The Left wants Donald Trump on the ballot this fall – the Trump with no internal governor who wrote the mean tweets, the Trump of the (often dishonest or fabricated) media narratives, and especially of the “January 6” of fact, fiction and in between.
But then, so does the GOP.
But which Donald Trump? The business tycoon? The loose cannon that could rope-a-dope either world leaders into agreement, or his own cabinet into distraction? Or the person that focused the economic and social concerns of a whole lot of people – middle America, blue-collar “Red” America, and by the bye more Black and Latino voters than any Republican in two generations, into political action?
The Virginia gubernatorial election showed us a hint: it’s #3. The first two camps barely registered in that fairly meat ‘n potatoes contest.
We’ve got a group of primaries coming up this month – Idaho, and later this month Georgia.
But it started last night, with Ohio’s primaries for Governor and Senate.
Or was it the “America First” agenda on the immigration, trade, and foreign policy? If that’s what you thought, then J. D. Vance was your candidate.
And the winner: Vance.
But Vance’s advantage was that he campaigned on the politics he believes in. That’s one of the reasons he was able to campaign so much more than his opponents; he doesn’t need to read from cue cards. It’s why he was able to constantly reiterate his position on the Ukraine war with confidence, even as his opponents got lost while searching for their own views. Much has been made of Vance’s supposed transformation from the author of Hillbilly Elegy to the Senate candidate endorsed by Marjorie Taylor Greene. He shifted his assessment of Trump, absolutely, but his politics have remained much the same. Even Vance’s vengeful former roommate — who tried to harm his campaign by sharing a text showing that, years ago, Vance made an overheated comparison of Trump to Hitler — ended up proving the point. In that text exchange, Vance was saying that the Republican Party needed to deliver tangible benefits to working-class white people who have migrated into the party. That’s the message he had three years ago, too.
I suspect this is at least part of the reason Big Left is trying to make they hay they are over the leaked Roe decision; the GOP is running on the Trump legacy that’s least convenient to then. .
The Middle East Institute has put out a PDF entitled “IRAN’S REVOLUTIONARY GUARD AND THE RISING CULT OF MAHDISM: MISSILES AND MILITIAS FOR THE APOCALYPSE.” If you’re looking for evidence that Iran is coming to its senses and will soon join the league of nations and embrace the West as brothers, you won’t find it here.
It’s worth devoting the time for a read, this is from the conclusion.
The finding of this research paper reveals three visible trends in the IRGC. The first relates to indoctrination becoming an increasing focal point in the Guard. Khamenei and his hardline circle have sought to nurture a more radical IRGC generation by dedicating more time to ideological indoctrination of its members. The promotion system within the ranks of the IRGC also favors ideological conviction over technical expertise, ensuring the most zealous members rise up within the chain of command. The second trend relates to the increasing priority given to Mahdism within the IRGC’s ideology. From the post-2009 period onwards, the doctrine of Mahdism has become one of the main prisms through which the IRGC and affiliated hardline clerics would understand the world around them and the IRGC’s actions, as well as communicate that understanding. In turn, there has been greater emphasis on viewing the IRGC as the military vehicle to prepare the foundations for the reappearance of the 12th Imam, with policy objectives such as hostility toward the U.S. and the eradication of Israel being understood through this prism. This is consistent with the goal of Khamenei and his hardline allies, such as Ayatollah Alamalhouda, the supreme leader’s representative to Khorasan and President Ebrahim Raisi’s father-in-law, to transform the concept of Mahdism from a set of feelings into an “ideological belief.” The third and final trend relates to the IRGC’s younger generations becoming more radical and extreme. In this regard, efforts by Khamenei and the Guard’s Ideological-Political Organization to nurture a more radical generation among the IRGC has paid, and is paying, dividends.
Against this backdrop, the rise of devout followers of the militaristic doctrine of Mahdism among the senior ranks of the IRGC is not inconceivable and should not be ruled out. While there is hope that the IRGC’s senior leadership will act pragmatically, internal structures within the Guard — including its indoctrination and promotion system — certainly open up the possibility that devoted Mahdists could occupy senior leadership positions. Such a scenario could have far-reaching consequences as it would bring the three pillars of the IRGC’s foreign policy — militias, ballistic missiles, and the nuclear program — under their control. Even if a small number of devout Mahdists occupy senior positions in the Guard, it is possible that they may seek to facilitate and speed up the return of Mahdi. This would have major implications for some of the policies that are being understood through the prism of Mahdism, such as Israel’s existence being the “greatest barrier” to the reappearance of the 12th Imam.
