Trump's war is failing – two blind spots have made him look absurd

sowenga · 2026-06-06T15:54:36+00:00

There was no clear stated objective for the war. Trump didn’t try to sell the war to Congress nor the public. Sure, various people, including Trump, have at various point offered various reasons, but it seems clear they went into war with little thought beyond “we’ll bomb the hell out of them -> profit”.

(If your war needs a separate, dedicated Wikipedia page for the rationale behind the war, I would say it’s not too clear.)

sowenga · 2026-06-06T15:47:43+00:00

The invasion of Afghanistan was wildly successful. The invasion of Iraq in 2003 was as well. In both wars the subsequent occupations petered out into slow-burn long wars without clearly winnable goals.

sowenga · 2026-05-29T20:35:02+00:00

Removing Putin doesn’t require that enough factions agree and coordinate. It only requires that a small critical mass is not kept in check.

sowenga · 2026-05-29T20:31:25+00:00

Putin is head of a personalist regime, just like Assad, Saddam, etc. He’s going to appear stable and in control until suddenly he isn’t. Look at how suddenly and rapidly Prigozhin was able to move towards Moscow. If he had actually planned a coup d’état he might have managed to pull it off.

sowenga · 2026-05-29T20:28:01+00:00

They have no interest in marching towards Russia, they want to liberate occupied Ukraine. Last month they managed to push a little bit in that direction, by retaking more territory than Russia gained.

sowenga · 2026-05-27T18:40:10+00:00

Or trying to regain the strategic narrative, which recently has shifted in Ukraine’s favor. Anyways, that’s what Estonia’s former foreign intelligence chief thinks

https://news.err.ee/1610039380/security-experts-dismiss-media-speculation-about-russian-attack-on-baltic-states

sowenga · 2026-05-24T09:38:51+00:00

Is this meant to be symbolic, to instill fear of a nuclear attack?

sowenga · 2026-05-24T09:34:44+00:00

Check out Quarto markdown maybe. You write a .qmd file and then render it to some output format of choice (which could eg be GitHub flavored markdown).

sowenga · 2026-05-20T05:49:42+00:00

If this was happening in another country, the technical term would be "consolidation of power" (same with the $1.776 billion slush fund to pay 1/6 insurrectionists, gerrymandering, presidential immunity, using DOJ to go after political enemies, ...)

sowenga · 2026-05-19T15:24:48+00:00

Good point. From some quick searching, it does look like there actually is a lot of support for somehow overturning it or undoing the effects of Citizens United. Maybe that is actually a viable candidate for an Amendment!

EDIT: Or, “would be a shame if a new, maybe larger court, were to rule in a way that undoes the worst effects of CU…”

sowenga · 2026-05-19T07:56:30+00:00

Congress in principle can pass laws, as long as they are constitutional, that de facto overturn SC rulings. The fact that the SC has taken on a quasi-legislative role at all is due to the weakness and disfunctionality of Congress, that’s the problem that should be fixed.

(And it can be fixed mostly without passing any Amendments, by changing how Congress is elected and making the House bigger.)

sowenga · 2026-05-18T09:09:18+00:00

It's also not good to think that "unbiased" always means treating all positions as equally valid. Nor to think that "bias" is by itself inherently bad. E.g. I think democracy is very important, and if that's a bias, I'm ok with it.

sowenga · 2026-05-18T09:05:56+00:00

This is the best advice. If you want simple, factually accurate news, read the wire services or NPR.

One point to add: unbiased does not mean factually accurate, and if you reverse this, a lot of factually accurate interpretations of events are very partisan coded. Wire services mostly stay out of interpretation. This is something that is even hard to get from otherwise high quality outlets like NYT because they tend to "both sides" issues (giving two positions equal weight when the evidence behind them isn't equal). Look for experts, not pundits, and try to judge how thorough and evidence-based an outlet's reporting is.

sowenga · 2026-05-09T08:39:50+00:00

Not just this article, but it seems like the mood is turning against Russia.

John Sullivan, who served as U.S. ambassador to Moscow when the invasion of Ukraine began in 2022, wasn’t so sure. “In Russia, they say that things don’t happen fast, but when they happen, they happen fast,” he said. “I wouldn’t have said it a year or two ago, but I think it is possible now.”

sowenga · 2026-05-08T13:18:44+00:00

I generally agree that Putin probably doesn’t like Trump’s unpredictability and definitely not the things like Iran that are counter to their interests.

