I talked about buildings made of Chinesium and rotten tail buildings, upon which construction stops but upon which mortgage owners are still expected to make payments.
Shoddy Chinese construction practices don’t stop there. This week an entire Chinese residential skyscraper went up in flames:
Fires are hardly unknown among American skyscrapers, but usually they occur in older buildings, not ones built this century, as modern construction practices like firewalls and sprinkler systems generally prevent fires from spreading from floor to floor. The Lotus Garden China Telecom building in Changsha was finished in 2000.
Buildings made from subpar constriction materials in China are know as “Tofu Dregs” buildings, as though they were built out of tofu:
Shoddy construction practices extend to buildings, roads, bridges, flood walls and other infrastructure. It’s hard to do quality work when cutting corners seems to be your national ethos…
Peter Zeihan says the abysmal performance of the Russian Army is going to have a whole lot of ramifications around the world, many in Russia’s own near abroad. “It means that the image of the Russians as a regional power, much less a global one, is gone, and it’s not coming back.”
Some takeaways:
“The countries that had signed on to kind of a Russian Alliance, if you will, [they’re] on their own completely, and that provides opportunities for their rivals to take matters into their own hands.”
Belarus: “Here’s a country of 10 million people that has basically hitched itself to Putin’s star. And the Poles, the Latvians, the Lithuanians, the Estonians, the Finns, and the Swedes they have been chomping at the bit for years to try to take Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus down to size and basically peel Belarus out of the Russian orbit. They will now have the opportunity, and it’s unlikely that anyone in Europe or the United States is going to try to stand in the way.”
“Unless Lukashenko sues for peace with the Balts and the Nordics, very quickly we should count on seeing him being brought up on war crimes before very long. Because after all he did provide the access that was necessary for the assault on Kiev early in the war.”
Georgia: “Here I do expect things to be a little bit more circumspect. The Georgians tried to call Russia’s bluff and invade their former secessionist Republics of North Ossetia and Abkhazia several years ago in 2004, and it was a trap and the Russians were able to destroy the Georgian Army. So the Georgians are not going to do this until a couple of other countries in the region have already pulled this off successfully.”
Moldova:
There’s a small secessionist republic there called Transnistra. It’s only 10 percent of the population of a country of like three and a half million people. There’s not much going on there, but the Russians intervened decisively right at the end of the Soviet collapse to basically make sure that Transnistra could be functionally independent under Russian sponsorship, but unlike the Georgian secessionist territories, which share a land border with Russia proper, Transnistra is on its own. The only way to supply it is through Ukraine, and that has obviously stopped. So the Moldovans and their sponsors in Romania have now a vested interest in ending this historical aberration, and I would expect to see that being wrapped up within a year or two.
Israel: Without big brother Russia providing help, Syria may be screwed.
The Russians have very publicly, unfortunately for them, relocated a lot of hardware from Syria to Ukraine, specifically air defense equipment to help them with their assaults. Which means that if you are Israel, the only thing that is standing in your way of going after the Syrian regime is someone from the Biden Administration saying “You know what? We really don’t want a nuclear event to erupt because there are Russian troops involved.” Well, the tone of the Biden Administration in the last 72 hours has kind of changed. Now it’s more of “You kids go have fun” sort of vibe, so I expect us to see some very interesting pyrotechnics between the Israelis and the Syrians in a very short period of time, followed by the Syrians suing for peace. Which means that we get to revisit the entire Syrian Civil War now without the Russians being players.
Two caveats from my viewpoint: 1. Given the history of Israeli striking Syria with impunity several times over the past decade, with possibly one Israeli plane hit during that period, I don’t think Russian anti-aircraft equipment have provided any significant deterrent to Israel doing whatever it wanted in Syria. I view it more likely that Israel views a weakened Assad continually beset by a grinding civil war against numerous enemies a preferable option to taking him out entirely. 2. Not sure where Zeihan is getting his information on a change in the Biden Administration’s messaging to Israeli, but I readily concede that he likely does have better sources than I do. It may also be that the most recent failure of the asinine Iran deal has changed the collective mind of whatever passes for a Biden brain trust.
Speaking of Iran: “Tehran has lost its primary weapons sponsor, and its primary Security Council sponsor, and that is going to force the Iranians to think differently and act differently in every theater.”
Plus possible policy changes in (or toward) Cuba and Venezuela.
