I was a victim of ‘Woke 1’ — and I refuse to let AOC laugh off the harm she caused

 “Woke 1 was crazy,” grinned Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Sunday as she sought to brush off a question about ideas she endorsed very recently — like “defund the police.”

She’s letting herself and her allies off far too easy.

The excesses of the toxic hyper-leftism that metastasized in so many American institutions — academia, media, sports, law, government, education, entertainment and the corporate world — were a form of illiberal authoritarianism that did deep damage to individuals and to the fabric of American society.

I know, because Woke 1 came for me.

My crime? Advocating for meritocracy in New York City’s public schools.

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I was an attorney with the Legal Aid Society during Woke 1’s peak in the summer of 2020.

“Woke 1 was crazy,” grinned Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Sunday as she sought to brush off a question about ideas she endorsed very recently.REUTERS

In my off-hours I was also involved in my children’s public schools, and I’d recently been re-elected by fellow parents to sit on the local Community Education Council.

In that capacity I disagreed with Mayor Bill de Blasio’s efforts to scrap the color-blind SHSAT, the single test used for admissions to NYC’s specialized high schools, based on the specious claim that the test itself was racist — and I had the audacity to say so publicly.

That’s when the Black Attorneys of Legal Aid, a caucus of my former union, the Association of Legal Aid Attorneys, chased me out of my job for wrongspeak.

It’s far easier to defend meritocracy in 2026, but in 2020 — the era AOC now wants us all to laugh about — it was career-ending.

BALA published a statement declaring that a public defender “cannot oppose anti-racism and effectively represent Black and Brown people.”

The group went on to say I had “no business having a career in public defense” and “we’re ashamed that she works at the Legal Aid Society” — and my employer amplified the message by re-tweeting it.

That post is still up.

A real knee-slapper, right, Congresswoman?

My public shaming served many purposes.

The Woke 1 practitioners of Ibram X. Kendi–style “anti-racism” wanted me to lose my job: Check.

I was running for City Council at the time, and thanks to their accusations, I was constantly asked to answer for my “racist” education positions: Check.

Even more important, they wanted to make sure everyone else at the Legal Aid Society got the message.

Years later, a former colleague wrote to tell me he was ashamed of his own silence during that period, but had feared losing his job if he spoke up: Check.

Woke 1 was vicious, effective and widespread — and it didn’t just silence public-school parents like me who value great education.

Academics were fired for merely expressing a verboten viewpoint about climate change.

Suggesting that COVID-19 originated in a lab, or that natural immunity negated the need for a vaccine, was sneered at — and cost more than 1,000 New York City workers their jobs.

Reporting that asked whether the surge in youth trans identification might reflect a social contagion made you an immediate outcast in most mainstream media.

Questioning land acknowledgments or the pronouns in someone’s bio invited professional peril for even the most apolitical.

And in a shocking number of cases, totally innocuous behaviors — mispronouncing words, making a misconstrued hand gesture or singing along to a popular song in a way that offended the wokerati — got people fired, shamed or rejected from schools.

All while AOC and other so-called progressives looked the other way. 

Today colleges and universities that abandoned the SAT with a bent knee to Woke 1 pieties are bringing it back — because, they can now acknowledge, the test is an effective mechanism to find and sort prospective students.

DEI consultants are looking for different work as the gigs dry up.

Detransitioners are filing lawsuits, and professional athletes and sports associations are suddenly remembering — and saying out loud — that people can’t change their sex. 

AOC wants us to forget and forgive what she calls the “crazy” of “Woke 1” so she can pursue a political promotion without having to answer for the harm done, the careers ruined, the lives upended and the deep societal rifts caused by Woke 1’s merciless demand: your acquiescence or your silence.

I want us never to forget the truth about Woke 1.

Instead, we must accurately assess it, catalogue the damage it did, demand accountability from those who led the charge — and build a society that doesn’t cave so quickly when it’s time to say something true but displeasing to the powerful.

Maud Maron is a New York attorney and education advocate.

https://nypost.com/2026/08/13/opinion/i-was-a-victim-of-woke-1-who-wont-let-aoc-laugh-off-her-harm/

Greedy Democrats are taking aim at Taylor Swift — and you’re next

 Taylor Swift is enemy No.1 to cash-grabbing Democrats in Rhode Island: They’ve named their state’s new vacation-home property tax after her.  

They and other radical leftists across the country claim that by attacking the rich, including celebs like Swift, they’re saving democracy.

Don’t be fooled.

