Welcome!
WELCOME. I am Christopher Chantrill @chrischantrill, writer and conservative. You can see my work at the following sites:
- Road to the Middle Class
- An American Manifesto
- usgovernmentspending.com
- US Debt
- usgovernmentrevenue.com
- Spending 101
- ukpublicspending.co.uk
- ukpublicrevenue.co.uk
- American Thinker
- US Stuck on Stupid
- US Presidential Elections
- US Midterm Elections
Road to the Middle Class contains the eponymous book and my daily blog. It investigates and celebrates the cultural artefacts that ordinary people appropriate as they struggle to adapt from country ways to the demands of life in the city. Start here.
An American Manifesto is the site for my book and blog. I am writing this book about "life after liberalism" and blogging about it as I go. All are invited to comment. Start here.
USgovernmentspending.com is a resource on government spending in the United States. It presents tables and charts on federal, state, and local government expenditure in the United States from 1902 to the present. Spending data are sourced from US budget data and US Census reports. Start here.
US Spending 101 is a “university” of government spending. It features several walks through the pages of the usgovernmentspending.com suite of websites. And the learning never stops. But it is not a real university, nor does it offer credits for courses completed. Start here.
USgovernmentrevenue.com is a resource on government taxes and receipts in the United States. It presents tables and charts on federal, state, and local government taxes, charges, use fees, and business revenue in the United States from 1902 to the present. Revenue data are sourced from US budget data and US Census reports. Start here.
UKpublicspending.co.uk is a resource on public spending in the United Kingdom. It presents tables and charts on public expenditure by central government, local authorities, and public corporations in the United Kingdom from 1900 to the present. Spending data is sourced from UK government Public Expenditure Statistical Analyses, the UK National Statistics “Blue Book,” and academic studies. Start here.
UKpublicrevenue.co.uk is a resource on public revenue in the United Kingdom. It presents tables and charts on public revenues by central government, and local authorities in the United Kingdom from 1900 to the present. Revenue data is sourced from UK Office for Budget Responsibility, the UK National Statistics and academic studies. Start here.
American Thinker publishes my op-eds most weeks. Click here.
US Stuck on Stupid analyzes the perfect storm of political bungling in the years from 1929 to 1939 that plunged the American people into untold misery during the Great Depression. Start here.
US Presidential Elections tabulates the results of presidential elections going back to 1788. Start here.
US Midterm Elections tabulates the history of midterm elections for the US Senate and the US House of Representatives going back to 1790. You can sort the elections by year, by party strength, and by party gains and losses. Start here.
Biography
I AM CHRISTOPHER CHANTRILL, a member of the international capitalist conspiracy. Both my grandfathers owned and operated import/export businesses in the early twentieth century, one in St. Petersburg, Russia, where my father was born, and the other in Kobe, Japan, where my mother was born.
I was born in India and raised and educated in England. I immigrated to the United States in 1968 and worked for many years designing and implementing utility control systems and software in Seattle.
Soon after moving to Seattle, I instinctively revolted against the suffocating left-coast culture of the Soviet of Washington, and soon came to revere the four great Germans who helped inspire the Reagan revolution: Ludwig von Mises, F.A. Hayek, Leo Strauss, and Eric Voegelin. Since then I have broadened my appreciation of “The German Turn” that has transformed the world over the last 200 years.
I have written for Liberty, FrontPageMag.com, and The American Thinker. My book Road to the Middle Class celebrates the self-governing culture of the United States in which enthusiastic Christianity, education, mutual aid, and living under law have taught generations of immigrants to rise from indigence in the countryside to a life of competence and prosperity in the city. My book An American Manifesto: Life after Liberalism tries to imagine what America would look like after the end of left-wing politics and big government.
Disclaimer and Transparency
WE make no respresentation about the accuracy of the data presented in these websites. Nor does Christopher Chantrill represent himself to possess any formal qualifications to select, evaluate or present the information. Users are urged to check all data against the published data sources and to report any errors or inconsistencies.
The websites have no relationship with any government institution, or any other institution. They are supported solely by advertising and by the life, fortune, and sacred honor of Christopher Chantrill.
Daily Blogging
WE BLOG DAILY, Monday to Friday, chiefly on national US politics, religion, education, mutual aid, and law. We also look at our junior partners in the global Anglospheric hegemony, the British. It is hard to say why, but very often our blogging zeroes in like a laser on liberal hypocrisies, monopolies, and sinecures. Of course, we love our liberal friends to bits, but we do not take them quite as seriously as they do. If we get too pompous and serious, please get in touch and tell us to lighten up.
We love to get email from our readers.
And you can follow on Twitter 
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Enjoy.
Strategic Shift in the Middle East
Our liberal friends started the week pushing the line that President Trump was committing genocide against Iran and also wallowing in AI images of Trump as a TACO.
And then there were leaks suggesting divisions in the Trump administration.
But now that there’s a ceasefire and crude oil futures are down I am trying to think through the noise about the real strategic situation.
First of all, I get a feeling that the mullah-cratic regime has been replaced with a simple military dictatorship of the IRGC. My judgement is that the “political formula” of the mullah-cratic regime, the justification for its rule, was that it was conducting a holy war against the satanic Israel and United States. The whole point of Iran being on a permanent war footing and running various anti-Israel proxies from Hamas to Hezbollah to Houthis was its war against the infidels. And indeed Israel seemed to be the enemy of all Muslim regimes in the Middle East.
But then began the Abraham Accords starting in the first Trump administration that involved economic ties between Israel and various Muslim states. It notably did not include Saudi Arabia. That was then. In May 2025 Trump went to the Middle East and brokered various deals with the Sunni Arab states, and made a notable speech to MBS in Saudi Arabia. My big takeaway was the video of MBS smiling at Trump as he watched the speech. Guess what: Elon Musk was in the frame with MBS. I’d say this is a strategic reset.
Then in the last six weeks, Iran has been targeting rockets on various Sunni Gulf states. The result has clearly been that everyone is now siding with the US against Iran. I’d say this is a strategic reset.
Suppose that the mullah-cratic regime has indeed been replaced by the IRGC dictatorship. Does that mean that the holy war continues? I’d say that the regime change means that the new regime needs a new “political formula.” It is no longer believable that the IRGC continues the holy war. It seems to me that a military dictatorship needs another narrative to justify its power. And I suggest that it must be pretty close to defending the Iranian people from “something” and making the Iranian people healthy, wealthy, and wise. You will recall that the Iranian people rioted in January about the mullah-cratic regime’s economic debacle: a miserable economy and runaway inflation.
Which is now, no doubt, ten times worse.
Meanwhile, my X feed has recently featured hot Iranian babes who turn out to be the relatives of top IRGC leaders. The hot Iranian babes were not wearing hijabs. Compare that with Iran regime propaganda photos of Iranian women in hijabs forming a protective ring around an Iranian electric plant. Other IRGC scions are professors at US universities. It seems to me that the IRGC is sending a message that they are not really down for the holy war but modern elitists making a place for themselves in the status hierarchy of the modern economy and culture.
Then there’s a piece in The Free Press about the seven strategic miscalculations of the Iran regime, from the Strait of Hormuz gambit to the hands-off attitude of China.
My understanding of politics is that a regime can crank up its people to fight the enemy — and especially the evil enemy — for quite a while. But for 50 years, non-stop, funneling the output of the nation into rockets and anti-Israel proxies instead of the prosperity of the people?
Just between you and me, I don’t think that politics works that way. You can crank up your people against the enemy for a season. But not half a century.
| Wed, 08 Apr 2026 23:29:49 GMT |
AI and Liberals
Here’s a piece at The Free Press saying that AI meaning the end of “learning to code.” Kids with software engineering degrees can’t find jobs.
Then there is Victor Davis Hanson saying that our liberal friends are desperately trying to appeal to the ordinary middle class, but it’s hard because they are “repulsed” by it.
May I say it again? We are entering the sixth technological revolution starting with the machine textile revolution two hundred years ago.
And the main thing to remember about each technological revolution is that to the people put out of work it looks like the end of the world. And for everybody else, they don’t have a clue what is coming. But they really like the cheap cotton textiles, the railways all over the land, the amazing results of steel in everything, the delight of seeing the USA in a Chevrolet, and the astonishing fact of the smartphone.
But then there is the Wish List.
