In which there's two epic reptile rants, but alas, no Dame Slap ...

 

The pond decided unilaterally and without any consultation that this was the best line of the week, captured and killed at the Daily Beast (paywall)

The American Media Inc. (AMI) chief told jurors he had grave concerns that buying her story in a “catch-and-kill” scheme to protect the future president could potentially sully the National Enquirer’s reputation.

This narrowly tipped out Dame Slap, quoted in the Weekly Beast...

...Albrechtsen wrote this week that, in fact, too many other people took sides in the Lehrmann-Higgins saga. And the Australian was not among them. “When guided by principles, there is no taking sides,” she wrote.

... though it was a close run thing, given the reputation of Dame Slap up against the National Enquirer's.

Amazingly, she attempted a comeback this weekend by scribbling about the art of writing and the importance of editing, seemingly unaware that a little humanity might also help ... 

Look, there in the top far right top of the world ma spot highly desired by the reptile 'leet ...

Bizarrely, the reptiles decided a reminder of Diana would be a good way to celebrate the return of King Chuck to save the empire, and even more bizarrely, Cameron Stewart offered the perfect solution to dictator Xi ... say a little prayer. 

You know, the moment the pond wakes up and combs its hair and wonders what to wear, it says a little prayer ...and that'll surely teach Chairman Xi a lesson ... (in the futility of dingbat fundamentalist Xian prayer).

Sadly Dame Slap and her thoughts on saying less and meaning even less had to give way to two epic rants ...

The bromancer and the dog botherer, forming a tremendous tag team, were on hand and attention had to be paid, as they did their usual gardening in the dark, which meant no space for a baker's dozen, nor any welcome mat for the tremendously tedious, always ululating Uhlmann, slipping into the war with China by Xmas without a pause for breath...

No doubt he'll cop a guernsey in due course, but right now there's a new Everest in town to replace the "Ned" challenge ...

Yes, it's one of those epic bromancer Ginsbergian howls, full of weirdness, nonsense and bile, delivered in a frenetic frenzy in quintessential bro style ...

At this point, with the reptiles in the angertainment business, there began a series of images designed to enrage or terrify the over sixty demographic,  and as usual, the pond decided to shrink them and dismiss them as a bulk item ...

The sheer number of snaps was a good indicator of the extent of the Ginsbergian howling at the moon that was routinely interrupted by the snaps ... allowing each gobbet to emerge with the full blown taste of a delicious fried dim sim from the South Melbourne market ...

Derivate leftist movements? Wow, that's the first the pond's heard that the GOP, MTG and Yale hillbilly Vance are lefties ...

Sorry, the pond should avoid slipping in visual distractions to fill the holes left by the absent bromancer snaps ...

It'd be wrong to get in the way of the Ginsbergian howl ...

Hmmm ... social media ...

Oh okay, the pond knows what it said about visual distractions, but always wanted to find a home for that cartoon ...

Now back to the over-reacting, verging on hysterical bromancer...

Nearly accepted wisdom? Perhaps in Sharri land, disrespect, but the accepted wisdom is that nobody knows for sure, and given the way that Chairman Xi conducts business, nobody is likely to know for sure, and in any case given the ways of an over-heated planet, blaming it all on a Chinese lab is an easy excuse up against the proliferation of all sorts of viruses, plagues and diseases. 

Once upon a time you could leave Ross River fever to the toads, but now it's everywhere ...

Sorry, that talk of fever dreams almost made the pond miss that splendid example of the prejudices of the reptiles (now unwoke) ...

Sheesh, the urge to interrupt and distract is strong, like an all-day sucker ...

Here it's possible to see the wisdom of removing the snaps because the bromancer's gobbets get shorter, and so the focus can be on the silliness, as for example the notion of the greatest possible transparency, because if you want an example of corporate gibberish purporting to be transparent, look no further than News Corp itself ...

Say one thing and preach another has always been at the core of this North American company ...

Luckily the next bro gobbet was short ...

