Ukraine

[Kendra]

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker ... Bx6bwsW1FY

For years, former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort worked in Ukraine for people who have now either fled to Russia, or been accused of supporting it.

Manafort, now staging a comeback via a book deal, worked in Ukraine from 2005 up through the country’s 2014 revolution and afterwards.

Russia’s invasion is a violent example of the Kremlin’s longstanding policy: reverse Ukraine’s decades-long shift towards the West and force the country towards Russia.

“I ran four parliamentary elections and a presidential campaign there, I got to know the country extremely well,” the former Trump campaign chairman told a radio host this month. “I think I know it better than Putin does right now.”

As a political consultant for the Party of Regions, Manafort helped elect a political movement that was at least in part a tool of those aims. Manafort spent a lot of time whitewashing his client’s abuses in a quixotic and partly successful bid to persuade the European Union to sign an association agreement with Ukraine.

[John Thomas8]

[Kendra]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/travel/news/h ... d9c24df221

Seattle-based Holland America Line will use one of its cruise ships to house Ukrainian refugees in the city of Rotterdam in the Netherlands.

The company announced the Volendam, a 781-foot-long cruise ship, will dock in Rotterdam for three months to provide temporary shelter for approximately 1,500 Ukrainians.

"I think the government knew that cruise ships are a little bit like floating cities,” said Holland America Line spokesperson Bill Zucker. “So, we can take care of a lot of needs on our ships."

While Holland America Line is based in Seattle, the company was founded in Rotterdam. Zucker said some of the company's first trips took people immigrating from Europe to the United States.

"That's something that is very much in our roots,” said Zucker. “So, when the government asked us about this, we said yes. That's something that we wanted to do and that

[MN-Skeptic]

What a wonderful, joyful video!

[AndyinPA]

[Kendra]

[Estiveo]

If you haven't seen the original video, here it is:

[Volkonski]

[Slim Cognito]

Fuck trump and the jackasses he rode in on

https://apple.news/AigeTaed9Q3C05ri6QU4Fsg

A restaurant manager flew a Ukrainian flag. Hateful messages followed.

[raison de arizona]

Fuck trump and the jackasses he rode in on

https://apple.news/AigeTaed9Q3C05ri6QU4Fsg

A restaurant manager flew a Ukrainian flag. Hateful messages followed.

what nasty people

[Chilidog]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/travel/news/h ... d9c24df221

Seattle-based Holland America Line will use one of its cruise ships to house Ukrainian refugees in the city of Rotterdam in the Netherlands.

The company announced the Volendam, a 781-foot-long cruise ship, will dock in Rotterdam for three months to provide temporary shelter for approximately 1,500 Ukrainians.

"I think the government knew that cruise ships are a little bit like floating cities,” said Holland America Line spokesperson Bill Zucker. “So, we can take care of a lot of needs on our ships."

While Holland America Line is based in Seattle, the company was founded in Rotterdam. Zucker said some of the company's first trips took people immigrating from Europe to the United States.

"That's something that is very much in our roots,” said Zucker. “So, when the government asked us about this, we said yes. That's something that we wanted to do and that

All of my ancestors came here on those ships.

[Notaperson]

Ukraine seizes 55 homes, 26 cars and yacht from Putin ally Medvedchuk

Ukrainian authorities announced Thursday that they had seized a sum of 154 assets from pro-Kremlin opposition politician and mogul Viktor Medvedchuk, who was captured this week following an escape from house arrest shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine.

Among the long list of property seized from Medvedchuk and his family: 30 plots of land, 23 houses, 32 apartments, 26 cars and one yacht.

The seizures add further intrigue to the circumstances of the escape and recapture of one of Ukraine’s most notorious oligarchs, known for his close relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who acts as godfather to Medvedchuk’s daughter.

In January, the U.S. Treasury Department said Medvedchuk and two members of his political party were involved in a plot to “recruit current and former Ukrainian government officials to prepare to take over the government of Ukraine and to control Ukraine’s critical infrastructure with an occupying Russian force."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/20 ... ty-seized/

[Ben-Prime]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/travel/news/h ... d9c24df221

Seattle-based Holland America Line will use one of its cruise ships to house Ukrainian refugees in the city of Rotterdam in the Netherlands.

The company announced the Volendam, a 781-foot-long cruise ship, will dock in Rotterdam for three months to provide temporary shelter for approximately 1,500 Ukrainians.

"I think the government knew that cruise ships are a little bit like floating cities,” said Holland America Line spokesperson Bill Zucker. “So, we can take care of a lot of needs on our ships."

While Holland America Line is based in Seattle, the company was founded in Rotterdam. Zucker said some of the company's first trips took people immigrating from Europe to the United States.

"That's something that is very much in our roots,” said Zucker. “So, when the government asked us about this, we said yes. That's something that we wanted to do and that

All of my ancestors came here on those ships.

Would this have been on the chili side or the hot dog side?

[Volkonski]

[Chilidog]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/travel/news/h ... d9c24df221

All of my ancestors came here on those ships.

Would this have been on the chili side or the hot dog side?

both. from Russian controlled Poland and from German (Silesia) controlled areas.

[Ben-Prime]

Off Topic

All of my ancestors came here on those ships.

Would this have been on the chili side or the hot dog side?

both. from Russian controlled Poland and from German (Silesia) controlled areas.

All kidding aside, mind you, all four of my grandparents could trace their own lineage to about 150 miles or so in a radius around the Ukraine-Romania-Moldova triple border area that is today oblast/province of Chernivitsi mostly on the Ukraine side. Family history is that the Bukovina part of that region was owned by Austria-Hungary at the time, and had a heavy township population of Jews and Poles transplanted from elsewhere, and when my paternal grandpa's dad came over to the U.S., it was right around World War I so you didn't want to admit being Austro-Hungarian, so he said he was Polish and we got a new family name that replaced the original one -- he never told his kids what that was, since "we're American now and XXXXXX, that's our name now" so that part of the family tree effectively starts there with only those fragments of the story, but the rest of my ancestry all seems to come from the same general area based on stories from at least 2 of my other grandparents.

I actually tried to maneuver into spending my second Foreign Service assignment, after getting out of Dhaka, next door in Moldova. Tradition in the Foreign Service is that on your 2nd tour, your career counselor negotiates your assignments in descending order of the 'equity' (the combined hardship + danger pay differentials, with an added boost for one additional factor) of your 1st post, and with Dhaka giving a 40% equity score I was at the top of that list and so had first pick of any assignment for which was I not disqualified. There was an open entry-level slot in Moldova in my career path, and it would have allowed me to spend the weekends crawling around the border area exploring both the known and unknown parts of my heritage, especially with my parents and all my grandparents having died between 1997 and 2019. Because of some decisions made by my first manager in Dhaka -- technically I agreed to them but outright asked at the time if it would have any downside and specifically about my assignment window and he lied to me and my career counselor backed him up -- that stretched my time there by just a few weeks, they had to disqualify my bid by falling out of the time window of the absolute latest date by which I could get there to take up the assignment, and so people play the world's smallest violin when I tell them that assignment to London was my consolation prize. But that's the reason I'm here instead of next door to this war. The classmate that ended up going to Chisinau instead was very upset that he hurt my feelings taking the job because of my strong and vocal desire to go there; I not only had to assure him that we're still tight (he's one of my best friends in my class) but I've had to offer to be his emergency fallback in case Moldova is next in line in Putin's plans and he has to evacuate to a safe distance. I'm actually using my away-from-keyboard time on this holiday weekend to do some work on rearranging my guest bedroom just in case. My current boss is helping me, since his first tour in the FS was Chisinau and he's going to be setting up at least one bedroom in his family's home here to take in a straggler or two likewise should it come to that.

I am really hoping it does not come to that and the Ukrainians hold the line and Putin doesn't spread his wings and talons further. All of this said, I've tried to post nothing really serious about this war, because I am unable to be serious about it without tears starting to come.

[Slim Cognito]

[W. Kevin Vicklund]

SEVASTOPOL, Russia — A Russian warship told by Ukrainian soldiers to go fuck itself has fucked itself, according to multiple reports.

The RTS Moskva, the flagship of the Russian Navy’s Black Sea Fleet, officially fucked itself on April 14, when it sunk in choppy seas. The crew of the Slava-class missile cruiser, in the early days of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, was infamously told by Ukrainian soldiers defending Snake Island to “go fuck yourselves.”

Russian officials and state-run media insist that the ship fucked itself with no outside assistance.

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“The regrettable loss of the Moskva was completely, totally an act of self-copulation,” Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov said. “A fire got out of control and the ship fucked itself — there is no truth to the rumor that the Moskva was fucked by the Nazi regime in Kyiv.”

https://www.duffelblog.com/p/russian-wa ... ainian?s=r

[Estiveo]

[Dave from down under]

The glory and freedom of Ukraine has not yet perished
Luck will still smile on us brother-Ukrainians.
Our enemies will die, as the dew does in the sunshine,
and we, too, brothers, we'll live happily in our land.

We’ll not spare either our souls or bodies to get freedom
and we’ll prove that we brothers are of Kozak kin.

[Phoenix520]

[Phoenix520]

Ben-Prime

[Volkonski]

[Kriselda Gray]

An English translation of the lyrics. The song is called "The Red Viburnum In the Meadow"

Oh, in the meadow a red viburnum has bent down low
For some reason, our glorious Ukraine is in sorrow
And we’ll take that red viburnum and we will raise it up
And we shall cheer for our glorious Ukraine, hey, hey rise up and rejoice
And we shall cheer for our glorious Ukraine, hey, hey rise up and rejoice

[AndyinPA]

Thank you.