At the top of the show, Jim Jatras, Deputy Director of the American Institute in Ukraine, a former US diplomat, and former senior foreign policy advisor to the Senate Republican leadership, joins the show to talk about what is the endgame for the west in Ukraine. They discuss the debate over whether or not to provide Ukraine with fighter jets. A week or two ago, there was talk that jets would come from Slovenia or the Czech Republic. That never happened. Two days ago, Poland announced that it would provide MiG fighter jets to Ukraine. The US came out in opposition to that last night. Why the back and forth? Either NATO wants Ukraine to protect itself or it doesn’t.
Next, Mark Frost, an economist, professor, consultant, drummer, eagle scout, marine, capitalist and recovering libertarian, calls in to talk about surging inflation reaching a 40-year high. They discuss the bite that rising energy costs are having on pocketbooks and how official statistics underestimate inflation. The cost of living for Americans is increasing at an accelerated pace. The trend from falling interest rates and low inflation have reversed to rising interest rates and higher inflation going forward, according to Frost.
Then, Kimberly Dvorak, investigative journalist, joins the Misfits in studio to talk about reports of bio labs discovered in Ukraine. Apparently, there are 26 bio labs in Kiev and Odessa, according to Dvorak. There are bio labs all over the world where there will be accidents such as viruses. Using biological weapons is a war crime during a time of conflict, Dvorak said.
And, they talk about why the Russians are moving slowly. Why is America so upset with Russia’s military action while in recent history, the US has initiated conflict with Iraq and Afghanistan? The Ukrainians will eventually agree to regime change as the Russian military will eventually overwhelm them. Russia will probably install a puppet dictator that is more friendly to the Russian people. Ukraine is 120 out of a ranking of 180 as one of the most corrupt nations in the world, Dvorak said.
For the last segment, Chris Smalls joins the show to talk about the current drive in Staten Island to unionize at Amazon. They talk about what organizers are planning to do ahead of the election at the end of March and what Amazon is doing to counter organizers. Also, Congress asked Amazon whether it uses the data it gathers from third-party sellers to design or promote its own products, and whether it tweaks search results to show in-house Amazon products before third party products. Amazon said no, they don’t, but a bunch of newspaper investigations found that yes, they did. Jeff Bezos himself told Congress he’d give them the results of an internal investigation into the matter… which has never materialized.
The Misfits sign off for today. Come back tomorrow. It’s Friday which means Stories of the Weird.
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