Author: Charlotte Hays

President Trump didn’t require the gift of prophecy to predict Iran will likely hang on until after the U.S. midterms. The latest is that the Iranian regime has mobilized its Houthis:

Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels captured more strategic islands in the southern Red Sea, government and Houthi officials said Monday, strengthening their control of a major maritime shipping route.

The capture of the islands of Greater and Lesser Hanish is the latest in the rebels’ swift advance around the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, a key passage for Saudi oil shipments that has only become more crucial during the Iran war since it serves as an alternative to the Strait of Hormuz.

It’s going to be a bad day for the markets. Brent crude jumped above $108 after the Saudis shut down a critical pipeline that bypasses the Strait of Hormuz. AI fears are also a factor. Meanwhile, a former Pentagon official suggests that the Houthis have “walked into a kill box”:

Iran-backed Houthi rebels captured Perim Island in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait Sept. 11, opening a new front at a vital global shipping chokepoint as a former Pentagon official warned Sunday the militants had entered a “kill box.”

“But they’ve put themselves into a kill box. They’re nowhere near the capability of the United States and if the president so chooses, he can wipe them off the face of that rock pretty easily,” Murphy warned.

But closer to home, do the bots really want to kill us? “Obama and the Dems are suspiciously sounding the ‘AI apocalypse’ alarm — just in time for the midterms,” proposes the New York Post’s Miranda Devine. Here is how she begins:

The “AI Apocalypse” scare campaign looks suspiciously like the climate hoax. How convenient that it’s come to a head right as the midterm election season kicks off this week.

The campaign launch was when Jacob Coxon, a low-level 27-year-old AI researcher, trumpeted his resignation from AI company Anthropic in a Wall Street Journal exclusive last week followed by a viral X thread warning AI will “kill us all.”

“The people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade . . . They are gambling with our lives,” he claimed.

His boss, the Democrat-aligned Anthropic founder and CEO Dario Amodei, amplified Coxon’s apocalyptic message with a 3,800-word essay on Saturday, followed by a giddy interview CBS aired Sunday in which he essentially called for a one-world government to regulate AI.CBS aired Sunday in which he essentially called for a one-world government to regulate AI….

Of course Barack Obama is involved. The former president and back-room Machiavelli “has taken a special interest in AI in recent years, and has offered himself as a sounding board to industry leaders, including [Open AI’s Sam] Altman and Mr. Amodei,” says The New York Times.

An editorial in the Wall Street Journal recognizes that “warnings of Apocalypse are also growing, often uninformed and amplified by those like Bernie Sanders who want government to stop the industry until the politicians can run it.” In an op-ed headlined “We Need a Science of the AI Mind,” Cameron Berg argues that we aren’t doomed but that models are advancing more quickly than our understanding of them.

Matthew Hennessey writes, meanwhile, that Anthropic CEO Amodei created a monster and wants everyone else to stop it. He might not get his way. President Trump brushes off AI apocalypse: “Whoever wins AI, wins.” Speaker Mike Johnson says AI leaders must meet with Congress over safety concerns, but he resists calls for a moratorium.

While bots are allegedly getting smarter, Allyssia Finley’s column this morning is headlined “Yes, Children Really Are Getting Dumber.” The bots—or rather reliance on AI—are a big part of the problem: 

Covid school shutdowns no doubt contributed to the learning loss, though they don’t appear to be the primary culprit, given that scores fell in countries that kept schools mostly open. But there are two common denominators across most countries where scores fell: increasing classroom distractions and reliance on artificial intelligence.

According to a Thomas B. Fordham Institute survey published last week, half of high-school students and recent graduates say they use social media during class every day. When devices are supposed to be used for instructional purposes in class, 58% said peers watch videos, use social media or engage in off-task activities.

Are students really to blame? As a result of their less mature brains, kids exhibit less impulse control and self-restraint than adults. Assigning in-class lessons on devices invites kids to rush through them so they can goof off. The result: hasty reading and math.

“Girl, Diagnosed.” A new book by a psychiatrist examines “our obsession with mental-health labels”:

In “Girlhood, Translated: Understanding Young Women in the Age of Therapy Speak,” Dr. Garfinkel-Crowell vividly describes her patients’ reliance on social-media buzzwords to understand themselves and their problems. Despite her suspicion of therapy-speak, Dr. Garfinkel-Crowell still believes in the value of therapy itself, unsurprising for a working psychiatrist. Unlike some other recent books, “Girlhood, Translated” defends the work of responsible clinicians.

Dr. Garfinkel-Crowell explains that many of her patients now arrive in her office with a self-diagnosis that they pressure her to affirm.

Culture War. The Kennedy Center could close as early as tomorrow, according to the Washington Post. The newspaper cites a “bleak,” 57-page packet distributed to the institution’s trustees that indicates a looming financial crisis, including the possibility of bankruptcy:

The presentation makes clear that Trump’s support hinges on getting public credit for his involvement. The financial resolution says Trump has offered to “raise the necessary funds to keep the Center from bankruptcy” while the building undergoes a sweeping renovation. But it says Trump is unlikely to provide “fundamental oversight” of that project or lead a financial rescue without “appropriate recognition” of his role.

