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Debt Rattle May 2 2026

May 022026
 
 May 2, 2026  Posted by at 9:20 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , ,  Add comments


Johannes Vermeer The girl with the wine glass (Dame en twee heren) 1659


• Trump Issues Letter Rejecting Congressional Oversight For War (ZH)
• Trump’s ‘Assurances’ To Americans as GOP Members Start to Scramble (ZH)
• Iran’s Brutal Test Of Endurance (ZH)
• Indictment-O-Rama (James Howard Kunstler)
• The Comey Memos and the Appointment of Robert Mueller (CTH)
• Another DOJ Investigative Case Against James Comey Happening in Virgina (CTH)
• James Comey Knew EXACTLY What ‘86 47’ Meant (Robert Spencer)
• New Footage of Trump Assassination Attempt Released (Matt Margolis)
• The Real Reason the Democrats Hate President Trump’s Ballroom (Tim O’Brien)
• Remember That Half the Country Once Hated Lincoln (Stephen Kruiser)
• House Ends 76-Day Shutdown (Sarah Anderson)
• Hakeem Jeffries Denounces the Supreme Court as “Illegitimate” (Turley)

 


 

https://twitter.com/BoLoudon/status/2049927123083657272?s=20

 


 


Does a president need to ask permission for a ceasefire?

• Trump Issues Letter Rejecting Congressional Oversight For War (ZH)

Trump Letter: Doesn’t Need Congressional Approval As Ceasefire Has ‘Terminated’ Conflict


In an acknowledgement that his anti-Iran Operation Epic Fury has indeed hit 60 days, President Trump has issued a formal letter to Congress which argues he does not need their authorization for war. He is arguing the current ceasefire has in effect ‘terminated’ the conflict. Below are his main points via NBC [emphasis by ZH]:

• “On April 7, 2026, I ordered a two-week ceasefire. The ceasefire has since been extended. There has been no exchange of fire between the United States Forces and Iran since April 7, 2026. The hostilities that began on February 28, 2026, have terminated,” Trump wrote in the letters, one of which went to the House and one of which went to the Senate.

• “Despite the success of United States operations against the Iranian regime and continued efforts to secure a lasting peace, the threat posed by Iran to the United States and our Armed Forces remains significant,” the president added in the letter, promising to keep congressional leaders updated on further developments in Iran.

• “I have and will continue to direct United States Armed Forces consistent with my responsibilities and pursuant to my constitutional authority to conduct United States foreign relations and as Commander in Chief and Chief Executive,” the president wrote in his letter.

In fresh Friday words to reporters, President Trump says he is not satisfied with the latest proposal from Iran. He further stated that these negotiations “are not getting there right now.”

His main points via Newsquawk:
• Iran wants a deal, but i am not satisfied.
• Iran has no military left.
• Talks with Iran are by phone.
• Made strides in talks with Iran.
• Not sure we are going to get to a deal.
• Not happy with Italy or Spain on Iran.
• Iran leaders do not get along with each other.

Bessent Lists 5 Pressures Iranian ‘Rats’ Facing
US Treasury Secretary Bessent takes to X on Friday to again call Iranian leaders “rats” – which won’t bode well for restarting stalled negotiations. He’s busy boasting on the economic damage unleashed by the ongoing US naval blockade, writing: “It is very difficult for rats in a sewer pipe to know what’s going on in the outside world. Some color for the Iranian Leadership as they literally sit in the dark.” He then lists out the following:

1. The United States has complete control of the Strait of Hormuz.

2. There is a hard currency, i.e. U.S. dollar, shortage.

3. Food and gasoline rationing are in place.

4. The entire international community has turned against you.

5. The BLOCKADE will continue, until there is pre-February 27 Freedom of Navigation.

He also shared a WSJ article proclaiming that the Iranians have ‘failed’ to roll back the US military blockade, and that supposedly the clock is ticking on the government’s ability to rule…

Israel To Renew Bombing if Nuclear Issue Not Dealt With
The Netanyahu government is signaling that it will restart the bombing campaign if the nuclear issue is not resolved. It should also not be forgotten that ‘denuclearizing’ Iran by force has been a multi-decade priority of Prime Minister Netanyahu and the hardliners of Israel. These are the latest warnings out of the Israeli military establishment on Friday: An Israeli military official says that if Iran’s stockpile of more than 400 kilograms of uranium enriched to 60% is not removed from the Islamic Republic, the entire latest war will be considered “one big failure.” Israeli officials have said that this stockpile is sufficient for 11 nuclear bombs.

And the Times of Israel underscores further, “The senior officer says that if, as part of negotiations between the United States and Iran, no agreement is reached to remove the uranium stockpile and halt enrichment in the country, the achievements in the 40 days of fighting will have been for nothing.” So this means that “If the nuclear objective is not achieved, then everything we did in Iran will be one big failure. The evil Iranian regime can pounce on the nuclear program,” the official emphasized. And then the threat…

The officer adds that “if the uranium is removed from Iran through diplomatic means, we have done our part.” However, if that does not happen, Israel would need to launch another operation in Iran to achieve the objective, they say. Already Israel has demonstrated its immense influence over the decision to go to war in the first place.

Read more …

Susan Collins (R-Maine) votes with Adam Schiff. Dump her!

• Trump’s ‘Assurances’ To Americans as GOP Members Start to Scramble (ZH)

The Iran war and Hormuz closure remains a game of geopolitical chicken, where each side believes it can inflict more pain on the other while being the one to outlast. But Iran, while being subject to a years long sanctions regimen and recent large-scale US-Israeli bombing campaign, does not operation on 4-year and 2-year election cycles. With next fall’s midterms staring Congressional Republicans in the face, there this increasingly uncomfortable trend: The average price of one gallon (3.8 litres) of gasoline in the United States has reached $4.30, according to the American Automobile Association (AAA), up from less than $3 before the February 28 start of the US-Israel war on Iran.


President Trump addressed this in fielding questions in the Oval Office on Thursday,telling reporters that gas prices would “drop like a rock” as soon as the Iran war ended. “The [price of] gasoline and the oil will go down rapidly once the war’s over,” he stated confidently – “like a rock,” he added.

However, the war is about to hit 60-days on Friday and America’s overall strategy and timeline remains anything but clear. Instead, Trump is insisting the Iranians have “nothing” in terms of a military, and yet the crisis in global energy remains, and Operation Epic Fury is still on, the extended uneasy ceasefire notwithstanding…

Meanwhile, an interesting argument (below) from Hegseth this week, as Congress is supposed to vote on a formal war authorization once any foreign conflict hits the 60-day mark, per US law. And the first Republican Senator has ‘switched’ and broken ranks with GOP leaders on Trump’s Iran war and Congressional authorization: Centrist Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) on Thursday broke ranks with Republican leaders and most GOP colleagues by voting for a war powers resolution sponsored by Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) to halt military actions against Iran, the first Republican senator to change her position on curtailing President Trump’s military authority.

Rand was over there getting lonely defending the Constitution, but the longer the Iran conflict persists – and Americans feel it at the pump – the more Republican members will likely peel off: Collins joined Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) in voting to advance a resolution to withdraw U.S. military forces from the conflict with Iran unless Congress votes to authorize the use of force. She and Paul voted with most Democrats for a motion to discharge the resolution from the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, but it still failed by a vote of 47 to 50. It marked the sixth time that Senate Republicans have defeated a resolution under the 1973 War Powers Act to halt further military operations against Iran.

Amid chatter that Israel could be preparing for renewed attacks on Iran, and as Trump is said to be mulling more limited strikes – but while at the same time the USS Gerald R Ford is returning to the United States after a record deployment – Iran is signaling it is ready for a long war and can endure the US naval blockade for a long time to come. However, there are also unconfirmed reports out of Pakistan that another draft peace proposal could be presented by Tehran as soon as this weekend. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has newly said Thursday the blockade is effectively an “extension of military operations” by Washington, despite the extended ceasefire declared by Trump.

Also on Thursday, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent signaled that the US administration gameplan seems to be to drive Iran into economic ruin, in hopes of triggering some kind of uprising toward regime change. But this was the exact same ‘prediction’ and gameplan in the opening days of the war – which never materialized. One the one hand his below message on X seems to gloat over imposing widescale misery over the bombed-out country, while on the other claiming to help and support the Iranian people, saying they “deserve a new era”.

As we reported earlier, Iran’s currency on Wednesday collapsed to a record low, plunging to 1.8 million rial per dollar amid the prolonged US-Israel war and uneasy ceasefire, also as surging global energy prices hit the economy. The rial began sliding sharply two days prior to this after weeks of artificial stability. In the early phase of the war that kicked off on February 28, the currency held steady due to a near-total halt in imports and limited market activity.

“We think the price was worth it” vibes…

Read more …

The hardship will be dumped upon the people. Don’t let’s forget they killed some 40.000 of their own people even before the US got involved.

• Iran’s Brutal Test Of Endurance (ZH)

Iran’s economy is undergoing one of the most brutal stress tests in its modern history. Official annual inflation has surged to 50% according to central bank figures released shortly after the ceasefire, while the year-on-year rate reached as high as 67% through mid-April, according to the Wall Street Journal. The rial has crashed to a record low of 1.8 million to the dollar, roughly two million workers have lost their jobs, and the US naval blockade of the Strait of Hormuz continues to throttle the country’s oil exports and critical imports.


