Ilhan Omar Responds To Anti-War Internet Disinformation

counterpunch  |   And even though they may lack the finely tuned mental framework to fit it all together, thanks to their news consumption habits, lots of people have begun to glimpse that Washington’s idiocy could get them blown up tout de suite and meanwhile is bleeding them dry and will very soon be bleeding them drier. Hence the public’s growing reluctance to keep handing Ukraine, the most corrupt country in Europe, blank checks. The GOP even climbed onto the bandwagon and announced it won’t fund this misbegotten war if it regains congress. I, for one, will be astonished if Republicans have the backbone to keep that promise. Anyway, Biden plans to preempt this oath by forking over more billions to Kiev now. This will not, ahem, help the Dems, which is probably what Republicans count on. But then Biden gets to look like he’s a man of principle (the show must go on), while the rest of us go broke and calculate our distance from atomic ground zero. Americans struggle with utility bills, grocery and gas prices, medical and educational debt. They don’t need to fund defense contractors to the tune of billions of dollars so Ukrainians and Russians can kill each other halfway around the world. And they certainly don’t need a war that has humanity teetering on the brink of nuclear Armageddon.

I am sorry, you all aren’t “anti war protesters”, you are dangerous propagandists who are literally making a mockery of the anti war movement.

I have never had the pleasure of responding to 🇷🇺 ridiculous internet disinformation in person before. Thank you for the opportunity ✌🏽 https://t.co/xzTLQCymgO

— Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) October 28, 2022

In an unexpected dribble of good news, on October 24 the Washington Post reported that some 30 members of the progressive caucus urged Biden to get diplomacy to end the war rolling. The next day, they sniveled and recanted. This was the first time any Dems had the guts not to cheerlead for more bloodshed and more war on Moscow. What caused this initial sea change, I don’t know. But it was good news. Better late than never, it seemed. It appeared to mean some on the so-called left in Washington had finally come to their senses and just might not behave as disgracefully as so many European socialists did once World War I started, when they abandoned their erstwhile pacifism. For a long time, honestly, it has looked like that was the inheritance Dem progressives wanted to claim, an inheritance not just of shame and mass murder, but, were the Ukraine war to morph into World War III, human extinction.

For less than a day the sun of reason and goodness shone down. Briefly, the people who consider themselves of the left decided this danger of humanity’s mass execution was worth speaking out about and that diplomacy for peace is the only sane route out of the fiasco. But then, the next day they chickened out of bucking their party’s bloodlust. Even their timid gesture was too much to ask. These people are not leftists. They are cowards. They are a disgrace to the left. If anyone in the progressive caucus ever speaks out for diplomacy again, I’ll be very impressed.

Speaking of being impressed, how about that Washington Post actually playing this story big, about progressives calling for diplomacy, instead of burying it? That was unexpected, to say the least. Because it’s long been sickeningly obvious that our mainstream media show one side of the story: the NATO, Washington, imperial, war-mongering side. And it’s been doing that, shamelessly, for a generation. (It did that earlier too, but with a bit of actual embarrassment, whenever it got called out.) Remember Iraq’s infamous weapons of mass destruction? The editors who hyped that lie for months on end went on to bigger and better things, and so did the politicians – Biden even became president! – while an entire country, Iraq, was bombed to smithereens, based largely on mendacious reporting and political chicanery and now, decades later, has simply swirled down the drain.

ANY Chance Rochelle Bersoff-Walensky's Daddy's Thumb Was On The Scale Of The CDC Director's Selection?

profilesinsuccess  |  Ed’s wife, Marilynn, was beside him every step of the way through the BTG journey. In fact, several years before they married, she left CTEC and became Ed’s first employee at BTG. “She’s my moral compass,” he says. “Through all the ups and downs, she’s always kept me on the straight and narrow, and is an exceptional judge of character. She’s got this sense about her, and she keeps me grounded.” Ed is also grounded by his remarkable daughters—one a research physician and professor at Harvard Medical School, and the other a practicing physician in DC who successfully treated one of the anthrax patients. “As proud as my parents were of me when I showed them my speech at the White House, I’m equally proud of my daughters,” says Ed.

Ok I'll weigh in. The question for me isn't whether it's okay to express schadenfreude wrt Walensky. It's how can we pressure her, as executor of a family trust whose $ comes from her father's role in Titan Corporation, to pay reparations to Titan's torture victims in Abu Ghraib

— Justin Feldman (@jfeldman_epi) October 23, 2022

Ed’s engagement in the business community has remained strong in the wake of selling BTG. In 2006, he joined with a team of investors to form a Special Purpose Acquisition Corporation, raising $126 million in the public market to purchase a civilian government contractor called ATS Corporation. Ed served as CEO of ATS, leading it to flourish until it was sold in 2010 to Salient Technologies, Inc.

Ed then shifted his focus full-time to his participation in nonprofit and for-profit boards—commitments he has prioritized since 1984.  Using his “Seven P’s” as guiding beacons, he has served as a Board member, Advisor, or Committee member of over fifty organizations, including Virginia’s Center for Innovative Technology, the Northern Virginia Technology Council, the Technology Work Group of the Virginia Economic Recovery Commission, and Holy Cross Hospital.

Education, as well, has remained a passion for Ed, and although full-time academic teaching never became the focal point of his career, he taught mathematics at NYU and Kingsborough Community College. During his tenure at NASA, he taught similar courses at Boston University and Northeastern University. Later on, he continued to teach at American University, the University of Maryland, and George Mason University. He served as President of the Board of Directors of the Northern Virginia Community College Educational Foundation, as well as on the Board of Trustees at Virginia Commonwealth University. One of his greatest honors came when he was asked to serve on the Board of Trustees at New York University, his Alma Mater, and more recently, he was invited by Governor Terry McAuliffe to serve on the Board of the Virginia 529 Program. “It’s a lot of fun,” he says. “We have to think about how you finance a college education, and what the return on capital for that education will look like in 20 years.”

In advising young people entering the working world today, Ed underscores the importance of commitment as a foundation for laying out the Seven P’s. “Nothing is easy,” he says. “Don’t flounder. Figure out what you want to do and then go do it. And when you face setbacks, remember you have two choices. You can go back to bed and hide, or you can go to work and put on a brave face. Those moments will be your waypoints, and I hope you choose to do what you have to do, rather than what you might want to do in that moment.”

Beyond that, Ed has found that the Seven P’s tend to lead people to that ideal ground where altruism and self-interest intersect. “Self-interest is fine, but never at the expense of others,” he says. “Altruism is wonderful, but you can’t have a mission without money. I think the real value set is all about pursuing something of importance, but in a business-like way so you ensure you have the resources to actually accomplish it.”

