07/09 -- Palestine: Israeli forces push deep into Gaza City; If You Don't Trust Media Now, Wait Until It's Government-Funded
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Thomas L. Knapp
Jul 9, 2024, 6:23:47 AM (7 days ago) Jul 9
to Freedom News Daily
Freedom News Daily, 07/09/24
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Produced by the staff of Rational Review News Digest
https://news.rationalreview.com/
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Today's Freedom News:
1) Palestine: Israeli forces push deep into Gaza City
2) Democratic memo details plan to replace Biden in “blitz primary”
3) Ukraine: Russian missile attack kills 36, hits children’s hospital
4) Bitcoin ETF Traders Buy the Dip With Nearly $300 Million Inflows
5) Federal judge in Alaska resigned after sexual misconduct probe
6) Paramount agrees to merge with Skydance, ending monthslong negotiations and Redstone era
7) Russia: Modi arrives in Moscow for talks with Putin
8) FL: Satanists to volunteer in government schools after DeSantis signs “chaplain” bill
9) Russia: Director, Playwright Sentenced to Six Years for “Justifying Terrorism”
10) Bullet vending machines introduced in three US states
11) Oil Falls as Hurricane Beryl’s Risk to Texas Operations Lessens
12) Study: Wegovy, Ozempic Lower Risk of Many Obesity-Related Cancers
13) At disgraced former president’s behest, GOPers move to change how they will oppose abortion
14) Biden blasts “elites” urging him to exit race in surprise interview
15) UK: Tate brothers accused of being serial tax evaders
16) Macron rejects PM’s resignation, as France seeks a way out of political “fog” of chaotic election
17) Citi to cease operations in Haiti after 50 years
18) Boeing agrees to plead guilty to felony charge over fatal 737 Max crashes
19) Whitmer shuts down 2024 POTUS talk, but doesn’t hide her ambitions in timely book launch
20) Lancet study: Gaza toll could exceed 186,000
Today's Freedom Commentary:
21) If You Don’t Trust Media Now, Wait Until It’s Government-Funded
22) A Win-Win-Win-Win on EV Policy
23) The National Security State Was Immune for Its Assassination of JFK
24) Fifty Years Ago Today, I Argued “U.S. v. Nixon.” The Supreme Court’s New Ruling on Presidential Immunity Appalled Me.
25) Democrats ARE going to get President Biden off the ticket
26) Liberation the Iranian way
27) Conservatives say liberals took religion out of schools. Truth is, it was never there to begin with.
28) Biden might exit, but rising distrust of institutions seems here to stay
29) War and Famine: America’s War on Terror and the Wasting of Our Democracy
30) If You Want to Be a Trade Hawk …
31) Biden and his backers are falling for the sunk cost fallacy
32) Democrats don’t give a damn about you
33) The Good That Jimmy Carter Did
34) It Didn’t Begin with LBJ: How the US Became a Transfer Society
35) OMG Haaretz Is Hamas Propaganda Now!
36) The History Lesson Jill Biden Must Read: How Lady Bird Johnson Got LBJ to Step Aside
37) A Scheme for Biden to Preserve His Dignity
38) Here’s how SCOTUS got the big free speech stuff right
39) Prisoners for Liberty
40) A human-centred approach to rethinking wealth and individual liberty
41) After 31 Years With the DNC, My Democratic Proposal to Get Out of This Mess
42) Quantum Vibe, 07/08/24
43) This week, NATO III celebrates itself
44) Yes to a Living City: Applying Jacobs’s Principles to New York’s Rezoning
45) Bidengate and the Doom Loop
46) Playbook for a Military Draft
47) Every American War is Bullshit: Exposing the Myth of the “Good War”
48) Niall Ferguson: The Intellectual Underwriter of Trump’s American Carnage Idea
49) Escape From the Box
50) Time for the Fed to Cut Rates
Today's Freedom Podcast and Video:
51) Reason Roundtable, 07/08/24
52) LibertyDad, 07/08/24
53) Cato Daily Podcast, 07/08/24
54) CNN Inside Politics, 07/08/24
55) Rising, 07/08/24
56) Unattended Baggage, episode 252
57) Conflicts of Interest, episode 630
58) The Bryan Hyde Show, 07/08/24
59) EconTalk, 07/08/24
60) The Libertarian Angle, 07/08/24
61) Finding Freedom, episode 445
62) Antiwar News with Dave DeCamp, 07/08/24
63) The Fifth Column, episode 462
64) Free Talk Live, 07/07/24
65) Soho Forum Debate: What’s the Best Argument for Libertarianism?
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_____ Today's Freedom News _____
1) Palestine: Israeli forces push deep into Gaza City
Source: Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
“Israeli forces advanced deeper into the Gaza Strip’s largest city in pursuit of militants who had regrouped there, sending thousands of Palestinians fleeing on Monday from an area ravaged in the early weeks of the war that has gone on for nine months. Hamas warned that the latest raids and displacement in Gaza City could lead to the collapse of long-running negotiations over a cease-fire and hostage release, after the two sides had appeared to have narrowed the gaps in recent days. … CIA Director William Burns returned to the region Monday for talks in Cairo, according to Egypt’s state-run Qahera TV, which is close to the security services. An Israeli delegation was also heading to the Egyptian capital, Israeli media reported.” (07/09/24)
https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2024/jul/09/israeli-forces-push-deep-into-gaza-city/
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2) Democratic memo details plan to replace Biden in “blitz primary”
Source: New York Post
“Two influential Democratic operatives are circulating a memo that lays out a plan for a ‘blitz primary’ before the party’s convention in August to replace President Biden if he can be convinced to bow out, a new report says. Georgetown University law Professor Rosa Brooks, a volunteer policy adviser on Biden’s 2020 campaign, and venture capitalist Ted Dintersmith, a deep-pocketed donor, authored the detailed memo being distributed to party contributors, executive branch officials and the president’s campaign staff, Semafor reported Monday. ‘We can limp to shameful, avoidable democracy-ending defeat. Or Democrats can make this Our Finest Hour,’ the memo says. President Joe Biden walks as he boards Air Force One at Harrisburg International Airport en route to Washington following a campaign event in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, U.S., July 7, 2024.” (07/08/24)
https://nypost.com/2024/07/08/us-news/democratic-memo-details-plan-to-replace-biden-in-blitz-primary-report/
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3) Ukraine: Russian missile attack kills 36, hits children’s hospital
Source: Reuters
“Russia blasted the main children’s hospital in Kyiv with a missile in broad daylight on Monday and rained missiles down on other cities across Ukraine, killing at least 36 civilians in the deadliest wave of air strikes for months. Parents holding babies walked in the street outside the hospital, dazed and sobbing after the rare daylight aerial attack. Windows had been smashed and panels ripped off, and hundreds of Kyiv residents were helping to clear debris. … The government proclaimed a day of mourning on Tuesday for one of the worst air attacks of the war, which it said demonstrated that Ukraine urgently needs an upgrade of its air defences from its Western allies.” ()7/08/24)
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ukrainian-air-defence-engaged-repelling-russian-missile-attack-kyiv-officials-2024-07-08/
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4) Bitcoin ETF Traders Buy the Dip With Nearly $300 Million Inflows
Source: CoinDesk
“Spot bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded funds (ETFs) recorded nearly $300 million in net inflows on Monday, marking their highest buying activity since early June when the cryptocurrency traded over $70,000. SoSoValue data show that market leader BlackRock’s IBIT led buying activity with nearly $180 million in net inflows, followed by Fidelity’s FBTC. Grayscale’s GBTC — infamous for its outflows — recorded over $25 million in purchases. ETFs offered by Invesco, Franklin Templeton, Valkyrie, WisdomTree and Hashdex showed no inflow or outflow activity. Strong inflows come as bitcoin faces significant selling pressure from various sources, such as repayments tied to defunct crypto exchange Mt. Gox and a German government entity moving hundreds of millions worth of BTC to exchanges in the past month.” (07/09/24)
https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2024/07/09/bitcoin-etf-traders-buy-the-dip-with-nearly-300m-inflows/
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5) Federal judge in Alaska resigned after sexual misconduct probe
Source: Honolulu Star-Advertiser
“A federal judge in Alaska who abruptly resigned last week subjected his staff to a hostile work environment and engaged in an inappropriate sexual relationship with a law clerk, a U.S. judicial panel said on Monday. The 9th Circuit Judicial Council publicly reprimanded and admonished U.S. District Judge Joshua Kindred, an appointee of Republican former President Donald Trump who submitted his resignation from his life-tenured position on Wednesday after joining the bench in 2020. The council in a May 23 order made public on Monday said it had requested his resignation while at the same time referring his case to the federal judiciary’s top policymaking body so it could certify the matter for Congress, which could then weigh pursuing a rare impeachment of a federal judge.” (07/08/24)
https://www.staradvertiser.com/2024/07/08/breaking-news/federal-judge-in-alaska-resigned-after-sexual-misconduct-probe/
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6) Paramount agrees to merge with Skydance, ending monthslong negotiations and Redstone era
Source: CNBC
“Paramount Global has agreed to merge with Skydance, capping off a monthslong negotiation, in a deal that would see the Redstone family step away from control of the storied movie studio and media company. Paramount’s special committee signed off on the merger Sunday, days after Shari Redstone’s National Amusements, the controlling shareholder of Paramount, once again reached a preliminary agreement with Skydance, the production company known for ‘Top Gun: Maverick.’ A similar deal had weeks earlier been stopped in its tracks. The latest iteration of the deal will see the buying consortium, which includes private equity firms RedBird Capital Partners and KKR, invest more than $8 billion into Paramount and to acquire National Amusements.” (07/08/24)
https://www.cnbc.com/2024/07/08/paramount-skydance-merger.html
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7) Russia: Modi arrives in Moscow for talks with Putin
Source: Deutsche Welle [German state media]
“Indian Prime Minister Narenda Modi landed in Moscow in Monday for a two-day visit including talks with President Vladimir Putin. … Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told a news briefing that the two leaders would meet informally on Monday evening with the opportunity to talk ‘with a free agenda one-on-one.’ A state banquet was also scheduled for Monday evening. The trip is Modi’s first to Russia since 2019, when he met Putin in the far-eastern city of Vladivostok, although the pair did meet at a Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Uzbekistan in September 2022, seven months into Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Putin visited New Delhi in 2021.” (07/08/24)
https://www.dw.com/en/indias-modi-arrives-in-moscow-for-talks-with-putin/a-69594807
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8) FL: Satanists to volunteer in government schools after DeSantis signs “chaplain” bill
Source: The Guardian [UK]
“Members of the Satanic Temple say they are poised to act as volunteer chaplains under a state law that took effect this week opening campuses to ‘additional counseling and support to students’ from outside organizations. Although HB 931 leaves the implementation of chaplain programs to individual school districts, and only requires schools to list a volunteer’s religion ‘if any,’ DeSantis has made clear its intent is to restore the tenets of Christianity to public education. Without the bill, DeSantis said at its signing in April: ‘You’re basically saying that God has no place [on campus]. That’s wrong.’ The satanists see the law, which comes amid a vigorous theocratic drive into education by the religious right nationally, as an equal opportunity: if Christian chaplains are permitted access to students, often at the most vulnerable and impressionable stages of their lives, then so are they.” (07/08/24)
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/jul/08/florida-satanic-temple-ron-desantis
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9) Russia: Director, Playwright Sentenced to Six Years for “Justifying Terrorism”
Source: US News & World Report
“A Russian court sentenced a playwright and a theatre director each to six years in prison on Monday for ‘justifying terrorism,’ concluding a trial that rights campaigners had said demonstrated Russia’s intolerance of artistic freedom. Director Zhenya Berkovich, 39, and playwright Svetlana Petriychuk, 44, were arrested in May last year over their production of a play called ‘Finist, the Brave Falcon,’ about Russian women who marry Islamic State fighters. The case was the most prominent prosecution of Russian cultural figures over the content of their artwork since Moscow sent troops into Ukraine in 2022. Both denied guilt. … At the start of their trial in late May, Berkovich and Petriychuk said they had staged the play because they oppose terrorism rather than support it.” (07/08/24)
https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2024-07-08/russia-sentences-director-playwright-to-6-years-for-justifying-terrorism
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10) Bullet vending machines introduced in three US states
Source: NewsBytes [India]
