Henri Matisse The Blue Window 1913
https://twitter.com/EricLDaugh/status/2021039707984101393?s=20
EPSTEIN: More evidence that Trump was the original Jeffrey Epstein whistleblower is coming out from court documents. Trump was responsible for Epstein’s first conviction and Epstein knew and was livid. https://t.co/OiDLlItLu6 pic.twitter.com/G5wqgZlWfI
— @amuse (@amuse) February 10, 2026
For those unaware, SpaceX has already shifted focus to building a self-growing city on the Moon, as we can potentially achieve that in less than 10 years, whereas Mars would take 20+ years.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 8, 2026
The mission of SpaceX remains the same: extend consciousness and life as we know it to…
https://twitter.com/Ellieinspace/status/1902069908608782472?s=20Elon Musk: “Nothing any of my companies have done has been to stifle competition. In fact, we've done the opposite,
— Mars University (@MarsUniversityX) February 9, 2026
At Tesla, we have open-sourced our patents. Anyone can use our patents for free.
At SpaceX, we don't use patents. Once in a while, we'll file a patent just so… pic.twitter.com/FD9Qfk3f57
Eric Weinstein has a theory about what Elon is really building.
— Dustin (@r0ck3t23) February 10, 2026
“You can’t get to the stars using SpaceX.”
Chemical rockets have a ceiling. They can reach Mars, maybe push deeper into the solar system, but interstellar travel requires physics we don’t have. Breakthroughs that… pic.twitter.com/NHzob7oeP4
Jensen Huang said if he were a student today, he wouldn’t prioritize coding. He’d prioritize learning how to talk to AI.
— Dustin (@r0ck3t23) February 9, 2026
Most people treat AI like Google. Type a question, get an answer, move on. Huang sees it differently. He calls it “expertise in artistry,” which sounds… pic.twitter.com/2LYtDcCVCj
Everybody has the story. But what will they do with it? They just love linking Trump to Epstein.
• Trump Called Police About Epstein in 2006 (Weiss)
Newly unsealed Department of Justice documents reveal that in July 2006, then businessman Donald Trump was one of the first to call police to warn them about sex predator Jeffrey Epstein. The documents include a previously unreported 2019 FBI interview summary with former Palm Beach police chief Michael Reiter. Trump had contacted the department shortly after reports of Epstein’s criminal sex investigation became public. The future president contacted Reiter to express relief that authorities were finally acting, suggesting his associates in New York had described Epstein’s behaviors as “disgusting,” and advised investigators to focus on Ghislaine Maxwell, whom he described as “evil.” The Miami Herald first reported on the development.Read more …
The first mention of Trump in the FBI interview summary notes that he told investigators that he “threw Epstein out” of Mar-a-Lago, something he has maintained consistently over the years. “Thank goodness you’re stopping him, everyone has known he’s been doing this,” Trump reportedly told the Palm Beach Police Department. “TRUMP told him people in New York knew EPSTEIN was disgusting. TRUMP said MAXWELL was EPSTEIN’s operative, ‘she is evil and to focus on her,’ the report continues. The president also noted that he had witnessed Epstein in the presence of teenagers and was apparently dismayed by what he saw and “got the hell out of there.”
BREAKING:
— An Open Secret (@AnOpenSecret) February 10, 2026
Unsealed court docs reviewed by the Miami Herald show DONALD TRUMP called Palm Beach police about Jeffrey Epstein in 2006
Trump described Ghislaine Maxwell as “Epstein’s operative “she is evil and to focus on her” pic.twitter.com/S01tfEn9XFThis bombshell document release is narrative-busting stuff. Democrats, desperate to land a punch on President Trump with the Epstein files, have repeatedly attempted to tie the two together as close associates. Epstein, the late financier, was convicted of procuring for prostitution a girl below the age of 18 in 2008 and was facing sex trafficking charges until he died, according to authorities, by suicide in a Manhattan jail cell in 2019. Maxwell is currently serving 20 years in prison for her involvement in the late billionaire pedophile’s crimes.
The media, of course, is framing the latest revelation not as ‘Trump tried to warn authorities’ but rather, as ‘this contradicts the president’s previous claims.’ From the Miami Herald: “That stands in sharp contrast to what Trump told reporters in July 2019 when he was asked if he had any knowledge that Epstein had molested girls. “No, I had no idea. I had no idea,” Trump said at the time It’s a misleading and dishonest spin, something one comes to expect from the media. Trump’s comment came in direct response to reporters asking if he had any knowledge that Epstein had molested girls. He was denying awareness of Epstein’s crimes or the allegations of molestation/sex trafficking that surfaced prominently around Epstein’s 2019 arrest.
Nowhere in this FBI interview does it indicate he had specific knowledge of the criminal molestation, sexual abuse, or trafficking details that later emerged in the full Epstein investigation or his 2008 plea deal. It’s Trump saying he had heard from others about “disgusting” behavior and how he was so creeped out that he had to remove Epstein from his club. Countless people in Palm Beach social circles noticed Epstein had a pattern of questionable behavior with young women, without having direct evidence or knowledge of the felony-level crimes. Good try, media. Maxwell repeatedly invoked her Fifth Amendment right not to testify before the House Oversight Committee during a closed-door virtual deposition on Monday. Her lawyer declared that she would “speak fully and honestly if granted clemency by President Trump.”
