The Social World

Category: Politics

  • Is political Christianity back?

    There is a passage in Milan Kundera’s novelistic essay Testaments Betrayed where he writes about the nature of history. Man walks in a fog, Kundera observes. He stumbles along a path and creates the path as he walks it. When he looks back, he can see the path, he may see the man, but he cannot see the fog. Everything looks inevitable after it has happened.

    So we have the “sleepwalkers” explanation of how Europe stumbled into the first world war. We have the “inevitability” of the slide into the second. It is perhaps the greatest of all idiotic modern presumptions that so many people imagine while looking back that they would have known better or acted differently.

    Which brings me to the present. Because the only thing you can do if you are going to try to tread a path well is to use what senses you have to work out what the next step might be. In the past week there have been two events, one on each side of the Atlantic, which have revealed a very interesting sense of the path we are on.

    Charlie Kirk was a proud and devout Christian. When asked what he wanted his legacy to be (a question it is awful to think that a man only just through his twenties was often asked), he always said that he wanted to be remembered first and foremost for his faith. Before being an American, a Republican, an activist or a supporter of Donald Trump, it was that which he wanted to be remembered for. His faith in Christ was the rock on which everything else stood.

    Since Charlie’s assassination there have been many gatherings around the world in his memory, from cities in America and Britain to as far away as South Korea. And these have so far been notable for a number of things. Unlike those in response to, say, the death of George Floyd, these gatherings have not compelled local businesses to board up their windows. They have not, so far, been despoiled by significant violence. What they have been dominated by is prayer. Indeed the memorial gatherings to Charlie have so far been defined by their Christian content more than anything else. That is a rather remarkable thing: in response to a political assassination, the people on the side of the victim have gathered to pray.

    In London last weekend Tommy Robinson held a rally called “Unite the Kingdom.” There is the usual dispute over the number of people who attended, but the area around parliament was full enough to suggest that it was more than 100,000. It has been attacked in the British media as some kind of far-right, white-supremacist gathering, but was in fact marked by its racial inclusivity and peaceable nature.

    In response to a political assassination, people have gathered to pray

    Something that the media coverage almost completely ignored were the efforts to insert a Christian element into the proceedings. Yes, there were various anti-mass migration activists and politicians. Yes, there were musicians, including black gospel singers. But to me one of the most interesting aspects of the events on the main stage was the prominence of overtly Christian figures – including the Maori men who performed a haka with a Christian pastor. The proceedings were kicked off by a fogeyish clergyman called Bishop Ceirion Dewar from something called the Confessing Anglican Church.

    I found his performance a tad bizarre. He seemed to mix up the role of public prayer with that of a wizard in Tolkien warding off the hordes of Isengard. But that is a matter of taste. And I can’t help noticing that various bishops of the actual established church were not available last Saturday. Perhaps like the bishops of Dover, Southwark and Barking, they were too busy denouncing the event to bother praying anywhere near it, or even speaking to the sort of people attending.

    Still, it is noteworthy to me that two movements within a week, at the very edge of the cultural and political struggles of our time, should end up leaning so heavily into the Christian element. Especially in Britain, where the role of Christianity in public life has become no more distinct than a whistle in the midst of a hurricane.

    It is perhaps inevitable. The concern that many people have about the levels of legal and illegal migration over recent decades has a great deal to do with the fact that many people arriving into the West have no desire to integrate into our traditions and a distinct desire to spread their own way of doing things. Prominent historians, including Tom Holland, have noted entirely correctly that Islam seems to have things about it which make it uniquely indigestible to the modern secularized state.

    In reality it is a double whammy. The deep cultural concerns of our time are caused both by the challenges which Islam poses to a secularized society and the push that a new religion of “progressivism” has made into the space where Christianity once was. The concerns are by no means dampened by the way that elements of these two other faiths have found a way, for the time being, to march together, creating a hybrid that might be summed up as “Trans for Palestine”: a clown-car which will inevitably come off the road.

    Amid this fog it is probably inevitable that people will try to return to their firmest orientations. This is what R.R. Reno, the editor of the Catholic magazine First Things, has described as “the return of the strong gods,” Though deeply moving at times and slightly comical at others, there is something significant going on here.

    A sensible society and a wise Church here in England would do something to speak to these urges. But I don’t expect it. The Bishop of Barking, the Rt Revd Lynne Cullens, could be found this week claiming that Robinson’s rally showed it is time for a “refreshed, contemporary and broad-based understanding of British values.” Treading wisely and treading timidly are not always the same thing.

  • Trump’s state visit to the UK could not be going better

    Trump’s state visit to the UK could not be going better

    So, the Donald was on his best behavior after all. There had been rumors flying around that President Trump would use his speech at the formal banquet that has been thrown in his honor by King Charles to make some pointed reference to free speech and its perceived absence thereof in Britain today. In the event, there was nothing but a series of emollient statements of praise for his hosts, their family and the country he was visiting, as well as, of course, himself.

