Coffeesforclosers

He has billions of dollars. He'll have the best defense money can buy, and he can retain them forever. Right or wrong, he'll beat this the same way every billionaire beats this. Unless he does something really stupid.

It's good news for sure, but don't echo chamber yourself inside a positive feedback loop. The Quincy Institute has some pieces from the Realist perspective on how to resolve the war. They're at least measured in their tone and thoughtfully argued, though as usual you wonder about what evidence it's based on. George Beebe is alright.

Huh. Interesting. Alright I'll keep an eye on this story. I don't read Polish so hopefully it'll filter through into media in a language I do read. What's going on in Israel has been chewing up a lot of my current events time. But so far, Peter Zeihan's call that May will be pivotal month in Ukraine has lease on life.

Most of the headlines I could find on the subject indicate Wagner's still there. That's been going on for some time now unfortunately. The Russian army is horribly inefficient, but that doesn't make it ineffective. Moreover, Russian society is still largely resigned to their army being horribly inefficient, and is unwilling to make their leadership pay any kind of price for it for now. It's a conventional war between mobilized nations who believe in their respective causes (or won't oppose them), whatever the logical merits of those causes are. The war won't end until the sides either stop thinking they can win, or start thinking they will lose. There's also always the chance some total ***** calamity occurs like France in 1940, but that doesn't seem likely.

Open Source Intelligence Lists of equipment destroyed, damaged, abandoned and captured. Something's up. The last few days there's been a spike in losses on both sides when it comes to tanks, apcs, and IFVs. Russia's got the initiative right now, so my guess is that there's a Russian tank attack going on. And the attack achieved some sort of success, because Ukraine is committing tank units to stop it. And Ukraine's counter attack had some kind of success, because their tank losses are about 1/3 Russia's, and Russian losses include captured vehicles. Oryx's twitter has regular updates. All this coincides with reports of a big tank battle around Adiivka. So those reports are probably true. The last time Russia committed masses of armored vehicles to an offensive was against Vuhledar, and it was a disaster for them. Adiivka is about half way between Vuhledar and Bakhmut, so punching through Ukrainian lines there threatens both places. It also makes sense for Russia, since the Russian Army operates most of their armored vehicles, while Wagner is mostly an artillery/infantry force of expendable shock troops. So Wagner keeps grinding itself to bits in Bakhmut while the Russian Army smashes tank units into Ukrainian defenses to the South. Where Russia hopes to create a breakthrough that forces Ukraine to pull back to avoid encirclement. And where Russian offensives take advantage of developed, relatively secure lines of supply through the LPR/DPR. Basically a replay of what Russia achieved at Popasna last year, which forced Ukraine out of the fortresses of Lysychansk and Sevierodonetsk as well. I guess I understand why Ukraine wants to fight it out where they are, even though my casualty averse western sensibilites think its nuts from time to time. They know the terrain. They've got strong fortifications. They can't assume they'll get back any towns they abandon. And they assume any population they give to the Russians will be filter camped and deported to Russia, or subjected to forced assimilation backed by intimidation and violence.

Read Sherpa's conversation with All Pro. It's proceeding exactly how I expected it would.

Really what we should be asking is why the hell this has to be an "either/or" proposition. I'm not against building the wall, and I'm not against helping Ukraine stack Russians up like logs. But my two parties are for some reason...

Of course you're right legally, not to mention morally and ethically. But I have a feeling like your about to get an education on how the America First! Agenda doesn't really care about the Constitution as it relates to ratified treaties.

Meh. It's the sort of pragamtism based hypocrisy I've come to expect from an elected official. DeSantis was for arming Ukraine back in 2014 so he could beat Obama over the head as a weak appeaser. Now he's against it in 2023 because GOP primary voters are increasingly against it and he needs to drive wedges into Trump's base. There's no deep thinking here. Just short term politics driving short term strategy. This is the heart of why we lose.

