Going to lay down my marker: As suggested herein, this will be a mistake comparable in outcome to the Crimean War. When similar historical acts were successful, great powers of the time were distracted elsewhere and/or not directly opposing. This, though, has their attention.
One of Tolstoy's first published works, The Sevastopol Sketches were inspired by his time spent there during the Crimean War. And the situation seems relevant again. https://t.co/XVrRRLASx0
Maxar’s statement on media reports regarding access rights to Maxar imagery:
Maxar has contracts with the U.S. government and dozens of allied and partner nations around the world to provide satellite imagery and other geospatial data. Each customer makes their own decisions on how they use and share that data.
One of those contracts is GEGD (the Global Enhanced GEOINT Delivery program), a U.S. government program that provides access to commercial satellite imagery that has been tasked and collected by the U.S. government. The U.S. government has temporarily suspended Ukrainian accounts in GEGD.
We take our contractual commitments very seriously. There is no change to the way we support our other customers nor their programs or contracts.
I have pledged not to get caught being insufficiently cynical again.
While the “let Trump burn it down!” stance may feel transgressive, your error is not being too mean. It’s being too trusting. It’s a lack of needed cynicism.
You think people will blame Trump. I’m not so sure.
3. These arguments are quickly becoming the conventional wisdom, but that’s not because they are good or accurate or right. It’s because they are easy. It’s easy to blame the loser for her defeat. It’s much harder to assess the real and more vexing reason for Trump’s victory.
There is unfortunately only one way to stop the President from proroguing our parliament: A team of our best men must steal the King's Mace from the House of Commons and return it to Washington https://t.co/bPvW0FGKFp
I was reminded recently of one of the more dumb-ass things I have done.
In one of the Armadillo Aerospace vehicles we ran an alcohol feed pipe through a liquid oxygen tank. It had an air gap jacket, but we were still concerned about the possibility of freezing the alcohol if there was an extended launch hold.
We did an experiment with a beaker full of ethanol in a liquid nitrogen bath, monitoring the temperature over time. The result was unexpected — the alcohol didn’t freeze solid, but it took on the consistency of a thick honey. We would pull the stir stick out and watch the viscous liquid slowly make its way down.
It was so mesmerizing that I… poked it. With my finger.
Liquid nitrogen is less dangerous than many people think — it isn’t like a Mr. Freeze gun. I had a high school science teacher that splashed some at students after doing the frozen flower demonstration. It flashes to gas and dissipates really quickly.
This was like reverse napalm. Super cold, sticking to my finger, and not evaporating or sliding away.
It was just a tiny drop, but it was instantly obvious I had made a mistake.
Only a tiny little patch of frostbite resulted, but it did drive a bit more caution later.
. @POTUS@VP The very least the government can do during the transition is ensure that all existing laws are enforced to the best of the government's ability.
The president-elect has been allowed too much leeway for too long.
Continue to hold the line on these required steps.
Donald Trump and his transition team are already breaking the law.
I would know because I wrote the law.
Incoming presidents are required to prevent conflicts of interest and sign an ethics agreement.
This is what illegal corruption looks like. https://t.co/JJjJ59DgB5
Trump not only didn’t welcome Biden to the White House, he also led a four-year disinformation campaign to claim the election was stolen from him, which continues to this day.
@BillKristol Yes BUT ALSO it was dereliction of duty by Republican senators (could have prevented him from running again by convicting him after EITHER impeachment), the Judiciary branch (did not stop conflicts of interest), GOP party leaders, and the Executive branch (prosecuted too late).
"Reelecting Donald Trump after January 6 is the greatest dereliction of civic duty by the electorate in the history of the United States. We’ll pay for it in years to come..."
https://t.co/gVtekyqnbO"
The whole “anti-neoliberal” thesis was “we traded off Midwestern manufacturing jobs for cheaper Chinese goods” and then we pursued policies that brought back Midwestern manufacturing jobs but raised prices…and voters hated it
I feel like I’m losing my mind
Quote-posting with this because it's brilliant, and also because it seems to me a perfect response to anyone who thinks the current leadership in Ukraine doesn't have some idea of the challenges of democracy in that country. https://t.co/pF8A603eFD
What's especially beautiful is that this moneybag who could never point Ukraine out on a map is now telling me, a guy from Donbas, and my community that we are actually ethnic Russians and want to go with Russia.
There's not a single drop of intellectual humility or sticking to the fact the world could not be that simplistic.
Maybe it's that you have no idea what you're talking about?
And that the vast majority of "ethnic" Russians" (who actually identify themselves as Russian-speaking Ukrainians) don't want to have anything in common with Putin's totalitarian hellhole, especially following terrible devastation that Russia brought upon Ukraine's south and east, where it swept off entire cities and regions?
Maybe it's that, especially given the catastrophe of 2022, even more eastern Ukrainians chose Ukraine and the West, so that's why they fled the war to settle down in other parts of Ukraine or in Europe?
Or maybe this is why a very large part of the Ukrainian military at war is the people of Kharkiv, Zaporizhia, Dnipro, Odesa, Mykolaiv, and Kherson, who hate Russia and fight it fiercely, knowing what it has done to their homeland and their own families?
How many men and women of Mariupol fight to have their revenge and defend the country from the plague of Russian fascism, next to the ones who lost their loved ones in Russian missile attacks on Lviv?
How many so-called "ethnic Russians" who have always identified themselves as Ukrainians now stay in free Ukraine, work jobs, pay taxes, run charities, send donations to buy drones, and take care of disabled veterans?
How many want to live in freedom, dignity, democracy, and pursuit of happiness, too?
But you know, David Sacks, in his infinite arrogance and ignorance, thinks he knows better.
Roger Zelazny’s My Name Is Legion posits a (top-down organized) fully tracked economy, created to fix societal problems.
(Some characters end up having doubts.)
Starting to see how a chaotic #4thTurning world can lead to desire for more control, though.
Evidently not as common as it feels to me.
2028 marks 20 years since the global financial meltdown.
We'll be in the #4thTurning until then, and probably a couple of years more.
My view of the current state of the #4thTurning assumes this attitude is widespread.
But if it may not be as common as it feels to me.
If Trump wins, then most people are NOT ready to move on, and the Turning has another 4+ years.
Or he loses, and this is what we build from.