April 2022 – Page 3 – Irregular Bullshit

Fast water

April 13, 2022benfell

I do not even know how to categorize this dysfunction:

.@GeorgeMonbiot's latest applies more generally than to the two examples he cites, the #ClimateCrisis and #COVID-19. If my father was still alive, he would be livid; he would see this everywhere.https://t.co/WQRMAeAZG5

— David Benfell, Ph.D. (@n4rky) April 13, 2022

I’m critical of my father for his abusive interpersonal relationships; he destroyed lives, including my own.^[1] But as an engineer, there can be no question he meant well. I don’t know that he saw the specific problem of streamlining riverflows making water run faster and thus enabling it to undermine bridges^[2]—he committed suicide in 2000, certainly long before I’d first heard of it—but I’m sure he would have.

George Monbiot, “Noisily Doing Nothing,” April 12, 2022, https://www.monbiot.com/2022/04/12/noisily-doing-nothing/

Police White supremacist gangs

Hallie Lauer, “Pittsburgh City Council puts hold on Burgess’ bill on warrantless police pedestrian stops,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, April 13, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-local/2022/04/13/pittsburgh-city-council-puts-hold-burgess-bill-warrantless-police-pedestrian-stops/stories/202204130106

^[1]David Benfell, “An unconventional obituary,” Not Housebroken, December 17, 2021, https://disunitedstates.org/2021/12/17/an-unconventional-obituary/↩
^[2]George Monbiot, “Noisily Doing Nothing,” April 12, 2022, https://www.monbiot.com/2022/04/12/noisily-doing-nothing/↩

Reading the toilet paper in Donald Trump’s toilet

April 12, 2022benfell

John Fetterman

There is a new blog post entitled, “This is one race that’s surely getting too much attention.”

Tina Nguyen, “The Trump-Oz-‘Dave’ Love Triangle Takes a Dark Turn,” Puck News, April 12, 2022, https://puck.news/the-trump-oz-dave-love-triangle-takes-a-dark-turn/

Ukraine

Anna Cooban, “Russia has defaulted on its foreign debt, says S&P,” CNN, April 11, 2022, https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/11/investing/russia-default-sp/index.html

Julia Ioffe, “Life and Death and in Between in Kyiv,” Puck News, April 11, 2022, https://puck.news/life-and-death-and-in-between-in-kyiv/

Bruno Waterfield and Charlie Parker, “Finland and Sweden set to join Nato as soon as summer,” Times, April 11, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/finland-sweden-set-to-join-nato-war-ukraine-latest-7m8bn6mf8

Shawna Chen, “West investigates reports of Russian chemical weapons in Mariupol,” Axios, April 12, 2022, https://www.axios.com/russia-ukraine-pentagon-chemical-weapons-adb8a153-2fd5-4313-aa5f-479b9a050925.html

Yuras Karmanau and Adam Schreck, “Putin vows to press invasion until Russia’s goals are met,” Associated Press, April 12, 2022, https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-kyiv-ap-top-news-europe-7d747ae240e9abbfb1951fd4ad27882a

Jon Sindreu, “If Crypto Can’t Be Used to Evade Russian Sanctions, What Is the Point?” Wall Street Journal, April 12, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/if-crypto-cant-be-used-to-evade-russian-sanctions-what-is-the-point-11649763827

Heroes work here? Guess what? They don’t feel like heroes

April 11, 2022benfell

I have fully explained what’s gotten me so pissed at Google that I will never again deal with the Google Store, never again buy a Pixel, and never again use Google Fi as a carrier in a new blog post entitled, “Customer disservice and the Google ecosystem.” No one, under any circumstances, should tolerate the idiocy that customer service seems increasingly to be descending to.

COVID-19 Pandemic

Doctors and charlatans

I was on my way to an Uber order when I reached an intersection that offered a vantage point on an elevated walkway between two buildings very near the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) Presbyterian Hospital. It had, in big bold letters, “HEROES WORK HERE.”

I’ve not been impressed by such empty language as we’ve been treating a lot of those “heroes” as expendable workers.^[1] And I’ve heard again and again from medical workers about their fury over COVID-19 denial. Platitudes, such as “HEROES WORK HERE,” could hardly be expected to remedy the psychological toll of such a highly politicized three-year-old pandemic on people who actually work with or near patients who are actually suffering from the disease.

