Weekly commentary by Connor O’Keeffe, examining some of the biggest stories in the news through an Austro-libertarian lens.
Reading the feed…
Trump has made his family billions by courting foreign and corporate money and accepting extravagant gifts while in office. But he didn’t bring self-enrichment to Washington, he simply made it much harder to ignore. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/profiting-government-didnt-begin-trump 2026 is the Year of Rothbard—Murray's 100th birthday—and we're celebrating by giving away free copies of The Case for a 100 Percent Gold Dollar through August 31. Grab yours today at https://mises.org/gabfreebook Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
The backlash against automated license plate readers is not really about traffic cameras. It is about a public that no longer assumes the people in charge are acting in good faith. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/flock-camera-backlash-very-good-sign 2026 is the Year of Rothbard—Murray's 100th birthday—and we're celebrating by giving away free copies of The Case for a 100 Percent Gold Dollar through August 31. Grab yours today at https://mises.org/gabfreebook Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
Fauci is back in the limelight after the release of his diary before a Senate hearing last week. And that’s good, because the career of Anthony Fauci can teach us a lot about where power actually resides in America and how our system really works. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/what-anthony-fauci-teaches-us-about-american-government 2026 is the Year of Rothbard—Murray's 100th birthday—and we're celebrating by giving away free copies of The Case for a 100 Percent Gold Dollar through August 31. Grab yours today at https://mises.org/gabfreebook Be sure to follow the Guns and
Democratic socialist candidates are becoming a serious political challenge in Democratic Party primaries. Have Americans suddenly become convinced by the arguments in favor of command economies, or is there something deeper going on? Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/country-having-its-socialist-moment 2026 is the Year of Rothbard—Murray's 100th birthday—and we're celebrating by giving away free copies of The Origins of the Federal Reserve through July 31. Grab yours today at https://mises.org/gabfreebook Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
The Fed Chair’s job isn’t to stabilize the economy. It’s to use prestige, technical jargon, and mind-numbing dullness to cover for the central bank’s expropriation of the American people. And Alan Greenspan excelled at that. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/greenspan-was-perfect-fed-chair-not-compliment 2026 is the Year of Rothbard—Murray's 100th birthday—and we're celebrating by giving away free copies of Keynes the Man through June 30. Grab yours today at https://mises.org/gabfreebook Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
Elon Musk becoming the world’s first trillionaire has triggered a familiar round of progressive outrage. But the imprecise focus on wealth distribution obscures the real issue: how much of modern wealth is acquired through politics rather than production. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/musk-trillionaire-panic-distraction 2026 is the Year of Rothbard—Murray's 100th birthday—and we're celebrating by giving away free copies of Keynes the Man through June 30. Grab yours today at https://mises.org/gabfreebook Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
Trump is trapped in a genuinely difficult situation as he tries to reach a deal with Iran. But it is a crisis of his own making. Also, the establishment figures now condemning him should not be allowed to pretend they had nothing to do with it. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/trumps-iran-predicament-his-own-fault 2026 is the Year of Rothbard—Murray's 100th birthday—and we're celebrating by giving away free copies of Keynes the Man through June 30. Grab yours today at https://mises.org/gabfreebook Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
Although it's true that many government-driven price hikes in recent years aren’t “inflation” in the strict sense, the pain they cause is just as real. Warsh’s push to narrow what the Fed counts as inflation—so it can justify even more inflation—is alarming. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/warshs-concerning-interest-redefining-inflation 2026 is the Year of Rothbard—Murray's 100th birthday—and we're celebrating by giving away free copies of Keynes the Man through June 30. Grab yours today at https://mises.org/gabfreebook Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https
AI has created enormous demand for new data centers, and many communities do not want them nearby. The Rothbardian answer is not blanket permission or blanket prohibition, but a property-rights framework and the return of market forces that government policy has largely displaced. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/rothbardian-case-against-bad-data-center-policy 2026 is the Year of Rothbard—Murray's 100th birthday—and we're celebrating by giving away free copies of Anatomy of the State through May 31. Grab yours today at https://mises.org/gabfreebook Be sure to follow the Guns
Both progressives and conservatives show a complete unwillingness or inability to distinguish between those who got rich by genuinely creating value by serving others and those who are getting rich by expropriating wealth through force. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/progressives-and-conservatives-are-wrong-about-taxing-rich 2026 is the Year of Rothbard—Murray's 100th birthday—and we're celebrating by giving away free copies of Anatomy of the State through May 31. Grab yours today at https://mises.org/gabfreebook Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mis