Reconstruction costs from bombed infrastructure are estimated near $270 billion – alarmingly close to the country’s entire annual GDP of roughly $341 billion last year. What was already a sanctions-battered, mismanaged economy now confronts a grinding “no war, no peace” stalemate. Tehran is wagering that it can hunker down and endure a protracted war – allowing it to outlast American pressure. The early data and on-the-ground reality suggest that wager is being tested to its limits.

The human impact is immediate and visible in everyday Tehran life. A 56-year-old housewife described to Najmeh Bozorgmehr of the Financial Times how a simple block of cheese rose from 5.2 million rials to 6.7 million rials (about $5.09) in a single week. Comparable jumps have struck rice, eggs, chicken, red meat, and other staples. A popular Peugeot 207 has climbed from 18 billion rials to 25 billion since the conflict began, while officials are preparing to authorize a 40 percent increase in government-mandated cement prices.

The cost of living has soared, with the annual inflation rate reaching 67% in the month through mid-April from the same period a year earlier, according to Iran’s central bank. The subsidized price of red meat, which was mostly imported through sea routes, has gone up to the equivalent of around $3.60 a pound, beyond the reach of most in a country where the minimum wage is around $130 a month. -WSJ

Business consultant Siamak Ghassemi publicly advised Iranians that anything short of a near-doubling of wages would fail to offset the cost-of-living explosion. One small petrochemical-dependent factory outside the capital has already dismissed nearly a third of its workforce. A clothing business owner reported recent costs running 150 percent above sales, bluntly concluding, “This is not sustainable.”

Read more …

“Pam Bondi’s era —which paved the way by restructuring the DOJ and navigating the Epstein disclosures— is over. We’re in the Blanche era now.”—Jeff Childers

Indict-O-Rama rolls lightly off the tomgue. Indictment-O-Rama sounds constructed.

• Indictment-O-Rama (James Howard Kunstler)

You might be pleased to know that today’s May Day street actions — rallies, marches, teach-ins, walkouts, demonstrations, and a broad economic blackout (”No Work, No School, No Shopping”) — planned and coordinated by hundreds of activist orgs, is styling itself as “Workers Over Billionaires.”


How do they figure that, exactly, considering the Lefty-left Resistance movement is entirely funded by. . . billionaires? You know. . . George and Alex Soros (the Open Society Foundations), Neville Roy Singham (the People’s Forum, Code Pink), Hansjörg Wyss (the Wyss Foundation), Reid Hoffman (Forward Majority Action, Crowdpac), Sir Chris Hohn (the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation), Alan Parker (Arabella Advisors, Environmental Law Institute) . . . .

Some 3,000-plus actions are planned today in cities all over the country. Last week, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries framed the Lefty-left’s strategy as “maximum warfare, everywhere, all the time.” Will the party’s foot soldiers do his bidding and get frisky out on the streets today. . . a little lootin’ perhaps. . . a fire here and there? Is May Day, as promised by its sponsors, the gateway into another Summer of Love (mostly peaceful riots)?

We’ll have an idea by day’s end. Meanwhile, the Lefty-left’s business-class lounge, the Democratic Party, has suddenly caught a case of the jim-jams over this week’s 6-3 SCOTUS ruling on the racial gerrymandering of Congressional districts, which is: no more snake-shaped districts through the bayous, cotton fields, pine Islands, palmetto scrubs, and Cypress hammocks of deepest Dixieland for the purpose of creating majority-black seats. Observers forecast the loss of up to nineteen Democratic House members going into the 2028 election. It’s not clear how the Party’s billionaires might be able to fix this.

Also, this week, interesting developments in the Lefty-left’s retirement clubhouse. The law (the DOJ’s Eastern District of North Carolina) finally caught up with Jim Comey’s prank of one year ago when he posted on Instagram a curious arrangement of seashells on a Carolina beach saying “86 47.” The cryptic message — “cool shell formation,” Mr. Comey said in the caption — was universally understood to mean get rid of the forty-seventh POTUS, Donald Trump. Because the former FBI Director was well-versed in mob lingo from prosecuting gangsters, it appears he knew exactly what the code stands for: the instruction to go whack somebody. Hence, the question: was Mr. Comey issuing such an instruction to the Lefty-left rank and file?

Mr. Comey suddenly finds himself in a sort of brand-new crossfire hurricane. Turns out, an investigation (said to be at the “pre grand jury stage”) was launched lately in the DOJ’s Eastern District of Virginia concerning Mr. Comey’s use of a “cut-out” messenger, Columbia U professor and BFF Daniel Richman, for leaking a confidential conversation with President Trump to reporter Michael Schmidt of The New York Times back in 2017. This was Mr. Comey’s notorious disclosure in a Trump Tower consultation with the new president that a video existed of Russian whores peeing on a bed in the Moscow Ritz-Carlton hotel for Mr. Trump’s amusement. It was, of course, a kick-off for the FBI’s totally fake RussiaGate campaign.

It’s also widely expected that the former FBI Director will be one of the many former officials fingered in the DOJ’s RICO case out of the Southern District of Florida. The grand jury is already seated and hearing the evidence in a Fort Pierce federal courthouse. That case is predicated on the chain of legal attacks against Mr. Trump, running back a decade, amounting to an ongoing coup, a comprehensive campaign of legalistic chicanery disguised as legality designed to overthrow the chief executive.

Observers have started trying to pre-bunk the seashell case, saying there are six ways to Sunday that Mr. Comey can explain it away. Don’t be so sure about that. Mainly, what the DOJ has to demonstrate is Mr. Comey’s mens rea (Latin for “guilty mind”), a fundamental concept in criminal law that refers to the mental state or intention a person must have when committing a nefarious act, in order to be held criminally liable. Expect to see bales of written evidence on that.

The beauty of the seashell case is this: It’s quite straightforward and uncomplicated. There might be little room for Mr. Comey’s lawyers to create procedural delays, such as dragging out discovery issues. Which means that in this case Mr. Comey will get exactly the speedy trial that the US Constitution calls for. . . meaning, the courtroom showdown could take place before the midterm election.

Read more …

It’s all one big anti-Trump soup.

• The Comey Memos and the Appointment of Robert Mueller (CTH)

I apologize for the deep weed details, but this stuff will soon become critical. If James Comey is indicted for leaking the “Comey memos” suddenly the door opens wide to see how the Robert Mueller appointment was a coordinated ongoing ‘conspiracy’ effort to target Donald Trump. Back in June 2017 CNN (and other media) filed a FOIA suit to gain the Comey memos. As the lawsuit progressed through a lengthy battle -where the Mueller team did not want to turn over those memos- Mueller’s lead FBI agent, David Archey, made sworn declarations to the court. Those statements became known as the “Archey Declarations”. Inside those declarations agent Archey provided a specific outline of the FBI and the memos.


There are two sets of documents that outline a very specific picture. Robert Mueller’s lead FBI Agent David Archey made sworn declarations to the court. However, at the time of his sworn statement, Archey did not have knowledge of an inside FBI “whistleblower” who provided information to DOJ Inspector General, Michael Horowitz. There is a distinct conflict within the IG Horowitz report on James Comey (and memos) [Available Here] and the David Archey declarations. However, beyond the conflict there’s an even more alarming picture of how Robert Mueller was deployed, when all the information is overlaid in a timeline. A very clear picture emerges; very clear.

Note the date: Agent Archey states the “investigative team” came into full possession of the Comey memos: “on or by May 12th, 2017,”…

The “investigative team” would be Andrew McCabe, Bill Priestap, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, and then James Baker as lead counsel for the group. The “Director’s staff” would be James Rybicki, who is identified by Archey as having “maintained” possession of the memos. This “small group”, particularly Comey’s Chief of Staff, James Rybicki, is the center of the team. This team is also confirmed by the IG Horowitz report. This team had the memos on May 12th, 2017.

Now we move into the aspect where the motives and ideology become clear as we look at the IG custodial record of the memos, as outlined by the Supervisory Special Agent in charge of Comey’s documents within the IG report, compared to the Archey declarations.The FBI Supervisory Special Agent (SSA) in charge of Comey’s document retrieval is the “whistleblower” who eventually went to the IG. I’ll explain why and how below; and to make understanding easier we shall use “SSA Whistleblower” to describe him.On May 10th, the Comey memos were not in Comey’s office [per IG report]. At the time of the search and review of Comey’s office there were no hard copies found by SSA Whistleblower.

Read more …

We should have 100 of these cases. So people can read every day what a piece of crap he is.

• Another DOJ Investigative Case Against James Comey Happening in Virgina (CTH)

In the first case against James Comey for allegedly lying to Congress, there was no dismissal; instead, the judge rejected US Attorney Lindsey Halligan’s involvement. After that, the statute of limitations ran out. However, if the report below is accurate, this would represent the third currently active investigation against former FBI Director James Comey, and Lindsey Halligan might get the last laugh.


