“Israeli media are now reporting that Benjamin Netanyahu is considering ‘a brief resumption’ of the onslaught in Gaza in order to pressure Hamas to make concessions and change the terms of the ceasefire agreement which was signed on the 19th of January. This framing that Hamas has ‘rejected’ Israel’s proposed extension of phase one is just the current propaganda line from the US-Israeli PR machine. In reality the terms of the ceasefire deal say that Israel and Hamas were supposed to move on to phase two of the agreement this weekend, but Israel has been refusing to negotiate the second stage of the agreement this entire time because it would entail a withdrawal of Israeli troops and a commitment to a lasting peace.” (03/01/25)
“Not everything worth fighting for, or against, is being taken up President Trump and Elon Musk. There are other battles. For a moment, at least, let us direct our attentions closer to home to consider the causes taken up by, say, the Institute for Justice and Pacific Legal Foundation. Unlike a taxpayer-funded NGO, always on the march to push big government or social decay, these organizations go to bat for people around the country who are being abused by local governments.” (02/28/25)
“Truman’s decision to position Israel as a citadel of U.S. imperialism in the Middle East has boomeranged and has resulted in the United States being despised in much of the world. Rather than protect U.S. interests in the region as planned, Israel has imperiled them. As we have seen since the 7 October 2023 insurrection, there are no limits on U.S.-Israeli brutality and on the suffering they have been willing to inflict on the Palestinians in order to preserve their imperium in the region.” (02/28/25)
“By now, we all know that Donald Trump and his friends have been breaking the law. The Impoundment Control Act, the Privacy Act, and the Constitution itself have probably all been violated by the executive branch since the inauguration. If one were disposed to agree with the president’s agenda, it wouldn’t be a far leap to think that Trump is justified in breaking the law because they are preventing him from implementing desirable policies. This leap is particularly narrow if you believe that Trump’s policies are literally ‘saving’ America.” (02/28/25)
“The Rising American Electorate? The New American Majority? The Coalition of the Ascendent? Ultimately, they were all really just the Obama Coalition. But, at this point, Democrats need to get over it. Since the 2008 election, the core Democratic political priority has been to hold onto this coalition – loosely defined as voters of color, unmarried women and young voters. These people powered Barack Obama to his historic and historically large win in 2008. The problem is, for the last nearly 20 years, Democrats haven’t had a strategy to grow – the priority was to hold and fortify this coalition that dominated in a moment in time. Well, like most movements, if you don’t have a strategy to grow, you’re vulnerable.” (03/01/25)
“Deporting immigrants may deliver electoral wins to politicians if voters have been sufficiently cultivated by years of demonizing and scapegoating them. For its victims, the cruelties involved are horrific. Yet such deportation makes little sense economically. It represents a nationally self-destructive program based on a faulty grasp of immigration economics.” (02/28/25)
“These are dark days for liberalism. I mean full, across-the-board, laissez-faire free-market, classical liberalism, otherwise known as libertarianism. While some budget-cutting and bureaucracy slimming will probably go through, those steps, though necessary to advance toward liberalism, are not sufficient. What’s conspicuously missing from the regime’s activities is a ringing and unmistakable endorsement of full individual liberty, which requires a free-market economy. The imagined dichotomy between economic liberty and personal liberty is a snare and a delusion.” (02/28/25)
“In addition to hurting everyday folks, these federal budget cuts will provide cover for the huge tax cut for wealthy Americans the Republican House just passed.” (03/01/25)
Source: The American Conservative
by Kelley Beaucar Vlahos
“Trump’s executive order on January 23 directed the director of national intelligence, now Tulsi Gabbard, and the attorney general to develop a plan within 15 days to release the remaining JFK records. Morley and others are concerned that the agencies might again try to slow-walk the release. There is also the issue of the records that the National Archives don’t have — files still located somewhere in dark corners of the federal bureaucracy that were never handed over to the official review board 30 years ago. We know they exist. The FBI said on February 11 that, in an effort to comply with Trump’s EO, it was handing over 2,400 heretofore undisclosed files to the archives for declassification.” (02/28/25)
