Links 6/18/2026

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1. The Rev Kev June 18, 2026 at 7:16 am

   “US using frozen Palestinian funds to push Israel’s ‘normalization’ agenda: Report”

   It was only a week or two ago that Trump was suggesting out loud that those Palestinian funds frozen by the Israelis should be given to his Peace Board as it is broke. There is no legal mechanism for it but Trump just wanted that money.

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2. AG June 18, 2026 at 8:14 am

   re: Algeria military and RU

   As per Martyanov the shift in Northern Africa is proceeding. Of course one intended addressee of this build-up, France:

   “(…)Depending on the weapons’ package and Su-34’s excellent range and the ability to carry some really scary weapons such as P-800 Oniks, among many others, it becomes clear what it all means.(…)”

   he links to:

   Algeria Becomes First Foreign Operator of Russia’s Su-34E and Su-57E as New Photos Signal Major North African Airpower Shift

   The emergence of presumed first photographs showing Russian Su-34E fighter-bombers in Algerian Air Force service signals a major transformation in North African military aviation and expands Moscow’s strategic defence influence across the Mediterranean security theatre.
   https://defencesecurityasia.com/en/algeria-su-34e-su-57e-russia-north-africa-airpower-shift/

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   1. vao June 18, 2026 at 9:14 am

      Algeria is hedging its bets, and balancing its military outlays amongst various suppliers. Martyanov may tout Algeria’s acquisition of SU-34 and SU-57, but Algeria has also bought:

      1) Chinese airplanes: J-10C fighters and KJ-500 aerial warning aircraft;

      2) Chinese electronic equipment: CHL-906 electronic warfare system;

      3) Chinese tanks: VT-4 main battle tank;

      4) Chinese drones: CH-4 and Wing Loong-2;

      5) Chinese anti-ship defences: YJ-12B — Algeria had already been using the Chinese CX-1 for almost a decade;

      6) Chinese artillery: SR-5 multiple rocket launcher and PLZ-45 self-propelled howitzer;

      7) Chinese ships: Algeria is supposedly building Chinese type 056 corvettes under license.

      Then there are lighter armament, which China also supplies to Algeria.

      Interestingly, other countries are following suit: thus, Morocco has acquired Chinese Wing Loong II and TB-001K drones, Chinese HJ-9A and HJ-8L anti-tank systems, Chinese FD-2000B anti-aircraft missiles, Chinese VT-1A tanks, and is also looking to acquire K2 Souh Korean tanks — although the USA remain a major if not the main supplier of military equipment.

      Algeria is therefore not just distancing itself from France, but actually diversifying its procurement — largely in favour of China, although other countries, such as Italy, Germany, and South Africa, play a not insignificant role as weapons suppliers. And Morocco is doing likewise.

      Just like Huawei and ZTE have been supplanting Ericsson and Nokia in mobile networking equipment throughout the world with good systems providing modern technology at affordable prices, it seems that Chinese weapons manufacturers are doing exactly the same with military equipment. This should seriously give pause for thought to those extolling the plans about restoring EU’s economic fortunes through the development of a military industry.

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      1. Aurelien June 18, 2026 at 11:31 am

         Algeria has always been a major user of Soviet and now Russian military equipment, and its armed forces are heavily influenced by those countries. Although it has bought limited amounts of equipment from countries such as Italy and Germany, it has historically bought very little from France, true to its general policy of gratuitously insulting France for fun.

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         1. vao June 18, 2026 at 12:37 pm

            Many Chinese weapons have the advantage of being compatible with Russian ones regarding ammunition. The main point is that by acquiring Chinese products, Algeria ensures it is not entirely dependent from its Russian suppliers which were traditionally very dominant — and it may be interesting price-wise as well. I presume Morocco is in the same situation regarding China vs USA.

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   2. AG June 18, 2026 at 1:35 pm

      Thanks for the detailed info.

