The Idea of Changing Your Mind Confuses Democrats

posted by Derek Hunter at Townhall 

Ever change your mind on anything or anyone? I bet you have. Do you know why I’d bet that way? Because you’re a human being, which makes you capable of all sorts of amazing things, especially the ability to learn new things and adapt to that knowledge. OK, maybe not ALL human beings have that skill – I’d tell Democrats to change their minds, but they shouldn’t work without tools – but those with an IQ larger than their hat size certainly can. This is why so many in the media seem to be confused by the idea that some people have changed their minds about Donald Trump.

Just after high school, my then-best friend met another friend in college who started hanging around our group. God, I hated that guy. It wasn’t jealousy; he was a jerk, and I had no interest in being around him. But he kept coming around the jerk, and eventually, I realized something: not that he wasn’t a jerk (we were all kinds of jerks), but that he was my kind of a jerk. 

We became great friends once we got past that initial couple of months (and it was quite a while) of disliking each other. He was at my wedding, and I spoke to him more frequently than the other guy. Life is weird that way, isn’t it?

I remember that every time I see some “news” outlet reporting about what someone who endorses him now called Donald Trump in the past. People grow up, people change, and people see results they did not expect or even think possible and adapt to that reality. Again, by people, I mean people who aren’t committed, ideological, progressive leftist Democrats. While they are technically people, they are like stalkers who are convinced Taylor Swift is sending them secret messages to notice, let alone acknowledge, the failures of their beliefs or actions. 

Republican Vice-Presidential nominee JD Vance wasn’t always a fan of Donald Trump’s. Vance, in the 2016 race when he was just a best-selling author and venture capitalist, said some really harsh things about Trump. So had I. So did just about everyone I know in politics, both famous and not. Why wouldn’t we have?

All anyone knew about Trump was what he said on the campaign trail, his TV show, and what we’d read in the newspapers for decades. His core philosophy didn’t seem very core, as he was on whatever side of whatever was happening at any given moment. He didn’t need to be consistent as he didn’t operate in the world of politics, just around the edges.

You’d see his pictures with Ronald Reagan and the Clintons. They took their picture with him for the same reason he took his picture with them: they were famous. Nothing was more profound than what rich and famous people do.

Then, Trump was elected President. In that job, he exceeded almost everyone’s expectations (I know Ann Coulter’s weren’t, but just about everyone else). That’s not to say Trump Derangement Syndrome didn’t have its casualties – some people never came around, no matter how many of their sworn life priorities Trump actually implemented. These Humpty Dumpties will spend forever shattering themselves into ever smaller pieces, unable to admit what is right in front of them.

Everyone else has opened their eyes. 

That won’t, however, stop the left from trying to drive a wedge between people on the right over Trump. “Tucker Carlson Hails Trump as ‘Bravest Man’ in RNC Speech After Telling Staffer, ‘I Hate Him Passionately,’” screams one headline. Another reads, “Elon Musk Called Trump a ‘Stone-Cold Loser,’ According to NYT Report on Billionaire’s Rocky Relationship With Ex-President.” Now, both endorse him. What does that mean? (BTW, I know Tucker, and that’s just how he talks/texts. It’s how most people do; no one interesting is nuanced in texts. As for Musk, I don’t know him, though I would love to – hit me up, E – but I have read the Walter Isaacson book on him a couple of times and he changes his mind when new facts present themselves. It’s how he’s gotten to space and how he’ll get to Mars.)

Well, the negative quotes are from years ago, which means Tucker and Elon have had new information to digest, digested it and have come to different conclusions. Or, even though they still hold their prior beliefs, they’ve seen Joe Biden and the Democrats in action and recognize how much better Trump is by comparison. Either way, they’ve changed their opinion. 

It’s a sign of intelligence to take in new facts and circumstances and adapt your thinking, it’s why no one on MSNBC has ever done it. OK, they have changed in that they’ve gone from “Trump is Hitler” to “Trump is Mecha-Hitler” to “Trump is Super-Mecha-Hitler,” but self-affirmation is not what I’m talking about. 