The first investigative notice to Comey was in mid-March from the Sunshine State. Essentially the ‘conspiracy case’ being reviewed by Jason A. Reding Quiñones, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Florida The second investigative case was in North Carolina, where a grand jury released an indictment for threats against President Trump. Now, Bloomberg is reporting on a third investigation against Comey for leaking classified documents to his friend and special government employee, Daniel Richman.

BLOOMBERG – […] The investigation is tied to his dissemination of documents to Columbia University Law Professor Daniel Richman, the individuals added. If successful, it would be the Trump DOJ’s third time indicting Comey since last fall. […] It hasn’t been decided if the department will present an indictment to a grand jury in Eastern Virginia, where Comey resides, or if the case could be pursued in a different location—such as in Richman’s home of New York. It doesn’t really matter whether New York or the Eastern District of Virginia (EDVA), either location would be the third state where the disgraced former FBI Director Comey would have to defend himself. Again, I remind everyone of ‘pressure points’ in Lawfare.

If the EDVA/NY case proceeds it is based around James Comey leaking his memos to his friend Daniel Richman. In addition to being a close personal friend to James Comey, Daniel Richman is part of the Lawfare network and close friends with Benjamin Wittes, another member of Comey’s tribe. The evidence of this leaking operation is solid, very solid. The only defense James Comey holds in this matter is to claim his memos were not ‘classified’ material.

In fact, several months ago I was told the reason Comey was not yet indicted was due to an internal debate within the DOJ as to the classification status of the Comey memos. To wit I replied, “there is a profound irony in this question the DOJ is asking itself.” You see, in the Mar-a-Lago documents case Jack Smith appealed the ‘classification’ ruling by Judge Aileen Cannon when she appointed a “Special Master” to review the documents and determine the classification status.

The DOJ/FBI Special Counsel, previously said to the Florida court they would not reveal the content of the Mar-a-Lago document information because it was “classified” under “national security” grounds. You might remember President Trump’s legal position was to make the content public because Trump said there was no classified material.To reconcile the issue, during discovery phase Florida Judge Cannon appointed a Special Master to review the “classified” documents. The FBI and Jack Smith balked at the demand and filed an appeal with the 11th Circuit to keep the Trump defense from reviewing what Jack Smith said were “documents marked classified.”

Smith didn’t want the documents made public or revealed to President Trump, so the DOJ/FBI position was that the documents were too sensitive (TSCI) with “national security” implications. The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the “classification status” of the Mar-a-Lago documents was whatever the national security apparatus of the federal government (DOJ, FBI and Intelligence Community) said it was. The judicial branch could not interfere in the classification status applied by the executive branch.

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“.. the line between speech and crime is – it should be clear, but it’s fuzzy.”

• James Comey Knew EXACTLY What ‘86 47’ Meant (Robert Spencer)

James Comey, former FBI director, former deputy attorney general, former U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, is a friend of presidents and kings, an admired figure who presents himself as a voice of reason and morality, and a pillar of the Washington establishment — or, as the Mafia would put it, a made guy. Surely he would never do something so lawless and undemocratic as threaten the president of the United States, would he?


That’s what Comey contends in response to charges that he was issuing a veiled threat to the president when he posted on his Instagram account a photo of seashells arranged to say “86 47.” “86” is a well-known expression for getting rid of someone, and whether or not Comey meant that Trump should be gotten rid of by assassination, it was an extraordinarily irresponsible statement for him to make at a time when leftist calls for violence against Trump and his supporters are distressingly common.

Those calls have now resulted in three assassination attempts against Trump, and no one knows how many more there will be, but in this climate, only a fool would say that the president will finish out his term without any more attempts to kill him. Comey took the photo down on the same day that he posted it, and explained: “I posted earlier a picture of some shells I saw today on a beach walk, which I assumed were a political message. I didn’t realize some folks associate those numbers with violence. It never occurred to me, but I oppose violence of any kind, so I took the post down.”

However, the idea that the former director of the FBI actually “didn’t realize some folks associate those numbers with violence” strains credulity well beyond the breaking point. That is clear from a potboiler crime novel, FDR Drive, that Comey wrote, or that was more likely ghostwritten for him.

In an unwittingly revealing May 2025 interview with NPR to plug the book, Comey explained that his novel was “about a right-wing podcaster who is trying to motivate his followers to engage in acts of violence against the targets of his vitriol. And it’s about my protagonist, Nora Carleton, a federal prosecutor in Manhattan, trying to figure out, how do we stop the violence? And is there a way to hold this podcaster criminally accountable for what he clearly knows he’s doing? And that’s the trick because the line between speech and crime is – it should be clear, but it’s fuzzy.”

All right. So here’s the intrepid FBI director explaining that he wrote a book about a “right-wing podcaster” (after all, who else do leftists think is evil these days?) who “is trying to motivate his followers to engage in acts of violence against the targets of his vitriol,” but he is apparently doing so in a veiled manner, because Comey adds that “he clearly knows” what he’s doing. Comey’s novel, he says, is all about “the line between speech and crime.”

And then Comey would have us believe that he posted a photo on his Instagram account that many of his followers would understand as a call to engage in an act of violence against the target of his vitriol, but that poor, naïve Comey himself didn’t know what he was doing? Sell me a bridge while you’re at it, why doncha?

This becomes all the clearer when the NPR interviewer asks Comey about the “line between free speech and violent incitement and domestic terrorism, ideologically motivated violence,” and Comey says he has had to “grapple with that very issue throughout my career.” Yet he expects us to believe that he didn’t pause to ponder even for a moment whether posting “86 47” might constitute violent incitement and domestic terrorism.

That’s what he’s insisting: “I took a picture and posted it ’cause I thought it was a clever political thing. Never occurred to me that someone would try to say it was associated with violence. I actually still don’t see that. But I took it down because I don’t want – I mean, this is my Instagram account, for God’s sakes. I don’t want anything on there to be associated with violence, even if I don’t get it.” And he didn’t think anyone else would get it, either: “Yeah, I’m not worried, ‘cause there’s no world in which this is an actual threat.”

Of course. So here is a guy who published a novel about veiled calls to violence, claiming that he didn’t know what he posted was a veiled call to violence, despite the fact that it’s common parlance. Sure, Comey. I’ll bet you would still insist you were acting in good faith regarding the Russia hoax, too.

Read more …

“The video also includes footage from the day before the attack. Allen can be seen walking the same corridor where the shooting would later occur ..”

• New Footage of Trump Assassination Attempt Released (Matt Margolis)

The friendly fire theory just got buried — on video. For days, questions swirled about whether a Secret Service agent wounded at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner had actually been hit by fellow agents in the chaos. U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro put that narrative to rest Thursday night. Pirro released new, high-quality security video from the Washington Hilton Hotel showing 31-year-old Cole Allen charging through a Secret Service checkpoint during the April 25 dinner, where President Trump was scheduled to speak. The footage, she noted, had already been submitted to U.S. District Court.


“Today, we are releasing video already provided to U.S. District Court showing Cole Allen shoot a U.S. Secret Service officer during his attempt to assassinate the President at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner,” Pirro said in her X post. “There is no evidence the shooting was the result of friendly fire.”

The new video is a significant upgrade from the grainy footage that circulated in the immediate aftermath of the shooting. When slowed to 35% speed, it captures something the earlier clips couldn’t clearly show — Allen, armed with a 12-gauge pump-action shotgun, opening fire at close range on a Secret Service agent as he blows past the magnetometer. Multiple agents return fire almost simultaneously. The wounded agent took buckshot to the chest but was protected by his bulletproof vest.

The video also includes footage from the day before the attack. Allen can be seen walking the same corridor where the shooting would later occur, stopping in the hotel gym to chat with an attendant, and studying the layout. Prosecutors say this is part of a weeks-long pattern of deliberate planning — Allen allegedly researched the event, booked his hotel room nearly a month out, tracked Trump’s schedule in real time on the day of the attack, and even watched a live broadcast of the president’s arrival moments before making his move.

NBC News has more: Investigators believe the man charged with the attempted assassination of President Donald Trump shot a Secret Service officer who was wearing a ballistic vest, according to three law enforcement officials familiar with the case. Investigators have determined that the Secret Service Uniformed Division officer was not struck by friendly fire from another member of law enforcement, the sources told NBC News on Wednesday. […]

The officer, who was taken to a hospital, was released over the weekend. Allen was charged with discharging a weapon but has not been formally accused of assaulting a federal officer. A law enforcement source said work continues analyzing Allen’s devices, including desktop and laptop computers from his California home, as well as his phone, a laptop and hard drives recovered from his guest room at the Washington Hilton hotel. While Allen already faces federal charges of attempted assassination, prosecutors have signaled that additional charges may follow as the investigation continues.

Read more …

Because it’s Trump’s Ballroom

• The Real Reason the Democrats Hate President Trump’s Ballroom (Tim O’Brien)

In the grand scheme of things, a White House ballroom seems to be too trivial a thing to create the level of controversy this one has. There are many reasons the Democrats are attacking the project, but there is only one reason that drives all the hate you’ve been seeing. Sure, the preservationists might say the new ballroom is not in keeping with the way the White House has been designed and carefully modified over the years. Others might take issue with its look, saying it’s too oversized and dwarfs the main building. The aesthetics don’t work for them. Still others say it’s about the money—that taxpayers don’t need to spend a single penny on a project that was never needed in the first place.


