@enhydra lutris then new cemeteries.
Now, I am taking your calculations for meal planning as true and correct. It was in those wedding vows, page 22, that you assumed cooking and meal planning every other week. Pretty standard boilerplate vow, imho.
Glad to hear the flowers and fruit trees are blooming. Fun time of year. By Wednesday, it will hit in the 90s here. It has been interesting to watch a fairly new-to-the-office lawn sprout so many Texas Dandelions. They are everywhere, but there is one area with a congestion of them, so Dear one can mow around them, shape them into a bed.
RU has kicked UKies' ass. Z is still begging for money and materiel, so I think it will wind up as an unconditional surrender.
Things are heating up in the Gulf States' canals and shipping lanes. Israel might end up with an economy that has no fix.
You are right that when we take a ship, it is righteous, sayeth both The Lord and Gummint. The blessings do not extend to Muslims, ya know, brown people.
We are having baby back ribs, potato salad, and coleslaw this evening. If I feel energetic, I might bake cornbread for myself, as Dear One rarely eats bread. (What is wrong with people who do not eat bread? Discuss.)
I spread some ant killers on some new beds that just popped up. Other than that, yard work is looking less and less a priority for today.
Hope you have a great dinner planned! Double sized, less effort!
Thanks for the Sputnik article. We need to keep abreast of all the news of the conflicts that just won't go away.
Take care, my friend!

I did find myself wondering "what are the odds that it will have an odd ending?", but, then again, I have no idea what might be an "even ending", so maybe it's a lock. I start cooking tomorrow and only have 28.5714286 percent of my menu planning done or perhaps 42.8571429 if I get two meals out of one planned "dish".

It is cold and raining again, after a tiny bit of warm weather. Will allegedly creep up into the low 70s by wednesday.

The Rus laid down the law the other day, saying that they are now, for all practical purposes, unstoppable and the ukies will either begin serious negotiations muy pronto or will be faced with unconditional surrender in the near future. Meanwhile, per Sputnik:

Game Over? Persian Gulf Powers Reportedly Refuse to Give US Access to Bases for Anti-Iran Strikes

but per the sotory, only some of them. [ https://sputnikglobe.com/20240413/game-over-persian-gulf-powers-reported... ]

Snoops already mentioned the ship Iran captured. Israel is calling it piracy and demanding that they be expelled from the UN. I recall we did that many, many times, and nobody called that piracy, so, seemingly, this is just yet another unilateral "sanction", but by an actual victim of something for once instead of being just out and out economic warfare.

Good to hear you've got nice wildflowers about. Our year is blanketed with CA Poppies, as usual, as well as weeds, and our fruit trees are blooming, so all this wet has a good side, I guess.

be well and have a good one.

@snoopydawg goes to hell in one place, we can expect it in all similar structures everywhere. Or something... It's only affecting the transport of supplies to the entire country, after all.
How on earth can a food processing plant be allowed to do business without routine inspections and upgrades? How can they be insured? How can they get proper permits? How can a corporation expect to make money if their plants burn to the ground? And that is normal, according to the government.
No worries.

#UPDATE: Photos show some barges are already jammed up against the Emsworth Dam pic.twitter.com/pwyUX66UkU

— R A W S A L E R T S (@rawsalerts) April 13, 2024

Or does this happen all the time and I’ve just never heard of it? Kinda like how many food plants have burned up in the last century huh?

@gjohnsit wanted Mileil,(sp?) and so it goes.

Argentina elected a Neoliberal president who took a chainsaw to the government.

(AP) — Argentina said Wednesday that it had cut 15,000 state jobs as part of President Javier Milei’s aggressive campaign to slash spending, the latest in a series of painful economic measures that have put the libertarian government on a collision course with angry protesters and powerful trade unions.

So what does Mileil do when poverty skyrockets? He outlaws protests.
This is beginning to cause a backlash.

(AP) — A confrontation between Argentine authorities and anti-government protesters angered by President Javier Milei’s spending cuts escalated on Wednesday, as protesters blocking the capital’s key thoroughfare were forcibly dispersed and eight of the movement’s participants arrested.

