Mikhail Gorbachev, RIP

August 31st, 2022

There are some people whose staggering failures are so awesome that they put ordinary successes in the shade. Like Christopher Columbus trying to find a quicker route to India and discovering the New World instead.

Such is the case with Mikhail Gorbachev, who died yesterday at age 91.

Gorbachev never meant to destroy Soviet Communism, he merely meant to reform it so that it could run more efficiently, allowing the Soviet Union to compete more effectively with capitalist nations that were stomping their communist counterparts both economically and technologically. Moore’s Law was creating a tech boom racing so far ahead that the Soviets couldn’t even copy technology fast enough to keep up. Reagan’s obvious resolve and the threat posed by SDI scared them even more. To compete with the west, Gorbachev had to reform his stagnant nation.

His means for doing so were glasnost (openness) and perestroika (reform, or restructuring). Those two methods, meant to rejuvenate Soviet communism, actually ended it. Glasnost made it clear that a majority of Soviet citizens across the various republics hated the oppressive nature of communism. Perestroika was a hard sell to stagnant and ossified state agencies and enterprises. While some well-connected oligarch’s got rich on the first green shoots of capitalist reform, western companies proved unenthusiastic about investing in Soviet co-ventures.

Politically, Gorbachev’s reforms eventually resulted in the draft New Union Treaty, which would have devolved more power to the constituent Republics. This was deemed so threatening to the status quo that an abortive coup was launched against Gorbachev by communist hardliners the day before it was supposed to be signed. The coup, opposed by Russian President Boris Yeltsin and a large swath of Soviet citizens, collapsed in a matter of days, sealing the fate of the Soviet Union, which would dissolve on December 25, 1991.

In the process trying to reform the Soviet system, Gorbachev would stop funding communist movements around the world and withdraw troops from eastern Europe. These were great, liberating decisions, but they were committed in support of reforming Soviet communism, not ending it. By that grand mistake, Mikhail Gorbachev did more to make the world a better place than all previous Soviet Premiers combined.

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Posted in Communism, Foreign Policy, video | 3 Comments »

Kherson Counteroffensive: Day Two

August 30th, 2022

Ukraine’s Kherson counteroffensive appears to be making significant headway. The Institute for the Study of War has some summary goodness.

Ukrainian military officials announced the start of the Ukrainian counteroffensive in Kherson Oblast on August 29. Ukrainian officials reported that Ukrainian forces have broken through the first line of defenses in unspecified areas of Kherson Oblast and are seeking to take advantage of the disruption of Russian ground lines of communication caused by Ukrainian HIMARS strikes over many weeks. Ukrainian officials did not confirm liberating any settlements, but some Russian milbloggers and unnamed sources speaking with Western outlets stated that Ukrainian forces liberated several settlements west and northwest of Kherson City, near the Ukrainian bridgehead over the Inhulets River, and south of the Kherson-Dnipropetrovsk Oblast border. The Russian Defense Ministry (MoD), Russian proxies, and some Russian milbloggers denounced the Ukrainian announcement of the counteroffensive as “propaganda.”

Many Russian milbloggers nevertheless reported a wide variety of Ukrainian attacks along the entire line of contact, and the information space will likely become confused for a time due to panic among Russian sources. Russian outlets have also vaguely mentioned evacuations of civilians from Kherson Oblast, but then noted that occupation authorities in Kherson Oblast are calling on residents to seek shelter rather than flee. ISW will report on the Ukrainian counteroffensive in a new section below.

Let’s snip to that.

Ukrainian military officials announced that Ukrainian forces began a counteroffensive operation in Kherson Oblast on August 29 after severely disrupting Russian ground lines of communication (GLOCs) for weeks. Southern Operational Command Spokesperson Nataliya Gumenyuk stated that Ukrainian forces “began counteroffensive actions in many directions” and have broken through the first line of defense in an unspecified area. The Ukrainian operational group “Kakhovka” stated that Ukrainian forces have cut Russian GLOCs across the Dnipro River in Kherson Oblast and called the situation a “brilliant chance to return [Ukrainian] territories.” The “Kakhovka” group also reported that the Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) 109th Regiment and Russian airborne troops have left their positions in an unspecified area of Kherson Oblast, and Ukrainian wires claimed that these elements withdrew from their positions around Kherson City. The DNR 109th Regiment had previously published an appeal to Russian President Vladimir Putin in late June identifying itself as a forcibly mobilized unit, complaining that it had not been rotated away from the front line for rest, and decrying poor conditions on the frontlines. Ukrainian military officials also released a DNR document dated July 24 that ordered the redeployment of the 109th, 113th, and 125th DNR regiments to Arkhanhelske, Vysokopillya, Zolota Balka, and Davydiv Brid in northwestern Kherson Oblast. “Kakhovka” also shared footage reportedly of a Russian serviceman seeking shelter on the ground amidst heavy artillery shelling while saying that Ukrainian forces have broken the first line of defense on August 29. Ukrainian officials did not discuss the directionality of Ukrainian counteroffensives.

Ukrainian and Russian officials called for civilians to evacuate or seek shelter in western Kherson Oblast on August 28-29. Ukrainian Kherson Oblast officials called on civilians to leave Kherson Oblast to get out of the way of Ukrainian forces and directed those choosing to stay in Kherson Oblast to seek shelter away from Russian military equipment. Occupation authorities of Nova Kakhkovka, where Ukrainian forces have frequently targeted Russian military infrastructure and GLOCS, called on civilians to seek shelter due to extensive Ukrainian strikes on August 28-29. Russian sources reported that Nova Kakhova occupation authorities do not plan to issue evacuation orders. Ukrainian Melitopol Mayor Ivan Fedorov stated that Russian forces evacuated their military hospital in Melitopol on August 29, indicating further fear of intensified Ukrainian activity even in rear occupied areas.

