Strongmen & Backfire:
How Aggressive Policies Fuel Their Own Downfall
The Whitestone Ledger Editorial Team
Editors-in-Chief: Audrey Kolber & Samson Caine
July Edition | 2025
Putin’s Historical War:
Policy Failures, Precedents, and the Path to Ukraine
Editor-in-Chief, Samson Cain
Political History / Foreign Policy Retrospective
How Putin's war in Ukraine backfired, uncovering the historical roots of Russian aggression, the miscalculations that turned his "3-day victory" into a prolonged disaster, and why this conflict echoes Europe's darkest chapters of authoritarian overreach
The Trump Administration’s Economic Policy:
A Reaction to Globalization
Editor-in-Chief, Samson Cain
Policy Analysis / Economic Commentary
This article traces the Trump Administration’s economic doctrine as a populist response to 1990s globalization. From tariff wars to tax cuts and institutional withdrawals, the piece explores how Trump’s policies aimed to reverse decades of global economic integration. It critically examines the political motivations, practical impacts, and ideological tensions behind this anti-globalist turn—raising questions about the sustainability and logic of “America First” economics in a deeply interconnected world.
The Regime of Saddam Hussein: Short Term Success, Long Term Foreign Policy Disaster
Editor-in-Chief, Samson Cain
Historical Analysis / Foreign Policy Case Study
This article examines the rise, rule, and fall of Saddam Hussein through both historical recounting and firsthand testimony. By blending political analysis with an interview from an Iraqi citizen, it captures the complex duality of Hussein’s legacy—his early modernization efforts alongside brutal repression and regional destabilization. The piece also critiques the aftermath of U.S. intervention, framing Iraq as a cautionary tale in the geopolitics of regime change.
Modi’s India and the Farmer’s Revolt:
When Nationalism Meets the Plow
Executive Director, Michael Lihanda
Case Study / Political Economy & Movement Analysis
This article follows Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s 2020 agricultural reforms, designed to liberalize India’s farm economy through market mechanisms, which triggered the largest protest in recorded history—revealing how top-down economic policymaking, when detached from social context and historical memory, can provoke mass democratic resistance and expose the limits of majoritarian governance in the face of moral legitimacy.
Legislating and Speculating:
The Governance Dilemma of Congressional Stock Trading
Executive Director, Michael Lihanda
Legal Commentary / Institutional Ethics & Governance
The constitutional and normative tensions surrounding congressional stock trading. By tracing the fault lines between fiduciary duty and private interest, this article examines whether a representative democracy can sustain the coexistence of legislative power and personal market exposure—or whether such dual roles inevitably erode the foundations of public trust.
Beyond Borders
Creative Writing Section Editor, Asia Newman
Poetry / Political Reflection
This poem asks a simple but urgent question: what if we identified as people before we identified with a country? Through lyrical inquiry and moral clarity, it challenges the logic of division, power, and nationalism—calling on leaders and citizens alike to abandon self-interest in favor of global solidarity. A meditative counterpoint to the policy failures and strongman regimes explored throughout this issue.
Editor's Note
We are proud to present the inaugural issue of The Whitestone Ledger, a journal committed to interrogating the intersection of law, policy, history, and democratic ethics. This edition explores the paradoxes of strongman governance, the fragility of institutional legitimacy, and the civic imagination required to resist overreach—whether through protest, critique, or poetry. In launching this publication, we hope to cultivate a forum where young scholars engage the machinery of power with rigor, conscience, and intellectual independence. Thank you for joining us at the outset.
—The Whitestone Ledger Editorial Team
