I’d hate to be the guy who throws on the spandex and a mask to play Captain Bringdown, but Spencer Pratt is not going to get elected mayor. That’s not dooming. That’s objectively assessing the situation. Spencer Pratt is a political superstar—there’s no doubt about that. He’s injected something that’s totally missing from the LA mayoral race, which is common sense. His innovative AI-aided ads and his ability to inflict something the Democrat overlords don’t ever get—public pushback—is highly entertaining. But Los Angeles is not coming out of its death spiral anytime soon. I wish it weren’t true. But it’s true.

And the spiral is spiraling. I just came back from my Houston house to spend some time here, and what struck me was the malaise. It’s dingy. It’s old. It’s dirty. This isn’t the California of my youth with swinging palm trees, sunshine, and endless opportunity. The sun still comes out, but there’s a vibe here I’ve never felt before in my 50+ years in Cali. It’s depressing. I grew up in a northern California San Francisco suburb (the same one and at the same time as Greg Gutfeld, though we didn’t know each other), and that had its unique problems, but it was a cool place to be. Then I went to college in San Diego in the 80s, and that was really cool. But after going off to the Army and the Gulf War, I knew I wanted to come back to Los Angeles because I knew Los Angeles was the place I could do whatever I wanted to do. And I did. I became a bunch of things: a senior Army officer, a partner in a law firm trying and winning multimillion-dollar cases, a best-selling author, a columnist, and even a stand-up comic. That was the California dream. If you wanted to do it and were willing to work for it, you could do it. This is where the great Andrew Breitbart chose to make his splash at the end of LA’s prime. Then, Los Angeles was a place of opportunity.

But that LA is gone, replaced by Palm Tree ‘n Fire Detroit. And it’s reasonable for you to ask why I’m not gone, at least not yet. Here’s what you need to know about California, and Los Angeles as well. It’s a feudal system. People asked me why I live here. I live here because it’s really good to live here, except for the taxes and the irritation I experience knowing they’ve managed to take the Golden State and turn it into the Gelded State. See, it’s semi-tolerable because I’m not a serf. I was a lawyer. I’m a nobleman. I don’t live in the City of Los Angeles. That’s not for people like me. The people like me—affluent professionals—live in the surrounding cities. I live in the Beach Cities south of LAX. It’s very nice here – good restaurants and very few bums. There are a few who wander in, but the cops are all over them. We don’t defund the police. We fund the police. All those ladies with the “Hate has no home here” signs? They see somebody who doesn’t fit in, and they’re on the phone to the local 5-0 before you can say “No Kings.” Oh, and when there are No Kings rallies, and there occasionally are, it looks like Sunny Acres has been issuing its residents day passes.

Of course, if you go five miles to the east across the 405, you get into where the poor people are. It’s Serfin’ USA. It’s a dystopian scene full of misery and decline. The high schools in my area send kids off to the Ivy Leagues and the UC system, provided they’re not white. The high schools in the hood might have five or 10 students who are grade-level proficient in reading and math. That’s not a percentage. That’s absolute numbers. But you know, their mom and dad voted for it or didn’t vote at all. Maybe the local Democrats just filled out their ballots for them—LA is as fully corrupt as Capone Era Chicago was. But it doesn’t matter. Not my problem.

Nope, Los Angeles is not my problem, and I’m not going to give it another moment of thought. If it wants to drown in a cesspool of hobo dung, it can dive in. Spencer Pratt is absolutely right about everything he says, from the fires to the junkies to the gross incompetence. Moreover, everybody knows it’s true. But nobody cares. You need to understand something. This isn’t about competence. When Karen Bass, a black communist mental defective, looks baffled at Spencer Pratt explaining how she’s helped run Los Angeles into the ground, that look of confusion is not because she’s stupid. She is, but it’s because he’s speaking a different language. She’s a literal communist. She’s gone to Cuba and taken notes. Her purpose isn’t to create prosperity and security for the people of Los Angeles. Her purpose, like that of all communists, is to secure power. The same is true of her bizarre, real competitor, some South Asian communist named Nithya Raman. As is endemic to the Third World, they fetishize power; these Marxists want control. That’s it. It’s not about filling in potholes. It’s not about safe streets. It’s not even about keeping half the city from going up in flames. It’s about control. There is no bottom to Los Angeles. It’s not going to get so bad that people are going to generate some sort of backlash, no matter how clever Spencer Pratt’s ads are, and they are clever. Those ads are only scoring with those of us on the outside. They give us false hope that something can be done. But nothing can be done. The decline is not the point. It’s literally irrelevant to them. Take Detroit, once also a rich and powerful city. Do you think that at some point, the leftists who control it looked at it and said, “Wow, we have become Detroit. Yikes! Should we try something else”? No. The dysfunction is the function; the squalor doesn’t matter to them. Not at all.

And it doesn’t matter to the vast majority of the inhabitants of LA. Almost all of those people who got burned out along the Pacific Coast Highway and in the Pacific Palisades are leftists who voted these people into office. And here’s the thing. They’re going to vote for them again. Raman ran an ad calling Spencer Pratt a “fascist.” It’s hysterically funny to the rest of us, equating the idea that safe streets and your house not burning down is pretty much the same thing as being Mussolini. But you know what? Those people whose houses burned down are going to listen to her, and they’re not going to vote for Spencer Pratt. They’re going to vote for her.

You can’t help somebody who won’t help himself. And let’s not fool ourselves into thinking we can.

What’s it going to take to fix Los Angeles, California, and the rest of the blue hellholes? Gosh, you don’t want to ask that. You’re not going to like the answer. They will never fix themselves. Never. All the normal people are gone. You’ve got a few rich leftists and a bunch of welfare cheats, and that’s it. It’s going to take something from the outside to fix them. It would have to be imposed upon them and not gently. It would take an American Franco, but then you would need to have an American Spanish Civil War to get there, and I’m not up for that—nor should you be. There are plenty of things I’m willing to fight and even die for, like my own personal freedom. After all, at my age, I’m too old to live on my knees, and I prefer to expire on a pile of expended brass. But I’m not willing to risk death to save people intent on destroying themselves.

Sorry to be depressing, but I’ve got to be honest. I’m not going to tell you the sun’s out like on an old-school California summer day. It isn’t. But that doesn’t mean Spencer Pratt isn’t performing an important service. The guy is a patriot. The guy isn’t giving up. He’s staying in the fight. And even if he doesn’t win this battle, and he’s not going to win this battle, he’s doing something for the rest of us. He’s shining the spotlight on the complete failure that the Democrat Party has embraced as it has invited the socialists and communists into the highest echelons of its ranks. Los Angeles won’t save itself, but the cautionary example that Los Angeles provides may help other places save themselves.

Thank you, Spencer, for sounding the alarm, and good luck to you even though you don’t have a chance in hell.

Kurt Schlichter, Townhall

A patient recently came to see me, saying she was furious with a friend. What began as an ordinary disappointment—a canceled dinner and a text returned too late—had become something far larger and far more charged. The friend was now “toxic.” The exchange had become a “violation of boundaries.” The hurt itself had been elevated into “trauma.” She had screenshots and a polished story about what the episode revealed about her friend’s pathology.

What she didn’t have was introspection. She was no longer asking the most psychologically useful questions: Could this have been carelessness rather than ill intent? Was the reaction intensified by other things that may have been going on? Had she contributed in any way to the conflict? The language she brought into the room gave her something powerful: certainty. But certainty is often the enemy of insight.

This scene has become one of the defining features of my work as a psychotherapist, and it sits at the center of the argument in my forthcoming book, Therapy Nation: Too much of modern therapy culture keeps people stuck, reinforcing grievance, externalizing blame, and turning everyone else into the reason their lives are so miserable.

The problem begins with my own field. For years, my profession has trained clinicians to elevate validation over challenge, affirmation over interpretation, and emotional fluency over the harder work of behavioral change. What has followed is the rise of grievance culture dressed up as psychological sophistication. Too many therapists now function less as clinicians than as reinforcers of the most self-protective interpretation available, teaching patients to locate the problem everywhere but themselves. Of course it is your boss’s fault. Of course your colleague is toxic. Of course your ex is a narcissist. Of course the world keeps wounding you. In this softened therapeutic frame, frustration is rarely something to examine; it’s something to assign.

The patient doesn’t gain greater agency, but instead, a more polished story about why someone else is to blame. If you feel injured, the injury must be real. If you feel unsafe, the threat must be there. If a relationship creates discomfort, the relationship itself becomes the problem.

I recently saw the aftermath of this in a new patient who came to me after months with another therapist. Every difficult interaction at work had been interpreted through the same frame: the boss was toxic, the co-workers invalidating, and the environment unsafe. By the time we met, the patient could describe every slight in flawless therapeutic language but had never once been pushed to consider whether avoidance, defensiveness, or fear of criticism might be part of the pattern. And she was never given constructive advice on how to bring about changes. The therapy had made the story clearer without making her stronger.

This is how therapy can quietly become an engine that keeps people stuck. Patients leave not more capable of tolerating frustration, ambiguity, or ordinary disappointment, but less. They become more fluent in explaining why they feel the way they do while becoming less practiced at changing what they do next. And therapists are largely responsible for this phenomenon.

While it may feel like growth, it functions as avoidance. And that is corrosive. The patient becomes good at explanation, more sophisticated in the language of harm, and more certain about who is to blame, but no closer to actual change. Grievance becomes part of identity.

That same emotional habit doesn’t stay confined to the therapy office. People carry it into marriages, friendships, workplaces, and, eventually, politics. Ordinary frustration becomes proof of mistreatment. Ambivalence becomes danger. Disagreement becomes evidence of harm. Once enough people are trained to interpret discomfort this way, coexisting with others starts to feel impossible.

The political consequences follow naturally. A citizen trained to experience ordinary conflict as evidence of harm will eventually bring that same mindset into public life. We’ve seen this dynamic play out vividly in the Donald Trump era, when members of my profession moved from helping people navigate political differences to legitimizing family estrangement as a sign of psychological health. On national television, prominent therapists and psychiatrists suggested it might be essential for mental health to avoid Trump-voting relatives during the holidays.

The same therapeutic scripts that encourage patients to pathologize difficult bosses and disappointing partners now teach citizens to reinterpret ordinary democratic differences as evidence of danger. The result is a society less capable of living with differences, less able to tolerate friction, and more likely to retreat into emotionally curated silos and echo chambers.

This is where therapy culture ceases to strengthen people and starts quietly weakening them. The person becomes increasingly protected from scrutiny, and increasingly fragile as a result.

Social media has been uniquely fertile ground for this corruption. The algorithm doesn’t elevate the most psychologically accurate interpretation. It elevates the most emotionally satisfying one. Hence the ecosystem of so-called mental-health influencers: Endless posts diagnose narcissists, decode toxic bosses, and turn ordinary disappointment into proof of pathology. Social media rewards certainty, speed, and self-protection—precisely the instincts real therapy is supposed to challenge before turning them into conclusions. The result isn’t a more psychologically sophisticated society. In many cases, it’s quite the opposite.

We are becoming emotionally articulate while growing psychologically brittle.

My own field should be willing to say this plainly: We helped create this culture. The original promise of therapy was never that life would stop hurting. It was to help people become stronger in the face of pain, clearer in the face of conflict, and more honest about the role they themselves play in the conflicts they keep re-creating.

Real therapy should make people more capable of dealing with reality, not less.

Trump has done so much damage to libtardery that the Democrats will need a decade of uninterrupted power to undo it, which they’re not going to get.” —Matt Forney on X.

If you learned anything from this week’s extravaganza in Beijing, it is that Donald Trump is aggressively re-aligning world relations so that the USA does not end up one of the losers in the global resource scramble that lurks darkly behind all current events. China does not intend to be an eventual loser, either, though it has lost a lot of traction lately. The Eurolands are certainly the main losers, embracing loserdom as the old and sick long for death. India and some of the BRICs countries are looking a little loser-ish just now.

The primary resource all nations scramble for is oil. Without lavish supplies of oil, you can’t have an advanced techno-industrial economy and, as the feckless Eurolanders learned the hard way, there really isn’t an adequate substitute for oil. The flow of oil depends on economically producible reserves of oil country-by-country, but also on geographic advantage, as we are learning just now in the Hormuz crisis.

“Europe’s crude oil production started its permanent decline in 2001. Asia-Pacific’s production hit a maximum in 2010, and it has been declining since. Africa’s peak oil production took place in 2008, and it has been mostly declining since.” — Gail Tverberg, OurFiniteWorld.com

Also, turns out, the peak oil story is still real, despite fifteen years of shale oil miracles. The Persian Gulf states, including Saudi Arabia, are probably past peak. American shale oil is in the peaking zone, too — the Permian Basin in Texas is running short of sweet spots. The Arctic National Wildlife Reserve (AMWR) is open for leasing, but it is expensive to drill and produce in the harsh arctic region and the US Geological Survey estimates recoverable reserves there between 7.7 – 10 billion barrels — America consumes roughly 7.5 billion barrels-a-year, so. . . .

There’s Canada, of course, and its tar sands, but the Great White North these days leans rather hostilely towards its neighbor to the south (us). Otherwise, North America is pretty fully explored oil-wise. There can’t be a whole lot of hidden, un-tapped “elephant” fields out there. On the plus side, America enjoys its geographic advantage, comfortably cushioned between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, far from the madding crowd of Eurasia.

We have lately trumpeted our supposed acquisition of Venezuela, but projected production of US companies there looking ahead several years would be under a million barrels-a-day while the US uses 20.5-million barrels a day. As for Venezuela’s jungle-bound oil sands, well, for now, fuggeddabowdit.

Russia’s Ministry of Natural Resources puts its commercially recoverable oil resources (with current technology and prices) at around 80-billion barrels, which is a lot, and leaves Russia in a theoretically favorable place for the short term, anyway. China uses about 17-million barrels-a-day and imports about 70-percent of that. Its imports of Iranian oil are substantial but obscured in official statistics due to the evasion of US sanctions. The Hormuz blockade has put a hurt on China.

Here’s how the global resource scramble translates into geopolitical behavior: As has been evident for some time, US interests are increasingly alienated from Euroland’s interests, and better aligned with Russia’s interests. Europe is demonstrably insane these days, roiling with loose talk as it whirls around the drain. Russia, under V. Putin, looks more like the adult in the room. Even Russia’s military operation in Ukraine looks rational if you consider how the EU and the CIA started the damn thing in the first place circa 2014 for the very purpose of provoking Russia.

Mr. Trump has yearned to normalize relations with Russia since he stepped on-stage in 2016, to the great consternation of America’s neocons, CIA shadow-meisters, and the born-again communists running the Democratic Party (who seem to resent Russia ditching Marxism-Leninism thirty-five years ago). This week, the US and China have mutually proposed becoming “partners” rather than rivals on the world scene. We will surely remain mutually wary, but apparently things have changed.

Most urgently, China would like its oil imports from the Persian Gulf restored, and the obvious way to make that happen would be for them to lean on Iran to stop screwing around and come to terms with the US — give up the enriched uranium and stop laying jihad on everybody near and far. We’ll know soon enough if China will do that for us, and we have some goodies promised for them, Nvidia chips, soybeans, and more.

Mr. Trump is rearranging the global game-board bigly, and the net result will be the sorting-out of winners and losers. Iran is the poster boy for that. It could go either way for them, soon, and rather sharply. If Iran’s jihad-happy leaders just quit FAFOing, they have the chance to re-enter the global community as an advanced modern economy with a comfortable standard of living. Or, the US could just blow up what’s left there. China will probably deliver that message forcefully in the days ahead.

There remains, however, the dirty business of America’s domestic enemies, of whom we learn more and more each week. This week, it was the testimony of “whistleblower” CIA agent James Erdman that the CIA worked sedulously to conceal the true origins of Covid-19. It looks pretty much like what half of America has suspected all along: that Covid was a trip laid on the nation by its own Deep State (mainly the CIA), in concert with the rogue Democratic Party, for the express purpose of queering the 2020 election.

Related seditious operations apparently continue to this very hour. Former CIA Director John Brennan told MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace this week: “There’s still a legion of professionals in the law enforcement environment, the Department of Justice, as well as the CIA and other places — the ones who are refusing to follow politically motivated prosecutions, those who are refusing to support any type of political activities on the part of the Trump administration. . . .” Did he just admit that the conspiracy he kicked off in 2016 is still ongoing? And that he is an active party to it? I think so. Do you think Joe DiGenova noticed that down in the DOJ’s Southern District of Florida?

Just as astoundingly, this week former FBI Director James Comey told CNN’s Kasie Hunt that he “still speaks regularly” to current FBI employees. Say, what. . . ? He palavers with the very agency that is investigating him for serious felonies, such as threatening the life of the US president? Sounds a little out-of-order, ya think? Does he long to spend the rest of his life as captain of the ping-pong team at the Lewisburg Federal Penitentiary?

Last year we mounted a GiveSendGo campaign to help Nurse / Midwife Kathie Breault pay her legal fees after “Joe Biden’s” DOJ indicted her for giving Covid vax cards to people who did not receive Covid-19 vaccinations so they would not be fired from their jobs under the Covid mandates. Kathie, age 67, was forced into a plea deal to avoid prison, but she faces a $10,000 fine. So, I have reactivated her GiveSendGo campaign, and urge you to consider helping her pay this fine. Click on: the Kathie Breault Legal Defense Fund.

James Howard Kuntsler

The NYU Executive Committee of the Student Government Assembly expressed “profound disappointment” that their graduation speaker was to be internationally renowned social psychologist Jonathan Haidt. In a Statement on All-University Commencement, the committee asked the administration to “reconsider.”

“The pivot from figures of universal inspiration,” NYU students complained, “to an individual who has been accused of making homophobic remarks in a class and public misconceptions about transgender identity, and has promoted disturbing rhetoric around antiracism, social justice, and diversity, equity and inclusion, claiming that the abolition of DEI may be the only way out of the Leftist ideological capture of American campuses, is deeply unsettling and clearly undermines the University’s stated values.”

Those accusations are deeply mistaken and profoundly misleading. The one accurate claim is that he did acknowledge that the abolition of DEI might be the only way for academia to correct course. So Haidt is clearly not an inspiring choice for students who are attached to that destructive paradigm.

