Ukraine – Page 17 – Politics Plus

Video Thread 4/28/22

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 12:02 pm Open Thread, Politics

Apr 282022

Glenn Kirschner – Judge holds Trump in contempt of court. Will Trump grift his MAGA base to pay his 10K-a-day fine?

American Bridge is reaching out to voters

Thom Hartmann – Should Ukraine Be rolled Into NATO Now – To Stop the War? (ends with a cliff hanger – I will post the next one though)

Rebel HQ [Texas Paul] – TikToker Roasts ‘Spineless’ Republican Party

Voice of America – US Cabinet Officials Pledge More Military, Diplomatic Assistance to Ukraine

Liberal Redneck – On Elon, Twitter, and our Billionaire Overlords

Beau – Let’s talk about Japanese-Russian relations….

Open Thread April 27, 2022

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:36 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Apr 272022

Yesterday, I finished putting together today’s posts at a little after 4:30. That was an hour earlier than they guarantee the information, but I looked it up anyway, and a lot of information was already there. There wass a group of 211 jurors ordered to report by 8:00 a.m. today, and another group of 286 standby jurors ordered to check in around 11:30 and be prepared to come in within the hour. Of that 268, I would be the 248th person to be called. On Tuesday they released 380 standby jurors, and on Monday they released 404. So I was figuring I can pretty well expect to be off the hook. But of course I don’t take that for granted.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

Common Dreams – EU Enacts Landmark Social Media Law to End Self-Regulation by Big Tech
Quote – “The law aims to end an era of self-regulation in which tech companies set their own policies about what content could stay up or be taken down,” the newspaper noted. “It stands out from other regulatory attempts by addressing online speech, an area that is largely off-limits in the United States because of First Amendment protections.” Calling the legislation a “major milestone for E.U. citizens,” Thierry Breton, the bloc’s internal market commissioner, said that “the time of big online platforms behaving like they are ‘too big to care’ is coming to an end.”
Click through for details. Yes, free speech. And yes, this is going to be a pain in the butt for them to administer, even without the FirstAmendment. But the way social media currently act will nevitably destroy democracy.

Crooks and Liars – Climate Activist Dies After Setting Himself On Fire At SCOTUS
Quote – And so Wynn Bruce had set himself on fire in front of the Supreme Court at about 6:30 p.m. on Friday, and we didn’t pay any attention to that, either. I thought I’d remind you, so he didn’t die in vain.
Click through for story. CPR reported the incident but not the reason. You may have seen the report somewhere (but probably not the reason.) I’m afraod he did indeed die in vain.

The Daily Beast – U.S. Vietnam War Insiders: Russia Is Making the Same Damn Fool Mistakes in Ukraine That We Did
Quote – “The Americans got run out of Vietnam, and the Russians are going to get run out of Ukraine,” William Taylor, ambassador to Ukraine from 2006 to 2009 and again, for seven months, from June 2019 to January 2020, told The Daily Beast. “The U.S. didn’t understand Vietnam, and the Russians didn’t understand Ukraine.” … Although comparisons are inexact, he finds an eerie parallel between the American failure in Vietnam and Russia’s violent campaign in Ukraine. “We didn’t understand there’s a nationalism about the Vietnamese,” he said. “The Vietnamese pushed us out,” and “the Ukrainians will push out the Russians.”
Click through for the reasoning. I was certainly not an insider then, but those who were have good reason to know mistakes were made. I hope their conclusion is accurate.

Food For Thought

Video Thread 4/26/22

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 11:45 am Open Thread, Politics

Apr 262022

Glenn Kirschner – Meadows had advance reports of possible violence on Jan 6 yet he & Trump did zip to protect Capitol

Meidas Touch – Texas Paul REACTS to Shameless Kevin McCarthy Border Stunt!

The Lincoln Project – Former President Obama on Challenges to Democracy

MSNBC – Democrats May Have A New Weapon In The Fight Against The GOP’s Culture War

Cake and war: Ukrainians mark sombre Orthodox Easter (I’ve been to Orthodox Easter services – just Russian and Greek. They are absolutely gorgeous, and a feast for the senses Orthodox Easter is almost never on the same day as it is in the west. This year it was a week after ours.)

Cute Cat Stands Up Like A Person When She Wants Treats

Beau – Let’s talk about Disney and Desantis…. Beau’s take is sound. The branding he describes goes way, way back tobefore Disney World. It was part of Disneyland from its inception. But then Beau’s takes are usually sound.

Open Thread April 26, 2022

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:39 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Apr 262022

Yesterday, I got a phone call from Virgil, which means he has been fully checked in (I was told that could take up to 2 weeks, but it only took 6 days.) He says the staff are very good people – I was surely glad to hear that. Anyway, I went to the DOC site to download and print the forms I will need (or may need) including the disability accommodation form. I have never needed to request accommodation at any of the other three places I have visited him, because they all are on one level or have ramps, and I can walk far enough to go therough the metal detector, and I can collapse the wheelchair so that it also goes through (not at the same time that I do.) But getting onto a shuttle bus is a shuttle bus of a different color. So I want to get that done in advance. I had no trouble finding the forms on line and only slight annoyance “printing” the pages I needed to a PDF. Next is to print to paper and fill them out.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

Crooks and Liars – Cawthorn Wasn’t In DRAG-Drag, He Was In NORMAL PERSON Drag
Quote – I’ve witnessed this kind of thing firsthand. At my high school every year, there was an assembly in honor of the football team — attendance mandatory. It ended with several players onstage dressed in drag. The message was that these kids were the embodiment of masculinity, so it was funny, get it? Not even remotely gay or transsexual or connected to transvestism!
Click through for details. I could wish this wasn’t correct and that it would hurt Maddy – but I fear that would be incorrect.

