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Debt Rattle March 19 2026

Mar 192026
 
 March 19, 2026  Posted by at 10:45 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , ,  76 Responses »


William Adolphe Bouguereau Girl with a pomegranate 1875


• Unidentified Drones Fly Over Army Base Where Rubio and Hegseth Live (Anderson)
• Israel Is Now the Regional Hegemon Iran Wanted to Be (Stephen Green)
• Trump Wonders If Crushing Iran Would Wake Up US ‘Allies’ (Catherine Salgado)
• Japan Signs Major $56 Billion Energy Deal with US (CTH)
• Appeals Court Refuses Trump’s Request To Reconsider CNN Defamation Suit (ZH)
• ‘Europeans Committing Demographic Suicide’ (ZH)
• Restore Britain Vows To EXECUTE Pedophiles, DEPORT Millions of Migrants (MN)
• Berlin Accused Of Prioritizing Migrants Over Merit (Brooke)
• Our New Ungracious Immigrants (Victor Davis Hanson)
• 200,000 Immigrant Truck Drivers Begin Losing Licenses (ZH)
• Migrant-Linked Violence Spirals in Rome’s San Lorenzo (Brooke)
• Greg Gutfeld Shreds Jessica Tarlov’s On-Air Meltdown Over SAVE Act (Margolis)
• Musk’s xAI Turns To Wall Street Bankers To Improve Grok’s Financials (ZH)
• The Inevitability of Self-Driving Cars (QTR)

 


 

 


 

The Western world in general, and certainly Europe, is under threat because the people there fail to acknowledge that islam wants to conquer the world. And once you get to the second generation, when the kids are born on your territory, you’rte already too late. But the people who belong to the Christian part of civilization forget they are part of Christianity, often because they are not practicing Christians. Well, you can either wake up now, or you will be woken later in a muslim world. We need 85-year old John Cleese of all people, to teach us this in a whole series of tweets. He does understand.

 


 

https://twitter.com/Shibumi93730007/status/2033775337629487223?s=20 https://twitter.com/_Patriot1776Q_/status/2033773278465298951?s=20 https://twitter.com/Sassafrass_84/status/2034359917801329050?s=20

 


 

 


 


Odd.

• Unidentified Drones Fly Over Army Base Where Rubio and Hegseth Live (Anderson)

On Wednesday night, the Washington Post reported that “U.S. officials detected unidentified drones above the Washington Army base where Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth live” and that those officials have not yet determined where they came from. WaPo cites three “sources familiar with the situation,” so keep that in mind.


One of the sources, who the newspaper says is a “senior administration official who spoke on the condition of anonymity” said that the military is currently monitoring threats more closely due to the “heightened alert level as the United States and Israel strike Iran.” In this case, “multiple drones were spotted over Fort Lesley J. McNair on a single night in the last 10 days.” This led to increased security and a White House meeting to determine how to respond.

Here’s more: The drone sightings in Washington come as the U.S. issued a global security alert for overseas diplomatic posts and locked down several domestic bases because of threats. This week, Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst in New Jersey and MacDill Air Force Base in Florida raised their force protection level to Charlie — a designation that means the commander has intelligence indicating an attack or danger is possible. The only higher alert level, Delta, is for when an attack has occurred or is anticipated.

Officials are now debating whether to relocate Secretaries Hegseth and Rubio, who are still living at Fort McNair. Back in the fall, several news outlet reported that both men had moved to military bases, along with Donald Trump’s Homeland Security advisor, Stephen Miller. Former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem also had to move to a military base. According to the Atlantic, other members of the administrative have as well. This is a developing story. I’m writing just after midnight (EDT) on Wednesday night, so hopefully, we’ll know more on Thursday.

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TEXT

• Israel Is Now the Regional Hegemon Iran Wanted to Be (Stephen Green)

It began, as so many unpredictable events did, on Oct 7, 2023, with the terror invasion of southern Israel. An army regiment’s worth of Hamas swept through Israel’s largely unmanned Gaza defenses, on foot, in trucks, and even paragliders. They murdered in kibbutzes, at a music festival, and in the streets. The mass murder was as well organized as anything the Nazis achieved before establishing death camps at places like Auschwitz.


Hamas prepared for months, relying on in-person meetings between trusted members to evade Israeli electronic and human intelligence. It achieved complete surprise. Before IDF troops could mobilize and force Hezbollah back into the Gaza Strip — where the real fighting would soon begin — something like 1,200 Israelis were dead, mostly civilians. The dead included babies, children, and women sexually assaulted to death. Another 250 or so taken hostage, the remains of the last of them not returned until early 2026.

There was chatter in the early hours of that desperate Saturday morning of Hamas continuing the rampage northward to the West Bank, where they would join forces with the P.A., effectively cutting Israel in half. Hamas forces in Lebanon would sweep down from the north under an unending rocket barrage. Had Hamas and Hezbollah gotten their way, the Oct. 7 invasion still couldn’t have fulfilled the long-held dream of ending Israel and claiming “Palestine” from “the river to the sea.” But it would have exposed Israel as weak and vulnerable, inviting further attack, weakening her will, and driving her people to emigrate back out of the Middle East.

Behind it all, providing the money, the weapons, and the vision: the Islamic Republic’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Supreme Leader of the Middle East’s new hegemon. And, with a near-witless Barack Obama crony ensconced in the White House, soon in possession of a formidable array of ballistic missiles tipped with nuclear warheads. Or at least that was the plan. And Another Thing: What the Gulf oil states might have done in that scenario is a matter of speculation outside the scope of today’s column. But they’d certainly have had zero reason for continued peacemaking efforts with a weakened Israel.

Before the invasion, Israel wasn’t just seen as boxed in; she was boxed in. Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu’s every decision is tempered by the threat of Hezbollah and Hamas missiles to his north and south. And perhaps even increased terror activity from the West Bank — a dagger aimed at Israel’s heart. Today, Ali Khamenei is dead. His dynastic replacement, Gayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, is dead or might as well be. So many other Iranian political leaders, military commanders, intelligence figures — I could go on — are dead that it’s almost impossible to keep track even with a scorecard.

Iran is boxed in by Israeli/CENTCOM air and naval forces, and a surprisingly resilient (albeit not very helpful) coalition of Arab Gulf states.If the Middle East has a regional hegemon — aside from the out-of-region global hegemon, that is — it’s the Jewish State. Israeli warplanes fly where they will. Israeli intelligence officers go where they will and turn whom they will. The Gulf states largely acquiesce, Hamas and Hezbollah are largely spent forces, and their sponsor state is on the ropes. All because one man — now dead — thought he could change the Middle East on Oct. 7, 2023.

Well, I guess he did.

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“WE DO NOT NEED THE HELP OF ANYONE!”

• Trump Wonders If Crushing Iran Would Wake Up US ‘Allies’ (Catherine Salgado)

President Donald Trump speculated on Wednesday morning whether completely destroying the Islamic regime of Iran would finally inspire our weak and feckless “allies” to protect the waters that are so vital for their own economies.Trump was asking other countries to help keep the Strait of Hormuz open, including multiple European countries and Communist China (which is 100% on Iran’s side and therefore happy to disappoint us). Even our supposed allies are largely digging in their heels and refusing to help, though. Therefore, Trump challenged on March 18, “I wonder what would happen if we ‘finished off’ what’s left of the Iranian Terror State, and let the Countries that use it, we don’t, be responsible for the so called ‘Strait?’ That would get some of our non-responsive ‘Allies’ in gear, and fast!!!”


Regime change in Iran is necessary to keep the fanatical Muslim jihadis who currently run it from rebuilding and continuing to attack Americans in the future. But instead of assessing the merits of the case, including the great benefit to themselves if the Iranian regime were to fall, multiple European nations are instead whining about “war” as if they hadn’t aggressively supported war in Ukraine for years.

Trump is also understandably tired of hearing complaints about his taking out a regime that has spread global death, chaos, and destruction for half a century now. “Remember, for all of those absolute ‘fools’ out there, Iran is considered, by everyone, to be the NUMBER ONE STATE SPONSOR OF TERROR. We are rapidly putting them out of business!” Trump posted on Truth Social at around the same time as his message about the Strait of Hormuz. Oddly enough, the strait is actually more important for European energy than American energy.

Trump also expressed his frustration on March 17 with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which is always demanding American money while bashing America. “The United States has been informed by most of our NATO ‘Allies’ that they don’t want to get involved with our Military Operation against the Terrorist Regime of Iran, in the Middle East, this, despite the fact that almost every Country strongly agreed with what we are doing, and that Iran cannot, in any way, shape, or form, be allowed to have a Nuclear Weapon,” Trump wrote. He added:

“I am not surprised by their action, however, because I always considered NATO, where we spend Hundreds of Billions of Dollars per year protecting these same Countries, to be a one way street — We will protect them, but they will do nothing for us, in particular, in a time of need. Fortunately, we have decimated Iran’s Military — Their Navy is gone, their Air Force is gone, their Anti-Aircraft and Radar is gone and perhaps, most importantly, their Leaders, at virtually every level, are gone, never to threaten us, our Middle Eastern Allies, or the World, again! Because of the fact that we have had such Military Success, we no longer “need,” or desire, the NATO Countries’ assistance — WE NEVER DID! Likewise, Japan, Australia, or South Korea. In fact, speaking as President of the United States of America, by far the Most Powerful Country Anywhere in the World, WE DO NOT NEED THE HELP OF ANYONE!”

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Token. Allegiance.

• Japan Signs Major $56 Billion Energy Deal with US (CTH)

CTH has said to watch the U.S.-Japan trade relationship closely because the outlines of multiple geopolitical shifts can be referenced from a new strategic relationship surrounding multiple sectors, including energy.The U.S, relationship with Japan is both leverage and a hedge against old alliances that may seek to disrupt the global reset currently underway through President Trump policy. The issues with the European Union, U.K, USMCA and other tenuous allies, look entirely different when President Trump has alternative partnerships for massive energy exports.


ENERGY NEWS – In a major move to secure stable energy supplies amid escalating geopolitical tensions, Japan has inked deals worth up to $56 billion with the United States for oil, natural gas, and liquefied natural gas (LNG) purchases and investments. This agreement, finalized at the Asia-Pacific Energy Security Forum in Tokyo on March 14, 2026, underscores Japan’s push to diversify its energy imports and deepen economic ties with the US under Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s administration.mThe deals come as part of a broader framework stemming from the 2025 US-Japan trade agreement, where Japan pledged $550 billion in US investments over several years, with energy as a key pillar. ]

The $56 billion package represents a significant escalation in Japan’s commitment to American energy, building on an initial $36 billion tranche announced earlier in 2026.nThis latest round emphasizes immediate purchases and long-term infrastructure projects, responding to global market volatility driven by conflicts in the Middle East and disruptions in key shipping routes like the Strait of Hormuz. […] The agreements encompass a mix of direct energy purchases, joint ventures, and infrastructure investments. As a nation that needs energy partnerships, Japan seeks stability and predictability. Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi has gone all-in on a strategic energy partnership with the United States.

As the tectonic plates are shaken:
• If Canada wants to try and leverage the energy trade infrastructure against a USMCA reset, President Trump has Venezuela production as an offset. Japanese automakers have already told Canadian trade ministers that if Canada loses the USMCA, there s no value in maintaining auto manufacturing north of the border because the target customers are all in the USA. Japan would move all production out of Canada. I doubt China could replace at scale.

• If Europe, who is now dependent on LNG from Norway and the USA, wants to create geopolitical friction, President Trump now has Japan as a replacement customer. More behavioral leverage. U.S. firms are making a lot of money selling LNG to Europe, but Trump has just created a customer base that is more reliable and politically consistent.

• Then, as the short-term lifting of LNG and oil sanctions on Russia is proving (petrodollars used), think about the potential for India and Southeast Asia to be supported by Russian exports. Who holds that distribution key, again Trump.] It is not accidental that India is sending support vessels to the Strait of Hormuz as requested by President Trump. Here s the kicker& With oil and gas from Russia, India doesn t need the Iranian oil and gas; yet, they are sending support. Why? Because Prime Minister Modi wants Trump to keep their Russian purchase exemptions in place.

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It’s Trump. The judge says you can say about him what you want. Been going on for 15 years+.

• Appeals Court Refuses Trump’s Request To Reconsider CNN Defamation Suit (ZH)

President Donald Trump’s defamation lawsuit against CNN appears to be dead for the time being, as an appeals court denied his motion to rehear the case. A three-judge panel had held in November that Trump hadn’t done enough to show that CNN compared him to Adolph Hitler when it described his claims about the 2020 election as “the Big Lie.” In a brief unsigned order on March 17, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit said that none of its judges asked for a vote to reconsider the case. Trump told the circuit that the three-judge panel erred. He wanted the full panel to consider whether his case should be decided by a jury instead of the court, and to reconsider whether the statements made by the network’s journalists allowed him to sue.


The order also ruled out the possibility of a rehearing by the original three-judge panel. As Stacy Robinson reports for The Epoch Times, Trump sued CNN in 2022 after the network’s journalists repeatedly referred to his disputation of the 2020 election results as a “Big Lie. That terminology has historically been used in reference to Hitler’s Nazi regime, his propagandist Joseph Goebbels, and the push for a genocide of the Jewish people. “CNN has acknowledged that the term the ‘Big Lie’ is a direct reference to Adolf Hitler and Nazism and uses the term in relation to the Plaintiff to create a false and incendiary association between the Plaintiff and Hitler,” Trump’s complaint alleged.

A district court found that CNN’s language was just “hyperbole,” and not meant literally. They dismissed the case. In a unanimous decision, the 11th Circuit affirmed that dismissal. “To be clear, CNN has never explicitly claimed that Trump’s ‘actions and statements were designed to be, and actually were, variations of those [that] Hitler used to suppress and destroy populations,’” its decision read. Trump wanted the full panel to determine if his case warranted a jury trial, and reconsider whether the CNN journalists’ language allowed him to sue CNN asked the court to toss out the case, saying the term “Big Lie” is “rhetorical hyperbole and does not refer to Hitler or Nazism.” Trump could not prove the network acted with “actual malice,” by publishing statements it knew were false, CNN argued.

“Actual malice is an extremely high evidentiary burden for any plaintiff to meet, much less the former President of the United States of America, and he has utterly failed to meet that burden here,” CNN’s response brief reads. In July 2023, Florida District Judge Raag Singhal dismissed Trump’s suit with prejudice, meaning it cannot be brought again. He ruled that there was “no question” that such statements met the standard for defamation under the law. But, he said, they were statements of opinion, and not fact—even though he found them to be “odious and repugnant.”

“CNN’s use of the phrase ’the Big Lie’ in connection with Trump’s election challenges does not give rise to a plausible inference that Trump advocates the persecution and genocide of Jews or any other group of people,” Singhal wrote. “No reasonable viewer could (or should) plausibly make that reference.” Trump appealed that ruling, arguing the judge had failed “to consider the totality and context of the defamatory statements,” by “finding that CNN’s statements were pure opinion or rhetorical hyperbole.”

The CNN case is one of several defamation suits Trump has brought against news outlets. Last year, the president sued the Wall Street Journal for publishing a birthday card he allegedly sent to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. That case is ongoing. In 2024, Trump obtained a $15 million settlement against ABC and its anchor George Stephanopoulos, who claimed on air that Trump was “found liable for rape.”

Last September, a judge threw out a $15 billion suit against the New York Times and some of its reporters on the grounds that Trump’s legal brief broke court rules: It was unnecessarily lengthy and contained improper language, the judge ruled. Trump refiled that suit in October. The president has also teed up a suit against the BBC, after reports it had altered a video of him speaking to supporters at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, to make it appear as if he was promoting violence. The BBC on March 16 asked the court to dismiss the suit.

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In one generation.

• ‘Europeans Committing Demographic Suicide’ (ZH)

Europeans are committing demographic suicide and the tools used to managed migration are failing at every level, said Rodrigo Ballester, the head of the Center for European Studies at the Mathias Corvinus Collegium. He made his remark at a recent Ordo Iuris Institute event in Warsaw, Poland, which saw European politicians, policymakers, and other important players gather to discuss a groundbreaking paper: “Taking Back Control from Brussels. The Renationalization of the EU Migration and Asylum Policies.”n“As Europeans, we are committing demographic suicide. We are a continent of old rich people, facing a continent of young, hungry, and determined people — ambitious people.


We’re still trying to manage migration with hopelessly outdated tools, using conventions from a century ago. They have completely lost their meaning today. In practice, I’m talking about the Geneva Convention. This is the ‘sacred cow’ we should get rid of,” Ballester emphasized. The “Taking Back Control” paper, which was recently covered by Remix News, outlines 18 ways Europe can regain control of immigration policy. Ballester emphasized that these policies need to be implemented and quickly. Many of the speakers discussed various aspects of Europe’s ongoing immigration crisis, including the sharply differing trajectories of pro-immigration countries such as Poland versus Germany.

Polish Prof. Zdzisslaw Krasnodebski, a former MEP, spoke to the large audience who had gathered, where he compared the impact of immigration on the Polish city of Warsaw to the German city of Bremen where he lived and worked for a long time. “How did it happen that such a process, which is suicidal, was supported by societies for years? I can tell you that I know two such cities well. One was poor and large, and people were moving away from it. It was Warsaw. Warsaw was also White, if I may use that term. The other city (Bremen) was well-off, middle-class, also White. In 2025, one is almost a ruin. It used to be a prosperous, medium-sized town. Meanwhile, this big, great city we’re in right now has become one of the wealthiest cities in Europe,” he pointed out.

Krasnodebski underlined the trajectory of Warsaw, which is economically booming while still maintaining a strong White majority and rejecting the diversity seen in many other Western cities. Meanwhile, Bremen has been labeled the “most dangerous city in Germany,” where an incredible 73 percent of crime suspects are non-German. The situation has deteriorated so greatly in Bremen that even left-wing politicians in the city have admitted that “massive immigration” has sparked a housing and crime crisis. However, other speakers warned that not all is well in Poland, either.

Jacek Saryusz-Wolski—a former Polish Minister for European Affairs and Member of the European Parliament, currently President Nawrocki’s main advisor for European affairs — took the floor. “Looking at the statistics, you can see that in most of Western Europe, immigrant communities make up a percentage in the teens, or even over 20 percent, of the population. It’s not like that here (in Poland) yet, but we too face the risk of an open-borders policy starting here. We will then, after a certain delay, share the same fate,” noted Saryusz-Wolski.] Saryusz-Wolski further warned that the EU is taking more and more power away from nation-states in order to dictate an open borders policy.

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The potential to get out of hand. But not their fault.

• Restore Britain Vows To EXECUTE Pedophiles, DEPORT Millions of Migrants (MN)

A new force in British politics is making waves with an uncompromising vision for national restoration. Just weeks after its launch as a full political party in February, Restore Britain has already overtaken the Conservative Party in membership numbers, reaching over 114,000 supporters and becoming the fourth largest party in the country. The growth has been entirely organic through social media and grassroots efforts, with almost no mainstream coverage. Campaigns director and spokesman Charlie Downes laid out the bold agenda clearly: “We will not lie to the British people. Restoring Britain will require decisions that are controversial and unpleasant.”


He continued: “We are going to strip millions of healthy Brits who refuse to work of benefits. If that causes outrage from those who think the taxpayer owes them a living, so be it.” “We are going to deport all illegal and burdensome migrants. If that means millions go, so be it,” Downes added. He further urged, “We are going to outlaw incompatible cultural and religious practices. If that means those who refuse to integrate no longer feel welcome, so be it.” “We are going to execute pedophiles, rapists, and murderers if that is what the British people want,” Downes stressed, adding that “If that means we are condemned by subversive ‘human rights’ groups, so be it.”

He concluded by noting “We take no pleasure in these measures. It is a damning indictment of our political class that they are necessary in the first place. But necessary they are.” In a video clip from the party’s launch event, Downes made the philosophy explicit: “We do not believe in conserving the system. We do not believe in reforming the system. We believe in revolution.” This stance marks a clear break from the traditional parties that have presided over mass immigration, welfare dependency and soft approaches to serious crime.It has also immediately become popular with British voters who have become frustrated with Nigel Farage’s Reform Party, over a perceived lack of transparency when it comes to their commitment to mass deportation, in addition to the questionable raft of defections of politicians from the traditional parties, the very people who oversaw the implementation of mass migration into Britain, to Reform.

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Forget about Germany. Stick a fork in it and turn it over.

• Berlin Accused Of Prioritizing Migrants Over Merit (Brooke)

A diversity hiring policy affecting the recruitment of judges and public prosecutors in Berlin has come under renewed scrutiny after the city’s justice senator warned that the system may conflict with Germany’s constitutional requirement that public offices be filled strictly on merit. The policy, introduced in 2021 under then justice senator Dirk Behrendt of the Green Party, stems from amendments to the Law to Promote Participation in a Migration Society, known as the PartMigG. The legislation was adopted by Berlin’s House of Representatives with support from the then-governing coalition of the Social Democrats, Greens, and the Left.


Under the law, recruitment procedures must ensure that applicants with a migration background are invited to interviews in numbers reflecting their share of the population. In Berlin, around 40 percent of residents fall into that category, defined by the Federal Statistical Office as individuals who themselves, or at least one parent, were not born with German citizenship. In practice, the rule means that some interviewees experience positive discrimination and their migration background is a criterion for their selection, regardless of whether other applicants may have stronger academic credentials.

According to Bild, the system has been implemented in recent years by Berlin’s chief public prosecutor, Margarete Koppers, also associated with the Greens. The newspaper noted that internal warnings were first raised when the measure was initially drafted. Officials cautioned that introducing a quota linked to migration background during the selection process could violate Article 33(2) of Germany’s Basic Law, which states that access to public office must be determined by “suitability, competence, and performance.”

Berlin’s current justice senator, Felor Badenberg of the center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU), has now drawn attention to the issue and questioned whether the rule is compatible with constitutional principles. Badenberg said she supports efforts to improve integration and participation in public institutions, noting that she herself has a migration background, with parents who came from Iran. However, she emphasized that the constitution must remain the guiding standard.

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Immigrants used to be more grateful?!

• Our New Ungracious Immigrants (Victor Davis Hanson)

The contrast between the grateful immigrants who once embraced America and the resentful newcomers who scorn it reveals how radically—and dangerously—the nation’s immigration ethos has changed. Silicon Valley was energized by legal immigrants from all over the world who founded eBay, Google, Nvidia, SpaceX, Stripe, Sun Microsystems, Tesla, Yahoo, and a host of others. The Greek American Elia Kazan’s 1963 film America, America is a fictional account based on the Herculean struggle of the director’s uncle to immigrate to the United States from an impoverished and hostile Turkish Anatolia.The film summed up Americans’ traditional view of immigrants: They had risked everything for the chance to reach America, and once there, became hyperpatriotic in their gratitude for the magnanimity of their new hosts.


An excellent example is the recently released memoir from Encounter Books, American Trojan, by former University of Southern California president and Cypriot immigrant Dr. Max Nikias. It resonates with thankfulness to America for offering him opportunities undreamed of elsewhere.He and his wife arrived in the U.S. from war-torn Cyprus nearly penniless but determined to work hard, master English, and enrich the country that welcomed them with their talents and education. What followed was an amazing American trajectory that saw Nikias become president of the University of Southern California—arguably the most successful one in recent memory.

I grew up in rural California surrounded by hard-working immigrant farm families from Armenia, India, Japan, and Mexico. Their work ethic, love of America, and productive farms were models for U.S. non-immigrants. Such immigrants explained why the San Joaquin Valley was the most productive and richest agricultural region in the nation. My own Swedish grandfather, disabled by poison gas while fighting on the Western Front in World War I, loved all things Swedish, but not nearly as much as his beloved America.Four Hansons fought on the front lines of World Wars I and II. One was disabled, and another was killed on Okinawa. And all felt blessed that their parents and grandparents had gotten to America.

But recently, something has gone terribly wrong with immigration—an open border, of course, but also a change in legal immigration as well as student visitors. During World War II, Japanese Americans fought heroically in horrific conditions in Italy in the famous 442nd Regimental Combat Team and 100th Infantry Battalion—even as their families were interned in the Western United States. Few native-born Americans were more loyal or patriotic than the Japanese Americans. And now? While America is at war with Iran and de facto with its terrorist proxies, crowds of immigrants, visitors, and foreign students in New York scream anti-American slogans as they cheer on our enemies in theocratic Iran and its terrorist proxies, Hezbollah and Hamas.

Are we surprised, then, when Islamic terrorists begin hunting down Americans on our own soil?] On campuses today, thousands of Middle Eastern international students, mostly arriving from autocratic, tribal, and failed nations, have staged often violent demonstrations in the years following the October 7, 2023, massacre. They are not shy about cheering on the Hamas slaughter of Israeli civilians. These pro-Hamas students have not just damned Israel but also often harassed Jewish Americans. They revile their host America and expect Americans to smile and shrug. It is hard to determine whether such zealots hate the U.S. more than they love living in America and preserving their student visas and work permits.

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Popular occupation.

• 200,000 Immigrant Truck Drivers Begin Losing Licenses (ZH)

About 200,000 immigrant truck drivers in the United States could lose their commercial driver’s licenses once they expire under a new rule backed by the administration of Donald Trump, according to VNY. Which leads us…and everybody else to ask: we had 200,000 immigrant truck drivers in the United States? But we digress. The policy bars asylum seekers, refugees, and participants in the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program from obtaining commercial driver’s licenses. It is part of a wider crackdown on foreign truck drivers following several high-profile crashes last summer.


Experts warn the change could further strain the trucking industry, which already faces labor shortages while handling the majority of freight in the United States. Trucks transport more than 70% of the country’s cargo, but the sector struggles with long hours, relatively low pay, dangerous road conditions, and extended time away from home. As many American workers leave the field, immigrants have increasingly filled those roles. In recent months, enforcement actions have intensified. The United States Department of Transportation has tightened English-language proficiency rules, leading to thousands of license revocations among immigrant drivers.

VNY writes that under the rule announced on February 11, people with various temporary residency permits will no longer qualify for commercial licenses, even if they are legally authorized to work in the U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy said the change aims to prevent “dangerous foreign drivers” from exploiting the licensing system and contributing to road safety risks. Officials have also pointed to several fatal accidents involving immigrant drivers and argued that verifying their work histories can be difficult. Critics, however, say the policy unfairly targets immigrants and relies on unproven claims that foreign drivers are responsible for more accidents than American ones.

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US and EU have different approaches to immigration.

• Migrant-Linked Violence Spirals in Rome’s San Lorenzo (Brooke)

Residents in Rome’s San Lorenzo district are sounding the alarm over a surge in violence they say is increasingly driven by homeless migrants, after another brutal street attack left a man hospitalized and renewed calls for urgent security measures. The latest incident unfolded in Piazza di Porta San Lorenzo, where a 30-year-old Gambian man allegedly slashed a Moroccan man with a broken bottle in the middle of the street, striking his neck and face and leaving him collapsed on the ground.The victim was rushed to Umberto I Hospital, where he remains in serious condition, while police used footage captured at the scene to quickly identify and arrest the suspect after he fled.


For many locals, however, the attack is just the latest in a growing pattern. Residents say the area has become dominated by groups of vagrants, often intoxicated or under the influence of drugs, who regularly fight among themselves but also target passersby at random. “The problem is that they don’t just fight among themselves, they also attack us residents. Men, women, and even children,” Sofia, a waitress who lives near Piazza dei Caduti, told Il Messaggero.According to the Italian newspaper, a neighborhood assembly has now been called in response, with residents describing a situation that has become “unsustainable.”

Katia Pace, head of the local committee organizing the meeting, said violence has escalated sharply in recent weeks. “Cases have increased visibly in the last two months. Just a few days ago, two women were beaten and robbed,” she said. Despite stepped-up patrols and recent police operations that led to multiple arrests in nearby districts, residents say the response falls short of what is needed to restore order.“It’s not enough,” said Maria, another concerned resident. “We can’t live like this anymore.” Scenes of disorder that are fuelling insecurity have become commonplace, locals say. In public parks, families with young children are forced to navigate areas where men sleep on benches, drink heavily, argue, and urinate openly, heightening fears about safety and hygiene.

Concerns have also been raised over attacks involving minors. In one case, a 12-year-old girl was targeted, while a separate incident saw a Tunisian man arrested after assaulting a woman and fracturing her nose and cheekbone. The attack, captured on surveillance footage, triggered a wave of additional complaints from women reporting similar unprovoked violence.“There have been at least 15 cases,” said Pace, adding that those responsible are typically “homeless foreigners” living in the area, many of whom are said to suffer from addiction or mental health issues.Encampments have spread across multiple parts of the district, including along the Aurelian Walls and several central squares, with tents and makeshift shelters now a regular sight. “The patience of those who live here is not infinite,” another resident told Il Messaggero, warning that vigilante-style reactions could emerge if the situation continues to deteriorate.

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They bent over backwards to accomodate the protests.

• Greg Gutfeld Shreds Jessica Tarlov’s On-Air Meltdown Over SAVE Act (Margolis)

The SAVE America Act cleared a big hurdle in the Senate on Tuesday, and while that doesn’t necessarily mean it will end up passing, Republicans are putting the pressure on the Democrats. And the liberals in the media may legit be panicking. Jessica Tarlov lost it on Fox News’ The Five over the SAVE America Act, as her co-hosts shredded her hysterical take. The entire display proved once again that liberals like her just can’t stand a bill that actually protects elections. Remember, all the proposed law would do is require proof of citizenship for federal voter registration and a photo ID to vote — two simple, extremely popular ideas.


Tarlov, ready with her DNC talking points, ranted that the bill disenfranchises everybody under the sun. She claimed young folks, seniors, married women, and adoptees lack the right papers. “Based on what the SAVE Act actually says and what it would require, it would disenfranchise young people, old people, married people, adopted people, which makes no sense at all,” she said. She even floated the idea of the government handing out $165 passports to everyone.

Greg Gutfeld jumped in with zero mercy. “Do you know somebody who doesn’t have an ID? Tell me about it.” She responded by saying she was talking about passports, not ID, but Gutfeld pointed out that liberals for years have been pretending minorities can’t get IDs, which obviously isn’t true, so they’re just pivoting to passports. It was brutal watching Gutfeld and even Dana Perino calling her out and mocking her, and I swear she looked near tears at one point.


https://twitter.com/KarluskaP/status/2034019654373384500?s=20


And the thing is, everything Tarlov claimed was wrong. She had the audacity to invoke what the bill “actually says,” yet clearly she’s never read it, because Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), the bill’s sponsor, has already debunked this nonsense and pointed out what is actually in the bill.

“When all else fails, if you don’t have documentation establishing the information on your birth certificate or what would be in a passport or otherwise, the bill contains a provision requiring each state to allow an alternative mechanism by which someone can, by attestation, issue a sworn statement establishing the critical facts underlying their citizenship.” No cost to voters. No legitimate voter left behind. “We took great pains to go out of our way to make sure that no American — no American — would be left in the dark. This will not cost them a dime. And no one will be excluded if they can’t find their documentation.”

Tarlov has never cracked open the bill and read it. She peddles the same tired lefty lines about Americans, particularly minorities, being helpless idiots who are too stupid to be able to get an ID.

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“Musk has acknowledged publicly that xAI still lags competitors in coding tools ..” Wait. What? The system IS the coding tool, no?

• Musk’s xAI Turns To Wall Street Bankers To Improve Grok’s Financials (ZH)

Elon Musk’s AI startup xAI is expanding efforts to make its chatbot Grok more capable in financial analysis by hiring experienced finance professionals to help train the system, according to Bloomberg. Job listings show the company is recruiting investment bankers, traders, portfolio managers, and credit analysts to join its data-training teams. These specialists would help teach Grok how to reason through complex financial work, including leveraged loan syndication, distressed investing, mortgage-backed securities, and collateralized loan obligations. The company is also seeking experts with experience in equity and cryptocurrency markets.


The move reflects a broader push by major AI developers to sell products to financial professionals. Competitors such as OpenAI and Anthropic have already introduced tools designed to speed up tasks like market analysis, research, and investment memo writing. These advances have raised concerns that some traditional financial software providers could lose relevance. Compared with those rivals, xAI is generally seen as behind in attracting corporate customers. Much of its revenue so far has come from agreements with Musk-related businesses, including Tesla, Inc. and SpaceX, which merged with xAI last month.

Bloomberg writes that the company is also adjusting its strategy after a turbulent start to the year that included significant staff departures, including members of its founding team, as well as criticism over Grok generating explicit non-consensual images.Recently, Musk recruited two senior employees from Cursor, an AI coding startup currently seeking funding at a reported valuation of around $50 billion. Musk has acknowledged publicly that xAI still lags competitors in coding tools, a category that has become an important revenue driver for other AI companies.

xAI relies on workers known internally as AI tutors to train Grok by supplying data and adjusting responses. At a recent staff meeting, tutor team lead Diego Pasini said the company’s biggest constraint remains the supply of training data. Much of Grok’s dataset currently comes from X. Many of the new tutor roles are focused on credit markets, which are under increasing pressure as private credit funds face withdrawals and other industry challenges. Great timing.

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You driving is too risky. In the future, cars won’t hit anything. You will. Can’t win that one.

• The Inevitability of Self-Driving Cars (QTR)

When you think of self-driving cars, you may imagine scenes from a sci-fi movie, with sleek silver cars sliding perfectly into and out of the flow of traffic. Pedestrians simply express their desire for a car, and in moments one appears. Just as easily, you might also think of media reports you’ve seen about crashes and other malfunctions of these vehicles in the recent past. You may even think of both and think that the sci-fi depiction is far-fetched and unlikely. The reality is actually simpler: self-driving cars are inevitable.


In the US, we love our cars. Nearly 92% of households have access to a motor vehicle. We have car shows, car racing, car dealerships everywhere, and even TV shows about cars. It’s an accepted part of our society. In a geographically expansive country like ours, cars are essential for many. Along with car culture, we also have a cultural acceptance of the dangers and even fatalities that come from car accidents. The US (human) accident rate is approximately 2,000 per million miles driven. Around 40,000 people are killed each year in auto accidents. Right now, hardly anyone talks about these deaths. There are few news articles, and it is generally accepted as the price of driving.

What if we could reduce the number of injuries and fatalities to 50% of what they are now? Or even further, what about 80%? Would it be worth it to switch to self-driving cars then? Interestingly enough, preliminary numbers from Waymo indicate that they already are 80% safer. The media rushes to report any accidents caused by these cars, which may give the impression that they are much more dangerous. The truth is, they actually promise a safer world for all. Imagine a world with safe, self-driving cars. Mothers would feel more comfortable about their children. Parents’ dreadful fears about having a 16-year-old out on the streets would be almost completely relieved. People wouldn’t worry about the vision and dexterity loss of the elderly when they get into a vehicle. Drunk driving would be a thing of the past. Road rage would almost be..

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https://twitter.com/robertdunlap947/status/2034235444154527962?s=20 Soon-Shiong is one of many who we met thru Covid. Thanks for that. https://twitter.com/FabulousWeird/status/2034005961971560757?s=20

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle March 7 2026

Mar 072026
 
 March 7, 2026  Posted by at 10:09 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  71 Responses »


Mark Chagall Paris through the window 1913


• Trump to Rubio: Here’s Your Next Project (Sarah Anderson)
• Strange – CNN Found a War to Cover Again (CTH)
• Trump’s Favorability With His Voting Base Tops All Previous Presidents (JTN)
• The Sinking Ship Problem of the Epstein Coalition (Helmer)
• The Rockets Red Glare (James Howard Kunstler)
• President Trump: ‘No Deal with Iran Except Unconditional Surrender’ (CTH)
• Virginia Dems Move to Require Teaching Jan. 6th as an Insurrection (Turley)
• James Comer Suggests Criminal Referrals Are Possible In Minnesota Fraud Probe (JTN)
• Anthropic CEO Apologizes For ‘Dictator Trump’ Meltdown Memo (ZH)
• Zelensky Issues Military Threat to Orban (RT)
• Orban Intercepts Zelenskyy’s Money Laundering Operation (CTH)
• Churchill Wasn’t The First: Europe’s War On Russia Is Centuries Old (Norin)
• This Speech Started The Cold War – Still Haunts The World 80 Years On (Amar)

 


 

https://twitter.com/EricLDaugh/status/2029740962369405166?s=20 https://twitter.com/AstronomyVibes/status/2029738545125150860?s=20 https://twitter.com/EvanLuthra/status/2029799159025521112?s=20 https://twitter.com/AlexMasonCrypto/status/2029590536722751572?s=20

 


 


Cuba.

• Trump to Rubio: Here’s Your Next Project (Sarah Anderson)

Donald Trump told Marco Rubio that he’s got a new project coming on Thursday, and no, I’m not talking about babysitting Kristi Noem, though, apparently, he’s doing that too. Trump welcomed the Inter Miami CF soccer club to the White House today, and there was a lot of talk about Cuba, as the club’s co-owners, brothers Jorge and José Mas, are of Cuban descent. After praising Rubio as the “best Secretary of State in the country’s history” and joking that he didn’t want him to get “too popular,” Trump said, “He’s doing some job, and your next one is going to be… special. He’s waiting, but he says, ‘Let’s get [Iran] finished first.’ We could do them all at the same time, but bad things happen. If you watch countries, over the years, you do them all too fast, bad things happen. We’re not going to let bad things happen.”


The “special” job is, of course, taking over Cuba (last week, Trump called it a “friendly takeover”). The president implied during his speech that it would happen in a couple of weeks, but he said we need to get Iran under control first. But Trump was adamant, as he has been for weeks, that Cuba will fall. Of the regime, he said, “They want to make a deal so badly. You have no idea.” If the Miami Herald is to be believed, the current hand-picked “president” of the nation, Miguel Díaz-Canel, is the holdout and “biggest obstacle,” but it sounds like if he doesn’t start negotiating, he could end up being Cuba’s biggest loser. Rubio is reportedly in talks with Raúl Castro’s grandson, as well as other people in the country’s so-called “government.”

Díaz-Canel actually spent his day at the Iranian Embassy, paying homage to Ayatollah Khamenei. These images are giving me major “defiant Nicolás Maduro before the January 3 raid” vibes. We know how that turned out. Unfortunately, there’s no warrant out for Díaz-Canel’s arrest. Trump also said today that soon, Cubans who live in the United States will be able to go back to their country, but given the current conditions, I can’t imagine a lot of people are super eager. On Wednesday, over two-thirds of the island suffered an extended blackout. While some power has been restored, word is that it could take days to fix it. Then again, sadly, I think the people in Cuba are used to it at this point. Many parts of the country go 20 hours a day without power. The regime blames Trump’s oil squeeze, but we all know what the real problem is. It starts with a “c” and ends with an “ommunism.”

I’ve been banking stories out of Cuba for the last few days for an update, but if I included every single one of them, this article would end up at about 8,000 words, so I’m going to pick the two biggies. So, we know that Mexico’s narco-president, Claudia Sheinbaum, was sending Cuba “humanitarian oil” last year and early this year before Trump put a stop to it by threatening more tariffs. In February, she began sending humanitarian aid instead. Tons of it — items like food and toiletries, while about a third of her own country lives in poverty. Many have condemned her actions, mostly because she sent the aid straight to the regime rather than the Catholic Church as our State Department has been doing.

Well, Azteca Noticias did some investigative work and found that those items are being sold wholesale in state or military-controlled stores that only accept U.S. dollars. For example, for $43, you could get about 30 kilograms or just over 66 pounds of dry beans. And so, people continue to go hungry. The other major news is that many countries in the region are cutting any sort of diplomatic ties with the Cuban regime. The most noteworthy in recent days is Ecuador, which declared Cuban Ambassador Basilio Gutiérrez persona non grata and gave him and his staff 48 hours to get the heck out of the country. Those staff members could be seen on the roof of the embassy burning papers on Wednesday.

Several other countries are also refusing to continue participating in Cuba’s forced labor program. Commies will tell you it’s a great humanitarian gesture in which Cuba sends doctors and other healthcare providers and professionals to underserved countries. But the fact is that these medical professionals are treated like garbage. Some have compared it to modern-day slavery. Meanwhile, the regime gets rich off what these countries pay for the services. Honduras just sent 168 people back home, and on Thursday, Jamaica announced that it was ending its relationship with the program after five decades. Trump said on Thursday that Cuba will definitely fall. It’s just a matter of time as to when. He acted as if it’s merely a scheduling conflict between handling that, Iran, and Venezuela. He makes it all look so simple. We are witnessing history here, folks, and I will continue to document it as much as I can.

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“..the media participation was limited to column inches, punditry reports, claims and scripted presentations that worked alongside Zelenskyy, the actor..”

• Strange – CNN Found a War to Cover Again (CTH)

CNN is bragging about the teams they have on the ground in Iran and around the war zone to provide coverage for Operation Epic Fury. [SOURCE] Which again, brings up an interesting contrast that seemingly flew under the radar from past events.


As we noted in the beginning of the Russian war in Ukraine, where was the media for that one? Where was this CNN coverage for the war in Ukraine? The Ukraine war was the only war in modern history with ZERO mainstream media reports complete with helmets, flak jackets and play-by-play reporting of every moment within the conflict. Why? The answer is not necessarily complicated. The Ukraine war was a war of narratives. Yes, there was actual fighting, but the physical conflict itself was not in alignment with the narrative the media intended to create from it. The reality within Ukraine did not fit in the pert chart and the visuals would not ever have supported the claims.

Ukraine was/is the COVID-19 of wars. A western intelligence operation using the geography of Ukraine to push an agenda in alignment with western interests. It would not and does not serve the interests of truth and transparency for media to report from inside a battlespace that might contradict their claims. Hence, we labeled it “World War Reddit,” and it remains that way through today. Volodymyr Zelenskyy was installed by the same interests who triggered the conflict. As an outcome, the media participation was limited to column inches, punditry reports, claims and scripted presentations that worked alongside Zelenskyy, the actor, traveling all around the world promoting the conflict and raising money.

The physical battlespace was far less valuable than the EU/NATO and Intelligence Community narratives needed to maintain it. As soon as everyone started making money from the screenplay, maintaining ticket sales was prioritized over the performance itself. Criticism and critiques can be completely avoided by keeping the curtain down and just narrating what’s going on behind it. That system of deception continues through today. Strange that everyone just accepted it.

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Says CNN.

• Trump’s Favorability With His Voting Base Tops All Previous Presidents (JTN)

Multiple new polls show President Donald Trump’s approval rating within his party is higher than any other president in history. “Republicans love Donald Trump more than any president’s own party’s supporters loved him at this particular point,” CNN’s Harry Enten told viewers Wednesday night. The poll, which found that at this point in his second term, Trump’s GOP approval sits at a remarkable 86%, while former presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush were both at 77%. Strong approval within their own parties is now at 53% for Trump, again higher than Obama and Bush, whose strong approval ratings were 48% and 47% respectively. This approval comes despite other polls showing majority disapproval for Trump’s strike on Iran.


Trump’s approval rating held steady at 44%
A Fox News poll released in late January 2026 shows similar results: strong support persists among Republicans, with 85% approving overall and 97% among those identifying as MAGA (Make America Great Again, Trump’s slogan) supporters. Among all voters, Trump’s job approval rating held steady at 44% among registered voters, with 56% disapproving, unchanged from the previous month. That survey showed that Trump’s rating matches former President George W. Bush’s at a comparable point in his second term and exceeds Barack Obama’s by 2 points.

A president’s own party approval is a direct result of campaign promises coming to fruition. For Trump, there’s a substantial list thanks to his bullishness. President Trump’s campaign promise to secure the southern border has come to fruition through aggressive enforcement measures, resulting in negative net migration for the first time in 50 years and border crossings dropping to historic lows. Trump fulfilled his pledge to deliver major tax relief by signing the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which extended his 2017 tax cuts, eliminated taxes on tips, overtime, and Social Security benefits, and provided significant reductions for working- and middle-class Americans.

The administration achieved record energy production and dominance by unleashing domestic drilling and deregulation, contributing to lower energy costs and positioning the U.S. as a leading global energy exporter. Trump successfully implemented policies ensuring that net job growth went primarily to native-born Americans through strict immigration enforcement, reversing trends from prior years. His commitment to massive bureaucracy cuts and government efficiency efforts has saved hundreds of billions of dollars, equivalent to substantial per-taxpayer relief, while reshoring trillions in investments to boost American manufacturing and economic growth.

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“… the US, Israel and their allies – the “Epstein Coalition” as the Russian military bloggers are calling them…”

• The Sinking Ship Problem of the Epstein Coalition (Helmer)

The problem is that rats can leave a sinking ship but they cannot return if their ship has already sunk. They must surrender instead or drown. This must have been what President Vladimir Putin meant when he instructed his spokesman Dmitry Peskov to announce on Thursday afternoon, March 5: “Moscow has not received any requests for assistance, including weapons provisions, from Iran, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in a briefing. ‘As for the current situation, there have been no requests from Iran. Our consistent position is well-known to everyone. It remains unchanged,’ he pointed out, when asked if Russia planned to provide any assistance to Iran, particularly by providing weapons, in addition to political support.”


In other words, Russian military intelligence must have told the Kremlin that the war aims of — are failing to decapitate Iran’s civilian and military leadership; failing to destroy their missile stocks and underground launcher capacities; and failing to detect, intercept and prevent the escalating destruction of Iran’s counter-attack targets in the US base system, the Gulf Arab economies, and Israel itself. Accordingly, the Russian assessment is that Iran will not need to request military resupply and other assistance from Russia. Not yet — because the attrition of the Epstein Coalition forces is so rapid, they will be compelled to ask for a stop before Iran will need to ask for Russian assistance.

This is not the interpretation of Russian plans by the Trump Administration. At his Pentagon briefing on March 4, the US Secretary of War, Peter Hegseth, was asked by a reporter: “What is your message to Iran’s allies, namely Russia and China, who have called for an immediate end to hostilities?” Hegseth replied: “I don’t have a message for them and they’re not really a factor here and we’re – our issue is not with them; it’s with the nuclear ambitions of Iran.” Peskov’s announcement followed after Hegseth’s. Since Russian and Iranian officials know exactly what they have been discussing with each other, before the war began and since, Peskov cannot have been addressing Iran. Was he then messaging Washington for reassurance that “our consistent position… remains unchanged”? Was Hegseth correct that this means Russia has not entered the war on Iran’s side and will not do so?

This is the sinking ship question. It remains to be answered whose ship is sinking. It is unclear if Peskov’s message is the same as the Russian Foreign Ministry’s. Reading in retrospect and between the lines of the Ministry communiqués after Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov’s first telephone call with Abbas Aragchi, Iran’s Foreign Minister, on February 28 and his second call on March 3, there is ambiguity. In the first call Aragchi briefed Lavrov on Iran’s “steps to repel the aggression by the United States and Israel” and “expressed sincere gratitude to the Russian Federation for invariable and solid support.” That last phrase implies Russian intelligence, air defence radar, missile battery, and electronic countermeasures support, plus missile targeting and guidance in the counter-offensive.

In the second call, Lavrov has reported himself as having “reaffirmed Russia’s principled position in support of de-escalation, rejection of force, and a transition to a political and diplomatic settlement of the conflict.” Transition means not yet.Lavrov’s spokesman, Maria Zakharova added on the next day, March 4: “We are convinced that the crisis surrounding Iran has no military solution. We strongly call for the abandonment of forceful methods and a return to political and diplomatic resolution of all issues.” Zakharova also announced that a special operation is under way for five border crossings between Iran and Turkmenistan to open for the northbound evacuation of Russians in Iran. This means that the same routes are now open for Russian military supplies to move southward to Iran, when or if they may be needed. When or if — this is the key to Russian decision-making in the days ahead.

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“If you are feeling dumb today, just remember, there are real people who believe Iran is winning.” —Cam Higby on “X”

• The Rockets Red Glare (James Howard Kunstler)

You probably wonder what the end of this war will look like. It won’t look like V-J Day in Times Square, 1945, with sailors kissing girls they met five seconds ago. Our country is way too divided and disturbed with politically-inflected mental illness for love to bloom in the streets like it did then. If you happen to catch the glum crew on CNN you will detect that they really want this operation to fail because, you know, Trump. The war will be over when Iran loses the ability to spray missiles and drones all over the place — and notice how they are pouring it on the Emirate states, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, and even Azerbaijan, for Gawdsake, turning would-be bystanders into pissed-off additional enemies they need like a hole in the head.


At some point they will run out of ordnance, or the will to roll them out of the supposed 10,000 bat caves their weapons are stashed in. Our side apparently has an uncanny knack for seeing the launchers creep into daylight and efficiently blowing them up. Creates a disincentive to even think about launching. Of course, Iran might have some spectacular last-ditch thingie they can unleash to horrify the world — perhaps a “dirty” bomb that uses the 460 kilos of 60-percent enriched uranium they bragged about at one of the last negotiation sessions before the war with Witkoff and Kushner. Standing by on that.

But, at some point a week or so hence, a stillness will fall upon the earth and sky above Iran, and that will be all she wrote for sheer havoc. Victory will not look much like anything. Just that stillness. The body politic in Iran is another matter. Expect awful turmoil. Iran’s command structure is shattered. Officials don’t dare pick a room in some building to meet in. The Internet is down and most communication with it. Nobody knows who is really in charge, and nobody may be in charge, not for quite a long time to come.

Let’s hope we have the patience to let the Iranians sort out their own governing structure, and that it will be made up of people who are not insane, not fanatics of the martyrdom cult that has ruled the place for fifty years. It’s probably not part of the US plan to slaughter the Revolutionary Guard, or Sepah, the chief apparatus of despotic control in the country. Or the Basij, (Sâzmân-e Basij-e Mostaz’afin, which means “Organization for the Mobilization of the Oppressed”), an auxiliary volunteer paramilitary militia that acts as the “morality police” and cracks down on dissent. Hundreds of thousands are employed by these groups.

You might imagine circumstances in which the members of those dastardly outfits decide to peel away from them, sensing a loss of legitimacy and danger in remaining on-board. Surely, a lot of Iranians will have blood in their eyes, looking for scores to settle, just as the people took revenge on members of the Shah’s secret police, the Savak, after the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Even now with the bombs still falling in Tehran (perhaps even because of them), many ordinary Iranians are dancing in the streets. You must suppose there is massive opposition to the regime. But first, chaos.

Why would we feel any necessity to put “boots on the ground” in there? Why expose American troops to the factional fighting that is apt to break out, as it did in Iraq? Did we not learn the lessons of Fallujah? Wouldn’t it be enough that Iran just loses its ability to fire weapons at anyone? Loses its ability to mess with shipping in the Persian Gulf? And loses its ability to foment mischief in other countries, including any ideological influence it might still have, or any financial mojo for sponsoring terrorism? Can we not just stand by and let the Iranians figure out their own future?

Try imagining a peaceful Iran not bent on exporting Jihad (just like you might imagine a peaceful Ukraine, not making itself a problem for the rest of the world). Forgive the cliché, but Iran (a.k.a. Persia), is an old and durable culture, with a highly educated population, one of the world’s largest oil-and-gas reserves, and plenty of other resources. Iran could be somebody. It doesn’t have to be a bum with a one-way ticket to Palookaville.

As for our own country, too many people here are busy wolfing down the black pills with their Adderall and their Starbucks iced lavender cream chai. It’s actually possible that there is a satisfactory outcome to this Iran operation. Would that disappoint you — as it apparently disappoints the glum crew at CNN? As with Iran, it doesn’t pay to be insane, and something close to half of America is insane. That perturbation is mostly lodged in the American Left these days, the Democratic Party, devoted to a long list of ideas and propositions at odds with reality and locked into a strange willful hysteria that regards any kind of good faith as poison. That is exactly why we can’t have clean elections. How about fixing that?

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“Keep an eye on Russia. Ignore the western media narratives and look for direct source information on Russian oil activity. Let them work and just keep watching.”

• President Trump: ‘No Deal with Iran Except Unconditional Surrender’ (CTH)

The U.S. and Israel have been targeting deep underground missile sites within Iran, with strong success. Iranian counterstrikes, missile & drone launches are down 80 to 90 percent according to Pentagon officials. Additionally, the Israeli military has reported they dismantled an underground bunker system in Tehran used by regime leadership. Originally the bunker was used by slain Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei underneath the leadership compound in central Tehran. The bunker was targeted by 50 Israeli fighter jets and subsequently destroyed. President Trump announced via Truth Social that he will not seek any terms with Iran other than unconditional surrender.


Meanwhile, in a somewhat predictable move, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has announced the U.S. will lift some sanctions on Russian oil exports in order to mitigate shortfalls. India will be permitted to purchase additional Russian oil for use in their refineries. The gasoline end products will then be sold into the market. BESSENT: “President Trump’s energy agenda has resulted in oil and gas production reaching the highest levels ever recorded. To enable oil to keep flowing into the global market, the Treasury Department is issuing a temporary 30-day waiver to allow Indian refiners to purchase Russian oil. This deliberately short-term measure will not provide significant financial benefit to the Russian government as it only authorizes transactions involving oil already stranded at sea. India is an essential partner of the United States, and we fully anticipate that New Delhi will ramp up purchases of U.S. oil. This stop-gap measure will alleviate pressure caused by Iran’s attempt to take global energy hostage. (more)”

Strategically, it has always appeared that President Trump wanted to remove the sanctions against Russia as part of a negotiated peace deal with Ukraine. However, the intransigence of Ukraine and the EU had blocked that move. I would anticipate at some date the U.S. will use the opportunity of global need as a justification to permit more Russian oil to be sold into Western markets. This approach will not make Ukraine or the EU happy; however, it could be structured to put petrodollars back in control of Russian oil sales. That approach would further weaken China and the BRICS assembly who have been purchasing energy products in domestic exchange currencies.

The U.S., Venezuela and Russia could increase output and replace the missing oil production from the middle east region. This would stabilize markets. Although, the politics of that approach would face stiff opposition. What seems very likely is that Bessent, Rubio and Trump have a plan. If there’s one person in U.S. politics who understands how to use oil to financially mitigate any geopolitical impacts, it’s President Trump. Keep an eye on Russia. Ignore the western media narratives and look for direct source information on Russian oil activity. Let them work and just keep watching.

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“.. the Supreme Court effectively reduced many of the charges to mere trespass in later litigation, rejecting obstruction claims.”

• Virginia Dems Move to Require Teaching Jan. 6th as an Insurrection (Turley)

Virginia Democrats are moving to require teachers to tell students that Jan. 6th was an “insurrection” and effectively bar them from referencing “peaceful protests” or election irregularities. The characterization of the riot as an insurrection is historically and legally false. However, any parents who want to send their children to Virginia public schools would have to accept this form of indoctrination as part of their children’s education.


In the last election, Democrats campaigned as moderates, including Abigail Spanberger. Once in control of the Governor’s mansion and the legislature, however, they have moved quickly to the far left in a flurry of measures. Democratic legislators just voted themselves almost a 300% increase in salaries. They will need it. They are moving to increase taxes on ride shares, concerts, counseling, leaf blowers, Amazon deliveries, DoorDash, Uber Eats, ammunition, and other areas. However, HB 333, drafted by Del. Dan I. Helmer of Fairfax, raises serious concerns over academic freedom and free speech. The summary of the bill mandates “a program of instruction on or relating to the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the United States Capitol” and further:

“prohibits any such program of instruction, any accompanying curriculum or instructional materials, or any instruction provided by a teacher as a part of such program of instruction from (i) describing, portraying, or presenting as credible a description or portrayal of the actions precipitating or involved in the January 6, 2021, insurrection as peaceful protest or (ii) stating, suggesting, or presenting as credible a statement or suggestion that there was extensive election fraud that could have changed or actually changed the results of the 2020 presidential election. The bill requires any such program of instruction, any accompanying curriculum or instructional materials, or any instruction provided by a teacher as a part of such program of instruction to describe the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the United States Capitol as an unprecedented, violent attack on U.S. democratic institutions, infrastructure, and representatives for the purpose of overturning the results of the 2020 presidential election.”

Soon after Jan. 6th, I condemned the riot but rejected the argument that this was an insurrection. However, it soon became part of an orthodoxy in politics and academia despite the fact that the public rejected it. As former House Speaker Pelosi declared, “It is essential that we preserve the narrative of January 6th.” Yet, “insurrection” and “sedition” are legal terms. They have a meaning. The FBI investigated thousands after January 6th and charged hundreds. Not one was charged with insurrection or conspiracy to overthrow the country. The vast majority are charged with relatively minor offenses of trespass or unlawful entry or property damage- the type of charges that are common in protests and riots.

Indeed, the Supreme Court effectively reduced many of the charges to mere trespass in later litigation, rejecting obstruction claims. Faced with a collapsing historical and legal narrative, Democrats are now moving to simply indoctrinate students that this was an “insurrection.” Notably, Helmer is running again for Congress after Democrats, with the support of Gov. Spanberger, moved to reduce Republicans in the state (which is divided down the middle between the parties) to just one of eleven districts through gerrymandering.

Helmer is running in one of the most notorious new districts, called the “lobster” or the “scorpion,” because it runs from the Potomac River in Arlington southwestward, then splits into two “claws” toward the West Virginia line near Rawley Springs and Goochland and Powhatan. In my book, Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution, I discuss the radicalization of the American left. While many on the left advocate censoring “disinformation,” they are far less circumspect in promulgating their own disinformation.Likewise, where Democrats have objected to the pressure put on universities for greater diversity of viewpoints as an attack on academic freedom, these Democrats see no problem in mandating the teaching of positions that are demonstrably false.

Here, Rep. Helmer and other Democrats are mandating the teaching of a false narrative to children rather than simply relying on public debate. The reason is that they are losing the debate over the characterization of this riot as an actual insurrection. This, and other moves on the left, will only accelerate the exodus of families from public education. Notably, Fairfax County (which Helmer represents) has seen a sharp fall in enrollments in recent years.

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Walz, Ellison, Omar et al.

• James Comer Suggests Criminal Referrals Are Possible In Minnesota Fraud Probe (JTN)

Chairman James Comer, who leads the House Oversight Committee, told Just the News that further criminal referrals are possible with the evidence his committee has uncovered of the rampant welfare fraud in Minnesota. A new report from Comer’s committee, released on Wednesday, concluded that senior Minnesota government officials, including Gov. Tim Walz and Attorney General Keith Ellison, were for years aware of claims of widespread fraud in the state’s federally funded welfare programs, but failed to act, other than to retaliate against whistleblowers, Just the News reported. Comer told Just the News that he has already shared those findings with the Justice Department.


“We’ve given [the Justice Department] the report today that shows Walz and them knew. I don’t know that it’s a crime. Incompetence isn’t a crime, unfortunately…but at the end of the day, if some of these fraudsters implicate a coordination with Attorney General Ellison or Governor Walz, then I think that you could see some referrals from the committee,” Comer said on the Just the News, No Noise TV show on Wednesday. Governor Walz, who was also the Democratic nominee for vice president in 2024, previously acknowledged there is fraud in his state, but said his administration has made it a priority to root it out for years.

He appeared at an Oversight Committee hearing on Wednesday alongside Ellison where he again defended his handling of the fraud allegations, touting the federal prosecution of more than 75 defendants, but struggled to answer why his own government did not take action against the suspected fraudsters after his office was informed of suspicious activity. “I have watched with dismay as members of this Committee have made unfounded allegations that I am somehow complicit in defrauding Minnesota programs,” Walz said in his opening statement before the committee. “As a former member of Congress, I know that this institution can be better than these evidence-free accusations levied for nakedly partisan reasons,” he said, before reiterating a commitment to work with Congress and federal prosecutors to root out fraud.

However, the Oversight Committee believes the evidence shows the opposite, that Walz and his senior officials knew about the fraud concerns from the very beginning of his tenure and ultimately failed to act to address it before facing public backlash and pressure from the federal government in recent months. That evidence comes from testimony gathered by the committee from nine current and former Minnesota state officials who oversaw the benefits programs within the Minnesota Department of Education (MDE) and the Department of Human Services (DHS), the two government bodies that oversaw the programs at the center of the fraud allegations.

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No company can force the hand of a government. If it does. it IS the government. Shouldn’t his model have told him that?

• Anthropic CEO Apologizes For ‘Dictator Trump’ Meltdown Memo (ZH)

As Anthropic attempts to salvage their relationship with the Trump administration, CEO Dario Amodei publicly apologized Thursday for the inflammatory tone of his leaked internal memo that accused the White House of targeting his company because it hadn’t offered “dictator-style praise” to President Trump. The apology came in his first major interview since the Pentagon’s Department of War (DoW) formally designated Anthropic a supply chain risk to national security – effective immediately – marking the first time such a label has been applied to a U.S. company.


The March 5 designation, confirmed in a letter to Anthropic leadership, stems from weeks of failed negotiations over Claude AI’s military applications. Anthropic refused to drop strict red lines prohibiting the model’s use for mass domestic surveillance of Americans or fully autonomous lethal weapons, insisting on meaningful safeguards rather than what Amodei previously called “safety theater” in rival deals like OpenAI’s. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had threatened broad restrictions, including barring defense contractors from any commercial activity with Anthropic, but the company clarified the scope appears narrower: it primarily affects direct DoW-related work, with partners like Microsoft confirming continued availability for non-defense uses.

Last Friday, the Trump administration ‘fired’ the company after a bruising dispute with the Pentagon came to a head over ethical concerns surrounding Claude’s military use. The Pentagon demanded to use ClaudeAI for “any lawful purpose” with no guardrails – or having to allegedly ask permission in a life-or-death scenario. In the interview with The Economist Amodei described the crisis as one of the most “disorienting” in Anthropic’s history. He attributed the leaked memo – written hastily on Slack amid rapid-fire events including Trump’s announcements and OpenAI snaking their contract – to confusion and panic from a “difficult day.”

“It does not reflect my careful or considered views,” he said, downplaying it as a casual internal message rather than a formal memo. He said he’d apologized to DoW personnel and signaled openness to further dialogue with administration figures, though he sidestepped a direct personal apology to Trump. Amodei’s Thursday mea culpa was accompanied with a blog post titled: “Where things stand with the Department of War,” where he emphasized shared interests with the military, offered Claude at nominal cost plus engineer support for warfighters, and highlighted ongoing “productive conversations” despite the label.

I also want to apologize directly for a post internal to the company that was leaked to the press yesterday. Anthropic did not leak this post nor direct anyone else to do so—it is not in our interest to escalate this situation. That particular post was written within a few hours of the President’s Truth Social post announcing Anthropic would be removed from all federal systems, the Secretary of War’s X post announcing the supply chain risk designation, and the announcement of a deal between the Pentagon and OpenAI, which even OpenAI later characterized as confusing. It was a difficult day for the company, and I apologize for the tone of the post. It does not reflect my careful or considered views. It was also written six days ago, and is an out-of-date assessment of the current situation.”

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“Orban, meanwhile, has taken to social media to issue his own warning. “There will be no deals, no compromise. We will break the Ukrainian oil blockade by force,”

• Zelensky Issues Military Threat to Orban (RT)

Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky has issued an apparent military threat to Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban over the ongoing refusal by Budapest to lift a veto on billions in loans underwritten by EU members for Kiev. Orban last month blocked a planned €90 billion ($106 billion) emergency loan raised by EU members for Kiev – following the bloc’s failure to agree on outright stealing billions in Russian assets frozen in Belgium. Orban took the step in response to Ukraine preventing key Russian oil supplies from reaching Hungary via the Druzhba pipeline.


Speaking on new weapons for Kiev’s armed forces on Thursday, Zelensky stated: “We hope that one person in the EU will not block the €90 billion… Otherwise, we will give the address of this person to our armed forces, to our guys, so that they call him and communicate with him in their own language.” The diplomatic dispute between Hungary and Ukraine has escalated in recent weeks, spilling over into personal barbs. Zelensky launched a string of attacks against Orban, including fat-shaming him during the Munich Security Conference last month.

https://twitter.com/BGatesIsaPyscho/status/2022635714953789612?s=20

The Hungarian prime minister has long opposed Ukraine’s push to join the EU, and has repeatedly refused to send it weapons or approve EU military aid, calling for diplomacy instead. Orban, meanwhile, has taken to social media to issue his own warning. “There will be no deals, no compromise. We will break the Ukrainian oil blockade by force,” he wrote on X on Thursday, adding that oil will soon flow to Hungary again through the Druzhba pipeline.

The Soviet-era pipeline, part of which runs through Ukraine, went offline in January after Kiev claimed it had been damaged by Russian strikes – accusations Moscow denies. Hungary and Slovakia, both heavily reliant on Russian energy, have accused Kiev of deliberately cutting them off for political reasons and inventing obstacles for restarting oil flows. Zelensky has issued threats against foreign leaders and officials before. Last year, he suggested that Russia’s top officials should check for bomb shelters, hinting that Ukraine could target the Kremlin. Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov called the comments “irresponsible.”

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“..a loan with no payback clause..”

• Orban Intercepts Zelenskyy’s Money Laundering Operation (CTH)

Ukraine (Zelenskyy) was angry at Hungary (Orban) for blocking the €90 billion EU loan (a loan with no payback clause) which was backed by confiscated Russian sovereign wealth funds. A splendidly European financial scheme. To get back at Viktor Orban, Volodymyr Zelenskyy destroyed an oil/gas pipeline hub in Ukraine that transferred Russian oil to Hungary and Slovakia (Robert Fico). Hungary and Slovakia were furious, and Zelenskyy said repairs were too complicated to be easily fixed. Viktor Orban and Robert Fico then doubled down on blocking Ukraine funds and Ukraine’s assentation to the EU.


When Zelenskyy was questioned about Hungarian or EU inspectors visiting the site to evaluate the repairs, Zelenskyy said they would not be allowed access. Zelenskyy further noted when he was told Patriot Missiles were in short supply, he did not get to visit the inventory; implying his lies were similar to lies told by the United States. Caught in a lie, Zelenskyy followed up by saying he didn’t care, it was Russian oil so get lost. Two days ago, Hungary then intercepted two Ukraine vans carrying $40 million in cash dollars, €35 million in cash Euros, and 9 kg of gold – presumably a money laundering transfer intended to fund Zelenskyy and his intelligence chiefs.

Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó stating that “since January, $900 million and €420 million in cash, as well as 146 kilograms of gold, have been transported across Hungary.” The shipment apprehended by Hungary included 40 million U.S. dollars as well as 35 million euros and 9 kilograms (19.8 pounds) of gold — worth around $1.5 million at current prices — according to a separate statement by Oschadbank. Hungary’s National Tax and Customs Administration confirmed Friday that it had detained the Ukrainian citizens and seized the two armored cash-transport vehicles. It added it was conducting criminal proceedings on suspicion of money laundering. {LINK}

Upon hearing of the intercept yesterday, a highly angered Volodymyr Zelenskyy then threatened to send Ukraine “special military operators” to the home of Viktor Orban to extract revenge. Zelenskyy’s threat caused the European Commission to issue an unusual rebuke of the Ukraine dictator. “Specifically in relation to the comments made by President Zelenskyy, we are very clear as the European Commission that that type of language is not acceptable. There must not be threats against EU member states,” Commission deputy chief spokesperson Olof Gill told reporters Friday, in a rare condemnation of the leader in Kyiv. {link}

Zelenskyy, with pants down and visibly on fire, now missing all the money/gold, retreats from the originating position that started this mess and says he will repair the oil transfer station he destroyed, if Hungary will permit Ukraine to get the €90 billion loan (not a loan) from the Russian sovereign wealth fund.

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“Before the Iron Curtain: The centuries-old roots of the Russia–Europe rift ..”

• Churchill Wasn’t The First: Europe’s War On Russia Is Centuries Old (Norin)

In 1946, Winston Churchill’s Fulton Speech symbolically marked the beginning of the Cold War between the Western world and the Soviet Union. Since then, relations between Russia and the West have been fraught with tension. In recent years, this culminated in a strong and almost existential antagonism. Surprisingly, just a while ago, Russia viewed Europe as a natural ally. For two decades following the collapse of the USSR, there was a belief that Russia and Europe have a promising future together. Russian energy resources and European technology seemed like a perfect match, and Europe was commonly considered to be a model, both in terms of lifestyle and organizational efficiency.


That optimism turned out to be fleeting. Unfortunately, the roots of Russian-European opposition run much deeper. Ideas about isolating, colonizing, or even breaking up Russia didn’t emerge recently, and weren’t even invented by Adolf Hitler.

Prisoners of geography
One defining characteristic of Russia is its geographical position, which has historically influenced the decisions of its leaders and its overall policy. Russia is located on the edge of Europe, making connections with the rest of the European continent challenging. Throughout the centuries, this has affected relations between Russia and Europe, giving rise to unrealistic expectations, illusions, and persistent mutual fear. Russian foreign policy has long been shaped by efforts to break through this ‘cordon sanitaire’.

At the turn of the 15th and 16th centuries, several global developments occurred at around the same time. Europe discovered the great wide world, and as a result, soldiers, traders, and missionaries left its borders. Europeans didn’t just discover new lands – they were intent on carrying the word of the true faith there. Those who were willing to listen became part of the Christian world (although they were granted lesser roles within it), and those who resisted became enemies. However, while European missionaries erected crosses on the shores of America and India, movements spread within Europe that were initially considered heresies. Protestantism spread rapidly across the Old World, and intense religious conflicts raged in Europe.

Ignorant of these troubles, Rus’ was preoccupied with its own affairs. The country had cast off the Mongol yoke and was piecing itself together after centuries of foreign domination. It was during this period that emissaries from Western Europe arrived, including representatives from Rome. Their main goals were to persuade Rus’ to join the fight against the Islamic world, particularly the Ottoman Turks, and enter into a union with Rome. Initially, Catholics felt inspired by Russia – here was a vast and already Christian nation, which needed only some guidance along the right path.

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“Winston Churchill’s Fulton address was a signal for the Iron Curtain to drop, and for nukes to almost drop as well..”

• This Speech Started The Cold War – Still Haunts The World 80 Years On (Amar)

Eighty years ago, on March 5, 1946, one of the most famous leaders of World War Two delivered a fairly short but stern message which helped lock humanity into a future of open-ended and high-risk Cold War. That was the essence of former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s Fulton Speech (if we name it after the small midwestern US college town where he gave it), also known as the Iron Curtain Speech (after its key claim).


A massive political, ideological, and last but not least, military barrier had come to divide post-World War Two Europe, Churchill argued, and it was all the wicked Soviets’ fault: They had broken the Grand Alliance with the West by taking control of “the ancient states of Central and Eastern Europe,” he charged. In the face of this “Soviet sphere” and the aggressive strategies seeking to expand it even farther, Churchill warned, a Western policy of “balance of power” would be ineffective and lead to “catastrophe.” Instead, he urged, the “Western Democracies” needed to “stand together” in order to – Churchill clearly implied – deter the Soviets, who in his view respected only strength, especially of the military variety.

Well lubricated with shameless flattery for American President Harry Truman, who had travelled far to be in the audience and had a hand in setting up the speech, as well as for the US in general – at its “pinnacle of world power” – the Fulton Speech also pitched Churchill’s own, badly declining Britain as a junior but special sidekick to the Americans in their “primacy.” Unfortunately, that too came to pass.

Short and – in its recommendations – really quite generic as it was, Churchill’s intervention, speaking in the middle of nowhere in what is now called fly-over country, has a secure place of honor in naively admiring accounts of the West’s Cold War. There, it is still celebrated as an example of looking unflinchingly at harsh realities, a valiant call to arms, and a wise policy recommendation. Even those less sentimentally inclined still consider the speech necessary and the strategy of containment that it was effectively selling, inevitable.

That however is lazy thinking. For more reasons than one: Most obviously, the old Cold War was extremely costly as well as outrageously perilous. In the end, it lasted for four decades, before it ended with a negotiated settlement, initiated by the Soviet Union, in the late 1980s (no, the Cold War did not end in 1991, whatever ideology-contaminated Wikipedia says). Over almost half a century, this Cold War of the last century could, all serious observers have long understood, easily have ended with World War Three instead, including a world-ending use of nuclear weapons. In that entirely possible scenario, I would not be here to write this, and you would not be here to read it. And everything around us would be missing as well.

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Dark matter https://twitter.com/AstronomyVibes/status/2029551805097808281?s=20

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle February 23 2026

Feb 232026
 
 February 23, 2026  Posted by at 10:52 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  60 Responses »


Edgar Degas Danseuse au Tutu Vert 1887


• JPMorgan De-Banked Trump Shortly After Jan 6th Capitol Chaos (ZH)
• Susan Rice Joins Call for a Revenge Purge If Democrats Re-Take Power (Turley)
• Trump Calls on Netflix to Fire Susan Rice (Matt Margolis)
• Europe To Recruit Migrants For “National Defense” (ZH)
• Sen. Kennedy Tells Us What He Thinks of AOC (Spencer)
• Scott Bessent Outlines “Multiple Tools” Now Deployed in Tariff Policy (CTH)
• Scott Jennings Drops Massive Truth Bomb About Supreme Court on CNN (Margolis)
• Mamdani Is Collapsing Faster Than We Thought (Margolis)
• CNN SLAMS Keir Starmer’s ATROCIOUS Ratings (MN)
• Starmer Appoints ‘Queen Of Woke’ As UK’s Top Civil Servant – Reform UK (RT)
• German Court Rules X Must Turn Over Data on Hungarian Govt Support (CTH)
• Hungary and Slovakia Push Back on Ukraine’s Oil Dispute (Manney)
• NASA Chief Blasts Boeing Over Botched Starliner Mission (RT)
• Investigation Exposes Cover-Up of Obama Center Taxpayer Scam (Matt Margolis)
• Is Tucker Carlson’s Career Toast Now? (Matt Margolis)

 


 

https://twitter.com/MarioNawfal/status/2025224492558016784?s=20 Bessent gay https://twitter.com/GuntherEagleman/status/2024998754667966960?s=20

 


 

 


 

 


 


On January 22 2026, the Epoch Times wrote: Trump Sues JPMorgan Chase Over Alleged Debanking . A month later, on February 22, new docs confirmed it all and they said: Documents Confirm JPMorgan Closed Trump’s Bank Accounts After Jan. 6 Capitol Breach . Also on February 22, Zero Hedge then cited the Epoch Times. see below.

We now know for double sure that one month after Jan.6, 2021, which is also right after his first presidential term, JPMorgan closed over 50 bank accounts tied to Donald Trump. Fankly, that raises more questions than I can answer. (Where do the contents go?) Trump filed a $5 billion lawsuit. And he should win. Banks should not feel free to act on political whims.

• JPMorgan De-Banked Trump Shortly After Jan 6th Capitol Chaos (ZH)

New court documents released Friday show JPMorgan Chase told President Donald Trump a month after the January 2021 breach of the U.S. Capitol that the bank was closing his accounts. The disclosure was made amid a $5 billion lawsuit Trump filed against JPMorgan and its CEO Jamie Dimon. JPMorgan, the nation’s largest bank, said for the first time late Friday that it cut off more than 50 Trump accounts in February 2021, shortly after Mr. Trump’s first term ended. The accounts included those for Trump hotels, housing developments and retail shops in Illinois, Florida and New York, as well as Mr. Trump’s personal private banking relationship that handled his inheritance from his father, according to letters filed to the court.


JPMorgan did not specify in those letters a specific reason for the mass account closings. In one unsigned note to Mr. Trump, dated Feb. 19, 2021, the bank wrote that he would need to “find a more suitable institution with which to conduct business.” The letter closed with, “Thank you for your prompt attention to this matter” – a phrase that President Trump often uses. As NYTimes reports, the President has maintained for years that his bank account closures were politically motivated, and a spokesperson for his legal team said the newest court documents are “a devastating concession that proves President Trump’ entire claim. [JPMorgan] admitted to unlawfully and intentionally de-banking President Trump, his family, and his businesses, causing overwhelming financial harm, the spokesperson said.

President Trump is standing up for all those wrongly debanked by JPMorgan Chase and its cohorts, and will see this case to a just and proper conclusion. the attorneys added. Mr. Trump’s lawsuit, which named Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan’s chief executive, as a defendant, contended that the bank put Mr. Trump on a blacklist because it “needed to distance itself from President Trump and his conservative political views.” That echoed earlier complaints from Mr. Trump that Capital One similarly closed his accounts and that Bank of America refused to accept billions of dollars in deposits after the Jan. 6 riots. The bank told The Epoch Times over email it will seek to dismiss the claims. “Plaintiffs’ threadbare allegations do not allege sufficient facts to plead a claim,” the institution said.

JPMorgan told The Epoch Times last month that the case “has no merit.” “[JPMorgan Chase] does not close accounts for political or religious reasons,” JPMorgan previously said. “We do close accounts because they create legal or regulatory risk for the company.” “We regret having to do so, but often rules and regulatory expectations lead us to do so.” These comments were made last month, days after Trump announced on social media his intention to sue the bank.

Since then, Trump’s lawyers have alleged in court documents that JPMorgan closed the president’s accounts because of its “‘woke’ beliefs that it needed to distance itself from President Trump and his conservative political views.” “In essence, [JPMorgan Chase] debanked Plaintiffs’ Accounts because it believed that the political tide at the moment favored doing so,” the lawsuit states. JPMorgan added it supports the Trump administration’s efforts to prevent the weaponization of the banking sector. There is still much legal wrangling to come. JPMorgan this past week asked that the case be moved from Florida state court, where Mr. Trump has had some success in litigation, to a federal court in New York.

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One scary lady.

• Susan Rice Joins Call for a Revenge Purge If Democrats Re-Take Power (Turley)

As Democrats plan for the possible takeover in the midterms and 2028 election, they are already openly discussing their push for radical changes in our political system, including packing the Supreme Court to guarantee that those changes are allowed. Many are also pledging trials, impeachments, and investigations of anyone who supported President Donald Trump in a purging of politics and government. The latest to join the revenge purge pledge is Susan Rice, Democratic powerbroker and top policy adviser to both President Barack Obama and Joe Biden.In an interview this week, Rice declared that supporters of Trump can expect the proverbial knocks on their doors:


“A very prominent public figure, who has served at nearly the very highest levels, once told me … ‘Revenge is best served cold,’ and the older I get, the more I see the wisdom of that.”She added: When it comes to the elites, you know, the corporate interests, the law firms, the universities, the media … it’s not going to end well for them, for those that decided that they would act in their perceived very narrow self-interest, which I would underscore, is very short-term self-interest, and, you know, take a knee to Trump. The promise to crackdown political opponents is hardly unexpected in this age of rage. Indeed, Democrats can point to the purging of the federal ranks, particularly at the Justice Department, as further justification for a tit-for-tat response.

Democratic politicians and pundits have been fueling the anger of their base with ludicrous claims that democracy is about to die since the 2020 election. They have now used anti-ICE protests to stoke the anger in the hope that it will return them to power in the midterm elections. Bravo star and liberal podcast host Jennifer Welch praised footage of a “No Kings” protester celebrating the death of Charlie Kirk. After playing the clip, Welch laughed with joy and declared, “So listen up, Democratic establishment. You can either jump on board with this s—, or we’re coming after you in the same way that we come after MAGA. Period.”

The pledge for revenge purges is an obvious way to further motivate a mob. In my book, Rage and the Republic, I discuss how elected officials often try to enlist mobs to advance their political agendas — only to be consumed by the unrest they helped fuel. This yielding to a “mobocracy” was one of the critical dangers that the Framers sought to deter through protections against majoritarian tyranny. It is a history that figures like Rice are ignoring in the hope of riding this rage wave back into power. The fact is that history has shown that “it’s not going to end well” for establishment figures like Rice who believe that they can control a mob.

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“How much is she being paid, and for what??? Thank you for your attention to this matter.”

• Trump Calls on Netflix to Fire Susan Rice (Matt Margolis)

On Preet Bharara’s podcast, Obama’s scandal-scarred former U.N. ambassador promised that any corporation, law firm, university, or media outlet that “took a knee to Trump” will be targeted when the left is back in charge. “It’s not gonna end well for them,” she warned, casting basic engagement with the Trump administration as a kind of original sin that must be punished. And now President Donald Trump wants accountability. On Saturday, Trump called on Netflix to fire Rice. “Netflix should fire racist, Trump Deranged Susan Rice, IMMEDIATELY, or pay the consequences,” he wrote in a post on Truth Social.


“She’s got no talent or skills – Purely a political hack! HER POWER IS GONE, AND WILL NEVER BE BACK. How much is she being paid, and for what??? Thank you for your attention to this matter.” In her interview with Bharara, Rice argued that major institutions are sensing a political shift and regretting their support for Trump. But that won’t stop the Democrats from settling scores aggressively. “If these corporations think that the Democrats, when they come back in power, are gonna, you know, play by the old rules, and say, ‘Oh, never mind, we’ll forgive you for all the people you’ve fired, all the policies and principles you’ve violated, all, you know, the laws you’ve skirted,’ I think they’ve got another thing coming,” Rice said.

She pointed to redistricting as proof that Democrats are done playing nice. “Just like when Trump thought, ‘Okay, I’ll redistrict, and the Democrats won’t have the guts to play hardball,’ they’re gonna be surprised. Democrats have had a belly full, and we’re not gonna play by, you know, the old set of rules, when these guys are playing by a very different set of rules.” Rice made clear that companies that accommodated the Trump administration will face consequences — big tech, media, universities, and law firms. “There will be an accountability agenda,” she warned. She even urged businesses to brace for investigations. “They better preserve their documents. They better be ready for subpoenas. If they’ve done something wrong, they’ll be held accountable.”

The only companies that would avoid the wrath of vengeful Democrats would be the ones that were on the “right” side of history. “If they haven’t broken the law, good for them,” she said. “If they’ve done the right things, good for them. That also will be noted and remembered.” We all know what that really means: If they were loyal to the Democratic Party, they’re in the clear. Her message was blunt. “This is not going to be an instance of, you know, forgive and forget… the damage that these people are doing is too severe to the American people and to our national interest,” Rice said.

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Muslims will defend the Christian heartland. Yeah yeah. Europe will no longer be Christian. And that’s a big deal, because then it will automatically become Muslim. Yes it will. And only then will the original population start defending itself. Much too late. Now there will be blood.

• Europe To Recruit Migrants For “National Defense” (ZH)

Europe’s lack of military readiness has become painfully obvious in recent years, due largely to the war in Ukraine as well as the Trump Administration’s efforts to force NATO members to fulfill their basic obligations. Specifically, Russia’s successful use of attrition tactics against NATO supported forces in Ukraine has exposed a significant weakness in western military doctrine.New and cheap technologies (including drone technologies) are making large scale maneuver warfare obsolete. The era of super-weapons dominating the battlefield with minimal manpower is over. As was the case in WWI and WWII, troop strength and boots on the ground are once again the key to victory.


A Washington DC-based defense think-tank, Center For A New American Century (CNAS), has come to the same realization and suggests a novel (as well as predictable) solution: Exploit mass immigration from Ukraine and third world countries to the west as a resource to fill the persistent void in military recruitment numbers. Writing for Foreign Policy, the CNAS notes: “Closing manpower gaps may prove harder than writing bigger checks. The continent’s demographic crisis compounds the problem: Births in the European Union fell below 4 million in 2022 for the first time since 1960, shrinking the pool of potential recruits as geopolitical threats—chief among them, Russian aggression—demand larger, more capable forces…

The argument, of course, presupposes that Russia has any intention of invading greater Europe. There is no evidence that this is Vladimir Putin’s goal. However, the Russian bogeyman does make for a useful excuse to justify the development of a unified EU military force. The threat of war can also be exploited by European officials as a way to justify open borders and mass immigration from the third world. Immigration from Ukraine makes some sense – It is a legitimate war torn country and Ukrainians are close to the rest of Europeans in terms of cultural attitude. But, EU elites need a rationale for flooding the region with third worlders and war with Russia seems to be their ticket. The CNAS uses the “demographic collapse” claim as a catalyst.

“Ukraine’s grinding war of attrition has laid bare an uncomfortable truth: Emerging capabilities in the form of high-tech weaponry cannot substitute for boots on the ground. Soldiers, sailors, marines, coast guardsmen, and airmen are the backbone of national defense. Yet the European Commission estimates a 43 million reduction in the bloc’s working-age population by 2070…” “…Meanwhile, Europe continues to grapple with significant migration flows from Africa, the Middle East, and other regions. These arrivals, often young, male, and seeking better opportunities, represent exactly the demographic cohort European militaries desperately need. Many migrants arrive with valuable skills: language abilities, cultural knowledge of strategic regions, technical expertise, and, most importantly, motivation to prove themselves and build new lives.”

It should be noted that these kind of articles from think-tanks are not so much “suggestions” for future policy initiatives. Rather, they are propaganda pieces designed to promote policies that governments already intend to implement in the near future. A number of European countries have already begun the groundwork for recruiting migrants for national defense. Ireland just recently announced that their are reviewing a possible program to give fast-track citizenship to immigrants who volunteer to join the military. Irish leaders assert that this is necessary to boost defense capabilities, but they also argue that it is need to increase Ireland’s “diversity.” Several other European governments are looking at similar programs, including Germany, France and Spain.

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“But our plan for dealing with her, as I have said before, has always been ‘Operation Let Her Speak.’”

• Sen. Kennedy Tells Us What He Thinks of AOC (Spencer)

Sen. John N. Kennedy (R-La.) is easily the funniest guy in the United States Senate, and would be the most hilarious politician in all of Washington were it not for the wit who currently occupies the Oval Office. Of course, most of his competition in this regard is no competition at all, as politicians are historically likely to be people who take themselves altogether too seriously. Today’s Democrats in particular are some of the sourest, unpleasant, and humorless people on the entire planet, so weighed down are they with the noble and never-ending struggle against Orange Man Bad, borders, gender, sanity, and common sense. And nobody, and I mean nobody, takes himself or herself or ximself more seriously than the average leftist who thinks that he (or she or xe) is nobly defending — well, not exactly the nation, which they want to leave borderless and defenseless, but at very least all the people who think the right thoughts and check all the proper boxes for the correct candidates — from the spread of “fascism.”


It’s doubtful that even a tiny percentage of these po-faced, self-righteous, self-important clowns even know what fascism is, but whatever, dude. They’re still busy saving us from it, and one of our principal saviors is none other than Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-The Queensboro), who recently went down in flames at the Munich Security Conference. After AOC sputtered and stuttered and hemmed and hawed and faked her way through an answer to a question about whether the U.S. should defend Taiwan militarily in the event of an attack from Communist China, President Donald Trump commented acidly: “Her performance was horrible. I was surprised, actually. I didn’t know she was stupid.”

One who did know that, however, was Sen. Kennedy, and on Friday, he didn’t hold back. “The Congresswoman,” Kennedy said as Charles Hurt of Fox News chuckled in the background, “is kind of like Vice President Kamala Harris, but with more bartending experience.” If you’d like a word salad with your beer, you’ll be happy to know that Kennedy was just getting warmed up.“She has never been accused,” Kennedy continued, “of being a policy maven. You put her in a presidential primary with Elizabeth Warren or Rahm Emanuel, they will devour her like a light snack.” The senator then added semi-apologetically: “I probably shouldn’t say this, but she can get me back.” No doubt about that, but can AOC be as funny as John Neely Kennedy? Not a chance? Will she even try, or just huff and puff about how evil Republicans are lowering the civil tone of our august legislative bodies? The smart money is on the self-righteous posturing.

Kennedy’s most uproarious jab came next: “Someone told me a joke today. They said Congresswoman Cortez announced today categorically that she is not a moron. And she went on to say she hasn’t even been to Utah, much less embraced their religion.” Buh-dum tiss! Kennedy then reiterated: “Now she can get me back, I don’t dislike the congresswoman.” And then he concluded with another zinger: “But our plan for dealing with her, as I have said before, has always been ‘Operation Let Her Speak.’ And so far, it’s working, and my message to my friend the congresswoman, is ‘You go girl! You just keep it up.’” Can we clone Sen. Kennedy? Can we get 52 more of him to fill out the ranks of Senate Republicans? Imagine the hilarity if we had 53 Kennedys instead of the likes of Thune, McConnell, Murkowski, Collins, and so many others. Not only would the legislation be better, but so would the laughs, and there’s a lot to be said for that.

Sen. Kennedy https://twitter.com/EricLDaugh/status/2025199354311520451?s=20 https://twitter.com/Jules31415/status/2025262073802858614?s=20 Read more …

There are so many options. Why did he pick the wrong one?

• Scott Bessent Outlines “Multiple Tools” Now Deployed in Tariff Policy (CTH)

Speaking to the Economic Club of Dallas, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent outlines what technical procedures the Trump administration will trigger now to retain tariff authority. As anticipated Bessent outlines section 232 tariffs, section 301 tariffs, and Section 122 tariffs. WATCH (prompted):


Section 232 [Steel and Aluminum examples] of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 (19 U.S.C. §1862, as amended) authorizes the President to impose trade restrictions—such as a tariff or quota—if the Secretary of Commerce determines, following an investigation, that imports of a good “threaten to impair” U.S. national security. {SOURCE}

Section 301 tariffs are a trade enforcement mechanism established under the Trade Act of 1974. They allow the U.S. government to impose tariffs on imports from countries that are found to be engaging in unfair trade practices. The Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) conducts investigations to determine if a country is violating trade agreements, and if so, it can impose tariffs as a corrective measure {SOURCE}

Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974 allows the U.S. president to impose tariffs of up to 15% to address “large and serious” balance-of-payments deficits. This authority can be exercised without prior congressional approval for a limited duration of 150 days. After this period, any tariffs must be extended by Congress. {SOURCE}

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“This is a properly functioning government today.

• Scott Jennings Drops Massive Truth Bomb About Supreme Court on CNN (Margolis)

Whatever you think about the Supreme Court’s ruling Friday on tariffs, the ruling was a blunt reality check for the Democrats, whose rhetoric about the high court has been vicious in recent years. On CNN’s NewsNight, host Abby Phillip was walking through the financial fallout from a court ruling, citing a CBO report that found U.S. businesses absorb about 30% of import price increases, while consumers bear the remaining 70% — with the net effect pushing consumer prices up by roughly 95 percent of the domestically borne tariff costs. Inflation has remained low and stable under President Donald Trump, but whatever. The left loves to push their narrative regardless of the facts. Scott Jennings promptly called out her inconsistency.


“Well, which is it?” he said. “You said all of it was passed through to the consumers. You said that most of it was absorbed by some of the companies. It sounds like maybe it might be a little bit of both.” While Phillip suggested refunds should mirror how the tariffs were collected, Jennings predicted a bureaucratic nightmare, warning of massive sums of money at stake and years of litigation likely to follow. Then Jennings shifted gears entirely, and this is where things got interesting.

“I’ll just say, you know, politically, today, you know, it was a big breaking news day, but I just think we ought to acknowledge something,” he said. “This is a properly functioning government today. The president of the United States, the head of the executive branch, made a policy decision. The Supreme Court, it renders legal opinions about these kinds of decisions, made a decision, they said, you can’t do that. The president of the United States said, ‘Okay, I agree, and I will acknowledge your decision. I’m going to use a different statute to try to do what I want to do.’ This is properly functioning government.”

