Monthly Archives: September 2026

Closet Socialist

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And sub rosa racist, in addition to his religious bigotry. That’s Progressive-Democratic Party candidate for US Senator from Texas, James Talarico. As recently as 2020, Talarico made his racism and socialist bent crystalline. He

described capitalism as an “oppressive system” that’s associated with white supremacy and climate change.

Capitalism is oppressive, and the primary alternative to that is the Progressive-Democratic Party—and Talarico—and Party’s recent enthusiastic embrace of the socialism of the Democratic Socialists of America. That overt embrace post-dates Talarico’s remarks, but he’s done nothing since to indicate he disagrees with his Party on that.

And: tying capitalism, which gets its strength and its legitimacy from the simple fact that it’s the only economic system that, on the one hand encourages voluntary participation in exchanges, and on the other hand, makes those participants—all of them—better off after the exchange than they were before the exchange, to the blatantly unequal—falsely so, immorally so—relationship among a supposedly oppressor race and supposedly intrinsically inferior races is nothing other than the manufacture of a race beef where none exists. And that is disgustingly racist.

Fatuous

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The Supreme Court has ruled that the White House’s East Wing conversion into a ballroom and an uprated secure facility can proceed. The majority (a 5-4 decision) said, in part, that the single individual the plaintiffs had trotted out, a woman whose aesthetic sense was being offended because she heavily favored the original architecture of the White House over the new architecture created by the East Wing conversion, was insufficient to stop the conversion.

Chief Justice John Roberts, writing in dissent, disagreed with that. He wrote, regarding this aspect of the matter, that

one of the group’s [National Trust for Historic Preservation, the main plaintiff] members is “deeply committed” to the preservation of historic American buildings.
“The White House is an iconic American building whose symbolism and history are wrapped up in its architecture,” he wrote.
Preservationists can be “aesthetically injured” in a way that gives them standing to sue, just as environmentalists can have standing to sue over the destruction of wildlife, Roberts wrote….

Aesthetics—personal taste—can be a source of material injury? Really?

I have questions, then.

Personal taste can be used to stop projects? What about the personal tastes of those who favor the project? What about the personal tastes of those whose aesthetic sense leads them to not care about the progress? On what basis does Roberts determine the minority should reign over the majority?

Roberts’ position is so fatuous it’s hard to believe he gave any thought at all to the matter.

An Illegal Strike

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Teachers strikes are explicitly illegal in Washington, but so far that State’s law men and women, at both the State and city level, have lacked the integrity to enforce their law. Thus, Seattle’s children are in danger of being deprived, yet again, of their access to education: the teachers of Seattle’s teachers union voted 91% in favor of striking and are set to walk off their jobs before the current school year starts.

There are two responsible answers to this move, if the union follows through, and both of them should be carried out. One is to fire for cause every teacher who goes on this illegal strike. The other is to decertify the teachers union for carrying out the illegal strike.

There are no other legitimate alternatives. The fact that the State’s and city’s managers have kowtowed to teachers unions in past illegal strikes presents no excuse for letting the union and those of its members get away with its illegal action this time. All acquiescing would do would be to demonstrate, once again, the intrinsic dishonesty of those in the State’s and city’s government.

Update: It appears the school district and the teachers union have reached an agreement. Apparently, the union is getting 9% in guaranteed salary increases, plus added school staff, but no added teachers on anything else to improve the children’s academic performance.

Illegal Aliens and CDLs

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The Federal government is finally cracking down on illegal aliens with commercial driver licenses and the schools that “train” them. The latter cavalierly ignore the grave danger to life and property—to say nothing of the businesses’ cargo that those illegal aliens are hauling around.

It’s good that the Federal government is finally moving seriously to reduce the number of illegal alien CDL holders and the risks to us Americans and our businesses that those illegals represent.

It’s not enough, though. Government isn’t the only player here, nor should it be the primary. Businesses that engage shipping companies to move their goods from port, factory, farm, retailer to stores, factories, assemblers, and end users have their own part to play in this. They should require those shipping companies, as a condition of doing business with them, to certify that they have no illegal alien CDLs on their payroll.

The Left and many of their Progressive-Democratic Party politicians like to talk about noblesse oblige in the context of rationalizing their drumbeat of imposing punishing taxes on the Evil Rich. A broader and far more legitimate onus is characterized by patriotisme oblige. It’s time for businessmen who are Americans to act like it, and to act on it.

Action and Response

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Russian President Vladimir Putin has been stepping up his drone invasions (they aren’t incursions; they’re deliberate and deliberatively provocative), sabotages, cyberattacks, election interferences, and on and on of Europe’s NATO member nations. The reason, Remigijus Bridikis, Lithuania’s State Security Department Director, says is this:

Russia is looking for ways to reduce support among NATO countries for Ukraine and, one of the secondary effects they are also pursuing is spreading panic[.]

The barbarian’s efforts to cow the Ukrainian people into submission with his terror bombing of houses, apartment buildings, hospitals, schools, shopping malls, and on and on is failing miserably. Those folks are too fresh from the Soviet jackboots on their necks to be intimidatable.  The populations of other nations are long gone soft and morally weak, he thinks, coddled as they’ve been, in fact, by American defenses and expenditures, so he’s starting to try those populations.

Putin isn’t far wrong regarding central and western Europe’s populations and government men and women. He’ll find the Baltic and Polish people, though, to be made of the same sterner stuff as Ukrainians and for the same reason.

The question becomes, then, how Germany, France, Spain, Italy, UK, Netherlands, Brussels, et al., will respond to Putin’s lower-key—journalists are pleased to call them “gray zone”—attacks. Those nations and their peoples have two paths along which to respond. One is to slowly back away and reduce support for Ukraine’s fight for its existence, hoping the barbarian at their gates will move on.

The other path is for them to have the moral courage and associated morale to step up their support for Ukraine and to do so materially, not just rhetorically.

That’s an open question, unfortunately.