Where Americans are moving to and from

James Garfield's Speech for the First Memorial Day (then Decoration Day)

May 30, 1868 Arlington National Cemetery

I am oppressed with a sense of the impropriety of uttering words on this occasion. If silence is ever golden, it must be here, beside the graves of fifteen thousand men, whose lives were more significant than speech, and whose death was a poem, the music of which can never be sung. With words we make promises, plight faith, praise virtue. Promises may not be kept; plighted faith may be broken; and vaunted virtue be only the cunning mask of vice. We do not know one promise these men made, one pledge they gave, one word they spoke; but we do know they summed up and perfected, by one supreme act, the highest virtues of men and citizens. For love of country they accepted death, and thus resolved all doubts, and made immortal their patriotism and their virtue.

For the noblest man that lives, there still remains a conflict. He must still withstand the assaults of time and fortune, must still be assailed with temptations, before which lofty natures have fallen; but with these the conflict ended, the victory was won, when death stamped on them the great seal of heroic character, and closed a record which years can never blot.

I know of nothing more appropriate on this occasion than to inquire what brought these men here; what high motive led them to condense life into an hour, and to crown that hour by joyfully welcoming death? Let us consider.

Eight years ago this was the most unwarlike nation of the earth. For nearly fifty years1 no spot in any of these states had been the scene of battle. Thirty millions of people had an army of less than ten thousand men. The faith of our people in the stability and permanence of their institutions was like their faith in the eternal course of nature. Peace, liberty, and personal security were blessings as common and universal as sunshine and showers and fruitful seasons; and all sprang from a single source, the old American principle that all owe due submission and obedience to the lawfully expressed will of the majority. This is not one of the doctrines of our political system—it is the system itself. It is our political firmament, in which all other truths are set, as stars in Heaven. It is the encasing air, the breath of the Nation’s life. Against this principle the whole weight of the rebellion was thrown. Its overthrow would have brought such ruin as might follow in the physical universe, if the power of gravitation were destroyed and

“Nature’s concord broke,

Among the constellations war were sprung,

Two planets, rushing from aspect malign

Of fiercest opposition, in mid-sky

Should combat, and their jarring spheres confound.”

The Nation was summoned to arms by every high motive which can inspire men. Two centuries of freedom had made its people unfit for despotism. They must save their Government or miserably perish.

As a flash of lightning in a midnight tempest reveals the abysmal horrors of the sea, so did the flash of the first gun disclose the awful abyss into which rebellion was ready to plunge us. In a moment the fire was lighted in twenty million hearts. In a moment we were the most warlike Nation on the earth. In a moment we were not merely a people with an army—we were a people in arms. The Nation was in column—not all at the front, but all in the array.

I love to believe that no heroic sacrifice is ever lost; that the characters of men are molded and inspired by what their fathers have done; that treasured up in American souls are all the unconscious influences of the great deeds of the Anglo-Saxon race, from Agincourt to Bunker Hill. It was such an influence that led a young Greek, two thousand years ago, when musing on the battle of Marathon, to exclaim, “the trophies of Miltiades will not let me sleep!” Could these men be silent in 1861; these, whose ancestors had felt the inspiration of battle on every field where civilization had fought in the last thousand years? Read their answer in this green turf. Each for himself gathered up the cherished purposes of life—its aims and ambitions, its dearest affections—and flung all, with life itself, into the scale of battle.

We began the war for the Union alone; but we had not gone far into its darkness before a new element was added to the conflict, which filled the army and the nation with cheerful but intense religious enthusiasm. In lessons that could not be misunderstood, the Nation was taught that God had linked to our own, the destiny of an enslaved race- that their liberty and our Union were indeed "one and inseparable." It was this that made the soul of John Brown the marching companion of our soldiers, and made them sing as they went down to battle-

In the beauty of the lilies Chris was born, across the sea,

With a glory in his bosom which transfigures you and me;

As he died to make men holy, let us die to make men free;

While God is marching on.

With such inspirations, failure was impossible. The struggle consecrated, in some degree, every man who bore a worthy path. I can never forget an incident, illustrative of this thought, which it was my fortune to witness, near sunset of the second day at Chickamauga, when the beleaguered but unbroken left wing of our army had again and again repelled the assaults of more than double their numbers, and when each soldier felt that to his individual hands were committed the life of the army and the honor of his country. It was just after a division had fired its last cartridge, and had repelled a charge at the point of the bayonet, that the great-hearted commander took the hand of an humble soldier and thanked him for his steadfast courage. The soldier stood silent for a moment, and then said, with deep emotion, “George H. Thomas has taken this hand in his. I’ll knock down any mean man that offers to take it hereafter.” This rough sentence was full of meaning. He felt that something had happened to his hand which consecrated it. Could a hand bear our banner in battle and not be forever consecrated to honor and virtue? But doubly consecrated were these who received into their own hearts the fatal shafts, aimed at the life of their country. Fortunate men! Your country lives because you died! Your fame is placed where the breath of calumny can never reach it; where the mistakes of a weary life can never dim its brightness! Coming generations will rise up to call you blessed!

And now consider this silent assembly of the dead. What does it represent? Nay, rather, what does it not represent? It is an epitome of the war. Here are sheaves reaped in the harvest of death, from every battlefield of Virginia. If each grave had a voice to tell us what its silent tenant last saw and heard on earth, we might stand, with uncovered heads, and hear the whole story of the war. We should hear that one perished when the first great drops of the crimson shower began to fall, when the darkness of that first disaster at Manassas fell like an eclipse on the Nation; that another died of disease while wearily waiting for winter to end; that this one fell on the field, in sight of the spires of Richmond, little dreaming that the flag must be carried through three more years of blood before it should be planted in that citadel of treason; and that one fell when the tide of war had swept us back till the roar of rebel guns shook the dome of yonder Capitol, and re-echoed in the chambers of the Executive Mansion. We should hear mingled voices from the Rappahannock, the Rapidan, the Chickahominy, and the James; solemn voices from the Wilderness, and triumphant shouts from the Shenandoah, from Petersburg, and the Five Forks, mingled with the wild acclaim of victory and the sweet chorus of returning peace. The voices of these dead will forever fill the land like holy benedictions.

What other spot so fitting for their last resting place as this under the shadow of the Capitol saved by their valor? Here, where the grim edge of battle joined; here, where all the hope and fear and agony of their country centered; here let them rest, asleep on the Nation’s heart, entombed in the Nation’s love!

The view from this spot bears some resemblance to that which greets the eye at Rome. In sight of the Capitoline Hill, up and across the Tiber, and overlooking the city, is a hill, not rugged or lofty, but known as the Vatican Mount. At the beginning of the Christian Era, an Imperial circus stood on its summit. There, gladiator slaves died for the sport of Rome; and wild beasts fought with wilder men. In that arena, a Gallilean fisherman gave up his life a sacrifice for his faith. No human life was ever so nobly avenged. On that spot was reared the proudest Christian temple ever built by human hands. For its adornment, the rich offerings of every clime and kingdom have been contributed. And now, after eighteen centuries, the hearts of two hundred million people turn towards it with reverence when they worship God. As the traveler descends the Appenines, he sees the dome of St. Peter rising above the desolate Campaigns and the dead city, long before the seven hills and ruined palaces appear to his view. The fame of the dead fisherman has outlived the glory of the Eternal City. A noble life, crowned with heroic death rises above and outlives the pride and pomp and glory of the mightiest empire of the earth.

Seen from the western slope of our Capitol, in direction, distance, and appearance, this spot is not unlike the Vatican Mount; though the river that flows at our feet is larger than a hundred Tibers. Seven years ago, this was the home of one who lifted his sword against the life of his country, and who became the great Imperator of the rebellion. The soil beneath our feet was watered by the tears of slaves, in whose hearts the sight of yonder proud Capitol awakened no pride and inspired no hope. The face of the goddess that crowns it was turned towards the sea and not towards them. But, thanks be to God, this arena of rebellion and slavery is a scene of violence and crime no longer! This will be forever the sacred mountain of our Capital. Here is our temple; its pavement is the sepulcher of heroic hearts; its dome, the bending heaven; its altar candles, the watching stars.

