🚨💰 BOMBSHELL: BIDEN LITERALLY PAID GEORGE SOROS $250 MILLION WITH YOUR MONEY RIGHT BEFORE HE LEFT OFFICE! 💰🚨
No audits. No accountability. Just Biden handing out taxpayer cash like it was Halloween candy to his billionaire puppet master Soros — while Americans foot the bill… pic.twitter.com/LEIRt66O7I
— MAGA Fox (@MAGAFoxwr5) October 15, 2026

Mississippi is now richer than us.

The World Bank puts Canada’s 2025 GDP per person at US$55,698. Mississippi, the poorest state in America, sits around US$55,877.

That puts us below all 50 states.

In 2014 the New York Times found Canada’s middle class had caught up to… pic.twitter.com/gJg2zQXxqD
— Ezra Levant 🍁🚛 (@ezralevant) October 15, 2026

🇩🇪🇺🇦AfD leader Alice Weidel just hammered another nail into Zelensky's coffin!

"Not even 10% of Germans support further aid to Ukraine…"

"90% of Germans oppose the continued burning of German taxpayers' money in Ukraine." pic.twitter.com/Iokb4ZMpbz
— Mario ZNA (@MarioBojic) October 15, 2026

It's worth remembering that Obama, in 2016, was asked by The Atlantic's neocon editor, @JeffreyGoldberg, why he didn't do more to protect Crimea and E. Ukraine.

Obama said Ukraine is a vital interest to Russia, but not the US, and it'd be insane to risk war with Russia over it. pic.twitter.com/KGJWIdmBJa
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) October 15, 2026

The conflict betweenTrump and the west intensifies. First the Russia diesel deal, now the waiving of brand new sanctions. Trump has had enough. He wants to do what he thinks is right. He wants to trade with Russia, not fight or threaten.

Europe/NATO and Zelensky the messenger boy, all those highly unpopular “leaders”, insist on threats vs Purin.

We seem to be getting closer to a “conclusion”.

• Trump Waives Several Russia Sanctions As Row With Zelensky Intensifies (BBC)

Donald Trump has used his presidential authority to block numerous sanctions on Russia two days before they were due to take effect, as a row with his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky deepens. The sanctions were passed by the US Congress and signed into law by Trump in September. But the US president issued an executive order on Friday night saying that withholding some was in the US “national interest”, prompting a backlash from US lawmakers.

It comes as tensions between Washington and Kyiv fray again – culminating in accusations of the Trump administration withdrawing key military support – over a controversial deal to import diesel struck by the US with Russia last week. Trump and Zelensky have exchanged sharp words about one another throughout the week. Ukraine’s president barbed that it was nice to be among “real leaders” while addressing an EU summit, after Trump said he was “more difficult to deal with” than Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The new US sanctions law took aim at Russia’s economy, giving Trump broad powers to levy tariffs of up to 100% on imports from the top five purchasers of Russian oil and gas – most significantly China and India. It also included sanctions against senior Russian figures, including Putin, as well as Russian financial institutions and Moscow’s so-called “shadow fleet” of vessels used to circumvent existing embargoes. Many of these provisions have now been waived by Trump.
Democrats such as the Virginia Congressman Don Beyer have already criticised Trump’s sanctions move, accusing him of capitulating to Moscow and turning his back on Kyiv and Zelensky. “Trump’s latest surrender to Putin again betrays our Ukrainian partners and defies clear congressional intent of legislation designed to punish Russia for its illegal war of aggression,” Beyer wrote on X. The move is also likely to draw criticism from Ukraine, where Zelensky has long stressed the need for tighter international sanctions to limit funding Russia can use in its war effort.
Trump initially drew criticism from Zelensky and Ukraine’s European allies for temporarily suspending some US sanctions to import Russian diesel as a latest effort to bring down US energy prices, which have skyrocketed during the Iran war. Trump has spent months grappling with the political consequences of the Middle East conflict – which has sent fuel costs, in particular diesel, soaring – ahead of the US midterm elections. Rising inflation has soured Trump’s standing with the American public.Zelensky suggested the deal was tantamount to the US investing in Russia’s war effort.
A few days later, Trump claimed that both Russia and Ukraine had agreed to an “energy ceasefire” to facilitate the export of Russian diesel.Both nations have been intensively striking one another’s energy infrastructure. Kyiv says this is to limit revenue for Russia’s war machine, while Moscow says it only targets facilities used by the Ukrainian military. Zelensky initially expressed surprise at Trump’s announcement, said Kyiv would stop the strikes if Russia did the same. After three days, and several fresh attacks from Russia, Kyiv resumed its strikes on Russian oil refineries.
This prompted scathing criticism from Trump, who said the strikes were a “disgrace”. Zelensky replied that he was “only standing up for Ukraine’s interests”. There was fresh acrimony when Zelensky accused the US of deliberately slowing down an internet uplink via Starlink satellites used extensively by the Ukrainian military for defensive operations, as well as withdrawing intelligence-sharing.
During the slowdown, Russia launched several deadly strikes on Ukraine, with residents and the government saying these came with no prior warning. Zelensky said on Friday that Starlink speeds had still not been fully restored. Trump has denied halting intelligence-sharing and deliberately slowing down Ukraine’s Starlink network.

“Trump bashed the Ukrainian leader as “not a good guy for (the US) to deal with.”

