In his series on the Five Books of Moses, Covenant and Conversation, the late and justly lamented Chief Rabbi of the United Kingdom, Jonathan Sacks, wrote on the connection between sex, power, and violence. He noted how in Genesis and in the beginning of Exodus, a series of conflicts occur between the covenantal family of Abraham and the surrounding peoples: In three separate incidents, Abraham and then later his son Isaac seek relief from famine in a neighboring kingdom, only to find that the king in each case demanded they surrender their wives to the royal harem. Abraham’s nephew, Lot, is confronted by the demand of the residents of Sodom that he hand over his male guests so they could be raped. Abraham’s great-granddaughter, Dinah, is raped by the son of the ruler of the city of Shechem. Abraham’s great-grandson Joseph is imprisoned, presumably for life, on the false charge of trying to rape the wife of his Egyptian master. Why does Genesis make such an emphasis on this? Rabbi Sacks proposes that this was the great first step in the establishment of a proper society in the world. What was at issue between the new covenantal community and the rest of the world was not a religious doctrine — we don’t find here the patriarchs making prophetic orations to the people around them about wrong modes of worship — but the nature of the relationship between the sexes. As Sacks puts it, the world accepted that sex was the reward given to powerful men. Their value system turns women into instruments of male desire. It places power, not love, at the heart of human relationships. It treats women as objects rather than subjects with equal dignity and integrity. It divorces sex from compassion and concern. It dishonors the most intimate human bond, the one in which we are most like God Himself: the love that brings new life into the world. The message that was being established by these events listed above was that this old mode is fundamentally incompatible with a livable world. If the core relationship that reproduces the species cannot be established on the bases of love and respect, the building of the structure of society inevitably give way, as it will be built on a faulty foundation. The long drive of the progressive Left has been to overthrow all values that do not serve their own power. In the centuries and millennia that ensued, the West chose the Abrahamic values. True, the old views were not entirely expunged — think of the scene in Braveheart in which the nobleman takes the newly married bride for the first night before turning her over to her husband, the practice of droit de seigneur or jus primae noctus. But as the middle classes started to make their clout felt in the modern age, the power of the ancient biblical counter-idea asserted itself against kings. King George IV did not grab brides away with the threat of violence as did kings of old and Edward Longshanks in the film, but his ugly profligacy nearly resulted in a complete alienation of the middle and lower classes from the monarchy. Victoria restored luster to the throne in no small part due to her exemplary love-filled marriage, which captured the hearts of the public and informed the tacit morals of the age. In America, in which religion had a far larger role in society than in modern educated Europe, the covenantal view of the relation between the sexes was tacitly accepted as the norm. It is only recently that public figures felt they could safely assume that mixing sex with force and violence could be overshadowed as a moral priority by intersectionality, the supreme and only value that remains standing in the woke mind after their work of total deconstruction. The long drive of the progressive Left has been to overthrow all values that do not serve their own power. So when it comes to the relations between the sexes, they did not stop with Henry Kissinger’s observation that “power is the ultimate aphrodisiac.” The true atavism was seen in all its force in the chambers of Stalin’s chief secret policeman, the sadistic Lavrenti Beria, who was a serial rapist. The flights to Epstein Island were a milder Western reflection of that ethos, substituting statutory rape for Beria’s more explicit form of violence. More telling and more violent has been the lack of interest in the proliferation of sex slavery that has been  a major part of the cartel-infested plague of the open borders invasion. The ruling class shrugged so what — in the progress towards Utopia, mere collateral damage that interests only the clingers. No powerful sense of revulsion that would compel a serious effort to stop a defining threat to our own moral standing as a people. Nowhere is this throwback to accepting sexual violence more evident today than in the homeland of the late Rabbi Sacks, the UK. A modern day J’accuse is featured in this week’s Free Press, written by Dominic Green and entitled “The Biggest Peacetime Crime — and Cover-up — in British History.” Green tells the story of more than a decade of grooming and rape of thousands of underage British girls, almost all from the lower class, most often personally vulnerable due to poverty, broken families, abuse, or the like. As Green makes clear, it is not that many people have not been aware of what once were considered by all among the most horrific of crimes. The shameful failure is of the entire governing class, whether