Edward Hopper Gas 1940
Absolute bombshell. Col. Macgregor predicts Putin has already delivered a terrifying ultimatum to Netanyahu: If Israel dares to use a nuclear weapon in the Middle East, Russia will drop a nuclear weapon on Israel. The US has no idea what it just walked into. pic.twitter.com/TEkmslZXXa
— Furkan Gözükara (@FurkanGozukara) March 22, 2026
Col. Macgregor predicts the total collapse of the American empire in the Middle East. He says Arab monarchies will fall to popular uprisings, the US will be completely expelled, and Israel will be systematically destroyed day after day. pic.twitter.com/TI8KOBBmoB
— Furkan Gözükara (@FurkanGozukara) March 22, 2026
Former FBI agent John Guandolo breaks down Islam in under 3 minutes—and he nails the core doctrine without apology.
— Yossi BenYakar (@YossiBenYakar) March 22, 2026
He explains: The entire purpose of Islam, according to all authoritative Islamic sources, is to establish an Islamic state (caliphate) across the entire world… pic.twitter.com/QDZKKnVEhW
The Crusades were not random wars of aggression. The Crusades were the Eastern Christian response to centuries of Islamic conquest. They were primarily defensive wars.
— Natasha Montreal (@NatashaMontreal) March 22, 2026
In early Christianity there were five centers of high authority: Rome, Alexandria, Constantine, Antioch, and… pic.twitter.com/wvLhFVjH4M
https://twitter.com/AdamMoczar/status/2035822308208660516?s=20 https://twitter.com/Alinavisooo/status/2035954387722674253?s=20Christopher Hitchens on Islam:
— Taya (@travelingflying) March 22, 2026
”Resist it while you still can, and before the right to complain is taken away from you, which will be the next thing. You will be told you can’t complain because you are ‘Islamophobic’.” pic.twitter.com/gl8wSOBnK6
For 300 years the Muslim Turks were stealing kids from their mothers and putting taxes on the Christians. Before Jizya, in Greece we had the "haraç" (charatsi). It was a form of land tax imposed by the Muslim Turks on "non-Muslim subjects", from the 15th century until the… https://t.co/G7hWhfqZEq pic.twitter.com/BO4VcEbutv
— Homer Pavlos (@HomerPavlos) March 23, 2026
“.. that’s what investors do: They overreact to good news — and they overreact to bad news. In their minds, the most extreme possibility is always the most likely..”
• 4D Chess: Trump Postpones Destroying Iran’s Power Plants (Pinsker)
On Friday evening, President Donald Trump issued Iran’s mullahs a 48-hour deadline: Open the Strait of Hormuz or say goodbye to your power plants. And then, this morning — just 12 hours before the deadline ended — the president abruptly pulled the plug: But did you notice the timing? Trump delivered the ultimatum on Friday evening, after the U.S. markets had closed for the week. And he canceled his ultimatum on Monday morning, just before the U.S. markets reopened. And the new five-day deadline? Why, it conveniently begins after the U.S. markets close on Friday! None of this was coincidental. Meanwhile, Iran quickly claimed victory:Read more …
🚨 #BREAKING
— IRIB (Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting) (@iribnews_irib) March 23, 2026
Trump, fearing Iran's response, backed down from his 48-hour ultimatum:
'I told the Department of Defense not to carry out any attacks on Iran's energy infrastructure for the time being' https://t.co/XIGrdtIPKEAs NDTV World reported, “After Trump’s No-Strike Decision, Iran Media Bursts Out Laughing at Him”: Trump’s announcement about a five-day window in which the US would hold off on hitting Iranian power plants and related infrastructure was met in Tehran’s media ecosystem with a mix of derision and triumph. Iran media Press TV reported there was no contact for talks with the US, whether direct or indirect. […] Ebrahim Rezaei, spokesperson of the National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, in a post on X said, “Trump and America have backed down again. The field is still charging forward. Another defeat for the devil.” President Trump prides himself on being an elite dealmaker, but deals are only possible when each side covets something different. If all parties want the exact same thing, a compromise is impossible.
At this juncture in the war, the Iranians and the U.S.-Israelis have dramatically different objectives.Iran can’t go toe-to-toe with its foes militarily. It’s outgunned, outmatched, outclassed, outmanned, and overwhelmed. If the war is decided on the battlefield, Iran will lose — and embarrassingly, too. But there’s still one place where it can win: the arena of public opinion. Iran needs PR to decide this war. If the mullahs don’t look strong, tough, and unbeatable, the Iranian people will rise up and overthrow them. Which is why, in their minds, losing the war-war — but winning the PR war — is a perfectly acceptable outcome. After all, the number-one goal of a dictatorship is to retain its power.
President Trump is less concerned with PR than he is with reality. War, by its nature, isn’t won with press releases — but with bullets. Which makes the president’s calculations clear: He needs time to obliterate the last vestiges of the mullahs’ might, annihilate its stormtroopers, crush the regime, and maximize the probability of a successful Iranian uprising. Because if we win the war-war, the PR war will take care of itself. From Trump’s perspective, victory is the only litmus test that matters. But Trump needs a free hand to continue softening the Iranian regime. Yes, his primary battlefield is still the battlefield — but not even the president is immune to public pressure. Domestically, his MAGA base hasn’t left his side:
There's no break in MAGA. Trump's approval with MAGA GOP is literally 100%.
