Needless to say, if a federal bureaucracy and judges had thwarted President Obama, there would be no praises of the "democratic" Deep State protecting our Constitution. Bureaucrats can serve or they can resign in protest. Carrying out an independent foreign policy that conflicts with the elected president is not an option. I'll say it again, some people in the civil service need to be fired and have their pensions revoked to rein this in. Tip to Instapundit.
After all the talk of Trump abandoning the Kurds in Syria, the American military presence won't be much less than it was before that so-called withdrawal. We get benefits for remaining in eastern Syria; although there is a risk of escalation by enemies without an increase in our willingness to fight for those benefits. So I do worry about a mismatch between our troop presence and our willingness to fight to keep them there and defend our interests. The issue is complicated and reasonable people can disagree on policy. I just protest the simplistic Orange Man Bad analysis. But no, the presence of Americans in Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, and the Persian Gulf is not an indication of "endless war."
I've long thought that if you compare the full life cycle of electric cars versus internal combustion engine cars that the former wouldn't come out looking very good. So yeah, what about the batteries? Help save the planet, indeed.
Yes, Democrats who control the House of Representatives can set up whatever rules they like for the impeachment-like inquiry regardless of the limited precedents. But it still doesn't look good for respect for rule of law and fairness if it's a Calvinball Impeachment, does it?
So are the Russians positioning themselves in the Libya civil war to aim refugees/migrants at Europe as a weapon? Well, they did the same in Syria, so probably yes.
Thank Goodness, the Brexit Party won't run against Johnson's people in the coming British election and risk splitting the pro-Brexit vote. Labour promised a new Brexit vote. Given that the one more than three years ago was supposed to settle the question, the pledge is clearly one of having votes until Remain wins. Which is standard EU imperial policy, to be fair.
You people seriously believe this?
That's horrifying. But this sounds more like a problem of overly aggressive county officials rather than the law. I was working for the legislature in 1999 and remember well that the law streamlined Depression-era statutes designed to make it very difficult for the government to foreclose on tax-delinquent property. The change was needed. But the locals really screwed that man who seems to have made a simple math error.
"Gangs" of unknown membership in Malmo have been violent--including a car bomb. Swedish authorities are creating a task force to combat the mysterious problem. Well they should given that it is a totally new thing to have 100 explosions in a year. The Danes are tightening border controls to avoid spill-over. I'm so old I remember when the problem was mere "youths." Now they're organized. I stand by my prediction at the end of this post. Am I wrong?
What's up with China ordering their students out of Taiwan by Taiwan's January 2020 national election? Normally I'd expect clearing the decks for an invasion as an explanation. But perhaps the Chinese authorities simply don't want their students to get dangerous ideas about Asian democracy in action lest the Chinese students start to think the Hong Kong protesters have a point.
What is ACK!'s major malfunction? ACK approvingly cited Canadian activist Naomi Kline. Which makes sense given that Canada has a prime minister personally trying hard to bridge that white-persons of color gap.
I'm not happy with China making such a major investment in a Greek port. Let's hope Greece stays financially solvent lest China just try to buy the country. Let's hope the EU can manage that problem.
Strategypage looks at the multi-war in Syria--including the al-Baghdadi raid--as well as the persistence of jihadi impulses in Islam that are currently tearing Syria apart. Apparently in the first month of Turkey's operation about 150 civilians have been killed and 850 combatants have been killed. Note that Turkey does not have their full security buffer zone because Kurds and Syrian government forces are resisting. On the jihadi issue, my view is that the only good jihadi is a dead jihadi--but rules of engagement need to be strict enough so that nobody responsible for making good jihadis adopts the view that "a Moslem running away is a jihadi and a Moslem standing still is a well-disciplined jihadi." And note that Assad tried to play the game of aiming jihadis at his enemies--in Iraq--and ultimately that weapon turned against him big time. May Pakistan's short-sighted, India-obsessed military rulers take note.
I find it bizarre to read articles that the White House has "overruled" this or that staffer on foreign policy. The president runs our foreign policy--not staffers. Staffers offer advice and then carry out orders or resign in protest. And while Democrats are praising Colonel Vindman for opposing Trump's Ukraine policy, it isn't up to him. I've long been clear on presidential control of the military. And Vindman isn't the hill for Democrats to die on for this issue, it seems. Vindman has the right--and duty--to resist unlawful orders. Beyond that, neither he nor his colleagues make policy. The president does not "subvert"--as Vindman stated--the policy preferences of staff--the president makes our foreign policy. Do you really think our military wanted to abandon Iraq in 2011 as Obama ordered? But never did I hint that our military should resist or obstruct that decision. The military has a duty to obey even bad decisions, if lawful. Vindman seems more like an infiltrator than a whistleblower. Also, keep in mind that basically Vindman was concerned that if the phone call at the center of this melodrama became public--which his actions may very well have helped happen--the Democrats on Congress would throw Ukraine under the Russian bus in order to protect Biden. Their sudden Russia outrage has limits, I guess.
