Matthew Yglesias: 75 Percent Of What catches Condi Rice floundering when asked how many al-Qaeda people are being counted as “leaders” when Bush et. al say they have captured or killed '75 percent of the al-Qaeda known leadership' . Given the vagueness of her answer, which appears due to total ignorance as to either the real facts or how this factoid was concocted, Matt Yglesias concludes “they could mean as few as eight people.”
Recent Bluessky Posts- Gotta wonder if Hakeem Jeffries's sudden spine on DHS funding might be connected to the growing number of insurgent Congressional candidates who are not willing to commit to voting for him as speaker. (Links in Alt text.) February 11, 2026 Michael Froomkin
- Also could be false negatives. We don't know. February 11, 2026 Michael Froomkin
- Am I alone in believing that when a politician or other public figure says "frankly" that is almost always a tell that they're lying? February 11, 2026 Michael Froomkin
- Amtrak says it requires ID to reserve a ticket, store luggage, and more. www.amtrak.com/passenger-id... February 11, 2026 Michael Froomkin
- Jotwell T&E: Victoria J. Haneman, Leveraging Trust Law to Protect Child Influencers, JOTWELL (Feb. 11, 2026) (reviewing Naomi Cahn, Trusting Remedies for the Child Influencer Space: Blocked Trust Accounts and Child Beneficiaries, 17 Drexel L. Rev. 971 (2025)), trustest.jotwell.com/leveraging-t.... February 11, 2026 Jotwell
Rice, of course, is supposed to be the person to make sense of the possibly confusing different takes coming up from different agencies.
How much confidence can we have in an administration where the national security adviser does not know within AN ORDER OF MAGNITUDE* what impact we are having in our “war” against an enemy which attacked us, an attack which, by the way, CHANGED EVERYTHING.
* [how many killed or captured?] — “I would suspect that that’s in the tens to hundreds”