Gus Van Horn

Blog Roundup

2026-07-17T06:37:10.762-06:00

A Friday Hodgepodge

1. "How About a Genuine America-First Policy?," by Peter Schwartz (PeterSchwartz.com):

The movement Trump launched claims that his policies will "make America great again." Here, too, there is a prior question that demands an answer: What made America great in the first place? And it's the same answer: freedom.

America's exceptionalism rested on the premise that each individual has rights, and that the task of government is not to rule him but to protect those rights, by leaving him free. In the 18th century, a world dominated by despotic monarchies, this was a radical view. America was founded not simply on the idea that the people ought to elect their government representatives, but on the more fundamental idea that the individual has inalienable rights -- rights that may not be violated even by the wishes of a majority.

785 words/3 minutes

2. "Are Taxes 'The Price We Pay for Civilization'?," by Jaana Woiceshyn (How to be Profitable and Moral):

[Author Carol Off's] paraphrased quote from the U.S. Supreme Court justice Oliver Wendell Holmes in the early 20th century: "Taxes are the price we pay for civilization," prompted my post. I wanted to challenge the premise that the tax-funded welfare state is the ideal civilized society. The focus here, therefore, is on the chapter about taxes.

Off sets up her defense of the welfare state with a false alternative: either we have a welfare state or a libertarian anarchy (which she equates with capitalism). She argues that the welfare state is ideal as the only social system that can achieve equality of outcomes for all, with the government collecting taxes from the productive and "redistributing" them to the less productive through various subsidies and programs.

865 words/3 minutes

3. "The Key to Sustainable Real World Results and Other Updates," by Jean Moroney (Thinking Directions):

When I see two mistakes of the same type, I look to draw a principle. Given that I've been teaching "motivation by love" (aka the value orientation) since my speech on the topic in 2019, I can talk for hours on the subject, and the principle is integrated into everything I teach in the Thinking Lab, how could I have been blind to these two major areas of threat orientation in my own life? The answer hit me at once: writing and time management are the two skills that I had given the most time and attention to prior to 2019. I had already put more than 20 years into understanding each of them before fully grasping the fundamental importance of a value orientation. This meant that my value hierarchy in these areas was integrated with mistaken beliefs about what was possible.

710 words/2 minutes

4. "Alan Greenspan -- Not a Eulogy," by Harry Binswanger (Value for Value):

[W]hile Alan Greenspan started out as a basically good man, he ended up as a traitor to capitalism, Objectivism, Ayn Rand, and his own soul. He went to Washington, and began to play the game. He chose the road of power.

Here are some points of acceleration in his decline. He "saved" Social Security by expanding its destructive power. At a State of the Union address, he rose up -- next to Hillary Clinton -- to join in giving a standing ovation to the call for universal (socialist) medical care. After the fall of communism, he refused to recommend capitalism to the newly freed regimes.

In the end, he abjured capitalism and, indirectly, Objectivism, as the logic of his premises required. He was an inexcusable blend of Peter Keating and Robert Stadler.

680 words/2 minutes

-- CAV

Taking Pet Adoption Seriously ...

2026-07-16T07:39:19.758-06:00

... sometimes means not adopting at all.

A couple of advice columns dealing with pets reminded me of the time one of my brothers broke up with a girlfriend decades ago.

The straw that broke that camel's back: She came home with two yippy dogs without having consulted him about it.

I am not a dog person. I was sympathetic then, but it took me time to appreciate what a good move this was on his part. That wisdom has nothing to do with my preferences regarding dogs and I would go so far as to say that anyone who seriously appreciates dogs should agree with me.

Why?

Because some pets -- off the top of my head: anything dangerous, high-maintenance past a certain point, or large enough to have the run of the house -- inherently affect the daily life of the members of a household enough that everyone in the household deserves a say before making such a commitment. I can even see the argument that such pets demand a degree of commitment that is comparable enough to a human relationship that whether to adopt one is a major life decision.

Two advice columnists bear this out. In one case, a woman who works in an animal shelter has brought home so many dogs it is beginning to make her family's home life unbearable despite the fact that they all like dogs. In another case, one partner in a dog-loving couple appreciated that a new pet would not work for them at this time in their lives -- but her partner went ahead and brought home a dog, anyway:

Fast-forward: Butch is a sweet, loving pup. I adore him, but he's a ton of work. My fiancé is back in school and working so he's not happy stopping multiple times a day to take Butch out for air and exercise as the dog is an active breed. He does it, but some days are stressful for us both.

Abby, I resent him for this. We're both overloaded and now have another full-time responsibility plus extra bills. We love Butch but are overwhelmed. I would be miserable giving him away, which is what my fiancé now suggests.

Both columnists correctly advise their readers that finding a new home for a pet can be the best option, including being an improvement for the pet itself.

In each letter, it is clear that the writer sees the pet as part of the family and cares for it, which underscores that bringing a pet into one's home is a serious decision. (And conversely, when someone unilaterally does this, it is a red flag.)

On top of my positive point, the cultural baggage of altruism can make this harder than it needs to be: The pet needs a home. Lots of people will deem protecting one's own time and sanity, rather than sacrificing it to an unwanted pet, as "heartless," for example. Such ideas can lead to a bad decision motivated by inappropriate guilt or unwarranted pressure from others.

The discussion about whether to adopt a pet isn't the time for martyrdom, or giving in to an out-of-context desire to help an animal, or appeasing the rest of the family in the moment. Any such discussion has to be made with everyone's best interests in mind, especially those of the caregivers.

If someone truly cares for animals, they will not adopt one on a whim.

-- CAV

Franchise Model Update

2026-07-15T06:16:00.745-06:00

There may soon be good news for businesses that rely on the franchise model, which, along with gig work, has been under assault from the left for quite some time.

The good news comes in the form of proposed regulations concerning "joint employment" that have just passed the required period for public comment:

These distinctions between business relationships and arrangements matter under our labor laws. What's known as "joint employment" occurs when two or more entities are both liable for a single worker's terms and conditions of employment. There's been a fight in Washington over changing the nature of franchising, staffing agenices, and even independent contracting relationships from partnerships to traditional employer -- employee arrangements, to the detriment of all and the communities they serve. The good news is that the Trump Department of Labor planted a flag in the ground to protect these independent arrangements in its thoughtful proposed joint employer rule.

The public comment period just concluded, but from the over 200 submissions, many franchise owners clearly communicated that they are their own boss, not the franchisor. Federal policy should weigh in favor of protecting this distinction rather than increasing legal liabilities for franchisors over the day-to-day employment decisions of independent business owners -- causing the whole model to crumble. [bold added]

The rest of the article does well to flesh out the advantages of contract work and the franchise business model, and by contrast, the potential damage of removing legal protection for them.

While this is good news, one must keep in mind a fact that is also apparent from the piece: As a regulatory change, this measure will be subject to the policies of future administrations. (A similar move in the first Trump term was just about wiped out by Biden.)

