First Kim Jong-Un said…
North Korea threatens 'packs of wolves' to 'strangle' US after latest round of US sanctions https://t.co/fLvfNV61S2
— Fox News (@FoxNews) August 8, 2017
Then Kim Jong-Orange said…
NEW: Pres. Trump says if North Korea continues threats "they will be met with fire, fury and frankly power." https://t.co/SWO0KcJhxx pic.twitter.com/CVS1Brfm8g
— Good Morning America (@GMA) August 8, 2017
As I mentioned on Twitter, wolves, lacking thumbs, are uniquely unsuited to the task of performing strangulation, whereas nuclear warfare is all about unleashing fire and fury. To be fair, Kim Jong-Un could be the victim of poor translation or may be employing some obscure local idiom that doesn’t resonate in another language (Americans who are temporarily plagued by phlegm, try telling foreigners you have “a frog in my throat” — you’ll get quizzical looks!). But let’s say Twitler wins this round of blood-curdling threats issued by nuclear-armed narcissists with bad hairdos.
One phrase in Twitler’s full statement (such as it is) troubles me even more than the fire and fury part: “frankly power.” Thanks to his father’s industrious bigotry and avarice, Trump has felt powerful all his life. His increasingly unhinged behavior since he was sworn in strikes me as the steady decompensation of a walking collection of untreated personality disorders who is confronted for the first time, at age 70, with intolerable limits on his power. Let’s hope he doesn’t fixate on ICBMs as unnatural male enhancement.
Open thread!
GregB
Think of all of the start ups and investment opportunities in a post nuclear apocalypse will offer.
MisterForkbeard
In Adam’s previous thread, I said This and I’ll say it again: As someone who works near and commutes through San Francisco, I now have a nontrivial fear of having a nuke land near me.
It’s probably still not likely, but this statement just made it much MORE likely than it was a day ago or even 5 hours ago.
JCJ
Eh, I’ll just ignore them and focus on today being International Cat Day!
Happy day, Schrodingers cat!
lollipopguild
Maybe we should lock these two morans in a steel cage for a death match. The winner is taken out and shot.
Dnfree
Shock and awe. Works great.
Frankensteinbeck
Trump has been terrified of any situation in which he does not have overwhelming power all his life.
Thoroughly Pizzled
But her emails
Betty Cracker
Wouldn’t you know it — there’s an old Trump tweet for this situation too!
Major Major Major Major
How exactly do you strangle somebody with a pack of wolves?
schrodingers_cat
@JCJ: Thanks! At my house every day is a cat day.
Baud
Since Trump always lies, this is good news.
Bobby Thomson
So basically, eat the pie.
Baud
@Major Major Major Major: Very carefully.
Mike J
trollhattan
@Major Major Major Major:
String them into an attractive necklace, with a slip knot.
Mike J
@Betty Cracker: Also:
Immanentize
@MisterForkbeard:
I understand why this sounds super scary, but it is not really all that plausible. It seems like you are maybe thinking the North Koreans can accurately launch , guide, land and detonate some maybe non-existent miniturized nuke on one of their often-failing missiles The DPNK has no experience guiding or landing anything anywhere with any accuracy. Again, hitting some place even as big as LA from where they launch is likely a crap shoot.
We understand these limitations even about our own missiles. Hence, overwhelming counter-response capabilities and TRIAD.
efgoldman
@Major Major Major Major:
Very, very carefully.
AdamK
Wolves can grab your neck with their jaws, thus sort of strangling you but also tearing your throat out.
debit
I dunno, I asked about him dropping a bomb in the other thread and was told to chill the fuck out.
Yutsano
So not a single system at my work is functioning and I’ve already been yelled at because I can’t help anyone today. Might as well end the world while we’re at it.
MisterForkbeard
@Immanentize: I don’t think it’s especially likely. I do think it’s now much, much more likely that NK will *try* to launch something after Trump escalates to war (nuclear or conventional).
Whether or not it hits is another question, but let’s just say this whole chain of events is much more concerning than it was… say, back when we thought Hillary would be President.
chopper
god, i miss obama so much right now.
Baud
@debit:
It’s the end of the world as we know it
and I feel fine
sm*t cl*de
It must be reassuring for the South Koreans, all this talk of cauldronising their peninsula.
Jeffro
It was not at all reassuring to see just how hard Orangemandias was hugging himself during his “statement”.
