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On more than one occasion, as a child going grocery shopping with my parents in the suburbs of Louisville, I saw a group of nuns together buying groceries at the local Krogers.

My parents, being devout Catholics, would always stop and offer greetings and otherwise show their respect. On more than one occasion I witnessed a group of redneck hecklers who would taunt the nuns about getting dates and wearing shorter skirts, or offered a variety of similar insults.

"What kind of idiot heckles a nun?" my dad would ask my mom. Mom would just shake her head.

On Tuesday night, the nation got an answer to my dad's question. As Joe Biden addressed a joint session of Congress in his first State of the Union address, Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert began heckling as the president spoke about his son Beau, an Army officer who served in Iraq and died of cancer in 2015.

It was a disrespectful show of stupidity and a low point in a speech that Biden used to highlight his administration's first year of accomplishments, as required by the Constitution. It was also a speech Biden used to reiterate the international resolve against Russia and Vladimir Putin for the illegal invasion of Ukraine that has horrified the world.

RELATED:Trumpers play fascist peekaboo: Are MTG and Tucker Carlson backpedaling on Putin?

Biden called it a "premeditated and unprovoked war," and vowed to defend all NATO countries with American troops, should the conflict widen. (Four member nations Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania border Ukraine to the west and south.) In the meantime, Belarus, effectively a puppet state of Russia, has apparently committed troops to the war while nearly the entire rest of the world has sided with Ukraine. As the first week of this conflict ends, some pundits predict the beginning of World War III. Some, in fact, suggest it really began with cyber warfare more than two years ago, and as recently as this week, a Ukrainian journalist confronted British Prime Minister Boris Johnson by saying, "NATO is afraid of World War III, but it has already started."

In this chilling atmosphere, Biden, according to even some of his staunchest critics, including former Tea Party congressman Joe Walsh, delivered one of his best speeches. "I think he did a very good job," Walsh told me. "But not everybody got it."

Some pundits have criticized Biden for being foggy, befuddled, obtuse or obsequious in his first televised address before the nation. That criticism is more about style than substance. NBC's Chuck Todd was particularly harsh, saying, "I fear this is going to feel like a speech that didn't age well," without really explaining why.

The Wall Street Journal criticized Biden for failing to "rally the world to face new dangers after Russia invaded Ukraine."

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Perhaps they heard a different speech than I did. Biden tried to reach a variety of different audiences, including our allies and the world community, along with American voters, Democrats and Republicans in Congress, the pundits and his many critics.

That's why he talked about funding police departments (not "defunding" them) and the need for coherent border and immigration legislation a move that provided an opportunity for a bipartisan standing ovation.

That's also why he talked about unity and said, "Let's stop seeing each other as enemies and see each other for who we are fellow Americans."

He was bluntest in speaking of the war in Ukraine. "We are inflicting pain on Russiaand supporting the people of Ukraine," the president told the nation."Putin is now isolated from the worldmore than ever." Then he cited a list of new sanctions, including closing off American airspace to Russian commercial flights and noting that the ruble had lost 30 percent of its value.

Then Biden spelled out exactly when and where American troops would engage Russia, if that becomes necessary. "And as I've made crystal clear, the United States and our allies will defend every inch of territory that is NATO territory with the full force of our collective power every single inch."

That is no empty gesture. The world has vowed to reinforce the people of Ukraine, with military and humanitarian aid, in their fight against Russia. While airlifts are part of that supply effort, the straight supply link to Ukraine runs through Poland, a NATO and EU nation directly to the west. Putin is as aware of that as anyone else. If shots are fired in Poland, which seems an increasing possibility, then the U.S. will be in a ground war with Russia.

RELATED:Lt. Col. Alex Vindman: How Trump's coup attempt encouraged Putin's Ukraine invasion

Make no mistake: This is the largest war in Europe since the end of World War II. Biden has surprised Russia by solidifying opposition to Putin's chosen war which the Russian leader likely believed he could win within a few days and apparently surprised the pundits as well, since to this point he's been highly effective in rallying America's allies to the cause.

When Putin threatened an escalation of the possibility of a nuclear war, Biden didn't take the bait. Jen Psaki, in one of her better performances in the White House briefing room, put down the combative rhetoric as swiftly as she has eviscerated Fox News reporters, for the moment allowing us all to take a breath.

