AUDIO:

POSSIBLE TOPICS: VOTETEXAS.GOV—Voter Information; REGISTER TO VOTE; APPLY FOR MAIL-IN BALLOT; Jersey Village City Council approves regulation plans for short-term rentals; Houston’s next freeway is taking shape with construction set for ‘Alvin Freeway’ near UH; EPA proposes first standards to make drinking water safer from ‘forever chemicals’; Fox News braces for more turbulence as second defamation lawsuit advances; Anonymous Sources Are Newsworthy—When They Talk to NYT, Not Seymour Hersh; How America Took Out The Nord Stream Pipeline; Turkey May Not Need Russia’s S-400 Missile Defense, Manufacturer Says; BlueWalker 3, an enormous and bright communications satellite, is genuinely alarming astronomers; More.

Thinkwing Radio with Mike Honig (@ThinkwingRadio) is now on Wednesdays at 11AM (CT) on KPFT FM-HD2, Houston’s Community Station. You can also hear the show:

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Welcome to Thinkwing Radio with Mike Honig where we discuss local, state, national, and international stories. My co-host and show editor is Andrew Ferguson.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/EwrSlzZC31w

1. Make sure you are registered to vote! VoteTexas.GOV – Texas Voter Information
   1. It;s time to snail-mail (no emails or faxes) in your application for mail-ballots, IF you qualify TEXAS SoS VOTE-BY-MAIL BALLOT APPLICATION (ALL TEXAS COUNTIES) HarrisVotes.com­ – Countywide Voting Centers, (Election Information Line (713) 755-6965), Harris County Clerk
   2. Harris County “Vote-By-Mail’ Application for 2022
      1. Fort bend County Elections/Voter Registration Machine takes you to the proper link
      2. GalvestonVotes.org (Galveston County, TX)
      3. Liberty County Elections (Liberty County, TX)
      4. Montgomery County (TX) Elections
      5. Brazoria County (TX) Clerk Election Information
      6. Waller County (TX) Elections
      7. Chambers County (TX) Elections
      8. For personalized, nonpartisan voter guides and information, Consider visiting Vote.ORG.   Ballotpedia.com and Texas League of Women Voters are also good places to get election info.
      9. If you are denied your right to vote any place at any time at any polling place for any reason, ask for (or demand) a provisional ballot rather than lose your vote.
      10. HarrisVotes.com – Countywide Voting Centers, HARRIS COUNTY – IDENTIFICATION REQUIRED FOR VOTING: Do not possess and cannot reasonably obtain one of these IDs?
          1. Fill out a declaration at the polls describing a reasonable impediment to obtaining it, and show a copy or original of one of the following supporting forms of ID:
          2. A government document that shows your name and an address, including your voter registration certificate
          3. Current utility bill
          4. Bank statement
          5. Government check
          6. Paycheck
          7. A certified domestic (from a U.S. state or territory) birth certificate or (b) a document confirming birth admissible in a court of law which establishes your identity (which may include a foreign birth document)
          8. You may vote early by-mail if:You are registered to vote and meet one of the following criteria:
             1. Away from the county of residence on Election Day and during the early voting period;
             2. Sick or disabled;
             3. 65 years of age or older on Election Day; or
             4. Confined in jail, but eligible to vote.
             5. Make sure you are registered:
             6. Ann Harris Bennett, Tax Assessor-Collector & Voter Registrar
             7. CHECK REGISTRATION STATUS HERE
             8. CLICK How to register to vote in Texas
             9. Outside Texas, try Vote.org.
2. BE REGISTERED TO VOTE, and if eligible, REMEMBER TO FILL OUT AND MAIL NEW MAIL-IN BALLOT APPLICATIONS FOR 2023.
   
   1. You can track your Mail Ballot Activity from our website with direct link provided here https://www.harrisvotes.com/Tracking
3. Jersey Village City Council approves regulation plans for short-term rentals; By Jovanna Aguilar | COMMUNITYIMPACT.COM | 9:15 AM Mar 13, 2023 CDT, Updated 9:15 AM Mar 13, 2023 CDT
   1. Jersey Village City Council members approved plans to implement regulations for short-term rentals during a meeting Feb. 27 after multiple community members expressed their concerns. …
   2. City Manager Austin Bleess said there is no regulation banning short-term rentals, so residents can sign up their homes on sites, such as Vrbo and Airbnb. …
   3. The regulations unanimously approved by City Council include implementing insurance requirements for short-term rental hosts as well as the requirement of a host’s presence on-site within an hour in the event of an emergency or police complaint. …
   4. Mayor Bobby Warren said, although the “easy” solution to the increase of short-term rentals in the Jersey Village area would be to ban them altogether, banning is not an option due to existing case laws. …
   5. Warren said, although there are limits to what can be done about short-term rentals, there are existing ordinances that restrict people from participating in unlawful activities. …
   6. He also encouraged community members to report any suspicious activity to the Jersey Village Police Department, so there can be probable cause on file to give officials the ability to act.
   7. MIKE: I understand that the term “Short-term Rentals” is usually applied to hotels, motels, and the like. As a small landlord, I tend to think of the term as meaning leases as short as 6-months.