Conservative or Labor, though Labor is portrayed as the most egregious in its failures. As Green writes: every level of the British system is implicated in the cover-up. Social workers were intimidated into silence. Local police ignored, excused, and even abetted pedophile rapists across dozens of cities. Senior police and Home Office officials deliberately avoided action in the name of maintaining what they called “community relations.” Local councilors and Members of Parliament rejected pleas for help from the parents of raped children. Charities, NGOs, and Labour MPs accused those who discussed the scandal of racism and Islamophobia. The media mostly ignored or downplayed the biggest story of their lifetimes … zealous in their incuriosity. Since the rape gangs have been largely ethnic Pakistanis, the woke power structure felt that it would be a far worse moral problem to direct any blame to those who stand higher in the intersectional hierarchy of victimization. And so it went on and on, brutalizing thousands of intersectionally expendable ethnic English girls. But it now at last seems that the covenantal values are more resilient and more widespread than the amoral power practitioners. The woke gospel has not established itself in the hearts of the public. It has not expunged, as the powerful had believed, the powerful revulsion to sexual violence that the Bible sought to establish at the beginning of its mission in the world. It looks and feels like a corner has been turned. The good people of the West have listened to all the moral exhortations of the Left and given it all a sincere try. It seems the people have enough data to draw conclusions that they feel are robust. They do not like the damage that has been done to their culture and their lives. The cure the wokeists had forcibly administered, so programmatic and all-encompassing in its scope, so breathtaking in the moral promises it made — that cure has proven far worse than whatever disease it may have addressed. Equally breathtaking is the world-wide scope of the rejection of what stands revealed as moral pretension and dereliction of duty of those at the helm. The woke ruling classes are losing their grip in France, in Germany, in the Netherlands, in Canada, in America. And now Britain, appalled at the broad assault on free speech and the ongoing and ever-more appalling revelations of the Great Rape Gang Coverup, has lost confidence in the new Labor government in record time. Already in October, the Independent reported that the Starmer Labor government, elected in a landslide only last summer, has slipped below a 30 percent approval rate. Starmer’s long role as chief prosecutor, in which he did very little to deal with the epidemic of organized rape, is not helping him at all. People are finally openly talking about the magnitude of the disaster over which so many presided, and about which they did little, appeasing the monster in their midst. At least the object of Chamberlain’s appeasement lay across the Channel. Here, the hungry savage beast is already on England’s shores and has found itself no small measure of political power. But as with Chamberlain, the nature of the beast is making itself clear, and the people are rising up to reject their leaders’ weakness and capitulation to violence. A severe political struggle lies ahead, but it just may be, with a fresh new wind blowing, the change will come faster than anyone might have thought possible just yesterday. Just like inauguration day in the U.S., it can’t come too soon. READ MORE from Shmuel Klatzkin: Freedom is America’s Strength Bob Dylan’s Music and the Age of Trump The post Biblical Values Strike Back Against Mass Rape appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

As President-elect Donald Trump is just days away from returning to the White House, American Catholic leaders are denouncing his immigration agenda. Chicago’s powerful Cardinal Blase Cupich warned in a recent interview that U.S. bishops “are going to have to be prophetic and denounce any abuse of human dignity that may occur” as Trump rolls out his mass deportation program. “We are going to be vigilant and we are going to defend the human dignity of immigrants,” Cupich said. The cardinal called deportation plans “intolerable, especially in a country where we are all immigrants. I am a product of immigration!” Over the past decade, the USCCB and groups like Catholic Charities have collected over $2 billion from the U.S. government for migrant and refugee “services.” Cupich’s comments follow those of Cardinal Robert McElroy, the newly-appointed archbishop of Washington, D.C. In a press conference last week, McElroy anticipated conflict with the incoming Trump administration on the issue of immigration and deportations. “In terms of what issue would I see coming forth in the life of the church that might be in contrast with some of the priorities the president-elect has been talking about, a large one, of course, is immigration,” the cardinal said. He claimed that “plans” for “wider, indiscriminate, massive deportation across the country would be something that would be incompatible with Catholic doctrine.” A far more Catholic understanding of and approach to immigration is evinced by Trump’s incoming “border czar,” former acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) director Tom Homan. In an interview with Tucker Carlson last month, Homan described why he came out of retirement for a second time to join Trump’s administration. “When you lose the border, trafficking and sex trafficking’s gonna skyrocket, child deaths will skyrocket, migrant deaths will skyrocket, American deaths will skyrocket,” the immigration official said. He continued, “I love this country. I want to save some lives. Secure borders save lives. So I’m gonna come back, do what I can.” Homan lamented the more-than-300,000 migrant children who have gone missing at the border since President Joe Biden took office four years ago. “We gotta save these women and children,” he said. “We gotta save these kids, a lot of them are living a life of hell every day.