Paragraph of Russian “counteroffensive failed, everything is fine, nothing to see here, return to your homes” blather snipped.

Russian and Western sources claimed that Ukrainian forces liberated five settlements during the first day of the counteroffensive, but Ukrainian sources have not announced the liberation of any settlements at the time of this publication. An unnamed military official of an unspecified country told CNN that Ukrainian forces liberated Pravdyne (approximately 34km northwest of Kherson City), Novodmytrivka, and Tomyna Balka (both about 23km due west of Kherson City). The official also stated that Ukrainian forces liberated Arkhanhelske on the eastern bank of Inhulets River and south of the Kherson-Dnipropetrovsk Oblast border. ISW cannot independently verify CNN’s report and will update its maps if and when more sources confirm the report. The Ukrainian official report about the withdrawal of the 109th regiment that operates in northwestern Kherson Oblast may suggest that Ukrainians have crossed the Inhulets River into Arkhanhelske. Several Russian milbloggers amplified a report from the Telegram-based milblogger Grey Zone (about 276,000 followers) that Ukrainian forces advanced 6km from their bridgehead over the Inhulets River and seized the Sukhyi Stavok settlement (approximately 7km west of Russian GLOCs along the T2207 highway). Ukrainian Former Head of Foreign Intelligence Service Mykola Malomuzh made similar remarks about the liberation of Sukhyi Stavok.

Ukrainian forces also continued to conduct missile strikes on Russian ammunition depots, GLOCs, and strongholds on August 28 and August 29. Beryslav Raion Military Administration Head Volodymyr Litvinov reported that Ukrainian forces struck Russian manpower and equipment concentration point at the Beryslav Machine-Building Plant, resulting in a large fire at the plant. Odesa Oblast Military Administration Spokesperson Serhiy Bratchuk also reported that Ukrainian forces struck a Russian command post near the North Crimean Canal just east of Nova Kakhovka, a Russian river crossing in Lvove (west of Nova Kakhovka along the Dnipro River), and an ammunition depot in Havrylivka (approximately 33km south of the Kherson-Dnipropetrovsk Oblast border). Ukrainian Telegram channels also published footage reportedly showing a strike on the Antonivsky Bridge and a nearby barge. Social media users published footage of reportedly Ukrainian strikes on a Russian ammunition depot in Nova Kakhovka. The Ukrainian Southern Operational Command noted that Ukrainian forces launched eight airstrikes at Russian strongholds and manpower and equipment concentration points along the line of contact on August 28.

Russian forces are continuing efforts to restore their damaged GLOCs over the Dnipro River. Satellite imagery shows that Russian forces are attempting to build a pontoon crossing near the Antonivsky Bridge, which appeared to be halfway finished as of August 27. Geolocated satellite imagery also showed that the Kakhovka Bridge is still out of service with strike holes on the critical junctures of the bridge. Satellite imagery indicated that Russian forces are continuing to move military equipment mostly north toward Kherson City via the pontoon ferry. Satellite imagery showed the movement of 100 Russian military vehicles as of August 25, with few moving south. Such transfer of equipment via ferries is inefficient and vulnerable to further Ukrainian strikes. Russian forces reportedly continue to experience difficulties maintaining other GLOCs to southern Ukraine. Mariupol Mayoral Advisor Petro Andryushchenko stated that Russian logistics efforts relying on Mariupol rail transit will likely falter in the following days due to lack of electricity, damage to station cranes, and flooding that hinders rail operation in Mariupol.

Deutches Welle has a meaty segment on the conflict:

Some takeaways:

  • Ukraine seem to have three main prongs for their counterattack:
    • West of Kherson
    • The land bridge that collects it to Mykolaiv
    • “Further north, near the Kakhovka dam.” (For certain values of “near.”)
  • Still shelling near the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant. (Lots of time spent on this.)
  • Germany is sending Ukraine Vulcano (though the DW announcers pronounce it “volcano”) high precision artillery shells.
  • Ukrainian commander Yurii Bereza says that HIMARS and precision howitzer munitions have been a great equalizer.
  • More than 90 billion Euros pledged to Ukraine. Biggest donors are 1. U.S. (far and away the biggest), 2. UK, 3. EU, 4. Poland, 5. Germany. (Yeah, I know the last two are in the EU.)
  • There’s a lot of talk over Germany going soft due to gas shortages, but German Chancellor Olaf Scholz sounds pretty hardline here, talking about “Russia’s brutal war of aggression.”
  • Private foreign donors have also allowed Ukraine to buy millions in drones.
  • Concerns over rapid depletion of EU weapons supplies. (Also a concern in the US.)
  • Ben Hedges, former commander of U.S. forces in Europe, thinks Ukraine has done a good job of shaping the battlespace and building up forces for the counteroffensive.
  • “The Russians have not yet fixed the many problems [that] were on display back in February and March. Especially their command and control framework …It’s still a mess.”
  • “The logistical system is fragile, it’s exhausted, it’s gotten weaker by the week.”
  • On Putin announcing a 10% increase in troop levels: “I’d bet a large sum of money that there’s not 137,000 Russians willing to step up and join the military.”
  • “There’s a history in Russia of serious inflation in numbers. They’ve never had what they said they had. This is a classic means of corruption, to claim a certain number to draw salaries, when in fact you’re only paying half to three-quarters of that.”
  • “It’s an unhealthy population decreasing in size.”
  • Even if Putin gets the additional troops he wants, it will be months before they show up with equipment.

    • Not only was the Antonivsky Bridge hit again, but the in-progress pontoon bridge was also hit, as was a ferry.

    Ukraine says that all the bridges across the Dnipro River near Kherson are “unusable.” They do appear to have been badly damaged, but I’d take “unusable” with a grain of salt.

    Ukraine also reportedly hit the Russian military headquarters in Kherson. Given Russia’s rigid top-down command structure, that’s potentially a huge blow.

    In-cockpit combat aircraft footage from a Ukrainian Mig-29 in Kherson theater:

    Some tweets:

    As always, the fog of war/grains of salt caveats apply…

    Edited To Update: Here’s a Ukrainian map guy covering the various thrusts of Ukrainian attacks in more detail.

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    Posted in Foreign Policy, Military, video | 2 Comments »

    Kherson Counteroffensive Finally Begins

    August 29th, 2022

    This morning I’m seeing a lot of reports that that long-rumored Kherson counteroffensive is finally beginning.

    The Odesa-based newspaper Dumskaya reports that the Units of the Defense Forces of Ukraine concentrated in the southern direction have launched a counteroffensive at night on the right bank of the Dnipro river in Kherson Oblast.

    Dumskaya says that soldiers deployed on the front lines informed the newspaper that they have already managed to liberate several settlements and advance in the direction of Kherson.

    This information, however, hasn’t yet been confirmed by the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

    Update:

    The Command of the Ukrainian operational group of troops Kakhovka reported that a Ukrainian counterattack knocked out the 109th regiment of the “people’s militia” of the so-called “DNR” from its defensive positions. The Russian paratroopers, who were sent to help them, reportedly fled from the battlefield under the pressure of Ukrainian troops.

    The Kakhovka group command also noted that the Russian forces in Kherson Oblast have been cut off from the supply of weapons and troops from the territory of occupied Crimea.

    Update:

    According to information available to Dumskaya, Ukrainian troops are advancing in at least two directions towards Kherson.

    Nataliia Humeniuk, Head of the United Coordination Press Center of the Defense Forces of Southern Ukraine, says that “the offensive actions are being carried out in many directions in the south of Ukraine.”

    “The counteroffensive has been going on for a long time — it is exhausting the enemy and not giving him the opportunity to advance. And today we started offensive actions in different directions, including in Kherson Oblast,” Nataliia Humeniuk said.

    Sources of Ukrainska Pravda in the Ukrainians Armed Forces stationed in the south note that in some areas there was a breakthrough of the Russian first line of defense, but “it’s too early to say anything concrete, the front is big.”

    Update 13:48

    Oleh Bratchuk, the Odesa Oblast Military Administration’s spokesman, says that so far today the Ukrainian troops hit the following facilities in occupied Kherson Oblast in the Russian rear:

  • Machine-building factory in Beryslav that was used as a Russian base
  • Russian army post near the North Crimean Canal
  • River crossing in Lvove, Beryslav district
  • Ammunition depot in Havrylivka, Beryslav district

    • That’s from Euromaidan Press, a pro-Ukrainian outlet, so treat it with a few grains of salt. From The Kiev Post, another pro-Ukraine outlet:

    Having repeatedly announced plans for a counterattack on Kherson, it seems that today the Ukrainian army has begun implementing orders to liberate the South of Ukraine from Russian occupiers.

    According to an operational group of Ukrainian troops, “Kakhovka,” on August 29, the Armed Forces of Ukraine broke through the occupying force’s first line of defense near Kherson, and the 109th DPR regiment withdrew from its positions. Russian paratroopers, who were the DPR regiment’s support, also fled the battlefield.

    “Ukraine has a brilliant chance to regain the territories, with the help of HIMARS. Almost all the large bridges in Kherson have already been destroyed – the Russian army have been cut off from the supply of weapons and personnel from Crimea,” the message stated.

    The Armed Forces of Ukraine have launched offensive actions in many directions in the south of Ukraine, the head of the joint press center of the Security and Defense Forces “South”, Nataliya Humenyuk, announced on Ukrainian T.V. news.

    Explosions can be heard throughout Kherson region. Massive attacks on Russian bases in Beryslav and Nova Kakhovka, Kherson Region, have been recorded. There are also reports of strikes on Russian infantry.

    Here’s a quick video from Suchomimus, a YouTuber who generally concentrates on analyzing weapon footage from the war:

    He notes the reports of HIMARS hitting Russian infantry positions, something we haven’t seen before and which suggest a counteroffensive is indeed underway. Plus a video of a single Russian soldier freaking out and reporting that Ukraine troops are attacking in force.

    Some relevant tweets:

    Developing…

    Edited to Add:

    This footage of Ukrainian planes pounding Russian positions is all over Twitter:

    Remember, Russia pulled aircraft out of Crimea following attacks on airbases there.

    Edited to Add 2: One of the Ukraine war map guys has a video of the reported tactical situation up:

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    Posted in Foreign Policy, Military, video | 12 Comments »

    San Francisco Shop Owners Reach Their Breaking Point

    August 28th, 2022

    Of all big American cities, San Francisco seems to have had the longest, closest look at what happens when you let the radical left wing of the Democratic Party run your city for decades on end. A half century of Social Justice has turned San Francisco into a literal shithole filled with drug-addicted transients shooting up and defecating on city streets.

    Now shop owners in the Castro District, the heart of gay San Francisco, have reached the breaking point and are threatening to withhold taxes unless something is done.

