Source: The Daily Economy
by Julia R Cartwright

“One year after fires tore through the Los Angeles region, devastation remains etched into the landscape, not only in the thousands of empty lots, but also in the near absence of rebuilding. More than 13,000 homes were destroyed across Los Angeles County; 12 months later, just 28 have been rebuilt. What should have been a story of recovery instead reveals deeper institutional failure. Despite political urgency, partial regulatory reforms, and repeated promises of speed, reconstruction has stalled under the weight of a collapsing insurance market, regulatory overreach, labor shortages, and soaring construction costs.” (02/16/26)

https://thedailyeconomy.org/article/with-fewer-than-16-homes-rebuilt-in-a-year-whats-blocking-las-fire-recovery/

Source: The Intercept
by Jeremy Busby

“American prisons have never been much for the First Amendment, and now, the Trump administration is exporting prison-style censorship to the general population. In tactics that are easily recognizable to incarcerated people like me, they’re doing it in the name of ‘security.’ This includes claiming antiestablishment ideologies and literature must be punished because they pose nebulous risks to those with government-approved political views. It also includes the logical next step: criminalizing efforts to keep authorities from finding out that one holds those ideologies or reads that literature.” (02/16/26)

https://theintercept.com/2026/02/16/daniel-sanchez-estrada-prairieland-trial-zines/

Source: Washington Monthly
by Jonathan Alter

“Presidents’ Day is a good day to rank presidents. There’s debate about the top three — my choices are Lincoln, Washington, and FDR — but no suspense about who’s bringing up the rear. Even if he racks up an achievement or two in the next couple of years, we can be confident that Donald Trump will be viewed as the worst president in U.S. history, with Richard Nixon now a distant second. Yes, historians said that in his first term, and more than 70 million Americans ignored his coup attempt and returned him to office. But Trump has no road back now; the country as a whole is finished with him. This period reminds me of 1943, when the Allies knew we would eventually defeat the fascists, but only after a lot more death and destruction.” (02/16/26)

https://washingtonmonthly.com/2026/02/16/worst-president-in-us-history-donald-trump/

Source: Law & Liberty
by Brian Pawlowski

“Thomas Jefferson enshrined our ideals in the Declaration of Independence with words every American recognizes: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.’ But he immediately followed that soaring statement with something just as important: ‘That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.’ Ideals alone were never meant to stand. They required durable forms capable of securing and sustaining them. Those forms were later prescribed in the Constitution.” (02/16/26)

https://lawliberty.org/americas-atomic-habits/

Source: Common Dreams
by James Zogby

“When President Donald Trump convened his so-called Board of Peace in Davos, Switzerland, a key item on the agenda was to endorse his son-in-law Jared Kushner’s extravagant (and, I might add, detached from reality) plan for a ‘New Gaza’. The rendering of Kushner’s scheme shows it to be more of a luxury resort for wealthy tourists than the foundation of a just future for the Palestinian victims of Israel’s genocide. But since the raison d’être of the Board of Peace was supposed to be dealing with the aftermath of Israel’s war on Gaza, the conversation, by necessity, had to address the needs of hundreds of thousands of now-homeless Palestinians. Thus, Kushner presented a proposal for a model Palestinian community (the ‘New Rafah’) he intends to build to house Palestinians in Gaza. The plans for this New Rafah have been circulated since the meeting.” (02/16/26)

https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/peace-palestinian-rights