Jolly Good Pals

That Fucking Newspaper (the New York Times) has its problems, but the Washington Post, at least the bits originating from the various spook-and-Pentagon-adjacent "foreign policy" lifers, is written by and for people who have been to dozens of parties with Kissinger.

 #3 story when I typed this:

Finally Got Him, Satan

The important thing to understand about Henry Kissinger is that people in Washington do not understand what anyone has against him.

Henry Kissinger, War Criminal Beloved by America’s Ruling Class, Finally Dies The infamy of Nixon's foreign-policy architect sits, eternally, beside that of history's worst mass murderers. A deeper shame attaches to the country that celebrates him

Like all true human rights advocates, Samantha Power goes to baseball games with Henry Kissinger pic.twitter.com/sWAhMpNU70

— 🦕 Jon Schwarz 🦕 (@schwarz) April 12, 2014

Birds of a feather, and all that.

It’s always valuable to hear the reverent tones with which American elites speak of their monsters. When the Kissingers of the world pass, their humanity, their purpose, their sacrifices are foremost in the minds of the respectable. American elites recoiled in disgust when Iranians in great numbers took to the streets to honor one of their monsters, Qassem Soleimani, after a U.S. drone strike executed the Iranian external security chief in January 2020. Soleimani, whom the United States declared to be a terrorist and killed as such, killed far more people than Timothy McVeigh. But even if we attribute to him all the deaths in the Syrian Civil War, never in Soleimani’s wildest dreams could he kill as many people as Henry Kissinger. Nor did Soleimani get to date Jill St. John, who played Bond girl Tiffany Case in Diamonds Are Forever.

Morning

Almost forgot the morning thread. Distracted by the sound of champagne corks popping.

Wednesday Night

Rock on.

Happy Hour

Get happy.

Car Brain On Fox

What is wrong with these people

Fox News is telling its viewers that speeding is a constitutional right: pic.twitter.com/wS93dBamtl

— Kat Abu (@abughazalehkat) November 29, 2023

Putting speed limiters in car would be great, though if people thought "defund the police" was bad politically...

Sure Why Not

 

"Boring Company" Is Just A Really Dumb Idea

Doesn't require much more explanation than that. The initial promise of it, really, was that Musk had somehow improved tunneling speeds/costs. He did this by (essentially) writing on a napkin, "make tunnel machine faster," and then got a bunch of writeups about it from the usual sycophants in the press.

A reasonable innovation, if true, but it wasn't true and tunneling speed/costs, at least the simple act of running the machines, aren't really the issue with any of these projects. 

As for what would go THROUGH the tunnels, he settled on "somebody driving a Tesla." The self-driving car man still hasn't made them self-driving, even in this tiny controlled environment! Amazing stuff.

On the financial front, Boring has since put its self-driving vehicle plans on the back burner—meaning it’s racking up costs to pay a driver for every one to three people it moves underground at relatively mild speeds of under 40 miles per hour in Vegas.

Lunch

eat

Hunter Biden's Hog

The Republicans know it's too powerful, and are scared to let the rest of the world see it.

Trust Us

A lot of "foreign policy" is behind the veil. Sure we all know there are sordid "compromises" made, that the US can't, actually, get anything it wants from everybody all the time. Even assuming maximum idealism (do not assume that), the details are messy.

We put up with bad actors for a variety of reasons, many generally left unsaid. 

Still when things in the world go to shit, when those bad actors who we actively propped up for years commit unfathomable crimes, it is the time to point fingers and say - you guys fucked up! You said you got this, that you were busy managing the world, and it was all above our pretty little heads. You didn't!

Or, really, we fucked up! We trusted them!

Tom and Tom

Can't give him his second mustache this week. Today:

Pay particular attention to that last point: a revamped Palestinian Authority is the keystone for the forces of moderation, coexistence and decency triumphing in all three wars. It is the keystone for reviving a two-state solution.

Less than a year ago.

A week of reporting from Israel and the West Bank has left me feeling that the prospect for a two-state solution has all but vanished. But no one wants to formally declare it dead and buried — because categorically ruling it out would have enormous ramifications. So, diplomats, politicians and liberal Jewish organizations pretend that it still has a faint heartbeat. I do as well. But we all know that the two-state option is not in a hospital. It’s in hospice. Only a miracle cure could save it now.

I suppose they don't strictly contradict each other, but earlier Tom was much more clear about what was happening. As much as it pains me to say it, the ghouls in the Biden administration should've read Tom's column a year ago.

Tuesday Night

Rock on

Happy Hour

Get happy

War Is Bad

It's the job of the self-appointed guardians of the rules-based international order to prevent things like the slaughter of thousands of innocents under their watch.  The mentality of the people who think Israel needs to be allowed some slaughter, as a treat, in response to the Hamas massacre and hostage taking, is the same as the mentality that led to our post-9/11 forever war.  

And if they don't? Where exactly are the red lines that previously didn't exist?

They let the situation persist for decades, pretending there was a peace process and that a two-state solution was possible, as a way of avoiding dealing with the situation.  The US isn't omnipotent, but it is actively involved in various ways and can't pretend otherwise.

Biden's people pursued the fucking Kushner-Netanyahu Middle East Peace plan, and when it blew up, instead of working for de-escalation, signaled plainly that it was time for some retaliation without limit.

They fucked up.  They've been fucking up for years.

"They" isn't always the Biden administration in this telling, but The Blob persists across administrations.

Treating Them Like Number 2

It is "funny" that they're just betting on him dying.

Vermin

One can never denigrate Real Americans, but the other half of the country is fair game.

Lunch

Eat

Regular Reminder

Thinking the Orange Man is bad is not actually a high enough bar to admit someone into the "good" column.

Sounds Crazy, No?

Can't believe Trump wishes to gently violate our noble traditions.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Campaigning in Iowa this year, Donald Trump said he was prevented during his presidency from using the military to quell violence in primarily Democratic cities and states.

...



Trump has not spelled out precisely how he might use the military during a second term, although he and his advisers have suggested they would have wide latitude to call up units. While deploying the military regularly within the country’s borders would be a departure from tradition, the former president already has signaled an aggressive agenda if he wins, from mass deportations to travel bans imposed on certain Muslim-majority countries.

What violence was that, precisely?