The Isolation

The way things are going, you'd think donald trump doesn't want any foreign policy at all. he's burning nearly every bridge the United States has to the world (via David E. Sanger at the New York Times (might be paywalled)):

In a span of only 50 days, President Trump has done more than any of his modern predecessors to hollow out the foundations of an international system that the United States painstakingly erected in the 80 years since it emerged victorious from World War II.

Without formally declaring a reversal of course or offering a strategic rationale, he has pushed the United States to switch sides in the Ukraine war, abandoning all talk about helping a nascent, flawed democracy defend its borders against a larger invader. He did not hesitate when he ordered the United States to vote with Russia and North Korea — and against virtually all of America’s traditional allies — to defeat a U.N. resolution that identified Moscow as the aggressor. His threats to take control of the Panama Canal, Greenland, Gaza and, most incredibly, Canada, sound predatory, including his claim Tuesday that the border with America’s northern ally is an “artificial line of separation...”

Mr. Trump has imposed tariffs on his allies after describing them as leeches on the American economy. And he has so damaged trust among the NATO allies that France is discussing extending its country’s small nuclear umbrella over Europe, and Poland is thinking of building its own atomic weapon. Both fear the United States can no longer be counted on to act as the alliance’s ultimate defender, a core role it created for itself when the NATO treaty was written...

trump is presenting a master class on how to alienate allies and punish innocent people. Not just with a trade war with his insane self-damaging tariffs - yes, trump's threatening 200 percent tariffs on European wines! - but with turning our visitation/visa policies into a straight path to prison as more people traveling to the U.S. are getting detained and harassed by our customs/border agents.

Balloon Juice collaborator Rose Judson - from what I can tell, she's watching all of this from the safety of the UK - is documenting these atrocities towards average Euro tourists:

Since the start of the new administration I’ve seen lots of UK- and EU-based folks wondering aloud on social media whether they should travel to the US. At first, this impulse was couched in a moral objection to Trump and Musk and everything they stand for. Now, this chatter has an edge of self-preservation, thanks to several recent news stories about tourists with minor visa irregularities vanishing into ICE custody for weeks at a time...

From the Guardian, “British tourist detained by US authorities for 10 days over visa issue”:

His daughter wants to leave the country and fly back to the UK, he said, but he feared the immigration crackdown in the US meant there could be a long delay before her case was dealt with.

“She’s in this orange prison outfit,” he said. “She just feels so isolated and desperate, you can imagine, she’s saying, ‘I want to come home’.”

She is safe, he said, but living “in horrendous conditions” and had not had access to legal representation. He was taking comfort from the fact that the other women at the facility, many of whom have been incarcerated for months or even years while fighting deportation, had “all been really nice to Becky,” Burke said.

But wait, there’s more!

Two German tourists were detained for more than 10 days each in separate incidents: a young man and a young woman. The young man, Lucas Sielaff, was traveling with his American fiancée from Mexico. He was held in detention for two weeks (his fiancée also alleges she was shackled and handcuffed and subjected to a body search)... 

Jessica Brösche, a 29-year-old tattoo artist from Berlin, will reportedly join Lucas Sielaff, 25, from Bad Bibra in Saxony-Anhalt, who is reported to have returned to Germany on 6 March, after being arrested at the Mexican border on 18 February before being detained for almost two weeks.

The families of the two tourists, who were detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice), had compared their ordeals to “a horror film”...

Judson's conclusion?

If you have family or friends planning to come from abroad, ensure they triple-check their entry requirements with the US consulate in their country and that they send scans of their documents (passports, visas, etc.) to you before they travel. Or, better yet, rearrange your plans. This isn’t getting better anytime soon.

As a Floridian - whose state relies a lot on international tourism - this royally sucks.

And there's been no need for ICE to go overboard detaining people especially for weeks at a time. Most of these issues tended to be minor glitches in the paperwork, or misunderstandings that a good translator would negotiate down to a stern lecture about not doing that again. Now? The cruelty and sadism of the trump regime requires handcuffs, incarceration, harassment, intimidation, and psychological (if not physical) harm. Nobody's going to want to visit a nation where the law enforcement can lock you up over the slightest quibble and subject you to hellish, soul-breaking conditions.

Throw into all this how trump and his lackeys have killed off - literally - the international health and financial aid we've been providing to third-world nations for decades, and you can see how trump is creating an environment where most of the globe is going to hate America for the cruelty and stupidity we allowed to happen by voting for this sadist/asshole.

And if you look far enough ahead, you can see what the end result trump wants: he wants us tied - financially and politically and emotionally - to Putin's Russia.

Think I'm joking? Look at the recent UN vote - which was mostly symbolic as the United Nations has no way to enforce it - where the U.S. were the only nations alongside Russia, North Korea, and Belarus to reject a motion declaring Russia the aggressor in their war against Ukraine. We are now siding with the dictatorial nations we declared over the decades as the bad guys.

With all the tariffs and trade wars our nation will enact, we'll be cutting our business ties with all the major economic powers - not just the European Union or the UK, not just Canada and Mexico, not just Central and South America, but pretty soon Japan and India as well - we could rely on... leaving only Russia as a "trading partner" - more like "raiders" as Putin and the oligarchs vacuum up every bit of wealth our nation has left - to give Putin fresh lease on rebuilding a Russia he's broken through corruption and war. 

Think I'm exaggerating? Putin's already preparing for trump to lift as many sanctions as possible: While the other G7 economic powers will likely keep their sanctions in place, rebuilding any trade with the U.S. - the largest economy on the planet - will quickly repair many of Russia's losses over the past decade.

What trump is doing is the standard practice of an abusive gaslighting narcissist - any cult leader - does in all relationships: he's enforcing his will on other people to make them reliant on himself and to any belief system he imposes. he's cutting us off from friends and families who are warning us of the dangers, who could provide sanctuary or rescue and end his control of us. he's going to isolate the whole nation from a western (liberal) culture we've been attuned to for centuries - a culture that we helped create - and force us to make friends with his fellow bullying authoritarians - and fellow uber-rich oligarchs like Elon Musk - so that we'll have nowhere to find relief.

There are a lot of Americans - even among the Republican voting base - who aren't fond of Putin or his spiteful world-view, and yet Putin's world-view - hating homosexuals and trans people, fighting border wars to build empires, letting only the rich and connected enjoy the fruits of everyone else's labor - is going to get shoved down our throats very quickly, very painfully.

Don't accept any of it, America. trump is pushing us over a cliff into inept, corrupt rule that tends to implode on itself every cycle of history. We're better than this. We should have been better last November, but that's in the past and we're fighting for our souls today.

Don't buy into the hate that Putin/trump/Musk sell us.

(P.S. This is the 2499th blog article at this site. We're coming up to 2500. I'll try to make it a special one)

Russia's Weapons In the Form of Words

Update 9/9/24: Thanks again to the Crooks & Liars crew especially Steve in Manhattan for promoting this article at Mike's Blog Round-Up! Please remember to GET THE VOTE OUT America and stop Republican/Russia sabotage of our elections! Also, please consider my book Notice a Trend as a stocking stuffer this coming Halloween uh Turkey Sacrifice Day hold on, Saturnalia!

 I am an arms dealer fitting you with
Weapons in the form of words
And don't really care which side wins
As long as the room keeps singing
That's just the business I'm in
-- "This Ain't a Scene," Fall Out Boy

The Department of Justice this week dropped a bombshell in the form of indictments and sanctions towards Russian operatives who were paying off Far Right media outlets and "influencers" to undermine our nation's elections and policies (via Shannon Bond, Jude Joffe-Block, and Caitlin Thompson at NPR):

On Wednesday, the Justice Department charged two employees of RT, the Russian state media broadcaster, in a scheme to secretly fund and direct the production of social media videos that racked up millions of views.

The RT staffers, named in the indictment as Kostiantyn Kalashnikov and Elena Afanasyeva, have been charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to violate the Foreign Agents Registration Act. They’re accused of funneling nearly $10 million to an unnamed Tennessee company that contracted with online influencers with big audiences...

“The company never disclosed to the influencers or to their millions of followers its ties to RT and the Russian government,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said on Wednesday.

Still, didn't anybody on the RT payroll suspect they were all working from the same script, all so favorable to Putin and to Russia? Or are these Far Right "influencers" so twisted by their own world-view - that Ukraine is the enemy, that liberals are Commies, that there's a global conspiracy to destroy Alpha Males - that they didn't care how much like puppets they are?

The charges against Kalashnikov and Afanasyeva come as U.S. intelligence officials say foreign efforts aimed at swaying the outcome of the election are escalating. On Wednesday, the government seized 32 internet domains connected to a separate Russian influence operation, while Iran has recently been accused of trying to hack both the Republican and Democratic presidential campaigns.

