Welcome to the New World Order?

Source: The American Conservative
by Peter Van Buren

“The Iran War may prove to be little more than a blip on the world’s radar. Or its real significance may lie less in who wins militarily than in whether it accelerates global recognition that the United States is no longer willing or able to enforce the international order it created after 1945. There is a strong argument that, even as the missiles continue to fly, the war is not that significant. It appears today the most likely outcome will be a return to something like the status quo in the Middle East. … The opposite argument requires focusing on a longer sweep of history, in which the Iran War may be a significant marker in the slow-motion end of the global system set in place by the United States after the Second World War.” (05/11/26)

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/welcome-to-the-new-world-order/

Who’s on Trial?

Source: Law & Liberty
by Juliana Geran Pilon

“It takes a lawyer’s disciplined detachment, ability to focus on the most relevant facts of a case, commitment to law, and linguistic accuracy in order to produce a book as competent and useful as Israel on Trial: Examining the History, the Evidence, and the Law. But besides the ideal professional training, Yale-educated US district judge for the Southern District of Florida and former federal prosecutor Roy Altman has the equally essential capacity to appreciate the moral significance of his topic at this moment in history.” (05/11/26)

https://lawliberty.org/book-review/whos-on-trial/

What Makes a Man Shoot Serial Killers: On Refusing to be Shocked by Political Violence

Source: exile in happy valley
by Nicky Reid

“The general consensus among both Dempublicans and Republicrats alike is that everybody needs to tone down the dialogue. That, and ‘such acts of political violence have no place in civil society!’ I might be tempted to agree with them if we lived in something resembling a civil society and I’m not talking about the rhetoric. As bombastic as these gasbags in the political class have become in a desperate attempt to improve ratings on that failed reality show they call a government, young folks aren’t popping off politicos because of what other politicos said. … The reality is that we live in a violent country and we always have. For the political class to expect to be immune from this harsh reality is absurd, especially when you consider how goddamn violent they are.” (05/10/26)

https://exileinhappyvalley.blogspot.com/2026/05/what-makes-man-shoot-serial-killers-on.html

Left weaponizing women’s misplaced empathy, and it threatens all of us

Source: New York Post
by Miranda Devine

“A young liberal woman refused to cooperate with prosecutors after violent recidivist Rhamell Burke attacked her on the subway five weeks before he allegedly pushed a retired NYC teacher to his death on Thursday. Now the 23-year-old woman has regrets. ‘Maybe a part of me was just like, I don’t want to put another black man in jail,’ she told The Post. Maybe if she had indulged in less self-congratulatory empathy for the maniac who allegedly tried to kill her and felt more compassion for her fellow New Yorkers left to the mercy of an out-of-control predator roaming the streets, Ross Falzone would still be alive. But Falzone, 76, was unlucky enough to be entering the Chelsea subway station Thursday afternoon when Burke allegedly randomly shoved him down a flight of stairs, leaving the beloved ex-teacher to die hours later at Bellevue Hospital from a catastrophic brain injury.” (05/10/26)

https://nypost.com/2026/05/10/opinion/miranda-devine-the-left-is-weaponizing-womens-misplaced-empathy-and-it-threatens-all-of-us/

Comparative AI: Exploring the Nuanced Differences Between the Major AIs

Source: The Jolly Libertarian
by Marco den Ouden

“In Walter Donway’s new book, A Serious Chat With Artificial Intelligence, the AI in question was Open AI’s ChatGPT. In one of his blog posts, Curtis Yarvin bragged about how he changed the mind of Anthropic’s AI Claude on his techno-authoritarian philosophy, turning it (Claude) into a believer. In my own dealings with AI I have been using Microsoft’s CoPilot. And another major player in the market is Google’s Gemini. What do all of these powerful artificial intelligences have in common and how do they differ?” (05/10/26)

https://jollylibertarian.blogspot.com/2026/05/comparative-ai-exploring-nuanced.html

Trump rejects traditional conservatism, embraces a Republican version of socialism

Source: The Hill
by A Scott Bolden

“Republicans have denounced Democrats as socialists and communists since the 1930s. President Trump has frequently joined the chorus, such as when he said in 2019: ‘A vote for any Democrat in 2020 is a vote for the rise of radical socialism and the destruction of the American Dream.’ Yet despite his hyperbolic rhetoric, Trump has abandoned key conservative principles that Republicans have long espoused and instead adopted some socialist positions.” (05/10/26)

https://thehill.com/opinion/5870607-trump-republican-socialism-democrats/

Seats of Power

Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by Mark Nayler

“Luis de Guindos escaped Spanish politics just in time. In March 2018, he stepped down as Economy Minister, having served under prime minister Mariano Rajoy since 2011; three months later, Rajoy was ousted in a no-confidence vote, his Popular Party engulfed in a huge corruption scandal. De Guindos, now 66, has spent the last eight years as Vice President of the European Central Bank (ECB), the institution responsible for maintaining price stability throughout the bloc. He hands over to Croatia’s Boris Vujĉić at the end of this month, leaving Spain without representation on the ECB’s six-member board for the first time in several years, a situation that Madrid is determined to rectify. Under the Socialist leadership of Pedro Sánchez, Spain has emerged as one of the strongest voices in the EU.” (05/10/26)

https://fee.org/articles/seats-of-power/