Tactical Grace

 

This won’t be enough for the Kremlin.

 

Bullet Points:

** Some of the best of Portlandia – when you order chicken at a restaurant in Oregon.

** I thought that Air Canada was friendly – until they canceled my flight. The stewardesses won’t be offering “coffee, tea, or me” anymore.

** More from the Little Tranny – Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy expressed cautious optimism about a potential shift in Russia’s stance on the war in Ukraine, following a call last week with President Donald Trump, U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff, and European leaders. Zelenskyy noted a signal from Witkoff that Russia may be open to a ceasefire as a first step toward ending the conflict. However, he firmly rejected any negotiations excluding Ukraine, stating, “Talks about us, without us, will not work,” ahead of Trump’s upcoming one-on-one summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska on Friday.

** An interesting take on why Muslim countries are better at dealing with radical Islam. While we’re on the subject, have you seen the new TV series – The Housewives of ISIS? They make black tents fashionable.

** DC Police Chief Pamela Smith (who is also an ordained Baptist Minister) is a moron. President Trump needs to fire all of the DC staff who are DEI appointees and hire actual people who can make actual decisions and fix actual problems. If they have an IQ above room temperature, it would be a real plus. It’s like the Los Angeles Fire Department, just like that.

** When you go for the record.

** Do you want to change the world? Don’t ring the bell. No matter what.

** From CDRSAL – Gen. Christopher Donahue, USA, Wants a Pony for Christmas CDRSAL is a daily read for me. I don’t link him at VM every day because a number of you also read CDRSAL.

 

A Job for the US Army

We need a smaller Army. A much smaller Army.

They’re doing a good job on the U.S.-Mexico border now that it’s militarized. It would be a good idea to militarize the US-Canadian Border, too, because drugs flow from that direction, too, and it’s not as though the Canadians are reliable US allies, the way that they once were. I am not advocating an anti-immigration wall because that is not the sort of national defense presence that I’m advocating.  I’m saying that we need to give them something to do because they’re expensive, and national defense would seem to be a good fit.

The US Army has grabbed the Air Defense Artillery mission (over land), and I think that’s a good fit too. Will they manage the new Golden Dome, or will that go to the Space Force? I suspect that the Army will have the muscle to cling to that.

Now that we’re not planning to go toe-to-toe with the Ruskies in the Fulda Gap (Fulda-Lücke)

An area between the Hesse-Thuringian border, the former Inner German border, and Frankfurt am Main, contains two corridors of lowlands through which tanks might have driven in a surprise attack by the Soviets and their Warsaw Pact allies to gain crossings of the Rhine River.

…and we’re hoping that the Germans and their European allies will have the strength to defend themselves because, as they keep reminding us, they don’t need the US to save them from the Eastern hordes. After all, the Russians couldn’t defeat Ukraine, with whom they share a border, given all the king’s horses (with a few Norks thrown in) and all the king’s men they’ve thrown at the problem.

We’re not planning a land war in Asia, are we? Defensively, we have 172,000 US Marines who are positioned toward China, backed by the US Navy, Air Force, and Space Force – augmented by the Coast Guard, which seeks to be taken seriously as a military force rather than a police/rescue/navigation presence. So how big does the US Army need to be? We currently have almost one million active-duty and reserve soldiers. How many of them are warriors?

 

NYCs Energy Policy

In July 2019, New York State passed the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, aiming to transition to 70% renewable electricity by 2030 and 100% zero-carbon by 2040.

Six years later, progress has stalled: the closure of the Indian Point nuclear plant has increased reliance on natural gas, and ambitious plans for wind and solar power, particularly offshore wind, have faltered due to the withdrawal of federal support.

Despite lengthy reports from the New York State Energy Planning Board and the New York Independent System Operator, no credible plan exists to meet the 2030 deadline. These documents, filled with vague rhetoric and lacking detailed feasibility studies or cost projections, fail to address the state’s energy challenges, leaving New York without a clear path forward.

The Big Apple is rotten.

 

The American Political Landscape

You may have noticed that the Democrats have recently upped their game when it comes to hypocrisy. You could say that they’re here to drink kale smoothies and be hypocrites, and they’re all out of kale smoothies.

