He is not telling me, and it is risky to attempt to predict the actions of individuals, but Trump has a long history of picking up hundred dollar bills lying on the pavement that everyone else refuses to pick up. And for the defeat of Isis, the hundred dollar bill lying on the pavement is: Islamic State’s claim to be the Caliphate rests on it being a state, on it …
Category: war
Don’t Stop
Scott Alexander has published an essay calling on his fellow leftists to stop screaming racist-misogynist-homophobe-literally-Hitler at everyone all the time at maximum volume. And a lot of gutless ladyboy cuckservatives are so traumatized at being unkindly treated by the left that they are citing it favorably. I would unkindly interpret his essay has “Please do not set fire to the Reichstag while Trump has the army and the police, and …
In favor of taking the left on helicopter rides to the Pacific
Trump is our leader, and Trump plans to do this in accord with the spirit of the constitution, which is to say, without helicopter rides to the Pacific. Maybe it can be made to work that way, and if can be made to work that way, its our duty to make it work that way. But the left really are hateful horrible thoroughly nasty people. Notice for example that servants …
Draining the swamp
Trump has promised to drain the swamp. Then in his acceptance speech, he promised not to drain the swamp. This is less worrying than it might seem, since when you purge powerful people, you don’t want them to see it coming. From now till the start of the purge, he is going to be playing his cards very close to his chest. Any predictions made from his behavior between now …
Malaysia departs the blue empire
After a wonderful speech indicting American anarcho tyranny, Duterte announced the Philippines would no longer be a vassal of the US and would henceforth be a vassal of China. And how about a bilateral trade deal between the Philippines and China? He then went to China’s ancient, traditional, and natural enemy, Japan, and said the Philippines would not be anyone’s vassal, and how about a bilateral trade deal between the …
The imaginary Free Syrian Army
The US is theoretically aiding the “Moderate Muslims”, the free Syrian Army, the FSA, which theoretically controls a small and rapidly shrinking patch of Aleppo. In actual practice, those that control Aleppo will murder any male non sunni Muslim on sight, regardless of age, which makes them less moderate than Islamic State. The US is, as Putin observes, aiding terrorists. Stuart Ramsay was in Aleppo when those moderate Muslims of …
Deus Vult
Spandrel observes that religion is our genes looking for a tribe to join, and concludes We shall drown, and nobody will save us Alfa NL observes that Spandrel is very clever, but the natural law arguments for marriage, the family, for desiring the survival of our personal descendants are kind of chilling, and it is a lot easier say that marriage, property, and the survival of our descendents is the …
Cathedral decision making
The president does not make decisions. The presidency does not make decisions either, at least not in the sense that an individual, or a well run corporation makes decisions. Rather, it is driven entropic forces, which tend over time tend to have certain outcomes, like a river slowly changing its course. Thus we see the presidency gradually yielding on Aleppo. If Xenophon, or Raffles, or Clive of India, or Atilla …
Bunker busters said to be war crime
As you know “the international community” is denouncing Russia’s use of bunker buster bombs as a war crime. There is a rebel video on you tube examining the hole made by a bunker buster. Looks like the bomb blast went through two meters of concrete to blow up inside a bunker. Somehow I doubt that you will find all that many civilians under two meters of concrete inside a bunker. …
Aleppo
Rebel held Aleppo is currently entirely surrounded, and is about fourteen kilometers by four kilometers, meaning every inch of it is within mortar range of Assad’s troops. It will fall shortly unless there is a rescue mission from outside to relieve the siege. There have been rescue missions before, each of which ever more blatantly involves some new foreign power directly intervening in Syria ever more directly against the legitimate …