“On Tuesday, President Donald Trump took down libertarian-leaning Rep. Thomas Massie (R–Ky.), to whom he’d taken such a profound dislike that he backed a primary challenger in the form of MAGA stalwart Ed Gallrein. Massie was highly ranked for his voting record by conservative organizations, but so were other candidates Trump pushed out of office — and out of the party. In truth, it’s been years since the Republican Party was a conservative organization; these days it’s a cult of personality around the president.” (05/22/26)
“Owners of small restaurants and bars can decide whether to allow smoking, and customers can choose for themselves whether to patronize them.” (for publication 06/26)
“A Minneapolis prosecutor charges an ICE agent, exposing how DHS shamelessly lied after its officers shot an immigrant, tear gassed two kids, and put a bullet in the wall of a child’s bedroom.” (05/22/26)
“The Democrat’s 2026 midterm electoral strategy remains essentially the same as it was during the melted-down 2024 presidential election: Focus on President Donald Trump’s obvious character flaws and failings rather than highlight the critical issues and offer progressive alternatives. Waiting for Trump to shoot himself in the foot is not a winning campaign strategy. Neither are abstract ideas about defending democracy and saving the nation from autocracy or fascism. Voters want practical approaches to everyday challenges of rising food costs, prohibitively expensive and inadequate health insurance, skyrocketing medical costs, exorbitant childcare and pre-K expenses, and spiraling energy pricing. Since the last quarter of the 20th century, establishment Democrats and their leaders have slid so far to the political right that progressive, populist initiatives are undermined by fear of taxes and debt.” [editor’s note: If this is true, may this be the death knell of that war party wing – SAT] (05/25/26)
“For many months now a historic debate about vaccine safety and effectiveness has been unfolding in America’s regulatory agencies and recently the debate has escalated into open partisan warfare. It started on June 9, 2025 when Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. dismissed all 17 sitting members of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) and replaced them with his own picks. As one might have expected such a sweeping step was very controversial.” (05/22/26)
Source: David Friedman’s Substack
by David Friedman
“William Niskanen, in a book published many years ago, proposed a simple model of government bureaucracy. The more money a bureaucrat controls the more important he is, so bureaucrats want to maximize their budgets. The legislature knows how much any level of output from a bureau is worth to it. The bureaucracy knows — and the legislature does not — what a government bureau can do at what cost. So the rational bureau finds the largest level of output that it can produce at a cost below the value of that level of output to the legislature and exaggerates the cost of any lower level of output by enough to make it higher than its value, thus tricking the legislature into giving it the largest possible budget. When I first read the argument it struck me as implausible.” (05/22/26)
“Nowadays, any Revolution extolled on campus might best be symbolized not by fife and drum or quill on parchment, but by a raised red fist.” (05/22/26)
