Why NATO Won't Fight in Ukraine

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Friday February 25, 2022 · 9:48 AM PST

2022/02/25 · 09:48

1213px-American_M60A3_tank_Lake_Charles_Louisiana_April_2005.jpg

Originally posted as a comment, reposted as a diary by request of the inimitable SEASHELLS. In response to the question:

Why Won’t NATO or the UN send in ground forces to fight in Ukraine?

NATO is a defensive alliance among NATO members. It is not, and never has been, a tool for intervention.

As for the UN, there is no ‘UN military’. The UN could authorize a resolution to use ‘all necessary means’ to deal with the situation, which authorizes UN members to use force… but interested countries could already use force under bilateral treaties, and no one has stepped up to the plate.

If you want to understand how mind-bogglingly stupid the situation is, go hunt down the RAND report from 2015 on the Russian threat to the Baltic states, which are NATO members. The report is here. www.rand.org/...

You may have seen the reports that 70% of Russia’s conventional combat power is arrayed against Ukraine. Think about that for a minute and think about how Ukraine is holding out compared to how Iraq held out in 1991 or in 2003, and the reports of how much combat power is being held back. The same combat forces that Russia needs to conquer Ukraine are the same forces that Russia needs to stop Polish MIG-29s from bombing supply routes for the Russian army into Ukraine, or even making reprisal attacks against Russian infrastructure.

The problem is that Russia has a strong military individually, but simply could not hold out against any kind of concerted attack from peer threats (IE a German, UK, French coalition), much less a united NATO. A western attack on Russia’s military would annihilate most of their conventional combat forces, if not ‘quickly’ it would still be fairly inevitable.

That would literally open the way to Moscow. Faced with imminent regime change, Russia could go berserk with their nuclear forces as the situation escalates and leave millions reduced to nuclear ash even before NATO ground forces actually crossed into Russia proper. The RAND war games basically came to the conclusion that most scenarios where Russia was defeated on the battlefield could lead to global nuclear war.

From page 7 of the RAND report:

Any counteroffensive would also be fraught with severe escalatory risks. If the Crimea experience can be taken as a precedent, Moscow could move rapidly to formally annex the occupied territories to Russia. NATO clearly would not recognize the legitimacy of such a gambit, but from Russia’s perspective it would at least nominally bring them under Moscow’s nuclear umbrella. By turning a NATO counterattack aimed at liberating the Baltic republics into an “invasion” of “Russia,” Moscow could generate unpredictable but clearly dangerous escalatory dynamics.

On a tactical level, a counteroffensive campaign into the Baltics would likely entail the desire, and perhaps even the necessity, of striking targets, such as long-range surface-to-air defenses and surface-to-surface fires systems, in territory that even NATO would agree constitutes “Russia.” Under Russian doctrine, it is unclear what kinds or magnitudes of conventional attacks into Russian territory might trigger a response in kind (or worse),but there would certainly be concern in Washington and other NATO capitals about possible escalatory implications.

…

that same risk would tend to greatly undermine its credibility, since it may seem highly unlikely to Moscow that the United States would be willing to exchange New York for Riga.

That’s part of why the west would like to implode the Russian economy. As long as they have nukes, they’re a certain type of unreasonable threat. However, if over a decade or two the Russian economy can be ruined, then maybe they’ll denuclearize in exchange for some help. Unfortunately with the way Russia’s leadership mind is set, that probably means a north Korea style famine for Russia, occupied Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and others before we get there.

Many Stories About Ukraine, Many Lies, and all Important.

PiRierran

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Thursday February 17, 2022 · 9:17 AM PST

2022/02/17 · 09:17

There is not a single story in the Ukraine crisis. That is the first and most import thing to recognize about the Ukraine crisis that is unfolding as we watch in near real time. Let’s look at a wider net of media. Let’s go read some lies. No, let’s go read a lot of lies. This is important because lies shape beliefs, and beliefs drive actions.

Let’s start with the real time situation. This should be familiar to most readers.

Russia has a considerable invasion force massed near the Ukrainian borders. Most of them. Russia says is doesn’t want a war, and won’t start a war (more on that later). Russia insists that diplomatic channels are open, and Russia and the west keep talking for show, all the while beefing up their armaments. Russia has recently blinked, or perhaps just narrowed its eyes slightly, reporting that it will pull back some troops, although it appears that nobody can see them pulling back, and the progress towards an invasion appears to continue. Perhaps some troops are moving back performatively, or are ‘returning to bases’ that were right next to Ukraine anyway.

Next, let’s look at the NATO angle.

vox.com/22900113/nato-ukraine-russia-crisis-clinton-expansion

theweek.com/…

en.wikipedia.org/...

he Russians point to aspirational speeches and other words from the past with promises that NATO won’t expand eastward. They claim to be aggrieved, and that NATO threatens the very security of Russia itself. Russia has bellowed loudly that NATO hasn’t respected its promise to forbear expansion any better than Russia has adhered to the Budapest Memorandum! At the same time, western countries talk about self-determination and autonomy, and the absolute right of countries to make their own decisions and alliances, just like Iraq or Iran had the right to pursue defensive nuclear weapons to secure territorial integrity.

Let’s not kid ourselves that Ukraine is anything other than a pawn in a geopolitical game. Western countries are backing Ukraine out of convenience, economic ties, and economic opportunity. Not out of morals. Europeans want to economically exploit Ukraine, and don’t want Russia to.

Let’s look at the Ukrainian civil war angle.

www.cnn.com/…

www.aljazeera.com/…

www.foxnews.com/…

www.theguardian.com/…

www.france24.com/...

