Breaking: Netanyahu Gets A Warning; Plus Musk, Ghosts In The Machine

Earlier today I received an email reprimanding me for indulging in “clickbait” titles. That was with regard to the first post: [UPDATED] Breaking: US To Indict IDF Killers Of American Woman. I explained that that wasn’t clickbait—it was sarcasm. This time, however, it’s neither. Instead it’s actual news, as reported by the Times of Israel:

US Warns Israel That Carriers Can't Stay Indefinitely

The Pentagon giveth and the Pentagon taketh away. According to Israeli media, the Netanyahu has been put on notice that US warships could soon be ordered home and that they can't stay in eastern Mediterranean waters indefinitely to protect Israel.

Israeli media is reporting Friday that with regards to a potential wider all-out regional war and Iranian attack, a message was sent that tensions need to be reduced at some stage because "the US aircraft carriers will not be able to stay in the area forever."

Currently no less than two air craft carriers — the Theodore Roosevelt and the Abraham Lincoln — along with accompanying warships are in Mideast regional waters. They were deployed there following threats from Iran weeks ago.

…

The news isn’t so much that US forces can’t remain at this level of deployment and alert indefinitely. We all knew that. As Larry Johnson put it recently, the effects of Viagra only last so long, and so also with this level of alert. We saw that effect in the Red Sea, as well. No, the real news here seems to be that Netanyahu was warned that he needs to lower “tensions”. Does that mean stop the genocide? Probably not. It does kinda look like a warning that the US isn’t making “ironclad” guarantees—that Israel owns the present crisis. Well, maybe.

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Gotta luv this one. Elon Musk says that Trump must win, else civilization is down the tubes. I don’t think Trump has ever gone that far:

Elon Musk: Trump Must Win, Civilization Is On The Line

It appears that Musk’s issues are the First Amendment and … affirmative action? DEI? He appears to use coded language:

I have never been materially active in politics before, but this time I think civilization as we know it is on the line.

If we want to preserve freedom and a meritocracy in America, then Trump must win. https://t.co/wHnuKsr9UJ

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 5, 2024

I think I get “freedom,” coming from a media magnate. “Meritocracy” is a bit harder to grok exactly. One way or another, good issues.

James Kunstler has an article out called Ghosts In The Machine. Two quotes that I liked:

“The lies then and now are mind boggling. The people who continue to lap up the lies are beyond reach. The poison unleashed into the population will be with us a long time.”

- Edward Dowd

And one from Kunstler:

If you prefer being insane, there’s always the current incarnation of the Democratic Party, dedicated to gaslighting the nation into ruin.

The reason I liked that second one is that my father, a clinical psychologist, once wrote an article that he couldn’t get published. The thesis was that insanity is often a choice, a preference. That fits in pretty well with Kunstler’s idea that the choice to support “the current incarnation of the Democratic Party” is a preference that is insane—a willful denial of reality and a preference for an alternate “reality” that can never exist. Well, I suppose something like that could be said for conservatives who vote Republican, believing their promises, but I think wishful thinking is different from a denial of actual reality.