RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.frontpagemag.com/war-is-about-more-than-big-battalions/

Napoleon famously said that “morale is to the physical as three is to one.” More troops and bigger guns don’t necessarily guarantee victory, as Napoleon himself demonstrated. The post-revolutionary French army took on the wealthy great powers of Europe and with the exception of England, inflicted on them defeat after defeat, dominating most of continental Europe from 1804-14. History is full of other conflicts and battles in which the motivations for fighting trumped the greater numbers of the foe. Indeed, the West only exists because twice, in 490 and 480 B.C., the free Greeks defeated the massive, servile armies of the autocratic Persian Empire, preserving the ideals of political freedom and equality.

What people are willing to fight, kill, and die for, then, is three times more significant than the materiel with which they wage war. This means that our culture’s fashionable self-loathing––its “oikophobia,” as the late philosopher Roger Scruton called the hatred of one’s country, its institutions, its history, and much of its people evident in our universities, media, entertainment, and even military establishment––is so dangerous that not only does it erode morale, it signals to our foes that for all our economic and military power, significant numbers of citizens will not risk their lives to defend their country from those who wish to supplant it.

Given this long history showing that the foundational beliefs people fight for is itself a force-multiplier, it’s puzzling to read this paragraph from Brookings Institute Senior Fellow Robert Kagan’s long essay in the Wall Street Journal. After summarizing the 20th Century history of aggressors underestimating the power of the U.S., Kagan writes:

“Are Americans as a people up to a major confrontation with another great power, whether in immediate conflict or a protracted Cold War-like struggle? It would be dangerous for a potential adversary to assume they are not. Whatever condition the American political system may be in, it is not appreciably worse than it was during the 1930s. That, too, was a deeply polarized America, including on the question of whether to intervene in the world’s conflicts. But once the U.S. found itself at war, dissent all but disappeared. If ever there could be a cure for American political polarization, a conflict with China would be it.”

https://www.frontpagemag.com/sen-fetterman-was-not-qualified-to-serve-his-doctor-and-staff-lied-about-it/

After hospitalizing him for what staff suspected might have been another stroke, Senator John Fetterman has now been hospitalized with “clinical depression”. This comes after the New York Times reported that the newly elected senator had trouble understanding what people were saying and was trying to avoid interactions.

And it’s a safe bet that we’re being told less than half the story.

Fetterman is not qualified to serve. He can’t do his job or any job. He needs extensive medical care and he’s not able to carry out his responsibilities. Whether or not he was aware of that depends on his mental capacity.

Contrary to Nikki Haley’s recent dumb quip, voters are allowed to elect unqualified people, including shambling wrecks, but Fetterman’s doctor and his staffers, not to mention his wife, would have been aware of his real condition and they lied about it to get through an election. Having lied their way this far, the star of Bernie’s Weekend broke down. That comes as no surprise after Fetterman’s debate performance.

Democrats just pushed out Sen. Dianne Feinstein, she showed up to work every day, and maybe she didn’t remember which votes she had cast or who her colleagues were, but she’s still more functional than Fetterman.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/who-killed-philip-haney-the-mystery-continues/

February 21 will mark three years since Philip Haney, 66, was “found deceased” in Amador County, California, killed by a gunshot to the chest. The victim was not the typical Sierra foothills resident.

Philip Haney was the author of  See Something Say Nothing: A Homeland Security Officer Exposes the Government’s Submission to Jihad, first published in 2016. The DHS whistleblower also authored Frontpage articles, “Deobond Attacks in San Bernardino, Sri Lanka,” “The Terrorist Ties that Bind,” and “The Assembly of Muslim Jurists of America’s Ominous Post-Election Statement.” The expert on Islamic jihad had been punished for doing his job at a high level. This is the man found deceased in Amador County.

In Haney’s RV, the sheriff found numerous thumb drives, a laptop computer, and other materials. Sheriff Martin Ryan turned these over to the FBI, which did not reveal what the devices contained, and the bureau remained silent on the case through 2021. Last year, the Amador County sheriff’s office told Frontpage there was “no new news” about Haney and that the case was closed. A month later, in March, 2022, more than two years after Haney was found deceased, the case was proclaimed a suicide.