… We’re gonna find some of them living with pedophiles, living in sex-slavery, some are gonna be dead, but we gotta find these children.” Endorsing Chaotic Immigration The approach of the U.S. bishops — that of facilitating the wanton violation of America’s laws, of encouraging the invasion of the nation by a host of criminals, of turning a blind eye to the horrific abuses that Homan plans to end — is not a compassionate one. The chaotic crisis at the southern border has fostered a dramatic increase in deaths, national security risks, drug trafficking, child sex trafficking, and a bevvy of other atrocities besides. Endorsing the crisis, as the U.S. bishops do, does nothing to protect the dignity of immigrants. The Catholic Church has very clear teachings on immigration and border control, but Cupich, McElroy, and their episcopal brethren are seemingly content to ignore and even denigrate these teachings. Why? Because the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) profits from the ongoing immigration crisis. Over the past decade, the USCCB and groups like Catholic Charities have collected over $2 billion from the U.S. government for migrant and refugee “services.” Lawsuits have alleged that these “services” include shuttling illegal immigrants released by Border Patrol further into the U.S. and providing them with pre-paid debit cards, phones, and food and housing vouchers. It just could be that all the pontificating from Cupich, McElroy, and the other USCCB illegal immigration apologists is less a matter of pearl-clutching in the face of Trump’s planned deportations and more a matter of clutching at their ill-gotten cash. The post US Bishops Denounce Trump’s Immigration Plans appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

The year 2025 represents a pivotal moment for those of us on the political right. President Donald Trump enters his second term as the 47th President of the United States with control of both chambers of Congress and a mandate for a conservative agenda. We also mark the 100th birthday of William F. Buckley Jr., the intellectual Godfather of the modern conservative movement in the United States. The good news is that President Trump has assembled one of the most pro-Israel administrations in the country’s history for his second term. Buckley’s brand of classical liberalism is far different from Trump’s populist overtones in the Republican Party today. However, one thing that remains constant and of the utmost importance is the fight against anti-Semitism, which is a legacy we must uphold to maintain our moral integrity, humanity, and widespread appeal. When Buckley started National Review in 1955, the conservative movement was void. Columbia University literary critic Lionel Trilling, in his seminal 1950 work The Liberal Imagination, described contemporary conservative thought as amounting to “irritable mental gestures which seek to resemble ideas.” However, Buckley’s journal provided a fusion of classical liberals, traditionalists, and libertarians. Influential conservatives of the time such as Charles Lindbergh and Henry Ford, as well as such organizations as the John Birch Society, drank deeply from the well of anti-Semitic sentiment. But Buckley was adamant about keeping National Review free and clear from such influences, and he succeeded. Indeed, as noted by historian George Nash, five of the 31 names on NR’s masthead were Jewish as of the first issue in November 1955. His persuasion through various mediums, including his Firing Line talk show on PBS, helped defeat the liberal establishment, persuade the public to support the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and promote national Republican politicians like Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, Jack Kemp, and Newt Gingrich. Yet when it was time for Buckley to step down as editor, he told the Washington Post that his most significant professional achievement was the “absolute exclusion of anything anti-Semitic or kooky” from conservatism. Although Buckley was a man of principle, he was also a man of good faith. He believed in a rational conservatism that advocated truth and defended American ideals like capitalism, limited government, and personal liberty. Former editor David Klinghoffer, who worked as an editor for National Review, remembers Buckley as a man of integrity and someone who “swept the vestigial anti-Semites from the right-wing scene,” alluding to banishing the leaders of the John Birch Society for their conspiratorial Jew-hating and, later on, writers Pat Buchanan and Joe Sobran for their seeming obsession with Israel and the “Jewish