DEI: Dollars, Euros and Income

In the wake of Amsterdam’s horrific “Jew hunt”, Rod Dreher reports in The European Conservative on the surrounding rise of violent crime in the Netherlands, describing the correlation between that phenomenon and growth in the country’s Muslim population. Dreher hopes that the U.S. Presidential election result will inspire Europeans to also free themselves from their “progressive” rulers.

In The Blade of Perseus, Victor Davis Hanson analyzes Democratic Party leaders’ embarrassing response to their defeat – especially their impulse to blame anyone but themselves and their vows to launch a new “resistance”. Hanson describes how the societal decay under President Joe Biden brought voters to a stark choice – and how they ignored the hectoring instructions of America’s elites.

Both sides of the political spectrum in the United States frequently accuse one another of being a threat to democracy. Writing for Law & Liberty, James Hankins argues that America’s government was not founded upon democracy per se, but on a (lower-case R) republican vision of ordered liberty and popular self-government. Hankins reviews America’s foundation and reminds readers of the intentions of the Founding Fathers for their new republic.

Joel Kotkin in Spiked reveals the reason for Democratic Presidential Candidate Kamala Harris’ seemingly spontaneous shift in policies: ever-more Americans, he writes, are wearying of woke/“progressive”/DEI ideologies. Finally recognizing their plunge in popularity, Kotkin writes, Harris and her campaign are attempting – insincerely, of course – to distance themselves from their once-loudly proclaimed principles.

In The Dispatch, Jonah Goldberg explores the difficulty of clearly defining the often-raised but ever-elusive concept of fascism. Discussing varying versions and analyzing historical regimes unanimously deemed fascist, Goldberg offers the view that fascism is a “political religion” with the simple, maximalist goal of securing as much power as possible.

John O. McGinnis reports in the City Journal on the rise of civic-education colleges at universities across the U.S. These schools, McGinnis describes, are attempting to correct for the painful failings of today’s universities by busting open the left-wing echo chamber and creating a space for free and genuine academic discussion.

In Jewish World Review, Jonathan Tobin looks at Ta-Nehisi Coates’ new book on the Middle East, The Message, and the (mostly) laudatory news coverage it has received. While he’s hailed as a literary genius, Coates’ claim that the experiences of Palestinians are analogous to that of blacks in Jim Crow-era America is wildly misinformed and inaccurate, Tobin explains.

As universities vacillate between the search for truth and social justice activism, Brendan Dooley and Joshua Hochschild in Law & Liberty reflect on how this is affecting their students. Young people naturally search for “transcendent meaning” in their lives, they write, yet many universities are instead delivering hatred, conflict and eternal grievance.

With long-time open border advocate Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk having recently declared his plan to suspend the right to asylum for anyone arriving from Belarus, Tim Black considers the internal pressures mounting within the EU to maintain a common border policy. “The Brussels regime is struggling to hold itself together,” he writes in Spiked.

In National Review, Jim Geraghty examines the state of the U.S. presidential campaign three weeks out from voting day. Putting his boots on the ground in several swing states, Geraghty surveys local perspectives and compares the situation with elections past. Despite a smug attitude to date, he finds “the Democrats are sweating” over what will be a very tight race.

Eitan Shamir of The Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies examines claims that Israel lacks a clear, long-term plan for the end of its current multi-front war. Noting that tactical maneuvers are an essential part of any larger strategic plan, Shamir explains how Operation Iron Swords is designed to upend the regional status quo and strengthen Israel’s position well into the future.

With several European countries looking to bolster their budgets by taxing the wealthy, Sven R. Larson considers the track record of wealth taxes on the Continent. As he writes in The European Conservative, such taxes are a “politically desperate lifeline for a fiscally desperate government” and more likely than not to have a detrimental effect on public coffers.

In Law & Liberty, Paweɫ Markiewicz and Maciej Olchawa draw parallels between current discussions to end the war in Ukraine, and the 1944 Yalta Conference that paved the way for decades of Russian dominance in Eastern Europe following the Second World War. The pair caution the West against convenient solutions to the current conflict, noting that a negotiated settlement risks handing Russian President Vladimir Putin a new “foothold in Europe”.

Want to end terrorism in the Middle East? Repeal “Obama’s Law”, says Edward Luttwak in UnHerd. With numerous terrorist groups directly funded by Iran, which in turn depends on oil exports for the bulk of its revenues, Luttwak argues that bombing the Iranian oil terminal at Khark Island would bring immediate peace to the region. Doing so, however, requires repealing former U.S. President Barack Obama’s still-extant prohibition on Israeli or U.S. attacks on Iran.

In Spiked, Joanna Williams reports on the growing politicization of British schools, and the rise of Relationship Sex Education (RSE) that seeks to indoctrinate young children in contested topics such as gender identity. “RSE is a means of imparting a particular set of values and political assumptions to a captive audience of school pupils,” write Williams, urging parents to take back authority for their kids’ education.