Biden spoke to that as well on Tuesday night. The situation is as troubling as any in my lifetime, but despite the rising global tensions, the president sought to calm the world. "I want you to know that we are going to be OK," he said. "When the history of this era is written, Putin's war on Ukraine will have left Russia weaker and the rest of the world stronger."

As reassuring as Biden strived to be, and as blunt as he has been about Russian intentions for the last month, the fog of war is upon us. It will become increasingly difficult not to get sucked into it. Some are predicting a long-term struggle in Ukraine, similar to the U.S. involvement in Afghanistan, that could go on for years or decades.

Taking that possibility into consideration, when Biden said, "From President Zelensky to every Ukrainian; their fearlessness, their courage, their determination inspires the world," those words take on a more nuanced meaning.

The president dramatically spelled out exactly where we are in history, and the criticisms levied against him make little sense. So many reporters increasingly seem out of touch and misinformed.

To paraphrase former Trump press secretary Sean Spicer, what did you want: Unicorns and rainbows?

Biden is grappling with serious issues, and our media are awash in pontificating, pompous peacocks of pallor, cackling like hens and more interested in the sound of their own voices than the gravity of the matters at hand.

Some in the press have said that Biden has lost the support of a majority of Americans, and they may be correct. Again, that remains the greatest problem with this administration. Biden has been, as he was Tuesday, very good at speaking to the public, when he chooses to do so. He doesn't do that nearly enough, and his surrogates, for the most part, are horrible at it. They become immersed in playing games with the networks while also being roasted by them or having their actions misinterpreted, because too many network reporters and anchors lack the experience to understand nuance in politics, even though they cover it.

But therein lies the bigger problem. No matter how much the Biden administration talks or doesn't talk, many of us in the press just don't get it. Donald Trump didn't care what we thought, and blasted out his venom with the ease of a meth-addled preacher on steroids calling the entire media the "enemy of the people" while also relying on it to spread his larcenous lies.

Today the stakes have never been higher and the potential outcome never more severe and, unfortunately, we don't get it.

Biden told us that we stand on the precipice. He told us in that calming, mellifluous voice that everything would be OK. I only hope he's right.

That was the point of that part of his speech, anyway. That was the issue and the moment that mattered. The focus of the United States is on containing the naked aggression of a Russian madman who is so intent on a power grab that even normally neutral Switzerland jumped in and said "No."

Ultimately, history will decide whether the strangulation tactics the world has employed are enough to choke the energy out of the Russian war machine, whether the sanctions will force an internal change that leads to new leadership in Russia, or whether Putin drags the world into a fiery hole from which we never emerge.

That was the subtext many didn't see on Tuesday night as they spoke out against the puerile and salacious antics of Boebert and Greene. It was the theme unseen by the pundits. It was the point missed publicly, and privately feared by many politicians.

And ultimately, that is the point the American people must understand for themselves.

Biden, with his experience on the international stage, understands far more than others what is at stake. Whether he communicated it effectively is the question. Where the world is at the end of this calendar year may render a judgment on how well he delivered his urgent message during his first State of the Union Address.

Read more on Ukraine, Putin, Biden and the war:

Read more:
Biden sounds the warning, and the fog of war descends: How bad will it get? - Salon

Gary North, a leading Christian Reconstructionist who argued for the biblical basis of free market economics and urged people to prepare for societal collapse, has died at 80.

North was a prolific writer, simultaneously penning a 31-volume Bible commentary on Austrian economics; turning out regular warnings about financial catastrophe; and firing off a seemingly endless stream of columns on the gold standard, government overreach, Gods covenants, and the greatness of libertarian Ron Paul.

He was perhaps most mainstream when he supported Pauls longshot presidential bid in 2012. He boosted the candidate throughout the Republican Party primaries, alternately explaining monetary policy to newly converted libertarians and hyping the chances that the Texas politician could actually win the White House.

He was most well-known, though, for his warnings about Y2K. North was convinced that a computer programing shortcutcoding years with two digits instead of fourwas going to lead to catastrophic crashes when the year 99 became the year 00 and the worlds digital infrastructure reset itself. He eagerlyeven gleefullyheralded the collapse of civilization and coached Christians on how to stockpile food, gold, and guns.