What sets the RT operation apart from many other interference efforts is that it appeared to reach a real audience, thanks to the recognizable names attached.

“Buying authentic influencers is a far better use of funds than creating fake personas, because they bring their own trusting audiences and are actually, you know, real,” wrote Renée DiResta, the author of Invisible Rulers: The People Who Turn Lies Into Reality, about how online influencers spread propaganda and rumors, in a post on Threads...

The thing every American - especially the ones getting hammered repeatedly by these propagandists - knew that what was coming from these influencers wasn't home-grown but a coordinated effort by a deep pocket source: They tended to repeat the same messages and stick to the same talking points. Now there's proof in a courtroom that the Far Right Noise Machine was getting paid to attack the rest of us. That the money was coming from Russia is what stings.

The money itself is obscene. One person getting $400,000 A MONTH to spew the pre-scripted content? About 90 percent of most Americans don't see that much income in a YEAR. The greed of these pro-Russian influencers barely equals the severity of their anti-American output.

A good number of social media commentators - most of them doing it for free by the by - pointed out how these Far Right influencers have been screaming for decades about "leftist bloggers and pundits getting paid by George Soros" so the irony is not lost. It may not be irony actually: It's certainly deflection and confession on their parts. 

What the mainstream media - affected by the revelation that there is this kind of corruption in their own circles - need to realize, what a majority of Americans need to understand is how all of this is Putin's psychological (psyops) war on the United States.

This may not be a real-world warzone like Ukraine with tanks guns and bloodshed, but our airwaves and information sources are battlegrounds now. Putin can't afford a direct war on America - Gods help us, it would end in nuclear fire if that happens - but he's bitter and enraged at how our government has imposed economic sanctions not only on Russia but on himself ever since the Magnitsky Incident in 2009 led to congressional legislation that targeted Putin and his corrupt regime.

You can see the uptick in Far Right rhetoric around that time as the Tea Party stirred anti-Obama resentment into anti-government outrage. It helped Putin that many of the Far Right are synced to his own political and social world-views - nationalist, extremist, evangelical/orthodox Christianist, expressing open contempt and horror towards women, ethnics, gay/lesbian/trans people - to where these so-called "patriotic Americans" would happily - for a high fee - turn against their fellow Americans to side with a foreign despot.

There used to be anger and outrage from the Far Right Republicans back at the height of the Cold War if ANYone was caught working on the Soviet Russia payroll. Today, you have to think that everyone from Fox-Not News to Newsmax on down to InfoWars (what's left of it) have their hands out for the Russian oligarchs to tickle their palms for another $400k each (I would like to think National Review have higher personal standards than to sell out like that, but even now I have doubts).

If we were at actual war, what these Far Right media elites are doing would be considered treason.

Thing is, we are at war: Engaged by an enemy nation in Russia that is overwhelming our media with disinfo, conspiracy tripe, brazen lies - what we'd call "flooding the zone with shit" - to where almost half our fellow citizens can't tell what's real or fake news anymore. All thanks to Russia's front-line Fifth Columnists spewing all that shit at us from Facebook to Twitter to podcasts to facetime on the prime time talk shows.

Half the reason the United States is on the brink of civil war is because Putin is paying those wingnut bullshitters to confuse and defame Americans, to make us fear and hate each other at the expense of our own common cause to support and defend this nation.

Goddamn them. Every single one of these greedheads betrayed America for Putin's cash. Send them to prison first, and let Hell take them when they die.

Ukraine Punching Russia - And Putin - Where It Hurts

Holy forking shirtballs, this is happening right now in the Russian-Ukrainian War (via Institute for the Study of War): 

Ukrainian cross-border mechanized offensive operations into Kursk Oblast that began on August 6 are continuing as part of a Ukrainian operational effort within Russian territory. ISW will not offer assessments about the intent of this Ukrainian operation in order to avoid compromising Ukrainian operational security. ISW will not make forecasts about what Ukrainian forces might or might not do or where or when they might do it. ISW will continue to map, track, and evaluate operations as they unfold but will not offer insight into Ukrainian planning, tactics, or techniques. ISW is not prepared to map control of terrain within Russia at this time and will instead map observed events associated with the Ukrainian incursion into Russian territory as well the maximalist extent of claims and unverified reports about Ukrainian advances. Maximalist claims and unverified reports about Ukrainian advances within Russia do not represent territory that ISW assesses that Ukrainian forces have seized or control. Inferring predictions about Ukrainian operations from ISW maps and assessments that do not explicitly offer such predictions is inappropriate and not in accord with their intended use.

Since August 6th, Ukraine started a counter-offensive into Russia itself - going into the Kursk Oblast bordering their nation - that has achieved stunning results 48 hours later. Here's a map from the ISW report:

More accurate than Risk, what what.

The fun thing about Kursk? It's the region right between Ukraine and Moscow. 

Where Putin has put Ukraine on the defensive since 2014 - don't forget, this all started with Putin seizing Crimea back then - and then creating a bloodied stalemate along the southeastern part (Donbas) of Ukraine over the last two years, this is the first true military offensive that Ukraine has put together. That counter-offensive in autumn of 2022 that reclaimed most of eastern Ukraine to them only went as far as the Russian border. Now they've crossed that border, and they've exposed a soft underbelly of how fragile Russia's own defensive capabilities are:

Russian milbloggers claimed that small Ukrainian armored groups are advancing further into the Russian rear and bypassing Russian fortifications before engaging Russian forces and then withdrawing from the engagements without attempting to consolidate control over their furthest advances. Russian milbloggers noted that the prevalence of these armored groups is leading to conflicting reporting because Ukrainian forces are able to quickly engage Russian forces near a settlement and then withdraw from the area. Ukrainian forces appear to be able to use these small armored groups to conduct assaults past the engagement line due to the low density of Russian personnel in the border areas of Kursk Oblast. Larger Ukrainian units are reportedly operating in areas of Kursk Oblast closer to the international border and are reportedly consolidating and fortifying some positions...

A lot of this echoes what happened last year when the Wagner mercenary forces mutinied against Putin's mishandling of the war effort. If I can recall what I wrote then:

Throughout this crisis, Russia's own military failed to respond in full against a "turncoat" private army, highlighting the low morale and poor discipline plaguing the regular forces. Prigozhin made faster advancements marching into Russia within 24 hours where it took him and his Wagner brigades over three months to achieve anything at Bakhmut.

It looks like Zelensky and his generals paid attention to what Prigozhin did - before he wimped out, surrendered to Putin, and got himself and others killed on his next plane flight - and realized how vulnerable Russia itself was to a military offensive. With Putin hellbent on seizing as much of Ukraine as possible before he's forced to into any ceasefire - so he can claim all that territory is legally Russia, and maintain a foothold he can use to invade the rest of Ukraine in the future - most of Russia's military might is stuck in the Donbas front lines.

While Russian forces are advancing in Ukraine, they're doing it slowly due to their draining resources. Putin's been able to turn it into a meatgrinder in the hopes of wearing down the defenses and whittle away Ukraine's own limited ammo and armaments. The US and NATO are NOT doing enough to supply Ukraine out of fears of escalation (something frustrating the hell out of policy experts like Adam L. Silverman).

But now it's looking like Ukraine had been intentionally holding back on their arms and armaments the last several months to pull off this Kursk offensive. And it's looking like - at least to this armchair general colonel major okay the highest rank I ever got was library branch manager - the Ukrainians are trying to catch the Russians in a risky Either-Or decision: 

1) Redeploy any and all reserves - especially armored units and air support - away from supporting the Donbas offensives, which would weaken their offensive capabilities and give Ukrainian forces there a chance to punch through their defenses, taking away Putin's land grabs, or

2) Refocus more military effort into Donbas - where Ukrainian defenses are already pitched in and can make it too costly - to take more territory (and force Zelensky to at last relent), and hope that the mostly untrained and undersupplied conscript forces in Russia itself can set up effective defenses to halt any advances that would be politically damaging (like say Ukrainian tanks rolling in plain sight up the Kremlin driveway in Moscow itself) to Putin.

Already three days into the Kursk Offensive, and the Ukrainian forces have beaten back most of the Russian counterattacks with ease. Russia couldn't do any of the heavy defensive fortifications they made in Donbas - you can't place landmines in your own country, after all - and they're relying on recently drafted conscripts - since this April - to work up the nerve to charge into a Ukrainian position. Whatever armored capabilities Russia has, their failures to fight back - at the moment - are highlighting the likelihood Russia's military has almost nothing left to defend with.