Hither our children’s children shall come to pay their tribute of grateful homage. For this are we met to-day. By the happy suggestion of a great society, assemblies like this are gathering at this hour in every State in the Union. Thousands of soldiers are to-day turning aside in the march of life to visit the silent encampments of dead comrades who once fought by their side. From many thousand homes, whose light was put out when a soldier fell, there go forth to-day to join these solemn processions loving kindred and friends, from whose heart the shadow of grief will never be lifted till the light of the eternal world dawns upon them. And here are children, little children, to whom the war left no father but the Father above. By the most sacred right, theirs is the chief place to-day. They come with garlands to crown their victor fathers. I will delay the coronation no longer.

Source

Note: I saw this on another blog late last night and deeply regret I could not find it again this morning as I prefer to give the customary HT. 

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Vatican II 🇻🇦 Springtime SUCCESS

🔥🏳️‍🌈 🤡 Dance Mass ✔️
No Latin Mass for you Schismatic ✔️pic.twitter.com/BtJB7YWHHL

— AdVoluntasTua ❤️‍🔥🇻🇦 🇺🇸 🇵🇹 🚜 (@AdVoluntasTua) May 20, 2026

HT: Dr. Tighe

The bond market is flashing a warning sign for the global economy

New York —  Take it from President Donald Trump himself: Stocks and commodities can throw easily ignored tantrums, but when the bond market gets “yippy,” you pay attention.

Ultimately, it took a sharp bond market selloff in April of 2025 to get Trump to pump the brakes on his sweeping “reciprocal” tariff agenda.

Once again, the bond traders are barking. But this time, it’s not clear whether Trump can do much to calm the market anytime soon.

“The bond market is basically reacting to the uncertainty created by oil prices, and (Trump) seems not to know how to get out of the problem he’s put us in,” said Daniel Alpert, managing partner at investing firm Westwood Capital, in an interview.

Put another way: Bond traders are starting to think that the recent inflation spike — largely a result of the war shutting off oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz — may not be as “short-term” as Trump has claimed. And that will likely depress bond prices even more.

Read the rest here.

Amateurs obsess over the stock market. Professionals watch the bond market.

McConnell slams Blanche over ‘slush fund to pay people who assault cops’

Former Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) on Thursday slammed acting Attorney General Todd Blanche for accepting the Trump administration’s proposal to establish a $1.8 billion legal compensation fund for people who claim they were wrongfully prosecuted by the Justice Department.

The fund has sparked criticism in both parties, particularly those who believe it could be used for claims from those convicted of assaulting U.S. Capitol Police officers on Jan. 6, 2021. Blanche has not ruled out such claims.

“So the nation’s top law enforcement official is asking for a slush fund to pay people who assault cops? Utterly stupid, morally wrong – Take your pick,” McConnell said in a strongly worded statement after Blanche met with Republican senators to justify the administration’s push to establish the fund.

Read the rest here.

That's all very nice Mitch. But where were you when the country needed your vote to bar Trump from ever running for office again? You had a chance to prevent this by voting to convict him in his second impeachment trial. You called him "morally guilty" but chose to vote not guilty on the specious grounds that he had left office. In doing so you gave cover for the other cowards in your party (no longer mine since 2016). You bear a very large degree of moral responsibility for where we are today as a country. History is not going to be kind in its judgement of you and your fellow enablers of the current junta. 

Fox News: Disapproval of Trump hits new high

Voters are increasingly pessimistic about the economy and President Trump’s handling of key issues, while a majority opposes continued U.S. military involvement in Iran even as most believe the U.S. is winning the war. That’s according to a new Fox News national survey.

Affordability continues to dominate the political landscape.

Fifty-eight percent flag the cost of living as their top economic worry, up from 50% in February. This eclipses other issues, such as government spending (16%), jobs (8%) and tariffs (8%).

More than three-quarters also say the economy is in bad shape (77%), worse than last month (73%) and a year ago (71%). Only 23% rate it positively, the lowest in more than a year. 

The pessimism is personal too. A slim majority of voters (51%) say their family’s finances are worse now than two years ago. Before the 2022 midterm elections, 44% said the same. 

Read the rest here.

See also...

Trump approval among Republicans at new low

The SpaceX IPO

See also...

Report: SpaceX IPO gives Musk unchecked power and forbids investor lawsuits

SpaceX insiders will get to sell shares earlier than usual after the IPO

A direct quote from the prospectus...

“We believe the next paradigm shift for humanity is the creation of a resilient, perpetually expanding spacefaring civilization that drives continuous innovation across new frontiers, ultimately propelling us to Kardashev Type II status—we believe we are capable of unlocking an era of unprecedented economic expansion, while also contributing to the safeguards of humanity’s future against existential risk.”

This sounds like a bad imitation of a Star Trek novel.

The United States is Now a Banana Republic

America is in the middle of the most serious constitutional crisis since the Civil War. It is time for a non-violent revolution. The people need to demand the resignation or removal from office by impeachment of this corrupt junta. We may getting close to the point where we will need to consider extreme measures like a national strike. Especially if Trump attempts to directly interfere with the November elections as some of his more rabid supporters are urging. 

DOJ Grants Sweeping Tax Immunity to Trump

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche signed an agreement Tuesday declaring the federal government will not seek any sort of audit or payment from the president, his family members and companies as part of Donald Trump’s settlement agreement with the Internal Revenue Service.

In a sweeping one-page addendum to Monday’s settlement agreement establishing a nearly $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” fund, Blanche agreed that the U.S. is “FOREVER BARRED and PRECLUDED from prosecuting or pursuing, any and all claims” including “monetary relief” that “have been or could have been” asserted by the IRS against Trump, his family or his businesses.

Read the rest here.

A Third Vatican Council?

 I'm not even Catholic and I shudder at the thought.

In Donald Trump's hands the Power of the Pardon is a dagger aimed at the constitution and the rule of law

...The pardon power raises more profound concerns, however, when wielded as a tool of managerial control—one that can negate the basic criminal-law constraints that apply to public officials.

Whatever the merits of the Supreme Court’s 2024 decision holding that a president is immune from criminal prosecution for actions within the office’s “conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority,” it shields only one actor: the president. In practice, presidents act through political appointees and career staff, all of whom remain subject to criminal law. But President Trump has reportedly promised pardons to many in his administration—by one account, to “everyone who has come within 200 feet of the Oval.” If the president is willing to pardon large swaths of his administration, government operations could be significantly transformed. 

To what extent? Consider the laws that could effectively cease to apply: the criminal statutes governing executive branch employees cover, among other things, bribery, conflicts of interest, classified information disclosure, political activity interference, destruction of public property, and records falsification. Relevant generally applicable criminal laws include those prohibiting perjury, false statements, obstruction of congressional proceedings, witness tampering, destruction or falsification of records in federal investigations, and the deprivation of rights under color of law. 

Read the rest here.

Some good reads from Reason

Trump Settles His Own Lawsuit Against the IRS for $1.8 Billion of Your Money

How bad is California's 'squatters rights?" Furious property owners are turning to vigilantism.

Donald Trump, Thomas Massie, and the Long, Slow Death of the Tea Party

Trump wants to admit more refugees to the US. But only White South Africans

The Trump administration is proposing increasing the refugee admissions ceiling for fiscal year 2026 to 17,500 for White South Africans, according to an emergency determination sent to Congress and obtained by CNN.

