ross hinkle

in love with the world // founder :: handmade capital | peak street funds and @liveset | board member of myLaurel

[ross hinkle @rosshinkle]

the ego believes you are separate from other people. the ego believes if i hurt you, it only hurts you and doesn't hurt me. the ego believes we die.

your higher self knows we are all one. your higher self knows if i hurt you i hurt me. your higher self knows your soul is timeless.

the path of wisdom is in part a journey of quieting your ego.

[This Is Beirut @ThisIsBeirut_]

🔴 UPDATE: Baalbek–Hermel clans released a statement in Arabic backing President Joseph Aoun and PM Nawaf Salam’s stance that there be no military or security arms outside Lebanese state authority, calling it a sovereign step toward full state control and a final ceasefire with Israel.

#IranWar

[Azat @AzatAlsalim]

The girl, who lit a cigarette with the photo of Ali Khamenei, celebrates the death of the supreme ayatollah with this video.

[Richard Hanania @RichardHanania]

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan discredited interventionism in the eyes of the American public.

What the last few years have done in contrast is discredit anti-interventionism, or the idea that American power cannot be used for good.

First came the Abraham Accords, where contrary to every prediction made by practically every Middle East expert, Israel signed peace treaties with several of its neighbors without taking care of the Palestinian issue first.

Throughout the first Trump administration, the maximum pressure campaign had Israel, the Arabs, and the US all on the same side against Iran.

The Syrian regime falls, the new leader in Damascus is pro-Western. We ended up fighting both Assad and ISIS, and defeated them both.

Then you had the Venezuela operation. Without losing any American soldiers, we removed the Maduro regime, and replaced it with a government that has been freeing political prisoners and opening up the oil industry to American companies.

Cuba will probably be overthrown without any cost next, ending the over half-century nightmare there.

Now, after taking a detour during the Hamas war and wiping out Hezbollah's leadership, Israel along with the US slaughter the entire upper echelon of the Iranian regime. What's next in Iran? Who knows? But isn't there at least a chance it'll be better than the old theocrats? Why would anyone dismiss the possibility? People deny this is possible just because they want America and the West to fail.

Russia and China remain problems and North Korea is an exception. But when it comes to weaker enemies around the world, we can just kill them and everything will be fine.

As it turns out, we misunderstood the lessons of Iraq and Afghanistan.

The lesson wasn't "never do regime change" or "never kill bad people."

The lesson we should've taken was "don't do social engineering through war." Killing bad people and removing bad government is fine, both in terms of American interests and from a humanitarian perspective. Now that we've seen how easy it is, we arguably have a moral obligation to keep doing it.

There is a lot to be gained by just removing the worst of the worst. Going from Stalin to Khrushchev and Mao to Deng made things much better. Same with going from Maduro to Delcy, and the same is likely to be true with regard to whatever comes next in Iran and Cuba. Don't waste your time on micromanaging the country and having feminist art exhibitions like we did in Afghanistan. Just remove regime you don't like first, and then be pragmatic with the next steps.

America is powerful and good. We just need to understand that it is ok to admit it.

[ross hinkle @rosshinkle]

@KamalaHarris this one is not going to age well

[ross hinkle @rosshinkle]

Freedom? Inshallah

What we're witnessing today is the end of a 47-year old experiment: what happens when radical far-left progressive ideologies unite with far-right islamofascist ideologies? Horrific suffering for Iranians, their neighbors, and the world. Let this be a reminder for us all today.

The death, destruction, repression, and denial of basic human rights, particularly for women, that this regime created has been on display for the world to see over and over again. Death to America, death to Israel, death to their own people. The Iranian people were begging for a rescue operation and today the United States and Israel provided the rescue. No one knows how this will end, but the Iranian people deserve as much of a chance to be free as the Germans and the Japanese did in 1945.

Let us all celebrate this moment and the heroes seen and unseen who made it happen, and do everything we can to support Iranians in their right for freedom. Next year in Tehran.

[ross hinkle @rosshinkle]

@hosseeb beautiful post - this is example 1 of why we've been committed to our dragonfly partnership for many years, with many more to come

[⭕️Faerie ❤️ @LiquidFaerie]

In her speech to the European Parliament, Swedish MEP Alice Teodorescu delivered a rather inconvenient truth: the world’s moral outrage has turned into a pick-and-choose buffet.
Since 7 October, half the planet has been frothing at the mouth over Israel, yet the same voices can’t seem to muster a single syllable for the industrial-scale slaughter, rape, and deliberate starvation tearing Sudan apart, hundreds of thousands dead, millions displaced, and still the silence is deafening.
Her point, delivered without the usual Brussels varnish, is brutally simple: when your condemnation hinges on whether you can shoehorn Israel into the villain slot and Hamas into the plucky-resistance box, rather than on actual human suffering, your moral compass isn’t just wobbly, it’s been nicked and sold for parts. Sudan lays that grotesque double standard bare for anyone still pretending not to see it.

