I traditionally don't get worked up over losing an election. I don't like it but I don't panic. My view is that counter-forces will resist the worst impulses of the winners. Work the problem, I say. I think even Resistance people would admit if pressed--if for no other reason that they are not in a secret prison and are able to loudly resist Trump--that Trump did not in fact carry out their worst fears from 2016. But I swear the worst of the Left make it difficult to take that easy going attitude this year. Tip to Instapundit.
Man, Biden sure is advertising heavily in Michigan on TV in the couple weeks before the election. The Democrats must not be confident that the polls really do show Biden up heavily here. Of course, they could be worried because of 2016 and not because of any deep knowledge. The people running the campaign are just people like anybody else and I don't assume they have special knowledge.
I'm not the only one angry with public school teacher unions for refusing to go back to work and teach our kids. Whatever happened to "If it saves just one child ..."?
I give Senator Collins the benefit of the doubt. I assumed ACB would be confirmed and she is a vote that is safe to lose to help her retain her seat. I hate RINO talk. It is good to have people 80% on your side, too. Insisting on 100% just drives people to the other side. Leave the fanaticism to the leftist Red Guards in the Democratic Party.
The Turkish air force is showing the results of the 2016 purge.
Decades ago I loved The Economist magazine. When I could actually afford to subscribe I was in heaven. But it has been a long time since it was anything but one more left wing "news" magazine. And it got worse. China's communists make everything worse. Via Instapundit.
Has the media retired to the basement to avoid covering Trump rallies?
Algeria seems to have suppressed its Islamist terrorism. Along with pretty much all other opposition, with the cooperation of the Xi Jinping Flu pandemic.
You'd think BOOM! would convince al Qaeda to use Zoom.
It looks like America will sign a satellite-intelligence sharing agreement with India.
Turkey has apparently decided to abandon 8 isolated outposts in Syria's Idlib province. Turkey has not figured out how to stop the slow Syrian-Russian advance. Turkey's allies there don't seem like they want to give up.
This just isn't working as I listen to Biden speak:
You know, I spent the last week and a half under the impression from news people that Trump "stormed out of" his 60 Minutes interview. He just calmly stood up and left. Why I even remotely trusted these figurative DNC staffers is beyond me.
Biden's storm troopers. He will never be asked to disavow them. Nor will any Democrat be forced to answer that--just once, let alone repeatedly forever.
Nothing is more "2020" than this story.
Food, clothing, tool, and pet?
I don't understand how the Pennsylvania supreme court can just amend statutes like that, and it sure sounds like an invitation for voter fraud. I can understand there being a problem with untrained people verifying signatures. But it hasn't apparently been a problem until now?
I find it amusing that Democrats claim true religious Christian believers can't support Trump because of his personal failings. Fine. Trump is not worthy of your religion, whatever it is (but who is?). But at least Trump is not viciously hostile to your religion. It's that simple.
Well, Firefox stopped dying on me. So I've got that going for me.
You can put a price on intimidation and violence. In Somalia, anyway.
"The press of conformity." Reporters may be showing at an alarming rate that they are horrible journalists. But they've proven they'd make perfectly adequate reeducation camp guards. So coding isn't their only fallback career if Biden wins.
Yeah, I think Antifa and other leftists will riot and burn after the election regardless of who wins. Democrats may think they can turn their useful idiots on and off at will, but the idiots will proudly demonstrate they aren't useful to anybody. The leftists hate America--even the Democrats. And Black lives matter to leftists only as cannon fodder to die for their hatred of America. My only question is whether these leftist rioters will drive more normal Democrats to vigorously oppose the leftism or whether the leftist rioters will drive the Democratic Party leftward like some Twitter-enabled Red Guard.
Justice Amy Coney Barrett was sworn in despite Democratic opposition:
The foreign plagues of Syria: ISIL, Iran, Turkey, and Russia. And then there's Assad, of course.
ACB's nomination fight is one more reminder that modern feminism is not about celebrating women who achieve great heights in our society. Modern feminism is simply the Democratic Party's women's auxiliary.
The Baltic states aren't actually the eastern-most NATO states--Norway and Turkey are more east--but they are the most exposed to Russia. These states are trying to adapt to being small and close to Russia, with NATO help months away.
Remember when the Clinton's taught us to "parse" answers to questions in order to figure out how clever wording could technically be legalistically true while hiding the truth while the press said "case closed!" Biden has learned that he can just refuse to answer a question and the media will say "case closed!" I'm nostalgic for the good old days.
