February 1, 2026
There Are No Good Reasons to Subsidize Stadiums. Governments Keep Doing It.
Despite decades of economic evidence showing that publicly funded sports stadiums fail to deliver promised benefits, governments continue to spend billions subsidizing wealthy team owners, often at the expense of taxpayers and public trust.
Article summary:
There Are No Good Reasons to Subsidize Stadiums. Governments Keep Doing It.
The Humiliation of Kristi Noem
One-Sentence Summary:
Mark Leibovich argues that Kristi Noem’s political crisis reveals a second-term Trump tactic of maximizing public humiliation and uncertainty rather than firing embattled officials outright.
Article Summary:
In this Atlantic essay, Mark Leibovich examines how Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem became the latest figure subjected to President Donald Trump’s evolving style of public discipline. The immediate trigger was a deadly incident in Minnesota in which federal immigration officers killed two protesters during a crackdown tied to Trump’s immigration agenda. As the public face of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection, Noem appeared to be the obvious official to blame, especially as public confidence in the administration’s immigration policies declined.
Instead of dismissing her, Trump allowed Noem to remain in office while leaving her exposed to public criticism, media scrutiny, and political isolation. Leibovich frames this as a shift from Trump’s first term, when high-profile firings were common, to a second-term strategy centered on suspense and humiliation. By keeping officials in limbo, Trump preserves his dominance, avoids conceding to critics, and maintains leverage over loyal subordinates.
The article situates Noem’s ordeal within a broader pattern of reduced Cabinet turnover in Trump’s second term. Leibovich notes that Trump has intentionally surrounded himself with hyper-loyalists, rewarding obedience and overlooking missteps as long as aides demonstrate devotion. This loyalty-first approach explains why figures such as Attorney General Pam Bondi and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth have survived scandals that might previously have ended their tenures.
Noem’s troubles intensified after she publicly labeled a slain protester a “domestic terrorist,” claims later undermined by video evidence. The White House distanced Trump from her statements, while immigration hard-liners and career officials criticized her leadership as performative and politically motivated. Trump further undercut her authority by dispatching border czar Tom Homan to Minnesota with instructions to report directly to the president, not to Noem.
Despite calls for her resignation from Democrats and several Republican senators, Trump offered only faint praise and conspicuously denied her opportunities to defend herself, including at a Cabinet meeting where she was never invited to speak. Leibovich concludes that Noem’s continued presence, combined with her visible sidelining, exemplifies Trump’s preference for control through embarrassment rather than decisive action.
Leibovich, Mark. “The Humiliation of Kristi Noem.” The Atlantic, 31 Jan. 2026, www.theatlantic.com/politics/2026/01/kristi-noem-humiliation-trump/685836
America Needs Restraint – and Facts
One-Sentence Summary:
Peggy Noonan argues that America’s escalating internal conflicts demand disciplined law enforcement, dignified protest, and a renewed commitment to factual, professional journalism as the shared foundation of civic life.
Key Takeaways:
- Law enforcement must enforce immigration law with professionalism, legality, and restraint.
- Aggressive, theatrical enforcement tactics undermine public trust and American norms.
- Modern protest movements have lost the disciplined dignity that once made protests morally powerful.
- Nonviolent, civil resistance appeals to conscience and strengthens democratic legitimacy.
- A shared factual foundation is essential to preventing further national fragmentation.
- Investment in professional reporting is necessary to restore civic stability.
Article Summary:
Peggy Noonan frames recent unrest, including confrontations around immigration enforcement, as evidence that the United States is not at peace with itself and is locked in what she calls a “long cold civil war.” She affirms that the federal government has both the right and the duty to enforce immigration law, particularly by detaining those who have committed violent crimes. However, she insists that enforcement must be carried out professionally, lawfully, and with restraint. Tactics such as masked officers in unmarked vans or deceptive official responses to violence, she writes, violate American norms and erode public trust.
Noonan criticizes the demeanor and conduct of some federal agents, describing them as poorly trained, overly aggressive, and oriented toward escalation rather than de-escalation. She calls for a pause in enforcement actions to allow for retraining and reorientation, emphasizing that true toughness is rooted in discipline and self-control.
Turning to protests against immigration enforcement, Noonan contrasts today’s demonstrations with the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s. She argues that modern protesters have lost the art of effective protest, which once relied on dignity, moral seriousness, and nonviolence. Drawing on the examples of Selma, Montgomery, Birmingham, and the leadership of Martin Luther King Jr., she stresses that peaceful resistance was powerful because it appealed to the nation’s conscience and exposed the injustice of violent responses.
