“JD Vance embodies MAGA’s corrosiveness. His wife, Usha, is the daughter of immigrants and a practicing Hindu. They have mixed-race children and a mixed-religion family. As Dalmia noted, Vance’s trajectory should have led him to embrace a Reaganesque vision of a shining city on a hill — his biographical background and intellectual formation should have made him a natural fit for a responsible conservatism that treats pluralism as a feature rather than a threat. Instead, Vance has gone in the complete opposite direction. He is positioning himself as the leading figure in an administration mercilessly kicking out of the country people like his wife and children by trying to build a coalition represented by every faction of the neo-right, no matter how reactionary.” (03/05/26)
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“Secretary of War Pete Hegseth gave one of his signature ‘I don’t have a small penis’ tirades at the Pentagon on Wednesday, ranting and raving about the big, powerful, masculine war machinery that’s currently raining death and destruction upon the people of Iran. ‘We will fly all day, all night, day and night finding, fixing and finishing the missiles and defense industrial base of the Iranian military, finding and fixing their leaders and their military leaders, flying over Tehran, flying over Iran, flying over their capital, flying over the IRGC, Iranian leaders looking up and seeing only US and Israeli air power every minute of every day until we decide it’s over,’ Hegseth bloviated, saying there will be ‘B-2s, B-52s, B-1s, Predator drones, fighters controlling the skies, picking targets, death and destruction from the sky all day long.'” (03/06/26)
Source: Independent Institute
by William J Watkins, Jr.
“The Founding Fathers rejected the European model. Our first charter of union, the Articles of Confederation, lodged all executive functions in Congress. Under the Articles, Congress possessed ‘the sole and exclusive right of determining on peace and war.’ The thirteen sovereign states were forbidden to engage in hostilities except in cases of invasion or imminent attack. So, what would the Founders think of President Donald Trump’s war on Iran? They would assume we have abandoned the U.S. Constitution and opted for the European model they rejected.” (03/05/26)
“For everyone saying the Limited Military Operation in Iran is ‘Unconstitutional,’ we agree. The problem is the 1973 War Powers Act. It was designed to curb Nixon’s ‘Imperial Presidency.’ (Look it up.) That act of Congress allows an Executive to (a) commit troops/military action without either (i) a Declaration of War from Congress, or (b) any other sort of ‘Authority’ from Congress; (b) provided the President informs Congress within 48 hours of taking the action, and (b) provided the actions are limited to 60 days without Congressional approval. (Up to 90 days if American troops need more time to ensure their own (relative) safety.) TPOL submits that the War Powers Act is itself unconstitutional: it wrongly transfers powers from Congress to the Executive Branch.” (03/05/26)
Source: Orange County Register
by the editorial board
“Setting aside any potential merits to war with Iran, part of the preparation should’ve included seeking explicit authorization from Congress. That would’ve allowed the American people, through their representatives, to decide whether it made sense to sacrifice American lives and American tax dollars on yet another regime change war. Instead, the president chose to initiate a conflict that has already claimed the lives of Americans and civilians, including hundreds of deaths at an Iranian girls’ school. These are not the outcomes Americans expected when electing the ‘anti-war’ president.” (03/05/26)
“The Trump administration has joined Israel in launching large-scale attacks across Iran. The strikes mark the beginning of ‘major combat operations’, according to President Donald Trump, and in response Tehran has reportedly launched retaliatory attacks in Middle Eastern countries that host US military bases. With hundreds of Iranians already killed and the war threatening to spiral out of control, here are five things Americans need to know: 1) Trump says he’s trying to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, but it’s the United States and its allies that are the greatest nuclear threat. … 2) Trump is contributing to the suffering of ordinary Iranians, not rescuing them. … 3) The United States is an unreliable negotiator. … 4) The United States has been threatening Iran, not the other way around. … 5) Trump’s war with Iran [is] unpopular with Americans.” [editor’s note: I leave it to the readers to sort the facts out of this screed – SAT] (03/05/26)
“I’ve written dozens of posts about Social Desirability Bias. Social Desirability Bias is the key psychological building block of my new book. When asked to succinctly explain Social Desirability Bias, my standard slogan is: ‘When the truth is ugly, people lie.’ This would be unexciting, however, unless some truths were, in fact, ugly. Which they totally are. For example: * Some children are stupid. * Some workers are lazy. * Some decorated veterans are racist. * Most human beings are unwilling to die for their countries. * God is rarely the most important thing in anyone’s life. Examples of ugly truths are so easy to mass produce that it’s easy to conclude that truth and ugliness go hand in hand. But it’s equally easy to mass produce pretty truths.” (03/05/26)
“California progressives’ single-payer health care fever dream is back. This time, the cost could hit half a trillion dollars a year. Single-payer means the government pays, for everything. Several candidates for governor are promising just such a government takeover of the state’s health insurance system. Billionaire Tom Steyer says, ‘Bernie Sanders was right. We need single-payer health care’. His campaign ads place a single-payer system at the center of his agenda. Betty Yee, Xavier Becerra, and Tony Thurmond are on board, too. Meanwhile, California State Assemblyman Ash Kalra, D-San Jose, has reintroduced legislation to create ‘CalCare’ (a bid to bulldoze private health insurance and replace it with a state-run health insurance monopoly). These are bold plans. They’re also complete fantasy. The California Legislative Analyst’s Office previously pegged the annual cost of CalCare at up to $552 billion — more than the entire state budget.” (03/04/26)
“Since the present Labour government won a landslide victory on July 4, 2024, numerous English liberties of constitutional significance have eroded. Labour is influenced, I argue, by a type of rationalist blueprint theory of politics and by what Edmund Burke called ‘political geometry.’ This approach to politics has led them to undermine established English liberties in the name of efficiency, saving money, and improving local governmental systems. Furthermore, it has led them to postpone local elections in the name of these goals. Despite its promises, Labour has not achieved any of these goals due to its own incompetence and attachment to rationalist plans for local government modification, and the greatest victim in this mess is the British constitution.” (03/05/26)