“American Rounds, a United States-based company, has launched automated ammunition vending machines in Alabama, Oklahoma, and Texas. The kiosks are designed to make bullets ‘more available’ to gun owners by allowing them to purchase rounds at their convenience. The company’s website states that these machines are as user-friendly as an ATM and can be accessed 24/7, eliminating the constraints of store hours and long queues. The vending machines employ advanced AI technology, card scanning, and facial recognition software to verify a buyer’s age and identity. Customers can select their desired ammunition via a touchscreen interface, scan their ID, and collect the ammo from the machine.” (07/08/24)
https://www.newsbytesapp.com/news/world/us-introduces-vending-machines-to-sell-bullets/story
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11) Oil Falls as Hurricane Beryl’s Risk to Texas Operations Lessens
Source: Yahoo! News
“Oil fell as Hurricane Beryl looked less likely to pose major disruptions to crude infrastructure in Texas. … West Texas Intermediate slid 1% to settle near $82 a barrel after four straight weekly gains. Concerns that Hurricane Beryl would impede oil operations in the Gulf of Mexico and Texas helped drive up futures last week, but weakening product spreads indicate the storm has been less disruptive to infrastructure than expected. Still, exports may face delays after the Port of Houston and Port of Corpus Christi were shut down — the Port of Houston will remain closed through Tuesday, but the Port of Corpus Christi has reopened. About 85% of Houston has lost power, forcing oil companies to adjust operations.” (07/08/24)
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/oil-climbs-traders-keep-tabs-232952665.html
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12) Study: Wegovy, Ozempic Lower Risk of Many Obesity-Related Cancers
Source: US News & World Report
“In yet another finding that touts the health benefits of wildly popular weight-loss medications like Wegovy and Ozempic, scientists report that taking the drugs may help reduce the risk of some cancers. In a study published July 5 in JAMA Network Open, researchers found people with type 2 diabetes who were being treated with a class of GLP-1 drugs were less likely to be diagnosed with 10 of 13 obesity-linked cancers than those who were taking insulin. The reduction in risk was significant: Taking the medications cut rates of gallbladder cancer, meningioma, pancreatic cancer and hepatocellular carcinoma, a type of liver cancer, by more than half. Risks were also reduced for cancers of the ovaries, colon, esophagus and kidneys as well as for multiple myeloma (a cancer of the bone marrow) and endometrial cancer (which begins in the lining of the uterus).” (07/08/24)
https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/2024-07-08/wegovy-ozempic-lower-risk-of-many-obesity-related-cancers
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13) At disgraced former president’s behest, GOPers move to change how they will oppose abortion
Source: SFGate
“The Republican National Committee moved Monday to adopt a party platform that reflects former President Donald Trump’s position opposing a federal abortion ban and ceding limits to states, omitting the explicit basis for a national ban for the first time in 40 years. Trump imposed his priorities on the RNC’s platform committee as he seeks to steer clear during his campaign of strict abortion language, even while taking credit for setting up the 2022 reversal of Roe v. Wade by the Supreme Court. Trump appointed three of the six justices who voted in the majority to overturn the 1973 precedent that established a national right to have an abortion. The scaled-down platform — just 16 pages and with limited specifics on many key Republican issues — reflects a desire by the Trump campaign to avoid giving Democrats more material for their warnings about the former president’s intentions if he wins back the White House.” (07/08/24)
https://www.sfgate.com/news/politics/article/national-abortion-ban-splits-the-trump-campaign-19560124.php
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14) Biden blasts “elites” urging him to exit race in surprise interview
Source: CNBC
“President Joe Biden defended his place at the top of the Democratic ticket Monday in a surprise television interview on MSNBC’s ‘Morning Joe,’ after more lawmakers and donors came forward over the weekend with concerns about his reelection bid. ‘I’m not going anywhere,’ Biden said in the phone interview. ‘I absolutely believe that I am the best candidate to beat Donald Trump in 2024.’ ‘I’m getting so frustrated by the elites in the party’ calling on him to step down, the president fumed. ‘I don’t care what the millionaires think.’ Biden’s comments came after a weekend where his political wounds only deepened, despite his efforts to stem the bleeding. During House Democrats’ closed-door virtual meeting on Sunday, four more Democratic representatives expressed that they think Biden should exit the 2024 race, according to an NBC News report.” (07/08/24)
https://www.cnbc.com/2024/07/08/biden-blasts-elites-urging-him-to-exit-race-in-surprise-interview.html
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15) UK: Tate brothers accused of being serial tax evaders
Source: BBC News [UK State Media]
“Controversial social media personality Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan have been accused of failing to pay any tax on £21m of revenue from their online businesses. Devon and Cornwall Police is bringing a civil claim against the brothers and a third person, referred to only as J. They are accused of paying no tax in any country on their online business revenue between 2014 and 2022.
The force is seeking to recover around £2.8 million in seven frozen bank accounts, an application the three defendants are contesting. ‘Andrew Tate and Tristan Tate are serial tax and VAT evaders,’ Sarah Clarke KC for Devon and Cornwall Police told Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Monday. ‘They, in particular Andrew Tate, are brazen about it.’ Ms Clarke quoted from a video posted online by Andrew Tate, in which he said: ‘When I lived in England I refused to pay tax.'” (07/08/24)
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cjk3xglre0ko
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16) Macron rejects PM’s resignation, as France seeks a way out of political “fog” of chaotic election
Source: South China Morning Post [Hong Kong]
“French President Emmanuel Macron on Monday asked his prime minister to stay in the role for now, pending what will be difficult negotiations to form a new government after a surprise left-wing surge in elections that delivered a hung parliament. The leftist New Popular Front (NFP) emerged as the dominant force in the National Assembly after Sunday’s election, thwarting Marine Le Pen’s quest to bring the far-right to power. However, with no single group securing a working majority, the outcome heralded a period of political volatility just before the Paris Olympics and raised uncertainty among investors about who would run the euro zone’s second-largest economy. … Prime Minister Gabriel Attal, a centrist and close ally of Macron, tendered his resignation, but the head of state rejected it.” (07/08/24)
https://archive.is/9QBBv
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17) Citi to cease operations in Haiti after 50 years
Source: Reuters
“Citigroup, opens new tab will wind up its operations in Haiti due to weak demand from institutional clients and lower international banking activity, ending its presence of more than five decades in the country. The exit is part of a strategic review and will not have a significant economic impact on Citi, the bank said, opens new tab on Monday. Citi, one of the largest banks in the United States, has exited non-core markets since CEO Jane Fraser took the helm in 2021. To catch up to peers whose profitability has outpaced Citi’s, the bank overhauled its operations and sharpened focus on businesses that offer the best returns. The bank is also exiting its consumer unit in Mexico, which is set for an initial public offering in 2025.” (07/08/24)
https://www.reuters.com/business/finance/citi-cease-operations-haiti-2024-07-08/
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18) Boeing agrees to plead guilty to felony charge over fatal 737 Max crashes
Source: United Press International
“Boeing has agreed to plead guilty to a single felony charge of conspiracy to defraud the government in connection to two crashes of its 737 Max jet that killed nearly 350 people during a six-month span in 2018 and 2019. The plea agreement was announced in a late Sunday court filing by the Justice Department, The New York Times reported. The document states Boeing agrees to pay the maximum fine allowed under law of $487.2 million and invest at least $455 million over the next three years in its compliance and safety programs. The embattled aerospace company will also be put on probation for three years as part of which the Justice Department will install a compliance monitor to ensure safety measures have been implemented and followed, The Times reported.” (07/08/24)
https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2024/07/08/Boeing-pleads-guilty/1411720420120/
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19) Whitmer shuts down 2024 POTUS talk, but doesn’t hide her ambitions in timely book launch
Source: SFGate
“Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer is releasing a new memoir at a particularly fraught moment, both for herself and for the Democratic Party. Set for release Tuesday amid the frenzy over President Joe Biden’s recent debate performance, ‘True Gretch’ won’t do much to dispel questions about her national ambitions. But in a pre-launch interview with The Associated Press, Whitmer did what she could to shut down such speculation. When asked if she would consider becoming a candidate this year if Biden were to step down, she responded with a definitive ‘No’. ‘It’s a distraction more than anything,’ said Whitmer. ‘I don’t like seeing my name in articles like that because I’m totally focused on governing and campaigning for the ticket.'” (07/08/24)
https://www.sfgate.com/news/politics/article/gov-whitmer-shuts-down-2024-presidential-talk-19560118.php
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20) Lancet study: Gaza toll could exceed 186,000
Source: Al Jazeera [Qatari state media]
“The accumulative effects of Israel’s war on Gaza could mean the true death toll could reach more than 186,000 people, according to a study published in the journal Lancet. According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, more than 38,000 Palestinians have been killed since Israel launched its military offensive on October 7 in the wake of deadly Hamas attacks. The study pointed out that the death toll is higher because the official toll does not take into account thousands of dead buried under rubble and indirect deaths due to destruction of health facilities, food distribution systems and other public infrastructure.” (07/08/24)
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/7/8/gaza-toll-could-exceed-186000-lancet-study-says
_____ Today's Freedom Commentary _____
21) If You Don’t Trust Media Now, Wait Until It’s Government-Funded
Source: Reason
by JD Tuccille
“In May, the New York State government agreed to subsidize news media. With audiences declining for news reports, many Very Concerned People have called on governments to Do Something to prop up outlets failing to win enough public support to keep the lights on. That something comes in the form of money unlikely to win back an indifferent public but that stabilizes employment prospects for reporters. The result may be that journalists will cater to state officials rather than woo readers and viewers.” (07/08/24)
https://reason.com/2024/07/08/if-you-dont-trust-media-now-wait-until-its-government-funded/
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22) A Win-Win-Win-Win on EV Policy
Source: EconLog
by David Henderson
“One of the first things you learn about in an economics course is the concept of trade-offs: You can’t have everything you want. … U.S. auto workers want to keep their jobs. Most U.S. drivers still prefer cars with internal combustion engines. Environmentalists want Americans to buy EVs. And free traders want, well, free trade. Something’s got to give. Or does it? There’s a path that would enable each party to achieve many of its objectives. First, end mandates and subsidies for EVs. Second, eliminate President Biden’s 100% tariff on EVs from China and allow duty-free imports. … More people driving EVs would make environmentalists happy. And ending mandates and subsidies would allow U.S. automakers to do what they do best: make cars with internal combustion engines. That in turn would keep U.S. auto workers employed and able to continue using their specific skills.” (published elsewhere 06/06/24l posted 07/08/24)
https://www.econlib.org/a-win-win-win-win-on-ev-policy/
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23) The National Security State Was Immune for Its Assassination of JFK
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
by Jacob G Hornberger
“No one should have been surprised over the Supreme Court’s recent ruling of absolute immunity for official acts carried out by a U.S. president. The federal judiciary has long held that the U.S. national security state — i.e., the Pentagon, CIA, and NSA — is immune from civil or criminal liability for its illegal acts, so long as such acts are ostensibly intended to protect ‘national security.’ … as we have seen with the Chilean coup and the U.S. coup in November 1963, sometimes the executive branch goes to war against the national-security branch. When that happens, there is no question as to which side is going to win and that the winning side would receive immunity from the courts upon a showing of protecting ‘national security.'” (07/08/24)
https://www.fff.org/2024/07/08/the-national-security-state-was-immune-for-its-assassination-of-jfk/
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24) Fifty Years Ago Today, I Argued “U.S. v. Nixon.” The Supreme Court’s New Ruling on Presidential Immunity Appalled Me.