 

Is it that long ago that Alan Seymour wrote The One Day of the Year?

1958?! Lordy, long absent lordy, those were the days ...

This alcohol-fuelled debasement is represented in the play by the working-class father Alf Cook. Belligerent and resentful of foreigners and anyone with an education, Alf clings to Anzac Day like a drowning sailor clings to a life raft. Boozing is just part of a noble tradition.

"I'm a bloody Australian, mate, and it's because I'm a bloody Australian that I'm gettin' on the grog. It's Anzac Day this week, that's my day, that's the old digger's day." (still being staged in 2003)

On with the howl...

Luckily David Rowe celebrated the orange Jesus and the doings of SCOTUS, a deeply corrupt body of late ...

It's always in the detail, the unfairly persecuted orange Jesus worshipped by the bro...

Or perhaps in the way of doing business ...

And then came a line the pond has always expected from a fundamentalist tyke ...

Here's the crisis in a nutshell ...the lies, the distortions, the palpable untruths, the errors and omissions...

And so to the dog botherer, with another epic rant, this time about the genocide in Gaza, though there will be little mention of the actual genocide ...

As seems to be the fashion these day with extended reptile rants, the dog botherer was supplied with a copious amount of illustrations ...

Is there an upside to the dog botherer's rant, what with it easy to be weary of barking mad fundamentalist fanatics on both sides, and the never-ending slaughter?

Well it took the dog botherer's mind off climate denialism, which is just as well with the news that now we know how many holes it takes to fill Antarctica ...

For those stories you'll have to head off to the ABC or The Conversation ... the pond is stuck with the ranting dog molester ...

It is possible to chew gum and hold two thoughts in head at the same time ... that Islamic and Zionist fundamentalism are not particularly palatable, but right now there's a genocide going down that only fuels the frenzy of fanaticism ...

That was culled from Al Jazeera, because you won't find any of that sort of stuff in the dog botherer's account ...

The trouble of course is that both sides have deployed from the river to the sea rhetoric, though only one side has deployed the nuke 'em all rhetoric, it being the side with the actual capacity to nuke 'em all ...

But at least it keeps the dog botherer's mind off climate science, what with that story in the Weekly Beast about the IPA's lies finally getting taken down ...

Mumbrella had the best approach, telling the story and showing the ad, but in a way that didn't actually make the text readable ...

On the other hand, it's worth noting the sort of lie the lizard Oz routinely published in exchange for a few shekels from the IPA, as a way of reinforcing the line of the commentariat, whatever the alleged aspirations of the North American company ...

So many lies, so little time, but back to the dog botherer ... and with the pond enormously pleased that some students decided to shun the dog botherer and the lizard Oz, because shunning is the least that they deserve ...

The trouble with mindless rhetoric about violations of humanity is that much humanity has been violated, and will continue to be violated ... per Al Jazeera ...

Fanatics - and the dog botherer is a fanatic - don't mind collateral damage on either side, especially in the dehumanising fog of war, which is why you won't read the dog botherer railing at the current genocide ...

One human bean to another, do you have any view on the current genocide? Silence. Do you have any notion of what to say or do about the continuation of the current genocide should Rafah be demolished like the rest of Gaza has been? Nothing. Hasn't there been enough killing and territorial expansion and demolition of any solution, the two state notion now being nothing but a fever dream ... (Al Jazeera)

Nope, nothing, just more fanaticism ...

The pond has noted that blather way too many times, per Rolling Stone ...

And so at last to the final gobbet in this epic reptile ranting ...

Or they could be bombed to smithereens, thanks to weapons supplied by the United States ... with a quick death if they're lucky, or they could just try eating grass for a week from the uni lawn, to find out what it's like to experience famine as a strategy of war ...

The pond is over the reptiles ... but at least killing the planet was off the agenda this day, and instead a small scale genocide took pride of place, though only a reptile would take pride in the killing fields...