“Both President Trump and President Clinton are innocent of any wrongdoing,” the lawyer said. “Ms. Maxwell alone can explain why, and the public is entitled to hear that explanation.”
I don’t think so. But that’s just me.
• Epstein Files: Victims Buried at Zorro Ranch? (Catherine Salgado)
One message in the Justice Department-released Epstein files claims that two girls, victims of the abusive trafficker, are buried at Zorro Ranch after they died as a result of sexual abuse there. Convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, who died under suspicious circumstances while in jail in 2019, owned one property that reportedly has yet to be raided by federal authorities: Zorro Ranch outside Santa Fe, N.M. Multiple victims have testified to Epstein’s criminal and horrifying sexual abuse there, and multiple powerful men, including a former governor, reportedly visited the place. And an eerie message in the Epstein files seems to indicate that the powerful pedophile was trying to cover up the reason for the deaths of two young women.
Award-winning journalist Catherine Herridge discussed the email and the possibility of investigating the allegations concerning the dead girls with a former FBI special agent and investigator, Jonathan Gilliam. A former staffer at the ranch wrote in the email, “Did you know somewhere in the hills outside the Zorro, two foreign girls were buried on orders of Jeffrey and Madame G? Both died by strangulation during rough, fetish s*x.” Madame G is likely Epstein’s partner-in-crime, Ghislaine Maxwell. Herridge mentioned the possibility of video evidence in the case of the dead girls and asked Gilliam, of the allegation, “Could that be investigated at this stage?”He affirmed, “That could absolutely be investigated. There is no statute of limitations on that, and then also, if they have testimony or some type of witness saying that that is where they were killed, they can then go out and do a search and potentially find a body.” Gilliam did caution, “It’s going to be difficult years later to prove something like sexual assault, but if you can find the evidence that somebody was killed, that’s totally different. And again, there’s no statute of limitations. But, see, this is also, Catherine, why you don’t just say, ‘Oh, that crime that that person committed is dropped off, we’re not gonna investigate that any further.’ [Because] you never know who these loop back around to.”
He went on to say that if, as some victims’ testimony indicates, “this was a society of people abusing women, then, and some of them died, you really don’t know who was connected to them… and who has knowledge of that. So that’s why you would continue to look into all these different subjects.” This “ongoing conspiracy” involves people still prominent in the media, Hollywood, business, and politics. Powerful pedophiles and sex abusers should NOT get away with their crimes just because they are wealthy and influential. What is the point of being a Republic if our oligarchy always evades accountability? We might as well have an official aristocracy. That’s what the Justice Department ought to understand.
Herridge asked if the released email about the dead girls was blackmail. Gilliam warily answered, “It looks like it could be any of several things. It could be blackmail. It could also be that somebody had some type of information, and they wanted to make it known somewhere along the way that they had nothing to do with that. We’ve seen that in other cases.” He concluded, “I don’t think there’s enough evidence at this point for me to say blackmail or not, but is there a possibility? Of course.” Sounds as if federal authorities need to pay a visit to Zorro Ranch.
Read more …NEW: Former FBI Special Agent says there is “No Doubt” the information gathered by Epstein looks like an “intelligence collection operation.”
— Catherine Herridge (@C__Herridge) February 10, 2026
“I think there's no doubt…He went after people or he had connections to people that had connections to national security or huge… https://t.co/Sktiq9b6uo pic.twitter.com/nEjRejIGo6
“I’d like to die on Mars, just not on impact…”
• Musk Shifts Gears: Moon Megacity Beats Mars Colony (Stephen Green)
“I’d like to die on Mars, just not on impact,” SpaceX founder Elon Musk half-joked to a capacity SXSW crowd in 2013, reiterating the launch company’s core mission of establishing a self-sustaining human colony on the Red Planet within his lifetime — and his lifelong dream of being one of those colonists. It seems almost impossible that just 13 years ago, SpaceX had yet to land a Falcon 9 booster rocket, much less reuse one. Yet since then, the Falcon is now so inexpensive and reliable that it launched more than 150 times in 2025 alone, accounting for more than 80% of all the mass lifted into orbit last year. While no other company has yet to master it, reusable boosters are the norm for SpaceX, and its Starship rocket — still in development — promises to reduce launch costs by at least one order of magnitude.Read more …
Times change. So do dreams. “For those unaware,” Musk posted to X (another Musk company) on Sunday, “SpaceX has already shifted focus to building a self-growing city on the Moon, as we can potentially achieve that in less than 10 years, whereas Mars would take 20+ years.” “It is only possible to travel to Mars when the planets align every 26 months (six month trip time), whereas we can launch to the Moon every 10 days (2 day trip time). This means we can iterate much faster to complete a Moon city than a Mars city.” That’s always been true — orbital mechanics are unforgiving in the extreme — but Starship development stalled badly enough in 2025 that a change in focus was perhaps inevitable.Musk had hoped to launch multiple Starships late this year on an unmanned exploratory/proof-of-concept mission during the next Mars launch window (the optimal Earth-Mars transfer opportunity using a fuel-efficient Hohmann transfer orbit). But too many technologies and processes remain unproven, including the orbital refueling that makes it possible for Starship to reach Mars. Or even Luna, for that matter. Starship’s unprecedented cargo capacity for deep-space missions is only possible through orbital refueling performed by other Starships acting as LEO gas stations. Direct-transfer windows to Luna — with flight times of just three to five days — open roughly twice per month. The Hohmann window to Mars opens about every 26 months, with a flight time of up to nine months. Another technology SpaceX has yet to fully iterate is crew protection from radiation during such a long flight.
