Sep 172025
 


Camille Pissarro Plum Trees in Blossom, Éragny 1894

 

Charlie Kirk’s Challenge to a Generation To Be His Legacy (Victor Davis Hanson)
Charlie Kirk Murder Investigation Expands (Margolis)
News Anchor Resigns After Being Suspended Over On-Air Charlie Kirk Tribute (ET)
Utah Attorney Reveals Why Robinson Killed Kirk in Shooter’s Own Words (Salgado)
Charlie Kirk Shooter Confessed to Murder in Discord Chat Group (CTH)
Biden’s FBI Targeted Charlie Kirk’s Turning Point USA (Margolis)
Appeals Court Rules Lisa Cook Can Remain On Federal Reserve Board For Now (JTN)
Fed Governor Lisa Cook Used as Tool Against Trump Administration (CTH)
Georgia Supreme Court Rejects Fani Willis’ Bid To Prosecute Trump (JTN)
The American Dilemma (Paul Craig Roberts)
Arab States Call For UN Suspension of Israel (RT)
Israel Guilty of Genocide In Gaza – UN Commission (RT)
Zelensky Is ‘Going To Have To Make A Deal’ With Russia, Trump Urges (ZH)
Kaja Kallas’ Ignorance Betrays The EU’s Bleak Future (Gao Jian)
EU Delays New Russia Sanctions Indefinitely – Politico (RT)
Lindsey Graham Threatens Hungary and Slovakia Over Russian Oil (RT)
Von der Leyen Facing Two No-Confidence Motions – Politico (RT)
Russians Largely Aligned With Americans On Moral Values (RT)

 

 

https://twitter.com/MonBreeden/status/1968020140899045394

https://twitter.com/JesseBWatters/status/1968121351434350616

https://twitter.com/VigilantFox/status/1968108500094955605

https://twitter.com/CharlieKirk4evr/status/1968141785450140145

Cruz

https://twitter.com/VigilantFox/status/1967983048479400253

https://twitter.com/GuntherEagleman/status/1967964208751853918

Bongino
https://twitter.com/TRUMP_ARMY_/status/1967927698887499835

 

 

 

 

“..he was a rare individual. And I don’t think we’re gonna see anybody like him. I can’t think of anybody on the conservative or the Left that has that many skills and that many talents and that much energy..”

Charlie Kirk’s Challenge to a Generation To Be His Legacy (Victor Davis Hanson)

I’d like to comment on the legacy of the late Charlie Kirk and why he is going to be remembered and what he accomplished. There’s been a lot of encomia about him, but I think one of the most unusual things that he did was he changed politics, but he didn’t address political issues first. In other words, he saw politics as a reflection of deeper social, economic, and cultural issues. I talked to him in late August, and what he was intent on was trying to tell a new generation of Americans that they were suffering from prolonged adolescence, and part of that wasn’t their fault. He was arguing that the Republican Party cannot empower people like [New York City mayoral candidate] Zohran Mamdani and the socialist Left, who have no solutions and will make things worse, but they have to address why they are popular.

Some of it, of course, is ignorance, but what he was trying to say is that people who cannot afford a home, they cannot afford energy, they cannot afford gasoline, they can’t afford to buy a car, they prolong their adolescence. They do not get married, or they’ve been indoctrinated in college that the nuclear family is toxic, or they don’t understand the beauty of child raising or raising children. And in a larger sense, these personal decisions they’re making are not only making them unhappy, but they’re hurting the country. In other words, we’re suffering from 1.6 fertility, a radical drop in the last quarter century from 2.0 at the turn of the millennium.

And what he was also trying to say is that there were solutions to these problems in sort of the red state paradigm in places like Florida, in places like Texas, in places like Arizona, in places somewhat like Nevada, where people were moving to—4 million, 6 million people a year—and they felt they could afford insurance, they could buy a car, it was safe, homes were affordable, they could get married at an earlier age, they could rediscover traditional norms of their grandparents. So, he was concentrated, not in those areas, but in the swing states, especially in the 2024 election—Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Minnesota, not Minnesota so much, but Michigan, somewhat Minnesota—and then blue states because he thought the battle had been won. We turned to common sense in half the country, but he was going as an emissary into hostile territory and telling people:

There is a reason why you’re leaving in the millions. There is a reason why you’re not buying houses. We have to look at zoning laws. We have to look at energy production. We have to unleash people’s individual talent to produce more goods and services at an affordable price. We have to champion the idea that a two-parent family is not aberrant. It was the historical norm for 2,500 years. It’s a good thing to have two or three children. It’s a good thing to be a young person and wanna buy a house in your 20s and not in your 40s, or to have a child in your 20s and not in your late 30s. Nothing wrong with the latter, but he was trying to offer a different paradigm that had proved successful.

The second thing, very quickly, about him is his methodology was as varied as his message. In other words, to get that message across that there were cultural, social, economic factors that reflected one’s political view, and if you’re gonna win people over to the conservative politics, you have to explain socially, culturally, and economically why they’re not receptive at first and what can be done about it. But he also was a good orator. He spoke extemporaneously. He had one year of college, and he waded into Oxford and Cambridge and took on people at, supposedly, the most prestigious universities in the English-speaking world. He could write. He created this huge organization, $100 million budget, somebody—we don’t do that in America without an MBA or a B.A. So, he was a multitalented figure.

And then, finally, as Aristotle said, courage is the most important of all virtues. And he was not afraid of his person. He was not afraid of getting into arguments with people. He was not intimidated by Ph.D.s, J.D.s, MBAs. So, he was a rare individual. And I don’t think we’re gonna see anybody like him. I can’t think of anybody on the conservative or the Left that has that many skills and that many talents and that much energy, and more importantly, saw that the problem with America is not whether you’re conservative or liberal per se, not necessarily, but why you are. And people who have some faith and some vision of being economically viable, and they can marry at an age at which they want to, they can have as many children as they please, they can buy a home, they are happier people. And the Republican Party in the past has not always ensured that they have that opportunity, and he was trying to address it.

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“Investigators are now pressed with the job of sorting out which of these messages were bluster and which could represent credible coordination or foreknowledge.”

Charlie Kirk Murder Investigation Expands (Margolis)

The investigation into Charlie Kirk’s murder is expanding, and what’s surfacing should trouble every American who still believes that political violence has no place in this country. The shocking assassination during a Turning Point USA event is now looking more and more like a disturbing level of online chatter may have preceded it, some of it so precise that it pointed to the exact day Kirk was killed. According to a report from the Washington Free Beacon, federal investigators are now digging into at least seven social media accounts that showed apparent advance knowledge of the September 10 shooting. These weren’t vague threats or passing remarks. Some of the archived posts, later deleted, referenced that date more than a month in advance. One account posted, “september 10th will be a very interesting day.”

After Kirk was pronounced dead, the same account mockingly added, “I plead the fifth.” Another user wrote on Sept. 3, “itd be funny if someone like charlie kirk got shot on september 10th LMAO.” And strikingly, within minutes of Kirk’s death, a different account crowed, “WE F*****G DID IT.” These aren’t coincidences. They are signals — ugly, public ones — that suggest that elements of the far-left digital underworld were not only cheering for Kirk’s assassination but potentially knew it was coming. Investigators are now pressed with the job of sorting out which of these messages were bluster and which could represent credible coordination or foreknowledge.

Outside sources preserved screenshots of these posts, which allowed federal agents to review data that might otherwise have been lost. Given how swiftly many of these messages got deleted, the push for platform records, IP logs, and account ID information suddenly matters a great deal. Equally alarming are reports that several of the accounts under scrutiny appear tied to transgender-identifying individuals or figures closely adjacent to that ideology. At least one apparently followed Tyler Robinson’s trans partner on TikTok.

Are we supposed to believe that this is all a coincidence? I can’t buy that. That same circle is believed to have reposted the August 6 “interesting day” prediction before gleefully celebrating Kirk’s death. This raises the uncomfortable but unavoidable question: was this purely one man’s crime, or did the poison brew more widely within extremist circles online and offline? We cannot ignore the larger implications. The FBI is now investigating whether other left-leaning groups in Utah had prior knowledge of or even connections to Robinson’s plans. As authorities dig through the tangled web of leftist online chatter, they’re discovering that Kirk’s assassination isn’t merely the act of a lone shooter on a rooftop. It reflects a culture increasingly willing to tolerate, and at times even celebrate, political violence aimed at conservatives. The harsh reality is that when a bullet silences a right-leaning voice, there are corners of America that respond not with outrage but with applause.

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“..if you do one thing today, make it be with passion, with conviction. Stand up for your friends, stand up for your beliefs, and speak loudly, even if your voice shakes. Your words have meaning, your values have purpose…”

“My resignation is guided by values that are essential to who I am, which I refuse to set aside in order to keep a job. I choose my faith and love of country, and always will.”

News Anchor Resigns After Being Suspended Over On-Air Charlie Kirk Tribute (ET)

A WICS-ABC20 News anchor in Springfield, Illinois, has announced that she is resigning from her position after her employer suspended her for paying tribute to the late Charlie Kirk on air. Beni Harmony paid an impassioned tribute to Kirk, whom she knew personally, during a Sept. 12 segment on ABC20’s Marketplace program. “I want you to know that it’s OK if you feel sadness, it’s OK if you’re grieving,” the host told her TV audience. “Two days ago, I lost a mentor, my first boss, the first person who made me believe in myself, that encouraged me to chase this dream that you’re watching right now, Charlie Kirk. “I want to share with you one of my favourite sayings that Charlie would always tell us at the office, he would yell it from the mountain-tops, so please listen: When conversations stop happening, when individuals become wordless, that’s when violence begins. So, if you do one thing today, make it be with passion, with conviction. Stand up for your friends, stand up for your beliefs, and speak loudly, even if your voice shakes. Your words have meaning, your values have purpose. Never forget that.

“Thank you, CK, you changed my life.”

According to a post Harmony made three days later, she was suspended by her network for the tribute to her former employer, whose assassination on a Utah college campus on Sept. 10 made national headlines. “Many in the mainstream media have been fired or punished for mocking his assassination,” Harmony wrote in a Sept. 15 post on X. “I believe I am the first to be targeted for honoring him on air. “Effective immediately, I have resigned from @WICS_ABC20 after being SUSPENDED for airing a non-partisan tribute to Charlie Kirk this past Friday.” Explaining the reasoning behind her decision to leave the network, Harmony wrote: “My resignation is guided by values that are essential to who I am, which I refuse to set aside in order to keep a job. I choose my faith and love of country, and always will.”

She then thanked her community in the city of Springfield and shared a prayer for the country, Kirk, and his wife and two young children. When asked on X about how people could support her, Harmony said, “While I’m still looking for my next job in media, I recommend everyone support Charlie’s family first.”

Numerous people in leadership positions have lost employment over inappropriate comments in response to the assassination of Kirk. One of the more prominent early cases was the firing of MSNBC analyst Matthew Dowd on Sept. 11, the day after Kirk was fatally shot. Another media commentator, Washington Post columnist Karen Attiah, also said she had been fired over her comments on the assassination of the conservative influencer. Several universities, including Clemson University in South Carolina, and companies, including American Airlines and Delta Air Lines, have terminated employees over their inappropriate comments on Kirk’s murder. Military officials have also said they are looking into disparaging remarks made by service members about the assassination, and that actions that discredit the service will be addressed immediately.

Vice President JD Vance, who was a close friend of Kirk, hosted a special broadcast of “The Charlie Kirk Show” on Sept. 15—a show that Kirk personally hosted every day from October 2020, right up until his death on Sept. 10, 2025. In the special broadcast, Vance called on his fellow Americans to confront the problem of political violence, which he said has “terrible consequences,” such as the attempted assassination of President Donald Trump and the shooting of GOP leader Steve Scalise. “I really do believe we can come together in this country. I believe we must. But unity, real unity, can be found only after climbing the mountain of truth, and there are difficult truths we must confront in our country,” Vance said.