Until and unless advocates of liberty gain enough cultural momentum to cause a decisive political shift in favor of free markets, this battle will continue indefinitely, threatening countless small businesses in the long-term and discouraging entrepreneurs.

A battle may have been won, but the war rages on.

-- CAV

Trump Steals Credit Rather Than Sees Light

2026-07-14T04:53:23.247-06:00

The White House is once again in damage control mode after -- get this! -- something the President said turned out to be made up.

I was going to say false, but that would be too good a word for what Trump spews out: False would imply that there is a relationship -- even a negative one -- between reality and what this person says.

Oddly enough, Walmart's recent lowering of food prices had something to do with the fact that the company isn't a charity or a criminal enterprise, and wants to make a profit.

Trump claimed in relevant part:

... one of the biggest, best, and smartest Retailers in America, Walmart, will be lowering prices, by a lot, at my Administration's request... [bold added]

(How some people willingly subject themselves to reading/listening to this irritating communication style on a regular basis is beyond me.)

In fact:

Shortly after Trump's Truth Social boast, Walmart issued a statement detailing its signature Rollbacks and Sam's Club offers, which the chain typically introduces during the summer. The statement mentioned price reductions on beef and other products but made no mention of Trump or the administration.

On July 7, one day after Trump's Truth Social post, The Wall Street Journal reported that an Agriculture Department official had called some of the country's largest grocers to urge them to lower their beef prices.

However, during a call with Walmart, the company told the USDA that it already planned to lower prices on a range of items, including beef, and that the reductions had been in place since June 29. [bold added]

Oh.

Setting aside the whole issue why in hell the government is telling people what to charge... Not only that, the price reductions came due to the February Supreme Court ruling against Trump's tariffs and the company's expectation that (1) a factor in our higher prices will have been eliminated and (2) it will recoup billions in tariff refunds.

Trump could learn from this, and reconsider his idée fixe regarding tariffs as an economic cure-all. He could admit he was mistaken about tariffs, get rid of them, apologize, and earn the nation's gratitude and relief.

But he won't. I leave it as an exercise for the reader to consider why.

-- CAV

Way More Safe Than Politicians

2026-07-13T06:48:04.494-06:00

John Stossel's latest column is eye-opening for three reasons, perhaps the least being the astounding safety record of Waymo's driverless cars:

Waymo claims its cars are 10 times safer than human-driven ones. I wouldn't believe that if insurance companies, with their own money at stake, didn't agree.

Reinsurance News reports Waymos had an "88 percent reduction in property damage claims and a 92 percent reduction in bodily injury claims."

"We have the data," says Adam Thierer, author of Permissionless Innovation. "94 percent of all accidents are attributable to human error ... We can address one of the leading killers of Americans."

Stossel notes earlier that car accidents kill 100 Americans per day.

I heard that such cars were safer, but I had no idea how much safer they were.

Even more incredible -- although appalling is a better term -- is the fact that mafioso-like politicians are waging war against driverless cars and are -- thanks to the altruism behind their featherbedding rationale -- proud of the comparison:

[Luis] Sepulveda [(D-NY)] responds: "Waymo is going to make billions of dollars -- let them pay for the disruption to the labor force."

"Sounds like a mafia pitch," I push back. "'Want to come here, Waymo? You have to pay.'"

"If the pitch sounds like a mafia pitch, so be it," Sepulveda replies.

I thought I might change his thinking by making a creepy comparison, telling him his ban would kill more people than infamous serial killers have. Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer, and John Wayne Gacy combined killed about 80 people. Human-driven cars kill more people every day.

"The data on Waymo is not 100 percent safety," he replies. "A Waymo vehicle struck a child in California."

Like most critics, he cites isolated incidents. Even that child wasn't injured. [bold added]

The daily human sacrifice of 100 humans to the god of make-work reminds me of Ayn Rand's apt turn-of-phrase to describe altruism: moral cannibalism.

If this isn't a story that at once shows the power of altruism to motivate and whitewash evil, I don't know what is.

-- CAV

Four Random Things

2026-07-10T07:32:40.969-06:00

A Friday Hodgepodge

Screen capture by the author.

1. If you like Wordle, one "pompomsheep" at Hacker News is developing a timed word-solving game called 18 Words. As of this morning, the game gives you 30 seconds to solve words of increasing length and presents your score, in shareable form, for the 18.

2. A recent post at GeekPress notes that $180,000 isn't a "living wage" in San Francisco, reminding me of my move, soon after the 2008 financial crisis, to Boston.

Still reeling from the sticker shock of moving from a three bedroom house ten minutes away from work in Houston for $1000 a month -- to an apartment the size of a matchbox in Boston for $3500 a month -- I would regularly meet people at biotech networking events who had just moved from San Francisco to save money!

On the positive side, since my wife needed to be within a short commute to the hospital for her residency, we were able to ditch our cars altogether since that part of town was very walkable and well-served by subways.

3. On long road trips, my wife and I enjoy listening to audiobooks. Unfortunately, our road trips are usually far shorter than they used to be, now that we're New Orleanians. A possible remedy for us might be The Escape Pod, a science fiction podcast for short stories. (Based on a cursory look, they seem to be in the 30-60 minute range.)

I learned about the Escape Pod by reading and enjoying "Why I Left Harry's All-Night Hamburgers," which I recommend.

And yes, each story is available for reading at the site.

4. If, as I do, you occasionally take a "liver holiday," you might want to peruse this article and discussion on what makes a good mocktail.

-- CAV

(Comic) Relief From Rude Guests

2026-07-09T07:20:35.049-06:00

Sometimes, advice columnists field questions about things that turn out to be non-problems. Case in point: a Dear Prudence question from the owner of a small farm whose guests fled at the prospect of no television set -- yes, set -- for a week after they broached the subject of their host purchasing one.

The writer is concerned that she should have informed the family beforehand that she didn't own a television set.

The answer contains all an egoist needs to know:

[T]hey could have 1) propped a laptop up on the coffee table and gathered around to watch it or 2) placed their own order for a new flat screen. It was incredibly rude of them to make you feel like you failed in some way. I'm just glad they left instead of subjecting you to whatever breakdown they were all going to have if they couldn't watch their shows.

Prudence was kind not to go further and wonder how worthwhile a week entertaining such couch potatoes would be for the host, or to congratulate her for getting rid of them so efficiently!

-- CAV

Tucker: Tip of the Demonic Iceberg

2026-07-08T05:51:50.550-06:00

Witch-Hunting is making a comeback.

If you thought Tucker Carslon's ridiculous assertion that he'd been attacked in his sleep by demons was a one-off, I have news for you: At the Atlantic is a disturbing read about a particularly irrational Christian movement to wage what they call "spiritual warfare."

