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The New Neo

A blog about political change, among other things

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Megyn, we hardly knew ye

The New Neo Posted on January 15, 2026 by neoJanuary 15, 2026

Once a strong supporter of Israel, Megyn Kelly seems to have now cast her lot with the Carlson/Owens/Fuentes crowd on the topic, at least potentially. She apparently has done little looking into the issue previously, if you can believe what she says in this clip. I’m just a lowly blogger, but I can assure you I’m quite familiar with both sides of the story; why isn’t she?:

What have I thought of Kelly over they years? When she first started with Fox, she seemed like one of the smarter newspeople and was unafraid to ask pointed questions of her guests. When Trump started his first campaign, she seemed very anti-Trump in the debates, and although I wasn’t keen at all on Trump at the time I didn’t think much of her question (see this). Then lately she’s seemed to veer more to the right.

After she left Fox, I noticed (the few times I watched her show) that she started covering more tabloid-type issues, and suddenly there was a lot of cursing from her, a kind of “tough-girl” persona.

And now this.

Posted in Israel/Palestine, Press | 13 Replies

Helping my ex …

The New Neo Posted on January 15, 2026 by neoJanuary 15, 2026

… deal with a medical issue. Nothing life-threatening, but I’ll be doing that for the next few hours.

I plan to resume posting after that.

Posted in Uncategorized | 5 Replies

Open thread 1/15/2026

The New Neo Posted on January 15, 2026 by neoJanuary 15, 2026

Posted in Uncategorized | 29 Replies

Anti-ICE demonstrations: it’s all fun and games until it’s not

The New Neo Posted on January 14, 2026 by neoJanuary 14, 2026

Do you recall that the press seemed okay with ICE before Trump came along? Here’s a video that might remind you; unfortunately, it can’t be embedded but you can view it here.

There’s also this:

2016. Obama’s Press Secretary is asked about reports that during immigration raids, ICE agents were storming into homes, going room to room looking for illegals, and making children tremble with fear.

I thought only fascist Presidents do that sort of thing.

Why was the press so civil? Why weren’t they crying or at least calling Obama a nazi?

How come nobody was shaving their head in protest? Surely there were a bunch of angry white liberal wine moms outside the building screaming at the top of their lungs, right?

Always keep in mind how fake and performative the outrage is.

I don’t think the present rage is fake. I’m basing this on the rage against ICE of some people I know. It’s real, and it’s created, fostered, and nurtured by Democrats and the press coverage as well as social media. It’s no accident at all, it’s deliberately drummed up, but the rank-and-file are for the most part sincere.

Some of the most active protesters seem to not understand that this is serious, and that their actions could be deadly serious – to themselves. For example, there was this:

Ask yourself what [Renee] Good’s partner’s conceptual world has to be like for her to scream [after Good was killed] “Why did you have real bullets?”

This is the outrage of someone who is discovering the hard limits of social construction.

Indeed. It’s also the result of too much reliance on imagology and not enough awareness of reality. Perhaps that’s saying more or less the same thing. But it doesn’t pay to live in a fantasy world where federal agents arresting criminals don’t have real bullets in their weapons, and impeding them – or even trying to run them down in your car – won’t have potentially very dire consequences resulting from the use of very real bullets.

It’s also a reflection of the fact that in this country, protesters are not shot unless they do something very dangerous. Despite the left’s rhetoric about ICE, the officers are not going around murdering people and demonstrations against them would be fine if those demonstrations were non-violent. So based on that knowledge, perhaps demonstrators get into a mindset of “anything goes” because they believe there will never be serious retaliation on the part of ICE. It’s paradoxical, but it makes a certain amount of sense – they hate ICE but rely on ICE’s general tolerance of dissent.

Who’s funding the training of these people? Here’s a piece that attempts to find out.

The left wants martyrs and is happy to have them and to exploit their deaths to fire up even more rage against ICE and Trump. It’s pretty much the Black Lives Matter playbook, only it’s not about race this time.

[NOTE: More from that tweet:

I’m reminded of a news story I read a couple of weeks ago. White couple out on the town, approached by a random black street psycho, random psycho insults the girl and spits at the guy, guy squares up to fight him.

The girl grabs her man’s arm and says “Don’t fight”. While she’s restraining him and his attention is distracted, black psycho stabs him to death.

That girl lived in a universe where everything was head pats and cookies and good intentions. So does Becca [Renee Good’s spouse]. And so, I’m pretty sure, did Renee Good.

I wonder about that analysis of the street fight. If an unarmed person is confronted at close quarters by someone with a knife, it’s very dangerous. I don’t think a fist fight necessarily stops the potential knifing at all – it might be best to try to get away as fast as possible. Knife attacks can be very quick, and even if the victim has a gun the knife often is faster at close quarters or even semi-close quarters.

Looking it up just now, I tried to identify the murder. If it was this one, the facts are significantly different from the description in that tweet:

Carson and his girlfriend were coming home from a wedding when the apparently unprovoked attack occurred, ABC New York station WABC reported.

