'Unconditional Surrender'

Plus: How many Iranians are there anyway, polling shows minimal support for a war with Iran, and more...

Israel says it struck more Iranian nuclear sites Wednesday morning. The Israeli military has said that 50 of its warplanes struck targets across the Iranian capital of Tehran, including factories that assemble nuclear centrifuges and missiles. Iran responded by launching missiles and drones at Israel, most of which Israel said were intercepted.

These latest actions follow U.S. President Donald Trump saying in a Truth Social post on Tuesday that Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was "an easy target" but that "we are not going to take him out (kill!), at least not for now." In a separate post, the president appeared to call for Iran's "UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER!"

pic.twitter.com/VoUY2xVnyK

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 17, 2025

pic.twitter.com/4sy7jjESGk

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 17, 2025

Khamenei, unsurprisingly, declined to surrender. In his own string of threatening posts on X, the Iranian leader said that the U.S. would suffer "irreparable" harm if it entered the war.

The harm the US will suffer will definitely be irreparable if they enter this conflict militarily.

— Khamenei.ir (@khamenei_ir) June 18, 2025

In another post, Khamenei said Iran's "suspicion" that the U.S. was already supporting Israeli strikes was "growing stronger day by day."

It was already suspected that the US was involved in the malicious move carried out by the Zionist regime, but considering their recent remarks, this suspicion is growing stronger day by day.

— Khamenei.ir (@khamenei_ir) June 18, 2025

On Tuesday evening, Trump spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the phone after meeting with his national security team. Three administration officials told Axios ahead of that meeting that the president was seriously considering entering the war and launching U.S. attacks on Iranian nuclear sites.

Trump administration officials have offered equivocal comments on whether the U.S. will enter Israel's war with Iran and what U.S. goals in such a war might be.

In a Tuesday briefing, State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce declined to directly answer reporters' questions about whether Trump sought regime change in Iran, saying instead that it was a "dynamic" situation and Trump wanted a "durable end" to forever wars.

Vice President J.D. Vance struck a similarly muddled note in a long X post in which he said that "the president has shown remarkable restraint in keeping our military's focus on protecting our troops and protecting our citizens," but that "he may decide he needs to take further action to end Iranian enrichment."

Look, I'm seeing this from the inside, and am admittedly biased towards our president (and my friend), but there's a lot of crazy stuff on social media, so I wanted to address some things directly on the Iran issue:

First, POTUS has been amazingly consistent, over 10 years, that…

— JD Vance (@JDVance) June 17, 2025

"I can assure you that [Trump] is only interested in using the American military to accomplish the American people's goals. Whatever he does, that is his focus," concluded Vance.

The American people will have to wait and see what Trump does then.

---

How many Iranians are there anyway? In a now-viral clip from The Tucker Carlson Show, Sen. Ted Cruz (R–Texas) fails to answer Tucker Carlson's question about how many people live in Iran.

Ted Cruz on Iran. Full interview tomorrow. pic.twitter.com/hJNwAHAnxZ

— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) June 18, 2025

Anti-interventionists, including Carlson during the interview, leaped on Cruz's ignorance as an example of how ill-thought the push for regime change in Iran (which Cruz supports) is.

As someone who lived through 2016 Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson's "What is Aleppo?" gaffe, I confess I'm not super invested in whether or not Cruz knows the population of Iran.

(In the interview, Carlson says it's 92 million, although some estimates put it at only 85 million.)

It is somewhat embarrassing that Cruz can't even offer a plausible ballpark estimate. Nevertheless, him answering that question accurately wouldn't (and shouldn't) convince people that a regime-change war in Iran is a wise and well-considered idea.

What's more interesting in the Cruz interview is what the senator said next, when he declared that "we're carrying out military strikes today" in Iran.

After some follow-up questions from Carlson, Cruz says that Israel was carrying out strikes "with our help. I said we. Israel is leading them, but we're supporting them."

Cruz and other Republican Iran hawks clearly already see Israel's war in Iran as our war too. Whether or not the U.S. starts bombing the country directly is a more minor tactical question, not a major strategic decision to enter the war. According to the hawks, we already have.

---

No one wants this. Some early polling from YouGov conducted over the weekend found that 60 percent of Americans, and a majority of Republicans, do not want the U.S. to enter the war on the side of Israel.

Our latest poll with @YouGov, conducted over the weekend, asked Americans if the US military should get involved in the war in Iran.

Overall:
60% no
16% yes

Republicans:
53% no
23% yes

Trump voters in 2024:
53% no
19% yes pic.twitter.com/pk6UV8bTWD

— Gregg Carlstrom (@glcarlstrom) June 17, 2025

Some 53 percent of Republicans, alongside 61 percent of independents and 65 percent of Democrats, said the U.S. should not get involved in the Iran-Israel conflict.

Much smaller minorities (23 percent of Republicans, 15 percent of Democrats, 11 percent of independents) proactively support U.S. intervention. The remaining balance of respondents is unsure.

---

Scenes from Washington, D.C.: On Monday night, a 39-year-old woman was struck and killed by a truck carrying one of the tanks that participated in Trump's military parade on the National Mall.

Per NBC Washington, a preliminary investigation found that the woman ran into the road, fell, and was hit and dragged by the truck for several blocks.

---

QUICK HITS

• The Cato Institute's Brandan Buck on why a war with Iran is a bad idea
• The Quincy Institute's Trita Parsi on why war with Iran is a bad idea
• John Allen Gay of the John Quincy Adams Society on why war with Iran is a bad idea
• Donald Trump on why war with Iran is a bad idea.

Comments

[Fist of Etiquette]

Say what you will about Boehm, he kept the Roundups running on time. LOOK AT THE CLOCK, BRITCHES.

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

Forget it Fist, it’s Britchestown.

[Fist of Etiquette]

My theory is that Boehm rightly said "hell with these a-holes find someone else to do it" and Reason had to scramble.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Britches lives in a case that reads BREAK GLASS IN CASE OF HUGE GAPING 9:30AM EDT HOLE.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

World War 6 is already disrupting normal life.

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

I blame the tariffs.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Ripples man.

[Ajsloss]

raccoon dogs

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

"Boehm rightly said "hell with these a-holes"

All that they have to do is stop lying to our faces.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

But Matty Y has the best insights.

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

Yglesias is so dreamy for them.

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

I'm guessing Boehm is working on the US steel article that will explain in excruciating utilitarian terms why the deal is bad.

[Medulla Oblongata]

THANK YOU

[Vernon Depner]

You know who else kept the roundups running on time?

[Fist of Etiquette]

No one.

[EISTAU Gree-Vance]

ICE, ICE, baby?

[Fist of Etiquette]

Israel says it struck more Iranian nuclear sites Wednesday morning.

Were they in Tehran? Because otherwise President Trump lied to us.

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

Wrong spot.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Tehran is usually the wrong spot.

[Minadin]

That's what they said?

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

That’s what she said.

[Rev Arthur L kuckland (5-30-24 banana republic day)]

War, huh, good god ya'll
What is it Good for?
Preventing a jihadist state that want the extinction of all non Muslims from developing nukes

[Dillinger]

putting the last line into eight beats is a hoot.

[Fist of Etiquette]

The harm the US will suffer will definitely be irreparable if they enter this conflict militarily.

DON'T JUDGE US BY AFGHANISTAN. The Soviets couldn't even do anything with that place.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Hey, I wonder if Baghdad Bob is still available to do Iranian media?

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

Wouldn’t that be Tehran Timmy?

[MollyGodiva]

He was hilarious. It is a bummer he did not get a comedy show after the war.

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

You should have a show. It should be called “Retards ‘R’ Us”.

[MollyGodiva]

Dude get with the program, I am an idiot, not retarded.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Cite?

[Spiritus Mundi]

Where empires go to die.

[See.More]

Where empires go to die.

What is: A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away?

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

But the Persian (Iran) conquored Babylon (Iraq), while Paul Bremer blew it.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Speaking of judges... which activist inferior court judge is the new commander in chief?

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

Apparently it’s Judge Dumbass from Bumfuck, California this week.

[Idaho-Bob]

Let me guess...A war with Iran is bad.

Got it.

[Spiritus Mundi]

Bad from the standpoint there is nothing to be gained from our involvement. Stay out, or get rich selling arms like we did in WWI (at least until the warhawks had to stick their war boners in it at the very end).

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Same response as Ukraine. Keep us the fuck out. Israel can handle it themselves. Iran's defenses are already decimated.

[damikesc]

Indeed. Trump is not showing a burning desire to invade. Israel has to do this on their own to show their neighbors what happens when they screw around and the US does not make Israel play nice.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Trump administration officials have offered equivocal comments on whether the U.S. will enter Israel's war with Iran and what U.S. goals in such a war might be.

