Brooks D. Simpson

It's not weird at all. Melania's just helping an old buddy from the Epstein days.

You would think that Bezos and the Trumps would know better. The truth is that they don't care.

Trump's beginning to learn that some of his puppies in office need to be house-trained.

Going to war with the American people never works out well.

Meaning that the consequences are that it's okay for such federal agents to act like the Brown Shirts and Gestapo?

Today's essay question:

Is the Trump turn in American foreign policy a repudiation of US foreign policy principles or their logical cumulative expression?

The Trump Doctrine: Extortion by a Bully.

So ... can you win a land war in Greenland?

And if so, so what?

I used to think Andrew Johnson was our worst president.

Used to.

It is surreal. Yet somehow I am not surprised. Neither are you.

We've gone from the bully pulpit to simply being a bully.

Wait until Speaker Mike Johnson says he has not seen the video of the ICE agent murdering a woman in Minneapolis, so he cannot comment.

YouTube video by Ohio Wesleyan University StreamOWU September 29, 2025: Smith Civil War Lecture - Brooks Simpson, Ph.D.

For anyone interested in the American Civil War ...
www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFlJ...

On January 6, 2021, Republicans accepted and defended what they opposed between 1861 and 1865.

Never forget.

The threat remains. If anything, it's worse.

I wonder how many pro-Trump neoConfederates who attack Lincoln's actions in the Fort Sumter crisis are celebrating Trump's actions today.

I would encourage the president to follow his own path on this matter, which is a clear demonstration of his superior performance on cognitive tests.

Erika Kirk teaches us all how to move on.

I have heard that you don't trade him.

Dust jackets can conceal what you are really reading.

And yes, it was Sadat at Gettysburg. Misspoke.

starworldwidenetworks.com/episodes/so-...

When it comes to publicly groveling in front of Donald Trump, Ted Cruz just lowered the bar to subterranean levels Texas Senator, Ted Cruz, has made a career out of publicly humiliating himself. There was the time he tried, and failed, to clean up some public vandalism, there was his truly disturbing Freudian slip...

Fame takes many forms.
www.thepoke.com/2025/12/04/w...

Their followers believe what they say. The question is how many voters who supported Trump are open to empirical evidence and experience.

So much lying.

Could you be a little more specific? Best about what? 😉

If you think that the military history of the Civil War is simply a story of generals and battles, you haven't kept up with the literature.

For decades.

At best, it's ignorance. At worst, it's insulting.

It's also sooooo yesterday.

Slob.

It smacks of a self-congratulatory assessment resting on the construction of strawmen. Just doesn't come across well.

But clearly it has our attention.

Should it?

The other thing that strikes me as odd about this exchange is that it sounds like an academic conference. I've given this lecture ... as a lecture, alone ... and I thought the idea was to bring some historical insight to a broader audience. Gatekeeping? Really? Whatever. Who cares about infighting?

I guess I don't follow this line of discussion. There's a lot of stereotyping hiding behind a refusal to name names. This sort of thing tells me more about the people making the arguments and how they view things than it does about whatever is being described.

Jim Downs's assertion in this regard is ... interesting.

What I notice is how non-military historians of the ACW sometimes flaunt their ignorance of military issues, often to their detriment.

Maybe Jim needs to read more.

Fight like it's 1846.