Another right winger goes into the ‘Can’t Fix Stupid’ File……
This tine it is that idiot from Florida (go figure), Gaetz, on the abortion issue…..
Appearing before a Florida convention of young people, Rep. Matt Gaetz said Saturday that women demonstrating for access to legal abortions are too unattractive to become pregnant. “Why is it that the women with the least likelihood of getting pregnant are the ones most worried about having abortions?” Gaetz told the group. “Nobody wants to impregnate you if you look like a thumb.” The Republican lawmaker was speaking to about 5,000 young people at the Turning Point USA Student Action Summit in Tampa, USA Today reports.
“Calling women unattractive is kind of Gaetz’s go-to schtick,” Laura Bassett writes for Jezebel. He made a complementary point in a tweet when the US Supreme Court threw out Roe v. Wade, posting, “How many of the women rallying against overturning Roe are over-educated, under-loved millennials who sadly return from protests to a lonely microwave dinner with their cats, and no bumble matches?” Bassett calls Saturday’s remarks by Gaetz, who is under federal investigation on suspicion of sex trafficking, “cartoonishly misogynist.”
The crowd did not boo the comments, which Gaetz included in his Twitter feed. Democratic Rep. Tom Malinowski of New Jersey called Gaetz’s speech “brain-dead misogyny” in a tweet, warning that after the midterm elections this fall, the next Congress will include more lawmakers who think that way. Former President Donald Trump also addressed the student audience and referred to Gaetz. “What a wonderful guy,” Trump said.
This from a guy that is under investigation for his sexual proclivities….
I am speechless at the unfeeling bullsh*t these types of ‘people’ can come up with on any given day.
Another GOPer opens mouth and proves ‘You Can’t Fix Stupid’…..
It seems these morons try to out stupid each other daily…..
As the war in Ukraine drags on and we hear this side or that is winning….a couple of representatives have horrible idea……they think we should send in military advisers to Ukraine.
A bipartisan group of House lawmakers visited Kyiv on Saturday, and two members of the delegation told Fox News that they support the idea of the Pentagon sending military advisors to Ukraine, which would significantly escalate US involvement in the war.
After meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Rep. Michael Waltz (R-FL) said he supported sending military advisors into Ukraine to oversee weapons shipments and help with intelligence and logistics. “It could be contracted, it could be civilian, but it could be military as well,” he said.
“I don’t think anybody is advocating for any [American] military on the front line, but helping with logistics, planning those operations, integrating the intelligence is incredibly important right now,” Waltz added said.
Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D-NJ) also expressed support for sending military advisors to track weapons shipments. “It would be good to have a logistics officer here to make sure that we understand and track the weaponry that we’re sending,” she said.
Last month, The New York Times reported that there is CIA personnel operating in Ukraine to direct intelligence sharing with Kyiv. The report said there are also commandos in the country from Britain, France, Canada, and Lithuania to help facilitate the transfer of Western arms, but there is currently no known US military presence in Ukraine.
Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA), the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, was also part of the delegation that visited Kyiv but wasn’t quoted saying he supported sending military advisors.
(antiwar.com)
Seriously?
Have any of these idiots every read a book?
Military advisers lead to the US escalation in Vietnam and we know where that lead (well some of us but not these morons)…..
Maybe a good idea would be to check out just who pays their ‘donations’……my money is on the M-IC.
Hopefully the rest of the Congress will see the folly of this idea….but I will not hold my breath.
There seems to be a war a week these days…..Ukraine, Russia, China, Taiwan on and on….but this war that I am referring to is a war within our own society…..a Civil War….yet another civil strife that tears this country apart.
We are told that all this could change if we just get out and vote….I do not believe so….the political divide is getting deeper and deeper…..
Our country is in a crisis. On a near-daily basis, evidence mounts implicating the former president of the United States in a coup attempt against our republic. And in just the past two weeks, a spate of extremist Supreme Court decisions have gotten rid of a woman’s fundamental right to make decisions about her own body, our government’s ability to regulate clean air and water as required by law, and the separation of church and state, all while curbing our ability to regulate deadly weapons.
