Ta da!
Just your basic yellow cake with chocolate buttercream frosting. It’s a bit crooked, but that just screams HOMEMADE, right?
Open thread!
by Betty Cracker| 139 Comments
This post is in: Food, Open Threads
Ta da!
Just your basic yellow cake with chocolate buttercream frosting. It’s a bit crooked, but that just screams HOMEMADE, right?
Open thread!
by WaterGirl| 66 Comments
This post is in: Open Threads
Update at 4:15 pm:
We did it! We hit the goal for both states! As soon as the $1,500 angel adds his match, we be at just over $19k for each, but we have TWO Angel checks for $1,000 – one for each state, and that takes us to $20,000 for each one! (Even though the checks won’t show in the thermometer!)
*****
Happy Sunday! We got a win for Ukraine in the House yesterday. Let’s take that win and get back to work, hopefully raising enough moolah to meet the external Angel match that Four Directions found us.
The external donor wants to make her match by April 25, and I don’t want to let them down.
So we’re sweetening the deal for donations to our underdog state – NEVADA!
Republicans are coming hard for Jacky Rosen’s SENATE SEAT, and you guys know we need every single senate seat because of the bad senate map this year.
We have a new double Angel match for NV up to $1,500 – that means 6x your NV donation amount up to $50.
On September 16, 2022, with litigation resources provided by Four Directions, the Shoshone-Paiute filed a lawsuit against Elko County, its County Commissioners, County Clerk, Deputy County Clerks, and Chief Deputy County Clerk.
A major hurdle to the Shoshone-Paiute’s access to voting was the fact that its tribal IDs lacked a physical address, a requirement of Nevada voting laws. Four Directions reached an agreement with the Nevada Secretary of State and Elko County officials, which stipulated the tribal government would create an affidavit certifying where residents lived. This would be in lieu of a physical address on their tribal IDs.
Four Directions’ creative thinking allowed the county and tribe to reach a settlement on October 26, 2022. As a result, the Duck Valley Reservation would be granted the following:
- An early polling location on five days before the general election day
- A ballot box on Election Day
- 12 days of early in-person voting
- In-person voting on Election Day for the 2023 election
“We were given citizenship in 1924, and it took us until 2022 to acquire equal access in the Electoral Process,” said Chairman Mason.
This historic settlement that Four Directions worked out helped the Shoshone-Paiute achieve equal access to voting opportunities for not only 2023, but also 2024 and beyond.
Four Directions won the lawsuit, now let’s make that new access a reality and help Four Directions get their people out to vote.
NEVADA
For those who prefer to donate to Four Directions Arizona, the thermometer is still in the sidebar! AZ is a 4x match.
.
Getting Over the Finish Line – 6x for Four Directions NV Donations – We Did It!Post + Comments (66)
by WaterGirl| 96 Comments
This post is in: Open Threads
Looks like we could use an open thread.
Sending people to prison just for possessing marijuana has upended too many lives and incarcerated people for conduct that many states no longer prohibit.
It’s time that we right these wrongs. pic.twitter.com/0avI1FmWf9
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) April 20, 2024
.
Those upset by the sight of Ukrainian flags in Congress after the funding bill passed, are the same people who didn’t blink an eye when insurrectionists were running around the Capitol with Confederate and Trump banners.
Take your outrage and shove it.
— Jack E. Smith ⚖️ (@7Veritas4) April 21, 2024
.
NEW: VoteVets On House Passage Of Aid To Ukraine
“Ukraine has gone above and beyond to hold Putin back, and keep Europe and America from having to fight a wider war…We urge swift passage in the Senate. Ukraine can not afford to wait any longer.” pic.twitter.com/1ihVPKyDDS
— VoteVets (@votevets) April 20, 2024
Anybody still up?
by Adam L Silverman| 47 Comments
This post is in: Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, Military, Open Threads, Russia, Silverman on Security, War, War in Ukraine
(Image by NEIVANMADE)
The three foreign and military aid supplementals and the GOP sort of wishlist bill have now passed the House. The House then immediately went into recess. The Senate will not take them up till Tuesday at the earliest. By not simply bringing the Senate supplemental to a vote, Johnson has instead wasted over four months and given Trump’s supporters in the Senate GOP minority the chance to kill the bill that passed the House this morning. Everyone who is taking victory laps right now should cool it. They are all the same people who took victory laps back in February when the Senate brought up what McConnell and his caucus demanded they had to have: a supplemental aid bill that included significant funding for border security and changes in immigration law. The need to negotiate the border and immigration language had delayed the Senate for three to four months. Ultimately that bill went nowhere because Trump demanded it be killed. So the Senate Democrats stripped the immigration and border provisions out and passed a Ukraine, Israeli, Taiwan/INDOPACOM AOR, and humanitarian aid bill only. Johnson then killed it in the House because it didn’t include anything dealing with the border and immigration.
