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You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / Person of the Year (Open Thread)

Person of the Year (Open Thread)

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Earlier this week, I saw a rumor on Twitter that the Time magazine staff had Ron DeSantis on the short list for their “Person of the Year” edition. If true, what a sick joke.

But in the end, the right man, Volodymyr Zelensky, shared the honor with the spirit of his country. Here’s an excerpt from the article, which is worth reading in full:

Zelensky’s success as a wartime leader has relied on the fact that courage is contagious. It spread through Ukraine’s political leadership in the first days of the invasion, as everyone realized the President had stuck around. If that seems like a natural thing for a leader to do in a crisis, consider historical precedent. Only six months earlier, the President of Afghanistan, Ashraf Ghani—a far more experienced leader than Zelensky—fled his capital as Taliban forces approached. In 2014, one of Zelensky’s predecessors, Viktor Yanukovych, ran away from Kyiv as protesters closed in on his residence; he still lives in Russia today. Early in the Second World War, the leaders of Albania, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Greece, Poland, the Netherlands, Norway, and Yugoslavia, among others, fled the advance of the German Wehrmacht and lived out the war in exile.

According to the Time reporter, Zelensky “recoils” at comparisons to Churchill due to the latter’s appalling record as an imperialist. Western commentators whose history books focus on Churchill standing up to the Nazis might make that connection, but Zelensky grew up in a country that was brutally repressed by another empire that is still unwilling to let go, and that history colors his view of the man. It also informs his objectives for Ukraine’s future in a distinctly un-Churchillian way:

I asked whether this history had in some ways hardened Ukraine as a nation, contributing to its resolve in fighting the present war. The question earned me a piercing look. “Some people might say it hardened us. But I think it took away so much of Ukraine’s ability to develop,” Zelensky says. “It was one blow after another, the hardest kind. How does that harden us? People barely survived. Hunger broke them. It broke their psyches, and of course that leaves a trace.”

Now it was his generation’s turn to face the blows of a foreign invader. Instead of Stalin and Hitler, it was Putin trying to break their will by depriving them of heat and light, destroying their ability to harvest food, or to think about much besides survival through this winter. Already the next generation of Ukrainians, like Zelensky’s own son, were learning about the tools of war instead of planning for prosperity. That is the pattern the President aims to disrupt, and his plan relies on more than weapons.

“I don’t want to weigh who has more tanks and armies,” he says. Russia is a nuclear superpower. No matter how many times its forces are made to retreat from Ukrainian cities, they can regroup and try again. “We are dealing with a powerful state that is pathologically unwilling to let Ukraine go,” Zelensky told me. “They see the democracy and freedom of Ukraine as a question of their own survival.” The only way to defeat an enemy like that—not just to win a temporary truce, but to win the war— is to persuade the rest of the free world to pull Ukraine in the other direction, toward sovereignty, independence, and peace. The loss of freedom in one nation, he argues, erodes freedom in all the rest. “If they devour us, the sun in your sky will get dimmer.”

Well goddamn! Going forward, when commentators need to invoke brave wartime leadership, they’ll speak of Volodymyr Zelensky.

Open thread.

Reader Interactions

235Comments

  2. 2.

    Mimi haha

    Person of the Year isn’t a Mr Nice Guy award. It’s recognition of the most influential person of the last 12 months.

    Which doesn’t mean I’m questioning naming Mr Zelensky PotY.

  5. 5.

    trollhattan

    But, DeSantis is sooo dreamy in those boots!

    Good and really, only choice, husk of Time Magazine. Well done. [Trump, again, throws things at nearest wall.]

  6. 6.

    Lapassionara

    Zelensky is so eloquent. And he does not do platitudes at all. No “what doesn’t break us makes us stronger,” and the like. What a great soul.

  8. 8.

    trollhattan

    Meanwhile in Germany–oh no you don’t, Germans, we remember what happened the last time. What the actual fuck?!?

    Twenty-five people have been arrested in raids across Germany on suspicion of plotting to overthrow the government.

    The group of far-right and ex-military figures are said to have prepared for a “Day X” to storm the Reichstag parliament building and seize power.

    A man named as Heinrich XIII, from an old aristocratic family, is alleged to have been central to their plans.

    According to federal prosecutors, he is one of two alleged ringleaders among those arrested across 11 German states.

    The plotters are said to include members of the extremist Reichsbürger [Citizens of the Reich] movement, which has long been in the sights of German police over violent attacks and racist and antisemitic conspiracy theories. They also refuse to recognise the modern German state.

    Other suspects came from the QAnon movement who believe their country is in the hands of a mythical “deep state” involving secret powers pulling the political strings.

    Interior Minister Nancy Faeser assured Germans that authorities would respond with the full force of the law “against the enemies of democracy”.

    An estimated 50 men and women are alleged to have been part of the group, said to have plotted to overthrow the republic and replace it with a new state modelled on the Germany of 1871 – an empire called the Second Reich.

    “We don’t yet have a name for this group,” said a spokeswoman for the federal prosecutor’s office. The interior minister said it was apparently made up of an organisation “council” and a military arm.

    Wednesday’s dawn raids are being described as one of the biggest anti-extremism operations in modern German history. Three thousand officers took part in 150 operations in 11 of Germany’s 16 states, with two people arrested in Austria and Italy.

    Somebody locate Bannon, stat.

  9. 9.

    jefft452

    “According to the Time reporter, Zelensky “recoils” at comparisons to Churchill due to the latter’s appalling record as an imperialist”

     

    He was also pretty incompetent as a war time leader

  10. 10.

    Betty Cracker

    @Mimi haha: I know that, but how was DeSantis even in the conversation? Because he won the Republican Party’s midterm wipeout participation trophy by being a Republican who was reelected in a Republican state? It’s ridiculous that he was even considered, IMO.

  11. 11.

    geg6

    I can’t even express my admiration of the man and his countrymen.  Bravest people I’ve ever witnessed.

  15. 15.

    Alison Rose

    This:

    “If they devour us, the sun in your sky will get dimmer.”

    is key. I wish more leaders would fucking come to understand this. Very very glad to see this, because he and the whole nation deserve this recognition.

  16. 16.

    dr. bloor

    @Betty Cracker: I dunno. He’s been criming in the open for the past four years, and the only price he’s paid has been to watch his presidential prospects improve.  Says more about the country than him, but it’s not a ridiculous nomination.