The legitimacy of a democracy rests on the consent of the governed, on the premise that decisions made by civic institutions reflect the will of the citizens and noncitizens they impact. From the January 6 insurrection to the increase in voter suppression, it has become increasingly clear that our country is in the midst of a legitimacy crisis, with the Supreme Court at the heart of it.
But the court’s recent rulings signify more than just a curtailment of our rights. As an immigrant who has seen countries descend into civil conflict, I recognize a familiar trend here: These are the latest signposts in the frightening backsliding of US democracy into authoritarianism.
David Brooks of the NYT has some thoughts on this…..
Look at the conditions all around us:
First, Americans are deeply dissatisfied with the way things are going. Only 13% of voters say the country is on the right track, according to a New York Times/Siena College poll published this week.
Second, Americans are deeply dissatisfied with the leaders of both parties. Joe Biden has a 33% job approval rating among registered voters. About half of Republican voters want to move on from Donald Trump and find a new presidential candidate for 2024.
Third, inflation is soaring. Throughout history, inflationary periods have often been linked to political instability. As economist Lionel Robbins wrote about Weimar Germany, inflation “destroyed the wealth of the more solid elements in German society; and it left behind a moral and economic disequilibrium, apt breeding ground for the disasters which have followed.”
Fourth, the generational turnover is coming. The boomer gerontocracy that now dominates power is bound to retire, leaving a vacuum for something new.
Fifth, Americans are detaching from the two political parties. Far more Americans consider themselves independents than consider themselves either Democrats or Republicans, and independents may be growing more distinct. And there’s some research that suggests independents are increasingly not just closeted members of the two main parties but also hold different beliefs, which puts them between parties. Sixty-two percent of Americans believe a third party is needed.
Sixth, disgust with the current system is high. A majority of American voters believe that our system of government does not work, and 58% believe that our democracy needs major reforms or a complete overhaul. Nearly half of young adult voters believe voting does not affect how the government operates
Things are not looking good for this social situation to right itself……so is there another Civil War in our near future?
50% of the Americans polled think that we are headed for another messy and possibly bloody correction in our republic….
A shocking new study has found that half of Americans expect to see a second civil war within years, while nearly a fifth say they would be armed with guns at a political skirmish themselves.
Distressing levels of “alienation,” “mistrust,” and a growing tendency to resort to violence were uncovered by researchers at the University of California, Davis, in their recent survey of 8,620 adults across the US. They found that more than two-thirds of respondents said they perceived a “serious threat to our democracy,” while more than half agreed that “in the next few years, there will be civil war in the US.” Over 40 per cent noted the importance of having a “strong leader” over democracy, while also agreeing that “native-born white people are being replaced by immigrants.”
According to the study, there is a growing tendency to settle political disagreements with violence. Almost a fifth of respondents told them that it was likely they would be “armed with a gun” at a political flash point in the next couple of years, while four per cent admitted it was likely they would “shoot someone with a gun.”
I fear that I may live long enough to see the final disintegration of our republic….it, the republic, is slowly going the way of the dodo. The slow erosion of civil liberties has been finalized by the Supreme Court.
Before I am accused of being a dirty old man, that this movement is more about equality than just flashing one’s breasts…I would be a liar if I said that it is not enjoyable for me…there is so much more to this than you would think……
There have been many women’s movements….like “Ban The Bra”…..the push for acceptance of public breast feeding…..of course the Puritan wing of the GOP have always been afraid of women’s breast in one form or the other….
Before I go on and make it look like I am that dirty old man your mother warned you about……
“Free the nipple” has made headlines yet again, this time over Instagram’s public apology to director Pedro Almodovar for censoring the poster for his latest movie Madres Paralelas. The image, designed by artist Javier Jaen, features a lactating nipple cropped to appear as a crying eye, and it was widely removed on the platform for violating Instagram’s guidelines. The apology issued by Instagram resulted in Almodovar proclaiming victory over the algorithm, and an abundance of media attention including the New York Times’s article.
