Good to know!
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... The Russian bombardment on Sunday night included 355 drones, Yuriy Ihnat, head of the Ukrainian air force’s communications department, told The Associated Press.
The previous night, Russia fired 298 drones and 69 missiles of various types at Ukraine in what Ukrainians said was the largest combined aerial assault during the conflict. From Friday to Sunday, Russia launched around 900 drones at Ukraine, officials said. ...
Russia has this month broken its record for aerial bombardments of Ukraine three times. ...
In all, Russia used 69 missiles of various types and 298 drones, including Iranian-designed Shahed drones, he told The Associated Press. ...
Ivan Fedorenko, 80, said he regrets letting their two dogs into the house after the air raid siren went off. “They burned to death,” he said. “I want to bury them, but I’m not allowed yet.” ...
Shrinking from calling what Russia did an invasion was a temporary flight from reality for CNBC, probably motivated by keeping people from panicking and selling stocks.
It's all about the money, for Trump no less than for CNBC. And also for Vladimir Putin.
It should be about something else.
Zelenskiy says Russia hit Ukraine’s power infrastructure, US should react
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Thursday Russian artillery had
damaged Ukraine’s energy infrastructure in the front-line city of
Kherson, two days after the U.S. announced that each side had agreed to a
truce on energy strikes. ...
Russia, which launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and now holds about 20% of the country, contends that it has observed an energy strike truce since March 18. Ukraine says Russia has attacked eight Ukrainian energy facilities since that date. ...
The official White House spokesperson is conceding that the lands taken in Russia's invasion of Ukraine are Russia.
This is a lie, a big lie, an utter disgrace.
Honest to God, these people are clowns.
Republicans consider major budget change to obscure deficit impact of extending Trump’s tax cuts
... Extending the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which Trump signed into law in 2017, would cost $4.6 trillion over a decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office, the official nonpartisan scorekeeper.
That’s under the “current law” metric that has traditionally been used, as the tax cuts are slated to expire at the end of this year. But Senate Republicans want to use a different scoring method called the “current policy” baseline, which would assume that extending tax cuts costs $0 because they’re already law.
The chair of the tax-writing Senate Finance Committee, Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, endorsed the “current policy” approach, telling reporters that it “recognizes that extending current law does not change the tax policy, does not reduce tax revenue.”
Congressional GOP aides say the idea could have a huge impact on what they’re able to pass in the budget bill. If they use the current accounting process, they have no chance of making the 2017 tax cuts permanent, because that would require paying for it. And this process would also be key to unlocking Trump’s other tax proposals, like slashing taxes on tips and overtime pay. ...
Rep. Richard Neal, D-Mass., said it would set a “terrible” precedent if Republicans adopt that budgeting approach.
He said it would be a backdoor way to nuke the filibuster and take an anything-goes approach to the reconciliation process, which Congress can use once per fiscal year to evade the 60-vote rule in the Senate for changes to spending and taxes. The process imposes significant constraints, like needing to pay for long-term laws that add to the U.S. debt.
“My advice is: If they adopt that policy, we should advise the American people to forget about their credit card debt,” Neal said. “You wouldn’t have to analyze revenue and expenditure.” ...
The budget framework passed this week by the GOP House is guaranteed to raise the national debt by $19 trillion in 10 years, which means we'll be $60 trillion in the hole by 2035.
All the shenanigans and pretending and make believe used over the years to get us to the current point of $36 trillion in debt, trotted out yet one more time aren't going to stop us from a date with $60 trillion in debt.
WE ARE NOT A SERIOUS COUNTRY.
No stories up at Real Clear Politics.
None at Just The News.
"If we don't cover it, it didn't happen".
Left is, finally and above all, lack of respect for property.
-- Oswald Spengler, The Hour of Decision, 1934
The US has signalled that it could leave an international effort to prosecute Russia for invading Ukraine, The Telegraph can reveal.
US envoys refused to label Russia as an “aggressor” at a meeting of a “core group” of countries preparing a Nuremberg-style tribunal to try Vladimir Putin for his war crimes, according to Western officials.
Washington is similarly refusing to co-sponsor a United Nations statement that supports Ukraine’s territorial integrity and demands Moscow to withdraw its forces from the war-torn nation.
Mr Trump’s administration has also refused to sign off a planned G7 statement calling Russia the “aggressor” in the war with Ukraine to mark the third anniversary of the conflict on Monday.
The US president has blamed Ukraine for starting the war, branded Volodymyr Zelensky a “dictator” and pushed for Russia to be invited back to the alliance of industrialised nations.
European officials fear Mr Trump’s flattery of Putin could lead to the Russian despot being let off the hook for his invasion as part of any peace settlement.
This stance has put preparations for the final meeting of the “core group” next month in doubt. The group is leading a 40-nation coalition to form a Special Tribunal for the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine, modelled on the response to Nazi war crimes after the Second World War.
It would involve the US and other countries joining Ukraine to grant jurisdiction to a dedicated criminal tribunal to investigate both the perpetrators of the crime of aggression and those complicit in that crime.
The crime of aggression cannot be prosecuted by the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
“Unless they acknowledge it’s an aggression, they can’t participate,” an official said of US opposition to the labelling of Russia as an aggressor.
Losing Washington’s backing for the tribunal will be a major blow to the project’s international reputation and standing.
“This is quite a drastic shift,” a European diplomat told The Telegraph. “Rewriting history and pretending that Russia wasn’t the one who started this war is something that we simply cannot and will not agree to.”
The US has not yet officially withdrawn from the scheme and is expected to attend its next meeting next month in Strasbourg, France.
A diplomatic note seen by The Telegraph revealed that European officials were “shocked” at US claims at a series of international meetings that Russia should be invited back into the “civilised world”.
European capitals are now holding talks over a possible collapse of the special tribunal if the US does walk away as feared.
The latest US position marks a significant shift in policy between Joe Biden and Mr Trump.
The former president had branded Putin a “war criminal” and signed off a series of international statements that described Russia as the aggressor state.
Washington is now pushing for the almost three-year war to be called the “Ukraine conflict” in discussions with international allies.
A State Department readout of the meeting between Marco Rubio, the US state secretary, and Sergei Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, twice described the war as “the conflict in Ukraine”.
Here are 11 things Trump has promised to carry out on Day 1 of his presidency
... One of Trump’s most audacious promises was that he could end the war in Ukraine within 24 hours of taking office — or even before.
“That
is a war that’s dying to be settled. I will get it settled before I
even become president,” Trump said during a September debate with Vice
President Kamala Harris in Philadelphia. ...
Video shows panicked beachgoers fleeing from falling shrapnel after Russian air defense intercepted the U.S.-supplied ATACMS missiles.
Don't sun on the beach in a war zone, unless you enjoy that sort of thing.
More.
American utilities have used the pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine war to price gouge the consumer.
Natural gas prices have nosedived 73% since 3Q2022 but utility prices stopped declining a year ago and are down just 14% from peak.
Utility gas actually increased in 4Q2023 and again in 1Q2024.
Look at all that air under the red line. First time that's happened in decades.
People should be MAKING A STINK!