sherpa

No. Wrong again. Hegseth gets no pass from me. The "grunts" as you call them don't need a SecDef as an example. They need to be trained, prepared, equipped and deployed capably and honestly. Most couldn't name the SecDef, and that is fine. I think you are amazingly naive about this. There are secrets and there are secrets. Your comparison of this to Mossad is ridiculous, and I guarantee you the SecDef is in possession of far more things that would climb the ladder to your analogy which he wouldn't disclose. Didn't happen. Again, I have no interest in defending the guy, and couldn't care less about him personally, but firing him? I say that with the caveat that I really don't know what the second circumstance was, and if he has a defense, I'm willing to listen rather than send him out to the firing squad because, be assured, there are entrenched individuals who will do whatever they can to avoid upsetting the status quo. Just like illegal immigration, DOD is an independent industry that seeks to maintain their current circumstance.

People in senior positions don't need to have an "example." Doing this, if he did it intentionally, and I think there is some question, is a stupid, irresponsible action, but these folks in senior positions don't need to be led by example. They kind of know what they're doing after 30 years. What they do need is sensible, rational policy, and choosing leaders based on record of performance instead of gender and ID politics.

It's been happening since war was invented. That is not to say it is OK, or should be tolerated, but if you fired everyone who shared info with a spouse you wouldn't have anybody left. Again, condemnable, but if it ends now, I'm over it as I think we have have far more serious things to worry about. The press loves the story because it's easy and requires no knowledge of actual import, but, if it was related to a strike where any level of capable integrated air defense was in opposition, I would be very disturbed.

Perhaps you should stop telling people what to do. I don't know enough about the changes at DOD to do that, and I really doubt anyone here does either. I do know that the previous DOD and senior Pentagon people were not well thought of by the people in positions I am familiar with, and they had a bit of the Vietnam control from Washington going on, where there was significant disagreement between the guys with the triggers and the suits in DC, and that is never good. Hegseth was a strange and risky choice, but he expressed solidarity with Trump in getting the war fighting aspect back instead of this insane social experimentation that was going on in both training and appointees. It's too early for me to have an opinion on him, except to be displeased at these stupid mistakes that thankfully had no consequences.

You should apologize because you lied. I have never said anything close to the quote you invented. Further, nobody here has any "responsibility" to anyone else, except maybe to be honest and not lie about them or assign views. The Hegseth thing was really stupid. I'm not certain the truth about the second occurrence is really known yet. Still, the impact was zero, because the Houthis couldn't do anything about it. But it can't happen. The impact of actual insanity in handling our military is absolutely impactful though. To wit, the foolishness that Washington imposed on Red Sea carriers that were firing million dollar plus missiles against few hundred dollar drones. Seeking authorization to strike in Yemen, they were denied, except to attack sites that had just launched drones. The Houthi actions resulted in length deployment extensions for the Ford and Eisenhower task forces. These extensions really impact maintenance schedules and subsequent deployments. More importantly the dramatically impact retention rates, which are more important than recruitment goals. The US servicemen throughout the ranks operate very sophisticated systems that take years to master. Senior enlisted and junior officer retention is critical, and it is really harmed by continued extensions to scheduled deployments. You recruit the serviceperson, but you "retain" the family, and understanding that is crucial. In the last few months, the Pentagon has OK'ed offensive operations against Yemeni positions that support or supply the Houthis, and that is a logical, sense making approach compared to what we were doing under the previous admin. I don't care if the fire Hegseth or not. I care immensely that our military is deployed with purpose and intelligent response.

I'm not sure what this additional bullstuff means, and by the way I have never expressed any "lover for these idiots," to quote your additional lie.

I have not interest is addressing someone's invented fantasies, and I have never claimed anything remotely close to your invented quote: "Oh yeah, man, it's totally cool the guy was texting his mistress battle plans to show off." You made it up and assigned it. Total nonsense.

Absolute nonsense, and complete bullstuff. You invented this claim, and then further assigned it to someone. This happens way too frequently here, and it's deliberate deception. I commented on military recruitment, and the good news what it was up. I then argued why that was important given the mission and the status of our current capability. The claim you made is your pure fantasy, preposterous, impossible and a lie.

I am unfamiliar with this claim. Who did this?

Say whatever you want. I'm just stating how it is. Iran is way more dangerous than it was. Russia has started a war. China is very aggressive.

