Lazy Caturday Reads: Trump’s War on Iran
Posted: March 7, 2026 | Author: bostonboomer | Filed under: just because | Tags: cat art, caturday, Donald Trump, Persian cats, Pete Hegseth, Trump's War in Iran, U.S. Economy, views of cats in Iran |
Good Day!!
Painting of a cat resting on a pillow next to a Muslim scholar in Cairo, by John Frederick Lewis (1805–1876)
Today I’m featuring Persian cats. It’s not the Iranian people’s fault that Trump is raining down hellfire on their country. According to Wikipedia, cats are the preferred pet in Iran; and Persian cats are the local favorite.
The Persian cat, also known as the Persian Longhair or simply Persian, is a long-haired traditional breed of cat characterised by a round face and petite, but not flat and not smashed in, muzzle. The short flat nose was created in the US from in-breeding and causes breathing difficulties in the breed, whereas, the traditional Persian breed has a petite nose which enables them to breathe without difficulties.
The first documented ancestors of Persian cats might have been imported into Italy from Khorasan as early as around 1620, but this has not been proven. Instead, there is stronger evidence for a longhaired cat breed being exported from Afghanistan and Iran/Persia from the 19th century onwards.[2][3][4] Persian cats have been widely recognised by the North-West European cat fancy since the 19th century,[5] and after World War II by breeders from North America, Australia and New Zealand.[5] Some cat fancier organisations’ breed standards subsume the Himalayan and Exotic Shorthair as variants of this breed, while others generally treat them as separate breeds.
The selective breeding carried out by breeders has allowed the development of a wide variety of coat colours,[5] but has also led to the creation of increasingly flat-faced Persian cats. Favoured by fanciers, this head structure can bring with it several health problems. As is the case with the Siamese breed, there have been efforts by some breeders to preserve the older type of cat, the Traditional Persian, which has a more pronounced muzzle.
Wikipedia on Islamic beliefs about cats:
In Islam, the domestic cat is regarded as ritually clean and thus holds a unique status in comparison to other companion animals, such as the domestic dog. Under Islamic law, cats are permitted to be kept by Muslims within their homes and other private and public spaces, including mosques. Likewise, if a person’s food or drink is sampled by a cat, it is not rendered impure or unfit for consumption, and water from which a cat has drunk is permissible to use for ablution.
Cats are believed by Muslims to possess barakah, which refers to a blessing power that is said to flow through those who are spiritually closest to God.[1][2] As such, they are widely acclaimed as the “quintessential pet” for a Muslim household.
I hope these cats will provide some respite from the horrible news.
Trump is really sounding drunk with power (what else is new?) on his illegal war on Iran. Yesterday, he demanded “unconditional surrender” from the Iranians.
Traditionall Persian cat
CNBC: Trump says no deal with Iran to end war without ‘unconditional surrender.’
President Donald Trump said in a social media post on Friday that there would be no deal to end the U.S. war against Iran without an “UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER” by Iran.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped more than 900 points, or nearly 2%, after Trump’s demand, which he wrote on Truth Social. The S&P 500and Nasdaq Composite fell 1.6% each, and oil futures prices rose.
Trump said that after a surrender and “the selection of a GREAT & ACCEPTABLE Leader(s), we, and many of our wonderful and very brave allies and partners, will work tirelessly to bring Iran back from the brink of destruction, making it economically bigger, better, and stronger than ever before.”
“IRAN WILL HAVE A GREAT FUTURE. “MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN (MIGA!)” Trump wrote, echoing his “Make America Great” movement’s name.
Trump’s demand came as Iran has yet to pick a leader to replace Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed last weekend in an airstrike at the beginning of the war by the U.S. and Israel.
What the hell does that mean? It’s not even a declared war.
Later, the White House tried to clarify the demand: Trump to Axios: “Unconditional surrender” is when Iran “can’t fight any longer.”
President Trump told Axios Friday that his demand for Iran’s “unconditional surrender” could mean the complete destruction of the regime’s military capabilities — not necessarily a formal surrender.