   8. MIKE: I’ve come to really dislike “Short-term Rentals” as is now commonly used to mean Airbnb and the like, because I see them as doing nothing positive for communities and only having negative impacts. Whether it’s disturbing neighborhoods, impacting housing availability, or causing increases in rents, I think their positive impact is strictly to the property owners to the detriment of almost everyone else.
   9. MIKE: Given laws that apply to such things in general, I think that Jersey Village has come up with an interesting solution. I may have a better one: Require the owner or their agent to be on the premises at all times. This would obviously be fine for hotels and motels, but would put a serious crimp in “Short-term Rentals” as they are currently defined for public discussion.
   10. ANDREW: That’s an interesting idea. I wonder if it’s possible within the framework of case law that Jersey Village is regulating in.
   11. ANDREW: My advice for homeowners who are dealing with a nuisance homeshare like this differs from that of Mayor Warren. I say folks should record evidence of the annoying behavior from your perspective (being careful not to identify any of the renters or anyone else you don’t have permission to film) and politely ask the renters or property owner to be more considerate. If that doesn’t work, you have something you can take them to court with. This way, you don’t involve the police, which is honestly safer for everyone involved.
4. Houston’s next freeway is taking shape with construction set for ‘Alvin Freeway’ near UH; Dug Begley, Staff writer | HOUSTONCHRONICLE.COM | March 14, 2023
   1. The first step of Houston’s next freeway is taking shape, provided highway officials finalize their plans for almost $94 million worth of work along Spur 5 near the University of Houston.
   2. A project to extend the spur from its intersection with Interstate 45 to Griggs Road could start in the late spring, after bids on the project were opened last week in Austin. …
   3. The work, expected to take more than two years, will lengthen the existing Spur 5 past the UH campus and Old Spanish Trail to Griggs, about two miles south. A popular detour route along I-45 to the university campus and other points, the spur is considered a key relief route by TxDOT, and connecting it to Griggs would help divert some traffic from I-45.
   4. Eventually, TxDOT plans to extend the spur at least as far south as Dixie Drive, just south of Loop 610, with a connection to the loop. That segment, perhaps, could benefit from TxDOT’s plans to shift money to other priorities as work stalls on the major I-45 rebuild planned north of downtown Houston.
   5. For some, the work to extend the road fulfills a long-unfinished planned freeway in Houston, potentially going as far south as Alvin. Some, however, worry TxDOT and regional officials are moving too fast to build a project many in the community are unaware of.
   6. [Katrina Blest, a resident of the Fonde neighborhood tucked between I-45 and Old Spanish Trail, told the Houston-Galveston Area Council’s transportation council on Jan. 27 [that] many in the community are concerned [that] the project and the four highway-grade lanes it will create will leave them surrounded by freeways, affecting everything from air quality to bike and pedestrian access in the community.
   7. Further, some residents question the need for another freeway, following work at I-45 and Loop 610 and the use of Spur 5’s northern segment to create a new interchange at I-45 and Interstate 69. …
   8. MIKE: Between Andrew and I, I’m the driver. But in my latter-years of retirement, I’m no longer intimately familiar with roads in that part of town. However, Andrew and I agree that the article doesn’t make entirely clear if Spur 5 between 45 and 69 is a done deal, or if it’s discussing something other than what we are envisioning from the article.
   9. ANDREW: This confusion makes it difficult to know what effect the project might have on local residents. The area may already be quite isolated by major thoroughfares, which would suggest that this project wouldn’t really worsen that situation. It could, however, make it more resistant to change in the future if city planners want to reintegrate this community with the surrounding city. Whatever happens next, the local residents’ thoughts should be the top concern.
   10. REFERENCE MAP: https://maps.google.com/maps?ll=29.702093,-95.329885&z=15&t=m&hl=en&gl=US&mapclient=embed
5. EPA proposes first standards to make drinking water safer from ‘forever chemicals’; By Jen Christensen | CNN | Updated 2:35 PM EDT, Tue March 14, 2023
   1. The US Environmental Protection Agency on Tuesday proposed the first national drinking water standard for “forever chemicals” that are dangerous to human health. The move could radically affect drinking water for nearly everyone in the United States.
   2. The new rule intends to set drinking water standards for … PFAS or “forever chemicals.” PFAS are a family of ubiquitous synthetic chemicals that linger in the environment and the human body, where they can cause serious health problems.
   3. Although there are thousands of PFAS chemicals, according to the National Institutes of Health, under the rule, water systems would have to monitor for six specific chemicals, notify the public about PFAS levels and work to reduce them if levels go above the standard allowed. …
   4. The agency chose these chemicals because it has the clearest science about their impact on human health and said it is evaluating additional chemicals, as well.
   5. The EPA’s proposed limits set the allowable levels for these chemicals so low that they could not be easily detected.
   6. The proposal would regulate two chemicals, PFOA and PFOS, at 4 parts per trillion (ppt). For [four related] chemicals, the EPA proposes not one standard for each, but a limit for a mix of them.
   7. Water systems would have to determine whether the levels of these PFAS pose a potential risk. They may need to install treatment or take other action to reduce PFAS levels, the agency said, and systems may also even need to switch to different water sources.
   8. The proposal would be one of the first new chemical standards that updates the Safe Drinking Water Act since 1996. The proposed [4 parts per trillion (ppt)] standards would be much stricter than the EPA suggested in 2016, when its health advisories recommended PFAS concentrations in drinking water of no more than 70 ppt.