While Jennifer Abbasi does not mention the politicization or the denial, she reports that many physicians and nurses are leaving or have already left their practices. Burnout and feelings of hopelessness abound. And platitudes won’t help.^[2]

Jennifer Abbasi, “Pushed to Their Limits, 1 in 5 Physicians Intends to Leave Practice,” Journal of the American Medical Association, March 30, 2022, doi: 10.1001/jama.2022.5074

Ukraine

I obviously disagree with Serhiy Leshchenko, whom Julia Ioffe interviews, about the possibility that Vladimir Putin will launch a nuclear war. Even if he is right that one man cannot do this alone,^[3] Putin has plenty of sycophants at the Kremlin.^[4] Surely, he can count on some of them being in the right place to help push that metaphorical red button.^[5]

Leshchenko argues in favor of further U.S. support. Diminishing the risk of a nuclear World War III is part of that argument.^[6]

But I would argue differently. I would argue that U.S. and North Atlantic Treaty Organization dithering does not diminish the risk of World War III. You can argue that Putin needs a victory and that failure to achieve it in Ukraine will result in escalation.^[7] You can argue that Putin’s ambitions extend far beyond Ukraine and onto NATO territory and that a Russian victory in Ukraine would merely whet Putin’s appetite for more. Neither argument diminishes the risk. And I still do not see a way that that risk is diminished short of Putin’s removal from power, which still seems wildly improbable.^[8]

When war is inevitable, we might as well get on with it. And I think it’s inevitable.

Julia Ioffe, “Life and Death and in Between in Kyiv,” Puck News, April 11, 2022, https://puck.news/life-and-death-and-in-between-in-kyiv/

^[1]David Benfell, “On a baffling presumption of goodwill toward ‘essential’ workers,” Not Housebroken, April 29, 2020, https://disunitedstates.org/2020/04/29/on-a-baffling-presumption-of-goodwill-toward-essential-workers/↩
^[2]Jennifer Abbasi, “Pushed to Their Limits, 1 in 5 Physicians Intends to Leave Practice,” Journal of the American Medical Association, March 30, 2022, doi: 10.1001/jama.2022.5074 ↩
^[3]Julia Ioffe, “Life and Death and in Between in Kyiv,” Puck News, April 11, 2022, https://puck.news/life-and-death-and-in-between-in-kyiv/↩
^[4]Isaac Chotiner, “The Purges in Putin’s Shrinking Inner Circle,” New Yorker, March 22, 2022, https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/the-purges-in-putins-shrinking-inner-circle; Mark Galeotti, “How does Putin extract himself from this nightmare of his own making?” Times, March 5, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/how-does-putin-extract-himself-from-this-nightmare-of-his-own-making-v2ktvw08g; David Remnick, “The Weakness of the Despot,” New Yorker, March 11, 2022, https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/stephen-kotkin-putin-russia-ukraine-stalin ↩
^[5]David Benfell, “Nuclear survival,” Not Housebroken, April 6, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/03/13/nuclear-survival/↩
^[6]Julia Ioffe, “Life and Death and in Between in Kyiv,” Puck News, April 11, 2022, https://puck.news/life-and-death-and-in-between-in-kyiv/↩
^[7]Bruno Maçães, “‘Russia cannot afford to lose, so we need a kind of a victory’: Sergey Karaganov on what Putin wants,” New Statesman, April 2, 2022, https://www.newstatesman.com/world/europe/ukraine/2022/04/russia-cannot-afford-to-lose-so-we-need-a-kind-of-a-victory-sergey-karaganov-on-what-putin-wants ↩
^[8]David Benfell, “Where does Vladimir Putin stop?” Not Housebroken, April 8, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/03/04/where-does-vladimir-putin-stop/↩

Important update to contact information

April 10, 2022benfell

The short version is that you should make sure you update my contact information in your contacts data.

The outcome of yesterday’s attempt to obtain customer service was that the Google Store support folks sent me, once again, to the Google Fi support folks, really an encore of the performance that had wasted an hour of my time already. My disgust was overwhelming.

There has been no response from the @GoogleFi team.

I think, moving forward, that a customer support experience in which agents have been reduced to bots with the accompanying intelligence–which is to say, they are idiots–is simply not an experience I can tolerate.

— David Benfell, Ph.D. (@n4rky) April 10, 2022

My experience with the #Google6Pro has, this year, simply been abysmal. First, there were the delayed updates. Second, there was the connectivity problem that wasn't fixed until the second of those delayed updates. Third, there was that it wasn't fixed. Fourth, the above.

— David Benfell, Ph.D. (@n4rky) April 10, 2022

I realize the phone has been getting rave reviews. But upon my return to my previous phone, a Samsung S21 Ultra 5G, I was struck by how stable it seemed. There was one point where I think the Internet connection failed, but this was almost certainly due to AT&T’s service for the car’s hotspot. Also, I think the GPS works better.

