Recovering savior. This is how I use my Political Science degree. Feminist, Anti-Racist, Queer-Ally, white guy. Get money out of politics. Do your part.
Clifton Springs, NY
Joined March 2011
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I spent 22 years as a far-Left activist, until l suddenly realized we were being used. We were manipulated and weaponized against our own country. 40 years of information warfare, and now this is the explosion.
#france #usapolitics
Iran war critics and National security nerds need to read this.
The Islamic Republic is a paper tiger, reaching a tipping point in Iran.
They do have one advantage; propaganda is their best long range weapon against Western societies who seem to trust everyone but their own government.
The founding commander of the IRGC Navy admits the Islamic Republic “talks too much” and that its supposed power is largely bluff, propaganda and empty threats.
After merely surviving a short American-Israeli campaign, the Islamic Republic began declaring itself a "global superpower." Now one of the IRGC’s most authoritative founding commanders has exposed that narrative as hollow.
Hossein Alaei was the first commander of the IRGC Navy from 1985 to 1990. He built the force that employed mines, fast boats and asymmetric warfare in the Persian Gulf during the Iran-Iraq War. He later chaired the IRGC Joint Staff, served as deputy defence minister and became a professor of strategic studies.
He is not an exile or opposition activist. He helped build the regime’s military system.
Alaei says one of the Islamic Republic’s greatest self-inflicted problems is “talking too much and making idealistic speeches” without possessing the operational tools needed to fulfil them.
When the regime makes enormous claims unsupported by real capabilities, he argues, its adversaries exploit the gap and build international coalitions against Iran.
He specifically condemned the IRGC’s practice of writing eliminationist slogans on missiles, describing it as arbitrary theatre rather than serious strategy. These provocations produce no military advantage. They generate isolation, sanctions and international support for action against the regime.
His criticism exposes a decades-long pattern:
▪️ Superpower propaganda: After surviving a limited campaign, the regime presented survival itself as a historic military victory and evidence of global-power status.
▪️ Missile theatre: The IRGC wrote “Israel must be wiped out” on ballistic missiles while commanders predicted Israel would collapse before those missiles even struck.
▪️ Imaginary weapons: The regime unveiled the Qaher-313 as an indigenous stealth fighter, despite an undersized cockpit, civilian instruments, inadequate air intakes and no credible record of operational flight.
▪️ Fabricated victories: The IRGC repeatedly announced extraordinary missile success rates while independent assessments recorded widespread interceptions, technical failures and limited strategic results.
The numbers demolish the superpower fantasy.
The United States spends approximately $930–975 billion annually on its military. The Islamic Republic spends roughly $7.4 billion, a disparity of about 125 to one.
The United States possesses 11 aircraft carriers and more than 80 destroyers. The Islamic Republic possesses neither. Its conventional air force remains dependent on aging aircraft and lacks the advanced aviation, intelligence architecture and global logistics required to project sustained power.
The economic foundations are even further apart. The American economy exceeds $30 trillion. Iran’s nominal economy is approximately $360–370 billion, weakened further by corruption, sanctions, currency collapse and the IRGC’s domination of major industries.
The regime retains dangerous asymmetric capabilities. Its missiles, drones, proxies, mines and fast boats can kill civilians, threaten shipping and impose regional costs. But the capacity to terrorize and disrupt is not superpower strength.
Alaei also challenged the regime’s nuclear doctrine, arguing that nuclear weapons would not provide the security its leaders imagine. He said realistic collective-security arrangements would produce more meaningful deterrence than nuclear brinkmanship and military posturing.
His admission reveals the central fraud of the Islamic Republic’s strategic culture. It confuses noise with power, survival with victory and theatrical threats with achievable objectives.
Ordinary Iranians bear the cost through sanctions, isolation, squandered wealth and perpetual confrontation. The officials responsible face no accountability. They simply invent another victory and announce another leap toward superpower status.
The Islamic Republic survived a short war. It did not become a superpower. Even one of the men who built the IRGC now admits that its grandiose threats exceed the power beneath them.
In what universe is this a good idea?
BREAKING
Gavin Newsom has less than two months left in office, a 2028 résumé to build, and a blue wave he doesn't want to watch from the sidelines. So he just erased California's death row.
548 sentences, commuted by one signature. Juries heard the evidence and voted for death. He overruled all of them.
The last time anything like this happened in California, it wasn't a governor. It was the state Supreme Court in 1972. That ruling spared Charles Manson and Sirhan Sirhan. Voters reversed it within months, and they've rejected repeal at the ballot box since, including in 2016.
Now consider who gets spared this time:
Richard Allen Davis, who snatched 12-year-old Polly Klaas from her own slumber party and strangled her.
Charles Ng, convicted of 11 murders.
Cary Stayner, who killed four women, including two teenage girls.
Whatever you think of the death penalty, a governor should not veto the voters and every jury on his way out the door.