  17. 17.

    PaulWartenberg

    Zelensky is a no-brainer for TIME: the second he said “I need ammo, not a ride” he pulled off the Churchillian moment the editors love to see in elected officials.

    We cannot ignore how the Russian invasion – expanded from their occupation of Crimea and Donbas – is arguably the most dominant event of this year. Everything from business/trade to global politics to even the environment has been affected by it.

  18. 18.

    Alison Rose

    @Steeplejack: I think the one-y, two-y thing is not a russian thing. His own book that just came out with a collection of his speeches has his name spelled with one y, and this is from his administration and raising money for United24. I think the russian spelling is the iy ending.

  19. 19.

    djwid

    @Mimi haha: I hear that but it is often used in defense of some indefensible choices. DeSantis is not influential, he is potentially influential and even his current potential is only in relation to Trump. Elon was on the short list and is only influential to journalists and the terminally online. There was only one choice this year thank god. Because if you give time a choice they will pick idiocy.

  21. 21.

    Jerzy Russian

    @Lapassionara:

     

    Zelensky is so eloquent. And he does not do platitudes at all. No “what doesn’t break us makes us stronger,” and the like. What a great soul.

    I had a boss once who used to say “That which does not kill you only wounds you”. I would think most people would want to become stronger without getting wounded or nearly killed.

  25. 25.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Steeplejack: It’s not as direct as the Kiev/Kyiv thing. I know you asked me in an Adam thread why I write Zelensky and not Zelenskyy, but I had gone to bed at that point. But your question deserves a lengthier answer, that I’ve been working on, on and off.

    I’ll correct people who write Kiev, or, especially, Dniepr, but will pass on Zelensky, because the former are russianisms, while the latter isn’t – it’s just a different Romanization. I hope to have my lengthier explanation done soon.

  27. 27.

    Ken

    Typical of the woke liberals at Time that they give the award to Zelenskyy, and completely ignore the man who made it possible -- Putin.

    (To head off any screaming by those who may not be aware of all Internet traditions, the code font indicates sarcasm.)

  30. 30.

    cope

    I’ve never been a fan of the variations on the “that which doesn’t kill me only makes me stronger” trope and it seems neither is Mr. Zelensky. That said, he is an excellent choice for this distinction.

  31. 31.

    Kay

    Ukrainians are tough people. I’m in awe of how brave and resilient they are. I am spending a lot of time in Cleveland lately and it is really something to see the Ukrainian flags and signs in windows and even “Fuck Putin” bumper stickers.

  33. 33.

    Alison Rose

    BTW if anyone wants to help a disabled jackal out and spots this in your local store, I’ll Venmo you the cover price and postage if you’ll mail it to me :)

  34. 34.

    Betty Cracker

    @dr. bloor: We’ll have to agree to disagree on that, because I still think it’s an utterly ridiculous notion. If DeSantis manages to slay the Trump dragon and inherit the dysfunctional cult that is the GOP next year,  yeah, he belongs on the evil side of the shortlist.

  37. 37.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @djwid: Elon was on the short list and is only influential to journalists and the terminally online

    Interesting point because it looks like the next two years  “Hillary has emails” is going to be “Moderation is violation of the First Amendment”. The Right basically morphed into a pack of internet trolls.

  38. 38.

    azlib

    @jefft452: 

    He was also pretty incompetent as a war time leader

    Churchill inspired the British people. He was probably the right person at the time. Remember his party lost the election right before the end of the war. His domestic policies were not popular.

    Churchill was an unredeamable imperialist and he did try to do a lot of micromanagement of the wartime effort which drove the British general staff crazy at times. Fortunately, most of his odder ideas got squelched mainly because the US asserted itself as the stronger ally.

    He was an excellent and prolific writer, however. His reputation was probably saved because he got his 6 volume WW II history out before everybody else. His history is a good read, but it left out a lot of his more controversial decision making.

  40. 40.

    Amir Khalid

    @Mimi haha:

    True. TIME caught a lot of grief for naming Adolf Hitler and Ayatollah Khomeini Man of The Year, but most people do forget that the citation isn’t necessarily an honour.

    (Style note: TIME styles its own name in all caps, to match its cover logo.)

  42. 42.

    Mike in NC

    The thought of Ron DeSatan as “Person of the Year” should make any sane individual want to vomit. He’s going to be the GQP’s Trump v2.0 in 2024. A slightly lesser megalomaniac who thinks he was chosen by God.

  43. 43.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @trollhattan: Meanwhile in Germany–oh no you don’t, Germans, we remember what happened the last time. What the actual fuck?!?

    If you ever dealt with a rich German man, idiocy like this is no surprised. They have to be the most entitled, whinny and lazy assholes on the planet.  I would not be surprised the German police found out about the plot because the plotters started ordering them to stage the coup.

  45. 45.

    Ohio Mom

    @Gin & Tonic: Thank you for this. I noticed that Slava Malamud only uses one y, which I wondered about. Now I can put that to rest and go on to the other questions on my list.

  48. 48.

    Steeplejack

    @Alison Rose:

    I meant it partially as shorthand for “how he wants it.” His official Twitter account is two y’s. Ditto his Wikipedia entry. And one of the (numerous) stories on the spellings says that’s how it’s spelled in English on his passport. And, not least, we regularly got reamed on Adam’s posts for not spelling it “Zelenskyy.”

    And, yes, he has spelled it different ways in the past.

    At least I got my pedantry quota out of the way early this month.

  49. 49.

    Old School

    @SFAW:

    Was there supposed to be a link for “this”? Or am I just missing something?

    I assume the “this” meant a copy of the Time Magazine POY issue.

  51. 51.

    lowtechcyclist

    Hadn’t thought about the PotY until FT named Zelenskyy as theirs yesterday.  But who else could it possibly be?  If the world’s a stage, he’s been front and center all year.  He has been the leader Ukraine has needed him to be.

    I’ve said before that it took many heroes to save Kyiv from the Russians. But if he had chosen even the relative safety of Lviv, let alone chosen to become President-in-exile in Poland, Lithuania, or wherever, it would have undercut whatever attempts the Ukrainian army would have made to save Kyiv.  It’s hard to imagine that the Russians wouldn’t have taken the city, and in its wake most of Ukraine, if Zelenskyy hadn’t stayed.  He knew his life was forfeit (probably after a show trial) if the Russians captured him, but he stayed anyway, and led his people from the place that mattered.  He is truly a hero.

