This much: Rasmussen finds that “[e]ighty percent (80%) of voters believe “fake news” is a serious problem in the media, including 56% who say the “fake news” problem is Very Serious.” Not surprisingly, 89% of Republicans think fake news in the media is a serious problem, but 75% of Democrats also say that fake news in the media is at least a “somewhat serious” problem.
Did Donald Trump ever say that the news media are the enemy of the people? What I remember him saying is that the “fake news media” are the enemy of the people. But Rasmussen asked this question:
Do you agree or disagree with this statement: The media are “truly the enemy of the people”?
The result is shocking:
Also unchanged since July is that 58% of voters agree – including 31% who Strongly Agree – with Trump’s 2019 statement that the media are “truly the enemy of the people.”
Wait–58% agree that the media are the enemy of the people? It is hard to imagine how any industry could so disgrace itself in the eyes of the American people. Or it would be, if we had not witnessed the self-inflicted collapse of the “mainstream” press in recent years.
(Alexei Druzhinin, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP, File)
A curious development — positive, but still curious. Ever since the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Defense Secretary has tried to get Sergei Shoigu to pick up the phone, at least for the purposes of deconfliction. The Russian defense minister has refused to engage … until today.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on Friday spoke with his Russian counterpart, the first such conversation between the two officials since the Kremlin’s attack on Ukraine began in February, according to the Pentagon.
Austin spoke with Russian Minister of Defense Sergey Shoygu by phone, where the Pentagon chief “urged an immediate ceasefire in Ukraine and emphasized the importance of maintaining lines of communication,” the Defense Department said in a statement.
A senior defense official later told reporters that the call was initiated by Austin and lasted about an hour, with the tone characterized as “professional.”
It’s the first contact between the two since February 18, almost exactly three months ago. Six days later, Russia invaded Ukraine in its so-called “special military operation” that it expected to wrap up within a week. Three months later, their military has gotten humiliated in every part of Ukraine and is now at risk of getting flanked in the area where their lines of communication should be strongest. Finland is days away from putting NATO forces within 150 miles of its strategic sub port of Murmansk and less than 100 miles from St. Petersburg. Russia’s economy is in a shambles, and the nuclear threats don’t appear to be rattling NATO’s determination to supply Ukraine enough weapons to kick the Russians out for good.
Under these circumstances, Shoigu might be looking for some good advice, and Austin at least gave his Russian counterpart something to think about:
On May 13, Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III spoke with Russian Minister of Defense Sergey Shoygu for the first time since February 18. Secretary Austin urged an immediate ceasefire in Ukraine and emphasized the importance of maintaining lines of communication.
A cease-fire would at least stop the bleeding on the Russian side of the ledger. Don’t expect Vladimir Putin to take Austin’s advice, but it would still be better than letting the Ukrainians chew up Russian forces in the Donbas. That may not yet be inevitable, but it’s certainly looking that way as Russia falls back from Kharkiv.
But if that’s not what Russians want to hear, why reach out at all? The only reason at the moment might be for some specific deconfliction purpose, which could be related more to the Syria-Iraq theater where both countries have forces. That seems like a stretch, however, especially given recent Russian threats relating to Finland’s decision to join NATO. It could be that Shoigu wants Austin and the US to prevent that humiliating expansion to a much more strategic Russian border than the Russo-Ukraine frontier would have been.
If we really want to play the rank-speculation game, let’s recall that Putin appears to be in poor health these days and is rumored to be about to go into surgery. Shoigu may want to reconnect to make sure that neither side does anything ill-advised out of bad assumptions while Putin’s out of commission, which would be a very wise move. It could also be that Shoigu wants to feel out the US attitudes at the moment if Putin suddenly reaches room temperature, whether in surgery or not.
Otherwise, this decision to reconnect to the US seems like a tacit admission that the whole “special military operation” has gone sideways so badly that Russia can’t easily extricate itself now. The Putin regime can’t bluff or bully the West, and the spectacularly inept and incompetent Russian military may not even provide mucjh of a deterrent any longer, as least not a conventional deterrent. On that point too, having watched the Ukrainians kick his “modernized” military around for three months, how much confidence would Putin have in his unconventional forces?
The Russians may not be ready to call off the invasion, but the desire to start engaging again gives the appearance that they’re no longer buying their own propaganda.
Ammo Grrrll wants to fill a JOB OPENING!!! She writes:
It has come to my attention that the Twitter Head Content Moderator Vijaya Gadde is the genius who had the great idea to ban the Hunter Biden laptop story, a story that some 16 percent of the electorate surveyed said would have changed their vote in the 2020 election. Well done, Vijaya! Oh, and she also banned the sitting President of the United States. Talk about a Power Trip. Can you imagine some entity telling FDR he couldn’t broadcast his Fireside Chats on the radio?
But the nerve of the woman is not what struck me the most. No, it was learning that for these crimes against Truth, Free Speech, Democracy and Human Decency, she also made $17 million dollars in a single year. No wonder she’s in a panic over the new sheriff soon to be in town, Mr. Elon Musk. However, if she isn’t also an idiot as well as a totalitarian liar, she should never have to work again after just that one year. I know I could scrape by on the savings from that – how ‘bout you?
But a little all-too-human frisson of envy tickled my brain and I have decided to apply for her job. Principles are all well and good, but SEVENTEEN MILLION DOLLARS? Are you kidding me? So, if anyone knows how to contact Mr. Musk, perhaps you could forward this to him.
