Source: The Daily Economy
by Peter C Earle
“The economic and agricultural threat posed by Chinese-owned farmland is modest, but our fears may reflect broader anxieties about national power.” (05/29/26)
https://thedailyeconomy.org/article/how-much-us-farmland-do-chinese-investors-actually-own/
Source: CounterPunch
by David S D’Amato
“Today’s technology sector does not represent the principles of anything like actual free-market competition; intensively subsidized by the public and deeply tied to the federal government, the major tech companies are a state-capital oligopoly that have benefited enormously from a variety of special subsidies and perks unavailable to ordinary companies and citizens. When we account for direct federal grants and subsidies, infrastructure support, and hardware manufacturing, public subsidies and allocations for AI have reached well into the hundreds of billions of dollars.” (05/29/26)
https://www.counterpunch.org/2026/05/29/the-new-religion-of-ai-accelerationism/
Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by Cláudia Ascensão Nunes
“When the Portuguese government decided to add a 10-cent deposit to the price of every plastic bottle under 3 liters (101 fl oz), a small family business in central Portugal did the math and launched a 3.1-liter (105 fl oz) bottle.” (05/29/26)
Source: Town Hall
by Derek Hunter
“To hear Democrats talk about black people is a mix of arrogance, racism and more condescension than could be crammed into the Grand Canyon. What do I mean by that? It’s pretty simple, really: the left simultaneously insists black people are perpetual victims with economic hardship thrust upon them by ‘systemic racism’ and the sole builders of everything good and superior to everyone else. None of it is true, but all of it is designed to manipulate. Democrats, even black Democrats, treat the average black American like they’re a child and special; neither is true. They’re just people, like everyone else.” (05/31/26)
Source: Liberal Currents
by Alan Elrod
“Ken Paxton is not the first criminal with a narcissistic personality to run for and hold office in this country. In the Trump era, such traits might not seem worth remarking on at all. But Paxton manages to exceed most of his peers in his perfidy and his cruelty. He’s a man who seems to know absolutely no decency, down to a molecular level. And, sadly, he also may be the future of this country.” (05/29/26)
https://www.liberalcurrents.com/hell-is-empty-and-all-the-ken-paxtons-are-here/
Source: The Watch
by Radley Balko
“It took nearly a year for the public to learn that a DHS officer killed a Latino man and U.S. citizen — and that federal officers lied about how it happened.” (05/29/26)
https://radleybalko.substack.com/p/you-cant-hide-your-lying-ice-the-432
Source: Liberalism.org
by Ilya Somin
“Liberalism — defined as the political philosophy that prioritizes individual freedom and human happiness — has always had an equivocal relationship with democracy. Democratic governments generally feature much greater liberty and happiness than other types of regimes. Liberals should resist the temptation to embrace authoritarianism. But there are also multiple ways in which democracy can often threaten liberty and human welfare. These dangers include the tyranny of the majority and widespread voter ignorance. Democracy can also be a threat to its own perpetuation, by bringing to power authoritarian political movements. These are all longstanding problems. But recent events demonstrate their continuing — and in some cases growing — significance.” (05/29/26)
https://www.liberalism.org/p/liberalism-s-uneasy-relationship-with-democracy
Source: Astral Codex Ten
by Scott Alexander
“The philosophers of the Frankfurt School practiced a technique called negative dialectics, where concepts are defined as much by what you can’t say about them as what you can. Appropriately, the Frankfurt School has ended up defined by what you can’t say about them. You can’t say that they invented a new form of left-wing thought called Cultural Marxism. This would be (according to Wikipedia) the Cultural Marxism conspiracy theory, a ‘far right anti-Semitic conspiracy theory that misinterprets Western Marxism, especially the Frankfurt School, as being responsible for modern progressive movements, identity politics, and political correctness.’ … What other aspects of our culture might we be unable to say they were involved in? For answers, I turned to the classic history of the group, Martin Jay’s The Dialectical Imagination.” (05/29/26)
https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/book-review-the-dialectical-imagination
Source: The Daily Economy
by Daniel J Smith
“Herbert Hoover’s wartime sugar program generated shortages that led to expanding rationing systems and increasingly centralized control over the allocation of sugar.” (05/29/26)
https://thedailyeconomy.org/article/the-bitter-lessons-of-sugar-control-in-world-war-i/
Source: The American Prospect
by Robert Kuttner
“The other day, Rep. Jake Auchincloss, a corporate Democrat who represents one of the most liberal districts in Massachusetts, dredged up the issue of Graham Platner’s tattoo, attacking the certain Democratic nominee in a must-win Senate contest two states away. ‘I find that tattoo and his commentary about it to be personally disqualifying,’ Auchincloss told CNN Monday. ‘I think that it would be a mistake for the Democratic Party to think that Graham Platner’s brand of the Democratic Party is what wins us durable majorities throughout this country,’ he added …. Since Platner’s opponent in the Democratic primary, Janet Mills, has folded her campaign in the face of Platner’s overwhelming [sic] lead, in effect Auchincloss has endorsed the Republican incumbent, Susan Collins. What in hell is Auchincloss up to?” [editor’s note: Maybe he’s trying to be consistent with the party’s alleged “principles?” -SAT] (05/29/26)
https://prospect.org/2026/05/29/aipac-auchincloss-massachusetts-platner-maine-congress/