Monday Blues and Jews...

Good morning, reader(s) of Stroock's Books, and happy December. Temps hover around freezing and there's a bit of frost on the ground. The weather babe tells us to expect a little snow tomorrow. 

December sales numbers are in. Keeping to form, sales of our latest novel, War Night, Stories of the Great Nuclear War of 1975, declined about 20 percent, month on month. War Night is still not quite in backlist territory yet. As usual sales look like the Normandy invasion + Australia, with various Euros bringing up the rear.  

Our 'Good morning, Substack this is your [insert day] reminder that Israel is great' posts get hundreds of likes. We usually link to one of our novels in the post now. Are we moving merch? 

On a whim we read the first story in To Survive the Earth last night. In this story a bunch of suburbanites are watching TV news (Fox) as the aliens arrive.  We barely remembered it, TBH. File and forget, as the great Robert Stacy McCain says. We did enjoy what we read, though. So that's a + for us. 

Well the Broncos and Redskins gave the NFL fan all he could ask for last night, including a Redskins loss in overtime. The Jets beat the Falcons. Yawn. The Giants play the Patriots tonight. Ugh. That should be pretty ugly. Or should it? 

In Israel, Iron Beam, which has already been battlefield tested, goes live at the end of the month. Iron Beam greatly changes the Israeli's calculus vis a vis Lebanon and Hezbollah. Notes JNS, 'The estimated cost per firing [Iron Beam] is about $2 to $5, compared to $40,000 to $80,000 for a single Iron Dome interceptor.' Iron Dome is obsolete and the Jew is clever. Exit question, what is Hezbollah's response?

Do note that while the Europeans make lots of noise condemning Israel, in the coming years they'll be lining up to buy Israeli weapons as they scramble to defend themselves from the big, bad bear. 

Reader(s) may recall that Netanyahu is caught up in a years long corruption trial. This blog calls bullshit on the whole affair. Champagne and cigars, who cares? Bibi has requested a pardon from President Isaac Herzog. Why not? Naftali Bennet (whom we hope is PM, some day) says the pardon should be issued in exchange for Bibi exiting politics for good. This is not a bad idea. 

Meanwhile, Israeli Opposition Leader Yair Lapid* has proposed a bill denying voting rights to draft dodgers. This bill is aimed at the Haredi, who continue to refuse service arguing their religious study is service. This blog supports Lapid's measure 100 percent. The Arab parties are not entirely happy with the bill, though. Note, Arabs can serve but are not subject to the draft. One day there will be peace, or relative calm, anyway. Fixing the Haredi situation will be the top domestic priority. 

...You see Monday is kind of a blue day, start of the week and all. It's cold outside leading to blue weather aesthetically, the Israeli flag is blue and white. The Giants play tonight. We're a bit blue ourselves....oh never mind. 

*Lapid is a fierce Bibi critic. We've no problem with the man. As the great Benjamin Disraeli (oh look, more Jews) said, the job of the Opposition is to oppose. Rumors are Netanyahu will call for an election next summer. While reelecting Bibi would piss off all the right people across the globe, the man would have to earn our vote.