Russia acknowledges defeat in Kharkiv, ultranationalists start to turn on Putin, Lyman is the new battleground, and unconfirmed reports of Russian troops abandoning Melitopol.
The Kremlin has recognized its defeat in Kharkiv Oblast, the first defeat Russia has acknowledged in this war. The Kremlin is deflecting blame from Russian President Vladimir Putin and attributing it instead to his military advisors.
The Kremlin is likely seeking to use the defeat in Kharkiv to facilitate crypto mobilization efforts by intensifying patriotic rhetoric and discussions about fuller mobilization while revisiting a Russian State Duma bill allowing the military to send call-ups for the regular semiannual conscription by mail. Nothing in the Duma bill suggests that Putin is preparing to order general mobilization, and it is far from clear that he could do so quickly in any case.
The successful Ukrainian counter-offensive around Kharkiv Oblast is prompting Russian servicemen, occupation authorities, and milbloggers to panic.
Russia’s military failures in Ukraine are likely continuing to weaken Russia’s leverage in the former Soviet Union as Russia appears unwilling to enforce a violated ceasefire it brokered between Armenia and Azerbaijan or to allow Armenia to invoke provisions of the Russia-dominated Collective Security Treaty Organization in its defense.
Ukrainian troops likely continued ground attacks along the Lyman-Yampil-Bilohorivka line in northern Donetsk Oblast and may be conducting limited ground attacks across the Oskil River in Kharkiv Oblast.
Russian and Ukrainian sources indicated that Ukrainian forces are continuing ground maneuvers in three areas of Kherson Oblast as part of the ongoing southern counter-offensive.
Russian troops made incremental gains south of Bakhmut and continued ground attacks throughout Donetsk Oblast.
Ukrainian forces provided the first visual evidence of Russian forces using an Iranian-made drone in Ukraine on September 13.
Oleksiy Arestovych, an adviser to Zelenskiy, said Ukrainian troops were now trying to retake the Russian-held town of Lyman in Ukraine’s Donetsk region and were eyeing territorial gains in the neighbouring Luhansk region which is under Russian control.
“There is now an assault on Lyman,” Arestovych said in a video posted on YouTube.
“And that is what they fear most – that we take Lyman and then advance on Lysychansk and Sievierodonetsk,” he said, referring to twin cities in the Luhansk region taken by Russia after fierce fighting in June and July.
The Ukrainian mayor of Melitopol said that Russians are evacuating Melitopol, the Zaporizhia Oblast city between Mariupol and Kherson, and heading to Crimea. I treat this report with a fair amount of skepticism, because if true it would essentially mean Game Over for Russia’s southern front.
I'm hearing more & more reports that Russians are evacing Melitopol. This remains UNCONFIRMED. If true, Ukr can reach the Black Sea, blow the Kerch bridge, & utterly destroy every Russia military unit in southern Ukraine and Crimea. And THAT would be a nation-ending event. pic.twitter.com/8cCDnDEbVl
DEEP STRIKE: Major explosions rocked the RU air station at Taganrog, followed by a number of secondaries & fires. Russian AWACs, including the including the newest A-100 platforms, are forward deployed at Taganrog. This strike will negatively affect RU air defense in the region. pic.twitter.com/iKPeaIW5w8
In the newly-liberated areas, relief and sorrow are intertwined – as accounts emerge of torture and killings during the long months of Russian occupation.
Artem, who lives in the city of Balakliya in the Kharkiv region, told the BBC he was held by Russians for more than 40 days, and was tortured with electrocution.
Balakliya was liberated on 8 September after being occupied for more than six months. The epicentre of the brutality was the city’s police station, which Russian forces used as their headquarters.
Artem said he could hear screams of pain and terror coming from other cells.
The occupiers made sure the cries could be heard, he said, by turning off the building’s noisy ventilation system.
“They turned it off so everyone could hear how people scream when they are shocked with electricity,” he told us. “They did this to some of the prisoners every other day… They even did this to the women”.
And they did it to Artem, though in his case only once.
“They made me hold two wires,” he said.
“There was an electric generator. The faster it went, the higher the voltage. They said, ‘if you let it go, you are finished’. Then they started asking questions. They said I was lying, and they started spinning it even more and the voltage increased.”
Artem told us he was detained because the Russians found a picture of his brother, a soldier, in uniform. Another man from Balakliya was held for 25 days because he had the Ukrainian flag, Artem said.