In which the pond experiences overload and nausea in equal parts, no thanks to "Ned", the onion muncher, the old bigot and Mein Gott ...

 

The pond tries hard to do its best, but sometimes is overwhelmed by nausea at the sight of so many loons ...

For whatever perverse reason, the reptiles chose today to celebrate the departure of the liar from the shire, while also featuring the onion muncher preaching to far right authoritarians, and that's even before you get on to our Henry's usual jihad.

It was overwhelming, and the pond could only muck in so far ... with the news that SloMo was trying to blame his assorted capers and misdeeds on meds only serving to put people suffering from genuine depression - as opposed to Xian delusional megalomania - in an unfortunately adverse light.

Even worse, the reptiles sent in nattering "Ned" to hail this alleged Messiah:

The pond almost stumbled at the first gate: "history will look kindly", when all history has to decide is whether the onion muncher or the liar from the Shire was the worst PM in living memory (except for those with a long memory, who might want Harold Holt and Billy McMahon in the list. The pond excludes John Gorton, a genuine warrior and a kindly man, though he did have an unfortunate habit of tanking planes).

Then when it came to blather about Xianity, the pond baulked and decided to offer just a few quotes. No need to endure "Ned" blathering on for an eternity. First there was that Xian thing, and never mind that Hillsong is about as low a con operation as anyone - even the orange Jesus - could offer unto the world ...

The paradox of Morrison was on display. As a politician he was assertive, driving and self-absorbed, his eyes fixated on the ultimate prize, yet as a Christian humbled by the imperfectability of human nature. He ruminated on Tuesday on the limits of politics and the false hopes vested in governments and markets, all being run by imperfect people “just like all of us”.
Morrison departs surrounded by contemporary dispute. He is loathed, even hated by many of his opponents, and the Labor benches on Tuesday were notably only half-full for the speeches. From his own side he is respected but largely unloved, seen as a prime minister whose ability was undermined by personal defects – witness the multiple ministries blunder that constituted misplaced prime ministerial egoism.
At the end Morrison opened his heart wider than before. Speaking as a politician and a believer, he said: “I leave this place not as one of those timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat. I leave having given my all out there in that arena and have many scars to show for it. I do leave behind in that arena any bitterness, disappointments or offences that occurred along the way.” 

Oh just bugger off and take "Ned" with you, and don't forget to pack your orange Jesus bible ...

Morrison said his release from any bitterness is “due to my faith in Jesus Christ, which gives me the faith to both forgive but also to be honest with myself and my shortcomings”. His farewell speech had a powerful moral and cultural message for the nation – a message our politicians are frightened to speak and Morrison spoke only in his farewell. It is that Australia needs to retain the core of its being, its Judaeo-Christian ethic.
This is a religious position but transcends religion, going to the essence of our civilisation. He said “diminishing the influence and voice of Judaeo-Christian faith in our Western society” risks our “drifting into a valueless void”.
Why didn’t Morrison stand for this position and issue this warning as prime minister? Why, only now, does he talk in this way about his deepest beliefs? And if he had, wouldn’t he have been more successful? A skilled transactional politician, Morrison had two obstacles as prime minister – the Labor Party and a cultural revolution that he only poorly grasped and that he kept provoking.
Morrison’s faith, his social conservatism and his traditional view of families revealed a prime minister governing in an Australia undergoing a cultural transition defined by the rise of secularism, the elevation of human feelings as the basis for morality, and demands led by professional women for new rules, better behaviour and an end to discrimination.
Morrison’s flaw was lack of empathy when empathy became the electric current of political communication. He was a professional who missed that the mood and values of the nation had changed. But it wasn’t just women who turned against Morrison – it was the professional class.
The combination of Morrison’s personal failures – from the bushfire crisis onwards – and the cultural shift in professional class values brought him undone. To a significant extent Morrison lost the 2022 election on character grounds. In an astute campaign Albanese denied Morrison a major policy difference to exploit and then made Morrison’s character the central question. He was helped by the obvious reality – the government post-pandemic was weary, exhausted, and out of ideas for the future.

