Congress and national intelligence are investigating ties between Trump and his campaign and Russia, and today we get another unsubtle bumping off:

A former Russian parliamentarian named Denis Voronenkov, who fled Russia last October and has criticized President Vladimir Putin’s government, was killed in Kiev on Thursday, in an apparent assassination that Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko is reportedly calling “state terrorism.”

Voronenkov, 45, had just left the Premier Palace hotel when he was shot twice in the head on a sidewalk along a busy street in Ukraine’s capital, according to the Kyiv Post. Citing police, the newspaper adds that both Voronenkov’s bodyguard and the attacker were wounded and in the hospital.

The killing has the “handwriting” of the

Donnie Junior must make Daddy proud.

It has become something of an online custom in the social media age to react to tragic news stories — like Wednesday’s attack in London — with well-meaning if sometimes rote messages like “thoughts and prayers.” But that does not appear to be Donald Trump Jr.’s style.

“You have to be kidding me?!” Mr. Trump said Wednesday afternoon on Twitter, as details of the episode — which left at least five dead, including the assailant, and 40 injured — continued to unfold. The message continued, “Terror attacks are part of living in big city, says London Mayor Sadiq Khan.”

Mr. Trump, the oldest son of President Trump, was calling attention to an article

The police have identified the marauding attacker:

The man believed to have carried out the attack in Westminster has been named by police as Khalid Masood.

Kent-born Masood, who was shot dead in the attack, was not the subject of any current police investigations, but had a range of previous convictions.

The 52-year-old was believed to have been living in the West Midlands.

The so-called Islamic State group has said it was behind the attack, in which PC Keith Palmer, Aysha Frade and US tourist Kurt Cochran were killed.

Whether or not IS gave any planning or logistical help, of course it’s “behind” the attack in the larger sense: it models violence and brutality in the name of religion, … Read the rest

Eiffel Tower in Paris turns off its lights in mark of respect to #Westminster terror attack https://t.co/86W3BGGHr0 pic.twitter.com/KPI72eq4wM

— BBC Breaking News (@BBCBreaking) March 22, 2017

PC Keith Palmer was killed doing his duty – protecting our city and our democracy from those who want to destroy our way of life. pic.twitter.com/p6igkEJoGY

— Sadiq Khan (@SadiqKhan) March 22, 2017

https://twitter.com/JamesCleverly/status/844684875550642177… Read the rest

It’s a gorgeous blowy spring-like afternoon here. I went for a walk in the cemetery about a mile from where I live, and in wandering about I saw a surprising inscription:

Elisabeth Utke Jorgensen
Scholar, Pioneer, Artist, Adventurer
1867-1939

I looked her up and found a brief biography by Seattle historian Paul Dorpat:

One of the first women to graduate from the University of Copenhagen, Elizabeth Utke immigrated in the early 1890s to the United States, where she found her degrees in logic and mathematics useless. Pursuing two of the few occupations open to her, she attended secretary school while earning her way as a seam­stress with a knack for “fancy work.” She married Carl Jorgensen, a Norwegian sea

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is not apologizing.

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, the Nigerian novelist and feminist, has condemned a “language orthodoxy” on the political left after she endured a vitriolic backlash over comments about transgender women.

The author of Half of a Yellow Sun plunged into a row about identity politics when she suggested in an interview last week that the experiences of transgender women, who she said are born with the privileges the world accords to men, are distinct from those of women born female. She was criticised for implying that trans women are not “real women”.

But Adichie defended her comments during a public appearance in Washington on Monday night. “This is fundamentally about language orthodoxy,” she told a

The Independent reports that the perp has been identified.

Abu Izzadeen, who was born Trevor Brooks, has been named in reports as the man who drove a car into the Houses of Parliament and attempted to attack police officers.

His views were far from secret: videos of him can be seen across YouTube, in which he rants about how important it is to kill the police and how everyone in Parliament are kufar, or infidels.

Not quite: he says those raised as unbelievers are kufar, but those born and raised Muslim are apostates. He helpfully names Sadiq Khan and Baroness Warsi. (Khan was an MP before he became Mayor.)

