Biden at debate says no one wants to screw with the USA, Houthi attacks continue in Red Sea sinking ships, diverting traffic, and driving shipping costs up 233% year over year

 

Does Joe even know?

Does Joe even remember?

 

Way to go, Brandon: The M/V Tutor is now believed to have sunk in the Red Sea after Houthi surface attack

 

Joe Biden's restraint in the Red Sea against Yemen's Houthis is a disgrace: 77 cargo ships attacked since Oct 7, container traffic down 67%, tanker traffic down 50%, US out $1 billion so far

  

 Since Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, Iran-backed Houthi rebels have lobbed missiles, drones and other weapons at commercial vessels and warships nearly every day. Although most of the weapons have been shot down, at least 77 cargo ships have been hit, and one British-owned ship carrying 20,000 tons of fertilizer aboard was sunk. ...

The Biden administration has limited its military response to the Houthi attacks, hoping to avoid being drawn into a wider Middle East conflict.

More. 

As we write the coal-carrier MV Tutor has been hit and abandoned in the Red Sea with one crew member believed to be drowned after being trapped in the flooded engine room.

Rubymar now reported sunk in the Red Sea thirteen days after Houthi attack

 

Update 3/4/24:

Red Sea internet cables may have been damaged by dragging anchor of cargo ship Rubymar on Feb 24, attacked and disabled by the Houthis on Feb 18

 The Wall Street Journal reports:

 

Attacked on Feb 18 by the Houthi Rebels and claimed sunk, the M/V Rubymar is still afloat as of last night according to CENTCOM but is mucking up the Red Sea

 

Long after Red Sea attacks began, ridiculous Biden administration appeasers finally re-adopt Trump designation of Houthis as terrorists which they had revoked in February 2021

The U.S. State Department on Wednesday designated the Iranian-backed, Yemen-based Houthi rebels as specially designated global terrorists, or SDGTs, in an effort to deter further attacks against commercial ships crossing the Red Sea. ...

The State Department under President Joe Biden revoked the Houthis’ designation as a foreign terrorist organization, or FTO, in Feb. 2021, just a month after it issued the label under former President Donald Trump.

The reversal came in response to calls from the United Nations and humanitarian groups who said that the terrorist classification and its associated sanctions were “accelerating Yemen’s slide into large-scale famine.”

Three years later, after months of Red Sea attacks, the Houthis have regained their spot on a U.S. terrorist list.

More.

American wing of the Houthi rebels reprises November attack on the White House, this time destroys new barrier fence

 It's going to be a long hot summer in Washington DC if this is what Joe Biden's going to allow in the dead of winter.

No one was arrested for this destruction, just as no one was arrested last time for damage done to the White House gate.

Delaying his response to the Houthis for months of their Red Sea attacks until last week only encouraged them to keep it up. Joe Biden's doing the same with these malcontents.

Meanwhile Joe Biden continues to hunt down leisurely non-violent Jan 6ers and put them in the slammer.

November 2023:

January 2024:

Coordinated Western attack on Houthi rebels said to be imminent

Biden loses in Afghanistan, Ukraine, and the Red Sea

 

Off again on again Maersk is off again on Red Sea/Suez Canal transit, freight rates triple

 From the story:

Uncertainty remains despite a U.S.-led military effort to curb the attacks. Maersk had resumed the Suez route, but suspended it again in recent days after one of its ships was targeted by missiles and small boats.

Asia-Europe is Maersk’s biggest trade lane, and freight rates on the route have roughly tripled from their early December levels, the Goldman Sachs analysts said, while “the impact on annual contract rates is likely to be positive, albeit dependent on how the security situation evolves.”

Maersk’s other major routes are seeing “positive second-order effects from the Suez disruption.” Global trade is also being stymied by drought in the Panama Canal.

However, analysts do not currently foresee the same level of global supply chain disruption and capacity constraint as experienced during the Covid-19 pandemic, which triggered a huge spike in freight rates and record profits for companies including Maersk.

Danish shipper Maersk suspended Red Sea transit for 48 hours after late Saturday Houthi attack, U.S. Navy claims 1,200 safe transits in the last 10 days

 From the story here:

The events surrounding the Maersk Hangzhou represented the 23rd illegal attack by the Houthis on international shipping since Nov. 19, the Central Command said. It was the first time the U.S. Navy said its personnel had killed Houthi fighters since the Red Sea attacks started. ...

Since the Pentagon announced Operation Prosperity Guardian to counter the attacks just over 10 days ago, 1,200 merchant ships have traveled through the Red Sea region, and none had been hit by drone or missile strikes, Vice Adm. Brad Cooper told The Associated Press in an interview on Saturday.

OK John

 US NAVY SINKS 3 HOUTHI BOATS
DEFENDS RED SEA MERCHANT SHIP :

The U.S. does not seek to escalate the conflict, National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby said on "Good Morning America" on Sunday.

"We don't seek a conflict wider in the region and we're not looking for a conflict with the Houthis," Kirby told ABC News' Whit Johnson. "The best outcome here would be for the Houthis to stop these attacks as we have made clear over and over again."

