Year: 2022

While much of the world rallies around Ukraine in the current war with Russia, and the number of innocent citizens who have been forced to flee their homes or prepare to lose their lives, not much has been said about the Russian soldiers who are doing Vladimir Putin’s bidding. Perhaps that’s because more than 7,000 Russian soldiers have so far been killed in just 20 days of fighting—a number which, as The New York Times reports, contradicts the unwavering veneer of strength that Putin regularly attempts to project.

That 7,000-plus number, by the way, is a conservative estimate. To put that number into better context, The New York Times notes that during 36-day Battle of Iwo Jima—one of the bloodiest battles of World War II—just under 7,000 Marines were killed. Similarly, the current Russian soldier death toll is higher than the number of American troops killed over the last 20 years in both the Iran and Afghanistan wars combined.

But these numbers say something beyond the total loss of life. As The New York Times writes:

It is a staggering number amassed in just three weeks of fighting, American officials say, with implications for the combat effectiveness of Russian units, including soldiers in tank formations. Pentagon officials say a 10 percent casualty rate, including dead and wounded, for a single unit renders it unable to carry out combat-related tasks.

With more than 150,000 Russian troops now involved in the war in Ukraine, Russian casualties, when including the estimated 14,000 to 21,000 injured, are near that level. And the Russian military has also lost at least three generals in the fight, according to Ukrainian, NATO and Russian officials.

In Ukraine, it’s more than just the armed forces fighting to regain control of their country. On Wednesday, The Wall Street Journal reported that a two-day battle in Voznesensk, Ukraine—in which citizens volunteered to take on Russian forces alongside their own military, and successfully defended their territory—was “one of the most comprehensive routs President Vladimir Putin’s forces have suffered since he ordered the invasion of Ukraine.”

These kind of monumental defeats can have a severe psychological impact on soldiers, dangerously reducing the determination and will of those fighting. Even some of Russia’s most notable state-run media pundits are protesting the war.

“Losses like this affect morale and unit cohesion, especially since these soldiers don’t understand why they’re fighting,” Evelyn Farkas, a senior Pentagon official for Russia and Ukraine under President Obama, told The New York Times. “Your overall situational awareness decreases. Someone’s got to drive, someone’s got to shoot.”

Then again, Russian troops are likely only being fed the information Putin wants them to hear via the state media to which they have access. At the moment, the mention of any casualties is rare and, as per usual, the propaganda pundits are painting a far rosier picture of the success of Russia’s “operation” in Ukraine (calling it an “invasion” or “war” in Russia is a no-no).

(Via The New York Times)

Last night, Questlove stopped by Late Night for a chat with Seth Meyers, to speak primarily about his Oscar-nominated documentary Summer Of Soul. While there, he told a great story about Barack Obama calling him to offer his congratulations for the nomination.

Questlove started the story by noting at the time, he was hungry and waiting on a Postmates delivery driver who was taking longer with his food than expected. While he’s usually wary of answering phone calls due to rampant spam, he got a call and since it could have been from his driver, he picked up the phone. Questlove continued the story:

“The person didn’t say much, and I was like, ‘Yes, on the duhduhduh floor, duhduhduh floor! Apartment duhduhduh!’ And he was like, ‘Uh… hello?’ I said, ‘Yes, duhduhduh floor!’ He said, ‘Uh… this is Barry.’ I said, ‘Barry?’ And I looked at all the texts: ‘The president is calling you right now! The president!’ Like literally, I has missed all my managers texting me that Obama’s about to call me in a second. […]

Even he said, ‘Uh, well, you think I’m, uh, Postmates?’ And I was like, ‘Wait, you know what Postmates is?’ You know what, though? I was so hungry at the time, I kinda wished it was Postmates.”

Elsewhere, he spoke about how the film’s success has exceeded his expectations, saying, “At least I know with music what a goal is, but with the movie world, I just had no clue. I just wanted to make something really cool and hopefully they were gonna show it in a few classrooms, and then maybe discover it 20 years from now, like, ‘Yo, you know Questlove did this thing?’”

Watch the full interview above.

What’s in the water at Wheel of Fortune?

