Understatement of the year

As the Syrian Army has taken back land, or defended it, from ISIS and al-Qaeda it has been transporting the surrenderers to Idlib Province in northwest Syria. 

"According to the UN, there are currently about 10,000 members of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham and other al-Qaeda-linked factions in the province of Idlib. All of them as well as members of their allied militant groups are deeply concerned by the expected Syrian Army advance in the area."

https://southfront.org/syria-map-update-military-situation-in-northern-hama-southern-idlib/

Trump: no more foreign adventurism; strengthen military; destroy ISIS

"President-elect Donald Trump laid out a U.S. military policy on Tuesday that would avoid interventions in foreign conflicts and instead focus heavily on defeating the Islamic State militancy.

In the latest stop on a "thank you" tour of states critical to his Nov. 8 election win, Trump introduced his choice for defense secretary, General James Mattis, to a large crowd in this city near the Fort Bragg military base, which has deployed soldiers to 90 countries around the world.

"We will stop racing to topple foreign regimes that we know nothing about, that we shouldn't be involved with," Trump said. "Instead, our focus must be on defeating terrorism and destroying ISIS, and we will."

Trump's rhetoric was similar to what he said during the election campaign when he railed against the war in Iran.

In Fayetteville, he vowed a strong rebuilding of the U.S. military, which he suggested has been stretched too thin. Instead of investing in wars, he said, he would spend money to build up America's aging roads, bridges and airports.

Even so, Trump said he wants to boost spending on the military. To help pay for his buildup, Trump pledged to seek congressional approval for lifting caps on defense spending that were part of "sequestration" legislation that imposed cut spending across the board.

"We don't want to have a depleted military because we’re all over the place fighting in areas that we shouldn't be fighting in. It's not going to be depleted any longer," he said.

Trump said any nation that shares these goals will be considered a U.S. partner."We don't forget. We want to strengthen old friendships and seek out new friendships," he said. He said the policy of "intervention and chaos" must come to an end.

While U.S. armed forces are deployed in far-flung places around the globe, they are only involved currently in active combat in the Middle East, specifically Iraq and Syria for the most part."We will build up our military not as an act of aggression, but as an act of prevention," he said. "In short, we seek peace through strength.""

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-military-idUSKBN13W06L

John Hinderaker

At Powerline titles his piece The Middle East Couldn't Possibly Get Worse, Could It? A thing of such beauty I read it twice. Or the déjà vu thing happened again because the link quoted the best part. I won't do that. It's too beautiful. Instead I'll describe it.

It has a ruminant quality to it, I suspect bourbon, where a set of circumstances piles up and bugs somebody so much they mull it over until sorted into one continuous diatribe and delivered burnished.

My dad showed me this. One time he came home late lit and vocalized his ruminations. I asked him, "Dad, is this what you're doing, drinking all night thinking about all the things that make you miserable?" He looked up wearily and said, "I'm going to bed."

The rumination(s) remain in the light of day. The misery still there. Sets of them. Rumination for specific miseries, very well sorted and available for delivery at the drop of a cue. When viewed disinterestedly they're hilarious. They really are very well thought out comedy routines. My dad could have been a comedy writer, his cynicism with bourbon is completed and when delivered at once flawless as John Hinderaker is. Reading it you go, pow, Dude, you've keeping all that bottled up inside?

The tell that the burnished rumination at the end is a separate object of art by itself, considered separately and in a different state, the next concluding sentence, a separate paragraph by itself,  telescopes out of the bar to the clear light of day to give a jab to the ribs with parochial bathos that, frankly, brings down the whole piece. Better to have stayed drunk.

I'm always wrong. Someone's going to say he's teetotaler. And that's okay. This is how it seemed to me as  I read it and enjoyed it immensely for reminding me of Dad.