Editor at large, @Reason. Co-conspirator, @wethefifth (wethefifth.com). Writer, The View Level. Note spelling of last name.
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That German was my great-great-great grandfather, Peter Joseph Osterhaus, who went on to a distinguished career as a U.S. diplomat in Europe. His son and grandson were rear admirals in the Navy, buried at Arlington Cemetery. My mom wrote a book about him.
amazon.com/dp/082621875X
Confederate Gen. Richard Taylor, son of President Zachary Taylor, had to surrender to a German 48er immigrant officer at the end of the war. Describing his response to the lecture about "American values" he received from the German in broken English, he wrote:
"I apologized meekly for my ignorance, on the ground that my ancestors had come from England to Virginia in 1608, and, in the short intervening period of two hundred and fifty-odd years, had found no time to transmit to me correct ideas of the duties of American citizenship. Moreover, my grandfather, commanding the 9th Virginia regiment in our Revolutionary army, had assisted in the defeat and capture of the Hessian mercenaries at Trenton, and I lamented that he had not, by association with these worthies, enlightened his understanding. My friend smiled blandly and assured me of his willingness to instruct me. Happily for the world, since the days of Huss and Luther, neither tyranny nor taste can repress the Teutonic intellect in search of truth or exposure of error. A kindly, worthy people, the Germans, but wearing on occasions."
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That time when Courtney Love randomly republished a piece of mine at Holemusic.com.
web.archive.org/web/20000816…
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In light of the NHJ Brooklyn-schools piece & reaction thereof, I re-read my 2019 account of how accusations of racism were used to cow parents into silence over District 15's admissions overhaul that removed all screens. It ... increased my blood pressure. reason.com/2019/09/17/is-eve…
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Matt Welch retweeted
Our state has an exceptionally rich Czech heritage, and it was tremendously encouraging to see Czech President Petr Pavel visit our state this week. In Wilber, Nebraska, he saluted the vitality of Czech heritage in Nebraska
"I hardly get emotional, but I do today, and it's all because (of) the warm welcome that we received here. "It's all because of dedication that you pay to the traditions, the language, the culture, the country of your grandparents, and it's something really special"
@CZinWashington @USEmbassyPrague @SenatorFischer @SenatorRicketts @USRepMikeFlood @RepAdrianSmith @RepDonBacon
journalstar.com/news/state-r…
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Matt Welch retweeted
Pope Leo XIV making a triumphal entrance into the magnificent Cathedral of Notre-Dame de Paris.
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Matt Welch retweeted
The likelihood that there has been an epidemic of lynchings in America is infinitesimal.
nytimes.com/2026/09/24/opini… via @NYTOpinion
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Matt Welch retweeted
Lucas Spence, an undrafted free agent playing in his 16th major-league game, had the night of his life. How the Astros found the man that may have saved their season -nytimes.com/athletic/7628458…
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Matt Welch retweeted
There are many, many neighborhood "tied house" bars in Chicago, Milwaukee and throughout the upper Midwest. Created by breweries (primarily Schlitz, Pabst, and Hamm's) from 1880s to 1919 to sell product. First body blow to them was of course Prohibition, but after Repeal they were nearly regulated out of existence in New Deal fervor.
Alcoholic beverage markets were controlled by states, and most all of them took a cue from new Federal laws prohibiting vertical integration - i.e., you could make a product but not sell it directly to consumers. States regulated and licensed AB at the manufacture, wholesale, and retail level, and if you had a license for one level you couldn't have one at any other level.
Pretty much ended the "tie house" system, and kind of a shame. Some of those brewery-owned bars were absolutely gorgeous. My favorite is Schubas in Chicago, now a bar-restaurant-live music club where Hawkspawn frequently plays.
The crazy thing now is Brewpubs are ubiquitous everywhere, a single location that makes beer and sells it straight to the customer. Not sure if those old laws have been changed or just ignored as obsolete.
America lost one in six of its neighborhood bars in a single decade, and the killer was real estate math.
A bar like this can pour $3 beers because the building was paid off decades ago. The owner often lives upstairs. No rent, no investors, no debt service on a Pabst sign that's been hanging there for 40 years.
The moment that building sells, the math dies with it. A new operator inherits a market-rate lease, which forces $9 drinks, which forces a renovation to justify $9 drinks, which produces another exposed-brick cocktail bar where the dive used to be.
