Author: Brick Tungsten

Brick Tungsten was forged in a Ford F-150 during a Toby Keith guitar solo and baptized in the smoke of a backyard BBQ. A former bass fisherman, amateur theologian, and full-time enemy of tofu, Brick believes America peaked somewhere between the invention of the Budweiser tallboy and Reagan’s first cold stare into the Soviet soul. He doesn’t write columns. He delivers freedom sermons. Each one is a bugle-blast of righteousness straight from the front lines of the culture war—where gender is a science, guns are gospel, and facts are best when cooked medium rare. Brick doesn’t trust the government, but he does trust his gut, his Glock, and the guy who sold him raw milk out of a barn in 2014. He quotes the Constitution like Scripture, Scripture like prophecy, and anything on AM radio like it was beamed straight from Sinai. Every week, he unleashes verbal roundhouse kicks on WOYJO.com—targeting liberal elites, soy-sympathizers, woke kindergarten teachers, and anyone who thinks freedom is optional. His motto? “Live free, grill hard, and don’t apologize.” He has six American flags, one wife (Betsy), two kids named Liberty and Buckshot, and zero regrets.

  • Even Sotomayor Smelled the Scam: NJ Transit Cannot Hide Behind Sovereign Immunity

    ByBrick Tungsten

    I knew what I was smelling before I finished the first page: that swampy mix of bureaucrat aftershave and legal hairspray. Somebody tried to dodge accountability by shouting a magic phrase like it was a force field. This time the magic word was sovereign immunity. And the U.S. Supreme Court just tossed that word on the coals and watched it melt.

    What the Supreme Court ruled (March 4, 2026)

    On March 4, 2026, the Court ruled unanimously that the New Jersey Transit Corporation is not an “arm of the State” of New Jersey for interstate sovereign immunity purposes. The opinion was written by Justice Sonia Sotomayor.

    Translation in F-150 language: NJ Transit does not get to operate across state lines, then throw a Jersey flag over the hood and claim it cannot be sued in another state’s courts just because it was created by New Jersey.

    The two cases that forced the issue

    The Court took consolidated cases involving two different crashes and two different courts reaching opposite conclusions:

    • Jeffrey Colt was struck by an NJ Transit bus in Midtown Manhattan in 2017 and sued in New York.
    • Cedric Galette was injured in a 2018 crash in Philadelphia and sued in Pennsylvania.

    New York’s top court said NJ Transit could be sued there. Pennsylvania’s top court said NJ Transit was immune. The Supreme Court stepped in and settled the split: no automatic out-of-state immunity shield for NJ Transit in these suits.

    Why NJ Transit could not hide behind the label

    NJ Transit argued New Jersey controls it. Sure, the state has levers. But the Court said control alone is not the secret sauce.

    What mattered was how New Jersey structured it: NJ Transit is a corporation with corporate powers. It can sue and be sued, hold property, make contracts, and raise funds. And New Jersey law says the state is not formally liable for NJ Transit’s debts and liabilities. If the state built it to be legally separate when the checks go out, it cannot magically become “the state itself” when a lawsuit shows up.

    Also, calling it an “instrumentality of the State” did not do the heavy lifting. Labels are cheap. Liability is not.

    What the Court did not decide

    This ruling did not decide negligence or who is at fault. It decided whether NJ Transit can invoke New Jersey’s interstate sovereign immunity to block these out-of-state suits in the first place. And in America, getting into court is step one of accountability.

  • Six Percent Smoke: Freddie Mac Says Rates Held at 6.00%, and the American Dream Still Pays a Cover Charge

    ByBrick Tungsten

    I could smell it before I read it. That hot, metallic scent of money getting cooked wrong, like somebody dropped a steak on the gas station pump and still tried to serve it. Anxious coffee, printer toner, and first-time buyers staring at a monthly payment like it is a rattlesnake in the tool box.

    Freddie Mac: 30-year fixed averaged 6.00% on March 5, 2026

    Freddie Mac’s weekly survey put the average 30-year fixed mortgage rate at 6.00% as of March 5, 2026. That is up a hair from 5.98% the week before. A year ago, it was 6.63%. The 15-year averaged 5.43%, just a touch lower than last week. No vibes, no guesses, just the number on the wall.

