Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Being the leader of the world means to be the leader of peace.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. let’s win this.

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

I’ve spoken to my cat about this, but it doesn’t seem to do any good.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

The revolution will be supervised.

So it was an October Surprise A Day, like an Advent calendar but for crime.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

Good lord, these people are nuts.

This blog will pay for itself.

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll

We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.

I really should read my own blog.

Schmidt just says fuck it, opens a tea shop.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

This fight is for everything.

When do we start airlifting the women and children out of Texas?

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Sunday Morning Open Thread: Busy Calendar

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Genuine silver lining: Thank *all* the gods for President Biden…

Reader Interactions

228Comments

  1. 1.

    SiubhanDuinne

    Twelve hours later, or however long it’s been since I first saw it, I remain gobsmacked by that TFG quote.

  6. 6.

    germy

    Notice even the most “tough on crime” DAs become lenient when it suits them: Memphis DA Amy Weirich cuts plea deal with a deputy who repeatedly raped a 14-year-old child. The deputy will serve no prison time and will not have to register as a sex offender. https://t.co/bU50BDDyXs

    — David Menschel (@davidminpdx) March 5, 2022

    Amy Weirich is the DA who prosecuted Pamela Moses, the Black woman who was sentenced to six years in prison for trying to register to vote after inquiring if she could. https://t.co/nFrazkNbSJ

    — Taniel (@Taniel) March 5, 2022

  9. 9.

    Chief Oshkosh

    Good morning, jackals! I’ve been pestering local media about their reporting “breakdown of the cease fires” rather than what they really are – an oft-used tactic of Putin to buy time for replenishing rockets and shells and to group civilians together for easier slaughter.

    Calling this a “breakdown of the cease fires” – they’re both-sides-ing even THIS.

  10. 10.

    Benw

    @SiubhanDuinne: 
    Russia (angrily): “Fighter jet bombing us, come in, who are you!?”
    Pilot: “Um… ni hao?”
    Russia (excitedly): “Da comrades, is China!”

  11. 11.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Gin & Tonic:

    In fairness, who among us  hasn’t had a moment of clarity while (mis)using a tool and realizing “Oh, this could go bad – I got lucky this time.”

  13. 13.

    prostratedragon

    Today in Sun Tzu:

    By being unsuccessful you have forewarned the enemy, and by being unable to take over with the previous methods you may have inspired their anger. They will now fight with more conviction to stop you, and your troops will suffer losses regardless of your apparent strength. You must attack with ferocity and fanatical enthusiasm if you are to succeed. You will have to convince your troops that the enemy has been unreasonable, and therefore must be stopped at any cost. This is called propaganda.

  26. 26.

    bbleh

    @SiubhanDuinne: The drunk-guy-at-the-end-of-the-bar metaphor is a bit tired by now but bang on in this case.

    And to be fair, that’s why a lot of them like him.

  29. 29.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    Thread which is a translation of post allegedly made by a Russian FSB member. This bit makes it a bit belivable

    Kadyrov’s squad was absolutely demolished before they even had a chance to fight and they got blown to pieces. I do not have any info that it was an FSB leak to Ukraine, so I’d give it a 1-2% chance – but can’t exclude this possibility completely.

    he says while talking over the internet.
    Probably the Russian government is riddled with internal spies from all those competing ministries who selling their reports to the highest bidder on the internet, Greed is the only virtue in Putin’s Russia after all.
    Even if it is a fake the rest is a good summery of how the Russians screwed themselves.

  32. 32.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @debbie:

    When redoing a hearth, I’d gotten one of those high speed rotary things to make cuts and notch cuts in the thick cement backer board. The thing had the switch on the back of the unit and no safety stop. I made it all work, but was convinced that it was sheer dumb luck that kept me from severing a femoral artery.

    I never used it again, and sold it to some workman on another household project for $75.

  33. 33.

    Baud

    @bbleh:

    It’s nothing new.   Norman Lear could have written those lines for Archie Bunker in the early 70s.  What’s changed is how the mentality has taken over one of our two major parties.

  35. 35.

    Waldo

    Speaking of China … what are the chances Xi will pressure Putin to back off before things get completely out of hand? I mean, no point planning for world domination if there’s no world left to dominate, right?

  36. 36.

    YY_Sima Qian

    All the stupidity & malice flying around in the world, all at once, how do I get out of this timeline?

  37. 37.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Baud:

    “Doc, I swear I was standing back a little, kinda imbalanced just in case and figured when the branch came down it would miss me. How could I have predicted THAT?

    Can you reattach it?”

  45. 45.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Gin & Tonic: I guess I won’t tell the story of the nut sack that met a belt sander then. You probably don’t want to hear the one about the drill having intercourse with a brain either.

  47. 47.

    Betty Cracker

    Ed Norton!


