[John Day]

@DBS: That’s the email I used okey-dokey.
I sent yet another testing attempt.
Check SPAM & so on, I guess.

[John Day]

@Michael Reid: You are welcome, of course. 😉

[John Day]

@RIM: “and special guest star, miss Dolly Parton, Now here’s the star of our show, Porter Wagoner!”

Wanda Jackson is 88. Now Hear This: “Fujiyama Mama” 1958 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IStr0Pfm-jk

[John Day]

@DBS: I just sent you an email at your eponymous email address: “Testing, Testing, Testing”

[John Day]

Government and vaccine-makers blame surviving victims: Idaho Mom Accused of Killing Twin Toddlers Pleads Not Guilty
An Idaho mother charged with murdering her twin toddlers pleaded not guilty on Tuesday. She says the children died from a vaccine reaction, not suffocation, as prosecutors allege. Her trial is set for January 2027, amid a national debate over the childhood vaccine schedule. https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/idaho-mom-accused-killing-twin-toddlers-pleads-not-guilty/

United Airlines Asks Supreme Court to Block Class Action Over COVID Vaccine Mandate. Here’s What’s at Stake
United Airlines is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn a ruling allowing roughly 1,000 employees with religious discrimination claims to sue as a group. The case could help define how workers challenge employer policies that conflict with their religious beliefs — and whether they can join forces to do so. https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/united-airlines-asks-supreme-court-block-class-action-covid-vaccine-mandate/

Two New Studies Raise Alarm Over Potential COVID-19 “Vaccine” Contamination of the Blood Supply
We report nine unvaccinated blood transfusion recipients who experienced serious complications including blood clots, heart damage, multi-organ failure, and death. https://www.thefocalpoints.com/p/breaking-two-new-studies-raise-alarm

Judge Pauses Lawsuit After HHS Announces Plan to Create COVID Vaccine Injury Table
Attorney Ray Flores asked the court to stay the suit for six months, after HHS last month announced plans to propose a rule in November to establish a formal “injury table” for all COVID-19 countermeasures, including COVID-19 vaccines. The table would increase the odds of compensation for many people seriously injured by COVID-19 vaccines, remdesivir and ventilators. Those whose claims were initially denied could have another year to file, Flores said. https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/judge-pauses-lawsuit-hhs-announces-covid-vaccine-injury-table/

[John Day]

Federal Appeals Court Rules In Favor Of James O’Keefe Over Undercover Reporting
A split panel of U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit judges said on Aug. 21 that a district court judge had erroneously kept in place $130,000 in damages against O’Keefe over an undercover operation that targeted Democratic strategists.
“The principal question in this appeal is whether the jury’s damages award violated the First Amendment by punishing the defendants for publishing a news story,” Circuit Judge Karen LeCraft Henderson, writing for the majority, said. “We conclude that it did.”
The case was brought after Project Veritas released a video showing conversations with strategist Robert Creamer and other Democratic operatives, including discussions secretly recorded by Allison Maass, a Project Veritas reporter, while she spent eight days as an unpaid intern at the Democracy Partners firm in 2016. https://www.zerohedge.com/political/federal-appeals-court-rules-favor-james-okeefe-over-undercover-reporting

Spanish Beach Stormed As Ceuta Chaos Spreads https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/spanish-beach-stormed-ceuta-chaos-spreads

Goldbug Libertarian take,but still somewhat useful: The Six Nooses: How Interventionism Is Strangling The Family’s Will To Reproduce https://www.zerohedge.com/political/six-nooses-how-interventionism-strangling-familys-will-reproduce

I observe that the “healthcare” system now micro-abandons patients at every turn, discharging them without follow-up appointments or enough medicine. This fosters panic and bad outcomes. It is how the system is structured for incentives. I suspect it is reducing American life expectancy invisibly.
‘Utterly Unsustainable’: Employer-Sponsored Health Care Costs Set to Keep Surging , Posted on August 21, 2026 by Yves Smith
Yves here. While this article correctly calls out the cancerous growth in US health care costs, it sadly over-estimates the degree to which a Medicare-for-All program would be an effective counter. Consider the practice of the smaller drug buyer, the Australian Therapeutic Good Administration. TGA staffers read medical research relentlessly. They select, for most ailments, a single medication for treatment. They often reject the latest whiz bang improvements, such as a newer once-a-day slow release version versus a three-times-a-day original, because the newer formulations do not improve medical outcomes. But they do count as FDA “new drug applications” and allow for extension of patent life, as in preserving premium pricing. https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2026/08/utterly-unsustainable-employer-sponsored-health-care-costs-set-to-keep-surging.html

Chemicals in Home Products Are Spiking Breast Cancer Rates
Under HHS Secretary Kennedy, the FDA is finally taking a hard look at chemical compounds in makeup, shampoo, laundry detergent and more.
The average American woman applies 168 different chemicals to her body every day, according to the Environmental Working Group (EWG), which surveyed thousands of people in 2004 about the personal care products they use. https://www.themahareport.com/p/chemicals-in-home-products-are-spiking

[John Day]

Helen of Destroy, Invasion of the Country-Snatchers – The AI-powered surveillance state is un-American. Literally. (Part I of a series)
Silicon Valley apologists insist that Americans must sacrifice their clean water, farmland, public funds, privacy, constitutional rights, careers, and dignity to stay ahead of China in the AI arms race. But that narrative is misleading: the US already has over 10 times as many data centers as China – 5,427 to their 449 as of May – despite less than one fourth the population, with nearly twice the installed data center capacity (52 gigawatts to China’s 28). At the start of this year, the US had more data centers than the next 14 countries combined – yet construction has actually sped up, with more spent on data center construction in the first six months of this year than in all of 2025 – and more than three times what was spent in 2024.
Despite unprecedented hype, AI has not replaced human labor – Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei even walked back his clickbait prediction that it would eliminate 50% of entry-level white collar jobs by 2027 – and the promised productivity gains have not materialized, even with employers forcing workers to use the technology if they want to keep their jobs… ..Deploying its full arsenal of dirty tricks to get Americans hooked on generative AI, the industry cons casual users of the tech into feeling guilty for their supposed role in the data center buildout and its attendant harms – as if their hunger for cat slop videos (and not the Pentagon’s need to maintain dynamic targeting lists of problematic citizens) is what’s really causing those data centers to dry up Lake Tahoe. In reality, corporate and government AI use the vast majority of US compute – over 85% by one estimate – dwarfing consumer-facing applications… ..The data center blitzkrieg is best understood as the foundation of the AI surveillance state. It enables the subversion of every freedom America claims to stand for by a parasitic fifth column, long embedded in the public and private sectors, that has been unable to mount a proper coup without AI. With that barrier removed, all bets are off. The Trump administration declared AI data centers critical infrastructure last year – it was this executive order that opened the door to the use of eminent domain to seize private property for their construction – and has reoriented the machinery of the state to service the occupying force. https://helenofdestroy.substack.com/p/invasion-of-the-country-snatchers

I presume they intend to run the planet, not merely trade on inside information, June 2025: Tech Executives Commissioned as Senior Army Officers Won’t Recuse Themselves from DoD Business Dealings
The new formation is set to recruit tech executives to work on major Army challenges, but the service has not articulated exactly what those individuals would do — instead focusing on recruiting talent and creating jobs around them.
​ The four include Shyam Sankar, chief technology officer for Palantir; Andrew Bosworth, chief technology officer of Meta; Kevin Weil, chief product officer of OpenAI; and Bob McGrew, adviser at Thinking Machines Lab and former chief research officer for OpenAI.​..
​..While in regular formations, lieutenant colonel is a senior rank that garners respect. Inside the Pentagon, it’s often the bare minimum rank to enter the room — a relatively junior-grade officer in a sea of top brass and high-level civilian decision-makers. The law allows the military to direct commission up to the rank of colonel, but that would require Senate confirmation.​..
..”When it isn’t obvious what rich guys get out of something, that’s what worries me,” one Capitol Hill national security adviser told Military.com on the condition of anonymity to speak candidly.​ https://www.military.com/daily-news/2025/06/27/tech-executives-commissioned-senior-army-officers-wont-recuse-themselves-dod-business-dealings.html

Escape Key, 9/11 This essay is not about controlled demolition, insider trading, or who knew what in advance. The question here is simpler. What institutional infrastructure was developed as a direct consequence of the event, what did it connect to, and what is the net function of the system that now exists?
The purpose of a system is what it does. In 1976, a claimed swine flu outbreak at Fort Dix was projected as a potential pandemic threat, triggering the first mass federal vaccination campaign in US history. Forty-three million Americans were vaccinated before the programme was halted after cases of Guillain-Barré syndrome. At the precise time of the Fort Dix episode, a conference convened in Rougemont, Switzerland, brought together pharmaceutical industry executives and senior public health officials to discuss surveillance and vaccines. Walter Dowdle — the CDC’s deputy director — delivered both the opening and closing remarks.
Two years later, CDC Director William Foege signed the first US pandemic plan — the same year as the Declaration of Alma-Ata, calling for global centralisation of information, education, drugs, and vaccines. The structure was ‘the third way‘ applied through health: neither exclusively state nor market, but a managed system in which a carefully selected ‘civil society organisation’ (NGOs) provides the purposive ethic… ..In June 2001, Dark Winter — a senior-level bioterrorism simulation — was held at Andrews Air Force Base, simulating a covert smallpox attack through mock National Security Council meetings. Participants included former CIA director James Woolsey and New York Times reporter Judith Miller, both of whom became among the loudest voices blaming the subsequent anthrax attacks on Iraq. The exercise script included fabricated news clips linking Iraq to bioterrorism — a narrative deployed operationally within four months.
On September 10, 2001, Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld announced that the Pentagon could not account for $2.3 trillion in transactions. The accounting offices investigating these discrepancies were in the section of the Pentagon struck the following morning. The investigation did not resume. In 2018, the Federal Accounting Standards Advisory Board adopted Statement 56, allowing government agencies to modify public financial statements to prevent disclosure of classified activities… ..9/11 sits at the centre of this picture not because of what happened on the day, but because of what was built in the months that followed.
The pre-positioning ran from 1966 to 2001. The triggering events arrived between September and December 2001. The construction ran from 2002 to 2006. The dress rehearsals from 2009 to 2019. The activation came in 2020. The codification is underway now — through the Pandemic Treaty, the EU AI Act, the unified ledger, and the Pact for the Future’s Emergency Platform. https://escapekey.substack.com/p/911

“When Plunder Becomes a Way of Life” – The “Pandemic Preparedness” and “Biodefense” industries are perfect examples of how the US government has become a glorified racketeering syndicate. https://www.thefocalpoints.com/p/when-plunder-becomes-a-way-of-life

Supreme Court Backs Trump’s Mail-In Ballot Overhaul https://www.zerohedge.com/political/supreme-court-backs-trumps-mail-ballot-overhaul

