President of PEN/America Director of the Fairfield University MFA. Author of Redeployment, Missionaries, and Uncertain Ground
Joined September 2011
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Phil Klay retweeted
Quite a chronology in the FT.
In May, Putin’s associate Umar Kremlev paid for Donald Trump Jr’s wedding party in the Caribbean.
In August, Trump Jr went to hunt endangered species with Kremlev in Mongolia. He also allegedly auctioned access to the trip for $225,000.
In September, Propublica broke the wedding reception story.
giftarticle.ft.com/giftartic…
Phil Klay retweeted
This is totally astonishing! My late husband Charlie loved all of these novels —had assumed a very different identity for the author—who evoked an entire complicated world & culture out of research & his imagination. No reader would ever guess that O’Brian wasn’t writing with some experience at sea.
hearing for the first time that novelist Patrick O'Brian (of _Master & Commander_ fame) invented much of his own biography,
didn't know how to sail & had no practical experience doing it, wasn't Anglo-Irish gentry but rather English working class, barely educated, concealed his early marriage...
Everything he learned about sailing & the 19th c was from obsessive research & reading books.
O'Brian comes out to be a far more puzzling, eccentric, twisted, anachronistic figure who lived in isolation on a small hobby farm in France, deeply secretive, insecure, brooding, exiled, aloof, yet TOTALLY COMMITTED TO THE BIT.
I like him even more now (am currently reading Master & Commander)
Phil Klay retweeted
Regarding Russian conscripts, this is not the case. The overwhelming percentage of Russian forces fighting in this war are men well over 30 who accepted service contracts for money. They were not conscripted, or mobilized. For more on this topic: warontherocks.com/a-return-t…
Excellent episode
NEW @KnowYrEnemyPod! We’re joined by the great @rozina_ali to discuss her superb book, Seasons of Fury, about the rise of Islamophobia in America as told through the stories of four families podcasts.apple.com/us/podcas…
Phil Klay retweeted
A strong and direct apology from Milwaukee Archbishop Grob for that Oval Office fiasco:
"I did not go without reservations. I wish I had heeded them."
Also a very good explanation of what really went down with White House manipulations:
archmil.org/posts/a-public-a…
Phil Klay retweeted
Trump family friends doing business with Russia, which it turns out secretly controls the $25 billion Alaska LNG project. ft.com/content/e9cfbfbb-e65a…
Phil Klay retweeted
The most important thing today is that Starlink and Starshield operations have been restored to the speeds we had before the restrictions. The speeds are now where they need to be. The restoration began overnight, and by this morning, speeds were already sufficient. This matters: for our frontline logistics, for defending Ukraine against jet-powered “shaheds.”
I thank all Americans and all our partners who took this seriously and truly helped – members of Congress, senators, all the media, the State Department, and the President. Protecting lives matters.
Phil Klay retweeted
Ukraine losing access to Starshield raises serious concerns for our national security—like who controls critical capabilities the U.S. government has spent billions to procure & how decisions to restrict them are made. I'm demanding answers from the Department of Defense & SpaceX
Phil Klay retweeted
“Ukraine’s military Starlink system was working normally again on Saturday morning, the country’s defense minister said.”
Drone tests showed the connection with Starshield was stable at speeds of over 400km. wsj.com/world/europe/ukraine…
Phil Klay retweeted
50% of maga voters sympathize with ukraine, 5% (!) with russia.
bots really have their work cut out for them.
Recently “the Pentagon has fired some of the nation’s most competent officers, injected political and religious rhetoric into a traditionally nonpartisan institution, and dismantled some of the strongest scaffolding supporting a smart and capable military”
usni.org/magazines/proceedin…
“Whoever is handing Putin the gift of a more vulnerable Ukraine should at least have the guts to put their name on it. Hiding behind denials while innocent people pay the price is cowardice.”
The shifting explanations from Musk and the administration sound like Abbott and Costello’s “Who’s on First?” Except the consequences for Ukrainian civilians are deadly.
Musk says he didn’t do it. The administration says it didn’t either. Yet someone in the administration reportedly told Musk to undo it, and Ukraine reports only partial restoration.
Are we supposed to believe Hegseth and the Pentagon don’t know the status of a capability critical to U.S., Ukrainian and allied security?
Whoever is handing Putin the gift of a more vulnerable Ukraine should at least have the guts to put their name on it. Hiding behind denials while innocent people pay the price is cowardice.
Meanwhile, Putin keeps murdering civilians and trying to starve and freeze Ukraine into submission. Americans deserve answers. Ukrainians deserve the means to defend themselves.
“I teach my children that we love, we accept everybody,” he said. “I don’t want to make this a political situation.”
After his family goes to bed, he lies awake.
“I relive, I see faces, I hear voices, I hear screams.”
He thinks about the teenager he shot.
Everything about this story breaks (and rebreaks) my heart, but this interview is a good reminder that everyday people are capable of extraordinary acts.
opb.org/article/2026/10/23/b…
Phil Klay retweeted
1/3 Musk ordered last week's slowdown of Starshield, which Ukraine fights on, after talking with Trump, per @WSJ. In '23 the Pentagon signed a contract with SpaceX to “prevent Musk from turning off the switch," per fmr Under Sec of Defense Colin Kahl.
newyorker.com/magazine/2023/…
Phil Klay retweeted
"Top officials in the State Department made clear that only candidates who voted for President Donald Trump would be eligible for the mid-to-upper level foreign service roles. They also told candidates that their campaign donation history would be examined and any donation to Democrats would be disqualifying."
SCOOP: The State Dept has started asking career diplomats up for promotion if they voted for Trump in 16, 20, 24.
Federal law prohibits politically based hiring for career staff.
State tells @washingtonsun it's screening for "fidelity" and execution of the president's vision👇