But Haidt is nothing if not a figure of inspiration for parents, writers, and budding social scientists. He has produced four bestsellers, of which three, including The Coddling of the American Mind, are global blockbusters. His latest, The Anxious Generation, has spent over a year on international bestseller lists, leading to not only parental and community efforts, but real policy changes to protect the mental health of children and adolescents.

This includes an initiative at NYU called “IRL” (In Real Life). As a result of Haidt’s work, designated spaces on campus are device-free to encourage face-to-face interaction and time away from the distractions of social media. The student statement, however, unironically asks whether the choice of Haidt was “yet another effort to push the IRL narrative.” At elite universities, where everything is “narrative,” even efforts to encourage friendships and immersive real life experiences can only be interpreted as an effort to push a narrative.

“Many students have reported feelings of disappointment, disgust, unenthusiasm, defeat, and embarrassment” as well as “being misunderstood,” the statement reads. Awkward phrasing aside, at least these students didn’t insist that Haidt’s selection was “harmful.” When I worked with Greg Lukianoff and Haidt on The Coddling of the American Mind, attempts to disinvite and deplatform speakers were often framed as efforts to protect vulnerable students from the “harm” of speakers’ words — or even the speaker’s mere presence.

Psychologists at UCLA, Harvard, and Ohio State have found that believing words can harm is associated with worse mental health: more anxiety and depression, less resilience, and worse emotion regulation. And when students see words as violence, they can become willing to endorse actual violence in response to speech — or even to prevent it.

According to the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), Gen Z is roughly 10 times more accepting of using violence to prevent speech than Baby Boomers, and more than 25 times more than the Silent Generation. Roughly 43% of Gen Z survey participants refused to endorse the view that violence against speakers is never acceptable.

As of May 7, campus deplatforming attempts had surpassed 100 for the year, according to FIRE’s publicly accessible Campus Deplatforming Database. In the first quarter of 2026, reports FIRE’s Chief Research Advisor, Sean Stevens, 65 of 70 attempts succeeded.

While failed deplatforming attempts are bad enough, at least they “show that institutional safeguards are holding,” Stevens says. “A successful attempt signals that those safeguards are eroding. If nearly all deplatforming efforts are now succeeding, then the problem is not simply that controversial events are being challenged. The problem is that universities appear increasingly willing to fold under pressure.”

Protesting commencement speakers is hardly new. When I graduated from Barnard College in 1990, students at Wellesley College were “outraged” by the choice of their commencement speaker, Barbara Bush, because she wasn’t a career woman.

But when students of past generations tried to school their elders, their elders schooled them right back. Psychiatrist and author Jean Baker Miller called those students’ objections “simplistic.” Wellesley alumnae quipped that the class of 1990 had apparently not learned the school’s Latin motto: “non ministrari, sed ministrare,” not to be served, but to serve.

And the pushback wasn’t partisan. Feminist Pat Schroeder offered, “I have nothing but respect for Barbara Bush…. Being a wife and mother is not a protestable offense. After all, if it weren’t for mothers, there would be no students at Wellesley.” Mrs. Bush, always the soul of discretion, said simply, “They’re 21 years old and they’re looking at life from that perspective.”

Gen Z has been less fortunate. Instead of university administrators and other leaders asserting their authority, they have increasingly appeased and indulged students’ emotional instability, arrogance, and even rule-breaking — including with respect to disruptions, harassment, threats, mobbings reminiscent of Maoist struggle-sessions, and even violence. This is not beneficial for anyone, including those students who violate the boundaries of protected free expression.

Both Jonathan Haidt and Barbara Bush delivered their keynote addresses. Mrs. Bush’s is now included in NPR’s list of best commencement speeches of all time:

“As important as your obligations as a doctor, lawyer or business leader will be,” she said, “you are a human being first. And those human connections—with spouses, with children, with friends—are the most important investments you will ever make.”

That advice has never been more true or more necessary. And it’s not so different from the message NYU graduates heard from Haidt on Thursday. “Call someone you love just to say hi,” he told them, “Invite someone to dinner. Say yes when someone invites you. Be the one who makes things happen in the real world.” Hopefully, the graduating class learned something from him.

The Wall Street Journal last week ran a column headlined, “The Congressional Pension Racket.” That got me thinking about how Congressional pensions aren’t such a big grift around here, because none of our Congressional hacks ever retire.

Why should they? The entire six-state region is 100 percent gerrymandered – 21 seats, 21 Democrats, even though about 40 percent of the New England electorate voted for Donald Trump in 2024.

That’s why the Democrats are so mad about the gerrymandering this year. They’ve already gerrymandered everywhere they could, in spades. Their gerrymandering is a mature industry. The Republicans had a lot of ground to make up, and now they have.

As for the Congressional pension racket, it’s tough to come up with the actual numbers. The feds don’t have to easy-to-access website, like we do for tracking our greed-crazed hacks here in Massachusetts.

But after doing some checking, it’s clear that our shiftless, corrupt local hacks are stuffing their pockets with a lot more cash than almost all of the Congressional layabouts.

The info in the WSJ column came from the National Taxpayers Union Foundation (NTFU), and some of it is outrageous.

For instance, Dementia Joe Biden, the worst president in US history. After a lifetime at the public trough, he now collects $413,000 a year.

More than the president makes – if Trump were taking a salary, that is.

I called the NTUF and asked them to run some local hack numbers for me. As I said, though, the numbers are vague, and there aren’t that many. You see, here in New England, as Thomas Jefferson said of the federal bureaucracy, vacancies by death are few, and by resignation never.

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen is retiring at the end of the year after two terms. The NTUF says she should be getting $50,610 a year.

One of those running to replace her is the guy she beat back in 2014, John Sununu. He’s still only 61, but when he turns 62, he’d be eligible to grab $32,515 a year. A call to his Senate campaign about his pension plans was not returned.

Then there’s ex-Rep. Barney Frank. He announced way back when that he wouldn’t take a hack pension. Was he telling the truth? Hot Bottom’s heart throb was not available for comment from hospice.

