Monday Miscellany, 3/9/26

Why is Iran shooting at fellow Muslims?  Many of the targeted countries have U.S. military bases and have become friendly to the U.S.  Though the bases have been hit, the missiles and drones have also attacked these countries’ industries, such as oil fields and Qatar’s luxury hotels.  A big factor is the ancient intra-Islamic conflict of Shia vs. Sunni.(Think Catholics vs. Protestants during the 30 Years’ War.)  Iran’s brand of Islam is Shia, which is also dominant in Lebanon and Syria, while the targeted countries are mostly Sunni.

The problem is, Iran has few allies and its attacks have alienated even potential allies. Its most powerful allies on paper, China and Russia, are condemning the U.S.-Israeli military action, but are not coming to its aid.  With, perhaps, one exception.  Though Iran shot a missile at Azerbaijan, a former member of the Soviet Union allied with Russia that is now retaliation, Russia is trying to help Iran behind the scenes.  In the words of a news report headline, Russia is providing Iran intelligence to target US forces, officials say  (Should that be considered an act of war?)

Iran is striking back by, in effect, closing the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow (and thus easy to shut down), 26-mile wide waterway through which 20% of the world’s oil supply is shipped.  The U.S. has offered naval escorts to tankers sailing through the strait, but most shipping companies have just stopped operations in those waters.  (Some of you may recall what an Exocet anti-ship missile did to the U.S.S. Stark in 1987.  An escort would not have prevented that.)  Gasoline prices have risen by an average 26 50 cents per gallon, with the average price set to go over $4.  A barrel of oil is selling for $90. $102. $117.  A drone attack on Qatar’s liquid natural gas plant forced its shutdown, causing natural gas prices in Europe to shoot up 70%.

Some NATO allies are expressing support for the U.S.-Israeli offensive, but are staying out of it, limiting their response to defending themseles from Iranian missiles.  In addition to the missile fired at Turkey, a UK base in Cyprus was hit by Iranian drones.

Many expatriates and Iranians at home are celebrating what could be the end of Iran’s theocratic regime.  Iran expert Karim Sadjapour commented, “I think this might be one of the few instances in modern history where a greater percentage of the society being bombed was supportive of military action than the society that was doing the bombing.”

But other Iranians and radical Muslims throughout the world are seeing the conflict as the beginnings of the Islamic version of the apocalypse.  According to Asra Q. Nomani, reporting for Fox News:

For certain hardline Shiite ideologues, including in the U.S., this is not an ending but a prophetic showdown that will usher in the arrival of the “Mahdi,” a messiah, according to Islamic eschatology, or the theology of end times.

In this prophecy, Mahdi will emerge to battle Dajjal, the Islamic equivalent of the Antichrist, in a final battle of Armageddon. For many of these ideologues, President Donald Trump is Dajjal. . . .

In the majority Sunni sect and the minority Shiite sect of Islam, clerics describe the Mahdi’s army traveling from modern-day Iran to Damascus, Syria, where Jesus would appear at the Umayyad Mosque and pray behind the Mahdi. The Mahdi’s forces would battle Dajjal in Syria and kill him in Lod, Israel, conquering the world.

A Film from 1897 about Dealing with Robots

Though there were precursors, Thomas Edison basically invented motion picture technology an introduced it to the world in 1894.  A Frenchman with a magic act named  Georges Méliès was one of the very earliest filmmakers.  He saw the creative potential of the new medium and developed special effects technologies that are still used today.

Méliès is most famous for his 1902 film A Trip to the Moon, the first Science Fiction space travel movie best known today for its iconic image of the Man in the Moon with a rocket sticking in his eye.  (See the whole movie here.  It only lasts just over 12 minutes.  It is silent, of course, so there is no language barrier.  Your mind will be blown.)

But the very first science fiction film was probably Gugusse and the Automaton in 1897.  It is the first depiction of a robot, which Méliès calls an “automaton.”  Unfortunately, though there have been records about it, the film itself has been lost.   Until last September, when a Michigan man named Bill McFarland sent the Library of Congress a cardboard box full of film reels that had been collected by his great-grandfather William Frisbee.  When the curators sorted through the donation, they were astounded to see this movie.