What civil war, you might ask? Well if you follow the narrative of much of the Russian punditry, Ukraine’s government since 2014 has been a neo-nazi, rightwing fascist autocracy hellbent on exterminating ethnic Russians (more on that below as well). The brave ethnic Russians in the two people’s republics are fighting either for their right to join with their motherland (Russia) or to assert their right to autonomy and self determination. Now, Russia is insisting that in order to deescalate, “all parties to the conflict” need to withdraw their heavy weapons from the line of control, withdraw all mercenaries and irregular forces, cease airstrikes, and offer amnesty and local elections. And of course, let’s be clear. Russia isn’t a party to the conflict, only a mediator. Never mind how those ‘separatists’ showed up in 2014 as the protests turned violent armed and well trained with weapons that are only used by the Russian military, have not been exported, and were never owned by Ukraine. I wonder how long the little green men won’t be Russian soldiers, until, like in Crimea, they suddenly are...

Russia certainly won’t ‘start’ a war in 2022. But Russia stands ready to intervene in the Ukrainian civil war, either to protect the god (read, Russian little green men) given right to ethnic self-determination, or to effect regime change in a dysfunctional fascist state that refuses to implement the terms of an entirely reasonable and certainly not signed under duress peace agreement.

There’s even a ‘save the children’ aspect of this that mirrors Qanon in the US!

www.polygraph.info/…

You see, according to some Russian media sources, the fascist Ukrainian government is engaged in a genocide campaign against ethnic Russians. The stories are replete with over-the-top mutilation of children, ‘tiny coffins’ and extermination camps. If The Ukraine won’t abide by the Minsk agreements and allow rule of law to return to the rightfully independent people’s republics so that they have the complete autonomy to choose whether to join Russia (as the widely mailed out Russian passports suggest and is in no-way influenced by all those Russian troops and separatists with never exported Russian weapons) then the Russian army stands ready to invade to save the children and effect regime change to save Kiev from the illegitimate fascist government that it has been laboring under since the 2014 ‘orange coup’ so as to save Russia’s national security and something something NATO!

Now, to be fair, this one reads as a pretty good stretch. However, the Russian equivalents of Faux News are openly talking about this sort of stuff and even Putin has made references to genocide in the Donbass. Insane as it might sound, fake news can lead to real beliefs. Though if Russia really were concerned about a genocide in Ukraine they’d probably welcome a joint UN peacekeeper force because you’d think that results would trump politics.

And we can’t forget the money aspect!

www.dailykos.com/…

I’ll plug an excellent pair of diaries discussing major steel production resources in or near the occupied regions in Ukraine. A Ukraine that is too western aligned and cares about things like ‘transparency’ and ‘rule of law’ and ‘regulatory compliance’ isn’t going to be a great place for an oligarch to run lucrative grift off of such a resource. If it is nearby, why not take it? There's a rich history going on to this day of national resources getting meddled with by foreign powers. Oil alone has enough history to support entire books, so why should steel be any different?

And as we noted before, Ukraine is a developing country, and could become quite a vibrant and growing economy in the next couple of decades. Who wouldn’t want to be in a position to economically dominate one of the world’s breadbaskets?

OK, let’s come up for air with a bigger picture:

carnegieendowment.org/…

Long term geopolitical trends don’t favor Russia. The Russian economy has a crappy per-capita wage, and is heavily invested in the fossil fuel sector that much of the world is trying to move away from. Indian, European and Chinese weapons systems are beginning to compete with Russian exports for the ‘non US origin’ weapons for smaller, nonaligned militaries. Russia is a crisis management problem. Given enough time, Russia will become weak enough that it can be defanged, brought into the fold, and exploited economically by more powerful countries. Keep the nukes in check and eventually Russia will collapse and conform.

Western countries say they don’t want war. The war would be terrible. It would be fought by people from some ‘other’ country, and the humanitarian disaster would affect those ‘other’ people. It Just happens to be so convenient that those brave defenders are corroding military assets that Russia can ill afford to waste. They are using weapons supplied by western militaries, who will need to buy up more weapons to replace the ones sent to Ukraine. No, a war in Ukraine would be terrible and it is an absolute imperative that we stop it using diplomacy, while at the same time shipping weapons over as fast as we can, the only natural outcome being the war being as bloody as possible. And let’s not even discuss the lucrative contracts that could be had rebuilding Ukraine after Russia is eventually pushed out, or providing services for refugees, or the marketing value of white Europeans in dire straits that could be exploited by the humanitarian religious complex for donations...

Conclusion:

As we possibly sit on the eve of a smoldering war breaking out into a larger fire, and want to know what is ‘really going on in Ukraine’, remember this: Like any major crisis, the issue is complex, with many dimensions, and it is driven by many conflicts among many people. There are politicians, business people, influencers, social engineers, and patriots of all stripes. They have their share of different motivations, be it money, prestige, individual or group power, or social change. They have many, many more beliefs and justifications, adding the layer of ‘what they say’, which may or may not match ‘what they believe’. And for every angle, agenda, justification, and action, there is money to be made on both sides. The only hero is you, introspective about your motivations, constantly improving on being empathetic and compassionate, staying honest even when it hurts, and doing the best you can.

Some Perspective of the Ukraine Situation

PiRierran

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Wednesday February 02, 2022 · 7:00 AM PST

2022/02/02 · 07:00

I’m seeing a lot of “Putin is Crazy” comments on this site and elsewhere in the media. This is a dangerous underestimation of Putin, and Russia in general. Here are some key points to keep in mind when forming an opinion on the Russia/Ukraine situation.