“One truth is that 24 percent of self-described liberals believe it is acceptable to be happy about the death of a political opponent, while only 3 percent of self-described very conservatives agree. Three percent is too many, of course. “Another truth is that 26 percent of young liberals believe political violence is sometimes justified, and only 7 percent of young conservatives say the same—again, too high a number. “The data is clear, people on the left are much likelier to defend and celebrate political violence—this is not a both-sides problem. If both sides have a problem, one side has a much bigger and malignant problem, and that is the truth that must be told.”

His comments come after Kirk’s suspected assassin was identified as Tyler Robinson, who Utah Gov. Spencer Cox said had “clearly a leftist ideology.” FBI Director Kash Patel said on Sept. 13 that Robinson’s father identified his son from footage released during the manhunt for the suspect. Cox also confirmed that investigators are assessing writings, some with anti-fascist content, allegedly left by Robinson, who had a transgender romantic partner. Authorities have not publicly said whether this is relevant as they investigate Robinson’s motive.

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“If I am able to grab my rifle and … I will have left no evidence, I have to retrieve it again. Hopefully they have moved on. I haven’t seen anything about them finding it.’

Utah Attorney Reveals Why Robinson Killed Kirk in Shooter’s Own Words (Salgado)

Hearing a murderer’s reasons for committing an atrocity will always be disturbing, and the new information released by authorities on the messages of Charlie Kirk’s accused shooter, Tyler Robinson, is sickening and insane. Kirk’s young wife is a widow, and his children will grow up without their father. His family, friends, employees, and many fans will never be able to meet or hear him again. All Kirk did was respectfully and charitably debate people, exposing lies without personally attacking the liars. And yet, Robinson proudly murdered Kirk, based on new allegations, and not only boasted about it to his partner, but justified it as laudable because he claimed Kirk was full of hate. Robinson was so blinded by his own hate that he killed a young father for free speech.

Utah County District Attorney Jeff Gray, after announcing charges against Robinson, including aggravated murder, for which he aims to request the death penalty upon conviction, went on to provide more details from the case. Robinson’s parents both thought that the image released of the shooter looked like their son, and also thought they recognized the rifle once it was retrieved. It seems that Robinson had used his grandfather‘s rather distinctive rifle. Family recalled that Robinson had raged against Kirk’s event at Utah Valley University before it occurred and, ironically, accused Kirk of spreading hatred. Robinson‘s mother also knew that her son had been increasingly radicalized by LGBTQ ideology and was dating a man who identified as a woman, much to his more conservative parents’ chagrin.

After some initial refusal to respond, Robinson did communicate with his father and indicated his desire to commit suicide. Instead, the family ended up convincing him to turn himself in. But the most shocking information came from Robinson‘s roommate, the transgender boyfriend who reportedly disclaimed any prior knowledge of the crime and was able to provide text messages to police. On September 10, the day he assassinated Kirk, Robinson texted his roommate, “Drop what you’re doing. Look under my keyboard.” Gray explained: The roommate looked under the keyboard and found a note that stated ‘I had the opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk, and I’m going to take it.’ Police found a photograph of this note, the following … text exchange then took place. After reading the note, the roommate responded, ‘what you’re joking, right?’

Robinson: ‘I am still okay, my love, but I’m stuck in Orem for a little while longer. It shouldn’t be long until I can come home, but I gotta grab my rifle still. To be honest, I had hoped to keep this secret till I died of old age. I am sorry to involve you.’ The apparently stunned roommate pressed, “You are the one who did it, right?” Robinson replied, “I am, I’m sorry.” The roommate asked about the initial report that the shooter was caught, but Robinson stated that the person was a “crazy old dude” and that the second person interrogated by authorities had simply been wearing similar clothes to Robinson. I think what I found most disturbing about the conversation Gray read out is that Robinson did not seem to have the slightest guilt or regret for what he did. His only regret was that he had not gotten rid of all the evidence to his own satisfaction.

In his mind, it seems, he was a hero for murdering a peaceful debater simply because his victim had not agreed that ideology trumps biology. Gray continued to read: [Robinson:] ‘I had planned to grab my rifle from my drop point shortly after, but most of that side of town got locked down. It’s quiet, almost enough to get out, but there’s one vehicle lingering.’ Roommate: ‘why?’ …Robinson: ‘I had enough of his [Kirk’s] hatred. Some hate can’t be negotiated out. If I am able to grab my rifle and … I will have left no evidence, I have to retrieve it again. Hopefully they have moved on. I haven’t seen anything about them finding it.’ Roommate: ‘How long have you been planning this?’ Robinson: ‘A bit over a week. I believe I can get close to [the gun], but there is a squad car parked right by it. I think they already swept that spot, but I don’t want to chance it.’

Robinson again: ‘I’m wishing I had circled back and grabbed it as soon as I got to my vehicle, I’m worried what my old man would do if I didn’t bring back grandpa’s rifle.’ Robinson didn’t believe police could trace the weapon to him just based on the serial number since it was technically not his. He was, however, preoccupied by the thought of fingerprints. “I had to leave it in a bush where I changed outfits. Didn’t have the ability or time to bring it with,” Robinson texted. “I might have to abandon it and hope they don’t find prints.” Still displaying no guilt, Robinson amusedly recounted how he had engraved messages on bullet casings that were “mostly a big meme” and cussed about having to abandon the weapon, smugly saying, “grandpa’s gun does just fine.”

And, ever focused on covering his tracks, Robinson urged the roommate to delete the exchange and worriedly said his father, whom he described as “die hard MAGA,” was asking for pictures of the rifle. Robinson did end up messaging his roommate that he was going to turn himself in, but advised the roommate to “stay silent.” The FBI announced, however, that the roommate was cooperating with the FBI, and police executed a search warrant at the residence, which turned up used target boards and engraved shell casings. All of the Democrats who falsely vilified Kirk and continue to do so have blood on their hands. They are complicit in the radicalization of Tyler Robinson. For example, today’s worst take:

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“It was me at UVU yesterday. im sorry for all of this.”

Charlie Kirk Shooter Confessed to Murder in Discord Chat Group (CTH)

There is a great deal of psychological darkness in the background of the Charlie Kirk murder. I strongly urge readers to stay grounded to faith as you engage review in any aspect of this story. The war between good and evil is taking place in the battle for minds. Originally reported by the Washington Post, apparently Charlie Kirk’s assassin, Tyler Robinson, confessed in a chat room just a few hours before he turned himself in.

WASHINGTON POST – […] The 22-year-old suspect in Charlie Kirk’s killing appears to have confessed to friends in an online chat shortly before turning himself in to law enforcement, according to two people familiar with the chat and screenshots obtained by The Washington Post. “Hey guys, I have bad news for you all,” said a message from an account belonging to the suspect, Tyler Robinson, on the online platform Discord. “It was me at UVU yesterday. im sorry for all of this.” The message was sent Thursday night, about two hours before officials said Robinson was taken into custody. Additionally, as state law enforcement and FBI now say they are expanding their investigation to identify if there was a network working with Tyler Robinson (which seems obvious based on the Discord chat), attention is now being paid to militant transgender groups and NGO’s in the Utah area who seem to connect to Robinson and his transgender boyfriend Lance Twiggs.

All of the research being done is preliminary; however, there does appear to be a Utah network of people within the militant left, connected to both Antifa outlooks and armed transgender activism. The scope of how the networks connect to various funding mechanisms is not yet clear, but radicalization does not happen in a vacuum. “Armed Queers SLC” and a Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) known as “Utah Global Diplomacy,” partly funded by the UN appear to be two groups in the region with connections to the overall militant transgender movement: a preliminary motive being explored by federal investigators. The fact that Tyler Robinson was in a Discord chat group with approximately 30 other individuals, does indicate some network of mutually aligned interests that seem to circle around far-left transgender activism.

[…] Discord provided a copy of the message with the confession to authorities, according to a person familiar with the company’s interaction with law enforcement. The person spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss details of the investigation. The message was sent from Robinson’s account to a small private group of online friends, the person said. Discord is working closely with the FBI and local authorities, providing information about Robinson’s online activities on the platform, the person added. Discord has said that an internal investigation found “no evidence that the suspect planned this incident or promoted violence on Discord.”

[…] The Discord conversation shared with The Post shows members of the group chat reacting to Kirk’s shooting Wednesday — before the news broke that Robinson was allegedly involved. The group included about 30 people, according to the person who provided screenshots. “Charlie Kirk got shot,” one friend wrote Wednesday afternoon, according to an image of the messages. “I just saw the video holy s—,” another user wrote about an hour and a half later, adding of Kirk: “Bro didn’t deserve to go out like that sad.” The only response from Robinson’s account came the next day with the message announcing, “bad news i’m surrendering through a sheriff friend in a few moments,” the message, posted at 7:57 p.m. local time in Utah, continued. “thanks for all the good times and laughs, you’ve all been so amazing, thank you all for everything.”

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“On that political list was one of Charlie Kirk’s groups, Turning Point USA.” [..] Arctic Frost was more than just an anti-Trump operation. It was actually about crippling the Republican political infrastructure.”

Biden’s FBI Targeted Charlie Kirk’s Turning Point USA (Margolis)

FBI Director Kash Patel faces questions during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing Tuesday morning, during which Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) revealed that whistleblower revelations showed that Joe Biden’s FBI targeted not just Donald Trump, but a wide swath of Republican organizations — including Charlie Kirk’s Turning Point USA. Grassley reminded Patel of the FBI’s recent history of political weaponization, pointing directly to an operation known as “Arctic Frost.” “At your nomination hearing, I made public records that whistleblowers provide me about Arctic Frost,” Grassley said. “Arctic Frost was the FBI case opened and approved by anti-Trump FBI Agent Thibeau. Arctic Frost then became Jack Smith’s elector case against then-citizen Trump and now-President Trump.”

According to Grassley, newly obtained records show that the Arctic Frost probe was far broader than previously known. “The case was expanded to Republican organizations,” Grassley explained. “Some examples of the group that Wray and FBI sought to place under political investigation included the Republican National Committee, Republican Attorney General’s Association, and various Trump political groups.” The scope was staggering. “In total, 92 Republican targets, including Republican groups and Republican-linked individuals, were placed under investigative scope of Arctic Frost,” Grassley said. “On that political list was one of Charlie Kirk’s groups, Turning Point USA.” Grassley argued that the evidence proves that Arctic Frost was more than just an anti-Trump operation. It was actually about crippling the Republican political infrastructure.

“In other words, Arctic Frost wasn’t just a case to politically investigate Trump,” Grassley declared. “It was the vehicle by which partisan FBI agents and Department of Justice prosecutors could achieve their partisan ends and improperly investigate the entire Republican political apparatus.” “So today, Sen. Johnson and I are making these records public for the entire country to see, and I hope a lot of people are interested in seeing what government can do when various agencies have a political agenda,” Grassley said. Grassley also connected the dots to the politically charged prosecution of former Trump adviser Peter Navarro. “My investigative work has also exposed the political way in which Peter Navarro was investigated and prosecuted,” he said, noting one FBI agent’s reaction to Navarro’s charges: “When FBI Agent Thibeau found out that Biden’s DOJ would prosecute Navarro, he said, ‘Wow, great.’ That’s a quote-unquote.”