    This threw up some incongruities – who would ever have imagined hearing Trump allude to Locke and Orwell? But his sentiments were warm (only partially reduced by his less-than-fluent delivery, reading at times haltingly off what looked like a giant prompt book). As such, they would have gone down well with those in St George’s Hall in Windsor Castle and far beyond.

    In truth, Trump’s state banquet was never expected to be a controversial or difficult event. Whether the King had wanted to host this second, unprecedented state visit for the American president or not, he was never going to make any public protestation, and so the speech of welcome that he gave his guest was typically warm and eloquent. He talked of the “enduring bond” between the two countries, in language soon echoed by Trump, and made a good joke, saying, in an allusion to George III and the War of Independence: “It is remarkable to think just how far we have come. My five times great-grandfather did not spare his words when he spoke of the revolutionary leaders.”

    Still, both men had their own agendas in mind, too, and they were expressed in polite yet pointed ways. The King talked with vigor of the enduring special relationship, but also – in lines presumably suggested by the government – he observed that “Today, as tyranny once again threatens Europe, we and our allies stand together in support of Ukraine, to deter aggression and secure peace.” Was there the slightest hint of irony when he praised Trump – a man obviously angling for the Nobel Peace Prize – and his “personal commitment to finding solutions to some of the world’s most intractable conflicts”? There almost certainly was.

    And even in his peroration, when Charles spoke of how “in renewing our bond tonight, we do so with unshakeable trust in our friendship and in our shared commitment to independence and liberty”, there was the hint of a suggestion that this commitment might present itself in rather different ways. Talk of Trump’s attempts to protect the environment may have been more wishful thinking on Charles’s part than demonstrable fact.

    The President, meanwhile, has had a splendidly indulgent day of watching military displays in his honor, all of which have taken place out of public view in the grounds of Windsor Castle, so as to avoid the embarrassment of any protests marring his fun. Therefore, when he delivered his remarks, they came from a place of apparent contentment – hence the sincerity of his warm words about the royals. Nevertheless, he was still unable to resist a spot of self-praise as he announced that America has gone from being “a very sick country” to the “hottest anywhere in the world”. The King, to his immense credit, kept his best poker face throughout.

    Still, everyone involved in organizing this state visit will, rightly, congratulate themselves on how well the day went. Even the gray, overcast weather did not turn into the downpour that occasionally threatened to materialize, and the pageantry and glitz on display (at a rumored cost of £15 million for the entire event) show that, when Britain attempts to put on a performance like this, it usually succeeds.

    The political aspects of Trump’s visit come today, and they will be harder-won than this largely decorative display of soft power. But this coming together of two very different men, with very different values, over watercress panna cotta and ballotine of Norfolk chicken could hardly have gone better, either for them or their respective countries. And Charles will also know that the occasion will not – cannot – occur again, either, which may have made the whole thing easier to bear with suitably well-bred equanimity.

  • The left’s favorite F-word

    Randi Weingarten, the US teachers’ union boss, has screeched out a new book: Why Fascists Fear Teachers. That’s right. If you thought the problem in our schools was cratering test scores or chronic absenteeism, you’re misinformed. The real menace stalking America is jackbooted conservative parents goose-stepping through PTA meetings.

    The left’s unhealthy obsession with the word “fascist” has become less of a warning than a tic, a nervous verbal cough. Every time a Weingarten-style progressive spots a parent questioning the school board, a voter challenging an irregular ballot, or a grief-stricken mourner at a Charlie Kirk vigil, the F-word erupts.

    Before we let this tic define the debate, a little perspective: If words matter, so should history. Hayek saw it with clarity in The Road to Serfdom: While conservatives and classical liberals may be responsible for many sins, one of which they are not guilty is constructing the deadliest authoritarian regimes in human history. That honor belongs not to the “oppressive right,” but to the left.

    Mao Zedong alone snuffed out more than 65 million lives. Stalin was not far behind. Add in Pol Pot, Castro, Kim Il-Sung, and a few other “People’s Republics,” and you have a ledger of death that makes anyone else’s butcher’s bill look amateurish.

    This uncomfortable truth blinds the left while they hurl “fascist!” like a meringue pie across the political stage. They sneered at the “fascist” Mitt Romney while excusing Mao. They mocked well-known fascists George W. Bush and John McCain while romanticizing Fidel. Today on college campuses, where the ignorant instruct the unaware, they hiss at Donald Trump while sporting Che on a T-shirt. The left calling the right “fascist” is like Bud Light calling Guinness weak. It’s as if they’ve outsourced historical memory to TikTok.

