03/02/26

Good morning! It’s Monday, March 2nd

International Rescue Cat Day

You know what I thought about when I read this? It’s weird that people buy cats. Like – it’s weird that people shop and don’t adopt in general but it’s particularly weird when you think about it with cats because there are just so many of those little weirdos all over the place. It’s so great!

And now, the news.

Austin Shooting

-via Texas Tribune and Washington Post

We start how we start in America… with at least two people dead and 14 injured in downtown Austin Texas, after a shooter, who is also dead after being shot by people, circled the block multiple times before he rolled down his window and began shooting out of his car with a pistol at people standing outside of a popular beer garden called Buford’s. After that, he parked and got out of his car with a rifle. He opened fired again before officers arrived on the scene. He was shot and killed by officers.

The motive for the shooting is still being investigated but the man was wearing a sweatshirt that said “property of Allah” on the front and a t-shirt that had an Iranian flag on it. Alex Doran, acting special agent in charge of FBI San Antonio, said that there were indicators of a “potential nexus to terrorism” and added that the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force has joined with other specialty teams for this investigation.

The suspect was from Senegal, but he was a naturalized citizen who had been in this country for twenty years.

At this time, it is not believed that he was working in coordination with any groups connected to the Iranian regime. It’s not even confirmed that he was working with anyone at all.

In fact, and let’s be crystal clear here… it’s not even clear that this was connected to the other big story of the weekend – our attack on Iran. He was wearing a sweatshirt and t-shirt. The FBI says there were “indicators” of this being a potential nexus to terrorism but haven’t said what those indicators are, beyond the clothing. I’m not in the FBI so I’m not going to irresponsibly brush off what they’re saying.

But it’s also this FBI and blindly going along with everything they say, without a single raised eyebrow emoji, is also irresponsible.

Anyway, when we know more, we’ll know more.

In the meantime, obviously, our thoughts are with the victims of this shooting.

Iran

-via AP News, NPR, Al Jazeera, and NY Times

And of course, the other big story is… bust out those shoulder pads and your Cold War safety manual - it’s 1988 again!

Yeah, we’re going back to the 80s… brace yourself – this episode’s gonna be a… normal one, I guess. I just wanted to say shoulder pads.

In 1988, the US Navy, in response to a naval mine laid by Iran that severely damaged the USS Samuel B Roberts, destroyed two Iranian oil platforms that were being used as their military staging bases, disabled or sank about half of their active navy, and wrecked (through actually wrecking or just shooting down) water vessels). All in about eight hours.

This happened during the Iraq-Iran war, but America was hit and we snapped back.

Immediately, Iran stood down. “Who us? Oh no… no no no no no no no… we—I—whoopsies!”

This was known as Operation Praying Mantis. For… some reason.

But it set kind of a rule that the Dude abided for 35 years – Iran will avoid trouble with the US by avoiding direct attacks that they can’t deny. (Instead they’ll do kind of grey-zone “I’m just holding it for a friend” attacks)

And in return, we don’t strike directly on their soil.

For example, in 2020 the US killed Iran’s top general… in Iraq.

But we’re in a whole new world now. It’s Trump’s second term (third if you ask him. Well, third, and also first, and also second. By which I mean… somehow in his “from the ankles to the brain, ain’t none of it working” mind, he is all of this at once: the guy that won in 2020 so really, hasn’t he been president the whole time?, the one who was cheated out of the 2020 election and how dare all of us continue on with our lives while this injustice continue, and also kind of a first term president because he will complain about how no other president before him has ever done something and it’s like… okay well you didn’t do it in your first term so… do you know you were the president before??)

ANYWAY, it’s Trump’s 2nd term and he’s very obsessed with his legacy and taking over a bunch of countries and not getting into heaven and also don’t look at the Epstein files (oh, now I can’t quote him??) and so even though for 35 years the rule was kind of “we pretend like we don’t attack each other” when it comes to Iran – last June the Trump administration carried out a series of attacks on their nuclear sites. They claimed that they were moments, mere seconds!, from having a nuclear weapon.