Let’s start in New York City, where the logic-challenged voting base of Manhattan masochists continues to rush headlong into the electoral nightmare of a Commie Mamdani administration. In addition to being a rabid Jew-hater, Mamdani is the kind of economic ignoramus who thinks that grocery stores – which have about the skinniest profit margins of any business – are “gouging” New Yorkers. The solution is to have the city government run them.

Get ready for the grand opening of dozens of city-run outlets of the “Empty-Shelves-R-Us” franchise! Like most high-profile, power-hungry socialists, Mamdani is a spoiled rich kid cosplaying as a working-class hero, which is pretty tough to pull off when you’ve never had a real job in your life.

You probably heard about Zohran’s lavish wedding in a luxury compound in Ghana, where he was surrounded by extensive security, including devices to jam cell signals during the ceremony. I’m no expert on the Ghanaian telecommunications system. Still, I’m pretty sure that Gha Bell (Ghana’s version of Ma Bell, duh!) consists primarily of hollowed-out coconut halves connected with strings. So using high-tech cell-signal jammers seems like overkill.

Though Zohran is lacking in real-world and governing experience, he’s already hit for a leftist hypocrisy hat trick:

1. After years of calling for defunding the police, he recently laid out $34K (of mommy and daddy’s money, I’m guessing) on AS&I. No, not “Arseholery, Smugness and Incompetence,” though that was an excellent guess, and a fine Democrat slogan for the ’26 mid-term elections. It’s “Advanced Security and Investigations,” a private security firm that will provide him with the kind of protection that New Yorkers will most definitely not be getting from the former NYPD cops who are now all down in Florida protecting Mar-a-Lago.

2. Despite his unearned wealth, Zohran lives in a rent-controlled apartment, an archetypal, chef’s kiss-perfect betrayal of all the New Yorkers struggling to find affordable housing. Because if there’s one thing a trust-fund kid who’s about to decimate the NYC housing market needs, it’s a subsidy from the saps who vote for him.

3. When Zohran was applying to college, he had to identify his ethnicity on paperwork. His mom is Indian, and his dad is Indian. (Not F-Troop Indians like Grandma Squanto Warren –  but red-dot Indian.) So the only sane and honest answer was “Indian.”

But the DEI religion looks down on Indians because they are generally successful. And we can’t have that. So Zero/Zohran checked the box for “Black or African American.” Because he was born in an African country and lived there for a few years as an infant. You know, the same way that if you had been born in Australia, you’d check the box indicating that you identify as “koala or arboreal marsupial” on your Columbia application.

New York voters will have no excuse if they vote for this jerk in November because he is an open book. And that book is a mash-up of “The Communist Manifesto” and “Mein Kampf.”

Speaking of the Albino Apache Liz Warren, she naturally endorsed Mamdani, giving him a tip of the headdress, from one phony to another. The NY Post had the perfect headline when Warren and Mamdani talked before the endorsement: “African American Meets Native American.” Because I am a grown 8th grader, I also enjoyed it when she was hanging around in the House chambers and leaned back on a desk, which then fell over, dumping her dishonest butt to the floor. She tried to cover up the gaffe, but nobody believed her excuse that she was putting her ear to the ground to see if she could detect any nearby buffalo herds that might be stampeding.

My favorite example of Democrat hypocrisy lately has been their kabuki theatre outrage about the evils of gerrymandering. A few weeks ago, Ron DeSantis (peace be upon him) won a three-year court battle when the state Supreme Court upheld his 2022 redistricting map that cemented the redness of this red state after years of GOP gains. Several other red states – including Missouri and Indiana – are considering redistricting too, following in the footsteps of Texas, where Governor Greg Abbott is pushing a new map that could give the GOP five more House seats.

In the past, the left made the term “gerrymandering” a feared accusation, at least among RINOs and other political invertebrates so spineless that they wouldn’t even take their side in an argument. But one happy result of last November – among many – was that Trump’s victory gave many in the GOP a spine, and then instilled some steel in it. Hence Abbott’s plan.

Hilariously, the strategy of Texas elected Democrats was to take arms against a sea of troubles by…running away to Illinois, to deny a quorum that would allow the Texas legislature to pass their redrawn congressional map.

On the one hand, the decision by several dozen Texan Democrats to flee to Illinois was a smart one. Because if the FBI came looking for them, they could all escape detection by hiding behind J.B. Pritzker (D-irigible).

