Saturday, October 24, 2026

Una más, por favor. An illegal war with Cuba, 1.ª Edición.


21 de mayo de 2026

Having not really completed anything meaningful with Venezuela, other than having tasted blood and developing fondness for it, and having gotten us into an endless war with Iran we're losing, King Donny the Mad is about to launch a war against Cuba, starting with a claim that Raul Castro, age 94, must be brought to justice over a US civilian aircraft that was shot down by the Cubans in 1996.

Oh horse poop.

Some in Demented Donnie's administration have been drooling over a chance to attack Cuba since the easily manipulated narcissist illegitimately moved back into the Oval Office.  Military action against Cuba has been a desire of displaced Cubans and their descendants in the US since 1959.  If the US attacked the island and removed the government, Lil' Marco would claim it as a victory attributable to him, one way or another, in the 2028 Presidential campaign he's clearly running in.

That's part of the problem.  Influential "Republicans" (there are no real Republicans left anymore) like Marco and the Robot Ted Cruz would do anything for a Cuba Libre other than actually live in Cuba.

Of course, with this administrations lust for territorial acquisition, as desire expressed by some imperialist Republicans going into the Spanish American War, the annexation of Cuba with the goal of making it a state, would be the more likely goal in the short term.  If Trump, or Marco, pulled that off, the irony would be that it would be solidly Democratic and admitting Puerto Rico as a state would happen immediately thereafter.

Probably the only thing that's really been holding this up has been the commitment of forces to Iran, where Iran is deploying Muhammed Ali's old "rope a dope" strategy and refusing to surrender even though King Donny assures us he won and the war is over.  Actually defeating Iran will require a ground invasion that even Donny, who can choke down killing schoolgirls, can't seem to muster up the will for and which the American public doesn't want.  The war itself has already achieved a level of unpopularity matched by that of the Vietnam War after Tet.

But, the thought is, this will go better. . . or at least Cuban Americans will like the result.

The threats against Castro started a couple of days ago.  Within the last twenty four hours China, which Trump went to and acted like a orphaned puppy, has warned the US to knock it off.

May 22, 2026

The future of Cuba belongs to the people of Cuba is terms of how they're governed, what the system looks like and so forth, but the national security threat, that's 100% something we're going to focus on because that's about America.

Marco Rubio.

What crap.  

Cuba has been a Communist country since 1959 when Fidel Castro overthrow the authoritarian government there (it wasn't obvious he was Communist at first).

They have not attacked us since then. 

We have, however, effectively attacked them, landing Cuban contras there in 1961.

Rubio knows this, however.  His parents were immigrants from Cuba who came over before the 1959 revolution, and who actually planned on returning to the country before the Communist nature of the revolution became apparent.

And that's part of the problem here. Cuban Americans are never going back to Cuba, but they imagine Cuba Libre with the same zeal as Irish Americans imagined a Republican Ireland.  In the latter case, that unthinking zeal helped contribute to decades of strife in Ireland, and here it's contributed to decades of misery in Cuba.

Efforts to force a political change in Cuba should have ceased in 1961 when John F. Kennedy withdrew air support for the Cuban contras.  There was no good reason at all other than anger not to normalize economic relations with Cuba at least by the early 1980s.  That's what we should do now.

Ho Chi Minh wouldn't recognize Communism in Vietnam today and, if transported from wherever his soul went to, he's be convinced that South Vietnam had won the war and reformed itself.  If we weren't keeping Cuba on the trophy shelf of failures, the same would be true for Cuba.

But we live in a dangerous age.  Donald Trump is desperately searching for something for Americans to remember him by (and we certainly have plenty to recall right now).  Marco Rubio has the misplaced child of immigrants probable loyalty to an imaginary paradise or imaginary would be paradise.

We're cruising right back into Havana's harbor where every American military adventure to date has been a disaster.

Remember the Maine.

June 25, 2026

With Cuba, Trump had better beware of what he wishes for

What obligation does the U.S. bear toward the impoverished island prison?

October 24, 2026

Donald Trump, and perhaps more significantly Marco Rubio, are threatening Cuba again.

