gehringer_2

She may have been in the wrong place at the wrong time, but she didn't help herself yesterday or for that matter any time this week. I'll go back to TigerHolics post about accountability. At this point I'd rather see a few people in authority get bounced unjustly (not that I'm even saying that in this case) as long as more get bounced that should be. When you have that kind of responsibility you should be motivated by that fact that you will lose your job if things screw up on your watch. The rest of us live that all the time.

I am not young, so I can tell you that even before the big de-institutionalization movement and the guys started coming back from 'Nam, we had drunks and addicts begging on the streets in Detroit. I think one difference is that there were places we called SROs (single room occupancy) - mostly old run down apt houses, that people could afford to stay in on their SSI (which used to be more generally available). But economic changes have squeezed out all kinds of cheap housing, de-institutionalization has added to the numbers, welfare rules are stricter, more drugs are available on the street, and returning warrior issues are worse than in the past. So we took a problem we didn't know how to solve when it was small and made it worse from multiple directions.

this is the modern disease.

As long as this doesn't turn into a stretch like last season when everytime they got to one under, they lost. Need at to at least break through that barrier as the spring board into next season.

this is such a key understanding. There is nothing you do in immunology that someone somewhere won't have a bad reaction to, but you can't let that chance stop you from doing what you need to do save the masses. If you are that person, it's a tragedy - absolutely, but you can't expect society to sacrifice its well being for your bad genetic luck. It's one of those risks in life like being struck by lightning. The truth is there are no easy answers. It's true that sometime when the benefit to the many is marginal and the risk to the few is great, treatments are not pursued, but this is never an easy calculus for anyone and as a society you have to do the best you can knowing some people will always end up unhappy with the result, and maybe justifiably so. It's another reason you need good politics rather than one dominated by big money and corporate interest groups. Those are the factors that make getting to good faith government decisions harder and less likely to be trusted.

the other interesting question (I think) is whether after another loss, anyone in the rad right wing would try to displace Trump from it's leadership, or whether Trump holds the movement as his own even after another loss. Maybe he doesn't go away - he just keeps agitating from his own media perch. If it's the later, then you can see a scenario where as Trump gets older and less capable a 'trusted lieutenant' could emerge who then inherits the mantle. The thing is, Trump only really trusts family and as you note, none of them seem remotely up to the task, unless maybe Jared and Ivanka pivot back into involvement in the movement, which right know doesn't look likely. Of course, we can''t count our chickens before they hatch, he hasn't lost yet.

Time will tell about the parallels. One possible difference is that what happened in France was just a holding action. If I read the numbers correctly Le Pen is still increasing her vote totals. If Trump looses this time around, I think most people believe the air goes out of that particular political balloon in the US. Of course if it doesn't, especially if a Trump sion can gain the allegiance of the movement and carry it on as Marine has done after her father, then you'd have a parallel in spades.

Wasn’t the management task the Pentagon’s? I’m usually skeptical about black and white. Do you think it possible/likely the Pentagon told the WH they couldn’t do what they were being asked to , or alternately, that the Pentagon had so burned its credibility at the WH that the admin no longer believed what they said? We have a history all the way back to VN of WHs and Pentagons where confidence in each other has been ……lacking. I do agree the US allowed too few to exit under our auspices. That was also a problem after VN. But you can blame Biden plus the entire rest of the government and for that matter the voting public as well for that. The nation's love for the people who risk themselves to ally with us seems to run proportional to their distance away.

Probably should use the past tense.

Sometimes you just can't keep pushing uphill against the realities of the geography. If Afghanistan were not landlocked, and you had a capital either on or with a defensible route to the sea, maybe you could have pacified and protected at least one major population center and let your nation building percolate outward - assuming you could even do that successfully, But Kabul had hostiles over the horizon in almost every direction. With no support for a western agenda anywhere in the hinterlands, and the fractured ethnic situation, Kabul was an ill-omened place to try and plant a western flag.

the BUNT is back

this one could be delayed but rain is supposed be gone be 8 or so.

people haven't adjusted to how much hitting is down across the league.

And that’s the difference isn’t it, that the Ukrainians are fighting for themselves for sometime we both understand in the same way while it was never more than a minority of Afghans that was true for? It’s tragic but it’s also true that there is only so much one society can do for another and those lines are not always easy to see in real time when decisions are made. We were also told we’d be hailed as liberators in Iraq, ~10 yrs ago we were laughing at how foolish that seemed, but maybe today not so much. History has a way of turning things on their heads more than once before it’s done. The US has been no saint around the world in my lifetime, it’s been a very mixed bag, but I have fewer reservations about supporting Ukraine than I’ve had about most of our FP adventures.

There are realities, you can't launch an all out attack on Russia. Once that is off the table, reasonable people can and do disagree on how to manage the situation. You can complain about having to spend the money but other people sometimes do things you have no choice but to respond to and those responses are often not free. If your business was being burgled you would have to buy security to establish your 'stalemate' with the local thieves. Of course you can always just give up. Everyone lives in a world where their choices may not be all they would prefer.

Putin is corroding the Russian nation and society from the inside out. He is a cancer that is going to kill its host. Nothing to be happy about in that whole mess. All the rest of the world can do is prevent his necrosis from metastasizing beyond his own borders.

I would have to guess somebody made sure in advance most of the possible choices would take themselves out of contention in the 1st hour. With Newsom, Whitmer et al coming out with almost instant endorsements, it was over before it began.

More projection apparently?

are these people even for real?

Interesting to hear them pretty much play the Byrds arrangement.

That's why a spot start (or two) isn't such a bad idea. JV found out his off-speed still needed work if he was going to stick. Same kind of lesson might benefit Jobe - or you might find out he ready to handle it. Sure you have to figure out the roster issues, but in the end those have to be secondary considerations. But with Jobe they probably already have in innings cap in mind so he's probably not a candidate all that much this year in any case.

Vierling isn't terrible - he's not bad going to his right, throws well and he'll make routine plays, but there are a lot plays he isn't going to make compared to say - Gio. I guess bottom line I don't mind him there on the short side of platoon, but he should get most of his AB in the OF. Haven't seen Jung to form any impression.

Good theater for the Congress critters but no bureaucracy is going to produce a vetted report for her to speak from in this short a time frame. That's just organizational reality. A number of the questions like reconstructing the shooter's day were not even her purview - they are the FBI's. The one proper defense she didn't use was that much of some of what he was asking were "sources and methods" questions which should be classified info. Executive branch people have sort of learned the best thing is just sit down and take their lashes and let it all roll off and don't say anything to feed the beast, but you don't want to be too obvious about the 'possum play.

RFK was a Trump inside job from the beginning. The polling must be confirming he would take more votes from Trump, thus the exit.

he also got hit pretty hard. which in JV's case was probably a good thing to happen.