“What if, on Thanksgiving Day, our gratitude is not to the government that assaults our freedoms and steals our wealth but to God, who gave us our freedoms and our ability to earn wealth? What if, on Thanksgiving Day, our gratitude is for life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, and the exercise of free will and human reason? What if these are integral to our humanity despite the government’s assaults on them? What if, on Thanksgiving Day, we recognize the evils of a government that is blind to the consequences of its killings, borrowings and assaults on freedom?” (11/27/25)
“Let’s set aside the controversy over what Walmart’s shrinkflation of its annual Thanksgiving feast bundle might suggest for the recent trajectory of grocery prices. The good news for which we can be thankful is that the share of their incomes that average Americans devote to paying for food has fallen steeply over the last 100 years.” (11/27/25)
“In most sectors of the American economy, we celebrate the moment when insiders break away to build something better. Engineers start their own firms. Chefs open their own restaurants. Innovators leave incumbents and test their mettle in the market. Only in US healthcare do we treat that entrepreneurial impulse as a threat worthy of prohibition. Section 6001 of the 2010 Affordable Care Act froze the growth of physician-owned hospitals (POHs) by barring new POHs from getting paid by Medicare and Medicaid, and by restricting the expansion of existing POHs. … The POH issue illustrates how, in a mixed economy, controls beget controls.” (11/27/25)
“Black Friday used to be ugly: Articles about people camping in parking lots on Thanksgiving night. Stories of retail workers being subject to abuse by rowdy customers. Videos of people elbowing and punching their way to a bargain on a new TV. Not a good look for capitalism. Fortunately, things have changed. Now people don’t expect to see customers shoving each other on Black Friday. In fact, they don’t expect to see them at all. People can shop online, at a discount, from the comfort of their own homes. They also spread out their holiday shopping more than in the past, making the single day less important. In other words, people are doing capitalism every day instead of taking Black Friday off.” (11/27/25)
Source: CounterPunch
by John W Whitehead & Nisha Whitehead
“The contrast between George Washington’s first Thanksgiving proclamation and the state of the nation today reveals how far we have drifted — and how low we have fallen — since Washington called upon early Americans (a nation of immigrants) to give thanks for a government that protected their safety and happiness, and for a Constitution designed to safeguard civil and religious liberty. But how do you give thanks for freedoms that are constantly being eroded? How do you express gratitude for one’s safety when the perils posed by the American police state grow more treacherous by the day? How do you come together as a nation in thanksgiving when the powers-that-be continue to polarize and divide us into warring factions?” (11/26/25)
Source: Karl Dickey’s Freedom Vanguard
by Karl Dickey
“We should be able to have conversations about politics (which, BTW, is force), while understanding we are having a voluntary dinner together with family and/or friends. Tomorrow, the family or friend sitting across from you may have voted for the ‘wrong’ candidate, but likely agrees with you that violence is bad, that kindness is good, and that they just want to be left alone to flourish.” (11/26/25)
“Do you have a long drive home after your family feast this week? The feds might be watching you. Recent reporting from the Associated Press and 404 Media reveals just how thorough federal surveillance of the highways has gotten, especially from immigration authorities. … remember, if you’re traveling by car for the holidays, you may be driving under the watchful eye of Uncle Sam. Just hope that he doesn’t find your travel plans suspicious.” (11/26/25)
“I’ve been extraordinarily blessed since birth, and I’m grateful for all the favorable bounces I’ve had. But in times like these, when it sometimes seems like events are spiraling downward and the worst people have more and more power and are using it just as badly as you’d expect, it’s especially important to take solace in whatever positive signs we can discern.” (11/26/25)
Source: Libertarian Institute
by Joseph Solis-Mullen
“As a long-time critic of Washington’s obsession with the so-called ‘China threat’ — and having written an entire book debunking it, The Fake China Threat — I could not in good conscience allow this year’s Report to Congress of the U.S. — China Economic and Security Review Commission — to pass without comment. If anything, the 2025 edition is an even more sweeping reiteration of the assumptions and exaggerations I have challenged for years. Page after page, the report presents an alarming narrative about Beijing’s intentions and capabilities, while simultaneously insisting that every corner of the globe — and every sector of American life — now constitutes a frontline in a zero-sum geopolitical struggle.” (11/26/25)
“The average person of the Enlightenment era, it seems to me, was not sitting around in salons sharing the free flow of ideas, but being oppressed and kicked around by their enlightened compatriots or invaders. There were some good ideas and far better art and music than much of the soulless fare of today — but this arose not from a flourishing paradise but closer to, for many, a living hell. Perhaps it was poverty and harsh reality that opened Handel’s mind and inspired Rembrandt’s brush, and we now miss something that this makes us see. But this better be by choice. Looking back to former times is a good way to learn and understand, and a person ignorant of history is like a scrap of paper blown in the wind. But history was written by the literate elite and should not be confused with a destination.” (11/25/25)
