NY State of Mind

August 8, 2025

NY begins the last chapter of its self-destruction this year. By 2035, every new motor vehicle offered for sale in NY must be fossil-fuel free…that is, electric. But that electric-vehicle mandate begins its 10-year phase in at year-endthis year! By the end of 2025, 35% of new vehicles on dealers’ lots must be electric. That percentage gradually increases to 68% by 2030 and 100% by 2035. The mandate includes all cars, SUVs and pickup trucks. Where will the electricity to power these vehicles come from? Governor Hochul neither knows nor cares. But I’d predict electricity rates in NY will be on the way up. So will the prices of reliable used cars.

To help offset the increased cost of cars and electricity, Governor Hochul will be handing out free money. Nothing stokes inflation like a free money giveaway. But, having learned nothing from the 20% inflation ignited in part by the Covid giveaways and the grossly misnamed “Inflation Reduction Act,” as part of her 2026 budget deal, the governor has unveiled a $2 billion “inflation refund” plan for 2026. The initiative will distribute checks to some 8 million New Yorkers. Checks will be for $200, $300 or $400, depending upon income. More inflation is sure to follow.

And then there is The Commie Mamdani. Democratic Socialist Zohran Mamdani seems a shoo-in to win the mayoral race in NYC. He is already the face of the Democrat Party and has become emblematic of the kind of politician young NY’ers are looking to for leadership. The kind who offers free stuff.

All of this spells disaster for NY… especially NYC. What the heck are they thinking?

Unfortunately, disasters like this rarely stay confined to those responsible. The electric grid throughout the northeast will almost certainly be impacted. So will neighboring economies. It’s going to be a bumpy ride to the bottom.

Celebrate America250: Ruining Lord Germain’s Career

Steve Fast

August 7, 2025

10 10401

Most often we analyze American wars from our own perspective. We look at the decisions that our commanders made or should have made. We ask why we won or lost a battle, a campaign, or a war. But there are two sides to a war, and the British made mistakes in the Revolutionary War that lost them the conflict and ruined many careers. Lord George Germain is one leader who often receives the lion’s share of the blame for losing America.

George Germain, 1st Viscount Sackville. Source: Wikipedia.

George Germain was the Secretary of State for America from November 1775 to February 1782, and had primary responsibility for the conduct of the war during those years. He was a British army officer and a member of parliament from 1733. He became an ally of Frederick, Lord North, who was the First Lord of the Treasury and thus effectively prime minister from 1770 to 1782. As Secretary of State for America, Germain was responsible for planning strategy, assigning officers, and supplying men, ships, and supplies to the forces. He communicated these decisions from London to the commanders in North America by sending letters on ships, which took 6-8 weeks. So his decisions were slowly received, and he often did not understand the situation well.

For example, Germain designed the disastrous strategy of 1777 when Burgoyne was supposed to march south from Canada and William Howe was supposed to divide his forces and send troops north to support Burgoyne and to send troops south to capture Philadelphia. This would simultaneously cut off troublesome New England from the rest of the colonies and capture the rebel capital. But Germain did not send the troops that had been agreed on, so Howe did not have enough troops to send north to support Burgoyne. As a result, American Gen. Horatio Gates defeated Burgoyne at Saratoga, and the Continental Congress eluded Howe’s forces attacking Philadelphia. In the end, neither British general accomplished his objectives. Worst of all, the British defeat at Saratoga convinced the French to enter the war. In effect, Germain’s failure to send the agreed-upon troops resulted in a colonial rebellion becoming a global war with Britain’s main European rival.

But was Germain really responsible for not supplying the necessary troops? Because of financial constraints from the cost of the Seven Years’ War (French and Indian War), Britain had reduced the size of its navy and army. Although Britain still had the largest navy in the world, it did not have enough ships to control the American seacoast and to supply its army in North America. And it did not have sufficient troops to occupy all of the thirteen colonies. It could capture individual cities, but it could not hold all of the American colonies. Thus, Washington could always keep an army in the field. And the Continental Congress could always decamp to another city and continue governing the United States. Germain simply did not have the resources required.

But Germain’s real fault lay in not designing a political and military strategy that took account of British limitations. He did not recognize that Britain lacked the naval and military forces for a successful conquest and occupation of America. He should have combined a political strategy to address some of the patriots’ objections with a military strategy that took account of Britain’s limited resources. By overpromising troops and then not delivering in the 1777 campaign, he left Britain open to defeat in America and made Britain vulnerable to its European enemies, France, Spain, and the Netherlands.

As the war dragged on in the late 1770s and early 1780s, it became increasingly unpopular in Britain. King George III and the prime minister Lord North recognized the defeat at Yorktown in October 1781 as the final catastrophe. When the news of the defeat reached Lord North, he appointed the unfortunate Germain to take the news to the King. The King’s speech from the throne two days later had to be hastily rewritten to take account of the defeat. The news of the defeat dismayed Lord North’s party in parliament and galvanized the opposition. By February 1782, North had lost his majority in parliament and was forced to resign.

Germain only agreed to resign as Secretary of State in exchange for being made Baron Bolebrooke and appointed to the House of Lords. In an unusual move, some members of the Lords opposed his being made a peer, although he rallied support and was eventually appointed anyway. His health deteriorated, and he died in 1785. Although his defenders made efforts to rehabilitate his reputation, in Britain he was held primarily responsible for the defeat. But Germain was only one of many British political leaders and military commanders whose reputations were ruined by the defeat in the Revolutionary War.

Damn the Torpedoes, Full Speed Ahead!

Susan Quinn

August 7, 2025

15 11500

This morning, I was inspired by a piece written by Catherine Salgado that a friend sent to me. I hope you’ll find it inspiring, too. In part, here’s what she wrote:

On this day in 1864, Union Adm. David Farragut was lashed to the rigging of the USS Hartford, surveying the progress of the Civil War Battle of Mobile Bay. His fleet of ironclads and wooden ships aimed to take one of the last open Confederate ports, that of Mobile Bay, Alabama. Unfortunately, the Confederates had set up a maritime mine field in the waters of the bay to prevent any ships from getting through. Not to mention the forts within firing range of the Union fleet.

The ironclad USS Tecumseh ran into a torpedo and sank. Union captains of the other ships, though within range of Fort Morgan, began to issue orders to halt their ships, not wanting to be the next vessel to sink thanks to a torpedo. Farragut, however, was determined to have victory no matter the risks. ‘Damn the torpedoes! Full speed ahead!’ he roared. The USS Hartford charged through the minefield and Farragut won a critical victory.

These are times when I find it is easy to become cynical about the future of our country. There seem to be so many evil and negative forces that want to take us down, that want to discourage us from fighting those forces, that want us to give up the battle. But Farragut reminds us that this is not the time to falter. We must continue the fight, cry out against the enemies of the state, and even inspire others to take up the battle alongside us. We can find a way to use our passion, whether we attend school board meetings, city council meetings, political activities, write an essay or even speak to those who share our views, and maybe even those who don’t. At those times when we may feel discouraged, we can remind ourselves that we are honoring the Founders’ hopes and dreams, and continuing the legacy of freedom and the Republic. That’s why I love Farragut’s statement:

Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!

From Link Trainer to Occupation Duty in Japan

Orange Gerald

August 7, 2025

9 8

I am reminded today of my late Uncle Al. Al was a junior enlisted man during WWII, training pilots using the Link Trainer. I have previously written about that system here.

