Source: Common Sense
by Paul Jacob
“Should we expect a four-year pitched battle? I see one brewing between the new communist mayor of New York City and those judges who respect law and the U.S. Constitution.” (01/20/26)
Source: CNN
“Michele Tafoya, a longtime sportscaster and conservative commentator, has officially announced she will run for US Senate in Minnesota, giving the Republican Party a well-known candidate in a state that’s being roiled by the ongoing federal immigration crackdown. In a video announcing her campaign launch on Wednesday morning, Tafoya said: ‘For years, I covered the biggest football games in America,’ adding that ‘it taught me about how leadership really works when leaders are prepared and accountable.’ … The broadcaster’s entry jolts an already dynamic contest set off by Democratic Sen. Tina Smith’s retirement announcement last year. Meanwhile, Sen. Amy Klobuchar is weighing whether to launch a run for governor that could further disrupt the state’s political landscape.” (01/21/26)
https://www.cnn.com/2026/01/20/politics/michele-tafoya-us-senate-minnesota
Source: Seattle Times
“Meta is laying off 331 workers in the Puget Sound region as part of broader cuts to its virtual reality division. The Facebook parent company last week said that it was cutting about 10% of its 15,000-employee Reality Labs division as it shifts resources away from what it called the metaverse to wearables like smart glasses. … Reality Labs has been a key part of Meta’s postpandemic growth in the Seattle area. … Meta’s layoffs are the latest to hit the local tech industry over the past year of cuts, including some made by the company in October that hit its artificial intelligence teams.” (01/20/26)
Source: Quillette
“Inside Iran’s Deadly Protests with Shay Khatiri.” (01/20/26)
Source: LP Alliance
“Alex Flores and the First People’s Role in the Libertarian Party.” (01/20/26)
Source: Independent Institute
by Ivan Eland
“‘The strong do what they can, and the weak suffer what they must’ is a quote that has come down through the ages from the Greek historian Thucydides’[s] History of the Peloponnesian War, written in 416 BC. It has come to encapsulate the ‘might makes right’ philosophy in international relations and is embraced by some in the realist school of foreign policy. Such realists are mostly right about how the world still works, but have a PR problem in today’s milieu of woke platitudes in international relations. Despite the fact that the balance of power and spheres of influence still shape the worldview of the vast majority of global leaders, some of these strong countries usually dress up the reasons for their military interventions in terms of democratization, humanitarian ends, or their national security.” (01/20/26)
https://www.independent.org/article/2026/01/20/trump-greenland-foreign-policy/
Source: Reason
by Jack Nicastro
“Threatening European allies to further tax American citizens is unlikely to persuade them to surrender Greenland to the United States.” (01/20/26)
Source: National Public Radio [US state media]
“Trump’s (second) first year.” (01/20/26)
https://www.npr.org/2026/01/20/nx-s1-5682909/trumps-second-first-year
Source: bloggingheads.tv
“AI After Us: The ‘Succession’ Scenario | Robert Wright & Dan Faggella.” (01/20/26)
Source: Washington Post
by George F Will
“As usual, today’s president, coming late to a long-standing problem, but presuming his original discovery of it, has made himself the issue. His acquisitiveness regarding Greenland has nothing to do with national security, and everything to do, as everything always does, with his fragile ego. He is pouting, and threatening aggression, because he has not received the Nobel Peace Prize. The Danes can perhaps take comfort from the fact that the president is contemplating military operations against another northern place. As this is being written, the Army is reportedly readying a potential deployment to Minnesota to quell disturbances stemming from ham-handed activities by the ludicrously — and lethally — militarized U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. During all this, the president has announced he will order that no other football game can be televised during the annual Army-Navy game.” (01/20/26)