Archive for the 'Politics' Category

On fire with tracer rounds flying around.

2:40 AM — Zaporizhska nuclear power plant. More small arms fire & RPG shots. Building is definitely on fire pic.twitter.com/hSMGHcmW3E

— Hugo Kaaman (@HKaaman) March 4, 2022

I have earned a living as a nuclear engineer for 43 years doing everything from systems engineering to reactor engineering and particle transport and radiation shielding and activation calculations.  I can’t even begin to tell you how idiotic, ignorant, stupid, vulgar, unwise, wrongheaded, witless, irresponsible, lamebrained, and knuckleheaded this move was.

Only an uneducated nitwit, a lunkheaded fool and crackpot would order such a thing or even participate in it.

Now let’s be clear.  Commercial reactors don’t explode like nuclear weapons.  They just don’t.  American made nuclear reactors must be designed with an overall negative power coefficient by the Code of Federal Regulations.

Not so for Russian designed reactors.  I developed and presented training years ago to the Department of Energy safety analysis engineers on Chernobyl.  The problem with that accident is that the reactor design could (and did) have an overall positive power coefficient because of its positive void coefficient (here is the stipulation – assuming that the electronic controls work, this has been accounted for by automatic reactor control).  The precursor to the accident was that an electrical engineer bypassed that automatic protection circuitry for the purpose of a test and plant management let him do it without a documented safety analysis.

Even then it didn’t explode.  It was a steam explosion, not a nuclear explosion.  Nonetheless, the core melted and the radiological source term caused a problem for an awful lot of people.  Today I would gladly take a walk around the exterior of the plant.  Then, not so much.

Even if the reactor was shut down upon the assault by Russian forces, there is still core cooling to consider, as well as thousands of metric tonnes of spent fuel in the pools.  A SRO (Senior Reactor Operator) and RO, along with equipment operators, must be on shift 24 hours per day.

Nuclear reactors (especially as designed and built in America) are inherently safe, clean and efficient, and produce carbon free power.  America will go nuclear or suffer life without power, because solar cannot even begin to compete with nuclear in terms of powering industry.  Russian reactors are inherently safe too, mostly, that is, until some dunderhead goes shooting at safety systems and kills plant operators.  That’s why nuclear power plants have the most intensive security of virtually any place on earth.  I’ve seen it first hand.

But the security wouldn’t be able to stop an assault like this.

I … just … can’t … even … begin … to … tell … you … how … stupid … this … is!  Well, stupid or wicked.  Words fail me.

But, Putin … and Russia’s military apparatus.  So there.  You can sign me up for being highly pissed at Putin and his military apparatchiks.  While the responsible ones among us are trying to convince people of the rightful need for nuclear, they have to go and muddle this up, even if it’s only because of wrongheaded thinking by people who don’t understand the physics of nuclear energy and are frightened because of that.  Even if the plant is under control right now, the psychology of this is damaging.

I consider it to be virtually impossible to get real news or even good analysis of the situation in Ukraine from the legacy media.  The propaganda and disinformation is far too thick – from all sides, including our own.  You can safely ignore most of it.

But this may be the most tangled analysis I’ve ever seen, and it’s symbolic of the sort of thing you’d read at the Small Wars Journal.  I’ll only give you the summary paragraph.

Despite the political influence of Ukraine’s veteran constituency, popular support for Ukraine’s far-right paramilitary forces is negligible. Biletsky and other members of far-right parties lost their seat in Ukraine’s Parliament—the Verkhovna Rada—in 2019. However, fascist paramilitary organizations could expand significantly in the wake of a Russian invasion. Ongoing civilian resistance training grant these organizations the opportunity to create widespread recruitment pools in the general populace. Further to that, a defeated democratic Ukraine would face a legitimacy crisis that extremist organizations like Azov and Right Sector could exploit to establish themselves politically, not unlike the Yugoslav Partisans in the Second World War. In this event, while NATO should refuse to recognize any Kremlin-appointed regime, it should likewise refuse to recognize any rebel Nazi government. Even if a strong opposition government led by Nazis may be enticing for the purpose of undermining a puppet regime, it would be a catastrophic mistake that would further destabilize the region and provide legitimacy to other far-right movements globally, particularly in the US.

The word Nazi is used about a 100,000 times in the commentary (I exaggerate only a little), and yet when trying to understand what a Nazi really is, there is only one URL which in effect subtly denies the very claim that the author is making.  The very best one can conclude is that a Nazi is an “ultra-nationalist.”

Um … okay.  I guess he means not a globalist.

Anyway, this author has a bit of twisted thinking in the summary, recommending that the U.S. take certain actions and recognize certain groups based on what he sees as a budding ultra-nationalist movement in the U.S.  Literally.  He recommends certain foreign policy actions based on what it might portend for groups he’s afraid of in the U.S.

You can’t make this sort of thing up.  This passes for “analysis” at SWJ.

I think he should give his college degrees back and sue them for breach of contract.  I’ve seen bad stuff before at SWJ, but never anything quite like this.  It sounds like a college freshman at Georgetown wrote it.

I guess it’s not over yet.  Canadians aren’t just going home and shutting up.

Oh, and by the way, Google doesn’t control Bitchute. I’d rather use them.

Daily Mail.

