You're not on your own. Neighbors help neighbors.

My Sunday viewing was the Netflix movie Yeh Ballet. I think it translates to something like “These Ballet” according to Google Translate. The translation was briefly mentioned near the start of the film, but I didn’t remember it. The story takes place in Mumbai, much of it in the slums. We meet Asif as he is break dancing with his buddies, proclaiming himself the king of their group. And he’s good enough his buddies mostly agree. We meet Nishi as he is dancing in a talent contest. He doesn’t go on to the next level, though is awarded a special prize (which is recognition and little else) by one of the judges. His parents are giving him money for college but he is actually spending it on dance classes. The third main character is Saul. He’s a white guy, quite angry with the world. He is in Mumbai because Nishi’s dance school invited him to teach. We later find out he’s there because he couldn’t get a teaching job in America, Israel, or anywhere else. He loudly grumbles that nearly all the students in his class aren’t ready for what he can teach them. I’m not sure I followed the circumstances on why Asif ended up in the same ballet class. As Saul tries to teach the class he soon sees that Asif and Nishi actually have considerable talent. But there is disapproval from parents and community – when the family is so poor why spend money on ballet? Asif gets in the middle of a Muslim/Hindi conflict. Add a bit of tragedy. And what future is there for ballet dancers in India? I enjoyed it. The movie is based on a true story. Back in 2017 Sooni Taraporevala wrote and directed a 15 minute documentary of Manish Chauhan and Amiruddin Shah, two young men who rose out of Mumbai poverty to be accepted in ballet schools in America and Britain. I don’t think that documentary is available. In 2020 the same director expanded the story into this two hour movie with Chauhan playing the role of Nishi (essentially a version of himself). Last Thursday Mark Sumner of Daily Kos wrote that the nasty guy seemed to have disappeared from the news. Understandable in the week Biden bowed out of the race and Kamala raised vast sums and volunteers. But it’s a new feeling for the old guy – who has dominated the news for nine years and last week didn’t. Isn’t it nice? Alas, the fresh air won’t last. He’ll say something outrageous and media will give him the attention he demands. Just today he said that Harris will destroy the country in the same way she destroyed San Francisco. Which sounds pretty good to me since San Francisco is humming along quite nicely. On Friday Sumner wrote about all the things that in the nasty guy’s view had gone wrong last week. Which means it was a good week for the rest of us. Walter Einenkel of Kos reported that FBI director Christopher Wray told the House committee investigating the assassination attempt on the nasty guy that it isn’t clear whether that ear was hit by a bullet or much smaller shrapnel. The only official word on what struck that ear is from the nasty guy’s doctor Ronny Jackson who was not the attending physician and whose authority to practice medicine has been sharply curtailed. But that is enough “proof” to allow Speaker Johnson to condemn Wray’s testimony. Joan McCarter of Kos noted the hospital released very little about the ear. It’s mighty strange there is no official information. The state of the ear should be public knowledge. Whether the ear was hit by a bullet or shrapnel shouldn’t matter – the nasty guy definitely survived an assassination attempt. Even so, he insists it was a bullet.

Trump needs to bolster the mythology that he, in his words, “took a bullet for democracy.” It wasn’t enough to have survived a horrendous assassination attempt. The MAGA hagiography demands more drama, that he be “shot”—a whole convention was centered on that.

Which leads me to believe that while the ear bled a lot there isn’t much of a wound. Kos of Kos wrote that the nasty guy has withdrawn from debating Harris. He could have said he would debate whoever was the official Democratic nominee. But he didn’t. So, wrote Kos, he’s too afraid to debate her. On Friday Sumner wrote about another cringy thing JD Vance said. He proposed that Americans without children should pay higher taxes. I’ll work hard to ignore some of the other strange and ugly things he’s said (though if you insist Sumner documented many). Conclusion: Vance is weird and not in a good way. He’s also a big gift for Democrats. On Monday Sumner documented more Vance weirdness and more responses to it. Some Republicans are now calling for Vance to be removed. But will the nasty guy ever admit he’s made a bad choice? Which, in this case, is good. For Democrats. oscarsmom of the Kos community reminds us that the nasty guy used a good long time to vet Vance and chose him for a reason. That reason appears to be that much of Vance’s thinking matches that of the nasty guy. The prime example is how completely they both disrespect women. Einenkel reported on Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz talking about Vance to Jen Psaki of MSNBC. Here’s some of what Walz said.

