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Are you tired of winning yet?

The White House had threatened mass layoffs of federal government employees if Senate Democrats didn’t end their filibuster of the continuing resolution to fund the government, and many of us were wondering when, or if, it was going to happen. From The Wall Street Journal:

White House Starts Mass Layoffs of Government Workers

Many department receive notices, and an official says cuts will affect ‘thousands of federal workers’

By Natalie Andrews and Ken Thomas | Friday, October 10, 2025 | 2:24 PM EDT

WASHINGTON—The White House said Friday that it is conducting mass layoffs of federal employees in response to the government shutdown, an unprecedented step that follows through on weeks of threats meant to increase pressure on Democrats.

“The RIFs have begun,” White House Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought posted on X, using an abbreviation for reductions in force. An OMB official characterized the retrenchment as “substantial,” and a White House official said it would affect “thousands of federal workers.”

Vought briefed President Trump on the layoffs by phone Friday morning, according to a White House aide.

Department of Health and Human Services employees across several divisions received reduction-in-force notices on Friday, said Andrew Nixon, a spokesman for HHS. Some of the people who lost their jobs were deemed “at odds with the Trump administration’s Make America Healthy Again agenda,” he said.

An Education Department spokeswoman said some agency employees would be among those receiving the layoff notices Friday, and a government official said there were layoffs at the Commerce Department.

Other Departments, including Commerce, Fatherland Homeland Security, and the Environmental Protection Agency, saw layoff notices.

Democrats were obviously aghast:

Reductions in force “are not a new power these bozos get in a shutdown,” said Sen. Patty Murray (D., Wash.), the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, on social media. “We can’t be intimidated by these crooks.”

Having lived and worked in once-reliably Republican Virginia, I have been appalled that Virginia is now a “blue” state where presidential elections are concerned, and that’s entirely due to the huge number of federal government workers living in the Washington outskirts of the Old Dominion. Reducing the federal workforce eventually leads to better government, as it strengthens Republicans and weakens Democrats.

Republican leaders have been lukewarm on firing federal workers. The Wall Street Journal previously reported that Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R., S.D.) and other senior GOP lawmakers had quietly advised the White House not to move forward with mass layoffs and sharp cuts to government assistance programs, citing people familiar with the matter.

But leaders have also expressed exasperation with the lack of progress as the shutdown heads into its second weekend.

Republican ‘leaders’ may have been lukewarm on firing federal workers, but do you know who aren’t lukewarm about it? Republican voters are not lukewarm about reducing the overpaid federal workforce, Republican voters want to see fewer people being supported by their tax dollars and more people working in real jobs in the private sector. We want tax payers, not tax consumers!

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My response to the Trump Peace Plan

I, for one, will wait and see if this deal is fully implemented. That the hostage release is the first step should mean, if there’s any rationality left in Hamas, that they intend to follow through with the rest, because the hostages are Hamas’ only point of leverage.

But whether this deal is completed or not, I don’t foresee any lasting peace. Looking at the timeline, we see Arab attacks against the Jews in 1948, 1956, 1967, and 1973, just the cycle for the 10- and 12- and 14-year-old boys, too young for the previous war, to get old enough to try to do what their candy-assed fathers couldn’t. Raised on resentment and hate, but not having gotten beaten themselves, they grew up thinking they could be the generation which succeeds.

This time has been different, however, as Israel unleashed so much Hell on Gaza that perhaps the growing generation of boys will be so terrorized that they won’t try it, but eventually children will grow up without memories of what happened to Gaza, and they’ll rise up and try again.

And let’s not kid ourselves: Israel won this war due to Benjamin Netanyahu, who was strong-willed and smart enough not to give the Arabs a cease-fire until they were thoroughly, thoroughly beaten. The wars in 1967 and 1973 were ended too soon, leaving too much of the Arab armies intact and alive and able to rearm. Fortunately, the Arab nations still learned the lesson, and the Arab nations never again attacked Israel, but the various terrorist groups kept at it. Hamas had hoped, perhaps even believed, that if they started the way, Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, and Saudi Arabia would mobilize and join them. The Arab national leaders were at least smart enough to say thanks but no thanks, in no small part because none of the other Arab leaders like or trust the Palestinians.