Antitrust populists claimed blocking the Spirit–JetBlue merger would protect competition and consumers. But their effort led to an intervention that strengthened the very oligopoly they set out to fight. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/how-antitrust-populists-drove-spirit-airlines-out-business 2026 is the Year of Rothbard—Murray's 100th birthday—and we're celebrating by giving away free copies of Anatomy of the State through May 31. Grab yours today at https://mises.org/gabfreebook Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
This Tax Day, as the American public reflects on what our government is using our money for, there is growing opposition to the behavior of the Israeli government. Yet we’re all still forced to send it some of our hard-earned tax dollars. Enough. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/american-people-should-not-be-forced-fund-israels-atrocities Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
This war is not just making energy more expensive, it’s knocking out the higher order goods the global structure of production depends on. This has already locked in dangerous shortages in critical industries like healthcare, food production, and much more. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/economic-destruction-trumps-war-goes-far-beyond-high-gas-prices Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
To call Trump’s actions king-like is to greatly understate the problem. What we actually face is a massive, self-amplifying executive branch that makes deranged presidents far more dangerous than an actual king could ever be. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/our-problem-isnt-kings-its-presidency Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
Anyone who cares about American greatness must also refuse to allow us to become the kind of society that shrugs off the crimes our government commits in our name and with our money. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/immorality-trumps-war-iran-matters Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
Leftists sarcastically asking where the money for this war will come from are right about the GOP’s hypocrisy, but wrong to imply that it actually means there's plenty to spend on all these government programs. We can’t afford any of this. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/no-we-cannot-afford-war-iran-either Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
As recent history shows, there are few things more courageous for a president to do than face down the ever-accelerating, wealth-draining, conflict-amplifying warfare state in DC. Trump has decided to go in the opposite direction. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/launching-war-iran-was-no-act-courage Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
The problem with this new campaign in Iran is not merely that it will likely have bad near-term consequences, but that it represents the American government doubling down on the imperial project that is causing our accelerating national crisis. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/trumps-war-iran-even-more-disaster-people-realize Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
If the Iranian regime were truly trying to sacrifice their entire country to commit a nation-level nuclear murder-suicide against Israel and the US, they would be acting very differently. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/trumps-iran-buildup-based-lie Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
While the Voter ID debate consumes the airwaves with political debate, the real issue is not who is elected, but the unelected elites that hold power. Even if Voter ID passes, the new law will not change the real structure of power. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/voter-id-common-sense-it-wont-fix-anything Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
The administration dismissed concerns about the last nuclear treaty between the US and Russia formally expiring last week. But even if this isn’t an exceptionally dangerous moment in itself, the end of New START reflects an incredibly disturbing trend. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/people-are-not-upset-enough-about-end-new-start Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
The latest release of Epstein files again highlighted how disgusted and frustrated people have grown with the current elites. Yet they remain essentially untouchable. Why? Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/everyone-agrees-our-elites-are-terrible-so-why-are-we-stuck-them Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
Trump is clearly focused on building a legacy in his second term with his domestic vanity projects and dramatic foreign interventions. But his actual legacy is shaping up to be defined by his lack of progress on affordability. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/trumps-embrace-economic-leftism-will-destroy-legacy-hes-desperately-trying-build Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
Even hawkish foreign policy scholars admit that changing the US security setup in Greenland is unnecessary. Its supply of raw materials is also nothing special. There isn’t even a ton of money to be made for crony companies. This is purely about Trump’s ego, and it will cost taxpayers a lot. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/greenland-trumps-folly Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
Central bankers are not afraid Trump will “politicize” the Fed and turn it into a crony arm of the government that warps the economy to benefit those close to power. They’re afraid his blind inflationism and lack of subtlety will make it impossible to hide the fact that it already is. Read the article here: https://mises.org/mises-wire/central-banking-establishment-genuinely-worried-about-trump-not-reasons-they-say Be sure to follow the Guns and Butter podcast at https://Mises.org/GB
