World’s oldest cheese found smeared on heads of 3,600-year-old mummies StudyFinds
“We sold our house for this”: Cruise passengers ‘stranded’ in Belfast before 3-year long trip Belfast Telegraph
Climate/Environment
Lambert will have a separate post on Helene coming later today.
Asheville cut off from world; damage estimated $100B in South The Center Square – North Carolina
Hurricane Helene’s ‘historic flooding’ made worse by global heating, Fema says The Guardian
Western NC Open Thread: What do you need/know/want? North Carolina Rabbit Hole
***
Climate policies that achieved major emission reductions: Global evidence from two decades Science (IME)
***
Poison PR Lighthouse Reports. The deck: “US taxpayers funded a covert campaign to downplay the risks of pesticides and discredit environmentalists in Africa, Europe, and North America.”
U.S. Races Towards Lithium Independence with Ambitious Mining Projects OilPrice
Electric cars causing fires after Hurricane Helene flooding WFTS Tampa Bay
Pandemics
RNA-Seq analysis of human heart tissue reveals SARS-CoV-2 infection and inappropriate activation of the TNF-NF-κB pathway in cardiomyocytes Scientific Reports. Translation:
Inflamed from Within: How COVID-19 Ignites Heart Damage
Here is a version non-medical language terms.
Scientists recently uncovered something unsettling in a study of 54 heart tissue samples. The virus behind COVID-19 can creep into heart cells too, stirring up a storm of… https://t.co/iPL4dJW5Ir
— David it Up! (@Dave_it_up) September 29, 2024
China?
China property shares jump as major cities ease buying curbs Channel News Asia
China unveiled its hydrogen-powered train at a trade fair in Germany. The zero-emission train generates electricity through a hydrogen-oxygen reaction, producing only water as a byproduct。pic.twitter.com/jrVNS3ECC8
— Zhang Meifang (@CGMeifangZhang) September 29, 2024
***
Biden Approves $567M Defense Assistance for Taiwan The Defense Post
Zheng Yongnian: Asia-Pacific, destined for world war? The East Is Read
Old Blighty
Britain Can’t Afford Rachel Reeves (2) Building a New Economics
European Disunion
Email from Athens set to cause von der Leyen, Metsola headaches Euractiv
Austerity, corruption, and neglect: How the Greek railway became Europe’s deadliest Modern Diplomacy. From last year, still germane.
***
Austria: Right-Wing FPÖ Achieves Historic Victory The European Conservative
Sahra Wagenknecht wants to coordinate BSW negotiations and break them off if there is no willingness to compromise Die Sachsen. “Wagenknecht reiterated in the RND that the state governments must take a clear position on the deployment of US medium-range missiles.”
Sahra Wagenknecht’s Party Is a Bad Example for the Left Jacobin
First Week of German Border Controls Had Little Effect on Immigration European Conservative
Sweden’s spreading crime epidemic alarms its neighbors Politico
War in Lebanon could fuel another European migration crisis Unherd
Syraqistan
Israeli F-15s Strike Infrastructure in Yemen After Ansuruallah Ballistic Missile Targeted Ben Gurion Airport Military Watch
Heavy bombardment hits Israel from Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen The Cradle
An Israeli airstrike hits central Beirut for the first time in nearly a year of conflict AP
IDF may have already begun small raids on Hezbollah in south Lebanon – reports Times of Israel
US occupation base hit by ‘intense’ rocket, drone strikes in Syria The Cradle
‘Israel’ expands aggression, intensifies strikes on Bekaa, Hermel Al Mayadeen. Commentary:
They’re now bombing Baalbek.
Baalbek is a world heritage site. And the same people who issued condemnations of ISIS, rightfully so, for their destruction of Palmyra will be silent if Israel destroys the temple of Bacchus. https://t.co/OAU96H1kla pic.twitter.com/q4M1U1POwL
— Philip Proudfoot 🇱🇧🇵🇸 (@PhilipProudfoot) September 29, 2024
Samantha Power and Sir Andrew Wood: where are they now with respect to Israeli atrocities in the neighborhood? Gilbert Doctorow
***
‘Israel’ assassinated Sayyed Nasrallah with US-made bomb: US senator Al Mayadeen
Legal Experts Criticize Biden for Praising Israel’s Extrajudicial Killing of Hassan Nasrallah Orinoco Tribune
End of an Era: What Hassan Nasrallah’s Assassination Spells for the Middle East New Lines Magazine. Commentary:
September 27th is the most important day in the Middle East since the Abraham Accords breakthrough.
I have spent countless hours studying Hezbollah and there is not an expert on earth who thought that what Israel has done to decapitate and degrade them was possible.
This is…
— Jared Kushner (@jaredkushner) September 29, 2024
Hezbollah leadership already replaced following Israeli airstrikes BNE Intellinews
Hezbollah: 10 Things You Need To Know Hauntologies by Elia Ayoub
***
Microsoft’s CEO for Israel to Appear at Event Celebrating Israeli Military AI Drop Site
Chase Doubles Investment in Israeli Weapons Manufacturer The Progressive
Google Was Set to Host an Israeli Military Conference. When We Asked About It, the Event Disappeared. The Intercept
New Not-So-Cold War
The West is trying to pressure Russia through Iran, but is it possible? RT
Zelenskyy on preparation for Ramstein meeting: We must decide how to increase pressure on Russia Ukrainska Pravda
Zelensky US Trip Flops; West Says Ukr Losing; Vuhledar Siege; F16s Destroyed; MidEast All Out War Alexander Mercouris (video)
Sources say Ukraine’s Military Intelligence Chief Budanov could be replaced soon Euromaidan Press
Norway is mulling building a fence on its border with Russia, following Finland’s example AP
Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland want EU funds to beef up border with Russia Euronews
Trump
Kamala
Retired military general described as ‘the finest warrior’ backs Harris for president The Independent. Stanley McChrystal, who among many other post-retirement duties, is chairman of the Board of Siemens Government Technologies and is on the strategic advisory board of Knowledge International, a licensed arms dealer cozy with the UAE.
Why Harris’ support from retired U.S. military leaders matters MSNBC
When odious foreign policy elites rally around Harris Responsible Statecraft
Kamala Harris campaign motorcade halted by confused robotaxis The Register
Democrats en Déshabillé
As FTC Chair Lina Khan’s Term Expires, Democrats Are Torn Between Donors and Their Base Wired
Gov. Newsom vetoes California’s controversial AI bill, SB 1047 TechCrunch
As extreme heat rises, Newsom blocks bill to protect California farmworkers Cal Matters
Imperial Collapse Watch
Belarus expects approval as BRICS prepares to add 10 new members Anadolu Agency
Police State Watch
“I Saw a Mirror”: Marcellus Williams’s Execution Enrages Palestine Solidarity Protesters The Intercept
Our Famously Free Press
The Empire Strikes Back Ken Klippenstein
All That Twitters The Baffler. The deck: “Who owns a piece of Elon Musk?”
Supply Chain
US East Coast port strike set to start Tuesday, says union Reuters
AI
Southern California’s hottest commercial real estate market is for tenants that aren’t human Los Angeles Times
The Bezzle
Crypto founder paid LA cops to help extort victims for crypto, FBI alleges Coin Telegraph
Guillotine Watch
In the US, opioid-maker Purdue is bankrupt. Its global counterparts make millions The Examination
Antitrust
Monopoly Round-Up: Corporate Slumlords and Housing Cartels BIG by Matt Stoller
Class Warfare
Tenants vote for rent strike at Independence Towers, Quality Hills if demands aren’t met Kansas City Star
Tenants Rise Up The Baffler
A tribute to longtime Maui resident Kris Kristofferson The Maui News
Antidote du jour (via):
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
227 comments
Comments are closed.
“Kamala Harris campaign motorcade halted by confused robotaxis”
Like pagers, it may only be a matter of time until these things are weaponized. So you could have a motorcade going down a street when some hacked robotaxis make their move. While two or three block the motorcade from the front and the rear, another that is laden with explosives makes a direct run at its target. No risk to the assassins who may not even be in the same city as the attack. Nobody will even see it coming until the first time that it happens. And such an attack does not even need the resources of a nation state to conduct it. Oh brave new world…
I just chalk it up to karma: the brainless meets the brainless. Not to get foily, of course.
Hmmmm. I’m just considering an AI that only used Kamala’s speeches and interviews as a training set. Man, that would be hilarious that.
Pretty clearly the largest set used already, based on performance and utility.
Or perhaps it will be something even more ominous:
“It is unclear if the cars that got in the way of Harris’s motorcade were glitching, or if the incident signifies the beginning of a robot uprising or other AI-organized political protest.”
The robots could be Trump supporters! AI deplorables! We’re doomed!
On the positive side, maybe it’s the first glimmer of the Singularity and AI will start taking over to save the Earth from the destructive homo sapiens.
If I was Ernst Blofeld III and new leader of SPECTRE, I would not harm Western political elites and protect them at all costs—-someone competent might actually rise up to replace them!
Sounds like a good investment opportunity for Isrseli govt funded capital. But does it really need to 15 yrs this time?
“How beauteous robotkind is! Oh brave new world that has such automatons in ‘t!”
We have been read our Miranda rights. Tis a Black Mirror that reflects back our sable hearts.
We conjure things mechanical. It is a rough magic that we here make.
Another scenario: a city full of robo-taxis finds itself “bricked” when those taxis, along with some autonomous 18 wheelers, converge at major intersections, bridges, and in tunnels, then just stop and refuse to move.
It’s an appropriate manifestation of a cluster*&^% of policies.
For any scifi fans who might be interested, there is the Terra Ignota series by Ada Palmer. One of the major plot points in this political scifi series is a network of self-flying(!) robocars that can bring a person anywhere in the world in under two hours. There are, however, drawbacks.
Some really fascinating politics in the series, and the first two books are tremendous reads. The last two, not so much, and maybe just check out the Cliffs notes for those.
This is my punishment for oversleeping: all the best responses have already been taken.
Just like with drones (now being launched into Israel on the daily from groups in Yemen, Syria, and Iraq ranging from the highly organized Houthis to angry college kids in Iraq after previously being a tool used by the US and Israel to terrorize them), the pager stunt is gonna bite back hard in a few years for the west.
Could be any Tesla though, right?
It would take a powerful explosive to penetrate heavily armored VIP SUVs. Drone swarms may be more effective.
Good morning, I look forward to the post by Lambert on the disaster caused by Helene.
Helene was really a nothing-burger in my immediate area, but I have friends and co-workers in Western NC, and the scale of the damage there is simply devastating. Roads washed out, I-40 shut at the TN line because half of the eastbound side just washed away (the entire thing looks structurally unsound.) Stories of people being evacuated by helicopter, mudslides impeding folks ability to get out of their homes, no power possibly for weeks. The governor said over the weekend to consider all roads into W. NC as closed.
I think this may be the future for a lot of areas in mountains in the east where “orographic lifting” due to upslope enhances rain totals from tropical storms. I also think that the media is underplaying/ignoring the story because it is in mainly rural “flyover” areas that don’t matter to the PMC and coastal elites.
I wondered this too, so I checked CNN yesterday afternoon. At the top in the middle was a video of the flooding and an article or two just below. On the left and right side was Trump, the wars, and other things I can’t remember. My take was, OK, there is some info, but not a lot. Seems less than what I remember in the past, but I might be remembering wrong.
Some PMC friends of mine were talking about it as well, and this one really made me perk up. Somebody mentioned a Tweet where the Tweet said; I saw more coverage on Fox Sports pre-football game than they did in all of cable news. The reply was priceless, IMO.
