Source: The UnPopulist
“Americans Have Never Had Less Recourse for the US Government Violating Rights: A Conversation With Steve Vladeck.” (03/06/26)
https://www.theunpopulist.net/p/americans-have-never-had-less-recourse
Source: The American Conservative
by Jason Lewis
“Trump personifies his own movement, so perhaps he has the prerogative of redefining it. But ‘regime change’ from Tehran to Moscow has little in common with non-interventionism. And if the U.S. was devoted to keeping ‘lunatics’ from enriching uranium for a nuke, North Korea and Pakistan (where Osama Bin Laden hung out) wouldn’t have one. No, this is ‘regime change,’ and whatever side you may be on and however you parse it, it’s at odds with a whole lot of Trump supporters. The only thing that those of us who harbor doubts about it can say is, ‘I hope he’s right.’ Because if he’s not, the midterms are finished — and so is America First.” (03/06/26)
Source: The Intercept
by Domenic Powell
“DHS has built a national police force with massive surveillance capabilities — which it could use to interfere with our elections.” (03/06/26)
https://theintercept.com/2026/03/06/democrats-dhs-ice-reform-midterm-election-integrity/
Source: The American Prospect
by Whitney Curry Wimbish
“House lawmakers on the Judiciary Committee debated a proposal Thursday that would force state and local police to help federal agents conduct deportations or risk losing federal funding. Not only would it essentially hold local jurisdictions hostage, Democratic lawmakers said, it also violates states’ rights. The bill, the Shut Down Sanctuary Policies Act, aims to punish Los Angeles, New York, and other cities that have policies limiting cooperation with federal agents, such as restrictions on honoring ICE detainers, providing access to jails, and sharing information about individuals’ immigration status. These cities have been in the crosshairs of the Trump administration for months; Attorney General Pam Bondi last year published a hit list of sanctuary jurisdictions, saying they cause risk to American citizens ‘by design’.” (03/06/26)
https://prospect.org/2026/03/06/ice-deportation-immigrant-sanctuary-cities-hr-7640-congress/
Source: US News & World Report
“Cuban officials said they expect to restart a large thermoelectric plant on Saturday after it shut down earlier in the week, sparking a massive blackout. Felix Estrada Rodríguez, a top engineer at Cuba’s Electric Union, told state-owned Canal Caribe that the Antonio Guiteras plant should be operating by Saturday afternoon. Crews have repaired a broken boiler at the plant that caused the outage on Wednesday, leaving millions without power in the island’s western region. … Cuba’s Electric Union said in a statement Saturday that only 1,000 megawatts of power were available, less than half of the island’s current demand. It did not say how many customers remained without power. The blackout, the second such outage to affect western Cuba in three months, was blamed on a crumbling electric grid and a lack of fuel.” (03/07/26)
Source: Reason
“Andrew Heaton takes stock of the United States on its 250th birthday.” (03/06/26)
https://reason.com/video/2026/03/06/americas-performance-review/
Source: Expression
by John Coleman
“When the Trump administration demanded changes to Anthropic’s AI system and backed it up with a threat to seize the system or blacklist the company, the message was clear: comply or be crushed. But cut through the rhetoric and the real question is whether Washington can bankrupt a company for saying no to the Pentagon. Though the media is busy framing this as a national security showdown, it actually poses a constitutional concern. It is a test of whether the federal government can weaponize its contracting power to force a private company to bend the knee.” (03/06/26)
https://expression.fire.org/p/who-controls-private-ai-systems-in
Source: Free Association
by Sheldon Richman
“Rothbard is surely right that, by definition, in a country or world of private property, the owners would set the rules for their own parcels, leaving others to shop around for situations that best suit their values. But let’s be clear here. It would not be the case that no one could enter a property ‘unless invited,’ as he put it in the first quotation above. Walmart does not invite particular people to its stores. Neither does McDonald’s. They have open borders during business hours. It’s a standing invitation to everyone and anyone who’s peaceful. So the word ‘invited’ is misleading.” (03/06/26)
https://sheldonrichman.substack.com/p/tgif-more-on-immigration-and-rothbard
Source: Astral Codex Ten
by Scott Alexander
“California lets interest groups propose measures for the state ballot. Anyone who gathers enough signatures (currently 874,641) can put their hare-brained plans before voters during the next election year. This year, the big story is the 2026 Billionaire Tax Act, a 5% wealth tax on California’s billionaires. … On one level, it’s no surprise that California, a state full of bad socialists, is considering bad socialist policy. But I think this is the wrong perspective. This proposition isn’t being sponsored by some generic group of Piketty-reading leftists. It’s the project of SEIU (Service Employees International Union) a union of mostly healthcare workers.” (03/06/26)
Source: The Daily Economy
by Kimberlee Josephson
“Productivity depends not just on systems and incentives, but on human action, aspirations, and judgment.” (03/06/26)