Category: Politics

Are you better off than you were two years ago?

A number of reports on Saturday suggested that White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain will step down after the State of the Union address next month. So, it’s a good time to look back on the Biden presidency so far.

Last year, just before President Joe Biden’s first State of the Union address, I wrote about seven failures of his administration.

From COVID-19 tyranny to a foolhardy retreat from energy independence to a vicious war on parents, the 46th president has proved to be far from the healing uniter he was promised to be. 

Though it seems many Americans have already forgotten about it, the disastrous Afghanistan withdrawal remains one of the most humiliating foreign policy fiascos in American history. Even worse, following that disaster, there was no reckoning, no accountability for what happened.

In Biden’s second year, we saw many ongoing problems, some of which have only escalated. So, to mark the second anniversary of Biden’s presidency, I’ve updated my analysis of some of his biggest failures that are affecting Americans today.

1.) Immigration Chaos

Biden said that the border crisis didn’t begin “overnight.” Actually, it pretty much did begin overnight—the moment he took office. Since he was sworn in as president, there have been an estimated 5.5 million illegal border crossings.

In December alone, there were 251,487 illegal immigrant encounters at the border, according to Customs and Border Patrol. That’s the highest number ever recorded.

BREAKING: Another Friday evening border news drop.
CBP reports migrant 251,487 migrant encounters at the southern border in December, making it the highest month ever recorded.
There have now been 717,660 encounters in first 3 months of FY’23 (Oct/Nov/Dec), not counting gotaways.

— Bill Melugin (@BillFOXLA) January 20, 2023

Border towns are besieged, but the whole country is now experiencing the effects of the illegal immigration crisis.

Not only are millions of people crossing the border illegally, the border situation has created additional problems beyond the humanitarian issue. Huge quantities of illicit drugs such as fentanyl are coming across the border, too, brought here by drug and human traffickers who thrive in the chaos.

It’s not a stretch to say that Biden has created the worst border crisis in U.S. history. We’ve set records for border crossings in each of his first two years as president, and at the current rate, we will set an illegal border-crossing record again this year.

This is all while Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas again and again assures us that the border is “secure.”

Does this look secure?

Quite literally living on the streets and sleeping next to trash bins in what will be another below-freezing night, this is what some immigrants who illegally entered the country and are evading border patrol have faced for months in El Paso pic.twitter.com/gRmQkQtuog

— Anna Giaritelli (@Anna_Giaritelli) January 16, 2023

Of course, when the president arrived at the border, in El Paso, Texas, on Jan. 8, for his first-ever visit, everything was cleaned up to make things look orderly and normal.

The White House and its media apologists first attempted to write off this crisis as a “seasonal” phenomenon. Nope, it wasn’t that. Now, they’ve gone with the more usual excuse for the president’s failures. He’s a victim of circumstances.

The ongoing, shambolic nature of the illegal immigration crisis is an inevitable product of the administration’s policies and ethos. From the moment Biden became president, he has stripped and chipped away at border enforcement and signaled to would-be border crossers that if they can make their way into this country, there’s a good chance they will be able to stay, whether they are detained or not.

It’s hard not to conclude at this point that what’s happening at the Southern border isn’t just incompetence, it’s intentional.

2.) Ballooning Debt

Pretty much every modern president and Congress has failed on the national debt issue. But Biden has ratcheted it up to a whole new level.

The United States started the 2023 fiscal year with a national debt of more than $31 trillion, which is 120% of the entire U.S. economy at this point. That debt increased by about $4 trillion since Biden arrived in office. And the administration is eager to pile up more debt, with a student-loan forgiveness program that will cost half a trillion dollars if it survives court challenges.

What’s the administration’s plan to deal with the debt that’s quickly reaching its congressionally authorized ceiling and flirting with a big Capitol Hill showdown? Well, some of the administration’s backers suggest that the Federal Reserve create a $1 trillion coin. 

Yes, a coin.

The proposal is of dubious legality. When questioned on this, the leading proponents of this “solution” suggested that the White House ignore the courts—creating a constitutional crisis—and march troops on the Federal Reserve if it doesn’t comply.

I asked @rohangrey & @NathanTankus — 2 of the leading theorists behind the “Mint the $1 Trillion Coin” idea — about some of the concerns I’d been hearing from those close to the White House about their plan Their responses, shared w/ permission, are worth reading pic.twitter.com/7HijRiohXp

— Jeff Stein (@JStein_WaPo) January 20, 2023

Sounds like a real plan for economic stability.

But don’t expect help from Congress anytime soon. The massive omnibus spending bill passed late last month in the lame-duck Congress locked in spending until September. A debt apocalypse isn’t here yet, but the consequence of limitless spending is starting to catch up with us. 

That leads to the next failure of the Biden presidency.

3.) Inflation

Inflation may be slowing down a bit—while food prices soar—but for the most part, the U.S. economy under Biden has suffered its highest levels of inflation since the Jimmy Carter administration in the late 1970s.

The result is that while the U.S. economy has low unemployment, for now, inflation and the cost of living are wiping out the wealth of the average American.

In fact, according to E.J. Antoni, an economist at The Heritage Foundation, the average American family has lost $7,100 in purchasing power under Biden due to inflation and high interest rates. So, while the Biden administration has celebrated a rise in take-home pay, the reality is that inflation during his presidency has more than nullified those gains.

Antoni also took issue with Biden’s spin on the slowing inflation. Slightly lower inflation is hardly a major victory.

“[Biden] is right to say inflation is going down, but that is not the same as prices going down. Inflation going down means that prices are still rising, just not quite as fast as before. A 7.1% inflation rate is still horrific. It means prices will double in about a decade,” Antoni said in a December interview with The Daily Signal, the news outlet of The Heritage Foundation.

Put another way, the house is burning down, but the good news is, we might save a few chairs.

4.) Woke Administrative State

The federal bureaucracy is being transformed into an apparatus more wholly devoted to the cult of diversity, equity, and inclusion. Following Biden’s 2021 executive order to establish a “government-wide initiative to advance diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility in all parts of the federal workforce,” the bureaucracy has been hard at work injecting every college campus-style inanity into its everyday operations.

Yes, NASA and the Pentagon are now discussing microaggressions and other woke nonsense. That’s comforting to know.

Moreover, all of this extends beyond the bureaucracy’s day-to-day operations.

In April, the Biden administration issued guidance through the Department of Health and Human Services to ensure that “transgender youth receive the care they need.”

What does that mean? This is from a Justice Department memo released at the same time:

Intentionally erecting discriminatory barriers to prevent individuals from receiving gender-affirming care implicates a number of federal legal guarantees. State laws and policies that prevent parents or guardians from following the advice of a health care professional regarding what may be medically necessary or otherwise appropriate care for transgender minors may infringe on rights protected by both the Equal Protection and the Due Process Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment.

The bottom line is that Biden, with the power of the federal government, wants to ensure that your child will be gender-transitioned, whether you like it or not.

The Biden administration also redefined Title IX protections for women to include sexual orientation and gender identity. Among other things, that could mean that gendered facilities in schools that receive federal funding could be eliminated or opened to the opposite sex.

The order means that the Department of Education will now go after, for instance, public school libraries that try to remove books with sexually explicit content that deals with LGBT identities.

5.) Specter of Scandal

A more recent development in the Biden presidency has been the discovery that he had classified documents from when he was the vice president under President Barack Obama.

Of course, when the FBI seized documents from former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago compound in Florida, the media treated it as the scandal of the century. At the time, Biden said he couldn’t believe how “anyone could be that irresponsible” to keep classified documents.

The media are working overtime to draw a distinction here to soften the blow for Biden, but the reality is that this looks bad for the president. It also undermines their arguments about Trump and Republicans being some kind of unique threat to the country.

Before Biden was elected, there were questions about scandal in his family. Was his son, Hunter Biden, using his father’s name and influence to enrich himself? Was the now president in on this corruption?

Of course, Big Tech and the media infamously quashed this story in the days before the 2020 election. It’s not going away now.

The Republican-controlled House will almost certainly be digging deep into potential corruption in the Biden family in the next two years. Even left-wing media and Democrats are acknowledging this is becoming a serious problem for Biden’s presidency.

Even Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., the No. 2 Democrat in the Senate, said that the recent discovery of classified materials in Biden’s Delaware home and the Penn Biden Center “diminishes the stature of any person who is in possession of it” and that Biden “bears ultimate responsibility.”

6.) No Return to Normalcy

Not only did things generally seem broken and dysfunctional in the past year, but Biden and his administration frequently took opportunities to portray half the country as evil, anti-democratic monsters.

That’s a real winning combination.

In Biden’s now infamous speech with a blood-red backdrop where he ranted and raved at length about the wickedness of “MAGA Republicans,” the president effectively defined his opponents as an existential threat to the country.

“As I stand here tonight, equality and democracy are under assault,” Biden said. “We do ourselves no favors to pretend otherwise.”

He kept doubling down.

“MAGA Republicans have made their choice. They embrace anger. They thrive on chaos. They live not in the light of truth, but in the shadow of lies,” Biden said. That’s quite ironic given images like this, from his Sept. 1 speech in front of Independence Hall in Philadelphia, which one news account headlined this way: “Biden shocks viewers with ‘hellish red background’ for polarizing speech.”

Now, Biden might not have genuinely believed what he was saying. After all, his 50-year career in politics seems to be mostly a long practice in opportunistic cynicism.

Biden’s primary strength as a politician has been in carefully triangulating to remain with the current of the Democrat Party, whatever direction that may take him.

One way or another, the speech most certainly represents what people in his administration believe. Many influential people on the Left in America apparently think that anyone to the right of Hillary Clinton—or who takes positions on social issues endorsed by Obama in 2008—should be ostracized, lose their job, and possibly have a powerful federal agency unleashed on them.

Ever the wily character, Biden tried to soften his position a bit after the speech. But the fact remains that that’s now a common view on the Left.

To a certain extent, Biden might have been right. What we are dealing with now truly is a battle for the soul of the nation.

The problem is, Biden is on the wrong side of that battle. He promotes extremist gender ideology, obliterates the wealth of the average American, empowers fanatical bureaucrats in Washington, and demonizes his fellow Americans, all while failing to uphold his constitutional duty to carry out the laws of this country and allowing millions of people to flood into this country illegally.

Biden’s presidency has been a failure. He’s the tottering, corrupt, intellectually bankrupt face of a radical, broken regime.

Have an opinion about this article? To sound off, please email [email protected] and we’ll consider publishing your edited remarks in our regular “We Hear You” feature. Remember to include the url or headline of the article plus your name and town and/or state.

Is it possible to rehabilitate the Order of Australia awards? Or should they be put out of their misery, written off as another Coalition monument to political cronyism — just as the Albanese government has done with the once independent and respected Administrative Appeals Tribunal?

This week, a new batch of 1000 or so honours awards will issue forth from the governor-general’s office on Australia Day.

In years gone by, as Crikey has reported, senior honours were handed to friends of the Coalition government at a dizzying rate. Our trawl through the awards made to politicians in the Australia Day and Queen’s birthday honours of 2019 and 2020 showed that out of a total of 62 honours 42 went to Liberal or National party figures while 20 went to ALP and independents. 

This means two-thirds of all gongs went to conservative parliamentarians.

There was a large difference in the distribution, too. In the most prestigious categories, the AC and the AO, Liberal and National party grandees received 14 of 18 awards.

Awards went to former Liberal/LNP/National premiers Ted Baillieu, Denis Napthine, Campbell Newman, Barry O’Farrell and Mike Baird. The backroom operative Tony Nutt, barely known outside Liberal HQ, picked up an award. So did Bronwyn “helicopter” Bishop, the partisan speaker of the House of Representatives.

On the ALP side, the former ALP figure-turned-Murdoch-media-favourite Graham “whatever it takes” Richardson was honoured for his high service to the nation.

Let’s not forget 2021 when former tennis champion turned Pentecostal pastor Margaret Court received an award upgrade under the reign of Scott Morrison. Morrison later journeyed to Court’s Victory Life church in Perth for the official opening of its prayer tower and to deliver a sermon in which he promoted the role of God over government.

Speaking of which, there were the Tony Abbott-George Pell-inspired awards of 2016 which saw the second-highest honour, the AO (Officer of the Order of Australia), go to The Australian’s Greg “I loved George Pell” Sheridan for his “distinguished service to print media as a journalist and political commentator on foreign affairs and national security, and to Australia’s bilateral relationships”.

Catholic ethicist Dr Bernadette Tobin, a prominent voluntary assisted dying opponent, received the same high honour in 2016, in her case for “distinguished service to education and philosophy, to the development of bioethics in Australia as an academic, and as a leader of a range of public health advisory and research councils”.  It is perhaps only tangentially relevant that Tobin is the daughter of right-wing Catholic royalty BA Santamaria, and great friends with the late cardinal. Looking for a common link here? 

Abbott, another great Pell man, had only recently departed the prime ministership, and given the long lead time on an Australia honour it is surely not beyond the realms of possibility that his mitts were all over the appointments.

Of course all of this was rendered quite unremarkable in the shadow of the greatest howitzer of all: Abbott’s decision in 2015 to award an Order of Australia knighthood to Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, Earl of Merioneth and Baron Greenwich, Knight of the Most Noble Order of the Garter, Knight of the Most Ancient and Most Noble Order of the Thistle, Member of the Order of Merit, Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order upon whom had been conferred the Royal Victorian Chain and Sovereign of the Most Noble Order of the Garter.

What to do with this legacy of cronyism, favouritism and left-field lunacy?

There is now a new breed and a new broom at the awards. In October Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced four appointments to take over the machinery of the Australian honours. 

The new chair of the Council for the Order Australia is Shelley Reys (AO), a Djirribul woman of Far North Queensland. Reys was the inaugural co-chair of Reconciliation Australia, where she had a significant role in the Rudd government’s official apology to the Stolen Generations. Her long career in reconciliation bristles with governance credentials, as Albanese’s announcement was keen to highlight — along with the fact that she was the first woman and First Nations woman to be appointed chair of the council.  

There is huge symbolism in her appointment of Reys, taking over from Liberal Party stalwart Shane Stone.

Albanese also made three appointments to the seven-person advisory council, meant to represent the community. All appointments are strategic in their own way.  

Annie Butler, a registered nurse, is federal secretary of the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation, Australia’s biggest union, with more than 300,000 members, and is a formidable campaigning force. 

Cathy McGowan was the independent federal member for Indi who — legendarily — ousted the Liberal’s Sophie Mirabella and in the process set the template for the success of other community independents, notably the teal candidates who swept aside Liberal MPs and ministers at last year’s election. McGowan’s sister Ruth has been a driving force of Honour A Woman, which lobbied hard to fix the gender disparity which has been ingrained in the awards.

Professor Samina Yasmeen AM is an academic from the University of Western Australia and director and founder of its centre for Muslim states and societies.

This week Reys wrote an opinion piece in The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age, which was a rallying cry for more diversity in nominations as the way to change who actually receives an award. This was likely also to be a spoiler alert to forestall any disappointment at this week’s awards. The process of nominating someone for an award and doing the necessary check takes around two years.

Reys’ pre-announcement announcement focused too on slaying the myth that the honours go to the well known at the expense of the little person who toils away unacknowledged for years.

But she didn’t mention the years of absurd and overt political cronyism which has made a mockery of the awards — what we might call AAT syndrome, where an institution is so leached of integrity that it no longer has our trust.

It is also hard to take a system seriously when it professes to be powerless to remove honours given to Pell after royal commission findings on his knowledge of child abuse and his failure to take proper steps to act on complaints about dangerous priests. Or that it was powerless to remove the highest honours in the land from former High Court justice Dyson Heydon, after he was found to have sexually harassed junior court staff. Heydon quietly relinquished his honour in October, without public explanation, around the time of Albanese’s appointments.