[ross hinkle @rosshinkle]

inspired

[Morning Brew ☕️ @MorningBrew]

Courtney Reum, a 45-year-old VC, made his professional soccer debut last weekend in Portugal

He signed with a second division club and financed the deal himself by giving the team a six figure loan and access to his VC firm

All-time move

[Elica Le Bon الیکا‌ ل بن @elicalebon]

I can’t believe I have to explain what’s happening here, but here goes. Elite students of Ivy League schools have glamorized oppression so much that they have now reached role play status to satisfy their fantasies. Here, the students have appropriated the suffering of Gazans and are cosplaying as living through humanitarian crisis. In their American make-believe story where Ivy League infrastructure sets the scene, the students play Gazans and the school administration plays Israel.

Israel (the school) is blocking their “basic humanitarian aid” in this play, and if they don’t receive it soon, they will “die of thirst and starvation” (appropriating exact experiences of Gazans). They also destroy upper class buildings and claim them as “liberated” while the students repeat chants in zombie-like chorus, playing the roll of “freedom fighters” destroying Israeli infrastructure and claiming them freed. If I’m alive in a world where people don’t see the levels of perversion in this, I give up.

You don’t see this in lower tier schools from kids of lower socio-economic standing because they aren’t plagued with the guilt of privilege that they’re seeking to launder through Middle East role plays of feigned suffering. This is as first world dystopia as it gets.

Meanwhile, these Ivy League students who can have much more than a glass of water and as much food as their stomachs can take are commanding the attention of the media and the entire American audience, while actual Gazans who need humanitarian aid are ignored. I still have to pinch myself that people don’t see this.

[ross hinkle @rosshinkle]

@Rhrudd hey richard - i listened to your podcast with rick rubin recently, and would love a suggestion of where to purchase beautiful teas online. thank you!

[Aviva Klompas @AvivaKlompas]

Earlier this week, the Houthis in Yemen sentenced 13 people to public execution on homosexuality charges.

Today students at @Columbia University chanted "Yemen, Yemen makes us proud, turn another ship around."

The cognitive dissonance is mindboggling.

[ross hinkle @rosshinkle]

"the size of your life directly depends on how much uncertainty you can live with. if you need to be sure and certain of every little thing and how it's going to unfold, you'll probably end up having a pretty small life where very few risks are taken. but the more we can develop the muscle of living with uncertainty, the bigger risks we can take, and the bigger the life we can have."

- posner

[ross hinkle @rosshinkle]

thru meditation, you can find yourself fulfilled before the next good thing happens in your life, not because of it

[ross hinkle @rosshinkle]

“If you're going to try, go all the way. There is no other feeling like that. You will be alone with the gods, and the nights will flame with fire. You will ride life straight to perfect laughter. It's the only good fight there is.”

— Charles Bukowski, Factotum

[ross hinkle @rosshinkle]

@coldxman @YousefMunayyer yousef uses exactly the same talking points as hamas is using in arabic language tv interviews in lebanon and elsewhere - really not the preferred path to navigate across the moral landscape here

[Yonit Levi @LeviYonit]

Please read this essential piece by @simonmontefiore for @TheAtlantic, particularly if you’re a college student

[Cernovich @Cernovich]

If your cause is just, or you believe it to be, some advice:

- Do not parachute into a civilian music festival and then rape and kill women visiting from around the world.

I thought this was basic stuff. Many seem to struggle with it.

[Coleman Hughes @coldxman]

In light of the grotesque attack on Israel by Hamas, I want to repost my conversation with reknowned Israeli historian Dr. Benny Morris.

Already we are hearing apologists claim that Israel had this coming––that 75 years of colonial oppression is bound to result in an equal and opposite reaction.

Most of the people who say this have no understanding of the relevant history. That is why I did this episode with Dr. Morris: we walk systematically through the history and ethics of the Arab-Israeli conflict from the 19th century to the present. Please listen to the episode with an open mind and share it with your friends.

https://t.co/yNNPq88lng

[ross hinkle @rosshinkle]

one thing you should know is that gaza wasn't occupied. it was given to the palestinians in 2005, at considerable political cost to the israeli govt who forcibly removed the jews living there. it was considered the right thing to do at the time, although many on the right warned of tragic consequences.

it was a land for peace deal to give the palestinians an unoccupied home from which to build a civil society.

they instead elected hamas to lead gaza in 2007, who then proceeded to murder many of the PA civil servants who lost the election, and from that point on have launched countless terror attacks on israel, using their own citizens as human shields.

israel is about to correct what they now see was a grave error in judgement in 2005. they are very likely going to go door to door starting in gaza city to kill or capture every hamas militant from there to the egyptian border.

it's going to be brutally violent and hard to watch and likely hundreds more israelis and palestinians will die.

hamas doesn't want peace. this is a religious terror organization whose charter calls explicitly for killing jews where you find them. israel can no longer afford to have territory on its southern border controlled by a militant terrorist organization, as yesterday has proven for the world to see. war crimes committed by the dozen on camera.

when the attack on hamas terrorists begins, please ask yourself what you would do if terrorists were rolling into your neighborhood killing grandmothers and kidnapping children. i know what would happen in the south where i grew up.

i have many palestinian friends. i have traveled to almost every refugee camp in the palestinian territories. i have broken bread in ramallah many many times. my heart aches for the innocent civilians there and in gaza. what hamas did yesterday set back the cause of peace in this region for a generation. i dont know how we get from here to peace, but i pray after this tragedy is over that we find a way.