Month: June 2025

Slight Reconsideration

Listening to more arguments about the Iran strike, which I supported.

There seem to be a few different arguments against.

  • Iran isn’t trying to get a nuclear weapon
  • What happened was an improper use of Executive power
  • This strike didn’t really work, and it’s going to really piss them off ensuring that Iran will finish the weapon, and start nuking people

The first one I am skeptical about. Yes, many of the strongest proponents have been right about everything all the time, that they were even refining Uranium argues against that position. I don’t at all think this is even remotely true. If they were just interested in nuclear fuel for peaceful purposes, there’s a laundry list of countries that’d be happy to supply energy-grade fuel. That they insist on doing it themselves, and refining it, indicates that their intentions aren’t pure.

I understand the arguments for the second bullet, but they really fall short for me. Congress, and the actions/inactions of many previous administrations and congresses, disprove this. Yes, there should be checks, but Congress has for so long abandoned those to the Executive Branch that it doesn’t convince me at all. It’s similar to the zOMG DUE PROCESS!!1! arguments about immigration/deportation. No, those duties have been dispatched by Congress to the Executive Branch. If they don’t like that, they can change the laws they passed. Yes, it’d require a super-majority, but Congress did this to itself. (It also speaks to my idea that every law should have an expiration date which would let everything revert to Common Law, but nobody seems excited to do that…)

Point three. There’s multiple things there. I’m inclined to think that it did work. So did Stuxnet. How long it’s going to delay the efforts is subject to debate, but it would have knocked things back a bit, at least. As for it provoking Iran into moving even faster, perhaps. But let’s say they get enough material to build a bomb; does it even work? Can they get it where they want it to go? Yes, I understand that it’d be safer if I got a vasectomy, but you should be about to start, and who knows if things coming out of me even work; I don’t need to wear a rubber.

The things that float around my scarred brain….

Stop Trying To Make Fasch Happen

Kind of ham-handed callback to a movie I was really too old to remember.

Will get back to this in a moment, but it’s all related to some of the reaction I’ve seen the past few hours about the US operation in Iran last night.

After further consideration, my feeling is very similar to how I felt after OBL was killed in Pakistan.

Were all the Fs crossed, Js dotted? Probably not. Does it matter? Nope. In my opinion, the right thing was done.

Lots of people I follow are disagreeing with that. Jersey Dave Smith is really upset that the oh-so-peaceful IRGC got their shit blown up. Democrats are doing what they do, which is call Trump a fascist.

Gimme a sec! I’m sure if I STFW, I can find some definition of fascism that fits whatever OrangeManBad did today. We’re not going to call him something else that might be a better fit, because the shoehorning is already done. And the Antifascists were right, even though they killed a hell of a lot of people, maybe more than the fascists did. (I might argue that both Trump and Biden are closer to Syndicalists than anything else…)

But my message is stop trying to make fascist happen. There are myriad reasons I never voted for him. Many in the Libertarian world are feeling regrets after they’d jumped aboard with his appearance in DC last year.

But they’re upset because he attacked the good folks in the dictatorship that is post-Pahlavi Iran? Um.

But they’re the same people who are a-okay with what Russia’s done in Ukraine. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.

Let’s just sweep things that the mullahs have done into the memory hole.

You don’t have to actually know anyone from the Persian diaspora to know they’re evil.

I know they were a long time ago, but I do remember Khobar Towers, and the AMIA bombing.

Reflexively I wanted to beg pardon for my reaction, but, no. Israel and the US can continue to pummel Iran until the IRGC are gone. My disdain might for them might be on-par with my disdain for the Norks’ leadership. I’m okay not negotiating. I’m okay with them being cast into the wastebin of history.

Trying To Be Okay With This

“Okay With This” is what I called my Substack. I still haven’t written anything there. I really haven’t had anything terribly insightful to write about. I mentioned last week the problems with Lacey. Unfortunately, we did end up having to put her down on Wednesday. In spite of a quick rally late last weekend, she worsened again pretty quickly, and wasn’t really eating or drinking.

She was a great addition to our family, and will be incredibly missed. Am I okay with this? Um. No, honestly no. I’d imagine it’ll get easier as time passes, but the emotions are still pretty raw. I do find myself doing the sorts of things I’d do to look out for her, even though I know she’s not around.

The doggie departure, along with difficulties I’m having with the insurer for my disability policies, has kept me from finding something to write about. Things are still going on with the Israeli operation in Iran, but who knows when that’ll finally be over.

I am sure the dog is somewhere better than the last Qads commander. I’m hoping they shoot themselves dry, and something positive happens.

Workouts are progressing; I’ve stayed on the schedule I’d set for myself, and whould be able to keep to it until I leave for my trip.

Maybe I’ll think up something I can plunk away about while I’m on the train.

No Kings Saturday

Haven’t written much this week. Dealing with the gymnastics of getting my private disability squared away, and dealing with a sick puppy, have taken a lot of time and energy.

It also finally got hot inside the Beltway Swamp, so going and doing much of anything has been tough. That hasn’t stopped me from sticking to my exercise goal, though it’s getting to be uncomfortably-humid inside the community facility may days.

So, kind of go piece-by-piece on this.