At this point, the pond decided to jump to the end ...

The pandemic response was blighted by the slow vaccine rollout and ongoing political battles between the premiers and Morrison. Mistakes were made in Australia – but far less than in many other nations. Australia had one of the lowest fatality rates from Covid in the developed world, with Morrison saying more than 30,000 lives were saved.
When history assesses Morrison’s performance as prime minister, much will flow from his handling of the three principal challenges on his watch, each being a world-defining event. So far contemporary assessments seem anxious to avoid this precise task, preferring an emotional focus on the rich list of Morrison’s flaws. And there are plenty of them. It is a safe bet, however, that as the tyranny of the present fades, history will reveal what really mattered and Morrison’s record is likely to loom in far more favourable terms.

As for the actual legacy? Not much chop there ...

Apart from ritual applause about "stopping the boats", this was the best that "Ned" could muster ...

He had an extraordinary prime ministership, dominated by three external events – China’s strategic assertion and its coercion of Australia, an event of international import; the pandemic that delivered not just a health crisis but the worst trauma for the federation in a century; and the global and domestic recession that threatened the highest jobless rates since the Depression.
On each front, Morrison’s achievements were significant. In retaliation, he internationalised China’s coercion, deepened ties with Japan and India, backed the Quad and was the originator of the AUKUS agreement for the development of nuclear-powered submarines in his negotiations with Boris Johnson and Joe Biden. That initiative is bipartisan. The Albanese government has assumed its political ownership. If it comes to fruition, over the decades Morrison will be seen as architect of one of the most important defence and foreign policy initiatives since World War II.
Australia’s economic response to the pandemic measures as implemented by Morrison and Frydenberg saw the most intense era of economic decision-making since World War II, co-ordinated with Treasury and the Reserve Bank. Yes, they spent too much. But they minimised the economic damage, saw unemployment return to historically low levels and delivered world-leading outcomes among OECD nations.

Uh huh, mistakes were made, and the pond's big mistake was to pay attention to "Ned". 

After being put into a truly bad mood by "Ned" eulogising the liar from the Shire, the pond wasn't in the slightest bit interested or ready for the reptile pandering of the onion muncher, which saw a lavish supply of stills on hand, as the onion muncher pandered to the visitors to the authoritarian crypto-fascists currently in charge of Hungary ...

You can see why the pond had the urgent desire to race to the toilet to upchuck a spectacular technicolor yawn, and it wasn't helped by the set of stills on offer throughout, leading off with one which purported to suggest that the onion muncher was a serious dude, as opposed to someone who badly needed to have his rug pissed on ...

What a triptych of frauds and losers and dropkicks, though it did serve to elevate the onion muncher above his natural level, and at the end of it all came Rish!

That only reminded the pond of the relief at the return of John Crace, giving Rish! hard time, RIGHT!?, but to be fair, also dishing it out in recent times to Minister Mikey, down, down deeper and Dowden, and Humza Yousaf ...

Remembering the good times possible after a heart attack stabilised the pond a little, lifted spirts and allowed the pond to press on ...

Truth to tell, only a bunch of weirdo comrades could swallow this stuff and yet the local reptiles remain intensely loyal, and yes there will be a burst of "climate cult is crap" later on ... the only upside is that with the photos excised, the gobbets are relatively short ...

Indeed, indeed, the onion muncher loves the poorly educated, because they're inclined to swallow this sort of guff ...

Before offering up the usual climate science denialism, in the now fashionable disguise of a caring environmentalist, the pond thought it should note the sort of company the onion muncher is keeping these days, courtesy an AP story ...

BUDAPEST, Hungary (AP) — Hungary’s nationalist prime minister, addressing a conservative conference in Budapest on Thursday, said upcoming European and U.S. elections were a chance for right-wing forces to defeat the “progressive world spirit,” and encouraged former U.S. President Donald Trump to defend “his own truth” in his ongoing criminal trial.