The only ones who joined the fight were Hezbollah, Iran, and the Houthis in Yemen. Iran is a thousand miles away from Israel, and the Houthis several hundred miles away, so they knew they wouldn’t get invaded by IDF troops, but they f(ornicated) around and found out anyway. Hezbollah sort-of tried to intervene, albeit a bit half-heartedly, but found out themselves as well, as their eyes and fingers and balls left their bodies.

You don’t get into martyr heaven without your balls! No 72 bacha bazi boys for them!

And Donald Trump deserves a lot of credit as well. Had Kamala Emhoff been President [shudder!] she’d have been pressing Mr Netanyahu to ease off all along, but President Trump recognizes enemies of Western civilization in ways our past DEI Vice President never did, and while he wanted this deal, and potential past deals, he also let Israel know that the US would support them if they went all out to destroy Hamas.

Still, with the Arabs allowed to stay in Gaza, there is eventually little way I can see this working out in the long run. Had Israel done what they should have done in 1967, and expelled every last Arab from Judea, Samaria, and Gaza, giving the country shortened, more defensible borders, and not having a Arabs under the thumb of occupation, we would not have seen this mess today.

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You in a heap o’ trouble, girl!

Precious Hamilton is only fifteen years old, but she just might spend the next couple of decades in prison. Her initial claims are that it was all an accident, but someone is still stone-cold graveyard dead.

15-year-old girl charged with third-degree murder in fatal shooting of Abington teen

Abington Township police arrested Precious Hamilton in a shooting that killed 17-year-old Baseem “Seyven” Baker

by Jesse Bunch | Tuesday, October 7, 2025 | 5:18 PM EDT

Precious Hamilton, mugshot via Fox 29 News.

Montgomery County prosecutors charged a 15-year-old girl with third-degree murder Tuesday in the shooting death of an Abington teenager in his family’s apartment on Monday afternoon.

Precious Hamilton, of Eddystone, was arrested that evening by Abington Township police in connection with a shooting that left 17-year-old Baseem “Seyven” Baker dead from a gunshot wound to the head, prosecutors said.

No, of course young Miss Hamilton’s mugshot was not published by The Philadelphia Inquirer, but a quick Google search found it for me, from more than one source.

Police arrived at Baker’s apartment on the 100 block of Old York Road to find the teen dead in his bedroom, authorities said.

Police said Hamilton had been staying at the apartment over the weekend and had shown Baker the gun, a small-caliber revolver, on Sunday when “dry firing” the weapon out of Baker’s window, according to videos and a photo recovered from Baker’s iPad.

Though the article does not state it explicitly, reporter Jesse Bunch’s article makes it appear that the gun was Miss Hamilton’s. The charges filed, including possession of a firearm by a minor and carrying a firearm without a license, support that reading. What, I have to ask, was a 15-year-old girl doing carrying a firearm?

Further down:

During an interview with Hamilton and her mother, police said, Hamilton told investigators she shot Baker accidentally after the gun was left in the cocked position from Sunday.

She told investigators she grabbed the revolver while going to pack her belongings, and that while grabbing the weapon in a “rapid fashion,” the gun discharged and struck Baker, who was on the bed and fell to the floor, according to the affidavit of probable cause for Hamilton’s arrest.

Hamilton told investigators she and Baker had previously dated, then maintained a friendship for about a year, according to the affidavit.

I’m surprised that Mr Bunch included that last paragraph. What he did not include in his article, though it ought to be obvious from the fact that the alleged killer’s name was released, is that Miss Hamilton has been charged as an adult.

Young Miss Hamilton has been charged with third-degree Murder, Title 18 §2502(c), which, under Title 18 §1102(d) carries a maximum sentence of 40 years in prison. She has also been charged with Involuntary Manslaughter, which, under Title 18 §2504(b) is a first degree misdemeanor, which under Title 30 §923(a)(7) carries a penalty of a fine of between $1,500 and $10,000, and the possibility of imprisonment for not more than five years.

