“Given that the 1980s and 1990s were in the wheelhouse of every Baby Boomer’s working career, I could see where the attitude would be that getting an education and working hard would lead to success. Extrapolating this thinking to the younger generations, it would make sense for Boomers to believe that the younger generations, having an even higher percentage with a college degree, just need to keep working hard and they will also achieve the same level of success. However, there are several major flaws in this thought process.” (01/08/26)
“For most of us, Friday, February 6, 2026, is likely to feel no different than Thursday, February 5th. It will be a work or school day for many of us. It might involve shopping for the weekend or an evening get-together with friends, or any of the other mundane tasks of life. But from a world-historical perspective, that day will represent a dramatic turning point, with far-reaching and potentially catastrophic consequences. For the first time in 54 years, the world’s two major nuclear-weapons powers, Russia and the United States, will not be bound by any arms-control treaties and so will be legally free to cram their nuclear arsenals with as many new warheads as they wish — a step both sides appear poised to take.” (01/08/25)
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
by Isaias Lobão
“Imagine yourself sailing on a boat through a serene and breathtaking sea. The waters shine around you, inviting and attractive, but they hide grave dangers ahead. This is ‘listening to the mermaid’s song’ — being deceived by something that, while it sounds charming, leads to ruin. … While strolling through the launch section of a bookstore in Brasilia, I came across a work that can be seen as a true modern siren song: the Portuguese translation of the book It’s OK to Be Angry About Capitalism by US Senator Bernie Sanders (Cia das Letras, 2024). Such work exemplifies how appealing ideologies can seduce audiences with seemingly irresistible but misleading and destructive promises. Like the sailors of antiquity, many may be tempted by these ideas without realizing the underlying dangers they carry.” (01/08/26)
“President Donald Trump violated his sworn and paramount obligations to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution when he ordered his invasion of Venezuela without congressional authorization and when he attacked a member state of the U.N. without U.N. authorization. James Madison himself argued at the Constitutional Convention that if a president could both declare war and wage war, he’d be a prince; not unlike the British monarch from whose authority the 13 colonies had just seceded. And the American drafters of the U.N. Charter, indeed American senators who voted to ratify it, understood that its very purpose was to prevent unlawful and morally unjustified attacks by one member nation upon another.” (01/08/26)
“Oh good. Now we have a war to focus on. Everyone’s tired of Epstein by now, and tired of the possibility that the bad guy may be, ho hum, our own national leader, aka, the commander in chief. So the commander in chief has stepped in for the sake of the public good, bestowing on America a far more traditional enemy to hate and fear and let dominate the headlines: narco-terrorists. I’m still trying to grasp the fact that President Donald Trump has actually invaded Venezuela. He’s no longer simply bombing boats in the ocean.” (01/08/25)
“In the words of legal scholar Timothy Sandefur, the concept of law includes certain rational elements such as clear formal rules and procedures, without which a legislative enactment cannot be ‘law’ in any real sense. He explains it this way: ‘Law is the use of government’s coercive powers in the service of some general principle; that is, under some intelligible theoretical regularity, and not based on the mere ipse dixit of the legislative body. Law is the use of coercion for public purposes, not for the personal interest of the lawmaking authority.’ So understood the Trump administration’s disfigurement of both the letter and spirit of the law to fit the personal vanity and passing vendettas of the person who, let us remember, was originally appointed by the American founders to preside over the faithful execution of the law is itself a shameful repudiation of the elementary principles of American jurisprudence.” (01/08/26)
“The year is 1983. At 8pm sharp on 28 February, 106 million viewers tune in to watch the M*A*S*H finale. The next day, everyone from truck drivers to corporate attorneys had the same reference points. For years, M*A*S*H functioned as a national ritual, allowing families across the country to laugh at the same jokes and debate the same plot twists. Of course, it wasn’t just M*A*S*H. Everyone could assume that nearly everyone else had seen shows like Seinfeld or Dallas. … This anchored social life in common references and fostered a sense of collective identity. This logic could also be applied to cinema … music … video games … or even software … Today, that sense of shared cultural experience has eroded and been replaced by a landscape of personalised content that appeals to ever-diminishing niches.” (01/08/26)
“In the year since Donald Trump returned to power, the United States has become — as one of Trump’s supporters, Rep. Andy Ogles of Tennessee, admiringly put it on Wednesday — ‘the dominant predator’ in the Western Hemisphere. Trump has extorted Canada and Ukraine, threatened Panama and Colombia, invaded Venezuela, and deployed the American military to loot Venezuela’s oil. Now Trump is now circling back to a familiar target: Greenland. He doesn’t care that the island territory and its parent country, Denmark, have done nothing to deserve aggression. Nor does he care that they’re part of NATO. And he’s utterly indifferent — just as he’s always been with his abuse of women — to their requests to be left alone. He keeps threatening and harassing Greenland and Denmark, no matter how many times they ask him to stop.” (01/08/26)
“As for the estimated $8 billion in government (taxpayer) money stolen by crooks in Minnesota, people demand answers to many questions. But the 800-pound elephant/question goes unasked: Why is government in the business of welfare in the first place? Where in the Constitution does it permit the federal government to extract money from taxpayers for charity? Years ago, I worked full time one summer as a ‘loaned executive’ for the United Way of Cleveland. My job was to meet with CEOs of companies, tell them the story of the United Way and hopefully arrange for me to make a presentation to the company’s employees, take questions and then ask for donations. Through this process, the United Way raised and donated money to other nonprofits involved in community activities such as preschooling, counseling ‘at-risk’ youths, after-school academic programs, care for the sick and elderly and youth sports programs, among other local initiatives.” (01/08/25)
