Dark And Rolling Sea (Death Star, One.)

General Cassio Tagge: And until this battle station is fully operational, we are vulnerable. The Rebel Alliance is too well equipped. They're more dangerous than you realize!

Admiral Conan Antonio Motti: Dangerous to your star fleet, Commander. Not to this battle station.

Tagge: The Rebellion will continue to gain a support in the Imperial Senate–

Grand Moff Wilhuff Tarkin: [walking in with Darth Vader] The Imperial Senate will no longer be of any concern to us. I have just received word that the Emperor has dissolved the council permanently. The last remnants of the Old Republic have been swept away.

Tagge: That's impossible! How will the Emperor maintain control without the bureaucracy?

Tarkin: The regional governors now have direct control over their territories. Fear will keep the local systems in line. Fear of this battle station.

Tagge: And what of the Rebellion? If the Rebels have obtained a complete technical readout of this station, it is possible — however unlikely — that they might find a weakness and exploit it.

Vader: The plans you refer to will soon be back in our hands.

Motti: Any attack made by the Rebels against this station would be a useless gesture, no matter what technical data they've obtained. This station is now the ultimate power in the universe! I suggest we use it.

Vader: Don't be too proud of this technological terror you've constructed. The ability to destroy a planet, or even a whole system, is insignificant next to the power of the Force.

Motti: Don't try to frighten us with your sorcerer's ways, Lord Vader. [Vader walks toward Motti, then slowly raises his hand] Your sad devotion to that ancient religion has not helped you conjure up the stolen data tapes or given you clairvoyance enough to find the Rebels' hidden fortr–– [grasps his throat as if he is being choked]

Vader: I find your lack of faith disturbing.

Tarkin: Enough of this. Vader, release him!

Vader: As you wish. [drops his hand and Motti's head hits the table as he regains his breath]

Tarkin: This bickering is pointless. Lord Vader will provide us with the location of the Rebel fortress by the time this station is operational. We will then crush the Rebellion with one swift strike.

~From Star Wars: Episode IV: A New Hope.

...

Oh you set your course for the furthest shores

And you never once looked back
And the flag you flew was a pirate cross
On a field of velvet black
And those landsmen who you but lately knew
Were left stranded on the lea
Don't call on them when the storm clouds rise
On the dark and the rolling sea.

Oh I have no need of a chart or creed
You told your waiting crew
For the winds of chance, they will bear us straight
And you spoke as though you knew
So you paid no mind to the warning signs
As you gave your words so free
Don't change your tack when the timbers crack
On the dark and the rolling sea

Now the thunder rails in the great mainsails
And the stars desert the skies
And the rigging strains as the hands of rain
Reach down to wash your eyes
And your oarsmen stands with his knife in hand
And his eyes spell mutiny
Don't call my name when your ship goes down
On the dark and the rolling sea.
~Al Stewart,
On the dark and rolling sea.

For some reason I'm reminded of one Saturday back in January or February of 2007. It was a Saturday, my late best friend Carl was at my house, Saturday, gaming day, and we were binge-watching Seasons 5 and 6 of Oz. We'd all worked the night before and were strung out on Monsters and junk food.

There's this episode in Season 5 of Oz where Robson, the profoundly unlikeable and unsympathetic Aryan sidekick, gets thrown out of the Brotherhood and very quickly ends up the "Prag" (Prison bitch) of Cutler, one of the other Aryans, who then proceeds to sexually assault him.

Right about the that scene, my partner (then ex-girlfriend/roomie) comes by in her pajamas, Ugg clogs and Carhartt jacket, going outside for a cigarette.

Stops. 

Looks at the TV. "What ya watchin'??

Before we could react...

"OH MY GOD WHAT THE FUCK?!?!"

Now mind you, she was also Carl's ex-girlfriend, we all worked Third Shift at the casino together. We routinely joked about horrible shit at work. My partner was the Tough Bitch who at least once per shift joked about keeping my balls in her purse and/or threatened to feed some other dudes testicles to my Schnauzer.

Frozen. Whiter than a ghost. Look of absolute horror on her face like a scared little girl.

She finally recovered her wits and went outside to smoke her cigarette.

We shut the shit off and went outside to talk to her and make sure she was OK. We ended up calming her down and taking it a bit easy in the following gaming session for the sake of her nerves.

I don't feel at liberty to discuss why she reacted the way she did.

This story is not about my Partner.