Trump is threatening, again, to invade the country, on the Navy's way back from Iran.  The Navy would not appear to be coming back from the Persian Gulf anytime soon, really.

Rubio, however, specifically called for Cubans to align themselves with CIA operatives.

Thursday. October 24, 1946. First photographs of the Earth from space.

 


The first photographs of the Earth from space were taken by a US V-2 rocket fitted with a movie camera.

The News covered the prior days speech by Truman, but with an awkward headline.



Hindu mobs targeted Muslim families in riots in Bihar, India.  They would continue into November, resulting in at least 20,000 deaths.

Kurt Daluege was executed at Pankrác Prison in Prague.

Last edition:

Wednesday, October 23, 1946. United Nations opens in Flushing Meadows, New York.

Saturday, October 24, 1936. The Estado Novo severs relations with the Republic.

Portugal severed diplomatic relations with the Spanish Republic.


Sensing that it was going down in defeat, the GOP was trying the same old, same old.


The Zephyr was getting some press.



Last edition:

Friday, October 23, 1936. No neutrality.

The 2026 Election. 27th Edition. The Impending Clerico-Fascist Coup.

Flag of the Belgian clericofascist Rexist Party of the 1930s and 1940s.

October 23, 2026

I keep thinking to myself that I'll be glad when the election is over.  The 2024 election was bad, but this one seems even worse, at least locally.  Seems like not a day goes by when I don't have to read something about Alabama Becky Bextel saying something outrageous or some disgruntled Wyoming Freedom Caucusers saying that they're the only real Republicans, and for that matter, the only real Americans.

Worst of all, not a day goes by that Donald Trump doesn't act crazier than the day before.

So, in the back of my mind, I keep thinking that the election will put an end to the Republican Party's control of Congress, if not an outright end to the GOP itself, and things will start getting back to sane, if not normal.

But Trump won't let that happen.  

The General Election is on November 3. The Evangelical Far Right Mago Clerico-Fascist Coup will start on November 4.*

There's no doubt about it.

Only if the Democratic victory in November is so overwhelming that it can't be sanely denied, and Republicans in Congress need to get moderate to save their remaining seats, will this be capable of being avoided.  Trump will attempt it anyhow.

And here it starts:


And the start of the attempted 2026 Coup commences:

Trump administration sues to block Senate race certification in Alaska if Republican loses

As this is the first part of what will be a desperate effort of the Trump administration to cling to power, we'll start a new edition.

Lawsuits, voter intimidation, the whole smash.  The Trump MAGA extremist, and the National Conservatives, who is all he has left, are not going to go into the political night without attempting to seize power.  Trump is all they have to try to make their dreams of a Clerico-fascist state (and their dreams on the nature of that state do not align) become a reality.

cont:

Guest Column: Proposition 1 — An Historically Huge Mistake


Rod Miller: Why Hasn't Bryan Miller And The Wyoming GOP Endorsed Eric Barlow?

October 24, 2026

Footnotes:

*  I started this thread a couple of days prior to the first post.  I hadn't anticipated the coup attempt starting before the ballots were counted, but it has.

Last edition:

The 2026 Election, 26th Edition. The hoping to avoid sitting on blisters edition.

Subsidiarity Economics 2026. The Times more or less locally, Part 13. “Walmart Recession Signal” grows louder.


October 21, 2026

According to the economist who came up with it, the “Walmart Recession Signal” indicating an oncoming recession is getting louder.

Tonight, I'm also pleased to announce that the Department of Agriculture will be launching a new harvest fuel relief program, providing our farmers with $8 billion in support to offset diesel costs during this harvest season

Donald Trump.

So the fuel relief is to relieve high fuel prices caused by the war against Iran which is illegal, and will be paid for by money we don't have.

Sure, that makes sense somehow.

Oil is coming out of the Strait of Hormuz, under US protection, at roughly the same amount it was before the war now.

In other news.

Oklahoma Tribe Buys One Of The Biggest Horse Betting Operations In Wyoming

Sublette Rejects Appeal For Girls Treatment Center, Owners May Take Fight To Court

October 22, 2026

Natrona County eyes two school closures. One is 40 miles away, the other is right around the corner

One of the schools is in Midwest.

