Source: Responsible Statecraft
by Doug Bandow
“Washington will have to get used to transformed international politics where it’s no longer the center of the universe.” (08/19/26)
https://responsiblestatecraft.org/trump-europe-independence/
Source: The American Prospect
by Katie Rose Quandt
“When Jerome Wright hears from people incarcerated in New York prisons, they describe a system in crisis. ‘I can tell you, unequivocally, from people in maximum, medium, every type of security they have in there, that the system has devolved into basically a lockdown,’ said Wright, co-director of the HALT Solitary Campaign, who spent more than seven years in solitary confinement in New York prisons. ‘It’s almost like the entire system is in solitary confinement … People are losing their minds, literally. Some people are committing suicide.’ … This should not be the case in New York, where lawmakers in 2021 passed the HALT Act, designed to limit which infractions can be punished with solitary confinement, cap stints in solitary to 15 days (after which people can be moved to special, non-isolation units), and ban certain vulnerable populations from solitary altogether.” (08/19/26)
https://prospect.org/2026/08/19/proponents-of-solitary-confinement-attempt-to-stifle-reform/
Source: CNBC
“Amazon said Wednesday it plans to offer drone deliveries in nearly 500 U.S. cities and towns by the end of the year, a sign of momentum for a project that’s been slow to develop since founder Jeff Bezos first laid out his vision for the service almost 13 years ago. The planned expansion for Prime Air would represent a sixfold increase from its current footprint, the company said in a blog post. Amazon’s latest update comes five months after David Carbon, vice president of Prime Air, spoke confidently about the program and laid out ambitious growth plans in an internal all-hands meeting, according to a recording obtained by CNBC. Carbon projected at the time that Prime Air will make 1 million deliveries this year, and said Amazon has the “’ighest demand drone delivery service in the industry.'” (08/19/26)
Source: Washington Post
“What empty pews reveal about America.” (08/19/26)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/podcasts/impromptu/what-empty-pews-reveal-about-america
Source: The Bulwark
by Cathy Young
“The anti-war, anti-government sentiment was apparently more than Putin bargained for.” (08/19/26)
Source: Expression
by Michael Hurley
“From 2000 through 2024, FIRE recorded 102 cases of politicians trying to silence faculty. That’s four cases a year on average. Then, in 2025 alone, we recorded 114. That extraordinary spike comes as federal efforts to reform higher education have too often crossed constitutional lines. At the same time, the old threat of censorship by school administrators never faded. This year, South Florida State College fired professor Vinita Prabhakar after its president called a celebrated short story she assigned about an alcoholic teacher ‘political.’ Now Prabhakar, represented by FIRE and FIRE Legal Network member Gary Edinger, is suing the school.” (08/19/26)
https://expression.fire.org/p/professors-are-being-squeezed-on
Source: SFGate
“North Korea said Wednesday that a U.S. decision to scale back military exercises with South Korea does not change what it sees as the provocative nature of the drills, dampening hopes for an early resumption of diplomacy between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and U.S. President Donald Trump. The powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un made the comments Wednesday night in her country’s first reaction to Trump’s moves to drastically cut back the annual U.S.-South Korean military drills. ‘We think it’s not worth making comments on that and we have no interest in it at all,’ Kim Yo Jong said in a statement carried by state media. ‘The provocative, aggressive nature of the drills won’t change even though their duration and size were reduced.'” (08/19/26)
https://www.sfgate.com/news/world/article/south-korea-says-the-south-korean-and-us-22393947.php
Source: Quillette
“‘Economic Vandalism’: Geoff Wilson on Labor’s War on Australian Aspiration.” (08/18/26)
https://quillette.com/2026/08/18/capital-gains-tax-geoff-wilson-on-labors-tax-grab/
Source: Antiwar.com
by Greg Pence
“As the 2026 midterms approach, a nationwide poll released in early August delivered a warning that goes to the heart of the Republican Party’s political identity: for the first time in nearly a decade, voters said Democrats were better stewards of the economy than Republicans. For years, Republicans benefited from a broad perception that they were more trustworthy than Democrats on economic management, even when the record of Republican administrations was contested. … Now that advantage is beginning to crack – not because the U.S. economy is necessarily on the verge of collapse, but because many Americans are judging it less by macroeconomic indicators than by groceries, electricity bills, healthcare and insurance costs, housing, and what remains in their bank accounts at the end of the month. For Donald Trump and the Republican Party, that change in how voters measure economic performance could be costly.” (08/19/26)
https://original.antiwar.com/greg_pence/2026/08/18/the-gops-fading-economic-advantage/
Source: US News & World Report
“A U.S. appeals court on Tuesday upheld an order limiting federal immigration enforcement at eight houses of worship affiliated with three faith groups, saying religious activities at the sites could be hindered by the operations. A three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sided with eight houses of worship from the Quaker, Sikh, and Cooperative Baptist Fellowship traditions in finding that a policy President Donald Trump’s administration adopted likely violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The case is one of a number of similar legal challenges that religious groups have filed nationally. The Trump administration had argued the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s policy did not prevent the plaintiffs from conducting worship or ministry services, and said the plaintiffs could not establish it would lead immigrants to choose to not attend their religious services.” (08/18/26)