Source: Astral Codex Ten
by Scott Alexander
“‘Stochastic terrorism’ is the idea that if you spread fear and mistrust against a target, then eventually people will commit violence against that target, and it will be your fault, even if you never specifically said the words ‘you should commit violence’. … The ‘stochastic terrorism’ concept is near-unique in how effectively it can be discredited merely by listing many examples of its use together in the same place.” (07/16/26)
https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/against-stochastic-terrorism
Source: USA Today
“Fresno City Attorney Andrew Janz was furious to learn that the Trump administration is threatening to withhold grant money the city uses to help prosecute rapists — all because the California city was deemed a refuge for immigrants. ‘Justice for victims shouldn’t be politicized. It has nothing to do with immigration enforcement,’ Janz told USA TODAY. It’s the latest example of the Trump administration’s promise to withhold funding from cities it calls ‘sanctuary jurisdictions.’ It pressures cities to sign cooperation agreements with Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials with the strongest tool at its disposal: money.” (07/16/26)
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2026/07/16/us-cities-police-ambulance-funding-rape-kits-ice-doj/90903355007/
Source: Cobden Centre
by Tim Price
“The chances are, if you speak to any financial adviser, they’ll tell you that asset allocation – how you divide up your investible pot among the major asset classes, including debt, equity, property, commodities and alternative investments – is the single most important investment decision you will make. And they’re right to do so.” (07/16/26)
https://www.cobdencentre.org/2026/07/how-to-avoid-the-crash/
Source: New York Times
“The former chief executive of an Italian highway operator was handed a 12-year prison sentence by an Italian court on Thursday for lapses that contributed to the collapse of a major bridge in Genoa in 2018 that killed 43 people. The former executive, Giovanni Castellucci, oversaw the highway operator, Autostrade per l’Italia, that ran the bridge — named for its designer, Riccardo Morandi — when the structure failed on Aug. 14, 2018. … Since July 2022, Mr. Castellucci had stood trial with 56 other defendants, including others from the company and civil servants from the Transport Ministry. Mr. Castellucci was convicted of negligence and manslaughter, and prosecutors had asked for a sentence of about 18 years.” (07/16/26)
https://archive.is/hXAIM
Source: CounterPunch
by John Kendall Hawkins
“Terminator 2: Judgment Day gave us intelligence as hunter. Ex Machina gave us intelligence as deceiver. Transcendence gave us intelligence as god. Surveillance, then persuasion, then something close to apotheosis. The films did not plan this arc together, but placed end to end they map the territory we now live in with an accuracy that ought to make us uneasy.” (07/16/26)
https://www.counterpunch.org/2026/07/16/the-god-in-the-machine-comes-with-an-owner/
Source: Law & Liberty
by Dennis Wieboldt
“Conservatives in Washington now seek to leverage their newfound power over American higher education more decisively than ever before. But not-too-distant history reveals that reform efforts led principally by the executive branch may come with unintended consequences. Indeed, that is the lesson of one major clash involving race, religious liberty, and Bob Jones University that unfolded less than 50 years ago before the US Supreme Court. By recalling the circumstances under which Bob Jones University v. United States reached the Court, both conservatives and progressives will find lessons about the perils that accompany the aggressive use of executive power to reform American colleges and universities.” (07/16/26)
https://lawliberty.org/bob-joness-warning/
Source: Townhall
by Mark Lewis
“Thomas Jefferson, as he nearly always did, nailed the point exactly. History shows that, as government grows, human liberty decreases. There is a metaphysical reason for this, and our Founders based the American system upon it. It runs like this. ‘People power’ is called liberty—the right to do what one wishes (in harmony with virtue and the laws of God). ‘Government power,’ when abused, is called tyranny. Government becomes necessary when people misuse their ‘power,’ their liberty, by living unvirtuous lives, which infringe on the rights of others. Thus, for that reason, government becomes necessary. But government power always limits somebody’s ‘liberty’—and again, sometimes, necessarily so.” (07/16/26)
https://townhall.com/columnists/marklewis/2026/07/16/mr-jefferson-and-our-two-criminal-enemies-n2679543
Source: Newsday
“Filings for unemployment benefits fell last week to the lowest level in 10 weeks as U.S. layoffs remain historically low. The number of Americans applying for jobless aid in the week ending July 11 dropped by 8,000 to 208,000, the Labor Department reported Thursday. That’s well below the 219,000 new applications forecast by analysts surveyed by the data firm FactSet. Weekly filings for unemployment benefits are considered a proxy for layoffs and are close to a real-time indicator of the health of the U.S. job market.” (07/16/26)
https://www.newsday.com/business/unemployment-benefits-jobless-claims-layoffs-labor-k38451
Source: Ron Paul Liberty Report
“Kushner And Witkoff: Diplomats Or Shady ‘Deal-Makers’?” (07/16/26)
https://x.com/i/broadcasts/1kJzDDmXZXXKv
Source: The Daily Economy
by Per Bylund
“A common but erroneous belief about entrepreneurship is that success is a property of the entrepreneurial idea itself. Sometimes described as an ‘opportunity’ that was out there waiting to be discovered and exploited, all it took for the successful entrepreneur was to come up with the ‘right’ idea at the right time. … Many of my students majoring in entrepreneurship suffer from believing in this myth: that it is the idea that makes the business and their success. Consequently, they seek that one great idea that will make them rich and successful. And when they find it, they therefore want to keep their idea secret and not tell anyone about it before launching the business. In stark contrast, practically all experienced entrepreneurs have the opposite view.” (07/16/26)
https://thedailyeconomy.org/article/entrepreneurship-requires-more-than-a-million-dollar-idea/