It's a negotiating tactic, baby. The Iranians need to crack open a copy of the Art of the Deal.

[Spiritus Mundi]

According Drudge, it is our war now.

[Fist of Etiquette]

That guy is still around?

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

I thought Matt Drudge died years ago and his website was sold to some Democrat or neocon group.

[Zeb]

Breitbart died. I think Drudge just sold out.

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

For some reason I keep mixing those two up.

[Vernon Depner]

Has anyone ever seen them together?

[Jefferson Paul]

I hope I never see Drudge walking around with the corpse of Breitbart, or what's left of his corpse. That would be pretty fucked up.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

You break it, you bought it?

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

There's a blast from the past. Iraq war booster to nevertrumper, the path followed by all the best GOPe.

[Longtobefree]

Only democrats give clear intelligence information to our enemies for free.
Trump is of the school -
Maybe we do this, maybe we do that, maybe we refrain from this, maybe we don't.
You figure it out. But best you figure it out from a bunker.

[Fist of Etiquette]

...Sen. Ted Cruz (R–Texas) fails to answer Tucker Carlson's question about how many people live in Iran.

All of them except the gay ones.

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

I wonder how many Americans have the population of Iran at their fingertips?

75 million? 91 million? 116 million?

Anyway, Make Persia Great Again.
(Chemjeff - "Persia was never great")

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

For some reason, that reminded me of the South Park episodes with Persians.

[Randy Sax]

Scissor me timbers!

[Minadin]

91.5, 17 million of which live in Tehran.

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

Yes, but you're exceptional. Not Cruz tier.

[Jefferson Paul]

Tucker's point, and I agree, is that if you're calling for regime change in Iran, you should know some bare basics like the population of that country. Even more so if you're a US Senator calling for that.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Let's forward-deploy the DEI brigades.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Iran doesn't allow gays. Has them all transition to women.

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

Sounds like Jeffy’s kind of place.

[Vernon Depner]

No, he would want them on puberty blockers so they stay boys.

[Fist of Etiquette]

It is somewhat embarrassing that Cruz can't even offer a plausible ballpark estimate.

Whatever you think of Cruz, this seems like a pointless gotcha.

[Randy Sax]

Carlson is weird. Part journalist, part whacko that believes in demons.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

"Part journalist, part whacko that believes in demons."

So, like most media types. Although their demon is Trump.

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

And yet, that’s still better than what passes for journalists in most places. Think people like Don Lemon or Taylor Lorenz.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

You work for big demon, trying to hide their existence. I'm on to you...

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

He worked in DC, it has to be impossible not to believe in demons after that. Some of those Washington Top Men must reek of sulphur.

[Randy Sax]

I'm specifically referring to this instance.

The attack happened “in my bed at night and I got attacked while I was asleep with my wife and four dogs in the bed and mauled, physically mauled … by a demon or by something unseen that left claw marks on my sides,” Carlson says.

My guess it that he screwed a kinky bitch and had to make something up to tell his wife.

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

I think he was giving everyone a hint to the "demon" who scratched him identity when he said "and four dogs in the bed".

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Nah. He has talked about demons om Rogan.

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

So he's in bed with four dogs, gets scratched, and wonders who did it?

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

He believes there are evil entities who go through portals or live in another dimension.

[Chuck P. (The Artist formerly known as CTSP)]

His clue should be that if something happened while he was asleep, then he didn't actually witness it.

Either he can't delineate between dream and reality or he is absolutely committed to a lie, no matter how stupid. Either way, that is a dealbreaker.

[Sun Wukong]

A billion Catholics believe that. Carlson says UFOs are actually demons from other dimensions not creatures from other planets. I don't think that is any less reasonable than thinking they are aliens from other stars. There is no evidence for either.

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

I've heard a lot of non-religious guys come to a similar conclusion about UFOs. Malevolent incorporeal beings make as much sense right now as interstellar travel when you look at the numbers.

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

Yup. The criticism should be the "we". Unless he is the Dude, speaking of the Royal We.

[Ajsloss]

Rug pissers did not do this.

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

Fuckin' Quintana. that creep can roll, man.

[Sailor1989]

when he moved to Hollywood he had to go door-to-door just to tell everyone he was a peder ass

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

What's a pederast, Walter?

[Sailor1989]

STFU Donny

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

Donny was a good bowler, and a good man.

[Bubba Jones]

Cruz shouldn't be oversharing what we are, or are not doing in Iran.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Some early polling from YouGov conducted over the weekend found that 60 percent of Americans, and a majority of Republicans, do not want the U.S. to enter the war on the side of Israel.

I wonder how the pollsters are defining war for the respondents.

[Bubba Jones]

I think handing over a couple bunker busters should be adequate.

And restocking the Iron Dome.

[Vernon Depner]

How 'bout on the side of Western Civilization?

[Spiritus Mundi]

No one wants this.

I wonder what a poll on Reeeason's open borders agenda looks like?

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

They’re on the 40 side of a 60-40 argument.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

In the Reason office or Koch Inc headquarters as a whole?

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

The notion that illegal immigrants became a significant part of the labor pool in the United States because Americans just decided to stop working is absurd. American workers were replaced with cheaper options, plain and simple. Employers got addicted to their off-the-books, substandard pay laborers. It never had anything to with concern for illegal immigrants or the lack of available American workers.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Watching major news outlets upset that Americans are applying for these jobs after raids is wild.

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

But they want their cheap shit made/farmed by near-slaves so they can pay less and reap bigger dividends.

[mad.casual]

This is especially egregious after the "Learn to code" stupidity in response to, literally, "We'd work in the coal mines forever if we could."

[See.More]

. . . American workers were replaced with cheaper options, plain and simple. . .

American workers were priced out of the legitimate job market with minimum wages out of line with market wages, and a host of other employment regulations.

[Chuck P. (The Artist formerly known as CTSP)]

And then out of control governmental spending and the transfer payments during the pandemic sent inflation through the roof and made the minimum wage moot.

[Medulla Oblongata]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-vs-aoc-new-poll-reveals-which-politician-s-policies-americans-prefer/ar-AA1GUaMD

A recent Napolitan News Service poll – which surveyed 2,000 registered voters between June 9 to June 12 – asked Americans who they would prefer in a choice among four presidential candidates "with equal skill and temperament."

A whopping 35% said they would prefer a Republican candidate who supports Trump's policies, while only 17% said the same of AOC's.

In another blow to AOC, 22% of those surveyed said they would prefer "a more traditional Democrat," and 17% said the same of a Republican.

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

Frightening news from the WaPo. Time to panic, Boomers.

The Washington Post @washingtonpost
Humidity will soon surge to extreme levels across 40 states.
Find out where there will be excessive heat and humidity — and how humidity patterns are changing.

They used to call it "summer".

[mad.casual]

how humidity patterns are changing.

Why Humidity Patterns Might Be Changing And Why the Scientific Principle Of Rain Causing Wet Roads May Stop Being True In the Future.

[Bubba Jones]

That link didn't go to the article, but it did take me to the latest Google Science News.

At first this was cool, and then I noticed just how ridiculously click baity the science beat is.

[mad.casual]

then I noticed just how ridiculously click baity the science beat is

JackNicholsonNoddingYes.gif

#IFLS /sarc

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

I remember when Sarc was on the IFLS kick. He thought he was so smart all of a sudden.

[Jefferson Paul]

What is IFLS? I googled it, but I don't think the results are what you're referring to.

[A Thinking Mind]

We’ve had an extremely moderate spring here in Georgia. I think it’s an El Niño phenomenon, we’re getting rain 5-6 days a week, and the rain and clouds are keeping everything nice and cool. It definitely has driven up the humidity but the temperatures are comfortable.

[See.More]

We’ve had an extremely moderate spring here in Georgia . . . and the rain and clouds are keeping everything nice and cool.

And amen for that!

[Zeb]

We keep having cool springs (at least in the East), so they need a new angle, I guess.

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

Fear mongers gotta keep grifting somehow.

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

Humidity will soon surge to extreme levels across 40 states.

This is why air conditioning was invented.

[Randy Sax]

Air conditioning was invented? Someone inform the Europeans.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

The regular peasants or the elite ruling class?

[Sun Wukong]

Outside of some areas around the Mediterranean, it really doesn't get that hot in Europe. Also, despite what American leftists claim, Europe is poor compared to the US and really can't afford AC. People living in trailer parks in America have higher standard of living than most Europeans.

[Longtobefree]

"Manufactured home retirement communities", if you please.

[Randy Sax]

Universal healthcare AC is a human right!

[Vernon Depner]

Universal AC would save many more lives around the world than universal routine "health care".

[Ajsloss]

Shelter in place!

