Look who’s here!
NASAMS and Aspide air defence systems arrived in Ukraine!
These weapons will significantly strengthen #UAarmy and will make our skies safer.
We will continue to shoot down the enemy targets attacking us.
Thank you to our partners: Norway, Spain and the US. pic.twitter.com/ozP4eXhgOg— Oleksii Reznikov (@oleksiireznikov) November 7, 2022
Last night in a comment, Aussie Sheila asked:
Adam, this is slightly OT, but I am increasingly enraged by Briahna Joy Gray and the grey zone fanboys re their genocide denying excuses for opposing US support for Ukraine. I value your updates here on the actual battle for liberation, but I would be interested in your take on these arseholes.
It is too facile imo to attribute it to Russian money/support, and in any case, such accusations are not useful. However, if you or anyone else has some views on this truly awful phenom, I would interested to read it.
I saw Gray’s antics the other night. I’ve been tracking the Greyzone chucklefucks for a while. Same with Greenwald, Chomsky, Mearsheimer, etc. There are a couple of dynamics going on here and none of it has anything to do with money. Chomsky, the Greyzoners, Gray, even Greenwald have gone all in on the US can never do anything right, especially when the Democrats hold the presidency, and no one else – state or non-state actor – has any real agency so everything is the US’s fault. This has been Chomsky’s schtick for decades. Greenwald is a bit different. I think it’s a combination of the US is always bad/the only actor with agency plus a willingness to stake out whatever position will get him the most attention plus he’s angry that people simply refuse to bask in his genius plus, in the case of anything to do with Russia, if he admits that he got played by Snowden and the Russian intelligence services, then he no longer looks like a ground breaking journalist and commenter who is really the only person who will speak truth to power. Rather he looks like naive and gullible. And I think that last one is too much for his ego. Gray is just a chaotic evil manic pixie. The grayzoners all want to be Greenwald or Chomsky. Mearsheimer is a bit different. He’s so far up his own pet theory’s – realism – grommet he can’t see anything other than his pet theory. There’s a larger critique of international relations theories, which is they’re normative not empirical, so using them to actually describe the world as it is versus the world as we’d like it to be is epistemologically unsound, but I’m just going to leave it with that brief statement on it. As for Kissinger, he’s Kissinger…
Here is President Zelenskyy’s address from earlier this evening. Video below, English transcript after the jump:
Good health to you, fellow Ukrainians!
I’ve just spoken with Benjamin Netanyahu, the leader of the bloc that won the elections in Israel. I congratulated him on victory. We discussed the main aspects of relations between our states.
I think it is clear to everyone what Ukraine emphasizes and what security emphasis Israel makes. I believe that we can significantly strengthen our states, especially since the threats to us are related.
Today, the occupiers struck more than 50 settlements in our country. Donbas, Zaporizhzhia, Kherson region, Mykolaiv region, Kharkiv region, Dnipropetrovsk region… Missiles, aviation, MLRS.
We respond everywhere. We have the necessary results – another Russian aircraft was shot down.
We also received new systems that significantly strengthen our air defense. The protection of the Ukrainian sky is, of course, not one hundred percent, but we are gradually moving towards our goal.
As of today, we can say that the recent escalation of Russian missile and drone terror has only resulted in the world responding – responding with new aid to Ukraine. We will do everything so that as many countries as possible join this aid.
In general, along the front, our forces are in a state of active defense – in some parts of the east and south, we are gradually pushing back the enemy. We are gradually moving forward.
The Donetsk region remains the epicenter of the greatest madness of the occupiers – they die by the hundreds every day. The ground in front of the Ukrainian positions is literally littered with the bodies of the occupiers…
And some of the Russian military started to think about what was happening. They “complained” to the governor of their region – Primorsky Krai – about colossal losses. And this governor, comrade Kozhemyako, predictably lied in response: he says that the losses are “far from being such”.
Not such… And what kind are they?
From Vladivostok to Pavlovka, Donetsk region, it is more than 9 thousand kilometers. But he is sure that the losses “are not such.” The governor, probably, can better see from there how many soldiers from his region are sent for slaughter and in what way. Or he was simply ordered to lie. Ordered from Moscow.
This is how the order to lie about Russian losses crosses thousands of kilometers. And even the bodies of most of those killed will not be brought back to some Vladivostok. But I am sure that Governor Kozhemyako will come out and explain why not everyone arrived, not everyone from those “not such” returned.
You can avoid this not by complaining to some wimps, but by your own opinion. And not in Telegram, but in public. Not by a complaint, but by a fierce protest. Not somewhere under the blanket, but on the streets. Against those in Moscow.
Or by surrendering to Ukrainian captivity. This is how you can survive as well.
Decision regarding some Ukrainian enterprises was announced today. This decision was dictated by military necessity and was agreed upon at the Staff of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief. Five strategic enterprises were forcibly alienated for wartime needs – Motor Sich, KrAZ, Ukrnafta, Ukrtatnafta and Zaporizhtransformator.
Some of them hardly worked. Now all of them will work. For defense. This is the repair and production of equipment, provision of the defense forces, and restoration of our infrastructure. A complex task that can be accomplished only through the system of military-state management.
I do not rule out other similar decisions either.
I delivered an important international address today. Climate summit in Egypt. A very significant event, a very representative gathering. Dozens of state leaders and heads of government.
The main thing for us is to inform the world about the ongoing Russian aggression, about the destabilizing influence that Russia exerts. When the world is focused on combating war, energy and food crises, the destruction of customary international relations, the climate agenda is clearly suffering. And the destruction of the climate cannot somehow be put on hold…
Therefore, anyone who is serious about the climate agenda should also be serious about the need to immediately stop Russian aggression, restore our territorial integrity, and force Russia into genuine peace negotiations.
Into such negotiations, which we have repeatedly proposed, and to which we always received insane Russian responses with new terrorist attacks, shelling or blackmail.
Once again – restoration of territorial integrity, respect for the UN Charter, compensation for all damages caused by the war, punishment of every war criminal and guarantees that this will not happen again. These are completely understandable conditions.
Today I signed the decree on awarding our heroes. 396 Ukrainian servicemen were honored with state awards.
Thank you to everyone who fights for Ukraine!
Thank you to everyone who works for our victory!
Thank you to all our partners who help us defend freedom!
Glory to Ukraine!
First, I realize President Zelenskyy is being diplomatic and running the necessary traps, but given Bibi’s ties to Putin, let alone the extremists in Bibi’s coalition who are all even farther right than Bibi ties to Putin, expecting anything from Israel would be delusional.
Second, this:
Therefore, anyone who is serious about the climate agenda should also be serious about the need to immediately stop Russian aggression, restore our territorial integrity, and force Russia into genuine peace negotiations.
Into such negotiations, which we have repeatedly proposed, and to which we always received insane Russian responses with new terrorist attacks, shelling or blackmail.
Once again – restoration of territorial integrity, respect for the UN Charter, compensation for all damages caused by the war, punishment of every war criminal and guarantees that this will not happen again. These are completely understandable conditions.
is pushback against the recent reporting that the US is leaning on Ukraine to make diplomatic gestures regarding negotiating a settlement of the war with the Russians.
Here is former NAVDEVGRU Squadron Leader Chuck Pfarrer’s most recent assessments of the situations in Kherson and :
KHERSON AXIS/1800 UTC 7 NOV/ RU troops continue the abduction of UKR civilians, torturing dozens in an attempt to identify Partisans. RU engineers construct defense positions on the S bank of the Dnipro near Hola Prystan. UKR air defenses down a RU Su-25 in Kherson battle-space. pic.twitter.com/q0VPXps2vG
— Chuck Pfarrer | Indications & Warnings | (@ChuckPfarrer) November 7, 2022
KHERSON CITY/ 7 NOV/ Dressed in civilian clothes, RU troops continue to construct urban strongpoints and fighting positions in the city. Mass searches and arrests continue as RU troops attempt to identify Partisans in the urban area. pic.twitter.com/1YYDR85Y6m
— Chuck Pfarrer | Indications & Warnings | (@ChuckPfarrer) November 7, 2022
Ukraine’s military intel: Russia has spent 80% of its Iskander stockpile, it now has nearly 120 missiles left.
— Illia Ponomarenko 🇺🇦 (@IAPonomarenko) November 7, 2022
Things are not going well for the Russians in Pavlivka
Reportedly Pavlivka, just 25 kilometers from my hometown in Donbas.
Z-tanks are in trouble.
(Sorry for the background music!) pic.twitter.com/TKdKyGMHBv— Illia Ponomarenko 🇺🇦 (@IAPonomarenko) November 7, 2022
If I recall correctly, Carlo was asking about the Russian salient in Makivkaa. The Guardian has answers:
Hours after Aleksei Agafonov arrived in the Luhansk region on 1 November as part of a battalion of new conscripts, his unit were handed shovels and ordered to dig trenches throughout the night.
Their digging, which they took turns to do because of the lack of available shovels, was abruptly interrupted in the early hours of the next day as Ukrainian artillery lit up the sky and shells started raining down on Agafonov and his unit.
