A New York moment: 

On Jan. 1, bail reform went into effect in New York, prohibiting judges from setting cash bail in about 90 percent of cases. Before, New York’s bail system was a mess. In 2018, I wrote about it, spending a day trying to post bail for someone at a far flung city jail. The national push for this particular criminal justice reform has been bipartisan, focused on how cash bail singles out the poor for pretrial detention. 

A Texas town with a population of about 10,000, is growing wildly just northeast of Austin. The capital city’s high housing prices have pushed families away from downtown to places like Manor, where they can afford a decent house and avoid a lengthy commute.

Many American journalists report battles within our government but don’t recognize fissures in the regimes of Iran, China, and other countries. I spoke Sunday evening (audio here) with international affairs strategist George Friedman, chairman of Geopolitical Futures, and asked him how his background in intelligence and international strategy influenced his perception of last Friday’s sensational report from Iraq. His edited responses are below.

WASHINGTON—The Trump administration announced on Thursday it will ban e-cigarette cartridge flavor pods except for menthol and tobacco. The Food and Drug Administration will target companies that sell fruit, candy, mint, and dessert flavors. But the ban exempts large, tank-based devices that allow adult vape shop consumers to mix their own nicotine liquids.

Civil governments, by their very nature, are better at telling people what not to do than what they should do. That’s why affirmative action, as a function of civil government, fails so miserably.

WORLD’s Q&As include perspectives from Christians who diverge from the evangelical mainstream: a Democrat in the last issue, two libertarians in this one. Elise Daniel, co-founder of Bellwether Communications, edited Called to Freedom: Why You Can Be Christian and Libertarian (2017). Taylor Barkley, a program officer at Stand Together, wrote a chapter in that book. Here are excerpts of their comments before a student audience.

How did you become a Christian libertarian?

WASHINGTON—The federal government will no longer burden churches and other nonprofit organizations with a tax on fringe benefits related to transportation and parking. President Donald Trump signed an appropriations bill on Dec. 20 that included the repeal of the unprecedented tax.