    Business owners in San Francisco’s Castro district have absolutely had it with the city’s inaction over burglaries, vandalism, and violent homeless people camping on the sidewalks in front of storefronts and residences.

    As the American Thinker’s Olivia Murray notes:

    San Francisco has an established reputation as a capital for fringe culture and leftism, much of which converges in the enclave of Castro. The first “Drag Queen Story Hour” event ever took place in the Harvey Milk Memorial Branch Library in the neighborhood and was “well received.”

    Now, under Democrat leadership, the iconically left community is ready to take drastic measures toward radical American patriotism. Three days ago, the San Francisco Chronicle reported:

    For years, business owners in San Francisco’s Castro district have complained to city officials that homeless people struggling with mental illness and drug addiction have wreaked havoc on the neighborhood. Now, merchants say the situation has gotten so bad that they’re threatening to possibly stop paying city taxes and fees.

    The threat arises from a letter drafted and sent to city officials by the Castro Merchants Association on August 8. According to co-president Dave Karraker, if the calls are neglected, the response will be civil disobedience, including refusal to pay taxes.

    Karraker said:

    If the city can’t provide the basic services for them [businesses] to become a successful business, then what are we paying for? You can’t have a vibrant, successful business corridor when you have people passed out high on drugs, littering your sidewalk.

    No, no, you can’t, which is why conservatives suggest not incentivizing criminality and drug use, nor electing D.A.s who hail from domestic terrorists and despise law and order like Chesa Boudin.

    First a school board revolt over Critical Race Theory, now a Howard Jarvis-esque tax revolt among business owners over the crime and disorder the radical left has inflicted on San Francisco.

    The good news is that if a tax revolt can happen in San Francisco, it can happen anywhere. The bad news is, it took 58 years of uninterrupted Democratic Party rule for citizens to reach their breaking point. (San Francisco’s last Republican mayor left office on January 7, 1964. Since then, Democrats (including the Reverend Jim Jones) have had complete control.)

    As the infection of Social justice has metastasized throughout the Democratic Party, even the most basic, fundamental aspects of city governance (enforcing the law, maintaining public order, protecting life and property) have become ideologically impossible to maintain.

    To have one-party Democratic rule in your city is to ensure its eventual destruction.

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    Posted in Crime, Democrats, Social Justice Warriors, video, Welfare State | 4 Comments »

    The Crazy Smart Felon Who Lived In A Toys “R” Us

    August 27th, 2022

    This is one of those crime stories that make your jaw drop at the audacity. Jeffrey Allen Manchester, AKA “Roofman,” AKA “Rooftop Robber,” made his name by cutting down through the roofs of McDonalds restaurants, hitting “over 40 stores in nine different states” from 1998-2000. He usually hit his restaurants right before they opened or after they closed. “Everyone noted he was exceptionally polite.” He was finally caught May 20, 2000, after robbing a McDonalds in Belmont, North Carolina, after having hit another McDonalds 10 mile away just a few hours before. He was sentenced to 45 years in prison.

    And that’s when the story gets weird.

    Some highlights:

  • On June 15, 2004, after four years as a model prisoner, he used his job in the metal shop to fabricate a panel to lay under the rails of the truck that picked up finished metal goods from the ship, letting him escape Brown Creek Correctional in Polkton, North Carolina.
  • Though he had family in California, he only went as far as Charlotte.
  • There, he managed to carve out a living space inside a Toys “R” Us store behind a bike rack.
  • He subsisted on baby food from the store. Honestly, I’m not seeing this setup as much preferable to prison.
  • He kept tabs on store personnel using baby monitors.
  • He tunneled into the abandoned Circuit City next door at set up a larger hidden space there, with Spiderman posters on the wall and a DVD player. He even slept on Spiderman sheets.
  • During this time he got bolder, and started eating at a nearby Red Lobster. (Don’t know how he got the money; maybe fenced merchandise from the store?)
  • He joined a local Presbyterian church and started dating a woman in the congregation. Not exactly “keep a low profile” behavior.
  • Naturally, he always spent time at her place. His excuse? “He had a government job that he couldn’t tell anyone about and that his accommodations were in a sterile and uncomfortable office-type building.”
  • He finally held up the Toys “R” Us the day after Christmas, but two employees managed to slip away and alert police.
  • “Things went even further sideways when an off-duty sheriff’s deputy arrived at the scene, Manchester responded by punching her, stealing her gun and running away.”
  • Police finally caught him by luring him to his girlfriend’s place for supposed party.

    • I’m surprised they haven’t already made a movie about him…

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    Posted in Crime, video | 1 Comment »

    LinkSwarm for August 26, 2022

    August 26th, 2022

    Democrats behaving badly, Russian tanks behaving badly, and CNN thinking people don’t hate them. It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!

  • Three Democratic cities are suffering the slowest recovery from Flu Manchu.

    The progressive approach to law enforcement in certain major US cities, supported by George Soros and others, has been a complete failure as residents’ quality of life has collapsed. Soaring violent crime and controversial open-air drug markets plague the downtown areas of San Francisco, Cleveland, and Portland, transforming these areas into wastelands.

    A recent study commissioned by the Institute of Governmental Studies at the University of California Berkeley found that San Francisco’s downtown activity was only 31% this spring (between March and May) compared to pre-Covid levels. Cleveland was at 36%, and Portland was at 41%.

    Meanwhile, after the pandemic, Salt Lake City, Utah, Bakersfield, California, and Columbus, Ohio, experienced the most massive booms in downtown activity.

  • Kurt Schlichter wants our GOP grandees to realize that it’s not 2005 anymore.

