Enjoying the view from Limbo
The Trump administration has spent much time and energy in recent months desperately trying to prop up Viktor Orbán in Hungary, in yet another obvious self-revelation of the truth of what Trump likes to call “The Russia Hoax.” Hungary was occupied and decimated for decades by a brutal, expansionist Russian dictatorship which supported a series of Hungarian puppet regimes to oppress the people...
America Descending / Ideas and Reflections / World Politics
by Daren Jonescu · Published April 8, 2026 · Last modified April 15, 2026
Here is a breaking news headline from CBS News: “Trump agrees to two-week ceasefire with Iran, delaying large-scale attack.” And from the accompanying story: President Trump said Tuesday he has agreed to a “double sided CEASEFIRE” with Iran, less than two hours before his deadline for Iran to either cut a deal with the U.S. or face massive strikes on its power plants. “I agree to suspend...
The Ring of Gyges.– The modern world is running a live test version of Glaucon’s brilliant challenge to Socrates in Book II of The Republic. The amoral thrill of being able to violate, invade, and steal everyone’s life, privacy, and property with impunity is now within reach of all of us, and above all, within the legislative reach of every government, and of...
The baby boomer generation, or rather the portion of that generation that did not permanently lose itself in the “drug culture” of the 1960s, invented the phrase “The Greatest Generation” to describe those Americans who had lived through, and won, World War II. That is to say, they invented this nickname to describe their parents. A quaint tribute, much like giving your mother...
George Will, the long-compromised Republican establishment conservative, has somewhat miraculously rediscovered his principles with aplomb during the Trump era, presumably due to the liberating effects of being forcibly ousted by the populist pogrom from his secure home within the party establishment. Exemplary of his octogenarian rejuvenation is his take on the Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision to strike down Trump’s global reign of terror...
The First Lady.— I cannot even imagine what it would be like to be the kind of person who would be interested in watching a documentary about Melania Trump — or “Sweet pea,” as her friend Ghislaine Maxwell affectionately called her, though this cute friendship, I suspect, is not mentioned in the documentary. Unaccomplished, vain, apolitical, amoral, a non-entity who, like everyone who...
by Daren Jonescu · Published February 15, 2026 · Last modified February 16, 2026
What does it mean to be open-minded, in the sense required for serious learning and self-development? It certainly does not mean assuming that every idea is as good as every other, or that no one’s perspective is truer than anyone else’s. That is not openness; it is relativism. Relativism is the death of thinking, philosophy, and self-development, because it suffocates the desire that motivates…
Anyone who knows me knows that I am often susceptible to the charge of being excessively disdainful or dismissive of most things contemporary, at least in the soul-defining realms of ideas, art, and politics. I freely admit to being guilty of such an excess on occasion, or even on most occasions. Having granted this, however, I must aver that I come by my...
A good warrior is a person who is willing to obey orders or carry out an assigned duty for his society, even to the point of death if necessary. A good man, by contrast, is a person who is willing to disobey orders or defy an assigned duty of his society, even to the point of death if necessary. From this it follows...
Fact vs. Fiction.– No one thinks or invents anything important due to the influence of alcohol or other drugs. But everyone who feels an immoderate attachment to a drug of choice has a vested interest in telling himself that these artificial intoxicants enhance thought and inventiveness. And every…
Follow: