Now is the time to push Vladimir Putin’s back to the wall

Ukraine


Fig. 1. “Destroyed Russian military vehicles located on the main street Khreshchatyk are seen as part of the celebration of the Independence Day of Ukraine in Kyiv, August 24.” Photograph by Gleb Garanich for Reuters, August 24, 2022,[1] fair use.

Justin Sherin, writing as Richard M. Nixon, pressing for more aggressive support for Ukraine:

The best case is to catch [Vladimir Putin] on the back foot and hope this destabilizes the Kremlin—either into negotiations or a sudden realization that President Putin will benefit from a long rest at his dacha. I don’t call either likely, but you have to swing when your opponent drops his hands. (We wrote recently about the danger of stasis leading to nuclear war.) If Putin were to be “taken ill,” we can’t assume that a successor would be more realistic. You can study the Kremlin for years, but changes in power come down to wind direction on a bad day.[2]

I hold a lot of admiration for the job Sherin does in portraying Nixon. It’s an extraordinarily canny performance of possibly the last president to have two brain cells to rub together and you don’t have to agree with Nixon—I certainly didn’t—to admire the insight.

This Nixon points, really, to a larger dilemma. Does the West allow Putin to intimidate it into holding one hand behind its back in aiding Ukraine? To capitulate in this way is rarely a winning strategy in military matters: It much more reliably underestimates the enemy. The question, really, is do you face a difficulty now, or do you kick the can down the road, hoping something changes, and, crucially, that that change isn’t for the worse?

What I’ve been hearing pretty consistently is that any kind of regime change at the Kremlin is precisely likely to be for the worse. There is no evidence and no one even attempts to claim that doves on Ukraine are in any way ascendent. It’s thus pretty damn hard to argue against Nixon here.

Shane Harris et al., “No conclusive evidence Russia is behind Nord Stream attack,” Washington Post, December 21, 2022, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/12/21/russia-nord-stream-explosions/

Richard M. Nixon [Justin Sherin], “Briefing,” Patreon, December 21, 2022, https://www.patreon.com/posts/briefing-76209718


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.

A replacement Fern Hollow Bridge might open as soon as tomorrow.[3] It’s simply flat out impossible to reconcile the speed at which this project has been completed with that of innumerable other road projects that are never, ever fucking done.

Kris B. Mamula, “Pittsburgh’s new Fern Hollow Bridge is engineering marvel, officials say,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, December 21, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/transportation/2022/12/21/pittsburgh-fern-hollow-bridge-engineering-collapse/stories/202212210108


Gilead

Twitter


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,[4] fair use.

This is the Wall Street Journal, not exactly a progressive bastion, on Elon Musk’s search for a Twitter chief executive officer in the wake of another Twitter poll,[5] the results of which called for Musk to step down:[6]

Wanted: Chief executive officer of a flailing tech company who will have no control over that company’s product or distribution. Hours: All. No free lunch. Must be willing to suffer public ridicule and disdain from the company’s owner.

It is not exactly the ad that is going to light up LinkedIn. But it is basically what Elon Musk is searching for in his quest for a new “Chief Twit.” Late Tuesday, Mr. Musk said that he will resign as CEO of the social network he bought barely two months ago “as soon as I find someone foolish enough to take the job!” He added that he still plans to run Twitter’s software and servers teams.

Elon Musk, in other words, isn’t going anywhere. Finding a capable someone to take over a struggling business he has managed to impair further with a few months of erratic management would be hard enough. But as Mr. Musk himself points out, a new Twitter chief won’t even have control over vital aspects of the business.[7]

This isn’t by any means a buried lede. It’s the first three paragraphs of Laura Forman and Dan Gallagher’s article. As they explain, the story gets worse, but then I’d have to quote the whole damned story. And it’s on the way to describing the by no means insignificant wizardry that Musk’s new lackey would need to accomplish.[8]

With respect to Forman and Gallagher, I believe their approach to fixing Twitter is misguided. It’s more than amply evident that Twitter’s biggest problem right now is Musk himself. Fixing the other problems will require fixing Musk, and this needs to be done first.

Michael Race and Monica Miller, “Elon Musk: Only blue tick users to vote in Twitter polls on policy,” British Broadcasting Corporation, December 20, 2022, https://www.bbc.com/news/business-64034892

Reuters, “Musk to step down as Twitter CEO once he finds ‘someone foolish’ enough as successor,” December 20, 2022, https://www.reuters.com/technology/musk-says-hell-step-down-twitter-ceo-after-finding-replacement-2022-12-21/

Laura Forman and Dan Gallagher, “Elon Musk Offers Worst Job in Tech,” Wall Street Journal, December 21, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/elon-musk-offers-worst-job-in-tech-11671648139


  1. [1]Reuters, “Ukraine puts destroyed Russian tanks on display in Kyiv,” August 25, 2022, https://www.reuters.com/news/picture/ukraine-puts-destroyed-russian-tanks-on-idUSRTSALV9Q
  2. [2]Richard M. Nixon [Justin Sherin], “Briefing,” Patreon, December 21, 2022, https://www.patreon.com/posts/briefing-76209718
  3. [3]Kris B. Mamula, “Pittsburgh’s new Fern Hollow Bridge is engineering marvel, officials say,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, December 21, 2022, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/transportation/2022/12/21/pittsburgh-fern-hollow-bridge-engineering-collapse/stories/202212210108
  4. [4]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/
  5. [5]David Benfell, “About Elon Musk’s Twitter poll and about Twitter polls generally,” Not Housebroken, November 21, 2022, https://disunitedstates.org/2022/11/21/about-elon-musks-twitter-poll-and-about-twitter-polls-generally/; Laura Forman and Dan Gallagher, “Elon Musk Offers Worst Job in Tech,” Wall Street Journal, December 21, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/elon-musk-offers-worst-job-in-tech-11671648139
  6. [6]Mike Murphy, “Elon Musk says he’ll quit if poll tells him to, as Twitter bans accounts that promote other social networks,” MarketWatch, December 18, 2022, https://www.marketwatch.com/story/twitter-bans-accounts-that-promote-other-social-networks-11671389073; Elon Musk, “Should I step down as head of Twitter? I will abide by the results of this poll,” Twitter, December 18, 2022, https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1604617643973124097
  7. [7]Laura Forman and Dan Gallagher, “Elon Musk Offers Worst Job in Tech,” Wall Street Journal, December 21, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/elon-musk-offers-worst-job-in-tech-11671648139
  8. [8]Laura Forman and Dan Gallagher, “Elon Musk Offers Worst Job in Tech,” Wall Street Journal, December 21, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/elon-musk-offers-worst-job-in-tech-11671648139

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