The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (No. 88)

Untimely Thoughts on a World in Transition

***ANNOUNCEMENT: I have been traveling a lot lately (just spent nine days in Texas) and will be on the road again several times over the course of the next couple of months. I’ll do my best to keep up the pace of one post per week, but I can’t promise.

THE GOOD

THE CAUSES OF WEALTH CREATION: Understanding the Great Enrichment: how mass prosperity replaced mass poverty. Britain became the first country to do learning-by-experiment at scale.

IF YOU DO NOTHING ELSE TODAY, PLEASE WATCH THIS SHORT VIDEO FROM X. It’s a reminder of all that’s good and beautiful in life:

SOMETHING GOOD ABOUT SOMETHING BAD & UGLY: Socialism is a hate crime.

ALL CRIME IS DOWN (THAT’S GOOD) EXCEPT WELFARE FRAUD, WHICH IS UP—WAY UP (THAT’S BAD)! What is the cause of all this? (The cause of welfare fraud is the existence of the welfare State. That it would lead to fraud is a basically a law of nature.)

PRETTY SURE MOST ATHLETES HAVE KNOWN THIS FOR A LONG TIME: Pre-exercise sexual activity does not harm strength or endurance in male athletes, finds new study.

LET’S CELEBRATE TRUE HEROES: Marine Corps legend ‘Ripley at the Bridge’ is finally getting the Medal of Honor: John Ripley vs. 20,000 communists. Who you got?

MEDICINE/HEALTH ROUND UP

• High-dose Vitamin D reduces MS activity, study finds.

• Poor sleep may accelerate brain aging.

• Scientists Identified Structural, Brain-Wide Changes During Menstruation.

• Breakthrough Blood Test Detects Head and Neck Cancer up to 10 Years Before Symptoms.

• Fragments of Bacteria in Our Gut May Lull Our Brains to Sleep at Night.

THIS IS VERY GOOD NEWS, INDEED! The number of federal government employees is now at its lowest level in 50+ years. Next, let’s go for the lowest level in 100 years!

SCIENCE ROUND UP

• Fueling research in nuclear thermal propulsion.

• Maybe the Shortest Path to Mars Requires a 240,000-Mile Detour.

HEROES DON’T ALWAYS WEAR CAPES: ‘I have to keep on going’: 13-year-old swims in rough sea for 4 hours to find help for family

ARCHEOLOGY/ANTHROPOLOGY ROUND UP

• Archaeologists find a supersized medieval shipwreck in Denmark.

• Ancient Jesus-era footprints discovered on Scotland beach, triggering remarkable race

MORE NUCLEAR IS GOOD: The future of American nuclear energy just touched down in Utah.

THE BAD

IT’S WHAT THEY DO: The Communism Isn’t Working, So Let’s Communism Harder.

THIS IS MARXISM APPLIED TO THE ENVIRONMENT: The 10 Most Insane Requirements Of The Green New Deal.

OUR COMING SOCIALISM: “The Warmth of Collectivism” v. Capitalism.

“OBSTA PRINCIPIIS”—“RESIST FIRST BEGINNINGS”: 7 left-wing groups to watch in 2026

WELFARE STATE WATCH:

• From Minneapolis to “Somaliapolis”: How Incentives Reshaped a City. A Case Study in Welfare, Incentives, and Parallel Society.

• ‘Midtermunition’: Mamdani Is Already Trashing New York to Third-World Status.

• New SNAP Work Requirements, Included In Trump Megabill, Now In Effect

• Sen. James Lankford Goes For Jugular Of $100 Billion In Blue State Unemployment Fraud

ASK YOURSELF THIS QUESTION: WHY ARE REPUBLICANS ALWAYS UNABLE TO OPPOSE AND EVEN MARGINALLY REDUCE THE SIZE OF THE WELFARE STATE? Medicaid fraud and abuse are hitting unthinkable levels.

DEEP STATE WATCH:

• Zombie’ programs given cash to live again!

• Watchdog alleges Netflix coordinated with FBI to promote left-wing narratives

• How Biden and Fauci suppressed the COVID-19 lab-leak theory

• Teaching ferrets to binge drink: Rand Paul’s annual Festivus report finds $1.6 TRILLION in government waste

• Four ways Trump has dismantled the ‘Deep State’ since inauguration

PEOPLE KEEP TALKING ABOUT “THE YOUNG MAN PROBLEM” (AS THEY SHOULD), BUT WE ALSO NEED TO TALK ABOUT “THE YOUNG WOMAN PROBLEM (AS WE SHOULD),” WHICH IS A VERY DIFFERENT KIND OF PROBLEM, BUT A PROBLEM NONETHELESS: Young women are radicalising.

IDEAS HAVE CONSEQUENCES:

THOUGHTS, COMMENTS, REACTION? The Least Laid Generation in History: Gen Z Is Ghosting Sex — and the Implications Are Huge.

LIVING IN HERBERT MARCUSE’S WORLD . . .

THIS IS NOT GOING TO END WELL, AND I DON’T MEAN POLITICALLY. Consider the sociological consequences of this ideological gap between young men and women:

CHINA WATCH:

• China’s Xi Publicly References Recent Military Shake-Up

• Chinese Academics Who Attended Chinese Military-Run Schools Work At US Colleges

• Las Vegas bio lab contained human samples, testing materials, FBI says.

• HOW CHINA CORRUPTS ACADEMIC RESEARCH.

• Dire Strait: Sure Looks Like China Is Writing Off the Ayatollahs.

GREAT BRITAIN WATCH

• This perverse government is a greater threat to the British way of life than Russia.

• British Students Mourn “Beloved” Ayatollah.

• How the Royal Navy shrank to its smallest ‘since English Civil War.’

• Decades in the planning, the Islamic Republic of Britain.

OH CANADA:

• This Canadian Man Is Poor, So the Government Offered to Kill Him. Here’s What Happened.

• Death Cult: Canada Set To Surpass 100,000 Assisted Suicides

• “One out of every 20 deaths in Canada is now caused by the government’s assisted suicide program.”

CIVILIZATIONAL DECLINE AND FALL: Paris wine show reflects surging demand for zero- and low-alcohol drinks.

STONER NATION: 20 Million Americans Say They’re Always High, And Even Liberals Recognize The Craze Has Gone Too Far

THE UGLY

IS THIS WHERE WE ARE IN 21^ST-CENTURY AMERICA?

• Is Giving Cross-Sex Drugs to Mentally Ill People Resulting in Trans Killers?

• Karol Markowicz: The rise in transgender killers proves that we have a major mental health crisis unfolding.

THEY LIED AND CHILDREN DIED: Parents told daughter would ‘probably die’ without sex change surgery, suit claims

. . . and THE BEAUTIFUL

Thomas Gainsborough. Thomas Gainsborough, Mary, Countess Howe, 1763–64, Oil on canvas, English Heritage, Kenwood House, London. H/T New Criterion

Have a great week!