Wednesday Open Thread

What's on your mind?

Comments

[not guilty]

It looks like the suspected assassin in Minnesota is a holy roller. https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2025/06/17/vance-boelter-minnesota-shooting-christianity/

Why am I unsurprised?

[bye]

Because you don't THINK, you aren't surprised.

X is an animal rights person, but killed the 4 dogs of a friend who angered him, Is he an animal rights person?

John is anti-capital punishment and he killed his neighbor who made fun of his politics.

May is a Jew but belongs to a Muslim woman's group. Is May really a Jew.

Am I a killer who calls himself Christian, or am I a Christian and a killer.

Use your head

[not guilty]

I don't know, bye. Are you a killer who calls himself Christian, or a Christian and a killer?

As the Nobel laureate (physics) Steven Weinberg observed, "Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion."

[Commenter_XY]

Let's see his manifesto.

Regardless, Boelter gets the needle. Or Old Sparky. He deserves death.

[Kazinski]

Now the repoting is there are pages and pages of notes, but about his victim list, their address, but no actual manifesto with motive or objective.

And I will admit I appear to be wrong about one thing, it is does not appear that he targeted Melissa Hortman based on her vote on health care for illegals. I am basing that assessment on the fact her's was the fourth legislator's house he visited, even though the only fatality. Seems if that was the reason it would be his first stop. But that is just my surmise.

[Dr. Ed 2]

I'm amazed that the other couple is gong to make it -- 8 & 9 9mm rounds at (I presume) fairly close range and living? That wouldn't have happened 30 years ago, the advances in trauma medicine are amazing.

I'd want to see the ENTIRE target list, and then compare it to the frequency with which those names appeared in the media. In other words, my suspicion is that they might just be the politicians most mentioned in the media and his motive was nothing other than name familiarity.

Also there is still the possibility of accomplices so we may not be told the truth -- i.e. he may have a manifesto and/or may have had conservatives on his list -- we wouldn't be told this so that LEOs can sort out the false confessors from those who are actually involved because only the latter would know stuff like this.

[Sarcastr0]

Oh good lord.

You've made a fool of yourself at this point.

Stop digging.

[Kazinski]

What makes a fool is someone who never admits error about anything.

[Sarcastr0]

You are seeking a cookie for admitting inconsequential errors while not seeing the error in your whole outcome-seeking endeavor.

That makes it look like your 'admitting error' is just an instrumental attempt to look objective.

You're not fooling anyone.

[grb]

Kazinski : "And I will admit I appear to be wrong about one thing ..."

I guess you see that as a dignified retreat. In fact, you were wrong about everything.

[John 4]

You are a clown.

[not guilty]

"Regardless, Boelter gets the needle. Or Old Sparky. He deserves death."

Minnesota does not have the death penalty. I haven't done a deep dive into what federal statutes may apply here and the penalties that such statutes carry.

[Commenter_XY]

That is too bad, b/c the SOB certainly deserves it = No DP in MN

[TwelveInchPianist]

The feds have

[Armchair]

Yes, we know, you're an anti-religious bigot.

Here's a hint for you. When you want to make a statement like this, replace the anti-religious bigotry with the word "black". If it sounds like it might be racist...maybe reconsider what you are thinking.

IE "It looks like the suspected assassin in Minnesota is black. Why am I not surprised?"

[hobie]

So you don't like bigotry, eh?

[not guilty]

False analogy, Armchair. Unlike race, religion is not an immutable characteristic.

One does not choose to be black or white. Becoming a holy roller is a conscious choice.

[Frank Drackman]

Because you're stupid?

[Magnus Pilatus, MBA, MD, JD, PhDx2]

Are you more or less surprised that the Walz administration spent a week scrubbing him from their websites before leaking this?

[David Nieporent]

I am completely unsurprised that you're repeating this lie.

[Dr. Ed 2]

If NG thought about it for a minute, the fact that the perp was a wanna-be cop is far more significant.

[hobie]

According to Senator Mike Lee, the victim's and Tim Walz's own marxism caused their murders. They brought it on themselves

[Dr. Ed 2]

Evil begets evil.

[LawTalkingGuy]

Weren’t you advocating to shoot children the other day for the crime of having the wrong dad?

[hobie]

Hasn't he also been advocating for the obliteration of all Palestinians as well? I cannot recall for sure. It's hard to keep up with all his hatreds

[David Nieporent]

"Nuke Gaza" — Dr Ed.

[hobie]

You did say that, Ed.

[TwelveInchPianist]

Whatever his politics, religion, etc, I'm sure he agreed with you about something.

That's just like shooting the people yourself, man.

[Riva]

It looks like the political assassin in Minnesota had “no kings” rally signs, was a democrat, and likely gay or trans.

Why am I not surprised?

[David Nieporent]

It looks like the bot is programmed to repeat already fully debunked lies. I am totally unsurprised.

[Riva]

Nothing was "debunked" crazy Dave. The disinformation is strong with you, but craziness is only an asset at a no kings rally.

As an aside, the insult you parrot reminds me of the way the buffalo bill character in Silence of the Lambs would address his victims. As "its." Rather a sick perverse way to insult someone, but you seem to enjoy it. And you have a lot of democrat company.

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Has Tulsi Gabbard re-shot her WWIII video, yet?

[Dr. Ed 2]

The fire-bombing of Toyko was far worse than the nuking of Hiroshima. It killed more, it maimed more, and it killed more cruelly.

I'm disappointed with Gabbard -- this is basic history.

[bye]

If it were basic history you wouldn't have to post it.
And this is anyway the fallacy that I might best illustrate by

"what smells worse 1 ton of horseshit or 1 ton and 5 pounds?"

Utterly fallacious to put an immaterial thing like suffering on a thermometer scale. And quite inhuman cold and tasteless

[Heedless]

The alternative to Hiroshima and Nagasaki wasn't peace. It was a massive invasion of the Japanese mainland (probably with Russia landing in the north, and we know how gentle they were), accompanied by a massive bombing campaign including many more raids like the fire bombing of Tokyo.

That's the thing about war. You can't win it unless you are willing and able to kill the enemy. If you aren't, then either the war will continue, or you will lose.

[Dr. Ed 2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Tokyo_(10_March_1945)

Far worse than nukes.

[jimc5499]

I agree. One thing that needs to be mentioned is that the fire bombing of Tokyo doesn't advance the concept of MAD, that's why it has a reduced role in history.

[Longtobefree]

Dresden, General; don't forget Dresden.

[jimc5499]

Dresden was bad, there's no denying it. Tokyo was a whole other matter. In Dresden the majority of buildings were made of stone while in Tokyo they were wood. Tokyo was also much larger with very little terrain features to slow the fires down.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Looks like Trump might take a lesson from Netanyahu. Beleaguered in office? Plunge your nation into wars. Better still, do it together.

Trump ought to think twice. Before any U.S. attack on Iran, what prospect can there be, long-term, to prevent a Middle East nuclear arms race.

By what means, and for how long, will the U.S. assure itself against terrorist nuclear retaliation? What measures can suffice to do that, less than full and continuous political control of Iran? All of it, not just Tehran.

Decades ago, while the Cold War was still hotly contested, Theodore B. Taylor was America’s leading expert on the design of fission bombs. He made it a point to ignore thermonuclear weapons, to experiment instead with all the ways to adapt fission weapons to multiple objectives. Those turned out to be astonishingly various.

Fission bombs could be made large or small, with yields ranging from megaton-range, downward into low single-digit kilotons. Their physical sizes could be proportionately reduced, at least down to a size and shape about like a golf bag, and almost as portable. Fission bombs could be tailored to direct and focus destructive effects, like shaped-charge conventional explosives. Their energy could be released in widely varying wavelengths, tailored by a designer to optimize a broad range of destructive outcomes.

Most of all, Taylor discovered fission bombs were easy to make. Astonishingly easy, as he told New Yorker writer John McPhee, who came to know Taylor well, and who discussed such issues with Taylor at length.

McPhee’s resulting book, The Curve of Binding Energy, is one someone capable to read simple, eloquent prose should study, and brief Trump on what it explains.

Four of Taylor’s observations:

1. It took only one Manhattan Project to make fission explosives readily available world-wide. Nobody else since has needed any such massive effort, because the Manhattan Project solved all the difficult engineering challenges. It reduced bomb-making obstacles to a single question. Can you get your hands on enough bomb grade fissile material to form a critical mass in a Hiroshima style gun-detonated device? If you can, home-garage conventional technology is all that is required to build a workable bomb.

2. By the time McPhee interviewed Taylor, Taylor could report that since the Manhattan Project, every known effort to produce a fission bomb had succeeded on the first try.

3. Commercial nuclear power generation has made plutonium in enormous quantities, measured in at least tens of thousands of lightly-guarded critical masses world-wide. For instance, every commercial nuclear reactor site in the U.S., active or retired, sits surrounded by hundreds of critical masses of plutonium stored in casks of spent reactor fuel.

4. Although a plutonium implosion bomb is far harder to engineer and build than a Hiroshima-style gun bomb, plutonium used in a gun-style device would still deliver a fizzle yield sufficient, for instance, to knock down the World Trade Center. That was the specific example Taylor chose to illustrate the point, before any attack on the World Trade center had happened.

Suppose a decapitated Iranian state, with Teheran fully, “controlled” by occupying U.S. and Israeli forces. How long would it take Iranians in the uncontrolled hinterlands of that immense country to get a critical mass of U235, or enough plutonium to do fizzle attacks at will?

It could take as little as the time it takes to fly a cargo plane from North Korea. Assume Iran has not already made and hidden beyond possibility of discovery enough critical masses to do nuclear terrorist retaliation. How can the U.S. be sure it does not already have ready access to critical masses which exist in other countries?

Perhaps Trump can be persuaded to give that some thought? If that seems ridiculous, maybe it is past time to get America’s mad king into some domicile safer for the nation than the White House.

[bye]

By 12-Points, Voters Support Trump Using National Guard to Quell L.A. Riots

[Dr. Ed 2]

And shooting the LA rioters....

[ObviouslyNotSpam]

Well, that's comforting.

[Commenter_XY]

Your logorrhea problem is back.

There won't be occupying US (or Israeli) troops in Iran. You can rest easy.

[Kazinski]

There could be boots on the ground to secure nuclear material, both from civilian contamination and proliferation, that might be prudent.

I do not think we should send any peacekeepers or combat troops.

I would support a scheme for a civilian weapons distribution. Something like provide any woman between 18 and 40 a concealable 9mm pistol, with at least 3 mags and a 100 rounds.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Kazinski — Your paragraphs are bizarrely at odds with each other. How, without military occupation, would you arm Iranian women? How, with military occupation, would you prevent those Iranian women from shooting American troops?

You write as if you think Iran is some MAGA-infested version of Ohio. Why do that?

[Kazinski]

Stephen Israel already has the networks to kill anyone anywhere in Iran at anytime, and they don't have troops on the ground.

It will be a lot easier now with a severe downgrading of regime cohesiveness, loss of confidence, and corresponding increase in hopes of vast numbers of Iranians that want the mullahs out.

I don't think would be hard to flood Iran with weapons, Look at Afghanistan for an example, and we had vastly more resources and organization trying to prevent supply there than Iran has now.

And we would have the benefit of not having troops on the ground, to be vulnerable to the weapons.

I don't think the mullahs would last long.

The only help we would have to provide is to continue to degrade regime capabilities via drone and standoff strikes.

[Stephen Lathrop]

It will be a lot easier now with a severe downgrading of regime cohesiveness, loss of confidence, and corresponding increase in hopes of vast numbers of Iranians that want the mullahs out.

In short, just like Cuba, before the Bay of Pigs.

[Heedless]

If the US had bombed the entire Cuban high command to smithereens, destroyed their Air Force, blew up their air defenses, and had not sponsored an attempted invasion by expats, then this would have been exactly like the Bay of Pigs.