      For fairness, Martyanov I think pointed out last year in a video that Algeria was acquiring not only Russian tech. But this here was his usual daily mini-bite of info. I found it fit in correlation with France announcing a new nuclear missile and as one commenter suggested station those in Finland? I still wonder how that works re: NATO-France. Apart from how smart and useful such a policy is.

      Lets hope Africa will maintain its non-nuclear zone policy with adequate support from Russia and China…

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3. The Rev Kev June 18, 2026 at 8:28 am

   ‘Aaron Rupar
   @atrupar
   NYT: Now that you’re approaching a new phase in this conflict in this Iran, can you now say whether you will hold anyone in your administration accountable for the strike on a school that killed more than 100 children?
   TRUMP: No. It’s such a strange question to be asked. It’s a long time ago. Mistakes are made. I would ask Pete Hegseth that question.’

   The Trump regime will never apologize over the double tap strike that killed all those school girls. They won’t even apologize for killing those Indian sailors a coupla days ago, much to India’s fury-

   https://www.msn.com/en-xl/news/other/3-dead-no-apology-us-strike-strains-relations-with-india/ar-AA25QQSr

   Being a super power means never having to say that you are sorry.

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   1. thoughtfulperson June 18, 2026 at 1:10 pm

      Impunity. Though looks like Israel may loose its impunity soon, and by extension the u.s.

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4. Booger T Washington June 18, 2026 at 9:34 am

   I suppose we should just be thankful Ohioan Robocop didn’t shoot anyone’s weiner off.

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   1. Cetzer June 18, 2026 at 4:55 pm

      “Failure to issue a single ticket”
      It seems his CM¹ was malfunctioning, as the AI mixed up Dollars and Cents. He thus could be bribed with 50-150 Cent instead of the usual 50-150$.
      And then came the clever kids who discovered, that for just 30² Cent he would bring them a big lucky bag from the law evidence room, filled to the brim with assorted drugs.

      ¹Corruption module
      ²probably another error

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5. Henry Moon Pie June 18, 2026 at 9:38 am

   Thomas Frank on nostalgia–

   Like me, Thomas Frank is a KC boy, who grew up across State Line Rd. from where I went to high school. As he recounted his memories of a Bicentennial in the city where everything is up-to-date and where crazy, little women are said to reside, it was no surprise to me that he mentioned what former New Yorker writer Calvin Trillin called the best hamburger joint in America. Winstead’s was a high school hang-out for me as well. They had curb service with roller skating waitresses as well as a roomy dining room, and “steakburgers” and chocolate malts were the stars of the menu.

   KC boy Trillin liked to troll the Acela set with his claims about Kansas City food, even proclaiming Arthur Bryant’s not the best barbecue joint, but the best restaurant in the world, when Arthur Bryant’s was a rough-around-the-edges BBQ joint behind the old ballpark that served its french fries in a paper bag. Still, Winstead’s and Arthur Bryant’s were places you get nostalgic about, especially in an era of franchises serving nuked “food” in cookie cutter settings.

   I agree with Frank’s focus on the harms of Reagan’s “Morning in America” escapist nostalgia. That marked the end of any hope for the changes that were sought by a segment of the young: reversals of the trends toward Empire, soulless consumerism and devastation of the biosphere. Instead, Reagan restored the faith in the American military that had been lost in Vietnam through a series of easy wins against opponents like Grenada and Panama. The shopping mall became America’s new Main Street, but with chain stores owned by the Epstein class instead of mom-and-pop hardware stores. And Reagan appointed James Watt to be head of the EPA, a man who summed up his environmental philosophy as follows:

   My responsibility is to follow the Scriptures which call upon us to occupy the land until Jesus returns.

   Earl Butz, SecAg, whose nemesis was Wendell Berry, was even worse.