“A Ukrainian drone first flew over us, and after that their artillery started to pound us for hours and hours, nonstop,” Agafonov, who survived the shelling, told the Guardian in a phone interview on Monday.
“I saw men being ripped apart in front of me, most of our unit is gone, destroyed. It was hell,” he said, adding that his unit’s commanders abandoned them just before the shelling started.
Agafonov was called up on 16 October alongside 570 other conscripts in Voronezh, a city in the south-west of Russia, as part of Vladimir Putin’s nationwide mobilisation push that has seen more than 300,000 men drafted to go and fight in a war that the Kremlin calls its “special military operation”.
After the attacks stopped, Agafonov, with roughly a dozen other soldiers, retreated from the forest outside the Luhansk town of Makiivka to the nearby Russian-controlled city of Svatove. In Svatove, Agafonov and his group moved into a deserted building, trying to contact other mobilised soldiers who had been with him that night.
According to Agafonov’s estimates, only 130 draftees out of the 570 survived the Ukrainian attack, which would make it the deadliest known incident involving conscripts since the start of the mobilisation drive at the end of September.
“And many who survived are losing their minds after what happened. No one wants to go back,” Agafonov said.
The incident points to Russia’s willingness to throw hundreds of ill-prepared conscripts on to the frontline in Ukraine’s east, where some of the heaviest fighting has been taking place, in an effort to stem Kyiv’s advances.
There is growing anger in Russia as more coffins return from Ukraine, bringing home the remains of conscripts.
Some of the details surrounding last week’s shelling could not be independently verified. But the Guardian spoke to a second soldier, as well as two family members of surviving soldiers, who gave similar accounts.
“We were completely exposed, we had no idea what to do. Hundreds of us died,” said the second soldier, who asked to remain anonymous. “Two weeks of training doesn’t prepare you for this,” he said, referring to the limited military training conscripts received prior to being sent to Ukraine.
The Russian investigative outlet Verstka, which first reported on the incident on Saturday, cited the account of a third soldier, Nikolai Voronin, who similarly described coming under Ukrainian fire in the early hours of 2 November.
“There were lots of dead, they were lying everywhere … Their arms and legs were torn off,” Voronin told Verstka. “The shovels we used to dig our trenches were now being used to dig out the dead.”
Much, much more at the link.
Also, for you railway enthusiasts (cough, Carlo, cough…), Russian Pravda reports that Ukraine has destroyed the Donetsk railway traffic control center.
The traffic control centre located in the building of the administration of Donetsk railways was completely destroyed as the Ukrainian forces shelled Donetsk on November 7 overnight.
“The control centre was completely destroyed, it was located on the fourth floor of the building,” the chief of the Donbass Railways Vladimir Kabatsy said, Rossiya 24 TV channel said.
Earlier it was reported that the railway administration building caught fire after the Armed Forces of Ukraine launched NATO 155-millimeter shells in an artillery attack on Donetsk.
There is no more at that link.
When worlds collide…
I will not be surprise if some galaxy brain really comes up with such a headline https://t.co/vvG0tcDjIo
— Illia Ponomarenko 🇺🇦 (@IAPonomarenko) November 7, 2022
Attention DougJ:
A lot more than social security, medicare, and the full faith and credit of the US is at stake tomorrow.
In Ukraine, we’re not afraid of cruise missiles.
We’re not afraid of Iranian Shahed flying bombs.
We’re not scared by Putin’s nuclear bomb threats.
The only thing we’re scared of, is that you, the civilized world, stops supporting us.
Please, don’t make us scared.
— Euan MacDonald (@Euan_MacDonald) November 7, 2022
If you haven’t voted vote! And if not voting describes you, then you’ll definitely need this.
Prigozhin continues his coming out tour as he sets the conditions to either take over when Putin falls or to challenge a weakened Putin.
Kremlin-connected entrepreneur Yevgeny Prigozhin admitted Monday that he had interfered in U.S. elections and would continue to do so — confirming for the first time the accusations that he has rejected for years.
“Gentlemen, we have interfered, are interfering and will interfere. Carefully, precisely, surgically and in our own way, as we know how to do,” Prigozhin boasted in remarks posted on social media.
The statement, from the press service of his catering company that earned him the nickname “Putin’s chef,” came on the eve of the U.S. midterm elections.
It was the second major admission in recent months by the 61-year-old businessman, who has ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin. Prigozhin has previously sought to keep his activities under the radar and now appears increasingly interested in gaining political clout — although his goal in doing so was not immediately clear.
If you’re so inclined, you know what to do!
My friends by the the link are fundraising to buy raincoats for Ukrainian fighters.