Nikki Tsongas was a Congresswoman in Massachusetts for a few forgettable terms. At age 80 she’s out now, and the NTUF estimates her annual take at $33,218. She’s also the widow of ex-Sen. Paul Tsongas – another kiss in the mail, for which we do not have the numbers.

Tsongas succeeded Marty Meehan, who seen his opportunities and took ‘em, parachuting into the ZooMass hackerama with a salary last year of $889,453.66, behind which comes the 80 percent pension.

But wait, there’s more. Marty is 69, and according to Congressional pension rules, since turning 62 he’s been eligible to collect even more public money — between $39,000 and $41,000 a year.

These are decent if not exorbitant pensions, especially when consider that it’s only undoubtedly only one of several stipends most of these tax-fattened hyenas are grabbing.

But it’s still short money compared to what Massachusetts hacks are making on the back nine.

Just to cite one example, there’s Cong. Bill Keating. Before he was elected to Congress, he was the district attorney of Norfolk County.

His predecessor, both as DA and as Congressman, was Bill Delahunt. After getting elected to Congress, in a very Joe Biden-like election, if you get my drift, Delahunt then connived himself a deal at the State House to shift the pension status of all DA’s into Group 4 – cops.

That means full retirement benefits available at age 55, 10 years earlier. Guess how old Delahunt was when he was first elected to Congress.

Suddenly Delahunt was eligible for a full-boat state pension – in addition to his full Congressional salary, on which he hardly paid any federal income tax because his legal domicile was more than 50 miles from D.C.

After 83 glorious years of uninterrupted slurping at the trough, Delahunt died in 2024. In addition to his Congressional pension, he’d been double-dipping with a state pension of $64,003 a year.

But his double successor Bill “the Invisible Man” Keating is the one who’s really stuffed his pockets full under the Delahunt dispensation.

Keating, who doesn’t even go to the bathroom without a hall pass from either Nancy Pelosi or Hakeem Jeffries, pockets $174,000 a year as a rubber-stamp Democrat Congressman.

And he now collects both his full Congressional salary of $174,000 – again, minus most federal income taxes – and a state pension from Massachusetts that is now up to $116,269 a year.

This is Keating’s 16th year double-dipping. Just from the state pension alone, he’s stuffed his pockets with $1.7 million.

A very long time ago, Keating was his own man. He was in the state Senate, and he actually ran for the presidency of the body against Billy Bulger. This was back in the day when Billy’s serial-killing brother Whitey was still around, so it took some stones to go head-to-head with the Corrupt Midget.

Keating could have allowed himself to be bought off a state judgeship. But he hung in for the big bucks, and it’s worked out for him more than somewhat. Cueball Keating is laughing all the way to the bank.

For the record, Billy Bulger crushed him in that fight for the presidency of the state Senate.

But who really won? In hack terms, only one thing counts – the money, the kiss in the mail for doing nothing.

So here are the final results:

Billy Bulger, pension of $274,539 a year. Since 2004, he’s collected almost $5 million — $200,000 a year until 2020, when his wife died, after which he started grabbing the extra $75K.

Bill Keating: $174,000 Congressional salary and $116,269 a year pension. There’s a saying:

Pigs get fat, hogs get slaughtered. That old saw obviously doesn’t apply in the hackerama, but here’s one that does.

Two kisses in the mail is better than one kiss in the mail.

This is why I say, don’t worry about the Congressional pension racket. The real scandal is the Double-Dip Pension Racket.

It’s one thing for all these hacks to be feeding at the trough. But why do they have lick the plate?

Howie Carr

China doubles down on its path to economic doom, and Trump has all the leverage.

Texas Hughes | May 20, 2026

Trump understands finance and economics. Trump knows that China is doubling down on their path to economic doom. I’ve come to believe that he is humoring the Chinese to get good trade deals for America, knowing that China is struggling to stave off their coming financial crash.

We have read about China building, and sustaining, its rapidly growing economy with huge spending on government financed projects. These projects are often large infrastructure and urban housing projects. 

All governments do this. China’s mistake is doing it on a gigantic scale by continuing to print money it doesn’t have. This creates a vast public debt that becomes progressively more dangerous. This is perhaps an inevitable mistake made by leaders of socialist economies. Russia is doing the same thing to keep paying for its failing Ukraine gambit.

Socialists avoid the natural controls of capitalist economies that let businesses fail, rather than continue to cover their failure to make a profit. This leads to ever more government debt to avoid economic collapse, thus making the problem ever larger, and making the inevitable collapse ever worse. 

This article from the Financial Times describes it well. 

How China enables American domination

Normally after an empire gains economic might, its currency takes an increasing share of reserves held by central banks. With a 17 per cent share of global GDP, but only 2 per cent of central bank reserves, China is trailing 30 to 40 years behind previous superpowers at a similar stage of their ascents.

Britain at its peak accounted for 40 per cent of trade, but 60 per cent of trade payments were in sterling. China by contrast has a leading 15 per cent share of global trade, but only 2 per cent of trade bills are invoiced in renminbi.

The dollar’s omnipresence lets America run the show in more than one way. High demand for dollars lowers US borrowing costs and allows it to run persistently large twin deficits.

China’s] money supply has multiplied sixfold since 1980 to 230 per cent of GDP, among the highest in the world. This liquidity sloshes around inside the walled economy, much of it in the domestic debt market, battered lately by a property bust. Beijing is wary of easing controls, lest it unleash capital flight.

So, China does have the world’s second largest economy. It does have a large external trade volume. It does have decently impressive technological capabilities.

But, it is built upon huge government financed internal debt from funding socialistic style projects. Its currency is shunned by the world’s financial markets, and used mostly when China can pressure other nations into accepting their crappy currency.

Trump needn’t do anything to pressure China. He can easily smile, nod, and flatter them to get deals good for America. He knows China’s economy is due to collapse. He knows it will take years for them to recover. He knows the present communist government may well collapse. He knows the USA will effectively win the economic struggle, and, that China will need a few decades to recover.

At worst, China’s leaders may attempt to capture Taiwan in the desperation of their failure. But, given what’s going to happen to China, negotiating anything about Taiwan now is useless.

Remember the old adage, “the Emperor has no clothes”?