He wasn’t done. Jennings went straight at the media narrative that has dominated coverage of this Supreme Court for the past two years — the one that cast the court as essentially a rubber stamp for whatever Trump wanted.”For every Democrat and every media person that has gone on for the last year or two about how this Supreme Court is a wholly owned subsidiary of Donald Trump, that it’s not independent, that it does whatever he says to do, obviously, that narrative was obliterated today.”

He drove it home: “So, to me, I thought this was actually — I thought the ruling was sound. I think the president is sound to try other statutes. And I think the narratives about the court not being independent and the president not obeying the court were totally blown up today.” How can you argue with that logic? You can’t. Democrats have become so obsessed with the narrative that the court has been a rubber stamp for Trump; they’ve literally considered packing the court because of this narrative. Frankly, the conservatives on the Supreme Court have shown far more independence than any of the leftists on the court.

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Wait till he starts raising taxes.

• Mamdani Is Collapsing Faster Than We Thought (Margolis)

You can’t say we didn’t warn New York what was going to happen if it elected Zohran Mamdani, but I gotta say, I don’t think anyone predicted it would start collapsing so quickly. But, alas, it has. That socialist utopia that Mamdani was supposed to deliver has instead turned into a slow-motion fiscal catastrophe a mere two months in — and even the liberal media is starting to notice. Mamdani unveiled a $127 billion budget for fiscal year 2027 this week — a staggering $5 billion increase over the prior year. But what’s $5 billion between socialists, right?


To put that into perspective, Mamdani’s proposed budget is actually larger than the budgets of 47 U.S. states, including Florida, which has nearly twice the population. And somehow, it still isn’t enough. The city is staring down a $5.4 billion deficit, with the real gap potentially closer to $12 billion when you do the actual math. So what was his plan? Tax someone else. Mamdani went straight to Albany looking for a handout, demanding that Gov. Kathy Hochul raise taxes on the “ultra-wealthy” and the most profitable corporations. When Hochul told him to pound sand and cut spending instead, he obviously couldn’t do that, and now he is looking at saddling homeowners with a 9.5% property tax hike.

“Faced with no other choice, the city would have to exercise the only revenue lever fully within our own control,” he said. “We would have to raise property taxes. We would also be forced to raid our reserves. To balance the budget as required by law, our preliminary budget takes the only path within our control: the second path. The options of the second path are the options of last resort. Options that we will only employ if there is no other means of arriving at a balanced budget.” As a New York resident, I can say there’s finally something I can agree with Hochul on. Why should the rest of the state subsidize Mamdani’s socialist experiment in New York City?

Let it foot the bill for the mistake of electing Mamdani. Remember, this is the guy who campaigned on affordability and making the rich “pay their fair share,” and now he’s already in a position where he has to tax regular people to cover the costs of his promises. This budget crisis he’s facing two months into his term comes on top of him taking heat for poor trash cleanup and snow removal on his watch. Two months into the job, and the basics aren’t getting done. Conservatives warned about exactly this before last year’s election. We said a self-described democratic socialist running one of the world’s most financially complex cities was a recipe for disaster. Voters in New York went ahead anyway. Now the city faces the reckoning that was entirely predictable.

“No one in New York is ambitious enough to dramatically reshape city government, and residents either vote for class warfare or vote with their feet,” the Washington Post editorial board observed. “A reckoning will have to come eventually. The question is how bad it gets before reality sets in.” That question may answer itself sooner than anyone expected. “No one in New York is ambitious enough to dramatically reshape city government, and residents either vote for class warfare or vote with their feet,” the Washington Post editorial board observed. “A reckoning will have to come eventually. The question is how bad it gets before reality sets in.” That question may answer itself sooner than anyone expected.

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The “leaders” of the large Eropean nations all poll in the sewers..

• CNN SLAMS Keir Starmer’s ATROCIOUS Ratings (MN)

Keir Starmer’s approval ratings have plunged to historic lows, with even CNN calling them “absolutely ATROCIOUS” and noting that President Trump appears “downright like Abraham Lincoln” by comparison. This brutal takedown highlights how Starmer’s globalist policies are alienating Brits across the board. As the Labour leader clings to power, his war on free speech and commitment to protecting illegal immigration is fueling a backlash that could spell the end for his regime. With polls showing just 20% approval, Starmer’s grip on Number 10 looks increasingly tenuous. The Overton News clip, which has gone viral on X, captures CNN’s scathing assessment of Starmer’s popularity nosedive.


In the segment, analyst Harry Enten declares, “The se numbers are absolutely ATROCIOUS! I mean, you never see numbers like this in the United States of America.” Focusing on the dire stats, Enten points out, “Britons who like Keir Starmer, look at this — overall it’s just 1 in 5! It’s just 1 in 5, 20%!” Even within his own ranks, support is crumbling: “His OWN party, Labour, he’s just at 52% there.” The commentary escalates, revealing, “I’ve even seen numbers with satisfaction in the TEENS — and this is actually HIGHER than the lowest.” The most striking line compares Starmer unfavorably to Trump: “You know, we always talk about Donald Trump being unpopular in this country — but Donald Trump looks downright like Abraham Lincoln compared to Keir Starmer’s numbers at this point!”

The latest YouGov survey from February 2026 shows Starmer’s net favourability at -47, with only 22% viewing him positively against 69% unfavorably. That’s an improvement from January’s -57, but still abysmal for a sitting PM.Other trackers paint an even grimmer picture. Ipsos reported satisfaction in the teens late last year, aligning with CNN’s observations. Opinium’s February poll pegs his net approval at -44, with over half the public calling for his resignation. Starmer’s woes stem from policies that prioritize globalist agendas over British interests. Mass immigration continues unchecked, straining public services while borders remain porous. Economic missteps, like burdensome regulations on businesses, echo the failures of socialist experiments.

Recall our earlier coverage where a former aide to Starmer revealed how a “stakeholder state” – an unelected network of insiders, NGOs, and civil servants – effectively controls the UK government. Paul Ovenden described this “political perma-class” as diverting power from voters to elite priorities, wasting resources on fringe issues while ignoring secure borders and sovereignty. This shadowy influence explains Starmer’s disconnect from the public, leading to approval ratings that rival the worst in postwar history. Historical comparisons show that every UK PM with similar low ratings either lost big or resigned before the next election. Adding fuel to the fire is Starmer’s aggressive stance against free expression. Threats to ban platforms like X over AI-generated content have drawn international condemnation.

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“Romeo set out plans for civil servants to spend around 20% of their working hours on diversity objectives such as encouraging workers to display their preferred pronouns and “recruiting non-binary staff,”

• Starmer Appoints ‘Queen Of Woke’ As UK’s Top Civil Servant – Reform UK (RT)

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has appointed the “Queen of Woke” as his new cabinet secretary, Reform UK party spokesperson Zia Yusuf wrote on X on Friday. Antonia Romeo’s elevation to the UK’s most senior civil servant position is the “embodiment of all that’s wrong” with the current establishment, Yusuf argued. While heading the Department for International Trade (DIT), “she bombarded staff with weekly emails pushing Transgender Awareness Week, Bi Visibility Day, and even recommended watching films about trans parenthood,” he claimed. During her time working in the Home Office, “65,000 illegal migrants have crossed on her watch,” he said.


During her stint at the DIT, Romeo set out plans for civil servants to spend around 20% of their working hours on diversity objectives such as encouraging workers to display their preferred pronouns and “recruiting non-binary staff,” the Telegraph reported on Friday, citing internal documents. She also reportedly instructed staff to join a “gender non-conforming book club” as part of their corporate performance review. Starmer has argued that Romeo is the “right person” for government to deliver a “period of national renewal.”

Only 15% of Britons approve of the prime minister’s job performance, according to an Ipsos poll from last month. His approval ratings have been battered by dissatisfaction with his handling of the ongoing migrant crisis, a surge in arrests related to comments made online, the cost-of-living crisis, and the resurgence of the Pakistani rape gang scandal. Most recently, revelations emerged that Starmer appointed Peter Mandelson as UK ambassador to the US despite knowing of his ties to convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. Starmer has maintained that he “was lied to” during the vetting procedure.

The waning popularity of the prime minister’s Labour Party is expected to culminate in major losses to Reform at the upcoming local elections, according to projections from the pollster ElectoralCalculus. On Monday, Starmer’s government reversed its plans to postpone the elections until next year after a legal challenge from Reform.

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“This effort against PM Orban by the European Union is part of the reason why Secretary of State Marco Rubio was so strong in his words of appreciation and support for Orban during his recent visit to Budapest…”

• German Court Rules X Must Turn Over Data on Hungarian Govt Support (CTH)

The European Union has a major targeting effort against Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, an ally of President Trump who does not support giving additional funding to the Ukraine war effort. Hungary is having national elections in April. Previously, USAID Administrator Samantha Power spent considerable time in Hungary organizing activist groups to conduct operations against the government {2023 – Go Deep}. Last week a German based NGO called Democracy Reporting International, won a ruling from a Berlin judge to force the X platform to turn over data related to support for Viktor Orban and the government of Hungary.


All of this opposition to Prime Minister Orban seems to be coordinated by quasi government agencies on behalf of Brussels and their interventionist intentions. We may remember it was also information from German intelligence, that was behind the nullification of the Romanian first-round election. However, Viktor Orban is fighting back and refusing to approve the funding of the Ukraine war despite the massive pressure campaign from inside the European Union.

As noted by Hungarian Minister Zoltan Kovacs, “Many have asked how Hungary can block the €90 billion Ukrainian war loan if we are not participating in it. clarified that the loan does not affect Hungary and does not entail any financial commitment for us. As Hungary is not part of the cooperation, in most of the decision-making procedures we do not even vote. However, he pointed out that for the scheme to function, the EU’s seven-year budget guarantee rules must be amended – and this requires the approval of all 27 member states, not only the financing member states. We are now blocking this decision, without which the war loan cannot be disbursed.”

https://twitter.com/PM_ViktorOrban/status/2025284661853782466?s=20

(Via Politico) – A court in Germany on Tuesday ordered Elon Musk’s social media site X to hand over data related to the upcoming election in Hungary to researchers for scrutiny. The court in Berlin ruled in favor of rights group Democracy Reporting International in its bid to access data to research influence campaigns and disinformation in the election. The group took its case to court after X in November refused its data access requests. The European Union’s rules for social media platforms, the Digital Services Act, obliges big online platforms like X to grant external researchers access to data to scrutinize how platforms handle risks, including election interference. The European Commission in December fined X €40 million for breaching that obligation, as part of a €120 million levy.

This effort against PM Orban by the European Union is part of the reason why Secretary of State Marco Rubio was so strong in his words of appreciation and support for Orban during his recent visit to Budapest.

RUBIO: “The President has an extraordinarily close relationship to the prime minister. He does. And it has had tangible benefits in our relationship. I’m not going to speculate about the future. What happens in this country is up to the voters of this country to determine and decide, and we love the people of Hungary. But I’m not – but there’s no reason to sugarcoat it. I’m going to be very blunt with you. The prime minister and the President have a very, very close personal relationship and working relationship, and I think it has been incredibly beneficial to the relationship between our two countries.” {Source – Transcript}

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When will the EU implode?

• Hungary and Slovakia Push Back on Ukraine’s Oil Dispute (Manney)

Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico delivered a blunt warning, saying Slovakia would halt emergency electricity exports to Ukraine unless Kyiv restored Russian oil transit through Ukrainian territory, setting a firm deadline of Feb. 23. The dispute centers on the Druzhba pipeline, which still supplies Russian crude to parts of Central Europe. Russian forces struck Ukrainian energy infrastructure in late January, an attack that damaged equipment tied to the Druzhba system in western Ukraine. The flow of oil to Slovakia and Hungary stopped that same day. mUkrainian officials blamed Moscow and offered alternative routes, including the Odesa-Brody pipeline and maritime shipments.


Fico responded by declaring a state of emergency in Slovakia’s oil sector, saying he would instruct SEPS, Slovakia’s state grid operator, to suspend electricity deliveries to Ukraine if oil transit didn’t resume. Slovakia supplied roughly 18% of Ukraine’s record electricity imports in January, and doubled its support compared with the previous year. Oil transit to Slovakia and Hungary has been disrupted since late January after a Russian strike hit the Druzhba pipeline, a key route carrying Russian crude to Central Europe. Ukraine’s pipeline operator said this week that the Jan. 27 attack damaged critical infrastructure and that repair works are ongoing.

In a letter to the European Commission, Ukraine’s embassy to the EU proposed using the Odesa–Brody pipeline or maritime routes as temporary alternatives to supply Hungary and Slovakia while repairs are completed. Fico accused Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of treating Slovakia as a “hostile country,” saying Kyiv first halted gas flows, costing Slovakia €500 million annually, and has now stopped oil supplies, causing further losses. He also defended his decision to refuse Slovakia’s participation in the EU’s planned €90 billion military loan for

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó escalated the pressure at the European level by blocking a major EU financial package for Ukraine that required unanimous approval. Budapest tied its position directly to the restoration of oil transit through Druzhba. It’s through that route that most of Hungary’s oil supply from Russia is delivered.When the EU adopted its 2022 oil embargo against Russia, Hungary and Slovakia both secured exemptions. Since then, Orbán has delayed or opposed several sanction packages and has resisted long-term funding commitments, while Fico shifted Bratislava away from the prior government’s strong military backing of Ukraine.

Disputes over gas transit agreements in late 2024 also strained relations. Kyiv ended certain transit agreements when contracts expired, increasing pressure on downstream countries that still rely on Russian supply routes. Each confrontation reinforces the same pattern: energy needs still drive national policy, even during wartime. Ukrainian officials labeled the moves as political blackmail, arguing that the infrastructure damage resulted from Russian attacks and that repairs and legal transit options were still under discussion. Officials in Kyiv also noted that only a handful of EU member states still import significant volumes of Russian oil.

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Boeing is gone. But it’s a big bloated corpse.

• NASA Chief Blasts Boeing Over Botched Starliner Mission (RT)

NASA chief Jared Isaacman has slammed Boeing for failures that plagued the botched debut mission of its first crewed spaceship, Starliner, which left two astronauts stranded for nine months last year. A billionaire private astronaut and close associate of SpaceX founder Elon Musk, Isaacman, who was appointed NASA administrator two months ago, also offered a blistering critique of the agency’s previous leadership, claiming that its decision-making risked creating “a culture incompatible with human spaceflight.” The remarks were made at a press conference on Thursday during the release of a sweeping report on the Starliner mission, which saw two astronauts, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, stuck in space for nine months instead of the planned one week.


The capsule returned empty in September 2024 while the crew came home on a different vehicle in March 2025.The report states the loss of control during the capsule’s rendezvous with the ISS constitutes a Type A mishap – the most serious category of anomaly. It identifies critical design flaws in Boeing’s spacecraft, presenting 61 recommendations to address the issues before any future crewed Starliner mission. It also exposed management failures, stating that the mission “was marked by chaotic meeting schedules, unclear roles, and communication breakdowns.” “Mistrust between NASA and Boeing was intensified by selective data sharing, perceived favoritism, and inconsistent transparency,” the report added.

Boeing is facing public scrutiny over numerous safety issues and incidents involving its commercial aircraft and repeated delays in delivering key government contracts. Despite its troubles, the US government continues to contract with the company because NASA has a strategic goal to maintain two independent American systems for transporting astronauts to the ISS. SpaceX, the agency’s other partner, has also experienced technical issues affecting ISS operations, including delayed astronaut returns and aborted missions.

With both US contractors facing challenges, Russia remains the only other country capable of independently transporting people and cargo to the ISS. While Western sanctions over Ukraine targeted Russia’s aerospace industry, space cooperation was deliberately exempted to keep the station operational. Last week, Isaacman publicly stated his desire to meet with Roscosmos head Dmitry Bakanov and expressed interest in attending the launch of the Soyuz MS-29 mission from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, scheduled for the summer of 2026.

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“.. leaving taxpayers high and dry and putting them on the hook for hundreds of millions of dollars to support the ugliest building in Chicago,”

• Investigation Exposes Cover-Up of Obama Center Taxpayer Scam (Matt Margolis)

Barack Obama promised Chicago a “gift” with his Obama Presidential Center. Instead, he delivered yet another boondoggle, buried in secrecy, with missing money, and stonewalling straight out of a Chicago corruption playbook. When Obama got approval to build his presidential center in Jackson Park, he vowed the project would be privately funded. Every penny, he said, would come from donations to his foundation. Taxpayers, he insisted, wouldn’t be on the hook. That was the sales pitch — and like so many Obama promises, it’s proven to be fiction.


The Obama Foundation may be paying for the building itself, but taxpayers have been secretly shouldering hundreds of millions of dollars in hidden infrastructure costs. Roads were torn up, utilities relocated, and parkland reshaped — all to serve Obama’s monument to himself. Cornell Drive, a major four-lane roadway that once ran along the park’s lagoon, has been erased so Obama’s massive campus could dominate the landscape. This wasn’t just a minor tweak to city planning. It was a taxpayer-funded overhaul of a historic public park — one that Obama’s team couldn’t have pulled off without Chicago and Illinois residents footing the bill.

Back in 2018, officials estimated public infrastructure costs at $350 million. Fast forward to today, and that number is almost meaningless. The Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) now admits to roughly $229 million in “state-managed spending.” Chicago’s records show another $206 million linked to the same project. No one in city or state government will say how those figures line up — or whether the total cost is far higher. And if you don’t think there’s something scandalous going on, then why are all the agencies involved being tight-lipped about it?

Fox News Digital filed Freedom of Information Act requests with IDOT, Chicago’s Department of Transportation, the Office of Budget and Management, Mayor Brandon Johnson’s office, and Governor J.B. Pritzker’s administration. Not one produced a complete accounting of public spending. IDOT offered vague numbers. The city stalled and refused to release records. Pritzker’s office contradicted itself, then stopped responding entirely. OBM even admitted it had “no responsive records” — an absurd claim for the agency that manages the city’s capital budget.

This is a coordinated cover-up, plain and simple. The Illinois Attorney General’s Public Access Counselor is now investigating whether multiple agencies violated the state’s open records laws. But you don’t need a court order to see what’s going on. Obama’s so-called “gift” turned into a taxpayer-financed vanity project — protected by the same political machine that made Chicago famous for corruption.

To make matters worse, Obama’s promised $470 million “endowment” to shield taxpayers in case the foundation ran out of cash has barely materialized. The fund has just $1 million in deposits — one-fifth of one percent of what was pledged. “Illinois Republicans saw this coming a mile away. Now, right on cue, Illinois Democrats are leaving taxpayers high and dry and putting them on the hook for hundreds of millions of dollars to support the ugliest building in Chicago,” Illinois GOP Chair Kathy Salvi told Fox News Digital. “Illinois’ culture of corruption is humming along with pay-to-play deals to their allies and friends while lying to Illinois voters.”

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Strange stories.

• Is Tucker Carlson’s Career Toast Now? (Matt Margolis)

Tucker Carlson just had one of the most embarrassing weeks in recent media memory. In the span of a few days, he fabricated a detention story, spread a debunked antisemitic smear about Israel’s sitting president, and then had to crawl back with an apology, as the public watched the wreckage of his career unfold in real time. Last week, Carlson flew into Ben-Gurion Airport on a private jet to record an interview with U.S. Ambassador Mike Huckabee. He never left the airport. Critics noted the obvious irony: a man who lectures his audience about Israel couldn’t bring himself actually to set foot in the country. After the interview, Carlson claimed that airport security had “hauled” his executive producer into a side room, seized his team’s passports, and demanded to know what was discussed with Huckabee.


That story fell apart almost immediately. The Israel Airports Authority stated that Carlson was “politely asked a few routine questions, in accordance with standard procedures applied to many travelers,” and that the conversation took place in a VIP lounge specifically to protect his privacy. The U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem confirmed his group “received the same passport control questions that countless visitors to Israel” receive. Then, leaked security footage surfaced showing Carlson smiling, hugging, and posing for photos with airport staff. Former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett called Carlson a fraud and said he “fabricated a tale about being supposedly harassed by our security forces.”

The detention story was bad. What came on Friday was worse. Carlson released the Huckabee interview and used it to launch a series of outlandish claims and accusations. He called Israel “probably the most violent country on earth,” questioned its right to exist, accused it of controlling American foreign policy, and declared it a police state. He claimed Netanyahu believes in “blood guilt” — that he punishes not just wrongdoers but their entire bloodlines — even though Netanyahu has never said anything of the sort. His claim that “Prime Minister Netanyahu has way more influence over American foreign policy than Americans do” echoed antisemitic tropes that have circulated for decades.

Then came the Epstein bomb. Carlson repeatedly pressed Huckabee about Israeli President Isaac Herzog’s supposed connection to Jeffrey Epstein’s island. “The current president of Israel, whom I know you know, apparently was at ‘pedo island,'” Carlson said on air. Huckabee said he was unaware of any such connection. And for good reason — there isn’t one. Herzog appears in the Epstein files only through news articles that ended up in Epstein’s emails. Carlson was basing his allegation on a fake, AI-generated image that circulated online after the Epstein files were released.

After Huckabee learned the claims were false, he wrote on X that Carlson’s allegations “could be the stuff of libel lawsuits” and that “it was hard to follow Tucker’s line of questioning.” On Saturday, Carlson released a video apologizing, acknowledging he had no evidence and saying, “I’m sorry to imply that I knew something I didn’t know.”] That apology changes nothing. More than a million people watched the original interview without a warning that its core claims were false. Carlson threw out a serious accusation against a sitting head of state without doing five minutes of verification, and the only explanation is confirmation bias.I don’t know what happened to Tucker Carlson, but it looks like we’re watching his career blow up in front of our faces in slow motion.

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https://twitter.com/Jules31415/status/2025406665386766644?s=20 Tulsi https://twitter.com/Real_RobN/status/2025310000286236865?s=20 Mar-a-Lago CAFitts

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle February 20 2026

Feb 202026
 
 February 20, 2026  Posted by at 10:51 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  56 Responses »


Vincent van Gogh Scène de rue à Montmartre 1887


• Former Prince Andrew Arrested After Epstein Files Revelations (Margolis)
• Hegseth Responds to Reports War With Iran Is Imminent
• Patel: We Know Who’s Bankrolling Antifa, and We’re Coming for Them (Hoge)
• 2-Hour Meeting in Geneva of US, Ukraine and Russia with Not Much Progress (CTH)
• Trump at Board of Peace meeting: ‘War in Gaza is over’
• Historic: Surprise High-Level U.S. Visitor Lands in Venezuela (Sarah Anderson)
• Rubio’s Case for a Stronger West (Ben Shapiro)
• CNN Issues Dire Warning To Democrats On 2026 Governors’ Races (ZH)
• The Bug In The Navalnaya Frog Poison Story (Helmer)
• GOP Should Be Willing to Politically Bleed, Fight, and Die (Victoria Taft)
• Mamdani and Other People’s Money (Turley)
• Orban Blasts EU ‘Fantasy’ About Russia (RT)
• EU In Worst Crisis Ever – Fico (RT)
• EU Elites Driven By Nazi Nostalgia – Lavrov (RT)
• Trump Has A UFO Speech Ready To Deliver (ZH)

 


 

Gates is an Epstein victim. Anthropic

 


 

 


 


Nothing to do with underage victims.

“…he shared confidential government trade documents with the late Jeffrey Epstein..”

“BBC’s Lucy Manning provided more color on what the investigation centers around: My understanding is that there’s been a very significant development in the investigation into the Epstein files. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor has been arrested this morning on suspicion of misconduct in public office. That goes back to documents from when he was a trade envoy, that are alleged to have been passed to Epstein.”

 


 

PLEASE NOTE; Before she died, Virginia Roberts Giuffre wrote multiple times that if she died, it wouldn’t be from suicide, that she would never do that. But every single source says she died from suicide. The press, governments… She was a brave woman. She deserves being taken eriously. She is not.

For many years, she lived in Australia with her husband and -eventually- three children. “Ms Giuffre had recently been living with her children and husband Robert in the suburb of North Perth, Australia, though recent reports suggest the couple have split after 22 years of marriage.

BBC Apil 1 2025; “Ms Giuffre posted on Instagram that she had suffered kidney failure after her car collided with a school bus, stating doctors had given her “four days to live” and were transferring her to a specialist hospital.”

[..] It remains unclear where and when the crash occurred. Both the Western Australia police and ambulance services told the BBC they had no records of such an accident happening in recent weeks. The police later specified that they had located records of a “minor crash” between a bus and a car on 24 March, but that no injuries had been reported as a result.”


• Former Prince Andrew Arrested After Epstein Files Revelations (Margolis)


Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, the former Prince Andrew and brother of the UK’s King Charles III, has been arrested. “I have learned with the deepest concern the news about Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor and suspicion of misconduct in public office. What now follows is the full, fair and proper process by which this issue is investigated in the appropriate manner and by the appropriate authorities. In this, as I have said before, they have our full and wholehearted support and co-operation. Let me state clearly: the law must take its course,” the king said in a statement. “As this process continues, it would not be right for me to comment further on this matter. Meanwhile, my family and I will continue in our duty and service to you all.”


Thames Valley Police did not identify the individual but confirmed in a statement the arrest of a man “in his sixties” from Norfolk on suspicion of misconduct in public office.” Thames Valley Police has opened an investigation into the offence of misconduct in public office. As part of the investigation, we have today (19/2) arrested a man in his sixties from Norfolk on suspicion of misconduct in public office and are carrying out searches at addresses in Berkshire and Norfolk. The man remains in police custody at this time. We will not be naming the arrested man, as per national guidance. Please also remember that this case is now active so care should be taken with any publication to avoid being in contempt of court.

Assistant Chief Constable Oliver Wright said: “Following a thorough assessment, we have now opened an investigation into this allegation of misconduct in public office. “It is important that we protect the integrity and objectivity of our investigation as we work with our partners to investigate this alleged offence. “We understand the significant public interest in this case, and we will provide updates at the appropriate time.” In October, the royal family stripped Mountbatten-Windsor of his royal titles and privileges over his association with the late Jeffrey Epstein. Virginia Roberts Giuffre, who committed suicide last year, alleged in her memoir that he had sex with her while knowing she was just 17. She recounted how Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell allegedly instructed her, “When we get home, you are to do for him what you do for Jeffrey.”

https://twitter.com/TheSaviour/status/2024429714203447521

“He was friendly enough, but still entitled – as if he believed having sex with me was his birthright,” she wrote. The following morning, she said, Maxwell told her, “You did well. The prince had fun.” According to Giuffre, Epstein later handed her $15,000 for servicing him. Mountbatten-Windsor has denied those allegations. Giuffre’s family responded to the arrest with a pointed statement: “At last. Today, our broken hearts have been lifted at the news that no one is above the law, not even royalty. On behalf of our sister, Virginia Roberts Giuffre, we extend our gratitude to the UK’s Thames Valley Police for their investigation and arrest of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. He was never a prince. For survivors everywhere, Virginia did this for you.” Police are reportedly searching two addresses in Berkshire and Norfolk linked to Mountbatten-Windsor.

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No nukes. Iran says they don’t want them. But then there’s Bibi.

• Hegseth Responds to Reports War With Iran Is Imminent

Amidst reports that the United States is close to a major war with Iran, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth said his job is to make sure the military is capable of backing up the president. “We have enormous capabilities, unlike anyone else in the world, and I think the big difference between this department and others is that we unlock and unleash our war fighters to get the job done should they have to,” Hegseth said in response to a question from The Daily Signal in St. Louis, Missouri. “But our hope is that we never have to use that,” he added. “The president is a negotiator looking for a deal. It would be wise for Iran to see that deal.”


Axios reported Wednesday that President Donald Trump is close to waging a war with Iran, and that a U.S. military operation in Iran would likely be a massive, weeks-long campaign that would look more like full-fledged war than the recent operation in Venezuela. While Iranian leaders want to reach a nuclear deal with the U.S., they are also rushing to prepare for war if negotiations fail, the Wall Street Journal reported.The U.S. could be ready to launch a “sustained” bombing campaign on Iran in the near future, the New York Post reported.

“The world has seen over the last year plus what the president is willing to do,” Hegseth said. “When he speaks, they should listen, and when he says Iran’s not going to have a nuclear weapon, and they should negotiate that. He means it, and our job at the Department of War is to have the capabilities to back him up.” The Trump administration has one message to Iran: come to the table and make a deal, Hegseth said. “Two people will make this decision: the Iranians could step up and make a real deal,” Hegseth said, “and ultimately President Trump will decide if it’s a good enough deal for the American people.”

On Tuesday, Trump advisers Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff had a three-hour meeting with Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi in Geneva, Switzerland. Hegseth echoed the message of other Trump administration officials that the talks yielded progress. Vice President Vance told Fox News’ Laura Ingraham that the talks “went well” in some ways, but “in other ways it was very clear that the president has set some red lines that the Iranians are not yet willing to actually acknowledge and work through.” The Daily Signal asked Hegseth about Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei suggesting Iran could sink a U.S. war ship. “I feel very good about the capabilities of our warships,” Hegseth said. “Very good.”

The war secretary spoke to reporters following a stop on his “Arsenal of Freedom” tour in St. Louis, Missouri, to visit a Boeing facility. Hegseth addressed some of Boeing’s 18,000 employees in St. Louis and asked them to build more planes at a faster pace. “When we unleash American industry, America wins,” Hegseth said. “When we compete, we win. When we innovate, we win. When we move fast, we win.”

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“A federal judge declared a mistrial Tuesday, but that was because the defense lawyer was wearing a politically charged T-shirt, about as dumb a thing as you could do as a trial attorney.”

• Patel: We Know Who’s Bankrolling Antifa, and We’re Coming for Them (Hoge)

We’ve seen the 2016 anti-Trump rallies, the 2020 George Floyd riots, and the ongoing anti-ICE protests in blue cities since President Trump started trying to clean up the illegal immigration disaster left by former President Joe Biden. There’s been one constant: Antifa. The group, whose name is short for anti-fascist, is known for their menacing black outfits, complete with masks, and their often violent behavior. They show up as if by magic the moment a demonstration breaks out, and they’re not there to keep the peace. But where does their funding come from? Who’s behind it? FBI Director Kash Patel wanted to know, so he’s been investigating it — and he says the bureau has found some answers:


FBI Director Kash Patel said Wednesday that investigators have uncovered what he described as major funding streams tied to antifa. The revelation signaled possible new enforcement action as the bureau intensified scrutiny of left-wing violence, according to a report from the Washington Examiner. Speaking on “The Dan Bongino Show,” Patel said the FBI under President Donald Trump has been conducting a financial investigation into how demonstrations linked to the loosely organized far left movement are supported.

By the way, all those who think that Bongino left his job as FBI Deputy Director on bad terms would be hard-pressed to explain why then Patel would appear on his show. The director continued, saying they’ve identified some culprits, but they’re not ready to reveal their identities just yet: “These organizations don’t operate alone or in silence,” Patel said. “They operate with a heavy, heavy stream of funding. And we started looking into it, and guess what? We found them.”

Patel did not identify specific donors, organizations, or financial mechanisms, but said more details could emerge in the coming months as the investigation continues. “Money doesn’t lie,” he added. He also smacked former Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden for ignoring the violent activists and calling the decentralized group “an idea.” “It’s not an idea when actual action follows the idea,” he chided them. Here’s what that “idea” looks like in the real world, Barack and Joe:

A public safety director at @Reed_College cooperated with the FBI investigation to identify Hoopes. In response, the college fired the man, and leftists in public denounced him.Currently, nine anti-ICE have been charged with ambushing an ICE officer in Texas and wounding him with gunfire. A federal judge declared a mistrial Tuesday, but that was because the defense lawyer was wearing a politically charged T-shirt, about as dumb a thing as you could do as a trial attorney. We’ll see where that goes next. Patel said he had elevated the issue internally, and they’re working hard on their case, but he did not announce any new imminent DOJ charges. Let’s hope that changes in the near future.

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Ukraine doesn’t want peace. War makes the guys behind their curtain superrich.

• 2-Hour Meeting in Geneva of US, Ukraine and Russia with Not Much Progress (CTH)

The U.S. mediating team met with Ukraine and Russia negotiators for the second day in Geneva, Switzerland. Unfortunately, despite the high praise and customary diplomatic niceties spoken, there was not much progress. There was, however, a rather remarkable accusation hurled by Russian media about uninvited British officials going to Geneva in order to conduct surveillance of the negotiations. Apparently, this is part of UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s efforts to retain maximum involvement and influence.


STEVE WITKOFF – “Today, at President Trump’s direction, the United States moderated a third set of trilateral discussions with Ukraine and Russia. Thank you to the Swiss Confederation for being gracious hosts for today’s meetings. President Trump’s success in bringing both sides of this war together has brought about meaningful progress, and we are proud to work under his leadership to stop the killing in this terrible conflict. Both parties agreed to update their respective leaders and continue working towards a deal.” (source)

RUSTEM UMEROV (UKRAINE) – “In Geneva, the second day of trilateral negotiations has begun.mConsultations are taking place in working groups by areas within the political and military tracks. We are working on clarifying the parameters and mechanisms of the decisions discussed yesterday. We are focused on substantive work. We will provide additional information on the results.” (source)

https://twitter.com/PM_ViktorOrban/status/2024116561091477726

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The end of the UN?

• Trump at Board of Peace meeting: ‘War in Gaza is over’ (JTN)

President Trump said Thursday at the inaugural Board of Peace meeting at the U.S. Institute of Peace in Washington, D.C., that “the war in Gaza is over.” Trump invited dozens of countries to participate in the Board of Peace and help end the war between Israel and Hamas. “The war in Gaza is over. It’s over,” Trump said, adding that, still, “there are little flames,” NBC News reported.”Hamas has been, I think they’re going to give up their weapons, which is what they promised,” Trump said. “If they don’t, it’ll be, you know, they’ll be harshly met, very harshly met. They don’t want that.”


The president explained that the U.S. would contribute $10 billion to the Board of Peace. “We’ve had great support for that number,” he said. “And that number is a very small number when you look at that compared to the cost of war.”] He also said that the leaders of several nations, including Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, the United Arab Emirates, Morocco, Bahrain, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Uzbekistan, and Kuwait “have all contributed more than $7 billion toward the relief package.” “That’s great, thank you, fellas,” Trump said, adding that, “and many more are contributing … this is our first meeting.”

The president noted that Indonesia, Morocco, Albania, Kosovo, and Kazakhstan “have all committed troops and police to stabilize Gaza.” He said that other nations, like Egypt and Jordan, “are likewise providing very, very substantial help,” to create “a very trustworthy Palestinian police force.” Trump called the Board of Peace “one of the most important and consequential things” he has been involved in and touted the countries and leaders who are participating. He was also optimistic that other countries invited to the Board of Peace would accept the U.S.’s offer after multiple key allies declined invitations.

“Almost everybody’s accepted, and the ones that haven’t will be,” Trump said. “Some are playing a little cute. Doesn’t work. You can’t play cute with me.” The United Kingdom, France, Norway, Sweden, and Slovenia are among the countries that have said they won’t join, partly due to concerns that it could diminish the United Nations. However, Trump said during his speech that Norway agreed to host a Board of Peace event. “I’m excited to announce that Norway has agreed to host an event bringing together the Board of Peace,” Trump said. As Norway previously indicated that it would not immediately join the Board of Peace, it is unclear if the country’s stance has changed.

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Trump must talk to Machado. Easy.

• Historic: Surprise High-Level U.S. Visitor Lands in Venezuela (Sarah Anderson)

For years, the idea of a high-ranking United States official visiting Venezuela was not something that was ever going to happen. Heck, six weeks ago, it was not something that was ever going to happen. But last week, Energy Secretary Chris Wright touched down in Caracas and met with Donald Trump’s pawn, “acting president” Delcy Rodríguez, and even joined her on a site tour related to the country’s energy sector. On Wednesday, another high-ranking U.S. official came in for a visit: SOUTHCOM Commander Gen. Francis L. Donovan. He was joined by Joseph M. Humire, the current assistant secretary of war for homeland defense and Americas security affairs. Donovan was just confirmed as the new head of SOUTHCOM a couple of weeks ago.


The two men met with our woman on the ground there, Ambassador Laura Dogu, and, according to a press readout, they also met with “Venezuelan interim authorities.” During the meeting, the leaders reiterated the United States’ commitment to a free, safe and prosperous Venezuela for the Venezuelan people, the United States, and the Western Hemisphere. Discussions focused on the security environment, steps to ensure the implementation of President Donald Trump’s three-phase plan – particularly the stabilization of Venezuela – and the importance of shared security across the Western Hemisphere.

It’s hard to put into words just how historic this is, but it’s yet another win for the Trump administration. I just Googled it to see if the MSM is reporting on it — so far, it looks like just a few outlets, like the Jerusalem Post and Reuters, are the only others mentioning it. That could change tomorrow, but the media does not like to celebrate these wins. I will. Here are some other things you might not find in the MSM. I’ve seen many headlines that Venezuelans are somewhat worried about the country’s future, and I’m sure some are, but according to a poll from Gold Glove Consulting, 72% felt that the country is “moving in the right direction following [Nicolás] Maduro’s January 3 capture.”

When it comes to hypothetical elections that will hopefully be held at some point in the not too distant future, Nobel Peace Prize winner and opposition leader María Corina Machado wins by a landslide with at least 67% of the vote. Only 25% of people said they wanted to Delcy to stay in place. I’m shocked it’s even that high, but I do hear from many people that there are some, mostly older, holdouts in the country who still support the regime. Thankfully, the young people seem to be heading in the opposite direction. All of that said, 58% are concerned about security.

There are still some bad actors within the regime, and they keep testing Delcy, Marco Rubio, and Trump. As I wrote earlier this week, 86-year-old Evanan Romero, a U.S. citizen who is helping the Trump administration court oil investors, was arrested last Friday. He was held for about four days and released on Tuesday afternoon. Apparently, the reason was a charge that dated back to a 2010 case, but since Romero comes and goes from Venezuela often, many exiles have said the reasons were political or an attempt to disrupt the forward movement of the energy sector.

[..] Last but not least, speaking of opposition leader Machado, she appeared on Jesse Watters Primetime on Fox News on Wednesday night, and said she is quite anxious to get back to Venezuela and help with the transition. Of course, it’s not safe for her to do so yet, but she did say something interesting: There are over a million Venezuelans living in exile in the U.S. She estimated that 70% will voluntarily return home once a democracy is in place. That’s a big number, but I can say that I’ve personally met and talked to many over the last year who are ready to return home and make their country great again and see their families and friends. With any luck, they’ll get to do that soon.

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“.. the harder question Rubio implicitly posed but did not fully resolve: What are the ideas of Western civilization that justify defense and sacrifice?”

• Rubio’s Case for a Stronger West (Ben Shapiro)

Secretary of State Marco Rubio delivered a speech at the Munich Security Conference on Saturday that stood out not for its bombast but for its clarity. In a room filled with political figures from across the Atlantic — and from both parties at home — Rubio was unmistakably the adult in the room. Within the Trump administration, Rubio is easily the most articulate spokesman on foreign policy, and at Munich he demonstrated why. His address offered a robust defense of the transatlantic alliance while avoiding the sharper edges that have unsettled European audiences in recent years.


That contrast was hard to miss. Last year, Vice President JD Vance traveled to Europe and delivered a speech in Davos that struck many Europeans as a warning shot. The message, intentional or not, was that America might be pulling back — and that Europe should prepare to stand alone. Some of that critique was warranted. Some of it was counterproductive. Rubio charted a different course. He emphasized the depth of America’s ties to Europe, ties measured not in election cycles but in centuries. The United States, he argued, does not seek weaker partners or dependent allies. It seeks strong ones.

“Together we rebuilt a shattered continent in the wake of two devastating world wars,” he said. “When we found ourselves divided once again by the Iron Curtain, the free West linked arms with the courageous dissidents struggling against tyranny in the East to defeat Soviet communism. We have fought against each other, then reconciled, then fought, then reconciled again. And we have bled and died side by side on battlefields from Kapyong to Kandahar.” Rubio also delivered an unmistakable warning: Alliances only work when all parties carry real weight. The United States cannot indefinitely subsidize sprawling European welfare states while also underwriting the continent’s security. Strong alliances require strong allies — capable of deterring threats, including a revanchist Russia.

“We do not want our allies to be weak, because that makes us weaker,” Rubio said. He urged Europe to abandon what he described as self-imposed guilt and shame, and instead reclaim confidence in its own culture, heritage and civilization. That critique extended beyond defense spending. Rubio pointed to policy choices Europe has made — from aggressive green energy mandates to mass migration — often driven by a sense of moral atonement rather than national interest. These choices, he suggested, have left the continent less stable, less cohesive and less capable of defending itself.At the heart of Rubio’s speech was a deeper question: What, exactly, is the West defending?

“Armies do not fight for abstractions,” he said. “Armies fight for a people; armies fight for a nation. Armies fight for a way of life. And that is what we are defending: a great civilization that has every reason to be proud of its history, confident of its future, and aims to always be the master of its own economic and political destiny.That claim invites debate. Armies have, in fact, fought for abstractions — communism, religious doctrines, ideological visions of the world. Which raises the harder question Rubio implicitly posed but did not fully resolve: What are the ideas of Western civilization that justify defense and sacrifice?

Europe itself is, in many ways, an idea, one forged through conflict as much as cooperation. From the Roman Empire to Christendom to the nation-state system born after the Peace of Westphalia, Europe has continually redefined itself, often in opposition to external threats. Christianity, Enlightenment liberalism, scientific inquiry, market economies and constitutional government all shaped what we now call “the West.”Those values — rule of law, freedom of speech and religion, property rights, democratic governance and republican self-rule — form the real foundation of the transatlantic alliance. They are also the reason Russia has always existed at Europe’s margins rather than fully within it.If those values erode, the alliance erodes with them. “

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“So this should stand as a major wake-up call to Democrats.. ”

• CNN Issues Dire Warning To Democrats On 2026 Governors’ Races (ZH)

Midterm elections have rarely been kind to the party in the White House. Republicans lost both chambers in 2006 under George W. Bush; Democrats were crushed under Barack Obama in 2010 and again in 2014; Republicans lost the House under Donald Trump in 2018; and Democrats narrowly lost the House under Biden in 2022. The lone exception was 2002, when Republicans gained seats in both chambers after 9/11. Otherwise, the pattern is clear: the president’s party almost always faces setbacks.With the 2026 midterm elections months away, Democrats have many reasons to feel confident they will, at the very least, win back control of the House, which would be enough to effectively stall Trump’s agenda, and most certainly find something to impeach for.


Over at RealClearPolitics, Democrats currently hold an average lead in the generic congressional ballot of +4.6 points. Only one pollster in the average – RMG Research – shows Republicans ahead, and even then by just 2 points. The Democratic advantage isn’t particularly large, and there’s ample reason to believe that a strong economy could boost the GOP in November, but when you look at gubernatorial elections, the advantage is clearly with the Republican Party. On Wednesday, CNN’s Harry Enten painted an unflattering picture of the Democrats when it comes to this year’s gubernatorial races.m”Look at this, a majority, a majority, 26. That is, at this point, the number of governors that are expected at least tilting towards the Republican Party at this point. Democrats come in at just 20. The rest of the races are toss-up,” Enten said.

“Of course, you sum up to 50. And I will note that the Republicans right now hold a 26 to 24 gubernatorial seat advantage.”That’s the current baseline. Republicans enter 2026 holding more governor’s mansions, and the trajectory doesn’t appear to favor a Democratic reversal. But, according to Enten, even accounting for toss-up races, the GOP is likely to come out ahead. “So at this point, it doesn’t look like Republicans on the net and the aggregate are actually going to lose any governorships. In fact, when you add in those toss-ups, they may gain,” he explained. “So this should stand as a major wake-up call to Democrats, because if there’s a wave building, it has not, at least at this point, hit the state level when it comes to governorships.”

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The UK, and with it the entire West, has no credibility left in the poison field after the Novichok disasster.

Do read: Put this frog in a lab, and it’s no longer poisonous.

“.. the same process in the current information war and in vulpine zoology has been recognized by forensic scientists as “the fox smells his own hole first.”

• The Bug In The Navalnaya Frog Poison Story (Helmer)

The Ecuadorian Poison Dart frog, Epipedobates anthonyi, doesn’t produce the deadly epibatidine poison out of personal spite. Indigestion, more like. According to British toxicologists, epibatidine is refined by the frog’s innards from precursor chemicals, also toxins, which come from the flies, ants, beetles, and other bugs which live in the same environment and are within range of the frog’s tongue. Captive frogs in a chemical warfare laboratory in the US, UK, Germany, France or Sweden would be unable to produce epibatidine unless the toxic insects the frogs eat are also captive.



“Technically, a captive frog would need to be given the same variety of food that it eats in the wild,” a forensic toxicologist in England explains. “These ants, bugs, etc. in the wild contain the toxins and chemicals which in turn the frog eats and then produces its own poison. So a lab would have a supply of these bugs that are present in the frog’s natural environment in order for the captive frog to produce the poison. You would need to airmail live ants from Brazil to the lab. Not impossible, but if a toxicologist is going to detect the poison post-mortem anyway, why bother with such an effort.”