Palestine is the definition of Apartheid.
Also they bribe people to commit violence against Jews. Look up Pay for Slay.
Is there a word for that? A practice so uniquely evil and ignored that nobody has coined a term to condemn it.
Exactly
If you’re right wing and you can’t admit liberals (not communists) are way better at art and design and boutique coffee shops and restaurants, you’re not living in reality.
If you’re left wing and you can’t admit conservatives are way better at running cities and businesses and police departments, you’re not living in reality.
You step inside a beautiful coffee shop in the PNW and think “man, these liberals are great at this stuff…conservatives should take notes.” Then the moment you step outside and trip over a homeless drug zombie shooting up fentanyl on the sidewalk, you think “man these liberals are terrible at this stuff…they should really take notes from conservatives”
Communists make disgusting anti-beauty art, but classical liberals aren’t like that. Put the libs in charge of the coffee shops, put the conservatives in charge of city hall. This is how you get a city that is beautiful, clean, and functional.
If you can’t accept that, you need to check your tribalism. We are never getting rid of each other, so figure out how we strike a balance or else the communists swoop in and take everything from us while we quarrel over stupid bullshit…which is exactly what’s happening now.
“That is the price of leadership... the willingness to do things that may not be politically popular.”
I can't wait to move on from the age of politicians who just say whatever you want to hear.
🚨🇺🇸 Rubio just picked the opposite side of Vance on the Iran war: he’s staying, he’s defending it, and he won’t rule out 2028
Two days after the vice president blamed the war for losing the Senate, the secretary of state told the Times the opposite.
Gas prices are nothing to brag about, he admitted, but Trump “deserves a tremendous amount of credit” for the war anyway:
“That is the price of leadership... the willingness to do things that may not be politically popular.”
Rubio also shot down reports he’s leaving, saying he’ll serve to the end of the term, and refused to say whether he’ll run for president:
“I literally will not talk about 2028 anymore.”
He once said he’d be the first to back a Vance campaign; today he gave Trump the loyalty Vance didn’t, and Trump is the one who decides which of them the party gets.
Source: New York Times / Writer: Daniel
Hope, through strength.
The celebrations continue across the streets of Haiti. 🇭🇹🇸🇻
The Bukele Model is saving a nation. The arrival of Salvadoran troops, sent by President @nayibbukele, is putting Haitian gang leaders on the run and giving the Haitian people hope once again.
UnbotheredModerate retweeted
So, does anyone else get MAJOR "Funded By Putin" vibes from these people?
They claim they pick their targets because the tech companies are "Israeli," but the actual equipment they destroy is almost always DEFENSE systems destined for UKRAINE.
If Democrats choose battle over bipartisanship, it will backfire spectacularly.
Americans want solutions, not stalemate.
A progressive group led by former Biden, Warren and Sanders aides has assembled a 182-page blueprint mapping out potential Democratic congressional investigations targeting President Trump's corporate allies and donors.
The document, obtained and analyzed by Fox News Digital, names Tesla, Apple, Amazon, OpenAI, Meta, Google, Microsoft, Oracle and others as targets for potential hearings. It also names Palantir's Alex Karp and Coinbase's Brian Armstrong individually. The blueprint goes beyond corporate targets, urging scrutiny of Trump's personal finances, his tax arrangements, cryptocurrency businesses and alleged preferential treatment of corporate donors.
A longtime Democratic Senate staffer familiar with the process says Democratic majorities on these committees already plan to exclusively focus on targeting allies and donors of the president, including those who donated to the new White House ballroom.
Full story here foxnews.com/politics/progres…
UnbotheredModerate retweeted
Lyon (6ᵉ) : le lycée Édouard-Herriot est en feu. Une partie des élèves exhultent, tandis que les autres sont en classe (Vidéo issue du compte Instagram de Samuel Soulier, maire du 6ᵉ arrt.)
UnbotheredModerate retweeted
Say no to the “pro-Palestine” industrial complex, Islamism, and cultural relativism: These scenes cannot become normal in the Western world. Earlier today in Copenhagen, Palestinian and Arab immigrants and their descendants were filmed chanting for Hamas, the al-Qassam Brigades, Yahya Sinwar, Abu Obaida, jihad, the destruction of Tel Aviv, and terrorism under the banner of being “pro-Palestine” (video source: Moumen Al-Natour @moumalnatour).
For three years since October 7, this behavior has been excused, minimized, or dismissed as fringe. In reality, it has become a recurring and alarming trend across North America, Europe, and Australia. As Palestinians in Gaza increasingly reject Hamas, segments of diaspora Arab, Palestinian, and Muslim communities have embraced the group as the embodiment of “resistance” and the supposed voice of Gazans.