The exposed weaponization of the FBI isn’t just a matter for Washington insiders; it’s a direct assault on the very foundation of our republic. Americans must demand full transparency and accountability before our institutions become irreparably politicized. This scandal isn’t some partisan gripe; it’s a glaring threat to the democratic process that affects every voter and every election ahead. And let’s not forget, Biden himself set the tone by labeling Trump supporters as enemies of the state. That rhetoric, coupled with a weaponized FBI, created the toxic political climate that ultimately led to Kirk’s assassination.

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Does she get to keep her cheap mortgage too?

Would murder also not be considered “for cause”?

Appeals Court Rules Lisa Cook Can Remain On Federal Reserve Board For Now (JTN)

A federal appeals court on Monday ruled Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook can remain on the panel while litigation over President Donald Trump’s attempts to fire her plays out. The Trump administration last week appealed a lower court’s ruling that allowed Cook to retain her position on the board of governors. The judge ruled that the allegations of mortgage fraud would likely prove insufficient to justify her dismissal. Cook is accused of mortgage fraud for allegedly listing a secondary residence as a primary residence. Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte filed a criminal referral to the Justice Department to alert them of the issue.

The appeals court sided with the lower court’s ruling in a split 2-1 ruling, according to CNN, ruling that U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb was correct in her assessment that Cook would likely be successful at this stage in two of her claims, including Cook’s claim that the firing violated the Federal Reserve Act’s “for cause” provision. “In this court, the government does not dispute that it failed to provide Cook even minimal process—that is, notice of the allegation against her and a meaningful opportunity to respond—before she was purportedly removed,” Judges Bradley Garcia and Michelle Childs wrote in their opinion.

“The district court issued its preliminary injunction after finding that Cook is likely to succeed on two of her claims: her substantive, statutory claim that she was removed without ‘cause’… and her procedural claim that she did not receive sufficient process prior to her removal in violation of the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment,” they added. Judge Gregory Katsas wrote the dissenting opinion, arguing that Trump did attempt to remove Cook “for cause.” The ruling comes ahead of a two-day meeting where the Federal Reserve Board is expected to consider lowering interest rates. The meeting begins on Tuesday.

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“..the issue around Cook is not as much about her unlawful conduct, as it is the value of what Cook represents in the fight against President Trump.”

Fed Governor Lisa Cook Used as Tool Against Trump Administration (CTH)

We see things for what they are, not what media try to have us believe. Unlike the first term playbook, the Lawfare operation against President Trump is facing a more affirmed attack posture. Instead of Trump (T1) being on constant defense, Trump (T2) is strategically willing to be more confrontational and direct against the use of Lawfare and corrupt courts against Trump’s intended policy changes. T2 Main Justice is still not going to the mattresses as many of us would like, and factually the DOJ and FBI operations are still a weakness in the overall war against the radical left; however, they do appear to recognize that direct aggressive confrontation is needed – despite the shortcomings in their capabilities. In the fight between the executive authority and Federal Reserve board member Lisa Cook, the embattled fed governor is being represented by Norm Eisen. Eisen, together with Mary McCord and other ideological travelers represent Lisa Cook and are using the issue as a point of attack against executive power.

In the latest development, in a 2-1 decision, a federal appeals court has rejected President Donald Trump’s bid to quickly fire Federal Reserve board member Lisa Cook. The two justices who decided to block Trump were appointed by Joe Biden. The justice who sided with the executive authority was appointed by President Trump. Ultimately, this issue is going to the Supreme Court where hopefully the highest court will rule that President Trump can remove Lisa Cook for cause, because Cook falsified federal mortgage loan documents. But in the bigger picture, the issue around Cook is not as much about her unlawful conduct, as it is the value of what Cook represents in the fight against President Trump.

WASHINGTON DC – […] Judges J, Michelle Childs and Bradley Garcia, both Biden appointees, voted to leave Cook in her post, while Judge Gregory Katsas, a Trump appointee, dissented. The Department of Justice declined comment. Last week, U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb rejected Trump’s bid to remove Cook just three years into her 14-year term, saying the president’s justification for the firing — mortgage fraud allegations that have not been adjudicated in any forum — did not meet the legal requirements to overcome laws protecting the independence of the Federal Reserve. While the Supreme Court has repeatedly endorsed Trump’s efforts to remove executive branch officials Congress has sought to insulate from politics, the justices have signaled they view the Federal Reserve as a unique “quasi-private” institution that may put it in a different legal category.

Federal law gives Trump the power to fire members of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors “for cause,” which typically means misconduct or malfeasance on the job. Trump said he had cause to fire Cook due to allegations that she claimed in separate mortgage applications that two different homes were her primary residence, which can entitle a homeowner to lower rates. Cook has denied the allegations. The D.C. Circuit’s majority said there was “no need” at this stage of the case for the appeals court to address whether the allegations against Cook meet the “for cause” standard to fire a Fed member or what that standard would require. Childs and Garcia agreed with Cobb’s finding that Cook’s due process rights appeared to have been violated because she wasn’t properly notified of the accusations against her and given a chance to dispute them.

In his dissent, Katsas grappled directly with the definition of “for cause” firing protections for Federal Reserve board members, concluding that the law gives the president broad power to define the “cause.” “The Board of Governors no doubt is important, but that only heightens the government’s interest in ensuring that its Governors are competent and capable of projecting confidence into markets,” Katsas wrote. “And in empowering the President to remove Governors for cause, Congress has specifically assigned that task to the President.” Delving into the president’s determination of cause, Katsas wrote, “would enable a potentially compromised Governor to engage in significant governmental action — such as voting on whether to adjust interest rates, which Cook says she must do tomorrow.”

The Trump administration’s expected emergency appeal will go to Chief Justice John Roberts, who oversees such appeals out of the D.C. Circuit. He’s all but certain to escalate the issue to the full court, but could issue a temporary order blocking Cook from remaining in her post while the litigation plays out. [..] Norm Eisen is a well-known Lawfare operative, second only to Mary McCord in his high visibility and connections to all of the anti-Trump efforts. Eisen, like McCord, is at the center of the leftist effort to stop the Trump agenda through the manipulation of the courts, ie. ‘Lawfare.’

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“..Georgia’s Prosecuting Attorneys’ Council could appoint a new prosecutor to take the case, that could be a months-long process, leaving the case in limbo.”

Georgia Supreme Court Rejects Fani Willis’ Bid To Prosecute Trump (JTN)

The Georgia Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ (D) bid to prosecute President Trump over the 2020 presidential election. The court’s 4-3 decision upholds a lower court ruling disqualifying Willis over a “significant appearance of impropriety” because of her romantic relationship with a top prosecutor in the case, The Hill news outlet reported. Willis had attempted to prosecute Trump and his allies in the state on racketeering charges for allegedly attempting to overthrow the 2020 election. While the Georgia’s Prosecuting Attorneys’ Council could appoint a new prosecutor to take the case, that could be a months-long process, leaving the case in limbo.

Trump’s lead attorney in Georgia, Steve Sadow, said in a statement that the state’s high court had “correctly denied review.” “Willis’ misconduct during the investigation and prosecution of President Trump was egregious and she deserved nothing less than disqualification. This proper decision should bring an end to the wrongful political, lawfare persecutions of the President,” Sadow said. Willis’s office had not yet responded to The Hill’s request for comment.

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“The two most powerful vested interests in America are the US military/security complex and the Israel Lobby. As they share the interest in war and its profits in terms of money and territory, peace faces a powerful counterforce..”

The American Dilemma (Paul Craig Roberts)

The problem that ethnic Americans face is that neither Republicans nor Democrats can represent their interest. The Republicans represent Israel’s interest. The reason for this is that Republicans tend to be more conservative, more religious, and more patriotic than Democrats and are often seen by their opponents as jingoistic. The Republican mentality toward Israel comes from the “Judeo-Christian ethic” and the long Cold War against the Soviet Union. The Judeo-Christian ethic is an oxymoron. God in the Old Testament is angry and vengeful. In the New Testament he is loving and forgiving. The “Judeo-Christian ethnic” is a propaganda term that disarms Christians from seeing Zionists for what they are. During the Cold War of the 20th century, there was much focus on the Middle East. Washington was determined to minimize Soviet influence and to control oil flows.

Israel was hyped as our ally, our base in the Arab Middle East against Soviet Communism. Thus, for conservatives, Israel is just part of America. Two consequences are that conservative Americans are blind to Zionist Israel’s genocide of the Palestinians and to the fake “war on terror” which in actual fact was Israel’s use of American lives and money against Israel’s opponents in the Middle East. Washington has spent the first quarter of the 21st century clearing away obstacles to Greater Israel. The Democrats represent the interests of those who are alleged to be “oppressed by prudes and white racists.” Democrats are the defenders of immigrant-invaders who enter our country illegally. They champion “multiculturalism,” which is white replacement and a Tower of Babel.

Democrats are the champions of sexual perverts. It is more important to a progressive, liberal, leftist Democrat that a male who declares himself a female have access to women’s spaces and athletic competitions than for a criminal suspect to have a fair trial. Democrats think that the most important civil right in the world is for biological males who self-declare themselves “transgendered” into females to take a woman’s place on a swim or soccer team and share the showers with the biological female members of the teams. The Democrats have no concern with the rights of the displaced real women to compete in sports. Similarly, Democrats are concerned with the sexual preference rights of “minor-directed persons” (pedophiles), not with the sexual abuse of children.

Have you not noticed how vehement the Democrat progressive liberal left is in defending the rights of sexual perverts? Indeed, you are not even allowed to use such a term as sexual perverts, because sexual perversions have been normalized by the Democrat liberal left. It is entirely possible that the Democrats will criminalize heterosexual sex, because it produces more “aversive racists,” thus perpetuating white racism. Yes, laugh, but the prospect has already been explored in science fiction. The consequence of the two parties’ indoctrinated biases is that it is impossible for either to represent the values and interests of the ethnic base of America. By supporting whatever crime Israel commits, Republicans maintain their pro-Israel base at the expense of the moral values of their base. Even red states such as Texas and Florida will not give you a state contract or job if you criticize or boycott Israel.

The Democrats, committed as they are to white replacement as all whites are aversive racists, refuse to protect American borders from immigrant-invaders. Democrats are committed to emptying citizenship from meaning. What is the result of the inability of either party to represent Americans? If Republicans are in office, it means wars for Israel. If Democrats are in office, it means open borders and wars against the family, wars against real Christianity not the fake Christian Zionist variety created by Israel, wars against normal heterosexuality, wars against merit and, thereby, the destruction of educational standards, and advancement based on skin color and perverse sexuality. For the Biden regime the ideal candidate was a black transgendered. Biden’s black Secretary of Defense announced that there would be no promotion of white heterosexual males until “equity had been attained.”

Elon Musk was correct when he said that America needs a new political party, one independent of economic, foreign, and ideological interests. But Musk did not say who would finance it. It would take Musk’s entire wealth. The combination of the corrupt US Supreme Court ruling that it is legal for corporations to purchase the US government with campaign contributions and the stupidity of the annual subsidy of billions of US dollars to Israel, which is used by Israel to purchase the House of Representatives, the US Senate, the President and the administration, make it abundantly clear that Americans have a government that is totally incapable of representing Americans.

Throughout the Western World it is not democracy that rules. The Western World is ruled by vested interests whose campaign contributions determine policy. When Putin and Lavrov negotiate with Washington officials, they are not negotiating with a government. They are negotiating with representatives of the private interests whose money places Representatives, Senators, and Presidents in office. The two most powerful vested interests in America are the US military/security complex and the Israel Lobby. As they share the interest in war and its profits in terms of money and territory, peace faces a powerful counterforce as peace does not serve the interests of the two most powerful interest groups in the United States.

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“..the Qatari capital had been used as a key venue for peace talks between West Jerusalem and Hamas.”

