Cynical Optimist

@BarakRavid I’m old enough to remember Trump demanding unconditional surrender.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is concerned Trump might strike a deal that falls well short of Israel's objectives, includes significant concessions and limits Israel's ability to conduct strikes against Iran, two Israeli sources say

I was reminded today that the US air campaign against ISIS lasted over 4 years. As for the putative negotiations with Iran, Trump’s position at the start was a demand for unconditional surrender. With a goal of regime change that looks unlikely. Wars are difficult to win without inflicting enormous pain. It took 2 atomic bombs before Japan surrendered. Will the US and Israel get their wish and the Iranian people take to the streets and overthrow the regime themselves? Not looking likely.

@mtracey Yeah, and how did that work out for the Romans?

Gen. Keith Kellogg, Trump's former envoy to Ukraine (how'd that go, by the way?) declares that he's a "big believer" in seizing the Strait of Hormuz, and "occupying" the relevant area with "boots on the ground." He adds: "We kind of need to do it the way the Romans used to do it"

What we are seeing right now with a large element of Special Operations Forces pushing to the Middle East is not just routine military movement. It is a deliberate positioning of capability, and more importantly, decision making power, at the highest level. The surge of at least 35 C-17 flights from key installations across the United States into Israel and Jordan strongly indicates the potential formation of a Special Operations Joint Task Force (SOJTF) or, if allied partners are involved, a Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force (CJSOTF). That distinction matters, but the implication is the same. This is not a conventional buildup. This is the architecture required to execute decisive operations. Special Operations Forces operate fundamentally differently than conventional military units. A traditional force buildup of brigades, divisions, armored units, signals preparation for large scale, sustained ground combat. That is not what this is. A SOJTF or CJSOTF is designed for precision, speed, and strategic impact. It brings together elite elements from across the services: Army Special Forces, Rangers, Navy SEALs, Air Force Special Tactics, under a unified command structure that can execute complex missions with minimal footprint but maximum effect. These formations are built to dismantle networks, eliminate remaining high value targets, enable partner forces, and create cascading operational advantages without requiring a massive ground invasion. The inclusion of the 82nd Airborne Division in this movement is also telling. The 82nd is not being positioned as the main effort, but rather as an uplift and contingency force. Their role is to provide rapid reinforcement, secure key terrain, respond to escalation, and enable the freedom of maneuver for special operations elements. They are there to support and stabilize, not to lead a conventional campaign. This combination gives the President something critically important: options. A SOJTF or CJSOTF provides the ability to act quickly without committing to a large scale war, apply precise force where it matters most, scale operations up or down based on conditions, and achieve strategic objectives without the political and human cost of a full conventional deployment. Most importantly, it creates a pathway to victory without a massive ground footprint. Victory in this context does not mean occupying terrain with large formations. It means achieving decisive outcomes: neutralizing threats, collapsing hostile networks, and shaping the environment through targeted, intelligence driven operations. That is exactly what Special Operations Forces are built to do. If the objective is to finish the job, this is the most effective way to do it. A SOJTF or CJSOTF allows the United States to bring its most capable and adaptable forces to bear, while avoiding the risks and long term commitments associated with conventional boots on the ground warfare. This is not escalation for its own sake. It is precision positioning for decisive action, and anyone saying any different is either doing so out of ignorance or because they want to use any force movement into the Middle East as a club against the President.

Israeli and perhaps US intel believed that a decapitation of the Iranian regime would lead to the kind of popular revolt that happened in December of last year and January of this year. That intel - so far - was wrong, but the war is only 3 weeks old. The air campaign alone in Operation Desert Storm in 1991 lasted 5 weeks and over 100,000 sorties were flown. So far, the US and Israel combined have flown less than 20,000. It is way too early to say that Trump is trapped.

A former NATO commander just said the quiet part out loud. Trump is trapped. The military logic of this war has collapsed into a binary no one in Washington wants to say clearly: either launch a ground invasion of Iran – a country of 90 million people, mountainous terrain, and three decades of asymmetric warfare doctrine – or declare victory over rubble and go home. Neither is winning. One is catastrophe. The other is theatre. The Strait of Hormuz is still contested. Iranian proxies are still operational. The nuclear program is dispersed, hardened, and possibly accelerated. Air strikes didn’t end the threat. Every day this drags on, the gap between what was promised and what is achievable gets wider. Gandalv / @Microinteracti1

1. This is a lie 2. Read the damn bill 3. The text beginning on page 12, line 22 makes abundantly clear that what you’re saying isn’t true 4. Why can’t Senate Democrats argue against this bill without lying?

This arrest of ILLEGAL ALIENS occurred yesterday on March 22, 2026 — BEFORE ICE officers were deployed to airports to bolster TSA efforts. ICE officers arrested Angelina Lopez-Jimenez and Wendy Godinez-Lopez at the San Francisco International Airport. These illegal aliens had a final removal order of removal from an immigration judge since 2019. While being escorted to the international terminal for processing, Lopez-Jimenez attempted to flee and resisted law enforcement officers. ICE is working as quickly as possible to repatriate the family unit to their home country of Guatemala.