Human beings, intelligent ones, admit when they’re wrong and learn from it. How stupid would you be if you held fast to everything you thought when you were 20? I’d be a dope-smoking moron, likely with a rotten liver, and would not have one of my best friends. If I stood fast to what I thought starting in mid-June 2015, I’d be my underpants cheering on Rachel Maddow, Joy Reid, and the rest of their Reich Cabinet of National Salvation in front of an LED screen pretending to be at the Republican convention on MSNBC. But I’m not. And you are not. Fewer and fewer people are, which only reinforces what I’ve been saying here. 

This is why Democrats are scrambling to replace Biden. They have no other game, so they’re going to try to rerun the same one with someone else at the top of it. Maybe the media should focus a little bit more on the reality of that, not just the surface facts, rather than on how people thought differently about someone years ago than they do now.

X22, And we Know, and more- July 21

 

Well now, this is quite a way to start a new week!

The Tide Has Turned

Biden is in full-on collapse. Liberals are despairing. Trump has never looked stronger. We are going to make America great again and there is nothing the left can do to stop it.

by Josiah Lippincott for American Greatness

For a split second, America stood at a crossroads. We were 1/4^th of an inch from a leaderless right-wing and liberals getting what they’ve not-so-secretly dreamed of for years.

But the assassin’s bullet missed. Was it a gust of Divine Wind, the spirit of our forefathers, or Providence himself who intervened? Perhaps all three?

Trump rose from the stage, blood streaming down his face and his fist in the air. Electrifying. That was real courage. Even Trump’s enemies had to acknowledge the greatness of that moment. Real virtue strikes the soul before any articulable cognition. Real virtue does not need to explain itself. Some men simply have more. More favor, more nobility, more sheer being.

Trump is one of those men. He is the greatest man of the age and a harbinger of something higher and more noble. In a time where decline is all around us and the lowest human types are in charge, Trump points to something better and higher.

His immediate reaction to being shot revealed once and for all that Trump’s virtues are not simply marketing. He is not a “con man” or a clown. Trump is real in a way that his enemies are not.

In early July, I wrote that Trump was a “Man of Destiny” who was going to win in November. I have never been more certain I was correct. Trump’s miraculous survival from the attempted assassination generated a seismic spiritual shift. We are in a new timeline, on the Golden Path. We can all feel it.

Peachy Keenan put it well over on Twitter:

I have been feeling like I’m in a dream, like how is Trump alive, he was not supposed to survive. I have not been able to shake this strange feeling of living in an alternate universe.

I just figured out what it feels like –hear me out.

It feels exactly like he WAS killed and died that day, but then so many prayers went up from around the world that it somehow reversed time, maybe just for a split second, and reran the event, and this time he lived.

Strangest feeling of having lived Version 1, but now we’re in Version 2. My husband agreed. Anyone else? We are sober lol.

It has never been more over for the libs.

As Tucker Carlson pointed out earlier this year, the logical conclusion of the ever-escalating attacks on Trump—from the pee tapes to Russiagate to impeachment to COVID to the fraudulent 2020 election and then the dozens of felonies—pointed, inevitably, to assassination. The next step after Biden’s disastrous debate performance was violence. The only way to stop Trump was to kill him.

But it didn’t work. Trump wasn’t supposed to live. The weaponized incompetence of the Secret Service was supposed to culminate in Trump’s brains getting blown out on live television. That was what was supposed to happen.

But it didn’t. By 1/4^th of an inch.

The whole American Left, for years, had been gathering its energy for this. Trump dying at the hands of a mentally ill MK Ultra freakazoid was the whole point of Biden’s rhetoric about Trump as a “danger to democracy” and his ranting about MAGA Republicans being the source of American fascism. It was the whole point of the unhinged insanity directed by the left for nearly 10 years now.

