The U.S. plans to send
M1 Abrams tanks to Ukraine, officials said, a big step in arming Kyiv in its
efforts to seize back territory from Russia.
|
Tuesday,
January 24, 2023 5:40 PM ET |
The White
House is expected to announce a decision as early as Wednesday, said the
officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity. One official said the number
of Abrams tanks could be between 30 and 50. |
Ostensibly exploring the practice of law before the internet. Heck, before good highways for that matter.
Tuesday, January 31, 2023
Wars and Rumors of War, 2023. The Bear and the Trident. The Russo Ukrainian War crosses the calendar year.
Saturday, January 28, 2023
What are you reading?
A new trailing thread, dedicated to what we're currently reading.
And. . . we hope. . . with participation from you.
What are you reading right now? Add it down in the commentary section
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June 21, 2016
Give Me Eighty Men
I'm presently reading Give Me Eighty Men by Shannon Smith. It's a history of the Fetterman Fight, and a history of the history of the Fetterman Fight. I'll review it when I'm done, but I'll note that the favorable mention of the book by the authors of The Heart of All That Is caused me to pick it up, even though I'd been inclined to previously avoid it.
So far, I'm enjoying it, and its certainly raising a lot questions in my mind about the Fetterman battle, although I'm reserving my judgment on various things so far.
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July 5, 2016
Red Cloud's War
I must be stuck on a theme right now. Having read The Heart of All that Is, and having learned about Give Me Eighty Men from that, I am now reading Red Cloud's War by McDermott which I learned about from Give Me Eighty Men. I wasn't actually aware that John McDermott had written a two volume history of Red Cloud's War until I saw it referenced, with a bit of criticism as to his treatment of Fetterman, in Smith's book but I'm enjoying it so far, having just started it today while riding on airplanes and sitting in airports. So far, I'm really enjoying it.
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July 29, 2016
The Lost Mandate of Heaven
The American Betrayal of Ngo Dinh Diem, President of Vietnam
I just finished the excellent Red Cloud's War earlier this week and started on this over breakfast this morning. While I'm not far into it, so far its been very readable and very interesting as well.
Update:
I just finished this book and I'm left, yet again, wondering why the Kennedy Administration continues to have such an golden aura surrounding it.
Besides Kennedy's personal ickiness, his administration was a foreign policy and moral wreck. Camelot? More like the court of AEthelred the Unready.
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October 13, 2016
Blacklisted by History
The Untold Story of Senator Joe McCarthy
by M. Stanton Evans
A good, and very well read, friend of mine has been recommending this book to me for quite some time. I just picked it up, and as I had been getting a lot of airport time, I'm about 3/4s of the way through it, even though its a lengthy book (in excess of 600 pages) and its incredibly dense in cited facts and sources.
Indeed, it's a hard book to describe. It purports to be the "untold" story of Senator McCarthy, and I had some concern that it might be a revisionist essay, but it's neither really solely about McCarthy nor is it so much of an essay (although it is that) as an incredibly detailed example of investigative reporting. Evans, who wrote the book, had a career in journalism and that shows. Given that it is investigative journalism, basically, combined with history, and because Evans knew he was taking on the prior record, it's extremely densely packed with cites to original sources and its also somewhat repetitive. Nonetheless, its riveting.
What the book really is, is a history of Soviet penetration into American government in the 1930s and 1940s. It starts well before McCarthy was on the scene and looks at a lot of data before he ever made his appearance. It then picks up his role in exposing Communists in American government once he arrives.
I'm not finished with the book yet, but while I'll come back with my full opinions when I'm done, I'm satisfied that its not a simple hard right McCarthy fan piece. Indeed, the friend who recommended it to me actually noted that when Evans started the book off he expected to find the opposite of what he did, which may explain in part why the book is so extraordinarily careful in slamming the reader repetitively with original sources. And I also have to note that its slightly, but only slightly, anti climatic (so far) in that the story in this area has really changed dramatically since 1990. McCarthy, however, hasn't really been rehabilitated so far in the public eye.
That's a bit surprising as following the 1990 collapse of the Soviet Union and the release of Soviet records, combined with the Federal Government's release of the Army's Venona files we now knew beyond a shawdow of a doubt that Soviet espionage efforts were far deeper than previously believed. Figures like Whitaker Chambers who suffered for sounding the alarm turn out not only to be correct, but in fact the Soviet effort was far greater than was previously known to anyone but the government and its investigative arms. Venona has confirmed that many of the people that left wing and liberal apologists maintained were innocent victims of accusations were in fact Communist operatives, just as they were accused of being. Indeed, people who were only sort of expected turn out to be proven Communist operatives.
Evans builds on that and demonstrates that the individuals on the original McCarthy list of suspects and the amended one, some 60 or so people, were in fact generally what they were accused of being. He also goes on to show that McCarthy clearly had sources inside at least a couple of agencies that were supplying him with up to date information so the period accusations that his stories were old news were inaccurate.
I'll leave it there, and there is more to discuss, but I'll pick that back up when I finish the book.
Update, November 14, 2016:
I finished the book noted above (some time ago actually) and highly recommend it, although it does have a very unusual style. It's author's role as a journalist really shows, as its basically a series of essay points and explorations of evidence.
