March 20, 2026

KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEFING: Trump 47 — Come for the Jokes, Stay for the Awesome President Stuff. “President Trump’s shoot-from-the-lip speaking style drives some people crazy, but I’ve always thought it’s a feature, not a bug. There’s the entertainment value, of course, but it also lends an honesty to his public persona that is lacking in most politicians.”

Posted at 9:09 am by Stephen Green

THEY’RE PROBABLY HIDING FROM DRONES:

Trump has pretty much the whole Muslim world against Iran and its allies now. Well, except for Britain and France.

Posted at 9:01 am by Glenn Reynolds

FASTER, PLEASE: Pentagon Eyes Second B-21 Production Line.

The U.S. military struck a $4.5 billion deal last month to increase the rate of production on its new B-21 bomber. Now officials are considering whether they will open up an entire second production line to go even faster in constructing the sixth-generation stealth Raider.

Adm. Richard Correll, head of U.S. Strategic Command, told lawmakers March 17 that his command still believes the Air Force needs to increase its planned B-21 fleet to 145 airplanes—a figure his predecessor Air Force Gen. Anthony J. Cotton endorsed last March. A second production line could be a way to reach that goal.

“There are, of course, investments that have been made to increase the production rate and to potentially open a second production line,” Correll told the House Armed Services Committee’s subcommittee on strategic forces. “That decision has yet to be made, but clearly the B-21 represents a really significant capability both from a conventional and a nuclear perspective.”

The current Air Force program of record specifies a minimum of 100 B-21s, to be built by Northrop Grumman at its Air Force Plant 42 in Palmdale, Calif. The planes are needed to replace aging B-1 Lancer and B-2 Spirit bombers in the 2030s.

Aside from Bidenflation and COVID lockdown-related delays, the Raider program is progressing remarkably well for modern, large procurement effort.

But if the B-21 is to do double deterrence duty against Russia and China, conventionally and the in nuclear role, we likely need 300 of them.

Related:

Posted at 8:38 am by Stephen Green

WELCOME TO THE PARTY, PAL: Saudi Arabia threatens strikes on Iran.

Saudi Arabia has threatened to strike back at Iran after attacks on oil and gas sites across the Gulf caused prices to surge across the globe.

Prince Faisal bin Farhan, the Saudi foreign minister, warned on Thursday night that patience with Tehran was running out after an oil refinery was hit and eight Iranian ballistic missiles targeted Riyadh.

“This pressure from Iran will backfire politically and morally and certainly we reserve the right to take military actions if deemed necessary,” he said.

Related:

Posted at 8:35 am by Ed Driscoll

NAILED IT:

Posted at 8:29 am by Glenn Reynolds

SUPER EASY:

Posted at 8:25 am by Glenn Reynolds

DISPATCHES FROM THE CAPTAIN OF THE SOMALI PIRATES:

Posted at 8:22 am by Ed Driscoll

NEXT!

Busy night.

Posted at 8:22 am by Stephen Green

THE ENEMY WITHIN:

Posted at 8:00 am by Glenn Reynolds

EVERYBODY LOVES THE FA, BUT SO FEW PLAN FOR THE FO:

More:

Anyway, back in 2022, you made comments where you urged conservatives to leave New York and go to Florida. We did. We took our money with us as well, because that’s how those things work. Now you want us back? Nah…

See, you’re in the “FO” stage of “FAFO.” It’s pretty glorious to behold. Good luck with all your social justice programs without the capital to fund them.

Don’t blame me, I voted for Lee Zeldin.

Heh.

Posted at 7:51 am by Stephen Green

NASTY: Iranian cluster munitions pose additional challenge for Israel’s air defenses.

Iran has launched dozens of missiles with cluster munition warheads ​at Israel since the start of the war, posing a challenge for Israel’s missile defense shield as they need to be ‌hit before they split and disperse into smaller explosives.

Israel failed to intercept one of the cluster missiles overnight, and its small bomblets scattered into civilian areas in Tel Aviv. A couple in their 70s was killed, and one of Tel Aviv’s main train stations suffered damage.

Israeli military spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani told reporters that the couple ​was killed in their apartment by a single, cluster munition bomblet.

“This cluster bomb was fired by the Iranian regime towards a ​center of mass population, firing dozens of rockets towards the civilians, deliberately targeting civilians,” he said. “This is a ⁠war crime by the Iranian regime.”

Cluster munitions have their uses, but not like that.

Posted at 7:36 am by Stephen Green

REDUNDANCY AND INVENTORY LOOK LIKE INEFFICIENCIES… UNTIL YOU NEED THEM:

Posted at 7:20 am by Stephen Green

ALL THE NEWS THAT’S FIT TO MEMORY HOLE AN INCONVENIENT HISTORIC LEFTIST ICON:

The @nytimes is being lavished with praise by the virtue-signaling brigade, but there are very basic problems with their Cesar Chavez story…

-The “evidence” doesn’t come close to the threshold for such a devastating claim, especially against a man who has been dead for 33 yrs

-We don’t know for sure that the 2 children who are now claimed to be his, via 2 “rapey” encounters, are biologically his, partly because his accuser had 4 kids with his BROTHER, which the NYTimes somehow left out of the story (along with the fact that she had at least 11 children with at least 4 men)

-We somehow don’t even know the names of the two kids that were allegedly fathered by Cesar -The NYTimes ignored the numerous very positive recent public statements by Dolores Huerta about Cesar, including a YouTube video created during the #MeToo panic where she praised him for his protection of women against sexual harassment

Read the whole thing.

Earlier: Why Cesar Chavez Suddenly Became Politically Inconvenient to the Left.

Posted at 7:14 am by Ed Driscoll

FROM JESSICA SCHLENKER:  Excessively Attentive.

Elizabeth Bennet harboured few expectations for her trip to Kent. Primarily, she was to see her dear friend Charlotte, which necessarily entailed tolerating the odious Mr. Collins. Perhaps, if she were truly fortunate, she might even gain an introduction to the great Lady Catherine — whether she wished it or not. She promised to fill her letters home to her father with faithful recountings of any absurdities thus encountered; he almost promised to write back.

But when a revelation prompts Mr. Bennet to arrive in person, Elizabeth is drawn into the center of a long-buried family mystery. A single portrait holds the key, and the truth it unlocks threatens to upend everything she understands about her past and her expectations for her future.

Excessively Attentive is a Regency-set reimagining of Pride and Prejudice that remains faithful to Jane Austen’s wit, social precision, and moral insight. Thoughtful, character-driven, and richly grounded in period voice, this novel asks what it means to belong — not by birth alone, but by character, courage, and choice.

Posted at 7:00 am by Sarah Hoyt

OR WORSE. LEFTIES WILL EXCUSE AND PROTECT ANYTHING UNTIL SUDDENLY THEY WON’T.

Posted at 7:00 am by Glenn Reynolds