In a rare move, riot police officers deployed powerful water cannons, drenching demonstrators. Argentines demanding more food for soup kitchens hurled sticks and stones, set garbage cans alight and paralyzed the main street of Buenos Aires in defiance of new legal changes banning roadblocks.

@gjohnsit Columbia is likely kicking their own ass for giving him asylum in the first place. They have enough problems as it is.
My hope is that he will be tried, and that the court will be fair.
My hope is that the CIA pet project guy will be convicted and receive a long sentence.
Thanks for the update, and have a great weekend, gj.

not welcome in Colombia

Venezuela’s best-known opposition leader, Juan Guaidó, has touched down in the United States after being unceremoniously ejected from Colombia while attempting to gatecrash a summit about the political future of his crisis-stricken homeland.

Guaidó shot to fame in early 2019 and for a brief moment looked poised to topple Venezuela’s authoritarian leader, Nicolás Maduro, with the support of dozens of foreign governments including the US, UK and Brazil.

But four years later the 39-year-old’s star has waned dramatically as a result of his failure to unseat Hugo Chávez’s political heir. Maduro has crushed street protests and consolidated power. Most of the international community has abandoned Guaidó’s parallel “presidency” and “interim government”.

Arrest warrant

Guaido — who is living in exile in the United States — is accused of treason, usurpation of functions, money laundering and association with a view to committing a crime, said Attorney General Tarek William Saab.

The prosecutor said "Guaido used the resources of PDVSA (the public oil giant) to cause losses close to or greater than $19 billion," adding that he relied on "revelations" provided to the press "by a federal court in the United States."

@gjohnsit an internationally monitored election, determined to be fair.
I do not believe he is some dictator.
Shutting down protests infiltrated and instigated by the CIA is about the most practical way to stop a coup. We do much the same here regarding certain protests.
Maduro's sin is that he is a socialist. He nationalized his country's oil. He just is now allowed to keep the wealth and treasure of his land. It "belongs" to Big Oil.

not welcome in Colombia

Venezuela’s best-known opposition leader, Juan Guaidó, has touched down in the United States after being unceremoniously ejected from Colombia while attempting to gatecrash a summit about the political future of his crisis-stricken homeland.

Guaidó shot to fame in early 2019 and for a brief moment looked poised to topple Venezuela’s authoritarian leader, Nicolás Maduro, with the support of dozens of foreign governments including the US, UK and Brazil.

But four years later the 39-year-old’s star has waned dramatically as a result of his failure to unseat Hugo Chávez’s political heir. Maduro has crushed street protests and consolidated power. Most of the international community has abandoned Guaidó’s parallel “presidency” and “interim government”.

Arrest warrant

Guaido — who is living in exile in the United States — is accused of treason, usurpation of functions, money laundering and association with a view to committing a crime, said Attorney General Tarek William Saab.

The prosecutor said "Guaido used the resources of PDVSA (the public oil giant) to cause losses close to or greater than $19 billion," adding that he relied on "revelations" provided to the press "by a federal court in the United States."

@humphrey Speaking for myself, I feel safe and confident the US is gonna do the right thing, and not go to war. Our leader is in complete control of the situation, after all. amirite?

catastrophic situation.

Or maybe it isn't?

If watching this senile decrepit old fool walking into a meeting about potential WWIII gives you any kind of confidence - you’re a special kind of stupid. pic.twitter.com/HCxR85B5iA

— David (@MAGAWoodworker) April 13, 2024

@humphrey comports with what I have read at MoA.
It is the base where we land to bring in weapons for Israel.
Bibi is out of Israel. Did he head for his bunker?

associated with it.

Footage showing one of the Impacts of an Iranian Medium-Range Ballistic Missile earlier in the Negev Desert of Southern Israel. pic.twitter.com/QExRPcGMey

— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) April 13, 2024

For those new here, Nevatim Air Base is where UK & US Weapons transporters land.

This is also from this base that the F-16s, F-35s … who Bomb Gaza take off from.

— MenchOsint (@MenchOsint) April 13, 2024

Israeli Channel 12 confirmed that 7 missiles hit the Ramon air base in the Negev. pic.twitter.com/yuIZYGYJDi

— MenchOsint (@MenchOsint) April 13, 2024

Iranian missiles over the "Israeli" Parliament pic.twitter.com/F9fM6OPeQs

— COMBATE (@upholdreality) April 13, 2024

@snoopydawg Fill your vehicle tanks, and any gas cans you have for lawnmowers, etc...

