It's a bit shocking at how far many of you would go to deny the obvious fact that Biden is clearly senile, and not merely just a bit dim, like Dubya always was.

I'm not sure though if this Weekend at Brandon's situation really is a worse situation than having someone like Hillary Clinton in charge, while she may not be senile, she is a flaming warmonger who could easily escalate the Ukraine war.

It seems like, within the current administration power blob, the somewhat saner faction of the Democrats, in conjunction with the professional faction of the Pentagon (who understand what a war with a peer military foe would look like), is at least holding back a little bit the neocons and neolibs pushing for direct intervention and an escalation in EE that would have paved a clear and short path towards world war 3...

Cal88 said:

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(who understand what a war with a peer military foe would look like)

---

hahahahahah

How much are you getting paid to pretend that Russia is a peer military? They've lost ~35,000 troops already in Ukraine which is what happens when you deploy terrified untrained conscripts using ancient poorly maintained and designed equipment. If your tanks are vulnerable to drones deployed by IT nerds and uh seasonal mud, you aren't a peer military to the US.

If it weren't for their Nukes, Russia wouldn't strike fear in anyone. They've North Korea with nukes and none of your propaganda can change that.

How would you measure a President being "clearly senile?" Is this a medical diagnosis?

I don't think I've seen Biden making any gaffes obviously worse than things other Presidents have done. As has been demonstrated, plenty of politicians read the wrong thing off a teleprompter from time to time.

Unit2Sucks said:

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Cal88 said:

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(who understand what a war with a peer military foe would look like)

---

hahahahahah


If it weren't for their Nukes, Russia wouldn't strike fear in anyone. They've North Korea with nukes and none of your propaganda can change that.

---

100% TRUE.

sycasey said:

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How would you measure a President being "clearly senile?" Is this a medical diagnosis?

I don't think I've seen Biden making any gaffes obviously worse than things other Presidents have done. As has been demonstrated, plenty of politicians read the wrong thing off a teleprompter from time to time.

---

It's unserious criticism. Biden hasn't made any substantive moves that would make one concerned about his mental state. I find Biden's views and opinions on legislation to be generally credible and at an appropriate level for a president. He chokes his way through a lot of it and is not the caliber of speaker I would look for, but it's better than other problems we could have. I would much rather have a speaker/communicator like Mayor Pete, but he's inexperienced and has other issues. Let's remember, the GOP shuns intelligence and it's hard to imagine them electing an obviously smart person. DeSantis and Pompeo are smart and well-educated but they have to pretend to be dumb to get GOP support.

Contrast these complaints about Biden with a guy like Herschel Walker who will be the next Senator from Georgia and who none of these hyperpartisans have any concerns about. You trust this guy to vote on legislation?

Herschel on the climate/Green New Deal/air:

"Since we don't control the air our good air decided to float over to China's bad air so when China gets our good air, their bad air got to move. So it moves over to our good air space. Then now we got we to clean that back up." pic.twitter.com/BsR4GVAbX7

— stephen fowler (@stphnfwlr) July 11, 2022

Just so I can get more of a feel for your diagnosis of Biden's*current mental state as "senile," do you have any opinions regarding tRump's current mental state?

*In his best day, Biden was certainly not an intellectual (like the vast majority of politicians). I would say now he is just a guy in his late 70's that is not real bright. I have been around many of my parents' generation that were senile (all deceased now). As of this date, Joe isn't even in their zip code.

Biden, like Reagan and tRump, is a figurehead president. Unfortunately for tRump, no one except the mediocre and criminally inclined want anything to do with him.

Unit2Sucks said:

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Cal88 said:

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(who understand what a war with a peer military foe would look like)

---

hahahahahah

How much are you getting paid to pretend that Russia is a peer military? They've lost ~35,000 troops already in Ukraine which is what happens when you deploy terrified untrained conscripts using ancient poorly maintained and designed equipment. If your tanks are vulnerable to drones deployed by IT nerds and uh seasonal mud, you aren't a peer military to the US.

If it weren't for their Nukes, Russia wouldn't strike fear in anyone. They've North Korea with nukes and none of your propaganda can change that.

---

You have a very limited understanding of military history, modern hardware or geopolitics, you get your information on Ukraine from low-grade propaganda tweets like the one you've posted about the Russian soldier blowing up an S-300 launcher.

Technically, you're right in saying that Russia might not be a peer adversary to NATO in a conventional ground war, only it's the other way around...

https://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/us-not-ready-peer-peer-fight-europe

Quote:

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As we all have, I have been watching the impressive Russian ground forces arrayed to invade Ukraine from three sides. Some comments after consultation with a good friend in the Marines:
Upon due consideration, it might have been unthoughtfully wise to not place our military in harm's way simply because it would have its clock handed to it. Our military, particularly the Army, is tailored for the 20-year war in the Sandboxes-not a Peer conflict.

Of equal import is that all the doctrine, tactics and professional skills are on the Sandbox model. None of our uniforms have had any experience in fighting Peer-Peer. We went into Korea and Vietnam with a goodly amount of leaders in both officer and NCO ranks who had such experience and could both adapt and train to the threat level required. That no longer exists.

We are also grossly dependent upon sophisticated comms and satellite systems that probably would not exist after the first round. (Sidebar: Find a Lieutenant that can read a map and land navigate with only a compass and paper map.)