   9. In June, based on the latest science, the EPA issued health advisories that said the chemicals are much more hazardous to human health than scientists originally thought and are probably more dangerous even at levels thousands of times lower than previously believed.
   10. EPA Commissioner Regan established the EPA Council on PFAS as soon as he came into office in 2021.
   11. “Despite [the] previous administration’s anti-science stance which severely strained EPA financial and human capital, I charged this council with undertaking a comprehensive review of the problem and identifying solutions that we can implement immediately,” Regan said. …
   12. Now that the proposed rule is out, it will be open to a period of public comment. The EPA will take those comments into consideration and issue a final decision on the rule, expected later this year.
   13. Public water systems generally have three years from the date of the regulation to comply, the agency said. …
   14. Manufacturing of PFAS chemicals has already started to change.
   15. Manufacturer 3M recently announced it would stop making them by the end of 2025. The American Chemistry Council, an association that represents chemical makers, said that PFOA and PFOS were phased out of production by its members more than eight years ago. …
   16. A replacement that many chemical companies have been using, GenX, may also be problematic, according to the EPA. Animal studies have shown that it may affect the liver, kidneys and immune system, and it might be linked to cancer.
   17. In June, for the first time, the EPA issued final advisories for limits in drinking water of GenX, considered a replacement for PFOA, and PFBS, a replacement for PFOS: less than 10 ppt and 2,000 ppt, respectively.
   18. The Biden administration has taken some steps to help eliminate exposure to this pollution. As a part of the 2022 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, $10 billion was made available for cleanup of contaminants like PFAS in drinking water.
   19. In February, the EPA also announced $2 billion available to address contaminants like PFAS in drinking water in small, rural and disadvantaged communities. Regan said the Biden administration is asking Congress for more resources to clean up PFAS pollution. …
   20. A new rule, paired with actual resources to clean up contamination and to make sure communities can test for these chemicals, is an important step, said Sarah Doll, national director of Safer States, a group that works to help communities prevent harm caused by dangerous chemicals.
   21. We also need the polluters, those who actually caused the harm, to help pay for the cleanup,” Doll said. Seventeen state attorneys general and others are suing now several makers and users of these chemicals. “This is a first step. It’s great. It’s really important, and we’re going to need additional resources, especially from those who have caused harm.”
   22. With the proposed rule, the EPA is catching up to 10 states that have enforceable drinking water standards for these chemicals: Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin.
   23. “We’re very excited that the administration is taking these steps forward. They represent a very positive step in the right direction,” said Liz Hitchcock, director of federal policy for Toxic-Free Future, a group that advocates for the use of safer products and chemicals.
   24. But no EPA water standard is going to solve the problem on its own. Manufacturers of items that use these chemicals will need to urgently find alternatives. …
   25. The [Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies (AMWA)], said it will be working with experts to determine if the EPA’s cost benefit analysis is accurate.
   26. “Ultimately, without more federal support for upgrading current treatment technologies, average Americans will have to pay the cost of further treatment through higher rates for their water,” [Tom Dobbins, CEO of AMWA] added. Users will also have to reduce demand. In one instance, the US Department of Defense has set a schedule to get PFAS out of firefighting foam by October and to stop use of it by October Hundreds of military properties have been contaminated by foam used to put out jet fuel fires.
   27. The proposal is now open for public comment before the standards are finalized.
   28. People who want to make their water safer in the meantime can use point-of-entry or point-of-use filters with activated carbon or reverse osmosis membranes, which have have been shown to be effective at removing PFAS from water, the EPA says.
   29. REFERENCE: How to reduce PFAS in your drinking water, according to experts; By Sandee LaMotte | CNN | Published 2:53 PM EDT, Tue March 14, 2023
       1. … For people who are concerned about PFAS exposure, three years or so is a long time. What can consumers do now to limit the levels of PFAS in their drinking water?
       2. First, look up levels of PFAS in your local public water system, suggested David Andrews, a senior scientist at the Environmental Working Group. The advocacy nonprofit has created a national tap water database searchable by zip code that lists PFAS and other concerning chemicals, as well as a national map that illustrates where PFAS has been detected in the US. …
       3. If levels are concerning, consumers can purchase a water filter for their tap. NSF, formerly the National Sanitation Foundation, has a list of recommended filters.
       4. “The water filters that are most effective for PFAS are reverse osmosis filters, which are more expensive, about in the $200 range,” Andrews said. Reverse osmosis filters can remove a wide range of contaminants, including dissolved solids, by forcing water through various filters.
       5. “Granular activated carbon filters are more common and less expensive but not quite as effective or consistent for PFAS,” he said, “although they too can remove a large number of other contaminants.” …
   30. ANDREW: This is good news, though three years is too long for comfort for a public health issue like this. If this regulatory process can be sped up, it should be. Lives may depend on it. Something also needs to be done to stop this filtering technology upgrade from increasing water bills. Perhaps a combination of tax incentives and price caps for affected utility companies. Finally, if PFAS demand is to be reduced, it’s industry’s responsibility to find a substitute, not consumers’.
   31. MIKE: And the sad part is that there are no other chemicals that do what this family of chemicals can do, so finding ways to eliminate them from the water supply is the only current option.
