While the world waits for Vladimir Putin’s promised memorandum of talking points for proposed ceasefire negotiations, and Russia and Ukraine swap hundreds of prisoners of war at the Belarus-Ukraine border, Russia’s missiles and drones continue to devastate Ukraine‘s cities, towns and villages.

In one demolished home in the Zhytomyr region — the area from which my maternal grandparents emigrated to the U.S. in 1905 — three children were killed in the early hours of the morning.
.

And near the capital city of Kyiv, multiple private homes — not military targets — were leveled.

And finally, after months of enabling Putin’s endless heel-dragging, Donald Trump spoke out on social media:

“I’ve always had a very good relationship with Vladimir Putin of Russia, but something has happened to him. He has gone absolutely CRAZY! He is needlessly killing a lot of people, and I’m not just talking about soldiers. Missiles and drones are being shot into cities in Ukraine, for no reason whatsoever. I’ve always said that he wants ALL of Ukraine, not just a piece of it, and maybe that’s proving to be right, but if he does, it will lead to the downfall of Russia!” [RFE/RL, May 26, 2025.]

Later, preparing to board Air Force One in Morristown, New Jersey for the flight back to Washington, he told reporters:

“I’m not happy with what Putin is doing. He’s killing a lot of people, and I don’t know what the hell happened to Putin. [He’s] sending rockets into cities and killing people, and I don’t like it at all. We’re in the middle of talking and he’s shooting rockets into Kyiv and other cities. I don’t like it at all. I’m surprised. Very surprised. Something happened to this guy — and I don’t like it.” [Id.]

Wait . . . what??!!! Is that old guy in the hat actually Rip Van Winkle, just waking up from a 20-year nap? Where has he been during the last three years and three months while Putin’s weapons have been raining death and destruction on Ukraine?

He’s “not happy”? “Something has happened to this guy”? “I’ve always said . . .”??!!!

Where does Trump get this stuff? In what dark recesses of his mind does he actually harbor the belief that he has always known Putin wants all of Ukraine? Does he really think that these attacks are a manifestation of some recent mental disorder, causing Putin suddenly to have become a tyrannical, war-mongering, homicidal maniac? And does he honestly think he can make us believe it?

Come to think of it, he probably does . . . and that’s the scariest thing of all.

But note what he didn’t say. He said nothing about further sanctions or other retaliatory action; nor did he actually say he (and our European allies) have had enough, or that Putin’s time has run out. His comments were more critical of his friend Vladimir than usual, but considering what is at stake, they really weren’t all that tough.

So is this the beginning of the end of the Trump-Putin bromance? Or will the next 24 hours bring yet another 180-degree turn in the never-ending soap opera that is now our day-to-day world?

Stay tuned, folks.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
5/26/25

It turns out that we Americans have more to commemorate this weekend than we may have realized.

In addition to honoring on Memorial Day the heroes who have given their lives in defense of our nation over the past 250 years, let us also pay homage to those brave patriots who, on May 25, 1787, sat down in the State House (now Independence Hall) in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to begin composing the document that would govern the greatest republic ever created by man: the Constitution of the United States.

Those 55 delegates — representing seven of the then existing 13 states that had, since 1781, been only loosely joined by the Articles of Confederation — included George Washington, James Madison, and Benjamin Franklin.

Over the next three months, those men devised a system of checks and balances to prevent the usurpation of power by any future would-be tyrant. They struggled over the question of state representation, with larger states voting for proportional representation and smaller states wanting an equal say; the solution was the creation of the bicameral legislature we still have today: the Senate having two elected members from each state, and the House of Representatives comprised of proportional representation.

By September 17th, the greatest governing document since the Magna Carta had been signed by 38 of the 41 delegates present. But it would not, by its own provision in Article VII, become binding until it was ratified by at least nine of the 13 states. Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia and Connecticut were the first to do so.

But some states — most strenuously, Massachusetts — refused to ratify the document as presented, because it lacked certain basic political rights, including freedom of speech, religion, and the press. Finally, in February 1788, those states agreed to ratify under condition that amendments would immediately be proposed to cover those most fundamental and vital issues.

And by June 21, 1788, Massachusetts, Maryland, South Carolina and New Hampshire joined the ranks, and it was decided that the U.S. Constitution would become the governing instrument of the United States of America as of March 4, 1789.

[“This Day in History,” History.com, May 25, 2025.]