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

And the latest news from DNC-Catastrophic Apocalypse Inc.:

Scientists have documented a frightening increase in the length of daylight in each 24 hour cycle since the start of the year. If we don't take action to stop this, we will soon all burn up under constant, searing sunlight.

Take action now! The most important thing you can do is send all your money to the Democratic Party, who can then save civilization.

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

Send your money before the 21ST of June, so we can get started on solving this problem!

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

Just wait until after Saturday when they start whining about the loss of daylight.

[See.More]

Scientists have documented a frightening increase in the length of daylight in each 24 hour cycle since the start of the year. If we don't take action to stop this, we will soon all burn up under constant, searing sunlight.

Time to sacrifice a virgin to get the sun moving faster across the sky.

[Sun Wukong]

It is hot and humid in mid June all across the American Southeast and Midwest. This is absolutely unprecedented. We are all going to DIE!!

[Longtobefree]

Florida man replies "what is humidity?".

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

New Orleans man laughs at Florida man.

[VinniUSMC]

do not want the U.S. to enter the war on the side of Israel.

How many of the Democrat respondents want the US to enter the war on the side of Iran?

Stupid Bithchgi.

[Fist of Etiquette]

On Monday night, a 39-year-old woman was struck and killed by a truck carrying one of the tanks that participated in Trump's military parade on the National Mall.

Maybe it was the Chevy that struck her next that did it. And maybe that Suburban was driving my a Democrat. Pointless.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Per NBC Washington, a preliminary investigation found that the woman ran into the road, fell, and was hit...

Any tasteless Tiananmen Square comparisons by the way will be met with harsh rebuke.

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

First Tank Womyn should be celebrated

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

No mention of her blood alcohol level?

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Was she wearing a pussy hat?

[Longtobefree]

Did "she" even have a pussy?

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Just glad the driver avoided hitting the woman's cat.

[mad.casual]

Harsh rebukes for "And traffic was backed up for miles, tanks to her." jokes only make Dad-Pun Hulk stronger!

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

TRUMP KILLS JAYWALKERS!!

Is there no depths to Orange Hitler's depravity? A whole 250th army parade just to kill a probable minority mother of three.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

And after deporting her loving, productive husband, too. Trump is truly evil.

[Minadin]

I'm just surprised that Democrat wasn't driving a Subaru.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Just a Subaru, or a Lezbaru?

[Minadin]

In my neighborhood, the beta male soy boys drive them too.

[Purple Martin]

Well....

"Per NBC Washington, a preliminary investigation found that the woman ran into the road, fell, and was hit and dragged by the truck for several blocks."

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

In cleanest ever election news, in 2020 the IC and FBI were aware of China trying to utilize mail in ballots to sway the election. This included an intercepted shipment of 20k fake IDs. Plan was to make Chinese students seem like legitimate voters.

https://justthenews.com/accountability/political-ethics/fbi-gives-congress-intel-alleged-chinese-plot-create-fake-mail

Of course Wray told Congress that there were no threats on 2020. Basically because ehe had the FBI recall these reports.

https://justthenews.com/government/security/fbi-asked-spy-agencies-destroy-intel-alleged-china-plot-aid-joe-biden-2020

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

Every day Wray isn't charged with treason is a day without justice.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Would you settle for tar and feathers (and a tragic boating accident)?

[Longtobefree]

Do you have any idea how long it takes to get an EPA permit to heat tar these days?

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

That’s why guillotines are better. Once built, they’re eminently reusable and good for the environment as long as you sharpen the blade regularly.

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

But they are made of wood! Why do you want to destroy the rain forest?

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

Recycled steel and aluminum fixes that.

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

Smelter's use coal you monster.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Big Z wants 40B a year. Seems like a discount. Half what we pay for illegal immigrants a year.

https://justthenews.com/government/security/zelensky-asks-g7-40-billion-year-keep-ukraine-afloat

[damikesc]

Hell, tell Dems the amount we give Ukraine is based solely on how much we spend on illegals.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Ripples...

U.S. business inventories were unchanged in May while sales dipped slightly, according to data released Tuesday by the Census Bureau. The figures suggest that the recent expansion of tariffs has not produced significant economic disruption, with firms showing no signs of precautionary stockpiling or supply chain stress.

Total inventories across manufacturers, wholesalers, and retailers remained flat at $2.66 trillion, following a 0.1 percent gain in April. Sales declined by 0.1 percent to $1.92 trillion, but were up 3.8 percent compared to May 2024. The inventory-to-sales ratio held steady at 1.38, slightly below the 1.40 level from a year earlier.

https://www.breitbart.com/economy/2025/06/17/inventories-hold-steady-indicating-no-tariff-stress-on-economy/

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

Another trump disaster!

[Chupacabra]

But Sarc's Mad Dog 20/20 is up 5%!

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

I thought that was his 40 of Colt 45 at a 70 degree angle.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Akward...

EU chief agrees with Trump on China trade issues, declares ‘Donald is right’

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/eu-chief-bows-trump-key-trade-issue-declares-donald-right

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

Do we still need to be more like Europe, or is that over now?

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

That’s actual Europe. They still want us to be like their make-believe fantasy Europe that doesn’t really exist anywhere.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

I have asked this before, but how would the political calculus about war change if we did deliberately target state leaders, instead of sending the peasants off to die?

[Randy Sax]

You can kill the leaders, but others will come along shorty. Doesn't really solve the problem. The long-term "solution" is nation building. Which requires boots on the ground and also doesn't work.

[Chuck P. (The Artist formerly known as CTSP)]

Japan and Germany worked out pretty well, but they were tech and industrial powerhouses before they surrendered. I would conjecture that the quality of life expectations within the nation have an effect on whether or not the populace can transition to peace.

[Zeb]

And Japan had to be pretty much completely humiliated before they would accept peace.

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

Yup, and German citizens were starving and we kept it that way, for a year or two during occupation.

[damikesc]

Japan worked well.

Germany took, what, 45 or so years to finally get their shit together in full?

[Zeb]

Well, 2/3 of Germany did OK.

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

Obama, Libya? No thanks.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

We've already lost the Iranian war. Iran posted the F35 they shot down. Our entire giants air division has gone missing.

https://x.com/mrklatsch/status/1934178466817020138

Yes. Iran posted that photo.

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

That is one giant assed airplane.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

F35-J model. J stands for Jeff.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

From their province of Lilliputistan?

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Great. Now Emma is going to have an article demanding we import the refugees.

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

You'd think, but if you look at the buses and nearby building those people have to be forty feet tall and the jet the size of an aircraft carrier.

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

The Spruce Goose finally got off the ground!

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

Worst job of P-shopping EVAH!

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

I'm sure Jeff has worse ones on his grndr account.

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

Naked beefcakes with raging erections and Trump's smug face cropped and pasted on.

[Eeyore]

Looks like a scale plastic model.

[mad.casual]

The subtle misalignment of parts of the air frame that should be straight, the perspective-oriented asymmetry, it's pretty clearly AI.

[Chuck P. (The Artist formerly known as CTSP)]

I agree, nobody that bad at Photoshop would bother to add the shadows.

It is pretty hilarious, looks like they asked it to add the plane to a real photo then asked it to add the people. The people are too small for the plane, but bigger than the busses on the street.

[Zeb]

Wow, that's funny. It crash landed in Lilliput, somehow without disturbing the ground around it or leaving any debris nearby.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

'Some early polling from YouGov conducted over the weekend found that 60 percent of Americans, and a majority of Republicans, do not want the U.S. to enter the war on the side of Israel.'

Let me guess. The extra 4% "yes" respondents in the GOP compared to Trump voters are the dedicated neocons.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

"These latest actions follow U.S. President Donald Trump saying in a Truth Social post on Tuesday that Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was "an easy target" but that "we are not going to take him out (kill!), at least not for now." In a separate post, the president appeared to call for Iran's "UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER!"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Trump says something, TDS-addled shit-piles panic!

[A Thinking Mind]

the Iranian leader said that the U.S. would suffer "irreparable" harm if it entered the war.

The US is already in this conflict. If you’re allowing one side to launch offensive operations unhindered, but are defending against the retaliatory missile strikes, you’re a co-combatant. Regardless whether the US is participating in the offensive actions, they’re enabling them by shielding Israel from the counterattacks.

Nobody is disputing that the US is doing this either. We’ve chosen sides and are engaging in an ongoing war, which is more or less a declaration of war itself.

[Randy Sax]

We’ve chosen sides and are engaging in an ongoing war

True, but levels of engagement are important. Suppling weapons and shooting down drones is significantly different than putting boots on the ground.

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

Defense is not normally an act of war.

[A Thinking Mind]

We’re not standing back and letting things play out, either. We’re saying it’s okay for one side to launch whatever offensives they want while limiting their opponent’s ability to respond.

