“We are constantly told that democracy is the worst form of government… except for all the rest. We are constantly told that in a true democratic scheme of government, minority rights are protected against the tyranny of the majority. We are also told that representative democracy is one of the best forms of democracy because we can elect and empower men and women who can concentrate on the matters and decisions facing our polity – town, county, tribe, State, etc. – and make wise decisions. We are told that fears of corrupt elections, vote-buying, fake voters, fraud, and all the rest of the limpets on the hull of democracy can be and are controlled. Especially now that we have electronic voting and counting systems and because we have a watchful, vigilant press and courts and all the trappings that are wrapped around modern democracy. But what have we seen?” (08/10/26)
Source: Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression
by Ally Duong
“‘Romantasy’ is a genre marriage of romance and fantasy that has been selling books like wildfire. And this year, your local bookstore’s romantasy section is likely lined with covers featuring a curly-haired brunette heroine next to a suave, silver-haired hero–all because fans who saw what an author couldn’t see decided to write stories about a couple that never came to be. … The attraction for publishers is obvious: a popular fanfic may arrive with a ready-made audience and social-media buzz. But that shift raises a serious legal question: What must an author change before an unauthorized derivative work becomes an independent — and lawfully marketable — novel?” (08/10/26)
Source: The American Prospect
by Whitney Curry Wimbish
“An anti-sex-trafficking nonprofit in Utah whose founder resigned after multiple women accused him of trafficking and sexual abuse has won a federal contract to provide legal services to unaccompanied immigrant children in government custody. The Trump administration gave Our Rescue a no-bid $244,034,658 contract on August 7, according to the federal award notice posted late Friday night. The deal floods the organization with seven times the amount of money it had in 2025, according to its most recently available Form 990, which put total assets at $36.9 million. It’s unclear how many children Our Rescue will represent. The notice says only that it will provide legal services to children in the care of the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR), established to offer support for victims of human trafficking and those seeking asylum in the United States. Nearly 1,800 children were in the agency’s care in June; over the last year, it has averaged about 1,908 children monthly.” (08/11/26)
“To economists, America’s housing crisis — in the form of high prices — is no surprise. For years, lawmakers have distorted the market through zoning laws that restrict new building and limit housing density. More recently, however, cities around the United States have been working to loosen restrictive zoning codes to increase housing supply. Chicago, meanwhile, has so far kicked the can down the road on zoning reform.” (08/10/26)
“As democratic socialists in general and the DSA in particular take over the Democratic Party, it’s worth examining the positions they take, the enemies they pick, and who supports them to see what they have in store for us as they seek to remake the country. … Given that the rise of the DSA is likely rooted in disillusionment and resentment, it may be a losing proposition to point out that socialism’s nostrums are nonsense. Still, we need to emphasize that free-market [sic] capitalism is good and contributes to liberty and prosperity while socialism does the opposite.” (08/10/26)
“It’s called the Fourth Political Theory (4PT for short). It’s gotten the Russian philosopher Aleksandr Dugin two major fans among throngs of minor ones. The first is Vladimir Putin. The second is Tucker Carlson. Each, in his own way, is important. But together, the three make for a subversive head-heart-gut triad: Dugin the thinker, Carlson the relator, and Putin the muscle. Much like the social justice left with its beachhead in the academy, these three are propagating their own form of ideological imperialism online. But don’t call it right-wing. Like most positions these days, 4PT defies a linear spectrum, despite the parrots of the progressive media calling him ‘far-right.’ Instead, Dugin searches through the ruins of history to put together pieces of something new.” (08/10/26)
“This month marks 55 years since President Richard Nixon closed the ‘gold window,’ severing the last link between the US dollar and gold. Under the 1944 Bretton Woods agreement, foreign countries pegged their currencies to the US dollar, which was then pegged to a fixed value of gold. Foreign countries could exchange their dollars for gold at a rate of 35 dollars per ounce. … Closing the gold window left the US with a pure fiat currency. The results have been disastrous. The dollar has lost over 97 percent of its purchasing power since the Federal Reserve was created in 1913, with most of the dollar’s decline occurring since 1971.” (08/10/26)
“Have you seen the ruling classes’ latest ploy for holding onto power rather than allow the public to hold them accountable through straightforward and honest elections? It’s clear as day to anyone with eyes to see. And the fact that the powerful now operate as much within the ‘MAGA’ brand as in the Democratic establishment shouldn’t blind us. If we let it, then even some of the best of us will soon be taken in – becoming useful idiots for the same ruling classes that the MAGA movement was founded to oppose. I’m referring to the new game of stirring up hatred against our neighbors of Middle-Eastern and Eastern heritage and labeling all dissenters against U.S.- and Israeli-led wars and war crimes as ‘radicals’ and ‘communists.'” (08/10/26)
“Many Democratic Party candidates emerging on what one might call the populist left are finding success in primaries across the country. But most of them have a shared liability: they were fully on board with the worst excesses and abuses of the ‘peak wokeness’ that emerged in the wake of George Floyd’s 2020 killing, enduring and contaminating most of our institutions for several years after. … AOC, who herself aggressively advocated those policies, sought to laughingly dismiss this all as just some momentary, harmless frenzy of ‘craziness’ that never really meant much and that everyone has all just agreed to move beyond …. It is, I suppose, a net positive that those who imposed extremist woke dogma are now too embarrassed to defend it. … But when AOC tries to giggle her way out of her behavior and the behavior of her allies, it actually is more offensive and cowardly than anything else.” (08/10/26)
“American politics is an ever-changing game of power and big money. For the modern Democrat Party, that means being challenged and sometimes eclipsed by the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) – and there is little to nothing the Democrat Party can do about its rise. The United States has had many political parties in its history. They include everything from the Federalists (1789) and the Whig Party (1830) to the Libertarian Party (1971) and the Green Party (2001). The current Democrat Party (1828) is the longest reigning major political party in American history. The role of the many lesser-known parties in American history has been to chasten the then-dominant parties and/or to champion particular issues – such as the Greenback Party (1874), which fought for paper money in the late 1800s. While that Greenback Party is no more, paper money has replaced gold as the dominant American currency.” (08/10/26)
