After Socialism

On this day:
1497
Vasco da Gama sets sail on the first direct European voyage to India.
1709
Great Northern War: Battle of Poltava – Peter I of Russia defeats Charles XII of Sweden at Poltava thus effectively ending Sweden’s role as a major power in Europe.
1896
William Jennings Bryan delivers his Cross of Gold speech advocating bimetalism at the 1896 Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
1947
Reports are broadcast that a UFO crash-landed in Roswell, New Mexico.
1970
Richard Nixon delivers a special congressional message enunciating Native American Self-Determination as official US Indian policy, leading to the Indian Self-Determination Act.
2011
Space Shuttle Atlantis is launched in the final mission of the U.S. Space Shuttle program.

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ESG is an official exemption from a company's obligation to enhance investor and employee wealth and return.

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Danish women now face being called up for 11 months of military service when they turn 18, after a change in the law came into effect.

Under new rules passed by Denmark's parliament, women are to join teenage males in a lottery system that could require them to undertake a period of conscription.

The change was implemented as NATO countries increase defense spending amid rising security concerns in Europe.

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Contrary to Pope Francis’s 2021 claim, the majority of bishops were not opposed to the Tridentine Latin Rite—in fact, it was even praised. So why was this report buried and Francis' case advanced?

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Electric vehicles now receive over-the-air updates that can boost performance, upgrade infotainment, or add driver-assist functions.

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After Socialism

Alan Charles Kors, writing for the Atlas Society, “Can There Be an ‘After Socialism’?“, is an old article, but interesting because it is so accurate and heartfelt. It also highlights the absence of any reflective examination of socialism's obvious disasters:

No cause, ever, in the history of all mankind, has produced more cold-blooded tyrants, more slaughtered innocents, and more orphans than socialism with power. It surpassed, exponentially, all other systems of production in turning out the dead. The bodies are all around us. And here is the problem: No one talks about them. No one honors them. No one does penance for them. No one has committed suicide for having been an apologist for those who did this to them. No one pays for them. No one is hunted down to account for them.
….

The record is truly plain. Socialism, wherever it actually had the means to plan a society, to pursue efficaciously its vision of the abolition of private property, economic inequality, and the allocation of capital and goods by free markets, always culminated in the crushing of individual, economic, religious, associational, and political liberty. Its collectivization of agriculture alone led to untold suffering, scarcity, and contempt for property as the fruit of labor. It was, at its best, the ability, through horror and servitude, to build Gary, Indiana, once, without the good stuff, and without the ability even to maintain it.
…..

To be moral beings, we must acknowledge these awful things appropriately and bear witness to the responsibilities of these most murderous times. Until socialism—like Nazism or fascism confronted by the death camps and the slaughter of innocents—is confronted with its lived reality, the greatest atrocities of all recorded human life, we will not live “after socialism.”

It will not happen. The pathology of Western intellectuals has committed them to an adversarial relationship with the culture—free markets and individual rights—that has produced the greatest alleviation of suffering; the greatest liberation from want, ignorance, and superstition; and the greatest increase of bounty and opportunity in the history of all human life.

This pathology allows Western intellectuals to step around the Everest of bodies of the victims of Communism without a tear, a scruple, a regret, an act of contrition, or a reevaluation of self, soul, and mind.
…….

We know that voluntary exchange among individuals held morally responsible under the rule of law creates both prosperity and an unparalleled diversity of human choices. Such a model also has been a precondition of individuation and freedom. By contrast, regimes of central planning create poverty and occasion ineluctable developments toward totalitarianism and the worst abuses of power. Dynamic free-market societies, grounded in rights-based individualism, have altered the entire human conception of liberty and of dignity for formerly marginalized groups. The entire “socialist experiment,” by contrast, ended in stasis; ethnic hatreds; the absence of even the minimal preconditions of economic, social, and political renewal; and categorical contempt for both individuation and minority rights. Our children do not know this true comparison

Democracy and Its Enemies, January 6

On this day:
1937
Sino-Japanese War: Battle of Lugou Bridge – Japanese forces invade Beijing, China.
1954
Elvis Presley made his radio debut when WHBQ Memphis played his first recording for Sun Records, “That’s All Right.”
2005
A series of four explosions occurs on London’s transport system killing 56 people including four alleged suicide bombers and injuring over 700 others.

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Over 700 ETFs were started last year.

