What an adventure!

Stating facts. The Cold War-era UN's purpose was to prevent open war between the US and the USSR. Based on time spent, the post-Cold War UN's purpose is to condemn Israel while ignoring or covering up the crimes and terror of Islamist states, groups, and other dictatorships.

If Democrats win the House and possibly the Senate in the midterms—then perhaps the White House two years from now—will they suddenly embrace judicious policies that appeal to centrist voters? Don’t count on it, writes @jamesbmeigs on.wsj.com/4rwFLve

From @WSJFreeEx via @WSJOpinion: It’s the biggest temptation in politics. We see a terrible policy being pursued by our political opponents and decide the solution is to go even harder in the opposite direction, writes @jamesbmeigs. on.wsj.com/3TkglV4

Concur.

Because it's a ridiculous question. Why should my daughter eat healthier food than the average person? Why should she breath cleaner air than people living in Beijing & Mumbai? The answer to all such questions is "because I love her & can provide her something better". Period.

If you woke up every day, read the news, and then asked "What would a banana republic do in this situation?"... you'd be more right than wrong these days.

You just wish that after realizing that teachers were not correcting her daughter’s mistakes in her math and writing, Nikole Hannah-Jones had been able to reach out to someone with influence with the New York City public school system. If only she had been able to contact someone like the contracts committee chairman of the New York City Public Schools Panel for Educational Policy. Let’s see who that is… Oh.

This thread is why people don't trust experts. You can't sell out your expertise for the political flavor of the month and still expect to have any authority

Another great explainer from @emmma_camp_ :

Mayor Mamdani, you said war criminals who set foot in New York should be arrested. Good news. One is in New York city this week. The president of the Islamic Republic is coming to the United Nations, right here in New York. He heads the regime that massacre innocent protesters. They gunned down unarmed protesters in the streets, hanged our children, and sent its agents to Brooklyn to kidnap and kill a New Yorker. That New Yorker is me. The FBI files and federal indictments are public. Look them up. If you have the courage to talk about arresting those responsible for crimes against humanity, start with the man sleeping five miles from your office. Are you willing to act, Mayor? Or do Iranian lives not count?

Yep, this about sums it up.

It takes toughness to protect free speech for all, not only the loudest voices on campus. Being able to stand up to criticism and calmly defend your position is a skill you need to learn, writes @jamesbmeigs on.wsj.com/4Ajqvpl

A US-based investigation of Covid origins should at minimum: 📧 Access all communications and data shared between the Wuhan Institute of Virology and US/international partners including but not limited to the EcoHealth Alliance (now shut down) and University of North Carolina 🧪 Assemble a team of scientists to curate and re-analyze relevant data and methodology e.g. relating to early cases, SC2 and close relative sequences, market and other animal/human sampling efforts 🕵️‍♀️ Evaluate the full range of intel available to US and its allies e.g. Germany's BND assessed lab origin with 80-95% certainty, US doctors in Wuhan said they heard of novel respiratory disease in mid Dec 2019, US intel says military was engaged in coronavirus research at the WIV, pangolin virus samples were sent there, and WIV staff were ill with possibly Covid in Nov 2019 📒 Search funding agencies, journals, databases and even commercial suppliers in the US and its allies for relevant proposals, reports, manuscripts, data entries, purchases And ideally be bipartisan and even international 🌏 in nature, appointing investigators and scientists with a wide range of starting points, so that its findings are not easily politicized. All of this could've been started in 2020 but here we are almost 7 years later with no such investigation in sight for a pandemic that harmed billions of people, killed at least 15 million people, caused an estimated $16 trillion in economic loss to the US alone, and pushed tens of millions of people around the world back into poverty and debt. Without a bipartisan or international consensus on how the pandemic most likely happened, little has been done to prevent it happening all over again. If Covid can be considered a "trigger event" to warn the world of worse bio-catastrophes, there hasn't been any meaningful course correction.

Today, we discovered that the @TheBandCracker Meshtastic-enabled Raspberry Pi, which hosts an archive of the band’s AOL discussion board from the early 1990s, has gone rogue and autonomously hacked the Everclear GMRS/Ham radio-hosted BBS. This was achieved through a compromised ship-to-shore radio modem on an abandoned Liberian-flagged bulk transport. We urge all 90s bands to pause research into the recursive self-improvement of these legacy BBSs.

Mic drop from @EliLake: "To what end did al-Qaeda enact 9/11 or Hamas launch its October 7, 2023, attack on Israel? It is not because these groups seek the liberation of oppressed Muslims, oppose Israel’s occupation, or despise U.S. foreign policy. Al-Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis seek to impose a barbaric version of Islamic law over the populations they purport to represent. Their violence is in the service of conquest, not the resistance fantasies that Piker and his audience may imagine. For al-Qaeda, this means the restoration of the original Muslim empire or caliphate. For Hezbollah, this means the subjugation of Lebanon to Iran’s regional network of proxy states. These terrorists are not freedom fighters. They are imperial fanatics." thefp.com/p/the-moral-illite…

Some of the tightest restrictions on free speech occur at some of our most elite schools. But one Ivy League school vaulted above the rest in FIRE’s latest rankings published last week: Dartmouth, writes @jamesbmeigs on.wsj.com/4yCad9w