In China’s case, the Emperor has no currency.

Global oil supply in 2025 is shaped by a tug-of-war between OPEC+ restraint and vigorous non-OPEC growth. Based on reputable outlooks (EIA, IEA, OPEC) as compiled by Trading Economics, output continues to edge higher versus 2024. Below is a clear, country-by-country look at the leaders and what is driving their barrels this year. Figures refer to crude oil production only (excluding condensates, NGLs and other liquids).

In 2025, worldwide crude production is hovering around the mid-104 to 105 million b/d range, up roughly 1.6–1.9 million b/d year over year. The bulk of new supply is coming from non-OPEC+—especially the United States, Brazil, Canada and Guyana—while OPEC+ extends voluntary cuts that curb growth from key members. Macro headwinds include softer price expectations (Brent trading in a roughly $58–$70/bbl band in several forecasts), uneven demand growth, and ongoing geopolitics from sanctions to regional conflicts. Project ramp-ups in deepwater (Brazil), shale (U.S.), and oil sands (Canada) underpin the expansion. Meanwhile, several producers face infrastructure, investment, or above-ground risks that will continue to shape their 2025 trajectories.

Top 10 countries by 2025 production

1.  United States — 13,642 kb/d

The United States remains the world’s largest oil producer in 2025 with an average of about 13.6 million b/d (13,642 kb/d). Growth is led by the Permian Basin, where productivity and infrastructure expansions keep setting new benchmarks. Pipeline debottlenecking and disciplined efficiency gains support high sustained output despite price volatility. U.S. shale remains the swing engine of non-OPEC+ supply growth this year. Service costs and decline rates are watched closely, but momentum remains firmly positive.

2.  Russia — 9,818 kb/d

Russia maintains substantial output near 9.8 million b/d (9,818 kb/d) despite sanctions and the OPEC+ framework. Redirected crude flows and discounted barrels have sustained production levels into alternative markets. The policy path within OPEC+ and the durability of export logistics remain key variables for 2025. Investment and technology access are ongoing constraints, yet operational resilience has been notable. Market watchers track compliance and export routing for signals on the year’s balance.

3.  Saudi Arabia — 9,722 kb/d

Saudi Arabia averages roughly 9.7 million b/d (9,722 kb/d) as extended OPEC+ cuts temper its near-term volumes. With spare capacity around 12 million b/d, the Kingdom retains unmatched ability to adjust supply if policy shifts. 2025 strategy prioritizes market stability over maximizing barrels. Domestic upstream capability and megaproject readiness keep optionality strong. Price signals and OPEC+ cohesion will guide any change in Saudi output cadence.

4.  Canada — 4,420 kb/d

Canada’s production advances to about 4.42 million b/d (4,420 kb/d), up roughly 0.3 million b/d year over year. Oil sands expansions and incremental optimization are the main drivers. New takeaway capacity improves netbacks and supports higher sustained runs. Environmental policy and ESG standards remain core to project pacing and capital allocation. Overall, 2025 marks another year of steady, infrastructure-enabled growth.

5.  China — 4,350 kb/d

China’s domestic crude output holds near 4.35 million b/d (4,350 kb/d), reflecting steady redevelopment of mature basins. Enhanced recovery and targeted investment cushion declines. While China remains a major crude importer, stable local production is strategically important. Policy support and national oil company plans aim to sustain plateau levels. 2025 thus looks broadly flat with limited upside risk.

6.  Iraq — 3,742 kb/d

Iraq averages around 3.74 million b/d (3,742 kb/d) under the OPEC+ umbrella. Field performance at super-giant reservoirs remains robust, though export coordination and policy factors shape realized flows. Infrastructure reliability at southern terminals is a perennial watchpoint. Investment timelines and contractor activity influence incremental growth. For 2025, volumes are largely policy-constrained rather than geology-limited.

7.  Brazil — 3,679 kb/d

Brazil climbs to roughly 3.68 million b/d (3,679 kb/d) as pre-salt projects add barrels. Deepwater ramp-ups deliver some of the strongest non-OPEC+ gains in 2025. High productivity wells and reliable FPSO deployments underpin continued momentum. Logistics and maintenance schedules are the main swing factors for monthly prints. Overall, Brazil is a cornerstone of global supply growth this year.

8.  United Arab Emirates — 3,240 kb/d

The UAE posts about 3.24 million b/d (3,240 kb/d) while remaining aligned with OPEC+ objectives. ADNOC’s capacity expansion program preserves medium-term upside once policy settings allow. 2025 strategy balances market stewardship with investment in spare capacity. Efficiency and low upstream carbon intensity strengthen its competitive position. Any relaxation of cuts could surface meaningful incremental barrels.

9.  Iran — 3,218 kb/d

Iran’s output is estimated near 3.22 million b/d (3,218 kb/d), higher than in prior years despite sanctions. Alternative trade channels and domestic offtake support sustained production. Policy dynamics and enforcement intensity remain the key uncertainties. Reservoir management and maintenance have stabilized declines at legacy fields. In 2025, Iran is a notable swing factor for balances and differentials.

10.  Kuwait — 2,489 kb/d

Kuwait averages roughly 2.49 million b/d (2,489 kb/d) within the OPEC+ framework. Mature field management and steady brownfield work sustain core volumes. Neutral Zone developments offer medium-term potential depending on project cadence. Investment discipline and reliability remain hallmarks of its upstream. For 2025, policy rather than geology is the chief limiter.

Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson went after all eight of her judicial colleagues Monday over the Voting Rights Act case of Louisiana v. Callais. 

She suggested that the court acted politically by speeding up the case’s final ruling so that Louisiana would have time to craft a new map for the upcoming midterm elections.

“It can so easily be perceived that the court is doing something political,” the Biden appointee said while speaking at the American Law Institute, according to ABC News.

“In my view, we have to be really, really careful in this environment when we’re dealing with issues that have a political overlay,” she added.

“We have to be scrupulous about sticking to the principles and the rules that we apply in every case and not look as though we’re doing something different in this kind of context.”

The original case struck down part of the Voting Rights Act in a 6-3 decision authored by Justice Samuel Alito. Her comments, however, seem to refer to the court’s 8-1 decision to certify the case faster than it normally would.