As good as it is, I still wouldn't say that its the definitive biography of McCarthy. It's really simply an exploration of his role in exploring Communist infiltration into the US government and the opposition that he met in doing that. I'd regard it as slightly partisan, but very well done.
I also think, however, that a full biography that's not biased would be in order, which I understand has not really been done. This book explores McCarthy's early life a bit, although not much, but completely omits anything regarding his personal life upon reaching public office. His marriage to a much younger member of his staff, for example, isn't even mentioned.
All in all, a very good correction to the record, very well researched, and convincingly written.
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November 14, 2016
The Secret War
by Max Hastings
Hastings is extremely well known to students of World War Two and has written a number of absolutely excellent books on that topic. The former journalist hasn't focused solely on the Second World War, and recently wrote one on World War One. At the time he wrote that book, he indicated that he was done writing on World War Two, but obviously, he wasn't. He's noted that he's returned to the Second World War after making such statements before, doing so this time to examine intelligence and espionage during World War Two.
I must be on an espionage and fifth column kick, as the book noted immediately above is also basically on that general theme, but when I heard that Hastings had written a new book on this topic, I knew that I'd get it. Due to a series of long flights, I actually started it before I completed Blacklisted By History.
I'm still reading it and still have quite a ways to go, but so far, it meets with Hastings high standards of writing and research. I'll detail more on it when I complete the book.
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May 4, 1918
Comment
This blog has a bunch of "trailing threads" that I have not been keeping up on. The same is true of the pages on the blog. I'll often think of updating them, but rarely do.
So I'm surprised to see that I haven't updated this entry since November 2016. I skipped 2017 completely. I finished The Secret War, enjoying it very much, and never entered anything else.
Pathetic.
May 4, 1918
Since my last entry, I read (at least):
Stalin: Paradoxes of Power 1878-1928
Stephen Kotkin
This excellent book, which is part of what will be a three volume treatment of Stalin's life, is excellent. It's also somewhat depressing and distressing, but then so is the life of Stalin.
I read this during 2017 but towards the beginning of the year shortly after finishing Hasting's book noted above. I should have noted it then. Anyhow, the treatment of Stalin is exhaustive, detailing his early life and distressing rise to power.
The German War: A Nation Under Arms, 1939-1945
Nicholas Stargardt
I'm frankly not sure if I picked this book up after the first volume treatment of Stalin's life or not. I may have. Some of the books I noted above I read while doing a great deal of traveling, which always makes for a lot of reading for me.
Anyhow, unusually, I read this book rather slowly. Often just a few pages at a time while eating breakfast, until perhaps the last third of the book which I read more rapidly (and again, partially while travelling).
This book is extremely interesting and extremely distressing. It details the views of average Germans on what they were thinking. The book is a large one, extremely interesting, and after reading it I still don't know if I understand what they were thinking. It seems they largely supported the war while knowing that some of their aims at least were grossly immoral. In some ways, the book details the success of propaganda and self delusion over clear thinking, something that perhaps gives us a very distressing lesson for the present day.
Kristin Lavransdatter: (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)
April 4, 2019
Once again, I've been bad about updating this thread.
For whatever reason, Kristin Lavransdatter, which I was reading when I last posted nearly a year ago, took me a long time to read. In part that was because, as is often the case, I tend to read a lot in airports and while traveling, and starting about that time it seems my travel slowed down.
Anyhow, I finished it and it was absolutely excellent. I very highly recommend it.
Anyhow, I did finish that book some time ago and now I frankly can't remember if I read another after it, other than a series of books on hunting dogs after we got our Golden Doodle, Odo. More on him in some upcoming post. Anyhow, last spring there was an entire series of books I read on training hunting dogs.
I gave up on that endeavor, however, and had somebody who knew what they were doing take up that task.
One book I did read after Kristin Lavransdatter was:
American Riding and Work Saddles, 1790-1920
Ken R. Knopp.
I've basically read this book twice, as I was privileged to read a pre publication version first.
It's excellent.
It probably would have come through a lot more a decade ago when I first started this blog, but at one time I rode a lot and have a deep interest in the topic. As part of that, I have a really deep interest in the material culture of riding. I post a lot, in fact, at The Military Horse, the best web sight there is for folks with this interest. And I've read a lot on the topic.
Knopp's book is excellent and in some ways is a nice companion to Margaret Derry's Horses In Society, a book that if you are interested in this topic, you need to read. Taking on a century and a half of American saddlery is a daunting task, and Knopp does it very well.
I'm currently reading:
Vietnam, An Epic Tragedy 1945-1975
Max Hastings
I love Max Hasting's works, which are focused on World War Two more than anything else (he's stated a couple of times that he wasn't going to write on World War Two anymore, only to come back and write on it again). This time he's writing on the what may be the defining war for American culture in the post 1945 era.
I'm only up to the assassination of Diem right now, but Hasting's doesn't disappoint. I'll report back when I've finished the book, but I'm glad to have an English author write on the topic. There have been other good histories on the war or on parts of the war, but they're all American or French, and therefore have a participants bias to at least some degree. Hasting's does not. Indeed, in reading his book I've already come to a better appreciation of the failings of The Lost Mandate of Heaven, discussed above, and a couple of other more recent histories on the Vietnam War.
Update, July 17, 2019.
Still reading this book but have to note, my collection of military historian friends who served in Vietnam, and Vietnam veterans in general, I suspect will really hate this book.