The suspect walked past the couple while they were seated on a bench at a bus stop, police said. They then begin to walk toward the suspect, who started to damage scooters, police said. The suspect said to Carson, “What are you looking at?” according to NYPD Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny.

“Mr. Carson immediately places himself between the male and his female companion to protect her,” Kenny said during a press briefing on Wednesday.

As Carson tried to de-escalate the situation, the suspect swung a knife at him, Kenny said. Carson backed up and tripped, falling to the ground. The suspect then stabbed him three times, with the knife piercing his heart, Kenny said.

“As Mr. Carson laid dying on the sidewalk, the male with the knife kicks him in the chest, threatens to stab the woman companion and spits in her face,” Kenny said.

Awful, horrible, but the woman was not restraining Carson and he was trying to get away, having seen the knife. He was murdered because he tripped and fell, affording the murderer the opportunity to stab him. The perp spitting on the woman occurred afterwards.]

Posted in Immigration, Violence | 54 Replies

The waiting game in Iran

The New Neo Posted on January 14, 2026 by neoJanuary 14, 2026

The killings have reached enormous levels. The mullahs are like cornered rats with very sharp teeth:

With the Iranian regime conducting one of the deadliest crackdowns in recent decades despite repeated warnings by President Donald Trump, the U.S. and several Western countries have advised their citizens to leave the country immediately.

The advisory comes amid reports that the U.S. was pulling out hundreds of troops from bases in the region, including the Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, the largest American military installation in the Middle East. “The Pentagon has begun withdrawing some U.S. troops and assets from a key base in Qatar as a precautionary measure while President Trump weighs whether to take military action against Iran, officials said,” The Washington Post reported.

The British broadcaster Sky News saw this as “a signal the US is readying a strike – or giving itself the option to do so.”

The death toll is reported to now be as high as 15,000. It’s impossible to know, but there’s little doubt it’s very high, and more to come.

Trump needs to do something effective, and it should happen as soon as possible. From the Times of Israel, on why it hasn’t happened yet:

Israeli and Arab officials have suggested the Trump administration hold off on striking Iran for now, believing that the Islamic Republic may not be sufficiently weakened in order for a US attack to topple it, NBC News reported Tuesday.

The report came as US President Donald Trump told reporters that he has not yet decided what course of action he will take in response to Iran’s killing of protesters.

Protests have taken place across all of Iran’s 31 provinces, according to the US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency. It said Wednesday that at least 2,571 people had been killed and more than 18,100 had been arrested in the more than two weeks of protests. The Mossad is said to believe the death toll is more than twice as high.

NBC said that Israeli and Arab officials prefer the US wait to strike until the Iranian regime is further stretched, and that this message was relayed in talks held the past few days involving US political and military leaders.

Can this report be trusted? Or is it a pretense to try to get the mullahs to believe no action is forthcoming any time soon when in fact something is imminent?

Posted in Iran, Trump, Violence, War and Peace | 49 Replies

SCOTUS decides in favor of standing for candidates challenging voting rules

The New Neo Posted on January 14, 2026 by neoJanuary 14, 2026

This seems like good news to me:

The Supreme Court on Wednesday backed a Republican congressman from Illinois who is challenging a state law that allows mail ballots to be received after Election Day, a decision that may make it easier for other candidates to challenge voting laws – even if they ultimately win their election.

The decision, written by Chief Justice John Roberts, was 7-2 with two of the court’s liberals dissenting.

“Candidates have a concrete and particularized interest in the rules that govern the counting of votes in their elections, regardless whether those rules harm their electoral prospects or increase the cost of their campaigns,” Roberts wrote. “Their interest extends to the integrity of the election—and the democratic process by which they earn or lose the support of the people they seek to represent.”

The congressman, Michael Bost, challenged an Illinois law that allows ballots to be received up to two weeks after Election Day, as long as they are postmarked by the election. Bost sued in 2022, claiming that the Illinois law ran afoul of a federal law that sets a uniform day for federal elections. …

“Today’s ruling could open the door to a lot of litigation—and potential chaos – on the far side of the next contested election,” said Steve Vladeck, CNN Supreme Court analyst and professor at Georgetown University Law Center.

“If candidates will generally have standing to challenge how votes are counted in any election they’re running in, that could dramatically expand the horizon of legal challenges that can be brought challenging even those elections that were completely by the book,” Vladeck said, “potentially injecting more uncertainty in those critical days and weeks after Election Day going forward.”

That’s certainly true. But I doubt the professor would be complaining if it happened to be a Democrat mounting the challenge for any reason.

The justice who sided with the conservative majority was Elana Kagan, by the way.

Posted in Law | 9 Replies

Open thread 1/14/2026

The New Neo Posted on January 14, 2026 by neoJanuary 14, 2026

Posted in Uncategorized | 30 Replies

On Iran

The New Neo Posted on January 13, 2026 by neoJanuary 13, 2026

[Hat tip: commenter “huxley.”]

