Source: The American Conservative
by Luke Nicastro
“When it comes to defense industrial policy, the Trump administration contains multitudes. On the one hand, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth has embarked upon a crusade to remake the defense acquisition system (now rechristened the warfighting acquisition system) on more market-friendly lines. … But at the same time, the state’s role in defense production is massively expanding. … One way to interpret the administration’s Janus-faced posture is as simple incoherence, the result of different principals pursuing different policies with different aims. A deeper read, however, suggests an essential compatibility between these two tendencies. Consciously or not, the White House is executing an ambitious double movement, simultaneously blasting open an arena for market competition while anchoring strategically critical production against the vicissitudes of fortune.” (01/05/26)
“The ratifiers of the 14th Amendment could not have contemplated excluding the children of unlawful entrants, because the concept did not yet exist in 1868. There were no visas or standardized passports, or other official travel documents, and thus no defined legal categories of immigrants. The first general entry restriction — a blatantly racist law that applied only to Asians — was not enacted until 1882. There were, however, many temporary residents, the other group subject to Trump’s executive order. Naturally, some of them produced children. As Professor Amanda Frost and her student coauthor, Emily Eason, brilliantly determined, at least a dozen members of Congress in the years 1865 to 1871 may have been the American-born children of temporary residents, whose citizenship would therefore have been ‘suspect under President Trump’s interpretation’ of the 14th Amendment. And yet, there were no challenges to their qualifications to sit in Congress, for which citizenship is a constitutional requirement.” (01/05/26)
“Until policymakers accept that financial regulation shifts risk rather than eliminates it, we will keep cycling through crisis, overreaction, unintended consequences, and the next crisis.” (01/05/26)
“For three years, the Washington foreign policy establishment has insisted that there is only one acceptable outcome in Ukraine: total victory over Russia achieved through relentless military aid, indefinite financial support and escalation readiness regardless of the risks. But strategy and morality are not always the same thing — and real leadership demands confronting reality as it exists, not as we wish it to be. I write this not as an academic or pundit, but as someone who worked at the center of this conflict. As U.S. ambassador to the European Union during the first Trump administration, President Donald Trump tasked me with bringing Europe into alignment — truly into alignment — behind Ukraine. That meant ending the EU’s habitual double-game: proclaiming solidarity with Kyiv while enriching Moscow through energy purchases and dragging its feet on serious sanctions.” (01/05/25)
“The stunning U.S. raid on Venezuela that removed President and socialist thug Nicolás Maduro from power to face trial in the U.S. raises questions: What’s next for long-suffering but hopeful Venezuelans, what is the legal basis for snatching a country’s head of state without congressional authorization, and where do Americans stand on the Trump administration’s nation-building project? We’ll have to wait and see on the first point, and the answer to the second is that there is no legal basis for unilateral presidential missions to depose foreign leaders. But while the public will need some time to digest these events, we know Americans — especially young ones — are increasingly dubious about foreign adventures.” (01/05/26)
“Let’s be clear about the claims made. The president is asserting that the U.S. can detain a sitting foreign president and his spouse under U.S. criminal law, that the U.S. can administer another sovereign country without an international mandate. That Venezuela’s political future can be decided from Washington. That control over oil and ‘rebuilding’ is a legitimate byproduct of intervention. That all of this can happen without congressional authorization and without evidence of imminent threat. We have heard this language before.” (01/05/26)
“Seven years ago, US Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard wrote in 2019 on Twitter: ‘The United States needs to stay out of Venezuela. Let the Venezuelan people determine their future. We don’t allow other countries to choose our leaders, so we have to stop trying to choose theirs.’ Now as director of National Intelligence in the Trump administration, Tulsi Gabbard is a key part of the US overthrow of the Venezuelan government and the kidnapping of the Venezuelan president and his wife and the deaths of at least 40 persons in Venezuela. During her 2018 Congressional reelection campaign, she warned of ‘regime change wars’: ‘Every dollar spent on interventionist regime change wars is a dollar not spent on education, healthcare, infrastructure, and a myriad of other needs desperately needed right here at home,’ Gabbard said in 2018.” (01/05/25)
Source: Karl Dickey’s Freedom Vanguard
by Karl Dickey
“So, we have a known risk. The flu is here, and this version of it packs a punch. The critical question now — the one that separates a libertarian perspective from the standard ‘public health’ view — is: Who is responsible for managing that risk? Thankfully, we haven’t heard too many serious suggestions that the government force flu vaccines onto the citizenry, it remains voluntary at this juncture. The prevailing narrative in modern public health often leans heavily on centralized collectivism.” (01/05/26)
“After nearly every U.S. military intervention since World War II, public opinion has followed the same trajectory: overwhelming support when the bombs first fall, then waning approval once casualties mount and victory proves elusive. … One reason for this cyclical amnesia is the way politicians package wars as risk‑free. In 2003 the Bush administration promised a short campaign financed by Iraqi oil, just as the Kennedy and Johnson administrations predicted a quick victory in Vietnam. Today President Trump suggests the Venezuelan operation will be swift, with no U.S. casualties. History suggests otherwise.” (01/05/26)