Mr Bunch should have included that in his story, because there’s a huge difference between third degree murder and involuntary manslaughter. My guess is that young Miss Hamilton will be offered an involuntary manslaughter plea bargain, if there is no evidence that she was carrying a firearm because she was part of a gang. Since this was in Montgomery County, and not Philadelphia, District Attorney Larry Krasner can’t simply dismiss the charges. We are no longer surprised when we read about 15-year-old boys carrying firearms; perhaps we shouldn’t be as surprised as we are that some 15-year-old girls are now packing heat.

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That thing that never happens has happened again You in a heap o' trouble, boy!

This is the second time in a row I have used this headline, but according to my WordPress software, the seventh time I’ve used it; there could have been more. I will admit to some surprise, because my source, The Philadelphia Inquirer, told us more than they might have. Then again, the reporter is Vinny Vella, whom I have previously noted might have gotten in trouble with his editors for telling too much of the truth.

A local Montco supervisor has been charged with sexually abusing a boy for years

The abuse allegations come weeks after Nicholas Fountain had been charged with soliciting child pornography in Maryland.

by Vinny Vella | Monday, October 6, 2025 | 9:41 AM EDT

Nicholas Fountain, photo via Channel 10 Philadelphia.

A Skippack Township supervisor, already facing charges of soliciting child pornography, has been charged with sexually abusing a boy who was in his care for several years, investigators said Monday.

Here’s the part that several newspapers, and sadly, law enforcement agencies, hide: the sex of the victim. I have previously admitted that when I see a story written to conceal the sex of the victim, my first instinct is to guess that the sexual abuse was homosexual in nature. Mr Vella did not hide it, and it was even part of the headline.

Nicholas Fountain, 38, was arraigned late Sunday on charges of involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, indecent assault, and related crimes, after investigators say he admitted to the crimes in an interview with Pennsylvania State Police detectives.

He remained in custody, denied bail. It was unclear if he had hired an attorney.

Fountain had been in custody since Sept. 24, when state police troopers arrested him on a warrant issued by the Hartford County Sheriff’s Office in northeast Maryland. He was charged with soliciting nude pictures from an undercover officer posing as a 14-year-old boy.

Naturally, the Inquirer didn’t include the photo of the accused, either in this story or the previous one cited in their article. I suppose it doesn’t matter, because all of the local Philly television news stations had his picture plastered all over their reports. Even Victor Fiorillo of Philadelphia Magazine, who has complained about Steve Keeley and Fox 29 News crime coverage, included Mr Fountain’s photo. Instead, the newspaper used a photo of the Skippack Township office building.

With the charges of seeking child pornography, and since he runs two daycare centers in Pennsylvania, state police detectives decided to see if there was more potential criminal activity by Mr Fountain, and began interviewing:

people close to him about any potential criminal activity, according to the affidavit of probable cause for his arrest in Montgomery County.

In one of those interviews, the victim, now 18, told police Fountain sexually abused him, beginning when he was 9 years old and continuing until he was 16, the affidavit said.

There’s actually a lot to unpack in those two short sentences. While the story does not say so, the first question which came to my mind was: did any of the adults interviewed know of any suspicious activity by Mr Fountain? How did the detectives come to interview an 18-year-old boy? WPVI-TV’s report noted that Mr Fountain is married — yes, to a woman — and has two younger children along with a stepchild.

How, I have to ask, did Mr Fountain, if he is guilty of the charges against him, and he is innocent until proven guilty, manage to conceal all of this for so long? If the victim’s story is accurate, he started this at least nine years ago, when he would have been 31, and somehow left no clues? His wife never picked up on it? None of his friends noticed anything strange about him? A boy who was nine at first, continuing sporadically for seven more years, managed to keep it a secret from his parents and siblings — if he has any — and his friends? Make it make sense, because I certainly can’t understand it.

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That thing that never happens has happened again

Hiring a 48-year-old, 5’7″, 210 lb ‘transgender woman’ to drive a school bus full of young kids? What could possibly go wrong?

Male bus driver who goes by ‘Ms Sharon’ charged with sexually abusing multiple boys

By Alex Oliveira | Sunday, October 5, 2025 | 2:27 PM EDT

A North Carolina school bus driver who calls himself “Ms. Sharon” has been charged with sexually assaulting several boys whom he lured to his house, cops say.

Leetwain Darrell Tate — a 48-year-old a male also known as just “Sharon” — was arrested Tuesday and charged with two counts of statutory rape and six counts of indecent liberties with a minor, according to Charlotte-Mecklenberg police.

He is accused of assaulting at least four boys age 14 and 15 years old, but officials said there could be more victims.

The children were found to be staying at his house, and one of them claimed Tate offered him money in return for sex, an arrest affidavit obtained by WCNC read.

The New York Post noted that the police said none of the ‘incidents’ occurred while Mr Tate was working for the school or on school property.

The WCCB news story doesn’t give us any more information than did the Post. Oddly enough, I was unable to find anything on this story in The New York Times, where they tell readers about All the News That’s Fit to Print.

The Charlotte Observer did report on the story, but of course the newspaper used the feminine pronouns to refer to Mr Tate. The Observer reported this:

In a letter to families about the allegations, Sugar Creek Charter School Superintendent Celeste Sundo said Tate met all of the necessary background requirements to get hired.

“All Sugar Creek Charter School candidates undergo a multi-step hiring process, including a national background check and reference checks, before an offer of employment is made,” Sundo said.

Yeah, that’s what the Des Moines board of education said about Ian Roberts, too, and look how that turned out! Apparently being a 5’7″ ‘transgender woman’ meets the ‘necessary background requirements’ for Mecklenburg County public schools! Normally when you hire crazy, you shouldn’t be surprised when you get crazy.

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Enforcing our immigration laws works!

We reported, on June 19th, that the decrease in the estimated illegal immigrant population was far greater than the number who had been deported, meaning that the greater part of the decrease was among those who ‘self-deported,’ those who realized that the welcome mat had been pulled, and chose to return to their homelands by themselves rather than being picked up and shoved out the door. Now, the number is even greater!

New Milestone: Over 2 Million Illegal Aliens Out of the United States in Less Than 250 Days

President Trump and Secretary Noem’s Robust Immigration Law Enforcement Yields Real Results for Americans

Release Date: September 23, 2025

WASHINGTON – On Tuesday, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced that 2 million illegal aliens have been removed or have self-deported since January 20.

The Trump administration is on pace to shatter historic records and deport nearly 600,000 illegal aliens by the end of President Donald Trump’s first year since returning to office. Two million illegal aliens have left the United States in less than 250 days, including an estimated 1.6 million who have voluntarily self-deported and more than 400,000 deportations.

Just the threat of being picked up and deported has caused somewhere around 1.6 million illegals to head back home; the threat of our immigration laws actually being enforced has worked. This is for what 77,302,580 Americans voted!

“The numbers don’t lie: 2 million illegal aliens have been removed or self-deported in just 250 days— proving that President Trump’s policies and Secretary Noem’s leadership are working and making American communities safe,” said Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin. “Ramped-up immigration enforcement targeting the worst of the worst is removing more and more criminal illegal aliens off our streets every day and is sending a clear message to anyone else in this country illegally: Self-deport or we will arrest and deport you.”

Let’s tell the truth here: if by the “worst of the worst” the Department means the illegals with other criminal arrests and convictions, that’s not quite right: a lot of illegals who don’t have criminal records have been picked up and shipped out as well. But the story of Des Moines, Iowa, school superintendent Ian Roberts provides us with a window into how even the (supposedly) nicest of the illegals have had to circumvent our laws and fabricate their backgrounds to make it economically in the US. They loved him in Des Moines, and thought that he was doing a good job — at $300,000 a year that could have gone to an actual American citizen — but he was a bad guy:

  • 1996 charges in New York of forgery and drug possession with intent to deliver.
  • A 1998 charge of unauthorized use of a vehicle in New York City, which was later dismissed.
  • A 2012 conviction for reckless driving, unsafe operation and speeding in Maryland.
  • 2020 charges in New York of criminal possession of a loaded weapon outside a home or business. The list notes one of those charges, for second-degree criminal possession, was “inchoate,” a legal term meaning the crime has been committed when the individual takes a “substantial step” even if the person ultimately fails to complete the crime.
  • A previously reported 2022 Pennsylvania conviction for unlawful possession of a loaded firearm.

