Source: Quillette
by Brian Stewart
“Too often, the UN’s valuable field work is overshadowed by cynical political posturing. As a result, collecting annual dues from member states has become more difficult.” (03/10/26)
https://quillette.com/2026/03/10/the-united-nations-is-going-broke/
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
“Contemporary academia’s equation of ‘science’ with ‘measurement’ represents a positivist assault on Ludwig von Mises’s praxeology, not due to his mathematical deficiency, but his superior ontological grasp. While physics successfully models inanimate bodies — where a copper atom reacts to heat according to immutable, universal constants — economics concerns human action driven by conscious, fluctuating intent. Because no constant dictates that a 10 percent income rise yields an 8 percent consumption increase, economic data is merely unrepeatable history, not scientific law. Attempting to extract universal predictions from this historical debris is ‘historicism’ — a methodological error akin to using Napoleonic War statistics to forecast World War III.” (03/09/26)
https://mises.org/mises-wire/why-ai-and-big-data-cannot-plan-economy
Source: The Realist Review
by Ivana Nikolić Hughes & Peter Kuznick
“Breaking international law seems to be a feature, and not a bug, of Trump’s actions, consistent with his admission that he is expressly not guided by international law, norms, traditions, or common decency, but by ‘My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.’ … It would be the ultimate expression of Trump’s unbounded power for him to break the one remaining international taboo — which, despite far too many close calls, has persisted for more than 80 years — detonating a nuclear weapon.” (03/09/26)
https://therealistreview.substack.com/p/breaking-the-nuclear-taboo
Source: Common Sense
by Paul Jacob
“The Mexican government wants to stop people from using cellphones anonymously. Every mobile phone number in Mexico — some 127 million — must now be biometrically tied to the owner’s identity. Cellphone owners must register their numbers by June 30 or lose signal. The ID card to which numbers must be linked will in turn be linked, via QR code, to a national registry of biometrically verified records. Who needs anonymity? Just criminals? … The safety of journalists, dissidents hiding from other governments, targets of abusers and stalkers, and anyone with good reason to keep his identity separate from his phone will be endangered by Mexico’s new mandate.” (03/09/26)
https://thisiscommonsense.org/2026/03/09/the-war-against-anonymity/
Source: Niskanen Center
by Lawson Mansell
“When it comes to ensuring that America’s supply of doctors is sufficient to meet Americans’ demand for medical care, one of the most significant investments is also one of the most overlooked: Medicare’s Graduate Medical Education (GME) payments. As the largest funder of medical residency slots, GME subsidies are a powerful lever in determining whether we have enough doctors where they’re most needed. So why aren’t we making the best use of it?” (03/09/26)
https://www.niskanencenter.org/congress-is-asking-the-right-questions-about-americas-doctor-shortage
Source: Independent Institute
by Craig Eyermann
“Americans awoke on Saturday, February 28, 2026, to discover that the United States had launched one of the largest military operations in its history. Operation Epic Fury followed the collapse of diplomatic talks purportedly aimed at ending the Islamic Republic of Iran’s efforts to build nuclear weapons and its 47-year history of aggression against the U.S. and the nations of the Middle East by Iran and its proxy forces. The effort began nearly two months after President Trump first called for a 50% increase in the U.S. defense budget, bringing it to $1.5 trillion. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the U.S. government was already on track to run a $1.9 trillion deficit in fiscal year 2026. Without any plan to reduce the government’s excessive spending, the new spending would require the U.S. government to borrow more, above and beyond that amount.” (03/09/26)
https://www.independent.org/article/2026/03/09/fiscal-security-risk-national-debt/
Source: The American Prospect
by Henry Burke
“A group of Democratic Party moderates gathered in Charleston, South Carolina, last Sunday and Monday for an event organized by Third Way, an influential group in the party’s moderate wing. The event, entitled ‘Winning the Middle’, brought together elected officials, prominent pundits, data gurus, communication savants, and industry figures with one goal in mind: how to block a progressive from winning the party’s nomination for president in 2028. The event’s speakers celebrated their claim that a similar conference hosted by Third Way in the same location back in 2019 helped power Joe Biden (whom they touted as ‘the most conservative Democrat in the 2020 field’) to the White House, recalling that South Carolina served as both the last refuge of and launching pad for the then-former vice president’s flailing presidential campaign.” (03/10/26)
Source: Responsible Statecraft
by Trita Parsi
“Trump’s ‘all over the place’ press conference at his Miami resort on Monday appears to have had two key objectives: a) Calm the markets by signalling the conflict may soon be over because it has been so ‘successful,’ and b) Prepare the ground for Trump ending the war through a unilateral declaration of victory. Though ending a war that never should have been started in the first place — rather than fighting it endlessly in the pursuit of an illusory victory as the U.S. did in Afghanistan — is the right move, it won’t be as easy as Trump appears to think. Tehran also has a vote — and there is little to suggest that it will agree that the war is over.” (03/09/26)
Source: The UnPopulist
by Jonathan Rauch
“Critical self-appraisals are fine so long as they don’t validate bad-faith attacks on the liberal order.” (03/09/26)
https://www.theunpopulist.net/p/dear-liberals-dont-forget-to-brag
Source: Law & Liberty
by Aidan Grogan
“America’s Boomers have established a bipartisan gerontocracy — a political and economic system under the leadership of the elderly. They take care of their own and make younger Americans foot the bill for their longer and more luxurious retirements. It’s obviously unfair, but no one on either side of the political aisle seems inclined to do anything about it. The federal government has run a budget deficit for 24 consecutive years as the gerontocracy tightened its grip on power. It’s particularly worrisome given that the political influence of senior citizens is likely to grow as the population ages, even as the economics of America’s gerontocracy become more and more unsustainable.” (03/09/26)