The game show has seen a string of facepalm-causing contestants lately, including one who shared “the most pointless story ever told,” another who made a costly mistake on a misheard lyric, and “Jurassic Park…Bodies?” There was also the worst sequence in Wheel of Fortune history, which was nearly topped during Wednesday night’s episode.

The category was “What Are You Doing?”, which is what I said to my television after contestants Seann, Michele, and Crystal all failed to correctly guess the following: “RENTING A PEDA_ BOAT.” Pretty easy, right? Well… Seann’s first guess was “Renting a Paddle Boat” (nope). Michele hoped the missing letter was an “M” (it was not). Crystal spun the wheel and, with clear hesitation in her voice, asked Pat and Vanna for a “W” (the only letter was she was posting was an L). Seann eventually got it, but not before him and his fellow contestants were the main characters of Wheel Twitter.

Sajak recently tweeted a defense of Wheel of Fortune contestants who face “online ridicule when they make a mistake or something goes awry,” and asked at-home viewers to “cut them some slack. Unless you’re there, you have no idea how different it is in the studio.” That’s probably true, but also: IT’S PEDAL BOAT, YOU FOOLS.

“It’s so cute, guys.”

“It’s adorable.”

That’s how Kim Kardashian and Ellen DeGeneres discussed how “very hittable” Pete Davidson went and put Kim’s name all over his body (including a brand), when he only started publicly referring to her as his girlfriend in February. No one can ever excuse him of not jumping into the deep end with both feet, right? (He can always cover them up later, like he did with Ariana Grande in what seems like a lifetime ago.)

Kim was on hand for the final lap of The Ellen Show to promote The Kardashians, which premieres April 14 on Hulu. The trailer already goes straight-up mobster after showing a flash of Kanye, and Kim hasn’t made any new friends while recently telling women to “get your f*cking ass up and work,” but she was in a fine mood when Ellen introduced the subject of Pete referencing her within his ongoing body collage. And this is a three-time thing, at least.

“A little more than that,” Kim revealed. “The branding is my name. ‘The other ones are cutesy things. I think my favorite one, it says: ‘My girl is a lawyer.’ And that one’s really cute.”

While discussing the branding (which, yep, was done with a full-on iron brand), Kim explained, “He wanted to do something that was really different because okay, first tattoo he got, I was like, ‘Thank you, oh my god.’ Second, I was like, ‘So cute,’ but that’s what tattoo people do, right? They get tattoos of what’s going on in their life.’”

Ellen then quipped, “Well, you are a brand, when you think about it.” Her talk show, meanwhile, will air its final episode on May 26. Expect to see Michelle Obama and David Letterman before all is said and done, probably without any tattoo talk.

An Ed Sheeran album title is easy to point out in a list because all of them, save for 2019’s No. 6 Collaborations Project, are named after mathematical symbols: 2011’s +, 2014’s x, 2017’s ÷, and 2021’s =. Having a distinct branding identity like that is a good way to stand out, but Sheeran says part of the reason he went that route with his career is so he himself wouldn’t stand out.

In a recent interview with New Zealand’s Project NZ, Sheeran said his album naming convention was sparked by his, as he describes it, “face for the radio”:

“The thing with the albums is I, very early on in my career, decided I didn’t… I don’t mean to play it down, but I do have a face for the radio. And I was like, ‘I don’t really want to be a poster boy ever.’ I don’t want to be, like, selling my record being like, ‘Hey, how you doing?’

So I had sort of figured out a way, I was like, ‘I’m going to do it with colors and symbols.’ So I was like, ‘I’d love to get to a point that there’s a billboard of just red with an equals sign, or green with a multiply, or blue with a divide, or orange with a plus, and people go, ‘Oh, Ed’s got an album coming out.’”

Then, when one of the hosts suggested – (aka Minus) would be the “obvious choice” for the name of Sheeran’s next album, he replied, “That’s not gonna be the next record I put out. I’ve got something else that’s a bit more of a curveball. We’ve got the first thing of it dropping in ten days. In ten days, there’s gonna be something coming out. I don’t think it’s gonna be a massive hit in New Zealand though, I’ve got to be honest. It’s more gonna be a big hit somewhere else. When you hear it, you’ll understand.”

So, based on the timing of the interview, Sheeran fans should expect something new from him at the end of next week.

Check out the interview below.