    The Associated Press added the scene-setting: this tiny uptick snapped a three-week slide and came as Treasury yields nudged higher, with oil prices jumping amid the war with Iran. In plain English, your dream of a backyard and a dog is still tied to the same global panic button that jerks bonds, crude, and every necktie economist with a microphone.

    Six percent is not a sale sticker, it is a cover charge

    I am not here to pretend 6.00% is the apocalypse. It is lower than last year. But for a middle-class family trying to buy a normal house with normal wages in a country where “starter home” sounds like a mythological creature, 6% still hits like a cast-iron skillet to the face.

    • Mortgage rates are not a weather report. They are a bill.
    • At 6%, the payment math still pops your checking account like fireworks.
    • Prices are still high in a whole lot of places, and the rest of the monthly stack does not politely step aside.

    Who benefits when you cannot buy? Follow the rent trail

    When rates stay elevated, millions stay trapped in the rental lane longer than they planned. They wait. They renew. They settle. And the rent machine keeps humming.

    Freddie Mac’s chief economist noted that rates are down about a full percentage point from this time in 2024, and that it is helping activity pick up, including refinance activity. Great. But “picking up” slowly still means the ladder stays one rung too high for plenty of people, while somebody else collects the pencil shavings.

    So when Freddie Mac says 6.00%, I do not just hear a rate. I hear the warning siren: if 6% is “steady” and the system still cannot produce affordable homes, that is not a market mystery. That is a policy choice dressed up like economics.

  • Zero Bids, Full Swamp: Cook Inlet Just Told the Green Grift to Cope

    ByBrick Tungsten

    I could smell the cold through the screen when this one landed. Not the postcard cold. The kind that makes you appreciate a warm engine, a full tank, and a country that can power itself without asking permission from a fancy foreign cocktail party.

    Then the headline reality hit like a dead radio station: the federal government lined up a big Alaska offshore lease sale, opened the door, and nobody walked in.

    BOEM Cook Inlet sale: completed, zero bids

    BOEM lists the Big Beautiful Cook Inlet 1 (BBC1) offshore lease sale as completed March 4, 2026, with no bids received. Not a rumor. Not a talking point. Just a goose egg on the agency record.

    Local reporting in Alaska said more than 1 million acres were on the table. Same result: zero. Zilch. The energy equivalent of a bar at last call with the lights on and the band already gone.

    Zero bids does not mean zero need

    Here is the part the climate hall monitors always skip: a no-bid lease sale does not magically erase energy demand. It means the rules and the risk have gotten so weird that even companies built for long-term projects look at the setup and decide, “No thanks.”

    Alaska Public Media reported this federal auction was the first of six Cook Inlet offshore sales mandated in President Trump’s reconciliation bill last summer, the One Big Beautiful Bill. The point of a mandate like that is simple: keep options open and keep a schedule so Southcentral Alaska is not stuck begging the global LNG market for mercy.

    Alaska Public Media also reported a University of Alaska economist said Cook Inlet is a mature basin and costs have climbed. Translation for regular folks: this is not cheap anymore, and companies want stability before they bet big.

    A bigger signal than one bad auction

    Alaska Public Media reported the state held its own Cook Inlet area sale the same day and drew just one bid of $600. So this is not just a federal livestream having a bad hair day.

    The villain: uncertainty and the paperwork rodeo

    Alaska Public Media reported Senator Dan Sullivan’s office blamed environmental activism, regulatory uncertainty, and past hostility to development for the lack of bids. Say it plain: if the rules can change mid-job, contractors do not start the job.

    What’s being discussed next

    Alaska Public Media laid out alternatives under discussion, including importing LNG by tanker from Canada or building a pipeline to deliver gas from the North Slope. Those are serious choices with serious consequences.

    Cook Inlet going bid-less is not a victory lap. It is a warning flare: when process replaces progress, America pays for it.

  • Tariff Refund Rodeo: The Trade Court Just Told Washington to Hand the Money Back

    ByBrick Tungsten

    I knew what kind of story this was the second I caught that familiar Washington smell: hot paperwork, cold excuses. Like somebody slapped a stack of customs forms on a grill and called it “strategy.”