lobby” (and, in Buchanan’s words, the “amen corner” in the US Congress). According to Jonathan Tobin of the Jewish World Review, Buckley’s political philosophy of civil libertarianism and fervent anti-communism were the driving forces behind his commitment to fighting anti-Semitism on the political scene, and also why he supported the state of Israel as the only functioning democracy in the Middle East. Buckley’s “great effort,” coined by Samuel Freeman, wasn’t just eliminating the American right’s disdain for the Jewish people but also developing a mainstream, truth-rooted conservatism. Along with bringing different coalitions together inside the Republican Party, he also made conservativism more modern in practice, which attracted different races and religious groups, especially Jews who defected from the Soviet Union and were unsatisfied with the liberal wing of the Democratic Party. Buckley’s rise to respectable prestige as a national figurehead spearheaded the Republican Party’s conservative political dominance in American government for the better part of the late 20th century, culminating perhaps in 1996, when even the Democrat president Bill Clinton announced in his State of the Union address that the “era of big government is over.” This lasted until 2016, the year that Trump became President and discarded much of the conventional wisdom of Buckleyism in the conservative establishment. He replaced it with populism and nationalistic overtones influenced, at times, by alt-right talking heads. However, conservative Buckleyites were pleasantly surprised to be able to unite and form an alliance with the Trump Administration on its allegiance to the State of Israel, which both sides of conservatism saw as a stalwart ally in the war against terrorism and Islamic radicalism, as well as an unparalleled military ally and resource. Trump’s first term achieved victories foreign and domestic, including recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of the Jewish state and relocating the embassy from Tel Aviv, signing the Abraham Accords to normalize relations between Israel and several Arab states, and signing an executive order implementing Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act to stop anti-Semitic acts on college campuses. Conservatives face a new challenge as anti-Semitism has resurfaced on college campuses and in the public square following the October 7th Hamas terrorist attack on Israel in 2023. Over the past year, roughly 10,000 anti-Semitic altercations occurred throughout the nation, a 200 percent increase from the year before, and college campuses recorded about 1,200 anti-Semitic attacks, a rise of 500 percent since 2023. This resurgence of anti-Semitism, which has attracted sympathy from parts of the right-wing online universe, underscores the urgent need for the conservative movement to uphold Buckley’s legacy and actively combat this hateful ideology. The good news is that President Trump has assembled one of the most pro-Israel administrations in the country’s history for his second term. Florida Senator Marco Rubio is replacingd Anthony Blinken as Secretary of State, and Florida Congressman Mike Waltz has been appointed National Security Advisor. Rep. Elise Stefanik, the congresswoman who famously raked three college presidents over the coals for their timidity in fighting campus anti-Semitism, will be the new ambassador at the U.N., and Governor Mike Huckabee will be Trump’s Ambassador to Israel. Huckabee is an evangelical Christian who has given paid tours in Jerusalem. These appointments signal a strong commitment to the fight against anti-Semitism and the defense of Israel within the new Trump Administration, inspiring conservatives to support and engage with these efforts. While few if any conservatives communicate with the same mastery as William F. Buckley, his vision of American conservatism can still exist. Now, more than ever, conservatives must stand united and continue to work with the new Trump Administration to defend Israel and defeat anti-Semitism while promoting conservative ideals for a new generation. READ MORE from Alex Adkins: Lori Chavez-DeRemer Will Not ‘Work’ as Secretary of Labor The Penguin Glides as 2024’s Best Drama The post Conservatives Must Thwart Anti-Semitism appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

As the NYC mayoral race enters high gear, the smart money is on Eric Adams abandoning a run in the Democratic primary and instead taking on the 2021 GOP Mayoral standard bearer Curtis Sliwa for the Republican line in November. At a Harlem business group, he stated, “Every day in the Police Department, I kicked those crackers’ ass.” Indeed, some GOP honchos are actively on board with this move, which would be in deep conflict with the GOP activist base in the boroughs that overwhelmingly support Sliwa. In fact, Sliwa garnered near 70 percent of the vote in the GOP mayoral primary in 2021 and has continued his support of local Republican groups and candidates over the years. There are two ways Adams can seek the GOP line in November. He can officially switch parties by mid-February and be eligible to run in a GOP primary, or he can simply remain a Democrat and seek a Wilson-Pakula designation from three of the five borough Republicans Chairs. A Wilson-Pakula authorization allows party leaders in a jurisdiction the ability