You might think that Israel, being in a tough neighborhood, with its survival at stake, would not allow woke nonsense to seep into its military and potentially compromise its national security. You would be wrong.
Israel for the first time ever will honor a transgender soldier with special medal of honor during the country’s annual Independence Day state ceremony, it was revealed Tuesday.
Sergeant Noam Shahar from Home Front Command’s mixed gender rescue unit will receive the President’s Medal during the country’s 74th Independence Day celebrations on Wednesday.
The soldier said she dedicated herself to setting an example even before joining Home Front Command. Last year, she chose to do her beret march- an arduous journey each IDF soldier goes through before being accepted to their respective corps – with the pride flag on her vest.
An individual who kills an eagle can be fined $100,000 and sentenced to a year in jail. An organization, $200,000. Penalties increase for subsequent offenses.
But a windmill energy company will be paying less than $30,000 each for dead eagles, with no jail at all.
Quite a deal: a bulk discount on dead birds and immunity from imprisonment. I guess that’s the price Mother Nature pays for saving the planet from global warming.
Joe Doakes
I fully (and only partially satirically) expect electric car drivers to get away with traffic tickets for running down pedestrians.
Trojan Footprint, a Special Forces joint exercise, began this week. An annual exercise, this is the largest one to date.
Trojan Footprint (TFP) 22 is set to begin May 2 and conclude May 13, with U.S. Special Operations Forces (SOF) proactively working and training together with NATO allies and European partners across Southeastern Europe, the Baltics and the Black Sea Region to demonstrate their collective military readiness to deploy and respond to any crisis that may arise.
This year’s TFP includes more than 3,300 participants from 30 nations, doubling in size from the previous year and making it the largest SOCEUR exercise to date. Land, air, and sea operations for Trojan Footprint 22 will occur across Bulgaria, Croatia, Estonia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia.
The two-week exercise also increases integration with conventional forces and will highlight the professional skillsets of land, air, and sea units to respond to hybrid threats through discreet theatre entry and exit. As an exercise in coalition building, TFP 22 is focused on cultivating trust and developing lasting relationships that will promote peace and stability throughout Europe.
As this tweet from US SOCEUR shows, it covers ground from the Baltic to the Med, a suspiciously united front facing neighbors to the east.
Our civilization may be crumbling, eaten away from within, but while we can still put an talented, determined, capable military in the field, we’re not done yet. Go get ’em.
So we have a leak and it appears the Supremos are sending Roe v. Wade and Casey v. Planned Parenthood to the dustbin of history. A few very brief thoughts:
Justice Alito is right: Roe was always built on a foundation of nothing. Justice White was also correct when Roe was decided. Roe was an exercise of raw judicial power. And raw power is always used eventually.
And if we’re in housekeeping season, now do Wickard v. Filburn.
The Dobbs ruling, assuming it goes through, changes nothing in Minnesota. Abortion is legal by statute here.
The leak itself is awful for the Court, but it was also inevitable. There was always an incentive to break this particular taboo and the leaker will be celebrated, not punished. MSNBC will have a corner office prepared by EOB today.
I don’t know what Chief Justice John Roberts will do, but it’s going to be another opportunity for him to go peak weasel.
One unanswered question — does Dobbs apply to pregnant men?
The usual caveats about interesting times are in full effect.
For those of you who know my family; my mother passed away over the weekend after a long battle with Alzheimer’s.
Mom was Janice Brooks.
Mom, probably 20-30 years ago. As much a fun contrarian with hats as with anything.
Before that, Janice Berg.
And before that, Janice Hall.
Like me, Mom was the oldest of three kids. I never knew much about her childhood – that’s a conversation I need to have with my aunt and uncle, sooner than later.. I wasn’t the only one to get the impression she got a little restless being a young mother of three in a small town in North Dakota. She had been an art major, loved painting, craved travel, and probably had had many other plans before she wound up as Mom.
She was born in Devils Lake North Dakota, grew up in Bismarck, lived in Jamestown throughout my childhood and young adulthood , spent several years in Ankara, Turkey, and then most of the past 25 years in Minot.
Mom is front and center, between my aunt Jerri and uncle Roger. My grandma Pat and grandpa Don are in the back. This was probably about 1950 or so.
Kids – at least, the ones who are lucky enough to have two functional parents – grow up as little melting pots of different combinations of their parents traits. Things I got from my dad should be fairly obvious; dad was a speech teacher, I speak a lot.
From my mom?