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Russian car sales are down ~40%, and farm machinery sales are down 33%, while inflation remains high at around 9%, despite interest rates of 21%.
Russia's wartime spending is up 20%. In comparison, oil and gas revenues drop 12%, and Putin has now burned through two-thirds of his (liquid) rainy day fund, potentially exhausting it within a year unless oil prices improve or he cuts military spending.

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Secrecy is the keystone of all tyranny. Not force, but secrecy ... censorship. When any government, or any church for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, "This you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know," the end result is tyranny and oppression, no matter how holy the motives. Mighty little force is needed to control a man whose mind has been hoodwinked; contrariwise, no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything -- you can't conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him. -Robert A. Heinlein, science-fiction author (7 Jul 1907-1988)

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Democracy and Its Enemies, January 6

January 6th was the day Biden kicked off his reelection campaign. He picked January 6th as it is the anniversary of the attempt of some enthusiasts to demonstrate in favor of Trump's assertion that the election of 2020 had been rigged. What looked like a riot to the whole world became, in the eyes of the press, a tipping point of near Gettysburg or Shiloh proportions. The Republic trembled and nearly fell before an assault of scores of unarmed citizens led by a guy wearing deer antlers.

If Lee had only known.

Let's say these misguided fools and the Antler Guy actually had plans of upsetting the election. It's a big country; how would they have done it? We don't know. But let's say they had some secret plan. How would you rate their chances of success? (Assuming the Antler Guy has some wonderful--if, as yet unseen--planning and leadership qualities.) How would they have fared? Against the Feds? The U.S. Marine Corps? 2500 SEALS?

On the other hand, what if the President of the United States promises 'fundamentally transforming the United States of America'? What if the President is so infirm that all of the executive decisions are deferred to a faceless cadre of unelected government employees? What if the national debt rises so high it destabilizes the currency, prompting an alternative world currency and leaving its citizenry impoverished and in despair? What if the integrity and safety of the country are threatened by hundreds of thousands of unvetted, illegal immigrants crossing the border every month with only cursory attention? What if the government becomes so venal, so corrupt, so insincere, and so inept that the people become estranged?

Which scenario threatens the democracy?

Sunday/A State Above

On this dsy:1535
Sir Thomas More is executed for treason against King Henry VIII of England.
1557
King Philip II of Spain, consort of Queen Mary I of England, sets out from Dover to war with France, which eventually results in the loss of the City of Calais, the last English possession on the continent, and Mary I never seeing her husband again.
1777
American Revolutionary War: Siege of Fort Ticonderoga – After a bombardment by British artillery under General John Burgoyne, American forces retreat from Fort Ticonderoga, New York.
1885
Louis Pasteur successfully tests his vaccine against rabies. The patient is Joseph Meister, a boy who was bitten by a rabid do
1892
3,800 striking steelworkers engage in a day-long battle with Pinkerton agents during the Homestead Strike, leaving 10 dead and dozens wounded.

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John Milton labored in 1660 on his epic poem “Paradise Lost,” he faced numerous obstacles: His role as an advocate for republicanism left him politically disgraced during the Restoration reign of Charles II. His second wife had recently died, and he had lost his vision entirely. Lying in bed at night, he composed verses of a poem vast in scale; it encompassed nothing less than the creation of the world and the fate of mankind. In the morning, he would dictate fresh lines to his daughters. --wsj

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“We are at a wonderful ball where the champagne sparkles in every glass and soft laughter falls upon the summer air,” he wrote [in 1968] of a high-flying stock market in “The Money Game.”

“We know at some moment the black horsemen will come shattering through the terrace doors wreaking vengeance and scattering the survivors. Those who leave early are saved, but the ball is so splendid no one wants to leave while there is still time. So everybody keeps asking — what time is it? But none of the clocks have hands.” George Goodman, who wrote as 'Adam Smith'

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Sunday/A State Above

There are a lot of opinions about America. Recent internal criticism--undermining America's position and reputation in the world--is becoming less and less significant because it seems more and more stupid. This is not to say that stupidity cannot carry the day in a democracy, but it does mean it will have less of a foundation and less permanence. And it is difficult to weaponize the supercilious.

But America has serious enemies. Democracies seek only commercial stability; the toltalitarians seek more.

