06/29 -- Afghanistan: Dozens of civilians killed in Pakistani air strikes; In defense of anonymity, the guard dog of free expression
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Thomas L. Knapp
Jun 29, 2026, 6:18:35 AM (8 days ago) Jun 29
to Freedom News Daily
Freedom News Daily, 06/29/26
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Today's Freedom News:
1) Afghanistan: Dozens of civilians killed in Pakistani air strikes
2) Bitcoin dips to $59,700
3) Russia: Putin details fuel shortages after Ukrainian drone strikes
4) US, Iranian regimes allegedly agree to halt strikes and meet this week
5) Uganda: Military chief orders shutdown of two media outlets
6) LA: Letlow wins GOP primary runoff for US Senate
7) Serbia: Vucic Says He Will Resign as President
8) Uber expands US driver background checks after sexual assault lawsuits
9) UK: Senior Labour figures say party is united behind Burnham
10) Archaeologists in Israel uncover 1,700-year-old Roman-era statues buried face down
11) CA: Pot company skyrockets to $1 billion valuation following Trump action
12) “Vespa is a way of life”: Thousands ride through Rome as Italy’s iconic scooter turns 80
13) Iraq: Officials, including lawmakers, arrested on corruption charges in overnight raid
14) Trump to nominate former Oklahoma state trooper as ICE gang shot-caller
15) Burkina Faso: Regime severs diplomatic ties with France
16) Vatican accuses EU of double standards on war
17) AOC whines that tech companies think they’re as very special and important as her
18) Trump regime allows Anthropic to release Mythos AI model to some companies, government agencies
19) CA: Lawsuit claims Oakland police suffocated ex-NFL player Doug Martin to death
20) China fires up world’s biggest superconducting magnet for nuclear fusion project
Today's Freedom Commentary:
21) In defense of anonymity, the guard dog of free expression
22) Blame the War, Not the Peace Deal, for Iran’s Leverage
23) Mail Voting Proposal: Make an Example of Steiner
24) In Defense of “Sweatshops”: Path to End Poverty Runs through Cheap Labor
25) None Dare Call It Socialism
26) What capitalism [sic] will look like in space
27) We’re against easing the pain of paying tax
28) “You’re next!” Democrats discover the mob has a mind of its own.
29) Iran War’s Biggest Winners: Defense Contractors & Big Oil
30) Recognizing the dangers of democracy
31) Leftist Dems thrown under bus, with socialists in the driver’s seat
32) The President’s Birthright Citizenship Order is Not Just Unconstitutional. It’s Crazy
33) Poem: The Din
34) How fearmongering sets policy, from “marihuana” to solar to AI
35) Why I Launched a Writing Community for Education Entrepreneurs
36) What if Trump is right to pump the brakes on the most advanced AI?
37) Democrats Ask: Obama Who?
38) Reclaiming the Third Space
39) Under Pressure
40) Trump’s Latest Election Power Grab Runs Through the Postal Service
41) Rogue Supreme Court Blesses Ethnic Cleansing
42) The Unfortunate Necessity of Court Packing to Stop America’s Authoritarian Drift
43) The Myth of Nationalist Victory: The Articles of Confederation and the Bank of North America
44) Justice Matters: Jury Service Gives Extraordinary Power for Ordinary People
45) Save American Lives & Prosperity by Cutting FDA Bureaucracy
46) Don’t Let the Country’s Wet Blankets Ruin Independence Day
47) Should Smartphones be Banned in Schools? A Look at the Research
48) The Iran war is the most unpopular major conflict in US history
49) Why Some Unions Are Joining the Call to “Freeze the Rent”
50) War and Constitutional Indifference
Today's Freedom Podcast and Video:
51) The Chris Spangle Show, 06/27/26
52) Unattended Baggage, episode 346
53) The Good Fight Club, 06/27/26
54) Pink Flame of Liberty, 06/27/26
55) System Update, 06/26/26
56) Fountainhead Forum, episode 464
57) The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan, 06/26/26
58) The Climate Realism Show, episode 206
59) Serious Trouble, 06/26/26
60) The Inner Life of Liberalism, episode 3
61) Reason Interview: Soumaya Keynes
62) Ron Paul Liberty Report, 06/26/26
63) The Fifth Column, episode 563
64) Freakonomics Radio, episode 679
65) The Tom Woods Show, episode 2026
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_____ Today's Freedom News _____
1) Afghanistan: Dozens of civilians killed in Pakistani air strikes
Source: France 24 [French state media]
“Overnight air strikes by Pakistani forces have killed at least 36 civilians and injured more than 160 others, Afghan officials said Monday, as tensions between the neighbours further escalated. Pakistani security forces carried out a ground operation along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border late Sunday, followed by strikes against militant hideouts and safe havens, killing 29 fighters, Pakistan’s Information Minister Attaullah Tarar said. They said the operations were launched in response to multiple militant attacks across Pakistan. … The Pakistani security operation followed a militant attack targeting the regional headquarters of the paramilitary Rangers in Karachi that killed three soldiers. Security forces killed three attackers and arrested another assailant, whom the military identified as an Afghan national in wounded condition. Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a breakaway faction of the Pakistani Taliban, claimed responsibility for the Karachi attack.” (06/29/26)
https://www.france24.com/en/asia-pacific/20260629-dozens-of-civilians-killed-in-pakistani-air-strikes-in-afghanistan-officials-say
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2) Bitcoin dips to $59,700
Source: CoinDesk
“Crypto opened Monday flat. Bitcoin traded near $59,700, down 0.3% on the day and 6.8% on the week, as a de-escalation in the U.S.-Iran conflict lifted equity futures but left digital assets unmoved, per CoinDesk data. Ether edged up 0.3% to $1,572, Solana added 1.5%, while XRP and dogecoin continued to slide.” (06/29/26)
https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2026/06/29/bitcoin-dips-to-usd59-700-as-iran-de-escalation-lifts-stocks-but-not-crypto
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3) Russia: Putin details fuel shortages after Ukrainian drone strikes
Source: CNBC
“Russian President Vladimir Putin has conceded that the country is facing fuel shortages following a barrage of long-range Ukrainian drone strikes on key energy infrastructure, although he insisted the Kremlin was dealing with them. The Russian president’s comments during an interview with a state TV reporter on Sunday mark the first time he has detailed the extent to which Ukraine’s deep-strike success has hampered Russia’s fuel production. Putin said Russia would import more fuel and expedite repairs of oil facilities to end what he described as the ‘temporary deficit,’ according to The Associated Press. … The Russian president also acknowledged the impact of Ukraine’s drone strikes during a meeting with government ministers and other officials, noting the queues at petrol stations and saying a full ban on diesel exports was under consideration.” (06/29/26)
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/06/29/putin-russia-fuel-shortages-ukraine-drone-strikes.html
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4) US, Iranian regimes allegedly agree to halt strikes and meet this week
Source: Axios
“The U.S. and Iran agreed to stop attacking each other, according to a senior U.S. official, as the two sides plan to meet Tuesday in Qatar’s capital to work out their dispute over the Strait of Hormuz. The ceasefire is barely 11 days old and already on shaky ground with renewed strikes by both sides and President Trump’s threat to restart the war and ‘complete the job.’ The renewed fighting was sparked by competing interpretations of the memorandum of understanding (MOU) to end the war — especially its terms on the Strait of Hormuz. ‘We decided to stop all the kinetic activity,’ a senior U.S. official tells Axios, using the military’s term for strikes and other attacks.” [editor’s note: With the passage of the concurrent congressional war powers resolution, the US regime is legally obligated to unconditionally GTFO of the (already illegally anyway) war – TLK] (06/29/26)
https://archive.is/2SbAf
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5) Uganda: Military chief orders shutdown of two media outlets
Source: Al Jazeera [Qatari state media]
“The chief of Uganda’s military says he has ordered the closure of two of the country’s biggest media outlets. Muhoozi Kainerugaba said on Sunday that the Daily Monitor, the country’s largest independent daily newspaper, and NTV Uganda, one of the largest private broadcasters, were being shut down and would not reopen without his permission. ‘In Uganda, I do not believe in a free press!’ Kainerugaba, who is the president’s son, wrote on X. ‘From now on ALL bad stories about Uganda have to be cleared by my office!’ he said in one of a series of posts, adding that all media in Uganda would follow the rules, going forward.” (06/28/26)
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/6/28/ugandas-military-chief-orders-shutdown-of-two-media-outlets
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6) LA: Letlow wins GOP primary runoff for US Senate
Source: NBC News
“Rep. Julia Letlow won the Republican primary runoff for Senate in Louisiana, NBC News projects, defeating state Treasurer John Fleming in another victory for President Donald Trump’s slate of preferred candidates. Trump endorsed Letlow early in the race, which went to a runoff after none of the GOP candidates won a majority of the initial primary vote on May 16. Trump waded into the state in an effort to oust GOP Sen. Bill Cassidy, who voted to convict Trump on impeachment charges following the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot. … Letlow will be in a strong position to win in November in the solidly Republican state, which Trump carried by 22 points in 2024. Democrat Jamie Davis, a farmer, easily won the Democratic Senate nomination Saturday night.” (06/27/26)
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2026-election/trump-backed-rep-julia-letlow-wins-louisiana-senate-primary-runoff-rcna351624
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7) Serbia: Vucic Says He Will Resign as President
Source: US News & World Report
“Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said on Saturday he would resign within weeks and the country will hold early presidential and parliamentary elections, following 18 months of anti-government protests. The announcement by Vucic, who has been in power as president or prime minister for 12 years, came amid persistent anti-corruption demonstrations led by students and triggered by the collapse of an awning at a railway station in the northern city of Novi Sad in November 2024, in which 16 people died. Protesters, opposition and rights groups allege the railway station disaster was a sign of broader government mismanagement of construction projects and corruption.” (06/27/26)
https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2026-06-27/serbia-president-vucic-says-to-resign-within-weeks-one-year-before-end-of-mandate
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8) Uber expands US driver background checks after sexual assault lawsuits
Source: Engadget
“Uber is adopting a more stringent background check process for its drivers, which will expand the kinds of criminal convictions that will disqualify them from driving or delivering for the company. The ridesharing firm has announced its new standard for background checks, shortly after its shareholders sued the company’s board of directors and executive officers. … The company will start implementing its updated background check, which it believes is the strongest in the industry, starting on Monday. Under the new rules, violent felonies that involve armed robbery, aggravated assault and arson, as well child abuse and endangerment, strangulation and stalking, will disqualify drivers, even if their record was more than seven years ago. Uber already doesn’t sign on interested people who had been convicted of sexual assault, sex crimes involving minors, sexual offenses, murder or homicide, kidnapping and terrorism.” (06/27/26)
https://www.engadget.com/2203130/uber-expands-us-driver-background-checks/
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9) UK: Senior Labour figures say party is united behind Burnham
Source: BBC News [UK state media]
“The Labour Party is united behind Andy Burnham as its next leader, two senior party figures have told the BBC. The party set out a timeline for a leadership contest following Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer’s resignation earlier this week, but there is scant evidence of support for any contenders other than Burnham. Former defence minister Al Carns has said a speech on Monday, in which Burnham will set out his economic policy, will decide whether he challenges him for the Labour leadership. Labour deputy leader Lucy Powell and Housing Secretary Steve Reed, who had stayed loyal to Sir Keir, both said that Labour MPs were backing a coronation of Burnham, rather than a contest.” (06/28/26)
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn0vkle1q5ro
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10) Archaeologists in Israel uncover 1,700-year-old Roman-era statues buried face down
Source: Fox News
“An archaeological excavation in Israel recently revealed ancient faces that haven’t been seen in centuries. Two statues were discovered near Binyamina, Israel, according to a June 15 press release from the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA). Archaeologists were digging ahead of construction of a coastal high-speed railway when they found two marble statues in the wine collection pit of a Roman-Byzantine winepress, the IAA said. The statues, which date back around 1,700 years, depict two unknown figures from the ancient Greco-Roman world. … Researchers are cleaning and conserving the statues before analyzing them further in hopes of determining exactly whom they depict.” (06/27/26)
https://www.foxnews.com/travel/archaeologists-israel-uncover-1700-year-old-roman-era-statues-buried-face-down
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11) CA: Pot company skyrockets to $1 billion valuation following Trump action
Source: SFGate
“Southern California mega cannabis grower Glass House Brands has skyrocketed to a valuation of over $1 billion for the first time, a striking turn of fate for a company that was facing existential panic and the prospect of federal charges just a year ago. … Last July, the Trump administration targeted Glass House’s two massive growing facilities in Santa Barbara and Ventura counties with a militarized immigration raid that left one worker dead and over 360 workers arrested. … But instead of charging the company’s executives, the Trump administration sent Glass House a lifeline. In April, Trump’s attorney general signed an order reclassifying state-licensed medical marijuana from Schedule I to Schedule III, moving it to a far friendlier designation. While the exact impacts are complicated and not certain, it’s likely to cut taxes for companies and could lead to legal interstate sales of medical marijauna.” (06/26/26)
https://www.sfgate.com/cannabis/article/glass-house-billion-dollars-22320798.php
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12) “Vespa is a way of life”: Thousands ride through Rome as Italy’s iconic scooter turns 80
