Is the Dutch Tulip Bubble Story Bullshit?
More on the foolishness of crowds
Good Morning:
The bloom has begun. The army is readying to march:
Yesterday on #DogShirtTV, the estimable
unveiled the newest development in the Cactus Conspiracy, the estimable came on to discuss his latest scoop, and I sang a farewell to Tom Lehrer. Yes, I sang on camera. It wasn’t even terrible.The Situation
In yesterday’s “The Situation” column, I argue that Israeli policy in Gaza is indefensible and that it will not do to defend it as not amounting to genocide:
Jeffrey Epstein’s crimes weren’t genocide either. Neither were Charles Manson’s. A lot of bad things aren’t genocide. And some really bad things aren’t even war crimes.
It seems to me that if one wishes to explore the question of whether Israeli policy warrants support—as opposed to mere defense against the charge of genocide—these questions deserve a little more attention than Stephens give them.
Israel has leveled Gaza.
It has also gravely bungled aid delivery—that is, when it wasn’t cutting off aid altogether.
Israeli forces have killed some untold number of civilians. A lot of others have been left malnourished and will die of starvation in the coming weeks.
And Israel has also repeatedly floated ideas of displacing Palestinians en masse from the strip. The language shifts. Sometimes it’s called reoccupation and redevelopment. Sometimes it’s encouraging emigration or resettlement. Sometimes it’s about creating a “humanitarian city” that one can only leave by leaving the territory entirely.
It will not do to say that all of this is Hamas’s fault, because Hamas launched the war and fights illegally and in a fashion that pervasively endangers civilians on its own side. All of that is true, and a great deal of responsibility for this humanitarian disaster thus lies at the feet of Hamas.
But Israel cannot escape responsibility for its own decisions—the decision to keep the war going, the decision to repeatedly block the delivery of aid, the decision to link the delivery of humanitarian aid to political objectives, and the decision to use huge ordnance in densely populated areas.
Yesterday On Lawfare
Compiled by the estimable Mary Ford
Why the United States Should Not Fear a Space Pearl Harbor
Zachary Burdette argues that although fears surrounding China’s ability to target U.S. satellites are increasingly overblown, the U.S. must still take the threat of Beijing outpacing the United States seriously and invest in more robust space architecture, capabilities, and concepts.
Going forward, these trends suggest that achieving a Space Pearl Harbor will be out of reach for both China and the United States. The implausibility of a decisive knockout blow is good news for crisis stability. But it also suggests that the United States will need to invest much more heavily not only in making its own space architectures more resilient but also in capabilities and concepts to offset China’s increasingly potent and resilient space systems.
Eight Takeaways From the Texas Flood Tragedy
Mark Nevitt provides eight lessons from the devastating floods in Kerr County, Texas, arguing that climate-resilient solutions must be taken into account to prevent future tragedies resulting from extreme weather events.
If the Texas floods offer a glimpse into the future, it will be one shaped by climate-driven instability and extreme weather events. In the face of a massive human tragedy, the U.S. should learn from the Texas floods and work toward building a more resilient future.
What Comes Next in AI Regulation?
Kevin Frazier takes stock of some of the most important provisions in the White House’s recently released Artificial Intelligence Action Plan, arguing that the plan—which was well-received by a diverse range of actors—might be more difficult to implement than initially thought due to its scope.
The AI Action Plan’s surprisingly broad reception demonstrates two things: the current state of American AI governance and its inherent fragility. While the plan successfully bridges competing visions for AI’s future—balancing innovation with safety, and worker interests with adoption—this very comprehensiveness might be its Achilles’ heel. The plan’s 90 recommendations feel less like a unified strategy and more like a political compromise, delaying tough decisions about priorities, trade-offs, and democratic accountability. Its long-term success won’t hinge on its ambitious goals, but on the administration’s ability to implement them while grappling with rapid technological change, geopolitical pressures, and unpredictable public sentiment. Ultimately, the plan might be remembered less for what it achieves and more for what it reveals about the immense challenge of governing transformative technology in a volatile and accelerating world.
Podcasts
On Lawfare Daily, I sit down with Scott Anderson, Roger Parloff, and James Pearce to talk about the Supreme Court’s ruling allowing for the removal of officials, the ongoing dismantling of executive agencies, and the latest developments in the Kilmar Abrego Garcia case.
Today’s #BeastOfTheDay is the dingo, which we honor today for its recent contributions to science. We also honor the dingo for being old.
A new genetic analysis published this month says:
We analyzed genome-wide data from nine ancient dingo specimens ranging in age from 400 to 2,746 y old, predating the introduction of domestic dogs to Australia by European colonists. We uncovered evidence that the continent-wide population structure observed in modern dingo populations had already emerged several thousand years ago… Modern dingoes derive little genomic ancestry from post-Colonial hybridization with other domestic dog lineages, instead descending primarily from ancient canids introduced to Sahul thousands of years ago.
Congratulations to the dingo for its successful resistance to colonialism. In honor of today’s Beast, be grateful to your ancestors for putting so much energy into domesticating dogs. If they hadn’t, there might be dingoes everywhere.
Tell Me Something Interesting
Prompted by my father’s column on the foolishness of crowds, I (
) decided to investigate a historical controversy of which I was vaguely aware, but the details of which I had never dug into. To whit: was there ever a Dutch Tulip Mania?The legend of the Tulip Mania is fairly well known and goes something like this: After tulips began to be cultivated in the Low Countries, they became increasingly popular, and a speculative trade in tulip bulbs emerged in the early 1600s. In the 1630s, the prices of rare bulbs began to rise precipitously, until, by winter 1636-37, a single bulb could sell for the equivalent of millions of modern dollars. Then, in February 1637, the bubble suddenly burst, all the bulbs were worthless, and the Dutch economy collapsed. It’s a great story.
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