* For your consideration: Assassinate Putin, international law be damned.
* Would Hitler have been allowed to keep access to SWIFT?
* The worst thing that happened Thursday not on the ground in Ukraine: President Biden, asked about the sanctions, said this:
“Let’s have a conversation in another month or so to see if they’re working.”
* Raise your hand if you find this video reassuring:
* If the resistance is predicated on saving Ukraine’s independence and freedom via civilians making Molotov cocktails….
* What if Putin plans to take Kiev right before President Biden delivers the State of the Union address?
* This New York Times story is very troubling on several levels:
Over three months, senior Biden administration officials held half a dozen urgent meetings with top Chinese officials in which the Americans presented intelligence showing Russia’s troop buildup around Ukraine and beseeched the Chinese to tell Russia not to invade, according to U.S. officials.
Each time, the Chinese officials, including the foreign minister and the ambassador to the United States, rebuffed the Americans, saying they did not think an invasion was in the works. After one diplomatic exchange in December, U.S. officials got intelligence showing Beijing had shared the information with Moscow, telling the Russians that the United States was trying to sow discord — and that China would not try to impede Russian plans and actions, the officials said.
The previously unreported talks between American and Chinese officials show how the Biden administration tried to use intelligence findings and diplomacy to persuade a superpower it views as a growing adversary to stop the invasion of Ukraine, and how that nation, led by President Xi Jinping, persistently sided with Russia even as the evidence of Moscow’s plans for a military offensive grew over the winter.
* If giving Putin second thoughts is predicated on tough statements at the United Nations….
* If Poland decides to close the border (or the Russians shut it down…)….
* I really don’t want to write a word about Donald Trump’s comments about Putin until the war ends, but Rich Lowry has no such reluctance.
* The journalistic competition to be the first to report that President Biden has (probably) chosen Ketanji Brown Jackson for the Supreme Court and will (probably) announce his decision Friday is not very germane in this moment, as historic as the selection will be.
* At 9am ET, President Biden plans to conduct a virtual meeting with NATO leaders, while the Psaki briefing is scheduled for 2pm ET.
* Essential reading on Ukraine: None that will survive the bombing and murders.
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WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration will significantly loosen federal mask-wearing guidelines to protect against COVID-19 transmission on Friday, according to two people familiar with the matter, meaning most Americans will no longer be advised to wear masks in indoor public settings.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Friday will announce a change to the metrics it uses to determine whether to recommend face coverings, shifting from looking at COVID-19 case counts to a more holistic view of risk from the coronavirus to a community. Under current guidelines, masks are recommended for people residing in communities of substantial or high transmission — roughly 95% of U.S. counties, according to the latest data.
The new metrics will still consider caseloads, but also take into account hospitalizations and local hospital capacity, which have been markedly improved during the emergence of the omicron variant. That strain is highly transmissible, but indications are that it is less severe than earlier strains, particularly for people who are fully vaccinated and boosted. Under the new guidelines, the vast majority of Americans will no longer live in areas where indoor masking in public is recommended, based on current data.
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