If I can go back to Silverman at Balloon Juice for a minute about the current (well, last night) situation regarding all of this:

The more I think about it, the more I think the second answer – that the Ukrainians are trying to demonstrate to the Biden administration, as well everyone else, that the emperor – Putin – has no clothes. That no matter what red lines he declares, no matter what he says he’ll do if they’re breached, such as tactically using nukes during a conventional war, these are just agitprop and hollow threats in order to establish reflexive control over the leaders of his adversaries in order to give himself a preemptive veto in their decision-making process. I also think they have studied Prigozhin’s aborted revolt from a little over a year ago, how Putin personally responded, and how Russia’s military, security services, and law enforcement were unable to do anything to actually stop his Wagner mercenaries. I think they have a very, very, very good understanding of what Russia is not able to do to actually defend itself within its own borders and is exploiting those weaknesses...

There is every likelihood that Ukraine is over-extending their own military with this offensive - after all, they're not making incursions into other Russian oblasts (not yet) - although there are signs they are setting up strong defensive positions at key locations inside Kursk if/when their attack forces need to pull back. Thing is with this operation Ukraine is clearly proving they know what they're doing and how to pull it off, whereas Russia is still swinging blindly to land any punches they think they can make.

Silverman is right in that Zelensky and his government are proving how much of a feeble paper tiger Russia truly is: That past the threat of launching nuclear reprisals, there's nothing left behind Russia except bluster. And even the threat of nukes seems ludicrous because A) Putin dare not use them in Ukraine or Eastern Europe due to literal fallout returning to Russia itself and B) going nuclear against the US and Europe period is basically summoning a full apocalypse out of sheer spite because it will leave all of Earth a radioactive dust-ball.

Biden - and NATO - needs to be doing more for Ukraine. They need more tanks, more ammo, more body armor, more resources. They need more Patriots and anti-missile systems to stop Putin's ongoing attack on civilian populations (the one thing Putin will never stop doing, because he's a genocidal sadist). And Ukraine needs all that yesterday.

Today, Ukraine is kicking ass. The western powers need to pony up to help Ukraine kick Putin's ass tomorrow. And keep aiding Ukraine until Putin and his ilk are all gone from power.

Old Hero Greeting The Next Hero at Normandy Anniversary

I wrote last year a comparison between the importance of D-Day as a key turning point in World War II and the importance of Ukraine standing up against Russian invasion: 

Those landings were 79 years ago, but they remain fresh in our memories. The realization of the horrors of war, the sacrifices made, the honors gained and lives lost. 

They remain fresh because those struggles are repeating in Europe today, as Ukraine is now the battlefront against a Russian horde seeking to rebuild an empire under Putin at the expense of European stability...

This won't be an easy fight for Ukraine. Wars never are.

But Eisenhower said it best in 1944 when he extorted Allied troops to victory:

Soldiers, Sailors, and Airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Force!

You are about to embark upon the Great Crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hope and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you. In company with our brave Allies and brothers-in-arms on other Fronts, you will bring about the destruction of the German war machine, the elimination of Nazi tyranny over the oppressed peoples of Europe, and security for ourselves in a free world...

Just switch out Germans for Russians, and the gist is the same.

I'm not the only one who thinks that. One of the few surviving veterans of World War II that appeared this week in Normandy France to honor the 80th anniversary of D-Day had a moment meeting Ukrainian President Zelensky (via Guardian News YouTube):

The veteran kissed Zelensky's hand - or tried to, Zelensky was too humble to take it - and told him "You're the savior of the people." 

"You saved Europe," Zelenksy replied.

Game recognizes game. Hero recognizes hero.

That veteran understands that Ukraine is fighting to save Europe now. The rest of Europe needs to do more to aid Ukraine against Russia and help them stop Putin's warmongering fantasies.

Georgia Protests On My Mind

No, not that Georgia, the other Georgia.

There's been a lot of unrest in that nation (via Ani Chkhikvadze at Foreign Policy):

In Tbilisi, on a cobblestoned street next to the Georgian Parliament, a robotic female voice warned protesters to disperse or face legal action. The demonstrators were gathered in opposition to the reintroduction of the controversial “foreign agent” law by the ruling Georgian Dream party.

The legislation that was retracted following widespread protests a year ago, requires civil society organizations and media outlets that receive more than 20 percent of their funding from abroad, mainly from the United States and EU, to register as agents of foreign influence. Tens of thousands have flooded the streets, demanding the withdrawal of the legislation seen as aligning Georgia more closely with Russia, which has used a similar law to crush dissent.

In the past, the Georgian Dream party kept hold on power through a combination of fearmongering, vilifying the divided opposition, and engaging in diplomatic bartering with Western allies. However, these once-successful strategies appear to have waned. As the party navigates its third term in office, it finds itself confronted with genuine protests both domestically and internationally that may cost it the elections in October.

One thing to remember from history is how Ye Olde Imperial Russia - and later the Soviet Union - treated a place like Georgia as occupied territory. When the USSR broke up in 1991, Georgia was one of the earliest states to break away and form their own nation.

Unfortunately, political opportunism and ambition - and arguably mixed signals from NATO and the U.S. - led to the Georgian government triggering a disastrous conflict with Russia in 2008, reducing the nation back into a puppet state under Putin's control.

Georgians as a population still resent the situation, and are using the current Russia-Ukrainian conflict to express their anger:

The full-scale invasion of Ukraine shook the carefully crafted balance the Georgian government sought between Russia and the West.

Over the past two years, hundreds of thousands of Georgians have taken to the streets in solidarity in demonstrations aimed as much at their own government as at Moscow. At every turn in Tbilisi, “Fuck Putin,” “Russia is an occupier,” and “Georgia stands with Ukraine” are painted on the walls. Almost every establishment, from banks to bars, displays Ukrainian flags...

The relationship between Tbilisi and Kyiv was already strained over the arrest of former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, who returned to his native Georgia after serving as a member of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s administration. Today, it’s near rock bottom. The two sides have exchanged strong words. Ukraine withdrew its ambassador from Georgia and sanctioned some members of Ivanishvili’s inner circle...

The current Georgian government is trying to spread fear and propaganda that "The West" is trying to drag their nation into another costly war against Russia, but the current street protests show that sizable numbers of their own people aren't buying those messages.

So the pro-Putin leadership is moving on to the next trick in the Putin playbook: mass arrests and beatdowns. Via Reuters:

WASHINGTON, May 9 (Reuters) - The United States is deeply troubled by actions taken against those protesting a draft law in Georgia and the government should change its course, U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said on Thursday.

Georgian security forces have repeatedly deployed tear gas, pepper spray and water cannon against protesters who have been staging almost daily demonstrations for around a month against the government's "foreign agents" bill.

There's been a number of reports on social media of bloody beatdowns and arrests of known opposition figures. There hasn't been any sign of the protests abating.

It does beg the question if the Georgian government destabilizes over this uprising "what would Putin do next?" He's already been shamed on the international stage over his Ukrainian warmongering, and he's invested a lot of his military and focus on breaking Ukraine's will to resist. There is still a lot of manpower in Russia he could deploy, but it would involve diverting resources away from his primary target. And any escalation of his conscription efforts to handle a multi-front war can well trigger protests back home even he can't subdue.

In the meantime, stay strong Georgia. Stay alive and alert and don't believe any of the bullshit Putin and his allies are going to shove at you.

And sing to yourselves the songs of Ray Charles, Georgia's beloved Favorite Son. Well, okay, the other Georgia's beloved Favorite Son, but we'll lend him out to you for the time being.

The REAL Scandal: Republicans Are Kompromized by the Kremlin

If the Republicans' efforts to dig up scandals on Joe Biden and his son Hunter - in an effort to weaken Biden's standing and cause embarrassment to cover for donald trump's real weaknesses and scandals (and upcoming criminal trials) - looked weak and ridiculous on their own, that's because the GOP's efforts to stir up scandal were weak and ridiculous.

And now, those Republican efforts have turned into a goddamned John Le Carre spy novel with the revelation that one of their key "witnesses" to Hunter Biden's business shenanigans was not only lying about his testimony but that he was passing along "evidence" fabricated by Russian Intelligence.

It's unsettling enough that the Special Counsel overseeing the investigation in Hunter Biden's potential criminal behavior had to pull a 180 on relying on this "witness" Alexander Smirnov and issue felony charges against him instead. And then, worrying that the Nevada magistrate who handled the bail release on Smirnov was giving Smirnov a chance to flee the country, they recharged Smirnov in a California court with more specific evidence - and that he was a flight risk - to ensure the guy stayed in custody.

