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They dress like students, or dress like housewives, or in a suit and a tie. Life during wartime in Ukraine the kind of conflict that Europe thought it would never see in the 21st century is less than a week old and producing some shocking images that practically no one expected. Certainly not the Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, who almost surely thought that a westward-looking democracy sated by McDonalds and KFC would instantly melt under the shock and awe of his powerful armed forces. Instead, a generation raised in relative comfort and prosperity is making the same existential choice their grandparents made during World War II.

Freedom is worth fighting for. And dying for, if necessary.

And so the grim carnage in Eastern Europe has been interrupted by heroic scenes of resistance. Weve seen the stylish 20-something Kyiv couple of Yarina Arieva and Svyatoslav Fursinb who moved up their wedding and took a honeymoon photo toting the rifles each had been issued to defend their home city from Russian invaders. And the videos of architects and accountants and teachers forming armed patrols, or mixing deadly Molotov cocktails to toss at armored vehicles in an attack with the techniques they learned on YouTube.

In the northern Ukraine village of Bakhmach, a column of Russian tanks one of the convoys that Putin had hoped would crush Russias western neighbor in a few days if not hours had to pause when an elderly man tried to climb aboard the lead vehicle, then kneeled in front of it. It was a callback to the legendary Tank Man in Chinas Tiananmen Square in 1989, except some 33 years later this didnt feel like a symbolic gesture against the irresistible power of a modern authoritarian state. This time, it feels like freedom has a fighting chance.

Its been less than four days since Putins Russia did the unthinkable that has been months if not years in the making, and invaded Ukraine. The fate of the war is clearly up in the air Russias military superiority and the ability of a massive nation to wreak havoc with brute force is clear, but Putins generals clearly didnt calculate on large-scale resistance either from Ukrainians on the ground or from a global community that has rallied on their behalf. Team Putin expected the largest cities of Kyiv and Kharkiv to fall overnight and that didnt happen, not yet.

But this much is clear: The war in Ukraine has become a time for choosing not just for its combatants and for the 144 million citizens of Putins Russia, but for people all around the world, including here in the United States. The first two decades of the 21st century have been marked by declining faith in democracy and a rising authoritarianism thats played out from Beijing to Belarus to Bakersfield sometimes as tragedy but often as farce.

Today, some of the silliness of our cultural wars over the fake banning of hamburgers or the canceling of Dr. Seuss is melting away as an honest-to-goodness war demands that people pick a side. Do you support the messiness of democracy as embodied, however imperfectly, by Ukraine and its courageous people, or will some folks continue to support the decadence embodied by weak strongmen like Putin, Xi Jinping, and Donald Trump, whose last resort in defending ancient systems of repression is the barrel of a tank?

The starkness of that choice is embodied by two remarkable men at the center of the world stage. In unleashing his tanks and missiles against the 44 million peaceful people of Ukraine as they were merely trying to live their best lives, Putin has revealed himself for once and for all not as a crafty practitioner of realpolitik but rather as a monster willing to mine the moral depths of an Adolf Hitler or a Joseph Stalin to keep himself in power. Just as Trump proved to the American people on Jan. 6, 2021, that all egomaniacal strongmen finally turn to violence against the free will of people, Putins descent into isolation and incoherence is showing us where that bloody road ultimately leads on a world map.

Meanwhile, Ukraines Volodymyr Zelensky a former TV comedian who once competed on Ukraines version of Dancing with the Stars and whose unlikely political rise began when he played an everyday citizen-elected president after a viral video has emerged as democracys first true icon of a new, troubled millennium. The 44-year-old Zelensky is showing that his unfairly maligned Generation X can fight with the courage and resolve of World War IIs so-called Greatest Generation when everything is truly on the line.

The Ukrainian president is using the tools of todays technology shooting a cell phone selfie video of himself and his cabinet standing strong in the streets of Kyiv as the capital city was bombarded by Russian forces to reinvent himself as a Winston Churchill for the 21st century. Zelensky is doing this not with blood, sweat, toil, and tears bombast but with a movingly simple, and-I-am-telling-you-Im-not-going courage, reportedly responding to an American offer to evacuate him from Kyiv by saying, I need ammunition, not a ride. The Ukrainians and their leader are winning the battle for world opinion in a rout.

READ MORE: Boomer fantasies of world peace die in Ukraine | Will Bunch Newsletter

Even in the streets of Moscow and in Putins native St. Petersburg, thousands of everyday Russians have taken to the streets and risked their own freedom in calling for peace and decrying the insanity of their own leader. Each day brings new instances of prominent Russians saying no to Putins leadership, from tennis star Andrey Rublev writing No war please on a TV camera to the head of a state-run theater in Moscow resigning because she refuses to work for a killer.

