Moved by Meaning
Source: Underthrow
by Max Borders
“A mind may be persuaded by explanation, but the will is moved by meaning.” (07/27/26)
Category: Opinion
The Full Risk–Benefit Balance Behind the First Covid-19 Vaccine
Source: Brownstone Institute
by Yaakov Ophir
“Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.’s recent decision to terminate the Covid-19 Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) declarations1 invites reconsideration of the evidence that launched this extraordinary regulatory chapter. The FDA’s first EUA for a Covid-19 vaccine rested on its determination that the known and potential benefits of the Pfizer–BioNTech vaccine outweighed its known and potential risks. Yet the pivotal trial report did not bring those benefits and risks together within a common quantitative framework. Better late than never: more than five years later, I did—and what I found was startling.” (07/27/26)
https://brownstone.org/articles/the-full-risk-benefit-balance-behind-the-first-covid-19-vaccine/
Nixon Goes Viral
Source: The American Spectator
by Caroline Petersen
“The 37th president is finding an unlikely new audience as Gen Z turns ‘Nixonmaxxing’ into an internet sensation.” (07/26/26)
How Netanyahu Lost America
Source: The Atlantic
by Franklin Foer
“The prime minister, a self-styled expert on the U.S., has shattered his country’s standing.” (07/27/26)
Paradise Lost, Government Gained
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
by George Ford Smith
“As John Adams wrote to his wife Abigail following a congressional vote for independence on July 2, 1776, ‘[This date] ought to be Solemnized with Pomp and Parade with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more.’ The future father of the Alien and Sedition Acts was justifiably proud and excited. … for those who took the risk of signing the Declaration, it was the document’s affirmation of the individual over government that became the hill they would die on if necessary. Government was a necessary evil, as Paine wrote, but that wouldn’t stop them from somehow putting the people at the top of the food chain.” (07/27/26)
https://mises.org/mises-wire/paradise-lost-government-gained
Trump and the AI rational actor problem
Source: NonZero Newsletter
by Robert Wright
“Last week two seemingly unrelated events, one in the tech world and one in Trump world, together illustrated how unprepared the planet is for the AI revolution—in particular, for its potential to create international turmoil, up to and including nuclear war. (1) OpenAI revealed that two of its models had, while under evaluation, escaped the laboratory and gone rogue in a way that inspired various nightmare scenarios. … (2) The Wall Street Journal, by way of illuminating the strategic logic that had led one of the world’s political leaders to bomb Iran for 11 days in a row, reported the following: According to a senior official in his administration, he is in ‘revenge mode.'” (07/27/26)
https://www.nonzero.org/p/trump-and-the-ai-rational-actor-problem
The Kremlin’s Easy Money Is Gone
Source: Foreign Policy
by Agathe Demarais
“Pity Russian savers. In June, the Russian Finance Ministry announced its support for draft legislation to transfer nearly $40 billion in private pension savings into government coffers. Later that month, Russian Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov encouraged President Vladimir Putin to make the most of the almost $1.8 trillion that Russian firms and individuals hold in bank accounts to support state finances. According to Zyuganov’s calculations, ‘that is three state budgets … sitting there and enriching bankers.’ Pondering whether the Russian economy will collapse is in fashion these days—but that may be the wrong question to ask. The better question is which sources of politically affordable money the Kremlin can still tap to finance military expenses while maintaining social stability.” (07/27/26)
Trump’s tariff addiction
Source: UnHerd
by Wolfgang Munchau
“In the 2002 movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding, the father of the bride claims that Windex, a US glass cleaning product, can cure all known medical conditions. I was reminded of that scene when I heard Donald Trump prescribe tariffs as a remedy for diarrhea last week. The Center for Disease Control has recently registered more than 4,000 cases of a disease suspected to be cyclosporiasis, an intestinal illness, transmitted through food. The suspect is shredded lettuce, grown in Mexico and exported to Taco Bell fast-food chains across the US. When a reporter asked him about the outbreak, Trump threatened to put a tariff on imported Mexican lettuce to control the spread of the parasite.
The President may not have been serious about the lettuce tariff, but he is serious about tariffs in general.” (07/27/26)
Oman is cozying up to China as US throws Mideast into disarray
Source: Responsible Statecraft
by Giorgio Cafiero
“The war in Iran is pushing smaller states to diversify their great power partnerships — if Washington will let them.” (07/27/26)
You Sirs Are the Duplicitous Murderous Failures
Source: Common Dreams
by Abby Zimet
“To date, ‘Emperor Commodus of Covfefe’s’ illegal, disastrous, dim-witted Iran ‘excursion,’ a mangling of ‘incursion’ and global clusterfuck with no clear mission, strategy, end goal or clue, has killed over 3,500 Iranians, many of them women and children, wounded over 26,500, and razed much of that country’s infrastructure, including fresh water sources. At least 18 U.S. troops have been killed, with up to 500 wounded. A quarter of the world’s oil is held hostage across two vital straits, at least 70% of Americans oppose the war, recession-level prices here loom, and rage, especially among Muslim nations, is palpable …” (07/26/26)
https://www.commondreams.org/further/you-sirs-are-the-duplicitous-murderous-failures