• Trump Unloads On Zelensky In Long Interview Tirade: ‘He’s Not A Good Guy’ (ZH)

In a rarity, President Trump spent a good amount of time in a fresh Newsmax sit-down interview lambasting Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky, a longtime Washington ally who has been the recipient of billions in US arms and funds. At a moment Zelensky has resisted Trump’s call to stop striking Russian oil refineries, Trump bashed the Ukrainian leader as “not a good guy for (the US) to deal with.” Watch Trump put Zelensky on blast…

.@POTUS: "Zelensky is not a good guy for us to deal with… If they're going to end up with a settlement of some kind, they're not going to do it with him. He doesn't want to settle. He says he wants to settle, but he doesn't." pic.twitter.com/jVbg0jRJg0
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) October 16, 2026

He lamented that the Ukrainian president does not want to help bring an end to the war, now it its fifth year. “He says he wants to settle, but he doesn’t. I’m not a big fan of Zelensky. They’ve destroyed that country,” the US president said, ultimately laying blame the blame also on the prior Biden administration.
Trump said it is the Ukraine war – and not the Iran war which he started with his Operation Epic Fury – that is driving up global energy prices. “Now, if you tell me that Zelensky is again shooting at refineries, all he’s doing is making the world oil price higher,” Trump stated.
“Well, I think that’s a disgrace. There’s plenty of other targets… There are a lot of targets that you can hit,” the president continued. Trump goes after Zelensky extensively in the interview, not holding back:

Trump: "I watched an interview of a young woman the other day from Ukraine. And she said, 'President Zelenskyy has destroyed our country. President Zelenskyy has taken our men away from us. Our men have no legs, no arms. Our men in many cases in mental institutions or they're… pic.twitter.com/BRyf7sr3sH
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 16, 2026

“But when you shoot at diesel refineries where you make, you know, diesel oil and we need that and the world needs that, then he’s not doing a good service for the world” – Trump said further of Zelensky. The American president again went so far as to say it’s time for a new Ukrainian leader, and that fresh elections must be held.
“I think you need an election because there’s nobody that’s telling me that the people of Ukraine are satisfied having missiles hitting their apartment building,” Trump said. Concerning the admitted ongoing difficulty of getting the two warring sides to the negotiating table, Trump described, “As you know, Putin hates Zelenskyy, and Zelensky hates Putin. And when you have that kind of hatred, it’s very hard to get something settled.”
Trump has engaged in plenty of prior public critiques of Zelensky, but again – it’s unusual for him to sit down with a conservative outlet and offer lengthy commentary on how Zelensky is failing. Show host Rob Finnerty looks briefly shocked when Trump bluntly says “I find Zelensky to be more difficult to deal with than Putin”…

Trump on Zelensky:

I find Zelensky to be more difficult to deal with than Putin. pic.twitter.com/7i8H2yDFHR
— Clash Report (@clashreport) October 16, 2026

This week there are signs that the US may be cutting back intelligence-sharing with Kiev, also amid Ukrainian outrage at the diesel deal with Putin announced last week. Ukraine has continued refinery strikes, also with Zelensky saying that Trump’s prior proclaimed ‘energy ceasefire’ was “news to me”.

Here’s that interview in full.

• Trump Responds to Zelenskyy Restarting Attacks Against Russian Refineries (CTH)

President Trump gave an extensive interview to Newsmax on the topic of Iran and Ukraine, expanding on how difficult it is to deal with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

In spite of Trump. That’s not Zelensky, that’s his backers.

• Zelenskyy Restarts Attacks Against Russian Oil Refineries (CTH)

• First, keep in mind that any attacks against Russian infrastructure should always be evaluated against the capability of Russia to effectively mitigate such attacks. Russia is an analog infrastructure in a digital world, and one of the benefits to their system is the rapid repair capability in the old-school systems.

This may seem like a small detail, however, as noted in the prior attacks against almost all Russian infrastructure, Russia continued energy operations and exports of diesel fuel despite Ukraine targeting. Russia is remarkably resilient and they build out their capabilities with redundancies no longer used in most of the western industrial systems.
Due to their analog systems Russia may be less efficient in maximizing productivity; but what they lose in industrial productivity becomes an actual asset when shifting between internal systems becomes a matter of physically opening and closing valves to shift from damaged to operational stations. Russia’s slow adaption of technological innovation factually becomes a strategic advantage in this type of kinetic war.

• Second, it is worth remembering that oil refining capacity has been curtailed by the “climate change advocates” who now assemble to support Zelenskyy. The nations now aligned against the interests of Russia are yet dependent on the dirty industrial carbon energy resources provided by Russia and other oil exporting countries.
Think about it. Because oil was considered a polluting industry, Canada, the U.K, almost all of Europe and even in the USA the refineries were devalued and capacity was eliminated. For decades coal, oil and gas were industries without investment. However, clean energy systems can generate electricity but not much else. Canada, the U.K, most of Europe and the majority of the world are still dependent on coal, oil and gas.
The irony of the dependencies plays out when you look at two-faced Europe purchasing oil/gas from Russia yet decrying Russian oil/gas sales to the global market. France is the biggest LNG purchaser from Russia, while NATO General Secretary Mark Rutte’s home country of The Netherlands is also a big buyer of Russian energy.
These dynamics become remarkable hypocrisies when we look at how the ‘Clean Energy West’ is fighting President Trump on the issues of Russia. In fact, it is not difficult to see how these same aligned nations are positioning their politics to attack President Trump and the alignment of domestic American opposition seeks to take advantage of this.
• The Wall Street Journal published an article earlier today that was transparently trying to set up a post-midterm impeachment narrative using the issue of Ukraine’s claim of Starlink no longer being a defense tool, because Donald Trump turned off the satellite system {SEE HERE}. It’s all nonsense, but with three weeks until the election, it doesn’t matter if the manipulated reporting is accurate or not – they are throwing everything at Trump in order to nudge the election.
Meanwhile Ukraine continues to represent a serious national security threat to the United States, especially when we see reports that Mexican and Central American drug cartels are sending their foot soldiers to Ukraine to learn how to use drones in preparation for combat against U.S. law enforcement {SEE HERE}. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has launched investigations into the matter.
It has become increasingly clear that Volodymyr Zelenskyy is not only a puppet to U.K/EU interests, but he’s also an unstable person. Zelenskyy is the precarious front man of a very corrupt system that operates throughout Ukraine, and it is increasingly obvious that Zelenskyy himself has little to no impact on the military operations inside Ukraine.
Ukraine military leadership seems to be running a simultaneous campaign of violence and self-enrichment. This was happening in eastern Ukraine for a long time, since approximately 2014, long before Russian President Putin crossed the border with Russian troops to confront what he called Nazi extremists and terrorists. The war machine is exceptionally lucrative for most of the Ukrainian leadership and unfortunately for Zelenskyy the world is very aware of it.
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukraine attacked a Russian oil refinery Thursday, abandoning a brief truce involving energy-related targets that it said Moscow did not heed, as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he felt betrayed by U.S. President Donald Trump. The drone strike started a fire at the refinery about 300 kilometers (180 miles) southeast of Moscow in Russia’s Ryazan region, according to the Russian Defense Ministry and Ryazan Gov. Pavel Malkov. Russia’s Astra online news outlet posted what it said was a photograph of the blaze.
The strike could further complicate Kyiv’s relations with Trump, which have soured again in recent days amid deepening tensions between Ukraine and Washington. Zelenskyy said he was outraged by Russia’s continuing aerial bombardment of energy infrastructure in apparent defiance of Trump’s demand on Sunday for both sides to halt those attacks. (more) With all of that being said, there’s also something else becoming clear – and that is making several EU leaders very nervous.
There’s a general awakening throughout the citizenry of the nations that form the foundation of Zelenskyy’s support. Despite the extreme propaganda being promoted by the European Union, the populations of Germany, France, Belarus, Belgium, Bulgaria and several other nations are now looking at the conflict and noticing how Zelenskyy is behaving with the politicians who support him.
Things don’t look right and people can sense what they are witnessing isn’t the whole truth. As a consequence, Zelenskyy is being told to dial back his direct confrontational stance toward President Trump, and it looks like some EU leaders have some form of an intervention planned for Friday. European leaders plan to urge Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to soften his public criticism of US leader Donald Trump, according to The Financial Times.
According to the FT, a summit of EU leaders is scheduled to take place in Brussels on Friday, October 16. According to officials familiar with the meeting plans, European politicians intend to discuss the situation with Zelenskyy during closed-door negotiations. (more)