“The New ObamaCare Trust Busters” describes how Democrats now want to break up the large firms they helped to create:

Who knew Jesus was an antitrust lawyer? So sayeth Texas Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico, who recently invoked his Lord and Savior in his campaign to “break up these big healthcare monopolies.” You have to chuckle at Democrats campaigning to crush the trusts they created.

Mr. Talarico held an event with billionaire Mark Cuban in which he laid out a plan to break up vertically integrated healthcare companies. “Healthcare corporations are ripping us off—jacking up premiums and profiting off our pain,” he said. Later he suggested that breaking up the companies is what Jesus would do.

The Senate hopeful cited reports claiming that 90% of U.S. hospital beds are controlled by large hospital systems, and three pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) process some 80% of prescriptions. Healthcare consolidation has increased and is driving up prices. But government policies, especially ObamaCare, have driven the consolidation….

A study this year by University of Chicago and Northwestern researchers found evidence that ObamaCare’s profit cap spurred insurers to combine with providers and shift profits to affiliates. The result: Higher prices and out-of-pocket costs for patients. The medical-loss ratio has also contributed to higher drug costs.

The revamped “60 Minutes” last night had an interview with the U.S. Air Force Colonel shot down in Iran and his miraculous survival story. Compelling TV, I’m told. Good shows, however, won’t deter the Left, which hates Bari Weiss, whose first “60 Minutes” installment this was.

From “The Lindsay Clancy Holdout Juror Is a Black Man. Here’s Why Gayle King Needed To ‘Sit with’ That For Just A Second’,” by Eddie Scarry at The Federalist:

“Is the holdout juror a person of — a black man?” asked King in near disbelief. Devlin said he was. King asked again, to be sure. “A black man is the holdout juror?” Yes, Devlin said, looking every bit as dismayed as King.

“Whoa,” said King, who was fortunately seated safely in a large cushioned chair, lest she had face planted. “I have to sit with that for just a second.”

A Few for the Road. As Townhall’s Matt Vespa notes, the media went after the holdout juror. … Vespa on why Randi Weingarten is involving herself in lawsuits over illegal CDL drivers. … Should the child tax credit be expanded? It could be a step toward universal basic income.  

Never Forget.

The cover of the New York Post is the iconic photo of New York firefighters in a sea of rubble.  “In Our Hearts” is the caption. The other Post also has a good photo spread.

Families of the casualties (I prefer this word to “victims”) and dignitaries will gather in solemn events (here also) around the United States (and the world). We will again be awed and proud of the courage and dignity of those who suffered loss.

But we need to do something in addition to honoring them. New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who joined a “Peace Walk” at its final stop (New York’s Islamic Center), says he wants to “stand in solidarity” with “those we’ve lost.” The New York Times this morning portrays Mamdani as a victim himself—of Islamophobia. Mamdani refuses to heed survivor families, who do not want him to attend. 

The Free Press has an excellent package on September 11—General David Petraeus on the usually unsung George W. Bush’s leadership and courage and the surge; a doctor who worked the hospital shift that day; and an interview with Frank Siller of the charity Tunnels and Towers, whose firefighter brother died September 11. Niall Ferguson writes a piece headlined “9/11 Did Not Doom the American Empire“:

I predicted its decline 25 years ago. Today, the U.S. has serious problems, but our rivals have even bigger ones.

The American Enterprise Institute’s Danielle Pletka is not so optimistic (“25 Years after 9/11 Osama bin Laden Is Winning”—not in body perhaps but in spirit). Nor is Spiked on Line’s Brendan O’Neill, who writes, “We are still failing the moral test of 9/11.” O’Neill highlights Western self-loathing and urges the West to assert itself. O’Neill writes:

Imagine if you had told someone on 11 September 2001 that in 25 years’ time the streets of New York City would ring out with sympathy for Islamofascism. Imagine if you had said to one of the startled souls watching American lives be incinerated by Islamist filth that one day the West would swarm with youths cosplaying as Islamist filth.

Imagine if you had said that in a mere quarter of a century even our leafiest campuses would be awash with jihad chic, with silver-spoon students gushing over an Islamo-army (Hamas) every bit as hateful and medieval as the one that burnt New Yorkers alive.

The Federalist, in the same vein, proposes that 9/11 revealed the weakness of a post-Christian West. An editorial in the Wall Street Journal argues that the War on Terror succeeded but the U.S. homeland is more vulnerable now than it was 25 years ago.

Meanwhile, Jonathan Clarke writes about “September 11 and the Loss of Certainty“: Clarke remembers the effect on him of the bodies falling from the Twin Towers. Stephen Kruiser of PJ Media asserts that “Any Moral Equivalence About 9/11 Is Pure Evil.” “Name the Enemy,” Fred Fleitz of AMAC orders. At Independent Women, we especially remember Barbara Olson, one of our own who was on the plane that crashed into the Pentagon.

