Law, Power, and Justice

MONDAY 11 SEPTEMBE 2023

Thoughts for Today

Ukraine

• The American military needs to stop running its collective mouth about the fighting in Ukraine, unless these comments (for example Milley’s warning that the Ukrainians had a 30-day window to finish the counteroffensive) are coordinated with the Ukrainians.  I don’t believe they are since for the first time, even the Ukrainians, are complaining about the statements.  The Ukrainians, since the beginning of the second invasion (February 2022) have been astoundingly disciplined about not criticizing the US.  Zelensky, for example, has even started pointing out the delay in supplying essential arms. 
• The British Newspaper, The Telegraph, has the best coverage of the war against Ukraine.  They have an entire section of the paper which is about Ukraine every day and they have the best podcast by far (Ukraine: The Latest) about the war.  When the second invasion was launched, the media in general gradually moved on to other stories.  The Telegraph had started the podcast about Ukraine.  The reporters who were contributing to the podcast argued vehemently that the podcast deserved to be continued until the war was over.  It is just the best thing out there.  At the beginning of every podcast, you can hear a Ukrainian translator saying: “Nobody is going to break us.  We are strong.  We are Ukrainians.”  Every time I try to repeat that to somebody, I tear up.

According to the Telegraph today:

• The Ukrainians have retaken strategic drilling rigs near Crimea.  The Russians have controlled the rigs since 2015.
• Putin’s political party (United Russia) has warned its members running in regional elections to stay away from focusing on the war against Ukraine.  This is a turn-around from the Party’s position earlier when they advised their candidates to run on the war issue.
• Ukrainian drones are now regularly hitting Moscow.
• Numerous explosions have been heard around the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant.  (I cannot remember how to spell Zaporizhzhia without looking).
• A top official with the European Commission has been recalled and admonished for his comment characterizing Austria’s payments for Russian gas as “blood money.”

According to the New York Times

• The NYT characterizes Biden as “stunned” over the possible federal indictment of his son Hunter.

In Foreign Affairs

• “The Real Origins of the Border Crisis: How a Broken Asylum System Warped American Immigration.”
• “…a toxic combination of political instability, criminal violence, and the punishing economic aftereffects of the COVID pandemic has unleashed the highest levels of migration in the Western Hemisphere since WWII.”
• The migrants flee “rapacious gangs and hopeless poverty” “misrule and repression”
• “At the core of the crisis…is the US asylum system.”
• It has “turned into the main channel for mass immigration” on the southwestern border.
• At the end of 2022, almost 800,000 cases were waiting adjudication.
• “The average asylum claim took more than four years to decide.”