I’m not anti Israel, but what level of aggression is going to be too high for our government to support? Do we stop protecting Israel if they land troops on Iranian soil?

[Randy Sax]

Do we stop protecting Israel if they land troops on Iranian soil?

I doubt we would. Not saying should or shouldn't.

We’re saying it’s okay for one side to launch whatever offensives they want while limiting their opponent’s ability to respond.

I think this is basically the plan. I don't think that plan will change anytime soon.

[damikesc]

No. I say we let Israel do what it wishes.

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

And just stay out of the way.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

But proxy war is like invading your sister.

[Eeyore]

Didn't web already decided during the Obama years that missiles and drones are not acts of war? Just offensive operations?

[Vernon Depner]

Under Obama, they were Acts of God.

[Fist of Etiquette]

The Cato Institute's Brandan Buck on why a war with Iran is a bad idea
LET'S DEFINE OUR TERMS, GENTLEMEN. The U.S. hasn't been in a war since WW2.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Coincidently, that's about the same time that the US had a (vestigial) Congress.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

'On Monday night, a 39-year-old woman was struck and killed by a truck carrying one of the tanks that participated in Trump's military parade on the National Mall. Per NBC Washington, a preliminary investigation found that the woman ran into the road, fell, and was hit and dragged by the truck for several blocks.'

Was she hoping for a chocolate bar or a pair of nylons?

[Fist of Etiquette]

Donald Trump on why war with Iran is a bad idea.

Is no one for the war? Anyone at all?

[Randy Sax]

Netanyahu?

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Neocons and even pro war democrats, same team after all, have come out in support of going after Iran.

Ben Rhodes is of course crying that his Iran Plan under Obama was revealed to be a joke.

[Ajsloss]

General Orlov says those who aren't for the war cling to timid, outdated and unrealistic policies.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x99njmZxaMA

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

The ghost of Teddy Roosevelt?

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

He may decide he needs to take further action to end Iranian enrichment. That decision ultimately belongs to the president.

JD Vance is wrong if the decision is to go to War or attack Iranian without Iranian attacking America first to insure the protection of American troops (and nothing else).

CONGRESS HAS TO DECLARE WAR.

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

And yet, since December 8, 1941 they’ve done no such thing, preferring to abrogate their authority to the executive for “police actions” in Korea, Vietnam, etc.

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

You don’t want congresscritters to look like the bad guys, do you?

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

Well they voted, a tranny by any other name.

And I just don't want another Libya.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

Went to a town hall many years ago with my house rep. When this issue came up he explained that your home insurance policy would not cover "acts of war" and as long as congress doesn't declare war they'd have to pay if the Russkies drop a nuke on ya.

[Medulla Oblongata]

The Iraq War AUMF was a declaration of war by another name.

Congress approved the actions (having provided a long list of the why's and told the President to act:

SEC. 3. AUTHORIZATION FOR USE OF UNITED STATES ARMED FORCES.
(a) AUTHORIZATION.—The President is authorized to use the
Armed Forces of the United States as he determines to be necessary
and appropriate in order to—
(1) defend the national security of the United States against
the continuing threat posed by Iraq; and
(2) enforce all relevant United Nations Security Council
resolutions regarding Iraq.

Also

(c) WAR POWERS RESOLUTION REQUIREMENTS.—
(1) SPECIFIC STATUTORY AUTHORIZATION.—Consistent with
section 8(a)(1) of the War Powers Resolution, the Congress
declares that this section is intended to constitute specific statu
tory authorization within the meaning of section 5(b) of the
War Powers Resolution.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

What's a "congress"?

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

The congress are those Americans whose job pays 6 figures to fundraise for the next most important election. In the small time they have left they pass bills they didn't read and need to be written in full by unelected bureaucrats who ultimately enforce their own rules on us the people.

[Its_Not_Inevitable]

Nice explanation.

[Longtobefree]

" . . . Sen. Ted Cruz (R–Texas) fails to answer Tucker Carlson's question about how many people live in Iran."

The correct number, for the next little while, is "less than yesterday".

[Rev Arthur L kuckland (5-30-24 banana republic day)]

2...many

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Believe around 200 have died which makes it a genocide.

[TrickyVic (old school)]

""It was already suspected that the US was involved in the malicious move carried out by the Zionist regime, but considering their recent remarks, this suspicion is growing stronger day by day.""

Sounds like a couple of people here.

[A Thinking Mind]

I have a question. Do people think we should hold dangerous suspects without bail before they’ve been convicted of a crime?

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

Define dangerous.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Parading through congress, some with police escorting them.

[A Thinking Mind]

I was specifically thinking of the Minnesota assassin. There’s many libertarians who think we shouldn’t infringe on the rights of people who haven’t been convicted of a crime. But then what do you do to prevent a murderer from resuming his killing spree?

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

Faster trials?

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Often the defense team delays the trials as long as they can.

[A Thinking Mind]

But the defendant deserves to defend themself at trial. Which may mean they require time to speak to all the witnesses, run any relevant tests on the physical evidence, extract data from electronic devices if it may be helpful. Faster trials do not always preserve the rights of the defendant, but also, some defendants are assassins who might kill again if set free.

[SRG2]

That's why hearings are held rather than just jailing someone after arrest and keeping them there until trial...

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

Need to know what evidence and crime, but for sake of discussion lets say video, eyewitness and DNA all point to guilt of murder, yes.

[Sun Wukong]

You need to speculate. There are tons or actual cases you can examine. To take two well known ones, do you think the guy in Minnesota or Luigi whatever his name his who is charged with murdering the healthcare exec should be granted bail? I certainly don't. If you think everyone should get out of jail pending trial, then those two guys should by that logic be out walking the streets right now.

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

I did speculate. Luigi would also fall into, yes hold till trial. But "dangerous" criminals could be illegal marijuana dealers who were armed when they made deal (didn't use the weapon or violence) and I don't think they should be denied bail.

[Sun Wukong]

The problem with that attitude is what about criminals who are not "dangerous" but just criminals. If I steal your car and get arrested for it but am out on the street that afternoon laughing at you, is that justice? Yeah, I am not Luigi. I am not out killing people. Yet, I am out stealing and doing harm nonetheless.

If you want to know what liberal bail policies look like in practice, watch the documentary No One Saw a Thing. It is about the case where the little town in Missouri finally just murdered the town bully. Missouri at that time had pretty much exactly the sort of bail policies libertarians want. The result was this guy terrorized this town and every time he was arrested he was out on bail doing more and intimidating witnesses and ultimately getting off time after time. When they finally did convict him of attempted murder, he got an appeal bond. When that happened, the town finally had enough and just shot him in broad daylight with like 50 witnesses who all said they didn't see who shot him. The liberal bail system didn't serve that town at all and in the end didn't serve the criminal It got him murdered for crimes that should have just sent him to prison for a few years.

You can't just let people out of jail every time because they haven't been convicted yet. It is not that simple.

[Randy Sax]

If I didn't steal your car and get arrested for it anyway but am out on the street that afternoon laughing at you, is that justice?

That's the balancing test.

[Sun Wukong]

That is a possibility. There is a possibility of innocent people being wrongly harmed in any criminal justice system. If that possibility means you can't do it, then we can't have a system at all.

Contrary to what the hipster doofuses at reason think, the vast majority of people who are arrested are guilty as hell of the crime they are arrested for. That is just the truth. Talk to any practicing criminal defense attorney and they will tell you 99% of their clients are guilty. So, the balance lies with the 99% not the 1%.

[Randy Sax]

The 99% - 1% ratio doesn't account for most people's general attitude of "it's better for a guilty man to go free, than an innocent man to be jailed"

[Sun Wukong]

That just means you have some bias in the system towards allowing guilty people to go free. That doesn't mean the bias should be unlimited. Holding people in jail who can't make some assurance that they will show up to trial or are repeat criminals or charged with such a serious offense such that they can't be trusted not to do real harm before their trial, is not violating the principle of better a guilty man go free.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

"...If you want to know what liberal bail policies look like in practice, watch the documentary No One Saw a Thing..."

Saw that years ago and it was disturbing, to say the least. Vigilantly justice can get out of hand quickly, but in this case, well...

[Sun Wukong]

He needed killing. You can't overstate how badly the state of Missouri let that town down and ultimately got McElroy murdered. Sometimes people need to go to prison for their own good. Letting them run free isn't helping them. McElroy was one of those people. The town of course shouldn't' have had to resort to murder to protect itself. That is not good either.

[damikesc]

That was the best story. Ken McElroy was a dick.

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

I'm not for giving bail to those who continually plague a community with theft either, I find theft to be violent whether physical force or threat of was used.