Viktor Orbán, a right-wing populist and the European Union’s longest-serving leader, told supporters at the Conservative Political Action Conference Hungary that conservatives across the West, including himself and Trump, are under attack by a hegemonic liberal order.

EU elections in June and U.S. elections in November, Orbán said, will be a chance to usher in an “era of sovereignty” modeled on Hungary, which he called a “conservative island.”

“These elections coincide with major shifts in world political and geopolitical trends,” Orbán said. “The order of the world is changing, and we must usher our cause to triumph in the midst of these changes. Progressive liberals feel the danger. Replacing this era means replacing them.”

Orbán’s speech opened the third Hungarian iteration of CPAC, an event that this year features numerous far-right figures including U.S. media personality Jack Posobiec, Republican Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona and Dutch anti-Islam lawmaker Geert Wilders.

The two-day CPAC event in Hungary underscores U.S. conservatives’ growing embrace of the Hungarian leader, who has been accused of dismantling democratic institutions, overseeing widespread official corruption and cracking down on critical media.

Independent media outlets, including The Associated Press, were not granted accreditation to cover CPAC Hungary, and were encouraged to follow the event via a livestream. In an email, organizers said the conference is a “no woke zone,” and that coverage would be possible at “future events when and if your organization becomes significantly less woke.”

Orbán has depicted himself as a defender of European Christendom against Muslim migrants, progressives and the “LGBTQ lobby,” and has faced backlash after comments that he opposes Europe becoming a “ mixed-race society.”

But on Thursday, Orbán accused “liberal progressive” governments of employing tactics that critics say he himself has used in Hungary, and suggested that the 34 felony counts against Trump for allegedly falsifying business records in connection with hush money payments were politically motivated.

“If necessary, they will use government agencies against us — as my American friends say, ‘weaponizing state institutions,’” Orbán said. “This happens to us Hungarians constantly in Brussels. This is what is happening to President Trump in America, and we encourage him to fight for his own truth not only in the elections, but also in the courts.”

Orbán, who is routinely hostile toward the EU, has sought for years to rally far-right European parties into a more cohesive political force in the bloc’s legislature. As campaigning for the June 6-9 polls heats up, he has called for a fundamental change in EU leadership.

But he has racked up domestic political headaches in recent months after several senior officials, including the president and justice minister, were forced to resign over a scandal involving a presidential pardon to a man implicated in a child sexual abuse case.

Franco, Orbán? It's all the same to a faux caring environmentalist blathering on about the climate cult and climate tsars ...

What a dropkick, and yet worse was to follow as the pond looked below the fold for guidance ... 

Dammit there was the onion muncher again, and a reminder that this was Friday and our Henry day, and things were so slow, the reptiles were holding over the anonymous mocker, the meretricious Merritt and Blainey of the orient ...

The pond regretted that these days the mere mention of a philosopher sees the pond get wildly excited.

Enough of that Kant, let's have some hole in the bucket man cant, as our Henry conducts his usual jihad ... with Thucydides taking leave for the day, because this is a Crusade ...

Fair dibs. The pond has no time for violence, nor Islam, nor - it goes without saying - barking mad Xians and fundamentalist Zionists, but we really should note that the bishop has been saying, with his wiki providing a useful short summary of his trolling ways ...

Emmanuel has gained popularity through social media, such as Christ the Good Shepherd Church's YouTube channel and TikTok, which earned him the sobriquet "TikTok Bishop". The bishop's sermons on social media have ranged from homilies on the Holy Bible to fervent criticisms of LGBT, COVID vaccinations, and U.S. President Joe Biden's election (where he expressed disapproval of Biden's support for gay rights). Moreover, he has also criticised liberal Christianity...