The body-equality slogan “Free the nipple” is so ubiquitous that it sounds as though it belongs in the annals of history alongside “Make love not war” and “Votes for women,” but actually this international rallying cry is barely a decade old. Born into the Instagram-age and made infamous through it, “Free the nipple” has regularly popped up on social media accounts, despite the fact that #FreeTheNipple itself is invisible on the platform: Type in “#FreeTheNipple” in the Instagram search bar and it will direct to a stark notice: “This Hashtag Is Hidden.” Alternatively, add a year to the slogan such as #freethenipple2021 and it works, effectively rendering the movement a yearly trend rather than the full-voiced campaign for change that it is.
Personally I do not understand the fixation of women’s breast…..I would be lying as a man if I said it did not matter….but let’s be real….I am a man and I am not dead yet….the concern should be for the 300+ mass shootings this year so far and less about what breasts are doing.
This is the story I read that got me to thinking about the movement…..and of course the trolls on social media that attack the young woman….
But it was never really about the dress, was it? It was about what’s under the dress and, more specifically, what exists just under the surface of society. The sheer fabric of a Valentino dress not only revealed Florence Pugh’s breasts, but shone a spotlight on the thinly veiled misogyny that remains rampant 2022.
This past Friday, Midsommar star Florence Pugh walked the red carpet at Valentino’s haute couture show in Rome wearing a fuschia tulle gown designed by the brand’s artistic director, Pierpaolo Piccioli. A nod to the emerging Barbie-core trend, the ensemble was all pink and featured a gauzy halter bodice that exposed the actress’ breasts and oh-so controversial nipples.
“Technically they’re covered?” Pugh wrote on Instagram, a platform known for its censorship of the female form. Posting these beautiful images to her following of 7.6million, it wasn’t long until the trolls crawled out of the woodwork.
It is the 21st century in real time but still Victorian in some eyes…..I do not understand the taboo-ness of nudity these….I mean one click on the PC and anyone can see all they want and much more graphic than some woman’s nipples.
I am old but I would to think that I have matured with time….I try to keep my thinking moving forward….I refuse to let it go in reverse.
The weekend and my attempt to give my readers the stories that the MSM refuses to give you…..
First, the weather in the UK is melting the people…..LA is melting from drought and a heat wave….here in Mississippi we are averaging about 100+ daily…..but that is about average.
Robots and AI….have you seen the Terminator series? SkyNet and its robots take over the world and start eliminating the humans….cool right?
But what do you know about robots and AI?
Let me help…..
Who would win in the ultimate robo deathmatch? A T-800, C3PO, or The Iron Giant? It’s a trick question—these robots are all fictional and this would never happen. But robots are a very real part of the modern world, in everything from car factories to vacuum cleaners. Let’s take a look at a few misconceptions about robots, adapted from an episode of Misconceptions on YouTube.
1. Misconception: Robotics and AI are the same thing.
These two fields often get lumped together. While the Venn diagram definitely features plenty of overlap, there are important distinctions.
Robotics involves the study and design of machines that can carry out tasks. According to NASA, “Robotics is the study of robots. Robots are machines that can be used to do jobs. Some robots can do work by themselves. Other robots must always have a person telling them what to do.”
Basically, they’re finely tuned machines that help assemble cars or your operate your Roomba. Robots aren’t necessarily humanoid in design—any robot that resembles a human should probably be considered an android. And, while we’re on the subject, a cyborg is different from an android. A cyborg is an organism, often a human being, with robotic enhancements.
Artificial intelligence, on the other hand, is a term that “is frequently applied to the project of developing systems endowed with the intellectual processes characteristic of humans, such as the ability to reason, discover meaning, generalize, or learn from past experience,” according to Britannica. AI is coding and programming. Think Watson, the supercomputer who crushes opponents on Jeopardy!, or even Siri on your iPhone.