    Oh, Mike Pence, you soft, naive little man. Oh, Tim Scott, you kind and friendly gentleman. I like you both. I really do. I would love you to be my neighbors. If I ran short of sugar or charcoal, you’d square me away. Not so much bourbon, but whatever. If I asked you to help me move or give me a ride to the airport, you suckers would be all in because you are nice guys. And that’s your problem and the problem of Republicans like you. You are nice guys in a time that calls for ruthless killers who want to destroy our enemies and leave them on their backs, figuratively cockroaching on the floor.

    We want vengeance and victory. You want hugs. I guess that’s nice. Hugworld would be pleasant, but it’s the hardcore bomb throwers who get us to that stage by pummeling our enemies into submission. You find that unsavory, disconcerting, unseemly. You would prefer a world of comity, collegiality, and unicorns. And that ain’t happening until we warrior cons have broken our enemy – yeah, I used the “E” word – and exacted our payback and thereby ensured that their pain is so great that they will not dare even dream of repeating this nonsense again for a generation for fear of our righteous wrath.

    Your problem is that you live on forever in a world that no longer exists, if it ever did. You live in a world where there are norms. You live in a world of rules and guardrails, where the institutions are at least nominally neutral and where we all share some basic premises that provide common ground. But we don’t. They hate America. They hate believing Christians and Jews. They hate the idea of free speech, freedom of religion, the right to due process, and not killing babies three seconds before they poke their heads out. They think kids should be mutilated to conform to gender delusions. They want us normals disarmed, disenfranchised, and, more often than you softies will admit, deceased.

    Snip.

    It’s time to accept reality and embrace the suck. The suck is that we are in a fight. It’s not going to be over when we pass a few laws or overturn some terrible precedents; those are necessary but far from sufficient actions. No, we are in a long and brutal political struggle where the stakes are our liberty, and while you want to figuratively clutch your pearls and worry about whether this is who we are, we know who we are. And we are the guys and gals who want to figuratively don our plate armor, sharpen our broadswords, and get some, Knight Templar-style.

    Mike Pence, Tim Scott, I like you. And I would love to live in your world. But that world exists only in your imagination, and I and the rest of us in the base are stuck here on Planet Earth. You guys can’t be president because you are not wartime consiglieres. You are both Tom Hagan, reliable and soft Tom Hagan, when we are Michael and we need a Sonny to go after the Barzinis and Tartaglias of the left.

    It’s sad that your dreams of the presidency in 2024 must die, but you don’t get it, and you can’t fake it. This was a test, and you failed. If you are still imagining that there might be some set of facts awaiting public disclosure that makes it okay to send guys with guns to invade the domicile of your primo political opponent, if you still can’t bring yourself to demand that the disgraced FBI be defunded and dismantled so it can never try to frame another GOP politician, then you are not up to the job. You don’t get to be president because you don’t know what time it is.

    (Hat tip: Ace of Spades HQ.)

  • Chicago Public Schools come out in favor of rioting and looting.
  • Evidently posting this image to Twitter will get you banned.

  • “Antonovsky Bridge Hit Again.”
  • Russia puts on a tank biathlon with some of their loser friends. Hilarity ensues.
  • CNN is suffering from delusions of grandeur.

    One thing about leftist culture that never ceases to amaze is their ability to take a failure and pretend that it was actually a success. This attitude is perhaps an extension of their penchant for propaganda – They lie so much about everything that they end up falling victim to their own disinformation. They tell their enemies they are winning even when they are losing, and then they actually start to believe it themselves.

    It’s a bit like the old rule for drug dealers – Everything falls apart when you start smoking the drugs you sell.

    For CNN and outlets like them, the problem is that you can’t run from reality forever. If no one wants to watch your content then you can’t force them to do so. Leftists wish they could use force, but they can’t, so instead they try to use gaslighting and shame. This has translated into the typical tactics we see today from the media, which include race baiting and accusations of bigotry, misogyny, homophobia, fascism, etc. These tactics really took center stage from 2016 onward and they haven’t worked yet, but the political left continues to beat that dead horse in the hopes that it will one day win the Kentucky Derby.

    They NEED regular consumers to watch their content, but they look down their noses at regular consumers and see them as untouchable peasants. So, they don’t make content for the peasant, they make content for themselves and their friends. This is not a recipe for a successful media network.

    In a recent article on the CNN issue, Vox (a far-left outlet) remarked on Brian Stelter being fired and his show being shut down even though he still had three more years on a six-figure contract. David Zaslav, an executive from Discovery, has taken oversight of Warner Brothers and its properties and has been making extensive cuts to save money and streamline the bloated company. Vox’s position really illustrates the deeper problem within leftist media:

    “Stelter, who reportedly made close to $1 million a year, was an easy cut: His show, along with his daily media newsletter, was a big deal in media circles…but not a huge draw for normals.”

    By using the term “normals” one might conclude that Vox sees themselves and and other journalists as “extraordinary” when compared to the rest of us. Or, maybe they are just “abnormal” – It’s hard to say. The statement is possibly a mistaken admission of how leftist journalists truly view the world, and their view is stunted. They see their work as vital to the masses because their PEERS and Twitter buddies see it as vital to the masses. But mainstream journalists are too far detached from the world and reality to make objective judgment calls. They see themselves as the saviors of humanity, but no one else sees them that way.

    The audience numbers talk. The money talks. It doesn’t matter how important you think you are – You don’t own the audience, the audience owns you.

    CNN has been a consistent loser in terms of audience numbers and ratings; their ratings have plummeted while their profits continue to slump over the past few years. The CNN+ project was supposed to draw in millions of viewers but only generated 150,000 subscribers, and of those subscribers only 10,000 were regular watchers.