6. Fox News braces for more turbulence as second defamation lawsuit advances; New York court greenlights $2.7bn suit against news channel by election company Smartmatic over 2020 presidential election lies. By Ed Pilkington (@edpilkington) | THEGUARDIAN.COM | Mon 13 Mar 2023 02.00 EDT. Last modified on Mon 13 Mar 2023 11.09 EDT
   1. As Rupert Murdoch’s Fox Corporation battles to contain the Dominion lawsuit scandal that has engulfed its top executives and stars, another crisis is building in the wings that has the potential to cause further turbulence for the media empire.
   2. Smartmatic’s lawsuit against Fox News has attracted only a fraction of the attention garnered by the legal action of Dominion Voting Systems. Yet both firms are suing Fox for defamation related to its coverage of Donald Trump’s stolen-election lie, and both pose a serious threat to Fox’s finances and reputation.
   3. In fact, on paper Smartmatic’s suit appears to be the more dangerous. It’s demanding damages of $2.7bn, compared with Dominion’s $1.6bn.
   4. So far, attempts by Fox lawyers to have the Smartmatic case dismissed have fallen on stony ground. Last week the New York state supreme court in Manhattan gave the green light for the case to proceed against Fox News, the Fox Business host Maria Bartiromo, the former business anchor Lou Dobbs and Trump’s former lawyer Rudy Giuliani. …
   5. The complaint goes on to argue that, contrary to … indisputable facts, Fox News broadcast a series of blatant lies in support of Trump’s stolen election conspiracy theory. …
   6. To prop up that story, the lawsuit claims, Fox needed a villain. That villain was Smartmatic.
   7. Smartmatic claims that more than 100 false statements were broadcast by Fox News hosts and guests. Smartmatic was falsely said to have been involved in 2020 election counts in six battleground states – in fact, it was present only at the count in Los Angeles county.
   8. Fox broadcast that Smartmatic shared its technology with Dominion, when in fact the two companies had no communication and regarded each other as rivals. Smartmatic was in cahoots with foreign governments in a conspiracy to rig the vote for Biden, Giuliani said on Bartiromo’s show – a claim that the company disputes as false and defamatory.
   9. Fox also described Smartmatic as having been founded in Venezuela at the behest of corrupt dictators. In fact, it was founded by Antonio Mugica and Roger Piñate in 2000 in Boca Raton, Florida, in the wake of the “hanging chad” fiasco, with the aim of using technology to restore people’s faith in election results.
   10. … The firm claims that it has lost clients as a result of what it calls Fox’s “disinformation campaign”. …
   11. Smartmatic has a very high bar to meet if it is to win the defamation suit at trial [in] New York state …
   12. Under it, plaintiffs have to be able to convince a jury that not only did the media outlet put out false information, it did so with “actual malice”. That means that it either knew it was peddling a lie and went ahead anyway, or showed a reckless disregard for the truth.
   13. “New York is pretty protective of media rights,” said Roy Gutterman, a media law professor at Syracuse University who was a consultant early on in the Smartmatic case advising a non-party entity. …
   14. Despite this tough challenge, so far the wind is in Smartmatic’s sails. David Cohen, the New York supreme court justice presiding over the litigation, has indicated that the company has a strong enough case to go to trial.
   15. In last week’s ruling, Cohen found that “at a minimum, Fox News turned a blind eye to a litany of outrageous claims” about Smartmatic. “Plaintiffs have pleaded facts sufficient to allow a jury to infer that Fox News acted with actual malice.”
   16. ANDREW: I’m not unhappy to hear about these cases, but I doubt they will have the kind of impact that is really needed to counter conservatives’ poisonous impact on the US media and political landscape. I think Rupert Murdoch is going to be just fine no matter how these lawsuits shake out, even if Fox News itself goes bankrupt. And there are many other far-right outlets waiting in the wings to take over.
   17. ANDREW: What is needed is the kind of work done by nonprofit broadcasters like KPFT(!) and by watchdog organizations like FAIR: truthful information that explains how the for-profit media is lying and what real world effect those lies have. Explaining these things inoculates the target audiences of these right-wing spin machines against their falsehoods. That makes it harder for them to set up shop, and leads to fewer of them, which means better and more accurate media for all of us.
   18. MIKE: This stuff is going to make a great movie someday. I already have a title for it: “Fox-washed — We distort, you decide.”
7. MIKE: The following story was found by Andrew, who tends to survey different information sources from me. This can be a good thing. I think that we each read news toward our own confirmation biases, but I also think we are both reasonably open-minded. In this case, Andrew turned up a very persuasive story at FAIR.org about the sabotage of the NordStream Pipelines. It is an old detective truism that every crime requires three things: Means, Motive and Opportunity. Crimes stories, on the other hand, always require the “Five Ws”: Who, What, When, Where and Why? There’s also the ”H”: How?
   1. When Andrew and I first discussed this story after the initial sabotage, we both considered the US suggestion that it was Russian sabotage to be entirely unconvincing. The Russians certainly had the means and perhaps the opportunity, but no plausible motive, and we said so at the time.
   2. When the US said that it was probably Ukrainian partisans without direct ties to the Ukrainian leadership, we agreed that they might have motive, but means and opportunity would be scarce and hard to put together. In any case, none of these stories contained any detail about “How” and very little about the ”Who”.
