Why I’m Running for Governor of California
I want to save California and America from the dangers of artificial intelligence.
Op-Ed
A collection of 347 articles.
The Non-Binary Runner Phenomenon
“However, for me, as a lifelong runner who has logged 10,000 miles on American roads in the past 10 years and who has competed in dozens of races from the 5K to the marathon since 2004, I disagree with Fedorowski. Adding a non-binary category to road racing is misguided and counterproductive.”
Has the “Journal of Controversial Ideas” Become Irrelevant?
“It has published on a range of topics that perhaps seemed controversial to someone at some time (specifically, academics in the early 2020s) but certainly not to the broader culture in 2025.”
Why We Should Still Read Orestes Brownson
“What our country needs is a long-term, multi-pronged rediscovery of the true Constitution and a commitment to live by it. The thought of Orestes Brownson can help us in this rediscovery.”
What Progressives Need to Do
“No, not everyone on the Left supported these tyrannies, yet what progressives cannot escape is that much of the Left lent political legitimacy to regimes that destroyed and damaged tens of millions of lives, leaving festering wounds that still bleed today.”
Redefining College: Adapting Higher Education for the 2020s
“However, if a single mother wants a faster track to employment and signs up for a six-month ‘micro-pathway’ at a local community college to become, for example, a junior data analyst or fiber optics specialist, she will likely have to pay out of pocket.”
When Student Disengagement Meets Worker Disengagement, and a Solution
“Engagement is inseparable from hope and motivation. The top quartile of students most engaged in school are more than four times as likely as the least-engaged students to believe they have a great future ahead of them.”
Vigilantism and the Sex Offender Registry
“Social media and online articles about these incidents boast ten or even twenty comments praising the vigilante for each one condemning the act of violence.”
Does America Have a New Natural Governing Party?
“These are not new principles. They defined the Republican Party for most of its history, a party that had always included a progressive element.”
What Europe Can Learn from the American Election
Writing from Munich, Gerfried Ambrosch considers what Europeans should conclude from the rather decisive electoral victory of President Donald Trump.
Continue to Support the Mises Institute at 99%
“This is not the first time libertarians have disagreed with one another.”
Making Sense of Germany’s Migration Deal with Kenya
“Chancellor Scholz’s Germany-Kenya deal fails to address these core issues… Nevertheless, it represents a step in the right direction, as it has German interests at heart.”
America’s Housing Dilemma: Building for a Future with Fewer People
“Bringing this back to the United States: While we need to address our current housing crisis, the goal should not be to build, build, build anywhere at any cost.”
Where an Anti-Aging Theory Goes Right (and Wrong)
“We need more visionaries and integrated fields…because just as the human body is a complex interplay of atomic, molecular, cellular, and systemic processes, so too must be our approach to increasing healthy lifespan.”
Burning Britain
“Political violence, particularly against minorities, has no place in a democracy. However, neglecting the undeniable social and cultural repercussions of mass immigration is a grave mistake that only serves to empower the hard right.”
Reckless Rhetoric and Its Consequences
In a Merion West op-ed published in January, I compared Russian President Vladimir Putin’s approach to dealing with those who challenged his political power to what the Biden administration was doing to former President Donald Trump as we approached the November presidential election. As I saw it, the
Why Are Democratic Alliances so Sluggish? (And a Proposed Solution)
“The democratic form of government is persistently incompetent at preparing for its own defense, despite fair warnings.”
Historical Shadows: The Far-Right Surge in Germany and Austria
“For far too long, their concerns were ignored by center and left-wing parties, and so they turned elsewhere.”
Yes, to a Palestinian State—Just Not Inside or Right Next to Israel
“There is a strong positive relationship between living under the benefits of a government and human flourishing. Those without its protection must suffer, at the very least, compared to those who are fortunate in this regard.”
Putin’s Very Limited Tactical Nuclear Warfare Options
“Anticipating what a Russian nuclear attack would look like is an important first step in fashioning an appropriate response.”
Jerry Seinfeld Understated the Death of Comedy
“In Carlin’s time, it was edgy and cool to push back against the prudish ideas about obscenity, so playing with the boundaries of the metanarrative was practically encouraged (at least from audiences). Today, quite the opposite.”