Proof was never given (and frankly, if you were a real American, you wouldn’t ask for it), and it’s actually disputed how much damage to those sites was done.

And now, over this weekend, the United States, along with Israel, have launched a large-scale military offensive on Iranian military infrastructure and officials.

Let’s start with – two things can be true at once.

This attack targeted and killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader. He was very, very bad. Supremely, some would say.

He held the top title in Iran starting in 1989 and among his many many pieces of legacies, what I will personally remember is his deadly response to political dissent (I’m not even being flippant when I say… there has to be a little part of Trump that respected the guy).

In 2019, at least 323 people were killed in the first five days of protests that followed an abrupt raise in gas prices.

In 2022, at least 550 protesters (including almost 70 minors) were killed as they protested the death of Masha Amini, who was arrested and beaten so severely that she died in the hospital three days later for wearing her hijab improperly.

And most recently the country just went through the biggest wave of protests ever. And in fact, Trump already said he wanted to get involved in Iran because of these protests… though let’s call a fact a fact – he did not say this in 2019 and 2022 and he does not care about supporting protesters here. So any comment he made in that scenario was only about finding a way into Iran. That’s it. Full stop.

Those protests started in response to a spike in inflation and then became about political frustration at large. The government shut the internet down for a few days in that case. Why? Because in January they opened fire on demonstrators. There is no official death count yet, but human rights activists have confirmed 7,000 names, while independent sources put the nation's death toll at between 30,000 and 36,500.

So yeah – the only people mourning this guy are also bad.

But two things can be true.

Because if you go look at the picture of the ayatollah’s compound where he was killed? The compound is destroyed, but the buildings across the street are fine.

Because we have precision weapons that allow us to do this. There’s a link in show notes about how they follows him for months, and knew his patterns. Knew he’d be home.

So tell me, then… why was a girl’s school bombed first?

Killing around 165 people – most of them kids.

Little girls.

He didn’t have a kid there. He didn’t have family there. It wasn’t a private school where other high leadership had kids going.

It was just… a school for little girls.

And, like all people everywhere, the people of Iran deserve a government, a country, and leaders who work for them.

But this is what Trump does!

This is what he did in Venezuela. And he gets the same benefit of confusion and mishmash of thoughts that happened there.

Maduro was not the president of Venezuela. Nor was he a leader.

Trump promised that he would remove Maduro and he finally fulfilled that promise.

And then he went onto Wikipedia, declared himself the acting president, let the woman who should be the president (but the man who ran basically in her place because Maduro wouldn’t let her did, in fact, win) sort of give him her Nobel Peace Prize, and he is still allowing Delcy Rodriguez run the country. She is no different than Maduro. She herself has said that Maduro, who has never been the legitimate president of Venezuela, is still the president.

And Trump is allowing this to happen.

And because I am not from Venezuela, my opinion here matters zero. But all of my knowledge of politics comes from one of my best friends, who is from Venezuela and has very generously talked to me about all of this and will yell at me/absolutely roast me when I get it wrong. Because I see how important it is to her that people get this story right.

It is inarguably a good thing that Maduro is gone.

But what comes next matters. And if Delcy Rodríguez gets to just – take over and there’s no real change, there’s no real change.

And no, let me stop you right there, I’m not going to make some comparison to Trump and Vance and, like, Canada coming to save us.

We have a democracy by the skin of its teeth, and we’re in danger girl… but please don’t embarrass me on Kelly Clarkson’s internet and pretend like anything about this is similar.

If Trump is going to go into these countries and try and get his dad to be proud of him for once, he needs to follow through.

It is fair for Iranians to be relieved that this monster is gone.

But he never has a plan for what’s next! You know? In a video posted on Sunday (I’m coming back to that in a second), he told Iranians: “I call upon all Iranian patriots who yearn for freedom to seize this moment to be brave, be bold, be heroic, and take back your country. America is with you.”

In what way? For how long?

What is the plan?