In the middle of that Venn diagram, however, is Sophia. This social robot with AI functionality, designed by Hong Kong-based Hanson Robotics, was named the first Innovation Champion by the UN Development Programme. She also has Saudi citizenship. She can hold conversations, make realistic facial expressions, and casually drop eerie quips. When asked if humans should be scared of robots, Sophia responded, “Someone said ‘we have nothing to fear but itself.’ What did he know?” Yikes.
Many relatively simple robots are now being designed to incorporate elements of artificial intelligence. But calling a basic robot vacuum—which is still designed to do one task, over and over—artificially intelligent is pushing it.
SIG Sauer’s new MCX-SPEAR fires bullets with twice the kinetic energy of those from an AR-15. That means double the horrifying force that mangled the victims of the mass shooting in Uvalde, Texas, and left one youngster essentially decapitated.
“It’ll shoot through almost all of the bulletproof vests that are worn by law enforcement in the county right now,” said Ryan Busse, a former firearms company executive who is now a senior policy analyst with the Giffords Law Center and author of Gunfight: My Battle Against the Industry that Radicalized America.
The MCX-SPEAR is the civilian version of the U.S. Army’s NGSW-R (Next Generation Squad Weapon-Rifle), which was created with the express purpose of tearing through enemy body armor.
“This is a weapon that could defeat any body armor, any planned body armor that we know of in the future,” then-Army Chief of Staff Gen. Mark Milley told the Army Times in 2019. “This is a weapon that can go out at ranges that are unknown today.”
Milley had in mind the body armor worn by Russian and Chinese troops. The Army just shrugged when asked this week whether the same could apply to that worn by cops.
A subsidiary of Hyundai Motor Co has used child labor at a plant that supplies parts for the Korean carmaker’s assembly line in nearby Montgomery, Alabama, according to area police, the family of three underage workers, and eight former and current employees of the factory.
Underage workers, in some cases as young as 12, have recently worked at a metal stamping plant operated by SMART Alabama LLC, these people said. SMART, listed by Hyundai in corporate filings as a majority-owned unit, supplies parts for some of the most popular cars and SUVs built by the automaker in Montgomery, its flagship U.S. assembly plant.
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A Hyundai auto plant is seen from inside a Greyhound bus outside of Montgomery, Alabama, U.S., August 13, 2008. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton
LUVERNE, Alabama, July 22 (Reuters) – A subsidiary of Hyundai Motor Co has used child labor at a plant that supplies parts for the Korean carmaker’s assembly line in nearby Montgomery, Alabama, according to area police, the family of three underage workers, and eight former and current employees of the factory.
Underage workers, in some cases as young as 12, have recently worked at a metal stamping plant operated by SMART Alabama LLC, these people said. SMART, listed by Hyundai in corporate filings as a majority-owned unit, supplies parts for some of the most popular cars and SUVs built by the automaker in Montgomery, its flagship U.S. assembly plant.
In a statement sent after Reuters first published its findings on Friday, Hyundai (005380.KS) said it “does not tolerate illegal employment practices at any Hyundai entity. We have policies and procedures in place that require compliance with all local, state and federal laws.” It didn’t answer detailed questions from Reuters about the findings.
Inflation, especially in food, is hitting us all hard….so I try to find ways to stretch the food budget a bit further….
Do you like shrimp?
If so you could be wasting a valuable by-product…..
When it comes to eating animals, most white Americans seem to favor muscle and flesh over innards, heads, tails, tendons, and anything that isn’t, well, muscle and flesh. That’s too bad, because those are some of the best bits with the most flavor, particularly in the case of shrimp.
AS our next election looms large on the horizon….there are many questions that need to be asked and they all deserve an answer…..
I want to look at a little history.
Ever wonder where the whole Left/Right thing began?
Well boys and girls the Old Professor can help with that answer….
Depending on the country you live in, political opinion may be varied, or biased in one direction. In democratic countries, you obviously have the option to actually decide what direction your state should move towards via voting. And while a lot of political parties may opt for a safer middle ground usually more relatable for a wider demographic, there will always be the ones standing on, and for, the far right or far left.
