In response to the strengthening of the Consumer Price Index (CPI) growth rate yearly to 8.6 percent in May 2022 from 5.0 percent in May 2021, on Wednesday, June 15, 2022, the US central bank (the Fed) raised the policy interest rate by 75 basis points—the largest increase since 1994. The new target range now stands at 1.50 percent to 1.75 percent, and most Fed officials expect the policy rate to rise well above 3.0 percent by the end of the year.

After the 75-bps rate hike last week, Powell took to the stage, saying in just his third sentence:

It was the best of the laws, it was the worst of the laws, it was built on freedom, it was built on power, it was the spontaneous order of organic social institutions, it was the deliberate order of ideology and coercion, it was a stream of jurisprudence guiding us to justice, it was a tangle of statutes pushing us to restriction.

Time and time again, prowar spending concedes one of the Left’s most convincing points. As Assal Rad tweeted recently, we will have sent

$54,000,000,000 to Ukraine in less than 4 months.

“How will we pay for it” never seems to apply to wars, just the basic needs of the American people.

In a piece of news that shocked the mainstream media, but which shocked no one familiar with the academic industry writ large, retired US Army general John Allen was forced to resign as president of the Brookings Institution after it was revealed the FBI was investigating him for lobbying on behalf of the Qatari monarchy.