Shot Heard Round the Web: Gen. Washington Ends Guy Fawkes Celebrations, Condemns Religious Prejudice thumbnail

Shot Heard Round the Web: Gen. Washington Ends Guy Fawkes Celebrations, Condemns Religious Prejudice

By Catherine Salgado

Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes

On this day, Nov. 5, in 1775 — exactly 250 years ago — Gen. George Washington put an end to anti-Catholic “Guy Fawkes Day” celebrations in the American Army. It was an important move toward combatting religious prejudice in America even before we officially declared independence.

On Nov. 5, 1605, the unfortunate “Gunpowder Plot” of a small group of upper-class English Catholics (including Guy Fawkes) failed. While the plan to blow up Parliament was undoubtedly terroristic, it is vitally important to note that the plotters appeared to have been driven into insanity by the harsh and bloody persecution of Catholics by Protestant King James I and his predecessor Elizabeth I. As awful as the plot was, it was one unsuccessful attempt balanced against hundreds if not thousands of successful killings of Catholics. Elizabeth had been particularly brutal in her attempts to impose Anglicanism on Ireland, leaving some tens of thousands of Irish dead, while up to 300 English Catholics were executed under her rule — along with Elizabeth’s Catholic cousin Mary of Scots. Indeed, Scots Catholics suffered under Elizabeth’s rule. James I sold 30,000 Irish Catholics into “indentured servitude,” which is a more flowery term for abusive slavery, in the New World. He also executed a number of English Catholics, though much fewer than Elizabeth had. This is the backdrop for “Guy Fawkes Day.”

The Gunpowder Plot was unfortunately weaponized as justification for a harsh crackdown on British Catholics. “Guy Fawkes Day” is still celebrated as a holiday in Britain, and when I visited England last year, ads for a historical event centered around the unsuccessful plot made it sound as if it were the worst terrorist plot in British history. Ironically, near the ads were massive and violent protests in London by huge numbers of Muslims in support of genocidal terrorism against Israel. Now as then, British elites fail to identify the worst threats to their society.

One man with no such inability to see through dangerous lies was George Washington. Though a devout Episcopalian, and thus a Christian in the Anglican tradition, he was remarkably free from many of the prejudices that both English and Americans of his day had — perhaps because one of his closest friends was the Irish Catholic immigrant John Fitzgerald (there is even an old tradition that Washington died a Catholic). Washington throughout his life always displayed considerable open-mindedness towards Catholics and Jews, two religious groups who were often targeted at the time, laying the groundwork for America’s religious freedom both in policy and in practice.

One way he did that was by scotching Guy Fawkes Day revels in the Revolutionary Army, which would eventually lead to the end of the anti-Catholic celebrations in America overall. On Nov. 5, 1775, George Washington heard that some of his soldiers were planning to burn an effigy of the pope, and issued the following proclamation:

As the Commander in Chief has been apprized of a design form’d for the observance of that ridiculous and childish custom of burning the Effigy of the pope–He cannot help expressing his surprise that there should be Officers and Soldiers in this army so void of common sense, as not to see the impropriety of such a step at this Juncture; at a Time when we are solliciting, and have really obtain’d, the friendship and alliance of the people of Canada, whom we ought to consider as Brethren embarked in the same Cause. The defence of the general Liberty of America: At such a juncture, and in such Circumstances, to be insulting their Religion, is so monstrous, as not to be suffered or excused; indeed instead of offering the most remote insult, it is our duty to address public thanks to these our Brethren, as to them we are so much indebted for every late happy Success over the common Enemy in Canada.

There was, of course, an element of political interest in Washington’s move, since America was hoping for the financial and military support of Catholic Spain, Canada, and France, not to mention the Irish were one of the biggest ethnic groups in the continental army. But it was more than that — Washington was explicitly condemning a long-held prejudice, a holiday with which all of those men had grown up, as “monstrous.”

He was standing up for a religion despised by many Anglo-Americans, including two large a portion of his own army and the Continental Congress, and condemning actions which were ubiquitous at the time. In doing so, Washington set a precedent for fighting against religious prejudice and encouraging political tolerance that proved so vitally important in the foundation and expansion of America. Washington would also repeatedly proclaim celebrations of St. Patrick’s Day in the army and put a stop to anti-Catholic, anti-Irish demonstrations.

Today, tragically, religious prejudice is rising again in America, particularly antisemitism, but also hatred against Catholicism and any Protestant church which does not bow to woke ideology. The only protected religion seems to be Islam, which is inherently antithetical to many of our founding principles. We would do well on this “Guy Fawkes Day” to learn a lesson from and follow the example of George Washington, prizing the religious liberty and tolerance which he fought so hard to establish.

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

Gen. Washington Ends Guy Fawkes Celebrations, Condemns Religious Prejudice thumbnail

Gen. Washington Ends Guy Fawkes Celebrations, Condemns Religious Prejudice

By Catherine Salgado

Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes

On this day, Nov. 5, in 1775 — exactly 250 years ago — Gen. George Washington put an end to anti-Catholic “Guy Fawkes Day” celebrations in the American Army. It was an important move toward combatting religious prejudice in America even before we officially declared independence.

On Nov. 5, 1605, the unfortunate “Gunpowder Plot” of a small group of upper-class English Catholics (including Guy Fawkes) failed. While the plan to blow up Parliament was undoubtedly terroristic, it is vitally important to note that the plotters appeared to have been driven into insanity by the harsh and bloody persecution of Catholics by Protestant King James I and his predecessor Elizabeth I. As awful as the plot was, it was one unsuccessful attempt balanced against hundreds if not thousands of successful killings of Catholics. Elizabeth had been particularly brutal in her attempts to impose Anglicanism on Ireland, leaving some tens of thousands of Irish dead, while up to 300 English Catholics were executed under her rule — along with Elizabeth’s Catholic cousin Mary of Scots. Indeed, Scots Catholics suffered under Elizabeth’s rule. James I sold 30,000 Irish Catholics into “indentured servitude,” which is a more flowery term for abusive slavery, in the New World. He also executed a number of English Catholics, though much fewer than Elizabeth had. This is the backdrop for “Guy Fawkes Day.”

The Gunpowder Plot was unfortunately weaponized as justification for a harsh crackdown on British Catholics. “Guy Fawkes Day” is still celebrated as a holiday in Britain, and when I visited England last year, ads for a historical event centered around the unsuccessful plot made it sound as if it were the worst terrorist plot in British history. Ironically, near the ads were massive and violent protests in London by huge numbers of Muslims in support of genocidal terrorism against Israel. Now as then, British elites fail to identify the worst threats to their society.

One man with no such inability to see through dangerous lies was George Washington. Though a devout Episcopalian, and thus a Christian in the Anglican tradition, he was remarkably free from many of the prejudices that both English and Americans of his day had — perhaps because one of his closest friends was the Irish Catholic immigrant John Fitzgerald (there is even an old tradition that Washington died a Catholic). Washington throughout his life always displayed considerable open-mindedness towards Catholics and Jews, two religious groups who were often targeted at the time, laying the groundwork for America’s religious freedom both in policy and in practice.

One way he did that was by scotching Guy Fawkes Day revels in the Revolutionary Army, which would eventually lead to the end of the anti-Catholic celebrations in America overall. On Nov. 5, 1775, George Washington heard that some of his soldiers were planning to burn an effigy of the pope, and issued the following proclamation:

As the Commander in Chief has been apprized of a design form’d for the observance of that ridiculous and childish custom of burning the Effigy of the pope–He cannot help expressing his surprise that there should be Officers and Soldiers in this army so void of common sense, as not to see the impropriety of such a step at this Juncture; at a Time when we are solliciting, and have really obtain’d, the friendship and alliance of the people of Canada, whom we ought to consider as Brethren embarked in the same Cause. The defence of the general Liberty of America: At such a juncture, and in such Circumstances, to be insulting their Religion, is so monstrous, as not to be suffered or excused; indeed instead of offering the most remote insult, it is our duty to address public thanks to these our Brethren, as to them we are so much indebted for every late happy Success over the common Enemy in Canada.

There was, of course, an element of political interest in Washington’s move, since America was hoping for the financial and military support of Catholic Spain, Canada, and France, not to mention the Irish were one of the biggest ethnic groups in the continental army. But it was more than that — Washington was explicitly condemning a long-held prejudice, a holiday with which all of those men had grown up, as “monstrous.”

He was standing up for a religion despised by many Anglo-Americans, including two large a portion of his own army and the Continental Congress, and condemning actions which were ubiquitous at the time. In doing so, Washington set a precedent for fighting against religious prejudice and encouraging political tolerance that proved so vitally important in the foundation and expansion of America. Washington would also repeatedly proclaim celebrations of St. Patrick’s Day in the army and put a stop to anti-Catholic, anti-Irish demonstrations.

Today, tragically, religious prejudice is rising again in America, particularly antisemitism, but also hatred against Catholicism and any Protestant church which does not bow to woke ideology. The only protected religion seems to be Islam, which is inherently antithetical to many of our founding principles. We would do well on this “Guy Fawkes Day” to learn a lesson from and follow the example of George Washington, prizing the religious liberty and tolerance which he fought so hard to establish.

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

A Dangerous Schism Is Growing In Conservatism- Part II thumbnail

A Dangerous Schism Is Growing In Conservatism- Part II

By Neland Nobel

Estimated Reading Time: 7 minutes

In Part I, we looked at recent events that seem to have reignited the feud between Buchanan isolationists and the general MAGA movement, at least as defined by Trump himself.

Whether one looks at the money spent on Israel, or the lobbying efforts of AIPAC, or the conduct of the GAZA war, Israeli critics distort the numbers, provide no context, and demand things of Israel not expected of others. Why do you think that is?

Why are they so eager to split apart the Conservative movement just as we are getting things done for our agenda?

And more importantly, do we want to turn foreign policy over to people who purposefully distort the record?  One can have allies without “forever wars.”

Moreover, why are they willing to corrupt the principles of the Conservative movement to get what they want?

As the American right seems to be wavering, the European right is swinging solidly in a pro-Israel manner.

Leaders like Italy’s Giorgia Meloni, France’s Marine Le Pen, and Hungary’s Viktor Orbán now frame Israel as a civilizational ally against jihadism and “woke” globalism, often visiting Jerusalem or blocking EU criticisms of Netanyahu’s government.

Key examples as of November 2025:

  • Italy’s Brothers of Italy (Meloni): Moved the embassy to Jerusalem in 2024; pledged €100M+ in arms. Meloni: “Israel fights our battles against Islamization.”
  • France’s National Rally (Le Pen): Backed Israel’s 2025 Iran strikes; parliamentary resolutions against Hamas. Ties it to anti-migrant security.
  • Hungary’s Fidesz (Orbán): Vetoed EU sanctions on settlers; hosted Netanyahu in July 2025. Orbán’s “Christian Europe” narrative casts Israel as kin vs. “Soros-Islam.”
  • UK’s Reform UK (Farage): Pushed post-Brexit trade deals; slammed Labour’s “naive” two-state push. Farage visited Israel in October 2025 for solidarity.
  • Broader Trend: Netanyahu’s team quietly engaged the far right in Spain and Sweden (May 2025 talks), viewing them as EU veto allies. Even figures like Tommy Robinson (EDL founder) joined 2025 Israel solidarity trips, blending anti-Islamism with philo-Semitism.

So oddly, as some elements of the American right turn away from Israel and flirt with anti-Semitism, the European right is going the other way!

So why this shift in America?  Why are certain elements making such a big deal early on in Trump’s Second Term?  The Epstein scandal involves Mossad, they say. Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, they say. Charlie Kirk was murdered before he went public against Israel, they contend. That seems to be the incessant line, no matter what the news story.

There is no news unless you’re slamming Jews.

We can’t read men’s hearts better than others, but knowing human nature, a good guess is that they want power.  Power to change the direction of the Conservative movement in the direction they desire.  They want to hijack MAGA.

Also, they may be infected by the ancient prejudice, Jew-hating.

The challenge for many of us will be how to resist their ideas without making the rift worse among Conservatives than it already is.  We must be cautious about what we will call “the Streisand effect.”

Named after Barbra Streisand back in 2003, when she sued to bury an aerial photo of her Malibu mansion from a public erosion study—her lawsuit made the image go mega-viral, viewed by millions instead of the handful who cared before. In short, sometimes calling attention to a problem makes it worse.

Attacking Fuentes, Kanye West, Tucker, and Owens risks turning them into martyrs and drawing undue attention to them.  Yet clearly, we must answer their charges, or their arguments win by default in the court of public opinion.

The event perhaps most precipitating this was Tucker’s softball interview with Nick Fuentes.

So, at the risk of the Streisand effect, who is this guy?

Nick Fuentes is a 27-year-old political commentator, live streamer, and activist born on August 18, 1998, in Illinois. He rose to prominence during the 2017 Charlottesville Unite the Right rally as a young white nationalist voice, and he hosts the podcast America First, where he promotes “groyper” ideology—a blend of paleoconservative isolationism, Christian nationalism, and explicit white supremacism aimed at infiltrating and “owning” mainstream conservatism. Fuentes leads the America First Political Action Conference (AFPAC), a rival to CPAC, and has built a following among disaffected young conservatives through memes, trolling, and anti-establishment rants.

Fuentes has a right to speak, and we have the right to reject him.  It is that simple.

In October of 2025, Fuentes said the following:

“Organized Jewry is the big challenge to unifying America—they’re unassimilable, control everything from AIPAC to Hollywood. When white Christians win back power, we’ll deal with them decisively, like Stalin did his enemies.”

After the killing of Charlie Kirk, Fuentes had this to say:

“I took your baby, Turning Point USA, and I fcked it… I’ve been fcking it, that’s why it’s filled with groypers.” Post-Kirk killing: Mocked Kirk’s widow as “fake” and “happy he’s dead”; claimed Kirk was “becoming a groyper” (anti-Zionist), implying motive.

In October 2025:

Fuentes seems to have made some headway among Young Republicans and even the government. “There’s groypers in every department, or so he claims.”

We think an approach of  “principled exposure” (data + principles, no ad hominem attacks) is smarter than pure attacks, and it exposes the flaws in their arguments without feeding into the “censored hero” script.

Not only is Fuentes crude, but he also lumps everyone together, a collectivist mindset.  Jews this, Jews that.  Dennis Prager is a Jew.  Adam Schiff is a Jew. Leon Trotsky was a Jew.  Milton Friedman was Jewish.  They have nothing in common.  Their ideas and philosophies are opposites. Yet he peddles the lie that they are all the same and that they are all evil.

This is both crude and vicious. It does not belong in the American Conservative movement.

Sticking to principles is the North Star here, clearly differentiating us from them—it’s what separates a movement worth joining from a grudge club. Judging by actions, not ancestry, isn’t just right; it’s the only way to keep conservatism (or libertarianism) coherent and credible.

Israel’s response to Oct 7—Hamas’s barbaric invasion (1,200 slaughtered, 250 hostages) and Hezbollah’s nonstop rockets (5,000+ since ’23, per IDF counts)—wasn’t vengeance; it was self-defense 101, a moral imperative under any just war ethic. 

And the restraint? John Spencer’s work seals it: Amid urban shields and a maze of underground tunnels that no army had to crack before, Israel’s 1:1 ratio and 1.5M warnings make it the gold standard of urban combat, not the war crime smear it gets painted as.

Besides countering the lies they are telling, what other positive steps can be taken?