.

The United States has reportedly asked China for a favor – that Beijing speak to Tehran about not retaliating to the April 1 airstrike on the Iranian diplomatic consulate in Damascus with a direct attack against Israel.

We’ve also asked the Saudis to talk to Iran, but Biden vetoed the UN resolution on Israel for attacking irans embassy and he says that he will use the might of American forces to defend Israel.

Washington’s behind-the-scenes diplomatic pleading with China and Middle Eastern countries stands in contrast to President Biden’s public assurance Thursday on America’s “ironclad” commitments to “Israel’s security against all these threats from Iran and its proxies.”

Maybe if Biden hadn’t told Bibi outright that no matter what he does America will back him up. If it’s really Biden who is making the decisions instead of the neocon idiots who have their hands up his backside to make him dance like a puppet.

In just 3 short years Biden has brought us to the brink of extinction with the Ukraine War, the planned war on China and now with the Israeli psychos who themselves are bombing 3 countries.

Not to leave out what he’s doing to the economy. Obama was right.

Never underestimate Biden’s talent for fcking up.

@humphrey "Let it go at that"?
Would you agree with me that the mighty Iron Dome is full of holes?
I hope you aren't invested in Iron Dome industry stocks. The cache' is now lost.

next steps.

U.S. President Biden is holding another Meeting in the Situtaion Room with his National Security Team to discuss the Iranian Attack on Israel; afterwards he is expected receive a Phone Call from Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu to talk about Response Options against… pic.twitter.com/zuOm1Yk285

— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) April 14, 2024

@humphrey /S

It seems as if only a few faces in the video are blurred out. I wonder if is the case that they are Americans?

IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi is currently holding a situational assessment at "the pit" in the Kirya regarding the attacks and to plan for future engagements, the IDF says. pic.twitter.com/FUgUwqV4VZ

— Moshe Schwartz (@YWNReporter) April 14, 2024

@humphrey although my use of that phrase has a completely different meaning than the other 'me, too' stuff.
Medea is headed to Gaza on a flotilla to deliver food and other aid. She is correct, she is smart, she has the courage of a lioness facing down a pack of hyenas.
I am considering her as my write-in vote for president come November, but have to wait to see if the Israelis kill her or not.

Your policies are driving us straight into World War III. If you had any sense, you would be calling Netanyahu to say “Stop the slaughter in Gaza—now. And stop trying to drag us into a war with Iran.” Instead you continue your reckless “ironclad support” for Israel???

— Medea Benjamin (@medeabenjamin) April 14, 2024

@humphrey n/t

The CEO of Raytheon on the phone to the CEO of Lockheed Martin
pic.twitter.com/fBHCQzpuiv

— RŌNIN (@ronin21btc) April 13, 2024

@snoopydawg the Israeli Security Council voted to retaliate (escalate to get the US involved militarily because...) against Iran's attack.
It ain't over, unfortunately.
The shit show shall continue.

.

Israel calls the UN wambulance….

The whole letter is a veritable LOL-fest but I've bolded some of the more ridiculously hilarious bits

Ambassador Gilad Erdan aka "Clowny McClownFace" Permanent Representative of Genocidal-Israel to the United Nations
H.E. Mrs. Vanessa Frazier
President of the Security Council
United Nations
New York

Excellency,
Six months after Hamas' brutal terror attack on October 7, I wish to express my outrage regarding the attack against the State of Israel by the Iranian regime, which once again undermines Security Council resolutions, fosters instability, and poses a grave threat to international peace and security.

Today, Iran has launched a direct attack from within its territory of more than 200 UAVs, cruise missiles, and ballistic missiles towards Israel in clear violation of the UN Charter and international law. LoL

.Iran has also publicly taken pride in the attack. The attack is a severe and dangerous escalation.