    Of course, Greenwald is calling Norton a McCarthyist.

  48. 48.

    sab

    @debbie: My college roommate knitted all her sculpture projects. No tools! No injuries! And they were amazing, but took her forever. She did not sleep for two years!

  50. 50.

    germy

    https://abcnews.go.com/Sports/wireStory/wnbas-brittney-griner-arrested-russia-drug-charges-83270235

    WNBA All-Star Brittney Griner was arrested last month at a Moscow airport after Russian authorities said a search of her luggage revealed vape cartridges.

    The Russian Customs Service said Saturday that the cartridges were identified as containing oil derived from cannabis, which could carry a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison.

    More than a dozen WNBA players were playing in Russia and Ukraine this winter, including league MVP Jonquel Jones and Courtney Vandersloot and Allie Quigley of the champion Chicago Sky. The WNBA confirmed Saturday that all players besides Griner had left both countries.

    The 31-year-old Griner has won two Olympic gold medals with the U.S., a WNBA championship with the Mercury and a national championship at Baylor. She is a seven-time All-Star.

    “Brittney Griner has the WNBA’s full support and our main priority is her swift and safe return to the United States,” the league said in a statement.

  51. 51.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I guess I won’t tell the story of the nut sack that met a belt sander…

    I hate to kink shame because I don’t want to yuck anyone’s yum, but…..

  52. 52.

    dmsilev

    The scary thing about that Trump speech is that, if anything, the rest of it was even more bonkers than the bit in the tweet. The Post got a full recording.

    Former president Donald Trump mused Saturday to the GOP’s top donors that the United States should label its F-22 planes with the Chinese flag and “bomb the s — t out of Russia.”

    He also praised North Korean leader Kim Jong Un as “seriously tough,” claimed he was harder on Vladimir Putin than any other president, reiterated his false claims that he won the 2020 election, urged his party to be “tougher” on supposed election fraud, disparaged a range of prominent party opponents and called global warming “a great hoax” that could actually bring a welcome development: more waterfront property.

    He espoused praise for North Korea’s brutal leader, marveling at how Kim’s generals and aides “cowered” when the dictator spoke to them. “Total control,” Trump said of how Kim ran the country, describing generals snapping to attention and standing up on command.

    “His people were sitting at attention,” he added.

    “I looked at my people and said I want my people to act like that,” he said to laughter.

    Trump also spent a large portion of his speech falsely claiming that he won Georgia, Wisconsin and other states in the 2020 election, offering unsubstantiated theories about how he won. After not touching on the election until minute 45 — a win for some of his advisers — he finished the speech with a long jeremiad about it. For example, he said, he knew he had to have won Georgia because he won Alabama and South Carolina by such large numbers, and he accused Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg of tilting the election against him.

    Trump reiterated some of his frequently repeated falsehoods and petty grievances. “The global warming hoax, it just never ends,” he said. He mocked the concept of sea levels rising, disputing widely held science. “To which I say, great, we have more waterfront property,” he said.

  57. 57.

    different-church-lady

    I went out for a drink Friday night.

    At a bar.

    Without a mask.

    I’ll let you know if I die.

  65. 65.

    Peale

    @different-church-lady: I think there is one where humans evolved to remain as svelte as snakes while being able to eat all the double cheeseburgers and fried chicken they want. Sadly, in that one, I’m constantly being pestered about quitting my job to become a super model.

  69. 69.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    Watching Sky News, which is running Chuck Todd interviewing Blinken on MTP.

    Todd is a fucking moron, but doubly so compared to his UK counterparts.

  70. 70.

    Peale

    The plan might work if Trump could persuade the Chinese to mass their troops at the border first so it would look like they were about to go to war. Maybe he’d produce an old map and put a big “X” on it just over the border with a sharpie with a note “Pirate Treasure Here.” That’d fool them. He’s sneaky that way.

  72. 72.

    debbie

    British Royal Marines have begun arriving on in Ukraine as volunteers to join the fight against Putin’s criminal war. Thousands of military veterans from across the world are currently en route to Ukraine pic.twitter.com/IPMXPD6zox— Business Ukraine mag (@Biz_Ukraine_Mag) March 6, 2022

  79. 79.

    topclimber

    @YY_Sima Qian: You have written previously that Ukraine is on good terms with China, as is Russia. Any chance Xi pushes for mediation? If he can broker a diplomatic solution, he is a sure shot for a Nobel Peace Prize.

  81. 81.

    Gin & Tonic

    @satby: That is the point in the ceremony where the bride and groom are traditionally “crowned” with wreaths woven from myrtle. Yesterday the helmets were a substitute.

  82. 82.

