Robot Jazz

June 28,1942 In the summer of 1942, the German army, stalemated on the Russian front after the failure of Operation Barbarossa  the previous year, attempted a second massive offensive, this time entitled Case Blue . This offensive would be aimed at one of the economic hearts of Russia: the Caucasus oil fields. Hitler believed that if the Wehrmacht could capture those fields, Stalin's war machine, starved of fuel, would crawl to a halt. While he did appreciate that the Soviets would fight to the last to stop this from happening, Hitler understood that this reaction provided a second opportunity for the German army: to crush Soviet reserve units, thereby militarily weakening, perhaps fatally, the Soviet army.  Lastly, Case Blue  also sought to cut the Volga River, thereby cutting off essential Lend-Lease supplies from Stalin's allies.  The initial stage of Case Blue  was a smashing success with vast amounts of territory gained, including the city of Rostov. Even t...

  The last few posts of mine have been pretty bleak, I admit.  It is hard not to descend into despondency when you learn that your nation is no longer one of the good guys; that 49.8% of the population knowingly voted for the worst people possible because they thought it would line their pockets (what I have come to refer to as the Bondi Defense ).   But I have also come to realize something else: that an old Catholic admonition is correct when it warns that to despair is to sin because there is  always hope,  and hope does not disappoint.  The Trump regime, along with its allies of the moment, has proven to be a glass cannon.  Sure, they can lash out with the awesome power of the state, but such firepower is short-lived.  When met with sustained resistance, the cannon begins to crack and, ultimately, shatter. 😊😊😊😊😊 There have been many such cracks as of late, but perhaps the most noticeable has been the administration's abject defeat in...

In a congressional hearing yesterday, the putative Attorney General of the United States, Pam "Swampy" Blondi...er, Bondi, made a, well, jackass out of herself by carrying on in a most undignified fashion. You know, the standard MO for just about every figure in this administration.  During a dramatic moment when Democratic Rep. Jerrold Nadler D-N.Y. criticized the DoJ for failing to bring any indictments against Epstein co-conspirators, Pam Bondi went on a bizarre rant about the DOW Jones Industrial Average: “The Dow is over 50,000 right now,” Bondi said in sworn testimony before the House Judiciary Committee after Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., slammed her and the Department of Justice for the lack of indictments of possible co-conspirators of the convicted sex predator Epstein. The S&P 500 is also up and the Nasdaq is “smashing records,” while Americans’ retirement accounts are “booming,” Bondi said after celebrating the Dow Jones Industrial Average’s gains. “That’s what...

  It's been too many years for me to recall - and I am too lazy to check my dusty texts - but I believe it was Plato who wrote that to live under the capricious whims of a madman was the closest one could come to being in hell. (Or maybe it was a Reddit thread quoting Plato. Who knows anymore?) Why? Because a madman, being mad, does not govern by rationality but by passing fancy and impulse. One day, he declares the sky to be blue; the next, it is green. One day vanilla is the best flavor of ice cream, the next it is chocolate. Of course, the issues will be more serious than that (or will they?), and so will be the consequences. To live under a mad regime is so dangerous because having the wrong opinion can land one in a gulag. But what is the wrong opinion when right and wrong exist in a state of quantum flux, one determined not by truth and falsehood but by lunacy? This observation has been bouncing around my head ever since Premier Trump and New York City mayor-elect Zohran...

Readers of this blog—again, to all eight of you, a hearty “Thanks!”—are used to me beginning with a running tally of how many days President Trump has worked to cover up the Epstein files. Which is to say: every day of his second term. Today, I offer no such blurb. This dispatch is all about the day’s news: congressional Republicans and the Trump White House are actively conspiring to scuttle a House floor vote that would force the full release of the FBI’s Epstein files. Headline: Top GOP and White House allies working behind the scenes to prevent Epstein vote on House floor Top congressional Republicans and White House allies are working behind the scenes to prevent a politically charged floor vote to release the government’s Jeffrey Epstein case files next month, according to multiple sources familiar with the discussions. The intensifying effort to halt that floor vote comes as Reps. Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican, and Ro Khanna, a California Democrat, declared on Wednesday t...

  'Trump Reinvents the Wheel' by Ideogram It's another torturous day of summer - 95°F as I write this at 5:40 PM - so I am finding it hard to focus on what to write about today.  I guess I will just see where I wind up! 🌞🌞🌞🌞🌞 As expected, the recent economic data from the Commerce Department shows that the economy is slowing down due to the Trump administration's chaotic and antediluvian economic policy. As the New Zork Times reports: Economic growth softened in the first half of the year, as tariffs and uncertainty upended business plans and scrambled consumers’ spending decisions. Gross domestic product, adjusted for inflation, increased at a 3 percent annual rate in the second quarter, the Commerce Department said on Wednesday. That topped forecasters’ expectations and appeared to represent a strong rebound from the first three months of the year, when output contracted at a 0.5 percent rate. But both those figures were skewed — in opposite directions — by big s...

  As per the New Zork Times: Attorney General Told Trump His Name Appeared in Epstein Files It was not clear what those documents were, or in what context the president’s name was raised. Attorney General Told Trump His Name Appeared in Epstein Files It was not clear what those documents were, or in what context the president’s name was raised. Attorney General Told Trump His Name Appeared in Epstein Files It was not clear what those documents were, or in what context the president’s name was raised. Attorney General Told Trump His Name Appeared in Epstein Files It was not clear what those documents were, or in what context the president’s name was raised. Attorney General Told Trump His Name Appeared in Epstein Files It was not clear what those documents were, or in what context the president’s name was raised. Attorney General Told Trump His Name Appeared in Epstein Files It was not clear what those documents were, or in what context the president’s name was raised. Attorney Gene...

  Recently, I had an unexpected confrontation with two MAGA fanatics on X. I didn't expect it because the verbal assault was triggered not by any comment I made about Trump, but by a response I made to New York Governor Kathy Hochul's post about her successes for the state.  Apparently, my flippant comment about how Democrats were leading the country while the GOP was doomed to go the way of the failed Whig Party got under the thin skin of two Red Hats.   Now, the first question one might ask is, why would two hardcore Trumpists be lurking around a Democrat governor's social media feed?  Good question! I wish I had an answer.  Perhaps they were paid trolls whose job was to troll the governor - it should be ' governess'  to be precise, but politically incorrect - but I don't think so, as their attacks were so facile as to be meaningless. If I had to guess, I would say that they were acting as MAGA cultists always act: as jilted lovers stalking their hea...

  What a summer of discontent!  The summer of 2025 is similar to last summer in that the weather is running ahead by a month.  June was very hot, much as July usually is, and July has been warm with jungle humidity, something more reminiscent of August. I would like to know if this trend will continue as it did last year, where August felt like September and October...felt like September, too!  Be that as it may, I am not enjoying this season, as I never do. Every fool out there who has "I love summer!" on their lips should be boiled in their own pool water and buried with an air conditioner through their heart.   🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽 When I last wrote, Trump was having a rare good day. His strike on Iran came off flawlessly, and his love affair with Russia seemed to freeze over as Trump began to take shots at Dmitri Medvedev. However, as I said then, this happy place for Trump 2.0 would not last, as this is a remarkably incompetent and incoherent administration....