The British discoverers of the frog in the 1970s reported the great difficulty they had in isolating the toxicated from the untoxicated frogs in the Ecuadorian jungles. By the 1990s, however, this problem had been solved by scientists all over the civilized chemical warfare world. On payment from the military research budgets of their governments, they then synthesized epibatidine, so that the supply could be assured without the bugs and frogs on hand. In the Wikipedia summary of the science, “more than fifty ways to synthesize it in the laboratory have been devised.”

The Americans came first in synthesizing and stocking epibatidine, then the British. More Americans followed in 1993. The Chinese succeeded in their synthesis methodology at a university in Virginia, also in 1993. The Russians were twenty years late. The first openly reported synthesis of the poison by Russian researchers was announced in 2013. In a British government press release, issued last week on February 14, it was claimed that “based on analyses of samples from Alexei Navalny. These analyses have conclusively confirmed the presence of epibatidine…Epibatidine is a toxin found in poison dart frogs in South America. It is not found naturally in Russia.”

The allegation by five governments – the UK, Sweden, France, Germany and The Netherlands – is that “given the toxicity of epibatidine and reported symptoms, poisoning was highly likely the cause of his death. Navalny died while held in prison, meaning Russia had the means, motive and opportunity to administer this poison to him.” Referring to the Novichok allegations in Germany when Navalny was in hospital in Berlin and in the UK following the Skripal and Sturgess cases, the press release adds: “only the Russian state had the combined means, motive and disregard for international law to carry out the attacks.”

This is false. The state chemical warfare establishments of the US and UK had not only synthesized epibatidine more than a decade before the Russians, but they had accumulated substantial stocks for battlefield antidote testing, as well as for commercial production of painkillers. Like the role of Porton Down (Defence Science and Technology Laboratory, DSTL, see lead image) in producing and stocking Novichok in the UK before the alleged Russian attacks of 2018, and the German, French and Swedish laboratory roles in analyzing the Navalny samples in 2020, the means, motive and opportunity for falsifying the Russian poison story have been openly documented for years.

Yulia Navalnaya’s presentations of the poisoning allegation confirm that she and the government agencies behind her have been preparing it for more than six months at laboratories they refuse to identify, and with evidence of tissue samples which, after two years, are forensically worthless. That means there is no proof that Navalny’s samples are genuine – that they have not been tampered with.“Conclusive” may well be the evidence of epibatadine in the Navalny tissue samples, but it is “highly likely” — the evidence standard identified in the press release — that the poison evidence has been added after Navalny’s death. Speaking scientifically, tracing epibatadine from the Ecuadorian frog is herpetology; the same process in the current information war and in vulpine zoology has been recognized by forensic scientists as “the fox smells his own hole first.”

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The price of voter ID .

• GOP Should Be Willing to Politically Bleed, Fight, and Die (Victoria Taft)

Let’s pretend it’s your last meal before midterms, Senate Republicans. What’s on the menu? Is it steak, caviar, and a dry gin martini or do you just roll over and ask for microwave pizza and Big Gulp? Well, I don’t know about you, but I want it all. And throw in a dog and a beer while you’re taking my order before you shuffle off to genuflect before that loser Chuck Schumer and the New York Times to sell out my vote. I want all of it. You should want all of it. If you believe the Polymarket wags and think you’re going down in the midterms, Republicans, then go down winning the biggest, most important, thing you’ve ever done in your legislative lives: Cleaner elections. Go for it all. If you’re going to politically die, then politically die a hero.


Leave it ALL on the field and save your country. Let this be your unselfish legacy. Be an inspiration worth voting for. Can you do that? It will be the most important thing you’ve ever done. And, who knows? Maybe Republicans in Oregon, Washington, California, Virginia, Arizona, Nevada, Michigan, and Maryland may win a few rounds. The least you can do, Republicans, after being rolled by the fraud-friendly absentee/mail-in ballot free-for-all in the 1980s is to ask for a photo ID based on citizenship to vote. The least you can do, Republicans, after being rolled by the fraud-friendly Cloward-Piven motor voter nonsense, which intentionally blurred the voter roll lines between citizen and illegal aliens, is demand a photo ID based on citizenship to vote.

The least you can do, Republicans, is make the Democrats live up to their own rules and require their dirty voter rolls be audited and connected to a person with a photo ID based on citizenship, birth records, and Social Security records. We don’t want to hear about your timidity to challenge Democrats to a speaking filibuster. We want to see some humility and bravery from you — and the Democrats. Make them defend the status quo of dirty voter rolls, racist memes about blacks not being able to get ID, and force them to explain to the American people why they support allowing illegal aliens to vote. Make them own it. Make it hurt. Record them. Put their own words in your campaign ads.

And here’s what we also want based on the Election Integrity Project, California specs: Stop universal mail-out ballots that completely warped the 2020 elections. Return to absentee ballots on a per election basis based on need. Return Election Day to Election Day. Your ballot must be in the hands of election officials by the close of polls on — what was that term again? Oh, yes, Election Day. No late ballots. Period. Outlaw ranked choice voting. That’s crap and we all know it. There must be “auditable paper ballots in lieu of electronic slips” to check their work. “Tighten voter list maintenance requirements” of the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) and the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA).

No ballot harvesting by “unrelated third parties” and that means SEIU workers at retirement and rehab homes, in addition to political parties. No tabulating votes until 8 p.m. on Election Day. Oy: Gavin Newsom Wants You to Know It’s Not His Fault That He Doesn’t Know What He’s Doing Prohibit ballot curing until “until 22 days before Election Day” Cleaning up the voter rolls is hugely popular. Why do you continue to drag your feet? Get on it. Save the country. And if you do, you may even save your jobs.

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Socialism will never come to the US.

• Mamdani and Other People’s Money (Turley)

In my book “Rage and the Republic,” I discuss the rise of support for socialism in both the U.S. and Europe, including the election of Zohran Mamdani. The new mayor was elected on many of the same socialist mantras, promising to introduce New Yorkers to the “warmth of socialism.” Now elected, he is discovering the problem of, as Margaret Thatcher put it, “running out of other people’s money.” Mamdani has announced that he may have to implement “painful” property tax hikes, including a potential 9.5% increase that would devastate an already struggling economy and accelerate the exodus of high-taxpayers from the state.


Notably, while Mamdani is suggesting cuts in police and other areas of the budget, he is proposing a $127 billion budget, an increase of $5 billion from last year. His budget would now be larger than those of 47 of 50 states. As noted by the Washington Post, that includes states like Florida with larger populations. The editors added, “The reality is that Americans may like the idea of ‘free’ stuff — it’s how socialists win elections — but they are less excited about having to pay for it.” nWith New York Gov. Kathy Hochul and state lawmakers in Albany balking at increasing taxes, Mamdani is faced with having to actually pay for all of the free stuff that he promised.

When confronted with the fact that the Governor opposes new taxes as the state struggles to keep wealthy citizens from fleeing to Florida, Mamdani responded that it was not important how they paid for the new stuff. The important thing was that they pay for it somehow. With rent controls, new massive spending programs, and proposed new taxes, Mamdani could be on the brink of causing the greatest exodus since the Red Sea Crossing.

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“.. while the bloc’s GDP is “almost ten times higher” than that of Russia, “Europe today is not ten times stronger than Russia.”

• Orban Blasts EU ‘Fantasy’ About Russia (RT)

EU leaders are wrong to believe that they can exhaust Russia and help Ukraine win the conflict, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has said. The remarks came in response to German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s statement at the Munich Security Conference last week, where he suggested that Brussels exacting “unprecedented losses and costs on Moscow” could weaken it and force it to “agree to peace.” “Who believes that the Russians will run out of steam sooner than Ukraine? It’s a fantasy, an illusion, and irresponsible,” Orban said in a speech on Tuesday, criticizing Brussels’ continued financial and military aid to Kiev.


During his Munich address, Merz claimed that the EU has not used its full potential against Moscow, saying that while the bloc’s GDP is “almost ten times higher” than that of Russia, “Europe today is not ten times stronger than Russia.” EU leaders have doubled down on pressuring Moscow. Top diplomat Kaja Kallas has insisted Russia is not ready for meaningful negotiations on the Ukraine conflict. The Munich conference also saw Kiev and its backers sign several defense industry deals, including joint ventures for drone production in Germany.US Secretary of State Marco Rubio lamented in Budapest on Monday that the Ukraine conflict is “one of the few wars” that some in the international community have been backing and resisting efforts to bring to an end.

Russia, Ukraine, and the US have held two rounds of trilateral talks in Abu Dhabi this year. A new round began on Tuesday in Geneva, with US President Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff praising “meaningful progress” by the delegations. Russian President Vladimir Putin said in December that Moscow prefers diplomacy but will achieve its goals by military means if necessary. On the battlefield, Russian forces have maintained a steady offensive. Russian officials have accused Kiev’s European backers of hindering US-led peace efforts and of increasingly preparing for a direct confrontation with Moscow, aiming at creating an enemy image to distract Western taxpayers from domestic problems.

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“Without a coherent strategy on competitiveness, the EU could “become a cultural open air museum..”

• EU In Worst Crisis Ever – Fico (RT)

The EU is facing the deepest crisis in its history, with economic problems compounded by a lack of leadership and long-term vision in Brussels, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico has warned. Fico made the remarks on Tuesday while speaking at a conference on affordable rental housing in country’s capital Bratislava, saying the difficulties confronting ordinary Europeans are part of a wider malaise affecting the entire bloc.“The European Union has never been in such a crisis as it is now,” Fico said, adding that the situation is “not only about economic indicators, but also about leadership and vision.” Without a coherent strategy on competitiveness, the EU could “become a cultural open air museum,” and risk further decline on the global stage, he cautioned.


Some regions of the world, such as China, are now 15-20 years ahead of the EU in key sectors, he added. Fico has repeatedly criticized Brussels over its policies, particularly on energy and Russia sanctions, saying the restrictions are “only hurting” the bloc. Commenting on the European Commission’s 20th sanctions package earlier this month, he said the EU should prioritize dealing with its internal problems over imposing new restrictions on Moscow. He has also sharply criticized the EU’s plan to completely phase out Russian gas imports by November 2027, describing the scheme as “suicide” for dependent economies, and announced that Bratislava would sue EU institutions.

The sharp decline in cheaper Russian pipeline gas imports following the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022 and ensuing Western sanctions, has driven wholesale prices and living costs higher across the EU, while undermining the bloc’s industrial competitiveness.Fico, who survived an assassination attempt by a pro-Ukraine activist in 2024, has described Kiev as a “black hole” of corruption that has swallowed billions of euros in EU funds. Last month, he called for the removal of the EU’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, known for her hardline anti-Russian stance.

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“What can we talk about with Europeans who openly say that Ukraine is upholding European values?”

• EU Elites Driven By Nazi Nostalgia – Lavrov (RT)

Much of the Western European antagonism towards Russia is driven by revanchist aspirations rooted in the defeat of the Axis powers in World War II, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Tuesday. In an interview with Al Arabiya, Moscow’s top diplomat accused senior EU and NATO officials of prioritizing personal ambitions and grudges over national interests. He argued that European anti-Russian officials label dissenting politicians as Moscow’s stooges while indulging in nostalgia “for the era when their forebears steered Europe towards Nazism, whether within [Adolf] Hitler’s apparatus or in countries where Hitler conscripted nearly all for the assault on the Soviet Union.”


According to Lavrov, “this hatred has resurfaced” and drives European governments to seek Russia’s defeat through Ukrainian proxies. European support for Kiev is meant to prolong the “war against us, a war which the EU wants to continue,” he asserted. “Europe has degenerated. Yet there remain voices of reason,” Lavrov said, naming Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico. “These are sensible, pragmatic leaders who prioritize their nations’ interests.”

Lavrov said Brussels wants a role in US-mediated Ukraine peace talks only to undermine them, while it simultaneously claims Moscow is avoiding negotiations despite evidence to the contrary. “What can we talk about with Europeans who openly say that Ukraine is upholding European values?” he asked. Western European leaders have expressed concern that US President Donald Trump will sideline their interests as he pushes for a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine. During the latest round of talks held in Geneva this week, officials from France, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, and the UK were waiting on the sidelines to consult with Kiev’s delegation.

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“I think Trump might be the only guy that’s willing to do something that crazy,” Rogan replied.”

And then yesterday he did:

“Based on the tremendous interest shown, I will be directing the Secretary of War, and other relevant Departments and Agencies, to begin the process of identifying and releasing Government files related to alien and extraterrestrial life, unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), and unidentified flying objects (UFOs), and any and all other information connected to these highly complex, but extremely interesting and important, matters.

GOD BLESS AMERICA!

• Trump Has A UFO Speech Ready To Deliver (ZH)

Documentary filmmaker Dan Farah appeared on Joe Rogan’s podcast in November to promote his new documentary, The Age of Disclosure, and predicted that his film might force Trump to become the first world leader to confirm the existence of extraterrestrial life publicly.”I wouldn’t be surprised if it happens soon after the film comes out — the sitting president has to step to the microphone and say: humanity is not alone in the universe,” Farah told Rogan. “We have recovered technology of non-human origin. So have other nations. There is a high-stakes, secret cold war race to reverse engineer this technology. We need to win this race.” “I think Trump might be the only guy that’s willing to do something that crazy,” Rogan replied.


Well, now Lara Trump, the president’s daughter-in-law, let it slip during an appearance on the New York Post’s Pod Force One podcast that Trump has a speech prepared confirming extraterrestrial life exists. “Do you think that he’s about to make an announcement about UFOs?” host Miranda Devine asked. “Because President Obama was just on a podcast talking about how he believes in UFOs and hinting that he saw something when he was president.” “Well, I said this in my podcast, too,” Lara Trump began.

“What’s funny is we’ve kind of asked my father-in-law about this, ’cause we’re like, ‘Well, what do you know?’ ‘Cause, Miranda, we all wanna know about the UFOs, or we all wanna know what’s going on and he played a little coy with us. And so that, of course, led us to believe, Eric and I, were like, ‘Oh, my gosh, if he won’t even, like, fully tell us, maybe there’s more to it.’ And then I have just heard kind of around that… I think he’s actually said it, I think my father-in-law has actually said it, that there is some speech that he has that, I guess, at, at the right time, and I don’t know when the right time is, he’s gonna break out and, and talk about, and it has to do with maybe some sort of extraterrestrial life, so to speak.”

The White House offered exactly the kind of answer you’d expect. “I’ll have to check in with our speech writing team,” White House Press Secretary Karoline said. ”That would be of great interest to me personally, and I’m sure all of you in this room and apparently former President Obama, too.” A clip from Obama’s recent appearance on Brian Tyler Cohen’s podcast went viral over the weekend after he was asked point-blank whether aliens exist. “They’re real, but I haven’t seen them, and they’re not being kept in … Area 51 … There’s no underground facility, unless there’s this enormous conspiracy and they hid it from the president of the United States,” Obama said.

By Sunday, Obama was on Instagram trying to walk it back. “Statistically, the universe is so vast that the odds are good there’s life out there. But the distances between solar systems are so great that the chances aliens have visited us is low, and I saw no evidence during my presidency that extraterrestrials have made contact with us. Really!” Obama wrote. Washington’s relationship with UFOs — or, in the preferred bureaucratic phrasing, Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAPs) — has shifted considerably in recent years. A House hearing in July 2023 featured testimony from former military intelligence officer David Grusch, who told lawmakers under oath that he “was informed in the course of my official duties of a multi-decade UAP crash retrieval and reverse-engineering program to which I was denied access.” Grusch further alleged the government had retrieved what he called “non-human biologics” from recovered craft, citing accounts from dozens of witnesses he interviewed over four years.

The Pentagon, of course, pushed back. A March 2024 report rejected the core claims — no reverse-engineered alien spacecraft, no hidden extraterrestrial biological material, no off-world technology stashed in some classified warehouse. The agency stood by its denials even as lawmakers held classified briefings.Lara Trump’s comment adds new intrigue to the discussion. Whether Trump eventually delivers that address — or whether this is one more piece of carefully managed intrigue from a president who has never met a story he didn’t know how to control — is a question that, for now, has no answer. But Trump sure does seem like the president who would do so.

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Censorship machine Solar system https://twitter.com/MAstronomers/status/2024251057212158079?s=20

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle February 14 2026

Feb 142026
 
 February 14, 2026  Posted by at 11:00 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , ,  45 Responses »


John Singer Sargent The moraine 1908


• Ukraine To Ban Russian Literature – Culture Minister (RT)
• Zelensky’s Escape Hatch: An Emergency Election Could Be His Only Option (RT)
• EU Weighs Training Sites In Ukraine As Kremlin Warns: ‘Legitimate Targets’ (ZH)
• Donald Trump Negotiates Like King Solomon (Rabbi Michael Barclay)
• Microsoft AI CEO: Most White Collar Jobs Fully Automated in 12-18 Months (ZH)
• CNN ‘Circling the Drain’ As Warner Buyout Heats Up (Stephen Green)
• Even CNN Admits That Democrats Are in Big Trouble (Matt Margolis)
• Ellison Scalp? DOJ Antitrust Head Departs, Possibly Fired (CTH)
• ICE Director Says 800,000 Criminals With Deportation Orders Tracked (Salgado)
• Zelensky Attacks The Olympics (RT)
• Ilhan Omar Under Fire For ‘Execute Trump’ Tweet (RT)
• Trial Date Set For Trump’s $10 Billion BBC Lawsuit (MN)
• Sure, Take That Time-Out (James Howard Kunstler)
• Kathryn Ruemmler Out at Goldman Sachs Over Epstein Ties (CTH)

 


 

Lots of human voices. But how does AI understand AI?

https://twitter.com/cb_doge/status/2021830155464061286?s=20

 


 


Book burning. For a lot of Ukrainians, Russian is their mother tongue.

• Ukraine To Ban Russian Literature – Culture Minister (RT)

The Ukrainian authorities are preparing a draft law to take all Russian and Russian-language books out of circulation, Ukrainian Culture Minister Tatyana Berezhnaya told Interfax-Ukraine in an interview published on Thursday. Moscow maintains that Kiev’s discriminatory policies against ethnic Russians in Ukraine, as well as its persecution of the Russian language and culture are some of the fundamental causes of the current conflict. According to Berezhnaya, Ukraine’s media authority is working on a bill to ban Russian books with the support of her ministry. She did not specify whether the measure would only remove them from store shelves or include confiscations from private collections.


Vladimir Zelensky’s predecessor, Pyotr Poroshenko, banned the import of books from Russia and Belarus in 2016, long before the escalation of the Ukraine conflict six years later. Kiev has since systematically purged Russian literature from state curricula, and intensified a purge of cultural monuments, memorials, and inscriptions to remove historical links to Russia. Kiev has also steadily cracked down on the use of the Russian language in public life, restricting or banning its use in media and in professional spheres. Nevertheless, it remains the first and primary language for many people in Ukraine, especially in metropolitan areas and in the east of the country. In December, the Ukrainian parliament stripped Russian of its protection under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages.

Berezhnaya at the time proclaimed that the move would “strengthen Ukrainian” as the state language. Moscow has noted that this crackdown has largely been ignored by Kiev’s Western backers. “Human rights – ostensibly so dear to the West – must be inviolable. In Ukraine, we witness the comprehensive prohibition of the Russian language across all spheres of public life and the banning of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Wednesday, accusing the EU and UK of not addressing the issue in their peace proposals. Russia has long said that stopping the persecution of Russians in Ukraine is one of its core peace demands, which it is ready to continue pursuing through military means if Kiev resists diplomacy.

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“Should Zelensky face a public backlash for using an unfair election to stay in power, his team has a ready-made excuse to roll out: Trump made them do it.”

• Zelensky’s Escape Hatch: An Emergency Election Could Be His Only Option (RT)

Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky’s team has floated and later rejected the idea of holding an election this summer. Like much of what leaks out of his office, the report was likely an exercise in narrative management. Zelensky “has begun planning presidential elections alongside a referendum on any peace deal with Russia,” the Financial Times reported on Wednesday, citing unnamed “Ukrainian and Western officials.” By holding both a presidential vote and referendum this summer, Zelensky would reassure US President Donald Trump that he is serious about peace, the British newspaper explained. Simultaneously, Zelensky’s plan would “align with a US” push for Kiev to organize elections before May 15, or risk losing US security guarantees, it added.


The plan, as described by the Financial Times, is so well-developed that Zelensky is reportedly ready to announce it on February 24, the four-year anniversary of the start of Russia’s special military operation. Six hours later, Zelensky’s team denied the report. “As long as there is no security, there will be no announcements,” a source within his entourage told RBK Ukraine. Shortly afterwards, Zelensky reiterated that there will be no election planned until Ukraine receives “the appropriate security guarantees.” Zelensky has insisted ever since his presidential term ran out in 2024 that he will only hold elections if a ceasefire or peace deal is reached, citing the difficulty in administration, campaigning, and voting during an active conflict. The FT report is the first sign of a “political pivot” – as the paper puts it – by Zelensky.

Behind the text, the report bears the hallmarks of a trial balloon: flown by his staff to gauge domestic and international support, before being shot down with the subsequent statement to RBK. That Zelensky’s office would leak the story to the FT is unsurprising. The reporters credited in the piece, Christopher Miller, Henry Foy, and Max Seddon, have worked together on multiple stories relying on leaks and inside information from US-Ukraine peace talks. All three are considered close to power in Kiev.

Miller is a veteran reporter with US state media in Kiev, and Seddon is a former Buzzfeed writer who now “exposes Kremlin policies” for the FT. Foy is the paper’s Brussels bureau chief, who reported that European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s plane had been subjected to “Russian GPS interference” while en route to Bulgaria in August. The report was later proven false by open source flight data. It is also no surprise that Zelensky is toying with the idea of holding an election sooner rather than later. His popularity has been in freefall since some of his closest associates were ensnared in an ongoing corruption scandal last year; his approval rating sank to 20% in December, and a recent poll found that almost half of Ukrainians want his “completely tainted” cabinet out of power after a peace deal is reached.

Holding a wartime vote, therefore, presents Zelensky with the best possible chance of clinging to power. His secret police can bar candidates and arbitrarily close polling stations under martial law, nearly a dozen opposition parties have been banned since 2022, and there is no infrastructure in place for the millions of Ukrainian citizens living in Russia to vote. Furthermore, Zelensky has no clear challenger at the moment. Former commander-in-chief Valery Zaluzhny is widely viewed as his main rival, but he is currently a safe distance away in London. Former military intelligence chief Kirill Budanov is often portrayed as a viable candidate, but is now tied to Zelensky by heading his office. Former President Pyotr Poroshenko and Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko are both facing corruption cases, which Timoshenko has described as fabricated in order to “purge” potential contenders for the presidency.

Zelensky’s escape hatch: blame America
Should Zelensky face a public backlash for using an unfair election to stay in power, his team has a ready-made excuse to roll out: Trump made them do it. Speaking to the Financial Times, his officials said that they “signaled to the Trump administration that they were open to the extraordinarily swift timeline, despite the logistical hurdles of holding an election at short notice in wartime.” Likewise, if a referendum found broad support for territorial concessions to Russia, Zelensky could attempt to assuage nationalist anger by pointing out that he was forced by the US to hold the vote. Whatever insight Zelensky and his team gained from the publication of the FT report is unclear. Speaking to reporters on Wednesday evening, Zelensky said that he would not “go into details” as to whether the US was pressuring him to hold elections, but claimed that Washington does “not link elections with security guarantees.”

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Looking for war. If only Trump would join.

• EU Weighs Training Sites In Ukraine As Kremlin Warns: ‘Legitimate Targets’ (ZH)

The European Union is weighing plans to set up two military bases inside Ukraine to train fresh troops – a move Moscow has already warned could make them targets of military strikes. “We have been discussing the training of the Ukrainian soldiers, also on the soil of Ukraine,” EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said Wednesday. “We have identified two training centers that could be used for that purpose.”


The Kremlin made clear just a month ago: “The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs warns that the deployment of military units, military facilities, warehouses, and other infrastructure of Western countries on Ukrainian territory will be classified as foreign intervention, posing a direct threat to the security of not only Russia but also other European countries,” according to the warning of spokeswoman Maria Zakharova. Western governments have already trained tens of thousands of Ukrainian troops over the course of the four-year grinding war with Russia – but this has been concentrated in countries like Britain, Denmark, and Poland.

On Thursday, Colonel General Andrey Serdyukov accused Europe of accelerating preparations for direct confrontation. “The militarization of Europe is continuing at an accelerated pace, openly aimed at preparing for a military confrontation with Russia,” he said. He added that “The territories are being rapidly fortified, and the relevant infrastructure is being improved.” The alleged ‘NATOization’ of Ukraine was a prime reason Moscow listed for going to war in the first place. Since Putin’s ‘special military operation’ next door, the opposite trend has happened: NATO is firmly ensconced in Kiev, in terms of the billions in weapons, equipment, and funds already poured in.

Meanwhile, the EU has just this week approved a fresh $100 billion loan package for Ukraine. As for proposed ‘EU bases’ – it’s hard to see this as in reality less than a full NATO established outpost in Ukraine. Russian leadership will see it as a recipe from taking the proxy war toward a full blown conflict directly with NATO. The minute an ‘EU base’ comes under Russian aerial attack, the gloves would be off, and NATO would likely seize the opportunity to enter the conflict directly against a nuclear-armed superpower.

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“Iran never won a war but never lost a negotiation.”

• Donald Trump Negotiates Like King Solomon (Rabbi Michael Barclay)

U.S. President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met yesterday in Washington, D.C., for over two hours. Also at the meeting were Steve Witkoff, Jared Kushner, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth. Witkoff and Kushner have demonstrated that they want negotiations to continue with Iran and believe they can structure a deal that will work for everyone. Hegseth has been busy preparing for whatever military action Trump decides upon. Rubio has been saying since October 7 that Hamas should be destroyed and that Iran should be kept from having missiles as well as nuclear capability. I’m certain a passionate discussion took place.


There is no way of knowing the content, other than that afterwards Trump said he hopes negotiations with Iran will work out, or else there will be military action that dwarfs what happened last June. It has also been reported by many sources, including the Wall Street Journal, that the U.S.S. George H.W. Bush aircraft carrier is being deployed to the region, but this has not officially been reported by the Pentagon. Based on where the Bush currently is in the Atlantic Ocean, it will take about two weeks to get to the area. To understand what all this means, Nimitz-size aircraft carriers like the Bush (and the Abraham Lincoln, which is already there) are over 1,000 feet long, move faster than 30 knots, and carry over 6,000 sailors and Marines. Each aircraft carrier is accompanied by a fleet of over 90 helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft, guided missile cruisers, guided missile destroyers, and additional support and weapons ships.

But while we would all hope that this show of military might would make the Iranians pause their decision-making, the Iranian regime instead keeps doubling down on their aggressive rhetoric. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi wrote on Wednesday night in a post on X that, “Reaching an agreement on the nuclear program is possible, but only if it is fair and balanced. Tehran will defend its sovereignty at any cost. Our rights and dignity are not negotiable.” Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said the U.S. and Iran are showing flexibility in negotiations over the nuclear program, the British financial newspaper Financial Times reported. According to Fidan, “It is positive that the Americans seem willing to tolerate Iranian enrichment within clear boundaries.” He added that expanding the talks to include the issue of Iranian ballistic missiles would lead to “nothing more than another war.”

So President Trump is placed in the unenviable position of being a judge. He must judge between the advice of those who seek to negotiate with Iran, despite the fact that every day this extends allows Iran to build more weaponry, and those who desire to immediately go after the Iranian regime, which will undoubtedly cause many deaths and casualties on all sides. Added into this equation for “Judge” Trump is the president’s own belief that “Iran never won a war but never lost a negotiation.” Perhaps that is why he chose Witkoff to be the chief negotiator with Iran in the first place: his belief that Witkoff may be a better negotiator than Iran. Except that Witkoff has, to all outside eyes, been extremely ineffective so far… although we should remember that none of us have any real idea whether Witkoff has been extremely successful and we just don’t realize it yet.

ut we all do know one thing about Trump: He is an extremely good negotiator. With all sides. So what happened yesterday? Netanyahu obviously came prepared for the meeting with proof about Iran’s lies and misdeeds, as well as information about how Gaza is still not safe and secure from Hamas, which has repeatedly been saying that they will neither disarm nor disband. Hamas is not, and has never been, interested in having peace with Israel; they are committed to the destruction of Israel, as exemplified not only in all of their statements but in their actual charter. Netanyahu came to Washington wanting U.S. support on two major fronts: the destruction of Iran’s military infrastructure and creating a Gaza that is a safe neighbor to Israel.

President Trump recognizes the challenges and importance of both of these issues. But people forget that Trump is actually a peacemaker, committed to creating peace whenever possible. He recognizes that the immediate and greater threat to the United States is Iran, and also undoubtedly recognizes that there are problems with this entire Gaza Peace Council, but they are not as imminent nor as dangerous as the issues with Iran. So what probably happened at this meeting yesterday?

There was undoubtedly a lot of passionate dialogue between the parties present. President Trump probably listened a lot and was making internal judgments as to how he would want to proceed as he heard the conflicting voices of his advisors and allies. As a builder, he knows that one step should be taken at a time, with the most immediate challenges being taken care of first. And we know that he understands the art of a deal better than anyone and is extremely proficient at “horse trading” in order to get his desired result.

It would make a great deal of sense for Trump to make trades with Netanyahu—something to the effect that Israel would accept and go down the path of Trump’s plan for Gaza, and in exchange, Trump would be more aggressive with Iran. Looking at what has happened since the meeting, it seems as if this is exactly what he is doing.

Besides the meeting, two notable things happened yesterday. The Bush aircraft carrier and accompanying fleet have started traveling, apparently, toward the Middle East. This implies that the president is going down the military pathway of conflict with Iran. But less reported in most media, and equally important to understand, is that Netanyahu suddenly did the exact opposite of what he has been committing to: he agreed to be part of the Gaza Peace Council. He chose to start going down the path that Trump desires of Israel being actively involved in the reshaping of Gaza, even though others on that council are anything but allies of Israel. Given that Israel has been so recalcitrant to support Trump’s Peace Council vision of Gaza, it is probable that Netanyahu’s capitulation about this Council was predicated upon getting other direct support from the U.S. against Iran.

Whether we agree or disagree with the process, it makes sense on a practical level. The immediate threat of Iran will be eliminated, and a hopeful peace process can be created with Gaza as a new “Riviera of the Middle East.” Doing this will satisfy the contradicting points of view of his advisors without committing to only one side. Most importantly, it will hopefully lead to peace with Iran, a replacement of the Islamic regime, and still keep Trump’s optimism about the potential in Gaza for peace and prosperity. If this analysis is accurate, President Trump again demonstrated his negotiating skills and a judgment worthy of King Solomon.

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“.. AI will disrupt 50% of entry-level white-collar jobs over 1–5 years, while also thinking we may have AI that is more capable than everyone in only 1–2 years.”

• Microsoft AI CEO: Most White Collar Jobs Fully Automated in 12-18 Months (ZH)

The specter of mass job displacement now haunts governments around the world, even as the true body count remains murky amid broader economic headwinds.A recent Challenger report showed that AI was blamed for 7,624 job cuts in January, 7% of the month’s total, and linked to 54,836 announced layoffs across 2025. Since tracking started in 2023, AI has been cited in 79,449 planned cuts, roughly 3% of the overall tally. “It’s difficult to say how big an impact AI is having on layoffs specifically. We know leaders are talking about AI, many companies want to implement it in operations, and the market appears to be rewarding companies that mention it,” said Challenger.


A stark illustration is unfolding at Bay Area startup Mercor, which has quietly hired tens of thousands of white-collar contractors, often highly credentialed specialists in medicine, law, finance, engineering, writing, and the arts, to train the very AI systems destined to replace them. Paid $45 to $250 per hour for weeks or months of reviewing and refining model outputs for giants like OpenAI and Anthropic, these workers are, in effect, being paid to hand over the keys to their own obsolescence, the Wall Street Journal reports. However, some jobs still remain immune from AI – for now. High on the list are occupations that hinge on physical presence and skills such as healthcare professionals and tradesmen such as plumbers and welders.

Those are just a sample of jobs that are safe until AI-powered Optimus robots are on the move. Want to know if your job is safe? Click here to see the list.On the other side of the argument – Morgan Stanley analysts recently warned clients that “AI impacts may take longer to appear in economic data,” with the first undeniable waves likely hitting “later this decade and into the next.” “While AI adoption may be faster than past technologies, we think it is still too early to see it in economic data, outside of business investment,” Stephen Byrd, the bank’s Global Head of Thematic Research and Sustainability Research, told clients.

Anthropic Warns Over ‘Heinous Crimes’
Meanwhile, Anthropic is warning that their latest Claude models could be used for “heinous crimes” such as developing chemical weapons. “In newly-developed evaluations, both Claude Opus 4.5 and 4.6 showed elevated susceptibility to harmful misuse,” in certain computer use cases, the company said in a new sabotage report released late Tuesday. “This included instances of knowingly supporting — in small ways — efforts toward chemical weapon development and other heinous crimes.” Anthropic also noted that in some test environments, when prompted to “single-mindedly optimize a narrow objective,” Claude Opus 4.6 appears “more willing to manipulate or deceive other participants, compared to prior models from both Anthropic and other developers.”

The company says that the risk is still low but not negligible, however the sudden departure of an Antrhropic AI safety researcher suggests otherwise. “I continuously find myself reckoning with our situation. The world is in peril. And not just from AI, or bioweapons, but from a whole series of interconnected crises unfolding in this very moment. We appear to be approaching a threshold where our wisdom must grow in equal measure to our capacity to affect the world, lest we face the consequences,” said Mrinank Sharma, who led the company’s safeguards research team. Today is my last day at Anthropic. I resigned. Here is the letter I shared with my colleagues, explaining my decision.

Last month Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei sounded the alarm on AI – warning of the following (via Axios):

Massive job loss: “I … simultaneously think that AI will disrupt 50% of entry-level white-collar jobs over 1–5 years, while also thinking we may have AI that is more capable than everyone in only 1–2 years.”

AI with nation-state power: “I think the best way to get a handle on the risks of AI is to ask the following question: suppose a literal ‘country of geniuses’ were to materialize somewhere in the world in ~2027. Imagine, say, 50 million people, all of whom are much more capable than any Nobel Prize winner, statesman, or technologist. … I think it should be clear that this is a dangerous situation — a report from a competent national security official to a head of state would probably contain words like ‘single most serious national security threat we’ve faced in a century, possibly ever.’ It seems like something the best minds of civilization should be focused on.”

Rising terror threat: “There is evidence that many terrorists are at least relatively well-educated … Biology is by far the area I’m most worried about, because of its very large potential for destruction and the difficulty of defending against … Most individual bad actors are disturbed individuals and so almost by definition their behavior is unpredictable and irrational — and it’s these bad actors, the unskilled ones, who might have stood to benefit the most from AI making it much easier to kill many people. … [A]s biology advances (increasingly driven by AI itself), it may … become possible to carry out more selective attacks (for example, targeted against people with specific ancestries), which adds yet another, very chilling, possible motive. I do not think biological attacks will necessarily be carried out the instant it becomes widely possible to do so — in fact, I would bet against that. But added up across millions of people and a few years of time, I think there is a serious risk of a major attack … with casualties potentially in the millions or more.”

Empowering authoritarians: Governments of all orders will possess this technology, including China, “second only to the United States in AI capabilities, and … the country with the greatest likelihood of surpassing the United States in those capabilities. Their government is currently autocratic and operates a high-tech surveillance state.” Amodei writes bluntly: “AI-enabled authoritarianism terrifies me.”

AI companies: “It is somewhat awkward to say this as the CEO of an AI company, but I think the next tier of risk is actually AI companies themselves,” Amodei warns after the passage about authoritarian governments. “AI companies control large datacenters, train frontier models, have the greatest expertise on how to use those models, and in some cases have daily contact with and the possibility of influence over tens or hundreds of millions of users. … [T]hey could, for example, use their AI products to brainwash their massive consumer user base, and the public should be alert to the risk this represents. I think the governance of AI companies deserves a lot of scrutiny.”

Seduce the powerful to silence: AI giants have so much power and money that leaders will be tempted to downplay risk, and hide red flags like the weird stuff Claude did in testing (blackmailing an executive about a supposed extramarital affair to avoid being shut down, which Anthropic disclosed). “There is so much money to be made with AI — literally trillions of dollars per year,” Amodei writes in his bleakest passage. “This is the trap: AI is so powerful, such a glittering prize, that it is very difficult for human civilization to impose any restraints on it at all.”

Call to action: “[W]ealthy individuals have an obligation to help solve this problem,” Amodei says. “It is sad to me that many wealthy individuals (especially in the tech industry) have recently adopted a cynical and nihilistic attitude that philanthropy is inevitably fraudulent or useless.”

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” I’m almost certain that Wolf Blitzer’s contract (first signed in 1990!) guarantees him an anchor spot for an additional 15 years following his death. This clause might already have kicked in.”

• CNN ‘Circling the Drain’ As Warner Buyout Heats Up (Stephen Green)

CNN might be “circling the drain” after losing two-thirds of its primetime audience in recent years, and with rival offers from Netflix and Paramount for the network’s parent company adding to the uncertainty. “The decrease, from roughly 1.3 million in 2016 to 553,000 now,” the Daily Mail reported Wednesday, fueled “rumors of a possible network sale — something CNN’s up-for-grabs parent company has vehemently denied.” “The network’s daytime lineup has seen a similar decline as hosts such as Wolf Blitzer failed to move the needle, dropping from 752,000 to 433,000,” the U.K. tabloid continued, and “when compared to the same part of the year in 2021, the drops were even more pronounced – 71 percent for primetime and 73 percent during the day.”


One line from the Daily Mail report was such a howler that I had to read it twice before sharing it with you: “CNN has lost nearly two-thirds of its primetime viewers over the past decade, even with fresh figures like Kaitlan Collins leading coverage.” Fresh. Figures. Collins is fresh in the sense that she’s been around CNN less time than, say, Jake Tapper has — and I’m almost certain that Wolf Blitzer’s contract (first signed in 1990!) guarantees him an anchor spot for an additional 15 years following his death. This clause might already have kicked in.

Anyway, Collins joined CNN nine years ago, so we can debate just how “fresh” her face is after nearly a decade. But even after we acknowledge that she’s at least far fresher than Blitzer, what freshness — what alternative viewpoint, what captivating news beat, what viral social media attraction — did she bring to the network? [crickets] And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the crux of CNN’s problem. CNN, whatever its biases, used to be the place people went for breaking news. We go to X for that now, and only a little later come back to your favorite PJ Media writers for the analysis and perspective needed to try and make sense of it all. I watched the Gulf War almost every waking hour on CNN. I watched Israel’s 12-Day War on X.

It’s impossible to tell what CNN’s social platform strategy is, aside from posting links to the stuff on their website — and even that’s a bit of a bellyflop. According to that Daily Mail report, CNN.com gets about 120 million visits per month, and according to publicly available data, most of those visits are brief. Scan a headline, maybe read the first few sentences, and then move on. A not-so-large communications company that I might happen to work for attracts roughly the same number of visitors — company-wide, not at any individual site — and does it with a staff and budget much smaller than CNN’s. And let’s not even talk about CNN+, the network’s attempt at a paid streaming service that cost $300 million to set up, and was shuttered after just four months.

CNN missed the move to social media, blew it on streaming, and its embrace of 24-hour-a-day nonstop TDS ten years ago just happened to coincide with the loss of nearly two-thirds of their viewers, many of whom are literally captive audiences in airport terminals around the world. But here’s the real shocker: TDS actually worked for CNN for a while. But like a short-term sugar buzz, they quickly came crashing back down.=In 2015, CNN’s viewership was at a lousy 711,000 during primetime. So when Daily Mail reported that viewership dropped to 553,000 from 1.3 million, that only tells part of the story.Typical for CNN, eh?

Anyway, if we compare pre-TDS CNN to today, the network has lost less than a quarter of its audience. The two-thirds headline number only comes from the 2016-2017 TDS sugar high, led as the DM put it, “by anti-Trump anchors including Jim Acosta, Don Lemon and Brianna Keilar.” Acosta and Lemon are gone and mostly forgotten, Lemon’s recent antics aside. And while Keilar is still at CNN, I had to check because she seems to have gone into stealth mode, unable now to even generate any crazy-eyed TDS hits on social media. At least as a way to grab viewers and ad revenue, this tells me that TDS is a spent force.

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“That conservative part of the Democratic Party — adios amigos, goodbye..”

• Even CNN Admits That Democrats Are in Big Trouble (Matt Margolis)

I don’t think any of this will shock you, but Democrats are in big trouble. But you don’t have to take my word for it, because even CNN is admitting it. CNN’s chief data analyst, Harry Enten, laid out the sobering reality for Democrats on Thursday morning, revealing how the party’s dramatic leftward shift is alienating mainstream voters. “The far left is significantly more powerful than they once were,” Enten explained, pointing to polling data that shows the transformation of the Democratic Party’s ideological makeup The numbers are quite alarming.


It’s hard to believe this, but back in 1999, conservative Democrats made up a sizable portion of the party, 26%, while just 5% called themselves “very liberal.” Enten emphasized that the far-left faction was “a smidgen, a smidgen, a smidgen” of the party. Fast-forward to today, and the party’s ideological diversity has pretty much disappeared. Now, 21% of Democrats identify as very liberal — more than quadrupling since 1999 — while conservative Democrats have nearly vanished, dropping to just 8%. “That conservative part of the Democratic Party — adios amigos, goodbye,” Enten said. Combined with somewhat liberal Democrats, three in five Democrats now identify as liberal, with the very liberal faction representing “a much larger portion of the party.”

According to Enten, “the far left, which used to just be a smidgen within the Democratic Party, has gained considerable power.” Here’s where things get really scary, though.When CNN asked Democrats whether they consider themselves Democratic socialists, the results were, frankly, disturbing: One-third of all Democrats — including independents who lean Democratic — identify with Democratic socialism.”Bernie Sanders and Zohran Mamdani are not alone,” Enten noted. “They are a considerable part of the Democratic base at this point.” Among younger Democrats, the numbers are even worse. A crazy 42% of Democrats under age 35 identify as Democratic socialists.

“What happened to New York City is not some aberration,” Enten emphasized. “It is something that we are seeing grow within the Democratic Party at this particular point.” There is good news, though, I promise: Mainstream America is still very much turned off by the leftward shift of the Democratic Party. When asked whether the Democratic Party is too liberal, 58% of all voters now say yes — up from 42% in 1996 and 48% in 2013. That’s a huge jump. “The Democrats are moving to the left, the far left is gaining power, and there could be some electoral repercussions because what we see right now is voters — the clear majority — say that they are too liberal,” Enten concluded.

When CNN is admitting that the Democratic Party has become too liberal and too extreme for mainstream America and that there “could be some electoral repercussions,” Democrats should take that seriously. The party has moved so far to the left that they are alienating the middle.

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There’s muic in them chairs.

• Ellison Scalp? DOJ Antitrust Head Departs, Possibly Fired (CTH)

Asst Attorney General Gail Slater was the head of the Antitrust Division of the Dept of Justice. Today she announces she has “left her role.” CNN is reporting that AAG Slater was fired. Gail Slater was in charge of the antitrust division and a hawk on the mergers and acquisitions of Big Tech and Big Corporate media. As head of the DOJ Antitrust Division, Slater’s view on competition was against the interests of the major Big Tech billionaires and corporate media conglomerates who intersect with them. Slater was in a position to influence the Warner Brothers-Discovery’s deal to sell the Warner Bros. studio and HBO to Netflix, which Paramount (David Ellison) is trying to stop.


If you have followed the influence of Larry Ellison (Oracle, TikTok) and his son David Ellison (Paramount, CBS) in/around the Trump administration as it relates to Elon Musk (a beneficiary of Ellison), then the timing of Gail Slater’s removal doesn’t look good at all. Gail Slater came into the administration as a part of the JD Vance network (Peter Thiel, Palantir, etc.), and it looks like that same Vance network stood aside and watched Larry Ellison leverage his position to see her removed. Slater was a solid MAGA voice in a critical Antitrust position against the interests of Big Tech and Big Corp. However, I said on Christmas Day 2024 – we were likely to be very disappointed by the influence of Big Tech/Big Corp in the White House.

Via CNN[…] Slater said in her Thursday post on X: “It is with great sadness and abiding hope that I leave my role as AAG for Antitrust today. It was indeed the honor of a lifetime to serve in this role.” The anti-trust division is expected to play a critical role in assessing Netflix’s Warner Brothers Discovery’s deal to sell the Warner Bros. studio and HBO to Netflix, which Paramount is trying to stop by appealing straight to shareholders with its own bid. (CNN is owned by Warner Brothers Discovery.) In an NBC interview last week, Trump said, “I’ve decided I shouldn’t be involved. The Justice Department will handle it.” But Paramount CEO David Ellison returned to the White House last week to meet privately with Trump, two sources familiar with the matter told CNN. (read more)

There may be something else in the background that we do not understand. However, when former lobbyists and political consultants become key administration officials (Wiles, Bondi) these types of outcomes are possible.

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“ICE Director Todd Lyons testifies that ICE is currently tracking approximately 1.6 million illegal aliens with deportation orders in the US, approximately 800,000 of whom have criminal convictions.”

• ICE Director Says 800,000 Criminals With Deportation Orders Tracked (Salgado)

Of the 1.6 million illegal aliens with previous deportation orders who are tagged in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) tracking, 800,000 of them already have criminal convictions. That’s what ICE Director Todd Lyons reportedly testified in the Senate Thursday. While every illegal alien is a criminal to the extent that he or she broke the law to be present in America, millions of them also have charges or convictions for other crimes too, including such horrific crimes as murder, rape, pedophilia, assault, human trafficking, drug trafficking, and terrorism.