"Siding with Egypt" against Ethiopia over the latter's GERD Nile Rive dam consists of backing a slower filling of the dam and some mechanism for making sure Egypt doesn't wither if too little water reaches them. So that's bad now because Trump recognizes that reality? Sudan is worried, too. And noting the threat of Egypt attacking the dam if no reassurances are hammered out isn't to support that threat. But if Egypt is worried enough it is an obvious option. I've noted that option myself for quite some time now. It would be counter-productive but leaders make bad decisions out of fear. Ethiopia should actually consider that.
Yeah, neither Biden nor his leftist supporters are capable of returning America to "normal."
It is clear that Democratic "moderates" are just leftists who own a suit and who manage to control their spittle while on camera. Sadly for them, the media can only do so much to conceal their true nature.
Perhaps the thought of Trump winning reelection makes Hillary! sick to her stomach. But I think the thought of Biden defeating Trump when she could not will make her suicidal.
Did the Obama administration help China get some stealth technology?
Black Lives Matter leftists rioted and looted in Philadelphia after police shot a knife-armed Black man advancing on the police officers. He later died in the hospital. The looting for justice continues. Really, this will work out swell for Philadelphia. Which might guarantee that Trump wins Pennsylvania by reminding enough people of the insanity of the leftist positions on race and police.
Those daughters love their politics more than their dying father. To be fair, their politics will be around the rest of their lives. And they are proud of their horrible action. May they not be too guilt ridden when they grow up a little bit and realize what they did to a man who clearly loved them with all his heart. This is the saddest story I've read all month.
Actual Resistance to actual tyranny and actual genocide. Red Man Bad, remember. Tip to Instapundit.
Somebody from Zambia offered me a gift of $2,000,000. Well that's thoughtful.
I don't want to hear one damn word from the Biden campaign about Trump's Xi Jinping Flu response.
Is this the basic platform for the Bradley replacement? Perhaps the Army would consider my suggestion in Infantry magazine for a crewed vehicle with the virtual infantry option before it reaches for remotely crewed IFVs.
That's nice, but can the Lebanese exploit Hezbollah's reduced reputation or will Hezbollah ride this out and return to full power within Lebanon?
To be fair, Democrats prefer poor subjects dependent on Democratic-controlled government. Tip to Instapundit.
Basically the media is wrongly claiming that the Biden corruption accusations are as flimsy and wrong as the entire anti-Trump collusion narrative that led to a failed impeachment trial for Trump. I used to respect Applebaum. But she went full TDS insane, it seems. Truly, it is a glorious era to be a journalist!
I wonder if the media blackout on this story will hurt them more than the story hurts Biden. As the saying goes, the cover up is always worse than the crime. So, yeah.
Even if--and there is no assurance there--the Supreme Court strikes down Roe v Wade, that doesn't mean abortion is banned. It just means that a poorly reasoned legal decision that created a right from nothing found in the Constitution is justifiably revoked. States will be free to legislate any abortion laws they want. Hell, California will probably make it legal for the fourth trimester just in case there is buyer's remorse. Some states might make it illegal, of course. But most will be somewhere in the middle. It will be a political decision for the state legislatures as it should be. Heck, on average America might get closer to sophisticated and nuanced Europe's more restrictive laws. But who knows? I don't.
America needs to publicize and prepare for Russian use of chemical weapons. Given Russian conventional army weakness, using chemical weapons rather than the nukes that they loudly rattle might be seen as an equalizer. The Cold War United States Army took operating in a chemical environment very seriously, indeed, as I remember well.
Figuratively if not literally true.
I don't assume Trump rally numbers and enthusiasm means the polling data is wrong. Maybe the polls are wrong. But in a country this large you can draw crowds. So it may or may not be significant for the actual outcome. Remember, unenthusiastic votes count as much as enthusiastic votes. We'll see if the Trump voter enthusiasm edge leads to an edge in actually going to vote. Of course, on the other side we are seeing stories of the legendary "youth vote" turning out. That is a long-predicted surge of voters who until rather recently believed in Santa Claus that will push Democrats into power. That surge never seems to happen despite the hype every four years. But who knows in this strange year? I just don't know what will happen with any of this. I hope Trump will pull out the win, but I have no way of distinguishing between hopes and analysis on this issue, so I won't insist I know what will happen.
Of course there is a movement among some Moslems to boycott France. The French should be honored to be murdered by Islamists in penance for the obvious French Islamophobia.