Asia's conflict with America is simply practical. America is the international rival of the totalitarian state. Putin believes America's liberal view of man has come and gone. The State has returned like the Grand Inquisitor to fill in Man's failures and weak spots. Both China and Russia feel Man needs a powerful State, like a child needs strong parents. Materialism seems to be less of a guiding principle than a dimly remembered inherited flaw.

Europe is different as it tries stubbornly to cobble philosophies out of its museums of old tribal hierarchies, ethnic hatreds, and academic incoherence. 

All, both East and West, struggle with the American idea of Man, who is ceded spiritual worth and not judged on circumstance, and always granted the Christian miracle of the second chance. Contrary to Arendt's social compact of equality before the law, America thinks "isonomy" is not an arbitrary construct but inherent and deserved.

Some thoughts on America by real thinkers:

We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Thomas Jefferson

Freedom is nothing but a chance to be better.
Albert Camus

There is nothing the matter with Americans except their ideals. The real American is all right; it is the ideal American who is all wrong.
G.K. Chesterton

Isonomy guaranteed … equality, but not because all men were born or created equal, but, on the contrary, because men were by nature ... not equal, and needed an artificial institution, the polis, which by virtue of its νόμος ['law'] would make them equal. --Arendt

"America – it is a fabulous country, the only fabulous country; it is the only place where miracles not only happen, but where they happen all the time." – Thomas Wolfe“

America is an idea, not a place.” – Jack Kerouac“

The best thing about America is that anyone can become an American.” – Arnold Schwarzenegger

The American Constitution is, as far as I can see, the most wonderful work ever struck off at any given time by the brain and purpose of man---Gladstone

America: At first, they strove to preserve the rights of Englishmen. This failed, and they declared their rights as human beings. This had never been done so largely.--Acton

Perhaps, after all, America never has been discovered. I myself would say that it had merely been detected
Oscar Wilde

The American Constitution is, as far as I can see, the most wonderful work ever struck off at any given time by the brain and purpose of man---Gladstone

Europe was created by history. America was created by philosophy.--Thacher

American Revolution: The great point is that the letter of the law was against them. The absence of real oppression likewise. It was definitely an appeal to unwritten law, unchartered rights.--Acton

SatStats

On this day:
1687
Isaac Newton publishes Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica.
1830
France invades Algeria.
1934
“Bloody Thursday” – Police open fire on striking longshoremen in San Francisco.
1947
Larry Doby signs a contract with the Cleveland Indians baseball team, becoming the first black player in the American League. (Jackie Robinson had broken the color barrier with the Brooklyn Dodgers in the National League 11 weeks earlier.)
1962
Algeria becomes independent from France.
1996
Dolly the sheep becomes the first mammal cloned from an adult cell.
1998
Japan launches a probe to Mars, and thus joins the United States and Russia as a space-exploring nation.

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The pause in shipment of some weapons systems to Ukraine— reported first by POLITICO — was driven by Pentagon policy chief Elbridge Colby and a small circle of advisers over concerns that certain weapons stockpiles in the U.S. were running low.
Even allies of President Donald Trump were frustrated by the move, and accused officials such as Colby — who led a review of U.S. munitions stockpiles that preceded the freeze — of pushing the move forward without notifying the rest of the administration or others.

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Sheen, with an awful analogy: "There is no such thing as saving democracy alone. Democracy is a branch, not a root. The root of democracy is the recognition of the value of a person as a creature of God. To save democracy alone is like saving the false teeth of a drowning man. First save the man and you will save his teeth. First preserve belief in God as the source of rights and liberties, and you will save democracy. But not vice versa."

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The UN's IAEA said Iran could start enriching uranium in a few months. But that's okay, right? They are just doing this for peaceful use, right?

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SatStats

Thirty people a day are arrested in the UK for things they say on social media.

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South Korea has banned the dog meat trade:
Traders and butchers before the ban would buy an average of half a dozen dogs per week.
Animal rights activists and authorities fought hard to outlaw the dog meat trade, but have no clear plan for what to do with the leftover animals, of which there are close to 500,000, according to government estimates.

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The median bride price for marriages in the Chinese countryside doubled in real terms between 2005 and 2020, according to a recent paper by Yifeng Wan of Johns Hopkins University. Prices in urban areas are rising, too. A bride price of 380,000 yuan would indeed be steep in Guangdong province, where the median was about 42,000 yuan when last estimated. But it would look a bit less outrageous in neighbouring Fujian, where 115,000 yuan is the norm.