Pleas me donate if you wish to help them win the war!https://t.co/Eke1hKAopR— Illia Ponomarenko 🇺🇦 (@IAPonomarenko) November 7, 2022
That’s enough for tonight.
Your daily Patron!
I believe in the power of social media. I need help @StephenAtHome, Stephen Colbert. I want to ask him and @colbertlateshow to take a few shots for me.I know it is like, "what does this dog think about himself?!" But I thought: what if I’ll just ask here? (paws crossed 🥺) pic.twitter.com/W7yvB3IdHI
— Patron (@PatronDsns) November 7, 2022
And a new video from Patron’s official TikTok!
https://www.tiktok.com/@patron__dsns/video/7163221525615611141?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc&web_id=7163061226580084270
The caption machine translates as:
Whoosh! Meet! Announcement of my comic, which will be released very soon! In the meantime, write in the comments what you think of this wonderful story😌 #PatrontheDog
Hopefully G&T or one of our other Ukrainian speakers and readers will be along to translate the speech and thought bubbles in the animation.
Open thread!
Alison Rose
This guy! I love him. And yeah, I had also raised an eyebrow at his comments on Netanyahu, but figured it’s not like he can either ignore the situation or be like “Oh Christ, it’s this asshole again” or something.
Adam, if you or someone else here has a take on this thing regarding the five companies, I’d be interested to hear. I read this piece at the Kyiv Independent but since I know very little about all the background, I don’t know if this is really no biggie like Reznikov says or if it’s more troubling as others seem to think. I mean, I kinda feel like fuck the oligarchs, but that’s a simplistic reaction.
Thank you as always, Adam.
Sebastian
Thank you for the update, Adam.
The railway administration building burned for a long time with flames being twice as high as the building itself. What could they possibly have stored there to burn so intensely and long?
lashonharangue
For those who are interested this thread from Tom Nichols explains the problem.
https://twitter.com/RadioFreeTom/status/1589382884997369858
Thanks for all your efforts Adam
Roger Moore
Greenwald is clearly deeply compromised on anything related to Russia. I don’t know if that’s just that he’s mentally compromised and incapable of accepting he was played by Russian intelligence in the Snowden affair, or if he’s actually been compromised by Russian intelligence and is now taking their orders. It doesn’t make much difference at a practical level. Either way, he will always take the Russian side on anything where the Russian side is clear.
bbleh
“the lack of available shovels”?!
Боже мій
Tony G
“lack of available shovels”. Why, yes, shovels are certainly a rare, advanced technology that tends to be scarce in a modern army. I guess a lot of shovels were sold on the black market recently. Is there ANY aspect of Russia at this point that is not completely corrupt and dysfunctional? I wonder whether the conscripts were barefoot because of a lack of available boots”?
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
The fall of Twitter will not be so bad if it keeps another Briahna Joy Gray from gaining influence and doing damage.
Martin
Democrats doing okay means that leftists can’t get their message heard. Unfortunately, they never seem to want to create the space for leftist messaging by choking the right out of the public square. Nobody is going to pay attention to your hot take that fascists are bad – but say that democrats are bad – well, the NYT is going to jump all over that shit.
Martin
No. Their entire GDP is basically just graft. Has been since Putin came to power. Maybe longer, but at least that long.
Aussie Sheila
Thank you Adam, much appreciated. I know I shouldn’t but these people enrage me more than anything else in this cluster..ck.
One thing I can comfort myself with though is that going forward a quick way to judge a person’s political/ethical bona fides is to know where they stand re these a…holes.
It’s not so much the Kissingers and Mearscheimers of this world, as the faux, too cool for school ‘left’ that set me off. They are nothing but grifters, but unfortunately they appear to have some influence with young people.
Briahna Joy Gray particularly annoys me. She knows absolutely nothing about anything, and yet she was Sanders spokesperson as I understand it at one time. Greenwald is just a narcissist imo. One of the worst aspects of the on line world is the magnification of deliberate malignancy designed to be picked up by young people for the money it gives grifters.
I love your description of BJG-so true!
Once again thank you for updates.
Adam L Silverman
@Alison Rose: This nationalization is fine and, frankly, long overdue.
cbear
Fuck Benjamin Netanyahu, and Fuck at least 50% of Israel too. Let them tap their Russian/Saudi/etc pals, or the Russian oligarchs they’re providing safe haven to, for any further military assistance and cash.
They can all eat a bag of salted dick’s AFAIC.
Adam L Silverman
@Sebastian: Vodka. Lots and lots of vodka.
Martin
@Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony: I think there is some benefit of Mastodon being the apparent successor here. It’s cumbersome but I think a distributed community/moderation effort should help break up some of the ability for attention seekers to get attention and distribute things a bit better.
