Weekend Data Dump

So Scott Jordan, the head of SCOTTeVest, thinks his customers are stupid? How many of those customers would be stupid enough to say they think the people responsible for their wealth are stupid? He wrote that on Facebook. He since deleted his account. Which is probably wise because it is apparently designed to hook you yet is emotionally destructive. And Jordan deleted his Twitter account. Also wise. Although that is a personal account. And I did ponder joining Twitter just to have a platform to expand the reach of this blog.  I remain happy and not angry. Avoiding Facebook and Twitter was a good choice, it seems.

President Trump apologized for an old Tweet that spread a Britain First video. Which is the right thing to do to fix that error.

It isn't fake news if you believe it is true. Very illuminating, I think.

I still find it outrageous that Clinton got away with her breach of security while Secretary of State by using a private email server that bypassed government systems and procedures--and evaded government record retention requirements, it should be remembered. Obviously, prosecuting her would have put the president in legal jeopardy, too, for letting her get away with it and participating in her violation. Recall that the then-President Obama said he learned about the private email by seeing the news. Which the media went along with despite being obviously implausible. Yet he also said he did not "initially" (that's safely vague) know. So at some point he knew before seeing the news. And his administration declined to release Clinton-Obama emails for national security reasons. Yet Trump's utterly trivial lies about crowd size are the outrage.

Britain needs to get out of the EU as soon as possible rather than delaying liberation by quibbling over the details. Remainers will seize on divisions and delays to derail Brexit and end that threat for good. Get out now and fix the problems later. Don't let pursuit of the perfect interfere with achieving a good thing.

As a rule-of-law guy, are Democrats really happy with the new rules of peaceful transfer of power that they are setting after the Trump victory?

South Sudan breached African Union long-standing policy of not touching borders drawn by colonial powers. It didn't change an international border, but it did split a country. But it didn't create a corner of peace. Lesson learned: dividing a country with artificial borders doesn't actually fix anything. At least in Sudan, anyway. And at least not in the short run.

Strategypage looks at nukes. America has 1,800 warheads we can launch with a total of 6,800 that can be used. Russia might build up to 8,000 warheads including non-strategic weapons. (Although Russian neighbors within range of those "non-strategic" warheads might quibble with that distinction.) Russia's military is not highly ready. They have pockets of excellence and a slice of adequacy. But most is crap. I know that as a result of that conventional weakness that nukes are the primary means Russia has of preventing invasion, but am I to believe that their nukes are so unique that lack of readiness and quality control won't apply to their nuclear arsenal, too?

Tim Horton's has the basis for a great marketing campaign to expand their franchise in Australia, now. G'day mate, eh?

The results of fake news: It's not so much the evil of jihadis that I mind but their utter stupidity. This young lass tried to burn down a school claiming that it was revenge for American destruction of schools in Iraq and Afghanistan. Where did she get that nonsense? It is a stupid reason given that it is 180 degrees opposite our intentions (even if results don't match investments). (Leaving aside whether her actions were justified even if her charge was true.) Note she said she regretted she didn't know how to build bombs. Remember that jihadis are the ones who wreck schools and throw acid in the face of little girls going to those schools. Dumb as a friggin' rock, she is. And evil.

Good Lord, just how much money does Amazon.com make?!

Last week I noted that Iran has stopped harassing American ships in the Persian Gulf. I wondered if we quietly told them that the next time their boats try that we sink them. Iran says that the reason they haven't gotten close to our ships is that the American Navy is now behaving itself there. So was the Navy behaving badly under Obama and more lawful under Trump? Or are the Iranians lying?

NATO state Romania's shaky government is trying to undermine rule of law by gutting anti-corruption laws. Public protests to stop that take place. The West should help defend rule of law there which is the foundation of our democracy and freedom. Without rule of law the West is just another autocratic tribe with no reason other than ethnic and racial factors to consider its culture superior.

Putin hopes that recent difficulties are only a temporary setback that he will overcome to rebuild the empire. So don't tell me NATO is obsolete.

The Army's active protection systems are running into difficulties for the Bradley and Stryker. The Abrams system is proceeding. I don't understand why 3 different systems rather than a single system are being used.

Strategypage looks at the top 10 threats for 2018. Russia isn't really on the list. Which makes sense. Despite their many nukes and hostility--which does make them potentially dangerous--they remain relatively weak and rely on bluster and weak targets that can be handled with their narrow slice of decent military power in order for Putin to ride around bare-chested on tigers. Or whatever his shtick is lately.