Definitions matter though, and when the attorney general can call parents protesting pta meetings domestic terrorists, I'm going to want specifics from the prosecution before I render judgements.

[Jefferson Paul]

By definition, if I can remember the sociology course I had to take years ago for a GR, theft is nonviolent. Robbery would be taking something using violence or the threat of violence.

[Zeb]

This is why you have judges to make judgements on things like bail conditions. Justice wouldn't be served by a blanket rule about no bail for all or certain crimes. Nor would it be served by letting everyone out on bail. The fact is that by far most people arrested for a crime are guilty. I am very sympathetic to people who are wrongly arrested or charged with crimes as that does do real and often significant harm even without a conviction. But probably the better way to deal with that is to compensate those people for the harm done as the harm will also happen even if they get out on bail.

[Sun Wukong]

Well said. It is never going to be perfect, but you have to try and make it better than doing nothing.

[Sun Wukong]

Yes. Do you think they should let that animal in Minnesota out on bail? Do you really want a guy who likely murdered two people and nearly murdered to others walking around free for the next year until his trial?

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Geez, while even wait until they have committed a crime?

[Rev Arthur L kuckland (5-30-24 banana republic day)]

Is that the same cato that supported the jab mandate? Then pass

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

More gracious than CATO was with the mandate.

[MollyGodiva]

Few points.
1. Trump needs Congressional approval to attack Iran. The fact that other presidents did not get approval does not make it ok.
2. The US is not a party to this war, so why is Trump demanding an unconditional surrender.
3. Does Trump even know what "unconditional surrender" is? It means the other side is so badly beaten that they have no negotiation power at all and the victor can do what they want. Demanding unconditional surrender makes counties fight harder because they have nothing to lose.

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

Tell us you know nothing about anything without saying you know nothing about anything.

[Sun Wukong]

I don't think anything she said was untrue. What do you think is wrong about her points?

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

He can ask all the guys who died in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq and so on about the need for Congress to approve anything.

[Sun Wukong]

Congress approved all of those wars. They didn't declare war but they approved. Hell, Congress practically dragged Johnson into Vietnam. Johnson wasn't nearly as keen on going into Vietnam as he is remember. It was the Democrats in Congress who wanted to go into Vietnam. They practically called Johnson a commie traitor for his skepticism. Then when the war became unpopular, those very same Democrats, people like Fullbright and others, were Johnson's and the war's biggest critics and Vietnam became "Johnson's war".

The only wars the US has fought without Congressional approval in my lifetime were Serbia in 1999 and Libya in 2012. Otherwise, Congress has enthusiastically signed up.

[Dillinger]

also turned off the spigot in 1975 or something ... instant Congressional disapproval

[Sun Wukong]

The Democrats couldn't allow Nixon to win the war, which he did in 1973.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

Well it was peace with honor at least.

[Dillinger]

jerks.

[MollyGodiva]

Oh wow your history is backwards. In 1968 North Vietnam was engaged in peace talks with the US. Nixon wanted to campaign on the war and not let the Ds have the win, and secretly sent them a message saying they would get a better deal under him. And the war lasted another seven years.

[Chuck P. (The Artist formerly known as CTSP)]

You are really going to lecture this forum on the Vietnam War? OK, JFree, you can fuck off now that you outed another sockpuppet. Although this one doesn't express as much hatred for Israel.

[Sun Wukong]

The North was never going to give a good deal in 1968. You are a complete moron. The North only gave an acceptable offer after Nixon destroyed their ability to fight with the Christmas bombings of 1972. I can't overstate how stupid and untrue your claim that the North was ready to offer a reasonable peace in 1968 or that somehow Nixon turned down such offers for four years after is. Just never speak on this subject again.

[MollyGodiva]

I have no idea what the North was offering. The point is that Nixon tanked any chance of truce.

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

I tried to tell you about Molly.

[Diarrheality]

I have no idea what the North was offering. The point is that Nixon tanked any chance of truce.

Fixed that for you, Molly.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

Serbia in 1999 and Libya in 2012
The Clinton/Clinton wars.

[MollyGodiva]

This seems like 2003 all over again. A war to "disarm" based on the president ignoring the facts.

[JesseAz (Prime Meanster of Sarcasia)]

Forget to switch your socks?

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

Right now, more Libya then Iraq. Had to disarm Gaddafi further or he'd murder all those slavers. And another president who may not go to Congress to attack a nation that didn't attack us.

[damikesc]

Khaddafy DID disarm. He ended his nuclear program. And Obama and Hillary STILL fucked him.

Why would any country work with us on that again?

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

Yup 100%, except for the helicopters of mass destruction he was going to use to mow down ISIS (or similar) freedom fighters.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Now do Ukraine vs Russia.

[MollyGodiva]

Nothing would change. But the US does have a more vested interest in stopping Russia.

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

Cite?

[MollyGodiva]

"Duh". MollyGodiva. Reason.com, June 18, 2025. https://reason.com/2025/06/18/unconditional-surrender

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

Are you trying to cite yourself?

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

That’s not a citation, retard.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

"2. The US is not a party to this war, so why is Trump demanding an unconditional surrender."

He's not "demanding" anything, steaming pile of lying TDS-addled shit.

[MollyGodiva]

You think "UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER!" is gentle suggestion?

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

It’s probably their best avenue.

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

If not enforced by American military action, yes.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

It's his opinion of the best result; only lying piles of lefty shit like you immediately escalate an opinion to a DEMAND!!!!!!!!!!!!
Fuck off and die, asshole.

[Medulla Oblongata]

So other Presidents *didn't* need Congressional approval?

[Sun Wukong]

Democrats want you to believe only illegal aliens would take farming, factory, hotel, and restaurant jobs. They’re flat out lying.

This past week, ICE raided Glenn Valley Foods, resulting in the biggest worksite immigration raid in Nebraska’s history. Dozens of illegal aliens who were employed at the meat-packing plant were removed for deportation, according to Revolver. And this enforcement of immigration law had an interesting result that Democrats would hate to admit: Americans immediately showed up to apply for the open jobs.

https://pjmedia.com/stephen-kruiser/2025/06/18/the-morning-briefing-dems-fave-argument-for-illegals-just-took-a-kick-to-the-groin-n4940889

Reason has repeatedly informed me that Americans won't take any job except being a criminal or a TikTak influencer. I am starting to think Reason lies about this stuff or something.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

Native born employment has been increasing since Trump shut down the border and started enforcing immigration law. And working class wages are rising. There's no mystery about where those jobs are coming from.

[damikesc]

Given that the entirety of Biden's "job growth" numbers, inflated as they were, were ALL immigrants. Domestic citizens got basically nothing.

[Marshal]

I'm surprised how little difference there is by party.
R = 53
I = 61
D = 65

[Sun Wukong]

Democrats follow orders and object to anything Trump does. Republicans are genuinely tired of foreign wars and Neocon nation building. These numbers are not surprising at all.

[Medulla Oblongata]

Scenes from NY:

Socialist Zohran Mamdani policies are so bad that even the leftist New York Times editorial board warns people not to vote for him.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/16/opinion/new-york-mayor-election-advice.html

Unfortunately, Mr. Mamdani is running on an agenda uniquely unsuited to the city’s challenges. He is a democratic socialist who too often ignores the unavoidable trade-offs of governance. He favors rent freezes that could restrict housing supply and make it harder for younger New Yorkers and new arrivals to afford housing. He wants the government to operate grocery stores, as if customer service and retail sales were strengths of the public sector. He minimizes the importance of policing. Most worrisome, he shows little concern about the disorder of the past decade, even though its costs have fallen hardest on the city’s working-class and poor residents. Mr. Mamdani, who has called Mr. de Blasio the best New York mayor of his lifetime, offers an agenda that remains alluring among elite progressives but has proved damaging to city life.

[Sun Wukong]

So this guy is so crazy that he makes the NYT editorial board sound sane and reasonable. Wow. I don't even know what to say to that. I didn't think that was possible.

[Chuck P. (The Artist formerly known as CTSP)]

That is not possible. It's a gimmick.

For any voters tempted to leave both off their ballots, it is important to understand that this decision would be tantamount to expressing no preference between the two. It is similar to voting for neither major-party candidate in a traditional election. If the polls are correct and the race is between Mr. Cuomo and Mr. Mamdani, the thing that matters most on a ballot will be the relative positions of those two candidates.

They don't want people to NOT to vote for him.

non-paywall link:
https://dnyuz.com/2025/06/16/our-advice-to-voters-in-a-vexing-race-for-new-york-mayor/

[Sun Wukong]

I don't understand. Are they encouraging people to vote "none of the above" as some sort of 12D chess way of getting him into office without being seen to support him? That paragraph is incredibly poorly written and opaque.