Claims that Haney killed himself had appeared from the start, but were steadfastly denied by Haney’s friends, family and members of Congress. In March of 2020, Rep. Steve King said, “I don’t believe that Phil Haney committed suicide.” Rep. Louis Gohmert told reporters “I’d been concerned about his safety, with all the information he knew and people who could’ve gotten in trouble.”  If the case had been pursued as a homicide, potential suspects would have been easy to find.

Philip Haney worked as a field agricultural entomologist in the Middle East, where he began studying Arabic and the Quran. With that background, the UC Riverside alum seemed a good fit for the Department of Homeland Security, but it didn’t turn out that way.

In “DHS ordered me to scrub records of Muslims with terror ties,” published in The Hill on May 5, 2016, Haney said DHS had ordered him “to delete or modify several hundred records of individuals tied to designated Islamist terror groups like Hamas from the important federal database, the Treasury Enforcement Communications System (TECS).”

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2023/02/florida-vs-new-york.php

As states increasingly segregate into red and blue, California, New York, Texas and Florida are the heavyweight contenders. (Although, don’t forget poor Illinois.) A year ago I had the good fortune to hear Governor Ron DeSantis give a speech to a Minnesota group in Naples, Florida. DeSantis said something that I thought couldn’t possibly be correct: that Florida has more people than New York, with a state budget only half as large. Afterward, I looked it up, and it was true. No wonder DeSantis romped to an overwhelming re-election!

Yesterday the Wall Street Journal editorial board compared “New York vs. Florida, by the Numbers.” The comparison tells us pretty much everything we need to know about the relative merit of conservative and left-wing governance:

Take a look at the nearby chart comparing some key indicators of governance in a pair of states that not long ago were about the same size—New York and Florida. As recently as 2013 the two states had similar populations, but so many people have moved to the Sunshine State that it’s now roughly 2.6 million people larger.

Here are the numbers. Read them and weep, if you are a liberal. Click to enlarge:

We see the same thing across the country. Red states are succeeding, blue states are failing. What is hard to understand is why so many blue state liberals don’t understand that their states are dying. Politicians, I get: decline is always a relatively slow process, so they calculate that they will be gone before their states finally circle the drain. But what about the people who live in blue states, who don’t intend to flee to more successful locations, and who will be left holding the bag? I can only assume that they are not familiar with the data.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/ohio-residents-erupt-town-hall-wheres-pete-buttigieg

Voicing their concerns at a town hall on Wednesday night, Ohio residents impacted by this month’s toxic train derailment asked where Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg was.

“Where’s Pete Buttigieg? Where’s he at?” one man asked Mayor Trent Conaway.

“I don’t know. Your guess is as good as me,” the mayor replied. 

He told attendees that Tuesday was the first time he had “heard anything from the White House.”

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan is on the ground in East Palestine on Thursday to discuss the agency’s efforts leading on the environmental response, a spokesperson for the Transportation Department told Fox News Digital in an email.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11745765/East-Palestine-Ohio-residents-demand-urgent-testing-toxic-train-wreck.html

‘We basically nuked the town’: Hundreds of residents in Ohio village demand urgent testing of their homes after train wreck released toxic chemicals into the air – and officials tell them it’s safe to return
About 50 cars, including 10 carrying hazardous materials, derailed in a fiery crash in East Palestine at about 9pm on Friday, February 3
Some train cars were carrying hazardous chemicals and houses were evacuated while authorities carried out a ‘controlled release’
But residents are suing Norfolk Southern and fear their health is still at risk 

Residents evacuated from an Ohio village where a freight train derailed before huge clouds of toxic gasses were released in an explosion fear they could still be in danger nearly two weeks later, despite authorities telling them it’s safe to return home.

About 50 cars, including 10 carrying hazardous materials, derailed in a fiery crash in East Palestine at about 9pm on Friday, February 3.

Houses were evacuated after vinyl chloride was slowly released from five of those cars. Authorities then ignited the gases for a ‘controlled release’ of the highly flammable, toxic chemicals in a controlled environment, creating a dark plume of smoke.

Officials warned the controlled burn would send phosgene and hydrogen chloride into the air. Phosgene is a highly toxic, colorless gas with a strong odor that can cause vomiting and breathing trouble and was used as a weapon in World War I.

Despite the threat, safety officials insisted it is safe for residents who were evacuated to return to their homes just days later.