In a real irony, former House District 58 representative Patrick Sweeney went to the Midwest town hall on the subject.  Long serving Sweeney was ousted by current representative Bill Allemand after the district was redrawn. Alleman was a complete asshole to Sweeney in a debate and ran, that time, as firebrand Freedom Caucuser.

He survived a challenge from Bar Nunn Mayor Peter Boyer whom he became crosswise with over a proposal to place the Radiant nuclear generator plant north of Bar Nunn, something Bar Nunn could not have stopped. Bar Nunn's city council meetings became the bizarre focus of the topic however with outraged populists even accusing some city council members of taking bribes, an absolute absurdity.  Radiant eventually grew tired of the matter and decamped to Tennessee.  Allemand, for his part, was arrested not all that long after for drunk driving.  He's one of the few surviving members of the Wyoming Freedom Caucus, barely hanging on to his seat.

Allemand is apparently backing fanciful thoughts of declaring the school to be a charter school or forming a new school district, neither of which will occur  It was really admirable of Sweeney to go out and speak to a group of people about their plight, which is concerning, which their votes for Allemand helped bring about.  It's the classic Leopard's won't eat my face situation. 

Campbell County Moves $500 Million Nuclear Fuel Facility Closer To Reality

Gillette Targeted For Massive $575 Million Uranium Processing Plant

October 24, 2026

Some headlines:

Midwest escapes. . . for now.


School funding crisis, brought to you by the Freakishly Dumb Caucus.


Kemmerer coal mine set to close in 2029, spurring Wyoming’s soda ash industry to seek new fuel source

Could Data Centers Save Wyoming Coal? Peabody Eyes 'Holy Grail' Strategy

Last edition:

Subsidiarity Economics 2026. The Times more or less locally, Part 12, the Deflect and Deny edition.

Wars and Rumors of War, 2026. Part 10. Blood on our hands.

You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom

Matthew, Chapter 24.

I never cut my neighbor's throat;

My neighbor's gold I never stole;

I never spoiled his house and land;

But God have mercy on my soul!

 

For I am haunted night and day

By all the deeds I have not done;

O unattempted loveliness!

O costly valor never won!

Marguerite Wilkinson

October 19, 2026

Russo Ukrainian War

Victim of Russian missile strike:



Impeach Donald Trump and allow him, and Putin, to be tried for crimes against humanity.  Putin, Ukraine.  Trump, selling his sold for diesel to Russia, killing people extrajudicially off of South America and launching an illegal war against Iran.

Mark you, John Barrasso, Cynthia Lummis,  Chuck Gray.  By not taking action, you are taking action.

Voters, are you voting for this?

October 20, 2026
October 21, 2026

Russo Ukrainian War

Signature of Elon Musk who is being credited with shutting down space based intelligence with Ukraine.  I have my doubts.  Musk may just be serving as a scapegoat.  At any rate, the evet demonstrates why no man should have that much economic power.

Finger pointing is going on regarding the question on who slowed down Starshield, which impacted Ukrainian air operations this past week.

Perhaps the important portion of this story is that the US has resumed sharing intelligence with Ukraine.  But who stopped it in the first place?  That's not clear.  President Trump denied responsibility, which would mean that if the order came from the government an underling did it and the report did not get up to the Oval Office, or that Trump is lying, or that he didn't remember what had been discussed.

Elon Musk briefly took responsibility and then clammed up about it.  His doing that seems to have satisfied many but it also requires explanation.  I'm not wholly convinced that story is true.

Assuming that it is wholly or partially true, that raises its own question.  Starshield didn't exist all that long ago but now it's critical.  If a single private person can shut it off, that person has too much power, even if its power over his own company's creation.

And now the impact of its disruption is clearly demonstrated.  If we end up fighting Russia, and when we end up fighting China, the latter of which will be very soon, it'll be wiped out right at the onset of the war.

Signature of Donald Trump, here standing alone rather than over the genitals of a doodled female figure in an Epstein birthday card where you might have previously seen it.