For his part, North thought his most important work and true calling was explaining how the alternative economic theories of Ludwig von Mises and Murray Rothbard (both nonpracticing Jews) were deeply biblical. Free market economics should be grounded, he believed, in the Bibles account of Gods covenants, the scarcity that follows the Fall, and the divine mandate in Genesis 1:28 that people should take dominion over the earth (KJV).

North conceived his magnum opus as a Christian version of Adam Smiths The Wealth of Nations but acknowledged it would probably never have the influence or the readership that he wanted. Really, he said, he was writing for a very small group of people.

Who are the likely readers? A remnant, he wrote. I mean those Christians who are convinced that there are serious problems with the modern economies of the world. I also mean those who are convinced that there are biblical alternatives to the collapsing secular humanism of our era. I write for those who are convinced that there had better be a distinctly Christian economics, and not baptized Marxism, baptized Keynesianism, or baptized Friedmanism, let alone the unbaptized varieties.

When North died in hospice care in Dallas, Georgia, on February 24, his books were available for free online.

North was born on February 11, 1942, in Horn Lake, Mississippi, to Peggy and Samuel W. North Jr. The family relocated to Southern California in Garys childhood, so his father could surveil the Socialist Workers Party for the FBI.

It was a deeply conservative home, committed to anti-Communism, but North nevertheless experienced a political awakening at 14 when he heard a lecture by Australian Fred Schwarz, head of the Christian Anti-Communism Crusade, about beating global Communism, the unbeatable foe. Soon the teenager was not only opposed to Marx and Lenin, but also Franklin Roosevelt, the New Deal, and Social Security.

North became a regular at the Betsy Ross Book Shop, a critical hub of Southern California conservatism, and a faithful reader of The Freeman, the libertarian magazine produced by the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE), the first free market think tank in the United States.

At 17, he became a Christian and became fascinated by the idea of connecting libertarian economics with his faith. Several people claimed to be doing this at the time, but in Norths estimation, they fell short. A Dutch Calvinist businessman was republishing the work of Austrian economist Eugen von Bhm-Bawerk and calling it Progressive Calvinism, but it wasnt notably more religious than the work of other Austrian theorists. J. Howard Pew, the Presbyterian oil magnate and Christianity Today financier, was publishing a twice-monthly journal called Christian Economics, but it didnt seem to be particularly Christian.

The authors were first-rate free market economists, and many of them were Austrian school economists, North later recalled. But there was no attempt by the authors to integrate what they were writing on economics with the Bible.

By the time he was 18, North was personally committed to this project. He decided he would do what others hadnt and show how the whole counsel of God supported capitalism.

The most significant moment in Norths development came in 1962, when he met R. J. Rushdoony, a Presbyterian pastor who developed a theology he called Christian Reconstructionism. Rushdoony said that everyoneand in fact everything and every intellectual discipline that started from objective, observable factswas in rebellion against God and needed to be brought under Gods authority. He argued a truly Christian society would be a theonomy, under divine law.

North embraced Christian Reconstructionism to the point that he would, over the years, make the argument that a truly Christian country would reinstitute the practice of public stoning.

That modern Christians never consider the possibility of the re-introduction of stoning for capital crimes indicates how thoroughly humanistic concepts of punishment have influenced the thinking of Christians, he would write. Christians have voluntarily transferred their allegiance from the infallible Old Testament to contemporary God-hating and God-denying criminologists and economists.

North spent one summer working with Rushdoony at a libertarian think tank and kept in touch.

After he graduated with a PhD in history from the University of California, Riverside, he went to work for FEE, directing seminars at the Irvington, New York, think tank, and writing articles for The Freeman. He wrote about gold, inflation, financial depressions, and the theology at work in economic theories (Men have a tendency to get their religious presuppositions confused with economic analysis, he said).

In 1972, North married Sharon Rushdoony, R. J.s daughter. The next year he quit FEE, partly in a dispute over rights to his writing and public lectures, and went to work for his new father-in-law. He edited the new journal of Christian Reconstructionism, the Chalcedon Report, assisted with the research for Rushdoonys Institutes of Biblical Law, and published his first book, a collection of articles titled An Introduction to Christian Economics.