Of course…
Coming from the same people who accuse any non vote blue no matter voter a cult member. We can’t vote our way out of this when people on both sides believe in fairy tales.
I am in asheville, I haven’t seen a single FEMA vehicle anywhere. I’ve seen a vehicle that had an emblem identifying it as having come from New Jersey, smallish disaster response looking thing parked at the civic center. Also a team that had trucks identified as a terrorism task force team, specifically a swift water rescue team from Illinois. They were deployed at a spot where a creek was running across a secondary road, monitoring for problems but otherwise not active. Today is the first day I have had internet. I had to assume the devastation was hugely widespread as there are so many stranded and devastated, yet no visible response so far. Yesterday was the first day I even saw any equipment rolling on the roads in asheville. A few caterpillers lumbering through town and I was suspicious they were locals. The county hasn’t started distributing water even though there is none in asheville. Just a few businesses selling water.
R U OK???
I am okay, my wife and I have no power and no water in town. My family is in worse shape in the surrounding area, cut off by bridge collapse. Have been ferrying fuel to them so neighbors can run generator to pump well water. We may be getting it from them by next week as our supply will run out. Could really use some large scale, coordinated, federal support in this area. Seen a few transport helicopters overhead but no distribution of water, fuel or food happening in buncombe county. I am unimpressed with the response if my feelings be known.
the short answer is yes. I typed a longer response but I don’t think it went through. It is bad, but me and my family are okay for now. Need federal help before people get desperate. No water in the city, hard to get gas, occasional fights at the gas stations and heard tell of a shooting at one.
Yes, most importantly best wishes that you, yours and everyone affected is hanging in there.
There is an obvious slant to this below being the Cato Institute but there is sone truth in it. Our federal government just can’t get quick response to disasters done very well.
https://www.cato.org/blog/hurricane-katrina-remembering-federal-failures
What it takes to change that I don’t know.
How fast did relevant branches of Federal Government respond to disasters in the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s? If the relevant branches responded to disasters faster in those decades, study how Government worked and what kind of people were let into it to staff it and if a different sort of people staff it now, start purging them out and start letting back in the former type of people.
Also, restore missing taxation back to New Deal-to-Eiesenhower-Era levels to begin funding again those government functions which take money to pay for and achieve.
And shrink some non-disaster-helpful government spending areas like Military Keynesian Jobs Programs to spend that money on disaster preparedness and disaster action response instead. It could be a ” genuinely useful jobs” program to make up for some of the Military Keynesian jobs which would be fired out from under the Military Keynesian Spending jobholders.
Simple but not easy. It might take as many decades to restore government functionality as it took the Reagan-era-to-now antigovernment arsonists, termites and moles ( What Thomas Franks called ” The Wrecking Crew” in a book by that name ) to destroy that functionality.
And could that be done or even begun without a very long running and very violent Civil Class War?
I just saw some pics on NY Times that showed some big thing laid across a road and maybe some railroad tracks. I can only wonder what is needed to move that.
In Asheville…
“I saw more coverage on Fox Sports pre-football game than they did in all of cable news. ”
Maybe appeal to the athletes on Southern teams of various sports to give reports or make appeals?
If they haven’t already started…
The best ongoing national coverage I’ve seen is actually from USA Today.
My local fishwrap had the Helene story on page A11 of the Sunday paper. On page A2 was a story about singer Lana Del Rey reportedly marrying an alligator tour guide.
I’m finding the estimates of damage and the actual loss of people pretty startling myself. I’m in the impacted area as well, upstate of South Carolina to be specific, didn’t get through unscathed but now have power up and the water was always running. One appreciates creature comforts, like for instance using your personal choice of cash or card to purchase a few gallons of gas….I never call the Quik Trip to ask if they have gas for sale at the ready!
Am hoping to work ( remote 100%, a nice advantage ) today and have some normalcy. As for parents and the teachers of local schools…i don’t imagine western NC parents are too concerned at this moment. South Carolina has much damage but less catastrophic, it would seem.
I’m appreciative of the coverage and related treatment here when it’s covering climate or environmental events.
My sister lives in Spartanburg County. As of ~8:00 AM this morning, more than 90% of ~175K Spartanburg residences are without power, including my sister, and virtually all other Duke Energy supplied residences:
Poweroutage.us
She is a middle school teacher, no school Friday (power went off early Friday morning) or today.
Thanks for that map and update. The power map really shows how metro Atlanta dodged a bullet. As of Wednesday/early Thursday, Helen was forecast to track right over downtown Atlanta. Then something changed around landfall Thursday evening. The storm moved further eastward, with the center heading through the Dublin area (not very populated compared to Atlanta.)
Being on the west side of the storm made a huge difference. I don’t think we saw any winds over 35mph here. All the energy seems to have gone over the eastern part. We got around 7″ of rain, but the ground here was very dry and seemed to have soaked up a lot of the rain like a sponge.
If that initial forecast of the track had verified, we might be looking a huge disaster in N. GA.
I’m told that Atlanta below downtown took a lot more damage than the northern areas. Seems the Braves (now out of downtown) were even having games this weekend.
Makes sense as the south side was closer to the higher winds. I still don’t think anywhere in the metro area took the sort of damage that happened further east, or in NC/SC. At least they aren’t reporting on it in the local news.
Here in Alpharetta, we got gusts to 40+ mph and about 4-5 inches of rain. A bad storm, but the kind of storm that I expect to see every year or few years.
I haven’t been downtown, but I have seen some news reports that make it seem worse, yes.
Downtown had power in areas yesterday evening and in my nearby neighborhood I have power. Those out in the county may be out much longer but the latest from Duke says they hope to have most or all power restored by Friday.
https://www.wspa.com/news/local-news/watch-gov-mcmaster-to-speak-in-greenville/
It sounds like hardest hit will be in Western NC–once poor people Appalachia and now full of wealthy retirees and a thriving hipster culture. It’s also a big tourist draw and here’s a report on one of the more long standing tourist villages. It sits at the base of Chimney Rock Park and for those who’ve seen Michael Mann’s Last of the Mohicans that’s where he final climax with that long waterfall was filmed.
https://www.wspa.com/news/local-news/damage-is-unimaginable-in-chimney-rock-after-images-show-half-of-village-wiped-out/
Here’s another power outage map that shows all affected states, not just NC:
https://data.citizen-times.com/national-power-outage-map-tracker/area/north-carolina/37/
I wrote something about this this morning but guess my links didn’t go through. The only real info was that Duke expects SC power in general to be back on by Friday. We have lots of downed trees–now cut and shoved to the side–and plenty of trees left. Except for a few damaged cars and houses the impact other than financial may not be that great. I, near downtown, now have power.
The Ohio River Valley, where I am, was hit with heavy rain and high winds from Helene. Trees and power lines were knocked down. Thousands were without power across the region (Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana and West Virginia). Many are still without power. This is an area with lots of hills and valleys, mostly rural. I’ve tried to reach a few elderly friends but their phone service is still out today.
Scioto County, Ohio, which is along the Ohio River, has experienced massive flooding and is under a state of emergency. Flood water was up to 12 feet. I have many relatives there. My cousin said the community is helping each other. Also getting help from the Salvation Army. It is one of the poorest counties in Ohio (24% poverty rate). The reach of this storm is just devastating.
I’m looking forward to Lambert’s post too as I only see snippets about this disaster in the media. Maybe what is needed is a disaster map. Ever seen those radar maps showing the intensity of storms by colours so light rain might be depicted with yellow but by the time you get to intense rainfall, it is coloured black? So you could have a map of eastern America with light damage depicted in yellow, heavy damage in red and finally severe damage in black. You could call up an overlay map showing which areas have no power while another overlay map might show which areas have had their water cut. Yet another overly map would show which roads and railway lines have been cut and which airports have had to shutdown.
My wife and I live in Midwest Florida, Tampa area. Her anxiety level is now off the charts. We dodged the Helene bullet better than Neo, just power out for maybe half an hour. But there’s “something gestating” in the same vague area where Helene hailed from.
She is agitating to move “somewhere safer,” and researching.
Until this past week she was looking toward NC, SC, maybe north GA. Now? Where is “safe” for us over-70 folks with tiny savings and modest fixed income? It costs a ton to downsize, pack and move. People here are, I think, going to discover pretty quick that the “value” of their home, if they are lucky to be homeowners, is headed way down. So where is the down payment for that new place, in an unknown town, without friends or relatives and with unknown but likely broke-down but necessary medical resources, going to come from?
We can bet the insurance cartel will be activating their wholly-owned legislators, “regulators,” and governor to offload all their liabilities and jack up premiums. “Government” has no solutions, is doing damn-all little to harden infrastructure and is fully invested in directing all wealth inward and upward.
Not complaining — we have it so much better (this time, at least) than millions of others. It’s obviously going to get worse, not clear if it will ever “get better.”
All while Gaza and Lebanon get the snot bombed out of them by the LikudKushnerWar Party, on the happy road to WW III…
I wonder how many folks who overpaid for homes sight unseen, waving inspections, ended up buying in known flood areas?
Another “gift” from Jay Powell, Ben Bernanke, and Congress. Inflated homes that wash away …
“overpaid for homes sight unseen” – RE/MBS per Bill Black back in the day and Hudson.
Minnesota is a good place to retire. Yes, it is cold for a considerable part of the year (climate change may mitigate that) but it consistently ranks highest as the best US state to grow old and be able to stay in your own home with long term care services as needed. It is where I would go if I were healthy and able to move (which I am not). Minneapolis-St. Paul is expensive but there are many nice smaller MN cities and towns that are safe and affordable.
Simularly, I would also say that upstate NY if you can stand the property taxes could be a decent alternative to FL/NC/GA. Not as bitterly cold in winters any more thanks to climate change, but beware the Lake effect snows. They get fewer but more intense episodes.
Strategic positioning outside of the snow belts may help. The Niagara Falls area is not normally hit as hard as the southern tier. Rochester also usually escapes the worst.
My wife told me when they used to go to visit relatives in Niagara Falls, NY, they would refer to it as ‘Stink City’ in the 60’s, and she has vivid memories of the different chemical laden hues of air that were on display.
The one time I was there, it seemed like an ok place if not rundown a bit with predominantly older homes. The city leadership’s grand strategy 25 years ago was to do a land-swap with the Seneca, allowing them to take over a failed convention center and turning it into a casino with 300 feet tall ceilings, place your bets.
I distinctly recall the odor driving up the 290 as a kid. Most of the chemical industry is long gone, leaving only EPA toxic waste cleanup sites. The last time I was in Niagara Falls the air seemed clean, though the abandoned homes and boarded-up storefronts gave a distinctly creepy feel. The Casino injected a bit of life, but it is still a sad place compared to the Canadian side.
On the drive up from Buffalo, you saw the anything goes debris field of late 19th century American industrial might, long ago closed down chemical factories and the like on the other side of the Niagara River, left to rot.
Once you clear the border into the Gulag Hockeypelago, there are vast fruit orchards.
Quite the contrast…
Southwestern Pennsylvania and Pittsburgh has taxes somewhat lower than NY state, and the cost of living is low. While they do get a few lake effect snows the winters are much, much milder than say Buffalo, NY. Low crime rate, good schools, and low housing costs with mild summers make it pretty attractive. I used to live there and found the people to be friendly and helpful — kind of like in the Midwest. The drivers are polite to a fault.
That area also gets train bombs, courtesy of railroad precision scheduling, brought to you by neoliberalism.
If you are referring to the East Palestine, OH derailment yes the fumes from that burn came over the area. Trying to avoid proximity to railroad accidents could be quite a challenge anywhere in the country.
Of course there are hills in this area, so choose a place to live not in a valley.
