King Charles on America

 Many posts have discussed the Founding.

Ironically, the British monarch echoed the No Kings rallies in the US.

From King Charles's Address to Congress:

The Founding Fathers were bold and imaginative rebels with a cause. Two hundred and fifty years ago, or, as we say in the United Kingdom ‘just the other day,’ they declared Independence. By balancing contending forces and drawing strength in diversity, they united 13 disparate colonies to forge a nation on the revolutionary idea of ‘life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.’ They carried with them, and carried forward, the great inheritance of the British Enlightenment – as well as the ideals which had an even deeper history in English common law and Magna Carta.

These roots run deep, and they are still vital. Our Declaration of Rights of 1689 was not only the foundation of our constitutional monarchy, but also provided the source of so many of the principles reiterated, often verbatim, in the American Bill of Rights of 1791.

And those roots go even further back in our history: the U.S. Supreme Court Historical Society has calculated that Magna Carta is cited in at least 160 Supreme Court cases since 1789, not least as the foundation of the principle that executive power is subject to checks and balances.

This is the reason why there stands a stone, by the River Thames at Runnymede where Magna Carta was signed in the year 1215. This stone records that an acre of that ancient and historic site was given to the United States of America by the people of the United Kingdom, to symbolize our shared resolve in support of liberty, and in memory of President John F. Kennedy.

Distinguished members of the 119th Congress, it is here in these very halls that this spirit of liberty and the promise of America’s founders is present in every session and every vote cast.

Not by the will of one, but by the deliberation of many, representing the living mosaic of the United States. In both of our countries, it is the very fact of our vibrant, diverse and free societies that gives us our collective strength, including to support victims of some of the ills that, so tragically, exist in both our societies today.

Lincoln the Politician

 Allen Guelzo at AEI:

Of course, we prefer to remember Lincoln the Statesman rather than Lincoln the Politician. Statecraft embodies nobility of purpose, shrewdness of insight, and prudential management of public affairs. But we are not doing sufficient justice to either Lincoln or ourselves if we forget how very much Lincoln was a career politician, in the fullest sense of the word. “Politics were his life,” insisted his longtime law partner, William Henry Herndon, “and his great ambition his motive power.” His confidence in his own judgment sometimes reached the borders of arrogance, and when John Hay tried to show him articles in the journals of the day “on some special subject,” Lincoln dismissed him out of hand: “I know more about it that any of them.”

It also does no justice to either Lincoln or ourselves to ignore the Politician, if only because in a democracy, politics is precisely what makes the world go round. Politics is universally tedious, routinely self-interested, and frequently corrupt, but in a polity where the citizenry are the sovereigns, there is no escaping it. So we can be grateful that Matthew Pinsker, who teaches at Dickinson College in Pennsylvania, has at last frankly told us the story of Boss Lincoln, and in much of its massively democratic details.

Party organization was Lincoln’s life, Pinsker states at the outset, and in particular Lincoln was “a party builder,” with a “particular talent for party management,” something which “was the driving force in his political career.” This was no small task in Lincoln’s America, since political parties had only the most rudimentary official structures and, what is even more difficult to imagine, no registration lists, voter surveys, or professional staffs. In Lincoln’s day, one did not actually join a party; one identified with, or affiliated with, a party. Party labor and loyalty were rewarded with patronage; party information was disseminated by newspapers whose editors never blinked in the direction of something called “journalistic objectivity.” He may not entirely have been a boss in the wicked sense associated with William Tweed or Richard J. Daley, but he was a politician to his fingertips.

And Lincoln loved every minute of it. His law practice paid the bills, but it was also valuable for earning him voter visibility across Illinois. He drew up precinct and municipal strategy plans, and the two political mobilization plans which survive in his hand (from 1840 and 1843) show he was quite adept at “how to create effective county-level committees … raise funds, and even preserve local harmony.” He expected patronage rewards, and at one point even bought part-ownership in a German-language newspaper in Illinois to influence immigrant voters. He did not like to lose, and in 1848 he walked away from Henry Clay, the man he called his “beau ideal of a statesman,” and endorsed the vaguer but more successful presidential bid of the unmemorable Zachary Taylor. “The election for him,” Pinsker remarks, “was about winning.”

The Impact of State and Federal Policies on Academic Researchers

Many posts have discussed the politics of colleges and universities in the United States.

Ithaka S+R The Impact of State and Federal Policies on Academic Researchers
Findings from a National Survey Dylan Ruediger, Chelsea McCracken, Jonathan Barefield

In open-ended comments left by 663 survey respondents, concerns about the state of academic freedom within the research enterprise were a common theme. Recent federal policies, noted one, are “beyond perilous for the system of higher education, and will have a far-reaching impact on the quality of life in the US and the world.” Another described their state government as working aggressively to limit academic freedom and institutional autonomy. While a few respondents noted that they agreed with the premise of divisive concepts or anti-DEI legislation or felt that this type of legislation had improved academic freedom, we heard most often from those who expressed concern that the future was bleak. “The collective institutional research capacity of the United States is in free-fall,” said one respondent, “we are losing our leadership position in the world.”

Key findings: 

• State and federal policies targeting divisive concepts or DEI are shaping research agendas at scale and across disciplines. Twenty percent of all respondents, and 29 percent of researchers working in states with divisive concepts or similar laws, reported having avoided certain research topics because of state laws and policies.
• Eight percent of respondents representing a wide range of disciplines reported having had a federal grant cancelled in 2025.
• Eleven percent of respondents reported that federal and state policies restricting research activities are compelling them to seek employment out of state, to leave the academy, or to look for academic positions overseas.
• Researchers, particularly those at doctoral institutions and those employed in states with divisive concepts legislation, report concerns about whether university presidents and, especially, boards are willing to advocate for their academic freedom as researchers.

