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

October 2, 2026.

We are, of course, about one month away from the General Election and it's universally agreed that, at least as of right now, the economy is not doing well, which is to say that it's not doing well for average people.  Having said that, all the monkeying around Trump has done with the economy has not resulted in a general collapse, as some feared.  This tends to give credence to the assertion that some make that the American economy in general is so strong that it tends to keep on chugging along in spite of everything.  

Having said that, prices on many things have gone up, and are now at the paint point for average people.  Beef prices, for example, are up about 25%.  That can't really be blamed on Trump, as its due to a historically low cattle heard, but Trump's efforts to address it were pretty much non existent at first, and the ineffectual when they were tried.

Beef Imports Haven’t Lowered Prices As Hoped. ‘I Told You So,’ Says Wyo Rancher

Addressing the price can only really come through a recovery of the North American herd.  Trump's constant crazy hatred of Canada and Canadians isn't helping this at all, as Canada is part of the North American market.  Mexican cattle, which had been banned from coming into the US due to screwworm, which we're not hearing much about, which is concerning, have started to come back in. That is likely to  have some effect.

Petroleum prices have shot up enormously since Trump started an ill advised and poorly planned war on Iran for no real discernable critical objective.

Wars are inflationary by their very nature, but attacking a critical global petroleum supplier is definitely going to be inflationary, and this is set to really start hitting home.  Everything in the US, whether it moves by truck, by rail, or in the air, uses petroleum.  That impacts the price of 100% of American goods.  Gasoline, Diesel fuel and Aviation fuel is way up in price.  Heating oil is up 50% to 70% just as we're entering the season where it starts to be used on the East Coast. NOAA, which usus science, predicts a warm winter in the East, like last years, so that might not be as impactful as it could be.  The Old Farmers Almanac, which I put no stock in whatsoever, predicts a cold winter.

An interesting side impact of the cost of things is that even Wyomingites are looking at electric vehicles.  I overheard a conversation the other day in which two people were wishing to get them, and they're both highly conservative individuals.  A report on increasing EVs appeared in one of the local online journals today.

Is Wyoming Going Electric? EV Registrations Surge Tenfold In Two Years

There are still a lot of naysayers out there, but there were when automobiles started to become common for that matter.

Anyway, the Trump Administration has handed out its flood of excuses for all of this, starting at first with "it's Joe Biden's fault".  Everything is Biden's fault according to Trump, whom while he routinely falls asleep in public still calls Biden, on occasion, "Sleep Joe".

The it's all Biden's fault is no longer selling very well so the "it's not much to pay to keep Iran from getting a bomb" has been tried and is still being tried, but it's not selling that well . First of all, well informed people know that while Iran is a very secretive state, the evidence that it was about to make a nuke is thin.  And frankly Israel's major early role in the war made it pretty clear that this was a joint Israeli American adventure in which the Trumpites had been heavily influenced by Israel.  That's adding to an anti Israeli sentiment that's been building in the US for several years and you'll even now hear, in response to the suggestion that it's all worth it to keep Iran from getting a bomb, that maybe we don't really care if Iran has a bomb.

We didn't care enough about North Korea having one in order for the US to attack it, and Trump loves the communist leader of North Korea.

So that excuse isn't working either.

So time to distract.

The government just announced that children under 16 years of age are being automatically enrolled in "Trump" savings accounts. The Government, which has no money whatsoever as it's borrowing piles, will place $1,000 of the money it doesn't have into such accounts, but parents need to claim it.

Will this achieve something?

Well, it might, or might now.  Truth be known with inflation being what it is, $1,000 that can't be touched until a person is 18 years old isn't going to seem like that big of a deal right now  But it might turn out to be.

Trump also promised people $5,000 if the GOP retains both houses of Congress, but then that would require Congress to do it, and Trump earlier promised everyone a $2,000 tariff dividend.  The government handing out cash it doesn't have isn't a good idea and frankly I thought it was a horrible idea when President Biden started handing out cash during COVID.  I've heard the Trump proposal compared to that, and that was a bad idea.

The Administration also just sent out $500.00 checks as supposed refunds for Obamacare overcharges.  They seem rather strategically placed, however.  

