By Selwyn Duke
“Advertisements contain the only truths to be relied on in a newspaper,” humorist Mark Twain once quipped. Of course, newspapers’ circulation these past decades has declined like that of someone gaining 50 years and 60 pounds. Yet their influence and that of other left-wing media sources is magnified — by social media and Big Tech generally. In fact, the bias is so intense, warns one observer, that it may win Democrats the midterms.
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By Selwyn Duke
“When Will They Blow Up Mount Rushmore?” I asked that rhetorically in 2017, alluding to the continual left-wing efforts to clear cut our American cultural landscape. And it was not three years later, in 2020, that a leftist did propose doing essentially that. In fairness, though, Oglala Sioux President Julian Bear Runner wanted to be civilized about it.
Mt. Rushmore should be “removed,” he said, “but not blown up.”
That monument is still with us, of course (for now). And you may assume that statue-toppling was left behind with the heady George Floyd-sensitivity days of the early 2020s. Well, tell that to one Charles Collins, San Francisco Arts Commission president at large.
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By Selwyn Duke
Some would call it “progress.” Others would say it’s poetic justice or being hoist with your own petard. Whatever you call it, it certainly is ironic.
First, a liberal Canadian politician pushes mass Third World migration because, well, Diversity™. Then guess what just happened this past Saturday?
That man, Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, the favorite to win what essentially was a primary, got diversified right out of a political-office opportunity by an immigrant.
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By Selwyn Duke
Here’s a point to ponder: Despite being 31-33 percent Republican, New Hampshire has no GOP congressman. What would a Republican congressional district look like were the state forced to create one?
Then, imagine Massachusetts had to forge a district for its gun owners, who comprise just 14.7 percent of the state’s population. Would it or the New Hampshire district look anything like this?
By Selwyn Duke
For decades, there would be much talk among politicians about United States budget deficits (and the national debt). Yet this faded sometime after 2010, at the latest, after which our debt achieved elephant-in-the-room status. It’s perhaps just too scary or inconvenient — when you want or are promising free stuff — to discuss. Regardless, what just happened is discussion-worthy. To wit:
U.S. public debt has reached 100 percent of GDP for just the second time (first was during the Covid pandemic) since the WWII-era. We’re now in league with debtor nations such as Greece, Italy, France, and Canada.
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My time working with kids, decades ago, left me with some interesting stories. One of them involved a boy of about 10 — I’ll call him Joe (not his real name) — who’d been diagnosed with “ADHD.” His mother told me a mental-health professional gave them a book for him to read on children thus diagnosed. She ended up taking it away from Joe, however. Why?
He began, she explained, copying the bad behavior of the archetypal ADHD child in the book.
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By Selwyn Duke
In the 19th century, European immigrants might write home a letter including something such as the following. “Dear Uncle Maarten, it’s unbelievable: Here in America, I can eat meat every day!” Such a lifestyle was unheard of in the Old World. And now there may be the 21st-century version of this incredulity. It goes something like this:
“Dear Uncle Maarten, it’s unbelievable: Here in America, I see meat advertisements every day!”
This isn’t so far-fetched now that Amsterdam, Holland, has just banned the advertising of all meat products. This comes on the heels, too, of another story about the “War on Meat.” In that case, cited were two “bioethics” professors who suggested spreading ticks whose bite can cause a severe meat allergy. (Yes, really.) Insofar as drug capital Amsterdam goes, however, meat is not the only target. As The Independent reported Monday:
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By Selwyn Duke
The Muslim Brotherhood once outlined a plan that “involved softening America through cultural influence, political infiltration, and demographic expansion,” as one ex-Muslim observer related it. And now critics have an Exhibit A in the cultural-influence department.
To celebrate the Islamic holiday Eid, there’ll be an event originally billed as “Muslims Only” at a taxpayer-funded Texas waterpark.
After a backlash, the organizer changed the messaging to, “modest dress only” and added “all are welcome” to celebrate Eid. But here’s the kicker:
However the event is framed, it appears legal.
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By Selwyn Duke
If your three children all got sick the day after a new kid came over to play, you’d have a decent clue about who the vector of disease was. This comes to mind with the reintroduction in California of an ancient killer: tuberculosis (TB).
The world’s deadliest infectious disease, TB caused an estimated 1.23 million deaths worldwide in 2024. In fact, approximately 10.7 million people were sickened by it that year. And the disease ranks among the top 10 overall causes of global mortality.
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By Selwyn Duke
It raised eyebrows when Michelle Obama said at a 2008 campaign rally, “For the first time in my adult lifetime, I am really proud of my country.” (And all it took was her husband becoming a probable presidential nominee.) But she’s not alone in lacking pride. In fact, a 2025 Gallup poll found that only 36 percent of Democrats are very proud to be American. (This doesn’t likely result from a spiritual quest to develop humility, either.)
Critics may point out that much of this hinges on who controls government. Surveyed Democrats do, after all, register lower pride numbers now that President Donald Trump is in office.
Yet this gets at a reality: When speaking of loving America, which “America” is at issue? Is it the republic of our Founding Fathers’ dreams — or of Karl Marx’s? Is it the one we once were heading toward or the one we’re now heading toward? Is it America or Amerika? Leftists very well may like the latter, in theory. (The experience of it would be quite different. See the Kronstadt sailors, et al.) But speaking of what these United States are meant to be, a commentator recently asked a question:
“Why Do Democrats Hate America?”
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