Good to see VP on int’l stage, and at a very tough time. https://t.co/fhk4aUshIY
— Dalia Dassa Kaye (@dassakaye) February 17, 2022
Big US delegation here at Munich Security Conference, including @VP Kamala Harris, @SecBlinken, @JohnKerry, @SpeakerPelosi @LindseyGrahamSC @SenWhitehouse @SenJoniErnst @RepSlotkin @SenatorShaheen @amyklobuchar @ericswalwell @RoKhanna @senrobportman @SenSasse @ChrisCoons. pic.twitter.com/D2gNcLvQM3
— Jennifer Jacobs (@JenniferJJacobs) February 18, 2022
The conference where the elephant refuses to be in the room.#MSC2022 starts. pic.twitter.com/12US9ObD9l
— Hannah Neumann (@HNeumannMEP) February 18, 2022
Ukraine crisis takes centre stage at Munich Security Conference https://t.co/W04nhOGsyn pic.twitter.com/1UkR117tAo
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 18, 2022
… Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg will be among the dignitaries attending the three-day event, known as “Davos for defence”, which kicks off on Friday at the luxurious Bayerischer Hof hotel in Munich.
No Russian delegation will attend the conference, the Kremlin said last week – the first no-show in years, underscoring how much East-West relations have deteriorated.
Even at the height of the Ukrainian revolution preceding Russia’s annexation of Crimea, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov attended. Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said the forum had increasingly become biased towards the West, “losing its inclusivity, objectivity”…
Per DW.com:
The chairman of the conference, Wolfgang Ischinger, told reporters that he could not remember when there had otherwise been “so many overlapping crises” to discuss…Ischinger said on Friday he deeply regretted that Russian government representatives had rejected invitations to join the conference.
While admitting that attendance would have “limited enjoyment value” for them, Ischinger told German broadcaster ARD their absence meant Moscow had no chance to give its input on the Ukraine crisis.
“The chance of us actually arranging meaningful talks on the issue in Munich is, of course, much greater if an authorized Russian government representative with permission to speak were present,” he said.
He said “quite a number of Russians” had canceled because COVID restrictions in place at the conference required attendees to be vaccinated with vaccines approved in Germany. Russians are usually vaccinated with Russian-made vaccines that have not yet been authorized in the EU.
He did add, however, that there would be very experienced people from Russia attending the conference…
Spokesman Ned Price did not provide a time/place for the meeting, the diplomats' 2nd in 2 months, except to say it would not happen if Russia further invaded Ukraine. “If they do invade in the coming days, it will make clear they were never serious about diplomacy,” he said. 2/2
— Lara Jakes (@jakesNYT) February 18, 2022
You won't attend #MSC2022 in person? Good news: Follow most of the sessions live on social media and our website: https://t.co/rKeKK3YDJ8
Tune in? pic.twitter.com/4rF4hPl3hb
— Munich Security Conference (@MunSecConf) February 17, 2022
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
Go MVP!
Another Scott
Thanks for the pointer.
Cheers,
Scott.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
Funny how the news media’s use of passive language always seems to remove agency (and obligation) from the aggressor, leading to bullshit like this to go unchallenged…
Why is the west being so mean, so exclusive? It couldn’t have anything to do with Russia’s overt military hostility to a large neighbor who they have invaded recently?
Only
Dems“the West” can have agency, and therefore must be held accountable for anything and everything.topclimber
OT but anyone been following Vienna talks JCPOA about reviving Iranian nuclear deal? With fifth largest oil reserves in the world, letting them sell some of it would sure help.
OTOH, Russia might very well be less receptive to reviving the pact now that they and the Saudis are doing the OPEC+ squeeze.
Omnes Omnibus
Munich Conference during a crisis as an authoritarian country lines its troops up on the border of a nascent democracy? Where have I seen this before?
taumaturgo
Question. So, the invasion won’t happen during the elite’s bash?
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@taumaturgo: “the elite’s bash”
Sounds like a party!
Chief Oshkosh
@taumaturgo:
When do the Olympics end?
topclimber
@topclimber:
Just found this from the odd couple foreign affairs site supposedly founded by George Soros and one of the Koch brothers.
Despite GOP doing its usual sabotage, if this article is to be believed, an agreement may be only weeks away.
mrmoshpotato
@Formerly disgruntled in Oregon:
Oh mainstream media…
I mean, Rethuglicans…
Err I mean, Russkies.
Geminid
@topclimber: It’s looking like there will be a deal to revive the JCPOA. @Cheryl Rofer has been following this on her Twitter account. Among other media outlets, the Times of Israel also follows this matter and keeps it’s reporting current.