How important was this "witness" to Republicans digging for Biden dirt? According to that AP News report from Lindsay Whitehurst, this important:

Smirnov’s claims have been central to the Republican effort in Congress to investigate the president and his family and helped spark what is now a House impeachment inquiry into Biden.

They became a flashpoint in Congress in July as Republicans demanded the FBI release the unredacted form, a so-called FD-1023, documenting the unverified allegations. Republican Rep. James Comer of Kentucky had subpoenaed the form as Republicans deepened their probe ahead of the 2024 presidential election. Republicans acknowledged they couldn’t confirm if the allegations were true but said they were significant in their investigation of Hunter Biden.

The allegations of Russian contact with the source of those allegations should be a death knell for the impeachment inquiry, said Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland. “It appears like the whole thing is not only obviously false and fraudulent but a product of Russian disinformation and propaganda,” he said.

Of course, the Republican leaders on this - Comer, Jim Jordan, the other clowns in that car - are running away from having Smirnov as their keystone to their entire impeachment effort, except for the fact they've been running away from every other tainted source they tried to rely on over the past year of sham hearings and "rumored" revelations.

What this twist exposes is not only their failure to find legitimate scandal against their true target Joe Biden (they honestly don't care if Hunter goes to jail or not), but exposes how corrupted and compromised the modern Republican Party leadership is towards a foreign power like Putin's Russia. The nominally conservative pundit at Washington Post Jennifer Rubin spells out the problem (this was via a gift link, don't know if it will paywall):

Are Republicans easy marks or willing participants in Russian anti-Biden operations? That’s a troubling question raised by the Feb. 14 grand jury indictment of a former FBI informant, Alexander Smirnov, on charges of concocting a tale about President Biden’s supposed involvement in his family members’ business dealings.

Allegations by Smirnov — who appears to have ties to Russian intelligence, according to the federal indictment — have formed the backbone of the House Republicans’ laughable attempt to build an impeachment case against the president. They championed him as their star witness. Now the Republicans’ fact-deficient storyline has been shredded...

Now Republicans are pretending that Smirnov wasn’t so important after all. They’re vowing to plow ahead on this cock-and-bull mission that never got off the ground. Not only did multiple witnesses testify that Biden had no involvement with his son’s business dealings, but previous allegations that Biden acted on his son’s behalf had also already been thoroughly repudiated...

The current House debacle overlaps with a Russian disinformation project described by the national security specialists Ryan Goodman and Asha Rangappa on the website Just Security in 2020. That scheme enticed Republican Sens. Ron Johnson (Wis.) and Chuck Grassley (Iowa) to buy into the now-discredited scenario that as vice president Biden sought on behalf of his son to stop an investigation of Burisma. (It also added in another phony Ukraine election interference claim.)

And let’s not forget that special counsel Robert S. Mueller III found “sweeping and systematic” Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election on Donald Trump’s behalf.

The current revelations concerning Smirnov should not merely spell the end of the comically inept impeachment proceedings; they should provoke questions about Republicans’ recklessness in peddling claims they apparently knew were unreliable.

At the very least, it is clear that House Republicans had reason to be skeptical of Smirnov’s allegations instead of embracing them. FBI briefers “warned lawmakers that the document, known as a 1023, containing Smirnov’s allegations against the Bidens also included raw, uncorroborated intelligence that should not be made public,” CNN reported on Wednesday. Even if the Republicans did not know Smirnov might have ties to Russian intelligence, they certainly knew the basis for making wild allegations about Biden was extremely shaky...

Republicans’ affinity over multiple elections for Russian-backed plots should warrant wall-to-wall coverage. (Let us not forget Russian efforts detailed in the Mueller report to enlist the Trump campaign and sabotage Hillary Clinton’s campaign in 2016.) Responsible news outlets should press House Republicans to justify their refusal to vote for aid for Ukraine and habit of spreading Russian conspiracy theories.

In short, Trump (enabled by House Republicans) wants Ukraine aid blocked and invites Vladimir Putin to invade NATO countries with military budgets Trump deems insufficient. He already has served as an indispensable helpmate in Putin’s assault on democracy and the international order. No wonder Russia appears yet again ready to pull out all the stops to boost Trump.

Rubin refers back to a particular matter that obsessed me during the trump years: The Mueller Report. It annoys me to no end that when then-Attorney General Barr - appointed by trump to shut down the Mueller investigation before it closed in on trump himself - ended that grand jury probe, he promoted - and the mainstream media bought into - the lie that the Report "exonerated trump" and that was the end of that. What everyone seemed to ignore were the factual elements Mueller's team found - the first half of his legal objectives - rampant and provable evidence that Russian Intelligence and their oligarch allies actively engaged in election interference in 2016. What Mueller couldn't prove was trump's direct involvement with those efforts (instead Mueller found at least five instances of Obstruction, which he couldn't criminally charge due to Presidential Immunity but tried to get House Democrats to attempt impeachment, which they failed to pursue).

I remain shocked and angered to this day that Congress both Democrats and Republicans failed to heed Mueller's - and the rest of the U.S. Intelligence agencies - warnings that Russia - above all the other foreign powers looking to interfere like China and Iran - will continue to attack America's electoral systems to force the results - like stealing the presidency AGAIN for trump - that benefits Russia instead of the U.S. and our long-standing European / Middle Eastern / Asian allies. There's been almost no legislation - no priority put to making our elections more secure nor passing legal sanctions and punishments on Russia for their crimes. We're talking about acts of war getting committed on us - our rights as Americans - and nothing, no response.

Worse: We have had solid evidence for almost a decade that Russia was, is, and will do anything they can to disrupt and divide the United States. And it's getting clearer that the Republican Party as a group are happy to help them.

I mentioned before how the Republican mindset - drawing from their deep conservative ideology - their One Truth is that they view only themselves as True Americans. To do so, everyone else - aka Democrats and those who do not fit in the Republican Culture War like women, Blacks, Latinos, gays and trans, and more - dare not and cannot be considered "American" even though geographically, demographically, philosophically, we are as American as they.

Their problem is that those conservative Republicans are not in the actual majority of Americans... and they know it. They've been sliding out of contention with the majority of voters since 2008, they'd been warned after the 2012 election cycle, and yet instead of moderating themselves to retain broad appeal the conservatives doubled down on Culture War extremism and RINO purging to keep party unity, tied into aggressive state-level and federal-level gerrymandering and voter suppression to skew elections to their favor.

Thing is, that Game of Demographics can only work for so long, as the Republican extremism on issues like abortion (and related issues like birth control and IVF) and tax cuts for the rich peel away the edges of their GOP voting base to where they can't "win" even with all the gerrymandering and suppression.

So the Republicans are desperate to get any help from anywhere they can. Even if that help is coming from a foreign power like Russia where their leader Putin and his cronies are openly threatening our allies and our own nation's safety/stability. Even when that help falls under open acts of sedition that rely on corrupted persons like Smirnov. 

Similar to how trump's 2016 campaign met with and tried to coordinate with Russian nationals over getting dirt on Hillary Clinton - in possible violation of 52 US Code sect. 30121 - the current House Republican leadership and their allies from trump's Justice Department (looking at you Bill Barr) have come dangerously close to breaking that law getting tampered/manufactured Russian intel just to pursue false claims against Biden. Not to mention more obviously legal problems like suborning perjury and presenting false evidence.

The GOP leaders did all this because they truly believe 1) they're above the law, 2) they're the Real Americans fighting against un-American Democratic "criminals," 3) the Russians are not the bad guys. That last part is important because the modern Republicans driven by their Culture War bullshit truly see Putin - with his open homophobia, his disdain for "librul" Western norms, and "traditionalist" worldview (not to mention his sadism towards his lessers) - as a serious ally in that Culture War.

I wasn't there to see it, but I read the history books about the Red Scare, the McCarthyism of the 1950s where conservative Republicans openly hunted liberals and left-leaning Americans as Communist threats buddying up to Stalinist Soviet Russia. "Pinko down to their underwear" was the accusations, and anybody who ever expressed solidarity with Soviet Russia were hounded until they were broken or dead. Today, we now see those inheritors of the conservative Republicans happily and publicly embracing a Russian regime that may no longer be Communist but is just as corrupt and tyrannical as anything Stalin ever led.

The irony of such betrayal is lost on these modern Republicans, too greedy and too desperate to stay in power to see how they've sold their own ideals and their own nation out to a Russian dictator.

This scandal ought to convince every American voter who truly wants what is best for our nation - for our families, for our communities, for our future - to stop voting for a Republican Party corrupted and compromised beyond redemption. 

Elections matter, people. There's a reason why Putin wants to corrupt ours this 2024 just like he tried in 2020 and succeeded in back in 2016. Get the vote out, America. For the LOVE OF COUNTRY  everybody, do NOT vote (R)epublican (R)ussia.

Anniversary: The Fires Of Putin's War Still Burning

It's been two years now, and it's not the best possible way to celebrate this anniversary of when Putin sent the full might of his Russian military into all of Ukraine back in February 2022. Looking back at some of what I wrote, I noticed these observations:

Russia (Putin) doesn't want Ukraine to go running off to another European alliance like NATO or the EU, but they can't offer anything to Ukraine that would honestly entice Ukrainians to take Russia back as a political/economic partner. So instead, Russia (Putin) will try to "encourage" their relationship by force, not caring that such bullying behavior will only drive Ukrainians more towards joining Western Europe against Russia.

Ukraine is never going to give in to Russia's demands here, they will not agree to any deal absolutely barring them from even thinking about joining NATO. They dare not. Even the mere threat of joining NATO is the only leverage Ukraine has against outright invasion and occupation. Paradox: Every move Russia makes to stop Ukraine from joining NATO only pushes Ukraine further towards joining NATO.

It's that fear of NATO - how Putin and his lackeys see that western alliance as a bulwark against Russian dreams of rebirthing their empire - that keeps Russia from just admitting to themselves they screwed up because it's been two years of failure after failure. I noted this five days in:

What Putin got was a bloody nose, figurately speaking. 

Literally, five days into his ordering the invasion of Ukraine, what Putin has is an international PR nightmare, near-global condemnation of his war, escalating sanctions and lockdowns of every financial avenue Russia has - including cutting off banks from SWIFT, a transactional process that can arguably block the Russian citizenry and businesses from their own accounts - not to mention a tanking stock market, and nothing resembling a cakewalk into Kyiv to set up his puppet state.

Putin's rival Zelensky failed to flee the capital when the invasion started, instead using his media savvy to go onto social media and make a personal call to arms to every Ukrainian to stop the Russians approaching their major cities. Reported when asked by western powers to evacuate for his own safety, Zelensky answered "I need ammunition, not a ride." Sonofabitch (and I mean this in a cool way) is getting comparisons to freaking Winston Churchill, for God's sake...

Putin has already shot his load, as it were. Making a grand pronouncement that Ukraine wasn't even a real country and that he was going to make them all happy Russians again, only to have nearly every Ukrainian grab a rifle and fight back. Even grandmothers were tossing sunflower seeds at Russian troops cursing that their bodies will be fertilizer for the flowers that will bloom. 

Putin has already flexed his nation's military might, only to face the possibility that he's going to have to retreat, never a good look for a bullying autocrat. Or worse, double down on the troops and weaponry (that he may not have) and try to overwhelm Ukrainian resistance by sheer numbers, risking the growing anti-war sentiment of the citizenry at home...

If there has been any noticeable anti-war sentiment - most of Russian media and local police have clamped down on any overt sign of unrest - it's been from the young Russian men savvy enough to skedaddle - yes still love that word - when they had the chance:

Putin is doubling down on making this conscription (don't call it a mobilization like it's a good thing, this is forced military servitude) because Ukraine's recent success shredded much of the ground forces he had there and he needs as many bodies as possible to hold onto whatever he can claim. As mentioned earlier, Putin is also forcing the occupied regions of southern Ukraine - the Donbas in particular - to "vote" on a rigged "annexation" so that Russia can claim to the world that it's Ukraine invading Russia, even though most other nations would never recognize such a brazenly illegal move.

Putin is relying on the one last resource he can utilize in his war to conquer Ukraine: Manpower. Russia's overall population at 143 million is 100 million more than Ukraine's (43 million), and just on simple numbers in a slogfest Russia should be able to outlast Ukraine to conquer a bloodied landscape.

But in his desperation, Putin is overvaluing quantity over quality of armies. By all reports, Russia's armed forces are poorly trained, poorly motivated, poorly supplied... and everything that's happened since this February has proven how poor Russia's performance has been in a straight-up fight with an army that can fight back. While Putin is emphasizing in conscripting men with previous military experience, there's no guarantee those men have good enough experience in the first place, and there's no sign of them having the discipline and motivation to perform any better than the first wave of troops Putin sent in. Most military experts in the West argue that Putin needs to train his conscripts, which would take months... and Putin doesn't have months at this rate. He will send raw untrained victims to the front lines and hope to Zerg Rush Ukrainian forces by sheer attrition...

It is that - combined with Putin's illegal use of artillery and drone attacks on Ukrainian civilian populations - sole advantage of bodies for the meat grinder that has prolonged this war.

Well, there's actually a second advantage Putin is wielding against Ukraine to prolong this war: A willing faction of Republicans in Congress - bowing not just to trump's demand they appease his puppetmaster Putin, but playing their own game of obstructing Biden to make him look weak - blocking all financial and supply aid to Ukraine as they need it most. The Western European nations making up most of NATO have been providing military aid here and there - surplus of tanks and transports and weapons - but without the military and financial might of the U.S. getting to them, Ukrainian front line forces are running out of ammo.

Without that help, Ukraine will enter its third year of survival at their most vulnerable with Putin willing to prolong the attrition until he can be certain of complete victory, which would be if trump steals the electoral results this November. If that happens, trump's threats to drive the U.S. out of NATO become fact, and NATO is suddenly faced with an emboldened Russian Empire eager to reclaim Eastern Europe and use their influence on internal Far Right political factions to destabilize whatever's left.

There's a lot of things we as American citizens can do to provide help to Ukraine. Urging President Biden to transfer the millions in seized Russian assets to fund Ukraine's war effort is one. Stopping trump this November is the other step. For the love of Ukraine, our European allies, and a true end to Russian aggression/war, DO NOT VOTE REPUBLICAN.

Slava Ukraini! 

The Shakedown Threat

Over the weekend, donald trump essentially threatened the survival of NATO - basically all of Europe - in the face of Vladimir Putin's aggressive push to rebuild a Russian empire. If we take a look at what foreign policy pundit Fred Kaplan notes over at Slate (paywalled):

Did Trump just encourage Russia to invade U.S. allies in Europe if they don’t spend more on defense? It seems so. At a campaign rally on Saturday, he recounted a story about a NATO summit he attended while he was president:

One of the presidents of a big country stood up and said, “Well, sir, if we don’t pay and we’re attacked by Russia, will you protect us?” I said, “You didn’t pay, you’re delinquent?” He said, “Yes, let’s say that happened.” “No, I would not protect you. In fact, I would encourage them [presumably the Russians] to do whatever the hell they want.”

In one aspect, this remark—widely reported in news media the past few days—has been taken a bit out of context. Trump cited the story as an example of how his tough-guy tactics were effective. He got the allies, he claimed, to “pay up”—to boost their defense spending after years of shirking their obligations...

Yet, more broadly, the remark is just as alarming and dangerous as Trump’s critics and many European officials are interpreting it. It reflects a long-standing attitude of indifference and borderline hostility to allies, of viewing them the same way that a Mafia boss regards his capos or clients in a protection racket.

There is no question: When—not if—Vladimir Putin read that remark, he mused that he might get away with intimidating or invading Poland, the Baltic nations, or some other nearby countries if Trump wins the 2024 election. Ditto for Xi Jinping and Taiwan...

Much like Kaplan, I'm viewing trump's public ire towards NATO not as trump as a landlord upset about rent not getting paid but as a mob boss demanding his payoff for protection by his victims. Try to remember, one of the things trump kept insisting to our NATO allies wasn't to increase their defense spending but to pay the United States - to pay him, hint hint - over what trump saw as "unpaid bills".

Which, of course, is not how diplomacy and military alliances work. But donald trump doesn't care about what works, he only cares about what profits donald trump. And he's perfectly willing to break everything to profit from it. Back to Kaplan:

Trump’s purely transactional view of alliances is nothing new. It was widely reported that, as president, he told his aides several times that he wanted to pull out of NATO. In 2020 he told the European Union’s president, Ursula von der Leyen, “You need to understand that if Europe is under attack, we will never come to help you,” adding, “By the way, NATO is dead and we will leave.” After he left office, some of his top aides said that if he had been reelected in 2020, Trump would have definitely quit the alliance...