Their new forms of taxation — including wealth taxes, mansion taxes and second-home taxes — are fueled by jealousy and hatred for our free-market system, the work ethic and everything American. 

Taylor Swift performs at the Paris Le Defense Arena during her Eras Tour concert in Paris on Aug. 12, 2025.AP Photo/Lewis Joly

And while Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s pied-à-terre tax has been stalled in court, his “enemies list” of ordinary homeowners is evidence that you’re the next target.

You may not consider yourself “rich,” but if you live in a blue state, these new forms of taxation will eventually hit you, too.

After all, they have a way of expanding: New York’s state Legislature is already considering a plan to impose Gotham’s pied-à-terre tax statewide, according to Republican state Sen. George Borrello.

Swift shelled out $17.75 million for her oceanfront Watch Hill, RI, spread in 2013 — but  the tax, which went into effect two weeks ago, is slapped on any vacation home worth over $1 million and occupied less than half the year.

Similar tax-the-rich schemes are building steam in Connecticut, DC, and California — and they’ll continue until “not a single state . . . is a safe haven,” the Democratic Socialists of America vowed in June.

Connecticut Democrats are ramming through a “mansion” tax — its first-ever statewide property tax — an annual levy on homes valued at over $3 million, whether they’re primary residences or not. 

That’s on top of the sky-high local property taxes residents already pay. 

And the state legislature’s veto-proof Democratic majority likely won’t stop with the priciest homes: Connecticut’s first income tax, imposed in 1991, was supposed to be temporary.

Three decades later, it’s still in effect — and it’s expanded from a flat rate to seven ever-higher brackets.

Washington, DC, is also proposing a “mansion tax” on high-value residences — all those valued at more than $2.5 million.

Three tiny, but tony, neighborhoods will bear the brunt: Georgetown, Kalorama and Massachusetts Avenue Heights. 

Plenty of wealthy politicians will be hit, but unfortunately not Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, vocal advocates for wealth taxes. They don’t live there.

Mansion taxes are proxies for wealth taxes, but in November Californians will vote on the real thing — the nation’s first tax on total net worth.

The Billionaires Tax Act, or Proposition 40, is billed as a “one-time” 5% tax on all forms of wealth, from homes and yachts to stocks, bonds and ownership interests in private companies — where the real money is. 

Its backers say 90% of the revenue will go to support health-care services for Californians, and health-care unions are its biggest supporters.

Don’t buy the  “one-time” claim; once health-care services are funded, does anyone really believe they’ll turn the spigot off?

The state Democratic Party endorses the tax, but not presidential wannabe Gov. Gavin Newsom.

He’s pivoted instead to a national wealth tax, warning that otherwise more California billionaires will follow Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Google cofounders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, and head for the exits.

Newsom joins a chorus of lefties, including Warren and Sanders, making the preposterous argument that  the existence of billionaires threatens democracy.

Nonsense:  Billionaire Mike Bloomberg blew through hundreds of millions of dollars of his own money seeking the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020 — and won support only from American Samoa. 

And have they forgotten the $2 billion Kamala Harris burned in her failed White House run?

Money doesn’t guarantee political success.

But democracy is threatened by dire poverty: Hungry people will succumb more easily to the promises of a dictator. 

And poverty in the United States is half what it was in 1959, when the US Census began measuring it.

The ideologues calling for wealth taxes aren’t  telling you the truth — wealth taxes are economy killers, and workers are the victims.

Only 2.7% of the typical billionaire’s wealth is in jewels, yachts, artwork, homes and other tangible luxuries; almost all of it is in business assets — stock and ownership interests that provide the capital for businesses to buy the efficient trucks, faster computers and sophisticated equipment that increase worker productivity. 

 As Cato economists Adam Michel and Chris Edwards warn, taxing wealth takes capital out of these companies, limiting worker productivity gains and the growth in future wages. Ouch!

Wake up, America: You, too, are in the “Tax the Rich” crosshairs.

Call out these left-wing demagogues for their lies. In Taylor Swift’s words, be “Fearless.”

Betsy McCaughey is a former lieutenant governor of New York.

https://nypost.com/2026/08/13/opinion/greedy-democrats-take-aim-at-taylor-swift-and-youre-next/

The Beautiful Great Game: Extra Time & Penalties

 By Michael Every of Rabobank

Yesterday’s in-line US CPI report was the non-event its relative insignificance vs tumultuous domestic and global backdrops suggested it should be. Meanwhile, in the ‘Beautiful Great Game’, it’s extra time and penalties, medals and champagne for some, and tears for others.