Proclaim ye this among the Gentiles; Prepare war, wake up the mighty men, let all the men of war draw near; let them come up: Beat your plowshares into swords and your pruning-hooks into spears: let the weak say, I am strong. Assemble yourselves, and come, all ye heathen, and gather yourselves together round about: thither cause thy mighty ones to come down, O Lord. Let the heathen be wakened, and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat: for there will I sit to judge all the heathen round about. Put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe: come, get you down; for the press is full, the fats overflow; for their wickedness is great. Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision: for the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision. ~Joel 3:9-14

I saw this last night when I got up for work.

According to Marjorie Taylor Greene, Trump & Co. are talking about using Nuclear Weapons in Iran.

If you don't see what the problem is with that, I'm not going to help you. You figure it out.

Regarding MTG, she has often struck me as a lot less insane than her public persona suggests, and since the whole Epstein files debacle she seems to have at least some genuine principles. Like my partner when she was 20, a lot of what MTG used to do was Kayfabe.

Not sure why, possibly political utility as much as anything else. At this point I'm not going to judge. We have bigger problems.

Let me tell you WHY:

I'm a United States Air Force bomb and missile wing veteran. 

I was an Air Force Security Policeman. None of this stuff is anything to fuck around with, use lightly, or honestly of any real tactical use on the battlefield unless things for one's own conventional forces are so fucked that there's nothing else left.

There's a reason there's been 50+ years of cuts to the arsenal.

Once used, the goddamn things create more trouble than they're worth, and that's where we lose even worse.

The thing about the Death Star is the Empire itself read it wrong, it was primarily a deterrent value. Once used? It wasn't that. Once used, too many peoples, planetary governments and so on, too many individual people...figured it was fight back or get blown up anyway.

And too much of their military doctrine was based on (as Rogue One made the comparison directly) the Star Wars version of the nuclear option. Anybody who sat through the Air Force's bullshit classes on Just War Theory can tell you this is actually a terrible idea.

You think the public in the Islamic world (where we have a fuck-ton of bases that require the goodwill of locals to exist much less operate) would stand for this??

That's a big hell No.

Not least because if you drop a nuke in Iran, aside from potentially millions of casualties there...unless you're specifically targeting places where features such as mountain ranges or valleys would contain most of the fallout? If the wind is blowing southerly or westward, fallout and radiation is going to affect either much of the rest of the Middle East, starting with Iraq, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia but eventually reaching places like Jordan, Israel (A nuclear power we'd have thrown into an unstable situation by doing this!) and Egypt. Or, if the wind is blowing east, it hits fellow nuclear powers Pakistan, India and very likely China. Anything going north is going to hit Russia. That's casualties in those countries too.

Think about that, will ya??

Any government...not just in the Middle East but likely globally...that wouldn't condemn this shit in the strongest possible terms and summarily eject not only US forces but US interests very likely at gunpoint, is going to get overthrown. If you think (for example) the public in a place like Saudi Arabia (where Radical Islam really is a nonzero percentage of the population) is going to stand for mass murder of civilians in a fellow Muslim nation or the fact that the next few days might see ash falling like radioactive snow on the Rub-Al-Khali, Riyadh, and the holy places of Makkah and Medina??

Think about that for a second too.

No way it's just the Iranians shouting "Death To America" at that point.

Homie, if you think that's not gonna lead to even MBS picking up the phone with shaking hands as he hears the chants of the mobs in the streets and calling Trump and telling him to go fuck himself and to get our military and every other goddamn thing out of his country?? 

And being filmed and publicly seen doing so?

You're straight-up wrong. 

Same for every Emir and Sheikh and Sultan and Wazir and every other damned thing that has any business with us because just for one example...even if they totally supported anything their government did to the contrary (and militaries, being composed of people, seldom do) the Royal Saudi Armed Forces does not have enough guns and ammunition to prevent that whole country from being overthrown in such a case as the Kingdom siding with the Murderers Of Persia and expect the keys being handed to whatever Radical Islamist cleric promises to cornhole The Great Satan for Allah by next week.

We have never failed to forget that cultural win conditions are different over there. Martyrdom is glorified. People who want to live to lord their Racism and whatever Power they think they have over the [Racial Expletive Deleted] next door and who don't believe much of anything at all, really, are gonna have a hard time understanding a Billion+ people screaming for their blood in genuine rage at mass murder, environmental destruction, etc. And if they die?? So what? They're going to the highest levels of the Heavens for getting killed in the service of a righteous cause.

If America actually followed the Lord's Word instead of Babylon Bullshit and the Prosperity Gospel, we might understand that.

(Some of us who've been over there and actually listened to the people actually already do.)

Hospitaler: One may stare into the light, until one becomes the light. I've done it many times.