Ed Sheeran is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

After three contests, the First Four games in Dayton had yet to deliver much in the way of drama as the appetizer for Thursday’s start to the NCAA Tournament, but Notre Dame and Rutgers saved the best for last on Wednesday night, pushing things into Thursday morning with a double overtime thriller for the right to play Alabama on Friday afternoon.

The two teams traded leads throughout, with Rutgers holding the largest advantage at eight points, but the Irish would not go away, even taking a late lead before ultimately pushing the game to overtime after a Gio Baker fadeaway at the buzzer fell short. That first overtime period was one for the books, as both teams found big buckets in the final minute. First, it was Ron Harper Jr.who gave Rutgers a one-point lead with this wild banked in three that, after a stop on the other end when a Notre Dame player dribbled the ball off their leg out of bounds, seemed to give the Scarlet Knights a path to victory.

However, on the ensuing inbound, Rutgers got all kinds of discombobulated and just lobbed a ball up under their own basket, which the Irish stole and laid up and in to retake the lead.

Rutgers wasn’t done, though, as they found Paul Mulcahy for a go-ahead three on the other end to bounce back from that turnover and take a two-point advantage, but Notre Dame came down and, with Rutgers desperate to run the Irish off the three point line, got a game-tying layup to force a second overtime.

In that second overtime the teams once again traded early leads before Notre Dame took brief control thanks to this bucket from Paul Atkinson.

A pair of free throws made it a three-point game, but Harper Jr. again had the answer with a wild three to tie things up with 22 seconds to play.

However, Atkinson’s presence inside was just too much for Rutgers, as the big man picked up an offensive rebound for a putback layup (and his 25th and 26th points of the night) with 1.4 seconds to play to finally put Rutgers to bed for good in an 89-87 win for the Irish.

It was quite the opening act for the full slate of games that tip off just after noon on Thursday, as one of the best weekends of the sports year is now officially upon us.

Mike Lindell sure can talk. The MyPillow guy has spent nearly the last year-and-a-half squandering his bedding fortune on utterly unproven claims that his favorite ex-president, Donald J. Trump, didn’t lose re-election by over seven million votes. He’s held symposiums that quickly go awry, marathons that no one watches, protests that few attend, even threatened to pester the Supreme Court with his spastic, incoherent lies. What he’s never done is accuse anyone of murder. Until now.

As per Raw Story, Lindell shocked one of his own employees, who ought to be used to the guy by now, with his latest, perhaps most unhinged accusation yet. During one of his typically unfollowable rants on his “Lindell TV” podcast, the CEO was unloading on Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold, who’s got something or other to do with one of his byzantine conspiracy theories.

Lindell said “she will end up in prison, prison, and more prison” and called her “a criminal beyond all criminals.” But he wasn’t done. “But I got news for you Jena, it’s already too late, you already committed a murder and we caught you.”

It was then that his host, who up till then had been very distracted, shuffling papers or whatever he was doing, stopped in his tracks. His jaw dropped. “A murder?!” he asked his boss. “A murder? A murder?”

Lindell immediately backtracked, calling it an “analogy.” But to what?

Meanwhile, Lindell is still being sued for $1.3 billion due to his election fraud misinformation. But clearly he’ll never learn.

(Via Raw Story)

The Golden State Warriors entered Wednesday night feeling as good as they have all year, coming off a big win in the first game in over two years that featured all three of their stars, as Draymond Green returned from his back injury to join Klay Thompson and Stephen Curry on the court.

However, that excitement over having all three healthy unfortunately turned to concern regarding Curry, who left Wednesday’s tilt with the Celtics in the second quarter with a foot injury and would not return. The injury occurred late in the quarter when Marcus Smart dove for a loose ball and went into Curry’s leg, rolling up his left foot and ankle — Smart would get called for a flagrant on the other end of the court for his flailing kick of Klay Thompson.

Curry would check out and go to the locker room and not return, and Steve Kerr was incensed, yelling at Smart for what he felt was a purposefully dangerous play.

Kerr would continue to talk to Smart during some free throws, although more calmly but still questioning the intent of Smart, who clearly was saying he was simply diving for a loose ball.

