“One of the things you used to hear conservatives say a lot is that they don’t want the government to ‘pick winners and losers’. That sentiment has been muted for the past nine months, because such choices have become the prime directive of the Trump administration. From taking stakes in companies, to dictating what kind of energy can get permitted, to going to bat for Big Tech in international trade deals, Trump has treated the U.S. economy like a personal plaything, and corporate success increasingly depends on proximity to the king. He didn’t raise $350 million for that White House ballroom because corporations think state dinner event spaces are a worthwhile investment. Last week, a rumor emerged revealing another example of Trump stage-managing the business world. Warner Bros. Discovery … has publicly announced that it is for sale.” (10/30/25)
“Since President Donald Trump’s return to the Oval Office, the federal government has trademarked its own version of Republican socialism by nationalizing steel production and taking equity stakes in chip manufacturers and mining projects. Now, it’s getting involved in the nuclear power sector. On Tuesday, Westinghouse Electric Company announced that it had entered ‘into a strategic partnership’ with the federal government, Brookfield Asset Management, and uranium fuel supplier Cameco Corporation to build ‘at least’ $80 billion worth of Westinghouse’s AP1000 nuclear reactors across the country. … Nuclear power is clean, reliable, and safe, but forcing taxpayers to bet on its future success is risky.” (10/29/25)
“Some opponents of regime change policies often cling to unreasonable hopes that a president will turn against the very hardline advisers and appointees he picked to implement his policies. They can see that the administration is stacked with regime changers, and they know that the president put them there, but they still try to appeal to the president as if he weren’t fully on board with his own insane policy. The appeals always fall on deaf ears because the regime changers work for the president.” (10/29/25)
Source: Rutherford Institute
by John & Nisha Whitehead
Monsters don’t always come wrapped in the trappings of horror or myth. Most often, monsters in the real world look like ordinary people. They walk among us. They smile for the cameras. They promise protection and prosperity even as they feed on fear and obedience. All is not as it seems. We are living in two worlds. There’s the world we’re shown — the bright, propaganda-driven illusion manufactured by the government and its corporate sponsors — and the world we actually inhabit, where economic inequality widens, real agendas are buried beneath layers of Orwellian doublespeak, and ‘freedom’ is rationed out in controlled, legalistic doses by militarized police and federal agents. … monsters with human faces walk among us. Many of them work for the U.S. government.” (10/29/25)
“Austerity never means ‘spending less,’ only growing a bit more slowly. That rhetorical dodge created a permanently expansionary state, in real, per-capita, and GDP-adjusted terms.” (10/29/25)
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
by Connor O’Keeffe
“Last week, President Trump ordered an aircraft carrier strike group into the waters off Venezuela. The deployment of the USS Gerald R. Ford, the Navy’s most advanced aircraft carrier, and all the warships that accompany it is the strongest sign yet that the Trump administration intends to escalate its operations in the region. It comes after US forces struck at least ten boats the administration claims were smuggling drugs from Venezuela, and after the president authorized covert CIA operations against the Venezuelan government run by President Nicolas Maduro. Publicly, this mobilization of US forces is solely an effort to disrupt the flow of deadly drugs into the United States. … However, this excuse completely falls apart with even the slightest look into how American users are getting their fentanyl.” (10/29/25)
“Trump’s ballroom has already served the public good. It has triggered some people who need triggering. They have been blasé about his presidential grandiosity when he spends money for purposes Congress has explicitly refused to authorize (the Big Beautiful Wall), or when he insults local police forces by sending troops to pacify U.S. cities, or when he vaporizes perhaps criminal Venezuelans. Now, however, because of the ballroom, and the East Wing, the blasé are suddenly aghast. … It is especially amusing to hear progressives, the principal creators of the watery Caesarism of today’s presidency, sorrowfully describing Trump’s ballroom as discordant with the White House’s proper modesty. They should worry less about the president’s residential immodesty and more about his anti-constitutional immodesty.” (10/29/25)
“A trio of elections in Africa this month were not expected to be overly open or fair. Longtime leaders and ruling parties retained power after voting in Cameroon and Ivory Coast. And it’s likely to be the same when Tanzanians go to the polls Oct. 29. Yet, earlier elections this year – in Ghana, Malawi, and Seychelles – did see smooth transfers of power. And, despite political stasis, the continent is showing consistent economic growth combined with stronger, more transparent financial governance. Forty-four African countries (including Ivory Coast and Tanzania) are expected to surpass the global average growth rate this year, thanks to new discoveries of oil and gas as well as modest gains in agricultural productivity and manufacturing. And just last week, the global Financial Action Task Force (FATF) removed four countries – including two of the continent’s largest economies – from its ‘grey list.'” (10/28/25)
“[Julius Caesar] wasn’t the first Roman dictator, just the most infamous one. In the Roman Republic, the title and authority of ‘dictator’ was occasionally granted by the Senate to an individual to deal with a big problem or emergency. Usually, the term would last no more than six months — shorter if the crisis was dealt with — because the Romans detested anything that smacked of monarchy. When Caesar crossed the Rubicon (where we get that phrase) his enemies in the Senate fled. So, the remaining senators named him dictator for 11 days to hold fresh elections. His second dictatorship was set for 10 years, and then finally he was named dictator for life. … Trump is not a dictator, but as Benjamin Franklin understood, republics fail not so much because would-be Caesars seize power. They fail because cowards give it to them — under the false pretense of an emergency.” (10/29/25)
Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by Kimberlee Josephson
“Political pressure and high levels of uncertainty are a big concern for businesses today. And such concerns can have a ripple effect on the communities and nonprofits that rely on and benefit from partnerships with the private sector. I was recently reminded of this at my local Giant grocery store which featured a special promotion: if a customer spent $15 on select grocery items, Giant would contribute $10 to local food banks. This promotion was co-sponsored by Feeding America, America’s ‘largest hunger-relief organization.'” (10/29/25)