It’s funny. I just got off the phone with one of my mom’s old friends, someone I’ve known since I was, well, old enough to remember humans outside my family.. One of her memories of mom is her running into groups of people and getting into long, involved discussions with them, just for the fun of it.. When I was in college, she ran for the North Dakota State House of Representatives, as a Democrat – in one of the most Republican places in the world. She didn’t win – but I think she enjoyed the battle just fine.
Where did I get my contrarian streak from, you ask?
And to the extent that I don’t sweat the small stuff in life, to the extent of sometimes very studiously ignoring the small things?.
That’s mom as well.
But I do know that, along with my dad, she gave me one of the great gifts a child could ever have; a completely unremarkable childhood, where the three of us – my little sister and brother and I – pretty much just got to be kids, without having to deal with a whole lot of a crap that parents inflict on their offspring if they are not lucky. Tolstoy wrote “Happy families are all alike, every unhappy family is different in their own way.” I used to complain that I had a “Beaver Cleaver“ childhood, especially when I was an angsty teenager; now I realize it was one of the greatest things a parent can give a child.
Years later, after my parents split up (10 days after my own wedding), she remarried, spent several years living in Turkey and indulging her latent travel bug, and finally moved to Minot when her second husband (who like my father was conveniently named Bruce), retired from the NSA.
(Side note: My extended family has two Bruces, two Jans, and a total of four Nicks – more than any non-Greek family in the world).
They built their dream house, which was like a little Turkish cultural center on the edge of town. One of my favorite enduring memories of both of them; meeting them on a visit to the Twin Cities, in the little Turkish restaurant down the street from our house; waiting with my kids, for them to come in, and watching the staff’s jaws drop as a couple of middle-aged Anglos would respond in fluent Turkish.
And while she sometimes may have bristled at the limitations of being mom, she loved being grandma. Some of my kids greatest memories, I suspect, involved trips to grandmas house, up over the creek on the southeast side of Minot. Watching those visits certainly stuck with me.
I’m not sure if it was a “pre-social media” thing, but she loved entertaining. She groused about it, of course, but she loved having people over; crowds of teachers, the book club she and her friends ran from probably 1970 to sometime in the mid-90s or early 2002s, and – during the epic Minot flood of 1997, when the city was flooded 15 feet deep, she and her house on the hill hosted probably a dozen people, on mattresses all over the place. It was her ultimate house party.
The picture below? She is sitting with her brother and sister and their spouses, at my fathers place in Jamestown, in September 2017. It was a mini “family reunion“ my brother and sister and I put together.
It was a wonderful couple of days, that brought together all of the branches of our (fairly small) family for the first time in decades. In retrospect, it was also bittersweet; it was the first time most of us noticed Mom‘s memory was misfiring a little too often, and too alarmingly, to be normal.
Her second husband passed away two years ago last month, right as the lockdown started. This left Mom alone in a memory care in Minot, for several miserable months during the lockdown. We have no idea how much damage being stuck, alone (despite the best efforts of an overstretched staff) was for her before the charnel house that was Minnesota’s long term care system settled down enough to move her here, but the ball of rage still burns.
But among the many things I’m thankful for are that we were, eventually, able to get her moved to the Twin Cities, to be back around family, my brother and I, after several difficult months.
Memory problems proceeded to dementia, which eventually turned officially into Alzheimer’s. And yet after 4 1/2 years, things resolved so quickly over this past week or so that I am still very much in shock.
Still, my mother was lucky; she never got to the stage of Alzheimer’s where the disease ate the part of her brain that contained her personality. She remembered me and my brother, and even as her mental loop dropped from 5 minutes to 3 to two down to simple responses to questions, she still remembered who we, her family, and the people around her were, up till the very end. For that, again, I am thankful.
So quit reading, and go hug your parents. Or your kids. Either, or both.
Some exciting news from sunny California… The power of the sun has now been harnessed.
Renewable electricity met just shy of 100% of California’s demand for the first time on Saturday, officials said, much of it from large amounts of solar power produced along Interstate 10, an hour east of the Coachella Valley.
While partygoers celebrated in the blazing sunshine at the Stagecoach music festival, “at 2:50 (p.m.), we reached 99.87 % of load served by all renewables, which broke the previous record,” said Anna Gonzales, spokeswoman for California Independent System Operator, a nonprofit that oversees the state’s bulk electric power system and transmission lines. Solar power provided two-thirds of the amount needed.