Since exactly 0 of those things actually happened, it's not like the Bay of Pigs in any recognizable fashion.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Heedless — An invasion of Iran—by the U.S. or anyone we aid or sponsor—is the catastrophe to be prevented.

Bombing will not subdue Iran, any more than it could have subdued China in 1949. Too little dependence on bomb-vulnerable targets in both cases. Bombing is not a credible threat to goat herders.

Iran is not dependent on Tehran in the same way the U.S. is dependent on its big cities. Perhaps you are not old enough to remember the ferocity with which Iran rejected the Shah. That ferocity found its base in the countryside, not in Tehran.

If there is an invasion, what will happen will be terrorist retaliation against the U.S. Iran is a nation infamous for nursing abiding grudges, which the U.S. will be powerless to ameliorate—just as it could do nothing to prevent the fall of the Shah, and the mass murder of his loyalists.

Years ago, Iran was said to be only a month or two away from achieving a fission bomb. Maybe they have not done that yet. If they have, and have failed to store a few critical masses with allies abroad, then they have been derelict.

But no matter, Iran has enough allies hostile to the U.S., and similarly fearful of the U.S. It will become possible to launch a terrorist nuclear attack against the U.S. from some foreign ally of Iran. That could be arranged even if Iran remained fully occupied. The U.S. will command no more obedience from the Iranian countryside than it got from the Taliban.

Military power capable to prevent that is not realistically available. Nor is preventing it even the objective of either Netanyahu or Trump. Both want war to empower themselves.

Netanyahu risks prison without it. Trump is in a pinch politically, because his base is catching on that they were suckered, and Trump has no way to predict once a slide from personal obedience starts, how far it will go.

That will likely depend on electoral vulnerabilities among Trump's minions. They have already seen that for colleagues, loyalty to Trump delivered little protection at the polls. Trump's base may be happy to back him, but blame his supporters for every feckless screw-up on campaign promise delivery.

Those screw-ups just increase, with almost all of them coming with more legal liability for Trump's closest associates. At some point, loyal service to a mad king ceases to be wise personal policy. Trump fears slippage could release an avalanche. War looks good to him as a distraction.

[Commenter_XY]

Not like Cuba at all, dipshit.

[Commenter_XY]

Kaz, neither Israel nor America will occupy Iran. Isn't happening.

[Don Nico]

I do think that were Iran "bombed into submission" Israel would want to assure that the fissile material were removed

[Stephen Lathrop]

Nico — Indeed. And not removed to Israel by unsubmissive Iranians, by surprise.

[John 4]

Trump solved the Middle East!

[Kazinski]

Well that's the point Lathrop.

Isreali and US intelligence determined that they did not think Iran had a bomb yet, or stock of sufficiently enriched uranium to build a bomb, so now would be the time to stop their program.

Iran only has one commercial nuclear reactor, and one "research" reactor.

[Don Nico]

Iran most likely did not have an assembled nuclear device. They certainly had sufficient material for several weapons.

[Brett Bellmore]

I think you're underestimating the problem, which is not building a bomb once you have the material, but instead obtaining the material. Which isn't "Uranium", but instead a specific isotope of Uranium.

U235 is an isotope of Uranium, and most Uranium is U238. Separating two isotopes that differ by so little in atomic weight is really difficult; You can separate H2 from H1 in your kitchen, but need complex and energy hungry equipment to separate U235 from U238. Isotopic separation is most of the work in building an atomic bomb! You're not going to do THAT in the hinterland, and most if not all of Iran's already enriched Uranium is going to be buried in radioactive underground ruins.

You can build a bomb with plutonium, sure, but even there the isotope matters somewhat, and while it's mostly just chemistry, it's chemistry performed on materials, (Spent fuel rods) radioactive enough to kill you very quickly.

Now, sure, NK could send them the material. NK could send them the bomb, for that matter. But taking out Iran's nuclear program didn't make that easier.

The easiest thing to do is a dirty conventional bomb, that just makes an area radioactive. Iran could build those in it's present condition. Iran could have built those a year ago, why didn't they?

Because they're not very useful unless your aim is to make genocide against your country actually popular with the world.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Bellmore — Read McPhee. Theodore Tailor laid it all out, with details on the chemistry required. Compared to his experience, your vague hints show only that you do not know what you are talking about. He anticipated and dispensed with the few objections you mention, and many more you did not mention.

What point do you hope to serve by urging an attack by the U.S. on Iran? Relief from nuclear threat? That hope went away when Trump dismantled the prior inspection agreement. It had prospect to postpone final progress toward bomb building, and seems to have done so while it lasted.

Add an active war now, and mere opacity will be replaced instantly with resourceful agency, on an emergency war footing. Iran cannot be militarily defeated. Not by Israel, not by the U.S., not by both combined. War advocacy against Iran is folly.

[Armchair]

Stephen,

1) The chemistry isn't necessarily the problem for U-235 separation. It's the engineering. Replicating the engineering, and replicating it well...is a problem.

2) Nations don't publish failed nuclear tests. Here's one of North Korea's though. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_North_Korean_nuclear_test

3) While plutonium is available, the acquisition, chemical extraction, and handling are not trivial by any means. If you have a nuclear plant entirely in your control...that's one thing. Trying to "steal" it from a nuclear plant? It's like trying to steal a blue whale. The Handling makes it problematic to do clandestinely.

4) A "Fizzle" attack is a lot of work for a little payoff. North Korea's fizzle was a 0.55 kt explosion. That's about $100,000 worth of ammonium nitrate. Big for sure...but wouldn't it be better to just use conventional explosives?

[tylertusta]

Big for sure...but wouldn't it be better to just use conventional explosives?

When has it ever been easy to use 500 tons of explosives all at once?

Thats the point of a nuclear device. It greatly scales down the amount of mass you need to move and blow up to get the desires effect.

500t sounds like its not, but it really really is. It's roughly equal to 1000 Mk 84 low drag bombs. Thats more bombs than most air forces could carry at any given time.

[Brett Bellmore]

Sure, but a crude gun type atomic bomb is a pretty big thing, not very easy to smuggle. Maybe you could build all the hardware but the "pits" in place, and just smuggle those, but radiation detectors at ports of entry are standard these days, and I'm guessing Israel is particularly thorough on that front. Not like the US with thousands of miles of poorly defended border; Smuggling one into the US would probably be feasible.

[tylertusta]

Why would anyone use a gun-type bomb in the 21st century?

In just about every way that matters it's harder to use a gun-type device than an implosion device.

[Armchair]

Except one. The engineering on a gun-type device is much easier. With the implosion-type device, you need to carefully calibrate the explosives. With the gun-type device...you just need one explosive, pointing the "bullet" into the rest of the bomb.

[tylertusta]

It is unfathomable to me that a nation state would go to all of the effort to build a massive industrial base to acquire, chemically modify, and then enrich uranium while also skimping on even the minimal effort into engineering implosion weapons.

It's also unbelievable that Iran would build a warhead that couldn't be used on a ballistic missile.

Keep in mind that gun-type bombs are very inefficient, meaning that you need more fissile material per unit of explosive yield. Enriching that extra uranium is not free. Far from it.

[Brett Bellmore]

Lathrop was positing that the bomb would be built by rag tag forces on the run or in hiding...

[tylertusta]

The good news for Iran (and bad news for Israel) is that Iran already did a ton of work on implosion devices.

[Don Nico]

True, but the bulk modulus of uranium is 3x that of delta plutonium; i.e, far more resistant to compression than stabilized plutonium. So the engineering of the implosion device is not simple, but Iran could certainly do it.
However, building a couple of gun type devices would be fast as soon as the UF6 gas is converted to metal and machined, Yes, the burn efficiency was less than 1% in Little Boy, but it did its job.

[Heedless]

Implosion devices require precision engineering. Slamming two chunks of uranium together at high speed could be done by an orangutan. The Manhattan project didn't even bother to test their gun-type bomb because they were so sure it would work.

If you are a corrupt, theocratic dictatorship that has murdered or exiled most of your competent scientists (and Israel has blown up a bunch of those who stayed), the orangutan option may seem like a safer bet.

[tylertusta]

https://reason.com/volokh/2025/06/18/wednesday-open-thread-21/?comments=true#comment-11093585

[Don Nico]

Brett,
Little Boy would fit and is light enough to be carried by an Iranian IRBM

[tylertusta]

No, I don't think it would either from a mass perspective or from a dimensions perspective.

Here's an example: the working bits of Little Boy are over 3 meters long. The total length of a Shahab-3 IRBM is less than 16 meters, and the warhead/RV section is somewhere around 2.5m in length, and the warhead section includes things like guidance computers, gyroscopes, and thrusters.

[Armchair]

"Thats the point of a nuclear device. It greatly scales down the amount of mass you need to move and blow up to get the desires effect."

I mean, there's a cost-benefit analysis going on. At a certain point, absolutely. The Hiroshima bomb was 15 kt. But...0.5 kt?

The lift capacity of a C-5 Super Galaxy has a lift capacity of 0.14 kt. A single train freight car? A little over that. Use some RDX instead of TNT, and that's two or 3 freight cars or 2 or 3 C-5's. And sure, they're bigger. But that should be much easier to get a hold of than a "fizzle nuke." Now, if you're talking 100 C-5s (a Hiroshima equivalent)...then yeah. The Nuke makes much more sense. But 2-3? It's a much closer call.

[tylertusta]

The lift capacity of a C-5 Super Galaxy has a lift capacity of 0.14 kt.

I'm trying to think of a use case for ".14kt" in a single unitary explosive being chucked out of the back of a C-5, and for the life of me, I can't. We could do it cheaper and easier with existing systems.

The GBU-57's BLU-127 warhead only has a little over 5000lbs of explosive, but the whole weapon weighs over 30,000 pounds.

Most of the rest of the 30,000lbs is actually just inert metal that allows it to penetrate deep underground before detonating.

[Don Nico]

Armchair,
The US built a 0.075 kt device the W-48 artillery shell. The US now has a 0,3 kt option in the stockpile.

[dwb68]

I didn't completely read Lathrops post. Too long and didn't get to a point in time.

There are other engineering issues that were glossed over I think, besides purifying the Uranium to weapons grade (which is hard). The radioactivity screws with electronics. Device geometry matters too (for example an implosion device relies on *extremely precise* detonation geometry). There are other configurations.

Bottom line: If it was that easy, Iran would have made one (they have enough Uranium), and if they made one, they would have already used it (they would have at detonated it for show purposes).

Even some of NKs test nukes have been duds.

Yes, there are many, many books that describe how to make a nuke (thank you, first amendment), but its just not as easy to do as it is to write about in the comments section of reason.

[Don Nico]

Iran could have made a gun-type design with 60% U-235.
There are many reasons not to do a "show test."

[jimc5499]

Funny you should mention a "dirty bomb". Do you know what the standard procedure for disarming a nuclear weapon? Blow it up. Works on implosion type bombs as well as gun bombs. You have a small explosion from the bomb's own explosives, but, there is less damage and radiation than a nuclear explosion. Hollywood always gets it wrong.
By the way, I was on a nuclear weapons load team in the Navy. Part of the training was where to put the shaped charges to render our bomb useless. Another point. The only time we became part of SIOP was when we were in the Eastern Mediterranean on a carrier, so if we would have had to use those charges............

[Don Nico]

That only works on devices that have permissive action links and that are not booby-trapped.

[Heedless]

It's very hard to create a device that won't at least squib if subject to a directional explosion that is not part of its implosion sequence.

Implosion is hard to do precisely because it requires, well, precise placement and timing of the explosives. Blow the device up outside that set-up, and it is very unlikely to go critical.

[Dr. Ed 2]

The WTC had the structural integrity of an empty beer can. It was nothing but the external walls and balanced load.

Gun type does not work with plutonium -- and it was an implosion bomb )fat man) that was tested in New Mexico.

What prevents me from building nukes in my garage? Similar consequences would work with Iran.

And the Iranians want to be free.

[SRG2]

FWIW years ago New Scientist published an article showing hoe you could convert your house into a nuclear bomb. They were widely criticised but pointed out that the technicals were already widely available and the challenge was always to get the uranium - which they did not tell you how to do.

[Don Nico]

What is very easy, IF you can get your hands on enough fissile material is to have a criticality accident that will kill you.

[Don Nico]

It will work after a fashion if you consider getting several tons of yield as working.
But the basic comment is okay. Even weapons grade plutonium cannot be assembled fast enough to get even 0.01% burn of the nuclear fuel.

[jimc5499]

You're right again. Take an empty beer can, set a brick on top of it. It will hold the brick. Raise the brick to 1 inch above the top of the can, drop the brick. The can will buckle. You can do the same with a Styrofoam cup.

[Dr. Ed 2]

"By what means, and for how long, will the U.S. assure itself against terrorist nuclear retaliation? What measures can suffice to do that, less than full and continuous political control of Iran? All of it, not just Tehran."

We did a pretty good job dismantling the theocracy of Japan...

[Don Nico]

And how may Americans died in the process? Try thinking for a change, Ed.

[bye]

a stupid post from a childless wealthy insulated misanthrope.
You don't like Jews, okay...why not leave at that , this isn't an audience of children

[Riva]

Most commenters here are childish misanthropes. And virulent antisemites. This first comment today is from one of the worst. He also doesn’t care much for Christians, or the unborn. But he really despises Christians.

[not guilty]

Riva, I am myself a Christian believer. I was reared among fundamentalists, and I refer to myself, only partially in jest, as a recovering Campbellite. Jesus, the Christ, was and is a wise and wonderful teacher.

I have serious problems with those who have perverted the teachings of Jesus. As the Mahatma Gandhi said, "I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. They are so unlike your Christ."

[Riva]

Absurd. Iran will not be allowed to have nuclear war weapons. Period. Paragraph. End of story.

And just curious, what advanced enrichment facilities are they using in these hinterlands? Something they quickly stuffed into a backpack before running away? And these “hinterlands” where they’re plotting are immune from a bunker buster bomb? Nowhere is immune from a bunker buster bomb. That’s why they call them bunker buster bombs.

[Don Nico]

Stephen,
I agree with your basic question/premise.
However, I have a couple of comments & corrections to your quoting of Taylor:
1) Fission devices have been made as small as 75 tons (the W-48 artillery shell)
2) Fission alone does not scale to the megaton range. Some level of fusion is needed. However a pure fission device could be as somewhat larger than 100 kilotons. That takes a rather sophisticated design.
3) Taylor is correct that getting a fission device at ~20 to 40 kilotons is easy.
4) Except for EMP, the damaging effects of nuclear explosions scale with the cube root of the yield. 20 - 40 kiloton weapons are sufficient for every thing except hard target kill with inaccurate missiles or bombers.
5) Trying to build a fizzile weapon from reactor grade plutonium is a fool's game unless the country is very sophisticated in nuclear weapon design.
6) The dismantling of the Iranian program does mean that all of the uranium enriched to greater than 20% needs to be recovered.
7) Taylor's main point is correct. There is no need for a proliferator to build thermonuclear weapons.

The engineering of Little Boy, the Hiroshima bomb, is very simple. Even accurate enough drawings exist.
Iran could have built such a device long ago. Certainly it now has enough 60% uranium to build as many as 10 such weapons. An "Little Iranian Boy" would fit in and could be delivered by present Iranian ballistics missiles. But like the Hiroshima bomb the device would be less than 1% efficient in its use of fissile material.

The so-called "intelligence community experts" and Tulsi Gabbard are wrong. Rafael Grossi is correct.

Trump's decision is not an easy one to make.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Nico — Your numbered list shows you have not read McPhee's book, or else did so too quickly and missed some of Taylor's quoted assertions. Whether to trust you or quoted Taylor on disputed assertions . . . ? I doubt the answer matters much. I take it we agree it is a supremely dangerous situation.

Two indisputable facts ought to get priority focus:

1. There are copious and growing amounts of bomb-grade fissile material in privately-held inventories around the world. Shipping and processing (or reprocessing) that stuff is an established private industry. Amounts equivalent to many critical masses are now unaccounted losses from inventories. The world-wide private market in fissile materials is not effectively under any national or international control.

It may be better regulated in the U.S. than elsewhere, but probably not well enough regulated. I expect if it were properly regulated, everyone would know how it works, what the regulations are, how compliance is tested, and what the results of such tests show. Who knows any of that, or where to go to find out?

2. Fanatics abound who are willing to sacrifice their lives to accomplish a grandiose attack against perceived enemies. People willing to die to accomplish an attack are able to accomplish some objectives too dangerous to attract those more cautious.

For me, those two points make improvement in controls on fissile materials by far the most important objective among any policy questions which touch on that issue. As in the present case with Iran, every other political question ought to be subordinated. I do not think that is the way either Israel or the U.S. is treating the current problem.

[jimc5499]

So how is Trump "plunging" us into war? To be honest, in my opinion we should have made Iran into a glass paved self-lighting parking lot in 1980. When you look at all of things that have happened over the last 45 years, that Iran sponsored, we have been at war with them since 1980. Some of those events killed friends of mine. Some of them had my ass getting shot at. (I won't go into my opinion of our State Department at this time)

[Stephen Lathrop]

Consider Iran as a military target.

It is one of the world's least accessible nations. It has a population of ~ 85 million. Of that population, ~ 20 million live in cities with populations greater than 1 million, with half of those in Tehran, which is by far the largest city. Those cities are conceivable military targets. The rest of the nation, not so much.

The rest of the nation is covered by mountains and high desert, distributed among provinces almost no one except Iranians and geographers have ever heard of.

It's geographic extent, superimposed on the U.S. stretches from southeastern Montana to Mobile Alabama. The boundary of that superimposition covers almost all of: Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Mississippi, along with smaller parts of numerous other states.

The Iranians speak languages few Americans understand. They cherish allegiance to cultures few Americans understand.

In short, Iran is a nation much like Afghanistan in extent and geography, but almost three times as large, more populous, and with even more forbidding geography.

The notion to subdue such a place militarily is not even slightly conceivable in any realistic framework of U.S. popular support. To the extent such support could be found, it would be on the basis of drastic under-estimates of the time and difficulty of nation building that project would entail—not less than an all-out commitment lasting many generations. The youngest Americans alive today would not have grandchildren who could hope to see that project completed.

It will not work.

[Kazinski]

I don't think that is anyones plan.

If there is a plan its to completely decapitate the regime and make its restive population ungovernable by the remnants of the theocratic police state.

If youve been paying attention there is a very large segment of the population that wants the mullahs gone. Doesn't mean they want us, but I think a clear majority wants new leadership, and a secular government.

This is from 2023:

"An opinion survey involving 158,000 people in Iran showed that more than 80 percent of respondents reject the Islamic Republic and prefer a democratic government.

The Netherlands-based Gamaan institute conducted the survey from December 21-31, which also included a sample of 42,000 respondents in the diaspora, revealed very similar attitudes between those in the country and abroad."

https://www.iranintl.com/en/202302036145

[Dr. Ed 2]

Heaven forbid, the UN could actually do something useful for once and go in and help them form a popular government.

And the Arab states would LOVE to see someone other than the crazy Iranian mullahs running Iran.

[Don Nico]

The UN would be useless there. Countries have to build their own governmental structure that are consistent with their own culture.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Kazinski — To read you, it's like Afghanistan never happened, to Britain, to Russia, or to the United States. Melville mentioned war in Afghanistan in Moby Dick.

As a military and foreign relations problem, Iran is Afghanistan, but bigger and harder.

Iranian hinterlanders will not get surveyed among the Iranian diaspora. The urbanites are outnumbered by the hinterlanders. They are pastoralists, not would-be Ohioans.

The Iranian urbanites are by no means advocating for U.S. culture either.

You are spouting nonsense and nation building. As usual, that recurring source of bad advocacy is more about domestic political advantage than about anything realistically in touch with the way the world works. But we now know from experience, in advance, nation building always looks easy.

[Kazinski]

You don't get it Lathrop, I am not advocating us troops on the gound or nation building. I am advocating providing weapons, and logistical support.

Look how fast the Taliban collapsed in Afghanistan in 2001 with almost no US troops in the country, our error there was putting troops in AFTER our objective was achieved.

[Martinned]

...because Afghanistan would have turned out better if NATO had not sent in an occupation force?

[Armchair]

It wasn't really about Afghanistan turning out better, anymore than attacking Japan during WWII was about Japan turning out better.

[Martinned]

Both were, at a minimum, about making those countries better in the sense of "not a source of problems for the US".

[Armchair]

You can learn.

[Bob from Ohio]

"not a source of problems for the US"

A success then, neither Afghanistan or Iraq is a source of problems right now.

[Sarcastr0]

Afghanistan is back to status quo before 9-11. Whatta victory.

[Kazinski]

Would have turned out pretty much the same.

How do we know?

Because that's what happened when the Soviets bugged out of Afghanistan leaving almost no government and no peacekeeping force in the late 80's.

Deja vu all over again.
But at least we would have wiped out a good chunk of al Qaeda first, and left a message about the consequences of being a terrorist haven.

[Martinned]

The Soviets left Afghanistan much worse than it was when they got there.

And it wasn't Al Qaeda getting shot at in 2001. The Al Qaeda leadership wasn't found and murdered until 2011 (Bin Laden) and 2022 (Al-Zawahiri). The only Al Qaeda leader of any consequence who was killed during the Bush years, and indeed during the initial invasion, was Mohammed Atef.

[Kazinski]

It certainly was al Qaeda getting shot too, we started using Guantanamo as a prison for both al Qaeda and Taliban in January 2002.

The fact that their two highest leaders got away doesn't erase that we got most of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan very quickly. The battle of Tora Bora was in December 2001. From Wikipedia:
"At the end of 2001, Al-Qaeda fighters were still holding out in the mountains of the Tora Bora region. Aerial bombardment ensued, including the use of large bombs known as daisy cutters."

[not guilty]

Osama bin Laden survived for as long as he did because he was worth more alive than dead to President George W. Doofus and His Pet Goat.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Iran was a stable British and then American colony. Afghanistan wasn't.

[Martinned]

Wut?

[Bunny495]

How quickly you forget. While not close to being democratic the Shaw ran Iran with an iron fist and at least in the cities it was a first world country with women dressing in miniskirts and a reasonably well-educated population. Mohammad Reza Pahlavi basically dragged Iran kicking and screaming into the 20th century. I am not trying to defend his heavy-handed approach to governance - characterized by censorship, the suppression of dissent, and the brutal tactics of the SAVAK; just pointing out that it was stable.

[Martinned]

Yes, the Shah ran Iran, not the British or the Americans.

[jimc5499]

He's right. The Soviets destabilized Iran. The reason that they went into Afghanistan was to secure an invasion route into Iran. The USSR wanted Iran's oil.
The USSR is responsible for much of the destabilization of the Middle East. It was part of a one-two punch. Enable the environmental movement to reduce oil production in the US and get us dependent on oil from the Middle East. Then destabilize the Middle East to make the US expend resources to protect the flow of oil from the Middle East. Iran played an important role because of how they could threaten the Straights of Hormuz. The Palestinians were an artificial construct of the USSR.

[Martinned]

Wow, that's a lot of alternative facts in just a few sentences. More fascinatingly, you start your comment with "He's right" before spouting a whole bunch of gibberish that doesn't seem to agree with anything said before by anyone in this thread.

[Brett Bellmore]

Hey, the Greens aren't called "watermelons" for nothing. Their movement was subsidized by the USSR.

[Sarcastr0]

They're called that by right-wing redbaiting delusionophiles.

It's not for nothing; it's because that sort thinks everything they don't like is somehow Marxist.

[Kazinski]

"The reason that they went into Afghanistan was to secure an invasion route into Iran".