Benw
Tomorrow I’m going to go work the polls. It’s a long day and since I’m in a red area mostly what I do is help Republicans vote. I’m going to do that as best as I can, and hope for democracy in my heart
Bill Arnold
@Martin:
Or, authoritarians are eagerly anticipating/celebrating the weakening of mass free speech.
Martin
@lashonharangue: That’s a good thread. I encountered a lot of that in my job as well. I was the data nerd/guy who understood the underlying mechanics, the policy, etc.
Cannot recount how many times I’m in some meeting with some PhD up there with his/her datasets and drawing the dumbest fucking conclusion because they have no goddamn idea how anything works. I’m trying to lock down a change to admissions policy that in a pilot did gangbusters for one program and extend it to the entire university. PhD rolls in with a report that says that student attrition is unrelated to my admission metrics – and points to a chart and says ‘look, it’s bimodal, correlation is zero’.
I fucking lost it. Didn’t attack him personally, but gave a general rant about the decision makers needing to know something about what they are deciding. Attrition is bimodal because at one end of the performance spectrum, students are struggling and failing out. At the other end, they are excelling and have their choice of what to study and are changing majors, transferring to more prestigious universities, etc. In the middle are students doing okay, but not so well to aspire to somewhere better. One peak is voluntary and one is involuntary. One is indicative of the admissions process not working well (the thing I’m fucking trying to fix) and the other is indicative of the process working so well that we’re attracting students that could have gotten into a better reputation university and the failing is that the university isn’t giving them enough of an experience to stay. Completely different problem. Not remotely related to the other problem, but on his fucking chart line goes up equally and correlation zero.
Data science helps experts to gain insight into what’s going on. It doesn’t in any way substitute for expertise.
Martin
It’s spelled ‘AIPAC’.
Bill Arnold
Thanks to John Cole twitter:
Hm, maybe one of the guys involved in the Blessing of the Russian Nuclear Weapons died as a spiritual consequence of his mortal sins. Not sure.
Nice robe:
Martin
@Bill Arnold: Right, but there are some benefits to not having all of what qualifies as acceptable speech gated behind a single corporate board.
Among other things, makes it a lot harder for the foreign interference to punch through.
Anonymous At Work
@Roger Moore: I always figured that it was a throwback to the 50s. Republicans, especially of the closet-fascist variety tried to tie liberals to Russia, when Russia was communist. Therefore anyone today bad-mouthing Russia must be a fascist, making me the only true and pure liberal.
Gold Medal caliber mental gymnastics, stubborn streak, massive ego, and a hatred for Hilary Clinton beyond 12 middle-aged white men insecure in their masculinity, all in one person.
cbear
@Martin: Too true, Martin.
Btw, it’s always good to see another BJ old-timer! I think we go back 16-18 years here, right?
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
@Bill Arnold:
I don’t think that is true. Russia has really made use of social media. Its given them a direct in-road into households in the US, Europe, and elsewhere. Its made it easier for them to discover and exploit fractures in our society. It isn’t just Russia. When you look at huge impact a few influencers have had on vaccine denial, for example, it is really disturbing and incredibly destructive. QAnon would be a few cranks on the street corner if it wasn’t for social media.
Steve in the ATL
Well played, Adam. Well played.
Alison Rose
@Bill Arnold: That last one, what in the entire fuck
Martin
@cbear: Yeah. I rolled in when Cole started losing his shit over Terri Schiavo and I showed up looking for some high contact trolling. That was 2005, I think? Not a ton of us still around.
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
@Martin: I date back to then. I changed my nym to the current one about 2008 or 2009, but I’ve been around that long.
jonas
@Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony:
I think I’ve been here about as long going back to JC’s conversion as well. Man, time flies.
Martin
@Alison Rose: Russians big on replacement theory as well. “Baby machine go ‘brrrr'” solves a lot of the cultural problems there as they do for the right here.
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
@jonas: It does. Its crazy.
Redshift
Being on the opposite side from Kissinger is never a bad thing.
Bill Arnold
@Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony:
Anti-Fascists (broadly) have been building defenses, working out how to detect and sometimes even spike malignant influence operations/networks in real time, generally rapidly becoming better at countering propaganda, and sometimes going on the offense. There are many players, not just malignant ones.
frosty
More of us than you think. I think I got here around 2007. WaterGirl looked up my first comment: June 2008. Or maybe that makes me a newbie :-)
Dan B
@Alison Rose: I believe he needed to mansplain it to the little women. They don’t instinctively know its good to have backups, you know, like men do. Spare “parts” are also something manly men know.