Supposedly I have unlimited data with AT&T, which is the vendor that supplies Internet connections to so-equipped Toyotas, but in practice, they rate limit me hard. This has been a point of frustration: My Pixel 6 Pro was flaky with Internet connections but so too is the Internet connection I have in the car. While I’m driving for Uber, the last thing I want to be doing in traffic is debugging Internet connections.

Because the S21 Ultra 5G doesn’t take an eSIM for Google Fi, and because I was unhappy with Google Fi anyway, and because when I was having a problem with cellular data connections, it didn’t seem to be that Verizon was failing, and because I don’t in any way want to be subsidizing this appalling customer service, I decided I don’t need that backup connection as badly as I did in California and decided to terminate it.

So there is revision to my contact information. The Google Fi number, which was originally my AT&T number before AT&T’s customer service pissed me off, is now gone. There are two things that are unlikely ever to be in my life again: Pixel phones and Google Fi.

I have never been able to abide idiots. This was an issue for me way back in junior high school (before they started calling it "middle school"), but it is especially offensive for me now when idiots have real jobs making real money and I'm stuck driving for Uber.

— David Benfell, Ph.D. (@n4rky) April 10, 2022

Actually I think it might have been high school. But it was for sure by high school.

Got that second COVID-19 booster today

April 9, 2022benfell

There is a new blog post entitled, “We are monsters.”

I finally managed to get my second COVID-19 booster. The glitches that bedeviled my previous attempt to schedule one seemed still present, though I got a bit farther with the Walgreen’s scheduling this time—only I did not receive a confirmation, leaving me somewhat skeptical that I had actually succeeded in scheduling it. As it turned out, I had indeed failed.

Looking at the listed plentiful available time slots, however, I suspected they’d be able to fit me in if they weren’t just being all bureaucratic about it and, sure enough, they did. I have previously received the Pfizer shot, but I was aiming for the Moderna shot this time because I suspect there is some benefit to mixing vaccines.^[1] The Moderna shot also appears to be more effective.^[2]

Other folks trying to do something similar, please note: Walgreen’s does Pfizer at some locations and Moderna at others. If you want a particular shot, you need to be fussy about location accordingly.

There was ache as she injected the vaccine and if I rub my hand over the site now, roughly eight hours later, it’s still sore. Otherwise I’m fine. But I very much expect that you should expect your mileage to vary.

It’s not just that I’m (well) over fifty and therefore eligible.^[3] It’s that as an Uber driver, I don’t know the vaccination status of anyone getting in my car and they often decline to wear masks. Uber continues to require masks, but this is a policy I don’t dare enforce because passengers retain the ability to retaliate against me.^[4]

In other news:

My @Google #pixel days seem to be over. My #pixel6pro decided to stop connecting to cellular data, this with the April update, and @madebygoogle support has descended to the level of Uber, which is to say, a complete waste of time.

Simply can't do this.

— David Benfell, Ph.D. (@n4rky) April 9, 2022

This is an absolute catastrophe for me as an Uber driver especially as I’m currently trying to raise money to pay my taxes. I need a properly functioning cellphone just like I need a properly functioning car. This tweet generated a response that seemed relatively intelligent, however, so we’ll see how it plays. It’s possible I may be doing something like driving to Chicago to get a replacement because I just can’t wait for FedEx Stupid to get it to me.

Police White supremacist gangs

Rick Earle, “Officers fired over tasing death of Jim Rogers officially appeal decision,” WPXI, April 7, 2022, https://www.wpxi.com/news/local/officers-fired-over-tasing-death-jim-rogers-officially-appeal-decision/ZZJIGZOTNBCLZNLDLUMSUKIJWE/

Dani Anguiano, “Water, weed and racism: why Asians feel targeted in this rural California county,” Guardian, April 8, 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/apr/08/california-asian-discrimination-water-rights-siskiyou

Dale Russakoff and Deborah Sontag, “Pa. agrees to pay $865k to Latino victims of state police traffic stops and arrests after Inquirer/ProPublica investigation,” Philadelphia Inquirer, April 8, 2022, https://www.inquirer.com/news/pennsylvania-traffic-arrests-latino-immigration-20220408.html

John Fetterman

So Donald Trump endorsed^[5] the carpetbagger from New Jersey^[6] who’s running for the U.S. Senate race.^[7] From what I can see of the yard sign race, John Fetterman retains a huge lead, especially around Erie. I did see my first Dr. Oz yard sign today.

But really, about now, I’d have to say around Pittsburgh the big action is in the Pennsylvania governor’s race where about the only yard signs I see are for the very, very Trumpist Doug Mastriano.^[8] I don’t even know who’s running on the Democratic Party side.