Iran remains defiant. Trump says he has “total control” of and “will keep” Hormuz. He’s hoping the UAE can shuttle vastly more refined product through Hormuz under the radar than it already is, as Axios flags, ‘Diesel desperation is mounting globally.’ Trump is also hoping Tehran will crumble in the face of 300% inflation, as the US blockade really is seeing import costs rise 4x in coming only by land. Over the longer term, a popular revolt can’t be ruled out – but until then that threat looms in many places.

In the US, despite a narrow defeat in the Wisconsin gubernatorial primary, the Democratic Socialist Alliance is rising to threaten to do to the Democratic Part what MAGA has done to the Republicans. Even the Wall Street Journal has noticed the rise of the pro-communist Hasan Piker.

The UK today sees a by-election where Reform UK leader Farage likely trounces Count Binface, a comedian wearing a trash can/rubbish bin on his head. While many in London and Manchester may think this mocks a right-wing populist feuding with much further-right figures, in a manner also seen in the US, The Times’ take is that Farage will return to Parliament in a Trumpian style that will further shake established British political norms.

A poll for the German state election in Saxony-Anhalt in four weeks shows the far-right AfD at 43%, Chancellor Merz's CDU 23%, the Left party 13%, the SPD 7%, the Greens 5%, the minimum to enter the parliament, and the far-left BSW and pro-business FDP 4% and 2%, respectively. In short, the ‘sensible centre’ of CDU, SPD, FPD, and Greens cannot govern in any possible combination, and perhaps nobody can.

The looming 2027 French presidential election holds the threat of far-right Le Pen meeting far-left Melenchon in the final round, where the former perhaps offers markets the relatively smaller shock given the latter has recently talked about outright cancelling French government debt.

Helpfully(?), the FT today asks, ‘Why must a socialist also be woke?’ arguing, “If the left could separate economics from culture, capitalism would have more to fear.” Yet elsewhere it notes the Boston Fed’s Collins saying poorer Americans are struggling to make ends meet while backing a rate hike if inflation remains hot that will hurt them too. ‘Why must capitalism not wake up?’ is a key question we ignore in assuming how we’ve played the game until now will still work ahead.  

Don’t think this is just a Western issue. India has been plagued with angry youth protests called ‘The Cockroach Party’; South Korea’s governing DPK is struggling with young voters furious about unaffordable housing and the need to gamble in the volatile stock market to make ends meet.

Unfortunately, it isn’t only Hormuz to resolve. The Wall Street Journal underlines that ‘War Is Squeezing Another Global Chokepoint: The Black Sea’, where Russia is ramping up attacks on grain shipments while Ukraine has been striking oil tankers. That war and the one in the Middle East are also conflating in the Caspian Sea, where Ukraine has struck Russian Iran-bound cargoes, which saw Iran contemplate an attack on Ukraine in response.

Moreover, Putin is reportedly now considering retaliatory seizures of European ships world-wide after his shadow fleet has been interdicted by them. That could require a firm, expensive, and risky response.

Eurovision banning countries in an “armed conflict” or a “sensitive geopolitical situation” from hosting its song contest will not suffice: Russia is already banned, so this is likely aimed at Israel, but also covers Ukraine – and could the recent border Spain-Morocco border issue count too?

Indeed, much more is needed in extra time. A belated Establishment recognition that free trade is not appropriate policy in a zero-sum, geopolitical, neo-mercantilist world disorder requires countries to ask, “What is GDP *for*?” That then creates a cascading stack of follow-on questions, including “*Who* is GDP for?”

Even if we drop free trade, nobody is going to buy into a neo-mercantilism that makes people feel even worse off. Countries will therefore have to find ways to protect themselves and make people feel better off.

Yes, there is the ‘inflationary impact of tariffs.’ However, that kneejerk retort overlooks that neo-mercantilism can generate a supply-side response that lowers prices; and it sees the relative GDP share of consumption decline vs. that of investment and exports while consumer spending can still grow significantly in real terms – it did in China for many years, for example.

The Beautiful Great Game will therefore require new strategies and tactics. Old ones will need to be substituted – and some will be sent off. Space precludes a more detailed breakdown of what this is likely to entail ahead, but as underlined years ago, it involves structural changes to how the government, central banks, businesses, markets, and even society operate.

