Thus Endeth 2023

Memo to J6 Defendants

Vixen Stragely wrote about one defendant who is in an absolute tizzy that she is being prosecuted for her actions on J6.

Ten Bears has no sympathy for them. He did a lot of outlaw shit in his day, got beaten by the cops a few times, locked up some, and he never, ever, hit a cop.

The memo to the J6 Perps is this: When you step outside of the law, you've got to ride the rap. As the old saying goes; if you can't do the time, don't do the crime.

Your Sunday Morning Jet Noise

A C-5:

Crybaby Russians

The Russians pummelled Ukrainian cities with various missles. So the Ukrainians hit back on one Russian city; the Russians screamed like stuck pigs and whined to the UN Security Council.

I have nothing good to say about Russia whatsoever. So I'll leave it at that.

Not Paying Attention to That Section 3 of the 14th Amendment Stuff

No, I am not paying any attention to the ongoing efforts to kick the TOFF off the ballots in several states.

I'm not because, whether or not there is wriggle room in the language of the 14th Amendment as to the applicability to presidential candidates, it's a matter that's going to end up in the Supreme Court.

And if you, Gentle Reader, have any doubt whatsoever as to how they'll rule on that issue, then may I interest you in some prime seafront acreage in North Dakota?

Caturday

"Pet me, pet meeee!"

Teslas Are Serious Pieces of Shit

Seriously. Wheels fall off, suspensions collapse, and Tesla, which knows of the problems, blames the drivers.

If you're thinking of buying one, get your head examined. If you have one, sell it with a contract that has "as is, where is, with all faults" language in large, bold type.

Because It's Friday

Brit steam on a heritage railway.

It seems that, on the British mainline railways, a safety engine is required on the other end of the train in case the steam locomotive shits the bed. On the heritage railways, they can run on their own.

A Hundred Years Ago

There was a problem with armed robbers hitting mail trucks, as back in the day, it was not uncommon to send really valuable shit (including cash) by mail. So they sent in the Marines to guard the mail.

This is from the FAQ for the guards:

Q. Is there a general plan for meeting a robbery?
A. Yes; start shooting and meet developments as they arise thereafter.

Q. If I hear the command 'Hands Up,' am I justified in obeying this order?
A. No; fall to the ground and start shooting.

Q. Is it possible to make a successful mail robbery?
A. Only over a dead Marine.

Nobody tried to fuck with the Marine guards.

Excavating These Down, Here

Spineless and Carpetbagging Republicans

Nikki Haley tried to say that the Civil War was about "the freedoms that people could and couldn't do". After being lambasted widely for the fact that one of those so-called freedoms was the freedom to own other people and work them to death, she admitted that slavery was one of the causes of the Civil War.

Hey, Haley, it was the cause. That's the issue your home state went to war about. Not stating that the Civil War was about slavery is like trying to explain orbital dynamics without mentioning gravity.

Meanwhile, Lauren Boebert is packing up her carpetbag and moving to another part of Colorado in search of voters who are dumb enough to send her to Congress again. So when the going gets tough, Boebert runs away. Just like Brave Sir Robin.

The Reaper's Been After the Notable, Today

Gaston Glock has died at age 94. Tom Smothers has died at age 86.

If you know anything about firearms, you know of Gaston Glock's gun. He revolutionized the handgun market with his polymer-framed, striker-fired 9mm. Like it or not, every other manufacturer had to either come up with a competing product or walk away from the market. His guns becaume as synonomous with "American police sidearm" as the Smith & Wesson revolvers they replaced. His designs expanded to most common autopistol calibers and evolved over time.

Was he the greatest gun designer ever? I think not. That title probably belongs to John M. Browning, Jr., who designed handguns, rifles, shotguns and machine guns. Glock did one thing and did it well.

Changing gears, if you are of a certain age, you well know Tom Smothers. He and his brother Dick pushed the envelope hard on airing political dissent in the late 1960s. He was excellent in his own right; his impression of Johnny Carson was about the best there was and he was a magician. A number of comedy giants started off as writers on the Smothers Brothers' Comedy Hour. Your Boomer uncle is probably in mourning tonight.

Israel's Reaction to the Hamas Attack of 10/7/2023 and A Look Back to 9/11/2001

I have read and seen a lot of stuff in the paper, on the TV and online decrying Israel's pummeling of Gaza. So let's take a short trip down memory lane, shall we?