Anyhow, stayed tuned for coming attractions. The trade war with Canada is just starting, the war is no where near over, and prices are really set to climb.  Trump has less than thirty days to address all of this, or even some of it, which won't be easy at all.  Voters who are inclined to vote their pocketbooks are likely pretty much set in their opinions by now.

October 6, 2026

Casper's Grant Street Grocery closed.

Grant Street Grocery, Casper Wyoming

Grant Street Grocery in Casper Wyoming is the only surviving small neighborhood grocery store in the town and even advertises the same.

Opened in 1921, the store was converted into a specialty grocery store and deli some years ago, and features meats and cheeses, as well as many other items, that are unlikely to appear on the counters of regular grocery stores.  It's featured here for its simple sign, as well as being a remnant of something that was once very common, a neighborhood store.

President Trump signed an order allowing for the temporary sale of red diesel, which you tend to only find easily in farm country, for regular diesels.  Effectively its a sort of kind of temporary suspension of the Federal tax on diesel.

I'd quite frankly question the Presidents ability to legally do this, but if I see red diesel for sale, I'm buying it.  

I probably won't find it for sale.

October 7, 2026

Something is definitely going on.

Bush-Wells Sporting Goods to close its doors at the end of the year

The store has literally been in business my entire life.

Paramount Skydance took over Warner Bros Discovery on Tuesday giving the company, now just called Skydance, CBS, CNN, Paramount+, and HBO Max

Tribal Data Center Study Had 'A Lot Of Options', But Community Said No Thanks

October 10, 2026

And also 

2026-009  Emergency Relief Permits for Transportation of Oversize and Overweight Loads of Agricultural Products 

2026-010  Executive Order Recognizing and Adopting the Federal Monitor Carrier Safety Administration Hours-of-Service Waiver for the Intrastate Transportation of Gasoline and Diesel Fu

On the red fuel order, some states, or at least Montana, have warned diesel users that they're not lifting their provisions. Also, red diesel stains filters and engine parts, so when the suspension ends, and you take your truck in to be serviced, you may have a lot of explaining to do.

And now this:

Trump is so desperate to put the economic destruction of the Iran War behind him that he's made a deal with Putin to import diesel fuel.  

First of all, this isn't enough diesel to make any sort of difference and I frankly do not think it will even occur. But more significantly he's made a deal with a country that is engaged in a completely immoral war against a neighbor and losing, and by doing this, helping them.  The US, it might be noted, has just acted to increase sanctions on Russia.

Totally inexcusable. 

Last edition:

Subsidiarity Economics 2026. The Times more or less locally, Part 10, The Autarky Edition.

Labels: 2020s, 2026, Adam Smith, Alcohol, Autarky, Chuck Gray, Economics, Ignorance, Nazi Germany, Petroleum, Stupidity, Taxes, The Second Trump Administration, Wharton, Wilhelm Röpke, Wyoming's boom and bust economy

King Donald's War, Part 14. The Houthi Edition.

 

Emblem of Yemen.

September 20, 2026

The Houthis hit the Saudi capital of Riyadh with drones.

September 25, 2026

The Senate voted against a resolution demanding an end to the war or Congressional authorization 50 to 49.  Four Republicans — Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Rand Paul of Kentucky, Thom Tillis of North Carolina and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska — voted in favor.  Spinless wimp John Barrasso of course voted against.

October 5, 2026

The US withdrew its strategic bombers from the United Kingdom in reaction to some sort of attempted attack on a US installation.

Frankly, at this point, it's impossible to know what's a legitimate US. action vs. Trump drama.

Last edition:

King Donald's War, Part 13. A Second Rate Military lead by a Third Rate Clown College with a Secretary of War who should be impeached.

Labels: 1940, 1940s, 1941, 1948, 2020s, 2026, Curragh Mutiny, Israel, John Barrasso, King Donald's War, Mike Johnson, Military, Pete Hegseth, Thomas Massie, U.S. Navy, United States and Israel v. Iran, War, Women, Zeitgeist

Banning the export of diesel as King Donald can start wars, but cannot win them.

