A view from vacation

It’s 7 AM on Wednesday in Budapest as I write (dictate) this, 11 PM Tuesday night in Denver. I’ve picked up some new subscribers (thank you!) in recent days and thought I should write (dictate) a little something even though I am on vacation (mostly) traveling with KOA listeners.

Even though I’m on vacation and probably making a mistake by at least somewhat keeping up on the news, I am doing so. I’ll just touch on a few things that have happened in recent days that seem like they are worth a mention. Not in order of importance, but just in the order that they pop into my head:

President Trump continues to Swing wildly between threats of massive destruction of Iranian infrastructure and pausing military activity for one reason or another, the latest being his statement that he is waiting for a “unified“ Iranian proposal, the idea of being that there are divisions within the Iranian government, which is certainly true.

The American stock market has recovered essentially all losses from the war which is truly remarkable to watch. Especially with oil prices and interest rates still elevated. It’s difficult to reconcile the stock market’s confidence in a relatively quick favorable outcome of the war with the obvious challenges to that happening in the fact that Iran is now more convinced than ever that they can leverage the world by closing the Strait of Hormuz. As far as the divisions within Iranian leadership, it seems likely that the IRGC has increased its power, which is also a net negative for the United States.

I maintain my view that this is a fight that is worth having and that the United States should’ve dealt with Iran a long time ago. I just don’t share the trust of the somewhat shrinking MAGA base or the stock market that President Trump has the skill set and the temperament to turn this into something close to an American victory. So far, despite the destruction of much of the Iranian military, this feels like a tie… Which is functionally a loss, especially when you think about the lessons that Xi Jinping will take from this adventure.

Speaking of the somewhat shrinking base, it’s slightly interesting to see Tucker Carlson now apologize for supporting Trump. In our group of listeners , most of whom are at least somewhat conservative (after all, they are talk radio listeners), folks wonder what has happened to Tucker or Candace to turn them into such raging antisemites and seemingly anti-American. I don’t know how many votes these people control with their messaging, but in a country with close elections, losing even a modest part of a political base can be electorally fatal. I also note a real weakening of support for Trump even among people who voted for him (meaning among the people I am traveling with who voted for him.)

As we head toward midterm elections which are less than seven months away now, supporters of Republicans are trying to make themselves feel better by noting correctly that Democrats are even less popular than Trump. It’s not irrelevant but historically midterms have been a vote about the popularity of the president which is why Republicans are in big trouble at the moment. I still think they are more likely than not to keep the Senate, but it seems like a very close call, which was not the case a year ago. Democrats will probably come out of the midterms with something like a 10 or 15 seat majority in the House. The swing towards the Democrats will not be quite as big as history would suggest simply because of how much gerrymandering there has been.

Speaking of gerrymandering, voters in Virginia seem to have passed an override to existing state law in order to allow what they expect will be a massive redrawing of congressional districts aimed at having 10 Democrats and one Republican in the House of Representatives, versus six Democrats and five Republicans now. This is a result of Trump stupidly, pushing Texas to do a mid-decade redistricting as if Democrats would not respond. The result may well be a net loss for Republicans in the House, but that’s not the most important point. The bigger problem is that creating fewer and fewer competitive seats is a disaster for our representative form of government. I don’t know if there would be a legal basis for the Supreme Court to rule against this kind of manipulation of congressional representation, but if there is one, I hope they will use it. It’s outrageous and dangerous how few competitive seats we have.

if there’s one guy you can count on to be the very last member of the Cult of Trump, it’s Sean Hannity, who announced after the dust up between Trump and the pope (which Trump cannot possibly win) that he (Hannity) was leaving the Catholic Church. There can be plenty of reasons to leave the Catholic Church and Hannity says it is because of corruption within that institution, but it’s easier to believe that Hannity sees Trump, as Trump clearly does, as some kind of Messiah, whether in a near literal sense or just in the sense of boosting his show ratings by pandering to the Cult of Trump. I don’t care one way or another about the Catholic Church but I do find Hannity‘s move oddly depressing.

All right, let’s move away from American politics… I’m on vacation after all

We visited Prague, which is a very beautiful city, but I probably don’t need to go back. The astronomical clock is a true marvel and the famous Charles Bridge and castle are beautiful and worth seeing, but there’s something a little bit offputting about a city so completely dominated by tourism. I mean, I get it… A country that was somewhat poor can make a ton of money from rich tourists, but for me, seeing Chanel and Versace, and so many other high-end stores, and Starbucks everywhere (even in the castle) is a turn off. It’s a place that’s definitely worth seeing once, but only once.

Vienna felt like the most upscale city I have ever visited. Unsurprisingly they have a very strong, classical music culture, and as we were walking around on Saturday evening, there were plenty of men in tuxedos and women in Lovely dresses heading to a concert. At least in the center of the city, the architecture is spectacular. It was pretty cool to get up early and take the subway to the Schönbrunn Palace, the home of the Habsburg Family and notably Empress, Maria Theresa, and go for a run through the beautiful gardens.

We took a river cruise on the Danube and visited the Melk Abbey which has been a functioning monastery for something like 1000 years. Remarkable place with one of the most beautiful churches I’ve ever seen.

We stopped in Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia, which is a lovely small city. For me, the most interesting part was the comment by the guide about how when she grew up, Vienna was only an hour away but seemed impossibly far because she was behind the Iron Curtain and did not get to Vienna until she was 17 years old. Her daughter, now 20, can barely imagine what that must’ve been like. It’s remarkable to think of how much sadness and poverty and suffering was caused by communism and how many people there are, including in the United States, who still think that somehow it’s a good idea. I mean, one of them just became mayor of New York City.

Now we are in Budapest and we’ll go on a tour soon after I finish writing this note. I’m very much looking forward to learning more about this city. My oldest friend and his wife, who live in Italy, flew up to meet me and we had a wonderful dinner here last night. So cool to drink Royal Tokaji In Hungary… I will certainly buy some to bring home.

I hope you have a wonderful rest of your week and I’ll talk with you again soon!