Today, The GoodFellows convene to discuss the nighttime raid to capture Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, as well as protests in Iran and US designs on Greenland. H.R. McMaster speaks about his work educating Stanford students, preparing them to confront future American national security challenges. And experts, members of Congress, and Hoover fellows gather to discuss the future of US AI policy.
Determining America’s Role in the World
American special forces capture Venezuela’s president and his wife in a daring nighttime operation, returning the deposed first couple to the US to stand trial for alleged narcoterrorism. Meanwhile, protests in Iran over worsening living conditions, coupled with a cratered economy, threaten that theocracy’s future. GoodFellows regulars Niall Ferguson, John Cochrane, and H.R. McMaster kick off 2026 by discussing both the precedents and the consequences of the move on Maduro, whether other nations (i.e., China) will invoke their own “Monroe Doctrines” to justify regional power grabs, plus the chances of similar fates awaiting Greenland, Colombia, or Cuba. Finally, the fellows send their best wishes to a pair of GoodFellows guests—former Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse and Hoover’s Victor Davis Hanson—as the two gentlemen do battle with cancer. Watch or listen to the episode here. (link still under construction)
On Hoover.org, Senior Fellow H.R. McMaster describes his work educating Stanford students and preparing them for the security challenges that will confront the United States in the future, as well as instilling in them the confidence to believe in America’s ability to triumph. In the piece, McMaster explains how he has introduced students to methods of intelligence organization and decision making employed in the US National Security Council. A past student also speaks of his time studying with McMaster, which led him to copublish an academic paper and later found an AI startup. One of his classes also worked tirelessly to support Afghan evacuees in the wake of the fall of Kabul in 2021. Read more here.
Revitalizing American Institutions
As the power of AI grows and its use in everyday American life expands, AI firms will have to ensure it meets people’s expectations and policymakers will have to determine how to regulate it effectively. That’s what the Hoover Institution’s Center for Revitalizing American Institutions (RAI), in partnership with Pepperdine University’s School of Public Policy and Stanford University’s Deliberative Democracy Lab (DDL), sought to explore by hosting From People to Policy Makers: A Symposium on Perspectives on AI. The December 9 event brought together 50 attendees from academia, industry, and civil society, including Reps. Ro Khanna and Jay Obernolte, for a full-day discussion of the public’s attitudes toward artificial intelligence. Read more here.
The Economy
At Project Syndicate, Senior Fellow Amit Seru criticizes the Federal Reserve’s increasing propensity to offer liquidity support to financial institutions, even ones that do not reach the threshold of insolvency and collapse, in a wide variety of scenarios. Since 2008, Seru says, this growing cocoon of support for banks and financial institutions has eroded the power of moral hazard and set the stage for the banking crises of the future. “What began as emergency liquidity support has become a recurring feature of financial market management,” he writes. Instead, Seru says, the Fed must develop clear criteria for when offering emergency liquidity is necessary, impose tough penalties for risky behavior, and publicize how emergency assistance “was used "once it is wound down.” Read more here. [subscription required]
California
As California Governor Gavin Newsom enters his final 12 months in office, Distinguished Policy Fellow Bill Whalen writes about what he may encounter in Sacramento as the possibility of a presidential run in 2028 still looms. Apart from the ongoing (and slow) rebuild after the fires in Los Angeles, Whalen points out that the 2026 state budget will likely show an $18 billion or larger deficit when it is tabled this week. And 2027’s deficit may be even larger. How will Newsom address the shortfall? And how will the wealth tax currently proposed by unionized state healthcare workers come into the mix? How the governor responds to this issue will likely color how he is perceived nationwide should he opt to enter the presidential race. Read more here.
Revitalizing History
More than 20 million Nigerian children are currently out of school, a level of exclusion that constrains opportunity and heightens political and social fragility. Past reforms expanded access but fell short because of weak coordination, underinvestment, and limited attention to instructional quality. In this video, Hoover History Lab Student Fellow Gift Iyioku explains that durable progress requires strong government leadership paired with civic and private participation, beginning with improved teacher training, expansion of proven models such as EdoBEST (Edo Basic Education Sector Transformation), and long-term, stable funding mechanisms. Watch more here.
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