What the House passed today may pass the Senate this week. It may not pass the Senate this week. We won’t know until Tuesday at the earliest. What we do know is that Putin and Russia will continue to bombard Ukraine. US aid to Ukraine is not a done deal. Hope is not a strategy.
Russia attacked Kharkiv again today. Twice!
This morning in Vovchansk, Kharkiv Oblast, began with russian troops destroying an apartment building, injuring a 60-year-old woman. Additionally, a 50-year-old man was killed in a separate attack that destroyed a private home. #ArmUkraineNow #SaveKharkiv pic.twitter.com/8PeXrSf9O7
— Iryna Voichuk (@IrynaVoichuk) April 20, 2024
The death toll from russian shelling of Vovchansk in Kharkiv Obl has risen to two, additionally two civilians were wounded this morning
Western media isn't covering this,so please spread the word: Ukraine is paying with human lives for each day's delay in receiving military aid pic.twitter.com/TEOxTPkq5P
— Iryna Voichuk (@IrynaVoichuk) April 20, 2024
Explosion reported in Kharkiv! Right now, my hometown is under russian missile attack for the second time in a day!
— Iryna Voichuk (@IrynaVoichuk) April 20, 2024
Here’s what Russia thinks it is doing to Kharkiv.
Watch the video and read the subtitles.
One of the most famous Russian propagandists Olga Skabeeva, who has been broadcasting hatred of Ukraine and the West on TV screens for a decade, gave a master class on propaganda for young students in Kaluga.
She openly stated that Russian strikes on Ukraine are just a matter of… pic.twitter.com/gr0gzdOAoF
— WarTranslated (Dmitri) (@wartranslated) April 19, 2024
One of the most famous Russian propagandists Olga Skabeeva, who has been broadcasting hatred of Ukraine and the West on TV screens for a decade, gave a master class on propaganda for young students in Kaluga.
She openly stated that Russian strikes on Ukraine are just a matter of interpretation and that the strike itself does not matter, only our attitude towards it.
Thus, Skabeeva paints a picture of Russian propaganda – all statements, regardless of the events described, must favor state interests.
And there is nothing particularly secret about this. However, for the first time, we hear such a frank confession from the main mouthpiece of propaganda of the so-called Russian Federation.
Here is President Zelenskyy’s address from earlier today. Video below, English transcript after the jump.
Today, We Received a Decision – the U.S. Assistance, Which Will Be Felt by Both the Warriors on the Frontline, and the Cities and Villages Suffering from Russian Terror – Address by the President
20 April 2024 – 21:30
Dear Ukrainians!
From early morning today, various regions of our country have been experiencing air alerts and Russian strikes. From the east to the south… Sumy, Chernihiv, Kharkiv, Dnipropetrovsk regions, Kherson and the region, Odesa, Mykolaiv, Zaporizhzhia and Donetsk regions. Missiles, drone strikes, artillery. There is a lot of destruction — houses, port infrastructure, and energy facilities. There are casualties and, unfortunately, fatalities. My condolences to their families and loved ones. Throughout the day, our air defense system was in action, there were responses to Russian strikes, the rescuers of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine, and all the services performed their duties.
But this day is still a little different. Today, we received the long-awaited decision: the American support package we’ve been fighting for so hard. And it is a very significant package that will be felt by both our warriors on the frontline and our cities and villages suffering from Russian terror. The U.S. House of Representatives voted today.
I thank everyone who supported our package – this is a life-saving decision. I am grateful personally to Speaker Mike Johnson, to all American hearts who, like us in Ukraine, feel that Russian evil definitely should not prevail. I hope that the package will be considered in the U.S. Senate and submitted to President Biden’s desk quickly enough.
We appreciate every manifestation of support for our state and independence, for our people, and for our lives that Russia wants to bury in ruins. America has shown its leadership from the very first days of this war. And this kind of American leadership is crucial for the maintenance of an international order in the world based on rules and predictability of life for all nations. We will certainly use American support to strengthen both our nations and bring a just end to this war closer – a war that Putin must lose.
And I thank the entire Ukrainian team, everyone who works and does everything to bring this outcome closer. I thank all the representatives of our state, all our diplomats who are working to increase the support for Ukraine, all the representatives of the public sector, every volunteer, all the friends of Ukraine. I am grateful to my team. The world unites for Ukraine when Ukrainians unite for independence.