   Reagan’s “Morning in America” nostalgia was the last thing we needed then, and Trump’s rhyming “Make America Great Again” would be even worse if more than a shrinking minority of FoxBoomers believed it. That doesn’t mean that a careful examination of the past isn’t desperately needed. It’s clear that we have trod a path that’s led us to the cliff’s edge, but correcting course is not possible without retracing our steps to understand how we arrived at such a unhappy destination. How have we become so alienated from each other and the life around us? How do we keep producing elites who have neither concern for their fellow citizens nor the competence to address problems if the wanted to? The answers to those questions lie not in fondly remembered cheeseburgers or malts but in a critical, unsparing investigation of where we went wrong and what direction humans need to take from here.

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   1. The Rev Kev June 18, 2026 at 9:44 am

      James G. Watt’s career is worth reading-

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_G._Watt

      He died only three years ago but I first came across his name in his efforts to stop the Vietnam memorial wall from being built.

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      1. AG June 18, 2026 at 9:50 am

         Interesting.
         Was there only once as a teen. I then found the memorial concept impressive to not elevate but rather hide it from plain sight and put below surface.

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         1. The Rev Kev June 18, 2026 at 10:02 am

            If you ever get the chance, it is worth reading the book about this monument called “To Heal a Nation” by Jan C. Scruggs who really pushed this idea forward. They even made a film about it. Scruggs was determined that every person that went to ‘Nam be remembered individually and not be just represented by some bland monument.

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            1. Just another Old Guy June 18, 2026 at 11:03 am

               Bland?

               I, for one, lose the strength in my knees when I stand in front of that wall and have to sit down on the grass. And I cry.

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               1. Judith June 18, 2026 at 1:51 pm

                  I can remember seeing people going up to the wall and touching the name of a person they knew who had Died in that war. The memorial clearly meant something to them.

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               2. CanCyn June 18, 2026 at 3:24 pm

                  I wept when I saw that monument too.

                  Here is a musical interlude, a song that captures that grief so well, 10,000 Maniacs’ The Big Parade

                  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWjJa2Z6IUw

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            2. AG June 18, 2026 at 12:18 pm

               thanks!

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            3. AG June 18, 2026 at 11:00 pm

               While researching today following your post I of course had to think about those 3.5M-4M dead on Vietnamese side. Even if the 58k Americans are probably less than really got killed – I must stop for a moment as “empire” to this day is still bleeding through in every of these instances…not to mention the utter destruction of the country. So much talk about “Vietnam” but so little is concerned with the actual “Vietnamese.” It´s as always us talking about ourselves. Same as with 9/11… 4 million names on one single monument….I´d like to see that.

               here the TV movie that you mention:

               TO HEAL A NATION (1988)
               100 min.
               https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uUt9WyZY4Sw

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   2. AG June 18, 2026 at 9:53 am

      To describe Panama etc. as a conscious choice to give the military back its credentials of success via small 1000% success probability missions is a wise analysis. I never thought about it that way.

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      1. alrhundi June 18, 2026 at 12:11 pm

         Makes me think Cuba would fulfill the same role with Iran

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   3. SufferinSuccotash June 18, 2026 at 10:15 am

      The burgers at Allen’s Drive-In were better anyway.

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      1. david lamy June 18, 2026 at 11:20 am

         This KC Daisy (Pem-Day, same class as Henry Moon Pecan) agrees with you whole heartedly about the superiority of Allen’s Drive-In. The girls from St Teresa’s Academy singing along to the jukeboxes that were placed in each booth made every burger taste that much better! That was Meyer and Troost. Out south on State Line the Loretto and Sion girls were equally enrapturing.
         I was too shy to flirt. Which was wise, the Rockhurst boys would have crushed me!
         I actually ate at Bryants at night (dinner time) while Moon was chilling in rough streets of Cambridge abutting Harvard. I would be the only melanin deficient diner there! No stares, no glares, no remarks about being lost. Just terrific BBQ!

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         1. Henry Moon Pie June 18, 2026 at 12:48 pm

            Fair enough, but I don’t think many of our classmates were to be seen as far east as Troost. In any case, you’ll have to take it up with Trillin and Frank.

            It was our classmate Orlando who introduced me to Bryant’s before a Royals game. To elaborate on the service, you picked up a loaf of white bread with your BBQ (brisket was my favorite) and a greasy sack of fries. Delicious.