These are all fair opinions if held sincerely, but the Democrats are never sincere, so when they express these concerns, it’s all just noise to hide the real reason they despise the idea of President Donald Trump building a new ballroom at the White House. They hate the ballroom because Trump is building it, and once it’s complete, it will be a lasting legacy of the 45th and 47th president, even if he never steps foot in it as president. It’s the Trump ballroom, and it will always be known as just that.That is why the Washington Post, the newspaper that brought you the Watergate investigation, is devoting as much ink and resources to a ballroom story as it did to make “Woodward and Bernstein” household names.

That Washington Post pull quote is pure propaganda. Sure, no one likes waiting in line, but they still have to do that no matter the size of the room. And no one likes going to a White House state dinner and then being crammed in so tight that they feel like they’re sitting in coach in a Spirit Airlines seat, either. Suppose a Democrat takes the presidency two, six or 10 years from now. They can try to erase Trump’s name from the project. They can rename it the Michelle Obama Dance Room and Aerobics Studio, the Lenin Grand Hall, or the Mamdani Mosque. It won’t matter. Everyone will still know it as the Trump ballroom, because it was Trump’s idea and he built it.

And that’s what bothers the Democrats most. Trump gets the last word and the last laugh. Trump has made many good arguments for building the ballroom. It’s embarrassing to be the world’s foremost superpower and be forced to erect tents on the White House lawn to hold events. As Trump noted immediately after the latest attempt on his life, a White House ballroom would provide necessary security for many events the president hosts or attends, which, for current logistical reasons, must take place off-site. By the way, the photo of Princess Diana and John Travolta below was taken in the White House East Wing entranceway, and it could only accommodate 150 people standing.

One of the funny things about the Democrat campaign against the ballroom in the wake of the latest assassination attempt on Trump is that many leftists are pointing out that the Washington Hilton, which hosted the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, has the capacity for over 2,600 attendees, while the planned White House ballroom is designed to hold 650–1,000, and so they say the new ballroom is too small.

At the same time, they say the new ballroom is too big and will overpower the main house.

So, which is it: too small or too big? This is how you know how unserious the Democrats are when it comes to the ballroom. They mean nothing of what they say. All they know is that if Trump is doing it, they’re against it. And they’re willing to go to the wall to defeat it. But the truth is, Trump is several steps ahead of them. The project is well underway. The East Wing is demolished. The project must be finished now, no matter how much negativity the left tries to attach to it. F

rom a public relations and a political standpoint, that’s really all the left is trying to do. It’s the same thing they have been doing to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and the same as what they did during those “summer of love” riots back in 2020. They start the chaos. Their billionaire funders pay for the chaos and orchestrate it, and they blame Trump for making them do it. If you want the chaos to stop, you have to get rid of Trump. It’s classic Democrat blackmail.

Since they can’t stop construction of the new ballroom in the end, they want to make enough of a mess of it so they can say that Trump made the mess. Then their narrative will be that they had to clean up after him.mIronically, the more they fight Trump on this, the more closely the ballroom will be associated with his name for decades or longer. Since the ballroom will be a very nice feature, that will only help Trump in a legacy sense. In the end, there will be a big, beautiful White House ballroom one day soon enough. It will be known as the Trump ballroom. And there’s nothing they can do about it.

Read more …

“President Trump is on the right side of history. He knows it. We know it. Now they just have to keep him safe. ”

• Remember That Half the Country Once Hated Lincoln (Stephen Kruiser)

Oh, the emotions in the United States of America here in the Year of Our Lord 2026! There’s despair. There’s anger. There’s…well, there’s mostly anger. Heck, I tend to be dead inside and the partisan political acrimony has even been getting to me. In a recent VIP column, I wrote that I was taking a brief break from my workday habit of perusing the Opinion sections of The New York Times and The Washington Post because I’m starting to worry about that kind of crazy being contagious.


That followed a week or two of me venting in various ways about the state of things in American politics. Then I remembered something very important: I’m rather enjoying President Trump’s second term. Seeing the Democrats rend their garments over everything that he does isn’t something I should let get me frustrated. It’s kind of a schadenfreude-filled bonus.

As I began to return to my typical Zen-like state, I decided it would be fun to trigger the lefties by writing a column that not only likened President Trump to President Abraham Lincoln, but likened today’s Democrats to the seditious secessionists (say that three times fast) of the Civil War era. I know I’m not the first conservative pundit to do this. Honestly, I’m surprised at how long it took me to get around to it. I have a lot of lefty trolls and a kajillion prog followers on X; I really should be thinking of triggering them more often.

Even though the circumstances are obviously different, finding parallels between what’s happening now and the America of the 1860s isn’t difficult for conservatives, mostly because we’ve all read history books. I am in no way saying that things are as severe right now — families aren’t killing each other from opposite sides of a war. I just can’t help but think that there are some similarities between the political climate then and now.

Today’s Democrats may not want to secede from the Union in the way that the South did back in the day. They’re far more insidious. The progressive dream that drives modern Dems involves the absolute shredding of any parts of the Constitution that pertain to real liberty. Free speech as we know it will be gone. Gun rights will be gone. Due process? See ya. Goodbye Electoral College, hello every president being elected by California, New York, and Illinois. The execrable 16th Amendment will, of course, be safe.

As I have written many times, they will still be calling it the United States of America, but it won’t resemble the country that we love. True, it’s not secession, but they’re still trying to break up the country in a different way. Now considered the greatest president in American history, Abraham Lincoln was unpopular with a lot of people when he was in office. See if this sounds familiar: during the presidential election of 1864, Lincoln faced intra-party opposition from Republicans who were dissatisfied with his handling of the war. The GOP has had its whiny turncoat problem since its earliest days.

While the Southerners pretended they had a new country, they were all still Americans in the eyes of Lincoln and the Unionists. Because they were. A note for the pedants out there: I know that the Southern states didn’t really make up half the population. I’m an opinion writer, not a journalist, and I sometimes take creative license to make a headline fit. Whatever the exact number, quite a lot of people had Lincoln Derangement Syndrome. You all get the sentiment, though.

When we are talking about support for a president, we’re never really considering the entire population anyway, just the electorate. Right now, a good chunk of that electorate really, really, loathes President Trump. The amazing thing about this second term is that he is not getting distracted by that at all. That’s one of the reasons that the Trump Derangement Syndrome sufferers are getting more unhinged by the minute. They’re still spitting nails because they couldn’t put him in jail in 2023 or 2024.

President Trump shares an important quality with President Lincoln: resolve. We can throw vision in there for good measure as well. Both are essential for a leader in troubled times. We may not be at war with each other like we were in the 1860s, but these are most definitely troubled times. Once again, the trouble is coming from the people who are trying to destroy the Republic and are consumed with hatred for the president who is fighting to preserve it. President Trump is on the right side of history. He knows it. We know it. Now they just have to keep him safe.

Read more …

Does anyone still wonder why?

• House Ends 76-Day Shutdown (Sarah Anderson)

It only took 76 days.


On Thursday, the United States House of Representatives unanimously approved a Senate-passed bill to fund most of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which will soon end the shutdown that began on February 14 — the longest partial government shutdown in the history of the country. All it needs now is for Donald Trump to sign it into law.

The chamber approved the bill via voice vote and with “little fanfare,” according to CBS. It’s important to note that it does not fund U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) or U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP). However, Republicans advanced a separate budget reconciliation package that will provide those agencies with funding for the next three years using only GOP votes. The shutdown only impacted DHS, including critical agencies like the TSA, Coast Guard (civilians), FEMA, Secret Service, USCIS, CISA, ICE, CBP, and more, leaving many of them struggling to pay employees.

Tens of thousands were furloughed, and many worked with delayed pay. Others quit. The shutdown led to long security lines at airports, as well as unpaid bills, delayed contracts, and cyber planning gaps, according to the White House. Shortly before the vote, we learned that active-duty Coast Guard members were using flashlights to see because they couldn’t pay their electric bills. Some were going into debt because they were not receiving payments for their reassignment moves. They were putting money on credit cards and taking out loans. We also had to cancel numerous national security exercises.

The shutdown was triggered by the fatal shootings of Alex Pretti and Renee Good by Border Patrol agents in Minnesota earlier this year. Democrats in Congress refused to fund DHS until Republicans agreed to new oversight rules and restrictions on border agents. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson calls it a win for Republicans.

“We got the budget resolution passed. This is very, very important because that will ensure that border security and immigration enforcement will continue today and well into the future, despite Democrat attempts to re-open our borders and protect criminal illegal aliens from removal. The net result of passing our reconciliation bill is that ICE and CBP are funded for three years, and Democrats got absolutely nothing for their political charade and shenanigans out of that.”

Read more …

Let ’em try.

• Hakeem Jeffries Denounces the Supreme Court as “Illegitimate” (Turley)

The Supreme Court’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais took 36 pages to explain why Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act is about combating intentional racial discrimination, not allowing racial gerrymandering. However, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries wrapped it up in one word: “illegitimate.” Jeffries was not speaking of the case, but the Court. The man who would become the next Speaker of the House if Democrats retake power in November has joined other radicals in denying the legitimacy of the nation’s highest court.


Just for the record, the Supreme Court did not strike down Section 2, but said that neither the law nor the Constitution allows legislators to manipulate district lines to guarantee that candidates of a particular race will be elected. It was written not to give any race an advantage, but to prevent a state from creating a disadvantage to voters based on their race. The Act prevents any State from intentionally drawing districts “to afford minority voters less opportunity because of their race.” This is a matter upon which people of good faith can disagree. Many of the justices have been long opposed to racial criteria in areas ranging from college admissions to voting districts.

Chief Justice John Roberts stated it bluntly in 2006 that “It is a sordid business, this divvying us up by race.” Like others, Roberts abhors racial discrimination but declared in another case that “way to stop discriminating on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.”You will find no such distinctions in much of the press where experts declared the death of equal voting laws in America. UCLA Law Professor Richard Hasen dispenses with any nuance and simply ran a Slate column titled “The Slaying of the Voting Rights Act by the Coward Alito.” For years, liberal law professors have been trashing conservative justices, including Berkeley Law Dean Erwin Chemerinsky, who called them “partisan hacks.”

However, the name-calling has mutated into a movement to scrap the Court or the Constitution, or both. Chemerinsky wrote a book recently titled “No Democracy Lasts Forever: How the Constitution Threatens the United States.” There was, of course, no such movement during the decades with a liberal majority that set aside an array of long-standing cases. It was only when a stable conservative majority emerged that law professors declared the Court illegitimate or dangerous, with many calling for packing the Court with an instant liberal majority once Democrats retake power. I discuss some of these voices as the “new Jacobins” in my book Rage and the Republic, figures echoing the radical concepts or means used in France before what became known as “The Terror.”

Law professors Ryan D. Doerfler of Harvard and Samuel Moyn of Yale have called for the nation to “reclaim America from constitutionalism.” Last December, they published a column titled “It’s Time to Accept that the US Supreme Court is Illegitimate and Must be Replaced.” They insist that citizens must be rid of this meddlesome court: “remaking institutions like the US supreme court so that Americans don’t have to suffer future decades of oligarchy-facilitating rule that makes a parody of the democracy they were promised.”

Many Democrats realize that the public is rather attached to both the Constitution and its core institutions. That is why various Democratic politicians and pundits have been pledging to pack the Court once they are back in power. Some have suggested that, if they are going to change the political system and retain power, they will have to do it with the help of a compliant Court.

Democratic strategist James Carville stated matter-of-factly, “They’re going to recommend that the number of Supreme Court justices go from nine to 13. That’s going to happen, people.” He added recently, “Don’t run on it. Don’t talk about it. Just do it.” To do that, you must first delegitimate the Court. You must attack both the individual justices and the institution itself. You need true rage to get a people to tear apart the core institution of a Republic on its 250th anniversary. Now you have the next possible Speaker of the United States declaring the Supreme Court illegitimate because he disagrees with its interpretation of the law.

What these figures do not mention is that the majority of opinions by the Supreme Court are unanimous or nearly unanimous. A comparably few cases break along strict ideological 6-3 lines. Indeed, just last week, it was President Donald Trump who was denouncing the conservative justices as disloyal and weak for, again, ruling against his Administration. It is not the voting record nor the underlying interpretations that are motivating this campaign of delegitimation. It is power. Former Attorney General Eric Holder explained it most clearly recently in pushing the packing plan after the Democrats retake power: “[We’re] talking about the acquisition and the use of power, if there is a Democratic trifecta in 2028.”

Read more …

 

 

 

 

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Home › Forums › Debt Rattle May 2 2026

Viewing 31 posts - 1 through 31 (of 31 total)
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  • May 2, 2026 at 9:20 am #239730
    Raúl Ilargi Meijer
    Keymaster

    Johannes Vermeer The girl with the wine glass (Dame en twee heren) 1659 • Trump Issues Letter Rejecting Congressional Oversight For War (ZH) • Trump’s
    [See the full post at: Debt Rattle May 2 2026]

    May 2, 2026 at 10:50 am #239754
    Dr. D
    Participant

    “COL. Douglas Macgregor : Does Trump Have Any Restraints?” –Judge Napolitano – Judging Freedom•15K•Streamed 3 min ago”

    Apparently yes? All of them? As he’s done literally nothing, arrested no one? “Dictator”, “Hitler” is when you do NOT arrest Judges and disband the Parliament but obey everything they say even when it annoys you, they destroys the nation, murders citizens, then let the media keep trying to get you killed. Or really your wife and children first. That’s what “Literally Hitler” means, right? It means “Always obeys the law?”

    I’d say “Keep talking and showing us all how stupid you are” but the general population agrees, regardless of how transparent, obvious, or irrational it is.

    So if that’s Hitler then “Non-Hitler” would disband elections, pack the Supreme court, and arrest everyone for years without charges on the thinnest pretense, right? Right. Because Carville just said they are doing a J6 on EVERYONE, EVERYWHERE. The DAY they get in. Arresting all your enemies and jailing them is “Not-Hitler”, but pure Love and Democracy. We must BE Hitler to stop Hitler.

    Hillary vowed to attack the Eastern Front and start WWIII on inaguration day. “Not Hitler”.

    Don’t worry, Fox News is on 24 hours a day with genius insights like this.

    “Trump Issues Letter Rejecting Congressional Oversight For War, Citing Ceasefire Has ‘Terminated’ Hostilities

    Ah. I see what he was up to. And he can start again any time and get ANOTHER 60 days. Will Congress do anything about it? A: Congress hasn’t done anything about anything since President Wilson. They exist to pretend things. So my bet is: peas in a pod. Both radically pro-war, whenever they like.

    “As Anthropic Entertains Offers At $900 Billion Valuation, OpenAI CFO Swears There’s A ‘Vertical Wall Of Demand’

    A trillion. For a computer that can’t count to 200 and erases whole corporations in 9 seconds, while advising people to eat rocks and kill themselves. What’s not to like? Why not $2 Trillion?

    Rah rah, blah Blah, ‘Merica, but: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uvMhapq1_X4

    1D Chess: Trump swaps Venezuela, keeps the government, keeps their sovereignty, opens their markets, their airlines, their oil, in anticipation of needing the oil open and refined (and sold at retail) to move on to do the same thing for (to?) Iran.

    “There’s no reason!!!! He’s INSAAAANE!!!” “There’ll be a million men there and an 80 year bloodbath!!” “Arrest!” “Impeach!” War crimes!!!”

    Yes, war crimes for opening Venezuela UNDER THEIR OWN GOVERNMENT, and making them rich. Jesus H. Christ on a stick. This ALREADY HAPPENED. In the PAST. Their oil is in our refineries now.

    But it’s 11D chess to think since Trump has like TWO pass plays in the whoooole book, he’s going to run one or the other of them, Again! in Iran, because they work.

    “Trump Lashes Out at Merz After Threatening to Pull Troops From Germany Amid Escalating Row” Time

    “Trump said words”    . Wow. Meantime, Merz said Trump was a dictator, a madman, a racist, literally Hitler, and a genocidal, mass-murdering criminal. That, however is NOT “Lashing out” nor “Threatening”. That is perfect goodness and light. This is how we know – and it’s perfectly logical to presume – that such rhetoric from Trump is how he just tried to assassinate himself again. If only he wouldn’t say rude things, people wouldn’t have to kill him all the time! Logic. …Everyone on the left from NPR, CNN, NBC, Kimmel, Colbert, Stewart….

    However, Merz saying Americans are stupid, violent, mass-murdering -ssholes does NOT mean we should stop basing there and defending their country for free. No. That is not what insulting us daily as moronic, drooling, uncultured “Jungle People” means.

    Merz is right about one thing though: with language like that, ONE of us is really, profoundly stupid.

    “Meghan McCain says her ‘The View’ successor does not rep conservatives” USA TODAY

    That’s okay, McCain didn’t represent conservatives at all either. No change. She’s as Conservative as Trotsky. As was her father. I mean: OBVIOUSLY. She’s a reporter and they let her inside MSNBC. Or Fox News. Either way.

    Tori Amos still tearing down the Patriarchy” Rolling Stone.

    In the sense of making a s—t ton of money for male oligarchs, corporations, and record execs. Just like all girl bosses. Owning a plumbing truck and sticking it to Bezos and corporations is HELPING the Patriarchy, ‘natch.

    Thanks Tori, we’ll see if they can hear your resistance over the sound of $100 bills.

    “Mills Drops Out In Maine Governor’s Race As Oysterman With Nazi Tattoo Becomes Democratic Frontrunner

    From No Kings to Pro Kings, and from No Nazi to Pro Nazi. (As are Azov…and Canada) Not a word, everyone nods. Republicans because they’ve seen this for generations, Democrats because “My party” “not noticing”. The only crime is “Noticing”.

