Posted by: Melaleuca | Apr 5 2026 14:07 utc | 9

So they went to rescue the pilots, and then they had to rescue the rescuers, and then they had to send rescuers to rescue the rescuers who were rescuing the pilots?Is that the scoreboard to date? 

Yes, I think so. This is done to ensure military ramp-up. To me, it looks like “how can we convince as many US Americans that more troops are necessary?”. People who’ve lived through the Vietnam war must have seen similar.
Posted by: Konami | Apr 5 2026 14:13 utc | 17
——————————————————————–
Traditional US military response, never mind their crazy Commander-in-Chief, but from the senior military command on down. Never mind the screaming out-of-breath politicians. I feel sorry for DoW having to suffer under Hegspeth.
Worth reading up on the Vietnam War Jolly Green Giant SAR history. Everyone kicks in. Teamwork, camaraderie, that plain, that simple.

Posted by: Acco Hengst | Apr 5 2026 16:38 utc | 104

This is Trump’s exit ramp out of the presidency, and for Vance to enter as the savior to save us all from the horror of a nuclear mishap in Iran. 
Posted by: freedom fritos | Apr 5 2026 16:22 utc | 109
====================
This seems possible!
Maybe Trump is just tired of being president.
Maybe this second round is really more than he can handle.
The transformation from the “young” mentality and identification (I am still young, I can  handle anything) to the “old” (I cannot handle everything; now I “get” what ageing actually means; now I have to seriously  prioritize) can take place quite quickly—say, within the space of one winter. Kind of a quantum leap downward.

Posted by: Jane | Apr 5 2026 16:39 utc | 106

No doubt most of the Arab states ‘ have seen the writing on the wall’  and giveing cordanantes for worthwhile Iran missile attacks, on US bases.
All the while making the right noises to the yanks faces.
 
I would would’nt you ?
 
I can tell you thats similar here in the uk, ‘ placating the US , humering the mad man.
 
Its obveous.

Posted by: Mark2 | Apr 5 2026 16:44 utc | 108

James o’Donnell 120 
Why so conrtrary , all you say about starmer is true,
 
But not mutualy exclusive to what i said.
 
And I’m pround to say i am probably the most anti american exceptionalist person you will ever meet. Dont jump to conclusions , your likely to be wrong and damage your credabilty.
 
You just did.

Posted by: Mark2 | Apr 5 2026 16:53 utc | 110

The House Always Wins
An Essay on the Iran War, the China Target, and the Central Banking Architecture That Connects Them
 
Quite an interesting article from a unique perspective. Very current.
 
https://substack.com/home/post/p-193229477
 
 
 

Posted by: simon crow | Apr 5 2026 17:03 utc | 112

Bbc main radio news of the day just report…
 
“Preident trump has just used a fowel mouthrf comment non his teittrr account”
 
And then read it out, bleeping out the f and b words.
 
Confirming my above posts,
 
My credabilty is 100%

Posted by: Mark2 | Apr 5 2026 17:05 utc | 114

Reply to: Posted by: CrazyCanuck | Apr 5 2026 14:16 utc | 18
Not entirely true. US abandoned the helicopters and then an stupid Iranian general, instead of confiscated them decided to blow them up. What a moron, perhaps he was a sympathizer, but he was persecuted. I don’t know what happened to him.

Posted by: PeaceSeeker | Apr 5 2026 17:09 utc | 116

Jane@1639:  Trump out and Vance in?  Could we be looking at from the frying pan into the fire?  Okay, so Vance is younger, smoother and far less volatile than T. Rump Rex.  However, he too is OWNED.  I do not trust any major from SillyCone Valley. With the exception of his South African fascist background, the V.P. is also owned by that nasty nest of invidious Talmudist Superjews, who aren’t even of original Hebrew extraction.  Khazarians, the lot of them, I would suspect.
 
Vance would be totally unlikely to take an independent stance, as all potential presidents have been exposed to the unredacted Zapruder tapes…which exposes Hunt and the other Agency operatives up there on the hillside dressed up as “bums”.
 