[John Day]

Trump has given Rubio free rein to break Cuba: US pummels Cuban economy with new sanctions on mining, construction
US economic restrictions have strained the island’s already fragile economy, prompting blackouts and medical shortages. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/8/20/us-pummels-cuban-economy-with-new-sanctions-on-mining-construction

Fishing and farming communities have no rights. Myanmar military offensive targets land for Russia-backed port project https://uk.news.yahoo.com/myanmar-military-offensive-targets-land-040139388.html

Trump says he will meet N. Korea’s Kim this year, puts N.K. nukes at 57 https://en.yna.co.kr/view/AEN20260820000354315

Track any person anywhere in any car or on foot: Flock Has a Powerful New AI Tool for Police. We Got Its Code
Flock’s surveillance cameras have already sparked outrage. WIRED reconstructed its next-generation AI system, already in use by some police, to confirm it goes much further than tracking license plates. https://archive.is/lT86y#selection-727.0-731.202

AI was supposed to win people over by now — it hasn’t
A recent CNBC poll of 18- to 34-year-olds found that, when given the names of nine top leaders in the AI industry, a majority of the respondents said they don’t trust those people to “act responsibly” when it comes to AI. A May Economist/YouGov poll found that over 70% of Americans think AI is advancing too quickly… The underlying sentiment spanning these stories is that consumers don’t see how AI is making their lives better, but they’re still being asked to absorb the costs. https://techcrunch.com/2026/08/19/ai-was-supposed-to-win-people-over-by-now-it-hasnt/

[John Day]

Simplicius, Cash-Strapped Ukraine Gripped by Preparatory “Female Mobilization” Info-Drive
A whirlwind new media campaign has been orchestrated around plying society to the acceptance of mobilizing the female population of Ukraine.
​ Ex-Defense Minister Reznikov first broke the ice by discussing the new “stricter” mobilization procedures being promised by Zelensky’s government, which include tightening various rules as well as potentially changing the draft age.
​ But at the 0:30 second mark, he states that for Ukraine to make it, it must look to other states which have successfully solved manpower issues, and elevates Israel to the exemplary role…
​..Ukraine is facing an increasingly dire condition. The latest developing crisis revolves around Ukraine’s funding shortfall, as outlined by Zelensky himself in a series of pleading statements.​..
​..The reason this makes sense is because Ukraine has been sending an unprecedentedly disproportionate number of drones against Russia, nearly 1,000 per shot on many nights. And most ignorant pro-UA observers absently gloat and cheer this on as if the prodigious resources for such strikes are simply materializing from thin air, recklessly believing that the piper never has to be paid in the end. Well, now the bill is due—and Zelensky is begging for mountains of cash more that the depleted Euro-vassals can no longer afford.
​ In​ fact, what now becomes obvious is that Zelensky simply staked everything on this year’s PR campaign to “bring Putin to his knees” via refinery and warehouse strikes—equivalent to doing 40x leveraged margin shorts and blowing up your entire portfolio once the gamble backfires.​ https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/cash-strapped-ukraine-gripped-by

They all know better: Europe’s hollowed-out armies: The race to find 100,000 soldiers https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2026/08/21/europes-hollowed-out-armies-the-race-to-find-100000-soldiers

Denmark deploys first conscripts to Greenland – Copenhagen send its youth to the Arctic after Trump’s threats https://www.euractiv.com/news/denmark-deploys-first-conscripts-to-greenland/

Russian objectives will need to be secured, but… Russia Says Ready For ‘New Ideas’ From US On Ending Ukraine War https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/russia-says-ready-new-ideas-us-ending-ukraine-war

​ US Air Force C-17 Makes Mysterious Visit To Moscow
A US Air Force Boeing C-17 Globemaster III military transport aircraft landed at Moscow’s Vnukovo International Airport on Tuesday, according to flight-tracking website Flightradar24.
​ The C-17 arrived from Riga, Latvia, where it landed on Sunday, according to Flightradar24 data. Flight data show that the military transport plane was recently at Camp Springs, Maryland, home to Joint Base Andrews, which supports presidential and senior US government travel.​..
​..There has been no official confirmation from the US about the C-17’s landing in Moscow. The flight could indicate support for a senior US delegation, the transportation of diplomatic cargo or a prisoner transfer. Keep in mind that Joint Base Andrews is a major hub for US government and military missions.​ https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/us-air-force-c-17-makes-mysterious-visit-moscow

[John Day]

My Greek friend says that Greeks have come to detest the exceedingly rude and entitled Israeli tourists who visit. Greece’s alliance with Israel is becoming a domestic liability https://www.middleeasteye.net/big-story/greece-alliance-israel-becoming-domestic-liability

The EU Commission’s Secret Plan to Share EU Citizens’ Most Sensitive Data With Israel
For three years the Von der Leyen Commission has been secretly negotiating to hand over its citizens’ data to a state committing multiple genocides. The EU has run a mission in the West Bank to support the Palestinian Authority with policing since 2005. If the data sharing agreement goes ahead, the data collected by EU police missions operating in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip city and Rafah could be fed into Israel’s existing military surveillance systems.
The really twisted part, as Deaglan O’Mulrooney notes in an article for Washington University’s The Spectacle Mag, is that the EU’s own legal service declared the agreement unlawful in 2022. The Commission, in time-honoured fashion, carried on regardless:
The Council Legal Service concluded that the Commission had breached its negotiating mandate, violated EU treaty requirements, and failed to consult the relevant working group. The lawyers specifically objected to provisions that would allow data shared with Israel to be used in the occupied Palestinian territories, warning it would be the first time an international agreement between the EU and Israel would provide for its application to the territories occupied since 1967, and that it would violate the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination and breach international law. The Commission read all of this, noted it, and continued negotiating anyway.
The agreement was formally frozen in late 2022 following the legal objections. What Statewatch’s investigation reveals is that it did not stay frozen. https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2026/08/the-eus-von-der-leyen-commission-is-considering-sharing-eu-citizens-most-sensitive-data-with-israels-genocidal-state.html

AIPAC Loses Yet Another House Race It Poured Millions of Dollars Into
AIPAC has lost yet another race into which it poured millions of dollars on Thursday after California state Sen. Aisha Wahab won her special election to serve out the rest of Eric Swalwell’s term in the U.S. House of Representatives.
The Associated Press called the race on Thursday evening for Wahab, who received 53 percent of the vote compared to Democratic opponent Melissa Hernandez’s 47 percent. Wahab is the first Afghan American ever elected to the U.S. Congress, and was the first Muslim woman elected to the California legislature.
Wahab is slated to serve out the rest of Swalwell’s term, which ends in January, after he resigned over sexual assault allegations made against him. She will represent a swath of the Bay Area, and will face off against Hernandez again in the general election in November for a full term.
AIPAC’s super PAC, United Democracy Project (UDP), poured $2.5 million into opposing Wahab and backing Hernandez, the New York Times reports, much of it in the final weeks of the race.
The spending has been somewhat puzzling, baffling even pro-Israel leaders in the state who question why the lobbying powerhouse would spend so much on a race that, unlike many others this election cycle, has not been defined by the candidates’ stances on the U.S.’s policies toward Israel. https://scheerpost.com/2026/08/23/aipac-loses-yet-another-house-race-it-poured-millions-of-dollars-into/

Simplicius, from 8/20/26, Plans Revealed for Massive Ukrainian Attacks Against Russian Airports, as Kiev Hit With Another Unstoppable Ballistic Swarm
In short, they wanted to plan a mass terror attack on Russian airports to completely shut down all civilian flights in and out of Moscow as a way to ramp up pressure and make Russian civilians in the capital city feel the consequences of the war.
The article claims Zelensky thought better of it, fearing that “accidentally” killing civilians would be seen as “piracy” at the hands of Ukraine.
By the middle of spring, the plan to force a more permanent shutdown of Moscow’s airports had advanced far enough to receive a code name: M&Ms, a reference to the many small, cheap, and nearly identical drones that the mission would require. To overwhelm Russian air defenses, the operation would need to send as many as 1,000 drones a night to airports in and around Moscow, said one of the sources familiar with it. The article details how it was ex-Defense Minister Fedorov that was responsible for driving the plan, but that even newly-appointed Yevhen Khmara is said to be carrying the reins forward…
..The article notes this tracks with Fedorov’s begging of Elon Musk to enable Starlink to be used over all of Russia. This gives us a general overview of what to expect from Ukraine in the coming months. https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/plans-revealed-for-massive-ukrainian

Gilbert Doctorow asks, Why did an 82,000 square meter warehouse in the Petersburg borough of Pushkin go up in flames yesterday? https://gilbertdoctorow.substack.com/p/why-did-an-82000-square-meter-warehouse

[John Day]

Israeli Defense Minister Orders IDF to Escalate Demolitions in Southern Lebanon – Weekend attacks centered around using artillery, white phosphorus on southern town https://news.antiwar.com/2026/08/23/israel-dm-orders-idf-to-escalate-demolitions-in-southern-lebanon/

Larry Johnson provides the numbers. Terrorism supporters #1 and #2 work together: The Data Doesn’t Support the Charge: Iran and the “Number One Sponsor of Terrorism” Claim https://sonar21.com/the-data-doesnt-support-the-charge-iran-and-the-number-one-sponsor-of-terrorism-claim/

It looks like WW-2 concentration-camp pictures: IDF Marks Palestinian Detainees With Numbers as It Expands Northern West Bank Operations https://archive.is/2CylM#selection-735.0-735.88

19 August 2026 (WAFA) – The Colonization & Wall Resistance Commission said that, between 7 October 2023 and 18 August 2026, the Israeli occupation authorities targeted approximately 29,335 dunums of Palestinian land through declarations designating it as so-called “State Land”, marking one of the largest waves of land seizure since the signing of the Oslo Accords. https://english-wafa-ps.translate.goog/Pages/Details/173890?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp

A US envoy clarifies his comments on Golan Heights that contradicted Trump’s position
The U.S. special envoy to Syria and ambassador to Turkey on Sunday walked back his comments from two days ago that Israel “still” occupies the Golan Heights in violation of U.N. resolutions, remarks that went against U.S. President Donald Trump ‘s position on the disputed territory.
Israel captured the Golan Heights from Syria in the 1967 Mideast war and annexed it in 1981. The United Nations and most of the international community consider the territory occupied Syrian land and do not recognize Israel’s annexation of it.
In 2019, Trump recognized Israeli sovereignty over the territory, reversing decades of U.S. policy.
Ambassador Tom Barrack on Friday said that Israel “still” occupies the territory in an interview with Lebanese-Australian entrepreneur Mario Nawfal.
Barrack now says that was a description of the territory’s historical status, “not an endorsement of the United Nations’ position” on the Golan.
“United States policy on the Golan was set by President Trump in 2019 and is unchanged,” he said. https://abcnews.com/International/wireStory/us-envoy-clarifies-comments-golan-heights-contradicted-trumps-135887479