    I’m not hepped up about some tattoo, only actions. However THEY say they are. THEY say any such “dog whistle” is a capital crime. Okay, show me now. We’ll have him and Hegseth tattoo- tour together.

    “Ex-CIA Analyst Warns Hegseth’s Claim Of “Ironclad” Hormuz Blockade Deeply Misleading

    The CIA disagrees with “America First”? Do everything they can to kill it include assassinate a bunch of Presidents? Who knew? A: Trust every CIA agent. If they’re on Fox News. I mean, if you can’t trust Brennan, who can you trust?

    “DOJ Probes 36 Illinois School Districts Over Sexual Orientation Content In Pre-K–12 Classes

    Well I’m glad they have time for this and not like, Congressional bribery and pedophiles and stuff. On day 33 where Iran can’t find, buy, or even fabricate evidence of Trump and Epstein. But they’re holding back, being nice, luring us in, like when they sank their Navy, none of our ships, and lets the U.S. fly over them unobstructed. All part of the plan.

    “The Curveball That Locks In Trump’s Own Words: “There Will Never Be a Deal” With Iran

    Yup. In 2139, we will still be in the exact same stalemate with Iran, except our side will all be Optimus robots and their side will all be the new Alien races which have landed. Totally plausible. The war goes on until the 3030’s at which time Iran is a lush robo-dinosaur jungle and the U.S. is one large “Logan’s Run”.

    Translation: Don’t oversell it. There will be a deal “shortly”.

    “CNBC just admitted President Trump’s latest job numbers are “TRULY INCREDIBLE.”

    In-Credible as in “Un-Credible”? Because while it’s improving, it’s still pretty bad out there. There’s no like, real hiring rush. They might be POSTING jobs, but at $18/hr for being a 4 year Civil Engineer. (barely kidding, I saw that listing) Yeah, no, that job’s not being filled nor that work being done.

    Sadly, Biden and Hunter can burn down the Rock n Roll mansion in an hour and everyone will cheer. Rebuilding it takes a long time of hard work. It’s Trump’s fault Obama burned down the nation where “Those jobs Ain’t comin’ back.”

    “Trump is gaining support among black Americans.”

    They just realized they’re the most racist party since Jackson, Jefferson Davis, the KKK, Governor Wallace, and oh wait, all of those WERE Democrats! Solution here is: “Never trust nor believe black or brown people in America, nor Arabs in the Middle East.” You go ahead and tell them what is best for them, as they are the Jungle people.

    “[Todd Blanche] is the guy we need right now.” To do literally nothing I guess. Maybe he can run away from his job for the beach like Bongino. Like Iran, 10 years later he’s luring them in. All part of the plan.

    “Obama & former CIA Dir. John Brennan would meet every Tuesday morning & discuss who they were going to assassinate that week.”

    Remember Nixon’s naughty list? Yeah, that wasn’t actually a “murder now” list. And Bongino left to make sure Brennan could carry on.

    “It’s all coming. Have some faith.” Uh-huh. There are only two states: something has been done / nothing has been done. TALKING is the “Nothing will ever get done” state. Act. We don’t “Signal” them into Riker’s. You ACT.

    “Iran leaders do not get along with each other.” Nor do ours.
    “There is a hard currency, i.e. U.S. dollar, shortage.” Here too, ask any worker.
    “The entire international community has turned against you.” This one is disturbing and inexplicable unless Russia, China, etc all AGREE with us bombing.
    Chart of Iranian Rial: Looks like the same chart as the US Dollar but on fast-forward, stolen 99% of your money in 100 years. We and Iran’s workers have more in common than our leaders do.

    “It should also not be forgotten that ‘denuclearizing’ Iran by force has been a multi-decade priority of Prime Minister Netanyahu and the hardliners”

    “Denuclearizing” Israel has been my goal since the USS Liberty, but that wasn’t going very well until just now when they got bombed flat and exposed as controlling America.

    “President Trump cuts off a reporter when informed that the average price of gas is now $4.30. Trump: …The gas is gonna go down. As soon as the war’s over”

    Yeah, THIS part was never the problem. The problem is they can stall – even irrationally and counterproductively – almost forever. I can’t make them stop killing their own people.

    “They have no navy, they have no air force, they have no nothing. We can fly right over the middle of Tehran without being shot at because they have no anti-aircraft. They have nothing.”

    So do the Houthis and it didn’t make them surrender either. This is the problem, not the “Sink the Navy” part.

    “the 60 day clock pauses or stops KAINE: I do not believe the statute would support that”

    Both fine arguments that will end up in the Supreme Court. But what would “Ending” mean? There are no carriers in the middle east and we disassembled our B2 bombers in Missouri? We disbanded the US Military and closed all world bases? How would you know we’re “Not at war” with Iran? In 1789, and under the Swiss model we were SUPPOSED to be under (and there is no Constitutional Amendment) the Army would only have men if State Militias were called out, etc, and were essentially completely disbanded and retired, eg after Shay’s Rebellion. Then it’s easy to know. (We did, however, have a standing Navy, and that’s already complicating Iran comparisons). Now it’s not so easy. I for one would yes, go back to a Swiss military and erase the entire Army until you make that amendment, but whatever, that’s me and nobody’s going to do that. I would also make corporations need a business license from Act of Congress like the Dutch East India company, but that’s not happening either.

    “We should have 100 of these cases. So people can read every day what a piece of crap he is.
    • Another DOJ Investigative Case Against James Comey Happening in Virgina (CTH)

    Well he’s committed far in excess of 100 felonies, so that’s appropriate. And guys who have committed only one, for drug possession are in jail while he, fabricating, railroading, and withholding evidence, serves none.

    “• James Comey Knew EXACTLY What ‘86 47’ Meant (Robert Spencer)

    I have no idea what they’re up to, nor do I care. Sure, you can send this case, but I think it’s to make him scramble and waste, put him in the news. He’ll have to argue as FBI director he has no idea what common criminal slang terms we all know are. Ie, “that he’s a fecking idjit.” Make him say it loud, proud and in the most forceful terms, so Americans can demonstrate what level of liar. They are shaping what they’ll find about his ACTUAL intent to murder. But that will be different and this will be withdrawn.

    “• New Footage of Trump Assassination Attempt Released (Matt Margolis)

    This was nuts. Someone should add sound, although they circle when the guns are fired. Because it was hard to see he just walks up and opens fire point blank at the first guy he sees. …Who was unharmed. The level of moronicy does not reflect well on CalTech, I just should be added to the “Drooling glue-sniffers Club” with Harvard.

    I am not going to let police go here, although their error was understandable: they arranged themselves, probably all afternoon and all day every day, to SHOOT INTO EACH OTHER as the backstop to bullets. You can have other problems if police are on only one side (You’d like to grab a guy physically from both sides) but you REALLY don’t want to shoot point-blank into a fellow officer as he does here. This is long-term training for a much more dangerous level, so I understand it, but it’s a miracle one officer didn’t shoot the others. Then they ALL draw weapons, BEHIND each other and not all are pointed at the ground. Again, very understandably. But this is a miracle you got lucky with, FIX this appalling, deadly behavior.

    Force all guests to the left side so you have a shooting gallery. Might also want to hang kevlar on the wall for the conference room behind the drywall. Ya think? Then training for pursuit, which is almost never mass-event like this, usually you’re praying you even CAN get a second officer there, not that there’s 18 of you in 200 square feet.

    Next, Everyone who comes running IS IN A SUIT. Not a uniform. How do I know who is who and not shoot each other again? I’d use this flaw as my entry point. Get a dummy to draw, then appear as if another USSS agent from a door, proceed to the President as if a hero. Bang. Fix this. Stop looking like chumps, we wildly overpay for you.

    “• The Real Reason the Democrats Hate President Trump’s Ballroom (Tim O’Brien)

    Remember the disco White House? My thought was they installed so many bugs there, it’s impossible to get rid of them all. (The strobe was used to identify the reflection of hidden cameras, or blind them). Then yes, they are hiding hardened-bunker stuff I’m sure. Add up all reasons together. And that’s why they hate it, more than the name. There was a LITERAL, ACTUAL purpose that the CIA could spy on and destroy the White House, daily.

    I agree dwarfing the White House is dumb, I disapprove, and wouldn’t do it. However, ALL construction I basically disagree with, anywhere in the U.S. — Use what you already built, Jimmy! — and so it hardy matters.

    “I tend to be dead inside and the partisan political acrimony has even been getting to me.”

    Totally agree: it’s all stupid, boring, and ghey.

    “House Ends 76-Day Shutdown (Sarah Anderson)

    They want no government employees: sold! I totally agree. Only if you stop paying all the rest of them. They managed ONE action in 400 days. No prosecutors, no judges, no cabinet appointments, (Surgeon General) no voting rights, etc.

    Coast Guard: clearly the plan is to leave the nation unprotected and undefended in every way. Half of America would bash their children with a hammer to help continue this.

    “• Hakeem Jeffries Denounces the Supreme Court as “Illegitimate” (Turley)

    You mean the court we had to obey every word of since Roe v Wade? Interesting.

    “The first company to scale humanoid robots wins the future of labor.”

