Review: The American Revolution on PBS

The new Ken Burns opus for PBS is The American Revolution in six installments. I watched (most of) it and was pleasantly surprised at how little heavy-duty woke was on display. The first 15-20 minutes of the first episode and the last 15-20 minutes of the last episode were preachy and woke, in between it was remarkably free of woke considering it is on PBS.

I viewed "most of" it because I fell asleep a couple of times. That isn't a criticism, I'm old and Burns style, while elegant, is ponderous. 

The other DrC felt it overemphasized the involvement of Native American tribes and enslaved black people. While accurate, I took that as a given on PBS and could mostly ignore it. 

If I have a complaint it is that, with the exception of Washington who was lionized, the other influential architects of our form of government - Franklin, Hamilton, Jefferson, Madison, Adams - were downplayed. 

It is fair to say this program is the history of the fighting as both civil war and uprising against authority. Designing a form of government substantially without historic precedent happens 'off stage' and isn't a major focus. 

White House-ology

Power Line links to a Substack opinion column by Danielle Pletka who purports to explain the confusing signals on Ukraine peace policy coming from the Trump White House. She believes Trump backs Zelensky while VP Vance heads a sub rosa group of isolationists whose foreign policy interests may be limited to the Western Hemisphere. 

If Pletka is right, it would explain the 28 point proposed plan that heavily favored Russia (supposedly a Vance leak) being countered by SecState Rubio dissing that plan and issuing his own Trump-backed 19 point plan that’s much more Ukraine-supportive.

Or just maybe the apparent confusion was intentional. Trump-the-master-negotiator lofting a pro-Russian trial balloon which was widely attacked, followed by a substantially ‘improved’ plan which is still short of what Zelensky seeks. 

Think of this two-step process as a “cooling the mark” scenario to get Zelensky to compromise and settle for the proverbial “half a loaf.” That makes the Pletka story a sign Trump currently favors Rubio over Vance as his successor, with Trump gifting Rubio a policy “win.”

The meta question raised is this. When negotiating, does Trump intentionally play 3-D chess, or is the bargaining game simply intuitive with him?

Pletka is with the American Enterprise Institute and its former VP for foreign and defense policy.

Three Strikes … Still Good Policy

Writing for City Journal, Tal Fortgang makes a good argument that “Incarceration Works.” In short, locking up the roughly one in twenty who commit most of the felonies protects the nineteen in twenty who, mostly, do not. Hat tip to RealClearPolitics for the link.

We had this argument back in the “Three Strikes” era of the early 1990s, and it worked. Very many of those so imprisoned were black. Civil rights activists claimed we were locking up too many individuals whose life experiences ‘doomed’ them to a life of crime. 

This claim of course ignored that many others with similar “life experiences” did not become career criminals. It continues to be true that separating the violent few from the not-violent many is good social policy. And apparently this is an argument we are doomed to repeat every few years.

Ukraine Update

Power Line's John Hinderaker pulls together extended quotes from the New York Post and the BBC to get a handle on the current state of play in negotiations aimed at ending the fighting in Ukraine. Much reported elsewhere has oversimplified the process and been misleading.

In Ken Burns' new PBS documentary on the US revolutionary war, an important point was made. It is claimed Washington realized that he didn't need to win, merely to not lose. The British opponent, on the other hand, needed to win. As long as the colonists continued to fight, the war was a continued drain on the British exchequer and diverted its attention from its peer adversary next door - France.

I wouldn't be surprised if Zelensky has reached the same conclusion and, like Washington, proposes to continue the fight by "not losing." President Trump wants to end the fighting, but that may not be in Zelensky's or Ukraine's interests. 

Plus Putin may have concluded there is no scenario (except outright victory) in which he personally survives ending the Ukraine war. If he believes that, settling for less would be suicidal and he won't agree.

Having staked his reputation on settling the Ukraine war, Trump may have painted himself into a corner.

Weird Dietary Science

Japanese researchers have determined that "arginine supplementation curbs Alzheimers disease pathology in animal models." The even better news is that arginine is commonly available, safe for human use, and occurs naturally in meats, nuts, dairy products, legumes, etc.

It remains to be seen if arginine is effective against Alzheimers in humans. Still, if I were concerned about the disease I would load up on OTC arginine as it is unlikely to be of harm. Hat tip to Instapundit for the link.

More on China

On Monday I noted George Friedman's thoughts on evolving relations between China. and the US. He has had subsequent additional insights on this topic which you can find here. He continues to see hints that China has chosen to be less belligerent towards the US than formerly, 

Friedman believes the change is driven by China's domestic economic issues. He suggests, and I agree, that even autocratic governments respond to shifts in public opinion, though in less obvious ways than in nations with popularly elected governments.

Saturday Snark

Images courtesy of Power Line's The Week in Pictures

and its Comments section.

Friday Snark

Images courtesy of Politico's 

The Nation's Cartoonists on the Week in Politics.

Images courtesy of RealClearPolitics'

Cartoons of the Week.

Thursday Snark

Image courtesy of Lucianne.com, 11-21-2025

Weird Psychiatric Science

Science Alert reports research which finds a correlation between cat ownership and schizophrenia. It speculates (but correctly does not conclude) about cat ownership causing schizophrenia.

"After adjusting for covariates, we found that individuals exposed to cats had approximately twice the odds of developing schizophrenia," the Australian team writes.

Assuming their data is correct, the causal arrow could point in either direction. Perhaps associating closely with cats increases one’s propensity to exhibit schizophrenia. Or the reverse, perhaps having schizo characteristics predisposes one to appreciate cats’ aloof and self-centered mannerisms.

 Offhand, I find either explanation equally likely. 

Saying the Quiet Part Aloud

Writing for The American Spectator, John Mac Ghlionn looks at states with high and low crime and finds a pattern that is widely understood, but rarely mentioned. See his conclusion.

The pattern is not complicated. The safest states in America are strongly-knit, mostly white, with cultures that still run on shared expectations. The most dangerous states are “diverse,” divided, and disorderly — proof that without cultural unity, color-blind catchphrases fall apart the moment they meet the street.

You cannot fix a problem you won’t name. You cannot reverse a trend you refuse to measure. America’s safety divide is consequence, not coincidence. And every family choosing a place to live already knows it, even if they never say it aloud.

Decoding China’s Intentions

Foreign policy thinker George Friedman launches a trial balloon theory of what’s going on with relations between the US and China. He sees this as signaled by two bits of semi-opaque information. 

The first, and possibly more important, is the sacking of several generals and admirals by the PLA. “Several” is a number too large for it to be coincidence. It definitely signals something, exactly what is unclear.

The second is the invitation to the US of the leader of Taiwan’s opposition party - the Kuomintang. This party is viewed as less hostile to the PRC than that of the current President. This would be like the CCP inviting the head of our Democrats to visit China, as they’re the party out of power at the moment.

Friedman hypothesizes that these two indicia may point to a decision by China to be less hostile to the US than has recently been the case. He speculates (1) the ousted military leaders may have been unwilling to give up their dream of a military confrontation with the US. And (2) weakness in China’s economy makes giving up exporting to the lucrative US market seem unwise.

Because I would like this to be an accurate decoding of the signals being sent, I am therefore doubly reluctant to endorse this rosy scenario. We humans need to resist the temptation to assume things have taken a turn for the better, because too often our hopes mislead us.

What I wrote in the previous paragraph reminds me of a line spoken by Scott Glenn playing CIA Director Ezra Kramer in one of the later Bourne films, here paraphrased from memory. “My policy is to hope for the best and plan for the worst.”

Sunday Snark

Images courtesy of Sarah Hoyt blogging at Instapundit.

Correction

Eleven days ago I wrote about our new humidifier. In that post I made a claim I believed to be true and subsequently discovered was not true. Here is the false claim.

What we perceived as dust was in fact fine particles of salt from the softened water, settling out all over the house. I finally remembered that the kitchen sink is supposed to provide unsoftened water, and began filling the humidifier there. Problem solved.

It took a week or so to learn that we were still getting "dust" settling all over the house, even using unsoftened water. Instead of salty dust, the new dust was the hard water's mineral content. 

The problem was the type of humidifier we were using - a "cool mist" type. It was spraying tiny droplets of water into the air in a stream that resembled fog. 

Containing mineral or mineral plus salt, the water would evaporate but the water-hardening mineral was left behind as "dust." Subsequent online investigation revealed recommendations to fill the cool mist humidifiers with distilled water, which has little or no mineral content. 

We consulted with neighbors who have had humidifiers operating for years with no dust problem and learned they had evaporative humidifiers. We've stopped using the cool mist microspray machine and purchased an evaporative humidifier. It is both larger and more expensive, but does not require distilled water.

The new machine wicks tap water up into a matrix through which room air is pulled. Evaporation will leave the mineral content behind as it does not evaporate. The stream of air leaving this new humidifier doesn't resemble fog. 

Cleaning the mineral stuff left behind in the machine will be a periodic chore that is likely to be unpleasant. We've yet to do it as it appears to be more or less monthly. If I remember I will report how ugly the cleaning process is, after we've done it.