Al had been a National Guardsman before the war and spent the war years stateside training pilots. He told me many times, “There were no promotions this side of the oceans.” Even though he became a pilot himself, he never made NCO.

Soldiers accumulated points based on time in service, time in combat, and other contributions to the war effort. Once a certain number of points was acquired, one was eligible for discharge. As a junior enlisted man with no overseas or combat experience, Al didn’t have many points.

When the war ended, Al’s job training pilots also ended. Many men were discharged, but he was ordered to Japan for occupation duty, with the prospect of continued service for an indefinite period of time. He was quite unhappy.

He was actually standing in line to draw equipment for his new assignment when an announcement came over the public address system. There were new point values being awarded, which, after a quick mental calculation, put him over the top for discharge. With intense gratitude, he stepped out of line and went to apply for his promotion to civilian.

The power of gerrymandering

Dr. Bastiat

August 7, 2025

29 17691

As you’ve probably heard, Texas Republicans have proposed redistricting their state to favor the Republican Party in their state legislature. Texas Democrats realize that they’ll lose this vote, so they’ve decided to do a series of town halls and other presentations around the state, explaining why gerrymandering is bad, and why the voters should put an end to this practice.

Ha! Just kidding, of course. Texas Democrats realize that they’ll lose this vote, so they left the state to prevent the Republicans from having a quorum, so they can’t pass anything. Ironically, they went to Illinois, which is one of the most heavily gerrymandered states in the country. Rich Lowry has a great article up in which he points out that Illinois Republicans won nearly 44% of the vote, but only about 17% of the state House seats. California Republicans won nearly 40% of the vote, but only about 17% of the House seats.

Democrats don’t want to stop gerrymandering. They want to control gerrymandering because they understand how powerful it is. There are no Democrat states. There are only Democrat cities. If Democrats don’t gerrymander, then Congress would more closely represent the views of the American people. This would obviously be disastrous for Democrats. So they don’t want to stop it. That would remove any influence they have in Congress. So all they can do is try to prevent the Republicans from doing the same thing.

I was talking to a Democrat patient yesterday – he was furious about Republican efforts to gerrymander Texas. I agreed with him, saying that we should ban gerrymandering completely. He looked at me for a second, then said, “You’re a Republican. Of course you would say that.”

Imagine being a Democrat voter and supporting gerrymandering so that the American government will NOT represent the will of the people.

I’ve spent a lot of time over the past 10 years or so trying to understand the thinking of leftists. I figured that once I understood their thought process, I would become more sympathetic to them.

I was wrong.

[Member Post]

Ekosj

August 6, 2025

15 11

The “future of care”: abolish the family, collectivize child-rearing, normalize sex work, and radicalize children into the movement. Video of a panel discussion about the family from the “Socialism 2025” conference was posted to the National Democratic Socialists’ website. It’s priceless… “I want to perform abortions at a church before it’s all said […]

⚠️ This is a members-only post on Ricochet's Member Feed. Want to read it? Join Ricochet's community of conservatives and be part of the conversation.

Namaste or Should I Go? A Few Days in Kathmandu, Part 1

Andrew Troutman

August 6, 2025

20 10

I was given five days of vacation by my rather stingy employer, and chose to go visit Nepal again, for the food, the animals, the nice people and, of course, the ticket price. Let me tell you what I saw, in a couple of posts, to make it easily digestible and easy to bail out, if you choose.

I left Korea on Wednesday afternoon. I flew the surly skies with China Southern, a kind of Dollar General airline. (Like Monty Python’s “Fly EZ, the airline that can’t afford to crash.”) The cabin was hot enough to steam salmon, and the lukewarm drinks were served in 4-ounce paper cups.

I finally had the opportunity to play this little airplane joke, which my seat-mates did not see the humor of, but I was pleased.

I transferred planes in Gwangzhou, China, and was a few seconds away from missing the connecting flight and spending the night there. The Chinese TSA opened everyone’s bags and patted down (full body) every transferring flier. It took quite a while. On the grass, just off the tarmac, tractors aplenty. John Deeres!

After another sweaty flight on what must be China’s least-respected airline, we hit Tribhuvan Airport in Kathmandu at about 11:30 pm. Saw female and male Nepali TSA giggling over who had to frisk the obviously trans-female going through yet another screening on the way out. The fake female was giggling too. He knew he was fooling no one.

I paid the $30 visa fee and pretty quickly was into the blur and chaos of the arrivals lobby, mobs of people, incredibly loud clanging electric fans, and above it all, “Hotel California,” blaring out of the coffee shop. Coffee’s a newish thing in Nepal. Drinking it gives off the impression of money, so I was told. Tea is old school, but coffee plantations are taking root. (Bought two bags of beans. They’re GOOD.)

Osho (subject of a must-see Netflix documentary) welcomes everyone to Nepal. Glad to see he’s found another country to flee to!

One thing I learned last time I was in Nepal is that you have to be ready to shrug a lot of things off. That’s Nepal! Amid the great Himalayas, Annapurnas, the forests and the welcoming environment, the country is a mess – no traffic lights, frequent power outages, poverty and NOISE.

I would wager that even if you check into an expensive resort, something major will be wrong with your room. (Last time in Nepal, at a “resort” in Chitwan, mud crept into the room at weird intervals.)

I wasn’t in a resort this time, but what was supposedly a 4.5-star TripAdvisor hotel. It looked pretty nice and clean. (There were old mattresses here and there in the hallways.) I chose it for the Indo-Nepali veg restaurant attached, with free breakfast. I got a room with a view of a huge Hindu temple and a whir of colorful, bustling activity, women in bright saris and men in dhaka topis, Nepali square hats. I know nothing about Hindus, but they definitely buy a lot of marigolds, colored powders and beads at all hours. And they “cross” themselves kind of like Catholics.

Despite the view, I got a room with a ceiling covered in mold, no wifi, no working TV, no hot water, and a broken bidet (a sprayer). That’s Nepal!

The desk clerk was amenable but surprised when I told him I wanted to change rooms. He couldn’t believe I wanted to give up that temple view! I was moved to a room with no mold, no windows, no wifi, no working TV, but with hot water and a bidet (a sprayer, like you’d have in your kitchen sink).

Okay, but the food WAS great. That, too, is Nepal. During my stay, I ate nothing but Indo-Nepali food (there is quite a bit of overlap), two meals a day, and did not eat the same thing twice. Let’s stop here with a picture of one of the last things I ate, Sandeko Momos, a spicy Nepali vegetable dumpling.

Dear Ms. Maddow (part two)

GrandpaPublius

August 6, 2025

6 9

Dear Ms. Maddow,

I saw your show last night. I am not a regular. To be honest, I only watch your network when I think it might offer an opportunity for schadenfreude. Last night, however, I was genuinely curious about what you would say about the unraveling of the hoax I mentioned in my earlier letter. I was not expecting to be pleasantly surprised, but I harbored a small, fleeting spark of hope.

Alas, the unraveling of the Russia Russia Russia hoax was not a topic discussed on your show.

The topic of your long opening monologue was summarized by the graphic behind you as IT’S NOT COMING. IT’S HERE. The “it” being a fascist dictatorship taking over the USA.

The principal evidence of this dictatorship being, in your words, a secret police force and concentration camps.