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The Federal government controls more than half of Oregon, Utah, Nevada, Idaho, and Alaska, and nearly half of California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Wyoming. The vast majority of this land is NOT parks.

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Latin America and the Caribbean are much more violent than the rest of the world. Homicide rates are significantly higher in this region, and the top 6 highest homicide rates are in the Caribbean Basin.

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Germany and Italy hold the world’s second- and third-largest national gold reserves after the US, with reserves of 3,352 tonnes and 2,452 tonnes, respectively, according to World Gold Council data.

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Pittsburgh had only made between 4-6 draft picks each year from 2013-24. Taking 13 players this year more than doubles the typical yield. The Pens hadn’t drafted 10+ players since 1994.
The Pens had four picks in the top-40 and seven in the top-100. Pittsburgh made four top-40 picks in 2013-24 - combined.

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The Pens draft was big. After the #11 pick, Zonnon (6’2”, 185 pounds) and Horcoff (6’5”, 203 pounds) are forwards. Peyton Kettles (6’6”, 194 pounds) and Brady Peddle (6’3”, 203) are monstrous defenders. Charlie Trethewey (6’2”, 201) isn’t far behind.

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Repair vs. buying new. The big story isn’t declining durability but declining price:
In 1972, Sears sold a clothes washer for $220 and a dryer for $90, per 2022 research by AARP Magazine. That’s about $2,389 in 2025, adjusted for inflation. Today you can get a washer-and-dryer pair on sale from Sears for around $1,200.

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No work of literary fiction has been on Publisher’s Weekly’s yearly top ten best-selling list since 2001
According to the National Endowment of the Arts, the number of Americans who “read literature” has fallen from 56.9% in 1982 to 46.7% in 2002 to 38% in 2022. 

Literary fiction makes up something like 2% of the market.

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In the early days of FedEx, when the company was struggling financially, Smith took the company’s last $5,000 to Las Vegas and played blackjack. He reportedly won $27,000, which was enough to cover an overdue fuel bill and keep the company afloat for another week.

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According to Israeli estimates, its interceptions of incoming missiles during an intensive bombardment cost as much as $285 million per night. Each Arrow 3 interceptor is priced at $2 million.

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Birth rates are lower, but in several high-income nations, rising female earnings are now associated with higher fertility. Studies in Italy and the Netherlands show that couples where both partners earn well are more likely to have children, while low-income couples are the least likely to do so. Similar findings have emerged from Sweden as well. In Norway, too, higher-earning women now tend to have more babies.

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Earning a doctorate during the first 70 years of the 20th century typically assured the graduate of a position in academe…Humanities Ph.D.s had the highest rate of academic employment—83 percent in 1995–99—but lower than the 94 percent level in 1970–74.

 

Fourth of July

On this day as well:

1054
A supernova is seen by Chinese, Arab, and possibly Amerindian observers near the star Zeta Tauri. For several months, it remains bright enough to be seen during the day. Its remnants form the Crab Nebula.
1187
The Crusades: Battle of Hattin – Saladin defeats Guy of Lusignan, King of Jerusalem.
1754
French and Indian War: George Washington surrenders Fort Necessity to French Capt. Louis Coulon de Villiers.
1863
American Civil War: Siege of Vicksburg – Vicksburg, Mississippi surrenders to Ulysses S. Grant after 47 days of siege. 150 miles up the Mississippi River, a Confederate Army is repulsed at the Battle of Helena, Arkansas.
1863
The Army of Northern Virginia withdraws from the battlefield after its loss at the Battle of Gettysburg, signalling an end to the Southern invasion of the North.
1918
Bolsheviks kill Tsar Nicholas II of Russia and his family (Julian calendar date).

1943
World War II: Beginning of the Battle of Kursk, the largest full-scale battle in history and the world’s largest tank battle at Prokhorovka village.
1976
Israeli commandos raid Entebbe airport in Uganda, rescuing all but four of the passengers and crew of an Air France jetliner seized by Palestinian terrorists
1997
NASA’s Pathfinder space probe lands on the surface of Mars.