    Betty Cracker

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: He also accuses Americans who want NATO to enforce a no-fly zone in Ukraine of being warmongers while simultaneously claiming it’s fair to conclude that the U.S. doesn’t support a no-fly zone because it’s willing to “sacrifice Ukraine” to bog Russia down in a ruinous war

    ETA: Interesting that he got extra-screechy at Norton’s tweet thread, which included a plea for the FBI, DOJ, et al., to root out Russian assets in the U.S. Seems kinda sensitive about that topic.

  87. 87.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    Kevin Rothrock @KevinRothrock

    Police officers in Moscow today are stopping people, demanding to see their phones, READING THEIR MESSAGES, and refusing to release them if they refuse. This from Kommersant journalist Ana Vasilyeva

    Mike Eckel @Mike_Eckel

    anti-war protests in Moscow today; people chanting “No To War!” newly passed legislation (signed into law on Saturday) makes it crime to call Russia’s invasion of Ukraine a “war”– or an “invasion” for that matter.

    pictures and videos including footage from the bus taking protesters to jail

  88. 88.

    MomSense

    @Gin & Tonic:

    I just saw video of this wedding on Twitter.  I want them to survive this horror and live the happiest, healthiest most joyous life possible.

  95. 95.

    Steeplejack

    I’m going over to Sighthound Hall in a bit, first social engagement in a while. Going to be a cookout on the patio, so I feel relatively safe. It was supposed to be up in the 70s today, but it’s actually 65° and cloudy. But still pleasant, I think. I just want to stand around, eat, drink and listen to people talk. My mouth feels mostly back to normal after the implant was installed Thursday, just a bit tender. Still trying to chew on the other side but occasionally forget.

  97. 97.

    Cameron

    @debbie: Something sounds off here – wouldn’t that be a direct NATO intervention if those guys are currently serving?

  100. 100.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @juliaioffe. 37m

    As Russian film critic Anton Dolin fled Moscow, he noticed his apartment door had been marked by a big Z. “The meaning was clear,” he wrote. “‘We know where you live.’”

  105. 105.

    debbie

    @Steeplejack:

    During my first spring walk yesterday, I ran into a friend I’d only communicated with on FB for the past couple of years. She lives nowhere near the neighborhood, but was so anxious to get her dog and herself out of the house, she drove and then walked. It was both wonderful and uncomfortable to be talking to an actual person in actual time rather than through a computer screen. I may need to relearn some manners.

  108. 108.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Jager: ​Did you read about the guy who shot himself in the mouth and didn’t even know it? Went to the dentist days later for a toothache and the x-ray showed why. The X-ray got printed with the article, pretty impressive.

    I knew a guy who had his foot shot into a roof deck by a cub. Went right between his toes. No blood, no foul.

    I was on a jobsite when a cub shot himself in the stomach and liver. They called a helicopter in for him.

    Then there was the idiot who buried one in his hand installing ceiling rafters with a bump gun. Wait a minute, that was me.

  111. 111.

    Steeplejack

    @debbie:

    If I stay home I’ll just be glued to the news and overwork my rage gland. And I drove the Sighthound Hall mob to and from the airport for their recent 10-day trip to pestilential Brazil—which they all came through unscathed—so an outdoor event doesn’t feel so awful today.

    I’m going to stop at Total Wine and get some cava and some Portuguese vinho verde, which is very nice as a cookout drink. I’m not in a beer mood today.

  113. 113.

    Gin & Tonic

    As seen on the twitters: “If you put two Ukrainians in a room they’ll form three political parties. But if you threaten them they become one family.”

  114. 114.

    jonas

    Trump mused to donors that we should take our F-22 planes, “put the Chinese flag on them and bomb the shit out” out of Russia. “And then we say, China did it, we didn’t do, China did it, and then they start fighting with each other and we sit back and watch.”

    “Am I jumping the gun, Baldrick, or are the words ‘I have a cunning plan’ marching with ill-deserved confidence in the direction of this conversation?”

  115. 115.

    Jinchi

    @dmsilev: ​
     He espoused praise for North Korea’s brutal leader, marveling at how Kim’s generals and aides “cowered” when the dictator spoke to them. “Total control,”

    The guy just can’t stop himself. He’s trying to convince us he wasn’t really praising Putin’s invasion and he follows up with his dream of ruling like the leader of North Korea.

  116. 116.

    frosty

    @different-church-lady: We’re in Cedar Key FL without a mask in sight. We went to a (very small) grocery store unmasked; it felt strange. Also had dinner out, but we were on a screened in porch.

  117. 117.

    OzarkHillbilly

    The zoologist sticking her neck out in the battle of the sexes

    London Zoo at half-term is a cheerful cacophony with blue macaws out-screaming six-year-olds, but in the relative calm of the lush spider “walkthrough” exhibit (apologies, arachnophobes), Lucy Cooke is happily absorbed. “Let’s see if we can see a big predatory female,” she says. We can: a gorgeously colourful golden orb weaver sits in the centre of her vast gold-tinted web, 125 times bigger than her tiny mate. “I didn’t realise that the majority of spiders are sexual cannibals, that the big spiders in the middle of webs were always female; males are basically wandering useless sacks of sperm,” Cooke says loudly in earshot of several harried-looking human fathers.