Last year, the administration restricted the number of refugees allowed to enter the country annually to 7,500, with a focus on White South Africans, slashing the previous year’s ceiling of 125,000 and excluding some of the world’s most vulnerable populations.

Read the rest here.

Since October of 2025 the US has admitted 4,499 refugees. Of those, exactly three were not White South Africans. 

You would have to go back to Woodrow Wilson to find a president and administration that was as nakedly racist as the current one. 

Donald Trump is a Pathological Liar and the World is Starting to Notice

President Lyndon Johnson’s lies about the Vietnam War created what came to be called a “credibility gap” when millions of people stopped believing him. Today, a credibility gap plagues President Trump because of his whoppers about the war with Iran and much more.

Trump’s credibility gap endangers our national security. His hyperbolic rants are so absurd — and his policy flip-flops so extreme — that our foreign allies and adversaries don’t believe much of what he says and no longer take him seriously. It’s as if the proverbial boy who cried wolf moved into the Oval Office.

Trump has alienated our allies with his lies, insults, temper tantrums, tariffs, aid cuts to Ukraine and other nations, and threats to withdraw from NATO and annex Canada and Greenland. Our adversaries don’t fear his threats because he often fails to carry them out. This has generated the insult of TACO (Trump Always Chickens Out).

Growing numbers of people now view Trump’s absurd claims as calculated lies at best — or the delusions of a 79-year-old man with declining mental health at worst.

A poll for the Washington Post and ABC News published May 3 found an extraordinary 59 percent of Americans believe Trump doesn’t have the mental sharpness to serve effectively as president. A total of 71 percent believe he isn’t honest and trustworthy, and only 37 percent approve of how he is handling his job.

Read the rest here.

Bill Maher on Anti-Semitism (PG 13)

Ok...a word of caution for the benefit of anyone who may have just arrived from Neptune and immediately stumbled on my blog. This is Bill Maher. So yeah; if vulgar language offends you just move on. I have my disagreements with BM. Quite a few to be frank. But I think he pretty much nailed this one, language and all. The comments over on YT are worth perusing. And yeah, I too noticed the deafening silence that his closing monologue got. 

A Deep Dive Into Sino-American Trade

Survey Gives Mixed Report on the Russian Orthodox Church

The proportion of Russians identifying as Orthodox has fallen from 78% to 65% in the past 15 years, according to a new survey.

The survey, conducted by Russia’s Public Opinion Foundation on behalf of St. Tikhon’s University in Moscow, also concluded that the proportion of Orthodox Christians who never attend services has risen from 28% to 32% in the same period.

The findings, reported May 14 by the Vedomosti newspaper, are significant because the Russian Orthodox Church is the largest of the 14 universally recognized self-governing Eastern Orthodox Churches. Estimates of its membership vary, with some counts suggesting there are 110 million Russian Orthodox Christians worldwide, including 95 million in Russia. But the number of active believers is considered to be far lower.

The new research, based on a survey of 1,501 adults in February and March, also sheds light on the state of Russian Orthodoxy amid Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which was launched in 2022 with the support of Patriarch Kirill of Moscow.

But some Russian Orthodox commentators have cast doubt on the survey’s findings. Fr. Alexey Volkov, a priest in Ulyanovsk, western Russia, told the country’s National News Service that he saw no decline in practice.

He said: “I view these figures with skepticism, because what I see at the church where I serve, and at other churches, suggests exactly the opposite. The number of parishioners is growing, and the number of people attending services is not declining. There is no decline in people’s faith or in Orthodoxy.”

He added: “Participating in the Church’s liturgical life is one of the most important attributes of faith. However, no one requires a certain number of services attended per year. There are no such quotas. Not everyone who doesn’t go to church on Sundays fails to be Orthodox. They simply have their own personal rhythm of Church life.”

The new survey also explored how intensively Russia’s Orthodox Christians practice their faith, providing detailed figures about how often they receive Holy Communion. Broadly speaking, Orthodox Christians tend to receive Communion less frequently than Catholics because of more detailed requirements concerning fasting and recent confession.

Read the rest here.

HT: Dr. Tighe

Pentagon officials stunned by Hegseth decision on troops in Poland

Pete Hegseth’s last-minute decision to cancel the deployment of 4,000 troops to Poland caught Pentagon staff and European allies by surprise — the latest example of an abrupt personnel move from the Defense secretary that blindsided both sides of the Atlantic.

It wasn’t clear exactly why Hegseth issued the order, according to three defense officials familiar with the matter. President Donald Trump has repeatedly expressed anger and frustration with European allies for their failure to help with the Iran war, although Trump has labeled Poland a “model ally” for its high defense spending.

The decision was even more surprising because troops and equipment had already started to arrive in the country. It sent fresh waves of anxiety through European capitals and inside the Pentagon on Thursday about whether such moves could embolden Russia — and which ally might turn into the next target.

“We had no idea this was coming,” said one of the U.S. officials, adding that European and American officials have spent the last 24 hours on the phone trying to understand the decision and figure out if more surprises are coming.

The move follows Hegseth’s announcement this month that the Pentagon would withdraw 5,000 troops from bases in Germany. But that decision followed through on a threat Trump made after German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said the U.S. was “humiliating” itself with the conflict in Iran.

The 4,000 Texas-based troops were preparing to leave on a long-planned nine month rotation to Poland that includes training with NATO allies when the order to halt came through. The cancellation of this routine mission is especially unusual given that American troops stationed on the continent are a key deterrent to Russia. Trump has insisted that Europe will have to fend for itself — even as he’s railed against allies’ opposition to the Iran conflict — and this latest order suggests the president is serious about reducing the American footprint on the continent.

The Army’s role in Europe “is all about deterring the Russians, protecting America’s strategic interests and assuring allies,” said the Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, the former commander of the U.S. Army in Europe. “And now a very important asset that was coming to be part of that deterrence is gone.”

Read the rest here.

Pennsylvania Supreme Court justice leaves Democratic Party over antisemitism concerns

A Pennsylvania state Supreme Court justice said Monday he is leaving the Democratic Party over what he sees as a rise in antisemitism from mainstream party figures.

Justice David Wecht, who was elected to the court as a Democrat in 2015, said in a statement he is switching his party affiliation to independent due to an “acquiescence to Jew-hatred” becoming “disturbingly common among activists, leaders and even many elected officials in the Democratic Party.”

“I can no longer abide this. So, I won’t,” Wecht said. “I am no longer registered within any political party.”

Read the rest here.

China Increasingly Views Trump’s America as an Empire in Decline

When President Trump visited China in late 2017, Xi Jinping welcomed him with a grand display of Chinese history and culture: a four-hour private tour of the Forbidden City culminating in a performance by the Peking Opera.

Eight years, a pandemic and two trade wars later, Mr. Trump is returning to Beijing, where the theme of future dominance, not ancient majesty, has filled domestic and international headlines with articles about dancing robots, drone swarms and the quiet hum of electric vehicles.

China increasingly casts itself not as a fading civilization trying to catch up to the West but as a superpower poised to surpass it. Chinese nationalists and state-linked commentators say they have Mr. Trump to thank. America under his rule, they say, validates Mr. Xi’s worldview centered on “the rise of the East and decline of the West.”

For decades, many Chinese viewed the United States with a mix of admiration, envy and resentment. America represented wealth, technological sophistication and institutional confidence. Even critics of Washington who reviled the American system often assumed that it worked.

Mr. Trump’s ascent and his volatile second term shattered that image.

In January, a nationalistic Beijing think tank affiliated with Renmin University published a triumphant report about Mr. Trump’s first year back in office. The report argued that his tariffs, attacks on allies, anti-immigration policies and assaults on the American political establishment had inadvertently strengthened China while weakening the United States. Its title: “Thank Trump.”

The report called Mr. Trump an “accelerator of American political decay,” with the United States sliding toward polarization, institutional dysfunction and even “Latin American-style instability.” His hostility toward China, the authors argued, was a “reverse booster” that unified the country and helped bring about its strategic self-reliance.

Read the rest here.

US National Debt Surpasses GDP

The U.S. government learned last week that it may have reached an unfortunate milestone: The size of its debt surpassed the nation’s total economic output.

It was a striking imbalance, according to early estimates, one that the country has experienced only in rare circumstances — briefly during the pandemic, and in the aftermath of World War II. But the development barely seemed to register in the nation’s capital, where few policymakers bothered to acknowledge the latest warning sign about the government’s poor fiscal health.

The root of the problem is well-documented and widely known. U.S. debt has soared in recent years because of a mismatch between federal spending and tax revenue, one complicated by a rapidly aging population, which has driven up costs across government.

For economists, the fear is that these conditions are inching the United States toward a fiscal crisis, one in which its debt is so great that the country can’t easily afford to pay the rising interest on it. But their warnings have long gone unheeded in Washington, calcifying the strains on the government’s balance sheet in ways that President Trump’s agenda is expected to exacerbate.

Despite winning a congressional majority, Republicans have cut little in spending over the past year. With the few savings they did achieve, they put that money toward offsetting a fraction of the cost of Mr. Trump’s tax cuts, which are still expected to add more than $4 trillion to the debt in the coming years.

Those fiscal risks aren’t yet fully realized in the total federal debt held by the public, which topped about $31.26 trillion in March, federal records show. By comparison, the nation’s nominal gross domestic product, a measure of its output using current dollars, reached $31.21 trillion in the 12-month period ending in March, according to data released last Thursday and analyzed by the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, which supports deficit reduction.

As a result, the ratio of debt to G.D.P. — a widely regarded metric for assessing the government’s fiscal health — slightly exceeded 100 percent in the committee’s calculations. That last occurred for a short period in 2020, as the pandemic clobbered the economy and government shelled out trillions in emergency relief, the group found.

Read the rest here.

Why Trump's "Trade Deals" are Worthless

When President Donald Trump struck a trade deal with the European Union in July, officials on both sides stressed how it would ensure long-term stability to trans-Atlantic trade.

The Trump administration called the deal a "generational modernization of the transatlantic alliance." European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said it "restores stability and predictability" by locking in 15 percent tariffs on most European goods exported to the U.S., while most American imports to Europe would be exempt from tariffs.

In other words, Trump got what he wanted out of that deal: A reduction in tariffs on American exports and the establishment of a new, permanent baseline tariff on European goods. European leaders also felt like they'd won something: the 15 percent tariff was lower than the 25 percent tariff Trump had threatened, and the deal would stop Trump from hiking tariffs the next time he was in a bad mood.

So much for that.

On Friday, Trump announced that he would raise tariffs on European-made cars to 25 percent. (Those tariffs are authorized by Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962, so they are not affected by the Supreme Court's ruling in February that limited some of the president's power to impose tariffs unilaterally.)

Those higher tariffs could cost automakers $4 billion this year.

Read the rest here.

1896: People Leaving Mass at Cologne Cathedral

Trump has lost control of the conspiracy theories

Conspiracy theories have been central to Donald Trump’s political rise. He was a leading promoter of the “birther” conspiracy theory targeting then-President Barack Obama, embraced outlandish theories about a “deep state” in the government and still pushes false claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

But conspiracy theories, and the people who support them, are unpredictable and hard to control. Now, Trump is increasingly the subject of conspiracy theories on both the left and the right, with many of his onetime supporters viewing him with growing skepticism.

This new dynamic played out immediately after Saturday’s White House Correspondents’ Association dinner with conspiracy theories and false claims flooding social media, questioning whether the assassination attempt was “staged” for Trump’s benefit. There is no evidence suggesting that is the case.

Some of those who circulated that idea were once among Trump’s most vocal backers.

“Was The Trump Whitehouse Corespondents Dinner Shooting Staged??” posted the right-wing conspiracist Alex Jones, who has recently broken with Trump over the war with Iran. Former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., who similarly broke with Trump over Iran and his handling of the release of information about the late disgraced financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, questioned why the suspect’s writing was released “almost immediately.” On the left, prominent progressive podcasters Jennifer Welch and Angie Sullivan released an episode on Monday headlined: “Major False Flags Revealed In Trump Shooting Aftermath, He’s Hiding From the Public?”

Read the rest here. 

Trump's 2nd Bogus Indictment of James Comey

If it’s possible, the Trump Justice Department’s new indictment of former FBI Director James Comey is even more absurd than the previous indictment. That one failed to state a crime. This one fabricates a crime.

The new charges, which have not been released as this is written, reportedly stem from an Instagram post Comey moronically published last year, showing seashells arranged to form the message “86 47.” Even more moronically, the Trump administration interpreted the message as a threat to assassinate the 47th president.

The number “86” is sometimes used in organized crime or gang circles to suggest killing; in more common parlance, however, it connotes getting rid or something, tossing something in the trash, etc. It is not even clear that Comey himself arranged the seashells in his photo, but the claim that, by posting what he’d observed, he was calling for Trump to be assassinated is ridiculous. In the United States, where political speech is protected by the First Amendment, the government may not criminalize the expression of opinion that the incumbent president should be removed or otherwise rejected. (I won’t try to count the number of times Trump did it while Biden was president.)

After uproar generated by the administration, Comey took down the post and publicly asserted that he opposes violence and meant no such suggestion. He also voluntarily submitted to interviews with the Secret Service — which proceeded to drop what should never have been a criminal investigation. There was not a threat of violence against the president, much less an unambiguous call for his assassination. Nor would it be remotely possible, on the known evidence, to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Comey intended violence.

Read the rest here.

Trump is Going After ABC (again)

The Federal Communications Commission has directed Walt Disney Co. to file early license renewal applications for its ABC television stations, citing an ongoing investigation, a day after President Trump called on the company to fire comedian Jimmy Kimmel.

The FCC said in its order that it is investigating ABC stations for "possible violations" of the Communications Act of 1934 and the agency's prohibition on unlawful discrimination. An FCC official told CBS News that the order is related to the agency's investigation into Disney's diversity, equity and inclusion practices, which the official said has been ongoing since March 2025.

In a statement to CBS News, Disney said it has received the FCC's order for an accelerated review of its ABC-owned television stations. 

"ABC and its stations have a long record of operating in full compliance with FCC rules and serving their local communities with trusted news, emergency information, and public‑interest programming," a Disney spokesperson said. "We are confident that the record demonstrates our continued qualifications as licensees under the Communications Act and the First Amendment and are prepared to show that through the appropriate legal channels."

The ABC licenses were originally scheduled for renewal between 2028 and 2031. The company owns eight TV stations, including WABC-TV in New York and KABC-TV in Los Angeles.

Read the rest here.

Jamie Dimon warns of ‘some kind of bond crisis’

CEO Jamie Dimon on Tuesday warned that rising government debt levels could trigger a crisis in the bond market, urging policymakers to act before markets force their hand.

Dimon’s statement was in response to a question about whether he was worried about rising levels of government debt “around the world and in your country.”

“The way it’s going now, there will be some kind of bond crisis, and then we’ll have to deal with it,” Dimon said at an investment conference held by Norway’s sovereign wealth fund, the largest in the world.

“I’m not that worried we’ll be able to deal with it,” Dimon said. “I just think maturity should say you should deal with it, as opposed to let it happen.”

Dimon, who runs the world’s largest bank by market cap, said history has shown that today’s growing mix of risks could combine in unpredictable ways. While the timing is uncertain, failing to address those pressures increases the odds that adjustment comes after upheaval rather than deliberate policy moves.

Read the rest here.

The First Royal Visit to the US (1939)

Meanwhile... The White House posted a picture of President Trump and King Charles III with the caption “two Kings” amid the monarch’s visit to the U.S. on Tuesday.

