It’s just another Manic Monday: October 12, 2026, and National Pulled Pork Day. Here’s a plate of the stuff at the Waiahole Poi Factory (it’s the Hawaiian version: kalua pig), along with beef laulau, a vegetable, and, my favorite, poi. I love poi, though others can’t abide it, and the Waiahole Poi factory, where it’s made on the spot, is the best poi I found in Hawaii. Sadly, I’ve never found the real stuff on the mainland.
It’s also Indigenous Peoples’ Day, National Gumbo Day, and in Canada it’s Thanksgiving.
Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the October 12 Wikipedia page.
Da Nooz:
*The Houthis attacked the Riyadh airport in Saudi Arabia, killing at least 12 people and injuring 309. Big time attack, requiring a big time response:
A missile attack on Saudi Arabia’s international airport killed at least 12 people and injured hundreds more on Saturday, in strikes carried out by Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi militants to which the kingdom’s military vowed a response.
The attacks, the deadliest in Saudi Arabia in more than a decade, shook the kingdom, which has struggled for weeks to fend off militant strikes amid a surge in cross-border tension.
Major General Turki Al-Malki, a spokesman for the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen, said that the attack, which killed and injured civilian passengers and airport workers, amounted to a war crime by the Houthi militia and that coalition forces would respond.
Among the dead were one American, four Saudi nationals, a Palestinian and residents from Bangladesh, Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Sudan, according to the kingdom’s civil aviation authority.
Missiles landed direct hits on Terminals 3 and 4 of the King Khalid International Airport, injuring more than 300 people, the civil aviation authority said. Several of them remained in critical condition, and the airport suffered extensive damage, with parts of the roof falling on people inside, Saudi officials said.
Ambulances and helicopters were sent to collect the wounded and take them to hospitals nearby, the officials said. Doctors were called in from other hospitals to help with the surge of patients, they said.
Saudi Arabia has vowed a big-time response:
The United States is providing Saudi Arabia with intelligence support, analysts and U.S. officials say. But the administration has so far stopped short of the direct military assistance that officials in Saudi Arabia and its allies in Yemen’s internationally recognized government have sought.
After Saturday’s attack, Trump told reporters he was weighing whether to join Saudi strikes on the rebel group, later adding that the U.S. “has communication with the Houthis.”
Trump has been reluctant to go after the Houthis, even though they’ve participated in blocking the Red Sea and impeding traffic through the Suez Canal by blocking the narrowBab al-Mandeb Strait. They’re also fundamentalist Shiite Iranian proxy and are trying to take over Yemen. Given that Saudi Arabia has a large army and an especially good Air Force, I wouldn’t mind them joining forces with the U.S. and Israel (see the next piece) to extirpate the Houthis.
UPDATE: Several places report a Saudi military response, but details are missing. Yesterday, the Houthis struck the Riyadh airport again, killing one and injuring 11.
*In response to the Houthi attack, Amit Segal argues, on the It’s Noon in Israel site, that “The Saudis need to become Israeli.”
It’s Sunday, October 11, and last night at least 12 people were killed and 309 wounded in a Houthi attack on Riyadh’s King Khalid International Airport. Saudi Arabia’s response is unlikely to prioritize the “protection of civilians, and self-control” as it encouraged Israel to do in the wake of October 7. But nor, to its great detriment, will it take the Israeli route: the one that leads to lasting security.
The strike comes a week into Operation Dawn of Yemen, a Saudi-backed offensive by Yemeni government forces against the Iranian-backed Houthis. With the help of some 100 Saudi jets, government-aligned forces have already retaken key stretches of coast along Bab el-Mandeb. But even as the Houthis are hard-pressed, and Yemeni officials talk optimistically of driving all the way to Houthi-held Sanaa, the Saudis are keeping one eye on the rearview mirror.
After joining the Iran war late and hesitantly, firing their first missiles at Israel only a month in, the Houthis largely held their fire against the Jewish state and found a much softer target in the Gulf monarchy. In July they declared a naval blockade on the kingdom. Riyadh’s response has typically been tepid: limited airstrikes and quiet diplomacy.
