Ep. 83: Hiding In Plain Sight
Hey FRs,
ICYMI, this week we covered "the Memo." Yeah, the memo. No idea what I'm talking about? Well, buckle up, it's not a pretty ride.
Did one secret memo actually blueprint the corporate takeover of America?
Yep, and the author made sure you'd never hear his name. Lewis Powell — corporate lawyer, Philip Morris board member, and Nixon's Supreme Court appointee — wrote a confidential memo to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in 1971 titled "Attack on the American Free Enterprise System." It was a mobilization order: fund think tanks, capture universities, flood the courts, and buy the lobbying apparatus wholesale. The Heritage Foundation, the Federalist Society, Citizens United — the direct line from Powell's memo to all of it has been traced by the founders of those organizations in their own words. He is, as scholar Mehrsa Baradaran put it on this episode, almost perfectly forgotten — which was entirely by design.
How did Powell give corporations First Amendment rights without anyone noticing?
Slow and steady, one case at a time, starting with a case Ralph Nader brought on behalf of consumers. Nader's argument in Virginia State Board of Pharmacy v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council was straightforward: people have a right to see pharmacy prices. Powell agreed — and then used that opening to establish that corporations also have First Amendment speech rights in commercial transactions.
The rest of the court went along. By the time they realized what the logical endpoint was, Powell had already built the doctrinal foundation for Citizens United and unlimited corporate spending in politics.
He noted privately that it was too late to reverse. He was right, the bastard.
Why are Cuban Americans turning on Trump over Cuba sanctions, and what does that mean for 2028?
Trump signed an executive order last Friday tightening economic sanctions on Cuba. His Cuban-American base in Florida is not satisfied. A recent poll found 78 percent of Cuban exiles in the United States would not accept economic reforms alone, with a strong majority supporting military action. The political problem is structural: sanctions that stop short of regime change produce exactly zero of what the diaspora wants, while guaranteeing Cuba remains hostile and economically closed. The same dynamic played out with Iranian-Americans and the JCPOA. Diaspora trauma is real and politically legible, but it has never once translated into a workable U.S. regime-change policy — and there is no serious argument that this time is different.
Is Trump's "Golden Dome" missile defense system a serious proposal or a $3 trillion vanity project?
The honest answer is both, which is worse than either alone. Trump initially estimated the cost at $185 billion. The Congressional Budget Office puts it at $550 billion minimum. Independent analysts now estimate the total cost at over $3 trillion for a satellite-based missile defense system that would potentially intercept warheads before reaching the US. For context, Israel's Iron Dome protects a country roughly the size of New Jersey. The existing U.S. Ground Based Midcourse Defense system succeeds at roughly 60 percent of intercept attempts under test conditions — and there is no indication that the proposed Golden Dome would fare any better. That said, North Korea's nuclear arsenal that has grown from an estimated 6 warheads during Trump's first term to a current stockpile of 50 to 60, with capacity to produce material for 20 more annually. The missile gap is real, but the solution being proposed is, to use a technical term, completely unserious.
Hear FP-Zaddy and T-Ceps full breakdown, alongside Lewis Powell expert Mehrsa Baradaran:
Meanwhile in Ohio: What Travis is Reading ––
Every week on TFR we talk about how foreign policy is domestic policy, but it's only when you dive into local news from your home state that you truly see how global events impact your community –– thanks to Marilou Johanek at The Ohio Capital Journal, folks in Ohio can hopefully start to realize how their kitchen table priorities in the Midwest (such as the price of gas, groceries, etc) differ from the priorities of their billionaire Republican leaders in D.C.
Drop us a line....
Email us your questions and tell us your thoughts on the newsletter! Theforeignreportlpn@gmail.com.