cartridges containing oil derived from cannabis in her luggage at the Sheremetyevo airport near Moscow."

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Thursday are here.

Michael Shear & Sheryl Stoldberg of the New York Times: "Jeffrey D. Zients, an entrepreneur and management consultant who steered President Biden's coronavirus response through successive pandemic waves and the largest vaccination campaign in American history, plans to leave the White House in April to return to private life, President Biden said in a statement. Mr. Zients will be replaced as the White House coronavirus coordinator by Dr. Ashish K. Jha, the dean of the Brown University School of Public Health and a practicing internist who has urged an aggressive approach to the pandemic in frequent television appearances. Dr. Jha will coordinate the government's Covid-19 response from inside the White House, officials said." An NBC News story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ President Biden's statement, via the White House, is here.

~~~~~~~~~~

Putin's War Crimes, Ctd.

The Washington Post's live updates of developments Thursday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here: "Attacks on civilian targets in Ukraine continued Wednesday, as an airstrike hit a theater in the besieged port city of Mariupol where hundreds of residents were sheltering.... On the square near the destroyed theater, the word 'children' was written in large Russian lettering, satellite photos show. And in the northern city of Chernihiv, where heavy fighting has been ongoing for weeks, 10 people were killed by Kremlin forces while waiting in line for bread, U.S. and Ukrainian officials said.... The attacks come as President Biden for the first time publicly called ... Vladimir Putin a 'war criminal.'"

Helene Cooper, et al., of the New York Times: "... according to American intelligence estimates..., more than 7,000 Russian troop[s have been killed in Russia's war on Ukraine]..., greater than the number of American troops killed over 20 years in Iraq and Afghanistan combined.... And the Russian military has also lost at least three generals in the fight, according to Ukrainian, NATO and Russian officials.... It is a staggering number amassed in just three weeks of fighting, American officials say, with implications for the combat effectiveness of Russian units.... 'Losses like this affect morale and unit cohesion, especially since these soldiers don't understand why they're fighting,' said Evelyn Farkas, the top Pentagon official for Russia and Ukraine during the Obama administration.... One recent [Pentagon intelligence] report focused on low morale among Russian troops and described soldiers just parking their vehicles and walking off into the woods." ~~~