Suppose that AI short circuits the NGO game that recycles money for Democrats. Suppose that AI removes the need for government to control the details of health care. Suppose that AI puts the whole regulatory state out of work. Suppose that AI puts all the lawyers out of work. Suppose that AI puts all the union school teachers out of work. Suppose that AI enables DataRepublican to identify every corrupt government payment in seconds.
OK, you can see that I am sneaking my own personal Wish List into my fearless forecast of AI.
Because what I would like to see is the replacement of the bureaucratic state with an AI state.
I would like to see the replacement of our current ruling class that believes that politics can save the world with a ruling class that believes that the less the government does the less it will Make Thing Worse.
But that is all in the future. All we know right now is that we are barreling into a new technological revolution and we don’t have a clue how it will all turn out.
But it would be really cool if AI pitched our liberal friends out of political power. And it would be even more cool if it could happen without any butcher’s bill. I’m talking to you, Dick the Butcher.
| Wed, 08 Apr 2026 01:06:43 GMT |
At usgovernmentspending.com we have assembled a record of government spending in the United States for the last century. You can view government spending, federal, state, and local, for every year from 1902 to the present. And you can generate charts of that spending. more>>
At usgovernmentrevenue.com we have assembled a record of government revenue in the United States for the last century. You can view government receipts, federal, state, and local, for every year from 1902 to the present. And you can generate charts of that revenue. more>>
At ukpublicspending.co.uk we have assembled a record of public spending in the United Kingdom for the last century. You can view British public spending, central government and local authority, for every year from 1983 to the present. And you can generate charts of that spending. more>>
The Road to the Middle Class is a journey from a world of power to a world of trust and love. In religion, it is a journey from power gods that respond to sacrifice and augury to the God who makes a covenant with mankind. In education, it is a journey from the world of the spoken word to the world of the written word. In community, it is the journey from dependence on blood kin and upon clientage under a great lord to the mutual aid and the rules of the self-governing fraternal association. In law it is the journey from the violence of force and feud to the king’s peace, the law of contract, and private property.
Road to the Middle Class: The Book
With the failure of the welfare state, it is time to consider what comes next. In "An American Manifesto: Life After Liberalism" I develop a narrative about where we are and where we should go to redeem the American experiment.
An American Manifesto: The Book
Racial Discrimination
[T]he way “to achieve a system of determining admission to the public schools on a nonracial basis,”
Brown II, 349 U. S., at 300—301, is to stop assigning students on a racial basis. The way to stop
discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.
Roberts, C.J., Parents Involved in Community Schools vs. Seattle School District
Churches
[In the] higher Christian churches... they saunter through the liturgy like Mohawks along a string of scaffolding who have long since forgotten their danger. If God were to blast such a service to bits, the congregation would be, I believe, genuinely shocked. But in the low churches you expect it every minute.
Annie Dillard, Holy the Firm
Sacrifice
[Every] sacrifice is an act of impurity that pays for a prior act of greater impurity... without its participants having to suffer the full consequences incurred by its predecessor. The punishment is commuted in a process that strangely combines and finesses the deep contradiction between justice and mercy.
Frederick Turner, Beauty: The Value of Values
Pentecostalism
Within Pentecostalism the injurious hierarchies of the wider world are abrogated and replaced by a single hierarchy of faith, grace, and the empowerments of the spirit... where groups gather on rafts to take them through the turbulence of the great journey from extensive rural networks to the mega-city and the nuclear family...
David Martin, On Secularization
Living the Virtues
When recurrently the tradition of the virtues is regenerated, it is always in everyday life, it is always through the engagement by plain persons in a variety of practices, including those of making and sustaining families and households, schools, clinics, and local forms of political community.
Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue
Conservatism's Holy Grail
What distinguishes true Conservatism from the rest, and from the Blair project, is the belief in more personal freedom and more market freedom, along with less state intervention... The true Third Way is the Holy Grail of Tory politics today - compassion and community without compulsion.
Minette Marrin, The Daily Telegraph
Moral Imperatives of Modern Culture
These emerge out of long-standing moral notions of freedom, benevolence, and the affirmation of ordinary life... I have been sketching a schematic map... [of] the moral sources [of these notions]... the original theistic grounding for these standards... a naturalism of disengaged reason, which in our day takes scientistic forms, and a third family of views which finds its sources in Romantic expressivism, or in one of the modernist successor visions.
Charles Taylor, Sources of the Self