    In other words, CNN+ would have been crushed by average YouTuber numbers and their projections for at least 29 million “super fans” were absolutely incompetent. This is why the project was shut down within weeks by David Zaslav – It was an embarrassment from the start, built on inflated delusions of grandeur.

    Forget “delusions of grandeur,” CNN suffers from “delusions of not being widely loathed.”

    And what is CNN really built on? What has been the company’s foundation for years? It’s only product has been anti-conservative agit-prop. That’s it. That’s all they have. This might work financially if the extreme left was as prevalent as they pretend, but if we look at the numbers and the cash flow, they are actually a tiny portion of the population puffed up and screaming as loud as they can to appear big and formidable. CNN is failing because there is an unsustainable audience for their product.

  • “Arizona ‘Has Had Enough,’ Starts Stacking Shipping Containers In Border Wall Gaps.” Good.
  • Federal court strikes down Texas gun law…and for once its good news. “A federal judge has struck down a Texas law preventing individuals aged 18 to 20 years from carrying handguns in public, in the first major court ruling on Second Amendment rights since the Supreme Court recognized a constitutional right to carry firearms in public for self-defense.” Cudos to Judge Mark Pittman for getting it right.
  • Japan pulls a 180°, ew-embraces nuclear power.
  • Remember how the left slobbered all over Gravity Payments CEO for giving everyone a $70 salary? Well, he just resigned after a rape allegation. (Hat tip: Instapundit.)
  • Democrat boycott of Goya Foods actually increased sales.
  • Democratic State Rep. Sergio Munoz Jr. to pay $1.2 million in damages for legal malpractice. Namely not mentioning that he and the judge presiding over a divorce case he was involved with had previously been law partners.
  • “Light wood framing is the hamburger of the building industry.”
  • “Nobody will win the streaming wars.”
  • “‘Rings Of Power’ Showrunners Clarify That Any Resemblance To The Works Of Tolkien Is Purely Coincidental.”

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    Posted in Border Control, Crime, Democrats, Elections, Guns, Media Watch, Military, Social Justice Warriors, Texas | 3 Comments »

    School District by School District, Critical Race Theory Is Being Defeated

    August 25th, 2022

    Time and again, when ordinary parents have a chance to weigh in on Critical Race Theory or transsexual madness (or any other racist/Marxist/social justice warrior/victimhood identity politics agendas), they reject them soundly. This week, we have multiple example from two different states.

    In Texas, two different north Texas school districts have tossed critical race theory into the trash where it belongs.

    On August 22, two Dallas-Fort-Worth area school districts made significant changes to their standards of instruction and education materials.

    Keller ISD, accused last week of banning the Bible and “The Diary of Anne Frank,” adopted new content guidelines to evaluate books available in their schools’ libraries.

    The guidelines prohibit texts that contain “sexually explicit conduct,” “descriptions of sexual abuse,” and “Illustrations of nude intimate body parts.”

    The policy passed 4 to 2 with one abstention. President of the Keller ISD school board Dr. Charles Randklev gave the opening remarks at the meeting.

    “The media has done an absolutely terrible job covering what is happening in Keller ISD,” he addressed the crowd.

    “For the record, Keller ISD has not banned the Bible or Anne Frank.”

    “Sexually explicit obscene content has no place in our schools. The new Keller ISD Board of Trustees and the district has acted decisively to protect our children from pornographic material.”

    Dozens of people gave testimony at the meeting that lasted for hours. Detractors claimed that the content guidelines were overly vague and could lead to more books being banned than necessary.

    During the Keller ISD meeting, Grapevine-Colleyville ISD was embroiled in its own discussion over the adoption of new district policies.

    Part of the measure is similar to the Keller ISD book review policies aimed at eliminating “pervasively vulgar and obscene” books from their schools.

    Regarding changes to curricula, the policy asserts, “The District, including its teachers and administrators, shall not teach, instruct, advocate, promote, or discuss any ideas, beliefs, or concepts that have any connection or are otherwise consistent with so-called ‘Critical Race Theory’ (CRT) or ‘systemic discrimination ideologies.’”

    Outside of CRT restrictions, the policy also restricts transgender athletes’ participation in UIL sporting events and prohibits the “promotion of gender fluidity.”

    CRT and tranny madness both on the dust heap. I call that a Win/Win.

    Speaking of winning, a lot of that also happened in Florida.

    Florida flipped multiple major school boards from liberal to conservative Tuesday evening, continuing a nationwide trend of parents taking back control of public schools.

    Florida school board elections have been a major political battleground this cycle, with big names like Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) and Rep. Byron Donalds (R) making endorsements and joining the campaign trail.

    While primary elections occurred in Florida, New York, and Oklahoma Tuesday, Florida has general elections for school boards, meaning the winners will be the official members of the boards.

    Many of the winning candidates have been endorsed by the 1776 Project PAC, an organization that has been instrumental in flipping school boards from liberal to conservative across the country.

    “We saw massive election victories all throughout the state of Florida tonight,” 1776 Project PAC founder Ryan Girdusky told Breitbart News Tuesday. “It shows the desire of parents and residents across the country for some normalcy in our education system, and that means pushing against transgender ideology, critical race theory, critical gender ideology, and equity which destroys merit in education.”

    “The 1776 Project PAC hopes to take these successes across the country,” he said.

    Sarasota County

    The Sarasota County School Board flipped from a 3-2 leftist majority to a 4-1 conservative majority.

    All three conservative candidates — Bridget Ziegler, Robyn Marinelli, and Timothy Enos — won their elections to flip the board.