~~~ For Example. Brad Reed of the Raw Story: "Wall Street Journal chief foreign affairs correspondent Yaroslav Trofimov has written a lengthy new report illustrating the serious setbacks Russia is facing in its invasion by focusing on the small city of Voznesens'k, which the reporter writes has 'dealt Russian forces one of the most humiliating defeats of the war.' Although Voznesens'k is a small city of only around 35,000 people, it is located in a strategically important area that could have given Russian forces a back door to assault the key port city of Odessa.... 'Russian survivors of the Voznesensk battle left behind nearly 30 of their 43 vehicles -- tanks, armored personnel carriers, multiple-rocket launchers, trucks -- as well as a downed Mi-24 attack helicopter, according to Ukrainian officials in the city,' [Trofimov] writes. 'Russian forces retreated more than 40 miles to the southeast, where other Ukrainian units have continued pounding them. Some dispersed in nearby forests, where local officials said 10 soldiers have been captured.'... Read the full report here." ~~~

~~~ MEANWHILE. Tim Lister, et al., of CNN: "A theater where hundreds of people had taken shelter in Mariupol was bombed on Wednesday, according to local authorities, as hundreds of thousands of people remain trapped in the coastal Ukrainian city that has been encircled for weeks by Russian forces.... Military strikes also hit a building that houses the Neptune Pool, just over four kilometers (approximately 2.5 miles) from the theater, according to videos shared by a local official. Its authenticity has been confirmed by CNN. Maxim Kach, a Mariupol city government official, said the building was for civilians, with only women and young children hiding within it and not military personnel.... A Ukrainian official accused Russian troops of holding some 400 people captive at Mariupol's Regional Intensive Care Hospital." Included is a satellite image showing the word "children" spelled out in large Russian letters in empty parking lots on two sides of the Drama Theatre.

Jeff Stein of the Washington Post: "The Treasury Department on Wednesday gave a new international body a list of 50 Russian elites that the United States views as its top priorities for enacting new sanctions, as global law enforcement steps up its hunt for the assets of oligarchs tied to the Kremlin. Treasury officials provided the list to the Russian Elites, Proxies and Oligarchs (REPO) task force, a new multinational body involving the United States and more than a half-dozen allied nations, for the group's first meeting. The task force will pool the resources of the countries' law enforcement divisions to track down the assets of Russian oligarchs stashed overseas, a difficult task complicated by the opaque or complicated financial instruments frequently used by Russian financial elites to hide their holdings from public view. Treasury publicly released 28 of the 50 names on the list, including ... Vladimir Putin, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Russian mega-billionaire Alisher Usmanov...."

Dana Milbank of the Washington Post suggests a fairly easy way for Americans to help Ukraine's war effort: boycott products made by companies that are funding Russia's war. Milbank lists a number of them, and it's likely you have purchased some of these products. (I have.) Milbank advises, "Go to Jeffrey Sonnenfeld's website via Yale's School of Management to make sure you aren't funding the businesses that are funding Putin's war machine -- and reward the vast majority of companies that share Zelensky's belief that peace is more important than profit.

Raphael Minder & Michael Forsythe of the New York Times: "Spain, which has pledged to seize the suspected superyachts of Russian oligarchs targeted for sanctions..., on Wednesday impounded the third such vessel, one of the world's biggest superyachts, in Spanish territorial waters this week. The ship was impounded in the Spanish port of Tarragona, pending an inspection to establish its exact ownership, Spain's transport ministry said in a statement. The ship, called the Crescent, was registered in the Cayman Islands.... The Crescent, valued by the SuperYachtFan website at $600 million, appears to be the sister ship of the slightly larger, slightly more expensive Scheherazade, a 459-foot superyacht that U.S. officials said could be associated with ... Vladimir V. Putin...."

The New York Times' live updates of developments Wednesday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here: "... President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine delivered an urgent, impassioned plea to Congress on Wednesday for more military aid to defeat Russia, describing the threat his nation faces as an attack on the democratic values championed by the United States.... In a remarkably direct appeal by a wartime leader to policymakers in Washington, Mr. Zelensky addressed lawmakers on a large screen in a movie theater-style auditorium under the Capitol, invoking the memories of Pearl Harbor and the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks -- when the United States came under attack -- as he pleaded for support saying, 'we need you right now.'" Includes reporters' comments on President Zelensky's speech. Missing: the usual snark attacks. (Also linked yesterday.)

Ashley Parker of the Washington Post: "President Biden explicitly called ... Vladimir Putin a 'war criminal' Wednesday, after weeks of avoiding the term and at a time when his administration is still determining whether that label officially applies. Biden made the dramatic accusation seemingly off the cuff, in response to a reporter's shouted question.... 'I think he is a war criminal,' Biden said, after delivering comments on the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act.... [Press Secretary Jen] Psaki depicted it as a heartfelt remark. 'The president's remarks speak for themselves,' she said. 'He was speaking from his heart and speaking from what we've seen on television, which is barbaric actions by a brutal dictator through his invasion of a foreign country.' She reiterated Wednesday that the State Department is conducting a legal review to determine whether the actions in Ukraine are war crimes."

Kaitlin Collins, et al., of CNN: "President Joe Biden on Wednesday announced an additional $800 million in security assistance to Ukraine.... 'The world is united in our support for Ukraine and our determination to make (Russian President Vladimir) Putin pay a very heavy price,' Biden said before signing a presidential memorandum at the White House to deliver the military assistance.... 'This could be a long and difficult battle. But the American people will be steadfast in our support of the people of Ukraine in the face of Putin's immoral, unethical attacks on civilian population.' According to the White House, the $800 million in security assistance will provide Ukraine with: 800 Stinger anti-aircraft systems, 100 drones, 'over 20 million rounds of small arms ammunition and grenade launcher and mortar rounds,' 25,000 sets of body armor, 25,000 helmets, 100 grenade launchers, 5,000 rifles, 1,000 pistols, 400 machine guns, 400 shotguns, as well as "2,000 Javelin, 1,000 light anti-armor weapons, and 6,000 AT-4 anti-armor systems.'" (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

