Paging John Kerry, There's A Call On Line One

The 1980s are calling and John Kerry has picked up the phone:

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said that Russia's plan to buy more intercontinental ballistic missiles was concerning and could herald a return to the international hostility of the "Cold War."

Speaking at a military and arms fair on Tuesday, Russia President Vladimir Putin announced the addition of 40 intercontinental ballistic missiles which, he said, were able to overcome "even the most technically advanced anti-missile defense systems."

...

Kerry said that, since the 1990s, there had been "enormous cooperation" in the destruction of nuclear weapons that were in the former territories of the Soviet Union.

No one wants to see us step backwards, nobody wants to, I think, go back to a kind of Cold War status," he added.

One might have thought that imagining that it can't happen can lead to a situation where it does happen. But maybe "Peace Through Strength" was just more Cold War nonsense brilliantly rebutted by the "Peace Through Unilateral Disarmament" crowd. Maybe!

 

 

Comments

[narciso]

this is why punctuation is important, people, yes the irony is not lost on me.

[NKonChrome]

so Greece not only defaults it reneges on the debt wholesale. Expect Greece to join Putin's currency union along with Serbia to form an Orthodox trading block. Ze Jermans will have to go somewhere else to get drunk and sunburnt. The Greek Isles will be reserved for Russian oligarchs.

[henry]

ROFL. Saturn's moon is basically made of oil.

"The hydrocarbons rain from the sky on the miserable moon, collecting in vast deposits that form lakes and dunes."

Some deity or other wants to make sure we don't run out of gas.

[Beasts of England]

A $4.0B divorce? I feel better already...

[NKonChrome]

henry-- wait, Gaia makes oil, as part of her providential bounty?

[narciso]

with that expression, you can see why she wants to divorce him,

[narciso]

there's a whole six degrees of kevin bacon, going on right there, juffali chipped in to scowcroft and red queen, christina was formerly with prince andrew, who hung around with borgia, and epstein,

[Eric in Boise]

Black Hawks Hockey Sticks and Pucks in the Net" territory

Not to mention references to "hat tricks" and the "penalty box". Who knew hockey was such a target rich environment for this stuff?

[Beasts of England]

TCFAH!

[Jack The Trans-Former]

You know you're in the Low Country and Charleston when you can get Bone Sucking Sauce and Slap Ya Mama Cajun seasoning.

[Eric in Boise]

Jackie Chiles declared the Greek debt to be outrageous, egregious, and preposterous.

Alexander Woollcott thinks it's illegal, immoral, and fattening.

[narciso]

a great interview,

http://www.historynet.com/interview-with-general-james-mattis.htm

of course, most people's historical background is very shortsided, and among those, they learn the wrong lessons,

[matt]

It's a shame the IMF doesn't have Rocco and Vito to visit Tsipras and Company.

When you blow tens of billions on the Athens Olympics; party like Zorba and then retire on the job before you retire for real and no one pays taxes there is a problem.

Didn't a Greek write the grasshopper and the ant?

As to dear Pope Francis, he still doesn't get the fact that capitalism has lifted hundreds of millions out of abject poverty just in the past 20 years. And if he can't understand that surely he cannot understand something as complex as climatology.

[narciso]

Luigi Vercotti, and the place is already wrecked,

btw, it's now the Canadians turn to be hacked,

[Jack The Trans-Former]

Thanks for that post on the interview with Mad Dog, narc.

He is warrior's warrior, a vanishing breed in this Regime's military.

[Thomas Collins]

Perhaps the Greeks bearing a deadbeat attitude is doing the international financial system a favor. Perhaps it's time for a reckoning.

Or perhaps George Soros can buy Greece. Wouldn't it be great to have your own 100% owned entity own Greece, George?

[narciso]

yes, but once you've caught that car then what,

[Thomas Collins]

For some reason, the attitude of Greece's leaders towards financial continence and the importance of a population's work ethic reminds me of this song from Grease.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njSQVLDl3-s

[NKonChrome]

ThomasC-- what did you think of the Malanga take on your world in Wash Exam?