Diesel fuel prices have shot up since King Donny thought that beating Iran would be a cheap and easy matter, and hence attacked them.

What the war is about is not really clear.  King Donald has given multiple excuses for it but with the price of fuel shooting up, he's latched on to the "Iran was going to get a bomb" line.  According to an article in Scientific American Iran was, in fact, nowhere close to being able to do that.

And there are other reasons to suspect that was only in the background.  The war really looks like an idea that Bibi Netanyahu had knowing that Trump was pliable and probably that the administration was packed with far right wing Evangelicals who see whatever  Israel does as sanctioned by God to some degree.  You can't blame Bibi for that, it was a golden opportunity to knock a major Israeli enemy down a few pegs, if not out of the enemy category entirely.

It didn't work.

Right now, we're stuck in what looks like an endless war with Iran.  All the conventional theories about how to win the war are wrong. The war turns out to be as Clausewitzian as any.  In order to win, we'd have to invade the country with ground troops and not even King Donald is up for that.

In the meantime, the economic warfare Iran is conducting is working really well.  Iran has brought its clients, the Houthis, into the fight, and they've hit Saudi Arabia.  The US has done nothing about that, in spite of a Saudi request for assistance.  Indeed, we've apparently told the Houthis, who have "Death to America" as part of their slogan, that we'll turn a blind eye to that spat. The Saudi military is not widely regarded as a very good one, which is problematic as they are being put in a situation in which they may well have to conduct a ground invasion of Yemen.

So the price of diesel is way up.

Of course, King Donald and his flunkies insist that its up as Ukraine his hitting Russian petroleum facilities.  That claim is partially true, but they've been doing that for years now.  The price didn't start to skyrocket until recently.

King Donny, you own this.

And that will impact the price of everything.  The trucking industry likes to boast that "everything comes by truck". Well, a lot does, and that's a problem.  Everything that comes by truck is going to have its price go up. Everything that goes by rail will as well.

In short, everything.

And we haven't even touched on the costs to agriculture.

So, in desperation, some members of Congress have noticed that the US experts diesel fuel.  If we prohibit that, the price will go down, right?

Probably not. 

Petroleum products in general are one of scale.  If there's less of a market, refiners might just switch to something else.  And of course the price of petroleum itself will likely not go down.

And hence this.

Diesel, and gasoline, prices may be Trump's one real lasting legacy.

They might never go down.

King Donald's War, Part 13. A Second Rate Military lead by a Third Rate Clown College with a Secretary of War who should be impeached.

As we noted yesterday, Thomas Massie has introduced articles of impeachment upon Pete Hegseth.

They actually stand a chance of passing.

They provide, in relevant part:

Massie needs a simple majority in the House to pass the resolution.  It would require 2/3ds in the Senate to impeach and remove Hegseth.

Massie is nothing if not independent.  I don't agree with him on everything, but he's been one of the few Republicans in Congress, as opposed to the pack of willing sycophantic cowards that claim to be Republicans.  When the history of this era is written, he'll be a hero, whereas people like Mike Johnson will be pathetic weirdos, and people like John Barrasso spineless wimps.

Everything in this bill is correct.

One thing that isn't is incompetence, which this administration has shown itself to be on military matters.  The US Military has been revealed to be, frankly, pathetically bad, or at least its Navy has has been.  We're losing the war against a power that has outfought us, and out thought us.

Hegseth promised a renewal, of sorts, in the U.S. Military. Frankly, it needs one, and has for a long time.

Hegseth seems to have imagined a military that was pre 1948 in some ways.  All white, and mostly men.  The date we really need to look back to is this one:

Today In Wyoming's History: September 16, 1940. Conscription starts and the National Guard mobilized.

September 16, 1940 is the day the US went from a peacetime establishment and peacetime military to a wartime establishment and a wartime military.  We've been there ever since.  To at least some degree, we've kept a huge military with a huge military establishment, massive arms requirement, and a very large professional military class.

That needs to end.