Balian of Ibelin: [throws a rock at a bush that catches fire by the spark] There's your religion. One spark, a creosote bush. There's your Moses. I did not hear it speak.

Hospitaler: That does not mean that there is no God. Do you love her?

Balian of Ibelin: Yes.

Hospitaler: The heart will mend. Your duty is to the people of the city. I go to pray.

Balian of Ibelin: For what?

Hospitaler: For the strength to endure what is to come.

Balian of Ibelin: And what is to come?

Hospitaler: The reckoning is to come for what was done one hundred years before. The Muslims will never forget. Nor should they.

[the Hospitaler slowly walks away as a second bush several yards from the burning one catches fire. The Hospitaler is nowhere to be seen in the clear and open desert]

~From the film Kingdom Of Heaven.

In a (maybe) gentler fashion, every other government in the world is likewise going to have to make that choice or get voted out (or worse) and of course some like China and Russia (or for that matter, France, Israel and the UK) will also be doing so under whatever Continuity Of Government options they have going as their nuclear forces will *Have* to be on alert as well.

If you think Israel's government doesn't fall next? You're wrong. Half the country hates Netanyahu.

The rest of the world will very rapidly blackball, blacklist and sanction us just like we're 1990's Serbia and even those who want to help will likely not be able to do anything for fear of the consequences to themselves.

We will very rapidly find ourselves alone in the dark with not much more than itchy trigger fingers and the creeping feeling that the whole rest of the damn world is pointing their guns at us.

And honestly? 

They're gonna have to.

Why?

Because we just crossed the line from untrustworthy asshole to homicidal (if not genocidal) maniac.

You think high gas prices suck??

Wait until there isn't any.

For the average person, things quickly escalate from expensive to unlivable.

Because if you think the people who didn't plan the Iran War correctly have planned for what the rest of the world will do about it if we murder innocent people with nuclear weapons?? LOL.

Every billionaire, every enabler, every government official, every member of the military finds themselves Persona Non Grata with the rest of the world, and very likely facing warrants for their arrest or that it's just plain open season on their ass.

If you think America itself doesn't come flying apart under the pressure of all this? Oops.

The United States Armed Forces is already falling apart due to incompetence and mismanagement.

The rest of the world snaps on us because we did something horrible, with all the division and fault lines in this country already?? America shatters, too.

Remember, Trump is a narcissist. He will demand that people choose HIM over their own families.

But he's not in the kind of position where that's a good move.

Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. They were haughty and did detestable things before me. Therefore I did away with them as you have seen. ~Ezekiel 16:49-50 (NIV)

Remember all the Whiny posts from "Conservatives" during COVID-19?? You think that was bad?? You ain't seen nothing yet.

Think what's happening to Russians in Moscow and St. Petersburg who don't understand why they can't put gas in their cars, just for a start.

Power grids, Comms, Supply lines go first, government next. We do not have enough force for this, either. In fact, whatever bandits pop up probably will be the local cops.

And we very, very rapidly end up with a United Nations stabilization force jammed up our ass that basically nobody with a brain in their head is going to do anything to stop (keeping in mind our forces likely won't be able to, either) and those who take exception to Chinese and Fijian and Ghanaian and Indian and Nigerian and (yes) Qatari and Saudi troops and officials and NGO's showing up and starting to try to un-fuck this mess for us, secure our nuclear (and other) weapons for disposal and all-around making sure this bullshit never happens again will find themselves arrested (and likely, incarcerated in some pretty bad places) shot, or if they're lucky on trial in The Hague right along with Keg-Breath and Trump where at least the food will be edible and some of the things that happen in British or Turkish prisons will be less likely.

If you don't think the rest of the world will ruthlessly stamp out the idiocy and privilege and racism and religious zealotry that caused this shit, you're wrong.

Lots of Kens and Karens will find themselves physically impressed to do physical labor fixing shit. You don't like it? Take it up with Senior Aircraftman Afolabi and his Type 56 assault rifle.

Whiteness?? LMAO. Good luck with that.

2nd Amendment?? Well that was great when we had a government that could enforce anything.

If we do this, America will not be remembered well.

Remember, the rest of the world hasn't been profligately expending all their best munitions in a war nobody asked for.

The rest of the world does not have billionaires shoveling embezzled government funds into their pockets, either.

These fucking people are hell-bent on bringing God's wrath on this country.

His Wrath will be forthcoming. And Man will be glad to be its instrument.

Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.

The Evangelical worship of Force as a means of exacting compliance is no different from that of the Empire in Star Wars and will lead to the same bad end. It's human nature to resist.