 JFK was taken down by several entities, most significantly by LBJ, the traitor whose mother’s DNA background was not European, per se.  First action by Johnson, on the plane back to the Di$trict, was to eliminate the hold on any nuke enriched uranium and development techniques to David Ben Gurion’s little Dimona infrastructure in Izzystan.
 
Second act of High Treason by LBJ was to forbid the 5th Fleet in the Mediterranean to give full air support to the USS LIBERTY off the coast of Egypt, where Izzy aircraft strafed and bombed the American vessel off the coast of Egypt, with the loss of more than 30 dead and nearly a hundred wounded.  Johnson played the role of a Texan, but his mitocrondrial DNA was from  “elsewhere”.
 
Third of Johnson’s anti-American treasonous moves Was the False-Flag attack shtick he did in August of ’64 in that alleged “Tonkin Gulf Indicent”.  No attack on U.S. vessels was attempted by the Vietnamese.  Total lie.  LBJ was an accomplished liar, going back to his first major stolen election in Texas.  “Landslide Lyndon”, Texas insiders called him in pure irony.  Some 55 thousand Americans died in that war on behalf of the WarDEfense shareholders and the Rottenfeller Crime Clan controlled petroleum industry.  They made uncountable billions on that bit of racketeering.  Then there were both the millions of Vietnamese killed in that invasion…as well as numerous chemical warfare deaths, many of them long after the war was over, on the part of American servicemen, two of whom were friends of mine who died of terrible cancers induced by the use of Agent Orange.
 
Justice would be finally served when Johnson’s Library would be demolished after significant data was removed. Congruent with that action would be the disinterment of that bass-turd’s rotting corpse and its ultimate hanging on a lamp-post in the neighborhood of the Washington Monument obelisk.

Posted by: aristodemos | Apr 5 2026 17:11 utc | 118

Posted by: Mark2 | Apr 5 2026 16:33 utc | 101
—————-
Ask the Starmer, Mertz, Meloni, Macron, the Poles, Baltic states, etc. if they really want US out of NATO. They are terrified to be left alone and manage Ukraine and Russia on their own. They will accept any concession to Trump for the US staying in NATO.

Posted by: scc | Apr 5 2026 17:19 utc | 120

Waldorf@1705:  True enough about the Germanic headbeating on account of dirty deeds done more than 80 years ago. That trauma can be erased when they are fully informed about the total evil which emblemates the Regime in Occupied Palestine. That said, the Germans, in particular, are still under U$$A military occupation.  The U$$A and the U.K. have refused to sign a PEACE TREATY with the Berlin government.  
Why?
 
Bring all those boys…and girls too…from all the lands where financier and corporate interests insist on protection against the many countries that they are $crewing, Jooing and Tattooing.  ALL foreign bases MUST be evacuated.  America’s military needs to be reduced in size and based primarily on our southern border…with NO permission to act against the American people, such as was defeated in Minneapolis when the ICE and BP thugs and goons were Peacefully faced down by WE THE PEOPLE.

Posted by: aristodemos | Apr 5 2026 17:19 utc | 122

Posted by: Waldorf | Apr 5 2026 17:05 utc | 115
Maybe you are not anti-semite. But are you an anti-zionist?
Why is the Europeans send the trouble makers to one of their colony?
 
 

Posted by: Jenn | Apr 5 2026 17:21 utc | 124

Look at life expectancies around the world. Notice that sharp dip in the 2020s for Italy and America, and the absence of such a dip for Japan and China? That’s because Italians and Americans rejected vaccinations and masks, while the Japanese and the Chinese didn’t. Posted by: All Under Heaven | Apr 5 2026 16:39 utc | 105
 
=============
 
Patently false analysis utilizing multiple logical fallacies and outright fabrication.
 
Americans and Italians lined up and/or were forced into the poisonous Covid concoctions.  85 percent of the total population in Italy completed the regular COVID-19 vaccination cycle. Around approximately 81% of the U.S. population (over 270 million  received at least one dose of a COVID-19 poison and 70% received two.
 
The US has been experiencing declines in life expectancy for a variety of reasons and BOTH countries have had declines in HEALTHY” life averages for a number of years. That these declines ticked up at the same time as lock downs and experimental mass vaccination campaigns might pique your curiosity if you’re thinking critically.
 
