Admiral George Dewey reported that ten officers and crewmen of the USS Yorktown were taken prisoner by the Philippine Republic, exactly one year after the U.S. Navy's defeat of the Spanish fleet at Manila Bay.
The Battle of Calumpit (Filipino: Labanan sa Quingua), alternately known as the Battles of Bagbag and Pampanga Rivers) concluded with U.S. forces under Arthur MacArthur Jr. combating Filipino forces under General Antonio Luna. U.S. forces were comprised completely of state militia units, essentially the equivalent of today's National Guard, somewhat, those being the 20th Kansas Volunteers, the Utah Volunteer Light Artillery, the1st Montana Volunteers, the1st Nebraska Volunteers and the 51st Iowa Volunteers. All were probably mustered to fight against the Spanish in Cuba, and not the Filipino's in their native land.
U.S. forces prevailed with Medals of Honor, under the original standards, going to Colonel Frederick Funston, Private (later First Lieutenant) William B. Trembley, and Private Edward White.
The Filipinos, interestingly enough, grossly over reported American losses.
A terrible tornado struck:
A statute of Grant was unveiled in Philadelphia.
BASH: Is this measles outbreak a consequence of the administration undermining support for vaccines?
DR OZ: I don't believe so. Secretary Kennedy has been advocating for measles vaccines
BASH: Oh, come on
From a CNN Interview of Mehmet Oz, a prime example of the Oprah Effect.1
In fairness to Dr. Oz, who in fairness should not be a government official, he does want people to get the measles vaccine.
Also in fairness, the dissing of vaccines isn't really a Trump thing in and of itself, but he gave it some boosted unneeded assistance by taking the political step of promising Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. a job as the HHS Secretary if he'd drop out of the last Presidential race. Kennedy is a quack, and an opponent of vaccines in varying degrees (it seems to change day by day). The rise of this movement, however, started with people like Jenny McCarthy who sadly has a son with autism. McCarthy herself was a Playboy model and her only real expertise is in showing her naked visage, something that really doesn't qualify a person for anything serious, and in fact may achieve much the opposite.
Oh, and by the way, Jenny McCarthy appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show multiple times in the 2000s to discuss her erroneous theories on autism and vaccines, and to promote a book she wrote.
Much of this story has to do with the inability to understand the difference between present conditions and past ones. People tend to assume that negative developments in a population mean a negative present condition. Sometimes they do, but sometimes they also represent a positive one. I'll give a personal example.
In 1982 I had pneumonia while at Ft. Sill, Oklahoma. I was extremely ill, literally on death's door.
Before the advent of antibiotics the fatality rates for bacterial pneumonia were between 60% and 70%.
Not good.
Now, the survivability rate is pretty good.
I've had a colon surgery for a developing condition that would have killed me even thirty years ago.
The point? Well, if I go on to develop Alzheimer's, which I pray I do not, it'll mostly be because I didn't die at age 19 of pneumonia.
Also, fwiw, Meet The Press this weekend had a physician on who noted that diseases we can now vaccinate for are associated with cancer, which is a developing field of medicine. I.e., you get some disease that's not big deal when young, and then you get cancer when older. You don't want cancer.
A fellow I know who suffered a heart attack, and who was otherwise very healthy, may have developed his heart condition this way as well.
Get vaccinated.
March 10, 2026
March 15, 2026
The Trump Interregnum is threatening to pull broadcasting licenses of those who do not give a happy spin to the war against Iran.
March 21, 2026
Waging a war against American airports must be easier than waging a war against a real country that fights back:
Footnotes:
1. The Oprah Effect is so named here to explain the phenomenon of Oprah Winfrey putting some flaming bogosity on to her popular daytime television show and thereby having millions of people give it credence. There are a fair number of examples, including the rise of Dr. Oz.
Related Threads
Last edition:
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.
We shall not enter into any of the abstruse definitions of War used by publicists. We shall keep to the element of the thing itself, to a duel. War is nothing but a duel on an extensive scale. If we would conceive as a unit the countless number of duels which make up a War, we shall do so best by supposing to ourselves two wrestlers. Each strives by physical force to compel the other to submit to his will: each endeavours to throw his adversary, and thus render him incapable of further resistance.
Carl von Clausewitz
The irony is that Trump could make a plausible case that this war is allowable under the Authorization to Use Military Force George W. Bush received in 2001. But symbolically that would mean Trump is continuing Bush’s “forever war.”
Regardless, Republicans aren’t just under a legal clock to get this thing over with, but a political one, too. Polling shows Americans, including many Republicans, have no thirst for a long conflict, which makes sense given that they were not asked to prepare for this war. Hence, the insistence that this war will be short and tidy.