Could somebody please give him a weighted vest, stat?
ETA: I think Frankensteinbeck at #6 and I are sharing a brain cell or two at the moment
Baud
Via LGM
TriassicSands
Here’s a sobering thought: One of these two idiots — Kim Jong Un and Donald J. Trump — was installed by a (more or less) free election.
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
That statement just proves how unhinged and unsuitable he is to the presidency. He needs to be impeached for the safety of us all.
Major Major Major Major
@Yutsano:
Ah, the wonderful world of programming.
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
@Baud:
*Screams internally*
MisterForkbeard
@Baud: I am Jack’s complete lack of surprise.
JCJ
@MisterForkbeard:
I suppose, But having first really thought of nuclear war when St Ronnie was having Pershing II’s deployed throughout Germany when he was first president and going to school in Hamburg this is not as stressful. Alexander Haig gave a speech in West Berlin stating, “There are more important things than peace.” I arrived in Hamburg in September, 1981 with all of this going on. The border with East Germany was only 40 or 50 miles away. True, Kim Jong Un and Trump are both idiots/lunatics/narcissists, but I don’t find it nearly as worrisome.
Chyron HR
@Jeffro:
But that would just increase his battle power.
Yarrow
@Baud: That is pathetic. I can’t decide what it says about me that not only am I not surprised they’re giving him a twice daily praise packet but I kind of figured something like that was going on.
eclare
@Jeffro: yeah, and Melania was sitting next to him?
Sister Golden Bear
@MisterForkbeard: I hear ya, I hear ya.
Although given how inaccurate the missiles would likely be, we might get lucky and the strike do something useful, like take out Bakersfield.
(Only half-snarking….)
Mike in Pasadena
@JCJ: Despots all over the world learned one lesson from the US invasion and destruction of Iraq: arm yourself as much as possible, including with nukes, or you might be the next target of American Republicans. Bush 2, Wolfowitz, Pearl, Rumsfeld, Cheney and the rest of that willfully ignorant crew have a lot to answer for.
MisterForkbeard
@JCJ: There have undoubtedly been more tense and worried times, no doubt.
The problem I’ve got with all of this is that Trump is much more likely to escalate than previous presidents. He doesn’t understand consequence, but he understands that someone threatened him. Likewise, he understands that angry, manly threats get him plaudits from his base and from the media – and he’s obsessed with his own image.
At this moment, I’m much less worried than you would have been in ’81. I don’t trust that situation to last, though.
@Sister Golden Bear: If only. :)
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
well it was nice knowing you all Japan, the Korean Peninsula and possibly most of the west coast
raven
When Gen. Barry McCaffery thinks you’re nuts. . .
Waldo
Kim is a beacon of hope for Trump:
World War III = Get out of jail free.
raven
The real bitch will be if this works.
Baud
Let me be the first to say that by threatening North Korea with nuclear war, Donald Trump became President of the United States today. #PunditTalk
Baud
@raven: How would you tell, other than through the absence of war?
By that reasoning, everything every past president has tried with NK has also worked.
SiubhanDuinne
O/T, sad news, Glen Campbell has died, age 81.
Chris
I’m glad it’s not just me. I was like… what the fuck? Do wolves have a particularly strong association with strangulation? Even in mythology?
catclub
From Bloomberg:
I wonder how the South Koreans and Japanese feel about limiting the missile range to … them.
JPL
https://twitter.com/ajmount/status/895004524347314176
JCJ
@Mike in Pasadena:
Agree. You could include the author of that catchy phrase, “Axis of Evil,” David Frum. He might have just been a speech writer, but those words cast in stone what the next steps Iran and North Korea should choose.
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
@Chyron HR:
I see what you did there
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
@Waldo:
Unless Trump is vaporized in a nuclear blast.
Baud
BTW
Win
Major Major Major Major
@Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD): The important thing is, we didn’t elect that warmonger Killary.
Lizzy L
I am much less nervous about what NK might decide/be able to do to the US (and I live in the SF Bay Area also) than I am about what Donald Trump might want/decide/be able to do to NK.
Yarrow
@SiubhanDuinne: Aww…I’m sorry to hear that. I know he was suffering from Alzheimer’s. I didn’t see the documentary they made about it but heard it was great. I loved his classic songs.