Fox News correspondent Bill Melugin, who was sharing updates about the hearing on X, posted, “ICE Director Todd Lyons testifies that ICE is currently tracking approximately 1.6 million illegal aliens with deportation orders in the US, approximately 800,000 of whom have criminal convictions.” He also noted: ICE Director Todd Lyons testifies that when ICE was about to conduct a large operation in Aurora, CO last year, targeting an apartment complex full of suspected TdA gang members, ICE gave a heads up to local authorities, who he suspects leaked the operation. Lyons says when ICE arrived, protesters were waiting for them and the buildings were empty.

That’s just one of many instances where local leftist authorities undermined federal immigration operations, and on behalf of the worst sort of human scum imaginable. And even now congressional Democrats are determined to defund the Department of Homeland Security as their latest ploy to sabotage immigration enforcement operations. No matter how much you loathe the Democrat Party, it isn’t enough.Just think about the extent of money and efforts that Democrats, both politicians and activists, lavish on shielding and defending illegal alien criminals. Sanctuary laws, ICE-free zones, lawsuits, mass riots, appeals in court, the 1,347% increase in assaults on ICE, the doxing networks, the social media campaigns — everything that goes into protecting aliens and wasting taxpayer and donors’ money. How can they justify it?

Speaking of sanctuary politicians, senators also grilled Minnesota Democrat Gov. Tim Walz and Attorney General Keith Ellison Thursday, including an interchange between Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) and Ellison. Moreno asked, “If you enter the country illegally, or you overstay a visa, should you be deported?” Ellison pompously replied, “My simple answer is, sir, it depends.” Moreno fired back, “Okay, sir, somebody breaks into your home. Should they be arrested for breaking and entering, or does it depend?” Ellison sputtered, “It’s an entirely different scenario.”

He ended up admitting that civil laws should certainly be enforced, but balked when Moreno pointed out this meant immigration law. Ellison doesn’t want rule of law; he wants to be the arbiter of what is considered legally enforceable. This exchange ties in to the statistics from Lyons because the reality is Democrats who have sanctuary policies don’t give a hang how many foreign criminals roam free in our nation.

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He likes publicity.

• Zelensky Attacks The Olympics (RT)

Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky has accused the International Olympic Committee (IOC) of playing “into the hands of aggressors” by banning a Ukrainian athlete while allowing Russians to compete under a neutral flag. Ukrainian skeleton pilot Vladislav Geraskevich was disqualified from the Milano Cortina Winter Olympics on Thursday for refusing to remove a helmet adorned with images of Ukrainian athletes killed during the conflict with Russia. The decision to ban Geraskevich was made because “he did not consider any form of compromise,” the IOC said in a statement.


Zelensky vented his frustration with the IOC in a social media post on Thursday evening. “The Olympic movement should help stop wars, not play into the hands of aggressors,” he complained. “Unfortunately, the decision of the International Olympic Committee to disqualify Ukrainian skeleton racer Vladislav Geraskevich says otherwise.” “And yet, 13 Russians are currently in Italy competing at the Olympics,” he continued. Despite these athletes competing under a neutral white flag, and not breaking the IOC’s rules on political messaging, Zelensky insisted that “they are the ones who deserve disqualification.”

At a press conference in Milan, OPC spokesman Mark Adams said that “you would have maybe five” countries represented at the Olympics if the organization banned every country engaged in wars or conflicts. “Because once you start, as a sporting organization, taking stands against wars and conflicts there is no end,” he said. However, Russia has accused the IOC of applying this logic unevenly. “The IOC has discredited itself entirely,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov declared in 2024, after the committee refused to apply any restrictions to Israeli athletes over the war in Gaza, but forbade Russian and Belarusian athletes from competing in the Paris games under their national flags.

The IOC’s ban on political messaging was put in place in 2021, a year before the escalation of the Ukraine conflict. Despite being offered other ways to honor fallen athletes, Geraskevich insisted on wearing his controversial helmet during all of his training runs in Milan, the organization said.Speaking after his disqualification, Geraskevich accused the IOC of making “a terrible mistake,” and playing “along with Russian propaganda.”

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“The US Republican Party has accused Democratic Representative Ilhan Omar of “calling for the execution” of President Donald Trump..”

• Ilhan Omar Under Fire For ‘Execute Trump’ Tweet (RT)

The US Republican Party has accused Democratic Representative Ilhan Omar of “calling for the execution” of President Donald Trump, after she called him a “pedophile” and suggested that he would be put to death if he were in her native Somalia.“Last night, Ilhan Omar tweeted, calling for the execution of the President of the United States,” the Pennsylvania branch of the GOP stated on Wednesday. Pointing out that “calling for the execution of a federal official is a felony under United States law,” the party urged Democrats to “take responsibility” for the apparent threat to Trump’s life.

One day earlier, Omar shared a clip of Trump condemning Somali-led fraud rings in Minnesota. Omar, who was born in Somalia and represents Minnesota in Congress, accused the president of trying to deflect attention from his name appearing in the recently-released Epstein files. “The leader of the Pedophile Protection Party is trying to deflect attention from his name being all over the Epstein files,” Omar tweeted. “At least in Somalia they execute pedophiles not elect them.”

The leader of the Pedophile Protection Party is trying to deflect attention from his name being all over the Epstein files. At least in Somalia they execute pedophiles not elect them. https://t.co/xC3Ype3zXI — Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) February 10, 2026

The Republican Party’s ‘RNC Research’ account also accused Omar of “casually” encouraging Trump’s execution, and noted that Somalia “has one of the highest child marriage rates in the world.” RNC Research’s post did not push back against her labeling Trump a “pedophile.”Omar has not faced any criticism from her own party for the tweet. The US Justice Department released more than three million files related to deceased pedophile Jeffrey Epstein last month. Among thousands of emails and text messages between Epstein and his associates, Trump’s name is mentioned thousands of times. However, no smoking-gun evidence has emerged linking him to any child sex crimes.

The files suggest that Trump had more contact with Epstein than he previously admitted, and that he knew the financier was involved with teenage girls. However, several documents revealed that he told Florida police that he was glad they were “stopping” Epstein, because “everyone has known he’s been doing this.” The document dump also contains anonymous complaints submitted to the FBI in 2020, accusing Trump of child sex abuse and complicity in murder. The Justice Department has dismissed these claims as “sensationalist” attempts to smear Trump ahead of the 2020 election.

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“..how globalist media like the BBC, funded by UK taxpayers, peddle disinformation to undermine the truth ..”

Is it legal to use taxpayers’ money to knowingly spread lies?

• Trial Date Set For Trump’s $10 Billion BBC Lawsuit (MN)

A trial date has been locked in for President Trump’s massive $10 billion defamation lawsuit against the BBC, following the broadcaster’s deceptive editing of his January 6, 2021 speech to falsely portray him as inciting violence at the Capitol. District Judge Roy Altman rejected the BBC’s motion to stay the merits-based discovery phase, allowing both sides to dig into evidence that could reveal the depths of this media manipulation. The two-week trial is set to kick off on February 15, 2027, one year from now, in Miami, Florida. This latest bombshell builds on the escalating saga that has already forced top BBC executives to resign in disgrace and drawn scrutiny from U.S. regulators, highlighting how foreign media outlets interfere in American politics with impunity.


https://twitter.com/BGatesIsaPyscho/status/2021961135507877986

Trump’s legal team accuses the BBC of splicing together disparate parts of his speech—separated by over 50 minutes—to create a fabricated narrative. In the doctored clip aired in a Panorama documentary, Trump appears to say: “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol… and I’ll be there with you. And we fight. We fight like hell.” The BBC Conveniently omitted Trump’s explicit calls for peaceful protest, which undercut the entire “insurrection” hoax pushed by legacy media. The BBC has scrambled to defend itself, filing motions claiming lack of jurisdiction in Florida and denying the documentary aired in the U.S. via BritBox. A spokesman stonewalled with: “As we have made clear previously, we will be defending this case. We are not going to make further comment on ongoing legal proceedings.”

But the damage is done. As we previously reported in the President put the broadcaster “on notice” with a demand for compensation, a retraction, and an apology—or face a billion-dollar reckoning for “false, defamatory, disparaging, and inflammatory” content. That threat materialized into this lawsuit, amplified by revelations of internal BBC turmoil. Director General Tim Davie and News CEO Deborah Turness abruptly resigned amid the fallout, with Trump blasting them as “very dishonest people who tried to step on the scales of a Presidential Election.” Adding fuel to the fire, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr launched a probe into the “news distortion and broadcast hoax.”

Carr demanded answers from U.S. partners NPR and PBS on whether they aired the fake clip, warning that such manipulation is a “heinous act against the public interest.” Carr’s letter hammered the point: “That would appear to meet the very definition of publishing a materially false and damaging statement.” He pressed for transcripts and videos to ensure no tainted content poisoned American airwaves. This isn’t just about one edited clip—it’s a stark exposure of how globalist media like the BBC, funded by UK taxpayers, peddle disinformation to undermine the truth. Trump himself called out the foreign meddling, noting the BBC hails from “a Foreign Country, one that many consider our Number One Ally.”

Leaked internal memos, including one from former BBC adviser Michael Prescott, condemned the edit as “completely misleading,” arguing it ignored Trump’s non-incitement as a key factor in avoiding federal charges. With discovery now underway, expect explosive revelations about the BBC’s “reckless disregard for the truth” and potential “actual malice.” The broadcaster’s history of biased reporting, from Gaza coverage to anti-Trump narratives, could unravel under scrutiny. Meanwhile, UK regulator Ofcom is investigating, but the real accountability may come from this U.S. courtroom, where Trump’s team seeks not just damages but a blow against fake news empires.

Carr’s letter hammered the point: “That would appear to meet the very definition of publishing a materially false and damaging statement.” He pressed for transcripts and videos to ensure no tainted content poisoned American airwaves. This isn’t just about one edited clip—it’s a stark exposure of how globalist media like the BBC, funded by UK taxpayers, peddle disinformation to undermine the truth. Trump himself called out the foreign meddling, noting the BBC hails from “a Foreign Country, one that many consider our Number One Ally.”Leaked internal memos, including one from former BBC adviser Michael Prescott, condemned the edit as “completely misleading,” arguing it ignored Trump’s non-incitement as a key factor in avoiding federal charges.

With discovery now underway, expect explosive revelations about the BBC’s “reckless disregard for the truth” and potential “actual malice.” The broadcaster’s history of biased reporting, from Gaza coverage to anti-Trump narratives, could unravel under scrutiny. Meanwhile, UK regulator Ofcom is investigating, but the real accountability may come from this U.S. courtroom, where Trump’s team seeks not just damages but a blow against fake news empires.

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“Crisis is when brittleness meets shock. “— Yuri Bezmenov’s Ghost on X

• Sure, Take That Time-Out (James Howard Kunstler)


By shutting down the government for a minimum of ten days supposedly over funding for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the Wile E. Coyote Democratic Party is about to blow up another Acme bomb in its mangy muzzle. I will tell you why. First, this DHS business is just a stupid prank to bamboozle the public. It will not shut down ICE operations, as Chuck Schumer pretends. ICE was already funded with $75-billion in last year’s Big Beautiful Bill. The shutdown will only defund the Coast Guard and airport security. (Does that sound smart?)


Second, senators will be leaving the DC swamp and going home to their states where, it turns out, polls show that voters of both parties combined overwhelmingly favor election reform by 84-percent. The House has passed the SAVE Act onto the Senate for action, up or down. For at least ten days of the shutdown, the senators will have to explain why proving that you are a citizen to vote is a bad idea — or conversely, why allowing non-citizens to vote is a good idea. So, thanks, Democrats, for sending the senators home to face their voters.

Eventually, senators will have to return to the US Capitol and take up the SAVE Act. The act will require proof of citizenship to register, photo ID to vote in person and for requesting an absentee ballot. The bill would prohibit universal mail-in voting, require absentee ballots be received by election day, impose a five-year prison sentence for helping anyone to register without correct documents, and provisions to clean up the states’ voter rolls.

Additional legislation still in the House, introduced by Rep. Bryan Steil (R-WI), would provide for Election Day only in-person voting by paper ballots, and yet other bills awaiting action would eliminate electronic vote-tallying machines. All the provisions above are common in most other civilized nations (and even a few that are not, such as Afghanistan). The Democratic Party is against all of it because they can only win national elections by deceit and chicanery.

When Senators return to DC, they will have to overcome the filibuster in its current mode, which is the silent or so-called “zombie” filibuster. You see, in the old days, before 1972, if senators wanted to filibuster, they had to actually hold the Senate floor and keep talking — bringing all Senate business to a complete halt until either they gave up or the majority could gather enough votes for cloture (ending debate). It was physically very hard on the senators, an ordeal, and to get through the hours of mindless blather, they would read the phone book, or the World Almanac, or a Sunday newspaper from page one to the obituaries, which subjected them to ridicule.

After 1972, the Senate introduced what they called “the two-track” system, which allowed the body to move on to other business under a filibuster, without requiring a member to stand and speak. All that was needed was for a senator to inform the leadership that he intended to block a vote, with the backing of 40 other senators. This led to a dramatic increase in the use of filibusters — transforming them from a rare, physically demanding gambit into a routine procedural threat.

Now, the catch is that this change in procedure was never formally voted on. Going from “talking” filibusters to “silent” filibusters didn’t happen through a deliberate decision by the full Senate to change the rules — it emerged in 1972 from a procedural workaround that then Majority Leader Mike Mansfield introduced. It’s just a custom masquerading as a rule, and one that now Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) could declare null and void.

Doing so would bring back the old talking filibuster. Opponents of a given bill, such as the SAVE Act, would have to step into the well of Senate and offer arguments against election reform, or they could read through the Chicago phone book. In either case, they’d expose themselves to ridicule. Perhaps those ten days at home during the present government shutdown will lead to an attitude change.

If that doesn’t do it, consider that sometime in the weeks and months ahead, you will be seeing some results from the seizure of the Fulton County, GA, 2020 voting records that took place in January. Since the FBI went in there on a warrant — meaning a judge saw probable cause of voter fraud — the country will likely be exposed to real evidence, for the first time, that one crucial swing state ran a corrupt election operation, and it will no longer be possible for the Democrats to yell that such claims are “baseless” or “debunked.”

It’s an astonishing sign of cultural decay that we are even arguing over election reform at this point. The measures introduced during the dastardly Covid-19 trip — unlimited mail-in balloting, organized “ballot harvesting,” counting ballots for weeks after Election Day, doing so with Dominion / Smartmatic machines connectable to the Internet, and ignoring chain-of-custody requirements — these operations were patently and obviously dishonest. That’s what got you four years of “Joe Biden,” a walking-talking lie. Is there anything that the Democratic Party doesn’t lie about? I’ll wait for your answer.

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Chief Legal Counsel for Goldman Sachs is quite the job. She was paid $40-50 million.

• Kathryn Ruemmler Out at Goldman Sachs Over Epstein Ties (CTH)

Former White House legal counsel/fixer to Barack Obama, and former personal lawyer/fixer of Susan Rice, Kathryn Ruemmler was Chief Legal Counsel for Goldman Sachs for the past six years. Throughout those jobs and networked professional relationships, Kathryn Ruemmler was also a personal friend and advisor to Jeffrey Epstein. Yesterday it was reported that Kathryn Ruemmler has resigned from Goldman Sachs.


NEW YORK – Goldman Sachs’s top lawyer, Kathryn Ruemmler, resigned on Thursday in the wake of the Justice Department’s release of emails and other material that revealed her extensive relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, the disgraced financier. Ms. Ruemmler and representatives for Goldman said for years that she had a strictly professional relationship with Mr. Epstein, a convicted sex offender. But emails, text messages and photographs released late last month upended that narrative, leading to Ms. Ruemmler’s sudden resignation, which surprised many inside the firm.

Before joining Goldman in 2020, Ms. Ruemmler was a counselor, confidante and friend to Mr. Epstein, the documents showed. She advised him on how to respond to tough questions about his sex crimes, discussed her dating life, advised him on how to avoid unflattering media scrutiny and addressed him as “sweetie” and “Uncle Jeffrey.” Mr. Epstein, in turn, provided career advice on her move to Goldman, introduced her to well-known businesspeople and showered her with gifts of spa treatments, high-end travel and Hermes luxury items. In total, Ms. Ruemmler was mentioned in more than 10,000 of the documents released by the Justice Department.

Ms. Ruemmler, in addition to being Goldman’s general counsel since 2021, was a partner and vice chair of its reputational risk committee. She earlier served as White House counsel under President Obama and was a white-collar defense lawyer at Latham & Watkins. (read more)

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https://twitter.com/RyanAFournier/status/2021976778420675000?s=20

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle February 13 2026

Feb 132026
 
 February 13, 2026  Posted by at 10:18 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , ,  68 Responses »


Paul Cézanne Forest 1902-04


• When Did It Become OK for Half the Country to Disregard Federal Law? (Thorne)
• There Is No Future For White People (Paul Craig Roberts)
• CNN Thinks Black Voters Are ‘Too Dumb’, Scott Jennings Torches Them (Margolis)
• Homan Announces End Of Illegal Immigration Crackdown In Minnesota (JTN)
• A Good Way To Destroy Your Country: Rogan Blasts Dems’ Open Border Insanity (MN)
• Are The Ukrainian Peace Talks A Hoax? (Paul Craig Roberts)
• What the Heck Happened in El Paso? (Sarah Anderson)
• NYC Mayor Urges State Lawmakers to Pass Tax Hikes on Wealthy, Corporations (ET)
• US Negotiating Updated New START Treaty With Russia – Vance (RT)
• US Attorney In New York Appointed By Judges Quickly Fired By White House (JTN)
• What’s Behind Von Der Leyen’s Two-Tier EU Plan? (RT)
• The Collapse of American Education (Paul Craig Roberts)
• ‘Snow White’ Lost [GULP] How Much Money? (Stephen Green)

 


 

https://twitter.com/latestincosmos/status/2021848499844002071?s=20 https://twitter.com/AndrewBolis/status/2021920991161856428?s=20

 


 


I often wonder that too.

• When Did It Become OK for Half the Country to Disregard Federal Law? (Thorne)

When did it become commonplace — celebrated, even — for half the country to simply disregard federal law? When did half the country conclude that it could just go ahead and subvert the will of the people, as expressed through the laws duly passed by their elected representatives, to its own preferences — even when these are in direct contradiction to federal statute? By “half the country,” I mean Democrats, of course. But seriously — how is this even a thing? It’s been going on for a long time, and it’s not just immigration law that these insurgents actively countermand. How many states have “legalized” recreational marijuana? Why do these people imagine they can “legalize” something that is a federal crime? (And no, I am not here to argue whether weed should be legal. If you don’t like the law, change it. You don’t get to ignore it in the meantime.)


Whatever happened to “No one is above the law?” Perhaps elitist leftists imagine that the lowly “brown” human beings they traffic and patronize are beneath the law. Or that foreign nationals present in the country illegally can simply override federal immigration law because they have already done so for such a long time. What other laws do officials, judges, and AGs routinely allow to be broken simply because the perpetrator has successfully done so for years? If I break into the museum and steal a Rembrandt, then I hang it on my living room wall and enjoy it for a certain number of years, does it then become mine to keep? What manner of incoherent lunacy is this?

Democrat activists don’t just ignore the law: They actively countermand it. On the municipal level, they create so-called sanctuaries, dedicated to impeding federal law enforcement wherever they can while aiding and abetting lawbreakers. On the state level, they afford benefits, licensure, voting rights, and more to illegal aliens who have no claim on such things. And on the national level, they invent things like DACA and the CBP1 app, using taxpayer money to facilitate the mass influx of illegal immigrants and “amnesty” scammers who have no business entering the country. But wherever the left has control, it subverts laws it dislikes.

The Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution is pretty clear on the matter: “This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.”

So what does the law say about immigration? Check out the list of reasons why immigrant wannabes must be refused entry into the country that is found in the Immigration and Nationality Act at 8 U.S.C. § 1182(a)(4) (Section 212(a)(4)). They cannot be admitted if they are likely to become a public charge, have a history of mental illness, are unable to document vaccinations, have previous criminal convictions, and much more. But Democrats just wave them through. WT actual F? Thus, while I know it is vitally important that the SAVE Act passes, I also don’t imagine it will fix the problem of widespread Democrat election cheating right away. Democrat officials won’t submit to that law any more than they do the other federal laws they don’t like.

The tactic for getting away with this seems to be based on the fact that the insurgency is so widespread, so entwined into the culture, that half of Americans feel they are justified when they break or abet others who break federal law. With this lawlessness infecting so many, it becomes nigh unto impossible to rein it in. You certainly can’t arrest, try, convict, and penalize some 100 million people. You can’t even find a judge or a jury that reliably comes down on the side of the law. Resistance. Insurrection. Sedition. Insurgency. Rebellion. Treason. Mutiny. Insubordination. This behavior has many names, but it all comes down to the same problem: placing one’s own will above the will of the people who pass the laws, thereby breaking down the societal compact.

I hold out faith that the Trump administration is doing its part to break the cycle. It is not only enforcing immigration laws, but it is also hunting down the funding and organization behind the insurgency, hopefully resulting in arrests and decapitation of the movement. It is not only urging the passage of election integrity laws, but it is actively investigating past fraud and abuse, ideally in order to arrest and prosecute the ringleaders. Culturally, though, we have a long way to go to re-instill the concepts of civic duty, lawfulness, fairness, and shame in half the country.

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“As I have previously predicted, by 2050, 24 years from now, the only white people who will exist will be in zoos displayed as the oppressors of “sun people.”

• There Is No Future For White People (Paul Craig Roberts)

For decades, the white European ethnicities that comprise Western civilization have been under deadly attack. But the attack does not come from external enemies. It comes from internal enemies–the white gentile and Jewish educators who control the universities and historical narratives. mThe Western universities have defined Western civilization as racist, misogynist, antisemitic, and exploitative of people of color. The New York Times sponsors the 1619 Project that asserts that the United States was founded on racism. A sense of guilt has been implanted in the educated portion of the population living in Western civilization, and the guilt leaves them incapable of racial defense. A society whose enemies control its education and information has no chance of survival.


It was in the 1960s, six or more decades ago, that left-wing students mentored by their professors marched on university campuses demanding “Western civ has to go.” By 2026 several generations have been inculcated with a negative view of the civilization in which they live. This leaves them as putty in the hands of the leftwing and the Zionists who have begun the erasure of the very concept of white ethnicity. A few years ago, A Scandinavian intellectual and documentary filmmaker gave us the story that the original Swedes were black people. We next heard that the first woman in Britain was black. And then we heard that William Shakespeare was a black Jewish feminist from Venice. This unfounded allegation has the silver lining of allowing Shakespeare to again be read and even taught.

But the elimination of white people from history proceeds rapidly. Shakespeare, the master of the British language, is not even British but a Venetian. In its update of its curriculum, Cambridge University has concluded that there is no such thing as an Anglo-Saxon. Nor are there English, Scottish or Irish. Cambridge University indoctrinates its students that white ethnicities are merely constructs. The department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic studies at the University of Cambridge teaches that ethnic nationalism is a myth. There never was a British, English, Scottish, Welsh, or Irish people with a coherent ethnic identity. White ethnicities are mere constructs. They are nothing real. Thus is identity, stripped from white ethnicities.

Tell me, please, University of Cambridge, if Beowulf is not an Anglo-Saxon piece of literature, what is it?Little doubt, the answer from Cambridge will be that Beowulf was a racist, anti-semite, misogynist, oppressor who killed the innocent Grendel because he/she was a person of color and a transgendered something, but certainly not the monster in the non-ethnic poem written by a black Jewish transgendered poet. In the new world being created, only Jews will have an ethnic reality. All gentile white ethnicities are constructs.

A French politician has said that the replacement of the French in France is nothing unusual. The French replaced the Romans just as the Romans replaced the Gauls. It is just normal for Arabs and Africans to replace the French.nIn Spain Spanish people led by a young Spanish woman welcome and encourage the replacement of the Spanish ethnicity by darker skinned boat people from Africa. She says that Spanish people are all horrible and need to be replaced. All over Western Europe, Western governments welcome the replacement of white ethnic nationalities by black immigrant-invaders. Yet the Western European governments want to go to war with Russia. Why? To preserve Europe for black immigrant-invaders?

Yes. The white Western elites are fighting for the conquest of Western civilization by black immigrant-invaders. In Scandinavia black immigrant-invaders largely escape charges for raping white women because mixed-race births help to replace white people. Rape of white women by black men is permitted as a white replacement tool. The way things are shaping up in Scandinavia it is permissible for an ethnic Swedish woman, which Cambridge University says does not exist, to abort a white baby, but it will be a hate crime for a white ethnic Swedish female to abort a baby of color. As I have previously predicted, by 2050, 24 years from now, the only white people who will exist will be in zoos displayed as the oppressors of “sun people.”

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“These ideas are popular with everyone but Democrats in Congress and the Democrats’ consultant class.”

• CNN Thinks Black Voters Are ‘Too Dumb’, Scott Jennings Torches Them (Margolis)

Scott Jennings wasn’t about to let Democratic operative Alencia Johnson get away with wild accusations about voter ID requirements, and the resulting exchange on CNN was a master class in dismantling talking points with simple, direct questions. Johnson kicked things off by claiming President Trump was “championing a bill that actually would take voting rights away from a lot of black people in this country.” But her argument immediately started to crumble when Jennings asked the most obvious question: “What voting rights is he taking away from black voters?” “The SAVE Act,” Johnson, a former advisor to Kamala Harris’s 2024 presidential campaign, insisted. “That is actually going to continue to disenfranchise overwhelmingly a lot of people of color.”


“How?” Jennings asked, justifiably perplexed. This is when Johnson tried to deflect, distancing herself from her own position. She claimed “There are so many civil rights organizations that have run the data” and invoked Chuck Schumer’s “Jim Crow 2.0” rhetoric. But Jennings wouldn’t let her off the hook. “How? You haven’t said how yet,” he pointed out. “I am talking about it. It’s the way that you’re putting new poll taxes on us.” Poll taxes? The SAVE Act does two things: It requires proof of citizenship when registering to vote and a photo ID to vote. That’s it. These ideas are popular with everyone but Democrats in Congress and the Democrats’ consultant class.

After multiple attempts to dodge, Johnson finally offered an answer: “It’s the way that we’re putting new poll taxes on this when you’re making people have to prove that they are citizens, that they have to prove with a voter ID.” Jennings couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Poll taxes?” he repeated incredulously. Johnson doubled down, calling it “kind of an idiom” and arguing that requiring people to prove citizenship makes it “harder for people to vote in this country.” That’s when Jennings lowered the boom.

He noted that 76% of black voters support requiring an ID to vote, along with 80% of Hispanic voters and 83% of Americans overall. “Are you saying that black voters are too dumb to know what’s good for them?” Jennings asked. “I mean, it sounds pretty condescending.”

The exchange perfectly illustrated how easily leftist claims about voter ID laws collapse under the slightest scrutiny. Johnson came loaded with buzzwords — Jim Crow 2.0, poll taxes, disenfranchisement — but couldn’t articulate a single concrete way the SAVE Act would actually prevent eligible voters from casting ballots, and even more particularly, why it would disproportionately affect minority voters. We all know what this opposition to basic election integrity reforms is really about. Democrats don’t want basic, commonsense election integrity reforms because they rely on a rigged system where it’s easy to steal elections. They invoke Jim Crow to try to scare Democrats, particularly black Democrats, into thinking that these basic safeguards are racist, but, as Jennings pointed out, the polling shows that not even minorities buy this argument.

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“.. it’s less of a sanctuary state for criminals.”

• Homan Announces End Of Illegal Immigration Crackdown In Minnesota (JTN)

White House border czar Tom Homan on Thursday announced the end of the Trump administration’s crackdown on illegal immigration in Minnesota. “As a result of our efforts here, Minnesota is now less of a sanctuary state for criminals,” Homan said at a news conference, The Associated Press reported. “I have proposed and President Trump has concurred, that this surge operation conclude.” U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement launched the crackdown, called Operation Metro Surge, on Dec. 1.


According to federal authorities, the crackdown focused on the Minneapolis-St. Paul metro area, and led to the arrest of more than 4,000 people. “The surge is leaving Minneapolis safer,” Homan said. “I’ll say it again, it’s less of a sanctuary state for criminals.”

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“… letting in unvetted masses isn’t mercy; it’s a calculated move to entrench power, sidelining American workers and safety.”

• A Good Way To Destroy Your Country: Rogan Blasts Dems’ Open Border Insanity (MN)

Joe Rogan has zeroed in on the Democrats’ border fiasco, calling it a direct path to America’s downfall by inviting criminals and chaos across the line. The podcast powerhouse argues that while the U.S. was built by immigrants, unchecked entry under Democratic policies is flooding the nation with murderers and cartel thugs, all in an effort to populate cities with voters loyal to the left—pure political gamesmanship at the expense of public safety. Rogan laid out the stark reality of America’s immigration roots clashing with today’s border free-for-all. “The whole thing is tough now because we’re a country that’s established by immigrants, but you can’t have an open border. You can’t just have anybody come through because there’s going to be a bunch of criminals that come through, and you don’t want that. You don’t want your country to be more crime infested,” Rogan said.


“You don’t want your country to have murderers and cartel members just coming into the country and now getting citizenship and being able to vote and organizing, and that’s crazy. That’s a good way to destroy your country,” Rogan urged. He further accused Democrats of turning illegal immigration into a cynical tool for power grabs, overwhelming sanctuary cities and stacking the deck in swing states. “When you just let everybody in, and you let in 10 million people, and how do you — unless they get arrested while they’re here — what do you do? And even then, like a lot of them during the Biden administration, they were getting let go. In sanctuary cities [they would let] people go. It’s just crazy,” Rogan said.

He added, “Because they just want a bunch of people in these swing states for the census. So they get more congressional seats, and if they get these people and give them the ability to vote, now you have a built-in voter base. You can just rig the election.” This critique comes amid the fallout from Biden-era policies like the CHNV migrant parole program, which fast-tracked over 530,000 nationals from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela into the U.S. with legal status and work permits—straining resources and enforcement to the breaking point. Contrast that with President Trump’s 2025 crackdown, where executive actions on border security prompted over two million illegal migrants to self-deport, slashing southern border encounters to historic lows.

It’s a clear win for America First priorities, proving that strong enforcement works when leaders actually prioritize citizens over political stunts. Rogan’s takedown highlights the danger in Democratic compassion claims: preaching open arms while cities buckle under crime waves and resource drains. These policies erode the very fabric of fair elections and national sovereignty. As Rogan points out, letting in unvetted masses isn’t mercy; it’s a calculated move to entrench power, sidelining American workers and safety. Democrats’ border negligence is a betrayal of the American people, paving the way for more crime, division, and electoral manipulation.

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According to PCR, there should have been more Ukrainian victims, earlier. To prevent more later.

“Putin made an extraordinary strategic error when he refused early in the game to put down a strong Russian foot.”

• Are The Ukrainian Peace Talks A Hoax? (Paul Craig Roberts)

The so-called Ukrainian peace talks have puzzled me for sometime. For the conflict to be resolved requires Trump and Putin to work out an agreement between themselves, but this necessary meeting has not occurred. Trump has said repeatedly that he wants the issue resolved, but his terms have never been clear other than demanding a cease fire before the terms of the agreement are known. It is not clear that Trump has taken trouble to understand what Putin means by the root cause of the problem or that the real problem is the absence of a mutual security agreement between Russia and the West.

Perplexingly, the “peace process” has been characterized by Trump blaming Putin for not accepting a cease-fire in place of a negotiated agreement and adding more Russian sanctions as a punishment. This has never struck me as indicating any seriousness on Trump’s part toward finding a solution, and it has puzzled me that Putin continues to see hope in such an unpromising process. Russian foreign minister Lavrov has come around to my point of view. He says the negotiations continue in words, but not in deeds, which is a polite way of saying that the negotiations have lost their purpose.mLavrov has noticed what I have been pointing out for sometime, and that is that there is dialogue on paper but pressure in practice.

I called attention to the fact that it is inconsistent for Washington to allegedly pursue peace in Ukraine while it foments regime change in former provinces of the Soviet Union that border the Russian Federation. Washington seeks to win the allegiance of these provinces away from Russia as is currently underway in Armenia. These efforts follow Washington’s recent attempt at color revolution in former Soviet Georgia. To allegedly negotiate peace in Ukraine, while stirring up trouble elsewhere on Russia’s border gives the lie to the Ukrainian “peace process.” Just last Monday American vice president Vance was in Armenia on a high profile visit chipping away with American offers Armenia’s economic engagement with Russia.

Another peculiar aspect of this so-called “peace negotiations” is the two people who are conducting them. One, representing Trump, is Witkoff an American real estate developer. The other, representing Putin, is the American– Russian Kirill Dmitriev, an Atlanticist Integrationist in charge of the small $10 billion Russian sovereign investment fund. Both are trying to negotiate money deals, not the elimination of armed conflict. The Kremlin’s line is that it is a double-track policy to see if economic deals can be made, regardless of whether the Ukrainian situation can be resolved.

This strikes me as utter nonsense, and it seems to strike Lavrov the same way. Lavrov notes that Washington is interfering with Russian oil exports by illegally seizing Russian-flagged tankers at sea in international waters, and by applying sanctions to India for its oil and weapons deals with Russia. Clearly, Washington is increasing pressures on Russia. What basis does Putin have for continuing to pretend and to deceive the Russian people that Ukrainian peace negotiations are almost concluded? Why is a popular leader destroying his own credibility, or allowing Dmitriev and Witcoff to destroy his credibility?

Putin made an extraordinary strategic error when he refused early in the game to put down a strong Russian foot. It remains to be seen what consequences the world will pay for this extraordinary strategic blunder by the president of Russia..

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“Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), who doesn’t have the sense God gave a goose..”:

• What the Heck Happened in El Paso? (Sarah Anderson)

On Tuesday night, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued a NOTAM that imposed a Temporary Flight Restriction (TFR) over El Paso, Texas, and nearby southern New Mexico, including El Paso International Airport and Doña Ana County International Jetport in Santa Teresa, N.M. It cited “special security reasons,” and it banned all types of flights, including, in some cases, medevacs, up to 18,000 feet for the next 10 days (until February 20). Early Wednesday morning, the FAA suddenly announced that “the temporary closure of airspace over El Paso has been lifted” and “there is no threat to commercial aviation,” allowing all flights to resume as normal.


So, what happened? The Donald Trump administration says that Mexican cartel drones breached the U.S. border. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy posted on X:

“The FA and [Department of War] acted swiftly to address a cartel drone incursion. The threat has been neutralized, and there is no danger to commercial travel in the region. The restrictions have been lifted and normal flights are resuming.” This sounds reasonable. El Paso sits right on the United States-Mexico border, and cartel drones are a rapidly growing threat. They’re used to smuggle in drugs, like fentanyl and methamphetamine, and they’re used to scout areas, looking for law enforcement. They’re also used in human trafficking coordination.

According to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), 27,000 drones were detected within 500 meters of the border in the last six months of 2024. But others aren’t buying it, and by “others” I mean Democrats, Mexico’s Narco-President Claudia Sheinbaum, and the MSM. Rep Veronica Escobar, a Texas Democrat whose district includes El Paso, complained that she wasn’t notified, and urged the FAA to reverse the decision, stating that she felt there was no threat to the community. “The highly consequential decision by FAA to shut down the El Paso Airport for 10 days is unprecedented and has resulted in significant concern within the community,” she said.

“From what my office and I have been able to gather overnight and early this morning there is no immediate threat to the community or surrounding areas.” Sheinbaum, during her morning press conference, stated that she had no information about any of this either but would like the U.S. to share it with her. The Associated Press, however, claims it has the real scoop… from anonymous sources. It claims that the shutdown “stemmed from the Pentagon’s plans to test a laser to shoot down drones used by Mexican drug cartels” and that it “caused friction with the Federal Aviation Administration, which wanted to ensure commercial air safety, and the two agencies sought to coordinate.”

It also claims that a meeting between the Department of War (DOW) and the FAA was scheduled for later in February, but the DOW was eager to test the laser, so the FAA responded with the shutdown. It goes on to explain that some people missed their Valentine’s Day weekend flights. Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), who doesn’t have the sense God gave a goose, piled on by saying it’s “the lack of coordination that’s endemic in this Trump administration.” And then, yet another story came out, which has been published by various outlets, like CBS and Fox News, stating that what actually happened was that the military thought it was taking out a drone, but it turned out to be a mylar party balloon. This led to concerns from the FAA, and that’s why the airspace was eventually closed. This was confirmed by, again, anonymous sources and has been mocked online by both sides of the political aisle.

So, which was it? Catel drones, a misidentified balloon, or a little spat between two government agencies — maybe some combination of all three? No one seems to know for sure. Given the players involved, I’m not one to blindly trust the federal government, but I am more inclined to trust Duffy over Duckworth and “anonymous sources.”

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Socialism in America is like snow in the desert.

• NYC Mayor Urges State Lawmakers to Pass Tax Hikes on Wealthy, Corporations (ET)

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani called on state lawmakers Wednesday to approve a 2 percent personal income tax increase on the city’s wealthiest residents as well as a hike in the corporate tax rate in a bid to close a multibillion-dollar budget gap. The mayor testified in a New York State Senate 2026 budget hearing about how the city’s projected deficit had decreased from $12 billion to $7 billion. He attributed the improvement to “assuming an aggressive posture on savings without compromising city services, incorporating updated revenue and bonus estimates, and using in-year reserves.”


Mamdani said nonetheless that New York remains “placed on a ledge,” and needs more revenue from high earners and businesses. “I believe the wealthiest individuals and most profitable corporations should contribute a little more so that everyone can live lives of dignity,” Mamdani, a democratic socialist, said in prepared remarks. “That’s why—along with raising the corporate tax—I’m asking for a 2 percent personal income tax increase on the most affluent New Yorkers.”

The mayor will release the city’s preliminary budget next Tuesday. He conjectured the personal tax surcharge, proposed to affect those earning more than $1 million annually, would close the remaining deficit by nearly half of what’s remaining. Mamdani also underscored his campaign pledge to increase the state’s corporate tax rate from 7.25 percent to 11.5 percent. Gov. Kathy Hochul and the legislature must approve any tax changes.

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Putin and Trump trust each other to get it done?!

• US Negotiating Updated New START Treaty With Russia – Vance (RT)

The US is continuing negotiations with Russia on an updated version of the New START treaty, Vice President J.D. Vance has confirmed. The strategic arms control agreement officially expired on February 5 after no formal extension was reached. Speaking to journalists on Wednesday in Azerbaijan, Vance stated that nuclear non-proliferation talks are ongoing and that the treaty will be different from its previous iteration. “It’s going to change compared to where it was, and that’s part of the negotiation that we’re engaging in with the Russians,” he said.


Preventing the spread of nuclear weapons remains a core priority for the administration of US President Donald Trump, Vance said, and that “more regimes across the world getting nuclear weapons” is the “worst thing that can happen” for the American people. Vance’s confirmation comes after Axios reported last week that US and Russian officials discussed the treaty on the sidelines of Ukraine peace talks in Abu Dhabi. A US official told the outlet that the sides had agreed to “operate in good faith” and begin discussions on updating the agreement, with some sources indicating a provisional six-month observance of the treaty’s terms.

Signed in 2010, New START puts caps on the number of strategic nuclear warheads and launchers that can be deployed and establishes monitoring mechanisms for both Russian and American arsenals. It was initially set to expire in 2021 but was extended for five years at the time. However, Moscow suspended the verification mechanisms of the treaty in 2023, citing Ukrainian strikes on elements of Russia’s nuclear deterrence and accusing the West of being actively involved.

Last September, Russian President Vladimir Putin proposed extending the treaty for one more year, provided that Washington reciprocated. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the initiative “remained unanswered.” Moscow has repeatedly warned of the dangers of allowing the treaty to lapse. Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, who signed the original treaty, stated that “the world could enter a dangerous new phase of uncertainty” if the agreement expired, predicting that the global nuclear club will likely expand.

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Weird. They’re not sure who appoints who?

• US Attorney In New York Appointed By Judges Quickly Fired By White House (JTN)

A U.S. attorney who was appointed by federal judges in New York was quickly fired by the White House. On Wednesday, Donald T. Kinsella, 79, was appointed as U.S. attorney for the Northern District of New York in a private ceremony, The New York Times reported. Then, Kinsella said, he received an email from a White House official hours later, telling him that he was being removed from the post. Kinsella told The Times that he did not yet know whether the White House email carried the force of law, and that he would discuss it with the district judges in the morning and go from there.


Before Kinsella’s appointment, the Trump administration had suggested it would fire any prosecutor chosen by district judges. It is unclear whether there is any recourse for the Northern District judges. “Judges don’t pick U.S. Attorneys, @POTUS does. See Article II of our Constitution. You are fired, Donald Kinsella,” Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche posted on X on Wednesday.mKinsella is a former criminal chief of the U.S. attorney’s office for the Northern District of New York, which prosecutes crime in cities such as Albany, Syracuse, and Utica.

He was to replace John A. Sarcone III, whom a judge found last month to be serving in the position unlawfully. Sarcone dropped the title of acting U.S. attorney this week, as his 210-day term had expired, and his office’s website now lists him as first assistant, typically the title of a U.S. attorney’s top deputy. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer criticized Kinsella’s firing. “Everyone knows Trump only cares about one quality in a U.S. attorney: complete political subservience,” Schumer said. “The people of upstate New York deserve a qualified, independent prosecutor, not another political loyalist.”

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The European Commission president won’t let individual member states stand in the way of her maximalist goals…

She’ll blow up the union yet.

• What’s Behind Von Der Leyen’s Two-Tier EU Plan? (RT)

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen wants groups of EU countries to pass ambitious economic reforms without the consent of the entire bloc. The move is about trade, regulations, and – of course – Ukraine.nEU leaders will meet in Belgium’s Alden Biesen castle on Thursday to discuss the bloc’s moribund economy. The meeting comes two years after former European Central Bank President Mario Draghi released a report calling on Brussels to slash regulations and invest up to €800 billion annually, or face “slow agony” as the economies of China and the US pull ahead.


Von der Leyen immediately opposed borrowing Draghi’s recommended €800 billion, given that her EU member underlings have yet to come up with the €90 billion to be borrowed for Ukraine that was announced last December. However, in a letter to the bloc’s leaders on Monday, she proposed a “deep house cleaning” of red tape and regulations, new trade deals along the lines of the one signed with India this month, and the elimination of remaining trade barriers between member states.

One paragraph in the letter stands out: “Our ambition should always be to reach agreement among all 27 Member States. However, where a lack of progress or ambition risks undermining Europe’s competitiveness or capacity to act, we should not shy away from using the possibilities foreseen in the treaties on enhanced cooperation.” In a speech to the European Parliament in Strasbourg on Wednesday, von der Leyen made her position even more clear. The commission, she said, will “crack down” on “unnecessary” national laws standing in the way of her reforms.

The EU’s Amsterdam and Nice treaties allow a minimum of nine member states to cooperate on certain policy initiatives without the consent of the rest of the bloc. According to the EU’s legal database, “the procedure is designed to overcome stalemate where a particular proposal is blocked by one or more Member States who do not want to take part. It does not, however, allow for an extension of powers outside those permitted by the EU Treaties.” Member states cannot veto the establishment of enhanced cooperation groups, except on matters of defense and the bloc’s common foreign policy.

What is the letter really about?
According to von der Leyen, her proposed reforms are so important that they risk delay or dilution if subjected to the bloc’s normal unanimity requirement. However, her letter neglects to mention a key European industry that would benefit from “enhanced cooperation”: the weapons industry. Last month, German Finance Minister Lars Klingbeil proposed creating “a Europe of two speeds,” in which Germany, France, Poland, Spain, Italy and the Netherlands – the so-called ‘E6’ – would collaborate on defense spending, lobby for increased military expenditure in the EU’s next multiannual budget, and raise money to turn “defense into an engine for growth.”

“Europe has to become stronger and more resilient,” Klingbeil said in a letter to his French counterpart, Roland Lescure. “Work towards this goal needs to be sped up in all dimensions. Continuing as before is not an option.” Klingbeil’s proposal would likely face staunch opposition from Europe’s dissident center. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, and Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis have all spoken out against the EU’s increased militarization. By recruiting three more countries and using the mechanisms of enhanced cooperation, the E6 could bypass this opposition and form an ideologically-aligned bloc within the bloc.

Why is this important for Germany?
Strengthening the European arms industry is an existential matter for Germany. Berlin’s decision to abandon Russian gas imports has left the country reeling, with its economy contracting in 2023 and 2024, and flatlining last year. Industrial giants such as BASF, Bosch, and Volkswagen have closed factories in Germany, but the weapons sector is booming. Rheinmetall, Germany’s largest defense contractor, has seen its stock rise more than 1,750% since January 2022, largely on the back of massive orders of 155mm ammunition and Leopard tank components for Ukraine. Airbus and Thyssenkrupp, both of which have substantial defense divisions, are up around 200%. Rheinmetall is now Germany’s sixth-largest company by market capitalization, outranking Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz, and BMW.

