Source: Tenth Amendment Center
by Michael Boldin
“Noah Webster told us exactly what happens when people join a political party – they become mindless puppets of people in power. His timeless warning that ‘faction is death to liberty’ is one we can’t afford to ignore any longer.” (03/11/26)
https://tenthamendmentcenter.com/2026/03/11/faction-is-death-to-liberty/
Source: Washington Monthly
by Markos Kounalakis & Theo Jan Snoey
“With AI creating insatiable demand for electricity, an old but clean source is getting a second look thanks to favorable politics and new extraction technology. It’s Landman for environmentalists.” (03/12/26)
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2026/03/12/geothermal-clean-energy-for-people-who-like-to-drill/
Source: Libertarian Institute
by Joseph Solis-Mullen
“Though the dust from the devastating Tigray War of 2020–2022 has barely settled, the Horn of Africa once again appears to be drifting toward catastrophe. Recent developments suggest a growing risk of renewed conflict involving Ethiopia’s federal government, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), and neighboring Eritrea. Military buildups, drone strikes, and a rising chorus of diplomatic accusations all point to a region edging back toward war. Should fighting resume, the consequences would be severe: hundreds of thousands more lives potentially lost, humanitarian crises deepening, and the possibility of outside powers becoming entangled in yet another regional conflict. To understand the present tensions, one must revisit the recent history that forged this volatile triangle.” (03/12/26)
https://libertarianinstitute.org/articles/the-horn-of-africa-is-ready-to-explode
Source: Liberal Currents
by Alan Elrod
“The reaction to Talarico’s Christian rhetoric demonstrates the ways in which far-right theology is about underwriting misogyny and racism.” (03/12/26)
Source: Responsible Statecraft
by Mark Thompson
“There’s nothing like a war to put new military hardware to the test. Early top scorers in the U.S. military’s arsenal include the Low-cost Uncrewed Combat Attack System (LUCAS) kamikaze drone and the long-range Precision Strike Missile (PrSM). The most expensive weapon system in world history — the F-35 fighter — got its first combat kill against a crewed aircraft (even if it was an Israeli F-35 downing an Iranian trainer). Speaking of cost, it’s worth noting that the LUCAS drone boasts ‘Low-Cost’ as part of its official name. That’s because each drone costs only about $35,000, a bargain in Pentagon terms. That’s the good news. The bad news is that it’s a copy of Iran’s Shahed-136.” (03/12/26)
Source: The American Prospect
by David Dayen
“One of the more fascinating sidelights of our war of choice in Iran is how it has reinforced the devastating consequences of our hollowed-out industrial base, consolidated commercial sector, and overreliance on long intermediated supply chains. For example, the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz carries implications for not only oil but also fertilizer, right at the height of the spring planting season. About one-third of the world’s fertilizer ships through the strait, and without access, prices have jumped and farmers are anxious. Yet there are enough natural resources in the United States — nitrogen, phosphate, potash — to serve all our fertilizer needs; in fact, in the 1930s and ’40s one of the largest fertilizer producers in the world was the Tennessee Valley Authority.” (03/12/26)
https://prospect.org/2026/03/12/iran-war-trump-military-america-israel-ukraine-bombs-supply-chains/
Source: Cobden Centre
by Elias Sanchez
“The AI boom seems unstoppable, but its long-term sustainability is uncertain. AI can quickly write a legal memo, but it might also invent a case citation. This inconsistency is called jagged intelligence. Courts and lawyers have warned that AI can fabricate legal citations, and lawyers have been sanctioned for submitting briefs that cite non-existent cases generated by AI. Because AI is not always reliable, it increases the need for checking and judgment, which limits how much it can replace human discovery in business. Still, investors are not discouraged, and capital markets remain eager for higher returns. Markets handle countless trade-offs every day, often imperfectly but by choice. Now, AI is part of this process.” (03/12/26)
https://www.cobdencentre.org/2026/03/the-economics-of-uneven-intelligence/
Source: Cato Institute
by Chelsea Follett
“If Americans could go back in time to preindustrial New York City, they’d likely be horrified and possibly traumatized.” (03/11/26)
https://www.cato.org/commentary/think-present-tough-try-past
Source: RealClearPolitics
by John R Lott Jr.
“If firearms are bad per se, it should be easy to find places where either all guns or all handguns have been banned and murder/homicide rates have gone down. One would think out of randomness there should be at least one place where murder rates have gone down or at least stayed the same, but every single time, even for island nations, murder rates have gone up immediately after the ban. A simple logic is at play here: Who is most likely to obey the law? While such statutes may take a few guns from criminals, they primarily disarm the most law-abiding citizens, making it easier for criminals to commit crimes. Similar problems exist for police. Taking away the guns that both civilians and police have doesn’t mean that criminals will readily forfeit their weapons.” (03/12/26)
Source: Law & Liberty
by Max J Prowant
“Before examining the Iran case, it’s worth considering the United States’ disquieting record with militarily imposed regime change, both to contextualize the current operation and to shed light on the factors most conducive to its success. The scholarship on the subject is highly contested, but if there is any consensus, it is that regime change is a herculean task that seldom goes well. Especially when led by foreign militaries, efforts to install new governments rarely produce stable, friendlier regimes, to say nothing of democratic ones. It is more likely, in fact, to create political vacuums, civil war, and general political instability. This was our experience in Somalia, Haiti, Iraq, Libya, and Afghanistan in recent memory.” (03/12/26)