Chris
@JCJ:
It’s occurred to me before that Russian-American relations in the early eighties might be the closest historical analogy for Donald Trump v. Kim Jong Eun today: two nuclear-armed powers run by posturing reactionary assholes who were also going seriously senile. Imagine how much more scared you’d have been if you’d know about Reagan’s Alzheimer’s.
(An imperfect analogy, as 1) both Brezhnev and Reagan still listened to their advisers more than Trump or, I suspect, Kim, 2) Brezhnev was going seriously senile by then, but we’re not sure exactly when it set in for Reagan, 3) Brezhnev and Reagan’s mental problems were the product of old age and genetics, as opposed to Trump and Kim who are simply overgrown brats who were never told “no,” and 4) on a happier note, North Korea vs. United States doesn’t carry nearly the threat of worldwide devastation that USSR vs United States did).
raven
@Baud: What reasoning are you referring to?
raven
@Yarrow: He was ok in True Grit too.
Fair Economist
If Kim Jong Un plans to unleash packs of wolves on the US they’ll need to be remarkably good at swimming, aside from the novel strangulation capabilities.
Baud
@raven: That it works because of the absence of war. How else would we know if it works?
Mike J
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lha5Gk-yCbw
Turgidson
@Major Major Major Major:
If Hair Furor manages to blunder us into a global conflagration through sheer impulsive dipshittery like that statement, we’ll still have GG and his imitators saying “well as bad as this might seem, corrupt neoliberal arglebargle Hillary would have been unimaginably worse and blah blah blah deep state derpity doo.” Fuckit, most of the Republican Party will keep telling us and themselves that, too, but for different reasons.
raven
@Baud: Adjust your snarkometer please. What if the fucking Korean moron backs down an denukes?
Baud
@Mike J:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/10/19/the-final-trump-clinton-debate-transcript-annotated/?utm_term=.89b506e2e387
Bex
@SiubhanDuinne: Barbara Cook has died, age 89.
Turgidson
Also, isn’t it obvious that Hair Furor’s big manly-man statement about fire and fury was based on the fact that he watched Game of Thrones on Sunday?
Baud
@raven: If Trump causes that to happen, I’ll give him his props.
JPL
I didn’t realize that Trump was reading a statement, which is why he repeated the section about fire and fury.
Is Bannon on the trip with him?
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Baud: You know Trump is name checked in that song?
debit
@Turgidson: Man, if only he had a dragon.
SiubhanDuinne
@Yarrow:
I didn’t see it either, although I heard most if not all of the audio on CNN in the car. Alzheimer’s is a true bitch of a disease.
Between Glen Campbell and Barbara Cook, it’s been a sad day for music.
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
@Major Major Major Major: On the plus side, Korean War II: Triple Genocide means Seattle doesn’t need to worry about The Big One sending it into the ocean.
zhena gogolia
@Bex:
Oh, so sad.
Bex
@Chris: Trump’s father died of Alzheimer’s.
Ithink
@? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?:
This assumes that the current composition of Congress (the Senate & House of Reps.), the Trump/Pence (failing rotating IKEA) cabinet, and every state legislature from the top/down are any more safer or more reasonable governing agents with or without Trp @ the head! They’re ALL Republican dominated, and until the Dens get it together and clean their clock up & down the tickets during midterms AND election years, we’re (meaning the 288 million Americans that DIDN’T vote for him & the world writ large) gonna be TOTALLY screwed/fearful/on edge until then?…
chris
I don’t think the Madman Theory was ever meant to be used by both sides. Yet here we are.
catclub
@Baud:
Ask Lisa Simpson if she still has that rock that keeps tigers away.
lamh36
Just got home and saw the news…smh
Trump is an idiot, but still, it makes me mad that we all have to be subject to this maniac with his fingers on the nuclear codes, surrounded by “good patriotic people” just trying to keep Cheeto under control, and instead ain’t doing shit…the dude is still cray..
To all them fuq’ers. who DIDN’T VOTE or WASTED your vote on 3rd party bullshit…or those HILARY IS SAME AS TRUMP idiots…oh and ALL STUPID AZZ, Mayo Nation, TRUMP VOTERS…Enjoy the next TRUMP WORLD WAR!!!
mike in dc
They should lie to Trump and tell him NK can hit Mar-a-lago and Trump Tower NY with nukes already.