    This is a very Lucy Cooke observation: uncensored, pithily expressed and startlingly informative. There is plenty more of that in her new book, Bitch: A Revolutionary Guide to Sex, Evolution & the Female Animal, a dazzling, funny and elegantly angry demolition of our preconceptions about female behaviour and sex in the animal kingdom (queendom?).

    For too long, Cooke argues, we have uncritically accepted a view of nature “through a Victorian pinhole camera” and worse, those misconceptions have been co-opted by ideologues “to claim that a host of grim male behaviours – from rape to compulsive skirt-chasing to male supremacy – were only natural for humans because Darwin said so.” That is simply, demonstrably wrong, as she outlines, combining colourful revelations with limpidly clear explanations of complex science. “Female animals,” she writes, “are just as promiscuous, competitive, aggressive, dominant and dynamic as males.”

    Bitch is a blast. I read it, my jaw sagging in astonishment, jotting down favourite parts to send to friends and reading out snippets gleefully to my male housemates for days. I don’t want to spoil it for you, but just a taster: spotted hyenas have eight-inch clitorises which get erections and female moles have “ovo-testes”, albatrosses can form lasting lesbian partnerships, all-female whiptail lizards reproduce asexually but engage in gender-fluid role play, and ducks have spiral-shaped vaginas, probably to evade forced copulation (40% of mallard sex is non-consensual; you’ll never look at your local duckpond in the same way, especially once you read the indelible phrase “The penis explodes out of his cloaca at 75mph, unfurling itself… like some kind of sinewy party hooter.”, which I screenshot and circulate widely) As for bonobos, if this were a podcast, I’d be issuing a content warning for later in the episode.

    That book is now at the top of my To Read queue.

  120. 120.

    Jager

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    My (pretty good) amateur carpenter brother in law put a nail in between his toes with a nail gun while building his deck. I was doing a deck repair on my sailboat and cut the front of my boat shoe with a Sawzall. Missed my big toe, but ruined a good pair of Topsiders.

  121. 121.

    Dopey-o

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: “Doc, I swear I was standing back a little, kinda imbalanced just in case and figured when the branch came down it would miss me. How could I have predicted THAT?

    While in college, I worked in an auto repair shop. The boss taught me “Look for where your hand is going to end up when the tool slips. Because it will slip, and you’ll break your fingers. And be out of work for a couple of weeks.”

    Saved me a lot of pain. Because the tool will slip. This advice may also apply to military adventures.

  123. 123.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Jager: I hate sawzalls because they hate me. Split my thumb with one when it jumped out of the pipe I was halfway thru cutting.

  125. 125.

    oldgold

    Nikki Haley this morning on MTP criticized Biden for not cutting off Rooskie oil, saying with her right foot firmly embedded in her mouth: “You never sleep with the devil because then the devil owns you.” The never nimble Toddler let that go without comment.

    Later in the interview, Nikki stated she should would not run in ‘24 for President if the devil Trump does.

  128. 128.

    debbie

    @frosty:

    I wore a mask to do my weekly food shopping yesterday and then again when I got my haircut. Fuck anyone who says anything to me.

  129. 129.

    frosty

    @Betty Cracker: Waves back! Suwannee State Park next, then St Augustine. Sadly, because of the pandemic rush to RVs we couldn’t get a site in Anastasia State Park this year.

  130. 130.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @Gin & Tonic:

    @zhena gogolia:

    I’ve been meaning to ask: I would love to see the “Russian Warship, Go Fuck Yourself” quote in the original language, which I’m assuming was Russian. Do either of you know the actual quote?

    I’ve been wishing for a poster with the original words.

  132. 132.

    frosty

    @debbie: Yeah, but I just had a day of pandemic fatigue. Otherwise my response will be “I’m wearing this so I can live long enough to get dementia.”

  134. 134.

    zhena gogolia

    On a frivolous topic, I have to spend a lot of time doing arm exercises, and I’ve been watching Hacks and really enjoying it. It’s not all that funny, but Jean Smart is so brilliant. And I like her co-star as well. And nice to see old pro Christopher MacDonald.

  136. 136.