A school principal called Tatiana told us she was held in the police station for three days and also heard screams from other cells.
The disaster in Kharkiv is so massive and apparent that even some of the pro-war Russian pundits are realizing it.
Life comes at you fast: pundits on Russian TV realize that their military is failing and their country is in trouble. They are starting to play the blame game. Some of them finally understand that their genocidal denial of the Ukrainian identity isn't working in Russia's favor. pic.twitter.com/jNNn5xifI5
For Putin, losing ultranationalists is much more dangerous than criticism from more liberal segments of Russian society.
Their criticism is that Putin is not doing enough. That the special military operation is insufficient, and that Putin should declare full mobilization. These ultranationalists are largely represented by those Russian military bloggers that have become quite famous during the war. The most famous one is probably Igor Girkin. These bloggers make sometimes very good military analyses, and they clearly have a network of sources that provide information about the situation on the frontlines. And we also know that their views are shared by many of the soldiers. For example, there have been studies that show that these ultranationalist views are pretty common in spetsnaz units. And these ultranationalist voices are a real challenge for the Putin regime. Because obviously he can’t dismiss them as being unpatriotic or foreign agents or something like that. And what is happening now is that these ultranationalists are turning against Putin. And that is dangerous for him.
The shift has been from “If you support the troops, you have to support Putin” to “If you support the troops, you have to blame Putin for fucking things up so badly.”
Ben Hedges: Ukraine will retake all pre-February 23rd territory this year, and recapture Crimea next year. “It could be quicker.”
More scenes of captured equipment in Izyum.
Ukrainians issued Russian passports find out they’re worthless to get into Crimea or obtain government services.
Ukrainian troops using the Polish-built Krab self-propelled howitzer say it’s like night and day compared to their old Soviet equipment. “It’s like a Porsche vs. a Lada.”
Russian politician Dmitry Medvedev reacts well to suggestion the West give Ukraine security guarantees. “The land will be on fire and the concrete will melt.”
Azerbaijani forces shelled Armenia’s territory on Tuesday in a large-scale attack that killed at least 49 Armenian soldiers and fueled fears of even broader hostilities.
Azerbaijan and Armenia have been locked in a decades-old conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh, which is part of Azerbaijan but has been under the control of ethnic Armenian forces backed by Armenia since a separatist war there ended in 1994. Azerbaijan reclaimed broad swaths of Nagorno-Karabakh in a six-week war in 2020 that killed more than 6,600 people and ended with a Russia-brokered peace deal.
Moscow, which deployed about 2,000 troops to the region to serve as peacekeepers under the deal, moved quickly to broker a cease-fire on Tuesday morning, but it wasn’t immediately clear whether it was holding.
The hostilities erupted minutes after midnight, with Azerbaijani forces unleashing an artillery barrage and drone attacks in many sections of Armenian territory, according to the Armenian Defense Ministry.
Azerbaijan charged that its forces returned fire in response to “large-scale provocations” by the Armenian military, claiming that the Armenian troops planted mines and repeatedly fired on Azerbaijani military positions, resulting in unspecified casualties and damage to military infrastructure.
Azerbaijan’s ally Turkey also placed the blame for the violence on Armenia. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu called for Yerevan to halt its “provocations” and Defense Minister Hulusi Akar condemned “Armenia’s aggressive attitude and provocative actions” following talks with their counterparts in Baku.
Speaking in parliament early Tuesday, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said that Azerbaijani shelling has killed at least 49 Armenian soldiers.
He said the Azerbaijani action followed his recent European Union-brokered talks in Brussels with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev that revealed what he described as Azerbaijan’s uncompromising stand.
Christian Armenia has a long, unhappy history with Turkey, including genocide at the hands of Muslim Turks in the waning days of the Ottoman Empire. Like the Balkans, the Caucuses are an unstable cauldron of mixed ethno-religious-nationalism, with a side-order of Jihadism thrown in for good measure (the Islamic State – Caucasus Province, the successor to the Caucasus Emirate, has been relatively quit recently, but such groups seldom wither away entirely). Russia still occupies the parts of Georgia it conquered in 2008, but the blooding it’s taken in Ukraine has probably weakened its hand regionally. And coming food and energy security issues (Azerbaijan in energy rich, but Armenia is energy-poor) are likely to exacerbate tensions in the coming months.
Putin’s Russia may be receiving a well-deserved comeuppance in Ukraine, but its resulting weakness could very well result in interesting times for many ex-Soviet states.