That has long been the Saudi playbook. Even at the height of its war on the Houthis, the kingdom kept one hand extended. In 2019, after Houthi-claimed drone strikes on its oil facilities, it said it viewed a Houthi truce offer “positively.” In 2020 it told the Houthis, through back channels, that it would sign a UN-brokered nationwide ceasefire in exchange for a buffer zone on its border. In 2021 it publicly offered a ceasefire and the reopening of Sanaa airport, with its foreign minister declaring “it is up to the Houthis now.” Since the 2022 truce, the kingdom has largely halted offensive operations even in the face of sporadic provocations. Even when the United States and Britain began addressing the Houthi problem in January 2024, Riyadh called for “self-restraint” from the sidelines. As recently as mid-September, with the Houthis fresh from seizing Mocha, the kingdom reportedly offered them a two-week ceasefire and direct talks through Omani mediators.
Rather than a new dawn for Riyadh’s Yemen policy, this war is simply a means to negotiate. After the Houthis’ advance last month, Riyadh concluded that it could not enter new talks while the Houthis held Bab el-Mandeb. Without U.S. support, it will likely declare victory if it simply pushes the Houthis off the Red Sea coast and restores quiet.
This is where the two countries [Israel and Saudi Arabia] diverge.
Surveying the destruction of its territory, Israel understood that such a threat could not be allowed to rebuild on its border, and, despite American misgivings, went about uprooting Hamas. The Saudis, looking at their burning tankers and smoldering oil facilities, also resolved that the situation had to be dealt with. So they called Washington for help, were rebuffed, and settled for a particularly aggressive round of mowing.
. . .That Israel has never had the luxury of the status quo lies at the root of what separates it from many of America’s allies, and from America itself. It is why the Houthis will happily strike King Khalid International Airport but now think twice about Ben Gurion. It is why the Saudis will not try anything without Washington holding their hand, while Washington grips Israel’s for dear life to keep it from upending the status quo.
. . . The Houthis in the mountains of northern Yemen present a different challenge from Hamas in its tunnels under Gaza, but the lesson of appeasing terror is the same. If the Saudis want to find themselves safer five years from now, they should start reading up on Zionism.
Indeed, for the Houthis have missiles and will have more if they’re not stopped. They’re just a short rocket flight from Saudi Arabia, and of course the Saudis have all the oil, oil that has to be moved. Amit Segal is right: the Saudis need to do something, and do it now.
*More juvenile behavior from Trump: now he’s going after Ukraine’s President Zelensky, blaming him for the high price of diesel gas in the U.S. and saying that Ukraine should get a new leader.
President Donald Trump said Saturday it was time for Ukraine to get a new president, suggesting Volodymyr Zelenskyy has not done enough to end his country’s war with Russia and blaming him for high diesel prices in the U.S.
“I suggest they get a new leader who can make a deal because he could have made many deals and for some reason he never does,” Trump said.
The president, who on Friday struck a deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin to buy diesel from Russia in an attempt to address high fuel prices ahead of the U.S. midterm elections, has been urging Zelenskyy for weeks to stop strikes on Russian energy infrastructure. He has also sought to blame record U.S. diesel prices on Ukraine rather than the U.S.-led war in Iran, which has elevated world energy prices.
“He wants to make problems for the world. He wants to make problems for our farmers, our ranchers, with diesel fuel,” Trump said, before departing for Tennessee where he was set to rally Republican voters.
No, Zelensky just wants to survive in the face of a very real threat to his country. And he’s done a good job as leader, but all Trump can do is beef about gas prices. I don’t expect him to send more help to Ukraine, even though gas prices will not appreciably fall before the midterms. And of course Trump made a deal with Putin to get more diesel, which is like making a deal with the devil. But here’s what he’s saying now:
Ukrainian and European officials on Saturday reacted to Trump’s diesel deal with dismay, saying it will help pay for Russia’s war efforts. Diesel prices have skyrocketed due to a collision of events, including the difficulty of getting oil out of the Middle East since the start of the Iran war, which has raised the price of all oil products.
Trump also suggested that if he had been U.S. president in 2022, “that war would have never started. There was no reason that war with Ukraine and Russia started. It started due to incompetence.”
Whose incompetence is he talking about? Biden’s? Zelensky’s? Because he’s sure not talking about Putin.
*The pushback on the award of the Nobel Prize to Navi Pillay, an advocate of The Genocide Lie, has received surprisingly widespread pushback, though of course the liberal MSM won’t decry it (the NYT has an admiring profile of Pillay). But the WSJ said what needed to be said, and I found a screenshot of their op-ed on Facebook (click to enlarge it):
Granted, Pillay did some good stuff, but it’s recognized that the Prize came largely from her work on a UN committee trying to prosecute Israel for genocide. I can’t figure out what’s the worse award: Pillay’s or Yasser Arafat’s. In response to the award, Trump went into full Two Year Old Mode, saying that he should have won eight Nobel Prizes. Here’s his self-aggrandizing Truth Social post. He’ll never get a Nobel Prize. Notice the misspelled “Nobel” in the last line. Does nobody check his tweets?