I would like to make a couple of points.

First, ICE is not secret. Everyone knows ICE exists, and everyone knows what they do, and what they don’t do. Yes, they often wear masks, but they also wear uniforms that say ICE in big, bold letters. Anyone arrested knows exactly who is doing the arresting.

You never defined the term “secret police.” If I may, I would suggest a couple features. One, they would be outside the established legal system. There would be no legal authority for their actions. There would be no judicial review of their actions. Ms. Maddow, there is nothing illegal about ICE. Their mandate is found in statutes passed by Congress. Everything they do is subject to judicial review.

Two, my notion of a secret police force is that they would act against the political enemies of the dictator. Illegal immigrants are not political enemies of anyone. Ms. Maddow, you are a proud political enemy of President Trump, as is everyone who works for your employer. Do you fear ICE? Really?

Ms. Maddow, I don’t wish to alarm you, but my personal test for knowing “IT’S HERE” would be your own sudden disappearance. Please be at ease, I place the odds of that happening at zero.

As for concentration camps, well, they all have one thing in common. Once in, you don’t get to leave. Without exception, anyone in ICE detention can leave whenever they want. The only requirement is that they agree to return to their home country. I know that sounds harsh to you. But, either that is the rule, or we have open borders. There is no other choice. That is what having a border means.

In violation of federal law, the Biden administration admitted roughly ten million unvetted immigrants into the country. The Trump administration’s effort to remedy Biden’s malfeasance by deporting these illegal migrants is not contrary to the law. It is pursuant to law. When it comes to immigration policy, “IT” (being lawlessness) was here under Biden. IT has left town.

The central event of your monologue was the apprehension of a Purdue undergrad here legally on a long-term visa. As told by you, it was indeed upsetting. (You even got emotional a couple times. It was touching.) And, if this were a widespread pattern of misconduct, and if this particular mistake is not soon rectified, then a case can be made for some ICE employees to be disciplined. Fortunately for the young lady in question, you disclosed at the very end of your show that she had already been released. You made it seem like you just learned of this development during the 40 minutes from the end of your monologue to the end of the show.

The other two topics of the show were the brave democracy defenders fleeing Texas to prevent the legal democratic process from functioning, and an interview with a lawyer seeking to get a couple DOJ lawyers disbarred for lying to a federal judge.

Ms. Maddow, I have no first-hand, nor even second-hand, relevant knowledge; but, I am willing to bet you a modest sum that one, you knew full well that the star victim of your monologue was safely home before you went on the air; and two, that the legal pleadings of your intrepid lawyer hero contain more falsehoods than the legal pleadings of the DOJ lawyers he is seeking to disbar.

In the future, unless I get advance assurance that the Russia hoax is on your agenda, I will not be watching. As a senior citizen, no one can make me eat broccoli, and no one can make me watch your show.

Sincerely,

G-Pub

Questioning Maslow & Bloom

Mark Eckel

August 6, 2025

10 7344

It is important to think about “thinking.”

There is a new book out on biblical integration that accepts the patterns of Bloom’s Taxonomy and Maslow’s Hierarchy as if they were given from Mt. Sinai. That upsets me. Why? The source of an idea matters. Consider that Bloom’s Taxonomy only concerns itself with the intellect, leaving out any attitudinal concerns. Or consider that Maslow’s Hierarchy ends with “self-actualization,” without any reference to supernatural concerns, contrary to a Christian point of view.

As an academic, I will read or listen to anyone’s point of view. What concerns me is when people will not give honest attention to the worldview of the person holding the position. The content of belief comes from someone who begins with an assumption that may be different from mine. As a teacher, I should always be cognizant of that idea.

Thanks for spending this minute with me, Dr. Mark Eckel.

Mark Eckel (MA English, ThM Old Testament, PhD Social Science Research) is Executive Director of the Center for Biblical Integration, Liberty University.

“Give Me a Minute” is an ongoing effort to simply, clearly, and quickly explain aspects of true Truth. [First published at MarkEckel.com]

Gratitude, as always, to my longtime friend, videographer, and tech guru Josh for his continued service.

AFTERWORD

Every theory comes from a worldview held by a person who subscribes to that view.

Maslow’s view of life excised any transcendent truth, making his hierarchy earthbound and human-centered.

Bloom focuses almost exclusively on cognitive and behavioral verbs in his taxonomy (“motive” and “value” may be two exceptions; nonetheless, there is no understanding of the internal nature of the person given by that verbiage). Do consider “Breaking Down the Bad of Bloom’s” by Jason Barney.

I am not arguing that elements of these theories are all wrong. What I am concerned about is an acceptance without Christian critique of these or any theories. Maslow’s focus on “family” is important to me. I utilize the verbs in Bloom for lesson plan development. However . . .

A biblical view would include ideas that are purely intrinsic, a transformation only possible by internal change.

I finished a journal essay, one section given to educational affective objectives (if you’re keeping track, I have written on the topic in these Friday emails obtained by sign up at the pop-up at MarkEckel.com : 4.4.25, 1.31.25, 4.26.24). Here is part of what I wrote:

Doctrine should be internalized, affecting our affections. Students in my Spring 2025 Gothic horror literature class, for instance, would be asked about doctrine through affective questions. Each query is burgeoning with creaturely concerns:

How has your attitude changed?
How have you been internally motivated?
What virtues should you display?
How has this experience brought you joy?
How have you been caused to repent of anything in your life?[1]

Notice that none of these ideas (attitude, motivation, virtue, joy, repentance) can be seen or held in one’s hand. As I have written elsewhere: “You can’t see an attitude. You can’t touch an emotion. You can’t taste a mindset. But I can certainly experience attitude, emotion, and mindset in a person’s body language, tone of voice, or facial expression. In education we call this kind of learning affective. Learning that reaches to one’s thought process, that works to transform someone’s spirit, is affective learning. Learning that reaches to one’s thought process, that works to transform someone’s spirit, is affective learning.”

The Problems with Trade Deals

Steve Fast

August 6, 2025

98 14

Regardless of whether you like Trump and tariffs (mostly yes on the former and absolutely not on the latter, for me), there are some significant problems with the trade deals.

The trade deals are executive agreements, so they can be changed by the next president. Thus, there is only limited stability for business. And executive agreements are of dubious constitutionality, at least they were when Obama was doing them with Iran.

Trump has already changed tariff terms numerous times with some countries. Sometimes on what seems to be a whim and sometimes for good reason, like when he threatened Canada with higher tariffs if they recognize “PLO-Hamastan” as a state. They do seem to be a powerful tool of diplomacy, but that comes at a cost of less stability for business.

They are complicated. There are exceptions for various types of goods. Each country has different rates now. USMCA goods are exempt, etc. Our tariff schedules were not simple before this, but now they are much more complicated. It’s often not clear from the press releases what is included in which categories, so it would be hard to know what you’re paying when you import, at least until it gets worked out.

The last two items have been argued endlessly on here already, but I’ll include them for the sake of completeness.

The rates are going up 20-30X. We had average tariff rates of about 1.5% before this, and many of the latest rates are now 15-35%. Economic growth will take a hit as we become a less efficient and more closed economy.

There is the dubious statutory and constitutional authority for the president to lay and collect duties. The courts could (and should) find all these schemes unconstitutional. I wouldn’t have wanted President Obama or Biden to have this power, and I wouldn’t want President Newsom or AOC to have this power in 2029.

