Tasting History with Max Miller
Published 13 Jan 2026Puff pastry rings filled with raspberry and apricot preserves and topped with a cherry
City/Region: France
Time Period: 1840The Pastry War between Mexico and France was kicked off when, during a time of political upheaval, Mexican soldiers ransacked Monsieur Remontel’s pastry shop in the 1830s. Seeking reparations for M. Remontel as well as the repayment of other debts, the French invaded.
While we don’t know what was sold in Monsieur Remontel’s pastry shop in Mexico, these puits d’amour could certainly have been on the menu. By all means, you can make your own puff pastry, but I gave myself permission to use store bought, and you should, too. You can even use store-bought preserves to simplify things even further, but this preserves recipe is very delicious and very sweet. I used both store-bought apricot preserves and homemade raspberry preserves, and both were delicious. You can also fill them with half jam and half chantilly cream or pastry cream if the fancy strikes you.
PUITS D’AMOUR.
When the puff pastry has received all its turns, roll it out to a thickness of two lines; cut it with a fluted cutter, that is to say with a pastry cutter, and place the first piece on a baking sheet; then, with a cutter of the same type but smaller, cut another piece and place it on top; moisten the round with a little water, press it in slightly, brush these puits with egg, and put them into a hot oven. When they are three-quarters baked, sprinkle them with sugar in order to glaze them — that is, until the sugar melts; then remove them, hollow them out, and fill them with whatever preserves you judge appropriate.
— Le Cuisinier Royal by André Viart, 1840
July 10, 2026
The Pastry War – When France invaded Mexico over pastry
QotD: Modern conspiracy theories
Probably the most important part of the modern conspiracy theory is that it must flatter the person obsessed with it. For the conspiracy buff, the thrill is in feeling that they have figured it all out. Those super-intelligent people working in the shadows were not smart enough to outwit the conspiracy hunter. Everyone else falls for the official story, but the conspiracy theorist knows the real truth. Paradoxically, the conspiracy theory makes the world a much simpler and safer place for them.
The best example right now is the Left’s obsession with white supremacy. They cannot accept that their vision of Utopia is not very popular. That’s the first step in a conspiracy theory, the rejection of the most plausible reason. That allows them to spin wild tales of secret Nazis and spectral supremacists. Rather than confront reality, which is frightening and disconcerting, they have created a series of conspiracy theories to explain why the world is not as they imagine it.
This is why conspiracy theories are a useful metric to gauge social trust. When order begins to break down, people naturally look for reasons. That opens the door to speculation and then conspiracy theories. This, in turn, erodes social trust, which is the foundation upon which every ruling class rests. As that foundation falters, the ruling class looks for reasons. Since blaming themselves is always off the table, they naturally begin to speculate, which opens the door to conspiracy theories.
The Z Man, “Conspiratorial Rule”, The Z Blog, 2020-10-01.
July 9, 2026
A new proposal for limiting “unreasonable searches and seizures”
In Reason, Jacob Sullum outlines Justice Gorsuch’s proposed new test for limiting government abilities to surveil and monitor private actions:
Supreme Court Justice Anthony M. Kennedy swears in Justice Neil M. Gorsuch on Monday, April 10, 2017, in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, D.C.
White House photo via Wikimedia Commons.
The Court’s 1967 decision in Katz v. United States, which held that the Constitution’s prohibition of “unreasonable searches and seizures” applies when people have a “reasonable expectation of privacy”, continues to shape Fourth Amendment rulings six decades later. That was clear on June 29, when the Court decided Chatrie v. United States, holding that a government-ordered analysis of cellphone location data qualifies as a “search” under the Fourth Amendment.
“An individual has a reasonable expectation of privacy in records about his cell phone’s location, and police intrude on that constitutionally protected interest when they demand the information”, Justice Elena Kagan wrote in an opinion joined by four of her colleagues. Justice Neil Gorsuch agreed with the result but not the rationale. The Katz test, he complained, “has no basis in the Constitution’s text or history”. He added that it has proven unworkable in practice because it has never been clear how courts should determine whether an expectation of privacy is “reasonable”.
Gorsuch is surely right that the Katz test has produced inconsistent and puzzling results. In cases addressing intrusions such as trash searches, demands for bank and telephone records, surveillance by low-flying aircraft, and police trespassing on private property, the Supreme Court has perceived no expectations of privacy it was prepared to recognize as reasonable. Applying the same test, it has repeatedly ruled that the Fourth Amendment does not apply to information that people voluntarily share with third parties. Yet the Court has repeatedly rebelled at the disturbing implications of that principle without explicitly renouncing it.
That is what happened in Chatrie, which involved a Virginia bank robbery investigation. Police used a “geofence” warrant to identify the perpetrator by requiring Google to search customer data collected by its Location History feature, which tracks the whereabouts of cellphone users. For reasons that are not entirely clear, the Court declined to apply the third-party doctrine, instead reverting to the original, unmodified Katz test.
