A Truly Wild Week of Weather Is About To Unfold...

A major severe weather outbreak (not surprising; it is late March/early April after all) looks set to unleash itself over the Midwest and most of the Eastern U.S. tomorrow through Monday. Safe safe, stay weather aware; as Ryan Hall puts it, "Don't be scared, be prepared."

Founders Quotes, 27-28 March 2025

Two of America's earliest Presidents with some interesting last words (along w/an explanation for them)....

(1) Thomas Jefferson still lives. - John Adams, after waking momentarily, 1826

(2) Is it the Fourth? - Thomas Jefferson, evening July 3; Jefferson died the next morning — 1826

The backstory here is interesting; both Adams and Jefferson were Revolutionary leaders during America's war for independence agst. the British and were the 2nd and 3rd Presidents of the United States. Unfortunately, the two of them very much opposites politically - Adams was a staunch Federalst and had helped craft the controversial Alien & Sedition Acts; Jefferson was a Democrat-Republican and wrote the Kentucky & Virginia Resolutions opposing them.

Indeed, the 1800 election resulted in a decade-long feud where they refused to speak to one another for about a decade but eventually they reconciled via. the assistance of fellow Revolutionary Benjamin Rush and remained friends through the remainder of their lives. Both of them, ironically, would pass away on July 4, 1826, marking both a poignant end to their respective lives but also an end to the Revolutionary Generation (most of their contemporaries having already died in years prior) and according to historians, Adams' last words were amazement over the fact that his once-rival and contemporary had supposedly outlived him, unaware that Jefferson had died several hours earlier (Jefferson died around 1pm; Adams around 6:30pm). 

Happy Sabbath - 28 March 2025

"What is the reason given for the institution of the Sabbath?—Because in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Sabbath is designed to call our attention to the Creator. It is his memorial. But we have already learned that it was Jesus Christ through whom God created the heaven and the earth; therefore it was Jesus Christ who rested on the seventh day. It was Jesus Christ who blessed the seventh day; it was Jesus Christ who hallowed the seventh day; it was Jesus Christ who sanctified the seventh day; and the purpose of this day thus blessed, thus hallowed, thus sanctified, is to call the attention of men everywhere to the Creator. But the Creator is Jesus Christ. The purpose, therefore, of all created things to which our attention is thus called by the Sabbath, is that we may understand the power and the divinity of Jesus Christ."—W. W. Prescott, Christ and the Sabbath.

Private Data of Yemen War Plans Chat Group Openly Available - Der Spiegel

Remember at the beginning of this week that Atlantic article about the supposed leak of Yemen war plans by senior officials in the Trump administration? Well...

The private data of top security advisers to US President Donald Trump can be accessed online, German news magazine Der Spiegel reported on Wednesday, adding to the fallout from the officials’ use of a Signal group chat to plan airstrikes on Yemen.

Mobile phone numbers, email addresses and in some cases passwords used by national security adviser Mike Waltz, defense secretary Pete Hegseth, and director of national intelligence Tulsi Gabbard can be found via commercial data-search services and hacked data dumped online, it reported. It is not clear in all cases how recent the details are. (The Guardian)

Now, I know I'm not the sharpest bulb in the political lighthouse - I've never even stayed at a Holiday Inn Express! (for those old enough to remember the reference) - but even I know if you're going to communicate with others in this day and age, you need to be (a) clear and concise in your words, (b) you need to make sure no one not-in-the-loop is listening in and (c) that your comms are as secure as possible.

Somewhere, someone missed the memo and, despite the Conservative Media Wurlitzer's protestations that this is a nothing-burger of a story, the fact still remains that senior Trump officials discussed some very secret things over a public messaging app. Are we that bankrupt as a country we can't afford top-end comms of this nature?

Expanding My Horizons...

After getting banned from Twitter/X (don't ask), I've moved onto greener pastures....

(Bluesky) Matthew Little

...such as rising social media platform Bluesky. Yes, its' supposedly more hostile to conservatives/classical liberals than X but given how X is most days, it can't be that bad. Right?

Starbase Prepares to Bury their STARGATE | SpaceX Boca Chica

Say whatever you want about Elon Musk and how he runs (or misruns) Twitter/X, but he'd be making money hand over fist there if he'd run it in the same manner he runs SpaceX (recent incidents w/Starship notwithstanding).

Founders Quote, 26 March 2025

It is not honorable to take mere legal advantage, when it happens to be contrary to justice. - Thomas Jefferson, Opinion on Debts Due to Soldiers, 1790

If we're going to send our brave young men and women off to fight and possibly give their lives in service to America, we owe them everything possible that we can give them. Period, end of story.