Kind of the middle of last week, the dog started drinking lots of water, and having accidents inside. And on the couch. Friday and Saturday were largely spent both finishing season three of The White Lotus, and trying to figure out if we were going to be without our little dog friend very soon. She is almost fourteen, but still not something we are, or ever will be, prepared for. My wife had taken her to the vet late in the week, and there was discussion that she might be in kidney failure. We’d planned on getting an expensive test done to check, but that got cancelled after we had to hit the emergency vet on Sunday. I accompanied. She had a rather-nasty UTI. Antibiotics, etc., but it really wasn’t until yesterday that she seemed kind of normal.

So, what else?

The Israeli attack on Iran Thursday night was very interesting. Credit to Chris Cuomo over on NewsNation about exactly who the IRGC are. I disagreed with President Trump’s efforts to even negotiate with them, almost as much as I disagreed with john Kerry’s blessed JCPOA. If Iran needs nuclear electricity, they don’t need to refine it themselves. They might do well to refine their own gasoline to start. They certainly don’t need to be enriching uranium to refinement levels far above what would be needed for electracy generation.

But that’s what they were doing in addition to building additional processing sites. And so Israel attacked. It sounds like they’ve done some serious damage, and killed. Much like the North Koreans fighting in Russia, these people are slaves.

Two other things…

No Kings protests. Following along on X, looking at the crowd sizes. Unimpressed. But the message about who’s funding all this is getting out.

    No tie-in with the stuff back in the winter. Nope. This is all organic. Repeat until enlightened — “Orange Man Bad.”

    Trying to catch up some on what’s going on with the shooting of pols in Minnesota. Big headlines will be that a DFL (Democrat Farm Labor) politician and her husband were killed last night.

    Pull out your Jump To Conclusions Mat, and assume it was a Republican.

    Except there’s now reporting that some of the more radical parts of her party were upset that she compromised with Republicans to keep the state government open.

    Moving on…..

    Weekends Worth Remembering

    This past one, well Sunday and today at least, was kind of spent consuming two things mentioned in this column.

    So I watched Road House, and listened to Toxic Empathy.

    The movie, I’m pretty sure I’d seen in parts, maybe in whole, at points in the past.

    It shows a point in history that many have no idea ever existed. One of the plot points is the character who was a mattress salesman. Buying something like a mattress used to be a really big deal. Or a car. Or shoes. Or a PC. None of that kind of thing is included in CPI anymore. You can see things like this, and think inflation isn’t a big deal.

    I do admit that I was kind of lost at points. Com^H^H^HXfinity’s on-demand offerings are strange. You’ll get strange parts of a commercial break at completely random Three thirds of ads, then back to the content.

    But the debate was over being nice until it’s time to stop being nice.

    Thinking about things before i started watching, and having paid attention to the hours of annual training telling me, a disabled person that I’m privileged because I’m nominally white and male, had me thinking about things from a DEI lense.

    Bar bouncers are kind of the antithesis of DEI.

    As a bouncer, you’re not trying to foster a diverse clientele. You’re trying to gather a crowd who’ll have fun together, be peaceful, buy a bunch of booze (how bars and restaurants tend to make money), and maybe leave together at the end of the night.

    By the very nature of what bouncers are hired to do, promoting inclusion is not at all a priority. Again, it’s to foster a crowd who’ll have a good time, and spend a lot of money.

    On Equity, if you’re not buying anything, you can leave (Unless you’re really hot, and others are trying to get you to….)

    Why, pray tell, is that wrong? This is the kind of things that humans do naturally.

    Fight or Flight (or Flee) is something most people probably remember from very basic courses surrounding human interactions. (Then there’s the two other Fs often omitted — Feed and Fuck.)

    I go to Waffle House, I can be pretty certain that I’m not going to be completely disappointed Feed is absolutely taken care of; they’re likely not going to screw that up too badly. Fight? Haven’t done that there. And, like so many other places, I’d probably lose. Flee? It’s there, generally, on where I’m trying to go. Fuck? Um, well, there was one of those scientific dating websites who determined that a waitress at on would be a good match…. (I’d basically given up on finding anyone when almost twenty years ago, I met the woman I’d end up marrying…)

    So, there’s lessons there, I suppose, but I think you have to consider more-deeply than the base-level. The powers-that-be in the town are corrupt. The main character wins by fighting. Even if I was physically able, I’d just leave. It’s what I do.

    The book, I don’t know. She states very well what the average Protestant thinks.

    As a severely-lapsed member of the the Papist Conspiracy, there’s things I really disagree with her on. At the same time, I understand her arguments. The Church, on the other hand, makes some arguments I find more compelling.

    Capital Punishment. I understand her argument, but I subscribe to The Church’s position against it. Though I’m really skeptical about the long-running efforts to find someone who’s been improperly-executed by the state, I admit that it’s a possibility. You don’t have to steal that much money to house someone until death.

    Though I have temptation for vengeance, that’s where faith comes in. Though it’s really difficult to not kill someone I absolutely know is guilty, i do believe there’ll be justice done.

    The method might not be proscribed, but…

    Would I absolutely be comfortable in a society filled with people like her? Yep. Even if I disagree with her on some things.

    If I don’t harm another person to invoke her wrath, she’s going to leave me alone.

    Allie’s writing is also very nice to hear; easily-understandable

    Still trying to figure out what the hell is going on with my benefits election. I understand that they’re going to shell out a good deal of money, but it’s part of the reason I put myself through this.