The Full Belmonte, 2/2/2022
Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks during a joint news conference with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban following their talks in Moscow yesterday.
“Russian President Vladimir Putin says the US and NATO have ‘ignored’ the Kremlin's key security concerns over Ukraine. For weeks, Putin had said little publicly about the crisis sparked by Russia's buildup of tens of thousands of troops near Ukraine's border, which has raised fears of a possible invasion. At a news conference yesterday, Putin said three key requirements remain unmet and also accused the US directly of attempting to draw Russia into an armed conflict to force ‘allies in Europe to impose the very tough sanctions’ against them, or to ‘draw Ukraine into NATO.’ Putin did not offer any solutions during his comments, but he did say he was open to more talks.” Read more at CNN
“Each new move Russian President Vladimir Putin makes has left U.S. officials more fearful he's preparing for a very real war, Axios national security reporter Zachary Basu writes.
Why it matters: A month of diplomatic talks has achieved nothing. Russia's alarming military buildup keeps growing.
In his first public comments about the spiraling tensions in over a month, Putin yesterday accused the West of goading Russia into a conflict.
Between 100,000 and 130,000 Russian troops are estimated to be stationed on the border with Ukraine — a presence that continues to grow.
5,000 Russian troops have been deployed in Belarus — potentially giving Putin a direct route to the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, which lies just 140 miles from the Belarus border.
At a heated meeting of the UN Security Council on Monday, U.S. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield said there's evidence Russia intends to expand its Belarus presence to 30,000 troops.
The big picture: There are few signs that would distinguish a bluff from legitimate preparations for an attack. The West isn't taking any chances.
The Pentagon has placed 8,500 U.S. troops on ‘heightened preparedness to deploy’ to NATO countries in eastern Europe, which President Biden said will happen ‘in the near term.’
The U.K., Poland, the Baltic states and other NATO allies have transferred weaponry and training forces to Ukraine, warning that a Russian invasion would have massive ripple effects across Europe.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said at a press conference yesterday: ‘This is not going to be a war of Ukraine and Russia. This is going to be a European war, a fully fledged war.’” Read more at Axios
“The U.S. national debt topped $30 trillion, a record.” Read more at New York Times
“Children younger than 5 in the US could soon begin receiving Covid-19 vaccinations. Pfizer and BioNTech are requesting emergency use authorization for their two-dose Covid-19 vaccine for children age 6 months up to 5 years. The companies are aiming to complete their submission process within the coming days, which will then be reviewed by the FDA’s vaccine advisory committee on February 15. The Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine is already authorized for use in people as young as 5, and the approval would be the first Covid-19 vaccine available for the youngest children. Since the start of the pandemic, at least 11.4 million children have tested positive for Covid-19, the American Academy of Pediatrics reported Monday, with over 3.5 million cases reported in January alone.” Read more at CNN
“WASHINGTON—A bipartisan effort to clarify the vice president’s role in certifying election results is gaining momentum and potentially expanding to include other areas of voting law, fueled by recent comments from former President Donald Trump that his former vice president should have overturned the result of the 2020 election.
Sen. Susan Collins (R., Maine) is leading a group of 16 senators in negotiations focused on overhauling the 135-year-old Electoral Count Act, or ECA. The push, emerging from the ashes of a broader Democratic voting-access bill that was blocked by Republicans, comes as members of both parties fear a replay of the contentious 2020 Electoral College process, when Mr. Trump refused to concede defeat and falsely blamed voting fraud for his loss.
Ms. Collins said Mr. Trump’s insistence that former Vice PresidentMike Pence had the power to overturn the election ‘only underscores the need for us to remove any ambiguity that exists in the act, which is poorly drafted and has not been revised since it was passed in 1887.’
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) said Tuesday that the Electoral Count Act is flawed and needs to be fixed. ‘Where it goes from here we’ll have to see,’ he said. Mr. McConnell’s support will be key to securing sufficient GOP support. All Democrats and at least 10 Republicans would need to support legislation for it to pass.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) said he, too, is supportive of overhauling the ECA, but he warned that doing so doesn’t eliminate the need to address voting access, campaign finance and redistricting, issues at the center of the failed Democratic legislation.
‘We’ll have to see what they come up with,’ Mr. Schumer said of Ms. Collins’s group. ‘Just doing ECA is not sufficient. It may be necessary, but not sufficient.’
The Electoral Count Act governs how Congress counts and certifies presidential election results. Critics say it allows for members of Congress to dispute election results without legitimate evidence and doesn’t provide the necessary safeguards to make sure the election results are accurate. They say one change would be to clarify the role of the vice president and eliminate any ambiguity about his or her ability to change an outcome.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“Teachers are picking up slack for absent colleagues. They're covering for unfilled positions. And 55% of them say they will leave teaching sooner than they had originally planned, according to a poll of its members by the nation's largest teachers union.
The National Education Association poll, conducted in January, helps quantify the stress being placed on educators right now. It found that the number who say they'll leave the profession sooner has risen significantly since August. Among the NEA poll's other findings:
90% of its members say that feeling burned out is a serious problem.
86% say they have seen more educators leaving the profession or retiring early since the start of the pandemic.
80% report that unfilled job openings have led to more work obligations for those left.
‘Last summer, I started traveling across the country,’ says Becky Pringle, president of the NEA, which has nearly 3 million members, talking about the impetus for the survey. ‘Without exception, every stop I made, from Kentucky to Oakland, I heard those similar stories of educators who were exhausted, overwhelmed, feeling unloved, disrespected.’
The poll found a racial gap in discontent: 62% of Black teachers and 59% of Hispanic teachers say they will leave earlier than planned, compared with 55% overall. But the desire to leave the profession was at similar levels for rookies, midcareer educators and those closer to retirement….
Of course, saying that you're thinking about leaving, or reporting the perception that others are leaving, is not the same as actually putting in your notice. Still, the Bureau of Labor Statistics says there are 567,000 fewer educators in America's public schools today than there were before the pandemic. And the NEA's analysis of BLS data indicates that 43% of jobs posted are going unfilled.
When it comes to solutions, the NEA says money is uppermost in its members' minds. They support raising salaries and hiring more people. Pringle says the union has been amplifying the Biden administration's message that American Rescue Plan money — $122 billion in federal aid to K-12 schools — can and should be used to improve pay and create new positions.” Read more at NPR
“Hundreds of Native American tribes that have suffered disproportionately high addiction and death rates during the opioid epidemic agreed Tuesday to a tentative settlement of $590 million with Johnson & Johnson and the country’s three largest drug distributors.
Together with a deal struck in the fall between the distributors and the Cherokee Nation for $75 million, the tribes will be paid a total of $665 million. Purdue Pharma has already committed at least tens of millions more to the tribes in a settlement that is in mediation.
‘We are not solving the opioid crisis with this settlement, but we are getting critical resources to tribal communities to help address the crisis,’ said Steven Skikos, a top lawyer for the tribes.” Read more at Boston Globe
“The federal government’s $800 billion Paycheck Protection Program ended up subsidizing business owners more than workers, researchers found.” Read more at New York Times
“Senator Ben Ray Luján, a New Mexico Democrat, suffered a stroke, temporarily threatening Democrats’ control of the chamber. He’s expected to fully recover.” Read more at New York Times
“Bridgewater College in Virginia has cancelled classes Wednesday after two campus officers were shot and killed , a stunning act of violence at a school that was ranked last year as the safest in the state. Campus Police Officer John Painter and Campus Safety Officer J.J. Jefferson, known as a ‘dynamic duo,’ were fatally shot during what Virginia State Police called a ‘brief interaction’ with the suspect Tuesday. According to authorities, campus officers responded to a call of a suspicious male around 1:20 p.m. The suspect fled campus on foot after shooting both officers and was captured by police by 2 p.m. ‘This is a sad and dark day for Bridgewater College,’ David Bushman, the school's president, wrote in a statement to the campus community. Virginia Gov. Glenn Younkin also released a statement, ordering flags to be flown at half-staff Wednesday.” Read more at USA Today
“Former Miami Dolphins coach Brian Flores has filed a proposed class-action lawsuit against the NFL and three of its teams, alleging racial discrimination by the league's teams in hiring practices.” Read more at USA Today
“A former lecturer at the University of California, Los Angeles, was arrested after police say he sent an 800-page manifesto riddled with violent threats to former colleagues.” Read more at USA Today
“Key swing vote Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia offered a grim update on the status of President Joe Biden's Build Back Better act, calling it ‘dead.’ This is another blow to Biden's remaining domestic agenda after the legislation hit a wall with no clear path forward following months of negotiations. Democrats, however, remain hopeful to eventually pass some kind of scaled-back version of the legislation. Manchin has raised concerns over inflation and said that passing a government spending bill ‘has to be done first.’ Since Senate Democrats control only a narrow 50-50 partisan split and need the support of every single member of their caucus, Manchin has an outsized influence over the process and the ability to stop the act from moving forward altogether. With Build Back Better stalled, lawmakers are now turning their attention to other pressing agenda items, including an upcoming government funding deadline on February 18.” Read more at CNN
“Donald Trump has more than $122 million in his political war chest, federal filings show. The former president hasn’t definitively announced a run for the White House in 2024. An estimated $105 million of that haul is in a PAC that has donated to 41 candidates Trump has endorsed in 2022 federal races. The new political financing comes as a number of major companies, including Goldman Sachs and Comcast, resumed giving to Republicans who voted against certifying President Biden’s victory after Trump supporters attacked the Capitol on Jan. 6 last year.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“‘This is a tragic day in the city of Richfield’: One student was killed and another critically injured in a shooting near the front entrance to a suburban Minneapolis school, authorities said. Police arrested two suspects.” Read more at USA Today
“At least 14 historically black colleges and universities received bomb threats this week -- the beginning of Black History Month -- disrupting campus operations. Southern University, Spelman College, Howard University, Albany State University, Bethune-Cookman University and Bowie State University were among those that received bomb threats, which prompted lockdowns and shelter in place orders. Classes were canceled and university operations were temporarily suspended to assess the situation. The FBI and local authorities are investigating to determine the credibility of the threats. Students are weighing in about the disturbing situation. ‘I'm just tired of being terrorized like how my grandparents were,’ said Spelman College student Saigan Boyd.” Read more at CNN
“A funeral will be held Wednesday at New York's St. Patrick's Cathedral for Officer Wilbert Mora, one of two NYPD officers who were fatally shot in an incident last month . Mora, 27, and Detective Jason Rivera, 22, were killed Jan. 21 as they responded to a domestic dispute call in Harlem. A wake for Mora was held Tuesday. It was the latest in a spate of shootings of officers that has left New York and its public safety officials reeling as they search for answers to address crime in the city. Thousands of officers attended the funeral last week for Rivera, who joined the force in November 2020 and was one of the youngest New York police officers killed in the line of duty, the New York Times reported.” Read more at USA Today
“Global electric-vehicle sales — battery electric and plug-in hybrids combined — more than doubled last year to 6.6 million vehicles, Ben Geman writes in Axios Generate.
They accounted for 8.6% of global light-duty vehicle sales, compared to 2.5% in 2019, according to the International Energy Agency.
Analysts see another growth surge this year, with research firm BloombergNEF projecting over 10.5 million in sales.” Read more at Axios
Police investigate a six-vehicle crash involving a FedEx truck in Cerritos, Calif., on Jan. 5. Photo: Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
“The U.S. recorded its highest spike in traffic deaths since at least 1975, reports Axios' Jacob Knutson.
An estimated 31,720 people died in motor vehicle traffic crashes in the stretch between January and September 2021, up 12% from 2020.
Fatalities increased in 38 states, the Transportation Department projected.
‘This is a national crisis,’ Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said.
‘We cannot and must not accept these deaths as an inevitable part of everyday life.’
The U.S. released its first-ever National Roadway Safety Strategy last week, calling for better safety standards in vehicles.
That includes automatic emergency braking and pedestrian automatic emergency braking.
The bottom line: Developments in vehicle automation and assisted driving may be years if not decades away, Axios' Joann Muller reports.” Read more at Axios
“The number of Black immigrants in the U.S. has soared 475% over the last 40 years, Axios' Russell Contreras writes from a new Pew report.
Why it matters: The report highlights the oft-overlooked diversity of the nation's Black population.
By 2060, around one-third of the U.S. Black population will be foreign-born if current trends continue.
Africa accounts for the fastest growth in the U.S. Black immigrant population. The Caribbean remains the largest origin region.
