Editor’s Choice
So, You Want To Save The World
A friend shared this Twitter snippet, which apparently crossed her facebook feed, presumably shared by a friend of leftist leanings. Her (wholly accurate) rebuttal offered that actually believing this, but choosing to share a meme instead of "storming their houses,"...
Gun Rights Lessons – A Series
The debate over gun rights and gun control stretches back decades, to at least the early part of the 20th century. It should, then, come as no surprise that there are quite a few recurring and oft-argued themes and positions in this long-running debate. Seasoned...
Grabby Hands And Dead Grannies
Three weeks ago, NY Governor Andrew Cuomo's top aide, secretary to the governor Melissa DeRosa, had an "oops" moment, wherein she confessed to something that many of us already knew: that there were not only thousands of deaths attributable to a colossally stupid...
GameStop’s Crapitalist Vigilantes
An astonishing story is unfolding, with this aspect of the story getting astonishingly blasé coverage: it seems a vigilante movement developed on Reddit to revenge itself on "Wall Street" for their role in melting down the global economy in 2008 (which went...
BLM and OPM
Where is all that money going? Thus spake Michael Brown, Sr. after he learned that BLM (the organization) had raised $90M by exploiting BLM (the movement) for financial gain. And, thus, the seedy underbelly of all things political emerges once again. It's always about...
A Nibble A Day
Cancel Culture, a phenomenon whose existence (too) many contort themselves into pretzels denying, has "found" the writings of Theodore Geisel. Or, as most of us know him, Dr. Seuss, author of more than 60 books and creator of The Cat In The Hat, Sam-I-Am, The Grinch,...
Killing Opportunity
What does the Left have against the young? Despite all the 'Science!,' schools remain closed or are opening sl-o-o-o-wly because of massive resistance from teachers' unions. A 'lost year' isn't a particularly big deal to adults from a developmental standpoint, but...
The Oppressor Class
The en-vogue social theory of modern times, when stripped of its various veneers, boils down to a simple concept: that there are oppressors and oppressed. Not individuals, mind you, but groups, aka classes, aka categories, aka "identities," and our only relevance lies...
The Double-Bind
Identity and "woke" politics are, it seems, an endless game of "hold my beer," where every face-palm inducing iteration begets an even more outrageous offering. Yesterday's escalation arrives from none other than the Coca-Cola company, wherein a training video thrust...
Conflict Karma
The fallout from the Capitol riot continues to expand, and we are now being told that the entirety of the Trump-voting populace should be labeled "insurrectionist." With such a label comes, of course, the application of tools the government has at hand in response....
How ‘Bout That Emmy?
Here in my home state of New York, land of the second-highest per-capita COVID mortality rate in the nation, a major scandal is unfolding in slow-motion. Governor Cuomo, the object of swooning adulation this past spring for his supposedly "adult" handling of the COVID...
Capitol Theater
In the wake of the January 6th riot at the Capitol, 25,000 National Guard troops were dispatched to DC, presumably to establish order and protect the Government against other acts of insurrection. Five weeks later, with nary a protestor in sight, 5000 troops remained...
The Neverending Derangement
To no one's surprise, the Senate failed to convict Trump on the impeachment charge forwarded by the House. What was originally put forth as a "save the nation from his lunacy the last two weeks of his term" was flipped on its head to a tepid "keep him from running for...
Rage And Loathing In Wokerica
Nowadays, it is virtually impossible to go through your daily life without receiving some blunt-force messaging about diversity, about inclusion, about multiculturalism, and about justice for the oppressed. That this messaging is being delivered (and often...
War Comes Through The Overton Window
In our political conversations, we encounter ideas that are broadly considered reasonable, and ideas that are considered unreasonable or flat-out bonkers. The latter exist outside the range of the former, with gray areas along the intersections. A couple decades ago,...
Green Energy’s Dirty Secret
A few years back, the phrase "Rare Earth" would most likely elicit recollection of a 70s Motown-soul band, that had a number of hit records (the most remembered, at least to this boomer, is "I Just Want To Celebrate"). Today, however, "Rare Earth" elicits...
…As Long As It’s Mandatory
A political friend shared a quote on social media today: "Liberals, I have heard it said, don’t care what we do as long as it is mandatory." -- Joseph Epstein This echoes a popular meme (and T-shirt, and other merchandise. A thumbs up for free enterprise!). I had an...
