A Trump Whisperer

If you read COTTonLINE you probably like Donald J. Trump, probably voted for him. I just read the best column about our next and former President I have ever seen, and you know I read a lot of stuff.

It is written by Salena Zito whose work we’ve cited here repeatedly … actually 20 times that a quick computerized search found. She likes Trump and he likes her, even if he has dissed her a couple of times. 

What’s more she “gets” Trump, understands why he connects with regular people, people who actually know how things work and how to fix them or build them. If she’s not a “coal miner’s daughter,” she grew up with gals who were.

Zito popularized the deep wisdom of the comment that the press takes him literally but not seriously, whereas his supporters take him seriously but not literally. They know each other well enough for him to tease her about her hair; if she teases him she doesn’t brag about it.

I put this column in the elite “must read” category. I make that call less than twice a year. That is how good it is.

Mean-Spirited, Corrupt, Avaricious, and Vindictive

As Joe Biden leaves office on Monday, various pundits are writing appraisals of the Biden presidency. For PJ Media, Lincoln Brown pens an unkind but probably accurate portrait of the man nominally in charge during those four years.

He is a mean-spirited, corrupt, avaricious, and vindictive old man who felt entitled to his ride in the Oval Office despite driving the nation to the brink of poverty and chaos and the world to the edge of war.

I believe Biden did two massively stupid things. He botched the withdrawal from Afghanistan and he threw open the border. History will forgive him for neither.

And I was often embarrassed by Biden’s stumbles, fumbles and foibles. The world’s supposed hegemon should have better representation on the world stage.

Not Loving Trans Issues

The Daily Wire summarized the findings of a new poll on transexualism.

New polling from the New York Times shows that Americans, regardless of political party, agree with Republican positions on numerous transgender issues, including gender transitions for minors and sports inclusion.

Steve McGuire Xtras those findings as follows: 

Society has gone too far or far enough accommodating trans people:

  Total: 77%

  GOP: 93%

  Dem: 62% 

Trans women should NOT be allowed in women’s sports:

  Total: 79%

  GOP: 94%

  Dem: 67% 

Minors should NOT be able to get puberty blockers: 

  Total: 71%

  GOP: 90%

  Dem: 54% 

Another indication, if needed, that a new age of common sense is dawning as the coerced age of woke dies.

Vietnam to Emulate Argentina’s Milei

Lucianne.com links to an unusual source - Gateway Hispanic - which carries an article reporting efforts by supposedly Communist Vietnam to emulate the government streamlining pioneered by Javier Milei in Argentina. In passing it notes the incoming Trump administration plans to do likewise.

Communists are supposed to love government planning above all else, so how to understand this move by Vietnam? The other DrC and I have visited Vietnam and I’ll report what we saw and experienced which tend to support what the article claims.

On our visit to Vietnam several years ago we saw lots of communist sloganeering - billboards and banners - alongside what was obviously rampant capitalism in action. Lots of gold stars on scarlet backgrounds and socialist realism posters, yes. Also everyone mounted on a lite motorcycle with their entire family hanging on for dear life, thousands of small businesses everywhere, and little evidence of regimentation or standardization. 

As a retired business school prof I pay attention to economic activity in a place I visit. Virtually every new house being built had a shop on the ground floor with living quarters above. If the builder didn’t intend to be a shopkeeper himself he planned to rent it to someone who wanted a place of business, making him a landlord. 

It was very clear that whatever government slogans were being mouthed, the people were culturally capitalists and getting on with their businesses. We also experienced some of this in 1980s China.

So whatever Marx and Mao said and wrote, the people of Asia have a seemingly quite strong sense of doing business and getting ahead that likely dates back centuries. The former Saigon, now Ho Chi Minh City, is a teeming, sweltering place with thousands of motorbikes put-putting every which way. And shops large and small everywhere you look.

I suspect the Vietnamese used the Communists’ sense of organization to help them get the foreigners to leave and are now honoring that “dictatorship of the proletariat” ideology more in the breach than in actuality. They understand neighbor China is a bigger threat than the far off U.S., and are among those contesting China’s attempts at hegemony in the greater South China Sea.

So yes, I can imagine Vietnam discovering the bureaucrats cost more than they were worth (certainly true here) and made doing everything much harder than it needed to be (ditto). Some regulation is necessary but it is easily overdone and should be kept to a minimum. Human beings thrive better when largely responsible for their own outcomes - good and bad.

David Lynch 1946 - 2025

People are writing to eulogize the great film director David Lynch. He is being remembered for the surreal TV mini-series Twin Peaks and a number of films. 

Most remembrances I’ve seen do not mention Lynch’s 1984 version of Frank Herbert’s Dune. I suppose the authors prefer the more recent adaptation by Villeneuve, two episodes of which are already released.

