The Federal Reserve has been oddly quiet this holiday season. However, members of congress have not. Only a few days before the new year, on December 29, President Biden signed the $1.7 trillion government funding bill known as the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2023.

So, what do you get for $1.7 trillion these days?

After years spent toiling as an activist against the tide of Czech politics, Vít Jedlička concluded that it would be easier to build a libertarian nation from scratch somewhere else. In April 2015, he declared that a new country called the Free Republic of Liberland would be founded on unclaimed land on the Danube River.

Australia’s superb performance on measures of international development has earned her the admiration of many. Few countries can boast such stellar achievements in economic and social affairs.

Legislators have a strange relationship with magic. To achieve that which physically cannot be done, they like to wave magic wands and pretend that it can. Reality puts a limit on political power, a realization that always sits poorly with those in charge of our trillion-dollar bureaucratic machinery.