The system also operates in near total secrecy. The governor-general’s office never comments on specific awards and the processes are exempt from freedom of information laws.

Rather than attempt to renew, reshape, rebrand and relaunch the honours, maybe it’s time to start all over again. 

Should there be a whole new honours system? Let us know by writing to [email protected]. Please include your full name to be considered for publication. We reserve the right to edit for length and clarity.

From Judge Diarmuid O’Scannlain’s opinion respecting rehearing en banc released today (and joined by Judges Sandra Ikuta, Ryan Nelson, and Lawrence VanDyke) in Tingley v. Ferguson:

Is therapeutic speech speech? Does a tradition of licensing a given profession override all First Amendment limits on licensing requirements? The three-judge panel answered ‘no’ to the first question, and a majority of the panel answered ‘yes’ to the second. In my view, both holdings are erroneous and significant constitutional misinterpretations, and I respectfully dissent from our court’s regrettable failure to rehear this case en banc.

First, the panel said that therapeutic speech is non-speech conduct and so protected only by rational basis review. True, it reached this result by faithfully applying our decision in Pickup v. Brown, which held that a California ban on “sexual orientation change efforts” was a regulation of professional conduct only incidentally burdening speech. But the Supreme Court has rejected Pickup by name. Nat’l Inst. of Family & Life Advocates v. Becerra (“NIFLA“) (2018). And other circuits have rejected Pickup‘s holding, concluding instead that therapeutic speech is—speech, entitled to some First Amendment protection. See King v. Governor of New Jersey (3d Cir. 2014); Otto v. City of Boca Raton (11th Cir. 2020). The panel’s defense of Pickup‘s continuing viability is unconvincing. We should have granted rehearing en banc to reconsider Pickup and so to resolve this circuit split.

Second, a majority of the panel purported to discover a “long (if heretofore unrecognized) tradition of regulation” which warrants applying only rational basis review to laws burdening therapeutic speech. In reality, the majority drew out a gossamer thread of historical evidence into a sweeping new category of First Amendment exceptions. If new traditions are so easily discovered, speech-burdening laws can evade any level of scrutiny simply by identifying some legitimate purpose which they might serve. We should have granted rehearing en banc also to clarify that regulation of the medical profession is not a First-Amendment-free zone.

Judge Patrick Bumatay also thought the court should have reheard the case en banc:

The issues at the heart of this case are profoundly personal. Many Americans and the State of Washington find conversion therapy—the practice of seeking to change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity—deeply troubling, offensive, and harmful. They point to studies that show such therapy ineffective. Even worse, they claim that conversion therapy correlates with high rates of severe emotional and psychological trauma, including suicidal ideation. Under the appropriate level of judicial review, these concerns should not be ignored.

But we also cannot ignore that conversion therapy is often grounded in religious faith. According to plaintiff Brian Tingley, a therapist licensed by the State of Washington, his practice of conversion therapy is an outgrowth of his religious beliefs and his understanding of Christian teachings. Tingley treats his clients from the perspective of a shared faith, which he says is conducive to establishing trust. And as part of his therapeutic treatment, Tingley counsels his clients to live their lives in alignment with their religious beliefs and teachings.

To be sure, the relationship between the LGBT community and religion may be a complicated one. But as with any community, members of the LGBT community have different experiences with faith. According to one 2013 survey, 42% of LGBT adults identify as “Christian.” Forty-three percent consider religion to be important in their lives—including 20% who say it is “very important” to them. A more recent study found that 46.7% of LGBT adults, or 5.3 million LGBT Americans, are religious. Thus, for many who voluntarily seek conversion therapy, faith-based counseling may offer a unique path to healing and inner peace. Indeed, Tingley only works with clients who freely accept his faith-based approach.

Ordinarily, under traditional police powers, States have broad authority to regulate licensed professionals like Tingley. Under that authority, the State of Washington has banned the practice of conversion therapy on minors. The prohibition applies to all forms of the treatment, including voluntary, non-aversive, and non-physical therapy. In other words, Washington outlaws pure talk therapy based on sincerely held religious principles. As a result, Tingley cannot discuss traditional Christian teachings on sexuality or gender identity with his minor clients, even if they seek that counseling. While States’ regulatory authorities are generally broad, they must give way to our Constitution.

{Washington notes that conversion therapy may encompass more pernicious practices, such as electric shock treatment or the use of nausea-inducing drugs. I have little doubt that a law prohibiting coercive, physical, or aversive treatments on minors would survive a constitutional challenge under any standard of review. But Washington’s law proscribes a broad range of counseling, some of which would clearly be classified as voluntary, religious, and speech. Under Tingley’s constitutional challenge, we must focus on the law’s impact on these aspects of conversion therapy.}

And here, the First Amendment protects against government abridgment of the “freedom of speech.” No matter our feelings on the matter, the sweep of Washington’s law limits speech motivated by the teachings of several of the world’s major religions. Such laws necessarily trigger heightened levels of judicial review. After all, “religious and philosophical objections” to matters of sexuality and gender identity “are protected views and in some instances protected forms of expression.” As Judge O’Scannlain writes, religious speech gains “special solicitude” under the First Amendment. And those protections don’t dissipate merely because Tingley is a licensed therapist. In the free exercise context, the Court has recently remarked that the First Amendment protects “the ability of those who hold religious beliefs of all kinds to live out their faiths in daily life.” That principle applies equally when faith takes the form of speech.

Because the speech underpinning conversion therapy is overwhelmingly—if not exclusively—religious, we should have granted Tingley’s petition for en banc review to evaluate his Free Speech claim under a more exacting standard. It may well be the case that, even under heightened review, Washington’s interest in protecting minors would overcome Tingley’s Free Speech challenge. But our court plainly errs by subjecting the Washington law to mere rational-basis scrutiny.

It is a “bedrock principle” of the First Amendment that the government cannot limit speech “simply because society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable.” While I recognize that the speech here may be unpopular or even offensive to many Americans, it is in these cases that we must be most vigilant in adhering to constitutional principles. Those principles require a heightened review of Tingley’s Free Speech claim. It may be easier to dismiss this case under a deferential review to Washington’s law, but the Constitution commands otherwise….

Here’s an excerpt from the panel opinion, by Judge Ronald M. Gould, joined by Judge Kim McLane Wardlaw and, as to the discussion of Pickup, by Mark J. Bennett:

This appeal requires us to decide, again, whether a state may prohibit health care providers operating under a state license from practicing conversion therapy on children. Twenty states and the District of Columbia have laws prohibiting or restricting the practice of conversion therapy, which seeks to change an individual’s sexual orientation or gender identity. This appeal concerns Washington’s law that subjects licensed health care providers to discipline if they practice conversion therapy on patients under 18 years of age.

In 2014, we upheld a substantially similar law enacted by California that subjects its state-licensed mental health providers to discipline for practicing conversion therapy on minor clients. Pickup v. Brown (9th Cir. 2014). Finding itself bound by Pickup, the district court in this case dismissed Plaintiff Brian Tingley’s challenge to Washington’s nearly identical law.

We affirm. Washington’s licensing scheme for health care providers, which disciplines them for practicing conversion therapy on minors, does not violate the First or Fourteenth Amendments. States do not lose the power to regulate the safety of medical treatments performed under the authority of a state license merely because those treatments are implemented through speech rather than through scalpel….

NIFLA did not abrogate Pickup to the extent that Tingley contends it did. All parties agree that NIFLA abrogated the part of Pickup in which we stated that professional speech, as a category, receives less protection under the First Amendment. There is no question that NIFLA abrogated the professional speech doctrine, and its treatment of all professional speech per se as being subject to intermediate scrutiny. But Tingley instead contends that NIFLA abrogated Pickup in full, and that Pickup and NIFLA are irreconcilable to the point where Pickup is no longer binding law. We do not agree….

In addition to following our precedent in Pickup, we have an additional reason for reaching the conclusion that we reach today. The Supreme Court has recognized that laws regulating categories of speech belonging to a “long … tradition” of restriction are subject to lesser scrutiny. Washington’s law regulates a category of speech belonging to such a tradition, and it satisfies the lesser scrutiny imposed on such laws….