    Here is Hayek’s point, put plainly: Socialist planning, state control, and the “we’re all in this together” collectivism of Zohran “The Grocer” Mamdani cannot be enforced by polite suggestion. It requires power. Lots of it. It demands restrictions on liberty, suppression of dissent, and regulation of every corner of economic life. And once those tools are handed to the state, they are never returned to the people. 

    The irony is thick. The left, which insists on saving us from fascism, is the political convention most prone to it. In theory, their goals sound noble: equality, solidarity, justice. In practice, they must build a vast machinery of coercion to achieve them. A progressive ideology that promises to make you equal must also prevent you from becoming unequal. It must turn freedom of speech into freedom from speech. If necessary, it will do so at the point of a gun, as we have too recently seen.

    Yes, conservatives sometimes lose their bearings, as when US Attorney General Pam Bondi speaks of abandoning free speech to prosecute progressive “hate speech.” But at least she has principles to violate.

    The right, in the classical liberal tradition of John Locke, prefers to let citizens order their own lives, speak freely, associate as they choose, and fail without dragging everyone else down. Freedom is messy, but it does not require firing squads to keep it neat.

    So, while Madame Weingarten tells us “Fascists fear teachers,” perhaps the better title would have been Teachers Fear Freedom. It is freedom that makes state-run monopolies obsolete, exposes bad ideas to competition, and empowers parents to raise their own children. Liberty terrifies Weingarten, and that tells us everything.

    The left shouts “fascist!” at every opponent, but their own kettle is not merely black; it is the darkest history has ever boiled. If “fascism” means authoritarianism, a record-breaking body count, mass coercion, and suppression of dissent, then socialism, as it is practiced, not just as it is preached, checks every box. Progressives should dial down this sort of rhetoric. For all their shrieking on social media, “fascism” is the mirror in which they can see their own image.

  • Don’t cry for Jimmy Kimmel

    The defenestration of the supposed talk show host Jimmy Kimmel, for the inflammatory remarks that he made during the monologue in his show on Monday night about Charlie Kirk, is both an unexpected and deeply predictable development. It was unexpected because Kimmel clearly believed that he was, like Lehman Brothers, “too big to fail,” and was therefore within his rights to make such comments as how “We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang trying to characterize this kid who killed Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it.” And it was deeply predictable because Kimmel now becomes the latest scalp that the right have seized this year, and perhaps the most high-profile yet. 

    In truth, Kimmel – whose show Jimmy Kimmel Live! should now, perhaps, be renamed Jimmy Kimmel Dead! as it has been pulled, or “pre-empted,” from the ABC schedules “indefinitely,” which means that the chances of its returning are negligible – was a marked man. It is, of course, possible that he may return in some form on a streaming service such as Netflix, and whether such employers of his as the Academy Awards are sufficiently cowed to take him off their roster remains to be seen. Certainly, the left will see the firing as Kimmel as a political action, and President Trump’s open gloating that the decision was “great news for America” will embolden his opponents even further, perhaps turning Kimmel into a martyr for supposed free speech. 

    If this does happen, they have picked the wrong person. In truth, Kimmel’s schtick wore thin a long time ago, and his continued presence hosting one of the nation’s late-night talk shows owed as much to a lack of imagination on the part of executives and producers as it did genuine talent. If there is a more irritating, drawn-out and smug running “joke” than his manufactured feud with Matt Damon – something that may have been briefly amusing for a couple of gags, but has now lasted, in some form, for twenty years (twenty years!) – then I would be horrified to hear about it, but the fake fracas sums Kimmel up perfectly: a bit that may or may not have been amusing for a short time, but was grotesquely overstretched far beyond any enjoyable or even bearable period. 

    Jimmy Kimmel Live! should now, perhaps, be renamed Jimmy Kimmel Dead!

    The talk show host has form. Many of the things that he should have been cancelled for on previous occasions, such as his donning blackface for a frankly racist impersonation of Snoop Dogg in 1996 and how he made some grimly sexist comments towards Megan Fox in 2009, were brushed under the carpet after Kimmel made the usual non-committal apologies of how “I believe that I have evolved and matured over the last 20-plus years,” even as he suggested that “I know that this will not be the last I hear of this and that it will be used again to try to quiet me.” He has always positioned himself less as a multi-millionaire interviewing celebrities and telling not-that-funny jokes on late-night television and more as a principled one-man source of opposition to Trump and MAGA. This may endear him to those on the left who will see his firing as an act of martyrdom, but for those on the right, or even of no political allegiance whatsoever, Kimmel’s attacks on the present administration will seem less like bravery and more like a childish urge to bear-bait. 

    Well, the bear has bitten at last, and apart from the fully paid-up devotees of this persistent man, who will be up in arms at ABC’s decision, many will be quietly relieved that Kimmel has been put out to pasture. No more wearisome Matt Damon “jokes”; no more MAGA insults. For any American who believes in dignity in retirement, let us hope that Kimmel enjoys a long and peaceful one, unburdened by the need to share his thoughts and feelings with the world again.

  • Rand Paul needles fired CDC director Susan Monarez

    Rand Paul needles fired CDC director Susan Monarez

    Kentucky Senator Rand Paul and recently-fired CDC director Susan Monarez exchanged “testy” words about vaccines in a Senate hearing today. That should come as little surprise. Paul has long been a vaccine skeptic, if not an outright opponent.

    The day started with Monarez telling Congress that RFK Jr. tried to get the White House to fire her because she refused to “rubber-stamp” approve a schedule of HHS vaccinations. “He just wanted blanket approval,” Monarez said. “If I could not commit to blanket approval to each of the recommendations I would need to resign.”

    She added, “I refused to do it because I have built a career on scientific integrity, and my worst fear was that I would then be in a position of approving something that would reduce access to lifesaving vaccines to children and others who need them.”

    On the table is an HHS recommendation that people vaccinate newborns against Hepatitis B, which it has continually recommended since 1991. RFK Jr.’s advisory panel is scheduled to rescind that later this week. Paul supports the move, whereas Monarez said she would only support it if “science” backs it up. “All of us had agreed that the science evolves and we need to see the data and the evidence to ensure that we are protecting our children,” she said.

    That’s when the testiness began.

    “Does the Covid vaccine reduce hospitalization for children under 18?” Paul asked.

    “It can,” Monarez said.

    “It doesn’t… You resisted firing people who have this idea that the Covid vaccine should be at six months. That’s what this is about. You didn’t resist firing the beautiful scientists, the career people… unobjective and unbiased. You wouldn’t fire the people who are saying that we have to vaccinate our kids at six months of age. That’s who you refuse to fire.”

    The sarcasm dripped thickly from Paul’s tongue as he said this. He’s never gotten satisfactory answers from the government about social-distancing recommendations, or lockdowns, or school closures, or federal vaccine mandates. Those are in the past now, but people who opposed them haven’t forgotten. If today’s exchange seems like an anti-vax head-scratcher, that’s the context.

    Though this was supposed to be a hearing about RFK Jr.’s plans for HHS, and, in particular, his plans for childhood vaccine schedules, in reality it was part of a slow-moving ongoing referendum on America’s disastrous Covid policies during the Biden administration and the first Trump administration. We’ve never had a real truth and reconciliation commission on the topic, except maybe in Rand Paul’s mind, so today’s congressional hearings were really part of an ongoing concern.

    The hearings did nothing but further retrench the teams. On one side you have “trust the science” people, who believe in the infallibility of the medical establishment, even though that establishment, or at least the immunology end of it, completely failed us during Covid, which is part of the reason we have an RFK, Jr.-led CDC in the first place. On the other hand, you have people who believe that shots contain slow-acting poisons that will kill us sooner or later. Ordinary people are just waiting to hear whether or not the government thinks they should vaccinate their children. Today’s exchange, between the former head of the CDC and a Senator who used to be a ophthalmologist, left no one satisfied.

  • Of course the Kirk suspect is a far-leftist

    Why was Charlie Kirk murdered? After the horrifying killing of the right-wing activist last week, the focus of American law enforcement and the world’s media has turned to the political leanings and potential motive of his alleged assassin, Tyler Robinson. The 22-year-old former college student is facing the death penalty after being charged with aggravated murder on Tuesday.

    Given Kirk was a Christian conservative and leading MAGA figure, tipped by some as a future president, Occam’s razor would suggest that his murderer would most likely turn out to be on the far left. Indeed, every bit of evidence that emerged has pointed in this direction.

    First, there were the engravings found on bullet casings recovered by investigators, over whose meaning there has been furious speculation. 

    “[H]ey fascist! CATCH,” read the first, along with a reference to a command for dropping a bomb in the 2024 videogame Helldivers 2.

    “O Bella ciao, Bella ciao, Bella ciao, Ciao, ciao!,” ran a second, the lyrics of a 20th-century Italian anti-fascist song, which has been “probably the most important rallying song to antifa militants for decades,” according to journalist and antifa researcher Andy Ngo.

    Then there was a “furry” meme, an internet subculture revolving around sexualized images of cartoon animals, which has a “significant LGBTQ+ presence” according to gay news site Pink News.

    The final one read: “If you read This, you are GAY Lmao” – puerile internet humor, but suggesting the assassination was carried out with a view to later notoriety.

