“We cannot even be secure in our use of the word ‘terrorist’ any longer, given that so many are determined to abuse it. How else to explain the fact that comedian John Cleese, of Monty Python and ‘Fawlty Towers’ fame, has been reported to Prevent, the British government program designed to stop people from becoming terrorists? Are dead parrots, silly walks and disgruntled hoteliers now deemed early warning signs of radicalization? The complaint to Prevent against Cleese was made by a member of the public, and the details passed to 5Pillars, an Islamist media outlet based in London. In its report, 5Pillars characterized the complaint as alleging that Cleese’s social media jokes and comments ‘go beyond legitimate criticism of Islam and instead portray Muslims collectively as violent, criminal and morally depraved.'” (10/07/26)
“Incumbent AI firms may benefit from a regulatory regime in which machine consciousness is considered plausible but remains impossible to prove or disprove.” (10/07/26)
“Nithya Raman appears to think she is running for mayor of Antifa, not mayor of LA. There’s no other explanation for her latest attack on her opponent — and the police. As The California Post has reported, Raman’s campaign posted, then deleted, a video in which she appears to call Mayor Karen Bass and LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell ‘fascists’. The video also shows McDonnell with a red ‘X’ over his face. It’s reminiscent of the graffiti scrawled on local businesses and government buildings during the George Floyd riots of 2020, or the anti-ICE riots of 2025. The rioters are her constituency. That’s the message she’s sending by calling McDonnell a ‘fascist’. Does she even know what that means?” (10/07/26)
“Israel has killed more than 1,300 Palestinians in Gaza since the so-called “ceasefire” took effect a year ago, more than the number of Israelis killed on October 7, 2023. The supposedly unlimited ‘right’ to genocidal retaliation invoked ever since has left at least 74,000 dead. This quotidian slaughter is not new. For years, it was normalized under the euphemism of ‘mowing the grass’, as Israel repeatedly brought its impunity and overwhelming military superiority to bear against a defenseless, besieged population: in 2008, 2012, 2014, 2018, and 2021. As a result, a generation of Palestinians in Gaza has been condemned to life and death under the deadly gaze of an Israeli panopticon.” (10/07/26)
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
by Jacob G Hornberger
“The Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution expressly prohibits federal officials from depriving people of life without due process of law, which necessarily means charging people with crimes and according them a trial. That’s obviously not what the military is doing with its killings of those people in boats on the high seas. No criminal indictment. No trial. No opportunity to contest the government’s evidence or accusation. Simply summary executions based on the government’s unilateral determination that the occupants are drug traffickers. Given the lack of due process of law, the military killings of these boat people operate as state-inflicted assassinations.” (10/07/26)
“Americans have a lot of misconceptions about the rich. This becomes clear when you read The Everywhere Millionaire by Owen Zidar and Eric Zwick. The authors open with the deceptively simple question: ‘Who are the rich in America?’ They go on to show that wealth in this country ‘is more abundant, and closer to home, than most people think.’ In nearly every city and town, owners of apparently ordinary businesses have accumulated extraordinary fortunes.” (10/07/26)
“There is something almost admirable about the Canadian government’s ability to respond to an American provocation with precisely the right number of carefully selected adjectives. Washington imposes tariffs. Ottawa expresses deep disappointment. Washington threatens Canadian sovereignty. Ottawa says the relationship is changing. Washington escalates again. Ottawa announces that Canada is entering a new era. Then everyone goes home. The problem is no longer simply that Canada’s foreign policy is too cautious. It increasingly appears to have no direction at all.” (10/07/26)
“Britain has a productivity problem, and it is one of our own making. Before the financial crash of 2008, output per hour grew by roughly 2 per cent a year. Since then it has crawled along at about half that rate, sometimes less. The gap with America, France and Germany has widened year after year. That matters more than almost anything else in economics. Productivity pays for higher wages, better public services and a comfortable retirement. A country that stops growing more productive stops growing richer. Its politics turn sour, because every gain for one group must come out of another’s pocket. The comforting story is that some deep mystery is at work, a curse visited on Britain by forces beyond anyone’s control. This is nonsense. Britain made it hard to build, costly to power and unrewarding to invest. The results were entirely predictable.” (10/07/26)
“In Jefferson City, legislative debates over school choice often turn into battles between special interest groups, union lobbyists, and trade associations. Lost in the technical jargon of funding formulas and accreditation benchmarks is the actual student sitting in a classroom where they are not learning. [Nikole] Hannah-Jones’s daughter saw clearly what many policymakers ignore. Adult political battles should never be waged at the expense of vulnerable children. When people demand that families stay put to support a district’s balance sheet, they are asking children to bear the burden of systemic dysfunction.” (10/06/26)
