(CNN) House passes key foreign aid package. Quoting,

A number of lawmakers who backed the aid packages today said their views on House Speaker Mike Johnson as a leader changed after the speaker put bills on the floor despite a threat against his job.

Well done, Speaker Johnson. You have secured your place in history.

The long term continuity of U.S. foreign policy remains at risk.

(CNN) ISIS claims responsibility for attack in busy Moscow-area concert venue that left at least 60 dead.

This was anticipated; see (CNN) Russia accuses Ukraine of mounting ‘sabotage’ attack across border. Quoting,

The Freedom for Russia Legion, Russian Volunteer Corps, and associated groups are inspirational to ethnic secession.  In the near term, the  [typo corrected] Caucasus will become restive, awakening old   memories and yearnings.

In the cause of Caucasus secession, ISIS is both a natural ally and a viable, importable ideology.

This will force action by Kadyrov, with troops withdrawn from Ukraine.

The alleged video of a Tajik perpetrator’s confession, with an improbable secular motive — “for money”, is likely a fiction contrived to meet the needs of the Russian state, which involve popular support for mobilization.

(CNN) House passes bill that could lead to US ban of TikTok.

The recommendation of this blog to the Senate is that TikTok should be banned or subject to forced divestiture.

It is a dagger pointed at the heart of the social media analog to infrastructure.

A masterful performance by a much younger man.  Joe, somehow you dragged the stump right  into the chamber.

The result is a reversal in drama of the two candidates, which if sustained may evolve to actual perception.

(CNN) Russia attempting to develop nuclear space weapon to destroy satellites with massive energy wave, sources familiar with intel say. Quoting,

Russia is trying to develop a nuclear space weapon that would destroy satellites by creating a massive energy wave when detonated, potentially crippling a vast swath of the commercial and government satellites…

See (Wikipedia) Starfish Prime, a 1962 high altitude nuclear test, detonated at an altitude of 250 miles. Quoting,

Starfish Prime caused an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) that was far larger than expected, so much larger that it drove much of the instrumentation off scale…

The weaponeers became quite worried when three satellites in low Earth orbit were disabled. These included TRAAC and Transit 4B.[13

Starfish Prime created  artificial  Van Allen radiation belts :

…In the months that followed, these man-made radiation belts eventually caused six or more satellites to fail,[14] as radiation damaged their solar arrays or electronics, including the first commercial relay communication satellite, Telstar, as well as the United Kingdom’s first satellite, Ariel 1.[15] Detectors on Telstar, TRAAC, Injun, and Ariel 1 were used to measure distribution of the radiation produced by the tests.

In 1963, it was reported that Starfish Prime had created a belt of MeV electrons.[17] In 1968, it was reported that some Starfish electrons had remained in the atmosphere for 5 years.[18]

(CNN) House Intel Chairman announces ‘serious national security threat,’ sources say it is related to Russia. Quoting,

One of the sources who has seen the intelligence confirmed that “it is, in fact, a highly concerning and destabilizing” Russian capability “that we were recently made aware of.”

Sensitivity has two  possible roots:

• The need to protect sources and methods.
• Disclosure would affect society at large in a negative way.

“Destabilizing” hints the latter. One of my long-term concerns has been North Korea’s Plutonium, Iran’s Uranium / Suitcase Nukes,

where Russia may have obtained or retained custody of refurbished weapons, with possible deployment in the continental U.S.

(CNN) Boeing executives to convene all-hands safety meeting at its 737 Max factory after yet another crisis.

See Boeing & Safety Culture Redux.

Boeing is building planes the way Detroit used to build cars. A crash course on manufacturing ethics won’t fix the Boeing wagon.

Every structural bolt or nut in a plane or motor vehicle has a prescribed tightness. While it is permissible to initially tighten with an ordinary ratchet wrench, it is mandatory to use a torque wrench for final tightening. This tool has an integral measuring function to precisely reach the prescribed tightness.

Even the Detroit comparison  pales. When is the last time a door fell off a Chevy? Combined with other reports involving loose bolts, it reeks of the semi-intentional, of willful recklessness — or  drug use.

Henry Kissinger, so recently deprived of his own voice, speaks to us now through his voluminous writings on realpolitik.

The current issues of U.S. foreign policy are fraught with moral dilemmas  that resist solution or even separation. Realpolitik does not address these dilemmas. It does offer predictions. If the following are not addressed as commitments that must be met,

• Security guarantees for Saudi Arabia.
• Arms for Ukraine.
• Arms for Israel.

.where the list order is deliberately counterintuitive,

• The dollar will crash.
• The bond market will tumble.
• Alternatives to SWIFT will rapidly proliferate.
• The split off of the Global South will accelerate.
• Russia/Iran will emerge to rival China as a threat.
• The world will become more distinctly unpleasant than it is now.

Republicans, remember that Kissinger was a Republican. This is your watch. He speaks loud to you now, through the veil.

(Click to enlarge.)

Turkey Feathers. 18×24″, oil on panel.

This started as an action painting.

Just in time. Good with leftovers.

(CNN) Israel says it is ‘at war’ after Hamas surprise attack.

Israel’s hacking expertise is second only to NSA. Israel intensively monitors Gaza electromagnetic emissions. So how did Hamas evade detection? The definitive answer cannot be reached unless technological surprise can be excluded.  With exclusion, there are only a few possible categories:

• A new dark web infrastructure running on virgin hardware, concealed by something analogous to CDMA or spread spectrum.
• Steganography.
• The low-tech Kremlin solution: typewriters/carbons, paper and pencil.

If technological surprise reveals, it will come as a thunderclap.

How did Hamas gain confidence their plans were undetected? Do they have a mole?