From his days delivering papers and playing street ball in Manhattan, to his introduction of President Bill Clinton at the White House, to his legacy of leadership throughout the DC business community, Ed’s astounding accomplishments are the projection of the mission sense that has always guided him—a pixel-precise vision he hopes the entire country will reclaim with time. “When I graduated from college and started work at NASA, every single person in that organization—and across the U.S.—was aligned and motivated in our goal to make it to the moon,” he reflects. “Now, I attribute our national sense of malaise to the fact that we’ve lost our mission sense as a country. Everyone needs that object called mission—the new moon that inspires them to write their future, and then go out and live it.”

The Pontificating Pustule Of Political Pomposity Dindu Nuffin!!!

Missile Defense Fantasies: AKA That Above Top Secret Green Gas BeeDee Was Talm'bout....,

undark |  century now, governments and their military forces have enlisted the aid of scientists and engineers to invent weapons, devise defenses, and advise on their use and deployment.

Unfortunately, scientific and technological realities don’t always conform to the preferred policies of politicians and generals. Back in the 1950s, some U.S. officials liked to proclaim that scientists should be “on tap, not on top”: in other words, ready to provide handy advice when needed, but not offering advice that contradicted the official line. That attitude has persisted into the present, but scientists have steadfastly refused to play along.

One of the best-known leaders of this resistance is Theodore “Ted” Postol, professor emeritus of science, technology, and national security policy at MIT. Trained as a physicist and nuclear engineer, Postol has spent a career immersed in the details of military and defense technology. He worked for Congress in the now-defunct Office of Technology Assessment, then in the Pentagon as an adviser to the Chief of Naval Operations before joining academia, first at Stanford University and then returning to his alma mater, MIT.

Throughout, he has been an outspoken critic of unworkable concepts, impractical ideas, and failed technological fantasies, including Ronald Reagan’s “Star Wars” system, the vaunted Patriot missile of the first Gulf War, and more recent intercontinental ballistic missile defense concepts tested by the U.S. His investigations and analyses have repeatedly revealed self-deception, misrepresentation, flawed research, and outright fraud from the Pentagon, academic and private laboratories, and Congress.

When we contacted him, we found that, far from being retired at age 70, he was preparing to travel to Germany to consult with the German Foreign Ministry on European-Russian relations. His work exemplifies the eternal verity that if something sounds too good to be true, it usually is. In the exchange below, his responses have been edited for length and clarity.

Tulsi Fitna Get A Little "Civil Affairs And Information Operations" Training

It’s almost Friday! Who am I kidding ... Weekends haven’t been a thing for me for a while. Congress isn’t back in session til Nov 16th so doing some great Army Civil Affairs Officer training! Grateful to be in Hawai’i. Sending you all aloha & best wishes wherever you are! #ALOHA pic.twitter.com/EXxU8klhjD

— Tulsi Gabbard 🌺 (@TulsiGabbard) October 15, 2020

armytimes |  Congresswoman and former presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard has left the Hawaii Army National Guard for a new assignment with a California-based Army Reserve unit, military officials said.

Gabbard’s new part-time assignment as an Army Reserve civil affairs officer follows 17 years with the Hawaii National Guard, The Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported Sunday.

The Hawaii National Guard confirmed Gabbard, who holds the rank of major, made the switch in June, but the transfer to an out-of-state unit was not formally announced, even to the state’s National Guard personnel.

Gabbard’s new posting, the 351st Civil Affairs Command, is based in Mountain View, California, but has subordinate units in other Western states.

The Army Reserve supports the active-duty Army and has more commands and promotion opportunities. Like the National Guard, most Army reservists serve part-time.

“The House in Congress isn’t scheduled to be back in session til Nov. 16th so I’m taking advantage of the time to do some great Army Civil Affairs training! I’m grateful to be able to do it in Hawaii,” the 39-year-old Democrat said in a social media message posted Thursday.

Gabbard’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Gabbard served in the Hawaii Legislature and Honolulu City Council before being elected to the U.S. House in 2012.

wikipedia |  The Information Operations (IO) is the Unit specifically and officially tasked with deployment of ‘information related capabilities’ (IRCs), which is euphemistic U.S. Military jargon for rapidly developing a broad range of propaganda, disinformation and any other tools of political subterfuge available in order to influence, disrupt, corrupt, or usurp the decision making processes of foreign governments, such as through creating propaganda, suppressing foreign news outlets and communications systems with ‘media blackouts’ particularly during operations also involving significant traditional military combat or other activities likely to result in imagery not beneficial to the United States, stirring up civil unrest, supporting false flag operations with false reporting in support of the U.S. narrative, bribery, blackmail etc. but officially not through any supportive role in political assassination support due to the Church Committee controversy. Generally, foreign assassinations and most other actual use of force operations are done in collaboration with classified elements of the U.S. military & intelligence communities such as the CIA and not within IO Units themselves unless absolutely necessary, such as if ambushed unexpectedly.

Equivalent foreign military intelligence programs are officially under the purview of FBI Counter-Intelligence (COINTEL].

The 151st Theater Information Operations is Group (151st TIOG) was realigned under the command of USACAPOC(A) in October 2015.

Information Operations units are the field commander's capability to synchronize and de-conflict IRCs in the commander's information environment. The Soldiers consist of teams which interface and provide IO expertise to the staff.^[6] 151st TIOG IO practitioners are particularly suited for this mission as U.S. Army Reserve Soldiers with civilian occupations such as law enforcement, engineering, medicine, law, finance, public administration and civil service, etc.; and, civilian education such as Project Management Professional (PMP), Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Juris Doctor (J.D.), Master of Business Administration (MBA), Master of Public Administration (MPA), etc.^[7][8]

Information Operations Soldiers are integral to U.S. missions across Northwest Africa, East Africa, Europe, Middle East, and various other locations. If you see something, say something.

Kara Murza: America's Compradors ALWAYS Look Like Whipped Dogs

WaPo  | “It takes incredible courage in today’s Russia to stand against the power in place,” Tiny Kox, the president of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, said this week in awarding Washington Post contributing columnist Vladimir Kara-Murza the Václav Havel Prize for his defense of human rights in his home country of Russia.

Kara-Murza is currently in a Russian prison awaiting trial on trumped-up charges of distributing “fake news” about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. His wife, Evgenia, accepted the prestigious award on his behalf in Strasbourg, France, on Oct. 10. The prize is named for the former president of Czechoslovakia, who — before he rose to that position after the 1989 revolution that overthrew the communist regime — himself spent many years in prison for his dissident activities. The Post is publishing Vladimir Kara-Murza’s acceptance speech below.

In his remarks, Kara-Murza draws an apt parallel between Russia’s current aggression toward Ukraine and the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. The Russian soldiers invading Ukraine display World War II battle flags on their vehicles and use slogans praising Stalin along with Vladimir Putin. In 1968, Czechs launched a reform campaign — known as the “Prague Spring” — that aimed to create a more liberal society by limiting the powers of the Communist state. Soviet leaders felt threatened by the prospect of a liberal democracy blossoming within the Warsaw Pact, so they sent in tanks, crushing a movement whose members included Havel and many other dissidents.