    Another Scott

    In other news, everything’s connected…

    BlueVirginia.US:

    by Kellen Squire

    My run for the Virginia House of Delegates in 2017 ended with me getting blown out on election night, 60%-40%. There were precincts in Rockingham County, Virginia where I barely broke 10% of the vote; Greene County was not a whole lot better. We were dramatically outspent, our $120k going up against almost a half million, which our opponent raised in five-digit increments. It was a year of campaigning; of hardship, heartache, sacrifice…

    …and it was a complete and total success. We were more successful than Amy McGrath, who raised over $90 million in her run against Mitch McConnell (EDITOR’S NOTE: in the end, McGrath got just 38.2% of the vote, losing by nearly 20 points). More successful than Sarah Gideon, who raised $80 million to lose to Susan Collins. In fact, we succeeded beyond our wildest imagination on the path towards the fever dream of a goal we conjured up almost a year earlier:

    Flip control of the Virginia House of Delegates, and protect the people of the Commonwealth of Virginia.

    […]

    So. What’s the takeaway here?
    Remember: our success can only be viewed as one part of a bigger whole. If it hadn’t been for candidates, volunteers and grassroots supporters in races across Virginia, it wouldn’t have mattered how much hard work our team put in – it would have been for naught. And that’s the kind of effort we need to engage in every state. The $90 million raised for Amy McGrath averages out to be $90,000 spent in a thousand different races. And most local races – county supervisor, mayor, school board, Soil and Water, on and on – need only a fraction of that amount of money. The more of those candidates we can run, the more they build up one another, and the more everyone benefits from it, up and down the ballot.

    […]

    A good read.

    “90% of everything is showing up.”

    People working together can punch far above their weight. B-J’s fundraisers show that every time.

    Forward!!

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  140. 140.

    trollhattan

    @OzarkHillbilly: Once worked at a place that had a subscription to “Journal of Light Construction” which specialized/reveled in construction accident articles copiously illustrated with medical imagery. Everything you would expect plus one I had never thought of: shooting paint into your body using the spray gun. Very nasty outcomes, because paint needs to be on the surface of that house, not beneath your skin and in the muscle.

  144. 144.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    TweetPatriotTakes [email protected] · 1h

    Former Silver Spoons child actor Ricky Schroder has joined the freedom convoy and warned the government:

    “Unless you’re ready to, I guess, kill us all, you better change your minds because we’re not going to live as slaves.”

     

    Tom [email protected]·1h

    I’m sorry that you peeked at 12 years old when you were on Silver Spoons but there’s better ways to get attention than acting like a total dipsh$t.

  146. 146.

    Villago Delenda Est

    Fallows uses the wrong term in his tweet. These are not “reporters”. They are, at best, PR spin doctors, at worst, outright propagandists for our loathsome parasite overclass.

  153. 153.

    Sebastian

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques:

    I saw that yesterday. It appears to be genuine and people who know more about this say it’s too long to be a fake. The longer a doc the more opportunity to make mistakes.

    In related news, Glorious War of Restoring Soviet Glory is not going so well. Russian support vehicles transport in week 3:

     

    Lmaooo here comes Russias week 3 reinforcements pic.twitter.com/H4XY7TJyxS— Lost Weapons (@LostWeapons) March 6, 2022

  154. 154.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Anton Troianovski @antontroian. 1h

    More than 3,000 Russians were arrested at antiwar rallies across the country today, the police said — the highest official single-day total at any nationwide day of protest in recent memory.

    I wonder if that’s an accurate estimate, and how it reflects turn-out.  Incredibly brave people to be going up against the brute in the Kremlin

  157. 157.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    File under: I hope this is true

    Richard M. Nixon @dick_nixon
    ·Jun 16, 2021

    Ten years or so ago Putin was going up the steps of the White Tower at the Tower of London. A raven was waiting for him at the top. The bird said “Good morning!” in English. Putin was terrified.

  160. 160.

    BeautifulPlumage

    • @OzarkHillbilly: the book “Sex at Dawn” is in this same mode. It takes the research/observations of victorian-era anthropologists and re-interprets them through a modern lens including what we now know about biology, etc. I recommend it a lot! I’ll have to get this book, thanks!
  161. 161.

    Sebastian

    @debbie:

    The total number of foreign volunteers, presumably most if not all of them veterans, is now 16,000.

    Assuming they’ll get Ukrainian combat support units and command, the strength would be around 20,000.

    <rapid eye blinking>
    That’s 50 battalions … an entire division.

  164. 164.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Sebastian: ravens in captivity, a quick google tells me, can learn to mimic speech

    Parrots are revered as the best talking birds, and that’s because they can amass extensive vocabularies. African grey parrots can say up to 1,000 words, whereas ravens can say around 100 words. Ravens are better at mimicking sounds, such as car alarms and animal calls. They can produce noises due to the syrinx, which is their vocal organ. 

    I’ve been to the Tower a couple of times, on the Beefeater tour. I don’t think I ever heard a raven speak

  166. 166.

