An author named John Mac Ghlionn wants you to believe that America should “take Greenland, whatever the cost.”

That sounds crazy, and when you read the piece you realize this guy isn’t thinking clearly, if at all. Who is he? Who knows, but The Hill should know better than to float his disinformation.

To make his “whatever cost” annexation swallowable, he coats his argument with a saccharin list of historical precedents that he probably assumes nobody will correct him on.

After all, who has two thumbs and actually studied history, let alone the ethics of military interventions? Without further ado, allow me to explain how very wrong, so incredibly wrong, his examples are.

Diego Garcia: “Negotiation and Agreement”

Ghlionn writes that the US “built Diego Garcia into a major military hub through negotiation and agreement rather than force.”

Dude. Agreement? Not even close. This is horse shit. It was seized by force and has been the subject of much protest.

Between 1968 and 1973, the British government forcibly expelled every single inhabitant of the Chagos Islands. Over 1,500 people had their identities wiped out. Officials killed their dogs. They loaded families onto cargo ships and dumped them in Mauritius, where many died in poverty. The UK cynically reclassified the permanent population as “no permanent population” to avoid legal obligations.

Anyone registering the .io domain today is sending money to the UK government for islands they forcibly and illegally stole.

Yes, it was illegal. In 2019 the International Court of Justice ruled British administration illegal and called for decolonization. In 2024, the UK finally agreed to cede sovereignty to Mauritius.

“Negotiation and agreement” basically states the opposite to reality, which was ethnic cleansing.

Yeah, this level of wrong is how we are supposed to buy into the invasion of Greenland. Sure. Ok.

Iceland: “Diplomatic Finesse”

Ghlionn claims the US “gained long-term access to Iceland during World War II because the island mattered more than diplomatic niceties.”

Come on. Again? I’m going to need a bigger shovel.

What actually happened was Britain invaded neutral Iceland on May 10, 1940, the same day Churchill became Prime Minister. I mean, Iceland had declared neutrality and Britain occupied it anyway. Then the US showed up to replace British forces in July 1941 (months before Pearl Harbor) because still officially neutral. Notably, America was so neutral that it could force 40,000 troops onto an island of 120,000 people.

This was clearly the military occupation of a neutral country. Calling that military to civilian ratio diplomatic access is weak propaganda.

Okinawa: “Negotiation, Despite Local Resistance”

What is this guy smoking? Describing Okinawa as a “negotiation” insults both the dead and the reader’s intelligence.

The Battle of Okinawa killed over 12,000 Americans, 82,000 Japanese military personnel, and somewhere between 40,000 and 150,000 Okinawan civilians. We are talking about possibly a quarter of the island’s population, dead. The US administered Okinawa as an occupied territory all the way to 1972.

Alaska: Inverted Causation

Ghlionn writes that America “purchased Alaska to keep Russia away from its doorstep.”

This is a grade school level mistake. Every kid supposedly learns that Americans considered the purchase foolish. “Seward’s Folly” am I right? The sale kept nobody away from anything, because Russia was already leaving and even America didn’t want it, really.

Even more to the point, Russia had initiated the sale. They were overextended after the Crimean War, feared losing Alaska to Britain in a future conflict, and needed money. Russia wanted out. America begrudgingly stepped in, persuaded by Russia.

Panama: Omission as Technique

Ghlionn acknowledges the US “backed Panama’s break from Colombia.” Ok, but again this was NOT negotiation. Roosevelt himself bragged about it:

I took the Canal Zone and let Congress debate, and while the debate goes on the Canal does too.

He took it. His words. No negotiation.

And “backing” had a bitter end. When Colombia’s Senate rejected the canal treaty in August 1903, Roosevelt dispatched warships to both coasts of Panama. A French lobbyist named Philippe Bunau-Varilla, of course with financial stakes in the canal company, met with Panamanian separatists at the Waldorf-Astoria and wrote them a $100,000 check to revolt. Colombian generals arriving to suppress the rebellion were literally tricked onto a train car to be separated from their troops. When Panama declared independence November 3, 1903 the US rushed to recognize it within three days. The canal treaty was signed fifteen days later, conveniently not by any Panamanian, but by Bunau-Varilla, the French lobbyist.

The New York Times called it “an act of sordid conquest.” The New York Evening Post called it “a vulgar and mercenary venture.”

In 1921, the US quietly paid Colombia $25 million as “reparation”, less any actual admission of guilt than a bribe to open Colombia’s oil fields to Standard Oil.

You can see how someone might be foolish and think “if Roosevelt did it we can park some warships near Greenland and pay a random French dude to sign it over” but that is most definitely not how anything works, and it still isn’t even close to an example of successful negotiation.

Take territory through force, then pay off the victim when you need something else from them. Makes the whole “negotiation” framing even more absurd.

The Hill Technique

Ghlionn also mentions Louisiana (Napoleon wanted to sell) and Gibraltar (British conquest in 1704) as if they help his case. They don’t.

This is a propaganda piece, and not a very good one. It attempts to establish a series of false precedents, then presents a controversial position as simply following the falsely established pattern.

Did I mention the history presented is false?