On the other hand, it was foolish, since Illinois is arguably the most corruptly gerrymandered state in the union, and only highlighted their hypocrisy. Many of the bluest states – IL, CA, NY, NJ, MA, etc. – have already been so heavily gerrymandered that even after Texas’ new map passes, it will STILL be less lopsided than the Dems’ current maps. And that reality made national Dems even more of a laughingstock when they threatened to redraw their districts to cancel out Texas’s efforts. Because the briefest glance at their maps showed how much they’ve already used the tactic that they’re now pretending to be so offended by.

For example, Trump received 44% of the vote in Illinois, but the GOP holds only 18% of the House seats there. He got 40% in CA, where the GOP has only 21% of House seats. And in MA, where Trump won 36% of the vote, the GOP holds zero House seats! Those numbers attest to how aggressively the Dems have worked to thwart democratically representative state maps, all the while stroking themselves over how they are righteous fighters to “save our democracy!”

And now the GOP is beginning to fight fire with fire. (And you know how much that terrifies Imhotep Pelosi, since her burial wrappings are so flammable that she’ll go up like a desiccated Roman candle. Or Egyptian candle, I guess.) The irony and schadenfreude are delicious! The very fact that Republicans have played the game more “fairly” in the past is what gives them the chance to gain so many seats now. Ben Shapiro gave some raw numbers yesterday: there are 67 Democrat House representatives from red states, vs only 39 GOP reps from blue states.

Those 39 GOP congressmen are likely the bare minimum number that can be produced given how many GOP voters there are in the country – what are MA Dems going to do, reduce their GOP members from zero to a negative number?! – while a decent amount of those 67 Democrat red-state congress-weasels can likely be gerrymandered right out of their seats.

Additionally, Trump’s idea of redoing the 2020 census now is an excellent example of the way he has been taking the lead and winning battles that past GOP presidents have been too hesitant to fight.

The Census Bureau has acknowledged that it undercounted many populations in red states during the 2020 census, and the numbers indicate that these states would have at least five more electoral votes if the count had been accurate. Knowing that, why should we have to wait 10 years – which would span five congressional and two presidential elections – to correct that error?

Yes, the census is traditionally conducted only once every decade. But have I mentioned what hypocrites the Democrats are? What else was once traditional? Just off the top of my head…Requiring a filibuster-proof majority to approve federal judges…which Harry Reid and the Dems did away with in 2013.

And not jailing opposition party members when they defied a congressional subpoena…as the GOP declined to do when Eric “Steadman” Holder and Lois Lerner both defied legitimate subpoenas during Trump’s first term. The Dems returned the favor by jailing both Steve Bannon and Peter Navarro based on much less severe subpoenas just a few years later. And not having their partisan local judges launch a flurry of illegitimate rulings to thwart the opposition’s president. And not using the legal system with some bogus lawfare attacks on your political opponent.

This just in: As I was writing this, I saw the headline that the Texas Democrats have announced they are returning to Texas. But they want us to know that their tails between their legs are not a sign that they lost. They are declaring victory because “they accomplished their mission by raising national awareness about the mid-decade redistricting effort.” Yes. You made fools of yourselves, thus raising awareness of how foolish you all are. So what have we learned today? Only what we already knew: the Democrats have completed the FA portion of their national partisan gamesmanship, and they’ve now entered the FO phase.

 

European Corruption

In a provocative critique of European institutions, Robert Williams challenges the European Commission’s claim that the EU stands among the “least corrupt regions in the world.”

Instead, he highlights two sweeping corruption scandals currently engulfing the EU: the Qatargate affair—an alleged influence-buying scheme involving Qatar (and other states)—and a separate investigation into bribery by China’s Huawei within the European Parliament.

Williams also draws attention to a March 2025 law-enforcement operation that saw Belgian police raid more than 20 locations across Belgium and Portugal, targeting Huawei’s lobbying offices and EU parliamentary facilities over suspicions of “active corruption”

Together, these episodes cast serious doubt on the EU’s anti-corruption posture and raise broader concerns about foreign interference in the bloc’s democratic machinery.

 

Identify the Aircraft

1

Note the four mounted radars. Never entered full production.

 

2

14 built

 

3

630 + built – 35 years old.

 

4

 

End