And it didn’t work. The left is now exhausted. Spent.

The only options now are to try and force America into a war with Russia and cancel the election or to try and use even more brutal methods against Trump. An IED strike on a rally, perhaps?

And yet, in all honesty, those options don’t feel real. There is no consensus in The Blob for Biden. How can the ruling class guide the nation into a shooting war with a nuclear power in a moment like this? How can they contrive the proper false flag attack to generate support for an existential war to “save democracy” when virtually no one in the country today believes that the assassin this past weekend was acting alone?

With the decrepit Biden precariously perched at the top of the Democrat ticket, how can they plausibly engineer mass fraud? Even the biggest Democratic donors don’t believe it. $90 million in pledged funds to left-wing SuperPACs has been frozen. Clooney is calling for Biden to step down in the pages of the NYT and leading Democrat strategists are telling reporters that they have resigned themselves to a second Trump presidency.

All of this feels inevitable. From the moment that Trump rose up off that stage, everything felt possible. On Monday, Judge Aileen Cannon threw out the classified documents case against Trump and Trump chose a right-wing populist as his vice president pick.

Biden is in full-on collapse. Liberals are despairing. Trump has never looked stronger or more alive.

That energy, this spiritual vibe shift, has spread throughout the land. Patriots are reinvigorated and filled with hope. Trump was right—we are going to win so much that we will be sick of winning.

We are going to make America great again and there is nothing the left can do to stop it.

Counterpoint:

Trump Supporters Must Avoid Overconfidence

https://amgreatness.com/2024/07/20/trump-supporters-must-avoid-overconfidence/

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JD Vance Stopped State Department Nominees Because of 'Woke' Policies and That's Supposed to Be Bad

streiff reporting for RedState 

Vice Presidential nominee JD Vance used his prerogative as a US Senator to temporarily derail the nominations of over 30 Biden-nominated ambassadors over the issue of using US embassies as a launching pad to push various 'woke' issues on host countries. The tool used by Vance was a very detailed questionnaire that required nominees to answer some uncomfortable questions.

Armed with a questionnaire on hot-button social issues about gay and lesbian rights, gender transition care and hiring practices related to diversity, equity and inclusion, Vance (R-Ohio) held up for more than a year the nominations of dozens of diplomats assigned to serve in posts across the Middle East, Africa and Latin America.

A copy of Vance’s questionnaire, obtained by The Washington Post and published here for the first time, asked would-be ambassadors if they would increase the number of “gender-neutral bathrooms” in U.S. embassies, boost resources for “gender dysphoria and gender transition care” and raise the “Progress flag” during “regional Pride celebrations.”

“The publics of many of our allies, and those countries we seek to build stronger relationships with, have traditional Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or Hindu moral values,” Vance wrote in the questionnaire he provided to all nominees. “If confirmed, how would you explain to them what the United States’ promoting ‘human rights for LGBTQ people’ would look like in their country?”

Eventually, Vance worked out agreements with all but two nominees. The nomination of David Kostelancik as ambassador to Albania remains in limbo. The nomination of Stephanie Sullivan to be US Ambassador to the African Union was eventually approved by the Senate, breaking cloture on Vance's hold. Here is a great clip of Vance roasting her from the well of the Senate.

Some members of the diplomatic corps cried foul.

“It puts career diplomats in a bind to be asked to go on the record commenting on how they would support policies that are favored by the current administration but may not be by the next,” said Barbara Stephenson, a former ambassador to Panama who served in senior positions under both Republican and Democratic administrations.

“One party may support climate change agreements or DEI, and another may not,” she added. “Those career diplomats are required to support the policy of the administration in power, even when that means changing positions they have previously argued for or against.”

While neither Vance nor his office responded to questions for the article, Vance has since used X to do so.

There is no reason that US embassies should be a billboard for pushing anything but American interests. Unfortunately, during "pride" month, the "pride" flag (quick theological question: which sin caused Lucifer's fall?) festoons US embassies across the globe.

