Rising, 01/07/26
Source: The Hill
“This Zohran Mamdani official wants to seize property from whites?” (01/07/26)
The “Law Enforcement” Rationale for Invading Venezuela Is an Open-Ended License for War
Source: Reason
by Jacob Sullum
“Venezuela is well rid of Nicolás Maduro, a corrupt, oppressive, and illegitimate leader who presided over that country’s continuing decline after succeeding Hugo Chávez in 2013. And judging from what happened after the 1989 invasion of Panama, when U.S. forces nabbed a similarly odious strongman who likewise faced a federal drug indictment, the courts will not stand in the way of Maduro’s prosecution. The ‘law enforcement’ rationale for Saturday’s attack on Venezuela is nevertheless both implausible and troubling. It offers an open-ended license for any president who wants to excise Congress from decisions about the use of military force, accelerating a trend that threatens to nullify its constitutional war powers.” (01/07/26)
France: Judge warns US against meddling ahead of Le Pen appeal trial
Source: Politico
“A senior French judge warned Tuesday against ‘unacceptable’ foreign interference after the U.S. reportedly considered sanctioning members of France’s judiciary. ‘If such facts were true or were to materialize, they would constitute unacceptable and intolerable interference in our country’s internal affairs,’ Peimane Ghaleh-Marzban, president of the Paris court that handled a contentious case involving far-right chief Marine Le Pen, said in an inaugural speech to new magistrates, according to AFP. His comments come after German news outlet Der Spiegel reported that the U.S. State Department had considered imposing sanctions on the judges who sentenced Le Pen to a five-year election ban last spring over embezzlement of EU funds, preventing her from running in the presidential election planned for 2027. … Le Pen, who denies all charges, will face an appeal trial from next week, with a decision expected ahead of the summer.” (01/07/26)
Is Homeownership “White Supremacy?” NYC’s New Housing Czar Thinks So
Source: Karl Dickey’s Freedom Vanguard
by Karl Dickey
“In case you’ve been hiding under a rock, you know that NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani has just appointed Cea Weaver to lead his new tenant protection office. If the name sounds familiar, it’s because Weaver is the architect of New York’s aggressive ‘cancel rent’ movements. And it’s her past comments that are currently setting the internet on fire. In resurfaced posts, Weaver labeled private property — and specifically homeownership — as a ‘tool of white supremacy.’ She has since pulled her X account. As an American, I find her perspective not just radical, but dangerously racist and seriously flawed.” (01/07/26)
https://palmbeachexaminer.substack.com/p/is-homeownership-white-supremacy
Discernment that shatters online falsehoods
Source: Christian Science Monitor
by staff
“The private lives of political leaders have long been fair game for opponents and investigative reporters – and, increasingly, amateur internet sleuths and online provocateurs. When the high-profile individuals are female, whether leaders themselves or their wives or partners, studies show that the scrutiny tends to be harsher and more speculative. ‘The scandalization and personalization of news is profitable,’ observed the Character Assassination and Reputation Politics Research Lab, a joint initiative between an American and a Dutch university. However, this trend not only ‘diminish[es] the public standing or credibility of the politician, but … also divert[s] attention from substantive policy discussions.’ Progressively powerful internet-enabled searching and sharing amplifies both facts and fictions, honest persuasion as well as embedded prejudices. This week, as the Monitor reports, a Paris court convicted 10 individuals of ‘degrading, insulting, and malicious’ cyberharassment of French first lady Brigitte Macron.” (01/06/25)
Trump Says He Will Ban Wall Street Investment in Homes
Source: US News & World Report
“U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday said his administration is moving to ban Wall Street from investing in single-family homes in a bid to reduce home prices, a potential blow for private-equity landlords that also pressured homebuilder shares. In a post on Truth Social, Trump said he was taking immediate action and would ask Congress to codify the measure, adding he would also be discussing additional housing and affordability proposals in a speech at the Davos World Economic Forum. … Wall Street landlords dispute that their investments have stoked inflation and hurt housing supply. In a January research note, Blackstone said institutions own only 0.5% of all single-family homes in the United States. It was not immediately clear what legal authority Trump would draw upon to impose such a ban on the private market purchases of houses.” (01/07/26)
The Remnant with Jonah Goldberg, 01/07/26
Source: The Dispatch
“Free Bird | Interview: Matt Ridley.” (01/07/26)
https://thedispatch.com/podcast/remnant/free-bird-interview-matt-ridley/
The W.E.B. Du Bois We Lost: Marginal Economist?
Source: The Daily Economy
by Paul McDonnold
“W.E.B. Du Bois was born in Great Barrington, Massachusetts (where AIER is now headquartered), in 1868. Today, this towering figure of the early civil rights movement is remembered as a groundbreaking sociologist, Pan-African socialist, and near-mythical hero to the intellectual left. … But there was once a W.E.B. Du Bois who was radical mainly in the scientific sense. Before drifting into the study of history and sociology, he was an economics student at Harvard. The marginal revolution had just remade the dismal science into a more mathematical and literally ‘edgy’ subject. And Du Bois made original contributions that leveraged insights from the free-market Austrian school and anticipated later developments in neoclassical economic thought, as Daniel Kuehn explains in a recent paper published in the Journal of Economic Perspectives.” (01/07/26)
https://thedailyeconomy.org/article/the-w-e-b-du-bois-we-lost-marginal-economist/
The spectacular failure of the Tim Walz Democrat
Source: Washington Examiner
by W. James Antle III
“Before Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN) became the first casualty of the burgeoning Minnesota day care fraud scandal, he was supposed to be the reason white men and working-class white people more generally might vote Democratic. Walz, who abandoned his gubernatorial reelection bid on Monday, was the Democratic nominee for vice president in 2024. He was billed as a dad’s dad, an affable football coach, a fixer of trucks who was not afraid to get his hands dirty under the hood. Instead, Walz was judged by many voters to be as ‘weird’ as he claimed Vice President JD Vance — then a freshman Ohio senator and junior partner on the 2024 Republican ticket — was. He, or at least his aides, bungled a basic football metaphor.” (01/07/25)
Syria: Regime, Kurdish forces clash in Aleppo
Source: NBC News
“The deadliest clashes so far broke out Tuesday between Syrian government forces and Kurdish fighters in a contested area of the northern city of Aleppo, as efforts to merge the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces with the national army have shown little progress. Syria ’s state-run SANA news agency said a soldier was killed and three others were wounded in an attack by the SDF. State TV later reported that three civilians, including two women, were killed and others were wounded, including two children, in shelling of a residential area that it blamed on the SDF. SANA also said nine Aleppo Directorate of Agriculture employees were wounded by SDF shelling that hit its office. The SDF in a statement denied being behind the shelling that killed the civilians and said a shell launched by ‘factions affiliated with the Damascus government’ landed in the al-Midan neighborhood.” (01/07/25)