Sunday’s Forum
Steven L. Taylor
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Sunday, March 29, 2026
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31 comments
About Steven L. Taylor
Steven L. Taylor is a Professor Emeritus of Political Science and former College of Arts and Sciences Dean. His main areas of expertise include parties, elections, and the institutional design of democracies. His most recent book is the co-authored
A Different Democracy: American Government in a 31-Country Perspective. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas and his BA from the University of California, Irvine. He has been blogging since 2003 (originally at the now defunct Poliblog).
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While Trump and friends are working hard to destroy the international liberal order, as well as the rule of law at home (but hopefully not hard enough!), it is easy to miss what an over-the-top evil country Israel is becoming.
Right now, they’re pretty close to introducing mandatory death sentences (in practice for Palestinians only, of course) for terrorist offenses to be issued by military courts, with the sentences to be executed within 90 days and without the possibility of pardons or commutations.
Meanwhile, the Jerusalem Post is publishing op-eds openly calling for ethnic cleansing. It’s not radical, it’s just science:
All this, of course, in addition to starting an illegal war that is wrecking the global economy and preparing for what is likely a permanent occupation of southern Lebanon.
I was never much for questioning Israel’s right to exist, but if this is what they want to be, I’m not so sure anymore.
The Epstein Files are not in Iran.
“GCC and Ukraine now allies”
An Iranian drone and missile attack appears to have destroyed an AWACS on the ground in Saudi Arabia.
The aircraft cost about a billion dollars. Zelensky is saying that he is certain that the Russians are providing targeting information to the Iranians. The Russians took satellite photos of the base three times before the attack.
@drj:
What about the U.S. right to exist? Israel is not the only state controlled by a right wing war mongering minority.
Plus similarly motivated nutjobs such as Pete Hegseth.
@charontwo:
@Jay L. Gischer:
“Image“
@charontwo:
If it’s Trump and Trump-alikes ever after, at some point that becomes a valid question, too, of course.
I think the most fitting comparison is South Africa, though.
Should the rest of the world have respected the right of the Republic of South Africa to exist in its pre-1985 form? After all, don’t White Africans deserve a homeland, too?
If they could have done it without apartheid, I would have been at least somewhat sympathetic to that argument. But if apartheid remains their sine qua non, too bad for them, I guess.
Very apt comparison also given S Africa’s many attempts to conquer the territory of all their neighbors with the explicit money and war materiel support of the USA.
@Gavin:
Along with all the rocket and missile attacks S Africa’s neighboring states were subjecting them to.
Fatso’s N. Korean lover is more of an imminent threat than Iran.
https://apnews.com/article/north-korea-kim-missile-engine-test-us-bdc130f08bed4fd569bdd041ce2c67aa?utm_source=copy&utm_medium=share
Update:
“Nance”
@Daryl:
Depends who/what is considered the target of the threat.
@drj:
Israel is pretty clearly pushing for Iran to become a failed state, for civil war, for the country to be torn apart by warlords, perpetually impoverished. They want Iran to be another Syria. Yep, that is evil. Israel has shed the last vestiges of liberal European Zionism. Israel has gone Middle Eastern, they are no longer so out-of-place sandwiched between Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria.
Netanyahu is not a Saddam or an Assad, but he is now the moral equal of MBS.
@Jay L. Gischer:
The Air Force ignored their own best practices leaving planes exposed that way. Arrogance and incompetence.
@Michael Reynolds:
I’m not sure I would express it in geographical terms, but something has certainly changed.
Around fifteen years ago, I was on holiday in Bolivia, where I shared a canoe for a couple of days with a bunch of Israeli ex-conscripts who were celebrating the fact that they were civvies again.
They didn’t speak English very well (let alone Spanish) but they were accompanied by another Israeli who had settled (more or less, I think) in South America and who had made a career out of guiding his compatriots on their post-conscription holiday trips – something of a tradition considering that back then anyone remotely suitable got conscripted for no less than three years.
This guide told me stories about how quite a few of the former conscripts he accompanied tended to get black-out drunk while crying about the vicious shit they had been ordered to do on the occupied West Bank, mostly.
He also told me stories about other ex-conscripts who were proud of what they had done. And that the latter group seemed to get bigger over time.
I think about this quite a bit.
It also reminds me of Star Wars and the dark side of the Force (and the countless martial arts movies that espouse similar ideas). I don’t think it is a coincidence that George Lucas belonged to a generation whose fathers often had first-hand combat experience.
Even if you crush your enemies, there is still a price to be paid. For a certain kind of politicians that might be easy to forget, though.
Likelier still: they don’t even give a fuck.
@charontwo:
As a quasi rule of thumb, any dissertation on defense against the swarms of Shaheds that doesn’t mention the APKWS is probably a politically driven desired narrative, and not a serious look at deets.
It’s been the mainstay of Ukraine’s war against those cheap drones, and anybody who suggests the Ukrainians are routinely lobbing Patriots or THAADs at those things hasn’t been paying attention. I think it quite likely the Saudis and Gulfies have opted for the more expensive stuff in their defense spending though. Just a wild guess, but they tend to always ask for nothing but the best.
This error, if it happened, we can safely bet our houses is being corrected as fast as possible at the moment.
@dazedandconfused:
Didn’t I just already post this pic?
“JPEG”
Which does not change the likelihood a lot of flag draped boxes will start arriving very soon.
For some ungodly reason, I accidentally wandered to the r/SeattleWA subreddit the conservative Seattle subreddit (it was linked from r/DragonsFuckingCars, a much better subreddit that doesn’t involve conservatives, just dragons and cars and their relationships).