Dan Lamothe of the Washington Post: "The Pentagon will expand the size and scope of weaponry being rushed to Ukraine, the Biden administration said Wednesday, including for the first time armed drones capable of inflicting significant damage to Russian ground units while U.S. officials continue to search for sophisticated antiaircraft systems owned by European allies.... The new aid package approved Wednesday includes 100 Switchblade drones, small unmanned aircraft packed with explosives that crash into targets in 'kamikaze' fashion, said a U.S. official.... The administration has declined to detail what specific additional European surface-to-air missiles could be sent to Ukraine, but [President] Biden said Wednesday that the United States has identified and is helping Ukraine acquire additional 'longer-range antiaircraft systems and the munitions for those systems.'"

Rick Noack of the Washington Post: "Russia was ordered to halt its invasion of Ukraine by the United Nations' top court Wednesday, in a preliminary decision that appeared to have largely symbolic significance. Ukraine initiated the case at the International Court of Justice in The Hague to contest ... Vladimir Putin's official explanation for entering the country as an effort to end a 'genocide' of pro-Russian separatists. The court voted 13 to 2 in favor of ordering Russia to 'suspend' military operations in Ukraine and to prevent armed units that are directed or supported by Russia from taking further action. Of the two judges in opposition, one was from Russia, the other from China." (Also linked yesterday.)

AP: "The Council of Europe on Wednesday expelled Russia from the continent's foremost human rights body in an unprecedented move over Moscow's invasion and war in Ukraine. The 47-nation organization's committee of ministers said in statement that 'the Russian Federation ceases to be a member of the Council of Europe as from today, after 26 years of membership.'... Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov insisted Wednesday that it would have left the body regardless." MB: You can't fire me. I quit. (Also linked yesterday.)

Adela Suliman, et al., of the Washington Post: “Officials from both Russia and Ukraine expressed cautious optimism Wednesday that peace talks were making progress toward ending almost three weeks of fighting across Ukraine. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a video address overnight Tuesday that negotiations with Moscow were heading in a 'more realistic' direction, and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Wednesday that there is 'hope for reaching a compromise.' However, both sides also stressed that the talks were difficult, with differences remaining over what neutrality, or security guarantees, for Ukraine would look like." An AP story is here. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I suppose it won't happen, but I think Russia should have to fix what they broke, as much as that is possible. They should pay to repair or replace all the structures they damaged or toppled, and they should pay reparations to people they wounded & to the families of those they murdered. This is not the same as bringing Germany to its knees after WWI. Russia has plenty of oil to pay for damages. In the meantime, since China claims it's ever-so dedicated to preserving the peace, President Biden should ring up President Xi & ask China to enforce no-fly zones, at least over humanitarian corridors throughout Ukraine.

Steve Inskeep of NPR: U.S. "Secretary of State Antony Blinken says that merely stopping the invasion of Ukraine may not be enough for Russia to gain relief from Western economic sanctions. The U.S. also wants an assurance that there will never be another such invasion. In an interview with NPR, Blinken spoke of Western sanctions that cratered the Russian ruble, led global firms to shutter their Russian operations, and closed the Moscow stock market. He said the unplugging of much of Russia's economy from the West is beginning to wreak long-term effects that are 'growing over time.' He insisted that U.S. sanctions against Russia are 'not designed to be permanent,' and that they could 'go away' if Russia should change its behavior. But he said any Russian pullback would have to be, 'in effect, irreversible.'..." (Also linked yesterday.)

Christian Shepherd & Lily Kuo of the Washington Post: "Three weeks into the largest military clash in Europe since World War II, China's effort to displease neither Russia nor the international coalition imposing sanctions on Putin is looking increasingly untenable. A disconnect is growing between the image of neutrality Beijing wants to project and President Xi Jinping's long-term strategy of fostering ties with Russia as a critical partner in the standoff with the United States and its allies. Pressure from Western governments -- and from pockets of Chinese academia and public opinion -- is mounting on the Chinese leadership to use its economic ties with Russia to force a cease-fire. But to do so is a risk for Chinese leaders, who have little experience dealing with geopolitical crises far from their shores." (Also linked yesterday.)

I want to thank the Russian Academy for this Lifetime Achievement Award. -- Hillary Clinton, reacting to Russia's sanctioning her, in a tweet

Lisa Mascaro of the AP: “Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy cited Pearl Harbor and the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 on Wednesday as he appealed to the U.S. Congress to do more to help Ukraine's fight against Russia, but acknowledged the no-fly zone he has sought to 'close the sky' over his country may not happen. Livestreamed into the Capitol complex, Zelenskyy said the U.S. must sanction Russian lawmakers and block imports, and he showed a packed auditorium of lawmakers an emotional video of the destruction and devastation his country has suffered in the war." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

Counterprogramming. Paul Shinkman of US News: "... Vladimir Putin put forward a comprehensive, if disjointed, defense of Russia's bloody assault on Ukraine three weeks after it began in an apparent recognition of growing international outrage at the brutality of the campaign. In lengthy remarks Wednesday..., Putin lobbed familiar claims at growing international condemnation for the military campaign he launched..., while also appearing to shift some of the responsibility for it. He offered, for example, that the character of the military assault -- ... originated within the Russian military and the general staff.... And, seemingly acknowledging new political fronts he faces at home, he put forward troubling language about the need for 'cleansing of the nation' against those who do not support the Kremlin's policies.... Putin's lengthy remarks took place while ... Volodymyr Zelenskeyy simultaneously addressed the U.S. Congress...." ~~~

     ~~~ Anton Troianovski of the New York Times: "... Vladimir V. Putin on Wednesday referred to pro-Western Russians as 'scum and traitors' who needed to be removed from society, describing the war in Ukraine as part of an existential clash with the United States and setting the stage for an ever fiercer crackdown at home and even more aggression abroad. Comparing the West to Nazi Germany, the Russian leader laced his speech with derision for the 'political beau monde' in Europe and the United States, and for the 'slave-like' Russians who supported it...."

Paul Kirby of BBC News: "When Marina Ovsyannikova burst into Russian living rooms on Monday's nightly news, denouncing the war in Ukraine and propaganda around it, her protest highlighted a quiet but steady stream of resignations from Russia's tightly controlled state-run TV. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has thanked her, appealing to anyone working for what he calls Russia's propaganda system to resign. Any journalist working in what he calls the fourth branch of power risks sanctions and an international tribunal for 'justifying war crimes', he warns."

Marie: Something I think about every day: what if Trump were still president*? ~~~