The Des Moines Register also noted that some of the criminal records against him had been sealed.

He also falsified his academic credentials in applying for the Des Moines job. Living and working illegally in the United States is something which has to be built on a web of lies. I wonder how many of those who have ‘self-deported’ realized the network of lies that had been forced to use would quickly fall apart if anyone looked.

The apparently entitled Mr Roberts thought that our laws simply didn’t apply to him, as he ignored a June 2024 deportation order. How many other illegals have similar records of law-breaking and evasion? We don’t know, but the probabilities that Mr Roberts is the only one of the illegals who have done things like this are vanishingly small.

The New York Times, which is editorially hostile to President Trump, reported:

The Superintendent’s Bio Seemed Too Good to Be True. It Was.

Ian Roberts rose through the ranks of American education with talent, charm and a riveting back story. He was also hiding a shocking secret.

By Mitch Smith, Ernesto Londoño, and Dana Goldstein | Sunday, October 5, 2025

School district leaders in Des Moines drew up a detailed wish list when they set out to hire a new superintendent in 2023. They wanted someone who could increase reading scores, improve the math skills of Black boys, adhere to an affirmative action plan and much more.

Most of all, Des Moines Public Schools needed a galvanizing leader who could meet a moment shaped by the aftermath of Covid and the racial justice movement of 2020.

Translation: the Des Moines school board wanted someone who is black for the job. Des Moines city is only 11.7% black, more than twice the state’s 5.2% black population. Judging solely by his résumé, Mr Roberts certainly filled the desired qualifications, or at least would have had his résumé not been partially falsified.

Ian Roberts’s application seemed almost too perfect.

Dr. Roberts had spent most of his career in urban school systems, building a reputation as a charismatic, hands-on administrator. He wrote books, gave speeches and boasted of degrees from brand-name universities. His life story was also compelling: an immigrant from Guyana who competed in the Olympics and spoke bluntly about his experiences as a Black man in the United States.

“I believe deeply in the promise of public education being the most important opportunity gap closer for youth, particularly with a focus on diverse populations,” Dr. Roberts, who is in his 50s, wrote in his cover letter for the Des Moines job.

“Dr Roberts”? The Times noted that Mr Roberts initially claimed a doctorate in education from Morgan State University, but though the school says he attended there, there is no record of him actually earning his doctorate. He now claims a doctorate in education from Trident University International, a non-resident school which Wikipedia is circumspect enough to not call a diploma mill, but the school’s Wikipedia description certainly sounds like just that. The First Street Journal, in line with very few other publications, does use honorifics, but we decline to refer to Mr Roberts as Dr Roberts; we will not honor such a sketchy school.

Back to the Department of Homeland Security:

DHS has made it clear: the era of open borders is over. For four straight months, United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has released zero illegal aliens into the country.

The rest of the world is hearing our message. DHS immigration enforcement is also demonstrably deterring illegal aliens from trying to come here in the first place.[1]Though my wife and I are both native-born American citizens, with American passports, I can testify that the re-entry screenings of ourselves and our luggage were far stricter when we arrived from … Continue reading

A recent study from the United Nations reported that President Trump’s immigration policies led to a 97% reduction in illegal aliens heading northbound to the U.S. from Central America. That same study found that 49% of would-be illegal aliens who decided to stop their journey towards the U.S. did so because they thought it would be impossible to enter the U.S. under President Trump. Likewise, 46% said fears of detention or deportation led to abandoning their attempt to illegally enter the U.S.

There’s a little more at the link.

