The irresistable appeal of the wunderwaffe.. there is a certain culture around this stuff in US, elevated by corporate media, and neocon think-tank sponsored "fluffers". Guess who benefits from it? Of course the military-industrial complex. They make money, at the same time bottom 50% of Americans hold just 2.4% of total wealth.
Jake Sullivan: "Regardless, despite Ukrainian tactical successes of using these [advanced] weapons beginning in October 2023, Sullivan said they were not game-changers... 'We ended up providing Ukraine with a very significant number of these systems down to the level where, again, we basically have no more to give,' Sullivan surmised. 'And the idea that they made a major difference operationally in the war has not been borne out by the evidence. So I think a lot has been put on this ATACMS decision to suggest, "Oh, if only you’d given ATACMS, the war would have turned out totally differently." And yet, the experience of the use of ATACMS by Ukraine on the battlefield, I think, suggests that that is not, in fact, the case'"
Ledbetter, Unwarrented Influence: "One reason the [MIC] debate has moved so little in the past twenty-five years is the lack of a clear alternative to the MIC. The problem isn’t theory—there’s plenty of theory. But the most visionary work on converting to a civilian economy has usually come from expectations—always dashed—that changing geopolitics would bring about large cuts in military spending. It may be time for critics of the MIC to abandon that fantasy. Barring some extremely unlikely events—a dramatic reduction in perceived threats to the United States, a wholesale rejection of the role of global superpower, or a protracted economic crisis that makes military spending impossible—it is difficult to see how the United States would be sufficiently motivated to eliminate its MIC, let alone replace it with something superior. The United States for the foreseeable future will continue to spend hundreds of billions of dollars every year for military purposes.
Scandals that spotlight ugly issues of military procurement—such as the $1,868 toilet seat and similar outlandish spending that surfaced during the 1980s—often create temporary impetus for limited reform. Such scandals tend to flare up either when the country is relatively at peace or after a military engagement becomes protracted. Many legislative remedies have been passed in the wake of scandals, such as increased requirements for competitive bidding and limits on the revolving door between departing Defense Department personnel and contractors. But scandals have been a recurring feature of the political and military landscape at least since the 1930s, and their reform power recedes as soon as another large conflict looms.
Hence, in the view of many critics, the size and sins of the MIC have grown, not shrunk. As has been shown repeatedly in recent decades, it is exceedingly difficult for the government to take even such seemingly simple actions as closing a few military bases. It is one of the pernicious features of a military-industrial complex that it is nearly impervious to democratic reform"
Anglo-friend Israel threw in their support immediately.
India always had a balanced approach but it is a right rope to walk on at the moment.
Was India was perceived as too buddy-buddy w/ the Anglo and somebody wanted to give a message..? There were attempts on upgrading rels with US recently, and right after the India response to Kashmiri attack, IN signed a massive trade deal w UK. Major powers of Brics all have issues with US at the moment.. The attack is obscene in its daring that it has to be some kind of message.
BBC: "UK and India agree trade deal after three years of talks"
"The 2025 Pahalgam attack was.. in the Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir.. This incident is considered the deadliest attack on civilians in India since the 2008 Mumbai attacks"
Let's see how ticket sales turn out.. Heard TB is not too Woke, I might go see this one
Is MCU back from the dead?
u.rottentomatoes("Thunderbolts")
Out[1]: {'critics': '88', 'audience': '94'}
Hughes: "Instead of wallowing in chaos, as if our job is to give the market what 'it' demands, we can harness markets to work for our needs. 'Capitalism needs to be cared for by policymakers,' Secretary of State Marco Rubio recently wrote. 'Our economy is supposed to work for our nation; our nation does not work for our economy'"
Hughes, Marketcrafters: "The stubborn persistence of the language of 'market failure' and 'government intervention' reinforces a faulty vision of how the economy works. There is no sequence where markets exist first, before a governance structure. Just as there was no state of nature where humans existed without a social order, there was never a time when markets flourished without a political order. The core flaw of the 'market failure' paradigm is that it casts the government as a reactive parental figure—one who merely corrects missteps or offers aid after harm has occurred. In this view, the government’s role is limited to 'intervening' in markets only after problems arise, much like a parent scolding a child for misbehaving on the playground. This notion of state interference with natural market forces reinforces a false market-government dichotomy, sets up the state in the role of nefarious nanny, and constrains its capacity to foster widespread prosperity"
The impression I get is US agreed not to attack Houthis in return US Navy not being a target. But ISR shipping continues to be a target.
Reuters: "US-Houthi ceasefire deal does not include Israel, says Houthi spokesperson"
NBC News: "Second fighter jet crashes into the sea after landing failure on USS Harry S. Truman"
Bessent: "[W]e’re reading every day what’s happening with factories in China. And from an academic point of view, I can tell you that the history of trade battles, we are the deficit country. The surplus country always has the most to lose"
CNBC: "China announces sweeping measures to ease policy in bid to boost trade-war hit economy.. China will cut its key policy rate by 10 basis points and lower the reserve requirement ratio by 50 basis points"
Reference
Nations and Nationalism, Culture, Narratives
The Fundamentals of Industrial Ideologies
Rome, The First Wave, Religion
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