Our land units-small units (squad-company/team), the cutting edge and only true maneuver elements, are not trained to operate in isolation from higher. The trained ability to make crucial decisions absent guidance and control does not exist. NTC and JRTC routinely proves that.
Unfortunately, we are not even close to being a peer force compared to the Russians less nuclear weapons.

---

Your estimate of 35k dead Russian soldiers is off by a factor of ~5, the number is likely below 10,000, or just above it if you include DPR and LDR rebel forces. Here are the estimates of Russian deaths, from a recent BBC article:



https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-61987945

75%-85% of casualties in the Donbas front have come from artillery. And in what boils down to an artillery duel, where one side has a 15-25 to 1 advantage in munitions fired, what do you think the KIA ratio is going to look like?!?

Quote:

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Ukraine forces outgunned up to 40 to one by Russian forces, intelligence report reveals

Exclusive: Grinding conflict in east is 'seriously demoralising' Ukrainian forces, dossier says


Ukrainian troops are suffering massive losses as they are outgunned 20 to one in artillery and 40 to one in ammunition by Russian forces, according to new intelligence painting a bleak picture of the conflict on the frontline.

A report by Ukrainian and Western intelligence officials also reveals that the Ukrainians are facing huge difficulties responding to Russians shelling with their artillery restricted to a range of 25 kilometres, while the enemy can strike from 12 times that distance.

For the first time since the war began, there is now concern over desertion. The report, seen by The Independent, says the worsening situation in the Donbas, with up to a hundred soldiers being killed a day, is having "a seriously demoralising effect on Ukrainian forces as well as a very real material effect; cases of desertion are growing every week".

At the same time, as the Russians capture territories in the east, and consolidate their control over the seized cities of Mariupol and Kherson, the bargaining position of the Ukrainian government is being weakened by acute disparity in the numbers of prisoners being held by each side.

The total number of Russian soldiers being held by Ukraine has fallen to 550 from 900 in April after a series of exchanges. Moscow meanwhile has more than 5,600 Ukrainian troops in captivity, the figure enlarged by the surrender of 2,500, including members of the Azov Battalion, in Mariupol.

---

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/ukraine-war-intelligence-russia-kyiv-military-b2096715.html

Quote:

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The battlefields of the war in Ukraine are now totally dominated by artillery warfare. The problem is that the Armed Forces of Ukraine have one artillery piece to 10 to 15 Russian artillery pieces.

The Ukrainian military intelligence emphasizes the importance of western weapon supplies. Currently, Ukrainian army has almost used up all of its artillery ammunition, Vadym Skibitskyi, the Deputy Chief of Ukrainian Defence Intelligence, says to The Guardian.

"This is an artillery war now, and we are losing in terms of artillery. Everything now depends on what the west gives us. Our western partners have given us about 10% of what they have", Skibitskyi emphasized.

---

https://tsn.ua/en/ato/the-russians-have-10-15-times-more-artillery-deputy-chief-of-intelligence-2083453.html

https://www.politico.com/newsletters/national-security-daily/2022/06/16/outgunned-outmanned-outnumbered-outplanned-00040024

This casualty imbalance is exacerbated by the fact that Ukraine has a very limited capacity to ferry out its injured from the front, and has put very limited resources into this. It is unfortunate that western countries like Canada or Sweden, which have taken on that role in past conflicts, are only providing weapons to extend this war and fight it out to the last Ukrainian.

35k might be a very low estimate of Ukrainian soldiers KIA. Ukraine has extended the draft to women under 60, who are now not allowed to travel outside their oblast without permission.

It turns out that in 2022, artillery is still king, at least in a war on or near Russia's borders.

sycasey said:

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How would you measure a President being "clearly senile?" Is this a medical diagnosis?

I don't think I've seen Biden making any gaffes obviously worse than things other Presidents have done. As has been demonstrated, plenty of politicians read the wrong thing off a teleprompter from time to time.

---

bearister said:

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Just so I can get more of a feel for your diagnosis of Biden's*current mental state as "senile," do you have any opinions regarding tRump's current mental state?

*In his best day, Biden was certainly not an intellectual (like the vast majority of politicians). I would say now he is just a guy in his late 70's that is not real bright. I have been around many of my parents' generation that were senile (all deceased now). As of this date, Joe isn't even in their zip code.

Biden, like Reagan and tRump, is a figurehead president. Unfortunately for tRump, no one except the mediocre and criminally inclined want anything to do with him.

---

Biden at his prime was probably just a bit smarter than Dubya, which is a fairly mediocre level, at least by presidential standards. But you've got to admit that a younger Biden wouldn't have needed the kind of geriatric pampering displayed by that cue card above.

OMG this is too rich. This war has been an absolute embarrassment for Russia and Putin and Cal88 thinks they've covered themselves in glory.

Call88's view of the effectiveness of Russia's military exceeds even Russia's public views. A Kremlin spokesperson acknowledged more than 3 months ago that they suffered "significant losses of troops" and that it was a "huge tragedy." A dozen Russian generals have been killed in action! Can you imagine 12 generals dying on the front lines and still pretending that things are going well? They've lost more troops in this 3 month continuous war crime than they did in 9 years in Afghanistan.

I honestly can't tell if he's a satire account or if he literally believe the things that he writes. The fact that he so gladly laps up and regurgitates Putin's propaganda is pretty entertaining. Really just validates everything we've seen from Cal88 over the last few years.

Oh and meanwhile, Cal88 is joining the chorus of hyper-partisans who is pretending like they have some sort of objective standard.