Arab States Call For UN Suspension of Israel (RT)

Arab and Islamic leaders have called for Israel to be suspended from the United Nations over its alleged violations of the organization’s charter. The demand comes amid Israel’s military campaign in Gaza and after last week’s airstrike on Doha which left six people dead, including a Qatari security officer. On Monday, the leaders of the League of Arab States and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation convened an emergency summit in Doha. In a final statement following the summit, the group called on member nations to “consider the compatibility of Israel’s membership in the UN with its Charter” and coordinate efforts to suspend Israel from the organization.

Israel has said its Doha strike targeted Hamas officials, although Arab and Islamic leaders branded it a “dangerous escalation that exposes the extremist hostility of the Israeli government.” They also accused Israel of undermining the international mediation and peacemaking process, given that the Qatari capital had been used as a key venue for peace talks between West Jerusalem and Hamas. The statement urged all states to review diplomatic and economic relations with Israel and take “legal and effective measures” to stop Israeli actions, including sanctions, suspension of arms, and dual-use exports. The Israeli offensive in Gaza began on October 7, 2023 after Hamas attacked southern Israel, leaving about 1,200 people dead and more than 250 taken hostage. Over 64,000 people, including women and children, have since reportedly been killed in Israel’s military campaign in the Palestinian enclave.

The conflict has drawn international condemnation with many countries accusing Israel of genocide against the Palestinian people. Israel’s attacks on neighboring countries have also been widely criticized, with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres denouncing the recent Doha strike as a violation of Qatar’s sovereignty. Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani called it “state terrorism.” Russia also said the strike was a blatant violation of international law and the UN Charter. Israel has defended its operations, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisting the Hamas leadership must be eradicated.

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“It is clear that there is an intent to destroy the Palestinians in Gaza through acts that meet the criteria set forth in the Genocide Convention.”

Israel Guilty of Genocide In Gaza – UN Commission (RT)

Israel has committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, a UN commission of inquiry said in a report published on Tuesday. According to the findings, Israel has committed four of the five genocidal acts defined under the 1948 Genocide Convention since the start of its war with Hamas in 2023. These include killing, causing serious bodily or mental harm, deliberately inflicting conditions of life aimed at destroying Palestinians in whole or in part, and imposing measures to prevent births. “The commission finds that Israel is responsible for the commission of genocide in Gaza,” Navi Pillay, chair of the UN body, said at a press conference in Geneva. “It is clear that there is an intent to destroy the Palestinians in Gaza through acts that meet the criteria set forth in the Genocide Convention.”

Pillay blamed “Israeli authorities at the highest echelons” for “these atrocity crimes,” saying they “have orchestrated a genocidal campaign for almost two years now with the specific intent to destroy the Palestinian group in Gaza.” She added that Israeli authorities have also failed to prevent or punish those responsible by not investigating or prosecuting the perpetrators of genocidal acts. The commission said it had analyzed Israeli actions in Gaza, including “imposing starvation and inhumane conditions of life for Palestinians,” concluding that “genocidal intent was the only reasonable inference.” It also cited the “systematic destruction” of healthcare and education, along with “systematic” sexual and gender-based violence against Palestinians. The commission urged Israel to “end the genocide in Gaza” and called on UN member states to halt arms transfers and prosecute individuals or companies complicit in genocide.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry has rejected the commission’s report as “fake,” accusing its authors of being “Hamas proxies” and calling for the “immediate abolition” of the panel. “The report relies entirely on Hamas falsehoods, laundered and repeated by others,” the ministry claimed. “Israel categorically rejects this distorted and false report and calls for the immediate abolition of this commission of inquiry.” The conflict has continued since October 7, 2023, when Hamas militants launched a surprise assault on southern Israel, killing about 1,200 people and taking more than 250 captive. The Palestinian death toll has risen to 64,905 as of Monday, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. On Tuesday, Israel launched a ground offensive in Gaza City – one of the few areas still outside IDF control – after weeks of intensified strikes on alleged Hamas targets. The move followed the Israeli Security Cabinet’s approval of plans to seize the city last month.

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“..So far Trump has not been willing. He could simply cut off the weapons and money flows to the Zelensky government if he wanted to – but he’s not even threatening to at this point.”

Zelensky Is ‘Going To Have To Make A Deal’ With Russia, Trump Urges (ZH)

President Trump told reporters in passing on the White House lawn Tuesday that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky “is going to have to make a deal” with Russia to end the the long-running war. Last month’s historic Alaska Trump-Putin summit failed to produce or lead to anything substantial, other than perhaps an improvement of bilateral relations. Trump acknowledged in the fresh remarks that the Ukrainian and Russian leaders “hate each other,” and said “it looks like I have to sit in the room with them, because they can’t sit in a room together.” “There’s great hatred there. But no, that meeting accomplished a lot,” he said in reference to the Alaska summit. And yet the reality remains that Putin and Zelensky are at this point no closer to actually being in the same room together, much less the same venue, even if other mediators like Trump are there.

Trump also in his comments took the opportunity to apply more pressure on the European Union, saying it must stop all purchases of Russian oil “immediately”. “They’ve got to stop immediately, not fair to us. They’re purchasing Russian oil, and we have to do this,” he said. Ukraine’s Zelensky without doubt wants the next round of EU sanctions to hit Moscow, but has also appeared supportive of Trump calling out Europe’s oil and other energy imports. “I’m sure the US can apply enough sanctions in order to hurt the Russian economy, plus Donald Trump has enough force to make Putin afraid of him,” Zelensky said. Still, Kiev wants to see more and more robust sanctions leveled from Washington’s direction. “Europe has already introduced 18 sanctions packages against Russia. And all that’s lacking now is a strong sanctions package from the US,” Zelensky has said.

As for Trump admitting that Zelensky must make a deal, the big question remains whether Trump is willing to use the significant leverage the United States has over the Ukrainian leader. So far Trump has not been willing. He could simply cut off the weapons and money flows to the Zelensky government if he wanted to – but he’s not even threatening to at this point. Such actions would result in huge pushback from Trump’s own Republicans. So for now, his urging Zelensky to the peace table appears to just be empty words, with no threat of repercussions. Meanwhile: TRUMP ADMINISTRATION CLEARS FIRST UKRAINE ARMS AID PACKAGE PAID FOR BY ALLIES, SOURCES SAY. Currently, there are reports indicating that Trump and Zelensky might meet again next week. At this point, there’s no sign of a Putin-Zelensky meeting being anywhere on the horizon.

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“.. the EU’s politicians have over-consumed its accountability and jeopardize a still possible peace not just for Europe, but for global balance and security.”

Kaja Kallas’ Ignorance Betrays The EU’s Bleak Future (Gao Jian)

China and Russia on the victorious side of World War II? “That is something new.” When EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas questioned whether China and Russia belonged to the victorious side of WWII during a conference organized by the EU Institute for Security Studies earlier this month, she revealed more than just personal historical ignorance. Her remark underscores a troubling detachment from fundamental historical truths that continue to shape today’s geopolitical landscape. While interpretations of WWII may vary across ideological lines, it is widely accepted that the Allied victory was the result of a collective effort involving multiple nations. The Soviet Union, in particular, bore the unimaginable cost of 27 million lives in its struggle against Nazi Germany, effectively dismantling the Wehrmacht on the Eastern Front.

Similarly, China’s resistance against Japanese militarism – lasting 14 years and costing over 35 million casualties – prevented Imperial Japan from expanding its aggression further into Asia and the Pacific. The tremendous sacrifices of both nations played a decisive role in the ultimate triumph of the worldwide anti-fascist war. To ignore these contributions is not merely an oversight; it is a deliberate erosion of historical memory. Yet Kallas is not an outlier in this regard. She represents a broader, though often unspoken, tendency within parts of the European political and media elite to re-frame WWII as a victory primarily achieved by Western powers. This revisionist narrative not only distorts history but also undermines the moral and strategic credibility of the European Union. When those in high office casually dismiss the sacrifices of nations that were vital in defeating fascism, they weaken the EU’s diplomatic standing.

What makes Kallas’ comments particularly damaging is the current social context in the EU and the UK. They are currently navigating multiple overlapping crises: economic stagnation, energy insecurity, military instability in their eastern neighborhood, and a growing loss of confidence in their governance model. At such a critical juncture, the EU cannot afford foreign policy leadership that indulges in historical denialism or rhetorical provocations. Comments by Kallas diminish the EU’s stature and fuel perceptions that it is led by figures who prioritize ideological posturing over strategic thinking. In such a self-righteous manner by merely detaching from history and social realities, the EU’s politicians have over-consumed its accountability and jeopardize a still possible peace not just for Europe, but for global balance and security.

One has sufficient justification to suspect a deeper crisis within EU democratic institutions since Kallas is so bafflingly incompetent. Is the EU still a politically serious entity? If its foreign policy chief behaves so senselessly, what can we expect from the EU as a whole? Can it still secure its supranational ambition under such poor leadership? The requirement for consensus among member states often results in fragmented foreign policies and ambiguous messaging. Nowhere is this more evident than in the EU’s uneven response to the war in Ukraine, fraught with internal divisions over military aid, sanctions, and long-term strategy. Kallas’ remarks – though not representative of all EU members – highlight how individual officials can amplify these contradictions and undercut collective credibility.

If the EU wishes to be taken seriously as a geopolitical power, it must ensure that its representatives embody diplomatic rigor and historical awareness. Kallas is demonstrating the opposite, at the expense of the EU’s democratic resilience and political seriousness. A very natural question would be: Is the EU sliding into being a potential liability for its member states’ interests? The bloc’s institutional design, often a product of political compromise, leads to confusion and inefficiency. When the High Representative for Foreign Affairs appears unaware of basic historical facts that underpin modern global relations, she not only erodes the EU’s ability to act as a reliable international actor but also dwarfs the international images of its member states.

Predictably, the anxiety of the EU’s future will loom larger as it fails to find its orientation in such a tremendously changing world. There is a growing fear that the Union is sliding into being a body hampered by bureaucratic inefficiency, ideological fragmentation, and a lack of strategic vision. Kallas’ absurd remarks are nothing more than empty talk, but they imply a wider governance crisis. For the EU to regain its credibility and influence, it must recommit to historical accuracy, foster diplomatic discipline, and reclaim a sense of strategic purpose. Otherwise, it is little more than a platform for uncoordinated and counterproductive rhetoric – a talking shop that weakens Europe from within rather than empowering it on the global stage.

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They don’t know what to do with Hungary and Slovakia. They’re trying to change the law that says decisions must be unanimous, but for now they still are.

EU Delays New Russia Sanctions Indefinitely – Politico (RT)

The EU has postponed presenting its new package of sanctions against Russia, Politico has reported, citing several EU diplomats. The outlet attributed the delay to pressure from the Trump administration to impose even tougher restrictions on Moscow, which has elicited resistance from Slovakia and Hungary. The proposed 19th package of measures targeting Russian oil exports and the banking sector over the Ukraine conflict was due to be presented on Wednesday. However, it has been dropped from the European Commission’s agenda indefinitely, several EU diplomats told Politico on Tuesday.

According to the report, the suspension comes as Brussels is increasing pressure on Hungary and Slovakia to cut their energy reliance on Moscow in light of a fresh ultimatum to do so from Washington. US President Donald Trump, who has so far refrained from imposing direct sanctions on Russia, reportedly said over the weekend he was ready “to move ahead” if Washington’s European partners halt Russian oil purchases. He has also urged the EU to slap tariffs of up to 100% on China and India – the key buyers of Russian oil since the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022. Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned Western nations against adopting a “colonial” tone toward China and India and trying to “punish” them.

