Time Changes Everything

On Father’s Day last year, I walked from my old house to the No Kings protest to see who would attend such an absurd rally in an area that had voted overwhelmingly for President Trump. The weather was typical for McAllen, Texas: clear skies, broiling sunshine, and a high well into the triple digits. The attendance at the rally was what you would expect: mostly postmenopausal, overweight women, and a handful of ectomorphic white male boomers with long hair and unkempt beards.

This year, there isn’t a No Kings protest, and the weather is no longer characterized by booming sunshine and triple-digit temperatures. The weather this year is dominated by El Niño, which will tamp down the Atlantic hurricane season and bring cooler temperatures to South Texas. Flag Day 2026 saw periodic rain showers and cool temperatures. These cooling temperatures coincide with a cooling attitude toward the Trump administration.

The cool-down began last summer when the administration announced plans to establish a National Defense Area in the Rio Grande Valley (RGV). The NDA was created by transferring the International Boundary and Water Commission land fronting the Rio Grande River to Joint Base San Antonio. Local and national media tried to cast the prospect of a militarized border as a calamity, but if you Google “NDA in the Rio Grande Valley,” all the reporting is from last summer. The post I wrote about it leads the field because I get more clicks than the legacy media, even though I don’t get that many.

The attempt to stir up local opinion about the NDA died because nothing down here had changed after the NDA designation. The military erected additional razor wire in the Eagle Pass area to reinforce the existing barrier. They also installed razor wire in the drainage ditches along the levee roads that parallel the river. I’m not sure what the razor wire is for, since illegal crossings around McAllen have dropped from thousands daily during the Biden years to zero since Trump closed the border. The Air Force has deployed a few GBOSS (Ground-based operational surveillance system) towers to cover gaps in the Border Patrol TARS (Tethered Aerostat Radar System), but that isn’t enough militarization to get locals worked up.

Then President Trump had the audacity to fulfill a campaign pledge by enforcing the nation’s immigration laws. This gave the Democrats and their media allies an opportunity to demonstrate their mastery of Brandolini’s law (better known as the bullshit asymmetry principle). Brandolini’s law holds that the energy required to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude greater than that required to produce it.

The Rio Grande Valley is overwhelmingly Mexican American, so we have a nuanced view of illegal immigration. Many of the citizens here are legal immigrants or the children of legal immigrants. As a rule, they don’t like people who jump the line, and they are especially hostile to line jumpers who live off government handouts. That said, they have grown accustomed to having talented artisans from Mexico do custom carpentry or install Spanish-tile roofs.

American companies insist on inconveniences such as obtaining building permits or using OSHA-compliant personal fall restraint systems for roof work. These costly requirements come with county inspections and higher property valuations, making them very unpopular. It seems un-American to have to comply with American laws and standards. In the RGV, ICE isn’t cool, but ICE enforcement is fine when confined to Minnesota or LA.

All the BS churned up by the media about immigration enforcement in the blue states had little effect here. The ICE agents involved in the shootings of the crazed car woman and the violent VA male nurse were Hispanic Border Patrol Agents from the Rio Grande Valley. They won’t have to worry about getting Doxed, SWAT’ed, or protesters outside their homes, because the local cops would beat those responsible like a bass drum. Even Biden’s DOJ wouldn’t target Hispanic police forces with a civil rights case (that would be racist), and down here, most of the cops are Hispanic.

Last year, I saw one Antifa dude show up at the No Kings protest, dressed in black and wearing a balaclava. The cops swarmed him as soon as he stepped out of his car. While they yoked the young fool up, the fat white girl who drove him here tried to protest his detention, but as soon as she started screeching, she got the face-plant and cuffs treatment, too. The No Kings protestors pretended they didn’t see what happened.

It’s easy to understand why President Trump’s popularity is declining in the RGV. What is not easy to understand is the unwavering support for Mexico’s government. Mexican President Sheinbaum has repeatedly declared Mexican soberania (sovereignty) is non-negotiable, but Mexico is not fully sovereign. It has surrendered between a third and a half of the country to drug cartels. As Jousha Trevino pointed out, the leftist Movement for National Regeneration (Morena party) has “…moved beyond ordinary gross corruption into a new model of governance that synthesizes state and cartels into the narco-estado – the narco state”.

Mexico is the best country in the world for elites. The courts are biased in their favor, and they have an endless pool of deferential servants to hire from their enormous poor population. In Mexico, only the elites live a first-world life, while the rest of society caters to them. It’s easy to see why Mexican elites are enamored with their country. But why are Mexican Americans so loyal to a country most of them are afraid to visit? And why do American elites seem to despise the United States?

I believe our cultural decline began with the boomer generation, which abandoned any sense of seriousness or reality about life. We (I’m a late boomer) have been unable to see the world honestly since we were conquered by a new religion, one whose dominant precept was that it was not a religion. This new religion ushered in the four biggest changes in elite leftist priorities. These are neo-racialism, mass immigration, gender ideology, and climate catastrophism. None of these ideas is supported by the working class. None of these new shibboleths can be defended by empirical data. But they do reflect the increasingly radical priorities of professional-managerial-class voters.

You cannot reason with the lunatic fringe. Opposing mass immigration is equated with opposing diversity, which can only mean you are racist and xenophobic. Doubting climate change means you’re doubting “settled science,” even though science is never settled. Science is a continuous process of inquiry, not an immutable set of dogmatic facts.