    Jay

    Truckers part of The People’s Convoy are leaving Hagerstown now and will do two laps around the Beltway. Organizer Brian Brase further pledged to increase the number of laps around the Beltway each day moving forward until their unspecified demands are met.— Zachary Petrizzo (@ZTPetrizzo) March 6, 2022

  167. 167.

    James E Powell

    @Sebastian:

    I’ve seen reports like this with varying numbers, but always fairly large numbers.

    But adding foreign volunteers to a nation’s defense forces raises a number of questions, the first of which is do they speak Ukrainian?

    How can they be organized & put into effective action? Is that even possible? Does Ukraine have the uniforms, guns, & ammo for them?

    Has this kind of thing ever worked?

  169. 169.

    BeautifulPlumage

    @Jay: I assume fuel prices are higher in the urban coastal area than they are in less populated areas? Keep spending your money, fools

  170. 170.

    Baud

    @Jay:

    It takes almost two hours to circle the beltway once.  They will quickly run out of hours in the day.

  171. 171.

    The Dangerman

    I dunno. F22 thing is stupid but suggesting nuking a hurricane is far more stupid. Ok, both are breathtakingly stupid. And he’s the odds on favorite for 2024 nomination; how does one govern a country where about half the country wants to elect this monstrously stupid fuck that is an admirer of one of the worst war criminals since Hitler?

  172. 172.

    Jay

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    Kamloops, BC, is infamous for it’s “Hello Crows”. About 20 years ago, a crow learned how to say “Hello” while begging for hand out’s in the park, probably because as he hopped closer and closer to people eating, they greeted him with variations of “hello,…….”

    Apparently, he/she/they got fat, prospered, had many offspring, to the point that dozens of crows wander around Kamloops saying “Hello”, and not to just beg to food.

  173. 173.

    BeautifulPlumage

    @WaterGirl: *sigh* I didn’t realize I have the humor of a 13 year old…I knew what the photo would look like before I opened it based on that joke. : )

  179. 179.

    Kelly

    @Baud: I was playing around with my new chain saw yesterday.  When I was done, I paused a little to think about my technique and marvel at the fact that I was uninjured.

    Many years ago I was clearing some brush with my chainsaw. It hung up in a 1 1/2″ sapling on steep ground. I jerked it loose, lost my balance, tumbled down the hill with a running chainsaw. Only tore my pants.

  182. 182.

    Jay

    @James E Powell:

    International Brigades, Spanish Civil War.

    Many of what are now called “Territorial Defence Forces” in Ukraine, (and the DPR and LPR) have a large contingents of “foreign fighters”.

    Royjova.

    The volunteers are often experienced, highly motivated, willing to die or take extreme risks, are often maximalists, and from 2014 to Minsk II, were some of the most effective forces on both sides.

  185. 185.

    Shalimar

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Ricky Schroder makes no sense.  Why would the government have to kill them all?  It’s not like they’re in an impenetrable bunker.  They’re  circling the city on an open highway.  Just confiscate their trucks and let them walk home.

  186. 186.

    Sebastian

    @WaterGirl:

    I’ll let the military experts opine on that but per Council on Foreign Relations

    Battalion. A battalion, usually about 400-strong, is comprised of three rifle companies, a combat support company, and a headquarters company. Battalions often blend companies with different fighting specialties to take on tasks no existing unit is properly configured to tackle. Battalions normally fight enemy forces they can see and engage. This is defined as an area extending from less than 100 yards in forests, urban areas, and other close terrain out to about two to three miles from the battalion’s direct and indirect weapons-fire.

    The 4,000 would be Ukrainians for support and command.

    Language is obviously a problem but the Ukrainians are highly motivated to make use of these experienced fighters. I have no idea if this will work but there are historic examples of foreign volunteer units being effective.

    According to the Kyiv Independent, the number is now 20,000, FWIW.

  187. 187.

    dmsilev

    @Jay: So, they’re just going to keep orbiting the Beltway, forming a tiny fraction of the traffic therein, until what?

    The Underpants Gnomes had a better-thought-out strategy.

  188. 188.

    trollhattan

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: I can verify mockingbird(s?) in the hood who could mimic car alarms, the ones from the ’90s that would cycle through several different alarm sounds. It was cute. At first.

  189. 189.

    Kent

    @James E Powell:

    @Sebastian:

    I’ve seen reports like this with varying numbers, but always fairly large numbers.

    But adding foreign volunteers to a nation’s defense forces raises a number of questions, the first of which is do they speak Ukrainian?

    How can they be organized & put into effective action? Is that even possible? Does Ukraine have the uniforms, guns, & ammo for them?

    Has this kind of thing ever worked?

    While I suppose people are also just showing up at the border, most of these folks are being interviewed by military attaches in Ukrainians embassies around the world and they are doing whatever screening for heath, experience, language, etc. they deem appropriate.  And many are bringing their own equipment.