Don't forget: The number of U.S. Latinos identifying as multiracial skyrocketed during the last decade, according to the latest census.
The dramatic shift in racial identity among Latinos came after the census offered more options in 2020, giving Latinos the opportunity to officially embrace Indigenous and Black backgrounds.” Read more at Axios
“24% — The share of Americans who reported they were ‘not too happy’ in life last year, according to survey data gathered by University of Chicago researchers. As the pandemic grinds into its third year, some folks are experiencing what experts term “resilience fatigue,” leading many to feel dejected or ready to give up on their goals. (Others are simply buying boats…see next item.)
$49.3 billion — The total value of U.S. sales of boats, marine products and services in 2020, the National Marine Manufacturers Association said. Now, as the business booms, the second-largest owner of U.S. marinas, Centerbridge Partners, is acquiring the third-largest owner, Westrec Marinas, to create a $2.5 billion company.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“The tracking devices have been showing up in police reports, sparking personal-security concerns. Apple published an AirTag safety guide last week and, in December, unveiled a Tracker Detector app for Android users who, unlike their iPhone counterparts, don’t get automatic alerts about nearby AirTags. Other brands’ tracking devices also are sometimes used for covert monitoring. Apple declined to comment on the severity of AirTag snooping or the scope of its response.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“Here’s a jolt: Coffee prices are on the rise.
Arabica coffee futures closed Tuesday at $2.37 a pound, but if you want to clutch your mug and feel real jitters, note that they finished 2021 up 76%, the largest annual percentage gain since 2010. Brazil, the top growing region on the planet, experienced a drought and then frost. Higher global shipping and freight costs also played a role.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“At least 23 people have died and nearly 50 were injured after heavy rainfall triggered a landslide on Monday in Quito, Ecuador. Authorities are warning the death toll could rise as workers continue to remove debris, according to Quito's mayor. The storm that triggered the landslide dropped the largest amount of rainfall the capital has seen in almost two decades, the mayor said. Videos posted to social media showed residents screaming for help as a muddy river flowed through the streets of Quito, carrying trees, vehicles, dumpsters and electricity poles, Reuters reported.” Read more at CNN
“Denmark became the first EU country to lift restrictions on Covid-19, which it says is no longer ‘a socially critical disease.’” Read more at AP / Jan M. Olsen
West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin said the Build Back Better bill is “dead.”
“Guinea-Bissau’s attempted coup. Gunfire erupted in the capital of Guinea-Bissau on Tuesday, sparking fears of a coup just a week after military forces seized control in Burkina Faso. According to President Umaro Sissoco Embaló, unidentified armed gunmen attacked the government palace in a deadly attempted coup. ‘Our republican defense and security forces were able to stop this evil,’ he told reporters after, while insisting that the situation was ‘under control.’
Guinea-Bissau has a long history of coups: since gaining independence in 1974, the country has undergone four successful takeovers and more than a dozen failed coups. After initial reports of gunfire were released Tuesday, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) denounced the attack. ‘ECOWAS condemns the coup attempt and holds the military responsible,’ the bloc said.” Read more at Foreign Policy
“FBI recommends burner phones. As the Beijing Winter Olympics approach, the FBI is advising athletes and visitors to use burner phones at the Games, amid ongoing security concerns over a health app that all attendees are required to download. While the FBI ‘is not aware of any specific cyber threat against the Olympics,’ the agency said, it ‘urges all athletes to keep their personal cell phones at home and use a temporary phone.’” Read more at Foreign Policy
“Syria’s humanitarian crisis. Heavy snowfall and plummeting temperatures are creating dire conditions for displaced people in Syrian camps, according to U.N. officials. In January alone, the organization said, snowstorms destroyed nearly 1,000 tents while damaging more than 9,500 others. Two babies have died from the harsh weather, while another child was killed after snow caused a tent to collapse.