2,977 people were killed in the 9/11 attack. Many more died as a result of cleaning up the debris of the World Trade Center.[1] In the aftermath, we not only drove the Taliban out of Afghanistan,[2] we invaded and defeated another country that had nothing to do with 9/11.[3]

The casualty figures of that misbegotten invasion are disputed. But it is safe to say that hundreds of thousands of civilians were killed. When "excess deaths" are computed, the butcher's bill is likely around a million or so.

A million people, all innocent, who were killed because we invaded a country based on no good goddamn reason, other than Darth and Chimpy wanted to do it. Besides that. two million or so people fled the country as refugees. Two million more were displaced internally, "internal refugees" if you will.

Not to mention that more Americans were killed there than who died on 9/11/01. The arrogance of American mercenaries resulted in a brutal battle that levelled a city.[4] The actions of soldiers guarding a prison became a further stain on American honor.[5]

A country that was a counterweight to Iran became, more or less, an Iranian puppet state. Terrorists took over a portion of the country, necessitating even more military involvement.[6]

All of that, the entire parade of horribles, came from American overreaction to 9/11. The reverberations from that overreaction will persist for decades to come. The consequences of that overreaction have been largely met with a collective shrug by the American people.[7], [8] So it's not as though we are standing on high ground when we criticize Israel's war against Gaza.
________________
[1] Most of those because of their own obstinacy. Though advised to wear respiratory protection, most refused. While at the Pentagon cleanup, which was a military project, the workers were ordered to wear respiratory protection and, as a result, the incidence of respiratory problems was very low.
[2] Temporarily.
[3] Iraq.
[4] The Battle of Mosul.
[5] Abu Ghraib Prison.
[6] ISIS.
[7] Though the senior members of the Bush Administration have since been scrupulously avoiding foreign travel in order to avoid being arrested on war crimes charges.
[8] A number of other countries also participated for their own reasons. So they own a piece of this, too.

Jon Swift Memorial 2023 Blog Roundup

It's live. And yes, this here blog is in it.

Dancing These Down, Here

Now Begin Silly Season, #TrumpStinks Ed.

Apparently there is something to this, as the TOFF camp isn't denying it.

Merry. Merry.

I don't anticipate having the time to do much blogging today. I hope you're busy enough not to be spending time on blogs, unless you're trying to avoid dealing with your Trumpy/racist elders.

Merry Xmas.

The Shepherd

This appears to be the full text of the book, so set aside a little bit of time.

A shorter version:

Happy Christmas, everyone. And spare a thought for those who are on the job tonight: Police, firefighters, EMS, hospital workers, military, all to keep the rest of us safe in our beds.

Shorter Ohio: "Next Time, Kid, Do a Better Job of Attempting to Kill Jews."

A 13-year-old boy who was arrested and accused of planning a mass shooting at an Ohio synagogue will have to write a book report on a Swiss diplomat who saved thousands of Jewish people during World War II, a family court judge ruled.

The teen, who is not being named because of his age, was charged with misdemeanor inducing panic and misdemeanor disorderly conduct after allegedly making a detailed plan to shoot members of Temple Israel in the city of Canton, south of Akron.

He allegedly shared his plan on Discord, an online chat platform that has been used by previous mass shooters.

Kid drew up a plan for mass murder and shared it online. Who else (besides the FBI) saw it and is there any way of knowing who downloaded it? And having him read up on Swiss diplomat Carl Lutz is going to convince him that he's a budding Nazi and he needs to change his ways?

I am skeptical as fuck.

And what about the parents who are raising this Hitler Youth? Is anyone taking a hard look at them?

H/T

Your Sunday Morning Jet Noise

The de Havilland Vampire.

Regular readers of this blog know what's in store tonight.

What He Said (And Trump Shits Himself??)

I think that the Rude Pundit is spot on.

UPDATE: From the comments... Donnie wears diapers and routinely shits himself? He smells like a toddler who has filled their daiper? Is this the reason why his wife sleeps in another suite?

Why isn't this being more widely discussed?

I Have a Lot of Problems With You People, and Now You're Gonna Hear All About It!

Festivus is today. But when it comes to some topics, the pole is up year round, here.