    The obvious conclusion from these messages, alongside the fact that Robinson lived with a transgender partner, was that Robinson, like other antifa-style activists, believed Kirk represented some form of “fascism,” probably in part due to his outspoken stances against transgender ideology.

    For many leftist partisans, however, this eminently plausible hypothesis, which later revelations have only lent further credence to, was uncomfortable and indeed, embarrassing. After all, many on the left often decry the alleged “violence” and “hate” of the right, and indeed label anyone opposed to the medical mutilation of “gender-affirming care” as “fascists,” just as Robinson appears to have done. So there soon emerged an extensive effort to rewrite the narrative and suggest that Robinson was in fact, somehow, part of the online far-right.

    The principal claim was that, based on an extremely tenuous reading of the bullet casings, Robinson was in fact not a leftist, but a “groyper.” This is an internet subculture loosely led by the influential American nationalist Nick Fuentes, which is generally seen as far-right or alt-right (though often steeped in internet irony). Fuentes has previously criticized Kirk for being too moderate, and the claim was that as a result Robinson had killed him as part of an internecine right-wing feud.

    Yet evidence for this wild hypothesis is so weak it scarcely bears repeating. One activist academic claimed to the LA Times that the anti-fascist anthem Bella ciao has in fact been “co-opted” by the groypers, based on the fact that a remix of the song appears in a single groyper Spotify playlist. As for the other bullet casing, others claim that the video game Helldivers 2 is allegedly “popular with the far right community” – while pointedly ignoring the words “hey fascist! CATCH” that precede it on the shell casings. For his part, Fuentes has said that his followers are being “framed” for Kirk’s killing, “based on literally zero evidence.”

    Another claim spun out of proportion has been the fact that Robinson “comes from a family of Trump supporters,” which the US leftist blog the Daily Beast used to imply one shouldn’t “point fingers at the left” over the assassination. This is laughably thin gruel. Are political beliefs suddenly 100 percent heritable now? And why in any case would a Trump supporter assassinate one of Trump’s closest allies? In fact, on Sunday, Utah governor Spencer Cox told reporters the suspect had a “leftist ideology,” following his rather underreported comments to that effect to the Wall Street Journal the previous day. Charging Robinson on Tuesday, Utah County Attorney Jeff Gray said that Robinson’s mother had told police that “over the last year or so, Robinson had become more political, and had started to lean more to the left, becoming more pro-gay and trans-rights oriented.”

    The narrative of Robinson being a right-winger has always been deeply dubious, but that hasn’t stopped it being amplified by various media outlets. Bizarrely, even the Daily Telegraph, an old stalwart of the British right, now reports that Robinson “spoke the language of the far-right,” focusing on a 2018 picture of Robinson in tracksuits doing a “Slav squat,” which it very tenuously links with “groyper” memes.

    Back in the real world, the picture that is emerging of Robinson is that, in keeping with standard far-left ideological tropes about right-wingers, he seems to have believed that Kirk was a “hateful” individual. Soon after Kirk’s death, a family member told the FBI that Robinson, who had grown increasingly political in recent years, had accused Kirk of “spreading hate” during a recent family dinner. Robinson is believed to have been in a romantic relationship with his transgender roommate, and Axios reports that authorities believe this could help explain a motive for Kirk’s killing: that Robinson felt that the conservative was spreading so-called transphobic hate. According to FBI director Kash Patel, when questioned over his motives, Robinson told law enforcement: “Some hatred cannot be negotiated with.”

    It is often the political right which is accused of being credulous, prone to confirmation bias, living in echo chambers, and of spreading so-called misinformation. But in the wake this appalling tragedy, left-wing organs and social media figures have done just that. The Kirk groyper hoax is as alarming as it is shameful. It seems there is no low to which leftist partisans will not stoop to avoid admitting that the US left has a problem with political violence

  • Don’t project your lifestyle agendas onto Tyler Robinson

    Charlie Kirk, conservative commentator and essential piece of the Trumpworld media ecosystem, is dead, allegedly at the hands of an individual whose inner life has, needlessly, been the subject of conservative speculation for the past few days. Seemingly, every faction of the American right has their own explanation as to how this young man might have been inspired to commit such an atrocity. Many of these are myopic but perhaps have a kernel of truth to them. Others are plainly wrong. The worst of them play right into the hands of the left, and deserve serious reconsideration.

    Details about Tyler Robinson, the suspected gunman, continue to pour in. He was an apparently accomplished academic student (that is, until he dropped out of college and enrolled in vocational school) and had a live-in transgender lover, but besides this biographical details are sparse. He is consistently described by former classmates and teachers as respectful, somewhat quiet, and intelligent. The worst that’s said of him is that he is socially awkward, but the man exhibited no behaviors that would indicate any particular mental malaise or sociopathy. In this way, Robinson becomes a blank slate for agenda-pushing conservatives to depict as their “problem child,” representative of whatever social ill they tend to fixate on.

    One narrative circulating among the American right is the idea that Robinson was radicalized by his time at university. It is not wrong to identify America’s colleges and universities as militantly left-wing institutions. The ideological bent of college professors needs no introduction. Even still, I find the suggestion that Robinson’s apparent journey towards left-wing extremism was spurred on by his time at school misguided.

    For one, Robinson had only attended a single semester of college. Afterwards, he dropped out and attended trade school with the goal of becoming an electrician. It’s hard to imagine Robinson as being set on his path by higher education, only to abandon it so swiftly and commit himself to a less ideological and far more prosaic vocational course.

    Additionally, violent, militant leftists are rarely created from scratch in America’s higher educational institutions. The solitary focus on college and university takes some much warranted heat off of K-12 education, itself perfectly capable of churning out dogmatic leftists, as anybody involved in their high school’s debate club could surely tell you. Mostly, the conservative stock character of the college liberal is not someone who experienced an epiphany upon going away to school, but is instead one who, after a decade and a half of essentially leftist moral schooling, finds an opportunity to express themselves ideologically in a less consequential environment. If Robinson’s radicalization could be attributed to education, it ought to be blamed on American primary and secondary schools, whose curricula regardless of geographic location are as woke as it gets.

    So surely, then, the shooter’s leftism was, in fact, an expression of anomie brought on by thousands of hours spent gaming and browsing the internet? Conservatives would do well not to fall into this trap either. It’s much to the advantage of leftists that conservatives, informed by their own parochial contempt for the youth, try to identify Robinson as a “school shooter” type, a wayward young man who needed his controllers and keyboards locked away for his own good.

    The freedom of Americans, particularly the young, to associate and network beyond the confines of their family and immediate community ought to be protected by conservatives – not just on principle, but because we owe so many of our victories to it. Modern American conservatism draws nearly its entire vocabulary and rhetorical arsenal from right-wing online spaces, old and new. In fact, the new and popular conservatism that has materialized around Trump traces a far, far larger component of its genealogy to these places than it does to, say, “postliberal” thinkers like Oren Cass.

    The characters pushing the nihilistic school shooter narrative are, by and large, those left behind by the right’s current dynamism, seeking to rein it back in, forcing it into a form they’re more comfortable operating within. This cannot be allowed to happen. The problem of left-wing bias in the media, in education at all levels, and even in most hobbyist circles remains. The right has an unofficial mastery over the internet, and it’s the only channel with this distinction. Indeed, many of the brightest pro-Trump and pro-American minds I’ve known are people who, being intelligent and critical enough to identify the leftism in everything young people interface with, made their home online in order to network with likeminded figures. To surrender this would be a critical error.

    What motivated Robinson was an overwhelmingly woke, anti-white, and anti-male social climate in contemporary America. Robinson himself was either too small-minded or poorly constituted in spirit to dissent from this, and instead chose to embrace the ideology he’s been passively absorbing throughout his entire waking life, and – if the allegations against him are true – followed it to its natural conclusion. Education and an internet censored and tyrannized by leftists are contributors to this environment, among many others. However, sole blame is not attributable to either component, and right-wing voices looking to elevate their own cultural hobby horse to the status of an omni-cause should forbear.

    The track the administration is taking, on the other hand, seems to recognize the stakes. Stephen Miller, as usual, appears to understand how broad the scope of any measures taken to crush radical leftism will have to be. Bringing up RICO charges against George Soros and other financiers and designating antifa a terrorist organization are great starts. Increased efforts to de-wokify education at all levels are welcome. Effective online measures – forcing Google and other tech companies to stop silencing right-wingers – would be too. But to blame this tragedy on only one ill is to misunderstand the nature of the problem. The ideology that drove the alleged killer Robinson is embedded in virtually every real-life institution that he would have interacted with; any solution must proceed from this core premise. A holistic approach to ending radical leftism, then, is the only way we can honor Kirk’s legacy, and make sure nothing like this is permitted to happen ever again.

  • Trump will be on his best behavior for King Charles

    Trump will be on his best behavior for King Charles

    The Donald has touched down in Britain for his unprecedented second state visit. It makes sense in a way that this most unconventional of American presidents is being granted a privilege that has never been offered to any other US leader, namely a repeat performance of pageantry and pomp that will flatter this Anglophile’s ego to its considerable core. That the event is happening against King Charles’s wishes might bother any other prime minister, but such was Keir Starmer’s desire to curry favor with Trump that he even waved the King’s handwritten invitation on camera. And with that he ensured favorable treatment for the country he is (barely) governing. The question is what happens next.