[John Day]

What I am seeing is a piling of blame onto “Netanyahu” ahead of October elections “he” is expected to lose. I think “he” has been AI images and a body double since an early March Iranian missile strike. This could be a convenient transition: Alastair Crooke: Netanyahu’s réprise of the ‘Iraq WMD deceit’ – re-launched to promote war on Iran https://strategic-culture.su/news/2026/08/15/netanyahus-reprise-of-the-iraq-wmd-deceit-re-launched-to-promote-war-on-iran/

This is particularly sly if Netanyahu is dead: Turkey Issues Arrest Warrant For Netanyahu, Seeks Interpol Red Notice https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/turkey-issues-arrest-warrant-netanyahu-seeks-interpol-red-notice

Poll Shows Voters Reject US-Israel Military Integration – 61% of respondents oppose legislation in the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for 2027 that would integrate Israeli weapons companies into the Pentagon at a level exceeding that of any other country. That figure rose to 78% among Democrats and 73% among independents. https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/poll-shows-voters-reject-us-israel-military-integration

Caitlin Johnstone, Our Entire Civilization Is Run By Oligarchs And Empire Managers
Zionists promote Islamophobia because convincing westerners to hate Muslims is easier than convincing them to like Israel.
This is a fact, not an opinion. Last year Drop Site News published a leaked polling report that had been commissioned by the Israeli government which found that while Israel’s reputation is crumbling throughout the western world, one way to salvage it would be to foment panic about Muslims.
Drop Site reports the following:
“Israel’s best tactic to combat this, according to the study, is to foment fear of ‘Radical Islam’ and ‘Jihadism,’ which remain high, the research finds. By highlighting Israeli support for women’s rights and gay rights while elevating concerns that Hamas wants to ‘destroy all Jews and spread Jihadism,’ Israeli support rebounded by an average of over 20 points in each country. ‘Especially once the situation in Gaza is resolved, the room for growth in all countries is very significant,’ the report concludes.”
So if you speak critically about Israel online and suddenly find your replies inundated with Zionists shrieking about Islam and Muslims, that’s why. Their research has concluded that convincing westerners to hate Muslims is easier than convincing them to love Israel. https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/our-entire-civilization-is-run-by

A coverup: After More Than Two Years, Israel Admits to Firing on Car Carrying Five-Year-Old Hind Rajab and the Ambulance Sent To Rescue Her
Israel has admitted that its forces fired on a car that was carrying five-year-old Hind Rajab, who was killed by the IDF along with six members of her family as they were attempting to flee Gaza City on January 29, 2024.
Hind was the only survivor of an initial attack on the vehicle and was surrounded by six dead family members as she spent hours on the phone with the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PCRS) pleading for help. The PCRS waited until it had authorization from the Israeli military to dispatch an ambulance to the area and send it along a route provided by the IDF’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT).
Despite the coordination with the IDF, once the two Palestinian paramedics arrived, they were fired on by Israeli tanks and killed. Hind was still alive after the blast that killed the paramedics and was speaking on the phone with her mother, but the PCRS lost contact with her shortly after. Nearly two weeks later, after the IDF withdrew from the area, the body of Hind, her six family members, and the paramedics, Yousef Zeino and Ahmed al-Madhoun, were recovered. https://news.antiwar.com/2026/08/19/after-more-than-two-years-israel-admits-to-firing-on-car-carrying-five-year-old-hind-rajab-and-medics-sent-to-rescue-her/

[John Day]

Michael Hudson and Steve Keen: The Federal Reserve, the Constitution, and the End of US Hegemony
Michael Hudson: Well, Steve, don’t knock the bubble. That is what has been supporting the dollar and the whole economy. After the United States went off gold, it could pump dollars into the world economy through military spending, deindustrialize, and run a trade deficit. Those dollars ended up in the hands of foreign central banks, which recycled them by treating them as the new form of monetary reserves. In the last few years, the great support for the U.S. balance of payments has been private inflows into U.S. stock and bond markets. The bubble has had two effects. All the growth in America’s wealth has taken the form of rising stock, bond, and real-estate prices, and almost all of it has accrued to the wealthiest ten percent—mainly the top one percent. The other 99 percent have had no increase at all in their wealth, while the bottom 40 percent run deeper and deeper into net debt every year. This money is coming in while polarizing the U.S. economy.
The United States has become the target of the Japanese carry trade, for instance: investors in countries with low interest rates borrow cheaply and speculate in U.S. stock and bond markets. The zero-interest-rate policy created the largest bond-market boom in American history. Right now, I don’t know any major investor among the people I talk to who thinks they can make any more money in stocks and bonds. They are just trying to preserve what they have gained since 2009, when the Obama bubble began. Yet foreigners, retail investors, and pension funds have all been putting money into this. Some economists call this the confidence fairy. But as Steve and I have been saying, this bubble cannot be sustained. By the end of this year, when there is a world depression from the oil war, you are going to see breaks in the financial chain of payments, defaults, foreclosures, and a huge transfer of property from debtors to creditors amid a worldwide breakdown.
If you are very rich and have enough billions of dollars to be a player, it is much easier to get wealthy very quickly in a situation of economic collapse than through economic growth. https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2026/08/michael-hudson-and-steve-keen-the-federal-reserve-the-constitution-and-the-end-of-us-hegemony.html

What Will Burst It: Ed Dowd Warns AI Is The Biggest Bubble Of All Time
Dowd sees the same bubble signs in AI (artificial intelligence) as he did just before the Dot-com bubble blew up.
This time around, it’s far worse. Dowd says: “Being a student of history gives you an idea of where you might go in the future. Currently, we have the greatest bubble of all time, and that is the AI bubble.
It is in the process of becoming exposed, and people are beginning to issue warning signals. Lloyd Blankfein, the former CEO of Goldman Sachs, has issued a warning . . . about the AI risk. He’s worried people are too concentrated in this trade…
First of all, there is not even enough power to power these data centers. That’s going to halt the CapEx (Capital Expenditure) on its own accord.
There is so much capital that has to be raised that will compete with government debt, there will be a crowding out effect.
The costs to finance this are going to keep going higher and higher, and this will cause some bankruptcies . . . and then it all unwinds.” …
..Dowd says, “It would not surprise me to see a 40% to 50% correction at some point…”
” Calling when that is going to happen is very difficult. I don’t suggest anyone short the market, but it seems like we are getting closer to the end game when people are openly calling this a bubble.
People say the bubble does not pop until everybody believes. That’s not true. There were plenty of people during the 2000 Dot-com bubble who knew it was a bubble.
They actually played it, and the game was ‘get out before everybody else gets out.’ So, people know it’s a bubble. The question is what will burst it?
That is the credit markets and private credit, which has been a big source of funding for AI that is under stress. There is a default cycle coming, and general backdrop of the real economy is quite weak. The consumer is not doing well. Walmart just reported, and it had the lowest same store sales in six years… The general population is not doing well, the housing market is rolling over… https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/what-will-burst-it-ed-dowd-warns-ai-biggest-bubble-all-time

About a managed-default on $US debt to gold at $20k-30k/oz: Gold: From DC’s “Enemy” To Its Last Hope?
After decades of exporting US inflation to the rest of the world, the increasingly diluted and unloved dollar is no longer just the world’s problem, it’s America’s problem as well.
Which means that what Bessent and Trump (as well as Judy Shelton) are subtly suggesting is that gold is no longer our “enemy.”
Instead, and quite ironically, gold is now one of America’s last options to de-deficit at least a portion of its fiscal nightmare.
Rather than Repress Gold, Let It Run – Or stated even more simply, it is now in the USA’s best interest to let gold run rather than to price fix it lower on a COMEX which has lost both its gold and credibility as China and Hong Kong move from paper-based exchanges to physical precious metal exchanges.
Gold at $4,000/oz., for example, won’t help the USA de-deficit nearly as much as it could if gold were at $17,000/oz., $20,000/oz or higher (in fact much higher) in the years to come.
And if you are wondering why central banks are stacking more gold than USTs today, it’s partly because that is precisely where they see gold heading: Much higher. http://zerohedge.com/precious-metals/gold-dcs-enemy-its-last-hope

Little by little… Pentagon says over 750 US troops wounded during war on Iran
A US official said the Pentagon’s counting method aimed to hide the true number of wounded, with estimates reaching 900 https://thecradle.co/articles/pentagon-says-over-750-us-troops-wounded-during-war-on-iran

Talks Collapse – Tariffs Begin Now – A Direct and Confrontational U.S-Canada Trade War is Now a Reality
When USTR Jamieson Greer and Canadian negotiator Dominic LeBlanc said the terms were “basically agreed”, again CTH said be careful.
The reason for our notes of extreme caution is because the divide between the two economies and trade policy is just too big. There was no way for both sides to close the gap without major structural economic changes within Canada. The issues are not points of friction, they are just too big and embedded within the laws of Canada that would have to change.
Banking regulations would have to change. Intellectual property and media rules, regulations and laws would have to change. Industrial policy would have to change. The Canadian energy policy would have to change. The carbon trading scheme would have to change or be removed. All of this would fall upon Canada to carry out in order to position their economy in alignment with the USA. There’s literally no way for their government to accomplish this against the backdrop of their political ideology.
That was the structural argument and point made by former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. This is also why the USMCA as a trilateral trade agreement is impossible to maintain. The only trade agreement construct possible is two clearly separate bilateral free trade agreements, one with Mexico and one with Canada… A trade war is underway. https://theconservativetreehouse.com/blog/2026/08/22/talks-collapse-tariffs-begin-now-a-direct-and-confrontational-u-s-canada-trade-war-is-now-a-reality/#more-286245

[John Day]

Our lif-support systems run on diesel. Supplies are already short: Transport voyages take months. Gold & Geopolitics, Running on empty – Buffered calm
Heating oil and the “crack spread” is signaling something is amiss, but both Brent and WTI are massaged to not signal very much.
I’m foreseeing a major repricing, absent any real ceasefire, or EVEN with a real ceasefire, oil’s not going to run very soon.
Same story as with silver: huge deficit, above-ground vaults being run down. The big difference is that oil is a visible product. If it’s not there, everyone will notice.
So line up your calendars: Nov: midterms, Jan 27: no Russian gas for the EU, early Feb: Norway should finish their repairs. And through all this time, the Red Sea and the Strait of Hormuz are blocked.
Yep, everything’s fine. The gov says so. https://no01.substack.com/p/running-on-empty

‘Perfect storm’ brews for global food supply this winter as grain prices soar https://www.cnbc.com/2026/08/21/grain-price-russia-food-supply.html