Jonathan Tamari, “Donald Trump endorses Mehmet Oz in Pa. Senate race,” Philadelphia Inquirer, April 9, 2022, https://www.inquirer.com/news/trump-endorses-mehmet-oz-pa-2022-20220409.html

^[1]Tala Michel Issa, “Is it safe to mix-and-match COVID-19 vaccines? Here’s what we know so far,” Al Arabiya, June 23, 2021, https://english.alarabiya.net/coronavirus/2021/06/23/s-it-safe-to-mix-and-match-COVID-19-vaccines-Here-s-what-we-know-so-far; Peter Loftus and Felicia Schwartz, “Moderna and J&J Covid-19 Boosters, Mixing and Matching Authorized by the FDA,” Wall Street Journal, October 20, 2021, https://www.wsj.com/articles/fda-authorizes-covid-19-vaccine-boosters-from-moderna-j-j-11634763535 ↩
^[2]Maggie Fox, “Moderna’s vaccine is the most effective, but Pfizer and J&J also protect well, CDC-led study says,” CNN, September 17, 2021, https://www.cnn.com/2021/09/17/health/moderna-vaccine-most-effective-cdc-study/index.html; Lena H. Sun and Joel Achenbach, “Unvaccinated people were 11 times more likely to die of covid-19, CDC report finds,” Washington Post, September 10, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/09/10/moderna-most-effective-covid-vaccine-studies/↩
^[3]Carolyn Y. Johnson, “FDA authorizes second coronavirus booster shot for people 50 and older,” Washington Post, March 29, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2022/03/29/fda-authorizes-second-booster-shot/↩
^[4]David Benfell, “The expendable worker,” Not Housebroken, May 14, 2021, https://disunitedstates.org/2020/07/05/the-expendable-worker/↩
^[5]Jonathan Tamari, “Donald Trump endorses Mehmet Oz in Pa. Senate race,” Philadelphia Inquirer, April 9, 2022, https://www.inquirer.com/news/trump-endorses-mehmet-oz-pa-2022-20220409.html ↩
^[6]Jonathan Tamari, Ryan W. Briggs, and Jonathan Lai, “Senate candidate Mehmet Oz says he’s a Pennsylvania resident now. So why’s he still hanging out in his New Jersey mansion?” Philadelphia Inquirer, December 2, 2021, https://www.inquirer.com/politics/pennsylvania/does-dr-oz-live-in-pennsylvania-20211202.html ↩
^[7]Trip Gabriel, “Dr. Oz Says He’s Running for Senate in Pennsylvania,” New York Times, November 30, 2021, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/30/us/politics/dr-oz-senate-run-pennsylvania.html ↩
^[8]Associated Press, “State Sen. Doug Mastriano opens Pennsylvania election audit plan,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, July 7, 2021, https://triblive.com/news/pennsylvania/pennsylvania-state-sen-doug-mastriano-opens-election-audit-plan/; Holly Otterbein, “Pennsylvania GOP pledges full allegiance to Trump,” Politico, January 26, 2021, https://www.politico.com/news/2021/01/26/pennsylvania-republican-party-trump-support-462843; Marley Parish, Stephen Caruso, and Cassie Miller, “Pa. GOP lawmaker — and Trump ally — Mastriano initiates ‘forensic investigation’ into state elections,” Pennsylvania Capital-Star, July 7, 2021, https://www.penncapital-star.com/government-politics/pa-gop-lawmaker-and-trump-ally-mastriano-initiates-forensic-investigation-into-state-elections/↩

Humans are inhuman

April 8, 2022benfell

1/3 When I have advocated #anarchism, I have assumed the best of humanity and attributed the worst to our system of social organization.

But if our rulers are no better than we are, it is apparent as well that we are no better than they are.

— David Benfell, Ph.D. (@n4rky) April 8, 2022

2/3 It is little wonder that we are so cruel to nonhuman animals when we are so cruel even to each other.

I do not know how to argue that the rest of us are better than the Russians in Ukraine, the workers in slaughterhouses, the Nazis in the Holocaust.

— David Benfell, Ph.D. (@n4rky) April 8, 2022

3/3 On the contrary, throughout history and now in the present, we are despicably savage. When we point to others, and say they do it, not us, we dehumanize them, just as they do to those they butcher. There can be no excusing any of this savagery, no excusing us.

