(AP) — A day after Moscow suffered a stinging symbolic defeat with the loss of the flagship of its Black Sea fleet, Russia’s Defense Ministry promised Friday to ramp up missile attacks on the Ukrainian capital in response to Ukraine’s alleged military “diversions on the Russian territory.”
The threat of intensified attacks on Kyiv came after Russian authorities accused Ukraine of launching airstrikes on residential buildings in Bryansk, a region that borders Ukraine, and wounding seven people. Authorities in another border region of Russia also reported Ukrainian shelling Thursday.
Life in Kyiv has been gradually returning to some normalcy after Russia failed to capture the capital and withdrew its troops in northern Ukraine to focus on a concentrated assault in the country’s east. A renewed bombardment could return the city’s residents to sheltering in subway stations and the steady wail of air raid sirens.
Ukrainian officials have not confirmed striking targets in Russia, and the reports by Russian authorities could not be independently verified. However, Ukrainian officials claimed their forces struck a key Russian warship with missiles on Thursday. If true, the claim would represent an important victory.
The guided-missile cruiser Moskva, named for the Russian capital, sank while being towed to port after suffering heavy damage under circumstances that remained in dispute. Moscow acknowledged a fire on board but not any attack. …
The Moskva was the pride of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, a symbol of the country’s dominance of the region and a powerful war machine that had been used to launch precision cruise missiles deep inside Ukraine.
Despite claims by Russia that an accidental fire broke out on the ship, U.S. officials confirmed on Friday that two Ukrainian Neptune missiles had struck the vessel, killing an unknown number of sailors and sending it and its arsenal to the bottom of the Black Sea.
The sinking of the Moskva on Thursday was a grave blow to the Russian fleet and a dramatic demonstration of the current era of warfare in which missiles fired from shore can destroy even the biggest, most powerful ships. …
‘Russia’s warship, the Moskva, was hit by missiles about 65 nautical miles south of Odesa, according to a Defense official.’ (i.e., it was well out to sea when attacked.)
Former Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows’s decision to share his text messages with the Jan. 6 committee before halting his cooperation has again provided a window into private GOP discussions about how to overturn the 2020 election.
CNN obtained texts between Meadows and Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, and Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, that were sent during the period from Election Day through Jan. 6. The texts reinforce the Keystone Kops nature of the effort, and they also shed light on internal GOP misgivings about the voter fraud evidence that was being presented – reservations that few Republicans actually shared publicly.
Both Lee and Roy ultimately declined to object to the election results on Jan. 6 (unlike many of their GOP colleagues) and even publicly disagreed with the effort. But both sought to help the White House in the days and weeks after Joe Biden was declared the winner – which included pointing the White House to two now rather infamous lawyers, Sidney Powell and John Eastman. …
Let’s walk through some of the more interesting texts.
The lack of actual evidence
As Election Day gave way to late November, then December and early January, it was clear Powell’s “Kraken” was indeed mythological. And the texts reinforce that both GOP lawmakers understood that, as they pleaded for something – anything – to actually work with as they publicly sought to legitimate Trump’s claims.
Roy texted Meadows on Nov. 5, saying GOP lawmakers had “no tools / data / information to go out and fight RE: election / fraud.” On Nov. 7, he said, “dude, we need ammo. We need fraud examples. We need it this weekend.”
On the date of Powell’s and Rudy Giuliani’s conspiratorial news conference on Nov. 19, 2020, both Lee and Roy made clear they were unimpressed with the evidence being presented.
Roy texted Meadows that “I kind of doubt she can” substantiate her claims. Roy texted, “Hey brother – we need substance or people are going to break…”
By Nov. 22, Lee texted Meadows a tweet from a conservative journalist, which noted that Powell had declined to provide evidence for her claims of a conspiracy involving Georgia’s GOP governor and secretary of state. He said, “we are struggling to figure out how to respond to things like this.”
By Dec. 16, Lee told Meadows that senators wouldn’t object to the election results “without some direction and a strong evidentiary argument.” …
Lee’s texts about the Nov. 19 news conference turned out to be rather prescient. After Powell and Giuliani repeatedly referenced baseless conspiracy theories involving Dominion voting machines, Lee warned about the legal liability they could create.
“I’m worried about the Powell press conference,” he said. “The potential defamation liability for the president is significant here. … For the campaign and for the president personally. … Unless Powell can back up everything she said, which I kind of doubt she can.”
Meadows responded: “I agree. Very concerned.”
Lee texted back: “Unless Powell can immediately substantiate what she said today, the president should probably disassociate himself and refute any claims that can’t be substantiated. … He’s got deep pockets, and the accusations Powell made are very, very serious. … That is an especially bad combination when you consider the damages that could easily be claimed (and indeed proven) and the deep pockets involved.”
The Trump legal team distanced itself from Powell a few days later. And now the Dominion claims are the subject of a major lawsuit against Giuliani and Fox News, which a judge recently allowed to proceed.
Lee, notably, had actually pointed Meadows in Powell’s direction early on, texting Meadows her phone number and email address on Nov. 7 and complaining that she wasn’t being given access to Trump. He said two days later that he “found her to be a straight shooter.”
After it was all over, Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel would tell the New York Times that she was concerned about Powell’s claims and worried about “what is the liability of the RNC, if these allegations are made and unfounded.” …
The tense situation at times boiled over, with the lawmakers complaining about their treatment and the cast of characters involved. At one point, Lee even suggested his close ally Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., were being self-serving by pushing to object to the election results.
“I have grave concerns with the way my friend Ted is going about this effort,” Lee said Jan. 3, a day after Cruz announced he and 10 other senators would object. “This will not inure to the benefit of the president.
Lee said that, absent states submitting alternate slates of electors – which they hadn’t yet done – “this could help people like Ted and Josh to the detriment of [Trump].”
When Lee declined to go along with the effort, Trump repeatedly brought him up at a rally on Jan. 4, saying he was “a little angry” at the senator. The same day, Lee texted Meadows, “I’ve been spending 14 hours a day for the last week trying to unravel this for him. To have him take a shot at me like that in such a public setting without even asking me about it is pretty discouraging.”
A few days after the Nov. 19 news conference, Roy responded to more Giuliani claims by texting, “Frigging Rudy needs to hush…”
The shoddiness of it all
One of the effort’s defining features was how half-baked it was. And Lee’s texts reinforce that.
In addition to complaining about the evidence presented (or the lack thereof), he repeatedly argued that the Trump campaign needed states to submit alternate slates of electors for any of it to work: Congress needed competing slates to choose from.
On Jan. 3, Lee texted a link to Meadows that he hoped showed Trump understood that.
“Should I take this as a good sign that he gets it?” Lee asked.
“Well. Not as good as it appears,” Meadows responded.
Meadows suggested that Trump was pressuring Vice President Mike Pence to overturn the election through his historically ceremonial role on Jan. 6: “He thinks the legislatures have the power but that the Vp has power too.”
“VP but not the House and Senate?” Lee asked.
Meadows responded: “I am not sure.”
That turned out to be an unreliable strategy. Pence declined to help overturn the election, dooming the whole thing to failure.
The bargaining
As noted at the top, neither Lee nor Roy wound up objecting to the election results. But both tried to bargain with Meadows in the closing days.
“He’s got a very real opportunity for a win in 2024,” Lee said of Trump on Jan. 3, while complaining about Cruz and Hawley. “That opportunity could be harmed in multiple ways this effort.”
Roy made clear by Dec. 31 that he wasn’t on board.
“The President should call everyone off. It’s the only path. If we substitute the will of states through electors with a vote by Congress every 4 years… we have destroyed the electoral college… Respectfully,” Roy said.
He urged Trump to “Give a statesman speech. End strong.”