Trump was wildly unpopular, almost died of covid, in obvious mental decline, and refused to respond to the public health crisis of the century, and it no point did anyone suggest he not run again.

— Moment Meeter (@agraybee) July 10, 2022

^ None of the sources I've posted in support of my statements above are anywhere near "Putin propaganda", those are all reliable British, American and Ukrainian sources.

Unit2Sucks said:

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OMG this is too rich. This war has been an absolute embarrassment for Russia and Putin and Cal88 thinks they've covered themselves in glory.

Call88's view of the effectiveness of Russia's military exceeds even Russia's public views. A Kremlin spokesperson acknowledged more than 3 months ago that they suffered "significant losses of troops" and that it was a "huge tragedy." A dozen Russian generals have been killed in action! Can you imagine 12 generals dying on the front lines and still pretending that things are going well? They've lost more troops in this 3 month continuous war crime than they did in 9 years in Afghanistan.

I honestly can't tell if he's a satire account or if he literally believe the things that he writes. The fact that he so gladly laps up and regurgitates Putin's propaganda is pretty entertaining. Really just validates everything we've seen from Cal88 over the last few years.

---

I admit, it's difficult to think that it's not a satire account.

But as I've posted earlier, the OT Forum is proof positive that my Cal degree from '82 is WORTHLESS.
Absolutely WORTHLESS.

Cal88 said:

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sycasey said:

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How would you measure a President being "clearly senile?" Is this a medical diagnosis?

I don't think I've seen Biden making any gaffes obviously worse than things other Presidents have done. As has been demonstrated, plenty of politicians read the wrong thing off a teleprompter from time to time.

---

---

It's pretty funny that you accused Unit2 of falling for "low-grade propaganda tweets" and then you post this. Seriously?

Oh no, Joe Biden carried some notes into a meeting. Clearly this proves he's senile.

sycasey said:

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Cal88 said:

---

sycasey said:

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How would you measure a President being "clearly senile?" Is this a medical diagnosis?

I don't think I've seen Biden making any gaffes obviously worse than things other Presidents have done. As has been demonstrated, plenty of politicians read the wrong thing off a teleprompter from time to time.

---

---

It's pretty funny that you accused Unit2 of falling for "low-grade propaganda tweets" and then you post this. Seriously?

Oh no, Joe Biden carried some notes into a meeting. Clearly this proves he's senile.

---

Let's completely ignore the content of these notes, those are the kind of instructions you wouldn't even make to a 10 year old child.

A 10yo could also be trained to properly read a teleprompter, a basic skill which has somehow eluded the sitting POTUS lately...

Asufutimaehaehfutbw.

At this point the only hope is that the guy in charge of the teleprompter writes, "I quit." at the end of a speech

Cal88 said:

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^ None of the sources I've posted in support of my statements above are anywhere near "Putin propaganda", those are all reliable British, American and Ukrainian sources.

---

You pick and choose what "reliable" sources you pull from. It just so happens to always coincide with Kremlin propaganda and to my knowledge you have not once criticized Putin or Russia's war of aggression.

You didn't choose to quote this BBC article. I wonder why?

Quote:

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"I don't want to go [back to Ukraine] to kill and be killed," says Sergey - not his real name - who spent five weeks fighting in Ukraine earlier this year.

He is now home in Russia, having taken legal advice to avoid being sent back to the front line. Sergey is just one of hundreds of Russian soldiers understood to have been seeking such advice.

Sergey says he is traumatised by his experience in Ukraine.

"I had thought that we were the Russian army, the most super-duper in the world," says the young man bitterly. Instead they were expected to operate without even basic equipment, such as night vision devices, he says.

"We were like blind kittens. I'm shocked by our army. It wouldn't cost much to equip us. Why wasn't it done?"

---

The BBC pointed out that a retired Russian colonel even acknowledged on Russian state TV how poorly things are going and urged Russians not to fall for the propaganda. I guess he should have warned people like you too.

Extraordinary exchange on Russian state TV’s top talk show about Ukraine. Military analyst & retired colonel Mikhail Khodarenok tells anchor Olga Skabeyeva “the situation for us will clearly get worse…we’re in total geopolitical isolation…the situation is not normal.” pic.twitter.com/ExMwVDszsk

— Steve Rosenberg (@BBCSteveR) May 16, 2022

Quote:

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The problems that Mr. Khodaryonok referred to, sometimes obliquely, included low morale, the array of Western countries aligned against Russia and the amount of fighters and matriel that Ukraine was assembling.

"We are in total geopolitical isolation and the whole world is against us, even if we don't want to admit it," said Mr. Khodaryonok, noting that Russia's "resources, military-political and military-technical, are limited."

He urged Russians not to take "informational sedatives." The clip was first highlighted by Francis Scarr of BBC Monitoring, which tracks Russian broadcasts. Mr. Khodaryonok did not immediately respond to a request for further comment.

---

I could go on and on with your same credible sources showing how wrong you are and you would respond by cherry-picking other random sources to try to piece together a narrative that the Kremlin would love.

You aren't fooling anyone and the whole world can see how much weaker their military is compared to what you and others have advertised for years.

DiabloWags said:

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Unit2Sucks said:

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OMG this is too rich. This war has been an absolute embarrassment for Russia and Putin and Cal88 thinks they've covered themselves in glory.

