Cacti

By attempting to hide in the bathroom, Sinema clearly provoked the student. Walking into a sleazy bar wearing a miniskirt is less provocative than what the Senator did. She was asking for it.

Due to NIL, mega-donors such as Knight can now step out of the shadows and openly facilitate paying players. Just think of the potential at Arkansas if the Walton clan or Jerry Jones were inclined to do the same.

Biden is creating a military united front against China, and he should, even though it appears that our continental European allies are saying wtf. Much has been said about how our NATO allies are increasingly viewing the U.S. as an unreliable partner, but the reality is that they, themselves, are unreliable. Since the Cold War ended most have failed to sufficiently fund their respective militaries; instead, they continue to rely on our military largesse. And now, they are economically cozying up to China, while ignoring the danger of doing so. And, true to character, they want to remain neutral as we move to confront China, both on the economic and military front. The Europeans seem to think they have no vested interest in trying to contain an aggressive China. But we do, as does Australia, Japan, Taiwan, India, and others. Good for Biden.

Apology in advance for the slight derail, but NATO countries don’t have the will to wean themselves from America’s tit. England and France have certain capabilities for temporarily projecting power beyond their borders but, as a whole, NATO is damn near impotent without the U.S. And the talk of them being more self-reliant is just that: talk.

Trump undoubtedly deserves some credit for the U.S. Women’s soccer team winning their second consecutive World Cup in 2019. According to team co-captain and super-patriot/activist, Megan Rapinoe, his tweets influenced their victory.

The first game for the next ten years should be at Hawaii. Surely such a trip could be used to sway at least one or two highly-ranked, fence-sitting recruits each year.

I’m doing some more reading concerning the Patricios, and the Mexican government (perhaps General Mariano Arista?) issued a proclamation containing “advice to the soldiers of the United States army”: Evidently that offer of material benefits—as well as the appeal to religion loyalty—was too good to pass up for a few hundred dissatisfied U.S. soldiers. And it’s interesting that the Catholics (at least the Mexican Catholics) considered the Protestant U.S. to be infidels.

I wonder how the Irish and Comanche would have interacted.

According to this blog there were three execution days. 16 were hung on 10 September 1847 and 4 were hung on 11 September. On 13 September William S. Harney, Colonel of the 2nd U. S. Dragoons, carried out his orders to hang the remaining 30.

I’m fairly familiar with Texas history and this is the first time I’ve heard of Saint Patrick's Battalion. Thanks for bringing it up. A quick search indicates that many of them were deserters from the U.S. Army, and were treated harshly after the war due to the fact that they took up arms against the U.S. It also appears that the Irish deserted to Mexico, in part, because they were Catholics and didn’t want to fight what they saw as a ‘Protestant’ war against a Catholic nation.

It’s no surprise that European countries would rather be neutral if there was a conflict between the U.S. and China—it would be probably be far from their shores—but it’s troubling when most of NATO would rather be neutral if Russia was involved. And that’s because if there is serious conflict between the U.S. and Russia, it’s likely as not to be in Europe’s backyard. A Pew Research Center poll, dated 2-9-2020, sheds some additional light on the fragile [my words] nature of the relationship between us and European members of NATO (despite the title). One Pew question was: % who say if Russia got into a serious military conflict with one of its neighboring countries that is our NATO ally, (survey country) should/should not use military force to defend that country? Germany (60%), Spain (56%), and France (53%) said ‘should not’. A majority of the other members also replied should not. The gist of your referenced article is that the Europeans feel they can’t rely on the U.S. But if the most powerful and influential European NATO members are hesitant about defending fellow members on their own mainland, then are they themselves reliable?

Such a tacky reply, especially considering I put a smiley face at the end of my comment. Geez…atheists not only don’t have a god, they have no sense of humor.

Not if our ‘woke’ society cancelled Dead White European Males.😊

Omar has pulled off the impossible: She simultaneously pissed off the right; influential members of her own party (who called for a ‘clarification’); and now, Hamas. This calls for a clarification of her clarification of her original statement.

Existing pipelines will pick up some of the oil originally projected to be carried by Keystone, while a substantial amount of that projected oil will now be shipped from Canada to the U.S. by rail, a method of transportation that is more risky and harmful to the environment than are pipelines. So if you mean “good” as good for the environment, then no. If you mean good as in good for Mr. Buffett and his Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad—along with other carriers—then the answer is yes.

Conservatives may dislike AOC but I wouldn’t be so quick to say it’s because of her heritage, skin color or gender. It could be because she is the most liberal of the liberal. And that fact alone causes most conservatives and many Democrats to dislike her, evidenced by the fact that she was soundly defeated in her bid for a seat on the House Energy and Commerce Committee when the Democratic Steering and Policy Committee chose Kathleen Rice by a lopsided 46-13 vote. Other than Sanders and other members of ‘the squad’, she doesn’t have much support. So little, in fact, that of the 21 ‘substantive’ bills she introduced, none of them even got past 'Action in Committee', indicating her bills were not taken seriously. As a matter of fact, she was ranked 230th out of 240 Democrats in legislative effectiveness. She is liked by her constituents; by the social media world; and by Surly, so she has that going for her.

Every MAGA person in the CR? Which one were you quoting? Surely you have someone specific in mind.

That’s a wild hypothetical, especially since I don’t recall any CR poster saying that we are “the greatest country in the world.” So refresh my memory, who are your quoting?

I’m not familiar with conditions (if any) that are attached to our aid to other countries. However, I am confident that some portion of the aid we sent to the Palestinians over the years has ended up in Hamas’s coffers. But since they don’t need our know-how to build tunnels or make rockets, I doubt if our industries have ever seen a dime of that money.

It’s easy to make the case that the Iron Dome system saves not only Israeli civilian lives, but many more Palestinian lives. If the system wasn’t so effective, the Israelis would conduct a massive bombing and artillery campaign on Hamas, followed by a full-blown ground invasion of Gaza. Israel would lose some civilians and many soldiers in such a scenario but the Palestinian civilian casualties would be staggering. This is true but a bit misleading. As a condition to receiving military aid, Israel agreed in 2016 to spend approximately 75% of the aid on U.S.-based firms.

Below is the post to which I was replying. Notice that @Lobo said “people that jump to their death from tall heights”…. JFC indeed.

After 15 seconds of freefall, the average size human would be travelling approximately 120 m.p.h. Considering the extreme trauma on every organ of the body, how could one possibly know if a heart attack or stroke occurred before impact?

That was Hank Johnson—not Maxine. Rep. Johnson’s concern about Guan tipping over has to be one of the funniest remarks I’ve heard from an elected official.

More than likely, not ever. This Pew Research Center article explains why. An excerpt from the article:

Now that Biden has announced a date for withdrawal from Afghanistan, it’s up to him to expedite the asylum requests of those men (and their families) who cooperated with U.S. forces. Leaving them to face the brutality and certain death at the hands of the Taliban will put him on the wrong side of history, just as he was in 1975 when, as a senator, he said “The United States has no obligation to evacuate one, or 100,001, South Vietnamese.” Afghanistan Gives Biden a Second Chance