Kara-Murza, like Havel, has spent his life defending the truth from the assault of dictators. The award of this prize affirms that triumphant continuity.

 

Is Serial Failing Turd-Burgler David Petraeus Being Polished To Run For Office Or Sum'n?

guardian  |  The US and its allies would destroy Russia’s troops and equipment in Ukraine – as well as sink its Black Sea fleet – if the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, uses nuclear weapons in the country, former CIA director and retired four-star army general David Petraeus warned on Sunday.

Petraeus said that he had not spoken to national security adviser Jake Sullivan on the likely US response to nuclear escalation from Russia, which administration officials have said has been repeatedly communicated to Moscow.

He told ABC News: “Just to give you a hypothetical, we would respond by leading a Nato – a collective – effort that would take out every Russian conventional force that we can see and identify on the battlefield in Ukraine and also in Crimea and every ship in the Black Sea.”

The warning comes days after Putin expressed views that many have interpreted as a threat of a larger war between Russia and the west.

Asked if the use of nuclear weapons by Russia in Ukraine would bring America and Nato into the war, Petraeus said that it would not be a situation triggering the alliance’s Article 5, which calls for a collective defense. That is because Ukraine is not part of Nato – nonetheless, a “US and Nato response” would be in order, Petraeus said.

Petraeus acknowledged that the likelihood that radiation would extend to Nato countries under the Article 5 umbrella could perhaps be construed as an attack on a Nato member.

“Perhaps you can make that case,” he said. “The other case is that this is so horrific that there has to be a response – it cannot go unanswered.”

Yet, Petraeus added, “You don’t want to, again, get into a nuclear escalation here. But you have to show that this cannot be accepted in any way.”

Nonetheless, with pressure mounting on Putin after Ukrainian gains in the east of the country under last week’s annexation declaration and resistance to mobilization efforts within Russia mounting, Petraeus said Moscow’s leader was “desperate”.

“The battlefield reality he faces is, I think, irreversible,” he said. “No amount of shambolic mobilization, which is the only way to describe it; no amount of annexation; no amount of even veiled nuclear threats can actually get him out of this particular situation.

“At some point there’s going to have to be recognition of that. At some point there’s going to have to be some kind of beginning of negotiations, as [Ukrainian] President [Volodymyr] Zelenskiy has said, will be the ultimate end.”

Now Biden Wants To Use India To Stack The U.N. Security Council Deck...,

It’s the DNC neoliberal modus operandi – if you can’t get your way fairly, then just stack the deck – see SCOTUS “Packing things” seems to be the strategy the Biden regime has settled on as cover for the pitiful joke that masquerades as “governing.” Pack the supreme court, make d.c. and Puerto Rico states to pack the senate - and now - pack the UN security council.

outlookindia |  US President Joe Biden supports Germany, Japan, and India as permanent members of a reformed United Nations Security Council, a senior official of his administration has said.

At the same time, a lot of work needs to be done in this matter, the official told reports on Wednesday on condition of anonymity.

"We have historically and continue to stand behind the idea that Germany, Japan, and India should be permanent members of the Security Council," the official said in response to a question.

Earlier on Wednesday, President Joe Biden in his address at the UN General Assembly reiterated his commitment to reforming the UN Security Council.

Biden said he believes the time has come for the institution to become more inclusive so that it can better respond to the needs of today's world.

Members of the UN Security Council, including the United States, should consistently uphold and defend the United Nations Charter and refrain from the use of the veto, except in rare and extraordinary situations, to ensure that the Council remains credible and effective, he said.

"That is also why the United States supports increasing the number of both permanent and non-permanent representatives of the Council. This includes permanent seats for those nations we've long supported," Biden said.

Biden Spouting Disinformation, Misinformation And Malinformation About Inflation And The Economy

cbsnews  |  Scott Pelley: Mr. President, as you know, last Tuesday the annual inflation rate came in at 8.3%. The stock market nosedived. People are shocked by their grocery bills. What can you do better and faster?

President Joe Biden: Well, first of all, let's put this in perspective. Inflation rate month to month was just-- just an inch, hardly at all,

Scott Pelley: You're not arguing that 8.3% is good news.

President Joe Biden: No, I'm not saying it is good news. But it was 8.2% or-- 8.2% before. I mean, it's not-- you're ac-- we act-- make it sound like all of a sudden, "My god, it went to 8.2%." It's been--

Scott Pelley: It's the highest inflation rate, Mr. President, in 40 years.

President Joe Biden: I got that. But guess what we are. We're in a position where, for the last several months, it hasn't spiked. It has just barely-- it's been basically even. And in the meantime, we created all these jobs and-- and prices-- have-- have gone up, but they've come down for energy. The fact is that we've created 10 million new jobs. We're in-- since we came to office. We're in a situation where the-- the unemployment rate is about 3.7%. one of the lowest in history. We're in a situation where manufacturing is coming back to the United States in a big way. And look down the road, we have mas-- massive investments being made in computer chips and-- and employment. So, I-- look, this is a process. This is a process.

 

Scott Pelley: Is the economy going to get worse before it gets better?

President Joe Biden: No. I don't think so. We hope we can have what they say, "a soft landing," a transition to a place where we don't lose the gains that I ran to make in the first place for middle-class folks, being able to generate good-paying jobs and-- expansion. And at the same time-- make sure that we-- we are-- are able to continue to grow.

Scott Pelley: And you would tell the American people that inflation is going to continue to decline?

President Joe Biden: No, I'm telling the American people that we're gonna get control of inflation. And their prescription drug prices are gonna be a hell of a lotta lower. Their health care costs are gonna be a lot lower. Their basic costs for everybody, their energy prices are gonna be lower. They're gonna be in a situation where they begin to gain control again.  I'm-- more optimistic than I've been in a long time.

Scott Pelley: Sir, with the Federal Reserve rapidly raising interest rates, what can you do to prevent a recession?

President Joe Biden: Continue to grow the economy. And we're growing the economy. It's growing in-- in a way that it hasn't in years and years.

Scott Pelley: How so?

President Joe Biden: We're growing entire new industries. Six hundred and ninety-five, I think it is, or eighty-five thousand new manufacturing jobs just since I've become president in United States. Continue to grow the economy and continue to give hard-working people a break in terms of we pay the highest drug prices in the world of any industrialized nation. Making sure that Medicare can negotiate down those prices by the way, we've also reduced the debt and reduced the deficit by $350 billion my first year. This year, it's gonna be over $1.5 trillion reduced the debt. So, to continue to put people in a position to be able to make a decent living and grow, and grow, and increase their capacity to grow.

The Oligarch-Induced Rail Crisis Is Far From Over

wired  |  In the early hours of Thursday morning, major US freight railroad companies reached a tentative agreement with unions, narrowly averting a nationwide rail shutdown less than 24 hours before a strike deadline. A work stoppage would have heaped devastating consequences on the nation’s economy and supply chain, nearly 30 percent of which relies on rail. Even a near miss had some impact. Long-distance Amtrak passenger services, which use freight tracks, and hazardous materials shipments are now being restored after railroads suspended them to prevent people or cargo becoming stranded by a strike.