Is there such a thing as a distinctively Christian economics? North asked in the introduction. His answer was Yes. The first chapter looked Old Testament prophets condemnations of dross and drew out implications for monetary policy.

In 1976, North took a brief break from the world of think tanks to go work for Ron Paul in Washington, DC. The Texas obstetrician won a special election and went to the capital promising to fight the Federal Reserve and return the US to the gold standard. He needed staff, and hired North to write twice-monthly newsletters to his constituents.

The job only lasted until Paul lost reelection in November. North was considered for a position in Congressman Dan Quayles office but didnt get it, and decided he wanted nothing more to do with government work.

Seldom in the history of man have so many incompetents, cronies, idiots, goof-offs, hangers-on, and nincompoops been assembled in one geographical area, he wrote. These people are yo-yos. You would not believe how second-rate these people are. I am speaking about the conservative staffers.

Leaving Congress, North moved to Durham, North Carolina, where he could access an academic library. He started working in earnest on his economics Bible commentary.

To fund the work, he founded the Institute for Christian Economics. He sold self-published books by direct mail for $10 and then got book-buyers to subscribe to his newsletter, Remnant Review, for $45 per year. He grew the subscriber base from 2,000 to more than 22,000, grossing $1.2 million in 1979. What North didnt use for his Bible commentary he poured into building up Christian Reconstructionism.

In the early 1980s, North moved to Tyler, Texas, be closer to other Christian Reconstructionists. At the same time, North had a bitter falling out with Rushdoony. The disagreement started with an article about the lambs blood on the doorposts in the Passover story in Exodus.

The esoteric debate quickly escalated. North told his father-in-law he was going to be replaced by younger, more vigorous men. Rushdoony replied, Your letter is written with your usual grace and courtesy.

The Texas Reconstructionists were also increasingly fixated on impending catastrophes, becoming preppers and survivalists. North wrote that the AIDS epidemic would lead to civilizational collapse, predicted numerous recessions and depressions caused by inflation or government debt, and frequently urged people to buy gold and silver before it was too late.

The peak of his apocalyptic fervor came in the late 1990s. North became convinced that a computer programing shortcut would end modern life as we know it, resulting in a nightmare for every area of life, in every region of the industrialized world.

To North, it was clear this was divine punishment for a world that had strayed from God. He called it a good, old-fashioned Deuteronomy kind of thing and launched a website with advice on postapocalyptic bartering, gardening, food storage, generators, where to move to best avoid murderous hoards, and of course, why you should buy gold.

When the predicted day of doom came and went, North noted that he had been incorrect, but said Y2Ks effects, so far, have taken all of the specialists by surprise. He believed, regardless, that gold was a good investment and people were better off, prepared for disaster in out-of-the-way parts of the world.

North moved on from predicting disasters and turned to more mainstream commentary in the next decade, when he became a regular columnist for the libertarian and anarcho-capitalist website LewRockwell.com.

He advocated for the Tea Party movement and the gold standard while attacking social security, fiat money, leftist evangelical Jim Wallis, and Franklin Roosevelt. He occasionally defended conspiracy theories, speculated about a conspiracy behind the terrorist attacks of 2001, and when his old boss Ron Paul started gaining momentum, he wrote about Paul.

As the libertarian candidates quest for the Republican nomination fizzled, North finally finished the 8,511-page book he had first dreamed of in 1960 and had started writing in 1973: An Economic Commentary on the Bible.

No one has ever attempted a Bible commentary like this: what the Bible has to say about the details of an academic discipline, North wrote. The culmination of my lifes work is here.

North posted the final, revised, and typeset PDF of the commentary online on January 29, 2021. He died a little more than a year later.

He was predeceased by his son Caleb and survived by his wife, Sharon, and their children Darcy North, Scott North, and Lori McDurmon.

See the original post:
Died: Gary North, Who Saw Austrian Economics in the Bible and Disaster on the Horizon... | News & Reporting - ChristianityToday.com

Bipartisanship still exists in Washington. At President Joe Bidens State of the Union address last night, members of both parties stood to applaud the strength of Ukrainians, to cheer for getting kids back in school, and to celebrate funding the police. In February, Democrats and Republicans came together to pass bills reforming the post office and the way that workplaces handle sexual harassment. But all is not well on Capitol Hill.

