At least five bombs exploded in and around the crowded Bulengo and Lacre displacement camps outside Goma on Monday morning, killing at least 32 civilians (including women and children) and wounding more than 70; the DRC government pointed fingers directly at Rwanda-backed M23 rebels, who are supported by an estimated 3,000–4,000 Rwandan troops, for launching the artillery strikes while simultaneously capturing the key mining town of Nyabiondo and surrounding hills, triggering another 200,000 people to flee toward Goma in just 48 hours and rendering the U.S.-brokered peace agreement signed in Washington on November 29 effectively dead less than two weeks later. What's particularly tragic is that maintaining peace in the region seemingly will require even more intense intervention on the behalf of the United States, which will further entrench non-African actors in the extraction of resources from the continent.

After marathon negotiations that stretched into early Monday, EU interior ministers gave final approval to the ten-part Migration and Asylum Pact that mandates fingerprinting and facial scans for every irregular arrival within seven days, creates “border procedure centers” for rapid screening, accelerates deportations to 12 weeks for rejected applicants from “safe” countries, and forces every member state to either take in a quota of relocated asylum seekers or pay €20,000 per person refused; the package, due to enter force in mid-2026 after national ratification, also allows governments facing “hybrid attacks” or “instrumentalized migration” to suspend asylum processing for up to six weeks. While this processing capacity is being sold by the EU as a means to help stabilize the migration process, once the infrastructure is built it's hard to imagine it not being used to surveille all movement on the continent in one way or another.

The United Nations launched its smallest global humanitarian appeal since 2015, asking for only $26 billion in 2026 (down from $51 billion this year) after donors provided just 43% of required funding in 2025; the cuts will eliminate nearly all education programs in conflict zones, slash food rations for millions in Yemen, Syria, and Sudan, end most cash-assistance initiatives, and leave only bare-bones life-saving aid (food, water, emergency healthcare, and shelter) for roughly 180 million of the 300 million people currently classified as in acute need. The UN is clearly collapsing under the weight of a tumultuous and not at all unified world.

The Department of Agriculture announced Monday that it will distribute $12 billion in direct one-time payments starting in mid-January, fully funded by tariff revenue from new and existing duties on imports from China, Canada, Mexico, and the EU; payments will be calculated using a formula based on 2025 county-level trade damage and individual crop losses, capped at $125,000 per Social Security number (with a separate $125,000 cap for spouses), averaging about $30,000 per eligible farm operation and reaching roughly 400,000 producers nationwide. Farmers are amongst the most important workers in the United States, so it is critical that they, especially those that are independently operating, have the backing to sustain themselves no matter how the political climate impacts their ability to be commercially viable.

The anonymous developer of ICEBlock—an app that used crowdsourced reports and public data to map real-time ICE and Border Patrol activity—filed a 68-page federal lawsuit Monday alleging that DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin personally called Apple executives on December 3 demanding immediate removal under threat of antitrust probes and new App Store regulations; the complaint, filed in the Northern District of California, accuses the government of violating the First, Fourth, and Fifth Amendments and seeks an emergency injunction, reinstatement of the app, and $20 million in compensatory and punitive damages. The government simply cannot behave like this and these allegations, if true, are cause for serious prosecution of anyone involved with the suppression of the rights of American citizens.

U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Boston issued a 74-page permanent injunction Monday blocking President Trump’s January 20 executive order that had attempted to freeze all new offshore wind permits, cancel upcoming lease auctions, and review existing leases; the ruling declares the president exceeded authority under the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act and the Inflation Reduction Act, immediately unfreezing five major East Coast projects (Vineyard Wind 2, SouthCoast Wind, Atlantic Shores South, Revolution Wind Phase 2, and New England Wind) totaling over 6.3 gigawatts and protecting leases covering 1.7 million acres off Massachusetts, New York, and New Jersey. Increasingly judges in the country are looking like rogue political actors whose allegiance with other members of the intelligentsia is clouding their judgment and making them feel empowered to rule away powers the president of the United States likely has.

For the first time in state history, all 55 county superintendents jointly signed and released a 42-page report Monday calling for the biggest overhaul of West Virginia’s education code in decades, including eliminating the 180-day seat-time requirement, allowing year-round calendars, creating fast-track certification for career professionals entering teaching, removing state caps on virtual learning days, giving districts full authority over third-grade retention, and modernizing outdated facility and transportation rules; the package now moves to the state Board of Education and the 2026 legislative session. It is good to see leaders in education thinking more radically about changes to the school system as what is going on currently is simply not sustainable or fair.

More than 400 residents overflowed council chambers and two additional viewing rooms Tuesday night to oppose a proposed permanent one-cent sales tax increase that would push the combined city-state rate to 9.5% and generate $68 million annually primarily for street repairs, new fire trucks, police equipment, and expanded bus service; speaker after speaker, including retirees on fixed incomes and single parents, called the tax “regressive punishment” and demanded property-tax relief instead, leaving at least four of seven council members publicly pledging to vote no when the ordinance returns for final reading next Tuesday. As we try to routinely point out, local officials have to stop thinking they can tax their way to sustainability; the only way out is cuts and they have to be able to communicate this to residents if they want to be good political actors.

In a 9-hour meeting that ended after 1 a.m. Wednesday, Metro Council voted 28-9 to approve the most sweeping zoning reform in Nashville history, legalizing duplexes, triplexes, fourplexes, townhomes, and accessory dwelling units by right on virtually every residential lot in Davidson County, eliminating minimum lot sizes in most zones, reducing parking requirements near transit corridors, and creating a new “missing middle” housing overlay; city planners project the changes could enable 50,000–75,000 new units over the next decade and lower the median price of a starter home by 15–25%. This is a clear indication that Nashville is fully committed to becoming a metropolis and willing to create the levels of density needed to make it competitive with other truly dense urban cities in the country.

State’s Attorney Ivan Bates announced Monday that his office is immediately ending all data-sharing agreements, joint prosecutions, and operational coordination with the Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement (MONSE), citing repeated refusals to disclose how the agency spends its $60 million annual budget on violence-intervention contracts and accusing staff of operating under an unacceptable “cloak of secrecy”; the move threatens to derail the city’s flagship group-violence reduction strategy and further strains relations between Bates and Mayor Brandon Scott ahead of the 2026 elections. Transparency is key, and while it remains unclear how this will impact the city in its efforts to ensure safety, as a rule of thumb, secrecy in government is a recipe for the abuse of power.