badgerx16

Mike Waltz, the National Security Advisor, is the person who "accidentally" invited Jeffrey Goldberg into the SIGNAL chat. Waltz says he does not know Goldberg, yet to add him into the chat he must have had his phone number listed in his contacts on his phone. ( Goldberg says they have met several times ). And now Elon Musk has been tasked with finding out how Goldberg happened to be included. I think our 5 year old Granddaughter could manage that. Maybe one of Musk's pubescent DOGE agents could explain it to the group, perhaps using emoticons.

OK, Thom, now tell us how you really feel.

Democrats trolling Hegseth and Waltz

Heart

The National Security Advisor, Director of National Intelligence, Head of the CIA, Head of the FBI, Vice President, Secretary of Defense, Middle East Special Advisor, and others, have all admitted the SIGNAL exchange happened. Even Trump has said so. Today the Atlantic has published the entire SIGNAL exchange - in response the White House Press Secretary, Karoline Leavitt, has called the new article a hoax. She must be living in a parallel universe.

Greenland would be my choice.

Tulsi Gabbard in front of the Congressional Committee investigating the SIGNAL group chat was asked to confirm that she was TG in the thread. "I don't want to get into specifics" was her reply, and when pressed on the question repeated this response. Other senior officers who were also involved were asked if they had participated in other SIGNAL chats potentially involving classified information, to a man they all replied "Not that I can recall". Surely they would know if they had used an unsanctioned, insecure device. The use of SIGNAL in these cases is a breach of the Espionage Act, and against Congressional rules that all communications must be retained. The use of SIGNAL in violation of these rules is to ensure that nothing is retained that might later be subjected to Freedom of Information requests.

Look at it from the other perspective, should people who are not in Government be given access to secret information ? I personally think certain individuals should, such as the leaders of the opposition parties in the HoC, but Trump has a far more simplistic, peurile and spiteful personality.

Gall or kidney ?

Our SiL used to live and work in San Francisco, and has been invited on a group visit to Las Vegas. He says he will not spend a single penny on travelling to the States whilst Trump is President.

Been going on since WW2. In the early 1940s the UK sent a lot of plans and working for advanced aerodynamics and jet engines to the US so that further testing could be carried out without the direct threat of enemy action or espionage. The US was to send back the test results and further design proposals - nothing came back.

From the BBC reporting on the SIGNAL leak, this, I think, may end up being the most damaging part of the discussions; ""Whether it's now or several weeks from now, it will have to be the United States that reopens these shipping lanes," the account associated with Waltz wrote on 14 March. The message continued, saying that at Trump's request, his team was working with the defence department and state department "to determine how to compile the cost associated and levy them on the Europeans". At one point in the thread the Vance account griped that the strikes would benefit the Europeans, because of their reliance on those shipping lanes, adding: "I just hate bailing Europe out again." The user identified as Hegseth responded three minutes later: "VP: I fully share your loathing of European free-loading. It's PATHETIC.""

Asthma inhalers are subject to prescription charges.

Our diesel is ULEZ exempt. Makes no sense at all.

What a bunch of amateurish chancers.

Maybe you should stop including such comments as "Perhaps those who think it is appropriate to post laughing emojis on these posts....." and presenting them with such a clear opening. Just ignore them and minimize the childish glee they derive from provoking you. Nutty Nic regularly puts laughs on my posts, I just take it as proof that he is, mentally at least, 5 years old.

Using condemned meat in school meals.

Keir Starmer, in an interview with trhe New York Times, has said that he was put under pressure to be publicly critical of President Zelensky in the immediate aftermath of the Trump / Vance pile-on in the Oval Office.

Do you post with the intention of garnering laughing emojis ? Is that a measure of justification?

He needs to ensure he stays "the smartest guy in the room", which probably explains who he picks.

Europe better watch out if the US foreign policy is being determined on the basis on what language people speak. Belgium and Switzerland are totally fucked; Belgium's 3 official languages are Dutch, French, and German, so there won't be much left after the borders are redrawn. Much of Switzerland would have to be ceded to Germany, as would parts of northern Italy, and Austria would disappear in a second Anschluss. Then again, would we want the English speaking US back ? Apart, that is, from the Spanish majority districts that would become part of Mexico. Is this World view a result of the US education system ?

Steven Witkoff, US Special Advisor to the Middle East, has said that the results of the referendums that Russia held in the occupied ares of Ukraine demonstrate that the people there want to be Russian, completely ignoring the facts around those polls where those people that hadn't fled the military occupation, or been detained by the Russians, were asked at gunpoint whether they wanted to be assimilated. It appears that yet another of Putin's key demands has already been conceded. Mind you, given the views of Trump and his cronies towards elections, is this surprising.

This is from the British Gas site; The starting price for heat pump installation with British Gas is £7,999 – or £499 after the £7,500 government grant is added. However, many homes do need extra work to get the best performance from a heat pump. After the £7,500 government grant, the average price for our customers in 2023 was £5,690. ..........,.......... We have one and love it. We have no gas supply to our house, and previously had storage heaters, an immersion heater if we wanted a bath, and a wood burning stove for the living room, ( which replaced an old coal fire and back boiler ). When the heat pump was installed we also replaced the immersion tank and had new central heating radiators installed in every room, so the pump is now giving us central heating all round and also 'instant' hot water. Obviously this cost far more than simply putting in the heat pump. My wife says it is the best thing we have ever done. The most important things to consider are how the pump would integrate into existing heating and plumbing systems, and how well insulated your house is. Also, get at least two or three estimates - there are reports of installed pumps being under sized for the intended installation.

If DOGE actually had a plan, other than slash and burn, published what it intended to do and how it was going to be done, and tried to use established processes, there wouldn't be so much push back. It is the seemingly random, bull in a china shop approach, and the high-profile "OOPS" moments that have lost public support for what in principle is the Republicans enacting their "Small Government" ideal Those Republican "Town Halls" are so reminiscent of the "This is not the Brexit I voted for" buyer's remorse - I fully support what Trump is doing provided it doesn't impact me personally.

Anything you can do I can do better. There is much about Trump's second term that might be interpreted as indicating a megalomaniacal slide towards dictatorship, this isn't part of that. This is just a big man baby throwing a sulk.