Iteration is the key, and at 54 years old, Musk probably can’t afford the time it will take to iterate Starship for manned Mars missions — certainly not on the scale needed to make life even semi-tolerable for, say, an aging launch company founder “It’s not any easier landing on the moon,” space photographer Andrew McCarthy added, “but once getting mass to the moon is a solved problem Mars becomes so much easier.” Indeed. Musk also said that SpaceX’s core mission remains unchanged, to “extend consciousness and life as we know it to the stars.” “Aim for the moon,” they say, because “If you miss, you may hit a star.” I’d still love to see human footprints on Mars in my lifetime, but if the alternative is a large and growing American population on Luna, I’ll take it.
”.. the policy “has got nothing to do with racism” and is “a classic example of how the EU proceeds to amass for itself more powers to regulate orderly life and get involved in politics.”
• US to Fund Free Speech Initiatives in Europe, Trump Official Reveals (ET)
The Trump administration announced plans to direct funding toward promoting free speech in Western allied democracies, a senior State Department official said on Monday. The initiative bolsters efforts to counter European online regulations categorized by Washington as censorship. Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy Sarah Rogers discussed the initiative during a trip to Europe. It includes grants to support free expression, a result of concerns about rules such as the European Union’s Digital Services Act and Britain’s Online Safety Act. These laws, which E.U. officials say aim to deter hate speech and misinformation, have been scrutinized by U.S. officials as restricting the free speech of American tech firms and suppressing immigration policy critiques.Read more …
“One way my office is going to operate differently is we’re going to be very forthright and transparent about everything we do,” Rogers said during a panel discussion in Budapest on Monday. She added that her role allows directing U.S. funding through grants, stating, “I want to promote free speech in Western allied democracies, and … that’s what my grantmaking is going to be doing.”Rogers, appearing alongside a top aide to Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, underscored the importance of free speech for democracy. “The United States government, via me, but not only me, has been engaging aggressively on the issue of free speech, because you don’t have self-governance without freedom of speech, you can’t have a democratic deliberation if viewpoints are proscribed from the public square,” she said.Rogers is scheduled to stop in Dublin, Budapest, Warsaw, and Munich to discuss digital freedoms with officials and others. The administration’s December National Security Strategy said that European leaders were censoring speech and suppressing opposition to immigration policies, warning of the continent’s “civilizational erasure.” Rogers said European polls showing European views on migration are similar to those in the United States.The United States imposed last month visa bans on a former European Union commissioner and four anti-disinformation activists. The administration labeled them agents of censorship for working to regulate U.S. social media platforms. European leaders lambasted the bans. They defended the commissioner and activists’ rights to push for regulations on foreign companies operating locally.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio revealed the designations on Dec. 23, 2025. He called the individuals “agents of the global censorship-industrial complex” and blocked their entry to the United States.The European Commission unveiled a new “anti-racism” strategy on Jan. 20, aiming toward a “Europe free from racism” with increased anti-discrimination enforcement and training. The Commission said the training will help civil servants “recognise and tackle racial bias, while fostering greater cultural awareness and sensitivity.” It also requires European educators to “address teacher training and professional development on diversity and inclusion, as well as promoting diversity in the teaching profession itself.”
Eric Kaufmann, a professor at the University of Buckingham, said the strategy “betrays an illiberal moralizing worldview” that could lead to “suppressing free speech and asphyxiating the historical pride and culture of Europe’s ethnic majorities.” Jacob Reynolds of think tank MCC Brussels called it a “slide to cultural socialist ideas.” Reynolds previously told The Epoch Times that he believes that the policy “has got nothing to do with racism” and is “a classic example of how the EU proceeds to amass for itself more powers to regulate orderly life and get involved in politics.”
“This is not [anti-racism], as ordinary people understand it,” he said. “This is the kind of woke [diversity, equity, and inclusion] agenda that has come to dominate the way that lots of civil servants, lots of academics, lots of civil society organizations think.”
They really want war. Trump really doesn’t.