Another Scott
@Chief Oshkosh: The Olympics end on Sunday February 20 (closing ceremony starts 8 PM ET).
[eta:] Er, Google says NBC coverage at 8 PM ET. Olympics site says 8 PM China Standard Time (Beijing time). 8 PM in Beijing is 7 AM in EST.
Cheers,
Scott.
topclimber
@Geminid: Come back, Cheryl!
taumaturgo
@Chief Oshkosh: If the goalpost keeps moving the answer is never.
Steeplejack
@topclimber:
The jackaltariat did not meet her rigorous audience standards. You have only yourself to blame.
piratedan
@Formerly disgruntled in Oregon: same old gameplan that’s run in the US… media bleats about Democratic Party messaging, steadfastly refuses to post any Democratic messaging on their newscasts or provide invites to “serious” news panel discussions…
Damn near to the point of ridiculousness… we get to see plenty of GOP twisting of Dem messaging out of context on a daily basis, plenty of soapboxes for that, but the actual Dem messaging itself… well, who has time for that?
Baud
@Steeplejack:
Only Jackals have agency.
Spanky
Did I miss a mention of China in the post?
Baud
@Geminid:
?
zhena gogolia
@Steeplejack: what’s weird is she went to LGM, where as far as I can tell there is no meaningful commenter interaction, thanks to threaded comments.
Baud
@Formerly disgruntled in Oregon:
Are you Jeremy Corbyn?
Baud
@zhena gogolia:
I don’t like threaded comments but LGM seems to manage.
zhena gogolia
@Baud: I can’t follow them.
jonas
It’s okay. They didn’t invite Josh Hawley or Rand Paul along, so there won’t be nearly as much appeasement this time around.
Steeplejack
@Baud, @zhena gogolia:
I can sort of follow threaded comments, if I get in the groove, but then I give up when I realize that new comments are appearing both below and above where I am in the general comment flow. Hard to go back and see the newly added “previous” ones. And maddening.
SiubhanDuinne
@Chief Oshkosh:
Not a moment too soon, from what I hear.
zhena gogolia
I just subscribed to the Grauniad again. I hate their coverage of US politics, but I keep going there to read cultural articles.
zhena gogolia
@Steeplejack: Exactly.
Old School
So is this why Republicans weren’t around to vote for Ted Cruz’s defund the schools amendment? He wanted everyone to cancel their trip to Munich?
brendancalling
OT, but still foreign affairs: live coverage of arrests in Ottawa here. Cops really moving in now.
Patricia Kayden
@brendancalling: About bleeding time. Had the “protesters” been Indigenous, law enforcement would have moved in long ago. I hope an investigation is conducted to find out why an insurrection was allowed to occupy the capital for so dang long.
mrmoshpotato
@brendancalling: Enough of this bullshit, eh?
Jackie
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy is attending? In person or via ZOOM? Seems like a good time for Putin to attack Ukraine, if Zelensky is in Munich.
dimmsdale
WTF are Joni Ernst, Rob Portman, and Lindsey Graham doing there?? Gawd, ‘bipartisanship’ again?? I would expect nothing out of them but sabotage at this point.
Old School
different-church-lady
@taumaturgo: I thought the invasion happened Wednesday. I was busy working, so I thought I had just missed it.
Soprano2
@Old School: So with good behavior she’ll be out in what, two or three months?
oatler
Munich needs furniture, with resolutions being brought to the table. items being tabled and groups being chaired.
oatler
Munich needs furniture, with resolutions being brought to the table. items being tabled and groups being chaired.
Bruce K in ATH-GR
@different-church-lady: I think the gist is that was the original plan, but Biden and company blew up Vlad’s narrative.
SiubhanDuinne
@oatler:
Not to mention cabinet members and probably a stool pigeon.
Old School
@Soprano2: Looks like 16 months in prison and eight months on supervised release.
hueyplong
I expect nothing but sabotage from any GOPer there, unless it is token notcrazyperson Mitt Romney.
At least we’ve been spared RonJohn, who Putin himself probably wouldn’t trust to do anything competently if outside the context of a Senate hearing with his instructions in writing in front of him.
trollhattan
@Old School: 16 plus 8 for murder? Oh, months, not years. Checks out.
Justice, how the fuck does it work?
Roger Moore
@dimmsdale:
Putin needs some representatives; they’re just hired foreigners rather than anyone from the Russian government.
Baud
@trollhattan:
Murder or manslaughter?
mrmoshpotato
@brendancalling: Also, listen to Bitches, you Trump trash, truck trash (no offense to law-abiding truckers), fascist shitstains.
hueyplong
@Roger Moore: Especially L Graham. It’s fair to wonder where Trump got the dirt he has so famously used on Graham.