    Unusually, Trump is not the issue at hand, at least as far as things currently stand. For all of his volatility and unpredictability, he is a fully paid-up admirer of the royal family. He has proudly, if erroneously, boasted that he was the late Queen’s favorite president. As such, he is unlikely to make any sort of trouble during his notably brief visit to Britain.

    He will be feted during Charles’s speech at Windsor Castle during the formal banquet, given every kind of pomp and respect that he surely sees as his due, and will generally be treated like a major global politician. Trump is a man of considerable ego, and that ego will be flattered. From Starmer and the government’s perspective, it is unlikely to be a troublesome trip.

    However, from Charles’s perspective, Trump’s ingress into Britain is less welcome. The two men may only be three years apart in age, but they could scarcely be more different. Charles is a liberal horticulturalist who has a great love of art, literature and history. Trump is a McDonald’s-munching pragmatist whose bestselling book was entitled The Art of the Deal; meanwhile, his host’s best-known publication is called A Vision of Britain.

    The King is a traditionalist – and a small, rather than large, ‘c’ conservative – who likes to think of his country as a fine place besmirched by ugly progress. Trump, meanwhile, shares the monarch’s idea of his own country having fallen behind, but his rabble-rousing slogan of “Make America Great Again” will find no echo this week. For Charles, Britain has never stopped being great.

    There are other issues that might prove contentious. The King has begun cautious steps towards a rapprochement with his younger son, and Trump’s last reported comment on Prince Harry was to say that, although he was now prepared not to deport him over his admitted drug use, “I’ll leave him alone. He’s got enough problems with his wife. She’s terrible.” It is probably accurate to say that Charles’s thoughts on his daughter-in-law may be similar, but he would rather see his throne fall than ever be caught making such an indiscreet admission.

    This sums up the difference between the two men and their respective values. One has always believed that “never complain, never explain” is an admirable way to live one’s life; the other has complained, explained, and then, for good measure, hurled invective at his enemies. How they will make small talk off camera remains to be seen.

    Still, one thing that decades spent as Prince of Wales have taught Charles is the value of smiling and waving, even when a situation – or a person – is not to his taste. Veteran royal watchers can easily see when the King has exerted his own influence (witness his reception of Zelensky at his private home of Sandringham, a conspicuous mark of regard after his appalling treatment by Trump and his Vice President J.D. Vance in the Oval Office earlier this year). Although Trump will be on his best behavior this week, every tactless or crass remark of the President’s will be noted. You can be sure that Starmer’s government will never be allowed to forget the help that Charles has given them – assuming, that is, Starmer is still in office, if not Labour in power, long enough for the King to ever call in his favor.

  • Donald Trump vs the First Amendment

    Donald Trump vs the First Amendment

    Charlie Kirk’s assassination was a tragedy. A young conservative voice was silenced by savagery, leaving behind grieving family, faithful friends and loyal supporters.

    But something deeply troubling is happening in the aftermath. The Trump administration isn’t just mourning Kirk or pursuing his killer. They’re using his death to justify an unprecedented crackdown on free speech that should alarm every American.

    Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that visa holders are being deported for “celebrating” Kirk’s killing. The State Department warned immigrants against “making light” of his death. An anonymous group called the Charlie Kirk Data Foundation is building a database of social media users who criticized Kirk or his politics. Stephen Miller promised to “identify, disrupt, dismantle, and destroy” what he calls “terrorist networks” – apparently meaning anyone who expressed the wrong opinion online about Kirk’s death. And Pam Bondi has vowed to go after those espousing “hate speech”.

    Don’t mistake this for justice. It is pure opportunism.

    MAGA supporters need to see the danger clearly. A government that can revoke visas and punish people for social media posts today will have no problem turning the same power on citizens tomorrow. The surveillance tools now aimed at so-called left-wing extremists can just as easily be aimed at conservative voices when political winds shift. The databases being filled with the names of Kirk’s critics can just as easily be filled with the names of Trump’s supporters once Democrats take power again.

    The First Amendment was never meant to protect only comfortable or convenient speech. It was written to protect the difficult and divisive, the words that anger us, unsettle us, even repulse us. Freedom lives in that space. Once the government claims the power to decide which opinions are acceptable, freedom begins to die. What starts as punishment for enemies always ends as control over everyone.

    Every authoritarian government follows the same pattern. First, they identify a sympathetic victim. Then they claim extraordinary measures are needed to protect society. Finally, those “temporary” powers become permanent and expand far beyond their original purpose. The Patriot Act was sold as necessary to fight terrorists after 9/11. Twenty-three years later, those surveillance powers are still being used against ordinary Americans. The same tools meant to catch foreign enemies now monitor parents at school board meetings and peaceful protesters.

