Triteleia Laxa wrote to me:

1. You honestly believe that those were the limits of his aims at the start of the war? That he didn’t intend to pacify all of Ukraine under Russian domination and didn’t think it would be easy? Please try being honest with yourself.
 

2. Putin is further from achieving those aims than he was at the start of the war. Ukrainian society is now extremely militarised. It also universally hates Russia. Has constant NATO support. And is desperate to join NATO.
 

The best case scenario for Putin as regards the Donbas ( especially the areas past where Russia previously invaded and occupied) is that he gets it in a peace agreement and it turns into a million times worse Northern Ireland. I write a “million times worse” because everything about it is so much less favourable for Russia than NI was for Britain.
 

And instead of glorious victory, Putin got about a third of his Generals, who were deployed, killed in a month, and has still yet to take a major city under fire. Indeed, he not even yet taken Kharkiv, which is 40km from his borders.
 

And this is the cause you are stuck into, whether you want to admit it to yourself or not, and that is exactly the agitated and weirdly pleading feeling which you get whenever you try to re-engage with this cause.
 

It feels like you have just adjusted yourself to a newer reality so you can still feel like it isn’t an L, and then you already have to adjust to yet another L and pretend it isn’t one.
 

This is a form of self-torture and Putin is taking millions of people on this journey. This is why he needs to go. The only way out of this loop is either cause/national collapse, or finding a suitable scapegoat and ritually purifying the movement. Putin is the perfect scapegoat and can retire to his dacha still. Much better than pretending that Ukraine has been taken further from NATO ...
 

Replies: @Triteleia Laxa, @AP

"The best case scenario for Putin as regards the Donbas ( especially the areas past where Russia previously invaded and occupied) is that he gets it in a peace agreement and it turns into a million times worse Northern Ireland..."

I think Putin is well on his way to million-times-worse-Northern-Ireland. It might even be at the "mission accomplished" stage.

How Putin managed to derussify East Ukraine in just 8 years...

What happened? How Kharkiv which used to be culturally and politically pro-Russian so quickly turned super anti-Russian? It's a huge cultural change and a very recent one. And the answer would be: Putin's conflict manufacturing strategy killed pro-Russian sentiments in Ukraine.

When Putin manufactured the Donbass War he presented it as an Ukrainian inner conflict. Many in Russia bought it. Many in the West bought it. Many idiots even now talk about "Ukraine shelling civilians of Donbass for eight years". Bad Ukrainians being bad, that caused the war

Nobody in Ukraine bought it. Russians and Westerners considered the Donbass catastrophe as a Ukrainian problem. In Ukraine however, it was seen as a Russian problem. Donbass was simply a part of Ukraine which fall under the Russian rule and its nightmare was purely Russian-made

Putin didn't think about it. He as usually manufactured a Donbass war to later come out as a saviour, do everything he wants to do, collect a payout and be showered in gratitude and public love. But in Ukraine he was seen as the one who created this war in the first place

Nothing de-russified East Ukraine so quickly and irreversibly as the Donbass catastrophe. I'm not talking about the war, I'm talking about a general socio-economic conditions there. Under Russian control, Donbass fall under the rule of the criminal gangs, presented as the "levy"

They were usually guys from below the social hierarchy who saw this war as a chance to rise up. And they did. With their power unchecked, they started systematic plunder. Take people's homes, cars, businesses, kill those who object. Arrest someone, torture and release for ransom

...With economy destroyed, and few opportunities for employment remaining, many locals, twenty-five-thousanders, joined this "levy" for 25 000 rubles a month paycheck. Russians paid them about 400 usd per month just to keep the war going on. It all turned into a vicious circle

You could sell this Donbass catastrophe as a Ukrainian problem to Russians or to the Westerners. But it was impossible to present it as such to the Ukrainians. People in Kharkiv, Sumy, Mariupol saw that nothing comparable is happening on territories under the Ukrainian control
 

Replies: @Wokechoke, @Wokechoke

Undoubtedly there was social upheaval during that era (though the numbers of dead are grossly inflated by the west)… but to compare that to 2022 is not wise at all

Yes. Aristotle had some odd ideas and some not-so-odd ideas, but his thoughts on causality are instructive here.

If you're Victoria Nuland, is the present horrendous war a bug or a feature?