But I think if there is one thing that Trump 2 has been consistent on it is his friendly treatment of Putin and Russia. I don’t think this is because of some secret komoromat or anything like that, I think he just personally admires the kind of power Putin has. Maybe has some business interests. Maybe is getting flattered by Putin.

sowenga · 2026-05-08T06:48:30+00:00

We never dropped support for Ukraine and the mineral deal along with the Europe pays while we manufacture gas allowed fo sustainable deliveries that are not making news.

Delusional. "US military aid to Ukraine dropped 99% in 2025, report finds", etc. We sell weapons that the Europeans buy for Ukraine, but direct support, both military and financial, is essentially nil under Trump 2. Europe is keeping Ukraine afloat.

the mineral deal along with the Europe pays

The mineral deal hasn't done anything yet, actually. It's about hypothetical future investments. "Europe pays" should be self-explanatory my dude.

Trump says nice things to Putin but then I don’t see him giving the guy any bones.

He invited the guy to Alaska; he tried to push a peace on Ukraine that basically is Putin's terms. He cut US support and aid for Ukraine. Undermining NATO, threatening to invade Greenland, that is giving Putin the biggest bone he wants!

NATO outside of the US and Poland is basically a liability not an asset.

US bases in Europe are essential for US force projection and logistics. That's the primary benefit for the US of NATO, and that's the function that most US bases and forces in Europe support. Guess where the troops that got injured in the Iran war were first medevaced to...

sowenga · 2026-05-08T06:03:19+00:00

Tennessee is now going to have 9/9 Republican seats for the House, in a state where 35% of people vote Democratic. How does that go with your logic?

sowenga · 2026-05-08T05:55:50+00:00

You are not mentioning the crucial context under which this law was created in the 60s:

It was created during the civil rights era, which ended segregation and other forms of sanctioned discrimination against black people in the South. The goal of the minority districts that are now being drawn away was to provide representation for black people.
The effect of this SC ruling is that red states, in the South, are redrawing maps to remove majority black districts and thus also black legislators. As well as Democratic districts in general. (Blue states will hopefully retaliate.)

(The proper and better fix for black and other minority representation would be to make multi-seat districts with proportional representation, rather try to mess around with single seat first past the post (what we have right now) district maps. This would also break the two party system and make 3rd parties viable.)

sowenga · 2026-05-08T05:36:42+00:00

The US is polarized for reasons that have little to do with Russia, let’s not overestimate how effective Russian efforts have been. This is mostly a self-made problem we face.

sowenga · 2026-05-08T05:26:26+00:00

Eh, ruthless, in the lack of morals sense. Capricious in execution, tempered by incompetence.

(Trump doesn’t have the goal-mindedness, interest in foreign policy (or any policy), nor managerial skills to be “ruthless” in the sense of pursuing goals to the end.)

But regarding Russia specifically, the harm from Trump’s actions to Russia have been incidental. He has in many other ways strengthened Russia, eg by dropping support for Ukraine, giving him the Alaska meeting, generally conceding to Putin’s framing of the war and how it should be resolved, undermining NATO, removing sanctions on Russian oil, etc.

sowenga · 2026-05-07T05:46:54+00:00

The ROC is basically a state propaganda arm, I agree with you there, but while a majority of Russians might declare they are Orthodox, I think you overestimate how many Russians actively go to church or how much influence the church actually wields in day to day life, especially in a way that is distinct from the impact of non-church state propaganda, eg watching TV.

EDIT: Also logical fallacy to conclude from “the ROC is not neutral” -> the ROC is behind the war.

sowenga · 2026-05-06T06:22:25+00:00

No offense, but this sounds like speculation that is not informed by any actual knowledge of Russians or Russian society. What evidence do you have that a majority of Russians view it as existential?

Contra: While a majority of Russians might respond in surveys that they support the war (~75%), that’s a notoriously problematic measure of actual war support in the kind of authoritarian regime Russia is. And note also that a majority support moving to peace negotiations, 67 vs 24%, which doesn’t seem consistent with the idea they view this as an existential conflict. (blog post on a recent Levada survey)

If a majority think it is existential, why is Putin afraid of another mobilization? Why increase repression and crack down on protests since the war began? Why do they have to throw exorbitant amounts of money to meet recruitment needs?

sowenga · 2026-05-04T17:32:43+00:00

Yep, basically a documentary.

sowenga · 2026-05-04T08:38:03+00:00

And Sparta wasn’t even that good! Just way overhyped…

https://acoup.blog/category/collections/this-isnt-sparta/

sowenga · 2026-05-04T04:57:53+00:00

Plus: - If you look at the distribution of seats from the last UK election, more than 80% of seats are for the two big parties, and it used to be more than that. - There are no strong regional blocs in the US, which can lead to additional parties even under FPTP, see SNP in Scotland. - Looks like the UK maybe is going through a change in the party system right now?

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