Passion: Biomed. Sci., life: #scuba,UWphoto,triathlon,good🍷 “When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace.”Jimi Hendrix🎸
People keep asking me what America is actually capable of, now that it has driven away every ally it has. The answer is not hypothetical. It is the Persian Gulf, right now.
Iran is a nation of 90 million people sitting on a mountain range that runs the entire length of its borders. Its military infrastructure is buried inside those mountains. Command centers, missile batteries, fuel depots, weapons production, all of it underground and dispersed across a country roughly the size of Western Europe. Operation Epic Fury struck approximately 6,000 targets.
Iran is still firing.
The Strait of Hormuz has been closed since late February. A quarter of the world’s daily oil supply has nowhere to go. The entrance is mined, patrolled and locked. And the most expensive military in human history is sitting outside it, unable to go in.
This is the moment to be honest about what America is missing.
Europe operates roughly 10,000 military aircraft. Not little propeller trainers. More than ten thousand combat-capable jets that would immediately transform the air campaign over the Gulf, free up American assets for the deep-penetration mountain missions that actually matter, and sustain an operational tempo no single nation can manage alone.
Britain fields two aircraft carriers and seven nuclear-armed hunter-killer submarines. France brings a nuclear carrier, fifteen frigates and its own nuclear submarine fleet. Belgium and the Netherlands operate the finest mine countermeasure vessels on earth, built specifically for strait-clearing operations of exactly this kind. Italy contributes two carriers and eight FREMM frigates. Poland has the largest land army in Europe. Norway has completed its conversion to the F-35 and fields fifty-two of them.
The map below shows some capabilities in Europe, but It represents only a fraction of what Europe actually has. It does not include Finland, Sweden, Spain, Romania, Greece or Portugal, each of which contributes substantial air power, naval tonnage and ground forces of their own. The full picture is considerably larger than what fits on one page.
And then there is Ukraine. Four years of industrial-scale warfare have produced the most battle-tested drone force in existence. Autonomous strike systems, mass swarm tactics and electronic warfare capabilities developed under live fire at a pace no peacetime military can replicate. An allied force with Ukrainian drone expertise integrated into it would look fundamentally different over the mountains of Iran than what America has there now.
European intelligence services have human networks inside Iran and across the Gulf that no satellite can replace. Germany and France maintained functioning diplomatic back-channels into Tehran until late 2025. That kind of quiet credibility is the difference between a negotiated shipping corridor and a permanent blockade. It cannot be improvised. It cannot be bombed into existence.
None of this is available, because Washington spent years treating its allies as freeloaders, adversaries and negotiating targets, and then went to war expecting the same loyalty it had spent years deliberately destroying.
The alliance built after 1945 was never charity. It was a force multiplier that no defense budget, however grotesque in size, can replace on its own. America is learning that now, at roughly a hundred million dollars per day in operational costs, with the strait still closed and the oil still not moving.
Trump was not acting in America’s interest. He was acting in the interest of a man who has never in his life had to live with the consequences of his own decisions. America is living with them now.
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*BRITISH WRITER PENS THE BEST DESCRIPTION OF TRUMP*
Someone asked "Why do some British people not like Donald Trump?" Nate White, an articulate and witty writer from England wrote the following response:
A few things spring to mind. Trump lacks certain qualities which the British traditionally esteem. For instance, he has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace – all qualities, funnily enough, with which his predecessor Mr. Obama was generously blessed.
So for us, the stark contrast does rather throw Trump's limitations into embarrassingly sharp relief.
Plus, we like a laugh. And while Trump may be laughable, he has never once said anything wry, witty or even faintly amusing – not once, ever.
I don't say that rhetorically, I mean it quite literally: not once, not ever. And that fact is particularly disturbing to the British sensibility – for us, to lack humour is almost inhuman.
But with Trump, it's a fact. He doesn't even seem to understand what a joke is – his idea of a joke is a crass comment, an illiterate insult, a casual act of cruelty. Trump is a troll. And like all trolls, he is never funny and he never laughs; he only crows or jeers.
And scarily, he doesn't just talk in crude, witless insults – he actually thinks in them. His mind is a simple bot-like algorithm of petty prejudices and knee-jerk nastiness. There is never any under-layer of irony, complexity, nuance or depth. It's all surface.
Some Americans might see this as refreshingly upfront. Well, we don't. We see it as having no inner world, no soul. And in Britain we traditionally side with David, not Goliath. All our heroes are plucky underdogs: Robin Hood, Dick Whittington, Oliver Twist. Trump is neither plucky, nor an underdog. He is the exact opposite of that. He's not even a spoiled rich-boy, or a greedy fat-cat. He's more a fat white slug. A Jabba the Hutt of privilege.
And worse, he is that most unforgivable of all things to the British: a bully. That is, except when he is among bullies; then he suddenly transforms into a snivelling sidekick instead.