A better approach, Gorsuch argued, would be to treat Location History records as “effects” covered by the Fourth Amendment — as a form of personal property, in other words. While it is not clear exactly how that property-rights approach would work in other contexts, it does seem less malleable than the Katz test, which gives courts wide discretion in discerning expectations and deciding whether they are reasonable. Gorsuch aptly likened the Court’s understanding of that test to its definition of obscenity in the 1960s: “We know a ‘reasonable expectation of privacy’ (and an exception to the third party doctrine) when we see it”.
They call it “Chat Control”
On the social media site formerly known as Twitter, Brivael Le Pogam talks about what the EU is calling “Chat Control”:
We need to talk about Chat Control, because it’s all happening this week and almost no one understands what it’s about.
In plain terms: the EU wants to authorize the scanning of your private messages. Your WhatsApp conversations, your emails, your DMs. Not those of a suspect. Those of everyone, all the time, by default.
The pretext is airtight, and that’s the trap: “protecting children”. No one can be against that. That’s exactly why it’s the perfect tool. They’ll never get you to swallow mass surveillance in the name of mass surveillance. They’ll get you to swallow it in the name of children, terrorism, disinformation. Always some cause you won’t dare challenge.
Understand the two-step mechanism well.
Today it’s the “soft” version: platforms have the right to scan, on a voluntary basis, unencrypted messages. Harmless on the surface. It’s the foot in the door.
Then comes the real version, the one under negotiation: mandatory scanning, including of your encrypted messages, analyzed directly on your phone before they’re even sent. Over 500 cryptographers have signed a letter saying it’s technically unfeasible without creating security vulnerabilities that any hacker or hostile state could exploit. You’re breaking encryption for everyone, including the criminals you claim to be targeting.
And the worst part isn’t even that.
The real danger isn’t that Brussels technocrats will be watching you tomorrow. They’re probably too spineless for that. The danger is that they’re building the infrastructure. Once scanning everyone’s messages becomes normal, legal, operational — the track is laid. And on that track will roll everything that comes next. The day a crisis brings ruthless people to power, they won’t have to invent anything. The machine will already be there, ready to go.
No surveillance infrastructure has ever stayed limited to its original purpose. None. It’s a law of administrative nature: a tool built for X always ends up serving Y.
What makes this text dangerous isn’t what it does today. It’s what it makes possible forever.
The decisive vote is Thursday. The last lock.
Auto-translated from the original French by X.
The good folks at Windscribe weigh in:
The EU is not a democracy.
They’re closer to a guy who keeps pressuring a girl to sleep with him despite her saying no.
5 times now.
But he won’t stop.
We’re at the stage where he’s giving her alcohol and making her drunk so she struggles to say no.
Over the last 3 years, Chat Control and similar scanning measures have been defeated or blocked 5 times.
The citizens of the EU and members of EU Parliament have made it abundantly clear — they don’t want Chat Control.
This latest attempt by the EU is the slimiest one yet. Revive dead legislation that was already defeated, flip the passing criteria so that majority don’t need to SUPPORT it, majority need to DEFEAT it, and as the cherry on top, hold that vote on the very last day before Parliament members go on summer break so that many don’t show up. Oh and if they don’t show up, it counts as a vote to pass Chat Control.
You can dress it up in as many legal technicalities and loopholes as you want, what the EU is doing here is fundamentally undemocratic.
No means no.
And if you ever saw a guy pressuring a girl into sleeping with him with disgusting tactics after she said no THIS many times, you would consider him to be a rapist.
So congrats to the EU on adopting rapist strategies to your governance.
Here’s why “free range children” went away
As a child in England and then in Canada, I had a pretty wide range for unsupervised activities and I generally took advantage of that. On foot or riding my bicycle, it was completely normal for me to be several miles from home on any given day. I’ve posted this image a few times, showing the “free range” diminishing generation by generation for an English family, and it’s mostly true here in Canada and in the United States as well:
Graphic showing the diminishing “free ranges” of each generation of an English family.
At Classical Ideals, Megha Lillywhite discusses the “political extremism” involved today in trying to raise your children:
One of the most fundamental things that children require in order to grow up healthy, strong, wise and good, is a lot of time outdoors and in public spaces. Yet what we see from more traditional families in the west, as well as from extremely wealthy families, is that they are holding their children closer than ever, and enclosing them in increasingly smaller and more carefully selected bubbles of protection.
This is because “the outdoors” and “public life” is territory that has increasingly been ceded by western society to violent criminals, the mentally ill, and drug addicts. Parenting, for those who are vigilant to the threats, can no longer be “laissez-faire” and it has become less about choosing the ideal, and more about choosing the least damaging option.
