If Trump is a fascist, can the same thing be said about Putin?

Drinking very tasty bottle of wine from the Nathaniel Rose winery on Leelenau Peninsula in Michigan. The winery is without pretense to say the least, but the wine is superb. I have to thank Terry Albano who shared the cost of the bottle, but will not enjoy the taste of this Michigan wine. I live in the Bronx; she lives in Chicago.

I saw Hillary on Morning Joe today. I didn’t agree with everything she said, but when she is on point, there are few better at articulating, clearly and logically, a point of view on this or that issue.

The massive lines, stretching for miles, to pass the Queen’s casket at Westminister Hall suggest, I would think, that the person of Elizabeth, not so much the monarchy, represents in the minds of many some degree of stability and predictability in a world riven by deep crises and unforeseen, life altering changes.

That one country is fighting to defend its independence and right to self determination and the other led by an imperialist minded racist anti-democratic demagogue – is Trump any worse? – is attempting to deny that right by military means remains unsaid in too much of the left converage of the Ukraine-Russia war.

That ommision ranks on my irritation barometer at the same level as the insistence by these same writers that the two sides should negotiate a settlement, but never add that a just peace must include the restoration of Ukraine’s full soveignty over all of its territory.