You either believe in civilization or you don't.

Might wanna remember that if the shit hits the fan.

Слава Україна!

The Holy Quran says it, "Pilgrimage to the House [of God built by the prophet Abraham] is a duty men owe to God; those who are able, make the journey." (3:97) Allah said: "And proclaim the pilgrimage among men; they will come to you on foot and upon each lean camel, they will come from every deep ravine" (22:27). Every one of the thousands at the airport, about to leave for Jeddah, was dressed this way. You could be a king or a peasant and no one would know. Some powerful personages, who were discreetly pointed out to me, had on the same thing I had on. Once thus dressed, we all had begun intermittently calling out "Labbayka! (Allahumma) Labbayka!" (Here I come, O Lord!) Packed in the plane were white, black, brown, red, and yellow people, blue eyes and blond hair, and my kinky red hair -- all together, brothers! All honoring the same God, all in turn giving equal honor to each other. . . .That is when I first began to reappraise the "white man." It was when I first began to perceive that "white man," as commonly used, means complexion only secondarily; primarily it described attitudes and actions. In America, "white man" meant specific attitudes and actions toward the black man, and toward all other non-white men. But in the Muslim world, I had seen that men with white complexions were more genuinely brotherly than anyone else had ever been. That morning was the start of a radical alteration in my whole outlook about "white" men. ~Malcolm X.

Last Post

[Luke's X-wing is in the trench, and Darth Vader is having trouble getting a lock]

Darth Vader: [Gets a lock] I have you now. [Suddenly, one of Vader's escorts is destroyed.] What?!

Han Solo: YEAH-HOO!!! [The Millennium Falcon arrives on the scene.]

Vader's Escort: Look out! [Vader's surviving escort panics and crashes into the trench, and Vader's TIE Advanced is flung out into space]

Han: You're all clear, kid! Now let's blow this thing and go home! [Luke shoots at the exhaust port and with the help of the Force]

Imperial Officer: Stand by.

[The Rebels and the Millennium Falcon fly back to Yavin 4]

Officer: Stand by.

[Just as the Death Star is about to fire, it explodes]

Han: Great shot, kid! That was one in a million!

Obi-Wan Kenobi: Remember... the Force will be with you, always.

~From Star Wars: Episode IV: A New Hope.

White Horse (Trailer Park Rome, Revisited II.)

 [ISB director Col Wullf Yularen addresses Major Partagaz and all ISB officers in the wake of the Aldhani raid]

Col. Wullf Yularen: The criminals responsible for last night's atrocity on Aldhani think they've taken the Empire by surprise. We know better. We know the real shock will be when they discover how ready and eager we are to respond, to be prepared, to be here this morning and know that the only question we need to answer is how tight to close our fist. This is why we plan. This is why we work so hard when we're at peace. This is why we recruit so carefully and demand so much. The following measures will be adopted Empire-wide as of today. A tribute tax equal to five times the amount stolen from Aldhani will be levied on any sector harboring partisan activity. We will make it clear that no one steals from the Empire. The use of any local custom, festival, or tradition as cover for rebel activity will trigger permanent revocation of Imperial tolerance. I spoke with Emperor Palpatine last night, and he's assured me that the ISB will be taking the lead going forward. No one in this room should have trouble accessing Army or Naval resources in future. The Emperor will be convening an emergency session of the Senate to propose a legislation package of bills and amendments that will free our hands in all matters of surveillance, search, and seizure. We will be invoking the Public Order Resentencing Directive later today. P-O-R-D. Any criminal act, with even indirect effect on the Empire, will henceforth be branded a Class One Offense. All prison sentences are immediately re-evaluated. All outstanding fines and levies are to be paid in full.

~From the Star Wars series Andor, S1.E7 "Announcement."

...

The Holy Quran says it, "Pilgrimage to the House [of God built by the prophet Abraham] is a duty men owe to God; those who are able, make the journey." (3:97) Allah said: "And proclaim the pilgrimage among men; they will come to you on foot and upon each lean camel, they will come from every deep ravine" (22:27). Every one of the thousands at the airport, about to leave for Jeddah, was dressed this way. You could be a king or a peasant and no one would know. Some powerful personages, who were discreetly pointed out to me, had on the same thing I had on. Once thus dressed, we all had begun intermittently calling out "Labbayka! (Allahumma) Labbayka!" (Here I come, O Lord!) Packed in the plane were white, black, brown, red, and yellow people, blue eyes and blond hair, and my kinky red hair -- all together, brothers! All honoring the same God, all in turn giving equal honor to each other. . . .That is when I first began to reappraise the "white man." It was when I first began to perceive that "white man," as commonly used, means complexion only secondarily; primarily it described attitudes and actions. In America, "white man" meant specific attitudes and actions toward the black man, and toward all other non-white men. But in the Muslim world, I had seen that men with white complexions were more genuinely brotherly than anyone else had ever been. That morning was the start of a radical alteration in my whole outlook about "white" men. ~Malcolm X.