No. Afghanistan may have regional significance to the Soviets, But Soviet Turkmenistan had a long border with Iran, and the Soviets and Iran shared long coastlines on the Caspian Sea on the east with a long flat plain along its coast. And their was a Soviet Azerbaijan with a smaller but still extensive to the west of the Caspian sea, all told at least 1000 miles of border so there was no need to go through mountainous Afghanistan.

[Mr. Bumble]

I posted this yesterday. Could this be the new face of Iran?

The new face of Iran??
An Iranian woman sends a message to the Islamic regime:

https://x.com/realMaalouf/status/1934944645538324485?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1934944645538324485%7Ctwgr%5Eaef23118ca423775ac587f05762aa66c98251cac%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Finstapundit.com%2F726738%2F

[David Nieporent]

That may or may not be an Iranian woman. She's not in Iran, so she's unlikely to be the face of Iran.

[Kazinski]

Maybe, but I did see a video of a indoor party where Iranians were watching the Israeli Air strikes celebrating,

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8PpY4FgXz7Y

When I initially watched the dancing video I couldn't see where it was filmed, but I see there is context now.

[Commenter_XY]

And yet, Iran lies prostrate before Israel (a country of 12MM), like a goat before slaughter. Iran is powerless to stop Israel from systematically destroying their military and nuclear capability. Their people flee their cities like panicked deer. Their leaders are being violently killed.

Iran is the manyouk of the middle east.

[Martinned]

Yes, and telling them that is definitely a great way to get them to do what you want.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Pax America.

[Martinned]

I thought the Trumpist line was that nothing that happens overseas is your problem?

[Dr. Ed 2]

The Trumpist line is no living enemies.

[Martinned]

Clearly...

https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/la-protests-injuries-1.7558111

[David Nieporent]

That is literally the opposite of the Trumpist line. MAGA is isolationist.

[Krayt]

That's the hot air to justify the curious stance re: Putin.

Whatever is really behind it, if anything, wouldn't apply to the mid east or anywhere else.

[Joe_dallas]

Martinned 3 hours ago
Flag Comment
Mute User
Yes, and telling them that is definitely a great way to get them to do what you want.-

So was giving iran wads of cash - so that everyone could pretend iran stopped their nuclear program

[Martinned]

There is consensus that the sanctions that have been in place for decades do have a significant effect on the ability of the regime to stay in power. Not enough to get them kicked out tomorrow, but enough that the regime worries about the sanctions, and about their effect on things like (youth) unemployment and growth, and would like to get rid of them. So it makes sense to use the sanctions as the carrot in a negotiation about nuclear non-proliferation.

You would think that someone who literally wrote the book on the Art of the Deal would understand that...

[bernard11]

Trump only figuratively wrote that book.

[Commenter_XY]

Nobody is asking Iran to do anything. Israel is doing what must be done. The 'asking' phase is over.

Iran is defeated.

The strong (Israel) will do what they will, and the weak (Iran, the manyouk) will suffer what they must. Iran's malignant actions over the course of decades brought them to utter defeat.

[bye]

So ???? Let them have a nuclear arsenal, turn it on us, and have some Iranian Stephen Lathrop write a pompous screed that ends "It will not work."
When you are attacked you put up your arms, useless or not. The world cannot let Iran have nuclear weapons.

[Don Nico]

Lathrop did not say that.
He did say that the US, UN, EU ideas of nation-building will not work.

[hobie]

I just hope Israel is not so besotted with Russia as we currently are, that they could do my boys in Ukraine a solid and knock out Iran's drone factories. I'd be quite pleased if that happened

[Don Nico]

that would be a useful bit of work for the world.

[Bwaaah]

Even your attempt at an expression of compassion is overwhelmed by your feelings of contempt. Hate runs deep in your heart, Hobie, like somebody who's been severely hurt. Or are you just a born natural that way?

[Swede425]

LOL!
Thanks for the commentary, Indy!
"The hell you will. He's got a two day head start on you, which is more than he needs. Brody's got friends in every town and village from here to the Sudan, he speaks a dozen languages, knows every local custom, he'll blend in, disappear, you'll never see him again. With any luck, he's got the grail already".

[Dr. Ed 2]

The Air India 787 Crash is interesting.

The Ram Air Turbine (RAT) was deployed -- that's automatic and a response to (a) catastrophic electric failure, (b) catastrophic hydraulic failure, and/or (c) loss of both engines. It's also a "fly by wire" plane, which means that engine throttle settings are electric wires and not mechanical cables.

AND the Air Conditioning is electric and not bypass air from the engines -- this a selling point because it is more efficient to do this.

AND the Air Conditioning wasn't working in the plane.

Multiple (2-3?) Air India 787s have aborted trips and returned due to unexplained "problems."

Landing gear is designed to drop via gravity, you need electric and hydro to raise it. Without both, it don't go up.

The black boxes were recovered several days ago, and we haven't heard anything. Indian media is now saying that there is a plot to blame the pilots to protect Boeing.

When it first came out, the 787 had battery fires.

What's the possibility we have another 737-MAX issue here???

[jimc5499]

What's the possibility that we have poor maintaince by Air India and they are taking a play out of the trial lawyer playbook by blaming Boeing?

[Martinned]

Taking a step back, it is fascinating to see how the Trump administration wanted to have an insolationist foreign policy where other people's problems aren't the US's problems, without understanding that that means that you can no longer tell foreign countries to do things or not do things.

So suddenly you have people like Putin and Netanyahu who get told by Trump to not throw bombs on Ukraine and Iran, respectively, only for them to do it anyway. Why wouldn't they? What is Trump going to do about it? Impose sanctions? Why wouldn't they call his bluff?

And so Trump and his friends end up having to beat a hasty retreat, by either pretending that they didn't ask what they asked (and in fact asked the opposite), or by just hiding the entire event in the black hole of history. So the whole question of Ukraine is a non-topic in the White House, they're pretending that the entire country doesn't exist, that Trump never said he would do a deal on day 1, that he never asked Putin to dial it down, never met the man etc. And with respect to Iran the White House is pretending that Trump has always been in favour of blowing the place up, and has never tried to do a deal (sorry, a Deal).

It's kind of like how the Brexiteers in the UK used to enjoy having their cake and eat it too. Trying to do two (or more) contradictory things, and then being frustrated when it turns out that isn't possible.

[Armchair]

Nuance. Look it up.

[apedad]

Don't ever mention "nuance" in reference to Trump in the same sentence ever again.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Be man enough to admit that apparatchiks such as yourself are the people whom Trump wishes to see unemployed.

[Dr. Ed 2]

"Bomber" Harris knew how to deal with Iran.

Maybe we should just nuke Tehran.

Or, better, simply dismantle Iran's economy and infrastructure, bit by bit. Bomb, Bomb, Bomb Iran!

[Don Nico]

Geez Ed. You have to be brain dead. What is with you frequent calls for "nuking" places?

[SRG2]

He is hoping to get promoted from Keyboard Warrior 2nd Class to
Keyboard Warrior First Class.

[jimc5499]

The US should take out the Fordow site and then pull back.

[Kazinski]

More isolationist foreign policy, but Trump was consistent about Iran not having nuclear weapons.

"MONTAGE: Over 16 straight minutes of President Donald Trump saying that Iran cannot be allowed to have a nuclear weapon.

"Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon... They can't have a nuclear weapon. Very simple. They can't have a nuclear weapon. We're not going to allow that."

https://x.com/SteveGuest/status/1934808469112070559?t=T-rpb04l-7YKyblLnlE3Ug&s=19

[Martinned]

I don't think "consistent" means what you think it means...

[apedad]

So Trump is just copying Biden?

Biden says US would use military force against Iran as a 'last resort' to prevent it from developing a nuclear weapon

https://www.businessinsider.com/biden-us-use-force-against-iran-nuclear-program-as-last-resort-2022-7

[Don Nico]

No, Trump is not copying Biden.
Biden rewarded Iran with billions of dollars to fund its proxy wars against Israel. Biden was taken for a fool by the mullahs for the 4 years of his presidency.

[Joe_dallas]

Yes biden was fooled by the mullahs and by former obama administration officials. Obama's similar actions were done with a good understanding the of eventual long term results.

[Sarcastr0]

You're saying Obama and his administration wanted a nuclear Iran.

Is this Obama was a sekret Muslim rewarmed?

[Brett Bellmore]

Oh, there are lots of possible explanations for wanting a nuclear Iran. The chief commonality is that they're all stupid, nobody but Iran wants a nuclear Iran.

Much more likely that Obama didn't think the money would finance their nuclear program.

The problem is, everybody knows that if you dump money by the ton on Iran, they WILL use it for something nasty, and he decided to dump money literally by the ton on them. Went to great lengths to dump metric tons of money on them.

The unavoidable conclusion is that he didn't mind them doing something nasty, just thought it would be done to people he didn't much like.

[Sarcastr0]

I mean, there's plenty of writeups of the Iran deal, including how hard it is to hide nuclear enrichment work.

But the right's really gone hard in an alternate reality where unfreezing is paying and where Iran are like nuclear enrichment ninjas.

Your unavoidable conclusion is the usual Brett speculation-to-confident-delusion-about-reality.

[Malika the Maiz]

Wasn’t that just money returned to them?

“The unavoidable conclusion”

It’s pretty avoidable. They most likely thought they were buying something.

[Don Nico]

No, he did not say that. Why do you lie by deliberately distorting what commenters write?
He did say that Obama's team knew that Iran was only delayed but not prevented. Evidently the negotiating team did not know about the weaponization tests in 2002 and 2003, but they were convinced that Iran's intentions were to build nuclear weapons.

[jimc5499]

It's a possibility. More likely it was how much of those pallets of money made it's way back to Obama and Biden?

[Sarcastr0]

So you're a pure tin foil person. Evidence not required.

[Commenter_XY]

Pres Obama is the one who cut the horrendous deal with Iran. He could have held out for 'no enrichment' but political considerations drove his decision-making; he wanted the credit and glory. He gets credit for cutting a truly atrocious deal with Iran.

I think Pres Obama got what he could with the time he had, and that approach lacked strategic patience.

[bernard11]

None of that makes sense.

Could he have held out for "no enrichment?" Sure. Would he have gotten it? Probably not. Amazing how many people think if only they had been in charge they would have easily negotiated a much better deal. An experienced, smart, and highly successful M&A guy once told me that no one ever likes the other guy's deal. True here also.

In fact, rather than RW propaganda world, the agreement was not "atrocious," no matter what Trump says, and worked reasonably well.

[Commenter_XY]

'Probably not', 'Could have', 'would have'....uh huh.

We know reality. The reality was that it was an atrocious deal, and Pres Obama paid the mad Mullahs billions in cash. We got bupkes.

[Joe_dallas]

As commentator stated - everyone knew the reality. Obama paid the mullahs wads of cash and then pretended the deal was working. Working only if you pretend a few years delay was the meaningful definition of "working"

[Bob from Ohio]

"White House is pretending that Trump has always been in favour [sic] of blowing the place up, and has never tried to do a deal (sorry, a Deal)."

What are you talking about?

Trump said yesterday that Iran could still make a deal, but it would be a total end to any nuclear program.

[Armchair]

FBI learned of Chinese Plot to throw the 2020 US Presidential Election to by shipping fake driver’s licenses to the United States to manufacture “tens of thousands of fraudulent mail-in votes” for Joe Biden,

Hmm...

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

[Martinned]

Why would they want to do that? A Trump win is much better for China.

[Armchair]

I've got a few billion in tariffs that say otherwise.

[Martinned]

TACO

[Armchair]

And yet, Chinese tariffs are still well above 30%

[Martinned]

That sounds like a big problem for American consumers, and particularly low-income consumers.

[Commenter_XY]

Haven't seen the problem yet, at least not in inflation data or wage data.

[hobie]

Tariffs don't bother China. Like Russia, I think they want an administration - a political movement, if you will - that will cause America to tear itself apart. And I must say...just look at us now

[Mr. Bumble]

Aren't you a genius. That has always been the goal. First of the Soviets and more recently China.

[Don Nico]

If the Demo-clowns who just cannot accept the elections keep it up, they are effectively doing China's bidding

[hobie]

I wasn't aware of anyone contesting the last election. But it's not like MAGA to make up things. I'll have to look into this

[Don Nico]

No, they aren't contesting the election process. They just cannot bring themselves to accept they fact that they lost.

[hobie]

"They just cannot bring themselves to accept they fact that they lost."

This sounds awfully familiar. Glad to hear you find contemptible those who think that way.

Lord it's like fish in a barrel these days

[Bwaaah]

Of course Democrats didn't contest an election. Donald Trump contested an election, and therefore, good Democrats can't do that. Whatever Trump does, good Democrats do not do. So Democrats tried to remove Trump from the ballot, to disqualify him, to bankrupt him, to jail him. Trump didn't do those things, so they're fair game.

The Democratic machine trashed their own party's nomination rules to install a machine-selected candidate. Democracy in action? No. Democrats in action.

Do you know why Joe Biden opened the borders (without saying so)? Because Donald Trump wanted to lock them down.

Trump bad. Democrats good. Hobie genius.

[Frank Drackman]

That's stupid even by your standards

[Dr. Ed 2]

Think logically here -- stirring up dissent and disorder is the best for China -- the real issue here is why did the FBI ignore this?

AND what else would fake drivers licenses do? Remember "REAL ID."

[Martinned]

China's interest is to have a US president who won't defend Taiwan, and who will alienate all of America's allies. From the perspective of 2020, that was obviously Trump rather than Biden.

[Armchair]

Russia and Hamas seem to have thought otherwise.

[Martinned]

Did they? They certainly seem to have gotten the best possible result out of the 2024 election.

[Armchair]

You fail to see who was President when they significantly escalated their attacks.

[Martinned]

It may shock you to hear this, but not everything is about the US.

[Bob from Ohio]

"It may shock you to hear this, but not everything is about the US."

Ironic coming from you, US affairs dominate your comments. So it seems everything is about the US for you.

[Sarcastr0]

That's flat untrue; he posts about overseas elections all the time.

[Bob from Ohio]

"he posts about overseas elections all the time"

10 comments a year is not "all the time".

I never said he never comments about Euro stuff. What does ""dominate" in "dominate your comments" mean?

[Sarcastr0]

He posts more about non-use events than anyone else on here.

[Bob from Ohio]

"He posts more about non-use events than anyone else on here."

Sure, he's the only non_US person who comments, other than maybe the dude with Japanese in his name.

[Sarcastr0]

So when you said 'US affairs dominate your comments' you meant as baselined to an imaginary other non-US poster on here.

Come on, man.

[Bob from Ohio]

"Come on, man."

Ok Joe.

99% of his comments are on US stuff.

[Brett Bellmore]

Hey, revealed preferences, Martinned. Maybe you think the Chinese ought to have preferred Trump, but they didn't.

So far the reports don't indicate an intelligence op large enough to have thrown the Presidential election, but the reports indicate that they swiftly shut the investigation down and ordered the findings destroyed, so, who knows what they'd have found if they'd wanted to know what the Chinese were really doing?

At any rate, seems to have been on a much larger scale than the Russian efforts in 2016 Democrats made such a fuss about.

Seems to be a pattern, actually, of the Biden administration aggressively not wanting to know about what Chinese intelligence services were doing in the US. Remember that spy balloon they didn't want to admit existed, or do anything about?

[Martinned]

Maybe you think the Chinese ought to have preferred Trump, but they didn't.

How can you tell? You're bootstrapping that conclusion to turn the initial speculation into facts.

[hobie]

Truth. If you want an America isolated from the world, and where all it's best institutions and supremacies are dismantled one by one; only one party can and does provide this

[Kazinski]

Here is a contemporaneous report from 2020 of about 20,000 fake drivers licenses being siezed the summer of 2020:

https://www.fox10phoenix.com/news/shipments-of-nearly-20000-fake-drivers-licenses-seized-at-chicago-airport.

" CBP said most of the fake IDs were for college-age students. Many had the same photo but different names. But one alarming discovery was that the barcode on the fake Michigan licenses actually worked, CBP said. "

Yes you might wonder just what good fake drivers licenses would be if the picture on them didn't match, one possible use would be remotely filling out a form that requires a drivers license, but nobody checks the picture with the bearer.

[Frank Drackman]

I had a great fake ID in 1978, even with my nome de guerre, Frank Drackman, got it at a "Head Shop"(remember those?) in Alhambra (California, not Spain)

[Dr. Ed 2]

Photos often really don't match, and then women change their hair color and style and really don't match.

[Frank Drackman]

Carpet doesn't match the Drapes?

[Malika the Maiz]

Just The News!

Some people never learn.

[Armchair]

Raw data is there too. Well linked.

But, if you would prefer your news be "filtered" through the appropriate "people" so you don't need to look at the raw data. Well...

None are so blind....

[Sarcastr0]

So if you got all that raw data you need now, do you think the 2020 election was stolen by China?

[Malika the Maiz]

There are two links in the story, one to another Just The News article. It’s based on a “confidential human source.”

You’d think you’d learn to stop getting your news filtered by a crackpot.

[bernard11]

What raw data? The CBP report? That's not raw data and it doesn't confirm anything except that the licenses, some of which came from the UK and South Korea were seized by CBP.

[bernard11]

This is nonsense, as always with Salomon.

A confidential human source told FBI counter-intelligence in summer 2020 that China’s communist government was shipping fake driver’s licenses to the United States to manufacture “tens of thousands of fraudulent mail-in votes” for Joe Biden, according to a raw intelligence report distributed to federal agencies that was reviewed by Just the News.

The report – one of two sent Monday by FBI Director Kash Patel to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley – was sent to U.S. intelligence agencies on Aug. 24, 2020, as an uncorroborated advisory, then suddenly recalled with little explanation other than the bureau wanted to “re-interview” the source, the documents stated.

The recall notice specifically asked spy agencies to erase or delete the original intelligence memo, the memos show.

So there is an uncorroborated story, from an unnamed source, which was withdrawn so the informant could "re-interviewed" by the FBI.

Meanwhile, there is a link to a CBP report about seizing 20K fake licenses, which lists a number of ways they could be used for criminal activity, with vote fraud not among them.

The licenses apparently all had the same, or maybe one of a few - it's not clear - pictures on them.

[Commenter_XY]

Let's see the evidence, on the record. FBI Director Patel should tell America exactly what happened, by whom, and when.

[apedad]

U.S. Department of Education Refers Massapequa Mascot Case to the U.S. Department of Justice

Today, the U.S. Department of Education (the Department) announced that it is referring its investigation into the New York Department of Education (NYDE) and the New York State Board of Regents (the Board) for their unlawful attempt to ban mascots and logos that celebrate Native American history to the U.S. Department of Justice for enforcement. This action comes as the NYDE and the Board rejected the Department’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR)’s proposed Resolution Agreement that would bring both entities into compliance with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act (1964) by rescinding its prohibition on Native American mascots and logos.

“Both the New York Department of Education and the Board of Regents violated federal antidiscrimination law and disrespected the people of Massapequa by implementing an absurd policy: prohibiting the use of Native American mascots while allowing mascots derived from European national origin. Both of these entities continue to disrespect the people of Massapequa by refusing to come into compliance with the Office for Civil Rights’ proposed agreement to rectify their violations of civil rights law,” said U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon. “We will not allow New York state to silence the voices of Native Americans, and discriminatorily choose which history is acceptable to promote or erase.”

https://www.ed.gov/about/news/press-release/us-department-of-education-refers-massapequa-mascot-case-us-department-of-justice

Glad to see the Trump administration is going after the hard cases!

[Dr. Ed 2]

This is an IMPORTANT case.

[Kazinski]

You should be glad they found a function of the Department of Education they want to preserve.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Tanker collision: https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/article-858079

Iran is messing with navigation.

[Martinned]

I think you might be jumping to conclusions, but yes, it's called the Persian Gulf for a reason. Bombing Iran might have consequences for your ability to drive your car to Wallmart.

For the record, oil prices are up since this conflict began, but nothing completely crazy. So some risk of interference with supply seems to be priced in, but no large probability.

https://oilprice.com/oil-price-charts/

[Martinned]

Ooh, that's convenient!

New Trump phone automatically adds users to classified war plan group chats

[hobie]

Where are them golden phones made?

"Trump threatens 25% tariff on Apple, other tech giants if they don't start making devices in America"

[Malika the Maiz]

Trump’s got history making stuff in China.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RVnoc-ISUag&pp=0gcJCdgAo7VqN5tD

[hobie]

In my former hometown of Faro, Portugal, passport control at the airport has gotten so bad this year that the lines snake all the way to the exit doors of the planes themselves. It takes almost 5 hours to get to the luggage carousels. Tourism has gone mad. The Louvre shut down. Venice shut down.

Where'd all these extra tourists and their beautiful shekels come from? It's almost as if some major, world tourist destination has made itself so toxic that discerning people no longer want to visit

[Malika the Maiz]

It’s interesting how many people think they have it worse than their parents as the number of cruises, overseas trips, etc., skyrockets.

[Martinned]

Overtourism long predates Trump, and the Portuguese are quite capable of screwing up their government bureaucracy on their own.

[hobie]

They were never having this kind of problem in Faro prior to 2025

[Martinned]

There are a million reasons why something bureaucratic works for a long time and then doesn't. Budget cuts, someone who turned out to be important retired, some new computer system that didn't work, a flight connection that used to go to Lisbon is now flying to Faro, etc.

[Frank Drackman]

So leave already, when I came back from Israel in 2023 it felt like Ellis Island 1901, standing in line with Borat and Omar the Shoe bomber, was afraid they were going to put me in Isolation for months like they did with Vito Corleone for my chronic Smoker's cough (much better now, seems like everyone in Tel Aviv smokes)

[Bored Lawyer]

"Where'd all these extra tourists and their beautiful shekels come from? It's almost as if some major, world tourist destination has made itself so toxic that discerning people no longer want to visit"

Yup. It's all the Jews' fault.

[Sarcastr0]

Maybe it's because I grew up in NYC but shekels has been a metonymy for dollars for a while; no actual association with Jewishness any more than mishigas or zhuzh spiel are.

[hobie]

Exactly as I intended. But to the MAGA hammer, every nail looks like antisemitic terrorism

[Bored Lawyer]

You stated that the rush of tourists in places like Portugal and Paris is due to the war in Israel. Which is laughable. Almost like those places would have no tourism if there were no Israel.

[Sarcastr0]

He was talking about the US, dingus.

[hobie]

He missed that part, too, didn't he. Oh Lord! Hear my prayers...please don't let these people be in charge of anything. On an unrelated topic, I've been in a coma the past eight months. Can anyone tell me who won the election?

[Dr. Ed 2]

Foreign passenger counts at Boston Logan are up from last year.

[Malika the Maiz]

Three years for this seems far too light. I get there was no premeditation, but this kind of wildness was just as lethal as if there were.

https://apnews.com/article/nfl-raiders-ruggs-vegas-fatal-dui-sentence-83f2ae13b0b52427900745b59637b058

[Martinned]

For reference, the UK sentencing guideline for offences involving death by dangerous driving is here: https://www.sentencingcouncil.org.uk/offences/crown-court/item/causing-death-by-dangerous-driving/

I would think that 156 mph on a city street qualifies as "Speed significantly in excess of speed limit or highly inappropriate for the prevailing road", and that's before we get to the alcohol. (I don't think the article says he was "highly impaired".) So that's the highest culpability category. Under English law that means a starting point of 12 years, with a range of 8-18 years.

(NB in England prisoners serve only about half their sentence as a matter of law, with the rest on parole, unless they misbehaved while in prison.)

[Frank Drackman]

I'd give him 10 years just for his complexion

[Malika the Maiz]

The writer of the Frank Fakeman character writes him edgy racist today, tomorrow he will be written to cry over the black baby holocaust yet again.

[Mr. Bumble]

Tomorrow he will be not celebrating Juneteenth.

[Frank Drackman]

June-what?

[dwb68]

Trump will probably unleash the B-2s to bomb Iran's nuclear bunkers in the next 48 hours. They may even be in the air already (they usually fly out of Missouri, and I would expect the bunker busters to be stored there).

An interesting question: if you drop a nuke on a nuclear weapons bunker, would anyone know?

The US (and likely Israel) have "low yield" gravity bomb nukes with a 7.5 kt yield (See the B-61 wiki page), about the same yield as the Massive Ordinance Penetrator (MOP) that they plan to drop on Iran's nuclear bunkers. I have little doubt they can (or have already) put these on a few MOPs.

The explosion will happen underground; it could be dialed to the same yield as a MOP**; there will be radioactive residual elements (but the US could blame that on the radioactive contents of Iran's facility).

Or, you might even dial it up to 2 or 3 MOPs, ... or ten because you plan to drop 3+ anyway on the same spot for certainty. Of course a single underground 75kt explosion would register on everyone's Richter scale so your have to say, well they are guided and our pilots are just that good to achieve simultaneous orga.. explosiongasm.

[Martinned]

if you drop a nuke on a nuclear weapons bunker, would anyone know?

1. Yes. Nukes are designed not to go nuclear unless someone presses the proverbial button. If you drop a regular bomb on a nuke, the place glows in the dark but there is no nuclear explosion.

2. No one is saying Iran has nuclear weapons, so it also doesn't have a "nuclear weapons bunker".

[dwb68]

"If you drop a regular bomb on a nuke, the place glows in the dark but there is no nuclear explosion."

I think you've missed the point: How do you know a 10 kiloton explosion 250 feet under hard granite was, in fact, a nuclear explosion?

For a high yield device, its obvious: he way most underground nuclear explosions are detected is seismic readouts (like earthquake sensors). You can see a 400 kiloton nuclear detonation on a seismometer.

For a low-yield device detonated underground, this presents difficulties (the yield might be too low to detect on a seismometer). A nuclear detonation is very high temperature and tends to turn sand into glass and melt rock...but if the detonation is underground, you have to dig up the evidence... and if the detonation is 250 feet under hard granite, who's going to do that? There would be radiological evidence (you could examine the residual daughter isotopes and tell what the fission material was), but again, you have to dig those up.

An underground nuke buries the evidence, literally.

Don't think Israel hasn't considered it.

The big risk of doing this is not getting caught after the bomb goes off; it's that the bomb ends up as a dud, or misses, and ends up on parade. Then the fact that you attempted to drop a nuclear-tipped gravity bomb is self-evident.

"Nukes are designed not to go nuclear unless someone presses the proverbial button."
Also no.
We have thousands of nuclear gravity bombs in our arsenal (google B61-11). The president gives the (presumably top secret) order, the Air Force drops it, it goes bang. There is nothing at all special about dropping a gravity bomb nuke. Instead of 5000 lbs of special high explosives, you substitute a 700 lb nuke.

The order need not be (and is unlikely to be) made public, not at least for many years.

[Martinned]

How do you know a 10 kiloton explosion 250 feet under hard granite was, in fact, a nuclear explosion?

You observe the radiation, both from space and from all sorts of places on earth that are set up to measure radiation. (Including lots of places that measure radiation for scientific purposes.)

[dwb68]

"observe the radiation" is not really an argument. From a nuke you observe: gamma rays; alpha particles (ionized helium); beta particles (high energy electrons); and the daughter byproducts of radiation fission. Most of the first three wouldn't penetrate rock. The underground bunker already has uranium, and so would be contaminated with similar radiological byproducts.

[Martinned]

Yes, I was talking about the types of radiation that very much do go through rock, like gamma rays. The fact that they exist on a constant level all the time doesn't mean you wouldn't notice if they spiked due to a nuclear explosion. But it's definitely true that detection is less likely if the nuclear explosion is relatively small, and if it is relatively far underground.

Wikipedia has a bunch of links about satellite detection: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_detonation_detection_system#Satellites

I'm not sure how well that stuff performs when the detonation is (far) underground.

[tylertusta]

and so would be contaminated with similar radiological byproducts.

No, it wouldn't. When a fission bomb undergoes fission, it create fission-products, which are radioisotopes that are distinctly different from natural decay chains.

For example, you would expect to see Protactinium-231 from a U-235 decay chain. When U-235 undergoes fission, it creates Xe-140 and Sr-94. If you find any Xe-140 or Sr-94, the only way it got there was through fission.

Here's a website discussing the decay chain for U-235 fission:

http://www.hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/NucEne/fisfrag.html

Here's the natural decay chain for Uranium:

https://sites.wustl.edu/hazardouswaste/radionuclides/uranium/

[tylertusta]

they usually fly out of Missouri, and I would expect the bunker busters to be stored there

B-2s and their bombs are already forward deployed to Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean.

An interesting question: if you drop a nuke on a nuclear weapons bunker, would anyone know?

Yes. Easily.

[dwb68]

"Yes easily" is not an answer. Explain yourself with ... idk, actual science.

[tylertusta]

The answer comes from your question: in your question, the weapon is dropped.

There's no way that a dropped nuclear weapon doesn't release detectable radioisotopes into the atmosphere even if the weapon burrows itself before detonating.

[dwb68]

"there is no way" is still not an actual argument.

Its not at all self evident. Israel is thinking about this problem as we write this, I have no doubt. They have bunker busting nukes, the same way we do, and are wondering whether they would get caught.

[tylertusta]

Do you think that the hole that a penetration bomb makes just closes up behind it instantly?

[dwb68]

The underground bunker already has uranium, and so would be contaminated with similar radiological byproducts as those that would vent. Its not at all self evident to me that a low yield nuke (say 0.3 kt) would be easily distinguishable from the fallout from a bunch of conventional bombs dropped on a radioactive pile.

[Sarcastr0]

Fission biproducts are gonna be different than just unfissed uranium sent into the atmosphere.

[tylertusta]

I'll repost my reply to the same point you made up above:

No, it wouldn't. When a fission bomb undergoes fission, it create fission-products, which are radioisotopes that are distinctly different from natural decay chains.

For example, you would expect to see Protactinium-231 from a U-235 decay chain. When U-235 undergoes fission, it creates Xe-140 and Sr-94. If you find any Xe-140 or Sr-94, the only way it got there was through fission.

Here's a website discussing the decay chain for U-235 fission:

http://www.hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/NucEne/fisfrag.html

Here's the natural decay chain for Uranium:

https://sites.wustl.edu/hazardouswaste/radionuclides/uranium/

[Sarcastr0]

You think Israel is working to nuke someone but keep it secret?

That's kind of a slam on Israel, no?

[Stephen Lathrop]

dwb68 — I am having a problem imagining how even a half-kiloton conventional explosion could be packed into a MOP. Can you explain how that works?

[Mr. Bumble]

The difference in the type of explosive used?

[ThePublius]

You're right, Stephen, the OP is mistaken. The MOPs conventional explosive yield is 4.46 tons, or 0.00446 kt.

[dwb68]

huh, i stand corrected. My bad. Google AI summary told me it was 7.5 kt. Only off by a few orders of magnitude. Score one for AI... lol.
So it weighs 30,000 lbs but the yield is 4.46 tons? Most of it must be steel.

So that's the answer, the difference between a 7.5 kt bomb and a .00446 kt bomb will be obvious.

[tylertusta]

Most of it must be steel.

That is exactly how it works. It's a lot of mass designed to penetrate deep into the earth before detonating.

[tylertusta]

Warhead weight ≠ explosive yield

PBXN-114 and AFX-757- the explosive parts of the GBU-57- are more energetic that TNT.

[apedad]

Hegseth couldn't even manage a parade.

We might drop a few bombs but nothing else.

We're certainly not going to invade Iran or get involved in nation-rebuilding - especially under Trump.

[Don Nico]

DWB,
Putting a multi--kiloton nuclear device inside a BGU-57 is not going to work. Very deep penetration requires a highly stylized design that is heavy long and narrow–much narrower that an your imaged 7 kt device.
One might design the old W-48, 75 ton shell in the rear of the BGU-57. But that will spew many tons of radioactive debris out the penetration channel.
Before speculating wildly, first find out how these weapons work

[dwb68]

True, but weve already done it-- the B61-11, designed to penetrate up to 750 meters of rock. We have about 100 of these we commissioned.

also: The B61 was designed to be dial a yield. It can go as low as .3.kt to as high as 400kt.

[tylertusta]

designed to penetrate up to 750 meters of rock

The B-61 Mod 11 does not penetrate 750 meters of rock prior to detonating; it only goes a handful of meters underground before it explodes.

[ThePublius]

That's GBU-57, for "Guided Bomb Unit," not BGU-57.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GBU-57A/B_MOP

[Frank Drackman]

Where's the Kaboom? There was supposed to be an Earth Shattering Kaboom!

[loki13]

dwb68,

This is all off the top of my head, but IIRC the following are some facts to consider-

1. B2s are stationed at Diego Garcia; I think there are six are so of them, and these would be the ones used. Each one can carry 2 MBUs. They were pre--positioned there several months ago, and have a range that would allow them to strike Iran from that base.

2. If they were to strike Fordo, it would take multiple MBUs to definitively penetrate to the depth required.

3. Regarding whether or not this will be made public, I will respectfully disagree; first, this type of operation can't be kept a secret, really. Second ... I mean, you remember who the President is, right? We will be lucky if it isn't on social media before the planes get back.

The last bit is an unfortunate reminder of the dynamics at play right now. This is not an administration driven by any deep policy concerns or ideological commitment; but by caprice and whim from the top, with factional infighting to get the "last word" before the final decision-maker (and a side-dose of self-enrichment and self-aggrandizement).

I have no special inside knowledge, but I would bet money that Trump was 100% against the Israeli strikes until he saw them dominate the news cycle and also saw how effective they were, and now he wants to claim some of that glory (well, Baghdad Bob ... erm, Karoline Leavitt, will try and claim all of it). Maybe not, but I'd definitely take that bet. Which is why I expect we will be making the strike sooner than later (and why I assume that the recent Vance verbiage was an attempt to smooth the waters with the isolationist base).

Disclaimer- I am 100% against Iran going nuclear, and 100% for the Iranian people being freed from the shackles of their theocratic overlords. But I also think that there is a long history of military interventions in the Middle East (going back to the Great Game) just not working out as intended.

[Commenter_XY]

Why do you assume 'air dropped bomb' is the only way to address Fordo?

[Longtobefree]

Does no one study logistics anymore?
Have all sieges been memory-holed?
You do not need to destroy a facility that no one can enter or exit.
Unless Iran built a deep underground rail line from that facility to a launching site, it is enough to isolate it with conventional munitions.

[loki13]

.....eh, not really.

If the facility is completely intact, and you just destroy the entrances and exits, then you've stopped it for now. And as long as you keep bombing it, that's fine. But as soon as there is a cease fire, you can dig it out. And within weeks (or months at most) it will be back.

Because you didn't destroy the facility, the equipment, or the material within. And it's annoying and time-consuming, but easily doable, to remove the rubble and restore the entrance and egress to the facility. In fact, it's almost like all of this has been discussed (and this has been done before).

[Bob from Ohio]

Destroy the entrances, block up the exhaust ports, eliminate any outside electricity connections.

Everyone inside dies, much of the machinery bricks.

[Dr. Ed 2]

An interesting question: if you drop a nuke on a nuclear weapons bunker, would anyone know?

Yes, because the nuke is not 100% efficient and the leftover nuke stuff has a chemical fingerprint that can trace it to where it was made, and often when.

That would be a problem if Israel ever used one of their nukes because they got the material from us.

[Commenter_XY]

This premise is very unlikely = POTUS Trump will probably unleash the B-2s to bomb Iran's nuclear bunkers in the next 48 hours.

