The Oasis for
Rational Conservatives
Wednesday, February 11, 2026
The Ancient Greeks began settling in the Mediterranean’s largest island around 750 BC. They called it Sikelia, after the Sikani and Sicel tribes that lived there. They flourished, building numerous cities, all with temples to their Olympian gods. The city of Akragas – now called Agrigento on the south coast – grew to a population of 200,000 by the 500s. It was here that the Greeks built the most outstanding examples of monumental Greek architecture that still exist today.
Along a ridge outside the city, they erected temples to Zeus, Hera, Heracles (Hercules) and many others. The one you see here the Romans called the Temple of Concordia (harmony), for by the time they showed up in the 200s, the Greek name was lost. In the foreground lies a remnant of a bronze statue to one of the Greek gods – perhaps Apollo. The glory that was Greece has been gone with winds of millennia. It can be a very emotional experience to be here. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #248 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
First Syria, then Iran, and now Venezuela. Slowly, but surely, Vladimir Putin’s hopes of creating an alternative network of alliances to challenge American hegemony is disintegrating.
For the past two decades, Putin has worked steadily to build Moscow’s military and trade ties with Caracas as part of a deliberate attempt to extend the Kremlin’s sphere of influence into America’s backyard. An added bonus of Putin’s long-standing support for Maduro was that it helped to sustain the anti-American regimes in Cuba and Nicaragua, with Caracas supplying them with everything they need, from oil to food.
China, a country Putin sees as a key partner in his burgeoning axis of autocratic powers, also enjoyed close ties with the Maduro regime. Now that the Chavist era in Venezuela has finally drawn to a close following US president Donald Trump’s dramatic military intervention at the weekend, Russia faces the very real prospect of witnessing the collapse of all three of their Latin American allies.
Viewed from this context, Trump’s decision to remove Maduro looks more like a geopolitical masterstroke than simply a brazen bid to seize control of Venezuela’s oil riches. With Maduro and his wife safely locked up in a Brooklyn jail, Caracas’s ability to function as an epicenter for anti-US activity for Russia and China has ended.
Welcome to the Merry Christmas HFR FOR 2025! We have to jump the gun a bit as next Friday will be the day after Christmas, and besides, that will be a day the TTP Team will be with their families, like on Thanksgiving.
So let’s celebrate now, by opening up all the Good News Christmas presents under the tree this week. There’s lots of them so let’s get started!
This delightful story appeared on the Daily Mail homepage this morning (12/19). The White House is understandably elated. The new CPI is a double-whammy for the Dems – both their Affordability! campaign and condemnation of Trump’s Tariffs just crashed and burned.
And for the Hat Trick – it’s not just the CPI that’s economic good news, it’s this too:
???SOMBRERO MEME OF THE DAY - A MUST SEE - WATCH TIL THE END…
?? The sombrero memes will continue until you quit holding the American People Hostage!!!?SCHUMER SHUTDOWN pic.twitter.com/DwaMReNzhk
— ???Nancy Hamm??? (@nancy_hamm1) October 7, 2025
With the Senate and House approving a new funding bill and sending it to the White House for President Trump’s signature, a group of top Democrats somberly removed their sombreros to signal the end of the government shutdown.
After holding the country hostage for 43 days and wreaking havoc on the travel industry and other areas of the public sector before caving for no discernible gain for their agenda, Democrats marked the pending reopening of the government by ceremonially taking off their Mexican hats.
"This is indeed a mucho, mucho sad day," said House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. "We held out as long as we could, and would have been perfectly fine holding out even longer to teach the Republicans a lesson about… something or other… but some of the members of our party decided to break ranks and vote to reopen the government. So, as a way of honoring our great shutdown, we now remove our beautiful sombreros. Farewell, government shutdown! Adios!"
Though he remained under heavy criticism from others within his party for failing to prevent the shutdown from ending, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer showed his solidarity by joining Jeffries in removing his own sombrero.
"I know my colleagues are not happy with me," Schumer said. "But I am still a proud Democrat. Proud to have presided over the longest government shutdown in U.S. history. Proud to have stood up to the Republicans and President Trump. And now, proud to honor what we did by removing this fabulous sombrero."
At publishing time, congressional Democrats were reportedly preparing to introduce a resolution to build a bronze sombrero statue outside the Capitol to commemorate the shutdown.
~ Babylon Bee reporting.
President Trump’s push to take control of Venezuela and its oil resources under Operation Absolute Resolve is good news for the United States and Europe, and bad news for Cuba, Russia, China, and Iran: America is reclaiming strategic ground.