According to some estimates, defense spending has accounted for as much as 20% of total EU economic growth since 2022. nUkraine benefits in material terms from every Rheinmetall shell it fires and tank it repairs at the company’s facility near Lviv. Kiev also benefits from any political decision that lets its most fervent supporters in Europe – namely the European Commission, France, Germany, and Poland – act without interference from the rest of the bloc. For example, when the European Commission proposed a €90 billion debt-funded loan to Ukraine last year, it was opposed by Hungary, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic. The EU Council used enhanced cooperation to issue the loan last month, with the first payment to Kiev expected in April.

Von der Leyen has used the Ukraine conflict to dramatically centralize power in the EU. Aside from using enhanced cooperation to issue a loan that Kiev will never be able to repay, the EC president has proposed an end to the unanimity requirement for foreign policy and defense decisions, and until this week planned to create a dedicated intelligence unit under her control, citing the supposed threat of Russian “hybrid warfare. Now that the EU economy is buckling under the weight of the commission’s decisions, namely its abandonment of cheap Russian oil and gas, von der Leyen is yet again tearing up the rulebook to achieve her goals. Ahead of Thursday’s meeting in Belgium, it seems that the much-vaunted unity of the bloc is of little concern to her if it stands in the way of her ambitions.

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“As the current generation being educated is content to ask AI for answers, they will never be able to answer a question themselves..”

• The Collapse of American Education (Paul Craig Roberts)

Forty percent of US fourth graders cannot read. Even fewer can read at their grade level. One teacher responsible for 110 eighth graders reports that only two can read at grade level. Teachers report that kids are not capable of comprehending the content of written material, and that thinking and working out the answer to a problem is beyond their ability.


https://www.bitchute.com/video/M8fPk94kCupI

The 15 minute video in the URL above is worth your time. It shows us that we are raising a generation that is incapable of functioning in any job, or understanding domestic and foreign concerns that require public input in a democracy. In effect, without an educated and thinking public, there can be no democracy. Therefore, the failure of education means the replacement of our political system with something else. The information in the video blames technology, especially artificial intelligence, which is beginning to undermine the comprehension powers of adults as well. The latter part of the video might strike some as a case for better teacher pay, but as the video makes clear pay is not the reason teachers are leaving education.

The adverse impact of artificial intelligence on learning is just the latest stage in the collapse of education. In previous articles, I have dated the decline in education from the destruction of neighborhood schools. People of the same socio-economic class fit together in more manageable ranges of ability. This makes it possible to hold all students in class to the same standard. Some do better than others, but there are not large differences that result in many who cannot fit within the standard range.

The neighborhood schools were destroyed by social engineering or the integration of different socio-economic classes under the same standard. The result was there were too many who could not meet the standard. Instead of questioning the policy, the blame was placed on racism. To avoid racism the educational standards were lowered. This let the Genie out of the bottle. Other deterioration followed, and the classroom degenerated into chaos and loss of teacher control. Today teachers say they are behavioral managers, not teachers.

Another adverse development was the creation of education departments in universities. In my early schooling years, education degrees were new on the scene. Those who taught my generation had degrees in the subjects that they taught. The math teacher had a math degree.The history teacher had a degree in history. The English teacher had an English degree, and so on. Most of the teachers were teaching because they love their subject, and their appreciation of the subject often passed on to the students and gave them an interest in math, history, language. Teachers had competence in the subject matter instead of in educational theory.

Today we already experience the decline in competence of graduates. Checkout clerks are not permitted to exchange for customers the equivalent in smaller bills for a larger one, because they don’t know how to do it. Customer service representatives are very limited in the help that they can provide. A real problem has to be moved up a level or two to a supervisor. To get an issue resolved today can require 30 minutes or one hour or half a day. I remember when issues were resolved in three minutes and that whoever answered the phone had the authority to resolve the issue. Today the time it takes to resolve the simplest issue is extraordinary.

As the current generation being educated is content to ask AI for answers, they will never be able to answer a question themselves. Everyone will think the same, which will be whatever AI answers. Therefore, those who control the database for AI will control understanding. Moreover, there will be no one capable of challenging the narrative in the AI database. The consequences of this is extraordinary. Everyone will think the same. Diversity will not exist. Those who control the database will have total control. Humanity simply ceases to exist.These are the real problems that we face, not whether we should destroy Iran for Israel, or whether Gaza should be turned into a resort. Does the fact that the real issues are unaddressed mean that the educational collapse has already gone so far that we can no longer think clearly and comprehend the real threats that we face?

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“:Nobody can say for sure because nobody actually knows, not even the people who signed the checks.”

• ‘Snow White’ Lost [GULP] How Much Money? (Stephen Green)

You had to figure that Disney’s live(ish)-action Snow White reboot would lose money, but even my eyes watered when I read this morning that the oft-derided musical lost about $170 million. But get this, had Disney not produced the movie in the U.K. — and received a reported $65 million (!!!) in tax credits — then Snow White would have lost the Mouse House a jaw-dropping $235 million……and entered the Hollywood Hall of Shame as one of the 10 biggest money-losing movie of all time, somewhere between Disney’s 2012 stinker, John Carter, and Peter Berg’s Battleship from the same year.
I could go over all the reasons with you again — bad concept, Rachel Zegler, bad script, Rachel Zegler, bad casting, Rachel Zegler, bad new songs, Rachel Zegler, budget-busting reshoots, Rachel Zegler, budget-busting (and unnecessary) CGI dwarves, and also Rachel Zegler — but we’ve been over all this before. Instead, let me ask one vital question that nobody at Disney seems to have asked themselves or one another: How is it even possible to lose that much money on a picture that could have been shot for probably $100 million, with another $50 million in marketing costs? That’s an easy one: Disney spent a well-reported $336 million to produce a frickin family musical, and another estimated $100 million to market it.

Factor in those U.K. tax credits and the movie theater’s take, Snow White needed to sell around $740 million in tickets for Disney to break even. That’s almost Star Wars money. For a family musical. Absurd! At a more reasonable budget — back when studios still cared about that kind of thing — Disney would have started making money at something closer to $260 million. Had there been any grownups in charge at Disney able to enforce some cost-discipline, a $100 million Snow White would have been a much better movie than the one they made for more than three times that much. Budgets — real budgets — force everyone involved to deliver value. Disney’s reckless corporate bosses just sign the checks and pray for the best, it seems.

But there’s a bigger story to tell. Let’s look at another big loser, John McTiernan’s The 13th Warrior. It’s impossible to say exactly where it places on the list of All-Time Box Office Bombs, thanks to Hollywood’s notorious accounting gimmickry. It might have lost as “little” as $130 million (adjusted for inflation), or as much as $243 million (ditto). John Carter might be the biggest flop of all time at $274 million in today’s dollars, or maybe in 11th place at $153 million. Nobody can say for sure because nobody actually knows, not even the people who signed the checks. That’s Hollywood for you, but Snow White wasn’t shot in Hollywood. In order to qualify for the U.K.’s lavish film-production tax credits, studios like Disney must follow the U.K.’s accounting rules — and the Brits don’t put up with the tricks that we do. So you can pretty much take it to the bank that Snow White did indeed lose $170 million.

But here’s the biggest part of the story. Adjusted for inflation, and applying a bit of Kentucky windage to account for Hollywood accounting witchery, eight or maybe nine of the biggest box-office losers of all time were released in just the last 15 years.Probably seven of the next 10 did, too. In fact, out of the 139 biggest box office bombs listed on Wikipedia (for losing about $100 million or more in today’s dollars), 123 of them were made since 2000. Folks, Hollywood as we know it was born in the 1920s, and those studios basically printed money for 80 years.

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https://twitter.com/VigilantFox/status/2021610914328256676?s=20

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle February 27 2025

Feb 272025
 
 February 27, 2025  Posted by at 10:57 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  45 Responses »


El Greco La Pietà c1575

 

• US Relations With Russia Promise Rollback To Pre-Gorbachev Period (Krutikov)
• America as Republic, not as Empire (Alastair Crooke)
• US To Impose Blanket 25% Tariffs On EU – Trump (RT))
• US Can No Longer Subsidize NATO – Rubio (RT)
• Trump Says US Could Lift Russia Sanctions (RT)
• EU Trying To Block Ukraine Peace – Lavrov (RT)
• Lavrov Calls Out Europe’s Peacekeeper Plan As Ploy to Rearm Kiev (Sp.)
• Russian, US Diplomats To Meet In Istanbul On February 27 (TASS)
• Zelensky Now With Only The Dictatorship In London To Support Him (Jay)
• Ukraine Can Forget About NATO, Says Trump (ZH)
• Ukraine Should Get As Much Land ‘As Possible’ – Trump (RT)
• Most Ukrainians Abroad Won’t Come Home – Unity Minister (RT)
• Federal Government Can’t Comply With Judge’s Order To Unfreeze Funds (ET)
• Rubio Cancels EU’s Kallas At Last Minute (RT)
• NATO-Skeptic Romanian Presidential Candidate Arrested (RT)
• Tulsi Gabbard Labels CNN ‘Propaganda Arm’ Of Spies (RT)
• AG Pam Bondi Announces Thursday Release of Epstein Files (ZH)
• Trump Gaza VIDEO With Bearded Belly Dancers Sparks Outcry (RT)

 

 

 

 

https://twitter.com/i/status/1894796332206039412

Press

Paper ballot

Bongino

ComeyKash

Ron Paul

 

 

 

 

It’s been a busy first 5 weeks of the Trump team. But every single day it feels again like we are just beginning.

John Helmer posts a translation of a piece by Yevgeny Krutikov, which describes the US withdrawing its troops from Europe pretty much entirely, or at least from those parts added after 1997. Let Europe take care of Europe. Problem is, it can’t. It’s pretty much broke, and it’s hopelessly divided. It needs its own Trump and Musk, but none are in sight. I guess we must hope for Brusssels to implode sooner rather than later. But that might take pitchforks.

John Helmer: “An essay by Yevgeny Krutikov, published this week in Vzglyad, the Kremlin-funded security analysis platform, suggests senior officials at the Security Council believe in the possibility of arms withdrawal from the current battlefield and of military deconfliction with Russia – without attempting the impossible, the dismantling of the NATO membership to the 1997 cutoff. At its simplest, this would mean the withdrawal of American troops, long-range missiles and nuclear ordnance (bombs, missile warheads, targeting systems) to the lines of 1997. This would leave in place NATO security guarantees for the post-1997 member states and their territories, combined with Russian non-aggression guarantees.”

• US Relations With Russia Promise Rollback To Pre-Gorbachev Period (Krutikov)

The United States is preparing to eliminate its military presence in Europe, including Poland, the Baltic states and Kosovo, in order to normalize relations with Russia. At first, the news about this in the European media has looked like fakes, but now it appears too logical to ignore them. Is this a bluff or a real prospect of “detente”? Citing an intelligence source in an Eastern European country, Bild claims that the United States is preparing to withdraw troops from Europe. More precisely, from those bases and positions which appeared there after the expansion of NATO to the east. “According to our information, we are talking about the Russian president’s demand for 2021, that is, the withdrawal of American troops from all NATO countries that joined the alliance after 1990,” the German magazine writes. And it wants to believe this.

The facilities from which the Americans are not discussing withdrawal are the bases in Ramstein, Germany, and the United Kingdom, which existed before the collapse of the USSR. But the largest American base in Europe after Ramstein, the Kosovo Bondsteel, is allegedly preparing for liquidation, and the Italian command of the peacekeeping forces in Kosovo (KFOR) inherits its infrastructure. Currently, American military personnel (just over 600 people) in Bondsteel are not part of KFOR, this is a purely American position. In the near-sensational Bild article, it’s not so much the detail that matters as the message. This is the first (!) attempt to link President Trump’s rhetoric and plans with the creation of a new security configuration in Europe that would take into account Russia’s interests.


Map of US forces and their bases in Europe, Jan 2022

Trump himself has been talking about reducing the American military presence in Europe all the time – this has been one of his narratives since his inauguration, interspersed with demands for Europeans to “defend themselves on their own” — for example, to increase their own military spending and bring their armies to a combat-ready state. For now, threats to withdraw the United States from NATO should be regarded as deceitful and frivolous. However, events are developing at such a pace that everything seems possible. This includes the rollback of the US military presence in Europe to the “basic settings” of the pre-Gorbachev period. If the White House is really ready to discuss this with Moscow as part of the process of restoring normal relations between Russia and the United States, this is a truly revolutionary event for American foreign policy. In the light of such normalization, any other pales by comparison, including Trump’s decree that the United States now recognizes only two genders – male and female.

The simultaneous withdrawal of all American troops from Eastern Europe is a “horror story” that can be used for a variety of purposes: from attempts to influence the election campaign in Germany to fueling anti–Russian sentiment. And this “horror story” is being launched against the background of unprecedentedly harsh statements by the US authorities regarding Europe, of which the most memorable is the cavalier speech by Vice President J. D. Vance at the Munich Security Conference. In this context, it is easy to believe the panicky rumours that the United States is abandoning Europe to its fate. For the last month, Europeans have been living uncomfortably under the “American umbrella.” But the fact is that the Italian military in Kosovo are indeed showing strange activity around Bondsteel.


Left: the US Bondsteel base in Kosovo; right, red dot marks the base location on the map.

Serbian sources also confirm the possible transfer of the base under the control of KFOR, which automatically means that the Americans will leave there. The Serbs, of course, are happy; when they are happy, the information coming from them should also be treated with reasonable skepticism. That is, something is definitely afoot in Kosovo, but it is not yet clear what exactly, and in what broader context this idea should be assessed. It is noteworthy that the Bild source referred to a certain demand of Vladimir Putin from 2021. Most likely, this refers to the famous declaration of the Russian Foreign Ministry dated December 2021. No one has canceled or disavowed this document, and in theory it can indeed be on the negotiating table between the Russian Federation and the United States as a certain opening of Moscow’s diplomatic position.

Smolenskaya Square [location of the Russian Foreign Ministry comparable to Foggy Bottom for the US State Department] unequivocally claims that negotiations in Riyadh are underway not only around the Ukrainian issue, but also about the normalization or, if you want, reformatting of bilateral relations. This is not a “conference on Ukraine,” but Russian-American talks about everything. Specifically, the Istanbul agreements may become the basis for negotiations on Ukraine, but in a broader context, we really need to talk about creating a configuration of continental security that would take into account Russia’s interests. The main thing here is to take into account the threats posed to the Russian Federation by the current security organization in Europe, which has developed after the uncontrolled expansion of NATO to the east.

The problem is not only attempts to draw Ukraine or Georgia into the alliance – Trump himself calls this “involvement” a mistake which has worsened the situation on the continent. In a broader context, other examples of NATO expansion have posed a threat to the Russian Federation. The current borders and configuration of the alliance cannot be the basis for lasting peace for many years. Roughly speaking, no one feels safe right now, and the source of these worries was and remains NATO as an outdated and decaying system. In the Smolenskaya Square declaration of December 2021, the first paragraph states that the Russian Federation and the United States should act on the basis of the principles of “indivisible and equal security, without prejudice to each other’s security.” Further, this basic principle is specified in slightly less general terms, but, in fact, this is a proposal to take into account the security threats to the Russian Federation that stem from the expansion of NATO to the east.

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“Europe’s “sound and fury” after jaw-dropping pivots in U.S. policy..”

“..the ‘blitzkrieg’ was “exceptionally well-planned” and had been discussed in Trump circles since late 2020..”

“That the U.S. would in essence leave Europe to their own delusions would be a calamitous event for the Brussels technocracy.”

• America as Republic, not as Empire (Alastair Crooke)

The bits are falling into a distinct pattern – a pre-prepared pattern. Defence Secretary Hegseth at the Munich Security Conference gave us four ‘noes’: No to Ukraine in NATO; No to a return to pre-2014 borders; No to ‘Article 5’ peacekeeper backstops, and ‘No’ to U.S. troops in Ukraine. And in a final flourish, he added that U.S. troops in Europe are not ‘forever’ – and even placed a question mark over the continuity of NATO. Pretty plain speaking! The U.S. clearly is cutting away from Ukraine. And they intend to normalise relations with Russia. Then, Vice-President Vance threw his fire cracker amongst the gathered Euro-élites. He said that the élites had retreated from “shared” democratic values; they were overly reliant on repressing and censoring their peoples (prone to locking them up); and, above all, he excoriated the European Cordon Sanitaire (‘firewall’) by which European parties outside the Centre-Left are deemed non-grata politically: It’s a fake ‘threat’, he suggested.

Of what are you really so frightened? Have you so little confidence in your ‘democracy’? The U.S., he implied, will no longer support Europe if it continues to suppress political constituencies, arrest citizens for speech offenses, and particularly cancel elections as was done recently in Romania. “If you’re running in fear of your own voters”, Vance said, “there is nothing America can do for you”. Ouch! Vance had hit them where it hurts. It is difficult to say what specifically most triggered the catatonic European breakdown: Was it the fear of the U.S. and Russia joining together as a major power nexus – thus stripping Europe from ever again being able glide along on the back of American power, through the specious notion that any European state must have exceptional access to the Washington ‘ear’? Or was it the ending of the Ukraine/Zelensky cult which was so prized amongst the Euro-élite as the ‘glue’ around which a faux European unity and identity could be enforced? Both probably contributed to the fury.

That the U.S. would in essence leave Europe to their own delusions would be a calamitous event for the Brussels technocracy. Many may lazily assume that the U.S. double act at Munich was just another example of the well-known Trumpian fondness for dropping ‘wacky’ initiatives intended to both shock and kickover frozen paradigms. The Munich speeches did exactly that all right! Yet that does not make them accidental; but rather parts that fit into a bigger picture. It is clear now that the Trump blitzkrieg across the American Administrative State could not have been mounted unless carefully pre-planned and prepared over the last four years. Trump’s flurry of Presidential Executive Orders at the outset of his Presidency were not whimsical. Leading U.S. constitutional lawyer, Jonathan Turley, and other lawyers say that the Orders were well drafted legally and with the clear understanding that legal challenges would ensue. What’s more, that Trump Team welcome those challenges.

What is going on? The newly confirmed head of the Office of Budget Management (OBM), Russ Vought, says his Office will become the “on/off switch” for all Executive expenditure under the new Executive Orders. Vought calls the resulting whirlpool, the application of Constitutional radicalism. And Trump has now issued the Executive Order that reinstates the primacy of the Executive as the controlling mechanism of government. Vought, who was in OBM in Trump 01, is carefully selecting the ground for all-out financial war on the Deep State. It will be fought out firstly at the Supreme Court – which the Trump Team expect confidently to win (Trump has the 6-3 conservative majority). The new régime will then be applied across all agencies and departments of state. Expect shrieks of pain. The point here is that the Administrative State – aloof from executive control – has taken to itself prerogatives such as immunity to dismissal and the self-awarded authority to shape policy – creating a dual state system, run by unelected technocrats, which, when implanted in departments such as Justice and the Pentagon, have evolved into the American Deep State.

Article Two of the Constitution however, says very bluntly: Executive power shall be vested in the U.S. President (with no ifs or buts at all.) Trump intends for his Administration to recover that lost Executive power. It was, in fact, lost long ago. Trump is re-claiming too, the Executive’s right to dismiss ‘servants of the State’, and to ‘switch off’ wasteful expenditure at his discretion, as part of a unitary executive prerequisite. Of course, the Administrative State is fighting back. Turley’s article is headlined: They Are Taking Away Everything We Have: Democrats and Unions Launch Existential Fight. Their aim has been to cripple the Trump initiative through using politicised judges to issue restraint orders. Many mainstream lawyers believe Trump’s Unitary Executive claim to be illegal. The question is whether Congress can stand up Agencies designed to act independently of the President; and how does that square with the separation of powers and Article Two that vests unqualified executive power with one sole elected official – the U.S. President.

How did the Democrats not see this coming? Lawyer Robert Barnes essentially says that the ‘blitzkrieg’ was “exceptionally well-planned” and had been discussed in Trump circles since late 2020. The latter team had emerged from within a generational and cultural shift in the U.S.. This latter had given rise to a Libertarian/Populist wing with working class roots who often had served in the military, yet had come to despise the Neo-con lies (especially those of 9/11) that brought endless wars. They were animated more by the old John Adams adage that ‘America should not go abroad in search of monsters to slay’.

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“..asked [..] whether EU countries would retaliate in-kind to any US tariffs, Trump replied: “They can’t, I mean they can try, but they can’t.”

• US To Impose Blanket 25% Tariffs On EU – Trump (RT))

US President Donald Trump has claimed that the EU was designed to weaken America and has issued new threats of 25% tariffs on all imports from the bloc. Trump made the remarks on Wednesday at the White House during his first Cabinet meeting of his second term as president. The trade row between the US and the EU has been escalating since Trump announced plans to introduce a wide range of import duties in an effort to tackle what he describes as a trade imbalance. “Look, let’s be honest, the European Union was formed in order to screw the United States, that’s the purpose of it,” Trump told the meeting. “And they’ve done a good job of it. But now I’m president.” He reiterated that his administration plans to impose tariffs on EU imports “very soon.”

“It will be 25%, generally speaking, and that will be on cars and all other things,” Trump said, describing the EU as “a different case than Canada… they’ve really taken advantage of us in a different way.” The US and EU similarly found themselves locked in a trade dispute during Trump’s first term, when he introduced tariffs of 25% on European steel imports and 10% on aluminum, to which the EU responded with countermeasures. Trump also threatened tariffs on European cars, though those never came to pass. In total, the two sides exchanged duties on goods worth over $10 billion. As part of his current tariff push, Trump has imposed 25% duties on all steel and aluminum imports from the EU starting March 4, adding to existing tariffs. He has also directed Howard Lutnick, his nominee for US trade representative and commerce secretary, to propose new levies on a country-by-country basis by April 1 in a bid to rebalance trade.

Since taking office on January 20, Trump has slapped a 25% tariff on all imports from Mexico and Canada and an additional 10% on Chinese goods, citing concerns over illegal immigration and drug trafficking. However, following talks with the Mexican and Canadian leaders, those tariffs have been postponed for 30 days after both nations agreed to bolster border security. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen condemned the latest US tariffs, expressing “deep regret” over the decision. She said earlier this month that the levies on steel and aluminum “will not go unanswered.” Asked on Wednesday, whether EU countries would retaliate in-kind to any US tariffs, Trump replied: “They can’t, I mean they can try, but they can’t.”

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Neither can Europe.

• US Can No Longer Subsidize NATO – Rubio (RT)

Washington can no longer allow its wealthy Western European NATO allies to take advantage of US taxpayers to fund their defense budgets, Secretary of State Marco Rubio told Fox News on Wednesday. The top US diplomat was responding to comments by Friedrich Merz, whose Christian Democratic Union (CDU) won last week’s elections in Germany. Merz claimed that the US-led military bloc is in “jeopardy” due to Washington’s “indifference” toward Europe’s security. “NATO is not in jeopardy,” Rubio said. “The only thing that puts NATO in jeopardy is the fact that we have NATO allies who barely have militaries or whose militaries are not very capable because they’ve spent 40 years not spending any money on it.” The current US administration considers it unfair that some wealthy Western European member states only spend 1% to 1.5% of their GDP on defense, Rubio added.

“We just can’t keep subsidizing that,” he stressed. “These are rich countries, especially in Western Europe. They have plenty of money. They should be investing that in their national security, and they’re not.” US President Donald Trump has argued that NATO’s current defense spending target of 2% of GDP per year – already a challenge for a number of member states – is too low and should be raised to 5%. During his reelection campaign, Trump said he would “absolutely” consider leaving the bloc if members do not “pay their bills.” The US allocates around 3.4% of GDP to military expenditures, according to a 2023 estimate by the World Bank. In contrast, European NATO members spend an average of 1.9%, less than 60% of the US’ spending, Reuters reported earlier this month, citing S&P Global.

Meeting Trump’s proposed 5% military spending goal would cause France and Germany’s budget deficits to rise to 4.6% and 8.9% in 2025, respectively, compared to the current projections of 1.7% and 6%, S&P estimated. Since 2022, the US and its allies have provided more than $258 billion in aid to Ukraine, including over $134 billion in military assistance, according to Germany’s Kiel Institute. Western nations have depleted their military stockpiles and struggled to increase arms production due to deindustrialization, offshore manufacturing, green policies, and sanctions on Russian energy.

Trump claims that Washington spent up to $350 billion on Ukraine under the administration of his predecessor, Joe Biden, and has vowed to recover this money. Moscow has warned that NATO’s military aid to Ukraine effectively makes member states parties to the conflict. Trump is the first and only Western leader to acknowledge that one of the root causes of the Ukraine conflict was “the previous administration’s ‘pushy’ policy of dragging Ukraine into NATO,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said last week.

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As Europe adopts new sanctions…

• Trump Says US Could Lift Russia Sanctions (RT)

The US could lift sanctions against Russia “at some point” during the Ukraine peace negotiations, President Donald Trump indicated on Tuesday. He noted, however, that no decision has been made so far. The US and other Western nations have placed an unprecedented number of economic restrictions on Russia since the Ukraine conflict escalated in 2022. Moscow considers the sanctions illegal and has consistently demanded their removal. “No, we haven’t lifted any sanctions on anybody… I guess it will be at some point, but right now we haven’t agreed to lift sanctions on anybody,” Trump said at a press briefing, responding to a question on whether the issue has been part of Russia-US discussions so far.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio recently suggested that Western nations will have to consider lifting sanctions on Russia in order to find an “enduring, sustainable” solution to the Ukraine conflict. Speaking after high-level talks between Moscow and Washington in Saudi Arabia last week, he indicated that in order to bring an end to the conflict, “there has to be concessions made by all sides,” including letting go of sanctions policies. Rubio noted, however, that the EU will have to be “at the table” to discuss sanctions relief as well, as it has also imposed restrictive measures targeting Russia. Brussels has indicated it is prepared to pursue an independent sanctions policy regardless of Washington’s stance. EU Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis said last week that the bloc has no plans to lift sanctions against Moscow even if the US decides to do so.

Earlier this week, the EU adopted its 16th package of restrictions, largely targeting Russia’s military-industrial complex and energy projects. It also introduced additional measures against alleged sanctions circumvention, including dual-use export restrictions. Moscow has often noted that sanctions have failed to destabilize or isolate it while backfiring on the countries that imposed them. Russian President Vladimir Putin said last week that Western sanctions have inadvertently bolstered Russia’s development. Speaking at the Future Technologies Forum in Moscow, he stated that despite the challenges that Russia was forced to overcome due to the measures, they played a “stimulating role,” prompting closer collaboration between Russia’s domestic businesses and science and bolstering the country’s economic and technological sectors.

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“..Europe’s role in fomenting crises and its reputation in this area, which it has acquired over centuries, remains unchanged..”

• EU Trying To Block Ukraine Peace – Lavrov (RT)

The EU is seeking to derail the Ukraine peace process by pushing the country to continue fighting against Russia, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said. Speaking at a press conference in Qatar on Wednesday, Lavrov weighed in on a resolution drafted by the US calling for a “swift end” to the Ukraine conflict, which was approved by the UN Security Council on Monday. The document, which was supported by Russia and China, excluded strong language denouncing Moscow. The resolution also came after US President Donald Trump refused to condemn Russia over the Ukraine conflict while blaming Kiev for failing to prevent the hostilities. The Russian foreign minister said that as soon as the political landscape regarding the conflict began to shift, “Europe immediately tries to undermine this trend, announces new large packages of military aid to Kiev, incites it to continue military actions.”

Lavrov went on to state that “Europe’s role in fomenting crises and its reputation in this area, which it has acquired over centuries, remains unchanged,” adding that the EU’s approach to the conflict is “hopelessly outdated and failing.” Last week, Politico reported that the EU is preparing a military aid package worth at least €6 billion ($6.3 billion) for Ukraine, with the magazine’s sources claiming that it could potentially balloon to €10 billion as the bloc’s members “dig into their inventories to see what they can send.” Meanwhile, Trump said on Tuesday that the US is not currently supplying Ukraine with any defense assistance. Russia has condemned the Western arms shipments to Ukraine, warning that they only prolong the conflict without changing the outcome.

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Who’s going to volunteer to be a Russian target?

• Lavrov Calls Out Europe’s Peacekeeper Plan As Ploy to Rearm Kiev (Sp.)

For Russia, any course of action involving the deployment of European peacekeepers to Ukraine is out of the question, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Wednesday. “No, we cannot consider any such options,” Lavrov told reporters after talks in Doha. The approach being imposed by the Europeans, namely France and the UK, is aimed at further fueling the conflict and “pumping Kiev with weapons again”, Russia’s diplomacy chief added. US President Donald Trump stated that he believes the presence of peacekeeping forces in Ukraine is necessary in one form or another, but the format of this mission must be acceptable to all parties. Russia is not blocking negotiations on Ukraine, Lavrov said, emphasizing that the best way to resolve the conflict is to understand its root causes.

“We are waiting for our European colleagues to stop spreading lies that Russia is blocking the negotiations. Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly responded to these false claims, pointing out that the Ukrainian leadership, instigated by Europe, refuses to negotiate,” Lavrov told reporters after his visit to Qatar. Lavrov noted that European politicians assert the conflict in Ukraine should be resolved through military means rather than through negotiations. “We believe that the best help from those who sincerely want to help resolve the conflict is to understand its root causes, as [US] President Trump did recently,” Lavrov added. An upcoming Russian-US meeting that will focus on normalizing the operation of embassies will be held on February 27 in Istanbul, Lavrov said.

“We announced that our high-level diplomats and experts, will meet and consider the systemic problems that have accumulated as a result of the previous administration’s illicit activities to create artificial obstacles to the functions of the Russian embassy, to which we naturally reciprocated and also created uncomfortable conditions for the work of the US Embassy in Moscow. Such a meeting will take place tomorrow in Istanbul,” Lavrov told reporters. Based on the outcome of the talks, it will be clear how fast and efficiently both countries can move, the top diplomat added. Israel’s presence in the south of Lebanon and the south of Syria requires constructive solutions which will not violate security of any party, Lavrov said.

“At present, the Israeli armed forces have entered the south of Syria, just as they decided to stay in the south of Lebanon. All this creates a new situation, which demands not simply understanding, but working out some kind of constructive steps, which take into account the security and development interests of all the countries of the region, including, of course, Israel. But these security problems must not be solved by violating the security and development of other [countries],” Russia’s diplomacy chief said at a press conference. Lavrov also said that Russia is deeply concerned about the fact that day by day the Israeli armed forces take steps that are not envisaged in the Hamas-Israel deals and create situations which contradict the agreements and the resolutions of the UN Security Council.

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No more time to wait or waste. There are major problems to be solved..

• Russian, US Diplomats To Meet In Istanbul On February 27 (TASS)

Russian and US diplomats will hold a meeting in Istanbul on February 27 to discuss issues related to the operation of the two countries’ embassies, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov announced. “Such a meeting will take place in Istanbul tomorrow,” the top Russian diplomat said at a press conference following his visit to Qatar. “We have announced that our diplomats and high-level experts will meet to address the systemic problems that have piled up as a result of the previous [US] administration’s illegitimate activities aimed at creating artificial obstacles for the work of the Russian embassy, to which we clearly responded in kind, also creating uncomfortable conditions for the operation of the US embassy in Moscow,” Lavrov noted.

According to him, the problem of Russia’s frozen assets “has nothing to do with the operation of embassies” because “the asset issue is a state-level one.” Lavrov expects that the Istanbul meeting “will make it clear how capable the parties are of moving forward quickly and effectively.” Earlier, the top Russian diplomat announced that Moscow and Washington had held two rounds of preliminary technical consultations on the issue. Russian and US delegations held talks in Riyadh on February 18, which lasted over four hours. Russia was represented by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Presidential Aide Yury Ushakov, and CEO of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) Kirill Dmitriev. The US delegation consisted of Secretary of State Marco Rubio, National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, and Special Envoy for the Middle East Steve Witkoff.

According to Ushakov, the delegations held a serious talk on all the issues they wanted to discuss, including ways to bring Russian and US positions closer to each other and future consultations on Ukraine. Lavrov described the meeting with Washington officials as very useful. According to him, Russia and the US agreed to make sure that ambassadors to both countries are appointed as soon as possible. Rubio, in turn, said after the talks that the US and Russia had agreed to reestablish embassy staffing. Embassy staff cuts began in both countries after 2014, when Washington adopted a policy aimed at “systemic containment” of Russia.

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“Who could forget Sean Penn giving him his own Oscar, or Ben Stiller chilling with the Ukrainian leader and making small talk? Angelina Jolie is even reported to have been paid 20 million dollars to meet with him..”

• Zelensky Now With Only The Dictatorship In London To Support Him (Jay)

What is the definition of a ‘dictator’? In the days that followed Trump’s social media post calling President Zelensky one, British media seized upon the subject and ran with it for days. Various public figures were asked whether Trump was right to use the word and whether they believed Zelensky was actually one. Two figures from the right, Nigel Farage and Liz Truss both said they thought Trump was both wrong to call him one and that in fact he wasn’t one. This remarkable endearment for Zelensky is really the core of the problem in the west in particular the UK, where its leader Sir Keir Starmer declared that he would be ready to send British troops to Ukraine – a suggestion which was quickly shot down by the elites of Germany and France as preposterous. It’s rare that the giants of the EU put the British government in its place on world affairs but we are living in unprecedented times of sensational stupidity and perhaps ignorance from politicians which we have never seen before.

Farage’s views on the Middle East tell us he is both ignorant of what is happening there and doesn’t have any advisors covering the region. But his views on Ukraine are even more shockingly deranged. Zelensky is a leader who has shut down anything which resembles an ‘opposition’ both politically and media, he has conglomerated all TV stations into one state-owned entity so as to shut down even the slightest criticism or accountability of his own actions, he has had the few dissident voices arrested and thrown into prison, with some predicting that there are thousands of journalists and media workers. Add to that it is rapidly emerging that the level of corruption and embezzlement linked directly to Zelensky is on a scale that even hard line critics in the West could not have even imagined.

In my own investigation in October 2023, where a very angry Ben Wallace insulted me in a WhatsApp interview before blocking me, I outline how the original, more sensational claim that only about a third of all military equipment sent to Ukraine was actually making it to the battlefield was in fact realistic. This analogy was bandied about for some time and was dismissed by Wallace and others like Alecia Kearns MP as nonsense and yet turned out to be more than just realistic but likely. That is to say that 66 percent of what was being sent to Ukraine was being sold on the black market in Libya making Zelensky and his close circle billionaires.

In recent weeks now mainstream journalists and politicians are talking about the arms scandal and it is only a matter of time before we shall see the realities of this. The British government have always turned a blind eye to it, both in Ukraine and further afield. It would cost them nothing to do a study in the Sahel to evaluate how much of the equipment there funding terrorism is coming from the arms bazaars of Tripoli where all of this kit is ending up. I suggested to Wallace that his own government at the time should send some investigators there (Libya) to look at what’s available. I was more or less told to go there myself and do the job for them.

But Zelenksy support structure for so long has been that of a dictator, in particular media. The hundreds of media outlets in Ukraine which were receiving USAID funding is extensive, not to mention the hundreds of civil servants which support him being on the same payroll. If that doesn’t shock Farage and Truss, then consider the same slush fund which paid out around a 100 million dollars to movie stars to go and visit him and fake their adulation, all for the purposes of cheating the humble U.S. taxpayer by raising his profile.

Who could forget Sean Penn giving him his own Oscar, or Ben Stiller chilling with the Ukrainian leader and making small talk? Angelina Jolie is even reported to have been paid 20 million dollars to meet with him but didn’t even manage that and simply mooched about a but in the country before jetting back to the U.S. Of course, the celebrities all dismiss these claims, through the same left-wing woke press which is part of their extended political family. But the question we should be asking ourselves is simply this: if they were not paid, then why won’t they show up now and show support at the precise moment when Zelensky needs it the most? Given that these celebrities supported Biden and are Democrats, this would be the most logical thing for them to do. In reality, the wall of silence is what we see.

Dictators don’t stand over their hired killers and watch their victims in their final moments like Idi Amin did. In reality, they only indicate and hint to the thugs on their payroll what she should do to fix problems. Does Farage and Truss actually believe that dissidents are not rounded up and thrown into jail where they are tortured and in some cases murdered? Now that the vultures are circling over Zelensky and many are wondering how many days in office he has left, more reports are emerging with details of such cases. The story of Gonzalo Lira, the American Chilean blogger whose vlogs were often well-informed and threw a very poor spotlight on Zelensky is a very sad one as he was brutally tortured while in prison and finally died. If the Zelensky cabal can do this to an American citizen, perhaps Farage and Truss will not be too surprised when in the coming weeks we will have the same Damascus prison media moment where it transpires that there are certainly hundreds, possibly thousands of journalists, commentators and political rivals in Ukraine’s prisons.

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“The European Union was formed in order to screw the United States, that’s the purpose of it. And they’ve done a good job of it. But now I’m president.”

• Ukraine Can Forget About NATO, Says Trump (ZH)

Huge and unprecedented words issued by America’s Commander-in-Chief in a press briefing on Thursday… Trump says Ukraine can “forget about” joining NATO: “That is probably the reason why the whole thing started.” Of course, Vice President J.D. Vance earlier this month voiced this point of view of the administration while addressing a gathering of defense leaders in Brussels. But never before has a US president so forcefully voiced that a path to NATO membership simply won’t happen. This also marks the most directly Trump has ever said NATO expansion is a key reason for the tragic war, which has taken hundreds of thousands of lives, having started in the first place. Mainstream media fact-checkers have been out in force, decrying this perspective as ‘Russian propaganda’. But is this really the case?

The head of NATO itself in the recent past said the quiet part out loud and fully admitted that constant NATO expansion to Russia’s doorstep was a central driving factor: “From the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we’ve been told that the issue of NATO expansion is irrelevant to the war, and that anyone bringing it up is, at best, unwittingly parroting Kremlin propaganda, at worst, apologizing for or justifying the war. So it was curious to see NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg earlier this month say explicitly that Russian president Vladimir Putin launched his criminal war as a reaction to the possibility of NATO expanding into Ukraine, and the alliance’s refusal to swear it off — not once or twice, but three separate times.

“President Putin declared in the autumn of 2021, and actually sent a draft treaty that they wanted NATO to sign, to promise no more NATO enlargement,” Stoltenberg told a joint committee meeting of the European Parliament on September 7. “That was what he sent us. And [that] was a pre-condition for not invade [sic] Ukraine. Of course we didn’t sign that.” “He went to war to prevent NATO, more NATO, close to his borders. He has got the exact opposite,” Stoltenberg reiterated, referring to the accession of Sweden and Finland into the alliance in response to Putin’s invasion. Their entry, he later insisted, “demonstrates that when President Putin invaded a European country to prevent more NATO, he’s getting the exact opposite.” How much clearer could the then NATO Secretary-General have said it (in the Sept. 2023 comments)?

https://twitter.com/i/status/1706173936025874767

How much clearer could the then NATO Secretary-General have said it (in the Sept. 2023 comments)?Trump also on Wednesday blasted the European Union… “The European Union was formed in order to screw the United States, that’s the purpose of it. And they’ve done a good job of it. But now I’m president.” Among other things, Europe has lately been accused of seeking to thwart Trump’s peace plan for Ukraine, even offering a rival rare earth minerals deal. The Europeans and Ukrainians have been cut out of direct negotiations with Moscow under Rubio.

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Aka very little.

• Ukraine Should Get As Much Land ‘As Possible’ – Trump (RT)

US President Donald Trump has said he wants Ukraine to regain as much territory “as possible” under a potential peace deal with Russia. He claimed that Moscow will have to make concessions, but that the agreement should ultimately represent the best possible outcome for both parties if finalized. Five formerly Ukrainian regions have voted to join Russia since 2014. While Kiev rejects the territorial changes, Moscow views them as final and non-negotiable. Following a cabinet meeting on Wednesday, Trump was asked if a peace deal that involved Russia maintaining control over Ukrainian-claimed land could send a message to China detrimental to American interests. ”We’re going to do the best we can to make the best deal we can for both sides,” Trump responded, adding that for Kiev that means “they can get as much back as possible.”

Although an agreement is not guaranteed, Trump expressed hope that it would materialize “for the sake of humanity.” If a resolution is reached, Trump stressed that Ukraine “can forget about” joining NATO as this aspiration lies at the heart of the ongoing conflict. He asserted that Russia will “have to” make concessions as well. Earlier in the day, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov indicated that Moscow would reject a truce that merely freezes the conflict along the current front line, leaving parts of Russian territory under Ukrainian jurisdiction. ”Some propose maintaining the line of engagement – this section is Russian, that one is Ukrainian… That won’t happen, as we have a Constitution reflecting the will of the people,” Lavrov said, referencing the referendums held in the five former Ukrainian regions.

Trump’s approach marks a departure from his predecessor Joe Biden’s strategy of isolating Russia, as he seeks to normalize bilateral relations. Both Moscow and Washington suggest that this shift provides hope for a swift resolution to the Ukraine conflict. Additionally, the Trump administration aims to recover taxpayer funds spent during Biden’s tenure through a forthcoming minerals deal with Kiev, expected to be signed on Friday. The new US administration has declined to offer security guarantees to Ukraine, arguing that the country holds minimal interest for American priorities and that European nations should address the issue instead.

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There’s nothing left to come home to but a crazed dictator and some neo-nazis in a barren landscape.

• Most Ukrainians Abroad Won’t Come Home – Unity Minister (RT)

The majority of Ukrainians who left the country over the past three years will not return to their homeland even after the military conflict ends, Minister of National Unity Aleksey Chernyshov has said, according to local media reports. An estimated over 5 million Ukrainians are still living abroad, three years since the conflict escalated. Kiev wants them back as it seeks to address the country’s imploding demographics, boost conscription and generate human resources for the post-conflict reconstruction. The minister reportedly claimed on Tuesday that 30% of Ukrainians currently abroad are “seriously considering coming back” when the security situation stabilizes, according to Ekonomicheskaya Pravda. “We also clearly understand that a significant portion of Ukrainians will not return,” the national unity minister said. “They have decided to stay where they are. This is not a catastrophe, it must be acknowledged.”

Chernyshov said that Kiev is developing measures to encourage people to return and cited statistics indicating that Ukraine loses 300,000 people annually for reasons unrelated to the conflict. “For post-conflict recovery and doubling Ukraine’s GDP within 10 years, it will be necessary to attract between 3.1 to 4.2 million repatriates and immigrants,” he noted. A study by the Ukrainian think tank Center for Economic Strategy (CES) published last week found that around 5.2 million Ukrainian refugees remain abroad, of which 60% plan to settle outside their homeland. Meanwhile, the share of those considering returning home had dropped to 43% by the end of 2024, compared to 74% in December 2022. The exodus peaked in March 2022, when around 2.5 million people left the country within weeks. Since then, the outflow has slowed, with around 300,000 people departing Ukraine last year, the CES said.

The agency estimates that up to 2.7 million Ukrainians may choose to remain abroad permanently, even after the conflict ends. The majority of refugees are women and children, while Germany and Poland are the most popular destinations, a Eurostat report published earlier this month showed. The report also revealed that the share of adult men fleeing Ukraine has jumped by nearly 10% over the past year amid the massive mobilization campaign. This prolonged emigration could have devastating consequences for Ukraine’s economy. CES projects it could reduce the country’s annual GDP by 5.1% to 7.8%. According to the think tank, the primary reasons Ukrainians are not currently returning home include the ongoing security threats, destroyed housing, low living standards, and difficulties in securing employment in Ukraine.

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Remember Alastair Crooke: “..the Orders were well drafted legally and with the clear understanding that legal challenges would ensue..”

• Federal Government Can’t Comply With Judge’s Order To Unfreeze Funds (ET)

Federal officials told a U.S. judge on Feb. 25 that they could not comply with his order requiring the release of frozen foreign aid within two days. U.S. District Judge Amir H. Ali’s order, which gave a deadline of Feb. 26 at 11:59 p.m. ET, would mean paying at least $1.5 billion across some 2,000 outstanding and newly created requests for payment to the U.S. Agency for International Development, the official serving as deputy administrator for the agency said in a court filing. It would also require paying at least $400 million to resolve outstanding payment requests to the State Department, Pete Marocco, the official, said. “These payments cannot be accomplished in the time allotted by the Court and would instead take multiple weeks,” he wrote.

Earlier on Tuesday, Ali, in a hearing with government lawyers and attorneys representing the groups that sued over the freeze, was told that the groups had not yet been paid despite his multiple previous orders, including one on Feb. 13, mandating that the Trump administration unfreeze the foreign assistance. “I’m not sure why I can’t get a straight answer from you on this: Are you aware of an unfreezing of the disbursement of funds for those contracts and agreements that were frozen before Feb. 13,” the Washington-based judge asked Indraneel Sur, the lawyer for the government, during the hearing. “Are you aware of steps taken to actually release those funds?” “I’m not in a position to answer that,” Sur said. It’s the second time a judge has found the Trump administration did not follow a court order. U.S. District Court Judge John McConnell in Rhode Island also found this month that the administration had not fully unfrozen federal grants and loans within the United States after he blocked sweeping plans for a pause on trillions of dollars in government spending.

In the Washington case, plaintiffs recently filed an emergency motion to enforce the judge’s temporary restraining order, saying they’re still owed millions of dollars and that their contracts terminated under Trump’s foreign assistance pause remain terminated. Ali granted the emergency motion during Tuesday’s hearing and ordered the government to comply by Thursday. Marocco’s declaration came with a motion from the government asking the judge to stay his order as a federal appeals court considers overturning it. “Defendants are likely to succeed on appeal from the Court’s order for several reasons,” government lawyers said in the filing. “To start, it is not possible for Defendants to comply,” they said, pointing to Marocco’s declaration. The government has appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.

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A subtle hint.

