Guardian – Iraq war: 20 years on Long shadow of US invasion of Iraq still looms over international order Brown University’s Costs of War Project estimates that the taxpayer bill for post-9/11 US wars reached $8tn, representing a profound diversion from civilian spending. About 400,000 Iraqis died. Guardian – Iraq war: 20 years on
Eight months into Russia’s war against Ukraine, POLITICO talks to the Russia analyst about whether Putin’s aims are evolving and what it would take to end the war. Now, despite the setbacks Russia has suffered on the battlefield, Hill thinks Putin is undaunted. She sees him adapting to new conditions, not giving up. And … [Read more…]
A blog link in Politico takes us to Remembering Parkland By GARY FINEOUT 02/14/2022 GRIM ANNIVERSARY — Today also marks the fourth anniversary of a horrific moment. Seventeen people were gunned down at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland.
An Undiscovered Coronavirus? The Mystery of the ‘Russian Flu’ Scientists are grasping for any example that could help anticipate the future of Covid, even a mysterious respiratory pandemic that spread in the late 19th century. New York Times – By Gina Kolata Feb. 14, 2022
On the New York Times: Lawrence Ferlinghetti, a poet, publisher and political iconoclast who inspired and nurtured generations of San Francisco artists and writers from City Lights, his famed bookstore, died on Monday at his home in San Francisco. He was 101.
Dreaming? Last night, I thought of Timothy McVeigh, I saw images of the April 19, 1995 Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building after the bombing, and I thought of Trump’s brag that “he’d not leave the political field.” Putting this together at 2 a.m. in a fog of sleep left me thinking of the WPE (Worst … [Read more…]
These two cards and lovely mobile arrived in the mail today:
So we never forget, as the reign of the WPE (worst-president-ever) slowly slips into the sunset, we need to remember a few things. David Frum in the Atlantic has written an excellent essay covering some of those things: The Trump Crew’s Incompetence Lasted to the End. The former president’s lawyers were bad—but that was all … [Read more…]
The Atlantic’s Peter Nicholas writes in “What I Saw at the White House on Trump’s Last Day” “This is the only president in American history who incited an insurrection against Congress that could have resulted in assassinations and hostage-taking and, conceivably, the cancellation of a free presidential election and the fracturing of a democracy,” Michael … [Read more…]
From the NYTimes: Before Capitol Riot, Republican Lawmakers Fanned the Flames A “1776 moment”: Several of the president’s closest allies in Congress used bellicose language to urge their supporters to attend the Jan. 6 rally that turned into a deadly riot. Just so we don’t forget.