On a European scale, Russia is playing from a position of weakness.

On a balance of forces scale, Russia is weaker than the European members of NATO. For example, Russia has 750 combat fixed-wing aircraft, more or less en.wikipedia.org/… Compare that with the top 6 European NATO air forces, (UK, Germany, France, Italy, Poland, Spain) and they weigh in at around 900 comparable aircraft. Running down lists of other metrics, from size of various combat commands, etc, again the European component of NATO has anywhere from parity to something of an advantage in available forces.

From an arms race perspective European NATO members have twice the tank factories, aircraft factories, three times the population and fifteen times the GDP. From a nuclear standpoint, France and the UK have 400 deployed nuclear warheads, 1/3 of Russia’s total and more than enough to have a credible nuclear deterrent en.wikipedia.org/…

And all of that is true before accounting for the USA.

Unlike the 1950’s and 1960’s, Russia is simply not in a position to win any great European war, even for the sacrifice of millions of Russian lives. In fact, the only places where Russia has a potential to flex its military to the west are Ukraine and the Baltic states, and the latter are NATO members. Russia’s main advantage lies not in its total military might, but in its willingness to use that might.

The long-term trend lines for Russia are grim.

The Russian economy is about the same size as Spain’s. On a more local level, Russia’s economy is slightly less than three times the size of Poland’s. As Europe moves to divest from fossil fuels, Europe is also divesting from a major sector of the Russian economy. A single decade of 10% growth in the Polish economy, and Poland alone might find itself a peer competitor to Russia.

Plagued by rampant corruption, a huge land area and large population, Russia is facing a real prospect of falling from superpower, to great power, to regional power, to regional player in a single lifetime. A moderate run of bad luck could even turn Russia from seeking a leadership role in the world to maintaining its own territorial integrity and autonomy; trying to avoid becoming a client state to Germany or China.

In Ukraine, the trend line isn’t favorable either. A western leaning Ukraine is making progress on its corruption and rule of law issues (even if slow, cultures take time to shift). Under threat of Russian occupation and invasion, we may be seeing the birth or renaissance of a Ukrainian national identity in real time. In 8 years, Ukraine has grown a military more or less from the ground up, transforming from a nonentity to a credible asymmetric threat to any Russian invasion. Over time, if this trendline continues, Ukraine will eventually develop to the point where it can run a coherent national defense strategy even in the face of a Russian invasion, making such much more costly.

Putin is aggrieved.

The politics of white grievance are a driving force in American politics, so why wouldn’t the politics of grievance be a force in Russia as well? Russia and Putin are quick to point fingers at the west for breaking promises about the expansion of NATO or disrespecting spheres of influence.

Putin doesn’t really recognize Ukraine’s sovereignty nor autonomy as an inherent thing. From his perspective, he’ll point to Catalonia or Puerto Rico as examples of western powers rejecting calls for independence. He’ll point to things like the 2003 invasion of Iraq as examples of western ‘hypocrisy’ when it comes to intervention as justified for national security.

The unfortunate reality in international politics is that it comes down to power, pragmatism, and convenience. Powerful countries tend to push their neighbors around. Always have and probably always will. As the suzerain of the USSR, Russia pushed around its satellites, and it is uncomfortable to be on the receiving end of such treatment. Putin’s government may have a bunch of different reasons woven into their narrative why they have every right to go in and do whatever it is they’re about to do. Like usual, it is simply justification as part of a means to an end.

Putin Perceives a NATO-aligned Ukraine as an existential threat.

From a certain point of view, his perspective is correct. Russia has a long history refining the use of hard power. Military force and, destabilization, and the threat of, or actual military intervention are evergreens in the songbook or Russian foreign policy. Look at the number of interventions during the last years of the Soviet Union, or even the intervention in Kazakhstan recently. The Ukranian city of Shostka is 500km from Moscow. That falls within the range of either the Russian Iskander missile, en.wikipedia.org/… or a US ATACMS en.wikipedia.org/… Looking from a historical Russian perspective, that is a clear and present threat of military force inside Russia proper. The clear implication is that Europe will start making demands on Russia with a threat of invasion and takeover.

And basically, this is true. Europeans of the current generation aren’t into big wars, and so a lightning drive on Moscow isn’t going to happen. However, Europeans don’t consider bullying of neighbors using hard power to be acceptable, and want Russia to stop. It is be fair to say that Europe would reply in kind to Russia’s military threats given the opportunity. Think of it like the 6 year old that just won’t stop swinging the shovel around while playing in the yard. Her parents might not care how she’s playing on her own, but she needs to stop swinging wildly so near her little brother!

Putin may be getting desperate.

Take those three items together and remember that Putin and other Russian leaders grew up during an era when Russia was one of two world superpowers. Russia’s military, political ‘unity’ and population are what got them there. Watching a country fallen to regional power status and falling farther would be a bitter pill indeed.

What’s Next?

Keep in mind that actions taken by nations are anything but X or Y propositions. All exist on a spectrum and in a specific context. It is essentially unthinkable that Putin would make the same mistake as Tojo in November of 1941, launching a large surprise attack on NATO forces that assures a major war.

Instead recognize that Russia will take calibrated actions that are using the military to get a means to an end. Pressure, division and use of force are all tools in Russia’s toolbox.

The Meadows Powerpoint Begs Two Key Questions...

