“Imagine buying George Orwell’s 1984 and Animal Farm on your Kindle, only for Amazon to reach into your device and remove the two classic novels. It sounds unsettling, but it happened in 2009 when a third-party seller lost the rights to distribute the books. Customers got their money back, and Amazon acknowledged that it had handled the situation poorly. But the incident raised a troubling question: what does it actually mean to own something in the digital marketplace?” (11/10/26)
“Thanks to a series of recent decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court, it has become exceptionally difficult to sue a federal officer in federal court over an alleged constitutional rights violation. Yesterday, the justices heard oral arguments in a case that could further insulate federal officials from facing any civil liability for their misdeeds.” (11/10/26)
“In the space of just two weeks, at least six nations around the globe have held consequential national or local elections. Voters in only two countries returned decisive leadership preferences. On Oct. 25, Brazilians elected their incumbent president to an unprecedented fourth term, and Serbia’s student-led movement won enough Assembly seats to end 12 years of rule by an autocrat. Elsewhere, voting tallies transmitted less clear-cut and more complex messages. None of the traditional parties or blocs won sufficient votes to form a national government in New Zealand or Israel, or to administer most major municipalities in South Africa. In the United States, Democrats gained congressional and state seats. But their majorities in Washington are not sufficient to withstand obstruction or vetoes from a Republican-led presidency. On one level, these results might seem like a recipe for legislative inertia and policy stagnation.” (11/09/26)
“I know the difficulty some people will have with that title. Not the words, but the doing it. Watching these leftists promise to ‘investigate’, toss in prison or simply execute anyone in the Trump administration or Elon Musk is a lot like being in Germany in the early 1930s: you hear the words but simply can’t believe they mean the words. You assume they’re just being hyperbolic; saying things for effect. They are not, they mean it. Many of these new Members of Congress, and a huge number of the people who put them there, would happily take you out. They say it, they scream it, but if you repeat it back to them, you will be cancelled. ” (11/10/26)
“On the runway in Fairbanks, Ken Jouppi was loading his Cessna for a short hop to Beaver, Alaska, a village of a few dozen folks on the banks of the Yukon. His passenger was flying out to see her husband for her birthday, and she’d packed some beer in with the groceries. Troopers showed up with a warrant before the plane ever left the ground. Some of you might be thinking, yikes, is Jouppi another Andrew Carter Thornton II? ‘Cocaine Bear,’ the sequel? Nope. Beaver’s a dry town. Not the weather, the beer. Bringing alcohol into Beaver’s a crime, and he and his passenger were both convicted of a misdemeanor. Three days in jail apiece and a $1,500 fine, as low as the law goes. But then Alaska did something extraordinary: It took Jouppi’s plane.” (11/10/26)
“In the 126 years since 1900, nearly 90 percent of the midterm elections have led to the party in the Oval Office losing House seats, and two-thirds of those same elections have led to it losing Senate seats. Given this history, midterm losses of some sort in 2026 were almost a sure bet. But what ensued in November went well beyond all normal expectations. When all the votes are tabulated, the current blue wave may match the massive midterm losses that buried Bill Clinton in 1994 and Barack Obama in 2010. First, what does this massive 2026 slapdown now portend? A second-term president in his final two years, facing a euphoric and frenzied opposition Congress, emboldened by a landslide, will have difficulty confirming federal judges or cabinet members. Most presidents in that dire situation try to rush through confirmations in the brief two remaining months of their lame-duck congressional majorities, not an easy task.” (11/10/26)
“US President Donald Trump may not be a big fan of solar, but it’s the country’s fastest-growing source of power generation. Standing up an independent domestic solar supply chain is critical to the country’s energy security and AI ambitions, and to lowering power prices, especially as Beijing moves to restrict the export of some key solar technologies. But, although it may be wise to raise trade barriers that push more China-affiliated solar components out of the US market, China’s role in global solar supply chains is so pervasive that instantly severing all ties could kill many US solar manufacturing efforts in the crib. Future growth for this industry depends on a more nuanced trade policy that gives US companies the space to benefit from China’s world-leading solar expertise while the next phase of home-grown plants gets built.” (11/10/26)
“Democrats have just won back control of Congress, delivering a major rebuke to Donald Trump and his policies. But now comes another critical question: Who should lead the new Democratic majority? Let’s look at the Senate. Chuck Schumer has been in Congress for nearly 46 years—18 in the House and almost 28 in the Senate. He has led Senate Democrats since 2017 and is already declaring that he expects to be reelected majority leader. But the public is clamoring for new leadership. A recent NBC News poll found that just 13% of voters view Schumer favorably! While most sitting senators seem reluctant to oppose him, eight newly elected Democratic senators—Abdul El-Sayed, Peggy Flanagan, Troy Jackson, Juliana Stratton, Adam Hamilton, James Talarico, Chris Pappas, and Annie Andrews—have either openly opposed Chuck Schumer or withheld their support. And there is a possibility that Senator Van Hollen will put his hat in the ring.” (11/10/26)