Lobbying on Iran and Venezuela

Many posts have discussed lobbying, "shadow lobbying," "unlobbying," and "non-lobbying lobbying."

Daniel Barnes at POLITICO:

LOBBYING ON THE FRONT LINES: The Trump administration’s military actions in Iran and Venezuela sparked lobbying activity from 54 companies and organizations in the first quarter of 2026, collectively spending $13.3 million, an analysis of lobbying disclosure data by our colleagues Paroma Soni and Catherine Allen found. Most of these came from political advocacy-focused groups or the energy industry.

— The biggest private sector represented was, unsurprisingly, oil and gas. Chevron spent $1.6 million on all lobbying activity in Q1 and listed sanctions on Venezuela and energy access as specific lobbying issues. Shell, which spent $1.4 million, lobbied to advance its role in the commercial development of natural gas in one of Venezuela’s largest offshore gas fields. BP lobbied on the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, which handles sanctions for Venezuelan energy activity and Iran-linked projects such as the Shah Deniz gas corridor.
...

— Several advocacy groups also lobbied on pending legislation related to Iran and Venezuela, particularly on the congressional war powers resolutions to disapprove of military action. They ranged from the American Civil Liberties Union to the Quaker-aligned Friends Committee on National Legislation to the American Federation of Teachers. The pro-Israel group American Israel Public Affairs Committee lobbied on increased sanctions against Iran and U.S. military assistance to Israel, as did the “pro-Israel, pro-peace” J Street group.

Threats to Econ Stats

A number of posts have discussed presidential documents, official data, and government websites.

David S. Johnson at Brookings:

Since the founding of the country, the nation’s economic statistical system has produced timely, accurate, and relevant statistics that are used by policymakers and the public to make critical decisions. However, in recent years, the nation’s economic statistical agencies have been increasingly threatened by political and technical challenges. Having dealt with continually falling budgets, staff shortages, and increasing pressures to modernize their statistical infrastructure, these agencies are now experiencing a period of unprecedented staff reductions, budget cuts, and criticisms of their statistical credibility. This social and political environment has put federal statistical agencies into a state of crisis, furthering distrust of government statistics among the American people and reducing the availability of statistics on various aspects of the nation’s economy, people, and well-being.

The specific threats to the Federal Statistical System (FSS) can be placed into two broad categories. First, some threats are internal within the FSS, including declining survey response rates, changing technology, and the use of blended data. Second, other threats arise from external factors or political structures, including declining public trust, political interference, falling agency budgets, and staffing limits.

This paper provides an overview of internal and external threats and suggests a key mechanism for how agencies can survive in this challenging climate: keeping the staff motivated. After reviewing the structure of the FSS and headline economic indicators (or Principal Federal Economic Indicators), the paper focuses on the internal threats of falling response rates and difficulties in innovation and the external threats of decreasing budgets, staff, trust, and increasing political interference. This analysis shows that falling response rates are a concern if they bias the statistics, demonstrates the challenges faced by agencies in modernizing their statistics, highlights the recent reductions in staff, and discusses the implications of decreasing financial resources over the past 15 years. The conclusion examines whether attempts to limit the independence of the agencies could harm the statistics.

Download the full report

Declining Desire to Move to the US

Many.posts have dealt with international views of the United States.  They have taken a negative turn.

 Julie Ray and Anita Pugliese at Gallup:

The U.S. remains the most desired destination for people who would like to leave their own countries permanently, but Gallup's latest data show it is less attractive than it once was.

In 2025, 15% of adults worldwide who say they would like to move permanently to another country name the U.S. as their preferred destination, the lowest level recorded in nearly two decades of Gallup research. From 2007 to 2009, 24% of would-be migrants named the U.S. as their top choice, and that figure remained near 20% through 2016. Since 2017, it has been at or below 18%.

The rank order of the countries attracting the most interest from potential migrants has seen little change since Gallup’s first measure. Canada ranks second, as it has for several years, with 9% of potential migrants mentioning the U.S. neighbor. The appeal of these desired destinations did not change in 2025, even as the U.S. became less desirable.

 

Federal Boards and Commissions: the Partisanship Issue

Many posts have discussed regulation and the administrative state. 

Chris Piper at the Partnership for Public Service:

Since returning to office, Trump has systematically targeted Democratic members of partisan-balanced boards and commissions. Now, nearly 40% of partisan-balanced boards and commissions have no Democratic members at all. This represents a rapid and historically unprecedented shift in the composition of bodies Congress designed to operate with bipartisan representation.

Of the 33 full-time boards and commissions, 23 include some form of partisan balancing requirement, typically limiting any one party to a bare majority of seats.

Partisan balancing requirements were designed not just to ensure representation, but to force internal contestation—replacing unilateral decision-making with structured disagreement and consensus building. Beyond cross-partisan deliberation, Congress has viewed partisan balancing as an “important restraint on the President from filling every commission seat with Administration partisans.”

In practice, presidents of both parties have historically maintained opposition-party representation, replacing members gradually as terms expired and often renominating incumbents. The Senate reinforced this practice through a long-standing norm of considering nominees to boards and commissions in bipartisan pairs. For example, through 2020, roughly 90% of Federal Election Commission members were confirmed this way.

Trump has abandoned these norms entirely. Since returning to office, he has fired or attempted to fire 16 Democratic members across 11 partisan-balanced boards and commissions while declining to nominate Democratic replacements. Over the same period, 12 new Republican members have been confirmed and zero Democrats.