~~~ Joyce Vance, in an MSNBC column: “The first impeachment [of Donald Trump] is pivotal to understanding the current war in Ukraine, and how narrowly we escaped an American presidency that could have readily aligned itself with Russia over our NATO allies.... Before the [infamous call between Trump & Ukraine's new president Volodymyr Zelensky], Trump had asked his chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, to hold back the aid [Congress had allocated to Ukraine. Despite attempts by the White House Office of Legal Counsel & Bill Barr's DOJ to bury the content of the call], the inspector general for the intelligence community, Michael Atkinson (subsequently fired by Trump, in April 2020) advised the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence that the director of national intelligence was sitting on a credible whistleblower complaint.... Trump now takes credit for the aid Ukraine received and suggests that if he were president, Ukraine would be better off. Indeed, 62 percent of Americans believe Putin would not have invaded Ukraine if Trump were president.... Had he won [the 2020 election], Trump could have fully denuded NATO and entered into once discussed joint cyber agreements with Moscow. We could have had a president who wouldn't protest Putin's Ukraine ambitions; after all, as Trump said originally, they were 'smart.'"

Maria Sacchetti & Nick Miroff of the Washington Post: "The Department of Homeland Security said Wednesday that it will grant temporary protected status, or TPS, to Afghan nationals living in the United States without permanent legal status, adding them to a long list of immigrants waiting for the same protection under the law. Approximately 74,500 Afghans are eligible to apply for the status, which grants them protection from deportation for 18 months and eligibility for a work permit. Afghans residing in the United States as of March 15 are eligible to apply, and they must pay a fee and pass a background check. For most Afghans, the protection is redundant: The vast majority were paroled into the United States under Operation Allies Welcome and allowed to apply for work permits free of charge. DHS said in a statement that this additional protection will mainly affect approximately 2,000 foreign nationals who were not evacuated -- such as international students -- and whose visas could expire and leave them in legal limbo." CNN's report is here. (Also linked yesterday.)

Katie Benner, et al., of the New York Times: "In the year after he disclosed a federal investigation into his 'tax affairs' in late 2020, President Biden's son, Hunter Biden, paid off a significant tax liability, even as a grand jury continued to gather evidence in a wide-ranging examination of his international business dealings, according to people familiar with the case.... As recently as last month, the federal grand jury heard testimony in Wilmington, Del., from two witnesses, one of whom was a former employee of Hunter Biden whose lawyer was later subpoenaed for financial records that reflected money Mr. Biden received from a Ukrainian energy company. The investigation, which began as a tax inquiry under the Obama administration, widened in 2018 to include possible criminal violations of tax laws, as well as foreign lobbying and money laundering rules...."