But what has been lost? And what must be reclaimed for those of us with power and spirit to have any kind of meaningful victory in this world?
Most leftists see politics through the framework of wanting to be “a good person” as it is defined by their peer group and ideology. The ordinary person, on the other hand, views politics through the set of decisions that would best protect their children and give them the best chance at a good life.
Why is this? Leftists either don’t have children, or they have children but live in gilded cages and are therefore untouched (yet) by the consequences of their ideological beliefs.
Children must exist as part of a broader community in order to develop healthily. They must be able to go to a public library, the local shop, ride their bikes to the park, take the city bus or walk to their grandmother’s house on their own. They must be able to play outside unsupervised for hours on end in their neighbourhoods.
[…]
But some measure of freedom is also necessary for children to develop a healthy psyche. A child who can go to the shop and pay for milk on his own and bring it home will develop not only a sense of responsibility, but will feel confident in his ability to do useful things. A child who can visit his friends and relatives on his own will develop social skills and a sense of belonging. A child who can go to the library on his own can begin the lifelong journey of guiding his own learning.
[…]
In a 2007 study done in Sheffield, UK by Dr. William Bird, he found that children in 1926 were allowed to roam up to six miles away from home unsupervised and by 2000, that number dropped to 300 metres. The major drop off happened around 1979 which is coincidentally the time when mass migration began in the United Kingdom and demographics of towns like Sheffield began to seriously shift. In the recent “Rape Gang Inquiry” released by the Restore Party of Britain, the report which details three decades of kidnap, rape and murder of a quarter of a million British girls which would have began around this time. So English parents restricting their children’s freedoms around this time period was not something hysterical or unfounded.
We must be politically courageous in order to admit what is required to maintain that kind of a world. Stated simply, a safe, healthy and good childhood requires a fundamental rejection of leftist “empathy” politics. There is one incident in particular that can help to describe how this system functions today.
Link from John Carter on Substack Notes, who commented:
The same shift towards a confined, highly monitored childhood took place in the US, corresponding to the great suburbanization. The suburbs grew due to white flight from the cities, following their colonization by blacks and the de facto ban on community defence enforced by the civil rights act.
Suburban municipal architecture is largely comprised of informal defensive barriers that prevent undesirable elements from penetrating the neighborhoods undetected.
This enables middle class parents to deniably insulate their children from the worst consequences of diversity, but at the cost of raising their children in open air prisons, in a stifling social atmosphere characterized primarily by a brittle insistence upon euphemistic avoidance of direct acknowledgement of the real issues. “Racism is simply terrible! We just wanted to live somewhere with good schools.”
Children brought up amidst the tedious fakery of the suburbs naturally become attuned to the pervasive hypocrisy of suburban white culture. They have to: simply navigating this culture requires the ability to understand the unsaid, while pretending that one has not understood it. Combined with the open air prison environment inhibiting emotional development, this is a powerful recipe for induced neurosis.
There are only a few possible outcomes: 1) they become cowardly hypocrites themselves; 2) they reject the hypocrisy and become fanatical anti-white race communists; 3) they reject the hypocrisy and become fascists.
The Ancient Greeks 03 – Enter the Persians 2 – Cyrus, Destiny, and the Making of an Empire
seangabb
Published 16 Feb 2026Greece: A Brief History, c.700 BC – 500 AD
Who was Cyrus the Great? How did a minor Persian ruler come to dominate the Near East? In this lecture we examine Herodotus’ account of Cyrus’ miraculous survival, his overthrow of the Medes, and the conquest of Lydia and Babylon. We analyse Persian imperial strategy: flexible governance, religious tolerance, and pragmatic rule. We also explore how the Ionian Greek cities of Asia Minor first came under Persian control — setting the stage for future rebellion.
Empire did not emerge through chaos alone. It was built through method.
QotD: The labels “capitalism” and “socialism”
It was not necessary to be an intellectual to be dismayed by the inequality of industrial society. The Welsh-born factory owner Robert Owen envisaged an alternative economic model based on cooperative production and utopian villages like the ones he founded at Orbiston in Scotland and New Harmony, Indiana. It was in a letter to Owen, written by Edward Cowper in 1822, that the word “socialism” in its modern sense first appears. An unidentified woman was, Cowper thought, “well adapted to become what my friend Jo. Applegath calls a Socialist”. Five years later, Owen himself argued that “the chief question … between the modern … Political Economists, and the Communionists or Socialists, is whether it is more beneficial that this capital should be individual or in common”. The term “capitalism” made its debut in an English periodical in April 1833 — in the London newspaper the Standard — in the phrase “tyranny of capitalism”, part of an article on “the ill consequences of that greatest curse that can exist amongst men, too much money-power in too few hands”. Fifteen years later, the Caledonian Mercury referred with similar aversion to “that sweeping tide of capitalism and money-loving which threatens our country with the horrors of a plutocracy”.
Niall Ferguson, “Capitalism, Socialism and Nationalism: Lessons from History”, 2020-02.
July 8, 2026
Don’t call them “U-boats”!
In his latest post for The Line, Matt Gurney violates the cardinal rule of discussing German naval equipment … don’t call ’em “U-boats”!
In Halifax on Monday, Prime Minister Mark Carney announced that Canada had chosen a preferred vendor for our new fleet of patrol submarines. Canada will (probably) be going with a German-Norwegian consortium that was offering the Type 212CD submarine, and not the South Korean boats offered by Hanwha. The prime minister said it was a close finish between the two competitors and noted that either design would have met Canada’s needs. The decision announced Monday is not a final purchase order but rather a determination of who our preferred partner would be. The prime minister said that if the negotiations with TKMS, the German company offering the 212CD, did not go well, Hanwha remained an acceptable option.
Personally, I was rooting for the Koreans. I liked their submarine’s ability to launch missiles vertically, which would’ve given the Canadian fleet some powerful strike options. I also tripped a little over the thought of Canadians in U-boats — I suspect many historically minded Canadians will also blink hard at that little twist of fate. But I fundamentally agree with the prime minister — either boat is fine for our purposes. The 212CD will be an excellent asset once it enters Canadian service (presumably with a snappier name).
Sooner would be better. The prime minister noted repeatedly during his remarks on Monday that the government was moving quickly to make this announcement, having settled on a preferred partner five years ahead of the original schedule. This is true, and I give the prime minister full credit for that. I would also note that the schedule was already ridiculously long. We actually should have begun replacing the submarines a decade ago. The PM’s comments reminded me that I had written a column about the urgent need to just get on with replacing the submarines when we had last announced another cycle of refurbishments to keep the current fleet in service because we had yet again delayed a decision on a replacement.
I found my old article. I wrote it seven years ago.
That was bad. Carney accelerating it is good. It’s also good that we are looking at a much larger fleet of submarines, going from four to as many as 12. Submarines are very complicated machines. For every boat you want available for service, you need three or four in your fleet. This gives you a large enough fleet to have an operational submarine available while others undergo maintenance or refits or participate in training exercises with their crews. The four Victoria-class submarines Canada possesses today mean that we typically might have one available for service at any given time, so a fleet of 12 will give us a much more robust presence. Given that we claim three oceans, and that the world is pretty much a dumpster fire these days, having a submarine available on each coast at all times seems like a good idea.
Time is of the essence. Germany and Norway, the prime minister said, have offered to allow Canada to cut ahead of them in line for deliveries of the submarines, which are already under construction but haven’t yet entered service. Given the decrepit state of our elderly existing fleet, that was obviously a meaningful sweetener, and the PM said the first boats could be in Canadian service in seven or eight years, which is pushing the Victorias to their limits, but should work. We hope?
HMCS Victoria, one of four ex-Royal Navy submarines in Canadian service, will have to carry on in service — as much as the class can carry on — until the early 2030s.
Image via Wikimedia Commons.
The Korean War Week 107 – America on Strike! – July 7, 1952
The Korean War by Indy Neidell
Published 7 Jul 2026The US Steelworkers Union strike enters its second month this week with no end in sight and the lack of steel production is affecting the war, worsening what is already an artillery shell crisis. President Harry Truman even considers taking over the steel industry to salvage the war effort. In South Korea, the constitution is amended to allow direct popular Presidential elections rather than the President being chosen by the National Assembly and in Chicago, at the end of the week the US Republican Party Convention begins, with Douglas MacArthur giving the keynote address.
00:00 Intro
00:39 Recap
01:09 Local SK News
03:22 Bombing the Power Plants
05:24 Artillery Crisis and Steelworkers Strike
09:53 Republican Convention Begins
13:46 Summary
13:59 Conclusion
Initial reactions to The Odyssey trailer
As always, I’m not closely following whatever movies Hollywood chooses to extrude, but I do see the occasional high and low lights from the reactions of others. The latest attempt to portray Homer on screen isn’t finding it easy to get potential viewers excited:
The public reaction to the Odyssey trailer is a strong indication that Nolan’s reputation won’t be enough to prevent this turd from leaving a smoking crater in the studio’s budget.
People are sick of blackwashing. They’re sick of girlboss reimagining. They’re sick of every movie turning into a sermon.
Does this mean that a Tipping Point will be reached, that Hollyweird will finally sit up and pay attention to the dashboard full of red warning lights and sirens screaming for its attention?
Lol. Lmao.
The cultural revolution means that everyone in a position to do something has been replaced with religious fanatics who don’t care about nonsense like “money”.
Just like every other institution they suborned.
They are crashing the plane with no survivors, and as it goes down in flames they will take the opportunity for a final smug lecture about how the failure of the audience to appreciate them demonstrates that the audience are nothing but white supremacists.