Saturday Snark

Images courtesy of Power Line's The Week in Pictures

and its Comments section.

Friday Snark

Images courtesy of Politico's

The Nation's Cartoonists on the Week in Politics.

Excess Demand

Vice President J.D. Vance has made an excellent point with respect to the high cost of housing - both home prices and rents. Costs are high because the supply is less than the demand. 

Demand is high because of the many millions of illegal aliens in the country. Deporting those here illegally would lessen housing demand and reduce upward pressure on both prices and rents.

Unqualified Drivers of Big Rigs

The US Department of Transportation has determined the State of California has issued 17,000 commercial driver’s licenses to illegal aliens who mostly can’t speak or read English. Such drivers have been involved in high profile fatal accidents.

Under pressure from Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy, CA has agreed to cancel all of these bogus licenses. I presume CA has also promised to stop issuing these credentials to individuals in the country illegally. It is almost certain bribery was involved in many of these.

CA isn’t the only state guilty of this abuse of authority, Sec. Duffy needs to pursue the other states which have issued credentials to those ineligible to receive them. 

The 40 ton rigs these fellows drive routinely go 70 mph on the Interstate near my town. They pose a real danger.

Quote to Ponder

 Instapundit reposts an X post by Noah Smith, who has an interesting thought.

Leftists are often downwardly mobile children of successful parents, who use leftism to try to force their way into the elite they believe to be their birthright. 

I read that as a loser's coping mechanism, one apparently as much on display in today's New York City, as it was in Finland’s civil war over a century ago.

Who Knew? Rats Eat Bats

We’ve recently learned something that apparently has been happening forever. In the dark, rats catch and eat bats. It was first observed by accident, and then German scientists checked to see if their observation was an anomaly. It wasn’t.

I have thought of rats as predominantly scavengers. Seeing them also as predators puts them in a new light, an ecological niche that they oddly share with bears - as opportunistic feeder/predators. Hat tip to Instapundit for the link.

Ah, nature … blood red in fang and claw.

Government to Reopen

Several sources are reporting President Trump has signed the continuing resolution passed earlier today by both the Senate and then the House. Government will reopen and stay open till the end of January. 

Perhaps we'll go through this whole pointless shutdown ritual again then. I hope we can avoid it.

Groypers and Zoomercons?

Yesterday I linked to a Rod Dreher column in which I’d found a paragraph I liked about an epidemic of lying we seem to be living through. Today I went back and read the entire column and I’d like to try to summarize that for you, and recommend you read it, though it is long.

His main concern, it seems to me, is about a group he calls Zoomercons, young conservative white males who are basically nihilists. They want to destroy what is, without any clear idea of what will replace it. 

There has been a minor kerfluffle about online chats among young Republicans which have been racist, anti-Semitic, perhaps pro-Nazi, and otherwise gruesome. Dreher attributes their negativity to current societal conditions. Here are few of his conclusions.

The Groyper thing is real. It is not a fringe movement, in that it really has infiltrated young conservative Washington networks to a significant degree.

It cannot be negotiated with, because it doesn’t have traditional demands. It wants to burn the whole system down. It really does.

This malign movement didn’t just appear from nowhere. There are within it legitimate grievances.

For almost two decades, left-wing radicals have marched through institutions and imposed illiberal, race-based leftist policies that openly intended to discriminate against whites, males, and anybody who dissented. You cannot understand the rise of the Groypers without understanding this first.

Anti-Semitism is spreading like a virus among religious conservatives of the Zoomer generation.

I'm not in touch with young conservatives, so I'm in no position to judge if Dreher is correct. The "hothouse" political climate of the DC area isn't exactly a representative sample of US opinion.

A Different View

The new fellow at Power Line - Bill Glahn - has a different theory about the government shutdown. He argues it was aimed at riling up the off-year electorate in NJ and VA to go to the polls and vote, and that it did so successfully. 

The two groups it prodded into action were FedGov workers and SNAP recipients. Both are meant to be serious parts of the Democrat coalition. SNAP recipients, in particular, are hard to motivate in non-presidential elections.

Glahn believes Dems will repeat this ploy before the 2026 midterm elections. Let’s try to remember next fall to see if his prediction is correct. If Schumer continues as Minority Leader, that will be an indication in favor of Glahn’s theory.

Lots and Lots of Lies

A long paragraph from the Rod Dreher’s Diary website describing flaws in our society about which we older persons need to worry.

