The War Room: The Russian military kept up attacks in the northern Ukrainian Chernihiv region all night long despite having said yesterday said that it would sharply “reduce military activity” around Kyiv and Chernihiv. There were explosions in Kyiv as well.

  Despite some signs of hopes coming out of yesterday’s peace talks, Russian and Ukrainian negotiators made no “breakthroughs” the Kremlin said. “What is positive is that the Ukrainian side has at least started to specifically formulating and putting on paper what it is proposing,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, but that there have not been “any breakthroughs, anything very promising.” 

  Russia’s deputy defense minister, Aleksandr Fomin, had said yesterday they were easing up the assault and making a gesture “to increase mutual trust for future negotiations.” 

  The Ukrainians said they had offered military neutrality in exchange for guarantees of national security.

  The Russian statement of course was met with immediate skepticism in the West, given that you can’t believe anything the Russians say. President Biden said, “We’ll see,” and “I don’t read anything into it until I see what their actions are.” Secretary of State Antony Blinken. Said, “There is what Russia says and there’s what Russia does.” After all, the Russians said they were not going to invade Ukraine right up until they did.

  Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said there were still air strikes yesterday on Kyiv. “We’re not convince that the threat to the capital city has been radically diminished,” he said.

  Some analysts believe the Russians are just resting and regrouping after getting chewed up by the Ukrainian resistance. There’s also a theory that they might shift the forces in the west that have been attacking Kyiv and move east in the effort to carve off a slice of Ukraine for Russian control. 

  The Russians also said that Vladimir Putin would be ready to meet Ukraine’s  Volodymyr Zelensky face to face once there’s a draft of a peace agreement. 

  As the fighting continues, the Ukrainians pushed back the Russians in the area of Irpon, north of Kyiv, but the invaders have been using missiles to hit targets deep inside the country. This week they hit another oil depot  

  Yesterday at least 12 people were killed in a Russian strike on a regional government office building in the southern port city of Mykolaiv. The city between Odessa on the Black Sea and the Crimean peninsula has been under heavy assault but the Russians have been unable to take it.

  The United Nations now says that more than four million people have fled Ukraine. 

Economic War: The US is preparing new sanctions aimed at hindering the supply chains of Russia’s military industrial sector in a continuing effort to make it harder for Moscow to make war on Ukraine,  according to Adewale Adeyemo, the deputy Treasury secretary. The new sanctions will be deployed in coordination with Western allies. 

   In London, the Brits have impounded a $50 million yacht believed to be owned by a Russian oligarch. The yacht called the Phi is 192 feet long, has what’s described as an “infinite” wine cellar, and a fresh water swimming pool. 

  The British National Crime Agency says ownership of the yacht had been deliberately hidden under registration to a company based in the islands of St. Kitts and Nevis, and flies a Maltese flag.

Viral News: The Food and Drug Administration has authorized a second Covid booster shot for people 50 and older as well as people with a compromised immune system.

  The NY Times reports that “Many scientists are dubious about today’s decision” but, there’s “an Israeli study that found that adults older than 60 who got a fourth dose were 78 percent less likely to die of Covid than those who got only three shots.”

  On the political front, the governors of 21 states are suing to end the federal public transportation mask mandate, claiming it “harms the states” and interferes with local laws. “President Biden’s shortsighted, heavy-handed and unlawful travel policies are frustrating travelers and causing chaos on public transportation,” Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody said in a statement.

Goal Line Stand: The National Football League passed a new rule that says both teams must have a chance to possess the ball in postseason games that go into overtime. This comes after a big stink this past season when Kansas City won a divisional playoff game against the Buffalo Bills, who didn’t get a chance to score in overtime.

  The league also this week passed a diversity rule requiring that teams hire a “female or a member of an ethnic or racial minority” as an offensive assistant. The candidates would need at least three years of collegiate or professional experience in coaching football.

The Spin Rack: President Biden yesterday signed the Emmett Till Anti-lynching law, making it a federal offense to commit a hate crime that results in death or serious bodily injury. It’s been a long time coming. Emmett Till was a 14-year-old tortured and killed in 1955 in Mississippi after the Black teenager was accused of whistling at and grabbing a white woman. — A gunman yesterday killed at least five people in Bnei Brak, an ultra-Orthodox suburb of Tel Aviv before he was fatally shot. — A former Yale employee pleaded guilty in federal court to stealing millions of dollars’ worth of computers and iPads from the university’s School of Medicine. Jamie Petrone, 42, had the authority to make purchases below $10,000 and for eight years was selling pilfered electronics for cash. — NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei, who has spent 355 days on the International Space Station, is returning to Earth today aboard a Russian spacecraft.

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