Suing the Pope? An Aggressive Class Action Presents First Amendment Problems

...The class action, O’Connell v. Conference of Catholic Bishops, threatens to violate the Constitution’s church autonomy principle. The lawsuit started several years ago with Peter’s Pence, a special collection that since the Middle Ages has been taken up by the Roman Catholic Church. It goes directly to the papacy to support the projects and activities of the pope. Lead plaintiff David O’Connell donated to the Peter’s Pence collection after being invited to make the offering during Mass. But he now complains that he was misled. He says that he thought that the church was going to use this for charitable purposes, which he understood to be direct aid to the needy. Only later, he says, did he learn that a substantial part of the Peter’s Pence collection went into long-term investments and supported church infrastructure. And so he decided that he would seek the return of his money by bringing a lawsuit, claiming that he was deceived into thinking that his donations supported charity.

The case was filed in federal court seeking the recovery not only of O’Connell’s donations, but all donations from a class of people who also claimed to be confused about the uses to which Peter’s Pence donations would be put. This class action lawsuit was aggressive; it was creative, but the church thought that it had a strong counter-argument: the church autonomy doctrine. If a court is to decide what counts as a charitable contribution, it would have to take positions on matters of church doctrine and governance. It would have to second-guess the internal decision-making of church leadership on how best to utilize the funds of the Roman Catholic Church and of the papacy in particular.

Read the rest here.

James Comey indicted over seashell photo

The Justice Department secured an indictment Tuesday charging former FBI Director James Comey with threatening the life of President Donald Trump by posting a photo of seashells on Instagram.

The two-count indictment, posted Tuesday afternoon, alleges that a reasonable person would interpret the image of the shells, arranged to spell out “86 47,” as “a serious expression of an intent to do harm to the President of the United States."

Justice Department attorneys sought the indictment in the Eastern District of North Carolina, where Comey has a beach house and where he posted the beach scene photo. The Department of Homeland Security previously investigated Comey, who has long been a Trump target, over the May Instagram post, even subjecting him to questioning by the Secret Service.

Comey had deleted the post, saying it never occurred to him that it would be interpreted as being violent. "Eighty-six" is a term commonly used in restaurants when an item is sold out, and it's also informally used to mean "cancel" or "get rid of."

In a subsequent Instagram post in May, Comey said that he assumed the shells he saw on a beach walk were "a political message" and that he "didn't realize some folks associate those numbers with violence," adding that he opposed violence "of any kind."

Comey said in a video posted after his indictment that he was innocent, that he was not afraid and that he still believed in the independent judiciary.

"They're back," he said of the Trump administration. "This time about a picture of seashells on a North Carolina beach a year ago. And this won't be the end of it."

Read the rest here.

The Rise of Ukraine (and Decline of the US) as the Defender of Freedom

A remarkable thing has happened on the world’s battlefields. Ukraine — a nation that was supposed to dissolve within days of a Russian invasion — has fought Russia to a stalemate, revolutionizing land warfare in the process. It has become an indispensable security partner in the Western alliance, including in the war against Iran.

Now, Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, is taking the next step, one that would have been unthinkable even as recently as 2024. By word and deed, he’s showing Europe and the world how the post-American free world can preserve its liberty and independence. This is what happens when, as Phillips Payson O’Brien wrote in a piece for The Atlantic, “Kyiv appears to have given up on the United States.”

If that is true — and it looks as though it is — it may be worse news for the United States than it is for Ukraine.

Events on the ground and in world capitals are moving so quickly that it’s hard to keep up. First, the strategic situation in the Ukraine war seems to have changed. Last week, Mick Ryan, a retired Australian major general and one of the most astute analysts of the war, wrote that Ukraine has largely stabilized the frontline in eastern Ukraine, deepened its coalition, isolated Russia diplomatically and developed an indigenous arms industry that makes it less dependent on external support.

It’s no longer accurate to think of Ukraine as a desperate underdog; it’s becoming an independent power. Even as it fights for its life against Russia, it’s reportedly reaching defense deals with the Gulf states and with the United States — and this time it’s Ukraine that’s providing military assistance.

In February 2025, President Trump mocked Zelensky in the Oval Office. “You’re not in a good position. You don’t have the cards right now,” Trump said. In April 2026, Ukraine has enough cards left that it’s sharing them.

This might be difficult for many readers to grasp — given our nation’s longstanding military supremacy — but the largest and most battle-hardened land force in the Western world may well be the Ukrainian Army. While the precise numbers are classified, the Atlantic Council estimated in 2025 that Ukraine had roughly a million men and women under arms, the vast majority of whom serve in the ground forces.

America’s total force is larger than Ukraine’s, but to put the size of Ukrainian land forces in perspective, the combined size of the U.S. Army and Marine Corps is around 620,000. It’s also worth noting that the U.S. forces have much less combat experience than Ukraine forces — especially when it comes to combat with a great power.

No one should minimize Ukraine’s manpower issues (more recent estimates place its total number of active troops well below the million-body peak) or the fact that it has no nuclear weapons and Russia has thousands. But its army is still vast, and its military is the only Western force that has fully adapted to modern drone warfare. Indeed, Ukraine is arguably the world’s leader in drone warfare.

Rapid change isn’t occurring just in Ukraine. Other developments across the Western alliance show that European nations are working with shocking speed to free themselves from dependence on America.

Read the rest here.

The Economic Risks From Trump's War Are Real and Growing

Trump's War is Dangerously Depleting US Military Weapons and Ordinance

Since the Iran war began in late February, the United States has burned through around 1,100 of its long-range stealth cruise missiles built for a war with China, close to the total number remaining in the U.S. stockpile. The military has fired off more than 1,000 Tomahawk cruise missiles, roughly 10 times the number it currently buys each year.

The Pentagon used more than 1,200 Patriot interceptor missiles in the war, at more than $4 million a pop, and more than 1,000 Precision Strike and ATACMS ground-based missiles, leaving inventories worrisomely low, according to internal Defense Department estimates and congressional officials.

The Iran war has significantly drained much of the U.S. military’s global supply of munitions, and forced the Pentagon to rush bombs, missiles and other hardware to the Middle East from commands in Asia and Europe. The drawdowns have left these regional commands less ready to confront potential adversaries like Russia and China, and it has forced the United States to find ways to scale up production to address the depletions, Trump administration and congressional officials say.

The conflict has also underscored the Pentagon’s overreliance on excessively expensive missiles and munitions, especially air-defense interceptors, as well as concerns about whether the defense industry can develop cheaper arms, especially attack drones, far more quickly.

Read the rest here.

For Frustrated G.O.P., Redistricting Fight Turns to Florida and the Courtroom

Frustrated Republicans looked Wednesday to rebound from another setback in a nationwide redistricting chess match, as the high-stakes contest turned to Florida and the courtroom.

A Democratic victory on Tuesday in Virginia, where voters approved a change to the state’s House map that could give the party up to four more seats in the midterms, left Republicans with little to show for a tit-for-tat they started last year in Texas at the urging of President Trump.

Republicans are holding out hope that Virginia’s top court might reverse Tuesday’s result. And they are eying a chance to gain ground by redrawing the House map in Florida, where they control the governor’s office and hold supermajorities in the Legislature. But there is growing doubt in the party about its broader strategy.

“The two sides spent hundreds of millions dollars to get back to where they started, and in general, it’s turned out to be a net loser for Republicans,” said C. Stewart Verdery Jr., a Republican consultant.

Read the rest here.

Pew Research: Trends in religious conversions

Christianity has experienced some of the largest losses from religious switching of any faith group around the world, according to our 2024 surveys. Religious switching refers to when people identify with a different religion in adulthood than they were raised in as a child.

Within Christianity, however, religious switching has affected the two largest subgroups – Catholicism and Protestantism – differently:

*Catholicism has lost more people than it’s gained in nearly all countries that we surveyed.