Dear Elon,
Hey, how’s it goin’? I have watched two outstanding biographies of you and think you are doing a great job. Your Tweets are awesome! My husband is really excited about going on one of your Mars trips, if the price drops below $51 million per ticket. I am trying to save up for it out of the grocery money, but with the Biden Inflation, it is getting more difficult.
Congratulations on your upcoming acquisition of Twitter.
I understand that you are going to be indulging in some good old-fashioned cost-cutting when you finally take the reins of Twitter. Though I have never Twitted a single line in my life, I have looked at some righteous beatdowns with entertaining voiceover by Steve Inman. And thanks to my husband’s obsession, we have watched many many cat and dog videos that people post there. But despite my not being a regular Twitter user, in the spirit of self-sacrifice and patriotism, I offer to take over Ms. Gadde’s job with – are you sitting down, sir? — a 50 percent pay cut! Yes, I believe I can do that job for just $8,500,000.
Or, seriously, just $7,500,000 and, say, six Teslas to give as gifts to my family members. I will keep driving my beloved 10-year-old Hyundai Sonata, no offense to your great product.
What, you may well ask, do I bring to the table in the realm of “banning” things? Okay, first of all, from the day I began using underarm deodorant as a young pre-teen – and not a minute too soon – I chose “Ban” Deodorant! It has served me well for many decades. [God, do you remember the mortifying first time you realized that instead of transforming from the Ugly Duckling into the Swan you had been promised in children’s literature, in addition to your awkwardness, you had now acquired the ability to smell bad?] Okay, back to the job application…
Second, I am a mother. And a foster mother. Of a total of 3 boys of several colors who were all teens at the same time. And each had no fewer than 4 friends in the house at any one time. Eating. Here is just a partial list of my nonnegotiable rulings against Hate Speech, Nebulous Danger, and Mis-Dis-Information:
STUFF I HAVE BANNED:
To prevent unsightly double-stacking of books, if a new book comes into the house, one must leave. (Admittedly, this one has been poorly enforced. We can but try.)
There will be no eating Cheetos except over the sink.
All Hate Speech will be banned: examples – “I hate broccoli.” “I hate writing thank you notes to Grandma.” “I hate Tuna Noodle Casserole.” “I hate leftovers.”
The boring, self-righteous, fake Black Preacher singsong voice of Obama cannot be tolerated. He may be watched on television, but only on mute. Especially he may be watched with the fake African interpreter for the deaf. What a day-maker that was!
Limit of one new gun per month. To replace the ones lost in unfortunate boating incident. Poorly enforced.
Kicking soccer ball in the living room – banned.
Practicing slapshots in hockey in the house – banned.
Going “long” for a pass in house – banned.
Bowling – don’t even ask.
There will be no dancing – This applies to Joe only. There will be no singing aloud – by pretty much anyone in family. Subdued humming acceptable.
With 3 teenage boys, the wearing of baseball caps at the dinner table – banned. Even backwards. Okay, for sure banned when Grandma visits or for Sunday dinner.
The wearing of a t-shirt – where in God’s name did you GET it? – bearing the words “You are standing on my penis” is banned from either high school wear or Grandma’s house.
Kickboxing is banned from everywhere but the basement. Allowances will be discontinued until the lamp and coffee table are fully paid for.
No rap that uses the “N” word or disrespects women will be played in the house or car. In other words, no rap.
Bonus things banned since retirement: pantyhose and alarm clocks.
Elon, I know you have eight children and I will also throw in free babysitting of any or all of those children, but the smaller the better. I am very good with children and my Story Hour Costume is just jeans and a t-shirt (with no penis messages on it), not drag. Also, my hair is its natural color – Platinum Blonde — sometimes mistakenly called Grey. So please think about my one-time, limited-time offer. The clock is ticking.
Wait, what? Lunatics hate you because you are NOT going to ban stuff? Oh. Em. Gee. How embarrassing. As my heroine Ms. Emily Litella would say, “Never mind.” Maybe just the babysitting part? And ONE Tesla as an Oprah-like present?
I haven’t seen Dinesh D’Souza’s 2000 Mules yet and can’t comment on it, but we have our very own mule in Minnesota. We have a pack of them, but I am thinking of the just-convicted mule Muse Mohamud Mohamed.
Last year Mohamed testified before a grand jury conducting in an ongoing federal investigation of Minnesota’s system of “agent delivery” of absentee ballots He was convicted this week on two counts of lying to the grand jury about his work delivering absentee ballots in Minnesota’s 2020 primary. It took the jury all of 40 minutes to reach a verdict, though they probably spent the first 30 minutes electing a foreman.
I’m going to go out on a limb and say that Mr. Mohammed was assisting the campaign of his brother-in-law, state senator Omar Fateh. Mohammed was a volunteer for Fateh’s campaign and Fateh himself had repeatedly refused to acknowledge the family relationship until the jury found Mohammed guilty. (Mohamed is also the brother of DFL-endorsed state senate candidate Zaynab Mohamed.)
Fateh only asserted in a written statement provided to Winter that he is “troubled” by Mohammed’s conviction. The statement is ambiguous and Fateh refused to reply to repeated requests for comment by Winter on his relationship with Mohamed over the course of weeks (as did Zaynab Mohamed). One is left to wonder why.
A politically active Somali friend has been insisting on the family connections to me for months and wrote me after the verdict: “Told you they are family.” My friend added, as one might infer from the stories: “They had refused to comment until the DFL asked them to.”
The United States Attorney issued an understated press release with this explanation of the evidence against Mohamed:
Mohamed was served with a subpoena to provide testimony before a grand jury seated in the District of Minnesota regarding the use of the agent delivery process during Minnesota’s August 11, 2020, primary election. The City of Minneapolis’ election records document that Mohamed delivered ballots as an agent for three voters during that election. The voters, however, testified that they do not know Mohamed and did not ask him to pick up and deliver absentee ballots for them.
As proven at trial, on October 14, 2021, Mohamed provided testimony to the grand jury that he received the absentee ballots from the voters themselves. When Mohamed was confronted with the fact that the voters each gave statements that they do not know him and that they did not ask him or anyone for agent delivery of their ballots for the August 2020 election, Mohamed testified that he received the ballots from the voters.
The press release is understated. It seems to be calculated to leave feathers unruffled.
Steve Karnowski’s AP story on the case appends this note, lest sentient readers draw the wrong conclusion (links omitted):
VOTE FRAUD IS RARE
Multiple reviews, recounts, lawsuits and an investigation by The Associated Press have confirmed there was no widespread fraud in the last White House race. The AP’s review found that virtually every case was based on an individual acting alone to cast additional ballots. Nationally, federal and state election officials and Trump’s own attorney general have said there was no credible evidence the election was tainted anywhere in the country.
Democratic Secretary of State Steve Simon has said repeatedly that Minnesota’s 2020 elections were fair and honest, with no credible evidence of significant voter fraud.
In another Minnesota case, Abdihakim Amin Essa was sentenced to probation last month in state court for pleading guilty to four vote fraud counts in the 2018 election. Nine other counts were dismissed in the plea agreement. He was accused of signing as a witness for 13 people who cast absentee ballots when he legally couldn’t because he wasn’t a U.S. citizen, and signing with his father’s name. All 13 ballots were rejected.
By contrast with the AP, my politically active Somali friend observes specifically with respect to the Minneapolis scene: “In 2020 it was a free for all.” Or as one of the internal headings of the Winter’s May 9 Minnesota Reformer story puts it: “Use of ‘agent delivery’ spiked in 2020 primary.”
Incoming White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre was asked who is running lead on the baby formula crisis for the White House? Her reaction was disturbing. During a press gaggle on Air Force One, she giggled and said she doesn’t know who that person is but she’d find out. The reporters took the answer in stride.
Imagine if the previous president’s press secretary delivered that answer (and giggle) to such an important question for so many families right now. The baby formula crisis is real and it has a lot of moms in a panic due to the shortage of products on store shelves. Imagine being one of those moms going from store to store searching for a canister of baby formula. This woman can’t even name someone working on the problem in the White House.
During a press gaggle on board Air Force One, a reporter asked, “Who’s running point on the formula issue at the White House?”
“At the White House, I don’t know,” Jean-Pierre said before laughing.
She added, “But I can find out for you and get you a person who’s running point.”
How about one of those super well-qualified cabinet secretaries? ( Pardon the sarcasm) What about Mayor Pete, a newly appointed super dad by an adoring press? Isn’t the Secretary of Transportation a part of the supply chain? Would a logical place be at the FDA? Jean-Pierre said the baby formula crisis is a top priority and the White House is working 24/7 on the shortage. But she has no name to offer up to answer a reporter’s question.
The FDA commissioner released a statement Tuesday.
Meanwhile, Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Robert Califf said in a statement on Tuesday, “We recognize that many consumers have been unable to access infant formula and critical medical foods they are accustomed to using and are frustrated by their inability to do so.”
“We are doing everything in our power to ensure there is adequate product available where and when they need it,” he continued.
“Ensuring the availability of safe, sole-source nutrition products like infant formula is of the utmost importance to the FDA. Our teams have been working tirelessly to address and alleviate supply issues and will continue doing everything within our authority to ensure the production of safe infant formula products,” he added.
I guess this is yet another crisis that the Biden administration was caught unaware of until it was too late. It’s alarming how unaware Biden and his White House staff are on everyday life for most Americans. Parents have been noting a shortage of baby formula for months and now it has gotten so bad that stores are rationing purchases. Where’s the White House been?
A majority of American babies are fed by formula. It’s easy for someone who is clueless about feeding babies to tell a concerned mom to just breastfeed her child. That isn’t always possible. Some women both breastfeed and use formula. The point is that just guilting women about breastfeeding as though bottle-feeding is some lazy way out is shameful. This supply problem lands at the feet of Joe Biden. Now the shortage is at crisis level and what are parents to do? The Washington Post notes that the nationwide out of stock levels for infant formula hit 43 percent last week.
In February Abbott issued a formula recall due to bacterial infections linked to formula produced in a Michigan plant. Babies in three states fell ill, some died. Formula under three labels were affected – Similac, Alimentum and EleCare. That was in February, though, and we’re in May now.
So, what is happening now? Abbott calls the shortage a priority and is even air-shipping formula from Ireland daily.
Abbott said it is “prioritizing production of infant formula products” to alleviate shortfalls, including air-shipping product from its FDA-registered facility in Ireland on a “daily basis.” The company said it has been working with government agencies to help parents who get formula through the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) with other Similac products “at no cost, including for other manufacturers’ products.”