Arguing against the tenets of leftist progressive positions in the blue states marks you as a racist, sexist, transphobic, Islamophobic, fatist, cis, Christian, Republican, gun-owning, pallid person who refuses to submit to your betters. But not in the RGV. There is no daylight between the way my Mexican American neighbors and I view the church, the 2nd Amendment, the sexes, or the law. We all want reasonably priced Spanish tile roofs, the eviction of free-loading illegal migrants, and the ability to legally carry firearms wherever we want.

Mexican culture is distinctly masculine, which might explain why its elites do not adapt to the strange passions of Western elites. Progressive America views men as defective women, which is why it cannot recognize anything good about men. The progressive critique focuses on negative male qualities like anger and domination, while ignoring the noble attributes of ambition, assertiveness, strength, courage, and risk-taking. There is an old Mexican saying: women are born, and men are made. Girls can be recognized as fully realized women in Mexican society simply by growing up. Men need to earn their place in a proper society, usually by displaying ambition, assertiveness, strength, courage, and risk-taking.

Mexico ranks poorly on governance metrics: Transparency International’s 2025 Corruption Perceptions Index rated it ~27/100 (highly corrupt). Cartel violence since 2006 has caused 350,000–400,000+ deaths. Homicide rates remain elevated, and collusion between officials and cartels is documented. The population shows persistent dissatisfaction with security and corruption.

Despite this, President Claudia Sheinbaum enjoys high approval ratings (often 60–80% in polls). Mexicans and Mexican Americans often report great national pride. This pride is more closely tied to culture, history, family, resilience, and symbols than to institutional performance. Mexican Americans frequently express cultural affinity, dual identity, and criticism of U.S. policies while maintaining emotional ties to Mexico.

In many developing nations, people distinguish the country or culture from the government. Decades of inequality and weak institutions have normalized dysfunction. Mexico is typical rather than exceptional. National pride and tolerance for flawed governments are regional norms rooted in history, inequality, and psychology. Success stories such as El Salvador’s security turnaround and Uruguay’s stability can shift expectations about competence when presented convincingly. Venezuelan, Colombian, and Cuban exiles have lost their affection for the motherland, demonstrating the price paid when a regime is seen as a total failure.

Mexico’s history of one-party rule, inequality, and violent and corrupt regional peers sets a low bar. But Mexico is not a total failure because it is being propped up by the USMCA, which will not change anytime soon. President Trump’s recent embarrassment in Iran will not allow him to make harsh demands on Canada or Mexico, our two biggest trading partners.

Even if Trump were able to punish Mexico with tariffs and high remittance taxes, leading to a severe recession in Mexico, that would not result in 64% of Mexican elites telling pollsters they have little to no confidence in the Mexican government. The Narcos would kill the pollsters if they discovered that level of discontent, but it’s not there anyway because Mexicans do not expect competence, truth, or justice from their ruling class.

Recent Gallup polling has revealed an unbridgeable partisan divide in the United States. Pollsters have nothing to fear from the criminals in America and can report whatever they want. When asked whether they were “extremely” or “very proud” of America, 92% of Republicans said yes, but only 36% of Democrats answered in the affirmative.

Those numbers for Democrats are temporarily much higher today. The Democratic Party is home to the AWFULs (Affluent White Female Urban Liberals). Women, regardless of education level, are not going to watch hours of TikTok videos of Europeans falling in love with America during the World Cup and not feel the nagging sting of cognitive dissonance. They will instantly shift their attitudes to align with those of their European sisters, becoming Sunshine Patriots for the duration of the World Cup. Their patriotic feelings won’t last because their convictions have been hollowed out. Envy is a sin, after all, but AWFULs don’t believe in sin, just envy.

Time has shifted the dominant weather pattern over Texas in less than a year, yet there is little talk in the legacy media about climate catastrophism because El Niño is a well-documented, easily understood fluctuation in the weather system. The punitive expedition to Iran has concluded in the most disgraceful manner possible, given our tactical dominance on the battlefield. But gas prices are falling below $4.00 at the pump across Red America, so nobody cares about Iran anymore.

The Democrats are running a white man for the open US Senate seat, even though he is actually a defective woman. They have learned nothing. Yet they could win everything if the federal judiciary continues to block efforts to purge the voter rolls of dead people and illegal aliens, ensure voters have valid identification, and eliminate fraud-prone extended mail-in ballot measures.

There is ample evidence that the average American is worse off than their grandparents. Incomes have not kept pace with the cost of living. The average American has fewer children, marries less, sleeps less, weighs 40 pounds more, and has far worse mental health. Inequality has surged to its highest level ever in America, while social mobility is at its lowest point. These facts are endlessly churned by the progressive left and their media enablers to elect more Democrats.

Yet the new American Boom Belt comprises 11 states: Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas. Together, they have the 3^rd-largest GDP in the world. They’re responsible for around 70% of U.S. population growth and 57% of all new jobs. But facts don’t win elections; compelling, simple, easy-to-understand stories do. They are the only weapons to deploy against Brandolini’s law. President Trump used to understand this, but he’s now lost in the fog of the Iranian campaign, and we may well lose our country because of it.