Nobody wants to admit this, but Ronald Reagan granting amnesty to millions of illegals in California was part of the problem.

— Pro America Politics (@Pro__Trading) June 9, 2025

Well, duh. Forget Democrat or Republican. Think, instead, neoliberal or not. Neoliberal is always pro-open borders. Originally, neoliberalism was concentrated on the Right (Reagan, Thatcher). By the end of the 1990s, more left-wing political parties in the West were neoliberal in comparison with right-wing parties. This is one of the most widely analyzed phenomena in social studies.

You can’t be “freedom above all” and not be in favor of one of the most important freedoms of all which is the freedom of reside wherever you are. People who are shocked that Rand and Massie are pro-open borders are not paying attention to the degree that’s quite scary.

The richest people in the country openly vaunt their desire to underpay workers:

The rich denizens of Martha’s Vineyard keep lecturing us about the plight of African Americans yet they have brought in illegals because they don’t have to pay them as much as they would have to pay black citizens.

An extraordinary amount of suffering was occasioned both in the US and these migrants’ home countries so that some rich bitch on Martha’s Vineyard can have cheap maids.

Here's a slice of life in Democrat-run Los Angeles: I've been teaching my 5yo to swim. My wife and I promised him that when he becomes water safe, we'll treat him to a small Lego of his choice at our local Target. He's finally gotten the hang of swimming, so this morning we took… pic.twitter.com/lIdrlHs6AW

— Noah Pollak (@NoahPollak) June 8, 2025

We don’t have this where I live. Everything is standing openly on the shelves at Target, Walgreens, Walmart, everywhere. The only thing I’ve seen locked down are bottles of Scotch upwards of $300.

I’ve heard in some places even detergent is under lock and key.

For a normal person, these locked shelves are a signal of a lower quality of life. When everybody gets treated like a criminal because there are many criminals in a community, that has a demoralizing effect.

When I traveled to the UK in 1990, little stores would place their wares outside. There was no supervision, and as a Soviet child I was stunned by this carefree, trusting approach. When I went back to the UK in 2012 and 2015, I no longer saw that. And it’s sad.

I like going for walks at night. It’s a thing I do, especially in the summer when it’s too hot to move while the sun is out. I’m acutely aware how unusual and precious it is for a woman to be completely comfortable, unafraid, and free on dark, silent streets. I want my daughter and then her daughter to have this. An enormous effort of civilization went into making this very unnatural and very beautiful reality possible.

We can’t make everybody else on the planet live like this. And we shouldn’t try. But neither should we give it up. It’s such a wonderful thing. Let’s do everything to keep it.

Does anybody have an explanation for why Israel stopped the Greta Thunberg boat? What is the purpose? What’s the big deal if she does get to Gaza?

Where’s Tucker Carlson when you need him?

One of the most interesting things about Mexican-Americans is that, despite their vast numbers in the US, they contribute almost nothing to scientific and technological innovation here, comparing poorly to other immigrant groups in this regard (especially on a per capita basis). https://t.co/NSwVDCY7vV

— i/o (@avidseries) June 8, 2025

I still can’t get over the story of a dude who opened a school for computer programmers in Ukraine. It was very successful, so he decided to open another one in Mexico.

Matt, blaming individuals for systemic government failures is lazy analysis. Mexicans flee corruption, not culture—and many of them work harder for this country than the people born here. Try again.

— OneStepCollective (@OneStepCol) June 8, 2025

Whose corruption do Mexicans flee? Is corruption like Godzilla, a magical beast that is chained in the middle of Tlatelolco and the only way to avoid it is to run away?

To those who can, I highly recommend reading Fabricación by Ricardo Raphael or Salvar el fuego by Guillermo Arriaga. That is Mexico as narrated by the most talented Mexicans. That is most certainly the culture. It’s wonderful in many ways. And it’s also extremely dysfunctional in others.

I told my mother about the conflict between Trump and Musk. She’s very not politicized and doesn’t like Trump but she immediately said, “But how can you lower the national debt if the border is wide open and there are millions of illegals?”

This is not as complicated as many people pretend.

I’ve been a little overwhelmed. I’m teaching an online asynchronous course, which puts me into a vile mood but nobody is paying for anything else. Our university restructurings is underway, and there’s unrelenting weirdness at work. My writing is as intense as ever. So in any case, my car looks downright indecent because I have no time to go to a car wash.

This is me taking a nap in the office on Saturday:

Today is Pentecost, and it means an extra long service. As if any Orthodox service could ever be not extra long but you know what I mean. So while I was inside, one of the parishioners cleaned my car. It had nasty tar stains that I didn’t know how to erase, and he took care of all that.

As nice as the action itself is the reason for it. The guy is sweet on my friend and is trying to impress her.