“The Trump administration is reportedly pursuing a deal with Saudi Arabia that would be a pathway to developing a commercial nuclear power industry in the desert kingdom and maybe even lead to the enrichment of uranium on Saudi soil. U.S. pursuit of this deal should be scrapped because the United States would bear all the increased commitments, costs, and risks with very little in return.” (04/21/25)
Source: Orange County Register
by Patrick Eddington
“If Trump does defy at-scale federal court rulings against him (which seems increasingly likely), he will have exposed the fatal flaw in the Founders’ constitutional design, a determined autocrat with total control over federal police and a subservient Congress can defy federal courts with impunity, a situation that, left unchecked, would mark the end of the republic and trigger the creation of an American autocracy. Democratic governors with friendly state legislatures could change this political dynamic by taking two steps. First, they should sever all ties between their states’ law enforcement organizations and those at the federal level as an initial step in protecting their own institutions and inhabitants from federal repression under Trump. … Second, one or more governors with friendly state legislatures could pass a constitutional amendment that would make three critical changes to the Republic’s governing document.” (04/20/25)
“As we approach Earth Day this Tuesday, it’s tempting to believe that the world is on the brink of environmental collapse. We are constantly inundated by dire predictions of climate catastrophe and warnings about the planet’s imminent destruction. But this is misleading. Rather than spiraling into panic, we should take a moment to appreciate the remarkable progress we’ve made in improving the environment, and acknowledge that a key factor is prosperity. When Earth Day was first marked 55 years ago, the world faced some grim environmental challenges. Rivers were catching fire and cities were choked with smog. Air and water pollution were rampant, especially in the industrialized West. Today, outdoor air pollution has declined dramatically in rich countries. Over the past three decades, death risk from air pollution has spectacularly declined by over 70%, while waterways have become cleaner and nations reforested.” (04/20/25)
“He doesn’t seem to have realized it quite yet, but Donald Trump has driven directly into a brick wall in Yemen. After Benjamin Netanyahu tore up his short-lived ceasefire with Hamas and escalated his genocide in Gaza with a total blockade and Donald Trump joined him to announce his intentions to build condos on the rubble, the Houthi rebels also known as Ansar Allah announced their intentions to restart their own guerrilla blockade against Israeli shipping in the Red Sea unless the Nakba stops. … While Trump and his minions belched proudly of the ‘incredible success’ of their war crimes, hundreds of thousands of Yemeni citizens have been seen taking to the streets of Sadaa to publicly celebrate their defiance of empire.” (04/20/25)
“There is an endless list of ways we want to improve cities and help the poor. The list of problems plaguing poor communities is long. Every major US city has areas where the schools are terrible, crime is rampant, the sidewalks and streets are little more than rubble, fresh food is in short supply, and there are no parks or playgrounds to speak of. Helping people in this lowly state should be simple. Make the schools better. Hire more cops. Spread some concrete and asphalt. Start a farmer’s market. Build a playground. Simple, right? Not really. Amenities are expensive even when you don’t have to pay for them directly. Why? They make places nicer and, therefore, more attractive places to live.” (04/20/25)
“Not all coups change a country in an instant. Some are a slow-boil process of subversion that nonetheless leaves the institutions they affect unrecognizable. Journalist Talia Lavin has spent her career looking at the violent and bigoted politics of the United States’ rightward turn, and, as she chronicles in her recent book, Wild Faith: How the Christian Right is Taking Over America, the Christian nationalist movement currently remaking U.S. society was one such long revolution. From the Christian Right’s early mobilization in the 1970s, as they fought desegregation by embracing private schools and homeschooling, to the culture wars seeking to undo myriad progressive reforms, Lavin finds that most of the movement’s political projects emerged from an authoritarian evangelical culture centered in the home.” (04/21/25)
“I first came to Bishkek as a college student trying to learn Russian and returned a few years later to report on an insurrection against the president. I don’t think I ever expected to actually live in Kyrgyzstan, but … life is funny sometimes, and for the past year and a half I’ve been living in Bishkek, teaching journalism and public relations at an international university. As a perk of being here, I get the opportunity to throw my kalpak into the ring with Yascha Mounk and Quico Toro in Persuasion’s ‘Observations About …’ series.” (04/20/25)
“A government powerful enough to do good is also powerful enough to do bad. A government powerful enough to decide under what conditions its subjects may trade is powerful enough to seriously disturb or ban their trading, internationally or domestically. A government powerful enough to financially support universities is also powerful enough to threaten them with penalties if they don’t repress opinions it does not like. A ruler powerful enough to define emergencies is powerful enough to increase his power with fabricated emergencies. A government powerful enough to require conformity to an ideology, say DEI, is powerful enough to forbid private institutions to embrace it or parts of it. A government powerful enough to ship non-citizens to a barbaric prison in El Salvador without due process is probably powerful enough to do the same to its own citizens. And so forth.” (04/18/25)
