What Should Be Said About China

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By Ralph l. Defalco III

Written by Ralph l. Defalco III

Senator Tom Cotton’s book is a tacit admission that more than 50 years of American policies toward China have failed

In March, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence released the 2025 Annual Threat Assessment (ATA). For the first time, the ATA identified the People’s Republic of China as the most capable threat actor that now confronts the United States. The reasons for ranking China as the top threat—militarily, economically, diplomatically, and informationally—are made clear in Seven Things You Can’t Say About China, a crisply written new book by US Senator Tom Cotton.

Cotton’s slim volume is a very readable and clear-eyed look at China’s capabilities, actions, and intent to challenge the US. Intended for a general audience, the book reflects Cotton’s keen understanding of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) decades-long plan to undermine US global leadership and the insights about China’s leadership he has gained from serving as a member, and now chairman, of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.

In Seven Things You Can’t Say About China, Cotton pulls no punches and calls out the media conventions, ideological leanings, commercial interests, and diplomatic niceties that preclude our leaders saying that China is an “evil empire,” waging economic war on the world, preparing for armed conflict, infiltrating US society and government, and targeting American children. He makes the case for each of these “unsaid” six things and concludes with the sobering assessment that Beijing could win the struggle for global supremacy—another unpleasant truth that goes unsaid.

Evil, Intention, and Infiltration

Much of what Cotton has written in this book could be dismissed by some readers as hyperbole. But his sharp, short arguments—written clearly and succinctly—are well-reasoned and supported by salient facts. His claim that China is an evil empire, for example, is buttressed when he describes ways the CCP built a “dystopian police state to monitor, manipulate and master its people.” He cites forced abortions and involuntary sterilizations that were used to enforce the party’s One Child Policy; the suppression of religious freedom, and Christianity and the Falun Gong movement in particular; the genocidal campaigns against the people of Tibet and Chinese Uyghurs; and a social-credit score that measures the average Chinese citizen’s political reliability and determines access to everything from education to housing.

The author also argues that China is preparing for war by funding an unprecedented military build-up. The Chinese People’s Liberation Army is now the largest ground force in the world; its navy is larger than the US Navy (and augmented with the world’s largest coast guard fleet and a militarized merchant fleet); and Beijing plans to have a stockpile of 1,500 nuclear warheads by 2035. “This massive investment of national resources,” writes Cotton, “speaks volumes about the party’s intentions.”

Seven Things You Can’t Say About China also details the party’s infiltration of American cultural, economic, and academic institutions and government. The author describes, for example, how JP Morgan Chase created a “Sons and Daughters Program” to hire family members of the Chinese elite, which violated American anti-corruption laws, and coughed up a $264 million fine for so doing. Cotton also recounts the now-infamous Hunter Biden dealings with Chinese companies. But he has special ire for retired politicians who have become lobbyists for Chinese enterprises with close ties to the state, including former Senators David Vitner, Barbara Boxer, and Joe Lieberman.

Influence and Obeisance

In his eye-opening chapter “China is Coming for Our Kids,” Cotton moves far beyond the story of TikTok’s hold on American children (in 2023, more than 60 percent of American teens used the app) to describe the influence the CCP is exerting on schools. On college campuses and in primary and secondary schools, Beijing is promoting Chinese language and cultural programs. Innocent on their face, Cotton argues the programs are artfully contrived. He quotes a less than circumspect Chinese official who noted the programs “are an important part of China’s overseas propaganda set-up.” The Chinese government is spending hundreds of millions of dollars on these programs, supplementing them with billions of dollars in donations (most of which are underreported) to academic institutions.

The CCP cannot win its battle for global supremacy without Taiwan in hand, and Beijing is readying to take that island by force.

That kind of spending, Cotton acknowledges, buys influence not only on college campuses, but also in K-12 classrooms. Nearly all of the estimated 120 Confucius Institutes on American campuses were closed when they were designated as foreign missions, and Congress prohibited DoD funding to any university that played host to these fronts for the CCP’s notorious United Front Work Department. Many have re-emerged as rebranded programs or have been spun off into other schools.

From 2007 to 2020, a Chinese-funded guest-teacher program placed 1,650 Chinese nationals in Confucius Classrooms. These K-12 teachers taught Chinese language and cultural studies and sanitized versions of Chinese history and the party-line versions of geography and politics in more than 500 American classrooms. The teachers, according to the Department of Education professionals Cotton cites, are “trained to steer classroom discussions away from an ever-expanding list of issues: Taiwan, Tibet, Tiananmen Square, Hong Kong, Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, the South China Sea and more. The problem isn’t what is being said; the problem is what is not being said.” The overarching teaching objective is to “normalize” the activities of the CCP and suppress any criticism of China.

The cost of criticizing China can be painfully steep. Cotton recounts the notorious story of how the NBA was forced to kowtow to China after losing an estimated $400 million when Beijing pulled all NBA games from state-run television and suspended sales of the league’s branded merchandise. The NBA’s affront was to permit one team’s general manager to tweet his support for the democracy demonstrators in Hong Kong. The CCP, Cotton explains, has “compromised American businessmen, academics, and celebrities,” and “uses fear and greed,” to influence them. The author notes that he has been “sanctioned” by China for his views on Hong Kong and sees that condemnation as a badge of honor.

Not so the business leaders, academics, celebrities, and influencers—like Disney’s Michael Eisner—who have issued self-abasing apologies after making any one of several statements deemed offensive by China. Cotton recounts actor John Cena’s mea culpa as one case in point. Cena referred to Tibet as a “country” when promoting the film Fast & Furious 9. At risk of losing access to the Chinese market of tens of millions of movie-goers, and millions in revenue, Cena groveled his apology in tutored Mandarin: “I made a mistake, I must say right now. It’s so so so so so so important, I love and respect Chinese people. I’m very sorry for my mistakes. Sorry. Sorry. I’m really sorry. You have to understand I love and respect China and the Chinese people.”

Then Taiwan

Throughout Seven Things You Can’t Say About China, Cotton builds a solid case for his claims. A Harvard Law graduate, the author assembles point-by-point arguments and usually avoids speculation that would open his arguments to criticism and counterargument. That objective and understandable approach to a complex topic gives way to informed speculation in the chapter, “China Could Win.” Here Cotton argues the CCP cannot win its battle for global supremacy without Taiwan in hand, and Beijing is readying to take that island by force. War for Taiwan would result in “a global depression, the fraying of US military alliances, nuclear proliferation, the decline of American influence, long term economic stagnation,” and “the sun finally setting on American power.”

Cotton handily explores these shocking claims in the same succinct style that characterizes the rest of his narrative—only to hedge by writing “no one can predict with certainty how a Chinese invasion of Taiwan would end up.” What is certain, however, is that Cotton has made the case here for the promulgation of an American strategy “to deter Chinese aggression in the first place.” But the author never hints at even a base outline of a deterrent strategy.

Seven Things You Can’t Say About China finishes on a weak note. The epilogue offers up seven things ordinary Americans can do to beat China, including boycotting Chinese-made products, buying American, and voting for candidates that will stand up to China. This is disappointing. Cotton could have provided a substantial call to action as he has been far more forthright with how to address the Chinese threat in other forums. For example, in his report, “Beat China: Targeted Decoupling and the Economic Long War,” Cotton called for severing most economic ties with China; reinvesting in scientific, technical and manufacturing fields where China has the lead; sanctioning China for the theft of intellectual property; and withholding visas for Chinese students. That report would have been a welcome appendix to this eye-opening book.

That’s a minor criticism of a well-crafted book that otherwise offers a savvy and startling assessment of the reasons why so many in academia, business, finance, stardom, and even government are reluctant to say what needs to be said about China. These things are left unsaid by so many lest they call forth an unwelcome reckoning and a galling confession. Seven Things You Can’t Say About China is, at bottom, a tacit admission that more than 50 years of American economic, military, diplomatic, and informational policies for China have failed.

It’s a silence now kept at our own peril.

*****

This article was published by Law & Liberty and is reproduced with permission.

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The First 100 Days of the Golden Age thumbnail

The First 100 Days of the Golden Age

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By Dan McCarthy

Editors’ Note: Donald Trump gets little love from the ” established” Conservative movement and mostly hostility from Libertarians. National Review remains overtly hostile; we also think the Wall Street Journal and Commentary are as well. We found this article particularly insightful, and remarkably, it came from the editor of Modern Age, one of the oldest  Conservative academic journals, published by ISI, the Intercollegiate Studies Institute. Trump was never part of the established Conservative Movement before he got into politics, and that lack of connection may account for some of the hostility. However, we think that Trump’s departure from Conservative defeatism has also insulted many who have made a good living pontificating while losing out on most of the major political battles. This article notes that he has gotten more done for the movement than years of Conservative bloviating and fundraising. He has embarrassed them because he has effectively gotten things done and likely offended them by not posing as the bow tie equivalent of George Will. His style is offensive to them, even if he is effective; there seems to be a class element of superiority and haughtiness among some Conservatives. But Trump is reshaping American politics as few have and many Conservatives seem to resent him for showing up their own inadequacies and class distinctions. Trump has connected with working people and minorities like no other recent Conservative leader. He has pulled off the seemingly impossible. He is loved for being a blue-collar billionaire.

Trump’s second term is fundamentally reshaping American politics

The first sign of just how revolutionary President Trump’s second term would be actually came two years before his re-election. On June 6, 2022, the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, delivering pro-life conservatives a victory decades in the making—but which, in the end, was only made possible by Donald Trump.

Before Trump’s first term, Republican presidents had displayed a remarkable knack for preserving a pro-Roe majority on the Court: George H.W. Bush more than offset the conservative jurisprudence of Clarence Thomas by appointing Anthony Kennedy and David Souter. And while both of George W. Bush’s appointees voted to reverse Roe, the younger Bush had tried hard to place a family crony, rather than a judicial conservative like Samuel Alito, on the bench.

Would Alberto Gonzales or Harriet Miers, Bush’s preferred choices, have overturned Roe? Would Chief Justice John Roberts have borne the burden of being the man who ended Roe if his had been the deciding vote, rather than just one of a 6-3 supermajority made possible by Trump’s three anti-Roe justices? Mitt Romney was a staunch supporter of Roe—and a financial contributor to Planned Parenthood—until he started running for the Republican presidential nomination. Would a Republican like Romney, or John McCain, or another Bush have dared do what Trump did?

Trump is the opposite of the Republicans who preceded him. They specialized in telling conservatives what they wanted to hear, but they were afraid to act—on Roe, on racial discrimination against whites and Asians, on immigration, on fulfilling Ronald Reagan’s pledge to dismantle the Department of Education, and on most other priorities for the American Right. The title of a book by Pat Buchanan that was published in 1975—Conservative Votes, Liberal Victories—accurately described the relationship between the Republican base and the leaders it typically put in office through 2015.

What President Trump has done in his first 100 days back in office is to implement as much of the Right’s agenda as he could in a little more than three months. He’s done more for conservative principles in that small span of time than the last two Republican presidents, the Bushes, did in their combined 12 years in the White House. The two Bushes did accomplish a great deal—but in the service of left-liberal aims.

These past 100 days provide a new perspective on the last 45 years of the American Right’s history.

Ronald Reagan was elected to do much of what Trump is now doing. Yet the Reagan era was in one sense not the triumph but the death knell of the post-World War II conservative movement. Before Reagan, it was usually a liability—even within Republican circles—to be identified as a conservative. After Reagan’s victory in 1980, however, centrist and liberal Republicans began to perceive an advantage in rebranding themselves as “conservatives.”

Voters liked what Reagan had offered, but perhaps political insiders who were accustomed to offering something else could retain their power by simply changing their labels and adjusting their language. They astutely recognized which themes in Reagan’s own rhetoric could be appropriated for their ends. His emphasis on America’s greatness and goodness, for example, could be—and soon would be—weaponized against anyone who called attention to the decline of the nation’s industrial workforce or who questioned whether Americanizing the planet through military force was either desirable or possible.

Voters put Reagan in office to do something radical, but many of the Republicans the president placed in his administration—beginning with his choice for vice president, George H.W. Bush—were not political conservatives but institutional conservatives, determined to preserve in Republican drag the institutions built by liberal Democrats.

The permanent “non-political” federal bureaucracy in Washington, D.C., which then as now was overwhelmingly liberal and Democratic in orientation, was also at cross purposes with President Reagan.

According to the Constitution, Reagan was the head of the executive branch. But according to progressive mythology, which even Republicans had internalized, “the government” was something permanent and “independent” of voters’ choices and the Constitution’s provisions. If Republicans wanted to lead the government rather than fight it, they would have to accept the administrative apparatus liberal Democrats had built, along with its attendant mythology of legitimacy—a mythology which necessarily de-legitimized the Constitution itself. It became unthinkable that Republicans would actually abolish the Department of Education or defund National Public Radio. And if the GOP was scared enough of Big Bird, what were the prospects the party would dare put an end to affirmative action or Roe?

Yet President Trump, who is not an ideological conservative, is doing all these things and more. He’s doing them despite the opposition he has faced, and continues to face, from the gatekeepers of ideological conservatism.

