President Biden is scheduled to provide an update on Russia and Ukraine this morning at 9:45 Eastern time.
Pure speculation on my part: Since the description used at the video link is so vague – “an Update on Russia and Ukraine”– I am hoping that this is more than what is being reported on in the press, which is another weapon package going to Ukraine.
I thought something was probably up when President Biden met with the Secretary of Defense, the Deputy Secretary of Defense, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Combatant Commanders on Tuesday, in a very public fashion.
There’s no doubt that we will be providing Ukraine with more of the same kinds of weapons, but it’s my hope that they have figured out a way to include some new kinds of weapons – that we can send without going over the (publicly undefined) line the U.S. is determined not to cross. And with good reason.
Almost every day I say out loud in my head “we have to find a way to do more”. It’s my hope that the clever people in this administration have come up with a way to do just that.
Open thread.
SiubhanDuinne
Yup.
Searcher
Whenever my employer posts “An Update on X” it means X is getting canceled.
eversor
The line isn’t really a line though. Offensive vs defensive weapons is mostly in their use and ability for force projection. It’s bullshit. Like what is or is not an assault rifle, semantics at best. Hell we define nukes as defensive weapons “aint nobody going to nuke us if we can blow up the world, defending!”.
I’d wager some shit is about to go down.
In other news Rod Dreher is getting divorced after a decade of marital problems. His wife is the one gunning for it so I’d also wager that exorcist wasn’t really an exorcist if you know what I mean!
Elizabelle
Is the video link working for you guys? I get an error message.
Another source??
SiubhanDuinne
@Elizabelle:
It’s working for me. I’m just getting the normal WH “We will begin shortly” message.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Searcher: Might be to preempt this
I guess that would be for Putin’s Mayday Parade.
debbie
NPR is so stupid. They’re presenting sealing off Mariupol as a new strategy rather than Putin’s decision to be even crueler than he already is. ?
WaterGirl
@Elizabelle: Is it working for you now?
wetzel
I would have liked to see a little emphasis or mention of the war crimes investigations. Still it was a good job. Biden is doing a good job.
It’s amazing what a knife edge of barely escaping world catastrophe the 2020 election turned out to be assuming Trump 2020 victory was part of Putin’s plans for this war. I am convinced FSB had us fighting a fake war with Russia this year under Trump as the path to becoming fascist ourselves.
I seem to have absorbed a dark view of things. I’m seeing scientific totalitarianism in the fact that everything on the radio is click-tracked. If you did that to Zeppelin it would not sound the same.
Don’t click-track this tune, my friend
Elizabelle
@WaterGirl: No. I can just catch it later. Thanks, though. Can’t reboot my laptop, but will, a bit later.
Omnes Omnibus
No, it was a lot of hard work from people throughout the country. We have to remember that because we need to do it again in November.
ETA: I see what I cited got edited out. My point stands. We did it in 2020, not some outside force. We can do it again this fall.
zhena gogolia
@wetzel: I am absolutely sure that Trump was part of the plan.
Ken
In a “the incompetent fool won’t be able to organize a Western response” sense, or a “he’s already agreed to supply Russian forces with weapons in exchange for a hotel contract in Moscow” sense?
zhena gogolia
@Ken: Both.
Elizabelle
@WaterGirl: Rebooted, and now get the “next up” screen.
Do alert us when speech starts. Thanks.
The Moar You Know
@wetzel: As a working musician I can tell you the reason it gets used on most everything is that it’s damn convenient, keeps the energy up, and makes work in different locations and with different musicians possible.
The Who used one consistently from Who’s Next onward and nobody bitches about them sounding like robots.
Omnes Omnibus
@The Moar You Know: Isn’t it just a high tech metronome?
RaflW
@eversor: “Rod Dreher is getting divorced.” Well, he’ll be even freer to move to Hungary and crawl up Orban’s ass.
RaflW
@Elizabelle: Click play and then drag the progress bar to about 30 mins. He apologizes for being late, that’s why the video is so long – lots of blue screen that didn’t get edited out when the speech was posted after completion.
The Moar You Know
@Omnes Omnibus: not even high tech. Just an electronic metronome.
