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Post by mhbruin on Sept 13, 2022 7:56:49 GMT -8
No chance of being blown away during the Super Bowl. There Ain't No Brees.
I Want These Socks!
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Post by mhbruin on Sept 13, 2022 8:01:45 GMT -8
Surrender or Die!
Remember when Russia walked into an obvious trap in Kherson Oblast and everyone knew it except Russia? Well, they finally caught on.
“In places where Russian forces demonstrate resistance, Ukrainians are firing shells with leaflets calling for surrender. An unofficial report says there are 5,000 Russian POWs in Ukrainian hands.” This pause to rest, refit, refuel, and repair forces used in the Kharkiv offensive is a great time to coax Russian and proxy forces to surrender.
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Post by mhbruin on Sept 13, 2022 8:03:15 GMT -8
Ukraine Pulled Off a MasterstrokeThe Atlantic has just published an analysis of how Ukraine pulled off its stunning counter-offensive in the Kharkiv region. It was written by Phillips Payson O’Brien, a professor of strategic studies at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. It’s well worth reading for those who have followed the war closely. "This stunning Ukrainian advance was anything but sudden. It resulted from a patient military buildup, excellent operational security, and, maybe most important, the diversion of some of the Russian army’s most powerful units from Kharkiv Oblast itself. The overall planning by the Ukrainian government and armed forces worked well on so many levels that it produced one of the greatest military-strategy successes since 1945.” Ukraine Pulled Off a Masterstroke
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Post by mhbruin on Sept 13, 2022 8:10:03 GMT -8
They're Singing a New Tune
The official, state-run media in Russia, which dominates in the country, has switched tones several times throughout the Ukraine crisis, from denying the invasion was to take place at all in early February, to praising the “righteous de-Nazification of Ukraine”.
Overall, compared with the first few months of war, the subject has faded into the background.
According to a recent study, state TV mentions the war less and less while “de-Nazification”, one of the stated goals of Moscow’s “special operation”, barely gets mentioned at all.
However, on September 6, Ukraine began a counteroffensive in the Kharkiv region, recapturing several key towns and occupied territory. This reportedly followed a weeks-long, purposeful, Ukrainian disinformation campaign of “leaked, exclusive reports”, designed to trick Russia into thinking the plan was to retake Kherson, to the south.
At first, pro-Russian bloggers and outlets played down Ukraine’s advance.
“There is no panic in Balakliya,” the Telegram channel Veteran’s Notes, which boasts 192,000 subscribers, wrote on September 6.
By the following day, however, there was a more sullen tone.
“Don’t expect good news today,” Veteran’s Notes warned.
Pro-Kremlin journalist and politician Andrey Medvedev, meanwhile, wrote a solemn, yet motivational post.
“It’s been a tough day,” he told his 122,000 readers on Telegram. “But now it has probably become clearer what it was like for our grandfathers and grandmothers in the Great Patriotic War [WWII] … It will be difficult. Very difficult in places. But we don’t really have a choice.” (Actually they did. Russia started this war.)
It's the Fault of the People Who Convinced Putin
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Post by mhbruin on Sept 13, 2022 8:12:13 GMT -8
Kangaroo Shot to Death. Police Investigating
A man who may have been keeping a wild kangaroo as a pet was killed by the animal in southwest Australia, police said Tuesday. It was reportedly the first fatal attack by a kangaroo in Australia since 1936.
A relative found the 77-year-old man with “serious injuries” on his property Sunday in semirural Redmond, 250 miles southeast of the Western Australia state capital Perth.
It was believed he had been attacked earlier in the day by the kangaroo, which police shot dead because it was preventing paramedics from reaching the injured man, police said.
“The kangaroo was posing an ongoing threat to emergency responders,” the statement said.
The man died at the scene. Police are preparing a report for a coroner who will record an official cause to death.
Is "Death by Kangaroo" an Official Cause of Death?
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Post by mhbruin on Sept 13, 2022 8:14:38 GMT -8
Privatize Social Security? A National Abortion Ban? Remember When the QOP Was Good at Messaging?