And today I would like to honor those of our people who have shown their best in the aftermath of the Russian strikes over the week – helping people, protecting lives. These are the employees of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine, our medical workers, police officers. Everyone who works on the scene after the hits. Everyone who rescues people from under the rubble, stops fires, and saves the injured. Thank you all!
I would like to mention some of them in particular… Dnipro: Denys Mikheyev, Artem Serha, Dmytro Nikolayenko – these guys are from the State Emergency Service. Vitaliy Arkhypov – an emergency doctor in the Dnipro region, Yevhen Holitsyn – an emergency feldsher. I would also like to mention the police officers: Oleksiy Bondarenko and Vitaliy Andriyanov. Thank you! Karyna Kolisnychenko – a dog handler from the Pavlohrad search and rescue unit. Thank you for every life saved.
Odesa, SES: Yuriy Sukhorukov, Vitaliy Telehus and Artem Kopechynskyi. Thank you, guys!
Chernihiv: Artem Lysenko – a firefighter, Vadym Avramenko and Maksym Zhylko – also employees of the SES in the region, as well as police officers Andriy Vovk and Bohdan Tkachuk. Thank you! I am also grateful to Natalia Nosenok, a nurse who really cares about people and helps them.
I am grateful to everyone who cares about Ukrainians, about life in our country, about their city, their community, about our entire country! And I am especially thankful to each of our warriors. To all those who destroy the Russian occupier, who hold the frontline and thus preserve Ukraine on the world map. We are doing everything to ensure that our warriors have as many opportunities as possible so that this war ends as soon as possible on our terms, Ukrainian terms.
Glory to Ukraine!
I am grateful to the United States House of Representatives, both parties, and personally Speaker Mike Johnson for the decision that keeps history on the right track.
Democracy and freedom will always have global significance and will never fail as long as America helps to…
— Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) April 20, 2024
I am grateful to the United States House of Representatives, both parties, and personally Speaker Mike Johnson for the decision that keeps history on the right track.
Democracy and freedom will always have global significance and will never fail as long as America helps to protect it. The vital U.S. aid bill passed today by the House will keep the war from expanding, save thousands and thousands of lives, and help both of our nations to become stronger.
Just peace and security can only be attained through strength.
We hope that bills will be supported in the Senate and sent to President Biden’s desk. Thank you, America!
Hope is not a strategy!
Lithuania:
🇱🇹🇺🇦Today, another shipment of Lithuanian military aid reached Ukraine. We delivered a disassembled light attack aircraft L-39ZA "Albatros" to the Ukrainian Armed Forces. L-39ZA "Albatros" was used in @LTU_Army to train fighter control officers, ensuring pilots' combat readiness. pic.twitter.com/sS3STsu8N2
— Lithuanian MOD 🇱🇹 (@Lithuanian_MoD) April 20, 2024
I’m not sure what the Ukrainians are going to do with just one of these, but every little bit helps.
Our weapons of Victory!
📹: @United24media pic.twitter.com/DOM22rYJkV
— Defense of Ukraine (@DefenceU) April 20, 2024
Head of Ukrainian Defense Intelligence Kyrylo Budanov shared some details about shooting down a Russian strategic bomber at a distance of 300 kilometers.
It was a lengthy and carefully prepared operation.
📹: BBC News Ukrainian https://t.co/pd3SAk1JPK pic.twitter.com/73RGOxP5Qi
— Anton Gerashchenko (@Gerashchenko_en) April 19, 2024
Novomykhailivka:
Repelling Russian attack on the Novomykhailivka front. Video by the Shadow air reconnaissance unit. https://t.co/LUTJDTWDMe pic.twitter.com/fHqsbENk9P
— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) April 20, 2024
Bakhmut:
Said to be AASM strike on Russian positions in Bakhmut https://t.co/LGsFGnKOe0
— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) April 20, 2024
Russian occupied areas of Ukraine:
After they beat Azat Azatyan so bad blood came out of his ears the Russians began to interrogate him about his faith. “When did you become a Baptist? When did you become an American spy?”…on how Russia’s war against evangelicals is a war against America https://t.co/vE14HCgPTO
— peter pomerantsev (@peterpomeranzev) April 20, 2024
Peter Pomerantsev in Time:
After they beat Azat Azatyan so bad blood came out of his ears; after they sent electric shocks up his genitals; after they wacked him with pipes and truncheons, the Russians began to interrogate him about his faith. “When did you become a Baptist? When did you become an American spy?” Azat tried to explain that in Ukraine there was freedom of religion, you could just choose your faith. But his torturers saw the world the same way as their predecessors at the KGB did: an American church is just a front for the American state.