As part of its sanctions’ pressure, Brussels has pledged to phase out Russian fossil fuels entirely by 2027, but several member states – including Hungary and Slovakia – continue to oppose the move, citing risks to their national energy security. The European Commission has recently proposed scrapping unanimous voting on the bloc’s foreign policy decisions to sideline dissenting members. Russia has denounced Western sanctions as “illegal,” stating that they have not only failed to derail the national economy, but have provided an impetus for domestic development. Russian officials maintain they seek a long-term peace, accusing Kiev and its Western backers of undermining the process.

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The War Party is not happy.

Lindsey Graham Threatens Hungary and Slovakia Over Russian Oil (RT)

US Senator Lindsey Graham has threatened Hungary and Slovakia with consequences if they do not halt purchases of Russian oil. The Republican from South Carolina issued the warning after President Donald Trump renewed calls for NATO states to end energy imports from Moscow, in apparent frustration over the pace of peace talks between Moscow and Kiev. The president was “right to demand that Europe stop buying Russian oil,” Graham wrote on X on Monday. He conceded that the EU had largely done so, adding it was “now virtually down to Hungary and Slovakia… to step up to the plate soon.” “If not, consequences should and will follow,” he warned.

The two countries blocked the EU’s 18th sanctions package in June, warning it threatened their energy security. Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said the plan would prevent states from buying “cheap Russian natural gas and cheap Russian oil,” while Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico branded some proposals “economic suicide” without viable alternatives. Brussels has pledged to phase out Russian fossil fuels by 2027, but Hungary and Slovakia remain opposed to immediate restrictions, citing dependence on the Druzhba pipeline. Kiev repeatedly struck the Druzhba pipeline in August, with Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky describing the attacks as “sanctions.”

The EU is currently drafting its 19th sanctions package, expected to target Russian oil exports and the banking sector. The measures, initially planned to be presented this week, have reportedly been delayed as Brussels debates how to respond to demands from Washington regarding Russian energy imports. Russia has denounced Western sanctions as “illegal,” stating that they have not only failed to derail the national economy, but have provided an impetus for domestic development. Russian officials maintain they seek a long-term peace, accusing Kiev and its Western backers of undermining the process.

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“No-confidence motions used to be quite rare at the EU Parliament. Prior to the July vote, such a motion was last tabled against Jean-Claude Juncker in 2014.”

Von der Leyen Facing Two No-Confidence Motions – Politico (RT)

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is set to face two separate no-confidence votes at the EU Parliament in early October, Politico reported on Tuesday, citing an internal email from the legislature’s president, Roberta Metsola. The motions of censure are scheduled to be debated during the plenary session from October 6 to 9. The motions submitted against von der Leyen, a divisive figure in Brussels, come from both right and left – the Patriots for Europe and The Left parliamentary groups.The Patriots for Europe have accused her of lacking transparency and accountability, particularly in relation to the EU’s trade agreements with the United States and the South American trade bloc Mercosur.

“The EU is weaker today than ever due to the persistent failure of the president of the Commission to cope with the most pressing challenges,” the group stated in its motion, as quoted by Politico. The Left has also criticized von der Leyen’s trade policies but placed greater emphasis on the EU’s handling of the conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. The group argued that the Commission has shown inaction and failed to hold Israel accountable. Both motions were filed at midnight on September 10, which was the earliest opportunity following a previous no-confidence vote in July. Von der Leyen survived that vote, which was initiated by Romanian right-wing MEP Gheorghe Piperea and focused on the so-called Pfizergate scandal.

The controversy stemmed from the disappearance of text messages between von der Leyen and Pfizer’s CEO during negotiations for a major Covid-19 vaccine procurement. Von der Leyen, a former doctor and German defense minister, was accused of a lack of transparency in negotiating the multi-billion-euro deal. She dismissed the allegations against her as “simply a lie” and branded her critics “conspiracy theorists.” The initiative ultimately failed, supported only by 175 MEPs with 360 voting against it. To pass, two-thirds of the 720 MEPs must vote in favor. No-confidence motions used to be quite rare at the EU Parliament. Prior to the July vote, such a motion was last tabled against Jean-Claude Juncker in 2014.

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Of course they are. Both are deeply Christian. Much more than, say, western Europe. Lots in common.

Russians Largely Aligned With Americans On Moral Values (RT)

Russians and Americans share similar views on key aspects of private life, from relationships to having children outside marriage, a poll by the Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VCIOM) has shown. The study, released on Monday, compared moral values in the two countries using Gallup’s July US survey and a parallel poll in Russia. It found broad overlap on personal issues but sharp differences on more sensitive topics such as gender transition and newer social norms. Some 90% of Americans and 82% of Russians said contraception was acceptable. Views on premarital sex were nearly identical, with 68% of Americans and 69% of Russians approving.

Russians were more permissive about children born out of wedlock, with 71% calling it acceptable compared with 67% in the US. Fewer Russians viewed divorce as acceptable – 65% versus 75% of Americans. Sociologists said private life was increasingly seen as a matter of personal choice in both countries. In Russia, researchers pointed to a “shift toward individualization,” where people decide for themselves when to have children and who to live with. On extramarital affairs, 16% of Russians and 8% of Americans said they were acceptable. Polygamy and suicide were judged permissible by 21% of Americans, compared with 11% and 7% of Russians.

The sharpest differences emerged on same-sex relations, deemed acceptable by 64% of Americans but only 12% of Russians. Russia has banned LGBT organizations and propaganda since late 2023. Attitudes also diverged on teenage sex: 41% of Americans said it was acceptable versus 14% of Russians, although US opinion was split, with 51% rejecting it. Researchers noted that Russian society was more willing to forgive ‘personal weaknesses’ like infidelity, but far less accepting of practices such as gender transition or same-sex relations.

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London
https://twitter.com/VetaChain/status/1967676147136930028
https://twitter.com/TRobinsonNewEra/status/1967884271126974985

Scott

 

 

Support the Automatic Earth in wartime with Paypal, Bitcoin and Patreon.

 

 

 

 

 

Sep 112025
 


Charlie Kirk with his family 2025

 

“Dark Moment For America” – Trump Addresses The Nation (ZH)
Elon Musk Jumps In On Iryna Zarutska Mural Project (Tim O’Brien)
“Art Must Always Tell The Truth” (CTH)
Kremlin Responds To Polish ‘Drone Attack’ Claims (RT)
Trump Against Economic Isolation of Russia – Vance (RT)
‘Russian Strike on Pension Queue’ Claims Debunked (Sp.)
Wondering Why The EU Is So Screwed? Just Look At Its Top Diplomat (Amar)
EU Uses Ukraine Conflict To Create ‘United States Of Europe’ – Orban (TASS)
Brussels Pushing To Silence Dissent Among EU Members (RT)
EU Eyes Russian Assets For Ukraine ‘Reparations Loan’ (RT)
Gulf Cooperation Council to Support Any Action by Qatar After Israeli Attack (Sp.)
We’ll Get Them Next Time – Israeli Envoy Rues Hamas-Qatar Strike Failure (RT)
Unaccountable Israel (Paul Craig Roberts)
BLS Announces 911,000 Fewer Jobs Created April ’24 through March ’25 (CTH)
Joe Biden’s Economy Was So Much Worse Than We Thought (Margolis)
Maduro Suggests Reason Behind Us Military Buildup Around Venezuela (RT)
Melania, Please Talk to Donald About Epstein (Frank Miele)

 

 

Leavitt
https://twitter.com/GuntherEagleman/status/1965471159274672129
https://twitter.com/DerrickEvans4WV/status/1965484112183214339

Walsh

11


Bessent
https://twitter.com/EricLDaugh/status/1965553818399044053

 

 

 

 

America has seen two violent murders in the span of one week, Iryna Zarutska and Charlie Kirk. What appears to tie the two together is the influence of what passes for a leftish world view these days. A view that made it possible for Zarutska’s killer to roam free despite countless arrests, as well as requests for psychological treatment. That guy should never have been on that train, and just about everyone who’s been in contact with him knows why. Woke society decided to set him free.

Charlie Kirk became a victim of his association with Donald Trump. If you can’t get to the boss, look at those around him. It’s very painfully ironic that Charlie lived by the word, not the sword. His favoite terrain was the dialogue, the exchange of ideas, but that’s not everyone’s favorite. Still, he wasn’t a far right wing activist or anything like it.

Violence in America comes from the left, they just about have secured a monopoly on it, while maintaining the illusion that it’s the right that is the real threat. That’s one false idea that needs urgent correction.

We’re going to let it all sink in, and read about it, and have the dialogue that Charlie loved so much, but what remains more than anything right now is the pain. As for Iryna: you’re beautiful. It breaks our hearts that we couldn’t save you.

 

 

“”I don’t know why this is affecting me so personally.” Its because in Charlie you see yourself, the most polite version of yourself, the most articulate, the most charitable to your enemies. And even that wouldn’t be enough to save you from them.”

“Dark Moment For America” – Trump Addresses The Nation (ZH) /span>

Update (2114ET) President Trump addressed the nation from the Oval Office on the senseless political assassination of Charlie Kirk at a Turning Point event at Utah Valley University, calling it a “dark moment for America.” Trump called Kirk a “martyr for truth” and vowed to crack down on the radical left… The president continued:

“My administration will find each and every one of those who contributed to this atrocity and to other political violence, including the organizations that fund it and support it, as well as those who go after our judges, law enforcement officials, and everyone else who brings order to our country. I am filled with grief and anger at the heinous assassination of Charlie Kirk on a college campus in Utah. Charlie inspired millions, tonight all who knew him and loved him are united in shock and horror.

From the attack on my life in Butler, Pennsylvania last year, which killed a husband and father, to the attacks on ICE agents, to the vicious murder of a healthcare executive in the streets of New York, to the shooting of House Majority Leader Steve Scalise and three others. Radical left political violence has hurt too many innocent people and taken too many lives. Tonight, I ask all Americans to commit themselves to the American values for which Charlie Kirk lived and died, the values of free speech, citizenship, the rule of law. His legacy will live on for countless generations to come. Today, because of this heinous act, Charlie’s voice has become bigger and grander than ever before, and it’s not even close. May God bless his memory. May God watch over his family.”

Our takeaway is that the radical left, which has been funding chaos through dark-money NGOs and other groups, is about to get a major wake-up call from the Trump administration. A move to counter these rogue NGOs could be just one executive order away. Stay tuned.

Kirk made a name for himself about winning debates in “proper democratic fashion” …

Civil terrorism expert Jason Curtis Anderson of One City Rising states:

“The assassination of Charlie Kirk marks a dangerous escalation in America’s culture war—where the battle of ideas is now escalating into political violence against those who run organizations devoted to debate and civil discourse. Very few people grasp the gravity of this moment . Incidents like this don’t exist in isolation; they risk triggering a chain of events that can further destabilize the country. Whether it’s the anti-ICE movement, pro-Palestinian agitators, anarchist networks, or NGO-backed permanent protest groups like Indivisible, we are watching the rise of something new and deeply alarming. As Tal Fortgang wrote in City Journal, America is entering a new era of civil terrorism—where the goal is no longer peaceful protest, but intimidation, silencing, and destabilization of our democratic order.”

Like us, many are struggling to find the words to discuss this but @Merovingianus offered some useful insight:

“Among all the justifiable outrage over the years, Charlie Kirk has consistently been one the calmest and most polite among us. Someone shot him and the entire scope of the Left is celebrating. If we do not act accordingly we might as well surrender now. I’ve seen several people saying something along the lines of “I don’t know why this is affecting me so personally.” Its because in Charlie you see yourself, the most polite version of yourself, the most articulate, the most charitable to your enemies. And even that wouldn’t be enough to save you from them. It is because you are seeing that the marketplace of ideas you grew up believing as sacred is now a war zone that will get you killed and you’re struggling to reconcile the world you live in with the world you grew up in.

