Another Ripple in the EU

For John, BLUF:  This is not going to end well.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Writing for The Financial Times, we have Ms Rachel Sanderson in Rome and Mr Alex Barker in Brussels.

Renzi ready to defy Brussels and bail out Italy’s troubled banks

"Renzi" would be the Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi.  There have been some 56 Prime Ministers since the Kingdom was abolished in 1946.  Granted, some, like Aldo Moro (twice before being murdered and Giulio Andreotti (three times) and Silvio Berlusconi (three times) inflate the number.

Here is the lede on this article, plus one paragraph additional:

Italy is prepared to defy the EU and unilaterally pump billions of euros into its troubled banking system if it comes under severe systemic distress, a last-resort move that would smash through the bloc’s nascent regime for handling ailing banks.

Matteo Renzi, the Italian prime minister, is determined to intervene with public funds if necessary despite warnings from Brussels and Berlin over the need to respect rules that make creditors rather than taxpayers fund bank rescues, according to several officials and bankers familiar with their plans.

Here is the point.  It isn't just the Brits who are unhappy with the EU.  This is a major act of defiance on the part of one of the PIIGS. And saying this is all because of the Brexit vote is to miss the underlying problems.  Sort of like the way the elites think about what is happening in the 2016 Presidential Campaign.

Regards  —  Cliff

Tone Deaf

For John, BLUF:  A special kind of tone deaf.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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‘President Hillary Clinton?’ She Wants Progress on Immigration and to Drink With G.O.P.

This is from Reporter Patrick Healy, yesterday, in The International New York Times.

Buried down in the article is this paragraph, with part of it underlined by your Blogger:

She hopes to reassure progressives with her executive actions, which would also include new protections for undocumented immigrant parents, as well as her personnel appointments. Having women make up half of her cabinet would be historic (in recent years, a quarter to a third of cabinet positions have been held by women), and Democrats close to Mrs. Clinton say she may decide to retain Ms. Lynch, the nation’s first black woman to be attorney general, who took office in April 2015.

Now that is tone deaf.

It isn't like it was The Onion or The Daily Caller.  This is The Old Gray Lady, herself.

I am thinking The Honorable Hillary Clinton thinks of herself as "bullet proof".

UPDATE:  Here is how Law Professor Ann Althouse plays it.

Hat tip to the Drudge Report.

Regards  —  Cliff

Happy Independence Day

Thanks, Tom, and Ben, and all you others, for a wonderfully radical document with a wonderfully radical idea.

Regards  —  Cliff

Veep Stakes

For John, BLUF:  But, it will be something to talk about.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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The Utter Inconsequence of Hillary’s Veep

From The New York Times and from the computer keyboard of Columnist Frank Bruni. Here is the lede plus two:

I DOUBT that Hillary Clinton really wants to run with Elizabeth Warren — I doubt that she fully trusts her — but if that’s her calculated decision:  mazel tov.  They sure were fiery together last week, two blue devils raring to bedevil Donald Trump.

Tim Kaine is totally sensible, mostly safe and a bit of a snooze: the aspirin of aspirants.  But if Clinton is tugged in the Virginia senator’s direction, she should head there.  I could certainly see him as the vice president.

Then again I’ve seen Julia Louis-Dreyfus in the job, in HBO’s “Veep.”  Clinton might as well pick her for all the difference it would make.

I like the Julia Louis-Dreyfus idea, but really, I go for Alexander Throttlebottom.

And, of course, for The Old Gray Lady the question of a Vice President for The Donald is totally irrelevant.  Who would want the job?

Hat tip to Memeorandum.

Regards  —  Cliff

More Trouble in Europe

For John, BLUF:  It isn't just the Brits messing up the Progressive dream of a unified Europe under the rule of the bureaucrats in Brussels.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Austria’s Highest Court Orders Repeat of Presidential Runoff

It is The Old Gray Lady, and the Reporters are Alison Smale and James Kanter.

Here is the lede plus two:

Austria’s highest court threw out the results of the nation’s presidential election on Friday, giving a far right, euroskeptic party a second chance to win.  The ruling put the European Union’s core issues back in the cross hairs of voters only a week after Britain’s decision to quit.

Citing irregularities in ballot counting, Austria’s highest court ordered a do-over of the country’s presidential runoff, which an anti-immigrant candidate, Norbert Hofer, narrowly lost in May.  It was the first time the country ordered a rerun of a national election since 1945, when the Nazis were defeated.