It is an achievement. However, Canary Media points out that there’s a bit more to the story…
Understanding the full picture requires first unpacking how CAISO calculated the 97% figure. California’s in-state renewable energy production was calculated as a percentage of energy demand after accounting for transmission losses. This demand figure omits demand met by rooftop solar, which generates power for more than 1 million California customers. Because large hydropower does not qualify for the state’s renewable portfolio standard, it is also not included in this figure.
Another important caveat: The figure does not account for all demand in California, even leaving aside demand met by rooftop solar. CAISO’s system does not include the areas served by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power and the Sacramento Municipal Utility District, two publicly owned utilities that together make up roughly 10 percent of electricity sales in the state.
April 3 was a big wind and solar day for California, coupled with relatively low demand due to mild spring weather. Across the whole day, wind contributed 24% toward meeting demand and solar contributed 22%, followed by large hydro at 8% and geothermal at 4%. Add in minor contributions from biomass, biogas and small hydro projects, and the total renewable percentage for the day was 61%.
But even on this banner day for renewables, 39% of CAISO’s demand was met by non-renewable sources. And even at the 3:35–3:40 p.m. interval when CAISO hit 97% non-hydro renewables, other power plants in the state were running, including gas, nuclear and hydro facilities.
That means California still burned enough gas to meet about 15% of demand at the same moment that it had enough non-hydro renewable production to meet 97% of demand; again, the excess was exported to other states.
Adding large hydro and nuclear into the CAISO mix during the renewables peak yields a maximum of 107% carbon-free power that day, as shown in the chart below. During the three hours when clean electricity was being produced in excess of demand, California was exporting its carbon-free energy to neighboring states, almost certainly offsetting fossil power.
I’ve spent the majority of my career in the employ of Fortune 500 corporations, including my current employer. In the early years, those companies would sometimes make a show of their social goodness but they weren’t particularly wedded to a lefty agenda. That’s changed in the last 10-15 years, but recent events have some C-suite grandees thinking twice:
The fallout from the recent political spat between Disney and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has alarmed leaders across the corporate sphere, according to executives and their advisers, and heightened the challenges for chief executive officers navigating charged topics. At many companies, vocal employees have in recent years pushed bosses to take public stands on social and political issues. Florida’s pushback against Disney has raised the stakes.
Yeah, it certainly has. You have to wonder why a company would choose to make their appeal, ahem, more selective, but the instinct is strong:
“The No. 1 concern CEOs have is, ‘When should I speak out on public issues?’ ” said Bill George, former chairman and CEO of Medtronic PLC and now a senior fellow at Harvard Business School. “As one CEO said to me, ‘I want to speak out on social issues, but I don’t want to get involved in politics.’ Which I said under my breath, ‘That’s not possible.’ ”
It’s not possible. Put more simply, it’s dumb. A CEO who spends more than a passing moment thinking about social issues isn’t paying attention to what really matters. Younger employees, who have gone from participation trophies to believing their opinions are probative without much active contradiction, are difficult to manage, so the urge to mollify them is strong.
My current company has a full range of employee groups that cater to the constellation of grievances of the modern Left. These groups regularly get a moment to hold forth in the latest Zoom Town Hall or on the company intranet page. There’s not a lot of evidence these groups actually improve the conditions they decry, but never mind that. It’s a chance to wave the freak flag, and as an overall strategy it makes sense:
Some executives say they have learned to monitor issues that could consume public attention and increase pressure for some response. Some use employee affinity groups to help flag potentially troublesome issues. “You make it a safe forum where people feel comfortable talking about concerns or whatever, and out of that, there’s really a kind of responsibility on our part to pick up on things that really do demand some attention,” said Nancy Langer, CEO of Transact Campus Inc., a financial- technology company based near Phoenix. “I look at that as a feedback loop for us.”
The challenge, as always, is to ensure the loop doesn’t become a noose.
Monday we took a look at the unfolding economic crisis in Sri Lanka. Yesterday then, some news that India heaved a life vest into the water, while China tied a concrete block to it…
Sri Lanka has extended a credit line with India by $200 million in order to procure emergency fuel stocks, the country’s power and energy minister said on Monday, as China said it supported efforts for the island nation to restructure its debt.
Colombo was also in talks with New Delhi over extending the credit line by an additional $500 million, minister Kanchana Wijesekera told a news conference, with four fuel shipments due to arrive in May.
Beijing’s ambassador Qi Zhenhong told Sri Lankan Finance Minister Ali Sabry at a meeting on Monday that China – one of the island’s largest bilateral lenders having extended about $6.5 billion in loans – supports its decision to work with the IMF to restructure its debt.