Apologies to the BLS

Old Bathos

August 5, 2025

34 16

In the Biden years, the reported job numbers each month were positive. Then about 3 weeks later, there would be a significant downward correction. EVERY MONTH. I just assumed that this was partisan hackery–an attempt to feed fake happy numbers to the media followed by quiet corrections back to the real numbers.

But now the recent jobs report and subsequent correction follow exactly the same pattern as under Biden–only with an even bigger correction than usual. You would think that whatever metrics are being used, they would be adjusted or revised so as not to require issuing these embarrassing subsequent admissions of having issued lousy data every time.

I apologize for insinuating political bias when it is apparently just that those guys are not very good at what they do.

The only real difference is that under Biden, the MSM reported the happy initial numbers and ignored the corrections, but under Trump, the reverse is true.

Paul Johnson’s Modern Times: A History of the 20th Century

Fractad

August 5, 2025

15 10

I read Paul Johnson’s Modern Times when he published a revised edition in 1991. I liked it very much, and I appreciated his heterodox takes on the events of the twentieth century that went against conventional opinion. I decided to reread it and see if it held up after more than three decades. I think it does, but I found it more depressing than I remembered it being the first time I read it.

Johnson begins his history with the scientific verification of Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity. On May 29, 1919, photographs of a solar eclipse confirmed Einstein’s predictions of light “bending” due to gravitational pull. From this successful experiment, Newton’s description of a deterministic universe governed by mechanical laws was rendered obsolete. Johnson uses this event to put forward his thesis that the turmoil and carnage of the twentieth century resulted from a loss of belief in absolutes – in other words, moral relativism ruled the day.

Over and over again, he makes the case that the horrors of Leninism, Stalinism, Nazism, fascism, and other twentieth-century ideologies were simply moral relativism taken to its logical extremes. Even the “good guys” – the Allied Powers that defeated Germany and Japan in WWII – succumbed to moral relativism and committed terrible acts, such as the firebombing of Dresden – an act of war that would have been inconceivable in the nineteenth century.

What makes Modern Times such an excellent work is its comprehensive reach; it truly is a world history. While Johnson carefully chronicles the struggles of Europe to recover from WWI, he also spends as much time explaining the agonies China was undergoing at the same time, and how Japan became the belligerent power that thought it could take on the United States. He also devotes many pages to how Africa fared as the colonial powers left and the African nations tried to build workable governing systems.

Even though Johnson is British, he is not afraid to criticize his country when that criticism is justified. Here’s how he describes the British Empire during the interwar era:

There is a vital moral here. Britain could be just to her colonial subjects so long as she was a comparatively wealthy nation. A rich power could run a prosperous and well-conducted empire. Poor nations, like Spain and Portugal, could not afford justice or forgo exploitation. But it follows from this, as many British statesmen had insisted throughout the nineteenth century, that colonies were not a source of strength but of weakness. They were a luxury, maintained for prestige and paid for by diverting real resources. The concept of a colonial superpower was largely fraudulent. As a military and economic colossus, the British Empire was made of lath and plaster, paint and gilding.

Johnson, Paul. Modern Times Revised Edition: The World from the Twenties to the Nineties (p. 239). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

He also has a sarcastic wit, as exemplified by this opening sentence of Chapter 5: An Infernal Theocracy, a Celestial Chaos:

While Winston Churchill was assuring the comatose Baldwin that Japan meant no harm, its economy was growing at a faster rate than any other nation, its population was rising by a million a year and its ruler was a god-king who was also insane.

Johnson, Paul. Modern Times Revised Edition: The World from the Twenties to the Nineties (p. 260). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

Another theme that emerges as the reader is guided through the twentieth century is how often missed opportunities led to disaster. Of course, hindsight is 20/20, but there are times when it is hard to believe people in positions of power didn’t see what was in front of them. Johnson explains it this way:

If the decline of Christianity created the modern political zealot–and his crimes–so the evaporation of religious faith among the educated left a vacuum in the minds of Western intellectuals easily filled by secular superstition. There is no other explanation for the credulity with which scientists, accustomed to evaluating evidence, and writers, whose whole function was to study and criticize society, accepted the crudest Stalinist propaganda at its face value. They needed to believe; they wanted to be duped.

Johnson, Paul. Modern Times Revised Edition: The World from the Twenties to the Nineties (p. 404). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

I mentioned that Johnson often goes against “received wisdom” when it comes to history, and a case in point is his championing of the Warren Harding presidency that followed Woodrow Wilson’s. I know from my own high school experience that I was taught Wilson was an exceptionally good president with many wonderful accomplishments to his credit, while Harding was one of the worst with a corrupt administration. After reading Johnson’s account, I’m much more likely to give Harding credit for allowing America to grow and develop without government meddling.

Another eye-opening section is Johnson’s explanation of the roots of the seemingly never-ending conflicts in the Middle East.

In 1921 they [Britain] authorized a Supreme Muslim Council to direct religious affairs; and it appointed Mohammed Amin al-Husseini, head of the biggest landowning clan in Palestine, to be senior judge or Mufti of Jerusalem for life. It was one of the most fatal appointments in modern history. … The Mufti outrivalled Hitler in his hatred for Jews. But he did something even more destructive than killing Jewish settlers. He organized the systematic destruction of Arab moderates. There were many of them in 1920s Palestine. Some of them even welcomed Jewish settlers with modern agricultural ideas and sold land to them. Arabs and Jews might have lived together as two prosperous communities. But the Mufti found in Emile Ghori a terrorist leader of exceptional ability, whose assassination squads systematically murdered the leading Arab moderates–the great majority of the Mufti’s victims were Arabs–and silenced the rest. By the end of the 1930s Arab moderate opinion had ceased to exist, at least in public, the Arab states had been mobilized behind Arab extremism, the British Foreign Office had been persuaded that continued access to oil was incompatible with continued Jewish immigration, and the 1939 White Paper virtually brought it to an end and, in effect, repudiated the Balfour Declaration: ‘a gross breach of faith’, as Churchill put it.

Johnson, Paul. Modern Times Revised Edition: The World from the Twenties to the Nineties (pp. 703-704). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

As the twentieth century progressed, Johnson laments the rise of the “professional politicians” – men who never worked at any job except running for office, and as a result have no idea how to start and maintain a small business, run a farm, distribute goods efficiently, or protect property. It’s a sad fact that today we take it for granted that nearly all of our elected representatives these days come from this professional politician class.

Modern Times concludes with a long chapter that covers the mid-eighties to the early nineties. It’s bittersweet to read how optimistic Johnson was after the successful alliance that expelled Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi forces from Kuwait. He thought the world had learned from the mistakes it made in the twentieth century, and a new era of turning away from government-led solutions to society’s ills to individual empowerment was dawning. Despite that not exactly materializing, Modern Times is a clear-eyed account of an amazing century. It saw the invention of the electric light bulb, radio, television, airplanes, nuclear power, microchips, and home computers. There were incredible discoveries in medicine. The per capita wealth of the entire planet began to rise rapidly. Life expectancy made huge gains. Communism rose and fell. And yet, it was also the deadliest century in humanity’s history. Hundreds of millions of people were killed by their own governments or in wars. Let’s hope the twenty-first century avoids that fate.

