Archive for 2017
May 3, 2017
AMERICA’S AIRLIFT AND SEA LIFT DEFICIT: It exists, unfortunately. This article does a good job of sketching the problem.
Here it is, succinctly:
TRANSCOM doesn’t have enough ships, airborne tankers or cargo aircraft to get a large number of troops to a battlefield and sustain them.
Last week I was at a conference where I linked up with an old friend who is a retired Australian Army reserve officer. He remains active in Australia’s military and foreign policy community. After the conference ended we went to one of my favorite Texas cafes. We discussed North Korea and Asian security then got to talking about C-17s — what fabulous planes they are and how we don’t have enough of them. Australia bought two of the last big batch Boeing manufactured. It has eight in service. My friend said he knows Australia and the U.S. both need more C-17s. For that matter, so do Canada, Great Britain and NATO. (If our list sounds parochial, remember the conversation was between an Australian and an American. FWIW, NATO’s Heavy Airlift Wing has three C-17s.)
There is simply no other transport plane that can do what it does. Unfortunately, Boeing built its last C-17 Globemaster III in late 2015.
Here’s an extract from the Defense Industry Daily article on the Aussie’s C-17 buy:
Australia is a big country. Coast to coast distances are roughly the same as New York to Los Angeles. Or, to put it another way, you could drop Europe on top from Lisbon, Portugal to the Russia-Ukraine border. Tactical transport aircraft like the C-130J Hercules and the C-27J Spartan are necessary within the country, and Australia’s role as a regional stabilizer and a Western country extends its circles of influence and concern to locations far beyond its shores.
An intratheater transport was necessary, and Australia’s government sums up their choice as follows: “One C-17A can carry up to four C-130 Hercules loads in a single lift, and cover twice the distance in three-quarters of the time of a C-130.”
The plane’s tactical advantage and combat loads:
C-17s can even operate from unpaved, unimproved runways, though this is rarely done. The potential for minor but expensive damage from flying rocks or other hazards makes air forces reluctant to do it, unless there’s some compelling need.
The C-17 is designed to airdrop up to 102 paratroopers and equipment. In Australian terms, it can also carry one 60-ton M1 Abrams tank as well as loads ranging from 5 Bushmaster external link infantry vehicles to 3 Tiger reconnaissance/attack helicopters external link.
“Compelling need” means soldiers on the ground need the equipment right now.
JOSH BLACKMAN: Pre-Existing Contradictions.
There is a perverse contradiction about Obamacare’s most popular feature: people overwhelmingly support Obamacare’s protections for people with preexisting conditions, unless they understand that these protections increase the cost of insurance for people without preexisting conditions.
I discuss the results of a September 2009 Kaiser poll in Unraveled:
Under the Affordable Care Act, he said, “for insurance companies to drop your coverage when you get sick or water it down when you need it the most.” By far, this was one of the most popular aspects of the ACA, if not the most popular provision. A September 2009 Kaiser survey found that 80% of respondents supported this ban – that included 88% of Democrats and 67% of Republicans. Among those supporters, however, only 56% still favored the provision if it resulted in higher premiums; 36% would oppose it. Supporters almost certainly did not realize that requiring insurers to cover sick people would necessarily shift the cost onto everyone else.
Eight years later, the numbers remain remarkably the same. According to a Cato/YouGov survey from March 2017, the support for the pre-existing condition ban flips when people recognize that it imposes costs on everyone else:
By a margin of 63% to 33%, Americans support the ACA’s community-rating provision that prevents health insurers from charging some customers higher rates based on their medical history. However, support flips with a majority opposed 60%-31% if the provision caused the quality of health care to get worse.
Majorities also come to oppose the ACA’s community-rating provision if it increased premiums (55% oppose, 39% favor), or raised taxes (53% oppose, 40% favor).
This divide resembles President Obama’s lie that people can keep the plans they like. Nothing is free.
Americans keep falling for the oldest scam in the world: That government spending is just other people’s money. In the end though, we’re all the other people.
THEY TOLD ME IF TRUMP WERE ELECTED WE’D SEE OPEN RACISM RETURN TO AMERICA. AND THEY WERE RIGHT! Missouri Official: Clarence Thomas Is ‘A Black Political Zombie’ Who Shouldn’t Be Asked to Speak.
St. Louis’ Bar Association has invited Supreme Court Associate Justice Clarence Thomas to give the keynote speech at its annual Law Day Celebration—an invitation that piqued a member of the Missouri Board of Education.
Mike Jones, who is also a columnist for the St. Louis American, described Clarence Thomas as “a black political zombie” and “a breathing example of what the evil of American racism looks like when it metastasizes in a black body.”
Jones says that Thomas is one of two Supreme Court Justices “uniquely worthy of the contempt of black Americans”—the other one being Chief Justice Roger Taney, who led the notorious 1857 Dred Scott decision that upheld slavery.
Much of Jones’ attack on Thomas is ad hominem. To the extent he does explain his ire, Jones is furious that the Justice would hold different political opinions than he does.
I feel like Missouri’s dying Democratic machine is still stuck at the “anger” stage.
GERSH KUNTZMAN: Hillary Clinton shouldn’t be writing a book — she should be drafting a long apology to America.
Hey, Hillary Clinton, shut the f— up and go away already.
I voted for Clinton on Nov. 8 and thought she’d be a good president.
But she lost. And she still wants us to feel bad about that. And, worse, she’s still blaming everyone else.
On Tuesday at the Women for Women conference, she reminded us again what a flawed candidate she was last year — and what a flawed person she has always been.
In her talk before a friendly audience, Clinton said she’s writing a memoir — and said it’s “painful” to revisit how Donald Trump beat her like a ragdoll in an election that was a lock.
Painful? We’re the ones in pain, Hillary. You’re making millions to process it. We’re the ones living it.
The lingering bitterness isn’t limited to Hillary herself.
WE NEED A SPECIAL PROSECUTOR TO INVESTIGATE THIS: Judicial Watch claims more evidence of classified info in Clinton emails. The seriousness of the charge requires it.
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AS ALINSKY WOULD SAY, MAKE THE ENEMY LIVE UP TO HIS OWN BOOK OF RULES: After the left took out O’Reilly, it’s no surprise to see #FireColbert heat up.
MEXICO VERSUS MEXICO AND THE BATTLE OVER IMPUNITY: My latest Creators Syndicate column. Corruption is rampant but a lot of former state governors are in jail or face criminal charges.
BRIAN LEITER IS UNHAPPY: Thought crimes watch: comparing trans-racialism to transgenderism verboten! It’s a feminist journal, so I love his reference to “whatever passes for peer review” there. Ouch! Plus:
Apparently the “harm” to Prof. Tuvel of a public apology by the majority of the editorial board of the journal that published her article was outweighed by the “harm” of her thought crime to transgender people. (Addendum: no thought crime is complete without a public letter of protest. What is chilling about this is that instead of this campaign of vilification of a junior faculty member and demand for “retraction” of her article, someone could have written a response piece and sent it to the same journal. But this is obviously not a scholarly community, but a political one. Those familiar with the history of 20th-century Marxist movements will recognize what’s going on here, and it isn’t a happy sight.)
Well, leftist autophagy isn’t an entirely unhappy sight. (Bumped).
‘TIS A PITY HE WASN’T: North Korea Arrests US Citizen For Plotting To Overthrow Govt.
FORTRESSES AS FAR AS THE EYE CAN SEE: B-17s on a mission fill the sky.
CULTURE OF CORRUPTION: Study documents how profitable access to Obama’s White House was.
On April 12, 2017, former Boeing CEO Jim McNerney sat down in the West Wing with President Trump. Trump had, on the campaign trail, advocated abolishing the Export-Import Bank, a federal agency that typically subsidizes $10 billion a year in Boeing exports.
On April 13, Trump announced he would fill out Ex-Im’s board of directors, thus reviving the agency’s ability to subsidize Boeing’s overseas customers.
This was a replay from eight years earlier.
Candidate Barack Obama had called Ex-Im “little more than a slush fund for corporate welfare.” Obama soon picked McNerney and General Electric CEO Jeff Immelt as his manufacturing czar and jobs czar, respectively. GE is arguably Ex-Im’s No. 2 beneficiary. Obama quickly came around on the agency, and became Ex-Im’s most important ally in Washington. . . .
The researchers found two notable things about the companies that made up these 2,286 meetings: That money helped the executives get in the door, and getting in the door helped them make money.
It’s the Chicago Way.
“I NEED WIDER POWERS!” Venezuela plan to rewrite constitution branded a coup by former regional allies.
“It seems that he is doubling down, and not realizing that those who die in the street – whatever colour they wear – are Venezuelans,” said Malcorra.