Exactly. Where Putin can be blamed is not undertaking this operation in 2014 when a foreign adversary had invaded and overthrew a democratically-elected government of a neighboring country and assisted in the slaughter of thousands of Ukrainians.

For anyone wishing to understand this whole Ukraine-Russia issue there is no better place to start than the declaration this week by former Apostolic Nuncio Archbishop Carlo Viganò. Russia’s actions are not only just but absolutely necessary.

https://www.marcotosatti.com/2022/03/07/declaration-of-msgr-carlo-maria-vigano-on-the-russia-ukraine-crisis/

And Russia went in essentially on a police operation to get the Azov Nazis who had committed war crimes. This is exactly what Putin said before the start of the operation. And Russia took great pains to bomb military personnel or even militants. It wasn’t even a no-knock they told them to surrender.

Because the Ukie military/militants started shooting back the Russian military was required to use deadly force. If cops are enter someone’s domicile to arrest them and the criminal fires back then the cops are fully justified in using deadly force.

But the West argues it was an illegal invasion because of international law (LMFAO) and because they didn’t have a warrant (US UN Resolution)! Police don’t need a warrant to enter someone’s property when they know felonious crimes are being committed.

Do you not see how vague your argument is?

As a test, can you differentiate between your argument as presented and the patently false axiom that "if something bad happens, and the US has been involved in any way, then the US is responsible"?

I can't.

Also, to address your reply to me elsewhere on this thread, (as I have limited allowed comments on this website,) other than pointing out that you thought Putin would invade, I don't get your point.

David Goldman is a smart man, but he still writes in the genre of geopolitical fan fiction. It is just for people who are intelligent and compassionate, rather than bitter, resentful and midwitted, like Pepe Escobar does.

That aside, you say that Putin will act if he thinks it is in the best interests of the Russian people. Maybe, but I bet, somehow just like that, his evaluation of what is in Russian people's interests happens to very often coincide with his own. I could say the same thing about Biden, but it probably coincides with his own actually quite a bit less.

As for your vague accusation(?) of "virtue signaling," sorry, simply stating that the person who invades a country is responsible for invading that country does not come under that banner. No amount of noise can confuse the situation. Putin neither needed to invade, nor does it help Ukrainians, nor even does it help Russians. It is a bungled operation based on a total ignorance of the Ukrainian people and one which is leaving cities littered with the corpses of pregnant mothers, children and brave soldiers, on both sides, not because Putin was provoked, but because he ordered in the tanks, and artillery shells and cluster munitions.

Link me to more fan fic, but it doesn't change the fact that Russian arguments currently sound a lot like Jussy Smollet: "we didn't invade Ukraine, and if I did invade Ukraine, I was provoked and here are some obscure historical melodramas and unreasonable senses of entitlement which I use to explain why."

It is pathetic. You don't seem like someone who would make such arguments in your own defence. Probably never have.

I prefer Anatoly Karlin's arguments made prior to the invasion. One, he referenced Frederick of Prussia having written a book supporting pacifism and then invading Silesia next year, just because winning overcomes hypocrisy. Two, he wrote that all the arguments wouldn't matter as Putin will be a conquering warlord.

Fair enough, at least, AK was honest and, probably, Russia wouldn't have needed to make arguments more than simply implying those things, if the operation was not such a chaotic and tragic disaster, which would only be if they understood Ukraine at all. And the fact that they didn't proves, as no words ever could, that Ukraine is not part of Russia.

Now the Russians, and those tuned into Russian propaganda, are backtracking into the entitled vicitmhood and wounded pride arguments which they love so much.

Well, withdraw their troops today and then let's listen to their antiquarian murderous whinging.

For clarity, and fun, perhaps try to put it in algebra:

W + X + Y = Z

Where Z is that it was totally cool and made sense and was just the decent thing for Putin to choose to start blowing up pregnant mothers in their cities in Ukraine.

Concreteness and specificity are the enemies of the pro-Russian arguments and those arguments cannot be made in that way for Putin's decision to start murdering Ukrainians.

Replies: @Jack D, @Esso, @PhysicistDave

Agree.

A good position during the Cold War was to be a pragmatic, non-aligned nation.

NATO has been an anachronism since 1991.

Mostly known, since the turn of the century, as a nation destroyer.