The tentative agreement, to be voted on by union members, came through talks brokered by the Biden administration. It scrambled this week to avoid a shutdown that would have caused major disruption and worsened inflation by restricting the supply of crucial goods and driving up shipping costs. Rail unions and the railroad industry association released statements Thursday welcoming the deal. But freight rail service has been unreliable since long before this week’s standoff, and trade groups representing rail customers say much work remains to restore it to acceptable levels.

Just two-thirds of trains were arriving within 24 hours of their scheduled time this spring, down from 85 percent pre-pandemic, forcing rail customers to suspend business or—grimly—consider euthanizing their starving chickens. Scott Jensen, a spokesperson for the American Chemistry Council, whose members depend on rail to ship chemicals, called the latest shutdown threat “another ugly chapter in this long saga of freight rail issues.”

Although Thursday’s agreement was lauded by companies dependent on rail freight, the ACC, the National Grain and Feed Association, and other trade groups also argue that further reforms to the rail industry are needed. Competition has dwindled as service concentrated among a handful of big railroads, which slashed their combined workforce by 29 percent over the past six years. Rail customers have asked lawmakers and rail regulators to intervene. Suggestions include federal minimum service standards, including penalties for leaving loaded cars sitting in rail yards for long periods, and a rule that would allow customers to move cargo to another service provider at certain interchanges, to work around the fact that many customers are captive to a single carrier.

Major US freight railroads made deep staff cuts in recent years as part of an effort to implement a leaner, more profitable operating model called Precision Scheduled Railroading. Profits have indeed soared—two of the largest freight carriers, Union Pacific and BNSF, owned by Warren Buffett, broke records last year. But after many workers decided not to return to the rail industry after pandemic furloughs, a staffing shortage tipped the network into crisis. At federal hearings this spring, rail customers complained about suffering their worst ever service levels from a network that had been stripped of its resiliency.

Many freight rail jobs have always involved erratic schedules and long stretches away from home, but workers complained that the leaner operations saddled them with still longer hours, higher injury rates, and less predictable schedules. Many workers received no sick leave and were penalized for taking time off outside of their vacation time, which averaged three weeks a year, or holiday and personal time, which reached 14 days a year for the most senior employees.

 

Arabella Advisors: Why The American Progressive Left Wing Is Neither

tabletmag  | Behind the closed doors of an unassuming philanthropic consultancy in Washington, D.C., is one of the most powerful lobbying forces in the United States. The Atlantic has called it “the massive progressive dark-money group you’ve never heard of” and “the indisputable heavyweight of Democratic dark money.” The Washington Post believes its potent lobbying arm is reason enough for Congress to enact forced donor disclosure laws, while Politico labelled it a “dark-money behemoth.” “The system of political financing, which often obscures the identities of donors, is known as dark money,” wrote The New York Times, “and Arabella’s network is a leading vehicle for it on the left.”

Meet Arabella Advisors, the brainchild of ex-Clinton administration staffer Eric Kessler and the favorite tool of anonymous, billionaire donors on the progressive left. Since 2006, the Arabella hub has overseen a growing network of nonprofits—call them the “spokes”—that collected $2.4 billion in the 2019-20 election cycle, nearly twice as much as the Republican and Democratic national committees combined.

These nonprofits in turn manage and supervise a vast array of “pop-up” groups—mainly political attack-dog websites, ad campaigns, and “spontaneous” demonstrations staffed by Arabella’s network of activist professionals who pose as members of independent activist organizations. These groups—such as Fix Our Senate, the Hub Project, and Floridians for a Fair Shake—typically emerge very suddenly in order to savage the political opposition on the policy or outrage of that particular day or week, then vanish just as quickly. The pop-ups do not file IRS disclosures or report their budgets, boards, or staff. In most cases, their connection to Arabella goes unreported. Many of them have offered sympathetic ordinary voters the opportunity to donate to whatever the “grassroots” cause happens to be, when in fact the money feeds back into Arabella’s enormous dark-money network.

The relatively novel and innovative model of political activism perfected by Arabella, which was founded 2005, went more or less unnoticed until 2018, when I was reporting on the activist groups that attempted to prevent the Senate confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Among the sea of picket signs outside the court in July 2018 was the name of an unfamiliar group: Demand Justice. A search of the IRS nonprofit archives showed the name itself wasn’t listed. What did turn up in an online search was a downtown address on Connecticut Avenue shared by dozens of other organizations, including the Arabella “spoke” that appeared to be running Demand Justice, Sixteen Thirty Fund.

It isn’t uncommon for political groups to share expensive D.C. office space, especially when they’re affiliated, like the Center for American Progress (CAP) and its lobbying arm, CAP Action. But Arabella’s arrangement is unique: A for-profit consultancy (Arabella Advisors) is the central hub; four (perhaps five) tax-exempt nonprofits (New Venture Fund, Sixteen Thirty Fund, Hopewell Fund, Windward Fund, and possibly North Fund, all founded and led by Arabella leadership) are the spokes; and countless ephemeral pop-ups branching out from the nonprofits.

In early 2019, the Capital Research Center (where I work) released a report on the network. Since then, my colleagues and I have collected large amounts of data on Arabella’s origins, lobbying, pop-up campaigns, board connections, and donors, which helped lay the groundwork for later reporting on Arabella in mainstream outlets like The Atlantic and New York Times—which have since acknowledged that the political “left” has outraised and outspent the political “right” using dark money in recent years by a margin of nearly 2 to 1.

And yet today, the vast majority of American voters remain unaware of Arabella’s existence, even as it promises to play an increasingly central role in American politics, and as the culture wars and fight for control of federal institutions reaches a fever pitch in the fall of 2022.

Never Forget That BLM Was/Is A Warren Buffet Production (Originally Posted 10/13/20)

 Obama's The Poster Child And His Cousin Warren Buffet's The Money Behind Black Lives Matter

tabletmag  |  Tides was founded in 1976 by Drummond Pike, a California real estate investor who named the entity after a Bay Area bookstore popular among left-leaning activists. From the beginning, according to their own documents, Tides was designed unlike most other nonprofit institutions. Rather than building up or spending down an endowment, it sought to become more like a sophisticated piece of software—a financial instrument that would allow wealthy individuals and donors to contribute to the causes of their choosing with more anonymity than is generally allowed by the laws governing ordinary nonprofits.

Recently, after Pike stepped away, the Tides network has taken on a distinctly political role, whose guiding star appears to be Barack Obama. The secretary of the Tides board is Suzanne Nossel, the CEO of PEN America and a former deputy assistant secretary of state for international organizations in the Obama administration; board member Cheryl Alston was appointed by Obama to the advisory committee of the federal pension program. Peter Buttenwieser, the heir to the Lehman Brothers fortune who passed away in 2018, financed a fund in his own name which is administered and distributed entirely by the Tides Foundation. A “major behind-the-scenes supporter of Democratic candidates,” Buttenwieser was one of President Obama’s earliest high profile backers, helping the then-senator organize his bid for the White House.