Source: France 24 [French state media]
“An icon of the Italian way of life, the Vespa was celebrating its 80th birthday on Saturday, as thousands of riders paraded through Rome on the legendary scooters. A few donned biker jackets despite the scorching heat while others opted for t-shirts, the hum of their machines filling the capital with a colourful buzz. … The Vespa, which means ‘wasp’ in Italian – a reference to the sound of its engine – was born on 23 April 1946, when the first patent for its manufacture was filed in Italy by Piaggio. It is still produced at the Pontedera site in Tuscany. … Thousands of ‘Vespisti’ from all over the globe turned up in the scooters, which are instantly recognisable because of their rounded lines, their brightly coloured metal bodywork and their round headlight mounted on the handlebars.” (06/27/26)
https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20260627-vespa-is-a-way-of-life-thousands-ride-through-rome-as-italy-s-iconic-scooter-turns-80
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13) Iraq: Officials, including lawmakers, arrested on corruption charges in overnight raid
Source: New York Post
“Several Iraqi political officials were arrested early Sunday on corruption charges, Iraq’s state-run Iraqi News Agency reported. It said the arrests were based on statement made by former Deputy Minister of Oil Adnan al-Jumaili, who was arrested last month, and ‘included members of Parliament whose immunity had been lifted.’ Iraqi security forces sealed off all entrances to the capital’s heavily fortified Green Zone early Sunday and carried out raids inside the compound that houses key government institutions and foreign embassies. A security agency report obtained by The Associated Press said that seven people were arrested, among them five members of Parliament.” (06/28/26)
https://nypost.com/2026/06/28/world-news/iraqi-officials-including-lawmakers-arrested-on-corruption-charges-in-overnight-raid/
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14) Trump to nominate former Oklahoma state trooper as ICE gang shot-caller
Source: United Press International
“President Donald Trump on Saturday announced that he nominated former Oklahoma state trooper Lance Schroyer to be director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Schroyer, a senior advisor at the Department of Homeland Security and retired U.S. Marine, will replace former acting ICE Director Todd Lyons, who announced in April that he would leave the agency on May 31. Trump announced that he is nominating Schroyer for the position in a post on Truth Social, touting his 29 years in law enforcement, including in previous partnership roles with ICE.” (06/27/26)
https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2026/06/27/trump-nominates-ice-director-lance-schroyer/7411782603608/
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15) Burkina Faso: Regime severs diplomatic ties with France
Source: BBC News [UK state media]
“Burkina Faso’s military junta has broken off diplomatic ties with France, accusing Paris of persistently acting against its national interests. Relations between Burkina Faso and its former colonial ruler worsened after Capt Ibrahim Traore seized power in a coup in 2022 and pursued largely anti-Western policies. In a televised statement on Friday, communications minister Pingdwendé Gilbert Ouédraogo said France was guilty of ‘ceaseless activism’ against his country and accused it of ‘neo-colonial ambitions.’ The French foreign ministry called the decision ‘hostile and unfounded’ and said it ‘illustrated the troubling drift by the Burkinabe government.'” (06/27/26)
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c7vymlgl5vgo
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16) Vatican accuses EU of double standards on war
Source: Politico
“Opening Pope Leo XIV’s closed-door conference of the world’s cardinals on war, the Vatican’s doctrinal chief accused the European Union of applying international law selectively, sanctioning some military invasions while treating others differently. The rare gathering was called by Leo to examine what he calls a global “culture of power” that fuels modern conflict and to consider how the Church should respond. A central focus of the discussions was the pope’s effort to rethink the traditional doctrine of a just war, which he argues has too often been invoked to justify military action. That position has already brought Leo into conflict with U.S. Vice President JD Vance, who challenged the pope’s interpretation of Catholic teaching after Leo questioned whether the U.S.-Israeli strikes in Iran could meet the criteria of a just war.” (06/28/26)
https://www.politico.eu/article/vatican-pope-leo-xiv-accuses-eu-of-double-standards-on-war
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17) AOC whines that tech companies think they’re as very special and important as her
Source: Fox News
“Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., revealed that she believes Congress should look to break up companies like Apple amid news that the tech giant might soon raise its prices on phones and laptops due to a strained processing chip supply chain. ‘We need to break up a lot of these companies that are far, far too big and we need to be instituting consumer protections for people,’ Ocasio-Cortez said. … ‘The problem that we have is that these big companies think they are governments. They want to be governments. They want to have totally unchecked power,’ Ocasio-Cortez said.” (06/28/26)
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/aoc-major-tech-company-on-notice-amid-looming-price-increases-far-too-big
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18) Trump regime allows Anthropic to release Mythos AI model to some companies, government agencies
Source: CNBC
“The U.S. government on Friday granted Anthropic permission to release its Mythos 5 model to a group of roughly 100 companies and federal agencies, CNBC has confirmed. The decision, detailed by the Commerce Department in a letter to Anthropic, marks a major step forward in the negotiations between the Trump administration and the artificial intelligence company, which have been engaged in a two-week standoff over its latest models: Fable 5 and Mythos 5.” [editor’s note: The US government enjoys precisely zero right to decide whether AI creators can release their models, or if so to whom – TLK] (06/27/26)
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/06/26/us-government-anthropic-claude-mythos5-ai.html
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19) CA: Lawsuit claims Oakland police suffocated ex-NFL player Doug Martin to death
Source: SFGate
“The parents of former Raiders running back Doug Martin say that the excessive force Oakland police officers used on their son during a mental health crisis led to his death in October, according to a federal lawsuit filed Tuesday. Martin died in police custody on Oct. 18. In a statement released two days later, the Oakland Police Department said the 36-year-old was involved in an alleged break-in near the Oakland Zoo. … According to the suit, Martin fled to a nearby neighbor’s home during what his family described in the immediate aftermath as a mental health crisis, where police found him in the basement. The suit acknowledges a struggle but alleges that officers placed Martin face down on the ground with at least one officer on his back. When Martin appeared to be unconscious, the lawsuit alleges, police thought he was sleeping or pretending to be asleep.” (06/26/26)
https://www.sfgate.com/sports/article/oakland-police-doug-martin-22322530.php
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20) China fires up world’s biggest superconducting magnet for nuclear fusion project
Source: South China Morning Post [Hong Kong]
“The world’s biggest superconducting magnet for a nuclear fusion reactor has passed final tests as part of China’s CRAFT ‘artificial sun’ project, eclipsing international performance benchmarks. The assembly comprises two coils: a toroidal-field magnet that acts as a magnetic cage, and a central solenoid that serves as the igniter. The results, achieved by researchers with the Institute of Plasma Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, clear a major engineering hurdle on the path to confining a plasma hotter than the sun’s core, state news agency Xinhua reported on Saturday. The project – the Comprehensive Research Facility for Fusion Technology – aims to create a miniature sun at over 100 million degrees Celsius (over 180 million Fahrenheit) and trap it inside a doughnut-shaped metal cage to generate electricity.” (06/28/26)
https://archive.is/iV8hX
_____ Today's Freedom Commentary _____
21) In defense of anonymity, the guard dog of free expression
Source: Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression
by Sarah McLaughlin
“Among social media commenters, columnists, and even heads of state, it’s a typical refrain: If we just rid ourselves of that pesky internet anonymity and pseudonymity, we will have a cleaner, better, happier world. Anonymity, the common sentiment goes, is the weapon of the evil and the cruel. Despite some prevalent misconceptions, anonymity is not an invention of social media, email, or the internet age. The American founding fathers, for example, took great advantage of pseudonymous and anonymous expression, as have denizens of Rome for hundreds of years on the city’s ‘talking statues.’ Opposition to anonymity is not new either — far from it. … Anonymity and pseudonymity are not weapons trained upon the vulnerable. Rather, anonymity is the protector of the vulnerable, the shield between them and consequences ranging from embarrassment to social fallout to the worst forms of government oppression.” (06/26/26)
https://www.fire.org/news/blogs/free-speech-dispatch/defense-anonymity-guard-dog-free-expression
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22) Blame the War, Not the Peace Deal, for Iran’s Leverage
Source: The American Conservative
by Ted Snider
“The Trump administration is right to defend the MOU as necessary and good. But it is good because it ends the war instead of allowing it to continue on its increasingly damaging path. They are wrong to defend it as an improvement over the JCPOA or even the deal that was on the table before the U.S. and Israel attacked this February. The Islamic Republic, liberated from maximum pressure sanctions and having demonstrated its ability to close the Strait of Hormuz and withstand major attacks, will be in a stronger position than perhaps ever before. A final agreement should be signed; the war should never have been fought.” (06/27/26)
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/blame-the-war-not-the-peace-deal-for-irans-new-leverage/
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23) Mail Voting Proposal: Make an Example of Steiner
Source: Garrison Center
by Thomas L Knapp
“I’ve got mixed opinions on voting itself (for one thing, I’m not sure it accomplishes much), and strong opinions on mail (the government should get entirely out of the matter and let the private sector handle it), but this particular matter is about rule of law. Regardless of whether I like the laws, or how they’re made, or who gets to make them, I’m a big supporter of holding the government and its officials TO the laws they claim are so important for OUR ‘protection.'” (06/28/26)
https://thegarrisoncenter.org/archives/20716
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24) In Defense of “Sweatshops”: Path to End Poverty Runs through Cheap Labor
Source: Independent Institute
by Benjamin Powell
“Garment factories do not conscript workers when they open in Dhaka, Bangladesh, or Jakarta, Indonesia. Many would-be workers walk for hours, lie about their age, and bribe their way into getting jobs. That is not victimhood. That is how people behave when they’ve found an opportunity to improve their lives. The U.N. panjandrums never consider the alternatives to low-wage factory work in poverty-ridden countries. The reality is brutal: subsistence farming at the mercy of monsoon season, scavenging, informal day labor, and even prostitution.” (06/27/26)
https://www.independent.org/article/2026/06/27/in-defense-of-sweatshops/
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25) None Dare Call It Socialism
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
by Jacob G Hornberger
“The increasing popularity of democratic socialism is causing the American right-wing, as well as many libertarians, to go bananas. After the Mamdani candidates won, President Trump declared, ‘America the beautiful will NEVER be a Communist Country!!!’ At the same time, some rightwing commentators and libertarian commentators are feverishly reminding people of the millions of people who have died as a result of socialism and communism. I find all of this fierce reaction among both conservatives and libertarians to the soaring popularity of socialism, especially among young people, to be quite amusing. Why? Because right-wingers and a very large percentage of libertarians are among the fiercest supporters of socialist programs that one could ever find … but with one caveat: No one is permitted to refer to such socialist programs as ‘socialism.'” (06/26/26)
https://www.fff.org/2026/06/26/none-dare-call-it-socialism-2/
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26) What capitalism [sic] will look like in space
Source: New York Post
by Rainer Zitelmann
“Science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke wrote in 1977: ‘The impact of telecommunications satellites on the entire human race will be at least the same impact as the advent of the telephone in so-called developed societies.’ Today, that prediction has long been reality. Few people realize how deeply daily life already depends on space infrastructure. If all satellites suddenly failed, navigation systems would collapse. Smartphones and vehicles could no longer determine location accurately. Weather forecasts would become unavailable. Airports would descend into chaos without GPS-based time and positioning data. Traffic signals would desynchronize, leading to chaos on the roads. Supply chains that depend on satellite-supported logistics would disintegrate. Even financial transactions would grind to a halt, as precise time signals via satellites are vital for synchronizing debits and credits.” (06/27/26)
https://nypost.com/2026/06/27/opinion/what-capitalism-will-look-like-in-space/
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27) We’re against easing the pain of paying tax
Source: Adam Smith Institute
by Tim Worstall
“Yes, yes, we know, paying tax is the price of partaking in civilisation. But that’s still a price, a cost. We think that people should see, up close and personal, the cost of that civilisation being built on their money. We are therefore against this: ‘Income tax will be automatically deducted from state pensions for millions of retirees under plans being considered by Labour, The Telegraph understands.’ Not because the state pension should, or should not, be taxed. But because this is easy taxation. Some to many will not really even note it. Tax should be painful so that proper consideration be given to how much is being demanded.” (06/27/26)
https://www.adamsmith.org/blog/were-against-easing-the-pain-of-paying-tax
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28) “You’re next!” Democrats discover the mob has a mind of its own.
