Welcome to The Square Inch, a Friday newsletter on Christianity, culture, and all of the many-varied “square inches” of God’s domain. This is a paid subscription feature with a preview before hitting the paywall. Please consider subscribing to enjoy this weekly missive along with an occasional “Off The Shelf” feature about books, a frequent Pipe & Dram feature of little monologues/conversations in my study, and Wednesday’s “The Quarter Inch,” a quick(er) commentary on current events.
Dear Friends,
Since I gypped you all of a current events roundup on Wednesday by writing a whole essay I hadn’t intended to write, why don’t I make it up to you today?
I trust you all enjoyed that State of the Union speech by President Biden. I don’t begrudge any of you for tuning in, but I had better things to do. You are certainly under no obligation to take my point of view, but there is literally nothing that either of these two candidates could possibly say that would entice me to lending aid, support, comfort, or a vote to their cause. We have unserious parties and unserious candidates in, alas, serious times.
Having perused the commentariat, it appears that Joe Biden managed to remain sentient for the whole affair. Score a point. It also appears that he was feisty and incredibly partisan. Democrats everywhere breathed a sigh of relief, but they should be careful what they wish for. Erick Erickson notes that the speech was a broadside to his own party that said, “I AM NOT GOING ANYWHERE!” So, yeah. He stayed awake and had the stamina to stand up for an hour (Erickson is convinced it was chemically induced, and he’s probably not wrong), but it means they are now completely stuck with Joe Biden for President. Not exactly worth popping the cork on the champagne, is it?
I understand the speech was the most nakedly partisan and divisive ever given at a State of the Union. Surprising, from “Joe the Uniter.” No, it isn’t. Joe Biden has been a fixture in American politics longer than I have been alive (getting close to a half-century) and he is what he has always been: an arrogant, ignorant, and obnoxious political hack. He is going with the “Democracy is at stake” line of argument and making restoring Roe v. Wade the centerpiece of his campaign. You can have one of those two things, but not both. Roe was arguably the most undemocratic regime in our storied history.
And it bears reminding that Roe is absolutely barbaric. Unfettered, unregulated abortion from conception to the very final moment prior to birth is not just grossly evil, but a global outlier. The Progressive Left just celebrated the fact that France has now (sadly) enshrined a right to abortion in their constitution. What they fail to notice is that France enshrined it up to fourteen weeks of pregnancy. These same people foam at the mouth at the very suggestion of a sixteen week ban. Bad faith all the way down.
Anyway, if you’re no fan of Joe Biden but can’t bring yourself to vote for the other guy, vote against the Democrat in your House and Senate races if you want to stop Biden (or, let’s be real: Kamala Harris) from making good on these outlandish promises.
The country of Haiti is in turmoil, which must mean that it’s Friday. When are they not in turmoil, with kidnappings for ransom, gang warfare, and all-around third-world Banana Republic problems? Most recently, the Prime Minister is trying to remain in power but he can’t actually get back into his country. Gang attacks have closed their airport and freed over 4,000 inmates from the local prison. I have no commentary on the current mess.
I want to know why Haiti is essentially a failed state, while it exists on the very same island as the Dominican Republic—a first-world country that is a paradise by comparison. I did a little browsing around on Google and found it interesting that the entire first page was filled with think-pieces by NPR, The Guardian, Human Rights Watch, Vox, PBS—all left-of-center groups focusing mainly on different colonial experiences—differing degrees of oppression, in other words. (Never forget that Google does have an algorithm and they love their favorites.) And Google’s “Generative AI” feature (Gemini, is that you?) wants me to know that Haiti is so poor because French colonizers exploited coffee and sugar farmers two centuries ago, and also that in addition to poor economic development, foreign interventions, political instability, social unrest, and devastating natural disasters, Haiti also has “other problems:” Gender-based violence, discrimination against people with disabilities, violence against LGBT people, and the fact that the political class are all involved in gangs. Yeah, Gemini gives it to you straight-up.
You know who else was colonized two centuries ago? The Dominican Republic. I find it fascinating how none of these “top line” results on Google say anything at all about actual economic policy beyond euphemisms (“poor economic development”). Two groups of people, sharing a single island; one is in abject poverty and the other relatively flourishing. It’s the western hemisphere’s version of North and South Korea. Somebody should study that. And they probably have, and if you know of a good essay or article on it, give me the links in the comments! Because I really am interested. I have a sneaking suspicion Fernando De Soto’s amazing book, The Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere Else contains many of the answers.
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