Machiavelli on mercenaries.

Simplicius is worth follwing for his takes on the Russian-Ukrainian War: https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/prigozhins-siege-ends-postmortem?publication_id=1351274&post_id=130789627&isFreemail=true

This signifies a cardinal shift in the Russian handling of tactical nuclear arms away from their traditional separation of the warheads kept in a central storage far from the delivery carriers to the method used by the U.S. military with respect to its tactical nuclear weapons in Europe. The Americans, he said stored the nukes just under the jets that would be used to deliver them. Now in Belarus, the warheads will also be just next to the planes and Iskander missiles that will carry them. This means that the time to launch will depend only on the time for approval from the Boss. And with respect to that, Lukashenko told Skabeyeva that he had just to make a phone call to Vladimir Vladimirovich and approval would be instantaneous.

Why such a hair-trigger mechanism for unleashing nuclear weapons to defend Belarus? For an answer to that, go to today’s article in The Financial Times on how Poland is now preparing hundreds of Belarus fighters to go across the border and overthrow Lukashenko. https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2023/06/19/tactical-nuclear-weapons-latest-news-from-russia/

I met Becky R. Jones at LibertyCon, yesterday. Tired of seeing her university taken over by a feminist cabal, she reimagined them as a coven of witches.
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Plato's Rave #DracoAlchemicus

What happens when a sturdy railroad tanker car implodes under the pressure of 1 atm impinging on a vacuum inside.
https://youtu.be/Zz95_VvTxZM

So, basically, the sinister establishment (e.g. The Atlantic) is saying that anyone who questions them is analog to raw sewage and nasty infectious disease...a "Great Stink"! And that "ugly voices" need to be shut off via "pipes, valves, and pumps." 💩 ☣️ https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/06/germ-theory-digital-platforms-internet-metaphore/674458/

The true villain is as far from the stereotypical depiction of ‘left-wing’ as it is possible to go without coming full circle: he wears a $10,000 suit and flies on private jets; he travels in tinted motorcades with a security detail and a police escort; he owns mansions on every continent and high-end town houses in New York, London, and Paris; he has a stock portfolio worth a hundred times more than the accumulated earnings of your entire ancestral line; he passes international borders without a passport and is immune from prosecution; he may appear on television from time to time to dispense reassuring endorsements of the status quo, and can often be seen at A-list sporting and entertainment events. https://jjdawson.substack.com/p/we-must-stop-saying-the-left

I'll tell you what really struck me about the Russian events over the weekend: the number of people - even trusted figures from our side of the argument , go-to guys for non-Normie podcasts, etc - who sounded off with great confidence while clearly knowing diddley squat.

A World War 1 memorial in Hungary of a family missing their father.

Be thankful if you can still call your dad.

Post modern action thriller heroes "do a thing."

And you can tell how cool they are because they get obscure references.

Both those examples come from Locus Award Winner John Scalzi.