  52. 52.

    Gin & Tonic

    @SFAW: The name of the big river is “Dnipro.” It’s also the name of the city that used to be called “Dnipropetrovsk.”

  53. 53.

    Layer8Problem

    @eclare, @Layer8Problem:  And while we’re at it, let’s pass a law mandating that rotating personnel continually whisper into TFG’s ear “All glory is fleeting,” 24 by 7.  Or maybe just “Loser!”

  54. 54.

    Kay

    @cain:

    Even if you hate the US (which I think a lot of the far Right do- I think they love a sentimental movie notion of the US, not the real thing) it is such an easy call to back Ukraine. I can’t imagine how fucked up they have to be for so many of them to end up on the wrong side of this. They’re bad thinkers.

    I pass this tidy little brick ranch on my way to work – an elderly married couple live there and it is neat as a pin. They have a big Ukrainian flag on the flagpole and have had for months- it dwarfs their little house-  and it is just so moving to me, this kind of quiet support you see.

  55. 55.

    JML

    War is certainly a crucible in which character is, if not formed, at the very least revealed. Zelenskyy has done very well in leading his country, inspiring his people but also generating support from the broader world community. It’s easier in some ways to be a war-time leader, because the internal squabbles are easier to shunt aside as an external threat unifies political divisions…but at the same time the risk are higher and the penalties for failure much greater. he’s a worthy choice and has been doing an impressive job for his country. (and in fighting back against Russian aggression, doing a service to the world, IMHO)

  57. 57.

    Gin & Tonic

    @lowtechcyclist: That’s why I’ve said that this 30-second video was critically important, and may have turned the tide of the war. It’s Zelensky and his crew, at night, outside in Kyiv, like on Feb 25 or 26, saying “we are here.” The importance of this cannot be overstated.

  60. 60.

    Jay

    Zelenskyy deserves every award he gets and Ukraine deserves more support than we are giving.

    As it’s an open thread, another rough month. T is still trying to get her disability, so just my income, and YVR is not a cheap city to live in. We barely make it month to month and the past few weeks were really rough, emotionally, financially. My contrast with work really drives it home. I don’t make that much money, am in month 2 of my 3 month probation, but with Geo leaving, was considered for Branch Manager, (the big negative was my short time with the Company). It was nice to be considered and be recognized.  Just finished day 2 of R.I.T.E. training, so am now a “certified” tech for  gas an hazardous atmosphere monitors, will be getting my Bivalent booster, then heading out to Post Kells, (the shop) to fix stuff. I really like my job and the people I work with. The training was a 12 hour zoom with some in class hands on, held in our Bby Hq Boardroom. On one of the breaks, I got to meet some of our Bby staff, all of whom knew of me, because Geo, Dan and Don are just so enthused that I am working there. We finished training early, so I am at home, having oatmeal and coffee before the clinic opens. Nice having a Service Van and a gas card for my use.

    Don’t get to hang out here much other than reading and Adam’s Ukraine threads.

  61. 61.

    eclare

    @Kay:   A house down the street from me in Memphis flies the flag from their porch.  Further down there is a porch banner, not sure what it says, but it is pro-Ukraine.

  62. 62.

    kalakal

    @Amir Khalid: Very true. The thing is it has become seen as an honour. If it was based on most influential there would be quite a few utterly reprehensible ‘winners’ eg Bin Laden, a man who improved the world by leaving it. No way could TIME have had that mass murdering piece of filth as Person of the Year and I’m glad they didn’t.

    Zelensky is a glorious choice, both for the effect he’s had this year and the example he’s set for years to come.

    DeSantis would be a sick joke

  67. 67.

    Cameron

    @azlib: Certainly, his experience as the military genius who cooked up the Great Gallipoli Adventure in WWI should have given some pause to anyone who sought his advice in how to wage WWII

  69. 69.

    Alison Rose

    @Gin & Tonic: That video still makes me a bit teary every time I see it. I knew so little about him or Ukraine at that time, but I could immediately tell that this moment would be seen as a turning point, that this was his like…introduction to the world as a leader worthy of their admiration and support and respect.

  71. 71.

    Ohio Mom

    @eclare: In the next neighborhood over there is a small speciality  grocery store. Their sign used to say “International Deli Russian Food Store.” As soon as Russia invaded Ukraine, they taped over “Russian,” and soon after, replaced the entire old sign with a new one announcing “International Deli Eastern European Foods” in blue and yellow letters.

    Makes me smile every time I drive past.

  72. 72.

    sdhays

    @jefft452:

    He was also pretty incompetent as a war time leader

    I remember being in school and seeing a picture of Atlee with Stalin and Roosevelt (Yalta?) and being confused. “Wait, so the UK dumped the great leader Churchill, even before the war was over? There’s something pretty significant that no one’s talking about.”

  73. 73.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Gin & Tonic:

    @lowtechcyclist: That’s why I’ve said that this 30-second video was critically important, and may have turned the tide of the war. It’s Zelensky and his crew, at night, outside in Kyiv, like on Feb 25 or 26, saying “we are here.” The importance of this cannot be overstated.

    I remember that. That was even before “I need ammo, not a ride.” I’m pretty sure it was on the 25th.  And you’re right, that was the key moment.

  74. 74.

    Barbara

    @Paul in KY: I read the Geoffrey Wheatcroft biography of Churchill, which some have described as a hit piece.  I thought it was a pretty fair assessment, and he did write it partly to counter what in his view is unjustified hagiography of Churchill.  He too believes that Churchill was the man for the moment in WWII, even if the rest of his career was mostly misbegotten

    ETA:  Wheatcroft draws particular attention to some of Churchill’s less savory wartime gimmicks, or exploits, which in some cases engendered significant loss of life with no discernible strategic purpose or advantage.  Wheatcroft identifies Churchill as the leader who more or less delayed D-Day for more than a year for reasons that, eventually, Eisenhower and others overruled.

  75. 75.

    Betty Cracker

    @Alison Rose: It sure doesn’t! I’ve made my living as a writer and editor for decades, so I am used to hanging out in pedantic spaces, but this place beats all I’ve ever experienced.

