RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/tim-walz-only-china-has-the-moral-authority-to-pursue-peace-in-the-middle-east/

Oh, come on. Minnesota Governor Tim Walz lived down to the worst caricature of him in his remarks at the Center for American Progress today, weighing in on the Israeli airstrikes against Iran, and concluding that only the People’s Republic of China has the “moral authority” to negotiate an agreement in the Middle East.

Here we are, with the Middle East back on fire in a way that has now expanded. With, I don’t — Iran has to retaliate, in their mind, I’m sure. And now, who is the voice in the world that can negotiate some type of agreement in this? Who holds the moral authority? Who holds the ability to do that? Because we are not seen as a neutral actor. And we maybe never were, I don’t want to tell anybody that. I think there’s a lot of people who would say ‘you always lean one way in this.’ But I think there was at least an attempt to be somewhat of the arbitrator in this. We saw President Carter do it with Begin and Sadat. We’ve had certain wins along the way that were actually mutually beneficial both ways. Now I ask, who that is. And consistently, over and over again, we’re going to have to face the reality of it might be the Chinese. And, and, that goes against everything they say they’re trying to do in terms of the balance of powers. I would just have to say, my heart goes out for this. Ukraine continues to go on. Gaza continues to be a humanitarian disaster, and now it’s expanded even further.

Lest you doubt that I am accurately transcribing Walz’s remarks, he begins this portion of his comments at 30:50 in the video below.

Now, a lot of people will look back to Walz’s extensive and longstanding ties to China — at least 30 visits, one funded by the Chinese government, status as a visiting fellow at the Macao Polytechnic University, a Chinese state-run institution of higher education, etc. — and conclude that he’s a “Manchurian candidate,” somehow brainwashed by the Chinese government to repeat their talking points and propaganda to American citizens I think that accusation is nonsense; if the Chinese government had brainwashed him, surely they would have programmed to not look like a deer in headlights during a vice-presidential debate. (Note that Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes’s new book, Fight: Inside the Wildest Battle for the White House, reveals that in the weeks leading up to the debate, Walz was so nervous that he couldn’t sleep at night and his aides had to remind him to eat.)

https://issuesinsights.com/2025/06/17/l-a-riots-just-one-more-symptom-of-far-left-californias-sad-decline/

In recent years, blue states have blundered repeatedly, taxing and regulating too much, pushing woke education on their failing schools, and driving productive citizens out with their reckless policies, as our exclusive report recently pointed out. California, led by its largest and wealthiest city, Los Angeles, is perhaps the prime example. But while some blue states are at least trying to correct course, no turnaround is in sight for the Golden State.

With recent disasters revealing the incompetence, greed and extreme politicization of its so-called leaders, California careens from crisis to calamity. The Los Angeles riots, entering a second week, are only the latest manifestation of the state’s steady decline, a symptom, not a cause.

We’re not new to this story. We’ve been writing about California’s decline since the early 2000s. But it’s growing worse, as two incisive critics of California’s political class and its insane “progressive” policies, Joel Kotkin and Victor Davis Hanson, separately have written. California is on the road to ruin, if not already there.

“Rather than a model for the future, Los Angeles today offers a masterclass in urban dysfunction,” Kotkin wrote last week in “Los Angeles has fallen.” “Drive through the streets of the South Side or along Central Avenue – historically black L.A.’s main thoroughfare, now predominantly Hispanic – and the ambience increasingly resembles that of Mexico City or Mumbai: cracked pavements, dilapidated buildings, outdoor swap-meet markets and food stalls serving customers, much as one would see in the developing world.”

Remember: This is the city slated to host both the World Cup (2026) and the Olympic Games (2028) over the next few years. What will visitors see?

https://thespectator.com/topic/why-democrats-back-the-wrong-side-of-80-20-issues/

“80-20” issues have become a catchphrase recently. Most voters on those issues favor one policy by overwhelming margins and oppose the other. The “winning side” may poll anywhere between 60 and 90 percent, depending on the issue, but they are all conveniently grouped under the same label of “80-20.”

These lopsided issues have three striking features. First, there seem to be more and more of them, especially on contentious social issues and law enforcement. Second, the same constituency that supports the 20 percent side of one issue frequently supports the 20 percent side of other issues, even those that are substantively quite different. Once an issue is depicted as “progressive,” for example, it generates that support. The result is that a series of issues have overlapping support, forming a coalition. Third, although elected officials (and candidates for office) might be expected to shy away from supporting issues with only 20 percent support, today’s Democrats have actually backed most of them. Support has been most vocal from the party’s progressive (far-left) wing, but center-left Democrats have rarely opposed them, at least openly. In a party that has gradually moved leftward, even moderates are wary of being caught opposing progressives. The rare exceptions come in “purple” states and congressional districts (that is, districts where the general electorate could vote either Democrat or Republican).

The easiest way to see how these leftist support groups overlap on multiple issues is to ask yourself, “Do you think the people who oppose closing the Southern border also oppose Israel?” The answer is obvious. They do. Support for open borders strongly predicts opposition to Israel.

Once I know someone supports open borders and opposes Israel, it’s not hard to predict her position on transgender women in men’s sports or school choice. Although those issues are strikingly different substantively, a voter taking the 20 percent position on one of them is very likely to take the 20 percent position on the others. The result is an activist progressive coalition that encompasses all these issues and more.