Secretary of State Antony Blinken has called off a scheduled Thursday meeting in Geneva with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, CNN’s Natasha Bertrand reports. “Now that we see the invasion is beginning,” it doesn’t make sense to talk anymore, Blinken wrote in a letter to Lavrov.

MAGA radio hosts Clay Travis and Butt Buck Sexton interviewed their Orange God Emperor at Mar-a-Lago on Tuesday, asking him what he thought of the situation in Ukraine. Just ignore all the whining and bullshit and read to the part where the former President, who was definitely never a big fan of Vladimir Putin shows himself to be a big fan of Vladimir Putin:

Buck: Mr. President, in the last 24 hours we know Russia has said that they are recognizing two breakaway regions of Ukraine, and now this White House is stating that this is an ‘invasion.’ That’s a strong word. What went wrong here? What has the current occupant of the Oval Office done that he could have done differently?

PRESIDENT TRUMP: Well, what went wrong was a rigged election and what went wrong is a candidate that shouldn’t be there and a man that has no concept of what he’s doing. I went in yesterday and there was a television screen, and I said, “This is genius.” Putin declares a big portion of the Ukraine — of Ukraine. Putin declares it as independent. Oh, that’s wonderful.

So Putin is now saying, “It’s independent,” a large section of Ukraine. I said, “How smart is that?” And he’s gonna go in and be a peacekeeper. That’s strongest peace force… We could use that on our southern border. That’s the strongest peace force I’ve ever seen. There were more army tanks than I’ve ever seen. They’re gonna keep peace all right. No, but think of it. Here’s a guy who’s very savvy… I know him very well. Very, very well.

By the way, this never would have happened with us. Had I been in office, not even thinkable. This would never have happened. But here’s a guy that says, you know, “I’m gonna declare a big portion of Ukraine independent,” he used the word “independent,” “and we’re gonna go out and we’re gonna go in and we’re gonna help keep peace.” You gotta say that’s pretty savvy. And you know what the response was from Biden? There was no response. They didn’t have one for that. No, it’s very sad. Very sad.

Biden announced a set of massive sanctions against Russia on Tuesday and will continue to escalate the penalties for Putin and his oligarchs should more violence break out.

Florida state Rep Joe Harding dropped a proposed amendment to the state’s “Don’t say Gay” bill which would have required schools to notify parents if their kid came out of the closet within six weeks, WFLA reports. The amendment led to fears that children could be subject to abuse, neglect or abandonment by homophobic parents, and also raises the question of how the fuck is it the state’s business to police how a kids sexual orientation is handled.

The bill itself is still insane bullshit, prohibiting teachers from explaining to kids younger than ten what homosexuality is, also allowing parents to sue teachers for not telling parents about any “critical decisions affecting a student’s mental, emotional, or physical health or wellbeing,” which is awfully vague – almost as if Republicans want to discourage any sort of healthy discussion about gender and sexuality issues in the classroom and leave it up to the internet.

The Russian Parliament approved Vladimir Putin’s request to authorize the use of military force outside of the Federation’s borders on Tuesday, a perfunctory move to give “legal” cover to the open war which can start at any point now, the Associated Press reports

The Biden Administration’s sanctions package is expected to feature export controls on Russian companies with alleged military ties and deny Russians access to global technology, including electronics and computers, Reuters military and intel correspondent Phil Stewart reports

“If properly handled, there was absolutely no reason that the situation currently happening in Ukraine should have happened at all. I know Vladimir Putin very well, and he would have never done during the Trump Administration what he is doing now, no way!” and blah blah blah says the Orange Screamsicle in a statement, at no point in which does he express any sympathy toward the people of Ukraine or actually condemn Putin’s attack on a sovereign state. It’s all just bitching about Biden.

The fat bastard must be awfully upset the botched launch of his own social media network – one that he’s promised for over a year now – and the crowd of cultists assembled outside of Mar-a-Lago wishing him a Happy President’s Day were pushed out of the news by Putin’s actions.

I may be the first officially "cancelled" Truth Social user. https://t.co/p1uqbdKTnX

— Matt Ortega (@MattOrtega) February 22, 2022

White Georgia hicks William Roddie Bryan, Travis McMichael, and Gregory McMichael were convicted Tuesday of a federal hate crime in the February 2020 murder of 25 year old Black man Ahmaud Arbery, the Daily Beast reports. The three men were convicted of the murder in November 2021 and sentenced to life in state prison – with only Bryan given the possibility of parole.

This long, insufferable piece by the Federalist’s Rachel Bovard is a sight to behold. Gems like “The rollout has been beset with not only a few bugs, but more than a few people lying in wait to call out the app’s flaws. Among them are right-leaning, self-described free-market groups – the ones who make their living telling critics of Big Tech to ‘build their own’ while defending the status quo as perfectly acceptable,” and “the pro-free market groups on the right will be there to justify Truth Social’s demise just as they sniffed condescendingly at its entry,” shine throughout the medium-long read that could’ve ran shorter if they’d simply written “Trump will be a victim, again, of the nihilistic savagery of the free market that we love but only when it owns the libs.”

In response to Russian aggression in Ukraine, on Tuesday, Germany has halted the certification process for the Nord Stream 2 pipeline which funnels fuel through the Baltic Sea to Germany, cutting off a key source of cash for Russia, Reuters reports.

Despite claims from US conservative, the Nord Stream 2 pipeline has not begun to transport gas from Russia to Germany, and Germany’s decision to not open the value on the pipeline continues will not ease high fuel costs in Western Europe.

“Welcome to the new world where Europeans will soon have to pay 2,000 euros per thousand cubic metres!” former Russian president and deputy chairman of its Security Council Dmitry Medvedev.  That’s a doubling in the price of gas.

The US Supreme Court officially rejected Trump’s petition for a writ of certiorari in his case against the House January 6th Select Committee on Tuesday. While this had been expected because the court had already denied his petition for a stay last month, the ruling shuts the door on any further challenges to the committee’s work obtaining records from the National Archives.

Since for whatever reason back in December Moscow Mitch declined to put together an official platform for the 2022 midterms, National Republican Senate Campaign Committee chair Senator Rick Scott went ahead and debuted his own 11 point unofficial platform titled “Rescue America” on Tuesday. It’s the usual eye-roll inducing culture war, small government bullshit, but one point that hilariously sticks out is Scott’s line on border security, written with a gusto of inevitability.

“We will secure our border, finish building the wall, and name it after President Donald Trump.
Nations have borders. We should give that a try. President Trump’s plan to build a wall was right. We welcome those who want to join us in building the American dream, immigrants who want to be Americans, not change America. We are a stronger nation because we are a nation of immigrants, but immigration without assimilation makes us weaker. Politicians from both parties talk big about border security and do nothing. We are done with that,” says the platform statement, as if Biden would sign such a law happily without a compromise like Medicare for All or DC statehood in exchange for building a towering monument to the glory of the Orange Pharaoh.

pic.twitter.com/3KGLl7MYFc

— U.S. Embassy Kyiv (@USEmbassyKyiv) February 22, 2022

On Monday Social psychologists Benjamin Ruisch of the University of Kent in England and Melissa Ferguson of Yale University published the combined results of 13 studies showing that Trump fans got more racist during his presidency. “In 13 studies including over 10,000 participants, we tested how Americans’ prejudice changed following the political ascension of Donald Trump. We found that explicit racial and religious prejudice significantly increased amongst Trump’s supporters, whereas individuals opposed to Trump exhibited decreases in prejudice. Further, changing social norms appear to explain these changes in prejudice. These results suggest that Trump’s presidency coincided with a substantial change in the topography of prejudice in the United States,” the researchers wrote, scientifically confirming what we already knew.

The US Women’s National Team (USWNT) players have won a $24 million settlement against the US Soccer Federation in their March 2019 equal pay discrimination lawsuit, Axios reports.

Said the parties in a joint statement: “We are pleased to announce that, contingent on the negotiation of a new collective bargaining agreement, we will have resolved our longstanding dispute over equal pay and proudly stand together in a shared commitment to advancing equality in soccer. Getting to this day has not been easy. The U.S. Women’s National Team players have achieved unprecedented success while working to achieve equal pay for themselves and future athletes. Today, we recognize the legacy of the past USWNT leaders who helped to make this day possible, as well as all of the women and girls who will follow. Together, we dedicate this moment to them. We look forward to continuing to work together to grow women’s soccer and advance opportunities for young girls and women in the United States and across the globe.”

THE LATEST, 2/22/22 9:43 AM EST: The AP reports the Biden Administration has deemed the Russian incursion into Ukraine an invasion, teeing up a strong sanctions package.

Republican candidate for the Senate seat for Ohio Josh Mandel had a dramatic performance at a debate against Democratic candidate Morgan Harper. At one point, an obviously fake-indignant Mandel tells a disruptive audience member dare NOT talk to him about race because he’s a Marine dammit and there is no race in the Marine Corps and he cared for all his men regardless of race, so you just sit down, lady!

Hank the Tank, a 500-pound bear in the South Lake Tahoe, California is responsible for at least 28 home break ins in the area during the last seven months, NPR reports.

Hank would gain access to the house by crushing garage doors, destroying front doors, and in other cases, crawling through windows. Hank has become “severely food-habituated bear,” a spokesperson for the California Department of Fish and Wildlife explained, meaning he’s no longer scared of humans and associates humans with access to food.

Last week, the quarter-ton critter made it’s way through the suburban neighborhood and crawled through the bottom window of a door to get access to the house.  According to the police department, two officers two officers “banged on the exterior of the home until he popped out a back door.”

The motion to affirm the Trudeau government’s decision to invoke the Emergency Act amid right wing anti-vax protests got the thumbs up from Canadian House of Commons on Monday by a 185 to 151 vote, extending the state of emergency continues amid the squeals of “fascism” from the clustertruckers who were routed from Ottawa on Sunday, the CBC reports.