Food Supply Alert: Ukraine Grain Exports Collapse As Black Sea Attacks Choke Global Shipments https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/food-supply-alert-ukraine-grain-exports-collapse-black-sea-attacks-choke-global

European Union on the Brink of Severe Food Crisis – It appears the EU food crisis is already beginning to take hold. With recent weather disasters caused by extreme heatwaves across the continent, local agricultural productivity is expected to plummet. This compounds an existing scenario of decline in the European agribusiness sector and sanctions against Russia – formerly a key supplier of agricultural goods to Europe. Now, European countries face the likely prospect of reduced food supplies alongside an exponential rise in prices. https://www.globalresearch.ca/eu-brink-severe-food-crisis/5937634

Martin Armstrong, The Strait of Hormuz Is Repricing the Entire World Economy
The more serious warning is coming from refined products, particularly diesel. Politicians obsess over crude because that is the price quoted every evening on television. Yet modern civilization runs on diesel. Trucks transport food and consumer goods, farmers operate machinery, construction companies run heavy equipment, and emergency generators protect hospitals and critical infrastructure. When diesel rises, the cost of virtually everything rises with it.
Governments will pretend that this inflation is temporary or caused by greedy corporations. They said the same thing after the monetary expansion of 2020. Inflation is never politically convenient because it exposes the true cost of government policy. A war financed through borrowing does not require politicians to present taxpayers with an immediate bill. The expense is transferred into sovereign debt, currency depreciation, and higher prices. The public pays through the destruction of purchasing power, while officials continue claiming that military operations can be conducted without domestic sacrifice…
..The Strait of Hormuz is becoming a tax imposed upon the entire world economy. It will appear in freight costs, food prices, utility bills, interest rates, government deficits, and eventually elections. Western leaders will blame Iran, corporations, speculators, or climate change before admitting that their endless wars carry an economic price. https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/world-news/world-trade/the-strait-of-hormuz-is-repricing-the-entire-world-economy/

[John Day]

​Gold & Geopolitics, Daily digest: 2026-08-25
The “Economic D-Day” everyone had circled arrived and turned out to be a warning shot: Bessent published an OFAC list across five pillars, threatened dollar-system expulsion for anyone helping Iran, then declined to fire the secondary sanctions because – his words – he doesn’t want to blow up the global financial system.
​ Overnight, a US-escorted tanker was struck and disabled inside the Strait of Hormuz, and the Houthis put an anti-ship ballistic missile into a Saudi VLCC from over 1,000km.
​ The other genuinely new thing: Stanley Druckenmiller took to the WSJ to publicly dismantle his former protégé’s bond-buyback plan, hours after Treasury floated tapping its ~$950B cash account to fund it.​ https://no1sdailydigest.substack.com/p/daily-digest-2026-08-25

​ Bessent Drops Iran Sanctions Hammer On Dozens Of Chinese Firms, Spares Big Banks As Beijing Threatens Retaliation
The Trump administration’s “Operation Economic Outcast” has expanded the sanctions campaign across China and Hong Kong, targeting dozens of individuals and businesses while intentionally holding off on sanctioning major Chinese banks that keep Tehran connected to the global financial system. Beijing, meanwhile, signaled earlier Tuesday that it would not retreat from its economic relationship with Iran, raising the risk that Trump’s economic war against Tehran could evolve into a direct confrontation with China, the largest buyer of discounted Iranian crude.​ https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/bessent-drops-iran-sanctions-hammer-dozens-chinese-firms-spares-big-banks-beijing

Gold & Geopolitics, Daily digest: 2026-08-24
The big delta is that Bessent’s “economic D-Day” against Iran stops being a threat and becomes a scheduled event – press conference today 1 PM ET, with Tehran’s security council answering that participating countries will be treated as belligerents. Second delta: the “Hormuz traffic explodes 400%” headline propagated across the feed while the people counting hulls put daily crossings in single digits. Everything else – gold through $4,700, Ozon warehouses burning across southern Russia, NVDA Wednesday as the AI trade’s fulcrum – is continuation with a specific 24h advance.
Bessent announces “economic D-Day” begins at dawn; presser today 1 PM ET. His own words: “the single greatest financial offensive ever marshaled against an adversary”, objective to “sever every economic lifeline” …The threat extends to third parties: “any nation that serves as a financial artery of a withering regime should expect to share in its isolation” (MenchOsint).
Iran’s response pre-commits to zero exports. Supreme National Security Council secretary Mohsen Rezaee: “if the economic war continues, not a single drop of oil will be exported, neither through the Strait of Hormuz nor from anywhere in the Persian Gulf”, and participation in sanctions will be read as an act of war (MoloWarMonitor). Both principals have now defined the other’s survival as the stake (SCapStrategist).
The “Hormuz traffic +400%” number collapses on inspection. Headline ran wide (zerohedge, warwatchh). Counter-evidence: crossings “still in single digits” (chigrl), weekend levels still 90%+ below pre-28 February (thesiriusreport), and small craft counted as ships (JustDario). The base is so small that “1 boat to 4 boats” produces the percentage (HeroDividend)…
..Tanker struck by projectile 63NM west of Yanbu, northern Red Sea. UKMTO Warning Attack 119, fire on main deck, crew safe, reported 07:44 UTC today (ILRedAlert). That is far north of Bab el-Mandeb – the leg Saudi re-routing was supposed to keep safe…
..Trump has “almost no remaining economic pressure left except massive fines on Chinese banks and refiners”; if he takes it, bullish oil, bearish stocks, and China has signalled retaliation via critical minerals and refining (Mark4XX)…
..Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan have invited Iran into the newly-established Mecca Joint Defence Agreement; Iran’s parliamentary news agency head says “the matter is under consideration” (FirstSquawk, JSchanzer). Sceptical read from the OSINT side: NATO members and US allies inviting Iran into a defensive alliance makes little sense (MenchOsint)…
..Gold: through $4,700 for the first time since mid-May, and China’s real buying is roughly double the reported number – China bought an estimated +40 tonnes via London OTC in June – 167% above the +15t the PBoC reported – after +48t in May against +10t reported; officially +20t in July, +60t YTD, 2,366t total (KobeissiLetter).
Customs data: 865 tonnes of gold imported January-June, +90% YoY, contributing 1.5% to GDP (oriental_ghost). Reserve rotation is the frame – gold up, Treasuries down (RiseHarvest)…
..Treasuries: the Fed now owns over half the 10-15 year bucket, and Trump names the ultimate intervention – The Fed owns more than 50% of all Treasuries maturing 10-15 years out (zerohedge, Barchart).
Asked whether another intervention was coming after yields backed up, Trump: “We have many types of intervention. The ultimate intervention is our military. And if we have to use that, we will.” (JoshPhilipPhair)…
..Oil: SPR at a 1982 low, 41 days of crude cover, and US airports short of jet fuel – US crude inventory down to 41 days, lowest in half a century (Barchart); SPR at its lowest since 1982 (Barchart)…
..AI: NVDA Wednesday, Alibaba’s $10.2B discounted raise, and Unitree down 38.9% from its post-IPO high – The chip/memory trade peaked the day total return swap funding costs hit a record – leverage masquerading as narrative (zerohedge). SOXX red on a Sunday night (buccocapital).
NVDA is now “bailing out a good chunk of its customer base”, which the market keeps reading as bullish (JustDario)…
..Power is the binding constraint: AI chip electricity demand projected at ~315GW globally by 2033, +1,100% from 2025, US ~200GW of it, with training runs spiking usage 50% above design capacity (KobeissiLetter). Nuclear and data centres have announced 52GW+ of US capacity partnerships (chigrl)…
..North Korea announces intent to sign a defense agreement with Iran (RothLindberg). If real, it changes the deterrence arithmetic Bessent is assuming.
US-South Korea cancelled the Ssangyong amphibious exercise because US forces are stretched by the Iran war, decided in July, before Ulchi Freedom Shield was separately cut from 11 days to 5 (MilitarySummary). Force-posture cost of the campaign, showing up in the Pacific. LOW
US casualties in the Iran war reported at 774 – 18 killed, 756 wounded – per Pentagon data via WaPo (OrlaCarlinn)…
..Canada expects a trade war lasting past the midterms (zerohedge); Carney calls it “at war” over trade and says Washington “miscalculated” (wmiddelkoop). The counter-case is that Canada is being asked only to block Chinese transshipment, which Mexico already agreed to (BaldingsWorld). https://no1sdailydigest.substack.com/p/daily-digest-2026-08-24

Gold & Geopolitics, Daily digest: 2026-08-23
Two things broke overnight: Canada walked away from the trade table and will match US tariffs dollar-for-dollar from September 8, and Trump said out loud that “the ultimate intervention is our military” – about the bond market. Meanwhile the administration’s claim that 40 tankers and 16 million barrels cleared Hormuz on Friday night collapsed within hours against Kpler data, SAR imagery and Iran’s own denial. Bessent holds a press conference Monday 2PM EST on the next sanctions phase; Iran has already published its target list. https://no1sdailydigest.substack.com/p/daily-digest-2026-08-23

Our lif-support systems run on diesel. Supplies are already short: Transport voyages take months. Gold & Geopolitics, Running on empty – Buffered calm
Heating oil and the “crack spread” is signaling something is amiss, but both Brent and WTI are massaged to not signal very much.
I’m foreseeing a major repricing, absent any real ceasefire, or EVEN with a real ceasefire, oil’s not going to run very soon.
Same story as with silver: huge deficit, above-ground vaults being run down. The big difference is that oil is a visible product. If it’s not there, everyone will notice.
So line up your calendars: Nov: midterms, Jan 27: no Russian gas for the EU, early Feb: Norway should finish their repairs. And through all this time, the Red Sea and the Strait of Hormuz are blocked.
Yep, everything’s fine. The gov says so. https://no01.substack.com/p/running-on-empty

[John Day]

Shooting Blanks https://drjohnsblog.substack.com/p/shooting-blanks

Some of looking at the current progression of history see a crisis of declining empire, hastened by large scale financial speculation on wars and conquests that became money pits instead of meal-tickets. This empire looks different to various eyes, but I see global finance as being it’s functional core, extracting wealth of nations wherever the imperial currency is invested and spent. This financial center was formerly in The City of London, though it is now also in New York, Frankfurt, Paris and Tel Aviv, as well as other outposts. It is a unified control system for global “free-trade” which invests in extracting valuable resources from every country, enriching pliant elites and global financiers. Various militaries and covert operations form enforcement arms.
This ravenous system consumes natural resources and spends the profits to consume exponentially more. The world is now at the limit of that process, which is causing existential clashes ahead of the financial crisis of an exponential debt bubble imploding, pricked by the reality of declining physical wealth to service it.
It is not the case that human needs cannot be met for the rest of our lives by the material goods still available on our fair planet, but they cannot be met by the present colonialist free-trade system that extracts, impoverishes and enforces its mandate violently wherever it goes.
Alex Krainer presents the case that the world is faced with 2 systems, the colonialist system, and the “American system” described in 1861 by Abraham Lincoln’s chief economic advisor Henry C. Carey. It served the United States and Germany in that century, and served postwar Germany and Japan in the 20th century, now China in the post-Mao era.
Operation Economic Outcast threatens to permanently expel from the $US global financial system, any “entity” that trades with Iran, helping to bypass economic sanctions. Expelling China, Russia, India, Pakistan and perhaps Turkey from the $US financial system would certainly teach Iran a lesson.
I am struck by the whimsical thought that the best way to rob a bank is to own one, and by extension, the best position from which to collapse an empire may be that of the ruler of the empire, through hubris, or perhaps the subtle-paradox of presenting the appearance of hubris to accomplish that end.. You decide. 😉