During the mostly peaceful and festive George Floyd riots, our embassies flew George Floyd and Black Lives Matter flags like this one from Colombo, Sri Lanka.

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Sometimes, what can only be described as anti-American events were sponsored by our embassies.

Interestingly, most of the videos of George Floyd banners flying at US embassies have been disabled.

Perhaps the most bizarre episode was the George Floyd mural painted on the wall around the US embassy in Kabul, where most of the locals apparently thought it was Barack Obama.

This is a good sign that he has the correct instincts and the courage to begin to demolish the DEI and anti-American culture that has taken root in the federal bureaucracy. 

Pollster Nate Silver: 'Unmistakable' Shift in Support for Trump

Sarah Arnold reporting for Townhall 

With just four months until the presidential election, America has witnessed a would-be assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump, and over 30 Congressional Democrats called on President Joe Biden to exit the 2024 race. 

At this point, nothing would be shocking, and almost anything can shake up the entire direction of the election. 

But for now, Trump is taking a massive lead as Democrats scramble to find a solution to their sinking chances of keeping the White House. 

Pollster Nate Silver revealed an “unmistakable” shift to Trump after surviving an assassination attempt. 

As of Friday, Silver pointed out that there are “a lot of bad polling numbers for Joe Biden over the past 24 hours.” On the contrary, however, Trump’s numbers are climbing the stairway to Heaven.

In a poll conducted by Silver, Biden’s national polling average is down nearly four points, with just a 26 percent chance of winning the Electoral College. 

On the flip side, there has been a major surge in support for Trump.

A lot of polling in since yesterday, and we're seeing an unmistakable spike for Trump, who is now up almost 4 points in our national polling average. This presumably reflects the impact of the assassination attempt against him, plus the start of the GOP convention. Note it's more a matter of Trump's numbers increasing than Biden's decreasing. The forecast/forward-looking component is designed to be quite cautious around the party conventions, discounting Trump's numbers somewhat (it will do the same for Democrats in August) and hedging toward its pre-convention forecast. Still, a new low for Biden: 25.8 percent. Via @NateSilver538

The poll’s findings come as more Democrats call on Biden to exit the 2024 race. 

In a recent podcast episode with Silver, the pollster— who is known for being historically accurate— said he doesn’t think Biden is “capable of running a normal campaign at all.”

In the episode titled "How to Convince Biden to Quit,” Silver argued that the president continues to fall further behind. Listening to his gut, Silver said there is no way Americans will vote for the 81-year-old president who is about to let COVID take him out after a bullet didn’t even stop Trump. 

Democrats have cited Biden’s disastrous debate performance as the nail in the coffin for any chance he had left to win a second term. However, polls conducted prior to the debate indicate otherwise. 

Before Biden took the stage last month against Trump, the president’s polling average was already struggling. In fact, it has been underwater since before his botched Afghanistan withdrawal. 

Biden began seeing his polling number drop rapidly as his reckless policies settled in. 

Earlier this year, his radical border policies highlighted the dangers of the thousands of illegal immigrants entering the U.S. had on Americans. This turned to voters citing his immigration policy as one of their top concerns. 

Inflation also caused Americans to reconsider voting for Biden. Every time they filled their car with gas or went to the grocery store, they were reminded of the president’s anti-American economic policies. 

Then, Biden’s support in key battleground states began to drop. 

Trump saw significant shifts in support among states, including Arizona, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Wisconsin, and Nevada, which Biden won in 2020. 

Flash forward to today; Biden is hemorrhaging supporters as his political future looks to come to an end. 

As Biden 'Fumes' at Pelosi and Obama, Here's What May Delay Any Decision About Getting Out

Nick Arama reporting for RedState 

The Democratic implosion couldn't happen to a more deserving group of people. 