Frankensteinbeck
Yes, and this is insane. He must have a food taster and be really, really sure about the loyalty of the bodyguards around him. Putin routinely has much smaller threats to his power assassinated. Prigozhin is either so insane and stupid that he can’t imagine the hammer falling on HIM, or is convinced that Putin can’t touch him. Putin would have to be a whole lot weaker than we know for that to be true. Plus, Prigozhin and the other righties are running on “We’ll keep this war going, but push Russia’s face even harder into the meat grinder.” Doubling down on the thing that got the last guy ousted is not a great way to keep your job or your life.
way2blue
@Tony G: I sometimes wonder if these Russian recruits will ever figure out that their leaders hold them in as low esteem as they hold the Ukranians. And if they ever do—would they switch sides?
cbear
@Martin: Yeah, I drug my carcass here in late 2003, early 2004.
10-4 on the trolling, LOL. Hell, we were still trying to beat the last vestiges of gooper out of Cole up to around 2009, weren’t we?
Man, LATE NIGHT was too much fun back in the early days!!
Shalimar
@Martin: Schiavo was when I arrived too, through a couple positive links from Daily Kos
edit: Markos’ message was basically “even a mil blogger like Cole is horrified by this bullshit.” And the most popular blogging Cole at the time was Juan, who I have no idea what happened to after around 2008.
cbear
@Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony: i remember you, sister!
Chetan Murthy
@Benw: Bless you, and stay safe. My mom used to work on election day, as a pollworker, some years as an election judge. This year? She’s not even gonna vote. B/c red area of a red state, and she’s already been threatened physically by MAGAts[1]. And of course, an absentee ballot cannot be had for neither love nor …. well, not for money obvs. She tried that last cycle: no go.
It is what it is.
[1] To my mind, if she doesn’t think it’s safe to go vote, it’s not safe to live there, but …. well, whatdoIknow?
Amir Khalid
@bbleh:
When you consider the kind of material support the Russians are giving their troops, it’s amazing that they’ve lasted eight months in Ukraine.
Splitting Image
@Martin:
I joined towards the end of 2007, I think. I remember following the early primaries here. As I recall, I wanted to find some news sources that were more reliable than the bobbleheads on TV. Cole seemed like a rare person who self-described as conservative but was open to other opinions and could listen to reason.
The commenters at the time seemed to come from all over the country, which meant that I could follow the election by reading what people from diverse parts of the country had to say rather than watching a pundit cover a primary like it was a trip to Walt Disney’s Iowaland.
15 years later, Bill Kristol is a Democrat and the Republican party is pro-Russian. Go figure.
way2blue
@Martin: Oh. I started reading Balloon Juice when JG Cole was still a Republican. (Watched the light bulb in his head turn on when he realized the Republicans were/are FOS.) Rarely comment though.
But Adam’s taxing nightly posts along with the substantive commentary is essential readiing. And here I am. In fact, I sought out political blogs after the 2000 election because I was so shocked at the Florida debacle and realized I needed to be paying attention…
Another Scott
I’m still poking around Mastodon, etc.
Popehat has a pretty clean page, but says there are server issues with that particular instance so he’ll be moving on to a new place sometime.
https://masthead.social/@popehat
So, it doesn’t have to look like a wall of tiny white text on a black background. Good!
And the tabs at the top show who he’s following and who is following him, so it does look possible to find people without too much trouble. Good!
Cheers,
Scott.
way2blue
@Chetan Murthy: That’s horrifying. Mail-in ballots for everyone! In every state. (California shifted to this system a few years back.)
piratedan
@Another Scott: have been lurking on counter.social seeing if that will end up as a viable alternative….
Amir Khalid
@Martin:
I started lurking around 2009, having followed here a few commenters who had migrated from the Swampland blog at the TIME magazine website. Goodness gracious, I’ve been here thirteen years!
Amir Khalid
Something just occurred to me. This blog started in 2001, right? So was there a proper 21st birthday celebration post this year, or did I miss it?
Sebastian
@Adam L Silverman:
That will help with the morale of the troops!
Seriously though, It burned almost as intensely as a fuel depot. Were they storing diesel in an office building?
Panurge
@Shalimar:
Still going at https://www.juancole.com/
Looks like a pro site now.
Ivan X
What about Hedges? You forgot Hedges! Collect ‘em all!
Alison Rose
@Amir Khalid: We had the 20th anniversary week at the beginning of January this year. So the 21st is coming up in a couple months.