    Each was endorsed by the 1776 Project PAC and Gov. DeSantis.

    Clay County

    The Clay County School Board now has a 3-2 conservative majority after three conservative candidates won their elections.

    Erin Skipper, Michele Hanson, and Ashley Gilhousen won their seats — all of whom were endorsed by the 1776 Project PAC.

    This school board has been the subject of much controversy, with recent testimony from father Wendell Perez telling the Florida surgeon general that Clay County Public Schools secretly starting “transitioning” his 12-year-old daughter without his knowledge.

    Perez’s daughter was called a male name and pronouns. She soon afterward attempted suicide in her school’s restroom.

    There’s nothing like the righteous fury of a parent finding out their child is being groomed.

    Duval County / City of Jacksonville

    The Duval County School Board, which also encompasses the City of Jacksonville, also flipped conservative Tuesday evening.

    DeSantis-backed candidates Charlotte Joyce and April Carney won their seats — Joyce was reelected and Carney defeated incumbent Elizabeth Andersen. Both candidates were also endorsed by the 1776 Project PAC.

    As Breitbart News reported, Andersen had been caught in the past few weeks using racially charged language against black parents in her school district, calling those who disagreed with her publicly “tokens.”

    Miami-Dade County

    The Miami-Dade School Board was flipped conservative Tuesday as well, making it the largest school district in the country with a conservative-majority board.

    Roberto Alonso and Monica Colucci won their elections, both of whom were endorsed by the 1776 Project PAC and Gov. DeSantis.

    Martin County

    The Martin County School Board has flipped conservative with all three 1776 Project PAC-endorsed candidates winning their seats.

    Christina Li Roberts, Jennifer Russell, and Amy Pritchett will now sit on the board.

    That’s a whole lot of school boards flipping in a short period of time.

    As San Francisco’s school board election showed, Critical Race Theory and radical transexism are political losers every time parents get a chance to vote on them. If I had guess, I’d have to say wokeness in general is one of the big reasons (though far from the only one) that blacks and Hispanics are abandoning the Democratic Party in droves.

    Now conservatives just need to take the time and make the effort to oppose social justice lunacy everywhere across the country.

    (Hat tip: Ed Driscoll at Instapundit.)

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    Posted in Elections, Social Justice Warriors, Texas | 3 Comments »

    Ukraine’s Attrition Strategy

    August 24th, 2022

    A lot of questions have popped up about the much-talked about Ukrainian counteroffensive for Kherson, among the biggest of which is “Where is it?”

    Anders Puck Nielsen, a military analyst at the Royal Danish Defence College, has some answers. What Ukraine is doing right now is not a traditional counteroffensive, but a prolonged attrition strategy to degrade Russian logistics and forces.

    Some takeaways:

  • Usually you want some level of operational secrecy, but Ukrainian officials have been talking up the “Kherson Offensive” since at least June.
  • “I think it was meant as a kind of trap. It was not enough for Ukraine to liberate Kherson, but they also wanted to take out a lot of Russian soldiers in the process.”
  • “This area west of Dnipro is probably the one area in the whole operational theater where Ukraine has all the advantages, and Russia has all the disadvantages. So it is better for Ukraine to fight as many Russians as possible in this area than it is to fight them later on somewhere else.”
  • Putin was faced with withdrawing or reinforcing. “And of course Putin was not going to give up Kherson without a fight, so Russia started pouring reinforcements into the area.”
  • The phrase that describes Ukraine’s strategy is “accelerated attritional warfare.”
  • Ukraine’s strategy: “To cause the Russians to have as many casualties as possible rather than defending specific pieces of terrain. And then what we see around Kherson is that Ukraine has figured out a way to accelerate that attrition among the Russians by luring them into a trap where they send reinforcements into an essentially undefendable area.”
  • So the frontline isn’t moving, but “the Ukrainians expect them to run out of supplies eventually, and then it will be easy.”
  • “I talked about the bridges, and how Ukraine can target the Russian logistics by destroying the bridges. And I also talked about how this war seems to have entered into what can be called the third phase of the war.”
  • Phase 1: Russia invades, tries to take Kiev, and fails, because their logistics suck. Advantage Ukraine.
  • Phase 2: Russia grinds out gains in Dobas, with logistics adequate to the task. Advantage Russia.
  • Phase 3 (current): Ukraine starts degrading vulnerable Russian forces in the south. “So they are going very hard after the Russian logistics systems. And that is what the attacks in Crimea and other places long behind the frontlines are about.”
  • “But the point of the attacks is exactly to make the Russian logistics as complicated as possible. To make the supply lines as long as they can possibly be. Because Russia now has to pull the ammunition depots even further away from the frontline, and they have to use trucks instead of railroads and stuff like that.”
  • “And the supply lines in Kherson and Zaporizhzhia oblasts are actually beginning to look very much like they did in northern Ukraine in phase one of the war.”

  • “That accelerated attrition [and] the sustained attacks on the Russian supply lines will mean that Ukraine can be in a pretty good position after the battle of Kherson. They will have all the territory west of the Dnipro. And it will be very easy to defend afterwards, because Russia is not going to come back across the river once they have lost that foothold. And then Ukraine will have freed up all those forces from the Kherson area that they can redeploy for a new counteroffensive somewhere else. So that could for example be an attack from the north down toward the Melitopol area. And Russia would be in a really tough position for such a fight. Because they don’t have more forces they can move from the Donbas area, because they already did that for the battle for Kherson. And they don’t have good logistics because Ukraine will have been hitting the infrastructure for months.

