“After decades of building one of the largest and most heavily armed war machines in the Middle East, Assad’s Baathist regime crumbled like sand because that is precisely what Syria is. It is not a nation, at least not by the Spenglerian definition of a people united by common cause and culture. It is a series of lines that some Englishman drew all over the map in blood after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. You cannot expect anyone who isn’t a certified borderline personality to die for something so synthetic. The Islamic State was equally transparent beneath all the macho posturing which is precisely why it disintegrated beneath the boots of one-hundred-thousand peasants and America and Israel’s new and improved model can be expected to meet the same fate but only if the Syrian people give up on all this Westphalian nonsense.” (12/22/24)
Source: The American Prospect
by Toni Aguilar Rosenthal
“Former Rep. Doug Collins is Donald Trump’s pick to head the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), a federal agency that oversees the administration of health care to over 9.1 million veterans. Collins, notably, is a veteran himself, but has seemingly little background on veterans issues. His early pronouncements are superficially bland, promising to ‘root out corruption, and ensure every veteran receives the benefits they’ve earned’, among other things. Unfortunately, here Collins seems to be suggesting the mass firing of VA employees, an act purportedly to be accompanied by the expansive downscaling and robust privatization of VA services, perhaps as outlined by Project 2025’s VA section. Privatization and other divestment schemes have a long history at the VA, a history that has continuously proven to hurt veterans while padding the profits of corporate profiteers.” (12/23/24)
Source: David Friedman’s Substack
by David Friedman
“Recently, when writing a check, it occurred to me that requiring the amount to be given separately in both words and number was a simple and ingenious solution to the problem of reducing error. It is possible, if your handwriting is as sloppy as mine, to write a letter or number that can be misread as a different letter or number. If redundancy consisted of writing the amount of the check twice as numbers or twice as words the same error could appear in both versions. It is a great deal less likely to make two errors, one in letters and one in numbers, that happen to produce the same mistaken result.” (12/22/24)
“Have you unhitched your wagon from the dying mule of government? If not, why not? It’s not helping you, in spite of the claims of its public relations team, but is holding you back. You could be better without it getting in your way and siphoning off the labor of your hands to benefit itself. More liberty, more wealth, more health, more self-respect. For many people, talk of the end of political government is crazy. Their ancestors thought any talk of ending slavery — excuse me, other forms of slavery — was also crazy. They have a hard time seeing how the world will function without this great evil continuing to devour individual liberty.” (12/22/24)
“There oughta be a law. If you know me at all, you know I don’t say that very often. But I really think this one could be important. In faux legalese, here’s my proposal: ‘No government employee, elected or appointed government official, or candidate for election or appointment to government office, shall make, utter, or issue any public statement relating to those positions between midnight on December 18 of the current year and midnight on January 1 of the next year.’ No speeches. No press conferences. No press releases. No social media posts on ‘official’ accounts. … none of this ‘my fellow Americans’ stuff. When you’re not annoying or enraging your fellow Americans, you’re just boring us. So shut your yappers for a couple of weeks and leave us alone.” (12/22/24)
Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by Katrina Gulliver
“Urban zoning is an issue on which the left and the right often find common ground: they don’t like it. The left often because they want the freedom to build multifamily and affordable housing in areas designated for single-family residences, and the right because of the undue red tape and restrictions on what can be built anywhere. Often held up as a hero in this game is the city of Houston, Texas, famous for not having zoning. However, as Sara Bronin explains in her new book Key to the City, that’s not the full picture. Outsiders picture a regulation-free developer’s paradise: ‘But in the unzoned city, private rules fill the regulatory vacuum left by zoning’s absence.'” (12/20/24)
“The road to hell is paved with good intentions — and so is the path to a potential surveillance state. After losing its high-profile case in the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia last week, TikTok is now one step closer to being outright banned in this country. If the Chinese-owned app fails to find a political ally in the incoming Trump administration by Jan. 19 (or new domestic ownership), mind-numbing scroll sessions and moronic viral stunts will soon be unavailable for its 170 million American users. While many may view the Biden administration’s actions as overreach, a ban on TikTok would be an act many American parents are desperate to see: the restriction of social media for their children. The harmful effects of predatory algorithms on young people are now as obvious as the link between cigarette smoking and lung cancer.” (12/21/24)