The golden rule that makes small towns work, so we're not at each other's throats all the time, is mind your own damn business. I don't need him to tell me about my family. I don't need him telling me about my wife's health care and her reproductive rights. I don't need him telling my children what books they can read. I think rural America is, they are angry. They were gutted. But Joe Biden's policies, and now soon-to-be President Harris, bringing back manufacturing jobs, bringing back dignity. Investing in infrastructure. How are you going to build a water treatment plant in a town of 400, if you don't have a collective effort at it? So I have to tell you, they scream socialism. We just build roads, and we build schools, and we build prosperity into this. ... You're not on your own. Neighbors help neighbors.

Walz also contrasted that with the goals of the nasty guy, Vance, and Republicans. With Walz having such a straightforward way of explaining things many Democrats are now saying, “Hey, Kamala, Tim would be a dandy VP pick.” Even if he isn’t from a swing state. Not bad to go from national obscurity to being pushed for VP based on one TV appearance. In the comments of a pundit roundup on Kos are a few good memes and cartoons. From memes posted by exlrrp:

Kamala has raised so much money that Clarence Thomas wants to go on vacation with her. Nasty guy: Lyin’ Kamala Harris destroys everything she touches. Harris: Which is exactly why you’re too intimidated to debate me!!! Why did the chicken cross the road? So he wouldn’t have to debate Kamala!

Tjeerd Royaards put up a cartoon showing a crowd watching Democracy Demolition at the Olympics: The ranking show: Russia, China, United States, Hungary, Turkey, Israel... Shotgun Rider played off Vance’s comments on Cat Ladies and said we haven’t yet heard from the Cat Daddies, who will have a lot to say. Jeff Danzinger posted a cartoon to Kos showing two woman at the grocery checkout with full carts and bawling kids. One says, “Was I happier being a childless cat lady?” The other replies, “I remember cats were cheaper.” Today McCarter reported Biden has called for Supreme Court reforms. He did so in an op-ed in the Washington Post. Biden called for term limits for justices and an enforceable ethics code. He also called for a constitutional amendment saying presidents don’t have immunity from being charged with crimes, an attempt to reverse the Court’s ruling for the nasty guy. Harris quickly released a statement with her agreement. On Thursday Justice Kagan, speaking at a judicial conference, had endorsed an enforceable code of conduct.

“I think that the thing that can be criticized is, you know, rules usually have enforcement mechanisms attached to them. And this one, this set of rules does not,” Kagan told the federal judges and lawyers. “Courts shouldn’t use individual cases as vehicles to advance some broader agenda or some broader project to change our governance structure or our society,” she said. “Hopefully, it doesn’t happen much, but there have been cases in the last few years in which it has happened to my lights, at least.”

Leonard Leo, the architect of today’s Court and saying something so Alito and Thomas don’t have to, blasted the idea of enforceable ethics. And Johnson called the proposals “dead on arrival” in the House – as we well know. But Biden put it out there to show the difference between Republicans and Democrats. And Republicans definitely played their part. Strange that Biden issued these reforms to restore people’s faith in the Court while Johnson says the reforms would “erode” that same thing. McCarter reported that recently the Supremes ruled that courts, not government agencies, should have the final say in federal policy. A group of eleven Democratic senators, led by Elizabeth Warren are now proposing legislation to undo that ruling. It would say that scientist, not courts and corporate interests, should write the rules. Already, red state Attorneys General have asked for a Supreme Court emergency ruling to block EPA rules intended to limit greenhouse gas emissions. And they’re well into preparing to challenge as many other government protections as they can, which would flood the courts. Again, nothing will happen until Democrats control the House, Senate, and presidency.