Azat was dragged back to the makeshift cell in the occupied city of Berdiansk, in southern Ukraine, where he was held with six others in a cellar that had a bucket for a toilet and hard mattresses on the floor. The other inmates wondered how he could be religious when the punishments meted out to him were so much worse than to them. Azat answered he felt God was always with him. He prayed for the other inmates to be spared. When the torturers returned they left the others alone but told him to come with them: “This time we will kill you.”
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is accompanied with a strategic effort to repress, control, and crush religious groups outside of the Kremlin controlled Moscow Patriarchate, the Russian Orthodox Church. There are over thirty cases of religious clergy killed and kidnapped. 109 known cases of interrogations, forced expulsions, imprisonments, arrests. 600 houses of worship destroyed. And these are just the confirmed numbers, with the real ones in information blackout of the occupied territories will much likely be higher.
Evangelicals are targeted by the Russians disproportionally, and Azat’s story is typical for Russia’s systemic persecution of Protestants in occupied Ukraine. Protestants were the victims of 34 percent of the reported persecution events, and 48 percent in the Zaporizhzhia region where Azat was held. Baptists made up 13 percent of victims – the largest single group after Ukrainian Orthodox. Under Russian control 400 Baptist congregations have been lost, 17% of the total in Ukraine.
There’s a reason for this. Protestants flourished in the democratic decades since the end of the U.S.S.R. Baptists are the third largest denomination in Ukraine. The mayor of Kyiv between 2006-2012 was an evangelical. And for the Russian occupiers they are perceived as agents of America.
Petro Dudnyk, Pastor of the Good News Church, explains that the occupying forces “thought and spoke like this: you are the American faith, the Americans are our enemies, the enemies must be destroyed.” Inside Russia Jehovah’s Witnesses are banned, as is missionary work for Mormons. Evangelical groups are constrained by laws banning missionary activity and labelling some groups as “undesirable organizations.” The U.S. Congress Commission on International Religious Freedom considers Russia as one of the world’s “worst violators” of religious freedom, on par with Iran and Pakistan.
What this persecution highlights is that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is more than just the latest iteration of the Kremlin’s centuries old attempt to crush Ukraine’s freedom. It is also part of the Kremlin’s larger war against America. By hurting those who practice an “American” religion the Kremlin can claim it is striking against American power—while picking on the powerless.
“Your church has no right to exist, as it has connections with America and other Western countries,” Russian authorities told the deacon of the Pentecostal church in Nova Kakhovka, Oleksandr Prokopchuk. They arrested him and his 19-year-old son. Both were later found dead in a forest. In occupied Sloviansk four members of the Evangelical Church of the Transformation were accused of being American spies because some U.S. dollars were found in their pockets. They were subsequently shot and killed.
But it’s not just individual clergy Russian forces go after, sometimes it’s whole congregations. As soon as Russia take over a city armed men turn up during prayers. The investigative news outlet, The Counter-Offensive, has reported on the fate of an Adventist congregation in Donetsk, where, the pastor explains, “every week or two there were searches. People would come with machine guns. Sometimes a tank would come. …they said, ‘You are Americans, this is an American church, this is not [a Russian] church. We were treated like dogs. They beat us. Some were killed. Some disappeared.”
When Russian occupying forces shut down the Melitopol Christian Church, they used sledge hammers to break into the building. Members were interrogated as to whether the church was hiding any Americans. The house of worship was expropriated and given to a Russian Ministry. Its fifty foot cross was chopped down. Click here for video.
Sometimes the Russians also try to “cure” protestants. Viktor Cherniiavskyi, was held for 25 days, beaten with a baseball bat and given electro-shocks. A Russian Orthodox priest was present in this process, and tried to cast demons out of him for being an evangelical Christian. The torturers used a taser to help the exorcism along.
The way the priest and the torturer worked together is emblematic of the interconnection between the Russian state and the Russian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate. The Moscow Patriarch, Kirill, who was reportedly a KGB agent in the 1970s, has vociferously supported the invasion of Ukraine, openly backs the destruction of Ukraine’s sovereignty and promises Russian soldiers their sins will be washed away. When Russian forces accuse evangelicals of being agents of the U.S. they are projecting how the Moscow patriarchate aids and abets Putin. The tradition of priests working for spy agencies continues with Orthodox priests in Ukraine who report to the Moscow Patriarch have also been found guilty of reporting directly to the Russian security services.