But why do we call them that? It turns out the terms actually come with a rich history of their own and while they may mean different things in different countries and plenty of nuance on each side, a general classification comes from Scottish sociologist Robert Morrison MacIver, who in his 1947 treatise ‘The Web of Government’ classified things as such: “The right is always the party sector associated with the interests of the upper or dominant classes, the left the sector expressive of the lower economic or social classes, and the centre that of the middle classes. Historically this criterion seems acceptable. The conservative right has defended entrenched prerogatives, privileges and powers; the left has attacked them. The right has been more favorable to the aristocratic position, to the hierarchy of birth or of wealth; the left has fought for the equalization of advantage or of opportunity, for the claims of the less advantaged. Defence and attack have met, under democratic conditions, not in the name of class but in the name of principle; but the opposing principles have broadly corresponded to the interests of the different classes.”
Fascinatingly, despite seeming to be diametrically opposed on the surface, both sides of the political spectrum show manifestations of populism and may find a strong base in people belonging to each class of people from impoverished to rich.
In fact, there are proponents of the so-called ‘horseshoe theory’, which essentially says that the political far ‘left’ and far ‘right’ are, well, far closer to each other than they are to the ones traditionally holding the center. The reason for this is that the extremists on both sides tend to favour authoritarianism and totalitarianism.
I am sure you know someone who explains everything away as ‘false science’…..if not then you are very fortunate for they are everywhere and rattling on about everything.
How do these ‘people’ come by their misguided belief that all science is ‘false’ of ‘fake’?
Anti-science beliefs are built on four foundations, or bases, the authors said. These foundations are: thinking scientific sources lack credibility; identifying with groups that have anti-science attitudes; a scientific message that contradicts a person’s current beliefs; and a mismatch between how a message is presented and a person’s style of thinking.
“What all four of these bases have in common is they reveal what happens when scientific information conflicts with what people already think or their style of thought,” said co-author Richard Petty, professor of psychology at Ohio State.
For starters, industries are degrading trust in science by hijacking scientific credentials, using “sciency” sounding claims to bolster their clout for profits; pharmaceutical companies have most certainly given us plenty of reasons not to trust them. What’s more, science doesn’t always get things right, and large factions of the media are stoking sentiments against “elitist” experts and bolstering anti-science views.
This distrust of the source of information is one of the four main barriers to accepting science Philipp-Muller and colleagues identify in their review.
When information challenges a person’s core beliefs, challenges the group they identify with, or doesn’t match their learning style are the other main barriers the team highlighted.
“What all four of these bases have in common is they reveal what happens when scientific information conflicts with what people already think or their style of thought,” explains Petty.
I have always admired Iceland for their governmental leadership…..like they jailed the bank execs that helped cause the worldwide economic crash of 2008…..that should have been the policy in this country as well but instead we gave them a free ride to do it again.
Sorry I digress.
Iceland has erected a monument to those that have helped the nation through civil disobedience…..
A huge piece of rock sits in front of the Alþingishús parliament building, barely heeded by tourists, with a black cone of a noticeable size calmly stuck atop it, cracking it in half. It bears a plaque that contains a quote from the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, originally drafted by the Marquis de Lafayette during the French Revolution: “When the government violates the rights of the people, insurrection is for the people and for each portion of the people the most sacred of rights and the most indispensable of duties.”
Created by Spanish artist Santiego Sierra as a monument to civil disobedience, the design of this sculpture was inspired by a medieval tradition during the Inquisition, in which the condemned were forced to wear black cone-shaped hats as a sign of humiliation. Commemorating the so-called Kitchenware Revolution or the Pots and Pans Revolution, the monument caused a bit of controversy among city council members at the time of its installation.
The protests took place between 2009 and 2011 in the wake of the Icelandic financial crisis and the government’s poor handling of the situation, calling for the resignation of the right-wing Independence Party officials and for a new election. Considered the largest-scale protests in Icelandic history at the time, thousands of people gathered before the parliament and demanded changes to the old system.
This is a great idea for this country…. we have monuments for individuals but there was more to our civil disobedience than one person….we should celebrate the masses that were the protests.