Source: The Bulwark
by Philip Allen Lacovara
“The issue in United States v. Richard Nixon was whether the president and his closest aides had conspired to obstruct justice in the Watergate break-in coverup. Just sixteen days later, the Court concluded that, while Nixon could claim a limited privilege for some confidential communications, that privilege could be overcome by the overarching public interest in prosecuting federal crimes. … Nixon was ordered to produce the evidence, which showed his own complicity, as the grand jury had alleged in naming him an ‘unindicted co-conspirator.’ He resigned two weeks later, still the only president to have done so. Dramatically different in tone and content was last week’s decision in Donald Trump v. United States fabricating immunity for Trump from criminal liability to the people he and other presidents are sworn to serve.” (07/08/24)
https://www.thebulwark.com/p/trump-nixon-supreme-court-case-50-years-later
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25) Democrats ARE going to get President Biden off the ticket
Source: New York Post
by staff
“President Biden insisted Friday that he won’t drop out of the 2024 race unless ‘the Lord Almighty’ tells him. Get ready for a lot of Democrats to start publicly praying. Not so much to God, though, as to Nancy Pelosi, Barack Obama and anyone else with a shot at getting through to Joe, who right now seems to be listening only to Hunter and Dr. Jill. The party’s down-ballot candidates are freaking out, rightly fearing that having a manifestly unfit-for-office guy at the top of the ticket will not only hand Donald Trump the White House, but elect a Republican House and Senate. Obama’s top electioneer, David Axelrod, is already telling the party’s donors to close their purses to any candidate who won’t call for Biden to drop …” (07/07/24)
https://nypost.com/2024/07/07/opinion/democrats-are-going-to-get-president-biden-off-the-ticket/
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26) Liberation the Iranian way
Source: Christian Science Monitor
by staff
“In a clear message to their ruling clerics, more than half of Iranian voters chose not to cast ballots in a highly engineered election for president on July 5. ‘I want a free country, I want a free life,’ one university student in Tehran told Reuters in describing her reason not to give legitimacy to an unpopular regime. Those who did vote sent a similar message, one that might now also influence Iran’s violent campaign across the Middle East to be the guide and guardian of all Muslims. Voters rejected the regime’s chosen hard-line candidate, Saeed Jalili, opting instead for a conservative reformer, Masoud Pezeshkian. … A former heart surgeon and health minister, he promised to end violent enforcement of a dress code for women as well as restrictions on internet access.” (07/08/24)
https://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/the-monitors-view/2024/0708/Liberation-the-Iranian-way
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27) Conservatives say liberals took religion out of schools. Truth is, it was never there to begin with.
Source: Philadelphia Inquirer
by Jonathan Zimmerman
“Once upon a time, public schools respected religion. They taught the Bible and posted the Ten Commandments. Then big bad liberals came along and took God out of the schools. And the rest, as they say, is history. That’s what right-wingers want you to think, but they’re wrong. In earlier eras, religious instruction wasn’t nearly as common as they say. And when it did happen, it was promoted by political liberals as well as conservatives.” (07/08/24)
https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/louisiana-ten-commandments-display-religious-education-public-schools-20240708.html
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28) Biden might exit, but rising distrust of institutions seems here to stay
Source: Washington Post
by George F Will
“The leakage of trustworthiness from American institutions began with the lies that enveloped Watergate and Vietnam. It accelerated during the 2008 financial crisis, when cynicism (‘You never want a serious crisis to go to waste’) fueled the government’s indiscriminate and lawless response …. Now the world’s oldest political party and its media accomplices have effected a gigantic subtraction from trust: Leaders of the former lied about President Biden’s condition until, on June 27, continuing to do so became untenable. The latter had allowed the lying because they believe Donald Trump’s many mendacities are an excuse for theirs.” (07/08/24)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/07/08/joe-biden-american-institutions-news-media/
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29) War and Famine: America’s War on Terror and the Wasting of Our Democracy
Source: TomDispatch
by Andrea Mazzarino
“Many war stories end with hunger wreaking havoc on significant portions of a population. In Christian theology, the Biblical ‘four horses of the apocalypse,’ believed by many in early modern Europe to presage the end of the world, symbolized invasion, armed conflict, and famine followed by death. They suggest the degree to which people have long recognized how violence causes starvation. Armed conflict disrupts food supplies as warring factions divert resources to arms production and their militaries while destroying the kinds of infrastructure that enable societies to feed themselves. Governments, too, sometimes use starvation as a weapon of war.” (07/07/24)
https://tomdispatch.com/war-and-famine/
-----
30) If You Want to Be a Trade Hawk …
Source: The Dispatch
by Kevin D Williamson
“Donald Trump loves tariffs. Joe Biden loves tariffs. The next president elected to lead these United States of America is — probably! — going to be a guy who loves tariffs. He will be surrounded by people who love tariffs or by people who will, for the right salary and an occasional chance for throne-sniffing, pretend to love tariffs. There’s a whole hatchery of trade hawks in the making out there. … there are those who argue for a very broad interpretation of security sensitivity, one that encompasses not only manufactured goods used by military and intelligence agencies but also critical industrial inputs of all kinds: rare-earth minerals, microprocessors, steel — hell, Sen. Marco Rubio thinks sugar is a national-security priority. (It is a priority to some of his cronies in Florida, for sure.) The problem with that tendency toward strategic autarky is that it isn’t … strategic.” (07/08/24)
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/want-trade-hawk-131500053.html
-----
31) Biden and his backers are falling for the sunk cost fallacy
Source: The Hill
“Joe Biden’s self-inflicted electoral crisis is a classic case study in the ‘sunk cost fallacy.’ As Vice President Kamala Harris and party leaders pour resources into the president’s flailing campaign, the argument that Biden is the only one who can defeat Donald Trump in November and ‘protect democracy’ is increasingly falling on electoral and donor deaf ears. Coined in 1980 by economist Richard Thaler, the sunk-cost fallacy describes a cognitive bias that leads people to double down on failed strategies in which they have invested time, resources and emotional energy. … as often happens with gamblers waging sunk cost fallacies, it was a high-risk move to do the extended interview with ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos, and it’ll be more ‘sunk costs’ for Biden to do other spontaneous live events without teleprompters.” (07/08/24)
https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/4757139-biden-sunk-cost-fallacy/
-----
32) Democrats don’t give a damn about you
Source: Washington Times
by Don Feder
“With the walking dead at the head of their ticket and the party facing annihilation in November, Democrats are desperate to convince you that they really, really care about you. In reality, they care as much about ordinary Americans as President Biden cared about those who died at Abbey Gate when their coffins came back to Dover Air Force Base, and he couldn’t resist checking his watch. Unless you’re a member of the elite, Democrats don’t give a damn about you. The Democrats’ indifference starts at our borders. The president doubled the number of illegal [sic] immigrants in the United States …. Mr. Biden canceled every one of his predecessor’s executive orders that limited the flow of illegals [sic], including the ‘Remain in Mexico’ policy. He stopped construction of the border wall and turned the Border Patrol into the equivalent of greeters at Las Vegas casinos.” (07/07/24)
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2024/jul/5/democrats-dont-give-damn-about-you/
-----
33) The Good That Jimmy Carter Did
Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by Lawrence W Reed
“Jimmy Carter never figured among my favorite presidents. I did not vote for him in either 1976 or 1980. I rarely found myself in agreement with him on policy matters. But as he approaches his 100th birthday in October, I find myself wanting to think the best of him. The very fact that he went to Washington but came back to Plains, Georgia, speaks strongly in his favor. He never allowed himself to be captured by the Beltway elite. The simple but sturdy life of small-town America appealed to him more than the pomp, power, and pretense of national politics. Carter was not a great president, and he evidenced considerable naivete on some important issues, but he was not a bad or venal man. Never personally tainted by self-dealing scandal, he resisted temptations to cash in on his election to the country’s highest office.” (07/08/24)
https://fee.org/articles/the-good-that-jimmy-carter-did/
-----
34) It Didn’t Begin with LBJ: How the US Became a Transfer Society
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
by Eduard Bucher
“Terry L. Anderson and Peter J. Hill’s fascinating account traces the decline of the American constitutional framework from its origins in laissez-faire individualism to its current state of redistributive collectivism. … Emphasizing the role played by the courts, the authors show how from ‘1877 to 1917 the Constitution was altered in numerous ways that made transfers much easier to obtain. Except for the income tax amendment, all of these changes came through interpretation.’ Furthermore, the ‘substitution of an equivocal concept like public interest for firm constitutional limitations meant that the subjective judgment of justices was supreme.’ This set the stage for private interests to learn to benefit from governmental transfers …” (07/08/24)
https://mises.org/mises-wire/it-didnt-begin-lbj-how-us-became-transfer-society
-----
35) OMG Haaretz Is Hamas Propaganda Now!