What Hegseth got right, sort of, is that the Military began to be used for odd social experiments and it never stopped.  People look back to the 1948 integration of the military as being when that started, but that really misses the point. Segregation of the Army (not the Navy) started during the Civil War when the Army took in large number of black troops for the first time. With the inherent racism of the country, it simply would not have been possible to integrate black soldiers into regular units.  They would have been killed.  Establishing black units in and of themselves was a major accomplishment, and one only the war could have brought about.

Some efforts to integrate the military more fully occured in the 19th Century, but inherent racism in American society really just didn't make it possible until World War Two when it started to occur on a smaller and localized scale.  American reaction to German racism reflected back in the face of Americans and made integration of the military not only fully possible, but inevitable, after the war.

Minorities have always been a huge success story in the military, and that's been the case all along.  It simply provided opportunities to them that didn't exist elsewhere.  That lesson was learned but started to be misapplied in the 1970s when the Carter Administration saw the military as a way to advance the cause of women in society.  That evolved into allowing women into combat MOS's which was a huge mistake. Women and men are different. And then the Obama Administration allowed "transgendered" individuals into the military starting in 2016, which was turning a blind eye to a medically enhanced mental illness.

Women in combat units did create an internal reaction in military units that went unnoticed to some degree.  Male combat troops didn't and don't like it, and react accordingly whereas the influence of young women had a feminizing and softening, even cutsey, impact on the military.  Look up "Battle Boo" on Youtube and you'll see what I mean.  

Having troops set against their political leaders is a bad thing. But that has occured.  This created the perfect situation for a sort of Curragh Mutiny, and it's happened.

The thing here is that this all needed correction, but competent correction, which would have required a an actually conservative administration to bring about.  We don't have one of those.  In stead we have a demented megalomaniac octogenarian who is surrounded by sycophants, weirdos, and dimwits. Pete Hegseth is a good example.  A Evangelical Protestant Zealot with tattoos recalling the Crusades, which weren't done by Evangelical Protestants, a record of hard drinking and philandering, he presents himself like an insecure frat boy trying to hang out with college football players.  He also, as noted, not only claims to want to restore the "warrior" ethos to the military, he seems to have something against minorities and a bias against women that extend to their just being women.  

Like much of the overgrown bloated U.S. Military, he doesn't seem to have grasped that its not 1941 any longer either.  The war in Ukraine has shown that the age of drones is here.  Iran and the Houthis have shown an ability to launch missile strikes that would have made Peenemunde pound.  Believing that the US could take on Iran with Naval air alone, something GMT Games had already shown you could not, US forces were left heavily exposed in Middle Eastern bases which were wiped out by Iran nearly immediately.  Logistical tails were stepped on and the USS Abraham Lincoln became a symbol for the entire country, a rusting psychologically stressed hulk.

There doesn't seem to have been a lot of clear thinking going on.

Speaking of not thinking, and related to this war:

But with your money.  

What the crap?

President Trump’s administration is planning to sell to Israel a munitions package worth $2.8 including 2,000-pound bombs which will be funded by a Foreign Military Financing (FMF) grant.

That's right.  The heavily indebted United States will be spending money it doesn't have for Israel's military.

One thing that this war has caused and is causing is a rethinking of the US relationship with Israel.  It's long overdue.

The common line is that "Israel is our only ally in the Middle East".  Israel isn't a formal US ally at all.  Indeed, in terms of formal allies, the only Middle Eastern one we have is Turkey, not Israel.  

The US has a close relationship to Israel for historic and demographic reasons.  The US was horrified to a greater extent than any other nation to what happened to Jews during World War Two and reacted by giving its strong support to the establishment of Israel, ignoring the fact that importing thousands of immigrants into a land already occupied by somebody else would result in problems.

Put another way, if Europe demanded that thousands of Mexican immigrants be allowed into Texas to create a new country, we'd freak out.

Added to that, the US has a substantial Jewish minority, although it has not been and has never been huge.  It's about 2.4% of the population today.  Somewhat ignored in this is that the US also has notable population of Middle Eastern immigrants, most of whom up until a couple of decades ago were Lebanese and Syrian Christians and Armenians.  Perhaps because they were all members of Apostolic Christian faiths, that was just easy to ignore in some ways.  It's France, for instance, that has traditionally defended the rights of the Lebanese.  The US once concerned itself with the plight of Armenians, but that's been a long time ago.  To some extent, perhaps because they were a more distinct minority, Jewish populations in the US have tended to be relatively better organized.