This was a legitimate fear for me back in 2018: Even before matters escalated over Ukraine in 2022, trump's disdain for NATO - and open willingness to pander to Putin - threatened to break the alliance in ways that would have harmed America's global standing as well as expose Eastern Europe to immediate threat from Russia:

Under other circumstances, it would be hilarious to watch all the hardened foreign policy wizards of the Republican Party - all of them perfectly aware of how the U.S. has benefited in both military and political matters being united with the other Western democracies during the Cold War and Global War on Terror decades - suddenly switch their worldviews from "Europe good, Putin bad" to "OMG Putin is just the best BFF ever!" Under other circumstances, most of those intelligent, well-studied thinkers of realpolitik would argue against any ill-advised ignorant demolition of a stable, valuable alliance. But we no longer live in that world: This is the World of Fox Not-News, and if you can't help shill the Narrative of the hour/month/year which happens to be whatever is in trump's head that very moment, you are persona non grata to the GOP...

We will see a near-immediate end to foreign sharing of intel: What is the likelihood the UK or France is willing to share data with a nation that could easily hand it over to Russia without batting an eye? NATO's efforts to stop Russia from a full-out invasion of Ukraine falls apart. Half of Central Europe - bizarrely under the political sway of right-wing Nationalist governments more friendly to Putin than they should - could well cut out of any NATO or shared alliance with Western Europe and turn most of Eastern Europe back into a Russian playground...

Which - again - is exactly what Putin wants.

We're getting into the second full year of Russia's full-out war on Ukraine, which followed eight years of border clashes after 2014 when Ukraine threw out their corrupt pro-Russian government. For all of Russia's military might on paper, it's been an utter disaster for Putin. While Ukraine hasn't succeeded in a major counteroffensive since autumn of 2022, Russia shows no sign of claiming more territory. All Russia has done well during this campaign has been targeting civilian centers to terrorize the populace and adding to their long list of war crimes. The only advantage Putin has - the manpower to conscript millions more of his people than Ukraine can - is the one resource keeping Russia in this quagmire.

Putin's hope is clear: If trump wins the November election, any potential American support to Ukraine - which has been tied up by trump's Republican allies in Congress - officially ends. Up until then, Putin can throw more Russians into the meat grinder and never care for the bloodshed he's spilling of both Russian and Ukrainian alike.

trump isn't even hiding how he's eager to play his part. He's made it clear he views Putin as a personal ally and would happily convert American foreign/military interests to align with Putin's. If that means using Russia as a threat to bully Europe into submitting to trump's demands, trump would love it. But trump would also cheer on letting not only Ukraine fall to Putin but also the Baltics and arguably Poland as well. There's a reason why Russians are starting to issue warnings to Germany, and it's because they're confident trump will help them squeeze Europe by next year.

The underlying message trump is getting out there is that he doesn't care one whit about the United States' obligations to long-standing treaties that have kept the peace with our most powerful allies for more than 60 years. And it's not even trump using Russia as a boogeyman to scare NATO into being more compliant. This is trump signaling to his mob boss Putin that Europe will be easy pickings should trump regain the White House in 2024.

If you genuinely want world peace, you have to realize that Putin is the greatest threat to world peace in our lifetime. You have to realize trump is just one of Putin's pawns to keep war and chaos going so Putin can reclaim his dreams of empire.

You have to, for the love of ALL that's holy, vote against trump and make sure he never gets anywhere near the Oval Office again.

Russia Rushing Toward Collapse (w/ Update)

Holy shit things are moving fast. 

Last night, the head of the mercenary Wagner group turned against the Russian military they were working with in Ukraine, seizing a key command HQ and twisting the knife into Putin's corrupt rule. The early hours of the turning created a lot of chaos, as Adam L Silverman the Intel expert at Balloon Juice tried to make sense of the early reports, conflicting stories, possible staged grievances, and other picture postcards:

As  I write this Prigozhin, supposedly leading Wagner, has announced that he’s moving on Moscow to deal with Minister of Defense Shoigu and the senior military staff/leadership who have failed Russia, the Russian people, and Vladimir Putin with both how they’ve prosecuted the reinvasion of Ukraine and how they’ve misled Putin. Not a coup, just a long overdue violent annual performance eval. In response the Fortress Plan – the security crisis action plan for municipal defense – has been activated for Rostov on Don and for Moscow. And the FSB, the Russian successor to the Soviet KGB, has either opened a criminal case or actually charged Prigozhin for violating the laws regarding not disparaging the military during the Special Military Operation and/or calling for armed rebellion. I’ve also seen reports that the St. Petersburg Police and/or Russian Special Forces have raided Wagner’s St. Petersburg offices.

Silverman adds among the Twitter feeds he's relying on for commentary that:

Other than videos and some audio released on social media THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO EVIDENCE THAT THE RUSSIAN MOD BOMBARDED A WAGNER REAR BASE OR THAT WAGNER, LED BY PRIGOZHIN IS MOVING OUT OF THE DONBAS, THROUGH RUSSIA, AND TOWARDS MOSCOW!!!!!

(This is presented in the BOLD CAPS LOCK mode that he's working with)

In Silverman's opinion, if Prigozhin was triggered by something it wasn't any kind of attack. Personally, my money is on the likelihood that the Russian military wanted to take direct control of the Wagner units to counter-attack Ukraine's counter-attack currently underway, and Prigozhin didn't want to deal with their sorry asses anymore (Update: I was kind of right. Prigozhin was refusing to sign contracts with the Ministry of Defense that would have taken away his control over his private army).

Silverman then spools together a Twitter thread by Tatiana Stanovaya, Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center, which I'll copy here:

Here are a few insights into the situation surrounding Prigozhin:

1️⃣ For a long time, Prigozhin has been out of direct contact with Putin, yet he’s believed he was acting in Putin’s interests “by default”. His significant contributions in the war enhanced his sense of exclusivity and privilege.

2️⃣ The President’s administration maintained the stance that unless explicitly directed, it wasn’t feasible to openly confront Prigozhin, despite a strong inclination to do so. In fact, they had even convinced themselves of his usefulness.

3️⃣ As I’ve previously stated, the atrocities of war can drive people to the brink of sanity. Even the most loyal players, who are dependent on the Kremlin (which doesn’t imply complete manageability), can lose their sense of proportion. This is especially true when there appears to be no response to the continual attempts to escalate the situation.

4️⃣ Now that the state has actively engaged, there’s no turning back. The termination of Prigozhin and Wagner is imminent. The only possibility now is absolute obliteration, with the degree of resistance from the Wagner group being the only variable. Surovikin was dispatched to convince them to surrender. Confrontation seems totally futile.

5️⃣ The impending end of Wagner has satisfied many in power. He had become excessively anti-state, which is intolerable during a war. However, a significant number of those outside of power now lament the loss of a character like Prigozhin, who had begun to appeal due to his daring and audacity. Consequently, political repercussions are expected.

A crucial point to note is that many within the elite will now personally fault Putin for letting the situation escalate to such extremes and for his lack of a timely, adequate response when to many it was evident that Prigozhin was pushing the limits of Kremlin’s tolerance. Therefore, this entire saga is also an undercut to Putin’s standing...

Even if Putin puts down Prigozhin's betrayal/coup attempt, this weakens Putin's own standing. He'll also be eliminating one of the few effective fighting forces he has in Ukraine, as the Wagner mercs will either flee or refuse to fight under the command of Russian generals they know are corrupt and inept.

The flip-side of that - as I was waking up to this morning as Prigozhin's attempt is still ongoing - is if Wagner succeeds in overthrowing the Russian military command or even Putin himself, utter chaos reigns. A demoralized army - already broken by a meat-grinder war in Ukraine - will have no idea who's truly in charge. Unless Prigozhin is primed and able to assume full command - and show any tactical and strategical skill needed to maneuver a large-scale military offensive - he's simply going to take over a bad job and make it worse for Russia.

The political implications of this coup are enormous. As long as Putin is in charge of anything, Prigozhin won't be able to dictate terms to the government (the "legislature" and "courts" however legitimate they are). There's also the reality of the oligarchs allied to Putin, and determining which way they'll jump (which will always be to favor their own pockets).

When I woke this morning, this was the current reporting from the international newswire Reuters: TANKS - okay, maybe just one so far - ARE ROLLING ONTO MOSCOW.

ROSTOV-ON-DON/VORONEZH, Russia, June 24 (Reuters) - Russian military helicopters opened fire on Saturday afternoon on a convoy of rebel mercenaries already more than half way towards Moscow in a lightning advance after seizing a southern city overnight.

President Vladimir Putin vowed to crush an armed mutiny he compared to Russia's Civil War a century ago.

Fighters from Yevgeny Prigozhin's private Wagner militia were in control of Rostov-on-Don, a city of more than a million people close to the border with Ukraine, and were rapidly advancing northwards through western Russia...

Prigozhin, whose private army fought the bloodiest battles in Ukraine even as he feuded for months with the top brass, said he had captured the headquarters of Russia's Southern Military District in Rostov after leading his forces into Russia from Ukraine.

