“Painted figures haunt an empty building. A boy leaning on a pair of crutches. A father and son wandering a barren railroad track. A nuclear family at a picnic table. These poignant scenes were painted by two of the foremost American artists of the twentieth century, Ben Shahn and Philip Guston. No one is around to see them. They are on the walls of the Wilbur J. Cohen Building in Washington, DC, one of forty-five federal properties currently earmarked for sale. The staff who worked in the building have been mostly fired, furloughed, or relocated. Only the murals remain—and perhaps not for long. The Cohen Building has been called ‘the Sistine Chapel of the New Deal’ for its ambitious mural cycles.” (11/30/25)
Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by Rachel Chiu
“Until the Supreme Court decides whether Trump’s tariffs are constitutional, American businesses are stuck in limbo — and the best way out invites antitrust scrutiny. … Home Depot and its subsidiary entered into an agreement to acquire building materials distributor Gypsum Management & Supply. This move consolidates their supply chain for building materials, including drywall, ceilings, and steel framing. Likewise, this summer, Walmart opened its first beef facility to create ‘more resiliency in [its] supply chain.’ … If SCOTUS finds that Trump’s tariffs are legal, these mergers could be the first of many among American businesses. In that case, antitrust regulators pose a real risk to the economy.” (11/28/25)
“Sorry, cows. The planet comes first. I don’t want to give the wrong impression. No order has been issued requiring Danish farmers to kill their cows. The state is merely requiring that they feed the cows poison. The purpose of the wonder-additive, Bovaer, produced by a company called Elanco Animal Health, is to limit the methane that cows produce as they digest their food. Then, says Elanco, the amount of methane that the cows emit — by a method too indelicate to mention — will be reduced 30 percent. Elanco must have done some kind of testing to figure this out, I suppose. What is the point, though? Why does anybody want to accomplish this?” (11/28/25)
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
by Hamoon Soleimani
“The Two percent inflation target — monetary policy’s sacred commandment for three decades — has become structurally impossible to achieve. Not because central bankers lack skill, but because every attempt to hit the target destroys the financial architecture that previous monetary expansion built. This is the endgame of central planning: a system that cannot tolerate its own success criteria without collapsing.” (11/28/25)
“It’s long past time America’s immigration optimists and restrictionists came to an arrangement. For a decade now, these two groups have been locked in an impassioned, sometimes vicious battle over how best to preserve the country they both cherish. And for the most part, that fight has taken place within the confines of the GOP — the only party ready, willing and able to have an honest conversation about migration and its downstream effects on America’s very character. On Wednesday, that fight resumed in earnest when Rahmanullah Lakanwal, an Afghan national who came to the United States amid the Biden administration’s chaotic withdrawal from his country [and was granted asylum by the Trump administration], allegedly opened fire on two National Guard troops in Washington, DC.” (11/28/25)
Source: The American Conservative
by Harrison Berger
“Overshadowed by the recent revelations in the Epstein files, the 62nd anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination came and went with little notice. Yet new documents relating to that still-unsolved murder — released only recently by the Trump administration — deserve far more scrutiny than they have received from corporate media.” (11/28/25)
Source: Washington Post
by Ian Ayres & Saikrishna Prakash
“We are caught in a vicious cycle. The in-group is using the law against the out-group, which will surely feel empowered to respond in kind once the tables turn again. Americans widely believe that prosecutions are increasingly being weaponized, even if they disagree about who started it. To stop the spiral and restore confidence, we propose a novel prosecutorial check.” (11/28/25)
Source: Electronic Frontier Foundation
by Paige Collings
“In late September, the United Kingdom’s Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced his government’s plans to introduce a new digital ID scheme in the country to take effect before the end of the Parliament (no later than August 2029). The scheme will, according to the Prime Minister, ‘cut the faff’ in proving people’s identities by creating a virtual ID on personal devices with information like people’s name, date of birth, nationality or residency status, and photo to verify their right to live and work in the country. This is the latest example of a government creating a new digital system that is fundamentally incompatible with a privacy-protecting and human rights-defending democracy.” (11/28/25)
“The summer sun burned through the clouds in California’s Salinas Valley, where a bounty of berries and leafy green vegetables grows across this rich farmland renowned as the ‘Salad Bowl of the World.’ Jose, a quiet 14-year-old, was squatting and bending over for hours with other workers in a sprawling strawberry field. The pickers, many of them also minors, snapped berries from plants and placed them in plastic cartons, eight of them in a cardboard box. They moved quickly along the long rows that lined the field. Jose was exhausted but working as fast as he could; he was being paid $2.40 for each box he filled. As he ran with a full box, he fell on the uneven ground and twisted his ankle. It hurt for days, he later recalled, but he didn’t say anything to his boss for fear of losing his job.” (11/28/25)
“On November 18, the UN General Assembly, which represents all 193 member states of the UN, overwhelmingly passed a worthy resolution affirming ‘the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination,’ including ‘the right to their independent State of Palestine.’ … Shamefully, however, just the day before, on November 17, eleven of the countries that voted for the General Assembly resolution — the UK, France, Algeria, Denmark, Greece, Guyana, Pakistan, Sierra Leone, Slovenia, Somalia and South Korea — voted for a Security Council resolution introduced by the US which, as the international lawyer Itay Epshtain explained on X, explicitly ‘aims to extinguish, suspend, or condition’ the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, including the right to their independent State of Palestine.” (11/28/25)
