Kim R. Holmes

Former Assistant Secretary of State and historian.

[Kim R. Holmes @kimsmithholmes]

“Fight fire with fire.” Where have I heard this before?

This is precisely what new right populists and MAGA said about progressive Democrats. And they used it to justify all of Trump’s transgressions.

The willingness on both sides to throw all moral restraints, the Constitution and the rule of law aside is how we got to our current sorry state of American politics. One side could also ways use the purported horribleness of the other side to justify them being horrible themselves.

This view is not “both-sidesism.” It is standing up for Americanism.

The malady will stop until we realize that standing up for decency, individual responsibility and morality, constitutional restraints on government, and the sanctity of the Consitition and the rule of law are not mere “processes,” but the very foundations of the American republic—and I dare say, the essence of American exceptionalism.

[Townhall.com @townhallcom]

CNN: Do you think that Democrats need to be willing to not play by the traditional rules...?

Debbie Dingell: I'm never gonna accept sexual violence...but...I do believe we have to fight fire with fire."

[Euromaidan Press @EuromaidanPress]

Ukraine took offline 42.74% of Russia's oil refining capacity, resulting inused $13.5 billion in industry losses since August 2025, according to the General Staff

Strikes in June reached over 1,100 km from Ukraine's border. Moscow diesel prices are up 43% since January
https://t.co/aoGSoK67o2

[Kim R. Holmes @kimsmithholmes]

This may or may not deter Russia. Putin has his hands full right now, but he may consider some provocation here not only to distract from his losses, but to test whether the US comes to Europe’s aid.

Trump’s vast uncertainty in his rhetoric and deeds toward NATO invites such a test.

But here is the problem. If Putin were to try a test, and succeed at it, the US would then be much more likely to intervene forcefully to stop him. Afterwards when it would be more costly and dangerous.

If, on the other hand, Putin tries something and the Europeans alone push him back, then the US is seen as a weak paper tiger.

Not good choices. It would have been far better for the US to show resolve ahead of time to shore up deterrence.

But I dream.

[Visioner @visionergeo]

‼️🇺🇦🇺🇲🇷🇺 BIG | The EU Prepares for Independent Defense Without the US, Moving to Protect the Suwałki Gap.

According to the reputable publication The Economist, the European members of the North Atlantic Alliance are considering a scenario where they would have to enter a military conflict without the direct involvement of the United States. As part of these preparations, EU countries have already begun deploying military contingents to protect the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius and the strategically critical "Suwałki Gap," which connects the Baltic states to Poland (and, consequently, to the rest of Europe).

This event marks a massive turning point in European defense: amid US instability, European capitals increasingly view the American security umbrella as a risk and are transitioning to true "strategic autonomy." NATO's new tactic—"deterrence by denial"—involves the forward fortification of the eastern flank and the Suwałki Gap to strip the Kremlin of any illusion of a swift Baltic isolation. This independent mobilization of troops sends a clear signal to Moscow that even in the event of Washington's passivity, Europe is ready to fight with its own forces, maximizing the cost of aggression for Russia.

See the latest updates with us: @visionergeo

[Ben Hodges @general_ben]

“There's no place to hide in Crimea,” said Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, a retired commanding general of U.S. Army Europe. “The Ukrainians have the ability to touch every single place where there’s an air defense weapon or a logistics hub or an airfield or headquarters.”

In Strike After Strike, Ukraine Is Bringing the War to Crimea https://t.co/dti7sZTlhF

[Kim R. Holmes @kimsmithholmes]

In other words, we are willing to give them an economic benefit they did not enjoy before the war, but which is now divorced from what they do with their nuclear weapons program.

The threat to control the Strait of Hormuz was always implicit, and as such was a major deterrent from striking Iran. Now the Iranian threat is explicit and being used as leverage to lift sanctions which had been aimed at Iran’s nuclear program, but which are now bargaining chips in getting Iran to stop doing what it was not doing prior to the war.

Regardless of what it does on nukes.

What a mess.

[Amit Segal @AmitSegal]

U.S. to Iran: We’ll release part of the frozen funds if you waive the toll in the Strait of Hormuz. For now, Tehran is refusing the offer (Wall Street Journal).

[Kim R. Holmes @kimsmithholmes]

It’s the old imperial model. Protect the regime elites while sacrificing the peasants outside Moscow and St. Petersburg. The flaw in this plan is that the Russian elites are as spoiled as the rich people in Paris or London. Yes, they are more dependent and fearful than the Western elites, but they are not nearly as compliant as the proverbial muzhik.

https://t.co/6wkidABsWw

[Kim R. Holmes @kimsmithholmes]

The shot is not gratuitous but intentional. Post-liberals like him made targeting free market conservatives a key part of their strategy to destroy traditional conservatism. It was partly tactical—to court blue color and young liberal voters—but its main thrust was ideological, to break the link between political and economic freedom. The heavy state he has in mind to regulate peoples’ lives will not abide by a citizenry that demands the state leave them alone economically.