You are struggling to comprehend and incorporate the irrefutable evidence that this political divide isn’t one solved by polite exchange of ideas and that we are in a nation at war with itself.”

RIP Charlie.

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Let’s have 1,000 murals each all over the country for Iryna Zarutska and Charlie Kirk.

Elon Musk Jumps In On Iryna Zarutska Mural Project (Tim O’Brien)

After George Floyd died and in the mayhem over the Black Lives Matter and Antifa riots, a cottage industry of artistic murals erupted, transforming Floyd from a common street thug into a saintly martyr. Within days of his death, a mural was painted on the site where Floyd died at the Cup Foods convenience store at 38th Street and Chicago Avenue. Shortly thereafter, a second mural was painted nearby. This sparked artists across the country and around the world to add to the contrived mythology of Floyd, creating murals in places as far away as Idlib, Syria, Barcelona, Spain, Dublin, and Berlin. The murals were one of the few purely peaceful ways Floyd was honored at the time.

Fast forward to this week, when news of the murder of Iryna Zarutska broke, and conservatives and everyday people were outraged, while the legacy media and the Left remained silent. No riots, no looting from the right, but plenty of anger. That anger, and a respect for Zarutska, appears to have inspired the CEO and founder of Intercom, Eoghan McCabe, to post on X that he’s “offering $500k in $10k grants to paint murals of the face of Iryna Zarutska in prominent US city locations.” He then provided an email address to learn more about this impromptu memorial project.

This morning, Elon Musk posted on X: “I will contribute $1M.” With momentum like this, expect to start seeing the face of Zarutska in a city near you. Who is McCabe? He’s a Berkeley-based entrepreneur who is prominent in the AI customer service sector. Earlier this week, like millions of Americans, he was outraged by the cold-blooded killing of Zarutska. He called for quick consequences for the person convicted of this crime, “I do think that rapid, public executions for crimes like this are a spiritual goal that we should point ourselves towards. I worry about Western society if we can’t react in proportion to how evil this is.” In another post on X, McCabe said, “It’s an objective fact that leftism is responsible for this[.] The leftist politicians who kept this monster free are evil, and must be very severely punished[.]”

Zarutska’s murder has outraged Americans for a number of reasons this week. The killing itself was so sudden and so gruesome on public transportation in a relatively safe city like Charlotte, that anyone who spends any time in public spaces can easily imagine something like this happening to them. The fact that the killing happened on August 22, but it only emerged in the public consciousness over a week later, and only on social media at first, is unsettling. How can such an inhuman act not make national news. Related to this is the reaction on the right. The cultural dilemma for everyone is based on trust in the news media. If the news media willfully ignores or even buries a story like this to advance its narratives, then what good is it?

Matt Margolis detailed how wretched the legacy media behaved once conservatives shamed it into covering the story. A healthy media landscape would shout this news early and often as a warning to America that something needs to be done about crime and the people who commit it. Now. Instead, through its silence and even worse, for blaming conservatives for noticing the murder, the news media has decidedly taken a stance in favor of more crime, more murder, more killings of people like Zarutska at the hands of hardened criminals like Decarlos Brown, Jr.

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A story that tells itself.

“Art Must Always Tell The Truth” (CTH)

Popular artist Banksy created a graffiti mural in London depicting the current state of the UK censorship system using the courts to trample the rights of British citizens:

It did not take long for the authorities to cover the mural and eventually attempt to remove it.

However, what remained of the artwork was the essential core of the truth.

I particularly like the fact the govt turned the CCTV camera, so they can monitor who might visit the scene of the criminal dissent.

Apparently, the British government doesn’t quite see the irony.

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Intriguing take: “..some drones used by Ukrainian and Russian forces for mutual attacks “lost their track as a result of the impact of the parties’ electronic warfare assets.”

Kremlin Responds To Polish ‘Drone Attack’ Claims (RT)

Moscow has dismissed Poland’s latest claim that Russian drones breached the country’s air space. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said no evidence has been provided linking the UAVs to Russia. On Wednesday, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk stated that the country’s military had shot down a “huge number of Russian drones.” Warsaw has described the incident as an “unprecedented violation of Polish airspace” and an “act of aggression.” However, Peskov has dismissed the accusations, pointing out that “The EU and NATO leadership accuse Russia of provocation on a daily basis. Most often, without even trying to provide any arguments.”

He further noted that, to his knowledge, the Kremlin has not yet received any request for contact from the Polish leadership over the incident. Meanwhile, Russia’s charge d’affaires in Warsaw, Andrey Ordash, told RIA Novosti that when he was summoned to the Polish Foreign Ministry on Wednesday, the Polish authorities did not provide any evidence that the downed UAVs belonged to Russia. He noted that the drones had flown into Poland from Ukraine. Tusk has claimed, however, that the aircraft came from Belarus rather than Ukraine, and characterized the incident as a Russian “provocation.” The Belarusian military had previously reported giving Poland early warning that some drones used by Ukrainian and Russian forces for mutual attacks “lost their track as a result of the impact of the parties’ electronic warfare assets.”

After announcing the alleged airspace violation, Tusk formally invoked Article 4 of NATO’s founding treaty, which provides for consultations in case one of the bloc’s members believes its security is threatened. Last week, former Polish President Andzej Duda referenced a November 2022 incident in which a Ukrainian missile landed on Polish territory. Kiev insisted it was an intentional Russian attack and called for NATO-level retaliation. Duda said that Ukrainian authorities were trying to get the US-led bloc into a direct confrontation with Russia, describing such a scenario as a “dream” for Kiev, but unacceptable for Poland.

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“.. once we get this peace settled, we could have a very productive economic relationship with both Russia and Ukraine..”

Trump Against Economic Isolation of Russia – Vance (RT)

US President Donald Trump does not view attempts to isolate Russia economically as a sustainable strategy and believes trilateral cooperation involving Moscow, Kiev, and Washington could ensure lasting peace in Eastern Europe, Vice President J.D. Vance said on Tuesday. In an interview with One America News Network, Vance described joint ventures with Russia as “one of the carrots” the Trump administration is offering in efforts to broker an end to the Ukraine conflict. The approach contrasts with Western European leaders who have sought to dismantle Russian trade ties, arguing that past decades of energy reliance on Moscow were a strategic mistake, but in doing so they have significantly worsened their own economic situation.

“The president’s been very open with both the Europeans and the Russians that he doesn’t see any reason why we should economically isolate Russia except for the continuation of the conflict,” Vance said. He stressed that Russia possessed vast natural resources whether other parties liked it or not, and that “once we get this peace settled, we could have a very productive economic relationship with both Russia and Ukraine.” Shared economic growth, he added, could be “the best guarantee of a long-term peace.”

Vance contrasted Trump’s stance with that of the previous administration, which he said poured American resources into Ukraine without any real exit plan. He was responding to host Matt Gaetz’s claims that behind closed doors Moscow was offering to increase use of the US dollar in energy trade to help ease American domestic prices. Last week, EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas accused Trump of “weakening” allies with trade tariffs and undermining Western unity. Russian officials have highlighted the benefits of renewed cooperation with the US. President Vladimir Putin said Russian businesses had both capital and technology to pursue lucrative joint projects, including gas extraction ventures in Alaska and the Arctic, if Washington is willing to give political approval.

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Like the spring 2022 Bucha false flag before it, the Yarovaya provocation looks like a fresh push to break off the peace process, and blame Russia.”

‘Russian Strike on Pension Queue’ Claims Debunked (Sp.)

Ukrainian officials have accused Russia of killing 24 people on line to collect pensions in the village of Yarovaya in the Ukrainian-occupied area of the Donetsk People’s Republic. Here’s why the claims don’t hold up. “The world must not remain silent,” Zelensky urged after publicizing the incident, demanding a “response” from the US and Europe. There’s just one problem: the incident bears all the hallmarks of a false flag. Here’s evidence. A Russian MoD source told Sputnik that Russian forces did not carry out any attacks in the vicinity of Yarovaya on September 9, with the last strike in the area carried out on the night of September 7, and targeting an area near the neighboring settlement of Novosyolovka on the line of contact. No reports on casualties were issues before Zelensky made his claims.

Info about the ‘Russian strike’ was immediately disseminated by Zelensky-aligned social media and immediately picked up by Ukrainian and Western media. Footage presented by the Ukrainian side shows landmarks that can be easily be determined on satellite maps, including the post office building, a local memorial and trees surrounding both. The destruction in the footage doesn’t even come close to matching the shape and size of a Russian aerial bomb (Russian 100 kg FAB-250 and 200 kg FAB-500 bombs’ destructive radius and power is incomparably greater than that shown in the video). Instead, the destruction looks more like the result of the detonation of an explosive device with the equivalent of just a few kg of TNT.

Yarovaya is one of the increasingly few areas of the DPR still under Ukraine’s control, signifying Kiev’s rejection of Russia’s negotiating position for ending the conflict, which includes full Ukrainian withdrawal from the Donbass. The provocation comes on the heels of last month’s summit meeting between Putin and Trump, during which Trump backed off on US sanctions threats. Like the spring 2022 Bucha false flag before it, the Yarovaya provocation looks like a fresh push to break off the peace process, and blame Russia.

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“..an amateurish and dim top diplomat becomes a disgrace to be ashamed of before the world, even among embarrassed friends.”

The word diplomat is losing its meaning, if it’s not already gone. A diplomat must engage in diplomacy, be diplomatic. Kallas obviously doesn’t fit that notion.

Wondering Why The EU Is So Screwed? Just Look At Its Top Diplomat (Amar)

Kaja Kallas, the European Union’s de facto foreign minister (and former prime minister of Estonia), is unusually, grotesquely incompetent, even for an unelected EU apparatchik. Like former German Foreign Minister Annalena “360 Degrees” Baerbock – now instagraming like an excited upper-class teenager from her ill-begotten UN sinecure in New York – Kallas also displays an enormous capacity for being pleased with herself. She appears never happier than when holding a mic to her own platitudes, presented in a mortifyingly basic form of very labored English, while being obsequiously soft-balled by a fawning interviewer. In both cases, the contrast between the self-image and reality is jarring: Kallas and Baerbock’s obvious, glaring lack of intellectual ability, elementary education, and basic professional know-how should have ended their misguided career ambitions long ago.

Yet, instead, Kallas, like Baerbock, has not only rapidly fallen up the slippery ladder of career and privilege. She has done so in a particularly visible area. High officials responsible for the economy, for instance, can do – and do – enormous damage. But those in charge of foreign policy are no less dangerous, while, literally, publicly representing tens or hundreds of millions of people. A professional and intelligent foreign minister – such as, for instance, China’s Wang Yi, India’s S. Jaishankar, or Russia’s Sergey Lavrov – can enhance respect for a country or bloc even among its critics or opponents. However, an amateurish and dim top diplomat becomes a disgrace to be ashamed of before the world, even among embarrassed friends. They’re perhaps worse: a laughingstock, signaling that whoever chooses to be represented by a fool must be foolish as well.

With Kaja Kallas’s tenure as the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, both cringe and ridicule are abundant. Her recent peak performances have included a truly inane take on the history of the Second World War, silly and rather racist musings on the general abilities of “the Russians” and “the Chinese,” and, of course, a preposterous attempt to blame them – plus Iran and North Korea – for disrupting our brave old world of a rules-bound order that includes the Gaza genocide, compliments of Israel and the West. Regarding what Kallas mistakes for history, the high-flyer from Estonia has opined that she was surprised by claims that Russia and China fought together in and won World War II. Of course, that’s simply a fact: Both countries were and are widely recognized as prominent members of the alliance that defeated global fascism in Europe and Asia.