[narciso]

some things are so obvious even jon stewart misses them,

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2015/06/shes-laura-linney-white.php

[narciso]

chocolate rations deliveries will be waylaid,

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-federal-reserve-interest-rate-20150617-story.html

[daddy]

OT I think.

FOX News just played this exchange at a House Armed Services Committee Hearing today between Joint Chiefs General Martin Dempsey and a Minnesota Congressman John Kline about what we are doing in Iraq.

Harris Faulkner plays this clip:

Congressman Kline: Are we in a quagmire there? Is it a stalemate? Are we winning? What's going on?

Gen Dempsey: I got it. And by the way, lets talk about the personal pronoun "We." This has to be "Them" right?, so if you're asking if the United States is wining, thats the wrong question.

Kline: No, I'm sorry, that's the question I'm asking. We've got soldiers there, we've got a commitment there, we're flying AirStrikes there, are We *(Big Emphasis) the United States, the Free World, Western Allies, our Allies there, are we winning or losing?

Harris then turns to her analyst talking head and says this:

Harris: You know Congressman Kline seems to be asking a pretty basic question. So is this our fight or not, and if it is, are we at least leading it?

Her talking head is some guy named Joshua Katz, former CIA covert Ops Officer; I do not know but he replies: You know Harris, it was a great question. And I think what we saw was General Dempsey...his transition is complete. He is no longer a Military Officer, he is a talking mouth for the Administration and it's policies. So unfortunately General Dempsey did not answer a very basic question. The Congressman was right...

My guess is we'll be seeing that clip many times later today.

[Thomas Collins]

NK, do you mean his pensions article? He understated the problem if anything. When I think about what rates of growth would be needed to pay federal, state and local unfunded liabilities, and what Obama and then Hillary if she's elected have done and will do to retard growth, I think we may be on our way to being a MegaGreece.

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/pension-wave-about-to-crash-on-taxpayers/article/2565965

[narciso]

no, it's exactly on point, Dempsey was one of those naysayers, along with Cartwright, when Petraeus was pushing his 'hail mary' counterinsurgency play,

[NKonChrome]

ThomasC-- considering you are our JOM Bond expert, thanks for that cheery assessment. Excuse me... I am going to go out and drink some hemlock.

[Gentlejim]

Beasts nails it with his last two. Hahaha

[narciso]

just a reminder,

http://www.frontpagemag.com/2013/joseph-klein/key-questions-on-chuck-hagel-go-unanswered/

before that Richard Clarke, was their big get, and who was the one who did more favors for the Sauds,
like greenlighting the flights after 9.11

[Captain Haiku]

Better song for Trump
Than Rockin' in the Free World
We Shall Overcomb

[daddy]

Harris Faulkner doing a great job sitting in for Shep Smith today. What an improvement.

[henry]

DuDa will rue the day he spiked the football over Gowdy making Issa stomp away mad. Rue. The. Day.

The Treasury Deputy IG has confirmed what most suspect re: Lois Lerner: "There is potential criminal activity."

(ht some lurker in Chicago).

[GMax]

I will believe a Greek default when I see it with my own 20/15 vision. Having been in lots of developer "work outs" with multiple lenders back when I was a highly paid consultant, I can say confidently that nothing gets done when everyone is talking nice to each other. Someone has to get mad, and I mean really angry swearing out loud mad, before any real progress is going to be made. Perhaps the Greeks had to have the lenders tell them to go see who else will loan you a drachma, in order to get it through their thick heads that they will not be calling all the shots in this.

[Beasts of England]

If it's 'them', then I'm not exactly sure why General Dempsey would be testifying. I mean, he's 'us', right?