to select an unregistered candidate to run in the party’s primary election, in this case against Sliwa in the Republican primary. It is unfathomable that any GOP leader can consider supporting Eric Adams. We can’t forget it was Adams who welcomed illegal migrants getting off the buses from Port Authority in 2022 and gave them free five-star hotel rooms, culturally appropriate food, phones, and gift cards. He said, “We should protect our immigrants. Period.” Adams opened migrant shelters throughout the city, sometimes uprooting veterans and seniors, and wrecking the quality of life in many neighborhoods. Now, after the political landscape has changed, he has taken a harder line and even indicated cooperation with the incoming Trump administration to deport those here illegally that have committed other crimes. New York Republicans should not be fooled. Of course, one can also opine that Adams is seeking Trump’s good graces to get a pardon from his alleged federal crimes. This is also the same man that called white NYPD police “crackers” in 2019. At a Harlem business group, he stated, “Every day in the Police Department, I kicked those crackers’ ass.”  Playing the race card is par for the course for Adams. In May 2023, Adams called Rockland County Executive Ed Day racist and antisemitic when Adams wanted to ship illegal immigrants he welcomed with open arms to the Hudson Valley. Adams stated, “So when you look at the County Executive Day — this guy has a record of being antisemitic, racist comments. His thoughts and how he responded to this really shows a lack of leadership.” Most real Republicans would say Day fighting to protect his county from illegal immigrants is real leadership. Adams also accused Texas Governor Greg Abbott if being racist and targeting “Black mayors” and “Black-run cities” with buses full of migrants. Left unsaid of course is that these cities have sanctuary city and state laws. Let us also not forget Adams still refuses to call out Governor Kathy Hochul, Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, and Senate Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins for not addressing the disaster of bail reform. He refuses to name and shame them. The same is true with Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg. As Bragg continues to let criminals go completely free, including Hamas supporters that shut down and vandalized college campuses, Adams stays mum. How can GOP leaders even consider this guy? The five county GOP chairs should today state that under no circumstances will they give a Wilson-Pakula authorization to Adams or support him in anyway. READ MORE: Professors Cancel Class After Republican Victory The Alvin Bragg Horror Show in Manhattan Continues Capano has worked in senior level position for two NYC GOP Members of Congress and has been a political science professor for almost 20 years. The post NYC GOP Must Reject Eric Adams for Mayor appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

China’s economy is currently facing a profound and multifaceted crisis that has captured global attention. Economically, this crisis stems from years of overexpansion in real estate, excessive debt, and supply exceeding demand. Local governments, in pursuit of GDP growth and personal promotion, have overborrowed and blindly expanded infrastructure and investment. The zero-COVID policy over the past three years caused people to lose trust in the government. Coupled with the recent suppression of private enterprises, both consumers and producers lack confidence and refuse to become “leeks” for the government to harvest. Pressure from the U.S. and other nations could push the CCP to reform, benefiting both the Chinese people and the world. Currently, the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) economic stimulus approach remains conservative, focusing mainly on helping local governments repay debts and stimulating investment. However, the CCP has not shown the resolve to dispense cash to stimulate consumer spending, reasoning that it must not “encourage welfarism.” While commentators have focused their analysis on the economic factors in this malaise, the political aspects of China’s economic downturn are no less important. China’s economic decline is not cyclical; it is institutional — a sign that the “China model” has reached its limit. What is the China model? I summarize it as follows: National mobilization system: The CCP’s greatest strength lies in its ability to mobilize the entire nation’s resources to develop critical industries, such as high-speed rail, solar power, and electric vehicles. Once a key industry is identified, foreign competition is restricted, selected domestic enterprises are supported, the state helps acquire foreign technologies, and China’s vast market size is leveraged to reduce unit costs quickly and dominate global markets. Partial legal improvement: Since the late 1970s’ reform and opening up, the CCP gradually established commercial laws that provided some degree of property rights protection for foreign and private enterprises. Partial privatization: Under limited legal protection, private property rapidly developed over the decades, leading to a large number of successful private entrepreneurs like Jack Ma, who fueled China’s economic growth. Globalization: Similarly, under partial legal protection, foreign companies