Omnes Omnibus
@The Moar You Know: An electronic metronome seems high tech to me. Mine was mechanical.
Uncle Cosmo
I wonder if this isn’t part and parcel of a Ptui!n strategy that includes slow-walking the reduction of Mariupol. I would not be at all surprised if in both cities the Orcs have prepared defensive positions against the enemy outside, and hope to provoke the Ukrainian Army into launching relief attacks to parlay the defense’s traditional 3-to-1 advantage into a major victory.
Frankly, if they faced an opponent known throughout history as brave, gallant, impetuous, and overimpressed with its own martial prowess, it might just work. But by all evidence, the Ukrainians are accustomed to stepping back and looking a few moves down the road before they saddle up. Which puts the Orcs in the position of the masochist who begs the sadist to beat and whip and torture them – and the sadist replies, Nyet.
Elizabelle
@RaflW: Thank you. Will try that. Was it a good speech??
Tony Jay
@eversor:
His wife was okay with the thrice daily flagellations, and she was even willing to overlook the hours of “Nope 2 the Pope, Hope 4 the Rope” chants emanating from his private study at all hours of the night, but she finally had to draw the line when she found an invoice for 100 anatomically correct Vladimir Putin ‘playdolls’ and a crate of camouflaged cargo pants stuffed in the bin.
Let’s hope she gets the kids out of there too.
Another Scott
@Uncle Cosmo:
DW.com – Live Updates:
He lies about everything, of course, but it’s interesting to see that the steel plant continues to hold out and his bluster hasn’t enabled him to take it.
Cheers,
Scott.
Nettoyeur
@eversor: Talibangical family values
wetzel
@The Moar You Know: Nowadays in production there is audio plasticity so that everything can be mapped and molded temporally. It’s really great, honestly for the reasons @Omnes Omnibus points to and others. It’s saving a lot of bands their drummers. It used to be that when a garage band would go into the studio to make their first album, it was the drummer who’d have to get replaced by a studio guy. You’re not playing to a click-track. The click-track puts you into time afterwards.
It gives all the tracks in a musical production a common meter so tracks can be mixed, matched, edited blah blah. It’s all really great. Autotune too. Even singers with perfect pitch get autotuned now because it doesn’t sound right.
My feeling is that there are blue rhythms and notes which are existential in music’s pure extemporaneous nature as a form of expression and there are a few bands who’s music would suffer because they’re better than a click-track. That’s all I’m saying.
I just mentioned it because it’s a ridiculous thought, indicative that I’m thinking too much about Putinism, that I’d see it in the click-track we’re putting music into. There’s no money for production to do all those takes is the reason. There’s no money for a session drummer or back-up singers. Not with streaming.
sab
Weird. Husband just came back from weekly coffee klatch, and the one friend with actual Ukrainian in-laws thinks the Ukrainians need to settle with Putin and Russia to stop the bloodshed. I don’t know why he thinks it is even possible
ETA Unlike Gin & Tonic, I don’t think they actually know anyone in Ukraine. They lost all ties except language back when they emigrated a couple of generations back.
jonas
Not going to look for it now, but dollars to donuts there’s a tweet of his somewhere where he makes the case that divorce should carry the death penalty or something, preferably by stoning.
jonas
@debbie:
Well, it kind of is a new strategy — if you don’t actually have the ability to take it by force, you sit back and starve them out.
The fact that Putin has to resort to this tells us something about the state of his forces, I think.
KSinMA
Biden’s very public meeting with his military leaders seems at least partly to show that he can, unlike Putin. They even ate dinner together—not afraid of poisoning!
dr. luba
@sab: People with real/recent ties to Ukraine understand what is at risk. Genocide. The destruction of Ukraine as a nation and Ukrainians themselves, those who are seen as intelligentsia or leaders or even nationalists or patriots.
My father’s family is from the Poltava region, which suffered the brunt of Stalinist policies. His father was shot as a kulak, his family barely survived the Holodomor.
They’re not interested in an encore.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Uncle Cosmo: Supposedly the Orcs are being used to force the Russian soldiers into combat.
That Steel Mill is like something out of Warhammer 40K. A literal military industrial complex. That’s why the Russians aren’t attacking. Since it was made to withstand a nuclear attack it’s quite possible the defenders can hold out as long as they have food and water.
NotMax
@jonas
Furiously drawing up plans for constructing a Trojan bear?
//
WaterGirl
Just putting in a plug for our current Balloon Juice Angel match for Michigan.
There’s still $215 to be matched, matching in increments up to $50. Once we get the $215 in the comments, Angel #5 can add his $1,000, which will get us in the neighborhood of $18,500.
Promote the Vote Michigan 2022
At $20,000 we can fund a 4th fellowship!
Barbara
@WaterGirl: Done for $215.
WaterGirl
@Barbara: Wow, thank you!
eversor
@jonas:
Rod has been banging the no fault divorce caused gay marriage drum for a long time now. Given how he works odds are his wife actually did bang someone else and he’s freaking out, fucking exorcists man. One second they are solving a Latino Demonic issue the next second their cock is in your wife!
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@eversor: So, Dreher was seriously arguing gays were getting married to ruin the institution of divorce.
eversor
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
The argument is no fault divorce lead to gay marriage which destroyed all marriage
scav
@eversor: Having a no-fault divorce turns one gay?! Or is it just direct no-fault divorce to gay married status with no gay dating stage of wild abandon?
Baud
Not the worst bet.
trollhattan
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Guessing they would prefer to leave it enough intact to reuse it, “Now to be making correct Russian steel!”
It’s by far the the largest mill in Ukraine, located handily at a port. Italy is the largest customer and they must be scrambling figuring how to replace that source, especially if it’s specialty steel.
Baud
@eversor:
The Obamas, Bidens, and even the Clintons are still going strong. Maybe right wing marriages are more fragile.
trollhattan
@eversor: That’s just…weird. “Divorce should be rare and painful!” One way to keep a marriage “intact” I suppose.
scav
Honestly, conservative heterosexual sex must be unbelievably horrifically bad if only the chains of unalterable lifetime marriage with no public mention of any possible sexual alternative can keep the practice alive.
Baud
@trollhattan:
Not a new concept in conservative circles.
debbie
@dr. luba:
I don’t think there’s any way to leave Putin alive, frankly. He’ll just do this all over again.
eversor
@scav:
Traditional Christian metaphysics teachs that the gender binary and heterosexuality and it’s roles along with marriage under pin the universe. If you tamper with it you will cause the end of everything. Rod’s not wrong that this is the TRUE CHRISTIAN view of everything and the single most important thing to worry about and police.
The issue is that Christianity is bunk.
The Moar You Know
@Baud: We have a problem with Germany. They are flat-out not even trying. Say they’ll stop buying Russian energy at the end of the year, that’s December 2022. That’s not helping. That’s not even pretending to help.
sab
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Well, I don’t know many gay men getting divorced.
Baud
@eversor:
This makes me want to be gay.
trollhattan
@Baud:
I remain flabbergasted Gingrich sister-wife #3 was our ambassador to the Vatican. They must have chucked about a hundred church rules to accept that posting.
scav
@eversor: There also does seem to be that problematic was-there-no-stable-universe stage between the creation and and the arrival of Christ because there couldn’t really be any truly universe-underpinning Christian marriage before him now, could there? They’re certainly willing to throw all the people living before Christ into the unsaved category, so toss the universe there too I guess. They don’t really seem to bother to think this all through some days.
trollhattan
Speaking of the pro-bidnez party.
Baud
@trollhattan:
Conservatives let conservatives get away with anything.
dr. luba
@debbie: My point was that Ukrainians went through this in the 1920s-30s (repressions, collectivization and Holodomor) with a small reprise in the 60s (another political repression). They don’t want to do it all again in the 2020s-30s.
But, yes, Putin has to go.
cain
@eversor:
My problem (and my wife’s problem) is that thanks to colonification – they’ve spread that shit all over the place. Hinduism actually was socially very liberal and in fact transgender were considered godly.
