Crooked Media - What A Day: Tanks for your service

- Disgraced former president Donald Trump advocating for the imprisonment of windmills

Russia’s war in Ukraine is quickly approaching its one-year mark. In that time, the United States and Ukraine’s other Western allies have worked in coalition to change the trajectory of the conflict.
 

• Continuing the commitment of Western allies to supply Ukraine with necessary arms, France and Australia’s defense ministers announced that the two countries will jointly supply Ukraine with thousands of ammunition shells. This comes as the first show of unity between the two countries since Australia reneged on a $60 billion contract for conventional French submarines in 2021 in favor of nuclear-powered submarines from the United States and Britain. 
   

• Meanwhile, a new report confirms that trade between China and Russia exploded last year, providing a lifeline to Russia’s economy and depleted supply chains. Russia saw a marked increase in imports of technologies critical to its war, including semiconductors and microchips from China, while China’s purchases of Russian exports like crude oil more than offset the declines from major Western European sanctions. The report shows that trade between Russia and China rose by roughly $27 billion between March and September of 2022 compared to the same period in 2021. 
   

• NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg urged South Korea to increase military support to Ukraine today at a conference in Seoul, citing the list of other countries that have reversed their policies of not providing weapons to countries in conflict after the start of the war. Stoltenberg’s trip will also include Japan and is aimed at strengthening ties with Western allies in Asia as China continues to fortify Russia’s offensive.

In the past few months, Germany’s increasing support for Ukraine has caused friction not only with Russia but among Germans as well. 
 

• Last week, the United States and Germany agreed to send tanks to the front lines of Ukrainian battalions, but military experts are unsure if the tanks will have the kind of decisive effect on the battlefield that they once assumed, as the deliveries will include a varied assortment of tank models, each with different delivery times and unique logistical issues. This includes Challenger 2 tanks from Britain, M1A2 Abrams tanks from the United States, and Leopard 2 tanks from Germany. Adding to the complications, Ukrainian forces still need to be trained to use the tanks. 
   

• For much of the past year, Germany has been the de facto leader of Ukraine’s European allies as the European Union’s largest economy, but German hesitancy to provide Ukraine with the Leopard 2 tanks has likely hindered the counteroffensive. Germany, however, characterizes its action as “negotiating” rather than hesitating. The ghosts of Nazism continue to cast a long shadow over Germany, and contribute to a conflict-averse foreign-policy outlook, especially when it comes to military involvement in other countries. Despite his many shows of support for Ukraine, Scholz has also warned against an arms race. 

For now, concerns about Putin further escalating the war remain. Russia continues to possess one of the largest stockpiles of nuclear weapons in the world. Whether fear of international retribution that would come from deploying one of these weapons will be enough to move Putin’s hand off the button remains to be seen.

A suicide bombing in a crowded mosque in Peshawar, Pakistan, caused the roof to collapse, killing 59 people and wounding 150 more. 

The Federal Reserve is poised to raise interest rates again this week, but will most likely announce a much smaller increase for the second consecutive month. 

A sixth officer in the Memphis Police Department has been terminated in connection to his involvement in the killing of Tyre Nichols. 

The Memphis Police Department has also shuttered the “Scorpion Unit,” as of Saturday—a reversal after the police chief defended the specialized unit that included the officers now charged with second-degree murder. 

President Biden has invited the family of Tyre Nichols to attend next week’s State of the Union address.

The Virginia elementary school where a six year-old boy shot his teacher reopened today with increased security and a new administrator. 

After the Sen. Peter Welch’s (D-VT) trial balloon to once again not investigate Donald Trump’s corruption went poorly, Chair Dick Durbin said the Judiciary Committee will “take a hard look” at the latest revelations. 

Meanwhile, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has instructed his frothing GOP caucus to treat every committee like the Oversight Committee, meaning: use every panel to investigate Joe Biden and the Democrats. Good stuff! Love that for them! What a productive group!

Gov. Spencer Cox (R-UT) signed bills on Saturday banning minors from receiving gender-affirming health care and tax-funded “scholarships” for parents to send their children to school outside of the public-education system, two hallmark Republican culture-war issues. 

United States Surgeon General Vivek Murthy says he believes 13 is too young for children to be on social-media platforms, despite the sites allowing minors of that age. But Dr. Murthy, how else will 7th graders build their personal brand while simultaneously acquiring body dysmorphia? 

A recent spike in Israeli-Palestinian violence in the occupied West Bank and beyond has confronted a great challenge to the Biden administration, and forced Secretary of State Antony Blinken into hot water as he visits Israel and the West Bank this week. The trip was expected to be fraught from the outset, as the far-right government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has dug in its heels as the violence continues. United States officials say the main objective and theme of Blinken’s conversations with Netanyahu and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas will be “de-escalation,” just days after Netanyahu’s government announced a series of punitive measures against Palestinians after the two sides traded attacks, making January one of the bloodiest months in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem in years. Netanyahu’s government firmly opposes the two-state solution, and has promised to “strengthen” Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

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Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) said that as the new chair of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, he is planning a “very aggressive” strategy to tackle pharmaceutical industry greed. We love to see it.

The Democratic political committee for state-legislature elections is launching a digital ad campaign focusing on abortion in battleground states.