Rachel Siegel of the Washington Post: "The Federal Reserve raised interest rates for the first time in the pandemic on Wednesday, while signaling far more hikes and warning that inflation would remain high through the rest of the year. The quarter-point interest rate hike was expected and considered modest, but the Fed more than doubled the number of rate hikes anticipated this year -- for a total of seven -- to help rein in the highest inflation in 40 years. Wednesday marked the first rate hike since 2018. The Fed Board has faced criticism that it has underestimated inflation over the past year, and now even more uncertainty lurks. Energy prices are spiking because of the war in Ukraine, and coronavirus surges are shutting down major Chinese manufacturing hubs, worsening global supply chain snarls that are pushing prices higher."

Carl Hulse of the New York Times: Senate Republicans have been vilifying Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson and some other judicial nominees for their work as public defenders, "by suggesting that they acted inappropriately in representing clients accused of serious, sometimes vicious crimes. Democrats say the tactic ignores a fundamental principle of the American justice system -- that everyone has the constitutional right to be represented by counsel-- and effectively seeks to disqualify from the bench anyone who has taken that obligation seriously.... The Republican strategy is a response to a concerted push by the Biden administration to diversify the federal bench by nominating more people with experience in criminal defense work, many of them women of color.... The nomination of Judge Jackson, who would be the first public defender and the first Black woman to sit on the high court, will be the biggest test yet of whether a lawyer who represented accused criminals can draw broad Republican support." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Jennifer Rubin of the Washington Post: "No politician better exemplifies the triumph of partisanship over duty to country than Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). But unlike some of his more brazen colleagues, he often feels obliged to concoct reasons for his ruthless partisanship, unintentionally revealing that power is his only objective.... He conceded there is 'no question' that President Biden's nominee for the Supreme Court, Ketanji Brown Jackson, is qualified. So ... his reason for opposing her, in all likelihood, is nothing short of ridiculous: Liberal interest groups back her.... White House Chief of Staff Ronald Klain weighed in on Twitter: 'Just for the record, Judge Jackson's supporters include the Fraternal Order of Police, conservative former federal judges Tom Griffith and Michael Luttig, a bipartisan group of former Supreme Court clerks, and the International Association of the Chiefs of Police.'" (Also linked yesterday.)

Allyson Chiu of the Washington Post: "Sleep experts widely agree with the Senate that the country should abandon its twice-yearly seasonal time changes. But ... unlike the Senate, many sleep experts believe the country should adopt year-round standard time. After the Senate voted unanimously and with little discussion Tuesday to make daylight saving time permanent, the American Academy of Sleep Medicine issued a statement cautioning that the move overlooks potential health risks associated with that time system.... The AASM made this stance clear in 2020 when it released a position statement recommending that the country institute year-round standard time. Its reasoning, in part, is that standard time is more closely associated with humans' intrinsic circadian rhythm, and that disrupting that rhythm, as happens with daylight saving time, has been associated with increased risks of obesity, metabolic syndrome, cardiovascular disease and depression."

Anna Phillips of the Washington Post: The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals "on Wednesday lifted a ban blocking the federal government from factoring damage from rising greenhouse gas emissions into its decisions, offering a temporary reprieve for President Biden's plans to tackle climate change.... With sweeping climate legislation stalled in Congress, the administration is counting on these regulations to meet its emissions reduction targets." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Worth bearing in mind: the confederate Supremes are bent on gutting the EPA's regulatory powers anyway.

The Pandemic, Ctd.

Lenny Bernstein & Joel Achenbach of the Washington Post: "A surge in coronavirus infections in Western Europe has experts and health authorities on alert for another wave of the pandemic in the United States, even as most of the country has done away with restrictions after a sharp decline in cases. Infectious-disease experts are closely watching the subvariant of omicron known as BA.2, which appears to be more transmissible than the original strain, BA.1, and is fueling the outbreak overseas.... In all, about a dozen nations are seeing spikes in coronavirus infections caused by BA.2, a cousin of the BA.1 form of the virus that tore through the United States over the past three months.... China and Hong Kong ... are experiencing rapid and severe outbreaks, but the strict 'zero covid' policies they have enforced make them less similar to the United States than Western Europe." The article is free to nonsubscribers.

