Welcome to the lunch hour –
Post-it Notes:
Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador on Wednesday criticized criminal charges against Donald Trump, suggesting that they were politically motivated to hurt his 2024 election prospects.
“Supposedly legal matters should not be used for purposes of electoral politics,” Lopez Obrador told reporters, a day after the former US president pleaded not guilty to 34 felony counts related to alleged hush money paid to an adult film star.
“That’s why I don’t agree with what they’re doing to former president Trump,” Lopez Obrador added during one of his daily press briefings, in which he often opines on wide-ranging topics.
He described the charges against 76-year-old Trump, who has already announced another White House bid, as a “smear campaign.”
***
A metaphor for life?
***
Trivial trivia
***
I do all my own stunts — but never intentionally.
***
Arizona Cell Towers:
***
Russia has increased its bluster over its rights as a sovereign nation in recent months as NATO has become more directly involved in supporting Ukraine, but has skirted around its own role in invading another sovereign country, referring to the war euphemistically as a necessary “special military operation”.
The United States, for its part, has reflected on the effectiveness of the Russian military after the invasion appeared to fail in its original dash to capture territory and quickly got bogged down. Speaking this week, a Pentagon spokesman said of that: “I think we’ve certainly seen failures that the Russian military has not been able to execute on the battlefield and failures in their command and control.”
Identify the Aircraft
From the Days of Fighting Sail
Ship’s Paint
The paint consisted of three parts, namely linseed oil as the base, pigments for the color tone, and turpentine as the dryer, so it was an oil paint to protect the hull against the seawater and the weather.
In the 18th century, it was standard practice to apply the paint on site and use it on the same day, otherwise, it would dry too quickly and break. The pigments were derived from natural products and this made them very expensive depending on the amount of pigment in the paint, which is why many ships of the time had a reddish brown known as Spanish Brown or a light yellow tone also known as Baby Puke Yellow. These were obtained from iron oxide and mixed with lead to give the color a little more richness.
Inside, however, the ships were not necessarily painted with oil paint. Milk or water-based paint was used because the paint did not need to be protected against the weather.
All three ingredients were carried by ships to make the paint on-site and used that day. Depending on how much the captain of the ship personally invested in paint, the more pigments he had with him, and he could change the color of the ship if necessary. The admiralty itself only granted the pale yellow standard color and then only in small quantities. after all, pigments were expensive and the admiralty was not fond of spending money.
The discovery of large deposits of chrome in North America in 1820 facilitated the production of chrome yellow, which now significantly reduced the cost of ship paint. However, black and white were used then because they were cheaper to produce.
Identify the Aircraft:
Cessna A-37B Dragonfly
I am impressed, Surly, you surely run on quantum computers. An AI beyond reproach.
SkyNet — has become sentient. You just need to make sure that you’re on the right side of history, Cederq…
Is everyone ready for the Easter Sunday Tank ID Challenge?
It’s a cool looking aircraft. (that’s my cheap seat contribution)
The A37 in the header pic has RVNAF livery.
Better known as the Tweety Bird… And the VNAF were the only ones that flew them in ‘combat’…
I’ve always thought the Dragonfly was a cool bird. Perhaps not as cool as the Bronco, but still very cool.
-Kle.
They didn’t have PAVE NAIL.
Pretty sure that A37’s were actually flown in combat by three air forces. The USAF flew the A model in Viet Nam (quite successfully) which led to the B model being supplied to the RVN air force. I don’t know if the RVNAF got any A models but wouldn’t be surprised. The North Vietnamese captured some during their final solution in 1975 and used them to bomb Tan Son Nhut air base and later after “reunification” during their invasion of Cambodia and the Chinese invasion in 1979.
Nice little planes. Used to watch them fly out of Patrick AFB, along with the A-7s, to go on bombing runs near Orlando.
Fun little planes. Would have been neat to be able to own and fly one.
Interesting fact, Cessna designed the T-37, which evolved into the A-37 with bigger wings and engines, and then used the A-37 as a base for a 4-6 person stretched civilian version, which unfortunately never got off the ground, so to speak. A business jet designed for rough fields. And low to the ground so easy to get in and out of. Stupid world, passing on that plane.
“More power”- Tim ‘The Tool Man” Taylor would approve, as do I.
When other nation leaders criticize Bragg and The Dem’s calculated move, you know we got sand in the gears. Yet, despite such high-level criticism Bragg and Co. continue doubling down on their own criminality. Says something.
AZ Cell towers- Very cool…we have “pine trees”, and at least one ‘rock formation’ and fat flag pole, here in CO.
We have several disgiused cell sites here in town. Mostly the pine trees, but one looks like an old silo, and some are up in church steeples.
I haven’t seen the rock formation one. About where is it?
North of Ted’s Place, around Graves Dairy turn, up on top of the East side escarpment, twin rock towers.
If you’re in Arizona, look for a cactus.
Heh.
Camouflaging cell towers is a pretty good idea. I have seen a few “pine trees” but never a cactus or rock formation. Something to look forward to. They are, in their original configuration, a bit of an eyesore.
Aircraft. In my mind’s eye I could imagine LL in the pilot’s seat getting ready for a bombing run. It does need a gun or rocket pods though.
Hearing Mexico’s president’s legitimate criticism of the fiasco that is the New York show trial is disconcerting at best and a bit embarrassing. From now on we will just have to live with the fact that we really aren’t taken seriously as a country anymore.
When actual banana republics cry foul and say, legitimately, they’d never go so far, that’s a perfect indictment of our current republic.
Twenty years ago a family member who worked for a large steel supplier/fabricator in Oregon was tasked with designing bullet resistant armor from AR500? steel for cell towers in Mexico.
It seems that locals made a sport out of shooting them up with AK47s.
Today the cartels probably want the cell towers operable and shooting one up would be counter productive to ones health and welfare.
I rather liked the way AMLO supported 45, unlike the despicable, pretentious, backstabbing, hated BOJO.