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They poured the liquid out blueberry-flavored, orange-flavored and the original, face-puckering unflavored version tweeting #DumpRussianVodka and, at gay bars across the country, made do with Absolut and soda instead.

This was 2013, after Vladimir V. Putin imposed harsh new measures aimed at L.G.B.T.Q. Russians.

And now, as Russias aggression in Ukraine takes a horrific human toll, turning millions into refugees, the boycotts are back: American consumers channeling outrage into ditching products they assume are produced by Russians in Russia, with ties, somehow, to Mr. Putin.

The problem with that logic is that Americans consume hardly any products that are truly Russian. That goes for vodka and oil, too. Russian oil makes up 3 percent of what Americans consume on a daily basis.

This mistaken impression has led people to punish businesses that are really Russian in name only. Some states that recently placed a ban on Russian spirits discovered they were setting a policy that affected only two brands with a small footprint domestically Russian Standard and Ustianochka. President Biden announced a ban on all Russian liquor imports on Friday. But less than 1 percent of the vodka consumed here comes from Russia, a beverage industry trade group has noted.

The vodka most commonly but incorrectly associated with Russia, Stolichnaya, has again borne the brunt of the online calls for a boycott. It has been produced in Latvia since 2002, and the headquarters of its parent company, the Stoli Group, are in Luxembourg. Last week, the company formally rebranded its signature spirit as just Stoli after bar owners from Vermont to Michigan to Iowa declared they would no longer serve it and shared video of themselves dumping bottles of it down the drain.

In New York, the famous red banquettes in the Russian Tea Room arent as full with patrons these days. But the restaurants Russian heritage is a bit of a sleight of hand. It was opened in 1927 by a Polish immigrant who called it the Albertina Rasch Russian Tea Room after a ballet dancer who was Viennese, even though many at the time assumed she was Russian.

In Chicago, a Russian-style bath house called Red Square has reported getting strange phone calls from people trying to pin down whether it has taken a side in the war. But Red Square is co-owned by a man who was born in Ukraine and said he still has family in the country.

In Washington, the Russia House restaurant near Dupont Circle had its windows broken and a door smashed. Its co-owner told the local media that the business, which has been closed since the pandemic, has no connection with Russia. According to its website, which advertises caviar spreads as the kind of indulgence that many Americans associate with Russian decadence, one owner fought in the Gulf War and the other was born in Lithuania.

The misplaced anger of the backlash against Russia has been an instructive development for those who study consumer habits, highlighting the ways that boycotts are especially ineffective and often counterproductive as a tool of protest in the social media era. A staple of American political resistance since the Boston Tea Party, boycotts have played a vital role in shaping public opinion about demonstrations for social progress. The civil rights bus boycotts in the South and the grape boycotts in the 1960s and 70s to protest conditions for agricultural workers helped spur meaningful change.

But thats not as true today, despite the exponential growth in the number of boycotts aimed at large corporations. One study conducted by a pair of scholars, Maurice Schweitzer of the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and Joseph Gaspar of Quinnipiac University, found that calls for boycotts against Fortune 500 companies had nearly tripled since 2010. The study, which has not yet been published, also found that the most common trigger was politics.

Calls to boycott can be effective by creating bad publicity that tarnishes, temporarily at least, a companys brand image. Sometimes they spur companies to change, as a backlash against SeaWorld over its treatment of orcas did. The company announced in 2016 that it was ending its breeding program, meaning the generation of killer whales now at its theme parks will be the last.

But more often, consumer boycotts fail to have much of an impact on the targeted companys bottom line because they are either too hard to stick to, as people discovered when they tried to shun BP gas after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010, or because they inspire a spirited response from consumers who want to support a company precisely because its under attack.

After the chief executive of Chick-fil-A professed his opposition to same-sex marriage in 2012, mayors in liberal cities like San Francisco and Boston said the Southern fried chicken eatery should look elsewhere to open new restaurants. Conservatives like Mike Huckabee, the former Baptist preacher and two-time presidential candidate, rallied their followers to support the chain. Its nationwide expansion continued at a fast pace, and there are now Chick-fil-A restaurants from Brooklyn to Seattle.