— (((Harry Enten))) (@ForecasterEnten) March 18, 2026
90% of MAGA GOP approve of US military action in Iran.
Those who disapprove of Trump are not MAGA at this point.
Importantly: MAGA makes up the same share of voters as it did when Trump won in 2024. pic.twitter.com/LqMRHm8t1BYet among independents and Democrats, the war is dreadfully unpopular — with its biggest potential pain points coming from surging oil prices and/or a stock market collapse: Had Trump stuck to his 48-hour deadline — which would’ve elapsed AFTER the close of U.S. markets on Monday evening — panicked investors would’ve braced for the worst when trading began at 9:30 a.m., triggering a self-fulfilling prophecy of economic Armageddon. They would’ve anticipated oil shortages, starving civilians, mass migrations, and global chaos, because that’s what investors do: They overreact to good news — and they overreact to bad news. In their minds, the most extreme possibility is always the most likely. (It’s simply their psychology.) This means that Monday, March 23, would’ve been an absolute financial bloodbath — an even blacker Black Monday.
It’ll be ugly. But how ugly?
• IEA Head Warns Iran War Sparked Energy Crisis Worse Than 1970s (ZH)
The head of the International Energy Agency intensified his apocalyptic warning about the global energy crisis, stating early Monday that the US-Israel war with Iran has sparked a shock far greater than the twin oil crises of the 1970s and the turmoil from the war in Ukraine combined.US-Israeli Operation Epic Fury has entered its fourth week, and emerging from the fog of war is the understanding that 44 energy assets across the Gulf region have been severely or very severely damaged by either U.S. and allied forces or by Iranian forces, according to IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol, who spoke at a media event in Australia on Monday. “This crisis, as things stand, is now two oil crises and one gas crash put all together,” Birol warned at the National Press Club of Australia in Canberra.Read more …
So far, the conflict has removed 11 million barrels of oil per day from global supply, which is more than the two prior oil shocks combined. There are concerns that repairs to QatarEnergy’s damaged LNG facility could take up to five years, while the disruption to energy flows has sparked a fuel crisis across Asia and is set to affect fertilizer and food supplies, as well as helium, potentially jeopardizing AI chip production.”The global economy is facing a major, major threat today, and I very much hope that this issue will be resolved as soon as possible,” Birol said.As of 0710 ET, Brent crude futures plunged 11% on President Trump’s Truth Social desesclation comments – a sign the administration needs an offramp to avoid a further energy crisis globally, but more importantly, one at home with fuel prices at the pump exploding higher. Overnight, President Trump gave Iran a 48-hour ultimatum to reopen the Hormuz chokepoint or face a bombing campaign targeting Iran’s power plants. There were reports overnight that the Trump administration was preparing a diplomatic off-ramp plan, but Iran says the expanding war has effectively shut the door.
Betting website Polymarket shows that ten new wallets are betting $160,000 on a U.S.-Iran ceasefire by the end of March. “Almost no history, all created around the same time. Potential payout: over $1,000,000,” the Polymarket History account wrote on X.
🚨 NEW SUSPICIOUS WALLETS
— PolymarketHistory (@PolymarketStory) March 22, 2026
10 fresh wallets just loaded over $160,000
on a ceasefire by end of March
Almost no history
all created around the same time
Potential payout: over $1,000,000 https://t.co/QvC48Md5iD pic.twitter.com/XzwBBLyBXzOn Friday, Birol told the Financial Times in an exclusive interview that the world is severely underestimating the scale of the Gulf energy shock and that it may take at least six months to restore disrupted oil and gas flows. “It will be six months for some [sites] to be operational, others much longer,” Birol warned.
“..accepting there is a psychological component to the information flow, it seems like the best option to listen to the experts who are conducting the operation.”
• CENTCOM Commander Admiral Brad Cooper Gives Update and Overview Interview (CTH)
The noise can seem overwhelming at times. There are those who say the U.S-Israeli joint military operation against Iran is a catastrophic miscalculation. There are those who say the operation is strategically succeeding. Many interests even appear to be cheering for the military operation to fail; others want the operation to escalate. It is difficult to find pragmatic facts about the events without shaped information to promote specific narratives. However, accepting there is a psychological component to the information flow, it seems like the best option to listen to the experts who are conducting the operation.Read more …
Giving his first interview since Operation Epic Fury began, CENTCOM Commander Bradley Cooper outlines the current status of the conflict and the elements he notes are of most importance. According to Adm. Cooper, Iran is “operating in a sign of desperation… In the last couple of weeks, they’ve attacked civilian targets very deliberately, more than 300 times.” “The Strait of Hormuz is physically open to transit,” he said. “The reason ships are not transiting right now is because the Islamic Republic is shooting at them with drones and missiles.”“I’d like everyone to note is I’ve watched this over the last week, this extraordinary contrast between the comfort and protection that you’re seeing with the senior generals in the Islamic Republic, at least those that are still alive, who are up in deep bunkers and facilities in and around Tehran. And contrast that with the soldiers who are down on the ground who are unprotected. The generals are protected. The soldiers are not protected.” “They’re launching missiles and drones from populated areas and you need to stay inside for right now,” he said. “There will be a clear signal at some point, as the President has indicated, for you to be able to come out.”