They attack him for his tariffs. They attack him for not wanting to prolong the war in Ukraine. They attack him for flouting the commands of judges, though they know the Constitution does not place the executive branch under the judiciary. They know it’s up to Congress to discipline the president with the power of the purse or impeachment. But the mythology of permanent bureaucracy, as opposed to the Constitution, makes it impossible to defund any part of government, even when the opposition party—which in this case is not the Democrats, but everyone who is anti-Trump—insists that the most sacred principles of the rule of law have been violated.

By reinvigorating the distinctions between the federal government’s branches, Trump in his first 100 days has been advancing the urgent task of reorienting the nation away from the progressive blueprint of a permanent, unitary, unelected government of bureaucrats and judges and back toward the Constitution’s design of separate branches that jealously guard their roles, with most powers vested in Congress and the president—not the courts and an executive bureaucracy “independent” of election results.

The hostility that Trump has faced from the elite gatekeepers of conservative or libertarian purity suggests something about what the function of “principle” was in the pre-Trump conservative movement: it was designed to arrest action. The useful thing about an all-or-nothing approach is it allows the self-righteous to believe they’re holding out for “all” when their actions consistently obtain “nothing.” It’s a way of turning the vice of fecklessness into the virtue of moral superiority. And it’s a way for hypocrites to defraud the innocent but gullible.

Even better, to the extent that “principle” excuses doing nothing that alters the status quo, it’s a way to feel righteous without having to live with the consequences of changing the world. As the example of Dobbs illustrates, sometimes the consequences of doing the right thing are disheartening—the country as a whole has not become pro-life simply because Roe has fallen, and many states have even liberalized their abortion laws or enshrined abortion rights in their constitutions. As long as “principle” remains out of practical reach, one can imagine its realization would lead to no downsides or disappointments. The danger of actually advancing principle in practice is that the idealist must face reality.

Donald Trump has always forced the American Right to stop daydreaming and confront reality—and the first 100 days of his second term have done that to a greater degree than ever before.

Procedural purists don’t like the reality of what cracking down on illegal immigration entails, though they should know full well that illegal immigration is, by definition, a violation of legal procedure in the first place.

The American Left has for decades succeeded in conning the Right into playing by a more restrictive set of rules than the Left itself follows. If there’s a “principle” that says immigrants may break the law by coming here, and once here they are under the protection of the laws they broke, why shouldn’t there be a “principle” that says judges can be ignored if that’s what it takes to send illegal immigrants away, with the corollary that once they’re no longer in our country, they’re no longer protected by our laws? Elite conservatives and libertarians who are socially and professionally comfortable in public and private institutions controlled by progressives have their reasons, of course, for accepting progressive lawbreaking while condemning any departure the Trump Administration makes from the norms established by liberal opinion.

These have been 100 days of conflict. Trump won’t win every battle, either in the law courts or in the court of public opinion. But he changes the political landscape just by engaging in the fight. He’s doing for every key issue what he did with abortion and Roe.

President Trump in 100 days has opened a frontier, one that the nation, and especially the Right, will be exploring for years to come, after long living on the progressives’ reservation. The frontier is dangerous and uncomfortable, but it’s free, and this frontier, unlike the one tamed by our ancestors, is only political—pending the acquisition of Greenland and Canada anyway. The men and women who will flourish in the America to come after some 1,360 more days like these first 100 will be those with a frontier spirit. Those without it, who have been well-fed and content in a liberal ideological cage, will merely continue to complain.

 is the editor of Modern Age: A Conservative Review.

*****

This article was published by The American Mind and is reproduced with permission.

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Fool’s Gold’: New Book Cautions Against Spreading California Policies Across US

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By Carrie Sheffield

Written by Carrie Sheffield

A new book exposes how California’s leftist political machine is unraveling the Golden State—and, sadly, how socialist policies could be exported nationwide if Americans aren’t vigilant.

The book is “Fool’s Gold: The Radicals, Con Artists, and Traitors Who Killed the California Dream and Now Threaten Us All,” co-authored by investigative journalists Susan Crabtree of RealClearPolitics and Jedd McFatter at the Government Accountability Institute.

“Violent crime is surging in California. Illegal drug use is off the charts, and it is subject to a daily invasion of illegal migrants crossing its southern border,” the authors write, mincing no words.

“Homeless addicts in once beautiful San Francisco shoot up, sleep, and defecate on its streets when they’re not stealing from what shops are still open in the city. Its economy is struggling. Tent cities block the sidewalks of Los Angeles as businesses leave the state’s crushing regulations, extortionate taxes, and unchecked property crime. Its police force is demoralized by negligent ‘Soros prosecutors’ who turn repeat criminals loose. Its universities, always a source of foment and dissent, have metastasized into playthings and espionage targets for America’s greatest adversary—the communist regime of China.”

“Fool’s Gold” is timely, given that polling shows two of the top five potential 2028 Democratic presidential primary contenders hail from California—former Vice President Kamala Harris (a former San Francisco district attorney and state attorney general) and former San Francisco Mayor and current California Gov. Gavin Newsom.

Newsom is currently running an image-rehabilitation podcast after botching the fatal wildfires that ravaged his state earlier this year.

McFatter and Crabtree, a California resident and my former colleague at The Hill newspaper, also dig into Newsom’s alleged ties to the Chinese Communist Party and his involvement in corruption. The book describes a nonprofit organization initiative started by Newsom called ChinaSF, which the authors report served as a gateway for Chinese Communist Party officials and Chinese criminals to exploit California.

“Fool’s Gold” is already having an impact, with Newsom publicly denying the book’s claim that he secretly funded a controversial City Hall bronze statue of his own bust.

The statue commemorates Newsom’s stint as mayor of San Francisco from 2004 to 2011. Newsom used what’s known as “behested payments” to fund the monument, with a reported three private organizations donating to the nonprofit designated for “Mayoral Bust at San Francisco City Hall.”

“Fool’s Gold” reports two of the three reported companies are companies owned by Newsom: Balboa Cafe Partners and PlumpJack Management Group donated a combined $10,000 to the $97,000 bust fund.

“We 100% stand by our Gavin Newsom bronze-bust vanity project story,” Crabtree replied on X in response to Newsom’s claim that the donations were not secret. “Team Newsom is afraid of the shocking revelations in FOOL’S GOLD—which is backed by more than forty-five pages of endnotes containing more than 1,000 open-source, reputable, and verifiable citations with zero anonymous sources—and that is why they are trying to smear this book.”

Crabtree also said “Newsom’s team has thus far refused to answer whether his companies got a tax break for funding this ‘charitable’ statue.”

“Fool’s Gold” also explains how Newsom’s horrific release of thousands of prisoners during the COVID-19 pandemic created a huge spike in crime throughout the state. Its impact is still felt today as residents and businesses continue to flee California for better-managed red states, such as Texas and Florida.

It’s no wonder, in light of a new report from the United Ways of California finding that 35% of households across the state—more than 3.8 million—are struggling to cover basic living expenses.

The Committee to Unleash Prosperity noted that a 2024 national survey found only 15% of respondents felt that California was a model for other states

The Public Policy Institute of California also found that only 1 in 3 Californians think the state is a good place to achieve the American dream.

McFatter and Crabtree pithily sum up the problem of exporting California’s policies nationwide: “If the fifty states are still America’s ‘laboratories of democracy,’ California is the Wuhan Institute.”

*****

This article was published by The Independent Women’s Institute and is reproduced with permission.

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80 Years After The Allies Won World War II, U.S. Taxpayers Are Funding European Authoritarianism

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By Hayden Daniel

Written by Hayden Daniel

Editor’s Note: You could make a good case that the US attempts to protect Europe from its folly go back even further. World War II had direct roots in World War I. In addition, we provided substantial food and financial aid to Europe after the First World War. After all this sacrifice, it is heartbreaking to see the Europeans turn their backs on free speech and liberty, and instead invite en masse millions of Muslims who don’t support either freedom or the European way of life. Europeans have so little confidence in their civilization that they can’t even stir themselves to have babies. We should all learn this lesson because America is not that far behind.

The United States has protected and bailed out Europe for far too long

May 8, 2025, marked the 80th anniversary of the Allies’ triumph over Nazi Germany and the end of World War II in Europe. Through Lend Lease and the destroyers-for-bases scheme, we had become involved in the European war much earlier than Hitler’s declaration of war on the United States on December 11, 1941.

American boots on the ground proved decisive in the Western Theater, from North Africa to Italy to Normandy to Germany itself. And American industry and money proved to be an overwhelming advantage, pumping out a nearly inexhaustible supply of materiel for the Allied cause.

Once the war ended, the U.S. decided to maintain a military presence on the Continent and extend its protective hegemony over Western Europe for two reasons. First, to create a bulwark against the specter of global communism embodied by the new Soviet bloc. Second, to keep a watchful eye on the troublesome European powers that had started two world wars. Through the Marshall Plan and other programs, the U.S. pumped in billions of dollars to help rebuild the shattered ruins of Europe while providing the vast military presence necessary to ward off any potential Soviet aggression.

And we’re still there today. But if you look at the state of the Continent now, it’s hard to justify our continued presence and support. We stormed the beaches of Normandy to rid Europe of tyranny, but in the decades since, the continent has succumbed to a wave of left-wing authoritarianism.

In the United Kingdom, supposedly our closest ally, government authorities lock up people for silently praying, and in some cases for just offering to chat within the vicinity of abortion facilities. Under a new “online safety” law, the U.K. has charged almost 300 people for so-called “hate speech” on social media. The law criminalizes “false information intended to cause non-trivial harm.”

Germany’s domestic intelligence service designated Alternative for Germany, the country’s conservative party and the second-largest party in the country’s legislature, as right-wing extremists, putting them on the same level as violent terrorists. That designation was quickly suspended, but the German government has been angling to ban the party for several years as it has grown in popularity.

The French establishment and far-left parties struck backroom deals to shut out National Rally, France’s conservative party, to prevent its victory in the 2024 legislative election. Then, a French court banned National Rally’s leader, Marine Le Pen, from seeking office for the next five years.

Romania’s government canceled its presidential election last year over claims of the classic deep state bugbear — “Russian interference” — after the right-wing populist candidate won the first round.

Meanwhile, practically every Western European government has opened the floodgates for migrants, bringing crime, fraud, and the degradation of Western values and civilization. Millions, mostly from Africa and the Middle East, have flooded in, and European governments have sat idly by as they replace native populations. In fact, the powers that be on the continent often celebrate the fact that their countries are being overrun by people who have no ties to Western culture or values.

While the U.K. authorities arrest people over edgy memes, they apparently turned a blind eye to the massive “grooming gangs” scandal that took place for decades across the country. Rape sprees, brutal murders, and terrorist attacks have become all too common from Europe’s supposedly “enriching” new members.

And while Europe turns its back on its own values and history, the U.S. is still footing the bill for its defense. A majority of NATO countries, including France, Germany, Italy, and Spain, still don’t meet the defense spending target of 2 percent of real GDP, instead relying on the United States to meet their defense needs. The U.S. has given almost $200 billion in aid to Ukraine, supposedly to prevent a full-scale Russian invasion of the rest of the Continent. Yes, we’re sending billions of dollars to “protect” a place that crushes political dissent and has no sense of self-preservation when it comes to limitless migration.

During a speech at the Munich Security Conference back in February, Vice President J.D. Vance perfectly diagnosed the problem with Europe: “While the Trump administration is very concerned with European security and believes that we can come to a reasonable settlement between Russia and Ukraine, the threat that I worry the most about vis-a-vis Europe … is the threat from within.”

“For years, we’ve been told that everything we fund and support is in the name of our shared democracy values,” Vance added. “Everything from our Ukraine policy to digital censorship is billed as a defense of democracy, but when we see European courts canceling elections and senior officials threatening to cancel others, we ought to ask whether we’re holding ourselves to an appropriately high standard.”

There are some particularly pessimistic commentators who believe that the European victory in 1945 was a complete waste, given how things have turned out. But that mode of thinking presupposes that our only choices then were a Nazi hellscape or a leftist hellscape a few decades later, and not that there were a million other ways the history of Europe could have gone after the death of Hitler. Any serious person can accept that the destruction of the Nazi regime was a good thing but that the post-war reaction has also been disastrous for Europe. V-E Day is worth celebrating, if for nothing else but the immense grit and courage of the Allied soldiers. We can, however, use it as a time to reflect on what Europe has become and what it should be.

As things now stand, the United States is shackled to the corpse of a once-great continent spiraling into an authoritarian nightmare. But, as we learned after both world wars, we can’t save them from themselves, no matter how much money or military might we throw at them. They have to do the work to save their own homelands. We should support those who strive to make Europe safe and prosperous again, but our time as Europe’s piggy bank and protector must end.

*****

This article was published by The Federalist and is reproduced with permission.

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What A Hill To Die On

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By Neland Nobel

Written by Neland Nobel

It’s a hill where there are some strange and unpopular defensive positions

We hear a lot of commentary about “what hill Democrats have chosen to die on”. But what exactly is on that hill? What follows is a partial list of what we think remains of strategic importance, worthy of the valor they are displaying. We admit our perceptions of what is on the hill may differ from theirs. That difference in perception may explain Democrats’ current record-low approval ratings.