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“A new report from the Israeli outlet Haaretz titled ‘IDF Ordered Hannibal Directive on October 7 to Prevent Hamas Taking Soldiers Captive’ confirms what independent outlets like The Grayzone and Electronic Intifada have been getting smeared as antisemitic conspiracy theorists for saying this entire time: that many of the Israeli deaths on October 7 were the result of an IDF policy of deliberately firing on their own people to prevent them from being taken hostage by Hamas. Citing ‘a very senior IDF source,’ Haaretz reports that Israeli troops responding to the Hamas attack were told ‘Not a single vehicle can return to Gaza,’ and that ‘it was entirely clear what that message meant, and what the fate of some of the kidnapped people would be.'” (07/08/24)
https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/2024/07/08/omg-haaretz-is-hamas-propaganda-now/
-----
36) The History Lesson Jill Biden Must Read: How Lady Bird Johnson Got LBJ to Step Aside
Source: The Daily Beast
by Julia Sweig
“Joe Biden’s presidency has been compared to Lyndon Baines Johnson’s for its highly significant reshaping of domestic policy. But here’s another comparison which has not been embraced — and should be: the crucial role of Lady Bird Johnson in creating and executing the strategy that resulted in LBJ bowing out after a single elected term. It’s a comparison that our current first lady should study closely, because these next few days may be the most consequential of her life.” (07/08/24)
https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-history-lesson-jill-biden-must-read-how-lady-bird-johnson-got-lbj-to-step-aside
-----
37) A Scheme for Biden to Preserve His Dignity
Source: The Atlantic
by Graeme Wood
“Senility is part of the human condition, but dignity is usually a choice. I pity Joe Biden for having to make what may be the most humiliating decision in presidential history. The questions Are you senile yet? Are you sure? have no dignified answer — which is why Biden should consider an option midway between resignation and denial, and persist in a way that is not, to my knowledge, being considered. … The dignity-preserving option is to release the delegates and run in an open convention. Asking the country to trust him is no longer a credible option. But inviting delegates to witness his continued vigor and competence, and his superiority to other candidates, is a possible path forward — indeed, the likeliest one to end in another Biden term.” (07/08/24)
https://archive.is/q1R68
-----
38) Here’s how SCOTUS got the big free speech stuff right
Source: Fox News
by Robert Corn-Revere
“In what some saw as anticlimactic, the Supreme Court last Monday declined to decide whether Texas and Florida laws regulating social media moderation policies violate the First Amendment. But the big news from these consolidated cases was what the court did say. Justice Elena Kagan’s majority opinion in Moody v. NetChoice (decided with NetChoice v. Paxton), made clear that the First Amendment ‘does not go on leave when social media are involved.’ What does that mean? Kagan and a solid majority laid down the basic First Amendment principles that will govern the cases going forward in terms so plain that not even the Fifth Circuit can get it wrong the next time around.” (07/08/24)
https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/heres-how-supreme-court-got-the-big-free-speech-stuff-right
-----
39) Prisoners for Liberty
Source: Law & Liberty
by Paul Schwennesen
“Ukrainians I’ve worked with generally feel they are on the right side of a world-historical crisis and believe that victory (broadly construed) will inevitably be theirs. They relish their membership in a scrappy, motivated, innovative brotherhood that is admired and supported at home and (however fitfully) by the wider free world. Strictly speaking, however, they are also effectively prisoners of the Ukrainian state, held as a fighting reserve against ceaseless Russian meat-wave assaults. It’s frightening and exhausting, and it takes an emotional toll. Mobilization drafts, updated recently by Verkhovna Rada Law 10449, expressly prohibit men aged 18 to 60 from leaving the borders of Ukraine without authorization for exceptional circumstances.” (07/08/24)
https://lawliberty.org/prisoners-for-liberty/
-----
40) A human-centred approach to rethinking wealth and individual liberty
Source: Students For Liberty
by Ogechukwu Egwuatu
“It is election season, so to speak. From the EU to India to the US, Ghana, Brazil and many more countries. An estimated 49% of the world’s population will head to the polls in national elections this year. Among those, 30 countries still have elections scheduled for the second half of the year. That means politics is the subject on everyone’s lips and with it comes political ideology and questions on how society and the economy should be organised. However, it is time to rethink how we should approach these questions.” (07/08/24)
https://studentsforliberty.org/blog/a-human-centred-approach-to-rethinking-wealth-and-individual-liberty/
-----
41) After 31 Years With the DNC, My Democratic Proposal to Get Out of This Mess
Source: Common Dreams
by James Zogby
“While there has long been concern about President Biden’s age and his ability to run an effective campaign, many Democrats have resisted any discussion of replacing him at the top of the ticket. They recognize that the president’s record on domestic issues has been a good one on which to run. They know that his persona directly challenges former President Trump’s appeal with white working-class voters in key battleground states. And they are afraid of the uncertainties that might accompany his stepping down. After the president’s unsettling performance during the June 27th televised debate, confronting this concern was no longer speculative. It became urgent.” (07/08/24)
https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/joe-biden-replacement-2668701117
-----
42) Quantum Vibe, 07/08/24
Source: Big Head Press
by Scott Bieser
Cartoon. (07/08/24)
https://www.quantumvibe.com/strip?page=2488
-----
43) This week, NATO III celebrates itself
Source: Responsible Statecraft
by Anatol Lieven
“During the 75 years of NATO’s existence, there really have been three NATOs: two with the mission of containing Russia, separated by one which thrashed around wildly and disastrously in search of a new mission. NATO I achieved a complete but peaceful victory when the Soviet bloc collapsed from within — though this came as a result above all of Communism’s own failed promise. NATO II threw away the fruits of this victory through a disastrous kind of frivolous megalomaniac dilettantism. It thereby helped to usher in NATO III, whose eventual fate remains uncertain.” (07/08/24)
https://responsiblestatecraft.org/nato-75th-anniversary-2668681311/
-----
44) Yes to a Living City: Applying Jacobs’s Principles to New York’s Rezoning
Source: Liberal Currents
by Nick Felker
“Later this year New York City’s council will vote on the mayor’s ambitious rezoning, the City of Yes. This change will reform the zoning code in numerous ways, including allowing for Accessory Dwelling Units, Single-Room Occupancies, infill housing, and by-right mixed-use buildings across the city. These changes are a once-in-a-generation shift in the city’s land-use, with the last major changes occurring in the 1960s. In 1961, the urbanist writer Jane Jacobs wrote The Life and Death of Great American Cities, where she laid out a number of problems in then-present urban planning. Since it was published, we have seen the consequences of those planning policies. Today, it is time to re-evaluate what Jane Jacobs wrote and why the City of Yes is the right path forward.” (07/08/24)
https://www.liberalcurrents.com/yes-to-a-living-city-applying-jacobs-principles-to-new-yorks-rezoning/
-----
45) Bidengate and the Doom Loop
Source: American Greatness
by Victor Davis Hanson
“The entire 2019-20 Biden candidacy and subsequent presidency were predicated on a rotten Faustian bargain. A hale Joe Biden would feign his aw-shucks, Joe from Scranton schtick. And an ossified working-class Joe’s camouflage would get the hard left elected, especially thanks to the changes in balloting laws that often saw only 30 percent of the electorate voting on Election Day in key states. In exchange, the two narcissistic Bidens would bask in the power and attention of the presidency. From the start, Jill and the media would orchestrate deep cover for Joe’s escalating dementia as well as the true intentions of the now-in-power radical Democratic Party with its neo-socialist agenda.” (07/08/24)
https://amgreatness.com/2024/07/08/bidengate-and-the-doom-loop/
-----
46) Playbook for a Military Draft
Source: Antiwar.com
by Edward Hasbrouck
“Preparation for a draft is used as a weapon when it is used to threaten escalating war to another level of death and destruction, even when that threat isn’t carried out. … Proponents of draft registration and readiness for a draft such as the authors of the CNAS report argue that if, and only if, the great-power enemies of the U.S. believe that we are able and willing to activate a draft, we can use that threat of draft-enabled rapid and total military escalation and total war as a tool of diplomatic and military policy. Resistance to planning and preparation for a draft is thus a way to rein in those policies that are based on the ability to rush into total war, and the threat to do so.”
https://original.antiwar.com/edward_hasbrouck/2024/07/07/playbook-for-a-military-draft/
-----
47) Every American War is Bullshit: Exposing the Myth of the “Good War”
Source: exile in happy valley
by Nicky Reid
“They all come with different excuses and some of them are pretty goddamn convincing but every major conflict that this country has ever engaged in has been motivated by greed and power, and every single war we’ve fought has ended the exact same way, with piles of bodies, fewer civil rights, and a growing thirst for more. Even our so-called Revolution, which so many otherwise peaceful libertarians hold in such high regard, was little more than another blood thirsty power grab.” (07/07/24)
https://exileinhappyvalley.blogspot.com/2024/07/every-american-war-is-bullshit-exposing.html
-----
48) Niall Ferguson: The Intellectual Underwriter of Trump’s American Carnage Idea
Source: The UnPopulist
by Matt Johnson
“Hatred of the woke is causing this hawk to wildly exaggerate America’s decline and make absurd comparisons with the Soviet Union.” (07/07/24)
https://www.theunpopulist.net/p/niall-ferguson-the-intellectual-underwriter
-----
49) Escape From the Box
Source: The American Prospect
by David Dayen
“Mario Flores was told he couldn’t look at the documents until he signed them. The saleslady at Cardinale Way Mazda in Corona, California, about 50 miles east of Los Angeles, was rushing Mario, a 20-year-old first-time car buyer, through a new loan agreement, asking him to make electronic signatures on a small tablet. When asked if Mario could see the physical agreement and all its terms, the saleslady insisted that the signature must be added in order to move forward. Anyway, she assured, it was a better deal than what he initially signed; the term was dropping from 84 to 75 months, and the interest rate from 13.77 percent to 10.99 percent. But the printout she was showing Mario wasn’t the loan document, and it didn’t reveal other information in the contract, which he would be bound by upon signature.” (07/08/24)
https://prospect.org/power/2024-07-08-car-dealership-fee-financing-scams/
-----
50) Time for the Fed to Cut Rates
Source: Beat The Press
by Dean Baker
“Federal Reserve Board Chair Jerome Powell has been saying for some time that he needs to see more evidence that inflation is under control before he lowers interest rates. We can never be certain of where the economy is going so it’s understandable that he remains worried that inflation could reaccelerate. However, there are risks in the opposite direction as well, which Powell has explicitly recognized in the past. He has stated that the Fed has an obligation to maximize employment and said that this part of the Fed’s mandate needs to be taken as seriously as its commitment to price stability. That is why many of us where [sic] happy see President Biden reappointed him as Fed chair. But he has to act now to show this commitment.” (07/07/24)
https://cepr.net/time-for-the-fed-to-cut-rates/
_____ Today's Freedom Podcast and Video _____
51) Reason Roundtable, 07/08/24
Source: Reason
"Why the Media Covered for Biden." (07/08/24)
https://reason.com/podcast/2024/07/08/why-the-media-covered-for-biden/
-----
52) LibertyDad, 07/08/24
Source: LibertyDad
“Libertarian Party of Florida Makes A Bad Vote.” (07/08/24)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dR8TGKppwpw
-----
53) Cato Daily Podcast, 07/08/24
Source: Cato Institute
“Adjudicating Federal Agency Claims after Jarkesy.” (07/08/24)
https://www.cato.org/multimedia/cato-daily-podcast/adjudicating-federal-agency-claims-after-jarkesy
-----
54) CNN Inside Politics, 07/08/24
Source: CNN
“Biden Vows to Stay in Race.” (07/08/24)
https://www.cnn.com/audio/podcasts/cnn-politics/episodes/042cc29a-0cac-11ef-8ac3-b7966160985a
-----
55) Rising, 07/08/24
Source: The Hill
“Jessica Burbank and Robby Soave discuss calls within the Democratic Party for President Joe Biden to drop out of the 2024 race.” (07/08/24)
https://thehill.com/hilltv/rising/4759805-rising-july-8-2024/
-----
56) Unattended Baggage, episode 252
Source: International Guild of Professional Anarchists
“Dementia to the Left of me, Dictators to the Right.” (07/08/24)
https://alexandersnitker.substack.com/p/unattended-baggage-episode-252-dementia
-----
57) Conflicts of Interest, episode 630
Source: Conflicts of Interest
“US Support for Israeli War on Gaza Fuels Terrorism Recruitment.” (07/08/24)
https://libertarianinstitute.org/kyle/coi-630-us-support-for-israeli-war-on-gaza-fuels-terrorism-recruitment/
-----
58) The Bryan Hyde Show, 07/08/24
Source: The Bryan Hyde Show
“Sometimes it seems as though the only absolute in our culture is that there are no absolutes. Paul Rosenberg begs to differ. He says, if there’s life and death, then there’s right and wrong.” (07/08/24)
https://www.podbean.com/ep/pb-swtxh-16613ee
-----
59) EconTalk, 07/08/24
Source: EconTalk
“Reading, Writing, and Fighting (with Mark Helprin).” (07/08/24)
https://www.econtalk.org/reading-writing-and-fighting-with-mark-helprin/
-----
60) The Libertarian Angle, 07/08/24
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
“Celebrating the Fourth of July.” (07/08/24)
https://libertarianangle.libsyn.com/celebrating-the-fourth-of-july
-----
61) Finding Freedom, episode 445
Source: Lions of Liberty
“Kamala Suddenly Coherent and Sandusky Medical Records Released.” (07/08/24)
https://www.lionsofliberty.com/episodes/kamala-suddenly-coherent-and-sandusky-medical-records-released
-----
62) Antiwar News with Dave DeCamp, 07/08/24
Source: Antiwar.com
“Report Confirms Israel Used Hannibal Directive on Oct. 7, Netanyahu Sabotages Hostage Deal, and More.” (07/08/24)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zid_MKncS9A
-----
63) The Fifth Column, episode 462
Source: The Fifth Column
“SCOTUS Interruptus (w/ Damon Root).” (07/07/24)
https://www.wethefifth.com/p/462-scotus-interruptus-w-damon-root
-----
64) Free Talk Live, 07/07/24
Source: Free Talk Live
“Gen G commits fraud :: Theft is wrong :: Skeeter says printing money is A-okay :: Cops just want to be cool :: Take drugs to solve all your problems :: Ridley calls about a gun case in MA :: Spain has porn passports :: Electric taxis in NM :: Sunday night bible study :: 2024-07-06 Lori, Riley, Rich E. Rich.” (07/07/24)
https://soundcloud.com/freetalklive/free-talk-live-2024-07-07
-----
65) Soho Forum Debate: What’s the Best Argument for Libertarianism?