Support for Ukraine has come from spontaneous anti-Russian demonstrations in cities as big as London and as small as Harrisburg and from everyday people in free European nations like Poland opening their arms and even their homes to the first wave of Ukrainian refugees, to the worlds democratic leaders from Washington to Berlin who normally bicker about everything finding near unanimity in tough sanctions against Russia, Putin, and his billionaire cronies.

This reaffirmation of faith in democracy hasnt only bolstered the Ukrainian spirit of resistance. Its also made the worlds anti-democracy naysayers from Beijing to the inner councils of the Republican National Committee look remarkably small. Suddenly, the Americans who praised Putin and his dictatorial maneuvers as genius the most prominent cases being Trump and Fox News prime-time star Tucker Carlson are looking as historically wrong as Charles Lindbergh and his America First-ers did in 1941. The tectonic plates of world opinion are shifting powerfully under their feet, and they are unable to gain their footing.

From the far-left to the far-right, this dramatic weekend has seen a seemingly heartfelt apology from the journalist Matt Taibbi for his descent into the Putin-apologizing dirtbag left and some attempts at pro-democracy reinvention from GOPers like Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, who famously spent July 4, 2018, in Moscow with some of his colleagues. But others on the wrong side of current history including the America First PAC conference backed by two sitting members of Congress on the extreme white supremacist right dug in. Meanwhile, the House Republicans who tweeted a picture of President Joe Biden walking away from a podium and called him weak (what was he supposed to do, moonwalk like Michael Jackson?) made a mockery of Americans rallying round the flag in a global crisis.

Trump, the Wests Putin-apologist-in-chief, whose 2016 election was openly backed by the Kremlin chief with the goal of destabilizing democracy, tried to have it every which way when he addressed the Conservative Political Action Committee, or CPAC, on Saturday night in Orlando, Fla. The 45th president was forced by events to acknowledge that Russias invasion is an outrage and that Zelensky is a brave man, while he also contended against all evidence that Putin is smart, but the real problem is that our leaders are dumb. The moral emptiness of Trumps posturing was made clear when Fox News asked him in an interview if he had a message for Putin.

I have no message, responded Trump. Ditto for Carlson and the GOPs ascendant right-wing. The nakedness of their worldview has been exposed.

Today, the issue is the survival of Ukraine itself. But once this immediate crisis is resolved, the broader fight to shore up democracy begins, and nowhere will that battle take on greater importance than right here in the United States. This is what that looks like: Real justice against the coup plotters of Jan. 6, making sure the rights of citizens to vote are expanded and not further shrunk, standing up for free speech in our classrooms and in the public square, and isolating and scorning the appeasers and the apologists like Trump and Carlson.

The late Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said that a man dies when he refuses to stand up for that which is right. Zelensky and the people of Ukraine are not only standing up for what is right, they are risking their lives to do so. The rest of the world must support them. This aint no party, this aint no disco, this aint no fooling around. The time for choosing has arrived. Which side are you on?

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War in Ukraine demands that all of us pick a side: democracy or decadence | Will Bunch - The Philadelphia Inquirer

Everything has changed. Russian President Vladimir Putin didn't just want two regions in eastern Ukraine after all. And he doesnt just want Ukraine. Putin wants to dismantle the rules-based, post-World War II international order that delivered an unprecedented period of peace and prosperity to Europe.

Whatever Joe Biden signed up for as a candidate, then nominee, and finally U.S. president, is gone. That battle to restore the soul of America, the plans to dramatically alter the social safety net, that is over. With little remaining political capital, Biden must still work to contain a pandemic and manage the economy, but he has a different job now, with challenges that neither he nor his party envisioned or preferred.

Stabilizing democracy at home and abroad, using his time and energy to combat indifference to threats to freedom among Americans, while countering authoritarian forces overseas this is the best use of the presidential bully pulpit and Bidens best hope for a legacy.

Its time to put the bickering over Build Back Better behind him. Let Sen. Bernie Sanders bark into the wind. Joe Biden can expect the remainder of his presidency to be full of inflation, international crises, and when Republicans will likely control the House of Representatives next winter, impeachment. There is nothing bright on the horizon, which means Biden has little left to risk or lose.

At 82, he will be too old for a second term in the Oval Office, and his exit will unleash an even more volatile period in our politics. There are likely to be open contests in both parties, probably dominated by the craziness of Donald Trump running again, and in the Democratic Party the bitter division between progressive and moderates.