Quinerly
@raven:
Yep. Been off line and out of the loop since this AM. Walked in and turned on MSNBC….At least Nicole was trying to remain calm.
MisterForkbeard
@Baud: Man, it’s almost as if someone saw this coming!
NCSteve
@MisterForkbeard: If it makes you feel any better, the arms control experts who follow this stuff closely are nearly certain that the ICBM’s they’ve already launched can already hit New York or DC, so they’ll almost certainly go there first if they’ve got the guidance capability.
Another Scott
What about that China-DPRK mutual defense treaty? SCMP from April:
How plausible is that analysis? I dunno.
Do we really think that Donnie would just blow up a bunch of stuff and declare victory and go home? Like he did in Syria? How’d that work out? Does anyone think that Kim wouldn’t respond as best he could if the DPRK is attacked? That there wouldn’t be pressure for US/ROK/Japan/others to “go in and take care of the problem once and for all”? And that China would just sit back and accept that?
Really?
We know there’s a whole bunch of people in Donnie’s White House that think that yelling “Lock Her UP!” is strategic thinking…
:-/
These are dangerous times, but nothing is inevitable. We can’t get stampeded into doing something stupid just because Donnie paints himself into a corner… We can’t assume that China will just sit back and do nothing if warheads start flying.
Cheers,
Scott.
lamh36
Chuck Todd…gonna be the type to spread never challenge anything that comes from this WH. He’ll spread their war propaganda far & wide
Chris
@Bex:
I sit corrected.
tybee
godzilla – DTS
Haruo Nakajima, who wore the Godzilla suit in 12 movies, died on Monday from pneumonia at the age of 88, it said.
In an interview this year Nakajima explained how the original 1954 costume was created from ready-mixed concrete and weighed up to 100kg (220lbs).
He said he studied animals in the Tokyo zoo to prepare for the role.
Nakajima started off as a stunt actor in samurai and war films including “Seven Samurai” by Akira Kurosawa.
He first played Godzilla – a giant beast who emerges from the deep after a nuclear test – in the 1954 film entitled Godzilla directed by Ishiro Honda and produced by the famed Japanese film studio Toho.
He went on to play the character in consecutive sequels as well as playing other beasts Rodan, Mothra and King Kong.
His last outing in the suit was in the 1972 Godzilla vs. Gigan
bystander
@Baud:
VICE News? Doesn’t that come on after Bong Appetit and before Weediquette?
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
@NCSteve: [citation requested]
debit
@lamh36: Chuck Todd will cream his pants on air and then smoke a cigarette after if Trump launches. Him and Tweety both. “Chuck, doesn’t it make you think of a man’s man, you know a guy who smells like Aqua Velva, maybe he just stepped out of the shower and launched the nukes, then had a drink with his generals in the war room? I bet they wear uniforms in the war room, and there’s maybe a smoky haze and the lights are low, because it’s somber, somber but sexy, you know?”
Betty Cracker
@JPL: He wasn’t reading the statement — the photo in the tweet is misleading. Just saw a clip of him making the statement, and man, is it WEIRD! His body language is bizarre — he’s hugging himself and sort of swaying. I wish I was joking — CNN has the clip if you want to see for yourself.
Baud
@bystander:
#FakeNews?
Yarrow
I don’t know what we as regular citizens can do about this situation. Any suggestions? Doesn’t seem like a “call your Reps” kind of issue, but maybe I’m wrong. Maybe I should call the Republicans who supposedly represent me and tell them to impeach the corrupt pumpkin.
Yarrow
@Betty Cracker: He needs a ThunderShirt, but for nuclear weapon anxiety.
Mike in Pasadena
@Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD): Prevailing winds here are west to east. Fallout can also kill lots of people.
Mike J
@Yarrow: Stretching exercises so we’re limber enough to kiss our asses goodbye.
Meanwhile, The National Interest channels Buck Turgidson.
catclub
@chris:
yep
Baud
@Mike J: Only tax hikes are existential.
tobie
@JCJ:
I remember that speech well. I was at the protest march in West Berlin and the outrage in the crowd at the danger the US was exposing Germany to was everywhere.
On another note: Did anyone else notice Melania sitting next to Trump during the opioid crisis meeting? Is she now an advisor, too?
SatanicPanic
@Mike J: Lopping that dude’s fingers off would be horrific, but not existential.
hueyplong
I guess we’re left to wonder whether Putin sees a downside to a nuclear holocaust.