Many lawmakers and staff say that something has shifted in the past two yearsthat the changes brought on by COVID-19 and the Capitol riot have frayed relationships and shattered trust between members, in some cases beyond repair. In light of this shift, members are doing their best to adjust and move forward. I have to deal with them, Representative Dan Kildee of Michigan told me of his colleagues who objected to the certification of the 2020 election. But I look at them as smaller people now.

Read: Republicans meet their monster

Democrats sparred with Republicans constantly under President Donald Trump, and political polarization was on the rise well before then too. But the COVID-19 pandemic divided Congress in new ways. Business closures, mask mandates, and vaccine requirements sent politicians scrambling to their partisan corners. In the House, many Democrats sent their staff home to work remotely; Republicans mostly didnt. Once they returned to the Hill, Democrats continued wearing masks in the hallways; many Republicans did not. It used to be difficult to tell whether the stranger who held the elevator door open was on your political team, and that uncertainty promoted a certain kind of cautious politeness. But mask wearing became a signifier of political affiliation and, to some, a symbol of concern for others. If these people will put their own health at risk to own the libs, what else will they do? Patrick Malone, the communications director for Representative Jim Himes of Connecticut, told me this week. God forbid the Republicans take over the House.

For two years, COVID-19 precautions in Congress also prevented lawmakers from having the kind of in-person interactions that good politics requires. Working together in the same place fostered cooperation, or at the very least, a veneer of civility, and gave members the opportunity for casual side conversations and negotiations. Very little of that has happened since 2020. All of it pried us apart, and I hate that, Representative Tom Rice, a Republican from South Carolina, told me. He and other Republicans have felt as though the COVID-19 restrictions in Congress ultimately did more to harm than help. Between members, its gotten even more acrimonious, Rice said.

The divisions brought on by the pandemic only deepened after January 6, 2021. Hill aides were watching along with the rest of America as Trumps supporters tore through the building looking for Speaker Nancy Pelosi and calling for the execution of Vice President Mike Pence. Occasional shooting threats and bomb scares had rattled their work days before, but to see some of their colleagues trivialize the attackand the Republican National Committee label it legitimate political discoursefelt unsettling in a brand-new way. Im sure the Germans have a word for it, Malone, the Himes staffer, told me. Its a combination of disappointment, sadness, and terror. A progressive aide, who asked for anonymity in order to speak candidly, told me that last year she stopped hanging out with two friends who work for Republicans in Congress. After the 6th, I was like, this is too dangerous, she said. I cant get drunk with you and say somethingI dont know who youre going to say it to.

The wound of the January 6 attack has healed, but the scar tissue remains. Lawmakers must walk through metal detectors to vote in the House chamber. Ahead of last nights State of the Union address, chain-link fences went up around the Capitol building, and police lined the corridors, checking ID badges. Members of the National Guard filed in four hours before Bidens speech, carrying duffel bags of equipment. A lot of us still feel unsafe, Minnesota Democrat Ilhan Omar told me. We have colleagues who walk around with their guns on them, and were still worried about who they might let in. Republicans argue that, as with COVID, all the added restrictions only further erode trust. Representative Dan Crenshaw, a Republican from Texas, shook his head yesterday as he watched people go through the metal detector. These kinds of things make this place a circus instead of a place where reasonable people can disagree, he said.

Read: Congress is slashing a $30 million plan to fight the next pandemic

The mask mandate in D.C. ended yesterday, and members of Congress walked the halls with their faces free. Soon, tours of the Capitol building will start again in earnest. Members see progress on the horizon. Last night, Representative Veronica Escobar, a Democrat from Texas, watched the State of the Union from the House gallery, a place she hadnt been since January 6 of last year. Weve seen both the best in people and the worst in people in the past couple of years, she said. Were trying to find a new normal. Kildee, the congressman from Michigan, couldnt look at many of his Republican colleagues last year, let alone work with them on legislation. But hes doing it now, because he has to. Were trying to find a way to get back to some degree of collegiality, he said. Ive gotta do what I have to do to advance the interests of my constituents.

