prior probability

I know, I know, the capitol fence is only a temporary one, but regardless of its transiency, it’s a “bad look” for the world’s oldest republic!

Check out this excellent essay by Tom McTague, a London-based staff writer at The Atlantic. Among other things, McTague compares and contrasts the bravery of Ukraine with the shameful and calculating cowardice of her pusillanimous NATO allies. Below the fold is an extended excerpt from McTague’s essay — links in the original; hat tip: Eugene Volokh.

Why hasn’t the Russian Federation been expelled from the United Nations yet? For further information about this question, see here and here.

Update: Hey, at least FIFA has banned the Russian national team from this year’s World Cup!

Bye bye, February! In honor of the shortest month of the year, below is a brief listing of my most succinct scholarly works:

1. Kant on Evidence: A Hypothetical Reply to Kerr, a three-paragraph comment letter published in the summer 2019 issue of my favorite law review, The Green Bag.
2. Research Fraud as Tort, a comment letter published in the Sept. 25, 2015 issue of the journal Science (also three paragraphs).
3. Public Trust Doctrine: Too Broad, a comment letter published in the Oct. 2, 2009 issue of Science (only two paragraphs!).

My all-time shortest contribution, however, is this one-paragraph comment letter that was published in the July 5, 2013 issue of journal Science. PS: Here is a non-gated version (see letter #4).

Although I hate to be “that guy” — and I am rooting for the Ukrainians to repel their Russian invaders — few people “north of the border” like to be reminded of the Mexican-American War (1846-1848), which was an illegal and unjustified war of aggression initiated by the USA, but the Southwest region of North America, including all of Texas and California, once belonged to Mexico (hat tip: u/Homesanto).

Putin is not the only world leader who has ordered an unjustified “special military operation” in violation of international law. The late Bush Senior ordered an old school military invasion of Panama in December 1989 in order to depose General Manuel Noriega, while his war criminal son, Little Bush (Bushito), began a costly and unjustified war in Iraq in March of 2003 under false pretenses.

(Point of order: I don’t mean to defend Putin with this post. The invasion of Ukraine is an illegal and unjustified war of aggression by any measure, much like the 2003 invasion of Iraq or the Mexican-American War of 1848. My purpose here is to condemn the USA, especially the knavish and ignoble patriarchs of the Bush family.)

Did you know the tallest standing wooden structure in Europe is the Gliwice Radio Tower (118 metres or 387 feet) and that this historic radio tower was the scene of the Gleiwitz incident on 31 August 1939? You can read about this famous “false flag” operation here, via Wikipedia, or better yet, you can watch the 1961 East German film Der Fall Gleiwitz (see below) or the 1979 Polish made-for-TV movie Operacja Himmler, both of which tell the story of the dramatic events leading up to this incident and to Germany’s invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939.