Temper Tantrum?
Good news, everyone. Unless the Senate knuckles under and approves the president's SAVE Act, nothing else will ever happen during Trump's administration. Trump is promising to refuse to sign another bill. No budget. No protection. No new laws. Nothing. Do it his way or ... nothing at all. (I don't actually believe he won't sign any other bills, but it sure sounds childish and ... potentially harmful to me.) Mr. President, you know there's a "separation of powers" for a reason, right?
War
More strikes in the Iran conflict at and from Iran. Bahrain, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia were hit along with shipping in the Strait of Hormuz and Iran has laid mines there. Israel hit Hezbollah and Hezbollah killed two Israeli soldiers. And Iran named a new supreme leader ... who is definitely not friendlier to the West. In his first remarks as supreme leader of Iran, Mojtaba Khamenei, called for unity among people and promised they had a policy of "friendship" with their neighbors while continuing to attack neighbors, urge the removal of all U.S. bases from the region, and blockade the Strait of Hormuz. I suppose AI is not the only entity unable to recognize truth. (You can't call on "unity" and "friendship" while you eject some and attack the rest.)
(In an interesting side story, Bill Maher read a statement about the right of the president to use force in the national interest to Democratic Senator Adam Schiff. Schiff concurred that the statement was wrong and Trump had no such authority ... and then Maher pointed out that the statement was not from Trump, but from Obama when he justified his attack on Libya in 2011 to remove Muammar Qaddafi. Double standards abound.)
Gas Attack
Oil prices are skyrocketing, topping $105/barrel, the highest since 2022. (I should point out that the highest national average for gas in the U.S. occurred in June of 2022 under Joe Biden.) Nationally, U.S. gas prices climb toward $4.50/gallon. (Prices where I live have gone up $0.87/gallon since a month ago.)
More War
Russia killed at least 10 in a strike on an apartment complex in Kharkiv, Ukraine, with drones and missile, while the Ukraine hit a Russian electronics plant that built parts for missiles. Funny ... that doesn't appear to be the same thing.
Your Best Source for Fake News
In the religion category, the Bee tells of a Jew who converts to Christianity after a devout Christian tells him "Christ is king, you filthy, money-grubbing Jew!" Right? I mean ... it could happen ... right? Then, on the SAVE Act story, Senator Mike Lee cleverly got the act passed after rebranding it the "Give Congress A Raise Act." That certainly would appeal to both sides of the aisle and is in keeping with so much we've "rebranded" today. Meanwhile, it's clear that Europe is under some sort of persistent delusion that anyone cares what they think about this war. I can't quite figure out why.
Must be true; I read it on the internet.
5 comments:
Temper Tantrum?
With this House and Senate, that's an empty threat since they're not going to put anything on his desk to sign anyway. They can't even agree whether to keep the government open or not, you really think they'll agree on anything enough to get something for him to sign? Plus, if the midterms turn out like everyone is expecting, he's done for.
War
If you can call them his remarks since they were a written statement and they swore in his cardboard image. Last I heard, we don't even know that he truly is alive.
Gas Attack
Not sure when you last looked, but this week the oil prices when down below $90 a barrel. Iran isn't exactly a huge supplier to the US, the price hike was more from market reaction than supply problems. We could have attacked anywhere and the oil prices would have spiked. I have a hard time with the "X"-is-more-expensive-now hand wringing. Everything is always more expensive and will never go back to the way it was. It is an unreal expectation of people that things should cost like they did 6 years ago. We don't want to exacerbate the problem, but going back to $2 a gallon for gas is never going to happen, and if it does, it's not for a good reason.
More War
It would be nice if country leaders cared more about their people than holding onto their power. Yes, if Putin backs off, he'll probably lose his position, but at least hundreds of thousands would stay alive. If Zelenski surrenders, yes, he'll lose power, but would Ukraine be any better off under him rather than Putin? Ukraine want exactly the greatest "democracy" in the region beforehand, so what is one "President" compared to another?
David, the price of gas isn't based on what Iran provides. They've attacked other gas-producing nations in the area and interrupted shipping in the region. Others are "panicking" in some sense. It's the atmosphere, not just the nation of Iran, that is causing the problem. And our gas prices at home ahve been going up and not decreasing. In February I was paying $3.15/gal. Today it's $4.60/gal. The price of oil notwithstanding, we're paying more at the pump.
Is a lower price on gasoline worth the increasing global threat of the Iranian Regime? Should we have allowed Iran to remain the mounting threat it has proved to be, just so we could maintain the status quo on our gas prices? If Israel and the US hadn't struck, was Iran proving to be a rational international partner? Or are you simply pointing out that this conflict (I hesitate to call it a war when there is no ground force) will have consequences we may not have intended? It sounds like you're fully against any action against Iran, but reading intent is hard.
I'm not sure of the "increasing global threat of the Iranian Regime." I'm not at all clear of how this falls in the "Just War Theory." The question of "Just Cause" is disputed, since U.S. intelligence reported Iran was NOT building a nuclear weapon. "Right Intention" regarding the "long-term threat and protecting citizens" is ambiguous with the conflicting reports regarding nuclear weapons. "Last Resort" is debatable since this was a preemptive strike rather than a response.
And if you see my reporting on rising gas prices as a defense of Iran, I suspect you're seeing something I never intended. I was actually only pointing out that you said oil prices were lower and Iran isn't a big supplier and was trying to point out that those weren't the issue in the price of gas.
You don't believe that since the beginning of the current regime, Iran hasn't been an increasing global threat? How many American lives have been lost due to their direct and indirect action? How many Israeli lives? No, they were not currently close to building nuclear weapons (we saw to that earlier), but according to the State Department, not having access to nuclear capabilities was never something Iran was going to agree to. And in the meantime, they have been stockpiling all sorts of medium to long range armaments, trying to make themselves untouchable for when they do get access to nuclear material. We know that they have terror cells in our country and others, waiting for the order to strike. We have been negotiating with them for years, and pretty heavily for the last couple months, and they've made it pretty clear they have no intention of being a nice global player. They were buying "hypersonic" missiles from China, which I doubt were strictly for self defense. They openly threatened to sink our ships in the area. They continue to fund the three largest regional terror organizations in the Middle East, requiring Israel to have an Iron Dome. Did we have to wait for Iran to openly strike at Israel in open warfare to wait to strike? Is that what Just War Theory requires, even though everyone knows their every intention is to destroy Israel and cripple America? And clearly Iran is a threat to everyone, just look at all the places they are attacking, even those they would have considered friendly to them. A new regime that isn't a tyrannical Islamist State looking to reinstate a Caliphate would be a good thing for the entire region. And that is only the public intelligence available. We don't know everything that was happening in the closed door diplomacy meetings, or the intel we and Israel had gathered.
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