The US had reached an agreement with Moscow to address the global fuel shortage that has driven up American energy prices

• Zelensky Has Issued ‘Blatant Challenge’ To Trump – Lavrov (RT)

Vladimir Zelensky is directly challenging US President Donald Trump through his outright refusal to acknowledge or accept a deal aimed at easing the global diesel shortage, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said.

Trump reached the agreement with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday after days of repeated US requests to halt strikes on Russian oil refineries being ignored by Zelensky. Washington subsequently eased sanctions on Russian diesel exports until April 2027, while Moscow pledged substantial fuel deliveries to help alleviate global shortages.
Speaking to reporters following a regional summit in Baku, Azerbaijan on Thursday, Lavrov said Moscow had backed the agreement proposed by Trump, while Zelensky continued to seek US weapons to carry out strikes on Russian energy infrastructure, including oil refineries. “The deal was proposed, and we supported it,” Lavrov said, accusing Zelensky of instead demanding more missiles for US-made Patriot systems to continue striking Russian energy facilities, including oil refineries.
“This is a direct and blatant challenge to President Trump,” Lavrov said. Zelensky criticized the agreement as a “weak decision,” lamenting that it would provide Russia with additional revenue. He also accused Trump of “betrayal,” blamed the global energy shortage on the US war on Iran, and condemned the withdrawal of American intelligence support as “dangerous.”
Trump hit back, accusing the Ukrainian leader of creating problems for the global economy and suggesting that Ukraine needed a new president. According to the Financial Times, Zelensky’s increasingly harsh criticism of Trump has alarmed European leaders, who plan to urge him to tone down his rhetoric during closed-door talks at a summit in Brussels on Friday.
On Sunday, Trump announced an immediate ceasefire covering attacks on energy infrastructure, although neither Moscow nor Kiev confirmed that an agreement had been reached. Zelensky said the announcement “was news for me” but added that Ukraine would observe a three-day pause in attacks on Russian energy facilities.
However, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Aleksandr Novak said on Wednesday that Ukrainian drones had targeted two oil refineries: in Ryazan and Saratov Regions.Overnight, a UAV attack sparked a fire at an oil refinery in Ryazan Region, according to local authorities.
Moscow has denounced the attacks as acts of terrorism and vowed to intensify strikes on Ukrainian military-related facilities, including drone and missile warehouses, while maintaining that it never targets civilians. The Kremlin said the renewed attacks ran counter to Washington’s efforts to broker peace. Moscow has repeatedly maintained that it seeks a lasting settlement of the Ukraine conflict rather than a temporary truce that would allow Kiev to regroup and rearm.

“The US-Ukraine rift goes beyond Trump: Washington’s interests increasingly clash with Kiev’s demands and Europe’s ambitions..”

• Zelensky Has Made His Choice, Now America Must Make Its Own (Poletaev)

Vladimir Zelensky’s latest interview with the London-based Financial Times deserves careful attention, because it may prove to be a watershed moment as for perhaps the first time, the Ukrainian leader has openly and directly challenged not merely Donald Trump, but the United States itself.