            Hope you’re doing OK. A mutual friend told me about your adventure.

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      2. Phil in the blank June 18, 2026 at 11:29 pm

         Agree about Allen’s wholeheartedly. Half of my grade school class went to Miege, and the other half to STA, Rockhurst, Sion, so I bounced between the State Line and the Johnson Drive stores. Winstead’s was for coffee and conversation during weeknights. For BBQ, we were Smokestack people, the old original on old 71 South.

         Growing up in this bubble of prosperity during the late 60’s and early 70’s—Johnson County, Kansas was then one of the most affluent counties in the nation—one was hardly aware of the hardships facing people less fortunate. I regret that we made fun of people from rural areas and poorer parts of town. We made little effort to understand them and their struggles. These people would become the supporters of Reagan, followers of Limbaugh and Hannity, and now Trump. Frank made an effort to try to understand the Trump voter (“What’s the Matter With Kansas”), but I think he missed the mark. If you want to understand the people who elected Trump, one would do well to live a year in, say, Butler, Missouri or Tonganoxie, Kansas.

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   4. Deb Schultz June 18, 2026 at 10:46 am

      Great comment. Thanks for taking the time to share.

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   5. lcm June 18, 2026 at 4:15 pm

      Watt was Secretary of the Interior, not head of the EPA, but you’re right about his philosophy. I had the misfortune of working at Interior while he was there.

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   6. Alphonse June 18, 2026 at 4:34 pm

      we have trod a path that’s led us to the cliff’s edge, but correcting course is not possible without retracing our steps . . . How have we become so alienated from each other and the life around us? . . . The answers . . . lie . . . in a critical, unsparing investigation of where we went wrong and what direction humans need to take from here.

      I think it’s too late. Maybe it always is. Golden ages last what, half a century at most?

      I have tried to understand what went wrong. I think I have much more of a grip on the answers than when I began. I think the factors are fairly clear. They are many. Causal priority is uncertain. If I had to pick one it would be energy. But reality is not so straightforward. What caused the Great War? Garvilo Princip? Fading empires? The Thucydides Trap? Nationalism? The death of God? The accursed share? There’s a mix of proximate triggers intersection of processes – some glacial and irresistible that happened to coalesce in this particular event.

      My boomer aunt said to me she feels a sense of malaise. Could I explain? My mind whirred, considering and discarding one gambit after another. We share the intuition but we live in separate worlds. It would take me years to build common ground before I could even begin to answer. What do you do with someone who thinks the institutions are basically sound? That Covid was a hoax or that the mRNA shots saved us? That Obama betrayed the people to the banks? That Trump was a Russian puppet? And those are just surface effects, not the real causes. The language barely has words for those.

      The thing we need to go forward, the thing no honest examination of the past can provide, is common ground. It does not exist. I say I think have a grip on an answer. I can’t think of anyone else with whom I share a common understanding of the world – even if I did the way forward would remain unclear.

      We have been operating with a model of reality that is wrong. This is normal: a model is necessary, but it is the nature of models to be imperfect. At one point the model was serviceable. The model changed. The world changed. The model no longer corresponds remotely with reality. There is no replacement. Most people – especially those who benefited from it – prefer a broken model to the raw chaos of none at all. Forced to reckon with the breakage, different groups choose different mixes of jury-rigged patches.

      I think the answer lies not with knowing but with doing. Hannah Arendt argues that through work we build a common world. This is not a postmodern claim that we create our own reality but an understanding that it is through our engagement with reality that we come to live in it together. The fireplace hearth, the table where we eat, the street where we walk are foci that connect us. (Screens, private automobiles, safety: contributors to breakage.)

      Less reasoning, less knowing, more dancing. Moving together makes us one. For better or worse: Rene Girard talks about the link between dancing and the exclusion of the other. We saw this during Covid in videos of nurses dancing in empty hospitals. Fascism and togetherness tread the same path. Every regime is founded on violence concealed by myth (the myth is also a basis for the model). Destroying the myth we destroyed the regime. There we will be a new founding, a new myth. Can we dance without violence?

