NATIONAL CATFISH DAY UPDATES

The Actual Fish, Not The Mean Internet Game or Dumb TV Show

-Political observers the world over are working to put the pieces together of ... whatever the heck happened in Russia starting Friday evening and ending more or less Saturday afternoon between Vladimir Putin and Yevgeny Prigozhin. The one thing most agree on is that whatever happened, it was not good for either Putin or Prigozhin. Putin, whose entire rule has been based on a self-created image of unquestioned strength (wrestling with bears and whatnot), had that image punctured by first allowing a caravan of Prigozhin's Wagner Group to take over two Russian cities with little resistance (and, in fact, the deaths of 15 Russian troops, thanks to the shooting down of at least one plane and at least one helicopter at the hands of Wagner), then negotiating a deal to allow Prigozhin to leave alive (and with a rock-star sendoff from the city of Rostov), then letting a man all thought was a lapdog to Putin, Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko, negotiate the deal to stop Prigozhin from heading to Moscow.

-Further, Prigozhin's entire argument - that the invasion of Ukraine was a failure that never should have happened (fact check: TRUE) and is the fault of Putin and his military minions Sergei Shoigu and Valery Gerasimov - seemed to have gone unrefuted. In fact, there are reports that Shoigu and Gerasimov may yet lose their jobs, which would seem to give Prigozhin what may have been his primary motivation for his attack.

-Other observers even noted one thing Putin did not do once that he has always done whenever he has had vague internal battles that he thought made him look bad: blame America or the West. Not once has Putin invoked any of those forces (even as we are now learning the White House was briefed as early as last Wednesday that the Wagner Group seemed to be up to something). It all adds up to a Putin virtually all agree looks far more vulnerable and, more dangerously for him, weaker than at any point during his reign.

-As for Prigozhin, well, the line from THE WIRE comes to mind: if you shoot at the king, you best not miss. Whether he spent more time setting up the caravan than thinking about what would happen if he actually succeeded in getting to Moscow (presuming Putin is even there) or whether he thought he would get more support than he did from other parts of the Russian military (or an oligarch or two), the fact is, he did not get to Moscow. And that has many noting that Putin has broke roughly 90% of his agreements he has made, and wondering loudly just how long Prigozhin literally has on this Earth after everything.

-While all of that was going on, Ukraine took advantage, opening up four separate lines of attack in their counteroffensive while Russian forces were diverted, with success reported. Given the continued lack of morale in the Russian military, combined with the effective total ouster of Wagner Group fighters from the battlefield, attention now turns again to the tougher-than-expected-but-still-occuring gains on the field, only now with an eye to see whether someone else may now attempt to usurp Putin given the fissures that this episode have opened up.

-SLAVA UKRAINI!

-Now, if you think all of this has been noticed by the political party who in recent years have looked up to Putin as an idol, well, fret not. On Fox today, Maria Bartiromo, still on the air despite costing her network hundreds of billions of dollars so far, opined that the entire incident - and the non-Fox media's coverage of it - was really nothing more than (and you know where this is going, don't you?) a diversion from the REAL story of The Corruption of the Evil Horrible Terrible Biden Crime Family, and some 2017 What's-App call in which The Most Evil Being Not Named Hillary Clinton - HUNTER BIDEN (dum-dum-DUMMMM!!) sounded like he was trying to impress businessmen in CHY-NAH as proof that Biden is Corrupt. Apparently Maria couldn't recall who was President in 2017 ...

-Oh, but we did, and Twice-Indicted Ex-President (TIEP) Trump popped up yesterday at something called the Faith and Freedom Conference, sucking up adulation from "Christian" conservatives, not mentioning the events in Russia once, while again claiming that the Presidential Records Act means that as President all the records are his (the law says the exact opposite, of course) - and even went so far as to claim that the law means nobody has the right to ask Trump to return ANY of the documents - all anyone can do is "ask (him) - nicely!" for the records back. (Uh ... no.)

-Trump also said that if he were to become President again (and a new NBC poll does show his lead over Ron DeSantis has risen since his second indictment) he would ban all Communists, Socialists, and Marxists from entering the country (except, presumably, his BFFs, Putin and Kim Jong-Un).

-Let's end with baseball. In case you missed it, the Anaheim Los Angeles California Angels (or whatever they're called) went to Colorado and won a squeaker of a game ... combining a 13-run third and 8-run fourth to eke out a 25-1 win over the Rockies. Which makes Colorado's night almost as bad as Putin's or Prigozhin's. (RIM SHOT!)

-I'm here all week, folks!

-On this date in 1876, Custer's Last Stand ended the Battle of Little Bighorn. On this date in 1950, North Korea attacked South Korea along the 38th parallel, opening up hostilities (it was never officially a War despite its name, y'all). On this date in 1967, the first global satellite television program premiered, featuring the live debut of "All You Need Is Love" by The Beatles. On this date in 1978, the rainbow flag made its debut at the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day parade. And on this date in 1984, PURPLE RAIN (the album) was released.

-Happy Birthday to Antoni Gaudi, George Abbott, Lord Mountbatten, George Orwell, Sidney Lumet, June Lockhart, Ted Stepien, Eric Carle, James Meredith, Larry Kramer, Harold Melvin, Willis Reed, Carly Simon, Jimmie Walker, Phyllis George, Tim Finn, David Paich, Sonia Sotomayor, Anthony Bourdain, Ricky Gervais, George Michael, Dell Curry, Dikembe Mutombo, and Linda Cardellini.

-Rest in Peace/Rest in Power to George Armstrong Custer (see above), Thomas Eakins, Johnny Mercer, Michel Foucault, Hillel Slovak, Warren Burger, Jacques Cousteau, Farrah Fawcett, Michael Jackson, Patrick Macnee, and Bill Dana.

-Feed the Worms: Racist slumlord and father to guess-who Fred Trump and segregationist Lester Maddox bought it on this date.