• French Defense Chief Says Europe Has Until 2030 For War (RMX)
France and Europe have four years to prepare for war, said Fabien Mandon, chief of the defense staff of the French Armed Forces, who cited Russia as Europe’s biggest threat. His speech at a major naval conference outlined that France, as well as its allies, must take into account that this war will break out in the near future and that the French military must be ready by 2030. “Today, we are preparing for war,” he said, according to BreakingDefense. During his speech at the naval conference, Mandon stated that France is not prepared for war and the country had “an insufficient number of ships and armaments.” He stated the nation needs “more missiles with greater range and lethality.”Read more …
Mandon recently made headlines for stating that Europeans and the French must be ready to lose children in a war, stating: “You have to accept that you will lose your children,” which is necessary to defeat Russia during a November speech at the National Congress of French Mayors. His words caused national shock, while the representatives of the parliamentary parties protested sharply in connection with his comment. As in November, he named Russia as the main source of the threat of war.
“Lavrov claimed that the US and Russia came to an agreement on Ukraine during President Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin’s summit in Anchorage, Alaska, back in August 2025.”
• Lavrov: US No Longer Wants To Pursue Its Own Ukraine Peace Proposal (Antiwar)
Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov said in an interview published on Monday that the US no longer wants to implement a Ukraine peace deal that it previously proposed, the latest sign that there’s little chance the grinding war will come to an end anytime soon. Lavrov claimed that the US and Russia came to an agreement on Ukraine during President Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin’s summit in Anchorage, Alaska, back in August 2025. He didn’t elaborate on the details of the potential deal, but it’s believed to involve Ukraine ceding territory it still controls in the Donbas, a condition included in a 28-point peace plan that was later drafted by the Trump administration.Read more …
“In other words, we were told that the Ukrainian issue must be resolved. In Anchorage, we accepted the United States’ proposal. To put it straightforwardly, they proposed, and we agreed – the problem should be solved,” Lavrov told TV BRICS. “The position of the United States was important for us. Having accepted their proposals, we essentially fulfilled the task of resolving the Ukrainian issue and moving toward comprehensive, broad, mutually beneficial cooperation.”The Russian diplomat said that despite the “positive” summit, the US began imposing sanctions on Russia a few weeks later and has continued the economic pressure. “New sanctions are imposed, attacks on tankers are staged in international waters in violation of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, and India and other partners are discouraged from purchasing affordable Russian energy, while Europe has long prohibited such purchases, forcing them to buy American liquefied natural gas at significantly higher prices,” he said.
Lavrov added that he didn’t see a “promising future in economic terms” when it comes to US-Russia relations. “Thus, in the economic sphere, the United States has effectively declared a goal of economic domination,” he said. Elsewhere in the interview, which focused on Russia’s relationship with other BRICS nations, Lavrov said the Biden administration has turned the US dollar into a “weapon,” prompting Russia and other countries to reduce their reliance on the US currency. “Under the Biden administration, the United States has taken every step to weaponize the dollar against those it considers inconvenient,” he said, adding that the policies have continued under the Trump administration.
“Moscow’s allegations specify that modern, Western-supplied stockpiles are being used far outside the actual Ukrainian battlefield, and that the illicit trade has enriched powerful Ukrainian officials, while increasing crime and terrorism.”
• Ukraine Launching Arms Exports At Centers Across Europe (ZH)
Ukraine has another money-making idea – instead of begging for urgently needed funds from Western partners, it plans to start exporting weapons, instead of only buying them. But there is a big and unexpected catch to the whole scheme. Flush with external funding connected to the war with Russia, President Volodymyr Zelensky has announced ambitious plans to open ten arms export hubs across the European continent by the end of 2026. Given Ukraine is still an active warzone, and given the likelihood that Russian forces will continue targeting defense manufacturing sites, Ukraine is seeking to have European allies play host to Ukrainian arms production plants.Read more …
For example, Ukrainian-made drones are expected to be in production on German soil later this month. Zelensky laid out new details of Ukraine’s move into foreign arms markets, describing it as a long-term economic necessity, in a speech before the Kyiv Aviation Institute on Sunday night. Ukraine’s defense sector rapidly grown as a result of the war, accounting for roughly 7% of GDP, according to July 2025 estimates from the Kyiv School of Economics Institute. “Today we are opening up exports. In Europe in 2026 there will be 10 export centers. These are the Baltic countries and the countries of Northern Europe. In 2026, 10 representative offices will operate,” Zelensky said, as quoted in Reuters.“This is a [production] line that is already working. The production lines are already operating in the UK. These are Ukrainian technologies,” Zelensky added – though without providing much more in the way of specifics. In essence, Ukraine is seeking to sustain its war effort while locking in a long-term economic leverage by expanding its defense production sector, but in a protected and safe way far from the front lines. Simultaneously, Moscow has complained that Ukraine is already deep in the black market export of arms siphoned off from Western deliveries, which Russian media alleging as follows:
Russian officials have long accused Kiev of fueling global arms proliferation through the black market and have specifically alleged that Ukraine has supplied weapons, including those it received from the West, to militant groups in Africa. Last week, Russian envoy to the UN Vassily Nebenzia reiterated the accusations and told the Security Council that “the Kiev regime is actively involved in… supplying terrorists with weapons, including drones, and training fighters,” citing the Sahel region as an example. Mali’s Prime Minister Abdoulaye Maiga has accused Kiev of supplying kamikaze drones to terrorists. Some serious question remain, however…
Ukraine: "We will export weapons to Europe. Production in Germany will begin in February."