The piece focuses on a campaign of harassment by a couple, Andrea and Mike Brewer, who deem themselves such warriors, against the owner of a bookstore:

They went abroad as missionaries to India and Haiti, which only confirmed their emerging understanding of a universe with three distinct realms -- the heavenly, the earthly, and the underworld, with the Earth being the realm of spiritual warfare. On one side, the Holy Spirit, angels, and believers comprised an army of God. On the other were the forces of Satan -- legions of demons with names, ranks, and personalities that could inhabit people, geographical regions, and entire nations. In India, the Brewers claimed to have battled Shiva, Brahma, and Kali. In Haiti, Python and Mami Wata. There was Marduk, Osiris, Ra, Horus, Diana, Artemis, Shesha Naga, and so on -- a whole pantheon of demons that represented ancient religions and civilizations, and whose earthly expressions were essential to understanding current events.

By the time the Brewers returned to Maryville, they saw themselves as hardened spiritual warriors. They founded the Well [their charismatic church --ed] to continue the battle, joining an international network of churches and ministries called Global Awakening, which also had a seminary, where Andrea began studying demon history and hierarchies. When Mike asked God for their exact assignment, he told me when I visited in March, "the Lord spoke so clearly. He said, 'I'm giving you and the Well a mandate for the full eradication of witchcraft and demonic activity in the region.'" [bold added]

It should come as no surprise that the couple would eventually threaten the owner of a bookstore across the street from their church over drag shows she sometimes hosted for fundraisers:

[Bookstore owner Lisa Misosky's] recollection is that she called Mike, and that he talked about doing spiritual warfare against voodoo chiefs in Haiti, and that she said, "That's great, Mike. Why don't you have a cup of coffee with me?"

Mike's recollection is that he called Misosky. "I said, 'I'm not calling to resolve differences. We're not going to do that. I am calling to request that you go 18 and older for events,'" he said. " 'If you're marketing to children of this area, we're going to do everything within the law and the spirit to stop you. We will never harm you physically.' I said, 'I'm calling out of respect.'"

And that was the last time they spoke.

Soon after, Misosky got a call from the Anti-Defamation League. There had been some chatter about a protest at Southland [Books and Cafe] on neo-Nazi forums that the group monitored. At the time, all kinds of LGBTQ events around the country were being targeted by extremist groups. A gunman had just killed five people and injured 19 at an LGBTQ nightclub in Colorado. Misosky called the police. She called some local pastors she knew and asked that they show up at the fundraiser wearing their collars. She posted on Facebook that "MAGA fascists" were threatening the toy drive. [bold added]

Misosky is completely correct in her assessment that the Well targeted her bookstore and gave "moral cover" to the violent elements that would eventually get wind of this "spiritual battle" and show up.

That phone call was the moral equivalent of a mullah "inviting" infidels to convert or die, knowing that terrorists will feel justified in doing the dirty work if the implied threat doesn't get results.

The article is well worth reading in full, but with the following caveat: It is written from a leftist point of view, and as such, it is by an enemy of liberty about enemies of liberty. The author states in plain English which side she would assume advocates of capitalism are on:

Their version of the Kingdom mapped neatly onto the political goals of social conservatives, libertarians, and, more recently, the MAGA movement. The Kingdom would have limited government, free markets, two genders, one kind of marriage, and one kind of God. The "right now" part, meanwhile, offered an urgent paradigm for mobilizing grassroots believers out of the Church and into electoral politics, government, education, and all other realms of life where they were to assert God's dominion. The new apostles and prophets of the NAR spread these ideas through decentralized networks of churches, international prayer ministries, schools, revivals, and prayer rallies, attracting followers who could find a sense of power and purpose in building the Kingdom. Leaders spoke of believers as "warriors" or "God's army" or even "special forces," and churches as "military bases," and certain apostles as "generals." They believed that being a Christian meant being in a constant state of spiritual warfare. [bold added]

Ronald Reagan's deal with the devil of the religious right has been the gift that keeps on giving to the wrong people, left and right. Any reader of Ayn Rand's Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal will know to the contrary, for example, that capitalism is incompatible with religious tyranny, that religion cannot provide intellectual support for freedom of any kind, and that personal freedom is incompatible with economic tyranny.

-- CAV

At Least Corruption Took an L

2026-07-07T04:45:39.366-06:00

The World Cup run for the United States Men's National Team came to an end last night in a manner harsh for the players, but befitting the autocrat who tried to influence the game.

Before the game and the controversy that would overshadow it, the Americans were having a good tournament. The head coach, Mauricio Pochettino, had done a fine job of instilling a team identity and a strategy that both played to the strengths of the players at his disposal and entertained the spectator with vibrant, attacking play.

Pochettino's men won their group with a game to spare, and narrowly lost the third game, when he wisely chose to rest some players and give backups playing time. Then, they very comfortably beat Bosnia in their first elimination game.

I've been a long-suffering fan of this team for decades, and I can't recall us ever winning a World Cup game comfortably, let alone three.

This is measurable progress.

But there are levels to go before this country will be a serious contender for the World Cup: I had no illusions about this game. Belgium have one of the ten best national teams in the world and, despite their aging squad, this game, while winnable based on what the Americans showed so far, was never going to be easy, let alone a sure thing.

Then, infuriatingly, on the day or so before the game, Donald Trump felt the need to insert himself into the world championship of a game he knows nothing about, and get overturned the one-match ban forward Folarin Balogun was to serve for being ejected from the Bosnian game.

Yes, the ejection was a mistake. Yes, there ought to have been an appeals process for the ban. But, as with any sport, bad calls are part of the game, and the time for amending the rules is between competitions -- not in the middle of them.

Trump's meddling sets a very bad precedent in a sport whose governing body is already corrupt, and was a very unwelcome injection of politics into a realm most of us enjoy in part because it offers a respite from politics.

(I am old enough to remember conservatives lauding the book title Shut up and Sing. Changing whose politics pollutes the entertainment is not the answer anyone needed here.)

All that said, the American performance last night was mostly unfocused and error-prone, and if there is one thing an elite team will punish mercilessly, it is mistakes.

Ahead of the game, I commented:

Before: If the US lost today, we'd have wondered what might have been absent [Balogun's] bogus red card.

After: Anything this very good team might accomplish will come with an asterisk, courtesy of the Meddler-in-Chief. We had a chance even without Balogun.

I wish Trump had not butted in.

I should have kept going.

We lost with Balogun on the field and we're wondering what might have been.

I may well have overestimated the level of the American team, but I can't imagine how this unwelcome controversy could have helped them prepare for that game or focus during the game. On top of that, what Trump did is also exactly the kind of thing that a good opposition coach will know how to use to motivate his players.

Earlier in the tournament, I watched Belgium's first game and texted my brothers of the turgid performance that Someone needs to take Belgium out back and shoot them. (Belgium improved over its next games, but they have an aging squad, and I can't see them getting past Spain in the next game.)

Before this mess, I wondered: Will this plucky, spirited team find a way to beat Belgium without its star forward? I didn't expect a win, but I was looking forward to the game.

As I see it, the Americans had a chance at an unforgettable win or at least a valiant stand. They and their fans got Trump instead.

-- CAV

Recipe: Pardon Me Mac and Cheese

2026-06-26T07:25:08.946-06:00

Editor's Note: I will blog sporadically or not at all until Tuesday, July 7 due to OCON and the upcoming holiday. I will probably continue to post daily on X, however.