    Why would they ever be humanoid? By definition, the only reason is that they replace human jobs, where they are standing. No other reason, humanoid is a fragile and pointless design otherwise. Other than if you’re inventing the T-600 murderbot. They are. That was always the plan.

    May 2, 2026 at 11:14 am #239755
    those darned kids
    Participant

    7.83hz = 7.83 beats per second ≈ 470 beats per minute.

    well, that’s just annoying.

    the closest pitch to 240.75 in ISO APPROVED TUNING is B3

    enjoy!

    May 2, 2026 at 11:17 am #239756
    those darned kids
    Participant

    “Other than if you’re inventing the T-600 murderbot. They are. That was always the plan.”

    oh boy, oh boy, oh boy!

    i agree.

    those bots ain’t for folding clothes; they’re for checkpoints and worse..

    May 2, 2026 at 11:32 am #239757
    those darned kids
    Participant

    here’s a guided tour (by elon himself!) of the optimus factory:

    May 2, 2026 at 11:38 am #239758
    Dr. D
    Participant

    I hope commenters haven’t left because they’re crushed America hasn’t been destroyed.

    This is the flip side of emotional elation that Iran would rule the world. Of believing a bunch of other Fox News/ AI stuff that’s yes, getting ever more clever. And part of it getting more clever is that were are getting ever-less hard news, actual facts, to dilute it with.

    Everyone is saying, no one can even guess what’s true anymore. Since there’s a stunning hunger for it, for real facts, and billions are being spent to specifically deny and drown out any Truth, we can be certain it’s a concerted Op from the highest level. And not about Iran.

    Remember “Three World Wars” where they pay to have wars pop up worldwide, to drive all mankind to “Financial, moral, mental, spiritual exhaustion”. THEY want to install a Brave New World with all their Optimus T600 murderbots. They are using the collect wealth of the planet to pile on you. But no one will WILLINGLY do so. Even the dumbest humans aren’t that stupid (only the Harvard/Caltech ones). So how do you get them to, eg, take a digital social credit CBDC?

    You make the world so confusing no one can agree if that’s even happening or not. OR who is doing it, OR when, OR why, OR what we should do about it, OR who our allies or enemies are, and then there are 1,000 other attacks, on food, medicine, family, sanity, at the same time. IF YOU KNEW…anything…you would grab it and be an effective soldier against them.

    “But even the elect will be (most) deceived”. ALL Truth is God. So ALL TRUTH must be destroyed, hunted down and ruined, wherever it may be. And so we just saw in Iran, using everything they learned from Covid, and piling on heaps, Ops, Thesises more, with 100 more traitors and double-agents who we were sure were trusted a minute ago. And they’re not done, it can still get worse.

    So when I say “The only Enemy is Truth” this is the new, higher level we are at. Truth is going to be hunted and shot on sight ANYWHERE, worldwide, on the web, in all nations, like the European wolves were. No questions, no quarter: see Truth, kill it and any mouth that speaks it. From now “’til the duration”.

    So I’m not mad people got this wrong. It was like WTF??? I’m mad I couldn’t come up with any better way that shouting and insulting to get people’s attention quickly. That’s a failure on my part, but I’m not actually sure there IS another way, or will be in the future. The faster you can snap out of AI-Guy ops, the faster we can pivot back to shooting the real enemy and grabbing the real truth.

    The Enemy is Truth. Elon’s AI murderbots will be roving the world freely, shooting any dissenters from lies, wherever they are found, with near impunity.

    Revelation 11 of the “Two Witnesses”, eventually killed as well, while everyone is forced to use CBDCs or die, turned in by their neighbors. Terrifying. However, remember, like Covid, this lasts only 3 1/2 years. That is endurable if you keep your head. I’m not saying EXACTLY, or that Revelations is the cracked code; I use that to put an active framework, a story in your mind of what this is like to be.

    (Also Rev 11 is a JEWISH prophesy, centering on Israel. The “10 nations” are arguably EUROPE, and have no comments on the New World whatsoever, whose (Native) prophesies are elsewhere.)

    Again, I apologize. Do you see why I had to shout “Iran is not landing in Virginia” so loudly?

    May 2, 2026 at 11:58 am #239759
    those darned kids
    Participant

    “I hope commenters haven’t left because they’re crushed America hasn’t been destroyed.”

    nope. i think they are offended by piece after piece glorifying the affairs of mass-murdering psychopaths.

    for me, at least i can still yell at the clouds here.

    thanks, raúl.

    §¶§¶§¶§¶§¶§¶

    “Do you see why I had to shout ‘Iran is not landing in Virginia’ so loudly?”

    Do you see why I have to continually shout “Donald Trump ET ALIA is a murderous narcissist” so loudly?

    May 2, 2026 at 12:02 pm #239760
    those darned kids
    Participant

    nice to see ol’ “blow ’em up” obama get a shout out!

    i wonder if actually ever did drone the jonas brothers..

    does anyone else remember when the taliban visited sugarland?

    [ed. no frikkin’ way.. it’s still up!]

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/world/west_asia/37021.stm

    Taleban in Texas for talks on gas pipeline

    The 1,300km pipeline will carry gas across Afghanistan’s harsh terrain

    A senior delegation from the Taleban movement in Afghanistan is in the United States for talks with an international energy company that wants to construct a gas pipeline from Turkmenistan across Afghanistan to Pakistan.

    A spokesman for the company, Unocal, said the Taleban were expected to spend several days at the company’s headquarters in Sugarland, Texas.

    May 2, 2026 at 12:16 pm #239761
    charles
    Participant

    None of the links in the War powers resolution (WPR) article are the WPR. They are all links to talking heads explaining their interpretation of WPR. None of them are machine translations. It will take me until tomorrow to read:
    https://www.congress.gov/bill/93rd-congress/house-joint-resolution/542

    May 2, 2026 at 12:38 pm #239762
    ₿oogaloo
    Participant

    The Debt Rattles were sub-par again, but the art and Calvin and Hobbes make the daily visit worthwhile.

    May 2, 2026 at 12:44 pm #239763
    those darned kids
    Participant

    órale…

    mr obama could not take out the “jonas brothers”,

    but mr trump (ows, folks, ows) could.

    https://variety.com/2026/music/news/zayn-malik-cancels-us-tour-1236735511/

    May 2, 2026 at 1:09 pm #239764
    zerosum
    Participant

    May 1, 2026
    Trump’s Iran Ceasefire:
    What is next?

    Another round of votes.
    (With Trump Influence, since he says that he wants peace/end war.
    Who is the decider?)

    The 213 – 214 vote

    Trump keeps saying that he wants peace.
    I’m waiting to see if Trump really, really, wants peace.
    He can get the majority, if he wants it.

    So, Trump built himself an off ramp!
    So, all the video pundits were 100% wrong about no off ramp!

    READ MORE …
    EXECUTIVE SUMMARY FOR THE OBSERVERS …
    https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/trump-argues-iran-war-terminated-60-day-congressional-approval-deadline-iran-submits#google_vignette

    OTHER INFLUENCERS ON DECISION MAKERS:

    The officer adds that “if the uranium is removed from Iran through diplomatic means, we have done our part.” However, if that does not happen, Israel would need to launch another operation in Iran to achieve the objective, they say. Already Israel has demonstrated its immense influence over the decision to go to war in the first place.

    ——————-

    May 2, 2026 at 1:20 pm #239765
    Raúl Ilargi Meijer
    Keymaster

    The Debt Rattles were sub-par again

    What makes them sub-par?

    May 2, 2026 at 2:21 pm #239770
    D Benton Smith
    Participant

    I hope commenters haven’t left because they’re crushed America hasn’t been destroyed.

    This is the flip side of emotional elation that Iran would rule the world.

    I don’t believe that you mean what you say.

    I believe that you mean the opposite of what you say.

    Which is another way of saying that you’re being deliberately disingenuous (nice way of saying that you’re lying on purpose, but I’m trying to be nicer than my usual self, and like I said, it’s a strain.)

    C’mon Doc. Iran did not attack America. It was exactly the other way around. Iran did not pulverize America’s school girls, bridges, Capital City, oil fields and nuclear energy facilities. It was America who did that to them. In a sneak attack that included the despicably dishonorable duplicity of luring their peace negotiators into a trap baited with good will… and murdered them in cold blood.

    So excuse me (not) if the “America” that YOU speak of isn’t the same America that I belong to.

    I’m sick of it! I am literally outraged by it. I am also sick of the way you habitually use tricksy double-negatives and other practically indecipherable language ploys to dress up the lie that the “America” which you speak of is by some rhetorical magic somehow not the rapacious, bloody, Epsteinian monster that the rest of the world is being forced to deal with violently.

    Fake Americans are as bad or worse than fake Jews.

    I have no problem with your open defense of the Empire, because when stated openly those defenses are easily rebutted, but I have a real problem with your double speak. Don’t call it “America” when what you really mean is a cruel, bloody and perverted EMPIRE that makes Rome seem pacifist in comparison.

    Stand up and fight like a man. If you think America should make the world grovel at its feet and sacrifice it’s children, sovereignty and lives to us because we are just naturally superior to all other forms of human life, then just say so and make your case.