The real leverage lies in proactive, principle-driven moves: Shine sunlight on the money trails to deter donors, while rebuilding acceptance through education and coalitions that appeal to conservatism’s core (actions over ancestry, fusionist big tents). This isn’t about purges; it’s about outmaneuvering the poison with transparency and moral clarity, letting the “inner moral sense” of Conservatism do the heavy lifting. 

In a sense, we all must do what Buckley did: call them out for their prejudice. We don’t need to ban them, but we do need to say we want no part of them in our movement.

The only public intellectual with real clout who comes to mind—and the bridge between MAGA Conservatives and the older Conservative movement—is professor and now podcaster Victor Davis Hanson. He has not been silent.

In a May 13, 2025, YouTube discussion “Post-Oct 7th Anti-Semitism,” Hanson intoned:

“Carlson’s flirtation with revisionists like Cooper isn’t isolated—it’s part of a right-wing undercurrent excusing jihadism by blaming ‘Jewish neocons.’ No pretense anymore; it’s raw antisemitism, and we must call it out to honor our Judeo-Christian debts.”

In a September 2, 2025, YouTube clip from his Hoover talks, Hanson linked Carlson’s “endless wars” narrative to antisemitic undertones: “Tucker’s isolationism echoes Buchanan’s—ditching allies like Israel isn’t pragmatism; it’s laced with old tropes about ‘Zionist lobbies’ pulling strings. It’s a flirtation with the paradox: Jews as victims and villains controlling policy.” He warned it “poisons the movement,” urging conservatives to “ostracize, not cancel” such voices to preserve fusionism.

On November 1, 2025, X post Hanson wrote:

“Tucker and his antisemitism should not be canceled but ostracized from the Republican Party.”

The Prickly Pear is a small platform in comparison, and we all need to build alliances with VDH and others who don’t want to follow Tucker down the anti-Semitic rabbit hole.

It would be helpful if Donald Trump would address this problem.  MAGA is primarily his creation, and his words would carry considerable weight.

Yet his actions speak volumes. Trump’s deep personal and political ties to Israel and Jewish communities—they’re not just optics; they’re woven into his family and inner circle. His son-in-law, Jared Kushner (Jewish), brokered the Abraham Accords; his daughter, Ivanka, converted to Judaism; and his chief aides, like Stephen Miller (Jewish) and David Friedman (former ambassador to Israel), shaped his Mideast policy. Trump moved the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, recognized the Golan Heights, and cut off UNRWA funding for its Hamas links.

He’s called himself Israel’s “best friend” and, post-Oct 7, 2023, issued an executive order expanding antisemitism protections in schools. Given this, it’s hard to imagine him countenancing Fuentes’ bile—like calls for a “holy war against Jews” or “dealing with organized Jewry’ decisively.” Yet, as of November 3, 2025, Trump has not directly addressed the Carlson-Fuentes interview or the broader “virus” of antisemitism infiltrating MAGA fringes.

It is not that Trump is an intellectual leader like Buckley was, but he is one of the most prominent political leaders, so some clear words from him would be beneficial.

Besides publicly condemning people like Fuentes, concrete steps should also be taken.  Among these could be:

Target funding streams surgically—Qatar’s $18 million 2024 lobbying blitz (5x AIPAC’s direct spend) and indirect grants—by empowering watchdogs and donors, not grand inquisitions. The goal: Make it costly to back the fringes.

Push for stricter DOJ audits via petitions or congressional letters (e.g., expand the DETERRENT Act to mandate disclosure for media “story pitches”)—partner with groups like the Middle East Forum for public FARA dashboards tracking Qatar’s 74 agents.

The referenced FARA dashboard is a public online tool from OpenSecrets (the Center for Responsive Politics) called Foreign Lobby Watch. It’s a searchable database and visualization platform that aggregates and displays data from U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) filings, enabling users to track, in real time, foreign governments’ lobbying activities, expenditures, registrants, and principals.

Quietly rally conservative foundations (e.g., Bradley, Scaife) to condition grants on “no foreign influence” clauses, publicizing anonymized “red flag” lists of tainted outlets/think tanks. Over time, this disrupts by default: Money flees scandals, acceptance follows clarity.

Invest in alternatives, educate without excoriating, ally broadly.

Conservative Jews and Conservative Christians need an alliance to keep poisonous characters out of our movement. 

Let the marketplace work. We have admired Tucker for years, but this was a bridge too far. We are not suggesting banning him; we canceled our subscription. He should not be invited to Conservative functions. He has made his bed, and we need to make ours.

What are we trying to conserve? The principles of the American Founding and the Judeo-Christian ethic. That is the opposite of what Fuentes is selling.

The public needs to know that he does not speak for us and that we vigorously oppose his views.

That is what we at The Prickly Pear have decided to do.

We would appreciate any support you can provide.  Becoming a VIP subscriber would be greatly appreciated, and we need contributions to expand our readership. If you look around on the site, you will find a big red “DONATE” button.  Hit it and follow the simple instructions.

If our readers are not willing to get in the fight, who is?

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

Indiana Is Innovating Education—More Than Any Other State thumbnail

Indiana Is Innovating Education—More Than Any Other State

By Dr. Keri D. Ingraham

Estimated Reading Time: 4 minutes

Indiana’s bold and comprehensive strategy to advance K-12 education has set a new national benchmark.

On Oct. 17, Indiana submitted a waiver application to the U.S. Department of Education seeking flexibility and a reduction of red tape from Washington. Under the leadership of Gov. Mike Braun and Secretary of Education Katie Jenner, Indiana is innovating K-12 education from all angles, and the rest of the nation should take note.

Upon taking office in January, Braun expanded eligibility for the Choice Scholarship Program to all families in the Hoosier State, creating a free market K-12 education landscape. Demand for education options has surged, and providers have responded. In Indiana, private school choices have expanded significantly over the past four years, with enrollment up 22 percent.

Indiana also offers robust public school choice, including inter-district and intra-district open enrollment, magnet schools, and public charter schools. Indiana has a robust public charter school community that has grown by approximately 40 percent over the past 10 years, resulting in 120 charter schools collectively enrolling upwards of 50,000 students. Furthermore, Indiana could set a national standard for equitable charter school funding, including both facilities and operations.

The state is leading the nation in the number of microschools, which are small schools created by individuals referred to as education entrepreneurs or by organizations. While microschools are generally private schools, Indiana also has public microschools. For example, the Indiana Microschools Collaborative is a public charter network that exists to “create and support innovative, personalized microschools” across the state, each serving 20-75 students.

This microschools collaborative was developed by one of Indiana’s most innovative public school districts, which is currently part of a small number of schools nationwide that are piloting a competency-based learning model—an alternative to the traditional credit hour.

In this year’s legislative session, Indiana removed a major barrier to creating new schools. Braun’s May signing of House Bill 1515 ensures that all public, charter, and private schools are permitted in every zoning district—paving the way for a surge in new microschools and private schools to meet growing demand.

The state ranks third in the nation for “education choice,” only trailing Florida and Arizona. Yet beyond school choice, Indiana is forging a new frontier for innovation in education. The school facilities where children are educated and the way kids get to school are experiencing forward-thinking initiatives. For example, more than fifty Indianapolis public charter and private schools are taking steps to collaborate by sharing transportation and school buildings to expand offerings for students and enhance efficiency, thereby driving down costs.

As an advocate for academic accountability, school transparency, and empowering parents to determine the best school for their child, Secretary Jenner believes that “every child has a unique purpose and deserves opportunities to be prepared for future success.” Modernizing outdated high school graduation requirements is foundational to preparing students.

In December 2024, the Indiana State Board of Education unanimously approved new high school diploma requirements. Arguably, the result is the new gold standard in the country and a model that other states would be wise to adopt and customize accordingly.

The base Indiana high school diploma now requires 42 credits, up from the previous minimum of 40 credits. It includes new requirements of one credit in personal finance, computer science, communications, and college and career preparation, as well as two credits in STEM-focused courses.

Beyond the base diploma, students can opt to earn readiness seals for Enrollment, Employment, and Enlistment and Service, each offered at the “honors” and “honors plus” levels. Students who graduate with the Enrollment Honors Plus seal are automatically accepted at each of Indiana’s seven public colleges and universities.

Braun’s forward-thinking leadership has been a catalyst, spurring partnerships with higher education, business, and industry that will help prepare students for post-high school success. Indiana is investing $7.5 million each year toward career coaching initiatives for students. Additionally, the state commits $10 million per year through Career Scholarship Accounts for students in grades 10 through 12 to obtain career training. The account provides $5,000 per year that can be applied toward work-based learning expenses.

The Indiana Graduates Prepared to Succeed dashboard, or Indiana GPS for short, provides educators with key data points and parents with “meaningful, relevant, and transparent information about school progress and performance.” ILEARN is used to assess students three times during the school year for early and targeted intervention.

Comprehensive and strategic solutions focused on foundational skills, with a $170 million investment, have driven four consecutive years of rising student literacy rates. Fourth-grade Indiana student reading scores moved up to sixth in the country in 2024 from 19th in 2022. Early elementary teachers are equipped with phonics-based science of reading practices. Additionally, $1,000 grants are awarded to families for student learning support. A key strategy is using IREAD in second grade to give parents and teachers an early “on track indicator” to gauge whether students will master foundational reading skills by the end of third grade. There is no wait-and-see approach.

Building on a successful phonics initiative in early grades, Indiana is now targeting adolescent reading in grades six through eight, using outcomes-based contracts that pay vendors only when specific student outcomes are met. Math proficiency strategy and policy further set Indiana apart from the rest of the nation. House Bill 1634 ensures educators use evidence-based instruction, implement math screening, and provide intensive support for students below grade level.

Recognizing that the teacher is the number one school factor in student learning, the Indiana Department of Education rates teacher preparation programs for their alignment with the science of reading to provide transparency, ensure accountability, and incentivize improvement. Once on the job, top-performing teachers may be rewarded with stipends up to $7,500.

Indiana’s bold and comprehensive strategy to advance K-12 education has set a new national benchmark for innovation, accountability, and student-centered reform. The Hoosier State isn’t just participating in the education reform movement—it’s leading it, charting the course for the rest of the nation to follow.

*****

This article was published by the Independent Women’s Forum and is reproduced with permission.

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

A Dangerous Schism Is Growing In Conservatism- Part I thumbnail

A Dangerous Schism Is Growing In Conservatism- Part I

By Neland Nobel

Estimated Reading Time: 6 minutes

The conservative movement is going to have to ask some tough questions and perform some uncomfortable housekeeping chores to avoid an all-out ideological civil war.  We have been concerned about this for some time.

Back in December 2022, when Trump was still a candidate, we wrote about his ill-fated dinner with the black rapper Kanye West and his sidekick, Nick Fuentes.   Later, we followed up with a three-part series on the growing problem of antisemitism within our movement. We compared our current troubles to those in the Conservative movement before. We noted we have no Conservative leader of the gravitas of William F. Buckley, Jr. Unfortunately, things have deteriorated to the point that our movement is now seeing open rhetorical warfare between thought leaders such as Tucker Carlson and Mark Levin. 

This is likely to spread and soon involve more combatants from both sides of the issue.

We urge you to watch the videos in the video section today, specifically those by Shapiro, Levin, and Stakelbeck.

At some point, everyone who considers himself a Republican and a Conservative will have to choose sides. While one may have nuanced disagreements with the government in Jerusalem, our shared values, basic conservative principles, our shared love of freedom, and our concern about the alliance between the International Left and Islamism put us at The Prickly Pear at odds with Tucker and others like him.

The Left has even a bigger anti-Semitic problem, and we don’t want to follow their direction.  Conservatives need to address this internal problem and not let it fester into something worse.

If there is a fault in this divide, we put it on the aggressors: Candace Owens, Tucker Carlson, Nick Fuentes, The American Conservative Magazine, libertarian Dave Smith, and others like them.

As the Trump brand of MAGA remarkably recovered from political purgatory, they have decided to open this rift as widely as possible very early on in his new term.  Why, we can’t really understand.

Conservatism is still a minority view in both the cultural and political spheres. Anti-Semitism is against Conservative principles, and secondly, it is not suitable for our brand.  If allowed to spread, it will harm the ascent of Conservatism as a governing philosophy.

Still, after the October 7th attack on Israel and its counterattack against Hamas and Hezbollah, the rather blunt anti-Israeli arguments coming within our own ranks are morphing into open antisemitism. This is not good for our movement.

After the murder of Charlie Kirk, they appeared to want to alienate Kirk’s followers from Kirk’s unequivocal support for the Jewish state.  They tried to tell us what he “really thought”, even though the public record is quite clear. Kirk’s new book is about why he wants to celebrate the Hebrew Sabbath and its value.

We found these attempts to hijack sympathy for Charlie Kirk both distasteful and disrespectful. 

The only possible motive we can think of for the timing of their attack is that, post-Trump, they want to be in charge of foreign policy.  Trump himself has been a friend and ally of Israel better than any before him, yet he makes it clear to the Israeli government when he demands they be part of his peace plans. Trump’s peace plan is still cooking, so to speak, and the final meal has not been eaten.  We have urged caution.  Beware of signing agreements with people who regularly break agreements, such as Hamas.  But he got Israel to join his plans. We will see.

The current struggle mirrors in many ways the fight between Pat Buchanan and William F. Buckley, which had been dormant for so many years, but began with tremors a few years ago and is now an open, exploding volcano.  Yes, the names and players are different, but the principles are the same.  That is why our three-part series went over Buckley’s arguments.  If you are not familiar with them, please re-read the series. 

Conservatives should not be collectivists.  We are individualists.  We should not judge people by bloodlines but by their actions.  We have principles and standards, and the same standards should be used to judge all those we support or oppose. There are no special standards for Jews and no special requirements. To demand different or higher standards is a hallmark of antisemitism, as Buckley pointed out decades ago.

As we mark two years since that Sabbath slaughter, with Hezbollah’s rockets still raining and Gaza’s tunnels crumbling under IDF precision, conservatives must confront a bitter truth: This infighting among us isn’t advancing limited government or individual liberty. It’s handing ammunition to our shared foes—the unholy alliance of radical Islam and the international left—while eroding the very principles that define us.

It started as a legitimate tension. Post-Afghanistan fatigue made Carlson’s warnings about “endless entanglements” resonate: Why funnel $3.8 billion annually to Israel when Detroit crumbles? TAC amplified this with pieces framing U.S. support as a “neocon liability,” echoing paleoconservative isolationism. Levin and his allies fired back, branding it moral abdication—Israel as the West’s outpost in a sea of jihadist tyranny.

The U.S. federal budget for fiscal year 2025 (October 1, 2024–September 30, 2025) totals approximately $7.0 trillion in outlays. U.S. aid to Israel in FY 2025 consists primarily of $3.8 billion in military assistance (via Foreign Military Financing and related channels), with minor economic and other components.  This represents about 0.05% of the overall federal budget.

But the US gets something back for that, especially intelligence and significant military and commercial innovation. Critical anti-missile systems and even laser beam platforms against drones are getting battlefield experience. Unlike other conflicts, there are no American boots on the ground, and Israel does not want them.

For .05% of the budget, that hardly seems worth ripping up the Conservative movement. That money could easily be saved elsewhere.  To eliminate it (which we think should be done in time) hardly moves the needle on our severe fiscal crisis.  So this really can’t be over money, can it?

But what began as foreign policy haggling has curdled into something uglier. Carlson’s October interview with Nick Fuentes—an avowed anti-Semite peddling “Zionist Jews” conspiracies—crossed the Rubicon, defended by Heritage’s Kevin Roberts as “free speech.” Suddenly, the debate veers into the paradox of antisemitism: Jews as eternal victims (Holocaust echoes, Oct 7 horrors) and shadowy rulers (AIPAC as “disloyal cabal”). This isn’t conservatism; it’s collectivist grievance, the left’s identity politics in a MAGA hat.

Yes, Tucker and others should indeed have their say, as Kevin Roberts suggests.  But those who oppose those views have equal free speech rights.   We need to exercise those rights.

It violates Frank Meyer’s fusionism—liberty through individual choice, not tribal smears—and mocks the Hebrew Bible’s imprint on our Founding, from Locke’s Talmudic natural rights to Adams calling the Jews “the most glorious nation” for birthing monotheism and ethics.

That intellectual history point is another irony.  We have just seen a wave of books recently about the Hebraic influence on the Founding.  Not long ago, it was said that the Founding was the intersection of Athens and Jerusalem. Still, most of the emphasis was on the “Enlightenment” or “Athens” influence, as secular professors downplayed the religious input and elevated the secular influence.  Recent history shows that there was a significant difference between the religious hatred (and Jew-hatred) of the French Enlightenment of Voltaire and others, and the Hebrew-influenced Scottish and English Enlightenments, which mainly influenced the Founders. It is almost as if some people are afraid to acknowledge the Jewish thinking embraced by the Founders and the English common law.

Libertarians, conservatism’s quirky cousins, mirror the mess. The Mises Institute—built on Jewish exiles Ludwig von Mises and Murray Rothbard—hosts anti-aid isolationists, while comedian Dave Smith mocks “Zionist neocons” to Libertarian Party cheers. The Ayn Rand Institute remains pro-Israel, tying it to rational self-interest rather than mysticism. Their split? Same poison: The”Non-aggression principle” used as a cover for selective standards.

The “non-aggression” principle never said that a person or a nation cannot defend itself when attacked. There would have been no war in Gaza unless Hamas started it, ruthlessly attacking civilians and taking them hostage.  Is Israel supposed to ignore the first responsibility of government, protecting the lives and freedom of its people?  In what libertarian fantasy world are these people living?

Exacerbating this is foreign meddling, with Qatar—Hamas’s banker and host—pouring $250 million since 2016 into conservative media to fracture GOP unity. FARA filings reveal $180,000 monthly to Carlson via lobbyists for “access” (that March 2025 PM interview? Six million views of soft-pedaled Hamas ties). Heritage took $1 million in 2023 for “Mideast research,” aligning with Doha’s “restraint” line.  That is a small contribution for Heritage.  But they still took the money.

Paleocons decry AIPAC as outsized, but ignore Qatar’s lobbying blitz (seven times AIPAC’s direct spend) or Tides/Ford’s billions funding anti-Israel NGOs. It’s hypocrisy: Follow the money, they say… or is it just the “Jewish” money?

Worse is the warfare double standard, a symptom of that victim-ruler paradox. Israel’s response—ground ops against 30,000 embedded fighters in Gaza’s 6,000-per-square-km density—was morally necessary after invasion and endless rockets. John Spencer, an expert in urban warfare, documents the unprecedented restraint by Israel: 1.5 million warnings, 99% precision munitions, a 1:1 civilian-to-combatant ratio despite Hamas’s explicit shields (hospitals, schools). Yet global headlines scream “genocide,” with U.S. sympathy for Israel dipping to 32% (Gallup, July 2025).

Stack Israel’s retaliatory war against any urban conflict in history: U.S. in Fallujah (2004)? 1:2 ratio, minimal warnings, 600-800 civilians dead—no frenzy. Manila (1945)? 10:1, 100,000+ shelled—WWII heroism. Yes, we killed 10 largely friendly Filipinos for every one dead Japanese soldier taking that city. Hue (1968)? 3:1, 2,000-5,800 caught in airstrikes—Vietnam fog.  These victors got grace; Israel, the defender with tech demanding perfection, gets the Inquisition. Why? Antisemitism’s long shadow: Tiny Israel (0.2% world population) as both fragile and omnipotent, yet its restraint is somehow”proof” of malice.

Military historian Victor Davis Hanson put the Israeli/Hamas conflict in its proper light.  He has described the Gaza conflict as “the most humane urban war in history,” noting: “No army has ever fought in such density—6,000 people per square kilometer—with such care for civilians, using warnings and roof-knocks while the enemy hides in hospitals.” He credits this to Israel’s “Western ethics,” echoing John Spencer’s analysis of the 1:1 civilian-combatant ratio.  But for those less informed, or maybe informed and just malicious, they prefer to toss around terms like “genocide.”

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

Lawlessness Is a Choice thumbnail

Lawlessness Is a Choice

By Miranda Devine

Estimated Reading Time: 9 minutes

The following is adapted from a speech delivered on September 30, 2025, at Hillsdale College’s Blake Center for Faith and Freedom in Somers, Connecticut.

While being interviewed on a recent podcast, Texas Democrat Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett decided to opine on crime, a topic on which she apparently considers herself to be an expert. Her nutty conclusion was this: “Just because someone has committed a crime, it doesn’t make them a criminal.”

I can see how this logic would have a wide range of uses for politicians: “Just because someone told a lie, it doesn’t make them a liar”; “Just because someone took a bribe, it doesn’t make them corrupt.” It’s a bit like the thought experiment: “If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?” If a crime is committed and no one is responsible, was there actually a crime at all?

Of course, it’s nonsense. A criminal is defined precisely as a person who has committed a crime. But when Crockett chooses her own definitions, she is simply echoing a progressive shibboleth that has turned blue cities across the country into lawless hellholes. It holds that people who commit crimes have no agency—that they are helpless victims of circumstance. Therefore, any attempt to hold them accountable by arresting them or putting them in jail is unjust—it further victimizes them.

The obvious result of this logic is that criminals are emboldened and their real victims become helpless hostages to lawlessness.

It is a short step from Crockett’s logic to the justification of defunding the police as a way to “make communities safer.” That communities become safer by having fewer police is, of course, a lie, but defunding police is what progressives have been doing since the anti-cop, BLM-Antifa riots of the “Summer of Love” in 2020.

As a former police reporter, I’ve seen how soft-on-crime policies hurt the very people progressives pretend to care about. It’s precisely the most vulnerable in our big cities who need the most policing and have the least resources to protect themselves from mayhem.

Living in New York City off and on over the past three decades, including in the pre-Mayor Rudy Giuliani era when it was a dystopian hellscape of crime and no-go zones, it’s striking how quickly soft-on-crime policies at the state and local level destroy your day-to-day sense of safety. Progressive criminal justice “reforms,” such as defunding the police, ending cash bail, refusing to prosecute misdemeanors, letting thousands of convicted felons out of prison early, and slashing the prison population, are the most obvious contributors to the escalating violent crime problem in blue cities.

In 2014, Bill de Blasio was elected Mayor of what he boasted was “the safest big city in America.” He championed all sorts of progressive policies, from bail reform to decriminalizing offenses such as public urination and marijuana possession—and eventually the New York City Council defunded the NYPD to the tune of $1 billion.

As predicted by everybody with any understanding of human nature, it did not take long for the city to become scary. There was a surge of mentally ill homeless people accorded the so-called freedom to sleep on the streets, and open-air drug bazaars popped up all over the place. This was followed by a surge of violent crime, including a spate of people being pushed in front of subway trains. Shoplifting became so normalized that convenience and drug stores had to lock up toothpaste.

The decriminalization of pot and public urination has only turbocharged the sense of chaos and disorder in blue cities. It marks a rejection of the famous “broken windows” theory that was the key to turning New York City around under Giuliani. The theory holds that addressing minor crimes, such as vandalism and public intoxication, creates an atmosphere of order and lawfulness. By contrast, the policy of ignoring so-called minor crimes encourages disorder and lawlessness.

People don’t knowingly or willingly vote for their quality of life to deteriorate. But this is the progressive template, whether in the cities they control or on a national level with the open borders policy that, under the Biden administration, brought in 20-25 million illegal migrants, many of them criminals.

It is common sense that law and order is an 80-20 issue. You don’t need a pollster to say so, although according to a recent AP-NORC poll, 81 percent of Americans across political persuasions say crime is a “major problem.” The other 19 percent must be either criminals, progressive politicians, or both.

In a world not defined by Jasmine Crockett, it makes no sense that progressives would remain stubbornly on the wrong side of their own voters. But their unhinged hostility to President Trump’s successful crime crackdown in Washington, D.C., suggests that that’s where they are.

In the first three weeks after Trump sent the National Guard into the nation’s capital, Attorney General Pam Bondi reported 1,528 arrests and 156 illegal guns seized. Nearly half of the arrests were of illegal migrant criminals, including violent felons convicted of rape, child molestation, assault, and robbery with a deadly weapon.

The D.C. crime rate plummeted across the board as a result, with violent crime down 30 percent in the first month after federal troops were deployed on August 7, according to the White House. The Metropolitan Police Department was even more bullish, citing a 40 percent drop in violent crime when compared to the same period last year, including a staggering 82 percent drop in carjackings.

D.C. residents, most of whom are black, expressed relief at being able to live without fear of being robbed or assaulted. Yet left-wing pundits on CNN and MSNBC called Trump a “dictator” and said his crackdown on “so-called crime” is racist and a “military occupation.” Bondi had to fire two of her staff members—left-wing paralegals who hurled foul-mouthed abuse and a Subway sandwich at federal officers who are bringing order to D.C.

Democratic Mayor Muriel Bowser, who had been remarkably cooperative with the federal intervention, nonetheless testified on September 18 that Trump’s National Guard deployment had nothing to do with the newly safe streets. She would rather be seen as unmoored from the truth than publicly admit that more cops and more arrests reduce crime. The hostility to law and order runs deep in a party that has made defunding the police an article of faith.

Trump is plowing ahead regardless, vowing to expand his D.C. policies to high crime cities like Chicago, Memphis, and Baltimore, which he called a “hellhole.” He is onto a popular issue and has shown that crime crackdowns can rapidly improve American lives. Ultimately he hopes to shame big-city mayors into cleaning up their own cities before he sends in the troops.

When asked by a reporter if he would consider sending the National Guard into Republican-run cities that are “also seeing high crime,” Trump replied: “Sure, but there aren’t that many of them. If you look at the top 25 cities for crime, just about every one of those cities is run by Democrats.” Cue apoplexy from the usual suspects, but he was right. If anything, he understated the problem. A 2022 report by the Heritage Foundation, “The Blue City Murder Problem,” found that 27 of the top 30 cities with the highest homicide rates were run by Democrats.

Now, inexplicably, New York City is set to elect a far-left mayor, Zohran Mamdani, who wants to decriminalize misdemeanors and divert money from cops to social workers. The Democratic Socialists of America platform he ran on when he was elected to the New York Assembly in 2021 called for decriminalizing all drugs, letting illegal immigrants vote and hold elected office, and dealing with 26-year-old criminals as youth offenders. Now he plans to make New York a double sanctuary city for illegal aliens and transgenderism, mirroring the catastrophic soft-on-crime policies of Minnesota Governor Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey.

Mamdani wants to ban ICE from removing violent criminals and predators, and he wants to spend millions of taxpayer dollars to create more “LGBTQIA+ Liaisons” in schools to brainwash more kids into thinking they are trapped in a body of the opposite sex. He also wants to codify transgender guidelines to force girls to share bathrooms with biological males.

Lawlessness and disorder are not inevitable in big cities. Giuliani demonstrated this 30 years ago in New York, and Trump has now proved it again in D.C. But the dwindling percentage of voters in New York who bother turning in a ballot for the mayoral race are determined to be the turkeys who voted for Thanksgiving.

The law-and-order paradox is even more stark when it comes to illegal migrant criminals. When Trump claimed on the campaign trail that other countries had opened their jails and set the inmates loose on America, it seemed like hyperbole. But among the bad hombres that DHS Secretary Kristi Noem and Border Czar Tom Homan have been arresting, there is an enormous preponderance of murderers, rapists, and child molesters.

You would think that we have enough home-grown criminals without importing new ones. But that is what Joe Biden and whoever was wielding his autopen decided willfully to do for four years while the nation’s media turned a blind eye.

After years of gaslighting and excuses from the Biden administration, Trump fulfilled his promise to secure the border within the first 100 days of his second term. But now comes the hard part: deportations. You would think every American would welcome the removal of the sorts of criminal degenerates who raped and murdered Laken Riley, Rachel Morin, and twelve-year-old Jocelyn Nungaray. But no! ICE and Border Patrol officers are under attack from violent, organized militants posing as protesters who throw rocks at their vehicles, slash their tires, and obstruct their movements. Officers have also been doxxed and labeled fascists.

Recently, an ICE officer was seriously injured when he was dragged down the road by a car driven by a criminal illegal alien resisting arrest. In January, a Border Patrol agent was ambushed and slaughtered by members of a vegan transgender cult on a murderous rampage across the country. On September 24, there was a sniper attack on an ICE facility in Dallas. That followed a July 4 shooting attack on an ICE facility in Alvarado, Texas.

The job is made more dangerous by sanctuary city laws, whereby authorities refuse to hand over violent criminal illegal aliens for deportation. DHS and ICE are conducting operations right now in Chicago, but Illinois Governor JB Pritzker and Mayor Brandon Johnson are doing everything they can to obstruct these operations.

I went on a pre-dawn raid in Chicago recently with Secretary Noem and more than 100 heavily armed Border Patrol and ICE agents. We rode in armored vehicles with helicopter and drone support to execute a felony arrest warrant on a single criminal illegal alien who had previously been deported but returned under Biden and has convictions for violent assault. It was an extraordinary commitment of resources for one criminal—although, as often happens with these raids, it netted an additional four illegal migrants who were also in the house.

Given the challenges of each deportation, it seems unlikely that Biden’s toxic border legacy can be reversed in four years, so we may be stuck with extra mayhem from foreign criminals beyond the next election cycle.

Trump’s latest law-and-order crackdown comes in the wake of the assassination of Charlie Kirk. On September 22, the President designated the violent anarchist group Antifa as a domestic terrorist organization. The 22-year-old leftist who shot Kirk in the throat as he was answering a question about transgender violence at a crowded campus event in Utah had carved Antifa slogans and transgender references onto his shell casings. Despite Jimmy Kimmel’s claim, the killer was not a “MAGA Republican.” He was a radicalized leftist with a trans lover who was also a “furry”—someone with a sexual fetish involving dressing up as an animal. The assassin told family members that Kirk was hateful and that “some hate can’t be negotiated out.”

Kirk’s murder has brought to the fore the leftist political violence that has engulfed this country in recent years. Only two months ago, Kirk warned that “assassination culture is spreading on the left,” citing a poll showing that

forty-eight percent of liberals say it would be at least somewhat justified to murder Elon Musk. Fifty-five percent said the same about Donald Trump. The left is being whipped into a violent frenzy. Any setback, whether losing an election or losing a court case, justifies a maximally violent response.

The latest wave of violence began with the deadly BLM-Antifa riots of 2020, which were tacitly encouraged by Democrats like Kamala Harris and Tim Walz as a way to destabilize then-President Trump. Then, of course, Trump was the target of two assassination attempts last year. There was the arson and vandalism against Tesla dealerships to intimidate Elon Musk and punish him for supporting Trump. In May, Israeli Embassy staffers Yaron Lischinsky and his fiancée Sarah Lynn Milgrim were assassinated, allegedly by a left-wing Palestinian activist, outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C. Even the arson attack on the home of Pennsylvania’s Democratic Governor Josh Shapiro was perpetrated by a left-wing, pro-Hamas, anti-Israel activist.

UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was assassinated in Manhattan last December, shot in the back in cold blood, allegedly by wealthy leftist Luigi Mangione, who spouted left-wing critiques of corporate greed and has become a folk hero to the Left. When Mangione appeared in a Manhattan courtroom recently, a crowd of supporters chanted, “Free Luigi,” and cheered when the judge dropped some of the charges against him.

The public outpouring of sympathy for Mangione and the callous attitude towards his victim, a midwestern father of two teenagers who worked his way to the top, seem to have altered the political discourse on violence. “Violence is never the answer,” was Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren’s verdict on Mangione. “But people can only be pushed so far.” Warren’s colleagues doubled down on their dehumanization of Trump and his supporters, branding them as fascists and Nazis. All that was needed for tragedy to ensue was an unhinged person to take them at their word.

With their dehumanizing rhetoric and soft-on-crime policies, progressives create permission structures that excuse crime and violence, remove accountability, and blur the distinction between right and wrong. As if that weren’t enough, in New York they have also created powerful disincentives for good citizens to protect themselves or others from crime.

A case in point was the persecution of former U.S. Marine Daniel Penny, who subdued a homeless, mentally ill man, Jordan Neely, as he was threatening to kill passengers on a New York subway car. Neely died soon after police arrived, and Manhattan prosecutor Alvin Bragg charged Penny with homicide. Penny was acquitted by a jury, but not before being portrayed by the media and others on the Left as a racist vigilante, despite the fact that passengers testified how scared they had been and how grateful they were that he had intervened.

It was a tragedy that there was no Good Samaritan like Penny in the light rail car in Charlotte, North Carolina, where 23-year-old Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska was murdered with a knife by another homeless man with a lengthy criminal record. But that was the point of prosecuting Penny: to make an example of him and dissuade other valiant young men from protecting women like Iryna.

The intense blowback against Trump’s efforts to restore law and order rams home the point that it is a deliberate choice by progressives to preserve lawlessness in their cities. When you think about it, the strategy seems to have paid off, if all you care about is power, since progressives have a generational stranglehold on the cities with the worst crime.

From that skewed perspective, maybe Crockett isn’t so nutty after all. 

*****

This article was published by Imprimis, a production of Hillsdale College and is reproduced with permission.

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

Profiles in Treachery-Part 4 thumbnail

Profiles in Treachery-Part 4

By M. Stanton Nobel

Estimated Reading Time: 4 minutes

While turnabout is fair play, the more critical issue with respect to Jack Smith and others in this series the mobilizing of multiple government agencies to isolate, impede, marginalize, and bankrupt the political opposition.  Appointed special counsel by then Attorney General Merrick Garland, Smith came close to achieving the goal of eliminating Donald J. Trump from political office.

Born John Luman Smith in 1969 near Syracuse, NY, he attended the State University of New York at Oneonta, graduating summa cum laude (1991) in political science, a common refuge for future politicians and bureaucrats.  His intelligence was further demonstrated by his receipt of a law degree from Harvard, cum laude.  

Not long after graduating, Jack Smith began working as an assistant district attorney in Manhattan, serving in the domestic violence and sex crime departments.  By 1999, he moved to the Department of Justice (DOJ), becoming an assistant attorney in the Eastern District of New York.  There, he handled high-profile cases, including capital murder.  From 2008-10, Jack was an investigation coordinator at the International Criminal Court (The Hague), leading the investigation into the sitting president of Kosovo, Hashim Thaci. He brought charges against several others for war crimes in Kosovo.  

As is the province of most smart, loyal apparatchicks, advancement is accelerated.  Jack was promoted to chief of the DOJ’s Public Integrity Section in 2010.  Considering Attorney General Eric Holder’s activities, like the botched Fast and Furious gun scandal, continual race-baiting, and the seizing of phone records of AP journalists, the word integrity seems like a contradiction in terms.  Smith did not question Holder’s “integrity” in these and other questionable cases and remained in his position until 2015.

Apparently, not caring to stay around Washington in the wake of a Trump victory, Smith lowered himself to take the post of assistant U.S. attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee (2015-17), possibly because he was assured that the top position (U.S. attorney) would be open in 2016 at the resignation of David Rivera.  However, Donald Cochran was confirmed for that job, and Smith left in 2017.  When political advancement seemed uncertain, as per the usual practice, the “private” sector provided ample compensation.  He became vice president and head of litigation for the Hospital Corporation of America and had no record of handling a single case, whether to sue or defend.  Perhaps it was a strictly managerial post.

Jack’s career as a prosecutor was not without controversy.  Under A.G. Eric Holder, he successfully prosecuted former Virginia governor Bob McConnell (R) and his wife a mere week after he left office (with a 55% approval rating).  The Eastern District of Virginia in Richmond produced a guilty verdict for accepting gifts, including jewelry for McConnell’s wife, Maureen.  The conviction was overturned at the Supreme Court in a highly unusual 8-0 decision, costing the former governor about $27 million. 

To illustrate Smith’s independent approach, he also brought charges against former Sen. John Edwards for misuse of campaign funds in concealing his scandalous affair during a time when Edwards’ wife had terminal cancer.  Edwards was an intense rival of Hillary Clinton in the 2010 primary.  But, as luck would have it, a deadlocked jury led to an acquittal, so the Dems didn’t need to hang one of their own; they just ended his political career.

Smith was criticized in and out of legal circles for expansive legal theories, rushed prosecutions, overreach, and political motivation.  In April of 2024, liberal legal journalist Ruth Marcus wrote for the Washington Post, “Smith’s decision to push for a broad immunity ruling (for Biden) has backfired, delaying justice and emboldening delays”.  Perhaps this is why the prosecution of Donald Trump failed.  Of all the cases brought against candidate Trump, this one had the most chance of success.  Smith, not doubt urged by the Biden White House, hurried to present a case before the election.  The classified documents retained at Mar-a-Lago had only Trump’s word, and perhaps one assistant, that he had declassified them orally, which, if true, is an acceptable act of the chief executive.  

Significantly, it was these very delays that pushed the case beyond the election, when presidential immunity was once again in force, making the legal challenge moot, and it was withdrawn by Smith.

Jack Luman Smith is now maneuvering to appear before congressional committees in public testimony in exchange for some immunity, as submitted on October 23 of this year.  He is responding to a subpoena issued by both the House and Senate Judiciary Committees on October 14, 2025, that want to investigate “partisan and politically motivated prosecutions” of President Trump.  The respective committees have not yet scheduled a hearing, pending the review of applicable records from the FBI and DOJ regarding this matter.  His position will no doubt cast further doubt on Trump’s suitability to serve.  Yet, the gathering of evidence may prove to be another disaster for the left, since everything they have thrown at Trump so far has been counterproductive to their cause. 

Like others in the “get Trump” movement, Jack Smith professed to be an “independent”, did not make any religious profession, and majored in political “science” with additional degrees in law.  It must be noted that almost the entire cadre of political “science” professors were and are hard left.  Even at so-called conservative campuses, the social science departments are dominated by socialists in spirit, if not in fact.  This condition has prevailed since the 1930s because the bulk of our citizens turned a blind eye to what seemed like a harmless place for eggheads.  

Unless this situation is addressed, the hard left will be training up generation after generation of copycats.  You will find them in all fields these days, not just in politics, academia, and journalism.  Today, even doctors and nurses will have those who endorse killing what they call a fetus, which we call a baby, and gleefully participate in gender altering surgery and drugs.  Will you take the warning, or stand by and watch the world’s last bastion of liberty become a casualty?          

 *****

Image Credit: YouTube screenshot Washington Examiner

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

What Was Operation Artic Frost And Why Is It Worse Than Watergate thumbnail

What Was Operation Artic Frost And Why Is It Worse Than Watergate

By Neland Nobel

Estimated Reading Time: 4 minutes

Operation Arctic Frost is a recently revealed FBI investigation (uncovered in documents released by the House Judiciary Committee in October 2025) into alleged 2020 election-related activities. The probe, led by Special Counsel Jack Smith, targeted over 160 Republican figures—including lawmakers, state officials, and GOP groups—for potential crimes tied to efforts to challenge or overturn the election results. Key details include:

  • The FBI sought 197 subpoenas, monitored communications of at least eight Republican senators, and collected data on broader Republican networks.
  • It was authorized by Attorney General Merrick Garland and FBI Director Chris Wray, and some documents allege it involved surveillance tactics that critics call “spying.”
  • The investigation fed into Smith’s broader probe into 2020 election interference, though no significant charges against the targeted Republicans have resulted from it so far.

This operation has been dubbed “Biden’s Watergate” by critics, who argue it represents politicized abuse of federal power.

Moreover, it has implications for election integrity.  It is often said that Trump and his allies made unsupported accusations regarding the fairness of the 2020 election.  However, if attempting to get supporting material is considered a crime, how could one ever legitimately challenge an election?

Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) stated: “Based on the evidence to date, Arctic Frost and related weaponization by federal law enforcement under Biden was arguably worse than Watergate.” Similar rhetoric has come from Sens. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Eric Schmitt (R-MO), who call for “Watergate-style hearings.”

Why is Arctic Frost worse than Watergate?  Basically, because rather than an isolated burglary of one Democrat office, it is a wholesale attack on the Republican Party and the conservative ecosphere generally. 

For the politically sensitive, this is far more sinister than mean tweets or even the Capitol Riot, commonly called January 6th.

Rather than an attempt to get dirt on the opposition party, Arctic Frost entails officials and law enforcement agencies being turned directly against domestic political opponents, their funding base, and their think tanks.

Over 400 Republican entities and individuals subpoenaed, including Trump’s campaign, the RNC, Save America PAC, America First Policy Institute, Conservative Partnership Institute, MyPillow (Mike Lindell’s company), and even Alex Jones/Infowars. This builds on earlier reports of 160+ Republicans, like 8-9 GOP senators (e.g., Ted Cruz, Mike Lee), whose communications were monitored.

Unlike Watergate, which was a rogue operation, this was a coordinated attack on conservative organizations and politicians involving over 197 subpoenas for bank records, donor lists, emails, and more; some warrantless surveillance. Rather than Cuban burglars, this monstrous operation was signed off on by AG Merrick Garland and FBI Director Chris Wray.

In Watergate, Nixon’s campaign broke into Democratic headquarters, subsequently attempted to cover it up with obstruction, perjury, and abuse of power (e.g., using the CIA and IRS against enemies). In the end, it led to 48 convictions, including top aides. Everybody, including Republicans, widely condemned it.

A small delegation of Republican congressional leaders visited President Nixon at the White House to deliver a stark reality check amid the Watergate scandal. Led by Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-AZ), the group included Senate Minority Leader Hugh Scott (R-PA) and House Minority Leader John Rhodes (R-AZ). They informed Nixon that, based on their private soundings, he could expect only about 10-15 votes in the Senate to acquit him if impeached and convicted—far short of the two-thirds majority needed to survive. Goldwater, a Nixon ally and the GOP’s 1964 presidential nominee, later described the meeting as one where he bluntly told the president, “There is no way you can avoid impeachment.” This bipartisan pressure (though the delegation was all-Republican, reflecting the GOP’s collapse in support) led to Nixon’s resignation, the first in presidential history.

So far, no Democrat has condemned President Biden’s illegal actions.  Nor are there any trials pending, or convictions obtained.

So, in a sense, Watergate was worse in that it led to the resignation of a President and 48 criminal convictions.

But the political crimes are arguably worse in that Arctic Frost was intended to kneecap the Conservative movement, which included a lot of private people, not political leaders.  Furthermore, we don’t know yet whether Congress and the Department of Justice will go after the Democrats who launched Arctic Frost.  So comparing Watergate to Arctic Frost is a little like comparing a nine-inning baseball game to one still in the bottom of the first inning.

We don’t know whether the upcoming investigations and prosecutions will rival Watergate in that regard.  But in terms of how broad the attack was, and that the operation was not a rogue operation at all, but carried out by the highest officials, it looks far worse as a political crime.

The “top-down” dynamic as a key differentiator—Watergate’s dirty tricks often get boiled down to the “Plumbers” (a rogue-ish White House squad of less than 20 operatives), but Nixon himself orchestrated much of it from the Oval Office, using his authority to loop in CIA, FBI, and IRS brass. That said, Arctic Frost’s chain of command feels more bureaucratically entrenched, greenlit by the entire executive law enforcement apparatus under Biden, which amplifies the institutional threat. It’s less a heist crew gone wild and more like the entirety of state machinery was deliberately set loose on one’s political opponents.

This is chilling for the political process.  Who would want to get involved in politics, or even get involved in policy arguments, if you feel that, routinely, the entire law enforcement and intelligence agencies of the government will be turned against you?  In short, Biden treated domestic political opposition as if he were facing the power of a hostile foreign state.

This takes political party fighting to a dangerous level, one deadly to the functioning of a representative republic.  Cynically, this was all done under the Orwellian goal to “save democracy.”

In terms of precedent, Arctic Frost is thus much more dangerous.  It is one thing for political parties to compete for voters’ attention.  It is quite another thing for one party to seize the police machinery of government, a government that also belongs to Republicans and Independents, to destroy the other political party and supporting private infrastructure.

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

Obama Targets Hungary, Poland With ‘Organizing’ Campaign thumbnail

Obama Targets Hungary, Poland With ‘Organizing’ Campaign

By Mike Gonzalez

Estimated Reading Time: 4 minutes

Editors’ Note: Even as the democratic verdict of the American people was to get less entangled in foreign affairs, 7 private NGOs funded by billionaires continue to intervene directly in other countries’ affairs. Why hold an election when you have NGOs?  To defend “democracy”, of course!

Former President Barack Obama thinks nothing of trying to interfere in the internal politics of democratic U.S. allies in Europe, and in the process, thwarting his country’s own current foreign policy, as determined by his elected successor, President Donald Trump.

All in the name of democracy, of course.

And he can do all this because he has built a very well-endowed foundation into which billionaires pour funds and which he uses to train future leaders to transform the world along Obama’s vision—pretty much the way he promised to transform the United States, and some say, sadly, he did.

The 44th president justifies all this because he describes his opponents as “authoritarian”—something he may really believe—and he poses himself as the redeemer. The savior role is one Obama played with gusto on the world’s largest stage for eight years, so we shouldn’t be surprised.

Still, stepping back and considering the cheek—he would call it “audacity”—takes one’s breath away.

Two U.S. allies Obama is currently picking on are Hungary and Poland, which have pro-American populations with living memories of America’s unstinting support during the hard decades of Soviet despotism. More importantly—or worse yet, when it comes to Obama—these nations by and large eschew race and sexual theories, climate alarmism, mass immigration, and anti-Israeli fanaticism.

Hungary has been led by Prime Minister Viktor Orban since 2010, and Poland just elected Karol Nawrocki as president. Both are conservative figures who support the U.S. government.

The platform Obama uses is his Obama Foundation, a Chicago-based nonprofit organization that has assets of nearly $1 billion, and in 2024 raised nearly $200 million. It’s like the U.S. Agency for International Development never went away.

Since its creation in 2018, the foundation has run several programs, including the Obama Foundation Scholars, which handpicks about 30 possible leaders from around the world every year and puts them through some sort of Obama boot camp for an academic year.

Then it unleashes them back into their countries for a lifetime of service to the Obama cause.

The training includes classes at Columbia University and workshops in Chicago “to build community, participate in skill-building workshops, and engage with local organizations advancing place-based change.” The scholars work on leadership skills, are indoctrinated by the foundation, develop “action plans,” and learn to network with alumni and other Obamaworld luminaries.

They also get an executive coach and are trained in strategic communications and fundraising, “to aid scholars in their action plan development.”

In 2022, the foundation received a strong bump in revenue from $159,322,544 to $308,860,345. The primary reason for this sudden increase in funding was a generous gift of $100 million from Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky to fund a new scholarship program.

The Voyage Scholarship created a two-year leadership program. It allows college students to receive up to $50,000 in financial aid for college, a $10,000 travel stipend, and $2,000 every year for 10 years (after college) to travel around the world.

In 2021, Jeff Bezos donated around $100 million. This donation was intended to build the foundation’s new complex in Chicago.

This is how you build a global cadre. And Obama isn’t shy about putting his special corps to work, as seen in a highly produced video the foundation just put out.

In it, we see him meeting in London with three members of the Obama Foundation’s alumni network—Sandor Lederer and Stefania Kapronczay from Hungary, and Zuzanna Rudzinska-Bluszcz, who was deputy justice minister in Poland from December 2023 to August of this year—for a chat on how to do neighborhood organizing, just on a global level. CNN says the meeting was last month.

The reason he picked those countries? They’re “on the leading edge of confronting autocracy,” he tells us. “I’ve become increasingly concerned about the rising wave of authoritarianism sweeping the globe.”

He greets his guests, saying, “All three of you have been fighting the good fight and rising up in the face of significant challenges to try to strengthen democracy. You’re setting an example for all of us in the United States, here in the U.K.”

Kapronczay, a “human rights defender” in Hungary, avers that “authoritarians came to power” because “democracy was not working.” Electorates, you see, vote in leaders like Trump, Nawrocki, and Orban, because “people are really, in general, disappointed in democracy.”

Obama kind of agrees. The liberal, democratic market-based order that dominated the West after World War II ran aground because the governments, “whether center right or center left, were losing touch with people and weren’t delivering on some of the basic hopes and dreams of people.” That’s actually true, but then comes Obama’s spin—“that obviously then opens the door for right-wing populism, anti-government sentiment, anger, grievances.”

The responses he heard must have pleased the old community organizer from Chicago: Hungarians and Poles on the Left need to start working the grassroots at the local level, where they can “nurture a new generation of decision-makers,” according to Lederer.

Kapronczay agrees: “Democracy is very much about this local level,” about “these micro-skills of cooperation, of reaching across the divide. … This is where we should really focus our attention. Participatory programs. Participatory budgets.”

Obama asked what more his foundation could do. But Orban is locked in a tight fight with a new opposition leader for elections in April. What are the chances this U.S. ally will not appreciate interference at this level from a former president?

*****

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

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

Virtue Economics thumbnail

Virtue Economics

By Nathan Smith

Estimated Reading Time: 10 minutes

Editors’ Note:  This is truly a thoughtful essay, worth your time.  While the author’s focus is on economics, it is equally valid in the political realm, which is hard to separate from economics anyway. We are convinced that from both the Left and the libertarian right, there is an imbalance between “rights” talk and “responsibility” talk. If you think about it, you don’t have a right to be honest; you have a moral responsibility to be honest.  You don’t have the right to be truthful; you have a moral responsibility to be truthful.  Can these virtues be taught in the absence of religion?  Perhaps, but the older we get, the more doubtful we are of the proposition.  People don’t spend much time thinking about constructing their own moral order, and have to be taught virtues at a young age.  And for those that do spend the time, self-construction morality usually boils down to what is good for “me”. Yet being honest must be something more than just being a matter of personal opinion. Otherwise, rejecting that virtue is easy in the absence of a higher order, a Bible-based morality. If you don’t think such simple violations of rules cannot destroy a society, look at the welfare fraud that is bankrupting the nation, the drug stores that must lock up everything behind glass cases, the massive crime coming from single-parent households, and people simply not showing up for obligations, ghosting customers and employers.  Quite alarming is that polls show about a quarter of Democrat college students are OK with killing their political opponents. It is clear that not all ethical systems are equal, and some lend themselves more to wealth production and social harmony than others.  We have people today saying they are “marginalized” and not successful, and they blame race, gender, sexual orientation, and just about everything…except their failure to behave virtuously. And, we have quite a few trashing our Western values and embracing the moral and economic chaos of those from poor and undemocratic systems, based on the idea of cultural relativism. The quote widely attributed to John Adams is: “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other”. We need to remember his words.

Economists have an old habit of assuming that people are strictly selfish and rational, maximizing their “utility.” In theory, everyone is “Max U,” as Deirdre McCloskey mockingly puts it. The assumption can be useful—people often do act selfishly, and belief in market efficiency sometimes clarifies moral choices—but it is false as a generalization. Virtue and capitalism need each other, and have long quietly collaborated to improve the human condition.

That truth is kept quiet, ironically, by economists themselves. They understand capitalism better than most, and generally defend it, but Max U is a moral blind spot that causes them to underrate capitalism ethically, and teach others to do so. With friends like these, capitalism hardly needs enemies.

In The Bourgeois Virtues (2006) and its sequels, McCloskey uncovers this virtue-capitalism nexus, and champions a richer economics grounded in the classical tradition of the seven virtues. Since the book consists in a quixotic quest to overthrow Max U and refound economics on virtual ethical foundations, it would have had to catalyze a sweeping reset of the discipline from the ground up to really succeed. Too many reputations are invested in the old orthodoxy, and Max U still rules. Yet McCloskey’s project remains vital. Capitalism will never be understood—or valued properly—while seen through the lens of assumed amorality. That misunderstanding is especially dangerous today, as the woke left and populist right feed each other’s doubts about the liberal order that undergirds modern freedom and prosperity.

McCloskey’s “virtue economics” (so to speak) also offends modern pieties by implying that some people, classes, and nations are poor partly because of a deficiency of virtue. Her argument that Western capitalists deserved their wealth because of their bourgeois virtues is a thumb in the eye to Marxists; Charles Murray’s similar thesis in Coming Apart (2012) also gave offense. If the seed of virtue economics ever takes root, it will grow up fighting.

Why Capitalism Needs Virtue

A simple parable can serve as proof of concept for why capitalism needs virtue.

Suppose a man wants a job as a cashier—the only work available. But he is dishonest. He’ll steal if he can get away with it. He is not a compulsive thief, only Max U: rationally self-interested. If he’ll be caught, he won’t steal; if not, he will.

Hiring managers see through him. They could monitor him constantly, but surveillance is costly. It’s more profitable not to hire him at all. Now suppose the man could truly change—coming to love honesty and hate theft. The same managers perceive it and give him the job. Virtue pays.

The story shows the limits of economists’ habit of treating preferences as the standard of value. Some preferences are simply better than others. Even by his former lights, the dishonest man should wish to become honest: the change makes him employable and happier.

Economists steeped in Max U may resist the idea that people can change their utility functions. They treat conduct as a function of incentives. Virtue ethicists know better. Conduct also flows from character, and virtue is habit-forming: act justly long enough, and you come to love justice.

The Bourgeois Virtues scales this lesson to society. McCloskey—at once a Chicago School economist and a humanist polymath—argues that capitalism depends everywhere on the virtues. Real markets are shot through with principal-agent problems that Max U theory cannot solve but ordinary virtue routinely does. Trust, self-command, and good faith keep commerce running where formal incentives fail.

Getting the List of Virtues Right

Which virtues matter, though? What’s fundamental? If our cashier needed a moral quality to be trusted, what is it, and how does it generalize? 

The dishonest cashier might be cured by justice, or by love toward his employer. Another man might need prudence or temperance to succeed—but these are virtues Max U already possesses, though economists often mistake them for automatic traits rather than acquired ones. Courage keeps the other virtues steady when things grow difficult; faith steadies a person and keeps them true to their convictions and identity through fluctuating moods and situations; and hope transforms mere toil into labor for a goal.

Courage, justice, prudence, and temperance (the classical “cardinal virtues”) and faith, hope, and love (the Christian “theological virtues”) represent a kind of “periodic table” of moral goodness, the qualities needed both for effectiveness and for expanding human happiness and giving life meaning. Other terms of moral praise, if valid, are synonyms, applications, or combinations. To infuse one’s life with these virtues is the higher self-interest that makes oneself interesting, one’s life story worth telling.

Not stealing is pretty basic, but at a higher level, capitalism is full of use cases of virtue like:

  • Mentoring an employee who’s likely to move on (hope and love);
  • Fulfilling the exact terms of a contract with a party not likely to sue or provide repeat business (justice and faith);
  • Maintaining an orderly, respectable “bourgeois” lifestyle and settling for slow, long-term success (temperance, prudence, and hope);
  • Tipping for good service in a restaurant you’ll never come back to (love and justice);
  • Maintaining excellence in an indispensable but underappreciated specialist role, instead of getting into a turf war for a more prestigious and upwardly mobile function (temperance, justice, and love);
  • Launching a business or trying to invent a new technology (prudence, courage, and hope);
  • Persisting in a job search despite a hundred rejections (hope);
  • Writing a reference for a colleague who’s not likely to have an opportunity to return the favor (love);
  • Guarding product quality when customers would take a long time to notice a quiet downgrade (faith); and
  • Making executive decisions in shareholders’ interests when they’re not looking and couldn’t understand the stakes (justice).

In Managerial Dilemmas: The Political Economy of Hierarchy (1993), Gary J. Miller channeled a lot of economics literature to laboriously prove that it’s impossible to design a firm in which employees’ self-interest is aligned with the firm’s profit maximization. Actual firms run on morale and solidarity. Virtue makes capitalism thrive, and makes people thrive in capitalism.

Such things were better understood when the premodern tradition of the virtues was in health, but unfortunately, as Alasdair MacIntyre discerned in After Virtue (1984), that tradition was largely lost when the Enlightenment, having lost faith in an older, Christian-infused metaphysics during the wars of religion, tried to rebuild moral philosophy on mechanistic rationality. Since that failure, there have been many attempts to fill the virtue-sized hole in the intelligentsia’s understanding of human nature. Much of The Bourgeois Virtues aims to retrieve and refine scattered modern attempts to rebuild moral philosophy, reintegrating them with the classical tradition. 

A sweeping rhetorical revaluation of commerce in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, especially in England and Holland, changed people’s motives and priorities and set the stage for modern economic growth.

Two such efforts since McCloskey’s work deserve brief notice. Jonathan Haidt’s “moral foundations theory” (The Righteous Mind, 2012) lists care, fairness, loyalty, authority, and sanctity; Charles Murray’s Coming Apart highlights marriage, industriousness, honesty, and religiosity. Both schemes are helpful in navigating survey and demographic data, but are rough substitutes for the classical seven virtues. They are like octagonal wheels—serviceable but clumsy compared with the original circle. When a society has forgotten the wheel, archeology is more useful than tinkering.

It’s not just amnesia that makes people forget the seven classical virtues and invent weaker substitutes. Social scientists struggle with ethics because they inherit the fallacy that one “can’t derive an ought from an is,” often traced to Hume, even though MacIntyre refuted it by showing the teleology inherent in language and reason. But the habit of trying to enforce sharp fact/value distinctions runs deep. The very name “social sciences” expresses an attempt to cross-apply, from the natural sciences, a paradigm of post-teleological, mechanistic objectivity to the study of human society. Max U appeals because it’s as simple as gravity, but that’s not what people are actually like.

A physicist learns externally, detaching his feelings and biases. But economists and sociologists cannot and should not do that. Since we are human, our introspection and conscience are crucial evidence about what humans are like. To ignore them in imitation of the natural sciences makes us duller, not wiser. Tradition, meanwhile, is in part humanity’s harvest of introspection, lessons learned from the moral experiments of generations. By learning from tradition through sympathy and imagination—not only data—we broaden our minds beyond what reason or personal introspection can achieve.

MacIntyre and McCloskey show how to redeem the social sciences through erudite moral realism and respect for tradition and the past. And part of that project is learning to think in terms of the old seven virtues.

The Christian and Chivalric Roots of Western Virtue

McCloskey’s ambition reaches beyond the constitution of present capitalism to illuminate its historic backstory, and is extended through two sequels to The Bourgeois Virtues, of which one, Bourgeois Dignity (2010), has the subtitle, “Why Economics Can’t Explain the Modern World.”

By “the modern world,” she means the “Great Enrichment,” the dramatic and sustained rise in living standards beginning in the early nineteenth century. And the subtitle really means “why Max U economics can’t explain the modern world, but virtue economics can.” She illustrates how a sweeping rhetorical revaluation of commerce in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, especially in England and Holland, changed people’s motives and priorities and set the stage for modern economic growth. But this story should be braided together with others to enrich the picture.

McCloskey pushes back, rightly though too strongly, on “institutional” stories that credit the origins of modern economic growth to changes in modern society mainly intended to secure property rights, rule of law, and representative government. These are overrated, but they still have some merit. There was more rule of law and respect for individual and property rights in eighteenth‑century England and Holland than in most societies through most of history. It’s true that institutions aren’t the whole story, partly because they rest on moral and cultural foundations. But McCloskey argues mainly from timing that institutions couldn’t have been decisive, noting that many Western institutional advantages predated modern growth by centuries. And that misses a key point, because the timing actually doesn’t need to match closely.

Think of modern economic growth like an airplane taking off. The West accelerated down a runway of commercial, technological, and educational progress for centuries before it gained enough momentum to escape Malthusian gravity. Then at last poverty retreated—but there may have been no sharp discontinuity at the moment of takeoff. The West was far ahead of other societies in most fields of endeavor, from warfare to navigation to astronomy to linguistics to law, and more fundamentally in its moral, political, and scientific understandings, long before GDP per capita began its sustained rise.

We remain willfully blind to the moral foundations of prosperity because we hesitate to admit that virtue often produces wealth, and vice, poverty.

Once we’re past tripping over the timing issue, another key factor, revealed by the astute Joseph Henrich as the central argument in his magisterial book The WEIRDest People in the World (2020), comes into focus. Westerners, he shows, became psychologically distinct because the Catholic Church’s “marriage and family program” (MFP) dismantled the kinship-based societies that dominated most of history. Kin groups had ensured property transmission through clear lineage and practices such as cousin or levirate marriage and polygamy. From the early Middle Ages, Christian churches—especially the Roman Catholic—suppressed these customs, partly for bequests but also from conviction, breaking up clan systems and fostering more individualist societies that value fairness over loyalty and guilt over shame. It drove a profound psychological shift that still distinguishes Westerners dramatically in survey research and behavioral studies. It is a key factor in Western success and the difficulty of exporting it.

Henrich, unlike McCloskey, adopts the nonjudgmental tone of the social sciences and avoids moral language, even when describing tendencies to lie or cheat. Yet his work is really a story of how Christianity nurtured virtue. It dovetails with McCloskey’s account, though with different timing and causes. Rodney Stark’s The Victory of Reason (2005) and Tom Holland’s Dominion (2019) trace other ways Christianity advanced virtue, but the MFP remains central. Katy Faust’s Them Before Us (2021) is a recent statement, lucid and activist, of the well-established truth that the stable two‑parent family long upheld by the Church is still the best setting for children’s flourishing and the transmission of virtue.

Finally, Gregory Clark, in A Farewell to Alms (2007), examines inheritance data showing that the better-off in medieval England had more children. From this, he infers a hereditary—genetic or cultural—advantage that shaped the British character by the Industrial Revolution. McCloskey, favoring the bourgeoisie, resists this view because it credits knights more than merchants. Yet modern liberal institutions—Magna Carta and Parliament—were indeed born from knightly revolts against royal tyranny. The bourgeois virtues, then, may partly descend from chivalry, as the evolution of the word “gentleman” suggests.

Virtue Economics vs. the Myth of Equality

If mechanistic objectivity and science envy are one source of resistance to virtue economics, another is modern thought’s obsession with equality. It resists any suggestion that wealth or poverty might reflect differences in virtue, often resorting to moral outrage or conspiracy thinking when the argument gets difficult. Democratic and communist ideals have long glorified the poor at the expense of the rich, while fascism and populism twist the same theme for their own ends. We remain willfully blind to the moral foundations of prosperity because we hesitate to admit that virtue often produces wealth, and vice, poverty. 

Instead, the deserving rich, classes and nations alike, should remember that much virtue is inherited: you do well by doing good because that’s what you were taught. Practice noblesse oblige towards others who were not so fortunate.

Virtue economics is an uphill battle, but it’s worth the fight. It warns against killing the goose—virtue—that lays the golden eggs. Virtue must be maintained through families, churches, and honorable institutions. And while the quiet collaboration of virtue and capitalism has done much to better the human condition, it could do much more if we were more intentional about making virtue and capitalism work together. Although noblesse oblige endures—billions flow each year from the wealthy who want to give back—the modern bias is not to trust it, but instead, to stand up government bureaucracies to do what noblesse oblige could do better. A brighter future awaits if we let virtue economics unlock it.

*****

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

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

House Judiciary Says FBI’s ‘Arctic Frost’ Probe Potentially Targeted Over 150 Republicans thumbnail

House Judiciary Says FBI’s ‘Arctic Frost’ Probe Potentially Targeted Over 150 Republicans

By Ashley Brasfield

Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes

Editors’ Note: Heretofore, some “establishment” Republicans either turned a blind eye or quietly chuckled as their MAGA brothers and sisters fell under the scrutiny of Federal intelligence and police agencies. Apparently not caring much about the woeful precedent being set, they may have seen Democrats as allies in keeping the Republican Party from becoming totally MAGA.  But these recent revelations are hopefully a wake-up call for all concerned.  It appears that Biden unleashed his police forces in a comprehensive intelligence gathering effort that makes Watergate (a single break-in into a Democrat office) look like child’s play.  It was a wholesale attack on the Republican Party, its official and elected members, and set a precedent that could easily be reversed one day to encompass Democrats. We can’t have one political party hijacking the police and intelligence agencies of the state for a war against their political opponents.  Former officials involved in this should be dealt with in the harshest terms allowable by applicable law. 

The House Judiciary Committee said Tuesday that the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) “Arctic Frost” probe potentially targeted more than 150 Republican officials and allies.

Newly released documents reveal the Biden-era Department of Justice (DOJ) and FBI ran an investigation into Trump allies, according to the committee. Nearly 200 pages of records provide insight into the sweeping probe. The move reportedly started under FBI Director Chris Wray and later continued by Special Counsel Jack Smith under Attorney General Merrick Garland.

The committee, led by Republican Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan, alleged that “45 individuals,” including former Trump White House adviser Steve Bannon, Republican Pennsylvania Rep. Scott Perry, former Republican North Carolina Rep. Mark Meadows, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, former Trump DOJ official Jeffrey Clark and former Trump attorney John Eastman “were potentially under investigation.” (RELATED: Jack Smith And Allies Are Making New Moves As Republicans Mount Pressure)

FBI emails from May 2022 reveal a redacted Washington Field Office official thanking multiple regional offices for their help with Arctic Frost interviews while another official said “everything” connected to the probe “is restricted” within FBI systems, according to the documents reviewed by Just the News.

Another email reportedly detailed the Arctic Frost team requesting about $16,600 from the DOJ Public Corruption Unit for June travel to carry out over 40 interviews, serve subpoenas and conduct multiple device search warrants. These targeted numerous GOP-linked officials across Arizona, Virginia, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and New Mexico, according to the documents.

The GOP-led committee claimed that “[a]nother 111 individuals,” including White House Deputy Chief of Staff Dan Scavino, senior adviser for trade and manufacturing Peter Navarro, current DOJ weaponization czar Ed Martin and former DOJ official Jeff Rosen “were also potentially under investigation.”

The documents revealed internal threat tags the FBI employed for this investigation, including “FRAUD CORRUPT”, “CORRUPT”, “PCORRUPT”, and “PCORRUPT_CAMP,” Just the News reported. They also reportedly featured the FBI’s “predication” for how they targeted multiple people. (RELATED: Jack Smith Called To Testify Before House Judiciary Committee)

A September 2022 document called “Subpoena_Counsel_Matrix” included the names of dozens of activists connected to the GOP, public officials, alleged electors and government workers allegedly tied to events around the 2020 election, the outlet reported.

Evidence released by the Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley appears to indicate that Wray, Garland and then-Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco approved the launch of the Arctic Frost investigation into Trump’s actions surrounding the Capitol riot.

Emails also reveal coordination between the Biden White House Counsel’s Office and an anti-Trump FBI agent to obtain phones belonging to Trump and former Vice President Mike Pence, according to a Senate Judiciary Committee press release. (RELATED: ‘Grossly Misrepresented’: Disgraced Ex-FBI Leader Andrew McCabe Appears To Defend Targeting GOP Senators)

Arctic Frost targeted numerous GOP officials and organizations, according to a committee press release in September. FBI Deputy Director recently Dan Bongino alleged that Smith monitored the phone records of multiple GOP lawmakers, including Sens. Josh Hawley of Missouri and Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee.

*****

This article was published by The Daily Caller News Foundation and is reproduced with permission.

Image Credit: YouTube Screenshot Reuters

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

If Sinatra Were Alive Today…. thumbnail

If Sinatra Were Alive Today….

By The Editors

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

We Are Not Fooled by You, Hamas thumbnail

We Are Not Fooled by You, Hamas

By Nils A. Haug

Estimated Reading Time: 6 minutes

On October 13, 2025, at Israel’s Knesset (Parliament) in Jerusalem, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in the company of US President Donald J. Trump, declared the war in Gaza over.

Oh, really? Sadly, the probability of an enduring peace with Hamas or allied Islamists appears close to zero. After all, in Netanyahu’s words, Israel is dealing with “monsters.”

Mosab Hassan Yousef, the eldest son of Hamas founder Sheikh Hassan Yousef, revealed the rationale behind the horrendous events in Israel on October 7, 2023: “Hamas is not just at war with Israel. It is at war with Jews, Christians and the very foundations of civilization itself.”

Western leaders, including the ever-optimistic Trump, nevertheless believe that some sort of permanent peace can now be achieved with Hamas over Gaza. There never will be, nor ever can be, an enduring peace with radical Islamists to whom the elimination of Israel is more important than “peace and prosperity,” which many of the Gulf states now enjoy anyway. To many Islamist leaders, MIGA (“Make Islam Great Again”) and spreading it throughout the world is their pact with Allah; without it, they would have no justification to lead. Their ideology, training, indoctrination and upbringing –- so divergent from that of the West — simply does not allow it.

“This is not politics,” Mosab Hassan Yousef states, “this is a religious war. Its purpose is to replace Judaism and Christianity with radical Islam. If the world does not understand this, everyone will pay the price.”

Notwithstanding peace treaties or a tenuous cessation of hostilities between Israel and its neighbors, much of the Islamic world remains at war with the West, especially with many dedicated activists, such as Qatar, Turkey, and the Palestinian Authority in its midst.

Their leaders, perhaps not wishing to get into a scrape with Trump, as well as seeing the delicious prospect of being in charge of the future Gaza chicken coop — refuse to acknowledge this reality.

Many leaders in the West also would possibly prefer not to admit the risk, even though their societies are precipitously at risk of being overwhelmed by the mass immigration of Muslims — who boldly practice a competing faith founded on displacing all other faiths. Western leaders appear to wish to placate the Islamist voters in their midst, despite the harm being inflicted on their citizens — with more expected in the offing. The perturbing fact is that, according to the CIA, the top fifteen of the world’s largest terror organizations are all radical Islamist to their core.

Given the chance, Islamists have been instructed to achieve global dominance and the imposition of an Islamic Caliphate under totalitarian Sharia law. This plan has been evident many times in the West, from the attacks on the US of 9/11/2001 to similarly-motivated attacks since then in France, Spain, Germany (here and here), Sweden and Denmark, to name just a few nations, and most recently in Hamas’s 2023 slaughter of more than 1,200 innocents of all ages, in Israel. Even so, many Marxist-anarchist activists in the privileged West — apparently affronted that Jews had survived and Israel had the audacity to successfully defend itself — rose up in support of the terrorists.

Israel’s caution towards the ceasefire with Hamas and associates was validated in the past few days when, upon partial withdrawal of Israel’s forces, Hamas immediately commenced a campaign of retribution in Gaza against rivals and anyone who they believed opposed their rule. Dozens of members of local clans – fellow Palestinians – were executed extrajudicially or killed in planned attacks. “The terrorists’ brazen post-ceasefire crackdown on rivals and dissidents,” commented journalist Jonathan Tobin, “mocks Trump’s promise to disarm them and shows they believe that they’re not going anywhere.”

In attacking domestic opponents, Hamas’s aim is evidently to reassert control of Gaza and this agenda reveals not only their determination not to surrender their weapons, despite commitments to do so, and instead to maintain their dominance.

With the release of some 2,000 terrorists from Israel’s prisons as part of the Trump peace plan, Hamas’s forces received a timely reinforcement of their depleted ranks from this event, “None are expected to take up careers in high tech or humanitarian relief,” writes Professor Thane Rosenbaum. “Terrorism is their chosen profession. Jihad their destiny. Martyrdom, a sacred calling.”

The publication of hand-written memorandum by the late Hamas leader, Yehya Sinwar, in preparation for the October 7, 2023 invasion of Israel, exposed the mindset of Hamas. The instructions, in the “Name of Allah the Most Merciful,” include acts such as “trampling on the heads of soldiers and shooting them at point-blank range, slaughtering some with knives, blowing up tanks, and capturing prisoners kneeling with their hands on their heads.” Their commanders were told to “deliberately create these events, film them, and broadcast the images as quickly as possible.”

Analyst Martin Kear writes that “the peace plan negotiated by US President Donald Trump looks shakier by the day.” He elaborates, “Hamas will not go quietly. And this is a very real danger to peace and security in Gaza, especially if Hamas sees any resistance to its authority from the clans as little more than a proxy war with Israel.” Given the fruitless history of peace accords involving Palestinians, the conflict could well muddle on endlessly.

While Israel may have substantially defeated Hamas militarily in the Gaza campaign, it can fittingly be said, as by columnist Dan Schnur, that “Hamas won its war against Israel in the eyes of the rest of the world”. Any success of the anti-Israel and anti-Semitic mass media can be attributed to their lies about Israel and Jews (such as here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

The consequence of Islamist propaganda is that Western leaders have been captured by those same lies. Only last month, France, the UK, Canada, and other countries recognized a non-existent “Palestinian state” at the United Nations General Assembly, in a motion adopted by a majority of UN member states. With an impressive dose of dissemblance, the UK claimed to have played an important part in Trump’s ceasefire deal with Hamas. US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee quickly called that claim “delusional.”

What was impressive was to see international leaders falling all over themselves to get onto a stage at Sharm el-Sheikh in Egypt with Trump to celebrate the ceasefire. Revealingly, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was not even invited.

Ironically, with the Gazan war halted, it would be expected that pro-Palestinian activists would be satisfied. Not so.

Most likely, their protests were never about peace with the Palestinians, only about eliminating Israel — and probably Jews.

While Israel compromised its position wherever possible to appease the Western powers, particularly the US, it does hold firm to certain “red lines” where its national security is concerned, and rightly so. Israel’s steadfastness to national interest is what feeble and hapless Western leaders like France’s Macron, Britain’s Starmer, Canada’s Carney, and their weak circles pretend they do not understand.

The escalating social and political turmoil in nations such as France, Britain, Australia, Spain, Italy and Canada can be directly attributed to domestic Islamist agitation, Muslim demographic explosion, and the spread of religious Islam throughout the infrastructure – which most leaders would rather appease than confront. With mosques being built at a rapid rate, complete with public calls to prayer over loudspeakers, and special Sharia courts, councils and schools, Islam has come to significantly dominate the landscape in the major cities of western Europe. In the UK and France, for instance, certain street scenes are reminiscent of the Muslim cities from where immigrants originated.

Describing a briefing given last year by Ruth Wasserman Lande, former Deputy Ambassador of Israel to Egypt, the website EU Today writes:

“Despite the existence of over 500 mosques in the city, an increasing number of Muslims now choose to pray in public areas such as Whitehall, Parliament Square, alongside Buckingham Palace, Kensington Gardens, and Hyde Park….

“‘It’s not just about prayer,’ Lande explained, ‘it’s a territorial statement. They are asserting their presence and influence in key public spaces.’”

In this way, Islamists demonstrate their authority over public spaces and society itself. And the West’s leaders blindly, if not recklessly, sell out their nations’ cultures, religious ethos, and futures.

The radical Islamic agenda since the 7th century seems to be to eradicate all “infidels”, first by killing all the Jews, and so take over the world for Allah.

After all, taqiyya (mandated dissimulation in the service of Islam) is part of the jihadist strategy in concealing their aim of global domination under Sharia law. In Rosenbaum’s words, “Hamas is not going away easily, even if some leave. The Muslim Brotherhood’s lasting influence over the hearts and minds of Gazan society is ironclad.”

The same may well be true for the generous leaders of the sovereign wealth fund states in the Middle East, who Trump seems to be counting on to rebuild Gaza.

Last week, when a ceasefire was announced to the world, Gazans took to the streets and chanted “Khaybar, Khaybar, ya yahud!”, referencing the Islamic prophet Mohammed’s massacre of Jews in Arabia in the year 628.

Or maybe Trump can actually pull it off. The time to worry about is after he is no longer president, supervising his dream of Gaza as a Riviera at peace with Israel. What if the prevailing Middle East ideology of eliminating Israel has not changed?

*****

This article was published by the Gatestone Institute and is reproduced with permission.

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

Featured Video: Another Attack On The Second Amendment That Needs Attention thumbnail

Featured Video: Another Attack On The Second Amendment That Needs Attention

By Neland Nobel

Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes

The following video by Matt Walsh commands your attention.  A new attack on the Second Amendment seems to be unfolding, this time with the “cooperation” of a foreign corporation.

Glock pistols are perhaps the most popular self-defense pistols on the market today.  While we personally prefer other designs, they are widely used by police forces and private citizens.  They are reliable, accurate, and reasonably priced.

As Matt Walsh notes, several progressive jurisdictions, such as Chicago and Minneapolis, and states like Maryland, have filed lawsuits against Glock because aftermarket “switches” can be installed to allow Glock pistols to fire fully auto.  Full auto means one trigger pull can empty the gun that may hold, depending on the model, up to 20 rounds of 9mm ammunition.

Using recent cases of criminals spraying each other with lead in gang-related shootings is the excuse they use.

The installation of these switches to modify a semi-automatic trigger mechanism is illegal.  Their use by criminals is unlawful.  Yet somehow, progressives blame the company.  The reason:  it is just another tool in the progressive tool bag to limit the ability of citizens to own firearms and protect themselves.  Their goal has always been to disarm the US citizen so that we can be like England or Canada.

What other brands can perhaps be modified?

Why should Glock be blamed because a career criminal was let out early, and illegally tampered with Glock trigger designs to alter the weapon?  Because in the US, the legal process is the punishment.  Liberal lawyers working for government entities can launch a fusilade of lawsuits that can exhaust a private company in court.  Management then decides to cave in or incur the expense of endless court battles.  We get it.  But caving in encourages those who want to interfere with the exercise of Second Amendment rights.