I saw this AI slop shit last night.

Trump, riding horses with George Washington.

The people who beat their meat to the idea of Trump as their Man On The White Horse (from Revelation) told on themselves, because they put Trump on the Black Horse.

And if you don't think that's exactly what the fuck is going on here, read the above public statements by the CEO of that Electroshock glove company that's in the news lately.

He thinks Trump was sent by God.

These Fucking People, fundamentally, think they can beat (or shock) the rest of the world into compliance with their horseshit (And I say that as a Christian, it's utter horseshit.) It's not a fucking accident that one of the other big items in the news lately is 1980's/1990's Focus On The Family type "Moral Majority" people who are now old and starting to die off, have the fucking BALLS to wonder why their kids have cut them off and won't talk to them. This after they bought James Dobson's abusive BS whole-hog and abused the shit out of their kids.

Now, neither my partner nor I was ever subjected to that crap, our parents weren't that kind of religious people. I'm ADHD, she's Autistic but wasn't diagnosed until much later in life. 

Her issues got listed as behavioral problems. We both had counseling and whatever psychological support was available in the 1980's and 1990's respectively. 

Guess what?? Growing up with those issues at those times still sucked gigantic ass.

And yes, I'm absolutely going to put a face on this mess, because people that could be or could have been affected by this kind of crap are important to me. And if you don't like it or want to think about it, fuck you.

[Cassian Andor and a number of men are sent to the Narkina Five prison complex]

Prison officer: Welcome to Narkina Five. This is an Imperial factory facility. You've all been assessed as labor-worthy. Now, following this introduction, you'll be transferred to your level assignment and workroom, where your floor manager will explain the details of our schedule and expectations. Your length of stay has been predetermined. The quality of that time will be up to you. Now, those who've been incarcerated before will be surprised by the calm, sanitary conditions, and our minimally invasive enforcement techniques. Well, I'm sure some, if not all of you, are wondering, how we risk standing before you without weapons? It's a potent question. And hopefully, one you won't need to have answered very often, but... [activates electric floor and the new prisoners are shocked to floor before he turns it off] You may stand. That was level one of three. Our floors are Tunqstoid steel. Do your time productively, keep to your lane, and this needn't be more than a memory. Good luck to you.

~From the Star Wars series Andor S1.E8 "Narkina 5."

Now America and its educational and medical professions (and allegedly even Law Enforcement) all supposedly know better and until very recently this was fairly bipartisan. However, that was before Republicans, no, not MAGA...Republicans, as in the institutional kind...think they wanna be the Empire from Star Wars but all started competing to be that guy from Season One of Andor that went around shouting "On Program!" at all the other prisoners in the Imperial factory gulag building Death Star parts. 

Now? Along with Trump 2.0 there's still a small movement of people that basically just want to beat (or shock) your kids (and their fellow citizens) into compliance with whatever Unga Bunga bullshit. 

It won't work.

I'm waiting for the first time this happens and some ignorant-ass gym teacher, School Resource officer or security rent-a-cop who did this bullshit gets their face blown off by an irate parent (whose kid got shocked for *Checks Notes* basically just being a kid) with a shotgun at point-blank range.

(And, considering the national backlash and these fucking things are just now being deployed, gets off because a jury that would normally convict a ham sandwich for about anything won't.)

And/or some shit-ass school district in a place like Dry Hump, Alabama becomes national news and gets their shit sued into oblivion by more liberal, louder activist-attractant or wealthier parents. Yeah, I'd imagine Ben Crump among others are waiting for this to happen.

Not what I'd do, I more likely fall in the first category and damn the consequences, but either way it's human nature to resist, one way or the other. It never fails to amaze me that there's a large faction of so-called "Conservatives" that seems to be very confused by this fact and/or maintain a "Tread on me harder, Daddy!" attitude in the face of it.

Because oh, yes, if you don't resist this fucking garbage, that is exactly what's going to happen to you.

Too many people don't fucking get that.

The Empire doesn't give a fuck about you, homie.

It's the White People these motherfuckers wanna enslave and colonize now, because that's who they couldn't get at before.