Source: The Hill
by Jonathan Turley
“‘You’re next!’ This chant, at the victory celebration of the Democratic Socialists this week, was a message not for the oligarchs or the billionaires, but for House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) and the Democratic establishment. They were threatening that Jeffries would be the next to lose his House seat to a socialist candidate. It was a scene that has recurred throughout history, as establishment leaders are overtaken by the very mobs they sought to use for their own purposes.” (06/27/26)
https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/5943132-rage-republic-democratic-downfall/
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29) Iran War’s Biggest Winners: Defense Contractors & Big Oil
Source: Common Dreams
by Elliott Negin
“Now that the United States and Iran have signed a nonbinding memorandum of understanding ending their war (at least for now) the general public and pundits have been weighing in on who won. A CBS-YouGov survey released Sunday found that 37% of Americans think the memorandum of understanding (MOU) favors Iran, while 22% believe the United States got the better deal. Nearly half (47%) say both sides broke even. Newsweek, meanwhile, queried 10 military experts ranging from a former US Navy admiral and a former Pentagon official to five think tank scholars and two professors of international relations. Seven said Iran won the war. Two said ‘no one’. Only one thought the United States came out on top, but added, ‘Neither side will gain a complete victory.'” (06/27/26)
https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/contractors-big-oil-win-iran-war
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30) Recognizing the dangers of democracy
Source: The Price of Liberty
by Nathan Barton
“Most, if not all, libertarians know the parable of the wolves and the sheep: what Hawai’i did was that very thing: supposedly, a majority of Hawaiians don’t want to be around guns. And therefore, elected a majority of conscript parents (senators) and people’s representatives that also don’t like to have guns around, either. In a democracy, anything is theoretically possible if a majority votes for it. Even if that majority, for example, consists of 5,000,001 out of 10,000,000 voters. (And since there are no quorums for voting, and so many people either don’t vote or have their votes ignored, that ten million voters would be ‘served democratically’ if only 10% of the voters turned out and the vote was 500,001 to 499,999.) The wolves (well, voters) get to enjoy their choice: veal Parmasan or veal stew, but the sheep are dead and eaten regardless.” (06/27/26)
https://thepriceofliberty.org/2026/06/27/recognizing-the-dangers-of-democracy/
-----
31) Leftist Dems thrown under bus, with socialists in the driver’s seat
Source: Fox News
by Tom Del Beccaro
“Democrat Rep. Dan Goldman has lost his re-election bid in New York. In the olden days (20 years ago), such an outcome was inconceivable. In the modern Democrat Party, however, the rush to socialism knows no loyalty. No matter what yesterday’s socialist or big government proponent did for the cause, that is not good enough for the current socialists, let alone tomorrow’s. In history, the run-up to class warfare/high tax/redistributionist policies we associate with socialism becomes a spiraling rush. Examples include the end of the Roman Republic and the end of the ancient Greek Athenian democracy. The same is true within the Democrat Party today. James Carville recently said the Democrat Party is ‘not a left-wing party.’ Contrary to his spin, however, the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) have the momentum within the Democrat Party.” (06/27/26)
https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/leftist-democrats-thrown-bus-socialists-drivers-seat
-----
32) The President’s Birthright Citizenship Order is Not Just Unconstitutional. It’s Crazy
Source: Washington Monthly
by Orville Vernon Burton & Armand Derfner
“The president’s challenge to birthright citizenship is more than unconstitutional, as the Supreme Court will probably hold—it’s crazy. Why? Because it would affect not just children born in the future—as it claims—but would threaten the citizenship of every living, native-born American, whether aged 25, 50, or 75. It would also mean that a U.S. birth certificate would be inadequate to prove American citizenship, thereby becoming almost useless. How can this be? It is all about two words: ‘prospective’ and ‘retrospective.’ The executive order may be ‘prospective,’ but the Constitution of the United States is not.” (06/26/26)
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2026/06/26/the-presidents-birthright-citizenship-order-is-not-just-unconstitutional-its-crazy/
-----
33) Poem: The Din
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“They’re designing park benches / so that homeless people can’t sleep on them / and placing metal spikes beneath overpasses / so they can’t be used as shelter. / Jerry Seinfeld says Palestine doesn’t exist / and that sometimes socks go missing in the dryer, / wocka wocka ha ha ha / it’s funny because it’s a witty observation / about life’s everyday little goofy goofs. / Fast food wrappers blow in the wind / like the leaves used to do. / Duct-taped gargoyles with garbage bag wings / peer down at the din of civilization / as we march over the sidewalk sleepers / to our Jobs, / stepping over dead bodies / while staring at our phones / and counting the minutes / til we can go home to our sofas / and watch wocka wocka …” (06/27/26)
https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/2026/06/27/the-din/
-----
34) How fearmongering sets policy, from “marihuana” to solar to AI
Source: Los Angeles Times
by LZ Granderson
“So much about the technology has been draped in doomsday scenarios and Terminator movies. It’s hard sometimes to separate the impossible from the improbable. Even more difficult if you can’t tell if the technology is meant for the good of all or just aiming to be good for someone’s bottom line. Maybe, unlike in the ‘marihuana’ prohibition era, the scary warnings are valid. But now just as then, we need to separate fact from myth before setting policy.” (06/26/26)
https://archive.is/KPKOX
-----
35) Why I Launched a Writing Community for Education Entrepreneurs
Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by Nasiyah Isra-Ul
“People often ask me how I got so involved in writing and public speaking. I’ve been a passionate writer for most of my life, starting to journal, write short stories, and willingly craft essays in my homeschool program outside of what was required in the curriculum by age 11. By the time I was a teenager, I was writing curriculum, developing language arts training for students, and starting a blog. I was also eventually writing for college, as one of the youngest in my classes, and my professors always said they loved reading my papers first because they were ‘always so engaging and well-written.’ Now, in my early twenties, I’ve written graduate-level papers, gotten published in a variety of news outlets, blog frequently, authored multiple books, and often write for the Lab. This didn’t happen overnight. It took years of encouragement, learning, and lots of peer mentorship to get to this point.” (06/26/26)
https://fee.org/articles/why-i-launched-a-writing-community-for-education-entrepreneurs/
-----
36) What if Trump is right to pump the brakes on the most advanced AI?
Source: Washington Post
by Robert Wright
“Like opponents of various other AI restrictions, [Alex] Stamos worries about handing an advantage to China — where, he noted, an impressive new model called GLM-5.2 had been unveiled that very week. ‘It is a great, great week for the Chinese AI industry, a fantastic week,’ he said, ‘and a huge own goal for the United States in the race to dominate the 21st century via domination of AI.’ I’m not sure what exactly it would mean for America to ‘dominate the 21st century’ — and I’m far from sure that living in a century without such domination would be as unpleasant as Stamos seems to think. But I do feel sure that the ‘race with China’ theme so often deployed in discussions of AI regulation has some downsides, and that this particular deployment is a good example.” (06/26/26)
https://archive.is/jMnxk
-----
37) Democrats Ask: Obama Who?