I have seen both versions as well as the TV miniseries. I prefer the mini-series to the Villeneuve effort. The Lynch 1984 film which I own on DVD and watch at least once a year is my favorite of the three. 

The Lynch film opens with a soliloquy by Princess Irulan (Virginia Madsen), of which the first line is this.

A beginning is a very delicate time.

Delicate indeed. Let’s hold that thought on Monday as a new President is inaugurated. 

Process Note

I will be traveling over the weekend. The Friday and Saturday "memefests" I normally post will certainly be late and may not happen at all. If they don't, never fear, the popular features will return next week.

Thinking About China and War

Something to keep in mind when considering China as an adversary. Expect much of its adversarial activity to be of a nature and level calculated to remain below the threshold of a shooting war, for the following reason.

China began it's one-child policy in 1980 and ended it in 2016. The "only child" cadre born during that period are now aged 9 - 44. Coincidentally all of China's current People's Liberation Army front line personnel, as well as some of its officers, were born during that period.

If China chooses to go to war and loses many thousands of men, and somewhat fewer women, each of those families ends at that point. In an ancestor-honoring or -worshiping society can you imagine the impact? 

I'm sure I cannot grasp the full meaning of that calamity as we don't much honor our ancestors, we may not even like them much. I suspect the PLA may be substantially less effective than its numbers might suggest at first, especially if committed outside of what is normally considered China.

China's leaders have to be substantially reluctant to commit troops in serious combat beyond China's borders. They in fact have not done so in any large numbers since the Korean War ended, decades before 1980. The social upheaval implicit in long PLA casualty lists could be regime-ending, and China's ruling oligarchs know it.

An Exaggeration

In his Morning Briefing column for PJ Media, Stephen Kruiser makes a comment with which I take issue. Hat tip to Instapundit for the link. Kruiser writes:

I'm just saying that the worst Republican in Congress is exponentially better than the best Democrat.

From my Republican perspective, the best Democrat is probably Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA), although I don't think much of his sartorial choices. Without analyzing his voting record, at least his public utterances reported in the press strike me as more sensible than the bumf often attributed to Lisa Murkowski (RINO-AK) and Susan Collins (RINO-ME). I'm just sayin'....

My Funny Valentine

When asked today about fears she will “weaponize” the DOJ against Trump’s enemies, I wish Pam Bondi had replied, “I intend to follow AG Merrick Garland’s sterling example. Of which I’m certain you approve. I’ve been interviewing prospective special prosecutors, several of whom show real promise.”

Heads would have exploded all over the District. I know why she treated the question seriously, but making fun of the question and the person asking it would have been hilarious.

About Drone Warfare

Conventional wisdom holds that artillery is "the queen of battle," the most effective weapon of war. Given modern drone technology, the lobbing of explosives at a distant enemy is evolving.

Ballistic artillery shells travel in straight line arcs and a combination of radar and computers can determine their launch point within a few feet by tracking the arc back to its origin. This enables what is called "counter-battery fire" where your own artillery fires at the opponent's guns which are shelling you.

The artilleryman's response to counter-battery fire is what is called "shoot and scoot," where you rapidly fire a few rounds and quickly move several hundred yards (or more) away. Such movement attracts unhelpful attention by the enemy but moving targets are harder to hit and counter-battery fire aimed at the point from which you fired falls on empty dirt.

An Xtra makes an interesting point about drone use in warfare, especially explosive "suicide" drones as a substitute for artillery. Drones almost certainly do not travel in straight arcs from launch to target, as such backtracking them and firing at the launch point may not be possible from the battlefield. 

Possibly the only counter to a drone launch point is satellite-based "look down" radar that sees launches happen and directs counter-battery fire at the launch site. 

Relatively speaking drones are cheap, counter-drone missiles exist but are expensive, the disparity being something like $1000 vs. $500,000. Actually a large model airplane with a grenade or other explosive as weapon can be a drone. Missiles which can track and shoot down drones are too costly to expend hundreds of them per day. 

Because of the cost disparity launching too many drones to overwhelm a fancy anti-drone system is feasible. To date, no one has figured out how to cope with drone swarms. Launch several drones at a target and at least 1-2 are likely to penetrate whatever AA fire is directed at them and detonate on the target. 

It is an interesting dilemma. Poor assailants can tie up or defeat expensive defenses with cheap drones. If you're a poor assailant you view this as a boon, if you are a wealthy fat target you hate this reality a great deal. This is the dilemma at the mouth of the Red Sea posed by the Houthis. 

Another Win Documented

From California, Power Line's Steve Hayward reports that, in anticipation of the Trump presidency, the CA Air Resources Board has withdrawn four requests for waiver of national regulations. Those waivers had sought permission to impose stricter limits than the rest of the nation.