But those efforts have yet to translate to store shelves, according to Brian Dittmeier, senior director of public policy at the National WIC Association. Abbott is the exclusive supplier for more than half the nation’s WIC agencies, through which more than 1.2 million infants receive formula benefits, Dittmeier said. Such benefits are typically limited to a specific variety of formula, but agencies have waived some requirements to give families more flexibility during the shortage.
“The unprecedented scope of this infant formula recall has serious consequences for babies and new parents,” Dittmeier said.
The FDA said it is meeting with major manufacturers. Shouldn’t that have already been done? Where has the sense of urgency been throughout a completely predictable shortage? Parents have seen it coming for months.
The agency is meeting with major manufacturers to “better understand their capacity to increase production,” and the industry is “already working to maximize their production to meet new demands,” the FDA said.
It is also expediting reviews of manufacturing changes and the issuing of certificates to “allow for flexibility” in importing approved products.
Baby formula isn’t an optional kind of purchase. It’s not advisable that moms make a homemade version as that endangers the baby’s health. Some babies have special formula needs. Homemade formula doesn’t provide the essential vitamins and minerals needed for brain development in infants. Desperate parents are diluting formula with water, using recalled products, or introducing babies to cows milk before one year of age. All of that is risky behavior and harmful for babies.
Today Biden will speak on a virtual conference call with retailers about the formula shortage. To say this old man leads from behind is an understatement. In that aspect, he is truly Obama 2.0. The question remains, what took so long? Biden has still not addressed this latest crisis in his very long list of crisis mismanagement. As I write this, he hasn’t aid a word about it. I’m willing to bet that Karine Jean-Pierre doesn’t know the name of the White House point person handling the formula crisis because there is not one. There simply isn’t any interest.
You all remember the story: the Biden Department of Justice coordinated with the National School Boards Association to arrange for FBI investigations of parents who are unhappy about their local schools teaching racism and anti-Americanism (Critical Race Theory) and gender confusion, and requiring masks. The episode was so sordid that many state school board associations dropped their affiliation with NSBA, and most people doubted that the FBI would be craven enough to follow Attorney General Merrick Garland’s patently unconstitutional directive.
But follow it they did. Yesterday Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee, acting on tips from unhappy FBI agents, wrote Merrick Garland to criticize the diversion of FBI resources to investigations of parents who dissent from “woke” ideology and care about their children’s education:
The FBI’s counterterrorism bureau reportedly created an internal “threat tag” in fall 2021 to track alleged threats against school boards following an October 4 directive from Attorney General Merrick Garland. Garland released his directive after the National School Boards Association called on the Biden administration on September 29 to investigate parents who allegedly threatened boards over policies on school masks and critical race theory, and to determine whether the parents had violated the Patriot Act or hate crimes laws. (The NSBA subsequently apologized for releasing the letter.)
The FBI labeled “dozens” of investigations with the threat tag “EDUOFFICIALS,” Representatives Jim Jordan (R., Ohio) and Mike Johnson (R., La.) claimed in their new letter on Wednesday, citing FBI whistleblowers.
Emphasis added. These “investigations” were ridiculous and could only have been intended to intimidate conservative parents from being involved in their public schools. One might note that these parents merely attended public school board meetings to express their opinions. I am not aware of a single case where they demonstrated outside the home of a school board member.
One investigation allegedly began after the FBI received a tip that a mom had told a local school board, “We are coming for you.” The complaint “alleged that the mom was a threat because she belonged to a ‘right wing mom’s group’ known as ‘Moms for Liberty,’ and because she is a ‘gun owner,’” the congressmen wrote. An FBI agent reportedly interviewed the the mom, who said she was upset about a school mask mandate and wanted to elect new board members.
Sounds like an insurrectionist! But imagine having a couple of FBI agents ring your doorbell on instructions from the Attorney General because you don’t align politically with the Biden administration.
In another instance, the congressmen wrote that an FBI agent interviewed a tipster who admitted he had “no specific information or observations . . . of any crimes or threats.” The tipster had submitted a complaint against an anti-mask-mandate dad, claiming that the dad “fit the profile of an insurrectionist,” and the FBI had opened an investigation into the dad.
The “tip line” sounds like something out of Red China. More details on that case from the Congressmen’s letter:
Another one:
The congressmen also claimed that the FBI began an investigation into Republican elected officials in a certain state because a Democratic state-party official claimed that the Republicans “‘incited violence’ by expressing public displeasure with school districts’ mask mandates.”
Contemplate that: a complaint by a “Democratic state-party official” was enough to trigger an FBI investigation of “Republican elected officials” who opposed mask mandates. What country are we living in?
Many liberals–perhaps most–believe that conservative, pro-freedom, pro-American speech should be illegal, if it isn’t already. What I want to know is, are there any Democratic House members willing to take a stand against this obviously unconstitutional overreach by the Attorney General? So far, I haven’t heard of any.
It’s a “victory for climate activists,” reports the Washington Post. It’s a loss for American consumers, both now and especially in the future. With gas prices soaring to record highs, Joe Biden and his team canceled oil lease sales on millions of acres of federal land, mostly offshore.