There is a long (if heretofore unrecognized) tradition of regulation governing the practice of those who provide health care within state borders. And such regulation of the health professions has applied to all health care providers, not just those prescribing drugs. In Collins v. Texas (1912), for instance, the Court affirmed the conviction of a man practicing osteopathy without a license, reasoning that “[i]t is true that he does not administer drugs, but he practises what at least purports to be the healing art.” Texas, and all other states, “constitutionally may prescribe conditions to such practice, considered by it to be necessary or useful to secure competence in those who follow it.” The Court provided a long list of cases from state courts similarly establishing “the right of the state to adopt a policy even upon medical matters concerning which there is difference of opinion and dispute.” …

Perhaps there are some procedural problems that I’m missing here, but the case seems teed up for possible Supreme Court review, especially given the split between the Ninth Circuit and the Eleventh Circuit noted in Judge O’Scannlain’s opinion (as well as the difference between the Ninth Circuit’s approach and the Third Circuit’s).

Fred de Fossard is a policy and strategy consultant. He served as Special Adviser to Jacob Rees-Mogg from 2020 to 2022, covering Brexit Opportunities, regulatory reform, and legislation.

Last Wednesday, the newest group of Conservative MPs was established: the Growth Group. Their mission is to champion supply-side reforms and deregulation to restore dynamism, competitiveness, and growth to the economy.

This group is long overdue, but it will have quite a challenge on its hands.

Within a couple of days of assuming office, Rishi Sunak’s spokesman confirmed that a package of deregulatory reforms being prepared by Liz Truss was to be shelved. This was followed by the abolition of the energy supply taskforce, the cancellation of housebuilding targets in the face of backbench rebellion, and swirling rumours about plans to dilute the Retained EU Law Bill, which will enable the rapid removal of thousands of EU regulations.

Despite the progress of some commendable reforms since 2019, such as the Genetic Technology Bill, the overall picture is depressing, with the United Kingdom becoming an increasingly expensive place to live and to do business.

The deregulation we have seen has either been piecemeal – such as the tweaks to HGV regulations made by Grant Shapps to ease the lorry driver shortage in 2021 – or in response to emergencies, like the rapid procurement and approval of vaccines and PPE in 2020.

Neither of these have led to lasting changes in how the government operates. Along with the demise of Truss’ tax-cutting plans, it appears that economic and regulatory reform is all but dead under this Government.

However, it would be wrong to lay this at the feet of one Prime Minister alone. One of the stories of the last decade of Tory rule has been the failure of regulatory reform.

Take childcare, which is incredibly expensive in England, in part thanks to the cost of regulations which do not reflect real risk or real-world practice. The first attempt to cut costs through liberalised regulations was made by Truss, then an education minister, in 2013; they were killed by Nick Clegg, then Deputy Prime Minister.

Since then, the Government has gone in circles, floating an almost identical proposal to loosen the ratios of carers to children last year, which has since been cancelled, or deprioritised, as the government often says.

It is notable how many deregulatory drives have failed. Some have actually managed to increase regulations in ways which would be comical, were the overall economic picture not so dire.

Under the “one in, one out” system of regulatory reform attempted in the 2010s, an expensive increase in the minimum wage was supposedly balanced out by a liberalisation in fishing rights for sturgeon. When the plastic bag charge was introduced in 2015, civil servants apparently justified this as a deregulatory measure – as it meant businesses were no longer required to offer carrier bags free of charge.

This failure has drawn many commentators to say that the Tory interest in reducing the size of the state is misguided or impossible in the modern era. I disagree. Supply-side reforms are one of the surest weapons against inflation to increase growth, competition and prosperity.

There is huge resistance to deregulation whenever it is mooted, often stoked by incumbent businesses with a powerful market position which they do not want disrupted, or from government officials who implement these regulations.

The British chemicals industry, for example, campaigned against the European Union’s introduction of its restrictive REACH regulations, but did an about turn after their introduction, for once they have spent the money complying with these regulations, they have an interest in keeping them in place, to reduce competition from new businesses.

The same is the case with regulations around selling junk food in supermarkets. Supermarkets which begrudgingly paid to reorganise their shops subsequently complained about the possibility of these regulations being removed.

The voice of the competitor or the consumer – suffering worse service, fewer products, or higher costs -is rarely heard. Much of the fault for this unfortunately lies with politicians themselves, who have often failed to articulate both the problem they wish to solve via deregulation and the way it will benefit Conservative voters and wider society, leaving their ideas vulnerable to attack as a threat to standards, safety, or welfare.

The tragedy is that, with inflation stubbornly high and the regulatory state growing, economic growth – the only way of improving our living standards – remains a distant prospect, suffocated by cartels, impact assessments, and legal challenges.

The problem is ultimately one of policy and legislation, and its effects are far reaching, especially in infrastructure and housing.

As Sam Dumitriu from Britain Remade recently observed, thanks to outdated national planning policies and political deadlock, infrastructure – like energy-generation, roads and bridges – is not being built, and what is built is more expensive than ever before and subject to ever more active judicial review.

As such, new energy projects take over a decade to be plugged to the National Grid, leading to manufacturers reconsidering their investments in the UK.

Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of homes have had their planning permission refused following an European ruling in 2018 on nutrient levels in water in the Netherlands. Outside the EU, the Government can now change this by amending the Habitats Regulations… yet it has not done so hitherto.

However, all may not be lost. The Cabinet is said to be hosting a series of sessions focused specifically on deregulation in the coming weeks, with each department presenting its priorities for reform. It remains to be seen what will be proposed, but the Prime Minister has been clear that he wants regulatory reform to make the UK a better place to do business and invest.

Ministers must challenge the regulatory instincts of their departments and focus aggressively on British competitiveness, especially on the cost and supply of energy and commercial space, which dictate so many companies’ decisions on where to invest.

Without this, any hope of Conservative economic reform will be lost, and the trickle of businesses and people leaving Britain for comparatively cheaper, freer and richer countries like Australia or the United States will become a flood.

This should sharpen the minds of ministers and the Conservative Growth Group alike. It is not just their current voters they need to worry about, but also the next generation of potential Conservatives, who may not just abandon the party altogether, but the country too.

Brexit and the resulting impasse around the protocol have tended to put the focus on the DUP and the failure of the Belfast or Good Friday Agreement (BGFA) institutions to operate properly. For unionists the issue is a perceived diminution in the constitutional link with Britain. For nationalists it is another sign of the failure of Northern Ireland to function properly and the need to remedy that by preparing for a united Ireland.

However, as our esteemed editor, Mick Fealty, likes to point out, the evidence for a major shift in popular sentiment for a united Ireland is lacking. For all the talk of demographic shifts, support for nationalist parties has been relatively stable since the BGFA, with a long-term decline in unionist parties matched only by growth in a constitutionally agnostic centre.

While this might be taken as a sign that Northern Ireland is becoming more open to the idea of major constitutional change, support for and against the idea of a united Ireland has become ever more extreme and entrenched within the unionist and nationalist camps. The more hard-line DUP has supplanted the UUP as the main unionist party, and Sinn Féin has eclipsed the more moderate SDLP in the nationalist camp.

Opinion polls in the south continue to show large majorities in favour of the idea of a united Ireland – until the subject of major constitutional changes to accommodate unionism is broached. Majorities oppose changing the Irish flag or anthem, membership of the commonwealth or closer links to Britain, and increased taxes or reduced public services to cover the cost of subsidising the north.

Fintan O’Toole and Andy Pollak have interpreted this as evidence that people in the south haven’t thought deeply about what a united Ireland would entail. In a letter published in the Irish Independent, and in The Irish Times I have suggested a different interpretation:

Unionists are welcome to join us, but they shouldn’t expect a lesser version or imitation of a bygone Britain.

It has become [a] commonplace for the commentariat to argue Ireland will have to change [dramatically] significantly in order to accommodate unionists in a united Ireland.