Truth be told, I don't have a lot of problems with folks on this blog. I did have to put on full-time comment moderatinn a few years ago to rein in the most active bomb-throwers and those who believe that personal invective is an adequate substitute for reason. They'd kick off a mini-flamewar before I came by with the extinguisher. Most of them have gotten the hint and gone off to haunt other lightly-used corners of the Internet, but a few persisten morons keep trying.

Which is funny, in a way. The ones who have made it to the Banhammer List, well, I don't read their stuff. I see their name in the list of comments and delete them. So I hope they're writing long screeds and wasting their time yelling into a vacuum. (But don't worry. Elsewhere, a copy is saved in case po-po involvement is called for.)

In the meantime, Operation Cleanup is underway for Monday's shindig and Festival of Keeping the Retail Industry Afloat.

Speaking of that, every year, I hear the conservatives whining about "keeping Christ in Christmas". I'd be more impressed if they didn't, as the Pope has mentioned, limit their Christianity to matters between the navel and the knees. It doesn't take much to see that it's a safe bet that Jesus would be horrified by most of his self-styled adherents, who use his name to justify greed, unkindness and killing.

So yes, I have a problem with them.

Night Launch by SpaceKarenInc. Scrubbed.

Maybe from Vandenberg in an hour or so, flinging German spy satellites into polar orbit.



Nothing is sure when it comes to rocket science, though.

UPDATE: Scrubbed.

Caturday

"Is it food yet?"

Comcast Customer Retention Fail

"If you're not happy with our service, go somewhere else."

Either someone at Comcast hates their job or they don't much give a shit.

Zinc Point Ammo

If you have any, well, you can do what you wish, but be forewarned. It has a bad rep.

Duds are bad enough, squibs are damgerous, but blowing up guns is no good at all.

Why Hasn't the TOFF Been Charged With Murder?

He stoked up a mob which stormed the Capitol to try and overturn the 2020 election. He watched it unforld, on TV, and declined the requests by his staff and family to call off the mob. People died as a result.

So why hasn't he been charged with felony murder? Is it because he's not a poor Black dude who's being represented by an overworked public defender?

Hell, the felony murder rule could apply to all of the J6 defendants, for that matter.

Because It's Friday

The T1 Trust is still at it:

Why Bible Mike, Meatball Ron and the Rest Are Waging Culture Wars, or "Dude, Where's My Recession?"

Because that's all they got. Crime is down. The much-ballyhooed recession didn't arrive.

As for Abbott sending migrants to Democratic cities, maybe it's time for those cities to send them on to Republican cities. Drop off a few hundred in Jefferson City, MO, for example.

Ringing These Down, Here

Extra, Extra, Snark All About It

"Excited Delirium" is Still Code for "Being Killed by the Cops"

It's still going on.

I'll bet the number of incidents of excitied delirium that don't involve the cops beating somebody are extremely rare.

It Sure Took Them Long Enough; Boston Ed.

Boston Mayor Michelle Wu on Wednesday issued a formal apology on behalf of the city to two Black men wrongly accused of the 1989 murder of a pregnant white woman, a high-profile case that deepened rifts between the police force and the Black community.

34 years to say "sorry about that shit, man". Without a recent HBO series about the case, it's a safe bet that the apology would never have been made. So color me unimpressed.

I wrote about the case fourteen years ago.

Who's the Biggest Loser? "Coach" Tuberville, That's Who.

The Senate confirmed nearly a dozen nominees for top military posts on Tuesday night, marking the end of Sen. Tommy Tuberville’s remaining holds over senior promotions.

With senators rushing to wrap up before the holiday, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer secured a deal to confirm all 11 nominees for four-star positions by voice vote.

Their confirmation ends Tuberville’s blockade of military nominations, which was in its 11th month. The Alabama Republican has been using the tactic despite harsh criticism from both parties, but it ended after failing to win any concessions from the administration.

Tuberville fucked with the lives of people who have devoted their lives to the defense of this country because he thought he could secure some political advantage. All he managed to do is piss everyone off and demonstrate to those who may have been interested in serving past their retirement eligibility date that their careers could be held hostage by one moronic senator for his own partisan reasons.

The GOP is Playing Putin's Game

After blunting Ukraine’s counteroffensive from the summer, Russia is building up its resources for a new stage of the war over the winter, which could involve trying to extend its gains in the east and deal significant blows to the country’s vital infrastructure.