It’s simple: no one is going to make the costly and difficult trek from Guatemala and Honduras and Mexico if they believe that they won’t be able to cross into the United States. When President Biden reversed President Trump’s first term policies, policies which had greatly reduced, though not completely eliminated, the flow of illegals across our southern border, he effectively opened the floodgates, and perhaps ten million or more people entered illegally under Mr Biden’s policies; only the Lord knows the actual number.

Illegal immigration was Donald Trump’s primary issue in 2016, and again in 2024. If President Biden had retained just his predecessor’s immigration policies, it’s fair to ask the Democrats whether Mr Trump would be President today.

We can and should discuss reasonable immigration reform . . . after we have deported all of those currently here illegally. But right now, no matter how good and kind and noble they seem — Mr Roberts certainly filled that bill! — they are constant liars and criminals, because that is what is required for an illegal immigrant to live in the United States.

References

References
↑1 Though my wife and I are both native-born American citizens, with American passports, I can testify that the re-entry screenings of ourselves and our luggage were far stricter when we arrived from London a couple of weeks ago than they were to board the plane in the UK, or to board the plane to leave the US a couple of weeks earlier than that.
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Hamas have not yet accepted the Trump Peace Plan they supposedly had “no choice” but to accept.

Hamas keep dithering, unsurprisingly, on the Trump Peace Plan, and Gazan ‘civilians’ keep being sent to Jahannam because of it. But perhaps, just perhaps, the people of Gaza are finally getting fed up with their terrorist masters. From The New York Times:

‘Enough Is Enough’: Many Palestinians Say Hamas Must Accept Cease-Fire Plan

Interviews in Gaza suggest wide support for a proposal that calls for an immediate end to a war that has brought immense civilian suffering.

by Liam Stack | Thursday, October 2, 2025 | 5:04 AM EDT

Tel Aviv — Palestinians in Gaza have spent almost two years longing for an end to the war that has destroyed their communities and killed tens of thousands of their neighbors. Many say their best hope yet is the latest cease-fire plan proposed by the United States — if only Hamas would accept it.

“Hamas must say yes to this offer — we have been through hell already,” said Mahmoud Bolbol, 43, a construction worker who has remained in Gaza City with his six children in the battered shell of their home throughout the war.

President Trump unveiled the proposal while meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel at the White House on Monday. Mr. Trump said that if Hamas did not accept its terms, then he would give Israel the green light to “finish the job” of destroying the armed group.

Hamas has not yet given its response to the proposal, but interviews with Palestinians in Gaza on Wednesday suggested widespread public support for the plan. It calls for an immediate end to a war that has brought immense civilian suffering.

Hamas, of course, don’t care about “immense civilian suffering,” but the well-being of their own leadership, a leadership which lead not from Gaza, but Doha, Qatar. We reported, on Monday, how the Qatari government (reportedly) told the Trump Administration that they could convince Hamas to disarm and accept the plan, and French President Emmanuel Macron stated on Twitter — I refuse to call it 𝕏, the worst rebranding in history — that Hamas have “no choice but to immediately release all hostages and follow this path.”

Yet, it seems that Hamas believe they have a choice, and, at least at publication time, have not accepted the plan. It took two atomic bombs, and that after half a year of relentless explosive and firebombing, to get Emperor Hirohito to force the militarist government to surrender. There’s no particular reason to think Hamas are any less pigheaded.

For the past two days, Mr. Bolbol said, his neighbors have talked about almost nothing but the cease-fire proposal. If Hamas rejects it, he said, his family would finally leave Gaza City and head for what he hoped would be the relative safety of the enclave’s south.

“Hamas needs to understand: Enough is enough,” Mr. Bolbol said. Most Gazans are not members of the group, he added, “so why drag us into this?”

We do not know how Mr Bolbol reacted personally to the October 7th attack, but we do know that most of the denizens of Gaza erupted in a cheering frenzy as hostages, both living and dead, were paraded back in Gaza, tied up, thrown in the back of the ubiquitous white Toyota trucks, celebrating an attack that anyone with an IQ above room temperature — room temperature in Celsius! — should have known would lead to a strong lethal and destructive response from Israel.