This isn't a condemnation of it by any means. It's excellent. And this book was necessary.
Update, August 2, 2019.
I concluded reading Hasting's book, Vietnam, An Epic Tragedy 1945-1975.
Gut wrenching would likely be the best description.
Hastings has done the history of this topic, and frankly Americans, an enormous service by writing this book. It's arguably the first really objective history of the war, in no small part because as an English military historian and former journalist, he has no stake in the fight and how it is recalled. Additionally, as a masterful writer in the English language, his book is widely accessible to those with an interest in the history of the war, which is largely the American audience.
Hastings' book is excellent, as are all of his books which I've read (I haven't read them all by any means). His research on the war is excellent, admittedly hampered somewhat by the fact that the Hanoi government has not come close to releasing the information that it retains on the war. His descriptions are, moreover, are both fascinating and heart rending.
Hastings is clear from the very onset of the book that he regarded the French and then the American effort in the war (most of the book deals with the American effort) as completely doomed right from the onset. This doesn't make him a sympathizer with the North Vietnamese effort, however, and he's clear that it was lead by brutal men who engaged in brutal acts. His concluding sections make it plain that whatever the communists claimed to be fighting for, and whatever those in the South and North believed about what the communist victory would mean, it mean unyielding and ongoing repression.
Still, reading the book really makes a person wonder if a different outcome was possible. Hastings basically regards the American effort from 1965 to 1973, when the US pulled out of active participation, as inept, and its really hard not to join him in that conclusion. He also makes the observation, which is undeniable, that the Saigon government was hopelessly corrupt and its military plagued with all the problems that largess and graft could bestow upon it. Nonetheless, it's clear in Hastings account that a fair amount of the ARVN fought hard and valiantly right to the end and that some Southern units were stubbornly fighting right until the Southern government surrendered. It's also hard not to come to the conclusion, as Hastings himself does, that the Republic of Vietnam would have weathered the 1975 North Vietnamese invasion if the U.S. had committed air power, as it had in 1972. Hastings feels that such a commitment in 75 would have only postponed things to a later date, as the North Vietnamese government was totalitarian and dedicated to winning no matter what losses it sustained, but by 1975 it was done to soldiers in its early teens. Frankly, I'm far from convinced that Hastings views are correct on that score, and strongly suspect that had American air power been committed in 75, the losses that would have been sustained by the North would have been too severe for them to really recover from for at least a decade. . . and a decade stretching to 1985 would have made quite a difference.
That makes the U.S. look really bad, of course, and indeed the U.S. comes out of this book looking absolutely horrible, including the American military throughout the war and in particular in the later stages of the war. Nixon and Kissinger come out looking awful, and they should.
I'd put this book in the must read category for a serious student of American history, and rank it was Alistair Horne's A Savage War of Peace on the French war in Algeria as a must read for contemporary American policy makers and military men (and women). It's interesting in that regard that two of the really seminal works on Western wars in non western lands have been written by British historians whose nations weren't involved in them. We're fortunate that they've written them.
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August 10, 2019.
The Vanquished. Why the First World War Failed To End
Robert Gerwarth
I decided to take a break from Vietnam and read something that coincidentally fits in really well with this blog. The Vanquished is a short book (about 1/3d of it is end notes) that deals with the wars and revolutions that came immediately out of World War One.
I'm about 1/3d of the way through this book now. It's quite good, although I'm not really learning anything I didn't already know. The reason for that, however, largely has to do with being a student of the era and, frankly, also because putting together the frequent posts for this blog have informed me about a lot of wars that followed World War One that I wouldn't have otherwise known much about.
I suspect that most people don't know that much about then, however, and have the idea that when the Great War ended, the fighting simply stopped and the soldiers went home. That's far from true, for any of the combatants.
This books, so far, has been doing a nice job of explaining why that was the case, and where it was the case.
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September 5, 2019
I finished reading The Vanquished. For a student of World War One, modern history, or history in general, I think it's a must read.
It's become very common to believe that when World War One ended, there was peace, but it simply isn't true. Indeed the United States may be the exception to the rule in that it largely entered peace, even though it still had troops in a combat role in Russia after November, 1918. Almost every other combatant was fighting on in some other war, and some of the wars were pretty intensive, at least locally. And most of those wars were an offshoot of World War One. The results of the war itself were very much in doubt for some time, and the new map wasn't established for years as new nations slugged it out over their borders or even for their existence.
It probably goes without saying, but all that is not only important and interesting history in its own right, it's necessary history for the understanding of World War Two.
I'm now reading;
A River Runs Through It and Other Stories
Norman Maclean
Most people are familiar with the really excellent movie based on this semi autobiographical novella by Norman Maclean which was made into an excellent movie by Robert Redford. I just started reading it a few days ago and I'm already well into it. I'll give, of course, a review of it when I've completed reading it.
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September 8, 2019
I finished A River Runs Through It and Other Stories yesterday.
The novella A River Runs Through It has achieved almost mystical status in certain quarters, with it being particularly highly regarded among those who like "western" literature, or perhaps I should say literature of the modern west, although all of these stories are set in the period prior to World War Two. The reputation is well deserved.