    Who do you think would be the most effective fighter?  A 35 year old British or American senior noncom with 10 years of combat tours to Iraq/Afghanistan/Syria and endless training under his belt? Or a 22 year old Ukrainian college student who is getting handed a rifle for the first time in her life?

    Plus, most of war is logistics anyway.  They need people who can repair equipment, drive trucks, run aid stations, train local volunteers, build bunkers and organize defenses, etc. etc

    And yes, foreign fighters have been integrated into armies since the time of the Romans and before.  There are over 35,000 foreigners (non-citizens) serving in the US military right now, for example.

  191. 191.

    Sebastian

    @Jay:

    Yeah, very much so. You can bet the Polish, Baltic, Czech, Slovak, Hungarian, Bulgarian, and Croatian volunteers and “volunteers”  joined with iron determination to settle old scores. What the Russians did to those people has never been forgotten and vengeance was sworn.

    My only worry is that there will be a ton of war crimes.

  193. 193.

    Sebastian

    #RussianReinforcements

    We’ll have to hashtag this now.

    Russians are running out of hardware. Shipping training vehicles to the front.

    These tanks might be from the 467th guard training school ( в/ч 30616 ). If the Russian armed forces are pulling tanks and troops from the training schools they’re beyond spent. https://t.co/zCK7z20ini
    — Stanimir Dobrev (@delfoo) March 5, 2022

  194. 194.

    Jay

    @Kent:

    I was taught that 50% of effective defense was digging, ( in the right place, deep enough), 25% was supply, and 25% was morale, ( keep shooting even if it seems you aren’t hitting anything, don’t quit).

  195. 195.

    Spanky

    @Sebastian:

    My only worry is that there will be a ton of war crimes.

    Well, the Russians already have a head start.

    My guess is that the UK command will not allow that sort of thing to happen, probably by integrating their own officers into the mix.

  197. 197.

    Jay

    @Sebastian:

    the Russian’s have tons of gear, ( poorly maintained, stationary, mothballed),

    pulling training tanks to the front, ( which are at least, maintained and serviced) would suggest that:

    A) they have learned some lessons regarding equipment reserves they sent forward last week, ( non runners, dead tires, etc),

    B) yeah, they have “burned through” a ton of gear, reserves and manpower.

  198. 198.

    Ksmiami

    @Spanky: any Russian in Ukraine is committing a crime. This isn’t even a war- it’s a criminal slaughter of a nation and her people on the whims of one tyrant.  Defending a nations sovereignty by any means necessary at this point will be excused.

  199. 199.

    Ken

    @dmsilev: So, they’re just going to keep orbiting the Beltway, forming a tiny fraction of the traffic therein, until what?

    “Until their unspecified demands are met,” according to the report. This adds an extra degree of difficulty.

  200. 200.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Sebastian: ​
     That definition is definitely taken from a US Army/USMC template. I was in a mechanized infantry battalion in Germany, it was about 700 strong, and the organization was just as the CFR states. Three line infantry companies (each with its own 81mm mortar platoon for indirect fire), a combat support company (with a heavier mortar platoon 4.2 inch mortars, a scout platoon, and usually some anti-tank assets (in the 80’s, this would be TOWs), and the headquarters company which has the command, communications, and logistical support.

  201. 201.

    trollhattan

    @Kelly:

    Last week a tree crew showed up to thin out an oak across the street. They strung a rope over a high branch that served as fall protection for the lucky dude who was sent up to do the trimming. He toted a long pole saw and a chainsaw that dangled from his workbelt by another rope. I watched as he would lean waaaay out from a branch on one foot to slice off branches while one-handing the chainsaw, until I decided I couldn’t take the stress any longer.

    A neighborhood friend had a tree-trimmer electrocuted in her backyard a couple years ago when he came in contact with the high-voltage line the local utility had hired the crew to clear trees away from.

    While not technically “logging” my hunch is tree service employee ranks with logging as one of the most dangerous professions, second only to ocean fishing.

  202. 202.

    Rob

    The convoy split into two parts, and both parts are on the outer loop of the Beltway at this time. Traffic could be worse, considering.

  203. 203.

    trollhattan

    @Ken: They’re all on an endless Zoom call sifting through their demand list, currently numbering 359.

  206. 206.

    Baud

    Biden should proclaim May 6 as “Wear Your Mask to Work Day” in honor of these truckers.

  207. 207.

    Calouste

    @Jay: C) They’re thinking short term. Sending training tanks to the front means you’re no longer training new tank crews.

  208. 208.

    Jinchi

    @dmsilev: I expect they’ll howl with outrage when they get caught in a legit traffic jam. Then complain about the cost of gas.

  210. 210.

    Jay

    @Calouste:

    what better way to train up a new tank crew, than to pull out a mothballed POS, get them to lube all 272 lubrication zerks, set track tension, drain the old fuel, oil, install new filters, swap out the batteries, install the new gunsights and tech, calibrate it all, then see if “she’s a runner”?