Russian President Vladimir Putin seems to be hoping that relentless military pressure, combined with changing Western political dynamics and a global focus on the Israeli-Hamas war, will drain support for Ukraine in the nearly 2-year-old war and force Kyiv to yield to Moscow’s demands.

“As far as the Russian leadership is concerned, the confrontation with the West has reached a turning point: The Ukrainian counteroffensive has failed, Russia is more confident than ever, and the cracks in Western solidarity are spreading,” said Tatiana Stanovaya, senior fellow with Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center, in a recent analysis.

Between Bible Mike in the House, the Most Gutless Senator Alive (Graham) and Putin's Poodle in Hungary, Putin has lots of allies. Maybe Bible Mike and Miss Lindsey have other reasons for blocking aid to Ukraine, but the effect is the same of that of Orban's blocking aid to Ukraine.

Anyone who thinks that Putin will be satisfied with conquering Ukraine hasn't been paying attention to his stated ambitions. Putin wants to "restore" what he sees as the imperial Russian empire. That means conquering a lot of other nations, incluidng all or part of NATO members. That is also why Putin is backing the TOFF, for he believes that the TOFF will pull the US out of NATO, which will give him a green light to proceed.

A politician wins election to lead his country, turns it into a dictatorship and then begins threating his neighbors. Under the guise of protecting his ethnic countrymen who live in neighboring nations, he begins invading, first a portion of a neighbor and then moves to conquer one or more of those countries. The US and other European powers do nothing but wring their hands and flap their jaws until the dictator invades a country who has defense treaties with theose powers and then it is Game Fucking On.

We've seen this play out before. It boggles the mind that the Republicans are choosing to play politics with a growing fire in Europe, using a growing conflagration to score cheap political points. But it is nothing surprising, for Republicans have signalled over and over that they value party loyalty above loyalty to the country.

As someone said elsewhere, America First 2.0, but without Lindy [the Nazi sympathizer, if not asset].

Heh. Heh. Fourteenth Amendment Ed.

The Colorado Supreme Court on Tuesday declared former President Donald Trump ineligible for the White House under the U.S. Constitution’s insurrection clause and removed him from the state’s presidential primary ballot, setting up a likely showdown in the nation’s highest court to decide whether the front-runner for the GOP nomination can remain in the race
....
Trump’s attorneys had promised to appeal any disqualification immediately to the nation’s highest court, which has the final say about constitutional matters. His campaign said it was working on a response to the ruling..

I'm not sure why the Supremes get a say, as qualification of people for a ballot is a state issue. But you know this court, issues are a matter for the states, unless they have an effect on conservatives. For we all know how Ginni Clarence Thomas will vote.

Shoot the Archer, Not the Arrow

That was the mantra of Navy AAW: Kill the launching platform, instead of the missiles it launched.

That maxim came to mind when I read this:

The U.S. and a host of other nations are creating a new force to protect ships transiting the Red Sea that have come under attack by drones and ballistic missiles fired from Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced Tuesday in Bahrain.
...
“This is an international challenge that demands collective action,” Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement released just after midnight in Bahrain. “Therefore today I am announcing the establishment of Operation Prosperity Guardian, an important new multinational security initiative.”

Swatting missiles and drones out of the sky seems kind of futile. Generally, if you want somebody to stop shooting at you, you shoot back at them.

There is even a military term for it: Counterbattery fire.

Gnarling These Down, Here

About self-checkout.

Torture Nation, Russian Ed.

These are the people that the so-called "Freedom Caucus" are supporting.

The UN’s high commissioner for human rights, Volker Türk, says his office has documented at least 100 civilian deaths in Russian custody in the Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine, including the annexed Crimea peninsula.

Citing a new UN report, Türk reported in Geneva on Tuesday that there were signs that at least 39 of the civilians had been tortured before their deaths.

None of this is any surprise. Russia is about as uncivilized a nation as there is for a country with all or part of its territory in Europe.

RobertaX remarks that Republicans are bound and determined to ignore history and play douchebag politics. I think it's worse than that, but you're familiar. But as she put it, if we get into a war with Russia, nobody's going to be sweating who crosses the Rio Grande. Hell, most people will be going the other way.