Western Pennsylvania, as well as eastern Ohio and most of WVa, is underlain by the Marcellus formation, the fracker’s delight. That means poisoned ground and surface water (they actually spread the chemical goo that these wells output on the roads as a de-icer). Then there’s the earthquakes. Then there’s huge trucks hauling sand 24/7 with exhausted drivers.
And we know that if there’s oil and gas under land, it will be fracked eventually as we eventually have pump jacks operating on the Mall in DC.
Of course as manmade global warming drives the bitter cold zones further north, the icky ticks with their icky tick diseases spread further north, chasing the retreating hard winter zone.
Southeast Michigan does not have widespread Lyme Disease yet, but we are just waiting for manmade global warming to bring Lyme Disease to Southeast Michigan, for example.
One might have to think about all the different things to stay safe from and whether retreat to somewhere safer or preparing to survive in place might be more achievable.
As raindump waterbomb events happen in more new and unexpected places, people will discover that they were living in little insta-flash floodplains that no-one ever imagined existed before.
Somewhat the same problem. I was looking at SC (from CA) as a possible desitnation, but that’s due for serious reconsideration…
Wishing that all NC folks in the affected areas stay safe!
Mother-in-law is 45 mins north of Tampa, same latitude as Cape Canaveral. Rarely hit by hurricanes. Irma was the closest brush so far, but made a last-minute turn. Helene did not even rate a power outage.
I have a friend and his wife who live south of Asheville (Pisgah Forest) with his father (who has dementia). He made a short call to me two days after telling me he had nowhere to go because his house is on a hill and both roads to town go over the French Broad River and the river was so flooded he could not even tell if the bridges were still there. He cannot go south either because it is a small country road with trees littering it for miles.He said he had enough water for quiet a few days but no showers. He has a well that runs on electric so when the water is down that is it. They probably have enough food for a while with rationing. He was at least happy that he could finally meet his neighbors. And luckily his father just keeps asking if they can go out to eat somewhere.
I have not heard from him since Saturday morning.
We have talked about climate change a lot over the last five years as we try to settle on what is the most important or fundamental catastrophe we should focus our advocacy towards. We decided the biggest catastrophe is the greed and power taking over peoples hearts and minds. And unfortunately, we said it would be events like this that would finally start to humble people.
The damage wrought here in the medium climes of the Sierra Nevada due to orographic lift by 2023’s atmospheric rivers did so much more damage than to the flatlands, with clogged culverts that weren’t taken care of beforehand, being the leading reason for road failure.
We took a drive a year ago in May to assess the situation and were repeatedly stymied by missing parts of road, the most spectacular being little Eshom Creek-a pipsqueak of a creek usually, but not that one day when deluge came where it was large enough to remove a bridge to the point where there was 60 feet of nothing where the span used to be, and a chasm 30 feet deep, yikes!
A couple of motorcyclists rode up, and I offered them a buck each to jump the span, Evel Knievel style. Maybe I could have sold the deal were there suitable ramps on either side, but all I got was a ‘you’ve got to be joking!’ look that spoke of the volume that came by once upon a time.
How do you prepare for 20-25 inches worth of something liquid comes this way?
That will be our new normal~
About 15 years ago in early October we received the perfect storm, a warm one out of season that rained up to around 8k totaling 8 inches with no damage done aside from chairs, coolers, etc. by the river that were swept away into the lake, and another inch would have meant a fair amount of destruction by those close to the rivers, a couple inches would have doubled the destruction and so on.
20 inches of rain would destroy most every business here on Hwy 198 along the river, which is sadly what happened in NC on a widespread basis.
The photo of I-40 is so reminiscent of the damage to our roads here, one stretch in particular en route to Cedar Grove that took a year and a half to fix as there was no nothing underneath what used to be the road.
I read that Mt. Mitchell or maybe Klingman Dome logged 28″ of rain from Helene.
All that water had nowhere to go but down the mountain …
I-40 is a big truck route from the Midwest down into NC and when I go out West via Tennessee that’s the route I take. The mountain clinging bit through the Smokies was the last part to built–the proverbial million dollars a mile when a million was real money–and they had lots of trouble with rock slides onto the roadway. When it was finally completed celebration was general. Arguably the coming of the Interstate system to Western NC had a lot to do with the transformation of Asheville from Look Homeward Angel plus Vanderbilt and his castle to the tourist mecca of today.
So the loss of I-40–for as long as it lasts–is a big deal. The freeway continues on to the east so presumably they will get supplies that way. And they say there are also blockages of !-26 between my town and Asheville but likely a lot less serious.
Yes, the loss of I-40 and I-26 is a big deal, especially with traffic between east TN and SC. Traffic will be routed through Virginia on I-77 and I-81 but that will add at least an hour to most trips.
Asheville is the bluest of blue LGBTQ-friendly dots in the Carolinas. Lots of wealthy folks have driven housing prices into the stratosphere compared to similar-sized cities in the region. Will be interesting to see how the federal and regional responses in Asheville compare to similar natural disasters that affected the less-well-to-do.
Good thing israel, ukraine and taiwan claimed their “fair share” of american taxpayer cash before Helene hit.
I’d imagine there are some “low information,” non-college educated americans who might reach the conclusion that american cash should be spent on americans first…
Wonder if we’re going to get the, “Well no FEMA funding, everyone should survive on their own and we can’t afford it.” crap from the Republicans, but always easy money for the MIC. Grifters all of them.
It’s quite possible based on some stories I’m hearing that the death toll for this thing in NC may go well over 1000. I realize that sounds shocking, but there are a lot of people missing/unaccounted for. Hoping that I’m wrong, and they’re just cutoff from communication with the outside world.
Of course, FEMA will be of no use just as in Katrina.
Its lame to reply to self, but to back that up with a link, and not be accused of making yak squeeze up, here is the Weather Channel that mentions 600 unaccounted for in Buncombe County, alone:
https://weather.com/storms/hurricane/news/2024-09-28-helene-north-carolina-flooding-florida-update
Unfortunately, the little bit of video I’ve seen make those numbers seem pretty reasonable.
Seems like a lot of people may have tried to shelter in place and were washed away with their homes. Given the amount of sediment that moved with the flood a good proportion of those bodies were buried and will never be recovered.
The Senior Bush Administration worked very hard to make FEMA of no use during Hurricane Andrew in South Florida. The Clinton Administration worked very hard to make FEMA of use again, one of very few good things that Clinton did. And the Junior Bush Administration worked very hard to make FEMA of no use again, including abolishing its cabinet status and turning it into an orphan division within the Department of Homeland Security. Heckuva Job Bushie . . . setting things up for Brownie to do exactly the sort of job that the Bushiepublicans wanted FEMA to achieve during, lets say, Katrina.
No power, no water, everything under 10 feet of water. Here’s a report from the ground:
https://social.coop/@LALegault@newsie.social/113224868348446670
I wanted to say that all of our family members have now been accounted for. The last group who live in the mountains of NC were found this AM – they had been out in the wild for 3-4 days – many miles from where their home used to be – and made it by sheer force of will.
I have the utmost of respect for these people. They are on my father’s side of the family – I have known them all of my life. The patriarch of this family is someone I grew up with. When we realized they were long overdue this weekend and were told to fear the worst – I knew that if anyone could make it – it would be him.
I would tell you all to expect lots of stories to be coming out like this over the next several days. Although the coastal elite and PMC and Hillary refer to these people constantly as deplorables – they are nothing of the sort. It burns me up every time I hear that claptrap. I would love to see Bill and Hill in a similar situation and see how they fare.
I have now heard from all kinds of family members – there is ZERO FEMA or any federal presence on the ground. The level of rage is intense in many of them. I have no way to know if this is true – but apparently the TN National Guard or at least large numbers of them are now deployed to foreign locations. Remember – just a few short quaint days ago – when Kamala was cackling through the debate that no American soldiers were in war zones? – That little commentary is going to come back to bite.
And the same week that Biden wrote out another billions of dollars of check to Ukraine – he cannot be bothered to leave his beach chair to at least show up in NC – the same can be said for Kamala – she has been out hobnobbing for dollars in CA all weekend. Can anyone explain to me how any part of this is a good look?
I have been a Dem all my adult life – the events of the past few weeks – have now made me wonder if I should become an Independent.
It will be interesting to see how this affects the election – This federal Biden negligence has certainly energized a state – but the problem is that the area affected is largely an anti Biden/Harris ( notice I did not say pro Trump) stronghold – and there is literally nowhere left for these people to vote. It will be interesting.
Good to hear that your family all made it safe. Next time there is a family gathering, there are going to a lot of stories to tell.
All the firsthand reports from Asheville and environs mention no Federal help of any sort coming to help, and maybe just maybe we’ve reached a threshold where we truly can’t help out anymore, every man, woman and child for themselves!
Not that Kamala needed much help in losing on November 5th, but once the enormity of the lack of response becomes clear, it isn’t as if she will have any excuse.
The bigger question, is why hasn’t Trump trumped the Fed’s thunder and showed up to save a liberal enclave!
It’d be a win-win for him.
Reminds of Biden’s response to East Palestine train wreck (literally and figuratively). Staying in the background instead of getting out, supporting the community, and drumming up support for labor, infrastructure hardening, regulatory reforms, etc.
Maybe they’re channeling Marie Antoinette: “Let them eat neoliberal small government.”
I’m guessing the locals aren’t going to sit around waiting for FEMA. There was a big flood several years ago in Vermont that washed out roads all over the place near where I grew up. The interstate highway runs nearby and a lot of the local roads are still dirt. The interstate is essential to get from one place to another, especially if other roads are washed out, but the interstate on ramp was washed away. One of the locals fired up his bulldozer and made a new ramp himself so people could get moving again.
yes, tropical storm irene in 2012. there was a lot then of that kind of bootstrapping by anyone who had the equipment and could act. then, as official aid eventually arrived, came bitter fights with officials trying to stop those who were working around the clock rescuing the infrastructure of their own communities, because they weren’t rebuilding their towns’ roads and bridges according to regulations.
. . . a fair number of crews came up from the US South to help the people of vermont at that time, partly in reciprocity for vermont crews and aid that had gone down to new orleans post-katrina. some of these southern crew members were quoted as saying they were awed by the spirit of the vermont people, the way they immediately pulled together on the ground and everyone pitched in.
if what IM Doc has reported of his family’s ordeal–OMG 3-4 days out in the wild–is any indication, the people of the NC mountains will behave the same way. (those mountains, and their historical poverty and independent spirit, extend all the way up through VT as well.)
i expect that once again some help already is, or soon will be, heading south from here in vermont.
First, happy to hear that all your folks are safe!
The distribution of the voters in the affected areas is what I was wondering about, also. In the short term, this will seriously affect the election administration in the affected areas, I imagine. Just in terms of pure arithmatic, if nothing else changes, this should actually advantage the Harris side. Now, I have trouble imagining nothing else changing, but I’m hesitant to guess what and how much will change. Will blue area North Carolinians be affected by how cavalierly negligent the administration (and worse, Harris herself) is towards their neighbors? Somehow, I doubt that. The effect will be longer term than for November and the direction and the magnitude, I’m not so sure. (Recall that there were all sorts of things that were said in the aftermath of Katrina about the political effects. Not muich happened, even if its long term non-(immediate)electoral effects were great.)
Trump has threatened to take away firefighting funds here in Cali, so the gloves have already come off, perhaps to get a few callouses while raking the forest.
What if we had one heckova wildfire here where it took 4 days for assistance to arrive, similar to the ongoing situation in Asheville?
So far, nothing like that has happened, responses by firefighters are lickety quick.