Various reviews attempt to compare the work to other well known authors who wrote in the same genera, with Hemingway being noted. Well, it's much better than any work of Hemingway's, even if we consider that the Hemingway outdoor works set in the West actually are good, as compared to the rest of his writing which is not all that great, frankly. A River Runs Through it, the longest of the novellas, is truly a masterpiece.
Maclean describes the West of the 1910s through the 1930s in a way that would be highly recognizable to anyone whose grown up in the real West even today. The novella is hugely interior, and for that reason the task of putting it on film must have been really difficult to say the least. To anyone wanting a real grasp of how Westerners see the West and themselves, this novella is the work to read.
One question that a person whose seen the excellent movie may have is how much does the novella depart from the film? Not much, but it does some, and the film adds some elements that are lacking in the novella. The novella does not deal with how Norman meets Jessie, his wife, in any fashion. Jessie Maclean really was from Wolf Point Montana, but the story of their early relationship is completely omitted. Indeed, throughout much of the novella Norman is already married, including those parts dealing with Jessie's brother.
It's hard to describe the writing of a novel, although this is barely a novel and close to a memoir and that also raises the question here on how much of the story is fiction and how much is fact. I'm not familiar with Maclean's life enough to know how much of the story is fictionalized, but I suspect its not all that much. By way of a plot spoiler, one thing that's definitely true, but somewhat fictionalized, is that Paul Davidson (Paul Maclean's actual nom de plum) did indeed die from being beat up in an alley in the late 1930s, just as described, and the murder remains an unsolved murder. It was a Chicago murder, however, as Norman Maclean had convinced Paul to come to Chicago where he worked as a reporter and for the press office of the University of Chicago. This wouldn't really fit the Montana centric story line however, as would the fact that Paul was a Dartmouth graduate.
The novella is, I feel, a must read.
As noted, this book contains three stories, not one, although A River Runs Through It is the longest and best known.
The second one is Logging and Pimping and You're Pal, Jim.
Maclean worked as a logger while attending college. The precise details of that I don't know, but it was for at least two seasons. This novella deals with that and I suspect, and indeed I'm certain, that it's much more fictionalized than A River Runs Through It. It's also of uneven quality.
In this novella Maclean sought to describe loggers but I suspect that he ended up, as is so often done, by fairly grossly exaggerating his depiction as he went on, which is unfortunate. Some elements of the description, in particular his description of clothing, are really excellent. But it decays as it the novella goes on and this one may be said to have almost no real point, other than being an odd character study.
The third one is USFS 1919, which deals as with Norman's work on a Forest Service crew in 1919.
This one is excellent, and again not only is the story worthwhile, but the descriptions of life at the time, and particularly a very distinct rural occupation of the time, are superb. Descriptions of horses, packing and Forest Service work in a now bygone era are extremely well done. This story is also probably mostly fiction, but his work for the Forest Service at a very young age (Norman is 17 when this story takes place, and he'd already worked for the Forest Service for two years) is not. This novella is well worth reading.
On a couple of other observations, knowing that the movie was from a novella, I've wondered if the plot details of the film were filled out from the other novellas in the book. They are not. As noted, the film includes story lines, such as Norman meeting Jessie, that aren't in the book at all. About the only added details provided is that Norman worked as a logger and for the Forest Service, and his work as a logger is mentioned in the film.
Anyhow, the stories included in A River Runs Through It and Other Stories are first rate stories in the modern Western genre and much better than many, maybe most. The stories due have an earthy element to them, and all three have some references to illicit unions of one kind or another, but they aren't graphic and they don't get down in the mud as much as later works of Larry McMurtry.
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September 12, 2019
The British Are Coming: The War for America, Lexington to Princeton, 1775-1777
Rick Atkinson
This book is a new release by noted historical author Rick Atkinson. Atkinson, whose Liberation Trilogy on the American ground campaigns in North Africa and Europe set the bar for the histories of the U.S. Army on that topic, now turns his eye on the American Revolution for a three volume treatment.
I've just started the book and I'm still in the prologue, but it promises to be excellent.
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July 30, 1920
The King and the Catholics.
Antonia Fraser
When I update this thread it occurs to me how bad I am at keeping it updated.
And looking back on this thread it also occurs to me how much my reading has slowed down during the pandemic, which is an odd thing to realize. Work has not slowed down for me at all, but travel really has, and that's a lot of the reason for that.
Anyhow, after I finished The British Are Coming I started, and just finished, The King and the Catholic by Antonia Fraser. It's not a large book so I should have read it quickly, but for whatever reason it took me awhile to read this very interesting work.
The book deals with Catholic Emancipation in the United Kingdom, which then included Ireland, and which took place over a period of several decades in the late 18th and early 19th Centuries.
The UK has a complicated relationship with Catholicism and went from being a deeply Catholic country after its conversion to Christianity to one that was embroiled in turmoil following King Henry VIII's severance of ties with Rome, to being a virulently anti Catholic country some time later. In that latter period it outlawed the Church and persecuted Catholics. In spite of that, some families in England and Scotland, including some prominent ones, remained loyal to the Catholic Church. By the mid 18th Century they were able to practice their faith at some personal risk, but were deprived of office and position. Ireland, for its part, had been incorporated into the UK against its will and it remained overwhelmingly Catholic.
During the American Revolution the law slowly began to change, in part as a response to it, although it faced enormous opposition and backlash. Nonetheless Catholics were largely freed from legal disabilities in 1829. This book traces that odd and interesting history.
I'm embarrassed to admit that I'm actually adding this book on the day I finished it, showing how much I've neglected this thread.
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August 1, 2020
The Great Plains During World War II
R. Douglas Hurt
I've just started this book which is about just what its title indicates.
I'm only in the introductory chapter, so I don't have much to report as of yet, other than that it looks promising.
Monday, December 19, 2022
The Post Insurrection. Falling chips. Part IV.
Yesterday, the FBI raided the home of former President Donald Trump.
There's a lot of speculation on what they were looking for, but it's just that, speculation. That speculation seems to be centered on documents that were improperly taken by the former President, but at least from my prospective that explanation seems excessively limited. It'd have to be further explained by what was removed and why that required a warrant to enter.
I'm not saying that it was improper. Personally, in my view, there seems to be ample evidence to charge Trump with seditious conspiracy at this point.
Something is clearly going on, at any rate.
August 11, 2022
Donald J. Trump appeared for his deposition in New York yesterday and invoked the 5th Amendment for all of the questions. The New York action involves his business affairs, not his presidency.
Trump has repeatedly stated in the past that only the guilty take the 5th Amendment.
Much attention has been paid to the FBI raid on his residence at Mar-a-Lago, with many Republicans wringing their hands over the matter. It's worth noting that the head of the FBI remains a Trump appointee, and this action required a judge in order to take place.
Two notable Republicans who haven't had that reaction are Mitch McConnell, who hasn't said anything, and Chris Christie, a former U.S. Attorney, who said that opening Trump's safe was "fair game".
August 12, 2022
Responding to Trump and his allies complaints about the FBI search warrant, the Justice Department filed a motion to unseal the warrant with the Attorney General, inviting Trump to not oppose it. He has until 3:00 this afternoon to decide if he will oppose it or not, but if he does, it'll look pretty bad to say the least.
Whatever it is seeking, apparently the tip that brought it about came from somebody close to Trump.
August 12, cont:
You know darned well that if President Obama had done this, there'd be cries for his conviction for "treason".
FBI agents who searched former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home Monday removed 11 sets of classified documents, including some marked as top secret and meant to be only available in special government facilities, according to documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation agents took around 20 boxes of items, binders of photos, a handwritten note and the executive grant of clemency for Mr. Trump’s ally Roger Stone, a list of items removed from the property shows. Also included in the list was information about the “President of France,” according to the three-page list. The list is contained in a seven-page document that also includes the warrant to search the premises which was granted by a federal magistrate judge in Florida.
Wall Street Journal.
And yet the very same individuals are going to defend Trump on this. There's no doubt.
Apparently, Trump is under investigation for potential violations of the Espionage Act. He certainly hasn't been proven guilty of this. But the fact nonetheless remains that what occurred here is 1) indicative of something, and 2) that something isn't defensible.
August 13, 2022
Donald Trump is now claiming that President Obama kept 33,000,000 pages of documents after he left office, some of which were classified. More specifically, he stated:
President Barack Hussein Obama kept 33 million pages of documents, much of them classified. How many of them pertained to nuclear? Word is, lots!
This is false.
At least one news report noting that Republicans are rallying to Trump's defense, again, is good news for the Democrats going into the primaries.
It's often stated that "elections have consequences", which is quite true. But do telling lies, have any?
August 29, 2022
Everyone is now aware of the FBI raid on the former President's Mar-a-Lago home. While the full details of this are very much yet to be revealed, it's clear that he took confidential materials to his Florida golf resort estate and failed to return them when asked. What the situation is beyond that, we really don't know.
It's caused an interesting reaction. Republicans, who earlier wanted to "lock her (Hilary Clinton) up, are now wanting to "defund" the FBI. Clearly there's hypocrisy on both sides here in that Clinton's errors, while much less severe, were real, and these are mind-boggling. A security review is now underway.
Inserted into this, as part of the overall tale of risk, it has developed that a woman presenting herself as one Anna de Rothschild, a member of the famous European banking family, made her way into Mar-a-Lago was in fact Inna Yashchyshyn, an American-born Russian-speaking individual of Ukrainian extraction whose job involves bringing Russian women to the United States so to deliver their infants so that the children can obtain U.S. citizenship. Her tale, replete with multiple passports, etc., is more than a little odd.
That's weird enough, but the rest of it is strange to say the least. Her status was revealed to Mar-a-Lago by music personality Dean Lawrence.
August 30, 2022
Donald Trump demanded that he be installed as President immediately or that a new Presidential election be held.
It's difficult that he actually believes that either demand will be taken seriously, so it has to be assumed that this is merely for attention or red meat for the least politically astute of his followers.
August 31, 2022
Ann Coulter, one of the earliest loud far right voices, and an early fan of Donald Trump who later soured on him, has come out with a blistering article calling him a "grifter" and "done".
September 2, 2022
Ginni Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, emailed Wisconsin legislators to overturn the results of the 2020 election. It was already known that she made similar efforts with Arizona.
There are very few jobs in the country where, if your spouse holds them, you ought to curb your political activities, but frankly being a member of the judiciary is one.
September 9, 2022
Ty Cobb, former White House lawyer, came out in an interview calling Donald Trump a "deeply wounded narcissists" and gave a damning series of opinions on Trump's actions. He feels an indictment is likely.