Alex Krainer, Two systems are before the world, part 1 of 3
We’re experiencing the conflict between two systems of governance. Understanding what that means could be the most important knowledge we need today…
..In a nutshell, the national system seeks to create protective barriers to foreign trade in order to give the domestic manufacturing a fighting chance against foreign competition. It also accumulates capital at home, investing it into manufacturing, infrastructure, education, research and development, innovation, culture and other uses that raise the society’s living standards.
By contrast, the British system of free trade extracts wealth and concentrates it: it seeks to remove all barriers to worldwide free flow of capital, always in pursuit of highest possible returns. With free trade, nations are obliged to compete for investment capital by systematically depressing wages, job security, pensions, health care services and education.
Other costs which cut into the returns on capital are infrastructure development, social spending programs and protection of the environment. Therefore, competing globally for investment capital entails progressive slashing of all these cost items, down to the bare bones. In that sense, British free trade system amounts to a competitive race to the bottom. https://alexkrainer.substack.com/p/two-systems-are-before-the-world

US launches Operation Economic Outcast to sever Iran’s financial ‘lifelines’
Directed by US President Donald Trump, the “unprecedented” sanctions target Iran’s “most vital lifelines,” including aviation, shipping, gold, technology, and digital assets, Bessent said.
Bessent warned that any entity facilitating money laundering for Tehran will be permanently removed from the US dollar system.
“I would expect that you will see a major announcement of a financial institution being sanctioned by the end of this week,” he further said without elaborating. https://www.aa.com.tr/en/us-israel-iran-war/us-launches-operation-economic-outcast-to-sever-irans-financial-lifelines/4036199

“Operation Economic Outcast” Begins: Bessent Warns Countries Helping Iran Face Expulsion From Dollar System https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/entering-endgame-bessent-unveil-economic-d-day-assault-isolate-iran

China Firmly Rejects US Demand To Back Its ‘Most Crushing Economic Operation’ Against Iran
Asked specifically about the latest comments of US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Lin emphasized the need for all parties to take “responsible measures” in resolving the war. “China opposes illegal unilateral sanctions that have no basis in international law and are not authorized by the UN Security Council,” Lin said. https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/china-firmly-rejects-us-demand-back-its-most-crushing-economic-operation-against-iran

[John Day]

Welcome back to Samsara, DBS. What did you do while you were away?
;-}
TBOC noticed your absence… Did’ja get my email?

[John Day]

Hi TAE Summary, “I’m traveling light” ;-}

[John Day]

I saw a Tesla Robo-cab in traffic on my bike ride in Austin theis morning, about 1/4 mile from a Tesla dealer. It debuts in a week.

[John Day]

The trade-war with Canada is a salvo against China colonizing Canada, I think.
Chinese drug gangs seem to be largely directing Canadian national politics in the port cities, from what I have read.

[John Day]

This is the mark of a Zionist operative, “controlled opposition”:

“Assassination Sing-a-Long: Hasan Piker Mocks the Murdered Charlie Kirk to Cheering Crowd”

[John Day]

That row of Philly cybercabs look like something out of Goldfinger, like when they spray-painted the girl in the bikini gold to kill her. ;-(

[John Day]

@Zerosum: I still think it’s virtual-“Netanyahu” and a dull body double that likes to listen to Sarah and Hegseth.

[John Day]

1) @TBOC: I have not heard from DBS yet.

2) I like “Sinkin’ Lincoln” ;-D

[John Day]

​Jessica Rose Ph.D. (Please see top comment) What did Anthony Fauci mean when he wrote “GAME ON!!!”?​ Thoughts following meditation on this question https://jessicar.substack.com/p/what-did-anthony-fauci-mean-when

“Misinformation” disputes government narratives: BMJ Retracts 2024 Excess Deaths Paper for the Sin of Spreading “Misinformation” https://www.soniaelijah.com/p/bmj-retracts-2024-excess-deaths-paper

Sasha Latypova highlights an alternate form of “solving”: Whitney Webb: “Solving Racism by Vaccination?” https://sashalatypova.substack.com/p/whitney-webb-solving-racism-by-vaccination

John Leake, NIAID’s David Morens Pleads Guilty to Concealing Records of Coronavirus Gain-of-Function Research Grant – Like Al Capone going to jail for income tax evasion. https://www.thefocalpoints.com/p/niaids-david-morens-pleads-guilty

John Leake, What Were Morens & His Co-Conspirators Doing? – Analyzing what Fauci’s senior advisor was trying to accomplish with Peter Daszak and Gerald Keusch https://www.thefocalpoints.com/p/what-were-morens-and-his-co-conspirators

[John Day]

​ How Can This Be Real?​ The Home Office in the United Kingdom is now handing asylum seekers a nine-page booklet and posters spelling out that rape is illegal, sex with children is a crime, women are equal to men, and you cannot mutilate girls’ genitals.​ https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/how-can-be-real

​ Caitlin Johnstone, Today In Dystopia: “We Have Cameras Everywhere In That Town”
Today in dystopia, police have been wrongfully arresting people based on faulty information from AI-assisted Flock surveillance footage instead of actually investigating the evidence of the crime.
​ In an article titled “She Spent 7 Months in Legal Hell After Cops Used Flock Surveillance To Identify the Wrong Car,” Reason Magazine documents multiple instances of innocent people having their lives upended in legal battles because police slammed them with charges based on incorrect Flock camera data which could have easily been ruled out by some basic verification.​ https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/today-in-dystopia-we-have-cameras

​ The Orwellian Company Behind ICE’s New Electric Shock Gloves​ – “With a glove, there are no burn marks or scars.” That makes it hard for victims to sue.
​ “We have a saying: Feeling is believing,” Compliant Technologies CEO Jeff Niklaus said in one 2022 YouTube video. In promotional clips, you can see people losing control of their limbs, falling to the ground, and crying out in pain after a light touch from the GLOVE. In 2022, the company called it a “weapon” in Instagram posts. Since then, though, it’s downgraded the language to “a Conductive Distraction and De-escalation device,” branding the technology on its website as “humane.”
​ Human rights organizations like Amnesty International have long raised concerns about electric shock devices like the GLOVE, as well as other products that Compliant Technologies sells, like electric shock belts and vests, which the company recommends for prisoner transport, courtroom use, and use on “combative individuals” during medical procedures like blood draws.​ https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2026/08/ice-shock-gloves-torture-compliant-technologies-jeff-niklaus/

​ The gelatin in the shots can induce alpha-gal allergy: BREAKING: First-Ever Study Links Vaccines to the Explosion of Alpha-Gal Syndrome
More than 90% of U.S. children are injected with alpha-gal-bearing mammalian gelatin before school entry, raising the possibility of direct sensitization or immune priming before a later tick bite.​ https://www.thefocalpoints.com/p/breaking-first-ever-study-links-vaccines

​ FDA Data Reanalysis Sent to HHS Finds Moderna’s mRNA Flu Shot Approval Should Be Immediately Withdrawn
We directly reanalyzed the FDA’s own data used to approve mFLUSIVA and found an extreme risk-benefit profile that is impossible to justify.​ https://www.thefocalpoints.com/p/breaking-fda-data-reanalysis-sent

[John Day]

​ Is it almost time to have presidential elections and negotiate a capitulation to Russia? Simplicius, Ukraine’s Economy Braces for Disaster as Zelensky Faces New Political Challenge https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/ukraines-economy-braces-for-disaster

China is serious about Japan not having (their own) nukes, but I wonder about Russia. Andrew Korybko, The Chinese Ambassador To Russia Issued An Ominous Warning To Japan https://korybko.substack.com/p/the-chinese-ambassador-to-russia

A coastal gas pipeline from Nigeria to Spain is planned. Andrew Korybko, The West African Pipeline Is Inherently Geopolitical https://korybko.substack.com/p/the-west-african-pipeline-is-inherently

Hellish: Ceuta Mothers Weep In Streets; Rapes Force Women To Flee; Kids’ Parks Smeared In Shit​ https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/hellish-ceuta-mothers-weep-streets-rapes-force-women-flee-kids-parks-smeared-shit

Ceuta Cops Claim Invaders Are Dragging Girls Into Mountains For Gang-Rapes​ https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/ceuta-cops-claim-invaders-are-dragging-girls-mountains-gang-rapes

[John Day]

Israel outsourcing coercion to settlers in occupied West Bank: UN’s Albanese​ https://www.presstv.co.uk/Detail/2026/08/17/774508/Israel-outsourcing-coercion-settlers-West-Bank–UN%E2%80%99s-Albanese

​ Qusra is where Israel’s lies about settler violence hit a wall​ – This method of ethnic cleansing, whereby settlers establish an outpost, force the families out, and take over their property, has succeeded countless times across the West Bank. In Qusra, the news cycle noticed before it was too late.​ https://israelpalestinenews.org/qusra-is-where-israels-lies-about-settler-violence-hit-a-wall/

​ Three Palestinian families in the Jabal Ras al-Ain area of Qusra in the northern occupied West Bank have remained under siege by Israeli occupiers for 11 consecutive days, in the latest in a series of attacks targeting Palestinian residents and their land over the years.
​ Since Aug. 9, occupiers, under the protection of the Israeli army, have surrounded three homes housing around 13 Palestinians in the town south of Nablus governorate, obstructing the delivery of basic necessities.​ https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/collusion-between-israeli-army-occupiers-seeks-to-reshape-palestinian-reality/4032271

​ Aid workers under fire as drones reshape warfare​ – The UN is warning that aid workers face a deadly and evolving threat, with armed drones reshaping battlefields worldwide – putting humanitarian teams increasingly in the line of fire.​ https://news.un.org/en/story/2026/08/1168153

Israel preparing execution wing for Palestinian prisoners, rights group warns​ https://english.palinfo.com/news/2026/08/19/368616/

[John Day]

Bessent: Aim Is To ‘Collapse’ Iran Regime Through Economic Warfare, But US Unlikely To Restart Major Combat​ https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/iran-fm-says-trumps-economic-d-day-threat-diversion-which-will-fail-new-carrier