I was going to complain that San Francisco voters elected Chesa Boudin, a socialist, terrorist-friendly person who worked for the thug Hugo Chavez in Venezuela, to be their district attorney. But as I've said, people have the right to local self rule. So I say San Francisco should fully enjoy the fruits of their judgment--good and hard. I'm cruel, I know, but the voters deserve to live with their choice. Tips to Instapundit.
Now all we need to do is get South Korea to agree that US-Japanese-ROK cooperation against common threats is a good thing. South Korea seems to want a triangular firing squad lately, which surely makes North Korea, China, and Russia smile.
I feel sorry for the obviously troubled Greta Thunberg. I'm mad at the extremists exploiting her for their own goals. I'm horrified that so-called adults treat her every utterance like some Oracle of Delphi (as I commented on in this data dump). And I'm outraged that these activists are trying to terrify our children over their fantasy's of doom. The end of the world is not in fact nigh.
The short answer is that why would Iran want to change the sloppy wet kiss the Obama administration gave Iran with this gift of nuclear weapons?
The San Francisco airport therapy pig is all cute and stuff--right until a Moslem group expresses offense. Then the city district attorney will order the pig arrested, tried, and executed (but not eaten), in that order.
Huh. Ballsy to subvert the Trump administration and beg for money to fund it. If GoFundMe had existed in the 1980s as a means to fund initiatives (perhaps by laundering money), the CIA could have avoided that whole Iran-Contra scandal.
Example 1,348 of why I don't trust the media--with particular disdain for the self-described "fact checkers." Tip to Instapundit.
In what alternate world of idiocy was Australia's decision to buy the F-35 a "problematic purchase?" Yes, Australia needs strike capabilities. And with stealth and precision, Australia gets that. And if what the F-35 can carry without killing stealth is insufficient, Australia can field long range anti-ship missiles from ships, non-stealthy planes, and ground launchers that the F-35 can aim and fire. And if the complaint is that Australia won't also commit funding to protect bases the F-35 will use, that's a whole other kind of problematic and can be addressed by committing sufficient funding to defense. Australia spends a decent amount but is around 2% of GDP. If the threat is rising, spending more than that is not out of line to defend their freedom and democracy, is it?
Israel creates a good jihadi. And don't even bother to tell me that this risks jihadi "retaliation." Gaza jihadis will kill Israeli civilians with or without the pretext of "retaliation."
Hahahaha! Quite accurate.
Another example of #liberalprivilege--control group edition.
She's clearly gone quite mad. Tip to Instapundit.
The Turks are deporting ISIL members to European countries who don't want them back--the countries that condemned America for holding jihadis at Guantanamo Bay.
No! Way! "The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has found uranium particles at a site in Iran that had not been declared by the Iranian authorities." One of the basic problems of the Iran nuclear deal was that the IAEA could only inspect facilities that the Iranians let them inspect. The mystery is why Iran let the IAEA into that facility. One assumes somebody on the Iranian side is in deep trouble for clearing the site for inspection.
Libya.
Believe in climate change as though it is a religion? It's a religion. I even wrote a song of faith for it!
Yes, the impeachment drama is really about policy differences--which should be resolved by elections and not impeachment. I differ a bit on the Russia issue. Yes, Russia is a foe and we need to prepare to fight Russia to deter them. And at the very least the large number of nukes we have justify some reductions in acute tensions. But in the long run we should want to split Russia from China to avoid being distracted by a pointless Russia front when facing a rising China. This probably requires post-Putin leadership. And I wouldn't throw Ukraine under the bus in an effort to achieve it (remember Russia needs America more than we need Russia).
I firmly believe that looking into whether there was corruption in the Biden-Ukraine issue in 2016 is a legitimate question--especially given the precedent provided by the insane Democratic efforts to keep the Trump-Russia 2016 "collusion" alive so long--and not an issue of "digging up dirt." What was going on in Kiev back then? The summer 2019 phone request was too specific to 2016 to be something similar to the Steele dossier that Democrats in and out of the Obama administration flogged.
Yeah, Spain (and the West by association) has no reason to feel guilty about destroying the Aztec empire. Remember that Cortes had plenty of local allies who didn't like being ritually sacrificed in massive numbers.