PiRierran

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Thursday December 16, 2021 · 8:00 AM PST

2021/12/16 · 08:00

I read through the ‘Meadows powerpoint’ a couple of times so you don’t have to. I know Meadows didn’t write it, some colonel did, but it was turned over to the Jan 6 committee responsive to a subpoena. It either has some legitimacy, or Meadows is facing an obstruction of Congress charge, so we’ll go with it.

The powerpoint is written in a pretty straightforward style for a military author. Data followed by courses of action, with some key points in the first few slides in case the reader is in a hurry. I’ve read a few hundred like it in my career, and I’m not impressed.

A lot of slides are wasted presenting infographics purporting to show ‘fraud’ but only serve to point to stuff on a random field of data or process flow. The powerpoints don’t contain any links or tie-ins to objective evidence nor to contextualizing standards for how to interpret them. Total crap, and basically worth ignoring.

Then the powerpoint makes a claim that some kind of ballot ‘audit’ is required to ‘restore confidence in the election’. This begs the question: “Is there really a crisis of confidence in the election?” The extreme urgency and tone of the proposed remedies clearly implies that the author thinks the answer is ‘yes’, but we all know it isn’t. The author provides no evidence, and taken in context with the fact that republicans are pushing the idea of fraud to create a crisis of legitimacy, is clearly a crock.

Then you get to a second issue. The powerpoint argues that ‘only legitimately cast paper ballots’ need to be counted to determine the ‘legitimate’ winner of the election. This begs the question of whether a cherry-picked set of ballots, cast a particular way and auditable in a limited time (IE, from small, rural precincts) are really a valid substitute for the total will of the voters, especially in a close race. Obviously it is not.

Before we get to the real issue that isn’t actually in the powerpoint, we need to go back and pull a little bit of context.

By the week after the election, there was no plausible, legal path for Trump to retain the White House. Enough swing states were certifying or transmitting their results that it was clear the first slate of electors was going to favor Biden. State legislatures weren’t showing the willingness to convene ‘emergency sessions’ to rewrite the states election laws and create processes to bypass the election results. Secretaries of state, especially republicans, weren’t keen on substituting their own whims for the vote totals either. Since the job of the SoS is to oversee elections and ensure their integrity, admitting to significant fraud so soon after an election would have been an effective admission of malfeasance, and certainly carried with it legal jeopardy.

By Jan 6th, 2021, transition activities were well under way. Most parts of the federal government were treating Joe Biden as the president-elect, and preparing key staffers for transition into formal roles.

The strategy laid out in the powerpoint to drive a contingent election or alternate certification was, in reality, always a nonstarter. Speaker Pelosi has plenty of options. As just a couple examples, If alternate slates of electors are registered into the count, threatening a contingent election, she can simply refuse to seat enough republicans to ensure the contingent election in Biden’s favor. The federal contested election law provides enough cover (challenge ‘duly elected’ status consistent with claims of fraud) that the courts won’t have time to matter between Jan 3 and Jan 21. If Pence refuses to count legal votes, Speaker Pelosi could pro-forma challenge a state and terminate the joint session, referring the issue to a committee that never meets and ending the count. There were a number of legal analyses on this topic floating around at the time so I won’t bother to repeat them.

The more extreme and possibly farfetched scenarios blast off from the world of existing law into some kind of outer-space of coup-adjacent thinking. A federalized recount over the objections of state legislators? In three weeks? Pence unilaterally providing a certificate of victory to Trump? None of those scenarios end with a consensus Trump victory. It simply isn’t going to happen by following the main forms of existing law. At best, an extreme muddying of the waters would provide for three claimants to the powers of the Presidency on inauguration day.

If Trump can’t win using existing law, and his only option is to flip the chessboard, then it becomes clear that the push is an intermediate step, not an end goal. All of the big lie, the gambits with state legislators and on the floor of the joint session, are nothing more than a pretext. And this gets to the critical word of this diary. Pretext.

You see, the Meadows Powerpoint raises a colossal, critical, lynchpin, keystone, foundational and overwhelming question: “What happens following this pretext?”

What we do know is that, whether through a ‘recount’ or through a certificate from the VP, Trump would declare victory. There’s no provision in the constitution or federal law for such late recounts or other activity. There is no provision to reconvene the joint session and certify some kind of ‘new’ electoral votes. The failsafe is the contingent election in the House. Jan 6th is the final count.

The only outcome would be chaos and a declaration of victory by the current occupant of the White House with only days or hours to act. There would need to be a plan to consolidate that ‘victory’. And fast. Any plan like that would be frightening and make all of the big lie pretext stuff look like a schoolyard argument.

At this point, I don’t know if any concrete evidence has surfaced in public as to what that follow up plan was. There are so many directions such a plan might have gone that I won’t speculate specifics. One line of evidence is telling:

We had a memo from the joint chiefs in August publicly refusing to participate in the ‘resolving an election dispute’. We had a secretary of defense who purportedly was fired for refusing to order the use of the military in accordance with Trump’s wishes related to the election. We had a chief of staff who stated that the national guard’s role was to ‘protect pro-trump people’. We had the Trump administration make heavy-handed use of federal goons on more than one occasion against peaceful protesters.

Scary stuff.

My Head is Splitting. I have Congestion, Fever, Body Aches, Coughing, and my Arm Hurts.

PiRierran

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Sunday November 21, 2021 · 5:13 AM PST

2021/11/21 · 05:13

NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA - FEBRUARY 02: Artwork of Dolly Parton holding a vaccine syringe is displayed on house float on February 02, 2021 in New Orleans, Louisiana. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic cancelling traditional Mardi Gras activities, New Orleanians are decorating their homes and businesses to resemble Mardi Gras floats. (Photo by Erika Goldring/Getty Images) — I found this picture in the library and it needs a lot more love.

