… hope.
*******************
And:
Never have I been so ashamed of my country as on February 24 this year…. Those who conceived this war want only one thing — to remain in power forever, to live in pompous tasteless palaces, sail on yachts comparable in tonnage and cost to the entire Russian navy, enjoying unlimited power and complete impunity.
Russia’s ex-representative to the UN in Geneva writes a Dear Vlad letter.
[Marat] Grachev was fined 100,000 rubles, more than $1,200, [for displaying an anti-war sign in his computer repair store]. A Moscow politician wrote about the case on social media, including Mr. Grachev’s bank details for anyone who wanted to help. Enough money to cover the fine arrived within two hours, Mr. Grachev said.
He received 250,000 rubles in total, he said, from about 250 separate donations, and he plans to donate the surplus to OVD-Info, which provided him with legal aid.
I walk along the Moscow streets you used to walk along with me
And every step I take reminds me of just how we used to be
Well, how can I forget, Vlad?
When there is always someone there to remind me
Always someone there to remind me
As Kherson falls I pass the refugees around me in the night
And I can’t help recalling how it felt to kiss and hold you tight
Well, how can I forget, Vlad?
When there is always someone there to remind me
Some Polish asshole there to remind me
I was born to love you and I will never be free
You’ll always be a part of me
If you should find you miss the sweet and tender love we used to share
Just come back to the places where we used to go like our beloved Red Square
Well, how can I forget, Vlad?
When there is always someone there to remind me
Always someone there to remind me
“It was like a moment of humanity because you’re there and you just were holding your heart to them, and they would come up to you. It was a human moment.”
This is exactly what Richard Rorty would have written if he were still alive. Read Achieving Our Country, Rorty’s urgent, late in life, defense of liberalism. As people have noted, he saw Trump coming way before the rest of us did. He warned us about Trump/Putin.
“Have you captured a Russian tank or armoured personnel carrier and are worried about how to declare it? Keep calm and continue to defend the motherland!” Ukraine’s National Agency for the Protection against Corruption (NAPC) said, according to the Ukraine arm of the Interfax news service.
The agency went on to explain there was “no need to declare the captured Russian tanks and other equipment, because the cost of this … does not exceed 100 living wages (UAH248,100) ($8,298).”
In stark contrast to the response Zelensky received from EU lawmakers, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was met with a cold shoulder at the United Nations.
Scores of diplomats walked out of two meetings at the UN in Geneva in which Lavrov was beamed in for a video statement.
Lavrov spoke by video to the Conference on Disarmament and the Human Rights Council, which he had planned to attend before the closure of airspace to Russian planes by several European countries prevented his travel to the Swiss city.
‘Former Amb. Michael McFaul absolutely destroyed a BBC anchor on air for interviewing a Russian official who he said spewed “ridiculous” propaganda about the invasion of Ukraine — and asked if the BBC would have given Nazis airtime during World War II.
‘AMB. MCFAUL: I want to ask a question. The BBC, if it was September 1st, 1939, would you put on the air a member of the Nazi Party to try to explain this ridiculous, absolute falsification of history and information that we just heard from Mr. Milonov? Because this is complete, utter nonsense what he just said, and I’m wondering if we’re doing a service to the world by giving him a voice on the BBC?
‘JAMES MENENDEZ: Do we need to hear, though…? And I don’t speak for the BBC, of course, but do we need to hear what the justification is in those elite circles, in the Kremlin and among parliamentarians, even if it’s not true? Put some of what he said to rest then.
‘AMB. MCFAUL: Well, it’s utter nonsense, and I really want to ask the question, let’s go back and find out was the BBC putting on Nazis on September 1st, 1939? Because I think it’s an ethical question for those that are in the business. You put him on and then you put me on. It’s here’s one view. Here’s another view, and I don’t like that. There are not flowers being thrown in front of tanks riding in Ukraine, the people of Ukraine voted, including in the Donbas, except for the occupied territories where there were no votes. They voted overwhelmingly for President Zelensky. So the gentleman you just had on was speaking under false facts.’
*******************
Between this, and their choosing Alan Dershowitz for objective commentary on the Epstein sex trafficking story, the BBC’s looking really really shitty.
Dr. Bernard Carroll, known as the "conscience of psychiatry," contributed to various blogs, including Margaret Soltan's University Diaries, for which he sometimes wrote limericks under the name Adam.
New York Times
George Washington University English professor Margaret Soltan writes a blog called University Diaries, in which she decries the Twilight Zone-ish state our holy land’s institutes of higher ed find themselves in these days.
The Electron Pencil
It’s [UD's] intellectual honesty that makes her blog required reading.
Professor Mondo
There's always something delightful and thought intriguing to be found at Margaret Soltan's no-holds-barred, firebrand tinged blog about university life.
AcademicPub
You can get your RDA of academic liars, cheats, and greedy frauds at University Diaries. All disciplines, plus athletics.
truffula, commenting at Historiann
Margaret Soltan at University Diaries blogs superbly and tirelessly about [university sports] corruption.
Dagblog
University Diaries. Hosted by Margaret Soltan, professor of English at George Washington University. Boy is she pissed — mostly about athletics and funding, the usual scandals — but also about distance learning and diploma mills. She likes poems too. And she sings.
Dissent: The Blog
[UD belittles] Mrs. Palin's degree in communications from the University of Idaho...
The Wall Street Journal
Professor Margaret Soltan, blogging at University Diaries... provide[s] an important voice that challenges the status quo.
Lee Skallerup Bessette, Inside Higher Education
[University Diaries offers] the kind of attention to detail in the use of language that makes reading worthwhile.
Sean Dorrance Kelly, Harvard University
Margaret Soltan's ire is a national treasure.
Roland Greene, Stanford University
The irrepressibly to-the-point Margaret Soltan...
Carlat Psychiatry Blog
Margaret Soltan, whose blog lords it over the rest of ours like a benevolent tyrant...
Perplexed with Narrow Passages
Margaret Soltan is no fan of college sports and her diatribes on the subject can be condescending and annoying. But she makes a good point here...
Outside the Beltway
From Margaret Soltan's excellent coverage of the Bernard Madoff scandal comes this tip...
Money Law
University Diaries offers a long-running, focused, and extremely effective critique of the university as we know it.
Anthony Grafton, American Historical Association
The inimitable Margaret Soltan is, as usual, worth reading. ...
Medical Humanities Blog
I awake this morning to find that the excellent Margaret Soltan has linked here and thereby singlehandedly given [this blog] its heaviest traffic...
Ducks and Drakes
As Margaret Soltan, one of the best academic bloggers, points out, pressure is mounting ...
The Bitch Girls
Many of us bloggers worry that we don’t post enough to keep people’s interest: Margaret Soltan posts every day, and I more or less thought she was the gold standard.
Tenured Radical
University Diaries by Margaret Soltan is one of the best windows onto US university life that I know.
Mary Beard, A Don's Life
[University Diaries offers] a broad sense of what's going on in education today, framed by a passionate and knowledgeable reporter.
More magazine, Canada
If deity were an elected office, I would quit my job to get her on the ballot.
Notes of a Neophyte