Piracy off the coast of Nigeria.
The New York Times notes that Ukraine would like some stability in the United States in order to get more support against Russia. Ukraine is trying to negotiate with Russia. The NYT thinks this is a damning indictment of the Trump administration. But in my view the chaos is at this point is almost exclusively the fault of the Democrats with their Ahab-like obsession with impeaching the Bad Orange Man. For the record, I don't think Democrats care about Ukraine one bit. Their sudden concern is suspicious, no? I have long been on board democracy in Ukraine. And I wasn't willing to sacrifice that in order to keep Ukrainian troops in Iraq.
Please God, let "Hearsay can be much better evidence than direct [evidence]" be Peak Stupid for 2019, at least.
Iraqi protesters bravely battle corruption and Iranian influence despite their casualties. This is a long-term problem to solve (with related "what the Hell happened to Max Boot" questions).
That is an excellent question. Perhaps it is related to how Hillary Clinton evaded record-keeping, FOIA, and communications security requirements by setting up a private server to conduct official State Department business on a private email account. Consequences are for the
The idea that Trump cared more about investigating the Biden family for their 2016 activities than he cared about Ukraine seems to be refuted by the facts that the Javelin missiles were sent and that Ukraine did not launch an investigation. I guess mind reading isn't an exact science yet. Also, on that delay in the missile shipment, this makes total sense.
You can't say we didn't give Erdogan a chance to reverse his S-400 purchase decision. I'm relieved Erdogan didn't take his opportunity. We have an Erdogan crisis and not a S-400 crisis. And we've taken steps to keep production going without Turkey. I wonder where the regional maintenance hub will go?
What worries me the most about China's naval power is the industrial capability behind it apparently capable of rapidly building warships. In contrast to our yards that have trouble with new designs, cost overruns, and quality control. Have a super sparkly day. As for their carrier force, which defenders of the American carrier fleet cite as proof that carriers are still the primary asset for sea control, thus far China seems to just want "just a few to intimidate its neighbors." Which fits well with my distinction between useful and burning hulks. (Lord, I've been doing this a long time).
More on the new Japanese submarines I mentioned last week.
Eleven years after bombing Khadaffi's forces until rebels killed the dictator--and then staying out of the country so locals can work out their differences without our "harmful presence" (and what about Russia's less-than-helpful intervention?)--Libya's civil war still rolls along and American forces still have to bomb ISIL there to create more "good jihadis."
China has more concentration camps to "reeducate" Uighers than is thought. It's bad enough with what we thought we knew. Oh, and may the UN rot in Hell for officially commending China's "remarkable achievements in the field of human rights." The UN serves a useful function. That function is not as the conscience of the "sainted international community." I'm sure the Chinese authorities could find room in those camps for quite a few Hong Kong protesters, if need be.
I guess you have to break a few eggs to enjoy your Trump-free omelet. Is strident impeachment fervor the last refuge of a scoundrel?
The Arab Spring largely failed. But the impulse for democracy as an alternative to autocrats or Islamists as rulers lives on. And the people who want that alternative have learned from past failures. This will take a long time and will be a big part of the good guys winning the Islamic Civil War over who defines Islam--murderous jihadis or normal people. But it is important to achieve regardless of how long it takes. One day, Islamists will have little legitimacy in a world where the Arab Spring finally triumphs. Syrians are probably too shell shocked and battered to be a part of this, after their effort in Arab Spring I was crushed by Assad and betrayed by jihadis. But Sudan, Algeria, Lebanon and Iraq may yet score a clear success. Iraq is already much better than it was under Saddam, and is an enemy of jihadis. With some rule of law, Iraq can be a fully functioning democracy. But will Iran try to crush these impulses in Lebanon and Iraq? With Hezbollah, Iran's chances are much greater in Lebanon than in Iraq. At least Iran's finances are stretched taut with American sanctions--see Iran's gas rationing and retail price increase--no doubt intended to prevent smugglers from exporting subsidized gasoline, which that article mentions. We'll see.
I keep worrying about reaching Peak Stupid. But Representative Swalwell is competing in a whole new category of Peak Moron.
Big if true, no doubt. Oddly, a lot of Iran's fans seem to hear one of those "dog whistles" I hear so much about here.
Is it just me or does the Left trot out every big-spending plan and slap "Green" on it, regardless of the subject of the plan? These people are nuts. And worse, they think the rest of us are, too.
Short of being used as a cure for pending blindness, I never trusted this procedure. It always seemed cosmetic in nature. Glasses will be fine, thank you.
Actual bribery.