In her final and most urgent argument, Noonan focuses on the collapse of a shared factual reality. She laments that after every crisis Americans immediately fight over what actually happened, deepening division. She calls for faster, deeper, and more sober reporting, asserting that great journalism is now a patriotic act. Facts, she argues, steady the civic mind and make moral judgment possible.
Noonan invokes Walter Cronkite and the tradition of wire-service journalism, which once provided the country with a common factual floor. That system, built on verification, neutrality, and professional discipline, fostered public trust. She warns that the decline of local newspapers and statehouse reporting has left Americans obsessed with each other’s beliefs while failing to understand each other’s lives. Although her prescription may sound like a return to old ways, she argues that those ways worked — they helped the country endure without rupturing, and they are essential if the nation is to do so again.
Noonan, Peggy. “America Needs Restraint-and Facts.” The Wall Street Journal, 29 Jan. 2026, www.wsj.com/opinion/america-needs-restraintand-facts-85293b6d
‘Spy Sheikh’ Bought Secret Stake in Trump Company
‘SPY SHEIKH’ BOUGHT SECRET STAKE IN TRUMP COMPANY
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One-Sentence Summary:
Four days before Donald Trump’s second inauguration, an Abu Dhabi royal secretly backed a $500 million deal to buy nearly half of a Trump family crypto venture, raising unprecedented conflict-of-interest and national security concerns as the U.S. later approved major AI chip sales to the United Arab Emirates.
Key Takeaways
- A foreign government official secretly purchased a major stake in a Trump family company just before Trump took office.
- The deal funneled hundreds of millions of dollars to Trump- and Witkoff-linked entities.
- The investment coincided closely with U.S. approval of large AI chip sales to the U.A.E.
- Legal experts argue the arrangement may violate the foreign emoluments clause.
Article Summary:
The Wall Street Journal reports that in mid-January 2025, just days before Donald Trump was sworn in for a second term, emissaries linked to Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan of Abu Dhabi quietly signed an agreement to acquire a 49 percent stake in World Liberty Financial, a fledgling Trump family cryptocurrency company. The deal, valued at $500 million, was structured so that half was paid up front, with $187 million directed to Trump family entities and tens of millions more routed to companies affiliated with the family of Steve Witkoff, a close Trump ally who had just been named U.S. envoy to the Middle East.
The investment was executed through a newly formed entity, Aryam Investment 1, managed by executives from G42, an Abu Dhabi artificial intelligence firm overseen by Tahnoon. The agreement made Aryam World Liberty’s largest shareholder and placed two G42 executives on the company’s five-member board alongside Eric Trump and Zach Witkoff. At the time, World Liberty had no products and had raised money primarily through sales of a crypto token, WLFI.
Tahnoon, sometimes referred to by U.S. officials as the “spy sheikh,” is one of the most powerful investors in the world and a key figure in the U.A.E.’s push to secure advanced U.S. artificial intelligence chips. During the Biden administration, those efforts were constrained by national security concerns, particularly fears that sensitive technology could be diverted to China through G42’s past ties with Chinese firms. After Trump’s election, Tahnoon gained extraordinary access to U.S. leadership, meeting repeatedly with Trump and senior officials.
Two months after a March White House meeting between Trump and Tahnoon, the administration committed to granting the U.A.E. access to roughly 500,000 advanced AI chips annually, a major policy shift that allowed the country to pursue one of the world’s largest AI data center projects. The Journal notes that what had not been publicly disclosed was that Tahnoon’s representatives had already signed the World Liberty investment deal in January, before those negotiations concluded.
The relationship between World Liberty and Tahnoon’s business empire deepened further when MGX, another Tahnoon-led investment firm, used World Liberty’s new stablecoin, USD1, to complete a $2 billion investment in the crypto exchange Binance. That transaction rapidly boosted World Liberty’s financial standing, generating tens of millions of dollars a year in interest income, while obscuring the fact that the two firms shared overlapping leadership.
Legal and ethics experts told the Journal that the arrangement could violate the Constitution’s foreign emoluments clause and posed severe conflicts of interest, given the proximity of private financial benefits to consequential U.S. foreign policy decisions. The White House and Trump Organization denied any wrongdoing, saying Trump had no involvement in World Liberty’s operations and that the deal did not influence government policy. Critics countered that the scale and secrecy of the transaction, combined with the subsequent policy outcomes, represented an unprecedented blending of foreign state interests and a sitting president’s business affairs.
Kessler, Sam, et al. “‘Spy Sheikh’ Bought Secret Stake in Trump Company.” The Wall Street Journal, 1 Feb. 2026, www.wsj.com/politics/policy/spy-sheikh-secret-stake-trump-crypto-tahnoon-ea4d97e8
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https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/spy-sheikh-secret-stake-trump-crypto-tahnoon-ea4d97e8?st=9jt7hK&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink