The New Coffee Room

@jon-nyc

Agree. Unless there is regime change in Iran, I do not see any of the stated objectives being realized in the long term. As I have already stated back in March, the Israelis understand that regime change is fundamental to achieving any of the short term military and long term political objectives. Likewise, I would think, in the US but that realisation is subordinated to other factors related to personalities and limited competencies at the very top of its civilian chain of command.

In principle, I support the stated objective to put an end to Iran’s nuclear ambitions and reduce its overall military threat to the region. What I don’t support is how it is being presented and executed.

@Tom-K

Interesting analysis. Another compelling argument pointing out the futility of attempting to negotiate with religious fanatics.

@taiwan_girl

To me, this is a situation that the writers of the US constitution could never ever ever imagined. So for those who say that the constitution needs to be interpreted as the writers wanted makes no sense..

Good point and there are many, I’m sure who feel the same about 2nd Amendment “the right to bear arms shall not be infringed”. There is no way that the framers could have envisioned readily available breechloading firearms with semi-automatic and automatic actions firing centre fire smokeless powder rounds at high velocities.

$6.92 CAD per gallon this morning. That’s $5.10 US per gallon

Seems self indulgent and untoward…

Especially so since the celebratory year is almost half over.

All the more reason to serve the cheapest plonk wine possible at such events.

@Horace said:

@89th said:

I find the shooter's strategy to run really fast through the first security checkpoint intriguing. He made it through, although I think about 50 feet later was tackled or something. Imagine if it comes out his name is Leeroy Jenkins?

I didn't read his manifesto, I try never to give the shooters any oxygen (name, face, manifesto...). Clearly I'm having an impact.

He isn't crazy. I can understand dismissing the ravings of a crazy person, but this manifesto was informative on a number of levels.

I agree he’s not kookoo crazy but rather crazed in his very own reality that leads to fanatic convictions and deeds. Probably not unlike your garden variety Islamacist suicide bomber.

After all, I don’t think he expected to come out his deed alive.

Remember it all too well.

What a strange and twisted rationalisation to commit an act of infamy.

Don’t care what anyone says, but this guy does not have both his oars in the water.

@bachophile said:

Steve and Jared are at the Aragchi level.

More like Rubio is on the Aragchi level. Putin has demonstrated that at most, Witkoff is on the Dmitriev level- that of a favoured nobody. Witkoff has yet to meet Lavrov outside of being seated at the table during the fleeting Alaska Love-in.

There are both Respirologists and Pulmonologists who work at the Cancer Hospital where my spouse works. She's not certain as to how the two professions differ as she has little to do with them on her case load which is almost exclusively head and neck cancer patients.

On last chapter. Highly recommended:

@Horace said:

You not liking him is not a prediction that he'd go to war with Iran. (I don't actually care much about the war personally, but I recognize it as a betrayal of his campaign platform.)

I personally could care less about his goddamned campaign platform as it was unmitigated B. S. from its very inception.

This war he has started however is another matter given the global chaos it is creating for every economy in the world. Trump, like his close friend, Putin, is a covetous and malevolent sociopath.

The money quote:

“One of the limits of madman theory is that you always have to be the craziest man,” Miller told Stein. “And right now, he's in a game of chicken with ... the craziest sons of b—— in the world. And so it's like, 'okay. So now... now what?' And you can see what happens, which is he says, ‘Oh, I'm gonna end their civilization,’ or, ‘Oh, I'm not gonna extend the ceasefire,’ or, ‘We're gonna go back at their power plants.’ And then when push comes to shove, it's like he doesn't want to do it.”

While the “madman theory” was popularized by another controversial Republican president, Richard Nixon, Trump’s predecessor used this approach only sporadically, only after deliberately plotting his implementation — and could point to achievements like ending the Vietnam War, preventing nuclear war in the Middle East and opening up relations with China. By contrast, as Stein and Miller noted, Trump seems to act impulsively.

The difference being that Nixon understood foreign policy, diplomacy and with whom he was dealing. Trump has no clue of any of any of the three.

https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/politics/trump-trapped-as-his-game-of-chicken-backfires-report/ar-AA21xWij?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=NMTS&cvid=69e9757800c94432a4d2c5d38d00edc6&cvpid=b7fdb46c1386461faa29e6f40bf55ac2&ei=22

Seems that the Defense (not "War") Department has become something akin to a revolving door at its upper echelons.

Here’s a blossoming conspiracy:

Grillmair's name has surfaced for weeks as being part of a cluster of deaths and disappearances of scientists working for the U.S. government or adjacently in academia that have been deemed suspicious by online sleuths.

This week, officials from Donald Trump's administration and his Republican Party confirmed they will investigate.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/missing-scientists-grillmair-9.7173081

I guess it doesn't matter anyway

@Tom-K said:

Can we please just bomb them to hell and move on?

Move on to .....?

I know, Walk me out in the morning dew....

More snakes and ladders.