- “Unconditional surrender could be that [the Iranians] announce it. But it could also be when they can’t fight any longer because they don’t have anyone or anything to fight with,” he said in a phone interview.
Why it matters: Trump’s explanation came hours after he appeared to leave no visible off-ramp for Iran, ruling out any kind of “deal” as he demanded “UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER” in a post on Truth Social.
— White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt later said on Fox News that “unconditional surrender” means Trump determining “that Iran can no longer pose a threat to the U.S. and our troops in the Middle East.”
— Leavitt listed U.S. objectives as destroying Iran’s navy, eliminating its ballistic missile threat, ensuring it cannot obtain a nuclear weapon and weakening its regional proxies.
From The Guardian: Iran rejects Trump’s demand for unconditional surrender as a ‘dream.’
The president of Iran has rejected Donald Trump’s call for the country’s unconditional surrender as a “dream”, while issuing a rare apology for Iranian attacks that hit neighbouring states, even as missiles and drones continued to strike Gulf countries.
Moder type Persian cat
In a prerecorded address broadcast on state television on Saturday, Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, said the country would never capitulate, responding to remarks by the US president, who said on Friday that only Iran’s total submission could bring the war to an end.
Iran’s enemies, Pezeshkian said, “must take their dream of the Iranian people’s unconditional surrender to their graves”, in remarks that further escalate the eighth day of conflict, which has choked global oil supplies and cut world air travel.
During his speech, Pezeshkian also issued an apology to neighbouring states for Iran’s recent “actions”, in an apparent attempt to ease regional anger after Iranian strikes hit civilian targets in Gulf Arab countries.
Tehran has responded to attacks on its territory by targeting Israel, but also Gulf Arab states that host US military installations, while Israel has also launched intense strikes on Lebanon, where the Iran-backed armed group Hezbollah is based.
In response to Iran’s refusal to surrender, Trump issued more threats. Politico: Trump vows to hit ‘very hard’ after Iran’s president says he won’t surrender.
President Donald Trump announced plans to launch yet more strikes against Iran on Saturday, escalating his threats as the conflict with Iran enters its second week.
“Today Iran will be hit very hard!” he wrote on Truth Social Saturday morning. “Under serious consideration for complete destruction and certain death, because of Iran’s bad behavior, are areas and groups of people that were not considered for targeting up until this moment in time.”
Islamic miniature depicting Abu Hudhayfa ibn Utba (right) informing As’ad ibn Zurara that he has converted to Islam, with the presence of a cat denoting his home’s ritual purity.
Trump’s threat came after Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian labeled the president’s earlier call for Tehran’s “unconditional surrender” a “dream that they should take to their grave” in a speech broadcast on state television Saturday.
Pezeshkian also said his country would no longer strike its neighbors in the Middle East — so long as attacks against Iran weren’t being launched from those countries. Trump took credit for the new policy, writing on Truth Social that it “was only made because of the relentless U.S. and Israeli attack.”
“It is the first time that Iran has ever lost, in thousands of years, to surrounding Middle Eastern Countries,” he said. “They have said, ‘Thank you President Trump.’ I have said, ‘You’re welcome!’ Iran is no longer the ‘Bully of the Middle East,’ they are, instead, ‘THE LOSER OF THE MIDDLE EAST,’ and will be for many decades until they surrender or, more likely, completely collapse!”
Trump is really full of himself. He even thinks he should help decide who Iran’s next leader will be!
Meanwhile, things here at home aren’t going so well.
Politico: Trump’s week: Poor jobs numbers, high gas prices and Noem’s ouster.
Donald Trump won reelection on the promise of restoring the economy and eliminating illegal immigration.
But in the last week, both issues have threatened to turn into liabilities: A stagnant labor market and soaring gas prices amid the Iran conflict are hammering the economy, and the ouster of Kristi Noem from the Department of Homeland Security has cast new light on the administration’s increasingly unpopular immigration agenda. The economic backdrop has grown ominous — Wall Street analysts are warning that surging oil prices could lead to stagflation — and the blitzkrieg of bad news has jeopardized the GOP’s ability to keep voters focused on Trump administration policies that were designed to help with the rising cost of living.