The topography on this hill is varied, so defensive positions remain complex. However, there is no doubt that fresh from November’s defeat, Democrats are digging in around their most cherished positions. They are pouring intellectual concrete, filling sandbags with rhetorical venom, and digging in to defend the high ground as they see it.

Their fighting spirit is high, even if their common sense is low. They seem determined to die on their distinct political hill, and for that, we must admire them. While we think they are misguided, they are sticking to their positions, unlike many Republicans in the Senate.

But what exactly is on the top of the hill that Democrats are so staunchly defending? Below is a partial list, as best as we can determine by aerial reconnaissance through the lens of the press. We don’t know what transpires deep in their political bunkers or how their generals view the political topography. But our reconnaissance has picked up the following defensive positions.

Prominent on top of the hill is the claim for open borders. Not only did Democrat officials ignore immigration laws, they actively, through their NGOs networks, encouraged tens of millions of migrants to break US immigration laws. They then spent lavishly to house, feed, and relocate them. Their positions on mass migration seem indistinguishable from those of European socialists. Now they spend their resources in court to see that the illegals are not deported. The cause for massive, unvetted, subsidized, and illegal immigration will not go down undefended.

Democrats believe in filthy, crime-ridden cities. Quiet leafy suburbs of single-family homes that cause urban sprawl, not so much. They can be breeding grounds for middle-class values. They see the homeless drug addict as a special class of citizen who is allowed to practice a “lifestyle” and a special privilege that destroys the lifestyle of others. To them, a person should be able to inebriate themselves, shoot up in public, defecate in public, and live in filth on the streets, regardless of the apparent impact on others. Democrats seem to have no problem either tolerating or promoting such behavior in all the cities around the country that they dominate.

This mixes well with the other political paradigm. A highly concentrated and combustible population in the inner city, which is allowed to fester in despair through failed schools and social policies that destroy the family. The results are apparent. About a dozen major cities run by Democrats account for most of the crime.  About 3% of the population accounts for over 43% of the homicides. Even more striking, in those crime-ridden cities, about 50% of crime emanates from a small area in the town, roughly 5%. Then add the homeless, export most of the industrial jobs overseas, and trap what remains of the family in failing public schools, crime-ridden neighborhoods, and social dysfunction flourishes. As long as those cities are run by powerful unions that support their party, it is worth defending.

Top 10 U.S. Cities with Highest Violent Crime Rates (2023 Data)

  1. Memphis, TN
    • Violent Crime Rate: 2,437 per 100,000
    • Mayor: Paul Young (Democrat)
  2. St. Louis, MO
    • Violent Crime Rate: 1,470 per 100,000
    • Mayor: Tishaura Jones (Democrat)
  3. Detroit, MI
    • Violent Crime Rate: 2,059 per 100,000
    • Mayor: Mike Duggan (Democrat)
  4. Little Rock, AR
    • Violent Crime Rate: 1,825 per 100,000
    • Mayor: Frank Scott Jr. (Democrat)
  5. Cleveland, OH
    • Violent Crime Rate: 1,627 per 100,000
    • Mayor: Justin Bibb (Democrat)
  6. Kansas City, MO
    • Violent Crime Rate: 1,483 per 100,000
    • Mayor: Quinton Lucas (Democrat)
  7. New Orleans, LA
    • Violent Crime Rate: 1,446 per 100,000
    • Mayor: LaToya Cantrell (Democrat)
  8. Baltimore, MD
    • Violent Crime Rate: ~1,800 per 100,000 (based on 2022 data, as 2023 figures vary)
    • Mayor: Brandon Scott (Democrat)
  9. Birmingham, AL
    • Violent Crime Rate: ~1,600 per 100,000 (based on 2022-2023 estimates)
    • Mayor: Randall Woodfin (Democrat)
  10. Albuquerque, NM
    • Violent Crime Rate: ~1,300 per 100,000 (based on 2022-2023 estimates)
    • Mayor: Tim Keller (Democrat)

Democrats also seem to have become the party of war, especially if it is in Ukraine. Once, Democrats said that war is “not healthy for children and all living things,” as I recall the popular poster. However, their constant insistence on a battle that cannot possibly be won against Russia is now a key defensive position. Even the Left Wing Guardian notes they have ceded the peace movement to Republicans.

Also residing at the top of the hill is a steaming pile of sexual confusion. On the one hand, Democrats seek to define away what it means to be a woman. On the other hand, they rail against patriarchy and the danger presented by men, especially white men. But they favor special treatment for LGBTQ groups. So, while they are simultaneously against both men and women, they are for everyone else who isn’t. Do we have that right? Furthermore, Democrats want grown biological men to have free rein in women’s sports and women’s locker rooms. In California, party leaders just had a difficult time passing a bill to increase the penalties for adults paying to have sex with children. That this was even a contested issue speaks to where Democrats now reside on the depravity scale.

Although Democrats have a general sympathy for anyone who breaks the law getting into this country, they seem to have a special place in their hearts for illegals who commit serious crimes, especially those who belong to trans national gangs.  Democrat leaders seem to be flocking to protect gangbangers. They claim all should be accorded “due process”, without noting that this concept exists on a spectrum, especially for those who are not citizens. The legal gradations don’t seem to matter.  Everyone deserves “due process”, without that process being defined. Some may get nothing more than a hearing, which many illegals failed to show up for anyway. They apparently want full jury trials after the fact for all members of international gangs, but summary incarcerations for all January 6th defendants. But they don’t believe in prisons, except if Trump supporters reside there. It is a nuanced position, to be sure.

Also flourishing on this heap of political contradictions is the view that Hamas is a particularly worthy terrorist organization to support. At the same time, the highly democratic state of Israel should always be condemned as a Zionist entity, a colonizer, and a white settler genocidal operation. That Arab citizens are freer, more prosperous, and represented in parliament in Israel more so than in any Arab country is beside the point. It is not a Muslim country. This enmity towards Israel cannot be limited, however, to the Zionist oppressor, but must also be extended to all Jews, especially if they are students at our leading universities.

Democrats share the view that America is also illegitimate. It was based on racism and slavery from the beginning, and is a colonizer of indigenous people whom it always sought to exterminate with genocidal intent.  The very country is illegitimate to its core because it is based on “stolen land”, something Democrats recite mechanically as “land acknowledgement declarations” at the beginning of almost all political meetings.  After all, the more you say something, the more it will be true, except if you offer a prayer in public or say the Pledge of Allegiance.

Democrats believe in law and order. However, they don’t believe in funding the police or allowing criminals to be incarcerated. The roving bands of therapists, counselors, and cultural studies professors can only maintain law and order.  The right and means of self-defense should also be denied to the citizenry if their theories fail. People who may have strolled into the Capitol rotunda need prison, but gangbangers and Antifa do not. It is another nuanced position.

In terms of what kind of government they want, they seem to want an enormous and expensive government whose primary purpose is the redistribution of wealth. Money spent on law enforcement and defense is improper. High taxes, currency debasement, excessive borrowing, and large trade deficits are preferred methods to finance the redistribution state. Attempts to cut spending by finding waste and fraud are simply an excuse for teenage nerds to invade the privacy of those receiving government checks. There is no waste and government; if there is, it should be regarded as a form of reparations to those exploited centuries ago.

Decision-making is best done in a democratic government through non-democratic means. Unelected experts in the bureaucracy or the judiciary are the best means of preserving democracy for the people, whoever they are.  Civil Service protection and lifetime appointments are the best way to practice “democracy.”

Their primary view of life is that it is a disappointment that they can only fix by ending it for others. This includes mass inoculations with untested vaccinations, abortion on demand paid for by the government,  the right to suicide, and preferably no family structure. Better yet, guilt all young people away from having children lest it pollute the planet and reduce the number of polar bears.

You can see they are primarily negative on human life. It is humans who spoil it for all other life.  So, in a sense, they are pro-life, as long as the life they are promoting is not that of humans. Sea turtles, wolves, Siberian Tigers, and microorganisms in the soil (don’t bust the crust) are high in the pecking order. Humans don’t even make the lower rungs of priority. But maybe life is not so much “the earth” that must be saved. If only we could return the world to its state before humans arrived, “the earth” would be happier.

There are likely other strategic positions at the top of their political hill that can be fortified against Conservative incursions. Time and space are limited, but this gives you an idea of what aerial reconnaissance has picked up.

Feel free to add your own take on what bunkers we are missing.

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‘Twin Deficits’: A Tale of Fiscal Folly, Not Trade Failure

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By Donald J. Boudreaux

Written by Donald J. Boudreaux

Editors’ Note: We respectfully disagree with some of the author’s points. We feel some trade practices are patently unfair to the US and its workers at home, and we would like to see that addressed. Adopting free trade unilaterally, when most of your competitors are cheating, is like adopting pacifism unilaterally in a world filled with war. We also think that until our competitors adopt free trade, we must protect vital defense industry infrastructure. We wish Trump critics on trade would turn their intellectual wrath on some of our competitors, like overtly mercantilist China. Trade with China is just one item in a big picture where China aims to dominate us. On the other hand, citizens should be free to buy foreign goods if they are cheaper and of higher quality than those produced at home. Anyone who remembers the junk made by American auto companies in the early 1970s recalls what a relief it was to buy a good Japanese car. Competition is always good. As we have written, trade policy has more implications than explaining problems by adhering to narrow accounting definitions. Please also note the complete absence of commentary about how trade deficits are a representation of the outsourcing of American jobs and factories; instead the author characterizes it flatteringly as an “inflow” of foreign investment. In other words, foreign producers are psyched about the ultra-consumerism of American citizens–or as our author dishonestly says, they’re “especially keen.” Somehow, this decades-long run of “foreign investment” coincides with the loss of 70,000 factories and 5.7 million manufacturing jobs. However, we agree with the author on some of the broader issues. US fiscal policy, creating inflation and capital distortion, makes our country less productive. We would add that so do overbearing regulations, militant unions that get special protection, and an unnecessarily complex tax code. Our educational system is also failing us. If America wants to be great again, it must compete more vigorously, albeit we hope on a more level trade playing field. While we have nuanced disagreements with the author, your time would be well spent hearing him out.

Irresponsible government spending is caused by Congress and the White House’s fiscal recklessness, not by foreigners making attractive offers of imported goods to Americans

No notion in economics is responsible for more misunderstanding and misguided government policies than that of the “balance of trade” (or “balance of payments”).

Rightly ridiculed in 1776 by Adam Smith as “absurd,” the so-called “trade balance” supplies protectionists with cheap yet convenient cover for their destructive interventions. The main reason is language: Saying that a country’s trade is “imbalanced” – especially if that country has a “trade deficit” – suggests to the economically uninformed that something is amiss. Who, pray tell, is comfortable with being out of balance?! All talk of “trade deficits” conveys the impression that the home economy is malfunctioning, or that foreigners are cheating at trade, or both.

But as I and others have explained repeatedly, this impression is not only false, it’s backwards. While hypothetical examples can be conjured in which a country’s trade deficit is a signal of domestic economic trouble, in reality U.S. trade deficits are overwhelmingly evidence of America’s economic vigor, at least relative to other economies. The reason is that U.S. trade deficits – or, more precisely, current-account deficits – arise whenever foreigners, during some period (say, some month), invest more in America than Americans invest abroad. Not only does this net inflow of global capital add to America’s capital stock, it’s also solid evidence that global investors are especially keen on the U.S. economy. Why Americans should be bothered by these realities is mysterious.

Nevertheless, if someone is intent on making the best case possible for being concerned about U.S. trade deficits, that case would point to the connection between U.S. trade deficits and U.S. government budget deficits – the so-called “twin deficits.”

Unlike trade deficits, which do not necessarily increase Americans’ indebtedness, U.S. government budget deficits do necessarily push American citizens further into debt: When the government borrows money to cover its current spending, future Americans are put on the hook to repay this debt. They’ll do so by paying higher taxes, by taking government-spending cuts, or by losing wealth through inflation.

So what’s the connection between U.S. trade deficits and U.S. government budget deficits? It’s the following: One of the countless ways for foreigners to invest dollars that they don’t spend on American exports is to lend those dollars to the U.S. government. These foreign investments in the U.S. both raise U.S. trade deficits and represent increased American indebtedness.

Is this a problem? Yes and no.

It’s a problem for what it signals, namely, government’s fiscal irresponsibility. It’s not a problem for what it does, namely, bringing more capital to the U.S. to help Americans shoulder the burden of Washington’s unsavory mix of gluttony (for spending) and cowardice (to raise taxes).

The U.S. Government’s Fiscal Incontinence

To the extent that U.S. trade deficits rise because the government sells more U.S. Treasuries – that is, borrows more dollars by issuing bonds – that part of the increase in U.S. trade deficits does in fact reflect a real problem in the U.S. That problem, again, is irresponsible government spending. But it’s vital to note that irresponsible government spending is caused exclusively by the fiscal recklessness of Congress and the White House; it’s not caused by foreigners making attractive offers of imported goods to Americans, or by Americans choosing to accept these offers. Regardless of how many or few imports Americans buy from foreigners, if the U.S. government lived within its means, there would be no new U.S. Treasuries for foreigners (or for Americans) to buy.