Things in Ukraine are moving so fast that the only thing I can be sure of is that what I post here will probably be obsolete before I press the Publish button.
What was a very successful Ukrainian counter offensive in Kharkiv Oblast is now a massive rout of Russian forces throughout the extent of their northeast line. All of Kharkiv (save a tiny bit east of the Oskil River) has been liberated.
“Ukraine controls all the land west of the Oskil River.”
The Russians left massive amounts of equipment behind, too much for any sort of orderly withdrawal, and they don’t appear to have torched any of it, either. They just turned tail and fled. “This is an armored brigade worth of vehicles. Looking at this, I think Russia has given more military aid to Ukraine than the United States.” Also, Russian civilians are fleeing the captured territories, only to be refused entry at the border.
“Fuck, every one of us can get a tank.”
Rus, Rus, Rus of the Ukraine
Fleeing as fast as he can flee
Rus, Rus, Rus of the Ukraine
Watch out for that tree!
Got to disagree with the first video: it’s damn hard to see if you’re peering out the forward driver’s port, and it’s quite possible the tank driver was unaware troops were falling off.
It looks like logistical problems and those long-documented Russian morale problems have finally intersected to destroy the ability of numerous Russian units to function as effective fighting forces. Here’s a recorded Russian phone soldier’s phone call from back in August illustrating low morale and how much Russian soldiers hate the war:
Russian soldiers don’t seem to be eager to die for a mistake. The extent to which Russian forces in Kharkiv Oblast have been routed and broken makes it an open question whether any can be reconstituted as effective fighting forces and redeployed to Donbas. That may explain why Russia seems to be trying to carry out a stealth conscription mobilization:
On their way out, the Russian army has given Ukraine a parting gift: destruction of Kharkiv’s civilian infrastructure. “Kharkiv and Donetsk regions were cut off. In Zaporizhia, Dnipropetrovsk, Sumy there are partial problems with power supply.”
Total dick move, but not necessarily a war crime; power generating facilities are usually considered legitimate military targets. Russia obviously held off attacking them because they expected to control the territory.
Now that Ukraine has that territory back, a lot more Russian logistic routes (especially those out of Belgorod) are under threat of disruption from Ukrainian artillery. Indeed, Belgorod now loses a lot of value as a logistics hub, since it’s farther away from the frontlines, on worse roads. Russia may shift to routing everything through Kamensk-Shakhtinsky or Rostov-On-Don.
Ukraine continues to grind out more modest gains in the Kherson counteroffensive. As for the next phase of the war, it’s an open question whether to attempt to push Russian troops out of Luhansk next, or to apply more pressure toward the center of the Russian line and retake Lysychansk and Severodonetsk. But it’s clear that right now Ukraine enjoys the strategic initiative.
Ukraine is carving out big gains in Kharkiv, Texas is in the money, Biden taps Clinton’s bagman to divy up the graft manage climate change funds, more groomers unmasked, and some big changes in the UK. Plus a bit about tanks. It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!
Ukrainian successes on the Kharkiv City-Izyum line are creating fissures within the Russian information space and eroding confidence in Russian command to a degree not seen since a failed Russian river crossing in mid-May.
Ukrainian forces in the Kharkiv Oblast counteroffensives advanced to within 20 kilometers of Russia’s key logistical node in Kupyansk on September 8.
Ukrainian forces will likely capture Kupyansk in the next 72 hours, severely degrading but not completely severing Russian ground lines of communication (GLOCs) to Izyum.
Ukrainian forces are continuing to target Russian GLOCs, command-and-control points, and ammunition depots in Kherson Oblast.
On Thursday, the state comptroller reported that the Lone Star State’s tax revenue rocketed by 25.6% to a total of $75.21 billion.
It’s only the fifth time since 1988 that revenue grew by a double-digit percentage — and it’s double the next largest increase over that 34-year span.
“Revenues continue to outpace even our most recent forecast as All Funds tax collections closed the fiscal year $841 million above the projection in our Certification Revenue Estimate,” said state Comptroller Glenn Hegar in an official release.
That’s a stark contrast to California, which saw July revenue come in 12% below forecast.
Texas has been a major beneficiary of migration from California: Over the last census cycle, 34% of new Texans arrived from California alone. Meanwhile, New York saw personal income tax collection fall 3.2% from April 1 through July.
Joe Biden has hired John Podesta to be the new Clean Energy Czar, citing his experience in progressive causes….