The most grievous was one mandating the end of diesel trucks. Evidence has shown that the huge weight of the batteries needed for EVs to pull heavy loads cancels out any advantage over diesel.

Further evidence, if any was needed, that we are seeing salutary outcomes from the new Trump administration, even before it takes office. I cautiously admit to some modest optimism that a common sense era may be aborning.

A Coven of Karens

In yesterday's Senate hearing on the proposed appointment of Pete Hegseth as Secretary of Defense, several Democrat women senators managed to beclown themselves, acting like a coven of harpies. They aren't the image the Democrats want their party to have in the public mind. 

As one of Bret Baier's panelists noted last night, in order to win the Dims need to convince some GOP senators to join their cause. The morals approach wasn't the winning card to for them to play. It didn't work against Trump, nor against Hegseth.

Republicans are genuinely split over whether isolationism or a smarter international involvement is the wiser path. Getting Hegseth on the record as siding with either position would have potentially alienated some Republicans, but they didn't try to do this.

Had they tried it, Hegseth's wise answer would have been along the lines of "The President makes foreign policy. My job will be to have our military ready to defend our nation and support with force his foreign policy aims. That will be my focus as SecDef."

One Week Left

Seven days to inauguration (again) of President-elect Trump. It’s gotten close enough to count down the days. 

If you’re like me you have fingers crossed Biden won’t commit further indiscretions between now and then. Sadly, there are no guarantees some awful notion won't bubble up through Biden foggy mind and be whispered to, and acted on by, one of his faceless minions.

Later ... It already happened. He today removed Cuba from the list of state sponsors of terrorism. Add that to the growing list of executive actions Trump will need to reverse asap.

Scumbags ... and Their Enablers

Kurt Schlichter writes "take no prisoners" conservative columns for Townhall. Today he dips his pen in sulfuric acid and etches a bitter portrait of today's California. Here is a sample.

Today’s California is a feudal society with an affluent aristocracy – their castles and keeps were the ones burned in this fire – lording over a huge caste of serfs. The middle class is either gone or leaving.

It was the middle class that made California a Republican state for so long. They were the ones who demanded good government. Most of them are now in Texas or Idaho.

That leaves a bunch of really poor people and a few really rich ones. The poor people vote Democrat because the Dems feed them scraps, and the rich people vote Democrat because it makes them feel that they’re not the complete scumbags that, in many cases, they are.

What remains of CA's middle class is the government employees who work for its cities, counties, special districts, the state, and the feds. Many are well-paid and have good benefits. Their unions fund the election campaigns of CA's Democrat elected officialdom who repay the favor when union contracts are negotiated. 

In Schlichter's feudal model public employees occupy the role of the Church, Joel Kotkin refers to them as the "clerisy." In feudal times the Church enabled the nobles, today’s government employees fulfill a similar role. They "manage" the poor and the infrastructure on behalf of the current aristos.

Whither Greenland?

The New Yorker looks at Trump’s expressed interest in Greenland, asks is his interest real, and concludes it is. They note:

Last week, Denmark’s foreign minister said that his government was “open to dialogue” with the United States on how the two countries could coöperate in the Arctic region, including Greenland. “I presume the idea is not to start a war or to invade,” Vidal said. “But over time there could well be significant economic and military deals that would bring Greenland a lot closer to the United States. That is the most likely outcome, in my opinion.”

Florian Vidal is a scholar at the Arctic University of Norway who specializes in polar geopolitics. This is one view, obviously there are others.

For example I can imagine Greenland signing with the U.S. a "compact of free association" (aka COPA) similar to those we have with the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, and the Republic of Palau.

Placing Blame

Thinking about the really lame governmental responses to the LA area fires forces upon one the following conclusion. We have to blame the relevant elected officials, and they are all Democrats. 

I'm talking about the Governor, super majorities of both houses of the CA legislature, the Mayor of LA, the City Council, the Coastal Commission, the DWP, you name it. All are Democrats, even those supposedly nonpartisan.

As you might imagine, Republicans are going to point out this Democrat monopolization of the levers of power in the Golden State generally and in the LA basin in particular. We already hear these officials bemoaning the injection of politics into a naturally occurring tragedy. It has been amplified by their governmental malfeasance, corruption, misplaced priorities and general ineptitude.

Wildfires are a fact of life in California, and as such their management must be high on the priority list of any CA official. If that had been the case, we wouldn't be talking about the worst firestorm in the area's history. 

Firefighting isn't sexy but it is absolutely essential. Doing it well is expected but wins you no kudos from the voters. Like the current Secretary of Transportation, you only notice it when it's done poorly or fails. 

LA has failed the test, and its voters are going to notice. CA also has failed the test, and its voters will notice as well. 