Much worse than yesterday. If things keep to their current pattern, the sweats will start in about 30 minutes.

But this is a good news story. I couldn’t be happier. It means the booster is working. With my kids protected ~2 weeks ago, it means that my whole family will be enjoying ‘peak protection’ at about the same time. By the time you read this, a little less than half a gram of isobutylphenylpropionic acid will be having its desired effect and I’ll be feeling almost completely fine.

The story behind the clickbait title: I had a mild sinus infection at the beginning of the week. You may know the kind, the opportunistic vial kind that makes you feel crummy for a couple days, but stay on top of it with Sudafed and the little pseud-living jerks get the message and eventually leave.

Anyway, by day 4, I’m down somewhere between ‘minimal’ and ‘mild’, symptoms wise. A quick drive-through COVID test (negative, as expected), and the next day I am off to the pharmacy. While recovering, I even found a tape dispenser sculpted like my son’s favorite animal. Score! www.target.com/...

Probably going to try to take the kids for a walk at the nearby wildlife refuge and see if any migratory birds have flown in yet. I wonder if a whooping crane will be there (probably not, but who knows?).

To hell with this virus. To hell with the incompetent republican government responses that saddled us with this.

*Couple of updates to correct typos, and clarifying which government responses own most of the blam**

It is Orb Weaver Season in North Alabama

PiRierran

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Friday October 08, 2021 · 7:49 AM PDT

2021/10/08 · 07:49

Sometimes, a unique combination of morning dew and sunlight coming from the back can make these little marvels stand out enough to be photographed from a distance. These orb weavers are guardian spirits against the swarms of late summer mosquitos and other pests. Got these while taking a walk on a rural road this morning.

Just a short couple of photos to take a break from politics.

Twenty Eight?

PiRierran

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Monday September 06, 2021 · 4:38 PM PDT

2021/09/06 · 16:38

Respect for others, being necessary for the prosperity of a free state, the autonomy and sovereignty of persons over the integrity, development and processes within their own bodies shall not be infringed.

We Need to Talk About that Ivermectin Tweet

PiRierran

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Saturday August 28, 2021 · 7:26 PM PDT

2021/08/28 · 19:26

547px-Ivermectin_skeletal.svg1.png — Ivermectin

By now you’ve probably seen mentions of the gastrointestinal side effects of ivermectin use, and probably had a good chuckle on the side.

Sad to report that the post of the girl pooping her pants in the grocery store was a troll, so I deleted the tweet with that screenshot, but the other ones are real. pic.twitter.com/npAv981Wrx
— Aric Toler (@AricToler) August 26, 2021

One tweet in particular, which drew such juicy attention, reflected the “FLCCC Protocol”. Which raises the question, what the heck is that? A quick search pulls it up easily enough. It is the “Front Line Covid Critical Care Alliance” and digging through it shows a slickly produced website modeled after the CDC and other public health websites in style and content. (I won’t link because I don’t want to drive traffic)

There are links to legitimate discussions on the importance of gathering multiple lines of evidence and doing robust science. There are video blogs from doctors, for example, Dr Cadegiani appears to be a legitimate endocrinologist with links to Brazil and appears to have some published research. There are links to actual preprint articles, that check out as having links to actual journals. Granted, the abstracts for those articles clearly doesn’t support the claims that the website is making, but the articles do contain language that can be interpreted as suggesting that Ivermectin could be good for covid (in some fashion).

Granted, there are some red and yellow flags on the website. The site has a link for resources on ‘where to get ivermectin’ on the front page, slipping that the website is basically a product shill. The doctor chat in the news feed has the doctors using a silly cartoon background that looks ripped right out of Blue’s Clues, and everyone in casual clothes. There is also a prominent discussion of censorship on the landing page. However, catching those red flags requires a certain type of trained skepticism. Depending on your frame of reference, these indicators could all seem normal.

Whether any of the medical practitioners have been wrapped up in other quackery is beyond the scope my investigation. The same is true for digging into whether the American Journal of Therapeutics sits on the spectrum from ‘gold standard in its niche’ to ‘second tier journal behind Lancet and Nature’ to ‘publication mill’. The key point is that many aspects of the website pass the ‘does this look like a legitimate source?’ test, especially when you’re fact checking using google searches.

I’d also like to point out that the website is targeting a particularly vulnerable population, and is a fairly tailored attack:

1) There is a nontrivial segment of the US population that has a nightmare time dealing with the medical establishment. One easy example is overweight women of limited means. The intersection of fat-shaming, male-bias in medicine, and poverty sometimes block those folks from receiving competent care even when they go to the doctor. Those folks get used to doing their own research as a matter of survival.

2) The use of veterinary formulations for medicine isn’t that crazy. For those who don’t live near the us-mexico border and can’t afford to pay the premium to import medicines from Canada, you make do. Veterinary medicines have the same active ingredients as human formulations, and are still subject to reasonable quality controls. Ivermectin is actually an interesting case, because it is very useful in topical formulations for head lice. However the human formulations in shampoo can run into the hundreds of dollars, while going to the local feed-n-seed is much cheaper. Therefore this vulnerable population is probably already familiar with this particular drug.

What I want you to take away from this diary is that Ivermectin isn’t some silly facebook meme people are buying into. There is real discussion of the importance of science. Real world experience. Real doctors. Real journal articles. We’re dealing with a sophisticated disinformation campaign.