***

Shortly after my son got me to work out a new gumbo recipe (which he indirectly named with his review of my first stab), he got interested in coming up with a family mac-and-cheese recipe.

Viewing this as a side dish, I dragged my feet a little, but then two things happened. First, my son developed an interest in cooking, including wanting to help develop the recipe. Second, my wife got an elaborate recipe for "Jailbird Mac and Cheese" (which is actually a casserole) from one of my sisters-in-law.

Boy! That's a lot of work for a side dish. was my first thought at looking over that recipe, but I decided to make it with my son, since he was interested.

I learned how to make a cheese sauce on the way to helping my son learn a few things about cooking. Also, that name inspired my name for the final result, in mocking tribute to our times. The final recipe fairly closely follows this Chick-fil-A mac-and-cheese knockoff, which I decided to try on our third adventure with mac-and-cheese.

It's still lots of trouble for a side, but this makes enough to freeze multiple servings, balancing things out in the end.

It's not a perfect knockoff, but it's quite good, and having a frozen side dish that everyone likes on hand comes in handy.

***

Pardon Me Mac and Cheese

Preparation Time is 1 hour.

Ingredients

elbow macaroni, 1 lb. (3 cups)
butter, 1/4 cup flour
1/4 cup
salt, 1 tsp
paprika, 1/4 tsp
milk, 2 cups egg
American cheese, 8 slices
shredded sharp cheddar, 16 oz.
shredded Italian blend cheese, 8 oz.
cooking spray

Directions

1. In parallel with next steps: set water for pasta to boil, add pasta, cook for 20 minutes, drain, and set aside.

2. Mise en place: a 9x13 inch baking dish; a colander; the butter in the pot for the cheese sauce; the flour, salt, and paprika in a bowl; a whisk; a stirring spoon; the milk; the cheeses; the egg; and a small bowl for the egg yolk.

3. Melt the butter at medium heat and whisk in the flour/salt/paprika.

4. Whisk in the milk a little at a time, then continue whisking for a minute or so until it has thickened.

5. Whisk together the egg yolk and a spoonful of the hot milk mixture in the small bowl.

6. Whisk egg yolk mixture into milk mixture.

7. Reduce heat to low.

8. Add to milk mixture: the American cheese (torn into pieces), and one cup each of the cheddar and Italian blend.

9. Stir cheese mixture to melt and combine the cheeses.

10. Add noodles to cheese sauce and combine.

11. Spray baking dish.

12. Place mixture into baking dish.

13. Top mixture with remaining cheddar.

14. Broil under constant observation until cheese just starts to brown.

Notes

1. Overcooking the pasta keeps it from sucking the moisture out of the other ingredients

2. The yield is 16 servings.

3. Freezes/reheats very well.

4. Do not take your eyes off this when it's under the broiler. Once it begins to brown, it can very quickly burn.

-- CAV

Altruism vs. Goodwill: A Prime Example

2026-06-25T08:17:04.641-06:00

A Dear Prudence reader who needs to unplug from current events every few weeks asks (search "autism and ADHD") what to do about people who "accuse me of not caring about what's happening outside my house's four walls" for taking a break from Things.

The question and the answer remind me of an acquaintance from my pre-Objectivist college days who seemed compelled to help people to the point it was negatively affecting his grades and other aspects of his life. You can't help them if you don't even take care of yourself, I observed. (Ayn Rand soon helped me get to what I was missing: That nobody has an unchosen obligation to help anyone.)

Prudence's answer is a little bit like mine then, as it also implicitly assumes altruism:

I appreciate that these people care about the awful things unfolding around us, and I understand that it can be frustrating to hear someone say they're simply not engaging. But don't they realize that if you're ultimately going to be able to tune into current events in a permanent way (and more important, do something to help make the changes you'd like to see) you have to be mentally stable and not in the middle of a family crisis to do so? You know the way you unplug and walk away from the news because it's draining your energy in a way you can't afford? Do the same thing -- but maybe permanently -- to those who are disregarding your wellbeing to shame you for what you're doing to survive. I would be very leery of anyone who saw me struggling with multiple diagnoses, caring for two generations of people, and decided to attack me instead of helping me. [bold added]

Despite its flaws, the answer is excellent advice, and it's too bad it doesn't question altruism since the attackers exemplify by way of a negative example a crucial distinction Rand made, but rarely gets credit for:

Do not confuse altruism with kindness, good will or respect for the rights of others. These are not primaries, but consequences, which, in fact, altruism makes impossible. The irreducible primary of altruism, the basic absolute, is self-sacrifice -- which means; self-immolation, self-abnegation, self-denial, self-destruction -- which means: the self as a standard of evil, the selfless as a standard of the good. [bold added] ("Faith and Force: The Destroyers of the Modern World," Philosophy: Who Needs It)

The attackers certainly can't be accused of goodwill the way -- thoughtless at best -- they would goad the letter-writer to self-destruction! It's an extreme example, but a good one of how altruism is, in fact, the enemy of the welfare of the "others" its preachers express concern about.

-- CAV

Groundhog Day, and They Don't Even Know It

2026-06-24T07:56:07.213-06:00

John Stossel's report on the latest attempt by central planners to "fix" contract work contains the following incredible passage:

The Democratic Socialists said they had a solution. Seattle's city council imposed a $26 delivery driver minimum wage.

What could go wrong?

Two years later, we know the answer: Gig workers make no more money, but prices went up.

Apps like DoorDash and Uber Eats added a $5 fee for consumers "to help cover the costs of these ... regulations."

Now Seattle residents complain about prices. "I ordered a $12 sandwich ... $12 grew to $32!" complains one in my new video. "I just deleted the app."

"[Work] has become slow because of the new law," an app driver complains. DoorDash says it got 1.7 million fewer Seattle orders in 2024.

This is what happens when politicians dictate wages.

...

Former Seattle City Council President Sara Nelson admits that the politicians made a mistake: "We created a problem and it's our responsibility to fix it." [bold added]

The last line is not the good news we might momentarily out of hope imagine it to be: All these fools could come up with to explain the devastation they wrought was that they'd picked the wrong number.

That passage reminds me of the following from Leonard Peikoff's lecture, "My Thirty Years With Ayn Rand:"

Ayn Rand started thinking in terms of principles, she told me once, at the age of twelve. To her, it was a normal part of the process of growing up, and she never dropped the method thereafter. Nor, I believe, did she ever entirely comprehend the fact that the approach which was second nature to her was not practiced by other people. Much of the time, she was baffled by or indignant at the people she was doomed to talk to, people like the man we heard about in the early 1950s, who was calling for the nationalization of the steel industry. The man was told by an Objectivist why government seizure of the steel industry was immoral and impractical, and he was impressed by the argument. His comeback was: "Okay, I see that. But what about the coal industry?" (Voice of Reason, p. 341-342)

Today, our politicians seem to be a choice of outright criminals -- or people like that man.

