“The idea that there are huge swaths of the United States populace who want and need the right wing’s unreality — their alternative reality — is a farce: a gaudy, festering artifice constructed and maintained by a million people who need it to be real for financial, political, and cultural purposes. And it was on full horrifying display during Super Bowl LX in Santa Clara, where Bad Bunny sang his catchy Spanish-language pop tunes at halftime, intermingled with some nonoffensive and rather hopeful political messaging. This was preemptively framed by the American right as an assault on the country itself: a Spanish-speaking Latino man doing Latin music during the nation’s biggest sporting event. During a time of revanchist white supremacy, this would simply not do. … So they fled, as they always do, to an alternative venue: an all-American halftime show hosted by Turning Point USA.” (03/25/26)
“America is more fragmented and polarized than since the Civil War. More and more Americans are seeking refuge in the arms of movements seeking to upend the status quo. The center of the political world is losing more and more as the extremes offer alternatives and possible solutions to economic and cultural issues. Lest we think this is unique, history has a way of reminding us that something has already happened. The more our polarization grows, the more it seems that we are living in the Weimarization of America. This is not to say that America is becoming Germany, but instead that there is a dissatisfaction with the system that is similar to Germany on the cusp of the rise of Hitler.” (03/25/26)
“New York Governor Kathy Hochul’s recent plea for wealthy residents to return to the Empire State reveals more than she likely intended. When a state’s chief executive effectively says, ‘We need your money,’ it’s not a sign of strength, it’s an admission that the model is broken. Her plea to well-to-do former residents comes across as a comedy skit: New York is already overtaxed and overregulated, but please come back as we are in the process of enacting higher taxes and imposing more anti-growth regulations. For years, New York has operated under the illusion that ever-higher taxes and ever-expanding government services can coexist with economic dynamism. That illusion is now colliding with reality.” (03/25/26)
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
by Connor O’Keeffe
“As all of this has unfolded in the last three weeks — the surprise attack during negotiations, the violent deaths of Iranian civilians as a result of US and Israeli bombs, and the credible threats of escalations that would significantly intensify civilian deaths — anyone who has voiced any concern about the ethics of any of this has been either dismissed by the administration and its supporters as a naïve utopian pacifist or demonized as a serious internal impediment to an operation that will finally bring about the kind of lasting regional peace that virtually everyone claims to desire. But ethics matter, especially in war. War is no trivial subject. It’s violence on the widest scale. At their best, wars can throw off the worst tyrannies and liberate the oppressed. But they can also bring about the worst atrocities.” (03/25/26)
“Much of Book 3 is dedicated to a historical account of how and why the feudal order that prevailed throughout Europe for many centuries eventually gave way to a liberal, commercial order—that is, how a world dominated by hierarchy, dependence, and intrastate conflict was superseded by one in which the rule of law reigned and people enjoyed comparative freedom and safety. Smith’s account of how the feudal lords squandered their immense power for the sake of frivolous luxuries has become a famous one.” 903/25/26)
“Two years after the European Union (EU)’s Digital Markets Act (DMA) took effect, the results have been mixed to negative. Promises about certainty, lower enforcement costs, and a more innovative and competitive digital ecosystem haven’t materialized. Rather than learn from Europe’s mistakes, Californian policymakers and federal proponents of Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN)’s American Innovation and Choice Online Act (AICOA) would import similar ideas to ostensibly help small businesses and hold tech giants accountable. The EU’s experience shows that DMA-style proposals aren’t just unlikely to achieve these goals. They’re also likely to harm consumers, competition, and innovation.” (03/25/26)
“This is a story of the unintended consequences of a Pyrrhic victory celebrated 35 years ago as a history-making triumph. As the U.S. fights its latest war in the Persian Gulf — this time against Iran, the country that benefited most from Saddam Hussein’s demise — it’s a good moment to reflect on Operation Desert Storm. That intervention now appears to have been an avoidable war that set the United States on a disastrous course from which it has failed to extricate itself. What seemed like a clean victory in 1991 has turned into a strategic quagmire.” (03/25/26)
Source: Grist
by Jake Bittle & Rebecca Egan McCarthy
“The government is paying TotalEnergies to halt a wind farm it isn’t building, in exchange for fossil fuel investments it’s already making.” (03/25/26)
“The Trump administration has been obsessed with maximizing the president’s war powers to justify his agenda on such things as industrial policy, immigration, domestic deployment of the National Guard, and, most glaringly, trade. But now, when we’re actually at war, officials are reversing their economic philosophy in service to Trump’s seat-of-the-pants decision-making. Trump’s trade policies are exactly what the great 19th-century economist Henry George had in mind when he warned, ‘What protectionism teaches us, is to do to ourselves in time of peace what enemies seek to do to us in time of war.’ What’s so strange is that Trump is turning George on his head by easing economic pressure on our wartime enemy. But he’s also reversing his own biases by liberating our domestic economy.” (03/25/26)
“The very quiet shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security got louder in the past week as lines outside TSA airport security checkpoints grew to tremendous lengths. … Congress seemed to get really interested once Delta suspended its special service that allowed members of the House and Senate to skip security lines. Funny how that works. The framework of the emerging deal was on the table before the shutdown even began. Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-CT) introduced a bill in February to fund other parts of DHS, but not ICE or Customs and Border Protection (CBP), while negotiations continued. What’s being discussed in the Senate would go further: Every agency in DHS, including CBP, would get funding except for ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO), the entity that finds and detains people. Republicans would then seek to fund ERO as part of a broader budget reconciliation bill on a party-line vote.” (03/25/26)