A tribute to the 70s

Gossamer Cat

August 5, 2025

45 9621

Summer concert season is in full swing. It seems like every village, town and park is hosting a free outdoor concert. Sitting under the summer sky, usually around sunset, listening to music is a glorious thing. I find it just isn’t summer until I’ve packed up my chair and cooler, fought for parking, lugged my stuff a half mile or so to the venue and plunked myself down in the summer swelter that soon turns to a cool summer night. It is a great way to commune with your neighbors – I always see someone I know – and even if I don’t, we often strike up conversations with those plunked next to us.

Over the past few years, I have noted that the musical acts have shifted from predominantly local bands and specific music genres (jazz, country, etc.) to almost exclusively tribute bands. Tribute bands specialize in performing the music of a specific band or artist. They don’t just cover songs, they “… aim to replicate the sound, stage presence, and image of the original act as closely as possible…they are paying homage to the original band by recreating their music and performance style.” -Google AI. Oh, there is still the odd tribute to Broadway thrown in, but over the past couple of years, I have sat in the presence of the Allman Brothers (my favorite tribute band name: “The Almost Brothers”), Chicago, the Eagles, ABBA, John Denver and many more. There is the occasional Zach Brown or Taylor Swift, but the alert reader will note that the most tribute is directed towards performers from the late 60s to the mid 70s. And why wouldn’t it be? With the benefit of 50 years behind us, we can see clearly now that this was the pinnacle of Rock and Roll. Both album-oriented rock, as it used to be called, and top 40.

When we were growing up during that time period, we had a sense from our parents that when it came to entertainment, nothing was quite as good as it had been. They were still making musicals, but for the most part, they paled in comparison to the heyday of Broadway with Rogers and Hammerstein, Lerner and Lowe cranking out classics. We had silly little TV shows like the Brady Bunch and Gilligan’s Island, but we were still watching I Love Lucy and the Honeymooners. Movies? My parents were horrified at what was in the theaters compared to the Golden Age of Hollywood, especially for children. Willy Wonka was great, but most family fare was silly Disney movies and re-releases of old classics. It made me think that every genre went through a birth, maturation, peak and decline stage. My brother and I despaired that we seemed to catch the decline stage in most of everything.

But of course, we were only a few years away from Jaws, Star Wars, Indiana Jones and the new norm of summer blockbusters. TV would go through another golden age with more realistic shows and now classic comedies. We remember vividly when Saturday Night Live came on the air. We just didn’t know at the time, we were just in a brief lull.

Music? Popular music continued to change and innovate, and new styles emerged through the early 2000s. I followed the new artists and liked many of them up until the early 2000s. That’s when it more or less ceased to capture my attention. I found the music largely forgettable and the vocal styles annoying. And of course that coincided with the birth of streaming services, where you could all of a sudden listen to any song you wanted with ease. And what did I start listening to? All the songs off all the albums that sat languishing in my closet for want of a turntable. All the songs I remembered from the radio on WABC. Even some disco. And because I was mostly listening to them through headphones and not cheap speakers or the car radio, I started to appreciate how well-crafted these songs were. There was real talent there, in songwriting, vocals, musicianship and production that stood the test of time.

So was I just getting old and lamenting for the old days? No, I don’t think so. Sometimes late at night, I turn to YouTube for fun and a few years ago came across the “Reaction” genre. Apparently, many young kids of all ethnicities have attracted considerable followings by listening to old songs and reacting to them. That’s it. Most of the time, their commentary is what you would expect from teenagers, but it’s fun to watch their genuine amazement at both the songs and the musicianship, especially at the live performances. One young man commented after watching Jimmy Page perform the Immigrant Song that he’s a fan of rap music, and that’s what he prefers. But he said that when he listens to a rap song, he feels like he could write and perform a rap song if he wanted to. But he couldn’t even imagine playing the guitar like Jimmy Page. The same with reaction videos to 25 or 6 to 4, surely one of the greatest rock songs of all time. Most of the reactors watched the 1970 live performance at Tanglewood, where guitarist Terry Kath “…totally pummeled his Stratocaster into submission with his legendary solo…” (Strat-Forum). The reactors were blown away by the entire band – the horns, the singing, the drummer – but especially the guitar solo. One complained about the cameraman, saying that today, a guitar player would be filmed by 4 different camera angles with special effects, making it seem like you were watching something special. But here he actually was watching something truly special, and it was just a straight, no-frills film of the performance. He thought Terry Kath deserved better. Another noted that he loved watching bands performing in the 70s because it was all about the music – no special effects, no dancing, no costumes. Just music.

I went to a benefit a few weeks ago and two kids in their early 20s provided live music. They played the Allman Brothers, the Grateful Dead, Neil Young and many more. Not just their hits but their lesser-known songs. I went up to them on the break and said they seemed too young for this type of music. One said, “We grew up on this music. Our parents raised us right. There’s nothing like it.” So yes, I don’t think they make ’em like that anymore.

Rock and Roll may be dying – according to Spotify, less than 5% of music released since 2020 was classified as Rock. But that’s OK, because the classic songs are there to be rediscovered and enjoyed by generations to come. But this time, I got to experience it as it happened. Long live Rock!

My one and only attempt at espionage.

Southern Pessimist

August 5, 2025

12 9

In 1994, my wife and I went on a Scandinavian cruise that included St. Petersburg, Russia. Our best friends at that time had been to Russia a year earlier and had sponsored a student to come to the US to study music composition. They wanted me to give a package to the student’s mother, Mira. It contained mostly clothing but also a substantial amount of Russian currency. We tried to call Mira from our ship but couldn’t understand a word she said, so we asked a Russian dancer from the entertainment ensemble if she would translate for us. That worked out well, but the cost for the two satellite phone calls we made was outrageous.

We told her the approximate times for our excursions the next day, and Mira told us that she would be outside the gates of the docking area when we got back from visiting some palaces. She would be wearing a red dress. It was misty when we arrived at the appointed place and late in the afternoon. Sure enough, we saw Mira in her red dress and told the bus driver we had to get off. He was very reluctant because we were still a long way from the ship and in a dangerous neighborhood.

So we gave Mira our friend’s gift to her. We were so relieved because we had been quite worried that we might get into trouble for our efforts. We were very dismayed when she turned around and gave us another package to take back to our friends! Nonetheless, we were glad to have met her, and after a short, awkward visit complicated by a major language barrier, we headed back through the mist for about a mile and a half walk. There were taxies at the gate but we had been told not to use taxies because they were all run by the mafia and we might be held for ransom. The deserted warehouses we walked past were very ominous.

We were now worried that there might be customs officials that we would have to go through to get onto the ship, and we had no idea what was in Mira’s package. There was no one monitoring our boarding, so everything worked out well.

Mrs. Pessimist, who is usually an optimist, was greatly relieved.

Milwaukee Meetup 2025 – A Pickup Game of RhodyBal

OmegaPaladin

August 5, 2025

8 6

Planning for this meetup was a bit limited, and several frequent previous attendees were definitely missed, like @wicon, @gldiii, & @lidenscheng. However, we got underway at Germanfest on Friday, July 25th, in the evening. The setting sun brought some relief from the punishing heat, which would dog us all throughout the weekend. @katiekoppelman and I met up, each of us bringing friends of ours to the meetup, before finding our way over to @hankrhody, @mnemonicdevice, @mattbalzaler, & @therightnurse, along with one of their friends. We had a wide-ranging conversation while waiting for fireworks that failed to appear before being distracted by voXXclub, a German Boy Band singing classic rock and pop anthems in German. They had awesome dance moves.

The next day started with a quick run to the mad science and crazy crafting store American Science & Surplus. (This 85+ year-old company is currently trying to raise money to move its warehouse and stay open.) After that, it was on to the meetup proper, over at Mader’s German restaurant. This is probably the classiest place we’ve ever had a meetup, and the food was excellent.

A whole lot of Rhodys, along with the power couple.

The Chair of the Meetup Committee

After lunch at Mader’s, everyone went to their own destinations. Katie and I had heard about the Milwaukee Public Museum at the Cultural Tent at Germanfest, so we decided to pay a visit. It’s quite a classy museum, with a little something for everyone. The butterfly garden is not to be missed. After that, there was a plan to visit the Safehouse spy-themed bar, but it’s by reservation only. Everyone found their way to their own restaurant. I ate at Doc’s BBQ, near the museum.

The next morning, everyone trickled into Germanfest in the sweltering heat. The plan was to see the Dachshund Races, but not only were they on the opposite end of the venue, but the crowd was insane. Some were able to see the races, but many of us just chatted in the shade, with @samrhody rounding out Team RhodyBal. Unlike previous events, we just wound down and headed our separate ways.

As easy as riding a bicycle.

Southern Pessimist

August 5, 2025

28 10

There is a saying in our culture that many things are as easy as riding a bicycle. I think that this is also related to the idea that once you have learned to ride a bicycle, the skill will stay with you forever. These suppositions are based on the fact that learning to ride a bicycle when we were children was a major milestone in athletic and social achievement. Learning to ride a bicycle when you are a clumsy boy is indeed a great accomplishment. I can testify to that. That skill does have an expiration date, however, as does everything.

My wife and I went on a river cruise in Portugal a year ago. It was delightful in every way, but Mrs. Pessimist wanted to enhance the tour with a bicycle tour of Porto. I was hesitant but reluctant to admit that I wasn’t sure I still knew how to ride a bike competently. I tried out a bike and wobbled around the parking lot until I decided to give it a go. About a mile down the road, when having to stop for a light, I leaned my bike over enough to catch my weight but the bike slipped out from under me and threw me into four lanes of heavy traffic. Thankfully no one ran over me. There were screeching brake sounds but I got away with only a few minor abrasions.

There was someone from the bike rental company with us and I told him I should have asked for training wheels. At my age, every new experience needs to include training wheels.

Maybe someday I can rent a tricycle to tour a European city, but I will probably also insist on air conditioning.

Political Arms Race: Gerrymandering

KellyJohnston

August 4, 2025

56 13

Gerrymandering. If you’re not familiar with the term, Wikipedia defines it like this: “The political manipulation of electoral district boundaries to advantage a party, group, or socioeconomic class.” Close enough.

And it’s always been with us, at least since America’s infancy. The name comes from an 1812 redistricting of legislative seats in Massachusetts, led by Governor and future Vice President Elbridge Gerry. One particular district was made famous for looking like a salamander, thus the name.

Electronics on Sale. Cheap!

Gary McVey

August 4, 2025

91 141050

For about 40 years, 1926-’66, electrical discount shops gave New York’s narrow, teeming Courtlandt Street its nickname, Radio Row. Every sizable American city had its own Radio Row somewhere downtown, stores where you could buy everything from console radios to vacuum tubes on sale. New York City’s was the largest and most bustling one, filled with small retailers in desperate competition to make the month’s rent. A tough way to make a living, but a great place to pick up a bargain.

When WWII ended, two developments brought renewed life to Radio Row. The first was television, which barely got started before the war. Suddenly, every bar in the city wanted a TV set, for baseball, boxing and wrestling, and every radio dealer was selling them. The best prices were on Courtlandt Street. The second new specialty was military electronics, new and used, released to the public as war surplus. Plenty of magazine articles detailed how to turn Army and Navy gear into ham radio stations, even TV stations. Radio Row was paradise for frugal experimenters, inventors, and students. Many science fair projects began with Uncle Sam’s discards, including a couple of mine.

Picture the brick tenements and fire escapes of The Bronx, 1948. Suppose you’re a Navy veteran who saved his discharge pay and wants a TV. You can go locally to Sachs or Davega’s furniture store and buy a set for $240, delivered. Or for a nickel ride downtown to Radio Row, buy it for $189.95, take a cab home for $11, and pay a pair of neighborhood kids $1 each to carry it up three flights of stairs.

In mid-century New York, the second language of retail was Yiddish. Remember the robot garment salesmen in Sleeper? The old guys really talked like that. To a greater degree than today, classic industrial-age cities had neighborhood specialties where similar businesses clustered to reach the public. Manhattan had its diamond district centered on 47th Street. Cameras were sold and repaired on or near 34^th Street. Typewriters and toys were wholesaled on 23^rd Street. It was natural that lower Manhattan would have its own shopping district for what would become consumer electronics. It wasn’t just an NYC phenomenon; London, Cologne, Hong Kong and Tokyo had their own, and so did many other cities.

Courtlandt Street was already known to be on borrowed time when I made my first visits during my high school’s Easter break when I was fifteen. Another kid clued me in, and I’m grateful to have seen, even savored, the legendary atmosphere of the past.

Radio Row was, relatively speaking, a mere brief-lived newcomer to Gotham. Courtlandt Street was once the home of rows of ship chandlers’ shops, and a few managed to hang on: places where you could buy rope, pulleys, and canned provisions.

Soon, every last bit of Radio Row was going to have to move, and fast; the stores had already received eviction notices, as demolition and excavation of the entire extended neighborhood to construct the twin towers of the World Trade Center were imminent. In retrospect, one vanishing world of old New York was about to make way for a different, tragically vanished world of twentieth-century New York.

Business on Courtlandt Street in April 1967 was still as brisk as ever, and a unique and soon-to-be forgotten subculture was still relentlessly focused on face-to-face sales. Bushel baskets of used and new parts spilled out onto the sidewalk, of Mil-Spec headphones, klystron tubes, Teletype™ keyboards, metal cylinder capacitors, polarized glass filters, JAN (joint Army-Navy) servo motors, gyroscopes, all at pennies on the dollar. “Pick ‘em up, gentlemen, pick ‘em up,” a barker ceaselessly exhorted from the store’s doorway.

Some snobs used to insult military hardware as “built by the lowest bidder,” but the fascinating bits and pieces we could buy and disassemble were impressively made, inside and out, with anti-corrosive coatings, flawless soldering, and robust buttons and dials. For $2 I bought a range-finding aux control of some type. It had flat black surfaces, cryptic labels, and the highest quality toggle switches I’d ever seen. It had two Veeder-Root odometer-style counters and a side dial adjuster controlled by Vernier precision concentric-within-concentric gearing. Whatever it was, it probably cost USAF a thousand bucks in 1955; a dozen years later, it was mine, for the cost of a couple of copies of Mad magazine.

By the fall of 1967, about half of Radio Row moved to Canal Street, a much wider, busier street half a mile north. I was glad to see the re-emergence of many of the “junk box” second-hand shops. The other pioneers signed off for good. By then, Manhattan’s original Radio Row was gone forever, replaced by a seven-story-deep, quarter-mile-wide hole in the ground that would be filled at the dawn of the seventies.

