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Thank you to everyone who has been contributing links to articles & other content in the Comments section of each day's "Conversation." If you're missing the comments, you're missing some vital links.

The New York Times lists Emmy winners. The AP has an overview story here.

New York Times: “Hvaldimir, a beluga whale who had captured the public’s imagination since 2019 after he was spotted wearing a harness seemingly designed for a camera, was found dead on Saturday in Norway, according to a nonprofit that worked to protect the whale.... [Hvaldimir] was wearing a harness that identified it as “equipment” from St. Petersburg. There also appeared to be a camera mount. Some wondered if the whale was on a Russian reconnaissance mission. Russia has never claimed ownership of the whale. If Hvaldimir was a spy, he was an exceptionally friendly one. The whale showed signs of domestication, and was comfortable around people. He remained in busier waters than are typical for belugas....” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Oh, Lord, do not let Bobby Kennedy, Jr., near that carcass. ~~~

     ~~~ AP Update: “There’s no evidence that a well-known beluga whale that lived off Norway’s coast and whose harness ignited speculation it was a Russian spy was shot to death last month as claimed by animal rights groups, Norwegian police said Monday.... Police said that the Norwegian Veterinary Institute conducted a preliminary autopsy on the animal, which was become known as 'Hvaldimir,' combining the Norwegian word for whale — hval — and the first name of Russian President Vladimir Putin. 'There are no findings from the autopsy that indicate that Hvaldimir has been shot,' police said in a statement.”

New York Times: Botswana's “President Mokgweetsi Masisi grinned as he lifted the diamond, a 2,492-carat stone that is the biggest diamond unearthed in more than a century and the second-largest ever found, according to the Vancouver-based mining operator Lucara, which owns the mine where it was found. This exceptional discovery could bring back the luster of the natural diamond mining industry, mining companies and experts say. The diamond was discovered in the same relatively small mine in northeastern Botswana that has produced several of the largest such stones in living memory. Such gemstones typically surface as a result of volcanic activity.... The diamond will likely sell in the range of tens of millions of dollars....”

Click on photo to enlarge.

~~~ Guardian: "On a distant reef 16,000km from Paris, surfer Gabriel Medina has given Olympic viewers one of the most memorable images of the Games yet, with an airborne celebration so well poised it looked too good to be true. The Brazilian took off a thundering wave at Teahupo’o in Tahiti on Monday, emerging from a barrelling section before soaring into the air and appearing to settle on a Pacific cloud, pointing to the sky with biblical serenity, his movements mirrored precisely by his surfboard. The shot was taken by Agence France-Presse photographer Jérôme Brouillet, who said “the conditions were perfect, the waves were taller than we expected”. He took the photo while aboard a boat nearby, capturing the surreal image with such accuracy that at first some suspected Photoshop or AI." 

Washington Post: “'Mary Cassatt at Work' is a large and mostly satisfying exhibition devoted to the career of the great American artist beloved for her sensitive and often sentimental views of family life. The 'at work' in the title of the Philadelphia Museum of Art show references the curators’ interest in Cassatt’s pioneering effort to establish herself as a professional artist within a male-dominated field. Throughout the show, which includes some 130 paintings, pastels, prints and drawings, the wall text and the art on view stresses Cassatt’s fixation on art as a career rather than a pastime.... Mary Cassatt at Work is on view at the Philadelphia Museum of Art through Sept. 8. philamuseum.org”

New York Times: “Bob Newhart, who died on Thursday at the age of 94, has been such a beloved giant of popular culture for so long that it’s easy to forget how unlikely it was that he became one of the founding fathers of stand-up comedy. Before basically inventing the hit stand-up special, with the 1960 Grammy-winning album 'The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart' — that doesn’t even count his pay-per-view event broadcast on Canadian television that some cite as the first filmed special — he was a soft-spoken accountant who had never done a set in a nightclub. That he made a classic with so little preparation is one of the great miracles in the history of comedy.... Bob Newhart holds up. In fact, it’s hard to think of a stand-up from that era who is a better argument against the commonplace idea that comedy does not age well.”

Washington Post: “An early Titian masterpiece — once looted by Napolean’s troops and a part of royal collections for centuries — caused a stir when it was stolen from the home of a British marquess in 1995. Seven years later, it was found inside an unassuming white and blue plastic bag at a bus stop in southwest London by an art detective, and returned. This week, the oil painting 'The Rest on the Flight into Egypt' sold for more than $22 million at Christie’s. It was a record for the Renaissance artist, whom museums describe as the greatest painter of 16th-century Venice. Ahead of the sale in April, the auction house billed it as 'the most important work by Titian to come to the auction market in more than a generation.'”

Washington Post: The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., which houses the world's largest collection of Shakespeare material, has undergone a major renovation. "The change to the building is pervasive, both subtle and transformational."

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Sunday
Dec242023

The Conversation -- December 24, 2023

~~~ Marie: For some reason, YouTube won't let me share this jolly Christmas carol, but click on the photo and you can watch it on YouTube. Is this video too woke to send to the kiddies at the grade school where Ron DeSantimonious' children are enrolled? Thanks to RAS for the lead.