“Ambassador Zhenhong also assured Minister Ali Sabry that as a major shareholder of the IMF, China is willing to play an active role in encouraging the IMF to positively consider Sri Lanka’s position and to reach an agreement as soon as possible,” Sri Lanka’s finance ministry said in a statement.
In other words, China is saying “Sri Lanka, you’re already into us for six and a half large. Before we send more good money after bad, you can go to the IMF, but as for what you owe us, we’ll see if we can come to an “agreement.””
In return for China playing the role of angel investors, what sort of repayment might China look for from Sri Lanka?
On the southern tip of Sri Lanka, China helped finance and build the Hambantota Port project. The port opened in 2010. Often cited as an example of China’s “debt trap” approach to its victims, er, partners, China lent truckloads of money to Sri Lanka in the decade that followed, and in 2017, China Merchants Port was granted 70% of the port, as well as a 99 year lease.
The port is part of China’s so-called “string of pearls,” a chain of China-financed ports stretching from Africa to Gwadar to Sri Lanka and around SE Asia and up to Hong Kong.
In addition to that, China is building and financing the Colombo Port City in the capital city, on the west side of Sri Lanka. The project, on reclaimed land, is meant to be an international finance and economic center. It will be interesting to see if China pushes for outright ownership of one or both of these projects as Sri Lanka’s ability to pay its debt plunges.
On Tuesday, the Chinese Embassy in Sri Lanka tweeted this.
To support #SriLankan people at this trying times, #China has decided to provide another 300 million RMB of aid to #SriLanka for the urgently needed drugs, food and fuels etc., which increases the total emergency grant from China to 500 million RMB (approximately 76 million USD). pic.twitter.com/uk1NY91nDy
— Chinese Embassy in Sri Lanka (@ChinaEmbSL) May 2, 2022
This came right after a series of tweets celebrating International Workers Day, but this was the subject of the tweets.
Overcoming all the challenges then and now, the construction work inside the @PortCityColombo never stop.
Sri Lanka is far away, it’s not an especially large country, but current events there may have lessons for us here at home.
Over the weekend, Sri Lanka’s president, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, agreed to remove his brother, Mahinda, as Prime Minister. The Rajapaksa brothers have been at the top of Sri Lanka’s government for nearly twenty years, but this move is the fallout of a serious economic crisis in Sri Lanka that is getting worse.
Sri Lanka’s 26-year struggle against the Tamil Tigers ended in 2009. (At the time, Mahinda was President and Gotabaya was Defense Minister.) That civil war was extremely costly, and the roots of the current crisis go back to the struggle to recover from the civil war. Sri Lanka borrowed what for it was a great deal of foreign money. Today, debt has reached well over 100% of GDP. Combined with a series of tax cuts under President Gotabaya a few years ago, Sri Lanka’s ability to pay back its debt became increasingly difficult.
Beginning in 2019, two shocks served to push Sri Lanka closer to the edge. The Easter bombings in April 2019 targeted several churches and hotels and killed 265 people. The Islamic State claimed responsibility for the suicide bombings. In the aftermath tourism, which is an important industry in Sri Lanka and and brings in a significant amount of foreign dollars which is needed to pay back the foreign debt, declined sharply, putting even more pressure on Sri Lanka’s distressed economy.
Then, COVID hit in 2020 which hurt tourism even more. By February of this year, inflation was running over 17%. There are shortages of fuel and electricity. Predictably, widespread protests broke out in March. On March 31 a large group of protestors tried to get to President Gotabaya’s home. A state of emergency was declared the next day.
Events have snowballed from there. Cabinet members began to resign as the Rajapaksa brothers were unable to hold a unity government together. The value of the Sri Lankan rupee dived, and interest rates have soared.
In mid-April, Sri Lanka said it would default on its foreign debt. Sri Lanka does not have the foreign cash reserves to make the payments due this year. What money Sri Lanka does have is needed for necessities.
Sri Lanka is seeking help from the IMF, and indeed from anyone who is willing. Sri Lanka has talked to India and China about loans as well as fuel shipments. Even medical supplies are starting to experience shortages. The social unrest is not going away any time soon.
Inflation, high debt, rising interest rates, shortages, social unrest. Are we looking into a crystal ball?
This blog hasn’t shown a lot of love for Ilhan Omar.
There are a lot of good reasons for that.
But as Greenwald points out, there’s more than one dimension to keep in mind:
I know she's been demonized by right-wing media to the point of caricature, but @IlhanMN is easily the most independent-minded and principled Squad member, arguably the most independent in the Dem caucus. Among other things, she: pic.twitter.com/3dQyiAFVtH