Source: Reason
“Free State Project activist Dennis Pratt and Soho Forum Director Gene Epstein debate the resolution, ‘A better way to persuade more people of libertarianism is to convince them of the ethics stemming from self-ownership and the non-aggression principle, without relying primarily on consequentialist/utilitarian arguments.'” (07/07/24)
https://reason.com/podcast/2024/07/07/whats-the-best-argument-for-libertarianism/
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Today's Freedom News:
1) Palestine: Israeli forces push deep into Gaza City
2) Democratic memo details plan to replace Biden in “blitz primary”
3) Ukraine: Russian missile attack kills 36, hits children’s hospital
4) Bitcoin ETF Traders Buy the Dip With Nearly $300 Million Inflows
5) Federal judge in Alaska resigned after sexual misconduct probe
6) Paramount agrees to merge with Skydance, ending monthslong negotiations and Redstone era
7) Russia: Modi arrives in Moscow for talks with Putin
8) FL: Satanists to volunteer in government schools after DeSantis signs “chaplain” bill
9) Russia: Director, Playwright Sentenced to Six Years for “Justifying Terrorism”
10) Bullet vending machines introduced in three US states
11) Oil Falls as Hurricane Beryl’s Risk to Texas Operations Lessens
12) Study: Wegovy, Ozempic Lower Risk of Many Obesity-Related Cancers
13) At disgraced former president’s behest, GOPers move to change how they will oppose abortion
14) Biden blasts “elites” urging him to exit race in surprise interview
15) UK: Tate brothers accused of being serial tax evaders
16) Macron rejects PM’s resignation, as France seeks a way out of political “fog” of chaotic election
17) Citi to cease operations in Haiti after 50 years
18) Boeing agrees to plead guilty to felony charge over fatal 737 Max crashes
19) Whitmer shuts down 2024 POTUS talk, but doesn’t hide her ambitions in timely book launch
20) Lancet study: Gaza toll could exceed 186,000
Today's Freedom Commentary:
21) If You Don’t Trust Media Now, Wait Until It’s Government-Funded
22) A Win-Win-Win-Win on EV Policy
23) The National Security State Was Immune for Its Assassination of JFK
24) Fifty Years Ago Today, I Argued “U.S. v. Nixon.” The Supreme Court’s New Ruling on Presidential Immunity Appalled Me.
25) Democrats ARE going to get President Biden off the ticket
26) Liberation the Iranian way
27) Conservatives say liberals took religion out of schools. Truth is, it was never there to begin with.
28) Biden might exit, but rising distrust of institutions seems here to stay
29) War and Famine: America’s War on Terror and the Wasting of Our Democracy
30) If You Want to Be a Trade Hawk …
31) Biden and his backers are falling for the sunk cost fallacy
32) Democrats don’t give a damn about you
33) The Good That Jimmy Carter Did
34) It Didn’t Begin with LBJ: How the US Became a Transfer Society
35) OMG Haaretz Is Hamas Propaganda Now!
36) The History Lesson Jill Biden Must Read: How Lady Bird Johnson Got LBJ to Step Aside
37) A Scheme for Biden to Preserve His Dignity
38) Here’s how SCOTUS got the big free speech stuff right
39) Prisoners for Liberty
40) A human-centred approach to rethinking wealth and individual liberty
41) After 31 Years With the DNC, My Democratic Proposal to Get Out of This Mess
42) Quantum Vibe, 07/08/24
43) This week, NATO III celebrates itself
44) Yes to a Living City: Applying Jacobs’s Principles to New York’s Rezoning
45) Bidengate and the Doom Loop
46) Playbook for a Military Draft
47) Every American War is Bullshit: Exposing the Myth of the “Good War”
48) Niall Ferguson: The Intellectual Underwriter of Trump’s American Carnage Idea
49) Escape From the Box
50) Time for the Fed to Cut Rates
Today's Freedom Podcast and Video:
51) Reason Roundtable, 07/08/24
52) LibertyDad, 07/08/24
53) Cato Daily Podcast, 07/08/24
54) CNN Inside Politics, 07/08/24
55) Rising, 07/08/24
56) Unattended Baggage, episode 252
57) Conflicts of Interest, episode 630
58) The Bryan Hyde Show, 07/08/24
59) EconTalk, 07/08/24
60) The Libertarian Angle, 07/08/24
61) Finding Freedom, episode 445
62) Antiwar News with Dave DeCamp, 07/08/24
63) The Fifth Column, episode 462
64) Free Talk Live, 07/07/24
65) Soho Forum Debate: What’s the Best Argument for Libertarianism?
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_____ Today's Freedom News _____
1) Palestine: Israeli forces push deep into Gaza City
Source: Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
“Israeli forces advanced deeper into the Gaza Strip’s largest city in pursuit of militants who had regrouped there, sending thousands of Palestinians fleeing on Monday from an area ravaged in the early weeks of the war that has gone on for nine months. Hamas warned that the latest raids and displacement in Gaza City could lead to the collapse of long-running negotiations over a cease-fire and hostage release, after the two sides had appeared to have narrowed the gaps in recent days. … CIA Director William Burns returned to the region Monday for talks in Cairo, according to Egypt’s state-run Qahera TV, which is close to the security services. An Israeli delegation was also heading to the Egyptian capital, Israeli media reported.” (07/09/24)
https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2024/jul/09/israeli-forces-push-deep-into-gaza-city/
-----
2) Democratic memo details plan to replace Biden in “blitz primary”
Source: New York Post
“Two influential Democratic operatives are circulating a memo that lays out a plan for a ‘blitz primary’ before the party’s convention in August to replace President Biden if he can be convinced to bow out, a new report says. Georgetown University law Professor Rosa Brooks, a volunteer policy adviser on Biden’s 2020 campaign, and venture capitalist Ted Dintersmith, a deep-pocketed donor, authored the detailed memo being distributed to party contributors, executive branch officials and the president’s campaign staff, Semafor reported Monday. ‘We can limp to shameful, avoidable democracy-ending defeat. Or Democrats can make this Our Finest Hour,’ the memo says. President Joe Biden walks as he boards Air Force One at Harrisburg International Airport en route to Washington following a campaign event in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, U.S., July 7, 2024.” (07/08/24)
https://nypost.com/2024/07/08/us-news/democratic-memo-details-plan-to-replace-biden-in-blitz-primary-report/
-----
3) Ukraine: Russian missile attack kills 36, hits children’s hospital
Source: Reuters
“Russia blasted the main children’s hospital in Kyiv with a missile in broad daylight on Monday and rained missiles down on other cities across Ukraine, killing at least 36 civilians in the deadliest wave of air strikes for months. Parents holding babies walked in the street outside the hospital, dazed and sobbing after the rare daylight aerial attack. Windows had been smashed and panels ripped off, and hundreds of Kyiv residents were helping to clear debris. … The government proclaimed a day of mourning on Tuesday for one of the worst air attacks of the war, which it said demonstrated that Ukraine urgently needs an upgrade of its air defences from its Western allies.” ()7/08/24)
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ukrainian-air-defence-engaged-repelling-russian-missile-attack-kyiv-officials-2024-07-08/
-----
4) Bitcoin ETF Traders Buy the Dip With Nearly $300 Million Inflows
Source: CoinDesk
“Spot bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded funds (ETFs) recorded nearly $300 million in net inflows on Monday, marking their highest buying activity since early June when the cryptocurrency traded over $70,000. SoSoValue data show that market leader BlackRock’s IBIT led buying activity with nearly $180 million in net inflows, followed by Fidelity’s FBTC. Grayscale’s GBTC — infamous for its outflows — recorded over $25 million in purchases. ETFs offered by Invesco, Franklin Templeton, Valkyrie, WisdomTree and Hashdex showed no inflow or outflow activity. Strong inflows come as bitcoin faces significant selling pressure from various sources, such as repayments tied to defunct crypto exchange Mt. Gox and a German government entity moving hundreds of millions worth of BTC to exchanges in the past month.” (07/09/24)
https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2024/07/09/bitcoin-etf-traders-buy-the-dip-with-nearly-300m-inflows/
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5) Federal judge in Alaska resigned after sexual misconduct probe
Source: Honolulu Star-Advertiser
“A federal judge in Alaska who abruptly resigned last week subjected his staff to a hostile work environment and engaged in an inappropriate sexual relationship with a law clerk, a U.S. judicial panel said on Monday. The 9th Circuit Judicial Council publicly reprimanded and admonished U.S. District Judge Joshua Kindred, an appointee of Republican former President Donald Trump who submitted his resignation from his life-tenured position on Wednesday after joining the bench in 2020. The council in a May 23 order made public on Monday said it had requested his resignation while at the same time referring his case to the federal judiciary’s top policymaking body so it could certify the matter for Congress, which could then weigh pursuing a rare impeachment of a federal judge.” (07/08/24)
https://www.staradvertiser.com/2024/07/08/breaking-news/federal-judge-in-alaska-resigned-after-sexual-misconduct-probe/
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6) Paramount agrees to merge with Skydance, ending monthslong negotiations and Redstone era
Source: CNBC
“Paramount Global has agreed to merge with Skydance, capping off a monthslong negotiation, in a deal that would see the Redstone family step away from control of the storied movie studio and media company. Paramount’s special committee signed off on the merger Sunday, days after Shari Redstone’s National Amusements, the controlling shareholder of Paramount, once again reached a preliminary agreement with Skydance, the production company known for ‘Top Gun: Maverick.’ A similar deal had weeks earlier been stopped in its tracks. The latest iteration of the deal will see the buying consortium, which includes private equity firms RedBird Capital Partners and KKR, invest more than $8 billion into Paramount and to acquire National Amusements.” (07/08/24)
https://www.cnbc.com/2024/07/08/paramount-skydance-merger.html
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7) Russia: Modi arrives in Moscow for talks with Putin
Source: Deutsche Welle [German state media]
“Indian Prime Minister Narenda Modi landed in Moscow in Monday for a two-day visit including talks with President Vladimir Putin. … Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told a news briefing that the two leaders would meet informally on Monday evening with the opportunity to talk ‘with a free agenda one-on-one.’ A state banquet was also scheduled for Monday evening. The trip is Modi’s first to Russia since 2019, when he met Putin in the far-eastern city of Vladivostok, although the pair did meet at a Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Uzbekistan in September 2022, seven months into Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Putin visited New Delhi in 2021.” (07/08/24)
https://www.dw.com/en/indias-modi-arrives-in-moscow-for-talks-with-putin/a-69594807
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8) FL: Satanists to volunteer in government schools after DeSantis signs “chaplain” bill
Source: The Guardian [UK]
“Members of the Satanic Temple say they are poised to act as volunteer chaplains under a state law that took effect this week opening campuses to ‘additional counseling and support to students’ from outside organizations. Although HB 931 leaves the implementation of chaplain programs to individual school districts, and only requires schools to list a volunteer’s religion ‘if any,’ DeSantis has made clear its intent is to restore the tenets of Christianity to public education. Without the bill, DeSantis said at its signing in April: ‘You’re basically saying that God has no place [on campus]. That’s wrong.’ The satanists see the law, which comes amid a vigorous theocratic drive into education by the religious right nationally, as an equal opportunity: if Christian chaplains are permitted access to students, often at the most vulnerable and impressionable stages of their lives, then so are they.” (07/08/24)
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/jul/08/florida-satanic-temple-ron-desantis
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9) Russia: Director, Playwright Sentenced to Six Years for “Justifying Terrorism”
Source: US News & World Report
“A Russian court sentenced a playwright and a theatre director each to six years in prison on Monday for ‘justifying terrorism,’ concluding a trial that rights campaigners had said demonstrated Russia’s intolerance of artistic freedom. Director Zhenya Berkovich, 39, and playwright Svetlana Petriychuk, 44, were arrested in May last year over their production of a play called ‘Finist, the Brave Falcon,’ about Russian women who marry Islamic State fighters. The case was the most prominent prosecution of Russian cultural figures over the content of their artwork since Moscow sent troops into Ukraine in 2022. Both denied guilt. … At the start of their trial in late May, Berkovich and Petriychuk said they had staged the play because they oppose terrorism rather than support it.” (07/08/24)
https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2024-07-08/russia-sentences-director-playwright-to-6-years-for-justifying-terrorism
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10) Bullet vending machines introduced in three US states
Source: NewsBytes [India]