The decision to move faster was essential, given the current timetable, Alito stated.

The dissent [from Jackson] would require that the 2026 congressional elections in Louisiana be held under a map that has been held to be unconstitutional,” he wrote.

Standard practice is to wait 32 days before a SCOTUS decision is certified, to allow other parties more time to consider asking for a rehearing. There are historical exceptions, however.

Jackson’s lone dissent stated that the court’s decision “has spawned chaos in the State of Louisiana.”

Alito was joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch in writing a concurring opinion that said Jackson’s sentiment “lacks restraint,” SCOTUS Blog reported.

He also called Jackson’s reasoning “baseless and insulting.”

the court had waited, Alito wrote, that, too, could have been seen as a politically partisan act, because it would favor supporters of the old map.

Alito added that Jackson’s accusation is a “groundless and utterly irresponsible charge.”

As a result of the Callais decision, other southern GOP states have gone back to the drawing board to change their maps.

Republicans are currently poised to have a potential 10- to 12-seat advantage in the congressional redistricting fights taking place around the country.

Some states have redrawn their lines early to favor the GOP, while others, like Alabama and South Carolina, plan to use the SCOTUS Voting Rights Act decision to pad their totals, in hopes of maintaining a congressional majority.

Nick Givas

Peace through strength deters war, appeasement invites war, and letting an enemy build up unmolested makes wars longer, costs higher, and risks greater.

William R. Hawkins | May 19, 2026

i Jinping holds the titles of General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), Chairman of the Central Military Commission, President of China, and Core Leader of the CCP. President Donald Trump used the title “President” when meeting with Xi last week, but in reality, his CCP tittles are what matter. Xi’s title as Core Leader elevates him to dictatorial power on a scale held previously only by Mao Zedong.

The pomp and circumstance shown to President Trump was an obvious play to the American’s ego, but also a display of Great Power status on a par with, if not better than, the United States. Chinese state media, academics, and officials have long promoted narratives declaring the “rise of the East and decline of the West” and that “the Chinese model is more effective, more competitive, and superior to the American model.” Xi, in a not very subtle way, asked Trump if he had read Harvard professor Graham Allison’s 2017 book Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides Trap? This was widely reported as an effort by Xi to promote peaceful relations, but such a view is not supported by the contents of the book and why Xi likes it.

Allison’s argument is that too many wars, starting with the conflict between Athens and Sparta described by the ancient historian Thucydides, have been the result of an established power (like America today) trying to resist a rising power like China. The status quo power is cast as the aggressor. So, it is better to accommodate the challenger to keep the peace. This will take “huge, painful adjustments in attitudes and actions” writes Allison, including accepting that America is doomed to fall to second place behind China. It is better to lose without a fight is his decadent advice.

The passage that Xi most likes is when Allison argues that resisting China’s rise is not even possible anyway because “China has already passed the United States” in economic strength and military potential.

Yet, Allison’s own historical examples show just the opposite of his preconceived conclusion if you instead start with the record. In each of his twelve examples of modern war between a “ruling” power and a rising power, it is the rising power that starts the war with acts of aggression. In none of the cases does the ruling power act in a pre-emptive manner to push its rival down before it feels strong enough to attempt an outright seizure of power. That was their mistake. Even Allison’s core example of Sparta reacting to Athens’ rise notes that the two Greek city-states had a 30-year peace treaty during which, as Thucydides writes, Sparta did little until “the better part of Greece was already in their [Athenian] hands.” This means that the ruling powers behaved exactly as Allison wants the U.S. to do; they did nothing to protect their position. But instead of the peaceful outcome Allison desires, war was the result as inaction invited continued aggression. The rising power saw no limits. The real lesson is obvious to anyone not blinded by Allison’s leftist ideology that embraces American decline. Peace through strength deters war, appeasement invites war, and letting an enemy build up unmolested makes wars longer, costs higher, and risks greater.

China’s leaders are happy to welcome scholars like Allison for visits where they can reinforce beliefs which favor their advance. During Trump’s first term, Allison visited China and stated, “For four decades, Republican and Democratic administrations alike saw China as a ‘partner’ or ‘strategic partner.’ But the Trump administration now publicly calls China a ‘strategic rival’ or ‘adversary.’ Obama, Bush, and Clinton pursued a strategy of engaging China and welcoming its integration into the global economic and security order the United States has led for seventy years.” If read in its proper way, this statement confirms that past presidents practiced appeasement. They did not just allow but encouraged the massive transfer of capital and technology across the Pacific to empower the Beijing regime. An epic blunder in grand strategy.

Trade is at the heart of the appeasement narrative. Economic interdependence was the core of the post-Cold War euphoria; the way to keep even militant regimes like the PRC in hand. This idea comes from the classical economists of the early 19th century who tried to proclaim a similar new world order after the decades of war sparked by the French Revolution and Napoleon. Foremost among these liberal philosophers was Richard Cobden. His most famous claim was that commerce was “the grand panacea” that would remove “the motive for large and mighty empires, for gigantic armies and great fleets would die away.” It is Cobden’s naïveté that sets the real “trap” that national leaders should avoid but have too often fallen for from the advice of academic and business factions. The French economist Frederic Bastiat added that “Free trade means harmony of interests and peace between nations.” Actual history shows the contrary as control of productive assets and resources is what fuels ambition.

It is this “Cobden Trap” that should be the center of study. The thirty or more business executives President Trump took with him to China has raised concerns that a “transactional” President may forget the essentials of grand strategy which require that the U.S. back away from economic interdependence with a China that uses its control of critical minerals and industrial supply-chains as leverage to shift the balance of power in its favor, and enhances its control by stealing technology on a massive scale.

A Chinese attack on Taiwan would be the last step in a march of aggression leading to a major war. Global Times, the CCP’s main propaganda outlet, hailed Trump’s post-Xi interview with Fox News where he supposedly weakened U.S. support for Taiwan saying he doesn’t want “the U.S. to travel 9500 miles to fight a war.” But the way to prevent such a war is by deterrence, not appeasement. I have visited Taiwan several times. It is a magnificent island filled with great people who have earned their freedom. Thucydides argued that interests override morality in human nature leading to the horrors of war. But in the case of Taiwan, the strategic interests of the U.S. and its Asian allies (especially Japan) are reinforced by the moral case for Taiwan’s continued independence which it has had on a de facto basis for three generations.