Iran against the Arab world?
• Saudi Arabia Expels Iranian Diplomats (RT)
Saudi Arabia has expelled several Iranian diplomats, citing Tehran’s strikes on its territory. The move comes after 12 Arab and Muslim countries, including those hosting US bases, denounced the Islamic Republic’s retaliation for the US-Israeli bombardment that began on February 28. On Saturday, the Saudi Foreign Ministry condemned what it described as Iran’s “blatant and repeated attacks targeting Saudi Arabia” and other Gulf countries, accusing Tehran of violating international law and the “principles of good neighborliness.” “Saudi Arabia has formally notified the Iranian military attaché, assistant military attaché, and three other embassy staff members to leave the kingdom within 24 hours,” the statement read, as quoted by the Saudi Gazette.Read more …
‘The kingdom will take all necessary measures to protect its sovereignty, security, territory, airspace, citizens, residents, and national interests, in accordance with Article 51 of the UN Charter,” the ministry said, warning of “serious consequences” for diplomatic relations between the two countries. The announcement follows a similar move by Qatar, which expelled Iranian military and security attachés, along with their staff, in response to a strike on an LNG facility at Ras Laffan Industrial City, one of the world’s most important gas processing and export centers. Iran targeted Ras Laffan in response to Israeli airstrikes on the South Pars gas field, which were also condemned by the Gulf states. Iran has also repeatedly targeted Prince Sultan Air Base in Al Kharj, Saudi Arabia, which hosts American troops.Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Tehran was targeting US military sites in the region in self-defense. He also claimed that the United States had used UAE territory during the recent bombing of Kharg Island. Tehran has warned that retaliation will continue for as long as Arab states allow the US to use their territory for attacks on the Islamic Republic. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian earlier apologized to the Gulf states for striking civilian infrastructure with missiles and drones.
“This is Hitler’s last days with Persian characteristics.” —LH Grey on X
• Lights Out? (James Howard Kunstler)
It’s not only darkest before the dawn, but the groupthink is murkiest, and the light at the end of the tunnel might be an explosion up your wazoo. Iran’s increasingly headless Revolutionary Guard (the IRGC) whirls in its gyre of martyrdom as the last traps are sprung under it. Tell the wide-eyed houris of paradise to primp for a fresh harvest of true believers.Looks like Mr. Trump is not chickening-out, as his detractors like to insist. Looks like somebody is already turning off the juice around Tehran, likely the Israeils. It will be very hard soon enough for the headless IRGC to tell its body of psycho-killers what to do.Read more …
Individual units are probably on their own now, anyway, wondering what the other units might be doing. . . might be thinking, while also, about now, the sore-beset, long-suffering, good-and-goshdarn pissed off, ordinary Persians will discover that nobody’s in charge, and maybe, at long last, it’s their turn to act, as the lights flicker out. On the ground, in the apartments, the cafes, the offices, the grand bazaars of Tehran, Isfahan, Tabriz, and Shiraz life has already gotten super-impossible. Whatever’s left of the government just issued banknotes in the denomination of ten million rials, worth seven US dollars.Everybody there has plenty of money. Everyone is a millionaire, but they won’t be swanning around Fereshteh Street in top hats and monocles, shopping for Hermès, Louis Vuitton, and Rolex. In actuality, nothing can function normally anymore when the currency is absolutely worthless, including the regular distribution of food and fuel, and you know from history that revolution is always only nine missing meals away. Something will have to give.
The American news media, especially The New York Times, remains implacably peevish over Operation Epic Fury. The news media remains locked in its own epic fury at Mr. Trump running the executive branch, because, uh, why? The tweets! The mystifying hair-do! The gold filigree plastered around the Oval Office! Ucchhh. . . ! It drives them batshit. They want the Iran op to fail because then Mr. Trump will fail. . . and then. . .? And then. . . ? You detect that maybe they haven’t thought that through exactly.
Perhaps the news media believe it’s unfair to deprive the Islamic State of a nuclear bomb and its arsenal of missiles and drones. (It can’t be that the news media are anti-war because they continue to be one hundred percent behind the Ukraine war.) They don’t want that to end anytime soon because, uh, well, Russia!) In reality, the news media abhors decisive action and especially any change in the geopolitical status quo, and super-especially one that inch-by-inch reveals that the USA has interests that actually intersect with the interests of post-soviet Russia.
Like preserving Western Civ. Unlike the poufs, cucks, and bozos running Euroland who are busy throwing two thousand years of history under the wheels of Jihad, and racing with eyes-wide-shut into a neo-medieval future without heat, lights, industry, art, or square meals. Europe — Great Britain in particular — yearns for an epoch-ending spasm of war against Russia because. . .uh. . . because Putin (like, because Trump). You understand they are completely incapable of prosecuting such a war, since they lack armies, navies, and sufficient weapons, but they can’t stop nattering about it.