October 24, 2026

Russo Ukrainian War

Melania Trump is being credited with  securing a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine forces in Oleshky, which will begin on October 29, to allow for humanitarian relief to the small number of people trapped there.

Related posts:



Additional Labels:


Wars and Rumors of War, 2026. Part 10. Blood on our hands. More Labels.

 


Friday, October 23, 2026

The 2026 Election, 26th Edition. The hoping to avoid sitting on blisters edition.

Elections belong to the people. It's their decision. If they decide to turn their back on the fire and burn their behinds, then they will just have to sit on their blisters.

Abraham Lincoln.

October 18, 2026

When we last posted, we noted who we had voted for and why.

That post was on October 13, and it had already grown too unwieldy by yesterday to keep on keeping on, so we're starting a new one.  The last one was fairly up to date, but over the past, national and international events have made it plain that the GOP is hopelessly captive to a declining Donald Trump.

Some new items:

Who showed up for Wyoming’s US House debate and key takeaways

October 19, 2026

Tom Lubnau:  Governor's Debate — Louder And Faster Doesn’t Make It True

Gail Symons: Lies, Damned Lies And Statistics On Prop One

Joan Barron: Tax Referendums Hot Here And In Colorado

Cont:

October 19, 2026

Russo Ukrainian War

Victim of Russian missile strike:



Impeach Donald Trump and allow him, and Putin, to be tried for crimes against humanity.  Putin, Ukraine.  Trump, selling his sold for diesel to Russia, killing people extrajudicially off of South America and launching an illegal war against Iran.


Mark you, John Barrasso, Cynthia Lummis,  Chuck Gray.  By not taking action, you are taking action.

Voters, are you voting for this?

October 20, 2026

Governor Gordon endorsed Eric Barlow in the Governor's race.

While others certainly are disagreeing, more and more it looks to me as if Gray may really be in trouble.  The GOP itself seems to be adrift here to some extent, given that people are drifting away from an increasingly erratic Trump.  People are sick of the Freedom Caucus, of which Gray was an original member, and Gray himself is deeply unpopular.

A question is whether Johnson's presence in the race hurts or helps Gray.  I suspect he hurts Gray by drawing away candidates that won't vote for Kinney, but you can argue it either way.

The local ballot:



October 21, 2026

October 22, 2026

"Pisses Me Off": Rock Springs Businessman Angered At Gov Candidate's Accusations

He should be angry.

Everyone who knows Bruce Pivic likes him and he's adamant that he didn't confront Alabama Becky about funding the University of Wyoming.

Not that people shouldn't confront Alabama Becky.  Based on her statements she's very ill informed.  She wanted, for example, UW to eliminate its German studies program, which it doesn't have.  She probably meant its study abroad in Germany program, which isn't the kind of thing that young Wyomingites only suitable for driving semi trucks and working in the oil patch, the only jobs suitable for young Wyomingites if you watch adds from the Carpetbagger class, need.

Golly gee, if Confederate great great grandpappy didn't need no German, well you don't either.

While she would like to see Wyoming become what Alabama was, that doesn't provide an excuse for asserting that it was Pivic who talked to her at a UW tailgate.  That's interesting in and of itself as Alabama Becky made a point of showing up at UW, even though the Freedom Caucus basically hates education and has really gone after UW.  He says he didn't, and he seems to have proven it, even managing to show that contrary to her description of Bruce as a man who spoke to her below head level couldn't be him, as he's 5'10". She declined to show her height, but a law enforcement record showed it at 5'9".  He'd be at face level.

Casper College Trustees unanimously approved a resolution outlining how Prop 1 could affect the college.

Wyoming's AAPG wrote an op ed for the Casper Star Tribune outlining potential harm to the geezer class by Prop 1.  

That's important as the measure is often camouflaged by its backers as a means of keeping the elderly in their homes, rather than carpetbaggers having more money in their bank accounts.  A major miss point is:

Currently, older Wyomingites benefit from the Long-Term Homeowner’s Exemption, which provides a 50% property tax reduction on home and land to qualifying homeowners who are 65 and older, and who have paid property taxes for 25 years. Proposition 1 only applies to “the assessed value of the dwelling” and states “...no more than one exemption shall apply to a single property or be claimed by a single owner per year.