The Israelis think they can do it. Let them try and fail, first. It isn't like the Israelis are bad engineers, you know. 😉

[Magnus Pilatus, MBA, MD, JD, PhDx2]

FBI asked spy agencies to destroy intel on alleged China plot to aid Joe Biden in 2020 election

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

2020 was a coup and the Democrats were the key players and cover-uppers.

[Martinned]

In case anyone cares about what the people think who would have to run a gloriously peaceful new Iran: https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2025/06/iran-opposition-israel-war/683207/?gift=yMNG1nWDz8TdLBAi02a-v-TPnvFiG9_ithGcWe-JN1w&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share

Last two paragraphs:

Kar told me she blames Khamenei for having made an enemy out of Israel for decades. But she made clear that Netanyahu is no friend to Iran’s freedom fighters. “Nobody I spoke to in Iran supports these attacks,” she said. “People are angry, and they hate the Islamic Republic. But they now probably hate Mr. Netanyahu and his military policies even more.”

Israel’s campaign could yet rattle the Iranian regime into some kind of change in behavior or composition. But the notion that air strikes will lead to a popular uprising, or that Iranian activists for freedom will support a devastating war on their homeland, appears to be little more than a fantasy.

[Bob from Ohio]

Interview a bunch of female "activists" and write an article. Useless. No one talking to The Atlantic has any real influence or will play any real role in a conservative society.

The aim is to get some regime elements to decide to end it. That is how such regimes are usually ended.

A civil war is the best outcome for us to be honest.

[Martinned]

A civil war is the best outcome for us to be honest.

Because Iraq, Lybia, and Sudan are doing great at the moment, and aren't at all a source of geopolitical problems for the United States?

[Bob from Ohio]

"source of geopolitical problems for the United States"

None of those are a source of geopolitical problems for the United States. We have some small Iraq bases but could live without them.

Sudan has never been a source of geopolitical problems for the United States.

Iraq btw is not doing "great" at the moment but is a relative functioning democracy and the Kurds have de facto independence.

[Sarcastr0]

You know, we learned a lesson about ignoring issues in the Middle East as none of our concern.

Well, some of us did.

[Bob from Ohio]

Israel whacked the 5 Families and settled family business for now.

We never "ignored" the Mideast, you goof.

[Sarcastr0]

We neglected it pretty hard before 9-11.
You can check the National Defense Strategies before and after.

[Commenter_XY]

I could care less what an emasculated Iran w/o nuclear capability does. If the people 'Saddam-ize' Khamenei, no problem. If not, he can look at his failure every day until he dies.

[hobie]

I see that Carlson and Bannon are trotting out footage of luminaries explaining that Israel has long dreamed of dragging America into a war with Iran. This could get them into hot water. To imply that the people of Israel would sponge off the United States makes it seem a little nefarious. With allegiance to Israel being a MAGA sacrament, this could get the two pundits the old RHINO/America-hater label like Leonard Leo now has. It's also antisemitic terrorism too

[Magnus Pilatus, MBA, MD, JD, PhDx2]

There is a video a Jew PM demanding the US invade Iran.

[ThePublius]

The corruption in the Karen Read trial continues.

Among the questions the jury asked the judge:

Question #4 – If we find not guilty on two charges but cannot agree on one charge, is it a hung jury on all three charges or just one?

Judge Cannone: This is a theoretical question, not one I can answer.

What? The jury is confused about how to proceed, and the judge refuses to clarify.

We're in the same place we were last year.

If I were on the jury I would just acquit on all charges, out of a sense of fairness to the accused. (It's clear the charge they are hung on is the OUI.)

[Martinned]

Aren't jury trials great? Why not simply flip for it and get everyone (except possibly the accused) home in time for dinner?

[ThePublius]

So, you don't like the idea of jury trials?

This is not a problem with jury trials, it's a problem with a corrupt judge. She's in cahoots with the prosecutor, and pulled this same nonsense in the first trial.

The "tool" she uses is an utterly confusing verdict form. She supposedly simplified is a bit at the request of the defense, but it's still a confusing mess; hence the jurors' questions.

[Martinned]

No, I don't like the idea of jury trials. Deciding guilt or innocence is not a job for amateurs, and still less should the power of the state to emprison people (or even execute them) be taken in the form of a decision that is unreviewable because it doesn't involve any sort of explanation of the reasons for the decision. Criminal trials for felonies should involve (at least) three judges, who should be made to write a judgment that explains why they concluded what they did, so that their decision can be reviewed on appeal.

[ThePublius]

1. Fine, everyone is entitled to their opinion. I completely disagree.
2. "in the form of a decision that is unreviewable" We have an appeals process, you know. Of course the jury deliberations are not reviewable verbatim, but the entire trial is.

[loki13]

In my experience, and in my opinion, I have come to a position in between that of Martinned and Publius.

Yes, the jury is a "black box," and that can be frustrating. However, for the majority of "regular crimes" and some "regular civil stuff," I have found that juries do an amazing job. Especially when it comes to "regular crime" I think that juries are a bulwark of liberty, and would not want to get rid of them. The perfect is the enemy of the good.

But ... I think that too many civil matters have required jury trials that are unnecessary. And I also think that there are a small category of crimes (e.g., financial crimes) and a large category of civil matters (e.g., medical malpractice, design defect) that the jury system, as currently constituted, just doesn't work well for.

TLDR; jury trials are an important right. And I think that they are, in fact, surprisingly effective when it comes to "murder" and things that most people are generally familiar with. But when it comes to certain civil issues or even esoteric criminal issues, I don't think the utility outweighs the repeated and notable deficiencies.

[LawTalkingGuy]

I’m not so sure I agree that med mals are over a jury’s skis. They aren’t any more out of their depth than a judge who also has no medical training would be.

On some civil matters, it’s not necessarily that they can’t handle it, it’s that you shouldn’t subject them to such boringness. No jury should be forced to listen to the worst lawyers you’ve ever seen fight about accounting practices.

[loki13]

I should be more specific- it's not all medmal matters (some are easily within everyone's understanding) but certain areas.

The problem is that it is easy to play on pathos, and the science can be portrayed as "disputed" when it isn't. There are solutions on the judicial side (better scientific gatekeeping through Daubert) but that's just one of many. As a general rule, as I stated, juries do really well when it is on issues that are generally within common understanding, and the further you are removed from that, the worse they do.

(IMO, a lot of the best reform would be accomplished by removing a lot of the actions from the tort sphere completely; IIRC, New Zealand did this with medmal. But ... well, this is 'Murikuh, and I just don't see that happening.)

[LawTalkingGuy]

“A lot of the best reform would be accomplished by removing a lot of the actions from the tort sphere completely.”

I’ve long thought this about commercial premises liability specifically, which juries easily understand. There’s just so much wasted time and resources on trying to find out whose fault it is, and whether that’s a legal question or a factual question. Instead of having rent-seeking “snow removal” experts preparing reports or courts taking years to decide if a puddle is a open and obvious as a matter of law, we could just have state funded accident insurance like workers comp. Which isn’t perfect but is way better than workers having to sue their employers all the time.

[Commenter_XY]

Who would replace jurors for those cases?

[Ridgeway]

How about patent infringement cases? Anecdotally I had understood that juries are completely out of their depth in these.

[Bob from Ohio]

"Aren't jury trials great? "

Yes they are.

[Brett Bellmore]

It's basically the only way to prevent a judge from sentencing on the basis of the conduct you acquitted on, sadly.

[ThePublius]

I don't understand that. Let's say there are three charges. The jury acquits on two, convicts on a third. Doesn't the judge have to consider only the conviction in determining sentencing?

[Bored Lawyer]

Yes and no. The person can only be sentenced on what he was convicted. Up to the maximum for that.

However, the Court is allowed to consider "relevant conduct." Which might include that he was charged with on the other counts. Or even uncharged conduct. And for which the Court only has to find the conduct by a preponderance of the evidence.

Sounds counterintuitive, but that's the law. You can see a short summary of it here: https://www.srtriallawyers.com/blog/2025/march/understanding-relevant-conduct-under-the-federal/#:~:text=Relevant%20Conduct%20refers%20to%20a,of%E2%80%94when%20determining%20their%20sentence.

Needless to say, prosecutors love it, and defendants hate it.

[ThePublius]

Thanks. But the resource you link to is regarding Federal sentencing guidelines. This case is State of Massachusetts. Are they the same?

[Bored Lawyer]

That I don't know. I would defer to Massachusetts lawyers.

[apedad]

I don't see a problem.

It's the jury's job to only find guilty or not guilty on each charge and not to be concerned with other factors outside of the guilty/not guilty decision.

Whatever happens after their decision is out of their hands and they shouldn't/needn't be concerned.

[ThePublius]

Thanks, I get that. But in this case it's my understanding that the verdict form is utterly confusing, and doesn't simply allow the jurors to express guilty or not guilty on each individual charge. Also, there's confusion about lesser included charges:

Question #3 – Does convicting guilty on a subcharge, example offense 2, number 5 convict the overall charge?
Answer: (Cannone) I have amended the verdict slip, and it’s going to be a little bit easier to follow.

Well, no. They are still arguing about this in court this morning.

The verdict form, and the instructions thereof, is a travesty of justice.

[hobie]

I see this cop killer is getting MAGA reverence ala the would-be cop killer tiny, microscopic Saint Ashtray Babbitt. You boys in red sure don't like our boys in blue

[ThePublius]

You're a jerk. You obviously know next to nothing about this case, and the corruption of the Canton PD, the State cop (who's been fired), and the corrupt ATF agent involved.

She didn't kill John O'Keefe. There was no collision. He had no bruises or broken bones consistent with any car impact, let alone a 3 ton SUV going 24 mph. He was apparently beaten, banged his head when he fell, which killed him, and dumped on the front lawn. They the PD, et.al., went into gear to frame Read.

The misconduct and malfeasance in this case is staggering.

But you don't care, as long as you can use it as a cudgel against your perceived political enemies, truth be damned. Shame on you.

[Sarcastr0]

I see even after Trump's trials we continue the saga of people who haven't seen criminal practice before seeing it and assuming a conspiracy based on their vibes of fairness.

[ThePublius]

That's a meaningless comment, because it can be used for every single case of someone pointing out unfairness or corruption in a case. Have you ever heard of the innocence project?

There is corruption and unfairness on the part of law enforcement and the courts. This case is stunning in the obvious display of such.

I don't suppose you've followed it, or watched any of it.

[hobie]

You MAGA have brought this on yourselves, Publius. Crying corruption/wolf about anyone and everything for years and never being right about any of it. Why should we take you seriously this time?

[ThePublius]

"Crying corruption/wolf about anyone and everything for years and never being right about any of it."

I have done no such thing. And I really don't care if you believe it, and you don't speak for "we," you speak for yourself.

[hobie]

Here, watch this. I'll start a partial list of the corruption you MAGA have been wailing about and have never been right about, and let's see if any other 'we' steps up and adds to it:

Courts
Judges
FBI
Smartmatic
Dominion
Hunter
Joe
Illegals voting in federal election
Vince Foster
Benghazi
Space Lasers
Wuhan
Nanotrackers
Ivermectin
Is 5G also a MAGA/Q thing? (I'll throw it in just to be safe)
Sandyhook
Pizzagate
Birth certificate
Stop the Steal

Whew! Haven't you mask hating patriots been a busy bunch!

[ThePublius]

"you MAGA?" Right. How did I get inducted into your imaginary group?

You're just as bad as those who refer to foreigners and brown skinned as "you people."

[LawTalkingGuy]

Lol “corruption.”

[ThePublius]

Lead investigator of the case fired for misconduct. Corruption? No, nothing to see here....

"The Massachusetts State Police investigator who was suspended over allegations of misconduct in the Karen Read murder case has been fired, state law enforcement officials said Wednesday.

The State Police Trial Board made the decision to dishonorably discharge Michael Proctor, who led the investigation into the 2022 death of Read’s boyfriend, a Boston police officer, after three days of hearings that began in January.