Anyhow, almost from day 1 Americans really bought off on the concept of the establishment of Israel being a really noble cause.  In my household growing up I remember my mother feeling that way, although my father had a much more nuanced opinion.  The plight of Arabs in the same region was generally ignored by Americans up until relatively recently, and only because populations of Palestinian and other Arabs have immigrated into the US. They're still a much smaller percentage of the population than Jewish Americans are.

Added to that, Islam has tended to really freak Americans out, and for good reason.  

Israel has very divided politics and is going through something akin to what the US is, with the current Israeli government being, in my view, extreme.  Nobody has ever stated it, but it seems relatively clear that there are those in Israel who would outright force Palestinians out of what had been Mandatory Palestine.  There are Americans who have equally extreme views about modern Israel and its place in the world from a religious perspective.

Whatever brought the current Israeli government to power, it's also clear that there are huge numbers of Israelis who are horrified by recent events and would take Israel in another direction.

At this point, I'm with those who, like my father so many decades ago, take a much more nuanced view on Israel.  Like Ukrainian born Argentinian-Israeli author Jacobo Timerman, I view Israel as a Middle Eastern state that has to learn to live in that neighborhood.  It also, at this point, has to learn to get by on its own.  It can build its own weapons and pay for them itself.

For that matter, while its a topic for another thread, the US wasn't a serious supplier of arms around the world until World War Two.  It needs to stop being one now.  Selling arms to some countries is, okay, in my view, but not to as many as we do, and for cash, not best wishes.

I'll note that it is interesting that a lot of our former arms client states have stepped out on its own in recent years.  South Korea, for example, manufactures its own armored vehicles, artillery and small arms.  Israel does produce some weapons of its own, but not all that many.  I'm not for selling them arms anymore.

When people are killed by American arms, no matter who uses them, we're implicated.

Back to the illegal war in the Middle East that Israel got us into.

A resolution requiring the US to get out of that war passed the House yesterday.

H. CON. RES. 93

Directing the President, pursuant to section 5(c) of the War Powers Resolution, to remove United States Armed Forces from hostilities with Iran.

---

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

April 28, 2026

Mr. Moulton (for himself, Mr. Crow, Mr. Ryan, Ms. Houlahan, Mr. Panetta, Mr. Auchincloss, Ms. Goodlander, Mr. Vindman, and Mr. Scott of Virginia) submitted the following concurrent resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs

---

CONCURRENT RESOLUTION

Directing the President, pursuant to section 5(c) of the War Powers Resolution, to remove United States Armed Forces from hostilities with Iran.

Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), That, pursuant to section 5(c) of the War Powers Resolution (50 U.S.C. 1544(c)), Congress directs the President to remove United States Armed Forces from hostilities against the Islamic Republic of Iran, other than those elements of the Armed Forces that may be necessary to defend the United States or an ally or partner of the United States from imminent attack provided that the President complies fully with the requirements of section 5(b) the War Powers Resolution (50 U.S.C. 1544(b)) with respect to any such use of the Armed Forces, unless explicitly authorized by a declaration of war or a specific congressional authorization for use of military force against Iran.

It's not going to go anywhere, but it's not irrelevant.  At least some are speaking up and standing out.

And some who claim to adhere to certain values should take note.  In the Particular Judgement Mike Johnson is going to have to explain supporting all this killing and standing with Israel isn't going to excuse it.  But then Johnson will have a lot to answer for.

cont:

The Houthis shot down a Saudi F-15 with a domestically produced missile today.

cont:

And Mike Johnson sent the House home early to avoid the impeachment vote.

That'd suggest either there were enough votes to pass it, or there were Republican Congressmen afraid to go on record.

They won't be back until November 9. They'd only been working for seven days since they came back from their last recess.

September 17, 2026

So it turns out the administration sent representatives to meet with the Houthis.