Critics point to polls showing large majorities in the Republic unwilling to make major concessions on flags, emblems, anthems, membership of the Commonwealth, increased taxes or fewer public services as evidence that voters in the Republic haven’t given a united Ireland serious thought.

Could I be so bold as to suggest that most in Ireland have thought about it and have decided they quite like the current direction of travel in the Republic: active membership of the EU and UN, forthright support for international law and the Good Friday Agreement, rapid development of infrastructure and the economy and a gradual movement towards a more open, tolerant, inclusive society sensitive to the needs of the less fortunate, as evidenced by our support for Ukrainian refugees.

We have our problems, to be sure, particularly in public housing, transport and healthcare, but those problems don’t include wanting to become more like Britain, and particularly not more like the Britain of 50 years ago, which some of our unionist friends in the North sometimes seem to aspire to.

Ireland, as part of the EU, will increasingly diverge from Britain in many ways, and that is our democratic right. If unionists enter the Irish political system, they will have a significant influence on our future direction of travel. That too will be their democratic right.

But unless [and until] that day comes, there is no point holding Ireland back in the hope that some [few] unionists might want to hop on the bus.

The majority on both sides of the Border will respect us even less for trying to be anything other than what we are: a proud, successful, inclusive, independent nation pursuing its own unique course within the context of the EU, the UN, the Good Friday Agreement and international law.

Unionists are welcome to join us, but they will be joining Ireland, not some lesser version and [pale] imitation of a bygone Britain.

If we want to progress towards a united Ireland, the best we can do is make Ireland even more successful and inclusive than it already is.

Negotiating and compromising with forces that might try to drag us back towards a difficult past is not the way to go.

[words in brackets not included or changed in letter as published]

It would be easy to interpret the above letter as abandoning northern nationalists to their fate and adopting a partitionist mentality. It could be interpreted as saying: “were going to get on with doing our own thing and let you guys mind your own business. You may have to get on with unionists, but we don’t have to. Our destiny is with Europe now, and if that means ever more distance between us and the UK, then so be it.”

But that is neither the intent of the letter nor the current political reality. Ireland remains extremely engaged with the UK through the third strand of the BGFA. The British–Irish Intergovernmental Conference has just met, and despite the failure of the DUP to operate the strand 2 institutions of the BGFA, both Michael Martin and Leo Varadkar have been extremely engaged with Northern Ireland parties.

What it does mean, however, is that no one is conceding that the DUP, or even wider unionism, has a veto on how Ireland and the EU will operate from here on in, either now, or in any putative united Ireland.

Political influence, yes. More intensive consultations, to be sure. Greater sensitivity to unionist concerns, absolutely. But let no one be under any illusions that we are ceding a veto to unionism either now, or in the future. If unionism doesn’t want to compromise or get with the programme of making the Northern Ireland economy more successful, that is their business. But we are moving on, without them, if necessary.

But there is also a rather large missing in this whole discussion. What about England?

On the surface, nothing much seems to have changed. England (ahem, the UK) is still being led by a Brexiteer, albeit less bombastic and perhaps more competent than some of his predecessors. Buyer’s remorse concerning Brexit seems to have set into the English populace more generally, but that is not yet reflected in party political policies. Labour may be 20-25% ahead in the polls, but Keir Starmer has ruled out even re-joining the Single Market, which would make the DUP’s protocol problem disappear overnight.

There has been an upsurge in English academic interest in a United Ireland and how it might come about, but the political focus has been on how England might achieve better access to European markets, without actually having to re-join the Single Market as such. Insofar as there has been constitutional debate, it has mostly focussed on preventing Scottish secession. If anything, there has been an embarrassed silence on Northern Ireland. It is mentioned only as a problem to be solved if better relations between the UK and the EU and USA are to become possible.

Meanwhile, the English economy continues to head south. The cost-of-living crisis and the resultant strikes are taking all of the oxygen out of the political room. The “levelling up” agenda is becoming a farce beyond even rescue by PR. Trade, productivity and investment growth continue to lag behind both historical averages and peer group trends. The City has lost its pre-eminent place in European financial services. Laundering Russian Oligarch’s cash isn’t the cash cow it used to be.

What remains of British industry is under threat. Car production has halved since 2016 and the UK now ranks only 18^th. in the world for car production. The NHS is falling apart. Even people in “good” jobs are having to avail of food banks. The UK national debt profile is appalling. Interest rates are still rising, and with it the cost of mortgages, business investment, and the national debt. Even greater austerity seems to be the only possible outcome.

However, the purpose of this opinion piece isn’t to engage in some doom porn, much less in schadenfreude at the UK’s decline. It must be a horrible period to live through if you are among the one in four who can’t afford to heat their homes, and the one in ten who can’t always eat when hungry. My point is that extreme crises like this tend to have extreme political repercussions, and it isn’t easy to predict how these might turn out.

Recessions end, of course, but the scarring they leave behind in the capacity for future growth can last for decades. Part of Ireland’s problems now are due to the cancellation of planned infrastructural investments in the wake of the 2008 financial crash. The loss of relative economic and political status in the world order can be permanent. The Pre-EU membership “sick man of Europe” moniker for the UK has returned, as the political instability has taken its toll.

The future course of the Ukraine war remains uncertain. Western nations are pledging ever more advanced weapons to help contain, if not reverse the Russian invasion. The costs to the world economy are adding up. Despite this, the IMF is predicting that the pace of global growth will decline only from 3.2% in 2022 to 2.7% this year, far from a global recession, and growth figures the UK could only dream of. A global debt crisis may be brewing, but so far, the EU economy, the most directly affected by the war, seems to be holding up, with 0.3% growth predicted for 2023 despite dire headlines warning of recession.

Polls on Scottish support for independence remain ambiguous, at best. Sometimes recessions, economic insecurity, and political instability can make people cling ever more tightly to the status quo. Times of great uncertainty usually make people more risk averse. But there is little doubt that any Scottish secession would open the floodgates to constitutional change in the UK more generally. The UK establishment are holding on by their fingernails.

The threat of Scottish secession is also inhibiting all talk of constitutional change with respect to Northern Ireland – for fear of opening up the pandoras box of constitutional change. But I have yet to meet an English person with a major problem with Irish re-unification, and many who actively support it. As the Barnett formula subvention to Northern Ireland grows ever larger – it is now greater than the much-hated net subvention to the EU – the options for reducing that cost are bound to enter the political conversation.

The problem for moderates and democrats is that any such change could come very suddenly and with very little notice. People need time to prepare for changed economic or political realities, and rapid change or uncertainty can provoke extreme responses. So, while I make no prediction as to how or when current economic realities are translated into political upheaval, the probability of such political upheaval coming can only be increasing. And one thing is certain: that upheaval will be driven by England’s priorities and not by sensitivity towards Northern Ireland’s or Ireland’s needs.

So rather than focusing exclusively on developments (or the lack of them) in Ireland, I am casting an anxious eye towards England, and how its seemingly remorseless decline and never-ending political theatrics play out. Ireland may be increasingly comfortable in its own skin, despite the housing, public transport and healthcare crises, and many unionists may be comfortable with the current political deadlock in Northern Ireland. But if all hell breaks loose in England, we may be just so much collateral damage in the fall out, and the whole basis for our current status quo could fall apart.

One doesn’t always get to have a say in the larger historical events which befall us, and being prepared for all eventualities is usually a prudent policy. I would be interested in finding out more about unionist perceptions, concerns and contingency plans for any major and rapid upheavals occurring in England. We do not need another “surprise” perfidious Albion betrayal. It is time we became the authors of our own destiny, rather than continually the “victims” of the machinations of others.

Ireland, I believe, is ready to move on. Wither unionism if England loses interest?

 

Current and recent events make it clear that there really are two kinds of people in the world. It’s not just some cliché. And they are living in two different realities. Their views are so incompatible that it seems they must come to blows.

The first group believes in good and evil, and understands the point of life to be, largely, to do good and avoid evil.

The second group believes in no good but to do and get what they want. Evil is interfering with them in the pursuit of their desires, or criticizing them.

Understand this distinction, and much that is happening now in the news becomes clear. We are in a great battle of good and evil, and what one side calls good, the other calls evil.