People who have bought in may very well have read what are either real journal articles, or what they sincerely believe are real journal articles. Dismissing this as ‘guy in a truck’ youtube videos or ‘silly facebook memes’ will only insult people and be intensely counterproductive.

Understand that this isn’t stupidity. This is sophisticated disinformation. It will require a an equally concerted and sophisticated effort to stop.

Translating the Subtext of the Joint Chiefs Memo

PiRierran

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Tuesday January 12, 2021 · 7:42 PM PST

2021/01/12 · 19:42

WASHINGTON, DC - JULY 9: Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley and Secretary of Defense Mark Esper testify during a House Armed Services Committee hearing on July 9, 2020 in Washington, DC. Esper and Milley were scheduled to testify about the role of the Department of Defense in civilian law enforcement. Active duty troops aided local law enforcement around the country at protests last month in the wake of George Floyd's death. (Photo by Greg Nash-Pool/Getty Images)

There are a number of things that jumped out at me from the Joint Chief’s memorandum. Some of the items I twigged on might not be obvious at first glance, so let me share my observations.

Here is the memo itself:

talkingpointsmemo.com/…

Starting at the bottom, note who signed the document. It is signed by the 8 highest ranking uniformed servicemen in the country. None of the civilian leadership by the current administration was on the document. This is the military chain of command asserting itself in the context of its continued institutional existence. A common theme in military doctrine and training is that politicians come and go, but the constitution and the national defense do not.

Second observation comes from the middle two paragraphs (emphasis mine):

We witnessed actions inside the Capitol building that were inconsistent with the rule of law. The rights of freedom of speech do not give anyone the right to resort to violence, sedition and insurrection.

...Any act to disrupt the Constitutional process is not only against our traditions, values, and oath: it is against the law,”

There is an important subtext here. Both sedition and support for insurrection are pretty serious among the military, and in normal times are so serious they are considered rather loaded terms. By putting this position so bluntly, the chiefs of staff are taking a very black and white position. A blunt reminder that support for insurrection is against the law. It can and should be recognized by any servicemember or DoD civilian as a plain warning. This is not a political issue for which there are two acceptable sides.

The third observation comes from the choice of wording of the next paragraph (again emphasis mine).

On January 20, 2021, in accordance with the Constitution, confirmed by the states and the courts, and certified by Congress, President-elect Biden will be inaugurated and will become our 46th commander in chief.

The use of the word ‘will’ here has a particular meaning. It is used to indicate intent or imperative. Specifically, who is going to ensure that the actions of inaugurating Biden and the military taking orders form him as commander in chief? The sentence has no subject, which means it is understood as the signatories. IE, the intent conveyed by the Joint Chiefs is that they intend to ensure that those things happen.

Contrast this language to the letters posted last year indicating that ‘the military has no role in settling election disputes’. The contrast is likely deliberate.

1) The election is over. This is no longer some kind of ‘election dispute’ but instead is a basic constitutional issue.

2) The military stands by the transition happening. The US Military will be taking orders from Joe Biden on January 20th, or following the chain of succession if he is assassinated. Full stop.

Finally, there is the ending paragraph.

To our men and women deployed at home, safeguarding our country — stay ready, keep your eyes on the horizon, and stay focused on the mission.

What is the mission? Bookended from the first paragraph it is:

protect and defend the constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic.

That is a warning order to be ready for action. Plain and simple.

What does it mean in summary?

I read it in two ways. First, to those in uniform as to which side the military is on. Second, I read it as a deadly serious warning that even if the insurrectionists were to take the halls of congress again, they would face the US Military in opposition.

Aggressive Application of the Text of the 14th Amendment:

PiRierran

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Monday January 11, 2021 · 9:23 AM PST

2021/01/11 · 09:23

Representation of the U.S. Constitution.

There is an important point in the way the text of section 3 is written that bears some analysis. It has direct bearing on the impending impeachment, as well as to a number of people including rep Mo Brooks.

To start with, here is the text:

Section 3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may, by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

So, what is that in a useful sense?

The important thing here is that the ‘disability’ here applies upon taking the defined actions. It can fairly be argued that neither trial nor conviction is required. Also, as it applied to confederate politicians such as Jefferson Davis, who never led troops in the field, insurrection can be political or leadership in nature just as easily. No trial or conviction was levied against the hundreds of politicians in the confederate states, for example.

So what would the aggressive use of the amendment be?

Bar the members from the chamber and hold a vote to remove the disability. That sets a 2/3 requirement to readmit. Such an action would work today in the house of representatives, and could work at 1PM on the 20th in the senate with Kamala Harris presiding over the chamber. Remember that, while congress cannot create new qualifications to serve, but the qualification of not leading an insurrection is written plainly into the constitution.

Governors and states would find themselves in the position of losing representation and leaving seats vacant, or appointing replacements who would then be seated, and thereby going along with the act. Used against Trump himself, it would render constitutional actions such as taking away the nuclear codes, and containing possible further damage to the nation.

Asking If Trump Will Leave the White House 'If He Loses' Is the Wrong Question

PiRierran

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Thursday September 03, 2020 · 3:26 PM PDT

2020/09/03 · 15:26

Trump has no intention of allowing himself to lose. That is actually the point. Team Trump has made it clear that they will use and abuse every lever of power at their disposal to ‘not lose’ and by ‘not losing’ will try to legitimize their stay in the white house.