This is a BS study--claiming 70% of Americans are "struggling financially"--that really requires an examination of the "definitions" section. One, it is a survey rather than being based on actual statistical measures. Two, the study says you are struggling financially if you report one of five different measures of struggling: being middle class and spending more than you earn; having trouble saving money; struggling to pay for groceries or housing; something related to debt, and being stressed by money issues. The article was amazingly vague about those factors. If you fail just one, you are struggling. And again, this is all self-reporting "data" with nothing objective in it. As one problem, let me note that if you save money for your child's college and now you are spending that money, you will most likely be spending more than your income. This just sounds like a political hit piece to convince you that our economy isn't in good shape (well, apart from the national debt and budget deficits--which nobody even pretends to care about these days).
Yes, America needs to know "whether [CIA director] Brennan’s actions and faulty information amounted to incompetence or something considerably worse."
Counter-terrorism up close and personal.
So it is horrifying that the Russians might have a transcript of a particular call between Trump and and our ambassador to the EUwho was in Ukraine because it was made on an unsecured phone? Maybe. But one, having an ambassador to the EU is annoying. But I digress. Two, we have no idea if we wanted the Russians to hear that conversation. And more to the point, so it is bad to communicate on unsecured communications systems? Okay. Now do Hillary Clinton and here private server that bypassed government security equipment and procedures for her entire tenure as secretary of state.
I remain unsure of the Multi-Domain Operations (MDO) concept. If it is really just ultra-"purple" combined arms across all domains, that's good. I worry that it will mean abandoning the idea that each service has a core competency for its own primary domain and that each service will instead dissipate its command of its core competency by expanding capabilities into all domains. The synergy of different services commanding their own domain was the point of this Land Warfare Paper that I wrote about the World War II Guadalcanal campaign.
Is Russia thinking about a base in northeast Syria at Qamishli? For God's sake, why would they want to do that? The Russians deny that intent, for what that's worth.
While I will vote for Trump in 2020 against the Democrats' unhinged 24/7 Resistance, I don't agree with defining being conservative as being aligned with Trump. As I've said many times, Trump started as a liberal Democrat and if the Democrats weren't borderline insane, he'd be free to go that way in policy (my prime example is his support for a massive spending program on infrastructure, which I absolutely oppose as a left-wing spending bonanza--see the 2009 "stimulus" spend-a-palooza). In many ways Democrats have actually created the Trump who does conservative things that are worth supporting. My support for Trump is tactical and not strategic.
Before the Michigan-MSU game on Saturday:
Iranians aren't happy at all with gasoline price increases. Greta Thunberg is no doubt annoyed at their lack of commitment to Green energy. But with the mullah rulers shutting down the Internet in response to the protests, I guess the Oracle of Stockholm won't be able to communicate her ire.
Let's examine the degree of difficulty America has faced waging the war on Islamist terrorism: America was condemned as monstrous for holding hundreds of actual Islamic terrorists at Guantanamo Bay. China has imprisoned at least a million for the crime of being Moslem and perhaps prone to terrorist inclinations.
PLA troops were used in Hong Kong to clean up streets after clashes. They are being used as labor and are in civilian clothes. But consider this a recon mission for the troops and consider it a way to ease the acceptance of PLA troops in the streets in uniform eventually.
The Russians continue to have problems with their sea-based nuclear deterrent. Fracking, aggression, and corruption are taking their toll. Seriously, do the Russians even have many working long-range nuclear weapons?
A reminder that the so-called lack of advanced planning for the withdrawal of American troops from northeast Syria was not Trump's fault. The military had advance warning going back nearly a year but did nothing to carry out that order--until the recent order to just do it. With no ambiguity to exploit, the military saluted and carried out its orders--as it does (and should). You may recall me writing about it. This has been building for a while. And we still haven't left Syria.
Our military exercises in South Korea are important to maintaining combat skills. I'm not comfortable delaying more to induce North Korea to negotiate seriously. I concede I don't know what else is happening quietly. Maybe economic and financial sanctions really are squeezing North Korea hard enough to justify suspending military training. Maybe we are closer to getting real talks than is apparent. But maybe we are going to accept a nuclear North Korea. Have a super sparkly day.
A kind of battle seems to be raging at a Hong Kong university campus.
Why do I get the feeling that Obama's recent warning to Democrats isn't so much about getting rid of the "crazy stuff" but rather is a warning not to let the voters "see" the crazy stuff. Tip to Instapundit.
So doesn't the result of the quantum physics experiment call into question the validity or even the very existence of the experiment? Tip to Instapundit.
Not so fast, those racists and sexists aren't merely "Americans," they're Democrats. This is the primary season, remember.
Ooooh. Burn!