There was a steady flow of new electronic surplus and all sorts of technical discards. TV stations everywhere had abandoned black and white by then. Everything down to the thick camera cables found its way to Canal Street. Computer parts were increasingly prominent, and their machine-made printed circuit boards were top quality. In one critical way, though, they were far too good for my liking: the diodes, resistors, and capacitors were efficiently trimmed so tightly, it was no longer useful to clip them off the board. Basically, you couldn’t re-use them. For a generation of parts scavengers, game over. The new integrated circuits were marvels, though.

Canal Street runs through Chinatown. The old world faded, soon to be replaced by hustling discounters who spoke Chinese and Hindi. The early 80s boom in consumer electronics once again drew people downtown in search of bargain appliances—color TVs, VCRs, microwave ovens, and early home computers. Some of the anonymous shoving mob of little guy retailers started running ads on local TV, and some became momentarily famous citywide. In New York, it was Crazy Eddie, whose prices were insane, Uncle Steve, and “Jerry,” the hard-hatted spokesman for JGE. “Izzat the story, Jerry?” “Yep, that’s the stor-rry!” he’d yell. Later, Jerry opened a disco on Long Island.

That was two generations ago. The old discounter’s motto, “Stack ‘em deep and sell ‘em cheap” went to its logical extreme with big box stores, which could stack ‘em deeper than any fifties retailer’s wildest dreams. Eventually, the internet’s retailing abilities would sound the death knell for most direct-to-consumer electronic parts.

I remember Fry’s, once a California mainstay, gigantic supermarkets of consumer electronics, computers, DVDs, wiring, security, and phone equipment — the biggest “toy stores” in town. When our kids were little and we were furnishing our home, I spent a lot of time and money there. With a smile, I might add. We kept going back, buying color printers for school projects, video games on birthdays, and unusual movies that few other stores had. The prices were great, and every day their cartoon spokes-character “Charlie Chip” pointed out oddball tech bargains on the back page of the sports section of the Los Angeles Times. Fry’s parking lot was so jammed they had to rent parking space along disused freight tracks. I remember it vividly.

But a memory is all it is. I recall the last time I was there, and in the distorted perspective of memory, it was part of the stricken look of the Covid Era: few shoppers, a vacant parking lot, aisles of nearly-empty shelves that evoked the twilight of the USSR. But this was three months before Covid “became a thing” (locally, at least). By the end of 2019, Fry’s was gone.

There’s a welcome place in this world for software developers, who can think and grow on successive generations of machines that entrepreneurial people will contrive to provide for them. What about future generations of hardware developers? Will there be anything like the five-and-dime, sometimes ramshackle path that created minor miracles on plywood work benches in seventies garages? For everyone’s sake, there better be.

The Identity of Indiscernibles

Saint Augustine

August 4, 2025

38 15

Picture, if you will, a universe with nothing in it except two perfect spheres with exactly the same color, size, and weight–the same everything, in fact. Except that they aren’t the same thing.

Or are they?

And if they aren’t, what makes them different?

And what’s the point of saying they’re different if you can’t tell them apart?

Meet Castor and Pollux. “Castor” and “Pollux” are the names we use for these wonderful spheres, even though they don’t have names. (That’s just one of those differences they don’t have.) Castor and Pollux come from a famous philosophy article by Max Black.

The whole point of this line of thinking is to understand that things are not just the sum of their size, color, shape, location, etc. But one worry with this way of thinking is that it means there are differences between things that seem to make no difference. It turns out that John Locke thought that way–behind all of a thing’s properties is its unseen, unknown substance.

But David Hume thought it’s silly to believe in differences that make no difference. A lot of philosophers follow his way of thinking, and they don’t believe in hidden identity or hidden substance like Locke did.

I like Locke, and sometimes I like Hume. You know what else I like? I likes me some Leibniz! Gottfried Leibniz thought things are not just the sum of their size, color, shape, location, etc.–there’s a substance and essence beyond all that. He also thought that these essential differences make a difference.

I’m on his team.

Frankly, this whole thing is obscure metaphysics–it’s lovely, but still obscure philosophy talk.

But it’s not just that. The relevance is that things do have natures, or essences–a built-in identity deeper than their accidental characteristics. My favorite teacup could have had a broken handle, but it couldn’t have been a functional shoe. I could have been a dentist, but not an orangutan.

If that’s all true, then we can also talk about some stuff that really matters, like the idea that people have free will. We can even have unfashionable but important discussions of what possibilities are open to a being with boy parts–he can’t be a girl–and whether a male-male romantic relationship is the kind of thing that can be a marriage or not. There are always some practical applications and moral questions in the vicinity of metaphysics.

But–honestly–the vast majority of the conversation of this topic is just very nerdy metaphysics.

I recently published an article touting the Leibniz way of thinking about this topic. Here it is. You can read it–if you can get a copy from a college library, and if you think you’re nerd enough.

FTC Demands Accountability for Gender Affirming Care

Susan Quinn

August 4, 2025

16 13350

The United States has witnessed the most unethical and bizarre treatments performed by the medical community than have possibly ever before occurred: the practice of gender affirming care. Doctors, counselors, and even parents have swallowed the propaganda (and even propagated it) for underage children. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has finally stepped up and is conducting an inquiry to determine whether these practices should be continued. Its approach is focusing on whether “informed consent,” a fundamental factor in medical practice, is being followed:

‘The FTC seeks to evaluate whether consumers (in particular, minors) have been harmed and whether medical professionals or others may have violated Sections 5 and 12 of the FTC Act by failing to disclose material risks associated with ‘gender-affirming care’ or making false or unsubstantiated claims about the benefits or effectiveness of ‘gender-affirming care,’ the FTC wrote.

These practices claim that it is possible for young people to have been born into a body, male or female, that does not comport with their experience of their gender. As a result, medical treatments are being used to mutilate their bodies, or provide hormone therapy to these young people, sometimes with long-term and irreversible results. The far Left insists this treatment is legitimate:

For its entire existence, what far-left activists call ‘gender-affirming care,’ which is really the idea that one can medically change their sex and somehow solve their mental health issues, has been based on very little scientific evidence and almost entirely on ideology. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) completed its systematic review of the evidence for efficacy of the interventions in May, only to find that there is essentially zero evidence it is safe or effective.

This latest inquiry is part of an investigation that the FTC began this month:

On July 9, 2025, the FTC hosted a workshop on unfair or deceptive trade practices in ‘gender-affirming care” for minors. The FTC heard testimony from doctors, medical ethicists, whistleblowers, detransitioners, and parents of detransitioners. That testimony indicated that practitioners of ‘gender-affirming care’ may be actively deceiving consumers.

Against this backdrop, the FTC seeks to evaluate whether consumers (in particular, minors) have been harmed and whether medical professionals or others may have violated Sections 5 and 12 of the FTC Act by failing to disclose material risks associated with ‘gender-affirming care’ or making false or unsubstantiated claims about the benefits or effectiveness of ‘gender-affirming care.’ The FTC has a long history of bringing enforcement actions in this area and is uniquely positioned to investigate this potentially unlawful activity.