Iran continues to violate its international obligations, evidenced by today's attack on Israel in violation of Security Council resolution 2231 (2015), and by accelerating the pace of its weapons transfers to Hezbollah in violation of Security Council Resolution 1701. Iran has been the architect of instability for years, through Hamas, the Houthis, Hezbollah and other proxies. But it is now standing front and center in its actions to fulfill its ambition to attack Israel.
These attacks on Israel are part of a dangerous trend of deterioration as reflected in my various letters to you over the past years, posing a concrete threat to the peace and security of the entire region. Israel has warned the international community of Iran's aspirations, beyond its terror activities and support of terror proxies, including the funding and arming of both Hamas and Hezbollah. The Iranian attack follows the seizure of a Portuguese civilian cargo ship by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps.

.

Iran poses a direct threat to international peace, and brazenly violates the UN Charter and Security Council resolutions.

The time has come for the Security Council to take concrete action against the Iranian threat.
April 13, 2024
I confirm Israel's request to convene a meeting of the Security Council immediately to unequivocally condemn Iran for these grave violations and immediately act to designate the IRGC as a terrorist organization.

NV-13APR-2024-SC
I should be grateful if you would distribute this letter and its annex as a document of the Security Council. I would like to inform you that an identical letter has been sent to H.E. Mr. Antonio Guterres, Secretary- General of the United Nations.
Sincerely,
Gilad Erdan
Israel's Ambassador to the United Nations

Posted by: SamHyde | Apr 14 2024 1:16 utc | 455

Israel complaining about Iran disregarding UN resolutions is rich when they have ignored every UN resolution telling them to stop ethic cleansing Palestine . Gawd what a bunch of cry babies they are when Iran defends itself according to UN resolutions. Funny how Israel is always the victim and never the aggressor.

@humphrey n/t

The face you make when you realize your army is only good for slaughtering civilians. pic.twitter.com/FWqqVQSAqu

— Yuliana Dlugaj (@DlugajJuly) April 13, 2024

@soryang millions. Imagine you enjoyed it. Imagine that you knew it was grifted money.
And you are totally, totally innocent, while enjoying your villa in Italy, or Morocco,which your combine income would never afford,and so on and so on...Surprise! How would you have ever guessed?
I just can't see a better world with Yoon in power. We need honest leaders at this critical time when we are on the verge of WWIII.
Thanks for all you do to keep us unformed here in a part of the world we tend to overlook, even though it is essential to our survival. We tend to look western Europe first, then other global parts, oftentimes Korea being off the radar, unless a basketball player visits North Korea.
Soryang, you know damn well we main lander Usians are ill informed, but for people like you.

Indicted opposition leader is South Korea’s top contender for president in 2027

The victory of South Korea’s main opposition party in parliamentary elections has made its leader a top contender for president in 2027, as long as he can manage a fickle public and stay ahead of a legal battle that could land him in prison before then.

Lee Jae-myung emerged from the election with a strong enough majority for the progressive bloc led by his Democratic Party to dictate the course of legislation and pressure the conservative ruling People Power Party to make concessions if it wants to get anything done.

An advocate of a universal basic income, Lee had proposed while he was on the campaign trail a total 13 trillion won ($9.5 billion) in cash handouts to citizens as a way to revive the economy. His Democratic Party has been looking to increase taxes on wealthy individuals and the chaebol conglomerates that dominate the corporate landscape.

It’s all quite a turnaround for a person who lost the presidential race in 2022 by a razor-thin margin and was then indicted over a variety of bribery and breach of duty charges. This raised questions within his party over whether he was damaging its image, but the victory in the Wednesday election showed he can connect with voters.

This article portrays a false picture of not only the current political situation in South Korea but also the fear of powerful interests on Wall Street that the democrats in South Korea will break ranks with Japan and the US on their anti-China campaign. Lee doesn't want to decouple from China, nor contribute armaments to Ukraine. Then there is also the neoliberal capitalism that is destroying the quality of life in South Korea. God forbid, Lee offers social programs and relief from economic woes.

The key misrepresentation chiefly involves mischaracterizing the polarizing figure as Lee rather than president Yoon, the US and Japanese tool who threw away South Korean sovereignty for what? The only thing that Yoon knows how to do, is to convict someone in the press with dubious leaks, indict them, jail them, and try to convict them by any means possible. This includes eliciting false testimony from witnesses under duress of some kind from prosecutors.