Some, including some from Hamas, have said that they didn’t think that Israel would have destroyed Gaza to the extent that they have. In the mindset of the ‘Palestinians,’ I suppose that they accepted that there’d be some martyrdom, but perhaps not this much martyrdom.

But the proposal contains several elements that Hamas has said are unacceptable.

Those include a ban on the group exercising future power in Gaza, a requirement that it disarm and the establishment of a transitional government overseen by foreign officials, including Mr. Trump and Tony Blair, the former British prime minister.

The proposal unveiled on Monday sent a rare flash of hope through Gaza, people said in interviews. But others are less hopeful.

Some people said the terms of the proposal made them doubt that Hamas would agree. Others said their doubts grew from something more basic and bitter: They simply did not believe that Hamas would put the interests of the Palestinian people above the interests of the organization.

Also see: William Teach, “Surprise: Hamas Likely To Reject Peace Plan“

Well, who can know? Perhaps Hamas leaders and fighters really believe that their interests and those of the ‘Palestinian’ people in general are the same, but attempting to read the minds of people who are in no way part of Western civilization by those of us who are civilized is often an exercise in futility. In the “mirror universe” episode of Star Trek, Mr Spock told Captain Kirk, once they were returned to their regular dimensions, that it was easier for them, as civilized men, to play the part of barbarians than it was for their opposites, as barbarians, to play the roles of civilized men.

So, we have the specter of civilized Westerners trying to bring aid and comfort to the people of Gaza, something the Israeli Navy has now stopped, all to aid people who have nothing in common with Western civilization, and who would happily assault or even kill many of the “Global Sumud Flotilla” if they actually lived in Gaza, or anyplace else in the world where Islamic fundamentalism has taken hold.

Perhaps Hamas will, in the end, accept or negotiate an amendment to the Trump plan, but one thing is certain: if Hamas do accept disarmament, it will only be until they can covertly — and perhaps not so covertly — rearm.

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We are wealthy!

Holy Monastery Roussanou from a neighboring peak. Photo by D R Pico, and may be freely used with appropriate acknowledgement. Click to enlarge.

My darling bride — of 46 years, 4 months, and 12 days — and I recently returned from our two week vacation in Greece, and we saw many amazing and beautiful places. The photo to the right is from the Holy Monastery Roussanou, one of five, including the one made famous in the James Bond movie For Your Eyes Only, around Meteora, Greece.

Other than Athens, the most famous city in Greece and the home to the ancient Grecian works, but which was a filthy city defiled with ubiquitous graffiti, we loved Greece. There is a seaside home in Kefalonia, and it is actually on the (rocky) beach, that I considered buying, for only 315,000€, though Mrs Pico would have vetoed it. Litochoro, on the other hand, had my wife asking about real estate prices; Litochoro is a short car ride from both Mt Olympus and Aegean Sea beaches. Being a poor country, prices in Greece are surprisingly low. Two nice dinners in Greece cost less than one in the United States.

However, despite this article title, we are not rich. Buying a 315,000€ home would have required selling the small farm we currently have; it’s not like we have six figures to the left of the decimal point in the bank. We’re both retired — though my wife, a registered nurse, picks up an occasional shift at the hospital, primarily to fatten the vacation fund — but we own our home without a mortgage, have a relatively small retirement annuity, and our Social Security. We aren’t really worried about money, but, on the other hand, we don’t spend much anyway.

We were sitting in a couple of cheap chaise lounge chairs on Monday afternoon, on one of our lawns. Yes, we have more than one! It was sunny and in the low 80s, with a slight breeze, but we’d arranged the chairs in the shade of a pin oak tree. The only road, which is not very busy, was a couple hundred yards away. There’s only one neighbor’s house visible from our property, and it was just barely visible. There were three dogs lazing around in the yard. We have food in the refrigerator and the pantry, we have heat and air conditioning when we need them, running water, electricity, the internet, all of the utilities of modern life. We have our (small) family nearby, and enough friends that we don’t need more.