This country was founded by those that participated in the disobedience……and we have a long history of civil protests………
I did not intend on today being a day of posts dedicated to the conflict in Ukraine and its leaders……but since the visit by Mrs. Z has made national news I figure there is more that I need to say.
For a couple of months now Zelensky has been purging the country of people that he deems dangerous to the ’cause’…..the first month or so of this conflict Zelensky started down this path…..
Before Russia invaded Ukraine, Western officials always cited corruption in Ukraine as the reason why Kyiv couldn’t join NATO or the EU. After the invasion, those concerns appeared to fall by the wayside as the US and its allies shipped billions of dollars worth of weapons and economic aid into Ukraine.
But Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s recent firing of two senior officials has brought the issue back up. Zelensky sacked his top prosecutor and the head of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) over allegations that many people in their departments were collaborating with Russia.
A Western official close to the Ukrainian government told Politico that Zelensky’s move appears to move away from the EU’s request for Ukraine to crack down on corruption and allow its law enforcement agencies to be more independent. Many anti-corruption activists believe the firings were an example of Zelensky using his wartime powers to consolidate more control.
Just a few months before Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, the US was still calling out the government of Ukraine for not appointing a corruption prosecutor. “The EU and the US are greatly disappointed by unexplained and unjustifiable delays in the selection of the Head of the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor Office, a crucial body in the fight against high-level corruption,” the US Embassy in Kyiv said on October 6, according to The Associated Press.
The State Department dismissed concerns about Zelensky’s latest firings. “In all of our relationships, and including in this relationship, we invest not in personalities; we invest in institutions, and, of course, President Zelenskyy has spoken to his rationale for making these personnel shifts,” State Department spokesman Ned Price told reporters on Monday.
Earlier in the war, Zelensky banned 11 political parties, including the country’s leading opposition party, Opposition Platform — For Life. But the move received little criticism from the West.
(antiwar.com)
Corruption?
And they think that since cash and weapons are pouring into the country….and corruption is suppose to cease with these purges….are we that naive?
Since the beginning I have not been a fan of Zelensky…there is much about the man that is been suppressed as the conflict rages….I do not think that we should put all our eggs in the Ukrainian president….
Volodymyr Zelensky, the embattled President of Ukraine has taken the world by storm. It seems everyone on Earth is singing his praises. It can be easy to feel that he deserves his legendary status. It is almost impossible to imagine him as anything less than a superhero pushing back against tyranny and saving the world. Is this a realistic characterization that anyone can live up to?
The war in Ukraine is a devastating and painful mess of towering misfortunes. In making sense of this disaster, it is very difficult to separate ourselves from the finality of what may seem inevitable. We try to interpret this tragedy in ways that make sense to us, we fall back to our ancient stories of good versus evil, David versus Goliath. Yet unfortunately our ancient stories and modern analogies are no use to us in the 21st century, in reality they don’t help us understand the danger the world faces.
They do present convincing arguments when there is derisory emphasis on peaceful solutions to the war. We have to ask what is the goal in this war? We can assume the goal is to save lives, we can assume the goal is victory. By learning what’s most important we can more greatly understand the progress being made. Of most importance is for the war to de-escalate immediately.
It must be understood that escalation takes us in the wrong direction, because a war against a nuclear armed power can’t be won. Without this crucial realization the most impossible things become possible, like a hero saving the world. Of course it’s essential to have inspiration and motivation in trying times, but it’s also essential to be practical.
I have asked many times….what is the end game for the US?
The defeat of Russia? We know that is not going to happen.
What is the national interests for the US (beyond the most obvious)….
To preserve democracy? That is a joke.
There is no interest in any end to the suffering of the Ukrainian people?
All American opinions are based on the ‘expert’ advice of the retired generals (who work for the M-IC) and group we should NOT trust at all….
Listening to television commentary and interviews of retired U.S. generals, one would be forgiven for believing Russia is on the ropes, and Ukraine was winning the war. Looking at on-the-ground battlefield reality in Ukraine, however, it quickly becomes apparent that the generals’ boasts continue a decade-long trend of rosy combat proclamations that all too often turn out to be disastrously wrong. American media, Congress, and the public need to start applying a little more scrutiny to what these officers say.
For example, retired Gen. Ben Hodges said last week that the “Russians are exhausted,” from four months of fighting and that if “the West sticks together through this year, then I think (the war) will be over (early 2023).” Earlier this month, retired Gen. Mark Hertling told a CNN audience that as Ukraine “gets more and more artillery” from the West, Hertling concluded that he believes “you’re going to see a gradual turn in the tide.”
On July 10th, former Vice Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army, Gen. Jack Keane – echoing Generals Hodges and Hertling – told Fox News that despite Russia’s progress in the Donbas, the “Ukrainians still have a real opportunity…to take back territory and we should not underestimate them.”
And yet, there is little credible evidence to suggest that any of these claims are accurate.
These people are employed to keep the population squarely behind the decisions to piss away much needed American funds.
We, the People, should be outraged at the prolonging of this conflict and yet we stand by and make excuses for the waste of funds needed in this country to carry on a war that yet again has NO viable end (a position the US finds itself in every war since 1945)….
Yesterday the First Lady of Ukraine came a-calling on our Congress….and it was theater at its best……
Ukrainian first lady Olena Zelenska, who has called herself “a non-public person,” stood in the US Capitol on Wednesday and starkly made the case for more US air defense systems to block Russian missiles. She showed America’s most powerful lawmakers images of the toll of Russian bombardment of cities on Ukraine’s children—a blood-splattered baby stroller, a small crumpled body. For Zelenska, spouse of President Volodymyr Zelensky, the appearance capped a week in Washington that marked some of her highest-profile appearances of the war, the AP reports. “We want no more airstrikes. No more missile strikes,” Zelenska told Republicans and Democrats on Wednesday, as an overhead screen displayed the wreckage of Russian bombardment of Ukrainian cities. “Is this too much to ask for?”
Speaking to an audience that included House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Zelenska appeared in the same congressional auditorium where her husband, speaking by video, drew standing ovations from lawmakers three weeks into Russia’s invasion. Until Wednesday, Zelenska’s conversations with US officials this week reportedly focused on the need for mental health care for Ukrainians dealing with the trauma of the war, and a US offer of rehabilitation assistance for children who have lost limbs in the attacks—humanitarian causes, not strategic or tactical. Wednesday’s appearance was different.
She showed photographs of a smiling, paint-smeared 4-year-old girl, Liza Dmytrieva, whom the first lady had happened to meet before Christmas. The screen next showed an overturned baby carriage with blood caking on the sidewalk beneath it, after an airstrike killed the girl. Another photo showed a girl in a pink headband, shot by Russian soldiers with her family as they tried to flee, and who screamed and cried for two hours in their car before dying, Zelenska said. Another showed a 3-year-old boy learning how to use a prosthetic limb after an airstrike. Zelenska noted the humanitarian needs. “Maybe you expected from me to speak on those topics,” she told lawmakers, through an interpreter. “But how can I talk on all that when an unprovoked war is being waged on our country?” Lawmakers gave her standing ovations before her speech, but the photos had some shaking their heads. “We’ve seen from Ukrainian leadership their courage but also their no-nonsense direct appeal and laying out the brutal mentality of Mr. Putin,” Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin said afterward.
Like I said theater…..looks like all that cash spent on PR by Ukraine is paying off.
I am old so I can remember similar theater for Kuwait and the Balkans in the 1990s….I would rather see the humanitarian aid doing some good or the bank accounts of the so-called ‘leaders’….it was masterful theater thrown at the Congress to justify the US throwing away money.
Now ask….what does the US hope to accomplish in Ukraine (other than the most obvious)….
By all accounts the best that Ukraine can hope for is a draw…..if true then what are our intentions?
To protect democracy? That ship sailed in the first month of the conflict.
Where is the national interest for the US (beyond the obvious)….
We need to ask questions and get direct answers before we keep flushing taxpayer cash down the Ukrainian toilet.