“If you combine an economy that people don’t like with a prolonged war that you know nobody in his base believes they voted for, that’s a toxic problem,” said one Trump ally granted anonymity to speak freely. While Trump isn’t on the ballot this year, his party needs the president’s poll numbers to improve to keep the House and Senate….
The Iran conflict has put immense upward pressure on oil and gas –- prices at the pump have climbed by more than 11 percent in a week. Now, with employers shedding payroll and Trump pressing reset on who’s leading his immigration agenda, the president is on the backfoot on the two issues he needs to own for his party to win the midterms….
The president, meanwhile, is also struggling with what was once his strongest and most defining issue — immigration. While the number of people crossing the southern border has fallen significantly, in part due to Trump administration efforts, the widely shared images of aggressive enforcement actions across the country have left even some of his supporters wincing. Other conservatives, still, are unhappy that those efforts have not gone far enough, falling short of the “mass deportations” he promised on the campaign trail.
Polling underscores the erosion of support. A recent NBC News poll found that 49 percent of adults strongly disapprove of Trump’s handling of border security and immigration, up from 38 percent last summer. Nearly three-quarters of the poll’s respondents said that Immigration and Customs Enforcement should be reformed or abolished.
Trump’s Thursday dismissal of Noem came after months of increasing frustration inside the White House with how she ran the department.
Consider three of the biggest developments in our politics right now: We just learned that the economy lost 92,000 jobs in February, a capstone to a terrible year in terms of job creation. President Trump has fired widely despised Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, a key architect of his mass deportations. And reports are indicating that the killing of scores of Iranian schoolchildren might have been the handiwork of the United States.
What links all these things? In addition to the massive human toll they’re inflicting, they suggest that Trump is about to pull off a unique trifecta. He is squandering the advantage he and Republicans have enjoyed in recent years on three major GOP-friendly issues: The economy, immigration, and national security.
Painting by Tatjana Cechun
This isn’t meant as a political gotcha; it has important ideological and policy implications. When Trump took office last year, it was reasonable to fear that the American public would rally behind mass deportations and tariffs—that is, embrace two of the main tenets of right-wing nationalism. Meanwhile, the launch of the largest military attack in the Mideast in decades might have plausibly produced a rally-around-the-war-president effect.
None of that is happening. And that’s significant in not-so-obvious ways.
Let’s start with Trump and national security. According to an extraordinary video analysis by The New York Times, the horrific bombing of an elementary school in southern Iran—which killed 175 people, many children—occurred while the United States was conducting missile strikes in the area aimed at a nearby Iranian naval base.
What’s more, Reuters reports that military investigators now believe U.S. forces likely bombed the school. We should suspend final judgement, of course. But it’s looking very much like this atrocity—one of the worst massacres of civilians in memory—is the result of Trump’s war. Whatever we learn about it, there will inevitably be more such horrors.
Now look at this in the context of remarks from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and White House adviser Stephen Miller. Hegseth recently declared that the United States is dispensing with “stupid rules of engagement” and will no longer fight “politically correct wars.” Miller recently enthused that Trump’s military doesn’t have “its hands tied behind its back,” mocked the very idea of human rights, and insisted that “strength” and “force” and “power” are fundamentally all that matter in the international arena.
But we’re now learning why we have the sort of constraints on military conduct these men ridicule. “Trump, Miller and Hegseth’s FAFO approach to the use of official government force and violence comes with considerable risk,” Democratic Congressman Adam Smith told me, employing the acronym for “Fuck Around and Find Out.” Atrocities like the school bombing, he added, show the perils that come when we “brazenly dismiss any sort of rules of engagement designed to protect the lives and rights of civilians.”
