“In a conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky last August, President Donald Trump noted that Ukraine hadn’t held elections since the Russian invasion, asking whether elections are called off during a war. Before Zelensky could respond, Trump added: ‘Oh, that’s a good thing.’ Five months later, Trump mused apophatically about canceling elections out of disdain for Democrats. Just days after that, in an interview with Reuters, Trump reflected with his typical braggadocio that, given his great success as president, ‘we shouldn’t even have an election’ this November. The sheer number of times Trump brought up canceling elections forced White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt to clarify that the president was only joking. But in light of Trump’s repeated affronts to democracy—including January 6th and his sustained lies about the results of the 2020 election—we are forced to take these remarks seriously.” (06/09/26)
“Long-term planning can be admirable. Some contracts — say, for construction — will genuinely take five or more years to finish up. Or when vendors need to make huge upfront investments, a long payoff timeline can entice qualified competition. Locking in five-year tech contracts, however, just allows the solicitation sins of the father to be visited upon their children a decade later: Between now and 2031 (or 2033), needs will change, technology will advance, and the project budgets will rise and fall.” (06/08/26)
“U.S. President Donald Trump has become a passenger in the Iran war, despite insisting that he remains behind the wheel after months of failed efforts to reach a peace deal. And by attempting to portray himself as in control and denying complex realities on the ground, he has only made it more difficult to reach an agreement.” (06/08/26)
“TLast week, the flesh-eating parasite known as the New World screwworm was found in a calf in Texas; a second case was identified about five miles away shortly thereafter. (A third case was found in a dog.) Screwworm flies lay their eggs in the live tissue of warm-blooded animals, from livestock to pets to humans. These larvae ‘screw’ into the animal’s flesh, and while they are not very harmful to humans, in that the horrifying effects of maggots chewing into your skin are relatively easy to notice and address, they can kill a livestock host if not treated. In a widespread infestation, one of the last resorts would be mass culling, which would obviously have huge impacts on a diminished U.S. cattle herd.” (06/09/26)
“Life comes at you in waves. You graduate high school, watch friends start careers, get married, and have kids. Then social media shows you their children repeating the cycle. As a member of the Pacific High School Class of 1999, I didn’t expect to reach the retirement wave so soon. Yet a recent post stopped me: a high school classmate, still in his mid-40s, announced his retirement after 25 years in Missouri public schools. … He is retiring at exactly the age when most professionals hit their career peak—when experience, leadership, and judgment are most valuable. And that’s the problem. Missouri’s Public School Retirement System (PSRS) is pushing talented educators out of the classroom at the very moment students and schools need them most.” (06/08/26)
Interview with Shikha Dalmia. Dalmia: “My break with libertarianism happened when Trump arrived on the scene. I was working at Reason magazine at that time and, the minute Trump came down the golden escalator, it was clear to me that he was a different kind of politician: he was a demagogue and an authoritarian, he didn’t really understand liberalism, and he didn’t understand America’s core commitments. … It is not that libertarians were completely unconcerned about Trump; it’s that they were just not taking the threat seriously. They were treating him as a normal politician, just bad in a different kind of way and, at best, maybe a corrective to the excesses of the left. This chasm between me and libertarian circles just kept growing, and it was getting hard to get my point of view taken seriously.” (06/08/26)