Founders Quotes, 24-25 March 2025

Two interesting quotes on the judiciary...

(1) A judiciary independent of a king or executive alone, is a good thing; but independence of the will of the nation is a solecism, at least in a republican government. - Thomas Jefferson, letter to Thomas Ritchie, 1820

(2) And it proves, in the last place, that liberty can have nothing to fear from the judiciary alone, but would have everything to fear from its union with either of the other departments. - Alexander Hamilton, Federalist #78, 1788

Contrary to popular conservative thought, an independent judiciary is a good thing for a country to have. No judge should ever have to bend to popular will, whether exerted by the people or by elected officials. That said, judges are also human beings who are cognizant of the political zeitgeist surrounding the cases they deal with and that means having both the patience of Job and the willingness to tiptoe through minefields without stepping on a political/social landmine.

NSC Leaks Yemen War Plans to Journalist in Major Security Leak

To quote the great Vince Lomardi, "What in the hell is going on around here?"

A catastrophic security leak is triggering bipartisan outrage after the Atlantic revealed that senior Trump administration officials accidentally broadcast highly sensitive military plans through a Signal group chat with a journalist reading along.

On the Senate floor on Monday, the minority leader, Chuck Schumer, called it “one of the most stunning breaches of military intelligence I have read about in a very, very long time” and urged Republicans to seek a “full investigation into how this happened, the damage it created and how we can avoid it in the future”.

“Every single one of the government officials on this text chain have now committed a crime – even if accidentally,” the Delaware senator Chris Coons wrote on Twitter/X. “We can’t trust anyone in this dangerous administration to keep Americans safe.” (The Guardian)

Basically, the TL/DR for this is that around the time of the strikes earlier this month against the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen, there was a group chat on Signal between the principals involved here - SecDef Hegseth, NatSec Advisor Waltz, DNI Gabbard, VP Vance, SecState Rubio, WH advisor Miller (and a few others more than likely) - and apparently someone added to the chat the phone number of a senior journalist for the Atlantic, Jeffrey Goldberg, who reported it earlier today to everyone's outrage.

Now, how he got it I suspect everyone would like to know but here's my first thought: why in the holy fuck did they do this over a publically available messaging system such as Signal (which is end-to-end encrypted, contrary to popular opinion) and not over the secure communications systems the United States is known for?

Secondly, who sent the group chat links to Goldberg, a well-known Trump critic? Third, and here's a political angle: this effectively nullifies conservative attacks against Democrats' who've in the past been loose and fast with cybersecurity and other security issues - Hillary Clinton and her emails, Eric Swalwell and his daillance w/a known communist Chinese spy - because now the argument can be made that if you're going to prosecute/attack them, then you need to go after whoever leaked these plans to the Atlantic. (Remember conservatives' criticisms of the well-known "two-tier system of justice"? Yeah, the argument can be made that if Trump wants to go after his political critics, then he also needs to have this investigated fully as well.

Suffice it to say, both sides of Congress - Democrats and Republicans - are horrified and outraged over it and I don't blame them...and it also throws out comments both Waltz and Hegseth have made towards Democrats' in past years.

Finally, there's another part of this angle that I suspect will come out in short order - by using Signal to communicate rather than through official comms, were they trying to escape scrutiny via. the Federal Records Act? Trust me when I say this, folks: you can escape a lot of things in government, but God help you if you misplace a piece of paper record somewhere.

D.C. Corruption

 

(The Patriot Post, 22 March 2025)

IN a land full of corruption, the honest man is an endangered hero.

Founders Quotes, 22-23 March 2025

Two George Washington quotes on international relations....

(1) Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence, (I conjure you to believe me fellow citizens) the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake; since history and experience prove that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of Republican Government. - Farewell Address, 1796

(2) My policy has been, and will continue to be, while I have the honor to remain in the administration of the government, to be upon friendly terms with, but independent of, all the nations of the earth. To share in the broils of none. To fulfil our own engagements. To supply the wants, and be carriers for them all: Being thoroughly convinced that it is our policy and interest to do so. - letter to Gouverneur Morris, 1795

International relations can be a fickle thing; Washington's sage words about not getting entangled in foreign adventures are words that I wish recent presidents would've taken to heart. Part of what makes a civil society functioning and successful is keeping out foreign influences, whether overt or covert, and making it clear that we wish the best for all but we are also prepared to deal out the worst if necessary.