No One Owns the Word Meat

Source: Reason
by Paul Shapiro

“Critics of the growing plant-based meat business say that unless a burger began with a heartbeat, it has no right to be called ‘meat.’ … More than a century ago, another incumbent industry tried to defend its turf by insisting that a new technology could imitate nature but never deserve nature’s name. The product was ice. America’s lucrative natural ice industry was being disrupted by a cheaper, cleaner, more reliable competitor: manufactured ice, or as its detractors insisted it be called, artificial ice. The incumbent industry fought back with a message that sounds remarkably familiar today: the new thing was an imitation, an artificial product masquerading as nature’s own.” (06/30/26)

https://reason.com/2026/06/30/no-one-owns-the-word-meat/

Thomas L. Knapp

Trump reports $1.4 billion in cryptocurrency income in government filing

Source: Al Jazeera [Qatari state media]

“A new government report has shown that United States President Donald Trump made millions from cryptocurrency and settlements with media companies last year, raising questions about possible conflicts of interest. On Tuesday, the US Office of Government Ethics released annual financial disclosure forms for both Trump and his vice president, JD Vance. One 927-page document itemises all of Trump’s reported assets and income for 2025. They include more than $1.4bn from his family’s cryptocurrency ventures. Trump received more than $500m from World Liberty Financial, a crypto venture he and his sons co-founded. The president also reported another $635m from the sale of his $TRUMP meme coins.” (06/30/26)

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/6/30/donald-trump-reports-1-4bn-in-cryptocurrency-income-in-government-filing?traffic_source=rss

Thomas L. Knapp

Birthright citizenship should never have been in question

Source: Los Angeles Times
by Erwin Chemerinsky

“This should have been an easy case for the Supreme Court. When the Constitution was penned in 1787, the founders followed English law and determined that everyone born in the country was deemed a citizen. This was followed until the Supreme Court’s tragic 1857 decision in Dred Scott vs. Sandford, which held that enslaved individuals were property of their owners and that they were not U.S. citizens, even if they had been born in the country. The first sentence of the first section of the 14th Amendment, adopted in 1868, was meant to expressly and unquestionably overrule this decision.” (06/30/26)

https://archive.is/rwWHy

Thomas L. Knapp

The Economics of Reconciliation on America’s 250th Birthday

Source: American Greatness
by Edward Ring

“On the advent of America’s 250th anniversary, the conventional narrative is that our country is deeply divided. Typical takes on the state of disunity in the United States include this headline from a guest op-ed that recently appeared in USA Today, ‘America celebrated together at 200. We won’t at 250’, and ‘We still had a sense of oneness then. We no longer do’. In a related news article, the publication cited major national surveys that ‘consistently show an anxious nation’ and ‘a divisive president’. These observations aren’t wrong, but the divisions they cite (partisan politics, old vs. young, racial polarization, bitter disagreements over social issues) are missing the biggest source of alienation of all, which is diminished economic opportunity. Fully half of American households report living paycheck to paycheck.” (07/01/26)

https://amgreatness.com/2026/07/01/the-economics-of-reconciliation-on-americas-250th-birthday/

Steve Trinward

As Pentagon stays quiet, AP reconstructs US strike that killed more than 100 Iranian children

Source: SFGate

“It was the deadliest reported strike in the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran, and most of the victims were children. Yet over four months since a U.S. missile struck an Iranian primary school, there is no final accounting of what happened. The Trump administration has not directly accepted the blame, though the military possessed evidence almost immediately that the site had been struck, a U.S. official with knowledge of the situation, speaking anonymously to discuss an ongoing investigation. told The Associated Press. Drawing from interviews with U.S. officials, human rights workers and Iranians in direct contact with rescuers and families of victims, the AP reconstructed the strike and its aftermath to reveal new details of what happened. Most requested anonymity for fear of retribution against them and their sources.” (07/01/26)

https://www.sfgate.com/news/world/article/a-us-missile-killed-iranian-schoolchildren-four-22328004.php

Steve Trinward

The Federal Government Cannot Solve the Housing Crisis

Source: Independent Institute
by Christopher J Calton

“With the median sale price of a single-family home exceeding $400,000 since the pandemic, federal politicians have been champing at the bit to show voters they are working to lower housing costs. The recently passed bipartisan 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act is Congress’s attempt to expand the housing supply. It awaits the president’s signature. The problem is that there is little the federal government can do to solve a crisis that is primarily the byproduct of local regulations. The local nature of the housing shortage is apparent when comparing housing costs in San Francisco, where the median single-family home price has reached a staggering $2 million, and Houston, where the median home sells for only $371,000.” (06/30/26)

https://www.independent.org/article/2026/06/30/the-federal-government-cannot-solve-the-housing-crisis/

Thomas L. Knapp