With vital commentary, of course internationalpolicy.org/publications...

This is the correct way to report on these boat strikes

Libertarians like Milei would say bailouts create moral hazard and incentivize risky policies in the future

Anti-corruption is a winning electoral platform in many many other countries in the world. Including ones that are less corrupt than the US!

Worth a listen!

This is absurd on its face. If the Trump administration is deporting criminals to El Salvador because they apparently trust that country’s justice system over our own, why are they sending a murderer back to the country that let him out of prison in the first place?

And keep in mind many of the people they are arresting, and many who were deported to El Salvador, are/were legally in the US on visas, TPS, or court-ordered protections.

It’s always unclear if his more punitive policies, whether on immigration or tariffs, are motivated by xenophobia or are simply shakedowns. It’s probably both.

There are many establishment Democrats invested in blaming “the groups” so as to avoid blaming “the consultants” and to justify shoveling millions more dollars to them to lose future elections

Political scientists: the IV estimator in our 2SLS model indicates that economic collapse may have an impact on voter behavior at a 0.05 significance level Data scientists:

A reminder that blowing up boats in the Caribbean does nothing to disrupt fentanyl trafficking, which doesn't come from Venezuela at all. As a synthetic drug, it increasingly is Made in the USA

Called it

For @palestinestudies.bsky.social’s Interactive Encyclopedia of the Palestine Question, I contributed an article on the Palestinian community of El Salvador, the third largest in Latin America. Fortuitously out on Sept. 15. Feliz Día de la Independencia!

New article on palestinians in El Salvador by @mpaarlberg.bsky.social Bukele had to come from somewhere 🫠 www.palquest.org/en/highlight...

Peak social science: let’s run 20 robustness checks to test if water is wet

This is par for the course for pundits whose only job is to have opinions, but it’s disappointing when politicians buy into it as well. I assume because they often go from hs debate club to college polisci major to law school, and don’t pass through social movements on their way to elected office.

This on the heels of the conviction of Uribe in Colombia. In the US, we refer disparagingly to countries that prosecute former presidents as “banana republics.” But which are better models of rule of law: countries that prosecute abuses of power at the highest level or those that never do?

One of Kirk’s more pernicious legacies was the whole “debate me bro” culture. He somehow convinced a lot of liberals like Ezra Klein and Gavin Newsom that “doing politics the right way” isn’t about organizing power, it’s about talking fast at people.

The best political lesson I got from working in the labor movement was during contract talks when I complained that the company was arguing something that’s untrue, organizers laughing at me and saying “You think whoever has the best argument wins? Winning is a question of power”

Fake military mobilizations against “drug traffickers” serve as a useful distraction for autocrats on both sides

"Cocaine, famously, comes from just three countries, Colombia, Peru, and Bolivia, none of which are Venezuela." -- @mpaarlberg.bsky.social for @cipolicy.bsky.social internationalpolicy.org/publications...

Looks like he’s going to have to find another boat to blow up

Mayor Adams should call another presser and show up with a full head of hair from one of his Turkey trips. Game change.

Todd once told me the best way to get engagement with op-eds is to say Trump is right about some things but for the wrong reasons. In any case this is a serious prescription at a crossroads moment for industrial policy. Worth a read.

Here is the @uaw.org statement on the arrests at Hyundai (h/t @lfelizleon.bsky.social)

Sen. Paul staking out an increasingly lonely position within a party that once stood for individual rights and due process and was skeptical of giving the federal government unlimited powers

A lesson from Latin American history: armed forces are among the most respected public institutions, but when the primary function of a state military shifts from national defense to domestic repression, it loses legitimacy. This can hasten the downfall of the state.

¿Hubo irregularidades en el ataque a la lancha rápida en el Caribe bajo la administración Trump? Según @mpaarlberg.bsky.social, el ataque sería una violación de los compromisos internacionales de EE.UU. youtu.be/D5co_u0IacM?...

I can’t imagine the timing of the Venezuela boat strike has anything to do with this…

Why didn’t we just track and interdict the vessel in US waters, arrest the crew and seize the drugs, as the US Coast Guard routinely does?

Oh well in that case

If Trump dies in office, Vance will be the Maduro to Trump’s Chavez: the uncharismatic imitator who must constantly genuflect to the deceased god-emperor because he has no base of his own, even as he has to deal with the collapsing economy left by his predecessor

Important reporting but I think media need to do a better job of pointing out many of those arrested are not, in fact, “undocumented immigrants”:

Really thoughtful interview with @cipolicy.bsky.social's @mpaarlberg.bsky.social on getting into the specifics of Venezuala/US migration policy guacamayave.com/en/michael-p...

Ironically the Trump DOJ is also dropping charges on real MS-13 leaders on whom they have actual extensive evidence, in order to deport them before they can testify about their pact with Bukele. In both cases the government fears what may come out in a criminal trial.

You mean the guy the Dems gave $700 million to lose the election? Can’t believe it

This is eerily similar to what Argentina’s junta did to children of alleged dissidents they disappeared during the Dirty War. Authoritarian learning is eternal.

El Salvador has 4 former presidents who were prosecuted - one of them jailed - for essentially the same thing

Waiting for his evangelical base to lecture him on sola fide and affirm that salvation is through faith and not works

There’s a lot of reasons for the astonishing downfall of the MAS, but the main one is named Evo.

Rubio thinks being Sec of State is burnishing his rep as a statesman for a future White House run. Instead, he’s being saddled with Trump’s most unpopular and illegal policies - eg Abrego Garcia - while having his credibility undermined daily.

From the Rubio State Department’s new human rights report for El Salvador. Good to know the constitution prohibits torture. Incidentally the constitution also prohibits running for reelection.

Trump is transparently doing everything he can to distract his base from the Epstein case. I worry the media are willing to move on from it because they feel they were burned by Russiagate and concluded the public doesn’t have the attention span for an ongoing scandal and coverup

One lesson Trump learned from Bukele is the crime issue can be a useful pretext for authoritarian consolidation regardless of the crime stats. If the stats don’t reflect the reality you want to present, you change them.

At least 10 disabled people have died in prison under El Salvador’s state of exception.

The Ezra Klein interview of Yoram Hazony, like an earlier one of Curtis Yarvin, is emblematic of this alarmingly common liberal fantasy that politics revolves around intellectuals with big ideas. The average Trump real estate buddy has more impact on policy than Yarvin or Hazony.

Correct. Many people portray Trump as returning to classic United Fruit Company-style 20th century US imperialism. But with his emphasis on state planning, strategic industries, plus domestic surveillance and party discipline, the aspirational model is China.

Geez. I cover implicit association tests in my research methods class to demonstrate how they are flawed. Even doing this probably gets us flagged.

Military force won’t work because DTOs like cartels are made up of shifting business arrangements between multiple illicit rackets specializing in production, trafficking, extortion etc. They are not unitary corporations, much less enemy states with a capital you can capture.