Anyway, they’re all whining about taxes and liberals and blaming everything on Seattle and Washington being uniparty blah blah blah, and it occurs to me that blue state Republicans are as fucking useless as the leftists who complain about Democrats being a right wing fascist party — they’ve just removed themselves from any and all power in favor of purity. They want to run a MAGA choad that can never win, and they don’t even have a closed primary to blame for this.
A Third Way Shithead promising social liberalism and fiscal conservatism and “common sense” solutions to complicated problems would actually stand a decent chance of getting elected.
I don’t particularly want a Third Way Shithead to get elected, but it could happen. And it would give the MAGA choads a fair bit of what they say they want — lower gas taxes, worse education and rising syphillis rates. But rather than going for what is possible, and building from there, they want all of it, right now, and they won’t get any of it. It turns out that high gas taxes are more popular than MAGA.
But it surprises me that we don’t have well-funded Bloomberg style people running in the blue areas, not on a Republican ticket (less popular than gas taxes), but as their own party. And maybe even if deep red areas, although I suspect the Bloomberg types are generally fine with Republican control.
(A Manchin-esque party in Alabama really might be competitive, given their desire to elect stupid people. Sure, it would be hard to compete with someone whose first name is “Coach”, but Manchin once held up legislation to try to get work requirements on the Earned Income Tax Credit. Could call it the Very Stupid People’s Party.)
Also, there’s a subreddit about dragons fucking cars. It’s exactly what you think it is, and it is hysterical for about 3-5 minutes.
@drj:
To pat myself on the back just a bit, this is a point we made many, many times in Animorphs and that I made as well in Gone and Front Lines. It is a terrible thing to orphan a child, no matter how righteous your cause may be. Necessary evil is still evil.
I wonder if there is some individual in the US military who knows he is responsible for the error that resulted in bombing that girl’s school in Iran. How the fuck do you carry that for the rest of your life?
@drj:
If Israel resorts to “ethnic cleansing” in Gaza, it will lead to European economic sanctions.
About a third of all Israels exports and mports are with the EU.
Their loss would be economically crippling for Israel.
In addition, Israel could kiss goodbye to any hope of reconciliation with any Arab or Muslim state.
Israel would become a pariah state, dependant on alliance with the US alone.
And likely a Republican US alone.
(And given the rise of the “groypers” in MAGA, relying on the Evangelical Zionists to secure even the Republicans looks a reckless bet)
This is probably better regarded as scream of incoherent rage against intractable problems, than a serious policy proposal
@charontwo:
As someone once said: “I’ve got a bad feeling about this.”
@dazedandconfused:
Also, given the stories told to me by various ex-RAF guys who spent time either as Saudi military support contractors, or BAE reps, another factor is that big-ticket weapons systems leave plenty of room for skimming.
@Michael Reynolds:
I think I’ve mentioned before, I once met a WW2 vintage RAF Bomber Command operations staff planner.
One of his jobs was assisting in the programme for bombing transport targets prior to D-Day.
It was known, at all levels, that this would involve killing large numbers of not just civilains but nominally allied French civilians. He said this was something they were well aware of, and attempted to minimise
Nonetheless, about 50,000 French civilians were killed.
The transport damage was probably vital to the success of the Normandy campaign.
How do you balance out such things?
I never asked him.
I did not think I had the right to ask.
@JohnSF:
The Trump family and their pals are making really really big bank from this “operation.”
Discussed in detail here:
“Schmidt”
There is a transcript button so you can read instead of listen.
ETA: Including, BTW, heavy investments in drone manufacturing.
@charontwo: Certainly the Gulfies will be sending money in exchange for expertise, and Ukraine can use all the money it can get.
@Gavin:
Made ya look!
A dark thought here. As it is being reported Trump is ramping up troop deployment, but not on a scale at this point to make any kind of difference to Iran’s existential imperative given it’s likely residual armament — and if this war becomes a rapidly deteriorating locus for the global economy, energy needs, fertilizer, food security, and Trump’s own political NECK — what real “failsafe” exists anymore against preventing this madman from nuking Iran in an attempt to bring his whole self-made mess to a halt? The moron once spoke of nuking a hurricane for crying out loud. And he has surrounded himself this time with supplicants and morons. The militant religious right seems like they’d be amenable.
Trump’s has a history creating big messes and leaving bag holders. He did so throughout his business life. He continued the practice as the 45th President. We are in the midst of perhaps Trump’s most colossal, bigglyest self-made mess ever. It wouldn’t be surprising to learn that the discussion of “possible use” hasn’t already arisen in the Oval Office. This current debacle could blanket the world with “bag holders.”
The shitstorm inside the shitstorm
The Iran War Could Collapse the United States in the Next Six Months
—-
War with Iran disrupts fertilizer exports as U.S. farmers prepare for planting season
America was playing with a faulty loaded gun by re-electing Trump. It was bound to go off at anytime.
@charontwo:
Here is some more regarding drone manufacturing and the Trump family:
“Denver Riggleman“
@charontwo:
And more:
“Denver Riggleman”
etc., etc.
Gee, maybe Trump might have taken us to war even without Bibi’s nagging.
Said this was where he would come down, four weeks ago..
I had in my head that it was uranium enriched to 60%, which you wouldn’t want to sleep on, but won’t just up and kill you. But it’s uranium hexafluoride. Look it up. It might as well be nerve gas. I would imagine given the June bombing that a lot of this stuff may be partially or completely buried. Picture the operation involved in digging up canisters of very deadly shit and carefully loading it on helicopters while the hills are full of drone operators. Someone here mentioned Dien Bien Phu the other day. I mean, if they can pull it off, drinks all around. But if I were 82d Airborne I think I’d be concerned.