The Tokyo Steelers

U.S. Steel, the Pittsburgh steel producer that played a key role in the nation’s industrialization, is being acquired by Nippon Steel in an all-cash deal valued at approximately $14.1 billion.

The transaction is worth about $14.9 billion when including the assumption of debt. The combined company will be among the top three steel-producing companies in the world, according to 2022 figures from the World Steel Association.

One thing is clear: Capitalists would sell their mothers, sisters and daughters to brothels if the money was good enough. The only concern in their minds is "how much can I get for it", with "it" being anything.

The ramifications of this deal for the U.S. economy, for the places where there are steel plants, for national security, none of that matters a flying fuck. All they care about is the money.

This is the biggest, bald-faced lie of all:

U.S. Steel executives were asked about a potential pushback from U.S. regulators over security concerns on Monday. “This is going to increase competition here in the United States with a great ally to the United States,” answered U.S. Steel CEO David Burritt.

I cannot think of a solitary example where one large company merging with another to become even bigger increased competition in any industry. It's quite the opposite.

Little Markie Has a Sad (On His Journey to Prison)

A federal appeals court on Monday ruled that former Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows cannot move charges related to efforts to overturn the 2020 election in Georgia to federal court.
...
Circuit Chief Judge William Pryor, who was appointed by President George W. Bush, wrote in Monday’s 35-page ruling that the law “does not apply to former federal officers, and even if it did, the events giving rise to this criminal action were not related to Meadows’s official duties.”

Basically, committing crimes was not within the scope of the duties of a presidential chief of staff.

And neither was it for his boss, which should give the TOFF something to worry about.

Where Those Millions of Dollars Bibi Let Flow to Hamas Went

Not to help the people of Gaza, but to build tunnels that one could drive through.

Rape and Hypocrisy in the GOP in DeSantisLand

The Republican Party of Florida suspended Chairman Christian Ziegler and demanded his resignation during an emergency meeting Sunday, adding to calls by Gov. Ron DeSantis and other top officials for him to step down as police investigate a rape accusation against him.

Ziegler is accused of raping a woman with whom he and his wife, Moms for Liberty co-founder Bridget Ziegler, had a prior consensual sexual relationship, according to police records.
...
The accusation also has caused turmoil for Bridget Ziegler, an elected member of the Sarasota School Board, though she is not accused of any crime. On Tuesday the board voted to ask her to resign. She refused.

The couple have been outspoken opponents of LGBTQ+ rights, and their relationship with another woman has sparked criticism and accusations of hypocrisy.

So, is it OK with the Christian Taliban if a woman has sex with another woman as long as her husband is watching? Or is it OK for a man to have sex out of wedlock as long as his wife is observing? Or are they absolved from sin if they're quoting Hitler at the time?

Don't Vaccinate Yourself and Your Kids. See If I Care.

Anti-vaxxers have been outright lying about COVID vaccines, and all of the others, so far as I know. That addlepated Kennedy manchild is one of the self-proclaimed leaders of the antivaxxers.

I know that the antivaxxers don't care about anyone else. They are intellectual babies, people who believe in freedom with no responsibilities or consequences. And you can bet the farm that they deny the reality that in states where people haven't been vaccinated for Covid have higher death rates.

The problem, of course, is that they themselves aren't footing the costs for their conspiracy-thory-based resistance to vaccines. When they or their kids go to the doctor, the walk-in clinic or the hospital because they've gotten sick from a communicable disease, the rest of us have to foot the cost. Whether its from higher medical insurance premiums or higher costs to the hospitals (which get reflected in insurance) or draining state Medicaid funds, we all pay for it.

And if polio returns to any extent and people start ending up in iron lungs again, we are all going to be paying for it.

Which is the basis of my objection: If you want to be stupid and run the risk of getting sick from communicable diseases, then the rest of us should not have to backstop you. If, it is found that you contracted a communicable disease that was preventable (or mitigatable) by inoculation and you didn't bother, then it should be the law that all of the costs should be recoverable from you, with a denial of bankruptcy or homestead laws as safe harbors.

Baby Kennedy can afford to be a medical moron. Can you?
H/T

Your Sunday Morning Prop Noise

A Corsair returns to the skies.