Just a bit more:
The swaggering certainty of Hegseth and Miller, those two giants of American statecraft, is what’s notable here. As Alan Elrod writes at Liberal Currents, at times like this you can almost smell MAGA’s “bloodlust.” Clearly they have no doubt the public will rally behind this supposed display of Trump’s “strength.” Or maybe they don’t think it matters what the public thinks.
But it does matter. Data analyst G. Elliott Morris averaged high quality polling on Trump’s Iran invasion, and found that only 38 percent of respondents approve—the lowest initial support for an American war perhaps ever. Trump’s overall approval has also dropped a hair since the bombing began—it’s hovering at around 39-58—leading Morris to conclude that no rally-around-the-flag effect is materializing.
Also note that a CNN poll just showed that 59 percent don’t trust Trump to make the right decisions regarding the use of force in Iran, suggesting already-entrenched skepticism of Trump’s commander-in-chief abilities exactly when a “war president” boomlet might be expected to kick in. The school bombing will make this worse. In short, Trump has no built-in national security advantage. If anything he’s viewed as bad on it.
Read the rest at TNR.
Two more stories that show the callous nature of Trump’s war:
HuffPo: U.S. May Have Committed War Crime In Sinking Of Iranian Ship.
The U.S. torpedoing of an Iranian frigate off Sri Lanka this week may have violated the Geneva Conventions by failing to help rescue sailors from the stricken warship, an act that could potentially endanger American service members in this and future wars.
The 312-foot Dena and its 130-member crew, many of them musicians in the Iranian navy band, had just finished participating in an Indian government naval exercise and cultural exchange that the U.S. Navy had also participated in and were on the way home on Wednesday. After clearing Sri Lanka, it was struck by a torpedo fired from a U.S. Navy submarine about 20 miles from the island’s southern tip. The weapon appears to have ruptured the hull from beneath, and the warship quickly sank. The submarine did not attempt to rescue Iranian sailors in the water.
Painting of a calico Persian cat, by Lynn Lachapelle Seguin
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt bragged about how the attack featured the first American use of a torpedo to sink a ship since World War II. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, narrating a video clip of the attack, used the same gloating tone. “An American submarine sunk an Iranian warship that thought it was safe in international waters. Instead, it was sunk by a torpedo. Quiet death,” he intoned.
Hegseth had previously mocked the “stupid rules of engagement” that aim to limit civilian deaths and other actions that could constitute war crimes.
“There is an affirmative duty to rescue under the Geneva Conventions,” said Mark Nevitt, a former Navy lawyer in the judge advocate general corps and now a law professor at Emory University.
He and other legal experts warn that disregarding those and other rules invites mistreatment, even death, to Americans who are shipwrecked or captured.
Yahoo News: Pete Hegseth Mocks ‘Iranians That Think They’re Gonna Live.’
In a preview of an upcoming 60 Minutes interview released on Friday, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth mocked “Iranians that think they’re gonna live” while answering a question on reports that Russia provided Iran with intel to target American soldiers in the ongoing conflict.
In the clip, CBS News’ Major Garrett cited three sources “telling us that Russia is providing intelligence to Iran on U.S. positions and movements.”
“The average American might hear that and think that’s a big and dangerous deal,” continued Garrett. “Is it?”
“Well, we’re tracking everything,” responded Hegseth. “We have the best intelligence in the world… President [Donald Trump] has an incredible knack at knowing how to mitigate those risks, and so the American people can rest assured their commander in chief is well aware of who’s talking to who, and anything that shouldn’t be happening — whether it’s in public or backchanneled — is being confronted and confronted strongly.”
“So the American people can therefore expect conversations with the Russians to stop this?” clarified Garrett.
“Well, I,” Hegseth stumbled. “President Trump, as people have seen, has a unique relationship with a lot of world leaders, where he can get things done that other presidents — certainly [former President] Joe Biden —
“Well, I,” Hegseth stumbled. “President Trump, as people have seen, has a unique relationship with a lot of world leaders, where he can get things done that other presidents — certainly [former President] Joe Biden — never could have. And through direct conversations or indirect, through him one-to-one, or through his cabinet, messages definitely can be delivered.”