Even the Post casts a nervous eye toward consumers and voters, as well as to the incoherence in Biden’s public statements:
The Interior Department confirmed Wednesday that it will not hold three oil and gas lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico and off the coast of Alaska that had been scheduled to take place, taking millions of acres off the auction block.
The decision, which comes as U.S. gas prices have reached record highs, effectively ends the possibility of the federal government holding a lease sale in coastal waters this year. The Biden administration is poised to let the nationwide offshore drilling program expire next month without a new plan in place.
While President Biden has spoken in recent weeks about the need to supply oil and gas to Europe so those nations can stop importing energy from Russia in light of the ongoing war in Ukraine, the move would mark a victory for climate activists intent on curbing U.S. fossil fuel leasing. …
Amid rising oil prices, inflationary pressure and the upcoming midterm elections, there is much uncertainty over how far the administration is willing to go on offshore drilling.
Thus we have the inherent contradictions of climate-change priorities in an electoral context. Some voters certainly do care about climate change, but they are now discovering that to be a luxury when gas prices shoot up 79% within a year. Demand in a recovering economy increases, and perhaps even more when the demand is pent-up from an artificial suppression such as the pandemic created. It should have been patently obvious that demand for oil would sharply increase not just for consumers but especially for distribution as supply chains healed up.
Put on top of that the desire to backstop Europe against Russia, and we have demand on steroids. We simply do not have the supply to feed one of those two demand categories, let alone both. If we had kept expanding leases and kept regulatory obstacles to exploration and extraction to a minimum, we might have been able to keep pace with some moderate price increases. Instead, Biden has cut off both paths to supply, and we can see the result at the pump.
That will only get worse as we begin exports to Europe at the scale Biden envisions, too. Without the ability to find new oil — and with all of the additional costs from Biden’s EO 13990 disincentivizing capital investment in those activities — we can look forward to continually spiraling gas prices. The only thing Biden reliably fuels is inflation. And today’s PPI inflation report shows that Biden will be fueling that for a long time to come, too.
Let’s not forget, too, that high gas prices are a feature for Biden in the long run. Progressives want gas prices to remain high so as to discourage the use of fossil fuels. They believe that imposing such pain on consumers will convince them to press for a conversion to renewable energy sources. Unfortunately, we have already seen the results of that conversion in places like California, which can’t keep up with electrical demand today even before forcing all vehicles onto the grid. The ultimate conversion that will take place is a conversion of the electorate to get rid of fossilized politicians peddling climate change, and the election of officials who focus on the immediate needs of American households.
As a new Iron Curtain descends, Russians leave and pastors face hard realities
The Kremlin’s Spasskaya Tower is seen through part of a lattice of the Nikolsky Gate in central Moscow after Red Square was closed to the public.Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP via Getty Images
Russian pastor Andre Furmanov senses a dark cloud descending upon his homeland. He says his phone is bugged and “rats” mingle with his nondenominational congregation on Sundays, ready to report anti-government rhetoric to authorities. More recently, the Kremlin has begun cracking down on anyone reporting the truth about Russian atrocities in Ukraine. “What I’m saying on social media is enough to put me in jail for 15 years,” Furmanov said.
When he was in college, Furmanov despised the Soviet Union and wanted to emigrate to the United States. But shortly before the republic dissolved in 1991, Russia didn’t have enough pastors to shepherd the growing numbers of converts to the faith. Furmanov decided to stay and join the ministry.
Three decades later, Furmanov is still pastoring his church in Vyborg and has once again decided to stay in Russia, despite increased risks and generous invitations from his friends in the West. “How can I teach these people for three decades and teach them to overcome difficulties, and then when troubles come, just say, ‘Okay, well, enjoy my teaching. Listen to the audio online. I’m going to wave my little handkerchief to you from California,’” Furmanov explained.
Furmanov’s decision to stay comes as thousands of Russians are getting out. Western sanctions, draconian speech laws, and fears that Russia will close its borders have created the largest exodus since the 1917 Russian Revolution. Some analysts say hundreds of thousands have fled and expect that number to reach a million by the end of the year.
When foreign airlines stopped flights in and out of Russia shortly after the invasion of Ukraine, many Russians panicked and began purchasing seats on whatever flights they could find, some at 10 times their usual cost. Journalists, artists, and celebrities were some of the first to pack their bags and quietly exit the country, and thousands of tech workers followed. The high-speed train line between Russia and Finland was another escape route for Russians until Finland shut it down a month after the war began as part of increased sanctions.
But the exodus is more than a panicked reaction to severed exit routes; it’s the culmination of more than two decades of rule by Russian President Vladimir Putin that have led to a precipitous decline in quality of life—so much so that Russia is now one of the least happy countries in the world (alongside several war-torn countries in the Middle East) according to a 2019 Gallup International poll.
Living standards in Russia have deteriorated since the 2014 invasion of Ukraine when Western sanctions hit a Russian economy already struggling with widespread corruption. Adding to the crisis, Russians aren’t having enough kids to replace the population, and life expectancy is remarkably low: 25 percent of Russian men die before the age of 55, with alcoholism the primary cause.
Nearly 22 percent of Russians want to leave for good, according to a poll conducted by the independent Russian polling group Levada Center a week before the war began. The percentage is much higher for young adults. Many of the people polled cited economic reasons for their discontent, and the latest round of Western sanctions is likely magnifying that sentiment.