They're absolutely out of their mind with the possibility that they might lose because of Joe Biden. But they're the ones who put him there and have kept him there, despite his degenerating issues being obvious to all. If they truly had put the country first they would never have put him forward to begin with. 

The elite Democrats who want him out now don't care now that they've had Democratic voters vote in primaries for Biden, but that isn't stopping them from telling him to step aside. 

This is also a bad road to go down. You don't get to circumvent the will of the people because you finally figured out that the candidate you convinced people to vote for in the primaries is going to be toast in the general election. But once again, the party who claims to care about "democracy" is breaking all kinds of norms with their actions. 

The word is that Biden is "coughing and hacking" -- and fuming --  behind the scenes at what's happening, blaming Pelosi and disturbed at Obama. 

Sick with Covid and abandoned by allies, President Biden has been fuming at his Delaware beach house, increasingly resentful about what he sees as an orchestrated campaign to drive him out of the race and bitter toward some of those he once considered close, including his onetime running mate Barack Obama.

Mr. Biden has been around politics long enough to assume that the leaks appearing in the media in recent days are being coordinated to raise the pressure on him to step aside, according to people close to him. He considers Representative Nancy Pelosi, the former House speaker, the main instigator, but is irritated at Mr. Obama as well, seeing him as a puppet master behind the scenes.

He has "rising exasperation" with them turning on him and thinking he's going to be defeated and he's ticked off Biden isn't helping him. 

And he certainly noticed that Mr. Obama has not done anything to help him in recent days even as his own former aides publicly have led the way in calling on Mr. Biden to withdraw in what was interpreted, rightly or wrongly, as a message from the former president’s camp. The unseen but clearly felt presence of Mr. Obama in particular has brought a Shakespearean quality to the drama now playing out, given their eight-year partnership.

The report says that while he is "increasingly accepting that he may not be able to" stay in and "some have begun discussing dates and venues" for stepping aside, as of Friday, Biden was still stuck on staying in. 

Yet Mr. Biden bristles at pressure and those pushing him risk getting his back up and prompting him to remain after all. Two people familiar with his thinking said he had not changed his mind as of Friday afternoon.

In privately railing about Mr. Obama and even aides to former President Bill Clinton, Mr. Biden has made clear that he finds it particularly rich that the architects of historic Democratic losses in the 1994 and 2010 midterm elections would be lecturing him about how to save the party after he presided over a better-than-expected midterm in 2022. While one person said Mr. Biden is not irked at Mr. Clinton himself — in fact, he is grateful the former president has been pressing donors to keep giving — others said that Mr. Obama is another story.. 

One thing that might be delaying his getting out is that he wouldn't want to do it before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu comes to Washington on Wednesday because he is "unwilling to give the premier the satisfaction given their strained relations lately over the Gaza war."

How juvenile is that? But that's Joe Biden, a petty small man. I used to think Obama was bad, but Biden is ten times worse in pettiness. 

Indeed, Biden issued a statement on Friday saying he intended to get back on the campaign trail next week, lying about Trump's "Project 2025" which has nothing to do with Trump. 

Mr. Biden pushed back on Friday with a statement vowing to continue the race. “I look forward to getting back on the campaign trail next week to continue exposing the threat of Donald Trump’s Project 2025 agenda while making the case for my own record and the vision that I have for America: one where we save our democracy, protect our rights and freedoms, and create opportunity for everyone,” he said.

It's hard to get around things like Rep. Seth Mouton (D-MA) who has known Biden for years who said that Biden "didn't seem to recognize me" at the D-Day ceremonies in France. But if Biden were ahead in the polls, the top Democrats would probably be behind him even with that. 

There was even one more leak out of the "Obama camp," dishing on what Obama thought after being at the George Clooney fundraiser with Biden where he seemed to lead him off the stage.  

One former Obama aide who was present that night said that it was clear that the former president was startled and shaken by how much Mr. Biden had aged and seemed disoriented.