[pagar]

Daddy, The WH claims:

http://www.weaselzippers.us/226669-white-house-takes-credit-kurdish-fighters-victory-over-isis-in-northern-syria/

[GMax]

Hell Triumph the Insult Comic Dog would be an improvement over Shemp Smith...

[NKonChrome]

GMax-- in truth Greece already defaulted on a 300M euro interest payment 10 days ago, so they are in 'default' This Parliament cmte Report is outright reneging on 'odius' Bankster debt. I think they want to leave the currency union altogether.

[NKonChrome]

I like Triumph the insult dog.

[daddy]

Judge Napoltano says this about the Supreme's upcoming decision on the ObamaCare subsidies:

Napolitano: I think we get (the decision) on whatever the last Monday is in June, June 28th. I think, just a guess from the Oral Argument, they are going to allow these subsidies to remain. They are going to find that this was "a Scriveners error," that it was written down improperly.

Harris: Those 5 words, Exchanges established by the State?

Napolitano: That's it.

Hopefully the Judge will continue to be dead wrong.

[Captain Hate]

Str8 outta Scranton:

http://www.weaselzippers.us/226722-biden-in-world-war-i-america-should-have-bombed-its-own-steel-mills/

[Beasts of England]

World's finest canine weatherman.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3-TfZslHKoo

[Thomas Collins]

"JOM Bond expert"

Cheer up, NK. I suspect TM is the expert from the financial side. Perhaps he has a rosier assessment. Even if he doesn't, eschew the hemlock and go for a glass of Giuseppe Rinaldi Brunate Nebbiolo with a Jameson chaser and a Bruichladdich subchaser. If that doesn't make you mellow, there's always Dom in the champagne room at Scores with Destiny (and your wife, of course).

[Thomas Collins]

We did build up our own nation, Ben, and then facilitated more growth by being the military might behind the international trading system. If we recede from this role, there will be no peace dividend; there will either be a successor backstopper (probably China) or there will be war of all against all. In either case, in the US, it will be the poor and middle class who will suffer the most (the Thorne Heinz and Obama and Gore and Billary types will do fine for awhile by continuing to exploit the fruits of spending the capital built up by others).

[Thomas Collins]

We did build up our own nation, Ben, and then facilitated more growth by being the military might behind the international trading system. If we recede from this role, there will be no peace dividend; there will either be a successor backstopper (probably China) or there will be war of all against all. In either case, in the US, it will be the poor and middle class who will suffer the most (the Thorne Heinz and Obama and Gore and Billary types will do fine for awhile by continuing to exploit the fruits of spending the capital built up by others).

[pagar]

TC, @03:32:

Do not worry Obama has a plan for that.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/government-paves-way-multiemployer-pension-plan-cuts-155134577--finance.html

"People 80 years old and over are protected from any upcoming cuts, while those over 75 are partially protected."

[NKonChrome]

@4:03-- the default advice, follow the ChiCom way.

[Beasts of England]

It's much more than a school of thought, re: bringing down Russia through an arms race - it was the idea behind Star Wars. And while the technological advnacement were nice, it was an economic weapon by design.

[Threadkiller]

Focus on the hair
When Trump says he has your back
Well... not Krauthammer's

[NKonChrome]

pagar- and if you like that plan, wait to you see Obummer's soc sec restructuring plan. Retired working class white people getting it the neck is an Obummer speciality.

[Thomas Collins]

Nationalism, Ben? I'd say I was totally non-nationalistic. I acknowledged that another Westphalian state could backstop the international trading system. Agree or disagree with me, I don't think it's nationalistic to argue that relief from the role of being the world's policemen involves unpleasant tradeoffs.

[Beasts of England]

*advancements*

[daddy]

You guys discussing gin or wine to deal with "Fear of Flying" syndrome, may need to switch to double martini's:

DOT to Investigate FAA Based on FOX Business Report

The Department of Transportation is investigating the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) following a FOX Business Network report, which uncovered misconduct and cheating in the air traffic controller program.