NobodySpecial
@Shalimar: Schiavo was my first time here as well. Had just gotten booted off of RedState because my troll game was too much for them. I just watched for a while, though, because watching Cole wake up was A1 content that didn’t need my commentary. Man, has it been a while.
cbear
@Amir Khalid: I remember when you first started commenting. I THINK you were living in Seattle (or somewhere close), but later made a move?
sanjeevs
Lots of these fake leftists promoting ‘peace’ with Ukraine are part of the Callin podcast network
Callin | Social Podcasting
Brie-Brie, Aaron Mate, Tulsi, Katie Halpers etc are all there.
Callin was founded by David Sacks – Elon Musk’s buddy and definitely not a leftist.
There’s a thread about it here
Post-Left Watch on Twitter: “Let’s talk about the podcast platform Callin. It is a platform founded by PayPal Mafia member David Sacks, longtime business partner of Peter Thiel. https://t.co/aXGfdDq0ye” / Twitter
Alison Rose
@sanjeevs: all these motherfuckers always know each other
Amir Khalid
@cbear:
That must be someone else. I’ve never lived in Seattle; I’ve only ever been in transit through SEATAC.
Carlo Graziani
Thanks, Adam, for the salient stuff and for the Donetsk admin building. Thing is, Donetsk is already pretty buggered as a depot — too close to the front line and to the Russian border. The Ukrainians really need some way to shut down Starobilsk urgently –it was very frustrating to watch the offensive stall, more for them, I’m sure– and probably the yards behind Luhansk as a second priority. And stop supplies coming up out of Crimea.
The problem with ATACMS is that I don’t think all the resistance is coming from the administration. According to this summary the US only has about 280 of them upgraded to the Block 1A Unitary. The number in regular Block 1A configuration is not one that I can find, but it’s probably also in the hundreds. I think there is internal DOD resistance to the idea of turning these into the next HIMARS/M-31 assistance program, because there’s no supply chain to make any new ones. There’s a new development missile on the way, but in the meantime, I’m guessing the Army and the Marines would be very reluctant to part with more than a very few, if any.
I did notice, however, that there were some older inertially-guided Block 1 ATACMS that were exported to places such as “Bahrain, Greece, South Korea, Taiwan, Turkey, and the UAE”. Those missiles have a 165 km range, and APAM submunition warheads that scatter 960 bomblets over 100m radius, each making a 15m blast, so accuracy isn’t such a concern, and they’d be pretty good for shutting down a railyard. They could even hit Dzhankoi from Nova Kakhovka (150 km). All that would be required would be a green light from the Biden administration for one of those countries to sell a few hand-me-downs…
The Pale Scot
@cbear:
AFAIC and all the other lobbyist groups for foreign countries should be registered as foreign agents and required to post bonds in the 10s of millions. Their entire staff and donors fingerprinted and pics and details of their entire families recorded.
Ivan X
@Martin: I rolled in not long after. You’re have been and remain one of my very favorite commenters.
Sebastian
@Carlo Graziani:
I read that this was discussed and considered, but the obstacle is treaties about cluster ammunition. I forgot the details.
cbear
@Amir Khalid: Hmmm, I think maybe it’s Yutsano I’m thinking about.
However, you and I did trade comments occasionally back in the “old days” .
cbear
@Ivan X: True dat, Ivan! Martin has always been on the ball.
cbear
@The Pale Scot:
Yep, yep, yep…and violations should be Minimum Mandatory 5 years!!
Mallard Filmore
@Sebastian:
Railroads do things differently. Lower floors might be storage areas or freight processing depots. It could have paints, buckets of grease, paper, acetylene for cutting apart damaged cars.
Ruckus
@Roger Moore:
Is it possible Glen’s just a fucking asshole who believes in Russia?
Ruckus
@Tony G:
I wonder whether the conscripts were barefoot because of a lack of available boots”?
You have to ask? They were sent to a war zone with weapons that were useless or close to it, likely without much ammo – didn’t need much with such shit weapons, little to no food and not enough clothes to keep warm, and 2 weeks of training. They were sent as targets for Ukraine to waste ammo on.
Ruckus
@Martin:
Their entire GDP is basically just graft. Has been since Putin came to power.
Yep. Vlad’s paycheck is supposedly $140K/year. Yet he’s a billionaire several times over, owns a palace, yachts… One doesn’t get that rich as a public servant without his hand in the cookie jar. Oh wait, we have a similar problem with some of our national politicians….
Shalimar
@Alison Rose: If you could time travel, you could go back 20 years and blow up one Paypal shareholder meeting to eliminate half the evil in the US. All of these assholes were in Paypal together.