In rural Kentucky, we don’t have fancy restaurants, we don’t have Starbucks, and we don’t have the glittering lights of the big cities. Then again, we can actually see the stars at night, and hear crickets rather than cars. We sometimes hear Jeremiah croaking in the evening.

So, how are we not wealthy? Two working-class Americans, fortunately in decent if not perfect health, who suffered a few reverses during life but still did things the right way, now retired and living the life that we want to live. The places in Tuscany, in France, in Greece, and in Scotland that we’ve seen and liked and said, “We could live here,” were all nice, but is there really anyplace better than the United States of America?
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The poor economics of Starbucks

While I would expend the effort to drive for a Wawa coffee, it’s pretty foolish to spend $4.50 or more for a Starbucks coffee that I can make at home for 50¢!

Sadly, the days of the wife sending her husband off to work in the morning with a lunchbox in his hand and breakfast already in his stomach are gone. Many, many businesses have grown up around that societal and economic change, with all sorts of chain and local stores selling coffee and a bagel — sesame bagel, dark toasted, with butter for me, thank you very much! — but I have to ask: has the market become oversaturated with some of these businesses?

Starbucks kind of broke the mold, with its waitresses now becoming ‘baristas,’ and its fancy shops and eight million different flavors and brews. The average prices that can be found on the internet vary wildly, but $4.50 seems to be about a midpoint.

Now, the company is having problems:

Why Starbucks is closing these six Philly locations

Starbucks has seen sales decline over six consecutive quarters.

by Erica Palan | Monday, September 29, 2025 | 12:44 PM EDT

Starbucks, the Seattle-based coffee powerhouse, announced last week that it would immediately shut down hundreds of underperforming stores and eliminate 900 corporate positions.

The cuts come as Starbucks has seen sales decline at stores open for at least a year for six consecutive quarters. The company’s shares have fallen about 12% in the past year.

The chain is grappling with rising labor costs, in addition to rising coffee prices.

We have twice previously reported on Starbucks and other coffeehouse workers efforts at unionization, and how OCF coffeehouse owner Ori Feibush simply closed his three Philadelphia coffee shops when the workers decided to unionize. The coffee shops were not profitable anyway, and were only a small part of the owner’s businesses, so he could afford to do it.

Checking Amazon, the Keurig which looks closest to ours, as pictured above, lists for $109. If a person is spending $4.50 every working morning, for coffee that costs me roughly 50¢ at home, he will have paid for that Keurig, and the coffee pods it uses, over the course of 27 workdays. That ignores having to physically stop at the local Starbucks, and whatever fuel he spent if it was out of the way on his way to work.

We also have a toaster, so I could toast a bagel at the same time! 🙂

Starbucks workers have been whining that the closures are the result of management fighting unionization:

Employees impacted by the store closures were notified Friday.

On Sunday, about 35 Starbucks union members gathered in front of the location at 16th and Walnut Streets in protest. They say they’re prepared to strike if the company doesn’t return to the bargaining table to negotiate higher wages, staffing levels, and healthcare benefits.

Over the last few years, Starbucks baristas in Philadelphia and beyond have taken efforts to improve worker protections. Some have been successful in establishing unions, while others have not. According to Starbucks Workers United, there are more than 12,000 unionized Starbucks baristas at more than 650 stores.

So, out of 18,734 Starbucks stores, only about 3.47% have been unionized. Management doubtlessly considers that a serious problem, but does it account for sales dropping for six consecutive quarters? Probably not, but it does point out the rather obvious problem of workers trying to unionize a shrinking company. It’s less expensive to shutter an economically underperforming store.

Three of the closed stores in Philadelphia — 1801 Spruce St., 1709 Chestnut St., and 1500 Market St. — are not unionized. Three others — 1900 Market St., 1128 Walnut St., and 490 N. Broad St — are unionized.

This is a matter of economic competition. If people are spending $4.50 every workday morning just for a cup of coffee they could Keurig themselves, that’s $1,080 in a 240-workday year. After four years of Bidenflation, there just might be a few families that decide that Starbucks every morning just isn’t that good an idea.