Now, Mr. Hofer has the chance to become the first far-right politician elected head of state in Europe since World War II.  Much like the British vote last week, the new election in Austria could well serve as a referendum on the central tenets, roles and responsibilities of the European Union.

Boys and girls, it isn't until the TENTH paragraph that we find out the other candidate is "Alexander Van der Bellen, a 72-year-old former leader of the Green party who supports a border-free 'United States of Europe.'"

To be fair, I used to be a strong supporter of the idea of a "United States of Europe", but I visualized a federal system, decentralized and not run by technocrats.  I visualized an open system that allowed for differences, such as letting Turkey join the crowd.♠

For sure, their Lordships at The Old Gray Lady see this as more about some Eurosceptic than about a nation having to redo a Presidential election.♥

By the way, USA Today gets to the other candidate more quickly, by the fourth paragraph.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Turkey was not allowed to join and now it is slipping back toward an oriental approach it had been growing away from since WWI.  An error that will cost all of us in the long run.
I don't see this happening in the US, given that if no one gets the majority of the Electoral College it goes into the House of Representatives.

Tone Deaf

For John, BLUF:  I wonder if this chap gets paid more than the median income.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Major League Baseball must permanently retire ‘God Bless America,’ a song that offends everyone

Everyone?  I can see that some might be offended, but definitely not me.  Definitely not.  And, to suggest same is to insult the memory of Kate Smith.

Is New York Daily News reporter Gersh Kuntzman for real?

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff

The Somme

For John, BLUF:  Gastly.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Battle of the Some

The Battle of the Somme started on 1 July 1916, with British and French forces advancing toward the German lines.  But, the artillery preparation (designed to cut barbed wire and destroy entrenchments) began five days earlier.  It was a terrible carnage, as the tables below show.

Here is the Wikipedia entry:

The Battle of the Somme, also known as the Somme Offensive, was a battle of the First World War fought by the armies of the British and French empires against the German Empire.  It took place between 1 July and 18 November 1916 on both sides of upper reaches of the River Somme in France.  It was the largest battle of the First World War on the Western Front; more than one million men were wounded or killed, making it one of the bloodiest battles in human history.

The original plan for the Battle was upset by the Battle of Verdun:

When the Imperial German Army began the Battle of Verdun on the Meuse on 21 February 1916, French commanders diverted many of the divisions intended for the Somme and the "supporting" attack by the British became the principal effort.

The first day on the Somme (1 July) saw a serious defeat for the German Second Army, which was forced out of its first position by the French Sixth Army, from Foucaucourt-en-Santerre south of the Somme to Maricourt on the north bank and by the Fourth Army from Maricourt to the vicinity of the Albert–Bapaume road. The first day on the Somme was also the worst day in the history of the British army, which had c. 57,470 casualties, mainly on the front between the Albert–Bapaume road and Gommecourt, where the attack was defeated and few British troops reached the German front line. The British troops on the Somme comprised a mixture of the remains of the pre-war regular army, the Territorial Force and the Kitchener Army, which was composed of Pals battalions, recruited from the same places and occupations.

The importance of the Pals battalions was that if a unit was wiped out in the advance, then all or most of the young men from a single village or town might be wiped out.  A whole generation lost.

It should be noted that air power was important to the battle and it was the first use of the tank.

A German officer wrote,

Somme.  The whole history of the world cannot contain a more ghastly word.

— Friedrich Steinbrecher

Somme casualties

Nationality	Total casualties	Killed & missing	POW
United Kingdom	350,000+	—	—
Canada	24,029	—	—
Australia	23,000	—	< 200
New Zealand	7,408	—	—
South Africa	3,000+	—	—
Newfoundland	2,000+	—	—
Total British Commonwealth	419,654	95,675	—
French	204,253	50,756	—
Total Allied	623,907	146,431
German	465,000	164,055	38,000

Western Front Casualties
July–December 1916
That is, the Somme and all the other fighting in France along the whole front.

Month	Casualties
July	196,081
August	75,249
September	115,056
October	66,852
November	46,238
December	13,803
Total British	513,289
French	c. 434,000
Total: Anglo-French	c. 947,289
German	c. 719,000
Grand total	c. 1,666,289

And yet this war went on for just a week shy of two more years.

And this war paved the way for the next.

Regards  —  Cliff