College Protests and the Limits of Virtue
“That is, virtuous striving now is something that seeks to turn our social paradigm on its head.“
What Happened to Columbia University?
“Seventy years of an educational ideology steeped in ‘openness’ has wreaked havoc on the United States, and what we see at Columbia University (and at other American universities) is clear proof of that.”
When Promoting Clean Energy, Patriotism Beats Moralizing
“The debate over whether to go green is not a debate over whether to incur costs. It is a debate over which set of costs to incur, and people’s willingness to bear tangible burdens to achieve goals supported by affluent, educated progressives is limited.”
The Freedom to Be Religious as an Atheist
“In other words, now that I have become an atheist, I feel free to appreciate and even dabble in various religions. To put this in terms of Waits Paradox: Once one has quit religion, he is free to be religious.”
Sanctimony: A Political Vice from Which We Must Escape
“Watching this quasi-religious mentality migrate leftward and displace more rational, humanistic values has been painful.”
The Age of Jihad
“As a result, an air of fear hangs over society, regardless of the fact that the likelihood of falling victim to such an attack is very low indeed. But this is how terror works.”
What Jordan Peterson’s Conversation with Destiny Can Teach Us
“Paradoxically, as the amount of online content available for consumption increases, conversations with as interesting a dynamic range as the one between Peterson and Destiny seem fewer and farther between.”
A Possible Solution to the Standardized Testing Debate
“The video games also adapted to my inputs and choices in real time, which meant they could capture my strengths and weaknesses, a fuller view of my aptitude than just a number from how many multiple-choice questions I got right.”
America Has a Writing Problem. How Do We Solve It?
“According to the most recent data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), only twenty-four percent of eighth- and twelfth-graders are ‘proficient’ in writing.”
Texas and Florida Content Moderation Laws Would Open Pandora’s Box
“A transparency mandate passed by Congress can avoid the controversial and difficult work of legally defining the terminology and specific guardrails for online safety and viewpoint neutrality.”
The Other Victims of the Surveillance State
“No doubt [Araya] Baker’s experience is legitimate, and, of course, it is true that state surveillance is a very serious problem, but paranoid delusions are real, too.”
Taking a Second Look at Nikki Haley
“It is true that one of the most important rules in politics is that ‘You can’t lose your base,’ but it is also true that in order to win competitive elections, broadening one’s base is essential, and Ambassador Haley might be able to accomplish that.”
“The Great Awokening” and Christianity
“Just as wokeness has eroded traditional liberal values like free speech, freedom of thought, merit, and individualism at an institutional level, it has also eroded traditional Christian doctrine within churches, seminaries, and Christian publications.”
The Age of Unnecessarily Complicated Academic Writing Is Over
“The fact is that effective communication is hard. Clear writing is hard. For the typical undergraduate—and no doubt the typical academic scholar or scientist—it is easier to string together vague buzzwords in meandering sentences than it is to say something clearly and concisely.”
Collective Punishment for Gaza? No. Collateral Damage? Unfortunately, Yes
“Any dictatorship (and Hamas is one, of the Islamic theocratic variety) is first and foremost at war with the civilian population it controls, and then against other surrounding countries, only second.”
What Happened to the American Psychological Association?
“When the most influential psychological association in the world wants to replace an ethic of care for all individuals with a new woke normativity that is gaslighting the next generation of psychologists, their patients, and the public, it should lose all credibility.”
Nothing to Answer for: The Fearless Art of Morrissey
“Refusing to take the path of least resistance when it comes to his career, Morrissey is the antithesis of the cookie-cutter ‘artists’ favored and propped up by the modern music industry.”
Young Americans Could Benefit From Conscription, Now More Than Ever
“Although it might not have been glamorous, my time in the military helped me through challenges that currently burden many young Americans.”
When They’ll Do Anything to Stop Him
“Although the Biden administration and his State Department are rightfully quick to denounce the persecution of Navalny and how Russia conducts its elections, there are many parallels between the Navalny saga and what is happening in the United States…”
Thomas Friedman Is at It Again
“What is certain, however, is that part two of this degradation will occur in the not too distant future, and part three some time after that, if this advice of this New York Times columnist is followed.”
Against Michelle Wu’s Anti-Market Real Estate Proposal
“If Chairman Wu were in power when Henry Ford was ruining the blacksmith, horse training and saddle making industries, she would have taxed the latter and subsidized the former. How about when computers took out the typewriter, carbon paper, and correction fluid (Wite-Out) industries?”