The same man who betrayed the Afghanis and surrendered their country to the Taliban is now negotiating with the Houthis while refusing support to Saudi Arabia.

Figures.

cont:

Apparently a deal was reached:

Yemen’s Houthis have agreed to allow US shipping unfettered Red Sea access if Washington refrains from direct military involvement in the Saudi-led war. That’s according to US reports which say the two sides struck the deal amid a Houthi offensive along Yemen’s Red Sea coast.

Al Jazeera.   

So King Donny stabbed Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in the back, not that he is a nice guy.

Not that the Houthis are either.

The Houthis (Ansar Allah) are a Zaydi revivalist and Shia Islamist organization allied with Iran, which supports them.  They've been a player in the Israel/Hezbollah War, as was Iran, and are attempting to gain control of all of Yemen.  

Their emblem:

The phrase on it translates as "God is the Greatest, Death to America, Death to Israel, Curse be upon the Jews, Victory to Islam".

Some deluded sots who supported the Trump participation in the ongoing war against Iran maintained early on that it was sort of a Protestant crusade. The US had a Divine mission, some argued who were in the military, or the Department of Defense, to take on Shi'a Islam.

Well, apparently not so much.

For the second time, Trump has surrendered to an Islamist organization and betrayed somebody we supported.

Anyone relying on Trump  for support is a fool.

And with this stab in the back, we will conclude this edition.

Last edition:

King Donald's War, Part 12. The "Economic D-Day" edition. CliffsNotes of the Zeitgeist 152nd Edition, the irony edition.

King Donald's War, Part 12. The "Economic D-Day" edition. CliffsNotes of the Zeitgeist 152nd Edition, the irony edition.

The fearsome Scott Bessent.

August 26, 2026

King Donny sent the fearsome Scott Bessent out to cause the Iranians to quiver in their boots, announcing that the US would inflict an "Economic D-Day" on Iran.

Except the US is going to exempt China, meaning that Operation Economic Outcast was stillborn from the very beginning.

Midweek Update#25: Sanctions Without China Are A Sign Of Defeat

So, It Turns Out That The US Is Winning!; A Story Illustrating Why This Pentagon Cannot Be Trusted

The US is moving its ambassadors back to the Middle East, however, which suggests it either naively thinks this will work, or that it's just going to give up.

Meanwhile:

Pentagon reveals hundreds of new Iran war casualties

More than 600 troops have been wounded in the Iran war, officials disclosed Saturday, almost 200 more than previously known.

This post, by the way, is the first one that I've ever had Bessent's name as a label, which surprises me.  He's been mentioned before, but I've never put in a label.

One thing I've thought about doing is posting how he's sort of uniquely a symbol of hypocrisy in the Trump Administration, or maybe in MAGA.  MAGA proclaims loudly that it's for "Christian" values by which it means far right Evangelical values.

Christianity pretty clearly holds that homosexual sex is a mortal sin.  St. Paul was blunt about it.  And yet Bessent is a homosexual in a homosexual union in which two children are being raised.  Most actual Christians of any type would question this, and if Evangelical Christians are to be believed, they find it completely abhorrent.

But then, by the same token, having an alleged president who is a serial polygamist, a special envoy for the Shield of the Americas, whatever that is, who seemed to be having an affair while in her earlier role and whose husband was wearing giant fake boobs in internet photos, etc. etc., is pretty odd too.

Indeed, it's impossible to reconcile.

Mind you, I'm not saying that a homosexual, including one who is in a homosexual union, cannot be an effective Secretary of the Treasury.  I'm saying you can't have an implied policy that everyone who isn't, white, straight, and sympathetic to far right Evangelicalism isn't a real American and still have a homosexual as one of your primary cabinet members and really mean any of that.

Making it all the more odd, Bessent is one of those cabinet members who has in recent months been dragged out to try to explain away whatever brain fart the Trump has uttered.  

That feature of this administration has been there all along.  Whereas for a transportation issue you might, in normal times, get a Transportation official, in this administration you might very well end up getting the Chief Chef of the White House to address it. And people appear and then disappear in that role pretty rapidly.  Chris Wright, the Secretary of Energy, regularly was being hauled out to address the Press on all sorts of things for awhile, right up until he said that Biden was validly elected to the Oval Office.