Politics plays a big role in government responses. Wealthy areas typically are aided more and faster than poor areas. Hurricane Helene hit the hardest in poor and rural areas. The FEMA response will likely be slow and very inadequate. A few years back a large fire threatened expensive homes (many second homes) in the Lake Tahoe Basin. The firefighting response was massive and so property losses were minimal.
“…but the problem is that the area affected is largely an anti Biden/Harris ( notice I did not say pro Trump) stronghold – and there is literally nowhere left for these people to vote.”
But there still should be other legislators capable of doing something. That’s what ticks me. The Executive Branch of the USA is out to lunch.
>‘Israel’ expands aggression, intensifies strikes on Bekaa, Hermel Al Mayadeen. Commentary:
During the early hours of Monday, the Israeli occupation struck the al-Bass refugee camp in Sour, South Lebanon. Several casualties were confirmed, including the head of the Teachers’ Union in Lebanon at UNRWA, Fateh al-Sharif, who was killed alongside his wife, son, and daughter.
If you’ve been following the guest on Judge Napolitano’s Utube channel, Danny Haipong and others with the same orientation, the titles of their podcast often paint Israel as on the ropes, flailing, and on the brink of collapse. But given the success Israel has had in decapitating Hezbollah’s leadership, the supine Islamic states that keep supplying Israel with oil and other commodities. It seems that Israel is far from failing. When your population is being slaughtered and your infrastructure decimated it may be a case of short term suffering for future strategic victory, but recent events give me pause.
I’m starting to think I’m getting a distorted view. The majority of the world condemns Israel and their expansionist genocidally actions, but as the attendance at Gerald Celente’s peace rally this past weekend underscores, unless the danger is imminent, the vast majority of people will not exert the necessary pressure on those running the gov’t to change policy.
Maybe it’s just wanting the “good guys” to win. And like in Ukraine, I wish that the oligarchs in the West, the “Collective Biden” were held to account and were eating humble pie…wishful thinking.
I am in the exact same spot you are, regarding the relative position of strengths of Isrsel vs The Resistance. Has the evaluation of strengths of each just been wrong, are we missing something, or is this drama of the moment? If the goal of the resistance is slow boil Israel as your entire leadership is felded, it doesn’t seem to working. Importantly, how is Isreal getting all these targets? From moles inside the resistance? Is it even possible to try to avoid full on war when your opponent is 100% committed to getting one? If so, is war inevitable regardless of the resistance strategy so pick whichever time your opponent is weakest before you are too weakened? In general, the US is at a low point strength wise. I am astonished by the lack of support from the Arab nations for the resistance. Am also astonished more effective drones/missiles haven’t found their way to the Houthiese, Syrians, and others at odds with the US and Israel.
I feel the Resistance has prepped for classic Israeli aggression. Israel is clearly engaged in wholesale genocide. The expectation was the US wouldn’t support genocide.
To kill Nasrallah, the Israelis indiscriminately bombed a neighborhood. The target was the neighborhood. Nasrallah was there to give Biden an excuse if he is asked in public about it.
Kid, those buildings built above the bunkers were mostly empty, akin to barracks and offices. The complex was built in and upon their old HQ.
Interferometry. Missing piece of the puzzle. Radar “seeing” horizontally into buildings at oblique angles, tire tracks from space, objects through walls, chemical composition of gases, heat maps of places locals won’t go near, just for starters.
Recall on April 13-14 when it dawned on Khamenei that his sacred Pasdaran had been lying to him; none of their gear worked as advertised. (Which is why the Iranians are now passing their knock-offs to the Russians.) The two special pillars of Iranian strategic doctrine, an oversized missile inventory and enthusiastic proxy forces, in lieu of a conventional military with expeditionary capabilities, was somehow going to topple Israel and place Iran in the champion’s bracket.
Where Iran got this strategy, I do not know. An imperative of revolutionary fervor is to prevent the regime from being discredited by destroying any history that came prior to the movement. Also, why they’re at it, liquidate the officer’s corp. The revolution burns down institutions and the hard-earned knowledge that comes with them, known to others as the conventional requisites for prosperity. In return, the revolution gains a warped theocracy who all believe they’re related to the Prophet. The movement would have otherwise been stillborn in a modern-day functioning society.
“Kid, those buildings built above the bunkers were mostly empty…”
Notice the belittling response from the opening word. Notice the falseness and demeaning all through.
The mystery that has puzzled me for a while now is why the IRGC still exists as such an outlier as part of the Iranian state apparatus. The revolution is over. They’ve had a functioning state for decades (and have a completely separate state military organization). Why maintain a force that operates with minimal oversight and such a broad mandate? This really became apparent back when they were detaining American sailors for what the press reported as no reason at all.
The US Navy boats entered Iranian waters. The boats with crews were briefly detained and released. Later, several crew members were officially punished by the US Navy:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_U.S.%E2%80%93Iran_naval_incident
What happened to the US sailors captured by Iran?
The sailors had a brief verbal exchange with the Iranian military and were released, unharmed, 15 hours later. The release was hailed by the Obama administration as an unintended benefit of the new diplomatic relationship.
“The mystery that has puzzled me for a while now…”
I however am puzzled about why there is a US Marine Corps or British MI5 and MI6. Why should the British have so many MIs? Then there is the French Foreign Legion, even after there are no French colonies left in Africa, or so I think.
MI5 does internal ‘security’, MI6 external skulduggery. Actual military intelligence is the remit of DI. Codebreaking and general comms surveillance is by GCHQ. There are others too, with narrower purposes, but MIs 1-4 exist only in history books.
Britain operates as if i still has an empire. In a sense it still does as its intelligence apparatus heavily influences US foreign policy. Some say that MI6 controls to some degree the US CIA. They work in lockstep all over the world.
Every bit of this would benefit from some evidence beyond bare assertions. Waiting with bated breath.
A few things to consider.
Israel is currently doing shock and awe, with some success, but ultimately is not sustainable in the long run.
There is also a news blackout of the effects of missiles raining down on northern Israel adding to the perception that this is a one sided battle.
Israel’s bar for victory is also extremely high. All Hizbullah need for victory is to launch missiles into northern Israeli settlements.
Genocide is only acceptable in the western ruling class.
I think this goes to show about the hitherto unappreciated weaknesses with the resistance (along with all the previous events) rather than Israeli strengths necessarily (although an informational advatnage is not something to be ignored): . Mercouris, the other day, was pointing out that Iran, rather than Hizb’ulla might be the weak link in terms of operational security. If, as some reports say, various Iraninan officials were with Nasrallah when he was hit, this would actually reinforce that view. Given the nature of the Iranian nation (far more cosmopolitan and unexpectedly tolerant of minorities), not to mention the long, complex, and clandestine history between Israel and even segments of “official” Iran lasting many decades, this is not particularly surprising.
Israel’s ability to “defeat” Hizb’ulla, let alone Iran, in a physical combat is not really enhanced by this: for tactical combat, should Israel actually intrude into Lebanon in force, I suspect that the Hizb’ulla forces have made extensive preparations at the small unit level that doesn’t really require too much input from higher command. The ability of the Hizb’ullah to act “politically,” I think, has been seriously weakened by this, not least b/c Nasrallah and other senior leaders were probably more cautious and were willing to enage in “politics” rather than fight. Add to this the apparent fact that Israel is not seeking a close in combat either–this plays to Hizb’ullh’s advantage and Israel is short on men and equipment and training for that either. So, militarily, Israel will continue just bombing Lebanon and elsewhere from the air with not much else–for which Israel will pay next to no cost since the bombs are paid for by US and the fuel transits Turkiye (and emerges from Azerbaijan) without much disruption. In the meantime, a political monkey wrench gets thrown into the internal politics of the “resistance,” especially if the Iranian ability to keep the coalition together is undermined on top of the loss of politically skilled leadership. So this becomes an interesting war of attrition: the ability of the Israelis to conduct an air war (and endure economic losses) vs. the resistance’s ability to maintain political cohesion. It also underscores the role of US, Turkiye, and Azerbaijan (and through them, implicitly, Russia and Armenia) in propping up Israel. (Can Russia pressure Azerbaijan and Turkiye, for example, when there’s a crisis in Armenia?) Both are paying a high price–hard to tell who’s going to break first the way things are going now…
I think this is one of those examples of Mercouris opining about stuff he knows little about. He has a tendency to do this–he’s poor on economics and US politics, for example, so much so that I have serious, serious doubts that his knowledge rises above shallow about a region as complicated as the Levant and a country as complicated and huge as Iran. In fact, I notice that he’s less eager to comment on Middle Eastern affairs than on Russian-Ukrainian, as he’s obviously more comfortable with that region of the world (being himself a product of the Orthodox cultural sphere).
Assassinations are not all that hard to pull off, let’s be honest. Trump almost got killed by two dudes with guns, one of which was a loner and the other was Ukraine-spook-adjacent. Reagan was nearly offed by a complete lunatic allowed to get too close. And these are both people with 24-hour secret service protection. Rabin himself got-got by a right wing assassin.
A country can have adequate to excellent security, but if there’s a renegade power with means (in terms of money and backing) and determination, you just can’t protect everyone perfectly all the time, which is why it’s important that strength for any movement be distributed into the collective network. For such movements, when the front rank is lost, the next rank moves up–like a phalanx–to press on.
Moreover, I notice in western commentary–whether it be from the MSM or alternative media voices–a tendency to focus far too much on individual characters. So, for instance, many of the NATO-types obsess over “getting rid of Putin,” as if this would change much. In my opinion, it’d be unlikely to improve matters even in the short term, as whoever replaced Putin would represent ascendant hardliners.
The alt-media types (who, by the way, often justly decry the narrative focus on Putin) fall into a similar pattern, only they tend to obsess over Biden and Zelensky. I don’t know how many times I’ve had to roll my eyes when alt-media personalities gleefully highlight how “nobody likes Biden” or “nobody likes Zelensky,” as if international diplomacy was some high school club. I’m not saying heads of state aren’t important, only that they’re the visible “tip of the iceberg,” below which lie the real sources of state power: collective human culture and capability. It’s that well-spring that repulses or attracts diplomatic favor, which is why a man as mincing and urbane as Macron was so ingratiating to an oaf like Trump. It wasn’t the man that he “liked,” it was what lurked beneath the waterline, so to speak.
I do think this is more than just about Nasrallah or Raisi or Haniyeh: Israel has been able to assassinate a lot of people in leadership positions lately, often with aerial bombing, among their adversaries. This seems to suggest that Israel has been able to penetrate something somehow that gives them insider information.
Even if the leadres being knocked off does not necessarily weaken them in tactical military terms, it does force a difficulty in terms of political coordination and, likely, political leadership, too. The alternate leaders who replace those who have been knocked off likely lack political skills and connections that would enable smooth coordination on the political-diplomatic front (justified or not, questions have been raised about the diplomatic skills of the new Iranian president and his foreign minister, for example). The difficulties in coordination necessitated by the problems with the communication network (even if the fiber networks, say, do not blow up, they do have to worry about moles in their midst digging into internal communications) will impose more problems as well–especially if, per Mercouris’ suggestion, they believe that Iran is the weak link in communications (since Iran is the hub through which various resistance factions, e.g. Hizb’ullah and Houthis, coordinate).
If Israel decides that it’ll actual start invading in force, that would actually ease the problems, but if they continue resorting to aerial bombing, then the resistance will need to respond “politically” and losing the likes of Nasrallah and Haniyeh, presumably with the more experienced political operatives, will cause problems, it seems to me.
