As Russia allegedly pulls back from attacks on Kyiv and Cheherniv, Ukraine is bracing itself for a fresh assault on the breakaway Dunbar region to the east, despite further peace talks scheduled for Friday via video-link, Ukrainian President Vlodymyr Zelniskyy warns (per The Guardian).
Meanwhile, up to 45 buses were reported headed to extra-hard hit Mariupol to evacuate citizens.
The Pentagon says Vladimir Putin’s military advisors are telling him that Russia is having much more military success in Ukraine than it is, heavily downplaying Ukrainian resistance, The Washington Post reports. Assessment is Putin’s advisors may be afraid to deliver bad news to their dictator. This is not as reassuring as it may sound; U.S. military experts fear the deliberate propaganda aimed at Putin could undermine negotiations underway between Ukraine and Russia.
In Steps Trump
Earlier this week Donald J. Trump raised questions based on unsubstantiated claims about Hunter Biden’s former business dealings in Russia on a program called the Just the News TV and said “I think Putin would know the answer to that. I think he should release (evidence).” This is as Russian troops are shelling hospitals and schools and trying to close off humanitarian cooridors.
White House spokesperson Kate Bedingfield responded Wednesday; “What kind of American, let alone an ex-president, thinks that this is the right time to enter into a scheme with Vladimir Putin and brag about his connections to Vladimir Putin?”
Wonder what the purveyor of The Big Lie might tell Putin how the war in Ukraine is progressing? There is only one, and it is Donald Trump.”
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Meanwhile, at Justice
As some anxious Democrats and never-Trump Republicans worry about deliberate progress in its investigation, the Justice Department has expanded its probe into the January 6 Capitol insurrection to examine preparation and financing for Donald J. Trump’s rally preceding the attack, The Washington Post reports. Good news perhaps, for DOJ, is this appears to fall largely in the time before seven hours, 37 minutes of communication with ex-President Trump went missing.
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Meanwhile, in the 11th
That Madison Cawthorn (R) succeeded Mark Meadows in the North Carolina 11th congressional district in 2020 is perhaps not entirely surprising. (Slightly more surprising is that for the purpose of voting in that district, Meadows’ address in the 11th is attached to a mobile home.)
Cawthorn, 26, had attended Patrick Henry College in fall 2016 . . . but dropped out because his grades were, apparently, below average. Cawthorn had been injured in a vehicle accident in 2014 when he was a passenger in an SUV on its way back from spring break in Florida. He was partially paralyzed by the accident. And it seemed to have had an effect on his college undertaking as, according to Wikipedia, he said in a deposition, "You know, suffering from a brain injury after the accident definitely I think it slowed my brain down a little bit. Made me less intelligent. And the pain also made reading and studying very difficult."
Of course he was elected to Congress.
Cawthorn said in an interview in the Warrior Poet Society podcast that he was invited to orgies and drug use among his fellow Republicans in Washington.
That, it seems, is the proverbial bridge too far for those for whom truth is fairly flexible, as House Minority leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) took him to task.
Axios reports that McCarthy said in an interview:
"It's just frustrating. There's no evidence behind his statements. And when I sit down with him ... I told him you can't make statements like that, as a member of Congress, that affects everybody else and the country as a whole."
"In the interview, he claims he watched people do cocaine. Then when he comes in he tells me, he says he thinks he saw maybe a staffer in a parking garage from 100 yards away.”
· "I just told him he's lost my trust, he's gonna have to earn it back, and I laid out everything I find is unbecoming. And, you can't just say, 'You can't do this again.' I mean, he's, he's got a lot of members very upset."
In an environment that has been characteristic of the Republican Party since at least 2016, when blatant lies can be told only to be walked back, it isn’t entirely surprising that Cawthorn made things up.
What if he had said the same things about being aware of Democrats doing those things? Would it even have been questioned by McCarthy, or simply amplified?
--Edited by Todd Lassa and Gary S. Vasilash