Here is why I am presenting to you.  The film is of more than mere historical and technological interest.  It is about technology.  Specifically, technology that tries to simulate human beings.  This is exactly what we are dealing with today with the advent of Artificial Intelligence.  In this film, Méliès imagines the technology, anticipates the problems, and shows what to do about them.  All in 45 seconds!  And in 1897!

How Is Progressive Governance Doing?

Liberals themselves are now criticizing the governance in progressive-run cities and states.

Jim Geraghty quotes CNN’s normally progressive Fareed Zakaria, who tears into New York City’s new Democratic Socialist mayor for proposing a $127 billion budget–as much as that of mid-sized countries like Greece and Thailand–despite the city’s loss of population:

The arithmetic is brutal. A larger bill is divided among fewer payers. Per person, the imbalance is stark. Using the Lincoln Institute’s fiscally standardized numbers, New York’s general spending in 2023 was more than 30 percent higher per capita than Los Angeles, and more than double Houston.

And what do New Yorkers get for this? Look at New York City schools, the largest school district in the country. The city’s education budget has climbed while enrollment has shrunk. The DOE budget has risen from roughly $34 billion in 2019 to over $40 billion, while the DOE says per student spending is projected to reach nearly $35,000 in fiscal year 2026, among the highest in the nation.

The outputs, graduation numbers, test scores, and reading levels, are at best middling, often comparable to places that spend a fraction of what New York does.

Geraghty interjects that “middling” overstates those educational outcomes.  In New York City, only 28% of fourth-graders are proficient in reading (compared to 31% nationally); only 33% are proficient in math (compared to 39% nationally); and among eighth-graders only 23% are proficient in math (compared to 28% nationally).  I’d say this also indicts public schools across the nation, but I digress.  The point is, despite spending $35,000 per student, New York schools are worse than typical bad schools.

Zakaria notes that the problem goes beyond New York City:

New York is really a prime example of a problem Democrats seem unwilling to confront. Blue cities are out of control. Promising more, spending more, delivering less, and pushing off the fiscal problems to some future day.

Take Los Angeles, another one-party metropolis wrestling with affordability and disorder. The city’s homelessness budget for fiscal year 2025-26 totals about $950 million. The L.A. Homelessness Services Authority reported that in 2023, homelessness was up 9 percent countywide and 10 percent in the city. And a 2024 AP account noted that homelessness has surged 70 percent countywide since 2015, and 80 percent in the city.

All this amid public frustration despite billions spent. An audit reviewed $2.4 billion in city homelessness funding and found that officials could not reliably track where it went or what it achieved.

Geraghty then points to an op-ed piece published in the New York Times, no less, in which liberal professors from Michigan and Harvard exhort the Democratic party to stand up to public-sector unions:

If blue-state governors and mayors want to get serious about delivering excellent public services, they will need to do more than battle billionaire elites or embrace abundant housing and energy.

They will have to push back against a core constituency within the Democratic Party that often makes government deliver less and cost more: unions representing teachers, police officers and transit workers.

They cite what is happening in Illinois:

Consider Gov. J.B. Pritzker of Illinois. A fearless opponent of Donald Trump, his bravery failed him when Chicago police and firefighter unions sought to raise pensions, often by thousands of dollars. Against the advice of civic and business leaders concerned about, as they put it, “grossly underfunded pensions,” Mr. Pritzker signed legislation that partly undid a 2010 attempt to rein in benefits for new employees.

The new law will cost the city $60 million next year — more than enough money to cover the city’s summer job program — before ballooning to $11 billion over three decades.

Geraghty concludes,

If the blue city and blue state “models” work so well, a whole bunch of blue states shouldn’t keep losing population while a whole bunch of red states keep adding population. If the tax-and-spend progressivism is supposed to be so good for working people, why is California the most unaffordable state in the country? Why is a black child in Mississippi two and a half times as likely to be proficient in reading by fourth grade as a black child in California? Why are low-income children more likely to test proficient in reading in Mississippi or Louisiana than in California, Massachusetts, or New York?

He notes that Gov. Pritzker is running for president.  So is Gov. Newsom of California.

I suspect these liberal critics of their fellow-liberals represent the perspective of the so-called “Abundance Democrats” who are contending against the radical progressives in their party.  More power to them.

I predict that whatever party can deliver good government–well-managed, efficient, cost-effective public services in the routine workings of government–will eventually win over voters, who, I think, are getting weary of all the culture war dramas.  I’m not saying that the culture war issues aren’t important, just that voters are getting tired of them.