“On the advent of America’s 250th anniversary, the conventional narrative is that our country is deeply divided. Typical takes on the state of disunity in the United States include this headline from a guest op-ed that recently appeared in USA Today, ‘America celebrated together at 200. We won’t at 250’, and ‘We still had a sense of oneness then. We no longer do’. In a related news article, the publication cited major national surveys that ‘consistently show an anxious nation’ and ‘a divisive president’. These observations aren’t wrong, but the divisions they cite (partisan politics, old vs. young, racial polarization, bitter disagreements over social issues) are missing the biggest source of alienation of all, which is diminished economic opportunity. Fully half of American households report living paycheck to paycheck.” (07/01/26)
Source: Independent Institute
by Christopher J Calton
“With the median sale price of a single-family home exceeding $400,000 since the pandemic, federal politicians have been champing at the bit to show voters they are working to lower housing costs. The recently passed bipartisan 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act is Congress’s attempt to expand the housing supply. It awaits the president’s signature. The problem is that there is little the federal government can do to solve a crisis that is primarily the byproduct of local regulations. The local nature of the housing shortage is apparent when comparing housing costs in San Francisco, where the median single-family home price has reached a staggering $2 million, and Houston, where the median home sells for only $371,000.” (06/30/26)
“The anti-school choice position is usually framed as a defense of public education. But at its core, what it really does is defend a particular way of assigning students to schools: where you live determines where your children go to school. The strongest opponents of school choice oppose vouchers, charter schools, and interdistrict open enrollment. In effect, they argue it is best if families have only one option: the public school assigned to them by their residential address. The problem with this argument is that it ignores a simple fact: many families already exercise school choice by choosing where to live.” (06/30/26)
“HUD recently issued a set of best practices for state and local governments to improve affordability by reducing the overall costs of construction, increasing land available for construction, and reducing the development timeline. By identifying specific regulatory and administrative barriers, HUD has taken a step toward a federal framework for encouraging housing production.” (06/30/26)
Source: Libertarian National Committee
by Evan McMahon
“If you’re a Libertarian candidate in America right now, the Republican Party doesn’t want to debate you. They want to sue you. When Republicans know they can’t win on ideas, they resort to their favorite tactic: suppressing voter choice. Right now, GOP operatives are dragging our candidates into courtrooms in Florida, New Jersey, and Iowa. Not because our candidates did anything wrong, but because Republicans would rather clear the ballot than compete on it. In Iowa, they went even further. Before filing their legal challenges, GOP operatives and even HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. personally contacted our candidates for Congress and offered them enticements to drop out. When they refused, they challenged their paperwork. This is a coordinated national attack. And we will not stand for it.” (06/30/26)
Source: David Friedman’s Substack
by David Friedman
“I recently spent a week in Chile as a guest of the Centro de Estudios Libertarios, interacting mostly with Chilean libertarians. Chile is the most free market country in Latin America and the richest but lately has been becoming a little less of both, so one topic of conversation was how to reverse that, more generally how to make Chile more libertarian (most Chileans would say more liberal). I then spent another week in Argentina, which is becoming more libertarian, again associating mostly with libertarians, so the same topic came up there in the context of how to keep it doing so. I have thought a good deal about the question in the American context. At a broad level the answer is the same.” (06/30/26)
“‘I am loving that the World Cup has brought to our shores all these people,’ comedian Bill Maher told his Real Time audience on Friday, ‘who are doing Americans the service of reminding us — just when we needed it on our big 250 birthday — that actually this place is kind of awesome.’ What Maher celebrated could be seen on social media, mostly. One German fan — and the first many American X users have encountered — is @FreddyLA7; his success is instructive, saying that he hasn’t ‘met a single unfriendly person.'” (06/30/26)
“This summer, a seismic wave ripped through the foundations of an ossified Democratic establishment as a swell of left-wing challengers channeled disgust at party elites to jolt the entire political system. On June 23, a slate of candidates emerged victorious with endorsements and support from the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and socialist Mayor Zohran Mamdani. They toppled longtime incumbents and added fuel to the economic populist electoral movement that has been sweeping the country. Union organizer Claire Valdez won a race for an open seat in New York’s 7th District, encompassing swaths of Brooklyn and Queens, by more than 20 points while community activist Darializa Avila Chevalier took out Adriano Espaillat in NY-13, in Upper Manhattan and the Bronx, and former comptroller Brad Lander (endorsed by Mamdani but not DSA) beat out Rep. Dan Goldman in NY-10, in Lower Manhattan and Brooklyn, by more than 30 points.” (06/30/26)
“Earlier this year, publishing house Hachette pulped the upcoming horror novel Shy Girl by Mia Ballard, following allegations that Ballard relied on artificial intelligence to write the book. Meanwhile, half of novelists in the UK fear they will be completely replaced by AI. As artificial intelligence continues to replace creative activities previously considered uniquely human, there’s a fear that fiction will grow ever more distant from the human experience, with predictable plots and simplistic dialogue and characters. Literature will start to function as synthetic junk food for the brain. Unfortunately, we didn’t need AI to do this. Literature has been functionally artificial for a number of years now, since long before ChatGPT came on the scene. It wasn’t computers that did this, it was us—publishers, agents, writers, and readers.” (06/30/26)
Source: Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression
by John Ellis
“Many, many boards for school districts, community colleges, and public universities, and at least one state, have formal policies that limit board members from publicly criticizing actions taken by the boards, speaking to the press, or communicating on social media. These policies, often called ‘One Voice,’ have resulted in punishments of board members and lawsuits challenging those actions. The policies are propagated by dozens of consultants and education attorneys, state and national board associations, at least one accreditor, and the New Jersey Department of Education. The policies are surely unconstitutional for elected boards (school districts and community colleges), though that may not be as clear-cut for boards appointed by state government (most public universities). Regardless, they are horrid governance policies for educational institutions, set bad examples for the students they’re educating, and contribute to the deterioration of civic culture.” (06/30/26)