FOX Business just ran a story on this, explaining how FOX had uncovered that applicants to become Air Traffic Controllers were being given the answers so they could cheat and pass the tests, and that once it had been reported the FAA had tried to sweep it under the rug via internal investigations. Now it seems that as a result of FOX re-pushing the story, outside agencies (the DOT) will now investigate.

I can't tell from the limited info if the cheating the FAA hirers engaged in was significant cheating, by which I mean whether it allowed incompetents into the job. IMHO, anybody with a decent quick brain, decent verbal abilities, perceptive, and relatively clear thinking, should be able to do the job, so I can't tell if FOX is playing this up since the general public knows nothing of the particulars of aviation and can easily have the bejesus scared out of them with stories like this, but overall I am glad it isn't being swept under the rug as apparently the FAA tried to do.

[lyle]

All you need to know from that Malanga Wash Examiner article linked upthread:

But as government employees gained political influence, especially through the emergence of public sector unions beginning in the late 1950s

Okay, maybe this, too:

But the ERISA law doesn't apply to state and local pensions.

[Beasts of England]

King Putt would love to screw with middle class pensions, but I promise that any action like that would bring on his rapid demise. There's no more give left...

[lyle]

Giuseppe Rinaldi Brunate Nebbiolo

I have a few '04s in my cellar if anyone wants to gather and commiserate...

[Thomas Collins]

I see the US as the best possible hegemon, Ben, on this level of creation. Does that equate to benevolence? No way. Westphalian states that can preen about benevolence can do so only if another Westphalain state is supplying the muscle.

As far as how the US is viewed in the world, Ben, do a thought experiment. Open immigration for a year. Which country would have the greatest percentage inflow? Something is telling it won't be China or any of the Euro-paradises.

[Eric in Boise]

Focus on the hair

Another commenter remarked that if Trump gets the nomination there'll be hell toupee.

[lyle]

But I'm plum out of hemlock...

[NKonChrome]

BoE-- Obummer sees it a little differently. While crushing private pensions and Soc Sec screws 80somethings, that plus college loan debt bailouts would make young white people happy and capture their votes. So while pension reneging destroys the Old White Dem Party, it opens the door for Prog Third World party, supported by white millennials.

[Beasts of England]

I don't think he cares about the party at all, NK, but I'm not arguing with your policy analysis. Let's just hope the clock runs out before he completes his destruction of our country.

[NKonChrome]

Yep BoE, that should be our plan. We need to call him out every time he tries a smash and grab to pay off his parasite base, at the expense of working people and producers.

[narciso]

teaching otto, is an quixotic exercise, like climbing 'the two summitts of Kilimanjaro,

it is rare to be that ignorant of history, economics, or any subject, outside of the Vox masthead, and Zaphod's white house,

[lyle]

Let's just hope the clock runs out before he completes his destruction of our country.

Cue the allegro assai double time final movement, maestro...

We can call it a tarantella. Or perhaps an arabesque would be more fitting.

[Beasts of England]

As long as we're drinking really good wine on our way to Belize.

[narciso]

in the 'scum and villainy' folder,

http://acecomments.mu.nu/?post=357392

[narciso]

would that we have another Palmerston,

http://www.civitas.org.uk/pdf/CivitasReviewMarch05.pdf

[GMax]

Since the 70s I have told everyone that would listen that Soc Sec is a scam and its going to blow up on my age cohort ( the youngest boomers). I have said to many incredulous folks, that I would make this bargain in a heartbeat, i.e. "just give me back the money I paid in, no interest required, and I will sign away any claim on another nickel." And I mean it. I am going to file on my birthday when I turn 62 and hope I get it back before the river runs bone dry. That is coming and some will learn to find that cat food with a little salsa aint half bad...( wont be me, as I will track Beasts to wherever he heads in Belize and become his next door neighbor!

[daddy]

Speaking of discrimination...

