The Commentariat -- March 2, 2014
** Alison Smale & David Herszenhorn of the New York Times: "As Russian armed forces effectively seized control of Ukraine's Crimean peninsula on Saturday, the Russian Parliament granted President Vladimir V. Putin the authority he sought to use military force in response to the deepening instability in Ukraine." ...
... Update: Alison Smale & Steve Erlanger of the Times: "Russia's move to seize control of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula on Saturday led Ukraine to call up its military reserves on Sunday and warn Moscow against further incursions as Western powers scrambled to find a response to the crisis." ...
... Update: William Booth, et al., of the Washington Post: "Russian soldiers spread out across the Crimean Peninsula on Sunday, taking control of military and civilian installations, after Russian President Vladimir Putin secured authorization to send in more troops as the Kremlin set the stage for a high-stakes international showdown over the future of Ukraine. Ukraine's new Prime Minister Arseniy Yatseniuk, speaking at a press conference Sunday in Kiev, said 'This is actually a declaration of war to my country.' Yatseniuk urged Putin to pull back his troops. 'If he wants to be the president who started the war between two neighboring and friendly countries, he is within just a few inches of his target. We are on the brink of disaster.'" CW: This is more than a "declaration." I'd call it an "occupation."
... Update. Karen DeYoung of the Washington Post: "President Obama spoke for 90 minutes with Russian President Vladmir Putin Saturday in what appeared to have been a testy exchange reflecting an escalating battle of wills and growing international tension over Ukraine.... Putin gave little ground, according to a Kremlin account of the telephone conversation. Calling the Ukraine situation 'extraordinary,' he charged that Ukrainian 'ultranationalists,' supported by the U.S.-backed government in Kiev, were threatening 'the lives and health of Russian citizens' in Crimea.... Both Obama and U.N. Secretary General Ban ki-Moon, who had his own phone call with Putin, urged the Russian leader to open an immediate dialogue with Ukraine's new leaders, and permit international monitors to assess the situation on the ground." ...
... Readout of President's Obama's call with President Putin: "President Obama spoke for 90 minutes this afternoon with President Putin of Russia about the situation in Ukraine. President Obama expressed his deep concern over Russia's clear violation of Ukrainian sovereignty and territorial integrity, which is a breach of international law, including Russia's obligations under the UN Charter, and of its 1997 military basing agreement with Ukraine, and which is inconsistent with the 1994 Budapest Memorandum and the Helsinki Final Act. The United States condemns Russia's military intervention into Ukrainian territory." There's more. ...
... Readout of President Obama's call with Prime Minister Harper & President Hollande. "President Obama spoke separately this afternoon with President Hollande of France and Prime Minister Harper of Canada."
... Here's the Guardian's liveblog (Mostly Saturday's developments. Last entry is at 9:24 am GMT Sunday). ...
... Update: Here's the Guardian's liveblog for Sunday.
... Karen DeYoung: "The Obama administration, its top European partners and the U.N. Security Council spent much of Saturday trying to fashion a response to the rapid escalation of the Ukraine crisis as Russian troops took up positions throughout the autonomous republic of Crimea. The U.N. Security Council met in emergency session for the second time in as many days. U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said he was 'gravely concerned' and expected to speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin later in the day." ...
... Peter Baker of the New York Times: "President Obama has warned Russia that 'there will be costs' for a military intervention in Ukraine. But the United States has few palatable options for imposing such costs, and recent history has shown that when it considers its interests at stake, Russia has been willing to absorb any such fallout." ...
... ** David Remnick of the New Yorker: "... the military incursion is unlikely to stop in Crimea: nearly all of eastern Ukraine is Russian-speaking. Russia defines its interests far beyond its Black Sea fleet and the Crimean peninsula." ...
... Julie Ioffe of the New Republic: "Putin's war in Crimea could soon spread to Eastern Ukraine. And nobody ...can stop him." ...
... Oxana Shevel in the Washington Post: "Russia may be planning to take over Crimea, but several factors make it harder to believe that Russia will be able to establish control and to effectively annex Crimea as it did with [the Georgian regions of] South Ossetia, Abkhazia and Transnistria." ...
... This piece by Patrick Smith in Salon, as Barbarossa notes, "the US and EU aren't exactly innocent bystanders in Ukraine." Also, Tom Friedman is a "shameless toady." ...
... (BTW, Steve M. Wrote a fine takedown of the Oracle of Alaska.) ...
... Oh, stop worrying, people. President Obama may be naive, as John McCain sez, but fortunately he has Eastern European expert Marco Rubio (RTP-Fla.), who has provided the President with a list of eight things he must do to "punish Russia." Marco may not be able to see Russia from his house a la Palin, but he has seen real, live Russians in Miami. Spending money. Marco sez that's got to stop. (No rebuttal yet from the Florida Tourists Bureau.) ...
... CW: In a piece linked yesterday, we learned that Sen. Jim Inhofe (RNuts-Okla.) longed for the happy days of the Cold War. Well, Lucky Jim. It's baaaaack! ...
... CW: I see Sam Tanenhaus, in a New York Times op-ed, agrees: "SUDDENLY the specter of the Cold War is back.... The Cold War was less a carefully structured game between masters than a frightening high-wire act, with leaders on both sides aware that a single misstep could plunge them into the abyss." The piece is "a history lesson" worth reading. AND a reminder of how fortunate we are that we're not living under a McCain administration.
** Fred Kaplan in Politico Magazine: "More than five years into Obama's presidency, the single word that best sums up his foreign policy is 'realist' -- in some cases, as one former adviser told me, 'hard-nosed,' even 'cold' realist. Like all postwar presidents, Obama speaks in hallowed terms about America's global mission. But his actions reveal an aversion to missionary zeal."
Helena Evich & Tarini Parti of Politico: "The food industry appears poised to one-up the Obama administration with the launch of a national media blitz to promote its own nutrition labels on the front of food packages. The Grocery Manufacturers Association and the Food Marketing Institute, which represent the biggest food companies and retailers, will roll out a coordinated marketing campaign ... on Monday to promote their 'Facts Up Front,' the industry's own voluntary program for providing nutrition information on the front of food and beverage packages."
Annie-Rose Strasser of Think Progress: Apple CEO Tim Cook tells climate-change deniers to invest their money elsewhere. CW: Cook presents Apple's sustainability effort as a purely moral decision -- "We do a lot of things for reasons besides profit motive" -- but as profit-motive denier, Cook is unconvincing: most Apple customers, & potential customers, are climate-change-aware. Apple's green energy policy is a sound business practice. Also, cheaper than paying its employees a living wage. ...
... Update. Tom Boggioni of the Raw Story: "Last year Apple announced it would build one of the world's largest solar arrays. Despite what [a conservative think tank] may believe about best business practices, the project is projected to generate about $11 million in annual revenue, and add 7,400 jobs in Cupertino, California."
CW: I missed this, but it's worth reading today: Rick Hertzberg's line-by-line analysis of Gov. Jan Brewer's "surprisingly good speech" announcing her veto of Arizona's so-called "religious freedom" bill.
Senate Races
New York Times: "Dozens of states will hold Senate primaries this year, beginning with Texas on Tuesday. [The page provides] a look at the key races in every state. The outlook of each contest is based on an analysis of data from the Cook Political Report and from Larry Sabato, a professor of politics...."
Michael Shear of the New York Times: "The ascension of [new White House political director David] Simas -- driven, data-obsessed and a relentless salesman -- is meant as a message to anxiety-prone Democrats that the White House is serious about mitigating losses in the Republican House and defending the party's control of the Senate." ...
... MEANWHILE, the Times piece -- by Nicholas Confessore -- that balances Shear's focus on Democratic strategy is all about Bucks from Billionaires: "Donors like Paul Singer, the billionaire Republican investor, have expanded their in-house political shops, building teams of loyal advisers and researchers to guide and coordinate their giving. And some of the biggest contributors to Republican outside groups in 2012 are now gravitating toward the more donor-centric political and philanthropic network overseen by Charles and David Koch, who have wooed them in part by promising more accountability over how money is spent."
... CW: As carefully as the Times may exercise its dubious balancing act, sometimes the he-said/he-said stories can't help but highlight the truth: the GOP is the political arm of Big Money. Nothing more.