It either turns out to be too delicious or too convenient, Mr. Schweitzer of the Wharton School said of shunning certain products. Another factor, he added, is the sheer volume of news that people find politically motivating. Theres something to be outraged about on a weekly or monthly basis, he said. And in the moment the emotion feels raw and powerful, but we fail to appreciate how fleeting that is.

One reason calls for boycotts keep growing despite their ineffectiveness is that many people appear to believe they are sticking to their guns when they arent.

A draft of a new study by scholars from Northwestern University, the University of Toronto and Harvard Business School examined the impact of several recent politically motivated calls for action, including the campaign to boycott or, conversely, buycott Starbucks after its announcement in 2017 that it would hire 10,000 refugees. The move came in response to former President Donald J. Trumps order halting migration from seven mostly Muslim countries.

Shortages of essential metals. The price of palladium, used in automotive exhaust systems and mobile phones, has been soaring amid fears that Russia, the worlds largest exporter of the metal, could be cut off from global markets. The price of nickel, another key Russian export, has also been rising.

Financial turmoil. Global banks are bracing for the effects of sanctionsintended to restrict Russias access to foreign capital and limit its ability to process payments in dollars, euros and other currencies crucial for trade. Banks are also on alert for retaliatory cyberattacks by Russia.

Researchers surveyed more than 1,000 consumers, obtained their actual spending at Starbucks over several months and asked whether they had changed their buying behavior because of the refugee announcement. They found that those who reported they had changed their habits either in support of Starbucks by buying more or against it by boycotting didnt actually do anything differently.

Katy DeCelles, a professor of organizational behavior at the University of Toronto Rotman School of Management and one of the authors of the study, said the results showed that people of all political persuasions believed what they wanted to be true about their own behavior.

Finding that there was no measurable impact on spending with such an emotionally charged and highly publicized issue surprised the researchers.

We thought if we were going to find an effect on peoples behavior it would be now, Ms. DeCelles added.

As that research and the current anti-Stoli sentiment shows, the anger channeled into consumer boycotts often lacks consistent logic. Though some states like Pennsylvania and Oregon have not included Stoli in their Russian spirits ban, New Hampshire has. A spokesman for the states liquor commission confirmed that because Gov. Chris Sununus order applies to not only Russian-made products but also ones that are Russian-branded, Stoli would remain off the shelves at state-operated stores.

Damian McKinney, chief executive of the Stoli Group, said in an interview that mistaken impressions about the brand have nearly led to major losses of business. He recalled a recent conversation with the head of one major retailer in Britain, who had informed him that Stoli was about to be pulled from its shelves.

I said, Do you know were Latvian? And there was a pause, Mr. McKinney said, declining to name the retailer. As he spoke, the background for his Zoom screen was framed in the blue and yellow colors of the Ukrainian flag alongside the hashtag #StandWithUkraine. I needed people to understand were on the good guys side. And this is about an evil man and a regime, not the Russian people, he added, noting that Stoli employs Russians as well as Ukrainians.

Like many businesses, Stoli has no singular identity that is simple to delineate. Its recipe is Russian, as is its name. Stolichnaya translates roughly to metropolitan. The company founder, Yuri Shefler, fled Russia after a dispute with the government over control of the Stoli trademark. He lives in Switzerland today. For years, Russia has fought Stoli in court over the rights to claim ownership of the name. The company makes its bottle caps and some of its bottles in Ukraine and recently evacuated five Ukrainian employees from the country to Cyprus and Luxembourg, Mr. McKinney said.

The Russian Tea Room, where during the pre-theater rush Friday only a handful of tables were occupied, has a similarly complicated lineage, despite the name. Its current owner is a New York real estate developer. But it started in 1927 as a popular hangout among Russians who emigrated to America and became citizens. A New York Times story from 1977 about the restaurants 50th anniversary noted that the restaurant was patronized early on by exiles who called themselves White Russians, to distinguish themselves from Lenins red Bolsheviks.