An essential part of the Conservative agenda was tort reform.  We don’t hear much about that today, and maybe we should.

Moreover, there has been a tendency for foreign corporations to own US firearms brands, and those foreigners may not have the reverence for the Second Amendment that a US citizen might have.  Would these foreign companies, which own household brands like Colt, Dan Wesson, Taurus, Rock Island, Remington, and Browning, be more compliant with liberal demands?

Glock is a private company domiciled in Austria. Founded in 1963 by Gaston Glock, the company remained in his control until his recent death in 2023.  Control then went to his widow, Kathrin.  Glock himself had supported conservative political causes in Austria.  His widow’s politics are largely unknown, aside from her being a strong supporter of animal rights.

Likely, the company did not decide to cancel all its previous models and launch new ones to make a political statement.  They wanted to make it more difficult for criminals to modify their product, hoping it would protect them from frivolous litigation. But there is no guarantee that criminal innovation might ruin their plan. 

But their capitulation creates a precedent, and that is worrisome.  Their calculus shows Democrats can bully major companies.

We would prefer to see companies fight for our rights rather than comply with ridiculous lawsuits, but we sympathize with the calculus.  While Glock will still be making a complete line of newly designed firearms, they demonstrated that lawsuits can threaten whole product lines. These lawsuits were without merit, and they proved to Democrats that false claims and court battles could shape the industry.

Besides fighting both the political and legal battles to stop Democrats from harassing companies that make guns and ammunition, what more can we do?  Support the Second Amendment Foundation, Gun Owners of America, and the NRA, and don’t vote for Democrats at any level of government.

As painful as it might be, perhaps not buying Glocks will be necessary.  How else can we send the message that management that caves to liberal demands will be punished?  We instead send the message that we will even pay higher prices if necessary to help companies defend themselves—and us—in court.  If you don’t protect our rights, we will buy from someone else.

In this case, there are plenty of fine polymer striker-fired pistols made by competing firms to choose from.  In fact, the new Ruger RXM—a Glock-like pistol that combines the talents of both Ruger and Magpul—is getting rave reviews.  It is made in Prescott, Arizona.

Gun owners have to be active in politics and must be generous in their contributions to organizations that fight the legal battles to preserve our Constitutional rights.  We also expect the companies we support with our consumer dollars to fight with us.

We don’t want to punish Glock, but don’t we have to send a message that, when it comes to our Constitutional rights, we prefer companies that fight rather than those that settle?

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

Modern Conservatism: The Philosophical Warrior-Scholar — Wisdom, Analysis, and the Modernity of Leadership Reflecting Ancient Truths thumbnail

Modern Conservatism: The Philosophical Warrior-Scholar — Wisdom, Analysis, and the Modernity of Leadership Reflecting Ancient Truths

By Judd Dunning

Estimated Reading Time: 6 minutes

Conservatism at its highest form has never been a matter of nostalgia. It is philosophy in motion—reason disciplined by gratitude, freedom guarded by order, and faith translated into civic strength.  The conservative is not a man clutching the past; he is the custodian of the permanent things, those “enduring norms of human existence” that Russell Kirk called the backbone of civilization.  To conserve, properly understood, is to remember that truth is not invented but inherited.

Marcus Aurelius begins the modern mind’s schooling in discipline: “You have power over your mind—not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.”  From that Stoic axiom flows every idea of ordered liberty.  The self-governed citizen precedes the self-governed state.  Aristotle refined the same law: “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.”  Virtue is not opinion but muscle memory.  The West’s political architecture—its parliaments, courts, and constitutions—was built to make those private habits public.

Edmund Burke warned that “society is a contract… between those who are living, those who are dead, and those who are to be born.”  He understood that liberty without lineage becomes license.  James Madison echoed him in The Federalist Papers: “If men were angels, no government would be necessary.”  The architecture of checks and balances was not cynicism but realism about the crooked timber of mankind.  Real conservatism accepts this anthropology: man is fallen but improvable, dangerous yet dignified.  Law and virtue must co-govern him.

Faith, the second column, anchors the first.  C. S. Lewis described pride as “the complete anti-God state of mind.”  Chesterton called tradition “giving votes to our ancestors.”  Their point was identical: humility is the precondition of freedom.  When a civilization forgets transcendence, it confuses appetite for rights.  Proverbs says, “Better a patient man than a warrior, one with self-control than one who takes a city.”  A republic cannot survive on temper tantrums; it survives on temperance.

The American Founding Fathers understood this symmetry.  Alexander Hamilton wrote that “energy in the executive is a leading character in the definition of good government,” but he coupled energy with accountability.  Power without virtue is chaos; virtue without power is futility.  The mature leader—ancient or modern—must carry both: strength guided by conscience, will moderated by law.  Burke’s “men of intemperate minds” can neither rule nor be ruled.

Viktor Frankl, forged in the furnaces of the twentieth century, gave the metaphysical corollary: “Those who have a ‘why’ to live can bear almost any ‘how.’”  Meaning, not comfort, is man’s first need.  When politics degenerates into therapy, citizens become clients rather than creators.  Frankl’s warning is everywhere around us: a society that loses purpose breeds grievance as its new religion.

F. A. Hayek saw the same rot in economics.  “The more the state ‘plans,’ the more difficult planning becomes for the individual.”  Freedom requires uncertainty; command economies destroy both wealth and will.  Michael Novak corrected the caricature of capitalism by calling it a “moral, cultural, and political system.”  Markets are moral when they reward work, risk, and service.  Ayn Rand’s fierce individualism—“A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others”—reminds us that production is not greed but gratitude in motion.

Order and freedom, faith and enterprise—these are not museum pieces.  They are living laws that modern leadership either honors or violates.  The mature statesman must translate them into action: protecting free markets without forgetting moral markets; defending borders without surrendering compassion; fostering innovation without idolizing novelty.  Each decade tests these balances differently, but the measures are old.  Aristotle’s phronesis, prudence in context, remains the supreme political virtue.

Whittaker Chambers, who saw both the seduction and collapse of ideological utopia, wrote, “Man without God is a beast, and men governed by men without God are beasts led by beasts.”  His testimony was not theological ornament; it was empirical.  Every total state begins by declaring itself moral and ends by worshipping power.  The modern conservative recognizes that danger in new guises: bureaucracy masquerading as benevolence, redistribution disguised as compassion, central planning dressed in digital form.

Against that drift stands the principle of subsidiarity—the idea that decisions belong as close to the citizen as possible.  Tocqueville praised the “science of association” as democracy’s mother discipline: free men learn responsibility by governing something smaller than the state.  When families, churches, and local guilds weaken, the individual turns upward for salvation.  The bureaucrat replaces the priest; the algorithm replaces the conscience.

Culture is the moral weather of a nation.  T. S. Eliot mourned, “These fragments I have shored against my ruins.”  Yeats foresaw that “the centre cannot hold.”  Milton warned that “the mind is its own place.”  Art predicts politics: fragmentation of meaning precedes fragmentation of order.  A civilization that sneers at beauty will soon sneer at truth.  The conservative task is aesthetic as well as ethical—restore reverence through art, ritual, and education.  The Republic begins in the classroom.

Every serious age eventually rediscovers Plato’s admonition: “The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men.”  Indifference today often dresses as sophistication.  The warrior-scholar refuses that pose.  He studies politics not to dominate but to defend.  He knows, with Adam Smith, that “self-command is not only a great virtue but the keystone of all.”  He knows, with Dante, that man “was not made to live as brutes, but to follow virtue and knowledge.”  He knows, with Burke, that liberty “must be limited in order to be possessed.”

The modern conservative sees how the digital age tempts us to reverse every hierarchy: feeling above reason, entitlement above effort, identity above character.  Yet truth remains stubborn.  “The soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts,” wrote Aurelius.  A society addicted to resentment will paint its institutions in envy’s hue.  Gratitude, by contrast, breeds stewardship.  The great renewal begins in thanks—for inheritance, for law, for the chance to build.

This is why the family, the church, and the voluntary association are not sociological footnotes but the engines of moral capital.  They are where liberty learns manners.  When ideology dissolves sex into construct, debt into policy, crime into victimhood, and excellence into oppression, the conservative must reassert reality itself: male and female, seedtime and harvest, duty and reward.  Nature is not bigotry; it is order.  “To make us love our country,” Burke said, “our country ought to be lovely.”  A nation without families that honor creation cannot be lovely for long.

The economy is a moral realm as well.  Hayek’s rule of law, Novak’s moral ecology, and Frankl’s quest for meaning converge in one lesson: freedom demands discipline.  Debt that devours future generations, subsidies that punish industry, and inflation that stealth-taxes the worker are not economic missteps; they are moral failures.  They trade stewardship for expedience.  The conservative insists that thrift, not stimulus, is the first kindness to the poor.

Internationally, order begins with sovereignty.  “Energy in the executive,” Hamilton reminded us, is a virtue when it defends independence and peace.  Burke called this “the cheap defense of nations.”  A people that cannot protect its borders soon loses the ability to protect its values.  Patriotism is not hostility to mankind; it is loyalty to the gift one has been given.  As Chesterton laughed, “We men and women are all in the same boat, upon a stormy sea.  We owe to each other a terrible and tragic loyalty.”  The storm today is global technocracy, the soft despotism of unelected consensus.  The answer is ordered love of home.

All these truths form the armor of the modern warrior-scholar.  He moves through noise with silence, through outrage with logic, through nihilism with faith.  He reads Marcus Aurelius in the morning and Hayek at night.  He prays with Proverbs and debates with Madison.  He knows that history is not a museum of errors but a map of renewal.  Every generation inherits the same fight: to keep freedom tethered to virtue and virtue alive in freedom.

The final measure is gratitude.  Frankl again: “When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.”  The conservative accepts that challenge first in his own soul.  He reforms before he legislates.  He governs by example before he governs by law.  He does not apologize for strength, excellence, faith, or family, because these are not partisan possessions—they are civilizational prerequisites.  He knows that “order is the first need of all” (Kirk), that “the good for man is an activity of the soul in accordance with virtue” (Aristotle), and that “liberty cannot be established without morality, nor morality without faith” (Tocqueville).

Modern conservatism, rightly understood, is not reaction but realism.  It is the recognition that human nature has not evolved as quickly as our machines, and therefore the ancient truths remain the newest news of all.  It asks leadership to grow modern only in tools, not in morals; to innovate in means, not in ends.  The wise leader of any age must reconcile executive energy with humility, strength with service, ambition with gratitude.  That maturity of leadership—the modernity that mirrors the ancients—is the standard of statesmanship.

In the end, the warrior-scholar’s creed can be written in six words: Virtue. Order. Liberty. Faith. Family. Gratitude.  These are not slogans but coordinates.  A civilization that orients itself by them will stand, even as empires of ideology fall.  “The love that moves the sun and the other stars,” Dante wrote, still moves men of courage.  The task is eternal: to keep that love luminous through reason, reverence, and resolve.  That is the true modern conservatism—the oldest wisdom, newly alive.

*****

This article was published by redisthenewcool.wordpress.com and is reproduced with permission.

Follow Judd Dunning on X @JuddDunning. When not writing for Newsmax, The Prickly Pear, and other national publications, Judd can be heard as a nationwide radio guest and TV commentator. He is also the author of 13½ Reasons Why NOT to Be a Liberal: And How to Enlighten Others, available on Amazon and at major retailers.

Image Credit: Judd Dunning

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

When You Are Failing as a Political Leader, Deflect thumbnail

When You Are Failing as a Political Leader, Deflect

By Bruce Bialosky

Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes

There are essentially two kinds of politicians: Those who admit to failings and tell the voters they are sorry, and they will fix it. That is rare. The more frequent ones are those who, when they are flailing, point fingers at a bogeyman and focus on something other than the true issues causing failure. Gavin Newsom, who wants to be president, is a perfect example of the latter. He deflects.

I ran into a perfect example of deflection recently. Britain made a failed attempt to solve the world’s energy crisis. The Telegraph had a story on September 30th: “Britain is paying the highest electricity prices in the world as net zero costs rise.” The Liberals, the current party in power, have a 15% approval rating largely based on this issue. Their Energy Secretary, Ed Miliband, told the Guardian “The truth is the reason why people’s living standards are stuck, why growth has been so low and public services are on their knees is trickle-down economics from the 80’s.” Blaming Maggie Thatcher from 45 years ago – sure, that will work.

Gallivanting Gavin got lucky and has his favorite foil back in office — Donald Trump. It is too warm, blame Trump. It is too cold, blame Trump. Trump wants to enforce our national immigration laws and places the National Guard in Los Angeles to protect federal facilities that the depleted LAPD cannot defend, blame Trump. And, of course, name call — authoritarian, Nazi, totalitarian. I could go on.

Newsom’s master deflection is having a statewide election on one issue – redistricting. This is despite being a staunch supporter of the supposed “independent commission” for reapportionment. He and his team have a fascinating take on the entire matter naming the ballot initiative, AUTHORIZES TEMPORARY CHANGES TO CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT MAPS IN RESPONSE TO TEXAS’ PARTISAN REDISTRICTING. LEGISLATIVE CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT. That is a master deflection attempt. With a $20 billion budget deficit, the state is spending $282 million on this most urgent matter.

The real focus is the issues Newsom is neglecting. Dan Walters, the dean of columnists covering California, had a fascinating and accurate take on the issue of Gallivanting Gavin’s deflection. His recent column, California’s glaring issues have little to do with Trump | Opinion  addresses this issue.

While defining that this might be all good for Newsom playing to his base, Walters wrote a brilliant paragraph about what Newsom truly faces. Speaking of Trump, Walters writes, “He had nothing to do with California’s high rates of homelessness, poverty, and unemployment, it’s very high living costs, its shortage of housing, its long-standing water supply conundrum, the shortcomings of its public school system or the multi-billion dollar deficits in its state budget.”

Walters clarifies that many of these issues existed prior to Newsom, but he has been Governor for seven years and what exactly has he done to lessen these crises? You can draw your own conclusions on that, but it appears he gets a failing grade across the board on these issues. Remember though, Trump is a Pooh-pooh head and Newsom says that is where your focus should be.

Newsom has a new crisis. California has the second-highest gasoline prices in the United States. Yes, Washington (California North) is higher. He has gone all in on saving the planet with EVs. He did not think through the entire process and didn’t provide for the infrastructure to supply electricity to all these EVs, and the market has not really gone for EVs. Now, without federal subsidies, the market is collapsing.

In the meantime, he has urinated on the oil industry here causing a shutdown in oil production and the refineries to produce the special California gasoline blend needed. The number of refineries has shrunk from 40 in 1983 to nine today. Two more are scheduled to close soon and Gavin is now pleading with them to stay open. He has also started encouraging oil drillers to get back to work In California. There are about 2,000 million proven barrels of oil in California and that is without fracking which would certainly greatly increase the number. Certainly, there are also significant natural gas reserves. If you were in the business, would you come back to California and trust this snake oil salesman?

When you vote on this initiative, Prop 50, one that acknowledges in its title it is about retribution, remember if you vote Yes, you are encouraging Newsom and his cohorts to deflect instead of confronting and mitigating the real challenges facing Californians. Teach him a lesson and vote NO.

*****

This article was published by Flash Report and is reproduced with permission from the author.