A new investigation by Julie K. Brown and Claire Healy for the Miami Herald says that in the days after Epstein's death, Manhattan federal jail began shredding large quantities of documents, and then removed them from the facility under unclear circumstances. According to records, an inmate was instructed on August 15 and 16, 2019 to transport what were described as “bales” of shredded paperwork to a dumpster behind the jail, an unusually large volume that prompted a corrections officer to alert the FBI and urge agents to inspect the contents before disposal. By the time any follow-up occurred, the material had already been collected and was no longer available. Around the same period, federal prosecutors noted that certain prison records from before Epstein’s death were missing, and investigators briefly examined whether the destruction of documents could constitute obstruction of justice. The inquiry was ultimately closed without definitive conclusions, leaving unresolved questions about the circumstances surrounding the handling of records in the aftermath of Epstein’s death. Once again, more evidence that suggests a coverup. © Reddit #drthehistories

@UN_News_Centre @WMO How is climate balance measured?

Earth’s climate is “more out of balance than at any time in observed history” as global warming speeds up, @WMO warns. news.un.org/en/story/2026/…

Same interview, a few minutes apart. She couldn't stop herself from making it personal, even when she tried. The entire platform of the Democrat party for a decade has been the demonization of Trump. They are never not trying to smear him. But oh the outrage when he hits back.

@Timcast To join the speculations, it's very possible everyone thinks they are telling the truth. The IRGC may be fracturing, and elements may be in contact with the Trump admin.

Whether Trump was telling the truth or not Iran is calling him a bitch with this comment They have no interest in de-escalation Trump will likely ignore this as any response would be bad for the markets Its looking like failure at this point

@MRaff57 @Noirchick1 Saw it when I was a kid - still remember "Gort klaatu barada nikto."

@Noirchick1 The Day the Earth Stood Still

What science fiction film would you recommend to someone who hasn’t watched many?

@Babygravy9 When was the last time Krugman had a gathering with rural white Americans? Yeah, but he read their minds. Anybody kept track of how wrong this guy has been over the years?

Think how confident people like Paul Krugman must have felt to be able to say stuff like this out loud on camera.

Anyone telling you that taking out top IRGC generals, commanders, and regime leaders does not seriously weaken the Islamic Republic is either naive or being deliberately dishonest. These people did not just land in those roles yesterday. They have spent decades building networks, controlling information, and locking down every detail of how their systems work. For security reasons, they do not share real power or real knowledge with those around them. That is exactly why they are so central, because they are the system. You cannot just swap them out like parts. Sure, they have backup layers, three, five, seven deep. But those replacements have never operated at that level, never had full access to the same knowledge, never carried that kind of pressure. And now they are suddenly in the spotlight, knowing they are targets too. That’s not a smooth transition, that’s chaos. Over time, they crack. They make mistakes. They lose control. Taking out high-level officials, even someone as central as the Supreme Leader, absolutely damages the regime. It is not an instant collapse, but it’s a serious fracture. And if the pressure continues, those fractures spread.

@MarshBrentnall Macgregor and Galloway- a real clown show.

Circa 15% of the population of Israel are Russian speakers, so no, Russia won't be nuking Israel. Muppet/

Robert Mueller not knowing who Fusion GPS is, is like Earl Warren not knowing who Lee Harvey Oswald is. This exchange alone should have triggered a full scale inquiry into the corrupt machinations behind the fraudulent Mueller report.

Stephen Miller: “At the beginning of this administration, we asked every state, red and blue, to share with us their voter rolls so we could scrub it against the DHS file of illegal aliens to remove illegal aliens from their voter rolls. Every blue state refused. California refused. Minnesota refused. New York refused. In fact, they sued us to stop us from removing illegal aliens from the voter rolls, removing non-citizens from the voter rolls. But that’s not the only thing. They don’t even want to get dead people off the rolls. They don’t want to get felons off the rolls. They don’t want to get out-of-state voters off the rolls. They don’t want to get double and triple voters out of the count. Because they want the fraud. This is the most important issue, Sean, because the Biden administration brought 20 million illegal aliens into this country and this is the way, the only way, to keep them from participating in our sacred democratic process.”

@ryanburge The keyword is traditional. Mixed faith marriages often involve one partner converting to the other’s religion.

72% of people are married to someone that shares their faith tradition. Three groups are above 80% on this: Hindus Evangelicals Latter-day Saints The groups that score the lowest: Those who claim no religion in particular Mainline Protestants Jews

NATO VOWS TO REOPEN HORMUZ NATO chief Mark Rutte said he is “absolutely convinced” the alliance will reopen the Strait of Hormuz. He noted allies are coordinating their response after weeks of planning, stressing the importance of acting together with the U.S. Rutte also called the U.S. operation “crucial,” citing Iran as an “existential threat.”

THIS Is why we can’t reopen the Strait of Hormuz. THIS THIS THIS We just don’t have enough Destroyers and US Merchant Marine supertankers…. And the SHIPs for America Act doesn’t have enough fraud inside it to be passed by Congress. Dems spent $65B connecting ZERO rural homes to internet. That’s 21 US Navy destroyers!! More than enough to run convoys in the strait. Navy Veteran @PeteButtigieg was given $2 TRILLION to fix infrastructure. That’s 666 destroyers or 133 nuclear aircraft carriers! 5 years later, longer than it took us to win WW2, our infrastructure is in worse shape. FORGET EVERYTHING THE MEDIA IS TELLING YOU 👇👇👇 IS WHY WE CANNOT SECURE THE STRAIT OF HORMUZ