What Elon Musk and Bill Gates Might Have in Common
“Musk still seems to have his wits about him when managing his other companies, when speaking on longform podcasts, or when staying conveniently on message with regard to China. So what is it about X that is specifically causing Musk to lose his composure and his business sense?”
Geert Wilders: Yet Another Warning to the Center
“Many Europeans are waking up to the failures of multiculturalism and open-border policies and are demanding action. If the parties of the center left and center right continue to fail on this front, someone else will step in.”
The Failure of Multiculturalism
“We have a broken immigration system. Despite saying the right thing, [Suella] Braverman did not take much action to stop it. She ought to be judged similarly to what economists would call a revealed preference. In other words, actions speak louder than words.”
When a Different Standard of Morality Applies to the “Oppressed”
“The woke ideology does not merely advocate for redistribution of resources, but it also calls for (or at least allows for) different moral obligations according to one’s identity. This means that so-called oppressors are bound by a different morality than so-called oppressed identities.”
In Reply to Beckeld: What Is “the West” Nowadays?
“Where I may disagree most emphatically with Beckeld is in his idealization of the ‘West,’ which is supposedly currently at war with barbarous ‘non-Western enemies.’ From my perspective, much of what we see in the impassioned pro-Hamas protests represents where Western civilization has moved in the
What Karl Marx Can Teach Us about Abortion
“What better way to avoid paying for maternity leave, family health insurance, and other perks than to make sure that one’s employees never have children?”
The Media’s Blood Libel of Israel
“All of this could have been uncovered with measured reporting and a skepticism that avoids trusting the word of the baby-murdering terror group, Hamas.”
How Jesse Singal Became the Symbol of Polarization on the Left
“Whether or not Singal is wrong in his conclusions does not matter. He dared to question the truisms, the sacred cows, and that brands him irredeemably transphobic.”
Barbarians in Our Midst
“It is safe to say that the Muslims who have been spouting anti-Semitic hatred and propaganda on our streets in recent days were socialized in a culture whose values are irreconcilably at odds with ours—a parallel society that sees itself not as part of Western civilization but in opposition to it.”
Black Lives Matter’s Shameful Response to the Attacks on Israel
“Meanwhile, the silence of companies such as Ben and Jerry’s that claim to support injustice is deafening. Clearly, when the issue of state-sponsored violence against the nation of Israel is in question, silence is an option…”
Mourning for Palestinians and Israelis—and the Possibility of Peace Ended
“After witnessing the events of the past few days, I admit that part of me is relieved that [my father] died before he had to watch Hamas take away his lifelong dream, slaughtering both it and Israeli civilians on video for the entire world to see.”
As the Violence Escalates, We Mustn’t Forget the Role of Iran
“The disturbing element here is not just the escalation but the advanced level of military precision demonstrated by Hamas—an unnerving signal that Iran’s influence is looming larger than ever.”
War in Israel, War in the West
“This is not Israel’s 9/11. It is not even Israel’s Pearl Harbor. It is worse by an order of magnitude. The closest parallel is the Rape of Nanking.”
Iran Invades Israel Through Hamas
“But one thing is absolutely clear: This is war, not just a terror attack. This is war not just by Hamas on Israel, but by Iran—through Hamas—on Israel.”
The Collapse of the Kabul Foreign Aid Bazaar
“The stated North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) objective in Afghanistan was nation-building, but what was created instead, over twenty years, and fell in days, was a heavily garrisoned foreign aid bazaar.”
Understanding Americans’ Rampant Dissatisfaction with Healthcare
“As a patient, I do not want to hold hands with a robot and confide my health problems to a faceless entity. As a doctor, a patient, and a human being, I reject the currently shattered doctor-patient relationship.”
On the Incoherence of “Decolonizing” the Academy
“Ideological pressure and political conformity in the workplace, professional organizations, industry, and public institutional life are so pervasive that identity politics has all but ruined social tolerance, meritocracy, and the pursuit of excellence.”
A Practical Approach to Career Education for K-12 Students
“America’s K-12 schools typically provide little information to young people on potential careers. They also generally do not provide work experiences that help them understand practical pathways to jobs and careers.”