“American Rounds, a United States-based company, has launched automated ammunition vending machines in Alabama, Oklahoma, and Texas. The kiosks are designed to make bullets ‘more available’ to gun owners by allowing them to purchase rounds at their convenience. The company’s website states that these machines are as user-friendly as an ATM and can be accessed 24/7, eliminating the constraints of store hours and long queues. The vending machines employ advanced AI technology, card scanning, and facial recognition software to verify a buyer’s age and identity. Customers can select their desired ammunition via a touchscreen interface, scan their ID, and collect the ammo from the machine.” (07/08/24)
https://www.newsbytesapp.com/news/world/us-introduces-vending-machines-to-sell-bullets/story
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11) Oil Falls as Hurricane Beryl’s Risk to Texas Operations Lessens
Source: Yahoo! News
“Oil fell as Hurricane Beryl looked less likely to pose major disruptions to crude infrastructure in Texas. … West Texas Intermediate slid 1% to settle near $82 a barrel after four straight weekly gains. Concerns that Hurricane Beryl would impede oil operations in the Gulf of Mexico and Texas helped drive up futures last week, but weakening product spreads indicate the storm has been less disruptive to infrastructure than expected. Still, exports may face delays after the Port of Houston and Port of Corpus Christi were shut down — the Port of Houston will remain closed through Tuesday, but the Port of Corpus Christi has reopened. About 85% of Houston has lost power, forcing oil companies to adjust operations.” (07/08/24)
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/oil-climbs-traders-keep-tabs-232952665.html
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12) Study: Wegovy, Ozempic Lower Risk of Many Obesity-Related Cancers
Source: US News & World Report
“In yet another finding that touts the health benefits of wildly popular weight-loss medications like Wegovy and Ozempic, scientists report that taking the drugs may help reduce the risk of some cancers. In a study published July 5 in JAMA Network Open, researchers found people with type 2 diabetes who were being treated with a class of GLP-1 drugs were less likely to be diagnosed with 10 of 13 obesity-linked cancers than those who were taking insulin. The reduction in risk was significant: Taking the medications cut rates of gallbladder cancer, meningioma, pancreatic cancer and hepatocellular carcinoma, a type of liver cancer, by more than half. Risks were also reduced for cancers of the ovaries, colon, esophagus and kidneys as well as for multiple myeloma (a cancer of the bone marrow) and endometrial cancer (which begins in the lining of the uterus).” (07/08/24)
https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/2024-07-08/wegovy-ozempic-lower-risk-of-many-obesity-related-cancers
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13) At disgraced former president’s behest, GOPers move to change how they will oppose abortion
Source: SFGate
“The Republican National Committee moved Monday to adopt a party platform that reflects former President Donald Trump’s position opposing a federal abortion ban and ceding limits to states, omitting the explicit basis for a national ban for the first time in 40 years. Trump imposed his priorities on the RNC’s platform committee as he seeks to steer clear during his campaign of strict abortion language, even while taking credit for setting up the 2022 reversal of Roe v. Wade by the Supreme Court. Trump appointed three of the six justices who voted in the majority to overturn the 1973 precedent that established a national right to have an abortion. The scaled-down platform — just 16 pages and with limited specifics on many key Republican issues — reflects a desire by the Trump campaign to avoid giving Democrats more material for their warnings about the former president’s intentions if he wins back the White House.” (07/08/24)
https://www.sfgate.com/news/politics/article/national-abortion-ban-splits-the-trump-campaign-19560124.php
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14) Biden blasts “elites” urging him to exit race in surprise interview
Source: CNBC
“President Joe Biden defended his place at the top of the Democratic ticket Monday in a surprise television interview on MSNBC’s ‘Morning Joe,’ after more lawmakers and donors came forward over the weekend with concerns about his reelection bid. ‘I’m not going anywhere,’ Biden said in the phone interview. ‘I absolutely believe that I am the best candidate to beat Donald Trump in 2024.’ ‘I’m getting so frustrated by the elites in the party’ calling on him to step down, the president fumed. ‘I don’t care what the millionaires think.’ Biden’s comments came after a weekend where his political wounds only deepened, despite his efforts to stem the bleeding. During House Democrats’ closed-door virtual meeting on Sunday, four more Democratic representatives expressed that they think Biden should exit the 2024 race, according to an NBC News report.” (07/08/24)
https://www.cnbc.com/2024/07/08/biden-blasts-elites-urging-him-to-exit-race-in-surprise-interview.html
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15) UK: Tate brothers accused of being serial tax evaders
Source: BBC News [UK State Media]
“Controversial social media personality Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan have been accused of failing to pay any tax on £21m of revenue from their online businesses. Devon and Cornwall Police is bringing a civil claim against the brothers and a third person, referred to only as J. They are accused of paying no tax in any country on their online business revenue between 2014 and 2022.
The force is seeking to recover around £2.8 million in seven frozen bank accounts, an application the three defendants are contesting. ‘Andrew Tate and Tristan Tate are serial tax and VAT evaders,’ Sarah Clarke KC for Devon and Cornwall Police told Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Monday. ‘They, in particular Andrew Tate, are brazen about it.’ Ms Clarke quoted from a video posted online by Andrew Tate, in which he said: ‘When I lived in England I refused to pay tax.'” (07/08/24)
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cjk3xglre0ko
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16) Macron rejects PM’s resignation, as France seeks a way out of political “fog” of chaotic election
Source: South China Morning Post [Hong Kong]
“French President Emmanuel Macron on Monday asked his prime minister to stay in the role for now, pending what will be difficult negotiations to form a new government after a surprise left-wing surge in elections that delivered a hung parliament. The leftist New Popular Front (NFP) emerged as the dominant force in the National Assembly after Sunday’s election, thwarting Marine Le Pen’s quest to bring the far-right to power. However, with no single group securing a working majority, the outcome heralded a period of political volatility just before the Paris Olympics and raised uncertainty among investors about who would run the euro zone’s second-largest economy. … Prime Minister Gabriel Attal, a centrist and close ally of Macron, tendered his resignation, but the head of state rejected it.” (07/08/24)
https://archive.is/9QBBv
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17) Citi to cease operations in Haiti after 50 years
Source: Reuters
“Citigroup, opens new tab will wind up its operations in Haiti due to weak demand from institutional clients and lower international banking activity, ending its presence of more than five decades in the country. The exit is part of a strategic review and will not have a significant economic impact on Citi, the bank said, opens new tab on Monday. Citi, one of the largest banks in the United States, has exited non-core markets since CEO Jane Fraser took the helm in 2021. To catch up to peers whose profitability has outpaced Citi’s, the bank overhauled its operations and sharpened focus on businesses that offer the best returns. The bank is also exiting its consumer unit in Mexico, which is set for an initial public offering in 2025.” (07/08/24)
https://www.reuters.com/business/finance/citi-cease-operations-haiti-2024-07-08/
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18) Boeing agrees to plead guilty to felony charge over fatal 737 Max crashes
Source: United Press International
“Boeing has agreed to plead guilty to a single felony charge of conspiracy to defraud the government in connection to two crashes of its 737 Max jet that killed nearly 350 people during a six-month span in 2018 and 2019. The plea agreement was announced in a late Sunday court filing by the Justice Department, The New York Times reported. The document states Boeing agrees to pay the maximum fine allowed under law of $487.2 million and invest at least $455 million over the next three years in its compliance and safety programs. The embattled aerospace company will also be put on probation for three years as part of which the Justice Department will install a compliance monitor to ensure safety measures have been implemented and followed, The Times reported.” (07/08/24)
https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2024/07/08/Boeing-pleads-guilty/1411720420120/
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19) Whitmer shuts down 2024 POTUS talk, but doesn’t hide her ambitions in timely book launch
Source: SFGate
“Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer is releasing a new memoir at a particularly fraught moment, both for herself and for the Democratic Party. Set for release Tuesday amid the frenzy over President Joe Biden’s recent debate performance, ‘True Gretch’ won’t do much to dispel questions about her national ambitions. But in a pre-launch interview with The Associated Press, Whitmer did what she could to shut down such speculation. When asked if she would consider becoming a candidate this year if Biden were to step down, she responded with a definitive ‘No’. ‘It’s a distraction more than anything,’ said Whitmer. ‘I don’t like seeing my name in articles like that because I’m totally focused on governing and campaigning for the ticket.'” (07/08/24)
https://www.sfgate.com/news/politics/article/gov-whitmer-shuts-down-2024-presidential-talk-19560118.php
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20) Lancet study: Gaza toll could exceed 186,000
Source: Al Jazeera [Qatari state media]
“The accumulative effects of Israel’s war on Gaza could mean the true death toll could reach more than 186,000 people, according to a study published in the journal Lancet. According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, more than 38,000 Palestinians have been killed since Israel launched its military offensive on October 7 in the wake of deadly Hamas attacks. The study pointed out that the death toll is higher because the official toll does not take into account thousands of dead buried under rubble and indirect deaths due to destruction of health facilities, food distribution systems and other public infrastructure.” (07/08/24)
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/7/8/gaza-toll-could-exceed-186000-lancet-study-says
_____ Today's Freedom Commentary _____
21) If You Don’t Trust Media Now, Wait Until It’s Government-Funded
Source: Reason
by JD Tuccille
“In May, the New York State government agreed to subsidize news media. With audiences declining for news reports, many Very Concerned People have called on governments to Do Something to prop up outlets failing to win enough public support to keep the lights on. That something comes in the form of money unlikely to win back an indifferent public but that stabilizes employment prospects for reporters. The result may be that journalists will cater to state officials rather than woo readers and viewers.” (07/08/24)
https://reason.com/2024/07/08/if-you-dont-trust-media-now-wait-until-its-government-funded/
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22) A Win-Win-Win-Win on EV Policy
Source: EconLog
by David Henderson
“One of the first things you learn about in an economics course is the concept of trade-offs: You can’t have everything you want. … U.S. auto workers want to keep their jobs. Most U.S. drivers still prefer cars with internal combustion engines. Environmentalists want Americans to buy EVs. And free traders want, well, free trade. Something’s got to give. Or does it? There’s a path that would enable each party to achieve many of its objectives. First, end mandates and subsidies for EVs. Second, eliminate President Biden’s 100% tariff on EVs from China and allow duty-free imports. … More people driving EVs would make environmentalists happy. And ending mandates and subsidies would allow U.S. automakers to do what they do best: make cars with internal combustion engines. That in turn would keep U.S. auto workers employed and able to continue using their specific skills.” (published elsewhere 06/06/24l posted 07/08/24)
https://www.econlib.org/a-win-win-win-win-on-ev-policy/
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23) The National Security State Was Immune for Its Assassination of JFK
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
by Jacob G Hornberger
“No one should have been surprised over the Supreme Court’s recent ruling of absolute immunity for official acts carried out by a U.S. president. The federal judiciary has long held that the U.S. national security state — i.e., the Pentagon, CIA, and NSA — is immune from civil or criminal liability for its illegal acts, so long as such acts are ostensibly intended to protect ‘national security.’ … as we have seen with the Chilean coup and the U.S. coup in November 1963, sometimes the executive branch goes to war against the national-security branch. When that happens, there is no question as to which side is going to win and that the winning side would receive immunity from the courts upon a showing of protecting ‘national security.'” (07/08/24)
https://www.fff.org/2024/07/08/the-national-security-state-was-immune-for-its-assassination-of-jfk/
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24) Fifty Years Ago Today, I Argued “U.S. v. Nixon.” The Supreme Court’s New Ruling on Presidential Immunity Appalled Me.