Call88's view of the effectiveness of Russia's military exceeds even Russia's public views. A Kremlin spokesperson acknowledged more than 3 months ago that they suffered "significant losses of troops" and that it was a "huge tragedy." A dozen Russian generals have been killed in action! Can you imagine 12 generals dying on the front lines and still pretending that things are going well? They've lost more troops in this 3 month continuous war crime than they did in 9 years in Afghanistan.

I honestly can't tell if he's a satire account or if he literally believe the things that he writes. The fact that he so gladly laps up and regurgitates Putin's propaganda is pretty entertaining. Really just validates everything we've seen from Cal88 over the last few years.

---

I admit, it's difficult to think that it's not a satire account.

But as I've posted earlier, the OT Forum is proof positive that my Cal degree from '82 is WORTHLESS.
Absolutely WORTHLESS.

---

If that degree were in History, Poli Sci, IR, PEIS or just about any social science, then you might not be that far off...

The purpose of a good liberal arts education is to provide graduates with a fair degree of critical thinking and discernment, and to provide the tools to decipher the limits and flaws of prevailing narratives.

We've had an unreal level of propaganda about the Ukraine war, by western media, directed at an unfortunately way too gullible public (including Cal grads unfortunately), going from the Ghost of Kiev, to the Snake Island "GFY Vlad" Alamo last standers, to claims of half of Russian soldiers getting frostbit toes in the Ukrainian springtime, to spontaneously exploding Russian tanks, to Russian generals getting decimated by the dozen...

This latest instalment, a spinoff of that last item above is actually pretty funny.

In case you might have missed it: so the narrative is that Ukraine has killed so many generals that Putin had to scrape down that barrel and recall a 300lb general from retirement, "General Pavel":



https://nypost.com/2022/06/26/obese-retired-russian-general-called-to-fight-in-ukraine-report/

https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1631272/vladimir-Putin-russia-ukraine-obese-general-losses-war

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/19003310/putin-calls-obese-20st-retired-general-lead-troops-ukraine/

https://www.dailywire.com/news/see-it-putin-pulls-porky-general-out-of-retirement-as-moscow-scrapes-bottom-of-the-barrel

Turns out this ruskie vet was a retired Russian border patrol officer who had put his uniform on for a local celebration of border patrol vets. His real name is not even Pavel, but that name has a nice Saturday morning cartoon Ruskie ring to it, I guess they could have gone for "General Popov" too.

This is the kind of very creative storyboarding that passes for war reporting. I've got to admit it's quite funny and creative.

Unit2Sucks said:

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Cal88 said:

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^ None of the sources I've posted in support of my statements above are anywhere near "Putin propaganda", those are all reliable British, American and Ukrainian sources.

---

You pick and choose what "reliable" sources you pull from. It just so happens to always coincide with Kremlin propaganda and to my knowledge you have not once criticized Putin or Russia's war of aggression.

You didn't choose to quote this BBC article. I wonder why?

"I don't want to go [back to Ukraine] to kill and be killed," says Sergey - not his real name - who spent five weeks fighting in Ukraine earlier this year.

He is now home in Russia, having taken legal advice to avoid being sent back to the front line. Sergey is just one of hundreds of Russian soldiers understood to have been seeking such advice.

Sergey says he is traumatised by his experience in Ukraine.

"I had thought that we were the Russian army, the most super-duper in the world," says the young man bitterly. Instead they were expected to operate without even basic equipment, such as night vision devices, he says.

"We were like blind kittens. I'm shocked by our army. It wouldn't cost much to equip us. Why wasn't it done?"
...

---

I looked up the authors of this BBC article, two young hipster "creative" types, a (very creative) fiction writer, Kateryna, and a fashion model (Olesya here below).

That BBC article was pretty good work, the kind that Eric Arthur Blair's BBC editors would have readily approved. I think they would have qualified Kateryna's semi-biographic essay below as a bit too melodramatic...


Olesya Gerasimenko



Kateryna Khinkulova

"It was a dark and stormy night in Paris"

I did not bury Tanya I scattered her ashes in Paris. All this romantic appeal dying somewhere but not in Paris, bridges over the Seine, whatever really got under my skin. I stood on one of the bridges, Bolik sleeping in his stroller. It wasn't the Mirabeau Bridge, but I could see the Eiffel Tower and the Musee d'Orsay from it anyway. I didn't have enough courage to do this during the day, so we came late at night when it got completely dark.


I stood there leaning on the rails, looking at the lights reflecting on the water's surface, and then I quickly pulled out a plastic bag of ashes from my pocket: gray, fine like face powder, with a few larger chunks of sponge-like bone. I was looking at the magnificent beauty of Paris at night and thinking about the even more magnificent beauty of Tanya's body, whose remains I had in my plastic bag. Which of these chunks did her hair, her green eyes, her thin fingers, her legs turn into? I was thinking about her pink lips that she licked with her wet tongue, her white teeth smudged with lipstick, her hair wet after a shower. The look of those dry gray ashes made me think of the colors and the wetness of her former body, of her former self.

That was also when another colorful memory came to my mind, of tango we left Bolik with Jeremy and went to a dancing class together at the Pineapple club. I got a partner a Frenchman with a stinking breath and a bit oversized nose, but with a decent sense of rhythm and even a better one of humor; Tanya found herself in the arms of the teacher himself, a short Brazilian man.