Having just spent a week back East I find how easy it is back there to wake up and quickly catch-up with the JOM threads, whereas now being back on the West coast, here it is 12:42 local and I still haven't caught up with the threads and usually don't until about dog walk time after 4 PM.

This is discrimination pure and simply. Me and A(B) have to put in 4 to 5 times as much effort as you East Coast guys, simply to catch up and not say stuff that's redundant or stupid.

Obviously we need compensation for this burden, but I haven't yet figured out what form that ought to take yet. What do the rest of you Time Zone oppressed West Coast JOMer's think the East Coast JOMer's owe us for this Cronyism Chronos-ism?

[Jack The Trans-Former]

daddy,

The interview with Mad Dog Mattis and the answer by Humpty Dempsey are so startling different you will understand why WE are in a quagmire and losing the war on ISIS whether we like it or not that its the Iraqi's problem.

[Thomas Collins]

It's the peak, Ben, if one concludes, as I do, that (I) mankind lives in original sin, and (II) even if one is an atheist, original sin is appropriately viewed as a metaphor for man's social relations. Don't make the ideal the enemy of the workable.

As for what attracts immigrants, what attracted my Christian Armenian uncle for whom I worked as a child in his Manhattan deli (today he would have been fined or arrested for violating child labor laws, and I wouldn't have had the opportunity to serve the most diverse group of customers imagineable) was a better opportunity than that provided by the Religion of Peace in the Ottoman Empire. As to whether the laziness of Americans entered into his calculations, I don't know for sure, but I suspect not.
By the way, Ben, although I have disagreed with you on many occasions with your view that strategic anarchism can produce a more just society, I do think you hold that view in good faith.

[Jack The Trans-Former]

So, narc, based on your 4:40 is Greece also going to drop out of NATO?

[NKonChrome]

Greece is IN NATO?

who knew

[narciso]

it's the one thing, the right and left wings of the coalition probably agree on,

[daddy]

there'll be hell toupee.

Eric,

What a great line:)

[Jeff Dobbs]

daddy:
Obviously we need compensation for this burden, but I haven't yet figured out what form that ought to take yet.

Look, I'm just junior part time blogger here, but let me put in a good word for you with the staff at JOM HQ and we might be able to get you a refund on your membership fees. No promises, but I'm willing to give it a shot. Fingers crossed!

[Jack The Trans-Former]

NK,

You're joking right? About Greece's membership in NATO.

Turkey will hold rallies if they drop out and then decide to annex Cyprus fully. Let Putin's navy come to the rescue. After all that is where all the Russkie money is buried.

[Extraneus]

TALIAN FAMILIES PROTEST FORCED CROSS-DRESSING OF SCHOOLCHILDREN

In the northern Italian city of Trieste, parents are in uproar over a taxpayer-funded elementary school program that includes dressing little boys as girls and girls as boys to overcome so-called “gender stereotypes.” Schools are calling the exercise “the game of respect,” which purportedly adopts many guidelines from the European standards on sex education, attributed to the World Health Organization.

The so-called “game of respect” consists in a box containing several cards, presenting the figures of different working roles: male and female housewives and husbands, male and female plumbers and firefighters, with the figures represented in exactly the same way to show that males and females are completely interchangeable.

There is also a card with a game called “If he were she and she were he,” where boys and girls are expected to exchange the clothes they are wearing: the boy dresses as a girl and the girl as a boy, and they discuss how they feel in that new “role.”

Parents are especially up in arms over the school district’s attempt to conceal the program and its contents from them. The father of one of the children, Amedeo Rossetti, said that in early February, he attended a PTA meeting where the program for the second semester was presented. When Rossetti posed specific questions on issues of gender, school administrators categorically denied the presence of gender-based activities at the school.

[lyle]

While you're at it, Jeff, the JOM mens room is out of handtowels and aftershave. Thanks.