Summer Concepcion of NBC News: "Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco decried Republican claims that the Justice Department has been politicized against ... Donald Trump, saying those accusations have contributed to an 'unprecedented rise' in threats against law enforcement and other officials. In an interview with ABC News that aired Sunday, Monaco, who oversees all Jan. 6-related cases, said that those accusations 'bear no resemblance to the Justice Department that I know. The Justice Department that I know is filled with dedicated men and women, investigators, lawyers, prosecutors, analysts, professional staff,' she said, adding that employees 'get up every day without regard to who's in the White House or who's in Congress...,'...."

~~~~~~~~~~

Alan Feuer of the New York Times: "Lawyers for ... Donald J. Trump asked an appeals court in Washington on Saturday night to toss a federal indictment accusing him of plotting to overturn the 2020 election, arguing that he was immune to the charges because they arose from actions he had taken while he was in the White House.... In a 55-page brief to a three-judge panel of the court, D. John Sauer, a lawyer who has been handling appeals for Mr. Trump, argued that under the Constitution, judges cannot hold the president accountable for any acts undertaken while in office.... In his brief to the appeals court, Mr. Sauer argued that executive immunity must exist, given the fact that no president or former president had ever been charged with a crime before Mr. Trump." MB: Right. Like arguing that a murderer can't be charged because no one at his place of business had ever been charged with murder before. ~~~

     ~~~ CNN's report is here.

He Has No Shame. Michael Bender of the New York Times: "For decades, American elected officials facing criminal charges or grave violations of the public trust would yield their positions of power, if only reluctantly, citing a duty to save the country from embarrassment and ease the strain on its institutions. Then came Donald J. Trump. The former president isn't just forging ahead despite four indictments and 91 felony charges, but actively orchestrating a head-on collision between the nation's political and legal systems.... The heated legal debate over whether Mr. Trump engaged in an insurrection [-- as the Colorado supreme court determined --] obscured the extraordinary reality that he is running for president at all -- returning with fresh vengeance and a familiar playbook built around the notions that he can never lose, will never be convicted and will never really go away. That blueprint remains intact largely because his approach continues to yield political returns." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: To me, Trump's "successes" say more about the cowardice of Republican officeholders and the moral depravity of broad swaths of the American people than they do about Donald Trump, who is nothing more than a vicious nincompoop.

Abbie VanSickle & Steve Eder of the New York Times: "In the 32 years since Justice [Clarence] Thomas came through the fire of his confirmation hearings and onto the Supreme Court, he has assembled an army of influential acolytes unlike any other -- a network of like-minded former clerks who have not only rallied to his defense but carried his idiosyncratic brand of conservative legal thinking out into the nation's law schools, top law firms, the judiciary and the highest reaches of government."

Steven Mazie & Stephen Vladeck, in a New York Times op-ed, urge the Supremes not to be as ham-handed as the Supreme Court majority was in Bush v. Gore. Marie: No doubt the writers know their advice is offered in vain. (Also linked yesterday.)

Presidential Race 2024

Maegan Vazquez of the Washington Post: "Local and federal law enforcement officials say they are investigating a surge in threats that justices on Colorado's Supreme Court are facing after their decision this week to bar Donald Trump from running in the state's presidential primary.... Since Tuesday's decision by the court, social media and forum posts on several platforms have shown users expressing violent, racist, homophobic and sometimes threatening language targeting the Democrat-appointed judges who ruled in favor of removing Trump from the ballot. The comments have ranged from peaceful protest to calls for executions. In a statement after Tuesday's ruling, Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung called the decision 'completely flawed' and attacked the 'all-Democrat appointed Colorado Supreme Court,' claiming it was participating in election interference." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Where are the wingers threatening the Maine judge and secretary of state who kept Chris Christie off the primary ballot for far less egregious conduct -- conduct not specifically prohibited in the U.S. Constitution? According to Leela Stockley of the Bangor Daily News, the secretary decided earlier in December that Christie had not submitted enough signatures to qualify. And the judge ruled, that the Christie camp did not "separate petition forms by town, as instructed by the Secretary, or, in the alternative, give himself sufficient time to bring those multi-town signature sheets to the relevant municipalities before the November 20 deadline." Wow! He didn't separate the petition forms by town? Miscreant! According to the report, Christie submitted only 844 acceptable signatures; 2,000 are required.

Out of curiosity, I took a look at how you qualify for the Maine primary ballot, and among the requirements is "Petitions must be printed double-sided on 8.5 x 14 inch (legal size) paper." IOW, if you submit petitions printed on letter-sized paper (you know, the kind almost everyone uses) or petitions printed on only one side of the page, you may be disqualified. There are two deadlines for filing: the first for filing with counties is November 20; the second for filing with the secretary of state is December 1. Presumably, if a candidate misses the deadlines by even a few hours, he's out. Caught in a snowstorm? Car breaks down? Too bad. These are just a few of the requirements to get on a state ballot, and obviously, the rules are going to vary state-by-state. It would be easy to slip up; it would not be surprising if some candidates were disqualified because of those bureaucratic slip-ups. Yet some people think a state justice should be executed for ruling that the leader of a violent, premeditated coup against the United States is not qualified to be president*.

Maureen Dowd of the New York Times: "The [Roman Catholic] church can't succeed in a time warp, moving at the pace of a snail on Ambien. Even Saudi Arabia is modernizing faster. It is simply immoral to treat women and gay people as unworthy of an equal role in their church. After all, isn't the whole point of the church to teach us what is right? And it's not right to treat people as partial humans." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ News Flash to Observant Christians: The New Testament does not address Jesus' sexual orientation; therefore, there's every reason to believe he was supposed to be gay. He never married -- as Jewish teenaged boys were usually required to do -- and he spent the years of his ministry living and traveling with men. There is at least one hint in the non-canonical Gospel of Thomas that Jesus had a sexual liaison with a woman. However, there is also a hint to the contrary in the Gospel of Mark (14:51-52): "Now a certain young man followed Him, having a linen cloth thrown around his naked body. And the young men laid hold of him, and he left the linen cloth and fled from them naked." Some scholars have asserted this suggested that Jesus and his male followers engaged in group sexual rituals. Dowd is right that the Gospels identify numerous strong women. They are generally portrayed as wiser than the male Gospel characters.