The problem is that Iran knows this. That’s why they don’t have to win, they just have to ride out the bombings until the public or Trump loses patience with this very real war.
Jonah Goldberg, Republicans aren’t willing to call war in Iran what it is.
But they were very strongly involved and all of the people that died through the roadside bombs died and are right now walking around with no legs, no arms. A face that’s been so badly damaged.
Donald Trump, alleged commander in chief.
Unless otherwise noted, every item in this updated thread is on Mad King Donny's war on Iran. Or not a war if you ask Sycophant Mike Johnson, Toady of the House.
March 12, 2026
New Hampshire National Guard’s 157th Air Refueling Wing in connection with the war with Iran.
Up to 17 ships have been hit by the Iranians in the Gulf of Hormuz.
Iran hit refinery targets in Oman.
The first week of Trump's war cost the $11.3 B.
$11.3B and they can still hit ships.
The US is releasing 172M bbls of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
Oil opened today at $90.75.
And, not only is the war nowhere near ending, Iran is dictating terms to the United States and Israel, those being acknowledging Iran's "legitimate rights" are acknowledged, compensation for damages and strong international guarantees to prevent future attacks.
Iran would not have made those if it was anywhere near "surrendering" in any form. Indeed, the last item strongly suggests that they've coordinated with China and Russia who would probably back that demand. If the US accepts any variant of this, we're surrendering, but given that the war is a unilateral action by demented Donald Trump, and that the GOP will start panicking soon about this still going on in November, of which there's an excellent chance it will be, and prices are going to skyrocket enormously, and that his mind wonders, there's a pretty good chance he'll do it and declare victory, which nobody except the most deluded MAGA will believe.
This has gotten next to no press and right now, the concept of the U.S. surrendering to Iran seems absurd, but Donald Trump surrendered to the Taliban in the Afghan War and is simply not a very intelligent man. As casualties mount and inflation ramps up, he'll look like a failure, which of course, he largely is. Because of that, he'll grow anxious. I don't put it past him at all to agree to some version of this, if not this.
Cont:
Iran's Supreme Leader issued a statement vowing to avenge those killed in the first strikes and to keep hitting other states.
So, the war isn't over. It's not close to over, and we have no idea how to win it.
March 13, 2026
Two acts of terrorism occurred yesterday.
A major Jewish synagogue was attacked by a U.S. citizen of Lebanese origin whose brother was killed last week in an Israeli raid there.
Mohamed Bailor Jalloh, a former Virginia Army National Guardsman attacked a ROTC class at Old Dominion. He joined ISIL after his discharge from the Guard and had been previously convicted of plotting a terrorist attack. The class instructor was killed before the ROTC cadets killed Jolloh.
These attacks are fairly clearly "lone wolf" type attacks, not sleeper cell attacks. The probable result will be howling complaints by MAGA that every Muslim in the US needs to be deported.
I will note that the Muslim population in the country is really winning the stupid prize for playing the stupid game. They rallied to some degree to Trump as they were upset about Biden's support of Israel. Well, now Gaza, which was the source of all of that, has been utterly flattened, Israel is waging war in Lebanon, and the US is in Iran. This is one of those items like Wyoming conservatives and their support of the "health care" amendment to the Wyoming Constitution wondering if maybe they have the blood of aborted fetuses on their hands (they do). Muslims who supported Trump are partiallyr responsible for this.
Trump threatened the Iranian leadership yesterday, calling them in "deranged scumbags". That's real adult.
A KC135 went down over Iraq, killing the crew of four.
Figures in the administration are quietly backing away from claiming the war will result in regime change. If it doesn't, it will have achieved utterly nothing, but then, we don't really know what the war is supposed to be about in the first place.
March 14, 2026
Is JD Vance Rooting for the Iran War to Fail?
Whatever Vance is or is not rooting for, the price of oil, now at $97/bbl, is definitely going to go up as the US hit a major Iranian petroleum loading facility yesterday, a purely economic target. Going after Iranian petroleum infrastructure means the price rise will last for years, to at least some extent.
Indeed, riffing off of this, the satirical "The Onion" has Trump getting the Greenpeace award for making oil too expensive to use. There's some truth to that. Electric vehicles are starting to look pretty good as the world's petroleum supply gets systematically destroyed.
Indeed, somewhat related to that, we have this:
We not only aren't making money from seizing tankers, we're spending far more on them than the contents of the oil they contained.
This really should have been obvious, but it does not appear that there's anyone in the administration who understands the petroleum industry whatsoever.
Indeed, frankly, while Trump may be a businessman, the administration is amazingly dim on economics itself. This probably shouldn't be a surprise as Trump is merely a real estate developer operating on inherited wealth. M'eh.
None of Trumps economic plans are working out. We're losing jobs, businesses are not moving to the US like he claims, and we're about to get hit by inflation in a ramped up fashion. Folks who bizarrely feel that Trump is some sort of super genius should read this:
Those folks should read this:
I Was Born Wealthy, And Know Rich People Don’t Work Harder Than You I never saw exceptional “hard work” or “intelligence” among the members of the class I was born into.
The gravity of the current situation can hardly be overemphasized. Trump doesn't know what he's doing. As far as anyone can tell, this war was launched as he thought it would be easy. It's not turning out to be at all. There's no plan on how to end the war and we don't really have solid war aims. Pete Hegseth and his company have a radical Calvinist view of what they'd like to do with US power. Marco Rubio is probably chomping at the bits, in his too big shoes, hoping to invade Cuba. We're nowhere near the end of any of this, including what will be endless price rises to fuel a war most Americans did not want and do not want now.
Cont:
As if any more evidence was needed that Trump had utterly no idea whatsoever about what he was doing, we have this:
Today, Trump is begging for the help of allies.
March 14, 2026, cont.
An editorial note.
When we started tracking Wars and Rumors of War as a series, the United States was not in a full blown war. Indeed, back in 2020, when the series started, the U.S. wasn't really in any major conflicts at all. That first entry is here:
White House officials revealed that the vice president made his opposition known in the leadup.
There's a fair amount of "this wasn't my idea" going on right now, and no wonder. A week into the war, there's no end in sight and, frankly, Iranian predications of oil hitting $200/bbl don't seem that far fetched. Terrorism is ramping up. Things aren't looking good.
March 16, 2026
King Donny was in fit mode over the weekend, threatening NATO if they don't help with the Straits of Hormuz and begging China for help.
Nobody is promising to send ships. Why would they? The US even asking is proof that this was wasn't thought out. What China would probably like to see if the US commit to keeping the straits open and tie up the U.S. Navy.
Iran rejected opening up a dialog with the United States and hit an oil target in the UAE.
Iran's Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei is reportedly in Russia where he received surgery.
March 17, 2026
Headline from the NYT.
Mr. Kent is the first Trump administration official to quit in opposition to the conflict. He said pressure from Israel had pushed the president into war against Iran.
And with that, we'll close this edition.
March 19, 2025
Israel his Iranian gas fields yesterday.
The price of oil leaped up to $118/bbl yesterday as a result, but is now down to $96.59.
It's increasingly obvious that Trump has no idea whatsoever how to bring the war to a conclusion. I've seen one commentary from a respected journal now nothing that Iran will dictate the terms on how the war will end, which we already noted. This is going to get worse, followed by a humiliation for the United States.
The Administration appears set to go to Congress and ask for $200B to prosecute the war. I've now seen, for the first time, a suggestion that its time to reprise the protests of the late stage of the Vietnam War and have a protest march on Washington.
cont:
The price of natural gas in Europe has jumped 35% due to gas fields being hit by both sides.
The US is reportedly considering deploying troops to the north shore of the Straits of Hormuz as the US war effort can't get the straits out of the line of fire.
Last edition:
Lex Anteinternet: The 2026 Wyoming Legislature.: Well, it's over, thank goodness. And it turned out to be not nearly as bad as was feared, and it was feared to be pretty bad. That does...
CST headline:
Wyomingites call for lobbying investigation in response to ‘Checkgate’ controversy
From WyoFile:
Kessler I filed a complaint with the Wyoming Attorney General's office due to Bextel not being a registered lobbiest, maintaining that she was lobbying for a corporation. I don't know the facts of it but Bextel tends to have a deer in the headlights look on these matters and it'll be interesting to see how these things develop. Kessler is a longtime Wyoming conservation activist so this isn't hugely surprising, particularly given the context in which Bextel was there in opposition to a bill pertaining to land use in Teton County.
The other complaint was filed by Michelle St. Louis, and that is a surprise. It's a more wide ranging complaint. St. Louis is a "conservative" and I'd generally regard her as being on the Freedom Caucus end of things, which is why this is surprising.
St. Louis was recently sued by Reid Rasner in something like the third of his suits arguing that certain members of the GOP engaged in a whisper campaign against him during the last election.
St. Louis, who is pretty feisty, didn't appear intimidated by the lawsuit at all.
It'll be interesting to see what the AG's office does with these. Bextel resorted to the typical "the radical left Democrats are picking on me" bullshit.
Actually, that time was some time ago, but for those "clean coal" and "drill baby drill" people, you are converting the planet into an image of Hell.
It's not too late to address this, but it'll take major action. The good news is that a nation that can waste billions of dollars on a war with Iran for no reason whatsoever, can afford to address it, and reverse it.
And not only, that, the rest of the world is leaping ahead of us in alternative energy systems, including China in spite of what the dolt in the White House says.
Simply believing that because we've always done things one way means its okay, or that our pocketbooks depend on coal and oil mean sit okay, is absolute lunacy. The day of fossil fuels either needs to end, or they'll end us.
And as a final note, all too often I've heard farmers and ranchers take the global warming is a fib line. This year, there's no water in the west, none coming, and there will be none . We won't be growing anything.
Wake up.
We started one of these before Oil City, but it's time for a new thread, as the old one can't easily be updated anymore due to a Blogger glitch, so we'll start here with what Oil City is listing.
Like we try to do with ours, theirs will be updated, which makes it a good resource.
Theirs also has some local races, most of which we omit. Theirs lacks our colorful commentary.
It is a serious election, to be sure. And listening to the candidates is important. Like their ideas, vote for them. Hate them, don't. Ignore their parties.
And anyone who just promises to be Trump's biggest supporter is just auditioning for the position of Trump paramour.
Last edition:
I had no idea that this is what this train was called. Thanks go out to MKTH for letting me know!
I've been looking into local passenger train travel as part of my efforts with a novel. What I found is that I knew very little about it. Probably more than your average bear, but that's about it. I'd long assumed that a person could board a train in Casper in 1916 and take the train to Douglas or Cheyenne, and then return that evening, but the more I looked into it, that was just an assumption.
I'm not the one who figured out how it really worked. That goes to MKTH. the result is fascinating.
It turns out I was right sort of. The Burlington Northern ran a train from Denver Colorado, to Billings Montana, and vice versa, daily. This article takes a look at it.
What I imagined, for novel purposes, was boarding in Casper, and traveling to Douglas. I may, as I work at it, make it Cheyenne.
Anyhow, this is a really interesting article and give a really good look at what traveling on the Denver to Billings night train was like, complete with stops for food, which is something I hadn't considered. It also picked up mail, and my source indicates, cream, something I also hadn't figured, but that may explain why the creamery my family owned was just one block from the Burlington Northern. In fact it probably does.
The trip took 19 hours. It take 8 hours today by car, assuming good weather conditions, and not figuring in stops for food, etc. The train moved about 34 miles an hour.
We'll look at the return trip first. The train having come up from Cheyenne boarded there at 12:49 in the morning. Uff.
It got to Casper at 6:20 in the morning, having made a couple of stops along the way.
What I imagined?
Not really. And I also had no idea that there was a major cafe right off the railroad. This article deals with the early 1960s, but I can see that some variant of it was there decades prior. That makes piles of sense, really. Of course there would be. How else would people eat if they were making the long journey?
It simply hadn't occurred to me.
In my imaginary trip., that'd be it. If I stuck with the Douglas variant of this, my protagonist would be boarding the train in the early, early morning hours and get in a couple of fitful hours of sleep, probably interrupted by a stop in little Glenrock. Indeed, this train stopped everywhere to pick up mail, and a few passengers.
What about the other way around?
Well that was a day trip, but as we can see, the 19 hours the train traveled in total meat that it took a good 6.5 hours to travel just from Cheyenne to Casper. Going the other way would mean the same thing, and likely a bit in reverse. The 6.5 hour trip from Cheyenne to Casper was the second major leg of the trip (it'd still stop in numerous small towns in between), the first being Denver to Cheyenne. Going the other way around meant that the Cheyenne to Denver leg was about five hours. The article notes that the train actually arrived from Billings 40 minutes before its 7:00 p.m. departure. So it arrived, more or less, at 6:00 p.m. and changed crews. That would have meant that it left Cheyenne, on the way to Denver, at about 1:00 p.m. or so, which makes sense. Passengers traveling all the way to Denver would have eaten lunch there.
By extension, however, that meant that the train left Casper at about 6;00 in the morning, approximately.
These times are almost unimaginable now. When we had good air travel to Denver I'd frequently board United Express here about 6;00 a.m. and be in Denver about 8:30, and take the train downtown and be to work by 9. I'd be back in Casper on the redeye about 10:00, or if I was lucky, 6:00.
And when I go to Cheyenne, I drive. Normally that takes me a little under three hours. I haven't stayed overnight in Cheyenne for years, although I recently had an instance which should really cause me to.
Anyhow, if I'm looking at 1916, why not just drive?
Well, in 1916 most Americans, including most Wyomingites, didn't own automobiles, and those who did, didn't normally make long trips with them. They frankly weren't that reliable, even though they were simple. Roads also tended to be primitive, and not really maintained for weather. Could a person have driven from Casper to Cheyenne in a Model T, the most likely car they would have had? Yes, but it wouldn't have been any faster. It may well have been slower, quite frankly, as well as much riskier.
