The argument was predictable, so its no surprise. Republican supporters of Mad King Donald are arguing that, well, sure it might have been a big whopping mistake, but we can't quit now.
Oh yes we can.
We've done it before.
We did that in Vietnam after seventeen years of effort and 50,000 dead. Heck, we left and felt good about leaving, blaming our embarrassing departure on the South Vietnamese, whom supposedly we were there to help.
Mad King Donny did that with Afghanistan, actually surrendering to the Taliban and leaving the mess for his successor Joe Biden to handle. To Trumpites everything is always Joe Biden's fault, but the abandonment of the Afghanis was Donny's fault.
So he has experience in losing wars and pulling out already.
We went into this war because Israel basically duped Donny into it. Knowing that Donny was of weak and declining mind, they convinced him that an Israeli strategic goal was an American one, as they couldn't achieve it on their own. The entire concept was lame in the extreme. We'd bomb Iran for two or three days, murder the leadership of the Islamic Republic, and suddenly everyone in Iran, exercising their Second Amendment Rights, would rise up and turn the country into a liberal democracy, complete with a representative government that loved us, and proper voter identification.
It was a stupid idea.
The Iranians are a captive people, but they aren't armed the way we are, and for that matter, if the Trump administration is any guide, even freedom loving. AR 15 toting, patriots will roll over like a dog when the government tells them to, even accepting that, well, guns are bad as King Donny said so. Sparking a revolution in a foreign country by bombing the crap out of it won't achieve that goal. Indeed, if the Germans, North Koreans, North Vietnamese, etc., are any example, bombing a civilian population causes support for the government. At some point, some person whom wanted freedom is burying a child and hates your guts.
Not that Trump could appreciate this. Trumps haven't served in the military the entire time they've been in the US. Heck, the founder of the Trump dynasty in the US was regarded as a draft dodger in the German state he was from, although that can be debated (he was, after all, busy in the US serving food and running a house of prostitution).
So, now we have the Iranians proposing terms to us.
In order to "win" this war we'll have to seize the country. Given the population of Iran, that will mean calling up the National Guard and occupying the country for at least a decade. My guess is that we'd sustain at least 20,000 dead, not as much as Vietnam, but a lot more than any war we've fought since Vietnam.
Let's not.
Chances are pretty good that King Donald is going to accept whatever terms the Iranians dictate to the US and call it a victory. It's a bit of an American tradition, after all. The British and the Canadians beat the crap out of the US in the War of 1812 and we still pretend that we won it, when in fact the British dictated terms to us. We won the Mexican War but only by forming our own Mexican body to surrender to us, legitimate Mexican authorities never did. We declared victory in the Philippine Insurrection when the war became too unpopular to continue to fight, through which we dictated to the Filipinos that they'd have to go independent, just like they were fighting to be. We went into Mexico in the Mexican Border War and then came back out, tail between our legs. We flat out lost the Vietnam War but got out before everything folded up and then blamed it all on the South Vietnamese.
And of course, as noted, we surrendered to the Taliban.
Trump is going to Congress and asking for $200B to fight this war. Just say no, Congress. Trump will then declare victory and claim that we wiped out Iranian nuclear material, which we claimed to have earlier wiped out, and go home.
This problem can be left for the adults.
If this war is to go on, one modest proposal. The Trump family ought to serve in it. Every single one under age 55. And in combat roles. The Trump family head of household can make that happen. And Trump lovers, like Chuck Gray, who are under 55 should sign up and go. To not do so would be hypocritical.
Shoot, it would make this a rich man's war, and a poor man's fight, if that didn't happen.
But, the better course, just stop. Chances are that's exactly what we're going to do anyhow.
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.
Quand les riches font la guerre, ce sont les pauvres qui meurent.
Jean Paul Sartre
February 8, 2026.
Russo Ukrainian War
The administration of Demented Don the pretend President, who is going to end the Russo Ukrainian War within 24 hours of his being nominated for President in 2023, and who has ended eight wars but hasn't since he was elected to serve an office he's not constitutionally qualified to hold, has given the warring parties until June to wrap the war up.
By June there's a good chance he'll be in a nursing home pointing out to the nurses where the ballroom will be built.