For the past year and a half, Zelensky, with considerable assistance from his Western European backers, has managed to navigate his increasingly difficult relationship with Washington. Faced with repeated demands from the White House, he alternated between sharp responses and diplomatic evasions, while maintaining a familiar refrain, that Ukraine appreciates American support, values President Trump’s efforts and intends to continue fighting with Washington’s assistance.
For a while, this approach worked, given the United States maintained limited involvement in the conflict, Ukraine continued fighting with varying degrees of success, and the EU largely picked up the bill. Meanwhile, the diplomatic maneuvering around Trump continued, with European leaders attempting to draw Washington back into the anti-Russian coalition as a fully committed participant.
Until recently, this arrangement appeared capable of continuing indefinitely, so Trump could pursue his peculiar dealings with Vladimir Putin, while Kiev and its European supporters performed an increasingly elaborate diplomatic dance to keep the Americans involved.
Then came the autumn, and Washington delivered what amounted to an ultimatum, essentially: accept our terms, or we will wash our hands of the conflict and deal directly with Moscow, without regard for Ukrainian or European objections.
The immediate dispute concerned Russian diesel, but the details are secondary because what matters is that Ukraine has once again found itself trying to sit on two chairs that are moving apart, and eventually, it must choose one.
In his Financial Times interview, Zelensky appears to have made that choice.
His message to Trump was remarkably direct. You want me to resign? I will not and you want me to stop attacking Russian oil refineries? Then provide missiles for our air defense. Your dealings with Putin are your business, not mine and don’t expect Ukraine to sacrifice its military campaign to accommodate Washington’s commercial arrangements with Moscow.
Then came the personal attacks, with Zelensky portraying Trump as weak and excessively sympathetic towards dictators, which represents a significant departure from the careful balancing act of the previous 18 months. Whatever diplomatic language may subsequently be employed, the underlying confrontation is now difficult to conceal.
For Washington and Kiev to resume anything resembling their previous relationship, one side would effectively have to retreat and accept the other’s demands and under present circumstances, neither appears particularly inclined to do so.
But suppose Trump’s opponents achieve a decisive victory in the coming congressional elections, allowing the American globalist establishment to regain effective control of policy, well would that fundamentally change matters?
I doubt it because American globalists, properly understood, favor US leadership through a system of worldwide economic dominance and it was precisely this system Washington sought to preserve in 2022 by attempting to force Russia into rapid economic capitulation.
When that strategy failed, the Americans began limiting their exposure, and indeed, Washington’s gradual withdrawal from direct responsibility for the conflict began under Joe Biden, certainly by 2023 and possibly as early as autumn 2022.
There is, I would argue, an underlying consensus within the American establishment on this question, but the disagreement concerns tactics rather than objectives. Trump and his allies favor a relatively abrupt disengagement, while their opponents prefer a gradual retreat, continuing to supply enough assistance to keep the conflict smoldering.
For Trump’s opponents to reverse this trajectory, they would have to return to the policies of early 2022, to policies they themselves had already begun abandoning, which would require an extraordinary loss of face.
For perhaps the first time in modern American history, Washington would find itself openly following the lead of countries it privately regards as troublesome dependents as across much of the American political establishment, from the most committed anti-Russian neoconservatives to liberal Democrats, Ukraine and Western Europe are increasingly treated as irritants rather than equal partners.
Nor is it easier to imagine Kiev and its European supporters retreating, given that even the proposals advanced by Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff in Miami, which from Moscow’s perspective involved considerable and rather humiliating concessions, proved unacceptable to them.
The logic of events suggests that Ukraine’s supporters in Washington will gradually lose influence, while those demanding that America stake everything on Russia’s defeat will become increasingly marginalized and this process will continue regardless of the congressional election results, and regardless of who occupies the White House in January 2029.
It won’t happen overnight and the retreat will be slow and frequently disguised by reassuring declarations and occasional gestures of support given American foreign policy rarely changes direction without first pretending that nothing has changed.
For Russia, the task is to recognize this developing reality without mistaking it for an immediate victory because the contradictions between Washington, Kiev, and Western Europe won’t resolve themselves, nor should Moscow expect its adversaries to abandon their positions simply because those positions have become increasingly difficult to sustain.
What’s required now is patience, a clear understanding of American interests, and painstaking diplomatic work.
Zelensky has made his choice, the only question left is how long Washington will tolerate the consequences.

“The MOAB is a massive information operation type weapon that is great for huge area clearance but not much else..

• Trump Mulls Using ‘Mother of All Bombs’ to Hit Iran (Rick Moran)

Donald Trump wants to end the war in Iran. Iran isn’t letting him. The Iranians are letting the Democrats and the media do their work for them in undermining support for ending the war on terms the U.S. can live with, and they see no reason to make a deal as long as they have a chance to get everything they want. That includes something that the Democrats also want.

A U.S. humiliation.
Politically, that’s the jackpot for Democrats. It would castrate Trump and the Republicans, undermine the last two years of the Trump presidency, and bring immense satisfaction to the Democratic base. Trump said on October 8 that he would refrain from striking Iran until after the midterms. Iran took that as an invitation and has escalated its proxy war, unleashing the Houthi rebels to attack Saudi Arabia and sinking container ships in the Gulf.
“Tehran is reportedly strengthening its defenses around sensitive energy and nuclear sites in preparation for a potential resumption of attacks, according to The Wall Street Journal. This has the Pentagon scrambling for a response. It may have found one. The White House and the Pentagon have prepared operational plans, including the potential use of the Massive Ordnance Air Blast (MOAB) bomb against Iranian military and nuclear sites, should the president order a strike once the electoral window passes.
The 21,600-pound MOAB is the largest non-nuclear ordnance in the U.S. arsenal. It’s not very effective against underground sites, but a MOAB (AKA “The Mother of All Bombs”) airburst could obliterate nine square blocks. This would make it an effective weapon against Iranian energy infrastructure, such as storage tank farms and the Isfahan oil refinery, which supplies a large percentage of Iran’s refined petroleum products. One advantage of hitting those targets is the probability of minimal to no civilian casualties.
Over the course of the last several weeks, White House advisers have held meetings to discuss various options for Iran. While Trump announced publicly that he would not take new actions before the midterms, several advisers said privately they didn’t know whether that statement was definitive or could change before Election Day.
Trump has ordered the military to develop additional strike packages against Iranian targets that include “a lot of energy infrastructure” and the potential use of a MOAB, one of the sources told CNN. The same source said the phrasing used was that this attack would come “prior to US retrograde in CENTCOM AOR (area of responsibility),” indicating the administration could launch the additional strikes, attempt to declare victory and quickly pull everyone out.
The MOAB could also be used to hit Pickaxe Mountain, where it is presumed Iran has stored its remaining advanced centrifuges and highly enriched uranium. But the MOAB is not designed to penetrate underground to the depths needed to destroy nuclear storage facilities. It may be enough to have a surface detonation and hope the seismic disturbance destroys the target.
“The MOAB is a massive information operation type weapon that is great for huge area clearance but not much else,” a source told CNN. “It is definitely not designed as a deep penetration warhead.”
“As originally conceived, the MOAB was to be used against large formations of troops and equipment or hardened above-ground bunkers,” CNN reports. “The target set has been expanded to include targets buried under softer surfaces, such as caves or tunnels.”
It seems fairly certain that the MOAB will not be used to take out bunkers buried deep underground. The U.S. has another massive ordnance bomb, the GBU-57 “Bunker Buster” bomb, that has been used effectively against the Fordow and Natanz nuclear facilities. The 30,000-pound GBU-57 is dropped from high altitudes (typically by stealth bombers like the B-2 Spirit) to maximize kinetic energy. It can punch through roughly 200 feet of earth or up to 60 feet of reinforced concrete before its “smart” fuze triggers the heavy explosive payload.
Regardless of where it’s used, Iran will know that the MOAB was deployed and that there are other targets it can be used against.