Ghlionn’s historical examples unfortunately do not appear to be mistakes. They are load-bearing lies, fabrications. Remove his false history and you’re left with a man advocating that America should annex another country’s territory “whatever the cost”. Stripped of its pseudo-scholarly veneer, that is simply an argument for bat shit crazy imperialism. Or I believe the precise term is Nazi Lebensraum.

The editors at The Hill published this guano.

They should be asked why.

And again I have to ask who is this guy? According to his various bios, a “psychosocial researcher” with an unnamed doctorate from an unnamed institution. His usual beat is culture war chumming for outlets like Brownstone Institute, Epoch Times, and Townhall. Nothing suggests he has any expertise in history, military affairs, or geopolitics, which might explain why every historical claim in this piece is so wrong.

Looking at you The Hill. Or should we now call you The Shill?

In November 2025, a University of Oklahoma student with a powerful, privileged family received a zero on her essay. Soon all hell broke loose and by December 22, the graduate instructor who graded that student had been fired with prejudice.

The student launched her zero grade into Fox News appearances, fancy awards from political groups, and many promotional photos highlighting her Bible. God is great and in his mighty power he clearly did not want momma’s baby to get a bad grade, or so the narrative seemed to say.

A state legislator, following God’s divine instruction, filed a bill allowing Oklahoma’s legislature to freeze 100% of funding to any university showing any signs of a certain, very specific, “ideological bias.”

Back to the student paper, for a moment, the assignment had asked for analytical engagement with a psychology study on how children rate gender-typical peers as more popular. It was a short assignment. The rubric was simple. The student would get 10 of the 25 points total just for a “connection to assigned article.”

The student’s submission, however, was decidedly lacking. It was unmistakably insufficient. To put it plainly, she had made no reference to the study at all. There was NO connection to the article, despite clearly being required. Oops. She wrote off the cuff, as if mocking the assignment with word salad, that “Women naturally want to do womanly things because God created us with those womanly desires”. Women do women things. Because God. The end.

Despite the assigned article being the required source material to work with, the student preferred citing only unspecified Bible passages. She also attacked classmates as “cowardly and insincere.” At this point you might think a student who submits a bag full of dog shit is a bad enough story. The zero grade already makes perfect sense. No, she had to then light it on fire as well, writing that transgender people getting any support is “demonic.” Grades don’t go below zero.

In her own defense, the student later admitted, according to her attorney’s filing, that she didn’t care:

She “merely looked at the topic and then rushed together a response based on her personal feelings… because she was in a hurry to go see a play that evening with her friend.”

You see the problem, now? Her essay was a reflection of the putrid, the abject hate, in her personal life. It is like she didn’t take time to put her hood on before lighting the cross.

She didn’t have time to do the actual assignment as required, in the format asked of college students. So she instead submitted her more authentic voice of personal feelings, her more readily accessible and familiar home teachings, if you will.

She rushed, no time. The hard work of an assignment was tossed aside, sheets tossed to the wind, so she could catch a play with a friend. Priorities. It was later when she received her grade that she realized a complaint of religious persecution could be used to attack.

Is there a religion for going out with friends instead of doing homework? Pretty sure many college students would attend those services.

Two instructors, two more than necessary, independently confirmed that the rushed and low quality paper “should not be considered as a completion of the assignment.” Obvious, because the student herself admitted as much. The chairman of Oklahoma’s Federation of College Republicans even weighed in to call the essay “indefensible.” That sounds more serious than it is, since even the student didn’t defend her paper. She only defended her privilege to not be graded by someone that her family had raised her to hate.

Notably, rather than go through any academic appeals process to judge the work, the student pulled the Oklahoma privilege fire alarm to assemble a hate campaign. She contacted the governor, she whistled for state legislators, she called the media and… her mother.

Her mother? Isn’t that a normal thing for a kid to do when they get a bad grade? I don’t actually know, but I know her mother is an infamously anti-constitutional lawyer who has defended January 6 insurrectionists. The student’s initial complaint emails oddly targeted “overtly political actors, such as disgraced former Oklahoma Superintendent Ryan Walters, who is known for his virulent anti-LGBTQ positions.”

Sounds less like an appeal for a grade review, and more like an appeal for a political campaign. Indeed, her powerful radical activist mom “helped her decide who to take her concerns to.”

The notorious Turning Point USA “chapter” took on the bad grade as a cause and exposed the grader’s feedback to social media, targeting her as transgender and attacking her personally:

We should not be letting mentally ill professors around students.

Forty million views for that. At this point I feel that Turning Point gets a zero for their tweet. The grader had said the paper sucked, she didn’t call a student mentally ill. But Turning Point couldn’t form a proper argument and just puked out a tired ad hominem. By their own measure they should rename themselves Mentally Ill Point, to represent better their analytic skill, if you see what I did there.

The mother went to work on her daughter’s behalf and predictably framed the case exactly backwards. She bemoaned:

First Amendment rights to be able to speak freely and to speak about their religion, especially if you are requested to do so and being asked for your opinion and not to cite sources.

If you read that right, with fascist decoder glasses on, she’s calling for state censorship of teachers. It’s literally an attack on the First Amendment couched deceptively in language of defending it.