    What happened: a trade-court order with a refund backbone

    On March 4, 2026, Judge Richard K. Eaton of the U.S. Court of International Trade issued an order in Atmus Filtration, Inc. v. United States. The message to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) was simple: stop processing entries as if emergency-power (IEEPA) tariffs still apply when the Supreme Court already said they do not.

    That Supreme Court ruling landed February 20, 2026, in Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump, holding the IEEPA tariffs unlawful. The trade court is now telling the federal machine to unwind the money trail in real life, not just in theory.

    The key line: importers of record get the benefit

    The order states that all importers of record whose entries were subject to the IEEPA duties are entitled to the benefit of the Supreme Court decision. That matters because this is not just about who wins an argument. It is about who gets cash back when the government collected under a program the Supreme Court knocked out.

    Liquidation, reliquidation, and the part where CBP has to fix it

    The court gets into the nuts-and-bolts, the stuff that decides whether refunds move like a check or crawl like a hostage note:

    • Unliquidated entries: CBP is directed to liquidate them without regard to the IEEPA duties.
    • Entries already liquidated but not final: they are to be reliquidated without regard to the IEEPA duties.

    That is the judge handing Washington a mop and pointing at the spill.

    Why Main Street cares: money back, but the whiplash remains

    Tariffs are not a cable-news abstraction. They show up as a line item that hits American businesses trying to move inventory, price contracts, and make payroll. Big companies can litigate forever. Smaller operators cannot live inside “courtroom bingo.”

    Meet the villain: the Paperwork Aristocracy

    The problem is not one person in one suit. It is the Paperwork Aristocracy: agencies, process priests, K Street whisperers, and “stakeholders” who thrive on confusion, because confusion is billable.

    Congress, pick up the wrench

    If America wants a tough trade posture that survives court challenges, the neon sign is blinking: if you want tariffs of this scope, write the law and own it. Otherwise, businesses get policy whiplash, while the swamp sells “uncertainty management” like it is a product.

    America is not a seminar. America is a worksite. Refund the money. Then build rules that do not collapse the minute they hit a courtroom.

  • Trade Court Orders Tariff Refunds, and the Swamp Smells Money

    ByBrick Tungsten

    I can smell it: burnt rubber off the stock tickers, cold coffee in a windowless breakroom, and that sweet Washington aroma that only shows up when there is a pile of money on the table and a thousand suits come sprinting in with napkins tucked like it is brisket night.

    This week, the refund machine finally got told to crank. After the Supreme Court knocked down President Trump’s big emergency-power tariffs from last year, a federal trade judge is now stepping in to sort the receipts. And buddy, the only thing faster than a hungry man spotting a tailgate buffet is a lobbyist spotting a refund window.

    What the trade court just did

    Here is the verified meat on the grill: On Wednesday, March 4, 2026, Judge Richard Eaton of the U.S. Court of International Trade in New York ruled that companies that paid the tariffs at issue are legally entitled to refunds.

    This follows the Supreme Court’s February 20, 2026 decision, which said President Trump lacked authority under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to impose those sweeping tariffs. The Supreme Court did not provide a neat refund roadmap, so now the trade court is stepping into the mess to start organizing what comes next.

    Customs is on the clock

    Judge Eaton did not just wave a hand. He clarified that importers of record are supposed to benefit from the Supreme Court’s decision, and he indicated he will be the one handling the flood of refund cases tied to these IEEPA duties.

    He also directed U.S. Customs and Border Protection to stop baking those struck-down tariffs into the liquidation process, and to rework calculations where needed so the illegal tariff layer is not still stuck to the bottom like burnt sauce. That is not a vibe. That is an operational order.

    How big is the money pile?

    We are not talking spare change under the truck seat. Estimates reported by major outlets put the tariff haul at more than $130 billion, with potential total refunds estimated as high as $175 billion. Different sources cite slightly different cutoffs and totals, but the ballpark is the same: a mountain big enough to make K Street start shopping for bigger calculators.

    Who actually benefits?

    Yes, some small and mid-sized importers may get relief. Fine. But do not miss the main event: the big players have the staff, attorneys, data teams, filing systems, and patience to camp out at the refund campsite with RV hookups. The little guy shows up with a sleeping bag and a cooler.

    And those refunds do not automatically mean you, the consumer, get a price cut at the register. A refund check goes to the importer of record. After that, you might just get a promise, a press release, and a coupon that expires on a Tuesday.

