John T. Reed’s news blog

Watters who has a new daily show at 4PM EST does not have the journalist’s fact checking habit. He strings together handfuls of “facts” each of which is overstated. If he does that regarding a living human, he could lose a libel suit notwithstanding his Times v. Sullivan actual malice protection. He is violating the “recklessly disregarding whether the statement presented as fact was true” standard. For example, he is talking about war crimes. Get too loose with that and you may get sued by billionaire Roman Abramovich or some such—and lose the suit. What Russia is doing in Ukraine,...

Crypto currencies are seeing increased activity in Ukraine and in Russia where converting rubles to foreign currencies is now illegal. Some cryptoexchanges are refusing to do business with Russians. The US government is considering using whatever authority they have to get cryptoexhanges to stop doing business with Russia. I guarantee Russia will ban or try to ban using cryptocurrency to convert rubles to crypto. If they did not, almost every ruble on earth would be converted to crypto. As I recently said, the problem with crypto currency is not crypto; it is the word currency. Nations want a monopoly on...

UN general Assembly voteThe UN General Assembly, as opposed to the Security Council, held a vote on a resolution to condemn the Russian invasion into Ukraine. The General Assembly voted 141 in favor and 5 opposed, with 35 nations abstaining on the draft resolution “Aggression against Ukraine” which has been co-sponsored by 94 countries. Noteworthy yes: Afghanistan who was invaded by USSR 1979-89.  We should temporarily recall our ambassadors from the nations who voted against or abstained from the vote. Enough of this crap. The five opposed are: • Russia (we should permanently withdraw the ambassador there and close the embassy)...

A Russian in NYC said, “Everyone I know [in Russia] is trying to get money [rubles] out at all costs.”.Told ya. What they really mean is they are trying to convert rubles into non-inflated foreign currency. The alternative is to buy goods and hope to barter with them. At present in the US, converting your USD into other currencies is no big deal. But if the ’flation hits the fan, it will be illegal, as getting the local currency out is now illegal in Russia. Procrastination may be fatal to your life savings. And your foreign currency must be held...

I have mentioned the 1930s Spanish Civil War repeatedly. Americans and others have volunteered to fight on the socialist side against Franco and the Nazis. A Ukraine surgeon was asked about her mood Tuesday. She raised her fist and said, “No pasarani,” Spanish for “They shall not pass.” That was a slogan from the Spanish Civil War. My email is johnreed@johntreed.com.