Housekeeping
There has been an update to my contact information. What’s new is that I can now be reached via another means of encrypted or clear text chat, Element, at @benfell:matrix.org . Remember that I am very often on the road and may not be able to respond right away.
Imperialism
Russia
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.
Ishaan Tharoor does it right.
Tankies, seeing the U.S. as the exclusive root of all evil in the world, blame the U.S. and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization for Russia invading Ukraine.[2] Vladimir Putin is doing his Peter the Great thing,[3] but this makes no difference to tankies: the U.S. is evil, therefore Putin is a saint.
Tharoor finds a way to blame the west for the invasion without such asininity. He points to a meeting years ago in which NATO equivocated on accession requests by Ukraine and Georgia. Putin invaded the countries soon after and now Ukraine wants to join NATO again. Are we learning from history? Of course, not.[4]
Ben Makuch, “Russian Militia Linked to American Neo-Nazis, Anti-Trans Figures,” Intercept, July 8, 2023, https://theintercept.com/2023/07/08/american-neo-nazis-ukraine-war/
Ishaan Tharoor, “A fateful summit 15 years ago hangs over the NATO meeting in Vilnius,” Washington Post, July 10, 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/07/10/bucharest-2008-nato-summit-history-vilnius-putin-georgia-ukraine-membership/
Wagner mutiny
Vladimir Putin needs Yevgeny Prigozhin and the Wagner Group. Putin knows he needs Prigozhin and Wagner. So here’s this meeting on the Ukraine war, with lots of military commanders, including Prigozhin, all about the war. Entirely as if the mutiny hadn’t happened.[5]
If this all seems mind-numbingly, forehead-slappingly, absolutely insane to you, well, you’re right. I guess the next thing on my bingo card now has to be that all this was a fucking charade.
Nicolas Camut, “Putin met Prigozhin in Moscow after Wagner mutiny,” Politico, July 10, 2023, https://www.politico.eu/article/vladimir-putin-met-wagner-group-yevgeny-prigozhin-moscow-after-mutiny/
Matthew Luxmoore, “Wagner Leader Prigozhin Met With Putin Days After Aborted Revolt,” Wall Street Journal, July 10, 2023, https://www.wsj.com/articles/wagner-leader-prigozhin-met-with-putin-days-after-aborted-revolt-kremlin-says-f10e2f1d
Georgia
Ishaan Tharoor, “A fateful summit 15 years ago hangs over the NATO meeting in Vilnius,” Washington Post, July 10, 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/07/10/bucharest-2008-nato-summit-history-vilnius-putin-georgia-ukraine-membership/
Israel
Palestine
Fig. 2. The ruins of a terminal at the Gaza airport. Image by Said Khatib (Agence France-Presse) on September 9, 2018, via the Times of Israel,[6] fair use.
Aime Williams and James Shotter, “Joe Biden calls out ‘extreme’ elements within Israel’s government,” Financial Times, July 9, 2023, https://www.ft.com/content/6c91f5df-58ce-4fe2-b4f3-de12f565eac2
Gilead
White Christian nationalism
Fig. 3. If one weighs by geography rather than population, Pennsylvania is very much a white Christian nationalist kind of place. Photograph by author, January 5, 2023.
Ben Makuch, “Russian Militia Linked to American Neo-Nazis, Anti-Trans Figures,” Intercept, July 8, 2023, https://theintercept.com/2023/07/08/american-neo-nazis-ukraine-war/
Illiberalism
Fig. 1. Photograph by Joachim F. Thurn, August 1991, Bundesarchiv, B 145 Bild-F089030-0003, via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0 DE.
James Shotter, “Netanyahu faces fresh wave of resistance to Israeli judicial reform,” Financial Times, July 10, 2023, https://www.ft.com/content/6ad4e56f-a511-4359-bad0-547883d2858b
Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh
Healthcare
Kris B. Mamula, “As city fades, UPMC McKeesport Hospital ends care for the most serious heart attacks,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, July 10, 2023, https://www.post-gazette.com/business/healthcare-business/2023/07/09/upmc-mckeesport-hospital-heart-attacks-angioplasty/stories/202307030055
- [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]Roane Carey, “Don’t Be a Tankie: How the Left Should Respond to Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine,” Intercept, March 1, 2022, https://theintercept.com/2022/03/01/ukraine-russia-leftists-tankie/↩
- [3]Julian O’Shaughnessy, “I’m reconquering just like Peter the Great, insists Vladimir Putin,” Times, June 10, 2022, https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/president-putin-creates-police-department-to-impose-martial-law-xqhlt79fn; Reuters, “Hailing Peter the Great, Putin draws parallel with mission to ‘return’ Russian lands,” June 9, 2022, https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/hailing-peter-great-putin-draws-parallel-with-mission-return-russian-lands-2022-06-09/↩
- [4]Ishaan Tharoor, “A fateful summit 15 years ago hangs over the NATO meeting in Vilnius,” Washington Post, July 10, 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/07/10/bucharest-2008-nato-summit-history-vilnius-putin-georgia-ukraine-membership/↩
- [5]Nicolas Camut, “Putin met Prigozhin in Moscow after Wagner mutiny,” Politico, July 10, 2023, https://www.politico.eu/article/vladimir-putin-met-wagner-group-yevgeny-prigozhin-moscow-after-mutiny/↩
- [6]Agence France-Presse and Times of Israel, “20 years after its opening, destroyed Gaza airport embodies grounded peace hopes,” Times of Israel, September 12, 2018, https://www.timesofisrael.com/20-years-after-its-opening-destroyed-gaza-airport-embodies-grounded-peace-hopes/↩