Like I fucking said, there's a lot of these people lately coming off like they think they're gonna be some kind of Roman Plebeians or some shit. The thing is, even in Ancient Rome, the State feared the power of the Mob and at least sought to keep the people distracted. Very few emperors let alone other officials were dumb enough to be like "Look at me! Look at me! I'm oppressing the People! Aren't I wonderful?"

There's a fair number of Roman Emperors and other famous people of that time that were probably clinically insane and likely today would be called narcissists...but, unlike Trump and a lot of today's cops and/or Republicans, they weren't stupid.

And, among other things, Rome as a society recognized that courage was and is the highest virtue.

America no longer does that, which is why we're Biblical-grade LOST.

And we WILL provoke the Wrath of God, if we are not doing so already.

Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. They were haughty and did detestable things before me. Therefore I did away with them as you have seen. ~Ezekiel 16:49-50 (NIV)

As much as some people like to pretend otherwise, America is not Rome.

In Rome, a certain level of physical courage or at least decorum was expected, demanded and socially enforced. A person who transgressed that would almost certainly suffer physical consequences for their actions. I mean, fuck, one such way is literally the root of where the term "Fascism" even comes from.

These Fucking People are such soft-handed bitches.

We're becoming a mutant love-child of Babylon and Sodom, because of the Republicans, not the gay people.

This bullshit only persists if we allow it.

Resist.

Because honestly, they wouldn't be trying so goddamned hard nor obviously and Epically Furiously failing at it if they had this whole thing in the bag.

This is going to end badly, but it will be worse for them.

Слава Україна!

[Cassian plays Nemik's audio diary]

Karis Nemik: There will be times when the struggle seems impossible. I know this already. Alone, unsure, dwarfed by the scale of the enemy. Remember this. Freedom is a pure idea. It occurs spontaneously and without instruction. Random acts of insurrection are occurring constantly throughout the galaxy. There are whole armies, battalions that have no idea that they've already enlisted in the cause. Remember that the frontier of the Rebellion is everywhere. And even the smallest act of insurrection pushes our lines forward. And then remember this. The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that. And know this, the day will come when all these skirmishes and battles, these moments of defiance will have flooded the banks of the Empire's authority and then there will be one too many. One single thing will break the siege. Remember this. Try. 

~From the Star Wars series Andor, S1.E12 "Rix Road."

One

[At ISB headquarters, Major Partagaz plays a clip of Karis Nemik's audio diary as Supervisor Lagret enters the conference room]

Major Leo Partagaz: I'm assuming you've heard it before.

Supervisor Lagret: Bits and pieces.

Partagaz: Just keeps spreading, doesn't it?

Lagret: It's been hard to contain.

Partagaz: Who do you think it is?

Lagret: I'm afraid they're waiting for you, sir. I told them I'd bring you down.

Partagaz: [breathes heavily and inhales sharply] May I have a moment to collect my thoughts?

[Lagret leaves. Outside the room, he hears a blaster sound, indicating Major Partagaz has shot himself.] 

~From the Star Wars series Andor, S2 E12 "Jedha, Kyber, Erso."

The martyrs of history were not fools, and our honored dead who gave their lives to stop the advance of the Nazis didn't die in vain. Where, then, is the road to peace? Well, it's a simple answer after all. You and I have the courage to say to our enemies, "There is a price we will not pay." There is a point beyond which they must not advance. This is the meaning in the phrase of Barry Goldwater's "peace through strength." Winston Churchill said that "the destiny of man is not measured by material computation. When great forces are on the move in the world, we learn we are spirits — not animals." And he said, "There is something going on in time and space, and beyond time and space, which, whether we like it or not, spells duty. ~Ronald Reagan

Plebeians, not Americans (Trailer Park Rome, Revisited I.)

The very deep did rot: O Christ!
That ever this should be!

Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs
Upon the slimy sea. 

~Samuel Taylor Coleridge, from The Rime Of The Ancient Mariner.

...

Yes makin' mock of uniforms that guard you while you sleep, Is cheaper than them uniforms, an' they're starvation cheap; An' hustling drunken soldiers when they're goin' large a bit Is five times better business than parading in full kit. Then it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, how's your soul?" But it's "Thin red line of 'heroes" when the drums begin to roll, The drums begin to roll, my boys, the drums begin to roll, O it's "Thin red line of 'heroes" when the drums begin to roll. 

~Tommy, Rudyard Kipling

...

Maximus: You sent for me, Caesar?

Marcus Aurelius: Tell me again, Maximus, why are we here?

Maximus: For the glory of the empire, sire.