Forget about rightly pointing out that two people have the inalienable right to contract bewteen themselves how much one will pay the other for an agreed-upon service. These people can't even apply relatively simple priciples like supply and demand to questions such as What happens to a market when a price is set arbitrarily?

And these are the politicians who are at least willing to admit a mistake.

We are in trouble.

-- CAV

An Endangerment Finding Own-Goal?

2026-06-23T08:34:35.060-06:00

One of the few things I hope the Trump Administration succeeds in accomplishing is in grave danger of not happening -- thanks to the incompetence of said Administration.

According to ClimateWire, contradictory briefs on energy-related cases might show up at the Supreme Court like two left feet on a dance floor:

Right-wing advocates including Steve Milloy and Myron Ebell, both of whom served on President Donald Trump's first-term transition team, said in interviews Tuesday that they were particularly concerned about a recent Department of Justice brief that appeared to contradict EPA's repeal of the so-called endangerment finding for greenhouse gas emissions.

In a May 21 amicus brief in Suncor v. Boulder -- an important climate case the Supreme Court will decide next term -- DOJ argued that the Clean Air Act reserves to EPA the authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. The administration is joining red states and industry groups in urging the court to block local governments such as Boulder, Colorado, from suing fossil fuel producers over their contribution to climate change.

Milloy, a senior policy fellow at the Energy and Environment Legal Institute, told POLITICO'S E&E News that the arguments DOJ made to demonstrate federal preemption of state and local climate action are "the exact opposite" of what EPA argued in its February repeal of the 2009 scientific finding that underpinned most Clean Air Act climate regulation.

"They could both wind up at the Supreme Court, and the court could say, 'Justice Department, you're on both sides of this issue,'" said Milloy. [bold added]

The article notes speculation to the effect that long-timers at the DOJ might be attempting to sabotage the litigation, but whatever stock one puts in that, flawed legal argumentation is hardly the only problem.

The piece goes on to note that, additionally, some proposed rule changes by the Trump EPA are proceeding slowly-enough that they may not get past legal challenges before Trump's term expires.

-- CAV

Graham Contra AOC

2026-06-22T06:58:56.359-06:00

I felt like a skating coach hearing someone say that it's impossible to do a triple axel. Of course it's possible. It's hard, but it's possible. -- Paul Graham on earning a billion dollars

***

In the wake of the latest populist drivel against "billionaires" by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, venture capitalist Paul Graham decimates her assertion, notably its smuggled-in premise that one must necessarily cheat others on the way to amassing a net worth of billion dollars.

The crux of Graham's argument is that startup founders like the ones he coaches and invests in do such a good job helping their customers that word-of-mouth helps their businesses grow exponentially:

A couple days later I was talking to the founder of a startup I'd funded. I began by asking, as I usually do when I meet a founder, what her growth rate was. 93% last month, she said. I pointed out that this meant her net worth was also growing at 93% a month. She was getting richer at a stupendously rapid rate. And yet she hadn't been doing anything bad. The reason her startup was growing so fast was simply that users loved what she'd built. So she could feel from her own experience how wrong that politician was. She wasn't exploiting anyone. Exactly the opposite in fact. The reason her startup was growing so fast was that she and her cofounder had been working their asses off to make their users happy, and as a result the users had been telling their friends. And that gets you exponential growth.

Graham notes further that "A couple million and 93% growth are not, in fact, radically different from a billion. They're nine and a half months apart."

Graham, of course, acknowledges that 93% growth is unusual, but after using the example and helping his readers understand the calculations, he shows that more typical growth rates can see someone who has a good idea and works hard become a billionaire in a decade -- as 30 of the people Graham has trained have done.

The essay notably goes beyond the demolition job by offering broad general advice on how to turn this trick yourself.

My only complaint is that, like most influential people, Paul Graham apparently does not see wealth creation as morally good. The idea that possessing wealth is evil is a moral idea with a stranglehold on our culture and it is that idea -- which Ayn Rand fought with her superior alternative of an egoistic morality -- that must ultimately lose its influence in our culture.

Graham's piece remains well worth the read, for it is a powerful antidote to the base ignorance that altruism excuses and encourages in our culture, such as about how it's possible for an honest person to become wealthy.

-- CAV

Four Wins

2026-06-19T06:41:23.818-06:00

A Friday Hodgepodge

Whenever possible, I list three wins at the end of each day. Here are a few from a recent review of my planner.

***

1. The other day, I finally thought to try this method for baking sweet potatoes and, yes, it works very well!

2. Lucinda nastily refuses all attempts to groom her, so naturally, at winter coat shedding time, she developed lots of knots we needed a professional to remove.

We have a shortage of groomers locally who do cats here, and one must use a vet if knocking them out is required, but even cat groomers at vets are hard to find. (And yes, we tried gabapentin on her to absolutely no avail.)

Going back through vet listings again, I found one I'd overlooked and that turned out to have a cat groomer and hearing we require our clients to be sedated was music to my ears.

She is now, finally, knot-free and seems a little bit happier, and I have a place to deal with her in the future.

There will be no image of her here out of respect for her vanity, but let's say she looks like a head on a stick compared to her usual fluffy self.

3. I have mentioned it here, but only in passing, so I'll repeat it here in part just because it makes me smile just to say it: Arsenal are Premier League Champions!

Ever since a gritty win against Newcastle early in the season, I made it a point to see as many of their games live as I could, and my gut was right.

The circumstances of my finding out are amusing. The race was down to the last few games of the season, with Arsenal merely needing to win their remaining games or Manchester City to lose or draw a game.

City played a mid-week game, the end of which coincided with my taking the kids to the dentist for their annual checkup. My plan was always just to check the score when I knew the game would be over, but I'd forgotten to check before we left the office.

On the way home, I stopped to get gas, and the kids had gotten into an argument in the back seat by the time I got back into the car. Remembering the game, I was oblivious to events in the back seat and checked the score.

1-1.

Yes! I said.

My kids burst out laughing, because the timing made it sound like I was expressing agreement with my daughter's immediately prior Shut up!

It has been a 22-year wait, but not exactly an out-of-the-blue development.

And long may that development continue...

4. After not being sure I'd be able to attend it at all, my calendar opened up and my wife surprised me with a pass to OCON 2026!

If you already know me and plan to attend, drop me a line. If we haven't met and you'd like to meet me, follow these instructions to let me know.

Sooner is better than later as I will not be accessing that email account during the conference.

-- CAV

Evangelism vs. Cultural Activism

2026-06-18T06:31:35.010-06:00

An Ask a Manager reader wants to shut down an employee who is annoying coworkers by constantly discussing the Keto diet. I found Alison Green's answer valuable both for helping me understand why that kind of behavior annoys me so much, and causing me to consider how I can avoid doing the same kind of thing myself in the future.

Alison replies in part:

If Casey were this obsessed with evangelizing for something unrelated to diet and health -- like, I don't know, the Dallas Cowboys or Daylight Savings -- it could still reach a point where you'd need to rein it in, but it being about diet and health gives it an extra layer of obnoxiousness and adds additional urgency for you to tell them to cut it out.