    So here is the bar-stool sermon: if Washington can unwind over $130 billion in tariffs, then Washington can also deliver clear trade authority sturdy enough to survive the next courtroom pileup. Until then, the swamp will keep doing what it does best: turning every national fight into a paperwork bonanza for the connected crowd.

  • 47-53 and the Pocket Constitution Gets Singed: The Senate Tries to Tap the Brakes

    ByBrick Tungsten

    You ever catch that smell when paper gets too close to heat? Not the good kind, like butcher paper hugging brisket. The bad kind. Scorched civics. That is what Washington was cooking up this week, and you could practically taste the committee-room ash through the radio.

    On March 4, the U.S. Senate did not serve up ribs or clarity. It served up procedure.

    Senate blocks move to advance Iran war-powers resolution, 47-53

    The roll call landed at 47-53 on a motion to discharge S.J.Res. 104, a war powers resolution aimed at directing the removal of U.S. Armed Forces from hostilities within or against Iran that have not been authorized by Congress. The motion failed. The math was clean. The message was muddy.

    And because modern politics cannot walk straight without doing a little dance, the Associated Press noted the vote was mostly along party lines, with Sen. Rand Paul voting yes and Sen. John Fetterman voting no.

    Washington’s favorite trick: voting on whether to vote

    Here is the part that makes regular Americans thump the bar. This was not a straight-up vote on war. This was a vote on how and whether the Senate would move a specific war-powers measure forward. The Beltway loves process the way a bad pitmaster loves sauce: it covers up the lack of meat.

    • Democrats leaned into warnings about bypassing Congress.
    • Republicans leaned into commander-in-chief muscle memory.
    • The public got the usual side dish: “trust us,” no receipt.

    The real fight: who holds the steering wheel

    Say the quiet part out loud. This vote was about Iran, sure, but it was also about power. It was about who gets to steer the national truck when the road gets rough.

    President Donald Trump is in the driver’s seat, and plenty of people in this town cannot stand it. Not because they suddenly fell in love with Article I for its own sake, but because they hate the guy holding the keys. The war-powers playbook became a way to grab at the wheel. The Senate’s 47-53 result said: not that way, not today.

    What it means in 2026: roll calls do not disappear

    Midterm year pressure is already in the air, and this vote put names on a record. You can argue the War Powers Resolution. You can argue Trump. You can argue Iran. But you cannot argue with a roll call.

    If Congress thinks the president is wrong, it should debate and legislate with clarity, not hide behind process. And if Trump is carrying commander in chief weight, he should keep making the case to the American people in plain daylight. Because the only thing worse than war is war plus politicians using it as a campaign prop.

  • DHS Wants Your Data Without a Judge, and Big Tech Still Says ‘Yes Sir’

    ByBrick Tungsten

    I can smell the hickory and hear the AM radio hiss, because the loudest fights in America are happening in the quietest place: forms, requests, and data demands. Liberty does not always get tackled on live TV. Sometimes it gets nicked to death in a filing cabinet.

    Congress wants answers on DHS administrative subpoenas

    This week, Rep. Robin Kelly and Rep. Pramila Jayapal led a letter to major tech and telecom companies asking how they handle administrative subpoenas from the Department of Homeland Security, including ICE and CBP. In plain Brick: Congress is asking what happens when DHS comes knocking for user data with no judge attached.

    The companies named include Apple, Google, Meta, Microsoft, Snap, TikTok, X, AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile. The letter asks for policies, numbers, and whether users get notified. Responses are requested by March 26, 2026.

    The no-judge “fishing license”

    An administrative subpoena is not your classic courtroom subpoena. It can be issued by a federal agency without prior judicial approval. That missing step is the whole reason people are alarmed: no robe, no bench, no judge squinting at the request to see if it passes the smell test. It is an agency deciding it wants records and sending a demand like it is ordering parts for a Ford F-150.

    The Kelly-Jayapal letter says these subpoenas allow agencies to demand records without prior judicial approval and argues Congress intended those powers to be limited and used carefully. It also claims DHS has used this tool in ways that can chill First Amendment protected speech and political activity.