Marcus Aurelius: Ah, yes. Ah, yes, I remember. Do you see that map, Maximus? That is the world which I created. For 25 years, I have conquered, spilt blood, expanded the empire. Since I became Caesar, I have known four years without war, four years of peace in twenty. And for what? I brought the sword. Nothing more.

Maximus: Caesar, your life...

Marcus Aurelius: Please. Please, don't call me that. Please, come sit. Let us talk together now, very simply, as men. Maximus, talk.

Maximus: Five thousand of my men are out there in the freezing mud. Three thousand of them are bloodied and cleaved. Two thousand will never leave this place. I will not believe that they fought and died for nothing.

Marcus Aurelius: And what would you believe?

Maximus: They fought for you and for Rome.

Marcus Aurelius: And what is Rome, Maximus?

Maximus: I've seen much of the rest of the world. It is brutal and cruel and dark, Rome is the light.

Marcus Aurelius: Yet you have never been there. You have not seen what it has become. I am dying, Maximus. When a man sees his end... he wants to know there was some purpose to his life. How will the world speak my name in years to come? Will I be known as the philosopher? The warrior? The tyrant...? Or will I be the emperor who gave Rome back her true self? There was once a dream that was Rome. You could only whisper it. Anything more than a whisper and it would vanish... it was so fragile. And I fear that it will not survive the winter. Maximus, let us whisper now, together, you and I. You have a son. Tell me about your home.

Maximus: My house is in the hills above Trujillo. A very simple place. Pink-stones that warm in the sun. A kitchen garden that smells of herbs in the day, jasmine in the evening. Through the gate is a giant poplar. Figs, apples, pears. The soil, Marcus- black. Black like my wife's hair. Grapes on the south slopes, olives on the north. Wild ponies play near my house. They tease my son. He wants to be one of them.

Marcus Aurelius: Remember the last time you were home?

Maximus: Two years, 264 days, and this morning.

Marcus Aurelius: I envy you, Maximus. It's a good home. Worth fighting for. There is one more duty that I ask of you before you go home.

Maximus: What would you have me do, Caesar?

Marcus Aurelius: I want you to become the protector of Rome after I die. I will empower you to one end alone: To give power back to the people of Rome, and end the corruption that has crippled it. Will you accept this great honor I have offered you?

Maximus: With all my heart, no.

Marcus Aurelius: Maximus, that is why it must be you.

Maximus: But surely a prefect, a senator, somebody who knows the city, who understands her politics?

Marcus Aurelius: But you have not been corrupted by her politics.

Maximus: And Commodus?

Marcus Aurelius: Commodus is not a moral man. You have known that since you were young. Commodus cannot rule. He must not rule. You are the son that I should have had. Commodus will accept my decision. He knows that you command the loyalty of the army.

Maximus: I need some time, sire.

Marcus Aurelius: Yes. By sunset, I hope you will have agreed. Now embrace me as my son, and bring an old man another blanket.

~From the film Gladiator.

I saw this last night.

The United States Navy continues to fall apart around its sailors, with reports of abject miserable conditions, bad or no food, terribly low morale and suicide attempts aboard the overextended USS Abraham Lincoln, even with the USS George Washington on the way to relieve her, that merely prompts the question in my mind of how do they propose to get the one Carrier Battlegroup out of the Strait of Hormuz which is utterly controlled by the Iranians and then get the other one in? 

And remember, they just did this same shit with the USS Gerald Ford, running shit into the ground to the point where parts are now having to be diverted from the currently under-construction USS Enterprise to repair the Ford. By the way, that pushes relieving the situation back by decades.

This is not sustainable. Eventually, we're going to run out of carriers at this rate with the whole fleet in drydock and don't think somebody hasn't thought that out that if they start another crisis, requiring another ship to be deployed, they can crank up the heat and pain on America globally, and all they really have to do is dig in enough to survive.

Here's Trump with all this bellicose rhetoric and we're already proving we can't back that shit up.

And these goddamn Republicans don't seem to be planning for us to.

As we said when I was in the Air Force, if you fail to plan...you plan to fail.

And all these fucking online Republicans act like if they just believe this shit hard enough, they're gonna be the ones buying new real-estate on the ashes of the next trouble-spot be it Gaza or Taiwan or Whatever The Fuck like these Russian ghouls in Mariupol.

But then we already know These Motherfuckers think the Vulture Capitalists are the real heroes, here.

The thing is, our allies, Canada, Europe, etc. are standing up where we should be while we wreck ourselves for Trump's vainglory and Republican cowardice, greed and selfishness.