Someone might respond that foreigners’ eagerness to invest in safe U.S. Treasuries encourages Congress and the White House to spend irresponsibly. Such a causal connection between foreigners’ investment preferences and U.S. government budget deficits is logically possible, but it’s practically implausible, and highly so.

First, more than 60 percent of all federal spending today is non-discretionary; it’s on entitlements and debt service. These expenditures are obligatory. They are at today’s levels because of irresponsible commitments made by the government in the past.

It’s farfetched to think that Congress, through the years, arranged for entitlement spending and debt-service expenses to increase as much as they have (without being covered by increased taxes) because members of Congress were convinced that foreigners would eagerly lend to the government to cover these outlays. What happened instead is that politicians bought votes in the upcoming elections while giving little or no thought to just how these promises would be paid for. “Vote for me! I arranged for grandma today, and you tomorrow, to have more Social Security and government-funded medical care. And I didn’t raise your taxes to do it!” 

Because the benefits to politicians of making such fiscal deals are reaped by those office holders immediately (in the form of greater electoral support), while the costs of these deals come due only in the future (when many of those same officials will be long gone from office), politicians who vote for increased entitlement and debt-service spending that isn’t covered by corresponding increases in taxes simply give no thought to how this spending will be paid for.

Second, discretionary government spending is driven overwhelmingly by similar political considerations. Politicians who vote for, say, agricultural subsidies without corresponding tax increases don’t do so because foreigners’ willingness to buy U.S. Treasuries keeps the government’s borrowing costs lower than otherwise. No. Even if the Almighty announced to Congress just before such a vote was to take place that only Americans and not foreigners can purchase U.S. Treasuries, the politicians who support these boondoggles wouldn’t in the least be deterred from voting for them. All that matters to these politicians is that the costs of today’s promises will be paid for tomorrow, largely by people who aren’t among today’s voters. And today’s politicians give absolutely no thought to the nationalities of the creditors to whom those future U.S. taxpayers will be obliged to pay.

Third, foreigners today own only about 23 percent of U.S. government debt. The bulk of this debt, in other words, is owned by Americans. If, therefore (and contrary to fact), the U.S. government’s fiscal incontinence is rightly to be blamed on people’s willingness to buy U.S. Treasuries, most of this blame would fall on Americans. Yet I’ve never heard any protectionist demand that the government obstruct Americans’ commerce with each other in order to reduce the profitability of that commerce and, in turn, diminish Americans’ willingness to lend to the U.S. government.

Before moving on, it’s worthwhile to make one further observation about protectionists who point to foreign purchases of U.S. Treasuries as evidence that U.S. trade deficits are a problem. In doing so, these protectionists portray the U.S. government as mindlessly borrowing money from foreigners that it shouldn’t borrow and spend. Yet to prevent this reckless borrowing and spending, protectionists propose giving that very same government more power to obstruct Americans’ freedom to trade. What miracle do protectionists have in mind that would transform a government that can’t be trusted to make sound decisions about how to spend its citizens’ tax dollars into a government that can be trusted to make sound decisions about how to obstruct those citizens’ decisions about how to spend their own dollars?

Foreigners Help Americans Share that Burden

Foreigners’ purchases of U.S. Treasuries push real interest rates in the U.S. lower than these rates would be absent such purchases. These purchases, therefore, help to encourage more productive investment in the private economy even if the projects on which the government spends the borrowed funds are wasteful or destructive. If foreigners were to stop lending money to the U.S. government, interest rates would rise and that part of the budget deficit once financed with funds borrowed from abroad would be financed instead with funds borrowed from Americans. In turn, Americans would devote fewer funds to private investment projects. The growth rate of the American economy would be made slower.

There’s no question that the government’s grotesque fiscal irresponsibility and resulting budget deficits pose a real threat to America’s economy. It’s a threat that should be taken much more seriously. If saner heads somehow manage to prevail and restore a measure of fiscal restraint, U.S. trade deficits might indeed fall, as foreigners buy fewer U.S. Treasuries. But, perhaps counterintuitively, U.S. trade deficits might instead rise. Greater fiscal responsibility in the U.S. would improve the future prospects of America’s economy. Attracted by these improved future prospects, foreigners might well increase their investments in the U.S. private sector by more than they decrease their lending to the government.

Either way, however, pointing to U.S. trade deficits as an excuse to have politicians – who are today incapable of fiscal responsibility – restrain Americans’ freedom to trade is, to use the most scientifically precise term, totally bonkers.

*****

This article was published by AIER, the  American Institute for Economic Research, and is reproduced with permission.

 

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Would the Left Finally Explain the Inexplicable?

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By Victor Davis Hanson

Written by Victor Davis Hanson

The left broke norms, erased borders, and weaponized justice—not to govern, but to crush Trump and cling to power by any means necessary

Somewhere between 10 and 12 million illegal aliens were invited into the United States by the Biden administration.

As far as logistics go, Biden could not flee Afghanistan without getting 13 Marines killed and abandoning to the terrorist Taliban $50 billion in munitions, a billion-dollar embassy, and a $300 million retrofitted huge airbase.

But Biden and his handlers proved far more logistically capable when their target was fellow Americans.

After all, they somehow managed to stop the congressionally approved continuance of the border wall, to subvert federal immigration law, to emasculate the border patrol, and to ensure that millions of people around the world could simply walk into the U.S. illegally, unaudited and with impunity.

But why did Biden or his puppeteers do something so anarchic, so injurious to their fellow Americans?

Why cost the nation hundreds of billions of dollars in massive new entitlements?

Why swamp the social services of our own poor citizens?

Why turn loose half a million criminal aliens and gang members to prey on our own weak and defenseless?

Was the idea to alter the demography in one fell swoop? To grow the dependent class, thereby expanding government?

Was it pure spite born of hatred of half the country?

Was it to ensure future constituencies, given that the Democratic agenda no longer appeals to most Americans?

Was it a globalist gambit to demonstrate borders are anachronistic?

Was it to fast-track new voters under the laxity of post-2020 early- and mail-in voting protocols?

They knowingly fixed the 2020 primaries to ensure a non-compos-Biden would be nominated. Under the cover of the COVID lockdowns, they kept him in his basement while operatives radically altered the voting laws in the key swing states.

For the next four years, they put their waxen effigy in a hermetically sealed cocoon—one of avoidance of the press, three-day workweeks, and four-hour workdays.

Yet Biden could still not read huge-font, teleprompted scripts. He could not finish a simple call for unity without snarling, screaming, and damning his opposition as “semi-fascists,” “ultra-MAGA,” and “garbage.”

Was the point to salvage the Democratic Party for one last hurrah before the Squad, and the Sanders socialists inevitably took over and destroyed it?

Was that the idea behind clearing the primary field and anointing a decrepit “good ol’ Joe Biden from Scranton” veneer?

Or was it more sinister still in the sense that a debilitated Biden facade was a godsend for the left? Did his pseudo-centrist cover ensure that his handlers—the Obama crowd, the DEI chauvinists, and the Sanders socialists—could enact from the shadows the most radical agenda since 1933?

Will anyone ever tell us why they endangered and nearly ruined the country with a zombie president?

Why did the left break every prior pretense of legality and of fair play in trying to wreck an entire legal system just to destroy Donald Trump?

Why did the so-called stewards of jurisprudence coordinate four local, state, and federal prosecutions to cook up 93 indictments—the vast majority of them ridiculous contortions that will never be charged against any other American?

What was behind the disastrous effort to de-ballot Trump in most of the blue states? To “save” democracy by destroying it?

Why did they twice impeach a president and then try him as a private citizen?

Why did SWAT teams swarm an ex-president’s home to carry off over 10,000 documents in order to find 102 classified files?

Why did the FBI bring their own pre-prepared classification labels? Why scatter photo files on the floor?

Had Trump destroyed subpoenaed evidence like Hillary Clinton’s emails?

Had Trump stored the files, Biden-style, at four different locations?

Had Trump earlier just flunked rather than aced the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, would special counsel Jack Smith—as did Robert Hur in the Biden file case—have dropped all the charges against Trump on the grounds he was “an elderly man with a poor memory?”

So, what was behind the four years of trying to blow up and discredit our legal and law enforcement system just to destroy Trump?

Was their goad his accent, his bombast, or his tan that so drove the elite left into insanity?

Were they convinced they could never beat him in another election?

Did they hate him because, in his first term, he had secured the border, grown the economy, and had no wars abroad?

Or was it an unstoppable fixation, a destructive addiction?

In sum, the more he mocked them, the more they sought to destroy him—and all the more they ensured he would be president again.

*****

This article was first published on American Greatness, and is reproduced here with permission

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Why Truth? Why Not Tucker Carlson-ism?

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By Conlan Salgado

Written by Conlan Salgado

I must confess that my title is slightly misleading. I am not against Tucker Carlson-ism in the way that I am against, for example, Karl Marxism. Tucker does some excellent work. Really excellent work. However, he is also a prolific retailer, and his retail products are sometimes dirt cheap in terms of fact-value and truth-value. I am against what some have called the woke right, and which I will term the cultural right (as opposed to the political right). Tucker just happens to be its most persuasive and most interesting representative.

The cultural right does not have its own grammar. This is partly because it does not have any powerful and devious philosophers to create a grammar for it, in the way that the Left had Nietzsche, Marx, or Foucault. GK Chesterton, alas, remains criminally under-read and undervalued.

The cultural right, grammar-less as it was, and suddenly finding itself in the position of speaking to millions who were previously deaf to it, quickly adopted a leftist dialect (which sounds suspiciously Canadian to me), even as it articulated right-wing or even conservative positions.

My previous case study, on which I wrote an article, was Darryl Cooper’s magnificent pulverizing of WWII history, on a podcast coincidentally hosted by—you guessed it, Tucker Carlson.

In the article referenced above, I attempted to refute his most outlandish claim—that the Germans accidentally killed millions of Soviet Soldiers, but for the purposes of this article, I will cite another one: that the Black Forest bombings were among the worst terrorist attacks in history.

Even confining ourselves only to WWII, the Black Forest bombings do not qualify as some of the greatest terror attacks perpetrated. The most obvious examples would be the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, although since, during wartime I for one have a strange partiality to saving American lives, I am glad we dropped the bombs RATHER THAN sending 100,000 young American men to certain death in an invasion of the Japanese homeland. If not the atomic bombings, how about selecting Hamburg or Dresden, the former of which certainly had terroristic qualities about it?

The greatest act of terrorism in WWII was the Holocaust. After the Holocaust, it was the implementation of Generalplan Ost. After Generalplan Ost, it was probably the Rape of Nanking. After Nanking, perhaps the Bataan Death March. Needless to say, in the company of such depraved acts, the Black Forest bombings are almost irrelevant.

Darryl Cooper, however, did not confine himself to WWII; he allowed himself the latitude of “history”. Are the Black Forest bombings equal to the Destruction of Thebes, or Carthage, or the campaigns of Ghenghis Khan, or thousands of Roman executions, or the Great Leap Forward, or the Destruction of Jerusalem and the Babylonian captivity, or perpetual regime of terror needed to maintain the Soviet Union, or any of the “historically significant” acts of terrorism over millennia?

Such a stupid statement laid to rest any doubt that Cooper was a historian. He is a pundit and a salesman. His product is cultural relevance and a founding myth for the right-wing moment. Mr. Cooper did tell one important truth: the “Manichean” account of WWII has become the Left’s genesis story about the “Fall” of the Right—and its original sins of racism and fascism.

Mr. Cooper’s response to this violent abuse of history is an equally violent counter-abuse. Puts me in mind of Ibram Kendi’s terrifying claim that the only way to mend past discrimination is with present discrimination.

Having discerned the need for a founding myth, having discerned that WWII has become a rhetorical weapon, Mr. Cooper decided to kill two birds with one stone: put the lie to the left’s version of WWII (being a cautionary parable about populism) while simultaneously transforming the story into a piece of right-wing rhetoric. Instead of a parable about Hitler, Grandfather of the populist right, perhaps we can tell a different story: that of Winston Churchill, Grandfather of the Neo-con and globalist elite. Perhaps, if we can perpetrate a myth about Churchill bearing primary responsibility for WWII, we might show how evil, genocidal, and altogether intolerable globalism and Neo-conservatism have always been. If the pen is mightier than the sword, we shall use Mr. Cooper’s to sever the heads of warmongering elitism and its patron saint Churchill.

If one is searching for a politician on whom to blame WWII, other than Hitler, try Woodrow Wilson out for size. He, among others, brokered the devastating and unfair post-WWI peace which authorized the rise of someone as repulsive as Ol’ Adolf.

As I’ve observed elsewhere, both the cultural right and the cultural left seem to agree that truth is not a function of history, only power is. In truth, WWII does not flatter either the right or the left, nor is it a cautionary tale about any ideology other than totalitarianism, whether arising out of the right-wing or the left-wing.

Interlude

In analyzing the crude and dishonest journalism of the Cooper interview, I am reminded as well of Tucker Carlson’s more recent interview with the Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Aal Thani, whose country has spent 6.3 billion dollars buying American Higher Ed institutions off. Perhaps the increased financing of American elite universities from Qatar (2 billion alone in the last 4 years) has little to do with the virulent brand of Islamism appearing in greater frequency on campuses (though I think not), but I could swear Tucker Carlson was deeply offended at foreign countries interfering in the domestic politics of the American body politic.