We all danced to a slowed-down melody, our reflections on the dance room walls crowding around us. I caught a glimpse of her reflection in the mirror the Brazilian with his palm on her back, her head thrown back, eyes half-closed, smile on her lips, her legs in black Mary Jane shoes and knee socks with grey and orange stripes stepping on the floor and, from time to time, on the teacher's narrow shoes. She bit her lip and couldn't keep herself from laughing she was being clumsy and not good at dancing, but she was perfectly beautiful and young, so it didn't matter.

Everyone was looking at her, admiring only her, and I stopped along with the rest, the Frenchman's hot hand still giving my waist an uncomfortable squeeze. It got cold and somewhat scary on the Non-Mirabeau bridge, but I wanted that moment to last. Not then, now. Not now, forever.

I started crying uncontrollably because Tanya's ashes were already scattered, the Seine swallowed them, I recalled that tango class and all I had left to do was to come back to London and keep fighting for survival. (I didn't know back then that I got a job at a bank, although even if I had known it wouldn't have brought me any joy, because my first salary was ridiculously small and my loneliness huge.) Bolik was peacefully asleep, and I stood there, sobbing, holding my head in my hands. The lesson that "life is unfair" seemed to be accurate more than ever, the only right reflection of the world.

Then I hear a voice behind my back saying something to me in French. I turn around and see a young woman, very tall, in very extravagant clothes, who, when I get a closer look, turns out to be a transvestite man. She has a white wig and a white boa around her neck, perfect skin, and a huge mouth, gorgeously painted with lipstick. She's telling me something, asking, begging, pointing her finger at Bolik, and I understand she thinks I want to commit suicide by jumping from the bridge and tries to persuade me not do it, at least for the baby's sake.

I gesture that I'm not going to jump, I'm just burying someone, my dearest friend, and as a proof, I show her the bag, all gray inside. She clearly can't understand what I say, so I get a handful of the ashes that I left for myself, reach out to her and open my fingers. She can't see what I'm showing her in the dark, but she probably understands that it's something incredibly important to me. I am still sobbing. She walks up to me, puts her large hands on my shoulders, and draws me close to her.

That half a second, when her painted lips are getting close to mine, lasts an eternity, and our kiss two eternities, or even three. That kiss was, for sure, the best in my life, both for the dramatic romanticism of the occasion and for the kisser's skill. At that moment I stopped calling her "she" in my mind and began thinking of her as "he".

Remind us again when you predicted COVID would be gone. July 2020 right? And you thought Russia would hold Ukraine within weeks. That was a few months ago.

And here we are 5 months into Putin's war and Cal88 can't find a single thing to say that isn't Kremlin endorsed.

I'm old enough to remember when Cal88 used to scold people for not dealing with the substance of the articles he posted and instead attacking the reliability of the sources. Now he's posting pictures of the reporters behind a BBC article in an attempt to discredit them (and, crucially, NOT refuting the substance of the article).

The reporters are pretty good-looking, though, I'll give you that.

Unit2Sucks said:

---

Remind us again when you predicted COVID would be gone. July 2020 right? And you thought Russia would hold Ukraine within weeks. That was a few months ago.

---

I was wrong about covid, that's the reason I now always shower and sleep with at least two masks on, it would be foolish to play Russian roulette with a virus that has 0.01% of killing me and my loved ones.


I don't want to joke about the war in Ukraine, because it's not funny, it needs to be stopped. This being said (and lord knows it needs to be repeated), the war's outcome, barring a diplomatic breakthrough (which unfortunately is unlikely at this point), is not very much in doubt. Russians are going to completely overwhelm the Ukrainian forces in the Donbass by the end of Summer and will move steadily towards Dnipro from the South and East.

They're moving at a slower pace because this is an artillery-driven battle where they can conquer well-guarded terrain and defensive lines without incurring too many losses. Earlier last Spring many analysts believed that NATO weapons like the Javelin, the precision-guided howitzers like the M777 and French Cesars, or the handful of MLRS were going to be game-changers. This is reflected in the Russian TV segment from 2 months ago that you've posted above. We now know that these weapons can't decisively change the balance of power, which has been dictated by the industrial depth and firepower density of Russian artillery.

sycasey said:

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I'm old enough to remember when Cal88 used to scold people for not dealing with the substance of the articles he posted and instead attacking the reliability of the sources. Now he's posting pictures of the reporters behind a BBC article in an attempt to discredit them (and, crucially, NOT refuting the substance of the article).

The reporters are pretty good-looking, though, I'll give you that.

---

I think their story of Russian troops morale collapse are most likely made up. There are no specifics, and there is a lot of dramatic embellishment that felt like the work of creative Brooklyn or Brixton types. My early hunch was confirmed by the profile of the authors, almost sterotypical.

If Russian troop morale is so bad, how come the Ukrainians have captured so few Russian soldiers? Where are the columns of disheartened, deserting Russian Sergeys and Borises marching in front of Ukrainian officers?

Most of the Russian POWs were captured in the early phases of the war, where they threw advanced divisions all over the Ukraine border with poor logistical support in an early failed attempt to "decapitate" the Zelensky govt.

In the last 2 months, since the end of the "shaping" operation and the consolidation in the Donbas, Russian POWs have numbered in the hundreds (if that), while Ukrainian POWs are close to 10,000. This should tell you all you need to know about relative troop morale, desertions and the general direction of this damn war.