Russia is now the most sanctioned country in the world, and Furmanov says he sees the negative impact at local stores where the price of office paper and other supplies has skyrocketed.
He compares what he sees in St. Petersburg—where many Western companies and restaurants have suspended their businesses—to a chalk painting on a sidewalk that slowly fades away. Toilet paper and toothpaste are hard to find, and food is disappearing from the shelves.
Shortages will likely fuel an exodus that was already climbing prior to the latest round of sanctions and causing serious concern. “This is the No. 1 threat to a Russian Federation that seeks to gain its foothold in the world again,” Russia expert Alina Polyakova said during a 2017 Atlantic Council panel discussion. She said nearly 1.8 million Russians emigrated between 2000 and 2014.
Passengers at Moscow’s Domodedovo airport.AFP via Getty Images
Deteriorating human rights is another reason Russians are leaving the country. Bishop Albert Ratkin says his evangelical church in Kaluga faced 12 lawsuits in 2020 alone, and police have arrested his son David multiple times. (See “Russian politics spark division among Christians,” April 27, 2021.) The situation worsened after the February invasion of Ukraine, and Ratkin said many people with democratic values, including his son and some of his professors and classmates, left the country in March to avoid imprisonment.
Russia has been in a state of declining freedoms since Putin came to power 22 years ago, and David Satter was one of the first Western journalists in Russia to sound the alarm. He wrote repeatedly about the apartment bombings in 1999 that were blamed on the Chechens but were likely carried out by the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB). Putin’s carefully crafted false narrative about the bombings helped usher him into power at a time when few Russians knew who he was.
Satter points out that Russia began to improve economically during the turn of the century which boosted Putin’s popularity, but the improvement was largely the result of higher prices charged for oil and gas, Russia’s principal export items.
Satter said the 2013 Maidan protests in Kyiv sparked a new wave of Kremlin crackdowns. When Ukrainians ousted President Viktor Yanukovych, a Russian puppet, the Kremlin started to worry about similar ideas taking root in Russia.
“They decided that some of the liberalization that they had tolerated in the past, they weren’t going to tolerate in the future,” Satter said.
The government expelled Satter at the end of 2013. “Under Putin, whatever freedoms were allowed under [former President Boris] Yeltsin were slowly shut down,” said Satter, who spent three decades reporting from Russia. “The situation really went from bad to worse in terms of atrocities, including atrocities against Russia’s people.”
Russians who challenge the Kremlin narrative often meet a worse fate than expulsion. In 2004, investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya was poisoned while on her way to the Russian city of Beslan. She survived, but FSB operatives killed her two years later.
In 2006, a former Russian intelligence officer died from poisoning while on British soil. Twelve years later, a second poisoning in England nearly ended the life of Sergei Skripal, another Russian officer turned critic. More recently, Kremlin opposition leader Alexey Navalny barely survived poisoning only to be arrested upon his return to Russia early last year.
Many Russians are losing hope in opposition movements, protests, and other efforts to push back against the Kremlin and its unpredictable repercussions. Russian Pastor Andrew Berdishev says Russians feel like their options are increasingly limited.
“Simple rallies end 30 seconds after they start. Therefore, in my opinion, this risk is unjustified, since it is not capable of leading to anything significant,” Berdishev said. “The simple example of Alexey Navalny showed that his stay outside of Russia was more effective than his return.” The political opposition leader was recently sentenced to nine additional years in prison on top of the two he was already serving for trumped-up fraud charges.
Since the February invasion of Ukraine, Moscow passed an amendment establishing up to 15 years in prison for anyone who spreads “misinformation” about the invasion. It requires Russians to use the term “special military operation” instead of “war.” Police in Russia have arrested more than 15,000 anti-war protesters since the invasion began, and Moscow blocked many social media sites in March, although many Russians have ways around the ban.
Moscow controls most major media outlets and has muzzled the rest since the invasion began. Unable to print the truth about the war, most independent media outlets have shut their doors and journalists have fled the country.
“Any information from sources other than the official source of the Russian ministry of defense about military operations in Ukraine has been declared fake, and you can also get a criminal sentence for it,” Berdishev said. That includes information about Russian soldier fatalities in Ukraine. Moscow claims less than 1,400 have died, but NATO estimates as many as 15,000 Russian casualties in the first month alone.
As the list of Russian atrocities and war crimes in Ukraine continues to climb, some Russians are still attempting to publicize the truth. Despite surviving two prior suspected poisonings, Kremlin critic Vladimir Kara-Murza called the Russian government a “regime of murderers” during an April 11 interview with CNN and emphasized the importance of saying the truth “out loud.” Police arrested him just hours after the interview.
Russian police officers detain a woman during an unsanctioned protest in Moscow.Contributor/Getty Images
ACCORDING TO RECENT POLLS, more than half of Russians believe a dramatically different narrative about the Kremlin than that of Kara-Murza’s. They claim the military operation in Ukraine is designed to rid the country of Nazis and protect ethnic Russians from genocide, and they are willing to endure hardships for the sake of Russia’s “noble mission” and a return to its former greatness. (Satter shared a story that underscores this long-held mentality: “I was standing in line in the Soviet Union, and someone in the queue began shouting, ‘How long can we stand in these lines? How long can this go on?’” And a woman turned to him and said, “Never mind, the whole world is afraid of us.”)