Sorry for Not Paying Attention to the Latest Possible Theft of National Security Secrets By the TOFF

A binder containing highly classified information related to Russian election interference went missing at the end of Donald Trump’s presidency, raising alarms among intelligence officials that some of the most closely guarded national security secrets from the US and its allies could be exposed, sources familiar with the matter told CNN.

Its disappearance, which has not been previously reported, was so concerning that intelligence officials briefed Senate Intelligence Committee leaders last year about the missing materials and the government’s efforts to retrieve them, the sources said.
...
The intelligence was so sensitive that lawmakers and congressional aides with top secret security clearances were able to review the material only at CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, where their work scrutinizing it was itself kept in a locked safe.

So the prevailing belief is that the TOFF stole the binder and then, what, handed it over to the Russians? Or Mark Meadows took it home and hid it for P01135809?

Look to members of the Party of Treason to yawn about this. They are loyal only to Orange Jesus. Every one of them who says the Pledge of Allegiance is lying. They are all traitors. In a just and ethical society, the firing parties would already be hard at work.

H/T

I'll Take "Things That I Could Not Care Less About" for $800

"What is Jeopardy?"

Mayim Bialik won’t be giving answers as a host of “Jeopardy!” anymore.

“The Big Bang Theory” actor posted news of her departure on Instagram on Friday.

“Sony has informed me that I will no longer be hosting the syndicated version of Jeopardy!” Bialik wrote.

I really don't, but the title was low-hanging fruit.

Other things I don't give a rat's ass about:

Daytime Emmys Or "Schmemmys")

The reason why any particular entertainer croaked.

The World's Richest Welfare Family.

Caturday

An attentive visitor and Chip is content.

FFS

Some stuff has disappeared from the blogrolls. I don't recall deleting them.

If you think your blog should be listed and it's not, drop me a line.

Message Sent

A jury awarded $148 million in damages on Friday to two former Georgia election workers who sued Rudy Giuliani for defamation over lies he spread about them in 2020 that upended their lives with racist threats and harassment.

The damages verdict follows emotional testimony from Wandrea “Shaye” Moss and her mother, Ruby Freeman, who tearfully described becoming the target of a false conspiracy theory pushed by Giuliani and other Republicans as they tried to keep then-President Donald Trump in power after he lost the 2020 election.

There was an audible gasp in the courtroom when the jury foreperson read aloud the $75 million award in punitive damages for the women. Moss and Freeman were each awarded another roughly $36 million in other damages.

There is a point that people should have figured out by now: If you hitch your wagon to the TOFF, you will fall into shit. Your reputation will be shredded and you will be lucky if you can afford to live in a refrigerator carton under an I-10 overpass.

This Holiday Season, Putin Should Send Gift Baskets to J.D. Vance, Gym Jordan, and the Rest of the Anti-Freedom Caucus

Mr Putin said support for Ukraine from its allies was running out.

"Today Ukraine produces almost nothing," he said. "Excuse my vulgarity, but everything is being brought in as a freebie. But those freebies could run out at some point. And it seems that they are gradually running out."

And there you have the Russian strategy: Keep throwing Russian men into the meatgrinder until his allies in Congress (and his asset in Hungary) can cut off all aid to Ukraine.

It really is a puzzle, in a way. Here we have a smaller country with a democracy and a vibrant economy (prewar, at least) and a breadbasket for much of the world, that is fighting off an invader that targets civilians, murders and torture civilians, rapes woman and kidnaps children and the Republicans back the country that is doing the invading, murdering and raping.

Further, if we fail here, a few very bad things are almost certain to happen. China will invade Taiwan, because they will believe that we won't stand with the Taiwanese and even if we did, we'd get tired and give up. Venezuela may invade its nighbor soon Russia will absorb, by persuasion or by force, most of the former Soviet republics. Eventually, Russi will turn its attention to the FSRs that are now NATO members, because Russia will believe that they can grind down western Europe, that the French and Germans will not send their sons to defend the Baltics. All because the Republicans are not just telegraphing American weakness and failure of resolve, they're shouting it from the rooftops.

Does anyone, other than the Putinites in Congress, not understand that Russia is an adversarial nation and has been since time immemorial? Russia has lost a third of a million men in this war (dead, wounded, captured), not counting the million or more who fled the country. Their economy is under stress. The only friends they have in the world who can provide meaningful help, so far, are Iran and North Korea. (China is being more circumspect to avoid being sanctioned.) Their soldiers are badly led, badly equipped and sometimes are moving forward under the threat of summary execution for not doing so. Their armored forces have been decimated; the Russians have been dragging rusted fifty and sixty year old tanks out of storage and junkyards and hurriedly refurbishing them for use.