  211. 211.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Baud:

    Patrick @QuadCityPat. 18m

    These idiots are burning an average of $196 worth of diesel a day to protest non existent mandates. Tell me again how they can afford to do this when they’ve all been ‘out of work’ because of refusing mandates….

  212. 212.

    Jay

    @Baud:

    the are trying to shut down the “ebil Gorbement” in Washington, DC, on a Sunday.

    guess they can’t read schedules.

  213. 213.

    Kelly

    @trollhattan: The tree climber chainsaws are designed for one handed operation but yeah that’s a tricky job. The arborists I’ve spoken while they’re on break are really into their jobs.

    My Dad built a few thousand miles of gravel logging roads and got me summer jobs on the crews when I was in college. A mix of logging to clear the right of way then road construction. He was very selective of who I could work for. He said logging isn’t dangerous, loggers are. It was a fun job. As a fit 20 year old at the end of my first summer I told him this fun, the money is great why go back to school? He replied it’s fun in the summer. It’s not fun in November when the rain is washing the snow down your neck and the mud is over your boot tops. When you’ve been doing it for 30 or 40 years everything hurts.

    I went back to school and had a comfortable career in IT.

  216. 216.

    Sebastian

    @Spanky:

    I am not worried about the British. I am worried about what the Eastern European volunteers will do to the Russians. Even more worried about what they will do once the offensive reaches Donbas where ethnic Russians live.

    I hope the Ukrainians are keeping the Foreign Legion out of there.

  218. 218.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Jay: ​
     So much unspoken in this process, as elaborate as it is as you present it. Training soldiers is a never-ending task. Everything in war is hard.

  219. 219.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I didn’t realise that the majority of spiders are sexual cannibals, that the big spiders in the middle of webs were always female; males are basically wandering useless sacks of sperm

    Speaking from my entomology degree, this is mostly true and sort of not.  Her overall argument is absolutely supported.  Spiders are cannibals as a side effect that they are very (mentally) simple killing machines designed to eat things about their own size, so other spiders of their species are on that menu.  All spider mating is thus primarily focused on getting around that problem.

    Golden Orb Weavers hilariously settled on the male being so small she doesn’t notice him.  The vast majority of spiders use tapping vibratory signals to establish they are a male of the same species, and if that goes even slightly wrong he’s lunch (although it usually works).  Some male crab spiders tie down the female to ensure she doesn’t change her mind to omnomnom mid-coitus.  A lot of spiders just run for it once they’re done.  The most intelligent and visually sensitive spiders, jumping spiders and wolf spiders, use visual signals.  Jumping spider dance language is (a little) more than just mating-oriented, and cannibalism among jumping spiders is very low.

    Two factors make this especially nervous for the male spider.  Spider mating anatomically requires sticking his face in her spider groin.  He is directly under her fangs during all of foreplay and coitus and she can eat him easily at any moment.  Most male spiders when they reach adulthood do indeed stop hunting, eating very little if at all and instead going on a sex safari, wandering the world in search of girls to impregnate until they die of whatever cause.  Evolution would rather he be the sacrifice.

    Oh, and Black Widows are not particularly more cannibalistic than other spiders.  Victorian naturalists put a male and a female in a jar, and gasp, since he couldn’t run away, eventually he got eaten!  This must be a bizarre aberration of nature!  A femme fatale animal!

  221. 221.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Calouste: The Germans resorted to this in 1945, sending Panzer Lehr, the training unit at Grafenwoehr, out to the field as a division.

  224. 224.

    Sebastian

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym:

    Read up on them a bit. Yeah, they are one of the core charities and organizations of Ukrainians in Canada and are associated with the Ukrainian Canadian Congress. Looks like they’ve been around for more than 25 years.

  226. 226.

    brantl

    Just when you think Trump couldn’t look any more stupid than a sack of hammers, he trots out a new idiocy. The Dean Wermer quote from Animal House was made for this guy.

  227. 227.

    Dopey-o

    @trollhattan: A neighborhood friend had a tree-trimmer electrocuted in her backyard a couple years ago when he came in contact with the high-voltage line the local utility had hired the crew to clear trees away from.

    The utility company will come and install bright yellow plastic covers over any adjacent power lines to prevent electrocution. No charge. Cheaper than ambulance / lawyers, etc.

    I had a pair of them on my lines, while the tuck pointers repaired my brickwork. Utility company came back a couple of months later to retrieve them. Cheaper than lawyers….

  228. 228.

    Steeplejack

    @zhena gogolia:

    Hacks is good. Not a laff riot, but subtle. Also recommend Barry on HBO Max. Bill Hader as a hitman who wants to get out of the game—via acting classes.

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