  76. 76.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Barbara: I think it was Wheatcroft I heard on a BBC history podcast expressing genuine bafflement at the American attachment to Churchill

  77. 77.

    zhena gogolia

    @Alison Rose: I’m going to see if I can find it. If I do, you don’t have to Venmo me anything. I’ll get your address from WaterGirl. I don’t know if the local stores carry it, though. I’ll look.

  85. 85.

    zhena gogolia

    @Ohio Mom: The name is written in a different alphabet. For Russian, some systems, when dealing with a name like Достоевский, transliterate it as Dostoevskii, some as Dostoevskyi, some (the most common because it looks best in English) as Dostoevsky. The ending of this type of Ukrainian name would normally be transliterated as -skyy, but -sky looks better in English and has no Russian connotation, like Kiev or Dniepr do.

  86. 86.

    Paul in KY

    @sdhays: The Conservative Party (at that point and with Churchill as their Party Leader) advocated for ‘3 people for each job’. That did not go over very well, in hindsight…

  87. 87.

    Betty Cracker

    @Kay: There’s a wingnut family in my town who fly the Ukrainian flag. I don’t know them; I only know they’re wingnuts because of the campaign signs I’ve seen in their yard. But knowing their politics, it is heartening to see that flag.

    It does seem like an easy call for even right-wing Americans to back Ukraine, but it seems the far-right here has thrown in their lot with the hard-right authoritarian movement worldwide. With rare exceptions, they don’t openly admire Putin (or quickly walk it back when they do so aloud, e.g., Tucker Carlson), but they do openly admire Orbán.

    ETA: I think the dimmer bulbs may just resent the fact that Zelensky didn’t knuckle under to Trump’s extortion threat and vaguely blame him for Trump getting impeached the first time.

  88. 88.

    JML

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: most Americans don’t know all that much detail about Churchill, just the public persona stuff and the big “We Shall Fight On…” speech. Americans like that kind of wartime leader, especially when they’re nice to us and we don’t know anything about the eff ups. We also generally only think of Churchill through the WWII lens, I think?

  92. 92.

    zhena gogolia

    @Alison Rose: I’ll let WaterGirl know whether or not I find it. I live in kind of a small town, so it might not be around. Someone in NYC would probably have a better chance.

    I want it for my bulletin board here at the university.

  94. 94.

    Paul in KY

    @kalakal: That one was sorta dingy. Pretty sure Churchill hated airplanes, just because they brought the age of the battleship to a close.

  96. 96.

    Miss Bianca

    @Gin & Tonic: Yeah, that was amazing. I remember watching that and getting chills. Thinking, “this invasion may not go quite the way the fascists are expecting…”

  98. 98.

    BellyCat

    Courage is contagious.

    Indeed! The man is pursuing with grace that which the GOP has abandoned: Democracy.

  100. 100.

    kalakal

    @Paul in KY: One of Churchill’s greatest problems as a war leader was he genuinely believed he was a military genius because of his great, great to xth grandad. Now Marlborough was the real deal, he really was a military genius ( as well as being no slouch at politics) but there have been very few military commanders in history who can be ranked with John Churchill and Winston was most certainly not one of them

  101. 101.

    Craig

    Volodymyr Zelensky is such an inspiration, just the right person to rise to the moment. I’d like to throw in a word for Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko, he’s the former World Heavyweight Champ and seems to be a capable mayor. Always seemed an interesting guy when I was watching him fight.

  106. 106.

    artem1s

    Time magazine staff had Ron DeSantis on the short list for their “Person of the Year” edition. If true, what a sick joke.

    I guess we can hope that the staff was pwning TFG, knowing he’d devolve into a ketchup throwing mess if his next rival for most awful human got a Time cover, let alone Person of the Year.

  108. 108.

    lowtechcyclist

    @kalakal:

    If it was based on most influential there would be quite a few utterly reprehensible ‘winners’ eg Bin Laden, a man who improved the world by leaving it. No way could TIME have had that mass murdering piece of filth as Person of the Year and I’m glad they didn’t.

    Actually, that was their standard: the person who “for better or worse, has most influenced events in the preceding year.”

    Hitler was their Man of the Year in 1938; Stalin was picked in 1939 and 1942.  The Ayatollah Khomeini was their 1979 pick, and a lot of people were upset at the time about that. But it was the right pick.

    By their own standard, Osama bin Laden should have been their pick, hands down, for 2001.  But they didn’t think America could deal with the psychic pain if they picked him (I think they still remembered the reaction to Khomeini), so they went with Rudy 9/11 instead – a pick that has aged terribly.  I am still pissed at them for not staying true to their own standards and picking ObL.

    Someone asked if Henry Kissinger had ever been PotY.  Yes, he shared the honor with Richard Nixon in 1972.

  114. 114.

    kalakal

    @lowtechcyclist: Oh I know that’s their stated standard, I’m commenting that they don’t always stick to it. when I said there was no way they could have picked Bin Laden I meant in terms of public reaction. It is seen as an honour by the  public at large ( and would have been seen as such by Bin Laden & his supporters), very few people people know of purported criteria

  116. 116.

    lowtechcyclist

    @kalakal:

    very few people people know of purported criteria

    Maybe, but it’s been in every damn MoY/PotY issue since I was a kid.  I still say they fucked up.  And doubly so by going with Rudy.

    Hell, even Shrubby would have been a better pick than that; after all, he opened the door for ObL by disregarding the threat of non-state terrorism, in large part because it had been a focus of Clinton’s.

    Yes, I know, if they’d have picked him, it would have been because of his rallying America against the terrorist threat, but in the longer run, it would have worked the other way instead. :-D

    I’m commenting that they don’t always stick to it.

    Really, ObL was the main exception.  Who besides him should they have chosen for infamy that they didn’t?

  117. 117.

    Mike in NC

    @Cameron: It was also Churchill who claimed invading Italy would be going after “the soft underbelly of Europe” when in fact it turned out to be a very brutal campaign.

  120. 120.

    Layer8Problem

    @kalakal:  Churchill wrote a biography of the Duke of Marlborough with a lot of detail about him, including how he not only took an English army across Europe from Flanders, I think, into Bavaria, but did it keeping the books strictly balanced financewise.  I found it pretty engaging, but for some reason dropped it after the Blenheim part.

  123. 123.