TheMightyTrowel
@Martin: I started lurking 2007ish and I think started commenting 2008 or 9ish under a different nym. Switched to this one ca 2010 (I had some email address problems) – but since moving down under the timezones make following along live pretty onerous and honestly the US politics are incredibly stressful when you live elsewhere but have family in the States. I still lurk though – especially these posts (thanks Adam!)
satby
@cbear: I arrived around then too, though I lurked for a while before my first comment.
It was indeed, but the tenor and temperament of this place has changed; and some of us aged all the way out, unfortunately. Lots of us on Twitter (still) for the time being, where the conversation is more raucous and subjects more varied.
Barry
@Roger Moore: “…or if he’s actually been compromised by Russian intelligence and is now taking their orders”
Perhaps one of his younger boyfriends was to young?
OTOH, ego is a sufficient explanation.
Matt McIrvin
@Anonymous At Work: It’s bigger than Greenwald. RT spent years positioning themselves with the foreign-policy progressive left as an alternative to warmongering Washington orthodoxy, and a chunk of the coalition opposing Bush’s wars of opportunity ended up swallowing their line if they weren’t with it all along.
I think a lot of them still have this intuition that Russia is the natural heir to the Soviet Union as the counterbalance to the military ambitions of the US, and they don’t really care about whether Russia is Communist or fascist, because politics was mostly about foreign/military policy to them all along.
And some of them were also always really cultural reactionaries who don’t particularly mind if they’re supporting fascism in the US. Our so-called radical left has this faction of tough guys who want some kind of herrenvolk socialism for white men, and extrapolate from corporations’ embrace of culturally liberal rhetoric to a position that cultural liberalism itself is a corporatist trap. Taibbi and Michael Tracey got wherever they are from that direction. There’s a huge amount of misogyny bound up in it too that was focused by the specific hatred of Hillary Clinton.
I think Greenwald never even really had that sort of leftism–he was always basically a right-winger. Obviously he supports gay rights but in this really narrowly defined way (the ability of super-reactionary gay conservatives to compartmentalize in this way, when “eliminate the gays” is one of the central tenets of the movement, always amazes me).
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
@cbear: :)
Chetan Murthy
@Matt McIrvin:
Rememember he got that early start defending a white supremacist. As they say, everybody’s entitled to representation, but when you choose to represent evil assholes, people can and should draw conclucions about you. The crew over at LG&M has his number: he’s a white supremacist, a misogynist.
RaflW
Absolute f*+king dirtbag.
Shalimar
@Chetan Murthy: Everyone is entitled to a defense, even neo-Nazis, but the attorney isn’t required to adopt the neo-Nazi’s rhetoric and tactics to defend him. Greenwald did. He was vicious.
Sofa Cat
Aaron Maté of The Grayzone has muddied the waters about Douma (where the Syrian govt chlorine-gassed Syrians in rebel-held territory but Aaron says the rebels gassed themselves) for years.
Maté’s tried to do the same about Ukraine… but Neil Abrams (PhD specializing in post-Soviet corruption) has debunked Maté’s claims about the Maidan Revolution being a ‘US-sponsored coup’, Ukraine being ‘run by Nazis’, Russia wanting to implement the Minsk peace accords/Ukraine refusing to, etc…
Abrams finally embarrassed Maté into responding to his debunking (Aaron follows the Roger Stone dictum of ‘attack, attack, attack, never defend’)… and Maté revealed over & over how his basic assumptions about Russia’s actions are incorrect. https://twitter.com/neil_abrams/status/1589726993003970560
Emily B.
I just want to put this out there. While phonebanking last night, I talked to an undecided Black voter in Georgia who is deeply disgusted by US aid to Ukraine. I know several Black members of my church who feel the same way: Why are we sending aid to Ukraine while we have so many problems at home? They’re really angry about it.
While this is anecdotal and a VERY small sample size, I do worry that support for Ukraine may be alienating a core Democratic constituency. It’s a great wedge issue for Republicans (and Russia!). Do our Democratic leaders need to make a stronger case to Black voters that aiding Ukraine will improve our security by weakening Russia and ultimately freeing up resources? Interested in hearing what other BJers think.
Geminid
@Emily B.: I suspect these beliefs have been shaped by an organized social media campaign, and might be best countered on the same level. Maybe Malcolm Nance can lead a Black NAFO!
Pointing out the problem as you have done is a good first step. The next one is to identify which accounts are propagating these beliefs. I hope that reseachers are on the case already.
Medicine Man
@Adam L Silverman: I’d like to thank you for your description of the various Greyzone extended universe of chucklefucks. Free therapy for me imo.
Also one of the best breakdowns of Greenwald’s special attitude. On the “MICE” acronym, he is super heavy on the “E”.