The Morning Dispatch: A Brutal Stalemate in Ukraine

Plus: Day 3 of Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Supreme Court confirmation hearings.

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Happy Thursday! We were going to start off today with another crack about Chicago sports, but instead we’ll just get to the news.

Quick Hits: Today’s Top Stories

  • The State Department formally determined that Russian forces are perpetrating war crimes in Ukraine. “We’ve seen numerous credible reports of indiscriminate attacks and attacks deliberately targeting civilians, as well as other atrocities,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement on Wednesday. “Russia’s forces have destroyed apartment buildings, schools, hospitals, critical infrastructure, civilian vehicles, shopping centers, and ambulances, leaving thousands of innocent civilians killed or wounded.” 

  • Madeleine Albright—former secretary of state, the first woman to hold that distinction, and U.S. ambassador to the U.N.—died of cancer on Wednesday at the age of 84.

  • NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg announced the creation of four new battlegroups in its eastern flank nations of Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia, and Hungary. The news came ahead of President Joe Biden’s meeting with other alliance leaders today in Brussels. While there, the president is expected to discuss plans for additional sanctions targeting Russia and defensive aid to Ukraine.

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  1. Avatar photo
    Bradley R

    We need some geographic sports diversity in this newsletter

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  2. Avatar photo
    Seth Higgins

    I've been waiting for the "amateurs talk about strategy, but professionals talk about logistics” quote to make an appearance in TMD.

    I'll do one better, from none other than Mad Dog Mattis:

    "Unleash us from the tether of fuel.”

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  3. Avatar photo
    Bill Nelson

    The attention of the public will drift. Putin is counting on the Europeans loosing focus and they eventually come back in the group. And it will happen, 14 months.

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    Show Jay Janney the 🚪!

    Okay back to work, grading. I think I'll put Carole King's "You make me feel like a natural "IDK" on the stereo

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    1. Avatar photo
      Bill Nelson

      If you want to power through, Free Bird is tops. Loud. And it’s long.

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  5. Jaybrown

    Not a big fan of John Bolton, but here he is right. What Biden and his people are negotiating is in fact a treaty. How anyone can claim otherwise is beyond me.

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    Jen

    I know this tweet is from Media Matters but TD should have used it in the PWOC. It’s a picture of Josh Hawley, Lindsey Graham, Ted Cruz and Tom Cotton all making appearances on Fox News programming last night. Just a reminder that the incentive structure for everything these days is prime time cable news hits.
    https://twitter.com/mattgertz/status/1506971055205855238?s=21

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    Loren Roberts

    Given man’s attention span and lack of care for human suffering I’m afraid for Ukraine’s future. I will however keep praying.

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    C C Writer

    Re Ukraine, I'm not sure how this is going to end. But it is clear that Russia will never be able to install a puppet government, nor achieve what anybody but Putin would consider a win. Letting it be known (by their actions if not in so many words) that they consider civilians as an enemy to be destroyed has made either of those goals impossible, and you have to wonder about the sanity of leaders who now seem to be pursuing destruction for its own sake. It seems that crushing the spirit of people who are defending their own freedom may not be such an easy task as crushing their homes and their bodies. This is in some ways a watershed moment for the world.

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    O.M.G. calling from Vaudeville, AZ

    In Afghanistan the Al KKK da of southwest Asia has taken back control, turned back the world clock to the seventh century, and is right now enslaving, barbarically executing, raping and pillaging innocents in a country the size of Texas, and no so called leader in the West seems to give a flyin….To Wit, hope that answers today’s brief question. In the meantime, may as many Ukrainian full mental jackets enter the skulls of Putin’s willing executioners. Why have no international Allie’s declared Putin a war criminal and not placed a billion dollar Bitcoin bounty on Putin’s head. Thanks for taking my rant Dispatch. Gotta run on. Peace through superior mental firepower

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    Dave Conant - MO

    "Most of the day’s fireworks came from Republicans—chief among them Sens. Lindsey Graham and Ted Cruz—". The only fireworks called to mind by the 5 GOP loudmouths is what we called 'Snakes' when I was a kid (long, long ago...). They were little pellets that, when lit, gave off an offensive (to adults) aroma and turned into long strands of ash. There is nothing bright, shiny or attractive about the questions, performance or ethics of Messrs. Graham, Cruz, Cox and Hawley and Ms. Blackburn and they do themselves and the Senate no credit.
    In re: QotD, those are, or should be, two separate questions. The international alliance supporting Ukraine has at least a moral obligation to continue that support until the Russians are gone and Ukrainian territorial boundaries are restored to the status quo ante 2014 or the Ukrainians decide to stop fighting. Mr. Biden and his counterparts can achieve that on their own simply by disregarding the carping that has already begun and will only get worse. Public attention will wander as it always does, but it is inconceivable or close to it that anyone anywhere will come to believe that what Putin has tried to do is right and that the Ukrainians don't deserve support.

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