September 30, 2022
Ginni Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice, Clarence Thomas, appeared in front of the January 6 Committee and reported reiterated her belief that the 2020 election had been stolen, without providing evidence as to why she believes this.
Having recently received two emails on this topic myself, one of which was highly vitriolic, but well written, I think it's safe to assume there's no convincing anyone that the attempted coup was that, at this point, who has set his mind to the opposite.
October 13, 2022
The January 6 Committee has subpoenaed Donald J. Trump.
October 14, 2022
November 12, 2022
Donald Trump has sued over his subpoena to present for a deposition for the January 6 Committee.
This isn't really a surprise. It's in Trump's interest to keep this up in the air until January, in hopes that the Republicans take the House and end the committee's charge.
And while it is still too early to make that call, it at least appears likely that the GOP will take the House back, although by a fairly tiny margin.
November 19, 2022
A special counsel has been named by the Justice Department to investigate the insurrection and Trump as well as the classified material situation involving Mar-a-Lago.
December 19, 2022
The January 6 committee has referred Donald Trump to the U.S. Attorney General on charges of obstruction of an official proceeding, conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to make a false statement and inciting, assisting or providing aid and comfort to an insurrection. It has also referred Kevin McCarthy, Jim Jordan, Scott Perry and Andy Biggs to the ethics committee for failure to honor a subpoena to the committee.
The committee has completed its work and issues its report.
The U.S. Attorney General is unlikely to specifically act on the committee's referral, as it is conducting its own investigation.
Last prior edition:
The Post Insurrection. The investigation goes live. The Tragic Part III.
Monday, November 7, 2022
The 2022 Election Part XIII. Some pre election predictions.
The much anticipated "pro choice" vote that the pundits are predicting to roll in nationally, and Democrats are depending upon, will almost wholly fail to materialize.
Young voters, who the Democrats are also depending on, won't show up.
Hispanic voters will, but a lot more of them will vote Republican, reflecting social conservatism, than anticipated.
The much ballyhooed babble that things are so violent out there that we're living in The French Connection, won't persuade anyone to vote one way or another on anything.
Inflation will influence older voters on fixed incomes quite a bit in their vote.
The Republicans will probably gain the Senate, but not by much.
The Democrats will barely hand on to the House.
A little more long term.
Withing a week of the election, Donald Trump will announce he's running in 2024. He won't, actually, as by that time the nationa will have moved on and his troubles will have grown. Moreover, given his age and all that being in the position of 1) being a candidate and 2) being a potential defendant in one more trials, will catch up with him and nature will take its course, as it always does in the end.
Up until that moment, Joe Biden will indicate he's running, assuming the intervention of the docking of the barque within the next year or so. After that, however, one way or another, he'll announce that he's not running.
The Tribune predicts a Republican sweep locally, but how could that not occur?
It will, but Lynette Grey Bull will pull in at least 33% of the vote, maybe more. Harriet Hageman will go on to be elected, but she'll be sidelined as an irrelevant freshman Congressman as soon as she shows up. Senator Barrasso will start to slowly pull away from Trump and Hageman. Senator Lummis will not.
Chuck Grey will of course win the Secretary of State's position, but a surprising number of Nethercott write ins will appear. He'll go on to be a largely ineffectual Secretary of State who will mark time until 2026, when he hopes to run for Governor. He will run, but he won't be nominated.
The next legislature will take a sharp leap to the right, and as a result it will be constantly at war, in some fashion, on local control and social issues. It'll also cut back on spending and dig in on fossil fuels. Given the probable GOP take over of the Senate, nothing big "green" will happen in the next two years, but nothing of the opposite nature will happen either. A couple of years in attempting to an evolving, changing energy economy will be lost.
By 2024 the bloom will start to be off the rose locally on the hard right lurch. Many of the diehard forces will have waned, and to some degree the movement will be a victim of its success. Political glory is short. Two legislative sessions of attacking the Federal government and not funding things will have its toll and the rollback will start.
By that time, it'll be harder to find people who, although they have Grey and Hagemean signs out right now, will admit that they voted for them. By the same token, people will be lying about who they voted for by mid-week. Lots of Grey Bull voters are going to deny they voted for her, and in some offices people who voted for Hageman or Grey will be lying about that.
Amendment A, allowing local communities to invest their reserves, will fail, even though it should pass.
Amendment B, allowing judges to serve for 15 years after they die, will pass, even though it should fail.
Last Prior Edition of Thread:
The 2022 Election Part XII. The General Election Race, Edition 2.
The 2022 Election Part XII. The General Election Race, Edition 2.
I didn't plan on doing a second one of these before the election, but the existing one got too big, so here we are. . . again.
Hopefully this is the last one in this tread, in a fairly sad election year.
The primary election really demonstrated Wyoming's lurch to the hard right with two of the state wide candidates receiving Trump endorsements, along with Harriet Hageman's whose only real issue was her loyalty to Donald Trump. This upcoming legislative session promises, quite frankly, to be absolutely frightening and in the Congress Wyoming goes from having a respected, but not disliked in GOP circles, figure to one who will be, at least at first, a reliable GOP nullity. In the Secretary of State office, which is the central business office for the state, a person who, back door, is widely disrespected in many circles goes into the fall completely unopposed.