Bottom line, John Podesta is being now being hired to divvy up the $316 billion in Green New Deal money recently authorized by congress. That is what Podesta specializes in, the distribution of taxpayer money to DNC allied groups and networks in advance of the 2022 midterms. Podesta, Hillary’s fixer, is a bagman, nothing more.
Worse, one of the many bag clients he’s adept at channeling money into Democratic pockets for is China.
President Joe Biden on Friday tapped John Podesta to oversee $370 billion in climate spending, a move that has China hawks on Capitol Hill concerned over Podesta’s encouragement of Chinese investment in American infrastructure and praise for the top U.S. adversary on climate change.
Podesta has called for Chinese investment in American infrastructure, arguing in 2013 that there are “great opportunities for Chinese firms to directly invest in this nation, to build American infrastructure, to create American jobs, and generate steady and handsome returns.” He added, “There’s also the ability for Chinese firms to invest here and learn best practices, and take those home to the tremendous and growing middle class market in China.”
Instead, in the intervening decade, the Chinese government has committed widespread economic espionage—one 2017 estimate found that China steals up to $600 billion in trade secrets a year. Engineers in China, meanwhile, use popular social media platform TikTok to access nonpublic data from U.S. users.
Podesta has also praised China’s efforts to combat climate change, arguing in 2015 that the Chinese “are beginning to do a fair amount.” China, which is the world’s top carbon emitter, went on to dramatically accelerate its coal consumption, which reached a record high in 2020.
That record has China hawks on the Hill concerned that America’s top adversary has a new—and powerful—ally in the White House. Podesta’s role will see the liberal consultant implement $370 billion in spending toward alternative energy, a sector that China dominates when it comes to raw materials. As such, alternative energy companies receiving the Podesta-steered funding could turn to China to secure supplies. The new Biden aide will likely take no issue with that dynamic, given that he has argued the United States and China should “align” on a green economy. Sens. Marsha Blackburn (R., Tenn.) and Ted Cruz (R., Texas) argued that the move reflects the White House’s soft-on-China stance.
Democratic County Administrator Robert Telles charged in the death of journalist Jeff German, “an investigative reporter with the Las Vegas Review-Journal who had spent the last few months exposing misdeeds and turmoil in the official’s office.” For all Sundown Joe’s dark mutterings about “UltraMAGA,” it seems like Democrats are the ones doing all the killing…
A now-former elementary school teacher previously charged with sexual abuse of a 7-year-old student was arrested again and charged with sexually assaulting a second victim.
Victor Moreno, 28, was charged in July with continuous sexual abuse of a child, a first-degree felony, and an improper relationship between a student and educator, a second-degree felony.
The accused pedophile’s victim was a second-grade girl in Irving Independent School District, where Moreno was a teacher at the time of the alleged assaults during the 2020-2021 school year.
Snip.
Meanwhile, a teacher’s aide in Mesquite Independent School District was arrested Tuesday after being accused of engaging in inappropriate relationships with students.
Bryan Garcia, 22, was charged with two counts of sexual assault of a child and one count of indecency with a child.
“Higher Ed’s New Woke Loyalty Oaths: A ballooning number of hiring and tenure decisions require candidates to express written fealty to political doctrines.” And you can bet those doctrines have nothing to do with constitutionally limited government based on universal rights…
Indeed, they’re talking about restarting old production lines to start manufacturing older BMP-2s. “The costs and challenges of bringing more modern designs into production are now surely aggravated by Western sanctions cutting access to many basic electrical components, requiring pricey and time-consuming workarounds.”
This is like a scene from a porn movie, only a lot creepier. “Las Vegas landlord requires tenant to sign sex contract in order to lease home.”
“Kim Kardashian Is Starting Her Own Private Equity Company.” Why not? But I’m betting being a genius at self-promotion doesn’t equate to being a genius at investing, especially since she’s starting in the middle of a fierce, widespread downturn…
Easiest way to win Dad of the Year? Pick your son up from school in a tank. Looks like a Scorpion light tank, most likely the FV107 Scimitar reconnaissance variant.
“FBI Drops Investigation After Discovering Trump’s Top Secret Nuclear Documents Were Just Print-Outs Of Hillary Clinton Emails.”