As the latest examples, the US is burning regulations like the Biden-era reporting requirement for US businesses; the US Army has just opened its testing ranges to private industry for the first time; and UK PM Burnham is talking about shaking up what the current vape-shops-and-Turkish-barbers high streets look like with differential local tax rates for various kinds of businesses. Moreover, the US Treasury has bailed out Argentina and intervened to help Japan – the latter to limited impact until the BOJ wakes up, which could trigger a tsunami for Japanese insurers and the Yen carry trade, requiring even greater US involvement; and, of course, the Fed is being restructured under Warsh and will almost inevitably work more closely with the Treasury.

There will be penalties: the US just sold 10-year debt at 4.68%, the highest such yield since the GFC. If that is a problem for the US, imagine what it means for a global system built on its back.

There will be winners’ medals and champagne: the FT today notes, ‘Wall Street giants bet Nvidia’s AI chips will defy the laws of finance’, where “Private capital firms are wagering that the crucial hardware will hold its value for years to come.”

There will also be tears. AI volatility and recent ‘permanent underclass’ fears aside, AI is such a national-security issue that it’s convenient that the private-sector is prepared to fund so many schemes exceeding the cost of the Manhattan Project, saving the state the expense, in the aim of… massive profits(?); but it’s the government --and military-- that will likely want the fruits at the end, and cheaply.

That realpolitik power dynamic is a key neo-mercantilism rule you wouldn’t want to get offside of.

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/beautiful-great-game-extra-time-penalties

'All Of Iran's Weapons Today Are Domestic, Missile Production Exceeds Usage: IRGC Official'

 At a moment US officials as well as media headlines have been voicing alarm over depleted US missile stockpiles - something which President Trump sought to bat down as false - Iranian leaders have been busy boasting that their domestic defense production has not only kept pace but even expanded on the local production front.

Mohammad Reza Naqdi, Senior Advisor to the IRGC Commander-in-Chief, has been featured in state media as claiming that the production rate of ballistic missiles exceeds their operational launch rate, which comes on the heels of Tehran saying that it used the ceasefire with the US - which stretched from April into the summer months - to boost its weapons arsenal.

Naqdi asserted in a state television broadcast this week: "We are currently producing, and this process is unending." Naqdi warned further that "The enemy should not assume that Iran’s missile stockpiles will run out one day."

Iranian state media image

He also said: "There are many capabilities we have not deployed because we are managing the war with missile power."

Prior US (and Israeli) bombing campaigns since the start of Operation Epic Fury took direct aim at Iran's defense industrial sector. While it can be estimated that perhaps dozens or possibly even hundreds of missile sites as well as manufacturing locations were hit, damaged, and destroyed - Iranian officials say that hundreds more are still intact, scattered across the country.

Citing Naqdi's words further, Iran Wire writes:

He added that Iran does not rely solely on existing stockpiles, as defense equipment manufacturing remains continuous. Naqdi claimed that even if the war continues for years, ballistic missiles will still be manufactured in Iran and supplied to the armed forces on the final day of the conflict.

Highlighting the country’s industrial capacity, the senior advisor noted that, in addition to hundreds of industrial complexes, Iran houses approximately 950 industrial towns where defense equipment production is actively underway across various regions.

The same top IRGC official also this week was interviewed by PBS. In that interview he more broadly laid out that...

"We have to attain deterrence so that the enemy never dares to attack us, so we can live with security. One way is to prolong this war until we get to the next term of the presidency and cause attrition, so that if anyone else wants to attack Iran, they will know there is a cost."

Last week, a separate Iranian army official voiced something similar:

"We have made maximum use of the opportunity of the memorandum of understanding and every moment of the ceasefire," army spokesman Mohammad Akraminia told state television this week, referring to a now-suspended MoU signed with the US in June.

He said attempts were made to induct existing equipment into the armed forces and import new equipment, as well as repairing and recovering damaged systems or manufacturing new systems.

The brigadier general also said new-generation drones have been used in combat, and their specifications would be announced later.

Last month, Iran’s acting Defence Minister Majid Ebn-e Reza said that missile and drone production had "not stopped for a single day" and that drone production had reached three times its pre-war levels. But he did not provide any figures.

Meanwhile, the White House appears to have given up on finding a 'military solution' - and is settling in for a longer economic war, hoping the Islamic Republic will be weakened from within and ultimately collapse. But the Iranian military and government say the country is prepared to endure and outlast these external pressures while remaining ever-ready to resume retaliatory strikes if necessary.

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/all-irans-weapons-today-are-domestic-missile-production-exceeds-usage-irgc-official

ICER says AZ's new hypertension drug too expensive

 US cost-effectiveness watchdog ICER has concluded that AstraZeneca's first-in-class aldosterone synthase inhibitor (ASI) Baxfendy for resistant hypertension does not offer value for money.