They (Zoomers) have learned to have no respect for authority. Why should they? The institutions of our society, as they see it, have lied and lied and lied, and still lie. They still lie in many ways about race (e.g., refusing to be honest about black crime), they lied about Covid, they lied about males and females, and they forced the insanity of gender ideology on us all. The military lied about Iraq. The universities embraced and enforced ideologies of lies. The Catholic Church lied about sexual abuse, and the connection to the prevalence of sexually active gay priests honeycombing the institution. They lied about the benefits of mass migration and diversity. They lied about Trump and Russia. The political parties and their corporate allies lied about what globalism would mean for ordinary people.

I wish I could tell you there were items in the above list with which I disagree. That I cannot is quite an indictment of our society. 

Latino America

See a good article by Kotkin and Hernandez for RealClearInvestigations looking at the role of Hispanic immigrants in the U.S. economy. In brief they find Hispanics are more likely than other immigrants to acculturate and intermarry, and are consequently doing better than other immigrants. 

Their findings certainly coincide with my experience, particularly since moving our winter residence to a NV retirement community. The service workers who make the community function are majority Hispanic. Not just the gardeners, cleaners, and store clerks, the manager of my local Wells Fargo is Hispanic. So is a medical specialist I consult. And we’ve a Hispanic US senator named Cortez Masto.

As the authors note, Hispanics often intermarry with locals. The affluent seniors who move here have no kids at home and I’d guess a majority of the children in our public schools are either Hispanic or part Hispanic.

Growing up in SoCal the middle class family across the street in our semi-rural neighborhood was named Lopez. There were kids surnamed Castro, Cordero, and Cardones in my high school class.

Happy Veterans’ Day

Today we celebrate our nation’s military veterans, those who served in uniform during war or peace. We owe you our gratitude.

My father was a vet and his brother was a career Army officer. Plus two of my mother’s brothers and her sister were vets.

I got a draft notice but flunked the physical twice, on account of a blown rotator cuff. They weren’t repairing those when I was young. You just lived with it and didn’t lift that arm over your head, a practice I follow to this day.

The Gales of November

It was 50 years ago today that the good ship Edmund Fitzgerald sank in a gale on Lake Superior.

The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
Of the big lake, they called Gitche Gumee
The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead
When the skies of November turn gloomy

With a load of iron ore, twenty-six thousand tons more
Than the Edmund Fitzgerald weighed empty
That good ship and true was a bone to be chewed
When the gales of November came early

That’s how Gordon Lightfoot begins the ballad of a shipwreck that remains something of a mystery to this day.  It has to be one of the most haunting elegies of modern folk music. See an article which describes the event and the impact of the story-telling ballad, a long-time favorite of mine.

Remember Nord Stream?

MSN echoes a Wall Street Journal report that German authorities are ready to accuse Ukrainian special forces of guilt in the sabotage of the Nord Stream natural gas pipeline under the Baltic Sea. This happened just after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. 

The description of the methods used to pinpoint the saboteurs is the epitome of high tech policing. They used traffic cam footage, facial recognition software and tracked legit passports issued under false names.

Germany views the plotters as criminals; Poland and Ukraine view them as heroes. Apparently the Russians aren’t the only ones to engage in “gray zone” warfare. 

The conflict may interfere with German support for Ukraine’s war effort. It has been picked up by the AfD Party as a campaign issue, arguing for a cessation of German support for Ukraine’s military.

Update

The other DrC and I were encouraged to lose some weight by our WY family physician, who prescribed Tirzepatide injections for both. We soon discovered we were both allergic to the weight loss drug, and stopped the injections. 

We were told it would take about a month for the drug to leave our bodies. It has been closer to 3 months and we're still having lingering reactions that are uncomfortable but not life threatening. 

I share this with you because our physician knows we both have sensitivity to some meds but didn't foresee our having these difficulties. Be warned.

Schumer Shutdown to End

Multiple sources report sufficient Democrat senators have agreed to vote with Republicans to end the FedGov shutdown. It is not clear whether that vote has actually happened or whether there is merely an agreement to vote aye when the vote finally occurs.

John Hinderaker, whose work at Power Line I follow, believes what finally pushed the Ds over the line was the airline slowdowns and cancelations. Senators don't miss EBT but they do take frequent flights back to their home states.

It isn't clear the shutdown accomplished much for Schumer & Co. Their giving up tends to "kill" any momentum they claimed to have gotten from recently winning in three states that Democrats usually win. 

Being a leaderless party is doing the Ds much harm, especially when the Rs have a strong leader in Trump.

Later ... the Senate finally passed the continuing resolution and sent it to the House for confirmation.

Understanding Universities

Image courtesy of Sarah Hoyt.

Saturday Snark

Images courtesy of Power Line's The Week in Pictures

and its Comments section.