[Chuck P. (The Artist formerly known as CTSP)]

Ranked choice ballots. They are reminding people to put at least one of them on their ballot.

The whole editorial is a weaseling out on the fact that they want people to vote for Cuomo, but they don't want to be seen endorsing him. They identify his sexual harassment as the primary reason while burying his COVID policy as "a significant mistake".

The editorial board is as unhinged as ever. Cuomo is a retard that lead his state to the highest number of COVID fatalities in the nation while scolding people questioning his policies with his brother on CNN.

[Sun Wukong]

Just be honest and endorse Cuomo. Yeah, he is a grandma killing piece of garbage but he is the best option available.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Geez, who wrote this fascist screed and snuck it into the NYT?

[Sun Wukong]

Reading common sense in the New York Times creeps the hell out of me. If there is anything that is a good candidate for being a sign of the apocalypse being near, the New York Times sounding sane and measured is it.

[Sevo, 5-30-24, embarrassment]

"...He wants the government to operate grocery stores, as if customer service and retail sales were strengths of the public sector..."

So he's never been to the DMV.

[Sun Wukong]

He has. He just doesn't care. It is not like he is going to be shopping in those stores. Party members don't have to do that.

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

He’s going to win.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

Isn't this the perfect storm that leads to a Republican mayor in NYC? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

[Zeb]

Giuliani and Bloomberg weren't that long ago.

[Dillinger]

>>"UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER!"

give up your nukes & keep Tehran or flee to France and give up Tehran I don't understand why this is so hard.

[Dillinger]

poor disillusioned Dave Smith. better to have kept one's mouth closed.

[Dillinger]

>>In his own string of threatening posts on X, the Iranian leader said that the U.S. would suffer "irreparable" harm if it entered the war.

is an X flamewar between T and Khameni "entering the war"?

[Dillinger]

>>On Monday night, a 39-year-old woman was struck and killed by a truck carrying one of the tanks that participated in Trump's military parade on the National Mall.

independent contractor or federal vehicle? two days after the parade is a stretch unless an M1-A was in-tow

[Sun Wukong]

The Army moves tanks and vehicles around on trucks all of the time. Blaming this on Trump's parade is something so dishonest only Reason would do it. Axios and the Young Turks read reason and think "dude slow it down a little, try to be a little more subtle".

[Dillinger]

>> something so dishonest only Reason would do it.

yes

>> Axios and the Young Turks read reason and think "dude slow it down a little, try to be a little more subtle".

funny because true.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

It's like that time a red SUV went crazy in Wisconsin.

[Dillinger]

at Christmas ...

[Ajsloss]

SUV color is the most important thing.

[Dillinger]

>>In another post, Khamenei said Iran's "suspicion" that the U.S. was already supporting Israeli strikes was "growing stronger day by day."

didn't Liz tell you no wishcasting in HnR?

[Dillinger]

>>Sen. Ted Cruz (R–Texas) fails to answer Tucker Carlson's question about how many people live in Iran.

and? Tucker's lost his fucking mind it's been sad to watch.

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

I've seen Tucker's problem happen to a lot of people. They discover that 95% of the purported "conspiracy theories" turned out to be true, even the really weird ones, and start to believe that they all might be true.

[Dillinger]

I listen for the guests not Tucker's opinion ... megalomania is an ugly monster

[Mike Parsons]

Rogan has had this same thing happen to him at times. He's been right on a ton, and has good reason to be skeptical of the gov for all the times they have fucked up, but he does go that extra step and start to get into every wild conspiracy.

Still like to watch him when a good guest is on, but I find myself rolling my eyes at him more often

[Dillinger]

Rogan doesn't know when to stop the Dave Smiths from their own idiocy ... but otherwise same thing I love the diverse guests and don't care what Joe thinks ... although sometimes it's cute when he geeks out

[Sun Wukong]

Rogan seems to actually believe the moon landings were faked. I can't understand how any otherwise intelligent person, and Rogan is a smart guy, could believe that.

The other thing about conspiracy theories is that I think a lot of them are government misinformation put out to discredit something they don't want the public to believe. Pizzagate is a good example of this. There was a lot of very odd and potentially incriminating things in the Podesta emails. Shortly after they came out, there was this flood of conspiracy theories about kids being locked in the basement of the pizza joint and Hillary Clinton eating children in so forth. All of those absurd things were very quickly debunked enabling the media to dismiss the underlying incriminating evidence by association with the craziness.

If you really look at conspiracy theories, you will find they are often bizarre extrapolations made from things that are damaging to the government. I can't help but think that is not by accident.

[damikesc]

That is baffling to me.

Does he think the Soviets --- who could easily track where Apollo 11 was --- would not have said a thing if it was faked?

[Sun Wukong]

Exactly. The US couldn't keep the Soviets from infiltrating the Manhattan Project. Yet, we are supposed to believe that just 20 years later the US ran what amounted to the most successful reality TV show in history and the Soviets never infiltrated the program or had any idea it was all fake? Or if they did, they didn't destroy the biggest American Propaganda coup of the entire Cold War out of kindness or something?

That alone renders any claims the US faked the moon landings absurd.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

Is believing that the moon landings were faked one small step for a man or a giant leap for a small subset of mankind? I'm reserving judgement until AI writes the definitive history.

[Chuck P. (The Artist formerly known as CTSP)]

Conspiracists see what they expect to see in the video and pictures and ignore that while physics don't change, the combination of lack of atmosphere and low gravity are conditions that can't be replicated.

[Sun Wukong]

Yeah. Low gravity is much more difficult to recreate than no gravity. The whole thing is idiotic.

[Vernon Depner]

A classic example is the Men in Black of UFO lore. The government has their UFO investigators dress and behave in bizarre manners so that the people who interact with them sound crazy if they speak out about it.

[Ajsloss]

Hillary eating children has been debunked?

[Sun Wukong]

It hasn't been proven.

[Dillinger]

clearly Huma Soros knows the truth & it's eating her up inside.

[Dillinger]

>>found that 60 percent of Americans, and a majority of Republicans, do not want the U.S. to enter the war

objection vague and ambiguous.

[Dillinger]

>>The Cato Institute's Brandan Buck on why a war with Iran is a bad idea

everybody knows a war with Iran is bad wake me when war with Iran were declared.

[Dillinger]

Thomas Massie thinks the War Powers Act is constitutional I'd be entertained watching the argument finally be decided @SC

[Sun Wukong]

It won't be. If the SC decided against the President, they couldn't enforce the order. So, they just won't touch it.

[Dillinger]

>>Cruz and other Republican Iran hawks clearly already see Israel's war in Iran as our war too.

Israel has every right to take down Iran ... what do I care if we lend air support?

[Sun Wukong]

The Supreme Court just upheld Tennessee's ban on minors getting sex changes. Let the whining and gnashing of teeth begin. Who will write the Reason "doctors can no longer castrate minors in Tennessee, the dark night of fascism has fallen on America" article? My guess is Liz.

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

Poor Jeff, so many young men left intact and facing puberty. When will the horror end.

[Mike Parsons]

Massive W for sanity and rationality.

Massive L for deranged psychopaths, but also an equally big W for their confused kids who will be able to grow out of the phase they are in without mutilating their body before they realize how big of a mistake they made.

[Sun Wukong]

Giving minors sex changes is the most evil and depraved thing this country has done in my lifetime for sure. Like most evil, it is all about money. Sex change operations are a cash cow for hospitals. And people who get them have to stay on hormones and various other drugs for the rest of their lives to make the effects of them sick. Both big Pharma and the hospitals stand to make tens of billions of dollars should these things become common. That is what drove this insanity more than anything else.

[damikesc]

It is also a huge chunk of why popular opinion on trannies has tanked so hard.

[Sun Wukong]

I think the fact that the large majority of adults who claim to be "trans' are just straight men who have gotten addicted to their cross dressing fetish did a lot to turn the public against it. Fair or not, appearances matter. No way on earth was the public going to support a movement whose most prominent exemplars were people like Richard (Rachel) Lavine for very long. A fat middle aged guy in dress pretending to be a woman disgusts most people at a very visceral level. There is no way around that or way to change it.

[Mike Parsons]

"why popular opinion on trannies has tanked so hard."

we are past the point in the story where the emperor has been correctly identified as naked, the majority of the population agrees he is naked, they are all talking about how silly it was to ever pretend he wasn't naked, and the few people left adamantly claiming he is clothed look like they are either insane, blind, lying, or in a cult

[Mike Parsons]

"Both big Pharma and the hospitals stand to make tens of billions of dollars should these things become common. That is what drove this insanity more than anything else."

copy paste that for COVID vax

[Sun Wukong]

Absolutely. That was all about money.

[mad.casual]

Giving minors sex changes is the most evil and depraved thing this country has done in my lifetime for sure.

Are you 4? Were you around for the creation and release of a novel pathogen that killed a million people, locked down billions around the world, and (not quite) forcibly (not quite) vaccinated millions while *simultaneously* silencing all dissent across major social media platforms around the globe?

Giving minors sex changes is definitely not good, especially when you extend it to ignoring Title IX to hold female athletes down, advancing public accommodation, spying on dissenters at school board meetings, covering up for pedophiles, etc., but it struggles to make the top 5 of any given adult lifetime and probably isn't in the top 10 of US History.

[Sun Wukong]

This is worse than any of that. They are preying on autistic and confused kids and then giving them surgeries and drugs that mutilate their bodies leaving them physical freaks for the rest of their lives because doing so allows their sick parents to virtue signal and makes big pharma and hospitals enormous amounts of money.

Short of just murdering those kids, you can't get any worse than that.

[Chuck P. (The Artist formerly known as CTSP)]

Meh. Mental illness aside, there is an element of choice for those kids. I don't remember the Grandma Killers in New York and New Jersey giving retirement communities any choice.

[Sun Wukong]

They will mutilate a lot more kids than they killed grandmas. Also, a lot of those people were dying of other things. That doesn't make killing them okay, but it does put a different light on things. The other thing is that those numbers were wildly inflated. An 88 year old man would die of congestive heart failure, test positive for COVID post mortum and the death would be classified as "COVID related".

[Zeb]

I'm not so sure about that. They killed a lot of grandmas, despite the problem of classifying with vs. of. Especially with the early strains in NY, covid did do a number on old sick people. Disgusting as it is, how many kids are getting puberty blockers or gender surgeries? I suppose over time they will catch up if it continues.

[Sun Wukong]

If that number is small, it is only because of the efforts to stop them. They are mutilating children for profit and politics. That speaks for itself.

[Zeb]

I like to think it's largely because most parents aren't insane in that way and would reject the whole idea. But I'm often disappointed by how insane or gullible people are, so I could be off.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

Somebody posted a video here a couple days ago of a mom holding her screaming pre adolescent kid down on an exam table while a smiling nurse injects him with estrogen. The mom had a choice. The nurse had a choice. Do you really think a seven year old has an element of choice? Really?

[Sun Wukong]

That video is like something out of the old USSR or Nazi Germany. It is just pure evil. I can comprehend a lot of evil. I can understand why people steal or become gangsters or even murderers. Anyone, let alone the kids' mother, doing that is something I cannot understand or have any empathy for. I could imagine a different life where circumstances lead me to become a different person who did various bad things that I have never done and likely would never do in my real life. I cannot imagine any possible life or set of circumstances where I would do something like that.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

Yes we've been down this road before but in the end cooler heads prevailed, if only briefly. It's important to remember that the eugenics theories that infected western culture in the 20th century are the ultimate manifestation of progressivism. They don't just want to control what you eat and drink and where you are allowed to live or the work you're allowed to do. They want your kid's body to create the ultimate socialist paradise. We are left with Planned Parenthood and transgenderism at this point but they will never be satisfied.

[mad.casual]

Also, meager or nebulous assertions of consent aside; outside a pretty narrow psychological profile of both the 'victim' and the 'victimizer', the particular psyop doesn't work. It is absolutely insidious as to how it spreads to, e.g., library policy and sports competitions. Still, that's nothing compared to the closure of libraries and abject cancellation of all sports and the way even "friends" and neighbors would turn into Gestapo enforcers at the drop of a dime WRT COVID.

Even the distinction of cancer vs. heart attack doesn't quite do the whole thing justice as the 'heart attack' of COVID was largely, even specifically, forced on people who were otherwise active and healthy. They were out arresting people for walking in public parks, there is and was nothing even remotely equivalent for the trans community.

Even if you up translate and count every conversion as a life lost the transgender movement is still going to take decades to even get close to the number of people killed *directly* of/with COVID. Let alone all the surgeries postponed, infirm people locked indoors, people who wanted to be around loved ones separated by hospitals and/or the state, COVID camps, etc. The only way you get close is if you, somehow, and I'd argue wrongly assert that these kids were otherwise going to have happy lives and all have 2.5 kids and you count *those* lives as lost too.

The two just aren't even remotely comparable and it's bordering on "motivated" or "virtuous dishonesty" to assert they are.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

I won't argue about the worst. But I think what makes this most appalling is that it empowers mentally ill Munchhausen moms and for profit racketeers to mutilate the weakest among us, little kids. I'm old enough to remember the recovered memories fad and the satanic day care centers and Clinton burning a bunch of kids at WACO. I was even around for the tail end of eugenics when JFK's sister had a needle shoved into her brain. But this shit is worse because the goal is to normalize it and force the culture to accept it. The Covid scam may be worse but it's not hyperbolic to say this is really beyond the pale.
Full decision here:
https://legalinsurrection.com/2025/06/supreme-court-upholds-tennessee-ban-on-transgender-minor-surgery-and-chemical-treatments/

[Sun Wukong]

Yes. That is very well said.

[mad.casual]

The Covid scam may be worse but it's not hyperbolic to say this is really beyond the pale.

I could kinda sorta understand "worse in severity but not in magnitude", but it's still a "The atrocities of Dr. Mengele exceed even the atrocities of the Nazis at large." argument to me.

It's very much like the similar argument about how Nazi Germany/The Holocaust was as oppressive for homosexuals as it was for Jews or Soviets or the Romani, despite the receipts showing that that orders of magnitude more Soviets and even just German dissidents were executed than were homosexuals.

[mad.casual]

My guess is Liz.

As if the place weren't Teen Reason enough: I presume you mean Lizzy B. and not Lizzy W.

[Dillinger]

Amber & Emma rounding out the Dora The Explorer Club crowd

[InsaneTrollLogic (Sarcs Kampf mit der Realität)]

The chart is a must-see for the commentariat.

https://x.com/profstonge/status/1935321071810412555?s=46&t=qeA47-JjK6vq0pfnxg60dA

Who the hell is Jeff?!

[Sun Wukong]

Whoever he is, don't screw with him.

[Mother's Lament - (Sarc's a Nazi, not even joking)]

Chemjeff's mass is so great his colon could go supercritical.

[Sun Wukong]

However stupid you think leftists are, you are wrong. They are dumber than you think.

What the fuck is this “losing money” bullshit? The entire point is for the grocery store to be a public service. A for profit grocery store makes money for its ownership at the expense of the public. I want my grocery store to “lose money” because that means cheaper groceries

https://x.com/chudbastard/status/1934496101564035324?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1935163318424969628%7Ctwgr%5E152085f8e0af66b3885f4b97e5718c1760662749%7Ctwcon%5Es3_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Finstapundit.com%2F726965%2F

[Dillinger]

too stupid to mock makes me sad.

[Mike Parsons]

Sent to me by Doximity today:

Trans Kids Deserve to Grow Up Too

I was born in Mobile, AL, on the edge of the Gulf where the water always feels close. I spent childhood summers rollerblading through Cottage Hill Park, chasing the ice cream truck for one last strawberry shortcake bar. I sat cross-legged on sidewalk pavements, cracking open boiled peanuts from the Shell on Airport Boulevard. I learned that people showed up for one another, even if they didn’t always understand you.

That’s the Alabama I know. That’s the version I stayed for. But now, my home is being reshaped by policies that insist people like me don’t exist. As a nonbinary medical student, I am learning to practice medicine while watching anti-transgender legislation harm my patients, my peers, and my future.

Earlier this year, Senate Bill 79 was signed, defining sex strictly by reproductive anatomy and legally erasing the existence of transgender and nonbinary Alabamians. This means that in the eyes of the law, a trans man is still categorized as female, his true identity erased in everything from driver’s licenses to medical records. This follows 2022’s Vulnerable Child Compassion and Protection Act, which made it a felony for physicians to provide gender-affirming care like puberty blockers and hormone therapy to minors. Supporters of these laws believe they are protecting the futures of “confused” children who are making spur-of-the-moment decisions about their bodies.

But the evidence tells a different story. The Trevor Project reports that more than half of transgender youth in the U.S. have seriously considered suicide in the past year. That’s not confusion; that’s terror. A study published in Nature Human Behavior found a 72% increase in suicide attempts among trans teens in states, including Alabama, that passed anti-trans laws. These statistics are more than just numbers. These are children who no longer see futures for themselves, all because the adults in power told them they don’t belong.

If being transgender were just a phase — if these kids were simply ‘misled’ — then denying them care would not push them to the brink. But it does.

The data is clear: when trans youth are blocked from accessing gender-affirming care, rates of depression, anxiety, and suicide attempts rise. When they are supported, those rates fall.

