Twitter user Phillips O’Brien:
The Battle of the Dohnbas has been going on for 76 days at this point. This would make it one of the 20th and 21st centuries’ longest major battles. Longer than Kursk, Bagration Normandy, the Bulge, etc. It is much more comparable to World War I. (Somme, Passchendale, Verdun)
And what has occurred over the past 2.5 months. Start with this map if possible. Basically, the Russians have drastically reduced their expectations—and, to be honest, those of others—that they would annex a sizable portion of Ukrainian territory.
Instead, the Russians have forced the Ukrainians to leave Severodonetsk and Lysychansk after 11 weeks of fighting, significant casualties, command changes, desperate attempts to raise forces, and concentrating their firepower in a very small area.
The Ukrainians withdrew in good order, which needs to be stressed even though the Russians never cut off their communications. The encirclement of Ukrainian forces would have been the primary objective on the map above (and in fact, modern combined arms and Russian doctrine).
But the Russian Army is unable to carry out the fundamental functions of contemporary warfare. Instead, it moves a kilometer at a time, making slow, incremental progress. It is unable to penetrate, take advantage of, or encircle. This does not indicate a highly developed military.
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Atlantic / Quinta Jurecic:
The final decision will be made by the January 6 Committee.
The members are bringing clarity to a political era clouded by lies by creating an official record of the insurrection.The January 6 committee has made the task of learning the truth the focal point of its public hearings, as Thompson’s remarks imply. Every congressional hearing is, in a sense, an attempt to establish facts: Witnesses frequently make the same oath Hutchinson did, promising to “tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth,” and it is still illegal to lie to Congress without taking an oath. And it makes sense that the panel would be focused on the truth as it was formed to investigate what happened on January 6. But up to this point, the committee’s hearings from January 6 have been remarkably potent as an elegy for the importance of facts. The committee appears to take seriously its duty to compile an official record of the insurrection and make that record as easily accessible to the public as it can. In a politically clouded with lies moment, that clarity is reviving.
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Here is a Saul Cornell/Slate quote that many of you have only seen (or perhaps missed entirely):
The most recent gun ruling by Clarence Thomas is anti-originalist and unhistorical.
In the end, the majority opinion in NYSRPA v. Bruen is among the least persuasive and intellectually dishonest judgments in American judicial history. Without a hint of irony, Thomas even praises Chief Justice Roger B. Taney’s infamous Dred Scott opinion, treating it as authoritative legal guidance and implying that Taney was the only judge in American history to have a thorough understanding of the Second Amendment. A judge’s career would have ended if they turned to Taney for judicial guidance in the past, but the court’s new originalist majority seems to be making history more often by creating it than by interpreting the law. Robert Bork and Chief Justice William Rehnquist’s old originalism aimed to use history to limit judicial activism and discretion. Thomas and his fellow originalists’ new brand of originalism embraces extreme judicial activism. In fact, the court’s current application of originalism more closely resembles a form of ventriloquism in which antiquated texts are forced to further contemporary agendas without much consideration for how they were received when they were written. Historical figures are reduced to little more than props for the justices to project their own contemporary values and ideas onto the past thanks to the new originalism, which includes the Bruen decision.
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Jed Handelsman Shugerman and Alan Z. Rozenshtein from Lawfare:
The testimony of Cassidy Hutchinson caused us to reconsider charging Donald Trump
We both publicly acknowledged up until Tuesday that there wasn’t enough evidence for the Department of Justice to bring charges against former President Trump for what happened on January 6. Our independently arrived at conclusion was largely based on First Amendment worries about criminalizing purely political speech.
However, Cassidy Hutchinson, a former assistant to Mark Meadows, Trump’s chief of staff, changed our minds with her explosive testimony on Tuesday. Hutchinson specifically recalled hearing Trump order the removal of the metal detectors (magnetometers) that were being used to keep armed individuals away from the president: “I don’t fucking care that they have weapons, they’re not here to hurt me. They don’t intend to harm me. Take the fucking magnetometers out of there. Embrace my people. From here, they can march to the Capitol, let the populace in, and remove the magazines.
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Giuliani: NY revoked his law license; Dominion is suing; Feds seized his phones over Ukraine; DOJ is looking into him for a scheme involving phony voters;
But… —GA, where he’s at the center of an investigation into overturning 2020 results, may be where he has the most trouble.
Vox/Li Zhou:
The numerous reasons why Democrats’ rhetoric about “just voting” is ineffective
It is unacceptable that there wasn’t a firm plan in place as soon as this decision was made.
The White House and national Democrats in general are up against real and, in some cases, insurmountable legal and legislative obstacles. Biden may not be able to accomplish some of the demands of activists and may receive less political support than if Congress were to pass the legislation instead. The administration can meet many of the demands activists are making, which may have an immediate impact on people’s access to accurate information and their ability to get abortions in the near future. In the end, Democrats must show that they can act when in power if they want their supporters to remain engaged this fall.
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Slate/Todd Zwillich:
The Time Is Right for the Media to Learn How to Cover Trump
Seven years ago was the other wonderful period. (Or four). Or two.The least significant aspect of Cassidy Hutchinson’s committee testimony from January 6 is currently the most hyped.
We all experience shiny-object permanence to some extent, which is one reason. The salacious behavior of former president Donald Trump reaching for his SUV’s steering wheel and lunging at a security guard is truly the stuff of memes (nice one, Monica.)
The actual cause is the next factor. With the help of eager Washington reporters, Trumpist dead-ends very likely used the anecdote to discredit Hutchinson’s damning testimony about Trump’s potential criminality. The episode makes clear everything about the self-serving bad habits that (still!) cause ostensibly well-meaning journalists to serve as our most trustworthy liars’ propaganda frontmen.
WaPo’s Greg Sargent
Liz Cheney is pleading for GOP sanity in her harsh new attack on Trump.
Of course, there is a lot about Cheney to despise for liberals. Some of this nation’s worst anti-democratic abuses in recent memory, like the “war on terror” abroad and at home, have been committed by her wing of the GOP. She opposes a lot of the measures necessary to genuinely safeguard democracy and voting rights.
But we need Republicans who are openly and firmly committed to a set of fundamental values. Election results are final. Voters have a right to know the reality of democratic outcomes. It’s important that we treat each other with respect as democratic citizens, so this is not a matter to take lightly. Any party that claims to be an actor in a liberal democracy must fundamentally renounce the insurrectionist spirit present in the Trump movement and the GOP as a whole.
The main issue between Cheney and the rest of the GOP is actually this.
AP:
Trump’s vulnerabilities after the damning testimony increase for 2024
Just as he considers another run for president, startling new details about Trump’s efforts to annul the 2020 election have revealed growing political weaknesses.
Several Iowa voters indicated Thursday that they were open to another presidential candidate even if Trump were to run again. Iowa is expected to host the first presidential nominating contest in about 18 months. At the same time, harsh criticisms of the former president were published by some conservative media outlets. Aides for several GOP presidential candidates also made public and private comments about how the explosive new testimony gave them more confidence to take on Trump in 2024.
Approximately 350 conservative activists attended a barbecue fundraiser for Congress on Thursday in Sioux County, where Trump received 82 percent of the vote in the 2020 election. Nikki Haley, Trump’s ambassador to the UN, attracted the attendees.
Trump fatigue was also evident in spades. Interviews with a dozen attendees revealed that even if Trump is on the ballot, there is still significant interest in a 2024 alternative.
To put it another way, I’m less concerned about Trump (who should be checking the gold lamé on his cell) and more concerned with Trumpism.
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