February 15, 2026
February 28, 2026
United States and Israel v. Iran
Americans are waking up this morning to find that Donald Trump and Bibi Netanyahu have launched an undeclared, and hence form the U.S. prospective, an illegal war against Iran. Missile strikes have already hit all over Iran which have been, so far as we can tell, ineffectual, and Iran has already hit back, hitting Israel, Kuwait, Bahrain and Qatar.
Trump made a late night statement in which he sounded like an inarticulate grade schooler. The supposed basis of launching the war was that Iran posed a grave threat to the U.S. Wearing a trucker's cap, the appearance of being a toddler was fully effectuated.
The text of his message was:
A short time ago, the United States military began major combat operations in Iran. Our objective is to defend the American people by eliminating imminent threats from the Iranian regime, a vicious group of very hard, terrible people.
Its menacing activities directly endanger the United States, our troops, our bases overseas and our allies throughout the world. For 47 years, the Iranian regime has chanted death to America and waged an unending campaign of bloodshed and mass murder, targeting the United States, our troops and the innocent people in many, many countries.
Among the regime's very first acts was to back a violent takeover of the US embassy in Tehran, holding dozens of American hostages for 444 days. In 1983, Iran's proxies carried out the Marine barracks bombing in Beirut that killed 241 American military personnel.
In 2000, they knew and were probably involved with the attack on the USS Coal. Many died. Iranian forces killed and maimed hundreds of American service members in Iraq. The regime's proxies have continued to launch countless attacks against American forces stationed in the Middle East in recent years, as well as US naval and commercial vessels in international shipping lanes.
It's been mass terror. And we're not going to put up with it any longer. From Lebanon to Yemen and Syria to Iraq, the regime has armed, trained and funded terrorist militias that have soaked the earth with blood and guts.
And it was Iran's proxy Hamas that launched the monstrous October 7 attacks on Israel, slaughtering more than 1,000 innocent people, including 46 Americans, while taking 12 of our citizens hostage. It was brutal. Something like the world has never seen before.
Iran is the world's number one state sponsor of terror and just recently killed tens of thousands of its own citizens on the street as they protested. It has always been the policy of the United States, in particular my administration, that this terrorist regime can never have a nuclear weapon. I'll say it again. They can never have a nuclear weapon.
That is why in Operation Midnight Hammer last June, we obliterated the regime's nuclear program at Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan. After that attack, we warned them never to resume their malicious pursuit of nuclear weapons. And we sought repeatedly to make a deal. We tried. They wanted to do it, they didn't want to do it again. They wanted to do it, they didn't want to do it, they didn't know what was happening. They just wanted to practice evil.
But Iran refused, just as it has for decades and decades. They rejected every opportunity to renounce their nuclear ambitions. And we can't take it any more. Instead, they attempted to rebuild their nuclear program and to continue developing long-range missiles that can now threaten our very good friends and allies in Europe, our troops stationed overseas and could soon reach the American homeland.
Just imagine how emboldened this regime would be if they ever had and actually were armed with nuclear weapons as a means to deliver their message.
For these reasons, the United States military is undertaking a massive and ongoing operation to prevent this very wicked, radical dictatorship from threatening America and our core national security interests. We are going to destroy their missiles and raze their missile industry to the ground. It will be totally, again, obliterated. We are going to annihilate their navy. We are going to ensure that the region's terrorist proxies can no longer destabilize the region or the world and attack our forces and no longer use their IEDs, or roadside bombs, as they are sometimes called, to so gravely wound and kill thousands and thousands of people, including many Americans.
And we will ensure that Iran does not obtain a nuclear weapon. It's a very simple message. They will never have a nuclear weapon. This regime will soon learn that no one should challenge the strength and might of the United States Armed Forces. I built and rebuilt our military in my first administration.
And there is no military on Earth even close to its power. Strength or sophistication. My administration has taken every possible step to minimize the risk to US personnel in the region. Even so, and I do not make this statement likely, the Iranian regime seeks to kill. The lives of courageous American heroes may be lost and we may have casualties. That often happens in war. But we're doing this not for now, we're doing this for the future. And it is a noble mission.
We pray for every service member as they selflessly risk their lives to ensure that Americans and our children will never be threatened by a nuclear-armed Iran. We ask God to protect all of our heroes in harm's way. And we trust that with his help, the men and women of the armed forces will prevail.
We have the greatest in the world. And they will prevail.