“It is not easy to change the United States Constitution, and we can thank the United States Constitution for that.”

• Now More Than Ever, the Survival of the Constitution Is on the Ballot (Stephen Kruiser)

One of the guiding comforts that I have relied upon during my 42 years of conservative political activism is an abiding faith in the strength and durability of the Constitution of the United States. It is a brilliant document, conceived by brilliant men, and it spawned the most brilliant exercise in freedom and government in history. Anytime that the United States was threatened from without or within, I knew that the guiding principles of the Constitution would help the country prevail. A frequent refrain of mine for decades has been, “The Constitution can handle anything.”

I still mostly believe that. However, both globally and domestically, the context that made me comfortable in that belief no longer exists.
Radical Islam (redundant, I know) has been inexorably gaining footholds in the Western countries that it has sworn to destroy in the name of Allah. China’s influence and power are finally starting to match the gargantuan size of its population. The worst part of the contextual change is that leftists in the United States and many of its ally countries are facilitating the Islamic invasion and the whitewashing of the dangers of Chinese communism.
Back in my “the Constitution can handle anything days,” it wasn’t under relentless assault from the Democratic Party. There were attacks, to be sure, but they came from the radical fringe of the party. Here in the Year of Our Lord 2026, those in the mainstream Democratic Party establishment are so far left that they make the 20th century Dem radicals look like moderate Republicans.
In Thursday’s Morning Briefing I wrote, “AOC said they want to ‘break the electoral map.’ They want to break the Constitution too. It’s a certainty that they won’t waste any time getting to that.” Almost everything that the Democrats dream big about these days involves either changing the Constitution, or wildly misinterpreting it.
Priority Number 1 for the frothing commies is, as we all know, to disarm the freedom-loving populace by force after they nuke the Second Amendment. More than anything else, that overwhelming desire of theirs telegraphs their endgame. For any newer firearms owners out there who are unfamiliar with how that game is played, here’s a heads-up: the gun control Dems swear that they only want to outlaw certain types of guns. Nah, they want those of us who are opposed to them to be completely disarmed.
It is not easy to change the United States Constitution, and we can thank the United States Constitution for that. It is far easier to deliberately misinterpret, unequally apply, or completely ignore the Constitution, all of which the Democrats do quite frequently. For example, their interpretation of the First Amendment “right of the people peaceably to assemble,” removes “peaceably” from the equation altogether. Prominent Democrats are often on record calling for escalation in tensions and/or violence. We see that playing out on a regular basis in the way that their minions treat ICE and Border Patrol agents.
The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) want to dismantle everything that we know and love about the United States, including the Constitution. We have already seen that the Democrats in Washington can’t handle them. Look at the disproportionate influence that AOC and her “Squad” have had since 2019, despite the best efforts of Nancy Pelosi to keep them in check when they first got there. Pelosi, by the way, was one of the most powerful House speakers in American history, and she couldn’t get Squeaky and Company to shut up.
Should the DSA get even more people elected to Congress, the Dem establishment will be absolutely steamrolled by them, and the full-on assault of the Constitution will be underway. These people are unhinged, anti-American, and quite proud of it. They are already showing us their lizard faces.
As we ponder the horrors of the socialist/communist cancer if it is allowed to spread, let us be stricken with terror over what that means for the United States Constitution. As I wrote in the headline, its survival is on the ballot. That’s not hyperbole, as I believe I’ve demonstrated here. Vote accordingly, and maybe pass this along to any undecided or moderate Dem voters you may know.

““Most people are not the enemy. They are scared, proud, lonely, overworked, and trying to protect something they love with the only map they were handed.” —LHGrey on Substack”

• Things Have Changed (James Howard Kunstler)

The Square Mile of the ‘City of London’ within Greater London

I remind you once again: history is a trickster. Sometimes things turn out, and sometimes they just turn, and these days they’re turning hard. Get this: Russia is not our mortal enemy anymore. This is not 1956 or even 1986. It is no longer the so-called Free World against the wicked Hammer and Sickle.