In Rostov, which serves as the main rear logistical hub for Russia's entire invasion force, residents milled about, filming on mobile phones, as Wagner fighters in armoured vehicles and battle tanks took up positions.

One tank was wedged between stucco buildings with posters advertising the circus. Another had "Siberia" daubed in red paint across the front, a clear statement of intent to sweep across the breadth of Russia.

In Moscow, there was an increased security presence on the streets. Red Square was blocked off by metal barriers.

"Excessive ambitions and vested interests have led to treason," Putin said in a televised address, comparing the insurrection at a time of war abroad to Russia's revolution and civil war unleashed during World War One.

"All those who deliberately stepped on the path of betrayal, who prepared an armed insurrection, who took the path of blackmail and terrorist methods, will suffer inevitable punishment, will answer both to the law and to our people."

Putin's saying this while on Twitter - instant news whether you want it or not - the observers are chortling "Moscow in 3" (either hours or days, they haven't agreed on which) as an ironic echo to Putin's 2022 decree of taking Kyiv in 3 days.

Kiev in 3 days has become Moscow in 3 days.

— Darth Putin (@DarthPutinKGB) June 24, 2023

This is all still chaos. Meanwhile in Ukraine, the fighting hasn't stopped. Russian troops are still holding their defensive positions in the Donbas and southeastern half of that country. Unless Putin decides he needs his troops back in Russia to stay in power, or if Prigozhin takes control and orders them back to consolidate himself, this war isn't going to be over anytime soon.

But if Putin does indeed fall from power, this seriously changes everything. He has tied himself into so many elements of Russia - the political corruption and the economic corruption and the religious corruption and the cultural corruption - that there is no idea what could rise up to fill that void.

Putin's dream of empire is still a nightmare for the rest of us, even as it crashes down around him.

Update: Not more than six hours after I blogged this, there's a tentative peace deal between Putin and Prigozhin. Via Reuters:

Heavily armed Russian mercenaries who advanced most of the way to Moscow began turning back on Saturday, de-escalating a major challenge to President Vladimir Putin's grip on power, in a move their leader said would avoid bloodshed.

Yevgeny Prigozhin, a former Putin ally and founder of the Wagner army, said his men reached within 125 miles (200 km) of the capital. Earlier, Moscow deployed soldiers in preparation for their arrival and told residents to avoid going out.

The Wagner fighters captured the city of Rostov hundreds of miles to the south before racing in convoy through the country, transporting tanks and armoured trucks and smashing through barricades set up to stop them, video showed...

The office of Alexander Lukashenko said the decision to halt further movement of Wagner fighters was brokered by the Belarusian president, with Putin's approval, in return for guarantees for their safety.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Prigozhin himself will move to Belarus under the deal. Peskov said Lukashenko had offered to mediate because he had known the mercenary leader personally for around 20 years...

To have Putin's puppet regime in Belarus broker this deal is merely one part of the overall humiliation brought to Putin's table. Throughout this crisis, Russia's own military failed to respond in full against a "turncoat" private army, highlighting the low morale and poor discipline plaguing the regular forces. Prigozhin made faster advancements marching into Russia within 24 hours where it took him and his Wagner brigades over three months to achieve anything at Bakhmut.

Despite all the assurances between the two sides ("We ARE struggling together!"), how can there be any trust now between Prigozhin and Putin? Prigo's gonna have to watch every drink handed to him and sleep with one eye open and avoid tall buildings for however long Putin's on this Earth. Putin is going to have to deal with the consequences of a failing military that may still mutiny themselves if he cracks down too harshly on them for this failure, and worry that Prigozhin's popularity with a Russian population that worships basic competence can still undermine him.

It should be noted that making any kind of deal like this is a mug's game. A deal with a Russian is no deal at all. The question is, which Russian is going to break it first?

Where Are The Ukrainian Children, Putin?

I was kind of waiting for arrest warrants to go out for the other guy today, but getting this announcement of arrest warrants for trump's evil puppetmaster Putin will do nicely (via Mike Corder and Raf Casert at AP News):

The International Criminal Court said Friday it has issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin for war crimes because of his alleged involvement in abductions of children from Ukraine.

The court said in a statement that Putin “is allegedly responsible for the war crime of unlawful deportation of population (children) and that of unlawful transfer of population (children) from occupied areas of Ukraine to the Russian Federation.”

It also issued a warrant Friday for the arrest of Maria Alekseyevna Lvova-Belova, the Commissioner for Children’s Rights in the Office of the President of the Russian Federation, on similar allegations.

The court’s president, Piotr Hofmanski, said in a video statement that while the ICC’s judges have issued the warrants, it will be up to the international community to enforce them. The court has no police force of its own to enforce warrants...

There is of course no way that the Russian government will honor the Hague's warrants, I don't believe they are even signed onto the treaties that created this court.

But this puts the whole world on notice. In the eyes of the international communities, of their legal systems, and in the name of justice, it is a matter of public record that Putin is the war criminal here in his uncalled and unjust invasion of Ukraine since 2022 (arguably well back into 2014 when Russia seized Crimea and the Donbas region).

The ICC said that its pre-trial chamber found there were “reasonable grounds to believe that each suspect bears responsibility for the war crime of unlawful deportation of population and that of unlawful transfer of population from occupied areas of Ukraine to the Russian Federation, in prejudice of Ukrainian children.”

The court statement said that “there are reasonable grounds to believe that Mr Putin bears individual criminal responsibility” for the child abductions “for having committed the acts directly, jointly with others and/or through others (and) for his failure to exercise control properly over civilian and military subordinates who committed the acts...”

Anybody trying to defend Putin's actions from here on will have to justify Putin and Russia's illegal kidnapping of thousands of Ukrainian children, which they can't. Everything else Putin is doing that's illegal - such as the bombing of civilian areas and the killing of innocents - becomes harder for his apologists to excuse away as well.

The sweeping investigation also found crimes committed against Ukrainians on Russian territory, including deported Ukrainian children who were prevented from reuniting with their families, a “filtration” system aimed at singling out Ukrainians for detention, and torture and inhumane detention conditions.

But on Friday, the ICC put the face of Putin on the child abduction allegations.

WHERE ARE THE CHILDREN YOU STOLE, PUTIN?

One-Sentence Observation About President Biden Visiting Ukraine Today

This is how the United States represents democracy and freedom to the world, by showing public support to a Ukrainian nation under siege by a corrupt Russian autocracy, as our President Joe Biden visits to honor the one-year anniversary of the full-scale invasion and commenting "One year later, Kyiv stands. And Ukraine stands. Democracy stands," rubbing it in the face of a broken Putin and making every pro-Putin apologist here in the U.S. throw a goddamn conniption, which is beautiful.

Photo provided by Dimitar Dilkoff/AFP via Getty Images

Russia's Dying Dreams

As the year (2022) ends, people get into the mood to make predictions for how the coming year (2023) will go.

Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, one of Putin's more loyal lackeys, laid out a bunch of doozies on Twitter a few days ago. If I can refer to the Reuters article that reported on it:

Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, an arch loyalist of Vladimir Putin given a new job this week, predicted war between Germany and France next year and a civil war in the United States that would lead to Elon Musk becoming president.

That noise you hear in the distance is me headdesking into infinity. Just on those two predictions alone, I'm asking the universe "who the FUCK spiked Dmitry's vodka with LSD?"

Okay. Okay. Taking a step back. Let's just see what else Medvedev predicted for the coming year:

In his list of predictions for 2023, published on his personal Telegram and Twitter accounts, he also foresaw Britain rejoining the EU, which would in turn collapse.

Musk, the Tesla boss who now owns Twitter, responded to the suggestion he would emerge as U.S. president by tweeting back "Epic thread!!", although he also criticised some of Medvedev's predictions. Medvedev has praised Musk in the past for proposing Ukraine cede territory to Russia in a peace deal...

Musk, it should be noted, needs all the ego-stroking in the universe right now because his mismanagement of both Twitter and Tesla has tanked Tesla stock to where Musk has officially lost $200 billion of value in 2022, the most a billionaire has ever lost in that timeframe.