It is an unfortunate situation for the Warriors and Curry, as they obviously are concerned about their superstar missing any extended time with the playoffs coming up and the team somewhat desperate to get some time on the court together to rebuild their chemistry as a unit. Both fan bases will see this play differently, with Warriors fans seeing it as Smart diving into Curry’s leg while Celtics fans will point out he’s simply going for a loose ball and gets on the floor first.

It is a play right on the edge, which is where Smart so often lives, and no matter what he says it doesn’t seem he’s going to make Kerr feel any better about his intent on the play.

The Los Angeles Lakers lost their third straight game by double digits on Wednesday night in Minnesota, as the Wolves beat them 124-104, dropping L.A. to 29-40 on the season. Minnesota led by 14 points after the first quarter, as the Lakers continue to get off to dreadful starts, and while L.A. pulled to within four in the second half, they once again could not sustain a run long enough to erase an early deficit.

While pretty much every team that has beaten the Lakers this season has enjoyed it and let them know about it, the Timberwolves seemed to relish Wednesday’s win more than most. That is largely due to the long-held rivalry between Patrick Beverley and Russell Westbrook, who have had more than a few notable run-ins, from Beverley injuring Westbrook’s knee going for a steal after a timeout to Westbrook rather famously saying Beverley “tricks y’all” regarding his defense — which Beverley believes “damaged my career.”

Westbrook’s struggles this season continued in Minnesota and no one was happier to be forcing him into misses and turnovers more than Beverley, who was ruthless in mocking Russ after a particularly dreadful sequence that saw Beverley steal a rebound and get a putback bucket before stealing a Westbrook entry pass to LeBron by sagging a good 15 feet off of Russ as he got to the three-point line.

After that, Beverley strolled by the Lakers bench, informing them Westbrook was “trash” and then holding his nose to ensure they got the full message.

Beverley wasn’t done feeling himself there, as he would go flex in the face of LeBron James before giving him a pat on the butt during a pair of free throws on the other end.

After the Wolves put the pedal down late to squash the Lakers brief comeback hopes, the cherry on top of the win came in the form of a Westbrook airball that led to Karl-Anthony Towns searching for the wind that blew that shot over the rim for a good five seconds.

Beverley also reenacted the airball after a timeout was called, ducking under the ball on the sideline before giving it to the official.

It really is something to see how much teams are enjoying themselves when playing the Lakers, but the Wolves took it to another level thanks to the personal rivalry between Beverley and Westbrook, with the former getting to bask in the struggles of the latter all night. As for Westbrook, he responded as one would expect.

There’s a chance these two teams could meet in a win-or-go home play-in game for the 8-seed and, well, it certainly wouldn’t lack for drama.

Lindsey Graham and Donald Trump seem to be good now. Ever since the former president left office in disgrace, South Carolina senator and GOP top dog has more or less been on his side, excepting a couple disagreements. But just as he despised him before he clinched the Republican nomination in 2016, Graham also seemed to abhor him the day a sea of his violent supporters stormed the Capitol building. And a new book claims that his fury was even greater than previously reported.

According to Axios (in a passage teased out by The Hill), a new book by New York Times reporters Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns, called This Will Not Pass, has yet another noteworthy bit about what went down that fateful day. At one point during the riot, Graham — either before or after he told police to “use” guns on the invading horde — furiously rang up White House counsel Pat Cipollone. And he reportedly told her that they in Congress will “be asking you for the 25th Amendment” if he didn’t do more to call off his misinformed, misled supporters.

The 25th Amendment, if you need reminding, allows the vice president and Congress to effectively remove the president from power if they’re no longer able to perform their job. The vice president then assumes the powers of the president.

That didn’t happen. But later that night, when Congress reconvened to finally certify the election the rioters tried to upend, Graham was visibly frayed. “Count me out,” he told his colleagues about further Trump shenanigans. According to Martin and Burn’s book, he went even further than that, saying he hoped the tragic event would unify the country.

“People will say, ‘I don’t want to be associated with that,’” Graham said. “There will be a rallying effect for a while, the country says: We’re better than this.”

Not long after, Graham went back to Trump’s side and started downplaying the Capitol attack that shook him so. And not long after that, the twice-impeached president accused of manipulating his supporters to overturn an election he lost became the presumptive Republican presidential candidate of the 2024 election, a position he holds to this day.

(Via Axios and The Hill)