Russia is no longer a weird political science experiment acting in defiance of human nature — that is, of people striving to make good lives for their families. No more sacrificing everyone’s happiness to prove Karl Marx’s cockamamie theories. No more trying to foist all that on the rest of the world. Russia gave up on that project and opted to become a normal nation, with the full kit of normality: commerce, shopping, banks, enterprise. Things have changed.
Things have gotten strange, too. You see every indication that, for now, Europe has become something of adversary, if not exactly our enemy, yet. Europe has lost its mind. Now, it is Europe’s turn to destroy itself in pursuit of idiotic theories — such as: nations don’t matter. . . you can have a high standard of living without productive industry. . . carbon is destroying the world.
Europe is now tyrannized by the unelected EU commission, much as the old Soviet Union was tyrannized by its politburo. An Orwellian switcheroo has occurred. When history plays tricks, it plays doozies. So, now you’ve got the grandmotherly Ursula von der Leyen dictating what all the countries in Europe may do and not do with their farms and factories and the daily lives of their people, just like Joseph Stalin in 1937. And you have the grotesquely weak leaders of France, Germany, and the rest submitting to this.
And outside the EU — which it voted to exit in 2016 — you have our so-called “mother country,” Great Britain (the United Kingdom) committing suicide in the most extravagant way, turning over prime ministers like they were jacks in a game of whist, jailing their own people for impure thoughts, while allowing the wholesale rape of its womenfolk by foreign invaders. Most extraordinary, as Dr. Watson might have observed to old Sherlock. Meanwhile, they have the ragged remnant of their old empire to defend, and it’s not going so well.
That remnant is all that’s left of Britain’s economy: its banks, its Wall Street, which they call The City of London, a square mile of hideous skyscrapers by which Britain desperately seeks to maintain financial flows into an economy that increasingly produces nothing. Which is to say, all that’s left of Britain’s vast imperial power is a matrix of nefarious financial rackets — just as, in the USA, all that’s left of the old Democratic Party is its matrix of rackets.
These days, Britain’s political apparatus is working hard to scare-up a war with Russia as a last-ditch attempt to salvage its hopelessly wasted economy. Britain’s leadership apparently thinks it can summon a war economy and even draft an army of foot-soldiers as if this were 1914 or 1939. It’s an insane project, based on an age-old wish to capture the vast natural resources of Russia. They’ve been at it, like, forever. (France and Germany tried it, too. Didn’t work.)
Now we, here in the USA, in our own hemisphere of the globe, far across the salty seas from Europe, had been enlisted in this project to mess with Russia since 1991, and that’s not working so well anymore, either. First of all, there is the NATO problem. We’re still entangled in that anachronistic treaty, despite Russia having opted to be normal thirty-five years ago. So, you see, the way to get Russia was to stir up a war between it and Ukraine.
And they used us to do it — because the EU+ NATO lacked the mojo for the job. They got our Anglified State department and its NeoCon errand boys, along with our intel cowboys and their “Five-Eye” pardners, to stage the 2014 Maidan Revolution in Kiev, kick out the Russia-friendly president Viktor Yanukovych and, after running through a couple of puppet presidents, installed the former comedian Zelenskyy in the job (who had played a buffoonish Ukrainian president on TV previously, another great prank by our friend, history).
The next gambit was to try to shoe-horn Ukraine into NATO, which everybody knew would provoke Russia to move against Ukraine, which it did in 2022. Russia did not want NATO military bases on its border. That, Mr. Putin declared, loudly enough to be heard in Berlin, Paris, London, and Brussels, was a “red line.” Voila, war! And the USA being the backbone and the bank account for NATO, got dragged into backing Ukraine by the feckless “Joe Biden” — years on Ukraine’s bribery payroll, and too out-of-it to not be punked into playing along. Yeah, he said, you can join NATO. The blue and yellow flags busted out all over our land. Slava Ukraini, the useful idiots shrieked.
President Donald Trump, having survived the Ukraine phone call impeachment gambit and many other attempts to put him out of business, was wise to the game, and one of the first things he did returning to power in 2025 was to confab with Vladimir Putin in Alaska. Against all odds, Mr. Trump has maintained that working relationship despite having to pretend to support NATO. He apparently realizes that the tricks of history have placed the USA in greater alignment with Russia than with our former World War Two allies, most particularly a desire to avoid the World War Three that NATO is now pushing for.
The President has made it clear that he is done with the weaselly Zelenskyy and all his machinations — his visits to suck-up with King Charles, his nefarious dealings with NATO, his monstrous money-laundering. If Mr. Trump has not yet secretly withdrawn America’s remaining support for Ukraine via NATO, he will do so soon, explicitly, and in a way that is liable to be an end to NATO, which trickster-history has managed to turn into a warmonger. The EU and NATO do not have the money to keep that war going. It’s as simple as that.
Now, Iran. Americans are badly exercised by this operation, which has so far claimed around twenty lives. Well, there’s an election on, and you can be sure that a lot of this discontent is being generated by 1) the desperate Democratic Party and 2) the various characters in what’s being called “Woke MAGA.” The peeved apostates, such as Tucker, Candace, MTG, and company, might be acting under, shall we say, foreign influence, but they also seem plumb crazy. In the case of Tucker and Candace, of course, the ideas they’ve been retailing seem garishly insane. Tucker babbles about literal infestations of Satan-sent demons, and sneers Goebbels-like against the Jews, while Candace follows her cuckoo Charlie Kirk vengeance project.
Get this: Iran has lost this war, and badly. And for a good reason: being that they were determined to develop nuclear weapons and long-range missiles to deliver them, and President Trump made the reasonable decision that it better not happen. Iran, being run by a lunatic Jihad faction, the IRGC, refuses to come to reasonable terms. The few weeks left before the US midterm election make this an especially delicate period. The Iranians well know this, and are playing it for all it’s worth in hopes that a flip of the US Congress will improve their position. It’s a bad bet.
The president has made it pretty clear, and consistently so for months. The Iranians can either agree to become a normal nation, even prosperous, happy one, but with no nukes and no more jihad, or we are going to put them out of business — whichever way the midterm election goes. In other words, what you’re seeing now in that corner of the globe is not the final disposition of things.
The Europeans apparently have an incentive to do whatever they can do keep feeding the flames in Ukraine and Iran, though they are not advertising it overtly. Our interests have diverged. The Europeans are maneuvering in such a way as to make themselves an adversary to the USA, a very unwise move. It also happens that their countries are going up in flames at the moment. Their citizens are not happy, and they are further belabored by a large force of invading savages. The leaders in charge of those countries might not be in charge a whole lot longer. Think about recalibrating your expectations about where all this is going. And don’t be so glum. The odds are in our country’s favor, and these wars can be resolved favorably.

