Free Xi’s Political Prisoners, The Cost of – Latest News
Faith beat: Gen Z’s Commodified Christianity
Gen Z’s curiosity in Christianity is booming, however they appear to be “just finding content about God,” laments Freya India at The Free Press. Ample content material online — from influencers, podcasts and hashtags to Bible apps and subscriptions — makes “learning about the faith” really feel “easier than ever,” however yields a “shallow faith,” one “fast and convenient.” Beyond the obvious “gamification of Christianity,” non secular apps share the identical drawback as Instagram communities or online porn: You encounter “the virtual version of everything first, before the real thing.” Instead, offer Gen Zers “something otherworldly” that “doesn’t abide by market logic”; warn them that religion is advanced and “to know more about it, the subscribe button won’t help.” They should “step into church.”
Libertarian: The Cost of Degrowth
Thomas Piketty, the “rock star” French economist, gives a plan for “global managed decline dressed up in the language of climate justice and equality,” warns Reason’s Veronique de Rugy. He’d “cap gross domestic product (GDP) per capita in wealthy countries at roughly $69,000.” This permits simply 0.115% annual growth for the United States, which now averages over 3%. Anyway, it’s unattainable to “restructure the global economy at that scale without a coercive apparatus that dwarfs anything in human history.” Above all, the scheme conflates “two very different things”: poverty and inequality. Degrowth is dreamed up by “people who already have high incomes, comfortable apartments, generous health care, and pensions.” This “villainous plan” would hurt not “just the billionaires but every American.”
Fed watch: Don’t Panic on Interest Rates Yet
“Inflation was too high again in May, with the consumer-price index coming in” at 4.2% for the final 12 months, laments The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board. One silver lining: “This was better than markets expected given the oil price shock,” and core inflation (sans food and vitality) slowed to a 2.9% annual price, suggesting “the oil shock isn’t spreading into the broader economy.” Yes, even 2.9% is just too high, prompting the Federal Reserve to eye interest-rate hikes. But “a rate hike doesn’t seem warranted until price increases spread beyond energy.” “The oil shock is a blow to economic growth”; no need for “the Fed raising the price of borrowing to compound the blow.”
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Foreign desk: Free Xi’s Political Prisoners
Chinese chief Xi Jinping’s September US go to is essential “not only for trade negotiations and economic priorities,” but in addition for President Trump to secure “the release of political prisoners,” plead Olivia Enos & Michael Sobolik on the Washington Examiner. In Beijing, Trump “raised by name the cases of famed Hong Kong pro-democracy advocate and billionaire Jimmy Lai, Chinese Christian Pastor Ezra Jin Mingri,” and different political prisoners. Congress “passed resolutions calling for the release of high-priority political prisoners,” which “hands the president a mandate” to make release a precondition for Xi’s go to. Trump ought to “leverage” China’s need for US market entry; if Beijing doesn’t show mercy, he “should make clear that negotiations will not proceed.” After all, “there is nothing more American than securing the freedom of someone unjustly detained.”
Tech beat: Scapegoating Data Centers
New York state legislators used the final “days of the 2026 legislative session to approve what could soon become a first-in-the-nation moratorium on large data-center construction,” grumbles City Journal’s Ken Girardin. The yearlong pause “would be open-ended, and even when lifted, would permanently increase the cost of deploying even relatively small facilities in New York.” Lawmakers sought “an energy boogeyman” accountable for hovering “residential electricity rates,” and knowledge facilities are simple to scapegoat as they “embody popular anxieties about artificial intelligence as a job killer.” Yet “state policymakers, not data centers,” have been drivers of “rising electricity prices.” Plus, the ban “would exempt ‘public research institutions’” just like the state’s “15-megawatt Empire AI project,” a signal “Albany lawmakers might be less worried about data centers than they would have you believe.”
— Compiled by The Post Editorial Board