We’ll see. I have zero faith that Trump will stand up to Putin on anything.
The New York Times on the Russia story: Russia Is Sharing Intelligence With Iran, U.S. Officials Say.
Russia has provided intelligence to Iran during the U.S.-Israeli war, including satellite imagery showing the locations of warships and military personnel, according to U.S. officials.
The information sharing could complicate relations between the United States and Russia, given that President Trump has often taken a more conciliatory stance toward Moscow than his predecessors.
Persian cat by Carolee Vitaletti
But some of the officials played down the partnership, saying Russia has long provided similar intelligence to Iran. And it is not clear how much Tehran has been able to use the new intelligence, if at all. Iran has advanced missiles, but they lag far behind Russia’s and it is not clear Iran could use the intelligence to target a ship.
Furthermore, given the immense pressure of the combined U.S.-Israeli assault, which began last Saturday, Iran’s ability to launch missiles has been degraded, officials said.
But officials confirmed that Russia has provided updated intelligence on the position of U.S. assets since the beginning of the war, information meant to help Iran target the assets.
So far Iranian forces have not hit any U.S. warships, but they have struck at U.S. military bases, killing six service members in Kuwait and damaging facilities in Bahrain. Iranian drones have also struck a building housing the C.I.A. station in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, though no one was injured in that attack, officials said.
I guess we’ll eventually find out how effective Russia’s help is and whether Trump will do anything about it.
Two more stories that address possible outcomes of the Iran “war.”
The Washington Post (gift link): Intel report warns large-scale war ‘unlikely’ to oust Iran’s regime.
A classified report by the National Intelligence Council found that even a large-scale assault on Iran launched by the United States would be unlikely to oust the Islamic republic’s entrenched military and clerical establishment, a sobering assessment as the Trump administration raises the specter of an extended military campaign that officials sayhas “only just begun.”
The findings, confirmed to The Washington Post by three people familiar with the report’s contents, raise doubts about President Donald Trump’s declared plan to “clean out” Iran’s leadership structure and install a ruler of his choosing.
The report, completed about a week before the United States and Israel initiated the war on Feb. 28, outlined succession scenarios stemming from either a narrowly tailored campaign against Iran’s leaders or a broader assault against its leadership and government institutions, the people familiar with its findings said. In both cases, the intelligence concluded that Iran’s clerical and military establishment would respond to the killing of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei by following protocols designed to preserve continuity of power, these people said.
The prospect of Iran’s fragmented opposition taking control of the country was described as “unlikely,” said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a classified report.
On the other hand, maybe this is all just a distraction from the Epstein files. Read more with the gift link.
Peter Baker at The New York Times (gift link): Wars Often Lose Public Support Over Time. Trump Started This One Without Much.
President Trump likes to assert that he has accomplished things no other president has. With the opening of his military assault against Iran, he has achieved another distinction: He is the first president in the era of modern polling to take the United States to war without the support of the public.
Traditionally, Americans stand behind their president when he first orders troops into battle, generally sticking with him unless it drags on, casualties mount and victory seems increasingly elusive. With Mr. Trump’s war against Iran, the public has skipped the rally-around-the-president phase this time.
Support for his ferocious bombardment of Iran has ranged from 27 percent in a Reuters/Ipsos poll to 41 percent in a CNN survey, far below the level of public backing that Mr. Trump’s predecessors initially enjoyed when they used force overseas. Given that wars tend to grow less popular over time, the initial negative response portends political challenges for Mr. Trump and his fellow Republicans the longer the fighting continues.
The opposition is revealing about this particular moment in American history. A country already tired of decades of combat in the Middle East has shown little appetite for yet another adventure abroad. And the deep polarization of American politics only makes it harder to build support across lines. Even some Americans sympathetic to the goal of toppling the repressive, terrorist-sponsoring government in Tehran find it difficult to embrace Mr. Trump as commander in chief.