Let’s spend a few lines on a little dystopian election fanfic to set the stage and illustrate the point. Imagine a course of events leading up to the inauguration. For most of the vingettes, I’ll link an example of something similar from recent history that rhymes with the story:

Going in to election day, Joe Biden has widened his national lead incrementally and looks to be holding around +11 in the 538 poll tracker. As voting gets underway, exit polls paint a picture of a polling bias favoring republicans, with a popular vote margin on the order of an incredible +13. Biden looks on track to sweep more or less all of the ‘swing states’, even taking Texas, Ohio, and Georgia by narrow margins, looking at a 400+ EV landslide.

Plenty of states experience severe polling irregularities. As night falls and poll closing times start to pass, things start to take a turn for the surreal. In Pennsylvania, and Texas, a horror story starts to play out. Proud boys and other deplorables start to gather near urban polling places. They harass voters of color and eventually fights break out. Police arrive and eventually declare an ‘unlawful assembly’, disperse the crowds with tear gas, and disperse those waiting to vote and order the voting places closed. www.propublica.org/...

In Virginia and Wisonsin, absentee ballots returned in the weeks ahead of election day are markedly above benchmark numbers for a clear Biden win; more than enough to offset Trump’s advantage in in-person turnout. But when results are released, something is strange. The number of mail in ballots delivered by the post office in the days leading up to election day is down markedly. Due to a ‘Funding Emergency’ the US mail stops running in Wisconsin. Stories come out of workers furloughed and offices shut down in the days leading up to the election. In Virginia, stories arrive of absentee ballots arriving on election day as printing delays prevented ballots being sent out even close to on time. Just after deadlines pass, ballots start flooding in. A firestorm begins to brew in congress, the courts and the media. www.dailykos.com/…

As days drag on, thing get even stranger. In Ohio and Georgia, the respective secretaries of states do not certify the election results as expected, despite returns that show clear but narrow wins for Biden.

The plot thickens in Wisconsin. An emergency appeal to the state supreme court by the republican Party secures an order on a party line vote that blocks certification of electors. It appears that Wisconsin will sit out this election cycle rather than certify what is clearly a Biden victory. In razor-thin Virginia, some of the late ballots are opened and results leak out, showing a clear margin for Biden. Both states eventually stall out in the courts and certification of electors is blocked due to aggressive Republican litigation. en.wikipedia.org/...

Naturally, Florida is an unholy mess. Recounts, court battles, missing and stolen ballots, and evidence of outright fraud fly thick and fast. As the date for the electoral college vote approaches, the secretary of state certifies Biden’s electors. However, forum-shopping republicans manage to find a judge willing to order their electors certified. This results in not one but two electoral college votes from Florida, which causes all of the votes to be rejected as improper and not counted. en.wikipedia.org/...

Along with this issue, as the December date for the electoral college votes draws near, republicans are openly courting democratic electors to defect. Many find themselves doxxed and the subject of rightwing protests. In fact, one democratic elector appears on Maddow and describes meeting a Trump campaign aide accompanied by DOJ staffers, sending an ominous message. www.politico.com/...

Even the Electoral College vote is marred with irregularities. In Ohio and Georgia, the respective secretaries of state certify the entire slate of Republican candidates early in the morning, ignoring the election returns. With no mechanism under either state’s law to contest the results, the electoral votes are sent out for Trump. In Pennsylvania, armed militia groups descend on the voting location occupy the building. An extended armed standoff ensues. In their most brazen action yet, armed BORTAC agents use the pretext of an immigration action to raid the California building where the electoral votes are officially being transmitted. Neither California nor Pennsylvania have their EV’s counted. en.wikipedia.org/… sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/...

Aghast at the brazen behavior of Republicans in Ohio and Georgia, House Democrats refuse to accept their credentials and seat the Democratic opponents instead. Senate leadership shows no such integrity. When the time comes to count the Electoral votes, the result comes out to be a 205-205 tie. With the President and VP thrown to the house and senate respectively, the senate gleefully votes in Mike Pence, and Trump secures the endorsement of 26 states by a single vote.

In a narrative like this, under constitutional rules, Trump never lost the election. In fact, he would swagger up to the chief justice on election day fully expecting to be sworn in for another 4 years in office.

Granted, the odds of things going this far are quite remote, but there is an important question we need to be asking:

How much cheating is too much? At what point would a ‘technical win’ by Trump after abusing every option available no longer be meaningful?

It isn’t just enough to ‘not lose’. A president is only legitimate with a clean and fair win.

Wargaming a 2020 All-Stops-Pulled Legal Brouhaha

PiRierran

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Sunday June 21, 2020 · 1:43 PM PDT

2020/06/21 · 13:43

Map of the US 2016 election showing results for counties adjusted for size of county population

With even Joe Biden saying that Trump will try to steal the election, www.cnn.com/… it might be worth spending some time looking at how that might play out. The tried and true methods of gerrymandering and voter suppression have played out recently in Wisconsin and Georgia. Around the block lines, and even voting that wasn’t finished until the following day have been documented. Many electrons have been spent talking about those tactics and plenty of effort is being allocated to fighting those efforts.

However we also saw something else important happen in Georgia in 2016 and in Wisconsin in 2020. Even the most strenuous attempts at voter suppression and dirty tricks doesn’t always work out the way one might hope. In Wisconsin, it resulted in the election of the ‘wrong’ supreme court justice, with a defeated incumbent and Jill Karofsky taking the seat. In Georgia, we saw the current governor, Brian Kemp, push his authority as secretary of state to the limit to ensure his own victory, even to the point of destroying evidence in the face of an impending lawsuit, and things are not getting better: www.dailykos.com/.../.