It matters because the world is entering an era of unprecedented energy demand driven by artificial intelligence, data centres, and digital infrastructure. Reliable, affordable energy is now a prerequisite for technological leadership. Nations that fail to secure supply will fall behind.
China currently receives the majority of Venezuela’s crude exports. US leverage over Venezuelan exports disrupts China’s ability to secure discounted crude and reinforcing America’s position in global energy markets.
This shift also weakens China’s broader resource strategy in South America, where it is seeking critical minerals for electric vehicles and AI technologies.
But the ripple effects extend beyond China:
Last May, President Trump by Executive Order declared the Establishment of the Religious Liberty Commission, under the Department of Justice, to advise the White House on how best to “vigorously enforce the historic and robust protections for religious liberty enshrined in Federal law.”
Last week on December 10, the now established Religious Liberty Commission held a hearing on Religious Liberty in the Military. My son, Brandon Holiday Wheeler, was invited to be one of the speakers. His speech brought tears to both his father and mother, my wife Rebel. You’ll soon understand why, as Brandon said I could share it with our TTPers.
Zohran Mamdani’s 2025 mayoral win pits Islamic anti-usury principles against New York’s capitalist core. His base may push regulatory sabotage such as disclosure burdens, pension shifts to sukuk, and usury investigations, risking capital flight to Miami or Texas. Liberals like Schumer urge coexistence and positioning New York as a dual-finance hub while implementing sukuk banking reforms and Shariah options to tap Islamic sovereign wealth funds (for the Democrats).
Morris Katz of Fight.Agency ran Mamdani’s campaign using a political OODA Loop, syncing narrative, moral, and logistical energy. Targeting Gen Z women (81% of Mamdani voters), he built a decentralized “starfish” model utilizing TikTok dopamine feedback strategies that turned politics into social validation. Volunteers amplified content; door-knocking became performance art. CAIR funding fueled this globalist push.
In early 2025, President Trump imposed sweeping tariffs via IEEPA executive orders with 10% on most imports, up to 145% on Chinese goods, to counter IP theft and fentanyl. The policy raised $151 billion in six months but triggered lawsuits from businesses and states, claiming unconstitutional taxation without Congressional approval. The Supreme Court heard Learning Resources v. Trump on November 5, debating whether IEEPA allows tariffs as regulatory tools or if legislative approval is required under Article I of the Constitution.
Dick Cheney, dead at 84 on November 3, 2025, has long been suspected of waging Iraq 2003 for Israel’s benefit by fabricating WMD intelligence to neutralize Saddam. Critics cite The Israel Lobby, AIPAC speeches, and Iran strikes as Zionist-driven, costing 4,400 U.S. lives and trillions of dollars.
In his later years, his anti-Trump stance, endorsement of Kamala Harris, and calling Trump a "threat to the republic" positioned him as a defender of traditional GOP global engagement. His support of Kamala Harris only amplified populist views of him as a key "globalist establishment" figure and proponent of a borderless world.
For decades, Venezuela provided the communist-run island with the bulk of its fuel and financing in exchange for Cuban doctors, teachers and security personnel. Without those programs, the island’s already devastating energy woes will worsen and its shortages of food, medicine and basic goods will become even more pronounced.
“They’ve been left without a godfather, a benefactor that has been paying their bills, and they’re totally bankrupt,” said Emilio Morales, president of the Miami-based Havana Consulting Group. “How are they going to survive?”
During a meeting of Cuba’s legislature last month, officials painted a grim economic picture as they placed blame for the current crisis on long-running US sanctions. But a cut-off of shipments of Venezuelan crude is catastrophic.
The lack of fuel is leading to massive, economy-crushing blackouts in Cuba.
[This Monday’s Archive was originally published in TTP on February 26, 2015. It’s timely, as now Elon Musk Declares No More White Guilt (TTP 12/10). Millions now agree. The end of White Guilt will be the salvation of America.]
Note: TTP has now replaced the Forum with a Leave A Reply feature at the end of every article where you can post a comment. Just remember, TTPers are polite to one another and refrain from foul language.
One of the results is an Internet that barely functions. I have heard little of what is going on in the US and the world save for headlines, which are so irretrievably awful that I’m glad I’m isolated here or else my head would explode.
I’ll keep this short. Everything you are seeing right now with America coming apart at the seams at the hands of this Affirmative Action President has one and only one cause: they are the wages of white guilt.
The one and only reason this evil, contemptible America-hating fascist has not been impeached for treason, the only reason anyone paid any attention to him whatever such that he was accepted to Harvard, made Editor of the Harvard Law Review, allowed to teach a course at Columbia, ran for Illinois State Senator, ran for Illinois US Senator, ran for the Dem presidential nomination, excused for attending a racist church for 20 years that prayed for God to damn America, got elected president, and re-elected president is the color of his skin.