The majority disdains restraint and grasps for power

I’m about to travel, leaving Monday after lunch. I might post tomorrow, and might not. I’ll be gone for two and a half weeks. If I post in that time it will probably be travelogue. Yeah, pontificating on Thursday’s debate is still a thing. Kerry Eleveld of Daily Kos wrote a review of the debate. In spite of the obvious flubs that are getting all the airtime Biden did give a spirited defense of democracy in the face of the nasty guy lies. The nasty guy’s lying did catch plenty of notice. Alas, there are still many who won’t vote for the nasty guy because of his lies and other behavior, but then saw Biden as old and won’t vote for him. Joan McCarter of Kos reported that Speaker Mike Johnson has found a reason to remove a president. Johnson was an architect of the nasty guy’s attempt to stay in office in 2020 and voted against impeachment twice. His choice in November is the criminal and constant liar. Johnson could have helped remove that president from office. And didn’t. But he’s called on Biden to pull out of the race. Reason? Biden lost a debate.

This is the same Mike Johnson who voted against removing Trump from office after the Capitol insurrection. He’s for removing a president because he’s old, and he’s against removing a president who is old and who tried to overthrow the government. Good to know.

McCarter than quoted CNN’s fact checker, who said the nasty lied more than 30 times. The quote lists them. Kos of Kos says Biden called for the debates and set the rules, so Biden needs to fix it. That does not mean dropping out. There is a problem if the nomination is handed to Kamala Harris. She’s not Biden and would have an extremely hard time winning. But shoving Harris aside for Newsom, Whitmer, or Buttigieg or any other Democrat ready to jump in would create quite bad optics. Also, states want names for the ballot by about six weeks. This was a lost opportunity to shift the narrative from Biden’s age to the nasty guy’s mental decline. But so far the polls have shifted little. The Supremes have issued quite a few rulings over the last few days as they conclude their session. An Associated Press article posted on Kos reported on a ruling about whether cities can enforce bans on homeless people sleeping outdoors when shelters are full. The question before the court is whether the bans were “cruel and unusual” and in violation of the Eighth Amendment. The majority, in the 6-3 decision along ideological lines, said nope, it’s not cruel. The minority, in a dissent read from the bench, said yes, it is. “Sleep is a biological necessity, not a crime,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor said. The minority sided with the homeless who, in many cases, do not have an option when shelters are full. The number of homeless in the country is more than 650K, the most since 2007. The majority sided with cities, who want to keep their beautiful and safe. The article doesn’t mention how the ruling supports the social hierarchy, which this Court is all about. This ruling is also about oppressing the people already in a difficult and precarious positions. Another AP article reported the Court overturned the Chevron decision. Many articles don’t mention the name of the two cases involved, which can be confusing, so I’ll mention them: Loper v. Raimondo and Relentless v. Department of Commerce. The main dispute is who has the final say when an agency issues a rule and the supporting law is vague in that area. Back in 1984 the Chevron decision concluded that in such cases deference should be given to the agency who wrote the rule. They’re the experts. Congress cannot foresee every possibility and having Congress wrangle every last detail of what “clean water” means is something they don’t have time or expertise for. So, fine, Congress can’t fill in the details. But corporations say courts can. Environment and consumer protection advocates say, courts aren’t subject experts either. It will take time to teach the courts the relevant science. Filling the courts with these cases (and there will be a lot of cases) will take up a lot of time and in the meantime the corporations could continue their harm to consumers and the environment. (To which corporations say to themselves, yep, that’s the point.) Scott Detrow of NPR talked to law professor Jody Freeman about this case in a six minute, understandable discussion. McCarter reported Justice Elena Kagan issued a strong dissent for these rulings. There’s the part about courts not being subject experts – which Justice Gorsuch demonstrated by repeatedly confusing “nitrous oxide” and “nitrogen oxides.” A bit of Kagan’s dissent quoted by McCarter:

In one fell swoop, the majority today gives itself exclusive power over every open issue—no matter how expertise-driven or policy-laden—involving the meaning of regulatory law. As if it did not have enough on its plate, the majority turns itself into the country’s administrative czar. It defends that move as one (suddenly) required by the (nearly 80-year-old) Administrative Procedure Act. But the Act makes no such demand. Today’s decision is not one Congress directed. It is entirely the majority’s choice. ... Its justification comes down, in the end, to this: Courts must have more say over regulation—over the provision of health care, the protection of the environment, the safety of consumer products, the efficacy of transportation systems, and so on. A longstanding precedent at the crux of administrative governance thus falls victim to a bald assertion of judicial authority. The majority disdains restraint, and grasps for power.