Members of Congress have felt uncomfortableor even in dangerat their workplace throughout the countrys history. Earlier this month, when Democrat Joyce Beatty asked Republican Hal Rogers to put on his mask while riding the subway in the Capitol, Rogers poked her and replied, Kiss my ass. (He later apologized.) Over the summer, Republican Ted Yoho told Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez that she was disgusting and out of [her] freaking mind on the steps of the Capitol building. The Tea Party movement fractured the Republican coalition and made lawmakers question when things had ever been so bad. (Although Representative Lauren Boeberts shouted accusation at the State of the Union last night made Joe Wilsons outburst in 2009 seem almost quaint.) Before that, House Speaker Newt Gingrich presided over a period of partisan conflict that, as my colleague McKay Coppins wrote, poisoned Americas political culture and plunged Washington into permanent dysfunction. Physical violence preceded rhetorical aggression: In 1856, an abolitionist senator was nearly caned to death on the House floor. The threat of violence was so high in the middle of the 1800s that most members of Congress were packing heat at work.

American democracy has so far weathered all storms, and lawmakers are optimistic that it will survive this one too. Members have figured out ways to work with one another because they must. Perhaps the most hopeful sign so far is the way that this countrys political leaders have responded to an attack on another democracy, half a world away. Its been a rough patch in American politics, Republican Representative Tom Cole of Oklahoma told me. But I dont think theres broad differences on doing everything we possibly can to help Ukraine. A few hours before Bidens speech, once the days votes were cast, members of both parties gathered on the marble steps outside the chamber for a photo. As the group assembled, a handful of lawmakers paused to fasten tiny blue-and-gold pins to each others lapels.

Continued here:
The Vibe Shift on Capitol Hill - The Atlantic

Comedian Al Franken, a longtime writer and performer on Saturday Night Live who served nearly two terms in the U.S. Senate before stepping down in 2018 amid allegations of sexual misconduct, is coming to Maine.

Frankens The Only Former U.S. Senator Currently on Tour tour will visit the State Theatre in Portland at 8 p.m. Sunday.

The 70-year-old has deep ties to Maine. His wife, Franni Bryson, is from Portland (the couple met while at Harvard University in the early 1970s), and they visit at least once a year.

Franken, a Democrat, had an interest in politics and public policy long before his successful run for the U.S. Senate in 2008. Now that hes transitioned back to comedy, politics anchor his performances even more.

Franken spoke this week about his two careers, his family in Maine and the situation in Ukraine. He wouldnt answer questions about the circumstances of his departure from the Senate. The following interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

Q: Whats it been like touring at this particular moment in time?

A: Well, theres different things happening. You know, were on COVID time, were now on World War III time (chuckling). I was supposed to start this leg of the tour in January. We had to postpone a couple shows in northern California because omicron was peaking then But Portland, Im really happy about, because I have a lot of family there. My wifes family is all there, and I love Maine.

Q: Do you find that people are eager to laugh again in a public setting?

A: We havent been able to do that until recently and I think its always kind of, whenever youre in a theater and theres people, its a bit of a celebration anyway, but especially now. People are very happy to get out.

Q: When you were in the Senate, I expect you had to work hard to shed the label of that SNL comic and be taken seriously. What was the transition like back to being a comedian? Was this always something you expected to do?

A: I really hadnt thought that Id be coming back to private life, so to speak, so soon, but thats where I started, was comedy, and I value it very highly, especially satirical comedy.

But I had never done standup as a single. I used to do it with my partner, Tom Davis (a fellow Minnesotan who like Franken was an original writer on SNL), but its a different beast when youre up there alone.

Q: Is your comedy more political now than in the past, because of your experiences in the Senate?

A: I talk a lot about my time in the Senate and give you some background and peeks into what the Senates like. Thats not a small part of it.

Q: Anything on Maines senators (Susan Collins and Angus King, with whom he served)?

A: I dont talk too much about that (in shows), but I may a little. I told Angus (King) Im coming, and he said Well, how do I go? And I said, Well, Ill send you two comps. And then he writes back and says, You know Im a U.S. Senator, and I cant take them. I said, Good, then buy the expensive seats.

Q: Did you leave any tickets for Sen. Collins?