In a preliminary evidence report (PDF), ICER concludes that Baxfendy (baxdrostat), which was approved by the FDA in May and has a wholesale acquisition cost of around $900 for a 30-day supply, has not delivered sufficient improvements over older generic drugs to justify its higher cost.

The organisation comes to a similar conclusion for Mineralys' rival ASI lorundrostat – which has been submitted for approval in the US, but not yet approved for marketing by the FDA – but bases its appraisal on an estimated placeholder price equivalent to AZ's drug.

ICER's meta-analysis of available clinical data for the two drugs concludes that they offer a "promising but inconclusive" improvement in blood pressure-lowering activity compared to spironolactone, eplerenone, or amiloride for resistant hypertension, but also finds that they are "comparable or inferior" to amlodipine, another commonly used drug.

Whilst acknowledging that the conclusions are preliminary and could change with additional evidence, ICER said that the much higher prices of the two drugs mean they far exceed the usual cost-effectiveness thresholds.

It also said questions remain about the long-term effects of ASIs, as well as their impact on patient-important outcomes and their efficacy and safety in some populations like people with chronic kidney disease (CKD).

While ICER is a private non-profit and lacks the regulatory authority of other health technology assessment (HTA) agencies, such as NICE in the UK, its reports are often used by health insurers, pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs), and federal programmes to guide coverage and pricing policies.

In the US, around half of the approximately 23 million people living with hypertension, who are already taking multiple antihypertensive drugs, still show elevated blood pressure that raises their risk of cardiovascular complications like heart attack, stroke, and premature death.

Baxfendy was approved on the strength of the BaxHTN trial, which showed that Baxfendy achieved statistically significant reductions in blood pressure compared with placebo at 12 weeks when added to two or more current antihypertensive drugs, and Mineralys reported similar findings with lorundrostat in its Advance-HTN trial.

AZ and Mineralys contend that the reductions in blood pressure achieved with their ASIs are of a magnitude that should deliver a reduction in serious cardiovascular events.

According to ICER's report, hypertension is a contributing factor to over 600,000 deaths in the US each year, with associated medical costs estimated to be upwards of $219 billion annually.

https://pharmaphorum.com/news/icer-says-azs-new-hypertension-drug-too-expensive

Sentynl bets up to $475M in licensing deal for Mereo’s rare lung disease asset

 

Mereo BioPharma’s asset, dubbed alvelestat, is set to enter Phase 3 development for AATD-LD in 2027.

Sentynl Therapeutics now has the chance to take charge of the future U.S. commercialization for Mereo BioPharma’s investigational therapy for alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency-associated lung disease, a rare and genetic respiratory disorder.

Under a Tuesday agreement, Sentynl paid an undisclosed fee for the exclusive option to market Mereo’s drug, called alvelestat, in the U.S. If Sentynl exercises that option, it will pay $40 million to Mereo, covering the deal’s upfront and R&D payments until the submission of a new drug application for the asset.

Sentynl, a subsidiary of Indian multi-national Zydus Lifesciences, has also offered up to $435 million in potential milestones to Mereo, plus double-digit tiered royalties on net U.S. sales of alvelestat. Sentynl is headquartered in California.

Alvelestat is a small molecule blocker of the neutrophil elastase enzyme, which plays a key role in inflammation and has been implicated in the destruction of lung tissue, according to Mereo’s announcement.

The oral drug is being developed for alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency-associated lung disease (AATD-LD), which arises from lack of the AATD protein that under healthy conditions protects the lungs against damaging enzymes like neutrophil elastase. Symptoms include shortness of breath and chronic coughs, progressing to asthma and bronchiectasis. Around 50,000 to 80,000 patients in the U.S. have AATD-LD.

Phase 2 data for the asset, released in May 2023, showed an 83.5% reduction in neutrophil elastase activity for the lower dose of alvelestat, ramping up to a 93.3% suppression in the higher dose group. Both effects were significantly superior to placebo, Mereo said at the time.

The biotech subsequently aligned with the FDA on a Phase 3 design for alvelestat but in January 2024 said that it was looking for potential development partners to take the asset forward. The Sentynl deal on Tuesday will help Mereo initiate its late-stage program, which could be launched early next year, according to the release.

https://www.biospace.com/deals/sentynl-bets-up-to-475m-in-licensing-deal-for-mereos-rare-lung-disease-asset