And if this Greenland thing boils over, we're going to lose. We're getting our ass kicked by the Iranians, and all most of the people in our government can think to do is find ways to embezzle funding off the whole mess. I read an article last night that a new artillery shell factory in Texas has not produced a single shell that the Army could accept, but yet the Defense Department keeps paying out to these shitheads like nothing is happening.

Manufacturing cannot keep up with the expenditure of munitions as it is, and these idiots wanna pick more fights??

The time is gonna come when somebody sees through the bullying talk, walks up, and punches us right in the goddamn mouth, figuring (correctly) that Trump and a third of America right now is full of shit.

These fucking people got our collective ass kicked by a virus in 2020.

Shit like this is how Rome fell, too great of divides between rich and poor, too much intrigue, politics and religion, and the vainglory of evil men.

At least Americans have the option to do something about it, but I have a feeling when they lose the election and public opinion is even more in the toilet, These Fucking People are just gonna declare an emergency, claim Florida and a few other choice spots as emergency "Safe Zones" and essentially break the country so they can keep some kind of a power base.

They won't even bother with "Continuity of Government" because their entire objective is to "free" themselves both from governance in particular and the rest of us in general.

And the thing that gets me about it, is Republicans and what's left of MAGA aren't even bothering to act like free citizens anymore, but rather more like some kind of Imperial subjects.

Think about that for a second.

Plebeians, not Americans, Roman peasants...not free citizens.

These Fucking People act like they're in an Imperial Cult and have to call Trump their god.

Like this shit is some kind of Trailer Park Rome.

That in particular really bothers me.

And yes, I'm here to tell you that with the US population being around 330 million, 30% of that is enough to at least make a hell of an attempt to get their own country. No, that's not really the world people like Elon Musk and Sam Altman want to live in, but making the attempt would get a lot of people killed...mostly their own, but as we saw during COVID-19 they don't really care about that. 

They'd probably lose, but they're losing in Iran and that's not stopping them from trying to win based on macho bullshit when reality and the rest of the world decided that logistics and training were the killer apps *Checks Notes* a couple hundred years ago. 

Hell, WE were the ones who took that obvious conclusion and turned it into an art form.

But These Fucking People think they know better. Of course, they also thought building a wall would do something. It didn't. Truthfully they think as long as they can cash out and catch a plane in the dark the night before enemy tanks crash through the palace gates, they're good.

It worked for Nguyen Van Thieu and Ashraf Ghani, they think.

Never mind what happened to the millions of people in South Vietnam or Afghanistan that got left behind.

Now we can either step up and stop this bullshit or we can start waiting for the unintended consequences of all this horseshit to keep piling up while Republicans lose foreign wars but then start treating their own fellow citizens, and ultimately their own group-members, as the Enemy in a never-ending search for more paranoid narcissist-fuel and the dopamine hits provided by exclusivism.

It's their new three R's; Racism, Religiosity and Republicanism.

Anything but "Love the Lord thy God" or "Love Thy Neighbor."

I've got a family to think about. I can't afford to tolerate this bullshit.

You either believe in freedom or you don't.

And either you're willing to fight for it or you're not.

Слава Україна!

[Cassian plays Nemik's audio diary]

Karis Nemik: There will be times when the struggle seems impossible. I know this already. Alone, unsure, dwarfed by the scale of the enemy. Remember this. Freedom is a pure idea. It occurs spontaneously and without instruction. Random acts of insurrection are occurring constantly throughout the galaxy. There are whole armies, battalions that have no idea that they've already enlisted in the cause. Remember that the frontier of the Rebellion is everywhere. And even the smallest act of insurrection pushes our lines forward. And then remember this. The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear. Remember that. And know this, the day will come when all these skirmishes and battles, these moments of defiance will have flooded the banks of the Empire's authority and then there will be one too many. One single thing will break the siege. Remember this. Try. 

~From the Star Wars series Andor, S1.E12 "Rix Road."

Last Post

And after these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory.

And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird.

For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies.

And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.

For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities.

Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her double according to her works: in the cup which she hath filled fill to her double.

How much she hath glorified herself, and lived deliciously, so much torment and sorrow give her: for she said in her heart, I sit a queen, and am no widow, and shall see no sorrow.

Therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong is the Lord God who judges her.

And the kings of the earth, who have committed fornication and lived deliciously with her, shall bewail her, and lament for her, when they shall see the smoke of her burning,

Standing afar off for the fear of her torment, saying, Alas, alas that great city Babylon, that mighty city! for in one hour is thy judgment come. ~Revelation 18:1-10