Yarrow
@tobie:
Yep. It’s weird. She may be his handler when Javanka aren’t available. Are they with him on vacation?
catclub
@Mike J: “Now, I’m not saying we wouldn’t get our hair mussed.”
catclub
@Mike J: I suspect it would be one US city and then all of N. Korea
Mike J
@catclub: As somebody in Seattle, it could be pretty fucking existential if you’re in the one US city.
tobie
@Yarrow: Well, she’s no better than anyone else as a handler. I know they sent her into the meeting with Putin at the G20 to break it up after an hour but she couldn’t stop her husband doing whatever he was doing with his BFF.
I think I heard Jared and Ivanka are in China so she may be taking their place.
lamh36
I take one day offline from da social media and my daily blogroll, and THIS is what I come back to…
MomSense
@Yarrow: I just faxed mine. This is insane.
d58826
So listening to the talking heads and how the policy of the past three presidents has been an abject failure and that is why we are at this point. OK but I have a question – at point in the past 30 years should we have gone to war rather than continuing along a failing diplomatic path? They talked about putting the military option back on the table but of what value is that unless the US really plans on launching an attack.
Another Scott
@Betty Cracker: Downstairs I just posted a link to one of his “tough guy” pictures where he’s crossing his arms and frowning like that. I think it’s his “this is what a tough guy like Mussolini did, so I’ll do it too!” pose. But Melania looks pissed off at him, also too, so maybe there’s some additional family dynamics pushing him to be crankier than usual… :-/
One thing is certain, Kim isn’t going to be swayed by Donnie’s tough talk.
Cheers,
Scott.
debbie
@Baud:
I think Trump’s trying to out-Un Un with those words. They should be locked together in a room to duke it out and get it over with.
bystander
@Baud: I thought VICE News was connected to that bro magazine and the cable station, but I guess not. Bong Appetit is my favorite program. Jacques Pepin + pot!
I just picked up on Barbara Cook’s death. She was my all time favorite. Broadway lights dim tonight.
lamh36
Uh…duh…
Mike J
@d58826:
The diplomatic path was working under Clinton, then Bush remembered hearing a comedian talk about the rule of three and made his axis of evil speech.
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@tobie:
Wait, that was a meeting and not a lunchtime photo op? WTF? I did notice that she was leaning as far away from him as she could without falling off her chair – but that’s normal. Her presence is as fucked up as that of his kids – in other words, just another Tuesday.
eataTREE
Everyone in the Bay Area is invited to sleep on my couch, post-apocalypse; I live on sixteen acres in the Sierra foothills. You will have to share with a variety of hippie kids who are already sleeping on my couch, but they are sweet and mostly harmless.
Depending on how many of you show up, we may need to increase the size of the vegetable garden rather. In your panicked flight from the flaming ruins please try to grab a decent pair of gardening gloves because we never have enough. Thanks!
Baud
January 2017
http://thehill.com/policy/defense/315855-dems-seek-to-curb-trumps-nuclear-options
JeanneT
@Major Major Major Major:
re. strangulation by wolves…
I’ve seen video of two adult male wolves attacking a senior male by grabbing him by the throat until he lost consciousness. The only reason the senior male wasn’t killed in that instance was because the staff at Wolf Park (a wolf study center in Indiana with a small captive wolf population) were able to pull him away from the younger males.
Baud
@Mike J: Yeah, but Bill gave us NAFTA and got a blow job, so we’re not allowed to positively acknowledge anything he did.
lamh36
debbie
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice:
What a joke that meeting was. Trump tore himself away from his vacation to hold a highly publicized meeting which basically was no more than, “We’re working on it”? Unbelievable.
Baud
@debbie:
Fixed.
Morzer
@Major Major Major Major:
Well, you tie the wolves together very tightly and…
MisterForkbeard
@Mike J: Well, it was “working” during the Clinton administration – it’s evident that NK might have been reneging in some areas (might have) while we also arguably failed to live up to our side of the deal. However, it was a repairable relationship and vastly superior to the other options, which makes the Bush team’s destruction of that policy completely indefensible.
tobie
McCain has issued a statement taking exception to Trump’s rhetoric. Don’t issue threats you can’t fulfill. He concluded by saying one should talk softly but carry a big stick.
Morzer
@debbie:
Da doo Un Un/
Da doo Un Un….
