Howdy All, a few Interesting Items for your information. Enjoy –
In this issue –
1. Hamas
2. Trans
3. IFT-11
4. Kidnap
5. Bounties
6. Dominion
7. Rapist
8. Tag
1. Hamas. I was waiting a bit for the turbulence following the peace agreement and end of the Israel – Hamas War. While there is still a bit of fog of war remaining, we can at least take a look at what happened. First and most importantly, the Trump team orchestrated a peace agreement that ended the war. They did it by getting all the Arab nations in the Middle East onboard. These included some particularly bad faith players like Turkey and Qatar. These nations put real pressure on Hamas to agree to a peace deal which requires them to release all hostages, alive and otherwise, put down their arms, and relinquish power, none of which they’ve done completely as yet. Gaza will be governed by a Commission / Board with Arab secret police / military providing security. This is an important point, as some of the participating nations have pretty good secret police who are ready, willing and able to do whatever is necessary to get the job done even it if means killing every single remaining Hamas operative who still wants to play. To the best of my knowledge, they have not been deployed into Gaza in any meaningful numbers as yet. This, in turn has allowed remaining Hamas to run their mouths, shake their tiny fists in the air, and carry out some level of retribution against Gazans who were deemed to be insufficiently supportive during the war. Hamas’ problem is that they no longer have any support from any major or minor actors in the Middle East. As such, they are now completely expendable, a job that will be done quietly outside the view of cameras and reporters. Yeah, I do worry about their continuing violations of the agreement but tend to view them a little more than bullies that got their noses bloodied when someone finally returned fire. Dangerous bullies, but little more than bullies, nonetheless. Israel killed a lot of them and pro-Hamas brainwashing manufacturing new Jihadis is stopped, so it won’t be manufacturing more of them or reinforcing the successful brainwashing of the last 70+ years. Hamas released all the remaining living hostages, perhaps 20, and at least 4 bodies, one of which was not that of a hostage. This leaves perhaps 16 remaining bodies. I suspect most if not all of them are buried in the rubble of the tunnel complex under Gaza. As of this morning, Hamas is pretending the agreement is a hudna, a temporary cease fire designed to allow them to rearm and reconstitute. They’ve also engaged in at least one armed attack against the IDF, killing two, demonstrating they’ve learned the wrong lesson. I expect they will be taught the error of their ways. Bluntly. Final observation is that both sides of the political aisle support the peace deal, I suspect because they want to sidle up to the newly filled reconstruction trough for at least $70 billion to rebuild Gaza. Let the feeding frenzy begin.
2. Trans. It turns out that the entire trans craze was a social engineering experiment, a bubble that appears to have popped as the youngsters reject everything associated with it. Of course, this has been predicted in various places for at least two years. Zero Hedge reports that the number of students identifying as trans fell from roughly 7% in 2023 to under 4% today. Those identifying as non-heterosexual are down by a full 10%. Non-binary identification is down by half. Freshmen are less likely to identify as LGBTQWTF than other students, indicating the decline continues. Hetro identification rebounded into the current 77 – 82% range. All the numbers are going the right direction, dragging along with it the cultural reinforcement driving the bubble. This will in turn drag the institutions demanding obeisance to the alternative lifestyle and governments back to where they used to be. Finally, as the bubble pops, somewhere along the line we will see the trial lawyers, who are in the on-deck circle, get their chances to play. I predict there will be a lot of bankrupt hospitals, doctors, teachers, school administrators, public health and the ever-popular therapy / psychiatric industry before this is all over as the kids herded into choosing to undergo life-altering surgery, hormone therapy and other get rich quick schemes for the medical industry get their revenge. And that revenge will (and should) be cold.
3. IFT 11. SpaceX flew its 11th test flight of Starship and Super Heavy Monday afternoon. The flight was mostly a replay of the equally successful Integrated Test Flight (IFT) 10 late August. It was the last flight of the Block 2 version of Starship. Next flight late Dec to Jan will be the newer Block 3, with improved Raptor 3 engines and redesigned Booster and Starship upper stages. Block 3 will be more powerful, capable of carrying more payload, and another step toward a rapidly reusable pair of vehicles that will start flying operational missions next year if all goes well. Once again Scott Manley has a pretty decent review of the flight with inflight videos in the video linked above. If you want to watch a replay of the flight, there are any number of YouTube videos available. SpaceX cranked up the production line at Starbase to the extent that they are running out of places to store what is coming off the production line. The Block 3 vehicle is a substantial upgrade in the ground side infrastructure, referred to as Stage Zero by SpaceX. The current Launch Tower Pad A was already being disassembled in preparation for an upgrade that will handle the Block 3 rockets. The new Pad B complex should be ready for operation sometime in December if all goes well. It’s twin is at Launch Complex 39A at Cape Canaveral. There is a second one also under construction there. The first one should be ready for launch somewhere in the first quarter of 2026. Once it is ready to go, expect SpaceX to start shipping Starship and Superheavy flight ready articles from Brownsville to Cape Canaveral via the Intracoastal Waterway around the rim of the Gulf of America, around Florida and up the east coast to Port of Canaveral. This shipping should continue until SpaceX has the ability to build Block 3 Starship Boosters and Ships at the Cape. Expect a couple test flights for Block 3, the second which is expected to attempt to catch both Booster and Ship before we see operational flights. The operational flights will start quickly with Starlink V3 satellites at 50 – 60 per flight and quickly move to a testing regime to figure out how to conduct on orbit refueling of cryogenics necessary for trips to the moon and Mars. 2026 is going to be a busy year. With any luck, they may be able to hit the first launch window to Mars Dec 2026. Remember that all of this is privately funded, being paid for by revenue from Starlink, which launched its 10,000th satellite over the weekend. 1,400 of them have been deorbited.