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      1. dave -- just dave June 18, 2026 at 5:53 pm

         I recommend reading William Catton’s Overshoot (1980) – it connects big thoughts about how humans relate to each other, and to the natural world, with how photosynthesis powers the biosphere. Former Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall wrote the introduction. Or see Thomas Murphy’s Energy and Human Ambitions on a Finite Planet: Assessing and Adapting to Planetary Limits (2021). Murphy also has a YouTube series “Metastatic Modernity” – the title removes any suspense, but he goes through the reasoning in a straightforward and convincing way.

         Here’s a quote from an e-mail earlier this week from a college classmate of mine, who was recently visited by my former roommate from 1966, and his wife, who was a couple of years behind us. He told me “Barry and Diane were not much interested in discussing ecological overshoot. Their lives revolve around family (3 kids plus grandkids)…” I pointed out that normalcy bias prevents just about everyone from noticing the implicit oxymoron in the juxtaposition of the two sentences.

         The social world is the way it is. The natural world is the way it is. People are the way we are. If people were different…but we aren’t.

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         1. Alphonse June 19, 2026 at 11:07 am

            The social world is the way it is. The natural world is the way it is. People are the way we are. If people were different…but we aren’t.

            Your matter-of-fact statement resonates with me because it does not propose that we should be what we are not. Transhumanism horrifies me. I feel we are meant to be human. Nature is meant to be nature. And we are part of it.

            For some reason I was struck an article NC linked to on insect farms:

            They’re often killed by being microwaved, suffocated, frozen, or boiled. We should be wary of boiling potentially sentient beings by the trillions, even if they’re small and don’t have many neurons. . . . insects are kept in overcrowded conditions where they express none of their natural behaviors.

            I eat meat. I don’t object to killing insects. But they are meant to be insects. To do insect things. Even if they themselves don’t care there’s something deeply wrong in this. (Though pigs would be first on my list of animals we should treat better.) It’s funny a chance reaction like this can have a lasting effect on one’s outlook.

            Mary Harrington wrote recently along similar lines. She says the problem with modern art is not a lack of naturalism, but that if you don’t have some metaphysical conception of what you are trying to capture art has nothing to say.

            A Goodreads reviewer says the Catton book you recommend led him to prefer biological, anthropological and geographical factors over abstract or ideological ones. I’m curious.

            My first explanation for our malaise is energy. My second is rationality. Even non-living systems dissipate energy and overshoot, e.g. a river that floods into a delta. But the reason for our species’ particular overshoot is… anthropological? psychological? Moderns treat nature as resources to be exploited rather than spirits with which we have a relationship. Left-brained thinking in McGilchrist’s framework, technological enframing in Heidegger’s. The cause of our malaise shifts from energy to what causes us to pursue it.

            I am the last person who should be saying these things. I used to mock Plato’s ideal forms. I have never been much of a romantic about nature. But my reason and intuition point me this way.

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      2. Henry Moon Pie June 19, 2026 at 11:17 am

         As we have lost touch with reality, so we have also lost the connection to our intuition. McGilchrist designates this as a left-brain dominance problem, and while he makes a convincing argument, I’ll just stick with Lao-Tzu preference for intuition over intellect:

         To know without knowing is best.

         Tao te Ching #71 (Le Guin rendition)

         and:

         Studying and learning daily you grow larger.
         Following the Way daily you shrink.

         Tao te Ching #48 (Le Guin rendition)

         The retracing I’m advocating is directed at reconnecting with that intuition, but I’d strongly agree with Arendt and you that “doing” (or maybe “not doing”) is a necessary component as well. It is the intuition that will produce the new myth that initiates the new founding, because it is only the intuition, product of our evolution, that can reconnect us with who we are and what must be done.

         I sure hope we can dance without violence, because, like Emma, I’m not that interested in a future without dancing.