The US news media can’t accept the possibility that the US Military is proceeding systematically and by clear stages to disarm the IRGC crazies. What has the IRGC got left? Apparently, they have missile launchers embedded in urban neighborhoods, the old human shield routine, same as Hamas and Hezbollah. And spidey-hole missile silos in the desert, supposedly hard to detect beneath the shifting sands. Not to mention the “underground cities” as much as 500 meters deep where missiles and drones are made and stored. They are core parts of Iran’s military architecture. We know where most of them are. Let’s see how they work if the electricity goes out across Iran. Do they all have backup generators and diesel fuel to keep the generators running more than a few days?
“We’re using a playbook that in a slightly different form was used in 1964 to overcome a cloture gap of thirty-two votes..”
• Are We On the Verge of a Breakthrough on the SAVE America Act? (Matt Margolis)
I’ve been admittedly skeptical that the current effort to pass the SAVE America Act will succeed. I want it to pass. Desperately. And from where I sit, there’s no reason why it shouldn’t pass. But we all know why something so popular and commonsense can’t get to President Donald Trump’s desk for his signature. Democrats in Congress don’t want election integrity and are fighting against it like their power is on the line. Despite my skepticism, Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah), the lead sponsor of the bill, is confident the SAVE America Act is going to pass — and after just six days of debate, Democrats may already be looking for a way out.Read more …
As you know, the bill does two things. It requires proof of citizenship when registering to vote and a voter ID when casting a ballot. Polls repeatedly show that Americans overwhelmingly support these ideas, regardless of political party or race. And Sen. Lee knows it, too. “Americans overwhelmingly believe that voters in the United States, you need to be US citizens,” Lee said. “So our bill does two things in order to make it easy to vote and hard to cheat.”The fight right now isn’t really about the merits. Let’s be honest about that. It’s about the Senate’s cloture threshold, the 60-vote supermajority needed to end debate and move to a final vote. Republicans don’t have those numbers on their own, which means they need Democrats to break ranks.Lee’s strategy is to make them do exactly that, and he’s drawing on a historical playbook to get it done.”We’re using a playbook that in a slightly different form was used in 1964 to overcome a cloture gap of thirty-two votes,” Lee said, referring to the landmark Civil Rights Act debate. Back then, the Senate debated for sixty days before enough votes materialized to close debate. Today’s cloture deficit is far smaller. “We’ve got only a ten-vote cloture deficit to overcome here,” Lee noted. “This is a simpler bill, and it’s preferred by eighty-five percent of American voters.”
The math is encouraging, but Lee argues that the process takes time — and that’s entirely the point. Lee described how sustained debate wears members down and eventually forces movement. “Members grow exhausted over time, and with that exhaustion, we’ll find ways of achieving consensus, perhaps some minor modifications to the legislation, either face-saving or to alleviate substantive concerns,” he said. “We can get there. This will pass if we give it enough time.” He was careful not to overpromise a timeline. “I don’t know exactly how many weeks, just as they didn’t know when they started the process in 1964,” Lee acknowledged. But he added quickly: “I don’t think it’ll take that long.”
According to Lee, the early signs are apparently promising. After only six days on the floor, he says Democrats are reportedly already hunting for an exit, which tells you something about the political pressure building around this vote. The only secret to passing the SAVE America Act, Lee says, is time and willpower. Six days in, it looks like the willpower is holding — and the clock is doing the rest of the work.
The only secret to passing the SAVE America Act is time and willpower.
— Mike Lee (@SenMikeLee) March 22, 2026
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed after a 72 day filibuster.
After only 6 days on the Senate floor, Democrats are already looking for an exit.
Don’t let up. pic.twitter.com/5aICF4aa0R
Withheld them from Trump, that is.
• Intel Board To Probe If Spy Agencies Withheld China Election Secrets (JTN)
The civilian board that oversees America’s spy agencies will probe whether political bias kept intelligence analysts from sharing with Congress and President Donald Trump evidence that China meddled in elections dating to 2020, its chairman says after an explosive report by Just the News “We ran a decade-long investigation in the Congress into China, and so this new bombshell that you just dropped is very concerning to me, and it should be to the Congress,” President’s Intelligence Advisory Board Chairman Devin Nunes told the Just the News, No Noise television show.Read more …
“This information was likely around in 2019, probably in 2020. I don’t know. We’re going to have to unpack this and figure out why this didn’t get to the Congress and why this didn’t get out to the American public,” Nunes said. Nunes, a former chairman of the House Intelligence Committee before he left Congress to run the company that operates President Donald Trump’s Truth Social platform, added: “Clearly, this is a scandal that’s brewing.” Nunes was named last year by Trump to lead the PIAB, a nonpartisan body made up of distinguished civilians from the national security, political, academic, and private sectors charged with independently overseeing the Intelligence Community’s day-to-day management or operational responsibilities.Just the News earlier this week disclosed declassified documents showing Chinese intelligence gained access to multiple states’ voter registration data in 2020 and conducted some voter influence efforts but chose to keep that intelligence quiet because spy agency analysts opposed Trump and his policies, even deriding the president as “that vulgarian in the Oval Office.”Similar revelations in 2024 that China hacked Great Britain’s voter registration database led to a national outcry and reforms in that country. But in America, most policymakers have been kept in the dark. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations Subcommittee Chairman Ron Johnson, R-Wis., called on Trump this week to declassify and release all evidence related to China’s meddling from 2020 forward.