But just like Clooney, they didn't say that at the time, they let the media go into this "cheap fake" spin. 

Now they're leaking like mad. But this is all on them, and they deserve the mess that they now are in. 

The Plan to Stage a Coup Against Defiant Biden

Sarah Arnold reporting for Townhall 

Someone in President Joe Biden’s inner circle must be blowing smoke up his ass because he believes he is doing well in the polls. Even more troubling, he thinks he is the only person who can beat former President Donald Trump.

As Biden staffers whisper sweet nothings in the president’s ear, Democrats and donors are working behind the scenes to form a “coup” against him. 

Two of those are top Democrats who are power-hungry to keep the White House. But so long as Biden stays in the race, those dreams might as well stay dreams. 

Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) are reportedly teaming up to oust Biden despite the president’s refusal to leave. 

According to Politico, Pelosi’s “fingerprints … all over the knife” that is ready to cut Biden from the race.

Schumer reportedly met with Biden at his house and told him point-blank he could not win the November election. Former President Barack Obama also echoed similar remarks. 

On Saturday, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said, “Joe Biden is our nominee, and he has a really big decision to make,” adding that Vice President Kamala Harris “is ready to step up, to unite the party, to take on Donald Trump, and to win in November.”

An Associated Press/NORC poll found that two-thirds of Democrats want Biden to drop out of the race. 

Despite this, Biden defiantly refuses to do so. 

Even left-wing celebrities such as actress Susan Sarandon and actor George Clooney have called on the 81-year-old president to withdraw. 

The Trump campaign, however, reportedly plans to use the imminent “coup” to their advantage. 

“They are actively engaged in an attempt – in my view, and a lot of people share this view – in deposing the president of the United States,” Trump campaign manager Chris LaCivita said. 

“Everything that they accuse Republicans of, they’re actually doing it on national TV every single day. Look, you can’t step down as a candidate for president because you’re cognitively impaired while still being the president. The two are linked,” he added. 

LaCivita also provided insight into how the former President will deal with a new Democratic candidate.

According to the campaign, Trump will continue to attack Biden’s record, especially if Harris replaces him. 

Conflicting reports claim Biden will announce his decision to drop out of the race as soon as this weekend—which was most likely not his idea. However, other reports say the president refuses to go anywhere. 

1,000 People Live on a Rock Smaller Than a Football Field on a Giant Lake—But You'll Never Guess Why

 On a tiny island on the world’s second-largest freshwater lake two nations wage Africa’s “smallest war.”

Too many photos to load here... got to :

https://www.theepochtimes.com/bright/1000-people-live-on-a-rock-smaller-than-a-football-field-on-a-giant-lake-but-youll-never-guess-why-5657026?&utm_source=MB_article_paid&utm_campaign=MB_article_2024-07-21-ca&utm_medium=email&est=1UlhZF7o4Qe6zTZ%2FnzCHrWVENNNOXbZVFWZ4%2FPofwulmLG6SqXzhV7R2IVsZQG58DNZc&utm_content=highlight-news-1

For the rest.

An iron-clad tortoise of rock and sheet metal juts from Lake Victoria, christened after Britain’s late queen, surrounded by over 23,000 square miles of water. Here a thronging mix of nationalities mingles—despite territorial disputes, competition over fishing, and myriad viewpoints—all in relative harmony on an island less than half the size of a football field.

All this began over three decades ago, with reports of fishermen earning three to four times in a day what shore-based cohorts earned in a month, driving anglers to seek their fortunes on Migingo Island, the outcrop in question, at the very source of the Nile River.

The catch? Besides the lucrative and plentiful Nile perch, now in supreme demand, Migingo Island lies right beside the Kenyan-Ugandan border, and conflicting claims placed that lonely rock within either’s dominion, depending on who you asked. The question of who would profit and who would tax whom became the center of a dispute.

Migingo Island has been claimed by both the Ugandan and Kenyan governments but was ultimately determined to be Kenyan.

