- Disgraced former president Trump saying he would have gotten a better seat at the Queen’s funeral. Just some normal ex-president stuff to be mad about!

After what appeared to be a turning point in Ukraine’s favor earlier this month, Russia began a stunning, embarrassing retreat from northeastern Ukraine, and the world waited to see what Russian President Vladimir Putin would do next. In the past 36 hours, we’ve got our answer. 
 

• Four Ukrainian regions occupied entirely or in part by Russia will hold “referendums” on joining Russia according to Russian state news media, a move widely seen as a prelude to annexation and a probable escalation of the war. Annexation of occupied territory is a precedent Putin set with Crimea in 2014 following a referendum that was summarily dismissed as a sham in the West, but one that Putin used to justify his threat to wage total war if Ukraine sought to retake the peninsula. This latest move to hold sham referenda comes as Russia faces heavy setbacks on the battlefield and prepares for an intensifying Ukrainian counterattack. The Kremlin is desperate to hold on to the few regions it was successful in overtaking. 
   

• State-controlled Russian media, of course, is reporting that Ukrainians in these regions do not want Russia to leave. So, one by one, Moscow-installed officials in four Ukrainian regions announced plans to hold referendum votes beginning on Friday. U.S. officials have warned for months that the use of sham referenda to try to legitimize the illegal annexation of different parts of Ukraine was a possibility, and now those exact circumstances have come to fruition. Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, the deputy head of Russia’s Security Council chaired by Putin, said such measures that fold regions into Russia itself would make redrawn frontiers “irreversible” and enable Moscow to use “any means” to defend them. Oh good!
   

• Another signal pointing to Russian escalation is that the Kremlin-controlled lower house of parliament voted today to intensify laws against desertion, surrender, and looting by Russian troops. Lower-house lawmakers also voted to introduce a possible 10 year prison sentence for soldiers who refuse to fight. Both are expected to be approved by the upper house and then signed by Putin. So Putin will get to say: “Morale issue? What morale issue?” as all of his soldiers stare down the barrel of a decade in prison if they don’t march headlong into battle.

The conflict will only get messier from here.
 

• In a statement from Putin today, he blasted what he described as U.S. efforts to preserve its global domination or “hegemony in global affairs” and ordered Kremlin officials to boost weapons production immediately as their war on Ukraine rages on. This furthers Putin’s longtime narrative that his decision to invade Ukraine was a response to Western encroachment. Look, has the U.S. intervened in foreign wars with the implicit goal of preserving its prominence as a world power? Yes, many times; but this isn’t one of them. In a separate speech on military industries, Putin encouraged Russian ballistics manufacturers to study Western weapons to improve their own. 
   

• This morning at the 77th United Nations General Assembly, which was held in person for the first time in three years, controversial Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan addressed the gathered world leaders, portraying himself as a mediator in Russia’s war on Ukraine. In an interview with PBS NewsHour yesterday, Erdogan called on Russia to return captured territory, including Crimea, while being careful not to criticize Putin. In the same interview, he said that Putin gave him the impression that “he’s willing to end this as soon as possible,” when the two recently met in Uzbekistan. Sorry my man, but something tells me you may have been duped, or you’re trying to dupe the rest of us. 

Happy National Voter Registration Day! (And no it’s not one of our made-up holidays, it’s a real one OK?!). It’s a good day to register, double-check that you’re registered and then help register the important people in your lives. It literally takes 2 minutes (or less!). Let's do this, no excuses! 

Visit votesaveamerica.com/beavoter to make your plan to vote, and donate to the Every Last Vote fund to directly support the work of organizers and volunteers in key swing states that are actively working to battle disenfranchisement in communities of color.

The Justice Department has charged 47 defendants for allegedly defrauding a federal program meant to provide food for needy children during the pandemic. DOJ described the scheme, which totaled nearly $250 million, as the largest of its kind to date. The defendants comprise a network of individuals and organizations tied to the Minnesota nonprofit Feeding Our Future, which federal prosecutors allege obtained federal pandemic funds in the names of children who do not exist, then spent that money on luxury cars, houses, and other personal extravagences. To run the scheme, defendants relied on a complex web of shell companies and bribes, and created a list of fake children, populated with names generated from the website “listofrandomnames.com.” Come ON you guys. With the money in hand, some of the defendants bought property in Minnesota, Kenya, and Turkey, luxury cars, and jewelry, leading the Justice Department to repeatedly describe the theft as “brazen.” Couldn’t have said it better ourselves.

