“‘We’ve seen encampments cleared, phones tapped, and permits held up—but this? This feels like they’re preparing for war,’ said Marisol Jennings, a D.C.-based organizer who has coordinated protests since 2017. Just days before thousands of Americans are expected to gather in Washington, D.C. to protest the Trump administration’s policies, a sweeping new executive order threatens to transform the nation’s capital into a showcase for authoritarian policing. Signed on March 27, the order—Making the District of Columbia Safe and Beautiful—appears less concerned with beautification than with containment. Its provisions call for surging federal law enforcement, accelerating immigration crackdowns, and strictly enforcing vague ‘quality-of-life’ directives for the city. And its timing, just a week before what organizers are calling the most consequential day of protest since President Donald Trump’s return to office, is raising alarm from civil rights lawyers, city officials, and veteran demonstrators.” (04/03/25)
“Most people automatically assume the War on Drugs is necessary. It’s something Americans have taken for granted. But what if it is causing more harm than good?” (04/03/25)
“At first glance, Le Pen’s disqualification could weaken the anti-war voices in France and the EU by reducing their cohesion and visibility. Her party is a founding member of the Patriots for Europe (PfE), the third largest political group in the European Parliament, where it sits with influential like-minded parties like Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s Fidesz, and Italian Deputy Prime Minster Matteo Salvini’s Lega. All of them have been vocal critics of the EU’s unconditional support for Ukraine, anti-Russia sanctions, and the dogmatic refusal to engage in direct diplomacy with Moscow to end the war.” (04/03/25)
“The Summer of 2024 was a political maëlstrom. It included a near-miss assassination attempt and a withdrawal of a sitting president of the United States from his re-election campaign, almost at the last possible moment. We still do not know much about Trump’s would-be assassin on that roof in Butler, Pennsylvania. Nor does there seem much media interest in that still mysterious criminal episode. But we are learning more about Joe Biden’s stepping down from the campaign, and Kamala Harris’s taking the reins of the Democratic ticket.” (04/03/25)
“President Donald Trump promised a new beginning in foreign policy. In Europe he has taken an independent course, pushing Russia and Ukraine to make peace. However, in the Middle East he continues down his predecessors’ misbegotten path — apparently ready to wage new, even more destructive wars.” (04/03/25)
“In this essay I discuss the relevance of the concept of political entrepreneurship to an understanding of political outcomes that have substantially affected personal and economic freedom in different countries. The essay has a particular focus on authoritarianism.” [hat tip — Chris Matthew Sciabarra] (04/02/25)
Source: David Friedman’s Substack
by David Friedman
“There are a number of things about money that I did not discuss in my previous post and perhaps should have, some of which came up in comments on my post and my responses. Hence this post … and perhaps one more.” (04/03/25)
“If President Trump wants to secure a national security legacy that will never be other than history changing, the time to do so is fast approaching. The Institute for the Study of War recently published this summary of the moment: ‘Senior Iranian officials are continuing to threaten nuclear weaponization, likely to try to deter a potential US or Israeli strike on Iranian nuclear facilities amid new US threats to strike these facilities. Senior Supreme Leader Adviser Ali Larijani stated on March 31 that a US or Israeli strike on Iran would ‘force’ Iran to develop a nuclear weapon to ‘defend its security.’ Western media reported in January 2025 that Larijani had made secret trips to Russia to gain Russian assistance on Iran’s nuclear program. Hardline Iranian Parliamentarian Ahmad Naderi separately stated on March 31 that the United States ‘wouldn’t dare threaten to bomb’ Iran if Iran ‘had an atomic bomb’.'” (04/03/25)
“I’m aware of the innumeracy of the Trump administration, apparently using a shortcut AI formula to reset global trade imbalances and trying to bullshit their way through the criticism. But I think we give too much credit to Donald Trump and his lieutenants when we suggest that they’re pursuing a misguided trade policy, or that they aren’t pairing tariffs with the necessary steps to boost domestic manufacturing. Those things are true, of course: U.S. trade policy has been deeply inequitable for decades, favoring multinationals over workers and the environment, giving benefits to those corporations in free-trade agreements that they could never get through normal legislative channels, and handing over economic decisions to Wall Street. But these careful explanations, however correct, have nothing to do with what we saw on display in the Rose Garden yesterday. Because these aren’t really tariffs at all.” (04/03/25)