The National Security Strategy, issued last November, should keep us on track. It states, “We want the world’s most robust industrial base. American national power depends on a strong industrial sector capable of meeting both peacetime and wartime production demands. That requires not only direct defense industrial production capacity but also defense-related production capacity. Cultivating American industrial strength must become the highest priority of national economic policy… We want to remain the world’s most scientifically and technologically advanced and innovative country, and to build on these strengths. And we want to protect our intellectual property from foreign theft.” These objectives cannot be met unless we break the Chinese economic grip and translate our economic strength into military power to counter Beijing’s buildup.

The good news from Allison’s work is that in most cases, the “ruling” power has been able to turn back challengers by drawing on its deeper reserves of strength. This is also true in those cases which did not result in war. Allison counts the Cold War as a success because it did not turn hot. Yet, appeasement had nothing to do with its outcome. U.S. strategy was based on containing the Soviet Union to hobble its economic development. Controls blocked technology transfers. There were “hot spots” where covert actions, proxy wars, shows of force, arms races and the support of dissidents and insurgents were used. In the end, the stronger power won. The Soviets collapsed both at home and abroad when President Ronald Reagan gave them a push.

Vladimir Putin pursues a revanchist policy, his smaller Russia is even more underdeveloped, inferior not only to the U.S. but to the EU. Indeed, the U.S.-led global alliance system unites over half of the world economy under the western banner. The challengers, whether in Beijing, Moscow or Tehran, do not have the power to prevail against such a strong coalition of advanced nations — unless Western leaders listen to defeatists like Allison. Which is why Xi wants to promote his views.

William R. Hawkins is a former economics professor who has worked for several Washington think tanks and on the staff of the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee. He has written widely on international economics and national security issues for both professional and popular publications including for the Army War College, the U.S. Naval Institute, and the National Defense University, among others. 

California’s aggressive push for a $20 fast-food minimum wage was sold as a moral victory for workers, a bold stand against corporate greed that would lift families without consequence. Yet the reality unfolding at Carl’s Jr. locations across the state tells a different story—one of shuttered opportunities, fleeing staff, and franchise operators driven to bankruptcy. What began as political virtue-signaling has delivered economic pain that no amount of union rhetoric can disguise.

Friendly Franchisees Corporation, a major operator running dozens of Carl’s Jr. restaurants, filed for Chapter 11 protection last month, citing the wage mandate as a primary driver of its financial collapse. The chain has already trimmed its California presence from 613 stores in 2023 to 588 in 2025. Sales are down, labor costs are soaring, and workers report fearing for their safety amid rising violence.

This is not progress. It is the predictable fallout of ignoring basic economics in favor of feel-good policy.

The Wage Hike That Was Never About Workers Alone

California lawmakers and union allies celebrated the 2024 $20 minimum wage for fast-food workers as a necessary response to the state’s crushing cost of living. Yet even as some employees saw higher paychecks, the policy’s hidden costs mounted. Franchise operators like Harshad Dharod, CEO of the affected entity, stated plainly in court filings that the wage increase “materially increased operating expenses.” Despite millions in revenue, the math no longer worked.

Rising prices at the counter have deterred customers already tightening belts amid inflation. National data showed a 4 percent drop in Carl’s Jr. consumer spending in 2025. Competition intensified while corporate marketing faltered.

The result? Locations struggling to stay open, hours cut, and innovation stalled. Government cannot simply decree higher wages and expect businesses to absorb the blow without consequences for jobs, service, and viability.

Violence in the Workplace Compounds the Crisis

Labor costs form only part of the story. Workers at Carl’s Jr. have walked out, organized by the California Fast Food Workers Union, citing chronic understaffing, inadequate supplies, and rampant safety threats. Union statements describe daily aggression—customers yelling, throwing food, and worse. One alleged incident involved a man threatening an employee with a frying basket before punching her. Another reported cash stolen directly from a worker’s hand.

“We live in fear just walking to work from the parking lot,” the union declared. “Nearly every day we’re subjected to aggressive and violent behavior.”

These are not abstract complaints. Employees describe humiliating conditions, broken equipment, and retaliation for speaking up. The very policy meant to empower workers has coincided with environments that drive them away. When businesses operate on thinner margins, corners get cut—security, training, staffing—and the human cost lands hardest on those at the front counter.

Policy by Wishful Thinking Meets Fiscal Reality

Supporters of the wage mandate point to studies claiming limited job losses and modest price increases. Yet the Carl’s Jr. case, alongside similar strains across the sector, exposes the fragility. Thin-margin operators in high-crime areas face a perfect storm.

Reduced marketing, executive churn, and lack of franchisor innovation compound state-imposed burdens. Jonathan Turley captured the dynamic sharply: “California’s war on basic economics continues to rack up losses.”

Rhetorical questions abound for policymakers in Sacramento. If higher mandated wages truly help workers, why are franchisees declaring bankruptcy while pleading for cash to meet payroll? Why do employees report fearing shifts more than ever?

The state’s experiment ignored incentives: businesses respond to costs by raising prices, cutting hours, automating, or exiting. California’s reputation as hostile to enterprise grows, pushing opportunity elsewhere.

When Good Intentions Destroy Livelihoods

This saga exposes a deeper truth about governance that elevates compassion signaling over sustainable outcomes. Families relying on these jobs watch as locations shrink and instability rises.

The biblical warning in James 5:4 rings with fresh relevance amid withheld wages and broken promises in the workplace: “Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth.”

California’s leaders chose coercion over cooperation. The result is fewer restaurants, anxious workers, and struggling operators. True compassion requires policies that recognize human nature, economic limits, and the dignity of honest work—not mandates that erode the enterprises providing it.

Carl’s Jr.’s struggles should serve as a cautionary tale for every state tempted to follow California’s lead. Ignoring supply and demand does not elevate the working class. It burdens them with scarcity, fear, and fewer doors of opportunity. Until leaders acknowledge this, more iconic chains and hardworking Americans will pay the price.