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6. Haydar Khan June 18, 2026 at 9:39 am

   re School Districts Are Struggling to Keep Up With Surging Special Education Needs:

   Covid definitely has a role to play but, in my opinion, the lax criteria for defining who qualifies for special education is the greater culprit. This predates covid and it gets a mention in the article:

   “But to some educators, like Cajon Valley Union School District Superintendent David Miyashiro, an oft-whispered, but largely unproven, concern is also playing a role – the overidentification of kids with disabilities.”

   Notice that federal special education responsibilities are being shifted to HHS, under the control of RFK Jr. I predict a new wave of ” teachers are failing our students”, a perfect weapon to deliver yet another hammer blow to a weak and dying profession.

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   1. James June 19, 2026 at 1:28 am

      It’s not just lax criteria and people being diagnosed who don’t necessarily need a diagnosis.

      It’s also thousands and thousands of people scamming the system, claiming disorders for benefits, setting up Learing Centers, etc. It’s a massive grift.

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7. The Rev Kev June 18, 2026 at 10:08 am

   “Ad listing for $7m Tokyo apartment with ‘invisible man’ goes viral”

   Little appreciated is his roles in major films-

   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5cskFcI7GM (6:45 mins)

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8. motorslug June 18, 2026 at 10:36 am

   From Dean Baker-
   “Last week was a big one for the AI bubble. SpaceX had the largest IPO ever and Elon Musk became the world’s first trillionaire. In fact, it was such a big deal I thought I would summon Mr. Arithmetic out of retirement to get his insights.”

   https://www.counterpunch.org/2026/06/18/spacex-elon-musks-greatest-scam-mr-arithmetic-weighs-in/

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9. alrhundi June 18, 2026 at 12:02 pm

   https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jun/18/moscow-oil-refinery-on-fire-ukraine-drone-stikes

   Ukraine strike on Moscow oil refinery. Seems significant

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   1. motorslug June 18, 2026 at 1:06 pm

      Very significant, whether errant or not, as drones struck residential blocks.
      Kyiv is in for a serious pounding.

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   2. AG June 18, 2026 at 8:52 pm

      according to Martyanov:

      “Latest data: 200 drones launched at Moscow, 194 shot down by Moscow’s AD defense (per Mayor Sobyanin). That means 6 got through, or 6/200 = 3% of drones launched. That means 97% combat efficiency of Air Defense.”

      I trust him. And he is not the only one who never tires to stress that AFU is mainly out for PR-worthy images.
      Real damage is rather difficult to cause.

      If it´s GUARDIAN or any similiar Western establishment source I would suggest to doubt it. As far as my reading experience in the past 5 years is concerned their level of dishonesty paired with incompetence is insane. Literally.

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10. farmboy June 18, 2026 at 1:13 pm

    dropping bombs on Moscow, WW3!!!!
    TheApeOfGoldStreet
    @TheApeOfGoldST
    I don’t think people understand the stupidity of striking deep into Moscow is.

    The odds for #WW3 just rised significantly.

    Have no doubt, Russia will not consider this as a strike from Ukraine. This is a direct result of NATO interference.

    NATO/European countries has enabled this by backing Ukraine with intelligence, weapons, weapon manufacturing and money. This is simply made possible because of them.

    This is absolutely nothing to cheer for, the coke actor is gambling with #WW3 more than ever and somehow he is backed by our European leaders doing so.

    Total idiocy. European people need to understand this, because they will soon get stuck in war if not.

    Idiots.

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11. thoughtfulperson June 18, 2026 at 1:20 pm

    My guess is the e.u. and nato want Russia to attack Ukraine arms suppliers in Europe. This will justify the trillions being spent (and benefit cuts for average persons) all over Europe.

    Thus we have seen more and more attacks *outside* Ukraine into Russia coming both from Ukraine but also via airspace of European countries. We see Russian ships stopped. Basically we are seeing the war leaving Ukrainian borders. It seems inevitable that eventually the Russians will respond in kind.