And that points out the collapse of the Democratic Party in the state. There are some notable Democrats who should be capable, in a sane situation, of easily beating a candidate like Chuck Gray, but they aren't running.
The races:
U.S. House of Representatives
Republican Party
Harriet Hageman. Anointed by Donald Trump to take out Liz Cheney, and a late adopter of the stolen election theory, Wyoming lawyer Hageman is the favorite, albeit one who is seemingly now fairly quiet.
On that, Hageman won't even debate her Democratic challenger, which is both arrogant and rude.
Democratic Party.
Lynette Gray Bull. Running a second time, the Native American candidate can be regarded as a "progressive" who is emphasizing her commitment to democracy, in opposition to Hageman's adoption of the stolen election story. Gray Bull has challenged Hageman to a debate, but Hageman has rudely declined, as noted above.
Governor
Republican
Mark Gordon.
Democrat
Theresa Livingston.
Secretary of State
Republican
Chuck Gray. Gray has only been in the state for a decade and is widely held in many circles to be temperamentally and professionally unqualified for this position.
Gray, who wasn't universally popular in the legislature, focused on bogus election concerns in his campaign. He'll take over from an even more unqualified interim Secretary of State who assumed this position when Ed Buchanan resigned to take a judicial appointment.
Democrat
None, the Democrats have defaulted in a race in which many feel the worst Republican candidate in the State's history won the GOP race, nearly assuring that the same individual will take that position.
State Treasurer
Republican
Curt Meier won the GOP nomination for a second term.
Democrat
None.
State Auditor
Kristi Racines took this race in the Republican primary, and she seems to be the only candidate in the state that everyone likes.
Superintendent of Public Instruction
This is the only race for statewide office which actually features two qualified candidates.
Republican
Megan Delgenfelder.
Democrat
Sergio Maldonado.
Proposed Amendments to the Wyoming Constitution.
This year features two proposed amendments to the Wyoming constitution. I'm not sure where the first one came from, but the second one is part of the general geriatric drift in the country, in which the generation that warned us to never trust anyone over 30 doesn't trust anyone under 60.
Proposed Amendment A
This proposed amendment's ballot summary states:
The Wyoming Constitution allows the state to invest state funds in equities such as the stock of corporations, but does not allow the funds of counties, cities and other political subdivisions to be invested in equities. The adoption of this amendment would allow the funds of counties, cities and other political subdivisions to be invested in equities to the extent and in the manner the legislature may allow by law. Any law authorizing the investment of specified political subdivision funds in equities would require a two-thirds vote of both houses of the legislature
The actual text of the revised statute would read as follows:
Article 16, Section 6. Loan of credit; donations prohibited; investment of funds; works of internal improvement.
(a) Neither the state nor any county, city, township, town, school district, or any other political subdivision, shall:
(i) Loan or give its credit or make donations to or in aid of any individual, association or corporation, except for necessary support of the poor; or
(ii) Subscribe to or become the owner of the capital stock of any association or corporation, except that:
(A) Funds of public employee retirement systems and the permanent funds of the state of Wyoming may be invested in such stock under conditions the legislature prescribes;
(B) The legislature may provide by law for the investment of funds not designated as permanent funds of the state in the capital stock of any association or corporation and may designate which of these funds may be invested. The legislature may prescribe different investment conditions for each fund. Any legislation establishing or increasing the percentage of any fund that may be invested under this subparagraph shall be passed only by a two-thirds (2/3) vote of all the members of each of the two (2) houses voting separately.
(C) The legislature may provide by law for the investment of county, city, township, town, school district, or any other political subdivision's funds in the capital stock of any association or corporation and may designate which of these funds may be invested. The legislature may prescribe different investment conditions for each type and class of political subdivision and for each type of fund. Any legislation establishing or increasing the percentage of any fund that may be invested under this subparagraph shall be passed only by a two-thirds (2/3) vote of all the members of each of the two (2) houses voting separately.
(b) The state shall not engage in any work of internal improvement unless authorized by a two-thirds (2/3) vote of the people.
I'm not really sure where this comes from, and I don't know what my opinion of it is. The theory, I guess, would be that the legislature could provide for a means for local governments to invest their funds in hopes of getting higher yields than they do from banks, which would also mean that they'd have to be able to tolerate downturns in the market.
Proposed Amendment B.
The amendment summary that will appear on the ballot states:
Currently, the Wyoming Constitution requires Wyoming Supreme Court justices and district court judges to retire upon reaching the age of seventy (70). This amendment increases the mandatory retirement age of Supreme Court justices and district court judges from age seventy (70) to age seventy-five (75).
October 13, 2022
Wyoming's interim Secretary of State Karl Allred made good on his promise to address a non issue by sending letters out to County Clerk's asking them to remove drop boxes. Only seven counties use them.
Prior Secretary of State Ed Buchanan, who abandoned the post he was elected to in order to be appointed a district court judge, thereby effectively disrupting the election leading to the GOP nomination and probable election of Chuck Gray, had encouraged their use due to COVID during the last election. Gray has promised to ban them.
Probably most people don't realize that drop boxes probably include the election machine outside of the clerk's door. I've only seen one dropbox that was located outside of a courthouse rather than in it, but I haven't been to all of these locations. Clerks are free to tell the unqualified to tell Allred to pound sand, and the Clerk of Laramie County, in her interview with the paper there, basically did, noting that her office already complied with the security requests that the never successfully elected Allred suggested in his cheery letter which acknowledged that prior elections had been successfully conducted.