Equally troubling is how academics, journalists, influencers, activists, politicians, and celebrities have obscured these pro-Hamas sentiments by presenting them as merely advocacy for Palestinian rights. Some have relied on “cultural relativism” that blurs basic moral distinctions. Yet there is nothing complicated about condemning Hamas’s torture of Palestinians, theft of aid and resources, disastrous two-decade rule, decision to launch October 7, devastation of Gaza, and perpetration of the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust.
The tolerance of Islamist extremism in Western societies, and the reluctance to confront openly hateful and pro-terror rhetoric, risks deepening polarization and instability. It is long past time to scrutinize pro-Hamas ideology, activism, and narratives that have gained traction among politicians, students, journalists, and protest movements. Nor is it “racist” or “Islamophobic” to oppose campaigns targeting Jewish-owned businesses or attempts to pressure businesses into adopting political litmus tests. Democratic societies should confront extremism consistently, regardless of who promotes it.
UnbotheredModerate retweeted
I was usually the ONLY WOMAN in my convoy in Afghanistan. Not only was I a military police team leader, I was the one who searched the Afghan women.
Those women told me things their husbands never would. They also told me things they wouldn't tell their husbands. They let me hold their babies and talk to their kids. These women had NO voice in that country. No rights. They were men's property.
40 months in a Muslim country taught me this: Sharia doesn't "coexist." It TAKES. And here in the USA, it will take from women FIRST.
Ladies, it starts with your voice. DO NOT hand it over. It wasn't very long ago at all that we fought for and WON our freedom here in America. We owe it to our daughters not to go backwards. 🇺🇸🪖
Good advice on political strategy for both sides msn.com/en-us/news/other/ohi…
I wonder what "Defund the Police" thinks of Haiti.
🚨 WOW! El Salvador President Nayib Bukele just had his troops STORM through Haiti to take down the gangs and rescue his missing men — and the locals love it
This is the guy who turned the m*rder capital of the world into one of the safest countries in the hemisphere 🇺🇸🇸🇻
Bukele is ripping apart these savages on their HOME TURF
And globalist NGOs can't stand it.
Bring your men home, @nayibbukele!
California cities look like dystopian nightmares.
officially moving our office out of downtown SF after 12 months on Market Street.
a space that incubated over 100 startups just a few years ago is down to fewer than 10 teams today.
the physical reality of working here took a heavy toll. getting chased down the sidewalk by an aggressive bulldog. a close friend rushed to urgent care with severe bite wounds after another attack. 20+ street dog encounters, shattered car glass on every block, and another friend struck in the head by a stranger while standing in line for dinner.
startups require total obsession with product and execution. a team cannot build the future when everyday survival consumes half their focus between the transit stop and the front door.
San Francisco is still home, and we are relocating to a neighborhood where people can walk to lunch without fearing for their physical safety.
UnbotheredModerate retweeted
To those of you living in free countries, watching the images coming out of Europe, Canada, and America, I feel there's an experience I need to share. Because today's news to you reminds us of a catastrophe we've been paying for for decades. I'm Iranian.
47 years ago, Iran was rich in natural resources, with an educated workforce and rapid development. Living conditions were improving. Women participated freely in public and political life.
Iran helped maintain regional security, commanded international respect, and was a model for developing countries. Then, an Islamist ideology arrived disguised as justice for the oppressed. Islamists, communists, and the radical left formed a deadly alliance and took power.
Then, the Islamists crushed their former allies. The regime imposed Sharia law, stripped away freedoms, and survived through imprisonment, torture, and execution. A country with enormous potential fell into corruption, economic crisis, and mass emigration.
Today, it's known as the world's leading sponsor of terrorism. From the start, the regime openly declared its ambition to export its dark ideology, a threat your governments didn't take seriously. For about 30 years, generations born after the revolution have repeatedly risen up to take their country back.
While we paid with imprisonment, torture, and massacres, your government signed political and economic deals with our oppressors. The regime expanded its networks of influence and propaganda. Today, you see the results in your cities.
Movements like the pro-Palestine movement and socialist Islamists claiming to defend the oppressed while spreading hatred and destruction. I'm Iranian and I'm speaking directly to you. Don't let Islamists use your freedom of speech, your tolerance, and your democratic rights to gain power and then take those freedoms away.
We've paid the price for their promises. Stand with the people still fighting to end this regime. Don't let what happened to us become your future.
How is this not a tantrum?
What is the government supposed to do about these issues? How does stopping the economy and burning cities help?
BREAKING: Hundreds of thousands of protesters flood the streets across France as a nationwide general strike intensifies, with authorities expecting as many as 700,000 demonstrators at roughly 220 protests today.
The demonstrations, initially driven by students demanding better school conditions, have expanded into widespread protests over rising living costs, low wages and government budget cuts.
France has deployed up to 70,000 police officers nationwide to prevent a repeat of the violence seen in recent weeks, while the U.S. Embassy warns American travelers to remain alert.
Download the FOX News app to follow this developing story: foxnews.onelink.me/xLDS/z2jy…