Indeed, if Kallas were capable of telling an intern to Google the matter or consult the online version of the Encyclopedia Britannica, she’d find out quickly that China and Russia (then the core of the Soviet Union) are counted among the “Big Four” core of the alliance (alongside Great Britain and the US). This place was earned with rivers of blood: China and the Soviet Union were the two most brutally devastated countries in World War Two. China fought massive Japanese forces, and Russia broke the spine of Nazi Germany’s Wehrmacht. Even busy Estonian collaborators could not save the day for the Führer.

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“..using the Ukraine conflict to financially chain its member nations so that it can subjugate them and strip them of their sovereignty..”

EU Uses Ukraine Conflict To Create ‘United States Of Europe’ – Orban (TASS)

The leadership of the European Union is using the Ukraine conflict to financially chain its member nations so that it can subjugate them and strip them of their sovereignty, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban believes. “The Brusselian elite are pushing joint indebtedness to strip nations of their sovereignty and drag us toward a United States of Europe. They want to use the war in Ukraine as the pretext to shackle us all financially. We must look beyond the battlefield to the future of the Union itself: free nations or submission to unelected bureaucrats?” he wrote on the X social network. The Hungarian Prime Minister noted that by doing this, the EU is making a last-ditch effort to preserve itself as currently formulated. Earlier, Orban said that the EU bureaucratic center had ceased to play the role of coordinator of the bloc and has turned into a “Frankenstein pursuing its own interests.”

He stressed that when the EU was created, it was agreed that power would be concentrated in the hands of individual nations, but now Brussels is trying to centralize that power. According to the politician, the leadership of the association is encroaching on the sovereignty of its participants, and failing to resolve any crises along the way. Since the very beginning of the conflict in Ukraine, the Hungarian government has consistently advocated for its peaceful resolution and has called on its allies to resume dialogue with Russia. Hungary also refuses to support Ukraine’s accelerated accession to the EU, warning that this would cause serious damage to the European economy and could lead to a direct military clash with Russia.

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Raw power game.

Brussels Pushing To Silence Dissent Among EU Members (RT)

The European Commission has announced plans to scrap consensus-based decision-making in EU foreign policy, in a step that could sideline member states resisting Brussels’ line. Brussels has long weighed replacing unanimity – a founding principle of EU foreign policy – with majority voting, arguing the change would speed up decisions and stop individual states from blocking measures such as sanctions and military aid for Ukraine. Under the current system, all 27 members must agree for decisions to pass. The proposed reform would require a qualified majority, meaning decisions would be adopted if backed by a set threshold of states. In her ‘state of the union’ address on Wednesday, Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said it was time to “break free from the shackles of unanimity,” and insisted that the bloc act “faster.”

“I believe that we need to move to qualified majority in some areas, for example in foreign policy,” she stated. The EC chief, who has repeatedly invoked the “Russian threat” to justify military aid to Ukraine, sanctions, and the push for accelerated militarization, was met with opposition from Slovakia and Hungary. Both governments have repeatedly threatened to use their veto powers to block EU actions they view as harmful to their national interests. Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico has warned that removing members’ veto power on foreign policy would spell the end of the bloc and could be “the precursor of a huge military conflict.”

Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orban has dismissed officials in Brussels as “bureaucrats” and argued that abandoning consensus would undermine national sovereignty, as member states could be dragged into wars without their consent. Orban said the EU is on the verge of collapse and will not survive beyond the next decade without a “fundamental structural overhaul” and disentanglement from the Ukraine conflict. Moscow has accused the West of pursuing “uncontrolled militarization” to prepare for war with Russia, while dismissing claims it intends to attack NATO or EU states as “nonsense.” Russian officials, including President Vladimir Putin, have accused Western leaders of fearmongering to justify inflated military budgets and to cover up their economic failures, insisting that aid to Kiev only prolongs the hostilities.

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Hahaha:

“Ukraine will only pay back the loan once Russia pays for the reparations,” she said.”

EU Eyes Russian Assets For Ukraine ‘Reparations Loan’ (RT)

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has proposed leveraging Russian assets illegally frozen in the EU for a “reparations loan” for Ukraine. Delivering a state of the union address to the EU parliament on Wednesday, the former German defense minister did not propose outright confiscation of the Russian assets, reportedly comprising some $300 billion. Moscow has condemned the asset freeze and warned that seizure would amount to “robbery” and violate international law, while also backfiring on the West. Von der Leyen introduced what she said was an urgently needed new mechanism to finance Kiev’s warchest, using Russia’s immobilized funds. Western nations ordered the freezing of the assets – some €200 billion of which is held by privately owned Brussels-based clearinghouse Euroclear – after the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022.

The funds have accrued billions in interest, and the West has explored ways to use the revenue to finance Ukraine. ”With the cash balances associated to these Russian assets, we can provide Ukraine with a reparations loan,” von der Leyen claimed, noting that “the assets themselves will not be touched” and that the risk would have to be “carried collectively.” “Ukraine will only pay back the loan once Russia pays for the reparations,” she said. The money, von der Leyen added, would fund Kiev’s military and ensure the security of the civilian population. Von der Leyen gave no figures, while the G7 last year backed a plan to provide Kiev with $50 billion in loans to be repaid using the profits. The EU pledged $21 billion.

She also announced an initiative aimed at boosting Ukraine’s military, including through a proposed “drone alliance,” explaining that the EU would “frontload” €6 billion. The proposal stops short of confiscation, which most EU states reject due to financial and legal risks. Several countries have also dismissed the idea of a “reparations loan,” warning it could breach international law. Belgium has been especially vocal. Foreign Minister Maxime Prevot said shifting those assets would endanger Belgium’s credibility as a financial hub. “Confiscating those Russian sovereign assets is really not an option,” Prevot said. “It would be a very bad signal to other countries worldwide” and could also “erode confidence and trust in the euro,” according to the minister.

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Did they miss them on purpose? Or do they just have poor aim?

Gulf Cooperation Council to Support Any Action by Qatar After Israeli Attack (Sp.)

The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) stands in solidarity with Qatar and will support any response following the Israeli strikes on Doha, GCC Secretary General Jasem Albudaiwi said. “The Council states express full solidarity with the State of Qatar and support any measures it takes,” GCC Secretary General Jasem Albudaiwi said. On Tuesday, the Israel Defense Forces said it had carried out strikes in Doha targeting senior officials of Palestinian movement Hamas. Eyewitnesses told Sputnik that several explosions occurred in the center of Qatar’s capital. World powers, including the United Kingdom, Germany and India, have condemned the Israeli airstrike on Hamas members in Doha and called for restraint.

“Today’s airstrike by Israel against Hamas leaders in Doha breaches international law and Qatar’s territorial integrity, and risks a further escalation of violence in the region,” the European External Action Service said in a statement. UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer condemned Israel’s strike and called for “immediate ceasefire, the release of hostages, and a huge surge in aid into Gaza.” India is concerned about the Israeli airstrike on Doha and calls for restraint to ensure peace and security in the region are not jeopardized, the Indian Foreign Ministry noted. “The Netherlands condemns the Israeli airstrike in Doha. The sovereignty of states must be respected. Additionally, this step doesn’t bring a much needed ceasefire in the Gaza Strip any closer,” Dutch Foreign Minister David van Weel said on X.

German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul noted that the Israeli attack not only violates Qatar’s territorial sovereignty, “but also jeopardizes our efforts to free the hostages.” Wadeful urged all parties to make every effort to achieve a ceasefire and free the hostages. “Cuba expresses its strongest condemnation of the Israeli attack on the Hamas headquarters in Doha, which constitutes a new extrajudicial execution by Zionism, a flagrant violation of international law and the sovereignty of Qatar, and a serious threat to regional security and stability,” Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez Parrilla said on X.

Venezuelan Foreign Minister Yvan Gil also condemned “the cowardly attack by the [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu regime on the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Qatar,” calling the airstrike “an act of state terrorism, a flagrant violation of international law and a challenge to the principles of peaceful coexistence among nations.” On Tuesday, the Israel Defense Forces said it had carried out strikes in Doha targeting senior officials of Palestinian movement Hamas. Eyewitnesses told RIA Novosti that several explosions occurred in the center of Qatar’s capital.

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An eye for an eye hands the world to the blind.

We’ll Get Them Next Time – Israeli Envoy Rues Hamas-Qatar Strike Failure (RT)

Israel is determined to kill Hamas leaders wherever they reside and will continue its efforts until they are all dead, Israeli Ambassador to the United States Yechiel Leiter told Fox News on Tuesday. Earlier in the day, Israeli airstrikes hit a residential building in Doha, Qatar, targeting senior figures of Hamas’ political wing. The group said its officials survived, while the attack has been criticized by the White House and condemned by Qatar. “If we didn’t get them this time, we’ll get them the next time,” Leiter said. The ambassador described Hamas as “enemies of Western civilization” and argued that Israel’s actions were reshaping the Middle East in ways “moderate” states understood and valued. “Right now, we may be subject to a little bit of criticism. They’ll get over it,” he said of the Arab countries.

US President Donald Trump said that while dismantling Hamas was a legitimate goal, striking a US ally undermined both American and Israeli interests. Leiter noted that Israel had “never had a better friend in the White House” and that Washington and West Jerusalem remained united in seeking the militant group’s destruction. Qatar, which hosts Hamas officials as part of its role as a mediator, said a Qatari security officer was among six people killed in the Israeli strike. Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani has denounced the attack as a “heinous crime” and an “act of aggression,” while Doha’s Foreign Ministry has accused Israel of “state terrorism.”

Israel has vowed to hunt down Hamas leaders, who it blames for the deadly October 2023 attack which was launched from Gaza into southern Israel. The ambassador vowed that those responsible “are not going to survive,” no matter where they are. Israel’s military response has left at least 64,000 dead in Gaza, according to local authorities. Critics have accused West Jerusalem of committing genocide by rendering the blockaded enclave uninhabitable and worsening famine conditions through restrictions on food aid.

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“Get ready for Israel’s next war–Washington’s military attack on Iran. Russia and China, by leaving Iran unprotected, have invited the attack.”

Unaccountable Israel (Paul Craig Roberts)

The Criminal State of Israel continues to initiate acts of war against states that are not at war with Israel. The most recent was an Israeli attack on a residential building in Qatar. Qatar’s Foreign Ministry accused Israel of “state terrorism.” A residential building is a place where people reside. Israel’s criminal action managed to kill six Qatari citizens, but not the Hamas leaders Israel allegedly was targeting. Israel’s ambassador to Washington, Yechiel Leiter, described Israel’s enemies as “enemies of Western civilization,” but Hamas has made no attacks on Western civilization. Leiter dismissed Israel’s critics with “they’ll get over it,” they always do. To calm the troubled waters Leiter played Israel’s US card: “Israel has never had a better friend in the White House and Washington and Israel are united in seeking the destruction of Hamas.”

Leiter summed up: “If we didn’t get them this time, we’ll get them the next time.” Qatar has joined Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen, and the United States if you believe those who explain that Israel was involved in the murder of President John F. Kennedy as countries that are victims of Israel’s self-righteous aggression. Yet Israel remains protected by the US, UK, EU, and the rest of the Western world, by most of what little remains of the Arab world, and by Putin. Yet Russia is demonized for protecting Russians in the Russian areas of Ukraine from massacre by neo-Nazis. How have Ukrainian neo-Nazis, financed and supported by Washington and Israel, avoided the demonization applied to Hamas? Hamas is fighting for its own country–Palestine, which has been destroyed by Israel armed with US money, weapons, and diplomatic cover.