    • Conclusion: There’s no guarantee of Ukrainian success, but it’s hard to see what Russia can do to counter this strategy. “After that Ukraine will redeploy and make a new counteroffensive somewhere else. Perhaps a Christmas offensive or something like that.”

    Winter offenses are always a hard sledding in this part of Europe, but the rest of his analysis accords pretty closely with what we’ve been seeing.

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    Posted in Military, unions, video | 21 Comments »

    State of Texas Lowers Boom On Harris County Over Police Defunding

    August 23rd, 2022

    It looks like the Democrats running Harris County are finally going to face some consequences for defunding law enforcement.

    Texas Comptroller Glen Hegar has ruled that Harris County reduced funding for some law enforcement agencies and will be subject to sanctions under a new state law enacted last year.

    According to a letter addressed to Gov. Greg Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, House Speaker Dade Phelan (R-Beaumont), and Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo, Hegar said that his ruling is in response to complaints filed by Constables Mark Herman (Pct. 4) and Ted Heap (Pct. 5) regarding funding changes last year and in a proposed budget for next year.

    One of the key allegations Hegar is investigating is the county’s move to take away more than $3 million in so-called “rollover funds” from constables’ offices. Last year, commissioners voted 3 to 2 along party lines to remove these funds from the eight elected constables as well as the district attorney’s office, based on a recommendation from County Administrator David Berry.

    Hegar notes that the proposed budget for Fiscal Year (FY) 2023 will reduce funding to the constables’ offices by over $12 million as compared to Short Fiscal Year 2022, which covers March through September of this year. Although the county appears to be revising the proposal, they are still poised to reduce overall funds for constables by $3 million.

    “The budgeting practices of Harris County may not provide the Constables Office with full authority to expend their allocated budget to meet public safety needs,” wrote Hegar.

    Signed by Abbott last year, the state’s “Back the Blue” legislation punishes cities or counties with populations of greater than 250,000 people if they reduce allocations for police, by either freezing property taxes or forcing cities to revisit any annexation done in the last 30 years.

    Thus, Hegar writes, if Harris County proceeds with the constable’s budget as proposed “without obtaining voter approval, the county may not adopt an ad valorem tax rate that exceeds the county’s no-new-revenue tax rate.”

    Snip.

    Last week, Hidalgo and County Commissioner Adrian Garcia (D-Pct. 2) held a press conference to tout increases in “public safety spending” that included non-traditional expenditures such as $1.5 million for public Wi-Fi, $8.4 million for new trails, and $50 million to address blight and add sidewalks and street lights.

    With the possible exception of streetlights, none of that makes anyone safer, but does provide nice conduits of graft to shovel to left-wing cronies via rigged bidding contracts (a Hidalgo specialty). We know from an in-depth dive into the Austin defund effort’s Reimagining Public Safety document that letting leftwing activists steal money from police funding to line their own pockets is one of the primary goals of the “defund the police” movement.

    The interesting thing about this ruling is that, compared to Austin’s defunding push, Harris County’s defunding efforts were relatively modest at-the-margins stuff. No showy reductions in headcount or refusals to let new cadet classes move forward, just a quick raid to hoover up some loose cash from the constables while no one was looking. That this was enough for Hegar to drop the hammer indicates that defunding the police is a dead letter in Texas.

    Does this mean the state government can nail Austin for their much more egregious defunding efforts? Probably not. The worst of that happened in 2020, while the law wasn’t passed until 2021. So unless the Austin City Council stupidly tries to stick their hand in the APD cookie jar again, I doubt they can be held to account for that under this law, unless they try the same trick again. On the other hand, time has proven again and again that there are few limits to Austin City Council stupidity…

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    Posted in Austin, Crime, Democrats, Texas | No Comments »

    New PayPal Walmart Phishing Scam Making The Rounds

    August 22nd, 2022

    There’s a new phishing scam making the rounds. I’ve received examples of this one twice myself over the last week, and since it’s a lot more sophisticated and polished than the average email phishing scam, I think it’s worth taking a look at.

    Scammers are using invoices sent through PayPal.com to trick recipients into calling a number to dispute a pending charge. The missives — which come from Paypal.com and include a link at Paypal.com that displays an invoice for the supposed transaction — state that the user’s account is about to be charged hundreds of dollars. Recipients who call the supplied toll-free number to contest the transaction are soon asked to download software that lets the scammers assume remote control over their computer.

    KrebsOnSecurity recently heard from a reader who received an email from paypal.com that he immediately suspected was phony. The message’s subject read, “Billing Department of PayPal updated your invoice.”

    While the phishing message attached to the invoice is somewhat awkwardly worded, there are many convincing aspects of this hybrid scam. For starters, all of the links in the email lead to paypal.com. Hovering over the “View and Pay Invoice” button shows the button indeed wants to load a link at paypal.com, and clicking that link indeed brings up an active invoice at paypal.com.

    Also, the email headers in the phishing message (PDF) show that it passed all email validation checks as being sent by PayPal, and that it was sent through an Internet address assigned to PayPal.

    Both the email and the invoice state that “there is evidence that your PayPal account has been accessed unlawfully.” The message continues:

    “$600.00 has been debited to your account for the Walmart Gift Card purchase. This transaction will appear in the automatically deducted amount on PayPal activity after 24 hours. If you suspect you did not make this transaction, immediately contact us at the toll-free number….”

    As always, look at every message from any financial institution as a potential phishing attack, so never click on links sent in email. Use your regular browser login to see if it’s a real issue, and if it’s a phishing scam, be sure to report the email in question.

    Let’s be careful out there…

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    Posted in Crime, Waste and Fraud | No Comments »

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