Even merciless sanctions struggle to deter determined adversaries. Especially ones, like China, that respond to the threat of them with sanctions-proofing measures, & who Europe probably can't afford to cut off anyway.

🚨Holy Moly🚨 We're on course to spend $𝟎.𝟗 𝐭𝐨 $𝟏.𝟒 𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐨𝐧 on debt cancellation. That's more than we spent ALL higher education spending before 2020, and as much as we are on course to appropriate for TOTAL education over the next decade.

crfb.org/blogs/total-co…

All of this is irrelevant to the war's gigantic strategic opportunity cost to the United States, which is far more important.

And the idea that removing the greatest regional check on Iranian influence was an L for Tehran is just disconnected from reality.

It's getting embarrassing just how badly the Biden Administration wants to commit U.S. troops to defend Saudi Arabia in order to get Riyadh and Tel Aviv to more deeply cooperate in ways they already have a shared interest in without our prodding.

US Amb to NATO expects allies at Washington Summit to “construct a bridge to membership by offering Ukraine a deliverable that will enable them to become even closer to this alliance.”

Part business-school mumbo-jumbo, part false hope.

The most predictable bit of news you'll hear today.

i24news.tv/en/news/israel…

It appears we have lost the capacity to reason analytically (vs emotionally) and consider the net strategic effect of repudiating debt used as the dominant sovereign reserve asset, introducing a tail risk into the “safe & liquid” collateral underpinning the global dollar system.

On April 25th, almost 50 years ago Rick Monday saved the colors from being burned by some clownshoes commies. Rick still owns the flag and has rejected multi-million dollar offers for it. He brings it to veteran charity fundraisers. Be more like Rick Monday.

NEW: Gaza pier construction area hit with mortar fire.

I’ve been warning since the day it was announced that the #Gaza pier would be a likely vector for U.S. troops and contractors to be attacked, perhaps even catastrophically, making the U.S. military a direct belligerent vs.…

Succumbing to the logic of preventive war is not, in fact, self-defense.

Its presence in Iraq provides Iran with targets, does little to weaken Iran's leverage in Baghdad, and adds to Washington's excessive pile of burdens to manage.

Before going into the SCIF | After going into the SCIF

Another secret VA waiting list, this time kept by an official who deleted veterans' orders for *prosthetic limbs* in order to make it appear like no backlog existed. Veterans need community care options to have an alternative to being at the mercy of these kinds of people.

I would personally rather raise a family in a high-growth society in which my children have more opportunities to pursue their goals as opposed to a stagnating one in which zero-sum competition heightens political tribalism and identitarian conflict.

This hagiography for W Bush *on the basis of the Iraq War* should be reputationally disqualifying.

No sense of OIF's strategic opportunity cost to the U.S., the consequences of removing a major check on Iran, or Reagan's real-life foreign policy nuances.
nationalpost.com/opinion/joe-ro…

We are so screwed.

There’s a serious point here: Spend enough money on Ukraine aid, and you’ll get some tank shell production (well, until the plant burns down…yeah, so, anyway…). Want shipyards? Gotta spend money on the Navy.

Does that create hard questions about tradeoffs? Yes - yes it does.

Getting Iraq wrong shouldn’t be like a Mulligan in golf. “Sorry! Let me try that again.”

Getting Iraq wrong should require grappling with why and how one’s policy views led to such an error, and adaptation. 2/