[NKonChrome]

I'm quite serious about Greece joining Putin's Orthodox currency and security union.The Greeks can rationally conclude that offers a grate deterrent against Erdogan than Nato.

[NKonChrome]

'greater'

[henry]

Well, this means the Chinese aren't necessarily great hackers, but the govt IT folks make the ACA website people look competent.

[narciso]

that juffali fellow'a got a nice crib in Surrey, they only show the pool in Kensington,

[Marlene on Kindle]

Wow,Dana Perino really hates Trump.

[Cecil Turner]

Well, this sucks:

Rising federal debt threatens to choke economic growth within a decade, beginning a death spiral that will sap revenue from government programs even as demands grow, forcing the government to borrow even more, Congress‘ budget watchdog said in a frightening report Tuesday.

Maybe if we just go Greek on it? How much is $19bil in drachmae?

[narciso]

anyone spot the paradox in that statement?

[Jack The Trans-Former]

narc,

His joint in Kensington is an old chruch he renovated with the indoor pool. When you're as ugly as he is its imperative you have beaucoup money.

[GMax]

The Greeks might want to have a talk with the Czechs, or maybe the Hungarians or maybe the Lithuanians about cozying up to a grizzly bear. Takes quite a bit of time, talent and effort to ever break free of the grip and the bear sometimes gets hungry...

[GMax]

First I read this and muttered "damn":

Fed officials sharply downgraded their economic forecast for this year. They projected the economy would grow between 1.8% and 2% this year, well below the range of 2.3% to 2.7% in its last forecast in March.

If they’re correct, annual growth would be the worst since 2011 and would be far from the breakout performance some economists had hoped for this year.

But now I am trying to set the betting line on the over/under for Josh Incredibly Not Earnest telling us about Recovery Summer. What will this be, Part Seven? Only Jason has more lives than this talking point...

[jimmyk]

Maybe if we just go Greek on it?

We have an option not open to the Greeks, which is to default by debasing the currency. I don't see a viable alternative, though it's hard to see when the fun will begin.

[rse]

Ex-that is straight out of UNESCO standards. I have them somewhere. I remember the reader who sent them to me offline in horror.

[Captain Hate on the iPad]

Shocking that a party outsider like PeRINO would hate Trump.

[jimmyk]

Actually there is one viable alternative to inflating away the debt, and that is large cuts in spending, plus entitlement reform. Those seem about as likely as discovering oil under Manhattan.

[Jack The Trans-Former]

Not until the Cypriot banks did the "bail-in" and buried the Russkie cash. You really are an idiot.

[henry]

Jack, he probably thought giving the Chinese outsourcers root access to the OPM system was a good idea. Oops, that was Obama.

[Jeff Dobbs]

lyle:
While you're at it, Jeff, the JOM mens room is out of handtowels and aftershave. Thanks.

Thank you for for contacting JOM. Your comment is very important to us. Please stay on the line and your comment will be answered in the order in which it was received. Para espanol escribe el numero dos por favor.

[NKonChrome]

The Fed Sez: "The economy continues to suck under Obummer" DO TELL!

CBO Says: "Obuumernomics have bankrupted the country with Debt." DO TELL!

JOMers have been saying this for 6 years. WE ARE SOOOPERGENIUSES!

[Captain Hate on the iPad]

As henry's links make clear, nobody who's been in the belly of the beast will be surprised at the hacking.

[NKonChrome]

former IRS Commish Miller was none too pleased.

[narciso]

we're at full Brawndo, of course the pieces don't explicitly point out, the policies involved, those just happened,

[Cispigmented Heteronormative Microagressive Ignatz]

Jeremy Clarkson on Greece.

[Ben Zaynus]

~ ` ' `, ~ ' . ` ,
.oOo. . . .oOo.

[Extraneus]

The gov't, with trillions of dollars of spending each year, couldn't secure their own computer systems.

I think I should read the ending of this before it's too late:

The Roman Empire: A Very Short Introduction