The following day, Roy added: “If POTUS allows this to occur… we’re driving a stake in the heart of the federal republic…”
Roy also decided to make a point on the House floor. Jan. 3 was swearing-in day, and just as members could object to the presidential election results, they could also object to the seating of their colleagues. If the presidential election results were so suspect, Roy reasoned, shouldn’t those doubts apply to the election of members of Congress, in those same states, on the same ballots? So he pushed for a vote.
Only two Republicans objected to seating their colleagues, apparently believing that though Biden’s win was in doubt, their wins somehow weren’t.
Hoarding cash, doling out favors and seeking to crush rivals, the former president is dominating the GOP, preparing for another race and helping loyalists oust officials who thwarted his attempted subversion of the 2020 election.
PALM BEACH, Fla. — On any given night, Donald J. Trump will stroll onto the patio at Mar-a-Lago and say a few words from a translucent lectern, welcoming whatever favored candidate is paying him for the privilege of fund-raising there.
“This is a special place,” Mr. Trump said on one such evening in February at his private club. “I used to say ‘ground zero’ but after the World Trade Center we don’t use that term anymore. This is the place where everybody wants to be.”
For 15 months, a parade of supplicants — senators, governors, congressional leaders and Republican strivers of all stripes — have made the trek to pledge their loyalty and pitch their candidacies. Some have hired Mr. Trump’s advisers, hoping to gain an edge in seeking his endorsement. Some have bought ads that ran only on Fox News in South Florida. Some bear gifts; others dish dirt. Almost everyone parrots his lie that the 2020 election was stolen.
Working from a large wooden desk reminiscent of the one he used in the Oval Office, Mr. Trump has transformed Mar-a-Lago’s old bridal suite into a shadow G.O.P. headquarters, amassing more than $120 million — a war chest more than double that of the Republican National Committee itself. Federal records show that his PAC raised more online than the party on every day but two in the last six months of 2021, one of which was Christmas Eve. …
And while other past presidents have ceded the political stage, Mr. Trump has done the opposite, aggressively pursuing an agenda of vengeance against Republicans who have wronged him, endorsing more than 140 candidates nationwide and turning the 2022 primaries into a stress test of his continued sway.
Inspiring fear, hoarding cash, doling out favors and seeking to crush rivals, Mr. Trump is behaving not merely as a power broker but as something closer to the head of a 19th-century political machine.
“Party leaders have never played the role that Trump is playing,” said Roger Stone, an on-and-off adviser to Mr. Trump since the 1980s who has been spotted at Mar-a-Lago of late. “Because he can — and he’s not bound by the conventional rules of politics.”
This portrait of Mr. Trump as a modern-day party boss is drawn from more than 50 interviews with Trump advisers past and present, political rivals, Republicans who have sought his support and G.O.P. officials and strategists who are grappling with his influence.
Mr. Trump plainly relishes the power. But as he hints repeatedly about a third White House bid, the looming question is whether he can remain a kingmaker if he doesn’t actually seek the crown. …
… Nothing reveals Mr. Trump’s hold on the party quite like the genuflections and contortions of those seeking his political approval.
Some candidates pay to attend Mar-a-Lago fund-raisers for others — clamoring for a fleeting moment of Mr. Trump’s attention, or better yet, a photo. “Epic moment,” was how one House contender memorialized her few seconds with Mr. Trump on Instagram.
When Mr. Trump invited candidates from Michigan to stand beside him at one event, a man’s voice rang out: “I’m running for governor, too, can I come up there?” It was Ryan Kelley. “You’re running for governor of what?” a confused Mr. Trump asked. “Michigan!” Mr. Kelley replied. Up he came, shaking hands with an opponent, Perry Johnson.
Mr. Johnson, for his part, had been a repeated presence at Mar-a-Lago, proudly posting a grainy video of Mr. Trump hailing his “good poll numbers” at another fund-raiser. He had even bought a television ad welcoming Mr. Trump to Michigan before an April 2 rally.