A: (long pause) Ah, no. No.

Q: Is it harder right now to do comedy given everything thats going on in the world?

A: That stuff has always been fodder. Im sort of a satirist, so on SNL, I wrote, with other writers of course, a lot of the satire. So that was part of our toolbox, what was happening. Even now, Im thinking, well, what I am going to say about Ukraine? How am I going to approach that?

But it is hard in these days where satire is supposed to be about pushing boundaries. Good satire always has. You talk about George Carlin, Richard Pryor, people like that, and now its comedians are finding it harder in some ways. A lot of comedians I know wont do colleges.

Q: What are your thoughts on Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky who, like you, was a comedian?

A: Hes doing great now. I loved when we offered to get him out and he said, You know, we need arms, not a ride. I just think the bravest people in the world are Jewish comedians who go into politics. Theres only two. (Franken is Jewish.)

Q: With your family connections in Maine, do you visit a fair amount?

A: We visit pretty much every year. My wife her four siblings, three sisters and brother, are in the Portland area and mom, my mother-in-law, is 99, and shes the family hero. I talk about her a little bit. Shell be embarrassed, but I dont care. Shes amazing. A remarkable story. Her husband died in a car accident after doing two shifts at the paper mill. He fell asleep and hit a tree, leaving my mother-in-law widowed with five kids, age 7 to 3 months, and thats why shes our hero.

Q: Are there specific places you go when in Maine?

A: We usually almost always go to Two Lights (State Park in Cape Elizabeth). When we come up, we eat a lot of lobster rolls. We just do. In summers, we go to Higgins Beach (in Scarborough).

Q: You hinted recently you might be interested in returning to politics. How different is the landscape now?

A: Its actually gotten uglier, which is hard to believe. When I was in the Senate, (Majority Leader) Mitch McConnell, he told his caucus, our job is to make sure Barack Obama gets nothing done, he filibustered executive appointees, and that started the destruction of the Senate as far as Im concerned. Now, you know, Trump is sort of the end result, I think of the Palins, the Hannitys, the Tucker Carlsons, Rush Limbaugh, the Tea Party, they finally got everything they wanted. They are authoritarian. Thats what theyve turned into as a party. Its always been there, but now its the top of the Republican Party.

Q: You mentioned Tucker Carlson, a part-time Maine resident, any more thoughts on him?

A: Hes been giving aid and comfort to one of the worst people in the world, to Putin. Its deeply disturbing. And its deeply disturbing that hes the most popular host on their primetime schedule. The others arent so great either, but Tuckers smart enough to know what hes doing.

Q: With all the podcasts out there, why did you decide to start one?

A: I think Ive carved out my podcast I do kind of public policy thats funny and fun to listen to. I care about this stuff about whats really going to make peoples lives better.

You think about my mother-in-law (Franken started to get tearful). Sorry. What made her life possible was Social Security survivor benefits, Pell grants for her kids, Title I. She got a GI loan to go to college, she teaches at a Title 1 school, she gets her loans forgiven. These things are important. It means stuff to people. And it kills me that it doesnt seem to mean stuff to the Republican Party at all.

Q: Do you think people have an understanding of what to expect at your show?

A: It depends on whether you do your job. I dont think they know exactly what to expect, but I dont think theyre surprised by anything. Theyll be surprised by some things, but theyll be comedic surprises. The show is funny. Thats the intent. And people really like it.

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Ahead of Portland show, Al Franken talks about his Maine connections, comedy and current events - Kennebec Journal and Morning Sentinel

Issued on: 03/03/2022 - 16:19

Sending push notifications through a face-swapping app, adding pictures of the devastation from the bombings in Ukraine to Google Maps, hacking electric chargers These are some of the tricks that are being used by Ukrainians to bypass Russian President Vladimir Putins strict censorship, and to make sure that accurateinformation about thewarin Ukraine reaches everyday Russians.

President Putin has blocked or limited access to foreign news coverage in Russia about the war in Ukraine, including Facebook and Twitter. Russias state communications and media watchdog Roskomnadzor has also passed a censorship law forbidding Russian journalists from using the words war, invasion or offensive when talking about the special operation in Ukraine.

