How Russian Spies Misread Ukraine And Misled the Kremlin. Faulty intelligence is not, as it turns out, the exclusive domain of the U. S.:
KYIV, Ukraine —In the final days before the invasion of Ukraine, Russia’s security service began sending cryptic instructions to informants in Kyiv. Pack up and get out of the capital, the Kremlin collaborators were told, but leave behind the keys to your homes.
The directions came from senior officers in a unit of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) with a prosaic name — the Department of Operational Information — but an ominous assignment: ensure the decapitation of the Ukrainian government and oversee the installation of a pro-Russian regime.
The messages were a measure of the confidence in that audacious plan. So certain were FSB operatives that they would soon control the levers of power in Kyiv, according to Ukrainian and Western security officials, that they spent the waning days before the war arrangingsafe houses or accommodations in informants’ apartments and other locations for the planned influx of personnel.
And yet, the agency failed to incapacitate Ukraine’s government, foment any semblance of a pro-Russian groundswell or interrupt President Volodymyr Zelensky’s hold on power. Its analysts either did not fathom how forcefully Ukraine would respond, Ukrainian and Western officials said, or did understand but couldn’t or wouldn’t convey such sober assessments to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Enough fair use. Read the whole damn article. Journalism at its best.
In the run-up to the 2016 election, Liz Cheney issued a dire warning. The future of American democracy, and the nation’s place as a symbol of freedom to the world, was on the ballot. If voters chose poorly, she told Rush Limbaugh, the next president “would be the most corrupt individual ever to sit in the Oval Office.”
She was referring, of course, to Hillary Clinton.
Are Ya Still Drinking Starbucks Swill? That’s fine, as far as you support union-busting:
A US judge has ordered Starbucks to reinstate seven employees at a cafe in Memphis, Tennessee who were allegedly fired for supporting a union campaign, as the coffee chain struggles to halt pending nationwide union elections.
Sheryl Lipman, the district judge in the city, said the US National Labor Relations Board had provided enough evidence that the dismissals earlier this year were motivated by anti-union feeling. Lipman granted the order pending the outcome of an administrative case before the board.
The Memphis store is one of nearly 220 Starbucks cafes in the US to unionise over the last year. Workers at 46 locations have voted against unionising, and dozens of other elections are pending.
Starbucks said in a statement on Thursday it disagreed with the ruling and planned to appeal. The company said the workers were fired for violating company safety policies and that it respected the unionisation process.
Yeah, right. Say-y-y-y, didn’t Starbucks’ CEO once run for the Democratic Presidential nomination? Well, he sorta did. Had he run, Jim Paoli would almost certainly have contributed to his campaign.
Why The Fuck Do We Need To Spend $122 Mill To Expand Leg Hall? Who benefits from this? The answer is: “Not the public.”:
Legislative Building Committee member Sen. Bryan Townsend, D-Newark, expressed some concerns he had within the vetting process. The proposal did not include improvements in areas like IT or general infrastructural issues like leakages, which he said he would have liked to see included as well as any additional enhancements deemed necessary. Sen. Townsend said while he certainly supports recommendations regarding Legislative Hall’s current needs, he did not feel comfortable modernizing the building at the proposed price tag as opposed to other investments that would better benefit the Delaware community, such as a modern, equitable high school in the city of Wilmington.
“I, for one, would find it very difficult to support recommending this level of investment on a building that is used part of the year, perhaps to avoid certain kinds of discomfort for legislators or even the public, when there are ample discomforts for other segments of the Delaware community that aren’t getting addressed or have a solution for,” Sen. Townsend said.
Although, come to think of it, I was looking forward to seeing the new lobbyists’ sanctuary, aka ‘The Bobby Byrd Big Bucks Lounge’, with extra-wide chairs, of course. And a complimentary open bar.
‘Campaign Checks 24-7. No Waiting’.
What do you want to talk about?