*Protestantism has seen a net gain from switching in nearly as many places as it has seen a net loss.

Here we take a closer look at religious switching into, out of, and between Catholicism and Protestantism, based on Pew Research Center surveys in 24 countries...

Read the rest here.

Are you ready for universal Trump pardons?

President Trump has reportedly told his staff “I’ll pardon everyone who has come within 200 feet of the Oval [Office].” Should we believe his boast, that he will issue pre-emptive presidential pardons to hundreds, if not thousands, of administration staff and officials who may or may not have committed or even been charged with a federal crime?

Although Trump often claims he can or will take certain questionable actions he may have no intention of taking, there are reasons to take this boast seriously.

Could a president issue what amounts to universal administration pardons? Perhaps.

Article II, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution says the president “shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.”

The Supreme Court has generally held that this power is unlimited with respect to federal crimes, but it does not apply to impeachment or crimes charged by state and local law enforcement. And there are other limitations — for example, a president cannot pardon someone for a future crime.

Read the rest here.

Being a Mets fan...

...is just God's way of preparing me for eventual martyrdom.

The Bizarre and Corrupt World of Prediction Markets

This is an excellent overview of the latest fad in online gambling.

ICE Is Determined To Unmask a Reddit User Whose Only Crime Seems To Be Criticizing ICE

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is trying to unmask an anonymous Reddit user whose only crime seems to be criticizing the Trump administration's immigration crackdown. Last month, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), which is part of DHS, withdrew an administrative subpoena demanding information about the Reddit account "Tired_Thumb" after facing a legal challenge in the Northern District of California, where Reddit is headquartered. But as The Intercept reported last week, federal prosecutors in Washington, D.C., now seem intent on obtaining information about the ICE critic from Reddit via a grand jury subpoena.

"Government critics are not suspects and free speech is not a crime," says Will Creeley, legal director of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE). "The First Amendment protects our right to criticize the government anonymously—an American tradition that dates back to the founding. So far, the government hasn't been able to point to a single Reddit post [by Tired_Thumb] that's not protected by the First Amendment. Not one. By putting the administration's feelings above the First Amendment, government agents are sending a deliberate message to each of us: Don't criticize us—or else."

Read the rest here.

Hungary Is a Laboratory for Illiberal Nationalism. The Results Are In.

Last month, Donald Trump offered Viktor Orban his “complete and total endorsement” in a video message ahead of Hungary’s April 12 election. The statement continued the president’s habit of boldly weighing in on the internal politics of other nations. But in this case, he would have been wise to first check the sell-by date of the prime minister and his creaking project of illiberalism.

After repeatedly winning reelection since 2010, Orban and his ruling party, Fidesz, now face a genuine electoral challenge from Peter Magyar and his center-right Tisza Party, which has led in the polls for more than a year while running on an anti-corruption platform. The result will allow the world to gauge Hungarians’ discontent with Orban’s brand of politics. It will also provide an answer to whether it’s possible for an opposition with broad support to win after 16 years under a government that rewrote election laws to its benefit while bringing much of the media under its influence.

The president’s interest in Orban’s political survival is certainly due in part to their rapport, but there’s a deeper nexus, too. Many of Trump’s supporters and allies — including Vice President JD Vance — see Hungary as a bastion of conservative and Christian values in a liberal and secular European Union.

For them, the election carries added significance. Hungary has served as a laboratory for policies promoted by many self-described national conservatives in the United States who want government to positively promote conservative values.

But regardless of the outcome, Orban has already shown that his vision of illiberal nationalism is a dead end that made Hungary poorer and less free.

Read the rest here.

It's time to talk about the 25th amendment.

Donald Trump attacks the pope online. He claims that it was he (Trump) who got the pope elected. And then he posts an image of himself as Jesus Christ.

Mr. Trump is a pathological liar. He is the most corrupt and incompetent president in US history. He appears to be functionally illiterate. His behavior is becoming more erratic by the day. And yes, he has the nuclear launch codes. 

It's time for the country to have an adult conversation about a man who is, on top of all of his other "issues," very probably mentally ill. 

Hungarian Strongman Victor Orban Concedes Election

After sixteen years in power, the pro-Kremlin ruler was ousted in parliamentary elections. 

Christ is Risen!

 

Reports: Pentagon officials menaced Vatican envoy over papal criticism

Briefly interrupting a blog break for Holy Week to report a potentially significant development in relations between the Catholic Church and the Trump Administration.

I'm not sure what to make of this. On the one hand, as of this post the big boys in the press/media world are not reporting on the alleged incident. However, it is getting widespread coverage in what might be called the second tier of the press. Clearly there was a meeting. Why would the Vatican's envoy be summoned to the Pentagon? The Pentagon says the meeting was respectful but have offered no other details. Some reports have gone so far as to claim that the Pope has indefinitely postponed a planned trip to the US. Conspicuously, the Holy See is thus far keeping quiet. 

Hmm...

Meanwhile, the Democrats...

In California Democrats could lock themselves out of the ballot for the governor's race.

And in New York, they are playing dirty in the governor's race. 

Ten Years Ago Donald Trump Promised to Eliminate the National Debt. It Has Doubled.

Ten years ago today, Donald Trump said he would pay off the national debt in the span of just eight years.

That did not happen. Instead, the gross national debt has doubled since that day—from about $19 trillion to over $39 trillion. Much of that additional borrowing has taken place during Trump's five-plus years in the White House.

The gap between Trump's outlandish promise and the brutal fiscal reality of the past decade is not just a political gotcha. It's also an apt illustration of how far and how fast the debt has spiraled. And it's a painful reminder of a missed opportunity that Americans will be facing for a long, long time. The bill for these 10 years of fiscal profligacy will be coming due long after Trump has finally departed from the political scene.

But it's a story that starts, as everything in politics seems to these days, with Trump.

Read the rest here.

Trump is trying to play dictator with the elections

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump on Tuesday signed an executive order to create a nationwide list of verified eligible voters and to restrict mail-in voting, a move that swiftly drew legal threats from state Democratic officials as the president demands further limitations on voting ahead of this year’s midterm elections.

The order, which voting law experts say violates the Constitution by attempting to seize the power to run elections from states, is the latest in a torrent of efforts from Trump to interfere with the way Americans vote based on his false allegations of fraud.

It calls on the Department of Homeland Security, working in conjunction with the Social Security Administration, to make the list of eligible voters in each state, according to the text of the executive order released Tuesday. It also seeks to bar the U.S. Postal Service from sending absentee ballots to those not on each state’s approved list, although the president likely lacks the power to mandate what the Postal Service does.

Read the rest here.

The People Trump Pardoned Are on a Crime Spree

The Constitution grants sweeping pardon powers to the president, which means that public opinion has historically been the only check on that power. The risk of a backlash is the reason that presidents have waited until their last days in office to issue many pardons and commutations, especially dubious ones to family members (like Hunter Biden) or political allies (like Caspar W. Weinberger, whom George H.W. Bush pardoned). The potential for a backlash also made presidents cautious about the number of pardons they issued. They understood that there could be an outcry if somebody who received a pardon later committed a new crime. The pardon system has also relied on the decency of American presidents.

President Trump has abandoned this approach. His self-serving pardons are so numerous that public attention cannot keep up with them. It is a version of the strategy that his former adviser Steve Bannon has described as “flood the zone”: Do so much so fast that people cannot follow the consequences.

He has created a veritable pardon industry, in which people with White House connections accept payments from wealthy convicts. Among those on whom he has bestowed freedom are dozens of people convicted of fraud. He has also pardoned Juan Orlando Hernández, a former president of Honduras, who helped traffic hundreds of tons of cocaine into the United States, and Ross Ulbricht, who was serving a life sentence for running Silk Road, a sprawling criminal enterprise that sold drugs. There seems to be no crime too ugly for a Trump pardon.