Source: The Bulwark
by Philip Allen Lacovara
“The issue in United States v. Richard Nixon was whether the president and his closest aides had conspired to obstruct justice in the Watergate break-in coverup. Just sixteen days later, the Court concluded that, while Nixon could claim a limited privilege for some confidential communications, that privilege could be overcome by the overarching public interest in prosecuting federal crimes. … Nixon was ordered to produce the evidence, which showed his own complicity, as the grand jury had alleged in naming him an ‘unindicted co-conspirator.’ He resigned two weeks later, still the only president to have done so. Dramatically different in tone and content was last week’s decision in Donald Trump v. United States fabricating immunity for Trump from criminal liability to the people he and other presidents are sworn to serve.” (07/08/24)
https://www.thebulwark.com/p/trump-nixon-supreme-court-case-50-years-later
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25) Democrats ARE going to get President Biden off the ticket
Source: New York Post
by staff
“President Biden insisted Friday that he won’t drop out of the 2024 race unless ‘the Lord Almighty’ tells him. Get ready for a lot of Democrats to start publicly praying. Not so much to God, though, as to Nancy Pelosi, Barack Obama and anyone else with a shot at getting through to Joe, who right now seems to be listening only to Hunter and Dr. Jill. The party’s down-ballot candidates are freaking out, rightly fearing that having a manifestly unfit-for-office guy at the top of the ticket will not only hand Donald Trump the White House, but elect a Republican House and Senate. Obama’s top electioneer, David Axelrod, is already telling the party’s donors to close their purses to any candidate who won’t call for Biden to drop …” (07/07/24)
https://nypost.com/2024/07/07/opinion/democrats-are-going-to-get-president-biden-off-the-ticket/
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26) Liberation the Iranian way
Source: Christian Science Monitor
by staff
“In a clear message to their ruling clerics, more than half of Iranian voters chose not to cast ballots in a highly engineered election for president on July 5. ‘I want a free country, I want a free life,’ one university student in Tehran told Reuters in describing her reason not to give legitimacy to an unpopular regime. Those who did vote sent a similar message, one that might now also influence Iran’s violent campaign across the Middle East to be the guide and guardian of all Muslims. Voters rejected the regime’s chosen hard-line candidate, Saeed Jalili, opting instead for a conservative reformer, Masoud Pezeshkian. … A former heart surgeon and health minister, he promised to end violent enforcement of a dress code for women as well as restrictions on internet access.” (07/08/24)
https://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/the-monitors-view/2024/0708/Liberation-the-Iranian-way
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27) Conservatives say liberals took religion out of schools. Truth is, it was never there to begin with.
Source: Philadelphia Inquirer
by Jonathan Zimmerman
“Once upon a time, public schools respected religion. They taught the Bible and posted the Ten Commandments. Then big bad liberals came along and took God out of the schools. And the rest, as they say, is history. That’s what right-wingers want you to think, but they’re wrong. In earlier eras, religious instruction wasn’t nearly as common as they say. And when it did happen, it was promoted by political liberals as well as conservatives.” (07/08/24)
https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/louisiana-ten-commandments-display-religious-education-public-schools-20240708.html
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28) Biden might exit, but rising distrust of institutions seems here to stay
Source: Washington Post
by George F Will
“The leakage of trustworthiness from American institutions began with the lies that enveloped Watergate and Vietnam. It accelerated during the 2008 financial crisis, when cynicism (‘You never want a serious crisis to go to waste’) fueled the government’s indiscriminate and lawless response …. Now the world’s oldest political party and its media accomplices have effected a gigantic subtraction from trust: Leaders of the former lied about President Biden’s condition until, on June 27, continuing to do so became untenable. The latter had allowed the lying because they believe Donald Trump’s many mendacities are an excuse for theirs.” (07/08/24)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/07/08/joe-biden-american-institutions-news-media/
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29) War and Famine: America’s War on Terror and the Wasting of Our Democracy
Source: TomDispatch
by Andrea Mazzarino
“Many war stories end with hunger wreaking havoc on significant portions of a population. In Christian theology, the Biblical ‘four horses of the apocalypse,’ believed by many in early modern Europe to presage the end of the world, symbolized invasion, armed conflict, and famine followed by death. They suggest the degree to which people have long recognized how violence causes starvation. Armed conflict disrupts food supplies as warring factions divert resources to arms production and their militaries while destroying the kinds of infrastructure that enable societies to feed themselves. Governments, too, sometimes use starvation as a weapon of war.” (07/07/24)
https://tomdispatch.com/war-and-famine/
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30) If You Want to Be a Trade Hawk …
Source: The Dispatch
by Kevin D Williamson
“Donald Trump loves tariffs. Joe Biden loves tariffs. The next president elected to lead these United States of America is — probably! — going to be a guy who loves tariffs. He will be surrounded by people who love tariffs or by people who will, for the right salary and an occasional chance for throne-sniffing, pretend to love tariffs. There’s a whole hatchery of trade hawks in the making out there. … there are those who argue for a very broad interpretation of security sensitivity, one that encompasses not only manufactured goods used by military and intelligence agencies but also critical industrial inputs of all kinds: rare-earth minerals, microprocessors, steel — hell, Sen. Marco Rubio thinks sugar is a national-security priority. (It is a priority to some of his cronies in Florida, for sure.) The problem with that tendency toward strategic autarky is that it isn’t … strategic.” (07/08/24)
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/want-trade-hawk-131500053.html
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31) Biden and his backers are falling for the sunk cost fallacy
Source: The Hill
“Joe Biden’s self-inflicted electoral crisis is a classic case study in the ‘sunk cost fallacy.’ As Vice President Kamala Harris and party leaders pour resources into the president’s flailing campaign, the argument that Biden is the only one who can defeat Donald Trump in November and ‘protect democracy’ is increasingly falling on electoral and donor deaf ears. Coined in 1980 by economist Richard Thaler, the sunk-cost fallacy describes a cognitive bias that leads people to double down on failed strategies in which they have invested time, resources and emotional energy. … as often happens with gamblers waging sunk cost fallacies, it was a high-risk move to do the extended interview with ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos, and it’ll be more ‘sunk costs’ for Biden to do other spontaneous live events without teleprompters.” (07/08/24)
https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/4757139-biden-sunk-cost-fallacy/
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32) Democrats don’t give a damn about you
Source: Washington Times
by Don Feder
“With the walking dead at the head of their ticket and the party facing annihilation in November, Democrats are desperate to convince you that they really, really care about you. In reality, they care as much about ordinary Americans as President Biden cared about those who died at Abbey Gate when their coffins came back to Dover Air Force Base, and he couldn’t resist checking his watch. Unless you’re a member of the elite, Democrats don’t give a damn about you. The Democrats’ indifference starts at our borders. The president doubled the number of illegal [sic] immigrants in the United States …. Mr. Biden canceled every one of his predecessor’s executive orders that limited the flow of illegals [sic], including the ‘Remain in Mexico’ policy. He stopped construction of the border wall and turned the Border Patrol into the equivalent of greeters at Las Vegas casinos.” (07/07/24)
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2024/jul/5/democrats-dont-give-damn-about-you/
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33) The Good That Jimmy Carter Did
Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by Lawrence W Reed
“Jimmy Carter never figured among my favorite presidents. I did not vote for him in either 1976 or 1980. I rarely found myself in agreement with him on policy matters. But as he approaches his 100th birthday in October, I find myself wanting to think the best of him. The very fact that he went to Washington but came back to Plains, Georgia, speaks strongly in his favor. He never allowed himself to be captured by the Beltway elite. The simple but sturdy life of small-town America appealed to him more than the pomp, power, and pretense of national politics. Carter was not a great president, and he evidenced considerable naivete on some important issues, but he was not a bad or venal man. Never personally tainted by self-dealing scandal, he resisted temptations to cash in on his election to the country’s highest office.” (07/08/24)
https://fee.org/articles/the-good-that-jimmy-carter-did/
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34) It Didn’t Begin with LBJ: How the US Became a Transfer Society
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
by Eduard Bucher
“Terry L. Anderson and Peter J. Hill’s fascinating account traces the decline of the American constitutional framework from its origins in laissez-faire individualism to its current state of redistributive collectivism. … Emphasizing the role played by the courts, the authors show how from ‘1877 to 1917 the Constitution was altered in numerous ways that made transfers much easier to obtain. Except for the income tax amendment, all of these changes came through interpretation.’ Furthermore, the ‘substitution of an equivocal concept like public interest for firm constitutional limitations meant that the subjective judgment of justices was supreme.’ This set the stage for private interests to learn to benefit from governmental transfers …” (07/08/24)
https://mises.org/mises-wire/it-didnt-begin-lbj-how-us-became-transfer-society
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35) OMG Haaretz Is Hamas Propaganda Now!