Presidents, Monarchs, and Tyrants
Joe Biden became the Democrats' nominee by projecting a "milder" agenda than the balance of the Democratic primary field. His party barely squeaked out a victory against a President who failed to capitalize on the various policy successes of his term, imploded on a...
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Opinion
Us, and Them, and Them
Speculative fiction writers, whether they be "science-y" or not, often bring us visions of possible futures. Some are optimistic, some less so. Some fall into the "dystopian" category, defined by the Oxford Languages folks as, "relating to or denoting an imagined...
A Policy of Ignorance
As promised (or as threatened, if you prefer), President Biden has made quick moves to advance the "greening" of America. Or, more accurately, to satiate the green lobby, an unholy alliance of ignorant virtucrats and corporate rent-seekers. He killed the Keystone XL...
Escalation, Not Equivalence
A libertarian site needs another article on "homo sapiens good," "homo politicus bad" like a fish needs a bicycle. Yet, here we are again, with obvious points of morality for individuals twisted beyond recognition as they grind through the mind of homo politicus:...
Social Corrosion
While looking for the exact wording of a Stalin quote, I found this nugget on a Wikipedia page: [E]specially in Stalin's Soviet Union, Mao's China and Pol Pot's Cambodia, a fanatical certainty that socialism could be made to work motivated communist leaders in "the...
Science!… When Convenient
I'm sure you've heard it time and again: Biden and his people asserting that they're going to 'follow the science' and 'listen to the experts' in setting policy and making decisions. To those who've been paying attention, this is pretty clearly a dig at the previous...
The Headline Is The Tale
Two headlines caught my eye this morning: "Why Vaccines Alone Will Not End The Pandemic" - The New York Times "COVID-19 will likely be with us forever. Here's how we'll live with it." - National Geographic Both articles were pay-walled, which means that most of those...
The Problem With Fascism
Fascism. It's a word that's becoming more and more common in the political sandbox. I see it used by people on the left side of our political aisle, and by people on the right side of our political aisle. Therein lies a problem: people cannot agree on what, exactly,...
First Impressions
Biden inaugurated his presidency with a bang, or more aptly, a torrent of executive orders, and in doing so, established a particular tone of governance. Sad to say, it's not what I had hoped, although I can't even remotely say I'm surprised. First off, he set about...
He’s Gone. Move On
Yesterday, Joe Biden got sworn in as the 46th President of the United States. In his acceptance speech, Biden spoke the word "unity/uniting" eleven times, and he declared that, We must end this uncivil war that pits red against blue, rural versus urban, conservative...
Power and the Purge
The Capitol riot is quite possibly the biggest gift the Democrats could have wished for, ahead of Biden's inauguration. It will be used to vilify the entirety of the Republican Party and its voters, no matter how horrified they were at the riot, no matter how overtly...
The Great Social Media Crackup
There was a man, of libertarian leanings, who found that he enjoyed talking politics. His business being business, he was a subscriber to the Wall Street Journal, and in time found himself drawn to the editorials published daily therein. He soon discovered that the...
Cutting the Rungs
Way back in the day, which in modern measurement means the previous Presidential campaign, Democratic candidate were all of a mind on doubling the national minimum wage. That there is a mountain of scholarship explaining why this is a Bad Idea from an economic...
Mandated Moderation
I recently listened to a snippet of a Ben Shapiro interview with Amy Peikoff, Parler's chief policy officer, wherein the de-platforming of the site by Amazon was discussed. This, on the heels of listening to a legal-issues analysis that affirmed my belief that there...
House-Cleaning 101
As the Trump-impeachment movement gains steam, I am prompted to recall some relevant history. A bit of it older: The Republican Party basically telling Nixon "resign or we will impeach you." A bit of it more recent: my multiple blog posts this summer...
Striking a Blow For Liberty
A few years ago, the popular political narrative was all about Russia, Russia, Russia. Meanwhile, Trump warned us all of China. Turned out, despite the urge that many have to simply gainsay anything that came out of his mouth, Trump was right. China has proven to be a...