Last night was JD night at the GOP midterm convention. “Vance’s Prime-Time Speech Kicks Off Sprint to 2028” is a Wall Street Journal headline:

Vice President JD Vance looked very much like a presidential candidate-in-waiting at the Republican convention this week. He delivered a prime-time address, met with delegates from battleground states and headlined a high-dollar fundraiser with GOP donors.

Vance’s Thursday night speech fired up the crowd, as he laid out his vision for the America he wants his children to grow up in while painting Democrats as extreme. During the speech, audience members said the quiet part out loud, shouting “48!” Donald Trump is the 47th U.S. president, and the next one will be the 48th.

“We’ve got to take care of business this November, then we’ll worry about what comes next,” Vance said.

The report goes on to remark on support for Secretary of State Marco Rubio, with some pushing for “VanceRubio.” Vance’s response to a heckler is proclaimed “hilarious.”

Skunk at the Garden Party? Kimberley Strassel argues today that President Trump’s midterm convention targeted the wrong audience: “It’s the ‘traditional Republicans’ he needs to get to the polls, not MAGA enthusiasts.” Here are key takeaways.

“Trumpapalooza is over, but the debate over the GOP’s future is just beginning,” writes Matthew Continetti in the Wall Street Journal’s Free Expression section. Continetti is offering his take on the GOP’s childcare proposal. He writes:

Here are the details: The Health and Human Services Department is preparing a rule that would grant stay-at-home parents access to the Child Care and Development Fund, a $12 billion program that currently subsidizes child care for low-income workers. Since the 1990s, the fund has provided eligible parents some $9,000 a year to help pay the cost of child care. Most recipients are single moms.

What’s surprising is how lively conservative discussion has been over the leaked proposal. It’s a reminder that President Trump didn’t settle arguments on the right so much as delay them. The force of his personality has overwhelmed policy debates for over a decade. Politics has been a matter of defining one’s relationship to an individual rather than to a set of principles. Now that the 2028 election is coming into view, conservatives feel liberated to argue the merits of an idea rather than a person.

Listen to the advocates of Mr. Vance’s family policy, and you hear big government conservatism. “The welfare state already exists,” writes Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts. “The subsidies already exist. And conservatives do not have the votes to dismantle either. Until that changes, taxpayer dollars should reward family formation, not subsidize its decline.”

Heritage vice president and former Trump administration official Roger Severino adds, “To respond to a clear improvement in allocation of existing funds with cries of ‘socialist!’ is either grossly unserious or grossly uninformed.” The message: Subsidizing stay-at-home moms is realistic, forward-looking and harmless.

Speaking of Families: Free-range parenting advocate Lenore Skenazy has a good Washington Post column about Karyann Parkinson’s decision to permit her five-year-old son to go for a walk that resulted in a six-month suspended jail sentence for her:

This new, limited idea of what kids are capable of explains why a 5-year-old walking around his neighborhood at lunchtime can look like a baby crawling along I-95 at midnight. Thanks to Karyann’s transgression — trusting her son — she was placed on Virginia’s child abuse and neglect registry for seven years. In court, she was found guilty of “contributing to the delinquency of a minor” — a Class 1 misdemeanor — and given a six-month suspended jail sentence.

American voters aren’t the only ones paying attention to the midterms. The Iranian regime is too, and President Trump believes they will hang on until after the midterms. But can they last that long? Headline: “Iranians Are Running Out of Gas as Economic Squeeze Takes Hold.” But this isn’t good: Iran’s proxies, the Houthis, have taken control of a Red Sea chokepoint.

If You Like Your Healthcare Plan, You Can Keep Your Healthcare Plan … yeah, I seem to have heard something like that before. James Freeman suggests that we wouldn’t really benefit from “Medicare for All”:

Large federal interventions in U.S. healthcare are a big reason medical inflation has outpaced general inflation for decades. But if politicians now impose a fully government-run system on Americans under the euphemism “Medicare for All,” it is patient suffering that will go through the roof.

More on the Labor Day Socialism conference that drew 3,000 socialists to Chicago’s Hyatt Regency McCormick Place to plan to abolish police, prisons, capitalism, and the family. City Journal has the scoop:

More than three years after the end of the Covid-19 pandemic, the conference required attendees to wear masks at all times except for when speakers were actively presenting. … In a session titled “Femme-inism Against Cisness: Bread, Roses, and Hormones, Too,” British Marxist writer Sophie Lewis delivered a talk on concepts such as “whorish artifice” and “transfeminist abolitionism.” At last year’s conference, Lewis provided more detail about what abolition means to her, stating, “When you abolish the police, you do burn down police stations.” This year, she drew on themes from her book Femmephilia: Love Letters to Trans Mermaids, Queer Mothers, and Marilyn Monroe to argue against “cisness,” defined as “the naturalization of assigned sex.”