Moreover, Atlantic Philanthropies, a nonprofit created by billionaire retailer Chuck Feeney in the 1980s, has directed more than $42 million in grants through the Tides network since 2000. Based in Bermuda, Atlantic Philanthropies was able to participate in political lobbying efforts in ways that continental United States nonprofits cannot. Atlantic became increasingly aggressive under the Obama administration. As Gara LaMarche, Atlantic’s president, said in one think tank address, when Obama was elected “we saw opportunities to assist our grantees in moving forward more rapidly and broadly in a number of areas central to our mission.” In return, Atlantic dispensed $27 million to help push Obamacare through Congress. At the ceremony to sign Obamacare into law, LaMarche stood beside President Obama in the East Room of the White House.

In any case, what’s clear is that there is now a sophisticated and complex structure underneath what many assume to be an organic and spontaneous social movement, one with deep pockets and ambitious goals. “After over fourteen years of learning and over 700 million dollars invested ... the collapse we have been expecting is surely underway,” reads the NoVo Foundation’s website. Right now there’s only this one statement on the site, which is under construction as noted: “Working on solutions now so old patterns of power can’t, once again, re-form to rebuild and continue to repress.”

British Police Fear Hard Winter Of Surging Crime And Violence

thetimes |  Police forces are braced for a rise in crime, a breakdown in public order and even corruption in their ranks this winter as they draw up emergency proposals to deal with the cost of living crisis.

Contingency planning among police chiefs is under way to deal with the fallout that could result from millions of households falling into financial difficulties.

A leaked national strategy paper, drawn up by them this summer, has revealed they are increasingly concerned that “economic turmoil and financial instability” has “potential to drive increases in particular crime types”.

These include “acquisitive” offences, such as shoplifting, burglary and vehicle theft, as well as online fraud and blackmail, and crimes that “rely on exploiting financial vulnerability”.

At a regional level, some police forces are preparing for more children to be sucked into county lines drug gangs and women falling victim to sexual exploitation. Priti Patel, the home secretary, is understood to share their concern.

One chief constable has said that their force has already noticed an increase in some offences and has stepped up preparations in response. The higher price cap on household energy bills, £3,549, comes into force on October 1.

Drawn up with input from the National Police Chiefs’ Council, the document goes on to say that “a more complex and unpredictable risk is the chance of greater civil unrest, as a response to prolonged and painful economic pressure”.

A senior officer at one force in the north of England told a local MP that without significant government intervention they feared a return to the febrile conditions that led to the London riots in 2011.

The document says: “Greater financial vulnerability may expose some staff to higher risk of corruption, especially among those who fall into significant debt or financial difficulties.” It offers a glimpse of the stark choices facing the new prime minister, expected to be Liz Truss, when they take office on Tuesday. It can also be revealed:

•Truss will make a “very short” speech to the country on Tuesday making clear that she understands the pain caused by rising energy bills and offering an “immediate” package of support for families, before getting cabinet approval for the plans on Wednesday.

The Limits Of Private Corporate Governance (Power)

aurelian2022 |  There’s a pretty solid consensus that the western political class today is totally incapable, and that it presides over fragile state systems, that it has itself hollowed out and de-skilled progressively for the last forty years. Conversely, it is agreed that the West faces an array of existential problems never seen before, some already with us, others yet to arrive. Yet there’s been a surprising lack of reflection on the implications of these two truths together. Let’s peel away a few scabs, and try to see what’s likely to be hiding underneath.

Almost everyone who’s not a member of the western political class, or a parasite upon it, views it with a kind of numb despair. Increasingly professional in the blinkered and isolated sense, it is increasingly amateurish in every other. This would matter less if the class were supported by competent and properly staffed state structures, but that is seldom the case. Most state services in western countries have been reduced to shadows of what they once were.

That much is generally agreed, but there has been little attempt to think about what exactly the practical consequences are, and how they might complicate, or even prevent, an effective response to problems caused by climate change, disease, war, mass population movements, and all the rest. The conclusion of this essay will be a bit like an Aristotelian syllogism: western states are increasingly being confronted with massive, interlinked  problems, requiring competent and far-sighted management. But there is no competent and far-sighted management. Therefore we are stuffed. I’m now going to try to put a little flesh on these unattractive-sounding bones.

Let’s start with the biggest weaknesses of the system. The first is the incestuous and exclusive nature the political class, Now of course this is not new. The House of Lords in eighteenth-century England, or the aristocracy at Versailles, were at least as ingrown and far removed from the concerns of ordinary people then, as their descendants are today. But in the eighteenth century there was no question of a notionally representative political class, theoretically owing a duty to the people: now there is. It’s a familiar story: the end of mass political parties, the dominance of politicians without experience of anything outside politics, the capture of the main western parties by a well-off, culturally homogeneous professional and managerial class, the triumph of image and discourse over reality, and the increasing contempt of the political class for the people who elect them. Beyond valid concerns about corruption and nepotism, there are two entirely technical consequences of all this, that bode ill for the political management of even relatively simple problems, and which will make facing up to the kind of complex crises that are starting to arise now difficult, if not impossible.

The first is that fundamental traditional political skills are no longer needed for career success. Once upon a time, politicians would try to get elected, and to develop personal and organisational skills that made that possible. They would rely on large numbers of volunteers for canvasing and to get the vote out, and on convincing as many people as possible to vote for them by personal contact and giving speeches. Few politicians are capable of that today. Rather, success comes from appealing to an in-group, to positioning yourself well with party militants, and to getting favourable coverage from certain media sources. “The electorate” is those who read your Twitter posts. Why does this matter? Well, it means that when a genuine crisis arrives, such politicians are incapable of understanding, let alone communicating with, and certainly not motivating, ordinary people. The epitome of this type of politician must be Emmanuel Macron, whose attempts to talk directly to the French people during height of the Covid crisis were so awful, and so embarrassing, that people hid under the table to get away from him. Here was a man clearly hopelessly out of his depth, in a situation where McKinsey was not the solution.

The second is that genuine ideas are no longer needed either. True, governments are still elected with notional programmes, but that’s a polite fiction. Politics is about winning the media battle, looking good on TV, massaging genuine political issues so that they go away, internal warfare within the party, and winning the next election. Government “initiatives” are generally sterile technocratic exercises which take money from those who have too little already, or give even more to those who already have too much. When a genuine political crisis arises (Covid, Brexit, Ukraine) the system finds that it cannot be managed or Twittered away, and has no idea what to do, other than to try to look good on TV. So it inevitably panics. With Covid, western governments have effectively surrendered, and allowed the disease to propagate freely, because they don’t have the moral or intellectual capability to fight it effectively. And Ukraine is being dealt with, so far as I can tell, on the basis that winter isn’t coming this year after all. The result is a kind of paralysis at the heart of government, where nothing is ever done except in haste and for immediate effect on one hand, or out of sheer panic on the other.