Think of it as nationalist nanny state which has the same economic powers as the socialist state, but not the same political agenda. It uses that power not only to control politically preferred outcomes, but to reward its preferred voters with the economic largess of the state (that it now controls).

Thr ends may be nationalist but the means are quasi-socialist. But a warning, it’s a hybrid kind of socialism. Don’t be fooled by the oligarchic nature of such a system which can carve out large swaths of a capitalist economy for the private gain of the state’s masters. The “socialism” here pertains to controlling the economic decisions of the “little people” (with tariffs, for example), while reserving Milton Friedman-like “free market” preserves for cryptocurrencies and other “deals” blessed by the political masters of the state.

It’s not an old fashion monolithic socialist control of the means of production, but a willingness to control the economy with any means possible provided it enhances political control and rewards the people who benefit from it.

PS. Even old fashion communism was oligarchic. The party’s leaders lived like princes while the rest of the population suffered extreme poverty.

PPS. The system the Chinese have set up is a model which many post-liberals admire because if its ability to control the people while enriching the ruling class that controls the state.

[Robby Soave @robbysoave]

JD Vance is so frustrating. Here he takes gratuitous shots at Milton Friedman as a bad model for Republican economic thinking.

With Friedman as the guiding light, Ronald Reagan won 49 states and ushered in a decade of unrivaled prosperity.

[Kim R. Holmes @kimsmithholmes]

This idea of devising a political system to ensure that “human dignity flourishes” has been around awhile.

A few examples.

From the Socialist International (Declaration of Principles, 1989)

“[We demand] …human dignity for all.”

From Zohran Mamdani (2025)

“I believe in the dignity of all people.”

From North Korea.

The Pyongyang Declaration states that capitalism “trample[s] human dignity underfoot” and claims that “Only socialism can…ensure…human rights.”

I’m sure any resemblance is merely coincidental.

[Lahav Harkov @LahavHarkov]

Vance describes at length how he thinks that unlike Milton Friedman, the Trump admin’s economic ideas “allow human dignity to flourish.”

And then: “Milton Friedman’s ideas made more sense in the 1980s” because America had “Christian guardrails.”

[Kim R. Holmes @kimsmithholmes]

It looks like time is not on Russia’s side after all.

[Tymofiy Mylovanov @Mylovanov]

Petraeus: Ukraine is about to isolate Crimea. Gasoline so short they won't sell it to civilians. Tourists who came for beaches are trying to get home any way they can

Kerch Bridge rail no longer works. Ferries knocked out. Land bridges destroyed. Pontoon bridges now targeted 1/

[Kim R. Holmes @kimsmithholmes]

Sounds to me like he wants to create a right wing version of Roosevelt’s New Deal.

[Lahav Harkov @LahavHarkov]

Vance describes at length how he thinks that unlike Milton Friedman, the Trump admin’s economic ideas “allow human dignity to flourish.”

And then: “Milton Friedman’s ideas made more sense in the 1980s” because America had “Christian guardrails.”

[Kim R. Holmes @kimsmithholmes]

The recent swing to the left of Democrat politicians winning primaries seems to defy the expectation that the Democratic Party would moderate to win elections.

We should not be surprised. It’s not only the pendulum effect, the tendency to counter one extreme by moving with another extreme in the opposite direction. That’s actually normal politics.

It’s also something that’s not normal. It is the strange tendency to engage in magical thinking—sometimes called populism—that is now the prevailing view of American democracy, left or right.

It has seized both parties and is the easy go-to button for all things political. It is supplanting many of the things—limited government, a strict rule of law and respect for the constitution, a sense of fair play, a unique civil (as opposed to governmental) role for religion, and the American faith in self-reliance—that had one made America a truly exceptional country.

It is not about to end anytime soon. In fact, it is likely to get worse before it gets better. We will likely have at least another decade before a new opportunity arises to overcome this sad state of affairs.

Or maybe we never change. That is my biggest fear—that we all embrace the decline in one way or another.

American exceptionalism was never magic. It was based on hard realities that through history became firm principles of government.

That is now lost, whether forever I don’t know.