The trial board found Proctor guilty of three charges of unsatisfactory performance and one charge of consumption of alcohol while on duty from January to August 2022.

The charges stem from Proctor's sending "derogatory, defamatory, disparaging, and/or otherwise inappropriate text messages about a suspect in that investigation to other individuals.” Proctor also consumed alcohol on duty and proceeded to operate his department-issued cruiser in July 2022."

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/michael-proctor-lead-investigator-karen-read-case-fired-massachusetts-rcna186684

And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

[LawTalkingGuy]

To clarify I was laughing at the idea that that response to a jury question, which is pretty similar to one most judges would give, which was drafted after consulting with the lawyers for both sides, in any way constitutes “corruption” or a continuation of it.

[ThePublius]

Judge Cannone rejected virtually all of the defense's objections to and proposed amendments to the verdict form. She buffaloed them into doing it her way. Now we apparently have the exact same problem as the first trial.

Why does she refuse to answer their question number 4 in the OP? Why is it even a question? If the verdict form was simple and straightforward, it wouldn't even be a question.

[LawTalkingGuy]

“If the verdict form was simple and straightforward, it wouldn't even be a question.”

LOL. LMAO.

[ThePublius]

What are you laughing at? The judge just amended the verdict slip. You can read the before and after:

https://www.bostonherald.com/2025/06/18/amended-karen-read-manslaughter-charge-verdict-slip-released-by-court/?utm_email=C54664A9B583C5530485E5E28E&lctg=C54664A9B583C5530485E5E28E&active=yesD&utm_source=listrak&utm_medium=email&utm_term=https%3a%2f%2fwww.bostonherald.com%2f2025%2f06%2f18%2famended-karen-read-manslaughter-charge-verdict-slip-released-by-court%2f&utm_campaign=bos-boston_herald-breaking_news-nl&utm_content=alert

[LawTalkingGuy]

I’m laughing at the idea that a jury wouldn’t ask this question if the verdict forms were “simple and straightforward.” I’m sorry it’s just funny. You’re making a huge deal about run-of-the-mill jury trial issues and questions. Jurors often have issues with the forms, no matter how simple, and they often have questions about agreeing on some counts and hanging on others. What you think is indicative of corruption is just everyday trial practice.

[Sarcastr0]

Practitioners are telling you this is all pretty normal, even if you don't like it.

There's an interesting discussion above about process improvements and reforms.

But no, you're sure it's corruption. Based on ignorance, vibes, and stubbornness.

This seems to happen to you a lot. I feel like outside of this website you live a pretty sheltered life.

[LawTalkingGuy]

The funny thing is, is that if I was the appellate attorney I probably would try and make an issue of the answer and the verdict forms. The other thing to remember is that no trial anywhere is perfect or free from error. It’s just that this is normal stuff. Which is why Publius’s broad pronouncements about there being corruption or simple obvious answers to things is so funny to me.

Maybe the prosecution is corrupt. Maybe the judge is dumb or in the tank for one side. But the jury having questions about hanging on some counts and not understanding forms and the judge providing a non-answer to those questions happens all the time.

[ThePublius]

Recall the first trial was a mistrial, where jurors interviewed after the fact said they wanted to acquit on two counts, but couldn't do so with the provided verdict form. So, Read was re-tried on ALL charges.

[LawTalkingGuy]

Okay. Sounds like a good issue on appeal.

[ThePublius]

In addition, look into the case of Sandra Birchmore, another high profile case in Norfolk County with a police-involved killing (and long term sexual abuse, starting when she was a minor) that the PD immediately ruled a suicide and then the feds stepped in and ruled it murder, and convicted a Stoughton cop. The murder happened in Canton.

"Birchmore's case has drawn parallels to the Karen Read case, another high-profile investigation in Norfolk County. Both cases involve allegations of law enforcement misconduct and have raised questions about the integrity of the investigations conducted by local authorities.[5][6]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Sandra_Birchmore#:~:text=On%20February%204%2C%202021%2C%2023,alleged%20to%20have%20killed%20her.

[hobie]

We need to get Sidney Powell on this one, assuming she hasn't been disbarred

[ThePublius]

One just can't get a serious, thoughtful response from you, and a small cadre of stone throwers here.

[Sarcastr0]

The thing is you're very passionate, but not very serious.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Since when is a statement made to the media that you were drunk evidence for an OUI conviction?

The RMV would be damn busy if it were....

[LawTalkingGuy]

Even under a democratic trifecta, ICE won’t be abolished. So here’s my one weird trick that a democratic president could do to improve ICE in all aspects: replace its senior leadership with postal inspectors. Real federal law enforcement heads know why this would be an improvement.

[Martinned]

Only Nixon could go to China, and only a Republican Congress/President can abolish ICE.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

Why not people who sell that flavored ice on the street? Probably many are immigrants. They also don't cover their faces.

[Martinned]

About 20 minutes ago was an excellent time to buy some short-dated put options:

Trump: "Maybe I should go to the Fed. Am I allowed to appoint myself? Am I allowed to appoint myself at the Fed? I'd do a much better job."

[hobie]

If you'd just donate to the Trump Clan, you get on the heads-up email list for when he's gonna play with the markets

[Martinned]

Some of the time. But the problem with Trump is that he says dumb shit all the time. Neither he nor his staff necessarily know ahead of time when something like this is going to happen.

[loki13]

It must be hard to be President, Pope, and Chair of the Federal Reserve!

Certainly, that would deserver another, better attended, parade.

On a serious note, maybe focus on the job you were elected to do, instead of constantly sending out messages about other jobs you'd also be terrible at.

[ReaderY]

Don’t forget head of the Kennedy Center.

As Louis XIV, great man, very nicely put it, “L’Etat, c’est moi!” I don’t think it can be denied that Mr. Trump is focusing on the job he was elected to do, looking out for the United States, so defined.

[Bob from Ohio]

Trump pulls out laser pointer, the lib cats must chase.

[TwelveInchPianist]

Skrmetti out

[Bob from Ohio]

Tennessee wins, 3 Lib Amigas lose again. Yeah!

[Sarcastr0]

No substance; just did the libs get owned.

I tend to think this was the right outcome; dunno about the level of scrutiny analysis.

[TwelveInchPianist]

Yeah! Fewer kids will get their dicks cut off! Take that, libs!

How's that?

[not guilty]

Uh, the Plaintiffs in Skrmetti did not challenge the ban on genital surgery for minors. Why do the peckercheckers incessantly trot out that red herring?

[TwelveInchPianist]

The ruling foreclosed any such future challenges.

Fewer children will be chemically castrate as well.

That really much frustrate peckerpluckers like yourself.

[apedad]

"One just can't get a serious, thoughtful response from you, and a small cadre of stone throwers here.

(H/T ThePublius!)

[ReaderY]

The majority found that it was unnecessary to decide whether transgender status was a suspect class because it found that the regulation did not treat people differently based on that status. Thomas, Alito, and Barrett all wrote separately. All three said that in their view it was not a suspect class.

This makes the case in some sense a more minor one because most issues are left undecided by it.

However, the case appears to have undermined an interpretation of Bostock I would have stuck with. In my view, Bostock is based entirely on behavior, treating men e.g. dressing in clothes traditionally associated with women (or engaging in other behavior traditionally associated with the other sex) as analytically no different from black people sitting in parts of the bus traditionally associated with white people, and hence and is not based on “transgender status” at all. A key difference is that a new status category would be less inclusive. A man fired for dressing in womens’ clothes once but who does not normally do so would have a claim under a behavior-based approach, but not under a status-based approach. To me, not covering isolated events would amend Title VI to refer to “on the basis of transgender status,” not “on the basis of sex.” And would this limitation translate to race? Could black people be kicked off the bus for sitting in the front as long as they don’t do so habitually and are not medically required to do so? To me, that simply doesn’t make sense. It’s altering the text rather than being faithful to it as Gorsuch claimed.

I personally would not interpret the Civil Rights Act as prohibiting things like sex-specific dress codes. I would consider legislative intent, not pure text. But if we claim to go strictly with pure text, I would stay with it, including when it leads to results the Court’s members may not like. (For example, I think Bostock’s textual approach equally protects white people who dress in blackface.)

[JoeFromtheBronx]

Two places to get good coverage later regarding today's "celebration" of Pride Month at SCOTUS are Erin Reed and Chris Geidner. A preliminary comment: Roberts, Gorsuch & Kavanaugh avoided going the extra mile to support anti-trans legislation than the other half of the majority, which reached out to allow it.

https://www.erininthemorning.com/
https://www.lawdork.com/

Roberts for the Court, with Sotomayor dissenting from the bench. We should have livestreaming of opinion announcements.

Earlier: The Trevor Project received a stop-work order last night on its contract with the national 988 suicide prevention hotline. The Trump administration is eliminating the option for LGBTQ callers to the hotline to press 3 and connect with someone who specializes in LGBTQ mental health.

[LawTalkingGuy]

The ACLU should not have sought cert with this Court. Sure the Sixth Circuit upheld the Tennessee law, but now there is a nation-wide rule on this that other circuits and perhaps more importantly state courts will follow. And using state con law to reach a different outcome state by state is difficult once SCOTUS has relieved them of thinking too hard about jt.

[tylertusta]

The ACLU should not have sought cert with this Court.

I don't think that's a fair criticism. The ACLU may have been hoping to get the Bostock majority to come out again.

[LawTalkingGuy]

Bostock worked because the statutory textualist angle was really straightforward and they already had a solid precedent in Oncale (written by Scalia). The constitutional argument is much harder to succeed on even in front of a more friendly court. Not sure they win in 2015 either.

[JoeFromtheBronx]

They were playing with fire.

Counting to five was hard with this Court, especially once it was no longer simply a statutory case and a more controversial subject was involved.

[LawTalkingGuy]

Counting to 5 would have been hard with Kennedy and Ginsburg still on the court IMO.

[Roger S]

Now we have all 9 on record, on the subject of the medical sexual mutilation of children. 3 for, 6 against.

[hobie]

American Jews are not gonna be happy with this ruling because of penis mutilation, and certain Muslim sects will be unhappy because of clitoral mutilation. In high school, I dated a girl who got a boob job. She was really vain. That's out the window now.

[not guilty]

You lie, Roger S. Genital surgery was not at issue in this case. The District Court opined:

Plaintiffs do not have standing to challenge SB1's ban on "surgically removing, modifying, altering, or entering into tissues, cavities, or organs of a human being" when the purpose of such procedures is to "enable a minor to identify with, or live as, a purported identity inconsistent with the minor's sex" or to treat "purported discomfort or distress from a discordance between the minor's sex and asserted identity." Tenn. Code Ann. §§ 68-33-103(a)(1)(A)-(B); 68-33-102(5)(A)-(B). Accordingly, any relief provided Plaintiff pursuant to the Motion will not impact SB1's ban on such surgeries.

L.W. ex rel. Williams v. Skrmetti, 679 F.Supp.3d 668, 681 (M.D. Tenn. 2023) [footnote omitted], rev'd on other grounds, 83 F.4th 460 (6th Cir.). No one appealed that issue.

[not guilty]

LawTalkingGuy, it was the Department of Justice's petition for certiorari which was granted in this case, limited to the equal protection question. The cert petition of the Plaintiffs (transgender minors, their parents and a physician), which raised substantive due process issues as well, was not granted.

[SRG2]

Authoritarianism in parents may hinder a key cognitive skill in their children

Children develop the ability to understand what others think and feel—an ability known as theory of mind—through early social interactions, especially with caregivers. A new study published in the International Journal of Behavioral Development suggests that parents’ beliefs about social hierarchy and obedience to authority may shape the development of this socio-cognitive ability.

This supports an hypothesis of mine, that more fundamental than the usual superficial political divides is the issue of "us v them" - who is "us", who is "them", and how steep are the gradients and the barriers

[Roger S]

The study claims that White kids of right-wing authoritarian mothers were less likely to attempt mindreading of Chinese kids. No mention of left-wing authoritarianism, or whether the mindreading was correct.