~~~~~~~~~~

Massachusetts. Nick Robertson of the Hill: "A federal judge in Massachusetts shut down an attempt to block the state's assault weapons ban Friday, arguing that the law does not break with recent Supreme Court precedent that has severely shaken gun control legislation. District Judge Dennis Saylor said the state ban keeps with 'historical tradition' of gun control regulation, after the high court ruled last year in the landmark New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen decision that all gun control legislation must keep with that tradition."

~~~~~~~~~~

Israel/Palestine

The Washington Post's live updates of developments Sunday in the Israel/Hamas war are here: "Israel is waging a military campaign in Gaza at a pace and level of devastation that likely exceeds any recent conflict, according to a Washington Post analysis. A U.N. official criticized Israeli instructions for Palestinians to evacuate parts of central Gaza, saying that Israel 'orders people to move into areas where there are ongoing airstrikes.'... The Israel Defense Forces has expanded ground operations in the southern and northern parts of the Gaza Strip, spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said Saturday, describing the war as 'a long and difficult operation that will continue for some more time.' on a phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Biden emphasized the need to protect civilians and free hostages still held by Hamas, The White House said. Netanyahu thanked Biden after the U.S. abstained from voting on a U.N. resolution that demanded pauses in fighting, aid deliveries and the release of hostages." ~~~

     ~~~ The New York Times' live updates for Sunday are here. CNN's live updates are here.

From CNN's liveblog yesterday: "US President Joe Biden spoke with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel on Saturday to discuss the latest developments in Israel and Gaza, according to the White House. Biden and Netanyahu discussed 'objectives and phasing' of the Israel-Hamas war during their call according to a White House readout.... 'I did not ask for a ceasefire,' Biden said while leaving the White House Saturday afternoon. 'I had a long talk with Netanyahu today, and it's a private conversation.'" (Also linked yesterday.)

From a Times of Israel liveblog: "Israel was about to 'preemptively' strike Hezbollah in Lebanon four days after Hamas's October 7 massacres, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was talked out of the plan at the last minute by US President Joe Biden, The Wall Street Journal reports, citing unnamed officials familiar with the details. The report says that 'Israel had intelligence -- which the US deemed unreliable -- that Hezbollah attackers were preparing to cross the border as part of a multipronged attack.'" (Also linked yesterday.)

Ukraine, et al.

Constant Méheut of the New York Times: "The Ukrainian police have arrested a senior Defense Ministry official on suspicions that he embezzled nearly $40 million as part of a fraudulent purchase of artillery shells for Ukraine's military. The Ukrainian authorities have been working to clean up the ministry since reports of graft and financial mismanagement led to the removal in September of the minister at the time. Ukraine's security service announced the arrest of the senior official, whose name was not released, on Friday. President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine has also made tackling corruption one of his key wartime goals, not only to reassure Ukraine's Western allies that their billions of dollars in aid are not being siphoned off, but also to ensure an efficient allocation of resources as the country's military runs short on weapons and ammunition in its fight to fend off Russia's forces."

Anton Troianovski, et al., of the New York Times: "Buoyed by Ukraine's failed counteroffensive and flagging Western support, [Vladimir] Putin says that Russia's war goals have not changed. Addressing his generals on Tuesday, he boasted that Ukraine was so beleaguered that Russia's invading troops were doing 'what we want.... We won't give up what's ours,' he pledged, adding dismissively, 'If they want to negotiate, let them negotiate.' But in a recent push of back-channel diplomacy, Mr. Putin has been sending a different message: He is ready to make a deal. Mr. Putin has been signaling through intermediaries since at least September that he is open to a cease-fire that freezes the fighting along the current lines, far short of his ambitions to dominate Ukraine...." (Also linked yesterday.)