I like how Cal88 ignores Russian state TV claiming morale is low and instead chooses to make baseless claims about the authors. Baghdad Bob or I guess we should call him Kremlin Koroly. The next time he says something negative about Russia or Putin will be his first, yet he is foolish enough to think anyone believes him to be objective.

Cal88 said:

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bearister said:

---

Just so I can get more of a feel for your diagnosis of Biden's*current mental state as "senile," do you have any opinions regarding tRump's current mental state?

*In his best day, Biden was certainly not an intellectual (like the vast majority of politicians). I would say now he is just a guy in his late 70's that is not real bright. I have been around many of my parents' generation that were senile (all deceased now). As of this date, Joe isn't even in their zip code.

Biden, like Reagan and tRump, is a figurehead president. Unfortunately for tRump, no one except the mediocre and criminally inclined want anything to do with him.

---

Biden at his prime was probably just a bit smarter than Dubya, which is a fairly mediocre level, at least by presidential standards. But you've got to admit that a younger Biden wouldn't have needed the kind of geriatric pampering displayed by that cue card above.

---

Bush was a bit of a dolt. Can't imagine a young Joe flying a supersonic jet fighter. No, Joe is stupid and demented.

Well, here's your other option:

"Several months back when Secretary of State Rex Tillerson called Trump a "fking moron," I discounted it. I know firsthand how frustrating it can be to serve in a president's cabinet, and I've heard members of other president's cabinets describe their bosses in similar terms….

National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster calls Trump a "dope." Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and former Chief of Staff Reince Priebus both refer to him as an "idiot." Rupert Murdoch says Trump is a "fking idiot."

Trump's chief economic adviser Gary Cohn describes Trump as "dumb as sh-t," explaining that "Trump won't read anything not one-page memos, not the brief policy papers; nothing. He gets up halfway through meetings with world leaders because he is bored."

When one of Trump's campaign aides tried to educate him about the Constitution, Trump couldn't focus. "I got as far as the Fourth Amendment," the aide recalled, "before his finger is pulling down on his lip and his eyes are rolling back in his head."…..

One of his professors at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business and Finance purportedly said that he was "the dumbest ******* student I ever had." ….

This is where Trump shines. He knows how to manipulate people. He has an uncanny ability to discover their emotional vulnerabilities their fears, anxieties, prejudices, and darkest desires and use them for his own purposes.

To put it another way, Trump is an extraordinarily talented conman."

Robert Reich Seriously, How Dumb is Trump?


https://robertreich.org/post/169394006010

I can vouch for Gary Cohn.

He and I were friends, neighbors, and members of the COMEX back in 1986. He was in the Silver pit. I was the floor broker for Paul Tudor Jones in Gold. He had to leave the floor due to polyps on his vocal chords. And no, you cant find that in a Google search. Wound up joining J Aron Commodities (a division of Goldman) and within 20 years became COO.

bearister said:

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Well, here's your other option:

"Several months back when Secretary of State Rex Tillerson called Trump a "fking moron," I discounted it. I know firsthand how frustrating it can be to serve in a president's cabinet, and I've heard members of other president's cabinets describe their bosses in similar terms….

National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster calls Trump a "dope." Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and former Chief of Staff Reince Priebus both refer to him as an "idiot." Rupert Murdoch says Trump is a "fking idiot."

Trump's chief economic adviser Gary Cohn describes Trump as "dumb as sh-t," explaining that "Trump won't read anything not one-page memos, not the brief policy papers; nothing. He gets up halfway through meetings with world leaders because he is bored."

When one of Trump's campaign aides tried to educate him about the Constitution, Trump couldn't focus. "I got as far as the Fourth Amendment," the aide recalled, "before his finger is pulling down on his lip and his eyes are rolling back in his head."…..

One of his professors at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business and Finance purportedly said that he was "the dumbest ******* student I ever had." ….

This is where Trump shines. He knows how to manipulate people. He has an uncanny ability to discover their emotional vulnerabilities their fears, anxieties, prejudices, and darkest desires and use them for his own purposes.

To put it another way, Trump is an extraordinarily talented conman."

Robert Reich Seriously, How Dumb is Trump?


https://robertreich.org/post/169394006010

---

Fake news. Surely some of the non-partisan truth tellers here would have told us if Trump was mentally unfit to be president and yet all the critics in this thread were strangely silent for four years.

Breaking news! Both are idiots. Respect the OP.

"This is real and just happened. He may not be fit for president. This has nothing to do with Trump nor the Twitter source."

https://twitter.com/greg_price11/status/1545441526133788673?s=20&t=***X31q0SPTU_SFXEFJ_iw

oski003 said:

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Respect the OP.

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Can you remind us of threads you started between 2016 and 2020 criticizing the last dumb president we had?

59% of voters worry about Joe Biden’s mental fitness.

— Rasmussen 6/30/22

— Wendell Husebø (@WendellHusebo) July 8, 2022

I'm also worried about the mental fitness of the other 41%

— Why Do People Suck? (@iamantinutjobs) July 8, 2022

Trump has got a fair amount of street smarts, the kind that allowed him to have a career in real estate and to will himself into the presidency as an outsider, which objectively is a remarkable achievement. Has an outsider ever made it to POTUS? Not in the last century. And to be fair, all the people cited above who claimed he was dumb are political enemies.

Both Biden and Bush were lifted to the presidency by their respective side of the establishment.

Trump has traits that make him very unlikable to somewhere around a third of Americans, a segment that is overrepresented among Cal alums. He has that brashness of a Queens nouveau riche businessman, a certain kind of "ugly American" aspect to him.