I’ve seen speculation that the current crop of “big” movies were all in early production just at the peak of a few trends that have since receded in popular culture — girlbosses and general wokeness — and it might just be a matter of timing … or it could be that Hollywood’s movers and shakers are still determined to press on with the undiluted progressive message even if it means losing hundreds of millions of dollars with every new release.
On the topic of The Odyssey, Ted Gioia talks about his own discovery of Homer as a youngster and says “youngsters were Homer’s target audience — you can feel that at every turn in his story”:
The first work of classical literature that thrilled me to the depths of my soul was the Odyssey. It made such a big impact that, decades later, I insisted on reading it aloud to my own children, hoping they would feel that same magic.
I was little more than a child back when I discovered Homer — 12 or 13 years old, I’d guess. Back then I knew more about comic books than serious literature. But I was outgrowing Spiderman and Superman, and decided to take a chance on Odysseus.
I approached this book with fear and trembling — worried it might be too difficult. But I soon discovered that Homer was the Stan Lee of antiquity. He told adventure stories not much different from the ones peddled by Marvel or DC.
I’d somehow gotten my hands on a tattered used paperback copy of the Odyssey, in a 1937 prose translation by W.H.D. Rouse — published by Mentor Classics (cover price when new = 60 cents). This is not a respected translation — they will never assign Rouse’s version of Homer at any Ivy League college. [NR: I think this is the way I first encountered The Odyssey … possibly this version in Grade 5 as it was a prose translation.]
That’s because the legit translators try to convey this epic as poetry. Rouse made no attempt at that. He just turned Homer into everyday language, just like it was a pulp fiction story for the mass market.
That was the right choice, he believed, because (as he wrote in his introduction): “The Odyssey is the best story ever written … It has been a favorite for three thousand years”. Other translations of this book are, he claimed, “filled with affectations and attempts at a poetic language Homer himself is free from. Homer speaks naturally and we must do the same.”
You can see the difference by comparing Rouse’s rendering of the opening lines with the esteemed Chapman translation from Shakespeare’s era.
Is this the best version of Homer? I won’t go that far — years later I became very fond of Robert Fitzgerald’s translation. But I will insist that Rouse is the superior version for a youngster. And, in many ways, youngsters were Homer’s target audience — you can feel that at every turn in his story.
So this is the first thing about the Odyssey you won’t learn at Harvard — namely that this tale was not intended for Harvard elites. It’s a story for everybody. So it’s an obvious choice for a big-budget Hollywood movie. There was no pretension or elitism in Homer’s approach. In today’s parlance, you would say that he was appealing to a mass audience.
Director Christopher Nolan — whose screen version of the Odyssey makes its debut in London today — relied on the more recent Emily Wilson translation of the Odyssey into iambic pentameter. In her version, our hero is described, like Shaft, as a complicated man who won’t cop out (when there’s danger all about). Okay, she doesn’t use those exact words, but comes close …
Emily Wilson’s translation of the opening lines of the Odyssey
I like this rendering, and can almost hear that Isaac Hayes synth vamp in the background. Wilson is just as straightforward as Rouse — living up to her aspiration to “tell the old story for modern times”.
ZKP-524: A Prototype Czech 7.62x25mm 1911 Copy
Forgotten Weapons
Published 18 Feb 2026The Czechoslovak military knew when they adopted it that the vz.52 pistol was not very good, and they initiated a replacement program at the same time as its adoption. Two pistols were developed to be its replacement; the CZ 531 and the ZKP 524. The ZKP was designed by the brothers Josef and František Koucký, based heavily on the Colt 1911 and Tokarev TT33 pistols. It was chambered for the 7.62x25mm cartridge as required by the military, and held 8 rounds in a single-stack magazine. In trials against the CZ-531, it proved to be more accurate, but less reliable and more expensive. It suffered a cracked slide after 4,198 rounds fired, and an improved second example was made. However, the vz.52 proved good enough despite its shortcomings, and the program to replace it fizzled out after this testing.
Thanks to the Czech Military History Institute (VHU) for graciously giving me access to this unique prototype to film for you! If you have the opportunity, don’t miss seeing their museums in Prague:
https://www.vhu.cz/en/english-summary/CZ 531 video: • CZ-531: A Czech Browning in 7.62mm Tokarev
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QotD: The Wilmot Proviso
The Wilmot Proviso attempted to scotch that, which forced the Senate, at least, to come right out and say it. People always underestimate the power of words and symbols, and professional historians are among the worst offenders. With the newer generations of pros it’s ideological enstupidation that causes it, but the older folks were almost as bad. It’s a structural issue — we rely on documents, so even though “the temper of the times” is real obvious in the aggregate, unless you can pin it down to specific statements in archival sources it’s hard to make your case.