— David Benfell, Ph.D. (@n4rky) April 8, 2022

Donald Trump

Coup attempt

Tom Jackman and Spencer S. Hsu, “Proud Boys leader admits plan to storm Capitol and will testify against others,” Washington Post, April 8, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/04/08/donohoe-pleads-guilty-proud-boys-jan6/

Police White supremacist gangs

Ukraine

Tom Ball, “Cancer surgeon ‘visited Putin 35 times in four years,’” Times, April 1, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/cancer-surgeon-visited-putin-35-times-in-four-years-gkflcsvfg

British Broadcasting Corporation, “Ukraine war: Gruesome evidence points to war crimes on road outside Kyiv,” April 1, 2022, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-60949791

Julia Ioffe, “How Putin’s Game Ends,” Puck News, April 1, 2022, https://puck.news/how-putins-game-ends/

Daniel Boffey, “‘It is a war crime’: two young boys among neighbours shot dead during attempted evacuation,” Guardian, April 2, 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/02/i-realised-my-husband-was-dead-ukrainians-tell-of-russian-army-atrocities

Martin Farrer, “Russians booby-trapping homes as they retreat, claims Zelenskiy,” Guardian, April 2, 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/02/russia-ukraine-war-invasion-retreat-zelenskiy-kyiv-us-biden-uk-evacuees-escape-mariupol

Bruno Maçães, “‘Russia cannot afford to lose, so we need a kind of a victory’: Sergey Karaganov on what Putin wants,” New Statesman, April 2, 2022, https://www.newstatesman.com/world/europe/ukraine/2022/04/russia-cannot-afford-to-lose-so-we-need-a-kind-of-a-victory-sergey-karaganov-on-what-putin-wants

Reuters, “Russia to halt cooperation over International Space Station,” Guardian, April 2, 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/02/russia-to-end-cooperation-over-international-space-station

Liz Sly and Max Bearak, “Russia pulls back from battered Kyiv region in major shift of war to east,” Washington Post, April 2, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/04/02/russia-ukraine-east/

Clare Ansberry, “In a Pennsylvania Town, a Ukrainian Church and Its Russian Neighbor Navigate Wartime Tensions,” Wall Street Journal, April 3, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/in-a-pennsylvania-town-a-ukrainian-church-and-its-russian-neighbor-navigate-wartime-tensions-11648920990

Bethan McKernan, “Rape as a weapon: huge scale of sexual violence endured in Ukraine emerges,” Guardian, April 3, 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/03/all-wars-are-like-this-used-as-a-weapon-of-war-in-ukraine

Reuters, “Patriarch urges soldiers to defend ‘peace-loving’ Russia amid Ukraine campaign,” April 3, 2022, https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/patriarch-urges-soldiers-defend-peace-loving-russia-amid-ukraine-campaign-2022-04-03/

Jennifer Rankin and Daniel Boffey, “Killing of civilians in Bucha and Kyiv condemned as ‘terrible war crime,’” Guardian, April 3, 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/03/eu-leaders-condemn-killing-of-unarmed-civilians-in-bucha-and-kyiv

David L. Stern et al., “Russian forces pull back from Kyiv, exposing horrors of war,” Washington Post, April 3, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/04/02/ukraine-russia-bucha/

Nandita Bose, “Biden urges Putin war crimes trial after Bucha killings,” Reuters, April 4, 2022, https://www.reuters.com/world/biden-says-putin-is-war-criminal-calls-war-crimes-trial-2022-04-04/

Malachy Browne, David Botti and Haley Willis, “Satellite images show bodies lay in Bucha for weeks, despite Russian claims,” New York Times, April 4, 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/04/world/europe/bucha-ukraine-bodies.html

Amy Spiro, “Liberman refuses to condemn Russia over Bucha, citing ‘mutual accusations,’” Times of Israel, April 4, 2022, https://www.timesofisrael.com/liberman-refuses-to-condemn-russia-over-bucha-citing-mutual-accusations/

Anton Troianovski and Matina Stevis-Gridneff, “Images of Russian Atrocities Push West Toward Tougher Sanctions,” New York Times, April 4, 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/04/world/europe/biden-putin-ukraine-war.html

Gerry Doyle, “Satellite images show civilian deaths in Ukraine town while it was in Russian hands,” Reuters, April 5, 2022, https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/satellite-images-show-civilian-deaths-ukraine-town-while-it-was-russian-hands-2022-04-05/

Alon Ben-Meir, “Bennett Is Siding with the Ruthless Killer Putin,” InterPress Service, April 6, 2022, https://www.ipsnews.net/2022/04/bennett-siding-ruthless-killer-putin/

Robert Burns, “Russia’s failure to take down Kyiv was a defeat for the ages,” Associated Press, April 6, 2022, https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-battle-for-kyiv-dc559574ce9f6683668fa221af2d5340

