Source: American Thinker.

I think the writer expresses a vain hope, but it might be useful to keep it alive to be remembered when our children, or their children, remake the United States.

Source: The American Spectator.

A few random thoughts…

Continue reading “Bacha Bazi in America?” →

Source: Summit News.

Without reading too much into it, this story is interesting for its conformance to pattern. It reminds me of Ronald Reagan, who said he never left the Democratic Party, the Democratic Party left him. It reminds me in ironic ways of the #WalkAway campaign and many of the confessions it generated.

It is unlikely the Democratic Party will soon collapse due to defection, but it is noteworthy that party defectors commonly describe their former fellows as unpleasant people.

Source: Astral Codex Ten.

The writer continues his exploration of the topic of culture-bound mental illness.

I wonder if some sort of synthesis eventually might be feasible. It might be helpful to know, for example, whether perceptions of equality/inequality correlate to some sort of psychological range in which health and illness represent the opposite extremes.

But that’s an aside. For now, just establishing that mental states are caused to some degree by the society in which one lives, or by the society to which one becomes exposed, is the challenge.

Source: Caitlin’s Newsletter.

Elon Musk has a sense of humor. Still and all, the writer makes a fair point:

All this bickering and squabbling about whose voice should be uplifted as trustworthy and whose voice should be squelched as untrustworthy is just a manifestation of the fact that powerful people understand something most ordinary members of the public do not: that whoever controls the narrative controls the world. If you can exert control over the way people perceive reality, then you can control reality itself.

Until the public becomes more aware of this fact, our lives will be subject to the whims of oligarchs, government agencies, and mass media propagandists. Not until then will we be able to awaken from our propaganda-induced coma enough to shake off the psychological manipulations which keep us marching to the tune of oligarchy and empire, and use the power of our numbers to force the emergence of a healthy world that benefits us all.

One should be skeptical of all media content, regardless of source, but it is an immature skepticism to view the world of media content as divided between “good” and “bad” sources.

Remarks begin at 3:05. Transcripted video here.

This could be called the “Going to Hell” speech. I think we’ll be hearing it over and over again.

Source: The Hill.

I think this article gets a lot wrong, but I would draw attention to a couple of things it gets right:

Ukraine needs to transition the battle out of a defensive position with a strategic maneuver, said George Beebe, the director of grand strategy at the Quincy Institute for Statecraft.

“If you’re looking at this as a war of attrition, where the Russians are not actually focusing on big arrow movements on the map, but on grinding down Ukraine’s ability to bring manpower and munitions to the battle,” Beebe said, “then I think you get a different picture and the Russians may have more reason for optimism.”

Beebe also questioned whether Ukrainian troops have the capability to break through fortified Russian defenses — even with Western armor, saying Ukraine needs hundreds of those to make a difference.

The Hill is telling us — in sugarcoated terms, perhaps — that the war in Ukraine isn’t going according to U.S. plans.

Point being: If the plan isn’t working, then we should change to a better plan, preferably one that doesn’t harm as many people.

Source: United States Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of New York.

I have some sympathy for the principled notion that purveyors of disinformation deserve to be punished when it can be shown that actual persons were harmed in a material way. Still, I am alarmed by this conviction.

Mackey was prosecuted for Criminal Conspiracy Against Rights. His attorneys attempted a First Amendment defense at trial, but the jury was not persuaded. Thus the case establishes a precedent that First Amendment law can be ignored in cases where the complaint is tried as a Conspiracy Against Rights.

Should the conviction survive appeals, the government will be empowered to abridge the right of free speech just by — in effect — calling speech something different.

Source: Wall Street Journal (free link).

The writer’s conclusion makes sense to me:

The U.S. military isn’t behind the curve in some grand transformation in warfare. It simply can’t employ the combat tools it has so carefully cultivated over the past 30 to 50 years because it has spent that time preparing to fight low-intensity wars, not a major strategic contest with a peer. If stagnation continues, deterrence will fail. So will the prospects for American victory in any major-power conflict.

The idea that the U.S. is some kind of “sleeping giant” that can be awakened to wreak catastrophic harm upon any global enemy is just BS. Worse, it is hubris to ignore such practical warnings.

I won’t link to them because the speculations contain a dollop of hysteria, but last night and this morning I have seen a spate of stories that ask the title question of this post.

Continue reading “Is Radical-Left Terrorism a Thing?” →