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A Fascist System with Communist Slogans

Commentary by , June 20, 2019

The Search for Sanity, Part 2 How far out of hand has the Democratic Party’s nomination contest gotten? I think The Onion pretty much sums it up: “Media Urged Not to Release Names of Any More Presidential Candidates in Effort to Prevent Copycats.” “When a person launches a bid for president and then receives widespread […]

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Tanker War II

Commentary by , June 16, 2019

Five Things You Need to Read Today 1. Tanker War II Back in the late 1980s, the US got dragged into the Tanker War, an offshoot of the Iran-Iraq War in which Saddam Hussein foolishly declared war on Iranian shipping, only to discover Iraq is way more vulnerable to a naval blockade. The war on […]

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“A One-Man Smoot-Hawley”

Commentary by , June 7, 2019

Five Things You Need to Read Today 1. A One-Man Smoot-Hawley President Trump’s trade war combines the three things he likes best: fear of foreigners, posturing about being “tough,” and the capricious exercise of unilateral power. So there is no reason to think he is ever going to end it. That’s the big takeaway from […]

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The God That Failed First

Commentary by , June 4, 2019

On Friday, I sent out an overview of Sohrab Ahmari’s attack on conservative “liberalism”–a word he is using in its correct sense, unfortunately. That piece is now up at The Bulwark. But there is another aspect of that story that I wanted to delve into a little more deeply, which is the brief but dramatic […]

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The Green Leap Forward

Commentary by , May 17, 2019

Five Things You Need to Read Today 1. The People Does Not Know What It Wills I’ve been loosely following the odd failure of Brexit–Britain’s exit from the European Union. Here’s the best political cartoon summing this up, which anyone who has ever owned a cat will understand. I am in favor of Europe having […]

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Viva la Revolución

Commentary by , May 13, 2019

A few weeks ago, the simmering conflict in Venezuela reached a crisis point when Interim President Juan Guaido called for the Venezuelan military to join him in overthrowing socialist dictator Nicolas Maduro. The prospect of an immediate uprising fizzled, so the conflict has settled in for the long haul. It’s not over, and just this […]

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Who Resists the Resistance?

Commentary by , May 1, 2019

Five Things You Need to Read Today 1. Viva la Revolución “Democratic socialism” has finally achieved its usual end-state in Venezuela: mass shootings of innocent civilians by government goons. I’ll warn you that the reporting on this has been pretty awful, and in the link I just gave, even Jake Tapper—who ought to know better—refers […]

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“I Never Had a Lawyer Who Took Notes”

Commentary by , April 20, 2019

What We’ve Learned About Trump from the Mueller Report Among the political media and Twitter obsessives—but I repeat myself—Thursday was dubbed “Mueller Day,” because it was the day when the mostly unredacted report from Special Counsel Robert Mueller was due to be released to the public. I was not among the obsessives, having been skeptical […]

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The Search for Sanity, Part 1

Commentary by , April 17, 2019

A Partial Guide to the 2020 Democratic Presidential Candidates Yes, I know the 2020 presidential election is a long way away. But it is probably less than a year before the Democratic Party will choose its nominee, and since Democrats have to winnow that down from a current total of 18 or more candidates—the New […]

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How Politics Works

Commentary by , April 13, 2019

Five Things You Need to Read Today Editor’s Note: I was very pleased to see my recent article, “Why I Don’t ‘Believe’ in Science,” picked up by Judith Curry, a distinguished atmospheric scientist who is skeptical of global warming—exactly the sort of person to whom I want to offer this kind of intellectual ammunition. Her […]

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