Local Teens Speak Out at Inaugural D.C. Teen Summit
House approves GOP bill to create public safety commission for DC
D.C.’s speed cameras are catching super violators. Most have Va. and Md. tags.: The most egregious violators have racked up thousands of dollars in unpaid fines for several hundred tickets. - "The biggest obstacle to better enforcement in the city is that most violators live in Maryland or Virginia. Of the 103 vehicles with the most tickets in fiscal 2025, 67 have Virginia plates, 25 have Maryland plates, and 3 have D.C. plates. Of the 100 top speeds registered by cameras in the past two years, 37 of the vehicles involved had Virginia plates, 35 carried Maryland plates, and 13 featured D.C. plates."
Miscellanea: The War in Iran - "The result is a fairly classic escalation trap: once the conflict starts, it is extremely costly for either side to ever back down, which ensures that the conflict continues long past it being in the interests of either party. Every day this war goes on make both the United States and Iran weaker, poorer and less secure but it is very hard for either side to back down because there are huge costs connected to being the party that backs down. So both sides ‘escalate to de-escalate’ (this phrase is generally as foolish as it sounds), intensifying the conflict in an effort to hit hard enough to force the other guy to blink first. But since neither party can back down unilaterally and survive politically, there’s practically no amount of pain that can force them to do so.
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"There is a very real risk that this conflict will end with Iran as the de facto master of the Strait of Hormuz and the Persian Gulf, having demonstrated that no one can stop them from determining by force which ships pass and which ships cannot. That would, in fact, be a significant strategic victory for Iran and an enormous strategic defeat for the United States.
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"But the United States is likewise going to bear diplomatic costs here. Right now the Gulf States have to shelter against Iranian attack but when the dust settles they – and many other countries – will remember that the United States unilaterally initiated by surprise a war of choice which set off severe global economic headwinds and uncertainty. Coming hot on the heels of the continuing drama around tariffs, the takeaway in many places may well be ‘Uncle Sam wants you to be poor,’ which is quite a damaging thing for diplomacy. And as President Trump was finding out when he called for help in the Strait of Hormuz and got told ‘no’ by all of our traditional allies, it is in fact no fun at all to be diplomatically isolated, no matter how powerful you are."
Building Tanks While the Ukrainians Master Drones: Ukrainian drones have made artillery and armored vehicles look obsolete. Why is the world still buying them? - "In the end, Rheinmetall has a strong incentive to continue making the expensive weapons it has made for much of its history, even if they can be blown apart by drones that cost less than the average smartphone."
The Surprising Reason for the New Homophobia: Americans are burned-out, frustrated, and hunting for scapegoats. - "But any good explanation of how queer personalities are formed begins with the acknowledgment of how powerful marginalization can be. Gay people realize, at some early age, that the world isn't made for people like them. And for men, raised with the social pressure to seek dominance, that realization can lead to an obsession with climbing the rungs-whether in the context of sex, money, or something else. All of which is to say: Gay men are the original incels. They are born into heightened status anxiety and must maneuver to get ahead. And one way to do that is to be hot."
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