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Fourth of July


America had an exceptional revolution, one that did not attempt to define and deliver happiness, but one that set people free to define and pursue it as they please.--Will

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Isonomy guaranteed … equality, but not because all men were born or created equal, but, on the contrary, because men were by nature ... not equal, and needed an artificial institution, the polis, which by virtue of its νόμος (law) would make them equal. --Arendt

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The American Constitution is, as far as I can see, the most wonderful work ever struck off at any given time by the brain and purpose of man---Gladstone

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Europe was created by history. America was created by philosophy.--Thacher

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Jay Leno had a recurring skit where he asked questions to passers-by on the street--questions most people think are rather simple and obvious. He asked several people what the Fourth of July celebrated, when independence was declared, and from whom the country separated. Of course, the results were embarrassing to most of those interviewed. One was particularly interesting. A college instructor knew nothing about the Revolution at all, thought it occurred in the 1920s, and thought China might have been involved.

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A recent survey found that 27% of the people questioned were unaware that the American Revolution was waged against the British.

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Both former U.S. Presidents Thomas Jefferson and John Adams died on July 4, 1826–the day of the Jubilee–the 50th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, in an extraordinary and eerie coincidence. Jefferson died shortly after noon at the age of 83 in Monticello, Virginia. Several hours later, Adams died in Quincy, Massachusetts, at the age of 90. According to newspaper reports, Adams’s last words were, “Jefferson still lives.”

Exactly five years later, on July 4, 1831, former U.S. President James Monroe died.

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The Fourth

When I was a child in the '50s, the Fourth of July was a great event. The kids decorated their bikes, small local parades were held--every community had some commemoration, and the larger communities had fireworks. It was unlike other secular events like Thanksgiving, which were delightfully family-oriented; this was a commonly held social event. It was a birthday party. And it was heartfelt. Everyone felt that years ago, something of value had been accomplished, something special in the world created. There was a glow.

When Obama was first campaigning, he was asked about American Exceptionalism. (The phrase was de Tocqueville's, from Democracy in America, 1835: "The position of the Americans is therefore quite exceptional, and it may be believed that no democratic people will ever be placed in a similar one. Their strictly Puritanical origin, their exclusively commercial habits, even the country they inhabit, which seems to divert their minds from the pursuit of science, literature, and the arts, the proximity of Europe, which allows them to neglect these pursuits without relapsing into barbarism, a thousand special causes, of which I have only been able to point out the most important, have singularly concurred to fix the mind of the American upon purely practical objects. His passions, his wants, his education, and everything about him seem to unite in drawing the native of the United States earthward; his religion alone bids him turn, from time to time, a transient and distracted glance to heaven. Let us cease, then, to view all democratic nations under the example of the American people.")

American exceptionalism is a description of how America developed, not what it was. I'm unsure de Tocqueville--or Europeans then and now thought it complementary. It was special. It was unique.

The phrase has been used since by those who saw America as a point of reference in man's search for freedom and liberty. (It was also used by Stalin as a slur, decrying America's self-held belief that it was somehow excluded from the Marxian class warfare generality.) Obama saw the question as a trap--it would not do to talk of "exceptionalism" when we want all people to be the same, all nations indistinguishable. So, he hedged and said, "I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism." He, unlike those Americans of just a generation or two earlier, does not think that America is unique.

Unique. If that element is lost in this country, a lot has been lost. So, buy a small flag. Decorate your bike.

Democratic Socialism

On this day:

987
Hugh Capet is crowned King of France, the first of the Capetian dynasty that would rule France till the French Revolution in 1792.
1754
French and Indian War: George Washington surrenders Fort Necessity to French forces.
1775
American Revolutionary War: George Washington takes command of the Continental Army at Cambridge, Massachusetts.
1778
American Revolutionary War: British forces kill 360 people in the Wyoming Valley massacre.
1863
American Civil War: The final day of the Battle of Gettysburg culminates with Pickett’s Charge.
1898
Spanish-American War: The Spanish fleet, led by Pascual Cervera y Topete, is destroyed by the U.S. Navy in Santiago, Cuba.
1913
Confederate veterans at the Great Reunion of 1913 reenact Pickett’s Charge; upon reaching the high-water mark of the Confederacy, they are met by the outstretched hands of friendship from Union survivors.
1940
World War II: the French fleet of the Atlantic based at Mers el Kébir, is bombarded by the British fleet, coming from Gibraltar, causing the loss of three battleships: Dunkerque, Provence and Bretagne. One thousand two hundred sailors perish.
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The Bill:

The 40% of Americans who do not pay taxes will not benefit from a tax-cutting bill.
Reconciliation bills can not cut discretionary spending.
The bill deals with Medicare and Medicaid only insofar as it clarifies those already not eligible for them.