In response, ordinary Ukrainians have been finding creative ways of fighting the Kremlins disinformation campaign and informing people in Russia about what is really going on.

The face-swapping app Reface, which is based in Kyiv, has launched a global information campaign to spread the news, share photos of destruction in Ukrainian cities and encourage its users to stand with Ukraine. The FRANCE 24 Observers team spoke to the companys CEO, Dima Shvets.

When Russia first invaded Ukraine, we sent out a push notification to our users with a message: Russia has invaded Ukraine. Users who opened the app were then presented with more details about the situation on the ground, including images and videos.

Nine million notifications have currently been sent worldwide and two million have been delivered to users in Russia. We have also moved up to the seventh place in the US App store.

Our app was previously used to take the faces of users and put them onto the bodies of celebrities. Since Russias invasion, we have been encouraging everyone to swap themselves into President Zelensky.

All new videos created by the app feature a watermark that includes the Ukrainian flag and the hashtag #StandWithUkraine.

On Monday, February 28, the hacking group Anonymous incited people to leave fake reviews of Russian businesses and restaurants in Google Maps to inform citizens about the conflict in Ukraine. The group tweeted: Go to Google Maps. Go to Russia. Find a restaurant or business and write a review. When you write the review, explain what is happening in Ukraine.

The tweet quickly gained traction. Reviews have been filling up across Russia with news about the conflict in Ukraine. For example, one of the reviews for a Moscow restaurant called Romantic reads 5,800 Russian soldiers died today, 4,500 yesterday. Stop your aggression, dont let your kids suffer, if you go to war you will not come back. Another review for the same place reads Food is great, but your leader is killing innocent people in Ukraine!!! Stop this war.

Google Maps allows users to upload photos of places usually as part of a review of the spot but users have also been using this feature to get images from Ukraine into Russia.

One of the images frequently posted for these locations is a screenshot of a phone that allegedly belonged to a Russian soldier, showing an apparent text conversation with his mother (see below).

Google Maps has since disabled reviews in Russia and Ukraine after they were used as a space to protest against the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

A Google spokesperson said in a statement: "Due to a recent increase in contributed content on Google Maps related to the war in Ukraine, we've put additional protections in place to monitor and prevent content that violates our policies for Maps, including temporarily blocking new reviews, photos, and videos in the region."

In a more organised effort, Russian electric charging points for cars were hacked to show messages of support for Ukraine, which included Glory to Ukraine and Putin is a d***head.

Caption: A car charging station on Russia's M11 highway

In a Facebook post, the Russian energy company, Rosseti, claimed that the Ukrainian company which provided some of the parts had hacked the charging points to which it still had access.

This effort is part of a wave of cyber campaigns targeted at Russia. The international hacking collective Anonymous has claimed responsibility for various cyberattacks, including on Russias state broadcaster RT and over 300 Russian websites.

The moves came after Anonymous declared itself to be in a cyber warfare campaign against Putin and his allies.

Can campaigns like this have a meaningful impact? The FRANCE 24 Observers team asked Valentina Shapovalova, a specialist in Russian media and propaganda at the University of Copenhagen.

I think that its still too early to see how effective these measures will be. But its still incredibly interesting to see how many regular citizens are participating in bottom-up counter-propaganda measures and to see how creative they are getting.

But we shouldnt underestimate the strength of Putins information warfare, he has been suffocating the information space for decades and there is now very little room for anything else to get into the minds of citizens. The same narratives have been replayed in the Russian media for years, Putin has been priming Russians with his propaganda efforts. And when you tell the same story again and again people start to believe it as true. Its so deeply rooted that reviews on Google Maps may not have the impact that they should.

Another very important strategy that the Kremlin has been using is to create confusion and fog, to spit out so many stories and so many contradictory images and news that people get confused and dont know what the truth is anymore.

Some of the grand narratives that the government has been feeding to Russians include the narrative that the Ukrainian government is a Nazi government installed by the West, that the Russian-speaking people in Ukraine have been oppressed since 2014 and that the Ukrainian government is exercising genocide.

More than one million people have already fled Ukraine and hundreds of civilians are believed to have been killed as a result of the war.

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How Ukrainians are bypassing Russian censorship to share news of the war - The France 24 Observers