Seriously, Victoria Nuland did it, all by herself. What was McCain doing over there? Let's be real, the buck stops with el Presidente Obama.
Amazingly Bush and Cheney did everything during their time in office. Absolutely everything was their doing, everything. But when Obama was in office, it was Hillary, the Secretary of State who caused all the problems, or anyone other than Obama. Obama was the el Presidente! I really don't think that anyone blamed Biden for anything, he must been asleep.
Can't the buck ever stop with Obama?
lara

Replies: @clifford brown, @PhysicistDave

"And that misery began as a reaction to the overthrow of a Ukrainian government, which had the ability to keep the peace with Russia, in 2014 by US apparatchik Victoria Nuland."

No. In 2014, the Ukrainian Parliament voted overwhelmingly for inclusion into the EU, in hopes of moving forward with their goal to become part of NATO. Its president refused to acknowledge the will of the people. Thus, the Verkhovna Rada Committee voted on February 22, 2014 to “remove Viktor Yanukovych from the post of president of Ukraine” on the grounds he was unable to fulfill his duties.

Now, let us assume that there was this definitive outside influence. Is it still not up to the people of Ukraine to decide for themselves whether or not to welcome that assistance? to remove a leader if they believe he/she is not representing their will? Does not Ukraine have the ultimate freedom to make their own decision about their future security, even if it meant preferring to align itself with the West?

And if one makes the argument the US is incapable of tolerating a non aligned Ukraine who refuses to abandon this objective, then the counter is that Russia is incapable of tolerating the Ukraine to decide, on their own behalf, to join any organization they desire to protect their own internal and external interests. However, NATO has no immediate plans to help bring the former Soviet republic into the alliance, and that membership requires unanimous consent. Furthermore, the Ukraine has yet to fully meet one of the three main criteria for entry into NATO–a commitment to democracy, individual liberty and support for the rule of law. While Ukrainian leaders say they have met that threshold, American and European officials argue otherwise.

Of course, the question remains how long is Russia willing to remain in the Ukraine when sanctions are in place? You would think they learned their lesson from Afghanistan. And where is this groundswell of Ukrainian support for Putin’s army to “free them from the tyranny of globalization and globohomo” as some have argued?

How long will Russia be able to hold onto Ukrainian, given its unpopularity in the Ukraine and among the citizens of Russia? Is the next leader of Russia going to carry on with Putin’s plan?

"According to you a “Russian oligarch” is a contradiction in terms, which basically proves my point. Thanks my man."

I'm not sure an oligarchy stops being an oligarchy solely because one guy can cut you down at his whim and holds perpetual veto priviliges. Bezos had to fork over half his money to divorce a woman a man with Putin-style powers could have simply had poisoned. Does that mean he's no longer powerful?

But let's say you're right (and you may well be). In that case, you "won" by pointing out that Russia is a dictatorship under the rule of one thug willing to blow up and carve up other countries to get his way. On that point at least, we're in total agreement. If everyone else were willing to agree as much, I'd be happy to find some other term that better captures both the wealth that these tools did little or nothing to earn and also their craven subjugation to Putin's rages and tantrums.

"I think the 'mega rich' all the world round are able to obtain and maintain their positions by corruptly currying the favor of the political class"

When the "political class" that needs to be curried consists of one dictator who really owns your cash, to the extent that you take orders from him, get back to us. Until then, really, give it a rest. Digging yourself in deeper is not helping you.

Replies: @James Braxton

"Something strange to me is how the term 'oligarch' has come to refer almost exclusively to any wealthy Russian."

Maybe because they buy up big obnoxious yachts and well known football clubs in the West more so than Chinese or Iranian oligarchs do? And I'm not surprised, given the sanctions now targeting Russian oligarchs, they dominate the term as of late.

However, if you type "oligarchy countries" into a search engine, you see things like this:

Several modern countries could be described as oligarchies, including Russia, China, and arguably even the United States.

So you want to call Soros or Zuckerberg or Bezos oligarchs as opposed to "mega-rich"? Fine. They didn't get their fortunes by being friendly with the President-for-life who is the real owner of their loot, so there are some "cultural differences" to consider, but whatever works. I certainly wouldn't dispute it.

Replies: @James Braxton, @quewin

That depends on whether China wants to kill the goose laying the golden eggs.

Taiwan in 1949 was an economic basket case.
Taiwan today is an economic powerhouse.

