“America’s fentanyl crisis and the deaths associated with cartel violence have a common cause: the war on drugs. The criminalization of drugs does not eliminate demand. Instead, it creates a void in the marketplace for illicit actors to fill — one that provides these actors with supernormal profits. Like compressing a strong spring, that pushes back the more you push on it — the drug war cannot be won through decapitation.” (02/24/26)
Source: Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression
by Adam Goldstein
“Walkouts are a recurring form of student protest; students have used them to oppose gun violence, protest against racial injustice, call attention to climate change, protest wars, and more. Is there a right to walk out? Are states censoring students by pushing back? The short answer is that the First Amendment protects students’ rights to express views, but not the right to walk out of class to express them. But there’s a lot to unpack.” (02/24/26)
“On February 20, the US Supreme Court ruled part of US president Donald Trump’s crazy-quilt tariff scheme illegal in its particulars. … Tariff victims had already begun preemptively suing for the restitution they’re owed even before the Supreme Court ruling, and since that ruling other companies, including FedEx, have also initiated court proceedings. The victims shouldn’t HAVE to sue. President Trump SHOULD just order the US Treasury to refund the money immediately. That would be the honest thing to do. … Refunding the money wouldn’t just be honest policy, it would be smart politics. … eight months of economic recovery would certainly help his party, and him, out.” (02/24/26)
“It has been just 36 days since Trump asked [Aileen] Cannon to prohibit the release of the report compiled by former special counsel Jack Smith, based on the investigation and Trump’s 2023 indictment in hoarding classified documents at his Florida estate after he lost the 2020 presidential election. The judge predictably ruled in Trump’s favor on Feb. 23, permanently prohibiting the U.S. Department of Justice from releasing the special counsel’s report, even while the 11th Circuit considers whether the report should be made public. … the DOJ has a long-standing policy that sitting presidents can’t be prosecuted. But that doesn’t mean Americans can’t know what Trump did to get indicted in the documents case.” (02/24/26)
“To truly feel the force of America’s cultural attraction you have to be born outside of it. The natives see the cracks up close and learn to take the whole thing for granted. Growing up in the Soviet Union in the 1980s, none of my friends had to be convinced of America’s appeal. Its jeans-clad, Ray-Ban-wearing, moon-dancing cultural exports were the opposite of propaganda. They were the natural overflow of a society so confident in its own desirability that it never had to make a case for itself. … it made American leadership feel less like domination and more like the natural order of things. The slow erosion of that dominance over the past decade is therefore not just a commercial setback for studio execs but a change in how American power operates.” (02/24/26)
“The U.S. Supreme Court upheld a controversial Texas law requiring age verification to access online pornography. Enacted by the Republican supermajority in the Texas legislature in 2023 and aggressively defended by Attorney General Ken Paxton, the court’s 6–3 decision against stakeholders in the online adult industry marked a significant shift in how the state may regulate access to lawful speech online. … Texas House Bill 1181 is presented as a child-protection measure. But it is part of a political project — one that seeks to normalize identity-gated access to lawful speech and to expand state power over digital life under the moral cover of protecting minors. … Once built, such systems are easily repurposed to censor disfavored groups. The danger is not only in restricting access to online pornography but in establishing a precedent for government-mandated checks.” (02/24/26)
“Congress has not had any hearings about going to war in Iran, never mind authorized a war. And we should be clear, Congress’[s] failure to greenlight a war doesn’t mean the president is free to launch one. It means, as a constitutional matter, a war would be illegal. Think of it this way: If I don’t have your permission to enter your home and take what I want, we’re not in a gray area. The legal default setting is that you don’t have permission to rob a person unless expressly told otherwise. … If you are in favor of the constitutional process only when you like the results, you aren’t actually in favor of the Constitution.” (02/24/26)
“Dozens of viral videos coming out of Iran in recent days reveal a marked shift in what Iranians think of the regime in Tehran, especially after its brutal killing of thousands of protesters on Jan. 8 and 9. The videos of funerals in homes and cemeteries for those killed last month show family and friends dancing instead of wailing, singing instead of lamenting, cheering with political slogans instead of trembling in fear of further repression. Many wear clothes that are vibrant, as if at a wedding, rather than traditional black. In Iran, memorials for loved ones are often held several times, until 40 days have passed. An Iranian who posted one video wrote on the social platform X that when the regime trivializes the killing of so many people, ‘we dance to welcome eternity.’ Death, in other words, is not being given the last word.” (02/24/26)
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
by Jacob G Hornberger
“The Epstein files have revealed the names of many wealthy and prominent people within Jeffrey Epstein’s orbit, many of whom are now justifiably going down because of their affiliations with Epstein. But the real rot regarding Epstein relates to the extremely sweet sweetheart plea bargain he received from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Florida. … Epstein was permitted to plead guilty to lesser state criminal charges. He then was permitted to serve a 13-month sentence in county jail rather than a state prison. He was also allowed out 12 hours a day, 6 days a week. He returned to jail each night to sleep. Now, that is what I call a super sweet sweetheart deal for a person charged with horrific sex-related crimes with minors.” (02/24/26)
“Malicious streetlights are an evil trick from Dark Data Journalism. Some annoying enemy has a valid complaint. So you use FACTS and LOGIC to prove that something similar-sounding-but-slightly-different is definitely false. Then you act like you’ve debunked the complaint. … the inverse evil trick is saying something ‘directionally correct,’ ie slightly stronger than the truth can support. If your enemy committed assault, say he committed murder. If he committed sexual harassment, say he committed rape. If your drug increases cancer survival by 5% in rats, say that it ‘cures cancer.’ Then, if someone calls you on it, accuse them of ‘literally well ackshually-ing’ you, because you were ‘directionally correct’ and it’s offensive to the victims to try to defend assault-committed sexual harassers.” (02/24/26)