A Supreme Court power grab? Yes, because a lot of cases will be appealed to them. In a pundit roundup for Kos Greg Dworkin had several interesting quotes. Jill Lawrence suggested that the nasty guy won simply by showing up because the impeachment process and the courts did not protect the country. He won again when moderators called him “Mr. President.” The rest of Dworkin’s quotes are about the ruling’s the Supremes have issued over the last few days. Just Security talked about another case, this one the Fisher ruling. It narrowed the definition of obstructing an official act. This was used to prosecute many of the Capitol attackers and the official act was Biden’s election certification. For those already convicted there is minimal impact. For those still waiting trial there are other laws to convict them under. Rock Hasen of Election Law Blog says the Fisher ruling probably won’t help the nasty guy because of his fake elector scheme. Inside Climate News discussed the decision to overturn Chevron. Though the actual question involved a small fishing operation the case was funded by the network created by the billionaire Koch family, who made their billions in petroleum and very much want to gut consumer and environmental protections. That original Chevron case was led by Anne Gorsuch, then head of the EPA and fierce opponent of regulations. She lost that 1984 case. Her son Neil wrote a lengthy concurring opinion to overturn Chevron. Noah Rosenbloom of The Atlantic said attacking the federal government’s ability to regulate industry (to protect consumers and the environment) has long been a corporate top priority.

A completely hypothetical complaint; a case without standing to complain

I spent yesterday’s post decrying the Supreme Court gutting affirmative action in college admissions. Alas, this post is to decry a couple more decisions as the Court finished their term and left for the summer. The first decision is that businesses may indeed discriminate against gay people. Joan McCarter of Daily Kos reported yup, it was decided 6-3. They hold that discrimination is protected by the First Amendment. A bit from Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissent (which I believe she read when the decision was announced), “Today, the Court, for the first time in its history, grants a business open to the public a constitutional right to refuse to serve members of a protected class.” McCarter posted her article before the decision was announced, the decision included in an update. And the case is – weird. So weird it should never have gone to trial and the Supremes should never have accepted it. But they jumped at the chance to stick it to the gays. The current case follows a 2018 case that decided a Colorado cake baker didn’t have to make wedding cakes for LGBTQ couples, but the Court didn’t extend the decision to include general religious beliefs or free speech rights. The weirdness of this case was uncovered by Melissa Gira Grant, writing for The New Republic: The case is about Lorie Smith who says Colorado’s Anti-Discrimination Act prevented her from a dream of creating wedding websites because she didn’t want to work with LGBTQ people. First problem: This was only a dream. She hadn’t actually been harmed yet. That’s the basis for “standing,” one of the requirement to bring such a case. Second problem: The suit was brought to the US District Court in Colorado on Sept. 20, 2016. The incident that prompted the case allegedly happened on Sept. 21, the day after. Third problem: That first request for a same-sex wedding website came from “Stewart” marrying “Mike.” Stewart’s contact information is listed. Amazingly nobody called Stewart for seven years, until Grant did. Stewart says Grant contacting him was the first he heard that his name was attached to a Supreme Court case. He denies he filed the complaint the case is based on. He’s married to a woman and has a child. He lives in San Francisco (they’re all gay, right?), so it is doubtful he would use a Colorado web service. He does not agree with the Court’s decision. The whole case is based on lies. Colorado AG Philip Weiser, in a brief to the court noted, “The record contains no evidence.” Yet, the ruling will have profound and dangerous consequences. How dangerous? As Sotomayor and Jackson noted in oral arguments, what if the website maker doesn’t believe in interracial marriage? What if a Santa refused black kids? Ruling on a case with such profound and dangerous implications, which has no evidence, and is based on lies is an example of how much this corrupt Court intends to rule by decree. A famous saying is the Supreme Court has no army, so relies on the respect for the Court and for Democracy to convince the rest of the government and citizens to abide by its decisions. I’ve concluded this Court does have an army – all those MAGA people the court has made sure are well armed. They’ll be delighted to enforce the bigotry of this Court. The other big case, as reported by the Associated Press in an article posted on Kos, is the Supreme Court decided that the Biden administration had overstepped its authority in offering to cancel or reduce student loans for millions of Americans. They held that the executive branch needed the endorsement of Congress before implementing so costly a program. Biden had based his argument on the 2003 HEROES Act. The Court’s decision says that act does not authorize what Biden wants to do. 43 million people are eligible for relief. 26 million have already applied. The projected cost over 30 years is $400 billion (as in $13 billion a year? In a multi-trillion budget? Sheesh). Joan McCarter of Kos wrote about the dissents Kagan and Sotomayor wrote on these two cases. From Kagan on the loan forgiveness decision:

The Court’s first overreach in this case is deciding it at all. Under Article III of the Constitution, a plaintiff must have standing to challenge a government action. And that requires a personal stake—an injury in fact. We do not allow plaintiffs to bring suit just because they oppose a policy. Neither do we allow plaintiffs to rely on injuries suffered by others. Those rules may sound technical, but they enforce “fundamental limits on federal judicial power.”

The second overreach Kagan says is the HEROES Act does indeed authorize what Biden proposed to do. At the end of that explanation she wrote, “But this Court today decides that some 40 million Americans will not receive the benefits the plan provides, because (so says the Court) that assistance is too “significant.” Significant? If it was a smaller amount – $40 billion? $4 billion? – the conservative justices would be OK with it? I have my doubts. Or is this not about the money, but that 40 million people will be less oppressed? Back to the LGBTQ discrimination case and Sotomayor’s dissent. McCarter sets some of this in a quote box, but it isn’t clear who is being quoted.

“This ostracism, this otherness, is among the most distressing feelings that can be felt by our social species,” she writes. The fundamental point of centuries of civil rights legislation has been to prevent that harm from being felt by whole classes of people—women, people of color, disabled people, LGBTQ people. Sotomayor cites case after case in which business owners came to the Supreme Court to argue that they had a particular right to discriminate in response to every new civil rights law enacted on behalf of each of these protected classes, and in which the court disagreed. “Today, the Court, for the first time in its history, grants a business open to the public a constitutional right to refuse to serve members of a protected class,” Sotomayor declared. “Time and again, businesses and other commercial entities have claimed constitutional rights to discriminate. And time and again, this Court has courageously stood up to those claims—until today. Today, the Court shrinks.”

McCarter wrote:

This is a court acting well beyond its scope. Neither of these cases should have been heard by the Supreme Court, just on procedural grounds. One was based on a completely hypothetical complaint; the other was brought by plaintiffs who didn’t have standing to complain. This court majority is intent on doubling down on its illegitimacy with every session, and it has to be stopped.

While Biden recognizes this is not a normal court, he doesn’t want to do anything about it for fear “we're going to politicize it maybe forever in a way that is not healthy.” To which McCarter responded:

This court couldn’t be more politicized and it couldn’t be more unhealthy. There are three justices who have laid out all the evidence, all the justification.

A fundraising email from March for Our Lives begins:

Today, the Supreme Court once again decided to steal our futures. * They ruled against our right to identify how we want to without discrimination. * They ruled against our right to be free of crippling debt. * They ruled against a decades-long program to make sure that people of color have the same right to a college education that white students do.

In a pundit roundup by Greg Dworkin of Kos quoted Ron Brownstein of The Atlantic that discusses the generation gap the MFOL email implies:

In the broadest sense, the Republican-appointed justices have moved to buttress the affluence and status that allow white people to wield the most influence in society, and to diminish the possibility that accelerating demographic change will force a renegotiation of that balance of power. In that way, the ruling is a judicial extension of the proliferating red-state laws meant to constrain the potential influence of younger generations through measures making it more difficult to vote, banning books, and censoring how teachers talk about race and gender inequities. All of these conflicts reflect the mounting tension between what I’ve called the brown and the gray: the racially and culturally diverse younger generations who are becoming the cornerstone of the Democratic political coalition, and the mostly white older generations who provide the foundation of Republican electoral strength.

I’ve heard the young generations in the Democratic party are annoyed the guy at the top of the ticket is 80. His likely opponent, at 77, is no better. Isn’t there someone who could lead this country and is only 50? Commenter exlrrp included a meme by Tristan Snell for Occupy Democrats:

Let me get this straight: forgiving PPP loans is capitalism – but forgiving student loans is socialism?

Kerry Eleveld of Kos reported Biden is already working out a different way to extend relief to those who have student debt. If he can’t use the HEROES Act, he’ll use the Higher Education Act. He had used the HEROES Act because it was faster. The other has a much longer rule making process, though that process has started.

Beyond announcing the particulars of his Plan B for helping borrowers, Biden slammed Republicans for opposing his $400 billion student debt relief program while backing the $760 billion Paycheck Protection Program for small businesses, where the average amount forgiven was about $70,000. Some congressional members borrowed hundreds of thousands of dollars themselves, Biden noted, with several borrowing north of $1 million. “All those loans were forgiven,” Biden said. “My program’s too expensive? … The hypocrisy is stunning,” he added.

The town declared itself liberated

I didn’t report on Michigan’s COVID data last week because the data came out the day after Labor Day when a lot of counties hadn’t reported. I did download data today, updated yesterday. The number of new cases per day continues to slowly decline. For the last few weeks the peak is reported as 2683, 2533, 2489, and 2055. The number of deaths per day remains low. At a time when Republican candidates around the country are scrubbing their websites of the word abortion (though that does not mean they are softening their stance) and Republicans have been saying for 50 years that abortion should be a state issue, Leningrad Lindsey said about a federal abortion ban “If we take back the House and Senate, I can assure you we'll have a vote.” Thanks to Laura Clawson of Daily Kos for that report. She added that Lindsey is trying to sell this as a compromise. To me it shows for at least some Republicans the dictates of their supremacy is stronger than their political needs. Other reports say the fall election won’t be a referendum on Biden, as most midterms are. Instead, it will be a referendum on Republicans and abortion. Joan McCarter of Kos discussed the comments by Chief Justice John Roberts who said the Supremes are being treated as illegitimate because we don’t like their rulings. I mentioned several real reasons a couple days ago. McCarter then discussed something Ryan Cooper of The American Prospect wrote about. The Constitution stipulates that Congress can limit the jurisdiction of the Court. And they did so in the recently passed Inflation Reduction Act and its drug price control provisions by including the phrase “There shall be no administrative or judicial review.” So let’s add that phrase to a bill on abortion rights. To one on voting rights. Civil rights. Environmental protection. Separation of Church and State. Alas, I can imagine the current gang in the Supremes coming up with a way of saying the phrase in the constitution limiting their power is unconstitutional. So using this phrase won’t be enough to take the Court back from extremists. McCarter also reported that Justice Elena Kagan had a reply to Roberts. McCarter wrote:

“Judges create legitimacy problems for themselves … when they instead stray into places where it looks like they’re an extension of the political process or when they’re imposing their own personal preferences,” Kagan said Monday in a livestreamed talk from Temple Emanu-El in New York. She added that the American people have the right to presume the court is above politics, and “that changes in personnel don’t send the entire legal system up for grabs.”

I’ve mentioned a few times that Ukraine was setting a trap around Kherson and everyone except Russia recognized it. Kos of Kos wrote that Russia is finally catching on. Troops in the area have started negotiating surrender. And they want to be allowed to leave with their weapons. Kos wrote:

Ukraine’s negotiating position should be simple: Russian forces can happily withdraw into a POW camp after handing their equipment over. Seriously, “We’re out of ammo, please let us out with all our gear” is not a particularly well-leveraged negotiating position. There’s no plausible “or else...” that is even remotely compelling to Ukraine.