In other words he was a loathsome man who … Read the rest

Manafort laundered money for Yanukovych, we’re told.

A Russian billionaire paid former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort millions of dollars to boost the interests of Russian President Vladimir Putin, the Associated Press reports. The new allegations arise months after Manafort resigned from the Trump campaign amid concerns over his work for a pro-Russian political party in Ukraine.

“According to documents that we’ve reviewed, Paul Manafort secretly worked for a Russian oligarch who wanted him to promote Russian interests,” the AP’s Chad Day tells NPR’s Rachel Martin. “And in particular, he wrote a memo that outlined this kind of vast plan for him to promote Russian interests in the former Soviet republics — and also to specifically benefit the Putin

The BBC’s latest summing up:

Four people, including an armed police officer and a man believed to be the attacker, have died in a terrorist incident near the UK’s Houses of Parliament, Scotland Yard has said.

A woman was among several pedestrians struck by a car on Westminster bridge, before it crashed into railings.

The officer was stabbed in the Houses of Parliament by an attacker, who was shot by police.

At least 20 people were injured, including three other officers.

…

The French Prime Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said three French school pupils were among the injured and offered “solidarity with our British friends, and full support” for the wounded students and their families.

The Port of London Authority

From the BBC’s live page:

What we know so far

•  A policeman has been stabbed and his attacker shot by officers at the House of Parliament
• Police are treating it as a “terrorist incident”
• The attacker is reported to have mowed down several pedestrians as he drove a grey Hyundai car across Westminster Bridge before crashing it into railings
• He is then reported to have run through the gates of the Palace of Westminster and stabbed the officer
•  Eyewitnesses said he was shot by police as he approached a second officer clutching his knife
• House of Commons and Lords in lockdown – as is nearby St Thomas’s hospital
• Public urged to avoid the area and Westminster Underground station is

Twenty minutes ago:

Incredibly brave @metpoliceuk anti-terror officers co-ordinating a lockdown & evacuation after #ParliamentAttack pic.twitter.com/XFv6KoNpm4

— George Freeman MP FRSA (@GeorgeFreemanMP) March 22, 2017

… Read the rest

A poignant memory:

https://twitter.com/borzou/status/843403846818979842

 … Read the rest

Pro Publica tells us about some more possible (or likely) corruption in the Trump gang.

Former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara, who was removed from his post by the Trump administration last week, was overseeing an investigation into stock trades made by the president’s health secretary, according to a person familiar with the office.

Tom Price, head of the Department of Health and Human Services, came under scrutiny during his confirmation hearings for investments he made while serving in Congress. The Georgia lawmaker traded hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of shares in health-related companies, even as he voted on and sponsored legislation affecting the industry.

Oh did he. Surely that’s a big no-no for legislators. I hope? Isn’t it? … Read the rest

Originally a comment by Freemage on Rex has to get a haircut that day.

And Trump (and even Vladimir) fail to fully understand the reason for the US involvement in NATO. It’s not got anything to do with protecting Europe from Russian aggression–that’s a happy coincidence, frankly, though it’s one that gave a polite cover-story to the real benefit to the U.S. for the last almost-70 years.

To-wit: We’re there so that everyone else doesn’t need to protect themselves from Russia. It’s a subtle, nuanced difference, but it’s the reason we haven’t had a World War during NATO’s run. I’m sure Germany, France and England could all make themselves largely impossible to easily invade. Even most of the nations … Read the rest

Tillerson is snubbing Nato.

US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson will miss a meeting of Nato foreign ministers next month, US officials say.

He will instead travel to a G7 meeting in Sicily, Italy, and then to Moscow to meet Russian leaders.

Under Secretary of State Tom Shannon will represent the US at the Western military alliance meeting in Brussels.

Correspondents say the move will add to concerns about US President Donald Trump’s commitment to Nato as he seeks better relations with Moscow.

Moscow of course hates Nato. Trump’s hatred of Nato seems to be linked to his servility toward Russia. I hope the FBI is including this in its investigation.

During his election campaign, Mr Trump expressed admiration