Comments Off

Reader Comments (13)

"To me, Trump's "successes" say more about the cowardice of Republican officeholders and the moral depravity of broad swaths of the American people than they do about Donald Trump, who is nothing more than a vicious nincompoop," Marie says, spot on.

But I would add the 400 plus million he inherited from his father didn't hurt.

A fundamental flaw in the American psyche is our tendency to take monied people seriously, just because they're rich. Or maybe we take their money seriously and they just come along as part of the gilded package.

We sure took this rich buffoon with all his glaringly obvious moral and intellectual failings so seriously we (with a little help from an undemocratic constitution) actually made him presidunce.

December 24, 2023 | Unregistered CommenterKen Winkes

Not all billionaires are created equal and they're not all like Herr
Trump.
We have one at the end of our street; a summer cottage on the river.
(Not Betsy, she's two blocks the other direction).
If you didn't know who he was or what he owns you'd think he was
just a working class retiree like the rest of us here. No linousine,
no servants, no gold plated toilets. He walks his own dog and
occasionally stops to admire the garden.
Herr Trump wouldn't give us the time of day if he happened to walk
past, or glide by in his golf cart.

December 24, 2023 | Unregistered CommenterForrestMorris

Forrest,

You make a critical distinction. The wealthy near neighbor you mention apparently doesn't suffer from the fatal flaw I mentioned.

Neither he nor his ego confuses his money with his worth.

There are such often admirable people in our midst, but I fear they are the exception.

BTW, Merry Christmas Eve to all. Calm and a little chilly here in the Northwest, with a beautiful rose sunrise an early Christmas gift.

December 24, 2023 | Unregistered CommenterKen Winkes

Merry Christmas Eve to all. Thank you, especially Marie, for keeping me relatively sane. It's an honor to hang out with all of you.

December 24, 2023 | Unregistered CommenterJack Mahoney

@Jack Mahoney: I'll drink to that! It must be cocktail time somewhere in the world.

December 24, 2023 | Unregistered CommenterForrestMorris

It's not cocktail time down here in the Swamp State but I guess that a working mans beer will do.

I've been looking back in time trying to figure out just when the Republican party I knew as a young man died. It was still gasping for air in the Regan era, and survived Gingrich and Bush 43. But it was dead before Trump. all he needed was to put the MAGAt moniker to the corpse.

Like the rest of y'all, I'm grateful for this site with an exchange of facts and opinions hard to find in this polarized day.

December 24, 2023 | Unregistered CommenterBobby Lee

@Bobby Lee: Here's an article from Feb 16, 2016, written by
Robert Reich explaining when and why the Republican party died.

December 24, 2023 | Unregistered CommenterForrestMorris

Sorry, forgot the link:

https://robertreich.org/post/139385548525

December 24, 2023 | Unregistered CommenterForrestMorris

Ghosts of Republicans Past

December 24, 2023 | Unregistered CommenterRAS

Hear hear to all here at RC, and especially to Marie, whose hard work does not go unappreciated by any of us here.

Merry Christmas to all - my very nonreligious mother was a big believer that everyone can have a Merry Christmas. After all, she said, why should we miss out on all the (cookies, light, presents etc) fun??

December 24, 2023 | Unregistered CommenterRockyGirl

I and Christmas don't get along well. In fact, I often wish that I could crucify the person who thought of the holiday. Regardless, if I'm forced to listen to the incessant Xmas music, this album by John Fahey is my go-to favorite...

December 24, 2023 | Unregistered Commenterunwashed

Merry Christmas to all and many thanks to Marie.

December 24, 2023 | Unregistered CommenterFrancie

Unwashed,

A good choice. Love that album, and the title bodes well for the coming year when we might see things turn away from chaos, hatred, lies, criminality, and fascism: The New Possibility.

A merry merry to all out here, and to our gracious hostess always at the ready to update us on the Naughty List.

December 24, 2023 | Unregistered CommenterAkhilleus
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