To the members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard, the armed forces and all of the police, I say tonight that you must lay down your weapons and have complete immunity. Or, in the alternative, face certain death. So lay down your arms. You will be treated fairly with total immunity, or you will face certain death.
Finally, to the great, proud people of Iran, I say tonight that the hour of your freedom is at hand. Stay sheltered. Don't leave your home. It's very dangerous outside. Bombs will be dropping everywhere. When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take. This will be probably your only chance for generations.
For many years you have asked for America's help, but you never got it. No president was willing to do what I am willing to do tonight. Now you have a president who is giving you what you want. So let's see how you respond. America is backing you with overwhelming strength and devastating force. Now is the time to seize control of your destiny and to unleash the prosperous and glorious future that is close within your reach.
This is the moment for action. Do not let it pass.
May God bless the brave men and women of America's armed forces. May God bless the United States of America. May God bless you all. Thank you.
Promising the Iranians freedom (while working at home to take it from Americans), is a pretty big promise that can only be effectuated by actually invading the country. If he's hoping to spark a domestic revolution, he's delusional.
Apparently Israel attempted to directly take out the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the President of Iran, Ayatollah Ebrahim Raisi, crossing a line that warring states do not cross. Targeting the actual head of a foreign country is extremely rare, although the US did, unsuccessfully, with Khadafi.
This is a profoundly bad move.
The thought probably was that if the regime was decapitated, it'd spark a revolution Maybe it would have, but it failed and now Iran will have every incentive to target Netanyahu and Trump. I suspect that Netanyahu would be extremely difficult for Iran to target but Trump, while difficult, would be less so. US leaders have nearly been hit before in a political targeting, that being Truman, and perhaps arguably both Kennedys.
The Allies didn't target Hitler during World War Two. The Nazis didn't target any Allied leader. The Allies didn't target the Japanese leadership. The US and RVN never attempted to kill the heads of North Vietnam. This was a really bad move.
March 1, 2026
United States and Israel v. Iran
Raisi was in fact killed in a raid that clearly was calculated to decapitate the Iranian regime and which hit other key Iranian figures. Cheering could be heard in Tehran when the news broke.
The war is continuing on, however. And the big question is now what. The U.S. and Israel have committed both countries, and more particularly the US, to a war of regime change, something Republicans were supposedly against in the post Bush era. The Iranian regime is a bad one, to be sure, but in order to topple it, now, its going to require boots on the ground.
Rest assured, none of those boots will be filled by Trumps.
So here we have an interesting set of existential issues. Trump has committed the country to a war illegally, and completely contrary to what the MAGAs claim they stand for. The Iranian regime is, and let's be clear, still is, a terrible one and has been since the 1970s, but no prior Western nation sought to topple it by armed force. And the US and Israel have killed the head of state, which opens up retaliatory moves of the exact same character.
Given Trump's mental state, moreover, it's really unlikely that any of this was his idea. So whose was it?
Mad King Donny, as an aside, was posting stupid tweets.
The Imperial Russian Army, which had been seeing success after success against the Ottomans, entered Erzurum, but botched it, allowing the retreating Ottoman Third Army to set up a new defense line less than 10 km away from the city. Losses were heavy on both sides.
Lomond, Alberta was established.
Kermit Roosevelt Jr. was born to was born to Kermit Roosevelt Sr., son of U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt, and Belle Wyatt Roosevelt (née Willard) in Buenos Aires. He's later work for the OSS and CIA.
Kermit Jr, Theodore Roosevelt, and Richard Derby.
A member of the greatest dynastic American family, he died in 2000. His father exhibited the occasionally tragic aspect of the family, dying by suicide in 1943 in Alaska.
Anyway you look at it, the Roosevelts stand apart as an American political family, although they have chosen to remain outside of politics since the 1940s. Never tainted while in office, and highly self sacrificing, their family remains admirable to this very day. The Adams family may rate a close second (or first?), followed by the Bush family, and perhaps the Kennedy family. The Trump family stands a chance of being the polar opposite.
Dương Văn Minh, the last President of South Vietnam, was born in French Cochinchina. A soldier by training and profession, he'd live until 2001. He spent much of his post Vietnam War exile in France, but immigrated to Pasadena California to be near his daughter in his old age. He was extremely quiet in exile, and did not produce a memoir.
A gas explosion destroyed Mexia Texas' opera house and damaged a half-block of buildings, killing nine and injuring eight.