The Midwest kept its dive bars because of how they got built in the first place. Before Prohibition, Milwaukee's breweries put up corner taverns themselves. Pabst and Schlitz wanted guaranteed outlets for their beer, so they built bars directly into residential blocks. That's why these places sit on quiet snowy corners between houses instead of on commercial strips where rent explodes.
Chicago had around 3,300 tavern licenses in 1990. It's down to about 1,200. At the worst of the decline, America was losing six neighborhood bars a day.
And every single closure is permanent. You can't build a dive bar. You can only inherit one.
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Matt Welch retweeted
My quickie review of the four new Taylor tracks, which I'll think of as an EP, however it's packaged... Taylor Swift Still Has Unfinished Business With Her Exes — Thank God! — While Also Mooning Over Her Groom in ‘The Life of a Showgirl: The Encore’: New Tracks Review variety.com/2026/music/news/… via @variety
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Matt Welch retweeted
🧵 President Trump’s attacks on the integrity of official statistics have continued. Last month, the US Census Bureau published an official brief that claims to have “readily determined with high confidence” that 24,000 non-US citizens illegally voted in the 2020 presidential election. The report flags: “Over 32 million voter records remain to be analyzed.”
The Census brief is of shockingly low quality across several dimensions. Like every professional economist, statistician, or demographer with whom I've spoken, I was astonished and deeply troubled to see analysis this shoddy be published by a gold-standard statistical agency.
The president himself posted about the report on social media, highlighting the 24,000 illegal vote figure and claiming that “The Census Bureau is going to analyze the next 32,000,000 Voters, and this number will explode. I WON THE ELECTION!”
Sadly, more shenanigans are coming. The Census brief described itself as “a beginning analysis,” and President Trump has already foreshadowed a follow-up report.
Before that happens, the authors of the first one should step out of the shadows and subject their analysis to interrogation by professional statisticians, economists, and demographers.
That sort of scrutiny is how US statistical agencies built the sterling reputations Mr. Trump is wantonly trashing — reputations that are a foundation of American prosperity.
My @ProSyn column.
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Matt Welch retweeted
At least a dozen Republicans in competitive midterm races have either publicly distances themselves from key Trump policies, or attempted a website rebrand
WH says there is no distance between Trump and Republicans. It quickly sent us LOTS of videos of Republicans praising Trump, many from the RNC midterm convention
w/@jonallendc @GarrettHaake
nbcnews.com/politics/2026-el…
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New Trump-focused "Love Me" ad campaign paid for by taxpayers hits airwaves. cbsn.ws/47h6Uc6
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Matt Welch retweeted
"And since McCarthy takes a gratuitous shot at libertarian organizations ("running on fumes," "irrelevant"), maybe he will forgive me one of my own. There is a conservative organization that recently lost a dozen staff members, including most of its legal and economic departments, following board resignations over leadership's failure to denounce white nationalism; that organization is McCarthy's employer, the Heritage Foundation. Talk about a strange death for a once influential policy shop!"
The 'Strange Death' of Libertarianism Is Greatly Exaggerated reason.com/2026/09/22/the-st… via @reason
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Matt Welch retweeted
Reminder: Paxton won the GOP primary race because Trump endorsed him. Now, absent a miracle, Texas — Texas! — is going to elect a woke Democrat as its next U.S. Senator because too many Texans can’t abide Paxton’s flagrant corruption
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Matt Welch retweeted
1/ Frederick Douglass spent two decades insisting free speech would defeat slavery.
Emancipation came. Amendments passed. For a moment, “a reform absolutely complete.”
Then Reconstruction was dismantled. What does a man do with first principles when victory proves fleeting?🧵
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Matt Welch retweeted
The First Amendment principles were never in doubt, but this case ended up being long and hard-fought. I could not be more proud of my team at FIRE for winning this crucial First Amendment victory.
And of course, congratulations to Ann and the Des Moines Register!
BREAKING: An Iowa state court has dismissed President Donald Trump’s frivolous lawsuit against veteran pollster and FIRE client J. Ann Selzer and the Des Moines Register newspaper, a victory for First Amendment rights.
More to come.
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Matt Welch retweeted
There’s zero chance he’s gonna win in Idaho as an independent but Todd Achilles might win best campaign ad of the year with this
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Matt Welch retweeted
The Republican Abandonment of Donald Trump Begins nationalreview.com/the-morni…
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Wow.
An absolutely fantastic piece of long-form sportswriting, narrative journalism at its best: nytimes.com/athletic/7617243…
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