Goodbye Chris.

Anyhow, there's something extra weird about Bessent, who always seems extremely nervous, being hauled out to address the Press on the war while we have Pete "High T" Hegseth in charge of the "War Department".  Hegseth definitely fits into the far right Evangelical mold and is loud about it, while also being loud about the services being for manly men.  

Well, anyhow.  So much for Operation Economic Outcast.

August 31, 2026

Trump just shot some missiles at Iran and nobody cared

September 1, 2026

Iran, which you will recall supposedly lost the war, numerous times, hit Jordan with missiles within the last couple of days.

Only somewhat related, Army Secretary Dan Driscoll, who is close to J. D. Vance, submitted his resignation.  It is well known that he does not get along with Hegseth.

September 8, 2026

Iran, which we are repeatedly assured is on the edge of complete collapse, is imposing a restricted zone in the Strati of Hormuz.

September 9, 2026

Houthis attacked four Saudi Arabian cities and their oil installations yesterday opening a new theater in the war.

The US hit Iranian tankers.

September 11, 2026

Iranian allied Houthis seized control of Yemen’s port city of Mocha on Thursday and advanced down the Red Sea coast to strategic islands giving them extended control over the Bab el-Mandeb Strait.  The movies are likely Iranian backed themselves and squeeze Saudi Arabia and the world further.

Meanwhile Donald Trump stated that he expected  the Iran war to end after the U.S.  midterm elections.  D'uh.

If the Houthi advance isn't arrested, it will draw Saudi Arabia back into the Yemeni civil war which will be an expansion of King Donald's War.  

September 12, 2026

It's being reported that Saudi Arabia asked for Trump to intervene against the Houthis.  Trump declined.

What an absolute irony.  Trump illegally engaged in war against Iran where Israel undoubtedly had an influence, if in fact it didn't convince Trump to do it.  That war has caused the Houthis to advance in the Yemeni Civil War, which was always a risk given that they're an Iranian client and have been active previously.  They've struck Saudi Arabia, probably at Iran's request.  Saudi Arabia has legitimately asked the US for assistance as a result, and we've said no.

If only we'd said no to start with.

The Houthis have taken islands in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait.

Saudi Arabia has halted transfers on its East-West Pipeline.

September 15, 2026

When the Japanese succeeded in launching a surprise attack on Army air installations in Hawaii and on the Navy's base at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 it resulted in a Congressional investigation that ended the careers of the Admiral and General in command.

All that and frankly the Japanese attack wasn't all that predictable.

The Iranian strike on U.S. installations in Bahrain were.

New photos show widespread damage at U.S. positions caused by Iranian missile, drone attacks

Donald Trump and his collection little girls are the most outrageous liars to have ever been in the senior leadership of a democratic nation, and perhaps in the leadership of any nation.  You'd have to look at Nazi Germany to find any comparison, so they are going to excuse this away, but the Iranian counterstrike's success shows a lack of planning and understanding by the Trump Administration that is simply unforgivable.

Related to the outrageous failures of the administration, Thomas Massie introduced Articles of Impeachment on Peter Hegseth including contravention of the War Powers Act, but also including ignoring the laws of war and extrajudicial killings, the latter including the illegal attack on Venezuela.  

With this, we will conclude this addition.

Last edition:

King Donald's War, Part 11. The worst defeat in American History. Sic transit Gloria Mundi.

Labels: 2020s, 2026, 2026 Election, Chris Christie, Donald Trump, Iran, Israel, King Donald's War, Operation Eagle Claw, Sic transit Gloria Mundi, Suez Crisis, The Second Trump Administration, United States and Israel v. Iran

CliffsNotes of the Zeitgeist 151st Edition. Дональд Трамп. Нелегалы? Donald Trump, Moscow's man in the White House or just really stupid (probably really stupid)?

Labels: China, Donald Trump, Espionage, Iran, North Korea, Predictions, Russia, Russo Ukrainian War, South Korea, Stupidity, United States and Israel v. Iran, Weird, Zeitgeist, Дональд Трамп — агент России