{"id":32508,"date":"2026-02-23T10:28:00","date_gmt":"2026-02-23T10:28:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/?p=32508"},"modified":"2026-02-23T22:32:18","modified_gmt":"2026-02-23T22:32:18","slug":"state-of-the-onion-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/state-of-the-onion-3\/","title":{"rendered":"State of the Onion"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone  wp-image-32510\" src=\"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/022326-1-e1771885854905.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"359\" height=\"92\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Snow Delays &amp; Regime Change Windows<\/p>\n<p>Miles stood before the White Board like a man briefing a reluctant empire.<\/p>\n<p>STATE OF THE UNION \u2013 Tomorrow Night<br \/>\nHe tapped it with the marker.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWith the USS Ford strike group still sliding east across the Mediterranean, and a prime-time address tomorrow, war with Iran probably can\u2019t happen until Wednesday at the earliest.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Rocket nodded solemnly.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou don\u2019t start World War Whatever during network sweeps.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Splash leaned in to lift a fritter from the platter Deirdre slid across the table, steam rising toward the light above the center of the Conference Table.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd the Ford?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Miles smirked.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe USS Ford is a $13-billion reminder that America does not impulse-buy aircraft carriers. It took a while for the new electric catapults and things to work. It arrives when it\u2019s ready. Preferably after cable news panels finish arguing about it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Rocket added: \u201cBesides, the President gave them ten days to stop enriching uranium. We\u2019re currently in the \u2018strongly worded letter with carrier escort\u2019 phase.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Splash chewed thoughtfully. \u201cThey could activate sleeper cells in Europe in response to what our Armada might do. Hit embassies. Stir up Hormuz. Or they could wait for polling.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He glanced at the snow outside and the weather images on his iPad,<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-32511\" src=\"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/022326-2-e1771885934389.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"650\" height=\"282\" \/><br \/>\n\u201cBut today feels less apocalyptic and more atmospheric.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Melissa motioned Holly forward with another platter.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBefore we topple a theocracy,\u201d Dierdre announced, \u201cwe fuel the democracy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>There was respectful silence as more fritters were deployed.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone  wp-image-32512\" src=\"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/022326-3-e1771885909585.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"552\" height=\"169\" \/><br \/>\nMiles nodded.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWar remains in Early Production. Weather is Live. Onions are fully operational. And let us frame the story like this:&#8221; The black marker came out to print the forecast:<\/p>\n<p>Outside: snow paralysis.<br \/>\nInside: layered speculation.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-32513\" src=\"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/022326-4-e1771885881568.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"650\" height=\"348\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 Vic Socotra<br \/>\nwww.vicsocotra.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Snow Delays &amp; Regime Change Windows Miles stood before the White Board like a man briefing a reluctant empire. STATE OF THE UNION \u2013 Tomorrow Night He tapped it with the marker. \u201cWith the USS Ford strike group still sliding east across the Mediterranean, and a prime-time address tomorrow, war with Iran probably can\u2019t happen [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32508","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-daily-socotra"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32508","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32508"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32508\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32515,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32508\/revisions\/32515"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32508"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32508"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32508"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}