Rocks
Joni Ernst was there? I wasn’t aware that hog castration was an international security concern.
Baud
@dimmsdale:
Maybe the whole thing is a sting operation.
mrmoshpotato
Ukraine-Russia explainer from Senator Chris Murphy.
MattF
@Roger Moore: We shall see. I wouldn’t be surprised if some Rs will want to distance themselves from Putin in the very near future.
ETA: To be blunt, there may soon be a lot of casualties.
Another Scott
ObOpenThread – ICYMI, excellent thread on the recent AP story on the “toxic” Democratic brand…
Well worth a click.
AP’s political reporting, like much/most of the US press, has been bad for decades.
(via nycsouthpaw)
Cheers,
Scott.
Ksmiami
@taumaturgo: this weekend…
Kelly
@Old School: Judge believed she thought she was holding her taser. I read somewhere that the original taser design was similar to a flashlight. Didn’t sell well until changed to current pistol design. Flashlight design would prevent this mistake (or maybe “mistake”)
Leto
@Baud:
This part from the judge:
Mainly because:
hueyplong
@Leto: White woman defendant cried in court.
Further explanation ok but not really necessary.
Oh, and if the judge has to say that the value of the victim’s life isn’t being degraded, you can rest assured that it is.
Villago Delenda Est
So, failure to adhere to the Muscovite line is “not objective.” Well, isn’t that special!
Leto
@hueyplong:
Also agreed about the “if the judge has to explain.” I don’t know what to do about it other than keep pointing it out and trying to change it.
hueyplong
@Leto: oops. Possibly got my shoot-instead-of-tase defendants mixed up. Genders can vary. Complexion kind of doesn’t
Used to be the judges didn’t feel the need to offer explanations. So, maybe, progress?
Another Scott
ObOpenThread – AngryBlackLady on Biden’s chance for redemption in his SCOTUS pick – RewireNewsGroup.
A good read.
Cheers,
Scott.
Burnspbesq
@topclimber:
I still find it difficult to believe that anyone with more than two functioning brain cells would prefer Loomis to Cole.
sdhays
I saw something about this in my Apple News feed this morning, and the headline pissed me off. CNN’s headline?
I doubt any vice presidency has been characterized as “young” before Harris’, especially after a year in already. I wonder why the headline writer felt the need to add that word. I went looking for it later on CNN’s website, and “young” had been conspicuously removed.
Also, what the fuck did the previous vice president do in his four years in office? He did fuck all. I remember him stare over the border at North Korea to make it seem like his boss didn’t have a huge teenage crush on Kim Jong Un, and he was nominally in charge of the disastrous COVID “response”, but no one answered to him and he didn’t give any briefings, or really do anything.
It really irritates me how badly Harris gets treated in the most off-hand ways.
debbie
@Old School:
Right? The judge said she had no fear of recidivism. So what about punishment? ??♀️
debbie
@dimmsdale:
Vlad ordered them to stand in for him.
Burnspbesq
@Another Scott:
As she so often is, Imani is spectacularly wrong. It is beyond dispute that Biden’s failure to allow Wright to testify had absolutely no impact on the outcome of the Thomas confirmation.
I’d like her a lot better if she would stop making shit up.
topclimber
@Steeplejack: Was it that or Cole paying FPs less than minimum wage?
Old School
@topclimber: I don’t get the impression anyone at LGM is blogging for the spending money either.
catclub
The 27% rule: About the Canadian trucker protest.
topclimber
@mrmoshpotato: Good stuff, with one nitpick. Russia is the biggest European country. Its smaller European portion is about 6 times bigger than Ukraine.
Jackie
@sdhays: And, let’s not forget that very important nfl football game Trump tasked him to go to so he could leave the game in protest, after a few players took a knee during the NA.
Raoul Paste
@mrmoshpotato:
This was very informative. Thanks
catclub
@topclimber: is this like saying that Wyoming is a much bigger state than Connecticut? I would guess Germany might be the largest European state by population.
hueyplong
@catclub: Likely true unless COVID did something there last night that should have made the news.
zhena gogolia
@mrmoshpotato: Excellent.
zhena gogolia
@Burnspbesq: The moment somebody says Biden needs to redeem himself, I stop listening.
zhena gogolia
@catclub: Territory size is important in this situation.
Gravenstone
@hueyplong: I did Lindsey the “courtesy” of checking his committee assignments. He does not at present sit on any relevant Senate committees that might relate to defense or foreign relations (Budget is as close as it gets). So yeah, WTF Linds?
satby
@Steeplejack: I hope you’re joking, because that’s not true.
Gravenstone
@Kelly: Cross draw and repeated training are supposed to address those “mistakes” too. They still apply lethal force when they claim they meant to use less than lethal far too often.
Baud
hueyplong
@Baud: I don’t know anything about Canadian law but I absolutely love the concept of what they’re doing.
Baud
A short clip for OzarkHillbilly.
Roger Moore
@catclub:
You would guess wrong. The majority of Russia’s population is in Europe, which makes European Russia (~110 M people) substantially larger than Germany (~83 M people) in population.
hueyplong
@Baud: The comments are pretty good.
“Never have I less needed a warning to not do something.
Two words: Floyd Collins
SiubhanDuinne
@Another Scott:
I see this frequently in your comments. At first I thought it was simply a typo, but it’s consistent enough that I’ve concluded it’s deliberate and means something — but I have no idea what!
Not being critical in the least, just very curious, and a little annoyed that I can’t figure it out. What does the “Ob” mean, please?
stinger
@Burnspbesq: Thought I read somewhere that LGM pays???
ETA: NM, I see others have discussed this above.
Yarrow
@zhena gogolia: No kidding. What even is that bullshit.
debbie
@hueyplong:
Just the thought of watching is too much.
Another Scott
@SiubhanDuinne: Ob = Obligatory
One of those internetisms I picked up somewhere along the way.
Not quite as bad as WFYITBFWLJ*
HTH!
Cheers,
Scott.
* – Waiting For You In The Bathtub Filled With Lime Jello (or something like that)
Origuy
@SiubhanDuinne: “Ob” is short for “Obligatory” It goes back to the early days of the Internet. Used to indicate that the poster was making a side remark diverting from the current topic. E.g., ObMontyPython, “I’m not dead yet!”
Jinchi
Other than this article (and all the others citing it), I only find one other result for the phrase “young vice presidency”
So it’s weird and unusual, but not exclusive to Harris.
Roger Moore
@Burnspbesq:
It’s also not at all clear that stopping Thomas’s confirmation would have resulted in a better outcome. It’s not like GHWB was going to nominate someone massively better had Thomas been rejected. Had the hearings shown a clear sense that the Senate thought he should be rejected for his ideology, GHWB might have felt compelled to nominate someone more moderate. But if he was rejected at least nominally because of his personal behavior, the next nominee probably would have been ideologically similar.
SiubhanDuinne
@Origuy:
Ah! Got it, thanks so much!
SiubhanDuinne
@Another Scott:
Many thanks! The only “Ob” I’m conversant with is “Obstetrician,” and I never could get past that in trying to suss out your meaning :-)
Another Scott
@Origuy: Excellent. I knew there was a relevant piece I’d forgotten to include.
Cheers,
Scott.
sdhays
@Jinchi: Based on the timestamp, that was less than 3 months into Dense’s term. I’d be less sensitive about that kind of timeline. But we’re now over a quarter into Harris’ term, so that’s quite different.
Clearly someone at CNN thought so too since they edited the headline.
Jinchi
I disagree, it’s important to draw red lines in these situations. Otherwise we’d have had Robert Bork instead of Anthony Kennedy on the bench.
After losing the nomination, Bork proved himself to be more extreme in his beliefs than any justice appointed to the court since, although Thomas is a close second.
Martin
@Baud: I offer a rebuttal in the form of a long video.
Roger Moore
@Jinchi:
As I said, had Thomas been rejected because of his ideology, Bush probably would have felt compelled to appoint someone more moderate. But that wasn’t what was happening. The hearings for Thomas focused on his personal behavior. Had he been rejected, it would have been perceived as being about his personal behavior, not his ideology, so Bush wouldn’t have felt compelled to appoint someone more moderate. It’s possible that the replacement would have been more moderate- Bush did appoint Souter, after all- but it certainly wouldn’t have been guaranteed.
I feel like the same thing is true with Kavanaugh. It would have been great to have defeated his nomination, but it still would have been
Trumpthe Federalist Society picking the next nominee. That’s why McConnell’s blocking of Garland’s nomination was such a big deal. It wasn’t just defeating a specific nominee; it was letting a different president make the nomination.Citizen Alan
@Roger Moore:
IIRC, the one possible (albeit remote) way that blocking Thomas would have worked would have been if it pushed the nomination into the 1992 election season. Poppy might have been reluctant to nominate another firebreathing Nazi if the confirmation hearings would have extended into that Spring. He might have even picked another Souter! Probably not, but it’s a thought.
It’s still a heart-wrenching tragedy that Thurgood Marshall looked at Poppy’s approval numbers in 1991 and thought there was on sense hanging on for longer. History would have changed if Bill Clinton’s first act was to replace Marshall.
Another Scott
@mrmoshpotato: Thanks for the pointer.
Cheers,
Scott.