And just like that, 40-foot ocean freight container costs Shanghai to UK soar from $2,400 to $10,000 because of Houthi attacks in the Red Sea

CNBC reports here:

The ceiling in ocean freight prices shot up in a matter of hours on Thursday as a result of more vessels diverting from the Red Sea. CNBC has learned that logistics managers were quoted this morning an ocean freight rate of $10,000 per 40-foot container from Shanghai to the U.K. Last week, rates were $1,900 for a 20-foot container, to $2,400 for a 40-foot container. Truck rates in the Middle East now being quoted are more than double. ... As of Thursday morning, 158 vessels are currently re-routing away from the Rea Sea carrying over 2.1 million cargo containers, Kuehne + Nagel tells CNBC. The value of this cargo based on MDS Transmodal estimates of $50,000 per container is $105 billion.

 

Maersk reroutes container ships around Africa to avoid the Houthis in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden

 

Maersk said that, after monitoring the situation since suspending the routes on Friday, it had decided all vessels currently on hold and previously scheduled to travel via the Red Sea would take the Cape of Good Hope.

The vessels will continue on diverted routes “as soon as operationally feasible,” the company added. As of Monday, Maersk said it had around 20 vessels stopped en route, around half of which are east of the Gulf of Aden. The remainder are located south of the Suez Canal in the Red Sea, or north of it in the Mediterranean Sea.

More.

BP suspends Red Sea transit while Biden & Co. dither

 “In light of the deteriorating security situation for shipping in the Red Sea, bp has decided to temporarily pause all transits through the Red Sea,” it said. “We will keep this precautionary pause under ongoing review, subject to circumstances as they evolve in the region.”

 

Shipping giants MSC, Hapag-Lloyd , CMA,  CGM, and Maersk  have also all announced suspensions of travel through the Red Sea due to the drone threat, meaning no access to the key link between Europe and Asia between the Middle East and North Africa.

 

Violence resumed on Monday in the Red Sea, with the U.K. Maritime Trade Organization saying it was alerted that a vessel nearly 30 miles out from Yemen’s port of Mokha “experienced an explosion on its port side.”

More.

World's largest shipping carrier MSC abandons Red Sea/Suez Canal travel, will divert vessels around Africa after Friday attacks by Iran-backed Houthi Rebels of Yemen, Biden administration dithers and jibbers

 MSC, the world’s largest shipping carrier, joins shipping giants Hapag-Lloyd and Maersk in Red Sea travel pause amid attacks :

 

 

 

MSC, the world’s largest shipping carrier, said it is no longer traveling through the Suez Canal after its container ship, the MSC PALATIUM III, was attacked Friday while transiting the Red Sea under a subcharter to Messina Line.  ...

In response to Friday’s attacks, in which three vessels were attacked, the World Shipping Council said it is deeply alarmed and concerned about the escalating crisis, and that it’s calling for decisive action to protect seafarers.

“The right of freedom of navigation stands as a fundamental right under international law, and must be safeguarded,” the council said. “The time for resolute international engagement is now.”

The U.S. government has been in discussions with countries of the 39-member Combined Maritime Forces to form a maritime task force to “ensure safe passage” of ships in the Red Sea.

U.S. Central Command, which oversees America’s military interests in the Middle East, has told CNBC discussions are ongoing.

This is a stain on the free nations of the world, which continue to tolerate Iran-backed Houthi attacks on ships in the Red Sea

Intercepting missiles is not enough.

Maersk to pause all container ship traffic through the Red Sea 

"we have instructed all Maersk vessels in the area bound to pass through the Bab al-Mandab Strait to pause their journey until further notice”

Rush Limbaugh trumpeted the Republican retirements myth to blame them for losing the House, Twitter fools run wild with it

There weren't 43 House retirements in 2018 "fearing a wave".

Just 23 House Republicans "fled" politics and retired. But of those just 8 seats flipped to the Democrats, or 35%. 65% were Republican holds.

Republicans lost CA-39, CA-49, FL-27, MI-11, NJ-2, NJ-11, PA-06 and WA-8. If you want to blame these losses on Republican retirements, you might as well credit Republican retirements for keeping the remaining 15 seats Republican: FL-15, FL-17, KS-2, MS-03, PA-13, SC-04, TN-02, TX-02, TX-03, TX-05, TX-06, TX-21, VA-05, VA-06 and WI-01 (Paul Ryan's seat). Which will it be?

The whole idea is stupid and vindictive, especially when considering that Republicans still allocated big bucks trying to retain control of retired seats even as Republican incumbents went down to defeat in six of the ten costliest races in the nation: CA-25, CA-48, CO-6, FL-26, MN-3 and NY-19.

Reuters ranked the retired Republican WA-8 loss the second most expensive House race in the country. Another analysis put the retired Republican losses in CA-39 and CA-49 fourth and third among the ten costliest House races in the country, with the GOP-retained seat in retired TX-02 the ninth most expensive House race.

The fact of the matter is Democrats outraised and outspent Republicans in this cycle in order to repudiate the 2016 Trump victory. Considering that it was by far the most expensive midterm ever, it's a wonder Democrats didn't do better than they did. 

Republicans retained 80% of "pure" House retired seats but this fool believes whatever Rush Limbaugh says