Intro
Welcome to The Cameron Journal Newsletter. Each week, Cameron Lee Cowan wraps up the headlines with commentary, helping you navigate today’s media narratives, how they are affecting our Culture, Lifestyle, and Society.
The World is Hard, This is Not
If you’re new here, my name is Cameron Lee Cowan M.A. MFA, and I’m the Creative Director here at The Cameron Journal. You can learn more about me on the about page. I do research and commentary on politics, culture, and the world around us. Each week I send out the latest headlines, the latest videos from The Cameron Journal and commentary about the week’s events.
Remember, The World is Hard, This is Not.
Update from Cameron
I’m feeling quite contemplative this week. Life always throws us a variety of surprises. I used to struggle with that, but I’ve learned to accept and try to prepare for it as best I can. My life has been filled with random events and happenstances. Sporadically I wonder if it was a good idea to devote my life to writing in a world that reads less than ever before. I’ve lived a crazy, amazing life with so many adventures. I’ve had the most random jobs. I did set out to live the random life of an artist and I sit here before you today with less than $100 in my bank account, writing this on a Saturday after a long week of managing SOOPMedia and trying to find the next evolution of The Cameron Journal. I think I might have some ideas about where to go next and to keep you all engaged.
However, this fall, I’m mindful of the meager harvest of this year. I spent quite a bit of time and money trying to turn what I do into a consulting business, but just wasn’t able to get that across the line in any meaningful way. I continued to meet great people. I published a new book on a story that people don’t necessarily want to hear (America’s Lost Generation). I also started a new podcast, and The Cameron Journal continues to grow as a publication. Ultimately, I think I might have been a little too soon to start into the consulting world. I don’t necessarily think that people want to hire a 37-year-old to tell them about things about the market and the world.
In my life, I’ve clipped through the worlds of TV, Radio, media, international relations and so many other worlds through the show and through doing this. In the past 6 years, I’ve written 5 books and released 4 of them. I’ve written viral essays and gotten tens of thousands of views, but I still never had a big, breakthrough moment. I think the part I’m most amazed at is that for all the random things I’ve done in my life and all the experience gained, I don’t have much to show for it other than a bunch of stories about times, places, people, and things long gone. It all feels a bit hollow. What did I do it all for? I made a lot of sacrifices along the way and went without having a lot of fun, time, money, and relationships. I thought I was chasing dreams and big plans.
But my priorities are starting to shift.
I’ve had many failures. Many of them were because I was too young to be doing what I was doing. Should have I been running a magazine at 21 years old when I was still partying most weekends? Probably not. Should I have been building brands and trying to start a record label and brands when I was the same age? Definitely not. But it seemed like the thing to do at the time. No one was offering me a job, so I tried to make my own and forge my own way in the world. I thought I could check all the boxes and do all the things and the world would respond to my efforts. As fate would have it, life is not so kind.
So where does that leave me now?
That is certainly the question this harvest season. I hope you’ll stay with me for the journey.
Before we get into the big headlines of the week, it appears that we may not be free of the whole classified documents scandal. You might recall that Trump took a bunch of classified documents with him after he left the White House, and they were discovered hidden in bathrooms and elsewhere at Mar-A-Lago during a raid. Jack Smith, the man investigating this, is starting to speak publicly, and it might be the next big scandal for the Trump Administration. Oh, and speaking of scandals, John Bolton was indicted for mishandling classified documents this week. Funny that, isn’t it?
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The Headlines
Don’t forget to join me on Monday for The Cameron Journal Newshour to catch on everything happening in the world!
Young Republicans and Text Messages
An interesting scandal broke out this week when a group of Young Republicans had a group chat revealed that included some particularly racist and inflammatory language. Chris Stanton issued a Substack post today that I saw pass through my email box about his involvement with an apology. I did not bother to read it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Emm82if6H9w
As someone who is a former Young Republican in Colorado who was (briefly) a chapter president, state treasurer (again briefly) and a national delegate in 2009, I was appalled. The organization grows and changes over time, but when I was involved, that kind of conversation was simply not happening. Honestly, my sexuality made more people uncomfortable than my skin color. I met plenty of great people along the way in my journey through republican politics. I know that young people will say things in a group chat that can be unserious but for comedic effect. I’m willing to give these people a bit of leeway on things. But the reality is that when you’re in a certain position, things you say matter.
I doubt anyone will have any terrible consequences for all of this, but just as the Far-Left does a great job of giving the GOP the perfect set of talking points during an election year, this looks bad for a Republican who is trying to downplay the fascist vibes many are seeing. Jokes about Hitler certainly don’t help. And the fact that this chat goes on for a bit is even more damning. People coming out and saying that this is a normal way of speaking makes it even worse. Who is defending this chat? Who is defending this? No one that I can tell. Nor should they, this is the kind of thing that can be funny at a party once but when it becomes a habit makes you wonder about what people really believe. Some will say that words don’t matter, but I always disagree with that.
I had an argument on X (formerly known as Twitter) about this very thing. I also got told I’m fat (they always act like I’m unaware) but their contention was that words don’t have any meaning and people can just say things. I’ve experienced this myself with my friends, but what I’ve noticed is that jokes often cover over hidden and unspoken beliefs. Even the guys (and it is usually men) who say that they felt like they “couldn’t have an opinion” and couldn’t “just say things” under the “woke/DEI” regime claim that they are just happy that they can “talk again.” What they really would like is the right to say whatever is on their minds without any consequence or responsibility to polite society for what they are saying. They want to be left alone with their cringe opinions and racist thoughts. It doesn’t mean anything, right? It’s just words. Fine, I’ll take that idea (even though I think it is utter BS) and I’m even willing to let them have all of that, but we should have standards in polite society, and we certainly have to be mindful of how those kind of people vote and what policies they are really voting for in our shared society.