Assassinations do cause problems, otherwise states the world over would refrain from them, but they are not decisive in any sense of the word, and in fact can be counter-productive, which is why I believe the Russians have refrained from killing Zelensky, even though they could at any time (and also, for what it’s worth, why the zionists have, until now, refrained from killing Nasrallah). Assassinations are basically terror–but war is not won by terror. Indeed, once again, I’m not even sure in the long run that terror helps to win wars. Often times, I think, it stiffens resistance and brings sterner elements to the fore.
Now, perhaps that’s what Israel wants. Israel’s war-partners-to-be have been unwilling as yet to acquiesce to a wider conflict. The zionists are hoping they’ll finally get a conflict catastrophic and massive enough to draw in a force as weighty as the US. In my opinion, the Zionists are likely to get what they want, but that’s not too much of a victory. If one side really, really wants war, the other side’s inevitably obliged to give in in the face of escalation and terror.
The real question is two fold:
1.) Once they get their war, can the Zionists win it, especially if it goes on for many years, as it probably will?
2.) Once they get their war, can the Zionists cajole the US into committing ground forces, as wars cannot be won by air campaign alone, especially against a big country like Iran backed by Russia and especially considering the fact that Israel’s way out-manned by its enemies?
These questions are very much uncertain. If asked to speculate, I’d say the Israeli position looks dire. I don’t think the Americans have the stomach for a long war in the Levant and Iran.
Once they get that war, can they lock the air space and the roads and the shipping lanes and railways going to Iran from Russia, China, etc. to stop Iran being supported?
I think its pretty clear that Hezbollah’s internal comms were not as clever as they thought they were, and that indicates deep problems with their strategy. One thing thats often forgotten is that they lost a lot of their best mid range commanders in the Syrian War. It can’t be assumed that they were replaced by people of equal ability.
At a guess, I think the pagers were part of a deliberate ‘ripple’ strategy to flush out operatives for assassination. The attack spread panic, which would have meant a lot of people breaking cover in one way or another. Its a very long established way to identify deep cover operatives (both sides used it in the Irish War of Independence), but obviously with modern technology it can be far more sophisticated and targets can be selected very rapidly. This could mean that Israel has done serious damage through several layers of Hezbollah leadership and possibly also their Iranian liaisons.
Even a very decentralised organisation needs some degree of internal communication and cohesion to make clear decisions, otherwise you have to fall back on pre-determined tactical plans, which may or may not be based on correct assumptions about what Israel will do.
Everyone assumes this will be a replay of 2006. But both sides are well aware of the lessons of that conflict and both have a very different range of weapons at their disposal. It will be a very different conflict.
I wonder how many of the Muslim governments supported the jihadi effort to overthrow and topple the legitimate government of the Syrian Arab Republic. Those government, especially the KSA government and the Little Gulfie governments must still be bitter about how Hezbollah helped the Syrian Arab Republic Government ( the ” Assad Regime” , according to the Global Axis of Jihad) survive the Global Axis of Jihad’s effort to topple it.
If they are still bitter about that, might their bitterness lead to their non-support of Hezbollah today?
I’m starting to think I’m getting a distorted view.
Me, too. Apart from the wars damaging Israel’s internal economy, which seems a defensible thing to assert, other claims of its weaknesses now seem increasingly detached from reality, at least with respect to the resistance. Of course I realize that in war things can change rapidly, but even before the exploding pagers I was starting to get the feeling that with the open firehose of US funds and weapons there aren’t likely to be too many tides turning in this conflict. It’s all very grim.
Hearing a new arguement that the pagers and walkie-talkies were, not a clear sign the they Israeli are completely confident that no rules apply but actually a way to show China, or Russia, or Russia and China both that they are powerful and using that power strategically.
Did I bump into a couple of chucklefaces who cooked this up on their own? Or is this a lib talking point making the rounds? And why would a country depending on billions and billions from the US want to impress China and Russia?
This is from people who are very wise and just shake their heads when childish idiots suggest the US could say or do anything that might influence Isreal.
Temped to tune into MSNBC or the View to see if that where they get it.
Guests on Judge Napolitano’s show are not wrong but tend to cater to what their audience wants to hear. Israel has proved that it can dominate the situation. It’s ground forces are not what they used to be but their alliance with the West’s covert op and intel community is absolute and effective. I talked to a guy who is retired intel and told me their satellites can pick up very detailed pictures to the square inch and that was ten years ago. The fact we are, increasingly, living in a tech world means those that master tech master the world and Israelis are always in the forefront. Also, we need to understand that Israel and the US security state are pretty much one and the same so that’s a lot of power. As for those that say Israel is suffering economically, I believe the US/EU will make Israel whole not matter what. Ukraine can go but Israel’s existence is non-negotiable for the West. Why that is the case is obvious.
It is early to be declaring victory. The decapitation of Nazrallah’s predecessor was also seen as a decisive blow and it wasn’t. Hezbollah and the Houthis and to a lesser degree some Iraqis are still shelling Israel. I don’t think it takes much in the way of leadership to decide how much to extend the range further into Israel. Independent reports say that Hezbollah has >100,000 missiles, with recent observations claiming 150,000. They can just keep firing rockets and deplete the Iron Dome. None of the great Israel attacks appears to have done bupkis to their main means of inflicting pain on Israel.
In addition, I do not think these commentators are pandering to their audiences. They are at worst cognitively captured. And they do have sources for their claims, even if you argue those sources might not turn out to be so hot.
I believe the resistance axis fears a nuclear attack by Israel both in Lebanon and Iran. The current government in Iran is weak and somewhat pro-Western. Just heard a video by Alistair Crooke on Judge Nap–he’s always the best at understanding that area of the world. And he is “bullish” on Hezbollah. And I get it–but I think Netanyahu is as confident as he appeared at the UN because he has guarantees that he’ll be made whole by the US/NATO if his economy tanks or if he gets into military difficulties. All, except the margins in the West, vehemently support Israel. In my view the US will use nuclear weapons against Iran (and Iran has already been intimidated and has refused to stepped back at every obvious Israeli provocation) if Israel’s existence is threatened. The neocon hold on Washington is always underestimated in my view, particularly the US/UK intel who are, so I’m led to believe, are woven together with the Mossad. At the heart of all this is the notion that the West is in decline–it may be, but the decline is and will continue to be very, very slow.
Alastair Crooke : Netanyahu Gambles on Slaughter
Two comments. First ‘why that is the case’ is NOT obvious. There have been multiple strands of support in the past, but none strong enough to explain the supine acceptance of out and out genocide.
Second, claims of satellites reading license plates (ie “to the square inch”) have been around for decades, and are a sign of not understanding physics, and/or useful intentional opsec. In addition, anyone who has been cleared to access said images would never tell you about it. ‘Retired intel’ covers a lot of ground, and doesn’t automatically imply access to the raw data. Talking about it almost guarantees it was someone exaggerating over a beer.
Well, that’s what the retired intel guy who launched satellites told me. Was he lying? Didn’t seem to be, but maybe he’s mentally ill and I didn’t pick it up.
It doesn’t necessarily follow that an intel guy involved in military spy satellite launches has the clearance to know the precise technical specs of the sensors or to ever see the intelligence produced by those sensors. If he doesn’t have that clearance then he probably only knows what everyone else knows : that US spooks claim to be able to read license plates from orbit but a picture that actually proves this has, as far as I know, never been released into the public domain. No need to assume he’s lying, just doing what a lot of Americans like to do : proudly brag up American military capabilities.
Well, he probably wasn’t intentionally lying to you, but retelling the story he heard from a guy, just like you are now.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/fish_story
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tall_tale
The tall tale about reading license plates from orbit have been around for decades. Whether it is possible nowdays we can not know (because it is top secret), but we can be sure it was not possible when the story started circulating. It was an urban myth, just like Chinese wall being visible with the naked eye from space, or people using only 10% of their brain, or German tanks being better than others.
I suspect if you put it to a vote in the Collective West, Israel’s existence is not only highly negotiable, it’s underlying rationale will be pretty high up in the hysterical laughter stakes. Using a European genocide of Jews to justify a Jewish genocide of sections of the indigenous population of the Levant whilst stealing ever greater areas of their land does not play well in the age of social media. When Russia completes it’s victory in the Ukraine it will be a mere footnote in history. But the Zionist rage for murder, whether of the Jewish or Christian cast, will turn out to be the vital turning point in the downward spiral of what is sometimes laughngly referred to as Western civilisation.
“success Israel has had in decapitating Hezbollah’s leadership”
Even though most non-biased reports have already stated replacements are already in place?
I love how people rush to conclusions in the light of limited and controlled evidence that supports the official narrative.
“I love how people rush to conclusions in the light of limited and controlled evidence that supports the official narrative.” ********* As in how you also rushed to the conclusions with your limited reports that support your narrative?
Its been verified by multiple sources that replacements are already in place. And it’s a known operating tactic.
So I’ve not “rushed” to any conclusions with limited reports.
I don’t doubt Hizb’ullah has pretty good leaders that replaced Nasrallah. The problem, I think, is the political cost. Besides the fact that Nasrallah was an extremely skilled political operative, he got where he was because he has been the face of Hizb’ullah for decades and has been buidling up connections with important people in the region, through many of its achievements. It will be a long time if his successor(s) can get to where he was in the political arena. This will be a big blow, even if it does not affect Hizb’ullah’s military capabilities, since a lot of resistance’s success depends on playing politics shrewdly.
Not so sure about that. I’ve seen a couple of reports that claimed he should have retired from the post before now.
In any case, his replacement is more hard line, which only leads to worse outcomes for all involved.
The anti-empire sites have done a lot of cheerleading and optimistic takes on the civilization war that’s ongoing, with many commenters lambasting “Putin” and Iran for not attacking the “on the verge of collapse” enemy with full force everywhere, being too cautious, weak, etc. But maybe Iran and Hezbollah and Russia are weak, in the sense of not really having the resources to prosecute a more aggressive war to shock-and-awe their enemies into submission.
Clearly Iran, Lebanon, and Syria are thoroughly infiltrated by Israeli informers, spies, and terrorist agents, otherwise Israel would never be able to do pinpoint assassination bombings. And they all lack serious anti-aircraft defense weapons. Even Russia, with some of the best AAD out there, can’t totally block huge swarms of drones. So as long as Israel is first in line for US aid and weapons shipments, it’s hard to see them backing down from the slaughter. Hezbollah and Ansar Allah can fire artillery and missiles all they want, but their ability to actually score a hit on something important seems very low.
Similarly, in Ukraine, Russia can grind out victories one village at a time, but they are still facing a strong enough AFU force (with empire backing and NATO “mercenaries” helping, obviously) that their advances are just not going to go any faster. The anti-empire forces are doing the best they can, but, sadly, that is not good enough at the moment to satisfy all the happy fantasies of sympathetic bloggers.
One of the things that has been under-reported is that the US/UK/Israel intel groups use bribery even more than threats to get their way. Israel has been very clever in its intel which is why the US/UK has decided to ally themselves with Israel so strongly. Arabs as old “Arab-hands” used to say are always open to bribery. Just because Western leaders appear incredibly stupid does not mean their operatives are stupid. Without a strong response very soon, the “resistance axis” will diminish.
Having said that, maybe now is not the time to attack Israel–it may be best to let the crisis simmer until Israel decides for a “final solution” to their Palestinian problem which I believe is likely. Then, maybe the West will reconsider its position.
Herzlbollah vs Hezbollah
Boola, boola.
Finkelstein makes the following observations in his latest on Greenwald:
1. Iran and its allies have long known that Israel-US combine, in a continuation of Bush-Cheney effort to neutralize disobedient states in the middle east will come for Iran. The only question was when.