Constant Daylight Savings evangelism would be annoying too (as well as pretty weird) but at least it wouldn't involve judging other people's diets and pushing unsolicited health advice. It would be irritating and boring, but it wouldn't cross boundaries in the same way. [bold added]

This is a great distinction, and I love how the humorous -- and neutral! -- phrase Daylight Savings evangelism makes the knowledge so retrievable by being so memorable.

To make it a little bit more generalized, it's worth taking a moment to unpack why the behavior in question crosses boundaries.

For the sake of argument, assume that this diet (or kind of diet) is indeed what we should be doing. Even so, in today's context, any audience will have (1) heard the same thing asserted about countless other diets; (2) be happy enough with their current well-being to not see a need to make learning/switching a priority over other more urgent matters; (3) have legitimate doubts about the speaker's claims; (4) considered the information already and made up their own minds one way or the other; or (5) have psychological issues with the subject matter and need space and time to even become receptive to thinking about it.

I'm probably missing a few possibilities that aren't rank evasion here.

On top of all of that, our culture is saturated with the influence of Christianity -- which (1) commands its followers to do things (like win converts), (2) preaches that other-centered ethics of altruism (often, among other things, causing people to not see moral questions as personally urgent or worthy of practical consideration), and (3) emphasizes profession of faith, verbally and non-verbally. (Why this somehow doesn't get called out as virtue signaling is a good question.) This influence predisposes anyone being advised on how to live a better life to feel judged and bossed around, for starters.

Building a better culture is not as simple as immersing people in water or haranguing them (especially with the truth) non-stop. Being more discriminating about when and how to share philosophical knowledge is vital to the enterprise.

After learning the truth, respecting the minds of others is high on the list of things to get right when one wants to improve the culture by spreading it.

-- CAV

Good News for Freedom of Speech?

2026-06-17T08:22:46.561-06:00

George Will reports with relief that "the separation of powers might actually be working" regarding a bipartisan proposal to make amends for a ruling many had hoped for, but that the Supreme Court did not think it could make.

Will's headline and focus are on a "judicial ruling prompt[ing] two senators to pursue legislation to curtail executive branch mischief," but the measure will indeed be good news for other reasons should it pass and be signed into law.

The problem this legislation seeks to fix is that the plainly wrong pandemic-era jawboning of social media platforms was not unambiguously illegal in part because the threats were delivered in secret:

[The bill w]ould require government to make public certain kinds of communications with social media companies, artificial intelligence companies and broadcasters. And would establish that plaintiffs must prove only that government attempted censorship, not that its pressure by itself succeeded. And would provide for money damages, instead of mere injunctions, for plaintiffs when an offending official left office while a case wended its way through courts.

So, crude and sneaky overreaching by the executive was followed by the Supreme Court's austere (and reasonable) refusal to overreach by ignoring principles of standing. This has prompted two lawmakers to respond. If Congress makes that response a law, there will have been a minuet of actions and reactions driven by each branch's prerogatives, responsibilities and incentives. The separation of powers will have functioned as intended.

As I greet the good news regarding freedom of speech, I agree with Will that our government working properly is indeed also newsworthy.

Let's hope -- and work for the day -- that checks and balances working their magic becomes un-newsworthy again.

-- CAV

Trump Drags Feet, Costs Lives on Drone Tech

2026-06-16T06:10:24.686-06:00

Ukraine, whose efforts at self-defense have repeatedly been stymied by President Trump, has developed a drone capability superior to an American rocket system it was consequently having trouble procuring:

Spring, identified only by her call sign for security purposes, flies a newer type of winged drone that enables Ukraine to consistently strike Russia's rear areas -- a capability previously only provided by Western artillery and munitions, such as the M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System.

Mid-range HIMARS strikes were key to undermining Russia's attack style early in the war, but Russia was able to curb that threat after the first year, analysts told Business Insider. Now, they said, the new drones are bringing that strike effect back in a way Western arms have not been able to do at scale.

...

The use of these drones has risen in the last two months, and Russia has been losing more ground than it has gained, marking a reversal of a yearslong trend in which Ukraine had been slowly bleeding territory.

As the article makes evident, the new drones incorporate abilities (like using AI) lacking in the older rocket technology, avoid the strings attached to the U.S.-supplied rockets (like limits on target selection), and cost much less to produce.

Despite the President siding with Russia throughout its invasion of this friendly nation, Ukraine has offered to work with our military on drone development, only for Trump to drag his feet:

[E]ven with senior Pentagon officials -- including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Army Secretary Dan Driscoll -- lauding Kyiv's drone abilities, the Trump administration is still biding its time on taking full advantage of the Ukrainian capabilities, a delay that experts say is potentially kneecapping the U.S. military.

"I don't know what the hang-up would be in denying ourselves the ability to take advantage of that. I don't think there's any good reason," Rebeccah Heinrichs, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute think tank, said of Ukraine's drone capabilities.

...

One former official who spoke to The Hill on the condition of anonymity made a more blunt assessment, calling the hold-up "lethargy" on the part of the Trump administration and "a certain amount of hostility towards Ukraine coming from the very top."

Each article notes different consequences of Trump's asinine hostility toward Ukraine, with Business Insider noting our country's loss of influence:

"We can't be certain that we can rely on the US," Bielieskov said. "92 kilometers, GPS-guided is not enough, it can be spoofed. So we have the incentive to develop something of a bigger range, more reliable, and with a bigger warhead." [bold added]

One needn't advocate America being the world's policeman to appreciate how damning it is to hear such words coming from a country whose interests align with our own.

And, speaking of our own country's interests, The Hill has this to say:

"The U.S. is putting its own troops in danger by not working as closely as possible with the Ukrainians on drone development," Phillips O'Brien, a professor of strategic studies at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, wrote on social media. "To stay close to Putin, Trump is showing once again how little he cares about US soldiers." [bold added]

Donald Trump's actions regarding Ukraine are costing our nation goodwill and the lives of our soldiers abroad, and for no good purpose anyone can discern.

-- CAV

Immigration Wins in Switzerland

2026-06-15T02:30:00.000-06:00

In Switzerland, a MAGA-like political party got an anti-immigration population cap put to a national referendum and lost. It is instructive to consider the reasons it lost:

Others, in particular Swiss business leaders, feared losing Switzerland's crucial access to Europe's single market.

Over half of all Swiss products are sold into the EU, but their access to Europe's markets depends on Swiss commitment to Europe's free movement of people. Had the population cap been approved, Switzerland would have had to terminate that agreement.

...

Only Swiss citizens were allowed to vote, but in the cities, which have larger immigrant communities than in the countryside, the proposal got a particularly resounding no.

In the capital city Bern, for example, almost 84% of those voting rejected a population cap.

...

"The EU is still by far the most important trading partner for Switzerland," explains Minsch, adding that is it is "in our interest to have stable and clear relationships with our main trading partner".