    The “Jon” example

    The letter points to a U.S. citizen identified as “Jon” in the Philadelphia area. After he emailed a DHS attorney urging basic decency in an Afghan asylum seeker situation, DHS sought information about him and his Gmail account within hours. About two weeks later, agents showed up at his home to question him.

    Big Tech and telecoms: comply, challenge, or narrow?

    The letter is essentially demanding clarity on what these companies do when DHS sends an administrative subpoena:

    • Do they comply, challenge, or try to narrow the request?
    • Do they notify users, and how often is notice delayed?
    • How many DHS administrative subpoenas have they received and responded to since January 20, 2025?

    That is the point of dragging it into daylight. If companies are going to serve as America’s communications nervous system, they should not get to hide behind “we just follow orders.”

    Fix it with American guardrails

    If DHS is going to demand user information, the default should be judicial oversight. If there is a narrow emergency lane, it should be narrow, time-limited, audited, and reviewable. And companies should publish real transparency around administrative subpoenas specifically, not bury them inside generic request totals.

    Because freedom is not a vibe. Freedom is paperwork too. The right kind of paperwork tells the government: you do not get to rummage through Americans’ lives without a judge, just because you feel like it.

  • Kansas Wants a Chiefs Dome, and the STAR-Bond Swamp Wants Your Wallet

    ByBrick Tungsten

    I smelled it before I finished the first paragraph. That familiar aroma of taxpayer brisket sizzling on a backroom grill, served with glossy stadium renderings and a tall glass of “trust us.”

    Kansas is talking about luring the Kansas City Chiefs across the border with a new dome and a financing gadget called STAR bonds. Sounds all red, white, and boom until you remember how these deals usually end: regular people holding the tab while the suits hold the pen.

    Verified headline, translated: “Too vague” is not a plan

    On March 3, 2026, KWCH reported that some Kansas lawmakers criticized the state plan to move the Chiefs to Kansas as too vague, warning it could pull money away from Kansans.

    State Sen. Cindy Holscher said the stadium would be funded with STAR bonds and argued the revenue setup would send stadium revenue back to the Chiefs. She also said lawmakers were told to expect two bills laying out local implementation details, including a Stadium Authority bill, but that the Stadium Authority bill still had not appeared.

    In plain F-150 logic: if you are about to sign up for a monster commitment, “details coming soon” is not a strategy. It is a smoke screen.

    What STAR bonds are (and why the brochure is not the reality)

    STAR bonds, according to the Kansas Department of Commerce, are Sales Tax and Revenue bonds. The pitch is that a city or county issues bonds for a big tourism or entertainment project, then pays them back using the sales tax revenue generated by the development.

    That is the clean version. The messy version is why lawmakers are asking for specifics before they vote.

    The law allows big numbers, big timelines

    Kansas passed special-session changes that explicitly contemplate major professional sports complexes. The law defines a “major professional sports complex” as including a stadium of not less than 30,000 seats for NFL or MLB contests. It allows financing up to 70% of total costs, with bond maturities up to 30 years.

    • Up to 70% financed
    • Up to 30 years to pay
    • At least 30,000 seats for NFL or MLB contests

    That is not a bake sale. That is a generational bill.

    Receipts first, fireworks later

    KWCH highlighted the basic problem: lawmakers are still waiting on the Stadium Authority bill, the part that can clarify who owns what, who collects what, and who is on the hook if projections miss.

    And if a senator is saying on the record that 100% of stadium revenue would go back to the Chiefs, every taxpayer response should be the same: show the math. Not vibes. The math.

  • Shadow Autism Panel: The Lab-Coat Aristocracy Grabs a Second Steering Wheel

    ByBrick Tungsten

    I smelled it before I finished the first paragraph: that classic Beltway cologne of burnt coffee, printer toner, and panic sweat from people who swear they are the only adults in the room. Clipboards like scripture. Lanyards like collars. Somebody says “reform” and they holler like you dropped a brisket in the church parking lot.

    On March 3, 2026, the Autism Science Foundation announced a brand-new group: the Independent Autism Coordinating Committee (I-ACC). The pitch is simple and loud: coordinate autism research outside the federal government and shadow the federal committee they no longer trust.