If the Red Chinese bomb the $#!+ out of Taiwan, they will have the province, but they will have tens of millions of starving and bitter people. It would take decades to recover, and even then the place may not ever get back to where it was. Anyone with the ability to leave will, which gets rid of the professional and managerial class. Already many of Taiwan’s managers are managing businesses in the PRC. They would probably leave the PRC as well.

One is the reasons why Taiwan prospered is that a million of China’s elite were airlifted out in 1949 to Taiwan.

At this point perhaps as many as 10-15 % of the Taiwan residents are people who would be in the top 1-2% of the general world population. I may be underestimating them.

Replies: @Brutusale, @nebulafox

That's because you don't know the situation. The PRC government has shown videos and broadcast them to the Taiwan people showing exactly what they would do. They would take out the military and the DPP (favor independence) - while not targeting civilian infrastructure nor the KMT (favor reunification). There are about 2 million Taiwan people living on Mainland China. You think they would kill their close kin??? Aside from the fact that people in Fujian province have lots of family links on Taiwan.

Replies: @James Braxton

"Ok, now do Asia."

Which ones? Kuwait? Taiwan, Tibet, Japan? Maybe Iraq or Afghanistan? Seems like they might be bitter about being invaded, too. Syria seems ticked off primarily because the focus on Ukraine is selective. Even they're not endorsing Russia.

Even CHINA isn't slapping Putin on the back. If he is the kind of crazy shoot-'em-up friend that NATO actions are forcing the Chinese to have a closer relationship with, maybe there's a long-term strategy to that, too, and I suspect China might be starting to suspect that as well.

Replies: @Sean

Judging from Putin's recent speeches, he wants to de facto and/or de jure more or less annex much of Ukraine.

Replies: @HA

I understand the concept of "my country, right or wrong". It's just that my country seems SO fucking wrong about everything these days.

Replies: @Twinkie, @The Anti-Gnostic, @AKAHorace

But why would you expect him to say anything else? Should he be touting how great it is that Biden’s ineptitude has led to this?

The only reason to have Trump on TV is to point out the contrasts with his foreign policy. I think we need to be fighting this “rally round the flag” bull shit the MSM is flooding the airwaves with right now. This ain’t my war.

“An invasion of the Ukraine, that could lead to something much bigger is not primarily a reelection opportunity.”

Because campaign contributions are never related to war profits?

It didn’t happen while he was in charge. Did it? It happened while Biden was in charge. And I might add Biden was building up Ukraine like personal fiefdom. He’s a big factor in why this war is starting.

I guess you missed the part where one of the top officials in the Russian government stood up for the olympic team.

Kyle went to work in Kenosha 5 days a week. He was a member of the junior fire department. His father and paternal grandmother live in Kenosha. He visited them often. He was a native of Kenosha and you are an unspeakable anti White liberal Jew.

Replies: @Corvinus

Personally, I would have loved to have kept playing amateur athletics at a high level into my 40s and beyond. So my reaction to this is not "How dare they juice," but why can't this technology be applied to anti-aging therapies in general.

Do any NFL players not use PEDs? If I had aggressive, 300-pound, juiced men chasing me, I'd juice too.

Replies: @James Braxton

That argument only works vs MLB, where it has long been considered cheating and dishonorable. In the NFL, it isn't particularly looked at in the same way, from a public standpoint. The NFL does periodically suspend players who have flunked drug tests, etc. But it isn't viewed in the same way as it is in MLB.

HOF BAL LB Ray Lewis, considered one of the best players of his generation was injured in his final season as a player. He tore his triceps three months before the Super Bowl. (This is actually a serious injury, some players have retired upon suffering it). Yet, in three months time, Lewis was on the field playing in the Super Bowl. Perhaps the injury wasn't as severe as it was reported at the time. But the idea that Lewis overcame this injury with Deer Antler compound or what was officially reported at the time, and he did not take any PEDS whatsoever is ridiculous. If this were MLB, he most likely wouldn't have been allowed to continue playing. The NFL looks the other way at players that it favors, while making examples of others.

But for the most part, PEDS in the NFL has been an ongoing thing for several decades, and yet no one blinks an eye or gets up in arms over it the way they tend to do with MLB.

If Tom Brady were taking any PEDS, most likely it would be more along the lines of HGH, since various teammates are on the record that he doesn't particularly lift heavy weights. It's not bulk he's looking to gain in the same way an offensive linesman or defensive player does. For the most part, Brady's physique hasn't much changed since his early seasons in the NFL. So if juicing, it would tend to be along the lines of HGH.