entered China en masse while Chinese enterprises sold products worldwide. Leveraging low human rights (low labor costs) and undervalued currency, Chinese products captured global markets, turning China into the world’s factory. Diligent and hardworking culture: Having experienced the poverty of Mao’s revolutionary era, Chinese people, since reform and opening, have seized every opportunity to work hard and make money, leading to highly efficient workers. But how many of these characteristics remain today? Years of private sector development created a massive middle class and wealthy entrepreneurs who are dissatisfied with the CCP’s strict controls and demand genuine rule of law. However, genuine rule of law would fundamentally undermine the CCP’s one-party dictatorship. Thus, the CCP has stopped advancing toward the rule of law, explicitly rejecting Western constitutionalism and placing the Party above the law. The national mobilization model persists, but the overproduction it creates — such as in electric vehicles — exceeds domestic absorption capacity, with global markets unwilling to accept the surplus. Other countries are now aware of the threat posed by the China model and are starting to resist it. Culturally, while Chinese workers remain efficient, the younger generation lacks the willingness to endure hardship like those born during Mao’s era. The emerging “lying flat” culture poses challenges to China’s productivity. The crux of the CCP system lies in the top leader’s unchecked power. The CCP operates under highly centralized control, suppressing society’s democracy and free expression. This centralization extends to internal Party dynamics, where power is concentrated in the hands of the top leader. Attempts at collective leadership have failed, as shared power results in dukedom, inefficiency, and rampant corruption. Under Xi Jinping, the consensus is that a single leader must hold absolute authority, and offending this leader results in political ruin or worse. The CCP faces severe economic challenges, such as deflation. Deflation — marked by oversupply, falling prices, reduced investment, and decreased consumption — severely impacts the economy. However, to someone with limited economic understanding, deflation might seem beneficial. The Wall Street Journal reported that when experts informed Xi of the deflation challenge, his response was, “Don’t people like it when things are cheaper?” No one dared to challenge him after this statement. Understanding the CCP’s policy-making swings between “left” and “right” is crucial. Left-leaning policies emphasize communism, class struggle, suppressing private enterprise, and opposing the U.S. and the West. Right-leaning policies focus on economic growth, encouraging private enterprise, and fostering friendly relations with the U.S. and the West. Internally, the CCP operates on the principle, “lean left to build powerbase, lean right to survive crises.” The CCP ideology is intrinsically left, making leaders who lean left less politically vulnerable. Conversely, leaders perceived as overly right-leaning risk being ousted, as happened with the reform-minded CCP leaders of Hu Yaobang (head of CCP, 1982-1987) and Zhao Ziyang (head of CCP, 1987-1989). For Xi Jinping, political considerations take precedence. To secure CCP’s rule, he is willing to close China’s doors, despite the economic costs. When necessary, he may adopt opportunistic right-leaning policies, such as courting private enterprises or improving U.S. relations. However, these are tactical adjustments rather than ideological shifts. Those who dislike Xi believe removing him will solve the problems, but this is a misunderstanding. Xi’s policies aim to save the CCP, and any leader would prioritize the Party’s survival. China’s economic crisis and gradual decoupling from the world have significant impacts on global economies, particularly the U.S. Supply chain instability: China’s scale and mobilization model made its industrial chains robust, producing cheap goods through low labor costs and undervalued currency. Decoupling will disrupt supply chains in the short term. However, globally, alternatives are being developed, making long-term resolution possible. Rising prices: To counter China’s mobilization model, the U.S. must reduce dependence on Chinese goods, causing short-term shortages and inflationary pressures. For years, China’s large-scale exports to the U.S. injected significant dollar inflows into U.S. capital markets, supporting low interest rates. Decoupling reduces this inflow, ending the era of long-term low interest rates. These costs are necessary. Continued reliance on China would strengthen its mobilization model, imposing greater future costs on the free world, especially the U.S. The U.S. must firmly reject the CCP’s mobilization model. Pressure from the U.S. and other nations could push the CCP to reform, benefiting both the Chinese people and the world. Under CCP control, Chinese citizens lack the power to protect their rights. International resistance acts as a counterbalance to the CCP, akin to an opposition party restraining the ruling party, ultimately benefiting ordinary Chinese people. READ MORE from Shaomin Li: DEI and Marxism Destroy Merit and Excellence The Chinese Model’s Challenge to the 2024 Nobel Prize in Economics Shaomin Li is a Professor at Old Dominion University. The post China’s Economy and the US in 2025 appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