Personally, I found him preferable to Hillary, warts and all, though at this point I would rather he passes the baton to another non-establishment GOP candidate next year, because he is too divisive a figure.

Just to be clear - you, as a journalist, are in favor of not reporting on the cognitive decline of a future president if you believe the other candidate is worse? https://t.co/59nAZuOMjJ

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) July 10, 2022

After Trump was elected I had psychiatrists call, willing to go on record to diagnose Trump from afar as removable under the 25th amendment. I called those same people back while on the road with Biden in 2019 and they refused to comment on “ethical” grounds. https://t.co/wrxqNsSyV3

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) July 10, 2022

Cal88 said:

---

59% of voters worry about Joe Biden’s mental fitness.

— Rasmussen 6/30/22

— Wendell Husebø (@WendellHusebo) July 8, 2022

I'm also worried about the mental fitness of the other 41%

— Why Do People Suck? (@iamantinutjobs) July 8, 2022

Trump has got a fair amount of street smarts, the kind that allowed him to have a career in real estate and to will himself into the presidency as an outsider, which objectively is a remarkable achievement. Has an outsider ever made it to POTUS? Not in the last century. And to be fair, all the people cited above who claimed he was dumb are political enemies.

Both Biden and Bush were lifted to the presidency by their respective side of the establishment.

Trump has traits that make him very unlikable to somewhere around a third of Americans, a segment that is overrepresented among Cal alums. He has that brashness of a Queens nouveau riche businessman, a certain kind of "ugly American" aspect to him.

Personally, I found him preferable to Hillary, warts and all, though at this point I would rather he passes the baton to another non-establishment GOP candidate next year, because he is too divisive a figure.

---

You really just enjoy making stuff up. Rex Tillerson was his acting Secretary of State when he called him a f'n idiot. Mnuchin was his Treasury Secretary for his entire term in office. These were people he hand-selected and hired. I know facts escape you, but you really need to learn what a "political enemy" is.

The fact that you think he "had a career in real estate" and that it's evidence of intelligence doesn't speak well for you. Trump literally put his own casinos out of business in Atlantic City by competing with each other, although I'm sure you have some Kremlin propaganda that suggests otherwise. Or perhaps you will cite reputable "unbiased" journalists like Matt Taibi and Glenn Greenwald.

You should give Biden credit for having street smarts. Despite the fact that he was a poor student who stutters, he managed to stay in politics for 50 years, serve 8 years as VP, steal the 2020 election through advanced voter fraud that only a genius pillow industrialist crackhead was smart enough to uncover, gave away all of our strategic oil reserves, used corruption to fire a prosecutor who wasn't investigating his son's business in order to ... prevent investigation of his son's business, helped his son commit financial crimes all over the world through influence pedaling (which son has also become an icon and inspiration to fascist incels the world over) and he spends most of his days misreading teleprompters and falling off bikes. And all of this was out in the public for all the world to see! That's far more impressive than Trump's 8 bankruptcies and numerous failed businesses and properties.

That's how this works right? When you just ignore reality and paint the picture the Kremlin would like you to.

Unit2Sucks said:

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Cal88 said:

---

59% of voters worry about Joe Biden’s mental fitness.

— Rasmussen 6/30/22

— Wendell Husebø (@WendellHusebo) July 8, 2022

I'm also worried about the mental fitness of the other 41%

— Why Do People Suck? (@iamantinutjobs) July 8, 2022

Trump has got a fair amount of street smarts, the kind that allowed him to have a career in real estate and to will himself into the presidency as an outsider, which objectively is a remarkable achievement. Has an outsider ever made it to POTUS? Not in the last century. And to be fair, all the people cited above who claimed he was dumb are political enemies.

Both Biden and Bush were lifted to the presidency by their respective side of the establishment.

Trump has traits that make him very unlikable to somewhere around a third of Americans, a segment that is overrepresented among Cal alums. He has that brashness of a Queens nouveau riche businessman, a certain kind of "ugly American" aspect to him.

Personally, I found him preferable to Hillary, warts and all, though at this point I would rather he passes the baton to another non-establishment GOP candidate next year, because he is too divisive a figure.

---

You really just enjoy making stuff up. Rex Tillerson was his acting Secretary of State when he called him a f'n idiot. Mnuchin was his Secretary Treasury for his entire term in office. These were people he hand-selected and hired. I know facts escape you, but you really need to learn what a "political enemy" is.

The fact that you think he "had a career in real estate" and that it's evidence of intelligence doesn't speak well for you. Trump literally put his own casinos out of business in Atlantic Casino by competing with each other although I'm sure you have some Kremlin propaganda that suggests otherwise. Or perhaps you have reputable journalists like Matt Taibi and Glenn Greenwald.

You should give Biden credit for having street smarts. Despite the fact that he was a poor student who stutters, he managed to stay in politics for 50 years, serve 8 years as VP, steal the 2020 election through advanced voter fraud that only a genius pillow industrialist crackhead was smart enough to uncover, gave away all of our strategic oil reserves, helped his son commit financial crimes all over the world through influence pedaling (which son has also become an icon and inspiration to fascist incels the world over) and he spends most of his days misreading teleprompters and falling off bikes. That's far more impressive than Trump's 8 bankruptcies and numerous failed businesses and properties. That's how this works right?

---

Trump's net worth is somewhere between ~$500 million and $2 billion. I do understand though that in your scale, he's a miserable failure.