Presidential Election 2016
Maureen Dowd: "By the time the Bushes and Clintons are finished, they are going to make the Tudors and the Plantagenets look like pikers.... Our meritocratic society seems increasingly nepotistic and dynastic." But enough of Jeb. What I really want to do here is bash Hillary.
News Ledes
AP: "Police arrested hundreds of people who strapped themselves to the White House fence on Sunday to protest the proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline.... Protesters were passionate but quite orderly."
CBS Baltimore: "Annapolis Police arrest two people for an armed robbery of a pregnant woman in labor."
Reuters: " A massive winter storm system packing cold air, snow and freezing rain was pummeling the central United States on Sunday and headed for the East Coast, sending temperatures plummeting and causing major delays for weekend travelers."
Guardian: "Twelve prisoners with links to the Taliban walked out of Kandahar's Sarposa prison on Saturday after forging a letter from the attorney general ordering their release. It was the third time prisoners have escaped from their cells in southern Afghanistan's main jail, and the most audaciously simple."
Los Angeles Times: "China's state media called Saturday night's knifing attack at a train station in Kunming 'China's 9-11' and called for a crackdown on terrorism. The death toll from the attack rose to 33 with four of the perpetrators among the dead. One suspect is in custody, a woman, who was reported to be hospitalized. The perpetrators were said to be Uighurs, a Turkic-speaking Muslim minority from northwestern China's Xinjiang region. Chinese authorities showed on a television station a black flag recovered at the scene which they said was calling for independence for the region that some Uighurs refer to as East Turkestan." ...
Los Angeles Times: "... a string of televised confessions that have raised alarm among Chinese attorneys as well as media watchers who say police, prosecutors and reporters are convicting people in the court of public opinion for political ends."
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Reader Comments (3)
..."Like all postwar presidents, Obama speaks in hallowed terms about America’s global mission. But his actions reveal an aversion to missionary zeal." (Politico)
Thank you, Jeebus, that Obama does not possess the "missionary zeal" exhibited by George W. Bush (and his Neo-Con narcissists). Definitely means less chance of being eaten by the cannibals! Let us hear it for cold, hard realism vs. delusional war-mongering!
BTW-- Speaking of cannibals, I hope you all saw Bill Maher "dismember" Billy Kristol on Real Time last night. Delicious!
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-02-27/the-new-great-game-why-ukraine-matters-to-so-many-other-nations
Peter Coy, Carol Matlack, and Henry Meyer in "Bloomberg Business Week." Why Ukraine matters to so many nations: "The New Great Game." The President said it's not a chess piece, but unfortunately for Ukraine, it is.
Re: pseudo-science and http://www.newrepublic.com/article/116781/whole-foods-pseudoscience-anti-rationalist-creationism. The NYT, OCTOBER 10, 2013, The Dangers of Pseudoscience By MASSIMO PIGLIUCCI and MAARTEN BOUDRY. Add that to your list.
My question is who and what is a healer? Some academically gifted emotionally absent person who tests well is not a healer. They're a glorified technician who could have just as well been a lawyer. Just because they slept on gurneys and survived sleep deprivation during their residency doesn't make a person a healer. Do I want a good debater backed by billions of pharma-dollars supported by insurance company MBAs and lawyers to be my doctor? Many of these same people deny the value and worth of midwives; these people and their organizations touted infant formula as better than mother's milk with its colostrum; these same people support processed foods brought to you by Corporate Food and their International Food Technologists.
Whether Rosalind Franklin, mad-hatters, lead-lined fresh water pipes of ancient Rome or the DDT I mentioned in yesterday comment, sometimes important health compromisers can't be immediately determined. Neither can important health enhancers be immediately always identified.
Abraham Flexner's work dedicated to reformulating medical education in 1910 was funded by Rockefeller and Carnegie and was dedicated to a centralized authority petrochemical based drug treatment methodology.
If I'm a "pseudoscientific" critic of my medical/health treatment protocols, perhaps I am qualified to state that to interpose the profit motive between me and my healer is one place the profit motive shouldn't be located.
Oh, and by the way, does this also mean that the Chinese are ignorant fools for the last 2000 years because they have used and continue to use acupuncture? Or could it be that the Physical Therapist Association now offers "dry needling" with years less training than an acupuncturist just wants to erect insurmountable barriers to entry to competing treatments?