There are unspoken rules to this stuff – the Queensberry rules of basic decency – and he breaks them all. He punches downwards – which a gentleman should, would, could never do – and every blow he aims is below the belt. He particularly likes to kick the vulnerable or voiceless or female – and he kicks them when they are down. So the fact that a significant minority – perhaps a third – of Americans look at what he does, listen to what he says, and then think 'Yeah, he seems like my kind of guy' is a matter of some confusion and no little distress to British people, given that:
• Americans are supposed to be nicer than us, and most are.
• You don't need a particularly keen eye for detail to spot a few flaws in the man.
This last point is what especially confuses and dismays British people, and many other people too; his faults seem pretty bloody hard to miss.
After all, it's impossible to read a single tweet, or hear him speak a sentence or two, without staring deep into the abyss. He turns being artless into an art form; he is a Picasso of pettiness; a Shakespeare of shit. His faults are fractal: even his flaws have flaws, and so on ad infinitum. God knows there have always been stupid people in the world, and plenty of nasty people too. But rarely has stupidity been so nasty, or nastiness so stupid. He makes Nixon look trustworthy and George W look smart. In fact, if Frankenstein decided to make a monster assembled entirely from human flaws – he would make a Trump.
Dear #MAGA Zealots,
I write this not with a heavy heart, but with a seething rage that burns brighter than the lies you’ve peddled for years. You, with your blind allegiance to a conman and your willful ignorance of facts, have dragged this once-great nation into the abyss. We are suffering—yes, suffering—at the hands of your fucking stupidity, your refusal to see beyond the echo chambers of hate and division you’ve built around yourselves.
How dare you cloak your bigotry in the flag, twisting patriotism into a weapon against your fellow Americans. You’ve empowered the worst among us, unleashing a torrent of corruption, incompetence, and cruelty that has eroded our institutions, poisoned our discourse, and left millions in despair.
The downfall of our country is on you—every policy failure, every emboldened extremist, every shattered dream bears your fingerprints. You’ve sold out our democracy for a cult of personality.
I will never forgive you. Not for the families torn apart, the lives lost to your reckless denial of science, policy and truth, nor for the international shame you’ve heaped upon us.
History will not look kindly upon you. It will brand you as the fools and sycophants who accelerated our decline, the architects of an American tragedy. You’ll be remembered not as patriots, but as the pathetic enablers of chaos, the fucking assholes who chose a man over our country.
With unyielding contempt,
A True American 🇺🇸
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When Donald Trump heard Robert Mueller had died he posted “Good, I’m glad he’s dead”
When Donald Trump heard Robert Reiner had been brutally murdered along with his wife in his own home…
Trump said “I bet he died because he had Trump Derangement Syndrome”
When Donald Trump heard Paul Pelosi had been savagely attacked with a hammer, his skull fractured and almost died…
Trump got on stage, mocked the attack and everyone laughed.
Donald Trump accused 5 Congressional Democrats of Treason…
Trump said they should be “Put to Dearth”
Donald Trump accused his hand picked Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Mark Milley of treason…
Trump said General Milley should be executed.
Trump encouraged his followers to attack the Capitol on January 6th and overturn the election results.
His supporters attacked the Capitol, built a Gallow and looked to execute Mike Pence and Nancy Pelosi.
Trump stood by for 186 Minutes and let the violence ensue.
Hundreds of Capitol Police Officers were injured.
4 Capitol Police Officers Died.
Trump has encouraged his supporters to “Knock the hell out of them” referencing protestors at his rallies.
Trump even stated he pay their legal fees.
This is the same motherfucker calling for the firing of Jimmy Kimmel because of a comedy skit.
The same motherfucker who just had James Comey arrested for posting a meme on Twitter.
If anyone needs to tone down the rhetoric.
It’s this piece of shit.
JACOBS: How do I explain this post to my constituents?
*displays a placard with Trump's post depicting himself as Jesus*
HEGSETH: I'm not here to explain posts. We have an incredible commander in chief
@atrupar The planned ballroom will not solve this perceived problem. It will only hold 1/4 the capacity of the Hilton ball room and Potus will be able to deny entry to anybody in the press he dislikes
Honored to receive the "W. Leigh Thompson Excellence in Research Award for Basic Research-2026". Grateful for the support and inspiration from my mentor @tritocool and colleagues, and thank You @JohnsHopkinsDOM for this recognition. https://t.co/cziCigwMc5
@RonFilipkowski The ballroom would not be used for events like the WHC dinner. The ballroom: 1). would hold only 1/4 the number of participants; and 2). POTUS would be able to exclude anybody from attendance
@atrupar Events at the ballroom would: 1). only hold about 1/4 the attendance as the Hilton ball room; and 2). POTUS can exclude anybody from attendance