*Among a host of rare birds in New Zealand, the black robin (Petroica traversi), once reduced to a single breeding pair (4 males and one fertile female named “Old Blue”), has been named the country’s Bird of the Year after a striking comeback. There are now about 390 of them.
The black robin, once the world’s rarest bird before an extraordinary conservation project brought it back from brink of extinction, has been crowned New Zealand’s bird of the year, after record voter turnout.
The tiny bird is found only in the Chatham Islands, 800km east of mainland New Zealand. Called kakaruia in Māori and karure in Morirori – the language indigenous to the Chathams – the birds are also fondly known as the “goth” of New Zealand’s bird world, for its striking black plumage, black eyes and a little pointy black beak.
Habitat loss and introduced pests devastated its population, and by the 1970s there were five birds left. Just one breeding pair remained: Old Blue, the matriarch, and Old Yellow. A breeding programme that pioneered using other species to foster parent the robins’ eggs proved a success, and its numbers have steadily climbed to 350 adult birds, although it is still classed as “threatened”.
“They are really cute,” said Jess Mackenzie, spokesperson for the Chatham Islands Landscape Restoration Trust, adding that the black robin has been in the top five birds for the past few years but never clinched a win.
“It’s a bird that New Zealanders definitely love and know,” she said.
Despite the name, the black robin is not in the same family as overseas robins and is a distinct species. In the Chathams, they live in lowland coastal forest on two restricted, pest-free nature reserves.
While a conservation success story, the black robin is not “saved yet”, Mackenzie said. Habitat on their islands is is nearly at capacity, and a third pest-free island is needed.
. . .The 2026 competition attracted a record 105,000 votes. About 88% of the votes were cast from New Zealand.
The world’s heaviest parrot, the kākāpō, came second and the 2025 winner, the country’s only falcon, the kārearea, finished third.
Over the years, the contest has been subject to scandal, from crowning a bat the winner in 2021, to accusations of Russian interference in 2019, and claims Australians attempted to rig the contest in favour of the shag in 2018.
In 2023, British-American comedian and talkshow host John Oliver ran a global campaign for the threatened pūteketeke, which was then crowned the winner that year.
Only Kiwis should be allowed to vote in this contest. And a bat???
Here’s a photo from Wikipedia (they can’t say whether it’s male or female). Isn’t it cute?
Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Andrzej has cleaned house on the Listy website:
Hili: You look like something’s bothering you.
Andrzej: I threw out three trolls today. I’m afraid they might be upset.
In Polish:
Hili: Wyglądasz jakbyś miał jakiś problem.
Ja: Wyrzuciłem dziś trzy trolle, martwię się, że im może być przykro.
*******************
From Meow Incorporated:
From 
From 2025 Darwin Awards!!!/Epic Fails!!!:
An odious man claiming that whipping of women in Iran is very gentle. The picture give the lie to that. From Masih. If you can’t see the tweet, click here to see it. (Embedding is probably prohibited for reasons I’m not clear on.)
Let me introduce you to another Iranian woman who received 74 lashes for removing her hijab in public.
A woman from Tehran sent me this video showing the scars left on her body. Her crime? Refusing to cover her hair.
Mohammad Marandi, one of the Islamic Republic’s defenders in Western media, justified the flogging of women by saying: “It’s not like hitting a horse. It was a very light strike, in a particular way.”
Look at her wounded body. Does this look like a light strike to you?
74 lashes. For showing her hair. In the 21st century.
To those who still deny the suffering of Iranian women: Look at these scars. Look at what this regime does to women who demand control over their own bodies.
The Islamic Republic whips women in Persian and then tries to justify it in English.
We will not let them hide the scars. We will not let them silence these women.
— Masih Alinejad (@AlinejadMasih) October 10, 2026
From Matthew. Larry was operated on, but it appears to be just a nonmalignant cyst. We love him!
The Number Ten Cat’s tweet:
Chicks dig the scar
— Larry the Cat (@number10cat.bsky.social) 2026-10-11T17:59:49.878Z
From Simon: Larry on Trump:
f you could find a way to generate electricity from Ronald Reagan spinning in his grave you’d be able to power the Eastern Seaboard right now.
