Source: Libertarian Institute
by Ted Snider

“Iran’s chosen response to the fatal strike on its embassy seems not to have been about retaliation nor escalation. If it had been, they would have fired more missiles than drones, and they would not have announced the drones as soon as they were launched nor declared the operation ‘concluded’ before they arrived. They would not have shared in advance the details and timing of the operation with Saudi Arabia, other Gulf countries, and Turkey, a member of NATO, who then, predictably, shared it with the United States. The chosen response was about re-establishing deterrence.” (04/17/24)

https://libertarianinstitute.org/articles/this-weekend-iran-changed-everything

Source: Reason
by Eric Boehm

“Just four days ago, the Biden administration launched a new line of attack against former President Donald Trump and his campaign trail promise to hike tariffs if he is elected in November. Those higher tariffs would be ‘inflation-feeding welfare for the rich’ that would raise prices for consumers, according to an Axios summary of a White House memo. The shift in messaging, The New York Times reported, was an attempt at ‘recalibrating’ Biden’s economic message in the face of stubbornly high inflation and the persistent sense among voters that the economy is not doing well. In effect, this is an attempt to remind voters that Trump’s economic plans include the deliberate goal of artificially inflating prices — because that’s what tariffs do. On Wednesday, President Joe Biden called for hiking tariffs.” (04/17/24)

https://reason.com/2024/04/17/bidens-call-for-more-steel-tariffs-is-economically-ineffective-political-pandering/

Source: EconLog
by Pierre Lemieux

“Economic models of cooperation and conflict are often based on the Prisoner’s Dilemma (PD) of game theory. As simple as this model is, it helps us understand whether or not a war will be fought, where ‘fought’ includes escalation steps through retaliation –the current situation between the government of Israël and the government of Iran.” (04/17/24)

https://www.econlib.org/prisoners-dilemma-a-simple-model-of-war/

Source: Cato Institute
by Norbert Michel

“Last week the U.S. House reauthorized Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, continuing a controversial foreign intelligence collection program. Still, reauthorization took some political arm twisting because several members wanted to add protection against warrantless surveillance under the FISA 702 program. … It’s no surprise that privacy advocates are upset about this reauthorization. But while it’s good to see Congress at least debating these issues during the Section 702 reauthorization, it’s even better to see the House Judiciary Committee recognizing how the Bank Secrecy Act of 1970 enables warrantless searches of Americans’ financial records. The BSA is an even bigger threat to the Fourth Amendment.” (04/17/24)

https://www.cato.org/commentary/bank-secrecy-act-bigger-threat-fisa