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    1. Tom Stone June 18, 2026 at 2:01 pm

       The behavior of Western “Elites” toward Russia is objectively insane.
       I wonder how much of this is Covid induced?
       It would explain a lot.
       Maybe we will get lucky…

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12. Lefty Godot June 18, 2026 at 1:42 pm

    Is the nostalgia that Thomas Frank describes a uniquely American thing? I tend to think everyone who has not had a very violent and traumatic childhood and adolescence is always nostalgic for the decade around when they came of age. It’s natural to see a time when you were younger and had more possibilities as happier than it actually was (and as you actually experienced it at the time). Which makes the nostalgia of subsequent generations unfathomable to one. Mrs. Godot and I were always boggled that anyone could be nostalgic for the Eighties. The Eighties! The Ronnie Reagan and CIA Bush days! Who could look back on that fondly?? Of course now the Nineties and Oughts are subjects of nostalgia for the Gen Y and Z folks. I think the politicians play on people’s desire to go back to the days before their bodies went into decline and their ambitions fizzled out, whichever “days” those were. Like promising programs you have no intent to deliver (like “Medicare for all” or “a balanced budget”), it’s one of those tactics that should be thoroughly skewered when it gets used, but I suppose you need an independent and skeptical media to be able to pull that off.

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    1. amfortas June 18, 2026 at 4:38 pm

       well,lol…ive had what could be described as a rough life..be 57 this september…and i remember 1976….specifically the red white and blue train engine that stopped on our sidetrack…as well as some elder cousin’s rock n roll band playing “Cocaine” outside my grandad’s BBQ Joint(also served fries in greasy paper sacks)…as we were pulling away, in my mind, thinking cocaine was something like butane, and wondering why someone would write a song about that.
       that was well before my real troubles began.
       but i dont get nostalgic for eras, or decades, or even years.
       i get nostalgic for specific days.
       except for events relating to Tam’s cancer adventure…i couldnt place any of these glorious days on a calendar…or even withing their proper year.
       but i can smell and taste and hear and feel and see them.
       some were actually terrifying…like when the boat i was on got crossways to the big swells in the channel leading to the harbor, and we were all thrown into the water, and the big ass boat capsized.
       (delivering supplies to offshore rigs)…but man, what a frelling memory! i can smell the mud at the reed and weed and cattail covered shore as i clawed my way out, and found my road buddy and some black dude who was the coolest of the rest of the crew…(i had been the cook)

       so yeah…T Frank always hits ya where ya live.

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    2. Roland June 19, 2026 at 1:47 am

       I’m Gen X, and do not have any sort of nostalgia for the 1980’s.

       The 1990’s weren’t bad. Low inflation. There were bad wars in Congo and Yugoslavia, and the ex-USSR was a shambles, but at least the major powers were not in conflict. When the internet was new, it was actually kind of fun. Of course, one could deduce that things were not sustainable, but “Irrational Exuberance” hadn’t yet gone bonkers. On the whole, if I woke up and found my current self living in 1996, I wouldn’t mind. Better than today.

       Oh, for the days when OJ and Monica were big news! The silly season writ large.

       After 9/11, nothing has been quite right. And since COVID, everything has been obviously going to crap. I doubt Gen Z will pine for the Twenties. My grandparents didn’t get nostalgic for the 1930’s.

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    3. Chris June 19, 2026 at 3:26 am

       The US was objectively much stronger in the 1980s that it is today and had a much more sustainable economy, so if those are your criteria for nostalgia, it is completely justified.