“Successive governments have turned to migrant labor while millions of Britons are on welfare, a think tank finds ..”

• Four In Five New UK Jobs Taken By Foreigners – Report (RT)

Foreign nationals have filled 80% of new UK jobs over the past decade, while millions of Britons have remained on out-of-work benefits, according to a new report by the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ). The UK think tank said on Tuesday that British nationals accounted for just 734,000 of the 3.7 million jobs added to payrolls between 2014 and the end of 2025. EU nationals accounted for 408,000 new jobs, while migrants from the rest of the world filled around 2.5 million.

“Employers have gained unprecedented access to overseas labour while taxpayers have absorbed the growing cost of domestic worklessness,” the report said. The findings are part of a major inquiry chaired by former UK Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith. The report argues that successive governments have relied on low-skilled migrant labor while millions of Britons have been “written off” by the welfare system.
Since 2020, payroll employment among non-EU nationals has surged by 2.1 million, while the number of people claiming out-of-work benefits has risen by 2.3 million. Much of the employment growth was concentrated in health and social care, administrative services, hospitality and retail.
“Compounding this, ministers have repeatedly pulled the easy lever of immigration rather than providing a better deal for left behind communities,” Duncan Smith said, urging coordinated reforms to welfare, immigration and regional development.
Around 6.7 million people in England, Wales and Scotland now receive at least one out-of-work benefit, equivalent to roughly one in six working-age adults, according to the CSJ. Since 2019, the number of claimants exempt from requirements to seek or prepare for work has climbed by nearly 1.7 million. Annual spending on working-age benefits is projected to reach £136.1 billion ($181 billion) in 2026-27.
The report comes amid mounting political pressure over immigration. Reform UK leader Nigel Farage has repeatedly accused successive governments of favoring migrants and minorities over the white working class, demanding tighter border controls and denouncing what he calls a “two-tier” system of unequal treatment.
Britain has also struggled to stop illegal crossings of the English Channel. Some 33,374 people arrived in small boats in the year ending June 2026, down 23% from the previous year, according to the Home Office. The crossings accounted for 88% of detected arrivals via illegal routes.
Public concern remains widespread. An August YouGov poll found that 69% of Britons believed immigration over the previous decade has been too high, while 43% considered it mostly bad for the country, up from 33% in 2016.

Not sure why the jews would leave.

“..46% of Muslims and 44% of Jews say they would consider leaving France if Le Pen wins..”

• Nearly Half of Muslims and Jews Might Leave France If Le Pen Wins in 2027 (RMX)

Nearly half of Muslim and Jewish respondents in a major French poll say they would consider leaving the country if Marine Le Pen wins the 2027 presidential election, according to an exclusive Ifop survey for the magazine Marianne. The poll found that 46 percent of respondents identifying as Muslim would contemplate “leaving France to settle in another country” under a Le Pen presidency.

Of those, 20 percent said they would “certainly” take that step. By comparison, 21 percent of the overall population expressed a similar willingness to leave. The figure is part of a broader set of findings on identity, secularism, and anticipated reactions to a National Rally (RN) victory. Eighty-one percent of Muslim respondents believed a Le Pen win would lead to a rise in discrimination against their community.
Twenty-seven percent said they would consider concealing their religious identity in daily life, including 18 percent who would stop wearing the veil in public. Similar sentiments appeared in other groups polled. Forty percent of the youngest cohort of French voters, 43 percent of France Unbowed (LFI) voters, and 44 percent of Jewish respondents said they would consider leaving. The survey also recorded elevated support for civil disobedience in some cohorts. For instance, substantial shares indicated they would refuse to respect laws they viewed as unjust. Notably, while Le Pen has been antagonistic towards Islam in France, she has often cast herself as a protector of Jewish life in the country.
In 2024, she said, “The best shield for French people of the Jewish faith is the National Rally. It is the only movement that has the will, the conviction and the means to fight Islamist fundamentalism, which is the major danger facing them.” Yet, nearly as many Jews said they would leave the country as Muslims.

Le meilleur bouclier pour les Français de confession juive, c'est le Rassemblement National.

C'est le seul mouvement qui a la volonté, la conviction et les moyens de lutter contre le fondamentalisme islamiste qui est le danger majeur qui pèse sur eux. pic.twitter.com/pggWHgzITu
— Marine Le Pen (@MLP_officiel) May 6, 2024

François Kraus, director of the Politics and Current Affairs division at Ifop, described the results: “The arrival in power of the candidate favored by the polls risks creating significant obstacles and generates high levels of fear and a sense of insecurity.”
The National Rally has long advocated tighter controls on immigration, greater priority for French nationals in housing and employment, and restrictions on Islamic veiling in public spaces. Le Pen has indicated she would not impose an immediate ban on the veil upon taking office but would put broader restrictions to a national referendum.
Previous Ifop work has documented rising religiosity and support for more rigorous interpretations of Islam among younger French Muslims, including significant shares prioritizing Islamic norms over French civil law on issues such as inheritance or ritual slaughter in certain scenarios. Remix News reported on this poll last year. Figures on the right treated these results as evidence of failed integration and the dangers of demographic change.
Currently, Le Pen has frequently led first-round voting intention polls, making her the favorite to win the presidential election. It is important to note that many groups claim they will leave a country if their preferred candidate does not win an election, but actually leaving is an entirely different story. The 46 percent figure for Muslims and 44 percent for Jews is only an expressed willingness or contemplation in a hypothetical scenario, not concrete plans to leave France.
The reality is that family ties, employment, and economic realities mean that leaving is far harder in practice.

Flying car.

• Tesla Roadster Wows Wall Street, But Production Waits Until 2028 (ZH)

Tesla shares rose 4% in early New York premarket trading after Thursday night’s flying Roadster reveal delivered what HSBC analysts called an “engineering flex.” However, for reservation holders who have been waiting years, the “Back to the Future”-style sports car that can perform midair barrel rolls using SpaceX air thrusters came with another dose of reality: production won’t begin until 2028.

