Source: Cobden Centre
by Philip Vande Elst
“According to the latest detailed annual survey (2026) of global freedom produced in New York by Freedom House, only 21% of the world’s population live in ‘free countries’ and global freedom has declined for the 20th consecutive year. Add to these grim statistics the huge potential threat to personal privacy and liberty posed by current advances in surveillance technology, and the desire of governments to use them, and no room for complacency should remain in anyone’s mind about the fragility of the world’s few genuinely free societies.” (07/14/26)
https://www.cobdencentre.org/2026/07/freedom/
Source: The Hill
“Robby Soave gives his radar on a viral photo of Denver Democratic Socialists wearing masks at their recent meeting celebrating Melat Kiros’ victory in the state’s Democratic primary.” (07/14/26)
https://thehill.com/hilltv/5962177-rising-july-14-2026/
Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by Ninos P Malek
“Is it the legitimate role of government to pressure or threaten private businesses over the prices they voluntarily charge for their own property? Most economists would begin with the basic function of prices. Market prices are not arbitrary numbers; they communicate information about scarcity, demand, costs, and alternatives. When prices are allowed to adjust freely, they coordinate millions of decisions made by consumers, producers, wholesalers, and retailers. That is why virtually every textbook on the principles of economics warns that government-imposed price controls—whether they are ceilings intended to ‘protect consumers’ or floors designed to guarantee sellers a ‘fair price’—produce unintended consequences.” (07/14/26)
https://fee.org/articles/price-fixing-at-the-pump/
Source: France 24 [French state media]
“The World Health Organization said on Tuesday that a deadly Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo could be four times bigger than official figures suggest. According to the DR Congo’s latest official figures, the haemorrhagic fever has infected more than 1,960 people and killed over 700 since it was detected two months ago. But WHO emergencies director Chikwe Ihekweazu told reporters in Geneva that its modelling indicated ‘the scale of the outbreak is at least two to four times the number of cases that we have found’. According to official numbers, this is already one of the largest Ebola outbreaks recorded, with the virus spreading faster than ever seen before.” (07/14/26)
https://www.france24.com/en/africa/20260714-scale-dr-congo-ebola-outbreak-could-be-four-times-bigger-than-official-toll-who-says
Source: Show-Me Institute
“A U.S. Attorney’s Perspective on Criminal Justice Reform with Thomas C. Albus.” (07/14/26)
https://showmeinstitute.org/article/state-and-local-government/a-u-s-attorneys-perspective-on-criminal-justice-reform-with-thomas-c-albus/
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
by Kevin Van Elswyk
“Pikachu is a yellow mouse and the internationally-recognized mascot of the Pokémon Franchise. Pokémon’s beginning was a game and disconnected (‘Pocket Monsters’) playing cards decades ago. Over time, it has spawned a TV series, a monopoly game, and a worldwide card collection fever. The tangible cards are now an ersatz currency to reward chore completion, trade for other cards, cash, and bitcoin. Bartering lives, and the card collection fever illustrates Austrian economics.” (07/14/26)
https://mises.org/power-market/pikachus-pokemon-price-information
Source: Fox News
by Liz Peek
“Democrats are lying to voters, claiming to be the party that can deliver ‘affordability.’ Nothing could be farther from the truth. … Democrat-run cities and states are, with few exceptions, the most expensive in the nation. The reasons include pro-labor rules that drive up wages and costs, regulatory overreach that creates hurdles and delays, energy policies that inflate electricity and gasoline bills, and reckless spending, which leads to high taxes. High taxes, another Democrat specialty, inflate the price of everything as they are passed along to the consumer.” (07/14/26)
https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/liz-peek-democrats-affordability-scam-collapses-states-they-run
Source: Fox News
“Public confidence in American higher education has taken a fresh hit, erasing a brief period of recovery, as concerns over campus politics and financial value intensify, according to a new Gallup poll obtained by Fox News Digital. The latest data reveals that just 38% of U.S. adults maintain a ‘great deal’ or ‘quite a lot’ of confidence in higher education. The figure represents a noticeable drop from last year, when trust in the sector experienced a modest uptick to 42%. … The current 38% confidence mark underscores a steep, long-term decline from 2015, when 57% of Americans expressed solid trust in higher education. Significant drops followed in 2018 and 2023.” (07/14/26)
https://www.foxnews.com/media/confidence-higher-education-slips-brief-recovery-gallup-poll-finds
Source: National Review
“That Big, Bad, Evil GDP Thing.” (07/14/26)
https://www.nationalreview.com/podcasts/capital-record/that-big-bad-evil-gdp-thing/
Source: Adam Smith Institute
by Miles Saltiel
“Burnham’s Manchester model is a game of bait and switch. It uses funds obtained from the Public Works Loan Board, an arm of the Treasury, which explicitly declines to look at the uses to which its money is put. Manchester loans these funds on to local projects, also free of arm’s-length scrutiny, in effect using the national credit rating for local projects. This brings to mind other public borrowers who believed that big Daddy would keep them out of trouble (bankers call malarkey of this kind ‘moral hazard’) leading to, eg, Argentine defaults, where provincial profligacy hides behind central guarantees. The Manchester model is not yet a big thing in the UK, but Burnham gives the impression that he believes he’s found the secret sauce.” (07/14/26)
https://www.adamsmith.org/blog/on-the-manchester-model