In the circles where Tillerson and Mnuchin run, Trump is not all that popular a figure. Tillerson was one of Trump's better appointments, far better than his successor Pompeo. Trump threw him under the bus, largely because his son-in-law was running many aspects of foreign policy in opposition to Tillerson (one of the worst and most corrupt aspects of Trump's presidency). In light of this, I can see how Tillerson has a very low assessment of Trump. But you also have to wonder what RT thinks of Biden's handling of current US energy policy...

On second thought, I'll have to agree with you about Biden having some street smarts as well, he did take care of his family business, 10% for the big guy on international ventures sealed aboard Air Force 2, from Beijing to Kosovo to Kiev (I guess it wasn't Kyiv back then).

Biden's greatest achievement, becoming president, was pretty much handed to him, largely because he was the only palatable candidate out of an abysmally weak field, due to his appeal in the key Rust Belt blue collar segment. He was just as much a token candidate as Kamala was. While he was in slightly better shape 2 years ago, he wasn't even then running his own campaign, spending much of it half asleep in his basement. He was an astonishing example of a politician failing upwards, same with Kamala.

Trump would be wealthier if he had the money he was given by his daddy (and in part stole from others in his family) managed by an average wealth manager, even if he didn't cheat on his taxes. The stock market has far outperformed him, although to be fair the S&P 500 hasn't gone bankrupt 8x or whatever for failing to understand risk. His most valuable assets are managed by Steven Roth and Vornado. The Trump Crime Family is a highly leveraged small business kept afloat by a few good properties managed by Vornado and a bunch of shady practices and scams. Only rubes think Trump is good at business. So congrats for being in that club.

Cal88 said:

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Unit2Sucks said:

---

Cal88 said:

---

59% of voters worry about Joe Biden’s mental fitness.

— Rasmussen 6/30/22

— Wendell Husebø (@WendellHusebo) July 8, 2022

I'm also worried about the mental fitness of the other 41%

— Why Do People Suck? (@iamantinutjobs) July 8, 2022

Trump has got a fair amount of street smarts, the kind that allowed him to have a career in real estate and to will himself into the presidency as an outsider, which objectively is a remarkable achievement. Has an outsider ever made it to POTUS? Not in the last century. And to be fair, all the people cited above who claimed he was dumb are political enemies.

Both Biden and Bush were lifted to the presidency by their respective side of the establishment.

Trump has traits that make him very unlikable to somewhere around a third of Americans, a segment that is overrepresented among Cal alums. He has that brashness of a Queens nouveau riche businessman, a certain kind of "ugly American" aspect to him.

Personally, I found him preferable to Hillary, warts and all, though at this point I would rather he passes the baton to another non-establishment GOP candidate next year, because he is too divisive a figure.

---

You really just enjoy making stuff up. Rex Tillerson was his acting Secretary of State when he called him a f'n idiot. Mnuchin was his Secretary Treasury for his entire term in office. These were people he hand-selected and hired. I know facts escape you, but you really need to learn what a "political enemy" is.

The fact that you think he "had a career in real estate" and that it's evidence of intelligence doesn't speak well for you. Trump literally put his own casinos out of business in Atlantic Casino by competing with each other although I'm sure you have some Kremlin propaganda that suggests otherwise. Or perhaps you have reputable journalists like Matt Taibi and Glenn Greenwald.

You should give Biden credit for having street smarts. Despite the fact that he was a poor student who stutters, he managed to stay in politics for 50 years, serve 8 years as VP, steal the 2020 election through advanced voter fraud that only a genius pillow industrialist crackhead was smart enough to uncover, gave away all of our strategic oil reserves, helped his son commit financial crimes all over the world through influence pedaling (which son has also become an icon and inspiration to fascist incels the world over) and he spends most of his days misreading teleprompters and falling off bikes. That's far more impressive than Trump's 8 bankruptcies and numerous failed businesses and properties. That's how this works right?

---

Trump's net worth is somewhere between ~$500 million and $2 billion. I do understand though that in your scale, he's a miserable failure.

In the circles where Tillerson and Mnuchin run, Trump is not all that popular a figure. Tillerson was one of Trump's better appointments, far better than his successor Pompeo. Trump threw him under the bus, largely because his son-in-law was running many aspects of foreign policy in opposition to Tillerson (one of the worst and most corrupt aspects of Trump's presidency). In light of this, I can see how Tillerson has a very low assessment of Trump. But you also have to wonder what RT thinks of Biden's handling of current US energy policy...

On second thought, I'll have to agree with you about Biden having some street smarts as well, he did take care of his family business, 10% for the big guy on international ventures sealed aboard Air Force 2, from Beijing to Kosovo to Kiev (I guess it wasn't Kyiv back then).

Biden's greatest achievement, becoming president, was pretty much handed to him, largely because he was the only palatable candidate out of an abysmally weak field, due to his appeal in the key Rust Belt blue collar segment. He was just as much a token candidate as Kamala was. While he was in slightly better shape 2 years ago, he wasn't even then running his own campaign, spending much of it half asleep in his basement. He was an astonishing example of a politician failing upwards, same with Kamala.

---

Donald Trump inherited his wealth.

"As of today, Trump would be an estimated $400 million richer if he had just put his father's money in the index."

(Source: It's Official: Trump Would Be Richer If He Had Just Invested His Inheritance Into The S&P 500 )