• Rubio Cancels EU’s Kallas At Last Minute (RT)

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has cancelled a meeting with EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas at the last minute “due to scheduling issues,” Euronews reported on Wednesday. Kallas, who is on an official visit to Washington to discuss the Ukraine conflict and new dynamics in transatlantic relations, intends to meet with representatives from the US Congress and Senate, according to her spokesperson cited by the EU’s news network. The bloc’s top diplomat had been scheduled to meet with Rubio on Wednesday, and news agencies had expected images from the bilateral talks, Euronews wrote. However, a spokesperson for the US official told the outlet that the meeting had been cancelled “due to scheduling issues,” adding that Kallas and Rubio “last met during the Munich Security Conference” earlier in February. According to the report, Rubio’s public calendar for February 26 did not list Kallas as an agenda item.

Former Estonian prime minister Kallas has been critical of the new US administration’s handling of the Ukraine conflict, denouncing President Donald Trump’s call with Russian leader Vladimir Putin earlier this month as a form of “appeasement.” She has accused Washington of adopting a “Russian narrative” and argued that Brussels should “support Ukraine right now more than ever.” Kallas also claimed that Moscow emerged as the winner in the recent US-Russia meeting in Saudi Arabia, stressing that any peace deal concerning Ukraine must involve both Europeans and Ukrainians to be effective. Following the Riyadh talks on February 18, Kallas held a phone call with Rubio, later warning, “Russia will try to divide us. Let’s not walk into their traps.” On Monday, while announcing the now-cancelled meeting with Rubio, Kallas stated “I have been very clear that no deal without us, without Ukraine or without Europe will work in practice – and that is for the US, which also needs to work with us.”

An unnamed EU diplomat commented on the canceled meeting for Politico, saying it “seems that the Trump administration doesn’t miss a chance to show that for them the EU is not a player.” On Tuesday, the Russian Foreign Ministry stated that the aggressive stance of Ukraine’s EU backers makes them unfit to participate in the peace process. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov further accused Brussels on Wednesday of attempting to derail peace efforts by encouraging Kiev to continue fighting against Russia. Kallas has recently suggested extending arms deliveries to Ukraine into 2025. The proposed package, worth €10 billion (over $10 billion), has faced resistance from some EU member states and is set for discussion at the March 6 summit of the bloc. Moscow has repeatedly warned against Western arms shipments to Ukraine, arguing that they only prolong the conflict without altering the outcome, while increasing the risk of a direct Russia-NATO confrontation.

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Europe is full of highly unpopular “leaders”. Who target the few that are actually loved.

• NATO-Skeptic Romanian Presidential Candidate Arrested (RT)

Romanian police have arrested Calin Georgescu, the front-runner in last year’s annulled presidential election, and conducted dozens of raids on his supporters and people tied to his campaign, local media reported on Wednesday. A critic of NATO and the EU and an opponent of sending aid to Ukraine, Georgescu made headlines in November last year when he unexpectedly garnered 23% of the vote in the first round of the presidential election in Romania. However, the Constitutional Court annulled the results shortly before the second round, citing intelligence documents alleging ‘irregularities’ in his campaign. Georgescu’s communications team has said on Facebook that he was arrested just as he was about to submit his new candidacy for the presidency.

”The system stopped him in traffic and he was pulled over for questioning at the Prosecutor General’s Office! Where is democracy, where are the partners who must defend democracy,” his team wrote. Prior to his arrest, Georgescu condemned the raids on his supporters in a post on Facebook. “The communist-Bolshevik system continues its odious abuses,” he wrote, accusing the Romanian authorities of trying to “invent evidence to justify the theft of the elections and to do anything to block my new candidacy for the presidency.” The Romanian Prosecutor General’s Office is reportedly investigating Georgescu over allegations of involvement “in a fascist organization and the promotion of controversial ideologies and historical figures in the public space,” G4Media outlet reported, citing sources close to the investigation. According to media reports, police found “weapons, live ammunition, and more than a million dollars hidden in a safe” during the raids.

Following the reports of Georgescu’s arrest, dozens of people gathered in front of the Prosecutor General’s office, chanting his name. The president of the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR) party, George Simion, said his MPs have also made their way to the Prosecutor General’s office to demand an explanation. Digi24 quoted Simion as saying that he maintains his support for Georgescu and that “until we see undeniable evidence, we suspect that this is political policing.” He added that so far, “not a single piece of evidence” has been presented. Georgescu’s surprise election victory last year and the subsequent annulment over unproven claims of Russian interference in the electoral process sparked controversy in the country. Both conservative and liberal parties have suggested that the establishment parties – the Social Democratic Party (PSD) and the center-right National Liberal Party (PNL) – are trying to hold on to power by pulling strings within the Constitutional Court.

The canceled election over alleged ‘Russian meddling’ has also been criticized by US officials. Speaking at the Munich Security Conference earlier this month, Vice President J.D. Vance suggested that “old entrenched interests” in Romania are “hiding behind ugly, Soviet-era words like misinformation and disinformation” and “don’t like the idea that somebody with an alternative viewpoint might… win an election.” Throughout his election campaign, Georgescu repeatedly insisted on Romania’s geopolitical non-alignment and highlighted national sovereignty and self-sufficiency. While expressing skepticism towards Western influence over the country’s policies and criticizing both NATO and the EU, he stated that Romania would respect its commitments to these organizations, but only “to the extent that they will respect theirs” toward Bucharest. He also vowed to halt Romania’s military aid to Ukraine if elected.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1894722137941749825

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Dismissed/disgruntled/disloyal spies.

• Tulsi Gabbard Labels CNN ‘Propaganda Arm’ Of Spies (RT)

Newly confirmed US Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Tulsi Gabbard has accused CNN of acting as a “propaganda arm” for disloyal intelligence agents, calling the network’s report on potential retaliation by dismissed spies an “indirect threat” to President Donald Trump’s administration. As part of Trump’s broader effort to downsize and restructure the federal government, the Central Intelligence Agency has recently offered so-called buyouts to its agents. In a report published on Monday, CNN, citing unnamed sources, claimed that some senior CIA officers were “quietly discussing” how the dismissals “risk creating a group of disgruntled former employees who might be motivated to take what they know to a foreign intelligence service.” “I am curious about how they think this is a good tactic to keep their job,” Gabbard told Fox News on Tuesday.

“They are exposing themselves, essentially, by making this indirect threat – using their propaganda arm, CNN, that they’ve used over and over again – to reveal their hand,” she continued. “Their loyalty is not to America, not to the American people or the Constitution; it is to themselves.” She stressed that these disgruntled employees are “exactly the kinds of people we need to root out, get rid of, so that the patriots who do work in this area, who are committed to our core mission, can actually focus on that.” Gabbard also claimed that many within the intelligence community had reached out to her personally, expressing support for Trump’s efforts to “clean house” and refocus on the core mission of serving the American people.

A former US congresswoman from Hawaii, Gabbard rose to national prominence in 2016 when she resigned as vice chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) to endorse Bernie Sanders for president. She later ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020, advocating against US military interventions abroad, which she argued are harmful to service members like herself and detrimental to national interests. As tensions with the Democratic Party escalated, Gabbard left the party in 2022. After two years as an independent, she joined the Republican Party and endorsed Donald Trump during the 2024 presidential campaign.

Trump’s nomination of Gabbard for the top intelligence role in November sparked criticism from establishment figures, who labeled her a security risk. Despite the backlash, she was confirmed earlier this month by a 52-48 Senate vote, with only one Republican, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, opposing her appointment. In January, the Senate also confirmed another Trump nominee, John Ratcliffe, as director of the CIA in a 74-25 vote. Ratcliffe, a former Texas congressman and ex-director of national intelligence during Trump’s first term, is known for his skepticism of intelligence agencies and his criticism of investigations into alleged Russian interference in the 2016 election.

CIA

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“..this will make you sick..”

We’ll see a lot of comments on redactions. Pam better be careful.

• AG Pam Bondi Announces Thursday Release of Epstein Files (ZH)

Attorney General Pam Bondi announced on Wednesday evening that she’s going to release DOJ files on dead pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. “You said last week that you had the Epstein files on your desk. When can we see them?” asked Fox News’ Jesse Watters. “Jesse, there are well over – this will make you sick, 200 victims. Well over… over 250 actually. So we have to make sure that their identity is protected, and their personal information. But other than that, I think tomorrow Jesse – breaking news right now, you’re going to see some Epstein information being released by my office.” “What kind? Are we going to see who was on the flights? Are we going to see any evidence from what he recorded – because he had all of his homes wired with recording devices,” Watters asked. “What you’re going to see, hopefully tomorrow, is a lot of flight logs, a lot of names, a lot of information… it’s pretty sick what that man did,” Bondi continued.

Epstein, a financier and convicted sex offender was found dead in a New York jail cell while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. While his death was rules a suicide, he was also good friends with the Clintons and several other high-profile figures such as Bill Gates, Britain’s Prince Andrew, former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, former Barclays CEO and ‘Disney princess’ aficionado Jes Staley, Larry Summers, Harvey Weinstein, and former Victoria’s Secret boss Les Wexner. Watters’ question about recordings stems from earlier reporting that the deceased sex trafficker’s homes were wired with recording devices. In late 2019, Jeffrey Epstein victim Maria Farmer alleged that the deceased pedophile had a “media room” on the first floor where high-profile johns were allegedly recorded having sex with women and children.

“So if you’re facing the house, there’s a window on the right that’s barred – that’s the room, the ‘media room’ is what he called it,” Farmer said. “And so there was a door that looked like an invisible door with all this limestone and everything and you push it and you go in and I saw all the cameras.” Maria said: “What it was – was like old televisions basically, like stacked.” “They were monitors inside this cabinet and there were men sitting here and I looked on the cameras and I saw toilet, toilet, bed, bed, toilet, bed. “And I was like I’m never going to use the restroom here and I am never going to sleep here.” -The Sun

The claim was supported in a 2024 lawsuit by two women – Danielle Bensky and Jane Doe 3, who said Epstein employed a sophisticated system involving constant CCTV surveillance within his New York mansion. Bondi’s appearance came hours after the DOJ appeared to give Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL) the brush-off, telling her in a Wednesday letter that they are “reviewing your requests and look forward to engaging further to accommodate your oversight and legislative needs.” On the campaign trail, Donald Trump suggested that he would be open to releasing the Epstein list, while Bondi said in November that anyone named in the documents who are “still fighting to keep their names private, Sean, they have no legal basis to do so unless they’re a child, a victim or a cooperating defendant.”

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Opens in new tab/window. No comment needed.Note: Trump did not make this.

• Trump Gaza VIDEO With Bearded Belly Dancers Sparks Outcry (RT)

A video re-envisioning Gaza as a lavish resort complete with bearded belly dancers and dollar bills raining down posted on US President Donald Trump’s social media channel has elicited a backlash from users. The clip, which appears to be AI-generated and comes after the US leader recently suggested turning Gaza into a “Riviera of the Middle East,” appeared on Truth Social on Tuesday. The 30-second clip begins with what appear to be current scenes of destruction in Gaza, with barefoot children running between wrecked buildings. The wreckage then morphs into a futuristic-looking Gaza with skyscrapers reminiscent of Dubai, pristine beaches, casinos, and opulent hotels branded “Trump Gaza.” The video depicts an AI-rendered Trump enjoying the local attractions, including sunbathing alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Elon Musk, also AI-rendered, is seen dining on the beach, surrounded by what appear to be bearded belly dancers. The video also features larger-than-life golden statues of Trump and kids frolicking under a shower of dollar bills.

The video is accompanied by a jingle with lyrics praising Trump’s supposed vision for Gaza:
“Donald is coming to set you free, bringing the light for all to see,
No more tunnels, no more fear, Trump Gaza is finally here.
Trump Gaza is shining bright, a golden future, a brand new light,
Feast and dance, the deed is done, Trump Gaza number one!”

Trump suggested earlier this month that the US was prepared to take control of Gaza and transform it into a resort. He has reiterated the idea several times since, claiming that because the enclave is unsafe to live in, it should be raised completely to the ground and rebuilt. While Israel applauded Trump’s initiative, other regional players and many global powers have strongly opposed it, particularly given that it would mean relocating Palestinians living in the enclave to neighboring countries. Trump’s video has so far drawn significant backlash over its tone and messaging, even from the US leader’s own supporters. Users on Truth Social described the clip as “horrible,” “creepy,” and “in poor taste.”

“I hate this. I love our president, but this is horrible,” one user wrote on Truth Social. “This feels all wrong and actually makes me sick,” another user stated. “I could not be a bigger supporter of President Trump but this particular video is in very poor taste!” another one wrote. Some suggested that the bearded belly dancers and golden statues were excessive, while others questioned whether the video had actually come from Trump’s team. “Something does not add up here??? Really does not feel that this is something Trump would post!! Wonder if someone is messing with his account??!! I surely hope so!! Very creepy!!” a user wrote. Several more suggested that Trump should “strongly re-evaluate” the communications team responsible for creating the video. Neither Trump nor his administration has commented on the video, nor was the clip accompanied by any explanation or caption.

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Catwalk
https://twitter.com/i/status/1894497772797141391

 

 

Owl

 

 

Donkey
https://twitter.com/i/status/1894819783696359446

 

 

Dachs

 

 

Trust

 

 

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Godspeed, DJT

Jan 202025
 
 January 20, 2025  Posted by at 6:23 pm Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,  28 Responses »


Johannes Vermeer The art of painting 1666-8

 

I was going to write something happy and positive and optimistic, about a future that looks brighter after spending 4 years out in the wilderness. But then I saw that the Democrats have pardoned the worst amongst themselves, and thereby every single one of them, for everything they’ve done over these 4 years, and before it. The entire Democratic party has been placed above the law, along with their Republican friends. The USA is now officially a lawless state.

That is something to think hard about. Because why would you still maintain a judicial system, with courts and judges and prosecutors, if that system doesn’t apply to a large group of people? I can’t think of a good reason. The rule of law in America is now an abstract idea that belongs in the past. What might be good about this is that the Dems have lost any and all future rights to go after any and all Republicans. But it still doesn’t sit well.

You can forgive someone for something they’ve done, but you can’t pardon them for what they might have done, or perhaps even still might do. That is literally a licence to kill. And that has to be illegal. Even if you are the President. It also violates the Constitution, and in too many ways to count. Ergo: the US is no longer a constitutional republic. It’s now all bananas all the way down.

Biden’s pre-emptive pardons have changed the country forever, though of course nobody realizes it at the moment it happens. From now on in, anything goes. Lying to Congress? No problem. Murder? Don’t give it a second thought. Just as long as you get along with whoever is President, or who functions as such, you will be pardoned.

The American people have long seen this coming. We know this because of the Nov. 4 election result, but perhaps even more because of the plummeting “attendance” numbers of the media the Dems use to spread their – often lying- messages. WaPo, NYT, CNN, MSNBC, they’re all on their deathbeds. And they owe it to themselves. They all had the option to tell the truth, and they all chose not to. But for them there is no presidential pardon. I’m watching CNN’s coverage of the inauguration as I write this, and they haven’t learned a thing.

Eventually, there will be new forms of “news”. But people won’t place their full trust in one or two sources anymore. Perhaps they will find what they need at X, but it’s too early to tell. What we know for sure is it won’t be at WaPo or MSNBC. And anyway, news about what? A banana republic.

 

So how is Donald Trump going to turn this mess into a viable nation again? Perhaps the only way is to sue Joe Biden for issuing his pardons the way he did. And Joe’s about the only one who’s not yet been pardoned (at the very last moment he just pardoned his entire family as well). But that is not Trump’s style. Still, how do you officially forgive someone for blowing up the Republic?

Yes, Trump at any point in the next 4 years can pardon anyone for anything, but that’s all Biden’s left for him. He didn’t leave him a constitutional republic. This blanket pardon power is handy when you surround yourself with people who habitually break the law, but not if you respect the republic. Then it turns against you.

We all wish Trump all the best. But he doesn’t only need to govern his country better, he has to completely rebuild it, the trust in it. And that’s only if he can, and if it is at all possible.

When you say “God bless the USA”, what exactly are you asking him to bless? The nation the Founders meant to build, or the empty shell the Democrats today left you with?

There are great hopes for Trump and the exceptional team he brings to the tasks ahead, but do they really understand what those tasks are?

 

Godspeed, DJT.

 

 

Debt Rattle December 27 2024

Dec 272024
 
 December 27, 2024  Posted by at 11:02 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , ,  60 Responses »


Giuseppe Arcimboldo Four elements – Water 1566

 

• Musk Backs Idea That Trump ‘Should Be Able To Fire’ Any Official (RT)
• The Musk-Led Manufacturing Revolution Nobody Is Talking About (ZH)
• Trump Defines A ‘New Geography’ For American Security (JTN)
• ‘Stop Donating To Wokepedia’ – Musk (RT)
• Musk Issues Bankruptcy Warning (RT)
• Putin Reveals Biden Offered To Postpone Ukraine’s NATO Entry (ZH)
• Western Europeans Losing Faith In Ukraine (RT)
• Germany Is Doomed Because Of This Grave Mistake (Romanenko)
• Milei Unveils Ambitious Plan To Make Argentina Global Nuclear Energy Player (ZH)
• A Christmas Prayer (James Howard Kunstler)
• Preservationists Say Wind Energy Is Harming America’s Historic Sites (JTN)
• What Was So Different This Time About Trump’s Election? (VDH)
• Mollie Hemingway Takes House Ethics Report on Matt Gaetz APART (Twitchy)
• CNN Loses Chunks of Viewership as Ratings Dive Into Death Spiral (Sp.)

 

 

 

 

Rogan Vance

Dems

Nvidia

O’Leary

 

 

 

 

It’s Chris Wray who broke neutrality and politicized the FBI director role by turning against Trump. It would be crazy if he stayed on.

• Musk Backs Idea That Trump ‘Should Be Able To Fire’ Any Official (RT)

Elon Musk believes US President-elect Donald Trump should be able to make any personnel changes in the executive branch of the government that he deems necessary, according to a post he made on X on Thursday. Musk’s statement came in response to an idea voiced by Utah Senator Mike Lee, who wrote in an earlier post that “the president of the United States should be able to fire any person employed in the Executive Branch… at any time for any reason,” with the exception of the vice president. Musk seconded the notion, responding “Absolutely.” The executive branch consists of the president, his or her cabinet, as well as various executive departments, independent agencies, and other boards. Lee was commenting on Trump’s plans to make several personnel changes in the government upon returning to the White House that some view as unconventional.

Following his victory in the November election, Trump started naming nominees for senior positions within his administration. However, according to the Washington Times, at least two of the positions are not scheduled to be vacated for several years, including the position of FBI director, currently occupied by Christopher Wray, and IRS commissioner, held by Danny Werfel. According to the New York Times, under Congress rules officials in these and several other posts have fixed terms and do not traditionally change as part of a transition when a new president comes in. Ousting and replacing the heads of these agencies is considered a breach of tradition. However, experts note that the president has the legal power to so. “Historically, there was more of a political constraint on removing someone before their term was over unless there was some bad behavior. The political handbrake is eroding, and it may be no longer functioning,” David Lewis, a political scientist at Vanderbilt University who studies presidential nominations, told the Washington Times.

Trump repeatedly vowed throughout his presidential campaign to completely remake the US government. He pitched Musk and fellow billionaire Vivek Ramaswamy to co-head the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a body that will be tasked with reducing government waste and streamlining the federal bureaucracy. Ramaswamy recently unveiled a plan to slash the federal workforce by 75%. Trump’s pick for the next FBI director is his former adviser Kash Patel, an ultra-loyalist who slammed the agency as a “government gangster,” accusing it in his most recent book of being behind the “deep state corruption” in the US. Billy Long, a former Republican congressman from Missouri, was pitched by Trump as the next head of the Internal Revenue Service. Long previously co-sponsored bills to abolish the federal tax authority and replace the federal income tax system with a national sales tax.

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Tesla doesn’t just optimize the -new- product, but also the production process. Seems obvious, but isn’t.

• The Musk-Led Manufacturing Revolution Nobody Is Talking About (ZH)

When most analysts discuss Tesla, they focus on new vehicles or the electric vehicle company’s advancements in autonomy. Yet, according to Launch i/o CEO Jeff Lutz, one of the most significant—and under-discussed—developments at Tesla is happening not in its design studios or on the road, but in its factories. Lutz, a former executive at Google and Motorola, argues that Tesla’s true innovation isn’t just the electric vehicles or robots it’s building, but how those products are being made. The company’s first-principles approach to manufacturing is a radical departure from the industry norm, focusing not just on cheap labor or existing models, but on rethinking the entire production process.

Tesla is creating factories that are the product—designing, testing, and perfecting every element just as they do with their cars. This focus on manufacturing efficiency, Lutz believes, will lead to a dramatic reduction in production costs, potentially bringing them closer to zero. And this shift in how products are built—rather than merely assembled—could set a new standard for the entire manufacturing world.

FARZAD MESBAHI: It’s no wonder that innovation has been lacking so much it’s because we’ve brute forced essentially manufacturing by leveraging globalization because we had that $2 an hour rate in China or Mexico wherever else like we’re not like well we have to just get really good at building stuff to be competitive I was like nah just let him do it like we’ll get get our margins just let them do it.

JEFF LUTZ: The most under-discussed thing in the analyst world about Tesla is not the new vehicles coming, nor the growing discussions about autonomy, but rather Tesla’s next product: their new way of manufacturing. It’s a big deal, a huge step in how products are made today, and I don’t think many investment firms have the right research people actually looking into what this impact is and what it’s going to enable. It’s going to enable the variable cost to build products to shrink further and further, approaching zero.

This is the step function needed for cost reduction to achieve further scale, and I don’t think enough people are talking about it. It’s going to be how the Cybertruck is made, how Optimus will be made. Tesla versions its factories like they version their product. They spend time perfecting it and have design reviews of their factory designs just as they do with their products. They have specs and performance attributes they are trying to meet. This is very different from what happens at other companies at the executive level.

FARZAD MESBAHI: This is such a profound statement because a lot of the stories that I hear are related to, like, say Tesla capitalizing on making manufacturing the product—really just honing in so much on the factory that it becomes the product, the you know, and where we throw around 2 million cars per year, five million cars per year per factory, tens of millions of bots per year sooner than people think. The usual narrative is crazy, pie-in-the-sky; they can’t do that, look at Ford, look at BYD, they can only do so much.

But what we’re missing here is that we’ve had decades of just sitting on our asses, leveraging cheaper labor versus going out of our way to really push the boundaries of engineering and manufacturing. And now that we have a company that’s willing to do that because the leader is viewing that as a first principles approach to manufacturing, right? Instead of like, okay, cheap labor is good, but why aren’t we pushing manufacturing and engineering as much as we can to make this as efficient and as productive as possible?

Of course they’re extremely talented, they’re doing something very unique, but it’s also on the backs of 30-40 years of, I’m going to call it laziness. Like, you’re just taking the easy way out, and I get it, more profits, you’re taking care of shareholders—I get it—but you’re not really pushing the boundaries of manufacturing. I think what this leads to is, if companies and leaders truly take this to heart, we’re going to see an explosion in manufacturing across the board. It’s not just going to be a Tesla thing; I think we’re going to see it all over the place.

JEFF LUTZ: I’m advising companies on this now, you’re going to see massive localization of manufacturing. People think costs just instantly go up when you do that. They do unmitigated, but if you’re a company like Tesla and you’re thinking about it the way they do, they’re actually focused on localizing and making costs go down. Think of it, how many auto factories are expanding in Germany? Just answer that question.

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“Trump’s posts on Christmas Day were intentionally provocative, designed to push Americans to think bigger and to create an environment for deal-making..”

• Trump Defines A ‘New Geography’ For American Security (JTN)

Making Canada the 51st state. Retaking control of the Panama Canal. Buying Greenland. Donald Trump made a series of Christmas pronouncements that legacy media dismissed as classic bravado unworthy of serious consideration, but those who advise the President-elect say there is a more calculating intent behind his recent social media flurry. America’s soon-to-be-47th president is laying the groundwork, they say, for a new strategic map designed to guarantee the security of America and western democracies in an era in which an aggressive China is imposing influence far outside its traditional Pacific region. “I think Trump is looking at the world from a new geography standpoint and asking how do we increase the zone of countries that are truly committed to freedom, and how do we make sure, how do we provide a very deep security belt around the United States,” former Trump State Department policy adviser Kiron Skinner told the John Solomon Reports podcast in an interview slated to be aired Friday.

In that mission, Trump is trying to educate the public with his provocative statements about the need to look at the world in a new light as American influence in Latin America, Africa, Europe and Asia has waned under the Biden administration, experts said. The Cold War paradigm that dominated more than a half century is no longer operative. A nuclear North Korea, an aspiring nuclear power in radically Islamist Iran and a Beijing communist government that craftily placed its contractors on the entries and exits of one of the world’s most important shipping passages requires a jarring change to strategic thinking, something the State Department has lacked for years, experts said.

“People forget that this issue has been a key one for President Trump. He has talked about the Panama Canal throughout the campaign, and he repeatedly and correctly noted that this remarkable geostrategic asset was frittered away gratis under Jimmy Carter,” Seb Gorka, who will soon join the National Security Council as Trump’s counterterrorism chief, told Just the News. “The fact that the port facilities at both ends of the canal would fall under the control of entities tied to China was never part of original agreement with Panama,” Gorka added. “The President has been clear that America’s economic might and full pallet of tariffs tools may be used to guarantee that the canal is operated in ways that comport with the economic and national interests of the United States.”

Trump’s posts on Christmas Day were intentionally provocative, designed to push Americans to think bigger and to create an environment for deal-making when he comes president, retired Army Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer said. “He always goes in from a position that gets people’s attention. And then once people kind of flail around … people settle down and they start having a realistic, adult discussion,” Shaffer told Newsmax on Thursday Calling unpopular Prime Minister Justin Trudeau a “governor,” suggesting Canada would become America’s 51st state and proclaiming America will buy Greenland from Denmark set the stage for making realistic security gains in the near future, one of Trump’s former advisers predicted.

“These are strategic areas that the United States needs to have dominant influence over,” former Deputy National Security Adviser Victoria Coates told the Just the News, No Noise television show on Thursday night. “Start with the Panama Canal. That was President Reagan originally. That was the hallmark of his 1976 primary campaign. It’s ours. We paid for it, and that is all true. It was President Carter who subsequently just unilaterally gave it back to Panama.” “We pay exorbitant fees. Meanwhile, Panama has gone into agreements with China for special economic zones on either side of the canal. That’s intolerable. All that has to change,” she added.

“As for Canada, which should be a great partner to the United States, hopefully they’ll be under new leadership next month, and … we could really dominate the world energy market.” She predicted Trump’s comments on Greenland might soon expand the U.S. military relations there to an energy and resource collaboration like what America struck in Saudi Arabia with the company Aramco. “Think about Aramco, for example, in Saudi Arabia, how successful that was of a partnership between Saudi and the United States,” she said The “am” in Aramco stands for America, that you can develop resources that way and keep China out. “There are lots of reasons that the former and now President-elect should be talking about these places. These are all direct interests for national security for America, and thank heaven he’s doing it,” she added.

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“..he offered $1 billion to Wikipedia if it renames itself ‘Dickipedia’ for at least a year..”

• ‘Stop Donating To Wokepedia’ – Musk (RT)

Elon Musk has urged internet users to stop supporting Wikipedia over what he sees as disproportionate spending on promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts. In a series of posts this week, the billionaire owner of Tesla, Space X and X vented his frustration over the online encyclopedia’s financial report, which showed that it spent more than $50 million of its total $177 million – or almost one-third of its 2023-2024 budget – on such goals as ‘Equity’ and ‘Safety and Inclusion’. More than 90% of the platform’s funding comes from donations. Commenting on the report on Tuesday, Musk wrote on X: “Stop donating to Wokepedia until they restore balance to their editing authority.” On Thursday, Musk suggested that Wikipedia “sucks” for spending $50 million on DEI.

DEI, a collection of business practices designed to promote workforce diversity, has faced criticism from conservatives who argue it enforces reverse discrimination against white people and undermines merit-based systems. In recent months, several major corporations, including Boeing, Ford Motor Company, Nissan and Walmart, have scaled back their DEI initiatives.Wikipedia claims it is taking steps to address barriers to free knowledge caused by racial inequality, while also striving to close the gender gap and ensure equal representation of knowledge and people on the platform. It has also sought to “defend our people and projects against disinformation and harmful government regulation” and other “external threats.” Musk has had a long-running beef with the encyclopedia, which he has called “broken.”

In October, he argued that Wikipedia is overtly promoting a narrative labeling US President-elect Donald Trump – whom Musk endorsed – as a “fascist,” claiming that the website is “controlled by far-left activists.”The same month, he offered $1 billion to Wikipedia if it renames itself ‘Dickipedia’ for at least a year, while accusing it of bias. Last year, Larry Sanger, Wikipedia’s co-founder, alleged that the platform is being used by US intelligence community as an instrument of “control” and to further the agenda of the left-liberal establishment. Wikipedia, however, insists that it adheres to a set of core principles, including providing information from a neutral point of view and in a verifiable and balanced manner.

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Not the first time.

• Musk Issues Bankruptcy Warning (RT)

The US government will “go de facto bankrupt” unless it reins in its rising debt, Elon Musk has warned. The billionaire is set to co-lead a new department tasked with curbing spending under President-elect Donald Trump. Musk was reacting to a post by Kalshi, a financial service that allows users to bet on future events and which makes a prediction on how likely these events are to happen. It hailed the fact that the market estimated at 36% the chance of annual federal spending being cut by at least $250 billion under Trump. Kalshi flagged the future Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which Musk is set to co-chair with fellow billionaire Vivek Ramaswamy, as the entity that would help slash expenditure.

The US gross federal debt surpassed the $36 trillion benchmark in November, a development that Musk called “terrifying” at the time. Last week, he leveraged his social media influence to weigh in on a debate in the US Congress over a stop-gap spending bill. Musk urged his more than 200 million followers on X who are American citizens to contact their representatives on Capitol Hill and express opposition to a proposed spending bill that he said “should not pass.”

The 1,500-page measure ultimately didn’t proceed, but neither did an alternative proposed by Trump and backed by Musk, which put the US government on the verge of a new shutdown. A compromise 118-page short-term solution was passed after the Friday midnight deadline and was signed into law by President Joe Biden on Saturday. “President Trump will return to DC and to the White House, and we will have Republican control of the Senate and the House,” Speaker Mike Johnson commented on the outcome. “Things are going to be very different around here. This was a necessary step to bridge the gap.”

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Not a chance:

“Ukraine’s admission into NATO would be unacceptable “whether it’s in one year or ten years.”

• Putin Reveals Biden Offered To Postpone Ukraine’s NATO Entry (ZH)

Russian President Vladimir Putin fielded questions from journalists Thursday at the conclusion of the Supreme Eurasian Economic Council meeting held outside St. Petersburg. The Russian-led EEU economic bloc includes member states Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. Among the more interesting moments was when Putin revealed what President Biden previously offered him in order to avert the Ukraine conflict, regarding the question of Kiev’s NATO membership. The comments came in the context of a question over Trump’s reported peace plan and the idea of freezing the front lines. Putin described that such a plan is nothing new, and added the following per state media translation:

“I know that the current President Biden spoke about this, it’s no secret, back in 2021. He proposed exactly this to me – to delay Ukraine’s admission into NATO by 10-15 years, because [Kiev] is not ready yet,” Putin said, referring to the midsummer meeting he had with the US leader in Switzerland. He stressed that no matter the timeline, Ukraine’s admission into NATO would be unacceptable “whether it’s in one year or ten years.” “We, too, are striving to end the conflict,” Putin added, but stressed that this should happen by achieving all of Moscow’s military and political objectives, according to RT. Toward this end, Putin during the Q&A proposed Slovakia as a ‘neutral’ potential host country for future peace talks:

Last week Putin met with Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico in Moscow. Fico, who survived an assassination attempt on May 15 of this year, has been blasted by European leaders as cozying up to Putin. But Fico in response has proclaimed that Putin has been “wrongly demonized” by the West. He also characterized the Moscow visit as about defending Slovakia’s sovereignty and energy security. Fico described in the meeting’s aftermath Russia is willing to continue supplying gas to Slovakia, but that Ukraine’s refusal to renew a key gas transit deal with Moscow makes getting the supplies “practically impossible”.

Putin on Thursday reiterated that Russia is willing to sell gas to anyone… Hungary too looks also bear the brunt of the negative consequences resulting from gas transit cutoff through Ukraine. Oil Price explains of both Slovakia and Hungary, “Slovakia has a long-term gas supply contract with Gazprom. The expiry of the transit deal with Naftogaz would interfere with that contract’s terms, which probably led to the visit to Moscow. Landlocked Slovakia and neighbor Hungary have few gas supply options that can compare on price with Russian pipeline gas.” As for Putin’s fresh comments rejecting even the possibility of future Ukraine membership in NATO, this means that in any future dealings with Trump, the Kremlin is certain to press this point hard.

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$100 billion later…

• Western Europeans Losing Faith In Ukraine (RT)

Public support for backing Ukraine “until it wins” the conflict with Russia has fallen dramatically in seven Western European nations, a YouGov poll has found. In four of these, more people now support a peaceful resolution even if it means forcing Kiev to accept territorial losses. The poll was conducted earlier in December in France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Sweden, Denmark and the UK, and published by The Guardian on Thursday. In Sweden, Denmark, and the UK, 50%, 40%, and 36% of respondents, respectively, said that they would favor supporting “Ukraine until Russia withdraws, even if this means the war lasts longer,” down around 10% in all three countries since February. Meanwhile, 24%, 34%, and 32%, respectively, said that they would “encourage a negotiated end to the fighting, even if Russia still has control of some parts of Ukraine,” figures that are up by a corresponding amount.

In Germany, Spain, France, and Italy, however, support for a Ukrainian victory has tanked, and peace talks are the most favored outcome in all four. Some 28% of Germans want Ukraine to keep fighting, while 45% support a negotiated settlement. Less than a quarter of respondents in Spain, France, and Italy want to prolong the conflict. The gap in public opinion is most stark in Italy, where 55% of respondents support peace talks, and only 15% want to continue arming Kiev. The governments of France and Germany have collapsed between February and December, while Britain’s former prime minister, Rishi Sunak, was ousted in a landslide defeat for his Conservative Party in July. Despite reports suggesting that Vladimir Zelensky wants to end the conflict this year, the Ukrainian leader has publicly rebuffed calls to negotiate, and insists on what he calls a “just peace.”

His conditions for this peace are the return of four former Ukrainian regions that joined Russia in 2022, and an invitation to join the NATO bloc – conditions that Moscow deems unacceptable. Russia maintains that any settlement must begin with Ukraine ceasing military operations and acknowledging the “territorial reality” that it will never regain control of the Russian regions of Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson, and Zaporozhye, as well as Crimea. In addition, the Kremlin insists that the goals of its military operation – which include Ukrainian neutrality, demilitarization, and denazification – will be achieved. US President-elect Donald Trump has repeatedly promised that he will end the conflict within “24 hours” of taking office, without explaining how he plans to achieve this.

However, he has said that he intends to speak to both Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin, and hinted that Ukraine should prepare for a reduction in US military aid. Trump has also suggested that Kiev should abandon its territorial claims, as “there is not a single building in good condition left” in some of the battle-scarred cities under Russian control. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Wednesday that Moscow is open to any deal that respects the national interests of Russia and the “legitimate interests of other countries.” However, he added that he has not seen any “serious, concrete proposals” from the West.

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“Berlin did not just turn against Russia – it forgot what made it successful in the first place..”

• Germany Is Doomed Because Of This Grave Mistake (Romanenko)

For decades, Germany was the envy of the world: a shining example of how a war-torn nation could rise from the ashes to become Europe’s economic powerhouse. This success was no accident. Germany’s prosperity rested on three key pillars: access to cheap Russian energy, unfettered free trade with the United States and other Western allies, and minimal military spending thanks to American security guarantees during the Cold War. These factors allowed Germany to build an unparalleled industrial economy, maintain a generous welfare state, and dominate global markets.

But Germany’s decision to sever ties with Russia following the Ukraine escalation threatens to dismantle this carefully constructed foundation. By aligning itself entirely with the US-led NATO strategy against Moscow, Germany has unwittingly sealed its economic fate. The consequences are already visible, and the worst is yet to come. Germany is doomed because of this grave mistake. The German economy has always been a giant built on energy-intensive industries like chemicals, automobiles, and heavy manufacturing. These industries relied on one key advantage: affordable Russian natural gas. For decades, Berlin fostered a close energy relationship with Moscow, importing vast quantities of cheap gas through pipelines like Nord Stream. This mutually beneficial arrangement kept Germany’s factories humming and its export economy highly competitive.

That relationship is over. In response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Germany abandoned Russian energy almost overnight, shutting down Nord Stream and scrambling for alternatives. The result? Soaring energy prices and a manufacturing crisis that is crippling German industry. Without cheap energy, the very sectors that made Germany an industrial giant – automotive, steel, and chemicals – are no longer globally competitive. To make matters worse, Germany’s ideological commitment to a rapid green energy transition has only exacerbated the problem. While renewable energy has its merits, it is nowhere near ready to replace the reliable baseload energy that Russian gas provided. Germany’s decision to phase out nuclear energy – a reliable and carbon-free power source – further undermines its energy security. The result is an economy that is buckling under the weight of its own short-sighted policies.

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“..blackouts will be just a bad memory..”

• Milei Unveils Ambitious Plan To Make Argentina Global Nuclear Energy Player (ZH)

In a bold move to transform Argentina into a global energy powerhouse, President Javier Milei introduced the “Argentine Nuclear Plan” on Friday, with the goal of harnessing nuclear energy as a core component of the nation’s future. The plan outlines the construction of Small Modular Reactors (SMRs), compact nuclear units designed to provide power to commercial sectors and other large-scale operations. “After years of stagnation, nuclear energy is making a powerful comeback, and we are determined to lead, not follow,” Milei declared confidently, emphasizing the country’s abundant natural resources, skilled workforce, and Patagonia’s cold climate, which he described as ideal for housing energy-intensive technologies like AI.

“Nuclear energy is the only source that is sufficiently efficient, abundant and rapidly scalable to cope with the development of our civilization,” he added. The project will have the backing of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), with IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi joining Milei and his key advisor, Demian Reidel, during the plan’s official launch. Reidel stressed that the increasing demand for energy, particularly from AI advancements, makes nuclear power crucial to Argentina’s energy strategy, jpost.com reports. The first phase of the plan will focus on the construction of a Small Modular Reactor (SMR) at the Atucha Nuclear Power Plant. The reactor is expected to help meet rising energy demands and alleviate power shortages throughout Argentina.

Reidel emphasized the significant contribution of Argentine nuclear engineers to the initiative. “We will do so with 100% Argentine technology, developed by our nuclear engineers, who are recognized among the best in the world,” he stated, according to Rosario3. He added that the plan “will give us energy sovereignty, will allow us to export this technology to the world,” and assured that “blackouts will be just a bad memory,” according to La Nación. In the second phase of the initiative, Argentina aims to capitalize on its untapped uranium reserves to meet domestic needs and establish itself as a leading exporter of nuclear fuel. The government envisions positioning Argentina as a global leader in the peaceful use of atomic energy, while also advancing its aspirations to become an international hub for AI innovation.

Currently, Argentina operates three nuclear power facilities—Atucha I, Atucha II, and Embalse—which together supply around 9% of the nation’s electricity consumption, according to government data from July 2023. The announcement comes as Argentina has officially emerged from a severe recession, a milestone that marks a major success for Milei and his bold economic reforms. According to data from Argentina’s statistics agency, GDP grew 3.9% in the July-to-September quarter compared to the previous three months. This growth was driven by robust performances in agriculture, mining, and consumer spending, signaling a recovery in key sectors of the economy, the Financial Post reports.

On Monday, Milei eliminated a 30% “inclusive” surcharge tax on foreign currency debit and credit card purchases imposed by the previous socialist government. The now-repealed “Tax for an Inclusive and Solidary Argentina,” or “PAIS” for short, was a temporary surcharge introduced by former socialist President Alberto Fernández. He enacted it in December 2019 during the early days of his administration. “I have more good news, and that is that the lowering of taxes will continue, as is our irrevocable commitment, to return the surplus in the form of relief to the taxpayer, because less taxes is more competitiveness,” the president said in a statement announcing the move.

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“If it’s time for you to go, leave willingly, as you would to accomplish anything that can be done with grace and honor.” — Marcus Aurelius

• A Christmas Prayer (James Howard Kunstler)

The longest and coldest night of the year is upon us with its portents of endings, the death of things, of people like ourselves, and also bodies of thought, movements of culture and politics. And for all the cold and darkness, you feel the stirrings of things waiting to be born. Christmas is the lovely distraction for a brief spell, and after that, the difficult labor of the nation commences for-real in the long night of the year. This moment in the cold and dark is also the climax of the Great Pretending. You knew it would come to this for “Joe Biden,” that he would be found-out. That in the waning days of his woebegone term in office, the people around him in the White House would betray him with the truth: that he was mentally unfit for the job from even before the get-go, from those drear days in the fall campaign of 2020 when he hid himself at home in Delaware while the FBI covered-up the massive bribery-and-treason story concealed in Hunter’s laptop.

And that for four years since then those people around “Joe Biden” have pretended to the world that he was doing his job, that he was okay, when he was absolutely not okay, as they well knew. It was only one big lie among the thousands of lies put over by the conspiracy between that gang in the White House and the perfidious organs of the news, especially The New York Times. If you want to see how stupendously dishonest the employees of that newspaper are, read this “roundtable” column of several Times pundits attempting to chew over the state of their patron, the Democratic party. Forgive me for quoting myself in the comment I posted there a half hour ago:

You’re all quite remarkably clueless and dishonest. Your party is in ruins because your policies are intolerable and often insane: censorship, war, gender lunacy, flooding the country with illegal immigrants – no, not “undocumented” in your parlance, as if it was just some clerical error. And you: Democratic Party aligned journalists are even worse than the politicians, because you’re supposed to make an effort to determine the truth, and you deliberately gaslight the public instead. Shame on you and the Democratic Party. It’s that simple. It’s hard to know for sure, but it looks an awful lot as though these journalists — in fact, the whole elite intelligentsia across America — are gaslighting themselves, still pretending that they didn’t know what went on, a coup against their own country. Everything they have been saying and publishing is the opposite of reality. And now it is about to all spill out because other people are about to take over the levers of power.

For instance: can the CDC and other agencies of public health continue to lie about disastrous Covid-19 vaccines, about the deaths and disabilities they have caused in millions of people? Under “Joe Biden,” there was no other way for the likes of Rochelle Walensky and Mandy Cohen except to lie. And get this: women were chosen to front for the CDC because you’re not supposed to believe that “Mommy” would lie to you, especially in matters of life and death. There was no other way because the crime was so great and they were all in it so deep — not just Rochelle and Mandy but the hundreds of high-ranking bureaucrats in CDC, FDA, and NIH who went along with all this. Of course, it’s hard to know whether the Covid-19 affair was just a venal and insane project by Anthony Fauci and his colleagues to play “hero” while making a ton of money. . . or whether it was actually a deliberate effort by the Intel Blob to queer the 2020 election by forcing a change in the voting procedure that would allow for wholesale fraud, in the service of cancelling Donald Trump. Possibly, it was a mash-up of both.

The truth about all this, and a lot more, is going to come out, whether or not Bobby Kennedy, Kash Patel, and other nominees get confirmed in their jobs, because there are many other figures just as capable behind them who would be nominated and eventually confirmed to run these departments. Those New York Times journalists are gaslighting themselves further if they think that blocking a few nominations is going to save their reputations. This populist revolution is bigger than that. It’s about overturning a paradigm of lies.

We really don’t know if our country is too far gone. The wreckage accomplished under the fakery of “Joe Biden” is prodigious. The financial quandaries alone are enough to sink the Republic in penury, and it will be hard to dodge the truth about that, too, because individual citizens and households know when they are hurting. When they hurt enough, they move to action, visibly, loudly, and you will not miss it. This ought to be a sobering Christmas then. This is the pause at the end of things when we might consider how important it is to tell ourselves the truth. Chew on that with the sugarplums of the season while we wait for that something that is busy being born.

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“..it’s not about the environment, it’s about Joe Biden’s and the elitist eco-left making sure their friends get paid..”

• Preservationists Say Wind Energy Is Harming America’s Historic Sites (JTN)

The Bureau of Land Management earlier this month approved a 241-turbine wind farm near Twin Falls, Idaho, about a two-hour drive from Boise. From the time it was announced, the project was met with opposition from ranchers, environmentalists and Native American tribes. This managed to get the developers to shrink the size of the project down by approximately half its proposed size. Another group of opponents in the fight against the project were historical preservations, a growing voice in the increasing opposition to the buildout of renewable energy across the U.S. The Lava Ridge Wind Project will be constructed near the Minidoka National Historic Site, where Japanese Americans were incarcerated during World War II. Friends of Mindoka, a nonprofit group that seeks to preserve and educate the public about the history of the site, was among the opponents of Lava Ridge.

The group explains on its website that the remoteness of the concentration camp helps visitors experience the sense of isolation felt by those who were incarcerated there by Democrat President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Executive Order 9066, signed on February 19, 1942. The wind project, they argue, will minimize “the trauma, loss, and humiliation suffered by American citizens based solely on racial discrimination.” Larry Behrens, communications director for Power the Future, a nonprofit energy advocacy group, told Just the News that the environmental left will fight against any impact on historic sites when it involves oil and gas, but they typically look the other way when it comes to renewable energy projects.