Trump nixes negotiation while the killings continue:

“I’ve canceled all meetings with Iranian officials until the senseless killing of protesters stops,” Trump says, repeating his announcement from the Truth Social post, again telling protesters, “help is on its way.”

What’s there to negotiate? Hopefully, the only thing under consideration would be to allow them to surrender the government and leave the country. Even that seems way too kind.

More from Trump:

US President Donald Trump reiterates his call for Iranians to keep protesting, take over their institutions and save the names of those cracking down against them.

I’m not sure how an unarmed populace “takes over institutions,” except through sheer numbers.

Posted in Iran, Trump, Violence | 31 Replies

Bill Clinton refuses to testify before Congress

The New Neo Posted on January 13, 2026 by neoJanuary 13, 2026

This story focuses on two elements that have come to bore me greatly. One is Bill Clinton, and the other is the much-hyped (much overhyped, IMHO) idea that Epstein, who did have sex with underage girls, involved many other famous people in the practice.

However, in case you’re interested, here it is:

President Bill Clinton defied a subpoena to give a deposition regarding Jeffrey Epstein in front of the House Oversight Committee.

The sworn closed-door deposition should have happened at 10 AM ET.

Chairman James Comer is not happy:

“Well, I think everyone knows by now Bill Clinton did not show up, and I think it’s important to note that this subpoena was voted on in a bipartisan manner by this committee. This wasn’t something that I just issued as chairman of the committee. This was voted on by the entire committee in a unanimous vote of the House Oversight Committee to subpoena former President Clinton and former Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton.”

He faces contempt of Congress, perhaps. But that’s not usually all that meaningful either, is it?

Will Hillary show up tomorrow? I doubt it, but if she does I very much doubt it will be meaningful.

Posted in Law | 8 Replies

Ten percent of the US budget goes to theft/fraud

The New Neo Posted on January 13, 2026 by neoJanuary 13, 2026

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has an estimate for us:

Somewhere between 5-10% of the total federal budget gets gobbled up by wrongdoers each year, Bessent said, citing data from the Government Accountability Office (GAO).

“If we can narrow that number, President Trump asked for a $500 billion increase in the defense budget to fortify the 10 to 20 years of neglect,” Bessent told journalist Christopher Rufo in a recent interview.

“If we need to flex up our military budget, if we can get rid of this waste, fraud, and abuse, we can finance a safer, sounder US with that, without taking on more debt. Sounds like a pretty good outcome to me.”

It is infuriating to think that much money has gone to criminals. And yet it’s believable. The amount almost certainly mushroomed during COVID, when many of the controls (including those on voting security, by the way) were relaxed. I don’t think this relaxation policy was done in all innocence, either. Was it done in part to facilitate fraud, graft, grift? I would bet on the answer being “yes.”

Plus:

Beyond fraudulent government spending, the Internal Revenue Service estimates that it has failed to collect hundreds of billions of dollars worth of taxes owed.

The IRS most recently projected that the so-called “tax gap” was about $606 billion as of fiscal year 2022.

Pretty soon we’ll be talking about real money.

[NOTE: That last sentence is a riff on this quote from Senator Everett Dirksen:

A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you’re talking about real money.

Indeed.

Posted in Finance and economics | Tagged IRS | 13 Replies

Scott Adams, RIP

The New Neo Posted on January 13, 2026 by neoJanuary 13, 2026

He said he was going to die soon and he kept his word: Scott Adams has died of prostate cancer at 68.

All of us are unique, but Adams was one of the more unique and independent-minded people around:

Adams became famous through “Dilbert,” the comic strip that poked fun at corporate culture with keen insight into the absurdity, cruelty and incompetence of management inside large organizations. In his last decade and a half, however, Adams achieved wide influence through his business advice and political analysis.

His 2013 best seller, “How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big,” is one of the most influential and entertaining business books of recent years.

In it, Adams introduced the concept of using systems, rather than goals, to achieve success in life. He also advised readers to accumulate skills — a “talent stack” — rather than traditional credentials.

In 2015, Adams began commenting on politics after observing the first Republican presidential primary debate. When then-candidate Donald Trump responded to a moderator’s question that accused him of mistreating women by interjecting, “Only Rosie O’Donnell,” Adams took notice.

A trained hypnotist, Adams predicted that Trump, then a huge underdog, would win the nomination — and the presidency.

I think his most impressive offering in the latter part of his career was his analysis of “The Charlottesville Hoax” – how it was perpetrated and the thinking process of those who bought into it.

He will be missed.

Here his ex-wife reads a final message from Adams:

Posted in People of interest | 15 Replies

Open thread 1/13/2026

The New Neo Posted on January 13, 2026 by neoJanuary 12, 2026

Posted in Uncategorized | 27 Replies

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