— Christoph Johanssen (@chjohanssen) February 9, 2026
Ok, so the production is not in Ukraine, the funding certainly isn't Ukrainian, and any development will have been enabled by Western tax payer money.
How exactly is this "exporting"? https://t.co/lxXXuchTECOf course, Russian weapons also often make their way to African battlefields. But Moscow’s allegations specify that modern, Western-supplied stockpiles are being used far outside the actual Ukrainian battlefield, and that the illicit trade has enriched powerful Ukrainian officials, while increasing crime and terrorism.
Keep cops safe, why don’t you.
• Judge Blocks California’s Law Mandating Federal Agents Remove Masks (ET)
A federal district court judge partially blocked a California law barring law enforcement officers from wearing masks in a Feb. 9 ruling, finding the law discriminated against federal officers. District Court Judge Christina Snyder ruled in favor of the Trump administration, prohibiting the state from enforcing its No Secret Police Act—which was scheduled to go into effect earlier this year—against federal law enforcement officers. The federal government sued California, challenging the law as well as with another law—the No Vigilantes Act, that requires federal officers to wear identification. Snyder ruled that the second law was not discriminatory. California had agreed to pause enforcement of the laws, which went into effect on Jan. 1, while the Trump administration challenged them in court.Read more …
Attorney General Pam Bondi praised the court’s decision on Feb. 9. “These federal agents are harassed, doxed, obstructed, and attacked on a regular basis just for doing their jobs,” Bondi posted on X. “We have no tolerance for it. We will continue fighting and winning in court for President Trump’s law-and-order agenda—and we will always have the backs of our great federal law enforcement officers.” California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed both bills into law last year in response to federal immigration enforcement operations in the state. The No Secret Police Act prohibited any law enforcement officer from wearing a facial covering while performing official duties unless the agency employing the officer has a policy regarding the covering. Some exceptions were made for SWAT teams and in other cases.The No Vigilantes Act requires any law enforcement officer operating in the state to visibly display identification indicating his or her agency and name or badge number when working. The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) argued the two state laws violated the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution, which mandates that if state laws conflict with federal laws, the federal law takes precedence. The department also argued that the laws violated the intergovernmental immunity doctrine, which prevents federal and state governments from interfering with each other’s operations.The DOJ argued that prohibiting facial coverings and requiring identification put officers’ safety at risk as violent crime against federal immigration officers has skyrocketed in recent months.
Snyder found the No Secret Police Act did not apply equally to all law enforcement officers in the state, and therefore it “unlawfully discriminates against federal officers,” according to her ruling.“Because such discrimination violates the Supremacy Clause, the court is constrained to enjoin the facial covering prohibition. California may not enforce the facial covering prohibition of the No Secret Police Act, SB 627 … against federal law enforcement officers,” she ruled. The judge denied the federal government’s other challenges. The state’s law was already receiving pushback by the largest metropolitan police agency in the state. Los Angeles Police Department Chief Jim McDonnell said his officers would not enforce it.
“The reality of one armed agency approaching another armed agency to create conflict over something that would be a misdemeanor at best—or an infraction—it doesn’t make any sense. It’s not a good public policy decision and it wasn’t well thought out, in my opinion,” McDonnell said during a news conference on Jan. 29.
He uses Canadians as toys. It’s what you get for electing Justin.
• Trump Threatens Blockade of Almost Completed Michigan-Ontario Bridge (CTH)
Writing on a Truth Social post earlier this evening, President Trump is threatening to block the U.S. side of a new bridge that links Detroit, Michigan to Ontario, Canada: (Truth Social) – “As everyone knows, the Country of Canada has treated the United States very unfairly for decades. Now, things are turning around for the U.S.A., and FAST! But imagine, Canada is building a massive bridge between Ontario and Michigan. They own both the Canada and the United States side and, of course, built it with virtually no U.S. content. President Barack Hussein Obama stupidly gave them a waiver so they could get around the BUY AMERICAN Act, and not use any American products, including our Steel.Read more …
Now, the Canadian Government expects me, as President of the United States, to PERMIT them to just “take advantage of America!” What does the United States of America get — Absolutely NOTHING! Ontario won’t even put U.S. spirits, beverages, and other alcoholic products, on their shelves, they are absolutely prohibited from doing so and now, on top of everything else, Prime Minister Carney wants to make a deal with China — which will eat Canada alive. We’ll just get the leftovers! I don’t think so.The first thing China will do is terminate ALL Ice Hockey being played in Canada and permanently eliminate The Stanley Cup. The Tariffs Canada charges us for our Dairy products have, for many years, been unacceptable, putting our Farmers at great financial risk. I will not allow this bridge to open until the United States is fully compensated for everything we have given them, and also, importantly, Canada treats the United States with the Fairness and Respect that we deserve. We will start negotiations, IMMEDIATELY. With all that we have given them, we should own, perhaps, at least one half of this asset. The revenues generated because of the U.S. Market will be astronomical. Thank you for your attention to this matter!” ~PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP
The USMCA renegotiation plan likely plays a big part in this announcement. Don’t react, just watch.