2. In this light, Oct.7 was ‘a God sent’, as Israel now had pretext to pick out Gaza, then Hezbollah and claim the final prize, Iran. (Btw, today Netanyahu issued an urgent announcement to the Iranian people — in their native English language of course — that democracy will soon be brought to Iran.
3. Hezbollah has a decisive advantage over Israel in ground combat. The principle factor, besides the network of bunkers, the 100,000 (alleged) militia force etc. is the fact that they have no fear of death. (Side note: by eliminating Nasrallah, Israel provided an immediate revenge motive on top of pre-existing religious motivations for matyrdom to the rank of Hezbollah milita).
4. The tactic by Hezbollah would be too hold back and sling a few shots every now and then, the get Israel to carry out large bombardments, declare victory, and then respond with a few more shots. Eventually, this would render Israel’s political situation untenable, and they would feel compelled to invade with a ground force. (Latest update from Guardian has Gallant announcing a ground invasion soon).
5. Finkelstein observes that Nasrallah was aware that Israel has the ‘technological edge’, and that the pager attacks ‘struck a powerful blow’ against Hezbollah. However, also aware of their advantages, in his last speech Nasrallah nearly pleaded Israel to invade. That’s how Finkelstein interprets the speech anyway.
Moving away from Finkelstein’s speech, were Israel to use even a single nuclear weapon against any Muslim country, they will invite a holy war against not just them, but possibly the United States. That is not a situation, I think, that the west is in a position to handle.
Finkelstein admits in that interview that he does not know the military side. For instance, he mistakenly assumes the pagers were used by the military wing of Hezbollah for comms when they were not. I think you therefore need to discount his other remarks on combat issues.
Yes!
But: NF announced a new book on the ICJ!
Which does sound exciting…
Perhaps “the Arab World” should re-read Niemoller’s “First they came for…”. Hezbollah and Iran did little when Israel came for Gaza, and now it’s Hezbollah’s turn while Iran fiddles and wrings its hands.
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.
It’s a big ask to expect the Iranians alone to take the kind of pummelling from the air that they would get from Israel and the USA in response to a major direct intervention against Israel. No doubt it would be a noble cause, but it not directly their own cause. It’s understandable why, of the parties outside Palestine and Lebanon, it’s only the Houthis, who have already been pummelled from the air for years and blockaded to the point of mass starvation, and thus apparently no longer have any f***s to give, who seem willing to take the risk of directly opposing Israel.
As I said before: ANIMALS!
However as animation movies go, “robotaxis” are almost as good. I guess they are even treated similiarly on narrative terms by the entertainment industry.
So it´s animals, machines and A.I. that will make our day as new-age information-“Soma”.
* * *
on a different note:
JACOBIN with an interview on the 1940s campaign “Dixie” to unionize the South.
Operation Dixie Failed but Pushed Racial Equality Forward
An interview with William P. Jones
The famous Operation Dixie campaign to unionize the South in the 1940s was mostly unsuccessful. Still, it left a positive mark on American society. It’s even possible that the civil rights movement wouldn’t have staged the March on Washington without it.
https://jacobin.com/2024/09/operation-dixie-cio-civil-rights
“The West is trying to pressure Russia through Iran, but is it possible?”
‘Meanwhile, as the West continues to impose strict sanctions on Iran, it audaciously demands that Tehran join the international restrictions against Russia.’
Gee, does this mean that Iran will have to tell the Russians to pack up all their air defence systems protecting Iran from Israeli strikes and take them back home? And also the Russian fighters being delivered that would replace the 1970s era fighters that they have to us? Who would ever trust they West to deliver on their promise and guarantees? They can’t be negotiated with and see everything as a zero-sum game.
p.s. Jacobin Germany has a text about the increased military expenditures in Poland.
The author´s understanding of history and geopolitics is limited but it has a few numbers.
However I again cannot get the auto-translation archived.
Dunno why…so this is German (but is easily translated via Google)
“Poland’s fear of war is great and expensive
Fearing Russia, Poland plans to spend almost 5 percent of its GDP on armaments next year. No other NATO country invests as much in defense. But it is questionable whether this spending will make Poland safer.”
by By Jan Opielka
https://jacobin.de/artikel/polen-aufruestung-russland-putin-ukraine-donald-tusk-nato
Jacobin is quite the periodical! I agree the author’s understanding of history is either uninformed or selective. I have to wonder if the gargantuan military expenditures are not Polish revanchism in action; the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth did incorporate a huge Baltic to Black sea area. Where will all the conscripts come from?
And the US Jacobin hit piece “Sahra Wagenknecht’s Party Is a Bad Example for the Left” was very special to say the least.
“Jacobin is quite the periodical!”
indeed.
At least it brings some colour into my online life:
“What you got for me to-day?”
And then we rip them apart on NC.
At least some fun action.
p.s. to be fair, they do have a lot of good stuff too (also: their past issues.)
I cancelled my subscription to Jacobin DE because they push out drivel like this Sahra Wagenknecht-piece. She is the only one who speaks about class. For god’s sake, she critiized the upper-middle-class life-style eco-left sitting in the cities despising the hard-working, sausage-eating & beer-drinking working class. Die Linke got completely lost in the letter-sexualities and anti-AfD (calling AfD and their voters stupid) without proposing anything concretely how to address the underlying problems in Germany. Sahra is the only one who is versed in economics.
I like the way the article starts by criticizing BSW for not drawing more people away from AfD. Almost as if BSW is to blame for AfD growing in popularity, even though BSW is the only party offering a real alternative to AfD.
Of course, if BSW had drawn votes from AfD, then the criticism would have been that BSW is really supported only by AfD jackboots.
These types of hit pieces are so transparent.
My guess is the .01% that controls all media access just took them over. They were never good, because Trotskyism I guess? But now total multi-letter agencies adjacent.
Yep, that US Jacobin piece was very special.
This bit
Is just something amazing.
On a related note: Sverige Demokraterna in Sweden claims to be socially (a leftist indicator) conservative but they are seen as far right. If AfS (alternativ for Sverige, alternative for Sweden) were ever to come into parliament then maybe AfS would be seen as a far right party and SD (Sverige Demokraterna) would then become similar to the BSW – a far left party?
Maybe what is needed now is some sort of franchise-organisation deciding which policies a party must have to be considered leftist, the ones with the ‘proper’ ‘leftist’ policies gets a special stamp they can use to signal their ‘goodness’ and parties not meeting the requirements are to be taken to court for false advertising…
I suppose as the vote can’t be split like in the first past the post electoral systems then the division has to be made on a party level in parliament. Left parties cannot ever be allowed to co-operate with right parties even if they have similar policies thus leaving the upper middle class parties to rule as they please as market-liberals. Popular opinion be damned because, well, just because
“gets a special stamp they can use to signal their ‘goodness’ and parties not meeting the requirements are to be taken to court for false advertising…”
Don´t decry it. They might get funny ideas from such suggestions.
In Germany some GREENS again talk about banning AfD.
Good god…sore losers.
There is a simple definition of the “left” as follows: people who favor policies that help the ordinary citizen more than the oligarchs and, as a result, oppose the current status-quo political forces. In the US the “left” is actually the “right.” The Democratic Party is actually a right-wing party slightly to the right of the Republican Party.
A society where everyone has enough, everyone knows when enough is enough and no one takes too much. Easy peezee? My 2¢.
The Jacobin article reads like they prefer some kind of supranational organization to do the defining.
“And the US Jacobin hit piece “Sahra Wagenknecht’s Party Is a Bad Example for the Left” was very special to say the least.”
It seemed like a lot of assumption that they know what’s best for Germans and the best way to reach them.
S.W. most likely took the approach that would get her the most traction according the particular needs and desires for her constituency – and within a certain timeframe.
Taibbi’s speech at Rescue the Republic. No paywall.
My Speech in Washington: “Rescue the Republic”
Freedom of speech isn’t just a legal right, but a way of life. On its history
https://www.racket.news/p/my-speech-in-washington-rescue-the
I might´ve been drunk at that time of day (Europe) but I enjoyed it.
RIP Kris
Just the other side of nowhere
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKT7CMlQmag
Lights of Magdala
RIP
Deportee (Plane Wreck at Los Gatos), performed by the Highwaymen
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awKLW7WgGB8
Kris Kristofferson – Sister Sinead (2009)
So I decided to look over his Wikipedia entry as my wife is a fan of his and am wondering if they are not talking about two or three different guys named Kris Kristofferson. He was an army brat, worked in a dredging outfit on Wake island, Rhodes scholar in Oxford, boxer and rugby player, US Army captain, helicopter pilot, Ranger School graduate – and I am only up to 1965!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kris_Kristofferson
And he was a helluva guy.
Heaven’s Gate was thought of as quite the disaster when it came out, but the restored version issued much later is now thought of as a classic of the genre, starring Kris.
HEAVEN’S GATE (1980) | James & Ella’s Waltz
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViVy4I-JnCY
KK industry obituaries
Variety
https://variety.com/2024/film/obituaries-people-news/kris-kristofferson-dead-country-music-legend-actor-1236159472/
Hollywood Reporter
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/kris-kristofferson-dead-star-is-born-1236017415/
Freedom’s just another word for nothin’ left to lose.
Somewhere near Salinas I let her slip away…
“Zelenskyy on preparation for Ramstein meeting: We must decide how to increase pressure on Russia”
I read one example of how Zelensky is doing this. So the Ukraine is taking the Russian Federation to court, specifically the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague. And the complaint lodged by the Ukraine? That the Crimean Bridge was illegally built so therefore the Russians have to demolish it-
https://www.rt.com/russia/604665-crimean-bridge-hague-arbitration/
They really do hate that bridge.
“They really do hate that bridge.”
😂😂😂
One has to wonder about this anal expuslsive fixation with the Crimean Bridge. Why? Is it because it is new and not falling down as bridges in the West do?
Ukrainian brain is running late on evolutinary timescale. For them, the brigde is an enemy totem, and they have to destroy it in order to weaken Russia and please the Banderite spirits.
St. Sciurus of the Dandelion Field appears very alarmed by the state of the world today. He is not alone.
Re: the still germane article about the state of Greek railways. 2 near collisions only recently after the deadly one last year that killed 50+ mostly young kids returning to their studies after holidays on a night train. Government stonewalling how the freight train crashing with the passenger created a huge explosion and fireball. Most victims burned. Some parents were not given remains. One theory that makes a lot of sense, the freight was loaded with chemicals used to adulterate fuel (eg toluene). That would mean that some powerful interests complicit in said adulteration have huge sway with the Greek government.
So they’re doing condos on cruise ships now? Psychotic. I hope they trip and fall into a vat of bunker fuel.
It was only a few weeks ago that I read in some article about retirement that people were living on cruise ships as a retirement option.
I could only wonder…
The ship actually sailed today. The erstwhile “guests” had been put up in hotels in Belfast for months but the company rescinded that a few weeks ago, with the result that some people quit waiting and asked for refunds. Others stuck it out. One woman was booted off the cruise, the company claims at the request of her fellow passengers for being a whinger, and she is now suing because she had sold up in the US and planned to travel for the rest of her life….
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn4y7q2dyndo
Belfast’s a nice place. They should have stayed and supported Kneecap against Israeli aggression!
https://nitter.poast.org/KNEECAPCEOL/status/1839419679183679630#m
Rest of their twitter feed here
https://nitter.poast.org/kneecapceol
Actually, an option I was considering myself. After all, what’s not to like? A cruise ship is a floating retirement/’lifestyle’ village – a self-closed community with the entertainments and all the usual facilities of such establishments, security, trips out to nice places and your choice of climate. Might not suite those with family outside the gates, but makes a lot of sense to loners like me.