...On 19 July 2021, amid the SARS-CoV-2 Delta variant outbreaks and the lockdown in Sydney, Emmanuel presented an online sermon that reprimanded the COVID-19 vaccinations and lockdowns calling them "mass slavery", and saying that the coronavirus is "just another type of the flu, no more, no less" and called it a "plandemic". In his video, he implored Australian prime minister Scott Morrison and NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian to do more and aid those with financial and emotional adversity, in addition to saying, "have we really lost the plot?"...

...In addition to criticising non-Christian religions, such as Judaism and Islam, the Bishop is also known for preaching anti-LGBTQ rhetoric and describing homosexuality as a "crime in the eyes of God". In one sermon, he stated that "Islam flourished and expanded with the sword". However, amidst the Israel–Hamas war, he has called for peace. In addition, he has supported American former president Donald Trump, imploring him to remain faithful to Christianity and defy the influence of the Freemasons. A sermon of his posted online by fans depicts him to claim the United Nations was established by Satan, in addition to labeling the World Health Organization a "fraud".

Footnotes at the source and there's a lot more ratbaggery online, and the pond will accept the half-baked wording about the UN because it's just an inept transcription of the archived France 24 source.

If you want the full experience, you can find a sermon on YouTube, Satan is the founder of the United Nations, with the helpful explainer Mar Mari Emmanuel explains the evilness of the United Nations and the USA and claims it has been founded by Satan... 

The pond recommends avoiding the experience, though it turns bemusing when he rampant bigot also blathers on about the wickedness of the telly, which rather dates his clown show, but he does get on to social media, deploring the mechanism he wilfully exploits and abuses...

A full, copious nutjob, but does any of this trouble the resident lizard Oz old bigot? Of course not, he doesn't pause to consider any of that, it's time for a bigoted history lesson ...

The pond has long lost interest in assorted bigotries, be they the schismatics in Islam, or the tykes v. the proddies, or all the rest of the guff offered up by assorted fanatics of the true believer kind, and in the end, our Henry is just one pompous attempt at taking part in a Python skit, which would be fine, except for the centuries of mayhem caused by barking mad believers howling that their god is the best, when She really doesn't care for any of it ...

Reading all this twaddle, you'd almost forget that it was the Xians that set off on the Crusades..."the triumphs of the Crusades were the triumphs of faith. But faith without wisdom is a dangerous thing." Steven Runciman.

Who knows if he actually said it - that's the way it is with the internet, but his history of the Crusades is an eye opener and the pond liked this quote from a show about the pilgrims in arms...

Steven Runciman: I always thought that the crusades they were basically a barbarian invasion. But these invasions usually can be inspired for the belief of fulfilling a religious duty. But unfortunately, his idea of serving God was very destructive, and not too civilized.

Well yes, it doesn't sound like the best transcript, but talk of barbarians is about right, and at last the crusading old barbarian bigot has reached his final hate-laden gobbet ...

Xianity has changed? Not when there are bigots like our Henry and Emmanuel to keep peddling the hate ...

And finally to the pond giving itself a treat. 

As the pond has remarked many times before, the publishing hours for Mein Gott are outside the usual pond hours, but every so often the pond notices a new Mein Gott outing ...

These are especially delicious when Mein Gott shows his skills as a military historian and a defence expert, far more accomplished than the bromancer...

Mein Gott, the pond remembers the old joke about generals always fighting the last war, but Mein Gott, it might be true ...

Hang on, hang on, back to that Gallipoli matter. Didn't the pond read yesterday that it was simply an away game draw?

Mistakenly, when younger, I thought that Gallipoli was a defeat for Australia. But the evacuation of our forces during a few nights in December 1915 was so successful that Gallipoli in football terms might be viewed as a drawn match; moreover, a match played away from home. 

Our emphasis on Gallipoli diverts attention from World War II. Then Australia itself was in peril but few of our leaders were prepared for that peril.

Essington Lewis, the chief executive of Broken Hill Proprietary, visiting Japan in 1934, rightly concluded that it was secretly preparing for a major war in the Pacific. At a large aircraft factory near Port Melbourne in 1939 his team launched their first planes, the Wirraways. Not fast enough, they were shot down in nearly every duel in 1941 and 1942.