These laws are not protecting anyone. They are inflicting harm. They are not saving children. They are pushing them toward despair. You cannot claim to care about young people while writing policies that increase their risk of dying. Taking this care away does not stop kids from being transgender. It just makes it harder for them to survive.

I’ll never forget Alex, perched on the exam table, peeling at the edge of the paper liner with nervous fingers. He wouldn’t meet my eyes. He just stared at his shoes while his knee bounced uncontrollably. When he finally spoke, his voice cracked. “If I can’t be myself here, I don’t want to be here at all.” He was 16, transgender, and terrified. Not just of being misunderstood, but of not being allowed to exist as he truly is. He was scared that his very identity might be made a crime.

I’ve met parents who are leaving this state to protect their kids. I’ve seen patients skip appointments because they’re unsure if their clinicians are still willing, or even legally able, to help them. I’ve talked to medical students wondering whether they'll be allowed to prescribe hormone replacement therapy to any patients at all in the future given the confusion and fear of prosecution when it comes to Alabama’s legislation.

It is exhausting to practice medicine in a state that criminalizes compassion. Transgender and gender-diverse people deserve better. We deserve to be seen and treated with dignity, not defined out of existence by lawmakers who pretend they can’t see us. If Alabama wants to claim the moral high ground, it must begin by recognizing the humanity of every trans and nonbinary person who calls this place home — including me.

To my legislators: As a constituent, I do not agree to these laws. Let families make medical decisions with their doctors, not their politicians.

To my fellow medical professionals: silence is complicity. Our oath is to do no harm, not to stand by while others do it in our name.

And to every Alabamian who believes in faith, family, and freedom: your voice matters now more than ever. Call your state representatives and tell them you oppose this legislation. Support local organizations like the Magic City Acceptance Center and the Campaign for Southern Equality that are providing resources to trans youth.

We don’t have to agree on everything to agree on this: No child should feel so hated by their own state that they’d rather die than live here. Alabama doesn’t have to be a place that buries its children just to prove a point.

Trans kids deserve to grow up too.

Sunya Reddy is a fourth-year nonbinary medical student at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. The views expressed are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of their institution.

All patient details have been changed to protect privacy in accordance with HIPAA.

[Mike Parsons]

take note:

- But the evidence tells a different story.

- A study published in Nature Human Behavior

- The data is clear:

People within the medical community are compromised. The AMA, AAP, APA are all compromised. They are full of people who are willing to use junk science, many times disgraced/disproven studies and hide the real data, to push an agenda. The language they use is unbending. They will lie to your face and tell you that all the data is clear, there is a consensus, etc.

If you didn't learn this from COVID, and from the climate nuts, the same monster is back in different clothes.

The Science is nothing but an activist, authoritarian power grab.

[Sun Wukong]

They locked the entire country in their homes, arrested people for the crime of going fishing or going to the beach and then immediately said people gathering shoulder to shoulder in large groups to protest George Floyd was totally okay and necessary.

Anyone who didn't lose all faith in the medical community after that, just doesn't care about the truth and supports whatever lie the powers that be tell them.

[mad.casual]

The whole thing is obvious and complete bullshit at several rather obvious points but one key:

my patients

As a med student, they are not "Your patients." You are a student of the school, not an employee of the hospital. They are the patients of whatever resident you're assisting. The resident has to get their consent before letting you participate in their care and any treatment you recommend or perform has to be approved by them.

But, again, the whole thing from "I was born in Mobile, AL" onward is as real as Mary Shelley's "I am by birth a Genovese,"

[Sun Wukong]

I just hope he is never my doctor. The quality of doctors graduating med school has fallen off a cliff in the last 15 years or so. This country is in a lot of trouble when the older generations retire and are replaced by morons like this.

[Mike Parsons]

"As a med student, they are not "Your patients." "

This is the kind of med student that wears their white coat and stethoscope to the grocery store or the gym on purpose. They are one step away from wearing the superman T shirt under their clothes and clark kent glasses. Self important narcissists

[mad.casual]

And, as a clinical chemist, they are worse than the doctors who wear the Superman t-shirt under their coats. The doctor who makes what I can objectively recognize as clinical chemistry "mistakes" or just unusual calls, I can at least pretend is really good at radiology or orthopedics or whatever, but a med student making the same mistakes can't possibly be any of those other things. They're just massive Dunning-Kruger patients.

[Chuck P. (The Artist formerly known as CTSP)]

The AMA, AAP, APA are all compromised.

This! Treatment of a patient that has no medical indications of any disfunction with surgery is quackery. I have complete confidence in saying that lobotomies would resolve the suicidal issues much more effectively.

[Dillinger]

>>Trans kids deserve to grow up too.

total fucking shame their terrible parents don't let them.

[Sun Wukong]

There is no such thing as a "trans" anything. Beyond the greed and evil of it, transgenderism is a rape of the language and meaning.

[Dillinger]

watching it take place w/my nephew it's heartbreaking

[Chuck P. (The Artist formerly known as CTSP)]

If being transgender were just a phase — if these kids were simply ‘misled’ — then denying them care would not push them to the brink. But it does.

So does denying them a concert ticket. It is not a surprise to anyone that teens can be dramatic, sometimes to the point of self harm.

When he finally spoke, his voice cracked. “If I can’t be myself here, I don’t want to be here at all.” He was 16, transgender, and terrified.

Transgender, as used here, is a complete fabrication on the part of the author, supposedly a medical student. Your diagnosis has not one single medical indication, you fucking quack.

[Uncle Jay]

Changing your sex is an adult decision, Einstein.

[Vernon Depner]

Einstein didn't kill himself.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

Didn't change his sex either. As far as we know...

[Uncle Jay]

Thank you for showing the world you have shit for brains.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

Aside from the cherry picked data and self serving claims it's obvious that adolescent kids often contemplate suicide and some actually succeed for multiple reasons. Some kids have probably wondered about their "gender identity" since Cro Magnon. But it's only in the last handful of years that the threat of mass potential suicides has been identified. Could it be a trend manufactured by self serving individuals? Hey assholes. Leave these kids alone.

[Sun Wukong]

How exactly is that there has always been kids and teen suicide has been an issue and something psychologists and doctors have been trying to understand for decades and somehow no one noticed all the "trans kids" killing themselves until now?

Are these people really this incapable of rational thought?

[Uncle Jay]

I have been informed a large number of the ruling party members, including the Ayatollah himself, along with some high-ranking Iranian military have left for Oman.
If this is true, then Iran is ripe for a revolution and could very well overthrow their oppressive, totalitarian theocracy.
Oh, wait.
I forgot one of the first things the Ayatollah in 1979 did was to disarm the masses.
My bad.

[Sun Wukong]

If that is true, then the Revolution is already under way or will be very shortly. If they left, it wasn't by choice. It was because it was leave or die. Either the revolution is under way and they were run out of the country or they left the country for fear of Israeli bombs abandoning their people to their fate. If it is somehow the latter, the regime is done because they can never go back after doing that. The population that they left to be bombed would never allow it.

[Vernon Depner]

We should kill them wherever they are.

[Don't look at me! (I miss having inflation)]

Such brave leadership.

[Zeb]

Brave leadership has been out for a while. When's the last time a king or president lead an army into battle?

[Zeb]

As far as I can see all that is confirmed is that several planes used by Iranian rulers have flown to Oman. So could possibly be something else, but if the high ups are indeed fleeing, this is going to get interesting.

[Sun Wukong]

The planes leaving may just mean they don't want to get their planes blown up. Their leaving doesn't say anything about who if anyone was on them. They may have sent their families to Oman.

[Zeb]

That seems more likely right now. I don't see them giving up that quickly.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

Love to see the Iranian people reclaim the nation they had before Islamist fanatics turned it into shithole. And Lebanon while I'm at it. But only the CIA can execute a successful regime change. It is known.

[Dillinger]

>>left for Oman.

oh, man.

[XM]

We won’t get involved in this war. Instead we’ll just send them the missiles they’ll shoot at Iran. And then we say we’re not fighting in this war.

Hey, don’t get mad at me, that’s just the Ukraine standard. You don’t get to support one war and denounce another.

The fall of Syria and Iran is bad news for Russia. Thank the Jews for striking a blow against putler while keyboard warriors with Ukraine flag on their social media page order door dash takeout.

[Sun Wukong]

Letting other people fight and die for us sounds a lot better than doing it ourselves. No war would be even better still, but proxy war is a real improvement over our fighting it.

[Minadin]

The trick isn't to die for your country, it's to make the other bastard die for his.

[Zeb]

You don’t get to support one war and denounce another.

I can do whatever I want, thank you. I'm going to denounce all the wars unless someone is actually attacking this country.

[Gaear Grimsrud]

Fair enough.