Ukraine
Fig. 1. “The atomic cloud over Nagasaki 1945.” Photograph from Office for Emergency Management. Office of War Information. Overseas Operations Branch, New York Office, News and Features Bureau, (12/17/1942 – 09/15/1945), by Charles Levy, August 9, 1945, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
Three U.S. officials said preliminary assessments suggested the missile [which hit Przewodów, a village in Poland, killing two people] was fired by Ukrainian forces at an incoming Russian one amid the crushing salvo against Ukraine’s electrical infrastructure Tuesday. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.[1]
Assuming these “preliminary assessments” hold, and it appears this is the line the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is adopting,[2] Russia remains at fault. Ukraine was defending itself against a Russian attack on its infrastructure. The trouble here is that the blame on Russia[3] is indirect and therefore muted. An opportunity to wring some concessions from Vladimir Putin[4] at a time when Putin’s back is against the wall with his retreat from Kherson,[5] and at a time when it is even more apparent that Russia is in hopelessly over its head with its war on Ukraine,[6] is going to waste.
Julia Ioffe, “Putin’s Retreat & Kyiv’s Dangerous Hope,” Puck News, November 15, 2022, https://puck.news/putins-retreat-kyivs-dangerous-hope/
Seung Min Kim and Zeke Miller, “Biden calls ‘emergency’ meeting after missile hits Poland,” Associated Press, November 15, 2022, https://apnews.com/article/g-20-summit-nato-biden-andrzej-duda-25e615909ba0d871d5092f5b3aec21c8
Vanessa Gera, Zeke Miller, and Michael Balsamo, “Poland: Russian-made missile fell on our country, killing 2,”
Daniel Michaels, Laurence Norman, and Drew Hinshaw, “NATO Says Missile That Hit Poland Was Likely Ukraine Air Defense,” Wall Street Journal, November 16, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/missile-that-hit-poland-likely-launched-by-ukraine-in-air-defense-western-officials-say-11668589786
Gilead
Fig. 1. “Elon Musk shared a video of his entrance on his Twitter account.” Photograph attributed to Elon Musk, October 26, 2022, via the New York Post,[7] fair use.
Elon Musk is simply delusional:
Anyone who did not sign the pledge by 5 p.m. Eastern time Thursday was told they would receive three months of severance pay, the message said.
In the midnight email, which was shared with The Washington Post, [Elon] Musk said Twitter “will need to be extremely hardcore” going forward. “This will mean working long hours at high intensity,” he said. “Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade.”
The pledge email, paired with a new policy mandating a return to the office, is expected to lead to even more attrition at a company whose staff Musk had already reduced by half.[8]
What Musk is attempting here is to treat creative (for an admittedly strange value of ‘creative’) people like Amazon warehouse workers, with work speed-ups. Creativity simply doesn’t work like that and only a fool imagines that it does.
And, just as with the warehouse workers, it’s not clear that there’s any reward for this effort, other than getting to keep an abusive, albeit a whole lot better paid, job for an abusive employer. What’s different here is that Amazon will probably still be in business next year and the year after. There’s considerable reason to doubt that Twitter will be.[9]
Faiz Siddiqui and Jeremy B. Merrill, “Musk issues ultimatum to staff: Commit to ‘hardcore’ Twitter or take severance,” Washington Post, November 16, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/11/16/musk-twitter-email-ultimatum-termination/
Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh
Infrastructure
Fig. 1. Post-collapse scene at the Fern Hollow Bridge, photograph by National Transportation Safety Board, January 29, 2022, via Wikimedia Commons, public domain.
Julia Felton, “Pittsburgh to use $400K designated for public safety training facility on road work,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, November 14, 2022, https://triblive.com/local/pittsburgh-to-use-400k-designated-for-public-safety-training-facility-on-road-work/
Julia Felton, “Pittsburgh sets goal to clear roads within 24 hours of snowfall,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, November 15, 2022, https://triblive.com/local/pittsburgh-officials-share-citys-plans-for-snow-removal-say-goal-is-to-clear-streets-within-24-hours-of-snowfall/
Unauthorized violence
Fig. 1. “A woman reacts at a makeshift memorial outside the Tree of Life synagogue following Saturday’s shooting at the synagogue in Pittsburgh, Oct. 29, 2018,” photograph by Cathal McNaughton for Reuters, via ABC News, October 29, 2018,[10] fair use.
