Liberty & Prosperity Blog

On Friday, July 3, 2026, an American flag was flown upside-down "at a Somali Independence Day celebration in St. Cloud." Alpha News is reporting "St. Cloud City Councilmember Scott Brodeen said he went to Lake George Municipal Park after receiving a message from a resident asking whether the city council had approved flying the American flag upside down during the event." That isn't the end of the story, unfortunately. The major part of the story is that the DFL is trying to BUY Somali votes by being disrespectful to the people who settled the land in the 1850s. According to the Alpha News article, "Brodeen urged residents to consider the incident when deciding whom to support at the ballot box, though he did not identify any specific candidates. However, the banner in the Rocks and Cows video indicated that the event was also sponsored by Democrat Minnesota House candidates Zachary Dorholt and Abdi Daisane, congressional candidate Doug Chapin and U.S. Se...

Obviously, a war that's lasted a few months isn't a forever war. Still, it isn't too soon to question President Trump's exit strategy and his accomplishment goals. The Powell Doctrine summary indicates that President Trump has anwered most of the major questions of the Doctrine: Is a vital national security interest threatened? Do we have a clear attainable objective? Have the risks and costs been fully and frankly analyzed? Have all other non-violent policy means been fully exhausted? Is there a plausible exit strategy to avoid endless entanglement? Have the consequences of our action been fully considered? Is the action supported by the American people? Do we have genuine broad international support? It's apparent that President Trump doesn't have "a plausible exit strategy to avoid endless entanglement." His approach to the negotiation phase of the war has been more of a play-it-by-ear or we'll-see-what-happens than a we'll-pound-them-into-...

Better late than never. Still, it's too late in terms of letting Iran's theocrats and IRGC know who the boss in this relationship is. CBS is reporting "President Trump said the U.S. would likely launch more strikes against Iran Wednesday night, telling reporters at a NATO summit in Turkey 'we hit them very hard last night,' and 'we're going to hit them hard again tonight.'" CBS is also reporting "Mr. Trump said, 'as far as I'm concerned, it's over,' when asked about the ceasefire with Iran. After an exchange of strikes by both countries, Mr. Trump called Iran's leaders "sick" and declared it 'a waste of time dealing with them.'" I'm not interested in working on snother negotiated settlement. Trump is right. It's a waste of time dealing with these theocrats. They simply aren't trustworthy. My most favored outcomes would be locating the theocrats, the IRGC and the Basij, then take them out ...

Graham Platner is missing lots of thing but chutzpah isn't one of those things. He's got that in overabundance. The Maine Morning Star is reporting that "The Maine Democratic Party accused U.S. Senate candidate Graham Platner’s campaign Tuesday of trying to influence the process for selecting a replacement nominee, as pressure mounts for him to leave the race." It's difficult to picture such an obnoxious man trying to play a hand that's best thrown away. Platner's political career is finished. What position is he in to demand such a change? Executive Director Devon Murphy-Anderson wrote "Unfortunately, Graham Platner’s team has repeatedly reached out to us in an attempt to put their thumb on the scale of what this process looks like. We’ve repeatedly reiterated to Graham Platner’s team that they have no role in determining our next Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate, nor in determining what this process looks like. We have also reiterated that Gr...

When you study economic models, it doesn't take long to figure out that socialism quickly leads to an affordability crisis. Though John Phelan's op-ed doesn't directly tie to socialism, it definitely highlights the difference between treating symptoms and fixing problems . In his op-ed, Phelan wrote "What can state and local governments do to alleviate this squeeze? One set of proposals is taxpayer-financed subsidies or tax credits for low-income households, but this is a misdiagnosis that doesn’t understand or tackle the problem. It regards the prices as the problem to be treated not as what they are: signals alerting us to underlying issues with supply of and demand for a good or service. These underlying issues must be treated to ease the squeeze on affordability." Socialism isn't a growth-oriented economic model. It's a redistributionist-oriented economic model. That means socialist models are based on scarcity of goods and services. Demand stays high...

Over the years, KSTP has done a fair job of covering the news. Over the past year+, I've questioned KSTP's impartiality to the point that I'm wondering if they're competing with the Star Tribune, formerly nicknamed the Star & Sickle. After reading this KSTP article , I'm questioning KSTP's impartiality more. The article opens by saying "Brian Nicholson, the running mate for GOP-endorsed gubernatorial candidate Kendall Qualls, confirms to 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS he was present on the U.S. Capitol grounds on Jan. 6, 2021. 'I was one of thousands of patriots who went to Washington DC to support President Trump after the 2020 election — I don’t apologize for being there,' Nicholson said in a statement. 'There were a lot of questions about the results of the 2020 election and I wanted to hear from, and show my support for, the greatest president of my lifetime.'" Next is the story's lede. That's where it says "Nicholson, who was n...