Nunes said a review of what happened with the China meddling allegations was directly aligned with the board’s current mandates. “We’ve been working directly with the CIA to depoliticize all of these agencies. President Trump gave us clear direction that he wants the politicization taken out of these intelligence products,” Nunes explained. The board’s effort recently prompted CIA Director John Ratcliffe to rescind or revise 19 intelligence reports the agency produced dating back to the Obama era because they were politically biased or used poor spy tradecraft, including one analysis suggesting that women who pursue traditional motherhood were at danger of becoming violent extremists.
“I think this is just the start of Director Ratcliffe trying to clean up the CIA,” he said. “Obviously, we’re here to help. We’re held here to help all the agencies as Chair of the President’s intelligence board, and we’ll continue to do that.” Nunes said the declassified documents uncovered by Just the News on the China election meddling were deeply concerning because “if you don’t have the — if you want to call it the truth transparency — real intelligence agencies getting the information to the policymakers and the decision makers, it’s a major problem.”
We need to see indictments. You can’t just let these people walk.
• Truth Will Out: A Grand Jury Investigates the Real Russian Collusion Conspiracy (Turley)
This week, we learned that the probe into the Russian conspiracy theory in Florida is moving forward with the disclosure that former FBI Director James Comey has been subpoenaed. What is different in this probe is that it is pursuing the real Russia conspiracy — the creation of a false narrative to kneecap the first Trump administration. At issue is what could be the greatest political hit job in history. Of course, the growing evidence of this conspiracy continues to be buried by one of its key components: the media. Nevertheless, the “truth will out,” and it appears to be coming out in Florida.Read more …
Headed by Jason A. Reding Quiñones, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Florida, the investigation is building on information uncovered by House and Senate committees that was long buried by the Biden administration. That evidence appears to show a knowing effort to manufacture a Russian conspiracy hoax at the urging of Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign. Ironically, the Washington Post and the New York Times received Pulitzer Prizes for their reporting promoting this Russian conspiracy hoax. The media spent years in wall-to-wall coverage of disproven allegations, including many claims made in the debunked Steele Dossier that had been secretly funded by the Clinton campaign.The true Pulitzer Prize-worthy story was staring the media in the face the whole time: a conspiracy to create a false conspiracy narrative to elect Clinton and later to derail the Trump administration. The latter effort succeeded with help from top intelligence figures. During the election, the Clinton campaign repeatedly lied to the media about its funding of the Steele dossier. When journalists discovered after the election that the Clinton campaign had hidden payments for the Steele dossier as “legal fees” among the $5.6 million paid to Perkins Coie, they were reportedly stonewalled.
New York Times reporter Ken Vogel said at the time that Clinton Campaign General Counsel Marc Elias had denied involvement in the anti-Trump dossier. When Vogel tried to report the story, he said, Elias “pushed back vigorously, saying ‘You (or your sources) are wrong.’” Times reporter Maggie Haberman later wrote that “Folks involved in funding this lied about it, and with sanctimony, for a year.” The key period was shortly before the 2016 election. We now know that the campaign and its surrogates shopped the conspiracy to their contacts in the Justice Department and in the media. They found eager allies.
Shortly before the 2016 presidential election, Peter Strzok, a key figure in the investigation, texted FBI lawyer Lisa Page to assure her “that there’s no way [Trump] gets elected,” adding that they “can’t take that risk.” He added that they had it all in hand because “It’s like an insurance policy in the unlikely event you die before you’re 40.” In fact, whether it was known to Strzok or not, there was an insurance policy in the works. In July 2016, then-CIA Director John Brennan briefed President Barack Obama on Hillary Clinton’s alleged “plan” to tie then-candidate Donald Trump to Russia as “a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server.” Brennan is believed to be a target of the current investigation, including possible perjury before Congress.
In reality, within days of that briefing on how Clinton would create this conspiracy theory, the investigation began, just as the Clinton campaign hoped it would. Early on, the FBI was told by the CIA that its sources — and the Steele dossier — were unreliable. However, key FBI officials continued the surveillance and the investigation targeting the Trump campaign and key figures. One official later pleaded guilty to lying to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court to continue surveillance without an evidentiary basis.
At the end of 2016, a CIA assessment found that “Russian and criminal actors did not impact recent U.S. election results by conducting malicious cyber activities against election infrastructure.” That presidential daily brief was scheduled to be published on Dec. 9, 2016, but the office of James Clapper, Obama’s Director of National Intelligence, reportedly stopped the publication “based on some new guidance.” Clapper later joined Obama, along with John Brennan, Susan Rice, John Kerry, Loretta Lynch, Andrew McCabe, and others, in a meeting that would ultimately inject the debunked theory directly into the media.