[Kim R. Holmes @kimsmithholmes]

Every single rule broken, law violated, and norm transgressed by exclusive presidential decree or action will now be thrown back at us from the other direction. Even when Trump addresses a legitimate problem, he does so not by arranging the passage of permanent laws, which is the way progressives institutionalized their “change,” but by lazily using presidential directives and “memos” that can be reversed the minute another president enters the White House.

His supporters may delude themselves into thinking that he or someone like him will rule forever. Trump may be counting on this sentiment to stay in power, as a pathway to a new kind of authoritarian rule.

But he will not stay in power forever. His supporters will then discover the cost of such complicity, when in all this edgy rule breaking is turned against them.

It was always the case, supporters say? Progressives were turning the “rules” against us already, so why can’t we give them a dose of their own medicine?”

It may feel good now, but it is at best a sugar high.

Before you could at least legitimately complain that the rules were being broken.

No more.

[Erick Erickson @EWErickson]

Yes.

[Kim R. Holmes @kimsmithholmes]

A socialist in her Twenties vows to take on the liberal establishment. I’ve seen this movie so many times before it should be in a museum. One of the remarkable things about modern politics is how a challenge from the far left is always—and I mean always—considered to be an edgy push for progress, when in fact it recycles some of the oldest myths in the book. Reminds me of that old adage about the Bourbons: they forget nothing, they learn nothing.

https://t.co/SqVc52tj4a

[Kim R. Holmes @kimsmithholmes]

Sad but true.

[Steven Pinker @sapinker]

The Crisis in the Humanities Is Not About Money: "Critical theory did not merely politicize scholarship. It made scholarship easier to produce" (anyone could get a dissertation out of showing that some work was really an instrument of oppression). Abraham Wyner cites a phenomenon I've long noticed: for an academic movement to get traction, it has to give grad students & junior scholars something to do. Chomsky dominated linguistics in part because he revised his theory every decade or so, sending linguists scrambling to reanalyze every construction in the new theory's terms. In the 80s and 90s neural networks spawned hundreds of papers called "A Connectionist Model of X," followed by the cognitive neuroscience revolution in which anyone could get a thesis out of sticking people in a magnet while they did some familiar experimental task. https://t.co/gguNcI0DFm

[Jennifer Griffin @JenGriffinFNC]

I asked a senior defense official why the US has had to go back and restrike these sites that have been hit multiple times since February 28 when the war began. I was told Iran has reconstituted its air defense and missile systems along the Strait of Hormuz since the US bombing campaign ended on April 7.
That, the source said, is why the US military is now having to restrike areas like Qeshm Island and Sirik which they had struck in the past.

“In the time since the cease fire on 7 April, Iran has reconstituted — thus the targets around the Strait of Hormuz,” a senior US defense official tells me. “There is a LOT that is damaged… a LOT… but they moved things around.”

It’s been 10 weeks since the April ceasefire was announced.

[Kim R. Holmes @kimsmithholmes]

Yes, it is the worldview of the United Nations and most often found espoused enthusiastically in the halls of the French foreign ministry, mainly because French diplomats see it as a counterbalance to American interests and values. It is a worldview that is the very antithesis of “America First.”

[James Lindsay, anti-Communist @ConceptualJames]

Yes, @EWErickson has it right here. That worldview is called multipolarism, or the Multipolar World model. If you believe in America and a world worth living in through the 21st century, you should oppose it just like you did the WEF.

[Kim R. Holmes @kimsmithholmes]

Not even North Korea or Turkmenistan have photos of their leaders on their passports.

[Jonah Goldberg @JonahDispatch]

Embarrassing.

[David Harsanyi @davidharsanyi]

I'm not surprised he's a fan of Richard "I am now a Keynesian" Nixon, whose wage and price controls and protectionism help drive the country into a decade of stagflation.

[Erick Erickson @EWErickson]

Three theaters have a common pattern. In each, an American adversary ends up stronger, and an American ally ends up weaker, more isolated, and less certain of our word. This is not the absent-minded drift of a distracted government. It is the consistent application of a thesis Vance has stated plainly for years: that the world is multipolar, that resources are scarce, that allies must fend for themselves, and that America should pull back to what he deems vital and let the other great powers run their own neighborhoods.

The trouble is what that thesis costs. American leadership was never charity. It was the cheapest insurance policy in history. We maintain a forward presence that keeps the sea lanes open, the rivals contained, and the wars small. Trade it away and you do not get a tidy multipolar balance. You get a world where Iran rebuilds, Turkey drifts, Russia digests, China watches, and every ally concludes the American guarantee is a wasting asset to be hedged against. Isolation does not make us safer. It makes us smaller, and it makes the people who wish us harm bolder.

https://t.co/lLlGXr6VxA