Renu Mukherjee examines the changing demographics of America’s top universities since the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2023 decision to eliminate affirmative action. Writing in City Journal, Mukherjee explains how the old policy did nothing to fix racial disparities, and recommends future efforts focus on bolstering the quality of elementary and secondary schools in black and Latino areas so those students can “gain admission on the basis of merit.”

In Spiked, Fraser Myers digs into a grim report by Mario Draghi, former head of the European Central Bank and former prime minister of Italy, describing the vast economic threats facing Europe. Of great concern is the growing competitiveness gap between the U.S. and the continent. “Without radical economic reform…EU member states will suffer from stagnant living standards, technological backwardness and geopolitical impotence,” warns Myers.

Robert Nicholson in Providence recounts his time spent with friends in Israel near the Lebanese border and the country’s long and fruitless efforts at making peace with neighbouring terrorist organizations. As missiles fly over head, Nicholson queries his female host about the long game. “‘How will this end?’ I asked her. ‘We destroy Hezbollah—it’s the only way. These people only understand power’,” is her pragmatic response.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has been under constant fire for its controversial approach to the drafting of its “Trans and Gender Diverse People” treatment guidelines, which began in 2023. As Joseph Figliolia reports in City Journal, while WHO has since walked back some of its earlier mistakes, it remains a flawed process given the lack of credible scientific evidence for “affirming care”.

Ryan Bangert, in First Things, explains how numerous state ballot initiatives to be decided in the upcoming U.S. election could create the beginnings of a new “pro-abortion legal regime” that is far more permissive than the old regime struck down by the Supreme Court in 2022. Bangert examines what abortion law could look like if it decided by “the demos”, and what that could mean for the pro-life community.

In Law & Liberty, James Hankins seeks advice on our current social ills from 14th century Italian scholar Francesco Petrarch. Pointing his finger at an education system that had lost its way, Petrarch demanded that the universities of his time stop sowing social discord and refocus on instructing their students in the timeless pursuit of truth and knowledge. Considering the state of campuses today, it’s still good advice, says Hankins.

In Law & Liberty, Nathan W. Schlueter reveals how both Republicans and Democrats are turning against the free market, and the dangers this entails. While admitting it can be a hard concept to defend, Schlueter lists the market’s best features, including its impersonal nature and the fact it forces everyone to confront the notion of scarcity. “Nature does not spontaneously provide food, clothing, and shelter,” he writes. Someone has to do the work.

Dan Katz and Daniel Di Martino, in City Journal, critique the claim from many leftwing economists that illegal immigration is a good thing because it “pushes down inflation” by keeping labour costs low. The pair argue instead that low-skilled and/or illegal migrants tend to receive more government benefits than they contribute in taxes, which inevitably increases government spending and thus boosts inflation.

State elections in Germany constitute a “political earthquake”, given the surge in support for upstart parties on the far right and far left. Writing in Spiked, Sabine Beppler-Spahl figures such tremors are the result of “government failure”, as crime rates and illegal immigration rise and the economy goes sideways. If the traditional voices can’t fix things, she argues, voters are prepared to let others give it a try.

In Law & Liberty, John O. McGinnis finds two causes behind the increasing polarization of western society. First is the rise of identity politics and the related need to label everything as either friend or foe. The second, perhaps surprisingly, is that our era of relative prosperity has made such activity possible. “Voters can indulge extreme beliefs because society and the world have been so relatively stable,” he writes.

Taking a close look at vice-presidential candidate Tim Walz’s speech at the Democratic National Convention, Jude Russo considers Walz’s self-identification as a humble school teacher who understands the interests of the average family. Don’t be fooled by his claims to ordinariness, Russo warns in The American Conservative: “The fanaticism of the public school teacher is rivaled only by that of the unionized transit official.”

Hugo Timms, in Spiked, describes a grim future for freedom of speech in Australia thanks to the country’s “eSafety Commissioner” Julie Inman-Grant. Based on recent clashes with Elon Musk and others, it appears Inman-Grant is determined to not only limit what Australians can say to each other over the internet, but to impose such censorship powers on the entire world.

In City Journal, Lexi Boccuzzi discusses Vice President and Presidential Candidate Kamala Harris’s pick of Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate. Given Walz’s egregiously left-wing track record – imposing among the most tyrannical Covid-19 lockdown regimes, allowing Minneapolis to burn during the George Floyd riots, placing tampons in boys’ school washrooms, authorizing biological men to compete in women’s sports, and pushing DEI policies wherever he can – Boccuzzi is convinced Harris is even harder-left than she’s letting on.

Noel Yaxley in the American Mind reports on environmental activists’ path of destruction across the United Kingdom – and their worsening disregard for the public. Yaxley details how, by selecting “soft” targets that enable them to disrupt the infrastructure of daily life, these out-of-touch green agitators increasingly resemble terrorists more than political demonstrators.

Joanna Williams reflects in Spiked on the seeming outbreak of violence amongst adolescents in the United Kingdom. The newly elected Labour government intends to respond by training children as young as five to identify “misinformation”. Williams, however, believes the government will use these school “reforms” to indoctrinate kids in the woke agenda.