“It’s funny how when it’s a new oil well or gas pipeline the eco-left is quick to cry crocodile tears over claims from select local residents or perceived historic significance. However, when these concerns are legitimate, but there’s billions in green dollars to burn, the green agenda can’t ignore the red lights fast enough. This all proves it’s not about the environment, it’s about Joe Biden’s and the elitist eco-left making sure their friends get paid,” Behrens said. The impacts of renewable energy development on historic sites is a nationwide issue. In September, the Preservation Society of Newport County and Southeast Lighthouse Foundation filed a lawsuit against Interior Secretary Deb Haaland and Revolution Wind, LLC, the owner of a wind project under construction 15 miles off the coast of Rhode Island. The project proposes 96 turbines nearly 900-feet tall. The project is part of a trio of offshore wind projects that will place over 200 turbines between Rhode Island and Martha’s Vineyard.

The lawsuit argued that the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) failed to properly consider the project’s impact on National Historic Landmarks and other historic properties. “Among other errors, BOEM has reviewed each project separately, effectively minimizing Revolution Wind’s projected harms. BOEM compounded this error by not taking a hard look at cumulative impacts and finding appropriate ways to lessen the harm of those impacts, even though the combined visual impacts of South Fork, Revolution Wind, and Sunrise Wind will harm the context and setting of some of the nation’s most valued NHLs,” the lawsuit stated.

According to the lawsuit, Rhode Island’s coastline is home to multiple historic and cultural resources, including Newport and Block Island. For the past century, the State of Rhode Island and local governments worked to protect and maintain the historic character of the area, which millions of people come to see each year. “Newport is inseparable from the Atlantic Ocean and its uninterrupted views. Known as ‘The City-By-The-Sea’ and for its ‘spectacular assemblages of architecture,’ Newport’s beauty and connections to the sea have inspired not only writers and other artists, but also property owners whose families have treasured their houses and history for hundreds of years…The Preservation Society owns historic properties, operated as museums, within the Bellevue Avenue Historic District, one of the most recognized NHL districts in the country,” the lawsuit explained.

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“The change is welcomed by an electorate exhausted by past presidential stumbling, wandering, incoherence, mind freezes, and angry, “get-off-my-grass” aged fragility..”

• What Was So Different This Time About Trump’s Election? (VDH)

In the weeks before the 2016 Trump Electoral College victory, Trump was polling between 35 and 40 percent. He would average only about 41 percent approval over his tumultuous four-year tenure. No one knows what lies ahead over the next four years. But for now, Trump already polls at well over 50 percent approval. Trump’s inauguration in a few weeks likely will not resemble his 2016 ceremony. In the 2016-7 transition, Democratic-affiliated interests ran commercials urging electors to become “faithless” and thus illegally reject their states’ popular votes and instead elect the loser, Hillary Clinton. Massive demonstrations met Trump on Inauguration Day. In less than four months after assuming the presidency, Special Counsel Robert Mueller was appointed to investigate the hoax of Russian collusion. That wasted 22-month, $40 million investigation found no collusion but did derail the first two Trump years.

What followed the collusion ruse was a consistent effort to undermine the Trump presidency—two subsequent impeachments, the laptop “disinformation” hoax, the COVID-19 nationwide lockdown, and news suppression of any mention of the Chinese lab origin of the virus or questioning the closing of schools. In the Trump administration’s last summer of 2020, 120 days of riot, arson, looting, assault, and murder followed, with the denouement of the January 6 turmoil. In contrast, during the 2024-2025 transition, Trump has all but assumed the presidency. Over 100 foreign leaders have elbowed each other to be invited to Mar-a-Lago or to phone in their congratulations to the newly elected Trump. Remember that in 2016 the left screamed “Logan Act” if a Trump transition appointee even talked with foreign officials. So why is newly elected Trump a veritable cultural hero in 2024 in a fashion unimaginable eight years ago when the media had rendered him a near demon?

One, Trump is now seen as a welcome relief. A departing and unpopular Joe Biden will leave with about a 36 percent approval rating. The prior Biden years are now seen as abnormal, if not disastrous. The left’s cultural revolution championed fringe policies never quite seen before: destroying the border, welcoming in 12 million illegal aliens, nihilist critical race and legal theories, institutionalizing a third sex, and mandating woke/DEI quotas and indoctrination sessions. Yet Biden had inherited from Trump a secure border, an economy rebounding after the COVID quarantines, 1.23 percent inflation, no wars abroad, and cheap energy. Four years later, the outgoing Biden administration is widely unpopular. Almost every one of its policies polls below 50 percent. In response, Trump promises not just to restore his first-term success but to expand it.

Two, Trump personally remains transparent, upbeat, and energetic—eager to meet with anyone, anytime, anywhere, to talk about anything. His energy offers a sharp contrast with the era of the non-compos-mentis Biden. The change is welcomed by an electorate exhausted by past presidential stumbling, wandering, incoherence, mind freezes, and angry, “get-off-my-grass” aged fragility. Three, Trump is grudgingly admired, now even by some of his enemies who once sought but failed to destroy him. He endured two impeachments, five civil and criminal court indictments, incessant lawfare, a 95% negative media, attempts to remove him from states’ ballots, and two assassination attempts. Yet all these unprecedented hostile efforts to end Trump may only have made him stronger—and more empathetic when seen as a target of increasingly fanatical enemies.

Four, Trump has expanded his MAGA base and permanently branded it as an ecumenical movement that welcomes shared class interests rather than fixates on the tired old tribal racial and ethnic chauvinism. Trump also brought in disaffected Democrats, independents, and minorities in a way the Democrats could not with the evaporating and bitter Never Trump dead-enders. Trump’s veritable campaign menagerie of RFK, Jr., Tulsi Gabbard, Elon Musk, Joe Rogan, Dana White, and Kid Rock made it impossible for the left to demonize MAGA Republicans as right-wing aristocrats, warmongers, or laissez-faire capitalists. Fifth, the endorsements of the Biden-Harris legacy media, calcified Hollywood endorsers, blowhard university faculties, and tech barons proved overrated. It was trumped by more popular and dynamic internet influencers, podcasters, bloggers, and maverick entrepreneurs.

Sixth and finally, Trump himself proved more experienced and reflective than in 2016. His team too was more disciplined and street smart, led by savvy chief of staff Susan Wiles. 2024 saw truly pivotal moments of Trump as everyman—posing for a mug shot after being railroaded by a weaponized lawfare indictment, serving McDonald’s drive-through customers, riding in a garbage truck cab, and raising his fist and yelling “fight, fight, fight”—after having his head near blown off by a would-be assassin. Add all of these once unimaginables up, and the people trusted more—and liked better—the Trump reboot than grouchy Joe Biden or inane, inauthentic Kamala Harris and their shared extremist agendas.

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“..there are so many flags around this report we’re not even sure where to begin … luckily, Hemingway did the work for us..”

• Mollie Hemingway Takes House Ethics Report on Matt Gaetz APART (Twitchy)

As Twitchy readers know, the House Ethics Committee magically decided to release their Matt Gaetz report … the day before Christmas Eve. Yes, the very report even Biden’s own corrupt and weaponized DOJ decided not to act on. Hey, think what you want about Gaetz and whether or not this report is true and his actions unethical (it is certainly not our place to defend or condemn him), but the way this has been done is shady AF. Mollie Hemingway was front and center taking the entire mess apart:

Read that again. “… completely lacked any credibility whatsoever.” BIDEN’S DOJ which would obviously be looking for any reason to go after Gaetz did not believe the evidence was credible. C’mon. She probably feels that way because from what we can tell she WAS the only reporter to look into the details of the Gaetz allegations.

Color us SHOCKED. And ultimately, that’s the point. Whether or not you like a person should not impact or influence their innocence or guilt. Even if you dislike Gaetz, the fact they released this report the day before Christmas Eve, a report Biden’s own corrupt DOJ obviously considered a nothing-burger, tells us all this was sneaky, dirty, and likely all-too-personal. To Hemingway’s point, it’s INSANE that they’d take seriously any sort of testimony from a witness who is currently in prison for making the same false sex-with-minors accusations against someone else. While we’re certainly not experts, this definitely sounds like a red flag. In fact, there are so many flags around this report we’re not even sure where to begin … luckily, Hemingway did the work for us. Sadly, we’ve been seeing this in the ‘elitist’ class for decades.

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Will it survive in 2025?

• CNN Loses Chunks of Viewership as Ratings Dive Into Death Spiral (Sp.)

CNN, just like a bunch of other liberal news networks, has been hemorrhaging viewership at lightning speed since Donald Trump’s electoral victory in November. The Cable News Network (CNN) has seen overall prime-time viewership plummet by 45% scooping up only 394,000 total viewers since November 5, according to Nielsen Media Research. When it comes to the prime 25-to-54 age demographic, CNN suffered a 52% decline, with just an average audience of 77,000 having tuned in after Trump’s win. Overall, CNN witnessed its worst-ever performance among viewers in this key demographic. Audiences feel that CNN “didn’t meet the mark” when covering Trump during the campaign, The Washington Post cited one journalist as saying.

Trump’s campaign spokesperson Karoline Leavitt had repeatedly criticized the “hostile environment” the network offered to the Republican contender. CNN is also reportedly heading for major layoffs as part of an overhaul by its corporate parent Warner Bros. Discovery, which is up to its eyeballs in debt after its Warner Brothers and Discovery merger deal in 2022. By the end of the third quarter of 2023, WBD’s gross debt stood at $45.3 billion, according to Forbes. MSNBC’s ratings have also collapsed post-election, with the audience down 46% compared with the first 10 months of 2024, according to Nielsen.

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Cars
https://twitter.com/i/status/1871930959505096929

 

 

Support the Automatic Earth in wartime with Paypal, Bitcoin and Patreon.

 

 

 

 

 

Debt Rattle September 12 2024

Sep 122024
 
 September 12, 2024  Posted by at 8:43 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,  47 Responses »


M. C. Escher Meeting (Encounter) 1940

 

• Debate ‘Was Rigged’ – Trump (RT)
• The Debate Will Backfire Horribly For Both Kamala Harris And ABC (QTR)
• CNN Poll: More Than 60% Think Harris Beat Trump in Debate (Sp.)
• Harris Won – Biden (RT)
• Harris and Trump Debating on Titanic – Zakharova (RT)
• Trump-Harris ‘Kabuki Theater’ Debate Crystalized Candidates’ Position (Sp.)
• We’ll Never Reach Mars If Kamala Wins – Musk (RT)
• Biden Leading US To ‘Nuclear Immolation’ – RFK Jr. (RT)
• Biden Mulls Stepping on Ukraine Long-Range Missile Tripwire (Sp.)
• Ukraine Races To Peace Talks With No Driver, No Breaks And a Dead Satnav (Jay)
• Ukraine Will Join NATO – Blinken (RT)
• Enemies Must Be Sure Russia Is Ready To Use Nuclear Weapons – Karaganov (RT)
• The 23rd Anniversary of September 11, 2001 (Paul Craig Roberts)
• Durov’s Case Is ‘Exemplary’ – Paris Prosecutor (RT)
• Elon Musk ‘Proposes’ To Taylor Swift (RT)

 

 

 

 

Megyn Kelly

 

 

RFK debate
https://twitter.com/i/status/1833707252751995181

 

 

WWIII

 

 

Hoaxes

 

 

Taliban

 

 

Pets

 

 

Greenwald

 

 

Willie Brown
https://twitter.com/i/status/1833539331505770508

 

 

 

 

He walked into a trap -not smart- and got out somewhat OK. Turn the page and move on.

• Debate ‘Was Rigged’ – Trump (RT)

Former US President Donald Trump has criticized the “dishonest” moderation of his debate with Vice President Kamala Harris by ABC News, saying he would only consider a rematch if it were hosted by “a fair network.” Speaking to Fox’s Sean Hannity immediately after Tuesday night’s debate, Trump claimed that he emerged from the encounter as the victor. Informed by Hannity that Harris reportedly wants a second debate, Trump seemed dismissive of the idea. “She wants it because she lost,” Trump told Hannity. “You know what happens when you’re a prizefighter and you lose, you immediately want a new fight… maybe if it was on a fair network I would do that.”

Harris is widely considered to have won the debate, with Trump struggling to fend off attacks from the vice president, as well as moderators David Muir and Linsey Davis. According to a flash poll conducted by CNN on Tuesday night, 63% of viewers felt that Harris had outperformed Trump. Speaking to Fox News on Wednesday morning, Trump slammed the debate as “totally rigged,” and called ABC the “most dishonest news organization.” “So many things I said were debunked, like totally debunked,” he told Fox. “But she could say anything she wanted. My stuff was right, but they would correct you.”

Trump was repeatedly interrupted and fact-checked by Muir and Davis throughout the debate, for instance when he claimed that Haitian migrants are “eating the pets” of people in Ohio. While multiple locals have testified that pet cats and wild birds are being eaten by the migrants, local police say they have received no reports of such incidents. Harris was not fact-checked when she repeatedly tied Trump to ‘Project 2025’, a conservative manifesto explicitly disavowed by the former president. Nor was she corrected when she claimed that Trump once referred to neo-Nazis as “fine people.” In reality, Trump said there were “very fine people on both sides” of a right-wing rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017, but that he was “not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists, because they should be condemned totally.”

“I’d be less inclined to [debate again] because we had a great night,” Trump told Fox on Wednesday, adding again: “We won the debate.” Trump initially asked Harris to agree to three debates: one hosted by Fox News on September 4, another hosted by ABC on September 10, and a third hosted by NBC News on an unconfirmed date. Harris’ campaign only agreed to the ABC debate, although Trump wavered about committing to this showdown, accusing the network of “ridiculous and biased” coverage of him.

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“I reaffirmed to myself my trust in the American people to think for themselves and to see tonight for what it was in hindsight: a set up..”

• The Debate Will Backfire Horribly For Both Kamala Harris And ABC (QTR)

The initial reaction to tonight’s debate is that Kamala Harris held her own, albeit with the help of two ABC moderators, and that Trump was “rattled” and on the defense more than he needed to be. Generally, the debate is being cast as anything but the overwhelming victory for Trump that many predicted. But my guess is that both the dejection from the right and the perceived victory from the left will fade almost immediately as people have a chance to take in everything that really took place tonight. For starters, the times when Trump looked “the worst,” like when moderators tried to debunk him on the Springfield, Ohio, animal/pet killings that were confirmed by 911 calls minutes before the debate, will once again be proven to be factual and on point. The delivery wasn’t fantastic, but over the last three years, the country’s tolerance for being lied to by the media has shrunk significantly, so it won’t take as long as it normally would for people to see past Trump’s delivery.

People are thinking critically now more than ever and doing their own independent fact-checking more than ever. In short, people will quickly realize that Trump’s comments sounded justified. And if Americans need a reminder as to why doing their own fact checking is so important, they only need to look at Kamala Harris’s near admission that COVID came out of a lab in China early in the debate. 3 years ago her side of the aisle would have called you a conspiracy theorist and banned you from social media for saying so. I’ve already written extensively about how the media has lost significant credibility with independent and moderate voters due to their covering for Joe Biden in the midst of his obvious mental decline. I wrote about it in an article a couple of months ago simply called “We Can Be Lied To About Anything”.

After tonight, when the average critically thinking, independent or moderate voter begins to emerge from the visceral reaction of who “won” the debate, the picture will start to come into focus. And it’ll be a picture of a news network that constantly tried to fact-check Donald Trump, despite Kamala Harris repeating multiple debunked conspiracy theories, like Trump’s Charlottesville comments, which were already debunked by Snopes, and his “bloodbath” comment, which was used in the context of talking about the auto industry. When the average critically thinking American looks at the veracity of the lies that Kamala Harris put forth tonight – including lies about Trump’s stance on in vitro fertilization, lies about Trump being associated with Project 2025, and lies about Trump not wanting to secure the border – it’s going to be very difficult to look back on this debate as a victory for her.

And God forbid these same moderate voters were looking for an actual policy stance from Kamala Harris. Despite being well-seasoned in her narrative and her answers and obviously prepared to answer questions she may or may not have received in advance, while benefiting from two friendly moderators and a question format that constantly pinned Trump as the antagonist before David Muir would lead Harris to her answer to reaffirm what the moderators had already decided, she was noticeably devoid of an explanation on her flip-flopping policies. She offered little to no detail on her flip-flops about fracking and her poor performance as border czar, and she failed to take accountability for what happened in Afghanistan, while simultaneously admitting that she approved of how it took place.

Not unlike when she was first crowned the “joy” candidate of the Left, there was a luster to her performance at the debate tonight that is going to wear off very quickly. And in my opinion, tonight will just be another example of a constantly evolving populace seeing the left-wing media for exactly what it is: an arm of the Democratic Party. Despite some mumbles and grumbles from the Republican side of the aisle tonight, as soon as the debate ended, I reaffirmed to myself my trust in the American people to think for themselves and to see tonight for what it was in hindsight: a set up. I honestly believe that the rise of alternative media in this country, and the legacy media’s track record of horrific embarrassments, like covering up the Hunter Biden laptop story and lying to the American people about the mental acuity of President Joe Biden, have built up a bullshit tolerance for media spin in the average American.

More people know today that the left-leaning media has a narrative and lies to them than ever before. This debate will be different from other ones because it’ll eventually be looked at in that context. And when people go back and watch how the moderators constantly argued the merits with Trump while leading Harris in her answers to multiple questions, this debate will be revealed for the biased farce that it was. And then — mark my words — it will do more harm than good for Kamala Harris. Harris has already come out and asked for a second debate with Trump, ostensibly indicating that she thinks tonight was a success. When the debate ended, the scrutinization of ABC’s dirty tricks began — and they will be off the table in any future debates. If I were Kamala, I’d be careful what I wish for in asking to step in the ring for a second debate. Just because the judges saw one round with Trump as a draw doesn’t mean you can go the distance and win by decision.

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Why do a poll when you know beforehand what it will say? Yeah, let’s poll CNN viewers… And it’s still just 63%..

• CNN Poll: More Than 60% Think Harris Beat Trump in Debate (Sp.)

More than half of registered US voters said Democratic candidate Kamala Harris outperformed her Republican rival, Donald Trump, in their first presidential debate, a CNN poll out on Wednesday showed. The survey conducted by SSRS Research found that 63% of 605 debate watchers polled said Harris had turned in a better performance onstage in Philadelphia, versus 37% who said Trump did a better job. Prior to the debate, the voters were evenly split, with 50% saying Harris would perform more strongly and 50% believing that Trump would. On August 23-27, ABC News and Ipsos conducted a poll among 2,496 respondents. According to the poll results, 43% thought that Harris would beat Trump in the debate, and 37% said that Trump would succeed. Donald Trump and Kamala Harris faced off on ABC News on Tuesday night for the first time since Harris entered the race. The US presidential election will be held on November 5.

Rematch

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He thought he did fine in his own debate too.

• Harris Won – Biden (RT)

US President Joe Biden has claimed that Vice President Kamala Harris clearly won the debate against her Republican rival, Donald Trump, and expressed pride in working alongside her for three and a half years. Biden dropped out of the race against Trump shortly after his own disastrous performance in June. The president, who reportedly couldn’t even remember if he re-watched his own debate, followed Harris closely from a hotel in New York City with family and staff, according to a CNN source. “America got to see tonight the leader I’ve been proud to work alongside for three and a half years. It wasn’t even close. VP Harris proved she’s the best choice to lead our nation forward. We’re not going back,” a message posted on Biden’s X account said late Tuesday.

During the debate with Harris, Trump repeatedly attacked her boss for being an embarrassment to the country and the world. “They respect me; they don’t respect Biden. Why would you respect him, for what reason?” Trump asked. “We are playing with WWIII, and we have a president that… Where is our president?” “They threw him out of the campaign like a dog… We have a president that doesn’t even know he’s alive.” Harris countered that Trump is now running against her, not Biden. However, Trump sought to frame a potential Harris presidency as nothing more than a second term for Biden.

“Remember this: She is Biden,” Trump said. “She copied Biden’s plan. It’s like four sentences long: ‘Run, Spot, Run’ – just oh, we’ll try to lower taxes… She doesn’t have a plan.” In his closing statement, the former president questioned Harris’ track record and the new promises she made during the debate. “She just started by saying she’s gonna do this, she’s gonna do that, she’s gonna do all these wonderful things… Why hasn’t she done it? She’s been there for three and a half years,” Trump said. “What these people have done to our country… they’re destroying our country. The worst president, the worst vice president in the history of our country,” he added.

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”Who do you think won? Why would that matter? The iceberg is 15 minutes away..”

• Harris and Trump Debating on Titanic – Zakharova (RT)

The US presidential debate between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris lacked substance and was largely irrelevant considering that their country is going full speed ahead towards disaster, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has argued. Speaking on Radio Sputnik on Wednesday, she said she did not consider it a high-profile event. It mattered as much as the outcome of a hypothetical wrestling match on board the ill-fated Titanic during its trip across the Atlantic Ocean, she claimed. ”Who do you think won? Why would that matter? The iceberg is 15 minutes away,” she said. Extending the metaphor, she said neither Trump nor Harris intended to get to the wheel to change the course of the ship. America is on its way to a “total, global disaster” and the rest of the world is trying to prepare for it, she suggested.

The debate itself, according to Zakharova, was a mixture of “fantasizing about the future” and citing some facts about the past, with the candidates failing to agree on what those facts were. ”We were given the latest show by people who apparently never ever take any responsibility for what they say,” the Russian official said. International audiences paid attention to what happened in Philadelphia on Tuesday night because they want to know which nations “will get punished and how much” during the next US presidential term, Zakharova stated. According to the media, neither candidate had a decisive advantage over the other in the debate, which could be the only one between Trump and Harris before the November election. In a CNN focus group of 13 undecided voters from Pennsylvania, eight said the Democratic candidate won. Meanwhile six out of 10 undecided voters interviewed by Reuters said they were siding with the Republican after the face off.

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“It’s going to perhaps create the perception or help build support for declaring that Kamala won the presidency, because I think there are active measures underway to try to steal the election..”

• Trump-Harris ‘Kabuki Theater’ Debate Crystalized Candidates’ Position (Sp.)

Former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris held their first (and potentially only) presidential debate on Tuesday ahead of the November election. Former CIA analyst Larry Johnson explains how the debate crystalized the candidates’ radically different views on the defining issue of our times: the conflict in Ukraine. From Ukraine and Gaza to China, North Korea and Iran, Donald Trump and Kamala Harris touched on an array of foreign policy matters alongside domestic concerns ranging from the economy and inflation to the energy and migration crises. Trump, who thrashed President Biden at a debate in June so badly that the latter dropped out of the race after showing signs of mental decline, focused much of his ire against Harris on national security matters and what he characterized as the threat of a nuclear third world war.

“With respect to this talk about Ukraine and Russia, the Kamala Harris approach is the Hillary Clinton approach from 2016, that Donald Trump ‘is a tool of Russia’, [that] ‘he’s a surrender monkey’, [that] ‘he’s going to give Vladimir Putin whatever he wants’. And Kamala Harris and the Democrats are ‘going to fight the Russians tooth and nail.’ It just underscores that there is no room in the United States right now for an opposition politician to make the case that we need to talk to Russia, that we need to deal with Russia as adults and have mutual respect,” Johnson said. “The only possible change in policy is if Trump is elected and there will be an effort to stop the war. If it’s the Democrats, then the war will continue. It continues for one good reason – it’s making people a lot of money. If you look at the stock prices of Raytheon, General Dynamics, Lockheed Martin, they’ve doubled and tripled in some cases since the start of the special military operation.

So we’re talking literally billions, tens of billions of dollars that are being made,” the observer stressed. Commenting on his impressions of the debate overall, Johnson suggested that it was mostly “meaningless,” in the sense that it igno[..] red changes in how people get their information on presidential candidates. “The old debate style, when it started out back in the 19th century with Lincoln-Douglas – the only way people could really get information was by having to hear people talk out in public or maybe read a newspaper. And that was basically the system until 20 years ago. What has emerged over the last eight years is this dramatic spread of social media. So the notion, number one, that there’s an undecided voter out there who was unaware of the positions of Donald Trump or the positions of Kamala Harris is just I think ridiculous. Most people’s minds are made up,” Johnson said.

The former intelligence analyst agreed with other commentators who have suggested that the debate was stacked against Trump, saying the ex-president’s performance was less about debating Harris, and more about debating “biased” media “fact-checking” him while serving Harris “softball questions.” “I don’t think this is going to have a lot to do with shaping people’s votes. It’s going to perhaps create the perception or help build support for declaring that Kamala won the presidency, because I think there are active measures underway to try to steal the election. For example, registering literally millions of illegal migrants that have come into the United States who are not citizens but nonetheless are being signed up to vote. If those votes end up counting in any form or fashion, it could affect the outcome of the election,” Johnson summed up.

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“Biden rarely shows up for work, so she’s basically in charge already.”

• We’ll Never Reach Mars If Kamala Wins – Musk (RT)

Former President Donald Trump would “do a better job” as the next US leader than current Vice President Kamala Harris, according to tech billionaire Elon Musk. The businessman’s comments follow a contentious first debate between the two candidates on Tuesday night, hosted by US outlet ABC. In a post on X, Musk said that while Harris “exceeded most people’s expectations” in the face-off with Trump, she still lacks his ability to produce real results. “When it comes to getting things done, not just saying nice-sounding words, I strongly believe that Trump will do a far better job,” Musk stated. He said that if Harris had the ability to “do great things,” she would have demonstrated it during her tenure as President Joe Biden’s right hand, as “Biden rarely shows up for work, so she’s basically in charge already.”

In a separate post, he explained that the US needs significant government reforms to move forward and “allow great things to be done,” which he said would not come from Harris. “We will never reach Mars if Kamala wins,” concluded Musk, who is well known for his investments in space travel and technology. Tuesday’s debate was widely seen as crucial to the outcome of the election, as polls currently indicate a tight race. Throughout the event, which ran past its scheduled 90 minutes, Trump and Harris clashed with each other on both domestic and foreign policy, including abortion rights, immigration, and trade wars. The two candidates often interrupted one another, and traded accusations over problems with the US economy and the Ukraine conflict.

Musk joined other netizens in observing that the debate hosts, ABC anchors David Muir and Linsey Davis, seemed unfair to Trump. One X user mocked the anchors for paying too much attention to fact-checking Trump and too little with regard to Kamala, while another slammed the entire face-off as “a gang up of 3 against Trump.” Meanwhile, the Harris campaign challenged Trump to another debate in an email immediately after the showdown on Tuesday, reportedly painting the event as a win for the Democrat. Trump told the press he would “think about” the challenge, claiming that Harris wants a rematch because “she didn’t do well” on Tuesday. It is currently unclear whether another debate will take place before voting day on November 5. However, according to Reuters, Fox News has already proposed hosting a second face off in October.

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“Trump makes a point that I hope everyone hears: Russia has nuclear weapons.”

• Biden Leading US To ‘Nuclear Immolation’ – RFK Jr. (RT)

The aggressive policy of the administration of US President Joe Biden towards Russia and its continued attempts to inflict a defeat on Moscow in Ukraine could result in a nuclear conflict, former independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has said. The comments were made following a debate between Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and his Democratic rival, Kamala Harris, which took place in Philadelphia on Tuesday night. During a discussion of the Ukraine conflict, Trump noted that Russian President Vladimir Putin “has got a thing that other people do not have. He has got nuclear weapons. They do not ever talk about that. And eventually maybe he will use them. Maybe he has not been that threatening. But he does have that.” Kennedy took to X to say, “Trump makes a point that I hope everyone hears: Russia has nuclear weapons.”

“The Biden administration’s policy of maximum confrontation, seeking Russia’s humiliating defeat and regime change, is a recipe for nuclear immolation,” he warned. Kennedy suspended his presidential campaign last month and endorsed Trump. A pinned message on his X page which he published on Tuesday reads: “Bottom line: No matter what state you live in, vote Trump. A Trump victory is a Kennedy victory.” During the debate, Trump reiterated that he would settle the conflict between Russia and Ukraine “in 24 hours” if reelected this November, even before being sworn in. “It is in the US’ best interest to get this war finished and just get it done. We need to negotiate a deal because we have to stop all these human lives from being destroyed,” he said.

The conflict between Moscow and Kiev began in February 2022 because Biden and Vice President Harris had “no idea” how to talk with Putin, Trump said. “And it is only getting worse; it could lead to World War III.” In June, Putin announced that Russia will update its nuclear arsenal, given that it is the primary guarantor of national security. He warned that the country would use all means available to defend itself should the nation’s existence ever be at stake. He added, however, that any conflict involving the use of nuclear weapons would have dire consequences for humanity. According to Putin, Moscow is not “brandishing” its arsenal, but instead hopes that “it will never come to” an actual nuclear exchange.

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“..the West, instead of seeking a peaceful way out and talking to Russia, is preferring confrontation..”

• Biden Mulls Stepping on Ukraine Long-Range Missile Tripwire (Sp.)

“Biden has shifted every single position that he said was a red line, so I don’t see why he’s not going to violate this one as well,” retired CIA analyst and counterterrorism expert-turned whistleblower Larry Johnson told Sputnik, commenting on Washington’s threats to lift its missile restrictions. The Biden administration “can’t afford a defeat” in Ukraine before the November vote, and thinks that if it takes the “incredibly dangerous and foolish” step of just okaying the missiles’ delivery and use, that will somehow help Ukraine, Johnson believes. “I appreciate President Putin’s desire to show restraint and keep this as a special military operation. But the West is at war with Russia, and I don’t think people are getting their brains around that.

We keep dancing around the edges pretending that this is not going to happen. It’s going to happen. And it’s not going to change the military situation as far as what Ukraine is facing. Ukraine is facing defeat. They will be defeated. But it gets more to the point that the West, instead of seeking a peaceful way out and talking to Russia, is preferring confrontation,” Johnson warned. Another question is whether Ukraine even has the relevant long-range missiles left, and whether the US is in a state to supply them, according to the observer.

“Because if the United States moves to supply a missile that’s frankly bigger than the ATACMS or if they offer up an ATACMS or a JASSM that has an extended range capability, then I think it’s going to raise the real possibility that the logistics hubs that are outside of Ukraine that are being used to provide these missiles could become targets. Which then is this is going to expand the war,” Johnson warned. In that sense, while the Biden administration may believe the move to free Kiev’s hand on the use of NATO missiles to attack the Russian interior could stave off the Zelensky regime’s defeat, “it may actually have the opposite effect of causing this war to expand and expand in a way that will get the United States involved. And then we’re into some very new and dangerous territory,” Johnson summed up.

Macgregor

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“.. during peacetime he must call presidential elections which he will certainly lose. Trump also knows this. The war itself is Zelensky’s oldest friend and greatest supporter.”

• Ukraine Races To Peace Talks With No Driver, No Breaks And a Dead Satnav (Jay)

The admission was shocking. In an interview with an American journalist Victoria Nuland more or less admitted plainly that the reason why Boris Johnson was flown into Istanbul at the end of the peace talks between Ukraine and Russia was to scupper the deal, so that U.S. arms manufacturers could go ahead with their intended mega deals supplying the country, aligning it to NATO standards. She tells Ryan Grim of DropSiteNews that the peace deal – which gave Ukrainians land back which the Russians held – would have effectively neutered Ukraine blocking massive deals in the pipeline which would have reaped scores of billions of dollars for U.S. arms makers. The admission is important for two main reasons. First it shows just how disingenuous everything that western politicians tell their voters about Ukraine is.

Yes, there is an ideological rationale there of America and its allies wanting to hit Putin but it is not very convincing and at best looks increasingly lame as the months and years pass. Do senators in the U.S. like Lyndsey Graham really hate Russians so much? Or is it that they love money so much more and profit themselves from those megadeals coming together? The second point about the Nuland admission is that it casts a long shadow over western governments and their relationships with the military industrial complex and leaves the observer feeling that we have reached a new peak now with that sector and the ruling elites. The former no longer lobbies or informs the latter but controls it. Completely.

A third point which is possibly a parenthesis to the whole story is that slowly we are seeing the truth emerge, like repugnant liquid excrement oozing out of an old sack. And it stinks. Biden is just one more U.S. president who allowed the military industrial complex to control him and his erroneous so-called foreign policies which can really be summed up in a few words: wherever possible, go to war. We need wars. But we in the West bit off far too much more than we could chew. In the early days of the Russian invasion the euphoria and confidence of Biden and Boris, not to mention Macron, was palpable. They genuinely believed that the war would be over in a matter of weeks. And that Russian sanctions would grind the economy down over a longer period of time bringing Putin to his knees.

Today, nobody acknowledges privately how futile and stupid these notions were more than the Ukrainian president. And nobody appreciates how shallow and self-serving this initial policy to go to war with Russia in the first place is, more than President Zelensky himself. Put yourself in his shoes. He is counting the days now to the U.S. presidential election, wondering if Trump gets in, how many days will pass in January 2025 before the Donald falls out with him? If Trump does get in, the future is unclear as we know from history that Trump is capricious, unpredictable and driven by ideas and values which few can understand but usually relate to him on a personal level. It is likely though after he pulls off a ceasefire in his first week of office – which both sides want but can’t admit it openly – it will be very hard indeed to thrash out a deal that both can agree on, particularly knowing that the martial law, which keeps Zelensky is in office, is over, during peacetime he must call presidential elections which he will certainly lose. Trump also knows this. The war itself is Zelensky’s oldest friend and greatest supporter.

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It would have to beat Russia first. That won’t happen. But the profits will be huge.

• Ukraine Will Join NATO – Blinken (RT)

Washington wants to see Kiev win the conflict against Moscow and join NATO, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said. Blinken is visiting Kiev with his British counterpart David Lammy to reiterate Anglo-American support for Vladimir Zelensky’s government. “At the July summit, we declared that Ukraine’s path to NATO membership is irreversible,” Blinken said on Wednesday, reminding his hosts that the US-led bloc has “established a command dedicated to support Ukraine’s membership.” Blinken has made the case for Kiev’s membership in NATO before. However, the bloc has officially declared, both in Washington this summer and last year in Lithuania, that this could only happen “when allies agree and conditions are met.” Hungary and Slovakia have already said they will not agree under any circumstances, as bringing Ukraine into NATO would mean war with Russia.

During the same speech in Kiev, Blinken painted a rosy picture of Ukraine’s military industry, claiming it had expanded six-fold over the last year. “In the coming years, that’s going to give Ukraine one of the most advanced defense industries in the world, and it will be able to take that to the global market and take global market share away from other countries like Russia, and also supply NATO allies,” he added. Kiev is presently entirely dependent on the West for weapons, equipment, ammunition and even cash infusions to keep its government going. Ukraine is also facing widespread electricity shortages, as Russian missile strikes have degraded power production capacity. Blinken himself announced on Wednesday that the US will send $325 million to help repair the Ukrainian power grid and provide emergency backup generators for critical infrastructure.

Another $290 million has been earmarked for “food, water, shelter, health care and education programs for Ukrainians” both in the country and abroad, with the remaining $102 million designated for landmine removal. “The bottom line is this: We want Ukraine to win,” Blinken declared at another point during his visit, according to AP. This, too, was stated by Western officials before, as a prerequisite for Kiev’s membership in NATO. This effectively means that Ukraine will never join the bloc, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said in June. NATO’s 2008 announcement about Ukraine’s possible membership “became the trigger for much of the entire crisis that we are observing today,” Ryabkov said at the time. “If NATO members are ready to fall into the same trap again and history teaches them nothing, then they will get hit again and their bruises will get worse,” he added.

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“It’s high time we stated that any massive strikes against our territory give us a right to respond with a nuclear strike..”

• Enemies Must Be Sure Russia Is Ready To Use Nuclear Weapons – Karaganov (RT)

Russia’s nuclear doctrine urgently needs to be revised to allow a nuclear response to any major military aggression against the country, former Kremlin adviser Sergey Karaganov stated on Wednesday. The former foreign policy adviser to the deputy head of the Russian presidential administration told the Kommersant daily that the existing document is “woefully outdated” and no longer serves as an effective deterrent. Adopted in 2020, Russia’s nuclear doctrine does not provide for pre-emptive nuclear strikes and envisages the use of nuclear weapons only in “exceptional cases” in the face of a “threat to the sovereignty and territorial integrity” of the country. According to Karaganov, this approach has rendered it nearly useless and has effectively “excluded” the nuclear deterrence factor from Russia’s military and foreign policy arsenal.

“We have allowed the situation to deteriorate to a point when our adversaries believe we will not use nuclear weapons under any circumstances,” the political scientist said. “Having nuclear weapons without being able to convince your enemies that you are ready to use them is suicide.” A failure to have an effective nuclear deterrent policy “would plunge the world into a series of wars that would inevitably turn nuclear and end up with the World War III,” Karaganov believes, adding that this could happen “within the span of several years.” “The main goal of a doctrine should be in convincing all current and future enemies that Russia is ready to use nuclear weapons.” His words came amid the continued Ukrainian incursion into Russia’s Kursk Region and Kiev’s attempts to receive permission for the use of Western long-range missiles to strike deep inside the country. “It’s high time we stated that any massive strikes against our territory give us a right to respond with a nuclear strike,” Karaganov insists.

He also called on Moscow to clearly define the “nuclear escalation” steps in the next doctrine to leave Russia’s adversaries no room for doubt about whether it is ready to use its nuclear arsenal and when. President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly demonstrated a more reserved position on the issue. Talking to Karaganov at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum in June, the president said that Russia was “not brandishing” nuclear weapons and expressed hope that “it will never come” to a nuclear exchange between Moscow and the West. Moscow “has no reasons to even think about” using nuclear weapons, he said at the time, calling on Russian officials to not even “touch upon” the subject of nuclear weapons unless absolutely necessary. Later in June, Putin also said that Russia did not “need a preventive strike yet, because the enemy is guaranteed to be destroyed in a retaliatory strike.” He did not rule out changes to the doctrine, though.

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“You can’t pull a building unless it is wired, a time-consuming complex job.”

• The 23rd Anniversary of September 11, 2001 (Paul Craig Roberts)

Time passes. An entire generation has grown up since that day when a few Saudi Arabians armed only with box cutters caused airport safety to fail four times on the same morning, caused the entire US/NATO/Mossad security system to fail, caused the WTC towers constructed to withstand airliner collisions to collapse into dust by flying hijacked airliners into them, and attack the Pentagon using maneuvers of which airliners and pilots are incapable and destroying the section of the Pentagon where the documents were that explained where the Pentagon’s missing billions or was it trillions of dollars had gone. During these hours of activity the US Air Force was unable to get interceptors off the ground, and no evidence has ever been found of the passengers on the four hijacked airliners. But an undamaged passport of one of the alleged hijackers were found in the ruins of two hundred-storied skyscrapers. And Americans fell for this totally unbelievable story. What hope is there for Americans?

It took a year of pressure on the Bush/Cheney regime to get a commission established that instead of an investigation wrote down the official narrative as dictated to them. Later the commission co-chairmen and legal counsel wrote books saying that the government withheld information and set the commission up to fail. It only took 10 minutes for a high school physics professor to demolish NIST’s multi-year computer simulation of the collapse of Building 7, the 47 story WTC building that a BBC reporter stood in front of announcing its collapse 30 minutes ahead of the collapse. They knew the building was slated for destruction, but the word got out prior to the event. Silverstein, who owned or had the leases to the World Trade Center said on live TV that the decision was made to pull building 7. You can’t pull a building unless it is wired, a time-consuming complex job.

It is totally obvious that all 3 buildings were wired for demolition. Building 7 collapsed at free fall acceleration, and the two towers at essentially the same speed. This can only be achieved by controlled demolition. If the alleged Muslim hijackers wired the buildings–an impossibility–what is the point of flying airliners into them? The orchestrated event was used by Washington to launch wars in the Middle East against Israel’s opponents. Norman Podhoretz at Commentary had called for these wars, and US four star general Wesley Clark, NATO’s commander in chief, later confirmed that Pentagon generals showed him war plans calling for the US to overthrow “Seven countries in five years.”Little of this extraordinary evidence had any impression on insouciant Americans who swallowed the false narrative hook, line, and sinker.

Consequently, Washington destroyed Iraq and Libya and was about to destroy Syria, but the Russians intervened. Israel has kept the American gun aimed at Iran, but Putin has said Russia will not tolerate an attack on Iran. You can easily understand why Zionist Jews hate Putin and Russia and why America is at risk from serving the Zionist agenda. But it is difficult to understand Putin’s patience with Israel. Does Netanyahu own the Kremlin like he owns Washington? We don’t yet know how the events unleashed by 9/11 will finish unfolding. They may bring death to all of us. What I have never been able to understand is why Dick Cheney, the neoconservatives, the military/security complex, and the whore media were so determined to turn a few Saudi Arabians into superheroes who were more than a match for the American National Security State. How can Washington possibly deal with Russia, China, and Iran when a few Muslims can deliver the worst humiliation ever delivered to an alleged superpower?

The total humiliation that the official narrative delivered to America on 9/11 is without parallel in history. One would have thought that such a system wide failure would have destroyed Americans’ confidence in Washington. Why explains American fists rising not against Washington but against Muslim countries that had nothing to do with it? If the American population is incapable of paying attention, how does it expect to remain free?

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Paris rules the world.

• Durov’s Case Is ‘Exemplary’ – Paris Prosecutor (RT)

The case against the CEO of Telegram messaging app, Pavel Durov, is “exemplary” with regard to the battle against cybercrime waged by the French authorities, Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau has said. Durov was arrested after landing in Paris in late August and charged with multiple offenses ranging from refusal to cooperate with the authorities to administering an online platform allegedly used by organized crime for illegal conduct, such as trafficking and child sexual abuse. The Russian tech entrepreneur, who also has French, UAE, and Saint Kitts and Nevis citizenship, was later released on €5 million ($5.55 million) bail. The 39-year-old billionaire is banned from leaving the country while the case is ongoing. Asked about the investigation into Durov and Telegram in an interview with RTL Radio on Wednesday, Beccuau said, “this case is exemplary in terms of the actions taken by the cybercrime unit of the Paris Prosecutor’s Office.”

She added that her agency previously had issues with the Coco chat website and Sky ECC encrypted messenger, which were both shut down. “Organized crime is spreading in a world that we consider to be virtual,” the prosecutor said. According to the Beccuau, France is reacting to this by amending its legislation and introducing a new criminal offense for administering an online platform that allows illegal transactions – one of the charges Durov faces. Telegram attracted the attention of the Paris Prosecutor’s Office because its cybercrime unit “contacted the platform several times asking it to identify cybercriminals, especially in the area of child pornography. But the platform did not respond to these requests. It did not react,” she explained. Beccuau noted that Durov is fulfilling the terms of his bail, which require him to report to the police twice a week.

Last week, Durov issued a lengthy statement on Telegram, insisting that the claims by some media outlets that his platform “is some sort of anarchic paradise are absolutely untrue.” Telegram takes down “millions of harmful posts and channels every day,” and publishes “daily transparency reports” about actions taken against the dissemination of illegal content, including child abuse and terrorism, he said. Durov claimed that he has cooperated with French law enforcement in the past and “personally helped them establish a hotline with Telegram to deal with the threat of terrorism in France.” He added that the platform remains open to working with state regulators to establish “the right balance between privacy and security.”

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“But if she agrees to have Elon’s baby, she could break even..”

• Elon Musk ‘Proposes’ To Taylor Swift (RT)

Tech mogul Elon Musk has offered to father a child with Taylor Swift and protect her cats, after the songstress announced her endorsement in the US presidential race. In a post to her 280 million Instagram followers, the 34-year-old pop star backed Democrat Kamala Harris, used a photo of herself holding a cat, and signed it “Childless Cat Lady.” That appeared to be a dig at a statement by J.D. Vance, Republican candidate Donald Trump’s running mate, who once said the Democrats are run “by a bunch of childless cat ladies.” “Fine Taylor… you win… I will give you a child and guard your cats with my life,” Musk posted on X on Wednesday. Musk has fathered at least 12 children with three different women since 2000. One died in infancy and another became transgender, after which the tech billionaire famously vowed to “destroy the woke mind virus.”

He has also openly endorsed Trump and signaled he would take the job of “government efficiency czar” in his administration. Swift publicly backed Harris after Tuesday evening’s presidential debate with Trump, calling her “a steady-handed, gifted leader” and arguing that the US could achieve more “if we are led by calm and not chaos.” The endorsement did not exactly come as a surprise, since Swift had backed the Joe Biden-Kamala Harris ticket in 2020.

Her catty post on Tuesday resulted in losing followers on social media, suggesting that there might be some substance to rumors about many ‘Swifties’ now favoring Trump. “Swift’s endorsement of Harris could end up costing her several-hundred-million dollars,” cartoonist and commentator Scott Adams said on Wednesday. He calculated about a 20% cut to her $92 million annual income from losing pro-Trump fans, paying higher taxes if the Democrats win, and facing “insane” unrealized gains taxes on the value of her music catalog, currently estimated at “around $500-600 million” “But if she agrees to have Elon’s baby, she could break even,” Adams quipped.

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Remigration

 

 

Paul Newman
https://twitter.com/i/status/1833615164890911146

 

 

Ohio cats
https://twitter.com/i/status/1833605627928514875

 

 

Noses
https://twitter.com/i/status/1833907267608944930

 

 

Red wolf
https://twitter.com/i/status/1833674414208012666

 

 

Perspective
https://twitter.com/i/status/1833875646390370790

 

 

 

 

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