The first 12 amendments to the Constitution — known as the Bill of Rights — were adopted by Congress on September 25, 1789, and sent to the states for ratification.

It was a long, tedious, seriously-undertaken process, conceived and developed by the best minds and the greatest patriots of the time . . . not the result of a deluge of hastily-scribbled executive orders dreamt up by a single, autocratic, would-be emperor of the very sort foreseen and intended to be precluded by the framers of the Constitution.

Today — and every day — it is our privilege and our duty as American citizens to honor and defend that Constitution, and to continue fighting the sort of tyranny that our founding fathers gave their all to prevent. So please forgive me if I repeat, once again, this reminder:

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
5/25/25

Not much came out of the May 16th abbreviated meeting in Istanbul, or the lengthy May 19th phone call between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin . . . at least, as far as negotiations to end Putin’s war against Ukraine is concerned. But on the plus side, agreement was reached to begin an immediate exchange of an estimated 1,000 prisoners of war from each side.

And on Friday, the first 780 people — 270 soldiers and 120 civilians on each side — got to go home.

The swap — the largest since the start of the war in February of 2022 — took place at the Belarus-Ukraine border, and is to continue throughout this weekend.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky called it “perhaps the only real result” of the earlier talks, while Donald Trump — ever the cockeyed optimist — posted:

“Congratulations to both sides on this negotiation. This could lead to something big???” [RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service, May 23, 2025.]

Unfortunately, Putin’s continued delays and accelerated demands make Trump’s hoped-for “something big” look less and less likely. But at least there is one cause for celebration this week: the hundreds of joyous family reunions taking place on both sides of the border.

And we can all be grateful for that.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
5/25/25

Here in the United States, we traditionally celebrate Memorial Day on the last Monday in May by spending time with family and friends, to pay homage to all of the men and women in the military who have given their lives to protect our nation . . . and to salute those who are currently serving.

This year, I’d like to extend my thoughts beyond our borders. In recognition of the ongoing struggle of the people of Ukraine — both military and civilian — in the defense of their country, I send to you my hopes and prayers for a speedy end to this horrific war, and a just and lasting peace in the future.

The people of Ukraine are, in the truest sense, Russia’s hostages. And so, you remain on my list of those to whom I pay my respects each week.

And not to be forgotten:

The People of Ukraine
The Azov 12
David Barnes
Ales Bialiatski (in Belarus)
Gordon Black
Andrei Chapiuk (in Belarus)
Antonina Favorskaya
Konstantin Gabov
Robert Gilman
Stephen James Hubbard
Sergey Karelin
Ihar Karney (in Belarus) on
Vadim Kobzev
Darya Kozyreva
Artyom Kriger
Uladzimir Labkovich (in Belarus)
Michael Travis Leake
Aleksei Liptser
Ihar Losik (in Belarus)
Mikita Losik (in Belarus)
Daniel Martindale
Farid Mehralizada (in Azerbaijan)
Nika Novak
Marfa Rabkova (in Belarus)
Igor Sergunin
Dmitry Shatresov
Robert Shonov
Eugene Spector
Valiantsin Stafanovic (in Belarus)
Siarhei Tsikhanouski (in Belarus)
Laurent Vinatier
Robert Romanov Woodland
Vladislav Yesypenko (in Crimea)
Yuras Zyankovich (in Belarus)

. . . and any others I may have missed.

Godspeed.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
5/25/25

Finland has been shoring up its defenses for some time now.

And this week, Germany — for the first time since the end of World War II — deployed a permanent military brigade outside its borders, this time to Lithuania. It was not an invasion; it was an action taken in support of the Baltic nation against any possible military incursion by Russia. As German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said at the inaugural ceremony in Vilnius, “the security of our Baltic allies is also our security.” [Astha Rajvanshi, NBC News, May 23, 2025.]

He added that, since the invasion of Ukraine in 2022, “Russia’s aggressive revisionism” could indicate an intent to redraw the larger map of Europe, and not just Ukraine. [Id.]

Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda added that both Russia and Belarus have already begun conducting military exercises on his nation’s border. [Id.]

Which is terrifyingly reminiscent of those weeks prior to February 24, 2022, as the world watched Russian forces building — in what they still insistently refer to as a “special military operation” — on the eastern border of Ukraine. And we all know how that has turned out.

The three Baltic nations of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia are geographically the most vulnerable European countries to a future expansionist move by Russia, as they share borders with Russia itself as well as its staunch ally Belarus, and are only connected to a NATO ally — Poland — by way of the narrow Suwalki Gap.