    James E Powell

    Congratulations to President Zelenskyy & I hope this brings more attention to his nation’s struggle. We could use broader & stronger support across the nation. This war is not going to end any time soon.

    I am old enough to remember when it kind of mattered who Time named as Person of the Year. Can you recall last year’s person without looking it up? The year before? I can’t. In college I devoured magazines. Partly because I read a lot, partly because my little sister sold magazine subscriptions to raise money for the gymnastics team.

    Time, Newsweek, US News, Harpers, & Atlantic. Does anyone read like that anymore? I also read multiple newspapers. I was working in the state legislature where the FTFNYT, WaPo, and every daily from across the state of Ohio were available for free.

  126. 126.

    Suzanne

    @Betty Cracker:

    It does seem like an easy call for even right-wing Americans to back Ukraine, but it seems the far-right here has thrown in their lot with the hard-right authoritarian movement worldwide. With rare exceptions, they don’t openly admire Putin (or quickly walk it back when they do so aloud, e.g., Tucker Carlson), but they do openly admire Orbán. 

    They also want to just let Ukraine go, with no aid or support or any involvement at all….and they pretend that they are sober, realistic thinkers making rational assessment of the world, and that they just “disapprove”.

    The real cheese-eating surrender monkeys are the American right, of course.

  127. 127.

    cain

    @Kay: Expect the GOP house to defund aid to Ukraine considering they already were calling for it earlier last month.

  130. 130.

    Annie

     

     

    @sdhays:

    Er, no.  Yalta was FDR, Churchill and Stalin.  Churchill went to the Potsdam meeting in summer 1945, then returned to England for the election results that voted him out.

  131. 131.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Betty Cracker: With rare exceptions, they don’t openly admire Putin (or quickly walk it back when they do so aloud, e.g., Tucker Carlson), but they do openly admire Orbán.

    I would say that’s because Putin been shown to be a complete fuck up, and enough shoes haven’t dropped with Orbán before it shown he’s complete fuck up and the mess Hungry really is in.

    It’s always 1938 Nazi Germany in these people’s eyes, never 1946 occupied and bombed to hell Germany.

  133. 133.

    Annie

    Re Churchill, who else could have become Prime Minister after Chamberlain that both parties could stand to serve with?

    Next, Churchill, for all his faults, was IIRC the only member of the Cabinet absolutely opposed to any kind of truce or pause in the war with Germany in 1940.  Most of the other Cabinet ministers were at least willing to consider it.

    Now, suppose there had been such a truce. One, how do you convince the population to start the fight again?  Two, the Luftwaffe would probably not have spent the resources it did on bombing England which would have meant more resources to pit against the USSR.  Three, if England had a truce with Germany, where do you stage what we now call the Normandy invasion?  And, back to Item 2, there would have been a lot more Luftwaffe planes available to bomb both the military bases and the invasion fleet.  Even if Pearl Harbor had brought the U.S. into the war, a Britain taking a break from fighting would probably mean we would have concentrated on Japan after Pearl Harbor, with possibly a very different end to the European war.

  134. 134.

    JaneE

    @Alison Rose:The one-y two-y thing is the difference between Ukrainian spelling and Russian spelling.  It seems only proper that we transliterate the Ukrainian spelling of his name – two y’s.  Likewise the name of Ukrainian places Kyiv.  If we can learn to write Guangdong instead of Canton, we can learn to use Kyiv instead of Kiev.

  136. 136.

    zhena gogolia

    @JaneE: Not exactly. Both Russian and Ukrainian would have two letters after the “k.” But they’re pronounced differently, and both languages get transliterated as “-skyy” (Russ. “-skii”) or “-sky” depending on convenience. This is not the same distinction as Kyiv vs. Kiev (the former is the transliteration of the Ukrainian name, the latter is the transliteration of the Russian name).

  137. 137.

    zhena gogolia

    Maggie Haberman:

    Former President Donald J. Trump hired people to search four properties after being directed by a federal judge to look harder for any classified material still in his possession, and they found at least two documents with classified markings inside a sealed box in one of the locations, according to a person familiar with the matter.

    Mr. Trump’s search team discovered the documents at a federally run storage site in West Palm Beach, Fla., the person said, prompting his lawyers to notify the Justice Department about them.

  138. 138.

    Alison Rose

    @JaneE: Right, but the spellings of his name don’t seem as urgent as Kyiv/Kiev, since, as I said, on his own book he spelled it with one y. I don’t think that’s because he was trying to appeal to russians. I always spell it with two ys because that seems the most common way and I like the way it looks, LOL. But I don’t think the one y version is “wrong” in the same way that city names can be.

  142. 142.

    zhena gogolia

    @Alison Rose: Here’s what it looks like: Зеленський

    There are definitely two letters after the “k,” but they are two different letters. So how do you transliterate that? The old-fashioned way I was taught in grad school would be Zelens’kyj. At least that way, all the letters are accounted for, and each one is different if it’s different in the original. But that looks really off-putting to an English reader. Least off-putting is Zelensky, and it approximates the pronunciation.

    But neither Zelenskyy nor Zelensky has any reference to Russian phonetics and spelling, as Kiev and Dniepr do.

  146. 146.

    waspuppet

    Earlier this week, I saw a rumor on Twitter that the Time magazine staff had Ron DeSantis on the short list for their “Person of the Year” edition. If true, what a sick joke.

    I was going to make my usual crack about “I thought Republicans were the ones AGAINST affirmative action,” but then I remembered I’ve been saying that for like 10 years now, and since then republicans have committed and explicitly supported violence, and you can’t discount the role of that in any unearned respect they get. So it’s all just depressing.

  148. 148.

    Alison Rose

    @frosty: Hahaha! Yeah, the two-L spelling is always more common, but it bugs me because that’s how it’s spelled when it’s a last name. That should be a differentiation. But some parents wanted to cheat at Scrabble :P

    In high school for a while, I spelled it Alisyn, just to be COOL and DIFFERENT.

  150. 150.

    eclare

    @Alison Rose:   Same here, only with my first *and* last name.  I have words picked out to go with certain letters so there is no misunderstanding, as in “D as in dog.”

    There is always a misunderstanding.

  151. 151.

    Old School

    @zhena gogolia:  @eclare: @Alison Rose:

    I guess I wouldn’t be surprised if the POTY Time issue didn’t arrive on newsstands until 12/16 considering the announcement wasn’t made until today, but maybe they started printing them before the official reveal.