Source: Town Hall
by JT Young
“Last week, Democrats came to Chicago to erect a cenotaph to their past. In the words of Shakespeare’s Mark Antony, they did not come to praise Obama as much as to bury him. They did so because they had already buried the party that nominated him twice. In Barack Obama’s 2012 reelection victory, he received the votes of 17 percent of conservatives. Just twelve years later, in 2024, Kamala Harris received nine percent of conservative voters. And of that nine percent, a good many were undoubtedly not voting for Harris but were ‘never Trumpers’ voting against Donald Trump. The point is: Obama once had a significant appeal to conservatives. That no longer holds for Democrats. The reason is that Democrats are not what they once were, or at least the moderates they were able to successfully pose as being..” (06/27/26)
https://townhall.com/columnists/jtyoung/2026/06/27/democrats-ask-obama-who-n2678395
-----
38) Reclaiming the Third Space
Source: Brownstone Institute
by Mollie Engelhart
“The first space is home. It is where our domestic identity lives. Family, rest, intimacy, and routine. The second space is work. It is where we contribute, produce, and create value. The third space exists in between. It is the neutral, shared place where people gather informally, without obligation or performance. Historically, these were cafés, churches, town squares, barber shops, libraries, local diners, pubs, and markets. Places where you could show up, be recognized, and belong without needing to achieve or prove anything.” (06/26/26)
https://brownstone.org/articles/reclaiming-the-third-space/
-----
39) Under Pressure
Source: Law & Liberty
by Peter Campbell
“Historical illiteracy has become a real problem in our time. The downsides of this have become rather glaring lately, as for instance in Tucker Carlson’s 2024 interview with Daryl Cooper, whom Carlson called ‘the most honest popular historian in the United States.’ Cooper claimed that Americans’ understanding of WWII was deeply flawed and that the true villain was Winston Churchill. The fact that some young Americans found this message sympathetic is very troubling and speaks volumes about our failure to educate the young about history. I regularly tell my students that reading history is their best defense against disinformation.” (06/26/26)
https://lawliberty.org/under-pressure/
-----
40) Trump’s Latest Election Power Grab Runs Through the Postal Service
Source: Exiled Policy
by Jason Pye
“A new USPS rulemaking will prevent mail-in ballots in states that won’t comply with the administration’s demands.” (06/26/26)
https://exiledpolicy.substack.com/p/trumps-latest-election-power-grab
-----
41) Rogue Supreme Court Blesses Ethnic Cleansing
Source: The American Prospect
by Naomi Bethune & Ryan Cooper
“Thursday was a decision day at the Supreme Court, and the American people got to enjoy the familiar experience of waiting on tenterhooks yet again to see which rights were going to be deleted this time. The answer was residency rights for hundreds of thousands of nonwhite immigrants. The most important of Thursday’s decisions was also the worst one: Mullin v. Doe, which overturned a lower-court order barring the Trump regime from removing Temporary Protected Status (TPS) from hundreds of thousands of nonwhite refugees. For months now, Haitian and Syrian recipients of the TPS program have been in limbo, with their legal status being held up by fragile pauses in lower-court rulings.” [editor’s note: shrewd commentary or whining nonsense? You be the judge – SAT] (06/26/26)
https://prospect.org/2026/06/26/rogue-supreme-court-blesses-ethnic-cleansing-immigration-tps-trump-immigration-ice/
-----
42) The Unfortunate Necessity of Court Packing to Stop America’s Authoritarian Drift
Source: The UnPopulist
by Andy Craig
“A few years ago, court packing was a fringe idea with no realistic prospects. President Biden’s commission on Supreme Court reform pointedly declined to endorse adding seats, and no realistic vote count could reach 51 in the Senate—not only for expansion itself, but for nuking the legislative filibuster to bring it to a vote at all. That is no longer the case.” (06/26/26)
https://www.theunpopulist.net/p/the-unfortunate-necessity-of-court
-----
43) The Myth of Nationalist Victory: The Articles of Confederation and the Bank of North America
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
by Joshua Mawhorter
“It is not uncommon for people to conflate victory and liberty with centralization and inflation. Even in the case of the American Revolution—which was relatively decentralized—many at the time, and others since, argued that monetary inflation, standing armies and a state-centric approach to war, consolidation under a centralized national government, direct taxation, and central banking were all necessary to achieve victory and independence. The not-too-subtle implication is that liberty depends on big government.” (06/26/26)
https://mises.org/mises-wire/myth-nationalist-victory-articles-confederation-and-bank-north-america
-----
44) Justice Matters: Jury Service Gives Extraordinary Power for Ordinary People
Source: Cato Institute
by Matthew Cavedon
https://www.cato.org/commentary/justice-matters-jury-service-gives-extraordinary-power-ordinary-people
-----
45) Save American Lives & Prosperity by Cutting FDA Bureaucracy
Source: American Greatness
by Thaddeus G McCotter
“By statute, the approval process of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is to determine the safety and effectiveness of a new drug. If both requirements are met, the new drug is approved. The process usually takes roughly a decade. Most people would reasonably assume the lengthy approval process is due to the need to prove a new drug is safe for use by patients. But the years-long lag between a drug’s submission for approval and its arrival on the market often stems from the process of assessing its effectiveness. The easiest way to think about it is this: determining safety protects patients; determining effectiveness protects consumers.” (06/27/26)
https://amgreatness.com/2026/06/27/save-american-lives-and-prosperity-by-cutting-the-fda-bureaucracy/
-----
46) Don’t Let the Country’s Wet Blankets Ruin Independence Day
Source: Reason
by JD Tuccille
“Leading up to our Independence Day party, my wife asked whether she should buy us T-shirts celebrating America’s 250th anniversary or stick with what we already have. We went with our existing garments. When the red, white, and blue string lights are up and the Gadsden flag is flying out front, my son will don his free speech shirt, my wife will wear one with USA printed across it, and my shirt will show an image of George Washington crossing the Delaware and text reading: ‘Americans. Willing to cross a frozen river to kill you. In your sleep. On Christmas. Not kidding, we’ve done it.’ It will be festive. But not everybody shares our enthusiasm for celebrating the nation’s birthday and the liberty at the core of its founding philosophy.” (06/26/26)
https://reason.com/2026/06/26/dont-let-the-countrys-wet-blankets-ruin-independence-day/
-----
47) Should Smartphones be Banned in Schools? A Look at the Research
Source: The Daily Economy
by Peter Jacobsen
“Students react poorly at first but show improvement over time. Unfortunately, government schools are tricky places to run experiments.” (06/26/26)
https://thedailyeconomy.org/article/should-smartphones-be-banned-in-schools-a-look-at-the-research/
-----
48) The Iran war is the most unpopular major conflict in US history
Source: Responsible Statecraft
by Stephen Semler
“During an April Senate hearing dominated by debate over the Iran war, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth batted down criticisms from skeptical members of Congress, saying ‘I believe we do have the support of the American people’ in this conflict. Hegseth, it turns out, was wrong. Two months later, we can now confidently say that the Iran conflict is the most unpopular war in U.S. history. When I compared public opinion on the Iran War to previous major U.S. conflicts in May, it hadn’t quite reached the Vietnam War’s level of unpopularity. But polling from June shows that the Iran War has now sunk to negative 32% net support — below the negative 31% recorded in the final poll during Vietnam.” (06/26/26)
https://responsiblestatecraft.org/iran-war-polling-us/
-----
49) Why Some Unions Are Joining the Call to “Freeze the Rent”
Source: In These Times
by Rebecca Burns
“‘I urge you guys to freeze the rent, because we want our students to succeed.’ That was the appeal Alyssa Wright made to the nine members of New York City’s Rent Guidelines Board (RGB) earlier this month, a little more than halfway through a packed, four-hour hearing in the Bronx on whether to freeze rents in the city’s some 1 million rent-stabilized apartments. Wright serves as a campus supervisor for a pilot program connecting City University of New York (CUNY) students with housing, healthcare and food resources. It’s a challenging role: Just that week, Wright said in her testimony, she had counseled five students facing eviction. Some 38% of CUNY’s 240,000 students experience housing insecurity, a condition that makes them twice as likely to withdraw or be placed on academic probation, according to a 2025 study based on a representative sample of students.” (06/26/26)
https://inthesetimes.com/article/labor-tenant-union-mamdani-rent-freeze
-----
50) War and Constitutional Indifference
Source: Antiwar.com
by Andrew P Napolitano
“Since its inception, the government of the United States has inexorably exceeded its powers under the Constitution. All three branches have been complicit in a consistent pattern of constitutional indifference. … that behavior is nowhere as manifest and harmful as war.” (06/26/26)
https://original.antiwar.com/andrew-p-napolitano/2026/06/25/war-and-constitutional-indifference/
_____ Today's Freedom Podcast and Video _____
51) The Chris Spangle Show, 06/27/26
Source: We Are Libertarians
“Trump’s Reflecting Pool Fiasco Exposes His Pattern of Leadership Failures.” (06/27/26)
https://www.chrisspangle.com/p/trumps-reflecting-pool-fiasco-exposes
-----
52) Unattended Baggage, episode 346
Source: Unattended Baggage
“It was fun while it lasted.” (06/27/26)
https://unattendedbaggage.substack.com/p/episode-346-it-was-fun-while-it-lasted
-----
53) The Good Fight Club, 06/27/26
Source: Yascha Mounk
“Matthew Yglesias, Claire Ainsley, and Yascha Mounk debate whether progressives have abandoned the working-class voters they once claimed to represent.” (06/27/26)
https://writing.yaschamounk.com/p/the-good-fight-club-17
-----
54) Pink Flame of Liberty, 06/27/26
Source: Pink Flame of Liberty
“LNC Chair McMahon moves the LNC back towards default transparency.” (06/27/26)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orsltodrfqY
-----
55) System Update, 06/26/26
Source: System Update
“Socialists SWEEP NYC, Tucker Apologizes to Muslims, Europe’s Russia Hate, ‘Chinamaxxing’ & More.” (06/26/26)
https://greenwald.substack.com/p/socialists-sweep-nyc-tucker-apologizes
-----
56) Fountainhead Forum, episode 464
Source: Fountainhead Forum
“Bola-Ige Alabi-Efeshodiamhe on life and liberty in Nigeria.” (06/26/26)
https://rumble.com/v7bwm8o-ff-464-bola-ige-alabi-efeshodiamhe-on-life-and-liberty-in-nigeria.html
-----
57) The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan, 06/26/26
Source: The Weekly Dish
“Robert Wright On AI And Evolution.” (06/26/26)
https://andrewsullivan.substack.com/p/robert-wright-on-ai-and-evolution
-----
58) The Climate Realism Show, episode 206
Source: Heartland Institute
“We’re Winning! Climate Alarmism Is Losing Its Grip.” (06/26/26)
https://heartland.org/podcasts/were-winning-climate-alarmism-is-losing-its-grip/
-----
59) Serious Trouble, 06/26/26
Source: Serious Trouble
“At Least the Fancy Lawyers Are Still Getting Rich.” (06/26/26)
https://www.serioustrouble.show/p/at-least-the-fancy-lawyers-are-still
-----
60) The Inner Life of Liberalism, episode 3
Source: The Inner Life of Liberalism
“Delight in Difference.” (06/26/26)
https://creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/aaronpowell/episodes/003-Delight-in-Difference-e3ladg4
-----
61) Reason Interview: Soumaya Keynes
Source: Reason
“The Right Way To Fight a Trade War.” (06/26/26)
https://reason.com/podcast/2026/06/26/the-right-way-to-fight-a-trade-war/
-----
62) Ron Paul Liberty Report, 06/26/26
Source: Ron Paul Liberty Report
“Our Founders Hated Democracy – A Tool of The Socialists.” (06/26/26)
https://x.com/i/broadcasts/1rGmqqnvVVkGy
-----
63) The Fifth Column, episode 563
Source: The Fifth Column
“The Cadres and the Cabal.” (06/26/26)
https://www.wethefifth.com/p/the-cadres-and-the-cabal-563
-----
64) Freakonomics Radio, episode 679
Source: Freakonomics
“Why Does Vanderbilt Keep Winning?” (06/26/26)
https://freakonomics.com/podcast/why-does-vanderbilt-keep-winning/
-----
65) The Tom Woods Show, episode 2026
Source: The Tom Woods Show
“2026 Is the Best Time to Be Alive, and It Isn’t Close.” (06/26/26)
https://tomwoods.com/ep-2773-2026-is-the-best-time-to-be-alive-and-it-isnt-close/
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Today's Freedom News:
1) Afghanistan: Dozens of civilians killed in Pakistani air strikes
2) Bitcoin dips to $59,700
3) Russia: Putin details fuel shortages after Ukrainian drone strikes
4) US, Iranian regimes allegedly agree to halt strikes and meet this week
5) Uganda: Military chief orders shutdown of two media outlets
6) LA: Letlow wins GOP primary runoff for US Senate
7) Serbia: Vucic Says He Will Resign as President
8) Uber expands US driver background checks after sexual assault lawsuits
9) UK: Senior Labour figures say party is united behind Burnham
10) Archaeologists in Israel uncover 1,700-year-old Roman-era statues buried face down
11) CA: Pot company skyrockets to $1 billion valuation following Trump action
12) “Vespa is a way of life”: Thousands ride through Rome as Italy’s iconic scooter turns 80
13) Iraq: Officials, including lawmakers, arrested on corruption charges in overnight raid
14) Trump to nominate former Oklahoma state trooper as ICE gang shot-caller
15) Burkina Faso: Regime severs diplomatic ties with France
16) Vatican accuses EU of double standards on war
17) AOC whines that tech companies think they’re as very special and important as her
18) Trump regime allows Anthropic to release Mythos AI model to some companies, government agencies
19) CA: Lawsuit claims Oakland police suffocated ex-NFL player Doug Martin to death
20) China fires up world’s biggest superconducting magnet for nuclear fusion project
Today's Freedom Commentary:
21) In defense of anonymity, the guard dog of free expression
22) Blame the War, Not the Peace Deal, for Iran’s Leverage
23) Mail Voting Proposal: Make an Example of Steiner
24) In Defense of “Sweatshops”: Path to End Poverty Runs through Cheap Labor
25) None Dare Call It Socialism
26) What capitalism [sic] will look like in space
27) We’re against easing the pain of paying tax
28) “You’re next!” Democrats discover the mob has a mind of its own.
