DL Open Thread: Saturday, November 26, 2022

Russia’s Economy Is Tanking Due, In Large Part, To Western Sanctions:

For months, Putin claimed that the “economic blitzkrieg” against Russia had failed, but Western sanctions imposed over the invasion of Ukraine are digging ever deeper into Russia’s economy, exacerbating equipment shortages for its army and hampering its ability to launch any new ground offensive or build new missiles, economists and Russian businessmen said.

Figures released by the Finance Ministry last week show a key economic indicator — tax revenue from the non-oil and gas sector — fell 20 percent year in October compared to a year earlier, while the Russian state statistics agency Rosstat reported that retail sales fell 10 percent year on year in September, and cargo turnover fell 7 percent.

The Western ban on technology imports is affecting most sectors of the economy, while the Kremlin’s forced mobilization of more than 300,000 Russian conscripts to serve in Ukraine, combined with the departure of at least as many abroad fleeing the draft, has dealt a further blow, economists said. In addition, Putin’s own restrictions on gas supplies to Europe, followed by the unexplained explosion of the Nord Stream gas pipeline, has led to a sharp drop in gas production — down 20 percent in October compared to the previous year. Meanwhile, oil sales to Europe are plummeting ahead of the European Union embargo expected to be imposed Dec. 5.

Not even the House Rethugs are likely to save Putin now.

Are There Enough Violent Men In Georgia To Elect Herschel Walker?  Forget about public office.  This guy is unfit for, well, pretty much everything:

Among the most-discussed aspects of Herschel Walker’s campaign for the US Senate seat in Georgia are the allegations he had episodes of violence and threatening to commit violence—allegations he later dismissed as the side effects of a mental illness known as Dissociative Identity Disorder, from which he now claims he is “healed.” 

Walker’s ex-wife Cindy Grossman, for example, said in 2008 that Walker once held a gun to her head and threatened to “blow [her] brains out.” This allegation resurfaced during Walker’s campaign against Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock, which will now conclude in a runoff on December 6. Voters have also learned that on a separate occasion, Grossman’s sister claimed in an affidavit that Walker told her he was going to shoot Grossman and her new boyfriend.

But Walker hasn’t just been accused of violence. He’s also defended other athletes who have inflicted it. For instance, he bragged about remaining in contact with a man who allegedly choked a woman and threw her onto a couch with loaded assault weapons. He also opposed the NFL’s suspension of two men accused of abuse—one of whom was videotaped striking a woman unconscious in an elevator; another was charged with felony child abuse for spanking his toddler with a switch.

Shortly before acquitted murder suspect OJ Simpson was released from prison in 2017 for a 2008 conviction for armed robbery, Walker told TMZ, “I think he’s paid his dues… I’d like to see him do something productive.”

One suggestion Walker had for Simpson was for him to “mentor some of these young kids that are coming up in this athletic world, to realize that life is more than sports.”

Good News. Muslims Voting–And Being Elected–In Record Numbers:

Islam, 32, is among a record number of Muslims elected to local, state and national office in November. A new analysis by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (Cair), a civil rights and advocacy group, and Jetpac, a non-profit focused on increasing Muslim political representation in the US, found that Muslims won at least 83 seats nationwide, up from an estimated 71 in 2020.

Muslims also won seats in Texas, Illinois, California, Minnesota, Maine, Ohio and Pennsylvania. These newly elected officials come from a variety of ethnic backgrounds, including Somali, Pakistani, Afghan, Indian and Palestinian, but tend to be young and Democratic.

Growing Muslim political participation is also happening at the voting booth. A 2020 study by EmgageUSA showed significant gains in the number of registered Muslim voters in several states compared with 2016: 39% in Georgia, 35% in Texas and 46% in Wisconsin. Even though Muslims make up just 1.3% of the US population, large communities in swing states such as Michigan, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Florida, Wisconsin and Minnesota mean they can play a role in determining key races. In Pennsylvania, for instance, Emgage’s Gula said the state’s large population of African American Muslims had helped the Democrat John Fetterman defeat the Republican Mehmet Oz. (Oz, who is of Turkish descent, has described himself as a secular Muslim.)

Muslims are also serving in government in non-elected positions, Gula said, as well as on campaigns and as community organizers, which has helped energize political participation in the community. More than 70 Muslims serve in the Biden administration, he said, including Lina Khan, chair of the Federal Trade Commission; Sameera Fazili, national economic council deputy director; Reema Dodin, White House Office of Legislative Affairs deputy director; and Rashad Hussain, ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom.

What do you want to talk about?