   3. The Seymour Hersh story from his own substack on February 8, on the other hand, goes into fairly intricate detail about means, motive and opportunity, as well as who, what, when, where and why.
8. Anonymous Sources Are Newsworthy—When They Talk to NYT, Not Seymour Hersh; By David Knox | FAIR.ORG | March 10, 2023 [Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) is described by Wikipedia as: “… a progressive left-leaning^[1][2][3][4] media critique organization based in New York City.^[5] The organization was founded in 1986 by Jeff Cohen and Martin A. Lee.^[6] FAIR monitors American news media for bias, inaccuracies and censorship, and advocates for more diversity of perspectives in the news media.^[7] FAIR describes itself as “the national media watch group”.^[6]”
   1. The New York Times (3/7/23) on Tuesday ended its month-long boycott of veteran investigative reporter Seymour Hersh’s February 8 story claiming the US destroyed the Nord Stream gas pipeline.
   2. The Times didn’t challenge Hersh’s story. It barely mentioned it. Instead, the Times reported “new intelligence” that “suggests” a pro-Ukrainian group was responsible.
   3. No firm details are provided, simply speculation, and the only sources cited are anonymous US officials.
   4. Hersh’s source also is unnamed, but is described as having “direct knowledge of the operational planning” of the operation. In contrast to the Times story’s lack of specifics, Hersh’s 5,000-word narrative provides extensive details of how US officials—at the direction of President Joe Biden—planned and executed the operation, using US Navy divers who used the cover of a NATO naval exercise in June to plant explosives, which were remotely detonated September 26.
   5. The response of the nation’s major news organizations to the two stories also couldn’t have been more different.
   6. While big news internationally, Hersh’s story was not reported by any of the major US corporate broadcast networks—NBC, ABC and CBS—or the public broadcasters, PBS and NPR. Nor did the nation’s major cable outlets, CNN, MSNBC and Fox News, cover the story (org, 3/3/23).
   7. The Washington Post ignored Hersh’s story for two weeks, and then mentioned it (2/22/23) only after Russia cited Hersh’s story in calling for a UN investigation of the bombing. But the Post didn’t hesitate to follow the Times later Tuesday with its own story (3/7/23), headlined “Intelligence Officials Suspect Ukraine Partisans Behind Nord Stream Bombings, Rattling Kyiv’s Allies.” Like the Times, the Post relied solely on anonymous sources to attribute responsibility for the sabotage, who provided little in the way of details about how the bombing was accomplished.
   8. In a striking example of how differently the large corporate news outlets treat Hersh, the Post credited its rival newspaper for breaking the story, but did not mention Hersh at all.
   9. The Post story did add one significant development—that shortly after the Times story was published, German news media had reported that investigators in Europe “had identified a small team of saboteurs using a yacht rented from a company in Poland that was ‘apparently owned by two Ukrainians.’”
   10. Fox News (3/7/23) also jumped on the Times story later Tuesday, but added nothing new. Hersh’s story was mentioned in two sentences at the end of the story and described as a “blog post” that “the White House last month dismissed….”
   11. CNN (3/8/23) also reported the Times story within 24 hours, but with a new element: “The German prosecutors’ office told CNN Wednesday they searched a boat in January that was suspected of carrying explosives.” The CNN story did not mention Hersh.
   12. That same day, MSNBC ran a segment featuring NBC News reporter Molly Hunter (3/8/23), who repeated the Times’ claim that its story was “the first significant lead” in the investigation of the bombing. It also failed to mention Hersh.
   13. A statement from German officials confirming that investigators in January had searched a vessel suspected of carrying explosives used in the bombing was reported by NBC News (3/8/23) and the Associated Press. The AP dispatch was picked up by ABC News (3/8/23) and PBS (3/8/23). All credited the Times story; none mentioned Hersh.
   14. NPR did its own report Wednesday (3/8/23), which referenced a high Ukrainian government official “questioning recent reports that a pro-Ukraine group was behind the undersea bombings.” The official was quoted saying the reports by the Times and Germany’s Die Zeit newspaper (3/7/23), which first reported the suspected involvement of a yacht, “had ‘lots of assumptions and anonymous conjecture but not real facts.’”
   15. While giving voice to skepticism about the Times story, NPR did not discuss Hersh’s alternative take.
   16. Summarizing the scorecard, all three major cable news outlets—CNN, MSNBC and Fox News—publicized the Times story within a day of publication. Of the five major corporate and public broadcasters, NBC, ABC, PBS and NPR carried the story; only CBS remained silent.