  155. 155.

    Martin

    @James E Powell: So much of the GOPs white nationalist/unfettered free speech/unfettered gun rights campaign looks like a deliberate effort to destabilize the US. I think the GOP has probably unintentionally fallen for an influence campaign and taken the reins.

  158. 158.

    Qrop Non Sequitur

    @Annie: Re Churchill, who else could have become Prime Minister after Chamberlain that both parties could stand to serve with?

    Ooh, let me draw on my vast knowledge of 1930s British politics to answer this…

    I got nothing.

  161. 161.

    lowtechcyclist

    @James E Powell:

    Time, Newsweek, US News, Harpers, & Atlantic. Does anyone read like that anymore? I also read multiple newspapers. I was working in the state legislature where the FTFNYT, WaPo, and every daily from across the state of Ohio were available for free.

    Just 30 years ago, TV, radio, newspapers, and magazines were it, in terms of being able to learn what was going on in the world.  And only the latter two, if you wanted more than a very superficial awareness.  A daily newspaper was part of my daily routine for nearly half a century, and a number of magazines were part of that as well, including Time when I was growing up. But now I get my news from here and there on the Web, like most people do.

  167. 167.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Alison Rose:

    Yeah, the two-L spelling is always more common, but it bugs me because that’s how it’s spelled when it’s a last name. That should be a differentiation.

    I’m only familiar with the two-L spelling as a last name. I’ve known a number of one-L Alisons, but I can’t remember anyone with two-L Allison as a first name.

    Gordon Lightfoot didn’t help, with “Poor Little Allison.” Fortunately, Elvis Costello’s aim was true.

  168. 168.

    trollhattan

    @mrmoshpotato: ​Ossis (like Merkel) especially are unlikely to be enthused by a Nazi uprising.

    NB Tried spelling that as Osti and learned a new French Canadian swearword. Don’t say I never warned y’all.

  169. 169.

    Steeplejack

    @trollhattan:

    Most supermarkets (in my experience) still have sizable magazine racks in the office supplies and greeting-card aisle, but almost all of the magazines now are celebrity, lifestyle, cooking and HGTV type stuff. Not news.

    Your mileage may vary in an NYC bodega or similar.

  171. 171.

    dnfree

    @rikyrah: There have been other brave people in my lifetime, like John Lewis and of course MLK, who faced down personal dangers and spent their lifetimes in support of their cause.  But among national leaders, none I can think of in my lifetime has faced a situation like this war and rose so magnificently and consistently to the occasion.

  172. 172.

    trollhattan

    @Steeplejack: ​Space taken up by greeting cards has grown an order of magnitude at our groceries, Target, etc. Guessing because greeting card prices have also gone up an order of magnitude–“70 cents? How does 7 bucks sound? You say the party is tonight?”

    Not sure when that happened; now excuse my while I clear the lawn.

  173. 173.

    dnfree

    @frosty: The last name Olson can end with either “on” or “en”.  I worked with someone who habitually introduced himself as “Olson with two o’s”.  He said that once someone asked him incredulously, “Oolson?”

  174. 174.

    trollhattan

    @dnfree: I wonder what it’s like for he and his security, knowing Russia has flooded the joint with assassination squads. They’re not known to be shrinking violets when it comes to rubbing out people they don’t like.

    Apart from having a ginormous tactical missile drop from the sky, which basically every Ukrainian faces.

  177. 177.

    trollhattan

    @dnfree: ​Anderson has a crapton of spellings. Es and Os and Ss of various counts. Have never seen Aa, but don’t rule it out. Just to be first in the phone book.

    Aanderssen, Ærikk

  178. 178.

    kalakal

    @trollhattan: It’s the proliferation of ‘Days’ that gets me. When I was but a lad there was Christmas, birthdays, and Mother’s Day. I’m expecting to finds cards for 2nd Cousin Twice Removed Day or National Gallbladder Week any day now when I go to the supermarket

  179. 179.

    ian

    @Omnes Omnibus: From what I’m reading, their president tried to dissolve congress.  The police and military are appearing to side with the legislative body against this move.

  181. 181.

    trollhattan

    @kalakal: ​Heh, yep. Also, “Cards, for the alternatively lifestyled” section. Once it exists, are you then compelled to get it?

  182. 182.

    Brachiator

    @dnfree:

    The last name Olson can end with either “on” or “en”.

    Sometimes, this depends on whether the person is Norwegian or Swedish.

    Not too sure about the Danes.

  183. 183.

    lowtechcyclist

    @trollhattan: The reigning champion of transliteration problems is the Russian mathematician Chebyshev. Wikipedia even devotes a section of its Chebyshev entry to the many transliterations of his name:

    The surname Chebyshev has been transliterated in several different ways, like Tchebichef, Tchebychev, Tchebycheff, Tschebyschev, Tschebyschef, Tschebyscheff, Čebyčev, Čebyšev, Chebysheff, Chebychov, Chebyshov (according to native Russian speakers, this one provides the closest pronunciation in English to the correct pronunciation in old Russian), and Chebychev, a mixture between English and French transliterations considered erroneous. It is one of the most well known data-retrieval nightmares of the entire mathematical literature. Currently, the English transliteration Chebyshev has gained widespread acceptance, except by the French, who prefer Tchebychev. The correct transliteration according to ISO 9 is Čebyšëv. The American Mathematical Society adopted the transcription Chebyshev in its Mathematical Reviews.[3]

  184. 184.

    Brachiator

    @Omnes Omnibus:

     

    Apparently there was a one hour coup in Peru earlier today.

    What a wild series of events.

    From BBC News

    Pedro Castillo said he was dissolving Congress just before they were due to vote on his impeachment…

    But Congress, which is controlled by parties opposed to Mr Castillo, convened an emergency session and held the impeachment vote Mr Castillo had been trying to prevent.

    The result was overwhelming: 101 voted in favour of impeaching him, with only six against and 10 abstentions.

    Congress says it will swear in Dina Boularte – who until now was vice-president and who slammed the attempted dissolution of Congress – as the country’s new leader later on Wednesday.

    Crazy background…

    In 2020, it had three presidents within the space of five days.

  185. 185.

    Carlo Graziani

    I don’t think it’s necessary to draw comparisons to the entirety of Churchill’s life  with that of Zelenskyy. Obviously the men and times are very different, and Churchill and Zelenskyy very likely would have despised each other had they met.

    Nonetheless they have one extremely striking and rare thing in common: they are among the very few individual leaders of nations who have, without a shadow of a doubt, changed the course of history for the better at a crucial singular decisive moment, by showing determination, steely character, and moral courage that inspired their respective nations to defiance and resistance, where more ordinary politicians in their place might very well have courted defeat and disaster.  Moreover I am sure that the calamities that they prevented would in both cases have had dire consequences for the entire world.

    So while Zelenskyy may demur at the comparison, I believe that it is both apt and deserved, in this sense, and it is one of the highest compliments that I can think of. It doesn’t make him a colonialist dickhead. It makes him a person of rare moral courage who did more to save democratic social order in the West than any other person alive this century, at least.

  186. 186.

    Geminid

    I have been following the terrorist-induced power outage in Moore County, North Carolina, in local and state media. TV station CBS 17 (WNCN) reported today that this was not an isolated event:

        News Nation [an affiliated news service] obtained a federal law enforcement memo warning “Power companies in Oregon and Washington have reported physical attacks on substations using hand tools, arson, firearms and metal chains possibly in response to an online call for attacks on critical infrastructure.”

    “….In recent attacks criminal actors have bypassed security fences by cutting the fence links, lighting nearby fires, shooting equipment from a distance or throwing objects over the fence and onto equipment.”

    ….The memo said the aim is “to cause widespread power outages with the potential impact of social disruption and violent anti-government activity.”

    TV station WRAL (Raleigh) also reported on a government memo, possibly the same one:

        [A] Bulletin dated Nov. 30 from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security National Terrorism Advisory System indicates the agency warned the nation of heightened threats to critical infrastructure just 3 days before the attack in Moore County:

    “Targets of potential violence include public gatherings, faith-based institutions, the LGBTQ+ community, schools, racial and religious minorities, government facilities and personnel, U.S. critical infrastructure, the media and perceived public opponents.”

  189. 189.

    Alison Rose

    @Carlo Graziani:

    So while Zelenskyy may demur at the comparison, I believe that it is both apt and deserved, in this sense, and it is one of the highest compliments that I can think of. It doesn’t make him a colonialist dickhead. It makes him a person of rare moral courage who did more to save democratic social order in the West than any other person alive this century, at least.

    Agree very much–and thank you for using the phrase “colonialist dickhead” which is so perfect for so many white male leaders in history (and some in present times, too).

  190. 190.

    Alison Rose

    @skerry: Hmm…the one that comes to mind is “How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child” but that could apply to any makeup of children. Trying to recall something more specific to three daughters.

  191. 191.

    Carlo Graziani

    One other interesting thing about Churchill that makes historians feel duty-bound to take him down nowadays — quite correctly, I might add — is that he pulled a historiographical fast one on the field when he wrote his magisterial 6-volume history of the Second World War. He had a completely unfair advantage on all other historians, since he had total access to British government papers while he worked, as well as to his compendious memory and to many civil servants who were happy to sit with him and provide accounts.  Moreover, he wrote with such style and power and sheer narrative persuasiveness that whatever account he set down simply seemed incapable of being gainsaid.

    As a result of all this, all accounts of the war (or at least of the war in the west) for the following 50 years or so essentially followed the general scheme set out by Churchill — the periodization, the players, the strategic choices, the mistakes, etc.  And, of course, the entire thing was almost embarrassingly self-serving in ways that are too well-known to be worth detaining us here.  But it was really remarkable how long the field of World War II history took to really recognize and shake off Churchill’s grip. A testament to his power as a writer, I suppose.

    Nowadays, no self-respecting historian would be caught dead making any unqualified positive statement about the man. They must feel about him the way zoo staff would feel about a gorilla that tried to impersonate a zookeeper…

  192. 192.

    Gin & Tonic

    @JaneE:

    The one-y two-y thing is the difference between Ukrainian spelling and Russian spelling

    Sorry, but this is not correct.

    ETA: Read zhena gogolia at #142. And maybe she and I can get into a tussle about Гоголь vs Ґоґоль. (j/k)

  194. 194.

    BC in Illinois

    On spelling:

    In a Music History class in college, the prof thought for a while that I was using a particular, scholarly spelling of Peter / Pyotr Illich Tchaikovsky / Tchaikovsky / Chaikovsky / Chaikovskii / Tschaikowsky. After a few assignments, he figured out that I just didn’t know how to spell the name. His favorite spelling was imposed from that point on.

  196. 196.

    Geminid

    @Paul in KY: The Japanese launched a first strike on Pearl Harbor in two waves, sending the first wave on while they launched the planes for the second wave. The two waves concentrated on battleships and airfields.

    The plan was to recover the planes and arm them, and then execute a second strike. But the Japanese commander, Admiral Nagumo, got cold feet. He heard how successful the first strike had been, but noted that more Japanese planes had been lost in the second wave. He decided that discretion was the better part of valor, and turned the fleet back towards Japan.

    This was a grave error, and one that Admiral Yamamoto, his superior, would never have made. Left untouched were the aviation fuel tanks you mention as well as the naval fuel tanks; dry dock and repair facilities; and the important submarine base and its ships. Within months, those intact assets enabled the Americans to inflict losses on the Japanese Navy that were many times what Nagumo’s forces would have suffered had he ordered that second strike.

  197. 197.

    cain

    @Geminid: Just a bunch of honorable citizens using their constitution granted 1st amendment rights. Yes, siree – no crime here at all. Just a bunch of boys just having some innocent fun. /s

  199. 199.

    jefft452

    @azlib:

    “He was probably the right person at the time”

    He was the right TORY at the time

    Labour preferred to not have a general election in the middle of the war, but would not form a unity government with Halifax

    Churchill was the only leading Tory that Labor would support

  204. 204.

    kalakal

    My last name is 3 letters, it’s a common English word and people misspell it all the time. I get it with my other names, they’re Scottish and one has a zillion variants but 3 letters! Hah!

  205. 205.

    Geminid

    @Elizabelle: I’ve been worried about people placing bombs at polling stations for a while now. Bombing is a tactic people tend to use when they know their side is losing. I have Charlottesville friends who keep their eyes pealed for abandoned backpacks if they are out and about on the anniversary of the August 12, 2017 rally.