The Supreme Court case, Skrmetti v. United States, affirmed the constitutionality of Tennessee’s Senate Bill 1, a law that prohibits GAC for minors; several other states have followed in Tennessee’s footsteps. The time has arrived for the issue to be tackled on a national level.

Now the FTC is taking the issue even further through a nationwide online inquiry:

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) invites public comment to better understand how consumers may have been exposed to false or unsupported claims about ‘gender-affirming care’ (GAC), especially as it relates to minors, and to gauge the harms consumers may be experiencing. Proponents of GAC, including healthcare and medical institutions, have long touted the benefits of this type of care, including for minors. Over time, however, reporting by multiple news outlets, personal accounts by parents and detransitioners, disclosures by whistleblowers, independent reviews and studies, and even information and communications from institutions promoting these practices.

This FTC inquiry is long overdue. Based on the results they garner, let’s hope that we can finally protect our children from these perverted and unethical practitioners.

[originally published in American Thinker]

If you ever wonder why someone is still grieving

CarolJoy, Not So Easy To Kill

August 4, 2025

17 9

I saw this on another social media platform.

That entirely sums it up for me.

Why? A dear friend lost her sweetheart one day in October. Some grief counselor told her that normally, the pain starts to taper off after a year.

Over her entire life, she had been considered “abnormal” by her family. The fact that her pain did not lessen after one year, combined with the idea that once again she was not normal, may have been the reason why she killed herself one year and two weeks after her fellow’s passing.

I missed any signs of her thinking about this. She was out riding her bike and to me it looked like she was once again enjoying life. How I found out about her death went like this: for several months she had been planning a huge Halloween party. So I called on Oct 25th to find out where my mailed invitation was. No answer. I then called her family and was told about her suicide.

There are deaths a person might never get over. Prior to Laura dying, I never considered that people who are grieving might go the extra mile to behave “normally” so their friends won’t think the worst of them. I wish I’d known this sooner.

RIP, dear friend.
(1959 to 1993)

Construction sites, DDT, and abortion

Dr. Bastiat

August 4, 2025

123 221542

I read a news story some time ago which made me chuckle. I can’t remember the details, but it was something like this: A Christian activist firebombed an abortion facility (I think it was in Wyoming or Utah or somewhere). She was accused of an act of political terrorism. Her conservative attorneys argued that the abortion clinic hadn’t opened yet, so she had only vandalized a construction site. The leftist attorneys prosecuting her argued that it was destined to be an abortion facility, so that meant that it was an abortion facility from the day they broke ground, thus she was a terrorist. I remember reading this, wondering if either side had considered that their argument was directly at odds with their views on the topic at hand: abortion. This reminded me, naturally, of DDT. And as it turned out, sorting that connection out in my head ended up helping me in just a few weeks.

A few weeks later, I overheard a discussion in the bleachers of a volleyball game about abortion. One person said that abortion was wrong, because it was killing a baby. The other person said that it was not murder, because it was not yet a baby. They were getting miffed at one another, so I tried to change the subject: “Hey! Did you folks know that they banned DDT back in the 70s?” They looked at me blankly for a second, then the pro-abortion lady rolled her eyes and said of course, so I continued: “Do you know why they banned DDT?”

The pro-abortion lady was all over it, and she pointed out that DDT made the shells of birds’ eggs thinner and fragile, which led to decreased birth rates for birds. Thus, the name of Carson’s famous book, Silent Spring. I nodded thoughtfully then asked, “Well, yeah, but I don’t understand. If they were worried about not having enough birds, why did they care about eggs? Eggs are not birds, obviously. I don’t get it.” She knew she had a problem, and she looked very peeved, but she didn’t say anything for a second. So I continued: “Wait a second – I wonder if we protected birds’ eggs, and increased their birth rates, I wonder if we’d have more birds? I wonder if that’s what they were thinking? Hmmm…”

She snapped, “You think you’re clever, huh?”

I responded, “If you understand that damaging eggs leads to less birds, and you still support abortion, then you are a monster. You don’t think that there are too many people. Otherwise you would have killed yourself already. You think that there are too many other people. Planned Parenthood was started by Margaret Sanger and other eugenicists who thought that there were too many of a very certain type of people. There’s no reason to support abortion other than to have less people. Not less of you. Less of other people. You’re a monster.”

She was yelling over my last few sentences, so she didn’t hear the witty conclusion that I had formulated a few weeks before. She was pissed. Really, really angry. But interestingly, she didn’t argue any of my points, or explain why I was wrong. She just called me a fascist and a Nazi. Which is pretty weird, considering our respective positions on population control.

I’ve spent a lot of time over the past 10 years or so, trying to understand the thinking of leftists. I figured that once I understood their thought process, I would become more sympathetic to them.

I was wrong.

I was very, very wrong.

[Member Post]

Southern Pessimist

August 3, 2025

6 7

Sometimes you get way more than you want or need. Many years ago, on our annual beach vacation to Emerald Isle, NC, we took a side trip for dinner in Beaufort, NC. It is a popular destination with a beautiful harbor and fairly typical seafood restaurants. We found a parking space across from the main […]

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A Fun, Fluffy Historical Sci-Fi Show

sawatdeeka

August 3, 2025

16 8438

When I started it on Prime, I thought Timeless was going to be another dud. The public rated it something like 4 out of 5 stars–a bad sign. Turns out it’s perfect for treadmill time.

In Timeless, a female historian, a military guy, and a techie pilot all keep getting snatched back to work for top-secret adventures in a time machine, chasing down a dark character who is trying to meddle in historical events. The protagonists land their craft in key places like Nazi Germany and the Atomic City. Meanwhile, another sinister plot line keeps intruding on our arc.

This show could have been a cheesy mess, but it works for me. I enjoy the immersion in random eras, our protagonists skulking around whispering in almost-there costumes, the fact that the history expert isn’t secretly a martial arts pro–not yet–but a feminine, worried, intense character who happens to know her stuff. I like the re-creations of past events, and found myself unexpectedly euphoric at a dramatization of Lincoln’s assassination that was just as this book described it. As I watch, I learn new details about important historical episodes, while finding the realism of revived history book characters to be convincing, almost thrilling. For example, in the Alamo episode, which I didn’t expect to love, Davy Crockett is noble, and saving the Texan’s revolution is shown as a worthy goal.

The costumes are one of the most fun aspects, especially for our history expert, an actress who was chosen not just for her ability to appear serious and stressed, but also to look sharp in any era. Then, in addition to the usual snappy dialogue and quips we see in these types of shows, our heroes start bonding and growing through their challenges.

Of course, if we could really send a crew on missions back in time, even a well-intentioned one, the present would be littered with changes as they lumbered around with our ancestors (but how would we know?). Timeless shows us some of these consequences, but most of the time, viewers have to play along, as well as overlook how the trio seems to have extra time on their hands before they prevent whatever the world-altering deed is–to talk to each other, go into a bar, have conversations with their favorite famous people, and so on. And the characters rarely plan for questions before they have run-ins with friends or foes, so their aliases are wretched.

Despite its improbabilities, the fun, suspense, drama, clear moral core, and moments of satisfaction and even delight will have me watching Timeless past Episode 6, and maybe even into the second season. Watch it beyond the pilot,* and tell me what you think.

*I never finished the Hindenburg pilot, as Prime skipped me forward to the Lincoln episode, but I didn’t mind.

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