Open Thread
Monday, June 16, 2025
Open Thread
There’s a lot of news. There’s a lot to be said about all of the news. Others are already saying it.
Things I’ve gleaned scrolling TwiX.
The authorities have captured the assailant who murdered the Minnesota politicians while disguised as a policeman.
The latest ballistic missile barrage from Iran hit several more civilian residential buildings in central Israel, as well as a fuel refinery in the port city of Haifa.
Unverified online scuttlebutt:
Online spelunkers claim to have found evidence that the MN assailant may have traveled to Russia to attend extreme right conferences in the past. It raises the question as to whether he was a Kremlin sleeper, wittingly or not.
Someone on TwiX cited fatalistic Iranians as saying: “When Iran fires at Israel, Israeli civilians go to their air raid shelters. When Israel fires at Iran, Iranians go to their rooftops to watch. Now, which country do you think targets civilians?”
Another TwiX witticism: “No one in Iran knows where Khamenei is right now. Only the Israelis do.”
The ayatollah is in a bunker in Tehran…or has left the country to seek refuge in Russia…or his family has…or the families of senior leadership. Top Iranian officials are supposedly well known as having multiple citizenships—as are top officials in the other Axis of Authoritarians terrorist states: Russia, North Korea, China.
Micro hot-takes:
“Ukrainians are dying because Merkel wanted to make deals with putin.
Israelis are dying because Obama wanted to make deals with Khamenei.
One of these two was atrociously corrupt, the other incredibly naive... neither deserves any good word in history books.” via X. The Authoritarian Axis uses “negotiating” as an opportunity to build up arms and make territorial advances. Always.Putin called Trump, requested Trump get Ukraine to stop targeting Russian energy facilities. Trump did so, Ukraine did as requested. Russia renewed attacks on Ukrainian power plants and substations nationwide.
The Axis is fighting a war against us, and we keep pretending we can just opt out. Meanwhile, they’re using Ukraine and its civilian population for target practice, for refining weapons systems and technologies. In response, Trump repeatedly makes empty threats—like Obama’s red-line dithering on a weekly basis.
Good morning. Happy Monday to all. 73Fs at this hour, supposed to be 87 in the afternoon and probably thunderstorms. I have a meeting with a fitness adviser this morning, a meeting with my mom's financial planner this afternoon, and a shift of helping Spanish-speaking people register for Sunday School this evening while Dau D goes to youth Bible class.
More than half the children and teens enrolled are from Hispanic families, but the online registration form is English-only. Why? "Because the system ...".
"Structures of exclusion": we let "the system" make things even harder for the people who already have less ability to do things online.
End of an era today: I'm closing on the sale of my house on the mountain. Gonna move down into the town of Manchester. Sandra really felt isolated up here. Will split time between new place here and place we purchased in Florida. I will spend periods of the winter up here; I still need to ski. Now I will have a 20 min drive instead of a 2 min. drive. (That would be from Manchester to the mountain; Florida would be a considerably farther drive...)