The Daily Beast – U.S. Is Now Aiming to Degrade the Russian Military, Says Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin
Quote – Austin, speaking bluntly Monday after a tour of Kyiv on Sunday, said Russia had “already lost a lot of military capability and a lot of its troops, quite frankly, and we want to see them not have the capability to very quickly reproduce that capability.” Austin was accompanied by Secretary of State Antony Blinken on his trip, which was shrouded in secrecy until President Volodymyr Zelensky blurted out the secret at a Saturday afternoon news conference.
Click through – their source is the New York Times but I’m paywalled out. That trip to Ukraine must have been one impressive trip.

Media Matters – With attack on Twitter, the right shows it has institutionalized Trump’s corrupt use of government power
Quote – “Nice company you’ve got there; be a shame if something happened to it. Maybe you should save yourself some trouble and sell it to our buddy.” That’s the message 18 House Republicans, led by Judiciary Committee ranking member Jim Jordan (R-OH), sent on Friday with a letter demanding Twitter’s board of directors preserve all records related to the bid by Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk to purchase the company.
Click through for article. This certainly sounds like RICO to me. Can we give DOJ enough money to hire 200 prosecutors, please? It looks like they are going to need more than 130 new ones.

Food For Thought

Video Thread 4/25/22

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 11:31 am Open Thread, Politics

Apr 252022

Glenn Kirschner – Lordy there are Cheney-McCarthy tapes! And they prove Kevin McCarthy is a coward AND a liar.

Meidas Touch – Texas Paul REACTS to leaked Kevin McCarthy Tapes!

The Lincoln Project – Ron DeSantis: Bad for business

Ring of Fire – Judge Hits Capitol Rioter With Longer Sentence Due To Pathetic Defense

Really American – Dr. Oz Shady History With Foreign Dictators EXPOSED

Robert Reich – The Solutions to the Climate Crisis No One is Talking About

Beau – Let’s talk about new tools in Ukraine….

Open Thread April 23, 2022

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 7:25 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Apr 232022

Yesterday, Besides getting this and the Videos up for today, I also worked on getting them ready for tomorrow, so that I can spend more of today on geting ready, and getting enough sleep to go see Virgil.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

Talking Points Memo – DOJ Signals Another Step Toward Broadening Jan. 6 Probe To Focus On Bigger MAGA Fish
Quote – Harvard Law School professor Laurence Tribe, who spoke to TPM last month about Garland’s slow pace in the Jan. 6 probe, tweeted on Wednesday that [Thomas] Windom’s appointment shows that the attorney general is “NOT asleep at the switch.”
Click through for more. TPM seems to be the only otlet talking about this. But we can hope everyone else is distracted by the shiny objects of Kevin and Marj and Ron and Disney.

Robert Reich – Zelensky patriotism, Putin patriotism, Trump patriotism
Quote – We recoil in horror as Putin and his forces wreak havoc and death on Ukraine — before our eyes and in real time. Both Putin and Ukraine President Zelensky repeatedly invoke “nationalism” and “patriotism,” but Putin’s nationalism and patriotism are manufactured to justify this brutal and unprovoked aggression while Zelensky’s words explain astonishing sacrifices now being made by ordinary Ukrainians to protect their freedom, democracy, and homeland. Donald Trump uses the same words, too — as do his acolytes in the Republican Party. His version of national patriotism is closer to Putin’s than to Zeleneky’s.
Click through for explanations. I’m glad he isn’t ready to give u on the word, but sadly, I am. I’ve seen too many words destroyed.

Crooks and Liars – Disabled Voters Don’t Exist
Quote – The Wisconsin Supreme Court finally got to hearing the case last week, after people had their rights denied. It was during this hearing that things went from bad to the stupefying ridiculous. Rick Esenberg, the head of WILL tried to deny that people like [Martha] Chambers [who has been paralyzed from the neck down following a horseback riding accident 27 years ago] even existed
Click through for the full story if you can bear to. This literally beought me to tears.

Food For Thought

Video Thread 4/22/22

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 12:29 pm Open Thread, Politics

Apr 222022

Glenn Kirschner – As Georgia Grand Jury Investigation into Trump Proceeds, Trump Co-conspirator Eastman Keeps Criming

Meidas Touch – Texan who went viral exposing Abbott’s border scam SLAMS Republicans for trying to raise his taxes

The Lincoln Project – It’s in the Plan

American Bridge Ad Launch featured on MSNBC

Really American – ‘Dark MAGA’ Trump Supporters Plot Revenge On Political Opponents (So nice to see Chip back – a little slower and a little softer language, but still Chip)

Golden Retriever Preps Little Boy For His New Role As Big Brother

Beau – Let’s talk about the US already learning from Ukraine and what we should…

Video Thread 4/20/22

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 11:37 am Open Thread, Politics

Apr 202022

Glenn Kirschner – Donald Trump’s “Hub-and-Spoke” Conspiracy to Overturn the 2020 Presidential Election: An Explainer

The Lincoln Project – Still Loyal to Putin

MSNBC – The Reid Out – Malcolm Nance [I can make it starts when he starts, but I can’t make it end when he ends. So when you get to about 11:12, feel free to stop it.