What happened with the Young Republicans and their group chat cannot be allowed to continue in polite society.
Trump and the Military
I have a pair of articles this week worth reading. One is from previous guest on The Cameron Journal Podcast, Marty France and the other is from Doug Krugman in the Washington Post about his own retirement from the military after 24 years of service. Trump always acts like the military is behind him and that he loves the troops and the troops love him. He has certainly used the military as a tool and will do so this weekend during the No Kings Protest in California. According to MeidasTouch, there will be a live fire exercise during a celebration of the Marine Corps in San Diego, and it will include traffic closures. Most people will say that it is unintentional and unrelated, but I think it sends a rather stark message, don’t you think? I think the implications are clear. Violence is not necessarily on the table, but it isn’t off the table either.
In the piece from Marty France, the retired Air Force General, he is writing about the pressure students at the United States Air Force Academy might feel with Turning Point USA (the organization began by Charlie Kirk) having a chapter on campus and seeing their superiors go to its meetings. He fears that these folks will feel like they have to attend in order to fit in and that might lead to tension within the well-oiled Air Force machine. The Military Religious Freedom Foundation has already fought on behalf of students who feel pressured to attend certain religious meetings. He does not feel it is appropriate for USAFA to allow such a thing and I agree with him. All political organizations, no matter what, should be taking place off campus and without the endorsement of USAFA command.
In the piece from Doug Krugman the quote that stood out to me was, “Worse than immorality, however, has been President Trump’s willingness to disregard the law and Constitution to achieve his goals. When asked in May about the Fifth Amendment requirements for due process and if he needed to uphold the Constitution as president, the first words out of his mouth were “‘I don’t know.'”
That is a stark statement from a man we have to trust to uphold the Constitution. The bright, men and women of the US Military should not have to wonder about this subject and neither should we the populace but thanks to the last election we are once again wondering about whether we can rely on President Trump to defend and uphold the Constitution. It is a dark day for the country.
Argentina’s Failed Politics
When Javior Millei arrived to power in Argentina, he promised to break the back of Peronism. The popular leftist policies had dominated Argentina for 90 years with mixed success. Argentina was facing rising borrowing costs, unserviceable debt and another currency crisis. He pulled from the neo-liberal playbook and cut taxes, regulations and government agencies. He even gave Elon Musk a chainsaw at a rally event for Trump to talk about what they were going to do with DOGE in the US. DOGE is long gone, and now Millei has discovered that just cutting back government and lowering taxes can have an adverse effect on the national economy. After a bit of a bump over the past 2 years, Argentina is now going broke, and it is so bad that the US is footing the bill.
The Trump Administration announced that Argentina is getting a $40 Billion bailout due to rising poverty and declining growth. It started out as a $20 Billion injection and now has grown even larger. As it turns out, Libertarianism only works as long as you don’t run out of other people’s money, and as a bonus, it results in massive poverty and human suffering in the mean time.
The sad part is that we know how this goes. A party gets into power and to “save the country” they privatize public goods, sell things off to investors and the wealthy who then make money off essential services and leave the government with a check that soon runs out as other programs demand funding. There aren’t even tax revenues to make up for the losses so the government is left with obligations it cannot pay due to the low taxes that were supposed to spur growth and the general public fails in the meanwhile. And yet, we keep trying this failed strategy over and over again. Today it’s $40 Billion for Argentina, but tomorrow it will be more. The point is that everyone must pay in to have a functional society and those with the most should be paying their share as much as everyone else.
Reminder: America’s Lost Generation is Out Now!
I’m excited to announce that America’s Lost Generation is out now! It’s available everywhere books are sold or through The Cameron Journal directly. You’ve been hearing me talk about this book for a long time, and you’ve read the Millennials collection on The Cameron Journal. Looking to Japan for guidance (and a cautionary tale), I told the story of Millennials through their voices.
I want to highlight some of the early buzz for this book from Sean St. Heart from Coup Save America:
America’s Lost Generation is a powerful and necessary examination of one of the most misunderstood generations in American history. Cameron Lee Cowan delivers a deeply engaging and thoroughly researched narrative that peels back the layers of Millennial life with nuance, empathy, and intellectual rigor. Drawing from the voices of everyday people through the r/lostgeneration subreddit, Cowan weaves personal testimonies with global economic analysis, offering readers a haunting yet relatable chronicle of a generation that came of age in the shadow of economic collapse, systemic failure, and social upheaval.
What sets this book apart is its ability to merge emotional resonance with academic precision. The parallels Cowan draws between American Millennials and Japan’s lost generation are particularly striking and underscore how globalization and neoliberal policy have shaped generational prospects across borders. Through these comparisons, Cowan highlights how young people in advanced economies are often scapegoated for failures they inherited, not created.
More than a collection of statistics or policy critiques, America’s Lost Generation is a humanizing work that amplifies voices too typically ignored or caricatured. It challenges prevailing narratives about laziness and entitlement by illustrating the structural barriers Millennials face—crushing student debt, unaffordable housing, stagnant wages, and a shredded social contract. Cowan’s thoughtful prose and meticulous storytelling make this book essential reading for policymakers, educators, social scientists, and anyone who wants to understand the lived realities of a generation trying to make its way in a system designed to fail them.
I highly recommend this book to anyone who would like to better grasp the forces shaping our current moment—and what it will take to build a more equitable future.
Watch my interview with Sean on Coup Save America:
Articles of Interest
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