It will be surprising if the political careers of Gov. Newsom and Mayor Bass aren't damaged beyond repair because this firestorm happened on their watch, during their incumbency. It was made orders of magnitude worse by their mismanagement. 

Fire hydrants without water are ridiculous. The equivalent of cops knowingly carrying unloaded weapons.

The Vice Presidential Jinx

I'm sure I'm not the first person to have noticed that in the last century those Vice Presidents who later run for the presidency do not fare especially well. Some fail to get elected, some get elected but cannot get reelected, some have decided not to run for reelection, and some have resigned.

Franklin Roosevelt's last VP Harry Truman served most of FDR's fourth term, and was elected once to the office, but didn't run for reelection though he was eligible to do so. History treats him kindly but he was quite unpopular when he left office.

Eisenhower's VP Richard Nixon ran but was defeated by Kennedy. Kennedy's VP Lyndon Johnson assumed the office when Kennedy was killed, won election to continue in office but, like Truman, decided not to run for reelection. Probably for the same reason, too.

Nixon ran again following Johnson, won, and then won reelection but resigned because of Watergate. Nixon's second VP Gerald Ford assumed office when Nixon resigned but could not get elected when he subsequently ran for the presidency. Carter's VP Walter Mondale ran for president but was defeated.

Reagan's VP George H.W. Bush was elected POTUS but failed to get reelected. Clinton's VP Al Gore ran for president but was defeated. Barack Obama's VP Joe Biden was elected but couldn't get renominated by his party. Trump's first VP Mike Pence could not secure his party's nomination.

Biden's VP Kamala Harris inherited the nomination but was defeated. No former VP has served two full consecutive terms as president in the last century.

The vice presidency appears to be an inherently unlucky office. Yet people continue to volunteer for the job that former VP John Nance Garner confided to fellow Texan LBJ "wasn't worth a bucket of warm spit." 

N.B., I'd guess "spit" was something equally biological, but even less attractive, in the original.

Late Regime

Ron Brownstein has been writing politics as long as I can remember, and though he leans left, he knows too much to turn him completely into a propagandist. Here writing for The Atlantic and copied out from behind their paywall by msn.com, Brownstein uses an analytic framework by Yale political scientist Stephen Skowronek that looks at "late regime" presidencies, men who served at the ends of multi-cycle period of dominance by one party or the other. 

He identifies a couple of the most recent as Hoover and Carter. Hoover led to FDR and a long period of Democrat dominance, Carter led to Reagan and a stretch of Republican presidencies. Brownstein asks the question is Biden another of these late regime presidents whose successor Trump redefines partisan boundaries, shifts constituencies, and begins another dominant cycle lasting for several presidential cycles?

Brownstein concludes there is a serious possibility that 2024 was one of those inflection points in our nation's political trajectory. That Biden will be grouped with Carter and Hoover meaning, if you've done the math, Trump can be as consequential as FDR and Reagan. 

Brownstein writes he asked Skowronek if Biden-to-Trump fit the pattern of Carter-to-Reagan and Hoover-to-FDR. Skowronek agreed that the key factors were in place. I'm sure it gives Brownstein little pleasure in writing this, see his conclusion.

For Democrats, however, the sobering precedent of the Carter era is a public loss of faith that set up 12 years of Republican control of the White House. They can only hope that the late-regime rejection of Biden doesn't trigger another period of consolidated GOP dominance.

Brownstein is careful not to name the Democrat stretch which may be ending. It is the 16 year Obama era that encompasses both his terms in office, the Trump term when Obama wasn't in office but dominated his party, and then the Biden term which many have viewed as Obama's de facto 'third term.' 

Got Woke, Went Broke

Glenn Beaton is the sage of Aspen, and a skilled columnist. Today he does an excellent job of deconstructing "woke" and its handmaiden "DEI." 

The thread that ties it all together for him is the Dims' obsession with everything being "RACIST!" (his caps, not mine). Leading the charge are the four young non-white Congresswomen of "the Squad" and their less famous allies. 

His column is definitely worth your time. Of the damage they've done to the Dim party, he concludes thus.

It’s one thing to argue that your position is the better one on the merits. That argument allows for negotiation and compromise. It’s another thing to climb down from a moralistic perch where you shout that your opponent’s focus on merit simply proves he’s a . . .

RACIST!

We’ve never seen a political climate quite like the current one. The Democrats went way out on a race limb, sawed it off, and are now surprised that they and their limb – not the tree – have fallen.

If the Squad's efforts leave the Dims wandering in the wilderness for several electoral cycles, it certainly won't hurt my feelings overmuch. That is the usual price a party pays when its efforts to lead Bob and Sue Public to a more 'enlightened' understanding fail. Finance types would describe it as "getting over your skis."

Saturday Snark

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