Republicans are struggling with the backlash against the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade and a series of Republican-controlled states instituting harsh abortion bans. Voters are angry, and that anger has contributed to a reduction in Republican hopes for November’s midterm elections. So what are they doing about it? Well, Sen. Lindsey Graham is going to introduce a national 15-week abortion ban.
That’s one way to do things. Voters are angry that your party is banning abortion in the states? Go ahead and ban it nationally! Many in your party defended the Supreme Court’s move as backing states’ rights on this issue? Take it federal!
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While most of the party has been engaged in an everything-sucks, destroy-the-system campaign that is as dishonest as it is relentless, candidates bankrolled by Thiel have indeed been coming up with new ideas. They’ve floated enacting a federal “personhood” law(which would ban abortion even in cases of rape), privatizing Social Security and even replacing American democracy with something like a monarchy.
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Post by mhbruin on Sept 13, 2022 8:18:34 GMT -8
Hannity Lists Previous Guy's Crimes
A strikingly broad subpoena sweep against more than 30 former officials and campaign aides of ex-President Donald Trumprepresents the clearest sign yet of the seriousness of the Department of Justice’s criminal probe into events surrounding the US Capitol insurrection.
The gambit, revealed on Monday, also shows that while Trump may succeed in slowing a separate investigation into the retention of classified information at Mar-a-Lago, his potential exposure to legal consequences is deep and threatening. Trump has not been charged with a crime in either probe.
But the subpoenas show that the DOJ’s investigation, which has proceeded behind the scenes for months and caused Trump critics to express frustration with Attorney General Merrick Garland, is far more expansive than was previously known. And it appears to be intensifying, with investigators apparently narrowing their focus based on other subpoenas, evidence and witness testimony.
Still Waiting for the Indictments
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Post by mhbruin on Sept 13, 2022 8:21:35 GMT -8
Maybe These Guys Gave Putin Bad Advice
Ivan Pechorin, 39, managing director of the Corporation for the Development of the Far East and the Arctic, reportedly fell off a boat at full speed and died Saturday near Russky Island in the Sea of Japan in Primorsky Krai, Russia, near Vladivostock, about 5,800 miles east of Moscow.
Ravil Maganov, 67, chairman and former head of Lukoil, fell six floors from a Moscow hospital window on September 1, and another former head of Lukoil, Igor Nosov, 43, “died of a stroke” in February.
In December of 2021, Yegor Prosvirnin—founder of nationalist website Sputnik and Pogrom—fell out of a residential building in Moscow and died.
A similar incident occurred in October that year, when a Russian diplomat was found dead after a fall from a window at the Russian Embassy in Berlin.
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Post by mhbruin on Sept 13, 2022 8:26:06 GMT -8
It's Melting! It's Melting!Greenland ice sheet just suffered its worst melt event ever for September The warm weather triggered a major melting episode in Greenland — a stunning event for September, which typically marks the end of the ice sheet’s melt season. During the episode’s peak Saturday, around 12 billion tons of ice melted and ran off into the sea. Scientists estimate that more than 200,000 square miles of the ice sheet — an area bigger than California — were affected by the melting.  Greenland is already the most significant contributor to sea level rise. This month's record melt event has only added to the planet's woes as human-caused greenhouse emissions continue to rise, heating the earth.
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Post by mhbruin on Sept 13, 2022 9:00:21 GMT -8
Not All Sexual Predators Are Male. But Churches Keep Protecting Them.
Julie Hoover, 39, a now former teacher at the Point of Grace Christian School in Perry, Florida, was arrested last week and charged with contributing to the delinquency of a minor and being an authority figure soliciting or engaging in lewd conduct with a student. That sounds grim.
Last April, at the school prom, she allegedly twerked on a student and forced an alcoholic drink on him by trying to jam the straw of her cocktail into his mouth. At least two people attempted to stop her, even forcing themselves between the sex-crazed teacher and her hapless victim. Which raises the question, if there were witnesses, why did it take five months to arrest her? Somebody was running interference. Was it the school? I do not know. Perhaps the investigation will reveal the truth.
As with many sex abusers, her crime was not a one-off. She was also arrested and jailed in June for sexting an 18-year-old high school senior. The student’s mother reported the misconduct to deputies after she found the messages on the teen’s phone, which allegedly included a plan to sneak the student into Hoover’s home while her husband was at work.