Read the rest here.

The Economic Implications of Trump's War

This is one of the best explanations I have seen for what is going on, and what might be coming down the road.

After a long and cold winter, hints of spring for conservative Catholics

The excellent, and often well informed Traditionalist Catholic blog Rorate Caeli has a summary of recent moves by Pope Leo XIV in the Roman Curia. Reading the tea leaves Rorate appears to be fairly optimistic, characterizing developments as "A Return to Normalcy and Competence."

Read their report here. 

Obviously, what goes on in the Catholic Church is to a certain degree not our business. On the other hand the spread of modernist nuttery within the one bastion of Western Christianity that had, ante-Francis largely resisted this malignancy, cannot be viewed as anything other than an alarming development. While I am reserving judgement on Leo, I remain hopeful that he will curb the more dangerous doctrinal and disciplinary strains of the Franciscan era. 

Alarming news from Finland

The Supreme Court of Finland on Thursday (March 26) found a former government minister guilty of “hate speech” for her biblical views on marriage following two prior acquittals by lower courts.

In a 3-2 decision, the court ruled against Päivi Räsänen for expressing her beliefs on marriage and sexual ethics in a 20-year-old church pamphlet. The court also criminally convicted Lutheran Bishop Juhana Pohjola for publishing the 2004 pamphlet, according to legal rights group Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) International.

The court levied fines of several thousand euros on both Räsänen and Pohjola and ordered the removal and destruction of the impugned statements. Räsänen has been sentenced to a fine equivalent to 20 days’ wages (in her case, 1,800 euros) and she will also have to pay her own legal costs, according to Evangelical Focus. Pohjola was also given a 20-day fine, and his publishing house, Finnish Lutheran Foundation, must pay a fine of 5,000 euros.

The convictions were based on “making and keeping available to the public a text that insults a group,” the court ruled.

Read the rest here.

cf: This

On a positive note; summer is coming

From here.

At CPAC a Generational Divide Over Iran

GRAPEVINE, Texas (AP) — A generational divide over the Iran war surfaced Thursday between older attendees and their political heirs at this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference, as the group’s leaders pleaded for unity in a challenging midterm election year for Republicans.

Younger conservatives spoke of disappointment and even “betrayal” over President Donald Trump’s launch of strikes against Iran, saying in interviews with The Associated Press that the president’s actions run counter to his many pledges to oppose foreign entanglements.

Meanwhile, older conservatives were looking past Trump’s campaign criticism of military action to topple foreign regimes, arguing the war in Iran is a pragmatic act forced by threats to the United States.

The bright dividing line emerged in conversations with a dozen participants on either end of the age spectrum who gathered for the annual meeting of conservatives, being held outside Dallas. That split could reflect flagging enthusiasm for Trump among some younger voters, a potentially troubling sign for Republicans heading into midterm elections and for the conservative movement as it looks to build beyond Trump’s tenure.

“We did not want to see more wars. We wanted actual America-first policies, and Trump was very explicit about that,” said Benjamin Williams, a 25-year-old marketing specialist for Young Americans for Liberty. “It does feel like a betrayal, for sure.”

Read the rest here.

Illegal Immigration and Crime

What the stats actually say.

US Shipbuilding and the Jones Act

Last month, I had the chance to sit down with 60 Minutes correspondent Lesley Stahl for a piece on the moribund state of US commercial shipbuilding. That story, “Turning the Ship Around,” aired last weekend, and having now seen it, I’d like to offer a few thoughts.

The segment opens with Stahl describing the US commercial shipbuilding industry as “nearly extinct.” The numbers back her up. As she points out, US shipyards produce around three ships per year. That’s less than what South Korean shipbuilder Hanwha produces in a month. But even that may be too charitable. Three is the US average over the last 25 years. This decade, US shipyards are on track to average roughly one per year.

But that’s just oceangoing cargo ships. Widening the aperture to include other vessel types does little to improve the picture. The most recent data show that the United States, the world’s second-largest manufacturing country, accounts for just 0.04 percent of global commercial shipbuilding output—good enough for 19th place. Over the past decade, the US has averaged 0.24 percent of global output. And it’s trending down.

South Korean firm Hanwha, however, says it will reverse the matter. According to the CEO of its Philly Shipyard, which the company purchased in 2024 for $100 million, the yard is set to transform into a 21st-century enterprise...

Read the rest here.

A war of regression: How Trump bombed the US into a worse position with Iran

Four weeks into a war that was going to take four days, and that has so far cost the US about $30-40bn and Israel $300m a day, Washington is further away from a diplomatic agreement with Iran than it was in May 2025.

Not only has the war failed to persuade Iran to agree to dismantle its nuclear programme in the comprehensive and irreversible way the US demanded in a 15-point paper that it tabled on 23 May last year, Washington is now having to negotiate to reopen the strait of Hormuz, a strategic waterway that has been open ever since the invention of the dhow, with a short exception of a tanker war in the 1980s between Iran and Iraq.

This regression is proving to be perplexing for the American high command. Pete Hegseth, the secretary of defence, recently said that “the only thing prohibiting transit in the strait right now is Iran shooting at shipping”, but this was not quite right. Iran has not been shooting at shipping that much in recent weeks. Instead, it is the fear of Iran shooting at shipping that is scaring off insurers and tanker owners.

Still worse from the US perspective, Iran has set up a waterside stall whereby prime ministers and tanker owners can bargain with the Iranian navy over the toll they are willing to pay for their tankers to be given “free passage”. Iran plans to turn the strait into a money spinner, just as Egypt charges for access to the Suez canal. By some calculations, given the massive scale of the traffic that passes through the strait each year, Iran could raise $80bn a year. If a law currently being rushed through the Iranian parliament passes, tankers carrying oil from favoured non-hostile nations such as India, Japan, Pakistan, South Korea and China will be waved through or offered cheaper rates.

Little wonder Trump is thrashing around. The US along with Israel continues to bomb Iran, but he has now twice put back the date of threatened strikes on Iran’s civilian power stations – an action that would constitute a war crime. He continues to insist Iran has been defeated and yet Iran continues to behave as if it is not.

Read the rest here.

Trump 24-karat gold coin approved by hand-picked federal panel

A commemorative gold coin bearing the image of US President Donald Trump has been approved by a federal arts commission.

The 24-karat gold coin is intended to mark America's 250th birthday this 4 July and portrays Trump with his fists pressed against a desk.

After a presentation by the US Mint, the US Commission of Fine Arts voted unanimously to approve the design, despite questions over its legality.

Federal law does not allow a living president to appear on US currency. But the coin is being issued in accordance with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent's authority and discretion to mint and issue proof gold coins.

Bessent is expected to order the coin to be struck once the US Mint produces final dimensions.

The commission's vice-chairman, James McCrery, said: "I motion to approve this [coin] as presented, and with the strong encouragement that you make it as large as possible, all the way to three inches in diameter."

For comparison, a US quarter dollar is less than an inch wide. Trump last year fired the Commission of Fine Arts' members, replacing them with allies.

Read the rest here.

The Shocking State of Britain's Navy 2026

Underestimating the Potential Energy Shock

It is hard to decide which is the bigger disaster: the unfolding car crash in the global gas market or the mounting danger that entire countries will run out of oil.

The benchmark TTF contract for gas in Europe was €29 (£25) per megawatt-hour (MWh) in mid-February. Bank of America says it could reach €500 this winter if the Strait of Hormuz remains closed for 10 weeks, as it may well do.

That would blow through the record high seen after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and amount to a full-blown economic emergency for Europe, the UK, Japan, South Korea and South Asia.

The picture is dramatically worse after Israel attacked Iran’s South Pars gas field, adding upstream gas and oil infrastructure to the menu of targets on both sides of the Gulf.