President Yoon portrayed as Lee Won-yong, the infamous traitor of Eulsa, who sold his country out to Japan.

Yoon and his right hand man Han Dong-hun, both former prosecutors have corrupted the administration of justice in South Korea for years. They persecute their political opposition and critics in the media. They've been prosecuting Lee for years and haven't succeeded yet. The irony is that Lee's alleged corruption was purportedly related to the Daejang dong development scandal. The money for the project was financed by the Pusan Savings Bank, which was given a clean bill of health by Yoon Seok-yeol, after tens of millions of dollars had disappeared, and subsequently went bankrupt. Yoon's former mentor represented the bank in the investigation. Yoon's mother in law and spouse have been one step ahead of trial and imprisonment for years, primarily due to Yoon's position and influence within the public prosecutors' office. Yoon's mother in law finally ran out of luck and was sentenced to prison last year. Anyone who has bothered to study the political abuse of the justice administration in South Korea can see this. Often otherwise intelligent observers say, oh well, we know his wife is corrupt, but Yoon isn't. Au contraire, obstruction of justice, and political prosecutions are the worst form of corruption. Just because the media and the power structure of Korea protects this form of corruption, doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Until Yoon was elected this very form of political corruption was often a plot device in contemporary dramas. In other words, it's common knowledge.

Worse still, Yoon is actively suppressing the media. 20 investigations for "election interference" were initiated the day after the election against critical media, particularly MBC. His administrative and coercive tactics to intimidate media figures didn't begin yesterday and are so obvious they have even made it into English language media on occasion.

Competence. Yoon and Han have no experience governing. They substitute knee jerk neo-liberal ideology for lack of ideas on how to manage complex economic issues. Similarly, knee jerk anti-communism substitutes for careful calculation of foreign policy which serves the South Korean national interest. Those in opposition are stigmatized as "enemies of the state," and communists. Domestic politics resemble those of early cold war politics of the US. Simple minded black and white analysis.

Three more years of Yoon, his brain dead policies, and his fundamentalist/ geriatic constituency, which is all that exists outside of the gold spoon elites, will likely wreck South Korea irreversibly. But the US elites can see no wrong as long as Yoon dances to their tune. His appeasement of Japan couldn't be more damaging.

Even the conservative Chosun Ilbo is basically begging Yoon to change his style to accommodate the opposition's views and negotiate legislation compromises. Yoon can't even get along with his own party's leaders let alone the opposition. It's Yoon's way or the highway. There is really no room for anyone else in the Yoon administration except to serve as the crash dummy when Yoon's farcical appointments, incompetence and public statements blow up in his face.

One thing the conservative media studiously avoid noticing is just how petty, mean, vindictive, and insulting Yoon and Han really are. It really doesn't take much study to notice their sociopathic demeanor and just how unpleasant it is just to listen to them. If they try to say something thoughtful, (like now because of their colossal election failure) it just doesn't come off, because they are so insincere and yes, deceitful. This sort of persona is not going to fly in South Korean politics.

By comparison, Lee Jae-myung is virtually a Gandi like figure. Lee is regularly compared to Kim Dae-jung who risked everything for his country. Note Bloomberg's language, police "say" the attempted assassination of Lee was politically motivated. It was politically motivated, it couldn't be more obvious. The would be assassin published a several page political manifesto, rationalizing his crime: it was filled with the political verbiage about communists and "state enemies" one could hear in Yoon or Han public statements, with which the would be assassin portrayed himself as the patriotic hero, whose duty was to kill North Korea's criminal agent Lee Jae-myung.

The essence of the polarization is that Yoon and Han have made many political enemies with their heavy handed autocratic methods. Most are in the opposition, in independent media, but some are (or were) within their own party. Therefore, the risk to Yoon and his party is palpable. Lee Jae-myung isn't the only one at risk of going to prison.

Thanks for the odds and ends OTC. Felt a need to correct Bloomberg. I've been following the posts here on the Israeli-Iran escalation. The only thing I will say, is that the idea that Israel is essential to US national security is nonsense. They are obviously a terrible liability, loose nukes held by a rogue state. Hope it doesn't escalate.