Even without forty years of the hollowing out of state capacity, this would still cause problems. Contrary to myth, public servants prefer to work for a government that knows what it wants, and sets objectives (and no, not those sort of objectives). Most senior figures in western public services have now spent their careers working in a political culture which is obsessed with image and with instant effects. There are no rewards any more for being prudent, for thinking long-term, or for telling the political class that they are storing up trouble for the future. All this produces a kind of corruption: the prizes go to those ready to tell the political class what it wants to hear, and to help them do whatever it takes to get good media coverage. Good people leave, or just never join.

As Goes Blackness - So Goes America...,

blackagendareport |  The Black Misleadership Class continues its descent into utter political irrelevance, dragging 48 million African Americans ever deeper into the abyss with them. Like a soap opera whose central pathologies endure through decades of changing casts of characters, the misleaders cling to their demeaning subservience to the Democratic Party in hopes of one day becoming honored and respected partners. The Black supplicants are always betrayed, of course, but prefer a bad marriage to no relationship at all. Indeed, the Black misleaders and the Democrats have been locked in what Malcolm X would describe as a house Negro/slave master   relationship for so long – certainly since the late Sixties – that the Black junior partner knows no other way to behave.

In the latest installment of “The Black and the Powerless,” the usual gaggle of national Black civic organizations are awarded a closed-door meeting with their love-object, president-elect Joe Biden. The civic leaders respectfully requested that the Party protect the voting rights of its most loyal constituency, and use the powers of the executive branch to curtail the police violence that has plagued the Black community since the days of the slave-disciplining “paddy-rollers” – in addition to their perennial concern that more Black faces be elevated to high places in the new administration.  However, as senior editor Margaret Kimberley recounts in this issue of BAR, Biden immediately put the house Negroes in their place:

“In a loud voice and in the manner of a bullying boss Biden dashed any hopes that he would use executive orders to enact policies that he can’t get passed because of Republican congressional opposition. He accused Melanie Campbell of the National Coalition on Black Civic Participation, of not reading his policy paper because she disagreed with him. He was vehement about not using the power of executive orders to thwart congressional Republicans and claimed concerns about constitutionality as an excuse for doing as little as he possibly can.”

“Biden immediately put the house Negroes in their place.”

As Margaret Kimberley observes, it is unclear who leaked the Zoom meeting – either one of the Black participants or Biden, himself, to demonstrate his eagerness to put the Black notables in their place and warn them not to encourage Black Lives Matter’s demand to de-fund the police. “We’re not,” said the Great Incarcerator, ruling out any rollback of the cops. “We’re talking about holding them accountable. We’re talking about giving them money to do the right things.”

Melanie Campbell, president of the National Coalition on Black Civic Participation and convener of the Black Women’s Roundtable, wrote the letter that requested the lopsided confab, which included NAACP President Derrick Johnson; former Department of Justice Civil Rights Division leader Vanita Gupta; National Action Network founder Rev. Al Sharpton; Sherrilyn Ifill, NAACP Legal Defense Fund; Marc Morial, president of the National Urban League; Kristen Clarke, executive director of the National Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law; and New Orleans congressman Cedric Richmond, who will serve Biden as director of the White House Office of Public Engagement  .

Clearly, Biden was not impressed by these would-be power brokers, knowing that the Black misleaders have no bite and have not even dared to bark in the half a century since they collaborated in shutting down the Black Liberation Movement to become operatives of the rich man’s duopoly. In the 21st century, the misleaders have so debased themselves at the feet of Democratic power, it is impossible for the Party’s leaders to pretend they represent a constituency beyond their own dark faces.

What "A Midwestern Doctor" Had To Say About Carlson's Broadside On The Medical Industrial Complex

Tucker Carlson takes a look at the effects the COVID vaccine is being shown to have on people. pic.twitter.com/G7WlV8BKLe

— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) July 26, 2022

I was in the doctors lounge this evening with two other docs.

Tucker came on. A 20 minute monologue about Big Pharma and the corruption Thereof. I simply could not believe what I was seeing.

He took 20 minutes and decimated opiates, SSRIs, COVID vaccines, Fauci, Birx, and the Biogen Alzheimer’s drug.

If you want an idea what I am barraged with daily even by the MSNBC crowd, look no further. I hear these same issues from patients all day long.

Tucker clearly has his problems but he also clearly has balls of steel. The execs at Fox with Big Pharma providing about half their revenue must clearly know the gig is up or they would not be allowing this on TV.

People are getting more enraged by the day. It is clips like this that make me certain the day of reckoning is coming soon.

Both the other docs in the lounge tonight, MSNBC watchers, agreed with me that there is not a thing in this monologue to be quibbled about.

Since the mid 2000s, right when Tom Cruise did his SSRI interview with Lauer – Tucker played part of it – the original Lilly Pfizer papers have been a standard the world over on how data is manipulated and how relative risk is abused. I have used them as examples of inappropriate data manipulation in classes for more than a decade. Most physicians with a questioning mind have known these drugs were a problem for years. And this is the first time I have ever heard this discussed on national TV in my life.

The Birx clip he features “I knew they were not going to be effective stopping the spread of the virus” was played today in a conference. Immediately followed by the Fauci, Walensky, Biden, and Maddow clips detailing that the vaxxes were a dead end, that you would never catch it, etc.

The ID fellow presenter, whose hospital and clinics are now being overrun with vaxxed and boosted COVID patients, after the above clips were played, in a dull monotone said, “One needs to ask WHAT exactly did these people know and more importantly WHEN did they know it?”

I could scarcely believe it. That kind of talk would have garnered intense guffaws and probably a trip to the chairman’s office just a few weeks ago. Now silent resignation.

The Fauci clip where he is asked about menstrual problems and states “we are going to study it….”. An epidemiologist commented “Seriously, you forced this upon millions of young women, and ONLY now we are going to study it? Did anyone have a hint this was a problem before the mandates? Knowing Pfizer’s history, my gut tells me they knew all too well.”

And yet another zinger from a retired ID professor – “If they knowingly released a non-sterilizing vaccine into an acute coronavirus pandemic and forced millions to take it, that may be the greatest act of medical malpractice in the history of this whole world.”

I am slowly seeing the return of “science” in my profession. Tough questions are being asked. Finally.

What do I feel tonight ….. the sun is shining, the scales are falling out of the eyes…and we are on the Road to Damascus. This may take quite a bit longer than you would expect, but I am fairly sure this is going to get really interesting

Valodya: To Hear The West Tell It, Putin Been Done Been Dead And Buried

moonofalabama |  Over the last months the British MI-6 disinformation service had fun with strewing rumors over Vladimir Putin's health, mostly via British tabloids. It used its usual tools - a former MI-6 chief, 'former' MI-6 spies and the ever available 'anonymous' Russian oligarch who lives in London. Like its other propaganda claims these were obvious nonsense but found a reliably echo in the gossip media.