And nearly a century later, drawing those distinctions with the Moscow regime are as important as ever. On the restaurants website, a pop-up banner statement on the war in Ukraine greets visitors, noting its history as an institution deeply rooted in speaking against communist dictatorship. It adds, We stand against Putin and with the people of Ukraine.

Kristen Noyes contributed research.

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That Russian Business Youre Boycotting Isnt Actually Russian - The New York Times

On March 17, 1776, British forces were driven from Boston by General George Washington.

Boston had been occupied by the British for eight years. Pre-revolution tension in the city escalated colonial frustration, including events like the Boston Tea Party in 1773, when a group of colonists boarded three British ships and dumped thousands of dollars of tea into the Boston Harbor to protest Britains harsh taxation without representation, or the Boston Massacre when Loyalists and Patriots fought in the streets and five colonists were killed by British officers.

During Americas war for independence, Washington set his sights on the town and on the evening of March 4, 1776, he ordered Patriot General John Thomas to take it.

Revolutionary cannons besieged Boston near the outskirts of the city to cover the sounds of construction as Thomas and 2000 men fortified Dorchester Heights. The Patriots successfully placed artillery and cannons to the south of Boston and on March 17, 12,000 British troops, civilians, and Royalists were forced to retreat by ship.

To this day, Boston celebrates the end of the siege with a holiday known as Evacuation Day. Schools and government offices close down and the fact that it also falls on St. Patricks Day is pure coincidence, surely.

Featured Image: An engraving depicting the British evacuation of Boston, March 17, 1776, at the end of the Siege of Boston.

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Today in military history: Washington drives Brits from Boston - We Are The Mighty

Jean with Healthcare Assistant Bea

Veterans at Royal Star & Garter enjoyed fun activities, cookery and delicious, healthy foods as part of Nutrition and Hydration Week (14-20 March).

Residents at the charitys three Homes, in Solihull, Surbiton and High Wycombe, tasted nutritional snacks and smoothies, drank flavoured juices and water, took part in quizzes and a Bake Off, and other cooking activities.

Nutrition and Hydration Week aims to highlight and educate people on the value of food and drink in maintaining health and wellbeing in social care. Royal Star & Garter staff, and caterers Signature Dining, worked together to provide informative and fun events and activities in the Homes.

In Surbiton, there were tasting sessions throughout the week. Hydration Station drink dispensers were set up with flavoured juices and water, and there were displays highlighting the importance of good hydration. Residents made fruit kebabs and prepared vegetables for lunch as well as enjoying other cooking activities and food quizzes. On Swallowing Awareness Day (16 March), staff hosted a modified tasting session exploring pureed diets.

In Solihull, veterans took part in a Bake Off competition. They also sampled different teas from around the world and tried a variety of different juices. They tucked into a St Patricks Day lunch on Thursday 17 March, complete with a glass of Guinness, and finished off the week eating cupcakes.

In High Wycombe, the Home held a global tea party with strawberries and scones, and learned about the importance of hydration. Residents made nutritious snacks with the chef, ate freshly made ice-cream, and enjoyed healthy treats from the snack trolley.

Royal Star & Garter provides loving, compassionate care for veterans and their partners living with disability or dementia. Director of Care Pauline Shaw said: As well as being a great source of shared pleasure and companionship, eating and drinking healthily plays a key role in maintaining wellbeing. It can also reduce the use of medication and prevent illnesses. Its a vital part of the care we provide every day, and Im glad that we used Nutrition and Hydration Week to illustrate the importance of a good diet.

The charity is welcoming new residents. For more information on this, or working for Royal Star & Garter, please go to http://www.starandgarter.org

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Culinary treats and fun for veterans as Royal Star & Garter celebrates Nutrition and Hydration Week - Royal Star & Garter - Royal Star &...

Thursday is an important day (wink, wink).

Its Evacuation Day, remember (wink, wink). Its an official government holiday in Suffolk County, which includes Boston, Chelsea, Revere and Winthrop.

In case you dont recall, British forces took control of Boston in April 1775 after revolutionaries started getting a little rowdy (you know, the Boston Tea Party, Bunker Hill, Lexington and Concord, etc.). They were there until March 17, 1776, when the Continental Army, led by George Washington, fortified Dorchester Heights with cannons captured from the British Army at Fort Ticonderoga, N.Y., forcing British Gen. William Howe and his troops to flee to Nova Scotia.