Defense analyst Anders Puck Nielsen says there’s a tendency for many to believe that, although Ukraine has put up a good fight, a Russian victory in the Russo-Ukrainian War is inevitable. (I assume he’s seeing these on the various MSM channels I stopped watching a long time ago, as the only place I see such assumptions these days is among comment trolls and the occasional ZeroHedge headline.)
Some takeaways:
“When Russia launched the invasion of Ukraine back in February, many people assumed that it was going to be an easy win. It was not only Vladimir Putin who believed that they could finish this war within days or weeks. Many people thought so. And even after it became clear that there would not be a quick victory, many people still carried over this assumption that Russia is going to win eventually because that is the only possible outcome.” (I too thought a Russian victory was the most likely (though not certain) outcome in the first few days, before it become apparent just how badly bungled the invasion planning was, how fragile Russian supply lines were, how poor the communication was between different branches of the Russian military, and how neglected even basic maintenance was for Russian equipment.)
“They think of Russia as a giant. And then they think about Ukraine as a small country. But that is not really a good comparison.”
Unmentioned by Nielsen is that one reason they thought so is just how much old Soviet military equipment Russia still had lying around. That assumption was somewhat overstated, and, again, a whole lot of that equipment was poorly maintained.
Russia’s massive display of incompetence didn’t change the minds of many who still saw Russian victory as inevitable. “The assumption was that this just means it’s going to take longer, and then Russia is going to figure it out, and they are going to win.”
“We still have analysts who say that Ukraine could never push Russia back from the occupied territories, and that there has to be a negotiated solution where Ukraine gives something to Putin to end the war. And then these analyst also often seem to take it at face value when Putin or Lavrov or somebody else comes with threats about escalation.” (True, but I don’t think anyone pays serious attention to such people any more, if they ever did.)
Nielsen says there are a number of reasons why Russia can’t just carry out a mass mobilization, or start tossing nukes around.
Putin launched the war due an entire chain of bad assumptions, including those about the inevitability of Russian greatness.
“Ukraine is winning the war of attrition, and they will start pushing Russia backwards.”
“That’s why I think this idea that a Russian victory is inevitable is so dangerous. On the Western side, it leads to the belief that it is dangerous to provide Ukraine with heavy weapons. And this can mean that Ukraine won’t be able to finish the war as quickly as they otherwise could. And on the Russian side it means that they won’t be motivated for peace talks, even if the situation on the battlefield is awful.” (Not sure I agree here; The U.S., UK, Germany, and Poland have all transferred significant heavy weapons to Ukraine.)
“It will be extremely hard for the Russian leaders to embrace the idea that a defeat is possible. Like, not even that it is going to happen, but just that it could be a possibility. Because that would require them to question everything they believe to be true about Russia and being a great power. So they will be able to live in denial for a very long time.”
“If we want the war to end, we need Putin to understand that a defeat is a real possibility. And the best way to do that is to equip Ukraine with the weapons they need to win.”
Biden goes all Nuremberg Rally, more transexual madness, Gibson’s Bakery wins final victory, states subcontract their energy policies to crazy California, and more really stupid criminals. It’s the Friday LinkSwarm!
You would think that Biden’s team might have better sense than to dress his set like it’s Darth Maul’s bedroom:
That was the most demagogic, outrageous, and divisive speech I have ever seen from an American president. Joe Biden essentially declared all those who oppose him and his agenda enemies of the republic. Truly shameful. pic.twitter.com/ZcJX2BbZlt
What happens when people in the federal government are incompetent and refuse to do their job? Usually nothing. Or they get promoted. But in Florida? Governor DeSantis fires their asses.
On Friday, Governor Ron DeSantis announced that he would be suspending four members of the Broward County School Board for their “incompetence, neglect of duty, and misuse of authority” at Marjory Stonemason Douglass High School.
In a press release, the governor’s office stated that Patricia Good, Donna Korn, Ann Murray and Laurie Rich Levinson had been suspended following the recommendations of the Twentieth Statewide Grand Jury. DeSantis has been particularly active in education, going as far as endorsing school board members in their races across the state, and enacting laws on curriculum transparency and parental rights.
“Even four years after the events of February 14, 2018, the final report of the Grand Jury found that a safety-related alarm that could have possibly saved lives at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School ‘was and is such a low priority that it remains uninstalled at multiple schools,’ and ‘students continue to be educated in unsafe, aging, decrepit, moldy buildings that were supposed to have been renovated years ago,’” the press release states.
