“Last week, the Supreme Court declined to review the California Republican Party’s request to prevent new congressional maps for the midterms, which passed after a public referendum last November: 64 percent of voters approved the measure. California’s congressional redistricting, which could net Democrats five pickups in the House, was a response to Texas, which at President Trump’s demand added up to five new Republican districts last summer. Unlike Texas, California actually made this decision through the expressed will of the public in a ballot measure,’ says Kareem Crayton, vice president of the Brennan Center’s Washington, D.C., office. ‘You could argue this isn’t just the electeds running amok.’ The Supreme Court didn’t explain the early-December order.” (02/10/25)
“If you grew up Evangelical around the time I did, you probably first heard the story of David and Bathsheba with the visual aid of a flannelgraph. That was certainly not the last time you heard it, as it is a frequently preached passage. It comes up in messages about repentance, or God using flawed people, or the compounding nature of sin, or even how idleness leads to sin. … Why are we talking about David as if he made a mistake and disobeyed God, and not that he kidnapped and raped Bathsheba, impregnated her, killed her husband, and then forced her to marry him? And then God punished David by killing her child. Do we ever once hear how she feels about any of this? Of course not. It’s not about her. It’s about David.” (02/10/26)
Source: The American Conservative
by W James Antle III
“‘Abolish ICE’ is the rallying cry heard from the streets of Minneapolis to the main stage at the Grammy awards. It’s the stick deployed against the Trump administration and the carrot consumed by Bad Bunny as he hops around at the Super Bowl. Closer to the nation’s capital, however, people have been muttering ‘abolish ice.’ The denizens of the Acela Corridor aren’t without their own misgivings about assertive immigration enforcement. But even the most hardened member of the Resistance — frozen solid — has to wonder why it takes two weeks after a moderate snowstorm for a Democratic-controlled city to plow a street or clear a sidewalk.” (02/10/26)
Source: Electronic Frontier Foundation
by Aaron Mackey
“For thirty years, internet users have benefited from a key federal law that allows everyone to express themselves, find community, organize politically, and participate in society. Section 230, which protects internet users’ speech by protecting the online intermediaries we rely on, is the legal support that sustains the internet as we know it. Yet as Section 230 turns 30 this week, there are bipartisan proposals in Congress to either repeal or sunset the law. These proposals seize upon legitimate concerns with the harmful and anti-competitive practices of the largest tech companies, but then misdirect that anger toward Section 230.” (02/09/26)
Source: The American Conservative
by Kelley Beaucar Vlahos
“There is a lot of talk about getting rid of the massive agreement that guarantees Israel billions of dollars in military aid each year. And it’s not just critics of Israel: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Senator Lindsey Graham have even said they want to ‘taper off’ the money because Israel is ready to stand on its own two feet. But while a debate over the annual package would be a most welcome one given the enormous sums of American taxpayer money that has flowed to Israel’s wars in recent years, it is important to keep an eye on what might be a bait and switch: trading one guarantee for a set of others that might be less transparent and more expensive than what’s on the books today.” (02/09/26)
“In an essay written over 15 years ago I observed that we were beginning to see a populist reaction to the rule of experts in the United States and (to a lesser extent) in Australia. In more recent essays, however, I have tended to see populism as a manifestation of interest group politics. These explanations are not mutually exclusive, but it may be useful to consider how the rule of experts and populism are both entangled with interest group politics.” (02/09/26)
“The Supreme Court has never been a democratic institution in any robust sense. From its inception, it has been insulated from popular pressure, staffed by elites, and oriented toward protecting property and hierarchy. For most of its history, it functioned as a brake on democratic change rather than an engine of it. And yet, over time, even this deeply conservative body proved somewhat responsive to shifts in public understanding. … What most distinguishes the present Supreme Court is not merely its conservatism, or even its willingness to roll back settled rights. It is the degree to which the conservative majority appears severed from shared facts altogether. This is not accidental. The modern conservative legal movement, organized and disciplined through institutions like the Federalist Society, has spent decades constructing a parallel professional universe.” (02/09/26)
“The best way to make Machu Picchu work like clockwork is, as usual, full privatization. Auction off the whole site — including the railroad — to international investors. In the short run, prices will rise, passport checks will vanish, and hours of operation will double. In the longer-run, cable cars will replace buses, and Ciudad Machu Picchu will get its own international airport. This is plausibly the most amazing archaeological site on Earth, so there’s no reason it shouldn’t be as popular as Disneyland — which gets over ten times as many visitors. Make the experience vastly more convenient, ration with money instead of queuing and aggravation, and all will be well. That said, I’m painfully aware that no electable Peruvian government will heed my advice to privatize their nation’s crown jewel. But rather than give up, I’ve concocted a much more palatable privatization proposal.” (02/09/26)
“Between an influx of funding for agencies that serve the president’s interests and cuts to departments that will ultimately cost taxpayers later on, it’s clear Republicans have no interest in curbing spending. Our tax dollars aren’t just being used to fund cruelty – they’re being used to fund idiocy. The aforementioned Big Beautiful Bill – now law – is projected to add $3.4 trillion to the already gargantuan national debt, all while decimating Medicaid access and gutting federal agencies. The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) didn’t live up to its name, only saving approximately $1.4 billion, according to Politico, and ultimately costing the U.S. government thanks to lawsuits.” (02/09/26)
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
by Jacob G Hornberger
“To justify his targeting the Cuban people with severe economic privation, including a high risk of death by starvation and illness, President Trump has declared a ‘national emergency.’ What’s the ’emergency? He says that Cuba’s communist regime poses a grave threat to the United States because, he says, it is a supporter of terrorism and because it has aligned itself with America’s ‘adversaries.’ This ‘national-emergency’ declaration is, of course, a sham and lie. Cuba has never been a threat to the United States.” (02/09/26)
