There is an old and familiar saying about difficult personal or social situations. When a weak or broken personality is faced with a difficult or dire situation the individual ignores the problem and pretends to be confident and cheerful about what is to come. Here, the individual is said to be “whistling past the graveyard.”
In “Lincoln as Statesman,” a chapter in his book On Statesmanship (Yale University Press, 2026; vii + 312 pp), Steven B. Smith portrays Lincoln as a political leader of almost superhuman wisdom and virtue. He says:
The Iran war could claim a casualty far more consequential than a missile battery, an air base, or an oil tanker: the petrodollar system.
“The lesson of the Cornell controversy is that justice is not measured by whether prosecutors satisfy public anger. It is measured by whether they faithfully apply the law.”
“”It’s not a simple story ... But I would say that I think we are in a rising term-premium environment.”
The 2026 FY just ended, and we find the new annual deficit was 12% above 2025’s deficit.