Big Tech’s Big Mistake
The political and cultural aftermath of the Capitol riot is already upon us, with Big Tech opting to 'cancel' the Parler social media platform that has become a go-to refuge for conservatives and Trumpists unhappy with Twitter's increasingly censorious ways. That I...
Fire Him!
The case for firing Donald Trump is an extension of an argument I've long made in these pages: impeachment should be "normalized." It should seem incredible that a man with control over nuclear weapons has less job performance accountability than a Starbucks barista....
Conservatives Against Liberty
Twitter's editorial bias in policing the content that flows through its service has been ruffling the Right's feathers for quite a while. The market responded, and Parler emerged as an alternative, with a promise of more freedom and less censorship. Google was...
One Failure To Rule Them All
The doer and the thinker, no allowance for the other - Gerald "Little Milton" Bostock A disinterested observer might conclude that there have been two Donald Trumps. There is the doer, someone who had some significant accomplishments during his Presidency. Some good,...
“Not In My Name”
Those four words, followed by an explicit repudiation and an unqualified concession, are what a true leader would have said during yesterday's riotous chaos at the Capitol building. Those four words would be the feeling and sentiment of a statesman, of a person who...
The Great Divergence
There was a time, not that long ago when measured against the scale of human civilization, but perhaps an eternity ago when measured in political years, when liberals held a number of beliefs associated with the word "free." Free love, free speech, free press, free to...
Our Skin-Walker Culture
We find, in many religions and the lore of many cultures, unusual beings, beasts, and creatures. Considered from a secular viewpoint, these translate into archetypes, to be either emulated or shunned. In contemporary pop culture, many are often adapted into fantasy...
Frivolity and the Supremes Redux
Last month, the Supreme Court refused to take up a challenge to Pennsylvania's voting process put forth by Texas, a decision I roundly criticized. That decision is, I fear, even worse than originally posited, with the country breaking at the seams, culturally, over...
The Perils of Vindictiveness
The New York Post runs a "Career Coach" column every monday, wherein a couple readers' letters are answered. This week, the column included a letter from someone who works for a recruiting firm, who noted that his boss instructed him not to refer any candidates who...
Frivolity and the Supremes
One rarely hears "frivolous lawsuit" and "Supreme Court of the United States" spoken together, yet that is the position we find ourselves in. The President's lawyers promised to "unleash the Kraken" of proof of widespread electoral fraud. Instead, fruit-bat-like Rudy...
Sacrificed To Ideology
A COVID-19 vaccine arrived, a product of human ingenuity motivated by crisis. In months, not years. Then, a second. Soon, a third. And, now, the politics. It was inevitable that there'd be debates about who should get immunized first. In a rational society, the...
Quadruple Baconator… With Lard
Many of us have a bipolar relationship with social media. On the one hand, I think it'll go down in history as a horribly corrosive influence on human interaction and cultural advancement. On the other hand, it offers us the opportunity to "meet" and interact with...
Emperor Cuomo and The First Amendment
I've long held the belief that NY Governor Andrew Cuomo has presidential aspirations. That belief has been bolstered of late by a number of his actions and public postures, including his myriad bits of self-congratulation regarding his handling of the COVID-19...
Defending Distrust
A common theme, in looking at America's galaxy of ills in the fall 2020, is that we are transitioning from a high trust society to one of low trust. Consider though, if we look at the last two decades, the problem is trust in the competency (and motives) of our...
Jill Biden and the Cancelniks
Joseph Epstein, a writer, essayist, and "visiting lecturer in literature and writing at Northwestern University," set off the kerfuffle of the day with an op-ed published in the Wall Street Journal that offered a bit of unsolicited advice to the First Lady-Elect....
They’re Not Even Pretending Any More
For weeks after the New York Post broke its story about Hunter Biden's shady dealings, we were told by the mainstream press that it was all "fake news," foreign propaganda, and wildly unconfirmed claims. We also bore witness to social media giants damping the story on...
Biden, Babies, and Bathwater
Politics of personality is the state of affairs America finds herself in more often than not, usually with problematic outcome. One of the greatest features of libertarianism, at least for me, is its elevation of ideas over idols, and while we do have our idols...
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COVID Mask Follies
An Anti-Vax Inflection Point?
“Not In My Name”
The Great Social Media Crackup
War Comes Through The Overton Window
Rights and Wrongs
A Policy of Ignorance
Whence Morality?
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