Politico: Trump prepares an extensive opposition file on ‘Ron DeSanctimonious’ So Trump is preparing to hit DeSantis as soft on child porn, among other things. His point is to show DeSantis is Jeb Bush with a thin veneer of MAGA paint, while totally not gaslighting that DeSantis is soft on child grooming.

*shrugs* I'll be worried about it when there's more to worry about.

First Prize... Is a Cadillac El Dorado.

Please use your wit and wisdom to explain this to All Pro. He's utterly convinced that Russia is waging a crusade against some global order run by Zelensky, Boris Johnson, and a lady named Cynthia Nuland.

Eh, this is where Tayyep Erdogan would step in. Were he not fighting for his political life because his political party took bribes and kickbacks instead of enforcing building codes. Or doing disaster relief. And 60,000 Turks died. Israel too, except they're drowning in domestic turmoil. Or China, but Xi's leadership has been so weak and so milquetoast on the Ukraine issue it's been a year and they still don't know what to do. Also ditto the turmoil. India just hosted a diplomatic summit where Russia's foreign minister was laughed out of the room on camera. And they're still getting bribed by everyone to not help anyone else. Ka-ching! Well played, India. Russia, for some reason, can't just take an L and live to fight another day. Because they're Really, Totally, For Real Guys, fighting a Nazi Satanist Globalist Warmongering American Hegemony or some other gibberish that comes with a useless liberal arts masters degree. We're happy to dump money and weapons into Ukraine for as long as Ukraine is willing to turn our support into dead Russians. Europe is split between countries who were occupied by Russia and justly hate them. And countries that are now scared of Russia but would really like this all to go away so they can get back to making money. It's an odd world.

Colin Powell...I wonder how history would have changed had Colin Powell run for President in 1996 instead of Bob Dole. Anyyyyyway...

Pass. TD Phins Talk is a Dolphins YouTuber with about 25k subs. That barely registers when it comes to "influencer" status. If none of the Dolphins beat reporters are saying anything, there's nothing going on. He just had a kid too, so if he wrangles another couple thousand subs off the rumor mill, good for him and his side hustle.

The video starts with the line "It's day 373 of Vladimir Putin's 10 Day Special Military Operation..." and moves on in the same spirit. Sky's not exactly being sympathetic to Putin. The battles for Bakhmut are winding down, Russia's going to take the city as expected. Nobody knows why they want it so badly but hey, they're getting it so bully for them?

Twitterbrain is real. Were I Russia, I'd want to stop this war as quickly as possible. Usually when global diplomats are laughing in the face of your foreign minister...in public...it means you've lost respect. Certainly nobody laughed at Russia before this war started. But they do now. Even Colin Powell's bogus bull#### on Iraq and WMDs was received with more dignity that Lavrov's moralizing talking points.

I really wish I could disagree with this. And ***** off with that Reagan worshipping bull####. I'm a Union man and Reagan can go straight to hell.

I'm an old school republican. I want limited government, reformed institutions, and a country that works for its citizens. I don't need a revolutionary party that smashes everything it deems to be corrupt. There is no party of limited government left. Just parties of activists playing to our base instincts and the internet age's addiction to outrage and instant gratification.

If you can't run'em up, the fill'em in! I wonder if this means McDermott's bringing in Jerrod Mayo? I think NE is running a 3-3-5 base defense, where one of the LBs is actually more a old school Strong Safety type player.

This was informative, but not in the way you intended. The first entity to say Keir Simmons was put on a hit list is Russia Today. A news corporation financed directly from Russian Government revenues. The only entities reporting Russia Today's "hit list" story are twitter accounts and susbtack authors. Like the twitter account and substack you posted. kanekoa happily retweets Michael Flynn, without commentary or analysis. So your source retweets Russia Today and Michael Flynn uncritically, while adding subtle digs that align with RT propaganda. This isn't earth shaking information. This isn't investigative journalism. This is literally how message amplification propaganda works, step-by-step.

Nuanced opinions? Come now sir, don't you realize this is the Internet?

George Pataki would have beat Hochul by 30pts. There just aren't any George Patakis left.

The beginning of the the end for the hard shell exterior helmet.