Apparently buying gigantic amounts of influence at culture-shaping institutions which train the next generation of bureaucrats, doctors, and judges–institutions such as Cornell, Harvard, Texas A&M, and many others–does not constitute interference in domestic politics. For the life of me, I have a difficult time finding anything more offensive or pernicious than a foreign country with totally alien values attempting to buy the minds of American youth.

This was either deliberate omission on Carlson’s part or journalism so derelict it does not deserve the name journalism. NOT ONE SINGLE QUESTION ABOUT THIS FOREIGN INFLUENCE OPERATION BY QATAR. NOT ONE.

WWII Again

Since the Manichean account of WWII was indeed the founding myth of the Liberal World Order, it is unsurprising to hear the Global Left constantly rely on terms or tropes which first arose in the War’s context. Often, these tropes are used in lieu of serious analysis. For instance, the notion that Putin will likely invade Poland if we cede Ukrainian territory to him is meant to conjure up the image of a brutal Hitler—poised to take Poland as a prelude to his brutal subjugation of much of the European continent.

The cultural right, or an increasingly large segment, seems also to enjoy loading scary WWII terms with the responsibility of an actual argument, and then flinging the thing at their opponents. Witness the rise in accusations that Israel is committing genocide. Genocide is a word invented to describe the systematic killing of European Jewry. Genocide is a succinct word for industrial murder, which constituted the most awful and impactful invention of the 20th century, far exceeding the atomic bombs’ horror. The 20th century was in some sense defined by industrialized murder, which was the preferred method of the Soviet Union, CCP, and Global Communism in dealing with its enemies.

If we accept Hamas’ casualty figures (we will do so for the sake of argument, acknowledging that they are almost certainly inflated and manipulated) of 53,000 civilians, and subtract about 22,000 for the number of militants Israel claims are dead, then we arrive at 31,000 collateral civilian deaths. This is almost two years into the conflict.

By comparison, the Allied powers killed 40,000 civilians over 14 days when it bombed Hamburg; needless to say, although civilian sections were specifically targeted by British bombers, Hamburg did not constitute a genocide. It was a brutal urban warfare campaign. If Israel had actually been indiscriminately bombing a densely populated urban environment with 5+ million people over the span of months, the death toll would not be 31,000 civilians. It would reasonably be 150,000 civilians at the most conservative estimate, perhaps as high as 500,000 civilians.

Given how Hamas strategically uses large civilian populations as both shield and bargaining chip for its own existence, it is almost miraculous that only 31,000 civilians have died. Whatever Israel is doing, it is not a genocide. One may adopt the position that it is an unjustified brutal urban war, or, as I myself do, one may adopt the reasonable position that Israel is prosecuting a justified brutal urban war.

Case in point: the cultural right, in a fight, relies primarily on pulling the pin and lobbing an emotional grenade. Genocide—BOOOMMM! Genocide is a more frightening word than most, and it is meant to make you categorize Israel with the worst regime in human history, not because facts have been followed to conclusions, but because the emotional impact of a word such as genocide will hopefully prohibit any need for fact-finding at all.

In any case, I trust the reader has absorbed my general concern. The cultural right is a coalition of resentments and odd postmodern insights. It is mostly an internet driven phenomenon. It reproduces through memes and podcasts. It is not nearly obsessed enough with orthodox Christianity. It eerily approximates a digital version of the French Revolution.

It renders history in the service of ideology. Frankly, I must confess that as much as I love Donald Trump, I do not believe MAGA will save the culture. It may save the federal government, and I shall be delighted if it does so. What will save American culture is orthodox Christianity and the destruction of the social media ethic and the emergence of a more sophisticated manner of spreading ideas other than memes.

Common sense is not an adequate replacement for Christianity; Tucker Carlson-ism is not a worthy replacement for truth.

Conclusions are important, and to the extent that the cultural right has very different conclusions than the left, it must be considered an infinite improvement. Ends, though, do not justify means, and leftist ways of thinking and feeling are uncouth and dangerous ways of reaching such conclusions.

Nietzschean methods breed Nietzschean monsters. Indeed, it remains for the cultural right to answer a thoroughly Nietzschean question with an enthusiastically un-Neitzschean answer: Why Truth? Why Not Strategic Falsehood?

For it was a ferociously anti-Nietzschean Jewish preacher who first gave an insight which a country trying to reclaim its freedom would do well to contemplate and hold dearly: “If you abide in [Truth], you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

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Make The Switch To Patriot Mobile – Here are the Key Steps

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By The Editors

Written by The Editors

The Prickly Pear is proud to bring you news articles and information from both local and national sources. We are happy to be part of the wave of citizen journalism replacing the legacy liberal media that can no longer be trusted. We are equally proud to bring our readers alternative opportunities and services we use in our daily lives.  The Prickly Pear supports Patriot Mobile Cellular and its Four Pillars of Conservative Values: the First Amendment, the Second Amendment, the Right to Life, and significant support for our Veterans and First Responders. When you switch to Patriot Mobile, not only do you support these causes, but most customers will also save up to 50% on their monthly cellular phone bill. 

Here at The Prickly Pear, we know that switching to a new cellular service can be challenging at times. Let’s face it, no one wants the hassle.  But that hassle is necessary if Conservatives want to support those who support them.   

Here are some helpful tips to make your switch to Patriot Mobile a smoother and more rewarding process. We want all our readers to have the opportunity to switch their mobile service and know they are getting the same major cellular network of their choice from the Big Three Network providers, with improved quality of customer service and tech support, all of which is 100% U.S.-based.    

Before porting your phone number to Patriot Mobile, ensure you have the following information available from your old carrier. This will make your switch easier and more efficient. 

  • Old Carrier’s Account Number: This can be found on your wireless bill. 
  • Correct Name and Address: Ensure these match exactly as they appear on your old mobile or wireless bill from your previous carrier.
  • Remove Phone Number Port Lock: This is a fraud protection measure that must be removed from every phone number you wish to port. This is usually accomplished when requesting the (NTP) Number Transfer Pin. 
  • Number Transfer PIN (NTP): Obtain this from your old carrier.
  • Know your device IMEI. This can be found by going to your phone app as if you were going to make a call, and entering/typing *#06#

Important Notes:

If you are on a multi-service plan (e.g., cable and internet), make sure to get the WIRELESS account number.

  • The name and address must match precisely to avoid transfer failure due to fraud detection.
  • Failure to remove the port lock could prevent the transfer.

Many NTPs expire within 4-7 days, so obtain the NTP and start your Patriot Mobile activation as soon as possible.

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Image Credit: GROK image generator

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Make the Switch to Patriot Mobile. Here’s How…

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By The Editors

Written by The Editors

The Prickly Pear is proud to bring you news articles and information from both local and national sources. We are happy to be part of the wave of citizen journalism replacing the legacy liberal media that can no longer be trusted. We are equally proud to bring our readers alternative opportunities and services we use in our daily lives.  The Prickly Pear supports Patriot Mobile Cellular and its Four Pillars of Conservative Values: the First Amendment, the Second Amendment, the Right to Life, and significant support for our Veterans and First Responders. When you switch to Patriot Mobile, not only do you support these causes, but most customers will also save up to 50% on their monthly cellular phone bill. 

Here at The Prickly Pear, we know that switching to a new cellular service can be challenging at times. Let’s face it, no one wants the hassle.  But that hassle is necessary if Conservatives want to support those who support them. 

Here are some helpful tips to make your switch to Patriot Mobile a smoother and more rewarding process. We want all our readers to have the opportunity to switch their mobile service and know they are getting the same major cellular network of their choice from the Big Three Network providers, with improved quality of customer service and tech support, all of which is 100% U.S.-based.    

Before porting your phone number to Patriot Mobile, ensure you have the following information available from your old carrier. This will make your switch easier and more efficient. 

  • Old Carrier’s Account Number: This can be found on your wireless bill.
  • Correct Name and Address: Ensure these match exactly as they appear on your old mobile or wireless bill from your previous carrier.
  • Remove Phone Number Port Lock: This is a fraud protection measure that must be removed from every phone number you wish to port. This is usually accomplished when requesting the (NTP) Number Transfer Pin.
  • Number Transfer PIN (NTP): Obtain this from your old carrier.
  • Know your device IMEI. This can be found by going to your phone app as if you were going to make a call, and entering/typing *#06#

If you are on a multi-service plan (e.g., cable and internet), make sure to get the WIRELESS account number.

  • The name and address must match precisely to avoid transfer failure due to fraud detection.
  • Failure to remove the port lock could prevent the transfer.

Many NTPs expire within 4-7 days, so obtain the NTP and start your Patriot Mobile activation as soon as possible.

Sourced from PRICKLY PEAR

Germany Designates Leading Conservative Opposition Party ‘Extremist’

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By Neland Nobel

Written by Neland Nobel

Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Vice President J.D. Vance condemned the decision

Germany has long had a “democracy” problem. It evolved neither under the English tutelage nor under Switzerland’s independent federal development.

First under the Kaiser, then under Hitler, and then under Soviet occupation of the East, Germany has had difficulty dealing with its past and creating democratic norms. Is it just us, or does it seem that after unification, Germany has taken more leadership from the East than the Western part of the nation—the Western part that Britain, France, and the American occupation powers had administered?

The East was run as a dictatorship under the careful supervision of the security services, the Stasi.  It seems not too long after taking the Berlin Wall down, German politicians want to put up an internal wall so they don’t have to deal with political opposition.

They have adopted radical green policies that deindustrialize the country, bankrupt farmers, implement radical transgender policies, and open borders to all comers. Some Germans rightfully object. How about debating ideas and letting German citizens decide? Moreover, it is interesting that Germany’s “security services” made this decision, which strikes us as a very undemocratic process.

On Friday, the German security services officially designated the Alternative für Germany (AfD Party) a right-wing extremist organization.

Oddly, these same “security services” have been silent as millions of Muslims have swarmed into the country, carrying with them Islamism, an ideology fundamentally opposed to Western cultural, religious, and political tradition. These Islamists are deemed less of a threat to the security and “democracy” of Germany than the Conservatives. That is quite a decision of historic import.

In a snap election last February, the AfD doubled its vote share to over 20%, which is significant in a parliamentary system.

This opens the possibility of banning the largest opposition party in Germany. That’s not healthy for “democracy,” is it?  Where do the party members go, and how can they express their opinions?

Should this designation be upheld in courts, the German security services will also have an increased ability to spy on the party. 

We are not making a brief necessarily for all positions and all members of the AfD. But we are suggesting they are a legitimate voice, the most popular party, and should have a voice. Reasonable people can disagree on the nature of mass migration and the beliefs of Islam. From what we have read, the AfD is not monolithic in its positions.

AfD co-leaders Alice Weidel and Tino Chrupalla reacted to the decision .“Today’s decision by the Office of the Protection of the Constitution is a severe blow to German Democracy,” the statement read, continuing, “In current polls, the AfD is the strongest force.”

The designation was given because of what they called “language” that seems to exclude other groups, espeically non German migrants. They did this with a straight face while they “excluded” with “language” Germans who might disagree with open borders policies.

Interesting. The AfD uses language while their opposition uses the police powers of the state and its “security agencies.”  Speech is not force, but German authorities seem eager to conflate the two. Secretary of State Rubio called it “tyranny in disguise” and Vice President Vance also condemned the move suggesting the Berlin Wall was being rebuilt.

At a critical time in talks with Russia to end the war in Ukraine, this also seems like a strange time to pick a fight with the Trump Administration and the cohesion of NATO.

Late note:

On May 2, 2025, the German government, through its domestic intelligence agency (Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, or BfV), changed the designation of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party to a “confirmed right-wing extremist” organization. This escalated from its previous classification as a “suspected” extremist group. This new designation allows for increased surveillance, including using informants and interception of communications.

However, on May 8, 2025, posts on X indicated that the BfV had temporarily withdrawn this classification pending a court decision, though it would continue operating under the previous designation. This suggests the “extremist” label is currently under legal challenge, with the AfD filing a lawsuit against the BfV, alleging the designation is politically motivated and a “blow to democracy.”

The situation remains fluid, with the designation change initially implemented but now paused for judicial review.  However, no matter the outcome, the German government is trying to destroy perhaps the largest opposition political party in the country.  Rather than political competition in the marketplace of ideas to be decided by voters, especially over the issue of mass migration, the German establishment is using the police powers of the state to “support democracy.” The irony is too obvious to miss. Moreover, this would seem like trying to clamp a lid on a boiling pot of water, with predictable outcomes.

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Shot Heard Round the Web: V-E Day and Pride in Our Country’s History

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By Catherine Salgado

Written by Catherine Salgado

On May 8, we will mark V-E Day, the anniversary of the 1945 end of WWII in the European theater, a date which President Donald Trump this week declared will be a national holiday to celebrate our “strength, bravery, [and] military brilliance.”