Migingo Island has seen both the Kenyan and Ugandan flags flown over several decades, leading to controversy.

In the early years of this contest, from 1991, when Migingo Island was still covered in birds, snakes, and weeds, ventures were made by Ugandan police, Kenyan marines, and intrepid fishermen to pitch tents, build huts, and raise their national flags here, because of the island’s closeness to deep waters where fishing was growing lucrative.

As demand for big Nile perch exploded, a multimillion-dollar export today, so did the island’s population—despite the ongoing dispute over whose it was. Fishermen boating in from Kenya took two hours to arrive, Aljazeera reported, while those from Uganda took 18, ending the debate for some. Concurrently, the deep and coveted waters where the fish are bountiful was easily within Uganda’s territory, supporting its claim.

Ultimately, agreements were meted out amicably, and fishermen from both countries were let ashore to fish, although surveys concluded, as Uganda finally conceded, that Migingo was Kenyan; a joint committee (and Google Maps) offered ample proof of this. The island lies 510 meters inside Kenya’s territory.

In 2009, the island’s inhabitants numbered 130. Today, reports say there are anywhere from 400 to over 1,000 crammed together on that tiny rock, making it one of the most crowded islands on Earth.

Life on a tiny, bustling island crossroads means all kinds of people tolerating each other in all kinds of ways. In January, Dubai-based filmmaker Joe Hattab visited Migingo to discover a mix of mostly Kenyans and Ugandans, but also Tanzanians and Congolese. On a land where jurisdiction is questioned, the community writes their own laws; they come together, mingle, and make harmony. “We are all African,” a local official tells Mr. Hattab in his film. “They’re my best friends.”

The spirit of entrepreneurship thrives on Migingo Island, yet where there are profits to be made there will be those seeking to exploit. Among the mesh of sheet metal enclosures blanketing the outcrop are supermarkets, a pharmacy, bars, brothels, a makeshift open-air casino, barbershops, and scales for fishermen. Reportedly, everyone who lives here has their own business.

Daniel Obadha ran a barbershop and a phone-charging station for several years. “I like to live on Migingo,” he told Aljazeera. “Thanks to many customers coming not only from Kenya but also from Uganda and Tanzania, there is a lot of business, and I earn much more money than I did on the mainland.” According to Mr. Hattab, one appeal the island has for its diverse congregation is that no visas are required to live here.

Eddison Ouma, a fisherman from Uganda, has lived here for over half a decade, but due to the long boat ride home he is only able to visit his family twice a year. “We don’t have jobs. That’s why we are fishing,” Mr. Ouma said in 2019, adding that he pays a few fish as a “protection tax” to the Ugandan police who patrol the waters. Since 2004, both police and marines were deployed to protect fishermen from pirates, who, Mr. Hattab was told, continue to dog them today.

Officials have been a thorn in the side for some fishermen. In 2019, Kennedy Ochieng, from Kenya, had his catch of nearly 700 pounds of Nile perch, along with his fuel and bait, confiscated by Ugandan police after he was accused of fishing in Ugandan waters, Aljazeera reported. In more recent years, agreements have squelched some of the feuding to allow both sides to fish in Uganda’s waters, France 24 reported, though venturing out too far may still lead to seized hauls.

Another party to capitalize on the profits are boat charters, who have reaped large sums by charging fishermen, who don’t own boats, eight-tenths of their catch to use their vessels, Aljazeera reported.

Peace hangs between two viewpoints on Migingo Island: Kenyans have made the unusual claim that Nile perch breed in the shallower Kenyan waters and, therefore, belong to them. Ugandans rightfully claim the depths where they thrive in abundance, though the island is undoubtedly Kenyan. Now co-managed by both nations, the island strives to heal amid Africa’s “smallest war.”

And so as governments contest claims over the outcrop, the question facing the fishermen and their fortunes persists: “How long can we hold them off our backs?”