Julia Ioffe, “‘Never Again’ Again: The History of Putin’s Terror,” Puck News, April 6, 2022, https://puck.news/never-again-again-the-history-of-putins-terror/

Sudarsan Raghavan et al., “Right-wing Azov Battalion emerges as a controversial defender of Ukraine,” Washington Post, April 6, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/04/06/ukraine-military-right-wing-militias/

Tom Engelhardt, “Ukraine in Perspective,” TomDispatch, April 7, 2022, https://tomdispatch.com/ukraine-in-perspective/

Isaac Stanley-Becker and Vanessa Guinan-Bank, “Germany intercepts Russian talk of indiscriminate killings in Ukraine,” Washington Post, April 7, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/04/07/bucha-german-intelligence-radio-bnd-russia/

Dalton Bennett, Adela Suliman, and Mary Ilyushina, “Train station strike in eastern Ukraine takes brutal toll on civilians evacuating,” Washington Post, April 8, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/04/08/kramatorsk-train-station-strike-civilians-ukraine-russia/

Jon Henley, “Russia laments ‘tragedy’ of troop deaths as Zelenskiy warns of atrocities in Borodyanka,” Guardian, April 8, 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/08/russia-laments-tragedy-of-troop-deaths-as-zelenskiy-warns-of-atrocities-in-borodyanka

Adam Schreck and Cara Anna, “Deadly missile strike on Ukraine train station busy with fleeing civilians,” CTV News, April 8, 2022, https://www.ctvnews.ca/world/deadly-missile-strike-on-ukraine-train-station-busy-with-fleeing-civilians-1.5853626

Manhattan district attorney: Liar, liar, pants on fire

April 7, 2022benfell

There’s nothing new that seems particularly enlightening on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, since the last issue.

Donald Trump

Finances

Don’t believe it when the Manhattan district attorney claims the criminal investigation into Donald Trump’s finances is ongoing.^[1] This is a baldfaced lie. It’s dead^[2] not on the merits^[3] but because this is a chickenshit D.A. who isn’t man enough to admit he’s chickenshit.^[4]

William D. Cohan, “The Billion-Dollar Trump-Wall Street Mystery,” Puck News, April 6, 2022, https://puck.news/the-billion-dollar-trump-wall-street-mystery/

Corinne Ramey, “Trump Criminal Probe Continues, While New York Attorney General Seeks Contempt in Civil Case,” Wall Street Journal, April 7, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-criminal-probe-is-ongoing-top-manhattan-prosecutor-says-11649356200

Tierney Sneed and Sonia Moghe, “New York AG asks court to hold Donald Trump in contempt,” CNN, April 7, 2022, https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/07/politics/james-trump-contempt/index.html

Hate

Arthur Goldhammer, “Yes, Be Worried: Marine Le Pen Could Finally Come to Power in France,” New Republic, April 7, 2022, https://newrepublic.com/article/166041/marine-le-pen-win-president-france-2022-elections

U.S. Supreme Court

Mike DeBonis and Seung Min Kim, “Senate confirms Jackson as first Black woman on Supreme Court,” Washington Post, April 7, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/04/07/jackson-confirmation-vote-senate/

John Fetterman

Julia Terruso, “An ad supporting Conor Lamb sparked a backlash for wrongly calling John Fetterman a ‘self-described democratic socialist,’” Philadelphia Inquirer, April 7, 2022, https://www.inquirer.com/politics/election/conor-lamb-super-pac-ad-john-fetterman-20220407.html

^[1]Corinne Ramey, “Trump Criminal Probe Continues, While New York Attorney General Seeks Contempt in Civil Case,” Wall Street Journal, April 7, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-criminal-probe-is-ongoing-top-manhattan-prosecutor-says-11649356200; Tierney Sneed and Sonia Moghe, “New York AG asks court to hold Donald Trump in contempt,” CNN, April 7, 2022, https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/07/politics/james-trump-contempt/index.html ↩
^[2]Jane Mayer, “Why Does New York’s Criminal Investigation of Donald Trump Appear All But Over?” New Yorker, February 24, 2022, https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/why-does-new-yorks-criminal-investigation-of-donald-trump-appear-all-but-over; Corinne Ramey and Deanna Paul, “Two Prosecutors in New York Investigation of Donald Trump Resign,” Wall Street Journal, February 23, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/two-prosecutors-in-new-york-investigation-of-donald-trump-resign-11645650257 ↩
^[3]Corinne Ramey and Deanna Paul, “Ex-Manhattan Prosecutor Who Resigned Said He Believed Trump Committed Numerous Felonies,” Wall Street Journal, March 23, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/ex-manhattan-prosecutor-who-resigned-said-he-believed-trump-committed-numerous-felonies-11648087035 ↩
^[4]William D. Cohan, “The Billion-Dollar Trump-Wall Street Mystery,” Puck News, April 6, 2022, https://puck.news/the-billion-dollar-trump-wall-street-mystery/↩

Your occasional reminder that when you have the ability to do something, and yet, you do not, you are complicit

April 7, 2022benfell

Ukraine

Tom Ball, “Cancer surgeon ‘visited Putin 35 times in four years,’” Times, April 1, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/cancer-surgeon-visited-putin-35-times-in-four-years-gkflcsvfg

British Broadcasting Corporation, “Ukraine war: Gruesome evidence points to war crimes on road outside Kyiv,” April 1, 2022, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-60949791

Julia Ioffe, “How Putin’s Game Ends,” Puck News, April 1, 2022, https://puck.news/how-putins-game-ends/

Alon Ben-Meir, “Bennett Is Siding with the Ruthless Killer Putin,” InterPress Service, April 6, 2022, https://www.ipsnews.net/2022/04/bennett-siding-ruthless-killer-putin/

Julia Ioffe, “‘Never Again’ Again: The History of Putin’s Terror,” Puck News, April 6, 2022, https://puck.news/never-again-again-the-history-of-putins-terror/

Tom Engelhardt, “Ukraine in Perspective,” TomDispatch, April 7, 2022, https://tomdispatch.com/ukraine-in-perspective/

Say hello to your forthcoming dictators

April 6, 2022benfell

Trumpism

Evangelical Protestants

This will be the new governing ideology.

Elizabeth Dias and Ruth Graham, “The Growing Religious Fervor in the American Right: ‘This Is a Jesus Movement,’” New York Times, April 6, 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/06/us/christian-right-wing-politics.html

Student loans

Gabriel T. Rubin and Andrew Restuccia, “Biden Administration to Extend Student-Loan Payment Pause Through End of August,” Wall Street Journal, April 5, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/biden-administration-to-extend-student-loan-payment-moratorium-until-end-of-august-11649181610

David Dayen to Today on TAP list, “ You Could Just Never Resume Student Loan Payments,” American Prospect, April 6, 2022, https://americanprospect.bluelena.io/index.php?action=social&chash=5ca3e9b122f61f8f06494c97b1afccf3.1437&s=1e9c8da033986e0d1f0baa630b5bb784

Danielle Douglas-Gabriel and Andrew Van Dam, “Biden extends federal student loan payment pause through Aug. 31,” Washington Post, April 6, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2022/04/06/student-loan-pause-biden/

Ukraine

Michael Birnbaum et al., “U.S. says Putin being misled, as Ukraine refugee tally hits 4 million,” Washington Post, March 30, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/03/30/ukraine-putin-misled-russia/

Nebi Qena and Yuras Karmanau, “Russia shells areas in Ukraine where it vowed to scale back,” Associated Press, March 30, 2022, https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-zelenskyy-roman-abramovich-kyiv-europe-ef9c28c44f94b34262fe6b7c296d58a6

Tom Ball, “Cancer surgeon ‘visited Putin 35 times in four years,’” Times, April 1, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/cancer-surgeon-visited-putin-35-times-in-four-years-gkflcsvfg

British Broadcasting Corporation, “Ukraine war: Gruesome evidence points to war crimes on road outside Kyiv,” April 1, 2022, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-60949791

Julia Ioffe, “How Putin’s Game Ends,” Puck News, April 1, 2022, https://puck.news/how-putins-game-ends/

Alon Ben-Meir, “Bennett Is Siding with the Ruthless Killer Putin,” InterPress Service, April 6, 2022, https://www.ipsnews.net/2022/04/bennett-siding-ruthless-killer-putin/

Julia Ioffe, “‘Never Again’ Again: The History of Putin’s Terror,” Puck News, April 6, 2022, https://puck.news/never-again-again-the-history-of-putins-terror/

Idiocy. It’s all about idiocy.

April 6, 2022benfell

Student loans

Ukraine

Suffice it to say, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has not gone well.^[1] I return to the theme of idiocy^[2] in a new blog post entitled, “A self-defeating idiocy.” A portion of this post was initially published as an update to two previous blog posts.^[3] Those updates have been replaced with a note pointing to this new post. The text in the new post has been revised and extended from the earlier updates.

^[1]William Booth, Robyn Dixon, and David L. Stern, “Russian generals are getting killed at an extraordinary rate,” Washington Post, March 26, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/03/26/ukraine-russan-generals-dead/; Larisa Brown, Charlie Parker, and Richard Spencer, “Ukraine forces ‘counter-attack’ as Russia loses estimated 7,000 troops and 230 tanks,” Times, March 18, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/ukraine-crisis-world-war-three-may-have-already-started-warns-zelensky-f5fs72vq5; Larisa Brown and Richard Spencer, “Struggling Russians ‘plant mines’ and dig in for a long war,” Times, March 21, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/retroville-mall-a-symbol-of-new-kyiv-is-destroyed-by-cruise-missile-0znsr9zc9; Robert Burns, “Russia’s failure to take down Kyiv was a defeat for the ages,” Associated Press, April 6, 2022, https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-battle-for-kyiv-dc559574ce9f6683668fa221af2d5340; Helene Cooper, Julian E. Barnes, and Eric Schmitt, “As Russian Troop Deaths Climb, Morale Becomes an Issue, Officials Say,” New York Times, March 16, 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/16/us/politics/russia-troop-deaths.html; Mark Galeotti, “How does Putin extract himself from this nightmare of his own making?” Times, March 5, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/how-does-putin-extract-himself-from-this-nightmare-of-his-own-making-v2ktvw08g; Michael R. Gordon and Alex Leary, “Russia, Failing to Achieve Early Victory in Ukraine, Is Seen Shifting to ‘Plan B,’” Wall Street Journal, March 20, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/russia-failing-to-achieve-early-victory-in-ukraine-is-seen-shifting-to-plan-b-11647824374; Jon Henley, Pjotr Sauer, and Shaun Walker, “‘Ukrainians are not naive’: Zelenskiy voices doubt on Russian military withdrawals,” Guardian, March 29, 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/29/ukraine-russia-peace-talks-istanbul-war-kyiv; Richard Kemp, “The Russian army has run out of time,” Telegraph, March 22, 2022, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2022/03/22/russian-army-has-run-time/; Dan Lamothe, Alex Horton, and Karoun Demirjian, “Ukraine’s military adapts tactics after enduring Russia’s initial invasion,” Washington Post, March 5, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/03/05/ukraine-military-strategy/; Eric Levitz, “Putin’s War Looks Increasingly Insane,” New York, March 4, 2022, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/03/putins-war-looks-increasingly-insane.html; Matthew Luxmoore, “Russia Refocuses on Ukraine’s East After Month of Heavy Losses,” Wall Street Journal, March 25, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/russia-refocuses-on-ukraines-east-after-month-of-heavy-losses-11648243627; James Mackenzie, Natalia Zinets, and Oleksandr Kozhukhar, “Russia getting bogged down in Ukraine, Western nations say,” Reuters, March 17, 2022, https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/shells-hit-theatre-sheltering-ukraine-civilians-biden-calls-putin-war-criminal-2022-03-17/; Justin McCurry, Samantha Lock, and Luke Harding, “Russia targeting cities as strength of Ukraine’s resistance ‘continues to surprise’, UK says,” Guardian, March 6, 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/06/biden-and-zelenskiy-discuss-more-aid-for-ukraine-as-russian-attacks-intensify; Ashley Parker et al., “‘No off-ramps’: U.S. and European officials don’t see a clear endgame in Ukraine,” Washington Post, March 11, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/03/10/ukraine-end-game/; Nebi Qena and Yuras Karmanau, “Russia shifts focus to try to grind Ukraine’s army in east,” Associated Press, March 28, 2022, https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-putin-kyiv-business-europe-7386a5893a3b43bad7e438cfe45468c2; David Remnick, “The Weakness of the Despot,” New Yorker, March 11, 2022, https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/stephen-kotkin-putin-russia-ukraine-stalin; Dan Sabbagh, “Is an outright Russian military victory in Ukraine possible?” Guardian, March 17, 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/17/is-an-outright-russian-military-victory-in-ukraine-possible; Liz Sly and Max Bearak, “Russia pulls back from battered Kyiv region in major shift of war to east,” Washington Post, April 2, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/04/02/russia-ukraine-east/; Liz Sly and Dan Lamothe, “Russia’s war for Ukraine could be headed toward stalemate,” Washington Post, March 20, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/03/20/russia-ukraine-military-offensive/↩
^[2]David Benfell, “Vladimir Putin is a fool,” Not Housebroken, March 29, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/01/24/vladimir-putin-is-a-fool/↩
^[3]David Benfell, “Nuclear survival,” Not Housebroken, March 30, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/03/13/nuclear-survival/; April 4, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/03/04/where-does-vladimir-putin-stop/↩