   17. As for Hersh, the blackout remains, with the sole exception of the two sentences totaling 49 words shirt-tailed to the Fox News …
   18. How America Took Out The Nord Stream Pipeline; The New York Times called it a “mystery,” but the United States executed a covert sea operation that was kept secret—until now. By Seymour Hersh | SEYMOURHERSH.SUBSTACK.COM | Feb 8, 2023
       1. The U.S. Navy’s Diving and Salvage Center can be found in a location as obscure as its name—down what was once a country lane in rural Panama City, a now-booming resort city in the southwestern panhandle of Florida, 70 miles south of the Alabama border. …
       2. The center has been training highly skilled deep-water divers for decades who, once assigned to American military units worldwide, are capable of technical diving to do the good—using C4 explosives to clear harbors and beaches of debris and unexploded ordnance—as well as the bad, like blowing up foreign oil rigs, fouling intake valves for undersea power plants, destroying locks on crucial shipping canals. The Panama City center, which boasts the second largest indoor pool in America, was the perfect place to recruit the best, and most taciturn, graduates of the diving school who successfully did last summer what they had been authorized to do 260 feet under the surface of the Baltic Sea. …
       3. Biden’s decision to sabotage the pipelines came after more than nine months of highly secret back and forth debate inside Washington’s national security community about how to best achieve that goal. For much of that time, the issue was not whether to do the mission, but how to get it done with no overt clue as to who was responsible.
       4. There was a vital bureaucratic reason for relying on the graduates of the center’s hardcore diving school in Panama City. The divers were Navy only, and not members of America’s Special Operations Command, whose covert operations must be reported to Congress and briefed in advance to the Senate and House leadership—the so-called Gang of Eight. The Biden Administration was doing everything possible to avoid leaks as the planning took place late in 2021 and into the first months of 2022. …
       5. From its earliest days, Nord Stream 1 was seen by Washington and its anti-Russian NATO partners as a threat to western dominance. The holding company behind it, Nord Stream AG, was incorporated in Switzerland in 2005 in partnership with Gazprom, a publicly traded Russian company producing enormous profits for shareholders which is dominated by oligarchs known to be in the thrall of Putin. Gazprom controlled 51 percent of the company, with four European energy firms …
       6. America’s political fears were real: Putin would now have an additional and much-needed major source of income, and Germany and the rest of Western Europe would become addicted to low-cost natural gas supplied by Russia—while diminishing European reliance on America. In fact, that’s exactly what happened. …
       7. Nord Stream 1 was dangerous enough, in the view of NATO and Washington, but Nord Stream 2, whose construction was completed in September of 2021, would, if approved by German regulators, double the amount of cheap gas that would be available to Germany and Western Europe. The second pipeline also would provide enough gas for more than 50 percent of Germany’s annual consumption. …
       8. In December of 2021, two months before the first Russian tanks rolled into Ukraine, Jake Sullivan convened a meeting of a newly formed task force—men and women from the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the CIA, and the State and Treasury Departments—and asked for recommendations about how to respond to Putin’s impending invasion.
       9. It would be the first of a series of top-secret meetings, in a secure room on a top floor of the Old Executive Office Building, adjacent to the White House, that was also the home of the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (PFIAB). There was the usual back and forth chatter that eventually led to a crucial preliminary question: Would the recommendation forwarded by the group to the President be reversible—such as another layer of sanctions and currency restrictions—or irreversible—that is, kinetic actions, which could not be undone?
       10. What became clear to participants, according to the source with direct knowledge of the process, is that Sullivan intended for the group to come up with a plan for the destruction of the two Nord Stream pipelines—and that he was delivering on the desires of the President.
       11. Over the next several meetings, the participants debated options for an attack. … The CIA argued that whatever was done, it would have to be covert. Everyone involved understood the stakes. “This is not kiddie stuff,” the source said. If the attack were traceable to the United States, “It’s an act of war.” …
       12. Throughout “all of this scheming,” the source said, “some working guys in the CIA and the State Department were saying, ‘Don’t do this. It’s stupid and will be a political nightmare if it comes out.’”
       13. Nevertheless, in early 2022, the CIA working group reported back to Sullivan’s interagency group: “We have a way to blow up the pipelines.”
       14. What came next was stunning. On February 7, less than three weeks before the seemingly inevitable Russian invasion of Ukraine, Biden met in his White House office with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who, after some wobbling, was now firmly on the American team. At the press briefing that followed, Biden defiantly said, “If Russia invades . . . there will be no longer a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it.” [VIDEO LINK: https://youtu.be/OS4O8rGRLf8]
       15. Twenty days earlier, Undersecretary Nuland had delivered essentially the same message at a State Department briefing, with little press coverage. “I want to be very clear to you today,” she said in response to a question. “If Russia invades Ukraine, one way or another Nord Stream 2 will not move forward.” …
   19. ANDREW: Aren’t we all glad I decided to reference FAIR earlier? This is an interesting theory. I recall Mike and myself agreeing that the US was just as capable as anyone else of having blown up the pipeline back when it first happened, so this possibility isn’t any more surprising to me than the Times story we talked about last week. I think as FAIR discusses, Mr. Hersh’s report is definitely more detailed than the Times report, but it has about the same level of verifiable evidence. It’s not a smoking gun, and neither was the Times story. So we still have no concrete idea who blew up Nord Stream 2. But that’s how it goes with clandestine operations; we just have to wait and see if any more damning evidence comes forward.
   20. ANDREW: I think the media coverage aspect of this story is more concrete, though. While I can understand news outlets not immediately considering a self-published report very credible from past experience, or even missing it if they aren’t following that particular author, the reality in the modern information age is that anyone can break news. Someone’s professional pedigree certainly is helpful in deciding who to trust, but stories need to be judged mainly now on what they’re saying and whether there is direct evidence to support it or if there is a history of similar occurrences that lends plausibility to the claim. Just because a story doesn’t have the money of a major newspaper behind it doesn’t mean it can be safely ignored anymore, and the mainstream media hasn’t really caught up to that idea yet. Perhaps because accepting it would reduce their own prestige. It’s disappointing that Mr. Hersh’s report was ignored in the media’s coverage of this latest chapter in the Nord Stream mystery, and the public is more poorly informed because of it. I hope this situation serves as a reality check for a few editors-in-chief.
