Source: The American Conservative
by W James Antle III

“It is the attempted political transformation of foreign countries, especially in the Middle East, that leads inevitably to American failure. George W. Bush wasn’t unsuccessful at overthrowing Saddam Hussein or the Taliban. He was unable to quickly replace them with anything better (or in the case of the Taliban, after 20 years in Afghanistan, really to replace them at all). Trump of course doesn’t want to devote much time or resources to a political transformation of Iran …. He is perfectly happy to stroll into Pottery Barn, smash everything on the shelf, and then leave someone else with the bill. The problem is that means you have to either leave behind a political vacuum or do business with the remnants of the regime you went to war with in the first place.” (04/28/26)

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/iran-will-be-shorter-than-iraq-will-it-be-better/

Source: Common Sense
by Paul Jacob

“In normal fraud cases, it is the defrauded who feel the most aggrieved. But here it is their political enemies who express the outrage that the defrauded should be feeling.” (04/28/27)

https://thisiscommonsense.org/2026/04/28/secrets-of-liars-calumniators/

Source: TomDispatch
by Andrea Mazzarino

“America’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has been receiving lots of scrutiny right now from journalists and ordinary citizens like me — and for good reason! Detaining people en route to their kids’ schools, in hospitals, or at work shouldn’t be the first thing that comes to mind these days when I think of ‘freedom,’ ‘civil rights’ or ‘America.’ Nor should spending tens of billions of taxpayer dollars to rebuild warehouses so that the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, or ICE, can hold people without charges in subhuman conditions. What do you think? In all of this mayhem, it’s easy to overlook new human rights violations because there are so many each day. Violations of the rule of law have become the air Americans breathe.” (04/28/26)

https://tomdispatch.com/the-global-war-on-terrors-journey-home/

Source: Brownstone Institute
by Rev. John F Naugle

“Our political leaders view their own constituents with a sort of boredom or indifference. In the leadup to the [NFL] draft, Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania engaged in a number of public works projects designed to improve the area in preparation for the draft. Suddenly, our governments remembered that potholes aren’t supposed to be allowed to exist and that crime isn’t supposed to be allowed to happen. For three days, Pittsburgh had a heavily subsidized and highly functional public transit system, something that hasn’t existed the entirety of my lifetime. Any one of these projects could have been accomplished at any time, but the actual people who live there provided insufficient motivation for our leaders. Rather, what really mattered to them was looking good in front of millionaires, soon-to-be millionaires, and the powerful elites who would gather to party the night away with Nelly, Steve Aoki, and 2 Chainz.” 904/28/26)

https://brownstone.org/articles/elites-and-their-contempt/

Source: Liberal Currents
by Joseph Stieb

“As ‘Mad Men’ depicts, history reshapes people’s lives, perspectives, and interactions, often without them fully realizing that things have changed.” (04/28/26)

https://www.liberalcurrents.com/the-historical-sensibility-of-mad-men/