Enjoying the view from Limbo
Ideas and Reflections / Liberty's Labors Lost
by Daren Jonescu · Published July 12, 2026 · Last modified July 13, 2026
Partisans.– A comprehensive explanation for today’s hyper-partisan politics (aka tribalism) would merely be an elucidation of this aphorism from Nietzsche, published in 1878: Not suited to be a party man. — He who thinks a great deal is not suited to be a party man: he thinks his way through the party and out the other side too soon. From which we may...
In case anyone is curious as to why I felt no inclination, let alone motivation, to write anything here in honor of this year’s most auspicious July 4th holiday, allow me to explain the reason. July 4th is Independence Day, a holiday established to celebrate the founding of The United States of America, and this year’s Independence Day was supposed to be special...
In 1987, in a speech at the annual convention of Kiwanis International, in the context of arguing for his proposed Economic Bill of Rights, Ronald Reagan reiterated his famous remark from twenty years earlier, “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. It has to be fought for and defended by each generation.” How many people in attendance when Reagan delivered...
Thomas Massie is a libertarian and a former leading member of the Republican Party’s “House Freedom Caucus” — a name which can only be used in scare quotes, since almost all of its members in Congress, past and present, have proven themselves to be utter frauds who would, and indeed did, sell their country’s last shred of freedom in a heartbeat to protect...
Here, from Axios, is the funniest headline I have read this year, or perhaps ever: Scoop: US suggests Cuba complicit in helping Russia fight Ukraine. No, of course, when I say this is the funniest headline of the year, I am not referring to the usual news media illiteracy that has become so commonplace that we barely notice it anymore. For does not...
Liberty's Labors Lost / World Politics
by Daren Jonescu · Published March 18, 2026 · Last modified April 15, 2026
During the absurd and wholly outrageous test-run assault on Venezuela, in which Donald Trump ordered an authoritarian president kidnapped and then “replaced” with that same president’s regime, all with the intention of grabbing control of that country’s oil reserves, though without having asked any of America’s leading oil men in advance whether they would be stupid enough to set up shop under the...
Headline I just read, from Real Clear Politics: Mark Levin: Bannon, Tucker Carlson, and Megyn Kelly have contributed nothing to conservatism or the country. Of course I will not read, and do not recommend, the accompanying article, apparently a transcript from an episode of the money- and audience-grubbing Levin’s Trump sycophant jamboree hilariously called “Liberty’s Voice.” But I will merely point out, for...
Liberty's Labors Lost / World Politics
by Daren Jonescu · Published March 2, 2026 · Last modified March 15, 2026
A text message exchange with a young friend of mine yesterday, March 1st here in Korea: She: I’m struggling with deciding how many clothes I should bring to Seoul. On another side of the earth, war is happening.I: Yes, there are now multiple wars happening, due to a few idiots who think they can do whatever they want. I hope you will be...
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...
A few random thoughts (not all of them mine) regarding the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to strike down Donald Trump’s global reign of economic terror by means of his “signature policy initiative,” namely his tariffs-by-mood-ring-and-mean-girl-whim fanaticism. First, from former Republican congressman Justin Amash on X: I’m not sure there’s ever been a president more distant from the ideals of the Founders of the...
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