The propaganda crisis isn’t just affecting those affiliated with the Russian Orthodox Church (which has developed close ties to the Kremlin over the past two decades). According to Russian pastors WORLD spoke to, Protestant Christians are also falling into the quagmire of Kremlin lies.
Berdishev, who has been a pastor for more than 20 years, recently returned to Russia after a four-week trip to Armenia and said it was as though he no longer knew the people in his church. “Unfortunately, the current propaganda mouthpiece is stronger than our preaching,” he said. “People believe the information of the authorities more than the sermons of the pastors.”
He said a pastoral crisis is brewing in Russia and described a new type of iron curtain descending upon the country. “It is built more on the rejection of the Western way of life,” he said, adding that Russian propaganda paints the West as retreating from Christian and universal values because of its more liberal views on the family, abortion, and LGBTQ communities. “Therefore, the average Russian sees the war with Ukraine as a war against all evil directed at mankind.”
Putin has presented himself as the protector of faith and family values and Russia as a bulwark against the sinful decadence of the West. He has used religious terms to unite Russians around the notions of spiritual and geographical greatness, and Ukraine is central to those claims. Russian Orthodox leaders proclaim Kyiv as their Jerusalem, or birthplace of their faith.
During a March rally in Moscow, Putin claimed the “special military operation in Ukraine” was designed to “save people from genocide,” and he paraphrased Jesus’ words in John 15:13: “There is no greater love than giving up one’s soul for one’s friends.”
Russian Baptist Pastor Yury Sipko echoes Berdishev’s concerns: “Christians believe that the destruction of cities is carried out by Ukrainian nationalists. All these vile lies are being imposed on them by the president, ministers, generals, and a host of all sorts of ‘experts.’ Terrible!” All four of the pastors WORLD interviewed signed open letters denouncing “the senseless bloodshed” in Ukraine.
Opposition activist Alexei Navalny attends Moscow’s Preobrazhensky District Court via video link.ITAR-TASS News Agency/Alamy
Furmanov says it’s not just Russians embracing the propaganda. An American acquaintance once bombarded him with messages about Putin’s Christian leadership and the blessings of living in Russia. He responded, “Well, come and live here and enjoy the so-called ‘blessings.’ Then we’ll talk.”
His church has been kicked out of every building it has rented, and Orthodox extremists destroyed one of the buildings it purchased. Bishop Ratkin said his church has been under constant pressure from government authorities for 22 years, and the slander against him has skyrocketed. A recent Russian film falsely accused him of drugs and arms trafficking, and a media personality labeled him a traitor, calling for revenge and publicizing the family’s home address.
Furmanov says the pastors he knows in his town of Vyborg are against the war in Ukraine but are wisely choosing their battles. “When we want to do something that will last and will be effective, we have to always not only count the cost, but sort of like the Count of Monte Cristo sitting in the prison, we need to figure out ways to do things that are less obvious,” Furmanov said. At the same time, Furmanov wants the world to know they feel “utterly disgusted with Russia and its creepy, sadistic actions toward the Ukrainian people.”
He regularly invites people into his home to discuss Kremlin propaganda, and as a result, few in his congregation support the official state position. And he helped write a letter for a young man drafted into the Russian military, explaining that he could not fight in Ukraine because of his Christian values.
Still, Furmanov is worried about the future of the church in Russia. He says many pastors are joining the exodus of people leaving the country, and that will negatively affect their congregations. “When you pray for pastors, please pray for their solid decisions to be with their sheep,” Furmanov said.
Ratkin said his calling is to be a pastor and bishop to his people, and that requires him to stay in the country: “This does not allow me to leave my ministry and the people whom the Lord has entrusted to me in Russia, although I’m fully aware of the challenges and threats for me and my country.”
Jill is a correspondent for WORLD. She is a graduate of World Journalism Institute and the University of Texas at Austin. Jill lives in Orange County, Calif., with her husband, two sons, and three daughters.
Progressive activists have long fallen on the tactic of resorting to violence, destruction, and even bloodshed to get their points across. With the upcoming Supreme Court ruling on abortion, I feel assured they will once more pull this oft-used tool from their belt, and once again resort to carnage and mayhem. Already, they vandalized several Catholic churches last weekend, and firebombed a Right to Life group’s headquarters. A bullet was fired into the office of the Virginia Attorney General this week as well. Violence is already here. These were all pre-game activities as they warm up for what is to come.
In reality however, members of the far Left have consistently resorted to violence and sanctioned attacks against civilians. Many of the Vietnam protests turned into riots. Domestic terrorists belonging to the Weather Underground bombed school buildings, the U.S. Capitol, and the Pentagon. The SLA robbed banks, set off bombs and murdered innocent people.
In recent years, staff of the Trump Administration, such as Sarah Huckabee Sanders, faced confrontational harassment and were asked to leave businesses – actions fully supported by politicians such as Maxine Waters. Mad Maxine encouraged her followers to publicly accost Trump officials. Ten years earlier, such a statement by a politician would earn a well-deserved censure in the House. Now, it is accepted and even supported with nary an uproar. Let’s not forget that in June of 2017, a Bernie Sanders supporter shot and wounded Representative Steve Scalise during a baseball game. Encouraging acts of aggression gets you one thing – more aggression.