David Shortell, et al., of CNN: "Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin, known as the Taoiseach, tested positive for Covid-19 Wednesday while attending a gala in Washington, DC, that had just been addressed by President Joe Biden. Martin left the gathering for The Ireland Funds after his positive result was confirmed, according to PA Media, a UK-based news agency. Irish Ambassador to the US Daniel Mulhall announced the results to the room, a person who attended the dinner told CNN. A White House official said Biden is not considered a close contact of Martin. The pair was set to hold a bilateral meeting at the White House on Thursday, but the official said the schedule will be changed.... In a photo posted online by the Press Association, Martin is seen sitting next to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi at the event." A Washington Post story is here.

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Wednesday are here. (Also linked yesterday.)

Beyond the Beltway

Illinois. Julia Jacobs of the New York Times: "An Illinois appellate court ruled Wednesday that the actor Jussie Smollett be released from jail on bond pending his appeal of his conviction for falsely reporting that he had been the victim of a hate crime. Mr. Smollett was sentenced last week to five months in jail, but his lawyers quickly asked a panel of judges to stay the sentence while they appealed the conviction." An AP report is here.

Ohio. Jessie Balmert & Laura Bischoff of the Columbus Dispatch: "The Ohio Supreme Court struck down the third set of state House and Senate maps late Wednesday, effectively ending any hope of a May 3rd primary with both legislative and statewide races. The decision marks the third time the Ohio Supreme Court has rejected legislative maps drawn by the Ohio Redistricting Commission. Once again, Chief Justice Maureen O'Connor, a Republican, was the deciding vote in a 4-3 decision. The Ohio Supreme Court ordered the Ohio Redistricting Commission to draw a new set of state House and Senate maps by March 28. In its decision, the court's majority ... made a suggestion for the next round of mapmaking: draft maps in public, convene frequent meetings and use a different mapmaker.... 'Resolving this self-created chaos ... depends not on the number of hands on the computer mouse but, rather, on the political will to honor the people's call to end partisan gerrymandering,' according to the court's decision."

Texas. Aaron Blake of the Washington Post demonstrates how Texas' latest voter suppression law does in fact work to suppress the vote, and it seems to suppress significantly more Democratic votes than Republican votes. ~~~

     ~~~ Paul Weber & Acacia Coronado of the AP: "Texas threw out mail votes at an abnormally high rate during the nation's first primary of 2022, rejecting nearly 23,000 ballots outright under tougher voting rules that are part of a broad campaign by Republicans to reshape American elections, according to an analysis by The Associated Press. Roughly 13% of mail ballots returned in the March 1 primary were discarded and uncounted across 187 counties in Texas. While historical primary comparisons are lacking, the double-digit rejection rate would be far beyond what is typical in a general election, when experts say anything above 2% is usually cause for attention.... The rejection rate was higher in counties that lean Democratic (15.1%) than Republican (9.1%)."

Washington State, Texas, Poland, Ukraine, Etc. Shea as in Shady. David Gutman of the Seattle Times: "Former Washington state Rep. Matt Shea, the far-right Republican who was found by a House-commissioned investigation to have planned and participated in domestic terrorism, is in a small town in Poland with more than 60 Ukrainian children, trying to facilitate their adoption in America. Shea has said his group helped rescue 62 children and their two adult caregivers from an orphanage in Mariupol, the city in southeastern Ukraine that has been bombarded by Russian forces. But international agencies say, with the chaos and confusion of war, now is not an appropriate time for international adoptions from Ukraine. And Shea's presence, and the lack of information surrounding the American group he's with, has raised concerns among some residents of Kazimierz Dolny, the small Polish town where the children are staying at a hotel-guesthouse.... A House-commissioned report found [Shea] had planned and participated in domestic terrorism against the United States with his involvement in a trio of standoffs against the government." MB: Maybe he's planning to bring the kids to the U.S. to make them foot soldiers in a 21st-century Shea's Rebellion.

Way Beyond

Iran/U.K. Karla Adam & Liz Sly of the Washington Post: "Two British Iranians who spent years in prison in Iran are on their way back to the United Kingdom, a development that suggests that a revival of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal could be imminent. Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a charity worker, and Anoosheh Ashoori, a retired civil engineer, 'will return to the U.K. today,' Britain's Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said Wednesday. She also said that a third person, Morad Tahbaz, who has British, Iranian and American citizenship, has been 'released from prison on furlough' to his house in Tehran." (Also linked yesterday.)

News Lede

The New York Times reports new details on the man who shot homeless people in New York City & Washington, D.C.