If it helps, think of the couple whose marriage is obviously on the rocks. They fight constantly, they all but live separately, everybody knows their relationship is doomed … but when one of them finally comes out and says “I want a divorce”, things often change radically. Temporarily, most often, but how many people have you seen suddenly make all-out efforts to patch things up only after somebody finally says the D-word?
You can hear the capital letters in their voices. Before, all that stuff — romantic weekend getaways and the like — were attempts to “get back on track” or “spice things back up” or whatever. As soon as someone says Divorce, though, all those things become capitalized — we’re Saving Our Marriage.
The Wilmot Proviso was like that. Somebody finally said the D word.
Severian, “1846-1861”, Founding Questions, 2022-06-25.
July 7, 2026
Canada decides to buy German submarines
I wouldn’t say I’ve been closely following the Canadian Patrol Submarines Project (CPSP), but I was interested enough to do a bit of reading about both of the contending bidders and their offerings. Based on my understanding of the RCN’s needs, I expected the South Korean KSS-III submarine to be the final winner, but I was wrong: Prime Minister Mark Carney announced that the German/Norwegian TKMS Type 212CD submarine had been selected instead.
Type 212 submarines at the HDW shipyard in Kiel, Germany, 1 May 2013.
Photo by Bjoertvedt via Wikimedia Commons.Submarines enable the Royal Canadian Navy (RCN) to defend threats near and far from Canada’s shores. Yet, our current fleet is aging, with only one of four submarines seaworthy. With the longest coastline in the world, Canada’s ability to deploy underwater surveillance capability is critical. Our security and sovereignty depend on them.
Today, at Canadian Forces Base Halifax, the Prime Minister, Mark Carney, announced that Thyssenkrupp Marine Systems (TKMS) has been selected as the preferred supplier to begin negotiations for delivering Canada’s next fleet of submarines to the RCN. This will be the largest defence procurement in Canadian history, and it will equip the RCN with the capabilities they need to keep Canadians safe.
With ultra-low acoustic and magnetic signatures, TKMS’ 212CD is one of the stealthiest submarines in the world. It is capable of Arctic patrol, undersea surveillance, special forces deployment, and it is fully NATO-interoperable. These submarines provide an unparalleled combination of advanced technology and lethality that will enable the RCN to detect, track, deter and, if necessary, defeat adversaries in all three oceans bordering Canada. This procurement will bolster Canadian security through a platform shared by Germany and Norway, two of Canada’s closest Allies.
The Government of Canada and TKMS will now enter into negotiations to finalise the contracts and all arrangements required to deliver the requirements of the CPSP. Canada will conclude contracting no later than the end of 2027, with the first four submarines to be delivered ahead of schedule, in 2034. In the event that negotiations with the preferred supplier are unsuccessful, Canada may designate Hanwha Ocean as the preferred supplier and enter into negotiations.
The CPSP is being advanced by the Defence Investment Agency and aligns with Canada’s Defence Industrial Strategy. Under the Build-Partner-Buy framework, the project demonstrates the Partner approach, with collaborations with trusted Allies to develop and deliver capabilities while ensuring industrial and economic benefits for Canada. The CPSP will prioritise investments across the Canadian supply chain, to create high-paying jobs, leverage Canadian defence industries, and maximise benefits for Canadian workers and businesses.
Noah comments on the press release information and some wider issues to do with the CPSP:
And with this, the long-awaited Canadian Patrol Submarine Project finds its home. What started as an ambitious RFI back in 2024 has quickly turned into one of the most consequential, publicized, and dynamic projects, I would say, in Canadian history.
TKMS and Kongsberg, operating as Team GERNOR, have claimed the preferred supplier designation from the federal government. As always, there is no contract today. The selection of a preferred supplier merely sets the table for negotiations to a final contract.
While the federal government will want to move quickly, and I’m sure that the Navy would like to see the contract signed, it is highly likely that comes in 2027. The typical “quick” timeframe is about a year. Keeping in mind, of course, that CPSP will be the largest procurement contract in federal history,1 and in this case also includes additional negotiations on build slots for submarines from both Germany and Norway.
[…]
There was no universal consensus, and I know this choice didn’t come easy for anyone. Both sides put all they could into it. Yet in the end, the GERNOR option pulled ahead. The European focus was championed heavily by those in the PMO as an opportunity to open doors and integrate Canadian industry into the wider European ecosystem, especially as European interest in Canadian expansion grows.
At the end of the day, that ecosystem came out on top. In the final weeks and months of the competition especially, the banner of Europe rallied to the call of unity, to stand with their hands at the back of Team GERNOR. That push, and that united front, is very likely what pushed that sense of alignment forward.