The Dignified Rant would of course like her digits ... Oh God, this keeps happening. But perhaps I've shared too much. Thank goodness I'm way too old for her.
If Trump does win despite pre-election day polling, it will be an indication that polling is broken or that the polling companies as a group have abandoned their neutral role to measure opinion in order to shape opinion for left wing causes; much as most of the media has abandoned a neutral role in reporting news in order to push left wing causes.
This would be hilarious if it wasn't so accurate (via Instapundit):
This is an interesting interview with George Friedman. I respect his analysis although I strongly disagree with his view on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Although to be fair he thinks every war we've fought except World War II was a failure. I put his new book on my list to buy.
The Chinese Communist Party is awful and trying to enforce their writ over here. Roll them up and lock them up. And maybe Congress needs to pass a new Fugitive Slave Act that this time protects the fugitives from Peking.
Could there be a Pakistan Spring? Those who oppose military rule and international pariah status might want to act fast before the growing relationship with China arms the Pakistani generals with the suppression tools that China is deploying at home.
Yeah:
If I understand the Xi Jinpiing Flu pandemic situation correctly according to Democrats, Germany and France must have abandoned science and followed Trump. What else can explain this pandemic surge? I am not mocking the Germans and French. I'm mocking Democrats. We're all trying our best in the face of incomplete and conflicting information. And right now the Europeans are doing much worse on cases than America. But again, this isn't over. Save the comparisons for the end.
I'm not saying that America could have followed Sweden's non-lockdown approach to the Xi Jinping Flu pandemic. Nobody knows enough yet to conclude that. But I am saying that the experts were wrong that Sweden would fail:
Remember that "Anonymous" op-ed author--later expanding it to a book--who claimed he was part of high level administration resistance to Trump? Yeah, he was a staff drone. You wonder why I totally mistrust anything I read in the news?
A look at Russian military reform using foreign models in the areas of special forces, military police, and mercenaries. These have been useful in Russian military interventions but are not the foundation for large-scale military operations.
I was skeptical that America could have a V-shaped recovery, but we seem to be doing that. And we could continue if Democratic governors and legislators would stop fighting our economy tooth and nail.
In 2008, Hillary Clinton slammed her primary rival Obama by asserting she would be the one who could handle a 3:00 a.m. phone call to deal with some global crisis. The way the Biden campaign calls early "lids" on Joe's appearances, that commercial would have to refer to 11:00 a.m. calls when Joe is safe and asleep. Hopefully enemies put a "lid" on their actions early in the day.
Better dead than rude. We never hear "if it saves just one child ..." logic in these cases.
Even when the LCS works--and they don't seem to reliably--they are virtually worthless for sea control missions. The seagoing corvettes (armed like a corvette but big enough to sail across oceans, as American warships must be capable of doing) were designed for the post-Cold War world before the age of great power competition raised its ugly head. The promise of reconfigurable warships had promise before the execution screwed the pooch.
If Hillary Clinton represents the 270th Electoral College vote for Biden, raise your hand if you think she won't strike a bargain for it. Rasputin was ejected from Russian palace intrigue more easily. Tip to Instapundit.
The man behind the alleged kidnapping plot against the governor of Michigan had said he wanted to hang Trump, too. It was shameful for Whitmer to lead the charge that Trump inspired the plot.
I'm torn about the Obama trip to Michigan to campaign for Biden. Does that mean that Biden really isn't up by nine points and needs Obama's help? Or does it mean that Obama won't risk appearing at a defeat and so Biden really is up by nine? Either explanation is equally likely.
Democrats really do think women are that flighty, fragile, and prone to the vapors, don't they?
Three more jihadi murder victims in France. The French should press forward with their effort to integrate Islamic citizens. Those who will not must be kept away from French society one way or another.
Despite Democrats' charges, Trump himself is the perhaps unlikely defender of our democratic, norms, traditions, and institutions.
If Trump does win contrary to conventional expectations it will because polling is dishonest and fatally flawed because of "shy" Trump voters ("shy" as in they don't want to be canceled, lose their jobs, or be violently attacked), a better Republican ground game (outreach and registrations), and because Democrats pushed by their leaders--in an effort to stoke pandemic panic--to vote by mail will disproportionately find more of their votes invalidated due to errors. And that any voter fraud is insufficient to balance those factors.