No one celebrated Evacuation Day for the first century of Americas existence.

But starting in 1876, amid a wave of Irish immigration to Massachusetts, the St. Patricks Day parade and other celebrations were held in Boston on March 17.

The city of Boston declared March 17 a holiday Evacuation Day (wink, wink) in 1901.

Pushed by heavily Irish-American political bosses on Beacon Hill, the state declared Evacuation Day (wink, wink) a holiday for Suffolk County in 1941.

The law was signed in both black and green ink.

Look, we get it. Its good fun to don some green, sing Oh, Danny Boy and raise a toast to St. Patrick on March 17, regardless of how much Irish blood is coursing through your veins.

And for the first time in two years, revelers will be able to celebrate St. Patricks Day.

As you recall, Gov. Charlie Baker wisely shut down bars and restaurants on the day before the St. Pattys in 2020 due to the rapid spread of the coronavirus pandemic.

COVID-19 restrictions have been eased, and were sure many local residents of Irish descent (and many who are not) will be celebrating on Thursday.

Surprisingly, Massachusetts, the state with the nations largest Irish population and the one most associated with the holiday, came in only seventh when it comes to drinking on St. Patricks Day (Pennsylvania topped the list), a recent survey found. The Bay State did come in third for residents who are most social on the holiday, according to the survey by Biggest Spenders, which analyzes the entertainment industry.

Were sure there will be plenty of socializing this Thursday in Boston, especially with the return of the event officially designated as the St. Patricks Day and Evacuation Day Parade.

And were equally confident that local places like The Chieftain and Fitzys Pub in Plainville, Flynns Irish Pub in Mansfield and the Dublin Rose in Seekonk will enjoy full houses.

We urge everyone to celebrate something we havent be able to do in two years but do so responsibly.

Its OK to raise a glass for St. Patrick and perhaps for George Washington and the Continental Army for the first major victory of the Revolutionary War.

But please dont raise too many.

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Our View: Raise a glass to St. Patrick ... oh and Washington, too - The Sun Chronicle

Pull up a chair. We need to talk about black voters.

There is a growing belief that a small, but notable, group of black voters is becoming disenchanted with the Democratic party and that a window is opening for Republicans to begin chipping away at the most stalwart and enduring segment of the Democrats electoral coalition.

The genesis of this latest wave of speculation began in the run-up to the 2020 election, when Donald Trump made an explicit play for more support from black voters, especially the men. Initial exit polls suggested it may have worked: Trump seemed to make measurable gains with black voters. And in the months since President Joe Bidens inauguration, his dwindling approval numbers among black Americans has added additional heft to the idea that a change may be underway.

If you hold all this up to the light at just the right angle, you might be excused for thinking that there may be some minor partisan realignment underway within the black electorate. Butand I cannot say this strongly enoughit aint happening.

Podcast March 15 2022

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Before explaining how I can be so sure, let us begin with some numbers. The immediately available exit polls showed Trump increasing his share of the black vote by 50 percentfrom 8 percent in 2016 to 12 percent in 2020and winning nearly 1 in 5 black men. If these splits were right, Trump would have tied for the highest Republican share of the black vote in four decades.

But those numbers were not correct. More reliable, adjusted exit pollssuch as one of verified voters from the Pew Research Center and another from AP VoteCast with a far larger sample sizehave since been released and tell a different story.

Trump received just 6 percent of the black vote in 2016 and 8 percent in 2020. On average, from 1968 to 2004, Republican presidential nominees earned just over 11 percent of the black votewhich means not only did Trump underperform the party average in consecutive elections, but he also did worse (twice!) than every single Republican nominee since the Voting Rights Act of 1965 except for the two (John McCain in 2008 and Mitt Romney in 2012) who ran against a black guy.

And even then, with Trump facing a not-incredibly-popular Hillary Clinton in 2016, he could only match what Romney could muster against the historic second-term candidacy of Barack Obama. This should not inspire confidence in those Republicans who believe they are at the precipice of tent expansion.