You don’t need to look far for it. Just after CANSEC, Italy’s Fincantieri, a noted ally of TKMS, signed a new MOU with Magellan Aerospace to investigate the potential production of heavyweight torpedoes and undersea countermeasures, building off the proposed investment TKMS plans to make.
While not in the 212CD network, Fincantieri is in the family, and they, among others, are also looking to Canada and our choices. It is the first example of the TKMS family taking notice and making proactive moves to jump in and secure capacity in a future Canadian submarine industry; and, as I understand it, far from the only one being discussed.
Another outside addition: Navantia of Spain and TKMS have also recently signed an MOU to investigate collaboration on naval shipbuilding. While this new agreement is young, I am also led to believe that Navantia is looking to Canada with interest, building off some of their previous engagements with industry.
Increasingly, the European front is united in industry, in the political sphere, and diplomatically to present the 212CD not as a German-Norwegian partnership but as a foundational Canada-Europe partnership that will build off the foundation of agreements like SAFE and the EU-Canada Security and Defence Partnership to create a united Atlantic front that promotes collaboration and joint investment, and opens the European market to Canadian industry.
- NR – “the largest procurement contract in federal history” … Canada’s major military purchases happen so rarely and always taking as long as bureaucratically/politically possible, so every ship, aircraft, helicopter, or tank purchase has a good chance of being the next “largest procurement contract in federal history”.
Clankers in higher education
On his Substack, David Friedman discusses the impact of AI on university exams:
Professor Roberto Serrano, who is the Harrison S. Kravis University Professor of Economics at Brown University, has detected a massive fraud in one of the classes he teaches, ECON 1170, an advanced undergraduate course in mathematical economics. He has conclusive evidence that at least 50 students cheated on the March midterm exam, making it the biggest known scandal at Brown and in the entire Ivy League
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“Academic integrity is a value worth defending. The faculty cannot be left on its own in a battle that is decisive if we want to preserve the future of higher education,” explains the 61-year-old professor … (El Pais)
It was a closed book take-home exam; the problems were designed to test the student’s ability but proved doable by an AI. After Serrano changed the final from take-home to in-person about half the students who had gotten perfect scores on the midterm chose not to take the final.
The existence of AI, like the earlier problem of students buying papers online, reduces the ability of teachers to test their students but does not eliminate it, is inconvenient but not catastrophic. It makes some kinds of testing more difficult but not impossible; Serrano could have asked students whose midterms were suspiciously good to explain some of their answers and failed any obviously unable to do so. That would have been additional work for him and, judging by the article, not a policy Brown would have endorsed. Unwilling or unable to do that that he can base his future grading on work done in-person and adequately monitored.
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It is not immediately obvious what is wrong with using AI on a test. If the purpose of the test is to generate information for potential future employers, why should they want the student tested without a tool that, if they hire him, he will have? A basketball coach does not evaluate potential team members by how well they can play with one hand tied behind their back.
Arguably the skills the employer wants tested are those that an AI cannot replace and it was up to Professor Serrano to find ways of testing for them. His take-home midterm, taken without the assistance of AI, might have provided information for him and his students about how far they had come along a path that would eventually produce skills an AI could not substitute for but not information for a future employer about the skills of the students taking the exam.
The Democratic Socialists of America
On the social media site formerly known as Twitter, Cynical Publius sounds the warning about the impending takeover of the Democratic party by the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA):
Logo of the Democratic Socialists of America
Since 2023, I have kept the same pinned post because I feel that post (the one discussing “my side of history”) is the most important sentiment I have ever posted on this platform.
For the short-term future, however, I am changing that pinned post to this one, because it is of such crucial importance to our nation’s survival.
Here goes.
The Democrat Party is in the process of being taken over by the Democrat Socialists of America (the “DSA”).
The DSA is an explicitly Marxist organization.
Marxism has impoverished more people and genocidally murdered more of humanity than all other ideologies ever to exist in human history combined.
It is a grotesque form of evil that is wholly incompatible with the Constitution of the United States of America.
Marxism in all its forms must be reviled and publicly treated with the same disdain with which intelligent adults view Naziism, pedophilia, serial murderers and cannibalism.
Do not back down. Each and every time you encounter Marxism in any of its forms, please call it out for the evil that it is. It is a rapidly metastasizing cancer that can only be defeated by public awareness.
Thank you.
Tom Knighton reacts to another self-identified Democratic Socialist’s criticisms of America:
… when I see someone like this, I have to think this should be automatically disqualifying for office.
Pennsylvania state and socialist Chris Rabb, the Democratic nominee for Pennsylvania’s 3rd Congressional District, has joined the growing chorus of Democrats denouncing the founding documents and core institutions in the country on our 250th anniversary. The Democratic socialist is running unopposed for Congress and will almost certainly be a member of Congress after November.
Rabb spoke at an event billed as “America at 250 — Trump Fascism, Historical Erasure, and the Battle Over Truth” at People’s Plaza on Independence Mall in Philadelphia.