Replies: @Steve Sailer

How does he beat the tests?

Replies: @James Braxton

If someone excells greatly at a human endeavor where PEDs are known to enhance performance, there has to be a presumption that that person is juicing.
 

Guerrero’s critics like to point out that Samra University no longer exists. The school closed in 2010, and its website redirects to a Los Angeles business, Samra Clinic of Oriental Medicine.

But Guerrero’s framed diploma, for a master’s degree in traditional Chinese medicine, hangs behind his desk, and he traces his now famous techniques, outlined in Brady’s 2017 book “The TB12 Method,” to that early intersection of massage and traditional Chinese medicine, also known as TCM.
 

Replies: @Steve Sailer

That sort of thing happens all the time. You realize they're perfectly capable of sudden bouts of competence - when it's in their favour.

E.g. you could do it yourself. Scrape the stats off the government website, reformat it to be readable, and slap some ads around it to pay yourself for the time and effort.

Guess how long until the IRS audits you all of a sudden. Probably measured in seconds. Which is why it hasn't already been done; I'm not the only one to know what would happen.

When it comes time to get paid, all of a sudden, for both drug-addled street bums and the government, there's no bumbling. The focus is razor lasers. Or laser razors, not 100% clear on that one.

"Headphones [whilst] walking outside?"

Listening to a black opportunist whilst surging with adrenaline about his outline for a book on another black opportunist. Johnny-One-Note. Does this obviously Jewish guy even qualify as a polar bear? Steve should get back to his pitch for PyGmIeS iN mY HoUsE!

"No situational awareness."

At a minimum. The pampered Trotskyites seem unaware that they are lapsing into self-parody. Humorless harpies.

"Many such cases"

Will there be mass self-immolation when they realize all of their passions have been underwritten by the most vicious and cutthroat capitalists? Unfortunately, no.

My first thought as well. And not just for potential assaults; there's right-turning cars, overhead construction work, couriers dashing out of buildings. There's all sorts of stuff happening in a city that bobos-in-paradise like Adam Shatz should be alert to. And then there's casual friendliness with people we encounter: how ya doing, etc. , versus putting on goddam headphones for a walk down the block.

These people are just precious.

Headphones while walking outside? No situational awareness. Many such cases.
 

Headphones while walking outside? No situational awareness. Many such cases.
 

Replies: @AndrewR, @AceDeuce

This situational awareness business is overrated.

I don't wear headphones. I don't talk on my cell phone. I "check my six" when I hear people come up from behind.

I was doing my medically prescribed brisk pace geezer walk on a combined bike/walking trail when a young Jennifer Lawrence wannabe jogged past me by inches.

Having a 5'11" slender woman in yoga pants come up from behind and glide past is certainly preferable to what happened to this dude. But it could have been a trio of exuberant youths coming up to beat me senseless, especially if they were moving fast and not making much noise.

I don't know how to guard against such a thing.

Replies: @Buffalo Joe, @AndrewR, @International Jew, @Veteran Aryan, @peterike, @Alrenous

After Mia Zapata's murder (by a Cuban immigrant, it later turned out), I never wore headphones while walking or bike riding again.

As I walked to A.’s building, I put on my headphones...

Headphones while walking outside? No situational awareness. Many such cases.
 

Replies: @Mr. Anon

“As I walked to A.’s building, I put on my headphones to listen to the rest of a podcast conversation…”

It’s 2022, for cryin’ out loud. I’ve lived in NYC since 1985, and I don’t think I’ve ever walked around, or traveled around town with headphones on. Heck, I don’t even pull my jacket hood all the way forward on the windiest, coldest day (in my own, predominantly White neighborhood), because it limits my peripheral vision and my hearing.

On subways and buses, I watch all blacks. It’s saved my life from sucker-punch b—ches, more than once.

During the late 1980s and 90s,’ new york newsday (and occasionally the nyt) used to publish an op-ed essay once a year on “the rule” about not looking anyone in the eye on the subway. Such people would get sucker-punched, but with perfect, non sequitur logic, refuse to connect their cowardice with its results.

I submitted my own counter-essay to nyn, but the editors rejected it. So, I published it in my own magazine.

https://nicholasstixuncensored.blogspot.com/2017/10/a-new-york-stare-of-mind.html

Replies: @AndrewR

II. I still recall my reaction, circa 1987, when I read about a White public school teacher who was murdered for his expensive bicycle in Prospect Park, Brooklyn. His widow said, illogically, that he would put on his headphones and commune with the world. His killers were able to sneak up on him. He disarmed himself.

Not only do headphones distract you from your surroundings, but it marks you to predators as a clueless sap, a soft target ripe for the plucking.

Actually, for raping two local women and murdering a third.

Give the boy his full credit.

Replies: @Right_On

William Manchester's first job after the war was a reporter for the Baltimore Sun. There, he became a friend of H.L. Mencken and was mentored (without learning much) by him. His first book was on Mencken, titled Disturber of the Peace. His second was City of Anger, about crime in Baltimore. Manchester wrote a few other novels in the 50s.

In the mid-50s, Manchester took a job with Wesleyan University and stayed there the rest of his life along with writing books.

Replies: @Art Deco

LOL!

I first read Goodbye Darkness when I was serving as a Marine back in the eighties. I was too credulous about his story at the time because I figured he had too many fellow Marines who would've known the details of his service and outed him if he lied. Your fellow Marines often shower together; they change with you in the same rooms; they use the same heads. It's hard to hide many personal details in those circumstances.

And Manchester's very graphic description of his encounter with a prostitute who was unable to accommodate his enormous penis just seemed too unbelievable for a famous 58-year-old author to make up.

...when the enlisted man took liberty, the reader of Goodbye, Darkness senses he takes liberties. Manchester boasted that buddies cruelly christened him “Tripod” and “Sashweight” after eyes tripped over his penis in the shower. The sobering sight of his organ during a drunk hookup leaves his shocked paramour exclaiming “Jesus” and failing to rid Manchester of his virginity despite the aid of Vaseline. “I didn’t fit,” Manchester notes. “I tried again,” he explains. “She started to moan, but I simply couldn’t penetrate her.” The young man too small for the officer corps [Manchester had been turned down for Marine Corps Officer Training School because he was too small] was too big for women.
 

Cities like New York becoming crime-ridden hellholes could lead to the wokerati finally changing their tune. If the daughter of a NYT editor gets shot in the head by a black thug who is later let out of prison by policies the NYT is supporting, maybe they will rethink the endless anti-white BLM propaganda.

It's one thing to write articles about abolishing stop and search and getting rid of cash bail from the comfort of your safe neighbourhood, but if you have to take the train from Brooklyn to Manhattan alongside those freshly-released criminals every day, maybe just maybe they will rethink things. And even if the people at the top are arriving to the office in bulletproof cars, they know their sons, daughters, nieces and nephews will be out and about at some point and vulnerable to the hell they've unleashed. Is it worth it worrying sick every time Hannah and Joshua take a little longer to come back home from a night out with friends?

Replies: @Tony massey, @AceDeuce

My guess is that the memo will be in effect until the 1st high profile death involving a celebrity or a billionaire and a thug who was out on no bail or was given a zero time sentence for a recent previous crime.

Replies: @Harry Baldwin

I read that Richard Halliburton book.

Replies: @Clark Kent, @James Braxton

The first documented winter ascent of Fuji was by American adventurer Richard Halliburton in the 1920’s. The Japanese thought it was a ridiculous thing to attempt.
 

Steve desperately wants to believe that we can still reform the system so he sees what he wants to see.

It's the same with how he continues to believe that some people in Hollywood are secret conservatives, putting dissident messages in their movies. It's insane, but it allows Steve to avoid the hard choice of supporting or rejecting white identity politics.

White identity politics is the question of our time, yet Steve assiduously avoids it. Why?

Replies: @EuroNat, @silviosilver, @Corvinus

All that matters: in the timeline discussed, are Republicans vertebrates or invertebrates?

Agree.

Original timeline November 4th
Midnight: Ballot counting shut down in key swing states for nebulous reasons.
3:00 AM: Ballot counting reopens with statistically absurd Biden surge.
Biden "elected".

Alternative timeline November 4th
Midnight: Ballot counting shut down in key swing states for nebulous reasons.
3:30 AM: Ballot counting reopens with even more statistically absurd Biden surge.
Return to original timeline.

You succinctly get to what always takes me many more words. The anyone who is anybody "Trump Must Go!" alignment, domestic and foreign, had four years to learn from their failure of planning and will in 2016.

As they openly demonstrated over and over in 2020, the Unstoppable Force was not going to give way to the Immoveable Object, no matter the cost and danger to the republic.

Thus whether the delayed Pfizer news, or the Soviet-style censorship and disinformation regarding the Biden Crime Family, an October Surprise(s) were merely a problem in terms of post-Election Day salesmanship of the steal. The Fake News wouldn't have missed a beat on Pfizer if it had come out. They would have labeled it good news for Trump that just wasn't good enough, early voting and all that.

It's fun to think about discrete counterfactuals. However, if you haven't figured out in the instant case that they were prepared to apply whatever level of malicious force to not fail this time then you weren't paying attention.

Am I the only one that remembers the Fake News shouting beginning in the summer of the "sieges" planned in all fifty state capitals beginning in September and amping up their violence until Trump was gone? It was quickly memory-holed but on 1/6, CNN and MSNBC were live reporting that "Trump supporters" were attacking at least one state capital.

By giving way, Trump saved us from a mass casualty false flag that would have been blamed on him and MAGA, and resulted in quick passage of the totalitarian, bye-bye to the Constitution, domestic Patriot Act they had ready to go.

He then saved the republic again by refusing to concede, allowing the illegitimate regime cards to
play. Rasmussen reported the other day that even 41% of Democrats question the election result.

Say what you will about Trump, but he has courageously teed up a win-win by, in effect, making election integrity law changes at the state level under the rubric of "so 2020 can never happen again," the only way to let air out of the 'Put him back where he rightfully belongs' balloon.

He's added the additional threat of becoming Speaker in the next (Republican-controlled) Congress, which is designed to get Democrats to sail dictator Pelosi's ship tout de suite. Then "the nastiest old woman in Washington," aka Mitch McConnell will quickly follow. Otherwise, unless I miss my mark, they're going to buy themselves Speaker Trump putting the wood to the Democrats and RINO filth like nobody's business.

Because the tastes of real, grown up people tend to be frozen in time according to what they liked when they were adolescents
 

Oh, come on mate. Every old bloke's got a soft-spot for some good ol' "Workin' Class Oi Oi Oi!" from back in the day. Whilst I couldn't say they were anywhere near my all-time favourites, they had the best and nastiest English yob-song ever, "Blood On The Terraces". I'd say the "anti-fascist' cobblers came later.

No. What has become of the United States isn’t worth 400,000 American lives either.

The seeds of our current state were sown long ago. It's not like everything was fine and dandy until "woke" showed up.

Hitler declared war on America a few days later on December 11.

Replies: @James Braxton

How would America be different today if instead of plunging into all out world war, we had responded in kind to Japan’s attack and called it a day?
 

Replies: @James Braxton, @PaceLaw

I saw some video of the Trial -- one of them was a really weird "Goth" type and he acted like a psycho during the trial -- sure that didn't help much...it was believable he could do whatever given the performance I saw....

A few years ago I stayed 2 nights in a hotel in the Gaslamp district, and walked around. Vagrants everywhere.

Okay. I stand corrected.

But wasn't that ruling only known later and based on a technicality? As far as Rittenhouse understood that August night when he shot three people and killed two, a curfew was in effect and he was breaking it.

Replies: @James Braxton

The curfew charge was thrown out because the prosecution never introduced evidence that the curfew was proclaimed. After they rested, Rhichards and/or Chirafsi moved for dimissal of this charge, which was granted by the Judge.

Replies: @James Braxton

He mentioned several times he was a deeply closeted homosexual.

norm kept it a secret.

the type of cancer has not been revealed.

 

“Dress at your best on your execution day (shave carefully); try to leave a good impression on the death squad by standing erect and proud. Try not to play victim when diagnosed with cancer (hide it from others and only share the information with the doctor—it will avert the platitudes and nobody will treat you like a victim worthy of their pity” —Nassim Taleb, Fooled by Randomness

 

Replies: @Ganderson

Impeccable logic.

Is this a joke playing on the conspiracy circuit in right wing circles where every time a man dies kinda young they blame it on secret AIDs?

To beat a phrase to death;
“You have a keen grasp of the obvious”.

Or as another infamous Joe said, it’s not the people who vote that count, it's the people who count the votes.

Elder will win easily on the actual votes, but then the mail in votes will break overwhelmingly for Gov Gav, as will the ballot harvesting tallies. During the night, after the election workers are sent home with instructions to finish up the next day, in will come the Dem operatives with pallet loads of Newsome ballots. It will not even be close.

And if you observe the obvious, you are guilty of treason, per the MSM.

Replies: @bomag

Well, I guess that's the long and the short of it.

The only way it could have been funnier is if the midget were obese.

Replies: @James Speaks

One can hope.

You probably tell little kids there's no Santa, too. Monster.

Staged or not, I gotta admit it was pretty funny; and I watched with no sound!

Replies: @Known Fact

Trump was worried: "Am I going out like Stan Chera?"

My guess would be that the Regeneron monoclonal antibody cocktail did him some good.

Replies: @Achmed E. Newman, @Inquiring Mind, @James Braxton

Yeah those carpetbaggers have really thinned out the Southern gene pool. Got any links for this hot take?

I take it you NEVER served in the military.

And no, males from the south or midwest are not the majority of unlisted men
 

What kind of fantasy is this? Soldiers are not upper middle class. Even officer types only seem middle class, whereas the rank and file are solidly lower middle class and working class.

There were at least 20 lower middle class white, Hispanic, and black guys (+ 2 girls) from my high school class who signed up for the army or navy right after graduation (late 2000s). This was a middle class suburban school, too, recruit numbers are way higher from more rural, inland, and poorer parts of the South.

Most signed up out of boredom, lack of direction, or desire for solid lifetime benefits (can’t blame em). Plus a few psychos with bloodlust. The tests aren’t especially hard to pass and fitness standards aren’t that stringent, either, considering they’ve been watered down over the years. Also, most recruits sign up in their late teens or early 20s, when it should only take a few weeks to months to get in shape.

Replies: @Reg Cæsar, @Anon

'US military servicemen are, on average, from upper middle class backgrounds, and generally come from New England and the PNW (especially special forces operators). ..'

This is almost perfect tripe. It becomes perfect tripe if we restrict the sample to the combat arms.

This type of post is usually a deliberate misdirection: either that or it's based on ignorance of the data.

The key part of this misdirection is that it fails to distinguish between service branches: Navy and Air Force have always had better recruiting demographics than Army (or Marines), just as enlisted men tilt more 'working class' than the officer caste.

More than half of the US 'military' is made up of Air Force, Navy and Coast Guard, so that gives the overall 'military enlisted' data a slightly more 'middle class' tilt as a result.

Look solely at Army and Marines - and narrow it down further to combat roles, and the working class tilt becomes obvious. The bullet-catchers are white and Hispanic.

There is also a tilt against enlistment for people from households in the top income quintile - roughly $87k in total pre-tax household income - which I would not consider anywhere near enough to furnish a 'middle class' family lifestyle... and yet the middle income quintile is $20k lower ($53k-$66k). This is the great lie of US social discourse: that class is meaningfully linked to income. Elsewhere in the West, class and income are (properly) unrelated - and 'middle class' is more about social affectations (consumption of classical music, literature and so forth) and is thought of as a bottom-half-of-the-top-income-quintile thing..

Demographically, one important predictor of enlistment is a father who enlisted - a lot of 'military families' are multigenerational. (And if your Dad is a 20-year Army enlisted man, your household is going to get to the 'middle class' total household income quintile really quite easily).

In raw numbers, the state with the greatest number of enlistees is CA - but there's plenty of white trash in California so it's hardly dispositive of the 'middle class military' trope. After that it's Texas, North Carolina, Georgia, and Florida (and New York).

In proportionate terms (relative to state populations), the top 5 include Georgia, Alabama, South Carolina, Virginia (and also Hawai'i and Alaska).

So no: the people who will turn their weapons on the US populace when ordered to, are not middle-income Californian children of relatively-affluent households (the latter might be 'piloting' the drones, though). When it comes, the triggers will be being pulled by white Southerners from the bottom 40% of the income distribution. The majority of them will do precisely as ordered.

SOURCE: https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/demographics-us-military

Replies: @Anon

What is an "unlisted man"? Try harder, troll.

So- Picasso, Dali and Generalissimus Franco are not white?

How is such lunacy possible?

Replies: @JMcG