"As the year winds down, the border is about to break wide open. In less than a week, the Biden administration's last remaining tool to control illegal immigration, left over from the Trump administration, will be taken away.

"Title 42, the public-health order invoked by President Trump during the pandemic that allowed immigration officials to quickly expel most migrants caught crossing the border illegally, will end on Dec. 21 by order of a federal judge.

"Once Title 42 is gone, federal agencies at the border will have no choice but to process and release nearly every illegal border-crosser. It will represent a full return to the Obama-era 'catch-and-release' policy. Border Patrol estimates they could see as many as 14,000 arrests per day in the coming weeks, which would totally overwhelm the border."

Read the entire article here.

"What a happy coincidence for Democrats that, hours before the alleged crypto criminal Sam Bankman-Fried was due to testify before the House Financial Services Committee, he was arrested in the Bahamas. That meant that SBF, the second-biggest Democratic donor of the 2022 cycle -- behind 92-year-old George Soros -- was able to evade questioning from Republican House members.

"Bankman-Fried helped to bankroll President Joe Biden's 2020 campaign and threw nearly $40 million behind Democratic candidates this year, and we have a feeling that questioning from Republican lawmakers would've been embarrassing for the Democratic Party. His testimony under oath would also have, presumably, been a boon for prosecutors who decided to arrest him on Monday instead. The timing is puzzling."

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"Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) hopes to be speaker when Republicans return with the House majority in January. And he already has the support of the vast majority of his GOP colleagues, 188 of them. But he needs 30 more to get to the 218 that will overcome Democratic opposition.

"Members of the House Freedom Caucus are withholding their support and demanding various procedural changes in exchange for their votes. There is a neat and desirable solution, for many of the Freedom Caucus's demands would return the House to a better way of operating. Thus, McCarthy can win the backing of his colleagues and, at the same time, seize an historic opportunity to make at least one side of Congress function better.

"The Founding Fathers always intended the House to be the federal institution closest to the people. But for far too long, leaders of both parties have consolidated power in the speaker's office. Now, McCarthy can make it the 'People's House' again.

"The Freedom Caucus identified several changes to both House and Republican Conference rules that would, as they put it, 'give all Members the power to fix Washington' and 'hold our own party leaders accountable.'"

Read the entire article here.

"The latest Twitter disclosures have raised potential legal liability for Twitter and its executives. No one appears more at risk than Twitter's former CEO Jack Dorsey

"It is an ironic turn of events since Dorsey supported the takeover by Elon Musk and has called for all files to be released without filtering. Dorsey has the feel of a 'designated degendant,' someone who was pushed forward by others to take any legal hit.

"On its face, Dorsey has vulnerability after the latest release. He was repeatedly asked by members of Congress about censoring and shadow-banning, which has now been confirmed in these files."

Read the entire article here.

"Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema is changing her party affiliation to independent, delivering a jolt to Democrats' narrow majority and Washington along with it.

"In a 45-minute interview, the first-term senator told POLITICO that she will not caucus with Republicans and suggested that she intends to vote the same way she has for four years in the Senate. 'Nothing will change about my values or my behavior,' she said.

"Provided that Sinema sticks to that vow, Democrats will still have a workable Senate majority in the next Congress, though it will not exactly be the neat and tidy 51 seats they assumed. They're expected to also have the votes to control Senate committees. And Sinema's move means Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) -- a pivotal swing vote in the 50-50 chamber the past two years -- will hold onto some but not all of his outsized influence in the Democratic caucus.

"Sinema would not address whether she will run for reelection in 2024, and informed Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of her decision on Thursday.

"'I don't anticipate that anything will change about the Senate structure,' Sinema said, adding that some of the exact mechanics of how her switch affects the chamber is 'a question for Chuck Schumer ... I intend to show up to work, do the same work that I always do. I just intend to show up to work as an independent.'

"She said her closely held decision to leave the Democratic Party reflects that she's 'never really fit into a box of any political party' -- a description she said also applies to her fiercely independent state and millions of unaffiliated voters across the country."

Read the entire article here.

"This has been a year of watershed moments in real estate, and not the good kind.

"The Housing Market Index, a closely watched industry metric that gauges the outlook for home sales, declined to 33 in November on a hundred-point scale, its lowest level in a decade, save for the first dystopian month of the pandemic. Anything under 50 spells trouble.

"A month earlier, interest rates on a standard 30-year mortgage passed 7 percent, capping the largest single-year increase in at least 50 years."

Read the entire article here.

"The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments this week in the biggest sleeper case of its 2022-23 term.

"The justices already have before them the blockbuster dispute of whether government-funded or -run colleges and universities can continue to use race in making admissions decisions, testing whether the court will live up to the Constitution's promise of equal protection of the laws and that the government will treat its citizens as individuals without regard to race. But the Supreme Court also has before it a potentially earth-shaking case involving governmental structure in addition to individual rights.

"Moore v. Harper asks the justices to decide whether a state court can impose its own map for congressional districts drawn after the decennial census. It will test whether the Supreme Court will honor the Constitution's text, rather than past practice, with implications for the control not just over congressional districting (which helped Republicans win the House in the most recent midterm elections) but also the selection of presidential electors. If a true dispute arose over the results of the 2024 election, Moore v. Harper might provide the touchstone for a state legislative role in determining the winner."

Read the entire article here.

"One of the old saws of censorship apologists is that without a government directing the suppression of free speech, it is not censorship.

That is clearly untrue. Many groups like the ACLU stress that 'censorship can be carried out by the government as well as private pressure groups.'

The same figures insist that if, there is not a violation of the First Amendment (which only applies to the government), there is no free speech violation.

The First Amendment was never the exclusive definition of free speech. Free speech is viewed by many of us as a human right; the First Amendment only deals with one source for limiting it. Free speech can be undermined by private corporations as well as government agencies.

Corporations clearly have free speech rights."

Read the entire article here.

"New York politicians are slapping a badge on my chest. A law going into effect Saturday requires social-media networks, including any site that allows comments, to publish a plan for responding to alleged hate speech by users.

The law blog I run fits the bill, so the law will mandate that I post publicly my policy for responding to comments that 'vilify, humiliate, or incite violence against a group' based on 'race, color, religion, ethnicity, national origin, disability, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression.' It also requires that I give readers a way to complain about my blog's content and obligates me to respond directly.

I don't want to moderate such content and I don't endorse the state's definition of hate speech. I do sometimes delete comments, but I do it based on my own editorial judgment, not state command. Still, I'm being conscripted. By obligating me to do the state's bidding with regard to viewpoints that New York condemns, the law violates the First Amendment."

Read the entire article here.

"Florida is divesting from investment giant BlackRock, becoming the latest state to pull assets from the firm over its environment, social, and governance (ESG) policies.

"The Sunshine State's chief financial officer, Jimmy Patronis, announced Thursday that the Florida Treasury would immediately begin removing roughly $2 billion in assets from BlackRock's control in a process that should be completed by year's end.

"'Using Florida's cash to fund BlackRock's social-engineering project isn't something we signed up for,' Patronis tweeted in making the announcement. 'It's got nothing to do with maximizing returns and is the opposite of what an asset manager is paid to do.' ...

"BlackRock and other major financial institutions, like State Street and Vanguard, have spearheaded an effort to promote ESG standards over the last several years. The ESG movement broadly seeks to promote a green energy transition and left-wing social priorities through the financial sector.

"Republican states and groups like the State Financial Officers Foundation (SFOF), though, have waged a war against the ESG movement, arguing that it is anti-democratic and harmful to taxpayers by pushing investments that don't result in maximum earnings for consumers."

Read the entire article here.