Donald Trump accidentally highlighted the fact that most of us Americans know very little even about our military history within living memory when he this week announced that May 8 will be celebrated as Victory Day for WWII and November 11 will be Victory Day for WWI. There was a great deal of backlash, not just from leftists, but even from conservatives. Strangely, those criticizing Trump seemed not to have done even a simple internet search to see why he chose those dates. November 11 is of course now celebrated as Veterans’ Day, but the entire reason there’s a holiday that day honoring veterans is because it is the anniversary of the 1918 end of WWI! By commemorating the armistice signed on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, Trump is only clarifying the “Armistice Day” roots of the holiday and trying to remind us of the history behind the date we now call “Veterans’ Day.”

May 8, as I noted above, is “Victory in Europe” or V-E Day. While WWII did not end officially until V-J Day at the beginning of September (1945), when the genocidal Japanese Empire surrendered, the war in Europe ended on May 8, when the Nazis and Italian fascists had been crushed. And with all the false accusations and rhetoric about Nazis flying around now against Trump and his supporters, it’s understandable that Trump is choosing to emphasize V-E Day, the day on which our triumph over the Nazis was complete. This is the history that Trump hopes Americans will learn with the creation of these new holidays, just as he aimed to change the condemnable negativity surrounding Vietnam War veterans by establishing Vietnam Veterans’ Day.

The late, great Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen, who was born on May 8 (1895), once said, “There are not one hundred people in the United States who hate the Catholic Church, but there are millions who hate what they wrongly perceive the Catholic Church to be.” But we could make the same observation just as truly of the USA— that is, there are exponentially more people who hate what they wrongly perceive America to be than people who truly hate America as enshrined in our founding documents. Sheen, an expert at teaching and capturing both hearts and minds, was also a patriot, as we see in his quotes including: “we no longer have love of God [so] we no longer have love of country,” and “It behooves us all to take pride in the words that Washington spoke at Valley Forge: Put only Americans on guard tonight.” Indeed, we should take pride in those words, we should take pride in our history! That is exactly what Trump wants to inspire: patriotic pride.

Yes, we should have holidays celebrating specific victories in our history. In previous eras, Americans were regularly reminded of the greatest triumphs and heroes of America with such holidays as Independence Day, Constitution Day, Armistice Day, George Washington’s and Abraham Lincoln’s birthdays, Columbus Day, and Thanksgiving. Schoolchildren were taught about the Revolution, the Civil War, the pioneering push West, the battle for civil rights, and more. The education was not always complete or perfectly honest (particularly about the Civil War) but most Americans recognized the most important names and wars and documents of our history.

That sort of patriotic education was gradually phased out or replaced with actively anti-American propaganda starting several decades ago, until we have reached the point now where most American students don’t know Washington or U.S. Grant or Frederick Douglass from Adam (or John Adams), where schoolchildren falsely think Thanksgiving celebrates genocide of indigenous peoples and where even many of our representatives, voters, and judges neither know nor care what is in the Constitution. How can we have a representative Republic with an ignorant, uninformed, unpatriotic, complacent population?

This crisis must be addressed if we are not to commit national suicide. Those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it, and Trump is absolutely right that we need to relearn our history and celebrate our triumphs. We must honor our Founding Fathers and military heroes, our military and political wins, from the Declaration of Independence to the Emancipation Proclamation to the fall of the Berlin Wall.

And if you’re interested in keeping track of all the key dates and events in our history, please read this column and encourage your friends to do so as well. Let’s fight the unpatriotic historical ignorance of our time and take pride in the words of George Washington and all our patriots throughout the two and half centuries of our magnificent Republic’s existence.

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The Assault on Substack Takes Predictable Shape

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By Bill Rice

Written by Bill Rice

For a while now I’ve been worried Substack would become a major target of the Censorship Industrial Complex for the hideous and dangerous crime of allowing free speech.

This story from The UK newspaper the Guardian, which was picked up by Citizen Free Press, might be significant or at least bears watching.

Here are the key excerpts with a few of my editorial comments added:

“The email newsletter service Substack is facing a user revolt after its chief executive defended hosting and handling payments for “Nazis” on its platform, citing anti-censorship reasons.”

Comment: I seriously doubt this is a serious “user revolt,” but that’s the way it will (and already has been) portrayed.

“… In a note on the site published in December, the chief writing officer, Hamish McKenzie, said the firm “doesn’t like Nazis,” and wished “no one held these views.”

“But he said the company did not think that censorship – by demonetising sites that publish extreme views – was a solution to the problem, and instead made it worse.”

Comment: Hip-Hip-Hoo-ray! Thank you, Hamish.

“… Some of the largest newsletters on the service have threatened to take their business elsewhere if Substack does not reverse its stance.”

Comment: This is the way these censorship movements always start – accuse someone (or an entire writers’ platform) of being “Nazis,” “extremists,” “racists,” or “science deniers”… which is usually enough to get the deplatforming started.

Now we should all be on the lookout for more stories along these lines. If the Democrats were still in charge of the House of Representatives, we’d have hearings on the “Nazi Substack” with the usual statements of outrage that this platform hasn’t been banned yet.

“… On Tuesday Casey Newton, who writes Platformer – a popular tech newsletter on the platform with thousands of subscribers paying at least $10 a month – became the most prominent yet.

“Rolling out a welcome mat for Nazis is, to put it mildly, inconsistent with our values here at Platformer,” he said today. “We have shared this in private discussions with Substack and are scheduled to meet with the company later this week to advocate for change.”

Comment: Always follow the money. Questions: Who’s funding or pushing Platformer to deplatform free speech … and why?

“…. Other newsletters have already made the jump. Talia Lavin, a journalist with thousands of paid subscribers on her newsletter The Sword and the Sandwich, moved to a competing service, Buttondown, on Tuesday.

“We’ve left Substack behind, after its founders stated, in no uncertain terms, that they’re not just OK with, but in principle supportive of, having loads of out-and-out Nazis on their platform,” she wrote.

Comments: I for one did not know that Substack had “loads and loads of out-and-out Nazis on their platform.”

But even if it does (which it doesn’t), I say (at least from what I know now), let them post away. The only Nazi-like techniques I see influencing any important narratives come from the government and its many fascist partners.

Also, why didn’t this article give us some excerpts from some of these “Nazi” Substack authors? For example, are these posters calling for the extermination of the Jews?

If these newsletter sites are advocating murder or violence, kick them off, but I don’t know that they are.

Also, how many subscribers do these sites have? Out of the tens of thousands of Substack authors and 30+ million Substack subscribers, how many are Nazis?

As usual, we get shocking charges with no examples given of alleged shocking speech.

We also learn from offended journalist Talia Lavin that her Substack site had grown to “thousands of paid subscribers.”

Apparently, Substack was very popular and lucrative for anti-Nazi’s like Ms. Lavin.

(I wish I had “thousands of paid subscribers.” In fact, I’ve recently begun to wonder if my paid and total subscriber numbers are being sabotaged by some kind of nefarious and secret Censorship Industrial Complex operation.)

Ah, the Money Quote. . .

“… Substack declined to comment on Newton’s remarks. The site has been consistent in its opposition to content moderation, telling the Guardian in 2022 that moves to silence vaccine sceptics would not work.”

Comments: Here, I suspect we get to the real issue and the real goal. These groups allegedly offended by “Nazi hate speech” are no doubt really incensed because Substack hasn’t “silenced vaccine skeptics” … yet.

Good for Substack’s executives defending the vaccine skeptics, who I’d argue made Substack a popular and important speech platform all by themselves.

What Substack’s enemies really want is the type of life-saving “content moderation” we get from more-virtuous speech platforms like Facebook, which employs more than 15,000 “content moderators,” as well as the ingenious algorithms and AI that nix unauthorized speech without human effort.

The vast majority of Substack authors don’t receive any advertising support. If we did, we’d already be hearing calls for advertiser boycotts.

Hang Tough, Substack. We Need You.

Anyway, I thought it was a matter of time before a concerted and Machiavellian effort commenced to scuttle Substack as we’ve come to know it and rely on it.

Since the executives at Substack are now being inundated with calls to censor its users, I hope many Substack authors and subscribers reach out to this vital company’s leaders and implore them to “not go wobbly” in this existential fight to preserve a few places where free speech still exists.

By now, nobody should be naive. The real goal is to shut Substack (as we’ve known it) down  – which must mean the truth bombs its correspondents are launching every day are starting to hit too close to key targets.

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This article was published by The Brownstone Institute and is reproduced with permission.

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Arizona Families Defend ESA from Superintendent Horne thumbnail

Arizona Families Defend ESA from Superintendent Horne

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By Jason Bedrick

Written by Jason Bedrick

Arizona’s Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) program has long stood as a national model for school choice, empowering parents with the freedom and flexibility to tailor their children’s education to their unique needs. But now, this vital program faces what conservative State Senator Jake Hoffman recently called “the single greatest threat to school choice” and the ESA program.

Remarkably, that threat comes not from the teachers’ unions or progressive politicians who openly oppose the ESA, but from a supposed supporter, Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne.

Horne, a Republican who claims to be a “champion” of school choice, has bogged down the ESA program with bureaucratic red tape. From unilaterally imposing restrictions on approved educational expenses to adopting manual review policies that have slowed expense approvals and reimbursements to a crawl, his administration has created unnecessary barriers for parents who simply want what’s best for their children.

Now Horne is asking the Arizona State Board of Education to adopt a new parent handbook that would add additional spending restrictions that are not required by statute. These moves threaten to undermine the very freedom that made the ESA program successful in the first place.

In a recent survey of ESA families by The Heritage Foundation, more than 99 percent of families using the ESA said they support the ESA program, but two-thirds were dissatisfied with the way Horne is administering it, while only 20 percent were satisfied.

That is a steep decline in satisfaction since the last time the Arizona Department of Education conducted a satisfaction survey, which was in 2023, under the Kathy Hoffman administration. That survey found that 67 percent of respondents were satisfied with the department’s management of the ESA program. Ironically, Hoffman campaigned against the ESA program while Horne campaigned for it, yet ESA parents were more likely to say they preferred her administration of the program over his.

Under Horne’s administration, the vast majority of ESA parents report having encountered challenges utilizing their ESAs. When given a list of common complaints, only 2 percent answered “none of the above.” The most common complaints concerned long wait times for expense reimbursements (86%) and approvals (77%), as well as difficulties reaching a department employee (65%) and getting questions answered about ESA issues (63%).

Horne’s policies have caused these problems. In attempt to shield his administration from bad-faith allegations by school-choice opponents that the ESA program was “unaccountable” and “wide open for fraud and abuse,” Horne overreacted, instructing his staff to manually review every single ESA purchase before approving it.

*****

To continue reading, click here, and go to ArizonaDailyIndependent.com

Image Credit:  YouTube screenshot ABC 15

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The Trump Counterrevolution and the Moral Ledger

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By Victor Davis Hanson

Written by Victor Davis Hanson

Trump’s counterrevolution presses on—quietly, methodically, and morally—while a flailing opposition offers only chaos, debt, and deflection in response

Despite the media hysteria, Trump’s counterrevolution remains on course.

Its ultimate fate will probably rest with the state of the economy by the November 2026 midterm elections. But its success also hinges on accomplishing what is right and long overdue—and then making such reforms quietly, compassionately, and methodically.

No country can long endure without sovereignty and security—or with 10 to 12 million illegal immigrants crossing the border and half a million criminal foreign nationals roaming freely.

The prior administration found that it was easy to destroy the border and welcome the influx. But it is far harder for its successor to restore security, find those who broke the law, and insist on legal-only immigration. Trump is on the right side of all these issues and making substantial progress.

Everyone knew that a $2 trillion budget deficit, a $37 trillion national debt, and a $1.2 trillion trade deficit in goods were ultimately unsustainable.

Yet all prior politicians of the 21st century winced at the mere thought of reducing debts and deficits, given that it proved much easier just to print and spread around federal money. As long as the Trump administration dutifully cuts the budget, sends its regrets to displaced federal employees, seeks to expand private sector reemployment, and quietly presses ahead, it retains the moral high ground.

The elite universities have long hidden things from the American people that otherwise would have lost them all public support.

They deliberately sought to neuter Supreme Court rulings banning race-based preferences by stealthily continuing their often-segregated policies on campuses, from admissions and hiring to dorms and graduations.

They have taken billions of dollars from autocracies, such as communist China and Qatar. And they have partnered abroad with their foreign illiberal institutions and then disguised their quid pro quo subservience.

These supposedly prestigious universities have previously made no real effort either to stop or even hide their own campus epidemics of anti-Semitism.

They have spiked their tuition and costs higher than the annual rate of inflation, assured that the tottering $1.7 trillion guaranteed student loan portfolio would always send them guaranteed cash flows.

They have gouged taxpayers by charging exorbitant surcharges on federal grants from 40 to 60 percent. And they make no effort to offer students intellectual, ideological, or political diversity.

So, even our most prestigious universities seem to have no real moral compass. Accordingly, as long as Trump retains the high ground, the public, too, will demand either reform in higher education or a cessation of federal support to it.

The economy remains strong, but its ultimate health depends on reaching a trade deal with a handful of nations that account for our $1.2 trillion trade deficit in goods: China, the EU, Canada, Mexico, the Southeast Asian trade bloc, and Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea.

These nations all know that their tariffs are not symmetrical. But our trade partners will not willingly change. They apparently, but wrongly, believe that the U.S. either welcomes its trade deficits, naively thinks they’re irrelevant, or is too wedded to libertarian trade ideology to demand accountability.