• Putin Laughs Off Rumors of Ill Health
   Reuters / NYT - Mar 16, 2015
• Opinion: Is Putin dying? Is he mentally ill? The emerging field of ‘Putinology’
   LA Times - Mar 5, 2022
• Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko attacks Putin: 'He's sick, he's an unhealthy man' - EXCLUSIVE
   Yahoo - Mar 18, 2022

• Putin's hand shakes before he grips chair arm and awkwardly taps his feet during meeting with Lukashenko two months ago in latest sign Russian leader is suffering health problems
   Daily Mail - Apr 26, 2022
• What’s wrong with sickly Vladimir Putin?
   Evening Standard - Apr 27, 2022
• Report: Putin faces cancer surgery; his temporary fill in won’t ‘do anything rash’
   Boston Herald - May 2, 2022
• Is Vladimir Putin sick? Health problems and abdominal cancer prognosis explored amid latest report
   Sk Pop - May 3, 2022
• Putin 'plans to hand over power as cancer rumours and signs of ill health grow'
   Mirror - May 4, 2022
• What The Obsession With Putin’s Health Says About The Grim State Of The War
   Worldcrunch - May 4, 2022
• People think these bruises on Putin's face are proof he's very ill
   Indy 100 - May 11, 2022
• Is Putin Sick – Or Are We Meant to Think He Is?
   NewLines - May 12, 2022
• Vladimir Putin 'very sick' with cancer and other illnesses, army boss says
   Mirror - May 14, 2022
• Russian oligarch secretly recorded saying Putin is 'very ill with blood cancer,' report says
   Insider - May 14, 2022
• Russian President Vladimir Putin ‘Seriously Ill’, Ukraine Invasion ‘Element’ Of Illness: Report
   ABT - May 15, 2022
• Vladimir Putin is 'seriously ill', says ex-British spy; Russian Oligarch claims Prez 'suffering from blood cancer'
   Free Press Journal - May 15, 2022
• Russian President Putin Is 'Seriously Ill', Claim Ex-Spy, Others: Reports
   The Quint - May 16, 2022
• Former M16 chief backs claims Vladimir Putin is in poor health following reports president is 'very ill with blood cancer'
   Sky News ´- May 16, 2022
• Putin Is 'Seriously Ill', Potentially Terminal, Ex-MI6 Russia Head Says
   Newsweek / MSN - May 16, 2022
• Putin Leaving Meetings To Get Medical Treatment, Claims Ex-MI6 Intelligence Officer
   Republican World - May 21, 2022
• Putin will land in sanatorium and lose power by 2023: ex-MI6 head
   NY Post - May 22, 2022
• ‘Putin will be gone by 2023’: Ex MI6 chief Sir Richard Dearlove says Russian president will be sent to a sanatorium
   Bulldog reports - May 22, 2022
• Russia’s Putin will be in a sanatorium and out of power by 2023, ex-MI6 chief predicts
   Business Insider / SCMP - May 23, 2022
• America’s ‘Biggest Enemies’ – Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping Critically Ill; Suffering From Terminal Brain Disease – Media
   Eurasian Times - May 26, 2022
• Putin sick with cancer, has three years to live, says Russian spy
   News.au - May 28, 2022
• MI6 spies claim Vladimir Putin could be dead and a body double is taking his place at public events - Chronicle
   May 29, 2022
• Timeline shows Putin's alleged health problems after contested Ukrainian claims that he is concealing a serious illness
   Insider - May 30, 2022
• Russia’s Sergey Lavrov denies Vladimir Putin is ill
   SCMP - May 30, 2022
• Vladimir Putin may already be dead with body double being used, MI6 source says
   Daily Record - May 30, 2022
• Is Vladimir Putin Sick? What We Know About the Russian President's Health
   Newsweek/MSN - May 30, 2022
• Exclusive: Putin Treated for Cancer in April, U.S. Intelligence Report Says
   Newsweek - Jun 2, 2022
• Ex-MI6 Agent Claims Russia’s President Putin Is A Body Double.
   Medium - Jun 2, 2022
• 'Putin Is Definitely Sick': Brutal Russian Autocrat Treated for Cancer, Survived Assassination Attempt, Intel Analysts Say
   CBN News - Jun 3, 2022
• Putin health deteriorating FAST: Warning to ‘be ready’ as ‘everyone senses end is near'
   Express - Jun 5, 2022
• The Many Deaths of Vladimir Putin
   CEPA - Jun 6, 2022
• Why the world is fixated on Vladimir Putin’s health
   Financial Review - Jun 8, 2022
• VLAD THE PALER Is Vladimir Putin ill?
   U.S. Sun - Jun 10, 2022
• DYING DAYS Putin health latest: Sickly tyrant will be ‘incapacitated’ and toppled in coup within three months, claims ex-MI6 spy
   Sun - Jun 10, 2022
• Putin ill health claims may be Western spy bid to topple despot - expert
   Express - Jun 14, 2022
• Vladimir Putin seen shaking in latest video
   NY Post - Jun 14, 2022
• 'Hits the Botox heavily' Hypochondriac Putin obsessed with looks - doctor 'never far away'
   Express - Jun 14, 2022
• Does This Video Prove Vladimir Putin Is Sick with Blood Cancer?
   1945 - Jun 15, 2022
• Is Vladimir Putin ill?
   Economist - Jun 15, 2022
• Vladimir Putin is gravely ill and will be 'dead within two years', spy chief claims
   Joe - Jun 26, 2022
• Vladimir Putin seen gripping table with veins bulging as illness rumors mount
   NY Post - Jun 16, 2022
• VLAD THE WEAKER Telltale signs sickly Putin is ‘losing control’ after disastrous limping appearance in Iran
   Sun - Jul 20, 2022
• 'PUTIN' ON A SHOW: Sick Vlad Tries to Keep Up Appearances as He Gets Off His Plane in Iran
   Hanity - Jul 20, 2022
• Is Vladimir Putin dead?
   New Statesman - Jul 21, 2022

CIA Director William Burns finally had enough of it. Getting asked and having to answer stupid questions about Putin's health is a waste of time. Official media picked up on it. The narrative is thereby dead.

• Vladimir Putin 'entirely too healthy' says CIA chief
   Euronews - Jul 21, 2022
• Putin is ‘entirely too healthy,’ the C.I.A. director says.
   NY Times - Jul 21, 2022
• Ukraine war: CIA chief says no intelligence that Putin is in bad health
   BBC - Jul 21, 2022

The Russians said 'thanks' to Burns and reinforced his message.