It is quite possible to be well read and completely stupid. They are not incompatible. But, as a sociologist, let me tell you that people who still read, even as a gesture of resistance, have a greater chance of understanding life a little better, and that’s enough. We live surrounded by gadgets that claim to be smarter than we are. In class we always picked on the nerd, the one who had the same emotional intelligence as an amoeba, but who got the best grades, because he or she devoured the textbooks and then threw them up in exactly the same order. After the exam, they would be wiped clean. Digital life is hateful, the modern world repels anyone with common sense. I’ve never been impressed by people with the ability to retain data. You might think it’s envy, because my memory is that of a goldfish, a dead goldfish at that, and maybe you’re right, but honestly, I think I’ve come out on top in the end: what the hell good is that gifted memory to you now when ChatGPT will best you each and every time? All in all, reading oxygenates. In these times of hysteria and urgency it is more necessary than ever, because it forces you to stop and focus your attention for a few minutes on something you can’t scroll with your finger every five seconds. Replacing reading with TikTok is the way contemporary civilization decided to get high and escape from the uncomfortable reality of living. Marx made a lot of fuss about alienation, but we have never been more alienated than we are today. The truth is that these days there is no excuse for frivolity, nor for literary illiteracy. It is no longer necessary to be rich, travel the world, and attend the most elite schools to become a cultural torrent. All one needs is an internet connection and a certain intellectual restlessness. The 20 million books available on Google Books is much more than any of the great scholars of the past could read in a lifetime. Digital life is hateful, the modern world repels anyone with common sense, and the 21st century is, broadly speaking, a far more terrifying dump than the unforgettable Argentine tango, Cambalache, depicted: That the world was and will be a mess, I know In 506 and the year 2000 too That there have always been crooks, Machiavellians and swindlers. Contented and bitter, values and rolled gold But that the twentieth century is a show Of insolent wickedness, no one can any longer deny We live wallowing in meringue And in the same mud, all of us are groped And yet, every coin has two sides. We have culture. Overwhelming, universal, timeless. The grand culture. All of it. Old moral codes, the long lost manners, a cultured and elegant writing, the costumbrismo, historical documentation safe from Wokeist poisoners, exemplary lives, prophecies fulfilled, the timeless novels, classical books of philosophy, art, science, religion. In the past, those who always tend to justify crime (you know who they are), used to say that most criminals, or terrorists who gave their lives over to hatred, did so because they had not had the opportunity to go to school and be morally and intellectually developed. In reality, there is no longer any cultural alibi for anyone with access to the Internet. So the usual people can start working on another speech to justify barbarism. And then there are those who are no longer capable of feeling, the unscrupulous, over-stimulated children of the digital revolution. Those who fell into cybernetic nets during the 90’s, killing zombies, and who have since then not experienced any brain activity whatsoever. Today they have no excuse either. Because the same poison that digitized their lives during adolescence, the same poison that stole their paper books, the same little screen that made them dumb by the ages of 15 or 20, can now, at 30 or 40, rescue them. They don’t need to spend more money on psychologists. The choice is theirs. And this goes to show that, even in the worst of times, freedom always ends up appearing to rescue us from captivity, be it voluntary or involuntary. The cultural divide has been broken forever. And so has the left’s favorite excuse to justify their violent revolutions. A big part of what is wrong with Nicolás Maduro is that he has never read a fat book in his life. And a big part of what is wrong with Venezuela is that no one has had the chance to throw one at his head yet either. READ MORE from Itxu Diaz: I Am Giving This Script to Disney So They Can Get Rich Again. The Year the (Woke) Stupidity Bubble Burst The post Everyone and Anyone Can Be Wise appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