Iran’s missile retaliation on Qatar’s Ras Laffan has inflicted serious damage to the giant complex, which alone produces a fifth of the world’s liquefied natural gas (LNG).

It will be months before shipments start again. Qatar Energy says 17pc of production is lost for three to five years. It will have to declare force majeure on LNG supplies to Italy, Korea, China and Belgium.

It is just as bad for oil. The paper market that we all follow does not capture the drama. Physical deliveries are under far greater stress than Brent futures, at about $113, would suggest.

Actual barrels of the Dubai basket and Oman’s Murban are fetching close to $170 a barrel as Asian refiners scramble to buy anything they can. Jet fuel deliveries have hit $210 in Rotterdam and $240 in Singapore.

Kurt Barrow, the vice-president of oil at S&P Global Energy, says it may become physically impossible to obtain supplies. “If the Strait stays closed for two months, you’ll have plants without feedstock and we’ll get real rationing. We’ll have panic buying and hoarding,” he said.

“This is the largest supply disruption ever. Net, we’re around 15 million barrels a day (b/d) short in the market. Crude gets the headline but the actual impact is further downstream in refined products, diesel, jet, fuel or naphtha. There are 68 refineries in the war zone.”

Read the rest here.

Wealth Taxes & Flight... It's Complicated

This is a very good examination of a hot button topic.

Early Color Film Footage from the 1930s Including Pan Am Flying Boats

Meanwhile...

Trump threatens to cut off HIV medication to Zambia unless they cede mineral rights to the US

Trump says he thinks he will have the ‘honor’ of ‘taking Cuba’

Two from CATO

5 Reasons the US Should Not Spend Another Penny on the War with Iran

FCC Threats and the Fog of War: The Government Cannot Be the Arbiter of Truth

Quote of the day...

“You have lost the confidence and the trust of this court. You have lost the confidence and the trust of the New Jersey legal community, and you are losing the trust and confidence of the public.” 

- US Federal District Judge Zahid N. Quraishi to the US Prosecutor 3/16/2026

Anarchists, Political Violence, and Legal Isonomia

The anarchist as a figure in crime is distinct. His goals are not financial, and the terrorist acts committed under the heading of anarchism have ranged from assassinations of public figures to bombings of random civilians. He has also slid far enough into history to seem quaint, or vaguely romantic, from the vantage point of the twenty-first century. 

The anarchist “movement” (if we could apply such a concept to a decentralized group) was the beginning of modern global terrorism. The idea that killing, bombing, were a tactic to bring adversaries to the negotiating table, in the age of mass media, was a novel concept, in the late nineteenth century. It would be a model followed by various political sects to come. But anarchists did not want negotiations. 

Their nihilism marks them out against groups like the Fenians (roughly contemporary, and operating mostly in Britain, with some activities in North America), who had a clear political goal. The Fenians wanted Ireland to be independent from Britain. Whether one agreed with their tactics, the motive was coherent (if alarming to the British authorities). 

Meanwhile, the anarchists (unlike socialists) tended to offer vague ideals as their results. They did not participate in elections or seek to gain support through normal political means. “Burn it all down” was their message. One that was resonant for disaffected young men - as it always has been. There’s a reason terrorist groups and street gangs alike all recruit from this particular demographic.

Read the rest here.

And the Oscar goes to...

Iran: My thoughts...

Any fool with a military can unilaterally start a war. But ending one, short of total and absolute destruction of your enemy (i.e. Germany 1945) is much harder. This war is likely to last a long time because Trump has completely misunderstood who he is dealing with. Religious fanatics who are unafraid of death, and who have highly developed plans to run a decentralized war, involving low tech weapons like drones and mines. To win this war, Trump needs to break the regime's willingness to fight and humiliate them on a level that leaves no doubt who won. For Iran to win, all they need to do is endure, and continue to inflict pain, primarily economic but also some military, until the American people have had enough of a war that is already deeply unpopular. The US is further hamstrung by poor planning and a reluctance to go "all in" by invading with ground forces. Additionally there is a finite supply of ordinance and high tech munitions which cannot be replaced either quickly or cheaply and which we are burning through at an alarming rate. (A fact that both China and Russia are paying very close attention to.) As of right now, I'd be a little surprised if this war ends before the November mid-term elections because the Iranians have zero interest in ending hostilities before then.

Doug Wilson Explains the Future American Christian Theocracy

Pete Hegseth's pastor and mentor says the United States should ban public Masses, Marian processions, and Corpus Christi devotions. Hegseth invited the anti-Catholic preacher to lead a prayer service at the Pentagon on February 14.

From here.

Video here.

The Good Old Days

Discontent fueled the 2025 New York City mayoral election and Zohran Mamdani’s victory. A common theme echoed across the five boroughs: New York is a hard place to live. “We are overwhelmed by housing costs,” said Santiago, a 69-year-old retiree, outside a Mamdani rally. Those opposed to Mamdani had their own complaints. María Moreno, a first-time voter from the Bronx who supported Andrew Cuomo, lamented, “Now everything’s dirty, and our neighborhood does not feel safe.”

Today’s voters have legitimate grievances. The city’s housing costs, quality-of-life issues, and perceptions of disorder weigh heavily on residents’ minds. But it’s important to keep things in perspective. Different voters may romanticize different eras, but many seem to share a sense that if they could travel back far enough in time, they’d find a New York that was once clean, safe, and affordable. When Americans were polled in 2023, almost 20 percent said that it was easier to “have a thriving and fulfilling life” hundreds of years ago. Across the country, as one writer put it, people are engaged in an “endless debate around whether the pre-industrial past was clearly better than what we have now.” In fact, Mamdani’s politics are grounded in an ideology that first arose from the frustrations of the early industrial era.

If Americans could go back in time to preindustrial New York City, however, they’d likely be horrified and possibly traumatized. Despite today’s real challenges, most New Yorkers would not trade places with their predecessors.

Long before the rise of factories and industry, New York City was a bustling port, founded by the Dutch as New Amsterdam in order to trade furs in the early seventeenth century. As early as 1650, local authorities enacted an ordinance against animals roaming the streets to protect local infrastructure—but to no avail. Then, in 1657, according to the Dutch scholar Jaap Harskamp:

New Amsterdam’s council attempted to ban the common practice of throwing rubbish, ashes, oyster-shells or dead animals in the street and leave the filth there to be consumed by droves of pigs on the loose. When the English took over the colony from the Dutch, pigs and goats stayed put. . . . Pollution persisted. The streets of Manhattan were a stinking mass. Inhabitants hurled carcasses and the contents of loaded chamber pots into the street and rivers. Runoff from tanneries where skins were turned into leather flowed into the waters that supplied the shallow wells. The (salty) natural springs and ponds in the region became contaminated with animal and human waste. For some considerable time, access to clean water remained an urgent problem for the city. . . . The penetrating smell of decomposing flesh was everywhere.

Into the early twentieth century, urban living in the United States felt surprisingly rural and agrarian, with an omnipresent reek to match. As late as the mid-nineteenth century, pigs roamed freely through New York City streets, acting as scavengers, and nearly every household maintained a vegetable garden, often fertilized with animal manure.

Indoor air quality was no better. A drawing from Mary L. Booth’s History of the City of New York depicts a seventeenth-century New Amsterdam home with smoke from the fireplace swirling through the room. Indoor air pollution remains a serious problem today in the poorest parts of the world, as smoke from hearths can cause cancer and acute respiratory infections that often prove deadly in children. One preindustrial writer railed against the “pernicious smoke [from fireplaces] superinducing a sooty Crust or furr upon all that it lights, spoyling the moveables, tarnishing the Plate, Gildings and Furniture, and Corroding the very Iron-bars and hardest stone with those piercing and acrimonious Spirits which accompany its Sulphur.”

Read the rest here.