Now, with Donald Trump finally — after three years of devastating death and destruction — realizing that his promise to end the war in Ukraine in a matter of days was never anything more than a self-serving pipe dream, Europe is preparing itself for the worst-case scenario. Will it happen? No one knows for sure. But it would be foolhardy — possibly even suicidal — to sit idly by, just waiting to see what comes next.

So the European allies are doing what they must do: they are arming, and giving fair warning to Vladimir Putin. As Chancellor Merz said, “Anyone who threatens an ally must know that the entire alliance will jointly defend every inch of NATO territory.” [Id.]

*. *. *

Following the May 19th call between Trump and Putin, which accomplished a much-desired prisoner swap but made absolutely no progress toward even a minimum ceasefire negotiation, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) issued a summary report. It stated, among other things, that:

“Russia reportedly continues to expand its military infrastructure along its border with Finland and Estonia, likely in preparation for future aggression against NATO.” And further, that “Russian forces recently advanced in Kursk Oblast and near Chasiv Yar, Toretsk, and Novopavlivka.” [Christina Harward, et al., ISW, May 19, 2025.]

The report concluded that certain actions on the part of Russia were essential to the progress of substantive negotiations:

• “Russia must explicitly acknowledge the legitimacy of the Ukrainian president, government, and constitution and Ukraine’s sovereignty in order to engage in meaningful, good-faith negotiations.”
• “Russia must agree that ceasefire negotiations must precede peace settlement negotiations.”
• “Russia must show its willingness to make concessions of its own in any future bilateral negotiations, especially as the Kremlin appears to be setting conditions to expand its list of demands amid the peace talks.” [Id.]
  

As logical and reasonable as their recommendations are, we all know there isn’t a snowball’s chance in Hell of Putin ever delivering any of those concessions . . . he has already made that abundantly clear as he has stalled, teased, lied, and blasted his way through more than three years of war.

And why? Because he has no intention of backing off . . . ever. He wants Ukraine; and that is only the first move of his long-term game plan. One of his principal delaying tactics is his ludicrous argument that Volodymyr Zelensky is not the legitimate president of Ukraine, and thus any negotiations with him would allegedly be useless. As Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told BBC’’s Russia editor Steve Rosenberg on Friday, when asked whether Russia would sit down and sign a peace agreement with President Zelensky:

“You’re putting the cart before the horse. First we need to have a deal. When it’s agreed, then we will decide. But, as President Putin has said many times, President Zelensky does not have legitimacy . . . Probably the best option would be new elections . . .” [Steve Rosenberg, BBC, May 23, 2025.]

And, as if that weren’t enough, Russia’s Kremlin-controlled media have chimed in with the following:

• From Izvestia: “Russia has won the latest round of global poker.”
• From Kommersant: “Donald Trump’s stance couldn’t be more advantageous to Moscow. In effect he backed Russia’s position of ‘Talks first, ceasefire later’ and refused to strengthen sanctions against Russia.”
• From a social scientist, as told to Kommersant: “Donald Trump, at least for now, is our ideological partner on certain issues. His views are much closer to Russia’s than to Europe’s.”
• Finally — and most significantly, so please read this one carefully — from Komsomolskaya Pravda to Europe’s leaders: “You were warned. Don’t wave threats and ultimatums in the face of the bear. Don’t try to impose conditions in talks that have nothing to do with you. Just sit in the lobby and breathe in the smell of the new world order.” [Id.]
  

“The new world order” . . . Putin’s ultimate goal. And Donald Trump, in all of his gold-plated ineptness, has played right into the Russian bear’s hands.

Checkmate.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
5/24/25

This is no ordinary Joe. In fact, he’s not even an ordinary billionaire (if there is such a thing). Consider his first 40 years:

• Born in Leningrad, USSR (now St. Petersburg, Russia) in 1984, his family moved to Turin, Italy, when he was just four years old, returning to Russia after the breakup of the Soviet Union.
• He and his older brother Nikolai were math prodigies, winning multiple gold medals at the International Math Olympiad. Having brought back from Italy an IBM personal computer, they were able to teach themselves how to program — a rare opportunity in those days.
• Together with a classmate at St. Petersburg State University, he created the Russian social network VKontakte (VK) in 2006, which amassed a million users in the first eight months.
• When in 2014 the Russian government insisted that he remove opposition politicians’ pages from VK, he refused and left Russia, saying he had “no plans to go back [because] the country is incompatible with internet business at the moment.”
• In 2013, the Durov brothers also launched Telegram Messenger, an end-to-end encrypted messaging service that now has a billion users and reported $1.4 billion in revenue ($540 million in profit) in 2024, after showing a multi-million-dollar loss the previous year.