    Kirk’s assassination is becoming the Patriot Act for speech. A crackdown on so-called terrorist networks is the first step toward a crackdown on dissent itself.

    Look closely at who’s being targeted. Not just people celebrating murder – though that’s deplorable – but anyone who “criticized” Kirk or “made light” of his death. The definitions keep expanding. What counts as “criticism”? Disagreeing with Kirk’s politics? Questioning his methods? Making a sarcastic comment about conservative media? Who decides what crosses the line from protected speech to deportable offense?

    Anonymous groups are building lists of American citizens based on their social media activity. They openly state their goal is to “clear out Leftwing Radicals” from American institutions. What’s being sold as law enforcement is, in fact, political purging.

    The infrastructure for mass censorship is already being built. The administration is reviewing 55 million visa holders for “violations.” They’re monitoring college campuses, tracking online activity, and encouraging citizens to report on each other. These systems don’t disappear when administrations change. They get inherited and expanded. The Democrat who defeats Trump’s successor will have access to every database, every surveillance tool, every legal precedent being established today.

    Real patriots defend the Constitution when it is inconvenient. Especially when it is inconvenient. Supporting free speech for those you agree with is easy. Supporting it for those you despise is what separates America from authoritarian nations.

    Trump supporters should ask themselves: Do you want the federal government deciding which opinions are acceptable? Do you trust future Democratic administrations with such powers? Do you want your children growing up in a country where citizens spy on one another’s posts? The answer should be a resounding no.

    Charlie Kirk believed in conservative principles. Honor his memory by defending them. Limited government. Individual liberty. Constitutional rights that belong to all citizens, not just political allies. His assassination was devastating, and it calls for justice through lawful means. But using that tragedy to justify greater government control over speech betrays everything he stood for.

    The First Amendment has survived wars, depressions, and deadly terrorist attacks. It must also survive Trump’s assault. Charlie Kirk’s legacy should not signal the death of free speech in America. It should stand as its defense, carried proudly by citizens who refuse to surrender their most sacred right.

  • What the Tyler Robinson indictment reveals about the Charlie Kirk murder

    What the Tyler Robinson indictment reveals about the Charlie Kirk murder

    Tyler Robinson, who has been charged with seven counts, including aggravated murder, appeared in court on Tuesday.  

    Clad in what appeared to be an anti-suicide vest, the 22-year-old sat in front of a blank wall that mirrored his own silence. But in its lapidary tone, the indictment that the Utah prosecutors have compiled speaks volumes.  

    In all likelihood, the alleged assassin will receive the death penalty. “I do not take this decision lightly, and it is a decision I have made independently as county attorney based solely on the available evidence and circumstances and nature of the crime,” Jeffrey S. Gray said at a press conference. 

    Gray seems to be a model prosecutor. The indictment recounts in careful and restrained detail the acts leading up to the sanguinary deed at Utah Valley University. The shot from the roof. The passage of the bullet after it struck Turning Point USA’s Charlie Kirk. The hasty flight after the shot had been fired. The disposal of clothes and the rifle. The spare wording possesses its own persuasive power, underscoring the shocking nature of the sanguinary deed that took place on that fateful afternoon at UVU.  

    Indeed, to read the indictment is to realize that Robinson has, in essence, indicted himself by sending numerous text messages to his roommate, Lance Twiggs (whom the mainstream media is referring to as his romantic partner). The messages could scarcely be more incriminating. For one thing, he gestures at his motive, declaring about Kirk that “I had enough of his hatred. Some hate can’t be negotiated out.” That he experienced a political evolution seems difficult to deny. Robinson’s mother allegedly told prosecutors that “Over the last year or so, her son had become more political and had started to lean more to the left, becoming more pro-gay and trans-rights oriented.” The bottom line is that in arrogating to himself the right to murder, Robinson apparently became the one consumed by hatred.  

    At the same time, he seems to have been keen to elude the police, if at all possible. Robinson texted that, “If I am able to grab my rifle unseen, I will have left no evidence. Going to attempt to retrieve it again, hopefully they have moved on. I haven’t seen anything about them finding it.” Fortunately, Robinson’s roommate declined to heed his admonition to delete the exchange. Instead, he provided it to the appropriate authorities. 

    The charging document is unlikely to quell the furor surrounding Robinson and the Trump administration. Instead, it may well prompt the administration to heighten its calls for a crackdown on what President Trump and his allies are depicting as a broader left-wing conspiracy, one comprised of terrorist networks intent on subverting America. In this regard, the bullet that was fired at UVU is ricocheting in ways that the assassin probably could not have predicted. 

    The next court hearing for Robinson will take place on September 29. Perhaps he will have shed his impassivity by then. But his text messages have already revealed more than enough about what appear to be his sordid plans for mayhem and murder.