    What happened (plain English)

    According to the Autism Science Foundation, the I-ACC is formed by autism research and advocacy leaders. It plans its first meeting for March 19, 2026, at the National Press Club in Washington, DC, with a livestream and public comment. It also says it will write a strategic plan for autism research and publish annual summaries of key scientific advances, mirroring the work Congress set for the federal Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC) under the Autism CARES Act framework.

    The Washington Post describes the same basic situation: scientists and advocates created a “shadow” panel after HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. reshaped the federal IACC and appointed new public members. HHS has defended the overhaul as aligning autism policy with what it called “gold-standard science” in its January 28 press release about the reconstituted IACC.

    Why a “shadow committee” matters

    Here’s the F-150 logic. If you don’t like the driver, you don’t bolt on a second steering wheel and call it “protecting the truck.” You’re fighting for control of the route.

    The I-ACC frames itself as a rescue mission for rigor. It argues the Kennedy-appointed federal IACC includes people pushing debunked vaccine-autism narratives and promoting non-evidence-based, sometimes dangerous, autism “treatments.” It also says the federal committee now lacks scientific expertise and continuity, and it wants institutional memory back behind the wheel.

    It’s also a power move: a way to tell Congress, the media, universities, and the grant ecosystem, “Ignore the official lane. The real lane is over here.” The Autism Science Foundation lists serious credentials among members, including former National Institute of Mental Health directors and former federal IACC chairs, plus leaders from major autism organizations and prominent researchers.

    What a sane America should demand next

    • Sunlight: The federal IACC should be clear on how members were chosen and how it will handle questions already studied to death. The independent I-ACC should be clear about governance and funding.
    • Boundaries: If the federal committee re-litigates settled issues without a clear scientific rationale, confidence drops. If the shadow group acts like a regulator, confidence drops.
    • Results: Families need better diagnostics, better lifespan supports, safer and more effective treatments, and honest communication.

    America doesn’t need a priesthood. America needs a scoreboard.

  • SCOTUS to California: Quit Running “Secrecy School” on Parents

    ByBrick Tungsten

    I could smell it through the TV, folks. That burnt-plastic aroma of a bureaucracy melting down because somebody finally yanked the power cord out of the feelings machine. California had been running what I call “secrecy school,” and the Supreme Court just drove an F-150 straight through the paper wall.

    What SCOTUS did (and when)

    On March 2, 2026, the Supreme Court issued an unsigned emergency order in Mirabelli v. Bonta. The Court vacated the Ninth Circuit’s stay as it applied to the parent plaintiffs. In plain truck-stop English: the district court’s injunction protecting those parents is back in effect while the appeal drags on, and California cannot keep leaning on rules and guidance that wall parents off from major school decisions involving their own children.

    Why the Court stepped in

    The order says the parents seeking religious exemptions are likely to win under the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause, and also likely to succeed on a Fourteenth Amendment due process theory tied to long-recognized parental rights. The Court also leaned hard on irreparable harm, because you cannot refund time after a government system keeps you locked out of your child’s mental health and wellbeing like you are an optional add-on to the family plan.

    The dissents, spelled out

    As reported by the AP, the Court’s three liberal justices publicly dissented. The order notes Justice Kagan dissented, joined by Justice Jackson, and that Justice Sotomayor would have denied the application in full. It also notes Justices Thomas and Alito would have granted even more relief, including for teachers.

    The “parents on mute” model

    Here is the part that makes the smoke roll out of my ears. California’s model, as presented in the case, was basically this: if a kid uses a different name or pronouns at school, school officials can decide parents do not get to know unless the child consents. That is not “privacy.” That is a state-run curtain, with adults playing puppet master and moms and dads holding a dead remote.

    Safety tools still exist

    And yes, the Supreme Court points out the state can still protect kids through child abuse laws and the normal tools of the law. But California, as framed in this fight, did not build a narrow safety valve. It built a whole system that cuts parents out, potentially for years, while litigation crawls.

    What it means (right now)

    Mirabelli does not end the case. It does something immediate: it says that while the appeals grind forward, parents should not be forced to live under a regime that likely violates their constitutional rights. The state is not the parent. The state is not the priest. The state is the referee at best, and lately it has been acting like it owns the stadium.

    Closing sermon

    Your kid is not a file folder. Your family is not a pilot program. And your rights are not a temporary badge that expires when a guidance memo drops. Keep your hands on the wheel.

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