It immediately strikes me that this dichotomy is expressed well by the Gospel’s division of mankind into sheep and goats. If you have ever had acquaintance with both sheep and goats, you will see it. Sheep automatically follow “the rules”—keep in mind that the shepherd referred to in the analogy is God, not some political or social movement, and not government. What is meant by the allegory is not social conformity. In dramatic contrast to sheep, although they look similar, goats do and eat whatever they want. You cannot tell a goat what to do.

The difference is also so distinct that it is remarkably easy to classify people as one or the other. This justifies the gospel’s firm division: sheep go to heaven, and goats go to hell, with no parole and no appeal.

Consider Erin O’Toole’s recent editorial concerned with the tone of politics. He objected to all the flags reading “F*** Trudeau.” 

He made no reference to any possible acts of Trudeau that might have prompted such strong emotions.

In other words, O’Toole did not care about acts that might have done harm to others; only being called out for them. The only sin is admitting sin exists. The only sin is judgement.

Pope Francis is also a goat. This is revealed by his recent profanity-filled demand to seminarians that they always give absolution. The problem is not the sin; it is acknowledging sin as something real and important. The only sin is judgement.

The recent “defund the police” drive was of a piece. Insane as it must appear to sheep, the premise was that the problem was not crime, but prosecuting it.

Although, ironically, the goats accuse the sheep of intolerance, the reverse is true. Sheep are constitutionally mild creatures. The sheep will go a long way in tolerating or ignoring the actions of others. But the goats cannot tolerate even a word wrong, or even silence. Ask St. Thomas More. They are therefore especially concerned with “hate speech.”

For example, abortion is free and legal. Protesting abortion, within a certain distance of an abortion clinic, is illegal. 

Apparently even praying silently in the vicinity of an abortion clinic is now illegal; if they can infer what you are praying about.

For example, Benedict or John Paul II, sheep, were reasonably content allowing either the Latin or the Novus Ordo mass to be said. Both were apparently softies when it came to dealing with Vatican corruption. Francis, by contrast, a goat, is eager to crack heads—the heads of those who complain about Vatican corruption. And he is adamant, for no visible reason but promoting disrespect for something holy, that the Latin mass must not be said. 

While the sheep are happy enough to say that the state has no place in the bedrooms of the nation, and to tolerate homosexual sex or sex outside marriage for others, for the sake of social peace and Christian charity, the goats insist that one must publicly agree that homosexual sex or transsexualism is morally good, and wear an advertisement for homosexual pride in public, or be fined, boycotted, or lose your livelihood. 

The sheep are prepared to forgive any sin with repentance. The goats will hunt down old private tweets from years before, or ancient testimony of drunken sophomore parties, to prove supposed “hypocrisy” in anyone who dares profess the unalterable nature of right and wrong.

This is why, in times when the goats gain dominance, it seems that “the best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.” Sheep are more tolerant and easygoing.

A recent column by regrettably goatish pal Xerxes opines that political positions ought to be judged on what emotions they appeal to: do they appeal to hate or anger? If so, they must be rejected.

So it is okay to do what you want to others, so long as you say the right things. The important thing is that the victims must never be angry about it, or accuse anyone of anything. 

A respondent to Xerxes sharpened the point: political speech must above all not appeal to guilt. 

“[T]hey attempt to make you feel guilty. The sad faces, woeful looks, desperate conditions depicted help us to feel guilty of not caring, not being willing to help, not participating… and can become powerful influencers/manipulators to open our wallets.”

“Making me feel guilty elicits a deletion in my world.”

For the goats, guilt is, in the end, the only evil. That is, their actual enemy is their conscience. And the worse their conscience troubles them, the more extreme their intolerance will become. They will begin smashing icons. They will begin burning churches. And there is nothing the sheep can do, by their own behaviour, to prevent or to moderate this. It is perhaps best for the sheep to realize this. You might as well speak out.

Officially, the Nazi genocide against the Jews was on racial grounds. However, the Nazis were largely influenced by Nietzsche. It seems likely that much of their real, if unstated, motive was that they blamed the Jews for spreading “slave morality” in German and world culture: in other words, the demand to “do unto others” and the Ten Commandments. Morality, in short. How dare they?

To Nazis, the great enemy, according to Himmler, was “pity.” Pity was weakness in the evolutionary struggle. For “pity,” one might as well read the prime Christian virtue of charity, caritas.

In ancient times, this battle of sheep and goats corresponded pretty well with the distinction between polytheists and ethical monotheists. This is why paganism has generally been able to be tolerant of other paganisms, and monotheisms of other monotheisms, but neither has been historically tolerant of the other tendency. They are like fire and ice.

We are in a time of global struggle today, it is a struggle between good and evil, and the battle lines are remarkably clear.

Rethinking Sex: A Provocation, by Christine Emba, Sentinel, 224 pages, $27

The Right to Sex: Feminism in the Twenty-First Century, by Amia Srinivasan, Farar, Straus and Giroux, 304 pages, $28

The Pornography Wars: The Past, Present, and Future of America’s Obscene Obsession, by Kelsy Burke, Bloomsbury Publishing, 352 pages, $29.99

Lost Americans understand today that sex without consent is a no-go, both morally and legally. Sex without consent is rape.

But consent should be the floor, not the ceiling, for ethical sexual encounters, suggests Washington Post columnist Christine Emba in Rethinking Sex: A Provocation. “Things don’t have to be criminal to be profoundly bad,” she writes.

Consent is a “baseline norm,” but consent alone doesn’t make sex “ethical, or fair, or equally healthy for both participants,” argues Emba. Indeed, there are “many situations in which a partner might consent to sex—affirmatively, even enthusiastically—but having said sex would still be ethically wrong.”

Emba’s vision of good sexual stewardship would involve everyone having less sex with fewer people and caring about those partners more. “In general,” she declares, “willing the good of the other is most often realized in restraint—in inaction, rather than action.”

As it stands, Emba adds, “there is something unmistakably off in the way we’ve been going about sex and dating.” To back up that claim, she offers statements from a number of young and youngish ladies, in addition to drawing on her own experiences with dating as a millennial raised as an evangelical Christian.

Echoes of Emba’s qualms can be heard everywhere these days. Critics spanning the political spectrum, including feminists like University of Oxford philosopher Amia Srinivasan, seem worried about modern sexual mores. Compared to prior laments from social conservatives and feminists, today’s debate is less focused on purity and patriarchy. It is more concerned with women’s satisfaction and happiness. Yet despite that focus, the conversation too often fails to treat women as individuals with widely varying values, tastes, and preferences.

***

The complaints Emba and her subjects have about modern romance vary in their particulars. But they coalesce around a common theme: discontent about sexual encounters with men. These men don’t care about their partner’s pleasure. They try things during sex—such as choking—that these women do not want. They pressure these women into sex. Or they don’t call afterward. Or they call only for hookups. Or they call for a while but ghost suddenly. Or they string women along with relationships that are OK but will not lead to marriage or kids.

Such complaints have been staples of sexual critique since sexual liberation started becoming a core American value. Promiscuity. Casual sex. Hookup culture. The labels assigned to the problem have shifted over time, as have the diagnoses of its origin. Feminism, porn, dating apps—all have taken some blame.

And not without reason. There’s no doubt that at least some feminists fought for women’s right to “have sex like men.” There’s no doubt that the internet and smartphone apps have made it much easier to hook up with larger numbers of people. And while pornography’s effect on off-screen sex is more debatable, there’s no doubt porn has become more ubiquitous and less taboo.

The net effect has been bad for women, argues Emba, whose book’s second chapter is titled “We’re Liberated, and We’re Miserable.” Women assume more risk in sexual encounters and reap fewer rewards, she says. They feel sex is expected when they date, and they often comply not out of authentic desire but because they think it is what’s normal or because saying yes is less hassle than saying no. Or they do it because they want someone to like them. They hope it will lead to relationships, but it often doesn’t (and meanwhile, their “biological clocks” are ticking). And even when they do want sex, they don’t want it like this—with the dirty talk, or kinky moves, or failure to provide emotional as well as physical fulfillment. They want more care in sexual encounters.