Boomers, in other words, of average income, will screw themselves directly just by voting for this.

And the Casper Mountain Fire District weighed in:


That's going to be another irony of this, if it passes.  Some retiree from California will build their dream home in the woods and have it burned up, and then be pissed off.

Speaking of voters screwing themselves:

Natrona County eyes two school closures. One is 40 miles away, the other is right around the corner

One of the schools is in Midwest.

In a real irony, former House District 58 representative Patrick Sweeney went to the Midwest town hall on the subject.  Long serving Sweeney was ousted by current representative Bill Allemand after the district was redrawn. Alleman was a complete asshole to Sweeney in a debate and ran, that time, as firebrand Freedom Caucuser.

He survived a challenge from Bar Nunn Mayor Peter Boyer whom he became crosswise with over a proposal to place the Radiant nuclear generator plant north of Bar Nunn, something Bar Nunn could not have stopped. Bar Nunn's city council meetings became the bizarre focus of the topic however with outraged populists even accusing some city council members of taking bribes, an absolute absurdity.  Radiant eventually grew tired of the matter and decamped to Tennessee.  Allemand, for his part, was arrested not all that long after for drunk driving.  He's one of the few surviving members of the Wyoming Freedom Caucus, barely hanging on to his seat.

Allemand is apparently backing fanciful thoughts of declaring the school to be a charter school or forming a new school district, neither of which will occur  It was really admirable of Sweeney to go out and speak to a group of people about their plight, which is concerning, which their votes for Allemand helped bring about.  It's the classic Leopard's won't eat my face situation. 

Voters had a chance, as noted, to dump Allemand in the primary for a really good candidate.  Allemand barely survived that challenge, and is going to be a completely worthless House member if he's reelected.  He's one of the few Wyoming legislative candidates facing a challenge in the general, and in his case there are two candidates seeking to take him on, Keenan Morgan (D), and Joe Porambo (L).  Morgan has put up a billboard near the Center Street underpass in Casper.  He holds the typical slate of Democratic views.  I don't know anything at all about Porambo.

In news that's nearly non news:

I"m disregarding Facebook in general as comments there by anybody about anything are extreme, but I noted that there are still some people who are upset that Hageman hasn't endorsed Bextel. They seem less upset about Chuck not doing so, perhaps because expectations for Chuck are low in general.  There's a real "get real" aspect to this.  It's hard to see Hageman putting an anchor around her neck in the form of Alabama Becky and then jumping off the GOP boat.  That wouldn't help Hageman a bit.

On that, however, another aspect of this is that Hageman just doesn't need the Freedom Caucus anymore.  It's dying out in the field, a victim of self inflicted wounds.  Hageman was once a big colleague of Cheney's and wasn't afraid to stab her in the back, there's no reason she'd go to breath new life into the dying carcass of the Freedom Caucus.

Chuck is a founding member of it, but he's dangerously close of seeing his adulthood dream of being a real boy, um politician, evaporate.  He's sure not going to step out in the line of fire either.

And so we have the irony of Trump endorsed Hageman and Gray, both of whom were darlings of the Wyoming Freedom Caucus, endorsing Eric Barlow, whom they hate.

Basically, they observed the dying body on the deck of the train station and have boarded the train leaving town.

October 23, 2026

It would appear that Gray is in trouble:

Tom Lubnau: A Party That Wants to Flush Fifty Years of Winning

Lubnau is spot on in his comments.  The GOP has told huge numbers of rank and file Republicans in the state that they are not welcome in the party.  I'm one of them.  This year, while I'm still registered as a Republican, I took my votes elsewhere for the House and Senate.

What's more, I'll say something Lubnau didn't. The GOP isn't run by Republicans at all. They're Dixiecrats.  They should be the ones who are not welcome.

And in Albany County:

October 23, 2026

And the start of the attempted 2026 Coup commences:

Trump administration sues to block Senate race certification in Alaska if Republican loses

As this is the first part of what will be a desperate effort of the Trump administration to cling to power, we'll start a new edition.

Last edition:

The 2026 Election, 25th Edition. The casting the vote edition.


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