    If I am being too harsh and pugnacious (and perhaps I am) then I will apologize after you have proven me wrong. Meanwhile, let’s clear the air.

    YES, I want America to just be a normal country again. FUCK the Empire.

    May 2, 2026 at 3:19 pm #239771
    those darned kids
    Participant

    “War crimes!!!”

    uh, isn’t 170 schoolkids and some youth volleyball teams enough!?

    AND WHAT ABOUT GAZA?!?!?

    grow a soul, man, grow a soul.

    May 2, 2026 at 3:32 pm #239772
    those darned kids
    Participant

    “What makes them sub-par?”

    “offensive piece after piece glorifying the affairs of mass-murdering psychopaths.”

    May 2, 2026 at 3:41 pm #239773
    those darned kids
    Participant

    funny, dbs, had not seen your comment when i posted #239771

    May 2, 2026 at 4:58 pm #239776
    tinfoilhatted canuck
    Participant

    Raul,

    Really?

    I applaud TDK’s short answer “ nope. i think they are offended by piece after piece glorifying the affairs of mass-murdering psychopaths.“, and of course DBS’s longer but bang on answer. I might also add one need look no further than including Mr. Kunstler , who outed himself as an unapologetic Zionist.

    It’s sad that I mostly skip the offered articles and look to process comments by TDK, DBS and Zerosum..

    Oh well, your blog, your right to chose content.

    May 2, 2026 at 6:34 pm #239778
    Maxwell Quest
    Participant

    I had no plans to comment today, as I’ve been feeling pretty out-of-sync lately with the TAE material. My last post days ago pretty much left me in a holding pattern waiting to see how events played out. However, it was DBS’s excellent comment and the follow-ups by TDK and tinfoil that got me off the fence.

    As much as I appreciate reading D’s posts, I do get weary of his tendency to swing the pendulum to the opposite extreme to make a point. Taking things to the Nth degree for the sake of sarcasm often appears like an attempt to win the argument by stepping around the truth, which often lies somewhere in between.

    I’m reminded of the Buddhist’s ‘Middle Way’, which proposes a balanced approach to life. And also, the description some masters give of “walking the razor’s edge”, where one can err morally simply by straying too far in either direction. And again, Shankara’s Crest-jewel of Discrimination describes the importance discrimination plays on navigating the path, where one’s mind must become like a scalpel in order to dissect complexities. I call it slicing and dicing a thing or event into its sub-components to get clearer picture of everything in play. One cannot just look at something as an amorphous lump and state that “this is good” or “this is bad”.

    So, that said, it would be nice to see D make the necessary effort now and then to address the subtleties (or morality) of our Iran war concerns rather than dismissing them with his all-or-nothing style.

    May 2, 2026 at 7:31 pm #239779
    hexadec
    Participant

    “What makes them sub-par?”

    Raul, you seem to mostly be clipping articles by partisan whackadoodles lately. I used to find TAE offered alternate views to the mainstream narratives, now it seems to have picked a side.

    P.S. “Don’t let’s forget they killed some 40.000 of their own people even before the US got involved.” Is a baseless anti-Iranian talking point.

    P.S. Who cares what Musk says.

    May 2, 2026 at 8:26 pm #239780
    cloudhidden
    Participant

    Before, when Raul disappeared for several months, I was thinking that possibly he got removed by (?)
    The plan being that the site would slowly die without the commentariat. That did not happen, as commenters kept the site alive through various proposed ideas, informed opinion, links, information. So TAE prevailed.
    When Raul returned, amidst the enjoyment of his return, there was a nagging thought that maybe it’s no longer really Ilargi who is our host. Recently, for me, that thought has come more to the fore. Apparently several others have sensed the change as well. Is this another, different attempt to kill this site that we’ve all followed and loved for so many years? I am in agreement with many in the past few days who find the articles a bit as hexadec describes.
    Raul, it it really you?

    May 2, 2026 at 9:09 pm #239781
    charles
    Participant

    That all plays in to desperation to find some hope of a fair and kind world. Looking for the person that will move the ball in the right direction, flawed and murderous as they may be. That is a set up to be manipulated even more. The only workable plan I see is to divorce myself from the establishment entirely. In a way that is invisible to the establishment. Hide my work. Hide my barter. Hide. 1001 ways to deny the establishment of me.

    May 2, 2026 at 10:51 pm #239782
    charles
    Participant

    In addition to me hiding. deny the establishment its minions.
    https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/cheap-foreign-labor-regime-blocking-agricultural-intelligence

    May 2, 2026 at 11:44 pm #239783
    charles
    Participant

    Lets tag opposition. There is some. Spare me the “HOW DARE YOU”.
    https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/exiled-maga-dissidents-consult-ron-paul-iran-war

    May 3, 2026 at 12:01 am #239784
    chooch
    Participant

    May 3, 2026 at 12:22 am #239785
    those darned kids
    Participant

    O beautiful for spacious skies,

    We … land on top of it and we took over the ship.

    For amber waves of grain,

    We took over the cargo, took over the oil.

    For purple mountain majesties

    We’re like pirates,

    Above the fruited plain!

    We’re sort of like pirates.

    America! America!

    But we’re not playing games.

    God shed His grace on thee

    it’s a very profitable business

    And crown thy good with brotherhood

    We took over the cargo, took over the oil.

    From sea to shining sea!

    We’re sort of like pirates. But we’re not playing games.

    May 3, 2026 at 12:49 am #239802
    charles
    Participant

    In the beating a dead horse category. oil well shut ins.

    Iran appears to have increased flaring to keep the oil and gas fields stable to avoid shut-ins


    https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/industry/energy/oil-gas/iran-juggles-oil-cuts-and-storage-strain-to-resist-us-blockade/articleshow/130717259.cms
    https://fortune.com/2026/05/02/iran-oil-production-cuts-crude-storage-limits-tank-tops-us-naval-blockade-hormuz/

    May 3, 2026 at 1:58 am #239803
    my parents said know
    Participant

    Griping about someone else’s opinion;
    Telling someone: “you are wrong!”
    Almost seems like you would like some dominion
    Over someone else’s song.

    May 3, 2026 at 2:45 am #239804
    those darned kids
    Participant

    if one insists that he must croon,
    lies and fibs and sundry tales;
    at least try to sing in tune,
    or else all ears he soon impales.

    May 3, 2026 at 4:46 am #239805
    ₿oogaloo
    Participant

    @Raul

    I have appreciated TAE over the years. I have been reading since Nicole and Ash were also contributors. The focus has changed over the years from energy, to macroeconomics, to understanding the debt based monetary system, to COVID-19, to the Russia-Ukraine War, to Trump. What stayed consistent was that TAE tried to find voices giving well-thought out perspectives that were different from the MSM. It was always food for thought to stimulate discussion in the comments.

    Recently the focus seems to have narrowed to Trump boosterism. I am fine with with that to the extent it is focused on exposing the rot of the Deep State and the corruption of the Democratic Party. Although I have not voted since 2008, there were many things Trump said that I agreed with. But surely you are aware that many of the Cabinet appointments have been disasters: Hegseth is a disgrace. Bondi did nothing. Lutnick is a grifter. “Lying Eyes” Kash Patel and his sidekick Dan Bongino accomplished nothing. Gabbard has been mostly invisible, but then lost credibility when she said that it is the President’s job to determine the intelligence consensus. Sure we now have the Comey indictment, and rumors of a future Obama indictment, but I am skeptical that this is all just political theater and will not go anywhere.

    Further, MAGA has now ruptured into Zionist MAGA and Non-Zionist MAGA, and it seems TAE has taken sides with Zionist MAGA. I happen to agree with the many former Trump supporters in the alt-media (Carlson, Owens, Kelly, Napolitano, Sachs, Ritter, etc) who believe that the President has lost his way by initiating the Iran war on Israel’s behalf. So to the extent TAE debt rattles regurgitate the Zionist MAGA’s talking points, I am inclined to tune them out. Having said that, I have not given up on TAE. Hopefully this is just an aberrant phase. I have said many times before that I do not know how you maintain your sanity and still run this site.

    May 3, 2026 at 5:58 am #239806
    WES
    Participant

    Peace:

    I get it ordinary people want peace.

    But there are people who do not want peace.
    In the US those war people are sitting in Congress.
    In Europe those people are the City of London/Globalists.
    Globalists control Congress via controlling the CIA.

    Ordinary people are excluded.

    Remember Jimmy Carter the peace President?
    His whole presidency was sabotaged by the City of London having it’s proxy IRGC holding US Embassy staff hostages.
    As soon as Regan came into office, the hostages were freed.

    Trump trying to shutdown the Ukrainian War.
    Congress continues funding Ukraine until 2027 and there is nothing Trump can do about it.
    He is slowly cutting off the money.
    He is slowly trying to regain control of the CIA.
    But he is fighting against the City of London/Globalists control of the US government.
    For that he is being labeled a mass murderer, not a peace maker in Ukraine and Iran!

    The war on Iran is also a war on the City of London/Globalists who have mass murdered over 100 million people without being labeled as the war criminals, they truly are!

    Trump is the only war criminal!

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