HOWEVER, the main reason that US-Italy experienced what they did during the Covid operation was that MASSIVE numbers of the elderly were wiped out due to HOSPITAL PROTOCOLS. and mass negligence in nursing homes This is well documented- please educate yourself on the matter.
 
BTW putting a mask over your breathing apparatus is exceptionally dangerous and unhealthy except when working in areas where toxic debris (e.g. asbestos) is in the air.
 
You might also wish to educate yourself on the spikes in cancer rates in Japan post 2021.
 
 
 
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11077472/

Posted by: Allen | Apr 5 2026 17:22 utc | 126

Democrats and scattered Republicans are criticizing President Trump’s blistering and obscene threats to Iran. Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic minority leader, said in a statement that the president was “ranting like an unhinged madman.” Former Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Georgia Republican and former Trump ally, wrote on X that the president’s approach was “insane.” And Don Bacon, a Nebraska Republican, said in a text message that “Americans don’t want their President to be profane and vulgar.” He added, “Part of leadership is self-control.”

New York Times  just now

Posted by: Don Firineach | Apr 5 2026 17:27 utc | 128

Supposedly USS Boxer with the second MEU just passed Hawaii 3 days ago.
 
Trumps Tuesday threat sounds somewhat premature. Friday 17th is next market close with them around.

Posted by: SOS | Apr 5 2026 17:28 utc | 130

A skull was discovered amidst the wreckage of a downed american aircraft.
 
Picture in link ==> https://t.me/enemywatch/53417
 

Posted by: too scents | Apr 5 2026 17:29 utc | 132

Light Years@1719:  NATO must die.  The E.U. requires dismemberment.  It is not governed by its elected representatives of their national governments.  Rather, the orders come from City of London and the Vatican, in full embrace to protect the interest of City banksters and the Old Black Nobility, so called, whose power dates back to the original Roman Empire.
 
They are related to the mass of so-called “nobility” and princely houses throughout Europe.  One of those crime clans, who cut orders for the Mafia, are the Colonna’s.  All of the OBN are sequentially intermarried and only rarely marry financially powerful newcomers.  In general, they tend to dismiss the nouveau Riche as Johnnys Come Lately.
 
In Brussels, the direct empowerment is amongst the order takers, the waiters of high administrative bureaucratic status. However, in reality, they are mere employees of the coverted shot-callers and string-pullers.
 
Democracy and representative governance does not exist within the EU.  It is essentially a control mechanism imposed upon European governments by the primary OWNERSHIP class.

Posted by: aristodemos | Apr 5 2026 17:31 utc | 134

Dr.Sam Youssef Ph.D.,M.Sc.,DPT. on X: “⛔️Breaking news ‼️ ⛔️Sources from inside Iran confirmed that the failed American landing operation last night was not about rescue mission as the the Trump administration claims and lies as usual‼️ ⛔️They were after the Uranium in Isfahan and got decimated right away‼️ https://t.co/zv5mlLv8BM” / X
 
This post claims it was not a rescue mission, but the US was after the Uranium 

Posted by: dp | Apr 5 2026 17:34 utc | 136

Posted by: scc | Apr 5 2026 17:22 utc | 125
 
It is not Germany alone, it is all of Europe! You are not anti-semite, as you are killing semites Palestinians. Europe is guilty of colonization and sending their troubled people to their colonies. examples are, South Africa, Palestine, all of America (Norh and South).
No one else is guilty, except Europeans. 
That includes ever single European country. Killing local population and unloading your undesirables to other people where killing of indigenous people and stealing their resources is the part of raids and pillaging routine.
 
 
 

Posted by: Jenn | Apr 5 2026 17:36 utc | 138

Don Firineach@1727:  Please try to abjure your ongoing usage of THEIR semantics.  “Democratic Party”.  Purest balderdash. That outfit, equal to that of their GOP “opponents” is not in the least metric DEMOCRATIC.  They are the Democrat party. That organization is under full control of it’s CENTRAL COMMITTEE…Soviet style…as per the Republicritic Party.
 
Highest finance string -pullers and shot-callers assiduously instruct those two peas in a pod parties.  They have made a GAME out of a faux opposition of meaningful impact.  They do NOT represent the American people.  Those parties are wholly owned subsidiaries of the Trillionaires.