Bob Bolus, who’s leading a fleet of transports from Pennsylvania to Washington on Wednesday, plans to help shut down the Capital Beltway on Friday in protest of vaccine mandates, pandemic-related restrictions, and more.

The 64 mile road – whose formal name is the I-495 – encircles the capital, and is its most vital ground transportation link. One lane will be left open for emergency vehicles, but Bolus has said ‘tough luck’ to commuters.

‘The Beltway will be shutdown,’ Bolus told Fox News. ‘I’ll give you an analogy of that of a giant boa constrictor that basically squeezes you, chokes you, and then swallows you. And that’s what we’re going to do to DC.’

‘We will not compromise anybody’s safety or health. As far as if they [people] can’t get to work, geez, that’s too bad.’

I’m left wondering about the wisdom in telegraphing your plans to your opponent.  Larry Bird used to tell his opponents exactly what he was going to do, and then he would do it.

This isn’t the same thing.  As for those folks who are going a different route, I’m also wondering if this isn’t perhaps a plan to hamper those efforts?

I had initially seen this with no direct reference to a name or a report in the field and was just a bit skeptical, deciding that I wouldn’t post it.

But then this report appeared, and it seems to corroborate the report above from someone to whom it happened.

But I’ll say (somewhat tongue in cheek) that the worst of all of this appears to be that they won’t let the lady in the video below buy coffee.

Beyond the fact that they acted like Nazi thugs (and certainly enjoyed it), this is just too far.  If you get between me and my fresh ground black coffee, there’s going to be trouble.

As for the first two reports, if they know they can’t really legitimately arrest protesters and they’re simply dropping them off down the road, that seems to me to be a similar criminal offense to false arrest (and maybe worse).

I believe the formal name for this would be kidnapping.

Anyway, I suspect that “support the blue” thing is rapidly evaporating in Canada with this behavior (just as it is in the U.S. with SWAT raids, asset forfeiture, bad treatment of people who carry firearms, indemnification of police in bad shootings, vocal support for gun control and permitting schemes, and a host of other awful things).  I also suspect that for every protester they mistreat or kidnap or trample with horses, they create a thousand new ones.  As for the lady who wanted coffee, we should all condemn the cops in complete disgust for that offense.

From the perspective of COIN (counterinsurgency) doctrine, they have learned nothing from the misadventure in Afghanistan.

Then again, neither did our doomed elitists.  They can talk about COIN all they want to and write pedantic and silly papers until they’re blue in the face.  They never understood it then, and still don’t today.  They never knew what they were doing.

Quick example: In Afghanistan they gave Viagra to child molester chieftains so they could continue their abuse, thinking they would make friends, while disgusting our own troops and infuriating the Taliban even more.  In the end, no one loved the command structure or brilliant “thinkers” and “strategists.”  They were hated everywhere and by everyone.

Western nations are one big gaggle of incompetence and stupidity.

Finally, there is this ridiculous, pretentious finger wagging and sermon-preaching by cops while threatening to bust doors down.

The story is in the comments.  Basically, this restaurant owner was about to go out of business because of Covid restrictions.  The truckers meant new business, saving his livelihood, while they also helped him clean up.  He had given interviews about that, and this is the cops paying him back.

What was that I said about bullying one protester and creating a thousand more?

In the offices of Klaus Schwab: “Call on line 3 … the boy king is in a panic and needs assistance and direction.”

In Toronto too.

And back in Ottawa.

Ottawa police try to make excuses for trampling an elderly woman.  Excuses suck.  And this one does too.  They wouldn’t have to make excuses if they didn’t do it.

Finally, I’ll observe that there is no insignia or badges or names on the goons on the line. They have de-personed them just as they’ve tried to de-person the protestors. This is what the Bolsheviks did.

The boy king got his way.  The police followed orders – of course – and so the Trudeau regime has demanded that this go to the next phase.  They’ve picked a fight. This was an unwise decision.

At Instapundit, this was seen in the comments.

Some people are just slow to learn, but learn they eventually will. Mike Vanderboegh used to call it “losing the mandate of heaven.” The constitutional sheriff and constable is replaced in favor of a standing army to suppress the citizens, whose only goal is to maintain the power of the regime. The main point to be made here is that tyranny is ungodly and an afront to the Almighty and therefore cosmic treason. It is a violation of God’s holy laws. Tyrants attempt to usurp the authority God Himself has over family, church and state (see here work done by Rousas J. Rushdoony) in favor of the great savior of all mankind, whom they want people to believe is the regime. Many people do believe such a thing, but enough people still don’t that it will cause massive problems for the boy king.

BANK Outages at all big 5 banks!
It’s happening.
Trudeau has crushed consumer confidence in the banks in less than 48 hours. Some ATMs are still allowing cash to be pulled out but going empty.
The bank has now locked up EVERYONES funds!
🇨🇦 🔔 pic.twitter.com/9CslynYJjD

— bu/ac (@buperac) February 16, 2022

Via WiscoDave.

Score one for the towing companies and Freedom Convoy.

No one wants to help New Zealand’s police commissioner tow cars from the Freedom Convoy away. Not even the military. pic.twitter.com/jpac0p6EnP

— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) February 15, 2022

I agree with this decision.  Live to fight another day, don’t have RMCP visit your home.  You don’t want that.  As I said earlier, evolve your tactics.

Ottawa protesters don’t intend to leave.

Also this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NN1l_2r4xqM