Kos included a tweet from Where is Russia Today showing surrender cards Russian soldiers can show to Ukrainian soldiers for safe passage (likely to a POW camp, then eventually home). There are even chat and phone numbers for detailed support. Mark Sumner of Kos took a break from maps showing which village is being liberated to discuss how natural gas and its price are playing into this war. Yes, the price of natural gas is up by quite a bit. But it was much higher before the fracking boom made natural gas cheaper than coal. Even so, the current price is hurting Europe now. And Russia is into its biggest propaganda campaign, saying without Russian gas Europe’s industries will collapse, unemployment will soar, and the people will freeze this winter. Russia has even gotten Western media to repeat it (though for Fox News that’s assumed). But that won’t happen. Yeah, energy bills will go up and spur inflation, but industries won’t fold and no one will freeze. But that can still put pressure on European politicians to end their support for Ukraine. In the meantime the Russian army doesn’t need to do anything but blow up Ukrainian power plants and make Ukraine more of a burden on Europe’s power network. However, Europe is now working hard to switch to renewable energy. The price of natural gas may be low (compared to before 2009), but solar and wind are even lower. This war may be a prompt, but Europe has been feeling the effects of climate change too. That means Putin’s natural gas threat has a time limit. Putin’s propaganda campaign means Ukraine needed its counteroffensive now. They need to show the war might be over quickly – in a few months and before winter, not many months or years. And even if their spectacular success over the last week can’t be maintained, they just might do it. In another post Sumner went back to his maps. The cities of Lysychansk and Severodonetsk are being fought over again. Northwest of those cities is the town of Kreminna. Russians have reportedly left, leaving the place under control of Donbas conscripts. And perhaps they have gone too. So, even though there are no Ukrainian soldiers present the town declared itself liberated and raised the Ukrainian flag. There are likely several more towns like this. In some the Donbas soldiers are left with weapons they don’t know how to use. Sumner included a tweet by Dmitri

If a garden snail started its 50km journey from Lysychansk to Bakhmut on 3 July, when Lysychansk fell, at the speed of 0.05km/h, it would have already made it to Bakhmut and almost made it halfway back. Unlike Russians.

Kos did another report on tankies, Westerners and Americans who believe American imperialism is the cause of this war while Russian imperialism is just fine. They are coming up with all sorts of excuses for what’s going on. Some are convinced Ukraine’s rapid advance around Kharkiv is a trap Russia will spring any moment now. Kos wrote:

Funny that Russian state media itself is more willing to admit battlefield reversals than RT’s English-facing propaganda shills.

Here’s a good cartoon showing the current war situation from Kevin Kal Kalllaugher. Mike Lindell, founder of MyPillow and famous for pushing 2020 election fraud conspiracies (that have been proven false), has incited his followers into action. Rebeka Sager of Kos reported he has urged them to request “cast vote records,” as Lindell calls them, from their local election offices. Voting records have been available since shortly after the last election and are kept for only 22 months – about now. It seems these people are looking for some sort of record to show voting machines were taken over by nefarious groups. But the requests are so numerous they are swamping election offices trying to get ready for the 2022 election. And that’s the point. What records are available can be given to parties that request them. And Lindell could have done it long ago. But he didn’t. He asked his followers to do it and do it now. Swamping election offices is intentional. Hunter of Kos, working from a report by CNN, reported that Republicans in Wayne County, Michigan (where Detroit is) are training poll workers and observers. They are promoting conspiracy theories and rigged voting and encouraging their recruits to break the law.

So it stands to reason that Republican Party officials would declare that the rules don't apply to them and that their side should feel free to break them. Makes perfect sense. And the reason, the Republican trainers told their fellow partisans, is that the other side's invisible conspiracies are so vast that violating rules meant to protect voters and ballots is obviously necessary.

I’ve heard from other sources that when these workers and observers take official election training they may see how secure our election system actually is. Or they get weeded out from working on election day. Or we’re in trouble. A few years ago Marist College took over the Mindset List from Beloit College. The List is a guide for professors to understand they way their incoming students think. When Beloit College did it the list had as many as 60 items, with statements like for as long as these students have been alive this has always been true – this device has always existed, that famous person has always been dead. It prompted us older people to think about how long we’ve been around. Alas, the Marist version of the list has only ten items in it. And some of them aren’t about something that happened 18 years ago. Some of the things in the 2022 list for the class of 2026: * Hillary Clinton has always been more significant than Bill Clinton. * Facebook has always been around. * Greta Thunberg has set the stage for demanding legal reforms to improve the climate. * They may graduate without crippling student debt.