Unless or until some infectious or contagious disease turns the cruise ship into a coffin ship.
Animals?
Take this you squirrels and groundhogs:
From Germany:
“Mushroom picker fights with wild boar for 20 minutes: “I had already given up
– A man goes into the forest to collect mushrooms. But it is not a relaxing trip for the 64-year-old. For the Bavarian, a fight to the death ensues – with a wild boar.
Last week, near the Bavarian town of Kelheim, a wild boar attacked and injured a man from the Regensburg district. Peter A. had been looking for mushrooms in the Frauenforst forest.
The 64-year-old describes the dramatic events to the “Donaukurier”: “I probably fought with the pig for about 20 minutes. I was scared to death and had already given up.”
Read the ENTIRE terrifying story of life in Germany in the year 2024 here:
https://archive.is/2IAVw
RE: Why Harris’ support from retired U.S. military leaders matters MSNBC
Setting aside the facts that this article is from the “maddow blog,” is written by maddow’s producer, and in no way explains the “why” in the title, to my mind, if stanley “we’re turning the corner” mcchrystal advocates for something, the correct position is exactly the opposite.
harris is the full-lobbying-employment-for-highly-decorated-top-military-brass-failures candidate, and mcchrystal is talkin’ his slimy, grifter book.
https://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/24/opinion/24thu1.html
June 23, 2010
Afghanistan, After McChrystal
There was no pique, and some apparent regret, as President Obama announced that he had fired his top commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal.
The president cast his decision as one of trust and military order. He rightly said that respect for civilian control and a strict military code of conduct must apply “equally to newly enlisted privates and to the general officer who commands them.”
Mr. Obama also insisted that his Afghanistan policy will not change. What he didn’t say is that the war is going badly. If there is any chance of beating back the Taliban and Al Qaeda, he needs a commander he can trust…
– ‘Why Harris’ support from retired U.S. military leaders matters’ – MSNBC
There are all kinds of reasons to be disgusted by this article. The Responsible Statecraft piece which follows it in Links lists several (I’m sure that was Conor’s intent). But here’s another one for me. Benen starts by singling out Stanley McChrystal for his brave and patriotic endorsement of Harris against the evil Trump, who has the audacity to speak disrespectfully about military leaders like McChrystal. But this was really no surprise, as McChrystal has been a supporter the the NatSec Democrats for a long time. In fact, reference to McChrystal reminded me of the article that made him famous – or infamous:
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/the-runaway-general-the-profile-that-brought-down-mcchrystal-192609/
That article was written by Michael Hastings. Some NC readers will know who he is. Here is Hastings’ last article, from Buzz Feed in 2013:
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/mhastings/why-democrats-love-to-spy-on-americans
I’d highly recommend it as a very prescient warning of things to come. Unfortunately, Hastings died soon after in an unfortunate car crash.
On the subject of CIA Democrats, I couldn’t help but laugh at Benen’s bio at the end of the article. Please note the title of his book:
“Steve Benen is a producer for “The Rachel Maddow Show,” the editor of MaddowBlog and an MSNBC political contributor. He’s also the bestselling author of “Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans’ War on the Recent Past.”
No worries. MSNBC is here to protect our recent past from the agents of disinformation, with the help of patriotic generals like McChrystal.
Let’s not forget that McChrystal was forced by Obama to tender his resignation for insubordination after that article came out. But now he’s a great guy in the eyes of the Democrat party! What a difference the TDS makes.
…it’s hard to quit doing McChrystal meth
From the twitter thread on Covid heart damage:
Why Princeton shouldn’t treat COVID-19 like the common cold
https://www.dailyprincetonian.com/article/2024/09/princeton-opinion-column-covid-update-health-policy
FPÖ in Austria and pearl-clutching stupidity. Here is a heading that is hilarious: “Far-right successes a threat to Ukraine”
So far-right in Europe is a danger for Nazis in Ukraine but Nazis in Ukraine are not a danger to anything. I wonder if that is a learnt skill or if you are born the way to not understand what you are writing about.
https://www-aftonbladet-se.translate.goog/nyheter/kolumnister/a/bm7q7v/valresultat-i-osterrike-visar-att-omvalvande-forandringar-vantar-i-europa?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp
great!
🤣😇😱
p.. Do they teach how to “spin news” at Columbia?
It is possible to do a fair argument with the idea that nationalists of country A are a threat to nationalists of country B, C, D… yet, if you ask me, they are the globalists/Atlanticists those who have shown to be the worst threat to Ukraine.
“Cruise passengers ‘stranded’ in Belfast before 3-year long trip”
To accompany this – AI picture autofill (built in Belfast):
https://old.reddit.com/r/northernireland/comments/1fsbe0n/dont_think_that_was_the_best_picture_to_use_google/
“Sahra Wagenknecht’s Party Is a Bad Example for the Left”
I don’t even know where to begin with this article but I suspect that if Sahra had taken a lot of votes away from the AfD, Jacobin would not be bitching so much about her win. I think that their main complaint is that she is a populist meaning that her values are in alignment with ordinary voters (shudder). So she is far right because she disagreed with Germany opening up the doors for over a million unvetted people under Mama Merkel and is not a fan of WW3. And she must be a terrible person because she is skeptical about the vaccines. Of course it is not too late for Sahra to redeem herself with Jacobin and she only has to do the following-
-Say how much she hates Russia and says that it must be broken up.
-Want an open door to let any number of immigrants into Germany no matter if there are not the jobs, rooms or resources to support them.
-Advise everybody to get their vaccines and any boosters that they can – twice.
-Ignore the pleas for help from ordinary people as them not being worthy.
-Pander to the elite professional managerial class and do whatever they want
-Be fully onboard with whatever the EU or NATO wants.
-Forget freedom of speech and embrace cancel culture.
-Learn to love the Greens.
If she does all this, then she too can join Die Linke in the political wilderness while the Jacobin continues to moan that nobody listens to what they want and how nobody in the left is being elected to power.
Dissolve BSW again and force members into joining the GREENs.
Much of the demand for weaponry is unbased fear of things that will never happen, the real fear being without electricity & water-not a bad guy with a gun.
A gun, holster & ample amount of ammo would set you back around $666, here’s what you could have spent it on instead:
10×7 gallon water containers, to keep 70 gallons on hand
1x Coleman 2 burner stove & 10x 1 pound propane canisters
2x Hot water bottles
20x Freeze dried meals & coffee, lots of coffee.
1x bag of popcorn & quart of olive oil, you’ll need lots of snacks during your downtime, and a pot on an open flame just happens to be the best way to prepare for heavy bouts of inflationary measures to occur within.
2x Headlamps (much more useful than flashlights, as you’re hands free)
1x Multi-band am/fm weather radio dual battery/hand crank powered
2x Battery powered lanterns
5x Bic lighters
1x Box of 300 matches
I think the biggest oversight is a water filtration or purification system. Small backpacking filters work against bacteria, parasites, protozoa, etc. Larger systems can remove viruses. Add an activated charcoal stage if potential water sources may be contaminated with pesticides or chemical spills. This will save fuel as it’s a substitute for boiling drinking water.
I mostly filter in pristine Sierra streams & rivers, but i’d be wary of what was in the wake of a flood that mixed everything together like a bad-arse stone soup.
The convenience of having pure water on hand beats filtering. The lazy persons way to do it would be 30x 2.5 gallon rectangles. You would have had many days before the hurricane hit to accomplish a pretty easy task.
Most of the time, I think people will be filtering water due to “boil water” advisories. But yeah, do collect the water from an upstream tributary to a major river, lake, etc. And upstream from any agriculture… which may not always be possible due to geography. But in the case of the Appalachians, there should be suitable streams and ponds up the hills.
Better to filter dodgy water for sanitation rather then dip into the potable stash. Washing hands and down below (there are adapters that turn any plastic water bottle into bidet) does wonders for keeping up morale.
That’s how we do it. I used bottled water for my tea as our tap water is often very hard which not only makes tea taste different, but destroys kettles pretty quickly. We keep between 10 and 20 2.5 Gallon containers at all times while using 1 or 2 per week and FIFOing our supply.
Nice list. I took a screenshot for future reference. Agree w LY’s comment re a water filter. I would also add some (cheap) chocolate bars; lots of calories in a small package, and goes well w coffee.
I would add Boost or Ensure to that list. The high protein variety would be good. It doesn’t need refrigeration. You can add it to coffee like a creamer if you want to.
If one is going to live on Boost, Ensure, chocolate and so forth for a while, should one also have some metamucil to be able to maintain fiber-based bowel function?
A good list for a disaster that allows for staying in place.
If mobility is a must, other things may be needed as well.
Buy the gun and use it to obtain the list items from someone else. That way you have the gun AND the list items (just kidding of course, but it is a course some might take)!!!!
Skip the popcorn. Dental care will not be available.
North Carolina:
Links for twitter and liveblog local reporting
https://x.com/BlueRidgePublic
https://www.bpr.org/live-updates/live-blog-hurricane-helene-wnc#no-food-water-distribution-plan-yet-shared-in-buncombe-county
Crazy thought here. How about they get the Air Force or the National Guard use their transports to drop palettes of food and water via parachute in areas that have been cut off. They do this sort of thing so often that they could do it in their sleep. Yeah, I know. They are all tied up flying bombs and ammo to Israel and the Ukraine and there are none to spare. Not so much sarcasm here as probably a reading of the true situation.
Comeuppance see me sometime…
Armageddon outta here.
Unanimously Calamitously
Kalamity Kamala … bringing us joy since 2012.
Can’t use the US Air Force for state disasters ; the states can use their Air National Guard units. States Guard units can be deployed to any state to help with rescues if so ordered/approved by both states’ governors. Has to do with how the US is set up.
Slower response to disasters also contributes a bit to disasters being the biggest on record.
can-t willy-nilly parachute stuff onto civilians. legit risk of them getting crushed
then add crowd management issues
Links for NC and US National Guard
https://x.com/NCNationalGuard/status/1840437613997543649
https://x.com/NCNationalGuard/status/1840760946064581060
https://www.nationalguard.mil/News/Article-View/Article/3919179/national-guard-assists-with-hurricane-response-in-southeast/
Thanks, marym.
adding as an aside: get to know any HAM radio operators in your area. There may be a club or just an informal group of (usually) guys who have HAM radio setups and emergency generators for when the power goes out. If you’ve never heard of this, here’s a short recap from 9 years ago.
HAM Radio Operators Vital For Emergency Communication
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lLqC8cvH_Aw
These guys are great.
Great point
This guy is Trump’s right hand. Just sayin’.
Electric cars causing fires after Hurricane Helene flooding WFTS Tampa Bay
~~~~~~~~~~~
Then: Tampa Bay Lightning-a hockey team
Now: Tampa Bay Lightning-a Tesla
No surprise with that headline. You can’t even take a Tesla Cybertruck through a car wash. How will they go in a flood?
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13904217/furious-tesla-cybertruck-owner-turned-away-car-wash.html
When I rarely encounter one, my first thought is always the same… it resembles a rolling pyramid scheme.
Something’s cooking on twitter re Keir Starmer. After a Labour MP resigned and complained about him having a problem with women and surrounding himself with a coterie of lads, there are now claims of superinjunctions, claims of him having been thrown out by his wife which was why he was living with Lord Alli, claims of him having an affair and claims that he’s not being straight about any of these things. There seems to be a concerted effort to get him out.
It is mainly among Reform types, it must be said, but there seems to be a lot of Labour inside briefing as well. But why now? Ukraine? Israel? The economy?
