“In its attempt to remake the federal bureaucracy, the Trump administration appears guided by three imperatives: Eliminate programs and agencies that do not fit into its agenda; exercise direct control over the remaining agencies; and enforce policies by coordinating across agencies. Political scientists sometimes refer to America as a ‘many-handed’ state, where one hand does not necessarily know what the other hand is doing. The new goal is to punch towards a common opponent and throw multiple haymakers at once. A key element of this strategy is increased data-sharing between federal agencies.” (04/21/25)
“The president’s lawyers also conflate fraud with defamation, misconstrue the commercial speech doctrine, and assert that false speech is not constitutionally protected.” (04/21/25)
“Those who hoped the second Trump Administration would reject big spending, war, and restrictions on liberty continue to be disappointed. A new disappointment came when Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced her department would in May begin enforcing the REAL ID law. Passed in 2005, the REAL ID Act created federal standards for driver’s licenses. The law requires everyone applying for a driver’s license to provide the DMV with his social security number, proof of legal residence, and two proofs of his home address. The REAL ID Act allows the Homeland Security Department to mandate, as it sees fit, the including of addition items in the related government database, including ‘biometric’ identifiers. Biometric identifiers include personal data such as retina scans, fingerprints, and DNA.” (04/21/25)
“Less than a year after announcing plans to establish a hydrogen-based aviation fuel hub at Pittsburgh International Airport, Pennsylvania-based natural gas producer CNX has quietly taken down the website on which it advertised the hub. The move comes as the fate of the much-vaunted hydrogen industry — seen by the Biden administration as a way to power America while reducing climate-altering emissions — is in upheaval. While a Biden-era rule dealt a blow to those in the gas and oil industry hoping to invest in hydrogen technology and offered greater financial incentives to the renewable energy sector, President Donald Trump is showing preference for fossil fuel-powered hydrogen. Meanwhile, the fate of those Biden-era tax credits — whether for renewable energy or fossil fuel — is up in the air as congress wades through the budget reconciliation process.” (04/22/25)
“As energy costs rise and reliability issues persist, more Americans are questioning if the investor-owned utility (IOU) model still serves their needs. Growing frustration has sparked a shift: communities across the country are exploring ways to gain more control and accountability in how their power is delivered. Many are turning to publicly owned utility models as a solution.” [editor’s note: Niskanen seems obsessed with “transmission” over long distances, when the only solution to power reliability is extreme localization (preferably to the household, or at most neighborhood, level – TLK] (04/21/25)
“The same rhetorical contortions once used by the woke left — semantic shape-shifting, moral panic, accusations that shut down argument rather than invite it — are now being used wholesale by Trump’s own administration. The champion of free speech has become a champion of selective speech, the kind that flatters the regime and shames the rest into silence. I ask readers to imagine if Joe Biden had attempted any of this — if his administration had moved to deport pro-Israel student activists, threatened Harvard over demonstrations, or equated protest signs with hate speech. Right-wing media would have had a collective stroke. They’d be setting up tripods outside every courthouse, shrieking about Marxism, totalitarianism and the end of the First Amendment. But because it’s Trump, and because the narrative suits the agenda, the outrage evaporates.” (04/21/25)
“How does Congress pass budget spending levels these days? It doesn’t. It’s really that simple. The federal government’s $6.95 trillion budget will spend more than $52,000 per household in America in 2025 and it is spending more than $38,000 of that without a single vote, and passing the remaining $13,000 with a single up-or-down, ‘should-the-government-shut-down-entirely?’ vote, just like it does every year. Gen Xers grew up watching Saturday morning cartoons, with ABC-TV’s School House Rock shorts during the commercials explaining to us then-youngsters how the process of passing a law worked under the U.S. Constitution. And now that I’ve got that catchy “I’m Just a Bill” tune locked impossibly in your head, here’s the bad news: that 1976 cartoon short marked the beginning of the end of that method of legislative budgeting.” (04/21/25)
“What’s the actual problem Donald Trump is trying to solve with tariffs? It isn’t that the United States is being victimized by an imbalanced global tariff regime, because that isn’t happening; it isn’t that the post-Cold War liberal trading order has seen other countries romp while the United States stagnates, because that hasn’t happened, either; it isn’t ‘deindustrialization,’ which hasn’t happened in the United States, or even a radical collapse in the availability of factory work, which hasn’t happened, either. Let’s look at these supposed problems one by one.” (04/21/25)
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“Pope Francis has died after using his Easter Sunday address to call for peace in Gaza. I don’t know who the cardinals will pick to replace him, but I do know with absolute certainty that there are transnational intelligence operations in the works to make sure they select a more reliable supporter of Israel. They’ve probably been working on it since his health started failing. … as far as popes go this one was decent. Francis had been an influential critic of Israel’s mass atrocities in Gaza, calling for investigation of genocide allegations and denouncing the bombing of hospitals and the murder of humanitarian workers and civilians. He’d been personally calling the only Catholic parish in Gaza by phone every night during the Israeli onslaught, even as his health deteriorated.” (04/21/25)
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
by George Ford Smith
“‘Wall Street got drunk,’ President Bush said in 2008, to which Peter Schiff replied, ‘They did. And the Fed provided the liquor!’ Schiff — who credits his understanding of markets and Austrian economics to his father’s teachings growing up — is renowned for his prediction of the Financial Crisis of 2008, years before the housing market nosedived. His position earned him the scorn and ridicule of almost every other commentator, as seen in this collection of videos, but he never blinked. The market was in trouble, not because of a lack of regulations, but because the government and the Fed were on a fiat money high.” (04/21/25)