29) Iran War’s Biggest Winners: Defense Contractors & Big Oil
30) Recognizing the dangers of democracy
31) Leftist Dems thrown under bus, with socialists in the driver’s seat
32) The President’s Birthright Citizenship Order is Not Just Unconstitutional. It’s Crazy
33) Poem: The Din
34) How fearmongering sets policy, from “marihuana” to solar to AI
35) Why I Launched a Writing Community for Education Entrepreneurs
36) What if Trump is right to pump the brakes on the most advanced AI?
37) Democrats Ask: Obama Who?
38) Reclaiming the Third Space
39) Under Pressure
40) Trump’s Latest Election Power Grab Runs Through the Postal Service
41) Rogue Supreme Court Blesses Ethnic Cleansing
42) The Unfortunate Necessity of Court Packing to Stop America’s Authoritarian Drift
43) The Myth of Nationalist Victory: The Articles of Confederation and the Bank of North America
44) Justice Matters: Jury Service Gives Extraordinary Power for Ordinary People
45) Save American Lives & Prosperity by Cutting FDA Bureaucracy
46) Don’t Let the Country’s Wet Blankets Ruin Independence Day
47) Should Smartphones be Banned in Schools? A Look at the Research
48) The Iran war is the most unpopular major conflict in US history
49) Why Some Unions Are Joining the Call to “Freeze the Rent”
50) War and Constitutional Indifference
Today's Freedom Podcast and Video:
51) The Chris Spangle Show, 06/27/26
52) Unattended Baggage, episode 346
53) The Good Fight Club, 06/27/26
54) Pink Flame of Liberty, 06/27/26
55) System Update, 06/26/26
56) Fountainhead Forum, episode 464
57) The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan, 06/26/26
58) The Climate Realism Show, episode 206
59) Serious Trouble, 06/26/26
60) The Inner Life of Liberalism, episode 3
61) Reason Interview: Soumaya Keynes
62) Ron Paul Liberty Report, 06/26/26
63) The Fifth Column, episode 563
64) Freakonomics Radio, episode 679
65) The Tom Woods Show, episode 2026
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_____ Today's Freedom News _____
1) Afghanistan: Dozens of civilians killed in Pakistani air strikes
Source: France 24 [French state media]
“Overnight air strikes by Pakistani forces have killed at least 36 civilians and injured more than 160 others, Afghan officials said Monday, as tensions between the neighbours further escalated. Pakistani security forces carried out a ground operation along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border late Sunday, followed by strikes against militant hideouts and safe havens, killing 29 fighters, Pakistan’s Information Minister Attaullah Tarar said. They said the operations were launched in response to multiple militant attacks across Pakistan. … The Pakistani security operation followed a militant attack targeting the regional headquarters of the paramilitary Rangers in Karachi that killed three soldiers. Security forces killed three attackers and arrested another assailant, whom the military identified as an Afghan national in wounded condition. Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a breakaway faction of the Pakistani Taliban, claimed responsibility for the Karachi attack.” (06/29/26)
https://www.france24.com/en/asia-pacific/20260629-dozens-of-civilians-killed-in-pakistani-air-strikes-in-afghanistan-officials-say
-----
2) Bitcoin dips to $59,700
Source: CoinDesk
“Crypto opened Monday flat. Bitcoin traded near $59,700, down 0.3% on the day and 6.8% on the week, as a de-escalation in the U.S.-Iran conflict lifted equity futures but left digital assets unmoved, per CoinDesk data. Ether edged up 0.3% to $1,572, Solana added 1.5%, while XRP and dogecoin continued to slide.” (06/29/26)
https://www.coindesk.com/tech/2026/06/29/bitcoin-dips-to-usd59-700-as-iran-de-escalation-lifts-stocks-but-not-crypto
-----
3) Russia: Putin details fuel shortages after Ukrainian drone strikes
Source: CNBC
“Russian President Vladimir Putin has conceded that the country is facing fuel shortages following a barrage of long-range Ukrainian drone strikes on key energy infrastructure, although he insisted the Kremlin was dealing with them. The Russian president’s comments during an interview with a state TV reporter on Sunday mark the first time he has detailed the extent to which Ukraine’s deep-strike success has hampered Russia’s fuel production. Putin said Russia would import more fuel and expedite repairs of oil facilities to end what he described as the ‘temporary deficit,’ according to The Associated Press. … The Russian president also acknowledged the impact of Ukraine’s drone strikes during a meeting with government ministers and other officials, noting the queues at petrol stations and saying a full ban on diesel exports was under consideration.” (06/29/26)
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/06/29/putin-russia-fuel-shortages-ukraine-drone-strikes.html
-----
4) US, Iranian regimes allegedly agree to halt strikes and meet this week
Source: Axios
“The U.S. and Iran agreed to stop attacking each other, according to a senior U.S. official, as the two sides plan to meet Tuesday in Qatar’s capital to work out their dispute over the Strait of Hormuz. The ceasefire is barely 11 days old and already on shaky ground with renewed strikes by both sides and President Trump’s threat to restart the war and ‘complete the job.’ The renewed fighting was sparked by competing interpretations of the memorandum of understanding (MOU) to end the war — especially its terms on the Strait of Hormuz. ‘We decided to stop all the kinetic activity,’ a senior U.S. official tells Axios, using the military’s term for strikes and other attacks.” [editor’s note: With the passage of the concurrent congressional war powers resolution, the US regime is legally obligated to unconditionally GTFO of the (already illegally anyway) war – TLK] (06/29/26)
https://archive.is/2SbAf
-----
5) Uganda: Military chief orders shutdown of two media outlets
Source: Al Jazeera [Qatari state media]
“The chief of Uganda’s military says he has ordered the closure of two of the country’s biggest media outlets. Muhoozi Kainerugaba said on Sunday that the Daily Monitor, the country’s largest independent daily newspaper, and NTV Uganda, one of the largest private broadcasters, were being shut down and would not reopen without his permission. ‘In Uganda, I do not believe in a free press!’ Kainerugaba, who is the president’s son, wrote on X. ‘From now on ALL bad stories about Uganda have to be cleared by my office!’ he said in one of a series of posts, adding that all media in Uganda would follow the rules, going forward.” (06/28/26)
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/6/28/ugandas-military-chief-orders-shutdown-of-two-media-outlets
-----
6) LA: Letlow wins GOP primary runoff for US Senate
Source: NBC News
“Rep. Julia Letlow won the Republican primary runoff for Senate in Louisiana, NBC News projects, defeating state Treasurer John Fleming in another victory for President Donald Trump’s slate of preferred candidates. Trump endorsed Letlow early in the race, which went to a runoff after none of the GOP candidates won a majority of the initial primary vote on May 16. Trump waded into the state in an effort to oust GOP Sen. Bill Cassidy, who voted to convict Trump on impeachment charges following the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot. … Letlow will be in a strong position to win in November in the solidly Republican state, which Trump carried by 22 points in 2024. Democrat Jamie Davis, a farmer, easily won the Democratic Senate nomination Saturday night.” (06/27/26)
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2026-election/trump-backed-rep-julia-letlow-wins-louisiana-senate-primary-runoff-rcna351624
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7) Serbia: Vucic Says He Will Resign as President
Source: US News & World Report
“Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said on Saturday he would resign within weeks and the country will hold early presidential and parliamentary elections, following 18 months of anti-government protests. The announcement by Vucic, who has been in power as president or prime minister for 12 years, came amid persistent anti-corruption demonstrations led by students and triggered by the collapse of an awning at a railway station in the northern city of Novi Sad in November 2024, in which 16 people died. Protesters, opposition and rights groups allege the railway station disaster was a sign of broader government mismanagement of construction projects and corruption.” (06/27/26)
https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2026-06-27/serbia-president-vucic-says-to-resign-within-weeks-one-year-before-end-of-mandate
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8) Uber expands US driver background checks after sexual assault lawsuits
Source: Engadget
“Uber is adopting a more stringent background check process for its drivers, which will expand the kinds of criminal convictions that will disqualify them from driving or delivering for the company. The ridesharing firm has announced its new standard for background checks, shortly after its shareholders sued the company’s board of directors and executive officers. … The company will start implementing its updated background check, which it believes is the strongest in the industry, starting on Monday. Under the new rules, violent felonies that involve armed robbery, aggravated assault and arson, as well child abuse and endangerment, strangulation and stalking, will disqualify drivers, even if their record was more than seven years ago. Uber already doesn’t sign on interested people who had been convicted of sexual assault, sex crimes involving minors, sexual offenses, murder or homicide, kidnapping and terrorism.” (06/27/26)
https://www.engadget.com/2203130/uber-expands-us-driver-background-checks/
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9) UK: Senior Labour figures say party is united behind Burnham
Source: BBC News [UK state media]
“The Labour Party is united behind Andy Burnham as its next leader, two senior party figures have told the BBC. The party set out a timeline for a leadership contest following Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer’s resignation earlier this week, but there is scant evidence of support for any contenders other than Burnham. Former defence minister Al Carns has said a speech on Monday, in which Burnham will set out his economic policy, will decide whether he challenges him for the Labour leadership. Labour deputy leader Lucy Powell and Housing Secretary Steve Reed, who had stayed loyal to Sir Keir, both said that Labour MPs were backing a coronation of Burnham, rather than a contest.” (06/28/26)
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn0vkle1q5ro
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10) Archaeologists in Israel uncover 1,700-year-old Roman-era statues buried face down
Source: Fox News
“An archaeological excavation in Israel recently revealed ancient faces that haven’t been seen in centuries. Two statues were discovered near Binyamina, Israel, according to a June 15 press release from the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA). Archaeologists were digging ahead of construction of a coastal high-speed railway when they found two marble statues in the wine collection pit of a Roman-Byzantine winepress, the IAA said. The statues, which date back around 1,700 years, depict two unknown figures from the ancient Greco-Roman world. … Researchers are cleaning and conserving the statues before analyzing them further in hopes of determining exactly whom they depict.” (06/27/26)
https://www.foxnews.com/travel/archaeologists-israel-uncover-1700-year-old-roman-era-statues-buried-face-down
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11) CA: Pot company skyrockets to $1 billion valuation following Trump action
Source: SFGate
“Southern California mega cannabis grower Glass House Brands has skyrocketed to a valuation of over $1 billion for the first time, a striking turn of fate for a company that was facing existential panic and the prospect of federal charges just a year ago. … Last July, the Trump administration targeted Glass House’s two massive growing facilities in Santa Barbara and Ventura counties with a militarized immigration raid that left one worker dead and over 360 workers arrested. … But instead of charging the company’s executives, the Trump administration sent Glass House a lifeline. In April, Trump’s attorney general signed an order reclassifying state-licensed medical marijuana from Schedule I to Schedule III, moving it to a far friendlier designation. While the exact impacts are complicated and not certain, it’s likely to cut taxes for companies and could lead to legal interstate sales of medical marijauna.” (06/26/26)
https://www.sfgate.com/cannabis/article/glass-house-billion-dollars-22320798.php
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12) “Vespa is a way of life”: Thousands ride through Rome as Italy’s iconic scooter turns 80
Source: France 24 [French state media]
“An icon of the Italian way of life, the Vespa was celebrating its 80th birthday on Saturday, as thousands of riders paraded through Rome on the legendary scooters. A few donned biker jackets despite the scorching heat while others opted for t-shirts, the hum of their machines filling the capital with a colourful buzz. … The Vespa, which means ‘wasp’ in Italian – a reference to the sound of its engine – was born on 23 April 1946, when the first patent for its manufacture was filed in Italy by Piaggio. It is still produced at the Pontedera site in Tuscany. … Thousands of ‘Vespisti’ from all over the globe turned up in the scooters, which are instantly recognisable because of their rounded lines, their brightly coloured metal bodywork and their round headlight mounted on the handlebars.” (06/27/26)
https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20260627-vespa-is-a-way-of-life-thousands-ride-through-rome-as-italy-s-iconic-scooter-turns-80
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13) Iraq: Officials, including lawmakers, arrested on corruption charges in overnight raid
Source: New York Post