If Colonel Smithers is on parade, perhaps he can add something? They’re not the accusations of being bought and bought cheap that I would expect of Labour. They’re positively Tory in their nature (giving some credence to the uniparty jibe!).
The Emperor has no clothes or too many clothes?
He’s 100 days in, and he’s openly corrupt. When he isn’t cutting budgets for domestic programs, Starmer’s big push is about who can use what bathroom. At a point, Starmer is going to make being a new Labour MP a lodestone instead of an opportunity to pick up a side piece. Then there are those with values.
Starmer doesn’t have the “filibuster” or the “cool” factor Obama had. Even then Obama “tried” to do healthcare, using the lie of “just give it time” to distract. After 14 years of Tory rule, he should have programs ready to be voted on regardless of how useless they might be (think Pell Grants forgiven for people who start and operate a business in a poverty stricken neighborhood for 3 years). This is just politics 101. Blair had enough programs to justify billboards saying what Labour did for you (the voters).
Not that Blair would be the right man, but Blair would roll in with a plan to justify his election.
Thank you.
I have heard about the affair and free gear Keir being thrown out of the house for a while. It’s not clear which of the mistresses led to this exile.
There are also rumours of sweetheart loans from Lord Alli, who got his break from the Maxwells and was friends with Ghislaine M and Epstein.
Thank you. Alli’s background with Ghislaine was also mentioned. Free gear Keir was not exactly the rhyme in the hashtag, though: it was more suggestive of a new master…. :-)
Although I don’t follow UK political twitter, I saw a few of those claims – essentially saying that No.10 has fallen into deep chaos. I’ve no idea how well founded they are, but the ‘usual suspects’ – the Guardian and BBC – are very quiet, which can be interpreted any way. Its also of course possible that there is a lot of trolling at work.
It wouldn’t surprise me if he is in trouble. I don’t think Starmer has a traditional power base within Labour – he is in place because of the perception that he’s a winner, and leaders like that are very expendable. The question is whether all his various puppetmasters (rumours vary as to who they are), want him in or out. I think almost any story can be suppressed if they want it badly or not, and Sue Grey is in there for a reason.
I’m beginning to wonder if the UK has become essentially ungovernable from the top level. The country keeps functioning because it has a ‘deep’ administrative infrastructure, it can keep going for years with a clown show on top. But this can only go on for so long.
It might be a good time for Russia, China, Iran, & Cuba to send assist to the states in need since the feds don’t care.
That would be considered meddling.
Remember when Venezuela sent aid after Katrina and Bush forbade it?
Personally, while I would love to get those nations helping, I would go to the nearest German consulate (or honorary consul) and ask if the Technisches Hilfswerk could come and help. They have rescue vehicles, heavy equipment, water purification units, and they aren’t military! The could arrive on Luftwaffe transport planes direct (or with a short refueling stop) from Germany . They came during Katrina.
Couldn’t find a place to jump in on the Helene comments but I think the strangely muted news media is very much intentional.
Biden-Harris didn’t slow ‘climate change,’ FEMA is still a #$%! #$@@show, National Guard has been gutted to keep Ukraine supplied, and in general the impacted states are being overwhelmed.
THE LESS SAID ABOUT THAT THE BETTER. For Harris-Walz. Harris can’t say anything because she’s the current VP. Her job isn’t to say right now, it’s to “do.” This is Walz’s strongest suit, dude was the top kick in the MN Guard.
If the media talks up this disaster, it ratchets up the expectations on the disaster relief.
Biden-Harris can’t deliver squat, let alone multi-state massive aid.
But if the chaos really roils the impacted and adjacent states…gosh, I guess we have to postpone the elections just to be fair! Or something else, my main point being that Helene is not timely for Biden-Harris or Harris-Walz but that doesn’t mean they won’t try to exploit it somehow.
Because I’m not a nice person, if I were Biden I’d speak on this to the nation when the waters have cleared and — without any warning to her — I’d name Kamala Harris as the Recovery Czar.
We have to save our money, collectively, for Ukraine and Israel. Washington is completely not interested in the welfare of the American people. Back in the days of the Cold War this story would have gotten far more play.
That’s absurd. The amount of money spent on Ukraine and Israel is rather small. Not only that most of the Ukraine money is spent in the US to buy arms. This is a very cheap way for us to defend ourselves from Russian expansion. The idea that it is costing us a lot in Ukraine is just a red herring ginned up by the right to agitate people.
If people want to stop funding Israel go talk to Speaker Johnson. The House of Representatives controls funding.
“The amount of money spent on Ukraine and Israel is rather small. Not only that most of the Ukraine money is spent in the US to buy arms. This is a very cheap way for us to defend ourselves from Russian expansion.”
You’re being ironic, right?
The deaths of so many Ukrainian men is monstrous; using them as our tools is even more monstrous.
The darkest part is that it’s not protecting US from Russian expansion. Or anyone else, for that matter. Russian army is now bigger, better and more experienced than three years ago.
Whereas saying that Ukraine will never, ever be a member of NATO would have created a new level of security in Europe with no cost at all. In human lives or money.
What you say is entirely true. However it is also true to say that the whole point of the exercise was to use Ukraine to help collapse the Russian Federation for the enormous looting opportunities that it would make possible – about $75 trillion worth. The damage and destruction to the Ukraine would have just been “collateral” damage.
Indeed, we agree in this. One would think, though, that someone, somewhere would have had second thoughts when the coup in Kiev run immediately into a civil war with the Donbass standing for the constitution and Kiev forces getting their arses handed back to them several times.
Obviously people who think international relations only in the terms of Good and Evil can’t do long term planning. Or even comprehend the facts on the ground.
No, it would have not, because it would be a lie used to buy time. Creating new level of security in Europe always comes with the same cost, war.
Really, because Europe is not insecure because of Russia, and hasn’t been for over almost a century. In fact they exist because of it during that time. And no I am not just discounting the insecure Cold War period. The same reasons Russia might have to wage war were caused by many of the same people that are causing it today.
The biggest threat to their security is the US and it’s advice and dictums. They absolutely would be better off both financially and security wise if they had told the US to take their proxy war with Russia and shove it where the sun doesn’t shine.
Yea, really. Though you might want to read it more carefully, in order to not misunderstand it.
The Empire of Lies did not get that moniker for nothing. Europe is not insecure because of Russia, but becase of NATO. This war has been going on ever since Cold War ended, and NATO started its march eastwards, wrecking Yugoslavia in the process.
No army goes towards Kiev without the intention to continue all the way to Moscow. For new security in Europe, Russia needs to push NATO back, hopefully destroying it in the process. No promises of “never ever”, but war, as usual.
P.S. US vassals don’t get to talk to the boss, unless they are asking “how high”.
Nope.
https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2024/09/links-9-14-2024.html#comment-4102000
https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2024/09/links-9-13-2024.html#comment-4101593
https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2024/09/links-9-11-2024.html#comment-4100591
If I were Trump, I’d halt my campaign and announce that I was doing so in order to allow Vice President Harris to focus her energies on getting aid to Helene victims. And I would then begin coordinating private relief efforts like Al Gore did for Katrina.
Hezbollah: 10 Things You Need to Know —
A long read, but worth it. Fascinating. Don’t skip the footnotes. My parents visited Beirut (as tourists) in 1974, just before everything went haywire. They said it was a lovely city. It’s a shame that Lebanon has suffered such an awful fate, but what a sectarian mess…..
Lily Tomlin’s quote (‘No matter how cynical you get, it is impossible to keep up’) applies to Lebanon in spades.
How NOT at all surprising that Jacobin would worry and fret about a left party getting a major electoral victory (BSW in Germany)
And the main thrust of the hit piece is to connect them to AfD
I nearly guffawed when the article recommended BS Bernie as a better example to emulate. Not making it up.
Re: LA data center in previous office space. In my thirty-five year career as an engineer, I worked in three building complexes that designed and built things. One became an Amazon distribution point for a while and is now largely empty, one became part of the headquarters for a sportswear company (clothes made offshore of course), and one became a datacenter for the internet landing in the area.
Anecdotal of course, but the overall data supports the trend of US deindustrialization.
Manufacturing decline
Despite Intel’s woes, the U.S. remains the revenue leader of the semiconductor industry
News
By Anton Shilov published 3 hours ago
And will stay this way for years to come.
U.S. semiconductor firms currently dominate the global market with a 50.2% share, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA). Competitors from other countries hold between 7% and 15% of the market, and this distribution is expected to remain stable for the foreseeable future.
https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/despite-intels-woes-the-us-remains-the-leader-of-the-semiconductor-industry
“Expected to remain stable for the foreseeable future”. LOL.
Are they expecting things to remain ‘stable’ while slapping increasing sanctions on the worlds largest purchaser of their semiconductor products? That’s a neat trick, that. Recall that China has been more than 50% of the entire world’s S.C. market since 2020. Pissing off and then outright banning your biggest buyers doesn’t normally do wonders for your market share, but apparently the GigaBrains in charge of Western policy know best.
The Zionist Entity is into Lebanon.
May their efforts wind up like Gettysburg, the Ardennes, Spring Awakening, Khafji, and Kursk.
May the region finally stand against them, or at least the nations they occupy and attacked.
Elijah Magnier is “somewhat” biased but seems to have quite good connections in Lebanon, and he’s saying that people from southern Lebanon are telling him “they’ve been waiting for the IDF since 2006”.
According to him Israel is about to find out how many missiles Hezbollah has left. Unlike the previous wars, this one will not be fought only in Lebanon.
Magnier is ‘biased’ politically, which is absolutely fine by me – I prefer journalists who are honest about their priors. He also has lots of contacts and some very useful insights, especially about Iran. However, I think he has often fallen into the trap Robert Fisk wrote about many times, essentially about believing what the last person (even a very well connected person) tells you in that region. It really is a hall of mirrors with the truth of any situation being very well hidden. As they used to say in Northern Ireland ‘if you claim to understand the situation, you’ve just proven you don’t understand anything’. I generally take it as a rule of thumb that when anyone states something as a ‘certainty’ in that region is almost always wrong.
My only experience with South Lebanon is a visit nearly 20 years ago, to visit Shiite and Christian friends (thankfully, they don’t live there anymore, but they do have relatives living south of the Litani). Plus, I’ve known quite a few Irish soldiers who have served there over the years with UNIFIL, and in general they always got on very well with the Shiite community (up to a few years ago, for some fairly obscure reasons). For the most part, its just a normal place, albeit distinctly poorer than most of Lebanon, most people are just trying to make a living and wish the whole conflict would go away. There are remnants of the old pro-Israeli populations (mostly Christian Lebanese) although they keep very quiet (they could well be a source of information for Israel). When I visited, there was clear bitterness expressed by some locals at what they saw as Hezbollah ‘making trouble’ for everyone. I’ve been told that the economic crisis in Lebanon has severely strained internal relations in many towns and villages in the area.
From the little I know about Hizbollahs military preparations, I’ve always assumed that they have planned on a ‘deep’ war – drawing Israel north of the Litani. I doubt if they have focused valuable units in that region, they’d be far too vulnerable to a quick Israeli strike.
I’ve always believed that whatever happens, it will not be a replay of 2006. The Israeli’s are not that stupid. They’ve clearly planned in great detail the decapitation operation and will try to destroy Hezbollahs power from an arms length if they possibly can. And its not impossible that one of the many Lebanese ethnic/political groups who don’t like Hezbollah are helping them. Anything goes in that region. From the look of things so far, Israel may have decided that the way to destroy Hezbollah is to destroy Lebanon. Of all the countries I’ve visited in my life, I don’t think I’ve ever been to one that managed to be so blessed with its people and natural riches, and so cursed by its history and leaders.