Did the Republican share of the black electorate double between 2008 and 2020 from 4 percent to 8 percent? Yes. And if you had your pay cut at work from $20/hour to $8/hour, and then management doubled your pay to $16/hour, did you get a raise? Sure.

To put a finer point on it: What we are witnessing with black voters today is not an exit from the Democratic party as a result of too much wokeness on the left and the appeal of Trumpism on the right. Rather, we are seeing black Republicans who chose to vote for the first black president (or sat out an election or two so as not to vote against him) return to their voting habits now that Obama is no longer on the ballot. And it seems that a couple percentage points worth of those pre-2008 black Republican voters may have decided to ride it out with Democrats.

How can I be so sure of all this? Because few things have been as steady in American politics in the last 150 years as black voting behavior. The centrality of federally administered civil rights protections has always governed partisan alignment for the overwhelming majority of the black electorate. It used to be that the Republican party carried this mantle, but since the passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1964, Democrats have made addressing racial inequality a more prominent aspect of its platform. This, more than any other single factor, explains why 9 in 10 black voters have supported Democratic congressional and presidential candidates for decades.

One result of this is what scholars call electoral capture. Defined in a1998 paper by political scientist Paul Frymer and sociologist John David Skrentny, electoral capture occurs when a group of voters finds at least one of the major parties making little or no effort to appeal to their interests or attract their votes precisely because they perceive that group to be divisive. In a two-party system, these voters are left with only one viable option, and Frymer and Skrentny argue that the group is likely to find its support taken for granted and its interests neglected by the other major partys leaders as well.

Capture can work both ways. Not only can parties capture certain groups, but groups and movements can capture parties. The Tea Party movement in 2010 successfully captured the Republican party, ousting congressional leadership along the way. And Trumpism has almost completely captured the party today, penalizing and ostracizing any who dare contest it.

In the case of black voters and todays Democratic party, the capture is the product of three interrelated factors.

(1) Republican leadership views the prioritization of the black electorates central policy demandstrong federal civil rights protectionsas harmful to its standing with its heavily white base.

(2) As a result, to demonstrate alignment with its base, the party takes positions perceived to be resistant to the policies most desired by black Americans.

(3) The Democratic party, while willing to deliver on some symbolic and expedient measures that appeal to black voters, is not compelled to be as responsive to the demands it calculates to be more electorally costly despite the black electorates partisan loyalty.

But lets say you are a principled conservative looking to recapture the Republican party, then you could turn to the states for inspiration. Republican governors have long fared better with black voters than the partys presidential nominees, such as when Maryland governor Larry Hogan won nearly 30 percent of the black vote in his 2018 reelection while running against Ben Jealous, a progressive black candidate and former head of the NAACP. Conservative positions on school choice, tax rates, and less regulation on small business, for example, paired with a principled but pragmatic approach to civil rights protections could be a recipe for success for the right candidate in the right moment.

But, proceed with caution: Recently inaugurated Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkinthe Republican party darling just a few months agois unpopular in the state, with a 41 percent approval rating last month among registered voters. And his outspoken position on critical race theory has run headlong into Virginians desire for schools to teach how racism impacts America today: two-thirds of Virginians support this, including the majority of white Virginians.

Given the current state of our politics and the especially divisive rhetoric around race and education in America, this almost certainly is not the moment for Republicans to make inroads with black voters. Moreover, executing a national strategy akin to what some governors have managed in their states is an extremely difficult task given that the party has not demonstrated either any genuine interest in the idea or the capacity to carry it out.

Where does this leave us? Trumps consecutive subpar presidential performances and Bidens approval rating among black voters that matches Bill Clintons in his first two years are not indications that the black electorate is ready to upend decades of partisan alignment. The leftward lean of Democratic politics could eventually cause a rift on the margins with a pragmatic black electorate. But that is not what weve seen over the past 12 years, and in any case, the Republican party is terribly out of position nationally to capitalize on any such developments.

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Are Black Voters Really Leaving the Democratic Party? - The Bulwark