   21. MIKE: I think the difference in initial credibility as judged by editors in mainstream media was the question of sources. I believe that it is a journalistic rule that the credibility of a story relies upon three corroborating sources. Hersh admits to just one. Though in fairness we don’t know how many sources the Times or Post had, or whether their reporters encountered elements of Hersh’s story, but without enough sources to corroborate. On the other hand, Hersh’s story, from his one source, is told with such detail and specificity that I think it behooved the other media to try to confirm or debunk his story as part of their own reporting. Certainly, at this late stage of the game, his story deserves some mention either to confirm or debunk, in part or in whole.
   22. GRAPHIC: https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F022aed68-426f-4b72-8ee1-afd4b180fc1e_3000x3000.jpeg
   23. REFERENCE: Russia, blaming U.S. sabotage, calls for U.N. probe of Nord Stream — Moscow cited independent journalist Seymour Hersh’s account — vociferously denied by the White House — as evidence. Washington says the Kremlin is just trying to divert attention from its crimes in Ukraine. By Karen DeYoung | WASHINGTONPOST.COM | February 22, 2023 at 2:00 a.m. EST
   24. REFERENCE: Intelligence Suggests Pro-Ukrainian Group Sabotaged Pipelines, U.S. Officials Say — By Adam Entous, Julian E. Barnes and Adam Goldman | NYTIMES.COM | March 7, 2023
   25. REFERENCE: The Who, What, When, Where, Why of a Story: One of the best practices for writers is to follow “The 5Ws” guideline, by investigating the Who, What, Where, When and Why of a story. —GATECH.EDU
   26. REFERENCE: The Five Ws, Five Ws and one H — BUSINESS.ADOBE.COM
9. Turkey May Not Need Russia’s S-400 Missile Defense, Manufacturer Says; By Selcan Hacaoglu | BLOOMBERG.COM | March 14, 2023 at 3:38 AM CDT
   1. Turkey might not need Russian S-400 batteries in order to protect itself as its homegrown equipment increasingly takes on that role, a major Turkish manufacturer said in comments likely to be welcomed by Washington.  
   2. The chairman of defense equipment manufacturer Aselsan Elektronik Sanayi said Turkey was working to develop its own Siper missile-defense system which has hit targets at a range of 100 kilometers (60 miles) in tests. 
   3. “We are making air defense systems. We don’t need S-300s, S-400s,” Haluk Gorgun told Milliyet newspaper in comments published Tuesday. “We are eliminating the need for them. This is our duty.”
   4. The US sanctioned Turkey and barred it from working on and receiving Lockheed Martin Corp.’s F-35 stealth jets after it acquired S-400 missiles from Russia in 2019. Ankara has been urging the US to scrap the sanctions and for Congress to approve the sale of F-16 fighter jets to Turkey. …
   5. Ankara has complained for years about being unable to secure defense equipment from Western partners. This includes missile-defense systems as well as tank engines, warplanes, drones and helicopters. …
   6. MIKE: This is a highly consequential story both geopolitically and in terms of NATO expansion.
   7. MIKE: Turkey (officially now known in English as “Turkiye’ ”) wants F-35s and F-16s. The US wants Turkey/Turkiye’ to agree to NATO expansion with Finland and Sweden.
   8. MIKE: Turkey’s earlier decision to buy Russia’s S-400 missile defense system raised alarms in the US and NATO capitals. Specifically, it might lead to leakage of military secrets to Russia by virtue of tying a Russian air defense system into Western military equipment. This is what led to an embargo of F-35s and other military equipment to Turkey/Turkiye.
   9. MIKE: It’s important to note that this story didn’t come from the Turkish government. This story was what amounts to a press release by a Turkish manufacturer of military equipment without actually having a government imprimatur, but it’s hard to imagine that this particular press release, framed in this particular way, wasn’t part of a Turkish government policy decision.
   10. MIKE: Now we have an interesting new scenario. Russia and Turkey\Turkiye (going back hundreds of years as the Ottoman Empire) have a troubled history. Turkey\Turkiye’ shares a land and sea border with Russia. Turkey\Turkiye’ may have had second thoughts about relying on a now-militarily and territorially aggressive Russia for their air defense since Russia invaded Ukraine.
   11. MIKE: Sending signals to the US and NATO that they’re reconsidering their Russian air defense system opens the door for militarily sensitive equipment like the F-35 to be sold to Turkey/Turkiye’. Those kinds of sales can be conditioned — semi-privately — on Turkey/Turkiye’ approving the addition of both Finland and Sweden to NATO.
   12. MIKE: This would amount to another strategic failure for Russia as a direct result of their invasion of Ukraine.
   13. ANDREW: This is complicated, and I don’t have a solid opinion in this specific case. Generally, I’m in favor of nations being able to produce their own defense so they don’t have to be pressured into political alliances.
