“California’s state government, which has run up $11,511 in debt per resident, is asking voters to approve more billions of dollars in bonds, to be paid back by taxpayers at a later date. The cost of carrying that extra debt will be added to the roughly $6 billion the state pays each year to service bonds issued in the past. But the Golden State isn’t the most debt-burdened state in the country. Connecticut and New Jersey are the most heavily burdened per capita, while Utah carries the least debt per person. The reasons for running up those obligations vary, but the heavier the load, the more taxpayers will have to carry in the years to come.” (11/02/26)
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“The most significant political reality of our time is also the most under-discussed political reality, and it can be summed up as follows: There are a whole lot more of us than there are of them, and we can force revolutionary change whenever we want. That’s it. There are a whole lot more ordinary people suffering under the status quo system of capitalism, imperialism, militarism and authoritarianism than there are people benefiting from it, and we can use the power of our numbers to overthrow that system whenever we decide to. It’s self-evident, and so simple that you can sum it up in a single sentence. But because our society is so deeply indoctrinated and mind-controlled, it simply doesn’t show up in the normal every day conversations people have about politics and the problems we face as a society today.” (11/02/26)
“2026 will be the most expensive midterm election ever, with nearly $11 billion spent just on political advertising. Americans don’t like the scale of the spending and fear that big-money contributors will buy elections or legislation. Notwithstanding these concerns, campaign finance reformers have been unable to stem the flow of lucre into our politics, especially with courts repeatedly siding with the campaign spenders. But perhaps we are focused on the wrong harms from money in politics and, as a result, losing sight of the reforms that can really make a difference. ” (11/02/26)
“On a cursory glance, the latest controversy over French soccer star Kylian Mbappé’s remark about Mao Zedong, and the string of obsequious apologies that followed it, might seem like just that: an ideological controversy, a fight over claims of offensive speech, or an absurd blip in the endless string of culture wars. But treating this as another eye-roll-inducing dustup would be a mistake. That’s because the fallout from Mbappé’s mild comment offers an insightful window into one of the most effective and widespread censorship campaigns today: the pervasive influence over how anyone, anywhere talks about China’s sensitive political issues. Authoritarians control how they are spoken about in life. And, apparently, even in death.” (11/02/26)
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
by Jacob G Hornberger
“I have the utmost respect for law professor Jonathan Turley. My admiration for him is reflected by the fact that he has been a speaker at at least two Future of Freedom Foundation conferences. However, I completely disagree with his critique of the concept of jury nullification, which he presented in an article this week entitled, ‘You Have This Superpower,’ which appeared on Turley’s website Res Ipsa Loquitur. Turley maintains that jury nullification constitutes an ‘assault on the integrity of our courts … a direct assault on the very foundation of the American court system.’ Nothing could be further from the truth. In actuality, as the British people and our American ancestors understood so well, jury nullification, which is an inherent part of the jury system, is a protection against the tyranny of one’s own government.” (11/02/26)
“My own hopes for what Democrats will (and will not) do after Tuesday undoubtedly differ greatly from those of most progressives—who, it should be noted, have not ‘taken over’ the party nearly as much as alarming narratives on the right suggest. But on the election itself, I join both progressives and liberals in wishing for a decisive result. I’m glad to note that some very strong critics of the left share that wish as well—from Andrew Sullivan (‘vote for anyone other than a Republican. … We need to send a deafening message’) to Peggy Noonan (‘Let it be a clear and obvious rebuke—a rejection, a rebellion, a rout’).” (11/02/26)
“‘Back in 1836, Houston said to Travis, / ‘Get some volunteers and go, / fortify the Alamo.’ / Well, the men came from Texas, / and from old Tennessee, / And they joined up with Travis, / Just to fight for the right to be free’ … That’s what TEXANS used to believe. And many of us, hopefully most of us, still do. But I’ll bet my last bottom dollar that James Talarico and his Texas Democrats don’t believe it. The question that forms the title of this article is absolutely ridiculous, of course — ridiculous to think that great men like Crockett, Bowie, William Travis, Almaron Dickenson, and approximately 180 other men, who fought and died for freedom against a corrupt military dictatorship from a country that’s now trying to overrun Texas again, it is impossible to think that such men would have given their lives for a … traitor, like James Talarico.” (11/02/26)
“How do we know how much a nation values athleticism? Spectacle? Hate for the college down the road and its insufferable student body? For the free-marketeer, the answer might be ‘profit.’ Whatever universities can charge for tickets, broadcast rights, merchandise, stadium beer, and more, balanced by what athletes are willing to play for and fans to pay, yields what college sports is worth. But college athletics might involve goods that transcend profit and loss: thrill of victory and agony of defeat, ‘nonrevenue’ sports we often overlook but love during the Olympics, amateurism, and more. We are also far from a free market in college sports because government is deeply involved, including through state universities and antitrust law.” (11/02/26)
“The United States began vaccinating against Covid-19 on 14 December 2020. Two CDC programs were designed and paid to catch any harm that clinical trials had missed. VAERS takes reports from doctors, patients and manufacturers. V-safe sends vaccinated people text messages asking how they feel. Here we follow the paper trail of those two systems from the Christmas 2020 rollout into 2022. The bottom line: The government’s ‘worst case’ for amount of Covid vaccine injury reports assumed 1,000 reports a day. For fourteen months it was double that. For some of those months, it was triple.” (11/02/26)
“With all of President Donald Trump’s wars – Iran, Yemen, Ukraine, Nigeria, Somalia, Venezuela, and cartels – it’s easy to lose track of what is happening on the Korean Peninsula. However, since Trump returned to the White House, a series of developments on the Korean Peninsula have increased the risk that a relatively minor border incident could escalate into a much larger conflict. The first, and potentially most important, was a policy shift by Pyongyang that began before Trump returned to the White House. North Korea abandoned its longstanding goal of reunification with South Korea, moving toward treating the Military Demarcation Line (MDL) as an international border.” (11/02/26)