“Several Iraqi political officials were arrested early Sunday on corruption charges, Iraq’s state-run Iraqi News Agency reported. It said the arrests were based on statement made by former Deputy Minister of Oil Adnan al-Jumaili, who was arrested last month, and ‘included members of Parliament whose immunity had been lifted.’ Iraqi security forces sealed off all entrances to the capital’s heavily fortified Green Zone early Sunday and carried out raids inside the compound that houses key government institutions and foreign embassies. A security agency report obtained by The Associated Press said that seven people were arrested, among them five members of Parliament.” (06/28/26)
https://nypost.com/2026/06/28/world-news/iraqi-officials-including-lawmakers-arrested-on-corruption-charges-in-overnight-raid/
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14) Trump to nominate former Oklahoma state trooper as ICE gang shot-caller
Source: United Press International
“President Donald Trump on Saturday announced that he nominated former Oklahoma state trooper Lance Schroyer to be director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Schroyer, a senior advisor at the Department of Homeland Security and retired U.S. Marine, will replace former acting ICE Director Todd Lyons, who announced in April that he would leave the agency on May 31. Trump announced that he is nominating Schroyer for the position in a post on Truth Social, touting his 29 years in law enforcement, including in previous partnership roles with ICE.” (06/27/26)
https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2026/06/27/trump-nominates-ice-director-lance-schroyer/7411782603608/
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15) Burkina Faso: Regime severs diplomatic ties with France
Source: BBC News [UK state media]
“Burkina Faso’s military junta has broken off diplomatic ties with France, accusing Paris of persistently acting against its national interests. Relations between Burkina Faso and its former colonial ruler worsened after Capt Ibrahim Traore seized power in a coup in 2022 and pursued largely anti-Western policies. In a televised statement on Friday, communications minister Pingdwendé Gilbert Ouédraogo said France was guilty of ‘ceaseless activism’ against his country and accused it of ‘neo-colonial ambitions.’ The French foreign ministry called the decision ‘hostile and unfounded’ and said it ‘illustrated the troubling drift by the Burkinabe government.'” (06/27/26)
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c7vymlgl5vgo
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16) Vatican accuses EU of double standards on war
Source: Politico
“Opening Pope Leo XIV’s closed-door conference of the world’s cardinals on war, the Vatican’s doctrinal chief accused the European Union of applying international law selectively, sanctioning some military invasions while treating others differently. The rare gathering was called by Leo to examine what he calls a global “culture of power” that fuels modern conflict and to consider how the Church should respond. A central focus of the discussions was the pope’s effort to rethink the traditional doctrine of a just war, which he argues has too often been invoked to justify military action. That position has already brought Leo into conflict with U.S. Vice President JD Vance, who challenged the pope’s interpretation of Catholic teaching after Leo questioned whether the U.S.-Israeli strikes in Iran could meet the criteria of a just war.” (06/28/26)
https://www.politico.eu/article/vatican-pope-leo-xiv-accuses-eu-of-double-standards-on-war
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17) AOC whines that tech companies think they’re as very special and important as her
Source: Fox News
“Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., revealed that she believes Congress should look to break up companies like Apple amid news that the tech giant might soon raise its prices on phones and laptops due to a strained processing chip supply chain. ‘We need to break up a lot of these companies that are far, far too big and we need to be instituting consumer protections for people,’ Ocasio-Cortez said. … ‘The problem that we have is that these big companies think they are governments. They want to be governments. They want to have totally unchecked power,’ Ocasio-Cortez said.” (06/28/26)
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/aoc-major-tech-company-on-notice-amid-looming-price-increases-far-too-big
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18) Trump regime allows Anthropic to release Mythos AI model to some companies, government agencies
Source: CNBC
“The U.S. government on Friday granted Anthropic permission to release its Mythos 5 model to a group of roughly 100 companies and federal agencies, CNBC has confirmed. The decision, detailed by the Commerce Department in a letter to Anthropic, marks a major step forward in the negotiations between the Trump administration and the artificial intelligence company, which have been engaged in a two-week standoff over its latest models: Fable 5 and Mythos 5.” [editor’s note: The US government enjoys precisely zero right to decide whether AI creators can release their models, or if so to whom – TLK] (06/27/26)
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/06/26/us-government-anthropic-claude-mythos5-ai.html
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19) CA: Lawsuit claims Oakland police suffocated ex-NFL player Doug Martin to death
Source: SFGate
“The parents of former Raiders running back Doug Martin say that the excessive force Oakland police officers used on their son during a mental health crisis led to his death in October, according to a federal lawsuit filed Tuesday. Martin died in police custody on Oct. 18. In a statement released two days later, the Oakland Police Department said the 36-year-old was involved in an alleged break-in near the Oakland Zoo. … According to the suit, Martin fled to a nearby neighbor’s home during what his family described in the immediate aftermath as a mental health crisis, where police found him in the basement. The suit acknowledges a struggle but alleges that officers placed Martin face down on the ground with at least one officer on his back. When Martin appeared to be unconscious, the lawsuit alleges, police thought he was sleeping or pretending to be asleep.” (06/26/26)
https://www.sfgate.com/sports/article/oakland-police-doug-martin-22322530.php
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20) China fires up world’s biggest superconducting magnet for nuclear fusion project
Source: South China Morning Post [Hong Kong]
“The world’s biggest superconducting magnet for a nuclear fusion reactor has passed final tests as part of China’s CRAFT ‘artificial sun’ project, eclipsing international performance benchmarks. The assembly comprises two coils: a toroidal-field magnet that acts as a magnetic cage, and a central solenoid that serves as the igniter. The results, achieved by researchers with the Institute of Plasma Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, clear a major engineering hurdle on the path to confining a plasma hotter than the sun’s core, state news agency Xinhua reported on Saturday. The project – the Comprehensive Research Facility for Fusion Technology – aims to create a miniature sun at over 100 million degrees Celsius (over 180 million Fahrenheit) and trap it inside a doughnut-shaped metal cage to generate electricity.” (06/28/26)
https://archive.is/iV8hX
_____ Today's Freedom Commentary _____
21) In defense of anonymity, the guard dog of free expression
Source: Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression
by Sarah McLaughlin
“Among social media commenters, columnists, and even heads of state, it’s a typical refrain: If we just rid ourselves of that pesky internet anonymity and pseudonymity, we will have a cleaner, better, happier world. Anonymity, the common sentiment goes, is the weapon of the evil and the cruel. Despite some prevalent misconceptions, anonymity is not an invention of social media, email, or the internet age. The American founding fathers, for example, took great advantage of pseudonymous and anonymous expression, as have denizens of Rome for hundreds of years on the city’s ‘talking statues.’ Opposition to anonymity is not new either — far from it. … Anonymity and pseudonymity are not weapons trained upon the vulnerable. Rather, anonymity is the protector of the vulnerable, the shield between them and consequences ranging from embarrassment to social fallout to the worst forms of government oppression.” (06/26/26)
https://www.fire.org/news/blogs/free-speech-dispatch/defense-anonymity-guard-dog-free-expression
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22) Blame the War, Not the Peace Deal, for Iran’s Leverage
Source: The American Conservative
by Ted Snider
“The Trump administration is right to defend the MOU as necessary and good. But it is good because it ends the war instead of allowing it to continue on its increasingly damaging path. They are wrong to defend it as an improvement over the JCPOA or even the deal that was on the table before the U.S. and Israel attacked this February. The Islamic Republic, liberated from maximum pressure sanctions and having demonstrated its ability to close the Strait of Hormuz and withstand major attacks, will be in a stronger position than perhaps ever before. A final agreement should be signed; the war should never have been fought.” (06/27/26)
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/blame-the-war-not-the-peace-deal-for-irans-new-leverage/
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23) Mail Voting Proposal: Make an Example of Steiner
Source: Garrison Center
by Thomas L Knapp
“I’ve got mixed opinions on voting itself (for one thing, I’m not sure it accomplishes much), and strong opinions on mail (the government should get entirely out of the matter and let the private sector handle it), but this particular matter is about rule of law. Regardless of whether I like the laws, or how they’re made, or who gets to make them, I’m a big supporter of holding the government and its officials TO the laws they claim are so important for OUR ‘protection.'” (06/28/26)
https://thegarrisoncenter.org/archives/20716
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24) In Defense of “Sweatshops”: Path to End Poverty Runs through Cheap Labor
Source: Independent Institute
by Benjamin Powell
“Garment factories do not conscript workers when they open in Dhaka, Bangladesh, or Jakarta, Indonesia. Many would-be workers walk for hours, lie about their age, and bribe their way into getting jobs. That is not victimhood. That is how people behave when they’ve found an opportunity to improve their lives. The U.N. panjandrums never consider the alternatives to low-wage factory work in poverty-ridden countries. The reality is brutal: subsistence farming at the mercy of monsoon season, scavenging, informal day labor, and even prostitution.” (06/27/26)
https://www.independent.org/article/2026/06/27/in-defense-of-sweatshops/
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25) None Dare Call It Socialism
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
by Jacob G Hornberger
“The increasing popularity of democratic socialism is causing the American right-wing, as well as many libertarians, to go bananas. After the Mamdani candidates won, President Trump declared, ‘America the beautiful will NEVER be a Communist Country!!!’ At the same time, some rightwing commentators and libertarian commentators are feverishly reminding people of the millions of people who have died as a result of socialism and communism. I find all of this fierce reaction among both conservatives and libertarians to the soaring popularity of socialism, especially among young people, to be quite amusing. Why? Because right-wingers and a very large percentage of libertarians are among the fiercest supporters of socialist programs that one could ever find … but with one caveat: No one is permitted to refer to such socialist programs as ‘socialism.'” (06/26/26)
https://www.fff.org/2026/06/26/none-dare-call-it-socialism-2/
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26) What capitalism [sic] will look like in space
Source: New York Post
by Rainer Zitelmann
“Science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke wrote in 1977: ‘The impact of telecommunications satellites on the entire human race will be at least the same impact as the advent of the telephone in so-called developed societies.’ Today, that prediction has long been reality. Few people realize how deeply daily life already depends on space infrastructure. If all satellites suddenly failed, navigation systems would collapse. Smartphones and vehicles could no longer determine location accurately. Weather forecasts would become unavailable. Airports would descend into chaos without GPS-based time and positioning data. Traffic signals would desynchronize, leading to chaos on the roads. Supply chains that depend on satellite-supported logistics would disintegrate. Even financial transactions would grind to a halt, as precise time signals via satellites are vital for synchronizing debits and credits.” (06/27/26)
https://nypost.com/2026/06/27/opinion/what-capitalism-will-look-like-in-space/
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27) We’re against easing the pain of paying tax
Source: Adam Smith Institute
by Tim Worstall
“Yes, yes, we know, paying tax is the price of partaking in civilisation. But that’s still a price, a cost. We think that people should see, up close and personal, the cost of that civilisation being built on their money. We are therefore against this: ‘Income tax will be automatically deducted from state pensions for millions of retirees under plans being considered by Labour, The Telegraph understands.’ Not because the state pension should, or should not, be taxed. But because this is easy taxation. Some to many will not really even note it. Tax should be painful so that proper consideration be given to how much is being demanded.” (06/27/26)
https://www.adamsmith.org/blog/were-against-easing-the-pain-of-paying-tax
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28) “You’re next!” Democrats discover the mob has a mind of its own.