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Post by mhbruin on Sept 13, 2022 9:01:30 GMT -8
A Small Silver Lining in a Pandemic Cloud
Poverty fell to a new low last year thanks to new federal spending passed in response to the coronavirus pandemic, according to new federal data released Tuesday.
Extra unemployment benefits, stimulus checks and a monthly child allowance helped push the poverty rate to 7.8% in 2021, according to an annual Census Bureau poverty measure that accounts for tax benefits and stimulus payments. The rate had been 9.1% in 2020.
Democrats included the various relief policies in a $1.9 trillion bill called the American Rescue Plan, which passed Congress on a party-line basis in March 2021. The bill represented Democrats’ vision of a more humane political economy that better supports parents and laid-off workers.
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Post by mhbruin on Sept 13, 2022 9:05:44 GMT -8
QANON Ron Doesn't Like China, But Loves That Chinese Money
Wisconsin Republican senator Ron Johnson, a vocal critic of Beijing who has vowed to launch investigations into the Biden family’s alleged relationships with Chinese businesses, declared $57m in income in his first 10 years in office in connection to his ownership stake in a company whose growth has closely been linked to China.
Financial disclosures show the senator’s wealth has sharply increased during his years running for and serving in the Senate thanks to his holding in Oshkosh-based Pacur, a plastics maker where Johnson previously served as top executive.
During his first run for public office before his 2010 election, Johnson portrayed himself as a successful businessman who knew how to create jobs. An advertisement he used in both his successful 2010 and 2016 campaigns showed the 67 year-old standing in front of a white board, touting his own record as a manufacturer, a fact that he said made him stand out in a sea of lawyers who serve in the Senate.
A close examination of Johnson’s financial disclosures and other public filings to the Securities and Exchange Commission, legal filings and other public records reveal that Johnson’s wealth was boosted by his company’s ties to another company that was owned and managed by his family, which in turn grew its business in China, acquired businesses in China, and reported having a loan worth tens of millions of dollars from the Bank of China.
In one case, the company run by Johnson’s family sued the US government to try to press for softer trade relations with Beijing, a position that Johnson himself adopted in a rare break with Trump administration policies.
Johnson sold his stake in Pacur in 2020, although documents show that an LLC owned by Johnson and his wife, Jane, still receives up to $1m annually through rent and royalties as owners of the building where Pacur operates.
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Post by mhbruin on Sept 13, 2022 9:07:00 GMT -8
DeathSentence Hopes Veterans Won't Say "Gay"
So many Florida teachers have abandoned their profession in recent years that the state is inviting military veterans with no prior teaching experience to lead classrooms while they earn education credentials.
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Post by mhbruin on Sept 13, 2022 9:10:14 GMT -8
Looking for a Cheap Vacation Home?
Russians are allegedly scrambling to move out of the Crimean Peninsula amid reports that Ukrainian forces will soon target the annexed territory.
The region of Crimea, a peninsula that juts off of southern Ukraine into the Black Sea, was annexed by Russia in 2014 as part of its long-standing conflict with Ukraine. Ukraine has strongly condemned the annexation in the years since, with most countries continuing to acknowledge the territory as Ukrainian.
Following a successful counteroffensive on Thursday in which Ukrainian forces drove Russians out of key strategic points in the northeast Kharkiv region, leaders have begun to suggest a similar move against Crimea in hopes of retaking the peninsula.
On Tuesday, a report from the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense claimed that, despite assurances from Moscow, leaders in the Crimean government have begun trying to move their families out of the region.
"The successful actions of the defenders of Ukraine force the so-called authorities of the temporarily occupied Crimea and the south of our country to urgently relocate their families to the territory of the Russian Federation," said the report, which was translated from Ukrainian.
"Despite the assurances of the population that it is safe to stay on the peninsula, representatives of the occupation administration of Crimea, FSB employees, and commanders of some military units are secretly trying to sell their homes and urgently evacuate their relatives from the peninsula."
The report also said that the Crimean government has made efforts to bar its civilian residents from selling their homes or traveling outside of the region. Information about the counteroffensive has also been heavily restricted.
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