Moreover, unlike his predecessors, Mr. Trump has not done much to bring the public along, forgoing the usual tools of his office to explain to Americans what he is doing, why he is doing it and how it will end. Instead, he and his administration have offered contradictory accounts of what drove this decision and what victory would look like.
“As he has in many other areas, President Trump is pioneering a new approach,” said Peter D. Feaver, a national security aide under President George W. Bush during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. “He has enjoyed considerable success in doing other things that previous presidents thought couldn’t or shouldn’t be done, but this is one of the biggest political gambles he has taken.”
The consequences are enormous for Mr. Trump’s presidency, for the success of the war and for the upcoming midterm elections, with Republicans already facing ominous signs that they could lose one if not both houses of Congress. The war power votes in the Senate and the House this week, in which Republicans backed Mr. Trump, may be featured in Democratic campaign ads this fall.
Use the gift link to read the rest.
Those are my recommended reads for today. What do you think? What else is on your mind?
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Take care, everyone. I’m exhausted. I think I’ll take a nap.
Love the kitties! Evidently, cats in streets and town cats are big deals in my parts of MENA especially Turkey. The Prophet had cats and so many of his followers and mosques have cat colonies.
Trump warns of imminent action against Cuba at ‘Shield of Americas’ summit
Trump hosted leaders from 12 nations across the Western Hemisphere.
President Donald Trump joined leaders from over a dozen other countries Saturday morning at a “Shield of the Americas” summit in Doral, Florida, where he boasted of the United States’ military actions and issued warnings against Latin American adversaries.
The White House claimed the coalition is committed to cooperating with the U.S. in taking on the cartels and securing the American border following the capture of former Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.
Among the invited attendees were: Argentinian President Javier Milei, Bolivian President Rodrigo Paz Pereira, Chilean President-elect Jose Antonio Kast and Honduran President Tito Asfura.
Trump began his remarks talking about the latest developments in the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran, telling the grouping of Western Hemisphere leaders that “tremendous progress” has been made.
“It’s been a pretty wild time, but it’s going very well,” Trump said about the military action in Iran.
The summit also comes as the conflict has resulted in major movements in the U.S. energy markets.
“We’re doing something. I built the military and rebuilt it and made it really strong. And my first administration, along with a lot of other things we did, we had a great first term, and now we’re using it, unfortunately, we have to, but you’re seeing how great it is,” the president said.
Trump repeatedly touted the U.S. military’s actions during his second term highlighting the military operation to capture Maduro, and warning of imminent action in Cuba.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-shield-of-the-americas-summit/
Absent Leaders: While U.S. President Donald Trump hosted leaders from several Latin American nations to discuss security and counter Chinese influence, reports explicitly mentioned that leaders from Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, and Peru were not in attendance.
The Shield of Americas Gathering and an Amplified Strategy to Counter China in the Western Hemisphere
The Trump Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine concerns itself with two main areas: (1) control and operation of strategic assets in the Western Hemisphere by great power adversaries and (2) control of strategic geographies. The Trump administration’s early focus on the Panama Canal, foreign-operated ports, and critical minerals demonstrates that the principal concern of the Trump Corollary is China. Furthermore, several countries, such as Argentina, Ecuador, El Salvador, and Guatemala, have already signed reciprocal trade agreements that include strong counter-China clauses, some of which are unrelated to trade specifically but encompass areas such as space cooperation. Just one week after the release of the National Security Strategy, China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs released its third policy paper on China–Latin America relations, showing no signs of slowing its efforts despite U.S. pushback. Sensing its grip over the Western Hemisphere slipping, China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has established a “task force” aimed at preserving its gains in the region and anticipating future U.S. actions.
Starting with the leaders most likely to align with Washington, the Shield of the Americas conference may be the best opportunity for the Trump administration to lay out more counter-China strategies in the Western Hemisphere. The time is ripe for renewed and revitalized economic partnerships across the Western Hemisphere, and invitees will likely form the nucleus of those pushback efforts.