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In Pete Hegseth’s world, generals and admirals are valued by their weight and muscle tone, not their seriousness in defending the Constitution. Personal loyalty to the president with a Ken or Barbie shine trumps courage, competence, and patriotism every day of the week.
Yet, these guys are not responsible for bad sewage design on an aircraft carrier, F-35s that are only operational 35% of the time, a slow, expensive, discombobulated logistics tail for every major American weapons system, or for US foreign policy founded on the nutty idea that we can borrow our way into permanent global dominance. They perpetuate it because, like their predecessors, they are not interested in how the system works, only in how it can work for them.
Dr. Karen Kwiatkowski, Lt. Col., USAF, Ret.
"If I were fierce, and bald, and short of breath
I’d live with scarlet Majors at the Base,
And speed glum heroes up the line to death.
You’d see me with my puffy petulant face,
Guzzling and gulping in the best hotel,
Reading the Roll of Honour. “Poor young chap,”
I’d say — “I used to know his father well;
Yes, we’ve lost heavily in this last scrap.”
And when the war is done and youth stone dead,
I’d toddle safely home and die — in bed."
“Base Details” by the British World War I poet Siegfried Sassoon
People in every single one of the top US allies now think it’s better to depend on China than the US.
The global balance of power is clearly tilting away from the US and toward China.
Yes. According to The Guardian, Britain’s national security adviser Jonathan Powell attended the final US-Iran talks in Geneva and believed Tehran’s nuclear proposal was significant enough to keep diplomacy on track and avoid escalation. Sources said progress had been made and that the Iranian offer was unexpectedly substantial.
The report also highlights concerns about the US negotiating team led by Jared Kushner and special envoy Steve Witkoff, both closely linked to Israel. One diplomat with knowledge of the talks told The Guardian: “We regarded Witkoff and Kushner as Israeli assets that dragged a president into a war he wants to get out of.”