Swiss employers were also worried about labour shortages, and losing access to a Europe-wide pool of skilled workers.

The issue of losing the EU as a trading partner strikes me as something the proponent Swiss People's Party might have demagogued as bureaucratic overreach, or an issue of national sovereignty. But free movement is an individual right, and recognizing that right is part of that country's trading agreement. The issue of labor shortages -- easily solved through immigration -- shows that respecting individual rights is in the self-interest of the businessmen, the immigrants, and their customers alike.

One issue that plausibly seems worsened by a high immigrant population -- bigger costs related to the welfare state -- is a red herring: As I and others have argued in the past, the problem is the welfare state:

Were the educational and medical sectors privately run, we would not attract or encourage freeloaders, and non-citizens who used these facilities would be paying customers.

I am glad for Switzerland's sake that its voters ignored the scapegoaters and chose freedom, the path of prosperity, in this referendum.

If only voters in the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave had half as much sense!

-- CAV

Freedom Four

2026-06-12T07:05:08.756-06:00

A Friday Hodgepodge

1. "The Foreign-Born Heroes Who Chose America," by Agustina Vergara Cid (The Orange County Register):

Lafayette chose to fight for America after he became enamored with the cause for independence. In 1778, he wrote: "The moment I heard of America I loved her; the moment I knew she was fighting for freedom I burnt with a desire of bleeding for her; and the moment I shall be able to serve her, at any time, or in any part of the world, will be the happiest of my life." He wasn't the only foreigner who felt this profound reverence for this country even though he didn't have any prior connection to it.

950 words/3 minutes

2. "Why the Missing Outrage Over (Domestic) Terrorism?," by Ben Bayer (The Orange County Register):

Could it be that there's less outrage towards terrorism directed against businesspeople, because the dominant moral dogma of our culture still sees profit-driven activity as less than noble? I for one reject that dogma. They are innocent victims of terrorism. Not only that: contrary to the Marxist smear of "exploiters," their productivity, industriousness and ingenuity create valuable products and services we choose to buy.

1250 words/4 minutes

3. "The Real Climate Crisis," (video) by Alex Epstein (Prager U):

But while climate change -- humans impacting climate -- is a real thing, "climate crisis" is not. The world is slowly becoming warmer -- at a cold point in geological history when many more people die of cold than of heat. This doesn't at all justify rapidly restricting global fossil fuel use. Fossil fuels actually make us far safer from the climate by providing low-cost energy for the amazing machines that protect us against storms, protect us against extreme temperatures, and alleviate drought. Climate disaster deaths have decreased 98% over the last century. The only rational approach to reducing fossil fuels' climate impacts is a long-term one based on developing truly competitive, reliable forms of energy -- most promisingly, nuclear energy. Unfortunately, instead of taking this rational approach, governments declared a "climate crisis" and started immediately restricting fossil fuels -- with no viable replacement. They pretended that solar and wind could somehow replace fossil fuels. But since these fuels are inherently unreliable -- they can go to near-zero at any given time -- there was never any reason to believe this.

800 word transcript/5 minute video

4. "Drug Patents Do Not Cause High Drug Prices," (Introduction) by Adam Mossoff (white paper (PDF) from the Center for the Protection of Intellectual Property):

In sum, the claim that drug patents cause high drug prices is ubiquitous in the drug price policy debates, but this ubiquity does not correlate with reliable data or proven harms that make it true. This white paper first describes how property rights in inventions (patents) are a key factor in innovation and economic growth, especially in spurring innovations in new drugs and other healthcare treatments to the benefit of all patients. Thus, the evidentiary burden rests on activists and academics who propose systemic "reforms" that restrict patent rights for drug innovators and impose additional costs on all healthcare innovators. Second, it reviews USPTO and FDA data and summarizes numerous empirical studies that consistently contradict allegations by I-MAK and other activists of patent thickets and evergreening by drug innovators. Dug innovators in fact have far less than the 20-year exclusive right secured to inventors by the Patent Act. Third, it explains how systemic changes to the patent system only for drug innovators violates the principle of technology neutrality that has been an essential feature of the U.S. patent system as a successful property rights regime in incentivizing the creation and distributing of new drugs in the healthcare market to the benefit of patients.

800 words/3 minutes

-- CAV

Healthy Alternatives to 'Keeping the Peace'

2026-06-11T07:56:11.417-06:00

A female grad student in history asked Captain Awkward about alternatives to suffering the condescending behavior of her mother's new partner some time back.

As Captain Awkward notes, the thinking she did and the advice she came up with apply to many situations, and I think are worth considering for people who find themselves stuck -- usually at work or with relatives -- dealing with people they'd ordinarily not have anything to do with.

One strategy I found particularly intriguing was the following, which I like because it hacks whatever value orientation such people might have:

2) Find three "safe" topics.

In a weird way, A. might be trying to engage with you (he thinks) positively by showing interest in stuff you like, like history. He's also a walking bag of insecurities who has to be the smartest & the best at everything, so there is no way this will go well. And he has the unfortunate "arguing until the other person is visibly upset is a form of fun!" chip installed. It's bad.

I suggest that you find three safe topics to talk about with A.

Topic 1: One where he is the expert or something he is passionate about, like, international business travel or being an old, somewhat privileged dude. Grilling. Fine wine. Sports. What you want is something that is of passing interest to you but you're not the expert or especially emotionally invested, but it is really interesting to him. And then you ask questions and let him talk.

True story, I once did tech support for a company. There was this older gentleman who was The Guy For Whom Everything Does Not Work As It Should. It was mostly not his fault, just, he had a bad track record of getting broken/shitty equipment or having stuff go wrong. And I was a girl learning the job as I went because it was a temp job & I was filling in for someone, and everything was somehow all my fault and all of our interactions were very negative.

I noticed once that he wore a Cleveland Indians (yes, the team name is racist) polo shirt, and that happened to be on a day where I had glimpsed the front page of the sports section (rare), so I was able to sort of say something like "Great win for the Indians ... last night, huh?" in an attempt at pleasant small talk. And he lit up and told me about the Indians ... the entire time I fixed his computer. After that, every time I went to see him, I would check and see how the Indians ... were doing first. Note: I did not pretend to know anything or care about or be a fan of the team. I never said anything beyond "Looks like it was a rough night!" or "What does this mean for the playoffs?" and let him do the rest.

Not only did he decide I was his new best bro-girl, after I left the job he tracked down my info through my temp agency and sent me a "Good luck, if you ever need a reference or a job lead, just call!" greeting card. I know a lot of people genuinely love, live & breathe sports, but until I met that dude I did not realize that even for people who aren't that into them, sports serve as a magically safe current events topic that anyone can opine on. Epiphany! "How 'bout them Cowboys?"

The other two suggestions for safe topics share the essential characteristic of being things the difficult person cares about, but which will not lead straight into a conversation you'd rather not have with said person.

The remaining strategies will be helpful in that they involve finding ways to spend less time around the difficult person and give oneself psychological space by, for example, being more assertive over time or simply being honest with oneself about disliking the difficult person.