Other things Medvedev predicted:

• The cost of oil will go up to $150.00 a barrel, which would reverse Russia's pending economic collapse.
• Russia will win its war against Ukraine, seizing the eastern regions that Putin's tried to annex.
• Poland and Hungary will join forces to partition western Ukraine.
• Germany will react to Poland and Hungary's annexation of western Ukraine by annexing Poland and Hungary, forming a Fourth Reich. This will essentially shatter NATO.
• France will go to war against the German Fourth Reich.
• Northern Ireland - even with Britain rejoining the EU, causing its collapse (yeah, go ahead and figure that one out) - will quit the UK and reunite with Ireland. Even though their border issues with Ireland were likely resolved with the Rejoin in the first place. (This is the point where I went cross-eyed)
• That US Civil War will lead to Texas and California forming their independent states, with Texas forming an alliance with Mexico. THIS is the point where I couldn't stop laughing for fifteen minutes straight.

Okay, that's as far as I'll go - he also predicted the end of the Bretton Woods economic agreements and the collapse of the US Dollar - before breaking down how EACH one of Medvedev's predictions are batshit crazy.

Medvedev's prediction of oil prices going up is a likely reaction to how global sanctions over Russia's invasion of Ukraine are crimping their economy now and for the foreseeable future. He's hoping that demand for oil goes up so high that other nations will quit their sanctions to get some of that sweet Russian crude.

His prediction that England will drop their Brexit stance and rejoin the European Union ignores the political dynamics in the UK, where the Conservatives still in charge of government have no intention of quitting their Brexit agenda. There would have to be a massive schism in Tory ranks to force an emergency election, and for the Labour party to win out. Even then, if the UK does rejoin the EU, there's no sign it will force the EU to split apart: After all, it would signal the EU's power to bring a nation that broke with them back into its ranks. It's not like Spain or Italy will quit if Britain reclaims a seat at the table.

There's not even any reason for the EU to let the UK back into their organization: Why trust a nation that would re-exit the minute the Tories got back in control? At best, the EU would compromise on a trade agreement that would turn the current No-Deal Brexit into a Soft Brexit that could alleviate England's current economic woes. And it'll be a deal that won't break the EU.

His follow-up suggestion that Northern Ireland will break with the UK to merge with the Irish Republic seems based on the current woes Northern Ireland has with the Irish border, which is a conflict born from Brexit. If Brexit ends, the border crisis ends: the Protestant half of Ireland would then stay with the UK. There's too much socio-political separation between Ireland and N. Ireland for any other issue to bring them together.

Medvedev gets crazier when he starts predicting how NATO will blow itself apart. He's convinced that when Russia defeats Ukraine, they'll take full control of the eastern provinces that they illegally annexed - including the Crimea - leaving the western sections vulnerable to the likes of Poland. Never mind that Poland would rather provide more military aid to Ukraine to ensure Ukraine never falls to Russia. Because the last thing Poland wants is a return of a Russian/Soviet empire at their own border. He's also ignoring the reality that Poland - having been divided itself between invading armies in World War II - is not about to inflict the same destructive annexation on another European nation. This is mostly Russian projection that other nations will be empire-building like they are.

This is leading into the fearmongering that Medvedev promotes when he claims Germany will forge a new Reich to dominate Eastern Europe as soon as Poland and Hungary move against Ukraine. Just invoking the Reich as a concept is his way to play to the dark memories of the Third Reich, when the Nazis blitzed in World War II and killed millions of Russians. 

One, Germany itself has been aggressive in shutting down ANY sign of Far Right fascist behavior, suffering through two straight world wars have been enough for them. Rebuilding a Reich is a pipe dream even for them: Just look at how the German government held mass arrests of extremists plotting to bring back the Kaiser and start a Far Right regime (a coup plot which was, by the by, backed by Russia).

Two, Germany is more likely to support Poland against Russia - which is supporting Ukraine - than annex it if Russia ever succeeded invading Ukraine. The thing about NATO, one of its key positive effects has been the treaty's ability to unite European nations to defend each other rather than split into competing factions the way it was when both world wars broke out. I can't speak for Hungary, which is under the control of a Russia-friendly regime: However, Hungary is still strongly tied to the EU and NATO, and they can't really go against either organization the way Russia wants to. 

This is the biggest reason why Putin and the other Russian elites want NATO gone: NATO's very existence prevents Russia from rebuilding its glory years of empire. This is why Medvedev predicts half of Europe turning on itself, with a German Reich triggering a French military response like it was 1877 (or 1914) all over again.

It's also feeding Medvedev's fantasy that the United States will break apart in Civil War. Granted, I'm a little worried that the U.S. already is in a low-grade civil war thanks to donald trump's insurrection attempt on January 6th, and thanks to the ongoing threats of violence coming from the likes of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers. But I've reviewed this situation before and there's little reason for even Texas - a Far Right state in opposition to a Democratic-held federal government - to break away from the Union. The hassles of nation-building - with few other nations to aid them, loss of supply chains with the rest of America, economic disruption, what have you - just aren't worth it to make the libruls look bad.

There's currently no reason for California to secede at all: a solid Blue State that would likely do everything to support Biden and the Democrats in DC. Most other states don't have the resources to actively secede, even with all the Far Right fantasies of pulling it off (most wingnut militias will fall quickly to even the National Guard units before the US military even steps in).

And Medvedev's idea that an independent Texas would ally itself to Mexico goes against everything we know about Texas' racist rage towards Mexico. The Republicans controlling Texas - hi, evildoer Abbott! - are livid about Mexican migrants, and screaming about "defending the border" by building a useless wall. These are not people who would suddenly want to work WITH Mexico in any way. Hell, that border becomes a flashpoint with Mexico declaring the border with Texas isn't the Rio Grande anymore (because that was a treaty made with the US at the end of the Mexican-American War). There's a whole Trope for it - Mexico Called They Want Texas Back - to where if Texas does secede their biggest problem will be an angry Mexican army marching to the Nueces River.

Oh, and that stuff about Elon Musk becoming President? Under the US Constitution, Musk can't qualify, he's not a natural-born citizen. If Medvedev thinks a divided United States is going to find the time to rewrite a brand new constitution that would grant Musk the chance to get elected, and that either Texas or California would be that idiotic to elect him, he's really drunk off his ass.

So with all that said, did you notice the common thread between every single one of Medvedev's predictions?

Every single prediction is a Russian elitist's wish fulfillment. Every prediction is about how the rest of the world - especially the United States and Europe - has to fall apart in order for Russia to succeed.

In particular, Medvedev's fantasy that the US will collapse into civil war with different states forming their own nations echoes similar predictions I saw Russians make back in 2009. It's a recurring dream apparently of the Russian mindset, having endured their own breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991 that has them wishing their rival the United States would do the same.

Russia - having lost its global standing when the USSR fell apart - is both angry and terrified about the NATO treaty that encompasses most of a European continent allied against outside forces (of which Russia is one). It's a self-defeating situation for Russia: The Russians need NATO out of the way to achieve Putin's dreams of rebuilding their imperial glory days of Peter the Great; but NATO stuck together partly because they feared in a post-Soviet world the rise of a Russian dictator (like Putin) who would conquer and divide Eastern Europe, in ways that led to two destructive world wars that Europe never wants to endure again. It's a Russian dream that - to nations like Germany and France and England and Poland - dare not come true.

Russia as a nation/people suffers from either a weird case of Imposter Syndrome or a self-punishing inferiority complex. Putin and other high-ranking Russians on the one hand see Western Civilization as weak and corrupt (and in Putin's homophobic world-view, sexually deviant). On the other hand, they are absolutely terrified that these weak nations will attack and destroy Russia. It doesn't help their psyche that they've been this way for centuries - Peter the Great himself was envious of European improvements and sought to emulate them - both coveting a dominant role in Europe and dismissing European cultural norms and political beliefs.

Russia has always been an outsider force in Western politics, even when they were allies to the remaining democracies during World War II. It's both rankled their pride and left them wondering what they've done wrong to be so slighted. It has a lot to do with how corrupt the ruling forces in Russia have been - either under the Tsars, or under the Soviets, now under Putin - to where the other major powers have been and still are wary of dealing with Russia in any way.

Thing is, Russia's corruption - not just economic greed but political brutality - has been so constant, so prevalent that they've failed repeatedly to reform themselves to where the Western nations can ever feel safe. Hence the ongoing existence of NATO and the EU, both of which enrage Russia into staying violent and corrupt, and nothing improves.

It's that same corruption now eating away at Russia as 2022 rolls into 2023. The political elites - the oligarchs that own everything to Russia's ruin - dare not turn against or reject the violent dictatorship of Putin that has pushed the nation into an unwinnable ground war in Ukraine.

The only way to end their nightmare is to dream of a world that collapses before Russia does.

But that dream is a lie, just like every self-delusion Russians have been feeding themselves for ages.

It's more of a nightmare for Ukraine and Europe and the United States and the world, that's not going to end until Putin is gone.

Gods help us.

May the new year see an end to this corrupt Russian madness.