Do you ever wonder what it was like for David when Goliath fell? The Goliath forces behind the ranked-choice voting movement have fallen, and its future has dimmed to a mere flicker. The weight of nations hanging in the balance. The whoosh of his slingshot. The crash of Goliath’s thud to the ground. The roar of the crowd behind him. It may have felt a little like the monumental collapse of ranked-choice voting on ballots across the nation on November 5. Except this time, the giant was a $150 million movement aiming to radically remake American elections, and the tiny challenger was the collection of states set on taking down this behemoth despite the odds. Ranked-choice voting is an alternative vote-counting method that flips our American one-person, one-vote system on its head. It replaces traditional voting with a confusing ranking system that even advocates struggle to explain, much less implement. Perhaps the defeat of ranked-choice voting this election cycle had a little less cinematic quality than David slaying Goliath, but it is surely no less dramatic: On Election Day, American voters delivered their verdict, and it was a resounding rock right between the eyes. This electoral monster failed on ballot initiatives in six separate states. It is now banned in Missouri, and was nearly repealed in Alaska. FairVote, an activist group that advocates for the system, still claims the multiple failed elections marked a “step forward” for ranked-choice voting — a delusion that seems rooted in equal parts fantasy and the need to raise funds. In reality, the future of ranked-choice voting is looking rather dim. Despite advocates spending millions — upwards of $150 million — to promote the system this election cycle, it was no match for the common sense of the average voter, who saw it for the disaster it is and shot it down. It’s hard to overstate the threat ranked-choice voting poses for American elections. In many cases, voters don’t know if their vote will count. It might end up in the trash. The very thing that democracy hinges on is erased along with basic election integrity — like fast and accurate counting — and, most importantly, trust in the system that will encourage participation. Everywhere it’s been tried, it’s proven to be a chaotic, confusing, disenfranchising failure. And nearly everywhere it was on the ballot this year (except for a single, deep-blue municipality — Washington, D.C.), it was handily defeated. Oregon’s Measure 117 would have implemented ranked-choice voting — it failed. Colorado’s Proposition 131 would have utilized it for certain statewide and federal offices — it failed. Idaho and Nevada had ballot initiatives to implement ranked-choice voting — they, too, failed. Montana and Arizona had initiatives that would have likely led to ranked-choice voting and — you guessed it — they failed. Missouri banned it outright, ending the possibility of it coming to the Show-Me State before the idea could gain a foothold. Other states should take note and do the same. Even in Alaska, where the measure to repeal ranked-choice voting ultimately did not pass, it’s clear that the system is not widely popular. The effort to end the practice only fell short by a few hundred votes, meaning ranked-choice voting is not held in high regard by more than a few Alaskans. Advocates should take the hint: Americans don’t want this. Perhaps the crushing defeat of ranked-choice voting at the ballot box is, in part, because voters know you just can’t beat the simplicity and straightforwardness of a system that has always worked — one person, one vote — or maybe it’s because they’ve seen what happens when ranked-choice voting is implemented. In practice, it’s taken weeks — in some cases, months — to determine the winner of elections run with this method. It brings about a loss of confidence when major errors result in the need for a recount or the wrong winner is declared, which happened in an Alameda County, California, school board race. And in most races, thousands of ballots are trashed — sometimes even more ballots are trashed than counted. Ranked-Choice Voting Dishonorable Results States that require voters to rank candidates, like Maine, are making the point for us. Their Second Congressional District race took days to finalize. Rep. Jared Golden didn’t secure a 50 percent majority from voters’ first-choice votes, so votes were retabulated, taking more time and costing taxpayers money, and yes, likely exhausting (throwing away) an untold number of ballots. There were two candidates running — Golden and his opponent, Rep. Austin Thierault. But because there were a few hundred votes for a write-in candidate and more than 12,000 voters didn’t make a first-choice selection on their ballot, Golden didn’t initially receive a majority, so ranked-choice voting was triggered, and it took an additional week after Election Day to complete tabulation. Between the ranked-choice voting delay and the Thierault-requested recount, the counting process wasn’t over until early December. Ranked-choice voting didn’t take a step forward in 2024 — voters pushed it forcefully aside in favor of what they know works and what they trust: one person, one vote. The states that either rejected or banned ranked-choice voting are safe from the chaos it inevitably brings to elections and will serve as examples for states that have yet to protect themselves. The Goliath forces behind the ranked-choice voting movement have fallen, and its future has dimmed to a mere flicker. Our elections and country will better off for it as long we keep it snuffed out. READ MORE: Why Voting In Person Matters for America’s Civility In Georgia, GOP Districts Dominate Early Voting Madeline Malisa is the former chief counsel to Maine Governor Paul LePage, currently working as senior fellow and election integrity expert at the Foundation for Government Accountability. The post Voters Wisely Dropped Ranked-Choice Voting appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

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