But soon appeared the Beauforts and Beaufighters, impressive aircraft made in factories in Melbourne and Sydney, and they certainly competed against most Japanese planes.

Lewis was appointed director of every kind of wartime manufacturing for the Australian government and led a huge workforce of men and women. A country boy at heart, he was to die, aged 80, after a fall from his horse.

It did, it did, and all we need are a brand new line of Beausubs courtesy of BHP ... and then likely we can score an away draw, and a bloody big win on home turf, provided we stick to the Brisbane line.

At this point the reptiles interrupted Mein Gott with snaps of safety vests and kits, in bromancer style ...

 

Mein Gott, the pond realises it hasn't mentioned the current genocide ... please allow the immortal Rowe to correct the omission ...

At last a use for Mein Gott ... as a cartoons clothes horse ...

Indeed, indeed, and the United States is in extraordinarily good shape at the moment, with its eye on the ball or the balls or the balling ...

What's that, the country is still at war?

Mein Gott, it's terribly easy to get distracted ...

And yet ... and yet ... hasn't the war in Ukraine turned into an old-fashioned artillery duel, with much fortification of turf that makes advancing very difficult, and so the war has turned to skirmishes using drones?

Ukraine is still likely to be outgunned by Russian artillery for much of the rest of 2024 despite Congress nearing the passage of a $60 billion military aid bill for Kyiv, officials and analysts told Foreign Policy, as both the United States and Europe ramp up production of NATO-standard rounds and restock their own arsenals.

For months, Ukrainian troops have been firing about 2,000 rounds a day, barely enough to sustain a defensive war against the Russians. And even with the approval of new U.S. aid, most factories have yet to ramp up production.

“The problem is there is a huge shortage—worldwide—of artillery shells,” said Oleksandra Ustinova, a Ukrainian lawmaker. “The Europeans said they would provide us a million shells—they provided only 30 percent of those. The Americans have dried out their stocks, and they’re also delivering to Israel. And they are only ramping up the production line.” 

The congressional seal of approval, expected to come Tuesday or Wednesday, will mean that the Biden administration can begin to replenish the U.S. Defense Department’s stockpiles of ammunition that the United States might need to fight a war of its own someday, thereby allowing the White House enough leeway to begin sending artillery to the Ukrainians from storehouses in Europe without harming U.S. military readiness. Reuters reported that the Biden administration is preparing a $1 billion package that will include artillery, rockets, and lots of vehicles.

But the expectation is that the administration will spend much of the year rebuilding U.S. stockpiles to prewar levels as the U.S. Army aims to level up artillery production to 100,000 rounds per month by the end of 2025. 

Or at the end of that story ...

...CNN reported this week that the Biden administration is also expected to provide the Ukrainians with long-range U.S. Army Tactical Missile Systems for the first time. But with U.S. and European factories just starting to work double time to get themselves—and the Ukrainians—the weapons they need, Kyiv is expected to spend much of 2024 digging defensive trenches, as it has been doing for months.

It’s not clear those fortifications will be as effective as the multitiered Russian lines that blunted Ukraine’s 2023 counteroffensive, though.

“Ukraine is developing fortifications. They are building a defense depth,” said Rob Lee, a senior fellow in the Foreign Policy Research Institute’s Eurasia program who last traveled to Ukraine in November. “But the problem is when you have this manpower problem and ammunition problem at same time, it creates issues.”

Artillery, trenches, oh what would the pond know up against Mein Gott ... time to slip in an infallible Pope ...

Mein Gott, the pond knows the feeling, and this is the final gobbet of reptile crash content for the day ...

Indeed,  indeed, wise words ... gad sir ...

Now can someone provide an armchair and a nicely matured vintage port, while the pond reports on a truly serious issue ...

What, no mention of the munching of buttered, salted popcorn, or the loud sucking of gunk and ice through a straw? What troubled times we live in ...