Let’s take a quick second to take a look at what our good buddy Brandon did this week.
China did something provocative in sending that balloon. It was clearly designed to elicit a response, and they got one. Let’s give that response a look.
First, according to flight radar there were Air Force planes circling this thing from the minute it was in our airspace. Now, the USAF rarely if ever calls me for advice but had they, I’d have suggested they use our extensive electronic warfare capabilities to ensure the balloon couldn’t beam anything back to China.
Given the comments made by the USAF and DoD to the effect that there was “limited intelligence potential” from the balloon, I’m going to assume they did that and no sensitive info made it back to China.
Next, let’s get into comments made about Republican ”thought” leaders on the subject. Why didn’t we shoot it down before it entered our airspace as MTG and these other very stable geniuses suggest?
Well gosh maybe firing on foreign property in international airspace could, I don’t know, cause all kinds of problems with the massive amount of manned and unmanned US equipment around the world? Would we want China or other countries shooting at our ships, subs, satellites or planes in international territory because they say it might transit their country? That’s the can of worms these “foreign policy experts” apparently want to open.
Why didn’t they shoot it down when it first entered America? Hmmm, tough one. As someone who has personally witnessed a radio station van being dropped from a helicopter at 1,000 feet, I can say with a lot of confidence that there’s no way to predict exactly where something like that is going to land.
The technology bay on the balloon was as big as 3 city busses, and the semirigid balloon itself was several times that size and resulted in a 7 mile long debris field. It also could have been carrying something harmful. The Air Force and Biden decided that rather than rain metal on Americans, they’d wait until it was over water before they took that action. Good thinking guys.
So now let’s check out the PR front.
First, Biden gave the order to shoot the thing several days ago as soon as it could be done safely. Personally that’s the exact order I want my president to give.
Next, rather than clue in the group that whines and insists everything he does is wrong no matter how clearly correct it is, he chose to let that shrill bunch of morons embarrass themselves by advocating for. bunch of stupid things and claim Trump would never have let that happen.
Finally, he shot the thing within sight of land giving us all a very satisfying “America, Fuck Yeah!” moment and illustrating that the F-22 and sidewinder missile has zero difficulty locking on to and destroying an aircraft with no exhaust or heat signature at close to 70,000 feet.
Then the administration kind of mentioned offhand that Trump had let Chinese balloons transit US territory three times with no consequence or even public acknowledgment, letting the group of dangerous morons below and their ilk seem even dumber.
To sum up, here’s what Biden did:
Shot first and asked questions later: ❌
Stopped balloon from doing its job: ✅
Didn’t take rash action that might cause consequences to US forces abroad: ✅
Considered and protected American lives: ✅
Shot the thing down in a very satisfying way demonstrating our willingness to do so and a previously unseen combat capability: ✅
Let the Republicans make themselves look like the foolish, dangerous idiots that they are as they advocated for stupid and dangerous things while falsely claiming Trump would have done something else, and condemning the thing Trump actually did when he faced this same issue without even realizing it. ✅
I personally don’t invest myself emotionally in celebrities or politicians and just judge their actions individually. When Elon was shooting his car into space and landing the rockets after, I applauded him. When he bought Twitter and started playing footsie with Nazis, I condemned him. (That’s how all sane people who aren’t in cults respond to people in the public sphere.)
That means I think that if Biden broke the law over classified documents I hope he gets the appropriate punishment and he’s got egg on his face for plenty of things they’ve handled badly.
That said, like so many other things over the past two years, he and his administration get an A+ from me on how they handled this particular issue, especially since he apparently also had to overcome dementia to do it.