Midway Drive, where a stabbing occurred,[11] runs through a housing project in a far corner of West Mifflin, adjacent to Whitaker Borough and near the Rankin Bridge.
The project is old and decrepit. I don’t know how anyone feels safe but there are a lot of people living there.
I venture into this project occasionally, picking up or dropping off passengers.
Security at this project is more than a little bizarre. If I drive in on Midway Drive past the first few buildings, where I guess anything goes, I have to present my driver’s license to a security guard who scans the code on the back, recording my details. But there are other streets leading into the project which are completely unguarded. Anybody on foot or riding a bus goes unidentified. Any passengers I bring into the complex go unidentified.
So there’s really no control whatsoever over who’s coming or going. They just pretend to have security.
Maddie Aiken, “Man dies after stabbing in West Mifflin,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, November 15, 2022, https://triblive.com/local/south-hills/man-dies-after-stabbing-in-west-mifflin/
Justin Vellucci, “Bystander struck by bullet in Downtown Pittsburgh, police say,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, November 15, 2022, https://triblive.com/local/bystander-struck-by-bullet-in-downtown-pittsburgh-police-say/
- [1]Vanessa Gera, Zeke Miller, and Michael Balsamo, “Poland: Russian-made missile fell on our country, killing 2,”
, November 16, 2022, https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-zelenskyy-kherson-9202c032cf3a5c22761ee71b52ff9d52↩ - [2]Daniel Michaels, Laurence Norman, and Drew Hinshaw, “NATO Says Missile That Hit Poland Was Likely Ukraine Air Defense,” Wall Street Journal, November 16, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/missile-that-hit-poland-likely-launched-by-ukraine-in-air-defense-western-officials-say-11668589786↩
- [3]Vanessa Gera, Zeke Miller, and Michael Balsamo, “Poland: Russian-made missile fell on our country, killing 2,”
, November 16, 2022, https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-zelenskyy-kherson-9202c032cf3a5c22761ee71b52ff9d52; Daniel Michaels, Laurence Norman, and Drew Hinshaw, “NATO Says Missile That Hit Poland Was Likely Ukraine Air Defense,” Wall Street Journal, November 16, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/missile-that-hit-poland-likely-launched-by-ukraine-in-air-defense-western-officials-say-11668589786↩ - [4]David Benfell, “Where does Vladimir Putin stop?” Not Housebroken, November 15, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/03/04/where-does-vladimir-putin-stop/↩
- [5]Julia Ioffe, “Putin’s Retreat & Kyiv’s Dangerous Hope,” Puck News, November 15, 2022, https://puck.news/putins-retreat-kyivs-dangerous-hope/↩
- [6]Julia Ioffe, “Putin’s Retreat & Kyiv’s Dangerous Hope,” Puck News, November 15, 2022, https://puck.news/putins-retreat-kyivs-dangerous-hope/; Vanessa Gera, Zeke Miller, and Michael Balsamo, “Poland: Russian-made missile fell on our country, killing 2,”
, November 16, 2022, https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-zelenskyy-kherson-9202c032cf3a5c22761ee71b52ff9d52↩ - [7]Thomas Barrabi, “Elon Musk barges into Twitter HQ as deal nears: ‘Let that sink in,’” New York Post, October 26, 2022, https://nypost.com/2022/10/26/elon-musk-barges-into-twitter-headquarters-as-deal-nears/↩
- [8]Faiz Siddiqui and Jeremy B. Merrill, “Musk issues ultimatum to staff: Commit to ‘hardcore’ Twitter or take severance,” Washington Post, November 16, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/11/16/musk-twitter-email-ultimatum-termination/↩
- [9]David Benfell, “Elon Musk’s Achilles’ heel,” Not Housebroken, November 15, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/07/10/elon-musks-achilles-heel/↩
- [10]Bill Hutchinson et al., “Pittsburgh synagogue-shooting suspect wheeled into courtroom; Trump to visit city Tuesday,” ABC News, October 29, 2019, https://abcnews.go.com/US/pittsburgh-synagogue-shooting-suspect-discharged-hospital-set-make/story?id=58825389↩
- [11]Maddie Aiken, “Man dies after stabbing in West Mifflin,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, November 15, 2022, https://triblive.com/local/south-hills/man-dies-after-stabbing-in-west-mifflin/↩