Currently Israel and the Zionist neoconservatives who have wormed their way into US foreign policy are pressuring President Trump–“Israel’s greatest friend”–to use nuclear weapons against Iran, a country who has done nothing to the US but nevertheless is under US sanctions and threats imposed at Israel’s insistence. The “powerful American superpower” cannot even control its own foreign policy. The blustering, threatening Trump doesn’t dare threaten Israel. Get ready for Israel’s next war–Washington’s military attack on Iran. Russia and China, by leaving Iran unprotected, have invited the attack.

Let us further compare the West’s treatment of Russia compared to its treatment of Israel. Poland has asked NATO to invoke “Article Four” against Russia for allegedly violating Poland’s air space. No attack was made on Poland. Moreover, the alleged drone incursions came from Belarus, not Russia, and Belarus warned Poland in advance that some drones had “lost their track as a result of the impact of the parties’ electronic warfare assets.” “This allowed the Polish side to respond promptly to the actions of the drones by scrambling their forces on duty,” said General Pavel Muraveiko, the chief of the general staff of Belarus. So, Poland wants Article Four invoked against Russia for a non-event, but it is anti-semitic to complain of Israel’s genocide of Palestine, both the people and the country, and Israel’s military/assassination attacks on other countries. Clearly, the future of freedom does not reside in such a corrupt Western world.

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“This brings the Biden jobs overstatement to a staggering 1.5M.”

BLS Announces 911,000 Fewer Jobs Created April ’24 through March ’25 (CTH)

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent noted, when you add the previous Biden revision of -577,000 to the current revision of -911,000 the Bureau of Labor and Statistics (BLS) had overreported Biden’s job growth by almost 1.5 million jobs. The BLS reports today an annual revision of 911,000 fewer jobs that previously reported. These further puts President Trump’s decision to fire the head of the BLS into context.

Bessent: “Now it’s official: 2024 job gains were exaggerated by nearly 1M workers, and this is on top of an already reported 577K in downward revisions. This brings the Biden jobs overstatement to a staggering 1.5M. The truth: President Trump inherited a far worse economy than reported, and he’s right to say the Fed is choking off growth with high rates.

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“The numbers prove that Biden’s presidency was a failure even on its own terms.”

Joe Biden’s Economy Was So Much Worse Than We Thought (Margolis)

For four years, Joe Biden bragged about presiding over the “strongest economy in history.” He propped up his narrative with the return of jobs after the COVID shutdowns and falsely claimed his policies created them. Even liberal outlets admitted he was padding the numbers, but Biden never stopped repeating the lie. Now the lie has officially collapsed. The Bureau of Labor Statistics just confirmed what President Trump has been saying all along: Biden’s “strong economy” was nothing but smoke and mirrors. On Monday, the BLS issued the largest downward revision in its history, wiping out nearly a million jobs — 911,000 to be exact. That’s not a minor correction; that’s proof Biden’s economic record wasn’t just exaggerated, but was a fraud from the start.

“Today, the BLS released the largest downward revision on record proving that President Trump was right: Biden’s economy was a disaster and the BLS is broken,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement. She continued, “This is exactly why we need new leadership to restore trust and confidence in the BLS’s data on behalf of the financial markets, businesses, policymakers, and families that rely on this data to make major decisions.” She’s exactly right. This revelation comes just over a month after President Donald Trump fired Bureau of Labor Statistics Commissioner Erika McEntarfer, a Biden appointee.

“I was just informed that our Country’s ‘Jobs Numbers’ are being produced by a Biden Appointee, Dr. Erika McEntarfer, the Commissioner of Labor Statistics, who faked the Jobs Numbers before the Election to try and boost Kamala’s chances of Victory,” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social last month. “We need accurate Jobs Numbers. I have directed my Team to fire this Biden Political Appointee, IMMEDIATELY. She will be replaced with someone much more competent and qualified.” Many on the left claimed that action was in response to a weaker than expected jobs report, but this revelation should prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the BLS under McEntarfer had clearly become politicized, with grossly inflated jobs numbers designed to boost Biden before the 2024 election.

But the scandal goes much deeper than that. Think about how many Americans made financial choices, how many businesses planned investments, and how many policymakers made decisions based on jobs data that now turns out to have been flat-out wrong. And it’s not just one bad revision. The BLS admitted they had overstated Biden’s “job creation” by about 1.5 million. That’s no small mistake. In fact, that’s not a mistake at all. That’s actively misleading the public, and that’s why firing McEntarfer was the right move, and why Trump’s nominee to replace her, E.J. Antoni, must be confirmed. The numbers prove that Biden’s presidency was a failure even on its own terms. He flooded the labor market with illegal immigrants, pumped out trillions in reckless spending, and handed out subsidies like candy.

Even then, he couldn’t match the jobs growth from Trump’s first term. That is nothing short of humiliating. For years, the media parroted Biden’s talking point that he “created more jobs than any president in history.” Now we know the truth: those jobs were fake, inflated, or outright imaginary. Biden built his presidency on a lie, and now the lie has collapsed. The so-called “historic job growth” was never real—it was a mirage propped up by partisan bureaucrats and repeated endlessly by a complicit media desperate to protect him. Meanwhile, Trump’s warnings about Biden’s phony numbers turned out to be exactly right, just as they were about inflation, gas prices, and the border. The revision is a complete repudiation of Biden’s entire economic narrative.

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Shale. oil and gas. And gold.

Maduro Suggests Reason Behind Us Military Buildup Around Venezuela (RT)

Washington is seeking to gain access to Venezuela’s natural resources, the Latin American nation’s President Nicolas Maduro has told RT in response to the arrival of US warships off the country’s coast in recent weeks. He dismissed Washington’s claims that it had mounted the effort to combat drug traffickers as a ruse. Last month, the US deployed at least eight Navy vessels and an attack submarine to the region, with an estimated 4,000 troops involved in the operation. Appearing on RT Spanish’s ‘Talking with Correa’ show on Tuesday, Maduro claimed that the US operation “is not about drug trafficking… they need oil [and] gas.”

He told the host, former Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa, that “Venezuela has the world’s largest oil reserves… the fourth-largest gas reserves.” He also noted that his country potentially boasts the “world’s largest gold reserves.” He lamented that Washington’s “aggression” against Caracas has surpassed anything seen in the region since the 1962 Cuban missile crisis. According to Maduro, these actions toward Venezuela fit into a broader “war plan,” which is supposedly aimed at subjugating the entire world to the will of the US. “But it is impossible… We already have a multipolar world with new power centers,” such as China, Russia and India, the official argued.

Maduro dismissed US allegations that Venezuela is a major drug-producing and trafficking hub. He insisted that Venezuela has eliminated all major drug-trafficking operations on its soil, and vanquished prominent gangs, including the Tren de Aragua. Relations between the two nations have been tense for years. Washington refused to recognize Maduro’s reelection in 2018, instead backing the Venezuelan opposition and imposing sweeping sanctions on the country. Last week, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova warned that the “situation is… being unacceptably escalated” around Venezuela, with potentially far-reaching ramifications for regional and global security.

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No, Frank and countless others. Trump never called the victims’ testimonnies a hoax, of course he didn’t, he’s neither stupid nor insensitive. He called the way in which the Dems presented the story a hoax.

Melania, Please Talk to Donald About Epstein (Frank Miele)

Last Wednesday, an extraordinary press conference was held in the shadow of the U.S. Capitol by victims of sexual abuser Jeffrey Epstein. Anyone who watched these women pour out their hearts to demand justice for themselves and other victims could not help but be moved. Unfortunately, President Donald Trump did not watch, and then – almost simultaneously – dismissed the women’s heartfelt pleas for a public reckoning of Epstein’s abuse as “a Democrat hoax.” No doubt, Trump is a rhetorical genius who has been able to define issues to his own benefit for years, but this was a low point in his presidency. Much as it is understandable that Trump perceives the attention being given to Epstein’s life and mysterious death in a federal prison as a distraction, that must be weighed against the human toll that Epstein took.

Calling it a hoax belittles the pain and suffering of women who were victims of, at worst, rape and, at best, sexual abuse. And though Trump judged the women before he had even had a chance to hear them speak, they had already rejected his label: “This is not a hoax. It’s not going to go away,” said Marina Lacerda, who was a witness in Epstein’s 2019 indictment that led to his imprisonment and death. Abuse survivor Haley Robson, who introduced herself as a registered Republican, invited the president to meet her “in person so you can understand this is not a hoax. We are real human beings. This is real trauma.” After the president made his dismissive remarks, Republican Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene called Trump to ask him to meet with the women at the Oval Office, but he did not accept – as of yet.

“It’s not a hoax,” Greene explained, “because Jeffrey Epstein is a convicted pedophile. That takes away the whole hoax thing. It’s not a hoax. It’s not a lie.” Greene challenged Trump to get past the political suspicions he has expressed. “I want him to be the hero and champion of this issue. And I want him to fight for these women, because I know him to be a fighter.” Indeed, President Trump has repeatedly shown a capacity for empathy in his capacity as a private individual and as president, most notably when he promised justice for the Angel Moms who had lost children as a result of the actions of illegal aliens. But in this case, Trump has conflated how his political enemies may seize upon the Epstein case as a weapon with the entirely unrelated issue of justice for the victims.

Speaking out about a “Democratic hoax” before he had ever seen the victims’ statements, or heard their perfectly reasonable demands, could prove to be one of the worst mistakes in Trump’s career, political or otherwise. It is not enough to know the names of Epstein and his procurer Ghislaine Maxwell; common decency demands that the names of all those who abetted them in abusing women be revealed. If there were powerful men in finance or politics who exploited these women, their names should be known too. And what about the officials who looked the other way? I don’t believe Trump has any culpability for his friendship with Epstein years ago. At the press conference, the women survivors said none of them knew of any evidence against Trump. But the president’s political opponents will surely seize upon his unwillingness to ensure justice for the Epstein victims, and plant seeds of doubt that could harm him and the nation – just exactly what Trump says he wants to avoid.

In order to avoid that fate, there is perhaps one person – and one person only – who could convince the president not to view the matter through a partisan lens. That, of course, is first lady Melania Trump. Melania’s willingness to lobby for generosity of spirit was recently apparent in the letter she wrote to Russian president Vladimir Putin when he and her husband met in Alaska to discuss the Ukraine war. Although Putin has been intransigent on the possibility of a ceasefire in the war he started, Melania urged him to think about the millions of children impacted by the bloodshed and to “nurture the next generation’s hope.” A simple yet profound concept, Mr. Putin, as I am sure you agree, is that each generation’s descendants begin their lives with a purity – an innocence which stands above geography, government, and ideology. … In protecting the innocence of these children, you will do more than serve Russia alone – you serve humanity itself. Such a bold idea transcends all human division, and you, Mr. Putin, are fit to implement this vision with a stroke of the pen today. It is time.

Just as Melania called upon Putin to protect the innocence of the children of war, so too she could – and should – call on her husband to honor the lost innocence of Epstein’s victims.

She probably doesn’t need to write a letter to Trump, but since they share a residence at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, it would make perfect sense for her to call him aside one night and sit him down for “the discussion.” The short version would go something like this: “Donald, you have enemies. We both know it. But sometimes your worst enemy is yourself. We both know that too. So I’m going to give you some advice. When women are young and pretty, rich and powerful men take advantage of them. That’s not a Democrat hoax. It’s a fact of life. Please watch these women, or better yet, meet with them. Find out what they want, and then help them get it. They don’t deserve shame because of what happened to them. They deserve our thanks for coming forward. They aren’t trying to hurt you; they are trying to help themselves and other women to make sure that powerful men are held accountable. It is time.”

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