We have the chance to break Russia as a military threat to the point that it will take them a decade or more to rebuild their conventional ground forces. All we are called to do in order to make that happen is to send money and weapons. The weapons, incidentally, from ammunition large and small to artillery pieces and missile systems are all made here,so those costs go to support American factories and American jobs.

Which, by the way, is something that we have needed to do for a very long time. Those who pay attention to logisitics have been pointing out for a very long time that we do not have the industrial capability to support a conventional war of any duration (the Navy still can't build surface ships for shit). We can use this war as a rationale to fix that problem and rebuild the Arsenal of Democracy.

But, for some reason, the Republicans are back in their time-worn practice of supporting dictatorships over democracies, and closing their eyes to fascist aggression. Is it because they know, in their souls, that when it comes to a contest of free ideas, they tend to lose? So they really do want to burn down the American Experiment and bring about a dictatorship of the oligarchs? And if we don't help other democracies when they are in trouble, then who can we expect to come to our aid if we once again need help?

I don't know the answer. Do you?

Because It's Friday

The Flying Scotsman.

Greyhound

Greyhound is a Tom Hanks movie based on C.S. Forester's book The Good Shepherd.

Hanks did a good job on the screenplay and in the title role, even though he might be a tad bit old for the role of CDR Krause, the destroyer's captain and commander of the convoy's escorts. It's a pretty good look at the grittiness of the Battle of the Atlantic, which was the longest battle of the war. The movie takes place in the Black Pit, the area of the North Atlantic that was not covered by land-based ASW aircraft.[1]

Now, some technical quibbles:

Forking These Down, Here

Mediaopoly

It wasn't banned from TV, though. This aired 25 years ago and it's still true. All you have to do is watch ABC's Good Morning Disney America to see the effects of corporate ownership of media (instead of them being tandalone public companies). That show is blatant; one of the recent Xmas Shit on Sale was nothing more than a Walmart infomercial.

Shorter Gym Jordan: A Rule For Me and a Rule For Thee(An Entry From the Beclowning Files)

He defied a congressional subpoena and he's mad because Hunter Biden has defied his subpoena.

Ol' Gym said that the subpoena he got was a "partisan political stunt", which are words that perfectly describe his subpoena to Hunter, as he and his party of partisan seditionists pursue an evidence-free impeachment inquiry.

The central point, though, is that Gym and the rest of his caucus don't get out of bed and take a shit unless so instructed by the TOFF. Their mouths don't move unless the TOFF wiggles his fingers.

Gym Jordan and the Rest Jump to the Yanks of Their Puppetmaster

The House on Wednesday authorized the impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden, with every Republican rallying behind the politically charged process despite lingering concerns among some in the party that the investigation has yet to produce evidence of misconduct by the president.

The 221-212 party-line vote put the entire House Republican conference on record in support of an impeachment process that can lead to the ultimate penalty for a president: punishment for what the Constitution describes as “high crimes and misdemeanors,” which can lead to removal from office if convicted in a Senate trial.

The latter isn't going to happen. If the Senate wasn't going to convict the TOFF after he sent a mob to storm the Capitol, it sure as shit isn't going to convict President Biden because the TOFF has ordered it. Gym Jordan hasn't been able to find any misconduct so far, but to be fair, he couldn't exactly find misconduct when he was a coach at Ohio State.

No evidence, but their Orange Jesus has demanded they proceed and so they shall. Not a single one of them has an shred of integrity, let alone courage. There is not a single House Republican who has anything resembling a spine or gonads. They are the largest pack of gutless critters known to science.

A Thought

The TOFF diverted military funds for his wall and it was legal.

So why not do the same thing for Ukraine?

The Appeasement Caucus, apparently, wants to pull out of NATO and break our security treaties. Since they don't want to help Ukraine, they sure as shit won't help Taiwan. So what do we need B-21s for, or more Virginia-class subs? We're not going to help our friends, the GOP Surrender Monkeys will see to that.

It's not a "peace dividend", it's the GOP Surrender Dividend.

Slashing These Down, Here