Only 4% of Ukrainians Patriarch remain faithful to Kirill’s Moscow Patriarchate—the vast majority have moved to the Orthodox Church under the Kyiv Patriarchate. Moreover 85% of Ukrainians think that the Moscow branch of the Orthodox Church is a security threat. The Ukrainian Parliament is considering a bill that would prohibit religious organisations that are controlled from a country waging armed aggression against Ukraine. Steven Moore, a former Republican strategist who now runs a center documenting religious crimes in Ukraine, compares the approach to the struggle to legislate against TikTok in the US. According to Moore “Congress wants to ban TikTok unless it gets new ownership. The parliament of Ukraine has drafted a bill to close individual churches affiliated with Russia unless they find ‘new ownership’ and renounce the Russian affiliation.”
But such nuance is lost on some lawmakers and media in America, such as Marjorie Taylor Greene and Tucker Carlson, who accuse the Ukrainian government of attacking religious freedom. It’s a twisted situation thinks Moore: while Russia literally murders and tortures Protestants, Ukraine is attacked for trying to find a balance between religious freedom and security.
When I asked Azat about Americans who think Russia a bastion of Christianity while Ukraine persecutes Christians he shook his head in bemusement: “The Russians have come here to kill and oppress—that is against God’s law, let alone human law.”
Smolensk, Russia:
At night a drone attack in multiple regions of Russia was reported. One of the targets of the attack was an oil storage facility in Kardymovo, Smolensk region. 285km from the frontline.
(54.8797115, 32.4317117) pic.twitter.com/8lVVKVFuYu— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) April 20, 2024
Seems like these Lukoil and Neftika oil depots in Kardymovo, east of Smolensk, will bring less revenue to fuel Russia’s war machine pic.twitter.com/iMQtoX4gxJ
— Maria Avdeeva (@maria_avdv) April 20, 2024
That’s enough for tonight.
Your daily Patron!
Listen to your heart ❤️ pic.twitter.com/X4EAsVDmr1
— Patron (@PatronDsns) April 20, 2024
USA 🇺🇸
Thank you 🥰— Patron (@PatronDsns) April 20, 2024
War for Ukraine Day 788: Kharkiv Is Attacked AgainPost + Comments (47)
This post is in: Foreign Affairs, Grifters Gonna Grift, Open Threads, Assholes
Some light debate / derision topics, to test my Blogmaster bigfooting talents:
Before 1977, Ralph Nader is an American hero
1977-95, Nader is an anachronism Dems should listen to but often don't
1996-Present. Nader loses all touch with reality, destroys his life work and reputation forever https://t.co/21KtqeRwVM
— Erik Loomis (@ErikLoomis) April 20, 2024
Hands across the horseshoe…
Newsmax host says Chef José Andrés is “not that nice” and the World Central Kitchen “needs to be disbanded immediately” https://t.co/HPrviyet6Y
— Media Matters (@mmfa) April 10, 2024
Chef Jose Andres is a card-carrying member of the liberal NGO award dinner complex which is why his aid workers getting bombed by Israel provokes such special performative condemnation from premier liberal figures in the US, unlike the countless others that have been bombed
— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) April 3, 2024
Imagining Michael Tracey being chased into the night by Jose Andres security team after they catch him eating an entire carton of butter https://t.co/rwHE5lc5ME
— Environmental Services Weedle (@PartyWurmple) April 3, 2024
Saturday Evening Open Thread: Alternate Timelines, Alternative RealitiesPost + Comments (113)
This post is in: Birdwatching, Food & Recipes, Open Threads
Our friend Spoonie is back, so we’re officially in First Summer (there are something like three) here on the Withlacoochee.
I’m still baking that birthday cake. There was an ingredient I forgot to set out to come to room temp, hence the delay.
Sometimes I wonder how important the ingredient temperature really is. But Ina says it’s important, and I trust her. So we wait.
Open thread!
This post is in: Biden Administration in Action, Open Threads, Politics, Proud to Be A Democrat, War in Ukraine
A long time coming. Too long.
Deep breath.
The best time to plant an oak tree was a hundred years ago. The second best time is today.
Slava Ukraini!
UKRAINE AID PASSES HOUSE
311-112-1
R:
101 Y
112 ND:
210 Y
0 N— Jake Sherman (@JakeSherman) April 20, 2024
Update:
The French ambassador’s residence in DC https://t.co/7S9HFXSGPS
— Eleanor Beardsley (@ElBeardsley) April 20, 2024