The assignment explicitly required connection to the article. The misrepresentation of the grading rubric is deliberate. The mother is a constitutional lawyer. She can read a basic rubric.

On December 22, the University of Oklahoma succumbed to angry mob logic and fired the instructor, Mel Curth. The university arbitrarily claimed her grading was “arbitrary”, refusing to release any investigation findings.

And of course Curth was bound by confidentiality rules throughout the investigation and could not respond publicly. She was being censored. Her speech was being attacked systemically and ruthlessly. Meanwhile the student did obnoxiously loud victory laps, a circuit of national television interviews and the university issued statements.

Curth is now appealing. Her attorney states the obvious, that the investigation “failed to consider all possible motives and issues” and that “new evidence has come to light.” The attorney argues investigators never examined whether the student “may have had an ulterior motive in pursuing such a complaint”. You know, the student copying known anti-LGBTQ political figures in her initial emails being evidence of motive.

The American Association of University Professors has gathered over 24,000 signatures demanding OU explain its actions and reaffirm academic freedom, reverse the censorship.

Meanwhile, Rep. Gabe Woolley has filed House Joint Resolution 1037, which would allow the Oklahoma legislature to freeze, suspend, or withhold up to 100% of state funding to any university in the state system. If approved, it goes to a statewide ballot.

This is unmistakable constitutional inversion: the language of rights weaponized as an instrument of suppression. It’s a reminder of what Oklahoma history has been.

The First Amendment protects citizens from government suppression of speech. In this case, government actors—state legislators, the governor, the former state superintendent—actively suppressed an instructor’s capacity to teach. A state senator aggressively attacked a person, claimed hormone therapy “diminishes rational capacity” at a public rally to incite targeted hate. The governor demanded board intervention. Legislators threatened funding and announced hearings into basic education skills being an “anti-Christian bias.” Now they’re moving to give themselves power to defund any university on a whim.

The actual government suppression of speech is occurring against the instructor—fired, publicly identified, subjected to death threats, bound to silence by confidentiality rules while her accuser had a PR circuit and was feted by cable news.

The student’s speech was never suppressed.

Her essay was read, it was graded. She had rushed it to see a play and was unconcerned about the outcome. She then received a national platform for describing her grade, on her self-admitted least-effort low performance, as persecution.

The genealogy rings a certain bell for this historian, as something particular to privilege of a certain race in Oklahoma.

In August 1920, a white mob lynched teenager Roy Belton in Tulsa. The police chief and sheriff expressed gratitude to the violent mob. The Tulsa World applauded their actions as “superior to government action” and predicted the lynching “will not be the last by any means.” That same month in Oklahoma City, a mob lynched Claude Chandler, an 18-year-old Black youth. Among the mob was one O.A. Cargill, who would become the mayor of Oklahoma City. State complicity was through endorsement.

In 1921, in Tulsa, a white mob destroyed the prosperous Greenwood District known as “Black Wall Street”, killing hundreds. The police chief deputized 500 men from the mob, gave them weapons, and instructed them to “get a gun and get a nigger.” National Guard troops arrested Black residents rather than protecting them. Some guardsmen shot at Black residents, to help amplify the lethality of white mobs. Oilmen flew company planes over the Black neighborhoods and dropped petroleum on fire to burn it all to the ground. No, seriously, St. Clair Oil Company supplied the planes with proto-napalm and Captain J.R. Blaine of the police department dropped the bombs. The KKK afterwards announced a Klavern would be built on the ruins as a monument to Oklahoma white power. State complicity through participation. Oklahoma erased and buried this history, hiding the mass graves of murdered Blacks and pretending like they never saw Black Wall Street, for over 70 years.

In 1930, a mob of over 1,000 white men and boys stormed the Grady County jail in Chickasha and lynched Henry Argo, a 19-year-old Black man—despite the presence of National Guard troops ordered to protect him. The arrestees were immediately released without bond. State complicity through impunity.

Need I go on? Oklahoma has a very particular concept of who gets to be graded and who doesn’t, based on antique notions of supremacy.

In 2025, a mob threatens an instructor and ends her career. Legislators amplify the harassment, demand hearings, threaten funding, attack her medical treatment at public rallies, then file bills to defund universities that displease them. State complicity through amplification. The mob no longer needs to deputize itself when legislators do the work publicly, when 40 million views of personal attacks deliver directed force under the principle of a pen being mightier than the sword.

Endorsement, participation, impunity and amplification. The mechanisms evolve and rotate. The structure of hate groups persists in certain families who have certain authority. This is, after all, Oklahoma.

The World predicted in 1920 that the Belton lynching “will not be the last by any means.” A century later, the prediction holds—though the method has changed.

A student who rushed an assignment to see a play is cast as a martyr for religious liberty. An instructor who applied a simple and fair rubric was fired, threatened, and silenced. The vocabulary of constitutional rights has been captured by those who, in 1921, would have been accepting deputization and weapons from the police chief for America First lynchings.

This is mob rule wearing the costume of rights, in order to take them away. Oklahoma knows exactly what it is doing, again.