If Trump loses, the media has worked overtime to undermine Biden's legitimacy. If Republicans act the same way as Democrats did after the last election we can look forward to sanctuary jurisdictions, serial lawsuits, and general resolve to obstruct governance. On the bright side, violence from the right will be much lower than violence from the left the last four years. On the dark side, if Biden ordered tanks to crush Republican protesters, the media would defend it.
The nuance! It burns! The Xi Jinping Flu is serious but there is no reason to panic. Calmly work the problem while balancing health, financial, and economic needs. Via Instapundit.
Sometimes I think the voting age should be 30.
I've noted before that the vast majority of people don't die only from the Xi Jinping Flu coronavirus. But I don't think that this means that the pandemic death count is as exaggerated as that 94% level implies. Except in cases of sudden events like accidents that when someone is closer to death a whole lot of things start to go wrong. Picking a single cause of death is probably hard. But I do think that we over-count pandemic deaths to some extent. But what that extent is I don't know. And I bet that over-count makes America closer to the much-lauded Germany in death rates, which is much stricter about who qualifies as dying from the pandemic virus. We will need common definitions before we can compare and contrast country responses with accuracy rather than politics in mind. But yeah, our public health and medical faith in those death toll models was wrong and worse than reading the entrails of chickens for guidance. Not to imply the entrails readers were dopes. They too thought they were at the leading edge of science.
Trump needs to win in order to defeat the media and social media, which have openly decided to censor information it doesn't like this year, as much as he needs to win to defeat Biden and the Democrats who have gone insane over the last four years. But on the actual Biden story, keep this in mind as a foundation for what is or is not true in the accusations and silence: "Shokin [who was famously fired at Joe Biden's urging with the threat of loss of American aid the hammer], at least early in his short tenure, opened several cases against Burisma (including a tax-evasion matter), while inheriting several others. Two, even after most American newspapers were describing Burisma cases as 'dormant,' there was evidence of open investigations, including one that specifically mentioned Hunter’s company Rosemont-Seneca, and another involving the seizure order of February 2016, for which Shokin does appear to have responsibility. [new paragraph] Lastly, it’s unquestionable that the cases against Burisma were all closed by Shokin’s successor, chosen in consultation with Joe Biden, whose son remained on the board of said company for three more years, earning upward of $50,000 per month." Have you heard that anywhere? Tip to Instapundit.
Mullah-run Iran continues to support mayhem around the Middle East. They deny it. But they deny a lot of things.
Getting a flu shot may help Xi Jinping Flu from being as severe as it would get without the shot. It doesn't have any effect on getting it mind you, but that is nice. I always get the flu shot and made sure I got it this year several weeks before I went to Las Vegas. I figured why not reduce the chance of getting sick in the usual way. Turns out it was a good idea for the pandemic, too.
The price of racial virtue signaling. This is what you get from fewer cops doing their jobs. Imagine what no cops would bring. From Instapundit.
What is wrong with these people?!
The U.S. will sell F-35s to the UAE. Like I've said before, the UAE doesn't need stealth fighters to defeat Iran's ramshackle air force and air defenses.The UAE is getting carried away with their "Little Sparta" label. This is a political reward for peace with Israel. On the other hand, if the UAE has F-35s, it makes it easier for American F-35s based out of the UAE to operate there. And it allows America to operate them over Iran while plausibly denying we--rather than the UAE--is doing it. And I suspect we will have the planes on a tight rein to avoid espionage losses.
Asymmetric warfare in the 21st century: around the world, "Muslims protest French cartoons"; while French protest Muslims beheading French people. Islam needs to win their civil war over the fanatics a little faster, please.
Bombs in a box are nice and all that, but reacting to our shortage of long-range bombers by allowing us to use our transport planes that are also in short supply as ersatz bombers isn't exactly ideal.
Of course America can lead without social cohesion. I have no clue what that author is talking about. Do you even remember the 1960s and 1970s? I'd rather have social cohesion for many reasons including foreign policy support, but as a prerequisite for global leadership? Get real.
Could China's boasting about containing the Covid epidemic in China backfire? Well, I can't read the article. But from my point of view China's boasting about "containing" the Xi Jinping Flu should be undermined by the fact that they did not contain it. China in fact unleashed it on the world. If China was capable of containing it within China as the Chinese Communist Party boasts, why couldn't they prevent it from spreading to the world? Because if China was capable of containing the virus, China's failure to contain it makes it look like biological warfare aimed at the rest of the world.