“..CNN needs to build a narrative, so the reality of simple explanations works against their interests.”
• Tom Homan: How Immigration and Customs Enforcement Can Supplement TSA (CTH)
Apparently, CNN needs to play the game of pretending that Customs and Border Protection (CBP) as well as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) do not already operate in U.S. airports. Airports are border checkpoints, and the “customs” part of both ICE and CBP are functions that happen as part of regular duty for CBP and ICE officials.As Tom Homan notes, CBP/ICE already exist in airports and can assist Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officials in various duties including, customs checks, routine security, entrance/exit security as well as baggage and pre-boarding security checkpoints that do not involve the use of x-ray and scanning machines. In fact, more than half the functioning work of TSA agents can easily be handled/supported by ICE/CBP agents. But CNN needs to build a narrative, so the reality of simple explanations works against their interests.Read more …
Too late. “..900,000 Moroccan nationals were living in Spain in 2024..” “What is now causing alarm is not just the scale, but the potential for political mobilization.”
• Alarm Bells In Spain As Moroccan Diaspora Seeks Political Mobilization (RMX)
Spain is facing mounting concern over the long-term consequences of years of large-scale Moroccan migration, as warnings grow that a sizable and increasingly organized community could begin to exert coordinated political influence. Official figures cited by La Región show that nearly 900,000 Moroccan nationals were living in Spain in 2024, making them the largest Muslim group in the country. More than 226,000 are concentrated in Catalonia, with numbers continuing to rise sharply. What is now causing alarm is not just the scale, but the potential for political mobilization.Read more …
The Spanish news outlet referenced a 2023 speech by Enaam Mayara, then-president of the Moroccan parliament’s upper chamber, in which he openly called on Moroccans living in Spain to enter politics, join parties, and take part in elections. His goal was clear: to build influence inside Spanish institutions and defend Moroccan national interests from within. “The community in our northern neighbor should be encouraged to participate in that country’s political process,” Mayara said. “Members of the Moroccan community should be encouraged to become members of parliament in the country of their nationality in order to defend the interests of their homeland whenever necessary.” “The Moroccan community must integrate into Spanish political parties to form a lobby that defends Morocco,” he added.The comments sparked fears that what began as migration could evolve into coordinated political leverage. More recently, Morocco has moved to strengthen its grip on diaspora identity through education. Earlier this month, in response to the suspension of the Arabic language and Moroccan culture program in the Spanish regions of Madrid and Murcia, Moroccan Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita called for reforms to overseas teaching programs that could trigger a “qualitative transformation” in how Arabic language and Moroccan culture are taught to children living abroad.
The changes will place greater responsibility for diaspora education under a new institutional structure, with a focus on expanding cultural and linguistic ties between Morocco and its citizens overseas. The push comes as Moroccan-funded programs are already deeply embedded in Spain’s education system. Hundreds of schools across the country offer Arabic language and Moroccan culture classes financed by Rabat, with teachers selected and paid by Moroccan authorities.
Essentially, they’re being called extreme right wing because they don’t want to live in a muslim country.
• French Election: Le Pen’s Populists Make Historic Local Gains (ZH)
Marine Le Pen’s National Rally delivered its strongest performance ever in French local elections on Sunday, capturing dozens of municipalities and installing an ally as mayor of Nice – while socialists predictably held onto key urban centers, including Paris, Marseille, Lyon and Lille. The results of the second-round municipal vote on Sunday mark the clearest sign yet that the populist party is no longer a protest movement but a genuine governing force in parts of France – and a growing threat to President Emmanuel Macron’s centrists and the traditional right ahead of the 2027 presidential election.Read more …
Jordan Bardella, the 30-year-old RN president widely seen as the party’s next presidential standard-bearer, hailed the night as “the greatest breakthrough in its entire history.” Speaking to cheering supporters, he said voters had delivered “a message of deep aspiration for change.”Marine Le Pen, still battling a conviction that could bar her from running in 2027, struck a similar note: the party is now “implanted everywhere” and ready to govern.
🚨BREAKING: Thousands are gathering in Nice, France now to celebrate the unprecedented victory of the RN/UDR nationalist candidate Éric Ciotti
— Inevitable West (@Inevitablewest) March 22, 2026
HOPE is restored to the French! ⚜️ pic.twitter.com/qOVd10cyjFhigh-stakes runoffs in Marseille, Toulon and Nîmes after left-wing and center-right candidates formed tactical alliances against it. In Paris and other major cities, the party remained marginal.The party did secure one major symbolic prize: former Les Républicains leader Éric Ciotti, who defected to the RN orbit, won the mayor’s office in Nice, France’s fifth-largest city.
“.. the European Commission has many tools and techniques to shift the outcome. This single small Hungarian election is the most critical election for the EU since Brexit. There are trillions at stake!”
• Major Gains for Germany’s AfD Nationalist Party (CTH)
Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s conservative party the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) won the biggest portion of the election, defeating the Social Democratic Party (SPD) who lost ground in the western area bordering France. However, the biggest electoral gains were for the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, with gains that more than doubled its previous vote share. There is intense interest throughout Europe on the ideological shift in political sentiment mostly driven by economic concerns as well as rising nationalistic sentiment against the elitist minds in Brussels. Essentially those being ‘ruled’ are increasingly fed-up by those doing the ‘ruling.’Read more …
The AfD party is akin to the pragmatic MAGA base more focused on economic nationalism than all the nonsense associated with multiculturalism, green energy programs and terrible immigration policy. The ideological battle within Europe is ongoing, with some gains by nationalist parties over the collective mindset of the European elites. However, the European Commission doesn’t just have a finger on the scales, they have full control over the mechanics of the elections themselves. Yes, AfD doubled their share of votes to 20%, but CDU at 31% and the socialists at 26% is akin to mainstream corporate republicans and progressives respectively controlling 57% of the support base.The biggest election to be held in Europe in the last decade or more, is going to be the election in Hungary which takes place April 12, next month. The European Commission is going all-in to try and manipulate the Hungarian voting base against Prime Minister Viktor Orban and the Fidesz party who is/are viewed by Brussels as standing in the way of their scheme to fund the ongoing war in Ukraine. Orban’s reelection campaign has been under relentless assaults from restrictions on EU social media, to outright propaganda and financing for his opposition Péter Magyar and the Tisza party.
Prime Minister Orban is strongly supported by President Donald Trump and the Trump administration; however, the scale of opposition to both of them is intense. Former leftist USAID Administrator Samantha Power spent time inside Hungary organizing the Tisza party to oppose Viktor Orban, and the totality of the European opposition to Orban cannot be underestimated. Every element of every political construct within the Europe Union is aligned to try and defeat Orban and the Fidesz party. Additionally, the government of Ukraine is actively working all intelligence angles to defeat Orban due to the $90 billion EU loan scheme that Hungary is blocking. Prime Minister Viktor Orban winning reelection this time in 2026 would be akin to Trump’s victory in 2016.
Do not underestimate the power of the U.K/European control system and the alignment of all their collective interests. Chancellor Fredrich Merz (Germany), President Emmanuel Macron (France), Prime Minister Keir Starmer (UK) along with the governing elites of Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Austria, Switzerland, Netherlands and many more, have all publicly taken positions against Hungary. As we saw in Romania, Moldova and Georgia, it is not simply a matter of what the Hungarian voters want that will determine the outcome of the Hungarian election, the European Commission has many tools and techniques to shift the outcome. This single small Hungarian election is the most critical election for the EU since Brexit. There are trillions at stake!
“..a good example of the failure of international law, which is one way to describe a fire while refusing to notice that you’re actually holding a fire extinguisher.”
• Western Europe Wrestles With Its Daddy Issues (Rachel Marsden)
NATO is supposed to be a defensive alliance. That means members aren’t actually obligated to go bail out a member state that goes around the world punching other countries in the face. Easy mistake to make from the optics of other recent conflicts, though, where the term “defensive” has been doing a lot of impressive rhetorical gymnastics.Read more …US President Donald Trump hasn’t been able to talk his ‘allies’ into coming along for the white-knuckle adventure this time. Largely because he threatened to invade Europe – specifically Greenland – barely weeks before asking for their help to do the same to another country. Apparently, they took his threat so seriously that they were getting ready to beat him to the punch by blowing up their own airfields first, according to the New York Times.
Before Trump just decided to go it alone and threaten to fix the global energy problem in the Strait of Hormuz by also blowing up a bunch of power plants in the region, he got to the “who needs these losers anyway” stage with Western Europe. Let’s see… Starmer is no Churchill, Trump says. Sick burn, if it were still 1940 and not just a guy declining participation in your dodgy group project. French participation doesn’t even really count, Trump says, because President Emmanuel Macron will be gone soon. Like a sitcom character whose hand is on the knob with one foot out the door in every scene.But here in the real world, Macron is actually still the president of France for another year. And it’s not like anyone who could possibly replace him would be up for this political suicide mission that Trump’s proposing, either. Hardly a day goes by without French military brass appearing on TV, either telling Trump to go “f himself” or else comparing his invitation to something along the lines of buying tickets for the Titanic after it hit the iceberg.
The Irish president should just be grateful for Trump’s mere existence, he says. Who isn’t at this point, right? One day Trump’s telling all the NATO allies to just get in the van already. The van’s on fire, but minor detail. And they’re like, no thanks. Not interested in careening down regime change highway with Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu like a scene out of Mad Max.
So at first Trump tries to make it sound like it’s for their own benefit to go send their own troops to hangout in the Strait of Hormuz where missiles are flying around. Because they’re the ones who largely use the oil that normally transits through it when Iran hasn’t closed it because Trump and Bibi started bombing them. A phenomenon that does tend to complicate shipping schedules.
Probably doesn’t help either that Europe already had the experience of volunteering to do the heavy lifting for Washington just so an American president, Barack Obama, could brag to his people that America did a regime change without a single pair of boots on the ground. Right, because there were covert, European boots on the ground. In Libya. Led by the Brits and French, back in 2011. And that turned into a years-long mess for Europe and a migrant tsunami that kept rolling in long after the “mission accomplished” energy had worn off. So it’s no wonder that some of those 15 NATO countries that helped out in Libya aren’t up for a rerun. Once you’ve helped a friend move and it turns into a ten-year renovation project, the next time they call you just let it ring.