Futures Slide As Treasury Yields Surge, Erasing Bessent Intervention, Driven By Oil Spike​ https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/futures-slide-treasury-yields-surge-erasing-bessent-intervention-driven-oil-spike

“Doom Loop” Engaged: US Debt Hits $40 Trillion As Treasury Enters The Endgame​ https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/doom-loop-engaged-us-debt-hits-40-trillion-america-enters-endgame

​ Yves Smith, Naked Capitalism, Iran War: Further Admission of Weakness With New Super Duper Trump Sanctions Threat; Israel Moves Against Turkiye Risk Broader Conflagration; Bessent at Odds with Fed in Move to Contain Longer-Dated Treasury Yields
​ To the Israel attack on Turkiye military operations in Syria. Douglas Macgregor provides excellent one-stop shopping in a new talk with Mario Nawfal. Recall that Macgregor is a serious military historian and has repeatedly admired the Turks as a nation with a strong martial tradition, and currently a very accomplished fighting force. Macgregor provides detail on how the Israel strike was essentially a warning shot, killing no Turkiye soldiers and perhaps not even damaging any assets. But Macgregor seems to believe that Turkiye has also not meaningfully bulked up at that base, as in Israel was trying to ward that off. Macgregor regards that as destined to fail.
​ Macgregor regards the Israel move as reckless, particularly now when Israel is clearly overextended. He also sees an escalation to direct confrontations as risking a much bigger regional war.
​ From a lightly edited machine transcript:
So that much I think we can say when this first began, this sort of Turkish Israeli agreement that we crafted in order to promote the dissolution of Syria, in other words, its liquidation and then its resurrection subsequently in the hands of our friends from ISIS…
​ I said that at the time I thought it was the Middle East’s version of the Nazi Soviet pact in 1939, that it was a temporary cessation of hostilities. It would not last and inevitably there would be an Israeli Turkish war.
​ So I fully expect that that will occur at some point in the future.
​ This is an extraordinarily bad time for Israel to cultivate bad relations with the Turks because the Turks, despite all of the unkind things said by both sides, have continually transported oil from Azerbaijan through Turkey down past Syria and into Israel. The Turks have also sold billions of dollars worth of goods, especially agricultural products to the Israelis. So Erdogan had practiced what he does best, which is to talk out of both sides of his mouth…This has been a sore point, I think, with a lot of people in the in the Muslim world. Most Americans are completely unaware of it…
​ Since then, we’ve seen lots of cooperation between the Iranians and the Turks to deal with the Kurdish problem. And the Kurds, of course, not all of them, but a large portion of them are exceedingly dependent upon Israeli support, arms assistance, and intelligence. And indeed, we cooperated with Mossad in a vain hope of stirring up a Kurdish rebellion/invasion of Iran. The Iranians had them targeted, destroyed them, and I don’t see much evidence that that’s going to happen.
​And of course, the Turks had no interest in letting that be successful either….
​ It’s a very bad idea on the part of the Israelis because in the meantime you’ve had this new alignment Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Turkey and everybody has said well what’s it really about? Well contrary to popular belief it’s not about attacking Iran. I’m sorry it is not an anti-Iranian alliance.
​ It has a great deal to do with putting an end ultimately at some point in time to the Greater Israel project. They’re not going to allow that to succeed.​ https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2026/08/iran-war-further-admission-of-weakness-with-new-super-duper-trump-sanctions-threat-israel-moves-against-turkiye-risk-broader-conflagration-bessent-at-odds-with-fed-in-move-to-contain-longer-dated-t.html

​From Iran: Exclusive: Reports of Iranian missile attack on UAE unfounded; Zionist false flag imprint evident https://www.presstv.co.uk/Detail/2026/08/18/774638/probe-rejects-claim-Iran-attack-UAE

[John Day]

There Will Be No Alternative https://drjohnsblog.substack.com/p/there-will-be-no-alternative

The world is burning up emergency reserves of oil, gas and refined fuels, while primary flows remain blocked, as if primary flows are being used, not emergency reserves. This will end suddenly, like Wile-E-Coyote going off a cliff.
Why are we being set up this way?
I remember the 1973 Arab Oil Embargo against countries that supported Israel in the September war. Americans were shocked, even traumatized, sat in gas lines for hours, started buyng VW Beetles, Toyotas and those little Honda cars. We were never the same, though most people now never knew those days.
This will be worse by all calculations. They are not difficult calculations, looking at what percentage of oil has been pulled off the market. It is more than 1973 and 1979 together. The strategic petroleum reserves that were put in place after 1973 are being exhausted, in order to re-create the shock they were designed to prevent.
The global financial system is stressed, chronically stressed, paying too much debt-service for nothing in return, except maintaining the financial system at higher parasitic cost every day. Financial systems re-set under stress periodically, about every 4 generations, like after WW-2, for instance.
Is this prelude to a global financial and economic reset? I have not been consulted or informed, though nobody except the 0.001% gets let in on these things.
The war against oil, gas and fertilizer is a war against people surviving. There will be some alternative other than death presented to us. We are likely to take it.

Gold & Geopolitics, Daily digest: 2026-08-20
The Treasury blinked. Hours before a 20Y auction that was tracking toward the highest yield on record, Bessent doubled long-end buyback operations from $2bn to $4bn – and total US debt crossed $40 trillion the same afternoon. Gold ripped ~$175, the dollar hit an 11-week low, bitcoin cleared $70k, and GDX had its best day in 52 weeks. Everything else – Hormuz tanker turnbacks, the Kyiv mega-strike, Trump’s “Economic D-Day” on Iran – is running in parallel and got mostly drowned out by the bond desk.​..
​..Treasury: buybacks doubled to $4bn/op, $40T crossed, 20Y auction tails anyway​ – The 20Y priced at 5.204% vs 5.199% WI – a 0.5bp tail, biggest since February, despite the intervention (zerohedge). Without it, the auction would have been the highest-yielding 20Y on record; it closed just inside the Oct ’23 print of 5.245% (zerohedge).
​ 30Y fell ~9bps to 5.196%, 10Y to 4.647%; the 30Y fixed mortgage reached 6.75% on Tuesday, against a 10Y that traded below 4% before the Iran war began in late February (shanaka86).​..
​..Interest cost: total US interest now $1.4tn, on track to pass Social Security’s $1.6tn by 2028 (zerohedge). That’s $3.8bn/day, versus $3.1bn on Medicare and $2.5bn on defense (KobeissiLetter). Monday’s semi-annual coupon payment was $85bn – the largest on record (zerohedge).​..
​..Structural frame of the day from TaviCosta: US debt-to-GDP is now roughly at WWII levels, but back then nearly half of Treasuries were backed by gold – today it’s about 3%.​..
​..Iran weighs striking US military targets inside Europe. FT-sourced: IRGC has assessed strikes on Bulgaria’s Bezmer Air Base and RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus once its 3–4 week ultimatum expires (HormuzLetter, HormuzReport, zerohedge).​..
​..Hormuz: three tankers turned back in 24h against Axios’ claimed 10 mb/d southern route​ – Axios, citing US officials: 10 million barrels a day – roughly half pre-war volume – are moving out of the strait via the Omani coastal route, and “the IRGC can be a nuisance, but they don’t control the strait. We do” (BrettErickson28, zerohedge).
​ The tracking data doesn’t support it. LVision_Trading mapped the Aug 17 satellite pass and found only 2 new STS pairs across Fujairah and Sohar, holding the count at 3.3 mb/d on a 7-day average.
​ Turnbacks are stacking: UAE-owned LPG tanker Yellow Stone pushed back by the IRGC Navy – the second failed transit in 24 hours (MenchOsint); Indian-registered Vaughan turned around overnight (MenchOsint); three China-owned tankers carrying or loading Iraqi crude stopped the day before (MenchOsint). Bloomberg tracked the Sea V and Hestia both U-turning (chigrl).​..
​..Iran: secondary sanctions on “any country” run into the country they can’t sanction​ – RnaudBertrand makes the sharpest structural point: “ANY country” won’t include China. In May the US tried to sanction Chinese refineries for buying Iranian oil; Beijing’s Commerce Ministry issued a formal prohibition order stating the sanctions “shall not be recognized, enforced, or complied with,” and Washington never meaningfully enforced. “ANY country” really means “any country we can actually coerce.”
​ JustDario puts it more bluntly: the “never seen before” sanctions to cripple Iran’s economy turn out to be tariffs on third countries, one year after the tariff programme’s own results.
​ Tehran’s escalation ladder: an Iranian MP argues the best answer is withdrawal from the NPT (MilitarySummary); the IRGC spokesman says warheads in a new war would be “completely different” from previous rounds (PressTV).​ https://no1sdailydigest.substack.com/p/daily-digest-2026-08-20

​ Gold & Geopolitics, Daily digest: 2026-08-19
Two things actually moved: the UAE severed all trade, commercial and financial links with Iran after two ballistic missiles landed in the Gulf, and Trump ordered his envoys to stop talking to Tehran entirely – strategy formally shifted from “hammer” to “strangle”. Underneath that, the long end broke again (US 30Y ~5.33%, France at GFC highs, Japan 2Y at a 33-year high) and Asia went into freefall, with the KOSPI limit-down for the tenth time this year. Everything else – Hormuz transit counts, the diesel crack, the AI credit stack – is continuation, but all three continued in the same direction.​ https://no1sdailydigest.substack.com/p/daily-digest-2026-08-19

Well, Duh… Media Accuses Hegseth Of Covering Up USS Lincoln Supply Crisis​ https://www.zerohedge.com/military/media-accuses-hegseth-covering-uss-lincoln-supply-crisis

​Sort-of, “Details at eleven”… “Economic D-Day”: Trump Announces “Most Crushing Economic Operation Ever” Against Iran https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/uae-cuts-ties-iran-warns-gulf-states-against-helping-washington-kpler-says-us-navy

[John Day]

@TBOC: You are welcome. I like Mr. Takala, as you descrinbe him. No word back from DBS yet.

@WES: I drew so many drawings on that engineering paper that has little squares covering each page. It’s really good for that. I made each square a foot, or even half a foot. I used straightedges and fine point pens. I kept enough preliminary drawings to show the process. I forget where they are.
I have the big working drawings with coffe and other stains on a shelf.
I was never any good with napkins.