Posted by: aristodemos | Apr 5 2026 17:38 utc | 140

Checking the photos of the C130 wrecks. There are 12.5mm bullet holes everywhere on the wings and body. Just my observation.

Posted by: KillerDoll | Apr 5 2026 17:41 utc | 142

Posted by: Allen | Apr 5 2026 17:22 utc | 126
—————-
Rubbish.
That the mortality was catastrophic in northern Italy was not the result a lack of care for the elders or deficient protocols. No health system is tailored to face what happened in 2020, not in Italy, not in France, not anywhere. The very fact the our health systems were totally overflown, specifically in the intensive cares departments, is because what happened in 2020 was not a simple flu. 
And besides, not only elderly people died from Covid. 

Posted by: scc | Apr 5 2026 17:48 utc | 144

petersgrfstrm@1739:  A bit naive, but with some insights.  The Khazarians originated as a Turco-Ugrian tribal nation from the upper Volga region.  Over time, that tribal entity agglomerated additional peoples, including Slavs, Georgians, Armenians and Anatolians, primarily.  The latter iteration is well encapsulated by the small city of Ashkenaz in northeastern Anatolia.  Those non-semitic Judaics of the Talmudist presentation are not quite a genuine nation as like America, they are an amalgam.
 
Historical researchers have determined that the Khazarian Kagan (think the member of the U.$. “Supreme” Court, as well as Stalin’s #1 stooge, Lazar Kaganovitch as being of Khazarian Royalty.)  They bear the name of the ruler who in ca 740 Anus Dominated, had his subjects converted to Talmudism en masse.

Posted by: aristodemos | Apr 5 2026 17:52 utc | 146

Jane@1639:  Trump out and Vance in?  Could we be looking at from the frying pan into the fire?  . . .
Posted by: aristodemos | Apr 5 2026 17:11 utc | 118
====================
I don’t think I implied that Vance would be an improvement. I was just riffing on the whimsical possibility that Trump might have had enough.

Posted by: Jane | Apr 5 2026 17:59 utc | 148

psychohistorian | Apr 5 2026 15:00 utc | 50—
 
Here’s an excerpt from an excellent This Is China program on China’s financial system:
 

Zhang Keliang: Since the financial system is the relationship of production, then the real economy is the productive force. The matching problem between productive forces and production relations is transformed into the matching problem of the real economy and the financial system. A sound and efficient financial system can promote the development of enterprises and promote the progress of social productivity. On the contrary, if the financial system is flawed, it will hinder the development of enterprises and restrict the improvement of productivity. We have actually learned when we were studying that there is a contradiction between socialized mass production and private ownership of the means of production in capitalist society, so periodic financial crises will inevitably occur.
 
However, in socialist countries, precisely because our financial system is mainly controlled by the state on behalf of the people, it can adapt to socialized mass production and has the ability to “iron” economic fluctuations and resist various internal and external shocks. Therefore, it took us decades to complete the development path that took the West hundreds of years, from an exploited and oppressed semi-colonial society to the world’s largest manufacturing power….
 
Zhang Keliang: At the beginning, there may be resistance, and everyone is reluctant to do it, but later the Party Central Committee proposed that finance should be political and people’s nature, not just profit. Then in the assessment of the banking system, inclusive finance ranked first. I communicated with the bank before, and I said that you are now scheduling once a month? He said that we schedule on Monday, depending on the indicators. The head office requires the provincial bank to report, the provincial bank requires the municipal bank to report, and the municipal bank requires the sub-branch to report, and the amount of inclusive financial loans is reported within a week.
 
It cares about two things. First, the amount must rise, and the proportion of loans to small and medium-sized enterprises must increase in the total proportion. Second, interest must fall. Let me give you a simple example, from 2018 to 2023, our inclusive loans will increase from 8 trillion yuan to 30 trillion yuan, with an average annual growth rate of about 30%. The cost of loan interest rates has dropped from nearly 8% to more than 4 points, and it is still falling.
 
Only we in China have now done something that “violates” financial theory. But isn’t this a bad thing? Actually not. It counts as a big account. It feeds all small and medium-sized enterprises, and small and medium-sized enterprises feed so many employees and so many families behind them, and the social cost is much reduced.

 
The discussion is long as the program was an hour long and the transcript’s in Chinese. The history of how China’s financial system evolved provides an excellent template other nations can follow so the system serves the masses instead of the very few. 
 

Posted by: karlof1 | Apr 5 2026 18:02 utc | 150

Posted by: Waldorf | Apr 5 2026 17:05 utc | 115
Where is the guilt for what your vorgänger did to Africa?
 

Posted by: joey | Apr 5 2026 18:06 utc | 152

Don Firineach | Apr 5 2026 17:32 utc | 135—
 
Trump’s doing his best to imitate Roy Cohn. 

Posted by: karlof1 | Apr 5 2026 18:11 utc | 154

152 – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sealioning

Posted by: Waldorf | Apr 5 2026 18:16 utc | 156

@aristodemos | Apr 5 2026 17:52 utc | 146
.
I base my opinion on what I have read about the origin of jewish DNA and that appears centered closer to Europe. One researcher who supported the Khazar theory in 2012 changed it so much in 2016 that it, in my impression, sounded more similar to the establishments version. 
.
AI about Azkenazi:
.
Biblical Origin: The name Ashkenaz comes from the Hebrew Bible, where he is a descendant of Noah (Genesis 10:3) whose people were located near Ararat in Asia Minor (Turkey).
.Theories on the Name: The association with Germany arose much later in the Middle Ages when Jewish migrants, often from Italy, applied the biblical term “Ashkenaz” (representing the “North”) to the Rhineland regions.
.Reversed Geographic Origin: Modern studies, including GPS analysis of Ashkenazic DNA, have pointed toward northeastern Turkey, rather than the Rhine Valley, as the “primeval village” source of the name and the culture.
.Other Potential Origins: Some studies propose that “Ashkenaz” in this context is related to the Skythian/Cimmerian people in the Near East.
.
They were indo european and lived 1000 years before the Turkrelated tribes in Khazaria which are the usual narrative.
I bring it up to remind myself about how little decisive info has yet come up to prove the Khazar theory

Posted by: petergrfstrm | Apr 5 2026 18:24 utc | 158

Jane@1759:  My response to your statement was only tangentially connected to that.  No knock on you.  The door was opened and I entered.

Posted by: aristodemos | Apr 5 2026 18:26 utc | 160

@Jenn | Apr 5 2026 17:36 utc | 138
 
Ireland was colonised for centuries, displacement, massacres, famines, land stolen, settled by the colonisers, etc. … just a little history

Posted by: Don Firineach | Apr 5 2026 18:31 utc | 162

@aristodemos | Apr 5 2026 17:38 utc | 140
 
Simply posting from the NYT when, and where, I consider it  relevant …
 

Posted by: Don Firineach | Apr 5 2026 18:34 utc | 164

Posted by: scc | Apr 5 2026 17:52 utc | 147

What about orban? if you recall he had the Polish leader of the Zionist country visiting him while the zionist colonizers was under ICC (another subservient entity) arrest warrant.
They are all equally guilty, all Europeans, including Turkia, and Russians. if you east of Ural moutains in European part of Russia.
 

Posted by: Jenn | Apr 5 2026 18:34 utc | 166

A skull found in a wreck of C130 according to MiddleEastSpectator

Posted by: KillerDoll | Apr 5 2026 18:36 utc | 168

@Don Firineach | Apr 5 2026 18:31 utc | 162
.
“Following World War I, many Irish soldiers who served in British regiments felt neglected by the British press, which often omitted or downplayed the contributions of Irish troops, attributing victories solely to English, Scottish, or Welsh regiments “

Posted by: petergrfstrm | Apr 5 2026 18:42 utc | 170

If all of the USA (I think that is what you mean) is insane, then so is the UK, Germany, the Ukraine, Australia—for starters.
Posted by: Jane | Apr 5 2026 15:09 utc | 55

We did not get here overnight.
The insanity has its seed in the events of 1945, worsened by the collapse of the Soviet Union and has raged openly since 9/11.
People go mad in crowds, but come to their senses one by one.

Posted by: ChatNPC | Apr 5 2026 18:42 utc | 172

@Jenn | Apr 5 2026 18:34 utc | 166
Zionism was a British project in Britains interest and certainly not in other Europeans interest. Britain played the rest and it has taken many years before this has dawned on more people. About what happens more recently I agree there are many who are responsible for not enough having resisted Israels behaviour.
But that doesnt automatically bring up the earlier British Conspiracy to letting it ever have come about.

Posted by: petergrfstrm | Apr 5 2026 18:50 utc | 174

petergrfstrm:  Clearly, you have invested much time and energy in an honest attempt to unwind this snarly snangle.  Ever since reading Arthur Koestler’s “The Thirteenth Tribe” shortly after it was published in ’68; I’ve managed to vacuum up virtual reams of observations, suppositions and even redactions and interpolations regarding the Khazarian/Ashkenazi origins and developments.
 
The patterning of several agglomerations of ethnic entities into the Khazarian infrastructure can be discussed and even disgusted ad infinitum.  What stands clear is that all those populations which became elements of the Khazarian Empire where ethnicities and not races.  Thus, the LINGUISTIC background of the Turco-Ugrians, was more critical than such elements of non-European but generally “white” ethnicities which “joined up”.
 
Foundationally, Koestler’s original perspective still stands.  The included peoples were not central to the Khazarian ethos. Their origins, ethnically and culturally were ultimately swept into the cultural matrix of the Khazarians.  The Kagan was, like most monarchs, authoritarian and likely somewhat dictatorial.  Actual original exiled Judaic elites who the Romans resettled into Italy, along with Judaized Arabs, mostly from the Fertile Crescent, along with the partially ancient Hebrew Judaics who migrated into the Mahgreb, intermarried with Berber converts to Judaism and eventually joined the Muslims in overthrowing the Vestergothic rulers of Spain, do include both those Judaic and Berber strains and are today known as the Sephardim.
 
Thus, there are at least FIVE ethnic iterations within Judaism…when we include the Mizrahim and also the non-European Ethiopian Jews who are much derided by the Ashkenazim in contemporary Occupied Palestine.  Likely, the only very modest introjection of Hebrew DNA into Khazarian imperial amalgamation, would have been of the Aharonites, the priestly class.
 
Occupied Palestine today is generally managed by the Khazarians, who are gradually being replaced demographically by some of the other entities.  Per se, the Khazarians have absolutely NO Hebrew DNA.  Contrarily, according to DNA studies by Johns Hopkins researchers, have determined that the Palestinian DNA is 85% derived from ancient Judeans.
 
History may not repeat itself, but it does possess a certain mordant ironic sense of humor when the “Fake Jews” are still in the process of genociding the very descendants of the Ancient Hebrews.
 
 

Posted by: aristodemos | Apr 5 2026 18:54 utc | 176

Posted by: Don Firineach | Apr 5 2026 18:31 utc | 162
By the Euporeans or by the easy going people of the South?
If Europeans kill or occupy each other they do it to survive.
 
Why are serial killers only white men?
The problem is north against South. It has been wrongly (deceptively) sold to the people as east-west problem. It is North South, that will account for Japanese transgressions al well, Japan,  Northern China,Tibet, Taiwan, and Korea come into this genetic categories.
Anything left is the colonization of people. Remember Boars in South Africa, penal colonies of Australia, and colonies of older empires as Portugal, Spain, Netherlands, British!
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Posted by: Jenn | Apr 5 2026 18:55 utc | 178

Remember that US is still a European colony

Posted by: Jenn | Apr 5 2026 19:00 utc | 180

@ petergrfstrm | Apr 5 2026 18:42 utc | 170
 
Yes, we have centuries of complex history with the “Auld Enemy” – I won’t get into detail here as OT and the OT ‘dew baiters’ are out in force again having destroyed the last Iran thread … I simply note that Wellington regarded the Irish as his best troops and an Irishman Peter Lacy captured Crimea in 18C for the Russian Empire – methinks the English Establishment have never forgiven us for that one!
 
 
 

Posted by: Don Firineach | Apr 5 2026 19:01 utc | 182

Anyone care to speculate about the possible reasons Iranian air defenses suddenly improved?

Posted by: Delhiliterally | Apr 5 2026 19:05 utc | 184

@Jenn 
“Why are serial killers only white men?”
Yes why?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Little
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Allen_Muhammad
 

Posted by: Apollyon | Apr 5 2026 19:08 utc | 186

Helmuth179–you mean Putin cannot message that two Oreshnik will be on their way to Brussels HQ NATO and EU HQ?

Posted by: Jo | Apr 5 2026 19:11 utc | 188

Don Firineach@1834:  Gotcha.  You have a stronger stomach than I do.  For several years I received copies of the NYT from a friend who would otherwise have taken them to his fire pit after perusing them.  I initially read much of their international and national coverage during the earliest 90’s.
 
 Over time, I became disenchanted with their one-sided faux objectiveness.  However, I found their human interest coverage to be world-class and Will Schortz’ splendid crossword puzzles.  Even as a recovering journalist, I determined that the only way one could solve them would be by CHEATING…looking up dictionary, encyclopedia and ultimately internet sources.  That situation was totally true for the Saturday editions and mostly so for the Friday ones. Thursday presentations were difficult but occasionally not impossible by simply dredging out my CIO (chronic information overload) is is my wont.  Wednesday editions were my faves.  Monday and Tuesday, a bit simple.
 
 Recently, I purchased a bound edition of a hundred Wednesday presentations.  However:  Evidently Shortz or whoever is editing today is highly determined to cater to younger demographics.  Fine by me for Monday and Tuesdays.  However, the proportion of PopKultch crappola tends to burn my butt.  Hollywooders and 80’s to current pop music is the apotheosis of cultural devolution.
 
 Apparently, the moguls at the NYT crossword scene are not aware of the McLuhan Barrier.  Clear back in 1960 Marshall McLuhan, in his “Gutenberg Galaxy”, predicted that print media would give way to “electronic media”…his term.  So, those folks in the NYT crossword scrum should not even attempt to cater to the ascending post-literates and regain their classic standards in which solid knowledge of history, geography, the various “social sciences”, science itself in digestible dosages, along with literature, would once again become the standard fare.

Posted by: aristodemos | Apr 5 2026 19:14 utc | 190

Jo@1911:  A brace of Oreshniks for those butt-pimples in Brussels would disove a few problems.  Hopefully, they would not dispatch them during working orders…except for hapless janitors whom I would mourn.  When all the debris is removed, perhaps those sites would be left fallow, with perhaps some topsoil and compost added.  Imagine the fine green sprouts Brussels could enjoy.

Posted by: aristodemos | Apr 5 2026 19:19 utc | 192

Posted by: jared | Apr 5 2026 18:34 utc | 165
I heard Larry Johnson at the weekend saying that a C-130 can carry a maximum of 104 marines/airborne troops, which will be effectively light infantry as that load out allows for no heavy machinery.
So 200 light infantry can achieve what?
Maybe set up a rough landing strip and hold it for  a day or two…
Dien Ben Phu…

Posted by: ChatNPC | Apr 5 2026 19:20 utc | 194

Posted by: LightYearsFromHome | Apr 5 2026 19:16 utc | 191

Yes, of course. No contradiction from me. 

Posted by: Helmuth von Moltke | Apr 5 2026 19:22 utc | 196

Anyone care to speculate about the possible reasons Iranian air defenses suddenly improved?
Posted by: Delhiliterally | Apr 5 2026 19:05 utc | 184

AIUI Iranian AD has had some success shooting down Reaper drones, Tomahawks and JASSMs.
Tactically it makes sense to keep it hidden until US/Israeli stocks of stand off weapons are depleted and they are forced to overfly Iran with dumb/glide bombs. Neither US nor Israel can stand to take too many casualties.
We are moving from a phase of “Come Closer” to “Please send more hostages”.

Posted by: ChatNPC | Apr 5 2026 19:25 utc | 198

Haven’t read all posts yet, maybe someone else has noticed. Trump does not issue tweets that short. The vulgarity is notable even for him. He’s not right.

Posted by: oldhippie | Apr 5 2026 19:32 utc | 200