Source: The Hill
by Jonathan Turley
“‘You’re next!’ This chant, at the victory celebration of the Democratic Socialists this week, was a message not for the oligarchs or the billionaires, but for House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) and the Democratic establishment. They were threatening that Jeffries would be the next to lose his House seat to a socialist candidate. It was a scene that has recurred throughout history, as establishment leaders are overtaken by the very mobs they sought to use for their own purposes.” (06/27/26)
https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/5943132-rage-republic-democratic-downfall/
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29) Iran War’s Biggest Winners: Defense Contractors & Big Oil
Source: Common Dreams
by Elliott Negin
“Now that the United States and Iran have signed a nonbinding memorandum of understanding ending their war (at least for now) the general public and pundits have been weighing in on who won. A CBS-YouGov survey released Sunday found that 37% of Americans think the memorandum of understanding (MOU) favors Iran, while 22% believe the United States got the better deal. Nearly half (47%) say both sides broke even. Newsweek, meanwhile, queried 10 military experts ranging from a former US Navy admiral and a former Pentagon official to five think tank scholars and two professors of international relations. Seven said Iran won the war. Two said ‘no one’. Only one thought the United States came out on top, but added, ‘Neither side will gain a complete victory.'” (06/27/26)
https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/contractors-big-oil-win-iran-war
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30) Recognizing the dangers of democracy
Source: The Price of Liberty
by Nathan Barton
“Most, if not all, libertarians know the parable of the wolves and the sheep: what Hawai’i did was that very thing: supposedly, a majority of Hawaiians don’t want to be around guns. And therefore, elected a majority of conscript parents (senators) and people’s representatives that also don’t like to have guns around, either. In a democracy, anything is theoretically possible if a majority votes for it. Even if that majority, for example, consists of 5,000,001 out of 10,000,000 voters. (And since there are no quorums for voting, and so many people either don’t vote or have their votes ignored, that ten million voters would be ‘served democratically’ if only 10% of the voters turned out and the vote was 500,001 to 499,999.) The wolves (well, voters) get to enjoy their choice: veal Parmasan or veal stew, but the sheep are dead and eaten regardless.” (06/27/26)
https://thepriceofliberty.org/2026/06/27/recognizing-the-dangers-of-democracy/
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31) Leftist Dems thrown under bus, with socialists in the driver’s seat
Source: Fox News
by Tom Del Beccaro
“Democrat Rep. Dan Goldman has lost his re-election bid in New York. In the olden days (20 years ago), such an outcome was inconceivable. In the modern Democrat Party, however, the rush to socialism knows no loyalty. No matter what yesterday’s socialist or big government proponent did for the cause, that is not good enough for the current socialists, let alone tomorrow’s. In history, the run-up to class warfare/high tax/redistributionist policies we associate with socialism becomes a spiraling rush. Examples include the end of the Roman Republic and the end of the ancient Greek Athenian democracy. The same is true within the Democrat Party today. James Carville recently said the Democrat Party is ‘not a left-wing party.’ Contrary to his spin, however, the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) have the momentum within the Democrat Party.” (06/27/26)
https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/leftist-democrats-thrown-bus-socialists-drivers-seat
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32) The President’s Birthright Citizenship Order is Not Just Unconstitutional. It’s Crazy
Source: Washington Monthly
by Orville Vernon Burton & Armand Derfner
“The president’s challenge to birthright citizenship is more than unconstitutional, as the Supreme Court will probably hold—it’s crazy. Why? Because it would affect not just children born in the future—as it claims—but would threaten the citizenship of every living, native-born American, whether aged 25, 50, or 75. It would also mean that a U.S. birth certificate would be inadequate to prove American citizenship, thereby becoming almost useless. How can this be? It is all about two words: ‘prospective’ and ‘retrospective.’ The executive order may be ‘prospective,’ but the Constitution of the United States is not.” (06/26/26)
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2026/06/26/the-presidents-birthright-citizenship-order-is-not-just-unconstitutional-its-crazy/
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33) Poem: The Din
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“They’re designing park benches / so that homeless people can’t sleep on them / and placing metal spikes beneath overpasses / so they can’t be used as shelter. / Jerry Seinfeld says Palestine doesn’t exist / and that sometimes socks go missing in the dryer, / wocka wocka ha ha ha / it’s funny because it’s a witty observation / about life’s everyday little goofy goofs. / Fast food wrappers blow in the wind / like the leaves used to do. / Duct-taped gargoyles with garbage bag wings / peer down at the din of civilization / as we march over the sidewalk sleepers / to our Jobs, / stepping over dead bodies / while staring at our phones / and counting the minutes / til we can go home to our sofas / and watch wocka wocka …” (06/27/26)
https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/2026/06/27/the-din/
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34) How fearmongering sets policy, from “marihuana” to solar to AI
Source: Los Angeles Times
by LZ Granderson
“So much about the technology has been draped in doomsday scenarios and Terminator movies. It’s hard sometimes to separate the impossible from the improbable. Even more difficult if you can’t tell if the technology is meant for the good of all or just aiming to be good for someone’s bottom line. Maybe, unlike in the ‘marihuana’ prohibition era, the scary warnings are valid. But now just as then, we need to separate fact from myth before setting policy.” (06/26/26)
https://archive.is/KPKOX
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35) Why I Launched a Writing Community for Education Entrepreneurs
Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by Nasiyah Isra-Ul
“People often ask me how I got so involved in writing and public speaking. I’ve been a passionate writer for most of my life, starting to journal, write short stories, and willingly craft essays in my homeschool program outside of what was required in the curriculum by age 11. By the time I was a teenager, I was writing curriculum, developing language arts training for students, and starting a blog. I was also eventually writing for college, as one of the youngest in my classes, and my professors always said they loved reading my papers first because they were ‘always so engaging and well-written.’ Now, in my early twenties, I’ve written graduate-level papers, gotten published in a variety of news outlets, blog frequently, authored multiple books, and often write for the Lab. This didn’t happen overnight. It took years of encouragement, learning, and lots of peer mentorship to get to this point.” (06/26/26)
https://fee.org/articles/why-i-launched-a-writing-community-for-education-entrepreneurs/
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36) What if Trump is right to pump the brakes on the most advanced AI?
Source: Washington Post
by Robert Wright
“Like opponents of various other AI restrictions, [Alex] Stamos worries about handing an advantage to China — where, he noted, an impressive new model called GLM-5.2 had been unveiled that very week. ‘It is a great, great week for the Chinese AI industry, a fantastic week,’ he said, ‘and a huge own goal for the United States in the race to dominate the 21st century via domination of AI.’ I’m not sure what exactly it would mean for America to ‘dominate the 21st century’ — and I’m far from sure that living in a century without such domination would be as unpleasant as Stamos seems to think. But I do feel sure that the ‘race with China’ theme so often deployed in discussions of AI regulation has some downsides, and that this particular deployment is a good example.” (06/26/26)
https://archive.is/jMnxk
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37) Democrats Ask: Obama Who?