-- CAV

Bureaucrats vs. Need

2026-06-10T08:23:36.329-06:00

Fellow fans and students of Ayn Rand might recall the following quote from Francisco d'Anconia's Atlas Shrugged speech about money:

[W]hen you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing ... you may know that your society is doomed. (p. 385)

One might also recall this conclusion seeming plain as day, for which one can thank Ayn Rand's masterful building of context, by weaving together concrete examples together with philosophical argument.

Taken in isolation, such a statment might make little sense, and certainly would have little intellectual purchase with a reader from a culture saturated with altruism -- the idea that one man's need is a moral claim on another's effort; and collectivism -- the belief that the basic unit of a society is not the individual, but some larger collective to which each individual belongs.

That said, the state government of Louisiana has provided us with a real-life example of what that quote means on a personal level that one is unlikely to forget.

In fact, it's such a good example, I'm torn between looking for where Ayn Rand anticipated it and wondering if she would have left it out for fear of her novel being dismissed as a farce.

[I]n many states, if you want to start a business, you first must convince bureaucrats that your business is "needed."

Four years ago, Louisiana blocked social worker Ursula Newell-Davis from helping kids with special needs. Bureaucrats said she hadn't proved her business was needed.

"Why does the state of Louisiana have the right to stop me from doing what I love?" she asks... [bold added]

It is incredible that anyone would have to explain -- to the satisfaction of someone other than a potential customer -- that what one wants to do for a livelihood is "needed." (And it's doubly so for someone with a good track record of earning money and praise from past clients in that field.)

My incredulity is matched only by my relief to hear from the rest of John Stossel's report that the ridiculous law behind this is being challenged in court by the good people at the Pacific Legal Foundation.

-- CAV

Has Trump Created a Monster?

2026-06-09T06:56:08.582-06:00

From Politico comes a story about one of the kook factions that Trump successfully pandered to to win the Presidency a second time.

The so-called Make America Healthy Again "movement" (MAHA) -- a collection of environmentalist-adjacent Luddites who oppose such boons to human flourishing as vaccination, modern fertilizers, and pesticides -- has become impatient because they feel Trump hasn't handed them enough favors. Some of them are now threatening to withdraw their support for him in the mid-terms.

This comes, predictably, with Republican officials protesting that they've done more for MAHA than the Democrats ever did:

"We thought we were getting a different administration that wanted to stand up to special interests, stand up to the pharmaceutical industry, stand up to the food companies, stand up to Big Ag, Big Chem. And that is not what we got. What we have right now is business as usual," said Vani Hari, a leader in the MAHA movement known as Food Babe who rose to prominence through her fight against chemicals in food.

"We're going to vote for whatever candidate puts the health of our children first," Hari said. "I don't have loyalty to anybody. And a lot of people feel that way within the MAHA movement."

This reminds me of a couple of things, the first being how conservatives -- seemingly until yesterday -- once correctly ridiculed such people as the lunatics they are.

Second, it reminds me of how effective voter blocs work in a two-party system: By being up for grabs, thereby making both parties responsive to their agenda.

Whether accurate or not, the perception that Trump needed MAHA to win in 2024, which he reinforced by handing Bobby Kennedy a cabinet post, is now part of the conventional wisdom. Based on the Republicans' past, sorry history of appeasing the Democrats on everything else, it's a safe bet that this will continue indefinitely along this new frontier. And the taste of political power Trump handed MAHA will have emboldened them and made them not content with being taken for granted by either party.

In an age where neither party qualifies as a champion of science -- with Democrat misuse of science to pretend their political aims are legitimate making Republican rejection of science seem less bad than it is -- Trump may well have made this army of crackpots into a political force that can press for horrible government science policy for decades to come.

-- CAV

At Least Steyer Had to Pay

2026-06-08T06:45:02.224-06:00

At Reason, John Stossel recounts leftist billionaire Tom Steyer's despicable vendetta against scientist Roger Pielke, whom Steyer ultimately hounded out of a position he held at the University of Colorado for over 24 years.

"My views are entirely mainstream," says Pielke. "My work is cited by all three working groups of the IPCC. There's nothing contrarian."

Both Steyer and Pielke agree that "greenhouse gases warm the climate," but Pielke's sin was saying, "it's not the apocalypse."

Because of that, "the Center for American Progress decided to make me a target," he says.

...

Pielke didn't know who funded the smears until WikiLeaks revealed an email to Steyer from ThinkProgress' editor: "Thanks for your support of this work ... it's fair to say, without Climate Progress, Pielke would still be writing on climate change."

Think about that.

"Progressive" activists are proud to stop a researcher from writing about what he knows.

Notably, Pielke was also attacked by the Obama White House itself, in a 3,000 word memo.

This should disturb anyone concerned about academic freedom, but conservatives have no business being smug now that we have a Republican President.

As I noted last week, the Trump Administration wants to subordinate all federal research grants to the whims of bureaucrats both before granting (with peer review becoming merely "advisory") and after (with grants being subject to cancellation at any time and at the whims of bureaucrats).

Rather than freeing scientists like Pielke even a little bit from political pressure, that measure will present them with the choice of forgoing all such money -- or parroting the line of the party in charge. It is not hard to see how much cheaper and easier it will be for busybodies like Steyer to manipulate "the science" to fit their preconceived narrative if the party they favor happens to be in charge. It is also all but impossible to imagine federal research money being well-spent going forward after the proposed changes.

As Stossel notes at the end of his piece, Steyer has a real chance of becoming California's next governor, thereby becoming a credible future presidential candidate. Imagine the damage he would be able to do -- now for free! -- to the career of any scientist whose findings or analysis he doesn't care to hear.

-- CAV

Four Neat Things

2026-06-05T07:31:16.636-06:00

A Friday Hodgepodge

1. A man describes his "two-part desk setup, with his long desk having digital and analog sides.

This is an interesting idea, and he claims to be able to shift contexts simply by sliding his chair between the sides.

This may not be for everyone, but it might be worth a look, if you are unhappy with your current setup and want ideas for improving it.

2. I don't edit video often, but when I do, I use ffmpeg, which is cross-platform and a veritable Swiss army knife.

It's nice to know that, should I need to do this on a computer I don't own or control, there is an in-browser implementation of ffmpeg here.

It claims to work on files locally, but its file loader looks like an upload icon, so if that's a concern, dig around a bit before using.

As a bonus -- and despite its name of ffmpeg CLI -- many common actions are iconified on the page.

3. While I am not upset that Google is making its searches more AI-centric, I don't always want to search that way, and I am not alone.

Tech Crunch recently reviewed six solid alternatives to Google.

In addition to DuckDuckGo, which I expected to see on the list, other choices variously offer such features as better privacy and customized means of limiting searches, such as putting out results for news from the left or news from the right.

4. Funny Comment of the Week: From a discussion about colonizing Venus: "At this point we're so deep into the science fiction that it might be easier to just hop into a time machine and colonize Mars before its atmosphere boiled off."

-- CAV