The characterization of the riots of 2020 as “mostly peaceful protests” by the mainstream media and Democrat leadership simply reinforces their willingness to cross the line into outright violence to make their point. The media love the violence because violence equals ratings and clicks on the web. They will highlight the carnage that is to come and make sure we all see it on the nightly news. They will paint the domestic terrorists as patriots. They, like the Democrat leadership, see the violence as the justified ‘means to an end’ of their social agenda.
Fear-mongering to whip their constituents into a frenzy has already begun. Warnings that same-sex marriages could be on the chopping block, and interracial marriage rights will face removal are the calling cards left by the ‘progressive’ Left. The View went so far as to warn that “….fascism is coming!” While we all joke that The View is far from a credible source, they do have a voice, no matter how cackling and grating it may be. Progressives are literally stoking the coals to start a fire that simply is nonexistent. In doing so, they are complacent in whatever violence may come.
In the past, the extreme Left was the source of mayhem, far removed from the Democratic party of John F. Kennedy. The problem today is, the Democrat Party and the extreme Left are one and the same. The Party shifted so far left, that the violent fringe is where the mainstream party now resides. As such, they have no issues with utilizing violence to achieve their ends. Machiavelli would be proud.
There will be blood because their other, more traditional tactics, are failing. Labeling people/groups as ‘Nazi’ or ‘racist’ ceases to have meaning. Painting parents as domestic terrorists backfired. Defaming and degrading, perhaps the most choice weapons in the Left’s arsenal, only further alienate people. Most grow tired of the rhetoric. America is numb to their false polls, their pundits, and their late-night-show hit jobs. Censorship and demonization of conservatives on social media reached a tipping point with Musk’s Twitter purchase. With midterms coming, even the most jaded person can see the tide is turning against the Left. What remains is brute force.
The best barometer of support for this tactic was the lack of action from the White House itself over the protests outside the homes of the Supreme Court justices. On their own, these protests were clearly attempts to influence the Justice’s decision which has not been issued – a violation of federal law. Did the White House condemn these actions and warn off the protestors with arrests? Did the Mumbler-in-Chief speak out against this and attempt to quell the anger? No. While they asked for no violence or threats, they saw no issues with this kind of personal harassment. In essence, they signaled to the crowd, ‘go for it!’
We are in no man’s land – between the illegal leak of the High Court’s decision and the formal announcement of its ruling. Rest assured, protest signs are being printed and plans for large-scale riots are underway. The Progressives are akin to spoiled children – if they don’t get their way, a temper-tantrum is inevitable. While I hope that I am wrong; I fear what is to come. A people who would advocate for the killing of unborn children will have few qualms about harming adults that think differently. We are potentially looking at a long and painful summer, one where viciousness and bloodshed are bound to occur.
Abortion, which is the killing of a human life, has been since its beginning inextricably linked to eugenics. That hasn’t escaped thoughtful black observers such as Fox Business’s Charles Payne, nor the GOP’s Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, both of whom have effectively called out this appalling fact, much to the benefit of everyone.
Abortion, which involves targeting the most helpless, is never otherwise. We all know how black lives don’t matter to the newspapers and networks in crime-infested blue cities. It’s even more of a problem with abortion targeting the even more helpless, who are black babies in the womb. After all, Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger famously promoted birth control, the predecessor to abortion, as a means of getting rid of “the unfit,” and you can figure out who that all too often turned out to be. The Bolsheviks introduced abortion in 1920 explicitly to break up families in order to make the survivors loyal only to the state. Prior to that, abortion was unthinkable. The left now tries to hide that sordid past, but even today, the ugly truth slips out.
This brings us to Joe Biden’s Treasury secretary, Janet Yellen, who, rather than get into the “my body, my choice” weeds of the street screamers baying outside the homes of Supreme Court justices, put out her own dry economic analysis on the value of abortions to society.
According to Fox News, as reported by BizPac Review:
“Yesterday, Janet Yellen, who is our secretary of the treasury, she was up on Capitol Hill and she had an extraordinary claim that said that if abortion went away, it would be bad for the economy,” co-host Steve Doocy recounted.
“Eliminating the right of women to make decisions when and whether to have children would have very damaging effects on the economy and would set women back decades,” Yellen claimed.
Charles Payne heard the dog whistle in that one and took out the trash:
After all, if a little abortion is good for the economy, why not a lot of it? Why not get rid of all of the black people through abortion and have the best economy ever? It’s the same disgusting logic the left employs in arguing for raising the minimum wage, which leads to the idea that if raising the minimum wage to $15 is a good for the economy, why not raise it to $100 an hour for an even better economy?
Abortion targeting the black community is a more serious topic than the minimum wage — the logic of Yellen is basically to max the economy out by getting rid of poverty, which would mean getting rid of Black people, who are disproportionately poor. Leave aside the matter that a declining population is not a good thing anywhere in the world for any country’s prospects for economic growth. Yellen left that part out.
Payne was keying off a retort by Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, who pointed out that yes, he was born poor, but his mother chose to give him life anyway, and he’s glad to be here. There’s some kind of vile bias against poor people in this abortion argument, which in the end always hits black people the hardest.
It’s rather amazing how this racist pattern in abortion arguments always seems to come to the fore. Might that be because abortion is racist? You don’t get this kind of problem popping up again and again without there being some kind of connection that’s inherent in the problem.
Fortunately for all of us, Payne and Scott had the fortitude to say that quiet part out loud.
MN Prager Discussion Group 
You must be logged in to post a comment.