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statsman

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Everything posted by statsman

  1. France’s Macron once advocated dialogue with Russia but now wants to keep all military options open in Ukraine, unsettling NATO allies. https://www.wsj.com/world/europe/macron-france-russia-putin-b89d1177?st=x8c5u6gx36w4qe9&reflink=share_mobilewebshare
  2. Israeli’s initial investigation into a strike that killed seven aid workers in Gaza found its forces had wrongly identified their vehicles as hostile targets https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/israel-blames-misidentification-for-strike-that-killed-gaza-aid-workers-f88da70e?st=eigwknbie7duiy8&reflink=share_mobilewebshare
  3. You don’t think mistakes happen? When ISIS blew up a dozen marines and 100 Afghans during the flight from Kabul, the U.S. responded by using a drone to blow up a car carrying an Afghan loyal to the U.S. and his family. You don’t think mistakes happen?
  4. I’ve jogged for decades. I don’t carry any spray. The technique I use with angry barking dogs on the loose is: I stop, kneel low and start patting the ground and call them to me- “Here, boy! Here!” It confuses the hell out of them and they have always stopped. That said, I have seen some dogs behind fences or tied up on ropes that I wouldn’t rely on that to work.
  5. https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/israel-iran-conflict-threatens-to-spill-into-open-warfare-1bd60453?st=hif5r8w81rfcoa3&reflink=mobilewebshare_permalink
  6. You might have to remind him of the time we accidentally bombed the Chinese embassy. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_bombing_of_the_Chinese_embassy_in_Belgrade Fog of war, indeed. Three Chinese journalists killed, and many false reports that it was deliberate.
  7. I think the Germans and Nazis had more to do with making genocide “a thing”.
  8. Innocents being killed is what makes all wars so tragic. Innocents being killed in a war that you prosecute while knowing you can’t win can be a crime. I have been (am) on the side of Israel, in this conflict, Hamas being a monstrous and illegitimate force. Eradicating Hamas is a worthwhile goal. I don’t believe Israel has a strategy that can accomplish that goal. It’s not enough to set a goal (eradicate Hamas), apply all your resources (call up all the reservists) and say you have a strategy. You have to evaluate whether your resources are enough. Clearly, they aren’t. Israel should have done a lot more thinking and planning, and less reacting. They have Hamas, they have Hezbollah, they have the West Bank and they have Iran all to deal with. (I confess my shame at not realizing this until now, when it was clearly a losing strategy in November.) No one (except Iran) wants to hear that Hamas wins. I’m afraid that’s what happens when you pick a losing strategy.
  9. This is my usual approach- as a rule, I am slow to attribute to malice what can be explained by stupidity. I apply this rule to all factions.
  10. I think it was a horrible screw up. A screw up that was a result of Israel not being capable of completing their war goals. This war, where they attack Hamas in a populated area (where Hamas actually is), and chase all the people away to another area, where Hamas remnants then follow to regroup and prepare for the next attack, is a stupid, failed idea, and events like the WCK are inevitable. Israel didn’t have the troops and willingness to really eradicate Hamas, in the time frame they have. They are trying to be clever, using advanced weaponry, where something closer to the Red Army taking Berlin was needed (and if you don’t have the manpower and will to do that, you need another strategic goal). Looks like Hamas will be the winner, because Israel’s plan couldn’t achieve their goal, and Hamas will take over the West Bank in short order. I think things are about to really get ugly. (PS- I think they need a new government, because a new strategic plan is needed, and new goals. The current one is a failure and sticking with it will just waste more lives).
  11. We once had an embassy in Iran. Do you know why we don’t anymore?
  12. Spell out your comparison. Are you comparing Ambassador Stevens to the Iranian RG commander?
  13. Take this political opinion to the cloak room
  14. Iran has killed, through its Houthi proxy, at least one U.S. sailor and seriously injured a few dozen more (I don’t know if that one dude ever came out of his coma). Iran, through its Hamas proxy, killed a dozen U.S. citizens on 10-7, and is holding five more U.S. citizens hostage (unless they’ve been tortured to death). Good for Israel. Fuck Iran.
  15. Is this the class you build when you think you may have a tough year, so you build it early, get everyone rating it high (because you have so many committed) and use as an argument for keeping the HC if things go south during the season?
  16. Two years ago, Ukrainian soldiers who retook Motyzhyn found the bodies of its mayor and her family in a shallow grave. These days the front line is hundreds of miles away, but the village is adapting for a long war. https://www.wsj.com/world/europe/ukrainian-village-scarred-by-murder-of-mayor-and-her-family-prepares-for-long-war-a3ebd750?st=lea0ywzj98c3cjr&reflink=share_mobilewebshare
  17. I think he’s also pretty good at managing employees, making it clear what their tasks are, how he expects them to complete them, and that they’re not done until the task is completed successfully.
  18. Well, hell. Sounds like you’ve got me all figured out.
  19. I’m not sure why GW Hayduke and Brickhorn gave me the double bird. Not that it bothers me that much; I just didn’t understand what I posted that they disagreed with. Do they just dislike anyone commenting that way about the atom bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki? I have pondered Truman’s decision and can understand why he made it- still, I don’t see any way around noting that our country dropped atom bombs on civilian population centers, and that is a horrific thing to do. We did it, and we should own it, in my opinion. Do they feel I am using that rhetoric- responding to monstrosity with monstrosity-as an apologetic for Israel in Gaza? I didn’t mean it that way. After 3.5 years of fighting Imperial Japan, after hundreds of thousands (maybe millions) of civilians killed by the Japanese, after Okinawa, there were no non-monstrous options to end the war (the above referenced comment about accepting a surrender is interesting, but not compelling, given the just completed Okinawa experience. Recent research has revealed that Imperial Japan’s last strategy was to convince the U.S. that the final battles would involve the last Japanese subjects fighting to the death. Plus, there is the whole element of Russia jumping in after Berlin fell; they were not interested in a peace negotiation; they wanted to grab as much of China as they could). The U.S. Pacific War was uniquely horrific, worse even than the German-Russian fighting. Israel is in a different situation. Yes, Hamas are monsters, but, no, Israel is not reduced to only monstrous options for responding. More is expected of them.
  20. https://www.wsj.com/articles/history-goes-to-war-in-the-holy-land-israel-leading-historian-palestine-hamas-66384695?st=5eehhnnsxswgj2a&reflink=mobilewebshare_permalink
  21. Strikes in Syria and Lebanon this week mark an escalation in Israel’s undeclared conflict with Iranhttps://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/syria-says-israeli-strikes-near-aleppo-kill-wound-dozens-27a66ace?st=5uvte29bd796anh&reflink=share_mobilewebshare
  22. I hate being so cynical, but an answer I heard to the question of “what’s in it for the U.S., bearing the lion’s share of NATO funding?” Was “Because, after two horrific world wars started on that continent, the last thing we need is for those assholes to start building up their militaries and start trying to be bullies in international affairs again”. But, maybe there is something to it.
  23. I don’t know who that is. I was talking about the Nazis and the Imperial Japanese, both believing they had some kind of genetic superiority.
  24. Was it LB Jake Hammer? Such a great name for a LB. 15 years ago, a friend and I were wondering whatever happened to him. It turns out that “Jake Hammer” is also a great name for another profession. If you google it, DO NOT hit the “Feeling lucky” button.
  25. WRT mock drafts, and projections, on Klatt’s podcast, Klatt said, “if a player is being projected in the same round by everyone, for example- the third round, he will go higher in the actual draft. If he is being projected all over the place, he’ll go low”.
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