Brazil’s top diplomat described the proposal for a constituent assembly as a coup d’état. “It is another break with democracy, violating the country’s constitution,” said foreign minister Aloysio Nunes in a Facebook post. Nunes said Brazil could not intervene, but had condemned Maduro’s “escalation of authoritarianism”.
Venezuela is likely to shrug off the accusations, having grown accustomed to criticism from the two countries which have seen a switch of government from left to right in recent years. In Brazil’s case, that shift came about after the impeachment of president Dilma Roussef – a move which Maduro described as a coup.
Maduro – who is struggling to overcome low approval ratings, bloody demonstrations, a deteriorating economy, runaway crime and riots over food shortages – said on Monday that the new constitution was necessary to overcome the gridlock paralysing the country so that the nation’s considerable oil wealth could be channelled to the people more effectively.
Unexpectedly, of course.
HAVE YOU HUGGED A FRACKER TODAY? Oil Forecast to Fall Sharply if OPEC Doesn’t Extend Production Cuts.
Oil markets have largely priced in an extension to the deal struck between OPEC, Russia and other producers late last year.
If that deal isn’t extended, prices could drop below $40, a level not seen for over a year, some analysts say.
If the output cuts are extended when the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and other suppliers meet on May 25, oil prices would rise to $60 a barrel by the end of the year.
“The market appears to have largely priced in an extension to the output-cut deal,” said Warren Patterson, commodity strategist at ING Bank. “This is a significant risk for the market, with no deal likely to lead to an aggressive selloff.”
Brent crude will average at $57 a barrel this year, reaching $60 in the fourth quarter, according to a poll of 14 investment banks surveyed by The Wall Street Journal in late April. That is broadly unchanged from the previous survey. The banks expect West Texas Intermediate, the U.S. oil gauge, to average $55 a barrel this year.
In early Wednesday trade, Brent was trading at $50.80 a barrel, while WTI was changing hands at $47.90 a barrel.
Supply could be increasing just in time for the annual summertime demand spike, and frackers are in better financial condition today than they were in 2014 when the last glut began.
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SO IT DOESN’T SOUND LIKE THERE’S MUCH TO THE TALK OF TRUMP REVISITING LIBEL LAW. Well, that’s fine with me. As a blogger and a pundit, I’m very, very happy with New York Times v. Sullivan.
But let’s not pretend that it would be the end of the world if Sullivan were overturned. We had a free press before Sullivan, after all. At core, Sullivan is just a subsidy to the news media, substituting constitutional doctrine for libel insurance premiums.
Ironically, though, all the left’s “Fake News” drumbeating increases the pressure for more press accountability. I don’t think that’s enough for a constitutional amendment, which is fine, but if Trump wants to jawbone them, well, they’ve given him a lot to work with.
CUE WORLD’S SMALLEST VIOLIN: Former RNC Chair on Paul Ryan: ‘Amazing’ His Hair Isn’t Gray or Gone. “My advice to the speaker was don’t take the job, back when he was looking at it.”
COMMUNITY PROPERTY: UK and EU at odds over size of ‘divorce bill’
An EU source has told the BBC that officials in Brussels will not enter into a discussion about potential figures for a final bill, likely to be one of the hardest-fought and most sensitive areas of the Brexit process.
On Wednesday, the Financial Times claimed the likely bill had risen sharply from 60bn to 100bn euros, basing its calculations on new data from across Europe.
Mr Barnier said there was no agreed figure but the UK and EU had entered into “mutual commitments” which must be honoured. “There is no Brexit bill. The final settlement is all about settling the accounts.”
Mr Davis said the negotiations had not started in earnest but he indicated the UK would set down a marker when it came to talks over the divorce settlement.
“We are not supplicants,” he said. “This is a negotiation. They lay down what they want and we lay down what we want.”
Various figures ranging from 50bn to 100bn euros had been knocking around, he said, but he had “not seen” any official numbers. Asked directly whether a figure of 100bn euros – was acceptable, he replied: “We will not be paying €100bn.”
Think of Brexit as a contested divorce between a wealthy couple with zero love left but plenty of bitterness, and you won’t go far wrong.
SHE’LL BLAME EVERYBODY BUT HERSELF: Clinton blames Comey, WikiLeaks for election loss. She’s willing to take responsibility for her defeat, but not the blame.
But hey, run, Hillary, run! Hillary 2020 — the Revenge Tour!
THINK OF HER AS AN ESPECIALLY OBVIOUS LEFTIST OPERATIVE AND YOU WON’T GO WRONG: Amanpour blows it: Clinton interview a fluff affair.