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Five oil tankers have had explosions so far this year and it appears all may have been caused by limpet mines attached to the hulls by unknown individuals with unknown motives.

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We have become obsessed with the outlier. 

A gift from Critical Theory: an individual cannot escape or transcend his group. Strange and outrageous behavior by one individual has become generalized to represent a larger group. So one lunatic cop is representative of all cops. And those cops are representative of all society.
The wide generalization from small experiences to large populations is a virtual definition of bigotry.

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Jeffries and Schumer are so boring, they must have been Republicans in another life.

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Democratic Socialism

The phrase "democratic socialism" mixes two entities, a governing system and an economic one. But the freedom of the vote in no way bleeds any freedom into the economic system. Democracy is the process by which the hierarchy--for good or ill--is chosen. "Democratic socialism" is, at best, a misunderstanding, and, at worst, malicious marketing.

So voting for socialism displaces a lot of the decision-making, by definition. It's not necessarily an oxymoron; the vote always creates a new reality. Individual freedom stops at the ballot box. The power to rule is transferred to another. The "representative." That happens in spades to democracies in wartime. The outrage over the internment of the Japanese in WW11 misunderstands this fundamental change. The vote allows citizens to choose their tyrant. Once the tribe had voted for the war chief, individual decision-making was over. 

"Democracy" implies "virtue" to our arrogant minds. It is not. It is a simple way of deciding. In the American example, it is ingenious--but only because of the limits created by its founders. The potential for tyranny is constrained by the Constitution. But this is not a characteristic of democracy; it is unique. Russia votes. Hitler was elected.

In democratic socialism, the citizen votes to surrender the national assets to a third party and accept the consequences.

Contemplating the Live Hand Grenade

On this day:

437
Emperor Valentinian III, begins his reign over the Western Roman Empire. His mother Galla Placidia ends her regency, but continues to exercise political influence at the court in Rome.
1881
Charles J. Guiteau shoots and fatally wounds U.S. President James Garfield, who eventually dies from an infection on September 19.

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Mark Rutte, the NATO Secretary General, gave an eye-opening interview on NATO and the Russian efforts in Ukraine, and North Korean involvement. He flattered Trump--except for one moment where he said future negotiations with Russia should include more than a "historian."

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A minority opinion: The gender debates in locker rooms, bathrooms, and sports received unintended stimulus when female reporters objected male reporters had an advantage over them when they could enter football locker rooms for post-game interviews. The culture demurred, and women were allowed in, causing surprised guys coming out of showers, a scramble for towels, and annoyed interviews with half-naked men.

It was sold as a women's rights question, but that crossed a line.. I don't recall any effort to make those men more comfortable. Men and women mixed in the locker rooms. The camel's nose was under the tent.

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Raising taxes, substituting social workers for police, and inserting government into private business is a good way to cause the flight of the only people in NYC who can help. As always, the Left creates what it tries to prevent.

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Contemplating the Live Hand Grenade

Zakaria had the bad judgment to give a platform to Jake Sullivan, the national security advisor under the Biden Regency, to rewrite the history of Ukraine and the Democrats' mishandling of Iran. First, he said that the Iran bombing could eventually be overcome with money and effort--a remarkably simplistic and obvious statement that led to the more obvious idea that only the participants' decision to prefer peace could keep the area safe. But the reason for the bombing attack was exactly that. And the idea that giving the Iranian regime money to continue their nuclear plans was not a solution, it was collusion. Obama--and the Biden Regency--underwrote Iran's nuclear development and contributed to the region's instability.

Remember, we are not trying to protect Israel from Iran; they don't need help. We are trying to protect the Middle East and ourselves from Iran's insane ambitions and Israel's inevitable insane vengeful response in its death throes.

Compounding this nonsense, Sullivan also criticized Trump for not being more forceful and supportive of Ukraine, this from a guy whose presumed boss called the invasion by Russia a "minor incursion."

All of this went unchallenged by Zakaria, who continued the tradition of journalistic one-sidedness. One obvious reason is the Press's political bias. However, another, painful, and discouraging factor is that these problems are dangerous and are felt to be more safely dealt with by platitudes. As in Ukraine and the national debt, the Left defaults to the safer, short-term news cycle rather than the challenging, long-term, and more dangerous policy.