Eddy Posted February 6 Share Posted February 6 What a mess. Thanks for explaining. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billbindc Posted February 6 Share Posted February 6 5 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said: Not a dumb question. The US has a quirk in its political DNA that in theory isn't a problem, but in reality it is increasingly killing the political system. In the US we have "primaries" where candidates of a particular party go against each other in a vote amongst only registered members of that party (with a few exceptions). The preferred candidate then goes on "the ticket" for the general election. In theory this ensures the best, strongest candidate for the party is put forward for a vote by the entire electorate (county, state, or nation depending). In reality what happens is the most politically active members of the party vote in the primary and the rest yawn on their couch. Increasingly the most radical of each party shows up to vote in the primaries and they tend to pick the candidates that tell them what they want to hear rather than a candidate that is fit for the job. That's problem #1. Problem #2 is that when the general election comes most of the electorate votes for the party and not the candidate. This is how batpoop crazy people with an R after their name get elected. It's because no matter how sane the other person might be, there's a D after their name and voting for that person is heresy. The Democrats are no better, except that they don't have the populist streak that the Republicans have and therefore their candidates less frequently have that sort of baggage. Democrats are also not very likely to be religious fanatics, which is another issue with American politics. OK, so let's say that sensible Republican House Member X decides to do the right thing for the country and not the party and certainly not for an unelected individual that has a massive cult following. Next election they get "primaried", which means knocked out before going to a general vote. Many center leaning Republicans have figured this out and decided not to run because of this, others try and are in fact knocked out by radical candidates supported by the radical base that shows up to the primary. Which means if Member X wants to keep his/her job, then it's all about voting in a way that the 5-15% of the US population views the world and that's that. The House GOP, in particular, has also been extremely hostile to independent minded voting. There's major retaliation against such members, not only within the House but also by the election arm of the GOP. Independence is punished, not rewarded. Which is ironic when you consider what the GOP claims it stands for. Steve Agree with pretty much all of the above except for the both sides aspect of it. Partisan extremism has affected the GOP far more than Democrats. Pew has the data: https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/03/10/the-polarization-in-todays-congress-has-roots-that-go-back-decades/ 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billbindc Posted February 6 Share Posted February 6 11 minutes ago, Eddy said: What a mess. Thanks for explaining. One more caveat: A big difference in American politics now from even 7 years ago is that there is a lot of actual intimidation going on on the Republican side. GOP pols get swatted (i.e. have bogus hostage/shooting calls made to police with their address), their kids get targeted online, they deal with waves of threatening emails, calls and texts if they publicly break with Trump. Nikki Haley was swatted in December at her home and just applied for Secret Service protection because of the unrelenting and violent comms she gets. When 20 GOP Senators who would have killed for this border bill in 2015 run cowering from it, it's not because they suddenly had a change of heart. They were scared off it for both political and personal reasons. One of America's parties has entered a very dark phase and it's not going to get better unless they lose and keep losing. 20 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
poesel Posted February 6 Share Posted February 6 2 hours ago, Battlefront.com said: GPS is not the only means of navigation, so again... EW can be completely countered except for an EMP type weapon. The alternative to GPS is not ideal for most purposes, but for CASEVAC it works well. ... I'd like to add that the CASEVAC drone just needs a magnetic compass and a barometer (or LIDAR) to fly towards the friendlies. Neither of which can be jammed. As soon as it is out of EW range, it can fly with all sensors towards its destination. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eddy Posted February 6 Share Posted February 6 Democracy is wasted on some people. Anyway, thanks for the reply and apols for shooting down the US politics rabbit hole 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dan/california Posted February 6 Share Posted February 6 (edited) 2 hours ago, Battlefront.com said: The anarchist/nihilists score a success with the killing of the Ukraine/Border deal: https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/4450891-senate-gop-will-block-border-deal-leaving-ukraine-in-limbo/ Steve 2 minutes ago, Eddy said: Democracy is wasted on some people. Anyway, thanks for the reply and apols for shooting down the US politics rabbit hole Sadly that rabbit hole is currently the most important front in the Ukraine War. That is both wrong and tragic. Edited February 6 by dan/california 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted February 6 Share Posted February 6 1 hour ago, billbindc said: Agree with pretty much all of the above except for the both sides aspect of it. Partisan extremism has affected the GOP far more than Democrats. Pew has the data: https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/03/10/the-polarization-in-todays-congress-has-roots-that-go-back-decades/ I was being kind Left extremists talk about unworkable government social experiments that will likely cost huge amounts and fail to deliver, the right talk about Jewish space lasers and how the Super Bowl is being rigged to boost Biden. I'm OK with having debates over policy issues, but debating insanity isn't productive. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted February 6 Share Posted February 6 2 hours ago, dan/california said: This must have been actively coordinated with Trump's efforts to sink the Ukraine aid bill. Well that's now confirmed. It was the most logical reason for him to be in Russia. Fortunately for him, the US is not officially at war with Russia. Otherwise the term Traitor would be stamped on his passport upon coming back to the US. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sburke Posted February 6 Share Posted February 6 (edited) Putin's Election Plan is Backfiring (msn.com) Quote Russian presidential challenger Boris Nadezhdin has become more prominent than government officials anticipated and the Kremlin may not allow him to run in this year's presidential election as a result, U.S.-based think tank the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) has assessed. In January it said that the Kremlin may use the March 2024 vote as an unofficial referendum on Russia's war in Ukraine by allowing Nadezhdin to run in an election that portrays President Vladimir Putin, and by extension his war in Ukraine, as overwhelmingly popular. Nadezhdin is the only presidential candidate who openly opposes Putin and the war in Ukraine. Its latest analysis of the conflict in Ukraine on Monday, however, said that a recent announcement could signal that the Kremlin may have backtracked from this plan out of concern that Nadezhdin might gain too many votes and reduce Putin's margin of victory below levels the Kremlin is willing to accept. The think tank was referring to an announcement on Monday from Russia's electoral authority, the Central Election Commission (CEC), regarding Nadezhdin, which said it discovered a 15 percent error rate in the signatures collected by his campaign. Under electoral rules, error rates must not exceed five percent should a candidate wish to be registered. The electoral authority is due to make a final call on Nadezhdin's candidacy on Wednesday. During a recent segment on state TV, Kremlin propagandist and Putin ally Vladimir Solovyov said he believes Nadezhdin will eventually be poisoned or imprisoned. What? No option to fall out a window? Edited February 6 by sburke 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Harmon Rabb Posted February 6 Share Posted February 6 (edited) AFU is getting a new branch focused on drones. Ukrainian military to have dedicated drone branch (Yahoo.com) Quote President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has ordered the Ukrainian Armed Forces to establish a separate branch dedicated to UAVs, the president said in his Feb. 6 evening address. Read also: Ukraine may become global player in UAV market – AZDIC CEO Zelenskyy instructed the Cabinet, in collaboration with the General Staff, to work out the details of establishing the drone force within the structure of the AFU. “Unmanned systems—drones—have proven their effectiveness [in combat] on land, in the air, and at sea,” said Zelenskyy. “Ukraine has significantly shifted the balance of force in the Black Sea thanks to drones. The repelling of assaults on the ground is largely the work of drones. The large-scale destruction of enemy troops and their equipment is also due to drones.” He added that it is now necessary to establish dedicated units for operating UAVs in battle and organize effective training and systematize experience sharing, as well as scale up drone production and attract the best engineers to the industry. Read also: Monument honoring Russian military attacked by Ukrainian UAV in Belgorod Ukraine’s Digital Transformation Minister Mykhailo Fedorov wrote on Telegram that the decision "will serve as a powerful impetus for the technological and innovative development of the Armed Forces." He said that combat drone companies at the brigade level were established a year ago, and drones have dramatically changed the situation on the battlefield. Fedorov also noted that Ukraine's first naval drones "completely changed the rules of waging war at sea." Read also: Russian night UAV strike results in infrastructure damage, no casualties “With the Brave1 [UAV development] cluster, we are actively working on the development of ground drones that can partially replace gunners or make their jobs safer, advance into attacks, evacuate the wounded, or deliver ammunition to the frontline,” the minister said. Read also: Zelenskyy wants to replace ‘range of state leaders’, not just Armed Forces chief Zaluzhny On Feb. 1, amid rumors of the impending dismissal of the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, CNN published his article discussing changes in the approach to conducting war and the main tasks for the Ukrainian military in 2024. In the article, Zaluzhnyi emphasized that the development of unmanned weapon systems is a driving force in the war, and that drones, along with other types of modern armaments, present the best way to break the stalemate on the battlefield. In other news as has already been brought up, we now know what Mr.Carlson is doing in Moscow. Can't say I'm shocked. Tucker has been parroting the Kremlin's talking points for years, now he can just sit down relax and have Putin make the same talking points without Tucker even needing to open his mouth. Thankfully Mira of Kyiv has posted a drinking game we can play while watching the interview. Edited February 6 by Harmon Rabb 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dan/california Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 Quote https://www.nytimes.com/live/2024/02/06/us/mayorkas-impeachment/da5ea30a-0a7d-5232-b85d-0822c4e4b2e5?smid=url-share To recap what has happened on Capitol Hill today: Republicans torpedoed a bipartisan border deal they demanded, leaving the fate of aid to Ukraine and Israel in peril. House Republicans tried to pre-empt that deal by proposing a standalone aid bill to Israel but were unable to pass it, with opposition from Democrats and their hard-right flank. And, finally, they failed to impeach the homeland security secretary after promising to do so for months. Other than that Mr Speaker, how was the play. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dan/california Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said: Well that's now confirmed. It was the most logical reason for him to be in Russia. Fortunately for him, the US is not officially at war with Russia. Otherwise the term Traitor would be stamped on his passport upon coming back to the US. Steve This is also his audition to be Trump's Vice President... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MSBoxer Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 (edited) deleted Edited February 7 by MSBoxer 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danfrodo Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 3 hours ago, Battlefront.com said: Well that's now confirmed. It was the most logical reason for him to be in Russia. Fortunately for him, the US is not officially at war with Russia. Otherwise the term Traitor would be stamped on his passport upon coming back to the US. Steve But let's not play the false equivalence game. There's crazy on the left, but it's fringe, not in power. Even a very left representative, like AOC, is still quite in the norm of a left-leaning politician in just about any western democracy. Meanwhile, on the right the crazies actually are in control, deeply in control. And these people would be considered insane and completely outside the norm in just about any western democracy. The diff is the crazy on the left is a fringe w no power. The crazy on the right controls the party which right now controls the house of reps. For UKR, this is of course terrible. People that thought Tucker carlson was a truth teller are blocking UKR aid. And their mouthpiece is in RU about to give interview to Putin. I would love to see how Tucker would've interviewed Hitler "Gosh, Mr Fuhrer, now that you explain it to me I really see how very very dangerous those jews are to you and your beloved, pure blood nation. I hope I can help more people to understand the reality of the situation because the mainstream media falsely claims the jews are somehow victims." 7 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Simcoe Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 8 hours ago, Battlefront.com said: That's fine and encouraged. However, anybody can challenge anything. Even the shape of our planet and if it really revolves around the sun. The trick is to challenge based on a solid, fact based premise that is defendable in a debate with the people you are challenging. Your pattern in this thread is well recognized as falling short, sometimes painfully short, of that standard. Your posts about Avdiivka are not an exception to your track record. Still, as we've said before, there is value in confronting weak and flawed challenges to the status quo because it does, at a minimum, obligate the side being challenged to review and potentially reassess their own positions. Or to use a well used quote, "what doesn't kill me makes me stronger". Which is the irony of your efforts... you are helping reinforce the status quo beliefs instead of challenging them. Why? Because those you are challenging go back and check the facts and return more convinced than ever that our understanding of the situation is sound and reasonable, while the challenges are not. Steve Ya I don't have time to respond to all the dissertations I get back but It's fun riling you all up every once in a while. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JonS Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 (edited) Can we call the GOP "baloney-eating surrender monkeys" now? Edited February 7 by JonS 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dan/california Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 17 minutes ago, JonS said: Can we call the GOP "baloney-eating surrender monkeys" now? YES! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billbindc Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 20 minutes ago, JonS said: Can we call the GOP "baloney-eating surrender monkeys" now? You mean you haven't been already? 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dan/california Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 Quote https://archive.is/A0AsK Boris Pistorius is proud to come from Lower Saxony — a part of Germany where people, as he puts it, “have their feet firmly on the ground”. Yet the defence minister is worried that even these stoic voters will balk at the idea of Berlin spending tens of billions of euros a year on building up the country’s military capacity. From Financial Times 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 1 hour ago, Simcoe said: Ya I don't have time to respond to all the dissertations I get back but It's fun riling you all up every once in a while. Your pattern is to drop in, post something fatally flawed, maybe bat back one or two well reasoned rejections of your thesis, then you run away because you're "busy". It's tiresome. So let's leave it at this. If you want to come here and stir things up for fun, you can do that once more and that will be the last time you post. Got it? Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danfrodo Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 lots of somewhat bad news on UKR, but I did see that US shell production ramping up. 36K per months now, but 70K by end of year. I am guessing that was 155mm. So only 1k per day now but 2k per day soon. On top of UKR domestic + EU supplies then UKR might get to artillery superiority by end of year. By superiority I don't mean they shoot more shells than RU since UKR is more precise and does more w less. I bet it would be really hard for RU if their 10k per day was matched by 5k UKR, instead of what seems to be ~2k per day for UKR now. Assuming of course that certain rotten US snakes don't continue to sabotage things. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 1 hour ago, danfrodo said: lots of somewhat bad news on UKR, but I did see that US shell production ramping up. 36K per months now, but 70K by end of year. I am guessing that was 155mm. So only 1k per day now but 2k per day soon. On top of UKR domestic + EU supplies then UKR might get to artillery superiority by end of year. By superiority I don't mean they shoot more shells than RU since UKR is more precise and does more w less. I bet it would be really hard for RU if their 10k per day was matched by 5k UKR, instead of what seems to be ~2k per day for UKR now. Assuming of course that certain rotten US snakes don't continue to sabotage things. A big open question is how long until Russia's sources for foreign shells runs into the same problem that Ukraine is in now. Let's not forget at the beginning of this war through summer of 2022 some thought Russia had sufficient domestic stocks to keep up with its massive usage levels. It didn't. Russia has effectively used up its stockpiles and is now relying upon foreign sources who have their own limitations and conflicting agendas (as with Ukraine's Western suppliers). I don't have a chart handy, but my impression is even with this aid Russia is firing about 1/2 what it was during the Spring 2022 offensive. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Butschi Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 4 hours ago, dan/california said: From Financial Times May I ask about the purpose of dropping a few lines from a five monts old article without any further comment or explanation why this fits the current discussion? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carolus Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 I am sure they will find other ways but this is not bad. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kraft Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 New Ukrainian fixed wing drone with jet engine, claimed 300km range 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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