‘It is incomprehensible that any child should face the winter scared for their life,’ Save the Children, a humanitarian organization, said in a statement. ‘Almost 11 years after the crisis in Syria started, it feels like the world has forgotten about children in North West Syria.’” Read more at Foreign Policy
“Journalist deaths in Mexico. Four journalists were killed in Mexico in January alone, an alarming spate of murders that has highlighted the country’s perilous media landscape and sparked nationwide protests. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, Mexico was one of the deadliest countries for media workers in 2021, along with India.” Read more at Foreign Policy
“India’s digital currency push. India is preparing to launch a digital rupee by April 2023, making it the latest country to embrace digital currencies. New Delhi will be joining a short list of other nations—including China, Sweden, Nigeria, and South Korea—who have also experimented with their own central bank digital currencies.” Read more at Foreign Policy
“In order to combat littering, one Swedish startup is recruiting crows to remove cigarette butts from the streets of Södertälje, Sweden. Research suggests that the birds have the same reasoning abilities as seven-year-old children, making them highly suited for the job, the company said. As part of the training, each bird will receive a tasty morsel of food in exchange for picking up a cigarette butt. ‘They are wild birds taking part on a voluntary basis,’ said Christian Günther-Hanssen, the startup’s founder.’” Read more at Foreign Policy
Photo: Andre Chung, Bell Visuals
‘Guerilla projectionists’ from The Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong emblazoned these taunting images on China's embassy in D.C. on Monday night. Read more at Axios
Photo: Andre Chung, Bell Visuals
“Tennis star Serena Williams and NBK Capital Partners joined a growing number of investors in African startups seeking to take advantage of a tech and innovative-finance boom on the continent.” Read more at Bloomberg
“Lives Lived: Alan A. Stone trained as a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst and taught at Harvard Law School, where he challenged psychiatry’s use in public policy. He died at 92.” Read more at USA Today
“Milltown, N.J., is without its beloved weather predictor this Groundhog's Day. Milltown Mel, who has told Garden State residents whether winter will be six weeks longer for years, died just before the holiday.” Read more at NPR
Harriette and Harry Moore in Fort Lauderdale in the late '40s. Photo: The Washington Post via Getty Images
“Florida civil rights leaders Harry T. and Harriette Moore have been nominated by Rep. Charlie Crist (D-Fla.) for the Presidential Medal of Freedom, Ben Montgomery writes for Axios Tampa Bay.
The educators founded the first Brevard County NAACP in 1934, protested lynchings and police brutality in Florida, and helped register more than 100,000 Black voters, Crist writes to President Biden.
A bomb exploded under the Moores' bed on Christmas Day, 1951, killing them both. Their murders were never solved.
Harry Moore ‘laid the groundwork for the modern civil rights movement,’ Bill Gary, former head of the Brevard NAACP, told NPR.” Read more at Axios
Photo: ‘The Late Show with Stephen Colbert’
“ABC News President Kim Godwin last night suspended Whoopi Goldberg from ‘The View’ for two weeks ‘for her wrong and hurtful comments’ she made on the show about Jews and the Holocaust:
‘While Whoopi has apologized, I’ve asked her to take time to reflect and learn about the impact of her comments.’
On Monday's episode, Goldberg made the comments during a discussion of a Tennessee school district's decision to ban ‘Maus,’ a Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel depicting the horrors of the Holocaust.
‘Well, this is white people doing it to white people, so y'all gonna fight amongst yourselves,’ Goldberg said.
Goldberg told Stephen Colbert during a previously scheduled appearance on CBS' ‘The Late Show’: ‘I thought it was a salient discussion because as a Black person, I think of race as being something that I can see. So I see you, and I know what race you are.’
‘I felt that it was really more about man's inhumanity to man.’
‘I don't want to fake-apologize, you know. I'm very upset that people ... misunderstood what I was saying. ... I did a lot of harm, I guess, to myself. ... Folks are angry. I accept that. And I did it to myself.’” Read more at Axios
“A day after saying he was evaluating his options concerning his future, Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady officially retired from the NFL.” Read more at USA Today
“Tom Brady — who retired as the best QB in NFL history, and one of the greatest athletes ever — was so good for so long that ESPN argued he had three Hall of Fame careers in one, Kendall Baker writes for Axios Sports:
The underdog (2000-06): Three Super Bowls, two Super Bowl MVPs, three Pro Bowls.
The GOAT (2007-13): Two NFL MVPs, six Pro Bowls, two First-Team All-Pros.
The Immortal (2014-20): Four Super Bowls, three Super Bowl MVPs, one NFL MVP, five Pro Bowls, one First-Team All-Pro.” Read more at Axios