The Democratic Party-media complex doesn't even care that you can see them manipulating the news flow to suit them. If Biden wins, the Biden-media collusion will have been more effective than the mythical Trump-Russian collusion. Lord, after everything about Trump and Kavanaugh that made it to air and print, the Biden story is not solid enough? Really? God help us if their effort succeeds in dragging the figurative corpse of Biden across the finish line. Via Instapundit.
Silver lining. And no, I'm not ashamed to say that. I won't cry about that development during the rioting and looting in Philadelphia.
Oh Holy crap. I think I saw this movie.
The FBI has been investigating Hunter Biden since 2019. Funny how the place hasn't been leaking like a sieve with bombshells since the investigation began more than a year ago. Funny how Trump was impeached for being correct--or at the very least being fully justified in thinking he was correct--about the Biden family's corruption.
What a glorious "fact check" in defense of Biden. Bravo.
The Air Force pilot shortage is getting better because of the commercial airline decline during the pandemic; but that's not the same as the Air Force solving the problem. The airline decline will end at some point. What then?
Maybe the state would have approved the crowd if they'd chanted "Orange Lives Matter."
Is Europe our future with lockdown riots? Americans have the advantage. All lockdown protesters here need to to is yell the appropriately leftist slogan and they'll be considered untouchable.
I can understand how leg infantry can be turned into motorized infantry with the new infantry squad vehicle (ISV). But how do you do that with paratroopers? I guess air drops aren't really anticipated, although it mentions their use in that situation. How? Via captured airfield? It just seems like a bigger unarmored HMMWV. But at least mine back in the day had vinyl doors and a roof. And the idea that an airborne unit would find JLTVs useful instead of the ISV if sent against Russian armored units is insane. Give them tanks, as I argued in Army magazine.
America and China are working on crisis communication, which would be nice to make sure an incident doesn't escalate to war because of errors and worst-case assumptions about the other side.
American forces rescued an American held in northern Nigeria. The man was about to be sold to jihadis but a SEAL raid went smoothly, with 6 dead captors another result. It's best to discourage such freelance kidnapping, eh?
Will Russia risk conflict with Turkey to support Armenia? The fighting between Armenia and Azerbaijan continues sporadically. Is this a lull while each side regroups to renew fighting in earnest?
Belarusians continue to protest the victory of Lukashenko. By now it looks like Lukashenko will simply ride out the protests. How many protesters will sit in Belarusian prisons and how many will flee to Poland and Lithuania?
I've noticed that YouTube accelerates my viewing vector. In the past I've found an opinion show with someone giving arguments I like and in a more assertive manner than usual, and I watch it regularly. It's refreshing. Then I get tired of the assertiveness and stop watching the show. I find the same thing on YouTube but it takes place faster because I can watch them more intensely. I wonder if there is a show timer in my brain that goes off regardless of calendar time?
I started out watching Star Trek: Discovery with great hope. Season one was enjoyable. Season two was enjoyable until the end when it lost me. And the reviews of the third season so far have convinced me not to buy the third season. Pity.
If Biden wins he will downgrade the special relationship with Britain under Trump and restore priority to the European Union--our soft enemy on a glide path to being an imperial foe.
Schwan's home delivery is pissing me off. I like their products. I really do. But I called to request no home sales visits apart from actual deliveries. That did not happen. After my last order I delayed the scheduled visit online to the maximum extent. I figured I could do that again. But I received a notice that this Tuesday there will be a visit. There is nothing online now to delay this again. I'm just not going to answer the door when the doorbell is rung. Lights will be on and I don't care if the salesman knows I'm home. I refuse to waste time calling them again to cancel the visit. I don't care. If the company wants to waste their salespeople's time, that's on them. And I'm getting close to just not ordering from them again because of this sales practice. [UPDATE: Well, there was no visit. Perhaps all visits are cancelled because of the Xi Jinping Flu and that is why I couldn't find a way to postpone it. But maybe the automatic email notice is a separate system and was overlooked. Regardless, their stay of execution is back in place and I'm not pissed off now. So that's nice.]
Democrats aren't as tolerant as their self image. Via Instapundit. Yes, it is a crime against language that "liberal minded" is considered a synonym for "open minded."
Iran is seeking to kill senior American military officers and officials even if on American soil. This should remind us that we are at war with Iran and should be continually seeking to defeat the mullah regime.
Marines will learn cold weather and mountain training from the experts in Norway.
The Navy and Marine Corps are now working on practical means of carrying out the renewed Marine support for the fleet.