Yet “the broader culture,” Emba complains, would have us believe most men and women are happy with the “sexually liberated status quo.” She implicates the usual villains: Hugh Hefner, Helen Gurley Brown, Sex and the City. But for the references to apps like Tinder, this book could have been written decades ago. Indeed, much of it was written decades ago, in books like Ariel Levy’s Female Chauvinist Pigs (2005), which railed against “raunch culture” and women’s objectification (often at their own hands). The fear undergirding all of these jeremiads is that previous generations’ sexual revolution has forced today’s young women into a world for which they’re not equipped. These authors aren’t the moralistic scolds of yore, insisting that all premarital sex is bad or that only bad women like sex. They just want women’s sexual and romantic choices to make them happy.

Critiques of this sort, including Rethinking Sex, turn on trotting out stereotypes about men and women while setting up a dubious binary between good sex and bad sex. “Good sex” is gentle and respectful, and it generally happens within the confines of relationships; “bad sex” is cold, casual, and commitment-free, leaving emotionally scarred women clutching their barren wombs. But it is not impossible for sex to be both casual and caring, or for even brief and uncommitted encounters to be beautiful and life-affirming. Nor will abstaining from uncommitted sex guarantee a path to romantic and familial bliss. These are possibilities Emba doesn’t really grapple with.

In fact, Emba does not have much respect for individualism in sexual preferences. Rethinking Sex gives the impression that, among women at least, the dissatisfaction it describes is basically universal. The book also gives the impression that it is mostly young women who are unfulfilled by modern dating culture, without taking into account the perspectives of young men.

I can’t say just how common it is for men to be more relationship-seeking than hookup-oriented, nor how often men really want to please sexual partners but are confused about how to do so. Nor can I attest to the prevalence of women who are not looking for serious attachments, or how many would hate it if sex were all rose petals and deep looks in each other’s eyes. But I do know—from a few decades of talking with male and female friends, and from my own experiences—that these things are common enough not to be dismissible anomalies.

Undoubtedly, some (many?) women would like sex to be more caring. Undoubtedly, some (many?) women feel unable to set sexual boundaries, or repeatedly have sex that leaves them feeling bad. But the fact that Emba talked with a couple dozen women who have had such experiences tells us little about what women want writ large. Nor would it be more illuminating to interview a couple dozen women who said the opposite.

What women want, in my experience, is to be treated like individuals, not sexual cogs. (The same goes for men.) But for this to happen, we should probably stop acting like there is one correct standard for good sex. Because good sex—that is, sex that’s physically and ethically satisfying—will look different to different people.

So how can any two people possibly figure out if their ideas of good sex are compatible? It would go a long way to be more open and communicative about our desires, and to not consent to sex we don’t really want to have. Stop blaming the culture, or sexual freedom, or porn, or TV, or Tinder. Start encouraging honesty and agency.

Emba rightly rejects the idea that we “call on the coercive power of the state to address all the problems of sex.” But she still wants to reshape sexual norms in a way that moves past “what we’re allowed to do” (i.e., have sex as long as consent is given) “and toward what would be good.” And what would be good, in her vision, excludes a good deal of activity that people consensually engage in, such as BDSM. A “craving to dominate,” she writes, “is generally less healthy than a desire to express affection.” Again, she sets up a binary between good sex, which is affectionate and should be socially encouraged, and bad sex, which is a bit kinky and should not. But any kinkster could tell you that rough sex doesn’t preclude affection, and that plenty of BDSM sexual relationships take place between loving individuals.

Although Emba tries to pass off her prescriptions as common sense, they rely on misunderstandings about a lot of people’s sex lives and a bias toward conservative sexual mores. No one should be having BDSM sex if he or she doesn’t want to. But there’s no evidence that those who enjoy it are less psychologically healthy than those whose tastes are more vanilla, or that a little role-playing in bed leads to harmful attitudes outside of it.

Yes, there should be more to sexual ethics than consent. Treating sexual partners with honesty and respect—”willing the good” for them, in Emba’s parlance—is certainly important. But a version of the good that relies on changing other people and making everyone conform to one’s personal preferences will always fail. The way to ensure that your love life and sexual experiences align with your values is to take responsibility for them and accept your own agency. It’s on you to communicate, to say yes, to say no. If you want to rethink sex, that’s on you too. You can’t force folks to come with you.

***

Expecting others to change their sexual choices to fit our own sexual preferences is entitlement logic. When certain communities do this, it gets condemned—as it should.

Take incels, a mostly male group of the self-labeled “involuntarily celibate,” who are prone to bashing women and modern culture because they can’t get laid. Incel communities are rife with suggestions that women are stupid and selfish, choosing “high value” men who treat them poorly while ignoring perfectly viable mates out of superficial concerns. Underlying all of this is the idea that incels are owed sex—and not just any sex, but sex with the type of women they desire.

Emba calls incels “not exactly a sympathetic bunch” and suggests that “their difficulty in connecting with the opposite sex has turned into a personality-warping obsession.” This may be true, but it seems odd coming directly after a section in which straight and bisexual women talk about hating men and swearing off relationships with them. Emba portrays these women as reacting reasonably to the conditions they face. But a more impartial observer might suggest that they have also let a difficulty connecting with the opposite sex warp their personalities.

Incel resentments drove Elliot Rodger to murder six people and wound many others in the 2014 Isla Vista massacre, and they have surfaced in several other mass shootings as well. Srinivasan details some of these incidents in The Right To Sex, a collection of essays about sexual desire and politics.

These men’s conviction that women owe them sex is obviously a distorted way of thinking. But it’s also not so different from some feminist ideas, Srinivasan suggests. Many feminists have long claimed that people are unfairly sexually marginalized because of their body size, their gender presentation, or some other superficial characteristic. Activists of various stripes ask people to reevaluate their desires all the time, guided by the belief that (as Srinivasan summarizes it) “what is ugliest about our social realities—racism, classism, ableism, heteronormativity—shapes whom we do and do not desire and love, and who does and does not desire and love us.”

How do we “dwell in the ambivalent place where we acknowledge that no one is obliged to desire anyone else, that no one has a right to be desired, but also that who is desired and who isn’t is a political question, a question often answered by more general patterns of domination and exclusion?” Srinivasan asks. There is no right to sex, but might there be “a duty to transfigure, as best we can, our desires”?

In taking this tension seriously, The Right To Sex showcases Srinivasan’s admirable tendency toward nuance. In writing about porn, consent, sex work, sexual entitlement, and more, she is willing to take readers in one direction and then, just when you think you know where she is going, abruptly pivot, allowing us to consider the terrain from a number of different views.

A chapter on sexual assault and misconduct dismisses up front the idea that false rape accusations are common. But then Srinivasan delves into the outsize effect that such charges have on racial minorities and asks “whether the notion of due process—and perhaps too the presumption of innocence—should apply to social media and public accusations.”

Like Emba, Srinivasan grapples with how porn influences sexual proclivities in ways that may not be awesome for women. But after giving voice—not unsympathetically—to famous anti-porn feminists such as Catharine MacKinnon, Srinivasan goes on to question the idea that “what young people need is better and more diverse representations of sex.” That prescription, she says, “leaves in place the logic of the screen, according to which sex must be mediated; and the imagination is limited to imitation, riffing on what it has already observed.” She suggests that real sex education “wouldn’t assert its authority to tell the truth about sex, but rather remind young people that the authority on what sex is, and could become, lies with them.”

Like Emba, Srinivasan stresses that she does not want to get the state more involved in changing sexual norms. She writes at length about the negative influence of carceral feminism, which sees the criminal justice system as the proper locus for effecting social change, and she dissects some feminists’ support for criminalizing prostitution.

“There isn’t much reason to think that throwing sex workers and their clients in jail will eventually lead to the end of sex work,” Srinivasan writes. “There is, though, every reason to think that decriminalization makes life better for the women who sell sex. From this perspective, to choose criminalization is to choose the certain immiseration of actual women as a putative means to the notional liberation of all women. It is a choice that again reveals, deep in the logic of anti-prostitution feminists, an investment in symbolic politics.”

