With Donald Trump, It’s a Mad World

My friend, Alex Krainer, holds a more benign view of Donald Trump than do I. I hope Alex is correct in his view that Trump actually has a strategy and is genuinely pursuing a path that will end the war in Ukraine. But I generally ignore what Donald Trump says and I focus instead on what he does. Today, for example, he changed the name of the Department of Defense to the Department of War. WTF!!! What happened to the concept that the best offense is a good defense? I really don’t think that Trump and his team thought this move through. Consider the internet interface… Instead of dod.gov, we now have war.gov. What kind of message is that sending to the world?

While Trump is obsessed with being awarded a Nobel Peace Prize, I think his decision to christen the Department of Defense as the Department of War pretty much ensures he’ll never get that prize. I suppose there is a bright side to this… At least the United States is now being honest about the activity of our so-called Department of Defense since the Korean War, because the name change more accurately defines what US military policy has been for the last 65 years. We waged war in Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Serbia, Libya, Panama and Ukraine.

I think the song, Mad World, which was written by Tears for Fears, best encapsulates the Trump mood (I prefer the Pentatonix version):

The attack on the cigarette boat departing Venezuela stinks to high heaven.

Cigarette boats typically come equipped with large fuel tanks, generally ranging from 200 to 250 gallons in total capacity. For example, the Cigarette Top Gun model—one of the most popular hulls—often features dual tanks with a combined capacity of approximately 220 gallons (two 110-gallon tanks). A typical cigarette boat with three outboard motors will burn approximately 28–35 gallons of fuel per hour per engine at wide open throttle, which amounts to 84–105 gallons per hour in total when running all three engines at maximum power. At normal cruising speeds, fuel consumption can drop to about 18–25 gallons per hour per engine, for a combined 54–75 gallons per hour for the boat.

A cigarette boat with a 220-gallon fuel tank can typically travel between 286 and 330 miles on a full tank under normal cruising conditions. This estimate uses a cruising fuel efficiency of about 1.3–1.5 miles per gallon, based on common data for these high-performance boats. There is no way in hell that his boat was headed to the United States. Let’s assume that the boat departed from Maracaibo, Venezuela. The distance by water from Maracaibo, Venezuela to the Florida Keys is approximately 1,014 nautical miles, which is about 1,167 statute miles (1,878 km). This measurement reflects the shortest direct route between Maracaibo and Key West in the Florida Keys, often used as the reference point for the archipelago.

The maximum weight capacity (also referred to as the maximum load or maximum displacement) of a cigarette boat varies by model, but typical figures can range from about 10,000 pounds (4,500 kg) for smaller 38-foot models up to around 33,000 pounds (15,000 kg) or more for larger, high-performance models like the 52-foot Cigarette 52 Thunder. If we assume that the average weight of the 11 people on the boat was 180 pounds, that is 1980 pounds of weight. The four outboard motors on that boat weighed a combined 2,800 pounds. If this boat was heading for the United States, it would have to carry around 2,000 pounds of fuel. Discounting the 220 gallons of gas already in the tanks, the boat would have to have an additional 339 jerry cans of fuel onboard to make it to Key West, Florida. Add all of this up and we have a total weight, without counting the alleged drugs onboard, of 6,780 pounds. This means that the boat could conceivably carry about 26,000 pounds of drugs. If each bundle of drugs weighed 100 pounds, that means we should have seen at least 260 bundles stacked in the boat.

Now look at a photo of the boat before it was destroyed… Can you see even 20 100-pound bundles of drugs? Can you see even a dozen jerry cans? No!!!

This story is bullshit. But no one in the media is capable, apparently, of doing basic math and asking logical questions.

I have a new video on Counter Currents. I am also posting my chat with Nima and Colonel Wilkerson and the Intelligence Roundtable with Judge Napolitano and Ray Mcgovern: