Odds and Ends — 21 March 2026

In the run-up to Hungary’s pivotal election in April, a unit of Russia’s foreign intelligence service last month began sounding the alarm over plummeting public support for Prime Minister Viktor Orban, whose friendly ties to Moscow have long given the Kremlin a strategic foothold inside NATO and the European Union.
Officers from the intelligence service, or SVR, suggested that drastic action might be necessary — a strategy they called ‘the Gamechanger.’ In an internal report for the SVR… the operatives proposed a way to ‘fundamentally alter the entire paradigm of the election campaign’ — ‘the staging of an assassination attempt on Viktor Orban.’

They saw how effective the staging was in Butler, Pennsylvania?

'This is about attention': Mike Lee's MAGA crusade is driving his colleagues crazy

———— Stark. Raving. Mad. ————

https://twitter.com/MattZeitlin/status/2034987411902533929

FEMA Official Claims He Was Teleported to Waffle House

As millions of Americans braced for a series of brutal storms this winter, the senior official in charge of the federal government’s disaster response had been on the job only a few weeks — and had previously claimed on podcasts that he once teleported to a Waffle House.
Gregg Phillips, appointed in December to lead FEMA’s Office of Response and Recovery, rose to prominence not through his time as a federal emergency management professional but as a far-right activist who spread conspiracy theories about voter fraud and frequently used violent rhetoric toward political opponents.
Most notably, Phillips on multiple podcasts made bizarre claims to have been involuntarily teleported, including once to a Georgia Waffle House 50 miles away.
Said Phillips: “Teleporting is no fun. It was real.”

Yes, it’s satire. Also, spot on.

———— Putin&Krasnov vs. Ukraine ————

https://twitter.com/nexta_tv/status/2034930446300312044

———— Melon Husk ————

Musk responsible for Twitter investors’ stock dropping when he bought company, jury rules

California jurors hand win to investors who sued billionaire saying he publicly disparaged social media platform in 2022

———— Hegseth on the Rocks ————

https://twitter.com/OunkaOnX/status/2034853838482809324

Hegseth Invokes Divine Purpose to Justify War

More than any top American military leader in recent history, Mr. Hegseth has framed U.S. military operations in the Middle East, Africa and Latin America as bigger than politics or foreign policy. Often he has imbued these actions with a Christian moral underpinning that suggests they are divinely sanctioned.
It is this view of a higher power, married to lethal American firepower, that Mr. Hegseth says gives him confidence that the United States will prevail in Iran.

https://twitter.com/lrozen/status/2035031318015152650

https://twitter.com/TheMaineWonk/status/2035103233404752006