Yet Mr. Trump snubbed him at the rally and instead praised a rival candidate, Tudor Dixon, who had held her own Mar-a-Lago fund-raiser in February. …
Democrats are the party of working people. Ahead of the 2020 election, we advanced ideas and plans that we believed would, in ways big and small, make our democracy and our economy work better for all Americans. Across this country, voters agreed with us — and gave us a majority in Washington so that we could deliver on those promises.
Republican senators and broken institutions have blocked much of that promised progress. Now Republicans are betting that a stalled Biden agenda won’t give Democrats enough to run on in the midterm elections — and they might be right. Despite pandemic relief, infrastructure investments and the historic Supreme Court confirmation of Ketanji Brown Jackson, we promised more — and voters remember those promises.
Republicans want to frame the upcoming elections to be about “wokeness,” cancel culture and the “militant left wing.” Standing up for the inherent dignity of everyone is a core American value, and Democrats are proud to do that every day. While Republican politicians peddle lies, fear and division, we should use every single one of the next 200 days or so before the election to deliver meaningful improvements for working people.
Democrats win elections when we show we understand the painful economic realities facing American families and convince voters we will deliver meaningful change. To put it bluntly: if we fail to use the months remaining before the elections to deliver on more of our agenda, Democrats are headed toward big losses in the midterms.
Time is running short. We need to finalize a budget reconciliation deal, making giant corporations pay their share to fund vital investments in combating climate change and lowering costs for families, which can advance with only 50 Senate votes. Other priorities can be done with the president’s executive authority. It’s no secret that I believe we should abolish the filibuster. But if Republicans want to use it to block policies that Americans broadly support, we should also force them to take those votes in plain view. …
Let’s begin with corruption. For years, Americans have identified corrupt government officials as a top concern. And they’re right: to tackle the urgent challenges we face — climate change, income inequality, systemic injustice — we must root out corruption. To start cleaning up government, members of Congress and their spouses shouldn’t be allowed to own or trade individual stocks, which the vast majority of voters support banning, according to multiple polls. Whether you’re a Republican senator or the Democratic speaker of the House, it is obvious to the American people that they should not be allowed to trade individual stocks and then vote on laws that affect those companies. I have the strongest plan and the only bipartisan bill in the Senate to get it done. …
(Owning mutual funds should be okay. MA’s wealthiest person, Abigail Johnson, Fidelity Investments CEO would no doubt agree. FWIW, so do I.)
Political scientist and member of the Russian legislative body Vyacheslav Nikonov: “in reality, we embody the forces of good in the modern world because this clash is metaphysical…. We are on the side of good against the forces of absolute evil…. This is truly a holy war that we’re waging, and we have to win it and of course we will because our cause is just. We have no other choice. Our cause is not only just, our cause is righteous and victory will certainly be ours.”
(Punishing Kyiv for an ‘accidental shipboard fire’?)
Russia loses warship, says it will increase attacks on Kyiv
Boston Globe – April 15
Prized Russian Ship Was Hit by Missiles, US Officials Say
NY Times – April 15
The Moskva was the pride of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, a symbol of the country’s dominance of the region and a powerful war machine that had been used to launch precision cruise missiles deep inside Ukraine.
Despite claims by Russia that an accidental fire broke out on the ship, U.S. officials confirmed on Friday that two Ukrainian Neptune missiles had struck the vessel, killing an unknown number of sailors and sending it and its arsenal to the bottom of the Black Sea.
The sinking of the Moskva on Thursday was a grave blow to the Russian fleet and a dramatic demonstration of the current era of warfare in which missiles fired from shore can destroy even the biggest, most powerful ships. …
‘Russia’s warship, the Moskva, was hit by missiles about 65 nautical miles south of Odesa, according to a Defense official.’ (i.e., it was well out to sea when attacked.)