  206. 206.

    Geminid

    @cain: When I heard about that memo on the CBS radio news last night I tried to find reports of grid attacks in the Pacific Northwest but couldn’t find any. I thought that I had misheard the report until I saw these stories today.

  208. 208.

    Geminid

    @Geminid: Correction: that should be “eyes peeled,” not “pealed” as if they were bells.

    Now I am afraid I will be swarmed by the pedant hoards.

  214. 214.

    Layer8Problem

    Hey, this seems to be an actual thing.

    https://mastodon.online/@[email protected]/109474596943074270

    RT @maggieastor
    Barring a breakthrough, @nytimes staff will walk out from midnight to 11:59pm Thursday, Dec. 8.

    We’re asking readers to stand with us on the digital picket line and not visit any NYT platforms tomorrow. Read local news. Make something from a cookbook. Break your Wordle streak.

  218. 218.

    trollhattan

    One recalls the Twain story of giving whistles to all of Brigham Young’s many children. “Rappylee” in this instance, not a real rapper.

    A self-proclaimed prophet in the US had more than 20 wives, some of them younger than 18, the FBI has said.

    Samuel Rappylee Bateman claimed it was God’s will for him to engage in sexual acts with his wives, the FBI said. Bateman, 46, was charged in September with destroying records and obstructing justice in an investigation into whether children were being transported across state lines for sexual activity.

    The details come from an FBI affidavit filed on Friday.

    Bateman was a former member of a branch of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS Church) – a breakaway sect of the Mormon church – until he left to start his own splinter group. The FBI said that Bateman was supported financially by male followers who also gave up their own wives and children to be Bateman’s wives. {now, who are the incels?}

    He punished followers who did not treat him as a prophet, the FBI said.In August, Bateman was arrested when he was discovered hauling a trailer with three young girls aged between 11 and 14.He posted bond but was later arrested on the charges of destroying records and obstructing justice.

    Earlier this year, nine girls were removed from Bateman’s care by Arizona child services, and placed in group homes. In November, eight of them ran away from the group homes. Washington state authorities tracked them down when an officer reportedly spotted a vehicle driven by one of Bateman’s wives, according to the affidavit.

    The driver and two other of Bateman’s wives have been accused of kidnapping in an ongoing criminal case, the FBI said.

    The driver has said that she became one of Bateman’s wives when she was under 18, the FBI said. She gave birth seven months after she turned 18, according to the affidavit. In interviews with the FBI, none of the nine girls placed in homes mentioned sexual abuse by Bateman, but in journals, they referenced intimate interactions with him, the affidavit said.

    The FLDS Church has been designated as a hate group by the Southern Law Poverty Center.

    Lots of alternative  dude hobbies out there. Just saying.

  224. 224.

    Geminid

    @cain: Expect me to disregard your advice.

    I’ve noticed there is a huge amount of cynicism about these attacks and the law enforcement response  to them. I already went round and round with people on a thread a couple nights ago regarding these issues- militia penetration of law enforcement, the shitty Sheriff, the crackpot ex-Army psyops Captain etc.- so all I’ll say now is that I am watching developments with an open mind.

    However, if people are interested in these events I would recommend they follow reporting on local and state media, easily found by looking up “Moore County power outage.”

  228. 228.

    Alison Rose

    @WaterGirl:

    There was good news and bad news after 12 hours of bargaining yesterday. Our collective action is working: Management backed off its attempt to kill our pension and agreed to expand fertility benefits.
    — NYTimesGuild (@NYTimesGuild) December 7, 2022

    But management still barely budged on some of our most important priorities. The company is stuck on paltry pay increases, eroding the minimum pay scales for new hires and contributing less to our health care fund than they currently do.
    — NYTimesGuild (@NYTimesGuild) December 7, 2022

  230. 230.

    dnfree

    @skerry: we also have three daughters.  In Act 3, when King Lear is with a madman in the heath, he gets into quite a rant about daughters.  He at first suspects the other “madman” must also have been driven mad by daughters.  In one version we saw, Lear says sympathetically to Edgar, “Hast thou daughters?”

    LEAR Didst thou give all to thy daughters? And art thou
    come to this?

    EDGAR Who gives anything to Poor Tom, whom the 55
    foul fiend hath led through fire and through flame,
    through ford and whirlpool, o’er bog and quagmire;
    that hath laid knives under his pillow and
    halters in his pew, set ratsbane by his porridge,
    made him proud of heart to ride on a bay trotting 60
    horse over four-inched bridges to course his own
    shadow for a traitor? Bless thy five wits! Tom’s
    a-cold. O, do de, do de, do de. Bless thee from
    whirlwinds, star-blasting, and taking! Do Poor Tom
    some charity, whom the foul fiend vexes. There 65
    could I have him now, and there—and there again
    —and there. Storm still.
    Edgar, in his “Poor Tom” disguise, has sunk ever deeply into the role: he begs and wheedles, sings songs, complains about the cold, and generally acts like a madman.

    LEAR
    Has his daughters brought him to this pass?—
    Couldst thou save nothing? Wouldst thou give ’em
    all? 70

    FOOL Nay, he reserved a blanket, else we had been all
    shamed.
    Lear, who’s getting madder by the minute, wants to know if “Poor Tom” is poor because his daughters took everything from him. The Fool is glad that “Tom” was at least able to hang on to a blanket. (The one covering his naughty parts.)

    LEAR
    Now all the plagues that in the pendulous air
    Hang fated o’er men’s faults light on thy daughters!

    KENT He hath no daughters, sir. 75

    LEAR
    Death, traitor! Nothing could have subdued nature
    To such a lowness but his unkind daughters.
    Is it the fashion that discarded fathers
    Should have thus little mercy on their flesh?
    Judicious punishment! ’Twas this flesh begot 80
    Those pelican daughters.

  231. 231.

    Tehanu

    This is the first political rhetoric I’ve heard in a long time that actually moved me and made me feel hopeful.

  232. 232.

    LiminalOwl

    @zhena gogolia: In grad school, I supported myself typing other people’s work. You just triggered flashbacks to a favorite client: a professor writing a book on Russian foreign policy, and I can still picture her manuscripts (literally: longhand on yellow legal pads) using all three transliteration systems.  We spent a lot of time going through the MS to ensure that each reference was using the correct system for that source.

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