It doesn't matter how anybody rates the "relative peacefulness" of a president. What matters is what Congress has deemed the military mission to be, and what it takes to be able to provide that. Right now, the mission is to be able to wage full warfare on two fronts. One in the Middle East or Europe, and the other in the Pacific. That takes a certain amount of manpower and capability which we currently don't have. We are short about 1000 Air Force pilots. We have fewer and far older airplanes than in decades. We could not possibly handle the operational tasking we covered during Desert Storm. Not possible. We are short two carriers, a bunch of Naval Aviators, and we can't man the carriers we do have. Every carrier that has gone to CentCom, or the Med/Red Sea has been extended beyond reasonable time. That has a massive impact on retention. We are wearing out our airplanes, which have a defined service life, at an astounding rate. Far accelerated from the initial plan. Our ship building capacity is sorely lacking, but getting better. That's the way it is. Want to change that? Change the mission requirement. Either way, the bump in recruitment is the best news in years.

This makes absolutely no sense. The recruitment numbers, and trend changes are very good news. Undeniable.

There's a good deal of irony in this. Jesus was put to death by the Romans, because the Jews did not have that power under occupation. He was put to death on a made up charge of sedition, which was a capital offense under Roman rule. The Jewish church Pharisees and leaders pleaded with the Romans to do it, thought Pilate had no desire to do so. The reason they did it was because he was upsetting their nonsense Jewish law, which they had invented over the years, far away from what Moses was given. So, Jesus gets executed for going against non religious traditions. Everything posted in the claim of disparaging the Easter celebration is also a non religious human "tradition."

I used to go to Guayaquil and Quito a few times per year. I liked their coconut broth sea food dish called Encocado de Pescado. Very good because the fish used is covina, which is even better than Chilean Sea Bass. Kind of like halibut but a bit better. I always ordered ceviche, because that is my favorite food in the world, but it's better in Peru. I found the food in Guayaquil to be better, since it's a coastal town catering to tourists. The food in Quito was more traditional, but I still ordered the ceviche. But they sold roses for dollar per dozed, so I always bought a couple dozen home.

Unfortunately, that isn't currently possible. There is no such coalition available or foreseeable. The US Navy is the only force dealing with freedom of navigation in international waters, just as the US military is the only force behind NATO, and footing the bill, and just as the US industrial base is footing countless foreign tariffs aimed against us, by allies and enemies. That is the reality.

A common, and meaningless event. We do this same thing all the time.

.Saw Byrd and James, Booker and a few others. James was the best corner I ever saw. As a fan, on passing downs, you could eliminate watching routes on the side of the field he was playing, because the simply would not throw there. He was a physical force in a time it was, somewhat, allowed. Simply the best.

So, being so convinced of this nonsense, why did you back down from a $10,000 wager regarding this? By the way, I get that processing language is not your strength, but I never claimed to be a "winemaker." Enology, or often spelled oenology, is the correct term, but never claimed that. I grow and sell a French Bordeaux red wine grape in the Monticello AVA, and have done so since 2008.

False premise, as always. Your link suggests nothing of a 5% 30 gov bill. By the way, I'm not sure you are familiar with this subject, but you posted it. You might want to educate yourself on the difference between a bill and a bond. Show me a 30 year fixed yield of a reasonable provider, (not junk), let alone the US gov, that is 5% per your claim. I'd buy it today.

Pure nonsense, as always. The bond market, also known as the fixed income market is just fine.

Head Coach Tony Bennett's surprise decision to retire at Virginia was the canary in the coal mine signal. Stating the reason as the changing landscape of college basketball was code for the portal and NIL. They spend all their time recruiting and raising money. Such a shame.

The NPR hearing with Katherine Maher was an absolute TKO.

Just stupid You can find any comment you want. Not interested. Find someone on the strike who had any concern, or better yet, find someone who claimed that it mattered or effected anything.

I'm not pretending anything. I understand their concern as it was a major screw up and needs to be fixed. You can find anyone on the internet to make any claim you want. But what happened? Nothing. I taught Soviet anti air systems and am familiar with the basics of these, which are derivatives. You could tell the Houthis that we were going to strike this target at this time using this weapon and this delivery maneuver, and it wouldn't matter. Any successful shot would be pure luck, and surely not the result of what this foolish leak was about.

I have criticized it over and over and over. Maybe you can't read. What I am claiming is that the threat is being exaggerated for political reasons. Are those two views hard to understand? Further, I am not part of any cult, and whenever that claim is made, it marks the claimer as a goof.