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“A new report from the Israeli outlet Haaretz titled ‘IDF Ordered Hannibal Directive on October 7 to Prevent Hamas Taking Soldiers Captive’ confirms what independent outlets like The Grayzone and Electronic Intifada have been getting smeared as antisemitic conspiracy theorists for saying this entire time: that many of the Israeli deaths on October 7 were the result of an IDF policy of deliberately firing on their own people to prevent them from being taken hostage by Hamas. Citing ‘a very senior IDF source,’ Haaretz reports that Israeli troops responding to the Hamas attack were told ‘Not a single vehicle can return to Gaza,’ and that ‘it was entirely clear what that message meant, and what the fate of some of the kidnapped people would be.'” (07/08/24)
https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/2024/07/08/omg-haaretz-is-hamas-propaganda-now/
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36) The History Lesson Jill Biden Must Read: How Lady Bird Johnson Got LBJ to Step Aside
Source: The Daily Beast
by Julia Sweig
“Joe Biden’s presidency has been compared to Lyndon Baines Johnson’s for its highly significant reshaping of domestic policy. But here’s another comparison which has not been embraced — and should be: the crucial role of Lady Bird Johnson in creating and executing the strategy that resulted in LBJ bowing out after a single elected term. It’s a comparison that our current first lady should study closely, because these next few days may be the most consequential of her life.” (07/08/24)
https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-history-lesson-jill-biden-must-read-how-lady-bird-johnson-got-lbj-to-step-aside
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37) A Scheme for Biden to Preserve His Dignity
Source: The Atlantic
by Graeme Wood
“Senility is part of the human condition, but dignity is usually a choice. I pity Joe Biden for having to make what may be the most humiliating decision in presidential history. The questions Are you senile yet? Are you sure? have no dignified answer — which is why Biden should consider an option midway between resignation and denial, and persist in a way that is not, to my knowledge, being considered. … The dignity-preserving option is to release the delegates and run in an open convention. Asking the country to trust him is no longer a credible option. But inviting delegates to witness his continued vigor and competence, and his superiority to other candidates, is a possible path forward — indeed, the likeliest one to end in another Biden term.” (07/08/24)
https://archive.is/q1R68
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38) Here’s how SCOTUS got the big free speech stuff right
Source: Fox News
by Robert Corn-Revere
“In what some saw as anticlimactic, the Supreme Court last Monday declined to decide whether Texas and Florida laws regulating social media moderation policies violate the First Amendment. But the big news from these consolidated cases was what the court did say. Justice Elena Kagan’s majority opinion in Moody v. NetChoice (decided with NetChoice v. Paxton), made clear that the First Amendment ‘does not go on leave when social media are involved.’ What does that mean? Kagan and a solid majority laid down the basic First Amendment principles that will govern the cases going forward in terms so plain that not even the Fifth Circuit can get it wrong the next time around.” (07/08/24)
https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/heres-how-supreme-court-got-the-big-free-speech-stuff-right
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39) Prisoners for Liberty
Source: Law & Liberty
by Paul Schwennesen
“Ukrainians I’ve worked with generally feel they are on the right side of a world-historical crisis and believe that victory (broadly construed) will inevitably be theirs. They relish their membership in a scrappy, motivated, innovative brotherhood that is admired and supported at home and (however fitfully) by the wider free world. Strictly speaking, however, they are also effectively prisoners of the Ukrainian state, held as a fighting reserve against ceaseless Russian meat-wave assaults. It’s frightening and exhausting, and it takes an emotional toll. Mobilization drafts, updated recently by Verkhovna Rada Law 10449, expressly prohibit men aged 18 to 60 from leaving the borders of Ukraine without authorization for exceptional circumstances.” (07/08/24)
https://lawliberty.org/prisoners-for-liberty/
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40) A human-centred approach to rethinking wealth and individual liberty
Source: Students For Liberty
by Ogechukwu Egwuatu
“It is election season, so to speak. From the EU to India to the US, Ghana, Brazil and many more countries. An estimated 49% of the world’s population will head to the polls in national elections this year. Among those, 30 countries still have elections scheduled for the second half of the year. That means politics is the subject on everyone’s lips and with it comes political ideology and questions on how society and the economy should be organised. However, it is time to rethink how we should approach these questions.” (07/08/24)
https://studentsforliberty.org/blog/a-human-centred-approach-to-rethinking-wealth-and-individual-liberty/
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41) After 31 Years With the DNC, My Democratic Proposal to Get Out of This Mess
Source: Common Dreams
by James Zogby
“While there has long been concern about President Biden’s age and his ability to run an effective campaign, many Democrats have resisted any discussion of replacing him at the top of the ticket. They recognize that the president’s record on domestic issues has been a good one on which to run. They know that his persona directly challenges former President Trump’s appeal with white working-class voters in key battleground states. And they are afraid of the uncertainties that might accompany his stepping down. After the president’s unsettling performance during the June 27th televised debate, confronting this concern was no longer speculative. It became urgent.” (07/08/24)
https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/joe-biden-replacement-2668701117
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42) Quantum Vibe, 07/08/24
Source: Big Head Press
by Scott Bieser
Cartoon. (07/08/24)
https://www.quantumvibe.com/strip?page=2488
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43) This week, NATO III celebrates itself
Source: Responsible Statecraft
by Anatol Lieven
“During the 75 years of NATO’s existence, there really have been three NATOs: two with the mission of containing Russia, separated by one which thrashed around wildly and disastrously in search of a new mission. NATO I achieved a complete but peaceful victory when the Soviet bloc collapsed from within — though this came as a result above all of Communism’s own failed promise. NATO II threw away the fruits of this victory through a disastrous kind of frivolous megalomaniac dilettantism. It thereby helped to usher in NATO III, whose eventual fate remains uncertain.” (07/08/24)
https://responsiblestatecraft.org/nato-75th-anniversary-2668681311/
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44) Yes to a Living City: Applying Jacobs’s Principles to New York’s Rezoning
Source: Liberal Currents
by Nick Felker
“Later this year New York City’s council will vote on the mayor’s ambitious rezoning, the City of Yes. This change will reform the zoning code in numerous ways, including allowing for Accessory Dwelling Units, Single-Room Occupancies, infill housing, and by-right mixed-use buildings across the city. These changes are a once-in-a-generation shift in the city’s land-use, with the last major changes occurring in the 1960s. In 1961, the urbanist writer Jane Jacobs wrote The Life and Death of Great American Cities, where she laid out a number of problems in then-present urban planning. Since it was published, we have seen the consequences of those planning policies. Today, it is time to re-evaluate what Jane Jacobs wrote and why the City of Yes is the right path forward.” (07/08/24)
https://www.liberalcurrents.com/yes-to-a-living-city-applying-jacobs-principles-to-new-yorks-rezoning/
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45) Bidengate and the Doom Loop
Source: American Greatness
by Victor Davis Hanson
“The entire 2019-20 Biden candidacy and subsequent presidency were predicated on a rotten Faustian bargain. A hale Joe Biden would feign his aw-shucks, Joe from Scranton schtick. And an ossified working-class Joe’s camouflage would get the hard left elected, especially thanks to the changes in balloting laws that often saw only 30 percent of the electorate voting on Election Day in key states. In exchange, the two narcissistic Bidens would bask in the power and attention of the presidency. From the start, Jill and the media would orchestrate deep cover for Joe’s escalating dementia as well as the true intentions of the now-in-power radical Democratic Party with its neo-socialist agenda.” (07/08/24)
https://amgreatness.com/2024/07/08/bidengate-and-the-doom-loop/
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46) Playbook for a Military Draft
Source: Antiwar.com
by Edward Hasbrouck
“Preparation for a draft is used as a weapon when it is used to threaten escalating war to another level of death and destruction, even when that threat isn’t carried out. … Proponents of draft registration and readiness for a draft such as the authors of the CNAS report argue that if, and only if, the great-power enemies of the U.S. believe that we are able and willing to activate a draft, we can use that threat of draft-enabled rapid and total military escalation and total war as a tool of diplomatic and military policy. Resistance to planning and preparation for a draft is thus a way to rein in those policies that are based on the ability to rush into total war, and the threat to do so.”
https://original.antiwar.com/edward_hasbrouck/2024/07/07/playbook-for-a-military-draft/
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47) Every American War is Bullshit: Exposing the Myth of the “Good War”
Source: exile in happy valley
by Nicky Reid
“They all come with different excuses and some of them are pretty goddamn convincing but every major conflict that this country has ever engaged in has been motivated by greed and power, and every single war we’ve fought has ended the exact same way, with piles of bodies, fewer civil rights, and a growing thirst for more. Even our so-called Revolution, which so many otherwise peaceful libertarians hold in such high regard, was little more than another blood thirsty power grab.” (07/07/24)
https://exileinhappyvalley.blogspot.com/2024/07/every-american-war-is-bullshit-exposing.html
-----
48) Niall Ferguson: The Intellectual Underwriter of Trump’s American Carnage Idea
Source: The UnPopulist
by Matt Johnson
“Hatred of the woke is causing this hawk to wildly exaggerate America’s decline and make absurd comparisons with the Soviet Union.” (07/07/24)
https://www.theunpopulist.net/p/niall-ferguson-the-intellectual-underwriter
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49) Escape From the Box
Source: The American Prospect
by David Dayen
“Mario Flores was told he couldn’t look at the documents until he signed them. The saleslady at Cardinale Way Mazda in Corona, California, about 50 miles east of Los Angeles, was rushing Mario, a 20-year-old first-time car buyer, through a new loan agreement, asking him to make electronic signatures on a small tablet. When asked if Mario could see the physical agreement and all its terms, the saleslady insisted that the signature must be added in order to move forward. Anyway, she assured, it was a better deal than what he initially signed; the term was dropping from 84 to 75 months, and the interest rate from 13.77 percent to 10.99 percent. But the printout she was showing Mario wasn’t the loan document, and it didn’t reveal other information in the contract, which he would be bound by upon signature.” (07/08/24)
https://prospect.org/power/2024-07-08-car-dealership-fee-financing-scams/
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50) Time for the Fed to Cut Rates
Source: Beat The Press
by Dean Baker
“Federal Reserve Board Chair Jerome Powell has been saying for some time that he needs to see more evidence that inflation is under control before he lowers interest rates. We can never be certain of where the economy is going so it’s understandable that he remains worried that inflation could reaccelerate. However, there are risks in the opposite direction as well, which Powell has explicitly recognized in the past. He has stated that the Fed has an obligation to maximize employment and said that this part of the Fed’s mandate needs to be taken as seriously as its commitment to price stability. That is why many of us where [sic] happy see President Biden reappointed him as Fed chair. But he has to act now to show this commitment.” (07/07/24)
https://cepr.net/time-for-the-fed-to-cut-rates/
_____ Today's Freedom Podcast and Video _____
51) Reason Roundtable, 07/08/24
Source: Reason
"Why the Media Covered for Biden." (07/08/24)
https://reason.com/podcast/2024/07/08/why-the-media-covered-for-biden/
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52) LibertyDad, 07/08/24
Source: LibertyDad
“Libertarian Party of Florida Makes A Bad Vote.” (07/08/24)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dR8TGKppwpw
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53) Cato Daily Podcast, 07/08/24
Source: Cato Institute
“Adjudicating Federal Agency Claims after Jarkesy.” (07/08/24)
https://www.cato.org/multimedia/cato-daily-podcast/adjudicating-federal-agency-claims-after-jarkesy
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54) CNN Inside Politics, 07/08/24
Source: CNN
“Biden Vows to Stay in Race.” (07/08/24)
https://www.cnn.com/audio/podcasts/cnn-politics/episodes/042cc29a-0cac-11ef-8ac3-b7966160985a
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55) Rising, 07/08/24
Source: The Hill
“Jessica Burbank and Robby Soave discuss calls within the Democratic Party for President Joe Biden to drop out of the 2024 race.” (07/08/24)
https://thehill.com/hilltv/rising/4759805-rising-july-8-2024/
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56) Unattended Baggage, episode 252
Source: International Guild of Professional Anarchists
“Dementia to the Left of me, Dictators to the Right.” (07/08/24)
https://alexandersnitker.substack.com/p/unattended-baggage-episode-252-dementia
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57) Conflicts of Interest, episode 630
Source: Conflicts of Interest
“US Support for Israeli War on Gaza Fuels Terrorism Recruitment.” (07/08/24)
https://libertarianinstitute.org/kyle/coi-630-us-support-for-israeli-war-on-gaza-fuels-terrorism-recruitment/
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58) The Bryan Hyde Show, 07/08/24
Source: The Bryan Hyde Show
“Sometimes it seems as though the only absolute in our culture is that there are no absolutes. Paul Rosenberg begs to differ. He says, if there’s life and death, then there’s right and wrong.” (07/08/24)
https://www.podbean.com/ep/pb-swtxh-16613ee
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59) EconTalk, 07/08/24
Source: EconTalk
“Reading, Writing, and Fighting (with Mark Helprin).” (07/08/24)
https://www.econtalk.org/reading-writing-and-fighting-with-mark-helprin/
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60) The Libertarian Angle, 07/08/24
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
“Celebrating the Fourth of July.” (07/08/24)
https://libertarianangle.libsyn.com/celebrating-the-fourth-of-july
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61) Finding Freedom, episode 445
Source: Lions of Liberty
“Kamala Suddenly Coherent and Sandusky Medical Records Released.” (07/08/24)
https://www.lionsofliberty.com/episodes/kamala-suddenly-coherent-and-sandusky-medical-records-released
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62) Antiwar News with Dave DeCamp, 07/08/24
Source: Antiwar.com
“Report Confirms Israel Used Hannibal Directive on Oct. 7, Netanyahu Sabotages Hostage Deal, and More.” (07/08/24)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zid_MKncS9A
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63) The Fifth Column, episode 462
Source: The Fifth Column
“SCOTUS Interruptus (w/ Damon Root).” (07/07/24)
https://www.wethefifth.com/p/462-scotus-interruptus-w-damon-root
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64) Free Talk Live, 07/07/24
Source: Free Talk Live
“Gen G commits fraud :: Theft is wrong :: Skeeter says printing money is A-okay :: Cops just want to be cool :: Take drugs to solve all your problems :: Ridley calls about a gun case in MA :: Spain has porn passports :: Electric taxis in NM :: Sunday night bible study :: 2024-07-06 Lori, Riley, Rich E. Rich.” (07/07/24)
https://soundcloud.com/freetalklive/free-talk-live-2024-07-07
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65) Soho Forum Debate: What’s the Best Argument for Libertarianism?
Source: Reason
“Free State Project activist Dennis Pratt and Soho Forum Director Gene Epstein debate the resolution, ‘A better way to persuade more people of libertarianism is to convince them of the ethics stemming from self-ownership and the non-aggression principle, without relying primarily on consequentialist/utilitarian arguments.'” (07/07/24)
https://reason.com/podcast/2024/07/07/whats-the-best-argument-for-libertarianism/
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