My latest:
The Iran Question Is All About China
Why Operation Epic Fury Is the Opening Act of the Indo-Pacific Century
The Iran question was never about Iran. Remove the Islamic Republic from the equation and China loses its pawns for a Taiwan contingency. Leave it in place and the Middle East remains what Beijing designed it to be: a second front that Washington can never afford to leave and can never afford to stay in. Trump's strikes are the first move by an American president who appears to understand that the road to the Pacific runs through Tehran.
https://t.co/sDBKn77CYY
Every Christmas Eve, I think about George Bailey.
He dreamed of escaping Bedford Fallsโof shaking off the dust of a small town, building skyscrapers, exploring the world. Instead, he stayed. He ran the Building & Loan his father left behind. He sacrificed his college money, his honeymoon savings, his chance to see the world, over and over, because people needed him.
By the time the crisis hits, George feels like a failure. His life looks like one long series of missed opportunities, thwarted ambitions, and quiet resentments. He stands on the bridge, convinced the world would be better without him.
Then Clarence shows him the truth: a Bedford Falls without George Bailey is a darker, meaner, hollowed-out place. The people he quietly helped, the small acts of integrity he performed without recognition, the risks he took to protect othersโthose werenโt detours. They were the substance of his life.
The filmโs deepest insight isnโt just that โno man is a failure who has friends.โ Itโs that real impact is almost always invisible in the moment. The lives you steady, the small kindnesses you extend, the responsibilities you shoulder when no one else willโthese things ripple outward in ways you may never see.
A strong sense of purpose doesnโt erase pain; it transforms it. It doesnโt merely explain why hard things happened. It asks: What are you now responsible for because they happened?
Faith, at its best, does the same. It doesnโt promise that everything was โmeant to beโ in order to make suffering palatable. It invites you to look at what has been entrusted to you in light of what youโve endured.
Georgeโs story reminds us that meaning is rarely found in the grand escape, but in the faithful presence. The dreams we surrender donโt always vanishโthey often become the raw material for something more enduring than we imagined.
If youโre carrying the weight of roads not taken, of dreams deferred, of a life that feels smaller than you once hopedโwatch Itโs a Wonderful Life again tonight. Not as nostalgia, but as revelation.
You may not see the full difference youโve made yet.
But itโs there.
And it matters more than you know.
Merry Christmas, friends.
๐๐จ๐ฝ๐ ๐ฆโ๏ธโช๏ธโ๏ธโค๏ธ
Temple & standout OT Giakoby Hills have agreed to a multi-year deal that makes him among the highest-paid position players in the G-5, his agency @thebizofathlete tells @mzenitz and me.
The 6-foot-5, 290-pound freshman was on the radar for high-level P-4s ahead of the portal.