Anthony Blinken's analysis of the Gaza peace deal reveals the framework of his thinking. "First, what changed to make this breakthrough possible? Hamas is finally and fully isolated. Arab states and Turkey have said 'enough.' .. delegitimized it ..."

https://x.com/ABlinken/status/1977076426932166686

He seems to think this was mostly due to Biden. "We can expect to see joyful images ... we’ve seen these images before. Under President Biden’s watch, we secured the release of 135 hostages and... a ceasefire ... and a post conflict plan"

https://x.com/ABlinken/status/1977076430266663044

Today's debt and deficit crisis is the 21st century equivalent of the 1930s Great Depression creating conditions “very much analogous” to the years leading up to World War II.

seekingalpha.com/news/4503222-r… Western welfare politics is an absorbing state from which there is no exit. The deficit has to keep increasing to pay for the deficit.

npr.org/2025/10/10/g-s…

"The state board that granted Roberts a license to serve as superintendent said that process included background checks by the state police and FBI." Crucially, none of the checks inquired into his immigration status.

edition.cnn.com/2025/09/29/us/… The background checkers categorically say their scope did not include immigration.

desmoinesregister.com/story/news/edu…

What scenes must be occurring in Gaza even now. In the days prior to the Battle of Manila the doomed Japanese garrison became like beasts in their last despair. Let me share some stories I heard from survivors.

The death of the Axis and neutral civilians. The German, Italian, Spanish and neutral European clergy, diplomats and civilians who fled to churches and embassies were systematically executed by the Japanese. The memorials are still there.

Subic to be a logistics hub. This implies is that Luzon will be the southern flank of Taiwan and Okinawa the northern flank.

philstar.com/headlines/2025… Grand strategy is largely about logistics and supply chains. Reshoring, lines of communication, production rates and human capital base are more significant than a snapshot of forces. The current admin seems to understand this a little more than the last.

A shattered political landscape not just in the US, but in Europe and possibly Russia too. Only China looks unchanging but it is not ... What happened in the West, I think, is that its consensus future -- open borders, one world, multiculturalism, the rule based system -- IOW the certitudes of 2000, have disappeared. Today we have a present but no future.

"Sir Keir Starmer will declare the end of globalisation and admit it has failed the public amid the growing fallout of Donald Trump imposing global trade tariffs, including 10 per cent on the UK."

independent.co.uk/news/uk/politi… Trump's decision to go hell for leather may set off a Wild West stampede. Countries which stay on the RMS Globalization risk being left behind and going down with the ship. Starmer sees this and is forced to say: "it's every man for himself! Be British boys! Be British."

A very curious thing has happened in the last decade. The "capitalist world" stands accused by the Western Left of the immoral act of abetting the actions of the world's Communist powers, China, Russia and even North Korea. Wait? So who are the "good guys"? The "good guys" insofar as there are any, is anyone, Communist, Islamist or irredentist who is loser. Cuba, Venezuela, Hamas, Houthi, ANC etc; become righteous because they are poor and powerless whatever they aspire to be. The more they lose, the more righteous they become.

The war in Ukraine is so disillusioning because from the start neither the Biden administration nor Western Europe aimed to defeat Russia. To attempt that would be 'too dangerous', risking nuclear war. The Western goal was a war of attrition that would bleed Moscow white. There were those who argued, with some plausibility, that Moscow could have been defeated; that nuclear escalation would never happen. Maybe. But in actuality the West carefully doled out missiles and support by dribs and drabs and achieved their stalemate.

As the Southport murderer refuses to enter the courtroom for sentencing claiming indisposition and it emerges he expressed satisfaction his victims were dead the modern theories of good and evil are put to the test. Something is locking itself in hell; the court no words for it. The court has the corporal power to lock up Rudakubana for 25 years, but neither the judge, the British NGOs nor even the killer's parents have the ability to defeat the malevolence that possesses him; that still glories in its evil. It is spitting defiance at the world.