So, too, on trade, the Trump administration is in the right.

Its only challenge is to avoid envisioning tariffs as a new, get-rich source of massive revenue. Data does not support the idea of such large tariff incomes.

The American people signed on for symmetry, fairness, and reciprocity in trade, not tariffing those who run deficits with us or seeing high tariffs as a cash cow to fund our out-of-control government.

Enraged Democrats still offer no substantial alternatives to the Trump agenda.

There are no shadow-government Democratic leaders with new policy initiatives. They flee from the Biden record on the border, the prior massive deficits and inflation, the disaster in Afghanistan, two theater-wide wars that broke out on Biden’s watch, and the shameless conspiracy to hide the prior president’s increasing dementia.

Instead, the Left has descended into thinly veiled threats of organized disruption in the streets. It embraces potty-mouth public profanity, profane and unhinged videos, nihilistic filibusters, congressional outbursts, and increasingly dangerous threats to the persons of Elon Musk and Donald Trump.

All that frenzy is not a sign that the Trump counterrevolution is failing. It is good evidence that it is advancing forward, and its ethically bankrupt opposition has no idea how, or whether even, to stop it.

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This article was first published on American Greatness, and is reproduced here with permission

Photo credit: Gage Skidmore

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Davos’s Not-So-Great Self-Reset

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By Michael Watson

Written by Michael Watson

  • Klaus Schwab resigned from the board of the World Economic Forum (WEF) amid allegations that he used the organization’s property for personal benefit.
  • The “Great Reset” and “Great Narrative” Schwab and the WEF promoted to advance environmental, social, and governance activism in the post-COVID era are in retreat.

Not too long ago with the COVID-19 pandemic raging, the lockdown regime entrenching, liberal Democrat Joe Biden having evicted populist Republican Donald Trump from the White House, and social-media chiefs agreeing to circumscribe debate at the urging of government officials, World Economic Forum (WEF) Executive Chairman Klaus Schwab could dream of a progressive environmental-social-governance (ESG) Great Reset sweeping the world.

But COVID-19 receded, the lockdown regime was thrown down, President Trump returned, and Trump ally Elon Musk bought Twitter (now rebranded as “X”). And as if to cap the end of his dream of the Great Reset in service of the Great Narrative, Schwab has exited as head of the WEF, best known for putting on the annual Davos meeting of international businesspeople and government officials (who sometimes appear super-villainous).

Nonprofit Malgovernance

The cause of Schwab’s departure from the organization he founded is not a late-in-life acknowledgement that he was wrong about everything, according to press reports. The Wall Street Journal reported that the WEF placed Schwab under investigation “after a new whistleblower letter alleged financial and ethical misconduct by the longtime leader and his wife.”

If the allegations (which the Schwabs deny) are substantiated, Schwab’s misconduct would be a classical case of a nonprofit executive at a highly prominent organization deciding to stick his hand in his donors’ cookie jar. According to the Journal, the whistleblower letter alleged that Schwab’s wife Hilde “maintains tight control over use of [Villa Mundi, a WEF-owned luxury property in Switzerland] and that portions of the property are understood to be reserved for private family access.”

The Guardian reported that the whistleblower letter further alleged that Schwab “used WEF funds to pay for private, in-room massages at hotels, asked staff to promote him for a Nobel peace prize, and instructed junior employees to withdraw thousands of dollars from ATMs on his behalf.” To those who scrutinize nonprofit organizations as we do at Capital Research Center, these sorts of allegations are depressingly familiar, and nonprofit malgovernance does not discriminate by ideology.

Where Stands the Reset?

Schwab’s exit is unlikely to reorient the World Economic Forum in a more sovereignty-and-shareholder-friendly direction. But those like Glenn Beck who feared a dark future brought on by Schwab’s Great Reset are likely to see the true believers in WEF-style globalist environmentalism disappointed all the same.

ESG activism in corporate boardrooms is in retreat, facing regulatory threats from the second Trump administration, public backlash to ESG policies, and interest rate hikes that have made paying for ESG-appeasing policies more expensive for corporate leaders. The realities of environmentalist energy transition are not living up to the promises of infinite zero-emission energy too cheap to meter in a world where people will own nothing and be happy. And global governance is as non-existent as it always was, with a protracted war in Eastern Europe, ongoing conflicts throughout the Middle East, and tensions heating up in Kashmir, the Taiwan Strait, the South China Sea, and other global hotspots.

With his vision in retreat, Klaus Schwab is gone. The World Economic Forum and its vision of global governance in the service of champagne-and-caviar environmentalism remain. But they cannot command the world, and for that, we can be thankful.

*****

This article was published by Capital Research and is reproduced with permission.

Image Credit: Shutterstock

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From Utopians to Social Justice Warriors

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By Itxu Díaz

Written by Itxu Díaz

For a long time, it has been commonly accepted that the fall of the Berlin Wall symbolized the end of the century of utopianism. Social experimentation seemed to have hit rock bottom with the collapse of the Soviet Union, sinking into blood and misery as it leapt from written theory to real life. Perhaps we were mistaken. Utopianism, the dream of a happy world, was merely shedding its skin in secret, much like what Nicolás Gómez Dávila said about stupidity: it “changes its subject in every era so it won’t be recognized.” Though the methods may have evolved, the victim remains the same today as it was three hundred years ago: individual freedom.

Much of this utopianism can be traced back to the Age of Enlightenment’s fantasies about perfecting society. Although largely unknown today, the French author Étienne-Gabriel Morelly is particularly representative of this tendency. Today he is forgotten partly because his utopian theories are now overshadowed by the more famous communist ideologues, and partly because his central work was anonymous and falsely attributed for centuries to Diderot, who, in any case, did nothing to deny the attribution and even tried to capitalize on it. The work in question is titled Code of Nature, Or, The True Spirit of Laws. Morelly, of whose biography we know almost nothing, had published Floating Islands, or the Basiliad (1753), an allegorical novel depicting a society founded on the precepts of communism. The backlash against Basiliad was so fierce and widespread that just two years later, the author responded to his critics with Code of Nature, an essay in which he dogmatically laid out the theoretical framework glimpsed in the fiction of his novel. In a way, it could be seen as a user manual for bringing the utopian vision of Basiliad to life.

Morelly thus became the first to codify the communist utopia into enthusiastic law, and the result, viewed through the lens of 2025, is chilling—not for its utopianism, but for the number of parallels we can draw between his totalitarian roadmap and the thinking and policies of our modern Western societies in the twenty-first century. I suspect we’ve also been underestimating Morelly’s importance in the gestation of the more radical strands of the Enlightenment.

Eighteenth-century authors who fought against private property broadly fall into two groups. Some, like Rousseau or Diderot, attacked the social order underpinning property but stopped short of fully rejecting it, while others, like Morelly or Mably, adhered blindly to communist principles. Morelly in particular believed in the natural goodness of man and attributed all evils and deviations to greed. And, as you might guess, for him, the sole cause of greed was the existence of private property.

What was novel about Morelly’s utopian Code of Nature was his determination to build the communist system from a moral theory, as well as his crafting of a pragmatic plan for the birth of a regenerated society where men could once again be happy as they were in their primitive origins, before private property. That plan consists of the “fundamental and sacred laws that uproot vices and all societal ills.”

Remarkably, his scheme for revolutionizing law bears a certain similarity to latter-day utopian plans, such as the United Nations’s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Swap “sustainable development” for “collective happiness,” and you’ll see that three hundred years later, we’re more or less in the same place. And it’s not just the 2030 Agenda. What’s been called “wokeism” advocates for strong state intervention to correct historical injustices through laws, quotas, or policies aimed at repairing historical harm or restoring what was theoretically stolen from certain groups. The goal is the same: to march toward a happy world without inequalities.

Like the radical Enlightenment, contemporary woke ideology, whose seams have recently begun to fray, also originates from the notion that traditional structures—capitalism, the family, gender, individual freedom, or meritocracy—are the root of all ills, namely, artificial inequalities that must be eradicated. In both cases, the ideal is a happy society where differences, whether material, biological, identity-based, or even in talent, do not create hierarchies. In both cases, the only way out is repression or coercion, perhaps reminding us once again of Reagan’s words, 36 years after the fall of the Wall: “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction.”

The first of Morelly’s laws establishes the abolition of private property: “Nothing in society will belong particularly to anyone, except things of current use for the individual, for their needs, pleasures, or daily work.” Citizens are forbidden from accumulating; they can only take what they need at that moment. You could acquire your daily bread, as allotted, and the baker could acquire the grain needed based on the loaves he plans to bake. All acquisitions would be free because everything belongs to the state. The citizen owns nothing. It’s impossible not to recall here the controversial World Economic Forum video about the year 2030 and its slogan: “You’ll own nothing and be happy.”

The second law turns all citizens into state employees: “Every citizen will be a public man, maintained and supported at public expense.” While the United States still partially resists this invasion of public life into the private sphere, Europe’s political elites have been walking this path for years, seeking to control as much of citizens’ lives as possible—whether directly through public employment or indirectly through subsidies, endless bureaucracies, and other forms of public dependency. Elites, from the Davos Club to UN leaders, also push for state intervention to “free” the individual.

We can find something like Morelly’s ideology in nearly the entire framework hidden within what today’s utopian theorists call “social justice.”

Morelly’s third law, inevitably, mandates universal labor: “Every citizen will contribute to the public good according to their strength, talent, and age; their duties will be regulated accordingly by distributive laws.” The author of Code of Nature then decreed a kind of mandatory military service, but for agricultural production: farm work would be compulsory for all from ages 20 to 35, after which individuals could choose their profession. All products would belong to the state, which would distribute them, with bartering, exchange, or trade strictly forbidden. This law aligns with the 2030 Agenda’s goals on education, inequality reduction, decent work, peace, industry, innovation, infrastructure, justice, and strong institutions. But this is just the beginning of the laws. The true social engineering unfolds in subsequent decrees. The nation is divided into families, tribes, and provinces. All must live in cities, mandatorily distributed across identical neighborhoods and buildings, and even clothing is dictated by enforced equality: the state provides uniform attire.

The Code’s slightest hint of freedom appears in the matter of marriage: Morelly’s laws permit it, yes, but make it mandatory upon reaching adolescence, “according to conjugal laws that prevent all licentiousness.” Divorce is allowed, but only after ten years of marriage. Even love is rationed, in a typically utopian exercise of dehumanization.

Children are raised by their mothers until age five. At that point, they are separated from their parents and moved to a sort of gymnasium, where the state educates them equally. From age ten, children are assigned to workshops for vocational training.

The preservation of marriage is a mere illusion. For Morelly, the family structure is just another link in the chain of state control, expanding from the individual to the family, from the family to the tribe, and then to the city. The happiness he promises is, after all, the chimera of a new Sparta. Forced marriage and the state’s theft of children are nothing more than a ploy to dissolve the individual’s only hope of freedom: the privacy of the family and the home. Using different mechanisms, today’s left promotes the destruction of the family, dissolving the institution into a mere shapeless mass.

And what of God and religion? Before banning personal revelations and dreams of faith, Morelly decrees that children be taught only “that the author of the universe can be known solely through his works; that they proclaim him as an infinitely good and wise being”; “the youth will be made to understand that the innate feelings of sociability in man are the only oracles of divine intentions.” It’s striking how closely Morelly’s educational ideas align with those Rousseau would outline seven years later in Emile. This species of secularism, of course, lives on in the ideology of the left today.

Morelly believes freedom of thought must be eradicated in youth. Thus, he establishes “laws for studies that will prevent the wanderings of the human mind and any transcendental delirium.” “There shall be,” he adds, “absolutely no other moral philosophy than that founded on the plan and system of laws.” This may be the point where, in 2025, we feel most trapped by the same utopia. Cancel culture policies, the mandatory belief that climate change is humanity’s fault, or the impossibility of publicly questioning the virtues of multiculturalism are prime examples of how freedom of thought—and the ability to subscribe to any alternative moral philosophy—is mutilated. The consequences are harsh, though with some differences still between Europe and the United States: social and professional exclusion, legal persecution, and public shaming of dissenters.

In the height of his contradictions, the French thinker senses that his utopia of mandatory happiness might collapse on its own. Perhaps that’s why he concludes his work with penal laws: serious offenses lead to social exclusion and transfer to horrific prisons located in the most remote, barren, and gloomy outskirts of the city, surrounded by massive, impenetrable bars. Of all crimes, the one Morelly pursues most fiercely is that of anyone who attempts to “abolish the sacred laws to introduce detestable property.” Such a person “will be confined for life, like a raving madman, in a cave situated” in “the place of public graves,” and marked as an “enemy of Humanity.” Furthermore, “his name will be erased forever from the list of citizens: his children and entire family will abandon that name and be separately incorporated into other tribes, cities, or provinces.” It’s astonishing how he juxtaposes an idyllic description of the utopian society—claiming the community is the social state best suited to nature and the source of all good things—while simultaneously devising a plan of gruesome punishments to force citizens to uphold this supposedly sublime and pleasurable system.