***

That isn’t a new debate. Sex work has divided feminists for decades, a fact the University of Nebraska–Lincoln sociologist Kelsy Burke demonstates clearly in The Pornography Wars. The book examines America’s crusades to banish pornography, from Anthony Comstock’s mail-based anti-obscenity laws in the late 1800s to today’s battles over internet porn.

It’s a great overview, more informative than polemical. And it has a fresh angle: Rather than portray porn performers, producers, and pro-sex feminists as polar opposites of the people crusading against pornography, Burke suggests “this dividing line of anti- or pro-porn is a false dichotomy.” Indeed, she reports that “no one I interviewed or observed believed that either the complete elimination of pornography or complete sexual freedom was a feasible or even a desirable goal.”

One point of agreement: “Everyone involved in the porn debate agrees that parents should not let teachers, peers, TV shows, or other adults be the only ones to shape what their children learn about sex.” And they often agree that free porn is a problem, although their solutions differ. (Quit watching, says one side. Pay for porn, says the other.) And they “share concerns over the safety, autonomy, and consent of those within the industry” (although their suggested responses again diverge).

Another area of overlap: Advocates on both sides want women (and men) to enjoy sex and have healthy sex lives. Burke quotes both Christian conservatives and progressive feminists dedicated to helping people have better sex. They all speak of women (married, unmarried, liberal, conservative, young, old) having bad sex lives—a range of unsatisfied women far more diverse than Emba’s.

All these observers agree, like Emba and Srinivasan, that “sex matters far beyond the private sphere in which it most often occurs.” America’s battles over pornography reflect the conviction that “sexual desires, experiences, and identities are connected to broader social systems, including capitalism, the law and criminal justice, the media, and beyond,” Burke writes. “The pornography wars are never about pornography alone.” Underlying all of this is a belief on both sides that sexuality is important and that, properly channeled, it can be “a path to freedom and authenticity.”

Anti-porn feminists, Burke argues, fall short in purporting to know “what authentic sexuality for women should look like” for all people. But she agrees with them that “we all experience sex with society at our side.”

Srinivasan asks, “What would it take for sex to really be free?” We could start by acknowledging the multiplicity of factors that determine what women (or men) want when it comes to sex. Our desires are, at least in part, socially constructed, political, and mutable. But they are also unpredictable, sometimes unknowable, and highly individualistic—a point that no serious attempt to diagnose people’s sexual discontent can ignore.

We take a look at when the forthcoming strikes are taking place.

Strike action is set to continue well into 2023. The new legislation planned by the government, which would restrict the right to strike by forcing some workers to maintain minimum service levels, has added fuel to the fire.

We take a look at when the forthcoming strikes are taking place.

February 1

The 1^st of February is set to be a landmark day for strike action. Hundreds of thousands of workers are to stage the “most important coordinated walkout for a century.”

Teachers, civil servants, university staff and train drivers have all said they will walk out on February 1. The same day will see the Trades Union Congress (TUC) carry out a national protest the proposed anti-strike laws. The TUC, which unites more than 5.5 million working people who make up its 48 member unions, is urging people to get behind a national day of action, dubbed the ‘Protect the Right to Strike’ day.

Railways

Train driver members of Aslef and the RMT Union at 14 rail operators will take strike action on February 1 and 3, over pay and conditions.

In a press statement about the new strike dates, RMT general secretary Mick Lynch said:

“Our negotiations will continue with the rail operators to create a package on jobs, conditions and pay that can be offered to our members.”

Teachers

More than 120,000 National Education Union (NEU) members have voted to strike for seven days in February and March. The dates are:

• 1 February: All schools in England and Wales
• 14 February: All schools in Wales
• 28 February: North and north-west England, Yorkshire, and Humber
• 1 March: East Midlands, West Midlands, and the NEU’s eastern region
• 2 March: South-east and south-west England, and London
• 15 and 16 March: All schools in England and Wales

The Department for Education has offered most teachers a five percent pay rise but the NEU is demanding a fully funded above inflation rise.

Dr Mary Bousted and Kevin Courtney, joint general secretaries of the NEU, said: “This is not about a pay rise but correcting historic, real-terms pay cuts.

“We regret having to take strike action, and are willing to enter into negotiations at any time, any place, but this situation cannot go on.”

Universities

Over 70,000 staff at 150 universities are to strike on February 1, as the UCU remains in dispute with universities over pay, pensions and working conditions.

A further 17 days of industrial action is due to take place over February and March.

UCU is demanding a meaningful pay rise to deal with the cost-of-living crisis as well as action to end the use of insecure contracts. The union said ‘the clock is ticking’ for university bosses to make staff a serious offer and avoid disruption.

UCU general secretary Jo Grady said: ‘Whilst the cost-of-living crisis rages, university vice-chancellors are dragging their feet and refusing to use the vast wealth in the sector to address over a decade of falling pay, rampant casualisation and massive pension cuts.

“On 1 February, 70,000 university staff will walk out alongside fellow trade unions and hundreds of thousands of other workers to demand their fair share.

“UCU remains committed to reaching a negotiated settlement, but if university employers don’t get serious and fast, more strike action fill follow in February and March.”

NHS staff

The GMB has announced more than 10,000 paramedics, emergency care assistants and call handlers are to strike on February 6 and 20, and March 6 and 20.

Nurses are also due to strike on February 6 and 7.

Emergency service workers represented by Unison will also walk out on January 23.

Unison general secretary Christina McAnea said: “It’s only through talks that this dispute will end. No health workers want to go out on strike again.

“Speeding up next year’s pay review body process won’t solve the current dispute, which is about the pitiful amount the government gave health workers this year.

“The government must stop using the pay review body as cover for its own inaction. This year’s pay rise simply wasn’t enough to halt the exodus of staff from the NHS.

“The government should right that wrong with an increase better matching inflation. Only then will vacancy rates reduce, allowing the NHS to get back on track and start delivering safe patient care once more.”

Rachel Harrison, national secretary of GMB, said staff ‘are done’ and ‘angry’ and has called on the government to get serious on pay.

“Ministers have made things worse by demonising the ambulance workers who provided life and limb cover on strike days – playing political games with their scaremongering.

“The only way to solve this dispute is a proper pay offer. 

“But it seems the cold, dead hands of the Number 10 and 11 Downing Street are stopping this from happening. 

“In the face of government inaction, we are left with no choice but industrial action,” said Harrison.

Civil servants

Around 100,000 civil servants will join the February 1 strike, the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) announced. The action will involve members in 124 government departments. The PCS union is calling for a 10 percent pay rise, protections from job cuts and protections to pensions.

“We warned the government our dispute would escalate if they did not listen – and we’re as good as our word,” said PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka.

He accused the government of “treating its own workforce worse than anyone else in the economy”.

Postal Workers

The ongoing dispute between the union and Royal Mail appears no nearer to being resolved. The Communications Workers Union (CWU) has accused Royal Mail of  “waging war” on staff and using intimidation tactics, including suspending more than 200 workers, in the ongoing dispute over pay and conditions.

As fresh talks were not heading toward an acceptable agreement, the CWU is preparing to ballot its more than 100,000 members over further national strikes.

Dave Ward, CWU general secretary, told MPs on the business select committee this week that his union was “still not confident we are in a place that we can reach an agreement”, following 18 days of national strikes in 2022.

“The union will be reballoting members [about strike action]. This is the most brutal attack on any group of workers the UK has seen in decades. It is a fight for every postal worker’s job,” said Ward.

The CWU is meeting Royal Mail shareholders on January 23 to explain the union’s concerns.

Firefighters

Firefighters refused a five percent pay rise. They are running a ballot on strike action until January 30.

Fire Brigades Union (FBU) general secretary Matt Wrack said: “Strike action will always be a last resort but we are running out of options.”

Gabrielle Pickard-Whitehead is a contributing editor to Left Foot Forward

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