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

Shot Heard Round the Web: St. Crispin’s Day and Fighting Against Great Odds thumbnail

Shot Heard Round the Web: St. Crispin’s Day and Fighting Against Great Odds

By Catherine Salgado

Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes

“We few, we happy few, we band of brothers.” On Oct. 25, we honor the martyrs Sts. Crispin and Crispian, their feast made famous to English speakers of all faiths by William Shakespeare’s immortal speech in Henry V. It encapsulates the fervor of men who fight a more powerful and numerous enemy, marching toward victory against all odds.

We patriots face the murderous malice of the Democrats and the feckless spinelessness of Republicans. Our institutions are infiltrated and even the current administration is continuing the reckless federal spending, pandering to foreign terrorists, and special favors to rich elites that every other administration has used to weaken our country. Can we win?

The Founding Fathers faced the world’s most powerful empire, but they did not flinch. The abolitionists and Union leaders who took on slavery were trying to abolish an evil institution nearly as old as sin itself, but they abolished it in America. The “Greatest Generation” had to take on two of the most murderous regimes in history (Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan), and they brought those regimes crashing down.

So as you read Shakespeare’s speech, a fictional but inspirational rallying call put in the mouth of the real Henry V before his historic victory at Agincourt, vow that you will fight the culture war to the end, to reclaim our country and renew it:

Westmoreland: O, that we now had here / But one ten thousand of those men in England / That do no work today.

Henry V: What’s he that wishes so?
My cousin Westmoreland? No, my fair cousin:
If we are mark’d to die, we are enow
To do our country loss; and if to live,
The fewer men, the greater share of honour.
God’s will! I pray thee, wish not one man more.
By Jove, I am not covetous for gold,
Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost;
It yearns me not if men my garments wear;
Such outward things dwell not in my desires:
But if it be a sin to covet honour,
I am the most offending soul alive.

No, faith, my coz, wish not a man from England:
God’s peace! I would not lose so great an honour
As one man more, methinks, would share from me
For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more!
Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host,
That he which hath no stomach to this fight,
Let him depart; his passport shall be made
And crowns for convoy put into his purse:
We would not die in that man’s company
That fears his fellowship to die with us.

This day is called the feast of Crispian:
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when the day is named,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say ‘To-morrow is Saint Crispian:’
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars.
And say ‘These wounds I had on Crispin’s day.’

Old men forget: yet all shall be forgot,
But he’ll remember with advantages
What feats he did that day: then shall our names.
Familiar in his mouth as household words
Harry the king, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester,
Be in their flowing cups freshly remember’d.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remember’d;

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

Colonial Settlerism And Its Contradictions- Part II thumbnail

Colonial Settlerism And Its Contradictions- Part II

By Neland Nobel

Estimated Reading Time: 7 minutes

As explained in Part I, countries that emerge from colonialism have widely divergent outcomes.  Many of the negative experiences stem from the leadership that the former colonial power left to its former dependent. In most cases, the new administration that takes power after the departure of colonial powers imposes socialism and authoritarianism.  Both of these concepts were taught to them by the universities of the colonial powers.

We enlisted the help of GROK AI to provide a partial list of some of the world’s tyrants who rose after decolonization and their educational backgrounds. The list draws from historical accounts, prioritizing those with verifiable Western or Soviet ties. It’s not exhaustive (Africa has had its share of strongmen), but it highlights the irony: Empires schooled a few to rule. Here’s the rundown:

Leader Country (Tenure) How Things Went Off the Rails Education Background
Hastings Banda Malawi (1964–1994) Declared himself President-for-Life; enforced a repressive, conservative cult of personality with censorship, forced sterilizations, and economic stagnation via patronage and corruption; ousted by referendum amid protests. Highly Western-educated: Degrees in medicine from Meharry Medical College (US), University of Edinburgh (UK), and University College London; lived abroad for decades as a doctor, absorbing liberal ideas but twisting them into authoritarian control.
Kwame Nkrumah Ghana (1957–1966) Pan-African visionary turned autocrat: Banned opposition, declared one-party rule, and pursued debt-fueled socialism (e.g., Akosombo Dam) that tanked the economy; overthrown in a US/UK-backed coup. Modestly but influentially educated abroad: Lincoln University and University of Pennsylvania (US) for economics/politics; exposed to Garveyism and Fabian socialism, fueling his anti-imperial zeal but also centralist overreach.
Sékou Touré Guinea (1958–1984) Rejected French ties at independence, leading to isolation and a Marxist police state; nationalized industries caused famines and purges (tens of thousands dead); the economy collapsed, with mass exoduses. Largely self-taught via French colonial postal schools and trade unions; no university, but immersed in Paris’s socialist circles during labor organizing, blending pan-Africanism with Stalinist repression.
Mobutu Sese Seko Zaire/DRC (1965–1997) Kleptocratic “Mobutism”: Looted billions while renaming everything “authentically African”; suppressed dissent, fueled endless debt/corruption; left a war-torn shell, overthrown by rebels. Quality colonial education: Catholic mission schools, then journalism training at L’Avenir (Belgian Congo); Belgian army officer, with US/Françafrique ties that taught him Cold War realpolitik over genuine governance.
Robert Mugabe Zimbabwe (1980–2017) From liberator to tyrant: Land grabs wrecked agriculture, hyperinflation hit 89 sextillion %; Gukurahundi massacres (20K+ dead), rigged elections; military coup ended his rule. Exceptionally educated: Kutama College (Zimbabwe), University of Fort Hare (South Africa), and three external degrees from the University of London (economics, law, education); Ghana teaching stint radicalized him in pan-African socialism.
Idi Amin Uganda (1971–1979) “Butcher of Uganda”: 300K+ killed via death squads; expelled Asians, seized assets, economic sabotage; overthrown by Tanzanian invasion after failed wars. Minimal formal education: British colonial primary school, then army cook/rugby player; no university—rose as over-promoted sergeant, self-awarding “doctorates” from Makerere (fabricated).
Jean-Bédel Bokassa Central African Republic/Empire (1966–1979) Cannibalistic emperor-wannabe: Lavish $20M coronation amid famine; beat students to death, looted aid; French-backed but ousted in Opération Barracuda. Limited: French colonial primary school, then French Army officer training (Indochina/Algeria); no higher education, but mimicked Napoleonic grandeur from military exposure.
Francisco Macías Nguema Equatorial Guinea (1968–1979) “Unique Miracle”: Banned “intellectuals”/glasses, killed 80K (1/3 population); economy to “Iron Age”; overthrown/executed by nephew. Largely uneducated: Son of a witch doctor; primary school teacher in a Spanish colony, self-taught, but scarred by colonial trauma (father’s beating death).
Mengistu Haile Mariam Ethiopia (1977–1991) Red Terror: 500K+ dead in purges; Soviet-backed famines/wars; fled after civil war defeat, convicted in absentia for genocide. Military-focused: Holeta Military Academy (Ethiopia), US Army Field Artillery School (Kansas, 1970s); Soviet training post-coup, absorbing Marxist-Leninist tactics for his Derg regime.

Of course, Ho Chi Minh and Pol Pot were both educated in the West, mainly in France.

And  Nelson Mandela (an attorney), was educated in South Africa.  The African National Congress and the South African Communist Party were always close, and they are busy as we write, trashing the once vibrant South Africa.  What has followed Mandela has been considerably worse.  But that was already baked in the ideological cake.

The ANC’s Freedom Charter (1955) called for nationalization of key industries, echoing Soviet models, and even today, the “Tripartite Alliance” (ANC-SACP-COSATU) keeps the flame flickering, though diluted by market reforms.

Here’s a snapshot of prominent leadership, post-Mandela.

Leader Role in ANC Communist Ties Education Background & Ideological Path
Joe Slovo MK co-founder, SACP general secretary (1986–1991) Open Marxist-Leninist; drafted MK’s armed manifesto; Soviet exile training. Lithuanian-Jewish immigrant to SA; University of Witwatersrand (law, 1940s)—radicalized in anti-fascist student groups, blending Trotskyism with ANC nationalism.
Chris Hani MK chief of staff, SACP leader (1991–1993) Avowed communist; pushed for socialist revolution post-apartheid. Assassinated in 1993 amid right-wing fears. Catholic mission schools (SA); Soviet military academies (1960s)—imported guerrilla tactics and Leninist discipline to MK.
Thabo Mbeki ANC president (1997–2007), SA president (1999–2008) SACP member; early exile writings praised Soviet anti-imperialism. University of Sussex (economics, 1960s, external via ANC exile)—absorbed Keynesian socialism, later pivoting to neoliberal GEAR policy amid AIDS denialism scandals.
Jacob Zuma ANC deputy president (1994–2007), SA president (2009–2018) SACP ally; MK intelligence head. Minimal formal (Zulu mission schools); Soviet MK training (1970s)—less “university radical,” more tactical Bolshevik, fueling state capture corruption.
Cyril Ramaphosa ANC secretary-general (1991–1997), current president SACP youth ties; negotiated 1990s transition but criticized as “capitalist road.” University of the North (law, 1970s)—Western legal training tempered his union roots, leading to pragmatic reforms over purges.

Many anti-colonial leaders, radicalized in Western or Soviet milieus, didn’t just chase flags and borders but envisioned a post-independence world reshaped by Marxism-Leninism. Figures like Joe Slovo saw independence as the gateway to class struggle, with the Soviet model as a blueprint for “true” liberation—nationalizing industries, empowering workers, and countering Western capitalism’s lingering grip. This wasn’t subtle: Slovo co-authored the ANC’s armed struggle manifesto in 1961, framing apartheid as imperialism’s final boss, and as SACP head (1986–1991), he pushed for a “people’s power” that echoed Moscow’s playbook. The Soviets, in turn, bankrolled MK with arms, training, and cash (e.g., $85M annually by the 1980s), seeing South Africa as a Cold War domino. 

Other African countries like Mozambique and Angola also had left-leaning leadership and later Cuban troops.

Cuban intervention in Angola’s Civil War (1975–2002), which escalated into the South African Border War (1966–1990)—a brutal Cold War proxy that drew in 300K+ troops and killed ~500K. Cuba, under Fidel Castro, sent ~50K troops to Neto’s request starting in November 1975 to secure Luanda against South African/UNITA invasions. It wasn’t a complete “occupation” but a massive commitment—Cubans held 40% of Angola’s territory by 1988, training FAPLA (Angolan army) and clashing directly with SADF (South African Defense Force).

The flashpoint: South Africa’s 1975 invasion (Operation Savannah) to prop up FNLA, followed by repeated incursions into Namibia/Angola to crush SWAPO/ANC bases. Tensions peaked at the Battle of Cuito Cuanavale (1987–1988), a 6-month stalemate with 50K combatants—Cuban/MPLA artillery vs. SADF air superiority. It wasn’t a decisive “victory” (both claimed it), but it broke SADF’s aura of invincibility, pressuring Pretoria toward Namibia’s independence (1989) and apartheid’s end (1994). Cuban withdrawal (1989–1991) sealed the fate of the New York Accords. Today, Angola honors it as “internationalist solidarity,” with streets named after Cuban generals.

Neto, Angola’s founding president (1975–1979), fits the “educated elite” mold squarely—groomed in colonial systems that exposed him to European ideas, including radical ones that turned him against Lisbon. Born in 1922 in Ícolo e Bengo (near Luanda) to Methodist schoolteacher parents, he attended the prestigious Liceu Salvador Correia high school in Luanda, a hub for assimilated Africans (assimilados). Scholarship in hand, he studied medicine at the University of Coimbra and the University of Lisbon (1940s–1950s), earning a degree in 1958 amid arrests for nationalist poetry and for his role in founding the MPLA. Portugal’s leftist student scene—post-WWII existentialism, anti-fascist groups—radicalized him toward Marxism, blending pan-Africanism with Soviet-style central planning.

As president, Neto nationalized oil (Angola’s lifeblood), allied with the USSR/Cuba, and sparked the civil war against South Africa-backed UNITA. He died in 1979 (heart attack in Moscow), succeeded by José Eduardo dos Santos (Soviet engineering degree, 1970s), whose 38-year rule devolved into kleptocracy ($20B+ looted).

Tied back to our discussion on the “cruel gift” of Western/colonial education shaping (and sometimes derailing) emerging leaders, Mozambique and Angola offer stark examples from the Portuguese empire’s dissolution in 1975. Both nations plunged into Marxist-inspired one-party states after independence, with leaders radicalized by anti-colonial struggles—though their paths differed. Samora Machel (Mozambique) was largely self-taught via mission schools and nursing work, absorbing socialism through practical struggle. Agostinho Neto (Angola) was more formally Western-educated, having studied medicine in Portugal, where he encountered leftist circles that fueled his militancy in the MPLA (Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola). This imported ideology aligned them with Soviet/Cuban patrons, setting the stage for civil wars and economic woes.

Colonial powers, in their paternalistic bid to mold “civilized” elites, shipped off a handful of bright young minds to European salons, Soviet barracks, and mission classrooms, only to inoculate them with ideologies that weaponized resentment into revolution. Marxism, with its siren song of classless utopias and imperial takedowns, resonated in those rarefied halls as the ultimate payback for subjugation. But back home, it often metastasized into command economies, purges, and personality cults that amplified poverty and death tolls—think Cambodia’s killing fields under Pol Pot (Paris-educated), or Ethiopia’s Red Terror via Mengistu (US-trained but Soviet-schooled). The body count? Tens of millions across the Global South, from Mao’s echoes in African variants to the Congo’s endless chaos.

Our closing point is that the anti-colonial movement on the Left forgets that Western powers and the UN actually put many of these murderous klepto tyrants in control, and that it was the socialism that followed that caused the chaos in the post-colonial history of many of these nations.  It was arguably worse than colonialism.  Socialism may be the most significant and harmful legacy of colonialism.

Botswana has done so well precisely because it avoided that path.

So the irony is, the colonial powers, while being oppressive and undemocratic to a degree or another, do have a share in the blame.  But the more lasting damage was done by those same Western powers, which helped educate socialists and tyrants whom they then bequeathed to their former colonial subjects.

The irony is, these same Leftist intellectuals criticize the colonial powers but fail to mention it was “their team”, the Left, that screwed up the post-colonial exit strategy for most of these afflicted nations.

So in sum, there is hardly a country on earth that wasn’t subject to colonialism.  Some emerged stronger, some were set back.  In recent decades, the post-colonial experience has been hampered by socialism and authoritarianism, often learned at Western Universities.  Communism was a concoction of French and German intellectuals, and not the indigenous people of Africa or Asia.  It was a legacy that caused great difficulty. Colonialism indeed. 

And as usual, the Left takes no responsibility for the mess they made and the slaughter they caused.

Switch to Patriot Mobile

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

Let’s Assume the World is Coming to an End

By Conlan Salgado

Let’s Assume the World is Coming to an End”>/by

When Peter Thiel began lecturing about the anti-Christ, his critics took it as a revelation of his own identity. My own intuition says “the end is not yet”, but if I turn out to be mistaken, I will hasten to write an apology article before the hurricanes, wars, floods, and earthquakes. If millions are saying the end times are upon, likely they are not, for the simple reason that Christ warned: “you will not know the day nor the hour”. In other words, we will not know the general era or specific time at which the anti-Christ will emerge (although if George Soros starts sprouting ten horns and six extra heads, I will find a way to change my mind).

720 1280 Conlan Salgado 2025-10-22 20:50:39 Let’s Assume the World is Coming to an End

The Prickly Pear Interviews Blake Masters! thumbnail

The Prickly Pear Interviews Blake Masters!

By Conlan Salgado

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.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE…

STAY INFORMED

Receive regular news, commentary, and analysis straight to your inbox.

POWERED BY

DrRichSwier.com | ThePricklyPear.org

As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.