   14. ANDREW: But it’s Turkiye’. Erdogan seems much the same kind of conservative autocrat as Putin and Trump. I don’t know that I like his government having the ability to produce weapons, but that may be out of anyone’s control now.
   15. ANDREW: I also oppose NATO expansion for the same reason I oppose the war in Ukraine. I see both aims as just two egotistical powers trying to dominate each other and the rest of the world in ways both subtle and overt.
   16. ANDREW: I think calling this a win for NATO and a loss for Russia plays into that domination game. I find that very dangerous considering what war can do to all life on Earth. I believe there can be good reasons for war, but the domination game is not one of them.
   17. ANDREW: In order to avoid that war, there need to be nations that bridge the gap between NATO and Russia. Countries like Turkiye are in the best position to be that. I just don’t know which outcome here best preserves Turkiye’’s connections to both powers.
10. MIKE: The next story is punnily on the brighter side of our topics …
11. BlueWalker 3, an enormous and bright communications satellite, is genuinely alarming astronomers; By Michael J. I. Brown | SPACE.COM | Jan. 8, 2023, published about 10 hours ago
    1. The night sky is a shared wilderness. On a dark night, away from the city lights, you can see the stars in the same way as your ancestors did centuries ago. …
    2. But like any wilderness, the night sky can be polluted. Since Sputnik 1 in 1957, thousands of satellitesand pieces of space junk have been launched into orbit.
    3. For now, satellites crossing the night sky are largely a curiosity. But with the advent of satellite constellations — containing hundreds or thousands of satellites — this could change.
    4. The recent launch of BlueWalker 3, a prototype for a satellite constellation, raises the prospect of bright satellites contaminating our night skies. At 64 square meters, it’s the largest commercial communications satellite in low Earth orbit — and very bright. …
    5. [I]n the past few years, the pace of satellite launches has accelerated. SpaceX has made satellite launches cheaper, and it has been launching thousands of Starlink satellites that provide internet services.
    6. Roughly 50 Starlink satellites are launched into orbit by each Falcon 9 rocket …
    7. Once the Starlink satellites disperse and move to their operational orbits, they are near the limit of what can be seen with the unaided eye.
    8. However, such satellites are bright enough to produce trails in images taken with telescopes. These trails overwrite the stars and galaxies underneath them, which can only be remedied by taking additional images. Short transient phenomena, such as a brief flash from a gamma-ray burst, could potentially be lost. …
    9. Amazon’s Blue Origin plans to launch more than 3,200 Project Kuiper satellites, and AST SpaceMobile plans to launch 100 BlueBird satellites (and perhaps more).
    10. The recently launched BlueBird prototype, BlueWalker 3, has produced genuine alarm among astronomers.
    11. … BlueWalker 3 … unfolded a 64 square metre communications array [MIKE: That’s almost 690 square feet] — roughly the size of a squash court. This vast surface is very good at reflecting sunlight, and BlueWalker 3 is now as bright as some of the brightest stars in the night sky.
    12. It’s possible the operational BlueBird satellites could be even biggerand brighter. …
    13. There could be a big impact on professional astronomy. Brighter satellites do more damage to astronomical images than faint satellites.
    14. Furthermore, many of these satellites broadcast at radio frequencies that could interfere with radio astronomy, transmitting radio waves above remote sites where radio observatories observe the heavens.
    15. What happens next is uncertain. The International Astronomical Union has communicated its alarm about satellite constellations, and BlueWalker 3 in particular.
    16. However, the approval of satellite constellations by the S. Federal Communications Commissionhas had relatively little consideration of environmental impacts.
    17. This has recently been flagged as a major problem by the S. Government Accountability Office, but whether this leads to concrete change is unclear.
    18. We may be on the edge of a precipice. Will the night sky be cluttered with bright artificial satellites for the sake of internet or 5G? Or will we pull back and preserve the night sky as a globally shared wilderness?
    19. ANDREW: There’s a balance to everything. I would love for every human to have reliable access to fast internet no matter where in the world they are. But I don’t want to give up humanity’s ability to study space from the ground. I believe the number of satellites in orbit needs to be carefully controlled in order to establish the balance between these concerns.
    20. ANDREW: Besides, limiting satellites doesn’t mean that improving internet access becomes impossible. There’s plenty of large and small transmitters on Earth that provide good coverage at reasonable speeds, and I think focusing on improving and propagating those systems could produce the same result without blocking off the stars. It’s just a question of whether someone (ideally governments) will spend the needed money.
    21. MIKE: When SpaceX began launching their Starlink satellites, the genie was out of the bottle. Now, in addition to the tens of thousands of Starlink low-orbit satellites, other companies and countries are launching their own orbiting satellite clusters.
    22. MIKE: If I recall correctly, Elon Musk hasn’t taken the problem particularly seriously, although SpaceX has been taking some steps to reduce the reflectivity of their satellites. Musk’s opinion is that we should be doing astronomy from earth orbit and from the Moon, so clouds of satellites surrounding Earth is not his biggest concern.
    23. MIKE: This used to be the stuff of golden age science fiction novels: The rugged, entrepreneurial individualist following his own ambitions to get rich while doing what he thought was best for humanity, other people’s opinions be damned. Are now seeing the result of the chicken or the egg? Either way, humanity will have to live with the decisions of a relatively few specimens of the species.

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