“It has now become de rigueur to call Starmer out for his legal cretinism. A writer for the Sun called him a ‘timid lawyer who is more attached to the enforcement of globalist judicial codes than the protection of our civilisation’. Writing in the Telegraph, Oxford theology professor Nigel Biggar said Starmer’s ‘blind obedience to international law’ has been a ‘boon to the world’s monsters’. This criticism is understandable. Prioritising international law over the national interest has been a defining feature of Starmer’s government, long before the strikes on Iran. It is, arguably, the only feature of his government.” (03/04/26)
Source: Independent Institute
by William F Shughart II
“I’m one of the many Americans who hate being forced to time-shift twice a year. After only four months on standard time, daylight saving time returns with a vengeance on Sunday, March 8, when 2 a.m. abruptly becomes 3 a.m. Only residents of Arizona (with the exception of those living on the land reserved for the Navajo Nation, which is compelled to follow Washington’s timekeeping edicts), Hawaii, Guam, Puerto Rico, and other outlying U.S. territories will not have their body clocks jolted by time suddenly ‘springing forward’ one hour. Public opinion has been slowly turning against the twice-yearly ritual of moving the clock hands forward and backward. The main question nowadays is, what is to be done, policy-wise?” (03/04/26)
“Once war begins and American soldiers are under fire, a rational discussion of the pros and cons of war becomes nearly impossible. That is exactly why our Founders wrote a Constitution that demands a debate before the initiation of war. But there was no debate in Congress, let alone a vote. On Feb. 28, Americans awoke to discover that their country was once again embroiled in a war in the Middle East. Americans were not asked if they would bear the burdens of war. Instead, the American people were told, through a presidential eight-minute video posted around 2:30 in the morning, that the country was, once again, at war. And because there was no national discussion about going to war, we do not know whether ground troops will be used. We have no idea how long the war will last. We have no idea who will lead Iran after the death of the supreme leader.” (03/05/26)
“It was beyond disconcerting to hear the Iranian foreign minister on Sunday sounding like Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky circa 2022. But that’s the comparison that instantly sprang to mind when Abbas Araghchi told George Stephanopoulos on ABC’s ‘This Week’: ‘What the United States is doing is an act of aggression. What we are doing is the act of self-defense. There are huge differences between these two.’ All you have to do is substitute Russia for the United States and it is all too clear who and what we have become. An aggressor nation that kills people on Caribbean fishing boats without evidence or due process. That captures and removes the Venezuelan president, then lays claim to Venezuela’s oil. That assassinates Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, sparking retaliatory attacks by Iran across the Middle East.” (03/04/26)
“It used to be so much easier to sell a war of choice. Bill Clinton mobilized troops for NATO’s mission to bomb Yugoslavia, and around three in five Americans approved. George W. Bush announced Operation Iraqi Freedom; more than 70% of adults went along with it. Americans were war-wearier in 2011, after electing the only presidential candidate who’d promised to get out of Iraq. But half of them heard Barack Obama endorse a no-fly zone over Libya and said: Why not? Operation Epic Fury doesn’t get that benefit of the doubt. If you’re old enough to remember the Iraq War build-up, a year-long sales job that it became ‘unpatriotic’ to question, the lack of any real presidential persuasion effort has been surreal.” (03/04/26)
“If J. D. Vance promised one thing during the 2024 presidential campaign, it was that America would not enter into a war with Iran of the kind that is currently raging. ‘America doesn’t have to constantly police every region of the world,’ Vance told the comedian Tim Dillon on his podcast. … These arguments look farcical now that President Trump has chosen—months after bombing Iran’s nuclear facilities and pronouncing its enrichment efforts ‘completely and totally obliterated’—to join Israel in launching a war on the Islamic Republic. … Vance entered the White House as a man full of ideas—about a more modest place for the United States in world affairs; a new, worker-friendly version of Republican economics; and aggressive, Teddy Roosevelt–style regulation of Big Business. Yet Iran is just the latest example of a noticeable trend: Within the Trump administration, Vance’s opinions seem to matter less and less.” (03/05/26)
“The deal, first negotiated between the Biden team and Anthropic, included two usage restrictions. First, Claude could not be used for mass surveillance of Americans. Second, Claude could not be used to control lethal autonomous weapons, which are weapons that can identify, track, and kill targets with no human in the loop at any point in the process. When it negotiated the expanded deal, the Trump administration had the opportunity to review these terms. It did, and it accepted them. Trump officials claim to have changed their mind not so much because they want to do mass surveillance on Americans or use autonomous lethal weapons imminently, but because they object altogether to the notion of privately imposed limitations on the military’s use of technology.” (03/04/26)
“At 2:30 a.m. on Saturday, President Trump posted a home video announcing that he was declaring war on Iran. Many Americans were shocked at the news in part because the Constitution requires congressional approval for taking the nation to war. In the weeks before the attack, the Pentagon press office helped distract public attention by promoting exercise videos. In his State of the Union speech last week, President Trump proclaimed: ‘Our military is stacked!’ Exhibit A for ‘stacked’ is a new video showing Secretary of War Pete Hegseth reportedly bench-pressing 315 pounds. Hegseth is the type of lifter who keeps grunting long after he finishes a lift. … I quipped on Facebook: ‘I bench-pressed that much when I was in high school. Guys past the age of 30 who fixate on their bench press totals tend to avoid mental heavy lifting.’ Hell hath no fury like hypersensitive weightlifters.” (03/04/26)
“Institutions and professors have mastered the language and posture of open inquiry without necessarily creating the conditions for it. A syllabus can promise a brave space while the actual classroom — with its particular mix of students, social pressures, and unspoken hierarchies — remains anything but. What Gallup is measuring, at best, is the invitation. What it cannot measure is whether the conditions exist for anyone to accept it.” (03/04/26)