Who doesn’t love him?
• Fetterman Breaks Ranks With Democrats, Supports Federal Voter ID Measure (AmG)
Senator John Fetterman (D-PA) has broken ranks with Democratic leadership and has come out in favor of requiring photo ID for voting in elections across the nation. Fetterman appeared on the Fox News program “Sunday Morning Futures” yesterday and told host Maria Bartiromo that voter ID wasn’t an “unreasonable” requirement, saying, “It’s not a radical idea for regular Americans to show your ID to vote.”Read more …
Fetterman’s right
— Mike Lee (@BasedMikeLee) February 9, 2026
Who agrees? https://t.co/vFUfyQgFPQFetterman pointed to states like Wisconsin that have similar protections requiring proof of citizenship for federal voter registration and photo ID at the polls. He noted that 60% of voters in Wisconsin support such safeguards, despite having elected liberal justice Susan Crawford in 2025 to the Wisconsin Supreme Court. House Republicans plan to vote this week on the Safeguarding American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) America Act with national polls showing 83% of Americans support the measure, including 71% of Democrats. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries continued to decry the SAVE America Act as “voter suppression” and accused President Trump and GOP leadership of trying to steal the upcoming midterm elections by nationalizing them.
Dana Bash: 71% of your fellow Democrats support requiring an ID to vote. Why are they wrong?
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) February 8, 2026
Hakeem Jeffries (D): Republicans are engaging in voter suppression!.. Trump is trying to steal the election!
Elected Dems oppose the will of Americans.pic.twitter.com/tFoNR5Kv2TFetterman rejected comparisons of the SAVE America Act to resurrecting Jim Crow laws as Democratic leaders have claimed. The Pennsylvania Senator also broke with his party leadership on the issue of funding for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) which is expected to run out on Friday unless lawmakers can break a deadlock.
https://twitter.com/i/status/2020564856663884171
Fetterman came down on the side of border enforcement and said he does not support shutting down the government, saying, “I don’t ever want to vote to shut our government down again.” Fetterman told Bartiromo that he expects Democrats and Republicans to remain divided beyond Friday’s funding deadline.
“They have what we call the Noah’s Ark problem,” Willems continued, “which is, if they effectuate this deal, they’re going to have two of everything.”
• Hollywood Is Sick — but It’s L.A. That’s Dying (Stephen Green)
Hollywood as we know it is sick — not the kind of sick you might usually think of with the woke agenda pushing, child-actor grooming, and all the rest — but the “sick and dying” kind of sick. Netflix’s Chief Global Affairs Officer warned Monday that Hollywood will suffer billions of dollars worth of job losses if rival Paramount Skydance succeeds in buying Warner Bros. Discovery out from under the streaming giant’s buyout bid. During an interview on Fox Business Network, Clete Willems said, “Paramount has identified $6 billion in synergies in the offer that they made, which is code for $6 billion in job cuts.” “They have what we call the Noah’s Ark problem,” Willems continued, “which is, if they effectuate this deal, they’re going to have two of everything.”Read more …
There’s also the matter of debt. The Paramount offer is generous, but requires billions in financing — including personal security guarantees from Oracle multibillionaire Larry Ellison, whose son David runs Paramount. So when Willems says Paramount will “have to cut, cut, cut,” if the studios merge, he’s probably right. But similar downsizing wouldn’t happen when and if Netflix buys Warner, instead? Color me skeptical that Netflix’s bid magically spares the axe — especially when it already churns out content like it’s going out of style (which, quality-wise, it often is). Netflix wants Warner more for its old intellectual properties for streaming than it does for its production facilities or crews.Netflix already spews out plenty of content on its own, seemingly without much care about actual quality in most cases. The last thing Netflix needs is probably more output; it just needs that sweet, sweet Warner IP to fill the streaming hours. “Cut, cut, cut,” indeed.mRegardless, either buyout likely means the end of Warner Bros. as Hollywood has known it for just over a century — and that, gentle reader, is the absolute least of Hollywood’s troubles. Or maybe I need to rephrase that bit. Maybe Hollywood is the sickness, and Los Angeles is the patient at risk of dying. The Hollywood Reporter featured a telling report in recent weeks, headlined with a dire warning for the City of Angels: “Los Angeles’ Hold on Hollywood Is Slipping.”
When 2025 wrapped, Hollywood tallied up its Los Angeles-based production figures, and the numbers were stark at best. “Superhero movies have fled to London,” HR’s Erik Hayden wrote, and “three major studios (Netflix, Paramount and Lionsgate) have inked expansive deals to build or lease in new production bases in New Jersey; states like Georgia, Louisiana and New Mexico are fighting for their share of projects with generous tax incentives while Illinois is becoming a player in its own right.” The result is that in 2025, there were almost as few productions in L.A. as there were during the panic-fueled COVID lockdowns. Read that again — and it’s close, too. Hollywood’s Los Angeles shoots dropped almost in half during COVID, from over 36,000 in 2019 to just under 19,000 in 2020. Things bounced back almost immediately when the lockdowns ended, right back up to 37k.
But something happened in 2023, and that number dropped precipitously to 24,000. Last year? Just 19,694 shoots in L.A.— barely above the 2020 lockdown abyss, yet it’s boom times anywhere that isn’t business-hostile California. Streaming killed Hollywood’s movie theater cash cow without even pretending to look for a golden goose first. Instead of enjoying a night out at the movies, anonymous Hollywood screenwriting veteran George MF Washington warned in 2022, “streaming subscribers expect a constant firehose of content fired directly into their faces 24/7/365.” Now the largest streamer is about to buy one of Hollywood’s oldest and most storied studios, just as Los Angeles plumbs COVID-era depths of disaster with no relief in sight.
Hollywood is sick, but it might be Los Angeles that’s dying.
Loooong excerpt.
• New York Post Publishes Long Excerpt From “Rage and the Republic” (Turley)
I am delighted that the New York Post decided this week to run a long excerpt from my new book, “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.” I wanted to share the full excerpt and a clip from the audiobook below. Here is the description and excerpt that appeared in the New York Post:Read more …
America’s Revolutionaries: We’re Our Own Greatest Creations, As Tom Paine Proved.
In his new book, “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution,” Professor Turley explores the meaning and future of democracy on the American Revolution’s 250th anniversary. The first half looks back at the unique confluence of people and events that led to the establishment of the American republic.The second half looks forward, exploring whether the American republic can survive in the 21st century in light of changes ranging from artificial intelligence to robotics to global governance systems. Turley believes the American republic is uniquely suited to address those challenges, but it will require a return, not a rejection, of the core values that defined the American Revolution.Excerpt: “Like Saturn, the Revolution devours its children.” Those words from journalist Jacques Mallet du Pan during the French Revolution referred to the Roman God Saturn, or Kronos in Greek. Kronos attempted to defy his mother’s prophesy that he would be overthrown by one of his children by them upon their births. When his son Zeus was born, Kronos’s consort Rhea decided to trick him by wrapping a stone in a swaddling blanket and handing it to him to devour. She then hid Zeus on Crete. Once he reached adulthood, Zeus returned and, fulfilling the prophesy, defeated his father. The story of Kronos held obvious meaning for Mallet du Pan, who watched with alarm as the French Revolution devoured first its aristocratic foes and then its own supporters.
It is a story played out over and over again in history as ambition becomes activism, activism becomes extremism, and extremism becomes authoritarianism. Call it the Saturn gene. We are all Saturn’s children with an inherent impulse that rests within each of us: the capacity of all mortals to become monsters. The lesson of Saturn would also be raised in the American Revolution by none other than Thomas Paine. Long before Jefferson put pen to parchment on the Declaration of Independence, it was Paine who would speak of the natural and inalienable rights as the basis for the American Revolution. It was Paine, in his pamphlet Common Sense, who made the case for “independency.” It was also Paine who saw, firsthand, the ability of a revolution to consume itself.
Paine would play a significant role in two revolutions that took strikingly different paths in America and France. Among the best-known figures of the American Revolution, only the Marquis de Lafayette could make a similar claim. Paine learned the dangers of unrestrained popular government in the hardest possible way. It came close to killing him in France. He would learn that what was lost in Paris was precisely what he had left in Philadelphia—a system that could channel tremendous political and economic pressures into a stable Republic.
We are again living in revolutionary times. It is not just classic revolutions where governments are overthrown, but rather revolutions that can change countries from within. We refer to the Industrial Revolution and the Information Revolution to signify the transformative changes that they brought to society. Often those new realities produce countervailing political changes in government. The twenty-first century has seen the acceleration of new technology like artificial intelligence (AI) that is reframing every aspect of human existence. These changes will redefine not just the workplace but also the place of citizens in society at large. The question is whether American democracy can survive in the twenty-first century or collapse under the same forces of democratic despotism that brought down its contemporaries. It is the unfinished story of the American Revolution.
Thomas Paine saw this up close in Paris at the height of the French Revolution. He had been among those voices early on among the French Jacobins who cheered the stripping away constitutional protections to unleash the “general will.” The insatiable appetite of Saturn took hold of the liberators.bFor Paine, the ultimate collapse of his ideals came in December 1793. He had just been stripped of his seat in the French National Convention in a vote of no confidence. In watching the executions in Paris, Paine lamented to a friend, “Ah France, thou hast ruined the character of a revolution virtuously begun, and destroyed those who produced it.”
The long-awaited knock at his bedroom door came on December 28, 1793. There stood five policemen and two representatives of the feared Committee on General Safety. When asked for the charge, they just shrugged. Such details were now largely meaningless in France. It would not be democratic ideals but poor ventilation that would save Paine from joining his decapitated colleagues in Paris. After opening the door to allow more air into the cell, guards missed the chalk mark designating him and his cellmates for death. Paine would soon walk out of the Palais du Luxembourg as the Terror came to an end with the death of Robespierre..[..]
“The Importance of Capitalism…in the Founding and the Future of the American Republic..”
• Adam Smith and The Importance of Capitalism (Turley)
Capitalism is under attack from classrooms to town halls to voting booths. According to polls, a rising segment of the population is calling for socialism or even communism as young people embrace a radical chic in the country. And this week, another socialist looks ready to join a growing “squad” in Congress. On our 250th anniversary, the fight over capitalism and economic freedom could prove critical to the future of this republic. However, there is an unexpected change that could help reverse this trend. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent recently announced that one million families have already signed up for the new tax-privileged Trump Accounts, which will be seeded with $1,000 in taxpayer funds for children born between Jan. 1, 2025, and Dec. 31, 2028.Read more …
With an anticipated 25 million participants, the initiative is one of the most ambitious and potentially impactful in U.S. history. But its true impact may be far greater than the wealth that it could generate for families. It may just be the determinative factor in preserving this Republic in this century. This month, Simon and Schuster released my new book on the founding and the future of the American republic — “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.” The book asks whether this unique republic can survive in the 21st century amid growing economic, political, and social challenges.What many celebrating our 250th anniversary do not appreciate is that this is also the 250th anniversary of Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations, released around the same time as the Declaration of Independence. The book was not a great success in Great Britain. In addition to its foundational support for capitalism, it challenged the mercantilist policies of the British Empire and supported the claims of the colonies in seeking greater economic freedoms. Smith, however, was immediately embraced by the founders, who saw his work as the perfect economic theory to advance their political theory. Ours was the first Enlightenment Revolution based on a belief in natural rights that came from God, not governments.
Yet, the founders knew that true individual liberty could not be achieved without economic freedom. Smith’s idea of the “invisible hand” offered an idea of individual economic freedom where whole economies were driven by the individual tastes and choices of citizens. The combination would prove transformative, as the U.S. became not only the world’s oldest large-scale democracy but also history’s greatest economy. We will need that combination in the years to come to maintain what I call a “liberty-enhancing economy.” The book looks at the expected impact of new technology, from robotics to AI, in the possible creation of a large population of unemployed, unproductive citizens.
The question is how the likely state support for a large segment of our population will change their relationship to the government, changing the dynamic of what it is to be a citizen. The danger of a “kept citizenry” is that we will lose the essential independence that our founders wanted to instill in new Americans from their government. As we face these challenges, we are seeing a rise in support for socialism and communism in the West. It is the rage among young people who have no experience or memory of the socialist governments that collapsed in the prior century. Their understanding of socialism comes from armchair revolutionaries in colleges and the sloganeering of figures like Zohran Mamdani about introducing them to “the warmth of collectivism.”
That brings us back to the Trump accounts. The insidious aspect of past socialist systems is that their consistent failure often resulted in demands to “double down,” to increase state subsidies, nationalizations, and central planning. For their part, citizens can become accustomed to government support. When socialist François Mitterrand came to power in France in 1981, promising a “rupture with capitalism,” he quickly destroyed the country’s economy. However, he continued to dazzle French citizens with promises of free money, even appointing Andre Henry as the Minister of Free Time to assist citizens in their new socialist leisure.
The same seductive appeal is evident today in the U.S. and other Western countries. Sixty-five percent of Democratic voters have a favorable view of socialism. An even greater percentage of young Britons want to live under socialism, and 72 percent favor nationalization of industries.Capitalism was key to the success of the American Republic, and it will be even more important in the coming years. As jobs are wiped out through robotics and AI, we will have to shift to homocentric jobs and productivity to preserve not just economic but also political liberty. We cannot preserve that liberty as some arts-and-crafts citizenry, entertained with state-subsidized leisure and distractions.
The $6.25 billion gift of Michael and Susan Dell (now augmented by dozens of corporations) could offer the single best hope for the survival of our system. Millions of young people will be able to experience the benefits of investments, savings and, most importantly, economic independence. It has the benefit of being a tangible lesson about capitalism — not simply an abstraction pulled from the pages of the Wealth of Nations. As socialist experiments replicate the failures of past eras, these accounts will offer a stark contrast for a rising generation. It is an investment that must be extended beyond 2028 to inculcate values of economic and political independence in the 21st century.
For young Americans, there has been a continual barrage of anti-capitalist sentiments. However, there is still muscle memory in this country of the gifts that free markets brought to a free people.
https://twitter.com/RussiaIsntEnemy/status/2021242773395968061?s=20 https://twitter.com/STANISKRAPIVNIK/status/2021226671307706762?s=20
Ray Dalio on how to prevent another American civil war.
— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) February 9, 2026
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