Source: Town Hall
by JT Young
“Last week, Democrats came to Chicago to erect a cenotaph to their past. In the words of Shakespeare’s Mark Antony, they did not come to praise Obama as much as to bury him. They did so because they had already buried the party that nominated him twice. In Barack Obama’s 2012 reelection victory, he received the votes of 17 percent of conservatives. Just twelve years later, in 2024, Kamala Harris received nine percent of conservative voters. And of that nine percent, a good many were undoubtedly not voting for Harris but were ‘never Trumpers’ voting against Donald Trump. The point is: Obama once had a significant appeal to conservatives. That no longer holds for Democrats. The reason is that Democrats are not what they once were, or at least the moderates they were able to successfully pose as being..” (06/27/26)
https://townhall.com/columnists/jtyoung/2026/06/27/democrats-ask-obama-who-n2678395
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38) Reclaiming the Third Space
Source: Brownstone Institute
by Mollie Engelhart
“The first space is home. It is where our domestic identity lives. Family, rest, intimacy, and routine. The second space is work. It is where we contribute, produce, and create value. The third space exists in between. It is the neutral, shared place where people gather informally, without obligation or performance. Historically, these were cafés, churches, town squares, barber shops, libraries, local diners, pubs, and markets. Places where you could show up, be recognized, and belong without needing to achieve or prove anything.” (06/26/26)
https://brownstone.org/articles/reclaiming-the-third-space/
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39) Under Pressure
Source: Law & Liberty
by Peter Campbell
“Historical illiteracy has become a real problem in our time. The downsides of this have become rather glaring lately, as for instance in Tucker Carlson’s 2024 interview with Daryl Cooper, whom Carlson called ‘the most honest popular historian in the United States.’ Cooper claimed that Americans’ understanding of WWII was deeply flawed and that the true villain was Winston Churchill. The fact that some young Americans found this message sympathetic is very troubling and speaks volumes about our failure to educate the young about history. I regularly tell my students that reading history is their best defense against disinformation.” (06/26/26)
https://lawliberty.org/under-pressure/
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40) Trump’s Latest Election Power Grab Runs Through the Postal Service
Source: Exiled Policy
by Jason Pye
“A new USPS rulemaking will prevent mail-in ballots in states that won’t comply with the administration’s demands.” (06/26/26)
https://exiledpolicy.substack.com/p/trumps-latest-election-power-grab
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41) Rogue Supreme Court Blesses Ethnic Cleansing
Source: The American Prospect
by Naomi Bethune & Ryan Cooper
“Thursday was a decision day at the Supreme Court, and the American people got to enjoy the familiar experience of waiting on tenterhooks yet again to see which rights were going to be deleted this time. The answer was residency rights for hundreds of thousands of nonwhite immigrants. The most important of Thursday’s decisions was also the worst one: Mullin v. Doe, which overturned a lower-court order barring the Trump regime from removing Temporary Protected Status (TPS) from hundreds of thousands of nonwhite refugees. For months now, Haitian and Syrian recipients of the TPS program have been in limbo, with their legal status being held up by fragile pauses in lower-court rulings.” [editor’s note: shrewd commentary or whining nonsense? You be the judge – SAT] (06/26/26)
https://prospect.org/2026/06/26/rogue-supreme-court-blesses-ethnic-cleansing-immigration-tps-trump-immigration-ice/
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42) The Unfortunate Necessity of Court Packing to Stop America’s Authoritarian Drift
Source: The UnPopulist
by Andy Craig
“A few years ago, court packing was a fringe idea with no realistic prospects. President Biden’s commission on Supreme Court reform pointedly declined to endorse adding seats, and no realistic vote count could reach 51 in the Senate—not only for expansion itself, but for nuking the legislative filibuster to bring it to a vote at all. That is no longer the case.” (06/26/26)
https://www.theunpopulist.net/p/the-unfortunate-necessity-of-court
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43) The Myth of Nationalist Victory: The Articles of Confederation and the Bank of North America
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
by Joshua Mawhorter
“It is not uncommon for people to conflate victory and liberty with centralization and inflation. Even in the case of the American Revolution—which was relatively decentralized—many at the time, and others since, argued that monetary inflation, standing armies and a state-centric approach to war, consolidation under a centralized national government, direct taxation, and central banking were all necessary to achieve victory and independence. The not-too-subtle implication is that liberty depends on big government.” (06/26/26)
https://mises.org/mises-wire/myth-nationalist-victory-articles-confederation-and-bank-north-america
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44) Justice Matters: Jury Service Gives Extraordinary Power for Ordinary People
Source: Cato Institute
by Matthew Cavedon
https://www.cato.org/commentary/justice-matters-jury-service-gives-extraordinary-power-ordinary-people
-----
45) Save American Lives & Prosperity by Cutting FDA Bureaucracy
Source: American Greatness
by Thaddeus G McCotter
“By statute, the approval process of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is to determine the safety and effectiveness of a new drug. If both requirements are met, the new drug is approved. The process usually takes roughly a decade. Most people would reasonably assume the lengthy approval process is due to the need to prove a new drug is safe for use by patients. But the years-long lag between a drug’s submission for approval and its arrival on the market often stems from the process of assessing its effectiveness. The easiest way to think about it is this: determining safety protects patients; determining effectiveness protects consumers.” (06/27/26)
https://amgreatness.com/2026/06/27/save-american-lives-and-prosperity-by-cutting-the-fda-bureaucracy/
-----
46) Don’t Let the Country’s Wet Blankets Ruin Independence Day
Source: Reason
by JD Tuccille
“Leading up to our Independence Day party, my wife asked whether she should buy us T-shirts celebrating America’s 250th anniversary or stick with what we already have. We went with our existing garments. When the red, white, and blue string lights are up and the Gadsden flag is flying out front, my son will don his free speech shirt, my wife will wear one with USA printed across it, and my shirt will show an image of George Washington crossing the Delaware and text reading: ‘Americans. Willing to cross a frozen river to kill you. In your sleep. On Christmas. Not kidding, we’ve done it.’ It will be festive. But not everybody shares our enthusiasm for celebrating the nation’s birthday and the liberty at the core of its founding philosophy.” (06/26/26)
https://reason.com/2026/06/26/dont-let-the-countrys-wet-blankets-ruin-independence-day/
-----
47) Should Smartphones be Banned in Schools? A Look at the Research
Source: The Daily Economy
by Peter Jacobsen
“Students react poorly at first but show improvement over time. Unfortunately, government schools are tricky places to run experiments.” (06/26/26)
https://thedailyeconomy.org/article/should-smartphones-be-banned-in-schools-a-look-at-the-research/
-----
48) The Iran war is the most unpopular major conflict in US history
Source: Responsible Statecraft
by Stephen Semler
“During an April Senate hearing dominated by debate over the Iran war, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth batted down criticisms from skeptical members of Congress, saying ‘I believe we do have the support of the American people’ in this conflict. Hegseth, it turns out, was wrong. Two months later, we can now confidently say that the Iran conflict is the most unpopular war in U.S. history. When I compared public opinion on the Iran War to previous major U.S. conflicts in May, it hadn’t quite reached the Vietnam War’s level of unpopularity. But polling from June shows that the Iran War has now sunk to negative 32% net support — below the negative 31% recorded in the final poll during Vietnam.” (06/26/26)
https://responsiblestatecraft.org/iran-war-polling-us/
-----
49) Why Some Unions Are Joining the Call to “Freeze the Rent”
Source: In These Times
by Rebecca Burns
“‘I urge you guys to freeze the rent, because we want our students to succeed.’ That was the appeal Alyssa Wright made to the nine members of New York City’s Rent Guidelines Board (RGB) earlier this month, a little more than halfway through a packed, four-hour hearing in the Bronx on whether to freeze rents in the city’s some 1 million rent-stabilized apartments. Wright serves as a campus supervisor for a pilot program connecting City University of New York (CUNY) students with housing, healthcare and food resources. It’s a challenging role: Just that week, Wright said in her testimony, she had counseled five students facing eviction. Some 38% of CUNY’s 240,000 students experience housing insecurity, a condition that makes them twice as likely to withdraw or be placed on academic probation, according to a 2025 study based on a representative sample of students.” (06/26/26)
https://inthesetimes.com/article/labor-tenant-union-mamdani-rent-freeze
-----
50) War and Constitutional Indifference
Source: Antiwar.com
by Andrew P Napolitano
“Since its inception, the government of the United States has inexorably exceeded its powers under the Constitution. All three branches have been complicit in a consistent pattern of constitutional indifference. … that behavior is nowhere as manifest and harmful as war.” (06/26/26)
https://original.antiwar.com/andrew-p-napolitano/2026/06/25/war-and-constitutional-indifference/
_____ Today's Freedom Podcast and Video _____
51) The Chris Spangle Show, 06/27/26
Source: We Are Libertarians
“Trump’s Reflecting Pool Fiasco Exposes His Pattern of Leadership Failures.” (06/27/26)
https://www.chrisspangle.com/p/trumps-reflecting-pool-fiasco-exposes
-----
52) Unattended Baggage, episode 346
Source: Unattended Baggage
“It was fun while it lasted.” (06/27/26)
https://unattendedbaggage.substack.com/p/episode-346-it-was-fun-while-it-lasted
-----
53) The Good Fight Club, 06/27/26
Source: Yascha Mounk
“Matthew Yglesias, Claire Ainsley, and Yascha Mounk debate whether progressives have abandoned the working-class voters they once claimed to represent.” (06/27/26)
https://writing.yaschamounk.com/p/the-good-fight-club-17
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54) Pink Flame of Liberty, 06/27/26
Source: Pink Flame of Liberty
“LNC Chair McMahon moves the LNC back towards default transparency.” (06/27/26)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orsltodrfqY
-----
55) System Update, 06/26/26
Source: System Update
“Socialists SWEEP NYC, Tucker Apologizes to Muslims, Europe’s Russia Hate, ‘Chinamaxxing’ & More.” (06/26/26)
https://greenwald.substack.com/p/socialists-sweep-nyc-tucker-apologizes
-----
56) Fountainhead Forum, episode 464
Source: Fountainhead Forum
“Bola-Ige Alabi-Efeshodiamhe on life and liberty in Nigeria.” (06/26/26)
https://rumble.com/v7bwm8o-ff-464-bola-ige-alabi-efeshodiamhe-on-life-and-liberty-in-nigeria.html
-----
57) The Dishcast with Andrew Sullivan, 06/26/26
Source: The Weekly Dish
“Robert Wright On AI And Evolution.” (06/26/26)
https://andrewsullivan.substack.com/p/robert-wright-on-ai-and-evolution
-----
58) The Climate Realism Show, episode 206
Source: Heartland Institute
“We’re Winning! Climate Alarmism Is Losing Its Grip.” (06/26/26)
https://heartland.org/podcasts/were-winning-climate-alarmism-is-losing-its-grip/
-----
59) Serious Trouble, 06/26/26
Source: Serious Trouble
“At Least the Fancy Lawyers Are Still Getting Rich.” (06/26/26)
https://www.serioustrouble.show/p/at-least-the-fancy-lawyers-are-still
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60) The Inner Life of Liberalism, episode 3
Source: The Inner Life of Liberalism
“Delight in Difference.” (06/26/26)
https://creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/aaronpowell/episodes/003-Delight-in-Difference-e3ladg4
-----
61) Reason Interview: Soumaya Keynes
Source: Reason
“The Right Way To Fight a Trade War.” (06/26/26)
https://reason.com/podcast/2026/06/26/the-right-way-to-fight-a-trade-war/
-----
62) Ron Paul Liberty Report, 06/26/26
Source: Ron Paul Liberty Report
“Our Founders Hated Democracy – A Tool of The Socialists.” (06/26/26)
https://x.com/i/broadcasts/1rGmqqnvVVkGy
-----
63) The Fifth Column, episode 563
Source: The Fifth Column
“The Cadres and the Cabal.” (06/26/26)
https://www.wethefifth.com/p/the-cadres-and-the-cabal-563
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64) Freakonomics Radio, episode 679
Source: Freakonomics
“Why Does Vanderbilt Keep Winning?” (06/26/26)
https://freakonomics.com/podcast/why-does-vanderbilt-keep-winning/
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65) The Tom Woods Show, episode 2026
Source: The Tom Woods Show
“2026 Is the Best Time to Be Alive, and It Isn’t Close.” (06/26/26)
https://tomwoods.com/ep-2773-2026-is-the-best-time-to-be-alive-and-it-isnt-close/
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