The head of the United Nations told world leaders today at the U.N. General Assembly that nations are “gridlocked in colossal global dysfunction,” and aren’t ready or willing to tackle the massive challenges threatening the future of humanity and the planet. Sounds bad!

Iran faces international criticism over the murder of a Kurdish woman, 22-year-old Masha Amini, at the hands of the country’s “morality police” who enforce Iran’s ultraconservative dress codes for women.  

A new court filing and accompanying video evidence related to the breach of the Coffee County, GA, voting system in 2021 shows that then-county Republican Party Chair Cathy Latham lied in her sworn deposition, and that she personally gave unauthorized access to the voting machines. 

Eight people were rushed to hospitals after an explosion tore through the top floor of a four-story Chicago apartment building. 

A Texas sheriff has opened a criminal investigation of Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) and his inhumane political stunt last week in which his administration flew 50 Venezuelan asylum seekers to Martha’s Vineyard under false pretenses. 

The city of Detroit, MI, sued the United States Census Bureau today because the Bureau refused to reveal how it produced the population loss estimates claiming that Detroit lost an additional 7,100 residents last year. 

Spreading Trump’s Big Lie helped a new generation of influencers emerge on social media. Terrifying stuff!

Responding to incumbent Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-NH) and her campaign’s focus on abortion rights, her Big Lie Guy Republican challenger Don Bolduc said, “Get over it.” Good luck with that strategy, Don!

Disgraced former president Donald Trump may have thought he’d managed to get a MAGA loyalist appointed “special master” to review the stolen federal documents FBI agents seized from Mar-a-Lago, but, whoops, nope. The Justice Department and Trump’s lawyers filed separate proposals on Monday for conducting said review, with Trump angling quite obviously to drag the process on as long as possible. But special master Raymond Dearie, a federal judge, said Tuesday that he intends to push through the review process as quickly as possible (given the volume of documents), and expressed skepticism of the Trump team’s reluctance to say whether or not Trump declassified any of the documents marked classified, as Trump has repeatedly (and ludicrously!) claimed in public. Dearie, a Ronald Reagan appointee, said that if Trump’s lawyers will not concretely assert that the records have been declassified, then he would be inclined to regard them as classified. “As far as I’m concerned,” Dearie said, “that’s the end of it.”

Why are so many dogs suffering with health issues?
 

According to world-famous actress and animal advocate Katherine Heigl, there’s a problem affecting millions of dogs across America — their food.
 

Heigl — who’s foundation has helped save over 16,000 dogs from kill shelters and place them in new homes — says she’s seeing more health issues in dogs than ever before.
 

And the problem isn’t just the food they eat — it’s what’s inside it.
 

Cheap ingredients and poor cooking methods can lead to joint problems, mushy poops, bad odors, itchy skin, and a host of other unexplained issues.
 

Fortunately, there are things we dog owners can do.
 

“What we’re seeing is that there are special foods and herbs that do wonders for a dog’s health. We call them canine superfoods,” says Heigl.
 

“If your dog has any of these issues, you want to get these superfoods into their diet immediately.”
 

Katherine Heigl shares her exact health boosting method along with step-by-step instructions for how to do it at home.
 

Enjoy this special offer for our readers and click here to save up to 44% now. Your dog will thank you!  

Much-needed rain storms are passing through central and northern California, bringing rare September precipitation to the drought-stricken regions. Let’s give it up for rain!
 

The Biden Administration has released state-by-state data showing estimates of how many borrowers will be eligible for student loan forgiveness under their plan, and the numbers are big.


Lawsuits filed in South Carolina to stop the removal of memorials to Confederate leaders and pro-slavery lawmakers like John C. Calhoun in Charleston, SC, have been dropped. Descendants of the Confederacy, like their ancestors, seem to take a while to understand when they’ve lost.