— Larry the Cat (@Number10cat) October 10, 2026
John Cleese got reported to the coppers for “Islamophobia”!
I can’t wait to be arrested
This is a real life sitcom !
Please tell the police to contact my agent
— John Cleese (@JohnCleese) October 5, 2026
Two from my feed. This first one is fantastic:
Great kindness https://t.co/dUNZyPjog9
— Wolf of X (@WolfofX) October 11, 2026
From a fellow squirrel lover:
This guy built a squirrel city with over 1,000 homes, complete with cameras to capture what they get up to
including hugging and “kissing” their loved ones in the privacy of their own homes. https://t.co/J59oPC62KH
— Science girl (@sciencegirl) October 11, 2026
One I reposted from The Auschwitz Memorial:
This Dutch Jewish infant, David, was gassed as soon as he arrived in Auschwitz–along with his older brother. David was two years old and would b 86 today had he lived.
— Jerry Coyne (@Evolutionistrue) October 12, 2026
Some music: a very famous jazz version of “Body and Soul” recorded by Coleman Hawkins (aka “Bean”) in 1939—nearly a decade after it was written by Johnny Green, Edward Heyman, Robert Sour and Frank Eyton. It was intended as a pop song, not a jazz song, but Hawkins did the most famous version.
From Wikipedia:
One of the most famous and influential takes was recorded by Coleman Hawkins and His Orchestra on October 11, 1939, at their only recording session for Bluebird, a subsidiary of RCA Victor. The recording is unusual in that the song’s melody is only hinted at in the recording; Hawkins’ two-choruses of improvisation over the tune’s chord progression constitute almost the entire take. Jazz critic Leonard Feather says, “This became his biggest hit and established him as a national name.” Because of this, as well as the imaginative use of harmony and break from traditional swing cliches, the recording is recognised as part of the “early tremors of bebop“. In 2004, the Library of Congress entered it into the National Recording Registry.
You can hear a more standard version, with the lyrics, in this recording by Frank Sinatra. It shows how much improvisation went into Bean’s version below.
A just posted thirty-minute video discussion of Saudi-Houti situation from Times of Israel at url
All lines of longitude converge at the north pole as well as at the south pole, so there are two places on earth where you can be in all time zones at once.
Happy Columbus Day to those that observe!
Today, we raise our Collective Consciousness, to sublate the centers of power, with the power of language.
I am not sure why the Saudis leadership has been so hesitant about responding to Houthi provocations before. Is it out of reluctance to attack fellow Muslims for a cause that is also entangled with Israel?
Give us this day, our daily Dialectic, as we look at some achievements that made indigenous peoples great :
“Feeding the gods: Hundreds of skulls reveal massive scale of human sacrifice in Aztec capital
Archaeologists uncover the remains of a giant rack of skulls beneath downtown Mexico City”
21 JUN 2018
Lizzie Wade
Science Magazine
Excerpts from :
Chapter 3: “Lie#3 : “Native Americans Were Peaceful People Who Spent All Day Dancing” in
Lies My Liberal Teacher Told Me (W. Reilly, Harper Collins 2024) :
“Let us, briefly, return to the Pacific Coast of North America and see what those large canoes praised by History Central were used for! As it turns out, in addition to occasionally engaging in ritual man-eating, powerful Pacific Northwest tribes like the Haida and the Kwakiutl were among the greatest warrior-pirates in history – using hand-carved boats the length of Byzantine warships to effortlessly raid hundreds of miles down the left coast of North America.”
[..]
“Slaves— unsurprisingly, given all this-had a fairly standardized value throughout the Pacific Northwest region. Per Mitchell, a single healthy slave was valued at 150 to 200 woven cloth blankets by the Haida, 100 blankets by the Kwakiutl, 200 blankets by the Tsishaat, 100 to 200 blankets by the Makah, 80 or more blankets by the Halkomelem, and up to 100 blankets (although, oddly, sometimes as few as 20) by the Chinook. Where elk skins were used in barter instead, Tsimshian tribal members would pay 15, and Stikine warriors and women 18 to 20. One of the few real outliers on the chart is the northerly Yakutat, who preferred to trade in exotic sea otter skins and would only pay two of them for an unfortunate Homo sapiens. ”
“And so the dialectic continues.”
-Delgado and Stefancic
Critical Race Theory – An Introduction, p.66, 3rd Ed., 2017