“These are inexcusable actions by school board members who have shown a pattern of emboldening unacceptable behavior, including fraud and mismanagement, across the district,” the press release continued.
“It is my duty to suspend people from office when there is clear evidence of incompetence, neglect of duty, misfeasance or malfeasance,” said DeSantis. “The findings of the Statewide Grand Jury affirm the work of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas School Safety Commission. We are grateful to the members of the jury who have dedicated countless hours to this mission and we hope this suspension brings the Parkland community another step towards justice. This action is in the best interest of the residents and students of Broward County and all citizens of Florida.”
In their place, DeSantis has appointed Torey Alston, former Commissioner of the Broward County Board of County Commissioners and President of Indelible Solutions, Manual “Nandy” A. Serrano, member of the Florida Sports Foundation Board of Directors, Ryan Reiter, a US Marine Corps Veteran and Director of Government Relations for Kaufman Lynn Construction, and Kevin Tynan, Attorney with Richardson and Tynan, who previously served on the Broward County School Board and South Broward Hospital District, to take the suspended members’ places.
Rachel, a Brooklyn mom with a gender-dysphoric child…went undercover as a pre-teen in the chat, searching for resources for detransitioners. She found none.
Instead, she opened a “Pandora’s box” of sexually perverse content, aggressive gender re-assignment referrals, adults encouraging minors to hide their transitions from their parents, and many troubled kids in need of psychological counseling. She shared screenshots of the chat with National Review.
Rachel says she looked to the Trevor Project in desperation, “when I thought my child was going to kill herself.” The organization frequently claims that LGBT youth are more than four times more likely to attempt suicide than their peers. It claims to be a refuge for these people with its crisis services including TrevorLifeline, TrevorText, and TrevorChat.
Under the advice of a “highly credentialed” medical and mental-health team, Rachel and her husband decided to socially transition their child a few years ago, she told National Review. After that, her child was hospitalized three times for self-harm and suicidality, including at least one suicide attempt. In New York, due to a ban on psychotherapy, so-called gender affirmation was the only legal option they could pursue, she said.
They were at their wit’s end, until her spouse sat her down and presented her with a PowerPoint, showing statistics that people who transition are, by a huge factor, much more likely than the general public to commit suicide.
“My jaw hit the floor. I said, ‘Oh my God we’ve been lied to’,” she says.
Since then, Rachel, a lifelong Democrat and feminist, has been dedicated to exposing the child gender-transition craze, which she argues is driven by “predatory medicine” incentivized by the government.
In TrevorSpace, she got a bird’s-eye view of the progressive non-profit giant that is claiming to save young lives but is really driving them further into existential rabbit holes, depravity, and potential danger, she said.
She documented kids talking about how to buy binders, an undergarment that constricts breasts, behind their parents’ backs. “I know the way people usually do this is by ordering it to a friend’s house or something of the sort, but I don’t have anyone to do that with,” wrote a girl whose account says she’s under 18. “I have money and know where I want to get it from and all that. I just need a means of getting it.” Another user suggested she have the binder sent to a post office where she could pick it up without her parents’ knowledge. Other users were referred to eBay to purchase a packer, or an artificial appendage meant to mimic a penis.
When people sign up for TrevorSpace, they have the option of placing themselves within the age ranges of “under 18” or “18-25.” The community is open to people 13-24, according to the site. There is no system in place to confirm a person’s age, Rebecca says and National Review confirmed. She also said she noticed entries from people claiming to be over 25 too, as well as guest accounts with no age listed.
Other teens, presumably girls transitioning to boys, testified to the effectiveness of Minoxidil, an over-the-counter medication that stimulates facial hair growth. “Can I get and use Minoxidil without my parents knowing?” a girl asked.
The kids Rachel followed on TrevorSpace spanned a diverse spectrum of gender disorientation, some confident in their belief that they were the opposite sex and some just gender curious. But, as Rachel observed, they were all pointed in one direction: gender transition. In a significant number of cases, adults gave minors this validation.
Gibson’s Bakery finally wins complete victory in their case, as Ohio’s Supreme Court refused to hear Oberlin College’s appeal. “It means the Gibsons now can collect approximately $36 million.”
Another day, another high profile Kamala Harris aide leaving. “Herbie Ziskend, a senior communications adviser, announced that he is leaving Harris’s side for the West Wing, where he will be the new White House deputy communications director.”
French tax agency deploys AI to find high ranking government official who are embezzling. Ha, just kidding! They’re using it to find and tax unreported pools.
The last Luftwaffe raid against the UK happened April 21, 1945, less than two weeks before Hitler committed suicide, and some three weeks before VE Day. The planes took off from occupied Stavanger, Norway, and it didn’t work out well for the Germans…
For those who think I rely too much on Ukraine updates and Peter Zeihan videos, enjoy this Peter Zeihan video update on Ukraine!
Takeaways:
“Everything that the Russians were bad at before (propaganda, logistics, precision, training, maintenance, equipment), everything they were bad at before, they’re worse at now.”
Ukraine has moved from trying to stop the Russian advance with shoulder-mounted weaponry to longer-range heavy artillery, allowing them to hit ammo dumps, logistical hubs and high-value officers.
“The degree to which the Ukrainians are able to put targeting information, either from their own human network or signal intelligence that is provided by the Americans, and put it to use has been very impressive, and it has snarled the entirety of the Russian advance in both the east and the south.”
“Russia may be running out of ammunition.”
Russian doctrine calls for slow advances prepared by massive artillery barrages.
“They faced a massive industrial collapse in the 1990s that they never really covered recovered from.”
They have fought three artillery intensive wars since the Soviet collapse: two in Chechnya and then one in Syria. So now the Russians are attempting to advance over a front that’s a thousand miles long with a burn rate for their artillery in excess of 40,000 shells a day. Going through a relatively small by Soviet standards arsenal that has been acquired since the Soviet collapse, when the industrial system collapses. Well, any equipment any shells that they’re going to use that are not from that stack are things that were built before 1989, meaning that they’re in excess of 30 years old. We’ve seen reports several a year in Russia going back 30 years that, every once in a while, one of these shells [just] cooks off and the entire ammo dump goes up. It’s entirely possible that some of the explosions were seeing in places like Belograd or Western Russia are not actually being caused by the Ukrainians, but by the Russians manhandling of their own equipment. But regardless, that burn rate 40,000 a day is not something that anyone could maintain at length.
Thus Russia has been shooting at big static targets like train stations and malls. “They have the feel of being a little bit more than the Russians shooting at things to demonstrate to the world that the Russians can still shoot at things. Tanks and infantry are not following up on any of these attacks.”
“Kherson was the only major city that Ukrainians ever lost to the Russians, the only regional capital.”
“All the normal things that plague offensives are appropriate to think about here. They trigger higher casualties among the attackers than the defenders. They require more troops, They require better logistics. They’re more vulnerable to disruption. All of that stands. Also, you have to consider that this isn’t simply Ukraine’s first significant offensive in the war, but this is Ukraine’s first significant offensive ever.”
“The Ukrainians have continually surprised to the upside, and the Russians have continually surprised at the downside. So what should have been a wildly unbalanced war that should have been over four months ago all of a sudden, if not a conflict among equals, is suddenly looking like a little bit more of a fair-ish fight.”
Summary of the Kherson situation so far, including damage to the bridges, covered here and here.
No guarantee that the Ukrainians will win in Kherson, but it obviously offers them the best chance.
“If it proves that the Ukrainians are successful [Russian] forces are going to have to evacuate on foot, they are going to have to leave all of their gear behind…this would be the single biggest military transfer to Ukraine of the post-war environment, and certainly of this war…all of a sudden, the Ukrainians might actually have what they need.” Sometimes Zeihan has a tendency to overstate things, and I think he does that here. Yes, they’ll probably capture some usable heavy equipment, but the estimates I hear are some 20,000 Russian troops in Kherson, and I’m not sure how many functional military vehicles will be left in usable condition after such heavy fighting. They might well pick up significant quantities of towed artillery.
He talks about the importance of taking Nova Kakhkovka, and controlling the irrigation gates for the canals that feed occupied Crimea.
If Ukraine retakes Kherson, they might theoretically be able to take out the Kerch Strait Bridge. (Note that this is only true if they actually have the ATACMS missiles for their HIMARS that the Biden Administration says we haven’t given them yet, as I calculate a distance of roughly 179 miles from Nova Kakhkovka to the bridge.) “Crimea goes from being an incredibly strategically valuable platform that the Russians can use to launch into Ukraine proper, into the most significant military vulnerability that post-war Russia has ever had.” Eh, I think I have to go with the Atomic Bomb between 1945 and August of 1949.
“If Ukraine is going to win this war, this is how it’s going to start.”