So Europe is banking on riding out the fuel disruption instead of prolonging it by getting involved with the risk of provoking an escalation. Unless of course the missiles stop flying. In which case, Macron will be there in a jiffy to film more heavily militarized thirst trap videos.n It’s one thing to not participate, but what are they actually doing to stop it, besides issuing strongly worded statements that reek of déjà vu?
The bloc’s chief diplomat says that it’s all such a good example of the failure of international law, which is one way to describe a fire while refusing to notice that you’re actually holding a fire extinguisher. Conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East “are products of erosion of the international law without accountability, judicial or political, the war will engulf the world once again,” Kaja Kallas said.nGotta love the passive verbiage doing the heavy lifting there. Really lets everyone off the hook. Yeah, international law just eroded on Iran. How did that happen? All by itself? Or because no one can bother actually trying to enforce it when it’s inconvenient because it involves the risk of eliciting the wrath of Daddy Trump?
She has no problem comparing the conflicts in Ukraine and Iran except in failing to notice that that one has involved like 20 packages of EU sanctions and the other zero. Or to notice that their favorite foster kid has been begging Trump to let him come play drone warfare in this war with the toys that they’ve been buying for him with money from the same EU taxpayers who are now being gauged on energy prices yet again as a result of this new war. The same war that the EU says violates international law.
Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky has said that he’s psyched to get over there and play in the sandbox with all his shiny new drones – which is one way to pitch the escalation that the EU says it doesn’t want. And the EU’s like, can’t you see – he’s really hurting here! “The longer the war continues in the Middle East, the more Ukraine suffers,” Kallas said. I’m really trying to lean into this whole Ukraine x Iran crossover. “I mean, Russia is already making money off the war in the Middle East with higher oil prices and the Strait of Hormuz closed, they can now again fund the war.”
Try telling that to your boy, Zelensky. Does he know that offering to help prolong the war with his drones would just be making Putin more money? But really, why should he even care when the EU keeps insisting on having their citizens pay for it all anyway.
He made them rich, but it’s still not enough.
• Jury Finds Musk Liable to Twitter Shareholders in Lawsuit (ET)
A federal jury on March 20 found tech billionaire Elon Musk liable for misleading Twitter shareholders by driving down the social media platform’s stock price months before acquiring it for $44 billion in 2022. The decision follows a civil class action lawsuit filed by Twitter investors in October 2022. Musk agreed to buy Twitter at $54.20 per share in April 2022 but later tried to back out of the deal, leading the company to take legal action to enforce it. He ultimately completed the acquisition in October 2022 and rebranded Twitter as X. The shareholders alleged that Musk made misleading statements after agreeing to buy Twitter in April 2022, leading them to sell their shares. They alleged that he published the statements to drive down Twitter stock prices in a bid to renegotiate the deal.Read more …
In a verdict on March 20, jurors found Musk liable for misleading investors through two social media posts. The first post said the deal was temporarily on hold pending verification that bots accounted for less than 5 percent of users on the social media platform. In the second post, Musk suggested that the percentage of bots could exceed 20 percent and said the buyout of Twitter could not go forward until he received confirmation that it was less than 5 percent. However, the jury found that the plaintiffs failed to substantiate claims that Musk had engaged in a scheme to defraud investors. The plaintiffs attorney, Mark Molumphy, called the verdict an important victory for both Twitter investors and the public markets.“I think the jury’s verdict sends a strong message that just because you’re a rich and powerful person, you still have to obey the law, and no man is above the law, Molumphy told The Associated Press.Musk’s legal team at Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan said in a statement to multiple news outlets that they plan to appeal the verdict. “We view today’s verdict, where the jury found both for and against the plaintiffs and found no fraud scheme, as a bump in the road. And we look forward to vindication on appeal,” his legal counsel said.
Musk also faces a lawsuit from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which alleges that he violated federal securities laws by delaying disclosure of his acquisition of Twitter stock in March 2022, before making an offer to buy the company. The SEC said the delay had allowed Musk to buy more shares at lower prices, allowing him to “underpay by at least $150 million for shares that he purchased after his beneficial ownership report was due,” according to the January 2025 filing. Musk has sought dismissal of the suit.
https://twitter.com/PM_ViktorOrban/status/2036091858829316542?s=20That will be one hell of a building! https://t.co/rCN0TwAlea
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 23, 2026
Kyiv ranked third in Europe for Bentley sales, – regional Director of the company, Richard Leopold.
— Diana Panchenko 🇺🇦 (@Panchenko_X) March 23, 2026
The average price of a Bentley starts at $400.000.
After Europe gives Zelenskyy another 90 billion, there's every chance of taking first place. pic.twitter.com/6SUOxvm7Wp
Discover how long different birds can fly
— Science girl (@sciencegirl) March 23, 2026
pic.twitter.com/xo6ii3MNKl
Overmorrow: the English word for the day after tomorrow pic.twitter.com/eIrwNpAGCn
— English Grammar (@GrammarUpdates) March 23, 2026
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