Guess which country came in and fucked that all up after being around a few generations. I
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hinduism_and_LGBT_topics
Modern Indian conservatives want to turn Hinduism like Christianity because it helps build power. A socially liberal religion doesn’t help drive hate. Luckliy they at least have the fucking caste system for that. I’d like to know which asshole came up with that.
eversor
@cain:
Blame the brits for the caste system being entreched as badly as it is as well I guess. Been to India many times, Hyderbad mostly. Always had a blast and loved the people and the food.
cain
@eversor: oh for sure – The brits have been using ‘divide and conquer” to keep all their colonies in check by using racist systems like the caste system to keep everone at each others throats.
It’s why the world is kind of fucked up with genocides and what not.
Reverse tool order
@WaterGirl:
Re Michigan fund, I put in $50.
Ksmiami
@RaflW: the guy just screams angry closet case…
Ksmiami
@The Moar You Know: tell Germany we will terminate their rights to do business in the US… that will get their attention
WaterGirl
@Reverse tool order: Thank you!
cain
@Ksmiami: Germany’s problem is natural gas – perhaps we can find ways to help shore their energy needs.
debbie
@dr. luba:
I was agreeing with you. Sorry it wasn’t clearer.
wetzel
@WaterGirl: One day soon our ship is going to come in over here, and I can be moneybags for candidates. The ship will need to be wheel-chair accessible!
wetzel
@trollhattan:
‘Divorce is supposed to be rare and painful’
I guess that’s just honesty in the Dreher marriage! I guess you gotta know when to hold em, know when to fold em, know when to walk away, and know when to run! Never count your money while you’re sitting at the table. Ther’ll be time enough for counting when the dealing’s done!! That’s the secret to a happy marriage!!!
wetzel
@eversor: Traditional Christian metaphysics teachs that the gender binary and heterosexuality and it’s roles along with marriage under pin the universe.
You really ought to justify a claim like that. I’m a Methodist, which is a long-standing Protestant denomination. I’ve never been taught what you are saying, not that I can recall. I’ve never heard anything like that in Methodist theology or teaching. Jesus was born out of wedlock.
The concept of the Trinity is a difference in Islamic and Christian metaphysics, for example, and so there are metaphysical aspects of the divine set aside, and so people say Father, Son and Holy Ghost. All religions have nuptials, just like there are burial rituals, so there isn’t anything particular in Christianity to have auspices of marriage, because marriage, religion and burial are always together in every human society, so there’s nothing particularly ‘gender binary’ about Christian metaphysics.
There isn’t any Christian metaphysics anyway. Among philosophically minded Christians there are existentialists like me and there are Hegelians. Catholic theology has its own concrete eschatology in the central role of the Priest to mediate. That is different, metaphysically, than what a Methodist might think, which is that a tree is all you need for a church. A lot of Christians have a kind of folk religion they are very defensive about where everything attaches to it as a ‘traditional way of life’.
My thoughts. Don’t know if any of this means anything, really. Though Christian metaphysics has meant a lot of different things over the last two thousand years, I don’t think it has ever had the structure you are saying in it’s sense of being at hand in peoples’ religious experience. A great deal of Christendom and Islam’s very strict sexual morality goes back to the Sumerians and Babylonians anyway. I think it just got carried along, but what do I know?
WaterGirl
@wetzel: We will all be happy for you when your ship comes in.
Andrya
@wetzel: I totally agree. I’m Catholic, of the liberal “cafeteria Catholic” variety (as are most American Catholics, including President Biden). Rigid gender roles is not a feature of Catholic teaching- if it were, it would be hard to explain the canonization of Joan of Arc (female teenager, peasant birth, brilliant general, wore male clothes, interacted with male authority figures as one of them).
Yes, official Catholic teaching says “no same sex sexual relationships” but the vast majority of American Catholics ignore this, as they do the ban on contraception.
Xenos
@RaflW: Dreher is Orthodox and not spending Easter with his family. That is just extraordinary.
wetzel
@WaterGirl: My ship already has come in. I have a family and a good little business. I’d like to get them somewhere with crown molding and giant oak doors like the magazines on the water. I will feel like the prospects of my youth were not false advertising. But then maybe that is a cage of golden bars! I am glad to be my own boss even though I don’t pay very well or reliably.