Combine this with a strong perspective www.politico.com/… that Trump is ‘winning’ the roll up to 2020, republicans may feel justified in ‘unskewing’ the ballot boxes just like they ‘unskew’ the polls. Doing so in the face of a clear mandate for your opponent may be deeply undemocratic, but it can also be legal. It is worth taking a look at some of the risk factors in close states.

I’ll consider states with a margin of about 5% or less in 2016. That will show the pattern for any of the more Trump-aligned states. Also, if we start looking at more than a 7% split (say, 52-44) in the popular vote, and the republicans resort to anti-democratic tactics at that level to outright steal the presidency, we’re in uncharted territory; massive civil unrest or a spiral into civil war become real possibilities at that point.

Here’s the data to source the analysis:

State	Governor	Legislature	Link
Arizona	R	R	https://azsos.gov/elections/arizona-election-laws-publications
Colorado	D	D	https://www.sos.state.co.us/pubs/elections/lawsRulesResources.html?menuheaders=5
Florida	R	R	https://dos.myflorida.com/elections/laws-rules/
Georgia	R	R	http://rules.sos.state.ga.us/gac/183-1
Maine	D	D	https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/21-A/title21-Ach0sec0.html
Michigan	D	R	http://www.legislature.mi.gov/documents/mcl/pdf/mcl-act-116-of-1954.pdf
Minnesota	D	Split	https://www.sos.state.mn.us/media/2304/minnesota-election-laws-statutes-and-rules.pdf
Nevada	D	D	https://www.leg.state.nv.us/NRS/NRS-293.html
New Hampshire	R	D	https://sos.nh.gov/ElecLaws.aspx
New Mexico	D	D	https://www.sos.state.nm.us/voting-and-elections/voter-information/election-resources/#
North Carolina	D	R	https://www.ncleg.gov/EnactedLegislation/Statutes/PDF/ByChapter/Chapter_163.pdf
Ohio	R	RR	http://codes.ohio.gov/orc/35
Pennsylvania	D	R	https://www.legis.state.pa.us/WU01/LI/LI/US/PDF/1937/0/0320..PDF
Virginia	D	D	https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title24.2/chapter8/section24.2-805/
Wisconsin	D	R	http://docs.legis.wisconsin.gov/statutes/statutes/12

I’ll look at two questions. Fist, what provisions in law might there be to manipulate vote totals outside of the ballot recount and vote-by-vote challenge processes, or challenge the results of the election outright? Second, even if there is not a provision, what does the legislative makeup of the state look like? If a state is under one-party control, they could convene an ‘emergency’ session and ‘fix’ the gap in election law that is blocking such shenanigans. IANAL and certainly don’t have time to dig through hundreds of years of case law, so we’ll be sticking to the plain text of statutes for this diary.

Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Virginia all have at least some means written in law that appear to cover ‘all other offices’, ‘all statewide offices with exceptions’ or some other catch-all text. Georgia, Maine, Michigan, New Hampshire, and Wisconsin appear to have no provision in law to contest the election of presidential electors.

The general pattern is to use some close variant of the criteria of allegations of ‘fraud, illegal votes, etc sufficient to change the outcome of the election’. The election challenge is decided based on ‘the greatest number of legal votes’. Florida allows a challenge based on factors that ‘place in doubt’ the outcome of the election. Arizona has the weakest defined criteria, allowing a court to overturn an election if "If a person other than the contestee appears to have the most legal votes cast". North Carolina is also an interesting exception in that it appears that an appeal to the legislature is possible after a court ruling.

Pennsylvania is the standout here, with clear instructions for every step of a challenge process, including an overall election integrity rule set. If there is a showing of fraud by election managers, a precinct can have their vote totals thrown out, or adjusted to remedy the fraud. In fact, Pennsylvania is also the only state that has a requirement to for anyone to prove the integrity of an election at all.

So where does that leave us? Consider if the gerrymandering and voter suppression tactics don’t work well enough to get the fix in. Only Arizona, Florida, Pennsylvania, and North Carolina have any real pathway to a partisan court or legislature based on nebulous fraud claims. All of the others rely on certified vote totals following recount. Pennsylvania’s SoS is a Democrat, and unlikely to go along with any such scheme, and asking as court to do something so blatantly partisan is a risky bet.

That brings up option #2, which is rewriting the election laws at the last minute to fix whatever mistakes let the voters pick the wrong candidate. There is a time limit on certifying electors, which suggests that a governor’s veto or challenge in court effectively blocks a legislative move. Only state with republican control of all legislative houses and a republican governor are plausible for such a gambit. That moves Arizona, Florida, Georgia and Ohio into the high risk category.

End effect: Of the close states Trump won in 2016, only Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are likely protected from both an electoral challenge under current law and legislative gambit. The end result would be Biden 273, enough to clinch the electoral victory. What about the other side of the coin? Only New Hampshire and Nevada have a split between governor and legislature that went blue in 2016, and Republicans have a lock on 0 of them.

There is one other line of defense for Democrats in such a scenario. If ANY of the states fails to appoint electors under such a scenario, the contingency election is thrown to the House, which would be very likely to stay under Democratic control. Delay so that no electors is appointed could be a valid option, which would deny a majority of electoral votes.

Conclusion:

Assuming that there is a D+7.3 election night, I am going to predict that R’s keep Arizona, Florida, Georgia and Ohio, with a razor thin 273 EV victory for Biden, with the possible surprise pickup of Florida. My reasoning is that those same states, if they are under one-party control to the point that they could keep the fix in by legislative action, then they’ll rig the voting and the vote-counting ahead of time and never get there.

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