Author: Thomas L. Knapp

Source: The Hill
by Joslin Joseph

“It is now August 2026. More than 560 days have passed since Trump took office again. He has attained more power, surrounded himself with yes-men, has a Republican House and Senate, a 6-3 tilt on the Supreme Court, and no excuse to fail. But here we are, with Trump polling in Biden territory and trying to convince Americans that things are going great. And yet, when pressed, Trump and company keep defaulting to how bad things were under Biden. … We have all dealt with kids that haven’t learned how to take responsibility for their actions. There is always someone else to blame because they believe that their parents, teachers or other adults will believe them.” (08/10/26)

https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/6018967-trump-fails-accountability/

Source: Law & Liberty
by Aaron Kushner

“Calls to ‘democratize’ the US Constitution seem shortsighted in the face of the early republic’s failed experiments with unicameralism.” (08/10/26)

https://lawliberty.org/the-socialists-institutionalism-tried-and-failed/

Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by Patrick McIlheran

“A political scientist laid out the grim numbers about lopsided ideology among his fellow Florida professors—whose donations go to Democrats by a 9-to-1 margin over Republicans—and ended up giving Wisconsinites who want exposure to a fuller spectrum of ideas something to dream about. Because when that political scientist, Ryan Owens, was a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, he found in 2024 that the margin there was more like 490-to-1. This tilt isn’t just a curiosity or fodder for talk-radio segments. It leads, Owens tells me, to blind spots that weaken universities’ place in society.” (08/10/26)

https://fee.org/articles/florida-shows-how-to-demand-a-more-open-minded-academia/

Source: Responsible Statecraft
by Dan DePetris

“Of course, permitting an Iranian toll or fee structure isn’t ideal. Before the war, such a hypothetical would have been difficult to imagine. The strait at that time was free and open, and roughly 120 to 150 ships relied on the route each day to get their products to customers worldwide. The United States wants Iran to return to this status quo. Yet Iran has no intention of doing so — and to expect otherwise is to be completely ignorant of how events have played out since. Trump’s war handed Iran the perfect excuse to leverage its geography, and the Iranians didn’t hesitate to do so.” (08/10/26)

https://responsiblestatecraft.org/straight-of-hormuz-toll/

Source: Persuasion
by Eboo Patel

“A field that once illuminated scarce truths has become an ideology in search of evidence.” (08/10/26)

https://www.persuasion.community/p/we-must-save-sociology-from-itself