The time to treat both the threats to the constitutional order at home and the liberal order around the world as an emergency is now. Not next year after the midterm elections, or the following year when Biden will most likely be serving his final months. The leader of the free world must treat these threats to the free world as paramount, above all other concerns. He must affirm that in America, and around the world, people must support a system of rules that does not accept an unprovoked attack on a sovereign nation, or a sustained attempt to overturn a free and fair election.

At a summit on democracy he hosted in December, Biden said: The choices we make at this moment are going to fundamentally determine the direction our world is going to take in the coming decades. Those words were true then. Thanks to Vladimir Putin, they are even truer now.

A continued threat from Russia may consume the rest of Bidens term, and require him to hold the alliance together not only to counter Putins ambition, but to confront the fallout of what Russias actions do to embolden China in Taiwan and Hong Kong.

To begin, Biden must keep talking to war-weary Americans throughout this crisis about Russias intentions and the threats they pose to the world and to us. He found the right words last week to warn of the cost our country will absorb while fighting for freedom elsewhere.

I will do everything in my power to limit the pain the American people are feeling at the gas pump. This is critical to me, Biden said. But this aggression cannot go unanswered. If it did, the consequences for America would be much worse. America stands up to bullies. We stand up for freedom. This is who we are.

Biden must stand up to the bullies in the Republican party not to defend his own actions against their attacks on his weakness, but to call out their lies that strengthen Putins hand. Before the Kremlins land grab had officially begun, Putin scored a victory when Trump offered high praise that was echoed by the man who served as Trumps secretary of state. Both backtracked slightly in their CPAC remarks as the world turned against Putin in solidarity with Ukraine, but the damage was done.

Trump first used the word genius to describe Putins invasion. His longer description of Putins prowess was pure, Russian state television propaganda. Heres a guy that says, you know, Im going to declare a big portion of Ukraine independent he used the word independent and were going to go out and were going to go in and were going to help keep peace, Trump said. You got to say, thats pretty savvy.

Savvy isnt as shocking as peace and independent.

Mike Pompeo West Point graduate, congressman, CIA director and secretary of state initially flattered Putin as very shrewd, very capable, and said he has enormous respect for him.

All of this, of course, has been echoed by influential right-wing voices. Media stars and Trumpkin celebrities have also praised Putin for his strength, or have chosen to sneer at and mock any criticism of him. The statements from Tucker Carlson, Steve Bannon, Candace Owens, Charlie Kirk, Roger Stone, and Michael Flynn have incorporated Russian talking points laying blame for Putins invasion with NATO and America.

Biden cannot reverse the rot in our political landscape. But he can seek to educate, energize, and unite Americans around the preservation of liberty and democracy. He can start with the left of his party, where some fringe populist, isolationist, and protectionist voices hold sway. And Biden should warn the our own backyard crowds in both parties of the costs of ignoring our leadership role on the world stage.

Biden could also explain to his own voters that their party is likely to lose power quite soon, perhaps for a long time. Democrats have failed to reckon with the coming threat of being in the wilderness. They do not tell their voters that by abandoning rural America and prioritizing urban America, they have bolstered the structural advantages the GOP enjoys in the electoral college and the U.S. Senate. Biden, perhaps because he served a small state for so long in the Senate, does not tell them this.

With the inexorable erosion of ticket-splitting, there will soon be no more Joe Manchins in West Virginia and Jon Testers in Montana. Red states will have red senators.

If Biden and his party are passive in the face of these perversions of democracy, Americans will remain detached. If he doesnt champion the sovereignty of free people around the world, Americans will remain detached. He may not succeed, but Biden himself said we must meet this moment with the knowledge it will determine the course of the world for the foreseeable future.

In the contest between democracy and autocracy, between sovereignty and subjugation, Biden said last week, freedom will prevail.

We dont know that it will. But if an American president, at this dark hour, doesnt fight like hell to preserve freedom, it simply cannot prevail.

A.B. Stoddard is associate editor of RealClearPolitics and a columnist.

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Biden Should Spend Next Three Years Focused on Democracy - RealClearPolitics

Join with AP photojournalists in conversation about how the free press plays an essential role in sustaining an informed democracy.

March 3, 6-7:30 p.m.NKUs Griffin Hall, admission is free or attend virtuallyRSVP by CLICKING HEREPresented with support from Kentucky Humanities

Even as democracy is threatened in the world, it has been under fire, too, in our own nation. On May 25, 2020, George Floyd was killed in police custody awakening national protests. On Jan. 6, 2021, the nations Capitol was stormed by a mob that wanted to overturn a presidential election.

Kim Johnson Flodin, Julio Cortez, and Andrew Harnik

Covering both was the Associated Press, the news service that provides coverage of events in our home communities, in the nation and around the world. Today, AP reporters and photographers are in Ukraine, covering the outbreak of a war.