• Since leaving Russia, he has obtained citizenship status in France, the United Arab Emirates, and Saint Kitts and Nevis. He travels the world the way most of us schlep around town . . . only first class.
• In August 2024, he was detained by French authorities for allegedly allowing illegal activity (including drug trafficking, fraud, and child sex-abuse materials) to be conducted on Telegram. He says he is merely protecting the privacy of his clients. He is currently under investigation, and if convicted, may face up to ten years in prison. Pending a resolution of the charges, he isn’t allowed to travel at all.
• On the personal side, he is unmarried, but claims to be the biological father of 100 children. Like Elon Musk, he is a pronatalist who believes the world’s population needs to be increased, preferably by superior human beings such as themselves. But unlike Musk, who prefers to hire women to bear his dozen or more children, Durov shares his largesse via sperm banks. What a stud!

But extreme wealth and a talent for procreation are not the only things he has in common with Musk. His company has been working on “conversational AI,” and has partnered with Musk’s company — xAI — to integrate its chatbot, known as Grok, into Telegram.

I guess what they say is true: that the first billion dollars are the hardest to come by; after that, the next few billion are easy.

I wouldn’t know.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
5/24/25

NOTE: Biographical details are from an article by Dave Smith, Finance.yahoo.com, May 22, 2025. Opinions and snarky comments are my own.

Ah, life on the seashore . . . the smell of the salt air, the roar of the pounding surf, the cries of the soaring gulls . . .

. . . and the crashing of the 443-foot-long container ship running aground in your front yard.

Well, that doesn’’t happen every day. But that is how Johan Helberg of Byneset, Norway, was awakened on Thursday morning. Actually, he didn’t hear the ship at all; it turns out that he’s a very sound sleeper. But his neighbor, Jostein Jorgensen, was awakened around 5:00 a.m. by the sound of a vessel approaching unusually close to shore. He looked out the window, saw the ship racing toward land, and ran outside shouting to his neighbors . . . perhaps something on the order of, “The containers are coming! The containers are coming!” . . . much like Paul Revere warning of the approach of British troops, only in Norwegian.

Still, Helberg slept. He didn’t hear the banging at his door, either. It was only when his neighbor rang his phone that he finally awakened.

“I went to the window and was quite astonished to see a big ship. . . . Five metres further south and it would have entered the bedroom. I didn’t hear anything,” Helberg told the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation. [Francesca Gillett, BBC News, May 23, 2025.]

Luckily for everyone, the ship missed the house by a distance of about 26 feet, and no one onboard or ashore was injured. The shipping company sent a tugboat to try to pull it free, but without success. Then a salvage company tried to refloat it at high tide, but the ship remained stubbornly stuck.

The latest word from the owners of the big new eyesore on Trondheim Fjord is that geotechnical investigations will be required before another attempt is made to move the load. In the meantime, the neighborhood has 16 temporary residents, a really big tourist attraction, and a hell of a tale to tell their friends.

And so ends another idyllic day at the shore.

I do love a good news story where no one was killed or maimed . . . don’t you?

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
5/24/25

The other day, I posted a tribute to the late George Wendt, who was best known for his years of acting in the role of the lovable Norm Peterson on the TV sitcom Cheers. I wrote that, just a few days earlier, I had begun streaming the early episodes of the show, which had been one of my favorites back in the ‘80s, and I was struck by the coincidence in timing. But was it precognition on my part? No . . . of course, it wasn’t.

Or was it? I’m now beginning to wonder, because last night — one of those nights filled with multiple, disconnected, weird dreams that somehow remain disturbingly clear long after you’re awake — one of my dreams involved a psycho serial killer who, whenever he heard the name of the ex-girlfriend who had dumped him, had an uncontrollable compulsion to murder someone. His weapon of choice: a very large, Crocodile Dundee-type of knife. In my dream, I even saw him chase down, slaughter and debone a bicyclist. I then ran and ran through this strange city until I found a couple of police officers, and the knife-wielding lunatic was subsequently apprehended. All’s well that ends well . . . right?

