Bruce Bartlett

Opinion | The Outrageous False Equivalences That Prop Up President Trump

Excellent critique of both-sides journalism by Frank Bruni of the New York Times. Too bad his employer does it so often. Free article. www.nytimes.com/2025/11/24/o...

When Republicans Used to Be Sane, Even “Compassionate” Trump Has Erased Their Memory

I think it's interesting that no postwar Republican president or presidential nominee could get the party's nomination today--including Goldwater and Reagan. They were all much too far to the left. I have receipts. brucebartlett.substack.com/p/when-repub...

They’re doing to America what they did to Christianity | Bill McKibben Trump’s wrecking-ball approach to America has a precedent: the evangelical perversion of Jesus’s message of radical love to one of hate and aggression

www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-i...

There's lots of other stuff from that and other unpublished books I've written. I plan to use Substack to get the material out for what little it may be worth, just for the record.

They have ignored my queries.

We asked 2,500 Americans how they really feel about billionaires Campaign donations from the country’s richest are soaring. But only 12 percent of respondents say billionaires have a positive impact on society.

wapo.st/3X9pHBl

When Republicans Used to Be Sane, Even “Compassionate” Trump Has Erased Their Memory

The secret history of when Republican presidents were moderate and sane. brucebartlett.substack.com/p/when-repub...

Dark Money Donor Conduit Funneled $195 Million to Right-Wing Groups in 2024 - EXPOSEDbyCMD Last year DonorsTrust, the preferred donor advised fund of the Koch political network, distributed $195.3 million in grants to the more than 300 right-wing influence groups, litigation centers, media ...

www.exposedbycmd.org/2025/11/21/d...

As lobbying revenue grows at record pace, Trump-aligned firms reap the biggest rewards - OpenSecrets News Lobbying firms with close ties to President Donald Trump are raking in staggering amounts of revenue, and K Street spending…

www.opensecrets.org/news/2025/11...

How billionaires took over American politics The current concentration of wealth is unlike anything in history. So is billionaires’ involvement in politics.

How billionaires took over American politics. Gift article. wapo.st/48nkqMN

The Death of the Moderate Republican It Long Predates Trump

The death of the moderate Republican. I wrote this essay in late 2014 but no one would publish it because no one believed me. open.substack.com/pub/brucebar...

The libertarian policy was to float the exchange rate immediately. That's what Milton Friedman would have advised. brucebartlett.substack.com/p/can-libert...

Exclusive | U.S. Banks Shelve $20 Billion Bailout Plan for Argentina Bankers are instead discussing a smaller, short-term facility to help Argentina make a roughly $4 billion debt payment in January.

Trouble in Libertarian Paradise? www.wsj.com/finance/u-s-...

Americans Show Consensus on Many Democracy-Related Matters A Kettering Foundation/Gallup survey finds most Americans support political compromise, view multiculturalism as a strength and reject political violence.

news.gallup.com/poll/696494/...

Another good wedge issue for Democrats.

On the right, Judeo-Christian values are out and Christian nationalism is in (RNS) — As someone who has been studying the use of ‘Judeo-Christian’ in American public discourse for over 40 years, I can say with confidence its usage has come full circle.

The rise and fall of Judeo-Christianism. religionnews.com/2025/11/18/o...

She and I worked together for 2 years at the WH. I was never tempted to date her.

I thought GHW Bush was a good man and I voted for him in 1992. I voted for Dole in 1996 out of personal loyalty and Bush in 2000 because of lingering support for the GOP, also in 2004, although I regret the 2004 vote. By then I knew better. Only Democrats since then.

brucebartlett.substack.com/p/the-50-yea...

Opinion | The Lesson We Teach Schoolchildren About the Holocaust Is Wrong

www.nytimes.com/2025/11/17/o...

Worth remembering that Larry once dated Laura Ingraham.

That's one reason.

I once wrote for a publication that substituted my links for others on the same website that had nothing to do with the point I was documenting. I discovered this only by accident.

Can Libertarianism Ever Succeed in a Democratic Society? If It Succeeds in Argentina, It Will Be the First Time

I think we need to get back to using academic-style references, so people know where a link will take them. I am trying to do that on my Substack. Here's an example. brucebartlett.substack.com/p/can-libert...

I have long been dissatisfied with internet links. Readers don't use them, and writers and editors are very lazy about using quality links. For one thing, they almost never use primary sources or even quality sources, relying instead on the first thing that shows up in a Google search.

Contracts don't enforce themselves. Government force is necessary or the "free market" falls apart.

Hong Kong was no libertarian paradise. The people had no political rights because it was a British colony. Its free market was imposed by fiat by a British bureaucrat. And the government was far more involved in the economy than libertarians acknowledge. brucebartlett.substack.com/p/can-libert...

I only worked there for a year, but I went to many of its events, wrote papers for it, and was close friends with its top staff for decades. But around 2010, the organization cut off all contact with me because I wrote something nice about Obama. True fact.

Opinion | One Horror of Slavery That Until Recently Could Not Be Told

www.nytimes.com/2025/11/13/o...

The Alt-Right to Heritage Foundation Pipeline: a 10-Year Journey Extremist rot goes up and down on the right

www.theunpopulist.net/p/the-alt-ri...