• Russia Denies Rumors Putin Is Sick
   Forbes - Jul 21, 2022

For incomplete lists of other MI-6 induced nonsense headline storms see:

• Russia Is 'Weaponizing' ... Everything
   MoA - Mar 3, 2016
• How Putin's Russia Weaponizes X
   MoA - Dec 17, 2018
• Putin Asks And Trump Delivers - A List Of All The Good Things Trump Did For Russia
   MoA - Jan 15, 2019
• The Man Who Weaponizes And Loses Everything
   MoA - Aug 13, 2019
• The 'Russian Military Build-Up'
   MoA - Apr 2, 2021
• How Russia 'Weaponized' 111 Times
   MoA - Apr 5, 2021
• When China Does Great Question Its Cost
   MoA - Dec 27, 2021
• China, Where Everything Vanishes 
   MoA - Jan 29, 2022

Meanwhile CIA Director Burns Says "Putin Entirely Too Healthy"

euronews  |  The director of the CIA has dismissed persistent rumours that Russian President Vladimir Putin is gravely ill, perhaps suffering from cancer, by saying Putin is "entirely too healthy." 

Speaking at the Aspen Security Forum in Colorado, William Burns stressed that this was "not a formal intelligence assessment," but given his expertise with Russia - Burns served as America's ambassador in Moscow from 2005 to 2008 - it will certainly give pause to those Putin opponents who hoped for signs that he could soon die from an undisclosed disease. 

"There's lots of rumours about President Putin's health and as far as we can tell he's entirely too healthy," adding "that's not a formal intelligence judgment."

Burns said that Putin's own views about Ukraine, and especially the will of the Ukrainian people to resist the Russian invasion, were based on "some profoundly flawed assumptions." 

"Putin really does believe his rhetoric, and I've heard him say this privately over the years, that Ukraine is not a real country. He believes that it's his entitlement, Russia's entitlement, to dominate Ukraine."

Giving an update on Russian casualty figures, the CIA director said that around 15,000 Russian troops had been killed so far, with roughly 45,000 wounded and described them as "quite significant" losses. 

"The Ukrainians have suffered as well, probably a little less than that, but significant casualties." 

Director Burns said that the Russian military has adapted after significant tactical failures at the start of the invasion and that one Ukrainian contact had told him "the dumb Russians are all dead", meaning the Russians on the ground who made battlefield errors had paid the ultimate price, and the Russian military had since learned to adapt. 

Russian forces had been concentrating on the eastern Donbas region over the last 90 days, said Burns, advancing between six and 10 miles in that time. 

"But it's come at great cost, and it's been very painful to both sides," he added.

 

 

When Fraudulent AssClowns Battle - Only Pissants Get Hurt...,

forummag  |  “Wokeness is a problem and everyone knows it,” James Carville, the political strategist often credited with Clinton’s 1992 victory (and, let’s be honest, not much else), whinged to Vox last year, 100 days into Joe Biden’s presidency. “It’s hard to talk to anybody today—and I talk to lots of people in the Democratic Party—who doesn’t say this. But they don’t want to say it out loud.”

If someone makes up an identity grounded in nothing but subjective feeling and a state recognizes it as constituting a protected class, subjective reality becomes immune to challenge and the ultimate political contest becomes to control what feelings are recognized by the state

— Wesley Yang (@wesyang) July 9, 2022

The statement is immediately self-contradictory, sure—it’s hard to talk to anyone who doesn’t say this, but not out loud? But it’s already setting the stage for a year of recriminations and preemptive blame-shifting for what is widely expected to be a midterm bloodbath for the ruling Democratic party. The political scientist Ruy Teixera—co-author of a best-selling Bush-era book on how demographic change would lead inexorably to permanent Democratic dominance—now peddles a newsletter where he moans about “the Democratic Left’s adamant refusal to base its political approach on the actually-existing opinions and values of actually-existing American voters,” as if “the Democratic Left” has been the determinant of what a government led by Joe Biden—again, that Joe Biden, the one who is president—has managed to accomplish, or not accomplish, over the last year.

In lengthy Twitter threads and ugly Substack newsletters, consultants and would-be consultants tell the gerontocratic and eternally triangulating leadership of the Democratic Party that the real problem is that the kids who work for them are too “woke.” Despite “everyone” knowing it’s a problem, “wokeness” is a poorly defined concept. “Woke” was once a Black slang term for being politically aware (specifically, being aware—sometimes in a comically exaggerated way—of the myriad methods the white establishment has of punishing politically active Black people). It now serves, in the popular political discourse, the exact same function as the term “PC” did for Marshall and From in 1993. “PC” stood for “political correctness,” which, after the fall of the Soviet Union and prior to 9/11, was, in the eyes of the white commentariat, the single greatest threat faced by the United States. (A few years ago Moira Weigel observed that the term “political correctness” hardly appeared in print at all prior to 1990. As she notes, in 1992, a database of U.S. magazine and newspaper articles turned up 2,800 references.) The point of each term, as deployed by these men, is to euphemize a euphemism: “special interests.”

“African Americans, women, white farmers, and, especially, organized labor,” is how Geismer describes the New Democrat conception of “special interests.” The big idea of the New Democrats was that denying all of these annoying groups any material gains would please the White Suburban Voter, who had emerged from all the social upheavals of 1960s and beyond as the Main Character of American Politics. What is remarkable, more than three decades later, is how little anyone has learned.

“WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE DOESN’T WANT YOU TO READ,” huffed a recent tantalizing subhead in Politico’s “West Wing Playbook” tipsheet. Was it some previously undisclosed intelligence operation? A newly declassified Kennedy assassination document? No. It was a Wall Street Journal op-ed by Republican Senator Mitt Romney calling on the White House to “ditch its woke advisers.”

“White House chief of staff RON KLAIN may have taken this a bit personally,” Playbook’s authors wrote. He “retweeted our own SAM STEIN, who quipped that White House deputy chief of staff BRUCE REED was the ‘embodiment of woke’ (Reed is objectively un-woke. In fact, the woke don’t like him).” I do not mean this as a cheap gotcha point, but all of the capitalized names in this dispatch are white men, and at no point do the keen analysts behind  Politico’s West Wing Playbook define what they think the term “woke” means.” At a certain point, though, you have to ask:. What does “wokeness” mean, to you, to Democratic centers of power and (last and probably least) to Politico?

Back in George W. Bush’s second term, Jonathan Schwarz articulated what he called the “Iron Law of Institutions.” It goes: “the people who control institutions care first and foremost about their power within the institution rather than the power of the institution itself. Thus, they would rather the institution ‘fail’ while they remain in power within the institution than for the institution to ‘succeed’ if that requires them to lose power within the institution.” Schwarz  meant to universalize it, but I think he nailed something very specific about how the Democratic Party works, and I think Al From and Will Marshall ought to agree.

The long-standing fight over who runs our nation’s left-of-center party has featured multiple linguistic evolutions but otherwise remained strikingly static. For my entire life, white moderates have been complaining about how difficult the people on the side of multiracial democracy are making it for them to win their idealized suburban voters.