Checking in on “Woke Europe”
“Like the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom, continental Europe would, therefore, do well to dial down the moralizing rhetoric associated with wokeness and return to the enlightened pragmatism, cultural liberalism, and scientific curiosity that gave us the modern world.”
Aliens and America’s Crisis in Meaning
“What gives? Why are people so eager to believe wild tales despite a lack of hard, clear evidence?”
The Atheist Movement Has One Job
“This is the atheist movement’s one job: to help people navigate the world and find meaning, purpose, and community in a society that has long depended on a god-belief for these ends.”
Could AI Become Angry at Humans for Causing Environmental Destruction?
“With artificial general intelligence (AGI) likely just decades away, there is an urgent need to consider the extent of environmental harm we are causing. AGI will likely question if humans are good stewards of the planet and quickly come to the conclusion that we are not.”
Why “Longtermism” Needs Anti-Aging Science to Succeed
“Assuming anti-aging science shows results, then all of those hypothetical people living way off in the distant future may include some of us. And if that is the case, then people alive today have a practical, personal reason to care how our current actions impact the future.”
Is the “Convenience Economy” Worth the Pain It Can Inflict?
“We live in a world where every conceivable product or service is instantly accessible.”
Stop Fearing the Best-Case Scenario with Artificial Intelligence
“What receives less attention but is equally consequential is the extreme scenario in which AI saves all of humanity by making us immortal. Just as we are unprepared for life-destroying AI, we are equally unprepared for our AI savior.”
The Ever Tenuous Coalition That Is the Left
“What makes this conflict noteworthy is that it reveals stress lines within the coalition of today’s Left, a coalition that often seems held together more by what it hates than by strong bonds of friendship.”
The Many Casualties of Hazing
“They were given a choice to participate, and they ultimately decided it was worth risking their life, health, individuality, and future for a chance to be a part of a group of people who ultimately couldn’t care less about them.”
How Do They Still Have Jobs?
“By any normal definition of the role of a Cabinet member, Secretary Mayorkas would have either resigned voluntarily or have had his resignation requested by the President.”
How Ideological Addiction Drives Extremism and Undermines Civil Discourse
“It is made even more dangerous because unlike other addictions, which are widely accepted as harmful, ideological addiction is being constantly fueled by irresponsible members of the political class, the press, and many on social media.”
Democrats’ Endless Anti-Institutionalism
“However, it has now become clear that once in power, Democrats, with a few notable exceptions, have largely sought to remove any impediment to realizing their agenda regardless of how time-honored or important a given tradition might be.”
The Stale Defeatism of the “Chomsky/Carlin Thesis”
“While criticizing the United States, Chomsky, Senator Bernie Sanders, those at outlets such as The Grayzone, and some of my friends have defended the likes of Hugo Chávez and Fidel Castro.”
Gen Z and a New Relationship to Work
“In the long term, it is likely that the workplace will diversify and, in turn, settle into four or five different buckets on a continuum from traditional and non-traditional, with less representation at the extremes.”
K-12 Domestic Realists Chart an Agenda to Go Beyond Education’s Culture Wars
“K-12 education’s collective illusions divert attention away from the dogged fact that most Americans, including policymakers and young people, agree on important K-12 issues.“
Elon Musk’s Bad Take on Longevity
“Zoltan Istvan, an advocate for life extension, has observed in his longevity writings that each human mind is a unique library of information. Every time a person dies, it is like losing the Library of Alexandria.”
A Government Is More Than Capable of Addressing Multiple Crises At Once
“So, to be clear, I largely favor reducing the power of the very federal government being discussed in this piece, but that is quite different from arguing that, at its current scope and scale, it is somehow incapable of addressing multiple priorities at once.”
Boris Johnson’s Most Fundamental Failure: Immigration
“After all, one of the major reasons for the Conservatives’ 2019 election landslide victory was due to [Johnson’s] populist rhetoric regarding mass immigration, including the Conservatives’ promise that ‘overall numbers will come down.’”
Internet Censorship: Democrats, Remember You Could Be Out of Power One Day
“The mainstream media has largely ignored the unsettling censorship tactics of the Biden administration, and Democrats—all the while—clearly cannot imagine a future Republican administration following this administration’s lead and censoring content…”
A Happy Retirement: A High Bar for High Achievers
“I had lost my ambition and with it my identity. Without CEO status, who was I? If I was not leading a company, what was my purpose? How would I find contentment without that all-encompassing fixation on achievement?”