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13. Tom Stone June 18, 2026 at 4:25 pm

    A few remarks about the US Military’s new M7 rifle and its 6.8X51MM ammunition.
    This round was adopted without any consultation with America’s NATO “Allies”, the same thing happened with the current 7.62MM Nato round and the 5.56X45MM round used in the M4.
    The Blurb is all about the high tech, including the new sight which combines a laser rangefinder with the scope, put the scope on your target, press a button and the crosshairs/illuminated dot will automatically adjust for bullet drop.
    Very cool.
    If you see an enemy soldier standing in the open taking a pee waaaay over there this sight will make it much more likely you will hit him.
    Since soldiers wear camoflage and move from cover to cover as fast and unobtrusively as possible this sight is inappropriate.
    “It is going to allow the American Warfighter to regain the Infantry half Mile” according yo US Ordnance, that half mile has never existed and never will.
    Then we have the “Cutting edge, High Intensity .277 Fury” cartridge which operates at 80,000 PSIA (Pounds per square inch, absolute) rather than the 62,000 PSIA of the 5.56MM round used by the M4.
    This has the advantage of being really cool.
    Disadvantages include horrific muzzle blast from the M7’s 13.8″ barrel and the fact that it will frickin’ EAT barrels.
    And good luck trying to control it in full auto, the .277 Fury is too powerful to be controlled in a rifle of reasonable weight and it is not powerful enough to perform the job of a squad automatic weapon.
    You will definitely want to attach the optional suppressor which only adds 1.25 pounds.
    Every Grunt wants more firepower and less weight to carry, the M7 rifle weighs 2 pounds more than the M4 carbine and you will not regret adding that 1.25 Lb suppressor once you fire it.
    The M7 is thus effectively 3.25 Lbs heavier than the M4.
    The ammunition is also 1/3 heavier, reducing the basic load to 140 rounds of 6.8MM from 210 rounds of 5.56MM.

    At least it isn’t a Bullpup.

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    1. Roland June 19, 2026 at 2:04 am

       I think the idea behind the new cartridge is to reliably penetrate the latest types of body armour. Whether that’s worth all of the drawbacks is debatable.

       I know that a lot of gun guys are disapproving, e.g. Ian at Forgotten Weapons. I can’t have much opinion, myself. And I hope that we never find how it performs in action.

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    2. Polar Socialist June 19, 2026 at 6:00 am

       I do think that FG 42 is one of the few rifles ever issued to troops that is both small enough for vehicles and accurate enough out to half a mile. I assume it has some serious downsides (expensive?) for not being adopted after the WW2 in any armed force.

       But yes, I was taught in my day that anything beyond 200 yards you leave to the SAW and HMG to deal with. Nowadays it would probably be the drones and the mortars, though.

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       1. Oregon Lawhobbit June 19, 2026 at 12:04 pm

          Well … the cartridge was far too overpowered for what the typical troop needed. Yer averij gunbunny is not going to see anything at half a mile, let alone hit it, without specialized equipment that is NOT going to be found on anything reasonably combat reliable.

          The Germans and Russians knew what they were doing with the assault rifle concept – mid-range caliber and power, full-auto capable, and decently accurate out to 300m or so. With iron sights that didn’t need batteries. ;-)

          The pistol grip that allowed it to be fired while doing parachute drops was kinda kewl, though, I have to admit….

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    3. Oregon Lawhobbit June 19, 2026 at 12:01 pm

       …the new sight which combines a laser rangefinder with the scope, put the scope on your target, press a button and the crosshairs/illuminated dot will automatically adjust for bullet drop.

       I wonder if the Army has gotten any better at supplying batteries (not included) to the troopies than it was in the 80s.

       Reply ↓
14. motorslug June 18, 2026 at 4:39 pm

    https://thegrayzone.com/2026/06/18/israeli-foreign-agent-charlie-kirk-show/

    “The Charlie Kirk Show is now distributed by a federally registered agent of Israel tasked with seeding American media with Zionist propaganda. It is part of a whopping $46 million dollar annual contract between the Israeli government and Brad Parscale, the former chief of staff for Donald Trump’s 2020 presidential campaign. This may be the largest lobbying contract in the history of foreign influence operations in the US.”

    Reply ↓
15. Buzz Meeks June 18, 2026 at 9:59 pm

    Thanks for this. Takes away the last little doubt I had that the Israelis murdered Kirk and hide in plain sight with it. Concrete pads at murder scene, the patsy, surveillance camera cards disappearing, etc, and now they own the programming.

    Reply ↓