The difference of commitment to sports versus academics by students and parents is striking, but don't believe for a minute that the same bias is not institutional as well. I have taught now at every level of American academia and I have yet to give a test or assign a project that was so important that it caused a game to be canceled or missed.
However, from elementary school to college, I regularly have had class time canceled, projects excused and test times altered to cater to athletics. In fact, it seems any academic activity humbly bows before the holy incantation, “Uh, I'm going to be gone; we've got a game that day.”
This explanation is not the bitter ranting of an egghead who was always picked last in gym class. Rather, I'm a former collegiate athlete and high school coach who is intrigued by what could be accomplished if we would bring our athletic commitment into the classroom.
And, because attitude is not enough, we should also contrast coaching to teaching, so that we might re-learn some valuable lessons about instructional methods. To this end, I see three prime areas for consideration.
Dalat, South Viet Nam, 1961. I was 17 years old. A friend of my father’s, Herb Klein, came by our house. He was a prominent businessman whose passion was big-game hunting. He had just returned from the mountain jungle highlands of South Viet Nam and regaled us with stories of the Montagnard tribespeople who were plagued by tigers with a taste for human flesh. He told me that after climbing the Matterhorn, living with Amazon headhunters, and swimming the Hellespont, hunting a man-eating tiger should be my next adventure.
“You’d be saving so many lives, Jack,” he told me. “There’s one I heard about from the Co Ho Montagnards that’s killed and eaten almost 20 of them in the forests outside the town of Dalat. I know who can guide you, he was mine, his name is Ngo Van Chi.”
Somehow, I talked my parents into letting me do this. I had saved up the money from giving tennis and judo lessons. So there I was, in pitch dark in a “mirador” of branches and leaves, holding a .300 Weatherby with a flashlight wired to the barrel, waiting for this man-eating tiger to come for the rotting water buffalo we set out as bait. Chi and I heard the tiger, I put the rifle barrel out, Chi clicked on the flashlight, I saw these two enormous red eyes, and fired.
And there he is, the Man-Eater of Dalat, who would never kill another human being ever again. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #175 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
The recent Democrat cry of “affordability” is ironic in many ways.
The left-wing narrative of Trump hyperinflation was one of desperation and came only after previous memes had failed to resonate.
The 2025 generic “dictator,” “fascist,” and “Nazi” smear points never helped the left much.
Nor did the nihilist government shutdown over the “Obamacare crisis” work other than perhaps to depress fourth-quarter GDP.
Nor did the earlier spring 2025 melodramatic predictions of an impending “Trade War,” “Recession,” and stock-market “Meltdown” resonate.
Nor did the “Gestapo,” “SS,” and “Nazi” ICE smears become effective talking points.
The “illegal orders” and “unconstitutional use of force” in destroying narcotraffickers’ shipments in transit of lethal drugs were mostly empty rhetoric.
Then the Democrats got smart and remembered how Trump had won in 2024.
“I don’t know what you mean by ‘glory,’” Alice said.
Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. “Of course you don’t—till I tell you. I meant ‘there’s a nice knock-down argument for you!’”
“But ‘glory’ doesn’t mean ‘a nice knock-down argument,’” Alice objected.
“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.”
“The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”
“The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master—that’s all.”
~ Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland
In the past, I’ve talked about the left's deliberate shift of language, but I’ve never mentioned the foundational shift I’m going to talk about now. This one is different. It doesn’t just twist one word or one idea — it changes the ground we stand on.This shift attacks logic itself. It strikes at the roots of reasoning, the process by which we decide what is true. It happened quietly and almost no one saw it occur.
The term critical thinking has been redefined.
Mulafassur waterfall below the village of Gasadalur is only one example of the serenity of the Faroe Islands. They’re a self-governing Danish possession in the North Atlantic halfway between Norway and Iceland. You won’t find a place of more captivating serene and peaceful charm.
Warmed by the Gulf Stream, in the summer it’s so strewn with wildflowers the roads are known as “buttercup highways.” At every turn along them you’re stunned by the incredible scenery. The capital of Torshavn is so laid back the Prime Minister’s Office – the Løgmansskristovan – is a wood cabin with a green grass sod roof. Great beer from the Faroes’ two breweries is always flowing in the pubs, where the Faroese islanders welcome you like an old friend.
You can easily fly here from Edinburgh, London, Copenhagen, or Reykjavik, Iceland . A few days here will do wonders for your soul. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #18 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