What really sticks out on the list of threats is the "Palestinian meltdown." Which doesn't strike me as a threat as much as an opportunity to achieve peace as Palestinians realize they are no longer the queen of the victim prom. Palestinians may learn that they can't reject any peace proposal (recall the 2000 deal that the Palestinians rejected) and count on the Arab world and America to prop them up with the threat of war against Israel to destroy it and financing (America helps in the latter, oddly enough).

I consider myself a happy person. Things work out even when things seem bad. Was it my choice to be happy? That sounds about right. Some people clearly choose to be unhappy despite all the good things in their life. So the reverse should be true, too. I didn't need meditation to choose to be happy. But whatever it takes is just fine as far as I'm concerned.

I'm sure liberals are upset that Trump announced he will keep the Guantanamo Bay detention facility open. But conservatives shouldn't gloat considering Trump has about 7 more years to match Obama's record on keeping the prison for jihadi scum open.

Separatists in Yemen backed by the United Arab Emirates advanced in southern Yemen. The UAE is part of the Saudi coalition that backs Yemen factions that the separatists marched on. The Saudis seem to have negotiated a halt to the armed clashes. Do you wonder why I consider Yemen a clusterfuck that should not attract American intervention to settle? By all means, kill jihadis and back the Saudi effort. But Yemen is too complicated to die for. Strategypage provides the nuance to explain the cluster.

I wasn't too worried about electoral fraud accusations in the recent Honduras presidential election because the winner was predicted by polling to win. So initially falling behind in the count and then surpassing the challenger didn't seem irregular.  But if the president ran in defiance of their constitution, that's another issue altogether that even popular support doesn't justify. It is better to support rule of law than any particular candidate. Yes the opposition candidate is not a good choice from America's point of view. But rule of law demands they be allowed to freely choose that as long as the people have the chance to change their mind in the next free election.

On the 50th anniversary of the Tet Offensive, a reminder that we won that battle. North Vietnam fully intended the offensive to trigger a popular uprising against the South Vietnamese government, but the people and army rallied to hold the line, and then--with Americans fighting at their side--inflict massive casualties on the enemy. The narrative that the offensive was intended to break American morale at home is only an after-the-fact claim based on the fact that our media portrayed the offensive as an enemy victory that did indeed lead Americans to start questioning the chance of victory. That was fake news with immense consequences.

The protests in Iran that exploded and then subsided simmer on in a hijab protest against the "most visible symbol of oppression" against Iranian women.

I hope this is merely funny. I really do. I really don't have the base of knowledge to judge whether the Republican FISA memo is a smoking gun of crime. At the very least, it speaks of a lack of commitment to nonpartisan service to whoever is in office. And it is rather disturbing if that kind of discretion is perfectly legal, isn't it? But I'll wait to see how others with far more knowledge on both sides of the aisle judge this. One thing we can say for sure is that contrary to vehement Democratic assertions that it would reveal so much it would damage American security, releasing the FISA memo has had zero national security implications. It's somewhere up to a smoking gun domestic rule of law outrage yet not close to dire threat to American national security. I can say with confidence it is somewhere within that range. UPDATE: Dershowitz doesn't see any actual direct evidence of wrongdoing but also sees no national security harm in the released memo. The memo does merit further inquiry to see if the facts behind the statements back what appears to have happened. It may be that there are reasons for the statements that don't rely on bad intent and illegal actions. But as I said, the real disturbing issue might be what is perfectly legal and routine in domestic spying.

God help me but I want this.

The flaw in single payer health care: when the single payer can't pay. It's so obvious when you say it out loud.

The Mayan civilization may have been three times as big as previously thought. It frustrates me that the Spanish destroyed so many records when they conquered large chunks of Central and South America.

Strategypage looks at the massive car bomb campaign that ISIL used (over 600) in the battle for Mosul (October 2016-July 2017). ISIL suffered nearly 10,000 dead out of their 11,000 men holding the city; the Iraqis suffered 1,400 dead and 7,000 wounded in their 100,000+-strong attacking force; while 6,000 civilians died, which was worse because of the common ISIL tactic of using human shields. This is why I cringe from suggestions that the Army should focus on urban warfare in mega-cities. If at all possible I want to bypass and isolate enemy-held cities rather than have such a massive force tied down for so long in a bloody fight. We may have to take a city--so I do want to have skills for it. But I'd rather the default position be that we bypass even a mega-city if at all possible, securing only key access points on the periphery of the urban area to contain the enemy inside and use firepower in a siege to immobilize and cripple the enemy defenders.