“According to President Donald Trump, taking possession of Greenland is a national security necessity. It’s so critical, he claims, that he’s willing to take the chilly island the ‘easy way’ or the ‘hard way.’ Denmark, which governs Greenland, isn’t eager to surrender the territory. Even more important, the residents of Greenland, most of whom don’t especially want to be Danish, have even less interest in becoming American. The leader of a country founded on high-minded sentiments about the ‘consent of the governed’ should consider taking that into account.” (01/16/25)
“Most days during the Biden administration, you’d wake up and wonder what Joe was going to trip over, either physically or verbally, today? How many mumblings would end with a ‘Well, anyway …’ like it was pudding time in the nursing home. With the Trump administration, both of them, you wake up wondering what the fake outrage will be and which liberal city might burn. The common problem is that both scenarios are Democrats, either lying to the public about Biden’s mental abilities or lying to the public in the hopes of causing riots. I used to feel bad for people in the cities overrun by Democrats’ BLM/ANTIFA Brownshirts; who wants to see their fellow Americans going through hell? But then you realize that these people voted for this, and did so repeatedly.” (01/18/25)
“The legacies of Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson have had an oversized influence on American political history. As important as their individual and distinct contributions to the formation of the American political order have been, their rivalry has had a lasting effect on American political thinking and conduct. In The Pursuit of Liberty: How Hamilton vs. Jefferson Ignited the Lasting Battle Over Power in America, Jeffrey Rosen argues that American political history can be understood as a continued tension between Hamiltonian and Jeffersonian ideas. Rosen does not take sides in this ideological competition; his greater concern is how it has served the health of the American regime.” (01/16/25)
“The essence of tyranny is the imposition of one man’s will on an entire polity — with no checks, balances, or even reasons cited to back him up. It is, to coin a phrase, a triumph of will. In fact, you could argue that a tyrant aims for exactly such a demonstrable act of pure solipsism as soon as he can pull it off — against all elite and popular opinion and common sense — because it proves by its very arbitrary irrationality that only he matters. That’s why President Trump’s threat to the sovereignty of a NATO ally, Denmark, is a red line. No one — neither Greenlanders nor Americans — wants what is an insane idea. No one needs it. No reason can be given for it. And yet Trump keeps insisting, like a mafia boss, that he will take it. He must be stopped.” (01/16/26)
“Welcome to the Trumpian ICE Age, a vivid lesson in the frigidity of collectivism. Take note, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani. Compared to Trump, you’re a piker.” (01/16/26)
“Thanks to everyone who sent in condolences on my recent death from prostate cancer at age 68, but that was Scott Adams. I (Scott Alexander) am still alive. Still, the condolences are appreciated. Scott Adams was a surprisingly big part of my life. I may be the only person to have read every Dilbert book before graduating elementary school. For some reason, 10-year-old-Scott found Adams’[s] stories of time-wasting meetings and pointy-haired bosses hilarious. No doubt some of the attraction came from a more-than-passing resemblance between Dilbert’s nameless corporation and the California public school system. We’re all inmates in prisons with different names. But it would be insufficiently ambitious to stop there. Adams’[s] comics were about the nerd experience.” (01/16/26)
“merican negotiators have been negotiating on separate tracks with Ukraine and Russia in the hope that those two tracks will eventually converge. Despite President Donald Trump’s recent statement that the two sides are ‘maybe very close’ to a deal, and the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky’s evaluation that a plan is ’90 percent ready,’ the two sides seem to be moving no closer together. In negotiating, the Ukrainian and European sides may be hoping to highlight that it is Russia that is saying no. And there is plenty in — and not in — their latest position that Russia will say no to. But, incoherently, Europe seems to have negotiated itself into a corner from which Russia doesn’t have to be the one to say no because Europe will.” (01/16/26)
“This past week has shown that you can’t leave something as important as resisting the government up to the opposition party. Democrats in Congress, like the majority of the country, are incensed about the murder of Renee Good, the subsequent wounding and maiming of others, and the seeming improbability of forthcoming accountability for any of this. To use the most salient example, federal investigators have commandeered the Good case, are withholding evidence from the state of Minnesota, and have turned the probe into a smear job against her and whatever activism she and her wife were engaged in. Justice Department prosecutors have resigned in protest. While state and local prosecutors try to keep the Good case alive, ICE agents are unquestionably violating their own written policies and the constitutional rights of citizens expressing their opposition through free speech and peaceable assembly.” (01/16/25)
Source: Responsible Statecraft
by Francisco Rodriguez
“‘We’re going to run the country,’ President Trump said regarding Venezuela at a press conference just hours after Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro’s capture in a U.S. military raid in Caracas. To do so, the Trump administration has begun taking charge of Venezuelan oil shipments and selling them directly in international oil markets. The U.S. plans to make sure that these revenues are used only to buy imports from American companies. Whether this will at some point transform into a net benefit for the Venezuelan people depends on the granular details of the plan, which currently we know little about. The broader outlines of the vision are of course enough to make the blood of any Latin American nationalist boil.” (01/16/26)
“President Donald Trump’s push to seize Greenland might be the least popular idea in American political history. Is that hyperbole? If so, that’s only because reliable and fast public polling is a relatively recent development within our 250-year experiment in self-governance. A Reuters/Ipsos poll released Wednesday found a staggering 4 percent of Americans favor the idea of seizing Greenland with military force. Among Republicans, the idea is actually twice as popular: 8 percent say taking the island is a ‘good idea.’ … do you know how hard it is to get such a minuscule percentage on a public opinion survey? Secondly, there’s the Lizardman’s Constant. That’s a term coined by Scott Alexander in 2013 to describe the surprisingly consistent finding that 4 percent of people will say they believe utterly outlandish things when polled — things like ‘human-sized lizards wearing skin suits control the world.'” (01/15/26)