Real life, baby pic.twitter.com/3QEqn18wig
— Tesla (@Tesla) October 16, 2026

HSBC senior global autos analyst Michael Tyndall wrote early Friday morning his first take on last night’s Tesla Roadster reveal, saying it was “an engineering flex rather than a demonstration of earnings power; still some wait for first deliveries.”

Here’s Tyndall first take:
Tesla revealed the Roadster at a SpaceX facility on 15 October, almost nine years after it started taking orders/deposits for the model in November 2017.
Financials – limited details
• No details on financial impact of the model (i.e. indication of potential units or pricing, other than reservation amount on Tesla’s website). The model is said to go into production in 2028. Global Mobility’s latest forecast (released 15 October) does not include any production estimates for this model.
• On Tesla’s 1Q26 earnings call, CEO Musk had said that: “I don’t think it [Roadster] moves the needle massively from a revenue standpoint, but it is very cool”.
• Tesla has not disclosed how many total orders it has for the model so far since Nov-17. The Founders Series that required a USD250k deposit (limited to 1,000 units) was sold out (totalling USD250m in deposits) but there is no clarity on the orders for the Standard version for which Tesla collected USD50k deposits per unit.

Regulatory approvals – no clarity
InsideEVs (15 October) notes that during the reveal event CEO Musk was “cagey about whether it would actually be legal to drive on public roads”. Tesla’s reservation page for the model says:
• The base “Performance” version is “road ready”
• The Thrust augment (limited release) is “race ready” – so potentially cannot be used on public roads
• The Rocket augment is not approved for public road use and not available in all regions

Key questions
• How much of the technology will make it to the final vehicles? How much of it will pass type approval legislation?
• Is 2028 production time-line realistic? Given the novel nature of the technology are we likely to see further delays?
• Given the pivot away from human-driven cars, does this represent a worthwhile use of R&D expenditure?Separately, JPMorgan analyst Rajat Gupta, who rates Tesla neutral, said the new Roadster’s “rocket upgrade” showcases deep collaboration with SpaceX, though production remains years behind the original schedule.

“Production is targeted for 2028, compared with the original 2020 delivery target announced when the vehicle was first unveiled in 2017,” Gupta said.
Notably, the flying Tesla Roadster appears to borrow technology from SpaceX, such as air thrusters, which supports the case that Tesla and SpaceX share not just materials but also engineering.
Barclays senior autos analyst Dan Levy wrote Thursday about the prospects of a Tesla-SpaceX merger, in which he said:
The possibility of a Tesla/SpaceX merger has increasingly become the consensus expectation, as widely highlighted by media reports. Even Elon Musk has publicly alluded to a combination: On the most recent Tesla earnings call, Elon Musk pointed to “more and more overlap” between Tesla and SpaceX, and in an interview at the All-In Summit last month, he noted, “With all this collaboration, on so many levels, who can imagine what action one might take when there’s so much close collaboration in so many areas.”
Levy expects a merger announcement ahead of Tesla’s annual general shareholder meeting in December 2026.
Watch Hagerty’s Exclusive Video on The Roadster

The FLYING Tesla Roadster explained by the man who engineered it

🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
Secretary Scott Bessent just casually called out London, Paris, and Switzerland as the globalist elite who are working with the IRGC in Iran!!
Why?
To control the price of oil and gas!
Through
– Perpetual war
– Conflict Insurance
– Market… pic.twitter.com/hFvnFqyN9Y
— Melissa Redpill (@MelissaRedpill) October 16, 2026

Exactly what I predicted has happened https://t.co/v6n2xFo72P
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 15, 2026

Gavin Baker and Antonio Gracias — Tesla board member — just confirmed what no AI investor has publicly priced yet.

Tesla is the most advanced AI in the world.

Not OpenAI. Not Anthropic. Not Google DeepMind.

Here's why:

Tesla's autopilot runs on an A4 chip — significantly… pic.twitter.com/MyffoU4nye
— stark0xbt (@stark0xbt) October 15, 2026

TODAY IS THE DAY, the Tesla Roadster reveal is finally here!

📍 SpaceX rocket test facility, McGregor, Texas
⏰ 8:55 PM ET

Nearly 9 years in the making. Are we about to witness a car take flight and make automotive history? 🔥 pic.twitter.com/2vFXHJh9NA
— Digital Daisy🌸 (@DigitalDaisyX) October 15, 2026

🚨 HAPPENING NOW: Elon Musk JUST absolutely did the impossible stuns the World with a flying car

THIS IS THE BEST THING I HAVE EVER SEEN

TESLA TEAM ACTUALLY DID IT pic.twitter.com/kUEz3Pxiw7
— MAGA Voice (@MAGAVoice) October 16, 2026

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This topic has 4 replies, 2 voices, and was last updated 16 minutes ago by John Day.

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October 17, 2026 at 5:36 pm #253258

Raúl Ilargi Meijer
Keymaster

Acropolis and Temple of Jupiter (Zeus) Olympus, Athens 1862 • Trump Waives Several Russia Sanctions As Row With Zelensky Intensifies (BBC) • Trump Unl
[See the full post at: Debt Rattle October 17 2026]

October 17, 2026 at 5:39 pm #253259

Raúl Ilargi Meijer
Keymaster

OK, that was a very stupid mistake. Sorry for that.

October 17, 2026 at 5:51 pm #253274

Raúl Ilargi Meijer
Keymaster

7 hours ago, something went wrong and I had to fix it in order to publish. I did that, but didn’t see that something else had also gone wrong.

October 17, 2026 at 6:06 pm #253275

John Day
Participant

“Promises, promises…”
Nearly half of Muslims and Jews would consider leaving France if Le Pen wins 2027 presidential election: poll
46% of Muslims and 44% of Jews say they would consider leaving France if Le Pen wins

October 17, 2026 at 6:07 pm #253276

John Day
Participant

Glad you are ok and it was a glitch, not a stroke.
;-}
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