[John Day]

Celia Farber, 2013 Study Found Lipid Nano-Particles Accumulate In The Ovaries Of Every Species Tested: Dr. Michael Yeadon https://celiafarber.substack.com/p/2013-study-found-lipid-nano-particles

​ Meryl Nass MD, New Zealand investigation reveals that govt ministers knew of the high risk of myocarditis to teens before the seond dose, but kept vaccinating them anyway​ – This is just as bad as vaccinating in pregnancy–a deliberate attack on our children​ https://merylnass.substack.com/p/new-zealand-investigation-reveals

​Paul Marik MD, with a topic that is a burning question for some people: Unproven Cancer Treatments: Separating Hope From Evidence – Part 1 https://paulmarik.substack.com/p/unproven-cancer-treatments-separating

Stored agricultural surpluses were worth murdering for, worth defending, and could feed an army. Patrilineal clan societies formed raiding parties, defensible towns and armies. Genghis Khan’s Y chromosome flourished. Most Y chromosomes died out. When Our Simplest Invention Killed 95% Of All Men Alive https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXd-iGbxdPE

[John Day]

​ Steve Kirsch with evidence that is strictly avoided: The average age that parents noticed their children became autistic shifted dramatically after the MMR shot rolled out – Listen to this testimony in Congress on April 3, 2000 by Dr. Bernard Rimland. As soon as they rolled at the MMR shot, the average age parents noticed autism shifted to when the MMR was given. https://kirschsubstack.com/p/the-average-age-that-parents-noticed

Steve Kirsch, The autism survey that “they” will never do – Bret Weinstein replicated my autism survey results using his followers. Will any pro-vaccine group show we got it wrong? No. Never. They won’t even try. https://kirschsubstack.com/p/the-autism-survey-that-they-will

​ Breaking Up MMR Vaccine Will Benefit Kids — But It Could Be Years Before Single Shots Are Available
President Donald Trump’s executive order calling for separating the measles, mumps, rubella (MMR) vaccine into three single-disease vaccines administered at separate medical visits is a long-overdue step in the right direction, according to doctors, scientists and medical freedom advocates who spoke with The Defender. However, it could be years before separate vaccines become available.​ https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/breaking-up-mmr-vaccine-single-shots-benefit-kids-could-take-years/

​ MMR is typically given at 1 & 4 years of age. Measles morbidity and mortality increase after puberty. I’d wait​ 10 years. Vaccine-Maker Claims Splitting MMR Shot Could Take Up To 10 Years​ https://www.zerohedge.com/medical/splitting-mmr-vaccine-could-take-10-years-merck

​ Franklin O’Kanu, The Complete Vaccine Harm Profile: A Comprehensive Reference Guide – A systematic documentation of vaccine injuries, mechanisms of harm, historical coverups, and real-world evidence https://unorthodoxy.substack.com/p/the-complete-vaccine-harm-profile

[John Day]

​ Meta Faces Unprecedented Legal Reckoning Over Youth Mental Health As Massive Multistate Trial Begins
Just weeks after suffering a massive legal defeat in New Mexico, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram is now defending itself in a California federal court against a bipartisan coalition of 29 states. The states say Meta deliberately designed its platforms to addict children and harvested their data in violation of federal law.​ https://www.zerohedge.com/technology/meta-faces-unprecedented-legal-reckoning-over-youth-mental-health-massive-multistate

​ Trump’s Executive Order Gives Revived Task Force 90 Days to Produce Vaccine Safety Report
An executive order signed Monday gives the HHS Task Force on Safer Childhood Vaccines 90 days to produce a report that could shape the nation’s childhood vaccination policy. After decades of ignoring a legal requirement that the task force evaluate and report on vaccine safety, HHS reestablished the task force just months after attorney Ray Flores, with funding from Children’s Health Defense, sued the agency.​ https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/trump-executive-order-task-force-on-safer-childhood-vaccines-90-days-produce-safety-report/

​ ​Fauci would kill himself in his car if he started to talk. Fauci In Hiding As ABC Censorship Bombshell Explodes
Dr. Anthony Fauci just refused a private transcribed interview with Sen. Ron Johnson’s subcommittee. The same week, a former ABC News correspondent revealed that the network gutted a 2021 Wuhan lab leak investigation after the script was sent to Fauci for review.​ https://www.zerohedge.com/covid-19/fauci-hiding-abc-censorship-bombshell-explodes

​ Meryl Nass MD, Acting FDA Commissioner Janet Woodcock (who killed HCQ) asked Fauci and Francis Collins to help study reported vaccine injuries in May 2021 – Senators Rand Paul and Ron Johnson released another tranche of Fauci documents over the weekend. https://merylnass.substack.com/p/acting-fda-commissioner-janet-woodcock

Celia Farber is dubious, but there are a lot of facts to legally discover: I’ve Changed My Mind: The Fauci Hearings Were Just Political Fish-In-Barrel Shooting: Beware Of Half-Heroes
​ Did You Know The Zelenko Protocol Was Invented By Ralph Baric To Protect THEM In The Event Their Bio- Weapon Sickened Them? What Did David Martin Hand-Deliver To Paul and Johnson, And When?​ https://celiafarber.substack.com/p/ive-changed-my-mind-the-fauci-hearings

[John Day]

Women Flee Ceuta After 15 Rapes Recorded Since Migrant Invasion​ https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/women-flee-ceuta-after-15-rapes-recorded-migrant-invasion

​ GB News Host Forced From Home By Migrant Gang Death Threats
GB News presenter Patrick Christys was ordered by police to abandon his home in the middle of the night after a credible death threat from the Channel people-smuggling gangs he continues to expose in Calais. The threat-to-life notice from the Metropolitan Police left Christys and his heavily pregnant wife, fellow GB News presenter Emily Carver, packing bags and fleeing to a safe house.​ https://www.zerohedge.com/political/gb-news-host-forced-home-migrant-gang-death-threats

​ Blasphemy Law Is Back: Retired British Police Officer Fined For Islam Joke​
A retired British police officer has been handed a criminal conviction and more than £1,000 in fines for resharing a satirical Facebook meme poking fun at Islam.​..
..The case has sparked fresh warnings that blasphemy laws, abolished in England in 2008, are being revived by the back door – but only for one religion…
​..The second image showed a man in a turban next to a rasher of bacon with the caption: “Fun facts about Bacon! People who eat bacon have a lower chance of marrying a 9-year-old!” That post led to the conviction.​ The judge decided it was about religion rather than politics and was therefore “grossly offensive.”​ https://www.zerohedge.com/political/blasphemy-law-back-retired-british-police-officer-fined-islam-joke

Trump’s DOJ Will Reportedly Support End Of National Firearms Act After 92 Years​ https://www.zerohedge.com/political/trumps-doj-will-reportedly-support-end-national-firearms-act-after-92-years

​ ‘No Guardrails’: Youth Sports Leagues Mandating Digital IDs, Selling Kids’ Biometrics for Profit
National and local youth sports leagues are harvesting children’s biometric data for profit while telling parents it’s a requirement for their child to play, according to Michelle and Doug Bottoms. Attorney Greg Glaser said the practice violates the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act.​ https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/no-guardrails-youth-sports-leagues-mandate-digital-id-sell-kids-biometrics-profit/

[John Day]

Meryl Nass MD, It was only a matter of time, and the middle east kerfuffle speeded it up: China takes the polar route to Europe
Russia has been expanding its ice cutter fleet. And now Scott Ritter tells us that China will be running weekly container ships through the Arctic to Europe. https://merylnass.substack.com/p/it-was-only-a-matter-of-time-and

It’s an age of economic and population decline that we are entering: Beyond the Age of Growth – An Interview to Ugo Bardi https://senecaeffect.substack.com/p/beyond-the-age-of-growth

The Honest Sorcerer notes that China has about 30 years of coal at the current burn rate: Coal: The Next Chokepoint – How ‘peak coal’ could become China’s Achilles’ heel https://thehonestsorcerer.substack.com/p/coal-the-next-chokepoint

When will the bubble pop? WSJ Catches Up, Discovers AI’s Off-Balance Sheet Liabilities Are $3 Trillion And Growing $1.2 Trillion Per Quarter https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/wsj-catches-discovers-ais-balance-sheet-liabilities-are-3-trillion-and-growing-12-trillion

Second Ceuta Border Invasion Attempt Underway As Military-Aged Migrants Mass Near Spanish Enclave https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/spains-vox-party-demands-morocco-pay-migration-crisis-ceuta-faces-public-health

[John Day]

Israeli Strikes Kill at Least 11 in Deadliest Lebanon Attack Since June – Israel presents attacks as targeting ‘terrorist infrastructure,’ but hit home full of civilians https://news.antiwar.com/2026/08/15/israeli-strikes-kill-at-least-11-in-deadliest-lebanon-attack-since-june/

Israeli Flags on Lebanon Road Violate UN Resolution, UNIFIL Says https://english.aawsat.com/arab-world/5308090-israeli-flags-lebanon-road-violate-un-resolution-unifil-says

ISRAELI MEDIA: What Israel Began in Gaza Is Spreading to Palestinians Everywhere https://israelpalestinenews.org/israeli-media-what-israel-began-in-gaza-is-spreading-to-palestinians-everywhere/

Celia Farber, Alex Jones Blasts Tim Pool And Other Influencers For Secret Meetings With Netanyahu; Israel Spent $1.3 Billion Last 18 Months Alone On US Social Media, Says Jones
Receiving Money From Any Entity You Cover Is A Hanging Crime In Journalism. Always Was. Banishment, And The Resignation of All Your Bosses, If You Did This. How Is This Reality? https://celiafarber.substack.com/p/alex-jones-blasts-tim-pool-and-other

Judge Throws Out “Political Prosecution” of Pro-Palestinian University of Michigan Student
The student, Hiab Teshome, is also a graduate student union leader in tense contract negotiations with the school. https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/university-michigan-eli-savit-student-pro-palestine-felony-charges-thrown-out

[John Day]

A bullet in the back: Palestinian nurse faces permanent paralysis https://israelpalestinenews.org/a-bullet-in-the-back-palestinian-nurse-faces-permanent-paralysis/

Israeli forces prevent UNICEF water tanker from reaching besieged homes in Qusra https://english-wafa-ps.translate.goog/Pages/Details/173670?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp

UN: Nearly 3,000 settler attacks recorded in West Bank since start of 2025 https://english.palinfo.com/news/2026/08/17/368473/

US lawmaker urges action against West Bank occupier violence
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries urges Trump administration to ‘compel the Israeli government to protect the lives, property and livelihood of innocent Palestinian civilians’ https://www.aa.com.tr/en/americas/us-lawmaker-urges-action-against-west-bank-occupier-violence/4030049

Thin cloth tents: Gaza: Over two million displaced people face disaster as winter approaches https://english.palinfo.com/news/2026/08/17/368479/

[John Day]

US Navy Destroyer Suffered 4-Day Power Outage In Sweltering South China Sea https://www.zerohedge.com/military/us-navy-destroyer-suffered-4-day-power-outage-sweltering-south-china-sea

US Lost 25% Of Its Reaper Drones In Iran War, Officials Estimate https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/us-lost-25-its-reaper-drones-iran-war-officials-estimate

‘Do What Israel Tells You!’ – Graffiti On USAF Jet Suggests Troops Think War Isn’t For America https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/do-what-israel-tells-you-graffiti-usaf-jet-suggests-troops-think-war-isnt-america

The new leaner, younger, more handsome Ben Gvir again, I see: ‘They’re Not Even People’: Ben Gvir Says Israel Should Kill 30-40 Palestinians in Gaza Every Night – The Israeli minister also said he believes ‘all of Gaza’ belongs to Israel https://news.antiwar.com/2026/08/16/theyre-not-even-people-ben-gvir-says-israel-should-kill-30-40-palestinians-in-gaza-every-night/

Report: Kushner-Netanyahu Meeting Ends With Agreement That Israel Will Keep Bombing Gaza https://news.antiwar.com/2026/08/17/report-kushner-netanyahu-meeting-ends-with-agreement-that-israel-will-keep-bombing-gaza/

[John Day]

Moon of Alabama, WSJ Unveils Iran ‘Secret’ – Trump Talks With NoKo? – Threat To Oman
This item on Korea smells fishy:
Trump orders military to ‘substantially reduce’ joint exercises with South Korea – NBC News
President Donald Trump said Sunday that he has directed the Defense Department to scale down joint military exercises with South Korea, citing the U.S. ally’s refusal to join the war in Iran and his “very good” relationship with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un.
Trump said the large, annual military drills sent a “signal that is totally inappropriate and hostile” to North Korea, a nuclear-armed state with which the U.S. has no formal diplomatic ties but which Trump says has been “unthreatening and respectful” as long as he has been president.
The reason Trump is giving for reducing the military maneuvers with South Korea is not serious. No country but Israel has seriously joined the U.S. in its War on Iran.
There is something else going on.
A reduction or end to U.S. maneuvers with South Korea has often been a pre-condition by North Korea for entering into talks.
Trump’s statement is therefore likely an opener for negotiations over some kind of peace agreement with North Korea.
Trump may hope for a fast ‘victory’ as peace-makers before the midterm elections. Unfortunately he and his stooges are incapable of doing the methodical work necessary, and of offering the serious concessions needed, to get any results. https://www.moonofalabama.org/2026/08/wsj-unveils-iran-secret-trump-talks-with-noko-threat-to-oman.html

​ Gold & Geopolitics, Daily digest: 2026-08-18
The US-Iran memorandum expired yesterday and Tehran answered by declaring a “fully offensive” posture, then striking a merchant vessel inside the US-escorted southern Hormuz corridor overnight – casualties, engine-room fire, and Trump still saying he has “total control” of the strait.
​ Meanwhile the diesel crack broke $100 for the first time on record and the global long end kept snapping: US 30Y ~5.31%, JGB 10Y at 2.95%, France at 2009 highs.
​ Copper’s LME backwardation hit its widest since the 2021 squeeze, and Nvidia put a reported $105bn guarantee behind an 8GW OpenAI campus in Ohio.​ https://no1sdailydigest.substack.com/p/daily-digest-2026-08-18

Gold & Geopolitics, Daily digest: 2026-08-17
The 60-day US-Iran memorandum lapsed over the weekend and nothing replaced it – Iran’s leadership responded by ordering the IRGC into “offensive form,” and Hormuz recorded zero commodity crossings on Sunday. Second delta: Trump cut US-South Korea exercises after Seoul refused to join the Iran war, leaving Asia with no US carrier, while Japan’s 10-year yield hit 2.91% (a 1996 high) and copper printed a record close with the widest LME backwardation since 2021…
..Iran: the MoU lapses into an IRGC-led offensive posture, with nuclear chatter on the fringe – WSJ reporting says Tehran’s hardliners read the pact as a stalling device and spent the two months preparing for a bigger fight: IRGC given more control over the regular army, Iran-Iraq war veterans into key posts, counterintelligence expanded, missile and drone production ramped (HFI_Research).
Army Commander Maj. Gen. Hatami: the Strait will “never return to its previous state,” control is now a condition for ending the war and won’t be surrendered diplomatically (HormuzReport).
Iran’s army chief reportedly set a $30,000 bounty on US forces, per Fars (zerohedge).
Counter-current: Trump’s advisers presented sanctions-damage data and convinced him to prefer intensified economic pressure over further military action, per WSJ reporting (Megatron_ron). Scotiabank is already mapping the Bessent economic hammer (zerohedge), and “unprecedented economic isolation” is the framing being briefed out (BrettErickson28).
Axios-sourced claim of secret Trump-Iran negotiations routed through Iraq, dropped ten minutes before the open (Nostra, House of Gold). Treat the timing as the tell.
Former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene claims nuclear weapons against Iran are being discussed in strategy meetings – “I’m not speculating, I know” (FmrRepMTG), echoed onward (Megatron_ron). A nuclear bunker-buster is described as one of Trump’s last remaining cards, disputed in-thread on grounds that no US weapon has meaningful earth penetration (Pataramesh). Single-origin claim – LOW, but it’s the reason Iran’s hardened-tunnel doctrine keeps coming up.
The White House confirmed Trump’s threat to declare Hormuz “a US territory” was a joke (Amb_Ulyanov)…
..Hormuz and oil: the fight moves from closing the strait to invoicing it – while diesel does the pricing – Iran is asking 5% of cargo value per transit (≈$8.85m on one supertanker at Friday’s Brent settle), and the Lloyd’s Market Association’s LMA5708 clause published 23 July lets hull underwriters terminate cover the moment a transit payment is made. OFAC designated Iran’s Persian Gulf Strait Authority on 27 May and prohibits US persons from even receiving safe-passage guarantees. Iran wants 5-7%, Oman has floated 3%, Washington wants zero…
..Anti-ship missile launches toward the waterway were reported minutes after USAF tankers and fighters cleared the area, following near-continuous tanker and AWACS activity (MenchOsint). By Monday morning, public data still couldn’t confirm a single successful transit through the US corridor…
..The battlefield extended to the Red Sea: Ansarallah fired two ballistic missiles at the Bab el Mandeb area, with unconfirmed reports of tankers targeted, which would explain the sudden crude climb (MenchOsint).
Diesel is where the stress shows. Diesel future options implied vol spiked above 100 again – checked, not a glitch – the second time recently traders have covered for a distillate spike while crude stays suppressed (JustDario). Either the suppression extends to diesel or the market stops trusting the crude print entirely (JustDario)…
..US force posture: morale graffiti, a broken carrier, and Gulf hosts reconsidering the lease – Photographs from the Persian Gulf show messages scrawled in the dust of an aircraft flap – “Operation Epstein Fury,” “Peace deal #64 incoming” – with a serviceman’s assessment that “this operation has no morale behind it… deployed to undesirable locations INDEFINITELY” (tparsi).
Families of US sailors publicly accused Trump and Hegseth of dismissing shipboard conditions and calling their relatives liars, per The Guardian (HormuzReport). The USS Abraham Lincoln’s sewage system reportedly failed, flooding sailors’ living quarters (Megatron_ron).
Blockade arithmetic: the carrier postured toward China has to relieve one of the two enforcing the blockade, because of morale and supply problems from a record-length deployment (Pataramesh). Only three US carriers are described as active, the rest in dock (AlternatNews).
Gulf states have reportedly lost trust in the administration’s Iran strategy and some are considering cancelling major US bases, per WaPo (BRICSinfo)…
..Lebanon and Gaza: deadliest strikes since the ceasefire, and eight foreign ministers put the blame in writing – Israel is threatening a return to war in Lebanon after unleashing the deadliest airstrikes since the ceasefire (zerohedge). The regional read is that Lebanon has no path that doesn’t run through either an Iran-initiated wider war or a US-imposed Israeli withdrawal after Netanyahu falls (ejmalrai).
The foreign ministers of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Pakistan, Indonesia, Turkey, Qatar and the UAE issued a joint statement condemning Israel’s declared rejection of the Gaza road map endorsed by UNSC Resolution 2803 and of Palestinian statehood, stating Israel “now bears responsibility for obstructing” peace efforts (KSAmofaEN). Eight signatories including three US treaty-adjacent partners is the datapoint.
Pope Leo XIV renewed his appeal over violence against Palestinian civilians in the West Bank (Pontifex). The framing that keeps landing: Israel thinks it has a PR problem (tparsi).
Attrition inside the force: two reported Israeli soldier suicides after Gaza service, one last Thursday and one the previous week (MenchOsint).
Separately, Trump celebrated a Mecca Joint Defence Agreement signed by Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan (EricLDaugh) – an alignment worth watching precisely because it doesn’t include Washington…
..Japan: 10Y at 2.91% (highest since 1996), a growth miss, and a FIMA workaround for $1.4T of Treasuries – Japan’s 10-year yield rose to 2.91%, the highest since 1996 (zerohedge); the 2-year jumped to 1.69%, a 31-year high (Barchart). GDP grew at half the expected pace (Barchart).
The plumbing story: Bessent reportedly pressing the Fed to expand the FIMA repo facility so Tokyo can pledge Treasuries for dollars and defend the yen without liquidating its $1.4 trillion position (leshka_eth). Corroborating detail from a different angle – the Fed’s T-bill holdings at $500bn from $200bn in 2025, and Treasury selling euros to prop the yen (GarrettGoggin).
The rate-hikes-strengthen-the-yen thesis is being challenged directly on the charts (JustDario). Framing that keeps recurring: both Japan and the US are in debt doom loops, and the only question is who face-plants first (DonDurrett).
US side of the same ledger: $25bn of 30Y at 5.216% (highest auction yield since 2001), $42bn of 10Y at 4.683% (highest since 2007), and a July deficit up $141bn YoY to a record $432 billion (KobeissiLetter) – that deficit being a +48% YoY surge (Hedgeye).
Interest costs are tracking toward $1.7 trillion annually at stable rates, which would surpass Social Security as the largest single federal expenditure (Barchart); $638bn was issued in one week, all of it rolling within a year (DonDurrett)…
..Russia broke the Cuban oil blockade – a Russian tanker with 100,000 tonnes of crude arrived in Cuba (thesiriusreport). LOW, single source, but a direct sanctions-enforcement test. https://no1sdailydigest.substack.com/p/daily-digest-2026-08-17

So not-a-joke today? Trump Drops Map Of Hormuz As “New US Territory” Amid No Talks, Declares Strait “Open & Operating”; UAE Under Missile Alert https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/trump-posts-map-showing-hormuz-new-us-territory-just-after-latest-tanker-attack

The conclusion preceded the visit, perhaps? Top Admiral Visits USS Lincoln, Suggests Reports Of Dire Conditions Are Greatly Exaggerated https://www.zerohedge.com/military/top-admiral-visits-uss-lincoln-suggests-reports-dire-conditions-are-greatly-exaggerated

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