What newly obtained texts between Mark Meadows, Mike Lee, and Chip Roy reveal
Washington Post via Boston Globe – April 15
Internal sniping
The tense situation at times boiled over, with the lawmakers complaining about their treatment and the cast of characters involved. At one point, Lee even suggested his close ally Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., were being self-serving by pushing to object to the election results.
“I have grave concerns with the way my friend Ted is going about this effort,” Lee said Jan. 3, a day after Cruz announced he and 10 other senators would object. “This will not inure to the benefit of the president.
Lee said that, absent states submitting alternate slates of electors – which they hadn’t yet done – “this could help people like Ted and Josh to the detriment of [Trump].”
When Lee declined to go along with the effort, Trump repeatedly brought him up at a rally on Jan. 4, saying he was “a little angry” at the senator. The same day, Lee texted Meadows, “I’ve been spending 14 hours a day for the last week trying to unravel this for him. To have him take a shot at me like that in such a public setting without even asking me about it is pretty discouraging.”
A few days after the Nov. 19 news conference, Roy responded to more Giuliani claims by texting, “Frigging Rudy needs to hush…”
The shoddiness of it all
One of the effort’s defining features was how half-baked it was. And Lee’s texts reinforce that.
In addition to complaining about the evidence presented (or the lack thereof), he repeatedly argued that the Trump campaign needed states to submit alternate slates of electors for any of it to work: Congress needed competing slates to choose from.
On Jan. 3, Lee texted a link to Meadows that he hoped showed Trump understood that.
“Should I take this as a good sign that he gets it?” Lee asked.
“Well. Not as good as it appears,” Meadows responded.
Meadows suggested that Trump was pressuring Vice President Mike Pence to overturn the election through his historically ceremonial role on Jan. 6: “He thinks the legislatures have the power but that the Vp has power too.”
“VP but not the House and Senate?” Lee asked.
Meadows responded: “I am not sure.”
That turned out to be an unreliable strategy. Pence declined to help overturn the election, dooming the whole thing to failure.
The bargaining
As noted at the top, neither Lee nor Roy wound up objecting to the election results. But both tried to bargain with Meadows in the closing days.
“He’s got a very real opportunity for a win in 2024,” Lee said of Trump on Jan. 3, while complaining about Cruz and Hawley. “That opportunity could be harmed in multiple ways this effort.”
Roy made clear by Dec. 31 that he wasn’t on board.
“The President should call everyone off. It’s the only path. If we substitute the will of states through electors with a vote by Congress every 4 years… we have destroyed the electoral college… Respectfully,” Roy said.
He urged Trump to “Give a statesman speech. End strong.”
The following day, Roy added: “If POTUS allows this to occur… we’re driving a stake in the heart of the federal republic…”
Roy also decided to make a point on the House floor. Jan. 3 was swearing-in day, and just as members could object to the presidential election results, they could also object to the seating of their colleagues. If the presidential election results were so suspect, Roy reasoned, shouldn’t those doubts apply to the election of members of Congress, in those same states, on the same ballots? So he pushed for a vote.
Only two Republicans objected to seating their colleagues, apparently believing that though Biden’s win was in doubt, their wins somehow weren’t.
Mar-a-Lago Machine: Trump as a Modern-Day Party Boss
NY Times – April 17
Democrats Can Avoid Disaster in November
Boston Globe – Liz Warren – April 18
(Owning mutual funds should be okay. MA’s wealthiest person, Abigail Johnson, Fidelity Investments CEO would no doubt agree. FWIW, so do I.)
Who’s Afraid of Abby Johnson?
Elizabeth Warren: Democrats Can Avoid Disaster in November
Boston Globe – April 18
Political scientist and member of the Russian legislative body Vyacheslav Nikonov: “in reality, we embody the forces of good in the modern world because this clash is metaphysical…. We are on the side of good against the forces of absolute evil…. This is truly a holy war that we’re waging, and we have to win it and of course we will because our cause is just. We have no other choice. Our cause is not only just, our cause is righteous and victory will certainly be ours.”
Prof Heather, Letters From An American