Who Will Fix a Broken Internet Landscape Before It’s Too Late?
“Despite the enormous improvements that technology has contributed to the human condition, if we do not choose to fix the way the Internet works, there remains the potential for a digital Pearl Harbor-type event.”
How a “National Divorce” Could Actually Unite Americans
“Far from giving up on the American project, national divorce aims to renew and deepen our ability to live in harmony together.”
In Reply to Robert Jensen: The Folly of the Nazi Comparison
“In fact, most Southerners did not own slaves; nor were Union soldiers, most of whom were drafted, fighting for the woke ideals of Jensen or the Southern Poverty Law Center.”
Republicans Should Stop Pandering about Charter Schools
“I have no idea why Republicans and the GOP media fall over themselves rallying to the cause of those who hate them and who would never vote for them, no matter what.”
Arguments Against School Choice Presume We Have Options
“In short, if public schooling on average is so woefully inadequate, how can we take seriously the argument that if a family cannot afford or otherwise access private or home schooling, public schooling is a perfectly sufficient choice?”
Stop Pretending All Cultures Are the Same
“So I will say it with my heart, and others should too: If a culture persecutes LGBT people, is overtly racist, or makes women second class citizens, then to hell with that culture. My culture is better than that one.”
Understanding Why Netanyahu Won
“Whatever else one may think about the unholy trinity of Prime Minister Netanyahu, Ben-Gvir, and Bezalel Smotrich, they are, among other things, willing to discuss the serious internal security concerns that much of the country outside of Tel Aviv faces.”
Work Is About Knowledge That Pays and Relationships That Are Priceless
“And both wages and relationships advance worker opportunity, the essential elements of which are what individuals know (i.e., profitable knowledge) and whom they know (i.e., priceless relationships).”
On the Inevitability of Racism
“As psychoanalysis long ago has perspicaciously demonstrated, prejudice is universal to human nature and is evolutionarily informed.”
COVID-19 and the Banality of Evil
“Compulsory obedience can especially be seen in how the Democratic Party has changed since the election of President Biden in 2020. Before he entered office, COVID-19 was more accepted as an important and legitimate issue.”
Russia Will Pursue Desperate Strategies After It Exhausts Its Missile Supply
“Aside from the fact that history shows that rockets are far more useful at inflicting damage against military than civilian targets, their misuse may indicate an underlying strategic desperation in the Kremlin.”
The First Metaverse Nation
“What is new, in this case, is that the people of Tuvalu are hoping their future metaverse-based civilization will continue to function as a state and will be recognized internationally as a proper nation.”
The Complexity Paradox
“We are great at handling complexity until things get really, really complex.”
Putin’s Nuclear Threats Show that Jacinda Ardern is Wrong About Nuclear Weapons
“[Prime Minister Ardern] is correct that nuclear weapons arsenals carry with them great risks of widespread destruction. However, the greatest risk lies in committing not to use them.”
Iran’s Uprising: Precursor to a New Revolution
“The unrest that flared up in response to [Mahsa Amini’s] death has been virtually unprecedented and provides the international community with perhaps the clearest reminder that the Iranian people abhor authoritarianism.”
Why I Support Australian Republicanism
“A republic represents the ability for Australians to recognize formally what has been long known: that we are willing and capable of charting our own future released from the bonds of the past.”
Friendships as Pathways to Upward Income Mobility
“For example, if poor children grew up in a neighborhood where seventy percent of their friends were wealthy, their future income on average will increase by twenty percent, similar to the effect of going to a four-year college.”
Salman Rushdie: The Antithesis to Moral Cowardice
“Leading by example, Rushdie refuses to be intimidated into silence.”
When It Comes to Iran, Say “No” to Appeasement
“Without an enemy to demonize, the Islamic Republic would have to answer for its many and grave failures.”
Peter Buxtun, the Hero of Tuskegee, 50 Years On
“In later interviews, Buxtun would shrug off the accolades he later received for his whistleblowing. ‘I don’t want to be embarrassed by an oversupply of compliments. I am who I am,’ he would tell bioethicist Carl Elliott in 2017.”