On Thursday, March 3, at 6 p.m., three AP photojournalists who have been in the thick of the events of the past few years, will visit Northern Kentucky University to talk about their work. The powerful images have helped to tell the story of America in our times.

The three are:

Kim Johnson Flodin, a deputy news directors based in Chicago, and one of APs photo editors who direct coverage.

Julio Cortez, staff photographer, and part of the 2021 Pulitzer Prize winning team of AP photographers his widely published photo taken on the night of May 28 in riot-torn Minneapolis shows a lone, silhouetted protester running with an upside-down American flag past a burning liquor store.

Andrew Harnik, staff photographer, is based in Washington, DC, and was among the AP team who covered the storming of the Capitol. His work has taken him around the world with top U.S. diplomats and all over the country with presidents and candidates for president.

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Democracy and the Press: Join an NKU Six@Six conversation about the free press' role in democracy - User-generated content

Ukraine's ambassador told the world that if his country is crushed, international peace and democracy are in peril, as the United Nations General Assembly held a rare emergency session in a day of frenzied diplomacy at the UN about the days-old war.

Ukraine is paying now the ultimate price for freedom and security of itself and all the world," Ambassador Sergiy Kyslytsya said at the assemblys first emergency meeting in decades.

If Ukraine does not survive... international peace will not survive. If Ukraine does not survive, the United Nations will not survive," he said. Have no illusions. If Ukraine does not survive, we cannot be surprised if democracy fails next.

Russian Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia reiterated his country's assertions that what it calls a special military operation in defense of two breakaway areas in Ukraine is being misrepresented.Russian actions are being distorted and thwarted," he said.

As Russian and Ukrainian officials held talks on the Belarus border, the UNs two major bodies the 193-nation General Assembly and the more powerful 15-member Security Council both scheduled meetings Monday on the war. In Geneva, the UN Human Rights Council voted to hold its own urgent session.

The assembly session will give all UN members an opportunity to speak about the war and to vote on a resolution later in the week. U.S. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield said Sunday the measure would hold Russia to account for its indefensible actions and for its violations of the UN Charter.

Israel's ambassador to the United Nations, Gilad Erdan, voiced his support for his Ukrainian counterpart, Sergiy Kyslytsya, at the opening of the emergency session. Kyslytsya visited Israel last year and assisted in gaining support for the successful passage of an Israeli-initiated resolution against Holocaust denial last month.

"The guns are talking now, but the path of dialogue must always remain open, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the assembly. We need peace now.

The Security Council meeting, set for later Monday, was focused on the humanitarian impact of Russias invasion. French President Emmanuel Macron sought the session to ensure the delivery of aid to growing numbers of those in need in Ukraine.

French Ambassador Nicolas de Riviere said Sunday that France and Mexico would propose a resolution to demand the end of hostilities, protection of civilians, and safe and unhindered humanitarian access to meet the urgent needs of the population. He said it would probably be put to a vote Tuesday.

Both meetings follow Russias veto Friday of a Security Council resolution demanding that Moscow immediately stop its attack on Ukraine and withdraw all troops. The vote was 11-1, with China, India and the United Arab Emirates abstaining.

Last week, Ukraine asked for a special session of the General Assembly to be held under the so-called Uniting for Peace resolution. It was initiated by the United States and adopted in November 1950 to circumvent vetoes by the Soviet Union during the 1950-53 Korean War.

That resolution gives the General Assembly the power to call an emergency session to consider matters of international peace and security when the Security Council is unable to act because of the lack of unanimity among its five veto-wielding permanent members -- the United States, Russia, China, Britain and France.

The U.S. ambassador told the council after Sundays vote that members had taken an important step forward in holding Russia accountable for its unjustifiable assault, fabricated out of lies and the rewriting of history, and now all nations can be heard in the General Assembly.

Albanian Ambassador Ferit Hoxha called Sundays resolution historic because it opens the big doors of the place where the world meets -- the UN General Assembly -- to speak out and condemn an unprovoked and unjustified pure act of aggression.

Russia must be stopped in its attempt to break the international rules-based order to replace it with its will, he said. All member states, especially the small ones like mine which constitute the majority of the UN, must remember that international law rules and the UN Charter are their best friend, their best army, their best defense, their best insurance.

During the council meeting, many speakers called for diplomatic efforts to peacefully settle the crisis, and said they would be watching Ukraine-Russia meeting expected to take place on the Belarus border Monday.

Jonathan Lis contributed to this report.

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Democracy will not survive if Ukraine falls, envoy tells UN ahead of Russia vote - Haaretz

Starbucks workers to unionize workplaces in Seattle and all over the country.

Starbucks workers in Buffalo, New York were the first to certify a union through the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), and their success has inspired workers across the country to follow suit. Founded over 50 years ago, Starbucks turned Seattle into the caffeine capital of the United States, becoming the largest coffee chain in the world. It generates more than 10 times the revenue of its closest competitor. Today, its workers are taking matters into their own hands, organizing for living wages and the provision of health insurance.

As we all know, essential workers are the real heroes of this pandemic. The only reason the economy hasnt ground to a halt is because they keep showing up for work. We applaud them for making a living, but their bosses are making a killing. As of 2020, CEOs average earnings are 351 times that of their employees but it's the baristas who keep the money moving and the coffee flowing.

60 stores in 19 states have organized their workplaces for unionization. Starbucks Workers United, the new Starbucks labor union, is fighting an uphill battle unions have been on the decline for decades, and real wages have gone down with them. Organized labor creates inclusive growth in the economy and fortifies the health of American democracy.

Rachel Ybarra is a Starbucks worker and union organizer. She recalled her excitement upon learning that the Starbucks in Buffalo had filed for a union.

It was kind of like finding out that they had done something that a lot of us had presented to one another as a joke, Ybarra said, describing how forming a union was something that almost everyone in her workplace favored, but considered an impossibility.

Seeing Buffalo win their union election prompted Ybarra and a coworker to meet with Starbucks Workers United in the days following.

We had that meeting on Friday, and over that weekend, we got all of our [union] cards signed and were able to get them filed by Monday, Ybarra said.

The National Labor Relations board requires 30% support to file for an election, where 50% support is needed to certify a union.

At their small coffeehouse, it only took three days to gain a majority, proof of the common desire for improved working conditions. Ybarra was ready for managements attempt to break their organizing efforts.

We had a couple of meetings with managers, Ybarra said. I had a three-on-one with my store manager, my [general manager], and another store manager that I had never met I decided to be maliciously compliant. They responded with a lot of hostility My district manager offered for me to leave three times during the meeting.

Why do corporations hire union-busting specialists, pay for costly legal battles, or spend money on anti-union campaigns? Because its cheaper than paying workers more than what is absolutely necessary. Unionized workplaces grant workers the ability to collectively bargain, allowing them to negotiate the terms of a union contract. With Starbucks Workers United, Ybarra expects increased pay and healthcare coverage.

Unionizing a workplace is difficult, and there are huge, huge advantages for employers who can make vague threats to punish workers for unionizing. Jake Grumbach, assistant professor of political science, said. Emerging moments of unionization in a place like Starbucks can show that it is possible even in difficult situations.

The recent organizing push is the result of a long term slowdown in the social mobility and economic outlook for low wage workers. When a business generates immense profit and chooses to not compensate the employees, low wage workers are left with no choice but to bargain for better wages through unionization.

Establishing living wages through labor union collective bargaining provides huge benefits for raising children, lowering crime, having a strong middle class with living wages for workers across education levels, across geography and industry, Grumbach said. That is absolutely crucial for an economy to work, and it can supercharge economic growth by having ordinary people have more money to spend in the economy stimulating demand by reducing inequality.

When labor unions are strong, they can drive up wages for both non-union and union members by offering better wages, creating competition for employers to attract employees. Moreover, private sector unions represent their workers politically by endorsing pro-worker candidates.

[Labor unions] serve to organize the working class politically and thats actually really crucial for democracy, Grumbach said. Imagine you live in some place where all the manufacturing is being outsourced and offshored, your town is changing, and there's an opioid crisis and things seem really bleak People in those positions are very susceptible to politics based in fear of immigrants or racial conflict, and labor unions are a way to organize mass politics in a more democratic way, so people have control over policies that affect their material lives, rather than just culture war politics.

When workers unite on the basis of shared interests, they can win and win big. Starbucks workers in Seattle are proving that labor unions are still possible in the most unlikely of places.

A union is just what happens when your team comes together and decides to take control of their workplace, Ybarra said.

The national labor struggle is ongoing, sending shockwaves from coast to coast. Ybarra hopes for a successful result in their union election next month. Our community must support essential workers like Ybarra and labor unions like Starbucks Workers United in their fight for fair wages and representation.

The old union song rings true: Oh miner, wont you organize wherever you may be, and make this a land of freedom for workers like you and me.

Reach writer Thomas DuBeau at opinion@dailyuw.com. Twitter: @thomas_dubeau

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Democracy starts in the workplace | Critical Conversations | dailyuw.com - Dailyuw