Another Scott
@lamh36: I knew that sounded familiar…
Thanks.
Cheers,
Scott.
debbie
I don’t see a post on this. Am I the only one who was surprised?
The Resistance is strengthening.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Betty Cracker: Who would have known it was a threat from the Trumpster.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@debbie: It was raining, so there was nothing better to do.
Major Major Major Major
@tobie: Meanwhile Graham is (I assume) still prattling on about how war with NK is ‘inevitable’.
Mike in NC
Trump is going to have his Cuban Missile Crisis — maybe this week or maybe next year — and it won’t turn out well. He’s mentally unstable and requires full-time adult supervision.
Gelfling 545
“Now go away or I shall taunt you a second time! ..” What a pair of “statesmen”. You’d better not threaten me or I will threaten you. Jesus. Neither of them should be allowed to use the pointy scissors.
Frankensteinbeck
@Baud:
That might pass. They already gave Trump the middle finger on the Russian sanctions. I wouldn’t bet either way.
debbie
The pack of ravening wolves reminded me of a segment on BBC radio at about 3 am Monday morning. It included a tape of chimpanzees attacking and biting a non-familiar chimpanzee to death. It was absolutely horrifying to hear. Sometimes nature is horrible.
p.a.
It is a tale told by an idiot, full of [fire] and fury, signifying nothing.
Cheryl Rofer
Secretary of Defense under Bill Clinton
ruemara
@eataTREE: I’m down. I’ll bring my violets, another compost bucket and my roommate’s basil plant. Possibly the roommate.
debbie
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
He tweeted this this morning:
MAJOR?????
The best response so far:
Mike in NC
@Cheryl Rofer: Going from Bill Perry to Rick Perry was quite a downhill slide.
A Ghost to Most
Kim Jong-Orange is definitely going into the rotation
In other news (apologies if this has already been addressed:
rawstory
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Lizzy L: Yes, it’s not impossible that Trump would order a first strike against Northern California thinking it’s Korea. After all, this is the same man who thinks Oahu is in Africa.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@debbie: Trump can’t golf in the rain.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
It’s not? Does kinda sound African.
ETA: Maybe a city in Kenya.
Morzer
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
To be fair, his whole administration so far has been a Trumpster fire…
Morzer
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Trump is still complaining that he liked Oahu Messenger before that wicked Marissa Meyer ruined everything.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
You guys, I feel so much better knowing the sage advice of JarVanka is just down the hall from Donnie.
Cheryl Rofer
North Korea responds:
debbie
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
Heavens, his makeup would run!
debbie
@Cheryl Rofer:
He’s as cowardly as Trump, picking on little Guam.
A Ghost to Most
@MisterForkbeard:
I spent 3.5 years living in that exact spot at SAC HQ. My plan was to go outside and try to catch the first one
Eta: sorry about that
Calouste
@tobie: I don’t know if Melanie is an advisor, but she might be an expert on opioid use. Most normal people who would have to live with the shitgibbon would be.
Mnemosyne
@Mike J:
Los Angeles and Long Beach are the two largest ports in the US. New York is a distant third.
But, hey, destroying our country’s ability to import and export goods wouldn’t be a problem for our economy, right?
p.a.
Kelly & McMaster currently have to take turns staying in the US when Twitler is here to try to maintain some control. Next, I guess, is putting a cot in his bedroom. Is there an operation to Siamese Twin two people together? Loser gets him.
JPL
@Cheryl Rofer: I assume that Japan, South Korea and China are paying attention, and I’m not sure what leader they fear the most. Trump and Kim are both narcissistic maniacs.
ruckus
Not volunteering but could a poll be taken to determine if these two males have the smallest measurable dicks on the planet?
MisterForkbeard
@A Ghost to Most: I’m mostly concerned about my property values going down. “Radioactive” isn’t usually on the list of desired features for a home. ^_^
chopper
@Cheryl Rofer:
i thought that said “president acute situation” and i thought well, yeah.
Mnemosyne
@Mike J:
Also, I read through the comments there and Kelly lives in South Korea, so I think his point was supposed to be that he’s in a fuckton more danger than anyone in the US is right now, but it didn’t come across that way, to put it gently.
Morzer
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
When you’re wounded and lost on Trumpistan’s plains
And Jared and Ivanka come to steal what remains
Just roll to your microphone
And lie out your brains
And sell out your country like a Trumper.
Bill Arnold
Cheryl Rofer, care to comment on the reports (and on the timing of the report) on NK warhead miniaturization?
The link from this link seems to get around the paywall.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/
(Guidance and re-entry are still technical challenges for them to solve, correct?)
Morzer
@Cheryl Rofer:
Well, I guess we now know that Kim Jong Un will not willingly cede the title of most blusteringly stupid head of state.
JPL
@Cheryl Rofer: That threat seems to cross the red line that Trump spoke about earlier.
MomSense
@Betty Cracker:
The weird way he kept holding his eyes closed as he talked was bizarre. He’s not well.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
So the word is Trump is now trying to kiss Muller’s ass since bullying won’t work. Good god, and North Korea now and we have this coward leading us. I am a hard core unbeliver but now I am tempted to take up prayer on a Pascel’s wager kind of moment
JPL
@MomSense: I think it means we’re f.ked.
A Ghost to Most
@MisterForkbeard:
True. I was living in the crosshairs of n nukes, where n>1. Since I worked in the basement just OUTSIDE the blast doors, we had no illusions of survival
Had a helluva good time, though.
Cheryl Rofer
@Bill Arnold: I’ve commented some on this thread. tl;dr: I agree with Sig Hecker’s comments in the WaPo article and would like to know more about the report(s) that are being quoted.
@JPL: It can be taken that way. After some thought, it looks to me like the message is “We won’t bomb Guam if you’ll stop overflights.” I got a like on Twitter from a North Korea expert, so I think that’s reasonable. The Great Negotiator set it up for North Korea to get one more negotiating point.
Calouste
@Bill Arnold: Guidance and re-entry only need to be solved if your goal is to blow up a specific target. If your minimum requirement is to cause nuclear contamination somewhere with a 1000 mile radius, you’re there already.
different-church-lady
@Major Major Major Major: Tie their tails together first. Jeez, it’s like you people don’t know how to do anything…
JPL
@Cheryl Rofer: I hope so.
Mart
Right wing radio jock while channel flipping in mid TN, I say we pop a cap in his ass. He can’t cross the border. We’ll mow them down. Trump has our backs on this. What say you, phone lines are open.
Ithink
@Mike J:
WASF!
Mnemosyne
@JPL:
I remember the good old days when people whined and complained that Obama had drawn a “red line” with Syria that he would never be able to back down from, and then some fine behind-the-scenes diplomating got announced and non-idiots realized that’s what had been going on the whole time.
The odds that something similar is happening here are … slim, shall we say.
Cheryl Rofer
@Mnemosyne: The people who complained about Obama’s “red line” are conspicuously silent now.
burnspbesq
@Sister Golden Bear:
Fresno first. Those assholes repearedly elected Devin Nunes.
Jeffro
@raven: @Baud: I’d say the likelihood of North Korea disarming itself of any nukes whatsoever is drifting into negative % at this point. It’s working for them: they haven’t been invaded like Iraq, they haven’t been forced into a restrictive agreement like Iran. They’ll tell China to pound sand too…but China might be able to tell them they only get to keep a couple if they want to continue receiving aid.
Gravenstone
@?BillinGlendaleCA: I think we should encourage him to. Especially if we can get Bill Murray to caddy.
TenguPhule
@Jeffro:
That option went out the window once NK successfully tested their first nuclear bomb.
Bill Arnold
@Cheryl Rofer:
Sorry about that, missed that thread. Read, and thanks.
Bill Arnold
@debbie:
Climate scientists seem in aggregate to be getting a bit feistier about political involvement. Very pleased to see this. The literature is largely without emotional content (e.g. couched (correctly) in probabilities), and so (IMO) we need more frightening scenario-style material like the nymag piece: http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/07/climate-change-earth-too-hot-for-humans.html
But for example, from Deadly heat waves projected in the densely populated agricultural regions of South Asia (August 2 2017),
(And more, calling out India and China by name…)(bold mine)
sylvania
@MisterForkbeard: Are you building a bunker in your back yard now? Do you always turn to jello so easily?
I would be a lot more worried if I was living in S Korea and you don’t see them panicking do you? N. Korea has missles that can hit S. Korea. Maybe Japan on a good day.
rachel
@Betty Cracker: It is wierd. I’d sure be interested in reading a body language expert’s reading of it.