And by the way…

Where is Trump? Where is Captain America First?

He has posted two pre-recorded videos about this. Not from the Oval but from somewhere at Mar-a-Lago. Mar-a-Lago??? That’s wild! Shouldn’t he be in the situation room?

YEP!

Instead… he’s at his Florida golf country club where anyone can get a membership.

He’s posted two videos from there and a few pictures where it looks like he’s in mobile situation room but if you look closely, it’s a table, chairs, a TV… a some curtains hung on PVC piping.

And whatever, an anesthetic’s an anesthetic but in 2017 when they used Mar-a-lago as the Florida command center for the Syrian missile strikes, with the same curtain-on-PVC pipe situation, it was reported that civilian club members were in earshot.

The Situation Room is a SCIF (Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility).

The Mar-a-Lago is a golf club.

But pop off I guess?

Also… in these videos… and here’s where I’m about to… I gotta find my calm. He’s a draft dodger. His dad paid a doctor to say he has shin splits and that’s why he couldn’t go fight in Vietnam.

My grandfather….

My grandpa lied about his age and said he was older than he was so he could fight in WWII. He was a part of the Frozen Chosen. When he came home, he was a recruiter for the Marines in Vietnam but he was also seeing the news and couldn’t, morally, sent all of those (at that time, let’s be honest, boys) to Vietnam while he stayed home. He was done. He’d done his combat time.

He volunteered to go to Vietnam.

While Donald Trump was paying someone to say his little shins hurt.

And then my poor Grandpa had to have THIS as a grandkid. And I’d run my mouth and he’d shake his head and I’d say “you served your country so I could say that.”

And he’d smirk. He loved it.

And the only times I’ve ever been happy that he wasn’t alive to see were Donald Trump insiting an insurrection because his little baby feelings got hurt and he lost the election and this past weekend… when this draft dodging little… something or other… casually said American servicemembers will lose their lives in this operation.

Three US servicemembers have died so far. This is how he described that: “That often happens in war.”

He also said, “There will likely be more.”

He has pre-recorded videos, posted online, taken a few audio-only (but not live) questions… AND HOSTED A FUNDRAISER… but he’s not even brave enough to face the public right now.

And he’s out here casually said “often happens” and “there will likely be more.”

These are human beings.

I’m from America’s finest city. Do you know why it’s the finest? It’s not because we have some of the best beaches (though we do – and one of them is a nakey beach). It’s not because of the Padres (what we lack in wins, we make up for in love)…. It’s because all but two of the branches of the military have a base in San Diego.

We have one of the highest concentrations of military personnel and infrastructure in the world.

We are widely considered to have one of the highest, if not the highest, concentrations of naval assets and military personnel of any city in the country.

My entire young adult and actually being an adult-hood has been understanding the nuance of supporting the troops and still being able to say, out loud (and now on a podcast with tens of listeners) we require nuance.

And listen… we’re going straight news here. Not “boy oh boy Bill Clinton must have really said something in his testimony on Friday” conspiracy theory (although… if he did the crime… is this DOJ really gonna hide it)

You will find plenty of that other places. There is a lot to talk about. A lot to cover. We’re going to be talking about this for a while because we haven’t attacked Iran since 1988, but this sure does rhyme with 2003 and the invasion of Iraq…

So let’s take a deep breath. We’re putting on our best “going out top” with jeans, we’re listening to… actually Hilary Duff just put out a new album, so that was very polite of her, timing-wise… and with 23 years (ohmygod I wish I hadn’t done the math on that, that’s rough) and with just a few of hindsight we can hold multiple thoughts.

We can support the Iranian people. We can support our own people. We can believe in the best of our country without falling for this idea of American exceptionalism that turns out to be detrimental. We can, and should, support our troops without supporting their mission.

We can do better this time, while wishing we didn’t have to do a “this time.”

And that’s it. That’s the news.

Last week was exhausting. This weekend was exhausting. It’s a lot. I know that. We know that. But you’re here and we did it. We got through it. And because of that… I’m proud of you!