4. Kidnap. Cali Governor and unannounced democrat presidential candidate Gavin Newsom signed AB 495 last week. The Family Preparedness Plan Act of 2025 reads a lot like dream legislation for child traffickers, as it expands the definition of who can sign a caregiver’s authorization, expanding it to the extended family. It also allows courts to appoint custodial parents, of a “trusted person” nominated by a parent as joint guardians on a temporary basis. It makes court records of these proceedings confidential. Finally, it prohibits childcare facilities from collecting immigration information about a child or parents. While this is putatively designed to grab kiddos of illegals, I expect it will quickly be used on kiddos of citizens, as it puts the schools and courts completely in charge. Do something a school doesn’t like? They go to court, file a temporary guardianship, and the court approves it, all without your participation or knowledge, and your kiddo mysteriously disappears. Imagine what they can now legally do if you refuse to allow gender affirming care or transitioning.
5. Bounties. In one of the dumber stories (if true), DHS Secretary Noem announced that some number of Mexican cartels are putting bounties on the heads of ICE agents. They are being assisted by Antifa and the Latin Kings gang (does No Kings apply to them?). The bounties range from $2,000 for information that will expose identities of ICE agents and their families, to 5 – 10,000 for those who kidnap and assault ICE agents, topping out with $50,000 to those that murder high ranking DHS officials. Note that the Latin Kings are based in Chicago, explaining recent DHS interest in Chicago gangs. I would say that threat analysis by these bozos and those that support them is limited to nonexistent. If there was ever a time not to screw around with an administration, this would be one of them. Perhaps the attrition is so significant, that they figure they need to stand and fight or end up like Hamas, which would be good for all of us. Keep this up and they will shortly have Special Ops running around in Mexico, Portland and Chicago.
6. Dominion. Two interesting pieces of election news last week. The first courtesy of Breitbart where Liberty Vote just purchased Dominion Voting Systems. The St Louis based company is owned by a Republican who may or may not come from the Romney-friendly wing of the party. Liberty’s goals on election integrity are closely aligned with those of the Trump administration. Dominion was particularly aggressive following the 2020 election filling multiple successful defamation lawsuits against critics claiming they facilitated election fraud. One of those was a $787 million settlement against Fox News. Before the announcement of the sale, they settled lawsuits against Rudy Giuliani $1.3 billion, Sidney Powell, $1.3 billion, and One America News, $1.6 billion. The ongoing lawsuit against Mike Lindell, who is now bankrupt, is ongoing. The sale now has democrats starting to make positive noises about using paper ballots (mail-in, questioned, and absentee) in lieu of Dominion voting machines currently used in 27 states. The second story comes courtesy of Jeff Childers Coffee and Covid, with the uncovering of an actual Venezuelan connection to Smartmatic, one of the more unbelievable claims following the 2020 debacle. Imagine what elections in this nation could be like if democrats can’t cheat nearly as easily as they do today.
7. Rapist. I suppose I shouldn’t enjoy this story, as it demonstrates nicely who law enforcement is protecting – in this case, the criminal from the population. I’m not all that happy with the outcome, but I completely understand it, especially the end. The story begins last October, when a father went searching for his abducted 13-year-old daughter. The Arkansas county Sherrif was also searching. The father located the girl and the 67-year-old rapist in a vehicle. A confrontation ended with the girl rescued and perp shot. The father was arrested on murder charges. The backstory of this is that the perp was a known stalker who had previously raped the girl. He was the boyfriend of a family friend. He was charged quickly and released on a $50,000 bond. He ignored a no contact order to execute the abduction. The father responded quickly to the abduction, finding the perp driving on their road. There was a collision, a non-accident described as an accident. The father claimed to have been attacked, defended himself and rescued the girl. Still no word on what the county or state prosecutor is going to do with this case. The father is now running for County Sheriff. Word of warning to the criminal justice system: either do your job and take care of the Bad Actors out there or someone else will.
8. Tag. Speaking of stupid guy tricks, the Rose City Counter Info, a Portland-based Antifa group, is doing their level best to join both Hamas and the Mexican cartels in the federal spotlight (or crosshairs). They circulated an online flyer advertising a “laser tag tonight at 9 PM” event. Participants were encouraged to “unleash your beam”, shining handheld lasers at helos overhead during the ongoing nightly riots. While there were apparently no federal helos overhead the night of the riot, air ambulances were. And because it is difficult to tell friendlies from combatants, the cute little trick ended attacking and shutting down air ambulance service over Portland. Good show, guys. You must be very proud.
More later –
- AG