He denounced the country as based on “stolen land and stolen labor.” He lashed out at the Declaration of Independence:
Those screeds that were very lofty but were notoriously catering to a performative aspect of collective genius that purposely erased indigenous and black peoples … It created distance from an empire to help very privileged people continue that privilege and ultimately institutionalize that through the U.S. Constitution many years later. But it certainly did not provide independence to indigenous and black peoples. And we cannot talk about anything today without acknowledging that this is a nation born on stolen land & stolen labor.
Actually, I think the Declaration did provide independence to American Indians and black people. It just took way too long to be recognized.
Lincoln cites the concepts of the Declaration in the Gettysburg Address, and there’s little doubt that many of those who worked to end slavery did so because our nation was founded on the principle that all men were created equal.
It should have been a given, granted, and I have no problem with anyone taking issue with the imperfect application of that concept, because that’s legitimate. The thing is, we fought an entire war to end slavery once and for all. As many as 750,000 Americans lost their lives in that war, and it was ultimately worth it to end that particular scourge.
Yet I find it disgusting that while socialists like Rabb will cite that imperfect application of natural rights as an evil, they completely ignore the blood price this country paid to end that scourge.
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How can someone like this want to serve a nation they despise? He’s not really looking to make it better; he’s looking to destroy the nation it is in favor of something it was never meant to be. It’s not about improving it. It’s about overturning it.
I’m still flabbergasted that “Democratic Socialism” is taking hold as strongly as it has, especially considering socialism’s track record in the 20th Century, and while I believe Rabb has the right to say whatever retarded thing he wants, I also believe the voters of this country should see that kind of rhetoric as disqualifying for public office.
Yes, that includes the Democrats.
Unfortunately, they nominated him, and he’s far from the only DSA nutball who has won their primary this election cycle.
Remember, boys and girls: You can vote yourself into socialism, but you’ll have to shoot your way out.
Andrew Sullivan is also concerned with the DSA consuming the rest of the Democratic party:
I’d say the DSA is to the Democrats in the 2020s what the John Birch Society was to the GOP in the 1950s. But the Dems won’t expel or cauterize them, so dozens of DSA candidates are surging to victory this year, from Colorado to New York State, with a big boost from Mayor Mamdani and Hasan Piker.
The DSA backs Hamas terrorism, the Maduro regime in Venezuela, and the Castro tyranny in Cuba. Its new platform — to be voted on next month — supports “scrapping the U.S. Senate, ‘abolishing the carceral forces of the capitalist state’, defunding the Department of War, amnesty for all immigrants, and ‘replac[ing] the President and Supreme Court with an executive and judiciary chosen by and subordinate to Congress’.”
Jon Chait has a good rundown of the the group’s darker undercurrents. Last year, they amended their founding documents to allow members of communist cells to join. The DSA “Red Star Caucus” brags:
We in Red Star are communists who believe that DSA is the most effective place to serve the socialist movement … We call on all communists in the United States to join us in the democratic struggle within DSA … as we continue to improve the democratic structures of DSA, and as communists contest for and win hegemony within the organization, we continue to move toward a revolutionary horizon.
When Donald Trump calls someone a commie, it’s a good rule to ignore him. This time, he’s right. Lenin-fan Darializa Avila Chevalier showed up to a pro-Hamas rally on October 8, as bodies still lay on the ground at a music festival — yes, that’s how deep the Israel-hatred runs. She supports abolishing all prisons, police, and national borders. Her now-deleted Twitter discourse is a 2020 fever dream: “Yes, literally, abolish the border”, “Seize the means of production”, “ALL PIGS EVERYWHERE ARE HARAM”. She also converted to Islam. Check out her answer to the simple question, “What should happen to somebody who has killed somebody else?” It’ll take a while.
Claire Valdez, another primary winner, pledges to abolish ICE and nationalize the airline industry. Melat Kiros, who defeated a staunch progressive in Denver, is more rooted in opposition to Israel’s existence as a Jewish state and “genocide” in Gaza. She refused to condemn as antisemitic the fatal firebombing of a solidarity walk for Israeli hostages. It was merely “anti-Zionist.” Israel is increasingly the dominant fixation among the activist left — just ask Scott Wiener.
After this wave of extremism, you might expect some Democratic pushback. And some came: a new group of 13 House Dems signed a “Promise to America”, rejecting socialism. “We disagree with MAGA. We disagree with socialists”, Congressman Tom Suozzi said. “We don’t want this extremism. We want mainstream.” But 13 signatures are not much against a growing and organized machine. And the pressure more broadly is on the critics: “You are creating the antagonistic dynamic that we do not need”, AOC said. “These are two young, talented, intelligent women that got elected against all odds, against millions of dollars. Perhaps there is something we can learn from them.” There is: communism.