While time will tell, this probably foreshadows an upcoming potentially hostile relationship between Clerks and Gray, if Gray tries to build on his "stolen election" campaign to tell the elected clerks what they can do.
Tulsi Gabbard, who left the GOP officially two days ago, has already endorsed a Trump backed Washington candidate.
According to the Tribune, a council for Casper's city council had to be shut down from speaking at a recent school board meeting when he got a bit out of control.
October 13, cont.
It should be noted that the GOP Governor has been riffing off of Trump populists, who also feel that just such actions in regard to the 2020 election resulted in it being stolen.
Hmmm. . . .
October 14, 2022
A debate of candidates for the U.S. House, save for Harriet Hageman, occurred last night.
Hageman was castigated by the other candidates for her failure to appear, which is either rude, arrogant, or cowardly. At least one candidate called her actions cowardly.
Hageman needs to be heard from on her failure to debate, and not with the excuse that she has other more effective means of communicating with Wyomingites. So far, more or less, her campaign has been limited to the fact that she supports now subpoenaed Donald J. Trump no matter what, whereas Liz Cheney has the courage of her convictions. Other than having united herself to Trump no matter what, there's nothing really known to distinguish her from Cheney, but the voters really haven't heard much from her otherwise in a widespread way. Public forum's she's attended to date have been principally populated with Hageman Fans/Cheney Haters, so that does not suffice.
October 14, 2022
Long serving (37 years) Deputy Secretary of State Karen Wheeler is leaving the office. She's the second prominent member of the Secretary of State's Office to leave, with the first one expressly leaving due to Chuck Gray coming into the office.
There have been rumor that resignations would be widespread. It would have been anticipated that this would have commenced after Chuck Gray assumed office in January, if it was going to, but with Interim Sectary Allred being of a similar mind to Gray, it may start sooner. If it does it will create the very election crisis that Gray and Allred claimed to be dedicated to avoiding, but because of their attacks on an institution which was not in trouble.
October 15, 2022
None of the clerks replying to Allred's request have agreed to comply with it, thereby making him 100% ineffective in that effort. Of course, the effort was pointless to begin with, but it foreshadows a likely showdown between the county clerks and incoming Secretary of State Chuck Gray, who has no more authority over them than Allred does.
This is not a minor manner. The clerks are rightfully telling Allred, and Gray by extension, to butt out. This is likely to visit the courts in some fashion.
October 20, 2022
The Deputy Secretary of State Karen Wheeler and Election Division Director Kai Schon announced in front of the Corporations Committee of the Legislature last Friday that they're resigning after the November election. While they termed it as being a good time to pursue other opportunities, it's pretty clear that neither wishes to serve under the likely winner, Chuck Gray, who based his campaign on fictional election security concerns. It's no wonder that either would wish to serve under Gray, although it remains a wonder that Gray won the primary. A lack of a primary opponent means that Gray almost certainly will tragically win the office.
Both individuals are graciously remaining through the general election, and Schon indicated he'll reach out to the "Secretary Elect".
October 23, 2022
Liz Cheney appeared as a guest on Meet The Press today. Relevant to the current election, she indicated that she's not voting for Harriet Hageman or Chuck Gray, and that anyone who is concerned about democracy, cannot.
Mary Peltola, Democratic Congressman from Alaska, received a number of Republican endorsements in that state for much the same reason.
October 25, 2022
The Natrona County School Board election is getting more attention than it normally would.
Superintendent for Public Instruction candidate Delgenfelder appeared at last night's meeting to support the district's right to make the decision to leave the book Gender Queer on the shelves, but to oppose the book itself, thereby basically taking both sides of the issue regarding the book. She suggested that it is pornographic. The book has drawn the ire of three candidates who are members of something called "Moms For Liberty".
I'd never heard of the group, but the name is a poor one and a bit ironic in some ways. Basically they're a conservative, nationwide, organization that emphasizes parental control of schools and fears that schools engage in liberal indoctrination. I'm not going to comment on that one way or another, but the "liberty" aspect of that shows the odd misuse of that word in our current culture.
The political right accuses, in essence, the political left of being "libertine", a word that I'd wager the majority of Americans are ignorant of nowadays.
The online etymology dictionary defines liberty as follows:
The French notion of liberty is political equality; the English notion is personal independence. [William R. Greg, "France in January 1852" in "Miscellaneous Essays"]
I’ll tell you what’s ‘toxic’ . . . trying to freeze free speech with ominous warnings that ‘we’re watching you’ from pointy-headed college professors and the leftist corporate media.
In the Biden administration, we are seeing the most dangerous, most destructive administration in U.S. history. President Biden and the radical Democrats are responsible for record-breaking inflation, record-breaking illegal immigration, record-breaking human trafficking, record-breaking drug running, and record-breaking energy and food costs.It would be one thing if these calamities were happening by accident, though it would still be tragic, but what we are enduring is actually the Democrats’ plan. Their goal is to completely upend our economy, to force people to bend to their will and compel behavioral changes to establish their leftist Utopia. We need members of Congress who will expose these nonsensical policies and fight to return us to a commonsense path that will lead us back to liberty and prosperity.