But that’s not the strange part. Around noon today, I received one of those frequent news flashes on my phone. This one read: “Twelve injured in Hamburg knife attack as woman arrested.” [Sofia Ferreira Santos, BBC, May 23, 2025.]

Now, that’s just too spooky!

There are differences, of course. In my dream, the killer was a man, not a woman. But in today’s inclusive, LGBTQ+ environment, that hardly matters.

The main distinction was that, in my dream, the police officers I approached were speaking Russian, not German. That, of course, was weird enough; but at least I really do speak Russian. It would have been even stranger if I’d been conversing with them in German, since I only know about a dozen words in that language, including ja, nein, bitte, danke, and the ever-popular and oh-so-useful dummkopf and schweinhund. With that limited vocabulary, I would have been hard pressed to describe a homicidal maniac with a huge knife chopping up a guy on a bike, much less give them directions to the scene of the grisly crime. Imagine running up to a couple of cops, obviously distraught, and shouting, “Yes, no, please, thank you, stupid pigdog.”

That would not have ended well.

*. *. *

But, aside from the psychological implications of my nightly nightmares, I’m beginning to have some concerns as to whether I might actually be foreseeing upcoming events. Real life has become scary enough without knowing in advance, for example, what Elon Musk is going to come up with next.

I can’t imagine what a psychoanalyst would have to say about my nocturnal adventures, and I’m not sure I want to know. But tonight, I plan to try thinking happy thoughts before I fall asleep, in the hope that that they’ll find their way into my dreams.

Perhaps I’ll start by conjuring up a whole new administration in Washington . . . much like the one from The West Wing . . . and work my way up to an end to war. By next week, I should have solved all of the world’s problems.

You can thank me later.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
5/23/25

If I were telling an old, corny joke, it might begin: “A priest and a rabbi walked into a bar . . .”

But this picture isn’t a joke, corny or otherwise. It was a moment from real life . . . the sort of moment that makes you feel, just for a while, as though there might be hope for mankind after all.

It is not yet known whether Pope Leo XIV will become the new mediator of the (hopefully) upcoming negotiations between Volodymyr Zelensky and Vladimir Putin. But I can’t think of anyone better qualified — more objective, diplomatic, apolitical, or peace-loving — for the job of bringing an end to the horrific war in Ukraine.

This one picture — seeing the expressions on the faces of those two good men — makes me feel something I haven’t felt in a long while: a sense of optimism.

Here’s hoping it will last.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
5/23/25

“Bully pulpit: A public office or position of authority that provides its occupant with an outstanding opportunity to speak out on any issue.” – Oxford Languages

It is a term originally coined by U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt, by which he referred to the office of president as an excellent platform from which to promote an agenda . . .

. . . not a stage from which to humiliate other world leaders and dignitaries, thus displaying one’s own ignorance, cruelty, and psychotic need to be king of the hill.

And yes, I am referring to the two recent displays of viciousness aimed at Presidents Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine and Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa, in well-rehearsed, perfectly-orchestrated harangues before the cameras of the world’s premier news media.

No doubt the Oval Office has, over the past couple of centuries, been the scene of many a contentious meeting. But they were not played out in front of the mass media for the entire world’s population to witness. And I daresay, no previous president would have stooped so low as to degrade and humiliate a counterpart from another nation, just because he could.

It takes the smallest of men to lord his advantageous position over those less fortunate — in these two cases, one whose country is being demolished in an unjust war, and another who hoped for a reset in relations by clarifying what he says are false accusations against his government.

The details of both ambushes have been amply presented in the media; and frankly, to repeat them here would simply nauseate me even more than I already am. I could not be more horrified or more disgusted by Donald Trump’s treatment of President Ramaphosa if he had forced that gentleman to strip to the waist and flogged him with a cat o’ nine tails.

Once again, I have to ask: How long are we, the American public, going to allow this administration to continue circumventing our laws, ignoring our Constitution, dishonoring our allies, desecrating our most sacred institutions, and destroying our credibility as a nation, before we take legal steps to put a stop to it?

And once again, I use this — my “bully pulpit” — to remind the members of Congress and the Justices of the Supreme Court that the solution to our problems rests in your hands. One man could not have wreaked so much havoc without support . . . your misguided, misplaced, unconscionable support.

Now, it is up to you to reawaken your consciences, do your jobs, and fix it . . . before it’s beyond repair.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
5/23/25