Once again, whenever communism leaps from theory to practice, it must include an appendix to its happy, egalitarian fundamental laws, outlining every possible form of repression to sustain the utopian system—as the history of twentieth-century totalitarianism demonstrates.

Perhaps you’re thinking that Morelly’s description better fits today’s China, Soviet Russia, or even Cuba or Venezuela than the West. Yet what’s more immediate and novel is how, like Morelly, our century has sought to impose uniform thought through woke ideology. The penalties, as noted: cancellation and social exclusion. The mandatory beliefs: feminism, environmentalism, egalitarianism, multiculturalism. The state’s savage distributism: taxes, fines, and fees.

In short, we find Morelly—and those who followed him down the totalitarian communist path—in nearly the entire framework hidden within what today’s utopian theorists call “social justice.” The key difference is that the French author merely wrote it on paper, while today’s woke utopians are actively carrying out this experiment through planned social engineering to limit private property, outlaw capitalism (replaced by the circular economy), and muzzle individual freedom to an extreme degree. I can still hear Milton Friedman’s words echoing with stunning relevance: “A society that puts equality before freedom will get neither. A society that puts freedom before equality will get a high degree of both.”

*****

This article was published by Law&Liberty, and is reproduced with permission.

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons Henri Demare

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READ THIS: Don’t Believe We Need DOGE? thumbnail

READ THIS: Don’t Believe We Need DOGE?

/in , , , , /by

By Bruce Bialosky

I am on vacation lying at the pool. I usually do not take much “beach” reading with me. This time no Connelly or Coben or Silva. A couple books to review that friends wrote, The Road to Serfdom (yes, I was shocked I had not read it), a Peter Drucker Book and a couple of lengthy biographies. Not your typical pool reading. Likewise included was the latest book by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch. I want to share a story in his book Over Ruled. 

He tells the story of Marty Hahne who at a young age became addicted to Houdini and decided to become a magician. As is typical with someone who does magic tricks, he had a rabbit; the first being Charlie then Casey. Everything was hopping along until 2005 when a woman with a badge approached Marty after a children’s show at a library in Missouri. She asked to see his license. Stunned, he said what license? “For your rabbit.” Marty stated, “I could understand if I was using a tiger, but I was using a bunny rabbit. A three-pound bunny rabbit.”

The woman worked for the U.S. Dept of Agriculture. Congress had previously passed a law that people using animals for research must have a license. Congress had recently amended the law stating that carnivals, circuses, and zoos must have federal licenses for their animals. You can see the expansion of government here. As they normally do, agency bureaucrats laid out their own set of rules. They expanded the licensing rules to animal acts and educational exhibits. 

Marty applied for a license. He received it, but he had to submit to “surprise” inspections of his house. If he took the rabbit on a road trip, he had to submit an itinerary to the Dept. His home visit had some problems. Casey’s travel cage did not have a sticker reading “live animal.” (You cannot make this crap up). The cage needed arrow stickers directing how to carry the cage. Marty told the federal employee he already knew how to carry the cage – by the handle on the top. The agent insisted he needed the stickers, but Marty had no clue where to get them. She said she would send him a few. Sometime later he received a box of two hundred stickers. 

He was later told he must have a written disaster plan. Marty stated he had one. He lived in Missouri where they have tornadoes, and he just used common sense. (Sadly, a dying thought). He had a safe room in his basement. That was not good enough. Marty had to hire a disaster management expert. The disaster expert told Marty the 28-page plan they drafted was short even though it covered not only tornadoes but also chemical leaks, floods, and heat waves. 

Marty finally resigned himself to everything after a Dept. supervisor objected to Marty putting his 12-year-old dog in the safe room before the rabbit because the rabbit is licensed. Marty told a reporter, “I always thought I had a fun, easy job, and I would never have to worry about the government bothering me. But our government has gotten so intrusive, their tentacles are everywhere.”  

One last thing. Marty had a discussion with the supervisor. If he had raised Casey to eat, he would not have needed a license. Marty said to the supervisor, “you’re telling me I can kill the rabbit in front of you, but I can’t take it across the street to a birthday party without a license.”

Many people are questioning why President Trump, and his team are attempting to dismantle a large portion of this invasive government. They are digging into every nook and cranny as I delineated in a prior column to find all the rules and regulations lawlessly made up by government bureaucrats that are not in compliance with Congressional laws. 

Since the ridiculously horrible “Chevron” ruling was overruled that allowed court deference to these bureaucrats the new administration is on a seek-and-destroy mission. Under “Loper” — the new ruling that withdraws “Chevron” — the expansion of our government in the hands of these meddling managers is over. Numbered are the days of our citizens being tortured by heartless overseers destroying the lives of normal Americans pursuing a joyful life. There might even be a readoption of the old idea where people simply use “common sense.”

And you wonder why we have all these agencies where we have no idea what they do. That explains why we have $36 trillion in debt.  

*****

The article was published by FlashReport and is reproduced with permission from the author.

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To achieve that mission, Prickly Pear often engages with like-minded contributors and organizations who share our values. We encourage to support these partners in any way you can, as these partners make our efforts possible.

Direct support of the Prickly Pear can be made at the link below. Every dollar is greatly appreciated!

Don’t Believe We Need DOGE?… Read This! thumbnail

Don’t Believe We Need DOGE?… Read This!

/in , , , , /by

By Bruce Bialosky

I am on vacation lying at the pool. I usually do not take much “beach” reading with me. This time no Connelly or Coben or Silva. A couple books to review that friends wrote, The Road to Serfdom (yes, I was shocked I had not read it), a Peter Drucker Book and a couple of lengthy biographies. Not your typical pool reading. Likewise included was the latest book by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch. I want to share a story in his book Over Ruled. 

He tells the story of Marty Hahne who at a young age became addicted to Houdini and decided to become a magician. As is typical with someone who does magic tricks, he had a rabbit; the first being Charlie then Casey. Everything was hopping along until 2005 when a woman with a badge approached Marty after a children’s show at a library in Missouri. She asked to see his license. Stunned, he said what license? “For your rabbit.” Marty stated, “I could understand if I was using a tiger, but I was using a bunny rabbit. A three-pound bunny rabbit.”

The woman worked for the U.S. Dept of Agriculture. Congress had previously passed a law that people using animals for research must have a license. Congress had recently amended the law stating that carnivals, circuses, and zoos must have federal licenses for their animals. You can see the expansion of government here. As they normally do, agency bureaucrats laid out their own set of rules. They expanded the licensing rules to animal acts and educational exhibits. 

Marty applied for a license. He received it, but he had to submit to “surprise” inspections of his house. If he took the rabbit on a road trip, he had to submit an itinerary to the Dept. His home visit had some problems. Casey’s travel cage did not have a sticker reading “live animal.” (You cannot make this crap up). The cage needed arrow stickers directing how to carry the cage. Marty told the federal employee he already knew how to carry the cage – by the handle on the top. The agent insisted he needed the stickers, but Marty had no clue where to get them. She said she would send him a few. Sometime later he received a box of two hundred stickers. 

He was later told he must have a written disaster plan. Marty stated he had one. He lived in Missouri where they have tornadoes, and he just used common sense. (Sadly, a dying thought). He had a safe room in his basement. That was not good enough. Marty had to hire a disaster management expert. The disaster expert told Marty the 28-page plan they drafted was short even though it covered not only tornadoes but also chemical leaks, floods, and heat waves. 

Marty finally resigned himself to everything after a Dept. supervisor objected to Marty putting his 12-year-old dog in the safe room before the rabbit because the rabbit is licensed. Marty told a reporter, “I always thought I had a fun, easy job, and I would never have to worry about the government bothering me. But our government has gotten so intrusive, their tentacles are everywhere.”  

One last thing. Marty had a discussion with the supervisor. If he had raised Casey to eat, he would not have needed a license. Marty said to the supervisor, “you’re telling me I can kill the rabbit in front of you, but I can’t take it across the street to a birthday party without a license.”

Many people are questioning why President Trump, and his team are attempting to dismantle a large portion of this invasive government. They are digging into every nook and cranny as I delineated in a prior column to find all the rules and regulations lawlessly made up by government bureaucrats that are not in compliance with Congressional laws. 

Since the ridiculously horrible “Chevron” ruling was overruled that allowed court deference to these bureaucrats the new administration is on a seek-and-destroy mission. Under “Loper” — the new ruling that withdraws “Chevron” — the expansion of our government in the hands of these meddling managers is over. Numbered are the days of our citizens being tortured by heartless overseers destroying the lives of normal Americans pursuing a joyful life. There might even be a readoption of the old idea where people simply use “common sense.”

And you wonder why we have all these agencies where we have no idea what they do. That explains why we have $36 trillion in debt.  

*****

The article was published by FlashReport and is reproduced with permission from the author.

Your Support is Critical

The Prickly Pear is focused on delivering timely, fact-based news, and citizen opinion that reflects our mission to “inform, educate and advocate about the principles of limited government and personal liberty.”

To achieve that mission, Prickly Pear often engages with like-minded contributors and organizations who share our values. We encourage to support these partners in any way you can, as these partners make our efforts possible.

Direct support of the Prickly Pear can be made at the link below. Every dollar is greatly appreciated!

Texas Tips the Scales: School Choice Now Covers Half of US Kids thumbnail

Texas Tips the Scales: School Choice Now Covers Half of US Kids

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By Jason Bedrick

In a historic victory for educational freedom, the Texas House of Representatives finally passed a universal school choice bill—marking not just a win for families in the Lone Star State, but a watershed moment for the entire school choice movement.

Once it clears the state senate and Gov. Greg Abbott signs Senate Bill 2 into law, half of America’s children will live in states where they are eligible for educational choice programs, including 15 states with “universal” choice policies for which every K-12 student is eligible. More than one in 10 U.S. students live in Texas.

The Texas House debated the bill for more than 12 hours Wednesday before passing the bill early Thursday morning. Opponents of the legislation attempted to obstruct it by filing more than 170 amendments. The House voted on more than 40 amendments, voting them all down, except for the friendly amendment proposed by House Public Education Committee Chairman Brad Buckley.

The Texas House passed the bill 85 to 63, mostly along party lines. The bill previously cleared the Texas Senate 20 to 11. Because the House amended Senate Bill 2, it will have to go back to the upper chamber before reaching the governor’s desk. The Senate will likely request a conference committee to hammer out a compromise.

Demonstrating the national import of the vote, before the session yesterday, President Donald Trump spoke with the Texas House Republican caucus expressing his support for the measure and encouraging the state lawmakers to vote for it.

Abbott has expended tremendous political capital to achieve this victory. During the last Texas legislative session in 2023, the Texas House failed to pass a school choice bill even after Abbott repeatedly called them back into special session. Twenty-one Texas House Republicans joined with all the House Democrats to defeat the school choice proposal.

In response, Abbott endorsed 16 challengers to incumbents who had opposed his school choice proposal. Five others—likely seeing the writing on the wall—did not seek reelection. Abbott-endorsed candidates who supported school choice fared well in the primaries, demonstrating once again that school choice is a litmus test issue for GOP voters.

When the dust had settled, only seven Republicans who had opposed school choice in 2023 remained in office. Of those, six voted for the school choice bill today.

Only two Republicans voted against it: former Texas Speaker of the House Dade Phelan, who was ousted as speaker in advance of the 2025 legislative session over his perceived opposition to school choice, and former public schoolteacher state Rep. Gary VanDeaver.

The school choice bill is not perfect. It would create education savings accounts that families can use to customize their children’s education. The accounts would be funded annually with around $10,000, compared with the average $17,000 spent at Texas public schools. Students with special needs can get significantly more—up to $30,000 depending on their disability—but homeschoolers will receive only $2,000.

Moreover, although every child is technically eligible, only a small number will actually get access to the accounts. The program is funded with only $1 billion, which is only enough funding for less than 2% of Texas students. Of the 100,000 students who will get access to an account, 80% must be from low- or middle-income families.

Children from higher-income families are only eligible if they are switching from a public school. As respected Texas-based economist Vance Ginn observed, “That’s a slap in the face to families already sacrificing for private or home education.” As Ginn noted, the taxpayers already “fund these families to go to government schools at a higher expense per student, so why wouldn’t everyone interested be able to receive an [education savings account]?”

There are additional structural flaws in the bill, including unnecessary accreditation requirements that will limit the supply of new schools and other education providers. This limited progress also came at a great cost—including $7.7 billion in additional spending on the bloated and inefficient Texas public school system that passed in a separate bill just before Senate Bill 2.

Still, if enacted, Texas lawmakers will have every right to brag that this represents the largest first-year education savings account program in the nation. The Lone Star State still has a long way to go to achieve truly universal education choice, but the policies in Senate Bill 2 represent a Texas-sized step in the right direction.

*****

This article was published by The Daily Signal and is reproduced with permission.

Your Support is Critical

The Prickly Pear is focused on delivering timely, fact-based news, and citizen opinion that reflects our mission to “inform, educate and advocate about the principles of limited government and personal liberty.”

To achieve that mission, Prickly Pear often engages with like-minded contributors and organizations who share our values. We encourage to support these partners in any way you can, as these partners make our efforts possible.

Direct support of the Prickly Pear can be made at the link below. Every dollar is greatly appreciated!

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