In Starmer's defense, these mass rapes occurred for years under both Labour and the Conservatives. Nobody wanted to rock the boat. Nobody wanted to make waves. Elon came along and the problem was how to make it go away. Starmer's thinking "you SOBs: I won't take the fall." What puzzled me from the start was the paltriness of the demand: "we want an independent inquiry into 250,000 rapes". A what? Then it occurred to me that maybe, just perhaps, nobody really wanted anything to happen. Just a big hoo-ha then back to business as usual.

Can Duterte hitman live long enough to testify?

nytimes.com/2025/01/05/wor… "At least two other members of the Davao Death Squad had already made their way overseas to be witnesses for the I.C.C. He was aching for his chance, too."

One of the adjectives UK pundits are applying to themselves in the grooming gang aftermath is "cowardly". However cowardice and bravery are both partly habits. To a certain extent people learn to be cowards just as in some cultures they are expected to be brave. For many decades now the West has extolled the virtues of the victim over the barbarism of the brave. If you see some creep torching a sleeping woman on the subway do not absolutely do not get involved. Bleat for help and wait.

The US probably needs another 50 years of space dominance and planetary peace to create the foundations of an inner solar system civilization. That opportunity is on everyone's mind though it is verboten to speak of it. The possibilities of such a breakout are so vast that they dwarf all historical precedents by comparison. An inner solar system wide civilization represents an advance on the Kardashev scale from the present greater than the difference between the stone and industrial ages.

To understand the collapse of the media it is first important to understand its rise. People trust the voice that brings them plenty. During Cold War 1, Pravda was the voice of sawdust sausage, the gulag and the KGB. The BBC was London buses, miniskirts and American supermarkets. The media was once the song of whiskey, democracy, sexy. Then at some point it became the screech of diversity, equity and inclusion; the drone of degrowth, global warming and self hatred. It became the voice not of plenty but poverty. People stopped believing.

Why does the workman believe the football scores in the newspapers but not the big stories? Because he may have watched the match himself or knows someone who has. Information corruption will blind the educated most, who only know things at second-hand. Reliable knowledge must ultimately rest on personal expertise and trust networks which is limited by the Dunbar number. For the rest your mileage may vary. This sets a limit on global governance because even leaders can't be sure they are hearing the truth.

How strange it is that when they found the 'fascists', they were not in the redneck haunts but in the last place you would look.

news.sky.com/story/dozens-a… Perhaps the moral of the story is we should take people at their word. When they openly vow to take possession "from the river to the sea" or abolish the "colonial state of America", whether you agree or not, you should regard this as a serious declaration.

Then vs now.

1990: experts all agree missile defense will never work.

2024: why doesn't the Fleet defend every country on earth like it did Israel? Seems effortless. Same thing happened to the Internet and GPS. It seems like secret diabolical Pentagon inventions become basic human rights in two generations. We go from "you must never build it" to "you must provide it, preferrably for free."

In assessing the danger of an attack on the Gaza port, you should always figure on capability. Don't assume intent. In fairness to Joe once he made the decision to stick his presence, into Gaza, absent active protection, he had no choice but to hope no one takes a shot at it. He is defended by "luck".

Nine months into his first term in 2021 Joe Biden told the UN: “as I stand here today, for the first time in 20 years the United States is not at war. We’ve turned the page.”

theguardian.com/us-news/2021/s… All Joe thought he had left to fix was Climate Emergency, the challenge of the age, to which he pledged $11B. The road ahead was bright. But somehow bad luck intervened. Future historians will try to understand the misfortune. But at the inflection point it was all rosy.

I have often argued that the Greatest Generation deserves the name, not because they won the war (which they did) but because they won the peace which was in many ways the harder trick. The key to their success was that they did not try to restore the pre-WW2 system. They let the British and European colonial empires die. The world was rebuilt on first principles. Subsequent generations have done the opposite. They've focused on preserving the World Order.